Cursebreaker | 53 - Anyway, Here's Thunderwall
Last time on Cursebreaker. We found Dor in a refugee camp, and though he was pretty shaken, we think he's happy
Tim / GM:to be alive. We found an entrance into the mountains where Idris told
Speaker 1:us to look for Vikshi the red dragon. This place is booby trapped like the dickens and Snack is
Tim / GM:doing his best to lead us as true kobolds. Hopefully
Speaker 1:we're through the worst of it. We've suffered plenty. But we're seeing signs of life. It seems we found an old friend of snacks.
Tim / GM:The exact moment we left off on. You were all moving through an area known as the dead flush full of, smelly old cobalt bones, other detritus and refuse, from Snacks Den.
Hannah / Eryn:Tim Tim, is there poo poo?
Tim / GM:There I mean
Speaker 4:yeah. Ew.
Hannah / Eryn:Well So gross.
Tim / GM:You made me say it. You made me bring that into reality.
Hannah / Eryn:Is there poo poo?
Tim / GM:It there is now. Until now, it was Schrodinger's poo poo.
Hannah / Eryn:Okay. Okay. Episode title.
Tim / GM:We already got it in the first 10 seconds. You're all kind of huddled out of the water and the poo poo, near this plateau that rises high and dry out of the dead flush, leaning over this plateau, looking over the edge down at you is another cobalt. This one has a almost shiny kind of grayish belly, and it's got some broken teeth and picked off scales, but it's staring down at you. And when it locks eyes with snack, it just says small
Hannah / Eryn:snack. Holly's gonna throw her dagger at his belly. Wow. Why? Because she's trying to be a kobold.
Tim / GM:Okay. Make an attack.
Hannah / Eryn:Holly got a 12.
Speaker 1:Okay. This
Tim / GM:kobold just kind of, like, yoinks its face back from the edge really quick and says, you've made friends.
Hannah / Eryn:Oh. Because she missed.
Thomas / Guy:Yes. Hi, Grey. Got,
John / Doran:and snacks slithers behind, Uli.
Speaker 7:Who looks as menacing as a couple of old as possible.
Tim / GM:A clawed hand reaches over the plateau and just kind of, like, shakes and does, like they, like, cross over each other like a no more kind of thing. You see Grey gut very cautiously peer over the edge again and look down at you, except it's looking right at Holly. And it says it says,
Speaker 8:Palak, we did not expect you to find your way back. We thought you were dead.
Thomas / Guy:Yes. My,
Tim / GM:He kinda, like, looks, like, over, like, where Uli is, and he's, like, seeing double now. Holly and Snack look exactly the same by Holly's intention. Oh. They were disguised to Holly matched Snack as closely as possible. Grey got seems confused as to who's actually who here.
Thomas / Guy:Yes. I quite lucky. Snack survived.
Tim / GM:He, kind of moves around on the plateau to get a better angle on you, and he says, how?
Speaker 8:There are 2 of you. How?
Speaker 7:I would move in front of Snack.
Speaker 8:Yeah. Okay.
Hannah / Eryn:Holly's gonna try to find a way up on the plateau.
Tim / GM:Yeah. You see there's actually a, like, just, like, tattered piece of cloth, that would probably support your weight. It seems that's how Grey Guts' been getting up and down.
Hannah / Eryn:Okay. I'm gonna climb up.
Tim / GM:Okay. Give me an athletics check to climb that. And are you trying to do it without being noticed?
Hannah / Eryn:Yes.
Tim / GM:Give me stealth then athletics.
Hannah / Eryn:Stealth first? Yep. Oh.
Speaker 7:Good. Good. Good. Good. Good.
Tim / GM:Sorry. Take disadvantage on stealth. You're, like, in conversation with this guy when this happens.
Hannah / Eryn:Shoot. 6. There it is. Alright.
Tim / GM:And then give me that in athletics on top of that.
Speaker 7:K.
Hannah / Eryn:I got an 18.
Tim / GM:Okay. So you actually are able to climb the cloth pretty rapidly. You feel it, like, tearing as you're climbing, but you're able to, like, get your fingers up on the edge of the plateau. However, Greg got noticed you the entire time and was just kind of waiting for you to get to the top. He has your dagger that you threw up there, and he is just kind of, like, pointing it, like, straight down at your fingers, like, on the edge, and he says, Block,
Speaker 8:how are you so big?
Speaker 9:I'm not Block. My name is
Hannah / Eryn:That's Snatch. And then Holly's gonna sit back, and her broom is gonna catch her butt from the edge of the cliff. And she's gonna zoom up on her broom around, and she's gonna cackle in the sky above the plateau.
Tim / GM:Does 21 hit you?
Speaker 10:I don't think you have to look that up.
Speaker 7:I think yeah. Yeah.
Hannah / Eryn:It hits me.
Tim / GM:Okay. You are struck for 1, piercing damage as, Greygut throws the dagger back at you. The rest of you, Greygut, like, gets right up to the edge of the cliff, and he says he says,
Speaker 8:what is this? You've come to destroy the rest of us? Is this vengeance?
Thomas / Guy:I think we should all leave. We shouldn't be here. It's not safe. Gragut, I am glad you are well, and we will leave these caverns. You clearly own them.
Speaker 8:There is no forward. This is the end, Snack. I'm all that's left.
Speaker 7:Not very scary.
Tim / GM:Snack, are we gonna have to fight this guy?
Thomas / Guy:No. No. We we can leave you. We don't need to be here. There's probably another way.
Speaker 7:Snick, he's insulting you. You're gonna take that?
Thomas / Guy:We don't need to fight.
Tim / GM:Uli, a little pebble, like, lands at your feet that, Greg got lazily lobbed off the plateau. He says, snack, where's mommy?
Speaker 8:Where's mommy to protect you? Mhmm. Where's mommy to save you from the arena, snack?
Speaker 7:Alright. That's it. I pick up the rock, and I whip it at him.
Tim / GM:Okay. Make an attack.
John / Doran:I try to stop Uli. Okay.
Tim / GM:Make an attack with disadvantage, Uli.
Speaker 7:16.
Speaker 8:Yeah. That's Maxim.
Speaker 7:Snack, what are you doing? Let go.
Thomas / Guy:Lily, we we we can leave. We don't need to do this. I think we should go. There's probably another way to find the dragon.
Tim / GM:Are you are you scared of this guy, Snack?
Speaker 9:Yeah. Don't let this kiss imbecile torture you. Snack.
Speaker 8:Small snack. Small snack runs away.
Speaker 7:I don't like this guy.
Speaker 9:Snack who is him to you? You are much more powerful.
Thomas / Guy:I don't think we should be here. Mhmm. Gragut, can we can we depart and leave this place?
Speaker 8:Snack, it seems you made some brave friends. Braver than you, small snack.
Speaker 7:He's the bravest of all of us.
Tim / GM:Greygut starts, like, descending that tattered cloth and comes down to where you guys are and, like, walks, like, into your group, like, right up to snack.
Hannah / Eryn:Can I see what's on the plateau now that I'm flying around?
Tim / GM:Yeah. Looking up there, there's actually, like, a framed, like, stone doorway. It looks like there's a small temple or shrine up there that he's been living in.
Hannah / Eryn:And it just looks like him living there?
Tim / GM:Yeah. He's the only kobold up there.
Speaker 10:Also, I don't know if it was a perspective thing when you were up on that plateau, but Snack is a lot bigger now.
Tim / GM:He, looks up at you, and he says, he kind of, like, is on all fours and then rises to about your height, Bert, and
Speaker 8:he just says, cowards are cowards.
Tim / GM:And he looks at snack and says, small snack. And he, like, like, whips out a claw to, like, antagonize you.
John / Doran:I jump out of the way and, hide behind Ullies more. He just cackles Hayden.
Tim / GM:And he starts, like, slapping a puddle and just, like, causing a big ruckus. And he says, small snack.
Speaker 7:Oh my god.
Thomas / Guy:See? See, what's with this guy?
Speaker 11:I do not like it. Tibio, waddles up and says,
Speaker 12:you are a rabbit, very rude,
Speaker 11:good old. How how dare you? And I cast vicious mockery. He has to make a wisdom saving throw. Okay.
Tim / GM:That's a natural 20.
Hannah / Eryn:Oh, he's so wisdom y.
Speaker 11:Damn. Okay.
Tim / GM:He looks at you, and he
Speaker 8:says, rude? What is rude? And he goes,
Speaker 12:dude. That that is rude. Very rude.
Speaker 11:And I kick the bones on the ground.
Tim / GM:K. Yeah. He, like, picks up, like, a handful of sewer poo poo and just, like, throws it in Snack's face.
John / Doran:Do I make a deck save, or does
Tim / GM:he just decide, please? Yeah. Oh, yeah. Oh my gosh. Uli, let's have you make a deck save, Uli.
Tim / GM:19. Wow. Okay. Yeah. Uli.
Hannah / Eryn:Uli moves, but then it hit sags.
Tim / GM:Well, no. I think, Uli, you step right in front of it, and you just get, like, a line of, like, sewer poo, like, from like, from your toes to your neck just in an arc up your body.
