Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: It.
Good evening, crew members.
How are you all today?
[00:00:09] Speaker B: How are you?
[00:00:10] Speaker C: Good.
[00:00:12] Speaker B: Slightly terrified of the villain in the swivel chair with the white cat.
[00:00:16] Speaker A: Right. I can't do a swivel because I'm attached to everything. But we'll make do. Yes.
This is just a cat takeover, isn't it? We've got multiple cats on screen at all times, so, yeah, why not have a third? Hello, I'm DM Dan, and you lot are the players of explorers of elsewhere's blaze in the dark campaign. Alicia rising. Are you not?
[00:00:42] Speaker D: Here we are.
[00:00:43] Speaker E: Yes.
[00:00:44] Speaker C: Sounds right.
[00:00:45] Speaker A: Sounds about right.
We are starting to get into the thick of it. Episode three, suffered. Things are definitely happening.
And I think now we should just kind of let you loose into the city willy nilly. How does that sound?
[00:01:03] Speaker B: Terrifying. Terrifying.
[00:01:07] Speaker A: Okay, well, yeah, let's see what direction you lot run in after this title screen.
[00:01:18] Speaker E: Welcome to Alicia, the jewel of the north. On our gilded streets, fortune and fame can be found by anyone.
[00:01:30] Speaker B: Hi, I'm Julia, and I'm playing Magpie, an ace of r lurk.
[00:01:35] Speaker D: Hi, I'm nate, and I'm playing cavern, a dragon scent slide.
[00:01:40] Speaker B: Hi, I'm Meg. I'm playing Frida, a wolfkin cutter.
[00:01:45] Speaker C: Hi, I'm JC, and I'll be playing Alganon, an ace of r spider.
[00:01:50] Speaker E: Hello, I'm Errol. I am playing Atta, a goblin whisper.
[00:01:55] Speaker A: And my name is DM Dan. I will be the games master on this adventure.
[00:02:01] Speaker E: Now, come on in and marvel at our wonders. Make sure you see the beautiful views we have to offer. And don't mind the ghosts. They're friendly, really. Grab yourselves a seat and make yourselves welcome in the city of Alicia.
[00:02:23] Speaker A: After Alicia was sealed away inside a shimmering blue sphere, life, as the citizens knew it, was turned upside down. Families torn apart, homes lost to the void, communities wracked with fear. But one thing has remained relatively constant, a general mistrust of anything with an arcane nature. After all, we have all heard a story or two of careless wizards meeting accidentally explosive ends.
But counter to the suspicion and wariness of arcane practitioners and their tools comes an acknowledgment that arcane potential has enriched and sometimes even saved the lives of many.
Thusly, in a city where arcane items are considered illegal, there is a market for under the table acquisition and sales of such goods.
And where there are people in demand, there must be people in supply.
Brave, daring people who aren't afraid of a little light smuggling.
[00:03:37] Speaker B: Sure is.
[00:03:38] Speaker A: And so where do we find this misfit? Bunch of five, all kind of gathered together on the morning of your first big sponsored run.
[00:04:00] Speaker C: We've probably just got into the specter, into the downstairs speakeasy area. We've sort of seen the crowd outside disperse, narrowly avoiding a violent conflict with the guard.
And Algonon has been given a note that he will want to share with the rest of you.
[00:04:23] Speaker A: Okay.
And sure enough, there is a note that arrived via courier not just mere minutes ago.
And it is inscribed in the slightly wobbly and sweat smeared ink handwriting of one Mustovan, the leader of the coalition of gangs known as the cobbles.
The letter reads, dear friends, there is a warehouse industry hill that I've found myself storing certain items in.
Due to current social political disruption, the owners of the warehouse have found themselves misplaced. I urgently require an item from my inventory within the warehouse and returning it to my stronghold would be greatly appreciated.
Attached are some drawings of said item I require retrieving, drawn by our expert, old Tom.
[00:05:56] Speaker D: Is lazy Tom now? Old?
[00:05:59] Speaker A: No, there's two. There's two. Presumably it's lazy Tom's dad.
[00:06:09] Speaker D: Yeah, old Tom taught everything to lazy Tom, all he knows.
[00:06:15] Speaker A: So as you look at the kind of attached bit of parchment, you see what looks like an orb with a number of kind of what seemed like the drawing doesn't help and it requires atta taking a quick peek to sort of piece together some of the ideas. But, yeah, so it's a sphere with what appear to be these kind of like bands that wrap around it.
One of you, from sort of like Magpie, from your perspective, almost looks a bit like a ball of yarn. Until atta kind of starts pointing out that, no, this looks like some sort of like arcane apparatus.
It's relatively.
Just from the general kind of the look of it at. Or I suspect you've probably seen and kind of dabbled with things like this in the past, but, yeah, generally the bands are likely some sort of metal contained around this kind of orb that in a pseudo protection kind of thing, the bands will slide round and move. There's usually kind of runic inscriptions along the metal bands and so on and so forth.
And Algonon, as the picture of this thing is being looked at, you noticed, you note down the address of this warehouse and, yeah, within Dustry Hill.
