Retro Role Cast
"Serious roleplaying games played by deeply unserious people."
We are a tabletop roleplaying actual play podcast featuring games that remind us of our gaming roots! We play in person with real math rocks! We love gritty, high action dark settings with nuance, but aren't too far away from our bitter, cynical, yet still lovable selves at all times!
Currently: Going way back to many of our players' 1e roots by playing the new third edition of OSRIC (pdf available free on DrivethruRPG, fantastic hard copies available through Mythmere Games) with a home cooked mini (?) campaign in the World known as Greyhawk in the classic era. follow along as the PCs navigate the dangerous environments and tricky politics of the Duchy of Tenh/Theocracy of the Pale border region!
In season one we played Low Fantasy Gaming by Pickpocket Press, Its sequel game Tales of Argosa is released, available, and comes highly recommended by all of us, stop by Pickpocket Games on the web for more info!
Season two saw a transition to a modified Version of Old School Essentials (Advanced) by Gavin Norman, one of many retro offshoots of the world's most popular role playing game. We borrow rules and content from many sources, but with Old School Essentials we used (in no particular order), Old School Feats by Eric Diaz, Into The Wyrd and Wild by Charles Furgeson-Avery, Into the Wild by Todd Leback, The Axian Library by Guiseppe Rotondo, and the Monster Overhaul by Skerples, amongst other sources.
With the close of Season 2 and the addition of two new Retro Role Casters we have moved to a more episodic format for Season 3. We are referring to seasons 1 and 2 as our Zero Level Funnel of Podcasting.
Season three and into the first part of Season four the four OG hosts took turns GM-ing one shots, Three Shadowdark adventures because we love Kelsey's fantastic Old meets New game, Mothership to satisfy our love of the Alien Movies and a Halloween special using the Call of Cthulhu rules.
Logo Art: Olivia G, Background Art: Bob Greyvenstein. Some artwork © Grim Press, used with permission. All rights reserved.
Retro Role Cast
Shadowdark! The Corsairs of Anon-Thuun Ep1
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We are back with a new direction on the podcast! Focusing more on shorter stories, a more varied cast, and trying out a lot of the games that make us happy! Lots more to come!
First up, we play the excellent game by Kelsey Dionne and the Arcane Library: Shadowdark. The players include two new recruits! The PCs get marooned on a mysterious island with a strange gemstone and an uncommunicative and somewhat hostile young woman. They find a mysterious sea cave that seems to shelter them from the gaze of the strange creatures atop an ancient temple...
#ad&d #Shadowdark #OSR #ttrpg #actualplay #rpg #Dnd #oldschoolrpg
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This week on Retro Rollcast. Can't magic anything, but I can totally get us faster through that tunnel, potentially. Alright, so here's my idea. Okay. Not to take over a roast. No, what do you I have to do? So I have a grappling hook, I think. Oh shit. I lost my grappling hook. Does anybody have a grappling hook? I have a grappling hook. Alright. So take his grappling hook, right? It took you, let's say it took you 30 seconds to go that 15 feet or whatever. Right. I do not have any rope, but somebody else might. We've got the rope that's we're gonna need two ropes. Oh, okay. You're gonna take the grapple hook on his rope and you're gonna put it in 15 feet. And then you're gonna come back out pulling on the rope that's attached to the silver. Now you can get in and out much quicker because you'll be grappled on both sides. So then you can take another breath, pull yourself along the grapple that you put in, you'll be 15 feet in 10 seconds versus 30. Now you have the breath to take the grapple, move it forward another 10 or 15 feet. Grab the rope and pull yourself back out, and now you have taken half the time to go twice the distance. And we can keep doing that until we're far enough through the tunnel where we either A, give up because we're out of the rope, or you can't make it through, or we make it through. And that's why I get these.
SPEAKER_05You can't have more than one.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. I have to ask for the enthusiasm still. It's a thing. But we are back and we're starting a whole new chapter. Gone is the two-year campaign that we that we played and then ended very unceremoniously in an afternoon. And we are back to a new direction of getting to experience a lot of the systems in one-shots that we had denied ourselves for having married ourselves to a setting in a group of three characters over the course of what we've played them for like three years, wasn't it? Something like that. Yeah. So if you're new to us, welcome. We are Retro Rollcast. We don't take ourselves too seriously. We are here today to play Shadow Dark, a game by Kelsey Dionne at the Arcane Library. We have never played this game before, although I've owned the book for quite a while and have been perusing it, as well as Sean. You also own a copy of the right. So we're here to play some Shadow Dark and have a little fun today. So hopefully you have fun with us. So today we have actually also two new players. Oh. So it's not just the regular three that have been been with us forever. We are adding today Mr. John. Howdy. He's a man of many words. We have to get him to like rein it in sometimes. But John, how long have you been playing these satanic and uh disruptive games? 30 plus years. Yep, so you experienced the satanic part of it? Not really. I skipped out of that because, well, I just didn't care. Right. And what is your favorite edition? Second edition. Second edition. All right, you belong with us already. Yeah, well. So I started playing when it came out. Next to John in Initiative Order, which we're going to get into as part of the Shadow Dark game, is old favorite Doc. Or Brian, depending on the day.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, but whatever the way the wind blows.
SPEAKER_01So also, Brian, what is your favorite edition?
SPEAKER_03Back and forth a lot. But I think I go back to second edition most.
SPEAKER_01Yep. See, I don't know why I'm asking this question, because I think we all agree. I don't know about Eric, actually. But we'll get to Eric in a little bit. I am Sean, the GM, returning as well as Rodney. And Rodney, I know what your favorite it is. Right, my favorite edition is. And having a blast. And also new to the table, Mr. Eric. Hello. And Eric, how long have you been playing this deal and what's your favorite?
SPEAKER_02I've been at least over 30 years now. I'm 56, so I've been playing since middle school. Wow. But my favorite.
SPEAKER_01Wait, are you? Yes. You are the oldest. You're the eldest member of the table. Why do you think I invited him?
SPEAKER_02I have taken over the role now.
SPEAKER_01I'm the youngest. I'm younger than you, I think. Oh, yeah, you are. Okay. So what's your favorite?
SPEAKER_02My favorite edition is Warhammer, but that's a nice interesting. Warhammer, Warhammer Fantasy November.
SPEAKER_01Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay? Yeah. Or the Battle Game. The Battle Game. Oh, okay. Necron's role. Have you ever played the Fantasy Roleplay? No, I have not. Oh, it's interesting. It should be interesting. Because that is a favorite of that's top tier. I don't know, John. Did you play Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay? Alright, and if it's a favorite of yours as well. I do like it. I don't know why we're not playing that. We've all we had this discussion. We all love it. And he likes Warhammer, so he just doesn't love it yet because he doesn't know. I'll get there.
SPEAKER_03I sense one shot in the future. I think if you're the blunderbuss right in the sorcerer's chest.
SPEAKER_01And last but certainly not least, man to whom the dice uh revere because he's easy. Sean. Wow. Sean, I'm easy. I think you've actually been playing this game longer than any of us. You've been playing longer than the game.
SPEAKER_03Just because I'm older. Not all the old desk. I started with the original pink box behind a friend's recliner in their living room in like 19 years. If you don't want to release too many details, no, like I mean we were young enough that we were sitting on the floor. In a corner of the living room with Doritos path. Sorry, I'm lying. Not Doritos. Fritos.
SPEAKER_01Which was the name of my first character. Yes, because Frito. Because I was super creative at the end of the day. Did you call them a halfling, or did you, or did you try to call it a trademark infringing hobbit?
SPEAKER_03No, no, because at that point, I mean I had read Lord of the Rings at that point, but I was embracing it.
SPEAKER_01It wasn't as big of an influence on you as it was to me and Rodney, probably. No, not probably not. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Well, I have to ask, who here has colored their own dice with a crayon? Oh yeah. Okay. Okay. That's the did it once. Absolutely.
SPEAKER_03That was enough. Sorry, I'm out. My first set. Yeah, exactly.
SPEAKER_01No, I have dice that were colored in with a crayon from back then, but I didn't do it. Yeah.
SPEAKER_03They were dice that just appeared.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Came into my orbit and stayed. My brother had my half-brother had something here.
SPEAKER_03See, I'm old enough that those are the only dice you could buy.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_03When I started, you cra you colored in all of the dice you bought. Yeah, there were done.
SPEAKER_02It came with a crayon, yeah. Yeah. Wax crayon.
SPEAKER_01Well, I started with Middle Earth role-playing because I started liking Tolkien first. So I bought Middle Earth role-playing, knowing that it was like DD, that I knew some of my friends played. I was just more into the Tolkien at that end of things. And the Middle Earth role-playing came with two translucent D20s that were actually percentile dice because it was a percentile system. It was Rollmaster, basically. But the two D20s had zero to nine marked Weiss on them, and they are still my favorite D10s, although I have lost them. That's sad. So yeah. So dice came into my life, and dice left my life in those days. But Damn, we are waxing Philistine. We are here today to play Shadow Dark, and I have written an adventure. Not the most original adventure I've ever written, but I think it's pretty good. We'll find out.
SPEAKER_03Well, I think part of the problem with our original podcast campaign was it was maybe a little too original.