Speaker 7:You shouldn't have done that. And then I I'm just gonna pop him in the face with with a unarmed strike.
Tim / GM:Okay. Make an attack on him. Okay.
Speaker 7:I crit.
Tim / GM:Alright. Okay.
Speaker 7:9.
Tim / GM:Okay. Punch. You punch this real cobalt square between the eyes, and you just hear a wet slap as it lands in a pile of sewer poo and is out cold.
Speaker 7:I'm, like, shaking my hand.
Speaker 10:Yeah. Oh, thanks, Uli. I don't like people who
Speaker 7:are rude to my friends.
Speaker 4:Who was that, Nick? What is going on?
Hannah / Eryn:Yeah.
John / Doran:Right after that, I'm going to, Misty step over to Greigot. Okay. And I'm gonna take out a dagger. Mhmm. I'm gonna stab
Speaker 11:him. Oh, no. Snag,
Speaker 7:what are you doing?
John / Doran:And I stab him again. Okay.
Speaker 11:Snag. Oh my god.
Tim / GM:Yeah. You see Snack regress just a little bit as there's a like, the second he hits the ground, Snack kind of is on top of him.
Speaker 7:Can I try and pull him off?
Tim / GM:You can try. Yeah. Let's do a contested grapple. If you're gonna fight it, snack.
Thomas / Guy:Small. Greg got so weak. 13?
John / Doran:You beat me. Okay.
Tim / GM:Yeah. Snack, you get another couple of pierces in, and, you can all hear, like, a trickle of blood leaking off the dagger as Uli picks you up or drags you away.
Speaker 7:What the fuck? You don't what would what would Idris think?
John / Doran:Snek looks around and moves, his bracers down, and you can see, like, along his, shoulder and arm, you can see, like, scars, and you kinda notice that there are, like, scales missing.
Speaker 7:Did he hurt you?
Thomas / Guy:Yes.
Speaker 7:Did he hurt your family?
Thomas / Guy:We should leave this place.
Speaker 7:I let go of the grapple.
Speaker 8:Okay.
Hannah / Eryn:Holly zooms up to the plateau again to grab her dagger and puts it in her pocket.
Speaker 8:Okay. Yeah. You've got that.
Tim / GM:So Greigga wasn't lying. This does look like a dead end. Your obvious exits here are the sort of shrine archway on top of the plateau. Also, farther up the dead flush, there is a giant dam, a blockage of bones and filth that are clogging this thing, causing the water to just be a a small trickle instead of its usual current.
Speaker 9:Investigation. You
Tim / GM:wanna investigate the shrine or the wall?
Hannah / Eryn:I'll investigate the shrine since I'm up there grabbing my dagger. K. I got a 13 for investigation.
Tim / GM:Yeah. So it's a it's a fairly small room. It looks like a little chapel, except everything in here is kind of like broken and also filthy. You can see Greg Gut had been living here for a little while. There's, like, little pieces of food and, like, half eaten bugs and stuff laying around.
Tim / GM:There are 4 statues in little alcoves on the walls, but each of the statues has their head broken off. And there is in the front of the room, there's a wall with an inscription on it, and there's a skeleton kneeling there, holding up one of its hands towards the inscription, but the hand is holding a loincloth like soiled
Speaker 11:mic right now.
Hannah / Eryn:Nice. Can I read the inscription?
Speaker 8:Yeah. I
Hannah / Eryn:know Dwarvish, common, and that's it.
Tim / GM:Then no.
Speaker 10:I will read it.
Hannah / Eryn:Can I can I get it up here? Hey, Bert. I see an inscription. You know how to read things. It's not Dorvish or common.
Speaker 10:I love an inscription.
Hannah / Eryn:Get up here.
Tim / GM:Okay. Bert, can you read everything?
Speaker 10:Obviously. I could I I can read most things. And also, I have tongues if Tongues. Pockery, common, dwarvish, elvish, gnomish, giant, halfling, and orc.
Tim / GM:Yes. So you can read this. This is written in giant.
Speaker 11:Of all things.
Tim / GM:Of all things.
Speaker 7:He just, like, reached down into the mountain with a
Speaker 11:crayon. Yeah.
Tim / GM:Basically, this explains the the purpose of this structure that you're in, this whole mountain thing that you've been adventuring through. Mhmm.
Hannah / Eryn:This
Tim / GM:is a tomb for the person who designed it, a trap maker and an architect Mhmm. And a giant, designed this place to be his final resting place. The inscription beneath says, if you expected congratulations, you've misinterpreted the purpose of this temple to suffering. Know that what lies ahead is designed to punish. If you seek to rob my grave, you'll be either worthy by divine right or lucky enough to be a friend of death itself.
Tim / GM:There's also, among the context of the inscription, you gather that these statues are, family members of the person who designed this place. The heads were broken off recently, it looks like. It mentions in the text of the inscription that the architect's younger brother is the only one worthy of visiting his tomb. He's the only one who knew how to keep a secret.
Speaker 10:Is it clear which of the statues is, like, who? Like, the little brother and such without the head?
Speaker 8:Give me an investigation.
Speaker 11:I'm gonna make my way up there
Tim / GM:Okay.
Speaker 11:And start looking around and poking around the bones and the skeletons.
Tim / GM:Yeah. You see Bert there. Looking through the different statues up there.
Speaker 10:Can
Speaker 11:I investigate the Skelly's?
Speaker 10:Mhmm. I got an 8.
Tim / GM:Okay. Yeah, Bert. Without the heads on them, it's really hard to tell, like, what the, like, age range of each of these is supposed to be.
Speaker 11:Do I get any sort of advantage or anything?
Tim / GM:The skeleton specifically, I'll give you advantage on.
Speaker 11:Okay. Let's see if that helps. Nope. 12. K.
Tim / GM:You you try to do that, like, memory read thing where you can see little ghostly visions of their recent past. What you get is that the skeleton was an adventurer seeking treasure and glory here, made it about halfway through, and was praying for some kind of, way out and thought that this was his answer. But it's more of a message of antagonism from the the creator.
Speaker 11:Okay. I'm getting that these skeletons aren't all family members.
Tim / GM:No. These are people great robbers.
Speaker 11:Okay. Yeah.
Hannah / Eryn:Holly's gonna message to let the tea, Uli and Snack be like, we're we're checking things out up here, but why don't you guys look around the cavern a little more?
Speaker 7:What are we looking for?
Hannah / Eryn:Any way forward, any way out, anything.
Speaker 11:Yeah. If I'm not getting anything in the shrine, I'm gonna go up to the bone dam.
Speaker 12:Okay. Ugh.
Speaker 10:Bert's gonna cast locate object to try to find some statue heads.
Tim / GM:Nice. Okay.
Speaker 7:I guess I'll poke through rubble.
Tim / GM:Okay. Yeah. Let's do it this way. Bert, you find 2 statue heads in that room. One of them was sort of located in the rectum of the skeleton.
Tim / GM:Why? It's, it looks to be an old lady, and then you find another one that looks to be an old man. Uli digging through this bone dam. You're just trying to see, like, exactly how much effort it's gonna take to clear this blockage, and as you're moving, like, filthy disgusting bones and stuff out of the way, probably, like, using magic as much as possible to not touch this stuff. But as you're clearing it, you see a round thing, like, roll down the bone dam, and you see, like, a statuette head of a young man roll onto the floor.
Speaker 7:Fanta head.
Speaker 10:Is it is that a young dude?
Speaker 7:Yeah.
Speaker 10:Oh, this might be it. Oh, how do we get it out there?
Tim / GM:It's not that big.
Speaker 10:Okay.
Speaker 7:I will carry it.
Tim / GM:Okay. That would have been a fun natural one.
Speaker 10:Good move, really. Yeah.
Tim / GM:Alright. Yeah.
Speaker 10:Carrying it.
Speaker 7:I'm super strong right now. I maxed out.
Tim / GM:You were, able to carry it up onto the plateau and match the break against the statues that are in that room, and you find what is obviously intended to be a younger looking statue.
Hannah / Eryn:So do all the statues have their heads now?
Tim / GM:One is missing a head, but you're pretty confident that you found the younger brother.
Speaker 7:Snack?
John / Doran:This might be
Speaker 10:the only one we need.
Thomas / Guy:What is it, Dooley?
Speaker 7:Do you see any heads?
John / Doran:Snack was staring down at, Greygut most of this time.
Speaker 7:We are gonna talk about that later, but I'm not mad at you. Can you help us find a head, please?
Thomas / Guy:I will I will look for this head.
Speaker 7:A statue head?
Thomas / Guy:Yes.
Speaker 7:Yes. Not the heads of kobolds that you hate.
John / Doran:Alright. Investigate. Got 21 looking for
Tim / GM:Yeah. I think you find what used to be a statue head, but it's just, like, crumbled into very small pieces. This one looks like it was tossed around in that cathedral room a lot.
Thomas / Guy:I believe it is over here, Uli. It is in pieces.
Speaker 7:Do you think they played hot rocks with it?
Thomas / Guy:Yeah. Potentially. Yeah. Absolutely.
