#So she starts taking barbarian classes and acting like they already are friends

[sleeperagentclone]

Anyway, can't stop think about Fig and Gorgug being childhood friends

[mythiccheroacademia]

—lunch box

A/N: just another cute idea i had because i’m obsessed with barbarian/dragon king!bakugo and fantasy shit in general. some context: you and bakugo are betrothed—although, sometimes you wish you weren’t bc he can be a real asshole. luckily for you, he’s willing to work on it bc he likes loves you just that much. a litte angst (it wouldn’t be a mtha story without it) but it ends in fluff <3

Warnings: cursing

Your friends looked at their food with heart eyes and dug into the neatly wrapped box with fever.

“Ahh! Thank you for making this, Y/N!” one of them exclaimed. The other could only nod in agreement, too into your cooking to speak.

You smiled and waved them off. “It was nothing. Consider it a thank you for letting me copy the homework last night,” you chuckled.

“Did you cook one for Prince Bakugo? I’d imagine he’d love it! If there’s anyone’s cooking he loves more than his own, it’s yours!”

At the mention of his name, your expression fell. You looked down at the case of food you had prepared for him as an apology.

Four days ago, you two were hanging around his residence. You managed to get him to dance around with you. Well, it more like you were dancing and he was doing his best not to combust in embarrassment. Katsuki warned you that you shouldn’t be too reckless otherwise you’d break something.

Of course, you paid him no mind, too enthralled with your fun to notice your proximity to a nearby statue—one of the Bakugo family’s treasures.

One thing led to another, and you knocked it over, shattering it before either of you could even react. Your rich skin lost its glow and your boyfriend cursed something nasty.

Least to say, his parents were not happy. But instead of being rightfully scolded, Bakugo had taken the blame for it.

They found him attempting to clean it up and assumed it was his fault. You wanted to correct them, but he threw you a nasty glare, sealing your mouth shut. He was now under punishment until they deemed fit and from then on, he hadn't spoken a friendly word to you.

A little sigh escaped your lips. Your two friends looked at each other before offering you encouraging smiles.

“Hey,” one spoke, placing a hand on your knee. You met her gaze. “You should go give it to him. He’d love it.”

There was a moment of silence before you decided to act. Taking the spur of confidence, you stood up and briskly made your way to the other classroom. Just before you entered, you heard his voice and felt your heart waver with anxiousness.

However, now wasn’t the time to let doubt consume you. Things wouldn’t get better until something was done.

You took a deep breath, calming your nerves, before opening the door and walking in. Your eyes scanned the room and found the young dragon prince amongst his group of friends.

Jaw set, you walked over to them, hands firmly around the packaged food.

Kirishima saw you first and gave you a friendly wave.

“Hey Princess L/N!”

“Hi boys! How’re ya doing?” you politely asked, putting on your best smile.

They gave you an upbeat answer that lifted your spirits.

Despite that, you hadn't heard a response from Bakugo. In fact, he hadn't even looked at you—but you wouldn’t be disheartened. You fueled herself with faux confidence and held out the dish to your betrothed.

“I-I made you something small yesterday, as an apology,” you stuttered.

Katsuki finally looked up, indifference in his stare. Ruby eyes flickered down to the box filled with rice, chicken, vegetables, and a small pastry on the side. His favorite kind. For a moment, he seemed like considered your offer, but you suffered the low blow of humiliation when he turned away to look through the window.

“Thanks, but I’ve already eaten. Should’ve given it to me earlier.”

Something in your stomach fell. Crushing rejection blossomed up your throat with each passing second. His words were cold, harsh, and unforgiving. It might’ve been stupid, overdramatic even, but it hurt.

Heartbroken wasn’t even the word.

Your nose burned, eyes blurring before you could stop it. Your chest tightened with embarrassment. Luckily, you mustered enough strength to hold in whatever was threatening to crumble you.

“Oh,” you dumbly responded.

“I’ll take it!” Kaminari excitedly said.

“No, I will! I’m still starving!” Kirishima chided.

You placed the box down, struggling to keep up your act.

“Split it between the both of you. I hope it’s good!” You internally winced over how high your voice had become. “I’m gonna to get going now. I’ll see you guys after school, yeah?”

And before anything else was said, you bolted straight out of the room. You hadn’t bothered to look at Katsuki. Knowing him, he probably hadn't noticed the strain in your voice.

As soon as you were out of sight, the tears flooded. You held your hands against your mouth, desperate to muffle your cries. You quickly took you into the nearest bathroom and you prayed no one had seen you lest there be questions. If you went to your friends, it’d cause a commotion. Your parents would eventually find out and you didn’t want any more problems.

So, you cried your eyes raw and eventually willed yourself to stop when it was time to return to class.

…

The week had gone by without another interaction. The weekend brought you some relief since you wouldn’t be forced to see Katsuki’s face for the time being. Or so you thought.

All you wanted to do was run some errands for your parents and then go back home and continue sulking. Yet the universe would not let you rest.

The moment you caught Bakugo’s eyes, you pivoted on your heel and booked it the other way. You assumed his anger with you would force him to keep his distance.

But you were thoroughly surprised to find he was following after you.

“Y/N,” he called.

Irritation and hurt filled your chest. You only walked faster, clutching the purse against her chest.

“Y/N, stop,” he demanded to which you promptly ignored.

This went on for a good thirty seconds until Bakugo decided he had enough. Without much noise, he ran up to you, grabbing you by the shoulder.

You weren’t having it.

You harshly shrugged off his hand. “Don’t touch me,” you snapped, keeping your eyes forward.

“I need to talk to you,” Katsuki grumbled.

“Well I don’t want to talk to you. So maybe some other time.”

Truthfully, the crowned prince found himself shocked at your coldness. Despite your innate boldness, he wasn’t used to such an icy tone. Especially directed at him.

His father warned him to never attack in these situations, but Bakugo let his temper get the best of him. His first reaction was to frown and deal back harsher words.

“What’s your fucking problem, dumbass? When I say stop, stop!”

A spike of anger flooded your veins. You whirled around on your heel and glared at him with frosty eyes. You felt compelled to drop your papers and slap him, but instead, you settled for a finger in his face.

“First of all, I’m not some dog you can just order around, you jerk! And just because we’re betrothed doesn’t mean I’m some girl you can treat like dirt whenever you feel like it! Until you apologize, leave me alone because my only problem right now is you. Bye.”

And just as quickly as you came, you turned to leave.

Now Bakugo was actually stunned. Forget, cold, this was a side of you he hadn't ever experienced. Admittedly, he hadn’t been spoken to like that from anyone besides his mother—and she only got away with it because she was not only the queen…but he was his mom.

Katsuki honestly didn’t know how to handle it. It was only then that he concentrated back on his father’s advice. Whenever his mother was upset with his dad, his father would fight back, but never with emotional anger. Always with humbleness and an understanding tongue.

It usually did the trick considering his mother could never stay upset with him for more than a night. It always struck the teen with hidden awe. Sometimes, Katsuki thought his dad was an angel.

Bakugo was no angel, but he hoped it’d have the same affect on you.

The blonde teen softened his face and walked up behind you. He stopped you, wrapping his arms around your waist to lie his forehead against the decorated braids the fell down your back.

“Damn it. I’m sorry okay?” he lowly said, face burning from such a public display of affection. “Just hear me out.”

You didn’t speak and he clenched his jaw.

“Please.”

You inwardly cursed your rapidly beating heart. If it weren’t for how stupidly nice being in his arms was (he was definitely working out more), and the fact that you found him kinda cute begging for your permission, maybe you wouldn’t have caved in so easily.

For now, you’d blame it on the fact that you two were destined to wed. It was better to start dealing with fights now so, hopefully, the future held less of them.

You heaved a sigh, unwillingly ignoring your body’s urge to curl in his arms. Instead, you pulled away and turned to face him. You peered into unsure crimson eyes with as much harshness you could conjure.

“Fine. Speak,” you permitted.

There was a small pause as he gathered his thoughts. When he opened his mouth, you instantly regretted it.

“I’m still mad at you for being dumb and breaking one of family’s treasures. And I’m still fucking pissed that my old hag is on my ass about it,” he started and noticed how your eyes narrowed in contempt.

You were about to turn away, thinking this was a waste of time. However, Bakugo took a hold of your wrist before you could leave.

“Leave me alone! If you didn’t want to get in trouble, you should’ve just let me take the blame. I can't believe I thought you’d apologize—“

“Let me finish, princess.”

It was your title, yet you felt your stomach flip when it came from his lips. You refused to let it influence you…but you’d give him another chance.

Bakugo stepped closer to you. “I’m upset, but I took the punishment because I wanted to. You didn’t mean to break it. Accidents happen, I understand that.”

There was a pregnant pause. Then, you softened your gaze a bit, eyes still lit with inquiry. “Why? Why would you do that if it meant getting in trouble? I could’ve taken the blame just fine.”

“Y/N, you freak the fuck out whenever you don’t get a perfect score on an exam. You try not to mess up and when you do, it’s like the world is ending,” he explained with a teasing smirk. You ungracefully snorted. He had a point. “When you broke the vase, I could hear your heart drop. You were two seconds away from crying. And when I saw how scared you looked I just—I don’t know.”

The look on your face was something between shock, surprise, and wonder. You blinked, thick lips parting slightly in awe.

“Katsuki…” you breathed to which the boy heavily blushed. Realizing how sappy he sounded, his mind screamed at him to cut it out.

Bakugo looked down and noticed he was still holding your wrist. He quickly let go and instinctively rubbed the nape of his neck.

“D-don’t be dramatic. I just didn’t wanna see you moping around or some shit. My father said that it wasn’t that important anyway…the vase I mean,” he mumbled.

Sure it wasn’t, you thought. What were you gonna do with this boy?

You supposed an apology was a good start.

“That was very nice and admirable of you Katsuki. Thank you,” you eventually said. “I’m still really sorry about the vase, and for being mean to you just now.”

He shook his head. “I know, but I’m the one that should be apologizing. I ain’t hafta treat you the way I did. I was being an ass for not accepting the food you made for me earlier.”

“Yeah you were, ya bastard.”

He chuckled at that. “The two idiots wouldn’t stop raving over how good it was.”

“Well, I had the best teacher in the kingdom,” you grinned.

“And I had an even better student,” he winked.

Your smile widened. Maybe marrying him wouldn’t be so bad.

You couldn’t help yourself when you heartily embraced him, enjoying how his arms slowly slithered around the small of your back. Your eyes met and you kissed him on the lips, leaving him with a little gasp. You pulled away and giggled under your breath.

“You know, you're a sweet guy underneath all that false bravado.”

“False brav—what the hell are you going on about!?”

Ignoring his explosive behavior, you readjusted the straps on your shoulder before turning on your heel.

“Don’t bring anything for lunch on Monday, okay? I’ll see you later, blondie.”

Despite his little tantrum, Bakugo still watched you disappear into the store with a gentle expression. You gave him more headaches than he cared for, but you were worth it. Besides, he was sure you could say the same for him.

Bakugo turned to leave and passed his fingertips over where your lips touched his own.

He’d never admit to the giddiness in his chest. He’d take that shit to the grave.

[sodasback]

Grow Up - Part 6

JJ Maybank x Cassie Routledge x Rafe Cameron

JJ Maybank Sublist

Warnings: FICTIONAL character age gap; Cassie’s 21, JJ’s 18

Over the next couple weeks, Cassie and Rafe saw a lot of each other unbeknownst to all of the pogues. 

JJ still flirted with Cassie as usual, but now Cassie felt extremely guilty about it. She loved JJ and thought maybe he might be the one for her. But she felt like she was taking advantage of him and that he was too young and vulnerable. She also was really falling for Rafe now too. JJ kept trying to get Cassie alone to talk to her about the kiss they shared and to tell her seriously how he felt about her, but she kept making excuses to avoid having a serious discussion with him.

One night, Rafe had taken Cassie out to dinner and they had a great time. Rafe even agreed to come back to the chateau with Cassie, so they could watch the sunset on the marsh from the dock. Cassie knew the pogues had plans to go on a night time adventure out on the water and she was relieved to see The HMS Pogue not in the water behind their house.

So Rafe and Cassie sat side by side on the dock, looking out at the sunset. Fireflies started to buzz around and the humidity was starting to fade away. Cassie leaned her head on Rafe’s shoulder and they held hands in her lap. 

“This is perfect.” Cassie said blissfully. 

“You make everything perfect.” Rafe commented and Cassie turned to look up at him. He smiled softly at her. “I really like spending time with you Cassie. And I don’t want to stop.” 

“Who said we have to?” Cassie asked. 

“Well, I’ve been meaning to ask you... why’d you come back home Cass? ...Don’t get me wrong, I’m really happy you did because I got a chance to shoot my shot with you but I heard you had accepted a spot in the Peace Corps?” Rafe asked. When Cassie gave him a questioning look about how he knew that. He smiled and let out a small breathy laugh. “I’m actually going too. I saw your name on the list, the villages we were going to are right next to each other.”

“You’re doing the Peace Corps? Wow, you really have changed Rafe Cameron.” Cassie asked, pleasantly surprised. 

“Yeah, I’m going in August. But weren’t you supposed to already be over there by now?”

“Yeah but my dad died.  ...John B. needed me.” You said softly, looking out at the marsh.

“He’s 18 Cass” Rafe said simply.

“Just because you turn 18 doesn’t mean you’re an adult.” Cassie said.

“You’re right. But it seems like John B. is doing okay. Hasn’t it been like a year since your dad? I mean he’s got a good job. You said he’s got classes at the community college lined up. He has the Heyward’s and my sister and Kie and Maybank. Like he has a support system. And I bet you a million bucks, if he knew your turned down the Peace Corps to come back, he’d tell you to go in a heartbeat.”

Rafe was making some good points. Cassie had definitely underestimated Rafe Cameron’s newly evolved emotional intelligence.

“I see those gears turning in the pretty head of yours. You know I’m right.” Rafe said in a teasing tone, bumping into her shoulder. Cassie broke into a smile.

“Come on, say I’m right.” He teased reaching an arm around her waist and lightly tickling her.

“No way!” Cassie exclaimed as he tickled her more, causing her to stand up and squirm in his grasp.”

“Say I’m right or I’m gonna throw you in the water!” Rafe threatened as he picked her up. 

“Never!” Cassie squealed.

Meanwhile, at the front of the chateau, JJ had pulled up on his motorcycle, he had lost track of time and wasn’t sure if the Pogues had left without him or not.  As he got off the bike, much to his confusion, he saw Rafe Cameron’s shiny lifted truck parked on the street.

“What the fuck?” JJ muttered to himself and then heard Cassie scream.

JJ quickly ran around to the back of the house where he saw Rafe with his arms around Cassie, lifting her off the ground. But he quickly realized Cassie wasn’t in distress and that she was actually ….laughing?

“What the fuck is he doing here?!” JJ yelled angrily as he approached them.

Rafe and Cassie both quickly stopped laughing turned to look at the hot tempered blonde teen storming up to them.

Cassie cleared her throat and instantly felt guilty before then feeling justified.

“Relax JJ, Rafe and I were just hanging out.” Cassie said with a slight eye roll, completely over the beef JJ and Rafe still had.

“You guys were just hanging out?” JJ asked incredulously.

“I took Cass on a date actually.” Rafe said.

Cassie bristled a little at this knowing Rafe partially said that to rile JJ up even more.

“Cass? He’s calling you Cass now? And you’re fucking dating?”

“We’ve been seeing each other, yes.” Cassie confirmed with an exasperated sigh, knowing this was only going to make JJ spiral.

“Are you fucking kidding me?! Did you forget about the party?! And I don’t know, maybe every horrible thing this prick has done to me and John B and Pope?”

Rafe instantly stood up straighter and Cassie recognized all too well the barbarian posturing 2 young guys do when they’re about to fight.

“The party? You mean when you guys kissed for like 2 frickin seconds and then she got up and left?” Rafe asked. He was more exasperated by the drama JJ was creating more than he was trying to goad him.