You know it to be like looking at the street name.
It is quite near.
So it's the northern half of Dustry Hill. So it's north of the river, like north of the canal, about two thirds of the way up the hill before you reach the vale, reach the barrier.
There are a number of kind of warehouse. It's a bit of a warehouse district, if you will. There's a number of kind of storage container, warehouse type buildings in that area.
Just like out of the way kind of thing, but still relatively near a main road for retrieval.
And you also see that musto would like you to transport this to a second address, this time in Waterside. So over the address of that, you know it to be on the sort of like southeastern side of the river. So you have to go down through Dustry Hill, cross the bridge over the river at waterside to get to your destination. In the grand scheme of things, not a particularly long journey, but quite public, especially in and around Waterside and the market.
Upon delivery, the letter continues.
I've instructed my men to hand you the grandsum of six coin.
[00:09:33] Speaker D: Can we gauge from the picture what sort of size it is at all?
[00:09:40] Speaker A: From the picture, no, from Atta. You would probably know that something of this size is relatively bulky, probably about two foot in diameter.
So it's not something that you could hide under a coat, for example.
[00:10:07] Speaker D: I was going to say it's nothing. You can pop up your Jumper.
[00:10:09] Speaker A: No.
[00:10:10] Speaker B: So how big did you say? Sorry, Dan.
[00:10:12] Speaker A: About two foot in diameter. This orb. Okay.
[00:10:15] Speaker B: So quite sizable.
[00:10:16] Speaker A: Quite sizable, yeah. You wouldn't be able to hold it in one hand. It would be a two handy job.
[00:10:21] Speaker B: Or you'd need to transport the real dummy to you. Dummy kind of thing. Okay.
[00:10:27] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:10:29] Speaker B: How heavy? Do we know how heavy it is.
[00:10:34] Speaker A: That until you pick it up, you wouldn't know.
[00:10:36] Speaker B: Can you not tell us slightly? Give us some idea?
[00:10:40] Speaker A: Is it kind of put you back.
[00:10:42] Speaker B: Out heavy, or is it, given it.
[00:10:45] Speaker A: Even if it were relatively light, it would be quite cumbersome to hold still, bulky.
So that's all the detail that musto really kind of goes into where it is, what it is, and where it needs to go. To this archive, you note the absence of what it is, specifically what its purpose is, or any kind of real detail on the artifact. And given what you know about musto, it's tough to say whether he either forgot to inform you, he doesn't care to inform you, or he just doesn't know.
Algonon, is there any information that you would like to gather, and if so, how are you going to do that?
[00:11:35] Speaker C: Well, I'm rather curious about the fact this warehouse's previous owners were misplaced.
I do wish muster would be rather more forthcoming with his information.
I also don't suspect that what he's asking us to procure belongs to him. But that's not really our.
[00:11:56] Speaker A: I mean, from everything you know about musto, you realize he's rarely completely above board and honest.
[00:12:03] Speaker C: He's always sending us to pick up his own possessions from some place or another in the city. Why doesn't he just have the keys?
[00:12:11] Speaker E: You don't think he's trying to set us up?
[00:12:16] Speaker C: I hope not. But if it comes to that, then I'm sure we can be prepared to outwit that sweaty little man.
Shouldn't be hard.
[00:12:29] Speaker A: So, yeah.
Is there any information that you're looking to gather?
[00:12:35] Speaker C: Yeah, I would like to find out who the building's owners are, and I thought maybe I could have a word with my old boy, Fairfax.
[00:12:47] Speaker A: Okay, so in which case we find you in abbotscape around approximately lunchtime.
Same place, same time. And as you take a seat with Fairfax on the bench that the two of you have graced so many times in the past, and Fairfax, just like always.
What does Fairfax look like?
[00:13:21] Speaker C: He's a sort of brow beaten civil servant working for a government who I've been spending the last two years under martial law, an architect for a department that doesn't tend to need much architecture.
He's an old school chum, probably the best friend that Algodon's ever had from Morton College for boys.
[00:13:45] Speaker A: Okay, in which case, yeah, this very kind of tired looking lorevar sits next to you wearing the same coat he always wears. He produces, like, his lunch sashle that he always carries his lunch in. And as he kind of opens up and looks at the kind of, the mushroom and eel mush that's contained within, there's the same kind of discontented sigh from the man.
And as he's kind of poking at this kind of gray mush that he's got kind of balanced on his lap, he looks up at the sphere over the veil overhead and sort of like the purple light that rains through it, and he sighs and you see the droplets of drizzle kind of bouncing off his forehead.
[00:14:46] Speaker C: Jolly boating weather, old boy.
[00:14:51] Speaker A: You know, of all of the things that I miss, Algie, I think I miss the sea the most.
Strips down to the beach, you know.
[00:15:07] Speaker C: Quiet. You don't miss the blue sky. That's the thing that affects me the most. But with us being old sky blues.
[00:15:13] Speaker A: And all, well, I suppose perhaps I've become a bit enamored with the hue.