Speaker 10:I thought this guy might be the only one we need. He's the only one who's according wait. How did I learn that? That he's the only one who
Speaker 7:That
Tim / GM:he's the only one that the architect even wanted to, like, visit his tomb.
Hannah / Eryn:Was his brother? Mhmm.
Tim / GM:Yeah. So, yeah, you've identified which one is the younger brother, but you don't know what's special about it quite yet.
Speaker 10:We gathered the other heads. Do we put the other 2 on the statue?
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 7:Also, I would have tried to gather as much of the other head as possible.
Tim / GM:Yeah. You've got, like, all the big pieces of it. There might be some, like, little pebbles missing.
Speaker 7:But And if Tibbs can mend it.
Speaker 11:Yeah. I'm gonna cast mending on the headpieces.
Tim / GM:Okay. You wanna, like, actually mend them back to the statues? Yeah.
Speaker 11:Yes. I will do that.
Tim / GM:You refuse all of the heads?
Speaker 7:Sure. I refuse them.
Tim / GM:You refuse them.
Speaker 11:I shake my head to the heads. Yeah.
Speaker 7:No. No.
Tim / GM:They have been reassembled and look pristine. But again, no no big reveal, no real movement here.
Speaker 4:Everyone, I was thinking of maybe sitting and trying to detect if there is any magic about, but it will take me some time, if you want to explore. Otherwise, if someone else can do it faster, that is an option.
Hannah / Eryn:How long are we talking here?
Speaker 4:I think 10 minutes.
Hannah / Eryn:Oh, okay.
Tim / GM:While you guys are talking, Tibia's bone dog slips out and just starts walking around the room.
John / Doran:Snack Kit takes out his, magic item dowsing rod.
Tim / GM:Oh, yeah. Okay.
Thomas / Guy:I think I can look for something, Tibio. Magic, you say?
Speaker 4:Yes. If there is anything, in this room that is maybe hidden or if there is a magical spot that we have not seen yet.
Tim / GM:Snack. You go to turn on your dowsing rod, and it's out of batteries.
Speaker 4:Oh, dang.
Speaker 7:You forgot to charge it.
Tim / GM:You turned on and you feel, like, a really strong pull aiming straight towards Tibio. And it's, like, really hard to pull it off of him. And when you do, it sort of magnetizes in Uli's direction.
Thomas / Guy:Everybody out. I cannot do this with you all here. You're all so magical.
Hannah / Eryn:Holly zooms out. Thanks, Snack. Holly zooms out on her broom, and she's gonna go try to look at the top of the dam on her broom and investigate up there while there but you can finish what the snack was doing.
Tim / GM:Okay. With everyone out of the room snack, you have to really, really focus, and you get, like, the tiniest, like, signal coming from the young statue.
Thomas / Guy:When I
Tim / GM:approach it. It seems to be pointing pointing, like, kind of right at the statue's loins.
Thomas / Guy:Perfect. Poke it with a dowsing rod.
Tim / GM:The loins begin to grow. No effect there.
Thomas / Guy:Snack Snack can figure this out.
Speaker 7:Erecting a statue.
Thomas / Guy:That's statue.
Tim / GM:Name of the episode.
John / Doran:So I'm gonna take out my crowbar, and I'm gonna scratch, like, try to see if there's, like, anything to get into.
Tim / GM:Okay. Yeah. I mean, you, you can scratch at it hard enough to cause little chips and scrapes in it, but it doesn't seem like it's hollow or like it's concealing anything inside of it. Would you like a description of the statue? Yes.
Tim / GM:Okay. It is a cloaked young man. So it's like most of the statue is just, like, rippled folded, cloak over his shoulders. You can see one hand is kind of out in front of his chest and almost like a regal sort of, like, salute or, like, mid bow or something, but you can see his other hand is underneath his cloak behind his back. Okay.
John / Doran:I snack tries to crawl under his legs and look up underneath the cloak.
Tim / GM:Yeah. You're you're pretty big these days, but you're able to, like, stick your kind of, like, draconic neck underneath the cloak and, like, worm your way up there. You see that he is holding a incredibly detailed, carved stone pouch in his hand behind his back.
John / Doran:Perfect. Snack and do this. Yes. I'm going to pull out my, thieves' tools and try to, like, remove this pouch.
Tim / GM:Okay. Yeah. It's like a a large part of the pouch is, like, connected to the rest of the statue. So, like, removing this entire pouch is kind of a feat Okay. Without doing a lot of damage here.
Tim / GM:So if you wanted, you could snap off the whole thing, but that's the decision point you've come to.
John / Doran:Yes. Snap off.
Tim / GM:Okay. Yeah. You stick the crowbar in there and just pry it until the whole pouch just pops off. And now you have the pouch.
John / Doran:Alright. I'm gonna slither out from Hunter's legs Mhmm. And then come running up to the rest of the group. Okay.
Thomas / Guy:Here. I have discovered this magic item. Oh, what's in the bag? I don't know.
Speaker 4:Did you did you break the statue that is made of stones, Nick?
Thomas / Guy:Yes.
Speaker 4:I don't think that there is anything in it. It's just stone.
Hannah / Eryn:Shake it.
Tim / GM:Mhmm. I shake it? You shake it, and you hear a little kind of metallic rattle on the inside. Looking in the top of the pouch, you can see, like, a glint of metal inside. The thing that's in there is too large to get out of the opening in the in the stone bag.
John / Doran:This is no problem. I set it on the ground and take
Thomas / Guy:out the crowbar, and I'm
Speaker 8:whack whack whack whack whack.
Tim / GM:Yeah. It only takes a strike or 2 to smash through the stone. And then, as you bring up your crowbar again, whatever was in there has disappeared. You can't see it anymore. The rest of you can see attached to Snack's crowbar is this small metallic disc that has just stuck to the crowbar.
Speaker 7:Oh, good job, Snack.
John / Doran:Snack has not noticed me. He's looking around frantically with his arm raised.
Thomas / Guy:Oh, I I see. Yes.
John / Doran:I meant for this to happen.
Speaker 7:What is that?
Thomas / Guy:This is my crowbar, and
John / Doran:it is now imbued with,
Thomas / Guy:something.
Speaker 10:May I, Snake?
Thomas / Guy:You don't have your own crowbar, Bert?
Speaker 10:I don't.
Thomas / Guy:Well, yes, of course, sir. It's from borrow.
Speaker 10:It's probably cobalt 101, but
Thomas / Guy:it's quite alright. You are new at this. Here you go. Alright. I give it to the crowbar.
Speaker 10:BirdCast, identify on the disc.
Tim / GM:Okay. This is a mundane medal that has been enchanted with a very mundane enchantment.
Speaker 10:This is hardly worth my time.
Tim / GM:It has been magic to be magnetic.
Speaker 10:Well, this isn't normal magnets, which we all know how those work. This is magic.
Tim / GM:Do you wanna pry it off of the crowbar? That seems a little ironic.
Speaker 10:It does, doesn't it? If only I had a second crowbar.
Hannah / Eryn:Okay. Well, while they're doing that, Holly's exploring the dam up top.
Tim / GM:Okay. Yeah. The top of the dam is definitely thinner. You can see a slow trickle of water. Holly, you would assume that if you guys moved this, that there would be a considerable, flow coming down this tunnel of very gross water.
Hannah / Eryn:Can I see anything in the, like, opening beyond, or is it too dark?
Tim / GM:Give me investigation.
Hannah / Eryn:11.
Tim / GM:It's pretty dark up that tunnel, but you can see a very faint violet light farther up.
Hannah / Eryn:Alright. Holly zooms back down to crowbar crowbar Bert.
Speaker 7:I'm gonna try and take it off of the crowbar.
Tim / GM:Yeah. We'll have you and Bert work together, and you're able to to pull the quite powerful magnet off of the crowbar.
Speaker 7:I do have maxed out strength. So
Tim / GM:Yeah. Yeah. It's I don't think it's so difficult that we'd have to roll for it, but you're able to yank
Speaker 8:it off of there.
Speaker 10:Alright. What do we do with this?
Hannah / Eryn:Is there a lot of metal in this room?
Tim / GM:Not really.
Speaker 11:Are there any in the shrine, are any of the walls, like, special looking, like, symbols? Or
Speaker 7:Were there less detailed?
Tim / GM:Yeah. No. Not really. The inscription was the only detail in that room. But even, like, knocking on that, you can tell it's solid stone.
Speaker 7:Alright. Let's break this dam down.
Tim / GM:Yeah. How do you guys wanna go about that?
Speaker 10:You think that's where his grave is?
Speaker 7:I mean, that's the only other way.
John / Doran:Has this pile of bones and detritus always been there?
Tim / GM:Let's clear that up. Snack. Yeah. You are very close to where your actual den is, where you used to live. You know that the dead flush, the beginning of it starts in the arena, and that's what you are close to right now if you go farther up this tunnel.
Tim / GM:You'll find the arena and then your den where your actual home is, and that's that's kind of, like, the heart of your civilization here.
Hannah / Eryn:Beyond the beyond the dam.
Tim / GM:Beyond the dam. Yeah. This dam was not always here. Not that you spent any time in the dead flush really, but this wasn't here before.