“You told him that? Wow Cassie.”

“No, JJ. Rafe saw from the balcony. You guys need to calm down.”

“Yeah, Maybank, relax.”

“Don’t fucking tell me what to do” JJ said as he shoved Rafe’s chest.

Rafe instantly shoved him back as his old temper got the better of him.

Cassie stepped between the 2 quickly.

“Hey! Stop!” And then she turned to Rafe, “Hey” she said softer and Rafe looked down at her, his expression softening. “I think you should go, okay?” Cassie told him gently. Rafe took a deep breath and then nodded.

“Call me later?” He asked quietly.

Cassie nodded and Rafe squeezed her hand before glancing at JJ and turning to leave. JJ scoffed. 

“This is a fucking joke right?!” JJ asked his brow tightly furrowed and his jaw clenched. 

“JJ-” Cassie sighed. 

“Did you hit your head or some shit?! Rafe Cameron? Really?!”  

“Why are you being like this JJ?”

JJ scoffed, “Don’t act like you don’t know Cassie. Playing dumb isn’t a cute look on you.”

Cassie just looked at him, waiting for him to explain even though she knew.

“You know I’ve been in love with you since I was a kid.” JJ admitted angrily. 

“You’re not in love with me JJ.” She sighed.

“Oh, I’m not?” JJ asked indignantly, folding his arms over his chest. “Please tell me how I feel Cassandra.”

Cassie paused, glaring at him for using her full name. She didn’t think JJ or even John B has ever actually called her that. But she moved past it. 

“You’re not in love with me JJ. You’ve just known me forever. And I’m like fucking ...forbidden fruit or some shit for you. I’m your best friends sister. I’m older than you. We’re not supposed to be together. So of course it’s what you think you want because it’s trouble and nothing screams JJ Maybank like running toward trouble.”

“I don’t give a fuck about any of that Cassie! I’m in love with you for a million reasons. Like the way you drop everything any time you see a dog. Or because you pull cookies out of the oven 5 minutes before you’re supposed to and eat frickin warm cookie dough. Because you care about the entire world and have a huge heart but you also flip people off on the freeway for not using a turn signal. ...Cassie I love you for a million little things. And I don’t care about all the other shit.”

Cassie dide everything she could to not launch herself at the blonde boy she loved in front of her. Her eyes getting wet at the heartfelt admission.

“We can’t JJ. You’re 18 and I’m 21”

“Who fucking cares Cass?! What? You think you’re like taking advantage of me?!”

“Yes JJ! You’re vulnerable and a kid and desperate for a family and someone to take care of you. Because someone should and you deserve that! But I can’t-“

“You’re a kid! You need a family and someone to take care of you too! I can take care of you. We can take care of each other. That’s what a fucking relationship is!”

Cassie was quiet. She had one other reason to say no to JJ. The one reason she couldn’t bare to tell him and break his heart.

The truth was she did love JJ and she could be with him eventually maybe. But she was also falling in love with Rafe Cameron. Rafe Cameron who was her age. Rafe Cameron who had already had fun in college and dealt with his childhood trauma and unhealthy coping mechanisms. Rafe Cameron who was going to the same village to live out the same dream she had of doing the Peace Corps. 

“I’m sorry, JJ.” Was all Cassie said with tears threatening to spill out of her eyes as she walked away and went inside. 

Taglist: @moniamaybank @abbyj1822 @october-cameron @moonrisebeach @hernameisnoell @railmerafe @jeyramarie @gabiatthedisco @littlementalpolaroids

[ironmandeficiency]

tf boys + dnd headcanons (bc i clearly have nothing better to do)

pairings: benny miller / reader (romantic) but platonic w the rest of the tf boys

word count: i’m typing this in the post itself good luck fuckers

summary: i got nothing y’all. just know that benny & will have a little extra info idk why

a/n: i’m semi-new to dnd but i’m armed w the player’s handbook and google so i will do my best

benny: i think dnd was a guilty pleasure for him during high school. yeah he was seen as a Hot Popular Guy™️ and played football and baseball, but there is and always has been a nerd living in that heart of gold. had one (1) set of dice he used for every campaign and even kept them with him when deployed. he joined a campaign for the first time in years after coming back from The Mission That Shall Not Be Named™️. creating new characters & a homebrew or two became a way for him to cope with everything that happened there and heal.

details abt (one of) benny’s character(s):

half-orc barbarian-bard multiclass, affectionately known as a bardbarian

college of lore + berserker pathways

himbo af and benny laughs a lot when he gets to act out said himboness

character has a tendency to start bar fights if his talent is questioned, and usually it’s beating them with his fists and/or lute. there’s an npc that owns an instrument shop the half-orc frequents that gives him a glare every time but will always repair or replace said lute

uses vicious mockery against the BBG (big bad guy) every time they face a new one and the guys have never laughed so hard at benny’s random insults

focuses more on utility spells bc it’s just that easy for him to beat the hell out of someone with fists and weapons. becomes a jack of all trades kind of guy (similar to irl) and enjoys the “oh shit he can do that?” questions when he pulls off an intricate

when you offhandedly mention dnd night with your friends while planning for a date, benny’s eyes go wide. “you play dnd?! why didn’t you tell me earlier, lovebug? i love dnd!” precious baby boy will gush abt his first campaign back in high school and find his first set of dice to show you. he’s excited bc dnd is now another thing you can do together as a couple. will ask if you two can make characters with interlocking backstories 🥺

will: he didn’t play in high school but knew some guys in basic training that played who explained the basics to him and his first thought was “oh benny would love this” bc he knows his brother that well benny never had the heart to tell will that he had been playing dnd for years before will told him abt it so will takes credit for introducing benny to dnd. didn’t join a campaign but a character was built & he was gifted a set of dice from that group’s dm in case he ever wanted to start. ends up taking this character with him when he joins one of your campaigns and enjoys it a lot more than he thought he would

details abt will’s character:

goliath male, abt 7’8” and 300ish lbs bc he a big chonk

ranger-fighter multiclass — “warrior who used martial prowess and nature magic to combat threats on the edge of civilization” & “master of martial combat, skilled with a variety of weapons and armor” (pg. 45, dnd player’s handbook)

you can’t tell me that william miller wouldn’t enjoy the FUCK out of this combo without your pants catching fire

favored terrain: mountain, forest at level 6, and arctic at level 10

fighting style: two-weapon fighting

archetype: beast master. prefers a wolf, hawk, or mule companion but isn’t too picky

less of an emphasis on strength (goliath characters already get +1 to strength & rangers need more dexterity and wisdom anyways); instead, put his higher stat rolls into dex, wisdom, and constitution

you mention dnd early in getting to know will partly to just make conversation (and to snuff out whether he was the kind of guy to look down on the game as a whole). he tells you abt benny and a few of his army friends that played, and that he didn’t consider himself a player bc he hadn’t used his character yet. you called bullshit and, after getting him to play once, discovered that will would make a fabulous dm. his memory? impeccable. session plans? infallible, no matter what the party can improvise. is somehow always able to steer the party in the direction he needs them to go without being forceful. no one has ever heard a “you can certainly try” sound so encouraging yet foreboding at the same time.

frankie: poor man is absolutely clueless. he joins in on the dnd fun bc he saw how excited benny was and figured that it would be better than sitting at home by himself watching western reruns. ends up being inspired by said westerns (namely “the rifleman”) when creating his character and is crossing his fingers the entire time hoping that no one calls him on the similarities. despite the emphasis placed on charisma, he’s drawn to the paladin class bc of their self-chosen holy quest and the desire to vanquish evil (trauma 🥺). is learning how spells work as he goes and is frequently apologizing for holding up the session bc of this.

details abt frankie’s character:

half-elf paladin male

neutral good alignment

worships helm, god of protection (forgotten realms)

strength & charisma highest stats

protection fighting style

takes the oath of vengeance — “a solemn commitment to punish those who have committed a grevious sin” (phb, pg. 87). the character’s own purity is inferior to serving the justice they believe is required. to me, this just SCREAMS frankie

with the guidance of helm, his character became the sole caretaker to a child whose village was slaughtered by his character’s sworn enemy. strives to defeat said sworn enemy both in the name of his adopted son’s lost family & simply bc helm was like “dude you gotta stop this guy” shortly before frankie’s character found the child

has a bunch of healing & defense spells instead of combat spells bc why would he need combat spells if he can just fuck someone up with a weapon of choice?

santiago: like frankie, santi was absolutely clueless. but unlike frankie, he did a fuck ton of research during the days leading to the first night of the campaign. he he showed up after actually having done research with a well-rounded character with fitting stats and an intriguing backstory. does what a lot of men can’t and won’t by giving the party a female that is a genuine badass and respected for her badassery instead of being talked down to simply bc she’s a female. enjoys putting feline tendencies into his rp and the guys make cat jokes a lot.

details abt santiago’s character:

female tabaxi monk, way of the open hand

chaotic neutral alignment

was raised in the monastery and became a teacher in the ways for a short time. left the monastery after her curiosity revealed corruption within the ranks & was only allowed to leave freely under the condition of not telling anyone what she found

she was called back to teach when a sickness took down a lot of the elders and despite the reluctance, when she learned her mentor was sick, she went back. taught until his death and is in search of a medicine to save the monastery

her curiosity is fueled by her passion to learn everything she can. sometimes this gets her into some shenanigans but nothing too bad

triple frontier taglist: @pedropasscals @max--phillips @likeshootingstarsinthenightsky @obirain @themarcusmoreno @catsnkooks @battletales @darthadeline @jedi-mando @book-of-anarchy @andysficrecs @purelypascal @whovianwar @lv7867 @kaermorons @princess76179 @greeneyedblondie44

[x--daughters-of-darkness--x]

Cristina Scabbia x Diablo: Inside metal and gaming’s most devilish crossover yet

Outstanding hack-and-slash remaster Diablo II: Resurrected isn’t just about polishing up the beloved original’s relentless fire and brimstone. In a striking collaboration with Lacuna Coil songstress Cristina Scabbia and bizarro YouTube star Mark The Hammer, it’s inspired the latest crossover between video games and heavy music, too…

When Cristina Scabbia first picked up the joypad, she had no idea she was steering herself onto a path that would still be throwing up juicy side-missions three decades down the line. A young teenager in northern Italy during the mid-’80s first generation video game boom, the future Lacuna Coil frontwoman didn’t have the spare cash for the cutting-edge equipment of the time, whose 128-colour palettes and blocky two-dimensional sprites felt utterly futuristic. When a local friend powered up David Crane’s 1982 masterpiece Pitfall! on their Atari 2600, however, it opened the doors to another world.

“I’ve been a gamer for quite a while,” her eyes light up at the memory. ​“I love video games. I love what you can learn from them. I love the stories they tell…”

Few games are as darkly compelling as Blizzard Entertainment’s legendary Diablo series. Bringing to life the dark fantasy realm of Sanctuary – a midpoint between the High Heavens and Burning Hells – its trio of classic titles chronicle the eternal conflict between mankind and the demonic legions led by Diablo, fearsome Destroyer Of Souls. When David Brevik’s original landed in 1996, it was a literal game-changer for the industry, raising the bar in terms of depth and detail, storytelling and character-building. 2000’s Diablo II raised it again, still revered by hardcore gamers as the greatest action-RPG of all, while 2012’s Diablo III brought the franchise into the modern era.

Fittingly, it’s against that shadowy backdrop that Cristina joins us today, to discuss Start Again, her musical collaboration with the minds behind thrilling 3D, HD remaster Diablo II: Resurrected.

Speaking from her high-backed gaming chair in front of an impressive PC set-up this morning, she looks ready for battle. A laid-back, dressed-down counterpart to her imposing onstage alter-ego, she is surrounded by stacks of proudly-displayed paraphernalia, from a plushie of Gremlins’ Gizmo and photos of her band, to figurines of her favourite virtual characters, spare controllers, and the ubiquitous energy drink refrigerator.

Anyone familiar with Cristina’s Twitch streams wondering if this might be a carefully-arranged studio space should think again. ​“It’s actually part of my living room,” she laughs. ​“There’s this big table that was supposed to be for dinners with friends, but as we would go out to eat instead, I decided to use it for something that I like, and filled it with computers, monitors and consoles.

“It’s where I play. It’s where I stream from. It’s the safe space.”

Diablo’s heroes work best when joining forces, and 30 minutes further north, in the town of Saronno, we meet Marco Arata – AKA YouTube sensation Mark The Hammer – Cristina’s collaborator on Start Again, and a playful like mind. ​“I was three years old when I first played on a Game Boy,” he smiles into the light of a bank of monitors, ​“and I never stopped.”

For readers not in the know, Mark is the uber-talented multi-instrumentalist who’s gained a reputation for uploading incisive, tongue-in-cheek videos to YouTube like Irritating Guitar Lessons and How To Create A Black Metal Song… Without Any Talent. Learning piano aged eight, he quickly graduated to electric guitar, bass and drums. He’s since been picked up as the live guitarist/keyboardist for Italian pop-hip-hop icon J‑Ax. The main Mark The Hammer YouTube channel has more than half a million subscribers, while its English-language alternative boasts close to 100,000.

Both accomplished, analytical, artistic minds, it feels key to Start Again’s success that the duo see gaming as a chance to switch off – less interested in graphics and game engines than narrative drive and world-building.

“Whenever you listen to a song as a musician, you have your brain working, thinking about what exactly is going on,” explains Mark. ​“I’m a big fan of acting and drama, too, and the same thing applies when you watch a movie. But when you pick up that game pad, you’re able to relax and [switch that part of your brain off]. It’s the only thing in my life that I can really say is completely relaxing.”

“I know that some people prefer creating groups or being part of a competition,” agrees Cristina, noting that Diablo, in particular, fits her play style ​“but I’m more of a selfish, solitary player. I don’t want to feel that competition while I play. I want to be able to relax and do things at my own pace, to have my own rhythm. I don’t necessarily think of games as an escape. For me, it’s a different world that I want to be part of, [parallel to] the real world. It’s not that I want to [run away and] live in the video game world. But when I’m playing, I want to stay there, I want to focus on what’s happening – I want to absorb all the vibes. It’s not just something that you’re watching: you’re part of it. You can choose your character. You can increase your power. You can pick your path and select your sides.

“There are things about this world that non-gamers could never really understand…”

Like all the best quests, it began with a message from out of the blue. Mark recalls the sense of absurdity, watching an email drop into his inbox that he couldn’t quite believe was real. “I remember opening the message and seeing that it was an opportunity to write [a song inspired by Diablo II] for the release of Diablo II: Resurrected. Oh, yeah, and you’ll have Cristina Scabbia from Lacuna Coil doing vocals. I was just like ‘What?!’”

Having dropped video game soundtrack cover albums Hammer Games Vols 1 and 0 in 2015 and 2016 respectively, Mark had pedigree in the field, but he struggled to comprehend the opportunity for such a high-profile collaboration.

“This is the game that I bought as a 14-year-old when it first came out back in the year 2000,” he fishes out his original CD-ROM jewel case for an unsubtle flex, ​“and you’re asking me to write an official song to go with it? That in itself is mind-blowing. But to be able to do that with the greatest singer in Italian metal?! I thought it was some sort of strange spam at first. When I realised that it wasn’t, it became amazing on so many levels.”

Not a huge fan of YouTube (nor, presumably, of the hack-and-slash sub-genre), Cristina’s manager didn’t quite know what to make of the invitation. Fortunately, having followed one of Lacuna Coil’s old guitarists through a laptop screen and into Sanctuary all those years ago, and already a fan of Mark’s videos, she didn’t take much convincing.