Lovely amethyst, wouldn't you say? And you can hear that he's like the. The cracks in his voice is almost trying to push through any degree of positivity in this conversation, but his shoulders slump and he looks to you.
[00:15:42] Speaker C: Well, I thought I might tempt you from the office stool once again. Fairfax.
[00:15:48] Speaker A: Yes, it's always a pleasure. What can I do for you, sir?
[00:15:51] Speaker C: I pass him a little piece of paper with the address of this warehouse.
[00:15:56] Speaker A: He reaches inside his sort of like jacket pocket, pulls out a thin pair of spectacles, balances on the end of his nose and kind of has a little look. He looks at the address, he frowns a Bit and yes, Amringer, yes, that warehouse, Amringer and daughters, yes, it's a warehouse up industry hill. He's used it to kind of gather. It used to be to gather all of his antiques before the vast majority of what else Amringer owned disappeared on the other side of the veil. But what exactly do you want this for?
[00:16:44] Speaker C: We are just hoping to arrange a little game of rugby with an unusual.
[00:16:54] Speaker A: Yes, Amariga. Fine upstanding gentleman.
[00:17:00] Speaker C: And has he been misplaced would you say, during the last two years?
[00:17:06] Speaker A: He frowns and Fairfax frowns for a moment and well, I can't imagine why he would. I mean with all of the trouble over in Old Town, I can't imagine a fine upstanding ace of r like Amringer would or his daughters would have anything to do with that sort of nonsense.
I mean Amringer always kept very good social circles. He rubbed a lot of shoulders with some of the.
So yeah, I can't imagine him getting kind of muddied with the riff raff. And that's really the only reason why I could think that he might have gone missing. I mean he's such an inoffensive man, I can't imagine he would have irritated anyone, except maybe other antique dealers.
[00:17:55] Speaker C: Sometimes the inoffensive don't mean to cause offense, but they end up doing it anyway.
[00:18:01] Speaker A: Well, if you do happen to see Amringer, I mean, fingers crossed, maybe he's just locked himself in there or something. Do say hello.
And yes, if you ever need an extra a spare for that rugby team, I'd be more than happy to jump in. Oh boy.
Thank you.
[00:18:18] Speaker C: Fairfax.
Fairfax.
[00:18:21] Speaker A: Yes?
[00:18:22] Speaker C: What's your favorite variety of mushroom?
[00:18:26] Speaker A: He is taken aback by your question and then he slowly looks down at his food. And not this, he says as he just starts poking through it a bit more.
[00:18:38] Speaker C: It just occurred to me recently, that's the sort of thing I should know about you.
[00:18:44] Speaker A: He thinks about it and once upon a time I would have said a good old portobello.
But now the thought of something so bulbous. Makes my stomach turn quite well.
[00:19:02] Speaker C: I'm heading over to waterside soon. I'll keep an eye out for you.
[00:19:08] Speaker A: Thank you, he says.
[00:19:10] Speaker C: Cheerio, old boy.
[00:19:12] Speaker A: He nods. There's a hint of sincerity on his voice. And he waves you off. And you see him just kind of prodding at his food with his fork.
Okay, so you have a name. Does anyone else want to do some gathering?
[00:19:28] Speaker E: The thing that I was thinking of, although I don't know whether I would be the best person to do this. Is figuring out the optimal route and then potential. What's the word? Like, alternative routes.
[00:19:43] Speaker B: Should that primary route get basically my one as well.
[00:19:51] Speaker A: Yeah, that makes sense.
Do the two of you want to go do that together?
[00:19:59] Speaker B: We could collaborate, couldn't we, on that one?
[00:20:04] Speaker E: I remember from one of the other sessions about. Is there a version of the help action?
[00:20:12] Speaker A: Yes. So you can help someone else in exchange for one stress, I believe.
[00:20:22] Speaker B: Give them an extra die or something.
[00:20:25] Speaker E: Yeah.
[00:20:27] Speaker B: Shall I take the stress or do you.
[00:20:30] Speaker E: I'm happy to take the stress.
After last time, it might depend slightly.
[00:20:35] Speaker B: On what we're rolling for it. What would we say is a convincing skill to roll for researching?
[00:20:46] Speaker E: Do we roll for this?
[00:20:49] Speaker A: Yeah. Based off what you're saying to me, that sounds like a survey. Because you're looking at the evidence, you're selecting outcomes.
[00:20:57] Speaker B: I've got one in survey, I've got zero.
[00:21:00] Speaker E: So if I help you.
[00:21:01] Speaker B: So if you help, take one stress, and I will roll with one extra die.
[00:21:06] Speaker E: Can I just clarify something though? Dan Dm. If I do this, can I not do another thing? Like in this sort of gathering info.
[00:21:17] Speaker A: Round you can do?
Just bear in mind that the more times you roll, the more chances there are that things might go wrong.
[00:21:26] Speaker E: Yeah. The only other thing that atom might be useful doing is any kind of research into this magical device. Like will placing it wrapped in cotton blankets. Activate it somehow? Just any.
[00:21:44] Speaker A: Sure.
Okay. Well, first off, let's do the route.