Thomas / Guy:If we go further, we will find more of the brood. Are we sure we need to head this way?
Speaker 4:It seems to be the only way.
Speaker 7:Yes. Sorry. Do you not want to see them?
Thomas / Guy:I am not sure. I was not prepared for this. I was wondering if I can seem like something else.
Hannah / Eryn:Well, then they're gonna think I'm you the whole time, so that probably wouldn't be good.
Speaker 7:Do you think I would be able to modify whatever ceiling is on? I could change you guys a little bit if you want.
Hannah / Eryn:I mean, I can look slightly less like snack.
Speaker 7:I'm making you pinker. Okay.
Tim / GM:You all hear a little bit of, cacophony as Emery is beginning to scrape and pull at the bones to break down the dam a little bit.
Speaker 11:Yeah. I'm gonna use necromancy to start pulling away chunks of bones.
Tim / GM:Yeah. Okay. You're pulling away, like, enormous, like, spheres of bones at once.
Speaker 11:They're just, like, rippling away like
Tim / GM:Yeah. And organizing on the walls.
Speaker 11:Yep. They're getting sorted by
Speaker 7:body. These are all tibias.
Tim / GM:He's reconstructing them.
Speaker 7:Do you have a preference? Just not you?
Thomas / Guy:I will stay this way for now.
Speaker 7:Are you sure?
Speaker 10:Snack, you're like 3 fourths of the way to Dragon. You're, far more impressive than you were when we first met you.
Thomas / Guy:Do you think so, Bert? 3 fourths the way? That's that's almost there.
Speaker 10:By my calculations.
Speaker 7:Well, just let me know.
Thomas / Guy:Thank you, Uli.
Speaker 7:It's what friends are for. I'm gonna help pull on the bones.
Tim / GM:Yeah. Emery starts to, like, back up and run away as the flood begins to pour out of the the dam breakage when Tibia pulls away another big chunk of bones. He, like, skitters over in his cobalt form up to the tattered cloth and holds onto it so as not to get his ankles wet.
Speaker 7:Oh, that's foul.
Tim / GM:Yeah. It's not great.
Hannah / Eryn:Oh, wow.
Tim / GM:But after the initial kind of, like, deluge and rush of water here, it levels off to something manageable where you guys can mostly walk outside of the water.
Speaker 11:I leave a little, bone path that's a little bit higher up so that we can walk on that without getting wet.
Tim / GM:Just actively building docks down there with bones.
Speaker 10:So what's next, Snack? What do we have up ahead?
John / Doran:We are approaching
Thomas / Guy:the arena, and beyond that, if memory serves, we should find some cobalt dwellings. The arena,
Tim / GM:You guys find, like, a tangential offshoot from this natural cavern into another constructed tunnel that leads forward. Snack, you know that this is the way to the arena. You also warn them that at the end of this tunnel, that there is a pressure plate in the ground. And if you stand on it, it slams closed the iron portcullis that closes off the arena. Right.
Tim / GM:There are a couple other traps that you are very well aware of in the arena, that we'll get to later on. You all begin moving down this long, dark tunnel of skillfully carved stone punctuated by chunky pillars along the walls. Who is leading this group right now?
John / Doran:I will take points on this.
Hannah / Eryn:Holly tucked her broom. She's walking now
Tim / GM:that
Hannah / Eryn:we got out of the dam area, and she's back not flying in to hide her room again. Okay. I would also say, like, can you give us a scale of the rooms we're in? Are they, like would you say giant sized, or are they small caverns?
Tim / GM:They're actually Snacks Head, really. Okay. It's it's fairly cramped, I would say, the feeling of Snack's head, really.
Hannah / Eryn:Okay.
Tim / GM:It's it's fairly cramped, I would say, the feeling of this place. It's a narrow hallway. Snack, give me a perception check as you walk through this tunnel. 10. Okay.
Tim / GM:You feel a sudden tingling and you hear a brief burst of static. The rest of you can see this weak flash of purple light, as Snack has stepped through a single spider web strand and when he touched it, it broke. And Snack, you could feel your connection to magic cease for a flash when you stepped into it. Mhmm. You lost your connection to Genie.
Tim / GM:You felt sort of sick and mundane for a second, and then it came racing back to you.
Thomas / Guy:Oh, that was a funny step. These webs are new, I think.
Tim / GM:Oh, more boy.
Speaker 10:More of those webs. What if I take point on this one? I I suppose, but
Speaker 7:Oh, yeah. You weren't affected. Right?
Speaker 10:I don't think so. I'm gonna pull out brain gore to chop down any webs along your way.
Hannah / Eryn:Emery, help him out.
Tim / GM:He, kinda looks forward nervously. He says, okay. He, takes out his longsword as well and is kind of, like, level with Bert. Just sort of, like, lazily swinging it up and down as he moves forward.
Speaker 11:Can we get an indication of are these webs newer and fresher than the ones we saw before?
Tim / GM:They are. The few that you see in here, and there's just a couple strands, are glowing with a neon violet light, until they snap, and then they turn into that sort of dead pale purple.
Hannah / Eryn:Are there any, like, holes, like, off the main tunnel here that I can see?
Tim / GM:This looks like a a solid construction tunnel. There's no tangents or openings.
Hannah / Eryn:Ahead seems to be the only way.
Tim / GM:You guys come upon that pressure plate.
Thomas / Guy:Yes. See, there are a few of these out and about, especially in the arena, so be careful when you step on it. It does this.
John / Doran:And then
Tim / GM:Snack steps on it, and you see these 12 iron bars with points on them just, like, rocket into the floor from the ceiling above and close the way.
Speaker 11:Ahead of us or behind us?
Speaker 8:Ahead of you.
Speaker 11:Okay.
Tim / GM:You, step off of the platform, and the bars retract and open the way again.
Speaker 10:Curious.
Speaker 7:How, how far apart are the bars?
Tim / GM:Close enough that a kobold would not be able to slip through them as was often the case when Snack was young. You see, the kobolds would be forced through this tunnel in groups, and the group behind them would step on the plate to make sure the group in front of them couldn't backtrack.
Speaker 4:Rude. What a scary way to live, Snek. I cannot imagine how it feels to be back here.
John / Doran:Yes. We should keep moving. Did you hear anything back there?
Speaker 4:Not that I'm aware of.
Thomas / Guy:Okay. Well, we better we better keep a move on. Watch out for these, though.
Speaker 11:I'm gonna watch behind us a little bit.
Tim / GM:Okay. Yeah. You don't see any movement behind you?
Hannah / Eryn:Holly's looking for any tunnels as we walk along, like, a way to be stealthy
Tim / GM:Mhmm.
Hannah / Eryn:And not just front full frontal approach.
Speaker 7:Like Yeah.
Tim / GM:Well, you're kind of, like, at the exit of this tunnel now, Holly, without having any options for other movement. However, there is just silence when you are looking out into this room. It is very bright with violet neon light coming down from the ceiling. You can see these strands of webs crisscrossing the room everywhere. It is rife with them.
Speaker 7:Does it feel very no magic?
Tim / GM:Yeah. It feels like even being in this room, you can feel this, like, dampening, that that promises to, weaken any of your attempts at magic here. Touching them yields that kind of static shock effect that makes you unable to cast at all.
Speaker 7:Can I try and do a little snap fire bolt
Tim / GM:Sure?
Speaker 7:Like, right next to 1 Yeah. Just to get a spark?
Tim / GM:Just to, like, ignite it, you mean?
Speaker 7:Yeah.
Tim / GM:Yeah. Yeah. You're able to, set one of the strands alight, and it, it burns pretty readily.
Speaker 7:Okay. But doesn't spread?
Tim / GM:No. It's not very thick down where you guys are. It's a lot thicker up higher.
Speaker 10:So we just have to make it through this place called the arena, and then we're at your home, Snick.
Thomas / Guy:Right. Yes.
Speaker 10:Everybody good?
Speaker 7:Oh, boy.
Speaker 10:So you 4 just stay away from the webs, and maybe we'll walk through here and nothing will happen.
Speaker 7:Alright. So
Tim / GM:you have all stepped into the arena. This is set up like a hexagonal amphitheater that you are now in the center of and the lowest point. Looking around, if you imagine a hexagon, 3 of the sides are stairways leading up, and 3 of the sides are walls, that are high platforms. Snack. You also know that there is a chain dangling from the center of this room about 15 feet up.
Tim / GM:If you pull down on that chains, it causes flames to, spill out from these pillars placed around the room. You know that there are also Up on the platforms, there are pressure plates that if you step on 1, it sends a giant column to squish the other two platforms. The webs are incredibly thick higher up until it just becomes a sort of luminous blur of neon purple light, but there is otherwise no action in here.
Thomas / Guy:I do not like this. These webs are new, I believe.
Speaker 10:Let's just keep moving, and we'll get to your home.
Hannah / Eryn:Yeah. How do we get out of here?
Tim / GM:Snack looking forward, kind of from where you guys came in. You can see that there's another iron porkcullis, but something is on the pressure plate keeping it sealed down there. There's a lot of rubble in that tunnel. It looks like there was almost an intentional cave in.
