Shadowdark! The Well of Shune Ep. 1

Player Shawn becomes GM Shawn and GM Shawn becomes player Shawn in an all new Shadowdark adventure!  The Story begins in the Frozen North as a small ragtag band of mercenaries and outcasts escorts a heavily laden caravan over the mountain passes...

#ad&d #Shadowdark  #OSR #ttrpg #actualplay #rpg #Dnd #oldschoolrpg

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Transcript

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SPEAKER_00 0:00

This week on Retro Rollcast.

SPEAKER_03 0:02

Anybody who's listened to the podcast when Sean is a player and a monster dies, you eat it. Immediately gets butchered, and then he there was talk of what meals are going to be made out of. Yeah. So this is the GM inserting into the adventure the things that he loves as a player. Eating moose.

SPEAKER_00 0:19

Some liver eating. Or eating moose.

SPEAKER_04 0:21

The GM has this random encounter table that he made. Rolled moose. And the moose is one of the options. We rolled moose. Hold on. You rolled a random encounter and we got a moose. Oh, hold on. No. No.

SPEAKER_01 0:34

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 0:34

We're gonna examine this man. Hold on. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 0:37

A random encounter for a moose. And then had his NPC going inside it, right? He didn't give us an opportunity to avoid the moose.

SPEAKER_04 0:46

He said his NPC go in there, and the moose is charging us. That's a railroad moose. We're going to play Shadow Dark. This is Sean, not the normal Sean that runs the game. Nobody's ever called me normal. Well, that's fair. I will be running Shadow Dark today. It's my first time running the system. I really dig it. These guys are well thinking they're gonna die. That's what I was talking about.

SPEAKER_03 2:00

Oh no, we know we're gonna die. So we have played games with you before.

SPEAKER_04 2:05

Yeah, well. So let's start out by just going around the room and doing some introductions. Let's talk about the character, who you are, and all of that fun. To my left, we have Doc. Hello. I am playing Homar Björnson, who is a sea wolf.

SPEAKER_00 2:26

He's very adept at uh crashing ships and has done it twice in his past.

SPEAKER_03 2:32

Nice. You might need to specify that that's a character class, not a race. You're not actually a sea wolf. Yeah, yeah, I am actually a sea wolf. Like part of the wall.

SPEAKER_06 2:42

Well, okay.

SPEAKER_04 2:43

Front end and dolphin back end. Let me back up. Good point, good point. We are using the base shadow dark rules. We are also using the rules from cursed scroll three, which add the seer class and the sea wolf class. Which is essentially a Viking. Ooh, look at that. Sean actually has it here. And it's not a downloaded PDF. Printed copies, baby. No. But the Cursed Scroll 3 comes with a hex crawl. There's a funnel adventure. And the rules for the classes, as well as several other tidbits. Good stuff.

SPEAKER_03 3:18

Are we using the adventures in this book?

SPEAKER_04 3:20

We are not. Damn it. Is this an adventure off the top of your head? This is a from the mind.

SPEAKER_03 3:26

I have the map right here.

SPEAKER_04 3:28

I like that adventure a lot, actually. I didn't read it. I've read it with the intent to run it. But I didn't want to do a funnel. Because well. We like the We have already done that. We've done that, and a lot of death.

SPEAKER_02 3:44

Yeah, but we love it.

SPEAKER_04 3:45

We know it is fun. That's great. You're a joy killer. I try. That's my role. I strive to be that as a dungeon master. There's no fun. Anyway, next in line, we have Rodney. Hello. I am playing Drek, a human thief.

SPEAKER_01 4:03

He has been banished from somewhere for some supposed crimes that he may or may not have committed. Here on Retro Rolecast, we don't exactly go into backgrounds.

SPEAKER_03 4:13

Our background starts today. Right. We haven't figured out our background until we start playing.

SPEAKER_01 4:18

Until we play the game.

SPEAKER_02 4:19

My background was push a button on the random character game. Shadow Darklings.net.

SPEAKER_04 4:24

Shadow Darklings is actually really cool. It's a good site. I love the fact that you can go in and choose the rule set. Yep. And then I can generate a link to send to my party and say, this is the rule set we're using. Follow this link and generate your character. I didn't. I know. Because he loves to have control like that.

SPEAKER_01 4:43

Actually, I did. I did use that, but I wrote it down on a piece of paper because that's how I do things.

SPEAKER_04 4:50

Rodney embodies unscented, apparently.

SPEAKER_03 4:53

Well yeah, we don't need to go into that. Yeah, let's we'll just we'll just let that there. Yeah. That's enough that people will wonder. Yeah, and maybe would not explain it.

SPEAKER_04 5:03

It's a cliffhanger. Same bet. I just don't feel comfortable discussing it.

SPEAKER_03 5:10

Okay, so next around the table we have Sean. Hi, I am Sean. I am playing Throll, a dwarf fighter of no particular manual dexterity, but high strength. He was a blacksmith. As all good dwarves are, apparently. All right. Next in and I worship all Nord gods, because that was an option in the character. All of them. All of them equally. By the gods.

SPEAKER_05 5:39

All right. Thor's hammer. Eric. Hello. It's good to have me here. It is. I am going to be Glem today, a human priest of the neutral variety. And I am here to keep everyone alive if that's possible.

SPEAKER_04 5:55

Neutral human priest.

SPEAKER_05 5:57

Yep, that's me. Neutral. It's actually me. It's you? It's just me. Wait.

SPEAKER_03 6:04

This is exactly the same character as you played the time. No, it's the same deity and everything.

SPEAKER_04 6:10

His name is Glem. I think we should have played this. I hear neutral human priest, and I think Joel Osteen. No, he's evil. Lawful evil. Evil. That's what we're going with. Alright. Okay. That's fair.

SPEAKER_03 6:23

What was your previous character's name?

SPEAKER_05 6:25

I don't remember. Melg. It was Glem.

SPEAKER_03 6:28

I think it was Melg. I mean, Glem was an NPC in our big campaign.

unknown 6:33

Was it?

SPEAKER_03 6:34

Yeah. Yeah. There was one. Huh. Eric is a member of the podcast, but he doesn't listen to the podcast. So he's not like you folks out there.

SPEAKER_04 6:46

Speaking of listening to the podcast, someone that plays a new player that actually has listened to the podcast. Yes.

SPEAKER_05 6:52

Really? Is John. And I'm still waiting for Sean to eat his book.

SPEAKER_00 6:56

He said he'd eat a book if anyone listened to all of it. That's true. That's right. The only reason I powered through.

SPEAKER_03 7:01

I mean, I think what I said was that I would eat this book, and I don't remember what book it was, and I don't have it with me. Where were you when this happened? I don't remember. You'd have to listen to all the episodes of the podcast to find out. We have a whole lot I might have had in my hand. We have a whole lot of books back there. Okay.

SPEAKER_05 7:26

Your homework is to determine what book, what book. All right. AI, here I come.

SPEAKER_03 7:31

I think it was I think it was a pamphlet, actually. I will read this pamphlet.

SPEAKER_04 7:36

Yeah, I think that Midgard World Book is probably what it was.

SPEAKER_00 7:41

Oh, yeah, there you go. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 7:43

That's a big old chunk of the that's probably the thickest book over there.

SPEAKER_03 7:47

Anyway. Alright, so. Well, John didn't introduce his character. Keep it down down there.

SPEAKER_00 7:54

He made everybody laugh. I am serial the half elf or halfling wizard. Serial.

SPEAKER_06 8:01

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 8:02

Cereal, cereal. Serial.

SPEAKER_03 8:04

Serial.

SPEAKER_00 8:05

Serial serial. Serial. I'm a traveling mercenary.

SPEAKER_04 8:11

All right. Alright. Sometimes. So as this is intended to be a one-shot, I've done a bit of hand waving on the backstory. So we'll go over that. Like 6'7? 6'7. 6'7. 6'7. 6'7? 6'7. Don't ask. Don't. I'm going to punch you. What's in real life? I missed it. You missed the whole societal thing. But it means nothing, so don't worry about it. Just like 6'7. You just say it.

SPEAKER_03 8:41

And then you gotta do this.

SPEAKER_04 8:42

I do have the internet right here. I could No, don't. Alright then. That's terrifying. So a part of today's adventure as we're using Shadow Dark is luck tokens. And just for that purpose, I have some gold chocolate coins. And it is required to activate a luck token, you must eat the chocolate coin.

SPEAKER_03 9:04

Foil and all. What if you don't like chocolate? Foil and all. Foil and all. I do, so it's not me. But I'm just saying.

SPEAKER_04 9:11

Sometimes you have to make sacrifices if you want the luck.

SPEAKER_03 9:14

Wait. Just saying. How about to use a luck token, you have to feed the chocolate to Sean's dog? No. You try to kill my fucking dog, dude.

SPEAKER_04 9:24

Dogs can't eat chocolate. What about the pig? No, the dog. The dog will leave nothing. I got a better idea. We have to feed the DM the luck token. He will absolutely let's make it really freaking awkward. With your mouth. You have to hold the chocolate in your mouth and feed it. Wait, I have a better idea. We're thrilled.

SPEAKER_05 9:50

Uncomfortable. Uncomfortable. I'm out of here. You have to rub it and let her sniff.