So the two of you are going to the address and then working back. Or are you starting from the end point, the destination, and working to the warehouse? How are you going about doing this?
[00:22:03] Speaker B: Does it make a huge amount of difference? I guess.
I think we'd probably go to the location area, right. And sort of gout it.
[00:22:13] Speaker E: Well, that the location, which is like the abandoned antiques place. It's likely a little bit more sus. Is it a little bit more sus than Musto's? Sort of. I'm assuming we're dropping off somewhere that musto uses. So there'll be musto y people?
[00:22:31] Speaker A: Yes. Yeah. You suspect it'll be a cobble's stronghouse?
[00:22:41] Speaker E: Yeah, maybe. Maybe it is best to go to the more. Hopefully more abandoned place first, and then go towards where we consider to be a more populated place.
[00:22:51] Speaker A: Okay, cool. In which case, yeah, roll me a. Between the two of you. Roll me a survey.
If we did do, what would be the core difference between a group role and a helped role?
[00:23:07] Speaker C: So a group action is that you both roll the same skill, and then for everyone that fails, the leader of the action gets stress.
[00:23:19] Speaker B: Okay. Yeah. Okay, I see.
So I'm not rolling with any added dice, basically because I'm not getting any help. We're just both doing it, correct?
[00:23:30] Speaker A: Yeah. And can you push yourself? Still think so?
[00:23:33] Speaker B: Well, I don't particularly want to take even more stress.
[00:23:36] Speaker A: Sure.
Well, I mean, ata. You could always push yourself for stress if you so wish.
[00:23:46] Speaker E: No, I'm okay. I won't ask for more stress.
[00:23:50] Speaker B: Wait, so who's leading this?
[00:23:53] Speaker E: Well, you've got a better survey than me. I don't know if that makes a difference. But the lead is who takes the stress, right? Yeah.
Okay. So it's up to the dice as to I'll lead then. So I'll take whatever stress goes on my dice.
[00:24:12] Speaker A: Okay. In which case, if you're taking a more kind of public route and Magpie is taking a more kind of discreet look, just seeing two sides of the coin. Yeah.
[00:24:23] Speaker B: If you both roll up survey.
[00:24:26] Speaker E: Right? Yeah.
And we still do risky standard and then just straight up all risky standard.
[00:24:33] Speaker A: Yeah, because I think it's mainly just the result, the number that we're.
[00:24:37] Speaker B: Oh, no.
[00:24:38] Speaker E: I don't know why.
[00:24:41] Speaker B: Oh, dear.
[00:24:42] Speaker A: Because you have zero in it.
So when you have zero dice, you roll two and take the lowest.
[00:24:52] Speaker E: Okay.
[00:24:56] Speaker A: So off the back of that atta, you would take one stress for the one failure.
[00:25:02] Speaker C: The best result is the overall effort for everyone, and then the character leading the group action takes one stress for everyone who failed.
[00:25:10] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:25:12] Speaker A: So it is a partial success. Okay.
Right. So in that case, as you're going through dusty Hill and you're kind of, like, scoping out the lanes, the streets and whatnot that you want to use at a. Where you are taking the more public kind of route.
And while, you know, Magpie, sticking to the shadows, you do find the route that you want to take.
But as you get closer to the warehouse, you start to notice more and more there's a commotion going on. And in the road leading up to the warehouse, you notice the streets being cordoned off, and there's a small group of red and yellow tabard wearing people. They all seem to be wearing the same sort of tabard. And as you kind of get on some boxes to kind of see over people's heads to kind of see what's happening.
And the both of you recognize these individuals who are, like, strong arming citizens away from the street and really kind of brute force and intimidating people back.
They are wearing the tabard of the shield of Alicia, which is, once upon a time, they were followers of Yala, the castellan, the divine goddess of defense and protection.
But ever since Alicia was lost, their faith in defense has turned into something a bit more aggressive.
The best defense is a strong offense kind of mantra.
And they appear to be kind of, they've locked down the area around that warehouse. Right.
And as you're peering up, two of these zealots spot you, and you see them kind of whisper to each other, and then they start moving forward with some sort. There's a strong sense of aggression in their eyes as they see this kind of goblin peering over and seeing what's up. And, Magpie, it's only with your kind of timely intervention that you're able to pull atta out of the line of fire and kind of into a discreet back alley.
So it would seem that the shield has business in the area, right? Yes.
[00:28:06] Speaker E: Errol cordoned off.
[00:28:11] Speaker A: As in there's a wall of. There's like two. Two or three people. Like two or three of the shields in the street, just like, kind of knocking people back. And you see the citizens kind of yelling to get to my house. And these zealots are just kind of. You watch one of them kind of push like an older man, so backwards, so hard that he trips on a cobbler and falls over. And you see the two shield of Elysia kind of sneering and giggling to themselves as this guy has to pick himself up from the ground.
[00:28:50] Speaker B: So is this the immediate area around the warehouse? Is the actual warehouse cooled off just in the area of.
[00:28:56] Speaker A: So it's in the area of. It's difficult to say. So effectively, the warehouse that you're targeting is in like, a small.