Thomas / Guy:We need to get that, gate open over there.
Speaker 10:Oh, but it's blocked.
Hannah / Eryn:How far across is it?
Tim / GM:Across the arena? Mhmm. Like, 30 feet?
Hannah / Eryn:Oh, it's pretty small. Yeah. Okay.
John / Doran:I will run, over to the other side. And then when I get to
Thomas / Guy:the other side, slow down.
Tim / GM:Okay? I need you to make a and forever, when anyone moves in this room, I need you to make a deck save to not collide with webs.
Thomas / Guy:Oof. 21. That succeeds.
Speaker 7:The more webs we run into and destroy, the less webs there are. Right?
Tim / GM:True. Yeah. Snack, you're able to, kind of dodge above and underneath the webs that are in your way.
John / Doran:Okay. Is the pressure plate inside the arena or is on the outside?
Tim / GM:It is. It's like a mirror of what you came from. So the one you're looking at is a closed portcullis, and then the pressure plate is behind that being stuck down by rubble.
Speaker 11:And it's it's over 30 feet away?
Tim / GM:The pressure plate? It's only, like, 15 feet inside the inside the gate there.
Speaker 11:Okay. I'm gonna get close enough to it so that I can Misty step to the other side of the portcullis to get to that pressure plate.
Tim / GM:Okay. Give me a Dex check as you move.
Hannah / Eryn:Fuck.
Speaker 11:That would be 5.
Tim / GM:Okay. Tibio, you immediately step into a web, and you can feel this, sort of, like, static burn in your mind, and you are disconnected from your magic. Your bones just kinda fall all around you immediately.
Speaker 11:No.
Tim / GM:And you tumble like ass over a tea kettle into more webs, and you become completely wrapped and bound. These things are, like, sticking to you.
Speaker 7:Help. Help. Somebody help.
Speaker 10:Oh, Tim. Oh, okay. I'll try to help.
Tim / GM:Bert, you, move towards Tibio and give me a dexterity check.
Speaker 10:19.
Tim / GM:Okay. Yeah. You managed to, dodge all of the webs on your way over to Tibio. When you get there, Tibio disappears before your eyes as he is pulled straight upwards.
Speaker 10:No. Go. Fuck. Tibio. Tibio.
Speaker 10:You went up there.
Tim / GM:Fuck. The air becomes soft and quiet. You all notice a few lines of neon light begin to buzz and blur as you hear this plucked, distorted, high pitched whine. This The chaotic plucking and distortion swells into a storm of melodic noise. You hear a familiar echoing voice.
Tim / GM:Snack. I'm surprised you came back for an encore. Oh, no. The trouble is, I'm not so much into collecting stories anymore. I'm more into ending them.
Tim / GM:Greygut, close the portcullis. Greygut.
Thomas / Guy:Greygut has been killed, stabbed by this here dagger, and I feel a need to stab you too. Wait. Let me try that again.
Speaker 11:Not bad.
Thomas / Guy:Yes. Yeah.
Tim / GM:You, you see a lot of the webs start to blur and distort. Lysander is so fast on these webs. Well He goes right up to where Tibio disappeared, and he says, I suppose I can start with a small appetizer.
Speaker 7:Don't you touch him.
Tim / GM:Roll initiative.
Thomas / Guy:Oh. 16. 15.
Hannah / Eryn:It's, 11.
Tim / GM:What'd you get, Tib?
Speaker 11:7 total.
Tim / GM:And Uli? 5. In his webs, Lysander is incredibly quick and difficult to hit for all of the, blockages up there. It will not be easy to strike Lysandre while he is high in the webs. While you guys are in this, lower section, you're gonna need to make deck saves every time that you move and every time that you make a deck save for another reason.
Tim / GM:Anytime you try to dodge something, there's a chance that you'll walk into the webs.
Speaker 7:Great.
Tim / GM:You can, at any point, use your action to clear all of the webs on you.
Speaker 11:Do you still get a bonus action if you do that as your action?
Tim / GM:Yep.
Speaker 11:Okay.
Tim / GM:First up, we have snack.
John / Doran:Okay. So I ran into webs before entering the arena. Do I have any, do I notice any effects right now?
Tim / GM:No. You were able to clear that off, and as soon as you did, that static burn stopped.
John / Doran:Well, I am going to, start off
Thomas / Guy:with a good old hex k. On the sander.
John / Doran:Ability checks, I will say dexterity. K.
Thomas / Guy:And, then I'm gonna use eldritch blast.
John / Doran:We're starting off with the 14 to hit.
Tim / GM:That does not hit Lysander. Sorry. You have disadvantage on this attack.
John / Doran:Alright. Oof. Okay. That one's gonna miss too. And then 3rd attack, 25?
John / Doran:25 hits. On the 3rd one. Okay. So
Tim / GM:18 You you hex Lysander, and he momentarily brings his attention to you. He was crawling towards Tibio, and you can see he has changed from what you have seen last time. His torso is about the size of a horse, but you can see these little spherical pustules all over his body. His arachnid limbs are twice as long as you'd expect them to be, and they're like spined on the ends. Like, they have sharp tips.
Tim / GM:He also has these neon, like, centipede legs, like the little tiny, like, phalanges that are growing off of his actual spider legs. It almost makes him look like a centipede and a spider at
Speaker 8:the same time. Awesome. Okay.
Speaker 10:Why
Speaker 11:would you do this to me?
Tim / GM:It's, skittering across the webs at maximum velocity and stops right in front of Tibio and, like, rears back its spider legs to stab into him, and then it catches your hex, and then it looks down at you, and you see these 2, eldritch blasts sort of fade out as they shoot towards him, and then he just smirks down at you. And the third one catches him right in the cheek, and it, like, turns his head and he looks back down at you. He starts to slowly descend, taking his attention away from Tibio. Great. Bert.
Speaker 10:Oh, no. It's me. How high above us is Lissander?
Tim / GM:We'll say he's 60 feet up.
Speaker 10:I'll just do this. Should've done it earlier. I will cast bless on
Speaker 7:Bless this mess. Bless on.
Hannah / Eryn:Bless this mess.
Speaker 7:Thomas, you have to say who. He's just, like, pointing.
Speaker 11:He's like, what are your names?
Speaker 1:You could have
Speaker 11:blessed I
Thomas / Guy:know know
Speaker 10:I've seen you guys.
Hannah / Eryn:He cast he cast blast on Tim.
Speaker 11:No. It'll be
Speaker 10:on the 5 of us. And using my bonus action, I will blast my book up to protect Tibio.
Speaker 11:Okay. Oh, thank you.
Tim / GM:Yeah. You all see the book, like, rocket, like, up through the webs just kind of, like, snapping them as it goes, and then it gets right in front of Tibio. And it Tibio, you're just it just, like, opens its pages on you, and you just see, like, it's talking about when you guys, had dinner with Uli's parents.
Speaker 12:Oh, how nice.
Thomas / Guy:Go but go.
Tim / GM:Next up is Holly.
Hannah / Eryn:Oh, crap. I'm gonna burn this shit down. Down. I'm gonna cast wall of fire.
Speaker 8:Okay.
Hannah / Eryn:I can create a wall of fire on a solid surface within range, which is a 120 feet. So I was trying to think, like, okay, maybe I can just do a straight wall across and try to cut a bunch make a path sort of to the other side.
Tim / GM:Yeah.
Hannah / Eryn:And then just try to, you know, if the webs all fall then to the side, we can kinda clear a middle path.
Tim / GM:And I believe you can do this in a ring too, which would be best for this case.
Hannah / Eryn:Would it be better?
Tim / GM:For for for volume's sake.
Hannah / Eryn:I'll do a ring then instead.
Tim / GM:You make
Speaker 10:it a hexagon? Yeah.
Hannah / Eryn:I'm not a spell shaper.
Tim / GM:Yeah. You create a, roaring ring of fire. Are you in the center of this or on the outside of it?
Hannah / Eryn:No. I'm standing outside.
Tim / GM:Okay.
Hannah / Eryn:I didn't move from I didn't move on purpose.
Tim / GM:Right. Okay. Is there
Speaker 10:a perfect song for this moment?
Tim / GM:Yeah. A scorching circle of flames.
Speaker 10:And it's hot. Hot. Hot.
Tim / GM:Starts up in the middle of the room, and you see the flame or you see the webs, immediately kind of ignite and begin to melt, and you can watch the flames kind of, like, trace up these webs. Mhmm. It gets about halfway up this room in the center, and then you see all of the webs, like, pulse with violet light, and you can see Lysander, like, wrapping his legs around the webs and, like, yanking on them and charging them with something, and the fires die out before it reaches too high. Oh.
Speaker 11:Oh, Sneaky sneaky. Fires die.
Tim / GM:The middle center of this room is completely clear, but it doesn't go up very high.
Hannah / Eryn:Okay.
Tim / GM:Anything else from Holly?
Hannah / Eryn:Is it clear now to move? Yes.
Tim / GM:In that middle part.
Hannah / Eryn:Okay. I think Holly's gonna stay where she is for now Mhmm. And just use the tunnel we are in as sort of, like, back away if needed for protection.
