Perpetua 21: A Roar Across Cenn 04
Transcriber: robotchangeling
Recap        1
Conflict [0:04:30]        3
Initiative [0:07:08]        6
Round One [0:09:10]        8
Round Two [0:29:33]        25
Round Three [0:43:22]        39
Round Four [1:17:25]        72
Round Five [1:30:07]        86
Escape [1:47:58]        105
Aftermath [1:54:04]        110
Recap
Austin (as Athen): You will find that there is a certain rhythm to conversations with the Living Metal. You will each be asked a question. Answer honestly and respond with one of your own. This process will continue until you circle the moon and return to the temple. You understand?
Sylvia (as Caoimhe): Yeah, man.
[“Perpetua” by Jack de Quidt begins playing]
Austin (as Castine): Antistrophe. What happened to your power?
Keith (as Antistrophe): Why— Do you know why I don't have magic or whatever?
Austin (as Castine): Brontë Adelvys. Why do people have kings?
Janine (as Brontë): What’s the deal with the earthquakes?
Austin (as Castine): Caoimhe Wake. What is the nature of loyalty?
Sylvia (as Caoimhe): Do you know of any way to combat the rot, the Sourcerot? Dismissed by who?
Austin (as Castine): What brought you to the Hexcloaks?
Janine (as Brontë): What’s the best restaurant in town?
Austin (as Castine): What draws you towards flirtation and entanglement?
Keith (as Antistrophe): What do you know about the force that’s gathering strength and causing the earthquakes, and what can you tell us about that?
Austin (as Castine): If you had your power returned to you, would you return to your old life of study with it, continue on this path, or find a new one?
Keith (as Antistrophe): Uh…uh…uh…is everything dying? It’s true, right? We're not crazy?
Austin (as Castine): What lies beneath Grande Sonnerie, a place I cannot see?
Janine (as Brontë): If I could fire an arrow in any direction, what direction would be the direction most likely to solve all of this stuff here?
[song plays out]
Austin: So y'all head— you, like, rush through the city?
Sylvia: Yeah. Yeah, absolutely.
Keith: Yeah.
Austin: Towards the west, towards where the dragon is? Okay. As you're running that way, you run past Kley and Delani, who are heading east, back towards the Temple of the Summit. You know, I think Kley locks eyes with you, Caoimhe. You know, is pushing Delani’s wheelchair.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: Does not stop to say anything. Simply moves past you. And, you know, people are yelling and screaming. Like, “Everybody head towards the temple! Everybody get on the moon!” You know, “Get as close to the center as you can!” 
Keith: Yeah.
Austin: You know, there are not sirens running, but there are big iron bells being hit, you know? Being rung as you head west. And these are bells that are normally very beautiful, but all of them ringing at once has a degree of cacophony still. And eventually, yeah, you make your way out past the Digsite West, out past the Pilgrims’ Quarter, past— you know, maybe the hotel you stayed in the first night has been destroyed by the debris that’s being flung.
Janine: Aw.
Austin: And you see it. It is gigantic. It is the size of a full dragon, you know? It is…I don't know, many stories high.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Keith: Mm.
Austin: It has scaly— it almost has an armadillolike quality, because it has dragon style scales but is not as— but is longer than an armadillo. It is still a mole, in shape, you know? It has, you know, sharp teeth. It has the kind of tight molelike eyes. You know what a mole looks like.
Keith: Yeah.
Austin: And it has big sharp claws that it’s using to dig up the earth and wreck the Ironclad Parade, the kind of statuary around the whole city.
Conflict [0:04:30]
[“Terram Fodio (Elom Combat Begins)” by Jack de Quidt plays]
Austin: It sounds like your goal, because we're getting into Conflict here, it sounds like your goal is to distract this thing long enough that the whole shield can come down around the city.
Sylvia: Yes. Right? We're all in agreement on that?
Austin: Sounds good.
Janine: Mm-hmm.
Sylvia: Yeah. Cool.
Keith: Mm-hmm.
Austin: All right. Then I think that that is a five round. You have to last five rounds to do that.
Keith: Damn.
Austin: Its goal is to, you know, knock you all out and then get into the city.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: I think that that’s pretty simple.
Keith: Yeah.
Austin: All right.
Janine: We have to roll for Initiative and stuff, but I want to say that, right out the gate, I want to do the high speed thing that has me, at the start of a Conflict, spend points to do a Hinder.
Austin: Awesome. Is that before Initiative, or is that right after Initiative? I don't remember. 
Janine: It just says, “At the start of a Conflict.”
Sylvia: [quietly] Oh shit.
Austin: Can you read me the whole thing?
Janine: “At the start of a Conflict, you may spend 10 Mind Points.”
Austin: Yep.
Janine: “If you do, choose one option, and apply it before the start of the first round. Perform a free attack with a weapon you have equipped or perform a Hinder or Objective action. You also gain a bonus equal to SL to all Checks you perform as part of the chosen option.”
Austin: Okay. I think— I don't remember how we've said this before. I think that that happens now, because, depending on what you do, it might affect the Initiative roll, you know?
Janine: Right.
Austin: I'm double checking to make sure. Structure of a Conflict. Yep, we've done that. We've determined which characters take part in the Conflict. Everybody else is treated as an extra and mostly fades into the background. You know, I think there are some guards, some town guards out here, shooting arrows ineffectively, you know?
Sylvia: Notably no Hexcloaks.
Austin: Um, is that true? Yeah. That is true. Notably no Hexcloaks.
Keith: Wow.
Sylvia: Listen. I know what they're doing, and it’s bad.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Sylvia: Fuck those guys.
Austin: Mm-hmm. Assess the goals. Player Characters perform a Group Initiative. Yeah, I guess the question here is: do we think a Conflict starts at Initiative or after Initiative?
Keith: After.
Austin: I guess it says before the start of the first round, so actually, let’s call that after Initiative, because the actual timing is before the start of the first round, which is after Initiative. Okay. Had to reread it more closely. 
Initiative [0:07:08]
Austin: All right. Let’s do Initiative, then. As a reminder, Initiative is a Group Check. Whoever has the highest Initiative score leads a group roll, basically.
Keith: Mm-hmm.
Austin: Or I guess whoever has the highest…I guess it’s whoever you want, technically. I've assumed it’s whoever has the highest Initiative, because that’s the person who’s going to roll the best, but everybody else rolls to support, which is a DC 10. Er, not DC, but a Difficulty 10 Initiative roll. And if you succeed, whoever’s doing the actual Initiative gets a bonus. So, who’s doing the Initiative roll? Who is just helping?
Keith: My Initiative is -3.
Sylvia: So, not you.
Austin: So you should be helping, probably.
Janine: Oh my god.
Sylvia: Mine’s +0.
Janine: Yeah, same.
Austin: Okay.
Janine: ‘Cause it’s, like, stat-based, I think.
Sylvia: It’s DEX and Insight, isn't it? Yeah. 
Austin: Yeah, it is.
Janine: Yeah. So we're equal there.
Austin: I think that that’s right. DEX plus Insight. All right, so which one of you is rolling real Initiative, and which one of you is doing the support?
Janine: I'll do real.
Sylvia: Okay. Sounds good.
Austin: Okay. So then Caoimhe and—
Janine: I feel like Brontë’s a little bit springing into action here, so, fair.
Austin: Yeah, that makes sense. So then, Caoimhe and Antistrophe, give me your rolls to see if you give Brontë a +1.
Keith: You got it.
Sylvia: I got a 9, so that’s a no, right?
Austin: Unfortunately, that’s a no.
Keith: I got 4.
Janine: Woof.
Austin: Neither of you are giving a bonus to Brontë. [Keith sighs] Brontë, give me your roll.
Janine: [cautiously] All right.
Austin: I can just tell you that— actually, just go ahead and give me the roll, because you'll find out. 
Janine: 13.
Austin: 13 wins. 13 wins.
Janine: Yay!
Austin: Its Initiative was 9.
Janine: Get fucked.
Austin: All right, so, you have this move that lets you go before— one of you gets to go again. So, first Brontë, and then your whole side can go.
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: Also, everyone should take a Fabula Point, because this is a Minor Villain.
Janine: Whoa!
Sylvia: Ooh, yay. I'm up to 2.
Keith: Sweet. Let’s see. Where…
Sylvia: I'm glad I noticed the “plus 1 Fabula Point if you have none at the start of the session” thing, before we got into this. [Janine chuckles]
Austin: Oh, yeah, important. Yeah.
Sylvia: ‘Cause my rolling has not been good. 
Austin: [sympathetic sound of agreement]
Round One [0:09:10]
Janine: Okay. I have a math question.
Austin: Love it. Got the calculator right here.
Janine: So, high speed lets me either— I spend 10 Mind Points, and then I can either [Austin: Mm-hmm.] perform a Free Attack— oh, wait, no. A Free Attack, we determined that before is just, like, an attack, right?
Austin: It’s just an attack. That’s right.
Janine: Okay.
Austin: A Free Attack is, like, a type of thing that’s bolded in the book.
Janine: Yes.
Austin: It means a particular thing that is just, like, do an attack.
Janine: But then I could choose to do— but then I would be spending more points for a similar roll, if I chose to then take that and then inflict shaken instead of damage, which is the thing I did before. I think I don't have to do that, actually. [cross] I think I can just perform a Hinder.
Austin: [cross] Right, 'cause you can just do a Hinder, right?
Janine: Yeah. Yes.
Austin: Right. And a Hinder is one of the Conflict Actions, which you should have on the handout, and it says, “You perform a Check (DL + 10) against an opponent. If you succeed, you inflict dazed, shaken, slow, or weak.” So you want to do that?
Janine: Yes. I just, I was like, is it easier to hit with either one, or is it the same roll?
Austin: It depends on what you're doing. The book says, “You force an opponent into a disadvantageous position. This may represent a variety of actions—a feint, a diversion, or even a stinging remark. Once you've described your approach, you perform a Check against your target with a fixed difficulty level of 10. The GM will determine the relevant attributes based on your description.” So it depends on what you're doing to get this effect, basically. Their example is someone challenges a death knight to a duel, circling him and attempting to put the light of the sun behind her, hoping to dazzle him, and that’s a DEX + Insight Check, for instance.
Janine: Okay. Um…
Austin: So you can kind of do whatever you want, and we'll work out what the thing is. And if you have something in mind, we can try to figure out a way to do it with that. You know what I mean? Towards that stat spread.
Janine: Yeah. I think the thing I would like to do is, like, kind of…I mean, we want to get some distance from the targeted area before attracting attention, right?
Austin: Right. 
Janine: But, like, attract attention to— like, you know, attracting attention while we're standing in the middle of the shit that she wants to fuck up is not really going to do much.
Austin: [chuckles] Yes.
Janine: Versus getting a little bit of distance and then being like, “Yo, over here.”
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Janine: So I think that’s maybe the angle here. I think that the thing that Brontë would be trying to do here is, like, kind of very battlefieldy tactics of, like, stay low, you know, scurry, move as fast as you can to get to a slightly better position, then do your bullshit.
Austin: And, in this case, your bullshit is, like, shooting with a bunch of arrows to get its attention, or something else?
Janine: I think, in this case…
Austin: And also, which debuff are you looking to put on it with Hinder?
Janine: I am looking to put shaken on.
Austin: Shaken. Okay.
Janine: Yeah, which I think would maybe mean, like, firing an arrow but in a way that is like shooting a chunk of shit out of the sky or something, in a way where it’s like, “Hey, I'm a contender here.” Like, I can, you know.
Austin: Mm, mm-hmm. Yeah. That makes sense.
Janine: In a way that’s, like, a little bit flashy.
Austin: Yeah. Well, then, that does sound like DEX + Insight to me.
Janine: Mm-hmm.
Austin: DEX to line up the shot and move and all that, and Insight to, like, plot out the right place to be and, you know, line it up right and all of that stuff.
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: Make sure that you're drawing it to the right place, you know?
Janine: Anticipate.
Austin: Is that—? Yeah, sure. Yeah, that works.
Janine: That’s what it says.
Austin: Boom. Hit it.
Janine: All right.
Austin: DL 10.
Janine: Oh, I also— wait, I also— hang on. Uh, where’s the fucking…? I gain a bonus equal to SL to all Checks you perform as part of the chosen option.
Austin: Okay, so yeah, so +1.
Janine: Okay.
Austin: And make sure you spend the MP, obviously.
Janine: Yeah. 11.
Austin: Boom. That is an 11. That does it. I will give it shaken. It is shaken. Yeah. It, like, flings something towards you, some big boulder, and you snipe it out of the sky, as you described. And it’s, you know, shaken here is a Willpower dip for it, so its Willpower drops. And importantly it has the shaken effect, so. It roars. You know, huge roar from its draconic mole mouth. A sort of blast of fire, of this sort of bright dragon fire. I believe we described it as being a blue-like flame, but maybe I'm misremembering that. But yeah, roars into the sky. And now we are actually back around to you, because it’s your turns.
Janine: I would also love to take the first move here, if no one minds.
Sylvia: Yeah, if you've got something.
Keith: Yeah, that’s fine by me.
Janine: Yeah. I would like to do a dance. [quiet laughter] 
Austin: Oh. I love it.
Sylvia: Brontë shot something out of the sky and then started emoting. [Janine and Keith laugh]
Janine: I think dance, in this context, is like getting its attention but then sort of the opposite of what he was doing to get to where he was. 
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Janine: Like, you know, being low and scurrying. I think it is now sort of like a flashy, like…I don't want to say parkour, but I'm thinking of, like, sort of Robin Hood, Dread Pirate Roberts type. Like, Cary Elwes, like…
Sylvia: You're swashbuckling.
Janine: Yeah, swashbuckling, like hopping up on some, like, if there's like a ruined wall or something, you sort of skip up the bricks of the ruined wall. It’s like a very flashy, confident…what’s the physical equivalent of, like, lyrical? You know, like…
Austin: Mm…
Sylvia: Fluid? I don't know. That’s the only thing I could think of there.
Janine: Yeah.
Keith: Buoyant?
Janine: Something dancelike. I don't know, but it’s…
Sylvia: Graceful?
Janine: Graceful, yeah. Balletic maybe is what I'm looking for?
Austin: Balletic. Because I think, yeah, lyrical, to me calls— it’s not chanting, right? It is, there are words, [Janine: Mm-hmm.] but the words are being, you know, aligned melodically, and so balletic makes sense.
Janine: He’s doing this by putting his weight on his toes kind of thing. Like, he’s being lightfooted. It’s that sort of kind of abstraction of dance.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Janine: Anyway, I want to do that and use Nightmare Dance. If that creature’s already shaken, they suffer weak.
Austin: There we go.
Sylvia: Yoo.
Austin: And that’s just you spend some points, right? Or you just do it.
Janine: I spend 10 points, and it happens.
Austin: And there's no roll. It just happens.
Janine: Nope. It is instantaneous.
Austin: All right. And it suffers weak. That’s a good one. All right.
Keith: Which one does weak do?
Sylvia: Lowers strength?
Austin: Weak lowers your strength, your Might, yeah.
Keith: Wow. Okay, that’s great.
Austin: Yes.
Janine: Oh, also, that’s not even my move.
Austin: Oh, 'cause— wait, why?
Janine: Dances are just a thing you do.
Austin: They don't take a round?
Janine: No.
Austin: Wild.
Janine: Yeah.
Keith: That is wild.
Austin: On your turn…
Janine: “Each time you take this Skill, you learn a dance. On your turn, during a Conflict Scene, if you have no martial armor equipped,” which I do not. I have a martial weapon, but no martial armor.
Austin: I see. I see.
Janine: “You may spend 10 Mind Points to perform a dance you have learned. This doesn't require an action, but it can only be done before or after an action and only once per turn. If you've already performed a different dance during your previous turn in this scene, the cost of the new dance is reduced to 5 Mind Points!”
Austin: There we go.
Janine: Yeah. So. [laughs quietly] 
Austin: Damn good.
Janine: Do that. And then, let me see. What do I want to…? Okay. Okay. Okay. I think I want to shoot my bow. I'm going to shoot my bow at it.
Austin: Yeah. Yeah.
Janine: My new bow, the Heartbreaker.
Austin: Your Siegebreaker. Sorry, your Heartbreaker. Right.
Janine: “Siegebreaker.” Who cares about sieges? Get out of here. Yeah, I'm going to use my Siegebreaker.
Austin: All right.