It's effectively like a street of warehouses, if you will. And the shield seem to have cordoned off that street like they're guarding that street, you know, from their very kind of rough and, like attitudes towards everyone. They also believe that anything arcane is inherently dangerous and must be destroyed to ensure the safety of Alicia, which is something they hunt down, they pursue with a relentless force.
So, you know, this much at least. Okay. Otherwise, Magpie, you know, looking at the two of you, actually looking at the buildings around, a lot of these buildings up in Dustery Hill are kind of tall, narrow buildings. The warehouse in particular, you can see even from here, has, like, the warehouses are all two story tall.
See? Larger items downstairs, smaller items upstairs.
Catherine, anything for thou.
[00:30:18] Speaker D: Just wondering if there's anything.
What.
[00:30:26] Speaker A: What.
[00:30:27] Speaker D: What tier are these? Shield of Alicia.
[00:30:31] Speaker A: So, you know that whilst the shield, like the zealots, are dangerous, but they're not too numerous, they stand as a tier two gang. Right. Okay.
[00:30:47] Speaker D: And where do they sort of stand in the hierarchy of the faith?
If there is anyone sort of higher in sort of like, either in the garden keepers or the children of ire, are they more likely to sort of sort of stand down in a.
[00:31:09] Speaker A: Mean. The children of ire would still kind of hold domain over the shield of Alicia and the garden keepers. So the garden keepers, you know, the worshippers of golden.
So the shield of Alicia, they believe that what they're doing is the right thing, but they're just a bit more kind of aggressive and direct in how they go about doing it. You may find that whilst they will kind of cede to iron instruction, they might still be bullheaded enough to kind of carry on anyway. But you suspect if you were to get someone to pull their leash, it would probably be the children of iron. Right.
Because, yeah, you could almost imagine that the shield would just laugh at the more peaceful, more moderate, more caring garden keepers. Okay.
[00:32:09] Speaker D: I kind of feel Kavron's going to go and have a little chat.
[00:32:12] Speaker A: Okay.
Who you're thinking of chatting to?
[00:32:16] Speaker D: Well, I think he's going to go and have a chat at the guards, who are sort of hanging around.
[00:32:23] Speaker A: Oh, okay.
[00:32:24] Speaker D: He's just going to sort of walk.
[00:32:25] Speaker A: Up, have a chat to the shield bearers.
[00:32:29] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:32:30] Speaker A: Okay.
In which case, yeah. So, Magpie atta come back and kind of tell you what's up, Kevin.
You make your way to dustry Hill in response, and you notice when you start to get there, you notice that there isn't, like, a crowd of people. Like, there was that Magpie and Natter reported back on. It's almost like the people in the local area have just known that there are some shield like shield bearers causing trouble.
But are you approaching kind of very directly, or are you sneaking up?
[00:33:13] Speaker D: I think I'm just going to approach up very directly okay.
[00:33:16] Speaker A: Yeah. And what's your angle?
[00:33:19] Speaker D: My angle is just as sort of a patron of the church just coming along. I mean, I don't know how much they would know about who's still a member of the children of Ire, but I feel like he's going to try and sort of, he obviously doesn't have like the uniform of the children of ire, but he's going to try and rack up something that looks a little bit close to it.
[00:33:49] Speaker A: Yeah. As you do. It's this very kind of stiff backed Lorevar woman, her hair pulled back in a very tight, it almost looks like a painfully tight ponytail.
But she turns to look at you and you notice that she's kind of leaning on this very heavy looking sledgehammer.
She eyes you with a sense of kind of suspicion and suspicion and interest and when you get close enough she tilts her chin up and citizen the streets off bounds, I'm afraid.
[00:34:31] Speaker D: Oh, so I can see. And it looks like you're doing a great job for our blessed gods.
I do wonder though, sort of what is going on. If you don't mind. If you don't mind telling me.
[00:34:47] Speaker A: I think that sounds like a sway.
[00:34:54] Speaker B: I'll do that. Good.
[00:34:55] Speaker A: Do that.
[00:34:56] Speaker C: Good.
[00:35:00] Speaker D: Risky standard.
[00:35:03] Speaker A: It'll be a risky limited right now.
[00:35:08] Speaker B: Well, she's not having any of your charms.
[00:35:13] Speaker D: A risky limited.
[00:35:14] Speaker B: Yeah, she's zealous.
[00:35:14] Speaker A: Unless you want to push yourself to get extra effect or extra dice or a push yourself.
[00:35:19] Speaker D: That's a stress, isn't it?
[00:35:21] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:35:21] Speaker D: Too stress. Yeah, go on then. Too stress.
[00:35:24] Speaker A: Push myself.
[00:35:26] Speaker D: Let's do this.
[00:35:30] Speaker A: That's.
Oh boy, oh boy, oh boy, oh boy. Okay.
Things go badly.
[00:35:45] Speaker B: They go real bad.
That was unlucky.
[00:35:52] Speaker A: As you ask, she has this stony look on her face and might be.
[00:36:02] Speaker B: Time for a resist roll.
[00:36:04] Speaker A: Do you want to resist?