SPEAKER_04 9:57

Oh my god. Okay. Dude, you've got a pile of dice at your feet. There's some more down there. Yeah, that happens. It happens.

SPEAKER_03 10:06

I drop them, they fall. I move on. I'm a little insulted because I do have these luck tokens with our logo on them.

SPEAKER_05 10:13

Yeah. That's cool. Can you eat them? Can you make them out of chocolate?

SPEAKER_03 10:17

If you're committed enough, you can eat anything. Oh, you know what?

SPEAKER_04 10:22

I think I need to take those, make a silicone mold.

SPEAKER_03 10:26

Make chocolate coins out of them with our logo on it. You need a design on the beds.

SPEAKER_02 10:32

That would be like a Christmas pack.

SPEAKER_05 10:34

Gummy tokens. Or something. You know what? And a half in.

SPEAKER_04 10:38

What a great thing to hand out at conventions.

SPEAKER_01 10:41

This is the third year of Retro Rollcast after. Really? Yeah. And it is. It would have been like about October of what, 2020. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 10:53

We're three years old. That's insane. As of this moment, we have 91 hours of our gibber jabber available on the same platforms where you can listen to Led Zeppelin.

SPEAKER_04 11:04

Nice. So does that mean I have to go to Facebook and change my profession to content creator? You are?

SPEAKER_03 11:12

Yeah, sure. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 11:13

So I have to change mine from professional gamer, lawn mowing simulator. No, you need to keep that. That's quality. It is actually a game, lawn mowing simulator. It is. Is it really? Yes, it is. And it is it is not relaxing.

SPEAKER_05 11:29

Is there a toilet cleaning simulator? Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 11:31

I feel like that's about the same thing. There's a more PC building simulator.

SPEAKER_05 11:35

There's everything.

SPEAKER_03 11:36

Yeah. I mean, you have to be able to do the thing that you simulate in order to be able to simulate it. But yes, there is a PC building simulator as a game.

SPEAKER_04 11:46

Why would I want to do that? It's training. I don't know. It's training. My favorite simulator was the trucking simulator. Oh, that's amazing. I've heard that's pretty cool.

SPEAKER_03 11:54

Like, seriously, out there, this is like one of the best games of all time. Go on Steam and look at the reviews and then look at how many of them there are. It's like 99% positive. And there's so many of them. It's so hard to back a truck up. And you can't explain to anybody why being a trucker is in a game is great, but it is.

SPEAKER_00 12:16

It's really fun.

SPEAKER_03 12:18

It's difficult. All right. Why aren't we? Dude.

SPEAKER_04 12:20

High five for trucking simulators. Wow.

SPEAKER_01 12:24

I added that to the list of curses I created while sitting here listening to you guys go on. Back the truck up. Back the truck up. These are all the things that Drek may say during the characters are going to know what a truck is. Back the truck up. Back the wagon up.

SPEAKER_04 12:42

Back the wagon up. Back the wagon. For purposes of generating curses, let's discuss the setting a little bit. Okay, let's do it. Setting is a fantasy setting, obviously. We're playing Shadow Dark. So you are from an area that is Nordic would be the best way to describe it. Vikings, seawolves, seers, etc. Built on a foundation of stone carved from the bedrock centuries ago, the town of Stone Harbor has thrived in harsh world longships, longhouses, and small villages. Really the only large metropolitan area in your world. You spent the summer working in and around Stone Harbor, odd jobs, whatever, contracts. Things have started to dry up a little bit, so your characters have all, through one path or another, ended up signing on for a caravan to a remote mountain town of Miro's Rest. It's late fall. There hasn't been any snows when you signed up, and the caravan master, Halvard Thormanson, is very eager to get through the mountain passes. Should it snow, things will slow down dramatically, and he wants to avoid that. Temperatures are cold, but not below freezing when you set out. Daylight's probably 40-50. Nighttime gets down to around freezing.

SPEAKER_03 14:11

Yeah, you didn't you didn't roll a weather generator, you just looked outside.

SPEAKER_04 14:15

Yeah. So one thing about Stone Harbor that your characters probably noticed over the years is it's clearly built on a stone foundation that was there long before the people settled here. Huge carved plinths stick out into the harbor. It has become a metropolitan center simply because it is the one harbor that remains open all year. No other reason. Not a great location geographically, but the harbor is always there. Any port in a storm. So, you know, people that are good at crashing ships end up there. But we're not there anymore. The caravan is set out, you're on the road, it's actually you're ten days into an eight-day journey. The snows have fallen, things have mired, wagons are moving slow, and you are all hired on as guards. There's eight wagons. You, obviously the caravan master Halvard, there's a guide named Stigier. There's also one wagon that someone lives in that you haven't really encountered. You've seen the caravan master go into that wagon periodically. But no one ever comes out that you've seen. It's morning. Caravan is getting started for the day. Sun is rising. It's sunny but chilly. May I interrupt for a question then? Go for it. Are we going to be using the Shadow Dark rolled initiative D20 where you roll initiative and then that's the order that our character actions take place in during non-combat time? I was just gonna go around the table. Okay. So we're gonna do it essentially because we tried that the first time and it evolved into it. It slows things down, I think. I think, yeah. Everything we do devolved. I would say if we were playing with new players, I would do that. Right, because then it forces them to act. No, I mean people that haven't played much, not new to the podcast. Okay. So that kind of forces everyone. I think for cons or random groups at a game shop, that's a great mechanic. We are all longtime experienced role players. So I think going around the table is probably going to be smoother for us.

SPEAKER_01 16:36

Okay.

SPEAKER_04 16:36

Well, because I I wanted to interrupt because I wanted to ask some general questions that we might know the answer to since we've been on this eight-day caravan for ten days. Fire away. What are we transporting? You're not quite sure. Um a thief? I'm pretty sure after two days. He knows what we're doing. I need to know what we're transporting. What was initially stated is this is just a merchant caravan that goes up to Miro's Rest twice a year, and brings supplies from the city, brings back raw materials from the village. Villages set in the mountains, they do some mining, they do a lot of hunting and trapping. So you bring back furs, you bring back raw ore, whatever. But what do we take to them that they are? Manufactured goods, processed food, wheat, okay, grain, stuff, barrels of mead. Stuff to get them through the winter that they can't create on their own. Exactly.

SPEAKER_03 17:30

Barrels of mead.

SPEAKER_04 17:32

The one thing you have noticed in your time moving through this in your uh 10-day journey thus far, it's very well fed. Like you have no problem filling your belly, going to sleep happy. They do break out casks of mead. Everybody's allowed to drink as much as they want. No shortage of anything. It's also the greatest caravan I've ever been on. Very well armed. Yeah, we're here. More well armed than you would expect. Yeah, that's us. Right. Among them, Halvard is a big burly fighter-looking dude. He is a big man, very hairy, as sea wolves are wont to be. Carries weapons, armor, all the time. Steegir, clearly a hunter, has got a longbow, carries a sword, leather armor. Looks like he knows how to use them. So it is not snowing, although it has. The path you are traveling on may be a road, but it's unbroken. Like you are breaking a trail in the snow on this path. So look, the village didn't move. Are we the only caravan that goes here twice a year? As far as period. Like there's no other villages go, or no other people go this way. As far as I know, yes. Okay. And these woods, there are we going through like uh coastal forest? Are we up in the big hills? You're in mountain passes. Mountain pass. So we're going through uh a colder section maybe of the journey. Okay. I'm just trying to set the scene for myself to know how my character might react in any kind of situation. So where you are right now, if you were to look up, you would see peaks on two sides, east and west. You're heading north. The peaks are covered in snow. There is a row of lower hills, and then the area you are is the bottom of that valley. And you've been going up and down through different passes over the last ten days. Conepherous for the most part. The area you're in right now is starting to get wet. There's streams, there's a couple marshy areas, some fens, if you will. Sure. But high mountain swamps. Yeah. Okay. Giant giant territory. I thought I had one last question. Beaver territory. So so for the duration of this, I will be shadowing Stigir, the guide, to learn and see what he's doing. And now I'll let everybody else do something. Okay. Before we send the gloss over that. Okay. Just give me a dex check. So is this these are difficulty classes, correct? Right. We're going to be able to do that. In this case, you roll high. Yeah, you want to roll high. Add your DEX bonus. 12. It's 12 total? Yep. Okay. So we'll move on from that, let that occur. Something. So you're shadowing Stigier. Yeah, I mean, I'm not hiding from him. I just like when he does something, I want to go with him and I'll scout with you. And be Woods buddies. He doesn't actually he ranges ahead a little bit. Shut your hole home. But he's typically not out of sight of the caravan. Yeah, it makes sense.

SPEAKER_03 20:49

Yeah, he's got to scout a path, make sure the way I could say go through. Right. Now, are you saying the town of Mirror's Rest is in the mountains covered by a blizzard? Typically. Very apropos.

SPEAKER_04 21:00

Yeah. Some would even call it the lost town of Mirror's Rest. That's true. Yeah. It's not my fault. Rumor has it. The barkeeper. Okay, just fucking keep piling one. In Mirro's Rest. He's a very glib barbarian by the name of Kor. Oh, okay. Very good. And he has a survivor. A right-hand man that's missing an ear. There is.

