PART II
LIAM: Welcome back to Unfolding Hell Under Grahtwood. I need you all to roll for initiative.
GRELNOK: Right as we were running out of the tunnel, I cast Hardened Armor on myself again.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Hardened Armor.
LIAM: Cast Rural Juror.
MALLORY: No!
HOA SEN: I like how we stare at each other like, "Mm-mm."
LIAM: Call out any 20 to 25s.
TAVIMA: Natural 20.
LIAM: Yo!
GRELNOK: What what?! You're going to take them out. Step away from the statue.
LIAM: For a total of 20? Okay, what else we got? 15 to 20.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I'm 16.
LIAM: Ooh!
HOA SEN: 15!
LIAM: Ooh! Okay, Hoa. Okay, 10 to 15. No, five to 10. Zero to five?
GRELNOK: Three!
TAVIMA: Oh no!
MALLORY: Ah!
LIAM: Wait, what'd you get?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Double *tres**-es.
MALLORY: Threes! Double threes.
GRELNOK: So Mallory's first, then me.
LIAM: Didn't you tie the last time?
MALLORY: Yep.
GRELNOK: Yep, we did.
TAVIMA: Aww, teamwork.
LIAM: Okay.
MALLORY: I have put that d20 aside. Now no more shall it darken my door today.
GRELNOK: I don't like this one any more.
LIAM: Okay, so. Frozen in time, Triss holding a dagger up in the air and a child by the scruff of their neck, staring at you, "What the fuck?" And before she, or he, can do anything, Tavima, you spring into action.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Come on!
TAVIMA: How much distance do I have?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Come on, Vivi!
LIAM: From where you are? Actually, not far. They're only about 25 feet away from you.
TAVIMA: Oh, okay. Let's do the fun one, then. We're going to start with a Shield Charge and burn two stamina. Moving 10 feet straight toward a target, I need...
GRELNOK: Don't spill blood next to the statue!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Unless you have to to save the girl's life!
TAVIMA: Push them away from it.
HOA SEN: We have rags!
TAVIMA: Does a 17 hit? What is her name again?
LIAM: Triss.
TAVIMA: Triss...
LIAM: It does.
TAVIMA: Cool. All right.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Well, I rolled a three.
GRELNOK:
TAVIMA: Okay. She's going to take nine, 10, 11, 12 points of bludgeoning damage--
LIAM: Okay.
TAVIMA: -- from my shield, and I need her to make a DC 13 strength save or be knocked prone.
LIAM: Okay.
TAVIMA: Please roll bad.
LIAM: Ah, she saves.
TAVIMA: Dang it. All right. That's okay. That was just a free action, so let's just hit her with the longsword. And I'm just trying to push her away from the statue and get her clear of the child. Because it looks like she was the one about to try to stab the kid.
LIAM: I think the free actions are stink put onto an attack action. If I understand correctly.
TAVIMA: Okay.
GRELNOK: We haven't been necessarily doing it that way, though.
TAVIMA: I respect that.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: You know, when *Marisha** was GM...
TAVIMA: When Marisha did it? She let me do whatever I want.
HOA SEN: For real. Plus 10s for everybody.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Not inaccurate.
LIAM: Yeah, yeah.
TAVIMA: That is kind of how that one round of combat went.
LIAM: Super cool. Super cool.
TAVIMA: Tight, tight.
LIAM: But I'm not going to do that.
TAVIMA: I respect that.
LIAM: I'm not going to do that.
HOA SEN: It's okay. We're going to play the Liam way.
TAVIMA: Then I would like to, for my bonus action then, I'm going to interpose myself between-- Basically, can I just body block and get in front of the kid?
LIAM: You absolutely can do that. Absolutely. The compromise between me and Marisha is you saving a child.
TAVIMA: Yes! I miss Marisha!
LIAM: So you just instantly bloody her nose--
HOA SEN: You can't say that!
LIAM: -- and she pushes her hand back against the statue to brace herself. Her attention is blown, which gives you a chance to use your heel to pull this kid behind you.
TAVIMA: Yeah.
LIAM: That gets us to her.
TAVIMA: Let's go. Don't splash your blood!
LIAM: "You're a problem." And she begins to--
TAVIMA: Thank you.
LIAM: -- twist her hands around them and her eyes go green. And there is, just for a split second, visage of a skull in front of her face and it's gone. And the earth underneath you begins to roil out, and you and the child have soil swarming and writhing under you going up your legs. I need you to make a DC dex save, DC of 12. I need you to make a DC dex save, DC of 12.
TAVIMA: 12.
HOA SEN: Add plus one?
TAVIMA: It's a 13, it doesn't make it. Wait, sorry, what was it?
LIAM: 12.
TAVIMA: Oh, I made it!
LIAM: Yeah.
TAVIMA: Cool, I wasn't listening to the number you said.
HOA SEN: Just immediately sad.
TAVIMA: I just assume failure at this point. Whatever I say is wrong.
LIAM: You actually cleave the soil, these tendrils of earth and bone shard coming out of the ground, away from you and the child and beat it back, and it has no effect. You stand your ground."
TAVIMA: Yeah, you're going to have to do more than dirt, I guess. And I'm just lifting the kid up. This is weird and you're weird for thinking that was going to be cool.
LIAM: Okay.
TAVIMA: And step away.
LIAM: Okay. That gets us to Slaughter Grimm.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Slaughter Grimm! Oh, what is this? This thing Okay, tuck that in. Tuck that away. They'll edit that out.
HOA SEN: Just leave it.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Okay, so there's a scrum of people, right? So they're in close prox?
LIAM: It's now Tavima and child, and Triss and Rennix all-- Yeah, all.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Pretty on top of each other?
LIAM: Pretty on top of each other.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: And Triss is already hurt a little?
LIAM: Yep. Bloodied face.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I can't risk injuring a child or Tavima, so I will, just-- I don't know, I'll put this skull in my inside pocket, I guess for now. Oh, it's on fire, shit! I'll just drop it and draw my flaming sword, which is an item that I have, I don't know what it does. And I will charge ahead and do crazy moves and try to hit Triss.
LIAM: Okay, that is a plus two to hit and a plus two to damage, a d8 plus two, and then an additional 1d4 of fire damage.
HOA SEN: Nice.
TAVIMA: Let's go!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Well, I rolled a 17, so plus stuff must hit.
LIAM: Absolutely.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: And then I'm rolling a d8 for this?
LIAM: d8 plus two.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Okay. That's a three.
LIAM: Okay, so five, and then a d4 for fire damage.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Yes! One.
LIAM: One, okay.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: But I will use one point of stamina to attack the other foe that's right next to me, I can do that! Ooh! 19 plus stuff!
LIAM: For suresies hits!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Another five points of sword damage and another one point of fire damage.
LIAM: Give me that total again.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Six.
LIAM: Six, thank you. Okay so, Slaughter Grimm drops a flaming skull on the ground and just does a quick little Princess Bride sword move, double hitting each of them. And they both singes of fire go up their bodies and he looks totally floored.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I'm going to also stop. I'm going to do a three-point landing. I know I wasn't jumping. I'm just going to sort of bend over and put my hand on the ground.
LIAM: Yeah, because your feet never left the ground, you don't have to roll from it. You just take the pose.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I just do the pose.
TAVIMA: I start to like duck instinctively with you, and then I don't know why you're dying, so I stand back up.
GRELNOK: Slaughter Grimm!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Slaughter Grimm!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Rachel Dratch! Tina Fey! Slaughter Grimm!
HOA SEN: Aw!
HOA SEN: Very good impression of that voice.
LIAM: Rennix pulls a mace off of his hip and says, "I really wish this could have gone different." He just takes a swing at your head.
TAVIMA: That's really sweet of you. I'm going to feel so bad killing you.
LIAM: What's your AC?
TAVIMA: 17.
LIAM: Okay, that hits.
TAVIMA: Does it? Shield Wall. Doesn't hit.
LIAM: Doesn't hit?
TAVIMA: Yeah.
LIAM: You bring up the shield, and his giant mace goes and there is a huge goddamn dent in the shield where he hit hard. That's it for man.
TAVIMA: Could've been me. Damn it.
LIAM: Now we're onto Hoa.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Could've dented you.
HOA SEN: Okay!
TAVIMA: Yeah! I was making a sex joke.
HOA SEN: I invoke the expert Hunter's Mark thingy that I can do as a bonus action.
LIAM: Canon.
HOA SEN: So I just do extra damage when I hit, and I grab my ice staff off my back: Don't break my friends' hearts! And I run in and I go for Rennix because he's a ding-dong. And I try to hit him. Okay, it's going to work, for sure. Hey, that's a 12.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Hey! Maybe?
LIAM: The staff arcs too wide and he, pissed at Tavima, or heartbroken, which is it?
TAVIMA: Oh no!
LIAM: Sees you coming and then just jukes under and you slash along the base of Mehrunes Dagon. And a streak of ice-- It was an ice staff, right?
HOA SEN: It is an ice staff.
LIAM: Yes, it coats the bottom of the statue.
TAVIMA: Does it hit any of the wine? Not the wine!
LIAM: No, the wine's safe.
HOA SEN: I didn't damage any product.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Damp-- I mean, no. Not damp. A dry, cool place.
LIAM: You wisely kept the wine at least 10 feet back from Mehrunes Dagon at all times.
GRELNOK: That's good.
LIAM: Yeah. Do you want to move closer, further away, hide behind the crates of wine?
HOA SEN: I move away, I get out of this little gaggle of people, if I can. Not sure who has opportunity attack, but should've mentioned that, maybe.
LIAM: All right, that takes us to Mallory.
MALLORY: Do I have a clear line of sight on any of this or--?
LIAM: Yeah, because you guys aren't all single file, you immediately fanned out, so you're on an angle. You can either have an easy shot at Triss or an easy shot at Rennix. I'll let you pick one of those two for the direction.
MALLORY: I was just going to say, there's no way I can line them-- Well, if I had a cone attack, would there be a clear shot?
LIAM: Yeah, if you veer to one side and just go for one of them, I would say you can for fear of striking Tavima and this child, you have to really go wide to get one.
MALLORY: I'll go wide and I'm going to attempt a Force Shock attack.
LIAM: That doesn't sound good.
TAVIMA: I'm sorry I'm in your way the whole time.
MALLORY: Big cone. It's a 25-foot cone. How many points is that? Oh, it's so many. And it's a constitution saving throw.
LIAM: Okay. Mm, saves.
MALLORY: Both of them?
LIAM: I said that to not hurt an innocent, you had to go veer to the side and only catch one in the cone.
MALLORY: Okay. It was a save?
LIAM: From your vantage point. Yeah, they save, so it'll be half damage.
MALLORY: All right.
LIAM: Who are you attacking?
MALLORY: I'm attacking your boy.
LIAM: That means you went to the right because Triss is on everyone's left.
TAVIMA: I understand.
MALLORY: Oh, is Slaughter on the left or the right?
LIAM: Slaughter is on the--
MALLORY: As long as its within 30 feet at some point, it's okay.
LIAM: He attacked both and you're in tight, too.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I have to be within five feet of both of them.
GRELNOK: So you're right up in it.
LIAM: You're right up there with Tavima.
MALLORY: Okay, that'll work fine.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I'm fine, though.
MALLORY: It's 14 points of force damage, halved.
LIAM: Seven.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: That goes on me, too?
LIAM: No, just hit Triss.
MALLORY: But I am going to use my bonus to cast Crystal Weapon because you got nuts.
GRELNOK: He cast it on Rennix, not Triss, right?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I get Crystal Weapon?
GRELNOK: That's what he said.
LIAM: And you said Rennix?
MALLORY: It was Rennix.
LIAM: Thank you.
MALLORY: Sorry.
LIAM: No, no.
MALLORY: And I can cast Crystal Weapon on you, so your weapon suddenly turns into a dark, crystal color, the fire itself now is coming out of a dark crystal.
LIAM: Jagged and terrifying.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Wow! So badass!
MALLORY: Yeah, you got to hit somebody.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Thank you.
LIAM: Is that it for your awesome turn?
MALLORY: That's it, and then I'm backing out of there as well.
GRELNOK: Okay. Grenlok!
GRELNOK: Grelnok!
LIAM: Are you sure?
GRELNOK: Yes.
TAVIMA: No!
HOA SEN: Where does the 'l' go?
GRELNOK: Damn it!
GRELNOK: I'm going to run to the other side, and I'm going to run over and try to--
LIAM: Hit the blonde bartender?
GRELNOK: Yeah!
LIAM: Mm-hmm.
GRELNOK: I want to mess her up.
LIAM: Okay, we're surrounding her.
GRELNOK: Yeah.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Bartender on bartender action.
GRELNOK: Yeah, I'm going to try to hit it with my big... m-m-mace?
TAVIMA: You'll pay for a whole Mehrunes Dagon statue.
GRELNOK: That's a 23.
LIAM: Oh, for sure hits.
TAVIMA: Let's go.
GRELNOK: Right? And I'm going to use my free action and a stamina point to add an additional 1d8 damage to that.
TAVIMA: Let's go!
GRELNOK: Ooh, that's 11 plus... four is 15. And then as my bonus attack, my bonus action, I'm going to, ooh, spend three stamina points and I'm going to Venomous Claw!
LIAM: Okay!
GRELNOK: So I'm going to finish my maid... my mace? Is it a mace or an axe?
TAVIMA: I don't know!
HOA SEN: I think it was an axe.
GRELNOK: Is it a m--
LIAM and GRELNOK: It's a maxe.
HOA SEN: Yeah!
GRELNOK: And then I'm going to,-- let's see if I go like this, I'm going to go like that with my claw.
LIAM: Got it.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: -- go like that, then do claw.
GRELNOK: I'm going to go like this, and I'm going to go like that.