Tim / GM:So yeah. Tib, it is your turn.
Speaker 11:Alright. I'm up in the webbing.
Tim / GM:Yeah.
Speaker 11:I'm gonna use my action to remove that webbing.
Speaker 12:No. Ugh. Yuck. Ugh.
Speaker 11:Get off of me. And, scrapes all of the webs off.
Tim / GM:You are still touching the webs and cannot use magic. You are suspended by the webs. That's the only thing you've got to hold on to up here.
Speaker 11:I'm gonna scrape off the webs, grab the book, and jump.
Tim / GM:Okay. Yeah. You all see Tibio, like, spiraling, like, on his way down.
Speaker 11:And the
Speaker 10:book a parasail.
Tim / GM:The book is like collecting webs and shielding you from hitting them, and you kind of, loft to the floor and, land with a not so graceful funk.
Speaker 7:Mhmm.
Speaker 11:Do I still have my bonus action?
Tim / GM:Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 11:Okay. I'm going to cast spirit shroud
Speaker 8:Okay.
Speaker 11:At a 4th level.
Tim / GM:That leads us to Uli if Tibia was finished.
Hannah / Eryn:Uli
Speaker 7:as a bonus action. Mhmm. I am switching my patch Mhmm. To the snack patch. K.
Speaker 7:I'm going to fireball the sander.
Speaker 11:Okay.
Speaker 7:I don't think I've stepped into the arena yet.
Tim / GM:Okay. So you're just, like, in the doorway?
Speaker 7:Yeah. Yeah. I would like to, like, aim up at him Mhmm. Through webs Mhmm. If that makes sense.
Tim / GM:Yeah. You'll have disadvantage on this as he's still up in his webs.
Speaker 7:Okay. Alright. Natural one.
Tim / GM:Oof. Okay. Yeah. The, fireball just kind of, like, falls out of your hand and, like, lands on the floor, and you're just, like, stomping it out kinda thing. Cool.
Tim / GM:Next up is Lysander. Lysander creeps across his webs, goes kind of towards the middle of this place, and then goes a little high up. And you can see him reach out these arachnid legs, and he can almost span the entire room from edge to edge. And he just grabs, like, random points on each of the webs, And then, you kind of hear this, like, distorted, like as he starts to, like, strum on one of the strings up there. And then with all 8 of his arachnid legs, he begins to pluck all of them, and it becomes this, like, cacophonous distorted, somewhat melodic, but also haunting and nauseating, wave of noise.
Tim / GM:Everyone is taking a thunder damage straight up.
Speaker 10:Okay.
Tim / GM:That is 20 thunder damage to everyone in the room. What the What the fuck? You can just feel this whole place rumble as you get this ear splitting headache that, almost causes you to fall into the webs. You then hear the room go completely silent, and Lysander says, who's ready for their solo? Next up is Emery.
Tim / GM:You hear this long, kinda like,
Speaker 11:shh, sling,
Tim / GM:as he takes out his long sword, like, holds it above his head, still in cobalt form. And you see, the kind of spirit jump out from him and a wreath around his sword, and the sword begins to glow a bright yellow.
Speaker 4:And
Tim / GM:Yay. Emre, like, does this big arc with it, and this yellow slash of energy goes, sailing up towards Lysander, cutting webs, in its path. Cool. Not a great attempt there. You see the arc just kind of start to tilt in an unexpected way as if caught by the wind and just diffuses into the webs.
Tim / GM:That brings us back to snack.
Thomas / Guy:I tire of this webbing.
Tim / GM:Snack. As soon as you talk during Lysander's dread solo, there is an eruption from your mouth, and you are exploded, and you go sailing across the room. Give me a, constitution saving throw.
John / Doran:That's gonna be an 8.
Tim / GM:That is, 16 thunder damage through your resistance, as this like, your words that you speak become extraordinarily loud and send you flying across the room up against the wall. The the noise kind of returns to this room after that. It seems the solo is over.
Thomas / Guy:Oh. Well, that sucked.
John / Doran:I'm going to use my brimstone cloak Mhmm. To Misty Step up to the chain. Okay. And I'm gonna pull on it.
Tim / GM:Okay. Yeah. Your body weight is sufficient to pull down the chain. I need everyone who is in the middle to make a deck save.
Speaker 10:15.
Speaker 11:21.
Tim / GM:K. Bert takes full damage. Tibia takes half damage.
Speaker 11:Rude. Yeah. I super dodged.
Tim / GM:You did have a good dodge. That is 22 full fire damage and 11 half fire damage.
Thomas / Guy:Everyone watch out. Oh.
Tim / GM:These these pillars run floor to ceiling with these brassy pipes that have little slits in them. Snack, when you pull down on this chain, you hear something click, and then it starts to pull the chain back up slowly, but in the interim, all of these vents start to open and you see this blurry heat start to come out of it, and then they ignite with flames. And it just sears everything in the center of this room, much worse than that wall of fire did. Lysander is forced off to the side and has to make a deck save, which he fails and takes 22 fire damage. Yes.
Thomas / Guy:Well, that went surprisingly well.
Tim / GM:Yeah. Snack, you're safe from your position flames die out. You all see Lysander, like, pull on his webs again to stop the burn from spreading. You can tell he's in game terms, he's using his reaction to do so. Bert, it's your turn.
Tim / GM:Just coughing out ash and smoke.
Speaker 10:Is Les Andrews still up there?
Tim / GM:Yeah. He is. He's just on the outer ring of the webs.
Speaker 8:Let me
Speaker 10:use healing word to top myself up.
Tim / GM:K. It's a bonus action. Right?
Speaker 8:Yep. K.
Speaker 10:I get 10 HP back. Then I'm gonna hit Lissander with a Sacred Flame.
Speaker 8:K.
Speaker 10:Calling down a divine flame. He has to make a dex check. Dex save.
Tim / GM:Wow. Well, Sandra has incredible dexterity. That is a 15.
Speaker 10:I think that's a fail. Yep. 16 is my DC.
Tim / GM:Yeah. He rolled extremely poorly.
Thomas / Guy:Okay.
Speaker 10:16 damage.
Tim / GM:Okay. Like, as you're casting bird, he looks down and even says, he's like, your flames aren't going to work. Nothing's going to work. You're all going to die here. And you cast up a sacred flame at him, and he just goes, it's not going to.
Tim / GM:And he just, like, skitters away from them. You can tell that this is eating through him, this radiant damage. Damn.
Thomas / Guy:Do we all notice this? Yeah.
Tim / GM:He is he is afraid of that shit. He skitters away to a different side of the webs, leaving him with just one little corner left where he can hide up there.
Speaker 10:I'd have a satisfying quip, but I see what happened to Snack last time.
Tim / GM:That leaves us to Holly.
Hannah / Eryn:I I don't think our magic is gonna be very good here, but those crushy pillars I mean, what do you do with spiders? You crush them. Right? Oh, yeah. Stop them.
Hannah / Eryn:So maybe we need to get him to get to one of those pillars while one of us does the button.
Speaker 7:I think it's a plan.
Hannah / Eryn:Is Lysander near one of the pillars right now?
Tim / GM:Yeah. He is he is kind of, like, hovering above one of those pillar platform things.
Hannah / Eryn:Okay. Holly's gonna cast sunbeam. A beam of brilliant light flashes from your hand in a 5 foot wide, 60 foot long line. Damn. Damn.
Hannah / Eryn:You gotta make a constitution saving throw.
Tim / GM:15. So this would be against your spell save 15, which he passed.
Hannah / Eryn:Dang it. Oh, wait. He takes some damage though still, I think. On I was hoping to try to clear out some Webbys while I cast that too.
Tim / GM:Yeah. You see a lot of the webs begin to, like, smolder and weaken, so it's less of, like, they ignite, but you can see them kind of, like, almost like holding a magnifying glass to it. They slowly begin to break and detach and burn. You see that radiant damage. This sunlight pours over Lysander, and you see him begin to scream again and skitters as if you had just uncovered a spider beneath a rock, but he, like, scrambles out of the way and goes lower onto the platform.
Tim / GM:You also see him, like, throw his hands around his torso, like, to cover himself, almost, like, to cover his skin from the burns. When he gets down and closer to all of you, you can tell that these spherical pustules on his body are small eyeballs.
Hannah / Eryn:Oh, that is so
Speaker 11:gross. Oh.
Tim / GM:He is covered with eyes and has lost his goddamn mind, and the eyes are all shut tight away from the sunlight.
Speaker 11:Eyeballs, Eyeballs.
Speaker 10:Eyeballs.
Speaker 7:Y'all. I I feel bad for him. That's so gross.
Tim / GM:I don't Tibio's turn.
Speaker 11:Okay. I am going to be across from him so that he's facing me. I'm facing the pillar area, so I don't want him to try and get anywhere else. Mhmm.
Speaker 12:2 can play at that game.
Speaker 11:And I whip out my loot, and I give it a couple strums.
Tim / GM:Mhmm.
Speaker 11:And I go, and I cast a snoot whispers at a 5th level.
Speaker 8:K.
Speaker 11:Yeah. And he has to make a wisdom saving throw.
Tim / GM:12.