SPEAKER_01It was a little too original. No, I can accept that criticism.
SPEAKER_03Also, I went a little deep with it. It was the river rogers that killed it. We all know that. No, it was distracted us beating.
SPEAKER_01It was not going to the river that killed it. The pain of having devised 27 different converging plot lines at the same time just to give these guys stuff to pick from, and then them zeroing in on what I randomly rolled as a random encounter, thinking they were going to travel down a river. They were like, oh man, the swamp ogres. We we should have done that instead of this epic dragon fight. And I think that did that did make lead us to this point right now.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. It felt more to scale of our desires. Yeah. Dragon fighters. I can actually kill river ogres like that's brought like a will out. Let's go back to the water.
SPEAKER_02We dragon scared the shit out of the dragon. Nope.
SPEAKER_0337 dragons fighting each other and wearing the crossfire. Or it wasn't really 37. It felt like 37. It was two. That's 37 we had in front of it. Right. I found out near the end that the only thing magical about that might have been my belief in it. He's like, I never really said it was magical. I just said it was plus one to hit. It was just masterwork.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, it was a dwarf. But I believe. But I did believe in it.
SPEAKER_03Dwarf Axe. That never let me down. Wholeheartedly. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Yep. But anyway, we are here. We're about to start Shadow Dark. We have rolled up characters before we started today. We have come up with an initiative order because Shadow Dark runs an entire game initiative. And we are going to start with John, one of our new players, and he is playing Union, a thief with a pirate background. And Union comes to consciousness as the surf is rolling up and above his head. You're like sprawled out on a sandy beach, and you hear the sound of gulls wheeling around in the air and making their cries. I spit the water out of my mouth and try to figure out what the hell it is. It's salty and and uh and and briny as water is from the ocean. That's not healthy. Is it daylight? It is early morning. You can see like the first rays of light coming up in the eastern sky. Okay, so we're on the eastern seaboard. Fantastic. And you come to and raise your head and look around, and around you on the beach are other figures. Okay. Four other members of your own party. There is the strange girl that was journeying on your boat trip. She's actually awake, sitting cross-legged, staring in your direction and glaring at you with absolute hatred. Not my fault. Well, you no, it's not your fault. But you've never known this girl to have any other look. Oh, okay. She doesn't speak a language that you understand. You've never heard her talk, really, in any sort of way. She you don't know if she was a captive of the captains or something that the captain was using to gain an advantage in his in his dealings with merchants. But she every time you've been near her, she just glares at any of you with absolute hatred with her red eyes. She's red-eyed, but is she human? She is human, fairly dusky skinned, very beautiful, wears plain clothes, but there's something about her that's just off. Okay. So also you see three other members of the crew of the ship that you were on, and that's when the memories come back. So Doc broke the human wizard sometime after Union Get gets up, you you raise your head as well, and you set about you you two set about uh waking everybody up on the party. Now, what how all of this started was you were in an inn in the town of Miro's Rest, far to the north. The at the winter was setting in, the cold winds from the north were howling down, and you had no employment prospects. The town of Miro's Rest is it's it's a town, but it's a shit town. There's not a whole lot going on, and your prospects for employment over the winter months were looking mighty thin, and you were just resigned to gambling and drinking the winter away with whatever remained of the treasure from your first adventure, knocking over the tower in the cold north that was your first experience. In one day came a man, Captain Ernach. Union, you had sailed for him before. He was a he's a sea captain and he's a sorcerer as well. He came in with a crazy plan that he was going to sail out of Murro's rest in the winter and sail for the southern continent. He said he had a cargo that was going to make everybody rich. But he had a problem. The problem ended from having sailed with him before, that his problem was he was not well liked by his crew and especially his first mate. So he was looking for protection. So he agreed to hire you on, pay you half in advance, and half upon return to Miro's rest. 100 gold either way, each of you, in order for you to make sure that he came out of the voyage alive and not been mutinied by the hands of his crew. So you all agreed sailing through the southern ocean felt like a better idea than wintering in Miro's rest and dealing with the snow and the sleet and the ice. And you also wanted to see the city that he was going to, which was the famed city of Alangatar, the city of the famed Golden Zigrat. And Captain Ernoch was going to deal with the Sultan and the Pale Master of that city for something you didn't know entirely what. So you left. The first few days of sailing were very rough. Horizontal rain, terrible winds, and the morale of the crew was awful and mutinous. You had to physically break up a confrontation between the first mate and the captain, which did not make you friends amongst the rest of the crew for the rest of the journey. But that simmered down into sullen resentment and accomplishing tasks at not quite the rate that they might be done otherwise. The other thing that the crew began to be very upset about was the presence of the young woman that we described. Your duties included protecting her from the crew, although one of the crew did manage to get to her and put a hand on her shoulder, immediately recoiled, screamed, and jumped off the side of the ship. So she may not have needed the protection, but you were there to provide it anyway. Ten days out of port, when you were in the southern ocean, the main mast snapped in a storm. The ship's progress was slowed to a crawl. The winds had died down and the foresail and the mizzen being unable to generate the speed that was needed to cover much water. The mood of the crew grew even darker. And as the morale looked like it was set to break again on the ship, on a moonlit night, the lookout spotted two ships with triangular black sails setting, heading in your direction. This was something you had heard of but not experienced before. These were obviously the dreaded corsairs of Anundhoon. Oddly, this is outside their normal waters, but they were upon you, and that's when the fight began. Ballista bolts of Greek fire hit your ship, burned away the foremast and the foresail, and the fight began. Very early in the fight, the captain with a panicked look on his face shoved the girl in your direction and threw a bag in your hands. The Union.
unknownOkay.
SPEAKER_01What's in the bag? You haven't looked at it yet. Okay. It was the middle of a fight, you didn't open it up and peruse it. But he thrust a bag in your hand and he made motion that you were to lead him to the stern of the ship and out and onto the one of the boats. He was abandoning ship beforehand. The first mate, seeing this, developed a sneer on his face and threw a dagger, which landed square in the captain's back, and the captain collapsed. The first mate then slashed a rope with his sword, and the and the boom swung and knocked a number of you out into the water, and that's the last you remember before waking up on this beach. Okay. But you all come to. There are the five of you, the strange girl, like we described, and there are three members of the crew as well that are just coming to. And they they greet you with looks that are not much better than the ones that she has been giving. And what I mean by three other members of the crew are backup characters.
SPEAKER_03Straight out of pre-gen.
SPEAKER_01So so those are a half-worked quirk named Cragshag. You don't want to play him. A human fighter named Nair, and a half-wing thief named Drog.
SPEAKER_03I kind of like the name Cragsag. Well, then I guess you should have thought of it there, Ron. Hey, Ron. I just did the random gen in the book, then. Remember how you said Frida was your first character? You're like, oh, that's not very main, like, oh, because of Frodo, Frida, whatever. You at least you used your own mind for that instead of a random generator. I'm just saying, I randomly generated mine too, so I'm in the same thing.
SPEAKER_01I possibly wouldn't be GMing this if I didn't have random name generators.
SPEAKER_03Name generators of the greatest. Oh, Cragshack's a nice name. I'll be stealing that later.
SPEAKER_01But you're all coming too, and we start first in initiative order. John, from your vantage point out to the east, you see sand dunes rising up. To the south, you see the peak of a couple of what look to be dormant volcanoes. Not very high ones. You'd probably reckon from the distance they are, they're probably about 100 to 200 yards high in in elevation at the caldera. On the lower slopes of the larger of the two volcanoes, you see some architecture. There looks to be some toppled pillars, maybe some form of statue. It's hard to make out of the distance. To the north, you see uh you see an area of somewhat overgrown, possibly some mangroves and some lower elevation stuff in in that direction. The the gulls are wheeling overhead and shrieking. Before these guys all woke up, a couple of them had had even come down, landed, and tried to pack it at some of the characters until you guys shooed them away. But what are you going to be doing? Do I still have the bag that the captain gave me? You do. What's in the bag? In the bag is a large blue gem. It's about fist-sized, and it's like a deep cerulean blue. Okay. I don't know what color that is. Blue. Blue. Yes. It's like a bluish green.
SPEAKER_03It's very blue. Turquoise. Alright. Extra blue.
SPEAKER_01Okay. And also a spy glass.
SPEAKER_00I take the spy glass out.
SPEAKER_01Okay.
SPEAKER_00I look through it. What else do I see?
SPEAKER_01Which direction are you looking?
SPEAKER_00I'm looking towards the ruins.
SPEAKER_01Towards the ruins? Okay. So you put the spyglass in, down towards the ruins, you see, like on the lower slopes of one of the volcanoes, there there's like a marble platform with some steps going down. There are toppled it looks like there was a cave in above that. It's hard to make out all the details, even with the spyglass. There's a number of toppled columns of like a classical sort. And what looks to be a ruined statue of a large bearded man. Okay. Good, good to know. And you see a little bit of movement. In that direction. Oh, okay. It's hard figures. It's hard to make out details. Even with the spyglass. Even with the spy glass. Right. So it's a big thing. But but there is mo motion in that direction. I'll look actually a little bit more towards the north. Well that that is the north. Okay. That's fine. That should be. So there's dunes to the east and a lower overgrown section to the south.