LIAM: All right, did you roll for damage on the claw?
GRELNOK: Nope.
LIAM: Give me totes on the whole thing.
TAVIMA: Let's go!
HOA SEN: The claw!
GRELNOK: Hold on. Let's see. I got to strike out. Treat it as a melee weapon attack with proficiency.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: You got to do some bartender one-liner, of course.
GRELNOK: Mix this!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Yeah, there you go.
HOA SEN: Oh! Sick burn!
TAVIMA: Amazing.
GRELNOK: That's 20-- What's 15 plus seven?
LIAM and TAVIMA: 22.
LIAM: Damage?
GRELNOK: 22 to hit.
LIAM: 22 to hit? Oh, I thought you-- Oh, okay, great.
GRELNOK: But then it's 3d8--
LIAM: So that was the maxe, or that was the claws?
GRELNOK: That was--
LIAM: The maxe already hit.
GRELNOK: The maxe already hit, all right.
LIAM: Okay. Ooh, hit the mic. And now the claws hit, as well, so roll for damage.
TAVIMA: Let's go.
GRELNOK: Oh my god! 21 plus--
TAVIMA: Let's go!
GRELNOK: -- three! 24 points of poison damage.
HOA SEN: Yay!
LIAM: Shug a bug a bug a bah!
HOA SEN: We roll well, we do real stuff.
MALLORY: We don't, though.
LIAM: You bash her across the head and you just watch her ear and cheek and left eye just get pulped and that's a mess. And before she can even register, you slash across her front and blood flies everywhere and you take a chunk out of the front of her throat. You're up.
GRELNOK: Oh my god!
SAM and GRELNOK: She's not dead!
TAVIMA: I just turn. That was awesome! Okay, I'm going to--
GRELNOK: Okay, yeah, yeah!
TAVIMA: Yeah! Okay. Then I'm going to cast Backlash for my bonus action. So I need a DC 15 con save.
LIAM: Okay. Natural 20.
TAVIMA: Golly. All right, that's fine. We'll just use a sword, then, for the main attack. 19 to hit?
LIAM: Yes.
TAVIMA: Cool, cool, cool.
GRELNOK: Maybe you can kick her away before you do this?
TAVIMA: Yeah, that's the goal. Terrible damage. Five, but I'm also going to use Puncture, spend my last stamina for Puncture. So I need a DC 14 dex check.
LIAM: Okay. Fail.
TAVIMA: Cool. What's a d10 look like? Oh, it's a 10! 15 points of total damage. And can I try to keep her from bleeding into the no-no zone?
LIAM: Keep her from bleeding into the no-no zone?
HOA SEN: The statue.
TAVIMA: Yeah. I said what I said.
LIAM: Tell me what the weapon attack is. Spin that to me.
TAVIMA: Yeah, so she drops her shield, fully drops it, moves away from the cran-baby, and pulls out her sword and goes to slash at her, but catches in her shoulder and then just pushes in to puncture. And I'd like to push her away from the statue.
LIAM: I'll allow you to push her back five feet.
TAVIMA: Yeah, that's fine.
LIAM: And she falls back in a bloody mess on the ground to the side of the statue. That was a lot of awful. I assume that's the end of your turn.
TAVIMA: Yeah, that's it.
LIAM: Okay, Slaughter Grimm.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: So Rennix--
GRELNOK: Is Triss dead?
LIAM: She looks pretty dead.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Rennix is still up, though?
LIAM: Yes.
TAVIMA: We can fix him! I'm just saying! I think there's good in him!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: So I shouldn't destroy his body?
TAVIMA: I don't know! Do what you think is best.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I'll spare the face, just in case.
TAVIMA: Thank you!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: All right, I slash my sword at his dick.
HOA SEN: You can't!
TAVIMA: I like scars!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I will roll to-- Oh no, it's gone forever!
TAVIMA: The dice knew! Thank you!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: All right. I aim for the belly, instead. And I will roll again. That's a four. What would it have been?
GRELNOK: It's over there.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Where?
HOA SEN: It's in between the--
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I can't even see it from here.
GRELNOK: Go under the table, find out!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I'll be right back!
LIAM: No, no, no, no, no!
TAVIMA: I bet it was a crit.
GRELNOK: What if it's a 20?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: It was a natural one! It was a one.
LIAM: I will grace you with the four instead of the natural one.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Probably still doesn't hit, though.
LIAM: No.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I wonder if the GM will let me use Momentum, where I can use a stamina point-- Oh, no, I can't. It says "when you successful melee attack." That was anything but successful.
LIAM: Boy, way to sell it, Sam. Okay, onto Rennix. He just looks at the situation. He looks at all of you, he looks at you.
TAVIMA: You don't have to do this.
LIAM: "'Follow Mehrunes Dagon,' they said. "'Rule over the weak,' they said." He reaches down and grabs the mangled corpse of this woman, picks her up, and smears her across the statue.
LIAM: "Anything?" And he looks up at the statue. And just watches the blood on the stone of this effigy to Mehrunes Dagon seems to be drawn into it. The stone blackens and dark veins spider outward and you hear a faint, low vibration. The statue begins to glow faintly with the same red hue as the first two chambers. And you hear a sharp originating from somewhere within it. And another crack off down that way, and then fainter, another. And the low hum grows louder. Its pitch rising and rising. And the sound of it grows painful to your ears and then with no warning, the terrible face of Mehrunes above you, maw open in a stony roar, vomits a writhing beam of blood red power up into a high beam through the wall of the chamber, blasting through it. The entire wine cellar that you're in rocks under your feet, red bottles of wine falling off of their shelf and smashing on the ground. Slaughter catches three and far above, through stone and earth, a great and terrible shriek unleashes, shaking you to your core. Hoa, you're up.
HOA SEN: What!?
TAVIMA: Can I just backhand, like that annoyed slap, to Rennix? Like, "Look the fuck you did." That's all.
LIAM: Yeah, he's looking up at the statue, so it's more of like a swat to the back of the head.
TAVIMA: Look what you did.
LIAM: "It's still good, it's still good, it's still good."
TAVIMA: That's bad.
LIAM: Hoa.
HOA SEN: Sorry, he killed a baby, basically. So, that's bad.
TAVIMA: We don't know that he killed--
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: The vomit guy?
TAVIMA: -- the vomiter.
LIAM: "Yeah, I killed the kid."
TAVIMA: My god!
MALLORY: Poor taste!
HOA SEN: It's not great. I do some *majica** and-- I actually forgot to roll my spellcasting to hit last time, sorry.
LIAM: We're having fun here, folks.
HOA SEN: Another swarm of fetcher flies going from my fingertips into his face.
LIAM: *Chutzpah** flies, here we go.
HOA SEN: Okay, to hit, that's a one. A one plus six, so that's a seven.
LIAM: Your stomach and heart have sunk so low with dread that you just go and three flies go.
HOA SEN: Oh, okay. They were my friends, but now they're dead. Okay. All right, that's great. I start to back up towards the staircase that leads out.
LIAM: Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
HOA SEN: That's my move.
LIAM: The child, by the way, cranberry, matching Triss' cranberry is just-- in the middle of you all.
TAVIMA: Yeah, someone move the cran-baby away.
LIAM: Mallory. You're up.
MALLORY: I'm going to just take a I'm just going to do a little-- I don't want this guy around, I'm going to make a little magic pop at him as I roll by with the Lightning Splash.
LIAM: Yeah, a little splash of lightning.
MALLORY: That's a dex save on his part.
LIAM: Okay, what's the DC?
MALLORY: 14.
LIAM: No-- Mm.
TAVIMA: He's dextrous?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Of course he is.
LIAM: No, he fails.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Oh!
LIAM: He fails.
MALLORY: Oh, that's not bad. That's 11 points of lightning damage.
HOA SEN: Wow!
LIAM: 11 points of lightning damage. Yeah, he's a little disheartened at the turn of events.
TAVIMA: What did you think was going to happen, my guy?!
LIAM: He plants his hand in Triss' blood and slides it to the right.
TAVIMA: God!
MALLORY: I'm going to grab the kid and start moving towards the ladder.
GRELNOK: Nobody's cleaning the blood? Nobody's trying to clean the blood?
MALLORY: We're a little--
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I should've been using my blood cleaning magic.
LIAM: The kid does not fight and you start making your way to the base of the stairs--
GRELNOK: ♪ Makin' my way! ♪
LIAM: -- to the top of the chamber. Yep, thank you. Okay, Nok-grel, you're up.
GRELNOK: I am going to--
HOA SEN: What?! I'm going to step up to the bottom of the Mehrunes statue.
LIAM: Yeah, Grelnok.
GRELNOK: Yeah. And I'm going to stick the edge of my maxe, at the base of the statue and at the same time that I try to use it as a lever to knock over the statue.
LIAM: We going Kiwi now?
GRELNOK: Yeah. I'm going to use my magicka and I'm going to cast at the same time, Stonefist, which uses force-- sends a shockwave of force damage out. So hopefully like aid me in the attempt to knock over the statue.
LIAM: The 30 plus-foot statue? Love it.
GRELNOK: Yeah. I'm hoping I can find a weak spot.
LIAM: Right.
TAVIMA: She's really strong.
LIAM: You got to look usually for a flashing light at some spot on the creature, so you got to look for that.
GRELNOK: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
LIAM: Roll, roll! You don't have to roll to hit. It's a statue. Roll for damage.
GRELNOK: I'm not trying to destroy it. I'm trying to knock it over. Just use my maxe.
LIAM: Absolutely. Actually, you know what? Do me one thing. Roll a d20, just for fun. Just for fun! Roll it.
HOA SEN: It's fun!
GRELNOK: It's so much fun.
LIAM: Could be.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: It's not fun?
GRELNOK: It's not fun.
LIAM: Okay, now roll for damage.
GRELNOK: It's no good!
LIAM: It's no good.
GRELNOK: Now I roll for damage, with 3d8 force damage.
LIAM: I would've gotten creative for a 20, but give me that damage.
GRELNOK: Nine, 11. 11.
LIAM: 11 total.
GRELNOK: Of force damage.
LIAM: You shove your maxe under there and it goes and a crack goes
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Cool.
LIAM: And one arm goes but does not let go and a splintering, bigger part goes through the arm. The one in the air.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Okay, okay. That's something.
GRELNOK: That's not terrible.
LIAM: No. The entire room goes and the arm goes. Everybody roll a d20.
HOA SEN: Oh no!
LIAM: And just tell me if you got under a five.
HOA SEN: What?
LIAM: Sure, that's funny.
MALLORY: Cool. Cool, cool ,cool.
TAVIMA: I got four. What'd you get?
GRELNOK: I got three.
TAVIMA: Okay, cool, cool, cool.
LIAM: You take 14 points of bludgeoning damage as a massive stone arm falls between you and you do your best to leap out of the way, but it catches you on the back and shoulder and you're going to feel that when you're dead and your arm almost gets pinned under and you feel your forearm pinched and you pull away and there literally is a blood bruise from hell and you're bleeding down your forearm.
GRELNOK: It pinched me!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Are you okay, Greknol?
GRELNOK: I'm fine! And I pull out my healing potion and take it.
HOA SEN: Nice.
LIAM: Tavima, you're up.
TAVIMA: Crap. Okay. Shoot. Hot boy is just shell shocked, just watching? There's no redemption arc here for my guy?
LIAM: He's not snapped out of it.
MALLORY: Does he not have to do a dex save for that? What just happened?
LIAM: Oh, you're absolutely right.
MALLORY: Thank you.
HOA SEN: Yeah!
LIAM: Natural 20.
TAVIMA: Wait, what happened?
LIAM: To be fair, he's right up against the statue, looking up at it so he's nowhere near that arm.
MALLORY: But is it like that Buster Keaton thing where the window, he's just sitting right at the window and just.
LIAM: Perfect.
MALLORY: Fucking natural 20.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Just kiss him!
TAVIMA: Tavima, after leaping away, is going to walk up behind him.
LIAM: Yeah.
TAVIMA: And she's just going to look actually, genuinely sad before I'm going to use Sunfire on his back and just try to incinerate him and hopefully catch the blood on the front, too, and try to burn that away.
LIAM: Okay. I like that flavor. Sunfire.
TAVIMA: Sunfire is a spell attack. So it's a 24 to hit.
LIAM: Do it at advantage because he is not good.
TAVIMA: Please don't make me crit on this. The second one was a two.
LIAM: Okay, cool.
TAVIMA: 24.
LIAM: Yeah, hits for sure.
TAVIMA: I'm so heartbroken right now. I hate this. 13. 18. 18 points of fire damage to him and a d6 of fire damage. Can I-- It's supposed to be to any other enemy, but can I try to send that fire damage to the blood to try to burn it off of the statue?
LIAM: Sure.
TAVIMA: Cool, okay.
HOA SEN: Burn that blood!
TAVIMA: Five points of fire damage to the statue.
LIAM: Where... Grelnok-- had to think for a split second, which one is it-- sent a crack up it, fire sears and singes up along that very crack and Mehrunes Dagon's chest just glows, veins of fire but it holds. However, Rennix-- fire spreads through his body and he doesn't say anything. Doesn't turn around. You don't even know what expression he had. He just goes up like a Roman candle and is gone. Wine bottles continue to fall off of the shelves that you have on the lower floor here.
TAVIMA: I catch one without looking.
LIAM: Yep, you catch it.
TAVIMA: Yeah!
LIAM: Far above, you hear -- We're out of initiative, but we're not in happy fun times.
HOA SEN: I summoned--
TAVIMA: I feel like I could've been happy. Which is wild, because I've known him for 20 minutes.
GRELNOK: Yeah, he was just hot, hun. He was literally just hot.
HOA SEN: It clouds your vision.
TAVIMA: There was a moment. I don't have a lot of moments.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Can someone take care--? Hoa, will you take care of this young?