SPEAKER_03 21:26

Okay.

SPEAKER_04 21:26

Yeah, I've heard. By the way, I just wanted to let everybody know that I did completely pimp myself out this morning by offering a luck token reward to anyone that brought me monsters.

SPEAKER_03 21:37

And then he turns around and gives everybody a luck token reward. Did you give Alban one? I did. Okay. Alright. But Alban was actually the one who bought the monster.

SPEAKER_04 21:47

I understand. I did too. But you all you drove Alban here. Ah. So I so without driving him here. I was the caravan master. You were the transport. Sean Maher.

SPEAKER_05 22:00

Why are we protecting this caravan? Why does it need protection going from this town to be?

SPEAKER_04 22:04

We're not protecting it yet.

SPEAKER_05 22:05

But why are we here? What do they want us for? Well, there hasn't been much motivation. There hasn't been much to protect it from yet.

SPEAKER_04 22:11

And honestly, that's a good thing.

SPEAKER_05 22:15

But in general, what are the threats?

SPEAKER_04 22:18

The known threats are all of the beasts of the wilderness packs of wolves. You've heard packs of wolves in the distance fairly regularly once you got up into the passes. And the the the rumors and all of those the history. Should have talked to the bard. Yeah, should have talked to the bard. Around the fire, the stories are things of frost dragons, hill giants, wandering ogres, goblins. I can't handle any of them. Should have brought a bigger sword. What? All of these things are known. I got a stick. He leads off with the dragon.

SPEAKER_05 23:04

Things that old women use to scare children at night. Wait, there's old women?

SPEAKER_04 23:09

This game's got a lot better. They speak of giant birds. They call rocks that live in the peaks.

SPEAKER_05 23:20

Okay, so we're not talking bandits. We're talking creatures that attack on the regular bandits could happen.

SPEAKER_04 23:28

You should never know. It'd be the worst bandits ever guarding a caravan route that gets used twice a year. Wait until we'll find them dead along the side of the road, fucking starved, right?

SPEAKER_03 23:39

Okay. I don't think we need to delve too deeply into the backstory. No, I just I gotta set the scene, man. There's gotta be a certain level of we don't want to dig too deep. Right. Yeah. Because I know my backstories aren't based on anything real.

SPEAKER_01 23:52

So remember where we said we don't have backstory until we play our characters? Where do you go?

SPEAKER_05 23:58

Now it's time.

SPEAKER_04 23:59

Okay. Carry on. So as the day progresses, everybody mounts up. You can either there are horses you can ride or you can walk. There are not enough horses for all of you. The caravan moves at a walking pace, typically, especially since the snows began. Who is you said you're following Stigir. What is everybody else doing during a normal day of caravan movement?

SPEAKER_02 24:23

Well, I'm gonna carry the halfling around on my back because he's probably gonna get bogged down in the snow.

SPEAKER_04 24:29

I would assume he's on a wagon. That's what I'm gonna do.

SPEAKER_02 24:32

Get a backpack for you, dude.

SPEAKER_04 24:33

I'm big. I'm jumping.

SPEAKER_03 24:34

I mean, let's do it.

SPEAKER_04 24:36

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 24:36

I'm pretty much hanging out on the on the cart drinking mead. Like the front? The back where the driver will be uh on one side, I will be occupying the other. So you're riding shotgun. I am riding shotgun.

SPEAKER_04 24:50

Okay. Are you at the back of the caravan, at the front of the caravan? Where would you normally go? Where is the cart? I'm wherever that cart is. There are multiple. There's eight wagons. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 25:00

The one with the mead in it.

SPEAKER_04 25:02

There are at least two, probably more, that have provisions in them. I'm probably in the second. Since part of the caravan's mission is to take provisions to Miro's rest. Okay. And next time it's not riding shotgun, it's riding crossbow. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 25:19

Right, sorry. Except that my Dex is a seven and I don't have a crossbow. Well, I'm just, you're still riding. Riding crossbow.

SPEAKER_04 25:25

I call shotgun, it doesn't mean I'm running around in my specific with a shotgun. We're in Pennsylvania. You'd never know. Oh, that's exactly what it means.

SPEAKER_03 25:33

In a touch of the cold here and it's just bad weather. But anyway, I'm probably on the second cart.

SPEAKER_04 25:38

Okay. Second from the front. So not the lead cart. Correct. All right. That's good because being a big burly fellow, you're often called upon to help push the wagons out of whatever they get stuck in.

SPEAKER_05 25:51

So uh Glem. I am a walking and I am just in the middle of the pack, but it doesn't mean that during the day, if the caravan gets slow, I won't be at the front or I lag behind a little bit depending on the speed. I'm floating floating around and uh watching out for old women.

SPEAKER_04 26:12

Uh-huh. Okay.

SPEAKER_05 26:13

I am also very curious about this wagon with someone in it. Well, the wagon no one comes out of. If we stop again, I will attempt to go in that wagon. And if it's allowed, I'll just go in the wagon. But if I'm out, I will not.

SPEAKER_04 26:28

So Stigir, one thing you have noticed in shadowing the man, he often stops to consult with the caravan master, and they pour over kind of a raggedy old map. But you've never managed to sneak a peek at what the actual contents of the map are. Sorry, who was what? They got a map. We don't know what it is. I wasn't sure if he was talking to me specifically.

SPEAKER_03 26:56

Oh, who was? Oh shit, I was writing. Yes, the GM was distracted by Rodney looking at a book. Yes.

SPEAKER_01 27:04

Well, yeah, sure. Sort of half taken care of. Sorry, what was that? Halbard?

SPEAKER_04 27:11

You there's a map? Halvard looks at you like. The fuck are you doing? What? Stiger and Halvard both turn from the map they were looking at and just stare at you for a minute. We're not lost, are we? I think you're being punished. No. Okay, good. Can I help you? No, I thought you called me. No, you walked into us. Oh. Sorry, I was distracted. I see. I was lost in thought. No more mead for you today. I haven't even had any mead today. Drek was looking at his phone.

SPEAKER_05 27:42

He was watching a magazine as he walked.

SPEAKER_04 27:45

I was praying. He was staring off into the sunset. Watching the snowflakes fall. Sorry, Halvard.

SPEAKER_01 27:51

I'll go back to my duties. Next time, if you need me, just say my name of Drek, and I will answer.

SPEAKER_04 27:59

Drek or Drake? Drek.

SPEAKER_05 28:01

He is Drek right now.

SPEAKER_04 28:02

I'm Drek. You're Drek right now. Drake is when I need to trick someone into me thinking I'm a fighter. Okay. But Halvard probably doesn't know. Right.

SPEAKER_05 28:11

No one knows this.

SPEAKER_04 28:13

So the day progresses. You do notice at one point something very large and winged flying around a peak off to the east.

SPEAKER_03 28:24

Let me get on my second character sheet. Yep. It's a chicken. I've got a wizard for my second character. The way that it flies.

SPEAKER_04 28:31

It reminds you of a bird of prey, but you're not sure how far off it is and how large it is. It might be close and be small. Might be far away and be very large. Difficult to say. Eventually it moves off and disappears. So what are you doing? Good idea. Did you touch it? No. We let it go. The mead is flowing at night. No drinking during the day. Sorry. Oh, I got a flash. Sir. They know you have a flash. They know. So the day progresses. You make some progress. It's very slow going through the muddy, snow covered swampy. There must be massive profit in this.

SPEAKER_05 29:18

Oh, there is. Or is there? Are we being paid? You will be. How much was negotiated? Not enough.

SPEAKER_04 29:29

No. Oh. You're getting paid by the day. So it's five gold a day. Wow.

SPEAKER_05 29:35

Well, let's take our time.

SPEAKER_04 29:37

Well, we got let's turn around and get another five days or ten days pay and then get armor, and then we'll come back.

SPEAKER_05 29:45

Go back, come back.

SPEAKER_04 29:46

You don't have any armor? And leather. Oh, Jesus. It's like an afford start now. Yeah. Odin's balls. You got a halfling on your back to protect you. There you go. That's right, yeah. Does the halfling provide armor class bonus?

SPEAKER_03 30:00

He's a half cover.

SPEAKER_04 30:01

And you can use him in the same fashion you would use a shield.

SPEAKER_02 30:06

I can't use him like a round shield and have him destroyed to take all the damage.

SPEAKER_04 30:11

Yes. He does provide the same bonuses and armor classes of nine A's from a game standpoint. He is a round shield.

SPEAKER_05 30:17

And he can be thrown.

SPEAKER_04 30:19

Are we doing that? Yes, we're doing it. As a spear. But what about dwarves? No, you're not tossing this dwarves. Dwarves are far too heavy for that. You can't toss a dwarf. I'm pretty damn strong. Pretty damn strong. I'm willing to try. Alright. So it's beginning to get dark. You've made it maybe six miles of slogging. Things are very quiet. So are we setting up camp? They do eventually pull off and start to break out provisions and start a fire. Big tents. Yeah. Circled wagons. Literally. Okay. Night begins to fall.

SPEAKER_03 31:01

Olivar watches. I think we're just all gonna be on watch all night.