SPEAKER_00Right. And I grabbed the gem. Okay. Does it like hit me with a anything information-wise?
SPEAKER_01It doesn't. No. You feel there might be some something there, but it's not like a bolt of lightning or anything like that. It's just you feel somewhat reverent. Oh. Okay. Not least that it it's probably worth a freaking ton. Okay, good. But doesn't glow. It doesn't glow. Doesn't have anything on the can't eat it. Roke the wizard also waking up.
SPEAKER_03Well, I'm gonna check my check my gear, see what all I have with me.
SPEAKER_01Oh, and what do you have with you?
SPEAKER_03Well, according to my sheet, I'm missing quite a few things. Looks like my bag opened up while I was floundering around in the water.
SPEAKER_01So I I had them select equipment for this adventure and then the roll 50% on each item as to whether they still have it after the events of the previous evening.
SPEAKER_03See, that that was to my advantage, because you said if we rolled low, we kept things. That's true, yeah. I have lost very little. That's good. But did you lose some critically important things? The only thing I lost was my flint and steel. Okay. Yeah, me too.
SPEAKER_01That's also statistically improbable. But what do you have in your bag?
SPEAKER_03I just have some rope, oil, two rations, one iron spike, and my dagger. Okay. My spellbook, at all.
SPEAKER_01Oh, and you John Union, what did your character end up keeping out of the out of the pile of stuff?
SPEAKER_00Torch, one ration, iron spikes, my backpack, short sword, and my armor. Okay, cool. I'm surprised they didn't.
SPEAKER_01You're a little light, but you can probably trade the gro the jewel for whatever you might need, right? Maybe. If it doesn't become more important for something else. And are we doing anything other than just getting your bearings or yeah, just getting my bearings, trying to see let's take stock of the situation.
SPEAKER_03We obviously can't stay here. There's no shelter, anything. Where are we where which direction we want to go, guys? We gotta get out of here.
SPEAKER_00Probably gonna get ruins with the ruins. There might be traitors or food at least.
SPEAKER_03Thunder dragons.
SPEAKER_02Thunder dragons. So I have a question.
SPEAKER_03Or our imminent doom. I don't know if this is like a random question. I noticed nowhere in the book is there a water skin. Water is abundant. What do you need water for? We got the whole ocean right here, dude. You go right ahead. You go right ahead.
SPEAKER_02Drink that ocean. But water.
SPEAKER_03Is it presumed to be part of your rations? I suppose. That's the only logical thing I could come up with.
SPEAKER_01Okay. We'll just roll with it for now.
SPEAKER_03Okay.
SPEAKER_01Also, waking up on the beach is Dirk. Human cleric, played by Rodney.
SPEAKER_03Yes. You could also call me Acolyte Wiggams, but you can just call me Dirk. No, I'm going with Acolyte Wiggams.
SPEAKER_01Dirk Wiggams?
SPEAKER_03Dirk Wiggams. How the hell did you come up with that?
SPEAKER_01That's like some Enders games too.
SPEAKER_03I used to I used magic. Ender Wiggins. Magic. Dirk Acolyte Wiggams is a human priest of Saint Tarragonus, a lawful deity crusading for the goodness of all mankind, or something like that. I really need to do my research. He is left after the tumbling through the waves with his backpack, one ration, two torches, a holy symbol, leather armor, shield, a bag of pebbles, which was my zero to third level adventuring. What's the word we called it? Treasure. Right. I got a bag of rocks as treasure. I believe the GM said we kept our weapons. Yes. Alright, so I am weaponed with a mace, a club, and a dagger. Because priests can use a variety of weapons unrelated to some other games where they are limited in their usage. Dirk is mostly concerned about maybe the extra flotsum and jetsam left over from the ship, and if there's anything that can be scavenged on the beach.
SPEAKER_01Okay. There's a lot of driftwood on the beach. Right, okay. There is definitely some timbers. Timbers. From the uh from the ship. Okay. And if you're looking around on the beach, you can actually see your ship. Okay out there cracking. Broken in half looks like on a reef about uh probably a half mile distance. All right. Out into the water. Out in the water.
SPEAKER_03All right. Well, if I know my character and every other character in this game, we will not risk an attempt at certain death because dice rolls will have to be involved. Water. To go out into the water. Water is off limits. Half mile. We saw it happen when we got on water. We ended up washed ashore. Exactly. Never been on a boat together before. First time on a boat, crashed into the water into rocks. Right. It sounded like there was a whole adventure going on the boat that we didn't actually weren't privy to. I feel like we could have altered our circumstances some and maybe not crashed the boat into the pile of rocks.
SPEAKER_01But you weren't the captain. And the captain was dead. The Corsairs we believe. Right, there we are, Corsairs.
SPEAKER_03Maybe we could have dealt with the Corsairs. I could have given them a bag of St. Theragnus pebbles. Maybe they would have been satisfied with that treasure. I mean was. But the main mast was broken and then they shot out the other two minor masts. I think what it boils down to is we're not going out to the boat. Right? Alright, so anything along the shore, we can gather up some firewood, and what the so that's what I'll do. I'll gather up firewood, look for anything useful, uh, guaranteeing our iron spikes did not make it to shore. Mine did. Mine did. Mine didn't because they weren't in my boat. I have one. And then there's two two questions for the GM. One, do we have any idea where we are? Or where we might be? None. None, right, because we didn't look at maps because we never got right shit down. Right. We don't know anything about it.
SPEAKER_01You're somewhere on the sea path between Miro's Rest and the city of the Golden Ziggurette. And we are making for. Right.
SPEAKER_03And we're on a coast facing east, if I recall, right, because the sun was rising over the side.
SPEAKER_01Actually, you're the sun is rising over the dune. Over the dunes. So the sun is on the western side.
SPEAKER_03You're on the western side. Okay. And we is Miro's Rest on the western side of something?
SPEAKER_01Miro's Rest is on the southern shore of the northern continent.
SPEAKER_03And we were heading south because it was winter in Miro's Rest. Correct. Okay, so Mirror's Rest is in the northern hemisphere. Good to know. All right. And then one last question. The current of the water is pushing the debris. Which direction? I want to know which way I'm walking to pick up.
SPEAKER_01Uh the uh the waves seem to be pushing everything to the well, hey.
SPEAKER_03Really, I just wanted to make sure that I had more opportunity to go that way. I go south on my search for stuff. Okay. To in to increase my percentage chance of finding things. Okay. Hint, hint.
SPEAKER_01All right. Aaron. Smart one.
SPEAKER_03Narioth. This is why you don't have to do things. The cleric.
SPEAKER_02The cleric. Narioth. I first look in my bag to see what I have, and I have my leather armor, my shield, a dagger, and a long sword. Okay. Luckily, my flint did not float away. I still have that. And I have an oil flask. So we should be able to make some fire if we need to.
SPEAKER_01Right, you can set stuff on fire with that.
SPEAKER_02I've lost a couple of my rations. But then I noticed in my bag and pull out, I'm very glad that I still have, and I pull them out and clutch them, the five red dragon scales. Yes. They're still there. And I put them back in very carefully.
SPEAKER_01I turned towards the ocean. Does Narjov worship a dragon as a cleric?
SPEAKER_02As part of his cleric, he's always looking at mystical creatures. All right. Mystical things, trying to find out what is going on in that other realm.
SPEAKER_01Alright.
SPEAKER_02And I turn towards the ocean.
SPEAKER_01And you didn't come by the dragon scales, honestly, by having defeated a dragon.
SPEAKER_02It's hard to say where I got those dragon scales. But do you say it? It was mystical.
SPEAKER_03So how large are these dragon scales? I'm curious. I don't know how big dragon scales are.
SPEAKER_02They're from like around the eye area. They're not very big.
SPEAKER_03Oh, okay, good. Because I was picturing five dragon clothes. Dragon loincloths, you know, or dragons dragon scale loincloth, because that thing is like default too. Like I needed to know how big they were. That's not going to work for me.
SPEAKER_02Honestly, I came about them by accident, found them, but I don't normally tell anyone that.
SPEAKER_01Okay. All right. Yeah, do you have a button?
SPEAKER_02Yeah. But I turned towards the ocean, I walk uh up to the where the waves are coming in, and I look for the boat. Okay. Where is our boat? Where is it out there? And I notice it.
SPEAKER_01It's definitely out on a reef. It's listing very badly. So half of it looks to be burned.
SPEAKER_02I fall to my knees and continue to stare out into the ocean.
SPEAKER_01Okay. The sight fills you with dread because you no longer have an easy way of not being wherever it is that you are. Exactly.
SPEAKER_02I don't know where I am, what's going to happen. Now, how long was the journey?
SPEAKER_01It was about 10, 11 days by the time.
SPEAKER_02And it should have been how long till we reached our destination?
SPEAKER_01It was going to be three weeks.
SPEAKER_02Three weeks? Okay. Does that help us know where we are?
SPEAKER_03No. Somewhere between where we left and where we're going. We're somewhere. This is a tale of our cast away.
SPEAKER_01And last to drag his sorry butt off of the sand is Aaron, the fighter, otherwise known as A-A-Ron.