MALLORY: I've got the young one.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: You've got the young one?
MALLORY: Yeah, yeah, we're getting out of here. I'm already taking the kid up.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I'm going to run up the stairs.
HOA SEN: I throw Tavima the other greater healing potion. You're pretty messed up still.
TAVIMA: Yeah, I'm dying.
HOA SEN: You're broken on the inside--
TAVIMA: My heart is broken.
HOA SEN: -- and the outside.
TAVIMA: She's just bleeding, she's like: Yeah, I'm emotionally in a lot of pain right now.
HOA SEN: Yeah, that'll feel good for a minute.
TAVIMA: Okay, I'm going to drink this, thank you.
HOA SEN: You will heal inside one of these days.
LIAM: You down it on the run, and you guys start carefully running up these stairs as best you can as the whole place continues to shake. You come up through the bottom of Grelnok's Skull. The entire bar area is just shaking and glasses are jingling where they are. Are we heading outside?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Yes.
GRELNOK: Yeah?
LIAM: You bust out the front and look--
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: On the way out, I'm going to just say: Rex, Rax, on me!
HOA SEN: Yeah!
TAVIMA: Yes!
HOA SEN: Rex, Rax!
LIAM: Rex is hovering over your shoulder. Rax is, I don't know, MIA. Something must have happened to him. You bust out the door, have a split second to register that there's an old man passed out in a chair right by one of your arcane heat lamps.
HOA SEN: With a blanket over him.
LIAM: And you find chaos. Three beings that look to be made of fire and swirling, molten viscera are throwing themselves in a fury at both Grelnok's Skull and the Golden Goose. These figures bubble and hiss and throw sheets of flame against the walls. But that is not the worst thing you see. Looming large and ominous over this quiet corner of Grahtwood stands a rip in the fabric of Mundus itself.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Mundus!
LIAM: You stare into a gateway to Oblivion. A shrill and imperious voice shakes you out of your horror. "Ha! If it isn't the fine people of the Leaky Hole."
TAVIMA: Excuse me?
LIAM: You look up across at the Golden Goose and on a balcony, high up, you see the tax collector. Cloaked in dark robes, similar to those worn by Triss and Rennix. "You know, I tried to run you off this land with bureaucracy. Then I tried to remove you the old fashioned way. But do you lot are doggedly persistent. In the end, I decided to get what I needed by just slipping in underneath. I drink your milkshake!"
TAVIMA: What is a milkshake?
HOA SEN: What is happening?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Probably something they sell at the Golden Goose.
TAVIMA: Probably. Bet it's delicious.
LIAM: He raises a black, metallic rod into the air, blood dripping from his own hand and down along his forearm. "And now at last we stand upon the edge of Oblivion!" Another horrible shriek rends the air around you. Everyone roll for initiative while I set up the map.
GRELNOK: What?
HOA SEN: This is my first map experience, and I'm very excited.
GRELNOK: I thought this just meant we all died.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Whoa!
MALLORY: Oh no.
GRELNOK: Uh oh.
TAVIMA: Oh, is this what this feels like? It feels bad.
HOA SEN: Yeah, feels bad, man.
TAVIMA: That looks scary. It's bad here.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: What is that?
TAVIMA: Oh no!
HOA SEN: What?
MALLORY: Oh, I don't like that.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: That's moving!
HOA SEN: That's a boy.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: That's a thing that's moving!
HOA SEN: Oh my gosh.
GRELNOK: It's on fire!
TAVIMA: Oh, that's rad.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: That's so cool.
MALLORY: That's horrifying.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Is it battery operated?
TAVIMA: That's fantastic.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: How does it do that?
MALLORY: I'll show you later.
GRELNOK: It's really on fire, Sam.
TAVIMA: That's fantastic.
HOA SEN: Oh, fire buddies.
TAVIMA: Someone got their iPod Touch involved in the map making and we love it.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Is that an iPhone in there?
MALLORY: Traditionally it's--
TAVIMA: It's an iPod Touch.
LIAM: That's a gate to Oblivion, Sam.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Cool!
HOA SEN: Yeah, Sam.
GRELNOK: That's so cool!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: That is really cool.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: What are all these things?
GRELNOK: Oh no, there's so many things!
TAVIMA: There's so many bad boys!
GRELNOK: Is that just fire? Or are those bad people?
LIAM: Those are-- You can call those--
TAVIMA: I got to put my glasses on, I got to see this.
LIAM: Flame atronachs, they are beings of pure flame.
TAVIMA: Flame astronauts?
SAM and LIAM: Flame astronauts.
HOA SEN: Atronachs!
LIAM: Tax collector goes up here, I don't know if you can see him but he's going in his balcony.
HOA SEN: Oh my gosh, so cool.
GRELNOK: I hate the tax collector!
TAVIMA: He's such a bad boy.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: One of those, too.
HOA SEN: It's so good.
LIAM: Now, hold everyone.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Hold! Hold.
LIAM: Wait 'til you see the whites of their eyes. Okay.
TAVIMA: Why's it got to be white?
HOA SEN: Those little lights in there just went off.
MALLORY: No, that's us.
HOA SEN: Oh, no, JK Rowling, sorry.
TAVIMA: Oh, do I have a little?
LIAM: There we go.
TAVIMA: I don't have a pointer, do I?
MALLORY: Some of us keep emergency laser pointers for this sort of occasion.
HOA SEN: Oh, just to trick the newbie, me.
MALLORY: You might have one of these at your table, I don't know.
LIAM: All right.
GRELNOK: Maybe?
HOA SEN: It's fine.
LIAM: Can we please call out if anyone has an initiative over 20?
MALLORY: This is not going to be good.
LIAM: How about 15 to 20?
TAVIMA: 19.
GRELNOK: I bet I rolled lower than you this time.
HOA SEN: 17.
LIAM: 17 and you got a 19?
TAVIMA: 19.
LIAM: Okay so, Tavima.
TAVIMA: These dice are doing the most right now.
LIAM: Hoa.
TAVIMA: Ooh, I'm out of everything important! Hey, while we were running, did our-
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Yeah, everything resets, right?
HOA SEN: Oh, that's right, yeah.
LIAM: That's right, there's a little bar, there's two little color bars that float around you at all times and as you leave one battle and run to the next it goes, whoop!
HOA SEN: I forgot.
TAVIMA: Perfect, thank you.
HOA SEN: I was scared for a second.
TAVIMA: I am out of stuff.
LIAM: Two got-- So that was 15 to 20, how about 10 to 15? What is wrong with you two? How 'bout five to 10?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Eight.
HOA SEN: Nothing's wrong with them!
LIAM: Eight.
TAVIMA: If they match again, I'm going to scream.
LIAM: And you two?
MALLORY: Ready? On the count of three.
LAURA and MALLORY: One, two, three!
HOA SEN: Oh my god!
LIAM: Vex and Percy strike again.
TAVIMA: Amazing! I love it.
MALLORY: I've been rolling poorly.
GRELNOK: Me too!
HOA SEN: Or for this game, "normal."
LIAM: Okay. Okay, okay, okay. Let's get into this. Let's place you on the board, guys.
HOA SEN: Ooh, yay!
TAVIMA: Oh cool.
LIAM: So you've all just come running--
GRELNOK: Out of the Skull.
LIAM: -- out, through flame and fire and an old man farting in his sleep.
HOA SEN: He's fine.
TAVIMA: Oh, I love old man toots.
GRELNOK: Oh, that area's going to be so flammable.
TAVIMA: Where's our horse? How's he doing?
HOA SEN: He's behind the tree.
LIAM: Sad Horse is here, by the way. What did we do with that kid?
TAVIMA: ♪ Sad Horse! ♪
MALLORY: I was just going to tap the kid and tell him to run off the board. Get running.
LIAM: Okay, so the kid is...
HOA SEN: They don't need his blood anymore, it's fine.
LIAM: Here for the moment.
HOA SEN: Oh!
LIAM: All right.
GRELNOK: Run away, little triangle!
LIAM: Tavima.
TAVIMA: Doesn't have legs.
LIAM: This is how I was formed. Tavima, whatcha going to do?
TAVIMA: Okay, so there's bad stuff right in front of us?
LIAM: Oh yes. Right here. You ran right out, your place is on fire.
TAVIMA: Yeah.
GRELNOK: Again.
LIAM: Yeah. Again.
TAVIMA: It happens. I don't even really feel bad about that part anymore, that's a thing.
MALLORY: We're well past feeling bad about that.
TAVIMA: Yeah. It's very good at being on fire. So I'm going to run up and attack the guy trying to light our place on fire.
LIAM: Okay, so just a straight line right here?
TAVIMA: First, I'm going to cast Backlash.
LIAM: Okay.
TAVIMA: Oh god. Do I have a sense of if fire will hurt a thing made of fire?
LIAM: It seems kind of dicey.
TAVIMA: Yeah, it feels bad. I do not do Backlash. All of my damage is fire damage!
HOA SEN: Oh no!
TAVIMA: Whoopsie.
MALLORY: There's a non-fire thing on the board.
TAVIMA: Yeah, so we're just going to run forward and do a hit with the longsword.
LIAM: Sure. Go for it.
GRELNOK: Durvin.
HOA SEN: Devin?
LIAM: Diven.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Revin.
LIAM: "My name is Diven!"
GRELNOK: Deyvon.
LIAM: "Grenlok."
TAVIMA: Deyvon, 17.
MALLORY: Pippin.
LIAM: Oh, for sure hits.
TAVIMA: Cool, cool, cool.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: My crystal palace is gone, right? My crystal sword?
MALLORY: Yeah, that's a one shot wonder.
TAVIMA: For nine points of slashing damage.
LIAM: Got it.
TAVIMA: And then I'm going to put a stamina on it to puncture. So I need a DC 14 dex check.
LIAM: Fail.
TAVIMA: Cool. Where's a d10? For another eight points of piercing damage.
LIAM: You just knock entire guts of molten magma out of this thing's torso and it drips and falls, it manages to flame back up, but it certainly looks very weakened.
TAVIMA: Hey, against all logic, swords hurt hot, so do that. And then I use my bonus action to Shield Wall.
LIAM: Okay. And your sword is heated metal at this point.
TAVIMA: I hold the sword, I do the buckler thing of just putting the hot boy on top of the shield.
LIAM: Awesome.
TAVIMA: Cool off.
GRELNOK: Oh, that's cool.
LIAM: Okay. That takes us to Hoa.
HOA SEN: Okay. Everyone, there's a lot of fire. We're going to be okay. I got the icy stuff! And I cast Frost Cloak on everyone of my choosing. So not the bad boys, even the child. So y'all get plus one to AC, resistance to cold damage, whatever, and if you're hit by melee by an enemy, that's three damage to them.
TAVIMA: Thank you.
LIAM: So remember that, because I might not.
HOA SEN: Yeah, I'll remind you. It's cold damage, if that matters, it might.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Nice.
HOA SEN: And then I will, since I'm going first, I'm going to go ahead and scoot back to the kid and try to get them to run south, away from here. This is very bad. They probably don't want your blood anymore because they took care of that on their own. So if you just go, they probably won't chase you.
LIAM: And the kid just looks at you going, "Uh!" Okay.
HOA SEN: And no more pie.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Because it's a triangle.
LIAM: Yep.
TAVIMA: He doesn't have a mouth.
HOA SEN: Hey!
MALLORY: The kid goes--
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Can't roll away either.
MALLORY: We have the plus one from the cloak, too, so it's now, okay.
LAURA and TAVIMA: Yeah.
LIAM: You hear Diven snickering from up in the balcony.
GRELNOK: I want to kill him.
TAVIMA: Shut up, David!
LIAM: "At long, long, last." And his hands swirl in a circle.
GRELNOK: Go after him.
LIAM: And more fire begins to swell in his hands and he pulls his arms wide. And there's a big roiling sphere between his hands.
GRELNOK: Oh no.
LIAM: A massive fireball comes your way and hits right here.
GRELNOK: All of us?
LIAM: All of you.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I'm going to use my reaction for Bone Shield! Actually, you know what? No. I'm going to just take it. I don't want to use my stanima.
LIAM: Everybody make a dex save.
TAVIMA: Okay. Don't forget, you have that plus one to your saves.
HOA SEN: Oh my god.
GRELNOK: Oh! Natural 20.
TAVIMA: Let's go!
MALLORY: Eugh!
HOA SEN: Nine.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I should've used the shield.
TAVIMA: 17.
LIAM: All right. Call them out again for me.
GRELNOK: Natural 20.
LIAM: Yes. That's good.
TAVIMA: 17.
LIAM: That's good.
HOA SEN: Nine?
LIAM: Okay.
SAM and MALLORY: 14.
LIAM: Okay, okay. Okay, so.
MALLORY: And the child.
GRELNOK: Oh!
TAVIMA: How'd the child do?
GRELNOK: Is child just out of the blast zone?
LIAM: Saves. But.
TAVIMA: Cran-baby.
LIAM: Okay. Here we go.
HOA SEN: Is it just me?
TAVIMA: This kid's going to turn into cranberry sauce, I feel like it.
HOA SEN: No! No cranberry sauce on the board.
LIAM: Hoa, you take 11 points of damage. Everyone else takes six points of damage and the child is knocked off his feet and blown back onto the cobblestone. He's... The child's on the ground.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Oh no.
GRELNOK: Can you use your mushrooms on the child?
HOA SEN: I can when it's my turn, yes. And it's AoE, so if you stay close, y'all get that.
GRELNOK: What do we take? Six points?
LIAM: Six points if you saved.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: This is the worst guy ever, this Diven.
GRELNOK: I hate him. We really should've killed him when we had the chance.
LIAM: And you see, where he's standing up on the balcony.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Ah! Oh!
LIAM: And he's higher up on the roof.
HOA SEN: What?!