[00:36:06] Speaker B: Well, it depends what the consequence is, doesn't it? I was anticipating the fact that you just rolled two, one, three. It's not going to be good.
[00:36:15] Speaker A: She's stony faced in front of your question and she starts like eyeing you up and down. Even her eyes squint slightly. You hear the sound of leather kind of gripping on the hammer on the sledgehammer handle.
I'm not at liberty to say, she says.
And as this happens you see another shield bearer kind of begin to walk over saying, is everything all right?
Resist.
How much stress is a resist? So it's six are interesting, minus whatever you roll on your resist.
[00:37:08] Speaker B: And I suspect given that this is a very social situation, it probably would be a resolve roll, which you're good at.
[00:37:16] Speaker D: Yeah. Let's go for a resolve, then.
[00:37:19] Speaker B: So then, yeah, whatever your highest number is will come off the six stress, right? Just don't roll another one.
[00:37:28] Speaker D: No modifiers on that. Let's go.
[00:37:33] Speaker A: Okay, so you take two stress.
So the second shield bearer kind of walks halfway to you and. Is everything all right? And the lady you've spoken to turns ahead and goes, it's fine. He was on his way anyway.
And with a nod, the second shield bearer turns and heads back down the street that the warehouse is on. And it is clear that you have kind of lost this opportunity. Like you're not in a horrible position under the fire of both of them, but, yeah, it seems that she won't answer any more of your questions and she shoots you off. Fair enough.
[00:38:17] Speaker B: No hammer in the face today?
[00:38:20] Speaker A: Not today, no. But at least you haven't kind of sufficiently raised their suspicions. In the face of your questioning, you will be forgotten rather than remembered.
[00:38:33] Speaker D: What this face.
[00:38:36] Speaker A: Okay, so you've done a bit of info gathering.
Any more info that you want to go Atta, you want to do in a tune, do a little bit of research?
[00:38:48] Speaker E: Magpie or Algonon? Do you want any?
[00:38:51] Speaker B: No, I'm good. I'm good.
[00:38:55] Speaker E: Okay, well, I was thinking, the only thing. Yeah. That AtA could do that is helpful is try and do. Well, not the only thing, but she could go do as much studying as she is able to do with the resources that she has access to as to how to handle this device as and when we. Or carry it, contain it, whether it needs to not be jostled.
[00:39:24] Speaker A: Sure. Whereabouts is it that you're kind of researching this?
[00:39:30] Speaker E: We have access to some public libraries, don't we?
[00:39:34] Speaker A: There would be. Do we, like, there is one remaining, like, one surviving public library in.
I mean, bear in mind, Alicia was much bigger than what was under this sphere, so there are a lot of places that you would have kind of grown up with that are now lost.
So, for example, Morton High for boys was unfortunately on the wrong side of the veil when the veil went up.
[00:40:05] Speaker E: I see. Well, I would imagine that a lot of the things that are to do with arcane stuff have either been destroyed and or locked away quite viciously.
Are there underground networks of, like.
[00:40:25] Speaker A: You could speak to someone in the speakeasy under the specter for knowledge like that?
I mean, that is. That is literally a hub for underground arcane knowledge.
[00:40:41] Speaker E: Just put a notice up on the notice board. Does anyone know?
[00:40:45] Speaker A: Have you received this orb?
[00:40:47] Speaker E: Orb? I need under it.
[00:40:54] Speaker A: I will say, if you want to kind of whisper some sweet nothings to people at the specter to see if you can effectively use them as your research repository. So you're using them as your study.
I'm happy to let you roll that.
[00:41:16] Speaker E: Yeah, there's that idea. And then the only other ideas are breaking in somewhere that will be very difficult and dangerous or trying to do a spooky UK. I don't really have rituals yet, but I could try and, I don't know, I suppose, like the old school blades in the dark thing would be, ask a ghost.
[00:41:41] Speaker A: Um, you could, I guess, with a tune. Bear in mind that, you know, our attune is slightly different.
If you wanted to attune, you'd have to do it nearer. Like, you wouldn't be able to do it back home. You'd have to be in the vicinity of the item, and then you might be able to literally kind of attune to it. Like, close your eyes, scrunch your face a little bit, clench your fists, and then try and get a vibe for what, effectively, you're doing, like an innate detect magic. If this were Dnd terms, I feel.
[00:42:16] Speaker E: Like when we're near it, it's going to be a little too late. But then we could flash back to and. Well, no, we couldn't because I'd have to have been there to know the information, to flash back, to have something that contains it.
[00:42:29] Speaker A: I mean, we could effectively do a flashback while the two of you were scouting out.
[00:42:36] Speaker E: Yeah, I suppose the best time to have tried to.
So this item was in the abandoned antiquity factory, right.
[00:42:46] Speaker A: So you weren't able to get super close, but you'd still be able to try and figure out what it is because you're almost certain it's magical in nature. Like arcane magic in nature. It's just a case of what it is.
[00:42:59] Speaker E: Okay, I'm going to try to ask it.
Dear orb.
[00:43:08] Speaker A: What?