SPEAKER_03A Aaron. So I'm just gonna get up and take stock of my stuff. Okay. Find that some of my rations must have gotten soaked with salt water and discard them. Okay.
SPEAKER_01And uh survey the scene, notice the boat. Alright, just looking quickly around, you see the same things that everybody else does. There is the uh the volcanoes with the associated structures to the south. I mean to the north, to the south is the overgrown area, and then high sand dunes to the east.
SPEAKER_03So the south is the overgrown area. I'm gonna start heading that direction. Okay. Because I was probably drinking on the boat. I've already got cotton mouth. I need some water. I think you should turn around.
SPEAKER_02There's an ocean.
SPEAKER_03We don't want to go through the overgrown. Let's go to the ruins. You don't drink salt water. We have water. Really? Yeah. Because one day of food and water supply for one person equals a ration. Oh. That answered your question earlier. Okay. Yeah. I missed that.
SPEAKER_01Good job with the rules reference.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, give play, take a look. See extra time between characters. Extra time between player actions.
SPEAKER_00Time to look stuff up and think.
SPEAKER_01Since you just dispensed a luck token. Yes. What do luck tokens do? Luck tokens allow you two. You can only ever have one at a time. You can give them to another player if you think the other player deserves it for any reason at all during the session. I can I can bestow them at my whim as well. But you can only ever have one at a time, and you can use them to re-roll a roll that you already made, and you have to take the new result.
SPEAKER_03Okay. I want to re-roll my charisma.
SPEAKER_01No.
SPEAKER_03Wait, what's your charisma? Six. I'll bet you could go worse. I was thinking, I guarantee you're going to get lower than six if you re-roll those dice. I'm tough, dude.
SPEAKER_01Iran starts stumbling in the direction of the overgrown area, and we are back to Union.
SPEAKER_03So there's a as a quick aside, we all know each other. We spent 10 days on a boat, or is this like we had an adventure together?
SPEAKER_01Yes, you were a party before the trip.
SPEAKER_03So we know what everyone else is capable of and what they really do. Correct. Right. So I know I don't need to go chase him down. Gotcha. Right. So everybody has nobody's injured. Nobody's injured. Okay.
SPEAKER_01Maybe I mean that would be that would be cruel of me. Thanks, Saint Teradness.
SPEAKER_03Before I stumble off into the jungle, I am going to take a moment to wade out into the ocean and get the sand out of my shorts. Okay. Thanks for that detail. Yeah. You could have role-played that in your head, dude. That's important. All right.
SPEAKER_01Beach equals sand in your shorts. You lower the spy glass, seeing that and to the to the north. Great.
SPEAKER_00Where are you going?
SPEAKER_03I don't know.
SPEAKER_00Looks like food's probably that way. But there's civilization that way. Civilization? Well, at least there's something moving that way.
SPEAKER_03Like structure. That sounds civilized. Wait, moving? What do you mean moving? There's there's movement towards the ruiny structure type stuff. Movement.
SPEAKER_01Oh, and you see the uh the three other crew members are huddled together on the beach and there's darting glances your way and muttering back and forth to each other. Well they were talking about it. And the girl was just glaring at all of you in turn with hatred.
SPEAKER_03When you say movement, like figures of dude walking across the sand movement or like dinosaur walking through the jungle movement. What's a dinosaur? Big lizard in my backyard.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, no, no, no big lizard, just small figure type, peoply type stuff. People, huh? People. Near as I can figure. Here, you look. Oh, yeah. There you go.
SPEAKER_01I will say that while my adventure isn't the most original thing in the world, I did not just recreate the Isle of Dread. I don't know what that is.
SPEAKER_03It's the module that came with the expert set. The blue box. Is that the assumption you were making over there? It's exploring an island that's infested with dinosaurs. No. Okay. I just assume every island with like jungle on it in any DD campaign, there will be dinosaurs. There's also a volcano. Don't forget. Multiple volcanoes. Necessary for the plot.
SPEAKER_01Right. But just like DD characters, if you ever end up in a cemetery, there's gotta be it's just gotta be absolutely infested with undead. Or to be time.
SPEAKER_03To continue the tropes, if you're on a ship, it's going to crash and you're going to lack. Yes, I did that. Yes. In the first ten minutes.
SPEAKER_01I think I remember us having a conversation on this podcast before where we discussed like the worst type of adventure is one that starts on a ship. Yeah. Because you just end up losing your crap. Right. And what did we do? So I did that.
SPEAKER_03But you didn't make us all like wash up naked or anything, which is what I expected. Right. No, I So it's a win. I had to break the new guys in.
SPEAKER_01I highly dislike spending time creating my character and getting all sorts of gear and then having it all gone at the beginning of the adventure.
SPEAKER_03But that's so much fun as a DM, though.
SPEAKER_01It is.
SPEAKER_03Alright. So I'm gonna look at the peoply-ly through his spy glass.
SPEAKER_01You're looking at which direction of the spyglass?
SPEAKER_03Wherever he's pointing for the peoply part.
SPEAKER_01Oh, okay. So yeah, you see you see what he saw with the stone platform with steps going up to it as some f roughly man-sized figures moving around, but you can't make out anyway.
SPEAKER_03What looks to be peopling? People. Okay. I'll give a spyglass back. Thank you. Uh-huh. That definitely looks peoply. Let's go to the people. Makes sense. I'll go with you. To the people. All right. To the people. To the people.
SPEAKER_01All right. So it's kind of objection otherwise.
SPEAKER_03Other than maybe drying out for an hour, maybe getting unwaterlogged, other and picking up what we can now. Get the sand out of your shorts. Yeah, figuratively speaking, yes. I'm gonna wring my robe out. What time of day is it? Right. Very early. So mid morning. Dawn, basically. Well, do we want to dry out? Start a fire. What kind of psychopaths are up and moving at dawn, though? Hard workers? The hungry ones? No, that's fair. Those that just washed up on a beach. Those that just washed up on a beach. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Those worshiping something?
SPEAKER_03Dinosaurs. Dinosaurs are up at dawn. No, worshiping dinosaurs. Oh. Dinosaurs worshipping dinosaurs?
SPEAKER_02You don't know. Well, I guess we need to get the buy-in of these crew members and this lady to Do we? Or are we just gonna leave them?
SPEAKER_03Is it a plot point? I don't know. What would Brian Boitano do? Somebody's listening to the wrong podcast. Sorry, South Park. South Park, yeah. It's a South Park joke. Oh no, sorry. I was thinking of Dungeons and Daddies, where they were always that guy that was in the bones, but I can't remember his name. And when you said the name, it made me think. They would literally say that. What would that guy, whatever that actor's name, what would he do? Oh no. But his name wasn't Brian Boitano. It's something like that.
SPEAKER_02Sorry, Dungeons and Daddies.
SPEAKER_03It's not a BDSM podcast. Not a BDSM podcast. Oh, that I'm not interested in.
SPEAKER_01The union has suggested marching north. I'll follow the union podcast. Are you guys all in agreement on that? We can skip the turn order for a little bit.
SPEAKER_03Yes, let's do it. We got everything we like, unless we're not going to get anything off of the shore, as a bonus shit. Let's move out.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, did you find anything?
SPEAKER_03I don't know. That's a good question.
SPEAKER_01Found some wood, anything in the football. A lot of wood floss. Um like some like metal fittings. See, so you found like little small bits of like metal straps and things like that that might put on a barrel. Nothing immediately useful. Okay, that's fine. But we can always come back. If you needed some metal for something, you can probably scavenge some and then repurpose it.
SPEAKER_03I'm alright. Most of the things would have sank. So yeah. Well, most of the things are out there on that boat, and we're not going there because there's people on shore, as Union pointed out, who might have boats that we could use to get there. A canoe.
SPEAKER_02Well, we can even build a craft now.
SPEAKER_03But a boat is gone. I think I'm swearing off boats for a little while. That boat is done. I don't know. The space between a reef and shore. Usually pretty calm. But usually pretty deadly. Full of monsters. Full of sharks and other nastiness. What do I know about the ocean? I've never been on a boat before. We're a tropical reef. What do I know about what the nastiness is? I just assume every part of the ocean is full of nasty. It is. It's way different. If the water is deeper than my ankle, it's bad. Or knee at the very most. Let's go north as suggested by Union and see what the hell these cannibals have to say.
SPEAKER_02How far away is that?
SPEAKER_03What are the other crew members doing?
SPEAKER_01Oh yes. They are keeping to themselves. If you don't go up and talk to them, they're not going to talk to you. They don't like you very much. I don't like them. I say we kill them now. But as you mosey north, you can see that they're following along a little ways back. What's the girl doing? She's walking ahead of you. Oh. She looks to be striding with some purpose. Every now and then she looks back and glares with absolute hatred at whichever one of you happens to be looking at. All right. It's not my fault. I am curious.
SPEAKER_03You mentioned red eyes on her. Yes. Like they're not glowing, but their pupils are red eye. The pupils, that's what I wanted to get at it. She said bloodshot. No, she was dusky. Dush. Dusky skin. Raven hair, dusky skin. I'm thinking albino. Plain clothing. Yeah. Obviously not.