SPEAKER_04 31:05

No, it's a normal rotation. By this point.

SPEAKER_06 31:10

By this point.

SPEAKER_04 31:12

Everybody knows their assignments. Yeah. What is my assignment? I don't know mine. I forgot. Your assignment is first watch. Perfect. Your assignment is last watch. He's pointing at Doc. That's me. Yes. So I'm getting drunk and going to bed now. Kilmar. Your assignment is mid-watch. Okay. Because, well, you're usually up hunting mead anyway. Right. Dwarves. Well, dwarves drink mead? The great mead.

SPEAKER_05 31:46

Why wouldn't they? Of course.

SPEAKER_04 31:48

I thought they were more ales.

SPEAKER_05 31:50

Alcohol. Whatever you have. Right.

SPEAKER_04 31:52

You're not assigned to watch duty.

SPEAKER_05 31:54

I like that.

SPEAKER_03 31:55

He's pointing out Eric and the priest.

SPEAKER_04 31:57

I'm me. Sorry, Clem. Is assigned to help make dinner. You've got KP. Nice. The halfling is ignored when it comes to labor. Because he generally just trips people.

SPEAKER_03 32:13

I would have thought the halfling would have. He's busy having second supper. Right.

unknown 32:17

Second.

SPEAKER_05 32:18

Hanging out at first water.

SPEAKER_03 32:19

Well, there is a reason they didn't put him on KP.

SPEAKER_05 32:22

Second breakfast.

SPEAKER_03 32:23

Yeah, but you would figure he would make awesome food. Right? Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 32:27

Because that's the problem is the from an economic standpoint, and this has been explained, they don't let him near the food simply because they want some to make it to the destination. Right, but it'll be amazing. But there won't be enough of it. But it won't be for sale. Man, I'm starting to get hungry. So we're going to go through the night in watches. So first watch. I skulk about during my watch. Define, please. I just I walk around the perimeter of the camp. I don't sit in one spot. Okay. Are you looking for anything in particular? Yeah, like trouble. Anything that moves outside the camp, noises, woodsy stuff. But you're not like messing with anybody in the caravan. No, yeah, no. Why would I do that? I'm just I patrol the caravan. It's eight, eight things. It's a tough thing to watch.

SPEAKER_03 33:18

Skulking has a connotation.

SPEAKER_01 33:20

Yeah, well, yeah, but it means I'm trying not to be seen by anything that can see the characters. If this was done skulking, it would be totally different.

SPEAKER_04 33:26

I got you.

SPEAKER_01 33:27

Well, what?

SPEAKER_04 33:27

Because when Rodney plays a thief, we don't know what skulking means. Listen, when Doculk Thieves said he was skulking, everybody would understand exactly what he was doing. Oh no, I would assume he was trying to steal stuff from the door in the caravan.

SPEAKER_01 33:41

No, I skulk around to not be seen by anything outside of the caravan. So my goal is not to sit there central and just look into the woods. I'm going to walk around and sneak and be proactive in my watch.

SPEAKER_04 33:54

All right. But when I say skulk, that means I'm not going to be seen. I'm hiding the entire time. Cloak pulled up over my head, long hair covering my face. I'm a shadow in the dark.

SPEAKER_05 34:05

You're skulking.

SPEAKER_04 34:06

I would call that skulking, yeah. What was that? What was that? It's windy.

SPEAKER_03 34:11

It's windy. Storm is coming. Don't get lost. Dark clouds rolling. If you really want the sound effects, I can mix them in like that.

SPEAKER_04 34:18

It's much more fun to blow into the microphone.

SPEAKER_01 34:21

I admit I did start looking around, like who hit their microphone?

SPEAKER_04 34:25

Okay. My microphone's now going to have a heart attack from the amount of monster on my breath.

SPEAKER_01 34:30

So I don't wake anybody up just because the weather changes, by the way. It's good. Don't overreact. But when my watch ends, I do go get Thrall and wake him up for his time. Assuming I get to the end of my watch.

SPEAKER_04 34:47

It passes fairly uneventfully. Thrall, he wakes you up. It is now a bit colder than it was. It's windy, and dark clouds have rolled in. You can't see the stars. Which means it's a bit darker.

SPEAKER_03 35:00

Is there any of that mead left?

SPEAKER_04 35:02

No, you don't get no mead. Go do your watch. You can have a glass when you're done. Come on now.

SPEAKER_03 35:07

I don't know if I can do it without the mead. Alright. Anything to be concerned about? It's freaking cold.

SPEAKER_04 35:15

Yeah, it got cloudy and windy. My my nose tells me snow's in the air. And that Halvart is full of shit. That's not a cloud.

SPEAKER_03 35:25

I could have told you that a while ago. Well, yeah. Alright.

SPEAKER_01 35:29

At least we're on the same page.

SPEAKER_03 35:31

Oh, make sure you don't die while you're sleeping, Laddie. Oh. Yeah, that's very reassuring.

SPEAKER_04 35:37

Thought it would be. Alright. You crawl out, and uh, like I said, it is weather is turning. Fire is burning down a bit.

SPEAKER_03 35:47

I'm gonna go find some uh perk up the fire a bit.

SPEAKER_04 35:50

Okay. Anything in particular you want to do during your watch?

SPEAKER_03 35:54

I want to stay awake. I want to drink some mead. And I'm gonna be I'm not gonna be skulking around outside the camp, but I'm gonna be attentive to any any noises or anything outside the perimeter.

SPEAKER_04 36:08

So you're drinking on watch? A little bit. Give me a constitution check. Which for him should be super easy.

SPEAKER_03 36:16

I do I get advantage because I'm a dwarf? No. Lies. Deception. This is just bullshit. I made it. You're wrong.

SPEAKER_04 36:25

You're doing it wrong. Remember, it's a DC class. Yep. Add your constitution bonus and tell me the end result. I didn't make it. Right, you're doing live. I'm doing old school.

SPEAKER_03 36:34

Yeah. Yeah. I didn't make it. What did you roll? I rolled a eight on my ten. Eight? Okay. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 36:43

What's the number that came up on the die? Seven plus one. Plus your plus one. Okay. So a total of eight. Alright. So the watch ends, but feeling pretty groggy. Overstay your watch a bit. Probably singing some dwarf songs. Yep. Sitting by the fire. Not really watching, mostly just trying to stay awake. And the sun starts to come up. And you realize your watch was over hours ago.

SPEAKER_03 37:12

Yeah, but it's good, right? Sun's coming up.

SPEAKER_06 37:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 37:16

I did a good job. You did. You made the sun come up. I didn't have to wake anybody else up. You're right. They're gonna be able to walk because I'm not walking. I'm on the I'm on the cart.

SPEAKER_04 37:28

So the however. The caravan master starts to crawl out. Stig ears waking up. Everybody's rousing because the sun is up. And they see a half-drunk dwarf sitting by the fire, probably singing badly.

SPEAKER_07 37:47

We can dance if we want to. We can leave your friends behind.

SPEAKER_04 37:51

What's in that mead, dude?

SPEAKER_07 37:53

Were you hammering that shit?

SPEAKER_04 37:55

Nobody said absinthe. Okay. So anyway, so Hjalmar, you kind of wake up on your own. I feel refreshed. A little surprised by that, but. Good night's sleep. Yeah, no one ever came to get you for your watch, which should be pretty alarming. I'm alive. It's not alarming. Alright. The sun's up.

unknown 38:17

Hey.

SPEAKER_04 38:18

We made it. Good job, Thrall.

SPEAKER_03 38:20

I kept everybody safe.

SPEAKER_04 38:22

Pat you on the back.

SPEAKER_03 38:23

Thank you.

SPEAKER_04 38:25

So you see the caravan master disappear into the uh the middle wagon. As he seems to do every day. Now, this is the wagon that you said there's somebody in it or something? Something's there. We don't know. It looks like the kind of wagon that, like, I'm not gonna say nobility would ride in, but traveling merchants, traveling. So it's almost like a house wagon kind of deal. Yeah, it is a house wagon-ish. It's habitable. Right, right. Somebody's living in there. Right. Elbow direct to where the money is. At night you do sometimes see light, like candlelight in it. Occasionally there is smoke that rises from a small chimney on top of it, like there's a wood stove inside.

SPEAKER_05 39:08

While making lunch, do I notice people taking food to it?

SPEAKER_04 39:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 39:14

Okay.

SPEAKER_04 39:15

So there's people in there. There's money in there. How much food? Is it for two people or for one? How many? I don't know. Well, are we talking one halfling? One dwarf? How many servings are delivered? That's the question. How many servings? Yes. That's not something you're part of.

SPEAKER_05 39:33

I just know people take food there.

SPEAKER_04 39:35

Yes. Okay. You've seen Halvard or Stigier just go get food and take it into the wagon. Plates come out. But you've not really seen anyone other than those two people enter or leave the wagon. I wonder where they go to the bathroom. In the woods like the rest of us. Oh, gross. Maybe there's a hole in the floor.

SPEAKER_03 39:57

Maybe that's what they're burning in the fireplace or bad. Don't walk behind the wagon.

SPEAKER_04 40:02

It's a little fresh to be burning. They just leave uh gallon jugs by the exit. Stigir. How many days?