GRELNOK: Aw, he's going to be harder to hit.
HOA SEN: Oh, he teleports!
GRELNOK: Oh no!
HOA SEN: He go fast.
TAVIMA: This guy.
GRELNOK: How do we get up there?
TAVIMA: Just throw your maxe at him.
GRELNOK: My maxe is really big.
TAVIMA: But you're really strong!
HOA SEN: Anyone good at climbing?
TAVIMA: You killed a statue a little bit.
HOA SEN: Yeah!
LIAM: Okay, there he is, perched above.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Man, he's far.
LIAM: Now we're on to atronachs. So they're going to fight back. Lub-a-dub-a-dub-a-dub-a-dub-a-doo. Okay. What's your AC, Tavima?
TAVIMA: 18.
LIAM: Okay. Well, that is a 20. So that hits, unless your shield helps.
TAVIMA: I got a five on the die.
LIAM: Excellent.
MALLORY: Wow.
TAVIMA: This one d6 is just like, "I gotcha."
LIAM: So your shield just erupts and you hold it up away from you and you watch fire gutting all around it, like a halo or a sunflower. And you can feel it hot against your forearm but you manage to protect yourself and stave off the attack. This one comes. Five, 10, 15, 30. And it keeps coming. Five, 10, 15, 20.
HOA SEN: No, too close!
LIAM: And it gets right next to its companion and-- Five, 10, 15, 20, 25, 30. 25, 30, so they don't do anything because they've spent their time burning their way across the road. But they're right up in your grill. And now we are at Slaughter Grimm.
TAVIMA: Slaughter Grimm.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Slaughter Grimm! All right. That guy Diven's probably, what, 80 feet away? How far is that?
LIAM: That seems like a good guess.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I can't really do much to that.
MALLORY: Not this round.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Okay. So, action. I will first use some stamina and throw some, orb-like webs will eject from my--
LIAM: Show me that movement again. Okay, good.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Let's just say they eject, my vest is so nasty that it just sloughs off and webs come off of it. And I'm going to attack the two that are close together and see if I can get them both in trapping webs that will make them unable to move.
LIAM: Okay, okay.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Dexterity 14 save.
LIAM: Natural one.
GRELNOK: Yeah!
HOA SEN: Yay!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: And? Oh, both of them?
LIAM: Sure. No, that's not right. Three. So a fail.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Okay, great. So they're both stuck. They're both stuck. That's it.
LIAM: That's it? Okay, great.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: They can make a strength check to try to get out of it, but they cannot move.
LIAM: So they're grappled?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Yes.
LIAM: Okay, so they can't move from that spot. Okay. So the necromantic webbing around them, flames burst through and around them but they just glisten poisonously through it and hold in place and they push and surge toward you but can't get any closer. Any other little tricks up your sleeve?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I will then move my movement to try to cross the street towards Divon.
LIAM: Okay. Five, 10, 15, 20, 25, 30. I'll say you get that far.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Okay. That's pretty much my moves.
HOA SEN: Oh, you have a tail!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Oh, and then I'll say, I don't know if they can move independently, but I've only seen Rex emerge, but I'll say: Rex and Rax, go serve Divon dinner!
LIAM: Rax comes bursting through the stained glass window which smashes open.
GRELNOK: Coolest tray ever!
LIAM: And it's trailing behind Rex, like he does so much and they are moving slowly across the road. Got it.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Okay.
LIAM: Okay. Next--
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: What they're going to do up there, we'll find out.
LIAM: -- is Mallory.
MALLORY: I'm in a tricky position. Am I actually engaged with that one?
LIAM: No, I'd say there's about five feet between you.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I'll just also yell: Hey, by the way, next round, those webs are going to explode, so maybe don't just stand right next to it.
HOA SEN: Okay!
MALLORY: Okay, I'm going to also head across the street see what 30 feet gets me. With a little bit of distance between the two of us. I don't want to be too tight.
LIAM: 20, 25, 30.
MALLORY: I can get up there.
LIAM: Are you using the rest of your action to move further?
MALLORY: I was going to say, am I within 60 feet? That guy is still forever away, he's not 60 feet away, is he?
LIAM: It's kind of hard to tell.
MALLORY: Kind of hard to tell.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Don't have any of Matt's tricks back there?
LIAM: I just use my guesstimating brain.
MALLORY: I just moved 30 feet?
LIAM: You just moved 30 feet.
MALLORY: That's more than 60 feet. If I'm eyeballing it, it feels like more than 60 feet.
LIAM: Okay.
MALLORY: I'm going to use the rest of my movement to cross the street.
LIAM: Where do you want to go? This way, this way or this way?
MALLORY: Straight across to see if I can get some cover from that jerk.
LIAM: 15, 20, 25, 30.
MALLORY: A little bit of cover.
LIAM: Yep. Okay, you're there.
MALLORY: As long as he can't see me, that's good.
LIAM: Next up, Grelnok.
GRELNOK: Grelnok! Am I right next to one of those fings?
LIAM: One of those fings? Yes, you are. Oh. No, you're not, because I moved the wrong mini before. So Tavima's there, and you're actually here.
GRELNOK: Oh, sweet, all right. Then I'm going to run away from those fings. And I'm going to also make my way.
LIAM: Following the same path?
GRELNOK: ♪ Makin' my way across the street ♪
LIAM: Five, 10, 15, 20.
GRELNOK: But I'm going to run toward-- Hmm. Is there anything on the ground? Any low balconies I could jump up to, maybe, that I could see? That I could run towards?
LIAM: Well, there's a set of stairs and I can't quite get over there, that gets higher up towards the roof there in the middle.
GRELNOK: I'm going to run towards the stairs.
LIAM: Okay. Five, 10, 15, 20, 25, 30. You're on your way. Things are burning too, everyone.
GRELNOK: Think I'm 30 feet away from him?
LIAM: No.
MALLORY: No.
GRELNOK: What if I jump up in the air?
HOA SEN: Yeah!
MALLORY: ♪ Everybody jump. ♪
LIAM: Well, we'll have to see what the dice tell us.
GRELNOK: Okay. I'm going to jump up in the air.
LIAM: Okay, and--?
GRELNOK: Try to cast Molten Whip on him.
LIAM: Great. I love it.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Jumping whip.
MALLORY: Hopscotch, or what is it? Jump rope.
TAVIMA: Hop, skip and a whip.
GRELNOK: Yeah. When I hit the peak of my jump, I'm going to cast Molten Whip.
LIAM: Okay, cool.
MALLORY: This is some Castlevania shit.
LIAM: Roll an attack.
HOA SEN: You got a turkey leg.
GRELNOK: Okay. An attack?
LIAM: Yeah, at disadvantage.
TAVIMA: Hurtful.
LIAM: He's on the roof!
TAVIMA: Yeah, that makes sense.
HOA SEN: Yes?
LIAM: How'd you do? How'd you do, La?
GRELNOK: With my disadvantage?
LIAM: Yeah.
GRELNOK: I rolled a one.
LIAM: Really?
GRELNOK: On my disadvantage. My first one was a 17.
LIAM: Oh wow. That would've been really cool.
HOA SEN: Yeah.
LIAM: That would've been really cool. Instead, you leap--
GRELNOK: You're such a dick!
LIAM: And the roof whips and breaks and tiles break off and go flying and scatter down all around you. And just the tiniest little fire starts right there from your hit.
GRELNOK: All right.
MALLORY: I'm okay with that.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Where's Mangla? Or whatever?
LIAM: I don't know. I don't know. Tavima, you are up.
TAVIMA: Okay. So I am currently in melee with some bad boys but they are whipped, or they're webbed up and about to explode?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: They're webbed up.
LIAM: Yes.
GRELNOK: Oh wait, for my bonus action, I'm going to cast Hardened Armor because I don't have any magic left.
LIAM: And the one that you're locked with, you fucked it up.
TAVIMA: Okay. But I've seen those webs do work. He looks very bad, so I'm just going to dip.
LIAM: Okay.
TAVIMA: Move away.
LIAM: Which way? Where do you want to go?
TAVIMA: I'm going to start heading across the street, too, and just get some eyes in the middle of this, as close to the middle of that main thoroughfare, to, you know, look at the rip into Oblivion.
LIAM: 30. That's your movement.
TAVIMA: Yeah, I'm just going to think about that a little bit. What the hell am I looking at?
LIAM: This?
TAVIMA: Yeah, it's a big hole?
LIAM: You are looking into another place that is full of fire and destruction and chaos. It is not just color and flame in front of you. You are seeing, in the far distance, things, unimaginable things flying through the air, crashing to the ground. Guts of lava spitting up into the air. It's another place entirely.
TAVIMA: Cool. Cool, cool, cool. I'm a Templar, so I'm just going to throw up some quick thoughts and prayers to that god I worship that we all know about.
HOA SEN: Uh-huh.
LIAM: Absolutely.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Which one?
TAVIMA: How can I go about unmaking this booboo in the universe real quick?
LIAM: How can you undo the gate?
TAVIMA: Yeah, is there a check I can make? Or a prayer to, once again, the god that we're going to dub in that I definitely just said.
LIAM: Let's say, make an arcana check.
TAVIMA: Cool.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Oh, you mean the blah, blah, blah god?
HOA SEN: Yes, we all know the name of that one.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: To be ADRed later.
TAVIMA: Can I have advantage? Oh, that's a 16, that's not bad. Just 16.
GRELNOK: "Can I have advantage?"
LIAM: What is it?
GRELNOK: Eh, it's okay.
TAVIMA: This is not where I'm going to plead with you. 16.
LIAM: There is no divine intervention coming to you in this moment.
TAVIMA: Cool.
LIAM: You are horrified.
TAVIMA: Yeah, that sucks so much.
LIAM: So that was half your movement, though.
TAVIMA: Yeah. Okay. I got to try something at this thing. Let's throw magical fire at it in hopes of cauterizing the rip in the world.
LIAM: Okay, okay.
TAVIMA: I'm going to try to hit it with Sunfire.
LIAM: Let's do it.
TAVIMA: And see what we get. Oh, shit, 19 on the die. 24.
LIAM: To hit?
TAVIMA: To hit the hole in the world.
LIAM: And the distance on Sunfire?
TAVIMA: 60 feet.
LIAM: Sure. Absolutely.
TAVIMA: Cool. All right.
GRELNOK: You probably could've hit Diven with your 60 feet.
LIAM: It's further away.
TAVIMA: He looks further away. I was listening when you were talking about distance and I didn't think I could get it over.
GRELNOK: But if you'd have jumped.
TAVIMA: Listen.
HOA SEN: We don't have that high Grelnok jump, all of us.
TAVIMA: That got me very good. Thank you very much. That went-- oh, goodbye! We ignore it. 15 points of fire damage. And a d6 of fire damage to anything that's within five feet on the other side of the rip.
LIAM: Okay. You extend your hands out and fire gusts out from your arms. There's a lot of fire in this area of town, guys.
TAVIMA: I'm hoping mine is divine and different.
LIAM: It strikes into this gate and just, and there is an explosion as one kind of fire meets another and for a second, you're blinded and then you look back and it continues to roil and burn in front of you.
TAVIMA: I didn't do anything!
GRELNOK: It was a good try, though.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: It was great, we had to try.
LIAM: You learned something.
TAVIMA: Yeah, don't put fire at the fire.
MALLORY: Can't actually fight fire with fire.
TAVIMA: Yeah. Cool. That's all I got.
LIAM: Okay, Hoa, you're up.
HOA SEN: Oh boy. I'm going to scoop up this little child in my arms. And I would like to move. I'm just checking, does that count as an action to carry this little cranberry boy across the way?
LIAM: I'm going to give it to you as a free action because he is thin and brittle.
HOA SEN: Oh, the little brittle boy. I take little brittle boy. I'm going to try to go, I want to head towards the-- Everything's on fire. That's not great. What's the spiky red thing at the edge?
LIAM: That is a blast mark out of the earth. And you guys, looking around, see one over near the edge of the Skull and one over near the edge of the Golden Goose.
GRELNOK: Oh, they're coming out where the statues are!
TAVIMA: Ah, crap, okay.
GRELNOK: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
HOA SEN: That's bad. There's no safe spot for this boy.
GRELNOK: Is there light coming up out of those blast zones?
LIAM: They're smoldering.
GRELNOK: Okay.
HOA SEN: I'm going to take this boy to the horse. I don't know how far that is, but.
LIAM: Okay.
TAVIMA: The horse?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: That's super far.
HOA SEN: Well, listen.
GRELNOK: That's also towards the giant arcane gate.
LIAM: You'll have to arc either through the atronachs, these beings of flame, or you'll have to take longer to arch around and through them.
GRELNOK: I bet if you take him off the map, he'll be in the safe zone.
HOA SEN: Yeah.
TAVIMA: Why don't you just push this boy in the bushes?
HOA SEN: Yeah.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: This poor little triangle boy.
LIAM: He's also out.
TAVIMA: Yeah he's dead, so.
LIAM: He's in a bad state.
GRELNOK: Is he dead? Try to heal him.
HOA SEN: I heard two different things. Can I tell if he's alive?
LIAM: Yeah.
HOA SEN: Let's do that, let's all do this first. This is sad.
LIAM: Make an medicine check.
HOA SEN: This is so upsetting. Jesus. That is a seven.
LIAM: Seven. You put your ear close to his mouth and it's very imperceptible, but there's a little tiny, shallow .
HOA SEN: Okay. I put him in this pink tree to the south instead.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Right next to that flame warrior?
HOA SEN: Listen, there's nowhere, where am I supposed to put this boy?
GRELNOK: Push him off the map!
TAVIMA: Push him off the map.
HOA SEN: Can I push him off the map? What's the other side of this map?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: End of the world.
LIAM: It just keeps going. Buildings are far apart in this part of the Grahtwood.