Speaker 11:Fails. Okay. He takes 3 d 6 psychic damage plus another 4 d 6 for it being level 5.
Hannah / Eryn:Wow. Damn.
Speaker 11:In addition, my spirit shroud
Tim / GM:Ah, yeah.
Speaker 11:Gives me 2 d 8 of the type. I will choose radiant. Oh my god.
Speaker 7:Okay. Let's
Tim / GM:keep that
Speaker 8:separate then.
Hannah / Eryn:So many dice.
Speaker 11:Okay. 20 psychic damage.
Tim / GM:Damn.
Speaker 11:So my my scares the shit out of them.
Tim / GM:Mhmm.
Speaker 11:And then my birds that are floating around my head start dive bombing him for 8 radiant damage.
Speaker 8:Okay. So 16 on that.
Hannah / Eryn:You know, spiders are more afraid of you than you are of them.
Speaker 7:That's true.
Hannah / Eryn:So this is a perfect example.
Tim / GM:Yeah. You see Lysander, like, back up all the way until he's got like, half of his legs are pressed up against the wall and sort of, like, curled in on himself, and then the other legs are, like, up towards his head. And he's trying to, like, cover his ears, and he's just, like, rapidly shaking back and forth and squirming and shouting. You can tell that he is beyond bloodied and, scared shitless. Next up is Uli.
Speaker 7:Can I see a platform from where I am? Yes. Dimension door to the platform.
Tim / GM:Okay. Yeah. You just kind of, appear on you know, we'll say that Lysander is, you know, on the northeast platform, and you just kind of appear on the northwest platform. You can see a couple times that his spider appendages come dangerously close to the pressure plate that would cause it to drop on you. Give me a Dex check on your way up there to, see if you collide with any webs.
Speaker 11:Natural one.
Tim / GM:Oh. Oh. Okay.
Speaker 4:Oh, fucking
Tim / GM:kidding me. Uli, you are, you get, like, right up to the pressure plate and you're right in front of it and you become tangled in webs and, like, you're just trying to, like, get a foot onto it to cause this thing to squish. And you're just, like, leaning forward and leaning forward. And you see on the other side, Lysander is, like, scrabbling and trying to back away from you and is, like, slamming down his little arachnid legs everywhere, and you see it just barely missed the pressure plate, like, a bunch of times.
Speaker 7:And I'm, like, restrained?
Tim / GM:Yeah. You're you're essentially, like, hanging like, leaning over the pressure plate, just waiting for your body weight to drop onto this thing. Is there anything else?
Speaker 7:Can I rage?
Tim / GM:Yes.
Hannah / Eryn:She's so angry. Yeah.
Tim / GM:You use your rage I mean, because this is a pretty frustrating situation to be in. Mhmm. You use your rage, and you see whenever Lysander was putting out those flames, you could see him charge his webs, and they would glow extra bright for a second, and the flames would stop. You start glowing in the same way, charging the webs around you, and they start to smolder. And then they burn and snap, and you fall face forward, taking 3 bludgeoning damage onto the pressure plate.
Speaker 7:Face first into the plate.
Tim / GM:Mhmm.
Speaker 7:Because I raged, I auto surge and get a spell if I'm not restrained by magic damps
Tim / GM:anymore. You're not anymore. However, as soon as you hit that pressure plate, you all hear a big click that echoes throughout this place and a rush of air that you can all feel no matter where you are in this room. And then your teeth hurt as soon as these things collide with the ground. It is so loud.
Tim / GM:Just one stone as these things hit the ground. They fall at the exact same pace even though one of them has Lysander underneath it. It just doesn't care about him,
Hannah / Eryn:and he pops. Oh, girl.
Tim / GM:Every every piece of Lysander is on the outside of this pillar now, just in
Speaker 7:different directions. Yuck.
Tim / GM:Uli, what do you do with your magic?
Speaker 7:I'm gonna surge first.
Tim / GM:Okay.
Speaker 7:For the next minute, any flammable object I touch that isn't being worn or carried by another creature bursts into flames.
Speaker 10:What the
Speaker 11:Alright. Okay. Topical.
Tim / GM:Yeah.
Speaker 7:So I feel like I would just
Hannah / Eryn:Run around.
Speaker 7:Run around. Okay. And also fire bolt
Speaker 10:Okay.
Speaker 7:As I'm doing it. I don't know. I'm just getting rid of webs. Also, I can use flame breath as I don't know.
Tim / GM:Okay. Yeah. Uli just turns into
Speaker 7:a volcano and,
Tim / GM:scorches down every last bit of web in this room. But before you're finished with your work, Uli, Genie pops out being a little less timid now that the webs have been cleared, and he just goes, wait. Wait.
Speaker 1:Wait. Wait. Wait. Wait. Wait.
Tim / GM:He, gets right in front of Uli and grabs the last bit of webs off the wall. He says, I have an idea. And he, hovers over to Holly, and he kind of no. With the just
Speaker 7:Well yep.
Tim / GM:I don't know how to do it. You can I
Hannah / Eryn:don't know? I mean, I can try. I
Speaker 1:but I think he's gonna love them.
Tim / GM:Just give it a shot. Okay. He pulls away, and, he looks at Holly and says, okay, ready? Get the weave thread. And, Holly, Jeanie has asked you to wrap your weave thread and sort of braid it with this neon spider web.
Speaker 7:Mhmm.
Tim / GM:You kind of hold the webs and begin to wrap your weave thread around as Genie is, like, pulling away on the webs and also charging them with his own magic. When you're finished, he pulls away 3 golden threads, and he moves over to Tibio, and he says, do you wanna restring your lute? I had an idea.
Speaker 11:Sure. Of course. And I pull out my lute.
Tim / GM:These webs have some pretty good, let's call it melody magic.
Speaker 4:Oh, that's amazing.
Speaker 7:This is some Kubo shit. Yeah.
Tim / GM:He, helps you restring your lute. It now has 3 golden strings.
Hannah / Eryn:Sick. Cute.
Tim / GM:This is basically like you get 3 strings to use, and you choose how you wanna use them here. You can spend 1 string to cast daylight and thunder wave at the same time. You can use 1 string to cause a target to become wreathed in golden flame, changing all of their damage to radiant.
Speaker 7:Like an ally?
Tim / GM:Yeah. Sweet. Oh. Or you can use 2 strings to grant everyone within 10 feet advantage on their next attack. Wow.
Tim / GM:With 3 strings, you'll be able to do that once per day and then still have one other string left over. And something else, just an idea I had. Pauley, I've got this one. He, grabs a little, like, remaining piece of web and just kind of, like, pulls on it. He takes one of his thumbs and he, like, sticks it into Snack's scales, and then he starts walking around Snack in a circle.
Tim / GM:And you see the web change from violet and sort of magic dampening to a bright crimson red, snack. We're gonna call these your crimson streaks. While flying, you move at 4 times flying speed.
Speaker 11:Fuck. What the what?
Speaker 10:You just get racing stripes?
Speaker 11:Yeah. Damn. Oh my god.
Thomas / Guy:Do these actually make me faster, Jeanie? I feel I feel faster.
Tim / GM:In this
Speaker 1:case, they do. Wow. Lysander was pretty quick and, well, we squished him, so now you're pretty quick.
Thomas / Guy:Thank you, Jeanie.
Speaker 1:Thank you. I hated that bug.
Hannah / Eryn:Nice craftsmanship, and Holly's, like, checking out the streaks on the side of the scales.
Tim / GM:She's got a racing stripe.
Speaker 10:Snack, that's 2 of your enemies dead in one day. How do you feel?
Thomas / Guy:3rd time's the charm. Let's keep this going.
Speaker 7:No one else feels bad a little bit.
Speaker 11:No. For Lysander? Yeah. No. He was a shitty guy.
Speaker 10:He said he didn't even wanna hear one of my stories again.
Hannah / Eryn:Did you see all those eyeballs?
Tim / GM:Looking up in here, there's, of course, parts of this fight that you didn't see. There are a lot of bodies in among these webs. Some of them have been, like, burned or dropped, but they're all just husks. But there's, you know, probably 30, 40 of them up on the webs.
Speaker 4:Embry, does any of this look familiar to you or to your spirit friend?
Tim / GM:He's, staring at the kind of squished guts of the dryer, and he says, you mean the eyeballs?
Speaker 4:Yes. I do mean the eyeballs. It just sounded very much like your story.
Tim / GM:I thought so too. And this guy, he didn't have these last time I met him in that other cave. Remember that?
Speaker 4:Yes. He has changed very much since that time.
Tim / GM:I wonder who else that creature is doing this to.
Speaker 4:Maybe that is something that we need to go solve at some point.
Tim / GM:He says, yeah. Maybe. That, portcullis that was closed. Tibio, you briefly misty stepped into there?
Speaker 11:Oh, I didn't make it that far. I got grabbed before
Thomas / Guy:I could.
Speaker 8:Okay. Yeah.
Speaker 11:Okay. But I would like to misty step there.