SPEAKER_02No.
SPEAKER_01I can't help but think tiefling, but yeah, she doesn't have horns or goat hooves or something.
SPEAKER_03I believe that's uh quite a stereotype you've got going on there. It's a little bit of a little bit of red eyes equals evil. Oh yeah. Right. Right. This isn't a photograph from the 80s. So I think the glowing red eyes would do it. But they're not glowing, they're just red. They're just red.
SPEAKER_02So we don't know what race she is. Saltwater probably made our. She's human.
SPEAKER_01She has round ears and she's roughly six, five and a half feet tall. Round ears. Is that what they call them?
SPEAKER_03Round ears, yeah. Only if you're non-point.
SPEAKER_01She's a non-pointear.
SPEAKER_03How far away did it look like through your looking glass there? Half a day. Half a mile. Half a mile? Half a mile? Oh shit. Oh, I guess we'll hell. Half a mile or maybe a little bit like three quarters. They couldn't possibly have missed a crashed ship out in the ocean.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I'm wondering why they're not out here looking for us. Well, maybe they are. Maybe.
SPEAKER_01Well, we're gonna find out. So so you begin walking. It is somewhat the sand is very deep and it's not as easy going as if it was a as if it was a smooth, hard path. But you walk, you go about ten minutes, and then from up to your right, it sounds like it maybe comes from the top of the dunes. You hear a couple of drum beats, and then and then just a few you stop and you don't hear anything more, and then like ten seconds later, you hear much farther away. They're signaling each other.
SPEAKER_03It's lunchtime. Yeah. And we're lunch. It's a little early for that. I think we're breakfast. We're breakfast.
SPEAKER_02Heavily habitat by cannibals.
SPEAKER_01Long pork. Long pork.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_01Okay. So you guys want to keep going, or you want to go back to turn order or yeah, go turn order.
SPEAKER_03I believe there's at least some minor investigation by people who are good at investigating things.
SPEAKER_01And as You go a little bit as you've covered the ground north, the sand looks ahead, looks like it's getting more vegetation on it. So there are grasses poking up through the sand. There's some lower level dunes between you. And it looks like right before that mountain, there you look at down at what might be some sort of sea cave. Right before you would get to the ruins or whatever they are there. Okay. But the drums didn't sound like they came from that direction. Okay, the drums came from the dunes and from the top. From the direction of the dunes, so like to your right and then back a bit. Okay. Like and the response drum came from right front. So where the peeply thing is? Maybe to the right of the volcano. So no, it's from that direction. Not peeply.
SPEAKER_03Not pee. But there's a cave immediately in front of us. Well, I guess we could always investigate the drum beats. Immediately in front of us? There's a cave between us and between us and our destination. Correct. So go right or go straight. I have a cave.
SPEAKER_02Was the ocean going into the cave or is it its own?
SPEAKER_01You can't really see it from this far out.
SPEAKER_03Well, not to be the Go ahead. Well, no, I'm just gonna give an alternate view here. We have humanoid shapes. Now, I'm not saying humanoid shapes are inherently antagonistic towards us, but they very well could be. So perhaps we should see.
SPEAKER_01I think I just said human-sized with no details.
SPEAKER_03Well, did they have a head, two arms, and two legs? They were people y, if that would be uh if I remember the exact humanoid shapes.
SPEAKER_01So exactly what I said. Right. Okay. And uh Well, I thought you were saying that I said humanoid direction. Oh, I have no idea what you said.
SPEAKER_03Semantics. Let's go. Jesus.
SPEAKER_01Because humanoid means something specific in DD.
SPEAKER_03I guess so.
SPEAKER_01It means not human but human shape.
SPEAKER_03Right, like a head and two arms and two legs. Well, but I want to know what kind of heads and two arms and two legs, right? Should we put eyeballs on that? I thought people description.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, there's some intelligence as they've seen us and have notified each other. Agreed. But they don't seem to be coming from the ruins or the cave. So one of those could be a safer bet. Or we could go find them, introduce ourselves.
SPEAKER_03How is that gonna work out? It's people good or bad. As usual. Exactly. We don't know. We don't know. But we could find out if somebody goes and puts eyeballs on whatever intelligent creature hit the drums with a spy glass. With a spy glass, or to maybe put cup balls on them. Well, I hand you the spy glass. So you're a smart thief. Okay. In case you haven't noticed me. Me limping up the beach very undexterously. So I'm very clumsy and I have a bum leg. Probably I tried to rip off somebody and got my kneecap busted. It's hard to say. Possibly. Clarence. I used to be a minstrel and then, well, I just decided it wasn't for me. You got an arrow in the knee. Right, right. That's what it was. Right. Not inherently clumsy or unskilled or unlikable.
SPEAKER_02But trying to change your ways in a lawful way.
SPEAKER_03Right. I'm trying to get good with God's mine particularly. But I think that's the best bet for somebody who knows their way around things. And on our first adventure, you were so good sneaking up on that bear that time that I really think it's a good idea for you to do it. Not me.
SPEAKER_02Don't sneak up on a bear.
SPEAKER_03Bears are hard to sneak up on. Then that's how good he is. And even if you do, what's what are you gonna do when you get there? No, don't hamstring him.
SPEAKER_01For inventing your own backstory.
SPEAKER_03I invented his backstory. I don't remember.
SPEAKER_01He's the guy that snuck up on the bear now.
SPEAKER_03Right, right. The bear whistle. The bear sneaker upper. Yeah, the bear sneaker upper.
SPEAKER_01Union bear. Okay. So actions.
SPEAKER_00So I will attempt to maneuver up the dunes to see if I can get a better view of the spyglass. Use the spyglass. See if I can figure out where the drums are coming from.
SPEAKER_01Okay. At the top of the largest dune, you see a few figures. They look an awful lot like the corsairs of an unthune. They two of them are orcs, three of them are human. They have the tattoos, they have the black garb, they have the weaponry. And there is a there's a large drum near where they are. Okay. And they appear to be looking out in different directions from the top of that dune. Okay. And you've got spyglass looking back at me.
SPEAKER_00You can't tell if they have a spyglass. Okay. I will hunker down onto the dune and slide back down and say, we're not going that way. That way is certain death. How many of them are there? More than one.
SPEAKER_02Certain death. Yes.
SPEAKER_03Now one, two, some few, run.
SPEAKER_02We're at run.
SPEAKER_01Now the girl was still walking down the beach towards the left us behind.
SPEAKER_02She's still going. Hey, you stop, stop. Why do we care? Does she walk like she knows where she's going?
SPEAKER_03Or just randomly? Is she walking with purpose? Yeah. Bitchy wife walk. That's what I'm seeing.
SPEAKER_01That's what he's thinking. You've had some mad experiences. We've all seen that.
SPEAKER_02Haven't we all? So you're just sitting down pouting now?
SPEAKER_04No, I'm just I'm just shaking my head, watching her walk away. No, it's fine.
SPEAKER_02Right. Exactly. 100%. It's okay. Never mind. We'll talk about it later. Go ahead and do it.
SPEAKER_03It's fine. Everything's fine. It's fine.
SPEAKER_01Okay, Roke. What are your thoughts on the situation?
SPEAKER_03Well, if there's more than one person there, that's not good. So we can't go that way. I still want to go check out that cave to see because we're going to need shelter. We're going to need to eat here soon.
SPEAKER_02We're going to.
SPEAKER_03I think that I've agree with Roke on this. We can go see about the sea cave and know if there is shelter and whatever. Are these corsairs looking for something in particular? Why are they here? They just chased our ship. Yeah, but why are they looking for us? Why should they wreck the shoe? I don't know. There's a weird lady with red eyes. Yeah, and she's getting away. But what does that have like, what does she have to do with any of it?
SPEAKER_01Well, I never said. Well, when you saw the figures, you're pretty sure that each of the four that you saw were looking in a different direction.
SPEAKER_03Okay. So they didn't spot us, they weren't warning somebody with the drums against us, right? Meaning, like as far as I could tell. Okay, good. Good.
SPEAKER_00That doesn't necessarily mean anything.
SPEAKER_03Well, the drum is some sort of communication.
SPEAKER_00But they definitely looked better equipped than we are. They came ashore with purpose.
SPEAKER_03Right. So they didn't shipwreck or crash. They're looking for something.
SPEAKER_00Possibly. Us. There's no other boats and there's no other mast or anything else we can see. Not that you can see from where you are.
SPEAKER_02Was there a reaction when he pulled out the blue gem for the red-eyed lady?
SPEAKER_01Did he do it even in front of her eye? That's true. Yeah, he didn't say he was looking at her when he pulled it out. So I just pulled it out and said, ooh, pretty.
SPEAKER_03Put it back. Yeah, I assume I don't even know about it. Yeah, I don't either. That's all I'm saying I was busy washing sand out of my shorts. You were. Right. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I was looking the other way.
SPEAKER_03I wasn't awake yet in initiative order, so I assumed I wasn't awake.
SPEAKER_02I wasn't awake.
SPEAKER_01All right. So uh you made your do you want to do anything in particular, Roke?
SPEAKER_03No, I just made my case of where I think we should go and why. All right. I'm good.