HOA SEN: Let's just say I put him in a safe spot somewhere that's not on the battle map area.
LIAM: Okay.
TAVIMA: If we all die, this kid's going to die. Who cares?
HOA SEN: What about the little bird shed I used to have for the birds that's out there?
LIAM: Sure.
HOA SEN: Just off the map, I just put him in there.
LIAM: I will say, though, he is in bad shape and on his turn, he's making a death save.
HOA SEN: And I cast Fungal Growth. Well, I was going to take him, then cast the thing.
LIAM: Okay. Cool.
HOA SEN: Yeah.
LIAM: Okay. So you run him, I'll say it's this far, to your bird house.
HOA SEN: Sure.
LIAM: And slide him into it like a pizza in a pizza oven. And you put your hands out to him and mushrooms just sprout up, all across his body.
HOA SEN: Live!
LIAM: You watch as the blackened, charred quality of his skin grows warmer and it's not entirely gone, but it is mostly now normal.
GRELNOK: Yay! He gets to hang out there for three turns.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: He's a little triangle boy.
LIAM: Yeah, the tip of the triangle had burned away but it reforms, and now he's a perfect d4.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Is he now an acute triangle?
LIAM: What's the opposite of inspiration?
TAVIMA: Desperation.
LIAM: Perspiration, all right. Any other tricks, Hoa?
HOA SEN: No, that's me. I'ma chill in this bird house with this kid.
LIAM: Okay.
HOA SEN: Yeah.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Hoa's gone!
HOA SEN: Oh, should I roll his first healing?
LIAM: Yes.
GRELNOK: Keep fighting!
HOA SEN: Oh, I got a two from there, that's a three.
LIAM: Okay. And as you look at him, his head comes up. " Thank you."
SAM and GRELNOK: Aw!
TAVIMA: Yo, ask that kid if he can kill a demon.
HOA SEN: No! I scream from across the battlefield. No!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: The kid's probably like, "Your restaurant sucks!"
LIAM: Diven--
LIAM: Diven's laughter can be heard pealing out from the top of the Golden Goose.
TAVIMA: I hate him.
LIAM: And you look up at him and see him point this black staff which glows red as he points it at the gate of Oblivion. And once again, you hear that deafening shriek curdling your blood and the gateway throbs angrily.
GRELNOK: No!
LIAM: Before you can even inhale to scream, a massive, scaled and terrifying, blood red reptilian face--
TAVIMA: I'll fall in love with him.
LIAM: -- fills the gate and pushes its way through--
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Through?!
LIAM: -- into your world.
MICHELLE, LAURA, and SLAUGHTER GRIMM: No!
LIAM: Massive clawed hands reach through, followed by a towering, roiling body of muscle, scale, and flame, dragon-like, but this monstrosity steps out and rears back on its hind legs, and massive claws outstretched to his sides. Vast and dreadful wings unfurl and this titan, this ash titan, screams in fury once more, before slamming its hands thunderously upon the ground before you. "Burn and be reborn!"
TAVIMA: Buy me dinner first!
HOA SEN: No!
MALLORY: This is a very crowded hole. Oh no.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: We're restaurateurs!
LIAM: Now, he's on all fours, but our guy, in the theater of your minds, is on hind legs.
GRELNOK: Oh my god, we are not going to survive this!
HOA SEN: I hope his secret weakness is ploughman's lunch or whatever.
MALLORY: His secret weakness is slightly charred children. Well done.
HOA SEN: No!
TAVIMA: All right.
GRELNOK: No!
TAVIMA: Look--
GRELNOK: But he's kind of hot!
TAVIMA: I'm looking for a rebound, what's up?
LIAM: And Diven holds bloody staff, blood still dripping down his arm, and he just kisses it.
LIAM: And looks down to watch the fun.
HOA SEN: I yell: What's your name?
TAVIMA: A nasty boy! Diven is a nasty boy.
LIAM: Oh dear. Oh dear, you guys.
TAVIMA: Oh, dear.
GRELNOK: He got out, you guys. It happened.
MALLORY: Aren't they netted?
LIAM: Oh, you're right! Thank you very much. Thank you, thank you, thank you.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Thank you.
LIAM: These two are, right?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Yes.
MALLORY: Yeah.
LIAM: But Tavima is still dealing with one. So one of the flame atronachs chases after you, Tavima. And that is a miss, for sure.
TAVIMA: I'm done dealing with you!
LIAM: And that is a 20 to hit.
TAVIMA: It hits.
GRELNOK:
LIAM: Don't you have your shield trick?
TAVIMA: Huh? No, I don't have it up. Wait, do I have it up on this round?
LIAM: I don't--
HOA SEN: It was up last round.
TAVIMA: No, I didn't redo it.
GRELNOK: You also have cold damage to him when you get hit.
TAVIMA: Oh yeah! When I get a boop.
LIAM: Oh, you're right, it's going to come back. So you are getting swatted, and you are going to take--
TAVIMA: Let's go.
LIAM: Something's on the table-- Ah, ooh! You take 10 points--
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Oof!
MALLORY: Whoa!
LIAM: -- of fire damage.
TAVIMA: Ow! And he takes three in return.
MALLORY: Of cold damage.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: It's cold, so maybe it's double.
TAVIMA: But it's more effective.
LIAM: I'm going to say it is.
HOA SEN: Yes!
TAVIMA: Cool! Ow! Do you see that guy? I'm doing that guy! You, go away!
LIAM: Slaughter Grimm.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Oh boy, me?
LIAM: Yes.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Boy, what's the strat here? Are we trying to kill the dragon man, or get the staff from Diven?
TAVIMA: Get Diven, he sucks.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: So we get the staff from Diven?
GRELNOK: Yeah, go for Diven, go for Diven, he's controlling the atronach.
TAVIMA: I'll deal with this kid as long as I can. It will not be long, but--
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: You know what, yes. I'll move across the street.
LIAM: Okay. Five, 10, 15, 20, 25, 30.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Jesus. Am I within-- I'm within 60 feet of Diven, maybe?
LIAM: Seems likely.
GRELNOK: Yeah, because I was almost within 30 feet on my whip.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I will do the thing that never works.
HOA SEN: It will work!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I'll take out my--
GRELNOK: You can do it!
TAVIMA: Let's go!
GRELNOK: You can do it!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I'll choose a good skull.
TAVIMA: Yeah!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: This one looks particularly--
GRELNOK: Right as he's about to do it: I'm going to go: Slaughter, you do this, you're the manager.
TAVIMA:
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Oh boy!
MALLORY: Well, now it's--
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Do you need an official CV to have on file--
TAVIMA: No, you're good!
GRELNOK: Just fucking throw the skull.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: All right. I cast my spell, my Ricochet Skull, and this time, instead of granny shot, I will basketball fade shot!
HOA SEN: Yeah!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Let's see if that works!
TAVIMA: Got to leave it up.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Two!
GRELNOK: No, you had advantage because I gave you inspiration!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Is that true, Marisha?
LIAM: It is this time.
TAVIMA: Marisha who?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: 17?!
MALLORY: What?
HOA SEN:
TAVIMA: Oh my god!
MALLORY: It finally worked maybe?!
LIAM: Marisha struck that guy!
LIAM: Roll for damage.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: All right! What does this do? It's never worked before!
MALLORY: This is the first time, isn't it?
LIAM: I just want you to be manager, Slaughter.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: 3d6 fire damage?
HOA SEN: Mr. Manager?
TAVIMA: Oh, let's go!
LIAM: Okay.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Decent. 11 points of 'fr' damage.
LIAM: He explodes in fire and gets knocked back and kicks, and tiles go skittering down, but he catches himself.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Ahh! Also, at the end of my turn, my net explodes.
HOA SEN: Yes!
TAVIMA: Let's go!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Dealing those two 2d10 poison damage? Are they immune to poison?
GRELNOK: I don't know.
HOA SEN: They're atronachs.
LIAM: Let's see.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: They're astronauts. Well, if they're not, they just got 10 points of damage.
LIAM: The webbing all over them just go
GRELNOK: They're immune!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: They're immune to poison.
LIAM: And that's probably the end of your turn.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: For sure.
LIAM: Okay, Mallory.
MALLORY: If I just step out a bit, I just want to get what feels like a comfortable 60 feet away from that jerk on the roof.
LIAM: I'm going to say about there.
MALLORY: All right.
LIAM: I feel just maybe there.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Sorry, at the end of my turn, I'll just say: Rex and Rax! Get that staff! That's all.
LIAM: Got it, got it.
MALLORY: I'm going to hit a Lightning Splash, then, at Mr. Tax Man.
LIAM: Let's do it.
MALLORY: That's a dex save.
LIAM: Okay.
TAVIMA: Let's go. Roll bad, please!
LIAM: Rolled real well. 17.
MALLORY: Rolled real rell, rolled real rell.
LIAM: Rolled real rell.
MALLORY: Okay, that's all of that, then.
LIAM: Oh, it's all or nothing?
MALLORY: Yeah.
LIAM: All the tiles around him get, and they fuse. All the tiles fuse, and it's like almost like molten, lumpy glass all about him.
MALLORY: Oh, I hate this. I'm backing off and taking cover about 15, 20 feet.
LIAM: Okay.
MALLORY: So.
LIAM: All right.
MALLORY: I want to have a little cover from whatever the hell that thing is.
LIAM: Grelnok.
MALLORY: Oh, yeah, no actually--
LIAM: Oh, sorry, you're going--
MALLORY: I'm backing up about, yeah, 15 feet.
GRELNOK: And all the tiles around Diven is molten glass now?
LIAM: It is all fused together.
GRELNOK: So it's extra slippies?
LIAM: Maybe.
TAVIMA: Yes!
HOA SEN: Yes.
GRELNOK: Okay, where's Rex and Rax?
LIAM: They're floating about here now.
HOA SEN: Oh no!
LIAM: Right above the road, in front of the ash titan's face, 15 feet out in front of it.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Rex'alia and Rax'ildan.
GRELNOK: Yeah!
LIAM: We're okay, Raggy.
GRELNOK: Uh-- Where's the stairs?
MALLORY: In between--
LIAM: They're pretty hidden from view. It's between these two large portions, two wings of the--
MALLORY: There we go.
TAVIMA: Oh, vibes.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Or you can kill the dragon.
GRELNOK: I can't get up to him with those stairs, can I? Can I run up and leap and grab onto the side of a building and try to climb up or something?
LIAM: I mean, there's a possibility that you could run up the stairs and try to heave yourself up, sure.
GRELNOK: Yeah, that's what I'll try to do.
LIAM: You wouldn't be able to do any kind of attacky stuff afterwards, but you could get up there if you succeed.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Oh, what if you held on to the trays and they, like--
GRELNOK: That's what I want to know where were they!
LIAM: They're here.
TAVIMA: They're right in front of the bad boy.
MALLORY: You could maybe hop and then flip.
TAVIMA: You're literally serving him dinner, just you.
GRELNOK: Yeah, I don't think that they're in the right spot.
LIAM: "Oh, hi!"
GRELNOK: Yeah. What's up? Yeah, I'm going to try to heave myself up.
LIAM: Okay so all your movement is used to chug your way up the stairs. You're getting closer, and you see that the edge of the roof is 15 feet above you. You've jumped that high a couple times.
GRELNOK: Uh-huh.
LIAM: So make an athletics or acrobatic check, whichever you prefer.
GRELNOK: Athletics.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Come on, Grelnok.
GRELNOK: Nine plus five is 14?
LIAM: I will say that that succeeds, yep. You hoist yourself up and catch the bottom, and one of the tiles starts to slip, you catch the one above it, and you pull yourself just up to the top, up to your waist, and your legs are just kicking off the side, and that's the end of you turn.
GRELNOK: Oh, shit!
TAVIMA: You look cool! You look cool! It's fine, you look cool.
GRELNOK: I thought I would be able to get up all the way, maybe on my turn, but cool.
HOA SEN: Well, do more pull-ups.
TAVIMA: You're doing it.
LIAM: For all intents and purposes, you are up.
HOA SEN: Yay!
TAVIMA: Let's go.
LIAM: Oh dear. Okay, that's where I'll have you.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: The camera can see that.
GRELNOK: Yeah, it's fine, I'll go up.
LIAM: You're up there, you're up there.
TAVIMA: You're doing it.
LIAM: Okay.
MALLORY: Whoa, yeah.
GRELNOK: Whoa, look at me!
LIAM: The ash titan.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Where is-- Oh, the ash titan, oh god! We forgot all about the gigantic dragon!
TAVIMA: We didn't!
HOA SEN: We didn't forget about it. We're trying to ignore it.
LIAM: Looks down at his right and just reaches out. Picks up Sad Horse.
MALLORY: No!
HOA SEN: What?!
TAVIMA: He killed our horse?!
GRELNOK: Sad Horse didn't even move when he came out! Sad Horse was just like, "What?"
MALLORY: So sad!
HOA SEN: I almost put the kid on that horse!
GRELNOK: Ugh!
TAVIMA: My dude.
HOA SEN: We really failed, I think.
TAVIMA: If you kill our horse--
LIAM: And this gigantic head comes looming down at you, Slaughter.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: At me?! I'm going to reaction, use two stamina and cast my Bone Shield.
LIAM: Okay.
GRELNOK: Joke's on him, he walked straight into Rex and Rax.
LIAM: I got a 16.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I mean, that hits.
MALLORY: Okay, is that with your plus two?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Yes.
LIAM: Okay, so the Bone Shield gives you extra HP, right?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I get six extra hit points.
LIAM: Okay, so. You take 10 points--
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Okay.
LIAM: -- of piercing damage as massive, dagger-like teeth bite into your whole arm up top.
GRELNOK: Oh no!