SPEAKER_01 40:09

We're already 11 days into an eight-day journey. This is not supposed to be taking this long. And I don't mind getting paid, but we're still in the middle of the damn mountains. What why aren't we there yet?

SPEAKER_04 40:24

I know we're slow on going, but come on. Well, it wasn't supposed to snow yet.

SPEAKER_01 40:30

Well, look. We should have maybe left earlier. Let's get going, man.

SPEAKER_04 40:34

Yes, we should have.

SPEAKER_01 40:35

Let's let this thing get there. Let's go.

SPEAKER_04 40:38

So let me just tell everyone. Yes, we are well behind schedule. That's true. I'll say. You're getting paid by the day. You'll get paid when we get there. We'll keep track. But yes, we are moving slowly. Perhaps if people, instead of riding the wagons and drinking mead, helped move the wagons through the rough spots, we'd move faster.

SPEAKER_03 41:09

This might be a bad time to bring it up, but could I get an extra watch allowance for last night because I did everybody's watch?

SPEAKER_04 41:16

No. This is bullshit. Consider your watch allowance to be the mead you drink. We need a union. Who missed the watch?

SPEAKER_03 41:26

I didn't miss the watch. Someone missed the watch. I watched for everybody.

SPEAKER_05 41:30

You missed. Yeah, I didn't get up. Are you there? Do we know where you are? I'm right here. You're not disappeared?

SPEAKER_04 41:35

No. Kjalmar did not get awakened for watch.

SPEAKER_05 41:38

Ah is that the idea?

SPEAKER_04 41:40

So he just slept through. Okay. Wouldn't you? Because the drunken dwarf lost himself in the fire. I mean, we're all still alive. No harm, no foul. Yeah. I'll just make sure. You did good. I'm gonna you protected us through the evening by yourself. As watchmaster. I'm gonna switch your two watches.

SPEAKER_05 42:02

As watchmaster.

SPEAKER_04 42:04

I go first.

SPEAKER_01 42:05

No, you go second.

SPEAKER_04 42:06

No. He goes last. What do you want to go first? Mid watch is the worst. I'll take it then. Fine. Give me midwatch. I'll do first one. You're first, you're third, I'm second. That way the dwarf can get drunk in the morning and ride in the cart all day. How come Shorty doesn't have to do watch?

SPEAKER_03 42:24

He can't see very far. I think he should.

SPEAKER_05 42:27

Yeah, I was well known.

SPEAKER_03 42:28

I remember a wagon. That's right. I'm a dwarf and I called you Shorty. Angles.

SPEAKER_05 42:32

That's right.

SPEAKER_03 42:33

Deal with it. The wizard.

SPEAKER_05 42:35

Deal with it.

SPEAKER_04 42:36

Because the wizards have to study at night. Exactly. Are we playing that way? Is that how this game works? I really don't know.

SPEAKER_05 42:43

Now, every time you drink mead, it's water.

SPEAKER_04 42:45

Well, that's what the little halfling told me. Well, he didn't seem like a trustworthy fella. But he couldn't take watch because he has to study at night. None of us are true.

SPEAKER_01 42:52

Well, none of this is getting us to Miro's rest unless we're bickering by waking up in the morning.

SPEAKER_04 42:58

I mean, I assume that you know the sun rise. I'm not growing up. You're packaging. Everybody's having breakfast.

SPEAKER_03 43:06

We need to go walking, and when I say we, I mean y'all.

SPEAKER_05 43:09

Because I'm riding. Still am I. That's fine.

SPEAKER_04 43:12

I'm riding the biggest horse that they have.

SPEAKER_00 43:15

That's got to look funny.

SPEAKER_04 43:16

You're riding a horse, I'm riding in your backpack, arms extended, ready to fire. So you get things rolling in the morning, and really only about an hour after things start moving, Stigir up front. I'm assuming you're probably up front as well. Mm-hmm. Motions for the caravan to stop. And you see him disappear into the brush. Are you following him?

SPEAKER_01 43:41

I will go to where he was to see if I can see whatever it was that he saw that made him stop. Bathroom.

SPEAKER_04 43:48

You see down the trail a couple hundred yards, a huge bull moose. I don't I do not attempt to do anything about bull mooses. Hey moose. Hey moose.

SPEAKER_03 43:58

I have a little tiny. I was about to say, did any of us does any is any of us packing a missile weapon?

SPEAKER_04 44:06

I have a hand axe. A magic missile.

SPEAKER_01 44:10

Yeah. Yeah. As I wait here, keep my eye on the moose.

SPEAKER_04 44:15

You don't have a bow.

SPEAKER_01 44:16

I do have a bow. It does D4 damage.

SPEAKER_04 44:18

That's a fucking moose. Oh, it's a short bow. Yeah. That's a moose. I have a short bow. So shoot it twice. It's a moose.

SPEAKER_03 44:26

I might need to shoot like eight.

SPEAKER_01 44:29

It's gonna be more stressful than the first one. Yeah, because it's gonna be coming right for me. But I do not go help Stigir with his moose hunt.

SPEAKER_05 44:37

I think yeah, I think he's got that.

SPEAKER_04 44:40

Or not get the moose because it's a moose.

SPEAKER_03 44:44

Freaking monsters. Moose. Yeah, it's like 1,600 pounds of weight. We don't particularly need that. Trees don't stop.

SPEAKER_04 44:53

Yes, we do. So you see you're standing there watching. Is anybody else moving forward? Are you just sitting in the caravan waiting?

SPEAKER_01 45:00

I I do the old hand signals where I make I take my hands from my head and I go like really wide and I just go like this. I'm going back.

SPEAKER_05 45:09

We recognize it as the sign of the moose. Right? The sign of the moose.

SPEAKER_04 45:13

I need everybody to make an intelligence check to see if they understand the moose signal. The moose. And I paw my feet on the ground while I do it. I got an 11.

SPEAKER_03 45:22

If that's an average check, I made it.

SPEAKER_04 45:25

Do we need under or over? DC 12er. You're looking high. Okay, I got it. Sh nope, I have no idea what you're doing. You roll the die, add your intelligence bonus, and tell me the total. Eight. You failed. No idea what I'm trying to get. Yeah, we have no idea. You also failed. So I think he's trying to say there's a moose. And just about that time, you see an arrow come out of the woods into the side of the moose. Yes. Okay. We have moose. The moose bolts right towards you. We knew this. Oh. Sure.

SPEAKER_01 45:59

Well, I mean, good job not shooting it. I mean, look, he said it was a couple of hundred yards away. Right. So I go. It's far. Yeah, it's far. Yeah, that's 200 yards.

SPEAKER_04 46:11

There's no way I can make that shot. So I go climb, look for a pine tree, one of those with all the branches sticking out in every single direction. That's super easy to climb. Yeah, like every tree here. Yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_01 46:22

So and then I get near the base of one of those inside like the wagon wheel of branches that are down at the base of it.

SPEAKER_04 46:29

And then I just I get my bow out in case it does come this direction. Okay. Stealth is dex, I believe. And just give me a dex check. Well, I'm not hiding. That dice is not doing anything that would be. Yeah, but I got a five total, by the way. This is more about how fast can he get into that wagon wheel of branches and get in a good position. I got 200 yards. That's at least 20 seconds at Usain Bolt Moose speed. In fact, this moose's name is. Is that Mussain Bolt? Moose. Alright. So give that man a luck token for that. You know what? I'm okay with that.

SPEAKER_03 47:09

I can't have two. Oh. Alright, I'll keep it. I mean, I'll eat one and you can give me another. That's not a problem.

SPEAKER_04 47:15

Moussein Bolt is charging down the path towards the caravan. You've jumped into the tree. It's coming right for us. So we'll go.

SPEAKER_03 47:27

Since you acted first, Sean. I am going to jump down and just sort of get behind a cart. Okay. So you were in the second wagon. You're now behind the second wagon. Right. I'm just climbing down, getting behind a cart. Yes. Okay. Readying weapons? What? I mean, my axe is always hiccuping near enough.

SPEAKER_04 47:49

Taking a drink.

SPEAKER_03 47:50

My my axe is, I mean. I'm a it's a moose. Alright. It is a moose. So I assume it's going to he's going to run over anybody that gets in his path. But he's not gonna stand there and duke it out with us. I'm thinking. That seems a reasonable assumption, to be honest.

SPEAKER_04 48:10

Squaring up. I can find you some YouTube videos that may change your mind. Oh yeah. Mooses do duke it out. Is that the correct terminal? Well, there's like 20 of us. Mooses will fuck you up. Well, they they will, absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 48:22

That's what I was doing earlier, by the way, when I was distracting moose. No, I made up names for every single caravan driver. Oh, it's a good idea.

SPEAKER_04 48:28

One of the coolest things I've ever seen is the sign in Pinkham Notch, New Hampshire, that has the count of deaths by moose.

SPEAKER_03 48:35

Oh, yeah, you don't want you do not want to hit a moose with a car.

SPEAKER_04 48:38

Yeah, you hit a moose with a car, you knock the legs out, and then a ton and a half on you of moose crushes you to death. By the way, you were in the cart with Ranga. She's a female. Just in case you wonder. Just in case. Yeah? Brown chicken brown count.