[00:43:08] Speaker E: Are you sure? Tell, please.
Yeah, no, I asked Magpie to keep an eye out on the various perimeters while we sort of are near the antique place, antique warehouse, and I kind of.
[00:43:26] Speaker A: Okay, roll me a risky, limited role.
[00:43:35] Speaker E: Okay.
[00:43:36] Speaker A: Because of the distance and whatnot.
Risky, limited distance, ambient magical noise, et cetera.
[00:43:44] Speaker E: So I could push myself to get a standard.
[00:43:47] Speaker A: Correct. Or get.
[00:43:49] Speaker E: Okay, and that would be two. Yeah, that would be a two stressor.
I'll push myself to get a standard and see what happens.
[00:44:02] Speaker A: Five. Okay, you do it. There's a consequence because this is a. Gather information. What I'll say is you ascertain that the item itself is like, if we'll use DND terminology here, there is a faint kind of source of divination magic. So thankfully it's not the explosive type of orb.
[00:44:47] Speaker E: Okay.
[00:44:50] Speaker A: But before you're able to kind of get any more information on it, Magpie again has to scurry you away because a couple of shield bearers come a wandering.
[00:45:03] Speaker E: Okay.
[00:45:04] Speaker A: That'll be your partial success.
Cool.
[00:45:09] Speaker E: You should be able to transport it reasonably standardly. In a pram.
[00:45:13] Speaker B: In a pram?
[00:45:15] Speaker A: Yeah.
Hopefully no one's going to catch fire being in its vicinity. No one's going to grow extra eyes? Unfortunately, yes.
Okay, so you have gathered information.
What's your plan of attack? How are you going in for it?
So to run you through it again, it is where?
JC, I've lost the methods of approach.
[00:45:49] Speaker C: So it's assault, deception, stealth, occult, social or transport.
[00:45:55] Speaker A: Thank you.
[00:45:56] Speaker B: I imagine it starts as a stealth. We kind of sneak into the warehouse and find this thing and then on the way between locations, it's kind of deception because we're pretending one of us is pushing a pram with a bibbit.
[00:46:11] Speaker A: So you're definitely going with the pram idea?
[00:46:13] Speaker B: Well, I liked it.
[00:46:17] Speaker C: There's potentially a social or deception connection if I can find Amringer or his daughters.
[00:46:26] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:46:30] Speaker A: Well, that is.
Yeah.
Are you hoping that Amringer might be in the building or are you doing a real quick gather?
[00:46:42] Speaker C: He could potentially give us access to.
[00:46:46] Speaker A: It.
[00:46:49] Speaker C: With a light spot of algononing.
[00:46:52] Speaker A: Did you want to try and give that a go before we start the run?
[00:46:56] Speaker C: Yeah, I think just an extra little bit of information to find out what his deal is nowadays, what his daughter's deal is and if he's approachable.
[00:47:04] Speaker A: How are you planning on kind of reaching out or finding out information about Amringer? Who are you going to or where are you going to?
[00:47:15] Speaker C: I think following my chat with Fairfax, I'm going to sort of consort my way through the other old boys that I know.
[00:47:23] Speaker A: Sure.
I mean, that sounds absolutely fine. Yeah, please, Romney, a consort?
No.
Okay.
As you kind of go around and start asking, no one's.
No one like Amringer was so such a wallflower. No one really seems to know anything much about him. Ever since post education, the one friend that you speak to, you don't get any information from the people you're speaking to.
As you're leaving, unbeknownst to yourself, your questioning has been overheard by forces in the shadows, which will come apparent soon.
But you do think as you're looking through a records book of the old school boys, you think back to what Fairfax said. Oh, he rubs shoulders with a lot of nobles. And it dawns on you that part of the reason why he was kind of notable in your life is that he also had ties to house Antelia.
Yeah. And it makes you, like, you probably haven't seen him, you've had no reason to see him since the veil went up.
But you do begin to wonder if he's also got the red eyes.
Likely.
So whilst you may have your suspicions, you don't really have any concrete information about his unexpected misplacing.
So flashback to the present.
So, yeah, if we're entering in the warehouse, you can either sleuth your way in through the shield bearers or sneak your way in. And then I guess if you wanted to do a deception to kind of lure the shield bearers away, have the pram at the ready.
[00:50:12] Speaker E: Do we choose our load? Are we at the Loadout point?
[00:50:15] Speaker A: It will be, yes.
How are you going in and how much equipment are you taking with you?
[00:50:27] Speaker E: I love that. I was like, loadout time, and then I don't actually know the answer to that question. Yeah. So let me think about how much loadout I want.
[00:50:37] Speaker A: I guess the real question for the point of entry is, like, how are you going about getting the item? Because that's going to be the first point of call. Are you sneaking in or are you talking your way in? Are you fighting your way in?
[00:50:51] Speaker B: My instinct is always to sneak.
[00:50:54] Speaker A: For sure.
[00:50:54] Speaker B: I'm probably not going to be a lot of help if other people.
[00:50:56] Speaker E: Different ideas can talking happen and sneaking also happen. Like, the talking is the distraction and the sneaking is the getting in, but it does mean splitting the party.