LIAM: You're thinking that you're going to get pulled up into the air, but it shakes, and you're thrown back a few steps. And you watch as the inside of its mouth starts to glow, but that's the end of its turn.
GRELNOK: It takes three points of cold damage!
HOA SEN: Six because it's cold! Unless he's not.
LIAM: I'm going to make that true across the board.
TAVIMA: Let's go!
LIAM: Because it just makes sense, you know?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Is it my serving arm?
LIAM: No, no, no. For sure not.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I'm okay, I'm okay.
LIAM: Okay, so that is the ash titan. At that moment, you hear, "Oh no! Oh no, come on," and two people run out into the field, and you see Mangla come running out around the corner, and--
HOA SEN: Please be with us.
LIAM: Wendla--
GRELNOK: Bjork?
LIAM: -- steps out-- "Oh yeah!" Steps out a door behind Mallory. "What on earth is going on? What are these things?"
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Wait, they're innocents?
GRELNOK: Oh, they're good people!
HOA SEN: We don't know.
LIAM: The two of them look at each other, and just look up at the creature and Mangla just pulls an arrow and gets ready to fight.
HOA SEN: Yes!
GRELNOK: They're good!
TAVIMA: Mangla!
HOA SEN: You can always trust a server and a hostess.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Oh, I knew it!
LIAM: Oh, they rolled really well.
HOA SEN: We have no adverse in our means.
TAVIMA: Does that mean I'm bad?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: You can always trust front of the house.
HOA SEN: Yeah! Front of the house can't lie.
TAVIMA: I hope we survive this.
LIAM: Okay, and actually Mangla rolled super high, so she takes that arrow, bends back, and fires it at the biggest threat on the field. Yep. Arrow streaks across the field, strikes it. It barely even notices, though, because it takes-- Oh, max damage, excuse me. It goes, And that takes us to Tavima.
TAVIMA: Tight. Yeah, I'm just going to move directly in front of this bad boy and square up.
LIAM: Whoa.
TAVIMA: And just be like: Okay, get Diven. I got this! Fuck! Backlash. Give me a DC 15 con save.
LIAM: Fail.
TAVIMA: Beautiful! I don't know if fire damage does anything, but I'll take the doom. Another eight points of fire damage.
LIAM: Okay.
TAVIMA: And is doomed, so I do extra damage if I hit with an attack.
LIAM: In the future, right?
TAVIMA: Which I'm going to attempt to do now with my longsword. Does a-- Does a 15 hit?
LIAM: Sorry.
TAVIMA: Yeah, shoot.
TAVIMA: Yeah, that's it. I'm done.
LIAM: Okay.
TAVIMA: Oh, sorry. Yeah, no, I used the other Backlash. Yep, and I'm just here because I can't do Shield Wall.
GRELNOK: No!
LIAM: Wendla, all 5'5" of her, looks around and says, "Are you all right? Who needs help?"
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Oh, she's a healer!
HOA SEN: I'm very badly burnt.
TAVIMA: Wait, aren't you in a bird cage?
HOA SEN: Yeah, no, but I only have 15 hit points left, also.
TAVIMA: Oh, that's fair.
HOA SEN: Well, who's doing worse?
TAVIMA: I mean, not great, it's going to get worse, but go ahead.
MALLORY: Actually, how bad are you hurt?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I'm okay. I mean, I'm fine.
LIAM: She will--
HOA SEN: Let's get closer to the fight.
LIAM: You see, she hears you, and she clasps her hands together and you see her mouth moving, and she glows with a pale blue light and, Hoa, you do feel a surge of wellness come over you, and you take-- you regain 13 points.
HOA SEN: Holy crap!
TAVIMA: Oh, shoot.
GRELNOK: She healed a lot!
TAVIMA: I would like to sign up for the next one.
HOA SEN: Yeah, I hope she has more than one of those in the pocket. Otherwise, I'll feel guilty.
TAVIMA: Please keep her alive, we're going to need her in a sec.
HOA SEN: Keep her alive, okay. I don't have any more healing left.
LIAM: Okay, and that takes us to you, Hoa.
HOA SEN: Yaas! Okay. So because I am still in the fungal growth at the beginning of my turn, I take 1d4 of healing. Yeah, it's a four, it's good.
TAVIMA: Let's go, let's go.
HOA SEN: I'm feeling a little better. Okay so, I'm going to move. Can I get within 60 feet of one of the atronachs?
LIAM: Within how many feet?
HOA SEN: 60.
LIAM: Yeah, for sure. You barely have to move to do that.
HOA SEN: Awesome. Oh, before I leave, I do tell small cranberry child: You're going to be fine, just stay in this healing circle for, maybe, three more rounds. You're going to feel great. Oh, so that child also got four healing.
HOA SEN: And then when you're feeling great, just run away. It's all you have to do. So when I move, I'm going to go ahead and cast Swarm again on--
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Swerrm!
HOA SEN: Closest little fire demon, and that is-- yeah! 18 to hit.
LIAM: To hit the atronachs?
HOA SEN: Yiss.
LIAM: Yes, absolutely.
HOA SEN: I hit one, right? Or I hit two? I hit one.
LIAM: Uh--
HOA SEN: The AoE is-- not great, it's--
LIAM: Is it 10?
MALLORY: There's two right next to each other. Yeah, I was going to say, those two are holding hands.
HOA SEN: Five-foot, yeah.
LIAM: Yep.
HOA SEN: Okay.
LIAM: You can hit them both.
HOA SEN: All right, here we go. It is a DC 14 con save.
LIAM: Okay. That is a natural 20.
TAVIMA: No thank you, sir.
HOA SEN: You can take half of five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14.
LIAM: Okay, 14. So the one that Tavima roughed up at the beginning of all this just splits in half and breaks as the bugs crawl in and you watch its body gouting, going.
SAM and GRELNOK: Eugh!
TAVIMA: Cool!
LIAM: The other one gets pushed back, but burns brighter and hotter, looking at you.
HOA SEN: Oh god, it's looking.
LIAM: Any other tricks?
HOA SEN: That's it.
LIAM: All right. That means--
GRELNOK: Oh no.
LIAM: -- we are now at--
HOA SEN: Bad boys.
TAVIMA: Did we get how hot is this ash titan?
GRELNOK: It's pretty hot.
TAVIMA: Yeah.
MALLORY: It's hot.
TAVIMA: I just want confirmation from the DM.
GRELNOK: Two feet, it's walking on two legs, big, muscly.
TAVIMA: Yeah, muscles, wants to murder.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Hot, you're talking about super handsome.
LAURA and TAVIMA: Yeah.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Okay.
MALLORY: He's got some good facial scales going on.
GRELNOK: Chiseled. Chiseled.
LIAM: Diven sees you coming up at him, and just you watch as fire swirls in his hand and he hucks it at you.
GRELNOK: Don't! No! No, no, no!
LIAM: And it streaks past your head and hits another wall on the inn and erupts at your back, and you feel the spray of sparks behind you. But he misses.
GRELNOK: You fuckin' suck!
LIAM: He's going to attempt to get further away.
HOA SEN: He feels sad about that.
GRELNOK: Is it slippery? Does he have to make a dex check because it's slippery?
LIAM: Yes, he does. Yes, he does, but we'll see.
GRELNOK:
TAVIMA: Does he do a bad job?
LIAM: He rolls really high, he rolled an 18.
GRELNOK: Aww, I wish he would've just fallen off.
LIAM: Yeah, to his death and broke his neck, that'd be super easy.
GRELNOK: That would've been awesome.
LIAM: Okay, now we're onto remaining atronachs. So one of these is gone, it was this one. And this one goes towards the one that hurt it. So five, 10, 15--
HOA SEN: Oh, so close! Too close, too close!
LIAM: Gets to you.
HOA SEN: Oh no!
TAVIMA: No!
LIAM: And swipes at you.
HOA SEN: Okay.
TAVIMA: I do not enjoy hot boy summer.
HOA SEN: My AC is super low.
LIAM: I'm assuming your AC is higher than a nine.
HOA SEN: Yay!
LIAM: So you just simply duck, and you hear over your head. And the bugs still burning in its molten body.
HOA SEN: Yeah!
LIAM: And that gets us to Slaughter Grimm.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Oh no!
LIAM: You know what, right now, your Rex and Rax-- I'm not going to get out a platform for imaginary platters.
TAVIMA: Yes, please.
HOA SEN: What?!
TAVIMA: My immersion!
LIAM: Make it up to about here, and are hovering in a little circle around each other. About 10 to 15 feet away from our dragon.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Okay, shoot, do I go after Diven again?
GRELNOK: Yeah.
TAVIMA: Please kill him.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Okay, am I within 60 feet? Of Divon?
LIAM: Down here-- It's kind of a close call.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: All right, can I hop up on those barrels? Try to get a little couple extra feet?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: You are just out of the range of this flame ash titan.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Oh god.
LIAM: 20, that looks better to you.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Okay, I will reel back, and prepare another skull to throw, aiming for the arm that's holding the staff, I guess, if I can--
LIAM: If you're trying to hit the staff, it's going to be at disadvantage.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Ooh.
GRELNOK: Just try to hit him.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: All right, I'll try to hit Diven wherever I can hit Diven.
TAVIMA: You're a manager.
GRELNOK: Come on.
TAVIMA: You can do it!
LIAM: I believe in you at disadvantage.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I believe in me, too.
TAVIMA: I believe in you!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: At disadvantage? No way!
LIAM: I believe in you.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: No, I will take my skull, and I'll split fingers! This is a split finger fast ball.
LIAM: Into the eye holes?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Oh yeah, like a bowling ball hold! And I'll bowl it up.
MALLORY: Oh no, not underhand.
LAURA and TAVIMA: "Bowl it up."
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: 19!
TAVIMA: Roll it one more time. I just want to see what disadvantage would've been.
GRELNOK: What if it's a 20?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: It was a 10. Terrible.
LIAM: What would've it been, though?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: 16.
LIAM: Yeah, that would've hit.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Okay!
TAVIMA: Goddamn it. You got to believe in yourself, my guy!
HOA SEN: Great!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: You're right! That's what every manager needs. Confidence. It's not all about--
MALLORY: Oh my god.
HOA SEN: Can-do attitude.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Okay, I will roll my-- Okay, 10 points on the dice plus three cold, so 13 points of damage.
LIAM: Okay.
TAVIMA: Let's go.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Oh, and I forgot. Whenever my skull hits, which is very rarely, it just comes right back into my hand!
TAVIMA: That's right!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: So that was the same skull as before. I'm just throwing the same one over and over.
LIAM: Right, so it slammed into Diven and then whipped out and went off the two platters, and then into your hand.
GRELNOK: Just hanging from my perch, and I go: Nice!
TAVIMA: I look over from facing down this guy, and I'm like: Dope.
LIAM: All right, now we're up to Mallory.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: But he did not drop anything. Damn it!
MALLORY: All right, seeing what just happened, I'm feeling slightly competitive, so I--
LIAM: Roll up the sleeves.
MALLORY: Step up next to you, make eye contact, pull out the staff, and firing back up again with a Lightning Splash.
LAURA and HOA SEN: Yeah!
MALLORY: That's a dexterity save, DC 14.
LIAM: Fail.
MALLORY: Yes!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I used to wear Lightning Splash in high school.
MALLORY: Is that why you smell that way?
GRELNOK: You should start wearing it again!
MALLORY: That is 15 points of lightning damage.
LIAM: Woo!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: It's my people!
LIAM: He stiffens up on top and goes, blackens, and there's just smoke and steam coming up from around his neck. Let's see how he does on the roof. He falls.
LIAM: Slides down the roof.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Rex, Rax!
HOA SEN: Get him!
LIAM:
HOA SEN: Make him merge with the dragon.
LIAM: What do you want the platters to do?
TAVIMA: Do the trays get opportunity attacks?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: If they can get the staff, it's fine, it doesn't matter because he could roll--
LIAM: Give it a shot!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: -- right on us.
LIAM: Right now, Rex and Rax, roll a 20, and I'll vibe check it.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: 18!
LIAM: 18? The shields circle, and circle, and circle and that circle gets tighter, and tighter, and tighter, and they just manage to clip and pinch the staff as this guy plummets and falls. He lands and slams into the stone, and you hear "Oh no,"
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Still alive.
LIAM: He's breathing on the ground.
TAVIMA: We gave you pie, you lonely bitch!
MALLORY: Where's the staff?
LIAM: It's pinched, hanging between two, slowly now, rotating platters above.
MALLORY: I'm going to back up away from this giant, terrible, red dragon, stepping on him as I go. Motherfucker! And, yeah, I'm just going to step back for the rest of my movement.
LIAM: Probably get to there. Yeah, there.
MALLORY: Yeah.
LIAM: Okay, so jaunty in your chef's hat. All right, now we're on to Grelnok.
GRELNOK: Fuck! I just got up here! I'm going to lift myself up--
LIAM: You're so badass!
GRELNOK: -- onto the roof.
LIAM: Okay.
GRELNOK: Run over along the edge of the roof and leap off and try to land on the back of the ash creature.
HOA SEN: Ooh!
TAVIMA: Let's go!
LIAM: Okay, make an acrobatics check.
GRELNOK: Acrobatics! Not athletics?
LIAM: It can be either.
TAVIMA: Yes!
LIAM: Because I want my players to succeed.
GRELNOK: Dirty 20!
LIAM: Ooh! You watch her jump out. Sail! And her arms go wide. And she falls--
GRELNOK: As I'm sailing, I pull my maxe out from behind my back and slam it down onto it.
TAVIMA: Grelnok, are you free on a Thursday?
HOA SEN: Aww!
LIAM: Okay, roll for an attack.
MALLORY: Literally never.
LIAM: At advantage, just because goddamn.
TAVIMA: Let's go!
GRELNOK: Ooh, ho ha! 23?
LIAM: For sure hits.