SPEAKER_02Where are we currently at? What's the terrain?
SPEAKER_01Are we in trees or what's still you're up off of the beach, but the ground is still sandy?
SPEAKER_02Still the stand okay.
SPEAKER_01But there's more brush, grass, high grasses, you know, of the sort that you would find just off of the beach.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I'd like to just verify we're alone. No one's hiding in the grass or anything.
SPEAKER_01Okay. He's gonna go beat the grass.
SPEAKER_02I go beat the grass.
SPEAKER_01All right. You check out the underbrush near where you are.
SPEAKER_02You don't Yeah, I just scan the area and make sure that I don't see anyone hiding in the booth.
SPEAKER_01Okay. Yeah, no, you do a scan, you don't see any creatures there.
SPEAKER_02So yeah, we're good to go to the cave.
SPEAKER_01Or are we? What's our fighter saying? How far ahead is she? About a hundred yards at this point. And she's going towards the cave. She stopped and looked back. She did. Okay. But she keeps moving that direction. The drumbeat close by was over the dune, meaning they can't see us right now. He had to climb up a smaller dune in order to check out the position. Okay. But you can't see what he saw from where you are right now. If you climbed up the dune that he did, you might be able to see them. I'm going to climb up the dune. I want to take a look at these guys.
SPEAKER_03I'm not familiar with these corsairs. Okay. So I'm looking for with the thought of impersonation, is there a particular uniform thing they wear? Tattoos. Tattooed.
SPEAKER_01And they're they're tattooed of the corsair of the corsairs of an unthrough mostly by dire reputation.
SPEAKER_05Okay.
SPEAKER_01Roughly, you know that roughly half of them are orcs. And orcs are well known as excellent sailors. These are maybe the best sailors of all of them. And they there are pirates in this world. Uh Union used to be one. Pirates hold up ships, take captives, take goods. The corsairs of Anun Thun do it for the love of the game.
SPEAKER_05Okay.
SPEAKER_01They are feared world over. Some political figures of nefarious sort will use them as privateers, but their payment is always awful that they require. They are rumored to use human sacrifice. They are rumored to having some sort of bargain with a dark god of the sea of some sort. Certain death. They are half of them roughly orcs. Some of them are half orcs, some of them are human. They all paint themselves their faces white. They have strange runes and tattoos tattooed on their body, of which meaning is known only to themselves. And climbing up, you see four of those. They have a small fire up there. You see, you see a little tendril of smoke coming from that direction. And they have the large drum. And they appear to be looking in in different directions out over the horizon. Okay.
SPEAKER_03That's not going to be useful. So I'll climb back down and start trying to catch up with the chick. Okay. And you're all sure. Gonna follow along? Yeah, and are are there three is Cragshag, Nair, and Drog bringing up the rear.
SPEAKER_01They are. They're keeping their heads down ever since the drums were heard.
SPEAKER_03Okay, good. I just like when I look at them, I'm just holding my finger to my lips in the universal quietness symbol. Cragshag's the leader. Given the four. Yeah, Cragshag is up over the hill. Totally. Yeah, of course. Clearly.
SPEAKER_01Okay, you uh you travel a little ways. You can see off to your left, as you get closer to the uh to the temple, to the left side, you see like a an outgrowth of a number of palm trees and heavier underbrush. Beyond that, you can see that there's like a narrow sandy spit angling out in into the ocean. So there's a little bit of a shallow bay beyond a shallow sandy bay. And just beyond that, you can see that you know where there's two basically volcanoes right next to each other. There's a smaller one and a larger one. And at the base of both of those, there looks to be a spot where the sandy spit ends, where the waves crash into what looks to be like a sea's cave. You can see that the action of the waves is has hollowed out like a narrow gorge in between where the two volcanoes, lava flows, have flowed into the sea. The sand in that direction is black, as opposed to the white sand beach that you washed up on. And like I said, on the slopes of the second volcanoes where you see those steps going up. The uh the figures that you saw on the platform, you only see one of them now, and it's just from the distance, you really can't make out any real details, but there seems to be some strangeness about it. Like one arm seems to be noticeably larger than the other arm for some reason. Am I able to get a better view with the spyglass? Yes. What do they look like? A monstrosity. A monstrosity. The torso appears to be that of a man, muscled, toned. The one side is covered in like a Krabby carapace and ends in a claw. The other side is holding a spear. And the head you might see tentacles. Definitely a couple of antennae. Roughly crustacean-like.
SPEAKER_00It's peopled by demons. They're malformed demons. It's fine.
SPEAKER_01But after after you scope them out, the thing turns around and just walks slowly back to out of behind some of the pillars there, and you don't see them on there anymore. Okay.
SPEAKER_03Demons. Demons. So my initial path to the south jungle is seeming better and better. Potentially. Oops. It is peebly.
SPEAKER_00That's peebly. I couldn't tell.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, that's fair. Well, how many, like so our ship? How many people is required to operate a ship like that? 20, 30. It's usually a larger number than right.
SPEAKER_01You keep a larger crew than you would necessarily need at a minimum to operate the ship. The ship you were on could have been crewed by a minimum of about six. Oh, okay. But the actual crew they had was closer to 30. Well, what about the Corsair's ship? Corsair's ship was smaller compared to your own, but there were two of them.
SPEAKER_03Right, right. But I'm just I'm thinking about our exit plan here. Yeah. Is it stealing a Corsair ship while some of them are on land? I don't have the faintest idea how to sail a ship. Well, he's a pirate. Yes. He could probably manage a little bit. I can row. We could do it under threat of force. There we go. That's rent in your wheelhouse, right? Yeah. Yeah. I was thinking more magical than beefy muscle, but sure. Threaten to turn him into a newt. Threaten to turn him into a half crab, half man demon. There you go. We already got one.
SPEAKER_00We're good. What about the sea cave?
SPEAKER_01How far away is that now? If you keep walking, you're going to arrive at the sea cave about 40 minutes or so after you you left the beach. Okay. Where does the woman seem to be going as she stops? Um she stops behind a pine tree or a palm tree. Not a pine tree, what in the world? Behind a palm tree right before the drop-off where the key sea cave begins. And you can see that there's a little bit of a path that begins there at the palm tree that she stopped by, and it winds all of its way up and over the sea cave. But you can see down into the mouth of the sea cave. Right now, the uh you can see that there's like a black sand beach at the bottom of it.
SPEAKER_00Okay.
SPEAKER_01And it it goes back to like a narrow crevasse at the end of it. Any chance of there being freshwater back in there versus the seawater? If it gets back far enough to where it the natural like you would know that would be a place like like the back of a sea cave, if it manages to stay not moving in and out. That you might find some ashore fresher water.
SPEAKER_03Right. Well, what about shelter? Isn't that kind of the number one sea cave reason, right? Shelter.
SPEAKER_00Well, yeah, we're gonna have to. Yeah, but if there's water on the base, it's not like we can really do much in there otherwise.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, I guess. I'm thinking that's where they stash their ships. Well, I don't know. That's the kind of the like we're thinking way out. We need a way out. That's what we're here for. We can't trust the natives because they're made of crabs and people at once, which is freaking weird. Weird crab, right? Crab people. And then, you know, we got the corsairs who are just as likely to murder us as to look at us or enslave us.
SPEAKER_01Oh, they're much, much more likely to murder you than to you.
SPEAKER_03Murder or slave, either one, bad. And then we have this mystery woman walking forward, and like she's on her own mission that none of us know anything about, and she won't communicate to anyone. And she's standing there on the ledge or at the top of this trail. Right. And we've never tried to talk to her once since we've been here. Maybe on the boat, once, twice.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, you've tried to talk to her on the boat. All right, well, maybe we'll speak. She glares at you. Occasionally she says some words, but you don't understand them.
SPEAKER_03I speak celestial. Do I understand? Is she speaking celestial?
SPEAKER_01No, she's not speaking celestial. Okay.
SPEAKER_03Dang it. All right. Well, that's my what about Elvish? Wasn't Elvish?
SPEAKER_01It doesn't sound like Elvish.
SPEAKER_03Did she say multipass?
SPEAKER_01Multipass.
SPEAKER_03Nope. All right. Well, I don't have any way to talk to her. I I walk up to the woman. Okay. Tap her on the shoulder.
SPEAKER_01Okay, you tap her?
SPEAKER_02Touch her? Oh, he did it. He said it. He said it.
SPEAKER_01He said he said it. I'll tap her on the shoulder. Alright. So, like, you this is the first time any of you have actually touched her. And like the girl, like immediately, your like mind is like full, like flames appear like in your vision. Like mad reaction. Like you feel like you're burning. Ow. And you pull your hand off, and it's nothing. You're not burned, you're not hurt in any way. That's helpful. Ow. Did to get her attention? Yes. Okay. Where are you going? She mutters some strange words and she motions down towards the towards the the floor of the sea cave. Are you a mermaid? It's obvious. She glares at you.
SPEAKER_03There's no other explanation. Why would she have come to shore? She has swam up the coast. Why would she own a boat to begin with?
SPEAKER_04The whole premise.
unknownNot smart.
SPEAKER_03What kind of DM puts a mermaid on a boat? It's a fire mermaid.