Keith: It seems like Brontë cares about sieges but as long as they're not called that. [Austin chuckles]
Janine: Ehh. Yeah.
Austin: I mean, you are, in a way, breaking this siege right now. That is literally the thing you're doing.
Janine: Meh. [chuckles] 
Austin: Okay, yeah. [Janine laughs] No, I'm not— I'm just saying, funny.
Janine: Yeah. Yeah.
Austin: You know?
Janine: Yeah. Yeah.
Austin: All right, give me your attack roll. That is a 10, and it would do 19 damage, and I think it now actually hits because of the…I believe because of weak. Does weak do that, or is it the other one? Maybe I'm just wrong. Anyway, it does it. It does 19 damage.
Janine: So…
Austin: Now what? Now give me your bonus.
Janine: So, what I would like to do with that, instead of taking the damage…
Austin: Ah. Yes.
Janine: Okay. I would like to…okay. I would like to take 20 Mind Points from the mole, [Austin: Oh.] using Warning Shot, where one of my options is each target hit by the attack loses SL times 10 Mind Points, and I upgraded that to an SL 2 with my last level.
Austin: Look at that. Describe your maneuver. What is it that makes this a warning shot that does this?
Janine: Does this mole have a weird nose?
Austin: Yeah. Absolutely.
Janine: Okay. I want to say, like, I shoot the arrow so close to its nose that its, like, whisker gets clipped.
Austin: Oh, damn. Giant whisker falls off its face.
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: Damn.
Janine (as Brontë): Make a wish. 
Austin: Damn, do you say that? That’s fucking hardcore.
Janine: Yes.
Sylvia: Yeah, that’s very good.
Austin: Damn. Okay, yes. And then I will subtract the 20 MP. Boom, done. All right. [Janine chuckles] I will also say: this fire does— the fire that the mole dragon— sorry, the Rotten Draco-Mole, as it said in my sheet, [Janine: Ugh.] does in fact glow blue, and also it is heavy. I've described it in the past as heavy. It’s heavy fire.
Janine: Mm.
Austin: And did, in fact, say in the first time that dragon fire showed up that it is the fire that fire is based on. It is like the blueprint of fire, in the same way that this is the blueprint for all moles. And speaking of the blueprint for all moles and the Rotten Draco-Mole, it gets to go. And I'm going to do something we haven't done in a minute, which is I'm going to roll to see who it hits or who it goes after. I'm going to roll 1d3, and I'm going to do it in alphabetical order, A, B, and C. Antistrophe, Brontë, and Caoimhe, in that order.
Sylvia: Yep.
Keith: Okay.
Austin: That is Antistrophe. It’s going to try to attack you here. I think, seeing your big bright armor, your, you know, shining shields.
Keith: My Runic Armor.
Austin: Your Runic Armor. It instantly tries to…it’s going to try to get you out of its way so it can charge in at Brontë, I think is what’s going to happen here.
Keith: Mm. I'm issuing a correction. I have Runic Shields. I have Bronze Armor.
Austin: Thank you.
Keith: Still shiny.
Austin: Thank you. Yes. Yeah, anybody who wants to say what they have equipped right now, if it’s something different than normal. Now would be a great time to do that, because we're supposed to do that right away.
Sylvia: Nah, my equipment’s all the same.
Austin: Okay. And so it’s just going to try to drop a heavy claw on you.
Keith: All right.
Austin: It’s going to miss with a 6. 
Keith: Good fucking luck.
Austin: Let me tell you, a 2 and a 3 ain't going to hit. All right, so it misses. Back to y'all.
Keith: I go last, right?
Austin: You go in the order you want to go.
Keith: I guess we go in whatever order.
Sylvia: We get to choose, yeah, so.
Austin: You get to choose.
Sylvia: Do you have something?
Keith: I don't have something, in that what I do is bash with my shields. [Austin chuckles]
Sylvia: Yeah.
Keith: And that’s my only move. But I am here, and that is fast.
Sylvia: If you want to go for it, go for it. To just put it out there, my move is probably giving us some sort of resistance on my turns.
Keith: Okay.
Sylvia: I don't know.
Keith: I'm going to attack with my Runic Shields. You know, I've got this claw that missed. I'm going to try to stub its toe.
Austin: [chuckles] Huge toe. You just try to slam the shields into it.
Keith: I'm going to stub this fucking toe.
Austin: All right, give it to me.
Keith: I just need to double check exactly what I do when I attack, because I've been forgetting about this. I always forget Defensive Mastery, which reduces damage suffered by skill level.
Austin: Uh huh.
Keith: But then also I deal extra damage because of Shieldbearer, also based on Defensive Mastery. So I continually forget both of those.
Austin: It’s Might plus Might and then HR + 5 damage, right?
Keith: Yes.
Austin: Plus another 1 because of…
Keith: But there's not a mod to this roll, which I wanted to double check.
Austin: That’s right. Yeah, it’s just raw Might + Might. Yep.
Keith: 16.
Austin: All right. Well, that— we'll count that, but what’s your high roll there? 9.
Keith: Oh, sorry. Yeah, 9.
Austin: Yeah, try to use the button, because it should just do it.
Keith: This was the button. Oh, no, I didn't. 
Austin: No, you did Might + Might, I think.
Keith: I hit the Effort Check.
Austin: Yeah, yeah.
Keith: And not the…
Austin: Next time. All right, so then, 9 plus 6 is 15.
Keith: Yeah.
Austin: However, this thing has physical resistance, so it drops to only 7, 'cause you round down.
Keith: Did we add the 1 from…?
Austin: Oh, it’s plus 6, it’s not plus 5. It’s plus 6, right?
Keith: Sorry, it is— so, the damage is high roll plus 6.
Austin: Yeah, so 9 plus 6 is 15.
Keith: Okay, right, got it.
Austin: Yeah. So then, yeah, half of that is 7 and a half, but it rounds down.
Keith: This already is including the weapons things, including the +1.
Austin: That’s what I thought, yeah.
Keith: Yeah.
Austin: Totally. All right. So then, yeah, you stub its toe, and it feels a little bit like if someone stubbed your toe in the middle of a fight. It would hurt, but it does not seem to mind that so much.
Keith: Okay. Bummer.
Austin: But in response, and here’s something that you learn immediately: this is a Champion. Champions get multiple actions per round, and so it gets its second action and, like, heaves out a blast of draconic fire, and I think, from here probably let’s do another roll. Let’s do an ABC roll again, a 123. It’s just right down at you, Antistrophe. 
Keith: That’s fine.
Austin: You know, you've stubbed it in the toe, [Keith: Yeah.] and it goes  broaroearoeah! down at you.
Sylvia: That’s a curse word in draconic mole.
Austin: You know, I actually think that this— I have been thinking that there is a draconic language. 
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: We've seen draconic runes.
Keith: Yeah.
Austin: So yeah, this thing has a name in draconic tongue that, you know, you don't know what it is.
Keith: Right.
Austin: How are you supposed to know what it is? You know?
Keith: So this is going to target my Magic Defense?
Austin: That is correct, yes.
Keith: All right, which is 12.
Austin: I'm pretty sure. I'm just double checking it. Yeah…yeah.
Keith: ‘Cause not all magic fire does magic damage.
Austin: That’s exactly right. That’s exactly right. Yeah. So I'm trying to— I'm looking at the book to see if it says, and it actually doesn't. It just says, “The target suffers blah blah blah blah blah,” but it is an attack roll.
Keith: Okay.
Austin: Oh, but you know what? I know how to double check this. I'm pretty sure this is right, but I'm just going to check spells. It’s an offensive spell. [typing] Oh, wait, Magic Defense. I typed Magic Damage. I think spells, I'm 90% sure, target Magic Defense unless otherwise stated. And like, creatures will sometimes have, for instance, a breath ability that is not a spell, you know?
Keith: Right.
Austin: And it’d just be, like, a thing, but this counts as an offensive spell, and yes, when you cast an offensive spell, you perform the appropriate Magic Check and the target’s Magic Defense score determines the difficulty level, so yes. Yours is 12. Is that right?
Keith: Yep.
Austin: That is a 15.
Sylvia: Whoa! That’s a good roll.
Austin: So you take, uh…what’s it say here? I don't know why I didn't— I think I did not put that in enough. Here it is. Breath: HR plus 10 fire damage, so take 20 fire damage, please.
Keith: 20 fire damage. This is, like, the most damage I've taken this game.
Austin: You're fighting a damn dragon. And now I think it’s Sylvi’s turn.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Keith: Hey, does anybody have Magic Defense higher than 12?
Sylvia: Mine’s 9.
Keith: Shit.
Sylvia: I am going to use this opportunity to cast Elemental Shroud on the three of us.
Austin: Smart.
Sylvia: “You weave magical energy and protect the targets from the fury of the elements.” That element I am choosing is fire.
Austin: I love that.
Sylvia: So I'm just going to— oh, I thought that would give me a thing to put in how many, the times target there. That’s going to cost me 15 MP.
Austin: Costs you 15 MP.
Sylvia: Oh, I did plus— hold on. I added 15 MP. Hold up. [Austin chuckles] Let me just subtract 30 MP! There we go. Yeah, I think that this is, like, an immediate reaction to seeing what happens to Antistrophe.
Austin: Yeah. The fire just, like, slams down, and Antistrophe, you know, you have your shields to protect you from them, but boy is it hot.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Keith: Hard to hold a hot shield.
Sylvia: I think the way the fire shroud works is it does just sort of make it so you kind of— it feels like you've got oven mitts covering you, a little bit. [Austin chuckles in surprise] 
Janine: Mm.
Sylvia: Like, everywhere. [Austin laughs] ‘Cause it doesn't get rid of the problem of fire, but it does [Austin: Right.] make it feel like you've got, like, an insulation protecting you.
Austin: Right, it gives you resistance, which gives you half damage to it, right? So. 
Sylvia: Yes.
Austin: Yeah, I like the idea that, like, that gets formed— is it like, what’s it visually look like, Caoimhe?
Sylvia: I've been thinking, because I'm thinking of this in the sort of PS1/Dreamcast era of RPGs, [Austin: Yeah.] I have really been thinking about just, like, “how is that represented?” and it typically is just sort of like a red shimmer over your character.
Austin: Yeah. Totally.
Sylvia: And, like, the color changes depending on the element, right?
Austin: Right. If you had done—
Sylvia: Definitely borrowing on the Skies of Arcadia your weapon changing colors depending on what element you set it to be.
Austin: Totally. Yeah, perfect. And so then, yeah, that happens. And I think, Antistrophe, you can feel that it gets less hot in that moment, though the attack ends, you know? You're like, “Phew, okay.” All right. It gets to go for its third time, 'cause Caoimhe, that was your action, right?
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: And I'm going to roll one more time for this opening round. And this time, it’s going after you, Caoimhe!
Sylvia: Fair enough.
Austin: Having placed that fire shroud up, it decides that you are a threat and slams one of its hands down into the ground, one of its claws down into the ground, and a set of pillars, of stone pillars, like, emerge around you. It is trying to hit you with them and also cage you in. This targets— we were just talking about magic style attacks that are actually just physical attacks.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: This targets your Physical Defense. What is your Physical Defense?
Sylvia: Okay. My Physical Defense is 11.
Austin: That hits! 
Sylvia: Whoa!
Austin: That is a 17. That is a 10 and a 6 plus 1.
Sylvia: That’s 15 damage.
Austin: 15 earth damage. If hit, the target is trapped inside of a jail of stone and earth. Complete a four step Objective Clock to break free. Locked you the fuck down, Caoimhe.
Sylvia: Wow!
Austin: I'm going to put a clock on the screen. 
Sylvia: And so how many turns do we have to survive this?
Austin: Five. That was the end of one.
Sylvia: [sarcastic] Cool. [Janine chuckles]
Austin: There's part of a clock, and then let’s do, boop, across, and then down…all right. So that is your, I'm going to say, [typing] turn one over. All right. We are back to the top of turn over.
Round Two [0:29:33]
Janine: I've got a move.
Sylvia: Yeah, go for it. I'm in jail, so. [Janine laughs]
Austin: Yeah.
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: As a reminder, you can do— just to talk about what that is and how to deal with it, you can use the Objective move [Sylvia: Mm-hmm.] to attempt to break out of that. And on a— it’s an open-ended thing, and for each level of success, I believe it goes up, how many ticks you get. Or at least that’s how we've been running it. That might actually not be exactly right, but eh, I'm pretty sure that’s how we've been running it, the Objective action. So you probably won't get it in a— you probably cannot get it in a single roll, but you probably could get it in a number of, like, a couple of rolls.
Sylvia: Okay.
Austin: What is your action?
Janine: Okay. A two-parter.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Janine: I got another dance I'm going to do. This is Hydra Dance, where after you suffer— until the start of your next turn, after you suffer damage, choose one option: either you recover 5 Hit Points or you recover 5 Mind Points.
Austin: Interesting. What’s a Hydra Dance look like?
Janine: I think, in this context, it is a little bit of being very aware that Caoimhe is now in some sort of rock jail and that Antistrophe just got blasted, like super blasted. And it is, I think, maybe a sort of back handspring. Like, a single hand. One hand holding the bow, like a back handspring on the other hand, sort of behind a little bit of cover. It is a sort of, like, “I need to stay on my toes” sort of…
Austin: Yeah.
Janine: You know, keeping light, keeping limber.
Austin: Love it.
Janine: In this context. Yeah. And the other thing I'm going to do is just shoot with my bow!
Austin: Regular-ass shot. Love it.
Janine: I have to spend my 5 points.
Austin: Oh, to do the…yeah.
Janine: Yeah. Okay. Eh…
Austin: 5 ain't going to do it.
Janine: No.
Austin: You do have Fabula Points, I'll remind.
Janine: I would like to spend a Fabula Point, yes.
Austin: All right. Do you want to reroll— which Trait are you using? Identity, Theme, or Origin, and which part of it?
Janine: Uh, let me fucking see them.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Janine: I think this is Origin. The last time we recorded, I, like, threw a little line out that no one acknowledged. [chuckles] 
Austin: Uh huh?
Janine: About how moles can be used for warfare.
Austin: I remember it! Here we are.
Sylvia: How did I forget that? [Janine laughs]
Keith: Yeah, I also don't remember that.
Janine: I said it, and then we moved on immediately.
Sylvia: Wow.
Austin: You have to imagine how I felt when you said it, Janine, where I went, “Fuck. Yeah, that’s so true.”
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: “I’ve got the stat sheet.” [Sylvia laughs]
Janine: I'm picturing that there is a chapter in Grande Sonnerie’s history that is like the War of the Roses, except it involved a lot of moles, and like, rival families—
Austin: The War of the Moleses. Uh huh.
Janine: Yeah, you're using moles to fuck with each other and their, like, soil and shit. So I imagine there is a degree of, like, Brontë grew up hearing the stories about the mole war. [laughs] 
Austin: Right.
Sylvia: This is like the great emu war that happened in Australia.
Austin: In Australia, yeah, of course. A famous war, yeah.
Janine: That was a clue in a crossword the other day.
Austin: Uh huh?
Sylvia: Huh.
Janine: Yeah. So I think I'm going to reroll both, because it was a 3 and a 2. That was not a…
Austin: Yeah. Those were not great rolls. Yeah.
Janine: Uh-uh. Uh-uh. Should I just hit the button again, or…?
Austin: Yeah, just hit the button again.
Janine: Yeah, okay.
Austin: And then drop your Fabula Points, if you haven't.
Janine: Oh, right, yeah. Where's the button for spending? Oh, right. Declare and spend.
Austin: Yeah. [Sylvia laughs]
Janine: Okay.
Austin: [chuckles] Mm-hmm.
Janine: I typed, “Rerolling to remember mole war lessons.” What the fuck? That’s the exact— wait.
Austin: That’s the same roll.
Janine: That’s the same roll.
Keith: That’s the same roll. Wow.
Austin: Well, the damage would be the same if the other one, you know? Actually, what you did is you flipped it. Last time, you rolled a 3 and a 2. This time, you rolled a 2 and a 3.
Janine: That’s fucked up.
Austin: It is pretty fucked up. It is pretty fucked up.
Janine: That sucks.
Austin: Yeah.
Keith: Look, sometimes you can't remember your mole lessons.
Janine: Mm…
Austin: No, that’s not what it is. In fact, I know how to respond to this exactly right, which is this is not some petty Grande Sonnerian mole. This isn't the greatest mole to ever live in your timeline.
Janine: This is no mere war mole.