“I was just like, ​‘Mark The Hammer? I follow him!’” she grins. ​“Then, when they told me the project was to write a song for Diablo II: Resurrected, I immediately said yes. If you look back at interviews that I did years ago, whenever they asked me what dream I had or what is missing from my body of work, I’ve always said that I’d like to write something for a video game. When this came along, it was like, ​‘Hello…’”

Cristina admits that she struggled with writer’s block over lockdown. Having watched her native Italy become one of the first countries crippled by the spread of COVID-19, she was unwilling to create music with the power to transport her back to those most troubled of times. Compared to the glacial pace of the music industry over the last 18 months, however, dropping in at crunch time in a massive game’s release schedule came as an invigorating change of pace. The first message exchanged between Cristina and Mark was on August 23, with the song due online to coincide with Diablo II: Resurrected’s launch exactly a month later.

“When you have a deadline, it can either throw you down or really speed everything up and add an excitement,” Cristina muses. ​“For us, it was definitely the latter. We were perhaps a little bit tense about not knowing each other. Any time you’re working with someone new, you ask yourself these questions: ​‘Is he going to be nice? Is he going to be an asshole? Is he going to have the same ideas that I have? The same creativity? The same speed?’

“As soon as we started to text, though, I realised that Mark was really relaxed, really funny. He’s like me. We would send and receive messages in the middle of the night, and get immediate replies. It was like we’d opened the floodgates on an ocean of ideas.”

A high level of fandom was pivotal. Diablo’s angels and monsters – Greater and Lesser Evils – seem like characters lifted from metal album covers to begin with, and the chaotic action that spills from the streets of Tristram and the slopes of Mount Arreat that go down into the depths of Hell could hardly be better suited to metalheads who’re never happier than when throwing down in the pit. Cristina and Mark’s preferred player classes – Sorceress and Barbarian, respectively – even mirror their onstage personas. To simply phone in the sort of crowd-pleasing banger either of these musicians could write in their sleep would be to do the project a deep disservice.

Cristina reckons that if Diablo were a band, it would be either Judas Priest – all OTT outfits, pointy edges and demonic imagery – or Rammstein, spewing sheer pyrotechnic bombast. Mark contends that the larger-than-life, battle-obsessed aesthetic of Iron Maiden might be a better match, pointing out that many of the most monstrous iterations of Ed The Head wouldn’t look out of place in its deepest dungeons. We’d argue that the ominous, folky atmospherics of peak Opeth even more closely evoke the playing experience, echoing Matt Uleman’s iconic original score.

In the same way that Diablo II: Resurrected marks an upgrade for players in 2021 while maintaining the original’s dark heart – dynamic lighting, three-dimensional rendering and high-definition presentation bringing the action sharply up to date – this song needed to pay respect while still packing enough heft to make an impact on metal fans in 2021.

“Diablo is such an iconic game,” nods Mark. ​“I knew the original score. I knew the original atmosphere. I knew where it had to go, more or less. But it was a challenge to make something new while paying respect to the original. There were parts where I wasn’t sure where I was going, but as soon as Cristina got really into the project and added her vocals, it felt like everything [clicked].”

“Mark’s involvement was crucial,” Cristina presses. ​“Looking at that original soundtrack, I was thinking, ​‘This is such a classic – it’s so iconic – but it’s not singable.’ It felt like putting a voice over the top would ruin it. But as soon as I heard the music that Mark had written, it changed everything. He made it singable. He created so many different parts, that offered so many different scenes, so many different moods. There are atmospheric parts, but there are also heavier parts. It’s like a journey, from beginning to end…”

Part sweeping re-score, part fan’s perspective love letter, part limb-swinging metal banger, the finished track feels like a striking bridge between worlds. Is the aim for fans who’ve yet to discover the pleasures of metal or gaming to be able to walk across it?

“The worlds of metal and gaming have always been strongly connected,” reckons Cristina, highlighting the fact that they’re both tightly-knit outsider communities fascinated by the dark and fantastical, which can appear intimidating to outsiders looking in. Although she and Mark will happily welcome new fans, the main priority was to write a great song, hopefully tightening the bond between communities that already exists. ​“It’s a lifestyle,” she gestures. ​“If you see a metalhead, there’s a strong chance you’ll be able to talk about games – or vice-versa.”

Indeed, the lines have increasingly blurred over the last couple of decades. Countless rockers found their way into the world via the legendary Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater soundtracks. The Guitar Hero franchise brought songs as unusual DragonForce​’s Through The Fire And The Flames, Lamb Of God​’s Laid To Rest and Slayer​’s Raining Blood – not to forget Lacuna Coil’s Closer – into the non-metalhead sphere. Celebrities as high profile as Tenacious D​’s Jack Black have spearheaded their own digital-metal crossovers, while Avenged Sevenfold​’s M. Shadows cropped up as a playable character in Call Of Duty: Black Ops 4. Gamers have even increasingly taken to wearing branded T‑shirts a la those of their favourite bands, enabling them to recognise each other on the street.

On the other side of the coin, bleeding-edge artists like The Armed, Refused and Run The Jewels have recently been inspired to write specifically for games. Svalbard​’s Serena Cherry just started a one-woman black metal side-project called Noctule, dedicated to her favourite epic RPG. Hell, Cristina even tells us that pounding compositions by djent-influenced video game soundtrack maestro Mick Gordon are amongst the most listened on her personal playlist.

It’s down to a change in perspective, Cristina reckons, where intelligent eye for detail is now considered every bit as cool as a debauched hell-raiser attitude. Games’ intricate storytelling and epic design are recognised as on par with the finest parts of cinema, and e‑sports competitions regularly boast larger prize pots than those of their athletic counterparts.

“I was always part of the nerd world,” she says, with more than a hint of vindication. ​“A few years ago, it felt like it was almost something to be ashamed of to admit that you’re a nerd, as if you had this weird, ridiculous aura. But now, everybody – all these people who were never interested – seem to want to be involved in this world. I [sometimes think], ​‘Nah, you need to prove you’re really into it…’”

She’s not kidding. As if that massive cache of gaming equipment – from the original PlayStation to countless Game Boys and computer components – wasn’t proof enough, Cristina has even appeared as playable character The Shadow Sorceress in Iron Maiden’s ever-evolving Legacy Of The Beast mobile game. ​“It was such an honour, such a pleasure to create my own character and give all the directions for the outfit, which was basically the outfit I was wearing on the last Lacuna Coil tour before lockdown,” she grins.

Going even geekier, Lacuna Coil also just launched their own Horns Up tabletop card game, where players must fight their way to the front of the stage. ​“It’s something we’re all really interested in, but particularly our bassist Maki [Coti Zelati],” Cristina continues. ​“Every card is related to metal clichés. We even gave our fans the opportunity to see themselves on one of the cards…”

Although Lacuna Coil maintained their high-drama presence with September 2020’s Black Anima: Live From The Apocalypse stream and June 2021’s live album of the same name, Cristina was keen to use the time off to introduce fans to her character away from the band, emboldened to set up her own channel on Twitch.

“I just wanted to learn new things which could enrich my baggage of knowledge,” she enthuses. ​“I’m already singing, already writing, but I don’t want to fixate on those. Life is made up of so many different things that can enrich my music and my creativity. I was already a Twitch user, watching other people play games, but I didn’t know what my purpose was. I almost felt scared at first. I am a singer. I am somehow an entertainer. I like to talk, which is clear. But it’s different when you’re talking to a lot of people for a couple of hours – or more!

“Eventually, I decided to keep it as informal as I could so that people could see how Cristina is at home. Cristina isn’t just the singer of Lacuna Coil: I have a house, I have a life, I have passions, I have my own personality. I just wanted people to discover that. Luckily they also like this quirky side of me, which feels like the opposite that dark goth lady that so many people know. As much as I didn’t have purpose in the beginning, there’s now such a strong community every time I go online – such a clean place to exchange good vibes!”

Even the persistent undertones of sexism and misogyny that have plagued gaming, she pushes, are a speed bump to be put in the rearview, comparable to what she experienced when first making her name in heavy music.

“In metal, I encountered the same problem,” she explains, bluntly. “[Women becoming a major presence in the community] was something new, and when something is new, people have suspicions and doubts. They don’t know how to deal with it. But there are a lot of female gamers now, and a lot of females in metal. It’s been normalised, which it should be, because games and metal are for everyone.”

As the world comes back up to speed, hectic schedules mean that attention is turning away from screens, and back towards studio and stage. Mark is churning out more and more top-class YouTube content. Cristina has a packed diary, with a tribute concert for late collaborator Franco Battiato at the spectacular Arena di Verona this week, and another secretive collaboration in the works, not to mention writing for Lacuna Coil’s 10th LP, which has just begun – her creative fires reignited by bringing Start Again to life.

Having dipped toes in the video game world, though, they’re both keen to return.

“I really hope we do,” Cristina says. ​“As a fan of video games, it’s such a great chance to bring together these different passions in your life. There are so many different things I’d like to do, and places I’d like to explore in this world, but time is limited!”

“I loved the challenge here, and the process of collaboration,” nods Mark. ​“If we could work together again when it comes time to make Diablo IV, that would be amazing. I’d love the opportunity to have my own playable character in an Iron Maiden video game, too, but I’m not sure that’s achievable!”

“I thought the same thing,” grins Cristina, ever adventurous, as we wave farewell. ​“Never say never!”

Diablo II: Resurrected is out now on Nintendo Switch, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox X/S and PC.

[the-big-nope]

While I’m certainly nowhere near ready for the story of the Mighty Nein to come to an end, I am also a D&D nerd and there’s a new sourcebook coming out soon with a bunch of new subclasses in it. By the time Campaign 3 of Critical Role gets underway, that book will be published, leaving a wealth of new options for the cast members to choose from, so why not entertain myself by making barely justified predictions of what the cast is most likely to pick for their next characters! (Disclaimer: Some of the new subclasses have been confirmed and some haven’t, so for a few of these picks I’m just going off of what I think is going to be in the book).

Travis

Cleric (Tempest Domain): Travis has been playing lowkey EMT since campaign one, and Laura’s already confirmed that Travis almost went cleric for campaign two. Between Grog with his barb-boosted movement speed to get around the battlefield so he could shove healing potions into his squishier teammates, and Fjord multiclassing into paladin and lovingly tapping his friends with single hit points to get them back up, it would be delightful to see him fully jump in and embrace the classical healer role. Of course, this is Travis, so I don’t see him picking a cleric domain that doesn’t allow for at least some whoop-ass, and Tempest Domain brings plenty of it. You get proficiency with all armor and weapons, Divine Strike at level 8 for boosted melee damage, you can use a reaction to inflict lightning or thunder damage against any enemy within melee range that’s hit you. And if you climb up high enough in levels, you gain a flying speed equal to your walking one whenever you’re outdoors. Pretty nifty, and makes for a fitting subclass for a guy that’s voiced Thor on multiple occasions.

Blood Hunter (Order of the Lycan): I mean, come on. The only reason it isn’t number one is that it was already widely assumed this would be Travis’s pick for campaign two, and I wouldn’t put it past him to surprise us again. But still, we saw him get a taste in Liam’s one shot and he was clearly having the time of his life. Besides, we lost Molly far too early to really see the blood hunter’s potential come to life; it would be damn cool to see someone else take a crack at it, and Travis is enough of a D&D gambler to not shy away from the class’s riskier features.

Artificer (Armorer): Speaking of Marvel connections, if Travis doesn’t lean toward fantasy Thor, then fantasy Iron Man might catch his attention instead. Artificer is an official class now, and since it’ll be reprinted in TCoE by the time campaign 3 gets underway, it’ll be a lot more visible as an option. The Armorer sits in almost a perfect middle ground of what Travis has done before: tanky and a frontliner, but also still has spells and tricks to help the party. Plus, you get a badass suit of power armor out of it. What’s not to like?

Marisha

Bard (College of Creation): After Hazel Copperpot, we all saw the pure magic that was Marisha Ray playing a bard. I know she implied that Hazel was supposed to be her campaign two backup character, but I hope this doesn’t discourage her from making another one. There are quite a few bard subclasses, a number of which I could see her being drawn to (Lore, Glamour, maybe even Swords), but I really vibe with the idea of Creation. I can’t exactly say why; maybe the idea of the ‘dancing object’ feature in Marisha’s hands is very funny to me (remember Keyleth’s adorable “Be Our Guest” moment? That, but this time it’s a walking wardrobe beating the shit out of the enemy).

Paladin (Oath of Vengeance/Conquest): As of yet, no one on Critical Role has ever played a paladin from the start, only multiclassed later down the line. I think this would be a cool departure for Marisha. Both campaigns she’s played characters that were either suspicious or at least indifferent to faith and the gods. Paladins are typically associated with deities, but they’re not tied quite so closely to them as clerics are. It would be fascinating to see what she did with it. As for the subclass, I just think Marisha’s earned her turn on the Goth Character Carousel, and while I know Conquest paladin is very unlikely given its moral grayness by default which might cause undue conflict and that Vengeance is a much more likely and acceptable pick, I just think it would be a sexy character choice. 

Wizard (Bladesinger/Graviturgist): This is a much more pie-in-the-sky, wishful thinking pick on my end, but not impossible imo. Marisha has experience with heavy spellcasting already, so she probably wouldn’t shy away from a wizard, but like Travis I suspect she likes a bit of oomph to her characters, and probably wouldn’t play as support heavy as Caleb does. To that end, Bladesingers get a bit more survivability and some modicum of physical prowess alongside their spells, while Graviturgists are definitely on the more aggressive side of the spectrum for wizard subclasses, with unique dunamancy spells to boot. I’m not sure how restrictive Matt would be about Xhorhassian characters in the next campaign if it takes place on another continent, but hey, you never know. Plus, she picked one of Matt’s homebrew subclasses for the current campaign; it would be cute if it happened again.

Liam

Druid (Circle of the Shepherd): At some point before Critical Role comes to end (hopefully far in the future), I know Liam’s gonna play a druid, I can feel it in my bones. He's too big of a Kiki fan not to. However, while Circle of the Moon might feel obvious given the potential for homage and how much he likes turning into animals, I feel like he might regard it as getting too close to old territory (also, I don’t know if Circle of the Moon is like an exclusive thing to the Ashari tribes, and if it is that would be rather restrictive for building a backstory). If that’s the case, Circle of the Shepherd feels like the next best bet. It has some great support options via the totems you can put down, and rather than becoming badass animals, you instead just get really good at summoning a fuck ton of them. It’s like Frumpkin, but ten of him. And they’re bears. (Honorable mention: If Circle of the Moon would feel like treading old territory then I’m certain Circle of Wildfire would too, but I’d bet my dice collection it would at least be tempting). 

Cleric (Unity Domain): Listen. The pure sap potential that would be at Mr. O’Brien’s fingertips with this subclass is incredible. The domain all about strengthening and protecting the bonds between friends and loved ones?? The domain with the Channel Divinity that can spread damage taken by one creature across the party however the cleric chooses to distribute it to lessen the blow to the individual??? The domain that used to be called the Love Domain???? I’m practically gagging on the soft moments and unspoken devotion conveyed through spellcasting already.

Fighter (Rune Knight/Psi Knight): Liam has yet to play a tank in a long-term campaign, and while I’m more enamored with the potential of the above classes, it would be novel to see him play a character with an actually respectable amount of hit points. However, I feel like if he was gonna commit to a straight frontliner, he’d probably want something a little more unique than a Champion or Battle Master (especially since he’s played those already for one-shots). Rune Knight has some fun options and built-in flavor, and with Psi Knight you can basically be a Jedi. Not bad options at all if you ask me.

Taliesin

Warlock (Fiend): Yeah, it might be expected, or Percy might have been too close to warlock anyway to feel like there’s new ground to cover, but hear me out. Both Percy (who, let’s face it, was a warlock multiclass in all but the actual mechanics) and Fjord were the classic reluctants. They got in over their heads without really knowing what was going on, and once they did they wanted out, cutting ties with their patrons and getting clear with only the scars remaining. I want to see Taliesin commit to a warlock in a way I imagine only he could manage to pull off. How fun would that balancing act be, to have a character that has no intentions of breaking their pact, who’s here for the powers, and is willing to work that delicate balancing act between keeping what he’s got and not letting his contract holder get the better of him? Give it to meeeeee.