SPEAKER_01She gives no indication that she's a mermaid. Or that she's but she did give the indication.
SPEAKER_02Exactly what I would do if I was a mermaid. You did point that to the cave.
SPEAKER_03Maybe I'm a mermaid. Alright, I'm walking towards the cave.
SPEAKER_01Alright, so from where past her. From where you are, there's like the path, like I said, that winds out and up and over. And you can you can see that going over towards the marble platform with the columns and stuff. So we can you can pick your way down through the volcanic rock. It's a little sharp, but you can do that. It looks to be like a little bit further down the path, there is like a an easier way of getting down.
SPEAKER_00Okay. Is there is there an easier way to communicate with you? I asked the do you understand what the do you understand the words that are coming out of my mouth? She doesn't say anything, she just glares at you.
SPEAKER_01Glaring's all fine and well and good, but I don't understand glare. She like spits a few angry words out and then just starts walking away. It's fine.
SPEAKER_03That's the language, that is the language of love. And she said it's fine. It's fine.
SPEAKER_00Universal translation thing. Yep. Okay. Okay. Does she seem to be walking in any particular direction?
SPEAKER_01She's walking towards the down back down the place where you would easier go down into the sea cave area.
SPEAKER_03Five grown men following a lady that they can't.
SPEAKER_01Look, don't make it weird.
SPEAKER_03Again, nothing unusual in the side. Nothing unusual. I will propose that I think it's a good idea that she goes first. Yeah. That way she can get ambushed. And not that I feel like we need to protect women, especially ones that are really weird like this.
SPEAKER_02With red eyes.
SPEAKER_03With red eyes who speak languages that no one understands. What languages do you speak? I speak Elvis. Giant. Giant, no kidding. Maybe you can talk to the crab guy if he can speak after having a crab head. I don't know. Yeah, tentacle head, not a crab head. Oh, all right, you're out. I speak goblin. I don't think that's gonna help us. Nope. I speak draconian.
SPEAKER_02That may help us.
SPEAKER_03Celestial. Uh-huh.
SPEAKER_02Does she speak draconian? You don't understand anything.
SPEAKER_03Dwarf and elf. Damn, you speak a lot of languages. Yeah, you're a learning.
SPEAKER_01You're a man of many tongues.
SPEAKER_03But the point of all this, what we've discovered is that there is no second language that we could speak that we could all understand that wouldn't be understood by a third party. Right.
SPEAKER_00I know, I know common and bad common.
SPEAKER_03Alright, so common and bad common.
SPEAKER_00Thieves can't.
SPEAKER_02We know pig Latin. Right, they can't a lot.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. So what I'm hearing is we need to invent our own languages so that we can communicate with each other. Pig Latin. Right, right. But we'll call it whatever our group's called. Gobbledygookin. In. Gobbledygookin. That's what we're doing. It's yeah, ein fe. Yeah. Yes. And that's how we're going to communicate with each other. Other. And eventually once we gain levels and special forces and grunts winks and points. So are we gonna go down with down the thing or what? Follow her down to the sea cave.
SPEAKER_01Alright, so you you follow her down, and uh he's looking. There's like a narrow rivulet of water that goes that runs down through the sea cave. You can see the waves crashing into the entrance of the cave at this point.
SPEAKER_00That rivulet of water, is it coming from the island?
SPEAKER_03It is, yeah. I tried to taste them. Don't drink that, you're gonna turn into a crab man.
SPEAKER_01No, it's better than going thirsty. It's not fully salty.
SPEAKER_03Fully salty. Fully salty.
SPEAKER_01It's only mostly mostly brackish.
SPEAKER_03It's got a hint of salty flavor. Boil it. Smells like old bay.
SPEAKER_00We can start a fire and then boil it, yes.
SPEAKER_03If we need to. Yes. Well, we're going to need to because we have between us, I think, five days' worth of food and water.
SPEAKER_01And you feel it uh you feel it might be low tide based on your experience with the sea. We're gonna need to get out of here. There's evidence on the walls of this cave that it's not always this low. This low.
SPEAKER_03I was concerned about that about that. Okay.
SPEAKER_00So we can go down there and see if we can figure out something, but yeah, I think we might be able to get some food.
SPEAKER_03But there's no Corsair ships down there, right? That's there's no I don't think we know yet.
SPEAKER_02We don't we haven't gone in really. We haven't gotten that far.
SPEAKER_03Okay. Well, we are now.
SPEAKER_02Does anyone have a title table so we know when the tide's gonna run? Well, what's the moon? None of you have a title, but more than four.
SPEAKER_03Let me check. What's are we even making the assumption that there is just one moon? There was a full moon last week. We're on the same planet for Christ's sake. We are which planet? Which planet is that? What's a planet? How many are visible?
SPEAKER_00Just the one. It's just like Earth.
SPEAKER_02And we think it's a great goddess in the sky.
SPEAKER_03And full moon equals full tide. Correct. I learned that in a story about preschool. A pirate. Preschool. You would be correct. If only preschool is taught such things.
SPEAKER_02Anything really.
SPEAKER_03Hey. You went to preschool, just like I did. Just because you chose the wrong god doesn't mean you didn't go to preschool. Priest, not pre. Priest. Preschool. Preschool. Preschool. Alright, so we're down in the bottom of the ravine. Sea cave.
SPEAKER_01You're down at the bottom of the sea cave. It narrows towards the back, and you can see the uh there's like a little overhang of volcanic rock. It's like the beginnings of lava tube, but it actually comes down to like a point. And there's something shiny back there at the very back of the cave. Of course there is.
SPEAKER_03Isn't there always I don't know why I looked at Doc when I heard shiny right over at him? Because Doc. I am not a greedy rogue. I know you're not that guy, though.
SPEAKER_02I run to the shiny, yeah. Yes. Union. Yes.
SPEAKER_00I run action.
SPEAKER_01I will go forth and investigate the shiny. Okay? Because duh. Alright. And it'll take you a turn to get back there and investigate it. You go back and you see that it at the very back of the cave ends, and then there's a like a little bubbling of water coming out, and then there's a silver spike pounded into the volcanic rock at like right above where that water bubbles out.
SPEAKER_03Okay. Silver spike. What is our light situation in this cave? Because I may have to light a torch.
SPEAKER_01You have some daylight behind you. Okay. What's obviously darker here than out on the beach.
SPEAKER_03Alright, I will wait to light my torch then. Alright, two things. We came in one way. Is there another way out on the other side of this sea cave? Like we came down a thing, or did like we just walk into the front of the sea cave.
SPEAKER_01You you came down one of the sides where where it was open. Right. You went under the underhang and then it comes to a to a point.
SPEAKER_03And there was no way out on the other side. Like we came down, like you mentioned, like a very small, almost like a little throne trail that we came down. Right. Is there anything like that on the other side to lead the other way? No. Okay. There is you can go out towards the ocean. Or climb a cliff, essentially, or steep thing. Right. Okay. All right.
SPEAKER_01Now up above, you would imagine you're right underneath that path that goes up above the sea cave.
SPEAKER_03Right. But on what so we were at the sea cave, let's say we're on the east side, the other side would be the west, or the whichever. And would the pyramid thing be further along in the direction like we were already heading? So you're on the south side.
SPEAKER_01Okay. South wall. Right. The north wall is the one we can't get out. Is about like a 30-degree offset. Okay. The platform and all that is beyond that.
SPEAKER_03On the other side. On the other side. Okay. So if we went up that cliff there, we would be closer to the to the to the ziggurat.
SPEAKER_01Right. If you climbed the cave walls on the other side, you would come out on the same side. Okay. All right.
SPEAKER_03I was just looking for escape routes. That's it.
SPEAKER_01There is none. Okay, Eric.
SPEAKER_02I reserve my action.
SPEAKER_01That's a different swift. You can do nothing. That's cool.
SPEAKER_02What is the uh yeah, the red-eyed lady? What is she doing?
SPEAKER_01She is uh she's looking around at the uh at the volcanic rock. She like runs her hand over it a little bit. But she's just examining the rock around there.
SPEAKER_02Does she seem to be enjoying this having a connection with it? Yes. Okay. And then I'm just going to make sure I'm checking out the entrance to the cave because I noticed there was like a path leading here. So just making sure no one's going to be able to do it.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, you so you you check your six. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, you don't see anybody behind you in the cave.
SPEAKER_03All right. I'm going to move to the spike. Okay. And search that for mechanisms like push it in, pull it down, side to side.
SPEAKER_02Really? You're gonna touch it.
SPEAKER_03See if it's a handle or a step or whatever.
SPEAKER_01Okay. How close are you getting to the spike? I'm right up on it. Okay. I'm kicking it. So you're like walking up this narrow rivulet of water, and with there's sand underneath under black sand underneath that. You get close to where the silver spike is, and you sink down to your waist.
SPEAKER_02More sand in the pants.
SPEAKER_01So like right right there, it is it is pretty deep. There's a pool there, basically. Yeah. Okay. You wouldn't necessarily see it unless you were right in it, but you're in it now. And you can see the spike is like just above eye level for you now, and you're down in the in in the water underneath. Grab the toilet flushing. Okay. Nothing happened. It's a silver spike. It doesn't using the spike to not fall in. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, you can steady yourself. Move myself around. Is there like an outflow? So you you kick ahead, and where the the rock wall would end, you you don't get any resistance if you like kick ahead.