Austin: That’s right. [laughs] This is a Draco-Mole. This is the first mole. [Sylvia laughs quietly] There was no moles before this mole. Your little strategies for dealing with the war moles of your youth have no bearing here. And it roars again, and it’s going to spend one of its Ultima Points.
Janine: Mm…
Austin: Because it has Ultima Points, and it’s using the ability Recovery. A Villain may use an action—which it’s doing—and spend 1 Ultima Point to recover from all status effects and also recover 50 Mind Points.
Janine: Ugh.
Austin: So it is back to maximum Mind Points, and it is no longer shaken, nor is it weak.
Janine: Bummer.
Austin: Uh huh. But hey, it’s still your turn now, because that was its turn. Not your turn, Brontë, but your side’s turn.
Janine: No, yeah, yeah.
Austin: Yeah. Caoimhe, Antistrophe? I also confirmed, Caoimhe, we set the base difficulty. I think the base difficulty here is 7 for one check mark on the clock.
Sylvia: Okay.
Austin: And then for each 3 points you get above that. So a 7 is one, 10 is two, 13 is three. On a crit, you can get up to five in a single roll, but that’s how it works. You only need four, so.
Sylvia: I'm down to go last, if, Antistrophe, you've got something, because mine is probably just doing that roll. And I don't know if you have something you want to get ready before the next mole strike.
Keith: Genuinely, Antistrophe doesn't do anything. I only hit with shields.
Sylvia: Fair enough, man. I just thought I'd offer.
Austin: You can— I just want to remind.
Sylvia: You've got items.
Austin: Yeah, you have items, and everyone should review the Conflict Actions sheet.
Keith: It’s— no, no, no.
Austin: Okay.
Keith: Yes, of course I have items. It’s not time to do that yet.
Austin: Okay.
Keith: I guess, you know, I could technically wait one turn and then maybe someone would be damaged enough…
Sylvia: You could Hinder?
Austin: You could Hinder. You could Guard. You could do an Objective for something I haven't thought of yet, you know? You could Study.
Keith: It’s true.
Austin: There are other things you can do. I just want to make sure it’s not just that.
Keith: That’s totally true.
Austin: Yeah.
Keith: Well, I could Study and then, you know, doesn't that…? I don't know that we have, like, the tools to take advantage of knowing a weakness. Although it does resist physical.
Sylvia: There's more than just knowing a weakness.
Keith: You said it resists physical damage? Is that true?
Austin: Does resist physical damage.
Keith: That’s the only kind of damage I do.
Austin: I mean, it’s half damage, right? It’s not immune, and it doesn't absorb. It could be way worse.
Keith: What’s the basic attack that Riant has?
Austin: I don't believe Riant has an attack. Oh, maybe it does. Flicker Shot. It does.
Keith: Yeah.
Austin: It does have Flicker Shot. Yeah.
Keith: It can do an attack instead of me.
Austin: Instead of you. That's what it was. It does have a natural, yeah, that’s correct. It just can't do one instead of you, or it has to be instead of. It’s not…
Keith: Yeah. I don't get an extra attack.
Austin: It’s not along with you. Correct.
Keith: Yeah.
Austin: But yeah, that’s true.
Keith: What is the damage on that?
Austin: It is…it should be in your sheets. DEX plus Willpower. It’s HR plus 5. But it can hit two targets, which that isn't a thing here, but yeah.
Keith: I mean, I might do that. I don't have…
Austin: How’s Riant—
Keith: Would I roll using my stats, though?
Austin: No, you’d roll using its stats.
Keith: DEX plus Willpower. That’s not bad. That’s 8 plus 10.
Austin: It is.
Keith: You know, I'm going to do that. I'm going to attack using Riant.
Austin: Okay. Give me the roll.
Keith: All right.
Sylvia: Triple Lantern Death Attack.
Keith: This is my Triple Lantern Death Attack.
Austin: Tell me what the Triple Lantern Death Attack looks like. Weird there's only one lantern, but tell me what it looks like.
Sylvia: Moving so fast.
Keith: I sort of picture Riant as having the disposition of Kirby.
Austin: Oh, I love that.
Sylvia: I love that!
Austin: That’s really good.
Keith: And you know how in, like, the Nintendo 64 Kirby game, you can, like, spit out your power into your hands [Sylvia: Mm-hmm.] and then you can chuck it across the screen?
Austin: Mm, mm-hmm.
Keith: It’s like that. He spits out a fireball into his hands, and he chucks it across the screen.
Austin: And then, very shortly after, he, looking like scared Kirby, hides behind you, [Sylvia: Aww!] because the fire hits the Rotten Draco-Mole and does nothing. The Rotten Draco-Mole is immune to fire.
Keith: Hey. Study. I studied. [laughs] 
Austin: [chuckles] Yeah, well.
Sylvia: In a way.
Austin: In a way. It roars again at that, and I think is just going to turn its attention to you, at this point.
Keith: Okay.
Austin: You know, you've garnished its…
Keith: Wages.
Austin: Its wages. [quiet laughter] You've garnished its attention. Oh, actually, it’s going to turn to— I guess, you know what? It’s you and Brontë are both out of jail right now, and so it’s going to do one of its other attacks and try to hit both of you with a single swipe. It is, like, going down into the ground with its claws [Keith: Uh huh.] and lifting up not just, like, a bit of rock and rubble but, like, a whole plate of ground. Not literally a plate from the Earth’s, you know, plates, but like that style of long sheet of rock.
Keith: Right.
Austin: And is swiping it up at both of you. This is a multi two attack. What are your Physical Defenses?
Keith: Mine is 15.
Austin: Uh huh.
Janine: Mine is 11.
Austin: It rolls a 12. It’s going to hit Brontë for 11 physical damage. It does not hit Antistrophe. So take 12 physical.
Keith: I've got a plan with my level ups, but I need to get to, like, the Bodyguard moves really fast, I think.
Austin: Uh huh.
Janine: I did also do Hydra Dance, so I can take that down to 6 damage.
Austin: You can. You absolutely can do that. Totally. 
Janine: So I'm technically getting the 5 back.
Keith: Hydro or hydra?
Janine: Hydra.
Keith: Hydra. That’s really fun.
Janine: All the dances are named after, like, monsters.
Keith: Ohh.
Austin: That’s very fun to think of little Brontë learning all of the monster dances. Oh, Night Mare Dance!
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: Not like a nightmare you have, but a night mare like the evil horse.
Janine: Yeah. Also, I have to say this or it will eat a hole in my brain.
Austin: Yeah.
Janine: You said “garnished attention.”
Austin: Well. What did I mean?
Janine: Garnered.
Austin: Garnered attention. Thank you.
Janine: Garnered attention. [laughs quietly] 
Austin: Yeah, well. Sometimes you say the wrong word.
Janine: [laughs] I know, it just was in my head.
Austin: [laughs quietly] Yeah, I get you.
Janine: It was just stuck in there like a little piece of corn.
Austin: Yeah. Glad you got it out. Caoimhe.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: You gonna try to get out of jail?
Sylvia: Yeah, I gotta break out of jail. I'm going to see if I can roll doubles and get out of jail.
Austin: [laughs] We're playing some other sort of dice game here.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: What are you doing to try to get out of jail?
Sylvia: Um…
Austin: Out of stone jail.
Sylvia: [sighs] I think it’s less trying to really break through it and more just trying to, like…‘cause you described it as pillars of rock, right?
Austin: Yeah, yeah.
Sylvia: Trying to make a wide enough gap between the two of them.
Austin: That makes sense.
Sylvia: Like, find a weak point in the dirt or something like that, that’s easy to destabilize the pillars some way.
Austin: Yeah. Sounds good.
Sylvia: So what would I be rolling for this?
Austin: That sounds like Might and something. You can tell me what the other one is.
Sylvia: Insight?
Austin: Yeah, Insight. That makes sense.
Sylvia: Insight or DEX?
Austin: Yeah, either.
Sylvia: Okay, then it’s Might and DEX, if it’s either.
Austin: Okay. I think that makes sense. Yeah, 'cause it would be Insight would be you're looking for the weak point.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: Might and DEX would be like you're trying to strike your way through what you intuitively sense is a weak point.
Sylvia: Mm-hmm.
Austin: I think I'm fine with either.
Sylvia: Oh, fingers crossed.
Austin: You know, it’s having its effect right now. 
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: You are focused on trying to— I don't need to rules lawyer you here.
Sylvia: That’s one, right?
Austin: That’s one. You get one mark. That’s right. 
Sylvia: Cool.
Austin: You rolled a 7. Do you want to Fabula Point it?
Sylvia: Um, let me look at these numbers.
Austin: You got a 2 and a 5. A 2 on your 6 and a 5 on your 10.
Sylvia: And I need to get a 10 for this to be…?
Austin: You need to get a 10 for it to be two marks instead of one. You have to keep the roll. So you could—
Sylvia: I am not going to do— no, because I'd be rerolling the d6, if I'm rerolling here.
Austin: Right, I see. Right. 
Sylvia: And I just don't like my odds on that.
Austin: Okay.
Sylvia: I'd rather just, like, not risk my luck of rolling a 1.
Austin: I get you. Okay. I will mark it once. Boom.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: Okay. And then it gets to go one more time here, and it does the wonderful thing that I know everyone has been waiting for.
Sylvia: Oh no.
Austin: It disappears under the ground. 
Keith: It uses Dig.
Austin: It uses Dig. [Sylvia groans] Disappears into the ground, becoming untargetable with melee or ranged attacks until it emerges or until it is forced to emerge. And that is the end of its turn and the end of this turn. Back around to you. That’s the end of turn two.
Round Three [0:43:22]
Keith: While it’s gone, this is maybe potion time?
Sylvia: That is literally the way that I would interpret it, if I was playing this RPG.
Keith: Right.
Janine: Yeah.
Sylvia: Is, “It’s gone. We need to heal up before the big attack.”
Keith: Mm-hmm. Another thing, I guess, is that we could Anticipate this attack. I don't know— actually, no one’s done Anticipate yet, I don't think, which is DEX plus Insight, to like, maybe get away from where it’s going to emerge.
Sylvia: Yeah. That’s not a terrible idea.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Keith: Maybe the person who— I guess the two of you roll equally good in that and will…
Janine: I could do— I'm not, like, super super hurt, so I'd be fine doing that.
Keith: Okay.
Austin: Yeah, what do you— what is the effect you're looking to get from that?
Janine: That would be trying to figure out, like, is it digging somewhere so it can pop up and eat us or whatever, you know? 
Austin: Yeah. Yeah.
Janine: Like, where’s it going down there?
Keith: Yeah, we're worried about…
Sylvia: You're looking at the Bugs Bunny, like…
Austin: [chuckles] Yeah, burrow thing.
Sylvia: Bumps under the ground, yeah.
Austin: Yeah.
Keith: I'd be worried about not being able to avoid the attack because we don't know where it’s coming from.
Austin: I see.
Janine: Mm-hmm.
Keith: But if we could figure out where it’s coming from, we could potentially miss the attack. Or be missed by, I mean.
Austin: Be missed by it. To me, that sounds like either you're doing a Guard, which would, you know, gain resistance to an attack type or give you bonuses to Opposed Checks or whatever. Or I guess it could be an Other. We haven't really done any Other things, and I could imagine it being, like, if you succeed on this, you can't be targeted by the next attack, you know? Something like that.
Keith: That's just sort of what Anticipate felt like to me, as a frequently used Check.
Austin: Yeah. As a reminder, those terms aren't, like— those aren't, like, skills in the—
Keith: They're suggestions.
Austin: They're suggestions [Keith: Yeah.] in the Roll20, more than they are, like, you know, explicit things.
Janine: Mm-hmm.
Keith: Mm-hmm.
Austin: You know, in that way. But, you know, I guess that’s the thing, and in that way, what I mean is: you can tell me the mechanical benefit you're looking for, and we can see if we can give you that. And so it sounds like what you want is “I want to exclude myself from being targeted by anticipating where it might pop back up.”
Keith: Yeah.
Janine: Yeah, I mean, the specific text for Anticipate. Like, you know, I think I'm on Keith’s— I have the same perspective as Keith here, where it says, “Anticipating someone’s movements and catching them by surprise,” I think is more or less what the intention here is, right? Like, being able to anticipate where the mole is going to pop up and not be where it expects us to be.
Austin: Totally. Because there’s nothing in the book that says what Anticipate does…
Janine: Yeah. Yeah.
Austin: I'm asking for mechanical outcome that you want, instead of—
Keith: Mm-hmm.
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: ‘Cause I could just come up with something, right? But I want to make sure that you don't have something mechanical in mind [Keith: Yeah.] that I don't honor if you succeed.
Janine: Yeah.
Keith: No, no. That is the pure damage avoidance.
Austin: Okay. Perfect.
Keith: ‘Cause that is really the only thing that it says in the book about Anticipate, which is like, “use DEX plus INS to anticipate the thief’s movement and cut them off.”
Austin: That’s right. Yes.
Keith: That is the only…
Austin: Yeah, well, and that’s in a particular subset of, like, you could do a Conflict where you are chasing someone, and that’s one—
Keith: That’s true. Sample Goal Clocks.
Austin: Exactly, yeah. Exactly, so. So, yeah, I think that that works for me. So yeah, go ahead and give me an Anticipate to try to— or a DEX + Insight to try to get out of the line of fire, so to speak, from…
Keith: Is this something we should do as a group action?
Austin: Right now, I think only you and Brontë can do it, importantly.
Janine: Yeah, Caoimhe’s…
Keith: Oh. Yeah, true.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Sylvia (as Caoimhe): [muffled] I'd help if I could! [Keith laughs] [Austin laughs sadly]
Janine: Aww.
Keith: Oh, maybe we should try and get her out of there.
Austin: Not a bad idea.
Janine: That’s true.
Sylvia: Yeah. I am also…
Janine: Actually, is that a better use of…? That might be a better…
Keith: That might be a better use.
Sylvia: Whatever works for y'all. I'm also not going to be mad if you want to try…
Keith: [muffled] Whatever works for—! [Austin and Keith laugh]
Sylvia: [muffled] Sorry, let me do— yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm not going to be mad! [regular voice] I'm not actually doing it like that. I'm not going to be mad if you guys try to, like, diminish the amount of damage you're taking because this thing hits so hard, you know?
Janine: I will also say, like, in terms of things Brontë would do in this exact moment.
Austin: Yeah.
Janine: I think he would be more inclined to go try and help Caoimhe than to be like, “Okay, I'm going to spidey sense where this mole is underground.”
Keith: Yeah.
Sylvia: I need to enter my mind palace.
Janine: Yeah.
Keith: I can roll Might plus Might to break her out of there.
Austin: Yeah.
Sylvia: Thank you.
Austin: Might + Might. Looking for a 7 for one mark, 10 for two, 13 for three. That would do it. Hey, that’s an 11.
Keith: 11.
Austin: So two marks get added. Boop. Boop. 
Sylvia: Wow, you rolled a 1 and a 10. 
Austin: Incredible.
Keith: Oh, can I Fabula?
Austin: You absolutely can.
Janine: Mm.
Keith: Perfect.
Austin: Give me— what Trait are you using, and what’s this look like? What’s the extra effort from the Fabula Point look like?
Keith: This is, uh…so, you can use Identity or Theme or a Bond, right?
Austin: No, it’s Identity, Theme, or Origin for the reroll.
Keith: Origin. Okay, yeah.
Austin: Bond would be a flat plus bonus, which, do you have a…? You only have a level one with Caoimhe.
Keith: I have a level one, yeah.
Austin: I see. If that was a level two, you could just spend it for the +2, and that would get you to 13, which would be enough.
Keith: Right. Yeah. So, I'm going to— this is my Theme of doubt.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Keith: Low self esteem. This isn't my job. This is a new thing. I don't know if I can do this. I don't know if I can do anything.
Austin: You've just learned that this dragon resists physical damage.
Keith: Yeah, the only thing that I'm even kind of good at anymore, this dragon is better than me at.
Austin: Mm.
Keith: Which, you know, rationally, that should be fine. It’s a dragon thing.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Keith: But still, it doesn't help. And I'm going to spend— let’s see. Declare and spend. And I'm just going to reroll the 1, obviously. I'm not going to reroll that 10.
Austin: Yes, yes, yes.
Keith: And I'm just going to type that, or is there, like, an official…?
Austin: You can just reroll a 1d10 if you want. You know, /roll.
Keith: Oh my god.
Austin: That’s a 1.