Tim / GM:Okay. Tibio misty steps behind the portcullis, and you're able to clear rubble off of the, pressure plate, to open the gate forward. It's a tight squeeze getting through there. It looks like there was an intentional cave in or collapse to prevent, Lisander getting any further. But once you push past there, you look forward into this large natural fissure that is strung with ropes and bridges running from one wall to the other.
Tim / GM:So it's this extremely narrow, but extremely tall, like, 100 foot tall chasm, that's maybe only 10 to 15 feet wide at any given point. There's a bunch of, like, ropes and rope bridges leaning from either side, and there's a bunch of tiny, like, pocket holes where things are living. Parts of the room are, like, moving in time with the trap or the intervals at which this mountain moves, and so at different times, you can see like water splashing into here through like an aqueduct. At different times, you can see flames being released into the room and like sulfurous smoke and stuff. And then you hear,
Speaker 8:is that my block? I thought you died. Could've sworn you died.
John / Doran:Snack hides behind Tibio.
Tim / GM:You see a a rather, like, old and, like, kind of powdery, scaly looking red cobalt walk towards your group.
Speaker 10:Aren't you, like, 3 times bigger than Tibia?
Tim / GM:Yep. He's staring straight down at you. He bears a striking resemblance to snack.
Speaker 11:How tall is
Tim / GM:this Cobalt? It's about as tall as Cobalt's get, so about as tall as Eutibio, maybe a little taller.
Speaker 11:As gnome form or a skeleton form?
Tim / GM:Gnome form.
Speaker 11:Sorry. So he's looking up at us?
Tim / GM:Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Most of you.
Speaker 11:Yeah. Okay.
Thomas / Guy:You thought I died?
Speaker 8:You disappeared. What what was I supposed to expect? Do you want me to come looking for you? No. No.
Speaker 8:You're all friends?
Thomas / Guy:These are my allies.
Tim / GM:Allies.
Speaker 9:Oh, are you? I'm a kolb. Snatch.
Speaker 10:Where are regular kobolds?
Speaker 8:You all call me hardtail.
Thomas / Guy:Mhmm.
Speaker 7:Snack. Why do they call you block?
Thomas / Guy:My name is Snack. Yes. Once, my name was Balak.
Speaker 8:Balak was small, weak. Knew he wasn't going to make it, so I call him Snack. Snack. Snack, you are now my oldest son.
Speaker 7:Looks like he made it.
Thomas / Guy:An heir?
Tim / GM:In air. And he kinda, like, looks behind him. And this place is, like, pretty, like, ramshackled. It's clear that they're in much worse shape than they used to snack. There's maybe a fourth of the kobolds here.
Tim / GM:Says, I suppose you're going
Speaker 8:to want to meet, the rest of your family.
Tim / GM:He, starts gesturing to other small kobolds in the room. This is Jakey. This is Kiki. This is 3 key. He points to a few more and says, this is 4, 5, and 7, and this is Martin.
Tim / GM:Hi, everyone. This is your oldest brother's snack.
Speaker 8:Balak.
Speaker 10:Well, there's more of you than there are nisses.
Speaker 11:That's pretty impressive. Kiki, 3 k457, and Martin.
Thomas / Guy:Hello, siblings.
Tim / GM:There's a smattering of
Thomas / Guy:My name is Snack, and this is my other family.
Speaker 9:Yes.
Speaker 10:Bye.
Tim / GM:A few of them, like, lean in and kind of sniff around you, and then they, like, shake their heads like they smelled something bitter.
Hannah / Eryn:Holly chomps her fangs.
Speaker 8:They look at you and they say, bad smell, kobolds.
Speaker 9:Speak for yourselves.
Speaker 7:Search for smell.
Speaker 10:We had to go through a poop shoot to get here.
Tim / GM:Snack your father says, fun.
Thomas / Guy:Yeah.
Speaker 10:It was cool.
Speaker 8:How did you elude, the spider?
Thomas / Guy:Lysander has been squished.
Speaker 9:Yes. Squished.
Thomas / Guy:That was Lysander?
Speaker 12:Yes.
Thomas / Guy:It was indeed.
Speaker 8:He grew up,
John / Doran:grew very big.
Thomas / Guy:Yes.
Speaker 12:Something, very icky happened to him. He was covered in eyes.
Speaker 8:He killed many of us. Many, many.
Speaker 9:Well, now we're your heroes because we killed him.
Hannah / Eryn:No. Holly pushes 1 of the kobolds away with her foot because he's, like, the little brother is getting too close. Yeah.
Tim / GM:Yeah. 3 key, like, snaps back at you. Mhmm.
Speaker 8:You've saved nothing. We are still slaves to the dragon.
Speaker 10:Maybe we kill him next,
Speaker 8:Small snack. Snack for a dragon.
Speaker 12:Have you seen him lately? Look at our dull ears.
Speaker 10:I think that's an outdated nickname.
Tim / GM:Some of your younger siblings are now looking at you, Snack, and they are kind of marveling at your size. And they're just, like, looking up towards your your father, and they say,
Speaker 7:are we going to get that big? As big as him?
Hannah / Eryn:I love tiny babies.
Tim / GM:He looks down at them, and he says, no.
Speaker 8:No. This is dark magics. He is a false.
Speaker 7:Not dark. Golden.
John / Doran:Snacks stands up straight.
Tim / GM:A lot of your siblings, like, go really quiet and take a couple steps back and kind of,
Thomas / Guy:we know of this dragon. This is why I have returned. We must deliver justice.
John / Doran:And, I'm gonna use thaumaturgy, and just make my voice, like, boom Yeah. With the justice line and echo.
Tim / GM:You all see the bridge as kind of a shutter, and, you see all of the flame vents in this room open up at the same time. You feel like this fissure might close in on you any second as the place rumbles with Snec's words.
Thomas / Guy:Why so few, father? Mhmm. Where are the rest of the kobolds? They they serve him. Vixi.
Tim / GM:The whole room kind of, like, turns to look at you. You just have, like, kobold eyes fixed on you from every angle, and a few of them are just like
Speaker 10:I'm
Speaker 11:gonna cast minor illusion
Tim / GM:Mhmm.
Speaker 11:And make the golden flight mark on Snack's head, like, glow.
Tim / GM:Your father, you hear him, what is this.
Thomas / Guy:I too have allegiance to a dragon. Pathetic.
Speaker 8:You think you're you think you're special. You think you're mightier than your father.
Thomas / Guy:That is not important to me, whether that be true. We have come here to deal with this dragon. What can you share?
Speaker 8:It sleeps much much more than dragons sleep every night.
Thomas / Guy:Are you getting this down, Bert?
Speaker 10:Munch is getting this down. Yep. So,
Speaker 7:Munch, Bert.
Thomas / Guy:Munch. Yes.
Speaker 8:There is a path through the caldera. We can feel the warmth behind the door of markings, though we cannot open it. But that is where the dragon sleeps. You may go and die, for all I care.
Speaker 11:Fuck you too, dad.
John / Doran:Snack takes a close look
Thomas / Guy:at all his siblings. Does he notice anything about them?
Tim / GM:They're not, like, dragonmarked or anything. They they seem they seem like they don't know much about the world. They seem like they've been brought up in poverty and strife. We'll say Martin, the youngest, walks up to you and says,
Speaker 11:Are you
Speaker 7:a dragon?
Thomas / Guy:Not yet, Martin.
Tim / GM:He said he points to your tail and just to your huge body, and he says, but you are. You're a dragon.
Thomas / Guy:I believe that I believe Munch said 3 fourths of the way there, but that is the plan, Martin.
Tim / GM:Genie is speaking to you from the lamp without making an appearance, but you can hear this rumbling, calling out from your lamp saying, maybe it is time.
Thomas / Guy:What? Genie.
Tim / GM:Let's make it official. I I promised you a long time ago that I'd turn you into a dragon. Snack, I can't do it quite yet. Okay? I just need a little time.
Tim / GM:We're close. I promise. It'll happen in Vindorin.
Thomas / Guy:All we have to do is deal with this dragon and survive, and then I can be a
Tim / GM:I'm afraid so. It's all about timing, you see? And if I well, we need to stay like this for just a little longer, but I think we should look forward to it. Snack, I think you should choose your name, and I hope I'm not being too forward, but, Snack, I'd like to share my name with you. Would you take on my last name as part of your dragon title?
Speaker 7:Is he pronouncing?
Thomas / Guy:I, that depends entirely on what your name is.
Tim / GM:I once told you my name is Doji. Doji Kalacious. I've always thought Snackalicious
Speaker 12:has such
Tim / GM:a nice ring to it. Would you become snackalicious for me? Thanks so much for listening. I'm Tim, your DM and your genie.
Hannah / Eryn:I'm Hannah playing Holly Hyacinth.
Speaker 10:I'm Thomas. I play Engelbert FF Wisherspoon.
Speaker 11:I'm Tara, and I play Tibio Femur.
John / Doran:I'm John. I play Snack the kobold.
Speaker 7:And I'm Maggie playing Uli.
Speaker 1:Hi. It's me, your genie. Thanks for listening to people being other people. If you wanna help Master Snack and his servants, you could make my wish come true by following us on Instagram at pbop_podcast. That's p b o p underscore podcast.
Speaker 1:Thank you very much.