GRELNOK: Okay, I'm going to add my free action Uppercut into this.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Skadoosh!
GRELNOK: Skadoosh!
GRELNOK: Five plus eight is what, 13 plus seven!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: What is that, is that damage?
GRELNOK: Yeah, that's all damage.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Plus three cold, right?
GRELNOK: Oh, no, that isn't--
MALLORY: No, that's only for take damage.
GRELNOK: That's only if something hits us.
HOA SEN: Yeah.
LIAM: Okay.
GRELNOK: So 15 plus five, that's 20, right?
LIAM: So your maxe lands and slams into the nape of this thing's neck, right at the base of the skull, and goes, "Little vermin!"
GRELNOK: Bonus action, take my claw and slam it down and rake it across his back as well.
LIAM: Go for it.
GRELNOK: That is a 13 plus-- 16.
LIAM: To hit?
GRELNOK: Oh wait, "treat as a melee." Nope, that's a lie. 21.
TAVIMA: Let's go!
LIAM: Yeah, that hits.
GRELNOK: Okay, and then--
LIAM: Ride the lightning.
GRELNOK: 3d8.
TAVIMA: Let's go!
GRELNOK: Five, seven, plus two, is nine, plus three, is 12 points--
GRELNOK: -- of poison damage from the claws!
LIAM: Got it, okay.
TAVIMA: Let's go!
LIAM: The thing looked at ease before, and now it looked furious.
GRELNOK: I look over its shoulder at Tavima, and I go: Ma'am.
TAVIMA: Oh! Oh my!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Ooh.
TAVIMA: Yeah, let's kill the shit out of this!
LIAM: Okay. Okay, cool. At that moment, a door to the inn kicks open, and--
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Who else is there?
LIAM: -- the cook comes out.
SAM and TAVIMA: Groth!
LIAM: "The fuck is going on here?"
GRELNOK: I thought he was one of the people--
LIAM: He looks down at the guy on the floor.
TAVIMA: Yeah, I guess not.
LIAM: "What is this? What is that?" And he comes running with a giant cast iron skillet and comes running.
TAVIMA: He's just a good chef and a good person?!
LIAM: Eh, kind of an asshole. Come running out--
MALLORY: Well, he's a chef.
TAVIMA: Yeah!
MALLORY: What passes for the purest of chef.
LIAM: Swings.
GRELNOK: I thought he was the owner? Is he not the owner?
LIAM: He's the owner.
TAVIMA: Yeah.
GRELNOK: He's a good guy?
TAVIMA: The owner's a good guy!
LIAM: I don't know, not everything's black and white.
HOA SEN: Ooh!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: This complicated restaurant!
TAVIMA: Of course my boyfriend had to be a bad boy! Cool.
HOA SEN: This lore!
LIAM: Swings the cast iron skillet up and he just slams it into the thing's chest, and you see a scale go "Shit!" And that's the end of that turn. The ash titan--
GRELNOK: Oh no.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Ash titan!
LIAM: -- takes a step to the left, looking down at-- I can't move him--
HOA SEN: He's so big!
LIAM: -- because his wing is too big.
TAVIMA: Yeah.
LIAM: Takes a step over, looking down at Tavima and at Groth, and knows there's something on his back, but first, he goes.
TAVIMA: He kills.
LIAM: Make sure that works. It does, and liquefies Diven on the ground.
TAVIMA: Yeah.
GRELNOK: Ah, ooh.
TAVIMA: Once again.
GRELNOK: You know.
LIAM: He will lunge down.
GRELNOK: He deserved it.
LIAM: Yep. And-- Seven plus eight is 15, 18. Reaches down and bites and tears off Groth's arm.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Oh no!
HOA SEN: What?
LIAM: With the skillet in the hand.
GRELNOK: Oh no!
HOA SEN: Aww!
TAVIMA: Bet it tasted good.
LIAM: And then his wings curl in and sweep out. Uh, I need--
HOA SEN: This feels like break stuff.
LIAM: Grelnok.
GRELNOK: Yeah?
LIAM: Mallory, Tavima, to make-- strength saves, 13.
GRELNOK: Oh, ho ho ho, yeah!
MALLORY: Oh yeah!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Wow, these are all--
TAVIMA: Let's go.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: -- good reactions.
GRELNOK: That's really good.
TAVIMA: 24.
LIAM: 24?
GRELNOK: 25.
LIAM: Ooh!
MALLORY: Natural 20.
LIAM: Yes!
HOA SEN: Finally, it's all happening.
MALLORY: With my Sailor Moon die.
LIAM: Oh my gosh. So a gust of wind blasts against you and you feel the wings, the musculature of the wings, these giant rippling muscles come in really close to you, and you're like, and you hold yourself down, and dig your hand in under his scales and ride it like a bull, and you guys feel this blast of wind go into your bodies and you just slam one foot down into the earth and just hold against it, and hold your ground,
GRELNOK: Yeah!
LIAM: And don't get knocked back on your ass.
TAVIMA: Let's go!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Amazing.
LIAM: That's great. Mangla sees the scrum on top of this giant monster, but looks over and takes aim at an atronach over there, and hits, and what did you do, Mangla? You did, you did--
GRELNOK: They were both just genuinely happy to be there.
TAVIMA: Oh my god.
LIAM: An arrow strikes--
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: It's a positive work environment.
LIAM: -- this being of flame right through the head and the atronach goes and sputters out on the ground.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Nicely done.
LIAM: This one is gone.
GRELNOK: Nice!
LIAM: That gets us back to Tavima.
TAVIMA: Sweet. Yeah, big boy in front of me, let's go. Backlash is still up, so let's just do a longsword attack. 18 to hit.
LIAM: For sure.
TAVIMA: Cool, cool, cool. Seven, 10 points of slashing damage, plus-- Where's a d4? I've never seen one before in my life. Plus six points of fire damage.
LIAM: Okay.
TAVIMA: And then I'm going to, got to puncture. So DC 14 dex.
LIAM: 14.
TAVIMA: Yeah, okay. And then bonus action Shield Wall.
LIAM: Okay. This thing is not invulnerable. It is starting to show rends in its flesh, and it looks on edge.
TAVIMA: Sweet, and I was centering all of those attacks, as much as I could, towards where Grelnok was hitting at the base of its skull.
LIAM: Got it.
TAVIMA: We need another skull.
LIAM: Oh, base of the skull was, right, Grelnok got it. Good, understood. It rears its head back and away from you--
TAVIMA: Yeah.
LIAM: -- after taking its bite from Groth, so its head was low. Good, and that's the end of that round for you?
TAVIMA: Yeah, I'm done.
LIAM: Wendla-
TAVIMA: I do want to ask, does he talk? Does he say-- Hey, do you have words?
LIAM: "What?"
TAVIMA: Oh, okay, cool.
LIAM: Wendla comes running out into harm's way and says--
TAVIMA: There's a chance.
LIAM: "Oh, my friends, I'm so sorry. This will help," And an orb of light expands out from her, encompassing Tavima, Grelnok, Groth, Mallory, and Slaughter.
GRELNOK: Whoa!
LIAM: And you feel a surge of energy in you, and all of your stamina and magicka--
LIAM: -- fills out.
GRELNOK: Yes!
TAVIMA: I just want to turn to her. You are so nice.
LIAM: On fire.
GRELNOK: I'm so happy.
LIAM: Okay, so that's it for Wendla. She's actually going to go back 10 feet because this is not good.
TAVIMA: Yeah, for sure.
LIAM: Ooh, this chair. Diven is road paste, so forget him, and Hoa, you're up.
HOA SEN: I really misjudged you. I am so sorry. You're doing great, helping a little more than I can. Okay, let's do this. And I get within 60 feet of the ash titan.
LIAM: Well, you're right up against, so this will take an attack if you get closer.
HOA SEN: Yeah, oh wait, what is that? Oh, there's one left? Okay.
LIAM: One left.
HOA SEN: I didn't see behind the tree. You know, let me just take care of this guy first. Actually, instead of doing that, I will just get in melee with that little boy.
LIAM: Where you were?
HOA SEN: Yeah, where I was is fine. And then I attack with my ice staff.
LIAM: Okay.
HOA SEN: And I do use my bonus action to get my expert hunter feature, and I'm going to try to hit. Please, please hit it, come on!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Hit that astronaut.
HOA SEN: Yeah! That is a 17 plus six, which is 23. And that's going to be-- Oh, no, a 17 plus three, which is 20.
GRELNOK: ♪ Dee dee dee dee! The tides are turning! ♪
TAVIMA: success, we're going to be okay.
GRELNOK: We got to close that portal.
TAVIMA: Don't use fire.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I'm on it.
HOA SEN: One plus one is two plus--
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: How'd he open it?
GRELNOK: I don't know.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: We didn't see him open it, right?
HOA SEN: Two plus nine, so 12, 11 points of damage.
LIAM: Your staff, crystalline with ice shards, swings up into the air and down and meets fire, and steam immediately erupts. And the staff slides halfway down into its torso and its whole body just dims and darkens and goes gray and falls into chunks of stone and ash in the room.
GRELNOK: Yeah!
HOA SEN: I did a thing. And then, if I can use the rest of my movement to get behind that bird fountain would be good.
LIAM: Sure. This maybe?
HOA SEN: Yeah.
LIAM: Okay.
HOA SEN: Birbs.
TAVIMA: Yay, birbs!
LIAM: All right. That gets us to no more atronachs. Slaughter Grimm. By the way, the staff is still hanging precariously between your two--
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Above me ish?
LIAM: Yes, it's slowly going.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I will just hold out my hand and beckon them to drop it.
HOA SEN: Ah! So good.
LIAM: Sure, that's a bonus action.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Okay, sure.
LIAM: It falls. Make a dexterity check.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Dexterity check is nine.
LIAM: Nine. It hits your hand, and you go. It goes on the ground down below.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Can I pick it up?
LIAM: As an action, you can.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Oh my god!
GRELNOK: What about as a free action?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I tried to give it to him as a bonus action, and he rolled really low!
HOA SEN: Fair, that's fair. You should probably get it.
GRELNOK: Damn it, Slaughter!
HOA SEN: Is someone else nearby to get it?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I will get it, I guess.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I will get it. That's it, that's my whole turn.
TAVIMA: Get somewhere safe!
LIAM: You're holding it and it is searingly hot in your hand, you can just barely hold it.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I am resistant to fire damage.
LIAM: You feel nothing. You were born for this.
HOA SEN: Yeah!
LIAM: And service.
TAVIMA: Slaughter, go hide with the thing.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Go hide?
LAURA and TAVIMA: Get away from this thing.
LIAM: You can definitely do that, you can move for sure.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Management does not flee from a treacherous moment. I stand with my staff, and with my staff.
HOA SEN: Aw!
TAVIMA: Brother, I will shove that staff up your ass. Go in the corner.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I will stay where I am, but I'll duck behind the barrels. I hope they're not full of gunpowder.
LIAM: Behind the barrels?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Yes.
LIAM: Okay. Grelnok.
MALLORY: Who keeps barrels of ether in here? Who would do that?
GRELNOK: I'm up, what about Mallory?
LIAM: You're right. Mallory's up.
MALLORY: I'm going to shift myself so that I can fire a cone at this thing and not hit anybody else.
LIAM: Yes, you could-- Hmm.
MALLORY: Probably stepping forward a bit.
TAVIMA: Have I been in your way the entire--
LIAM: Yeah, for sure, because he's so big you can hit it, aim for his legs and his ass.
MALLORY: Yeah, first, as I'm walking, I'm going to cast Crystal Weapon on Grelnok.
HOA SEN: Yes!
MALLORY: So you have Crystal Weapon now.
GRELNOK: What does it mean, what does it mean?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: No one's ever used it.
MALLORY: No one's ever actually used it, but the next thing you hit is going to have a little bit of a bad time.
GRELNOK: Sweet.
MALLORY: Or at least--
LIAM: It's like Crystal Light, there's no calories.
MALLORY: Okay, that's round.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Purple stuff.
MALLORY: And then I'm going to cast Force Shock.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Force Shock!
MALLORY: Which is a constitution saving throw.
LIAM: A failure.
TAVIMA: Let's go.
MALLORY: That's 13 force damage.
LIAM: Ooh. There's an eruption in its gut as that force blasts through and you can see
MALLORY: Full dragon.
LIAM: Red hot bones underneath--
GRELNOK: Ooh.
LIAM: -- where the flesh has been blasted away, singed and burning. Any other movement? You probably have another five or 10, if you want.
MALLORY: I'm just going to get a little bit away from everybody else, just to spread out the problem.
LIAM: Okay, maybe a diagonal towards the bottom of these steps. I can't see around the corner.
MALLORY: Yeah, yeah, yeah, into the barrels.
LIAM: Okay. Now it's Grelnok.
GRELNOK: Feeling extra special with my pretty new--
LIAM: Crystal Maxe?
GRELNOK: Crystal Maxe.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: New Crystal Maxe: Twice the calories, double the caffeine!
GRELNOK: Do I have advantage because I'm on his back?
LIAM: No, because he's been doing this, so no.
MALLORY: Technically engaged.
LIAM: We'll call it a straight roll.
GRELNOK: 13?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Damn it.
TAVIMA: Oh yeah, do we have--
LIAM: Nuh-uh.
TAVIMA: Advantage because of pack tactics, because we're a pack?
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Oh yeah, flanking, we're flanking.
TALIESIN, MICHELLE, and GRELNOK: We are flanking!
TAVIMA: Flanking is the word I wanted!
GRELNOK: We do get flanking bonus.
TAVIMA: Flanking.
LIAM: Yeah, I'll call that flanking, sure.
GRELNOK: Okay, okay, okay. Come on, come on, yes!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Pack tactics?
GRELNOK: That is a natural 19!