Janine: Haha!
Sylvia: That’s insane.
Janine: I think Roll20’s broken today, and we should file a complaint. 
Austin: [laughs] Yeah, that’s not great.
Keith: No. No.
Austin: Well, you could… Didn't we look into this and determine that you could just spend again? Didn't we look that up last session?
Sylvia: Yes, 'cause I was rolling terrible.
Austin: Mm-hmm. So you could just double down. No one’s saying you can't.
Keith: Keep bashing. Declare and spend.
Austin: And, you know, the mole is getting closer and closer as this happens, you know? Like Jaws.
Keith: Yeah.
Sylvia: That’s its name in the draconic tongue.
Austin: [singing Jaws theme] Mole, mole. Mole, mole. Mole mole mole mole mole mole mole mole mole mole mole—
Keith: 10!
Austin: 10! That’s a crit!
Janine: Whoa!
Keith: That’s a crit!
Sylvia: That’s a crit. You shatter this thing.
Austin: Yeah.
Keith: Worth it for the Fabula Point.
Austin: What’s this look like?
Keith: I think I maybe even hit it a little bit too hard, and it like— [laughs quietly] The jail, like, explodes. Like, you know, you're trying to— I want to dig her out. I don't want to, like, bowl us both over.
Janine: But you get a thing, right?
Austin: Yeah. You get an Opportunity.
Keith: I do, yes.
Austin: They are in the sidebar.
Keith: That list of…where is that? I see the— oh, there we go. Oh, no, that’s creating and changing Bonds.
Austin: Advantage, Affliction. Yeah. Bonding, Faux Pas, Favor, Information, Lost Item, Progress, Plot Twist, Scan, Unmask.
Sylvia: I'm loving the image of me, like, trying to use, like, the tip of my sword or something to loosen one of these pillars.
Austin: [laughs] Yeah!
Sylvia: And then, all of a sudden, it explodes in my face.
Keith: It’s already weak and shaken. 
Austin: It is neither weak nor shaken anymore. It cleared those.
Janine: No, it fixed that, yeah.
Austin: It spent one of its Ultima Points to fix that.
Keith: Oh, right.
Austin: Yeah.
Keith: Favor is interesting, because…it’s tough. I don't know what’s going on with the Hexcloaks, but it would be very interesting to, like, earn the favor of someone that could come help who’s, like, currently not helping, conspicuously absent.
Austin: Mm.
Keith: There's also a god here. I could earn the favor of the god.
Austin: True.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Janine: Or you could earn the favor of the mole by being good at smashing.
Keith: That would be—
Austin: [chuckles] The mole sees a kindred spirit.
Sylvia: Hey, man.
Austin: “I too like to smash the earth.” [Janine chuckles]
Sylvia: Shields could be used as shovel. You want to…?
Austin: That’s true. Wow. From shields to shovels.
Keith: You know, uh…what’s the god’s name? Oh my god. 
Austin: Castine.
Keith: Castine. Castine did call the— is this the force that Castine said was more of a force than a—?
Austin: I think it’s unlikely that you're dueling the force that could kill all of the gods.
Keith: This is an avatar of the force.
Austin: Uh, this is the first mole. [Sylvia laughs quietly]
Keith: This is the first mole.
Austin: This is a draconic being.
Keith: Sorry, I mean like a thematically, like, connected to that force, not like actually controlled by.
Austin: You tell me.
Sylvia: I don't know if we have the information for that.
Austin: You don't. Castine did not tell you exactly.
Keith: Well, it said it was draconic power.
Austin: It did, yeah.
Keith: So I guess this could be just a different draconic power.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Keith: The dragon league out there causing trouble. Lost Item: an item is destroyed, lost, stolen, or left behind. Plot Twist: someone— I used Plot Twist last time, and it was highly effective.
Austin: Plot Twist is very powerful. It is. 
Keith: Unmask: you learn the goals—
Austin: And again, we could do whatever we want. Yeah.
Keith: Yeah. “You learn the motivations of a creature of your choice.” This thing may have no motivations. That’s sort of what I'm worried about. I'm worried about something that could be cool but it’s like, this is a dragon mole. It’s motivations are to destroy.
Austin: It’s…yeah. I think you could get something. I think you could potentially get something from this. It would not be…I’m not going to say outright, “My goal is to do blah!” but it will be a characterful way of getting at why it’s doing this or what is happening more broadly maybe.
Keith: Right.
Austin: But, you know.
Keith: What do you two think? I think I'm leaning towards Unmask.
Sylvia: I feel like that would at least give us some direction with our actions here. My other thing would be that, like… I, again, am really trying to stay in the mindset of, like, old RPG video game stuff.
Keith: Mm-hmm.
Sylvia: And sometimes in fights like this, there’ll be, like, another thing you can target that isn't the boss, and when you deal with it, it like…
Keith: Kley.
Janine: Mm.
Sylvia: Well, no.
Keith: Hmm?
Sylvia: Like, the Paper Mario example, there's a tree you can hit, and a big nut falls down and lands on the boss and basically takes out half his HP. Information might be able to give you, like, something like that we could do, maybe like…but honestly, Unmask I think would work.
Janine: Is our survival thing a clock?
Austin: It is not.
Janine: Oh, okay.
Austin: No. Because it is— I mean, I guess, ha, it theoretically is, but the thing that you would have to do is help Castine build the shield, because that’s what the clock literally is. The clock is Castine extending the metal of the moon [Keith: Mm-hmm.] across the entire city. Which, Antistrophe, [Keith: Yeah.] that’s the type of thing maybe old Antistrophe could have helped with at some point.
Keith: Yeah.
Austin: But not something you have done recently. Now, you've just critted. I'm happy to say that that’s a thing we could open the door for.
Sylvia: Ooh.
Keith: No, I don't want to do that.
Austin: Okay. But I wanted to, you know, I'm putting the ball in your court there, so to speak.
Keith: Yeah. Yeah.
Austin: You know, and I'll give it to you in a— yeah. I think that that’s— here’s what I'll say. You've made this crit. You could choose to do that now for free. For the rest of the fight, if you let me tick your Ruin Clock, one for one, you can get a round for free. You know what I mean?
Keith: Mm-hmm.
Austin: So like, if everyone’s about to die and it’s round four and you want to end this fight and win, just let me tick [Keith: Right.] the Ruin Clock once, and you win.
Keith: Sure. And it’s never been ticked. I have so many ticks left.
Austin: I know.
Keith: [sarcastic] Surely that’s fine, to tick it a few times. Who cares?
Austin: Yeah. You could just win right now, for what, three clicks? Come on.
Keith: For three clicks? Yeah, that’s nothing. That’s a third, barely. [Austin and Keith laugh] You know, I do like the idea of Information. I'm going to stick with Unmask, because I believe in us winning.
Austin: I love that. Always believe in us.
Sylvia: Thank you. Very shonen of you. [Austin chuckles]
Austin: As you are digging, you can feel the reverberation of the mole coming towards you under the ground, and because you're kind of now, like, your Runic Shields are connected with the soil, the runes are, like, picking up the thought waves of the mole, right? It’s like, its intent is spreading through the ground, and it’s as if your shields are, you know, unintentionally translating them and broadcasting them into your brain. And there is a degree here of a creature driven mad, driven into anger and violence, but there is not a…there are some clear phrases that emerge from this mole’s, you know, brain; from this mole’s, you know, will. And it’s like, “We will get them to notice! The cycle will stop!” You know, “My kin will live real lives.”
Keith: Mm.
Austin: These sorts of gestures at getting the attention of something to stop— again, it’s about stopping the Perpetuan Cycle. That seems to be what this wants. And at the heart of it is a sort of riotous energy, this sort of, like, I will kill gods if that’s what it takes to get the— to push this system off of its hinges, you know? To get it from—
Keith: Right.
Austin: To stop the train from moving, you know?
Keith: Right.
Austin: But it also does not— and I think, you know, as part of this, there's a “we” mentioned, “we will do this.” “I will do this” is also said, but there's clearly, you know, to confirm your previous feeling, like, oh, this is a being in league with something else, probably other dragons. You know, the dragons are going on strike.
Keith: Right. The dragon union.
Austin: Mm-hmm. The dragon union. Yeah, writing this down. The dragon union.
Sylvia: Oh, my dragons have unionized.
Austin: And you get its name. You get its name. Its name is Elom, E-L-O-M.
Sylvia: [chuckles] Okay.
Keith: Important M.
Sylvia: Hugely important M.
Austin: Oh yeah. Uh huh.
Janine: Yeah, we all had the same thought.
Austin: Gotcha, yeah. There's something way cheesier happening there than you thought, so.
Sylvia: No, it’s “mole” backwards, Austin.
Austin: It’s “mole” backwards, yeah. 
Keith: Yeah.
Austin: Okay, good. Yep.
Sylvia: I play Kingdom Hearts. 
Austin: Yeah, yeah, yeah. This is the shit.
Sylvia: I'm used to do rearranging names for this. Yeah.
Austin: Yeah.
Sylvia: I get you.
Janine: What was Elon’s Boring Company? What was the name of that thing? The Loop?
Austin: [sighs, quietly] Oh my god.
Keith: Boring Company, yeah.
Austin: It was the Boring Company, yeah.
Keith: Yeah.
Janine: Yeah, and the Loop was the thing he was trying to make, right?
Austin: The Hyperloop, yeah.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Janine: Hyperloop, yeah.
Austin: Uh huh.
Janine: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Austin: It’s deeply stupid.
Sylvia: You don't say?
Keith: Deeply stupid thing from a deeply stupid guy.
Austin: Yep.
Janine: Well, cool.
Austin: So that is your success. Caoimhe, you are able to break free, because that was a crit that absolutely fills the rest of that clock. I've deleted the clock from the screen.
Sylvia: Thank you.
Austin: And it gets to go, and it, like all great shark movies, as I was doing the Jaws theme before, it actually just kind of skirts past you, around you, and it is using a different ability than you may have thought it was going to do. It uses Rub Some Dirt On It! If used when digging, heal 20 HP. Otherwise, heal 10 HP. Costs 5 MP. So it heals up.
Keith: Oh, invincible mole.
Austin: Invincible mole. Healing mole.
Sylvia: Hey, listen. We don't gotta kill it. We just gotta stall it, you know?
Austin: Yeah.
Keith: Yeah.
Janine: Yeah, yeah. That’s important.
Austin: All right. Back to you. Wait, so, Caoimhe’s left? No, both Caoimhe and Brontë are left, right? This was the beginning of the turn.
Sylvia: I think so.
Keith: Yeah, this is a new round. Just I have gone.
Austin: Yep. Antistrophe went. Yep.
Sylvia: I'm just going to look at these Conflict Actions again.
Janine: It’s still underground, right? Or is it not?
Austin: It is still underground, yeah.
Janine: Okay, yeah.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Sylvia: Does that make it, like, untargetable?
Austin: Yeah. As above, it says untargetable by melee or ranged attacks. It does not say by magic.
Sylvia: Okay.
Austin: Or until it is, like, forced out from underground is the other thing it said.
Sylvia: See, unfortunately, I'm, like, out of MP, basically.
Austin: Do you have any IP?
Janine: Drink a thing.
Sylvia: No, yeah, I do have— I was going to. That costs an action though, doesn't it?
Austin: Yeah, it’s an Inventory Action.
Janine: Yeah, but like, what else are you going to do?
Sylvia: Yeah, so…I don't know. I was going to offer you to go first, if you had something to do.
Janine: Mm…
Sylvia: It’s fine if you don't.
Janine: Nothing leaps out, really.
Sylvia: All right. I'm going to pop an elixir, then.
Austin: Yeah.
Sylvia: That’s IP cost 3. I'll just click it.
Austin: There we go.
Sylvia: Recover 50 Mind Points. That’ll take me back up to max, and I've got 2 IP left.
Austin: Boom. All right. And at this point, it’s going to reemerge—and roll 1d3—and it’s going to go for you, Caoimhe. [Austin and Janine chuckle]
Sylvia: It hates my ass. It hates me.
Austin: It does hate you. And is going to do just its basic Heavy Claw attack. It does not in fact have a—at this point, anyway—a special emerging attack thing. It goes down there to heal up. And in this case, it emerges with Heavy Claw aiming at your regular Defense, which is 11. Rolls a 4, so it is going to miss you.
Sylvia: And I get to Counterattack.
Austin: Ooh.
Janine: Oh!
Austin: Read Counterattack.
Sylvia: “After an enemy hits or misses you with a melee—” This is a melee attack, right?
Austin: Yeah, yeah.
Sylvia: “If the result of their Accuracy Check was on an even number, you may perform a free attack against that enemy after their attack has been fully resolved. The attack must be a melee attack, and it must have that enemy as its only target. Treat your high roll as 0 when calculating damage dealt by this attack.”
Austin: I love that. That didn't happen before, because it rolled a 17 against you, right?
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: Yeah, okay.
Sylvia: And it didn't happen in Burzin, [weakly] ‘cause I forgot. [Janine laughs sadly]
Austin: Oh, you had this already in Burzin.
Sylvia: I think I took this as, like, one of my early levels, and then I kept—
Austin: Oh, buddy.
Sylvia: Well, 'cause I kept forgetting that it happens on a hit.
Austin: It happens on a hit or a miss. It happens on both, right?
Sylvia: Or a miss. It’s just it happens on an even number is…
Austin: I see. Yeah. 
Sylvia: Yeah. So I'm going to just roll my Flamberge, and this is…
Austin: This is your Counterattack. Yeah.
Sylvia: Yeah, but it’ll just do 10 damage.
Austin: That’s a hit.
Sylvia: It’s only 10 damage, not 18, 'cause my high roll is 0.
Austin: I see. Your high roll counts as a 0. I see.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: So it’s just the +10, and also this is [Sylvia: Yeah.] physical damage. You don't have a—
Sylvia: It is physical damage, so what, that’s 5?
Austin: Yeah. Wait, you haven't done—? 
Sylvia: I haven't done that yet.
Austin: You haven't done Elemental Weapon. 
Sylvia: No, I did Shroud. Yeah.
Austin: You did Shroud instead. Oof. Okay, so it does—
Sylvia: Yeah. I can still do that now.
Austin: Yeah. It does 5. You do 5 damage to it. What’s this look like? It misses you. You know, it kind of emerges with the claws first and then kind of, like…I’m really imagining some of the Tears of the Kingdom, the way the dragons emerge from big holes [Sylvia: Okay.] and kind of, like, lift up above you.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: And like, you know, kind of like “Whoa, it’s big.” So it kind of, claw first, emerges from the ground and leaps up and misses.
Sylvia: Can I hit you with what I was thinking of?
Austin: Please.
Sylvia: You know when Morpheus cuts that car with his sword?
Austin: Always, yeah. I'm always thinking about it.
Sylvia: It’s like what if the car was this thing’s claw, you know?
Austin: Yeah.
Sylvia: It’s like a swipe I take while it’s passing me, [Austin: Yeah.] using its momentum to sort of help drive my sword in a bit more.
Austin: Yeah. Perfect, yeah. And you don't do a lot to it, because it’s just so big.
Sylvia: No.
Austin: And I think it, like, your sword doesn't break, but it does eventually hit a scale that’s hard enough to, like, make it flip backwards, and you have to use all your strength to make sure it doesn't leave your hands, you know?
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: All right, back to y'all. So, I think, Brontë.
Sylvia: I probably flip backwards a little bit, honestly. [laughs quietly]
Austin: Yeah, very good. Yeah. 
Janine: I'm just going to do a good old fashioned…actually, no. [chuckles] I'm going to stay limber again. I'm going to do another— not a full handspring but like a, you know, just a little bit—
Austin: [laughs] This is what the fucking moves are for.
Janine: Just a little bit of Hydra Dance. Yeah, just a little.
Austin: Yeah. Just one neck of the Hydra Dance, you know?
Janine: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Austin: One head of it.
Janine: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Just to be safe.
Austin: Yeah.
Janine: You never know.
Austin: You never know.
Janine: And then I'm going to fire my bow.
Austin: Yeah. An important bow here, because it ignores resistances.
Janine: Yes. Yeah. Yeah.
Austin: So.
Janine: Despite being physical, yeah.
Austin: Yeah, exactly.
Janine: All right. Fingers crossed.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Janine: That’s not good.
Austin: That is a 5. It’s another 3 and a 2.
Janine: Okay. This is— that’s—
Austin: Don't look at me! [Sylvia laughs]
Janine: Is that the third time I've done that exact roll?