Sorcerer (Psionic Soul): Psionic Soul has a bit of that eldritch flavor that vibes with Taliesin so much, with the added interest of introducing a brand new feature to 5E, the Psi Die (with this subclass, using them can do things like letting a sorcerer learn a spell they don’t already know for a few hours, allow you to cast spells without needing verbal, somatic, or material components, and can give you telepathy). Taking both Percy and Molly into account, it seems Tal likes to lean into those unique additional mechanics, and while Psi Die aren’t as risk-heavy as Gunslinger or Bloodhunter, they do add a layer of variability and unpredictability that seems to match his style.

Rogue (Swashbuckler): We only got a little bit of time with Molly, and so missed out on the opportunity to see Tal play a more cavalier character this time around. If he feels like leaning away from spells next time and back toward martial, I think a high-charisma, high-swinging swashbuckler from Tal would be a delight to watch.

Laura

Barbarian (Path of the Ancestral Guardian): Laura deserves to hit things, okay? Yes, spellcasting is great and comes in clutch frequently and Jester’s amazing, but you can tell Laura misses doing fat stacks of damage to the enemy in a single round. I personally think it would be amazing to watch her just cut loose and go full rage machine. As for the subclass, I’m not glued to the idea, but Ancestral Guardians are pretty kickass, have decent support capabilities for a barb without detracting from their DPS at all, and it doesn’t tread on any previous characters’ toes or their aesthetics.

Rogue (Scout/Soulknife): Laura deserves to play her favorite class at last, okay? She’s been class poached two campaigns in a row, and though that resulted in both Vex and Jester and I wouldn’t trade them for the world, Laura has earned first pick. Seeing as she already dipped into Assassin as Vex and Sam took Arcane Trickster, I could see Scout being a viable subclass choice. It’s in the classic sneaky vein, relatively simple in concept, but comes with features that grant easy-to-understand benefits that you can never turn your nose up at (boosts to movement, advantage on initiative, giving advantage against a target to everyone else in the party, etc.). If she’s looking for something a bit flashier, Soulknife has the benefit of retroactively dunking on Vax by taking the basic knife-rogue and making it better, with psionic knives that you can manifest with a thought, that can teleport you around Whisper style, and cranking up that stealth to ridiculous levels by just being able to turn invisible for ten minutes, no concentration or spell needed. The psionic die mechanics are a little funky of course, but I don’t imagine it’s any trickier than learning to manage all those cleric spells.

Monk (Way of the Open Hand): Between Beau just being super cool and her brief stint as Farriwen Breeze, monk wouldn’t be a surprising pick from Laura. An Open Hand monk might be the definitive version everyone knows, but you can’t deny it’s a solid subclass, and between previous overlap and the concepts of the other subclasses just not seeming to fit, I could see the classic being what she went with. But hey, it’s Laura Bailey. She could surprise us with Way of the Drunken Master or something.

Sam

Ranger (Monster Slayer): Let’s be real, I don’t think this would be his actual first pick for a Campaign 3 character, but the amount of shit-stirring he could achieve by making a character with the aim of pissing off Laura Bailey specifically would be hilarious (and since Matt isn’t completely opposed to UA and acknowledges that PHB ranger has a lot of issues, I wouldn’t be surprised if they went Revised Ranger this time).

Warlock (Genie): Actual first pick here, Pact of the Genie Warlock is confirmed by now, and the potential of a warlock in the hands of Sam Riegel is pretty vast (for some reason I’m imagining he would go the ‘spoiled sugar baby’ route). The subclass doesn’t matter as much, but the Genie one is nice in that, depending on the type of genie patron you pick, you can get a wide variety of extra spells, you get a container like a classic lamp or lantern that you can bamf into for short rests, and you get a limited Wish ability for your capstone, all features I feel like would especially appeal to Sam.

Barbarian (Path of the Wild Soul): I want to see Sam play a fairy barbarian. ‘Nough said.

Ashley

Fighter (Eldritch/Echo Knight): Ashley really seems to vibe with the crushing power of martial classes (she does love her brutal kill descriptions), so I could see her sticking with it rather than going back to full caster. However, I do see her picking one of the magical subclasses for some variety after Yasha. Eldritch Knight is a classic and reasonably easy to manage, but tbh I’d LOVE for it to be Echo Knight. And think, if my wishful thinking came true, with Ashley picking an Echo Knight and Marisha playing a Graviturgist wizard, they could link up their backstories and be a traveling Kryn battle duo that left their homeland behind to explore the world!

Sorcerer (Draconic): If she does want to go back to full-time casting, Sorcerer doesn’t require near as much bookkeeping as a cleric, druid, or wizard while still having decent variety, and the Draconic subclass is a bit beefier than the other subclasses. Also, it would be the third campaign in a row where Ashley Johnson’s character eventually got wings, soooo...

And tbh I have no idea what a third pick might be for Ashley, so I’m just gonna throw a dart or two at the board and say either College of Whispers Bard or Way of Mercy Monk *Shrug* We can only wait and see!

[disbander-of-armies]

2020 tag

I was tagged by the wonderful @hiddenlookingglass! Thank you!

Rules: answer the questions about 2020 and tag some people to pass it on!

Favorite films you watched in 2020? Waves, Phoenix (2014), 1917

Favorite TV shows you watched in 2020? Unorthodox, The Good Place, The Queen’s Gambit, and just finished and loved The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance. I also watched Barbarians. The plot is only meh imo but the spoken Latin is excellent!

Favorite songs you listened to in 2020? I don’t really have any because I hardly ever listen to songs, I much prefer soundtracks. I‘ve already mentioned it but this piece from the Lord of the Rings soundtrack has helped me a lot lately. And I really like this remix of the Vikings intro song.

Favorite books you read in 2020?

 -Fiction: Earthsea by Ursula K. Le Guin (really anything by Le Guin is great, Lavinia is one of the best myth retellings I’ve read so far!), Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel, Der Tag, an dem mein Großvater ein Held war (The Day my Grandfather was a Hero) by Paulus Hochgatterer

-Non-Fiction: Big Gods by Ara Norenzayan, Ghost on the Throne by James Romm (about the years following Alexander the Great’s death - it reads like a novel!), Ordinary Men by Christopher R. Browning, Biased by Jennifer Eberhardt

How did you spend your birthday this year? My birthday is in June and since we didn’t have any special restrictions during that time it wasn’t different from any other year, which was nice.

What was your most memorable day this year? One was definitely the day of my oral exam for a class where we translated a song from Homer’s Iliad. I feel really honored by the feedback the professor gave me. They told me that they can’t give me the best grade because I wasn’t as good as the others (most of the other students were from the Classical Philology department, which focuses heavily on Ancient Greek and Latin. I’m from the Ancient History branch which focuses on history and culture and has very few mandatory language classes. I’d love to do both but I just don’t have the time). But they also told me that I was the only non-Classical Philology student that didn’t drop out at some point during the semester (I had no idea because everything was online) and they really appreciated all the honest and hard work I put into my translations.

I just appreciate it so much that this professor gave me honest feedback but at the same time saw my love and ambition. I know it will take me a much longer time than others to be able to reach a really good level of Ancient Greek reading comprehension but I am as determined as ever!

What was the most memorable meal you had this year? Eating pizza on a roof terrace in Naples on a warm summer night.

Did you find any new hobbies or interests in quarantine? I started doing yoga. I took a break later on but a friend of mine is giving online lessons now so I started again.

What was the last big thing you remember doing B. C. (before Covid)? I was at a good friend’s birthday party. A lot of nice people and great food, what more could you want?

Positive things that happened to you/biggest lessons learned in 2020? These are actually two separate questions but I want two answer them as one because I think in my case it makes more sense. It’s also the reason I’m doing this ask meme. I’ve already done quite a few of these and I don’t want my blog to become too monotonous but I think this is an important lesson to learn that I want to share.

This year really sucked. One big setback was that my landlord decided it was a good idea to terminate the lease of my roommate and me during the pandemic (class act). I first wanted to move in with a friend but this didn’t work out so I had to move back in with my parents.

And now I’m just ... so thankful it turned out that way. As I’ve already mentioned, my guinea pig Mia had to be put to sleep on December 25th. The last few years, I always left in the morning of December 24th (after filling the cage with veggies and hay of course) to go to my parents and returned in the evening of December 25th. This year I didn’t and so I immediately noticed in the morning of the 25th that something was wrong with her and took her to the vet. If it had been like the years before, she would have had to suffer a whole day and I would have had a huge shock when coming home and probably wouldn’t have been able to forgive myself. But this way I was able to get help as quick as possible and had someone there to give me a hug.

I still think 2020 sucked. But this way I can make my peace with it a little bit and that is the lesson I take away from it: There are still things to be thankful for even in dark times like these.

What are you most looking forward in 2021? Things returning to (somewhat) normal and me continuing to improve my French skills (I’ve been doing French on Duolingo for a few months now and I hope I’ll stick with it)

[grailfinders]

Servant #2: Artoria Pendragon (Saber)

Moving along, our next subject is the face of Fate, King Arthur herself! For this build, we need to accomplish three things: A very fancy sword, laser beams coming out of said sword, and mana burst-esque abilities for when you need to give it 110%. A quick rundown of the build can be found here, and details under the cut!

Race and Background

Surprising no one, Artoria is a Human, meaning she gets +1 to all abilities.

Once again we are using the standard array (15,14,13,12,10,8). You can roll if you want to, but make sure it’s good enough for multiclassing. 

We start with Strength as our highest stat. If we’re putting this much effort into pimping out our sword, we better be worthy of wielding it.

Next is Charisma. Artoria’s the king for a reason, and it’s because she’s surprisingly good at deception. That, and being a paragon of goodness and all.

This is followed by Dexterity. Artoria needs to be able to move if she wants to.

After that is Constitution. Artoria is tougher than your average bear, but it’s not what she’s known for.

Then we choose Intelligence. Artoria has a good head on her shoulders, enough to know she needs to keep Merlin around anyway.

Finally, Wisdom is our dump stat. She doesn’t have a good sense for interpersonal relationships, even if she can rally an army. Just ask Lancelot. Or Mordred.

For Artoria’s background, the obvious choice is the Noble variant, Knight. This gives you proficiency to History and Persuasion, and gives you the Retainers skill: three ordinary people who’ll take care of all that day-to-day stuff for you. Feel free to base them after your less popular family members. My personal suggestion is to make three clearly different people and claim they’re all Gaheris. Nobody will be able to prove you wrong.

Class Levels

1. Paladin 1: Starting off to no one’s surprise as a paladin, Artoria has proficiency with Wisdom and Charisma Saves, as well as All armor and weapons, and Intimidation and Religion. Your status leaves you difficult to approach, and you’re most well known for hunting down religious artifacts. This is your life now, you’re the shiny cup guy.

You also get Divine Sense, letting you sense extraplanar entities around you, and Lay on Hands, providing  yourself and your allies with welcome healing.

2. Paladin 2: At second level, you gain your fighting style, Great Weapon Fighting. Even from an early age, Excalibur is calling to you.

You also gain Spellcasting with Charisma as your ability. There are plenty of spells you can use here, I’d suggest looking at Ceremony, Detect Magic, Divine Favor, and  Searing Smite. Searing Smite lets you turn your sword into a lightshow and bring the pain, which is one step off of our final goal. 

You also have Divine Smite, a skill that lets you burn spell slots to make your sword moreso.

3. Paladin 3: You’re finally taking the Oath of the Crown, for obvious reasons. With this oath, you gain Command and Compelled Duel as your oath spells, and can Channel Divinity by issuing a Champion Challenge or Turning the Tide. As king of England you will need to set an example for all the realm to follow; no evil can be allowed to get past you. This is also around the point you meet Merlin, and everything goes to hell.

4. Warlock 1: Merlin is your Archfey Patron, granting you a whole trove of magical goodies. At this level, you gain a Fey Presence, letting you spend an action to force a wisdom save on everything within 10′ of you or else they are charmed/frightened of you until the end of your next turn. Now that Merlin is in your support, everybody wants to be on your friends list.

You also gain Pact Magic. It should be noted that unlike most magic multiclassing, pact magic and spellcasting don’t mix. You get exactly the spell slots listed for each level of paladin and warlock you gain. You can, however, use warlock slots for paladin magic and vice versa.

 At this point you should pick up the Booming blade and Eldritch Blast cantrips, along with the spells Expeditious Retreat and Faerie Fire. Expeditious retreat is functionally replacing part of your Mana burst ability, allowing you to move much faster at the cost of magical power. Eldritch Blast is a stable of the Warlock Community, and one day it will become the closest thing to a laser sword we can manage. 

5. Warlock 2: At this level, you gain Eldritch Invocations, small effects that alter your life just a little bit, like everything Merlin does to you. Here, choose Repelling Blast and another invocation that will be getting immediately replaced next level. You also gain another spell at this level, but that will be getting replaced shortly as well, so pick whatever you’d like right now. Also, Repelling blast isn’t absolutely necessary, so feel free to pick whatever flavor of blast you’d prefer.

6. Warlock 3: At this level, you gain your Pact of the Blade. By now, you’ve probably noticed your life is getting pretty much dominated by oaths and pacts. This is kind of a running theme for you. The good news is you finally get Excalibur, the magical greatsword you’ve spent so long working towards! If you find a cooler sword later, you can also turn that into your pact weapon, but for now let’s bask in your achievement.

At this point, replace that one invocation with Improved Pact Weapon, turning your sword into a spell focus so you can shoot lasers out of it, plus turning it into a +1 weapon in the process.

You also gain another spell, and your slots move up to the second level. Gain Calm Emotion and Invisibility. Now your allies can repress their emotions as well as you do, and I’m sure if you asked nicely your DM will let you target your sword instead of a creature for the latter spell.

7. Warlock 4: For your first Ability Score Improvement, add to your constitution and charisma, to make your spells a bit stronger. At this level you also gain a new cantrip, Create Bonfire, and a new spell, Enthrall.

8. Warlock 5: For your final stop as a warlock, your spell slots move to the 3rd level, and you gain another spell, Tongues. You also gain a third eldritch invocation, Eldritch Armor. This allows you to spend an action to magically put on any suit of armor you can touch, even if someone else is already wearing it. The effect only works if you’re not already wearing armor though, so don’t go thinking you can sneak two sets of armor on. I would think it should also let you take off armor as an action, but you’d have to talk to your DM about that. It would be pretty on point for Artoria, though.

9. Paladin 4: Now that Merlin’s done ruining your life, we can get back on point. Put your next Ability Score Improvement into Strength, and try to forget the last 5 levels happened.

10. Paladin 5: You gain an extra attack each turn, and some 2nd level spell slots that won’t leave you like the warlock ones did. You gain Warding Bond and Zone of Truth as Oath spells, and should also take a look at Branding Smite when you get a chance to prepare your normal spells.

11. Paladin 6: You gain an Aura of Protection. Friendly creatures (including yourself) gain a bonus to saving throws equal to your charisma modifier if they’re within 10′ of you. You’re so good at ruling you inspire people just by being around them.

12. Paladin 7: You gain another crown skill, Divine Allegiance. If someone within 5′ of you is going to take damage, you can react and throw yourself in front of the bullet.

13. Paladin 8: Another Ability Score Improvement, once again going into Charisma. A lot of your abilities are riding on this stat now.

14. Barbarian 1:  We’re taking another detour to grab some barbarian skills. Rage acts like your mana burst, giving you a sudden boost of strength when you need it the most. You’ll need to remove your heavy armor for this (again, push to tweak that Eldritch armor with your DM), but in return you gain advantage on strength checks and saves, +2 to melee attacks, and you resist bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage. This eats up your mana pretty quickly though, so you can’t use spells or concentrate while doing so. You also get Unarmored Defense, so you aren’t completely defenseless when your armor’s off. The lowest your AC can go now is 10 + your dexterity modifier + your charisma modifier. A good king is ready at any time, after all.