SPEAKER_03Okay. Hey, uh found something. Who wants to go first? Send the rogue. You found an ingenious way to drown. Send the scouts. The scouts. Do you have any rope? I do some rope. Tie the end of my rope to the 60-foot spike. Okay. You can see the 60-foot to the spike. That's a big spike. The whole invention would turn into how do we get this 60-foot silver spike out and onto the Corsair boat?
SPEAKER_05That's got to be worth a bunch.
SPEAKER_01Claim we were all thieves. But you can definitely tie an end of the rope to the silver spike. Okay. And I'm going to release it and see if it flows down. Well, the water is coming back, so the route the rope plays that direction. It's coming out, not going down. This is going to be terrible.
SPEAKER_00And we're back around to uh Union. I mean there. If the tide is going that way, then the water should be going that way, not the opposite direction.
SPEAKER_03Unless it's fresh water coming out. Or we gotta wait for the tide to reach.
SPEAKER_01If it's tide water, it would be going that direction right now. If it's not tide water, it would be something else. It would still be going that direction right now.
SPEAKER_03Either way, there's sorcery afoot. Yes, that water is water. Dynamite. Great. Sorcery. Sorcery. Well then we should go another way. Well, if the sorcerer says it's sorcery, then I'm a wizard. If the wizard says it's wizardry, it is, but I'm gonna believe in it. But he said sorcery. Oh, you're saying it's sorcery as a wizard.
SPEAKER_01But anyway, union action. Okay.
SPEAKER_03Not the split airs, but no, I am clutching.
SPEAKER_00Does it seem like I could potentially get down into that water? How clear is that water?
SPEAKER_01It's murky. It's murky. Yeah. All right.
SPEAKER_00I don't know if I necessarily want to swim in it, but I can give it a shot, I guess. Okay. The other end of the rope, tie it around my waist and go.
unknownDo it.
SPEAKER_01Boop. Okay. Alright. So you find yourself in like a narrow underwater tunnel. Okay. That heads in the same direction as the cave was going. Okay. How far do you go? About half of the rope. Okay. Make me die. Suffocation check. What we didn't think through was a crab man with half crab man with tentacles. You held your breath, and your breath is getting close to what people. I'm swimming back out. You can hold your breath for a bit, but you haven't reached the end of it yet. Okay. You've gone about 15 feet, though. Okay. That's enough. I'm gonna swim back out. Okay.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, for your first run.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_03Okay, gotta get you psyched up for the second go.
SPEAKER_01Or somebody else doing it. But the tunnel didn't end. Okay. But there's no way for me to get up to get air. I'm I was completely submerged. For the amount of length that you've gone in, I guess. And I didn't see or feel like there's any opening or light or anything. It seemed to get seemed to get a little bit wider than it was. But there's no light at the end of the tunnel. I mean you don't see any, you didn't see any light.
SPEAKER_00No, it's just darkness. There is water. There's water at the end of the tunnel. I'm swimming back out. I'm not going to watery death. No, I'm going to avoid that. I was a pirate. I know better.
SPEAKER_01I don't know. You didn't put a knife in your mouth.
SPEAKER_02Who can hold their breath the long?
SPEAKER_01You you see union come back out of the water spluttering. Don't all pirates do that? Splutter? Spluttering.
SPEAKER_00Swim with a knife in their mouth? Yeah. The dumb ones do. Rogue.
SPEAKER_03Yes, I'm trying to decide. I've yet to meet smart ones, so. Pirates. That way is probably the way we need to go, but it doesn't look like it's gonna happen. Can't you magic something? Sure. It's not gonna help anything.
SPEAKER_02It's always the assumption.
SPEAKER_03I can't magic anything. But I can totally get us faster through that tunnel, potentially. Alright, so here's my idea. Okay. Not to take over roasting. No, what do you I think? So I have a grappling hook, I think. Oh shit. I lost my grappling hook. Does anybody have a grappling hook? I have a grappling hook. Alright. So take his grappling hook, right? It took you, let's say it took you 30 seconds to go that 15 feet or whatever. Right. I do not have any rope, but somebody else might. We've got the rope that's we're gonna need two ropes. Oh you're gonna take the grapple hook on his rope and you're gonna put it in 15 feet. And then you're gonna come back out pulling on the rope that's attached to the silver. Now you can get in and out much quicker because you'll be grappled on both sides. So then you can take another breath, pull yourself along the grapple that you put, and you'll be 15 feet in 10 seconds versus 30. Now you have the breath to take the grapple, move it forward another 10 or 15 feet. Goodness. Grab the rope and pull yourself back out, and now you have taken half the time to go twice the distance. And we can keep doing that until we're far enough through the tunnel where we either A, give up because we're on a rope, or you can't make it through, or we make it through. And that's why I get these.
SPEAKER_05For those of you who know, you can't have more than one.
SPEAKER_03It might also be. But you understand my method, right? You see how that's sounds completely logical to me on board. Our one shots never end up being one shot. I see no flaw in your own. The only flaw is it's further than 60 feet and we don't have the rope. And we die. Or there's a goddamn crab demon on the other end of this, and he dies the moment he sticks his head out. We have no idea what the fuck happens. I love how this is a binding. Sorry. Didn't mean to take over the watching, and that's a great point. Yeah, just we're either gonna die or we're gonna find something awesome. Who has the best constitution? Not me. Probably me out of 16. Okay. Are you wearing any kind of significant armor or are you I'm in leather. Yeah, me too. Anyone got any better? No. We never got any chance to earn any real money. Wow. It's fine.
SPEAKER_02If you mentioned it, they would drown in it.
SPEAKER_03Doc is playing the angry wife here now. Back around to John and Union.
SPEAKER_00Just saying. It's fine. I think that pouch, that bag that had the gem and the spyglass in it. Okay. I'm awfully good at it. Hold that.
SPEAKER_04All right.
SPEAKER_01Now, while you guys are talking about that and he's describing his apparatus of underwater cave travel, the girl jumps in the water and disappears. Anyway, into the hole or some other fine.
unknownGod.
SPEAKER_01And you think there was a little steam rising up when she got in the water.
SPEAKER_03I'm telling you, this woman is possessed by the devil. We should probably just go the other way.
SPEAKER_02But can she breathe underwater?
SPEAKER_03No, it doesn't matter. If we leave. If we leave, no. Yes. But this is actually a good thing in one way that I can think of and maybe more. She is a crap. If there is a crab demon at the other end, her first. Her first, right? Or get killed by her, in which case we win. Or, as you said, it's really not as far as we think, and we're just over overanalyzing them. It's definitely something we've done in the past. Yeah. I don't know what you mean.
SPEAKER_00I I I all right, back around, demon.
SPEAKER_03My ancestors.
SPEAKER_00So I hand him the pouch. Let's make this happen. We've got sixty foot of who else has got rope? I got rope. All right. So we've got 120 feet of rope. Okay. And at least one grappling hook. All right. So as he said, I will take the grappling hook, dive in as far as I can go, holding my breath, and then attach the grapple, yeah. Grab the grapple, grapple, and back out and repeat as necessary.
SPEAKER_01Alright, you manage to do that. You take you two trips. All right. And then you pull yourself. Are you doing this or is around doing this? Okay. Okay, you're doing that.
SPEAKER_03That's a finger point. Around point.
SPEAKER_01Okay. So you you move the thing along with the thing. It's his action. When you when you do that the second time, you pull yourself and then you find that your head is above water. You see nothing but darkness, but you have air to breathe.
SPEAKER_00Okay. Very good. So now's about how far in? Sixty feet? About that, yeah. Okay. So based on what the length of one rope. Right. Okay. Can I feel anything above me?
SPEAKER_01Anything else going on? Or is it just darkness? You just see darkness. You reach out, and where you basically like behind your head, you feel volcanic rock.
SPEAKER_00Okay.
SPEAKER_01Like, but you reach out a little bit and you don't feel anything there, but you do hear a couple of splashes when you do that in the room that you're in. Okay. I don't feel like there's a presence of anybody else or anything. I do feel that there's a presence. Okay. Is there a pair of red glowing eyes? Although the eyes have never glowed to your knowledge. Yeah, they're just red.
SPEAKER_05You don't know.
SPEAKER_01Hello? You can hear you hear a voice coming back in the unintelligible language. Fine. It's fine.
SPEAKER_00Relax. That's fine. I'm going to get everybody else in here. Is there does it seem to be enough room to put more than a couple people in here?
SPEAKER_01Uh, I mean, you haven't moved around the whole room, but there's definitely room in front of you with an arm's length. You know what? I will. And the splashing seems to be like five to seven feet away. All right.
SPEAKER_00I'm going to attempt to move about the room as best as I can. See if I can find another edge or anything like that. Okay. I'll take another 20 minutes doing that.
SPEAKER_03Find out what happens to our heroes on the next episode of Retro Rolecast.
SPEAKER_01This has been a Retro Rolecast production.
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