Austin: Well, no. you did a 2 and a 3 once, instead of a 3 and a 2. [laughs quietly] 
Janine: Okay, no, but I— 
Sylvia: This is how I felt last session.
Janine: Hey, but seriously. My last few rolls have— it’s the same result three times.
Austin: Well, again, the 15 is just always— on a 5, it’s just always going to be 15.
Janine: Oh, okay.
Austin: ‘Cause it’s just high roll plus the number.
Janine: Yeah.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: And so, in each of those rolls, the 3 is the— it’s not always going to be a 5.
Janine: I need to Fabula again.
Austin: Yes, you do.
Janine: I just, I can't stand this.
Austin: You gotta break this. Uh huh. 
Sylvia: I swear to god, if you roll a 2 and a 3.
Austin: I don't know what I'll— you know?
Sylvia: I might need to get up and leave for a minute.
Austin: I understand.
Keith: Yeah.
Janine: My justification for spending this Fabula Point, the thing that I am pulling on…
Austin: Yes, please.
Janine: Is the Theme of scintillation.
Austin: Mm.
Janine: Because rolling the same shit over and over again is sooo boring! [Austin laughs]
Austin: It is. [laughter] Janine’s written, “This is evil. Stop it.”
Janine: [sarcastic] Great.
Austin: Well, that’s a 7. That’s not going to hit, but it’s a 7.
Janine: That sucks. That’s so shit.
Austin: A 5 and a 2. Yeah. 
Janine: Ugh.
Austin: Sorry to say, it’s still not.
Janine: Whatever. I got my Hydra Dance in.
Austin: Yeah, you got your Hydra Dance in.
Janine: Not enough games that we have played [Austin: Mm-hmm?] have a contingency in for, like, you've rolled the same shit too much, and it sucks, and you're bummed about it.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Janine: Like, give me something. Throw me a fucking bone.
Austin: Yeah. Well, and I will say, again, and Perpetua’s a world that works on these rules, and in something that we would play— you know,  we've played lots of PbtA games. We've played lots of Forged in the Dark games. In both of those things, when you miss a roll, I immediately go, “Ooh, and here’s the thing that happens that shifts the ongoing narrative such that there's a different situation that you're responding to.” And I can do that to some degree here, but Conflict is really structured, you know? 
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: You did a turn. Your turn was “I'm doing the Attack action,” you know? That’s just…
Janine: For some reason, I thought, when you launched into that, that you were going to say that there’d be, like, an achievement or something. It’s the kind of game where, like, an achievement would pop up for sucking. [laughs] 
Austin: No, no. That would be very funny. That’s this game, actually, I feel like.
Janine: Yeah, yeah.
Austin: I feel like you should get a little badge.
Janine: That’s what I mean, is like a little… [Keith chuckles] It has to be like the fucking Xbox Live, like the fucking ba-doop.
Austin: Yeah, uh huh. The classic achievement noise, yeah. God.
Keith: And it pops up over the dialogue of what’s being said, so you don't know.
Austin: Yeah, get out of here. I'm trying to read, yeah. [Keith and Janine laugh]
Sylvia: Austin, if you ever gotta write another forum discussion description.
Austin: Oh, and I will. Yeah.
Sylvia: You can include some talk about, “I got the achievement for Brontë missing three times in a row. What the hell?” [Janine laughs]
Austin: [sighs] Well, and it would have to be proto-achievements, because this is way before that era.
Sylvia: Oh, yeah.
Austin: But like, a game could still theoretically have little micro quests that are things like that, you know?
Keith: Totally.
Austin: You get extra XP when you do da-da-da. Yeah.
Sylvia: The Tales games give you titles for your characters that you can put on.
Austin: That’s right. Yes. That’s exactly right. And yeah, oh, god.
Sylvia: I got the Bored Scion title for Brontë. [Austin and Janine laugh]
Austin: Yeah, Brontë Adelvys, Bored Scion is very good. Anyway, that is your turn. It gets its turn, and it is going to do another Plate Swipe, the sort of multi attack. I think, this time, at Caoimhe and Antistrophe. Defenses again?
Sylvia: 11 for me.
Keith: 15.
Austin: It fumbles.
Sylvia: Yo! It fumbled!
Austin: 1, 1, 1. 1 plus 1 plus 1. That is a fumble. Which means you all get an Opportunity. It tries to lift up, again, another big plate of the ground and flick it at you or, like, fling it at you, but it rolls two 1s. So either of you can decide, I guess, since it was a roll against both of you.
Sylvia: I have a question about the move it did earlier to get rid of its status effects.
Austin: Yes.
Sylvia: Was that a free action that it had, or…?
Austin: No, it took a turn to do that. It took a turn after.
Sylvia: We could—
Austin: Yeah.
Sylvia: We could put an affliction on it.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Sylvia: We could put weak back on it, [Austin: You could.] because it seems like Might is its main stat.
Austin: Yeah, it has a very high Might. At this point, I think you can tell just by the dice rolls, it has a 12. It’s rolling a d12 on Might.
Sylvia: Yeah. I don't know, Keith, I don't want to just unilaterally decide. Do you have any of these that are looking good for you?
Keith: So, it’s tough, because Might is obviously its main thing. I'm doing okay at stopping those attacks still, but neither of you can consistently do that.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Keith: The magic it’s rolling less, but all three of us are failing against its magic, right? None of us have an outstanding Magic Defense.
Austin: I think you're the only one who’s been hit by its magic yet, but yeah.
Keith: Oh, but my Magic Defense is 12, and everyone else’s is lower than that.
Austin: I think that’s probably true, yeah.
Keith: Yeah. 
Sylvia: You're the tank.
Keith: ‘Cause Sylvi, yours is 11, and then…
Sylvia: My Magic Defense is 9.
Keith: Oh, 9?
Sylvia: Yeah.
Keith: And then, Janine, what’s your Magic Defense?
Janine: I think the same as Sylvi’s, yeah.
Austin: It’s 9. Yeah.
Keith: Okay. 
Sylvia: Yeah. I need to get some better armor.
Keith: So we could bank on that it will keep rolling physical attacks, but I don't know that reducing it to 10 will help the two of you that much, but it might. I don't know. I'm kind of split here.
Sylvia: There's…we could also reveal, like, a vulnerability.
Keith: That’s true.
Sylvia: We could do Scan to do that.
Keith: Though we might not be able to take advantage of that.
Sylvia: Fair. I don't know, yeah.
Keith: I keep saying that, and maybe it’s just the wrong thing to be saying, and maybe we should.
Sylvia: I mean, I have access to at least four different damage types, I think five.
Austin: Yeah, what are your elemental types that you can do?
Sylvia: Let me maximize my character sheet again real quick. I can put air, bolt, earth, fire, or ice.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Sylvia: So, five.
Keith: That’s a good spread.
Austin: And then everybody can Elemental Shard, right?
Keith: It’s true.
Sylvia: I can use Elemental Shroud. Oh, you mean, Elemental Shard, the…
Austin: No, the item. Yeah.
Sylvia: Yeah, yeah, sorry. I misunderstood.
Austin: Yeah, no, fair. Fair.
Sylvia: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I forgot we had those.
Austin: And then, Brontë, you don't have any elemental stuff. You just have physical stuff, right? None of your dances do elemental. It’s all, like…
Janine: No, no. I don't do any of that stuff.
Sylvia: I can use Elemental Weapon on your weapon as well. It’s not just a thing that targets me. It just targets one weapon, so.
Austin: Oh, interesting. That’s cool to know.
Keith: Oh, that’s great.
Sylvia: Yeah. I need to remember that.
Keith: Theoretically it could go on my shields or the bow.
Sylvia: Yeah. Like, I can buff you guys way more than I have been, and I need to remember that.
Keith: Maybe we should do that, then.
Sylvia: Find a weakness?
Keith: Yeah.
Sylvia: Scan? Okay, yeah.
Austin: What’s it actually say? It says…
Sylvia: “You discover one vulnerability or one trait of a creature you can see,” I believe is the one we're thinking of.
Austin: Okay. Yeah.
Sylvia: I guess this could also fall under Information, if you think it’s more applicable.
Austin: I think that that makes perfect sense.
Sylvia: Cool.
Austin: I'm trying to decide which one of these to show you, based on— I'm trying to be as generous as I can be here. Again, every elemental type that you can do, as a whole party, besides the Elemental Shards, which you can use IP to get. Air, bolt, earth, fire, ice, right?
Sylvia: Yes. Are we out of luck?
Austin: You are out of luck on those.
Keith: Yeah.
Austin: I will tell you…
Sylvia: I felt it! I felt it after I said them the first time, Austin.
Austin: Yeah. I know.
Keith: This may be the wrong lesson to learn, but I've been resisting… [laughs quietly] 
Austin: I will say that you are using— you are not even using the Study action, because the Study action could potentially reveal all of them at once, right?
Sylvia: Yeah, this reveals one.
Austin: That’s why I was like… I'm surprised it only reveals one, you know? 
Sylvia: Yeah, me too.
Austin: Because I feel like a crit should give you more than that, but okay.
Sylvia: [hopefully] We could always house rule.
Austin: We could house rule it. We could house rule it into being a successful Study roll, you know? Like a Study 10? I think that that’s fine.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: I'm going to house rule to a Study 10. I feel like that’s just, like, not equivalent to anything else here, you know? Like, for instance, Affliction: a creature suffers dazed, shaken, slow, or weak. That takes an action to do. 
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: That would be you using a Hinder, and that would take an action on a successful roll, so I feel like Scan should also give you a successful roll worth, right? So I'm going to give you this. Here is the difficulty 10 version of a successful Study. It’s a Champion. It’s a monster. It has 240 HP. 6 DEX, 6 Insight, 12 Might, 8 Willpower. Resists physical, resists air, resists lightning or bolt.
Sylvia: Oh my god.
Austin: Vulnerable to dark, immune to earth, immune to fire, resists ice, vulnerable to light, and vulnerable to poison. Defense 9. Magic Defense 9. Frenzied, confused, furious. A massive draconic mole. It is a Champion. It is the highest level of a boss it can be.
Sylvia: Mm-hmm.
Austin: But it’s alone, which means, in the weird balance system of this game, it’s actually not, like, a hard fight technically. As you can tell, 'cause you're not dying right now or anything, you know?
Sylvia: No, we're doing okay.
Keith: Yeah.
Austin: Kind of equally matched. But the thing it is is hardy as shit.
Keith: Right.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Keith: That’s sort of what I felt like at the very beginning. I was like, it couldn't hit me, until the fire came out.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Keith: It couldn't hit me, and I could hit it but only barely doing any damage.
Austin: Yep. Yeah. And, you know, I think Antistrophe especially…but no, I’d say all of you. You all have different expertizes here, whether that’s understanding moles from Mole War history, being a Hexcloak or, being a magical scholar, or a scholar of magic, I guess now. Something is being— there is something more here, which is like, oh, this is maybe speaking a little bit to draconic strength, more than just this one mole.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: I think it is notable that it is weak to both light and dark and poison. So, yeah. But not to the natural elements, you know? It’s not weak to fire and ice and bolt and stuff. Which obviously light and dark in this world are natural elements, but you know, the sort of classic divide in some ways inside of an elemental chart.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: So, yeah. How do you learn this? What’s the way that you…? How does it fucking up its big Plate Swipe give you this information? Does it just give you a chance to, like, do something cool to study it? I know you have your magical device that you use sometimes.
Sylvia: Yeah, it could be the reagent.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Sylvia: Like, maybe when I'm dodging. Like, it falls out of my bag for a second or something, and the way it reacts gives us this information.
Austin: Yeah. Yeah, I like that. That makes sense. Cool. All right. Well, that is the end of turn three. Two more. And you can see the big dome is, like, closing pretty quickly. It could still burrow under, you know? 
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: But it couldn't walk straight in, at the height that the dome is at now. You are, of course, small, and could totally do that.
Sylvia: [laughs quietly] And we're doing a good job of keeping it in one area.
Austin: You are.
Sylvia: Yeah?
Austin: You have not failed at that. It has not tried—
Sylvia: Cool.
Austin: You have distracted it. I'm taking that as its, you know, that is a thing that could come up, but right now, you have kept its attention. You haven't, like, gone a turn without attacking it at all, [Sylvia: Cool.] for instance, which is a thing I've been waiting to see if it’s happened.
Janine: Hmm…
Round Four [1:17:25]
Sylvia: I got a move, if nobody else does, but I'm happy to go next if somebody else has something in mind.
Janine: If you got a thing, go for it.
Keith: Yeah.
Sylvia: All right. I am going to cast Flare, which damage dealt by this spell ignores resistances!
Austin: Look at that! What does Flare look like?
Sylvia: That includes immunity, right?
Austin: Yeah, that’s a…I believe so. Let me double check.
Sylvia: Yeah, double check that first.
Austin: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Sylvia: I can describe— do you want me to still describe it while we do, or…?
Austin: Yeah, 'cause it’s a new spell from you.
Sylvia: So, I learned this after Burzin, and I was thinking of it looking like the flames from Burzin, right?
Austin: Oh, that’s really fun.
Sylvia: Which were blue. Yeah. Like, I think because I had that book of Kalsi.
Austin: Yeah.
Sylvia: Like, reading that and studying over that with— oh, what was her name? The little rodent girl who inherited the…
Austin: Oh, M’Shalia’s, like…
Sylvia: M’Shalia‘s, like, niece.
Austin: Yeah. I forget the character’s name.
Sylvia: But I have this image of, like, while filling her in on this stuff…
Austin: Ryn. Ryn. R-Y-N.
Sylvia: While filling Ryn in on the stuff about Kalsi and her aunt and everything that, like, Caoimhe was able to sort of piece together how to tap into that type of fire magic.
Austin: Yeah. Unfortunately, ignoring resistances and ignoring immunities are different things.
Sylvia: Okay. Nevermind.
Austin: [typing] I'll double check that there's not a, like, “If you normally ignore resistances, you now ignore—” you know, immunity gets dropped to resistance.
Sylvia: Yeah. No worries.
Austin: But I don't see anything that says that.
Sylvia: I can do something else.
Austin: Okay.
Sylvia: I can try and Hinder it, and I was thinking of… I mean, like, weak is the mechanical one that makes the most sense to me.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Sylvia: But like, fictionally, within trying to distract this thing, I was going to go for something like dazed or something [Austin: Yeah.] by, like, blinding it temporarily.
Austin: Ooh, that’s fun.
Sylvia: Doing Solar Flare.
Austin: And could still let us visually let you use Flare. Yeah, exactly.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: Yeah. That’s fun.
Sylvia: Cool.
Austin: You know, you don't charge it with the magical energy needed for it to be a magical attack, so we're not burning your MP or whatever. You're just using the light from it. Yeah.
Sylvia: Just using it to create a flash of light.
Austin: I love it.
Sylvia: Will this also stay DEX + Insight? ‘Cause that’s what—
Austin: Yeah. Let’s do that.
Sylvia: That’s my Spellblade roll.
Austin: Yeah. Let’s do it.
Sylvia: Okay.
Austin: DEX + Insight. Difficulty on this. This is…?
Sylvia: I think DC 10 for Hinder, right?
Austin: For Hinder. Yep. I think that’s right.
Sylvia: Cool.
Austin: Yeah.
Sylvia: DL, sorry.
Austin: Yeah, please. DL 10.
Sylvia: I got a 12 on my Solar Flare.
Austin: That’s a 12. All right, so it is dazed.
Keith: Sick.
Austin: Bringing its…what is that? Is that Willpower? No, shaken is Willpower. Dazed is Insight.
Sylvia: Insight.
Austin: Yeah, boom, done.
Sylvia: Maybe not the best mechanically, but whatever. I'm trying to keep its attention on me.
Austin: I appreciate it. Yeah. And you have its attention, for sure. You have garnered its attention, this time. [chuckles]
Sylvia: Oh. [someone applauds]
Austin: And it’s going to try to immediately respond. Thank you. I appreciate it. Let’s hit you with…eh, we'll see if we hit you with it. I mean, here we go.
Sylvia: Hit me.
Austin: As Antistrophe was saying, let’s see how you stack up to the Dragon Breath. This is a real, “Oh, that’s fire for you? Here’s what fire is for me.” And that is a 16! 
Keith: Jesus christ.
Austin: That is going to hit you for 21 fire damage, and it’s going to burn—
Sylvia: Half of that!
Austin: What’s that?