15. Barbarian 2: You gain a Reckless Attack, letting you have advantage on all attacks this turn in return for your enemies having advantage on their turns. Hopefully by this point your sword is fancy enough that they don’t get those.

You also gain Danger Sense working in place of your instinct skill. This gives you advantage on all dex saves caused by sources you can see.

16. Paladin 9: Back on track yet again, you gain your third level spell slots, complementing the warlock slots quite nicely. You gain Aura of Vitality and Spirit Guardians as oath spells, and should look into preparing Daylight and Crusader’s Mantle.

17. Paladin 10: You gain an Aura of Courage. Your presence is so calming, allies within 10′ of you can’t be frightened.

18. Paladin 11: You’re so holy now, you have Improved Divine Smite. Now your weapon is so fancy it deals 1d8 extra radiant damage without even trying.

19. Paladin 12: Spend your last ability score improvement on Inspring Leader. Good kings send good men to die for them in battle. Great kings make them happy to do so.

20. Paladin 13: At your final level, you gain the ability to cast 4th level spells. You gain Banishment and Guardian of Faith as oath spells, and should look into Aura of Purity and Aura of Life as well.

The strength of this build lies in its combat versatility. You’ve got one fancy sword with 57 flavors of smite for close combat, a couple useful cantrips for midrange fighting, and even a bit of healing if things go Camlann. 

The tradeoff is you’re not particularly great at any one thing, a condition I like to call “Terminal Protagonist Syndrome”. You’re also pretty bad at social interactions, but you’re Artoria, so that’s to be expected. Finally, if you can’t convince your DM to let you tweak Eldritch Armor so you can take your armor off with it, your barbarian levels are pretty much wasted. Nobody said it was easy being the king.

[niqhtlord01]

Humans are weird: Absorbing culture

Public advisory notice: - All those traveling to the Planet Earth are hereby warned to keep their visits short.  - Continued exposure to Human culture has known side effects of confusion, uneasiness,and head pain. - Keep all possessions close at hand at all times. - Humanity lacks a single language so if you do not speak them naturally have your translator set to the most popular languages which include: English,  Mandarin Chinese,  Spanish,  Hindustanti,  Arabic,  Malay, and Russian. - Be prepared for oddities possible misunderstandings.     ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Mara read the public notice at the spaceport and laughed. Hefting her backpack, she walked past the sign and continued to the exit of the spaceport. All my friends are going to be so jealous, she thought as she passed by scores of alien tourists who had just arrived alongside here. “Mara, you’re so brave!” “Mara, i can’t believe you went to see those blood thirsty humans!” “Mara, I never knew you were so brave, please go out with me!” The visions of her friends all looking on at her when she came back from her trip in awe made he smile.  This would be her first time on Earth and her first time seeing humans up close. She had seen them before on news broadcasts back on her home world.They’d always be stories about some war they had just fought or some act of brutality they had committed against their enemies. The news had made them out to be technological barbarians that had carved out a pocket empire in the stars; making them a perfect place for Mara to visit.  She was not very popular back home and often passed over to go to parties. But when Mara saw the news that humanity had signed peace treaties with their warring neighbors which included open trade and travel. That was when lightning struck.  If she went to Earth for a vacation, people at home would see her as awesome and want to be with her. She did research and found that shuttles were now running between her world and the human’s capital planet called “Earth” which in the human tongue translated to “dirt”. She never got tired of hearing that. To prepare herself she got a translator unit and had it begin downloading the human languages while also taking some self defense classes. No war like human was going to get the drop on her and if they tried anything she’d snap them like a twig.  She reached the exit of the star port and took a deep breath. She felt her bag twitching against shoulder and looked to see what was causing it. Too her surprise it was her own hand grabbing the strap. It was shaking and fidgeting.  It was one thing to talk about doing something people consider dangerous with no fear, but now that Mara was on Earth about to meet what some called the most war like species in the universe, she felt the fear she had long suppressed begin creeping up again.  Thankfully sometimes the universe throws you a bone and makes the choice for you because the rest of the crowd of exiting tourists came up behind Mara as she was struggling with her dilemma and through sheer numbers.  The doors opened wide and she was carried outside, the blazing sun causing her to shield her eyes. When she opened them again she was standing face to face with a human. Mara couldn’t say a thing and just stood there frozen. From her research she could tell it was a male standing at roughly the same height as she was. “I know I know.” The human said with a hint of agitation in their voice. “Seeing a human for the first time, so scary. Yada yada yada. Can you please move? I need to catch my flight.” When she didn’t move, still trapped in shock, he just simply pushed passed her.  The push jolted her back into reality. She thought the human was about to attack her so she got ready to defend herself but before she could throw a punch but the human was already gone.  She turned around saw Earth for the first time. The area outside the star port was packed with not only aliens but also humans going in and out in so many different sizes, shapes, and colors. She could hear them and realized the warning wasn’t entirely wrong as there were several humans speaking different languages.  Reminded by it, Mara pulled out her translator unit. She wrapped the vocal unit around her throat and put on the ear pieces.  The sudden roar of a star ship taking off made her look up. As the smoke cleared she was taken aback by the sudden mountain looming over the star port. But there was something strange about it, it was moving in places. She looked closer and to her wonder it dawned on her that it wasn’t a mountain at all, it was a city.  A collection of buildings clustered together, towering into the sky like a titans hand reaching out to grasp the sun. Swarming around it were hundreds of ships and vehicles that looked like ants. Mara took a deep breath and realized that would be the best place to start her vacation and set off for the city.  ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Mara had researched humans with what was available to her and everything said that humans lacked any sense of culture and were devoted to acquiring technology for war. From what Mara had seen after entering the city was that that statement was only half true. Humans were acquiring technology, but not for war.  As she walked through the choked streets she saw countless oddities that seemed so out of place in human culture. On one human she saw their hair braided techno tentacles of the Havara people which interwove themselves into different patterns every few minutes. Another human had shaved half of their hair on their head diagonally and had died the remaining half a mixtures of shades of purple and green that was found among the Bobako species. She was even amazed when she past a human whose arm wasn’t made of flesh, but composed of a series of cubes that as far as Mara knew were only used by the sentient machines of Lunar Hegemony. She saw the human approach a door and the cubes slid along themselves in perfect formation to grab hold of the handle and pull it open.  As she adventured deeper into the city she saw more and more mixing of cultures that she had never even dreamed of until she felt like the near madness of it all would over take her and she quickly left to find a hotel to stay the night.  After stumbling around the streets for some time she found herself in front of a hotel called “Gardens of  Versailles “. She was just about to open the door when it swung outwards and knocked her off her feet.  “On my gosh I’m so sorry!” She heard someone say as a hand reached out. Mara took it and hauled herself back to her feet before getting a good look at the speaker and falling back down again. Nestled on a series of mechanical spider legs in place of real ones was a human woman who now looked down at Mara even more puzzled. “Did you slip again?” the woman asked as she extended her arm again, though this time Mara backed away and rose to her feet on her own. The woman stared at Mara as she rose. “You alright?” Mara stared at the metal legs before realizing the human had asked spoken to her. She tapped her translator and it identified the language as English. “Could you say that again?” Mara asked trying out the translator for the first time. The woman smiled. “Ah, you must be new here. I asked if you were alright.” Mara nodded. She remembered humans found it disrespectful when those speaking to them did not look at their face, but she found her gaze drifting down to the metal spider legs.  “Impressive aren’t they?” The woman began moving her spider legs one at a time showing them off to Mara. “Indeed, most impressive.” “I got the idea when humans began trading with the Insectoid Hive. Those little buggers can really move around.”  Humans traded with the insects? Mara thought. The woman extended her hand again. “Forgive me, I’m Elizabeth.” “Mara.” She took Elizabeth’s hand and shook it. “So you cut off your own legs for the Inesctoids?” Elizabeth looked at her and laughed. “I never looked at it that way, but you could say so.”  The metal exoskeleton Elizabeth was wearing parted and opened up in the front. Mara saw that Elizabeth’s real legs were still attached to her but tucked away inside the frame. Elizabeth smacked her legs hard to Mara’s confusion. “See?” She asked Mara, but Mara did not understand the question. “My real legs don’t work. I’ve been paralyzed from the waist down my entire life.”  Understanding hit Mara and she realized her questions were rude. “I am so sorry. Please accept my apology for my rude question.” The exoskeleton sealed itself back up again. “Don’t be. It’s a natural question when you see something as scary as me.” She laughed and Mara felt like she could calm down some.  “But if there is technology to get new legs, why did you not get a pair that matched your old ones?” Elizabeth shrugged. “I never knew what it was like to use my legs so I guess I am somewhat detached from any connection to looking what I would be like if my legs did work.” She flexed her metallic legs. “But that’s not the only reason, I had another.” Mara looked at Elizabeth and saw wonder in her eyes and something more when she spoke of her new legs. When she spoke about them it was as if she had a glow around her, something that when looked upon infected you with its radiance and filled you with the same joy.    “But that’s enough about me, what brings you to Earth?” Mara laughed nervously. “Well, I wanted to impress my friends by visiting humanities home world all by myself. It’s not what I expected to see.” “Not as barbaric as the rest of the galaxy thinks are we?” Elizabeth said with a smirk. Mara nodded. “Well if it’ll help you you could take a picture of me attacking you with my robot legs and send it back to your friends.”  Mara backed away instantly at the mention of her attacking Mara. Elizabeth saw it and held up her hands. “Oh no, no, no. I wouldn’t really be attacking you! But they wouldn’t know that now would they?” Mara paused to consider it. It would make her look brave and cool. “That’s....actually not a bad idea.” “You’ll find Mara that we humans are chalk full of ideas.”  “I must ask you though,” Mara said as she waved her arms at the surrounding people and buildings, “I see many different species culture here but none that are specifically human. Do you not have your own or has it been erased as you opened to the galactic community?”  Elizabeth shrugged. “A bit of both you could say. Humans do have our own culture, but we also have what we like to call the “Mixing pot”. That means we take other cultures and add them to our own, mixing them in with our daily lives until we don’t see them as other cultures but ours as well.” “Doesn’t that upset you though?” Mara pressed. “That you rather have the styles of others rather than develop your own?” She pointed to Elizabeth’s legs. “You even chose the legs of another species rather than your own to make prosthetics for.” Elizabeth looked down at her spider legs and ran a hand over them. The polished steel catching the street light to make them almost appear glowing.  “For most of my life I had been confined to a wheelchair having either someone or myself pushing me from place to place. I watched others run and jump and climb mountains and swim across rivers all my life. All I wanted to do was join them. But then I would look down at my legs and feel sadness. But one day I remember seeing the Insectoid Hive on TV for the first time. They were coming back with the representative that had been sent to the Cosmic Federation. I remember how nimble they were, how their slender limbs could scale any surface with such ease and grace, how powerful they were that let them jump meters into the air on a whim. I knew then and there, that those were the legs for me, not my own legs. So when I stumbled across an Insectoid shop that had setup a here I came as fast as could to see there wears and low and behold they had this exoskeleton. It was designed to help rehabilitate Insectoids as they recovered from leg injuries but with a little modification I turned this bad boy into my personal chariot. Now I can do things like this!” Elizabeth leaped into the air several meters high before coming down with a thunderous crash. “And this!” She shouted as she began scaling the wall beside her as Mara watched from the ground below. “And even this!” She joyfully announced before letting go of the building and performing several flips, landing on a single mechanical leg in perfect balance.  “Humans are a odd bunch for sure Mara.” Elizabeth said while still standing on a single leg. Her others began moving on their own and striking poses. Mara snorted as Elizabeth began taking ever funnier poses. “You make it sound like you all are a pack of scavengers.”    “When we find something we like we adapt it to our own and it that sense it becomes our culture just as much as those who it originated from.” She lowered herself down to all of her legs. “I could show you a few places that would blow your mind if you wanted.” Mara looked on at Elizabeth’s radiant glow and smiled. “I think I’d like that.”

[hellyeahheroes]

Building Molly Hayes in D&D 5e

So I noticed that I have now one build more for DC than I have for Marvel so how about we build something straightforward and easy and yet very fun to play? How about one little girl who really can beat everyone up?

Since I follow the blueprint set by Tulok the Barbarian, we need to establish our Goals for this build. First of all, we need to punch like a true Bruiser, someone worthy the title Princess Powerful. Second, we need to be as hard to kill as someone whose creator forced into the contract a clause she will never be killed or maimed. And finally, we need to do that while being able to fool people into thinking we’re just a harmless little girl, so they won’t realize the problem before it is too late.

Ability Scores: We Will be using the Standard Points Array - 15, 14, 13, 12, 10 and 8. If you want to roll or use point-buy, go ahead but remember to keep your Strength high.

Strength: 14, your nicknames aren’t just for show.

Dexterity: 13, we will boost it in a moment

Constitution: 15, Molly can take as much as she can diss.

Intelligence: 8, it represents formal education and Molly has few years of a hole in that and even without it is still in her early teens so she had even less of it than many other characters we did.

Wisdom: 10, should be higher but we cannot have everything.

Charisma: 12, Molly is adorable aaaand much smarter than people give her.

Now for D&D version of species, Race. Molly is a mutant and last time I checked mutant considered themselves a separate species altogether. So we’ll go with Stout Halfling. Your size is small, to the point Halfling passing for a human child is a known thing in D&D. You get +2 to Dexterity and +1 to Constitution. You are Lucky, allowing you to reroll natural 1 on any attack roll, ability check or a saving throw. You can move through space of any creature larger than you, you have an advantage on saving throws against poison and resistance to poison damage. You can speak Common and Halfling and your base speed is 25 feet.

Alternatives: If you want to play Molly Hernandez, who is not a mutant, pick up Variant Human and grab Lucky feat.

We will make Custom Background - pick up Deception and Acrobatics, any language that could be campaign relevant, artisan tool proficiency to play tuba and City Secrets feature from Urchin background. 

Class Levels: First we will get us some punching. First level Fighter gains proficiency in all simple and martial weapons, Strength and Constitution saving throws and proficiency in two skills, I’d go for Insight and Athletics. You get to pick a Fighting Style, Unarmed Fighting makes your fist deal 1d6+ Yoru Strength Modifier damage instead of static 2, 1d8 if you use two hands at once. When you grapple a creature, you can deal them 1d4 damage whenever you hit them by a melee attack. You also get Second Wind, letting you once per short rest use your bonus action to regain 1d10+your Fighter level hit points.

2nd Level: Molly is known for wearing cute hats. But do  you know what she doesn’t wear? An armor. Which is why we will quickly grab the first level of Barbarian for Unarmored Defense, letting you add your Constitution modifier to your Armor Class when you're not wearing armor. You also get to enter Rage, in which you have an advantage on Strength checks and saving throws, lets you add extra damage to attacks made while you rage and resistance to bludgeoning, piercing and slashing damage. You can enter it a limited number of times, it lasts 1 minute and ends if you decide to, lose consciousness or do not attack anything for one turn.

3rg Level: Fighter of 2nd Level gains Action Surge, letting you take extra action for a turn between every long or short rest.

4th Level: 3rd Level Fighters get to choose a martial archetype. Brute lets you add 1d4 to any damage you deal with a melee weapon you’re proficient with. Meaning now this little girl hits with her bare hands like a guy with a sword.

5th Level: 4th Level Fighter gets an Ability Score improvement, but we will pick a Feat. Second Chance is a Halfling feat that lets you once per battle force a creature to reroll an attack roll that would hit you. You also get to Increase your Dexterity by 1.

Alternative: If you build Molly Hernandez instead, either grab Tough for more HP or increase your Strength.

6th Level: On 5th Level Fighter gets an Extra Attack, letting you attack twice in a single attack action, four times with Action Surge. You can punch fast because you have the power of youth...wait, that’s from some manga.

7th Level: 2nd Level Barbarian gains Reckless Attack, letting you before the first attack decide to gain an advantage on melee attacks during this turn but at the cost of enemy attacks having an advantage against you during the next turn.