LIAM: Woo!
GRELNOK: We do get advantage because we're flanking!
LIAM: We'll call that Crystal Maxe Tactics.
GRELNOK: Crystal Maxe Tactics! I'm going to add my free action uppercut onto this thing as well.
MALLORY: Well, before you do, I should tell the DM that, that thing's AC is down by two now until the beginning of its turn.
LIAM: Got it.
TAVIMA: Shut up!
HOA SEN: Crystal Weapon is very good.
GRELNOK: So that's 10 plus.
TAVIMA: We have to use Crystal Weapon more often.
GRELNOK: Whoa, 10 plus eight is 18, plus five. That's a lot of damage.
HOA SEN: The way you said it was like you're excited about math, but I get it .
GRELNOK: 10 plus eight is 18!
SAM and LIAM: 23.
GRELNOK: Plus five!
TAVIMA: Stop trying to make me like school.
MALLORY: This is so--
LIAM: Okay.
MALLORY: Math is fun.
GRELNOK: And as my bonus action, I'm going to add a Venomous Claw attack.
LIAM: All right.
HOA SEN: Yeah! Math!
GRELNOK: Do I get-- Oh, because I'm flanking, do I also get advantage on flanking attacks?
LIAM: Yeah, all your attacks, if you're flanking.
GRELNOK: 17 plus seven, that's awesome.
MALLORY: Oh my god.
GRELNOK: So I'm going to do 3d8 damage now.
GRELNOK: Hold on! Where's my-- okay.
LIAM: "I am the sto-- Oh shit, oh shit!"
GRELNOK: 12 plus three. That's 15 extra points of poison damage.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Oh man!
HOA SEN: Whoa!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Damn!
LIAM: That was--
TAVIMA: So many.
LIAM: 37, I think, total.
GRELNOK: Yeah!
TAVIMA: That sounds low.
LIAM: Okay. Okay. Y'all done there, Tex?
GRELNOK: That's it, that's all I got.
LIAM: Okay. One hand strikes down on the ground, as he twists his neck around.
LAURA and TAVIMA: Ah!
LIAM: Dulgan Groth, squished like jelly below this thing's hand. Dulgan Groth.
TAVIMA: Shit, he was so talented.
LIAM: And he tries to snake his head around and bite you. It'll be at disadvantage because you're kind of hard to reach. Natural 20, or... 12.
TAVIMA: Oh my.
LIAM: Plus, right, right, right, right, right.
TAVIMA: I'm so stressed out right now.
LIAM: For a 20 to hit.
GRELNOK: Oh, 19.
LIAM: Okay.
MALLORY: That's with the plus two?
LIAM: Oh, no that's the AC down.
MALLORY: AC is down.
LIAM: So it's going that way.
GRELNOK: Oh, his AC is down, yeah.
LIAM: So eight. You take 14 points of piercing damage as he sinks into your leg.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: You okay there?
TAVIMA: How ya doing, bud?
GRELNOK: You okay there?
LIAM: But you manage to bash him away a bit with your maxe and get your leg free.
GRELNOK: Hurtin'.
LIAM: And he's just going to kind of like, he's not going to move, he's going to circle. He doesn't know what to do. He's low-key panicking, as big as he is.
TAVIMA: It's just me, drunk in the club. Where's my purse?
MALLORY: Yelp needs a random button.
LIAM: Mangla pulls another arrow and fires it, but it goes wide as the titan is moving and ducking from side to side.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: It's okay, you're doing great.
LIAM: Tavima, we're on you.
TAVIMA: Okay, okay. I guess keep hitting is the thing that we're going to do here.
LIAM: That could work.
TAVIMA: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, I have all my stuff back. That's great.
GRELNOK: Yeah.
TAVIMA: So Backlash again for a bonus action, DC 15 con save. Please and thank you.
LIAM: Seven.
TAVIMA: Cool. That's seven points of fire damage and you're Doomed until the end of my next turn.
GRELNOK: Ya doomed.
LIAM: Okay.
TAVIMA: It's so much more damage. Fire is hurting this guy, right? Because I've--
GRELNOK: Or is it helping?
LIAM: It's been hurting him. It didn't have an effect on the atronachs.
GRELNOK: Oh, right.
TAVIMA: Okay. Wait, sorry, say that again, I'm panicking.
LIAM: The flamey people.
TAVIMA: Yeah?
LIAM: Seemed to have no effect on. This guy--
TAVIMA: Okay, all right, then I'm going to Sunfire him instead.
LIAM: Okay.
TAVIMA: So. Fuck yeah. 21 to hit.
LIAM: Yes, that hits.
TAVIMA: Shitty damage. 10 points of fire damage, and yeah, that's it. Okay, I think that's it. That's it.
LIAM: Okay, okay. How do you want to do this?
TAVIMA: Shut up!
HOA SEN: You did it!
TAVIMA: Cool, cool, cool, cool. I think, even though it's a ranged spell, instead as he's reaching and craning, I just want to jump up and grab it by the face, and pry its jaws open. And I think in a weird, "My God is Dead and Doesn't Care About Me and Nothing Matters," I just breathe fire down its throat and burn it.
LIAM: You wedge your hands between massive fangs into the safe place at top and bottom
TAVIMA: Those gums.
LIAM: And hold this huge, overpowered jawline around you. And you can feel it pressing down, and you don't think you can hold it, and you see light and fire roiling up in its mouth. And before it can unleash, you. And the back of its skull radiates out as your blast pushes through its skull and you watch as the eyes, and the mouth, and the snout just evaporate away from its skull, and it's left just blood and gore and singed stone. The look of as magma turns to stone and fades out. And it sinks into the Nirn beneath it.
LIAM: You watch as its wings molder away. And once powerful musculature collapses with rot. You watch as the flesh of this titan disintegrates to ash. The night air carrying it away on the wind. There's a rumble in the distance within Oblivion.
GRELNOK: Oh no.
LIAM: And the air closes, and the gate and the iPhone disappear.
HOA SEN: Yay!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Wow!
TAVIMA: Whoa!
HOA SEN: Amazing!
LIAM: You look around at the rubble. There's flames still crawling up both establishments. Wendla and Mangla have one arm on each other, holding each other, looking around, looking very out of sorts. The owner of the Golden Goose, no longer with us. The little boy is crawling out of a bird house not too far away. And Sad Old Horse is gone.
TAVIMA: Oh yeah.
HOA SEN: What a loss.
GRELNOK: I step down off the corpse of the ash creature, put my arm around Tavima's waist, and say: I'm glad things didn't work out with Rennix. And I kiss her!
TAVIMA: Hell yeah!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Whoa!
TAVIMA: I do a smooch back.
HOA SEN: Aw! Well, I've seen this before. Both of these things, sorry. I'm actually talking about the fire over here.
MALLORY: We should probably put--
HOA SEN: I only got one more use left. I go over and I cast Frost Cloak on our tavern.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Nice.
HOA SEN: To put out the fire.
MALLORY: I'm just saying, this property is probably going to be up for sale pretty soon.
LIAM: "Maybe, yeah, our owner is dead and we don't know how to run this place, so maybe we can work something out."
GRELNOK: I stop making out.
LIAM: "The two of us."
GRELNOK: We will totally take over.
TAVIMA: Yeah, for sure.
GRELNOK: We're experts at this shit.
LIAM: The two of them look at each other. "We've only been here a week. Could we still keep working?"
TAVIMA: Yeah, he's your boss.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I crawl out from behind the barrels. Yes! I am upper management. I will be taking care of hiring and firing, scheduling work shifts, issuing paychecks, et cetera. So, welcome aboard the staff of Grelnok's Skull: A Really Nice Hole, LLC. MCIHELLE: How lovely!
LIAM: Mangla looks down at you and says, "Yes, sir! Okay, I still have a job."
MALLORY: You don't happen to know if the owner had, like, a book collection of--
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Recipes?
MALLORY: -- recipes, things like that. Other things too, but you don't know of any of that?
LIAM: "I think he kept it in the basement."
MALLORY: That'll burn last. That's nice, okay, okay.
HOA SEN: I sort of kick my way over and I'm like: And I am Hoa Sen, assistant to the manager sometimes. And I will also help train you to know all the ins and outs of how to-- I'm here to help. And just-- Your system of seating was so upsetting and I, you know, there's better ways to do everything, and I have totally lost my character voice. And I will help you. First point of order, if the manager says this is, maybe put out the fire on your tavern.
LIAM: "Oh, okay, I think we have some water inside." And she runs indoors. Comes out in a moment with a bucket. Does next to nothing. "Okay, we are going to need many of these, all right," and the two of them run in and out.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I'll just call down the street, run down the street and call to everyone. Anyone who wants a free meal, come put out this fire!
HOA SEN: That's smart. That's so smart.
GRELNOK: That's great, that's great!
LIAM: A guy wakes up at a table over by your place. "Free, ah, okay." Rips a big one and then hustles over blearily.
GRELNOK: Man, he has a problem!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: What is his deal?
TAVIMA: You are lactose intolerant, sir.
MALLORY: It's the rabbit. The rabbit was a bad idea for everyone involved.
TAVIMA: Look, I didn't want to say anything, but the reason I had to poop was because I had the rabbit.
MALLORY: We know. No one was supposed to have that. That had gone horribly wrong.
HOA SEN: It wasn't true love after all.
MALLORY: It popped when I opened the thing. Clearly, it went bad. That was, yeah.
TAVIMA: It's okay.
MALLORY: The seal was broken.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: We might have a whole, not just a single business, we might have a compound now.
GRELNOK: A couple of Really Nice Holes.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: With an inn and-- We have two Really Nice Holes!
TAVIMA: No!
GRELNOK: Yeah.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: And three tunnels.
MALLORY: I have a proposed name.
GRELNOK: Okay.
MALLORY: The Sad Horse Inn.
LAURA and HOA SEN: Oh.
TAVIMA: The Sad Horse Inn.
GRELNOK: That's really good.
MALLORY: Yeah, I'm really feeling good about it.
GRELNOK: Yeah, yeah, I like it.
TAVIMA: That does feel good.
MALLORY: Yeah.
LIAM: Mangla speaks up, "What's the end of the title? Sad Horse and what?"
MALLORY: Sad Horse Inn.... I don't know, let's workshop here.
HOA SEN: My vote is, Our Chosen Family.
GRELNOK: The Sad Horse Inn and Our Chosen Family?
HOA SEN: Well, no, like, not with The Sad Horse, he was part of our family!
LIAM: "Sad Horse and Our Chosen Family."
HOA SEN: Well.
TAVIMA: We are atrocious at naming.
GRELNOK: This is really bad.
TAVIMA: Look, this place was called The Golden Goose.
HOA SEN: Should we talk more about the holes?
TAVIMA: And we learned nothing from it. No, we don't keep it.
HOA SEN: Okay, okay.
TAVIMA: But I don't have a better idea.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: The Leaky Goose.
HOA SEN: The Horse Goose? The Sad Goose and The Happy-- wait. The Sad Horse and The Happy Goose?
TAVIMA: No, this now sounds like a sex thing.
HOA SEN: Flip it, no.
TAVIMA: I don't feel great about it.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: We'll keep workshopping it.
TAVIMA: Yeah.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: The Sad Horse is a good--
TAVIMA: The Sad Horse is great.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: The Sad Horse is fine for now.
HOA SEN: We'll do a subtitle later.
SAM and TAVIMA: Yeah.
LIAM: And so it goes.
HOA SEN: Sorry, Liam.
LIAM: The world of Tamriel is vast and full of endless wonders. And its fair share of terror, too. Got something caught in my throat.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: It's the emotion of this moment.
LIAM: It is, it is. That Sad Horse. Its chapters thick with the relentless creep of evil, and the heroes who rise in every age to hold back the dark. Less often sung about, though no less loved by the divines on high, are the good women and men of this world who live their lives one day at a time. Looking for little more than a fire to warm their hands, friends to warm their spirits, and a house to call home. Thank you for joining us for these three tales. And remember: Always tip your server.
TAVIMA: Yeah!
HOA SEN: Yes!
TAVIMA: Heck yes!
LIAM: That's it, all. Thank you for joining us.
GRELNOK: That was so much fun.
TAVIMA: That was so fun. Aw, man.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: We captured the essence of Elder Scrolls Online.
HOA SEN: We definitely did. All that Nirn.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: Oh man. Wow, that was so much fun, Liam. What a capper.
LIAM: This was a blast!
GRELNOK: That was a great time.
TAVIMA: That was so great!
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: I'm going to miss these characters.
GRELNOK: I know!
HOA SEN: They're so dumb.
LIAM: Those are the best kind.
LAURA and HOA SEN: Yeah.
TAVIMA: It's so fun.
HOA SEN: I had some real fear when the ash creature showed up. I was like, "Oh no!"
GRELNOK: I thought it was going to be TPK.
MICHELLE and TAVIMA: Yeah.
MALLORY: I had a moment.
GRELNOK: But no.
TAVIMA: No.
GRELNOK: Slaughter Grimm!
SAM and TAVIMA: Slaughter Grimm!
GRELNOK: Making dreams come true.
SLAUGHTER GRIMM: We try.
HOA SEN: What an arc.
TAVIMA: What an arc.
LIAM: Well, we really learned a lot here, guys.
LIAM: I had fun watching the first two of these. I had fun watching you guys come together and make this food squad. I was happy to step in at the end and just want to thank you all for coming along with us. Thanks for hanging out. And if you liked what you saw here, go check out Elder Scrolls Online: Blackwood now at www.elderscrollsonline.com/buy. Thanks, guys.
This Critical Role one-shot was created in collaboration with Zenimax Online. It aired on YouTube on October 28th, 2021. You can access the video here.
Although The Golden Goose is one long video, we have chosen to separate it into two parts of transcription, split at the location of the video's commercial break.