Keith: Fire resistance.
Sylvia: We have resistance to fire.
Austin: That’s right! You have resistance. You have resistance: fire. 
Keith: That’s great.
Austin: There you go. [Janine chuckles]
Keith: We all do, right?
Austin: You all do.
Sylvia: That lasts until the end of this.
Austin: The end of this scene, right?
Sylvia: The end of the scene, yeah.
Austin: Love it. Perfect. Boom.
Sylvia: So that’s…I mean, I’m…
Austin: You're oven mitted up.
Sylvia: I'm in crisis still, 'cause that’s what—
Austin: Oof!
Sylvia: Do I round down to 10, or do I go to 11?
Keith: I think it’s round up from—
Austin: It’s round down. It’s always round down in this game.
Keith: Oh, it’s round down. Oh, okay.
Austin: I'm pretty sure. [typing]
Sylvia: So I take 10 damage?
Keith: I thought that it was always round up.
Austin: No. Always round down, I believe. Yes.
Sylvia: Okay. So I'm just below my Crisis point. I'm 18 when it’s 22 that puts me under that threshold.
Austin: All right.
Keith: God, your Crisis is 22?
Austin: Keith, you're like the only person in this game who has good HP. 
Sylvia: Buddy. [Keith laughs]
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: Like, on either side of the game. It’s very funny.
Janine: Mm-hmm.
Sylvia: I am a DPS character.
Austin: Yeah.
Keith: It’s true, but it just feels almost impossible.
Sylvia: I could have done over 30 damage if this thing wasn't immune to fire.
Austin: Yeah.
Sylvia: But unfortunately, here we are.
Keith: In the second turn of this thing, I took 20 damage. [laughs quietly] Almost your entire non-Crisis health pool.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Keith: Yeah.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Sylvia: I'm baby.
Austin: You're baby. It is your turn. You know, decide. Not literally, yeah.
Janine: Yeah.
Keith: Okay. I feel like I haven't gone in a while, but I could just be feeling that.
Sylvia: Then go.
Keith: I just wasn't sure if it was my turn or not. Or I mean, if it was…
Janine: If you— go. Do something.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Keith: Okay. I'm going to hit.
Austin: Hit.
Keith: I'm going to hit.
Austin: Hit.
Sylvia: I'm going to hit. I'm going to punch.
Keith: Here we go.
Austin: Hey, that’s a hit.
Keith: That’s a hit.
Sylvia: Nice.
Austin: That’s a 16. 
Sylvia: Whoa.
Austin: That does 16 damage, which is 8 because of its resistance. What’s this look like? Talk to me about hitting the damn mole. [quiet laughter] 
Keith: I am just going to use the fire breath as a distraction.
Austin: [quietly] Oh, yeah.
Keith: I am just going to run up, and I'm going to try to— I'm just going to, like, I think I've done this before, but instead of pushing or slamming, I'm going to, like, jab at it [Austin: Yeah.] with the tops of the shield.
Sylvia: Nice.
Austin: Yeah.
Keith: Where it’s kind of, not sharp, but pointy anyway.
Austin: Mm-hmm. It is going to turn its attention to you, as you kind of are jabbing at it, and try to put you in the Stone Cage like it did with Caoimhe earlier. I think kind of, like, swatting you away, trying to swat you back and then, you know, surrounding you with the same stone pillars. That’s a 21. That’s a 12 and an 8.
Sylvia: Whoa!
Austin: That’s the best possible roll on both of its die.
Keith: Wow.
Austin: It does 17 earth damage to you, and you are in the damn cage.
Keith: It hits.
Austin: How’s your HP doing now, Antistrophe?
Keith: Um…let’s see. I'm just above Crisis, I think? Or just below. I reduce this by 1, so I take 16 damage. Let’s see…
Austin: Is that from your Defense thing, your Guardian thing?
Keith: Yes. Yep, I'm just above Crisis. 38 out of 37.
Austin: There we go. And it is back over now to Brontë, I believe. [Janine sighs, chuckles] As we approach the end of turn four.
Janine: Yeah. I'm going to…mm…I’m going to Hydra Dance again. I'm still—
Austin: Yeah, I mean, yeah.
Janine: I'm still doing it. I'm still doing it.
Austin: You're kind of, like, almost in the posture of Hydra Dancing. You're like…
Janine: Yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Austin: Weaving some dancing moves in as you move around.
Janine: I'm thinking of it in, like, Final Fantasy XIV terms, of like a sustained state of Hydra Dance.
Austin: Yeah, literally. I love it.
Janine: That costs me 5 MP every turn.
Keith: I mean, you've got— yeah, you can do it for free every turn, and it’s a really good thing to do, so might as well, right?
Janine: Well, not fully for free. It costs me 5 Mind Points, but…
Keith: Sure, yes. I mean it doesn't take up your move.
Janine: It’s not a turn. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Austin: Yeah.
Keith: Yeah.
Janine: And then I am, once again, going to use the Heartbreaker, who’s earning its name in the worst way.
Austin: Oh, it is. Damn.
Sylvia: Wow!
Austin: I believe.
Janine: And I'm just going to hope.
Austin: Hey. That’s a hit. That’s 22 damage.
Janine: 13. 22.
Keith: Wow.
Austin: 13 beats its 9.
Sylvia: Nice.
Austin: Yep.
Janine: So here’s the thing about that. I'm also going to do Barrage, where I spend 10 Mind Points.
Austin: Ooh, tell me what Barrage does.
Janine: And when I perform a ranged attack, you may spend 10 Mind Points to choose one option: the attack gains multi (2), or you increase the attack’s multi property by 1 to a maximum of multi (3). I want to hit it twice. Can I do that?
Austin: I don't think so. I think multi is explicitly hits a second target.
Janine: Oh.
Austin: Unfortunately.
Janine: Okay. It just says multi.
Austin: I'm double checking. I'm double checking.
Janine: I thought I had a separate one that was, like, other.
Austin: Let me see. “When you perform an attack with multi, you may select as may different targets as the specific weapon allows.”
Janine: Ah.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: Multi (2) lets you target up to two different creatures.
Sylvia: I think there's a specific Weaponmaster thing that lets you target the same enemy multiple times with multi.
Janine: Ah, I see. Okay.
Austin: That makes sense.
Sylvia: But I think it’s like a specific skill you have to take.
Janine: Well, then I'm going to do something slightly different.
Austin: Uh huh?
Janine: I am instead going to do— wait, Caoimhe, does it have a status effect on it now? Did that succeed?
Austin: It does. 
Sylvia: Yeah, it has…is it dazed?
Austin: It’s dazed.
Janine: Okay. Then… [laughs quietly] Then I'm going to do Cheap Shot, which is free.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Janine: “If the attack only targeted the creature that you hit and they are suffering from one or more status effects, you may have it deal extra damage equal to SL plus the number of status effects on the creature.” It just adds an extra 2.
Austin: An extra 2. I'll take it. You know, you should take it. Fuck it.
Janine: You know, 2’s 2. A hit’s a hit.
Austin: 2’s 2. A hit’s a hit. All right, so that’s 24 damage. Blurring through its— I mean, you know, I think the first arrow completely, you know, cracks through one of the armor plates, the dragon scales. In fact, the—
Janine: It’s just the one arrow, remember.
Austin: Well, but you have a Cheap Shot, right? So I'm imagining the Cheap Shot is a follow up attack or something.
Janine: Oh, okay. Well.
Austin: No? I guess not. What do you imagine the Cheap Shot is? I guess I should ask you.
Janine: Well, it says, “When you hit a creature with an attack, if the attack only targeted that creature, [Austin: Yeah.] you may have it deal extra damage.” So have it deal, to me, is like, that’s the one that…yeah.
Austin: Yeah. That makes sense. So you think it’s— what makes it a cheap shot, in your mind? Is it where you hit it? Did you trick it in some way?
Janine: I think it’s a combination of factors. I think it’s, like, the fact that Brontë’s been whiffing [Austin: Mm-hmm.] and the fact that before Brontë was whiffing, Brontë was deliberately missing the mole.
Austin: I see.
Janine: Was, like, going for the whiskers and stuff.
Austin: Right. Yeah. [laughs quietly] 
Sylvia: I meant to do that.
Janine: So I think the cheapness here is this time he’s doing it for real. 
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Janine: And through a combination of deliberate and not deliberate factors, that maybe feels a little bit unfair. [laughs quietly] 
Austin: Yeah.
Janine: Just a little.
Austin: Yeah. That makes sense. Okay. Boom. Yeah, you break right through one of these scales, and they fall to the ground, and you've done damage to the dragon underneath it.
Sylvia: I love the idea of those being scripted misses in the game. Like…god. 
Austin: Uh huh. 
Sylvia: Good shit. Yeah.
Austin: All right. It gets it final turn, or yeah, turn this round, and I'm going to roll 1d3 again. [typing] Actually, I'm going to roll 1d2, because as far as it’s concerned, Antistrophe, you are in jail. And so it’s only looking at Brontë, which is number 1, and Caoimhe, which is number 2.
Keith: Sure.
Austin: And it is going for Caoimhe.
Sylvia: That’s me.
Austin: It is going for you. Ignoring the arrow now sticking out of it, it is going to come down with a classic Heavy Claw at you, Caoimhe. 
Sylvia: Oh my god!
Austin: And hit, with a 9? Is that right?
Sylvia: Oh, no, wait! No, I'm wrong.
Austin: What do you have?
Sylvia: My Magic Defense is 9. My Defense is 11.
Austin: There you go. You are safe.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: And it does not burn an Ultima Point to reroll. You know, it’s doing fine. It’s not worried about that. It’s not trying to burn through all of its lifetime’s Ultima Points on just trying to hit you once, you know? So, yeah. Swings down at you, but, you know, maybe with the pelting that’s coming in from Brontë, can't quite land the shot or the hit.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: And that is the end of round four.
Sylvia: One more.
Austin: One more. Can you do it? It seems like maybe.
Keith: It’s easy. Easy. 
Austin: Yeah.
Round Five [1:30:07]
Sylvia: I have a question, about…
Austin: Yes.
Sylvia: Would I be— I was looking at the rules for Ritual magic again, [Austin: Mm-hmm.] because I know you can do it in a battle.
Austin: Yeah. You totally can.
Sylvia: I was wondering if I could use that to help get Antistrophe out of rock jail.
Austin: You definitely could. Yeah.
Sylvia: Does that fall under Elementalism, to like, 'cause it has shape rock as one of the possibilities here.
Austin: Yeah, I think that’s totally possible to do. Yeah.
Sylvia: Cool.
Austin: Yeah. And that would be Insight and Willpower, and I think that’s probably Minor and Individual, so it would be 20 MP, right?
Sylvia: Sick.
Austin: I'm pretty sure. Let’s see.
Sylvia: And that’s DL 7.
Austin: Rituals during Conflicts use an Objective action to begin the Ritual. Perform steps. This is on page 121. Use the Objective action to begin the Ritual; perform steps one and two of the flowchart to determine its discipline, area, and potency.
Sylvia: Oh.
Austin: So it’s not an instant, is the thing.
Sylvia: Yeah, you're right. I forgot to read this extra page and was like, “Well, hold on. This is not going to help.”
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Sylvia: I'm just creating another four turn clock.
Austin: That’s right. Yeah. Yeah. 
Sylvia: Nevermind then.
Austin: I think it’s probably better to just go do something like this. You know, in the same way you were doing it before, directly, you know?
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: And we can kind of flavor it around magic, but not—
Sylvia: Mm-hmm.
Austin: It’s not ritual in the same way, you know?
Sylvia: Yeah. Okay. Yeah, I was going to just try and help get my buddy out.
Austin: Yeah. What a good deed, you know?
Sylvia: If I'm using magic for this, would this stay with my DEX + Insight, or…?
Austin: Yeah, let’s stay with DEX + Insight for this. That makes sense.
Sylvia: Okay, cool.
Austin: I should have put a clock up, actually, but let’s see where we're at with this.
Sylvia: That’s a 3, so yeah, you should put that clock up.
Austin: I'll put that clock up real quick, 'cause that 3 ain't doing shit.
Sylvia: I could reroll. I could reroll that.
Austin: Where are we at on Fabula Points, by the way? I know we've gotten at least—
Sylvia: I have 2 of them.
Austin: Yeah. Where are we in that way, and then also, how many have we spent? Because I feel like we're definitely earning y'all some extra XP here.
Sylvia: ‘Cause there was the Antistrophe reroll that became a crit.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Keith: Which was two rerolls.
Sylvia: And Janine, you've done two as well, right?
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: Yeah, “Mole War lessons” I see. “Reroll rock jail” I see. “Keep bashing,” that’s three. “This is evil, stop it,” that’s four. [Austin and Janine laugh quietly] I see four right now. Did you do one, Sylvi? 
Sylvia: I have not done one this session, no.
Austin: Okay. So we're at four right now. So.
Keith: Okay. At 6, we get 2 XP, right?
Austin: That’s right. Yeah, so if you spend 2 more…
Sylvia: Yeah, I'm going to reroll.
Keith: We can make that work.
Austin: Mm-hmm. That’s at least one. That’s a 9. You could spend another one and use a Trait to just get a +1 to it, right?
Sylvia: [cross] Reroll that 3?
Austin: Or not a Trait, a Bond.
Sylvia: Oh, yeah.
Austin: Do you have a Bond with Antistrophe?
Sylvia: I do have a Bond with Antistrophe.
Austin: What’s your Bond with Antistrophe?
Sylvia: My Bond with Antistrophe is admiration.
Austin: Aww. 
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: You could draw on your admiration for Antistrophe to try to help break these walls.
Sylvia: I think I will.
Austin: Okay.
Sylvia: He helped me out.
Austin: That’s true.
Keith: It’s true.
Sylvia: That’s my friend in there.
Austin: Yeah.
Sylvia: So I'm spending another one?
Austin: Spend another one. Boom. And that, I think, is 6 now, right?
Keith: Beautiful.
Sylvia: Yep.
Austin: There you go. And now I'm going to roll 1d2 again to see if the mole is going to go after Brontë or Caoimhe. [chuckles] It’s Caoimhe again!
Sylvia: This thing hates me!
Keith: Oh no.
Austin: Seeing you try to free Antistrophe.
Sylvia: It hates me! That’s fine.
Austin: Yeah. Okay.
Sylvia: Come for me.
Keith: This thing wants us in jail and to stay there.
Austin: That’s right.
Janine: I'm going to be honest: I think Brontë’s starting to get a little bit, um, offended.
Sylvia: Hurt? Yeah.
Austin: Yeah, fair.
Janine: Just, like, a little bit overlooked. Like, what’s wrong with me?
Austin: Yeah.
Janine: I'm a threat.
Keith: Spends the whole fight missing on purpose and then is like, “How come this thing doesn't see me as a threat?” [Janine and Austin laugh]
Austin: Yeah, okay. Misses you though, with a 6 here.
Sylvia: Yeah. That’s a spell though, so I don't get a counterattack.
Austin: Yeah. Oh, you do. It’s a 6. You're right.
Sylvia: On a spell, I don't. It’s only melee attacks.
Austin: Oh, on a spell you don't. Yeah, and this is breath. Yeah, okay, this is a spell. Unfortunate.
Sylvia: Does this just hit me, but, because of the Shroud, it just doesn't really affect me?
Austin: Yeah, I think it’s not— I think that it’s, like, you weren't in the full heat of the blast.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: It aimed a little too high, you know? Maybe it was. Maybe it was like, “I don't know. Do I want to hit Caoimhe, or do I want to hit Brontë?” And like, finally decided on you, but like, so late in the decision making that it didn't, you know, didn't line up the shot right. Went high, you know? All right. Back to y'all.
Keith: Also, it’s used up a lot of gas. Maybe it’s run out of gas. We can hope.
Janine: Oh, yeah.
Austin: Yeah, you can hope.
Keith: I can hope this thing’s running out of gas.
Austin: I mean, you can see how much MP it has, 'cause y'all did that Study.
Keith: Oh, yeah. I don't remember how much it had.
Austin: It has a max of 100 MP, so.
Janine: Yeah.
Keith: Okay, so that’s pretty high.
Austin: Yeah.
Keith: Not way higher than me.
Austin: Yeah.
Keith: Not that I can use it.
Austin: Yet.
Sylvia: Whoa.
Austin: So, back to y'all. Back to Brontë or Antistrophe.
Keith: Hmm. Brontë, do you have, like, a fun special thing that you can do?