Unearthed Arcana also gives Barbarian Survival Instincts, letting Molly become proficient in Perception and Animal handling and doubling her proficiency bonus to these skills. Between Old Lace and psychic cat Rufus, Molly is pretty good with animals after all.

8th Level: 3rd Level Barbarian gets to enter a Primal Path. Path of the Zealot is lore-wise hard to fit, as it is a fanatical follower of the gods. But you can easily refluff it - Molly is so devoted to protecting her friends that it gives her outright fanatical empowerment. Or maybe ask your DM which god in their setting is a patron of friendship and found families. 

You gain two features. Warrior of the Gods ensures that if you’d die and someone, say your goth surrogate mom, cast a spell restoring you to life, they do it without having to pay a, usually high, material price. The second feature, Divine Fury, makes Molly hit even harder. Now when you rage the first attack you hit with on each of your turns deals an extra 1d6 + half of your Barbarian level of radiant or necrotic damage.

9th Level: 4th Level Barbarian gets an Ability Score Improvement, boost up your Strength to hit even harder.

10th level: 5th level Barbarian is sadly a doozy because you get Extra attack you already got from Fighter. It sucks but they do not stack. Cheer yourself up by the fact you can now puch so well to make Punisher write it in his journal. And you get extra 10 feet of movement when you’re not wearing armor to cheer you up.

11th Level: 6th Level Zealot gets Fanatical Focus, letting you to once per rage (which at this level raises to four uses per long rest) reroll a failed saving throw while you rage. As with previous features that let you reroll things, you must accept the new result even if its worse.

12th Level: 6th Level Fighter gains another Ability Score Improvement, increase your Constitution for better AC and more Hit Points.

13th Level: 7th Level Brute gains Brutish Durability, which allows you to add 1d6 to any saving throw you make, and if it’s a Death Saving Throw and it would push you to or above 20, you treat the roll as a natural 20, making you automatically regain 1 hit point.

14th Level: 8th Level Fighter gets to round up Constitution with another Ability Score Improvement.

15th Level: 9th Level Fighter becomes Indominable, allowing you to once per long rest reroll a failed saving throw and accept the new roll, even if it's worse.

16th Level: 7th Level Barbarian gains Feral Instinct, giving you an advantage on Initiative rolls and letting you act as if you’re not surprised in case an enemy surprises you, but only if the first thing you do is enter Rage. Which is what you should do if X-Men show suddenly to kidnap you to their weird cult island.

17th Level: 8th Level Barbarian can increase Strength with our last Ability Score Improvement.

18th Level: 9th Level Barbarian gets Brutal Critical, allowing you on a critical hit roll one additional die of any type you use in an attack, and since you use multiple ones, you can pick the highest one.

19th Level: 10th Level Zealot can make a Zealous Presence, letting you once per long rest as a bonus action rally up your teammates in need, giving them an advantage on saving throws and attack rolls for their next turn.

20th Level: Our capstone is 11th level Barbarian, giving us Relentless Rage. If you are raging and drop to 0 hit points but not outright killed, you can succeed a DC 10 Constitution saving throw and drop to 1 hit point instead. Every time you use it between rests the DC increases by 5 and goes back to 10 after short or long rest.

Overview: Molly Hayes is a Stout Halfling Brute Fighter 9/Path of Zealot Barbarian 11, let us see how good this build is.

Pros: First of all, your damage from various sources can stack up to pretty decent damage. Second, you are ridiculously hard to put down, with over two hundred hit points, resistance to damage, multiple ways to succeed saving throws and even more to get yourself out of the death situation - Indominable, Fanatical Focus, brutish Durability - and Second Wind, you can stay in combat for a long time. Your AC is at 18, which is also decent. Finally, you get to reroll so much you really feel like someone who is contractually set up to not die.

Cons: You are not as strong as you could be, we didn’t round up Strength in the end. Molly is strong but not as much as guys like Colossus. You also don’t deal much in magic damage and many creatures will have resistances or immunities against your punches, so you better hope DM gives you something to make your fists magical. And finally, you're a bit of a one-trick pony, you just punch people and I know from experience playing someone who just hits can bore some players fast.

However, this is pretty in character. You’re still a kid, so you have still time to surpass powerhouses like Hulk. But in meanwhile remember to keep your found family safe and teach everyone this kid is not to be underestimated.

Alternatives: I was considering Rogue but it didn’t really work with it since Molly doesn’t use anything that can deal Sneak Attack. if you sacrifice that character bit, you can start as a Rogue to get better skills. Going up to 4 levels and picking Swashbuckler or Scout for an Archetype will combine well with Cunning Action to make you move on the battlefield with an energy an excited kid like Molly has.

- Admin

[comicgeekscomicgeek]

Their Hero Academia: Once Upon a Time

Presenting the next installment of my on-going, nextgen, MHA fic! Earlier chapters can be found here

Once upon a time, in a far off land, there lived a boy named Isamu.   He was tall and he was kind and he was known for being extraordinarily fleet of foot.  It was said that he had a kind word for everyone, though he was possessed of a nervous disposition, given to jumping at the slightest surprise.  But in spite of that, he was quick to speak up for those in need and quick to rush to the aid of others.

In other times, he might have been a knight, a protector of the realm, so great was his desire for to help others.  But that was an impossible thing, because he was a commoner.  He had no noble lineage and parents were ordinary people.  It had been said in times past that the common folk could earn knighthood by special deed, but in his small town, it seemed as though that would never happen.  Isamu fully expected to live out a normal, happy life, free from the troubles and adventures that had once plagued the land.

But fate often has a way of proving such beliefs wrong, as Isamu would find out one summer day.

***

His parents had sent him to the neighboring larger city to sell some of their wares and it had been a good day.  Isamu was ready to return home and his pack was lighter by far but his coin purse heavier.  Just as he finished tying together the bundle of his pack, an ugly voice split the air.

“Give us your purse and we won’t hurt you. Much.”

His eyes instantly went to the source of the voice.  Two big men, both of rough and dangerous, had cornered a girl about his age and had her blocked against a wall.  She wore a hooded cloak, despite the summer heat, but from what he could see, she was pale and very slight.  There would be very little that she could do to defend herself.

He looked around.  No one was paying them any attention.  It was just one more facet of life in a bigger city, he guessed. People said it happened all the time.  People said things like “somebody ought to do something about it.”  But right now, there weren’t even any members of the city watch around.

He should have just kept walking.  It was none of his business.  This was just the way of the world sometimes.  No one would have blamed him.  Both of the men had muscles he could only dream about and both were armed, carrying knives that looked like they had not been cleaned in some time.  He was just a gangly young man and no one would have ever expected that he act.

And yet, his body moved on its own.

Before he knew what he was doing, he was running forward, swinging his pack through the air in big circles.   He let out a sound that was half battle cry and half terrified scream before releasing it.  The pack sailed through the air and hit the nearest of the two with a heavy impact, knocking him senseless.  The sound of shattering pottery told him that he would be having a very difficult discussion with his parents when he returned home, assuming he survived the next several minutes.

“What the hell?” the one who was still standing asked, turning to face him.   He swung his knife wildly, slicing through the air.  “That was a mistake, boy!  You’re going to pay for that!”  He took a menacing step forward, the girl seemingly forgotten for a moment.

It was starting to look even less likely that he was going to survive the next few minutes.  Which was, in truth, a relief, because it meant he would not have to explain anything else.  He could only hope that the girl would run while the man took his anger out on him.

But just as suddenly, the man paused, stopping dead in his tracks.  Fear flashed over his face and the knife fell to the ground, his fingers suddenly gone boneless from terror.  “I… we weren’t meaning no harm, see?” the man babbled.  “I’ll just… be going now…”

Isamu did not know what caused the man to turn tail and run, but he was grateful for whatever it was.  The girl, who had not fled as he had hoped, stepped over the unconscious form of her other attacker and smiled at him.  Up close, he could see that she was very beautiful and had kind eyes.  Her smile made him feel as though all was right with the world.

“Thank you,” she said, and her voice was soft, barely above a whisper, like someone unaccustomed to speaking loudly.  “You were very brave.  But there was no need to endanger yourself.  I would have been all right.  And even if I was not, my friends would have taken care of them.”

Her friends?

A grunt behind him made him turn.  Behind him was a young man about his age, with a shock of green hair, dressed in well-worn, but clearly high class clothes, a scabbard on his back and a sword in his hands.  Next to him was the most terrifying girl he had ever seen, short, but with thick muscles and red eyes that seemed to glow.  She had to be from the barbarian outlands, for she was dressed in furs and skins, her arms and stomach exposed to the elements.  An axe that looked far too heavy to hold was in her hands and her face was twisted up in rage.

The boy relaxed when he saw that things seemed to be all right.  “Thank you,” he said to Isamu, replacing his sword in its scabbard.  “We could have handled them, but I’m glad we didn’t have to.”

The scary girl on the other hand, pushed past him and approached the girl, putting her hands on her upper arms with a tenderness that surprised him.  “Are you all right, Izumi?” she asked.

“I am fine,” the other girl said.  “You worry too much, Katsumi.”

“I worry exactly the right amount,” the scary girl—Katsumi—said.  “It’s not safe for you here.  We need to…”

A stiff breeze chose that moment to pick up, and it flung the pale girl’s hood back, fully revealing her pale face and soft features.  Hair that was white, but became red, cascaded from her head.

Isamu sucked in a breath in surprise.  Even being from a small village, he recognized the princess of the realm.

***

“You’re the… you’re… you’re…” Isamu stammered, arms flailing through the air wildly.  Some powerful instinct dropped him to his knees and he averted his eyes.  Of all the people in all the land, he never would have expected in a thousand years to see the princess!  What was she doing here?  Why wasn’t she at the castle?  And why was she in the company of a barbarian?

“Please,” Princess Izumi said, “rise.  There is no need for ceremony here.”  She carefully pulled her hood back up, hiding her hair once again.

“And you’re going to blow our cover, you fool!” the barbarian woman snarled, clenching a fist.

It was the green haired boy who helped him back to his feet, offering him a hand up.  Isamu took it gladly.  “Sorry about that,” he said.  “Katsumi can be a little scary, but she is right.  We can’t afford to draw any attention to ourselves.  There’s people chasing us who would do anything to catch us.”

“Tell the whole flaming world, why don’t you, Toshi?” the barbarian girl, Katsumi, snapped.

“I should at least like to compensate you for your troubles,” Princess Izumi said, reaching into the pouch on her belt.  “We do not have much, but you risked much for us and…”

Isamu shook his head. The click of coins sounded like silver or maybe gold, money that would have more than paid for what he lost in merchandise throwing his pack. “I don’t need a reward.  It was the right thing to do, even if it cost me.”

“Great,” Katsumi said, pacing impatiently.  “He’s fine.  You’re fine.  We’re all fine. Can we go now?  We need to get to Naruhata by nightfall.”

“As soon as we figure out where it is,” Toshi said.

The barbarian girl gave him a menacing look, though Toshi did not flinch from it.  In fact, he seemed far too used to it.  “Which would be a lot easier if you hadn’t the lost the maps.”

“I apologized for that already!  And I didn’t lose them!  They set them on fire!”

“Naruhata?” Isamu asked.  He didn’t want to think about who they were.  “I’m from there.  I can take you.”

In the back of his mind, he wondered if whoever they were, they would follow.  Was he bringing danger home?

But this was the princess.  The boy seemed important too.  He didn’t know about the barbarian; she was too scary to focus on for long anyway.  He would swear that her eyes seemed to glow when she got mad(der), and that he could see little puffs of smoke on her breath.

The barbarian girl looked at him with her wild eyes.  “Well, guess who just got himself elected guide.”

Princess Izumi laid a hand on the barbarian’s shoulder.  “There is no need for that, Katsumi.  You’re frightening him.”

Katsumi seethed for a moment, but calmed under the princess’s touch.  “Hmph.”

The princess turned to him.  “I am afraid we must ask for your help again. It may be dangerous.  But the safety of the kingdom, the safety of our parents, the safety of everything depends on our mission.”

That was scary news indeed.  But what could Isamu do?  His father had always said that if you were able to help someone, you should.  Small acts of kindness had the power to move mountains.

“I’ll take you,” he said.

***

The light of day was beginning to fade as they walked the road from the city to Naruhata.  It wasn’t far, only a couple of hours walk, but there were some parts that were tricky if you didn’t know the way, where the road ended.  Without a map, Toshi, Katsumi, and Princess Izumi probably wouldn’t have found it.

What a strange trio they made!  Despite being no older than him and all of them being shorter than he was, they all seemed to carry themselves with so much more confidence than he had ever had.  The barbarian girl Katsumi in particular seemed to walk through the world as though it had personally offended her and was moments away from feeling her wrath.  And yet, whenever Princess Izumi was involved, she seemed to soften for just a moment.   Already, he had seen her listen to the princess many times.

The green haired boy, Toshi, carried himself like a knight, taking the lead, and scanning ahead for trouble.  The sword on his back had to be heavy, but he carried it was though it was nothing, and though he seemed concerned about something (probably whatever they were running from), he also seemed to clearly believe that whatever happened, it would work out.  He seemed neither quite as high class as the princess, nor as rough as Katsumi.  His clothes were well-worn, but high-class, a contradiction if ever there was one.  It was rare to find a noble who understood the plight of the common folk, and yet Isamu was certain that he did.

Even the princess was surprising.  She was easily one of the most beautiful girls Isamu had ever seen.  Her reputation as the fairest in all the land was well earned.  But so to was her reputation for kindness.  She spoke to him as those he were an equal, even though he had to fight every instinct to avert his eyes rather than look upon her.  And yet there was something about her, a steel hidden within her silk, that told him she truly could have protected herself if it had come to it.  But what was she doing here?  The palace was many leagues away, in the center of the land.  Surely King Shoto and Queen Momo would not have allowed their daughter to travel so far, especially in such strange company.

“You must have questions,” Princess Izumi asked, walking beside him.  Toshi and Katsumi were in front, though Katsumi continued to look back to check on her and to glare at him.

“I, ah, yes,” Isamu said.  “None of you seem like the kind of people you would find around here.  And I didn’t think people did quests anymore…”

“Would that it were so,” the princess said, with a slight bow of her head.   “But there is always darkness in the land.  And right now, there is far more of it than there has been in many years.”

Isamu felt a cold chill go up his spine at her words.

“You know that my parents are the king and queen,” she said.  “Toshi’s father is my father’s most trusted friend and knight and his mother a mage of the court.  And Katsumi is the daughter of the chieftain of the barbarians who roam the kingdom’s outlands, through a mutual arrangement between their chieftain and my father.”

So he was indeed traveling with very important people, a commoner among nobles.  Of course, the tales said that the king’s most trusted knight had once been a commoner himself, raised to his current station by the sponsorship of a golden champion and by his own heroic deeds, but no one knew if those tales were true.

“Many years ago,” the princess continued, “our parents banded together with several others and drove back the greatest threat our land had ever seen.  A dark wizard had left behind a disciple called Shigarki.  It took all of them and many more besides to defeat him.  It brought about a new age of peace.

“But Shigarki left behind many tools and weapons of his war on peace.  We had thought them all destroyed, but someone has found what was left, foul monsters called the Nomu, and used them to wage war on peace all over again.  Already, the outlands have fallen, and many more lands besides.

“Before they took our kingdom, Toshi’s and my parents were able to spirit us out of the castle, with maps and the names of towns where it was said we might find weapons and allies to stop the threat.  We already found Toshi’s sword and Katsumi’s axe, but on our way, we were attacked, and lost the next maps we were to use.”

“That… that’s bad,” he said, feeling dumb that he had no better words.

“It is,” she agreed.  “But I have faith that we will succeed.”  She grew quiet.  “We must.”