SPEAKER_03 48:54

All right. She doesn't have a beard, so she's not my type. How do you know? Roll for beard.

SPEAKER_05 48:59

She doesn't have a beard.

SPEAKER_04 49:00

Because she's human? Mostly. So Eric. Exactly. Who? Glam. Glam. Does Glam see the character Eric always plays? Glam. Two out of two times. Human priest of neutral gods. Yes, Eric.

SPEAKER_03 49:16

Well, Marine didn't work out for him.

SPEAKER_05 49:18

Yeah, that's true. I rolled this fairly. Anyway. Do I see the moose? You do.

SPEAKER_04 49:25

It's hard to miss the moose.

SPEAKER_05 49:26

It's the moose I see.

SPEAKER_04 49:27

This is a large bull moose charging full speed down the path.

SPEAKER_05 49:32

Looking at the moose, do I notice if there's a squirrel nearby? You're not seeing any squirrels. So it's not moose and squirrel. No. No moose and squirrel. So no moose. I just want to take my shield, take my sword, get out of its way under the caravan, perhaps. So you were in which wagon? I don't know.

SPEAKER_04 49:51

Well, roll a D8. The kitchen. Yeah, roll a D8. You could see which wagon you were by D eight. That's a D8. You literally just touched it.

SPEAKER_05 50:00

That one?

SPEAKER_04 50:00

Yeah. There you go. Make a declaration of your position.

SPEAKER_05 50:03

My position. I am in the fourth caravan. That is yours.

SPEAKER_04 50:06

Under wagon caravan.

SPEAKER_05 50:08

The fourth wagon. I am under the Canute's wagon.

SPEAKER_04 50:11

So you're in under the fourth wagon, which is the wagon in front of the house wagon of mysterious occupancy. Yep. Yes. All right. All right. Lucky charms. What? Am I able to see over anything to even see the moose coming? You heard more than saw. I also yelled. Alright, I'm gonna sit back down and just relax. Alright.

SPEAKER_05 50:35

You did the moose sign.

SPEAKER_04 50:36

I can't see nothing. Okay. So now we're off to Hjalmar. Well, a big moose. I have a big axe. I'm gonna go stand in front of the first caravan with my large axe and uh smash this thing in the face if it comes near me. We have our first one. So you're in front of you're in front of the first wagon. Just standing there like you got it. Meat crush moose.

SPEAKER_03 51:03

I'm also assuming the moose isn't just gonna charge. I'm gonna try to headbutt the moose.

SPEAKER_05 51:07

He's gonna scream and give the moose.

SPEAKER_04 51:10

I'm gonna headbutt him. The moose is loose. Alright. So everyone has declared a position. The moose is charging down the path. Stingir is off in the weeds. And our uh our Drek is cowering behind a tree. Well, I mean, I'll take a shot if it's within uh range of my puny little bow. Alright. It will absolutely pass by you. You will be able to get a shot. Oh, nice. So now that Hilmar has taken up his position, go ahead and take that shot. I'm shooting the moose. Does it know does it know where I am? Oh, wait, we just we doesn't seem to care. It's charging down the pick. It does matter for my sneak attack. So if I can if I have an unknown, I get an extra die of damage. You did not pass that hide check, did you? No. No, you pulled it too. But it's a moose. So no, the moose is aware of you. Oh, it's a moose. It does not matter, apparently. Oh man. I rolled a natural one. Nice. Alright, so you uh draw back your bow, which ding! Zero ding. Which seems to ding seems to have gotten wet and the string snaps. Oh curses! Our only bow is now gone. What? Tarragus' beard! Were you waiting for a particular range or were you just firing it wherever the hell it was?

SPEAKER_01 52:32

I will fire when it gets into the closest range that I could hit it.

SPEAKER_04 52:36

That way I would get multiple shots as it passed by on its way to kill Homar. So I would say before it's by you, probably would be two shots. Okay, well, I don't get the second one because I broke my string on the first one. So it's all irrelevant. So we'll say the moose is parallel to your position right now. Alright. Yep. It's going right by me. It's a parallel moose. Wait until it gets close, he pulls back and snaps his bowstring.

SPEAKER_03 53:01

It's good that we have position for that.

SPEAKER_04 53:03

Yeah, it is important. Yep. Yeah. So we'll move to Thrall, the dwarf fighter, who is currently behind a wagon. Yep. Waiting for the moose.

SPEAKER_03 53:13

I'm just unlimbering a shield and so you're preparing. I'm shouting Look out! Glem.

SPEAKER_04 53:21

You've seen the moose. It's continuing to charge. You would think somebody would have taken a shot at it by now, but you haven't seen anything materialized.

SPEAKER_03 53:30

We should know a trajectory at this point. Does it look like it's barreling down on any particular location in the caravan?

SPEAKER_04 53:36

Oh, it's coming towards the front of the caravan. Okay. Think of it this way. You've been in heavily wooded forests. Coniferous forests. Right. This is the only obvious open path through said coniferous forest. The moose was in a kind of a boggy area. Okay. And it was shot by surprise from the woods. It bolted. This was an open path. It's following it. It's taking the path of least resistance. Right. So what we're saying is this is all Stigger's fault. Yes.

SPEAKER_03 54:05

Yeah, that would be safe. Stigger. Can't wait until the moose just ambles along.

SPEAKER_04 54:10

No, can just let it go.

SPEAKER_05 54:12

It hasn't reached the first wagon yet.

SPEAKER_04 54:14

No, it has not. No, I'm in its way.

SPEAKER_05 54:16

I'm staying where I am.

SPEAKER_04 54:17

Okay. It has to go through me first.

SPEAKER_05 54:20

Serial? I'm preparing to heal you.

SPEAKER_04 54:23

I'm going to pop up and try to look around what all the noise is. Okay, so you towards the front. You were on the seat at the front of the wagon. Do I see the moose? Not really over the wagons in front of you. Which wagon were you in? I don't know. I roll a D8. I don't have a D8. Presumably not the front one. That's a 12. Yeah, I'm on the third wagon. Okay. Well, you can't be on the third wagon. That's the special wagon. Oh, next to the third wagon. Oh, the fifth wall. The fifth wagon is the special wagon. You're riding with Astrid. There are no remember your caravan guard's names. No, there are. You will be quizzed later. Like when the player makes up his own NPCs. You get an extra chocolate coin if you get them right.

SPEAKER_01 55:05

Yeah, where's my coin for making up NPCs? All right. Stack a lot.

SPEAKER_04 55:10

So you're just looking around. I'm going to start moving towards the front where all the noise is. So you're hopping down off the wagon? Yep. Okay. And moving towards the front of the caravan. Yes. So you'll be able to get up to the second wagon on your little stubby legs. Going underneath the wagons. I guess that's true. You wouldn't need, yeah. Underneath the wagons is probably the safest place right now. So then back to Hjalmar, you are standing in front of the main wagon, feet planted, facing a charging bull moose with an arrow sticking out of its side. What is your intention?

SPEAKER_03 55:46

You need to work out the concept of an inertia. I do. I have that all figured out.

SPEAKER_04 55:52

Alright. How far away is the charging behemoth at this point? At this point, it is probably about 25 yards. Okay, so I am going to use my action to increase my AC to 20, making a shield wall and standing in front of it. So you're just setting yourself, getting behind the shield, racing for impact. Waiting for the moose. It doesn't say I have to have a interesting choice. No, I think that's an innate ability in the Seawolf class.

SPEAKER_00 56:25

Yep.

SPEAKER_04 56:26

Okay. So the shield wall of one planted in front of the wagon train, waiting for the moose to charge. So Hjilmar hides behind his shield in hopes that it will save him from the charging moose. So Oh my god. I mean, is the moose gonna run him over? Because I can't wait to see that. Back to Drek. You're in the tree. Okay. You've snapped your bowstring. The moose is roughly parallel to you, moving towards the caravan. So it's so it's running right by me. Ride him. It's 10 or 15 feet away. Alright. I want to do close enough you might be able to smell it. Yeah. I'm gonna I'm gonna attempt to do a run by slash. So you're gonna charge the moose. It's running by me. I'm going to I'm doing a doing a drive-by, right?

SPEAKER_01 57:16

The moose is running like this. See, this is me with the moose running, right? And I'm holding a run.

SPEAKER_04 57:24

And a leatherman tool. And the leatherman is me with the stabby bits. And I'm gonna it's running by and I'm gonna stab it as it runs by. There's no way it could stop and attack me because it's running full speed towards Krawmar's shield wall. You're gonna slash a moose on the ass. Do it on the side.

SPEAKER_01 57:42

Slash a moose.

SPEAKER_04 57:43

I'm hamstringing the moose. Yeah, all right. I get it. A 16. That'll hit. This will do d6 damage. Is this uh am I a known quantity by the moose at this point? Yeah, it can see you. Five points of damage. Alright. Are you using a sword? Yeah. Okay. Short sword cuts a bloody slash down the side of the moose. And I don't stop. I am running by. To go in in front or behind of the moose. I know what you're saying. I know what you're gonna do if I go behind the moose. It's gonna kick me while it's running full speed, which is absolutely impossible. So I'm gonna run behind it because I've already made my argument against it.