Janine: I mean, I kind of…I’ve done most of my tricks. I was thinking maybe, for my last thing, it might be good to make it weak again, just to be safe.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Keith: Yeah. I was thinking I could attack it or I could try to heal Caoimhe, who’s looking pretty weak. No offense.
Austin: You are in jail.
Sylvia: You're in jail.
Keith: Oh. 
Janine: Yeah, no.
Keith: Oh, I thought that I got the three. Oh, that was just to get two, right?
Austin: That was just to get two, yeah.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Keith: Right, okay.
Austin: You need two more.
Keith: Oh, it’s four this time, not three?
Austin: It was four last time too.
Keith: Or it was always four.
Austin: It was always four.
Keith: It was just that there was only three left when I…
Austin: That’s right. Yeah.
Keith: Okay. Well, then I can try to break myself out.
Austin: You can.
Keith: All right. Yeah, I'm going to do that. Should I just do Effort, like I did before, the Might plus Might?
Austin: Yeah. That makes sense to me.
Keith: Or should I use an attack?
Austin: Use Effort. Boom.
Keith: 13.
Austin: 13. It would be another three things, but boom, you've done it. What’s it look like as you shatter this stone cage? 
Keith: This is like, you know, there's just enough room in there to get some momentum going, where just the weight of the shit I've got on. My getup is heavy.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Keith: Antistrophe’s not, like, a huge guy or anything.
Austin: Yeah.
Keith: He has big armor and big heavy shields, but that’s enough to be chipping away at the inside, and then, you know, once there's some cracks, it just breaks. It just can happen that you can get out.
Austin: Yeah. All right. As you do that and break free—I know that the turn isn't over yet, but I'm doing some narration here—there is the sound of bells from town. You might remember I said they were cacophonous before. Well, now they are all ringing at the same time, as if a signal to say: Hey. Hey. It’s about time to close the gate, the big, you know, outer moon wall, the outer dome.
Keith: Mm-hmm.
Austin: And in fact, you see that the dome was not only growing from the top down, because it also begins to emerge from the ground up, knowing that the mole could try to dig to get into the city also. And there is, like, a sliver. Not at the equator of this dome, but, you know, a little high up, there's a hole or a line around, and a stairwell, a long metal stairwell that kind of reaches around the western part of this dome around the town for y'all to try to, like, climb into, right?
Keith: It’s like The Truman Show.
Austin: You've been called— I don't think it’s a single staircase. I'm saying it’s like a wide staircase.
Keith: Oh, gotcha.
Austin: It’s not like a, yeah. It’s not like one row.
Keith: It’s not like a secret horizonal staircase at the edge of vision.
Austin: Yeah, it’s not that. It is like temple stairs, wide, you know what I mean?
Keith: Got it, yeah.
Austin: Across the entire, with like— and you can imagine the dome is almost made from the top and the bottom, and so there's almost like an equatorial line across it that is up, you know, a story or two, that you could climb up to and get into, you know? And I say all of that because they want to close the damn thing. They're going to do it after you get in, but the Draco-Mole is going to try to put Brontë in jail. And with a 7, it’s not going to succeed.
Keith: Wow! [Janine chuckles] For once.
Austin: For once. It turns to you. It hears the bells. It starts to understand. You know, I think, in its mind, it had time still, because it could just go through the earth into the city. It thought, “Okay, I'll get going that way once the dome is down, you know, to the horizon line, to the land, because I'll still be able to dig underneath.” But now it sees that it can't actually do that and so is trying to stop you as a way to, like, force them to keep the gate open, so to speak. But with a 7, again, your Defense is 9. Your Physical Defense is 9, right?
Janine: No. My Physical Defense is 11.
Austin: Oh, is 11.
Janine: Yeah. Either way.
Austin: So you're, like, completely solid here.
Janine: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Austin: It only rolled a 3 and a 3, and I don't think—
Janine: I've changed my theory. I think the mole has a crush on me.
Austin: Oh, scintillation.
Sylvia: Oh.
Janine: Mm-hmm.
Austin: [chuckles] I see. And it misses here.
Keith: All that dancing you're doing, who could blame them?
Austin: That’s right.
Janine: Yeah, yeah.
Austin: And it is back to y'all for the final thing here, before we hit the end of turn five. Which I think is Brontë. I guess it will have one more turn, actually, because it goes after you, but yeah. But your final, you know, action.
Keith: Is it going to be part of it that we have to actually get there, or are we going to just finish this last thing and then book it?
Austin: I think you are— mm. I'd like to see you roll to get there safely. 
Keith: Sure.
Austin: I don't think it’s about getting there or not. Well, we'll see what a fumble does, you know?
Keith: Yeah, right.
Austin: Yeah, 'cause the goal was to kind of keep it distracted so the town would be safe.
Keith: Yeah.
Austin: Whether or not you get in is a second question.
Keith: Right. Yeah, the question was more like, is Brontë taking one more turn against the mole, or are we changing focus?
Austin: I would say we're still in that five that you need.
Keith: Got it. Gotcha.
Austin: It would be unlikely at this point that the mole would, like, kill you all somehow in its one remaining action, necessarily.
Keith: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Janine: That would be wild.
Austin: It would be.
Janine: Uh, let me see. Hmm. I wanted to do, like, some sort of flashy thing to kind of steal its last turn away, but I don't think I can do that. [Austin chuckles] I don't think there's really an option for me there. And also, it feels kind of pointless to, like, shoot at it. It just feels mean, you know?
Austin: Yeah. It does sort of feel— well, you know. It will remember that, theoretically, if you do something other than try to shoot it here. I'm not, you know. If that’s a thing you remember and want to bring up later, you always could.
Janine: Yeah.
Sylvia: Elom will remember that.
Austin: Elom will remember that.
Janine: I'm looking at, like, the alternative actions.
Keith: You could tell it to, “Tell your dragon buddies…” [Austin chuckles] Some message, I don't know.
Janine: Uh huh.
Austin: “Hi.”
Keith: “Hi.”
Austin: “Stop. Cut it out.”
Keith: “If you wanted to ask me out, you should have just said so.” [Austin laughs]
Janine: Wow.
Sylvia: “Tell your dragon buddies they don't got moves like this,” and then you do, like, a spinaroony. [Janine and Austin laugh]
Janine: Hmm. I think I want to— can I try and Hinder it?
Austin: Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, and in fact, that might be useful, because what we're going to do after the turn is over is some sort of contested roll to get in safely, so.
Janine: Mm-hmm.
Austin: Hindering it makes a lot of sense.
Janine: Actually…
Keith: Yeah, and I can imagine what sorts of things I'll need to be rolling for that, and not looking good. [Austin laughs quietly]
Janine: Actually, I think I will…okay. I'm going to try and shoot it.
Austin: Okay.
Janine: But with the goal of doing other stuff.
Austin: Yeah. Yeah, doing some Brontë type shit. Let’s see it.
Janine: Again, this is— [sighs] This is a thing of, like, is it actually better to just take the Hinder roll? It might be. Because the Hinder needs to hit 10, right? Or…?
Austin: Yeah. Hinder is 10, correct.
Janine: And to land a hit, I have to get…
Austin: A 9. Its Defense is only 9.
Janine: Oh. Nevermind. Okay.
Austin: Yeah. Mm-hmm.
Janine: Yeah, I'll do that, then.
Austin: Yeah. Yeah, that’s the thing. Many things have lower than 10.
Janine: [sarcastic] Even though that’s been working out so well for me.
Austin: Yeah, well.
Janine: Uh huh, uh huh. Critical fumble. [Austin groans]
Keith: Oh my god. Oh no. Oh no.
Sylvia: Wow!
Janine: Yeah.
Keith: Do you have a Fabula Point left?
Austin: You can't Fabula fumbles.
Janine: You can't.
Keith: Oh, on a fumble!
Austin: Yeah.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Keith: Oh, I thought you could Fabula away a fumble, but you can't.
Janine: But I get a +1 for fumbling the Check, right?
Keith: That’s true.
Austin: Yeah, you do get a bonus Fabula. Yeah, you get a Fabula Point for a fumble, which, by the way, someone—
Janine: Should I have been taking them before, for the other—?
Austin: On fumbles? No, not on misses.
Janine: Okay, okay.
Austin: No, no, no. Just on fumbles.
Janine: Okay.
Austin: Just on fumbles.
Janine: Great.
Austin: Which I think the only other fumble was it, and I don't think it gets Ultima Points on fumbles, so.
Janine: No. I think this is maybe a canon moment where Brontë had the same realization I did, which is like, we have to go. What’s the point of attacking it?
Austin: Right, and that’s like a—
Janine: Again, it feels cruel.
Austin: Uh huh. So yeah, do you fail to follow through with the attack, the way you need to, and it gives it an opportunity?
Janine: I think maybe, yeah. I think it’s a thing of, like, bow raised, arrow nocked, kind of ready to go, and then just like, hesitation. Just like, this is a waste of time. This is pointless.
Austin: Mm. Okay. Can I look at your backpack, real quick?
Janine: Yeah?
Austin: Okay. I'm just peeking at stuff. Seeing what I can do.
Janine: I got water.
Austin: You do have water.
Janine: And I have a racket and a spear.
Austin: You do.
Janine: And a fig.
Austin: And Efta and Zolfta. They're here, right? They're not items, even though they're under your other items.
Sylvia: Oh no.
Janine: Yeah, they're just there because I need somewhere to check their fatigue and, like, how much they're sick of me.
Austin: I see. [chuckles] Yes, of course. God. You know, I think that this is simple, actually. I think this is a little of Brontë’s own medicine, in a sense. You're going to take an affliction. You're going to take slow, for the same reason that, you know, you just described, right?
Janine: Mm-hmm.
Austin: You hesitate for a second, and then it’s on you in a way that’s kind of scary, and in fact, it’s going to just try to claw you again with its final action.
Janine: That’s rude.
Austin: Does that change your Defense? I don't think it does.
Janine: Yeah, slow brings my Defense down to 9, because it’s reducing your Dexterity.
Austin: Right, 'cause it reduces it.
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: Yeah, of course. All right, and it’s just going to do Heavy Claw, and that is 13 physical damage.
Janine: I would like to— well, do I want to halve that? Is it even worth it, at the end of this? We're probably going to, like, have a break or something.
Austin: Up to you.
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: We haven't seen Efta and Zolfta, so. I'm sure they're watching, you know? I'm sure they're out here with us. We just haven't talked about them, because that’s how they kind of work.
Keith: Are they into this kind of stuff, or are they bored? [Sylvia laughs]
Austin: Fighting dragons?
Keith: Yeah, I don't know. They're weird. They might be bored by this.
Austin: You know, the way I tend to play it—
Janine: You can be both. You can be into it and bored. [Austin chuckles]
Sylvia: Whoa.
Austin: So true.
Sylvia: [laughs quietly] Me trying to convince my date I'm having a good time. [Janine laughs quietly] 
Austin: That’s right, yeah. Yeah.
Sylvia: No, you can be into it and bored. 
Austin: Yeah, uh huh.
Sylvia: Trust me. It’s okay. [Austin laughs] Tell me more about your Warhammers.
Keith: It’s not that I don't like you. It’s that I don't like what we're doing or…you. [Austin and Janine laugh]
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: Wow! [Keith laughs] Yeah, you know, the rule of comedy here would be for one of them to be way into it and one of them to bored out of her skull, you know?
Janine: Mm-hmm.
Austin: That tends to be the way that you would schematize that, but, you know. I think a dragon is exciting. I think that, like, despite their sometimes affectless demeanor, [Keith: Mm-hmm.] I would imagine they're like, “Whoa.”
Keith: Whoa.
Janine: Yeah. That’s a dragon.
Austin: You know, the prince is fighting a dragon. Yeah.
Janine: That’s a dragon-ass dragon.
Austin: Yeah.
Keith: I'm leaping out of my lederhosen or whatever I wear.
Janine: Eh… [Austin laughs] You know, it’s in the spirit of what they wear, which is…
Austin: Janine, you don't have to rise to that. Yeah, uh huh. [Keith laughs quietly]
Janine: No, I appreciate, because it’s in the spirit of how they're dressed. It’s not correct.
Austin: Okay. Yeah, yeah.
Janine: But it is in the spirit. It’s not like…you know, Keith didn't say, like, “jumping out of my, you know, Jordache jeans” or whatever.
Austin: [laughs quietly] But he should have!
Keith: What kind of jean is that?
Austin: Jordache, the brand? No? Was this before your time?
Janine: They're probably not still around anymore. 
Austin: Yeah, they're not around anymore.
Janine: This is very ‘80s to me, I think. I think I'll just take the hit.
Austin: Just take the hit. Boom. The Heavy Claw comes down.
Janine: I escaped this fight getting basically no fucking, you know, trouble. So.
Austin: Yeah. Yeah. So I'll say that drops you down, though, to…are you in Crisis now? No.
Janine: I think I'm just shy of it.
Austin: Yeah, I think you're just shy of it too.
Janine: Yeah.
Escape [1:47:58]
Austin: All right. The bells are ringing. You've heard that one before, folks.
Janine: Mm.
Keith: Mm-hmm.
Austin: In this case, it means everything’s okay.
Keith: Yeah.
Janine: Uh, well.
Austin: And it’s time to make a break for it. Well, you know. And yeah, I think we're going to do it very quick, as it realizes the door is closing. It’s kind of rushing towards the entrypoint, which you're also rushing towards, and we're just going to do a quick contested roll to see if you get in without taking any damage. I think this is, like, this is a roll for running as fast as you can, like navigating the world, which is probably DEX plus Might. I think this is just, like, the “I'm doing sports” roll.
Keith: Sure.
Austin: Which I don't think has one on the, like, the wheel of frequently used Checks, but we can just write one in. The run away one. And it will do the same, and I will do its first, so you know what you're rolling against. DEX plus Might. Whoop. That was not it. I misclicked. Ignore the 8. DEX plus Might. [typing] Chasing the party into the dome. All right.
Keith: I like the 8.
Austin: Well, too bad! It rolled a 17!
Janine: What the fuck? Oh my god. 
Austin: Yeah.
Keith: I can't beat that, actually.
Austin: Even with— oh, you can always beat it with a crit.
Keith: True.
Austin: A crit just wins, and also, could you get to a 15?
Keith: I could get to a 16 is my top.
Austin: Well then, you could then use a Fabula Point Bond to get a +1.
Keith: Sure.
Austin: So you could.
Keith: Yeah.
Austin: It just rolled really well, and it’s just going to do it’s basically damage to you if you don't get there.
Keith: Okay. All right. No, I've got it. I've got it.
Austin: Yeah?
Keith: Yeah.
Austin: Oh, 'cause you're just going to be fine.
Keith: Yeah. I'm just going to be fine.
Austin: Yeah, it will do 16 damage if you don't hit a— because we have 11 plus its basic 5, HR + 5 for the Heavy Claw.
Keith: All right, who’s going to roll first?
Austin: You all just have to roll. You just all do it at your will.
Sylvia: All right.
Janine: I definitely can't do…
Austin: You could always crit.
Janine: Yeah.
Keith: You could always crit.
Austin: This is not a— to be clear, this is—
Janine: [sarcastic] Especially after today. That’ll definitely happen.
Austin: Well.
Janine: All right. 5.
Austin: There's a 5. 
Sylvia: We're all rolling DEX and Might?
Austin: Mm-hmm, DEX + Might, yeah. Trying to outrun it.
Janine: Mm-hmm.
Austin: 3!
Sylvia: That’s a 3.
Janine: Cool. Doing good.
Keith: All right.
Sylvia: Time to get trampled!
Austin: Uh huh.
Keith: Yeah.
Janine: How much damage do we take?
Sylvia: Yippee!
Austin: Ah, Antistrophe, only a 10.
Keith: 10. Shit.
Austin: What did I say? 16. 16 damage.
Sylvia: I am not dead.
Austin: See?
Sylvia: I have 2 HP. [Austin and Janine groan]
Keith: Oh, I guess I could Fabula. That would get us to 6, right?
Austin: No, you're at 6, because Caoimhe used 2 in that last scene, or in that last action, to get you from 4 to 6.
Keith: Oh. Oh.
Austin: I'm pretty sure.
Keith: Well, that’s a shame.
Austin: Why?
Sylvia: No, I did.
Keith: I mean, it’s good that we did it, [Austin laughs] but if I used a Fabula Point, it wouldn't be going towards [Austin: I see.] a potential third XP, because I think it’s just unrealistic that we're going to get the 9.