Before them, Katsumi suddenly stopped and held up a hand.  Around them, it had grown darker.  Ahead of them, the path wound through dark woods, much more frightening now, somehow, than they had been when he had first walked this way. She sniffed the air deeply, then reached for her axe.   “Damnation,” she growled.  “They’ve found us.  Get ready for a fight.”

Toshi drew his sword.   “Isamu, we’ll hold them off as best we can.  But if it starts looking dangerous, I want you to take Izumi and run.”

He gulped.  “I… I can do that.”

“I will not flee,” Izumi said, producing a pair of small daggers from her belt.  She handed one to him, which he took with shaking hands.  He had never wielded a weapon before.

He heard it before he saw it.  The sound of something heavy coming from the woods, steps that made the ground shake.  And they were upon them, monstrous, twisted creatures, with dead skin, beaks, and their skulls open, exposing the brains within.

One of them let out a monstrous roar that he would remember for all of his days.

***

Without any fanfare, the creatures attacked.  Toshi met them first, swinging his sword in a wide arc, leaving a great gash in the skin of the nearest monster.  There was no blood and it did little to stop the creature, so he struck again and again, his sword flashing like lightning.

“DIE!” Katsumi yelled, adding her axe to Toshi’s sword strikes.  With a single blow, she beheaded the monster.  Oily black fluid went flying from the stump and the head landed several feet away, but the body continued to move and fight.

There were four of the monsters all together and the one Toshi and Katsumi were fighting was by far the biggest.  Two smaller ones broke past them to attack Isamu and the princess, while the last circled around to try and get at Katsumi and Toshi from behind.

It let out a growl and struck out.  In a panic, Isamu stabbed forth with his borrowed dagger.  It left a scratch along the creature’s skin, which then immediately burst into flames along the scratch.   Had he done that?   It must have been the power of the dagger.

Princess Izumi dodged out of the way of the other’s strike, stabbing her own dagger into its hand.  From the point where she had stabbed it, ice spread out, freezing the creature’s hand solid, so that when she wrenched her dagger free, it shattered.  It let out a monstrous howl, but struck again, forcing her to take steps back.

His own foe seemed no worse for wear for the flames that appeared every time he struck it with his dagger.   All he could do, it seemed, was hold it at bay.  Thankfully, he was fleet of foot and able to dodge its blows, but he knew he could not do it forever.  Unless something changed, he would likely tire long before the monster did.

“Oooh!”  Princess Izumi let out a cry as the creature struck out with its remaining hand, tearing through her cloak and knocking her to the ground.

“Princess!” he shouted, throwing himself in front of her.  He struck out, stabbing the creature in the eye.  As he pulled the dagger back, the creature’s head burst into flames.  It let out a great roar and when he looked upon its burning face, he saw not bone and muscle under its skin, but clockworks!

“How?” he asked.  “It’s… not alive?”

Princess Izumi got her feet, standing beside him.  “Yes and also no, I think.   The clockworks augment something that was never natural to begin with.   Foul magics indeed.”

The other one had regained its senses, even as it burned.  It struck out again and this time both of them stabbed it at once.  Their daggers struck home, and flames and ice both spread along its body.   The intense heat and cold must have proved too much for it or its clockworks, because it jerked to a stop, twitching as it collapsed.

“Are you all right?” the princess asked.  Worry marred her delicate features.

“I, ah, I, I guess?” he said.  “I never really did anything like that before.  Ever.”

“Battle is never easy,” she told him.  “Even less so your first time.  But you did well.  I am just sorry I did not have time to tell you about my daggers, and even more sorry to have dragged you into this.”

“I volunteered to help,” he said.  “And it’s definitely not your fault those things are after you all…”

Speaking of…

It looked like Toshi and Katsumi had finally subdued the one she had beheaded, chopping enough of its body to keep it from moving.  The other one was bigger and slower, but it wasn’t going down from any of their strikes.  Instead, it struck out again, knocking Toshi away and sending his sword clattering from his hands.  Its follow-up blow hit Katsumi hard and it pinned her to the ground.  She tried to reach out and grab her axe, but it was just too far away.

“Katsumi!” the princess screamed.  Isamu had to restrain her to keep her from rushing forward and attacking that monster.  “Let me go!  She needs help!”

“That thing will kill you!” Isamu said.  They had been lucky with the others.  That one had beaten Toshi and Katsumi…

“Don’t worry, Izumi,” the barbarian girl said, laughing in spite of the danger she was in.  “I got this.”

And then she began to change.

***

He couldn’t see it clearly, because the monster’s bulk was in the way, but Katsumi’s skin began to ripple and her features began to stretch and distort, as crimson scales spread across her body.  Hands and feet became claws, tearing through her furred boots.  She was growing too, becoming larger and larger, the force her of growth enough to throw the monster off her.  Leathery wings sprouted from her back and her face began to elongate.

In mere moments, there was no more Katsumi, barbarian girl.

There was, instead, a crimson dragon, big enough that a man might ride it, dwarfing the monster.  But the eyes of the dragon still seemed very human and very intelligent.  The monster roared a challenge and the dragon roared one right back.   Neither seemed cowed by the other.

But the dragon kept roaring and unleashed a powerful blast of flame.  It engulfed the monster, setting it on fire.  The heat was so intense it took the beast’s flesh off, exposing the iron and other clockworks underneath.  The dragon kept the attack up, even as the clockwork monstrosity struggled to step forward, until the heat melted it into a messy puddle.

By now, Toshi had recovered.  “Katsumi!” he shouted.  “I think it’s dead!”

One of the dragon’s eyes looked upon him, then back the mess that had once been the monster.  It stopped its fiery assault and Isamu would swear it was smirking.  Then, just as suddenly as it had happened before, the dragon began to change.

“You may wish to avert your eyes,” the princess told him.

It took him a moment’s thought to realize what she meant, but as he saw scales become skin, he hastily found somewhere else to look.

“In your pack, Toshi?” Princess Izumi asked.

“Ah, yes,” Toshi replied.  “Over there… somewhere.  I can’t look right now.”

“Allow me, then,” Princess Izumi said, walking past Isamu.

There were the sounds of hushed conversations for a moment, before the princess spoke again.  “You may turn around, gentlemen.  Thank you for your patience.”

When Isamu turned around, Katsumi seemed dressed the same as she had been, though her boots were new.   He must not have been able to keep the curiosity off of his face.

“Did you think you were missing seeing me naked?” Katsumi asked, sneering.  She laughed.  “You wish.  Most people just don’t like seeing me turn back.   I’m told it isn’t pretty.  Murder on my boots though.”  She retrieved her axe and gave it a few experimental swings, which seemed to satisfy her.

His mind reeled.  How had she done that?  It was rumored that one of the last dragons served the barbarian chieftain, but how would she have inherited such power?  He had already thought her to be dangerous, but now she seemed so much more so.

“Those monsters…” Isamu began.  

“The Nomu I spoke of,” the princess said.  “And where those travel, I fear there may be more.”

More?  But if they were already this close, then could they have made it…

Isamu ran.

***

Isamu did not know how long he ran for.  At a walk, they had still been two hours out from his village.  At a run, for someone was fleet of foot as he was, it took considerably less time.  His thoughts drifted to his traveling companions, to brave Toshi, frightening Katsumi, and Princess Izumi, who had surprised him with how well she had fought and taken care of herself.  He had not meant to leave them behind like that and he hoped that they had been able to follow.

But when he came upon his village of Narahuta, his heart sank and at last his knees gave out, dropping him to the ground.  The village was aflame, many of the structures already collapsed or charred nearly beyond recognition.   The baker’s shop.  The town hall.  The church.  The… the houses…

There were three of those monstrous Nomu tearing through what few structures remained, one long-limbed and more animal-like, prowling about on all fours, one large and muscular, like one of the creatures he and his companions had fought already, and one pale and winged, with flames dancing all along its body.  He quickly ducked out of sight, behind one of the buildings still standing, one of the storehouses, and hoped that they could not see him, or worse, smell him.

It was only then, with the sounds of flames and monsters and his own breath ringing through his ears that he realized what he was not hearing.   People.   There were no sounds of people, none at all.   No cries or screams or pain or fear, not one trying to mount some kind of defense, nothing.

The people of his village were farmers and merchants and craftsmen.  There were few, if any, weapons in the village.  They would have been helpless when these monsters attacked…

But he had seen no bodies either.   No corpses sliced to ribbons, no charred skeletons, nothing.  Whatever had happened, it was as though no one had ever lived her at all.

He ran again, this time towards his home, not caring if the monsters saw him or not.  When he arrived, his hopes were quickly dashed.   Where once there had been his home, there was only ash and scorched earth.   Of his parents, there was no sign.

But there, in the middle what remained of the floor of what had once been his home, was what was clearly a trapdoor.   Strange.  He didn’t remember seeing that before.   But hadn’t there always been a rug there?   Had his parents been hiding something?  He wouldn’t have thought it possible.  He thought of his dad as one of the most honest people in the whole world.

Carefully, he crept forward and opened the trapdoor, the wood not even singed and the metal cool.  He could tell now that was closer that a protective sigil, a closed fist with a knuckleduster, had been drawn on it.  That must have been expensive.   Wandering wizards were few and far between and quite costly.  What could his parents have possibly had that was worth protecting like that?

Inside, he found a pair of gauntlets, shining and metallic, while looking remarkably flexible.  There was something about them that instantly told him they were magical.  It just raised more and more questions.   His eyes fell on a roll of parchment, perfectly preserved, and nestled between them.  Carefully, he grabbed the parchment and unrolled it.

 Son,

 If you’re seeing this, then something bad’s happened.  I’d hoped to never have to show you these.  I’d hoped that, at least, I’d have been able to give you these myself.  But sometimes, what we hope for isn’t what happens.

 What I never told you was, once upon a time, I was known as the Crawler of the Woods.  I was never a knight or a squire or a rogue or anything like that, but I did a little bit of good and I helped people. It was thanks to these gauntlets that I was able to do it.  They’ll give you the power to fight whatever evil is out there again.  They won’t be as good as some of the magical stuff they give people up at the castle or in other reaches of the kingdom, but they did some good once.  And they can again.

 No matter what happens, know that I love you and I know you’ll make me proud.

 Dad

There was no time for tears now.  It was too much to think about.   He would probably have a good cry later, when there weren’t monsters about.  Carefully, once again, he reached out and grabbed the gauntlets.  They slipped onto his hands easily, not even needing any adjustment.  The fingers were surprisingly flexible and he could swear he could see a faint blue-white glow between the joints.

“Look out, you idiot!”  A harsh voice—he realized quickly it was Katsumi’s—split the air and he looked over his shoulder just in time to see one of the Nomu coming for him.

***

Isamu rolled just in time to see the Nomu swing its massive arm and hit the ground with a ferocious impact.  It was the big one he’d seen earlier.  Reflexively, he brought up a hand to try and shield his face should its attention turn on him again.  From the palm of the gauntlet, a beam of blue-white light shot out and struck the Nomu, burning a hole right through its skin.  He could see the gears underneath and saw that some had melted and ground to a stop.

It was not nearly enough to stop it.

But it was enough to get its attention.  The Nomu pivoted and raised its arms to strike again, letting out that terrible roar that he could feel in his bones.  Isamu saw his life flash before his eyes.

No!  He couldn’t die here!  He had to find out what had happened to his parents and the people of his village!  He had to find out why his father and now he had these gauntlets.  He had to live!

“C’mon,” he hissed.   “Do it again…”   He pointed both his hands and wished with all his might that they would fire again.   Once more, blue-white beams of light lanced out and pieced the Nomu’s body, knocking it back for a moment.   He realized that he’d maybe bought himself moments at best.

 SCHLICK!

There was a sickening sound, as an axe blade split the Nomu clean in half.  As the pieces fell to either side, he saw Katsumi standing behind it.  She had a feral grin on her face and, in his opinion, it took a far too long moment for the battle lust to leave her eyes.

“I guess I should thank you for distracting it,” she said.  “Where’d you get the new toys?”

“I...  I found them,” he said.  “They were buried under my house.”

“Your house?” she snapped.  And then she looked around, as though seeing the damage for the first time.  Her expression softened by several degrees and he remembered that something had happened to the barbarian outlands.  Were her parents…?   “I’m sorry.”

She shouldered her axe and offered him a hand up.  He took it and she hauled him to his feet roughly.  “Word of advice?” she said.  She didn’t wait for him to respond.  “Any fight you don’t end up dead from is a good one.”   She gave him a slap on the back that nearly knocked him over.

“C’mon,” she added.  “Toshi and Izumi were going after the other ones.”

“And you came to save me?” he asked.

“Figured there’d be a fight,” she said.  “Don’t let it go to your head.”

The sounds of battle filled the air.  Sword against flesh, the war cries of the Nomu…

Katsumi took off towards the sounds of the fight without even looking back.

***

They arrived just in time to see Toshi’s sword fell one of the Nomu, the one that had been like a giant dog.  There were burn marks and signs of freezing, where Princess Izumi’s daggers must have struck home.   Toshi held his sword tightly, eyes darting around for signs of any further danger.  Relaxing only slightly when he was Katsumi and Isamu arrive.

“You’re all right!” he called out.  “Thank goodness!  When you took off… and then when we saw the village…”   His voice trailed off, uncertainly.

“We feared the worst,” Princess Izumi finished.  She held a dagger in each hand, looking ready to use them again if the need arose.  Where had a princess learned to fight like that?

“Sorry about that,” Isamu said, feeling guilty for having left them behind.  Fear had overtaken his heart and now that shamed him.

“I can’t blame you,” Toshi said.  “I’d probably have done the same.”

“Is your family..?” the princess began.  “We haven’t seen anyone other than you.”

He shook his head sadly.  “Gone.  My home was burned to the ground.  And there were no people, anywhere.”   He held up his hands, showing off the gauntlets.  “But I did find these.”

“They’ve got some punch,” Katsumi replied.  “Probably enchanted.”

Princess Izumi and Toshi exchanged glances.  “Do you think…?” the princess asked.

“I do,” Toshi agreed with a nod.  “Isamu… I think those were what we were meant to find.  The maps said we might find a weapon and an ally here.”

Had it meant his father?  Was he known to heroes of the realm?  “I think you’re right,” he said.  “And you’re right… you did find an ally.”

He looked around.   “There’s nothing for me here now. “

“Place is just like everywhere else,” Katsumi said, bitterly.  “When those damn things came to the outlands, there wasn’t anything left.”

“Father believed the people were not killed, but taken,” the princess said, kindly, and he realized those words were both for him and for Katsumi.   “He thought there a very good chance they are still alive.”

“If not,” Katsumi growled, “then I’m not just going to kill whoever’s behind this.  I’m going to kill them double dead!”

Isamu took a slight step further away from the scary barbarian girl.   “I hope you’re right,” he said.  “But whatever happens, I need to see this through to the end.  That is, if you’ll have me.”

“Of course,” Toshi said.  “It’s said these weapons we find can only be used by the worthy.  Those gauntlets must have chosen you.  And I can tell already, you’ve got the heart of a hero.”

“I knew it from the moment you were able to unleash the power of my Dagger of Flame,” the princess said.   “The road before us is hard, but it will be better traveled in the company of friends.”

Isamu nodded, the future stretching out before him uncertainly.  He knew not what it held, just that it would hold challenges aplenty.  But something worried him in the back of his mind…

“Wait,” he said, “there was another Nomu, with wings.  Where did it…?”

As one, the four of them looked up.  In the sky, heading towards the far distant mountains, was the last Nomu.  Even assuming Katsumi could turn into a dragon again, there was no way they could catch it.

“It would be safe to say it’s returning to its foul master,” the princess said.  “Whoever they may be… they will know what transpired here today.”

That was not an encouraging thought.  But from the way his new companions had spoken earlier, it seemed there was little encouraging these days.

“Let them,” Katsumi said.  “Let them know we’re coming for them all.”

There was great evil out there.  But perhaps, in finding his father’s gauntlets, there was some measure of hope as well.

As for whether or not hope could turn back darkness…  That was a story for another day.