SPEAKER_03 58:21

This is fantasy, man. Everything's possible. It's a little fucking tense in here. Sweating.

SPEAKER_04 58:27

I wasn't supposed to be the guy fighting the moose, okay?

SPEAKER_03 58:30

I'm trying, but everybody, you can hide by the tree, man.

SPEAKER_04 58:33

I mean, you were literally hiding in a tree. It was running by the tree.

SPEAKER_03 58:37

He absorbs the moose. That's his job.

SPEAKER_04 58:40

Technically, it's my job. The moose can't stop on a die. You can pick up a slack when I die here. The moose can't stop on a coin. So it would appear between your slash and the arrow in its side that the moose may actually be bloodied. Oh, yeah. It's got a blood trail. There is now easy to track. There's now a fairly discernible blood trail. I'm gonna have one here in a second, too. You ready, Clem? Well, warp. Thrall, I believe you were hiding behind a wagon. Yes. Alright, you remain hiding behind the wagon. I think I might be doing this. Fair enough. For those of you at home, he just cringed in a rather like a bitch.

SPEAKER_03 59:29

An anticipatory cringe, because I'm about to watch something that I it's gonna be ugly. It's gonna be a train wreck here in about two seconds.

SPEAKER_04 59:37

Ooh, I don't want to watch this, but I can't not watch this. That's accurate.

SPEAKER_05 59:44

Glam. I am still waiting for the moose to get to my underneath.

SPEAKER_04 59:50

All right.

SPEAKER_05 59:51

Cereal.

SPEAKER_04 59:52

I'm still heading towards the front of a caravan underneath another wagon. So you're just walking under the wagons towards the front of the caravan at this point. Hustling at a new movement. You are now at the front of the caravan. You have the choice of going like under the horses or around. What are you doing? I run right between them. If you're going between the horses, are you getting in front of him? No. You'd be behind him to try to cast. So you're getting ready to catch the seawolf. He's gonna cushion the cast.

SPEAKER_05 1:00:29

He crawls into the backpack.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:31

He's got them inflatable things that they throw over to the side before they crash into the city. What are you preparing to cast?

SPEAKER_04 1:00:36

I'm using the hand swing as. Okay. So I would say you can probably move and cast this turn if you want.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:43

Sure.

SPEAKER_04 1:00:43

Do it. Let's do it. If not, I'll just throw you at it. So what are you casting? Magic missile. All right. Get an advantage on that roll. He's a wizard. What is he going to cast? You roll to cast.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:55

It's going to fail.

SPEAKER_04 1:00:56

19. Oh, 19.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:58

That will succeed. 21, 22, 23.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:01

It's successful.

SPEAKER_04 1:01:02

Yeah. You cast the spell.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:04

Do your 1d4 versus 2.

SPEAKER_04 1:01:07

Alright. The magic missile hits the moose's chest as it's charging towards you. Seems to do a little damage. Doesn't break stride. No, it's still. That freight train is still coming.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:21

Am I aiming an antler?

SPEAKER_00 1:01:22

That way the weight suddenly drops off and it veers off to the left.

SPEAKER_04 1:01:26

No, sorry.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:28

That's a great idea.

SPEAKER_04 1:01:29

Kalmar. Yes. What are you doing? I am brace for shock. Okay. It's happening. The moose will be here.

SPEAKER_05 1:01:39

It's coming.

SPEAKER_04 1:01:40

Next turn. It's happening.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:41

It's happening. Are you giving him an attack? Well, you're still doing your uh armor class 20 thing.

SPEAKER_04 1:01:47

He's in yoga pose right now. Downward facing dog.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:51

He's inward dog.

SPEAKER_04 1:01:53

He's sexy seawolf pose. I don't even want to fucking go there.

SPEAKER_05 1:01:59

Standing on one foot, hands in the air.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:01

He's voging seawolf style. And see. And you're uh think Jason Momoa is Aquaman. Are you?

SPEAKER_05 1:02:08

No, I can't say that.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:09

Oh my god.

SPEAKER_04 1:02:10

I'm taunting the moose. Oh my god. I'm gonna headbutt that fucker if he comes close. You're gonna get one more action before. Has the moose part past you? Right. Alright, so I my only action would be to string my bow, so I can't really do that. So I'm gonna I'm gonna sheath my sword and attempt to string my bow in case old Halmar there gets trampled. Okay. Because I'm not gonna catch a running moose. So it looks like it's angling to go past the wagon. Okay. Is it gonna go after is it going right for Halmar? There is uh an intersection there, yeah. Good.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:45

Alright, no, that's fine.

SPEAKER_04 1:02:46

I'm assuming that he's going to stop it. So wow.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:50

Everything I've seen by talking to this man has led me to believe that there's no way a moose could run over him.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:55

Kilmar is punt blocking.

SPEAKER_04 1:02:57

Yeah, I mean, linebacker versus moose, I'm always going with the moose, buddy. Yeah. Yeah, well. Yeah, I'm going with the human intelligence of Gilmar. That moose is probably smarter than me. Alright, so we'll just run through this. Thrall, are you doing anything or are you just holding position? Yeah, I'm waiting for impact. Right. If only you wait really had a crossbow. Waiting for a riding crossbow. Shoot again. You can try to get off one more spell. It is right there. And Yomar is there. You're behind him. You're wondering if you don't take it down and Yalmar crumbles, what's going to happen to you? He hasn't fought that. He's under a wagon. No, he's not. Two more.

SPEAKER_05 1:03:42

Good job. Okay. Phew!

SPEAKER_04 1:03:44

I'd be sitting in I'd be sitting cross leg under that thing. Cat spells. It maybe stumbles a little bit when that hits it, but it's still coming. Well, now. This is the defining moment then. This is it. What happens? The moose arrives at Hilmar. Let's see if it hits it. The moose misses.

unknown 1:04:07

Woo!

SPEAKER_04 1:04:08

I prefer to, in my mind, that was like it ran into me and bounced off. Or you bounced away without getting damaged. No, I'm still standing. You're still standing. He stumbled a little bit. You sighed. But you didn't move an inch. And I didn't move an inch. It was like when Conan punched a camel. This is very similar. That's beautiful. I like that. It's more like very much flipped. The moose was coming in and cheating to the left to go around the wagon train. So what I'm hearing here is the moose and Hiromar played a game of chicken and Horalmar won.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:42

Yes, the moose.

SPEAKER_04 1:04:42

The moose stand in exactly the same spot. Right.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:45

There was an exchange of antler versus shield as it skirted by him to the left. I was thinking that game of chicken was going to end on a tie.

SPEAKER_05 1:04:54

They both come to a complete.

SPEAKER_04 1:04:56

It was a the moose got to him, said, get the fuck out of my way with its antlers, and missed in its attempt and has now moved past him. So it is now parallel to the first wagon on the left-hand side. Oh. Well, that's good. You can't attack from that, right? I use my action to do that. Right. Okay. Is my bow strung? Do you have a spare bowstring? Look, man, Shadow Dark does not say a goddamn thing about bowstrings. You don't buy bowstrings. You buy a bow. It's assumed you probably have better bowls. I'm going to have a second bow. Let's say or is it in the wagon? If I have my bow, I would have extra bowstrings. It's all part of my bowman's pack. Yeah, you can do that. Shadow Dr. Right.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:43

I'm going to say I have D3 bowstrings. The bow extra pack.

SPEAKER_04 1:05:47

I have three extras. Okay. So you can continue to break them until I am out.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:53

And then we want. If you break them, you broke them. No, you said it broke. I rolled a one. You broke the string.

SPEAKER_05 1:05:58

You have to say you have two strings.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:01

I have two strings left. So was I able to string it quickly?

SPEAKER_04 1:06:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:05

Okay. So then I will attempt. You've done this before. Yeah. They break all the time. So I will attempt another bow shot at the back of the moose.

SPEAKER_04 1:06:15

Roll to hit. Alright. 17. That'll hit. Alright. Alright. Do I use the wrong shape D3 or the pointy D3? I'm going to go with the pointy D3. Does Shadow Dark's sneak attack include if they are engaged in melee with someone else? I don't think so. I think it does. Three points of arrow damage. It just says it has to not be aware of my attack, which I'm directly behind it, so I can imagine how it would be aware, but also it's not very well defined.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:45

So either this I could be doing three dice of D4 damage or not, because we haven't defined. I don't think mooses can see behind it.

SPEAKER_04 1:06:52

We'll do this old school. One, two, three, it is aware of your attack. It is aware of your attack.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:57

Alright, that's fine. So I do three points of damage to it.

SPEAKER_04 1:07:00

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:00

I shoot it right in the ass.

SPEAKER_04 1:07:02

Moving on. It is continuing to move down the left side of the convoy. Alright. You guys could help anytime. Yeah, get your asses out from under the wagon. Serial and I doing all the work here.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:13

If you're passing by the second wagon, which is where I am, I will whip out my hand axe and chuck it.

SPEAKER_04 1:07:21

Are you gonna throw it? I am nine. Oh god. This is gonna be bad. Yeah. But not if you roll a natural 20. That will be a nine. That's a little bit that did not hit. That's a disappointing number. Hand axe flies out from the second wagon off into the woods.