Austin: Yes. You're not going to get another 3. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That seems…
Janine: I have a question.
Austin: Yes.
Janine: Do we— we're getting hurt, but then we're inside and it’s all good?
Austin: Then you're safe. 100%. 
Janine: Okay.
Austin: Yeah, this is damage taken as the rocks are— you know, as you're sprinting here, the rocks are, like, falling all over the place. You've succeeded at your goal, which was keeping the city safe. The question was: could you also escape the Rotten Draco-Mole, Elom’s, you know, final attacks. You get up the stairs. You get into the city. The dome closes the rest of the way behind you, and then you can hear it slam against the metal behind you. Something really wild is it’s, like, dark in here, you know? The dome has covered the light of the day. The lights have, you know, turned on. There's torchlight and candles and, you know, other types of light, magical light around the town, but it’s, like, dark dark, you know? There's no stars. There's no other moonlight coming down. And so it is dark in here, but you are safe. And you can see most of the city has been abandoned, as people have moved into the center towards the moon itself, towards kind of the temple. And in fact, the moon is smaller in the center of the town than what’s on our map. Remember I said there was a little gap between the Digsite West and East and the kind of, like, actual moon? Like a little step between them?
Keith: Yep.
Austin: The metal of the moon has been used to build the dome, and so it has receded. Like, it has gotten smaller.
Keith: Little moon.
Austin: And now there's, like, a bridge connecting digsites, or like from Digsite West and East across into the much smaller central orb where everyone is kind of standing. And, you know, it is weirdly— it is breaking the laws of physics. It is a Mario Galaxy ass moon. People are standing at odd angles on the side of the moon in disorienting ways, you know? It is, you know, large enough to fit the people of the city on it but not by that much, you know? And presumably some other people have not made it there and are, like, hiding in their homes or remaining, you know, to the side where the other half of the dome is. And, you know, from here, as you kind of step back in from the Pilgrim’s Quarter, where the dome has kind of blocked everything off, you— and again, it’s more of an orb than a dome, right? Because it goes all the way around, top and bottom. It’s like a sort of sphere around the entire area. Yeah, you can continue to hear the draconic mole slam against the wall ineffectively.
[“Fuimus (Elom Combat Ends)” by Jack de Quidt plays]
Aftermath [1:54:04]
Austin: And you can't quite see— you know, you don't get to see any individual people from this far off, but you can see the crowd of people mulling about the moon.
Keith: Mulling about.
Austin: Mm, yes.
Janine: Ooh. I want to say, for flavor, that the—
Keith: Mulling it over.
Janine: That the last sort of bit, climbing up the stairs, Brontë was being, like, pushed comedically by Efta and Zolfta.
Austin: [chuckles] Yes. Yes.
Janine: Because he was slowed and also hurt, in Crisis and everything.
Austin (as Efta/Zolfta): Sir, we have to go.
Austin: Yeah.
Janine: I don't think they’d call him sir. I think it was—
Austin: What do they call him?
Janine: I don't know. I think they're often very— I picture them, like, you know how in anime, there's often the characters who basically don't say anything but are [Austin: Mm, mm-hmm.] just there to, like, have expressions and actions?
Austin: Yes.
Keith: Mm-hmm.
Janine: So I picture it as a very wordless, like, they both run up.
Austin: That’s this then, yeah.
Janine: Like, as they're approaching, you get the anime sound of, like, “pap pap pap pap pap,” of like, the hard leather shoes on the ground.
Austin: Uh huh. [chuckles] 
Janine: And they both, like, scurry up, and they both sort of get behind him, and they're both, like, pushing him to help him up the stairs. And they all scurry in.
Keith: That’s funny. When you're in bed, they're so talkative. 
Janine: [laughs quietly] Uh huh.
Keith: Never even occurred to me that they don't talk very much.
Austin: [laughs] I love it. Great.
Janine: I think they both just, like, look at each other, like, “Phew.” [Keith laughs quietly] 
Austin: God. All right. You've done it. You've gotten back inside. Do you make your way towards the moon? Do you hang out somewhere else in the abandoned town? What’s your play?
Janine: I think Caoimhe and I need a doctor. [laughs] 
Austin: Probably.
Janine: Or, like, need to rest.
Sylvia: I want to confront the Hexcloaks about why they weren't helping.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Janine: Mm.
Keith: Yeah.
Janine: That’s actually, that’s good. That’s a good question.
Sylvia: I'm mad, and I don't think there's anything else on my mind right now other than that.
Janine: Okay, but if they sneeze on you, you're going to die. [laughs quietly] 
Sylvia: Well, let ‘em sneeze. I want to do this in front of people.
Austin: So yeah, do you head towards, then, where people are, presumably? Which is the temple and the moon.
Sylvia: Yeah, I mean…yeah.
Austin: We get this, like, you know— again, if we were playing this game, it would be— the things that are happening here. You're walking through, like, the same city stages that you were, like, shopping in before, you know, the same maps, but all of the, like, town music is quiet, you know? It’s just, like, the sound of wind. Wind.wav is playing at a low volume, 'cause it’s abandoned, you know? None of the stores are available to shop from. And then we get to the edge where you would step onto the moon, except now it’s, like, an empty gap, you know, with like a chasm that goes down into the depths of the digsite, underneath where the moon was, and there's a long silver bridge that connects you to the moon, and you get the whole screen of walking. You know, it kind of, like, instead of the pseudo top down view or the asymmetric type view or whatever, it’s just the sideways on wide shot of the party walking across the bridge towards the moon.
Janine: You know it’s bad if the Gap is empty.
Austin: That’s right. Yeah, uh huh. And then, yeah, you make it to the moon, and, you know, there are definitely people set up as, you know, with medical supplies and stuff all over the place. This is a place you can do the Rest action and all of that. But before we get there—and that’s probably where we should end, is getting healed up, or maybe we'll come back in on that. But as you get there, you know, I think you see, wounded on the ground, maybe being attended to by one of these doctors, Delani.
Sylvia: [sadly] No.
Austin: Who is pulling on the lab coat or, you know, the coat of the doctor. Probably not a lab coat. [laughs quietly] But, you know, the doctor’s coat.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: And is saying, like:
(as Delani): Where’s Kley? Where’d they take my Kley?!
Austin: And, yeah.
Sylvia: [pained sound] I want to ask what happened, but
Austin: Yeah, you can. We don't have— 
Sylvia: No, we can do that next time. Okay.
Austin: You can have a little conversation if you want before we wrap. I think that’s a—
Sylvia: I want to run over [Austin: Yeah.] and be like:
(as Caoimhe): Tell me what happened.
Sylvia: Because we saw them…
Austin: You passed them on the way out, yeah.
Keith: Mm-hmm.
Sylvia: Yeah. And be like:
(as Caoimhe): When was the last time you saw Kley?
Austin (as Delani): Oh, Caoimhe. Thank goodness! You're not— where are they? Where did you take them?!
Sylvia (as Caoimhe): I just got in the dome. Tell me— walk me through what happened.
Austin (as Delani): You just got in the dome? No, you all took my Kley!
Sylvia (as Caoimhe): Who took Kley?
Austin (as Delani): You Hexcloaks!
Sylvia (as Caoimhe): I'll get to the bottom of this, okay?
Austin (as Delani): You better. You better.
Sylvia (as Caoimhe): Promise.
Sylvia: And I look at the doctor and be like:
Sylvia (as Caoimhe): You make sure to take good care of her. Thank you.
Austin: You know, just kind of nods at you. You know. I think actually looks at you with, like, a weird look. There is something— something happened. Something happened here, you know?
Sylvia: I know. I can tell something happened, and I am…
Austin: Yeah.
Keith: Mm-hmm.
Sylvia: Considering we saved the say, I'm feeling all sorts of ways about it.
Austin: Yeah. You know, you're close enough now to the Temple of the Summit that I think Athen, the High Cleric of Castine sees you and kind of waves you over.
Sylvia: Yeah, I'm going to go. I'm hurrying over.
Austin: Yeah.
(as Athen): Our Lord—
Sylvia: Not quite sprinting or anything, but I'm doing a light jog everywhere right now, at least.
Austin: Yeah, you're at 2 HP, you know? But.
Sylvia: Yeah. It’s the best I can muster, but, you know.
Austin: Yeah.
(as Athen): Thank you for your aid.
Austin: Or, I guess, actually says, you know…
(as Athen): Living Metal sends thanks. Our Lord is in conference with the Ennead and cannot attend to you himself, but thank you. Please, come inside.
Sylvia (as Caoimhe): No problem.
Austin (as Athen): We have quarters prepared for you to rest.
Sylvia: I don't know if she even— like, the second they start walking, she might be like:
(as Caoimhe): What happened while we were outside the dome?
Austin (as Athen): It’s hard for me to understand. The…your commander, Aegir, entered the Temple of the Summit soon after you left and was looking for our Lord, but before he could even find him, a strange…a strange youngster arrived and tried to attack him. It was the Kaina child, the one who just visited with their mother.
Sylvia (as Caoimhe): [quietly] Ugh, Kley… Okay. I'm going to get to the bottom of this.
Austin (as Athen): I'm sorry to say that your commander has left.
Sylvia (as Caoimhe): He left?
Austin (as Athen): We've seen no sight of him nor any of the other Hexcloaks. After the attack, they vanished.
Sylvia (as Caoimhe): Yeah, they might as well have not been here from the beginning, with how they handled things.
Austin: Mm. You know, worth a special good mechanical note here that, of course, we know that Aegir has mastery over light magic, the thing that dragon was weak to.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Keith: Hmm.
Sylvia: There's a reason I'm mad.
Austin: And, for that matter, Kley is a poison elf, right? 
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: So, you know, could have also maybe helped. Who knows?
Sylvia: Yeah. Right now I'm like, in my head like, “Is there a way I can hinder or remedy some of the harm they've done to get a Subversion Point?” but it’s been a long session.
Austin: Ooh, yeah, wait, talk to me about that. Talk to me about Subversion Points.
Sylvia: Well, so, because I have Repentant Enforcer, right?
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Sylvia: The way that it works is I'm trying to build up 4 Subversion Points.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Sylvia: Which, one, they can be used instead of Fabula Points, is the big thing.
Austin: Yeah.
Sylvia: But also, it helps with eventually the culmination [Austin: Yep.] of the Quirk, is my understanding of it. Like, I have to defeat the leader of the— “The Villain leading the organization is defeated and surrenders. You lose this Quirk permanently. Increase your maximum Hit Points,” and a bunch of other stuff. But what I'm really trying to do here is finally actually, like, show that Caoimhe’s taking some action against them or, like, starting to break with them in more tangible ways.
Austin: Yeah. Yeah. I think Athen gives you an opportunity here for that, which is like, says, you know:
(as Athen): We'll of course get you healed up and give you space to rest, but we really could continue to use help. Tending to the wounded, distributing supplies. Anything, anything you could do to help. Would you be willing, the three of you?
Sylvia (as Caoimhe): Healing magic isn't my forte, but you point me in a direction, and I'll do what needs doing.
Austin: You know, looks—
Keith (as Antistrophe): Agreed.
Austin (as Athen): Sir Brontë?
Janine (as Brontë): I'm good at carrying stuff.
Austin (as Athen): I will ask you, though, Lady Hexcloak, to leave your official garb to the side. The people are not very trusting of your organization after they failed to address the attack. You understand.
Sylvia (as Caoimhe): Yeah. I wouldn't be either.
Sylvia: And I think she’s already sort of, like, unhooking it from her armor, putting it away.
Austin: Yep.
Sylvia: Not armor, but like…
Austin: Yeah, I know what you mean.
Sylvia: Her uniform, and putting it away.
Austin: Uniform. Yeah. Yeah, all right. I would say you can take one here.
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: You know, you are putting down the uniform to do this work. People have seen you wearing it. They are going to see you not wearing it now, you know? On top of it being… I would not say that you understand what role they were playing here [chuckles] or not playing here. You know what they weren't doing.
Sylvia: Yes.
Austin: But I will say that there is a degree to which, you know, you are getting in the way of plans, your entire set of actions here, you know?
Sylvia: Good.
Austin: So.
Sylvia: ‘Cause like, as far as Caoimhe’s concerned, what happened is they decided, instead of helping to stop the catastrophic attack, they thought they should raid the Temple of Castine instead.
Austin: Yep.
Sylvia: And it’s the type of shit that makes her sick to her stomach.
Austin: Yeah. You know, and it’s clear they didn't get to do whatever they wanted to do at the temple because of Kley, but you don't know what Kley actually was aiming for, outside of maybe…
Sylvia: Oh, yeah.
Austin: You know. As you begin to tend to this, you can start to put together a little bit of a picture that Kley, you know, eventually jumped out of nowhere and tried to assassinate Aegir and was quickly apprehended.
Sylvia: But apprehended, not killed.
Austin: As far as anyone has seen, yeah.
Sylvia: Yet!
Austin: No, in fact, I think that that’s— you know, give me a Study Check.
Sylvia: Okay. Just a Study?
Austin: Open-ended Study, yeah. Yeah. Or Persuade. Either. Whatever the— they might even be similar, which is like—
Sylvia: They're basically the same. 
Austin: It’s Insight + Willpower, right?
Sylvia: They're the same roll for me either way, yeah.
Austin: Yeah. Insight + Willpower, because what you're doing is talking to people.
Sylvia: Okay, cool.
Austin: Nah, that’s all you get.
Keith: I have a bonus to Study, if I can also study.
Austin: Yeah, go for it.
Sylvia: I'm too mad to study. That’s why I rolled a 3.
Austin: Yeah, makes sense.
Keith: Uh, just want to make sure…
Sylvia: Fuming.
Keith: Yeah, I get a bonus of 3 to Study rolls.
Austin: Yeah, go for it.
Keith: 8.
Austin: Okay. You know, I'm still going to give you the thing, you know, the basic part of this which is there is a sort of, like, you don't know the detail. You didn't get above— 7 is the minimum, right? 
Keith: Okay. Yeah.
Austin: So you're getting the minimum here. You don't know the detail. You don't know exactly what was said. But it seems like there was something besides basic decency that held Aegir back from killing Kley. It seemed like there was some sort of relationship or affiliation, you know. There's a sort of, like, “If it weren't for blank, I'd kill you right here,” you know? 
Keith: Mm-hmm.
Austin: You just don't know what the blank is.
Sylvia: [amused] If it weren't for the laws of this land?
Austin: No, no, no, no, no. Well, they supersede laws.
Sylvia: No, I know. I know.
Austin: That’s, like, literally the thing though, right? Is…
Sylvia: Yeah.
Austin: It is something else. It is something beyond— they wouldn't get in trouble. They would, you know. So.
Sylvia: No! Dude is literally above the law, 'cause he makes it up.
Austin: That’s right. Yeah.
Sylvia: Like, he is the law.
Austin: That’s exactly it. So, there you go.
Sylvia: All right.
Austin: And we'll come back in, and we'll do resting and all of that at the beginning of the next session. I don't want to, you know. There's all sorts of, you do downtime stuff. you can do, you know. So let’s not stretch this out too long.
Keith: Mm-hmm.
Austin: For now…
Sylvia: We're getting a total of 7 XP, then?
Austin: 7 XP? 5 plus 2? Yeah. That’s 7.
Keith: Yeah. Before we do that, I have a roll that I need to do.
Austin: You sure do. Make the roll.
Sylvia: Oh, yay!
Austin: Which now is what?
Sylvia: Jumped the gun; apologies.
Austin: Still under a 9, or are you leveling? You're leveling.
Keith: Well, it’s not about levels. It’s about a number of times you make the roll, right?
Austin: Oh, is that what it is? 
Keith: Oh, no, you—
Austin: I thought it was levels.
Keith: Hold on. Let me reread it. It is levels. It’s under a 9.
Austin: When does it happen? Tell me when it actually happens. 
Keith: Let me reread the…uh, there we go. “Before assigning XP, roll 2d20.”
Austin: Okay, so that means it’s under a 9.
Keith: “If you roll equal to or lower than your level,” so it’s a 9 or lower.
Austin: 9 or under, then. Yep. Give me the— is it 2d20?
Keith: Yeah.
Austin: Okay. 
Keith: 28.
Austin: All right, that is a 28. You are doing fine.
Keith: Doing fine. Rolling good on these.
Austin: Rolling good on these.
Sylvia: 28, doing great.
[“Perpetua” by Jack de Quidt plays]