[00:51:09] Speaker A: Yeah.
So we could do the social entrance would be talking your way in. If Catherine wants to get in on that action.
[00:51:21] Speaker D: Yeah, more than happy to do that.
[00:51:23] Speaker A: Okay, so social distraction out front and sneaky lurk out back.
Okay, cool.
Where's Algonon going to be during all this? Back home looking at a well drawn map.
Yes.
[00:51:40] Speaker C: I'll probably be out on the barge, the nearby.
[00:51:47] Speaker A: To be. That's a good point. Off the back of atta and Magpie's scouting.
Are you going to be pushing the pram all the way through the districts or are you going to push the pram to the nearby canal?
[00:52:00] Speaker B: Well, what did our wrecking reveal to us? Was there a good route by canal? Because that would be preferable.
[00:52:08] Speaker A: Well, so the wrecky showed that there was the shield bearers there, and you can tell me which route you ascertained to be the best. So either walking on foot or going.
[00:52:20] Speaker B: By barge, if barge is an option, I think that sense we do have.
[00:52:25] Speaker C: To go over the river.
[00:52:26] Speaker B: Yeah. So pram for the first bit, pram to the barge, barge to waterside, pram the rest of the way.
Unless the place we're going is on the canal, as it were.
[00:52:44] Speaker A: Yeah, no, it's a little way from the canal. Okay, cool. Right, so we have our route, we have our point of entry.
Who is leading the social point of entry?
[00:53:00] Speaker D: I guess that would be me.
[00:53:02] Speaker A: Catherine? Yeah.
Okay, so off the back of your gather information.
So it's one engagement dice to begin with, you have scouted out the location so you're not caught unaware by the shield bearers that are there. So that's a neutral.
Whilst you did run into a bit of confrontation cavern, you didn't run into enough to raise suspicion. So that's still neutral.
Whilst you were able to ascertain kind of roughly what it was in terms of it was a divination thing, you weren't able to kind of pinpoint its location to give that information to Magpie. So again, we'll call that neutral. So at least we know roughly where it is. We know it's upstairs.
But forces in the shadows mean that cavern you'll be rolling on zero dice.
Oh, so minus one.
Yeah. Someone has heard of a sanguivar asking a lot of questions about another sanguivar.
So it's zero dice. So that'll be two. And take the lowest.
[00:54:37] Speaker D: So where is this? It's the two little dice in the left hand corner.
[00:54:42] Speaker A: That's it. And then engagement. And then zero dice.
[00:54:45] Speaker B: Is there anything we can do about.
[00:54:46] Speaker D: This role to make it zero dice engagement?
Let's roll.
[00:54:55] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:54:58] Speaker B: The five was like. And then the three was like.
[00:55:02] Speaker A: Okay, so as we enter into this run cavern, and Atta, you're the tip of the spear, right? Yeah. Okay.
In which case, as the two of you approach and.
No, you realize that it's the same woman that you bumped into earlier.
And she turns to you with a raised eyebrow as she immediately recognizes you.
[00:55:37] Speaker B: Is it, though? Is it the same woman you saw earlier? Can we resist this as well?
[00:55:43] Speaker A: No.
[00:55:44] Speaker B: Gosh darn it.
[00:55:47] Speaker A: She raises an eyebrow and kind of studies you and at her, just kind of her eyes flicking back between the two of you.
And as she goes to take a step forward to sort of, like, say something to you, the two of you hear an ear piercing whistleblow.
And the two of you and the shield bear in front of you all just kind of like your shoulders, like you freeze for a moment as you look around.
And Cavernata, as you look over your shoulders, you see a group of charging guard tearing up the hill behind you.
[00:56:31] Speaker B: Oh, no.
[00:56:32] Speaker A: Like city watch.
And you hear them shouting, go down. Down on the ground. Don't move. Don't move. As they come up and you realize that the shield bearers presumably are being counter raided by the watch.
[00:56:49] Speaker B: What?
[00:56:50] Speaker A: And Magpie, you're up on the roof about to kind of like behind the warehouse, and you can see this small, large group of city watch streaming up towards the building. And you know that whatever time you did have is now significantly reduced.
[00:57:12] Speaker B: I just. I get on with it. Humming in a flash.
[00:57:16] Speaker A: And Alginon, as you kind of sit on the barge, wondering how it's all going, I reckon we take a quick break.
[00:57:31] Speaker B: Oh, my goodness me.
[00:57:35] Speaker E: We not flash back and have made a pit for them to fall into.
[00:57:39] Speaker B: Or we totally anticipated this quite possibly.
[00:57:45] Speaker A: Well, we'll have to see what happens. If you want to see what happens, then make sure to hit the subscribe button and the bell icon for notifications of new releases, because, yeah, you wouldn't want to miss the second part to.
[00:57:59] Speaker B: This run where we all get diced up by the watch.
[00:58:04] Speaker A: If you like this episode, hit the like button. Leave some comments down below. And as always, thank you for watching. Thank you for playing.
See you next time.
Bye.