SPEAKER_05 1:07:39

We'll find that later.

SPEAKER_04 1:07:40

Yeah. That's findable.

SPEAKER_05 1:07:42

The moose antler just knocks it aside.

SPEAKER_04 1:07:45

Glem? He parries. In the what fourth wagon, I believe we said. Yes, where is the moose? Still not at me?

SPEAKER_05 1:07:50

It is a it's heading, it's very close. You can move to it. You can heal it. If you want to attack it. I do. I want to get out from another wagon and take it to legs out.

SPEAKER_04 1:08:00

Okay.

SPEAKER_05 1:08:01

Do you? I do.

SPEAKER_04 1:08:02

Do you want to do that? Yes. I do. Did I mention that sign, pink em notch? He already declared. Do it. Roll to hit.

SPEAKER_05 1:08:11

Fifteen. That'll hit.

SPEAKER_04 1:08:13

Nice.

SPEAKER_05 1:08:13

And what does my sword do? I can't remember.

SPEAKER_04 1:08:15

D8 plus strength. Alright. Are we doing strength? No, no strength.

SPEAKER_05 1:08:19

No strength anyway. Five.

unknown 1:08:21

Nice.

SPEAKER_04 1:08:22

Alright, so you step out from the wagon, and you attempt to take its legs out. Swing. And do the moose crashes to the ground and slides probably a solid 15-20 feet through the snow and mud. Comes to rest.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:39

That is exactly what the god of nature would have wanted you to do.

SPEAKER_04 1:08:42

It comes to rest next to the fifth wagon. Eating well, boys. No nature. It is bleeding. Moose meat. Looks like meat's back on the menu, boys. So you see Stigier is jogging down the path at this point back towards the caravan. I go meet up with Stigier.

SPEAKER_05 1:08:57

I would have left the moose alone, but everyone had already heard it, so I had to take it out of his put it out of his misery.

SPEAKER_03 1:09:03

Why didn't you heal it? Stigier obviously didn't have any plan beyond releasing the bowstring. That's why I'm going to talk about it.

SPEAKER_05 1:09:14

I want to redo my turn and heal the moose.

SPEAKER_04 1:09:18

I mean, now that it's down, you could do that. I don't think it's coming back.

SPEAKER_05 1:09:22

I think it's dead.

SPEAKER_04 1:09:24

What the hell were you thinking, Stigir? It's bleeding. That was a kill shot. No, it wasn't. You severed legs. Way to go, druid. Bled out pretty quickly. The hell, man. You want to have a moose hunt?

SPEAKER_01 1:09:37

Let's get coordinated and we'll do a moose hunt. None of this shoot the moose and it charges the caravan. What the hell are you thinking? You ever seen a moose before? I have. Well then you should have known better. I've never seen one and I already know better. Lucky for our shield wall.

SPEAKER_05 1:09:54

Am I mad? No, I don't get mad. Why was no one else but us helping? Where was it?

SPEAKER_03 1:10:00

Because they're all drivers. We're the guards. There's all the drivers. I thought there were other guards.

SPEAKER_05 1:10:04

Oh, okay. I thought there were other guards but us. So did I. Just us. Are there? Mercenary. Someone else was there. No. No, just us. Okay.

SPEAKER_04 1:10:12

There's Stigir. There's Halvard.

SPEAKER_05 1:10:14

The words heavily guarded were used.

SPEAKER_04 1:10:16

They were, and I think heavily was us. It's us. We're heavy. To be fair.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:21

We are pretty the meat heavily armed.

SPEAKER_04 1:10:23

There's at least one armed guy per wagon. What do you want? But they're not gonna attack a moose.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:29

Well, I guess we'll uh I guess we'll butcher this son of a bitch.

SPEAKER_04 1:10:32

I want to nice job, Raw Mark. I want to uh take its horns and make a helmet.

SPEAKER_03 1:10:37

Do we have time? I'm gonna jog at butcher a moose.

SPEAKER_04 1:10:42

I want a moose horn helmet. It's pretty early in the day. Put him on his head. Halvard doesn't want to stop for the day here, but he will certainly stop long enough to put the ball.

SPEAKER_03 1:10:51

Yeah, we're not gonna leave him. I'm gonna jug over and get my hand axe.

SPEAKER_05 1:10:54

Is it is there a butcher wagon we can put the moose in?

SPEAKER_04 1:10:58

There are wagons that the moot meat can be. I have a great axe. There are empty barrels from the provisions that have been consumed to this point. We're not putting raw meat in a barrel.

SPEAKER_05 1:11:10

You can salt it. You mean no?

SPEAKER_04 1:11:17

I'm listening I'm listening to Thrall. He's right. We quarter the moose, we throw the sacks of meat in the back in its own skin.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:24

Tonight, we'll eat well. Tomorrow we'll eat well. The meat is not going to spoil next weather. We'll eat well. Right.

SPEAKER_03 1:11:31

And by the time the entire village of Ramiro's West is going to eat well. My thoughts exactly.

SPEAKER_04 1:11:38

On moose. So the afternoon goes by, you spend the day butchering the moose, packing it up. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:11:46

I believe the slayer of the moose should eat the kidneys. No, the liver. The heart. That's the heart.

SPEAKER_00 1:11:52

All the internal organs. Let's do it the right way.

SPEAKER_04 1:11:57

You killed it, you drink the blood. That's how you do it. You have to take the magic of the animal into the blood. That would be Nordic, yes. Are you a seawolf? Yulp. I am not. Yeah, me either. He's a druid. Yelp. No, he's not. Are you druid?

SPEAKER_05 1:12:10

He likes to call me a druid. I don't know why.

SPEAKER_04 1:12:13

Alright, so you have some moose horns and we're never gonna run out of meat this way, boys. Meat's definitely back on the menu. Anything in particular anybody wants to do before the caravan gets back on the road. I'm assuming my arrow is lost in the moose crash. No, you're able to retrieve whatever. If you just want to roll a one to three. I pre-rolled and I did save my arrow until the moose crashed to the ground. I assumed then my arrow got destroyed. No, I'm fine with that. Just one to three, it does. Alright, I already rolled it.

SPEAKER_05 1:12:49

I want to walk into the mysterious wagon as if I belong there. It's locked. I guess I don't belong here. I have no skills. Do we already have Australia? Oh, so we only had a thief. That's knock.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:03

Okay, I know. So about mid-afternoon, you get back on the road. The thief and the clerk took care of it. Not wise to uh camp near a kill site. No. No. So you get back on the road.

SPEAKER_03 1:13:15

We're gonna hang the moose up on a tree. To bleed it.

SPEAKER_05 1:13:19

I just feel that this is an awful lot of work for a moose. It's a whole heavy man wasted on it. I know, but it's not a magical creature. It's not a dragon.

SPEAKER_03 1:13:28

You teased us with dragons and listen to the podcast. Trolls. But when Sean is a player and a monster dies, you eat it. Immediately gets butchered, and then there's talk of what meals are going to be made out of it. Yeah. So this is the GM inserting into the adventure the things that he loves as a player. Eating moose.

SPEAKER_00 1:13:48

Some liver or eating moose.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:50

To be fair, moose is probably pretty tasty. I have had it. It's good. It will not allow you to survive on it. Moose roast is the font. One cannot live on moose alone. Nope. Gotta cook it like a pot roast, though. How about mead? Moose and mead. It's very lean. Yes. That's gonna be the end name when we all retire from open the moose and mead in. That's it. In mirror. Or the GM has this random encounter table that he made. Rolled moose and moose is one of the options. We rolled moose. Hold on. You rolled a random encounter. And we got a moose. Oh, hold on. No? No? Okay.

SPEAKER_03 1:14:26

We're gonna examine this man.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:28

A random encounter for a moose and then had his NPC go and incite it, right? He didn't give us an opportunity to avoid the moose.

SPEAKER_04 1:14:38

No. He had his NPC go in there and the moose is charging us. That's a railroad moose. Right. I would just like to point out the stageer is gonna lose fair. It gave privileges towards you. You could have just allowed the moose to run by the caravan.

SPEAKER_03 1:14:53

That's come on. That's where Thrall was in this whole thing.

SPEAKER_04 1:14:57

What are the odds of that happening with this group? What are you letting it run by the caravan? Zero. Zero small. But anyway, A D D group. That was always an option. Any RPG group attacks the moose. There's not a single one that lets it go by. It attacked us. Oh, the NPC attacked it first.

SPEAKER_03 1:15:18

That moose frickin' had it coming.

SPEAKER_04 1:15:20

He did.

SPEAKER_03 1:15:20

Yeah. Dick.

SPEAKER_04 1:15:21

Yeah, if you weren't standing in the way, it would have gone after the horses, or the horses would have bolted or something. I heard that moose say, Your mom. We could have harnessed that moose. My father road killed by a moose. Could have got us to Miro's rest in the next week. Could you imagine a big Viking riding a moose? This is I heard about an elf who did that. An elf? Don't worry. An elf king. We need to find another moose. No giants, not moose. Not a moose. That's gonna happen now. Okay. But I guess we'll find out on the next episode of Retro Rollcast. This has been a Retro Rollcast production.