[bedlamhammer]

Fun and Games

All areas of the Last City were not equal in her eyes. While she disliked being in the designated Vanguard section of the wall near where the remains of the old Tower stood, she greatly enjoyed being in the city itself. It gave her time to check in with people she knew, many of whom she had escorted to the City personally. She kept her helmet on, mostly to avoid the exhaustion of having to explain to everyone why a Lightbearer had scars on her face, but it currently wasn't sealed against the atmosphere and allowed her to detect the odors of the street level bazaar around her. Most of the food smells were pleasant, though occasionally she would catch a whiff of excessively strong curry from one of the stalls at the far end of the area or the stench of some unwashed individual.

It was as she passed by a small bookstore that she spotted them. A group of teens huddled around a table that was far too small for their number, talking animatedly and gesturing and laughing. She couldn't hear them through the window, but curiosity got the better of her anyway and she slipped inside. Murdoch didn't exactly take up a lot of space, even with her Titan-esque armor, so it was easy to maneuver the disorganized bookshelves to get closer.

“Alright. The gremlins are advancing on your caravan, so everyone roll initiative!” The voice was familiar, feminine, but she didn't have the speaker in sight just yet. The sound of dice rolling across the table mixed with several thoughtful murmurs, shuffling paper and a couple groans of disappointment before the voice continued. “I saw that, Mick. What was that?”

“A one. I rolled a one.” The voice belonging to Mick replied with a snort. The mechanical echo told Murdoch Mick was an exo.

“That's a shame. You have no clue what everyone else is panicking about, you're still half buried in the back of the wagon thanks to Boga the goblin.” Laughter followed. “Everyone else, get ready to fend off a gremlin ambush.”

Murdoch and her ghost exchanged a look before they stepped around the corner made by two bookshelves coming together. The group was a mix of human and awoken, with a trio of exos. Most of them were focused on the table, which held some sort of board that looked like it was supposed to be a model of a valley, complete with a river and a couple trees. Small figurines were arranged across the board to represent the gremlin ambush and the caravan. The girl at the head of the tiny table looked up as Murdoch was examining them, and her face lit up. “Murdoch!”

No wonder the first voice had been familiar. Murdoch hadn't seen Hannah since the onset of the Red War. She had escorted the girl's father, then a young boy, and grandparents to the Last City many years ago. Hannah's father was killed in the Red War defending Murdoch from a pair of warbeasts when she had lost her Light. The memory made the Lightbearer's chest tighten briefly before she spoke. “Look at you, kid. You've grown up a bit since the Legion got kicked out,” Murdoch said, grinning under her helmet. “What's this here?”

“It's a game!” Hannah beamed. Several of her group eyed Murdoch warily, but the girl didn't seem to notice. “We're pretending to be adventurers on a quest to deliver an artifact to a king. Do you want to play?”

Murdoch cocked her head to the side as Sybil floated by her shoulder. She could see the reluctance on the faces of several people. “I'm afraid I'm terrible at pretending. If it's alright, I'll just watch.”

“That's weird, dad used to tell all kinds of stories of you entertaining people back at Ridgevale. He said you were pretty good at improv.”

“I think he embellished a little, if you ask me.” That was a lie. Murdoch had, on occasion, helped to lighten the spirits of the people she and several other Lightbearers protected by performing small acts. Those had been good times. “I'll watch. I don't know how this sort of game works, anyway.”

It didn't take long. Each player had a little figure that represented their character, and they either acted out or narrated their actions in the scenario. Dice rolls determined how well or how badly they did actions. Hannah was the storyteller, in a way, and was responsible for the actions and rolls of everything the group encountered. By sundown, the players had successfully reached the castle the king lived in with the artifact still in their position. Miraculously, no one's character died.

“Are you here in the City for long?” Hannah asked as she and Murdoch made their way down the street towards her family's apartment building.

“We're here for a while. After spending a few months working between Mars and the Reef, we could use the vacation.” Sybil answered for them. She hadn't spoke while Hannah's group of friends were still present, but now that it was just the three of them, she was more talkative. “I have to ask. Why do you all crowd around such a tiny table? They don't have anything bigger?”

“Not since the Red War. The bookstore owner gave their old table up to help the resistance here, and they've been using these tiny little tables ever since. They can't afford a replacement just yet.”

“That's unfortunate.” Murdoch stopped in front of the structure Hannah had lead them to. It bore battle damage from the Legion's occupation, but repairs had been started on the southern wall. This building was luckier than most. “Your game seems like fun, at least. If a bit crowded.”

“It is, but it's still fun. I'm sorry about how they acted towards you. We don't get to see too many Lightbearers down here, not even the Guardian sort.” Hannah shrugged as she ascended the building's short staircase towards the door. “But I'm sure they'd warm up to you, if you want to come back next week.”

Murdoch considered that for a moment. “When?”

“Every Friday. We start around midday, and go till the sun's down behind the mountain.”

“I'll think about it. Tell your family I'll come visit later, and Joran and Zaeya send their regards.”

⸶⸸⸷

She had the table delivered halfway through the week, before Hannah and her friends held their next game. It wasn't fancy, but it was solid and bigger than the little card table they had been using. The shop owner tried repeatedly to repay her, saying that the table would be used by more than just kids playing games, and Murdoch declined it each time. The store had given up one table, she had explained, and it was only right that it get a new one.

When she returned that Friday, everyone else had already arrived and was setting up. Hannah patted a chair next to hers, ignoring the wary looks given to her. “We've got a guest today! I've known her my whole life, like most of the rest of my family. She and my dad were real good friends.” After an awkward silence, one awoken teen finally came forward and welcomed Murdoch, and the introductions quickly commenced before Murdoch sat down to set up her character for the session.

“So, hold on. You want to be a merchant?” Mick asked incredulously. “Just a merchant? Not a mage, or a barbarian, or even a cleric?”

“Nope. Just a merchant.”

“That's not near as exciting as a warrior or paladin.”

Murdoch peered at Mick as she fidgeted with the little horned figurine in her hand. It was supposed to be her in this game, and Hannah had pointed out the horns on her helmet almost matched the ones on the model. “It might not be exciting to you, but I've spent the last couple hundred years or so being a warrior and fighting monsters. Being a trader sounds pretty good to me.” She watched the thoughtful expressions that crossed several faces, and so it was agreed she would be the proud minotaur owner of a shop.

Over the several hours that the game's session lasted, the questers encountered cut-purses and a mind controlled mob before reaching Murdoch's pretend shop. Her part in the game was small, but by the time she had nearly cleaned each of the other characters out of most of their money (and, sadly, had to sell a very nice magical weapon for almost nothing because of a bad dice roll) before seeing them off to the castle itself, Murdoch found herself smiling. At the end of the session, the artifact was delivered to the king and everyone was able to continue on for their next adventure.

“So how'd you like your first ever roleplay game?” Hannah was asking as she and a few others helped to clean the store up before it closed. “Did you enjoy it?”

“I kind of did, actually. It seems like a fun way to pass an afternoon.”

“Then you're going to love this.” Mick held out something out to her, wrapped in paper. It was a book, and a fairly thick one at that. “It's the latest edition book for the game. Goes over classes and races, skills, the whole bit.”

Murdoch hesitated, book in hand. “You're giving me this? You're sure?”

“Sure am. Just promise me you're going to be something more interesting than a trader.”

“Hahah! Alright, that's fair. You've got a deal.”

[c-is-for-circinate]

Ok, if I’m going to keep proper DM records for D&D on this tumblr, I need to actually write them.

Being An Account of Game #1: In Which Several Youth Attend A Party, And Some Experimental Magic Has Less Than Optimal Results

[all game logs thus far]

The Setting:  It is a Thursday night in the city of Karna Vi, called by many the last surviving bastion of the Trava Empire in Highnorth.  In the mostly student-inhabited districts around the University Karnassa, scholars are working, resting, eating, hanging out--and having parties.

More excitingly, there’s a classics major party tonight.  And it’s not just any classics majors.  It’s the self-styled Young Pre-Glorians.  In a society mostly built on a relatively even mix of human, gnome, and dwarf citizens, where humans are the unnecessarily tall people who don’t live nearly long enough to ever get really good at rulership or scholarship (though gods know you won’t find a more versatile, intense group of people in any species you can name), this little cluster of classics majors includes two humans, two tieflings, and a half-orc, all living in one slightly shabby student apartment.  Every single one of them is going to be dead before they’re a hundred.  Every single one of them is obsessed with figuring out how things worked at least 2000-4000 years ago.  And they party like it.

Our NPC hosts for the evening include Peary (a bubblegum-pink tiefling who makes historically accurate bathtub gin, and reconstructs ancient crafting methods from diary fragments and scraps, and den-mothers all the rest of her roommates with constantly chipper affection); Athenasi (or Athen, a human cleric of the Church of Lost Things made entirely out of sticks and paleness, who buries himself in ancient records trying to reconstruct the specific rituals used to properly worship long-mislaid gods); Riva (an enormous half-orc sportsball player and also wizard who mostly only bothers using spells to light his bonfires and translate dead languages, intent on uncovering the distant origins of magic as written ritual); Lisha (a human who got briefly campus-notorious last year when she reconstructed an ancient power-binding ritual well enough to actually summon an archdemon who hasn’t been seen in three millennia and somewhat incidentally get herself warlock powers); and Wren (a dark-skinned, gray-haired tiefling who knows very nearly everything there is to know about the politics and power struggles spanning half a continent and seven centuries, 5,000 years ago, and does not particularly care to know anything else).

These five like hands-on experimentation and practical research.  They’ve thrown historically-accurate parties in celebration of a dozen ancient forgotten holidays, with Peary’s bathtub gin to really make it work.  There’s rumors about an invitational-only orgy last year.  In short, their parties are the place to be if you’re the kind of nerd who likes to study hard and party harder.  Which...does not quite describe our PCs, but it’s a fun party to be at anyway.

Marion the human paladin has spent enough afternoons pouring through ancient records with fellow church acolyte Athen that they can’t really turn down the invite, even if Athen’s insistence on “you need to talk to other live people more than once a week!” is ridiculous and hyperbolic anyway.  Kevin the elf barbarian has been a cornerstone of the University sportsball team for ten years straight, and would never turn down a party invite from a teammate, let alone a party that looks as promising as this one.  Kou the halfling bard, who spends so much time with the music-majors half the university forgets she isn’t one, got invited along with her bard friends to be the entertainment.  

Gnome rogue Reigenleif, of course, is the beer supply.  Reigenleif is always the beer supply.

It’s a Thursday night, and a four-bedroom apartment with attached rooftop deck is crowded full of graduate students eating cheese, drinking a dozen different kinds of alcohol, and arguing about history.  Life is, for the moment, good.

The Hooks:

One by one, each of our PCs--vaguely familiar to one another, in a nodding-acquaintance sort of way, though nothing like the friends they’ll be by the end of the week, let alone the eventual end of this campaign--finds themselves tugged into conversation with an acquaintance.

First (in-game time, though we played these way out of order thanks to a handy d4), before the party even begins, Reigenleif heads down into Old Town to pick up some beer.  It’s one neighborhood over from the district of ancient, pre-Imperial ruins and thousand-year-old buildings where the University and its denizens live, so most students don’t know to come this far for good, cheap beer in the first place.  (Of course, even if they did they wouldn’t know to go where Reigenleif’s going.)

Her destination is a small bakery owned by two dwarven brothers and a sister.  Out the front, they sell excellent bread, with a very nice additional line in cakes and cupcakes.  Out the back, the middle dwarven brother Milosh acts as middle management for a smuggling ring that’s known in the right, quiet corners for its ability to get just about anything for anyone, given the right place.  Reigenleif runs errands on his say-so on weekends, in between avoiding her own research and helping out with everybody else’s.  Buying a few kegs of decent ale that hasn’t been marked up for tax, and then reselling it to thirsty college students, has basically been paying her rent for the past two years.

“How’s the family?” Milosh asks, and, “how’s that school thing going?”

“Eh,” says Reigenleif, and, “school’s school,” and, “parents still want me to go straight,” which isn’t even a pun because every player at the table is so generally disinterested in heteronormativity that it’s too easy to even bother with.

“You know,” Milosh says, “you really want to do more of this and less of that, could be Anna’s got a job for you.”

Anna’s not a real person--she’s been the code name for the leader of the smuggling ring for over a century, and given that her so-called last name literally means ‘human’, probably if there ever was a real Anna Cheloveko, she’s long dead now.  An Anna job might be hard, but it’ll pay, and then some.

The job, Milosh explains, isn’t too complicated.  There’s a certain package that needs to get to the city of Ormiras, and then past Ormiras a week or so’s travel up into the local mountains.  The contents of the package don’t matter, but with the strictures on the large industrial teleportation circles downtown, it’s unlikely to pass through without comment.  A University student, on the other hand, looking to do some research in the library of another University, could use one of their teleportation circles without anybody raising an eyebrow at their research materials, now, couldn’t they?  Grab a few friends to head with you up into the mountains, and when you come back down, there’d definitely be a job waiting--back here in Karna Vi, or with some of Anna’s friends in Ormiras.

(Reigenleif and her player go on a digression about bags of holding, immovable rods, and other magical items attempting to pass through teleportation circles, and then the potential of measuring continental drift with immovable rods over a long enough period of time.  Milosh raises his eyebrows and wonders if maybe Reigenleif should stick with those University-types after all.  This is about to prove extremely indicative of Reigenleif’s entire character.)

With that offer in mind, Reigenleif heads off, six kegs of ale for thirsty college students in hand.  This would be tricky for the average human, let alone a three-foot gnome, but Milosh lets her borrow the Bag of Holding for the job.  It’s no real risk.  He knows where Reigenleif lives.  He knows where her parents live.  She’s good for it.

Second, an hour or two into the swing of the party, Kevin and Riva are out on the roof deck supervising a cluster of increasingly tipsy party guests as they climb onto each others’ shoulders and attempt to joust with a couple of sportsball sticks.  The pair of them are taller than any two gnomes stacked together.  They are taller than nearly any gnome on top of any dwarf here.  They are taller than most double-stacked dwarves.  They make good referees.

They’re cleaning up some good-natured bruises and spilled beer when Kevin’s friend Poppy finds him.  She’s a half-elf, and barely as tall as his bicep.  She has dark curly hair, and smudged-up makeup, and she is already drunk.

“Kevin,” she says.  “Kevin, Kevin, look.  Can I ask you a favor?  Can I beg you a favor?  Please?”

Poppy is in Kevin’s cohort in the art history department--they started with the same incoming class, ten years ago.  You don’t really graduate out of university, in the Nine Cities.  You study until you get hired into a professorship or government position, or you run out of money, take a lesser job, and quit.  Poppy’s dad is an elf, with plenty of resources to throw in her general direction.  She hasn’t run out of money yet.  Ten years is a lot longer for a half-elf like Poppy than it is for Kevin.

Poppy says, “if I don’t do something big, I will never get hired, ever.  I will never amount to anything.”  She says, “I know there are Glorian-era ruins on the Iris Peninsula that haven’t been found.  I know there’s something there.”  She says, “I know there are elven aesthetic motifs in Glorian-era Irissan fragments.  Seven hundred years before elves ever made it to this continent.  If I go, I can prove it.  It will matter.  It will mean something.”

“You grew up on Iris,” she says.  “And you’re good at hitting things.  Right?”

It’s been 512 years since the Elven Ascendancy broke their isolation and sailed forth into the world for the first time in six millennia.  Five centuries since the very first elves set foot on the continent of Nokomoris.  The Glorian Empire conquered half the Iris Peninsula, and was driven out, and collapsed, a thousand years ago.  Not a single soul under Glorian rule had ever even heard of elves.  And sure, elves live on the Iris Peninsula now--in the cities, like proper elves, in shining tall buildings with a lovely background view of the tangled wilderness where they never, ever go.  Elvish art in Glorian-era ruins?  It would upend everything anybody knew about history.  It would be huge.

“It would probably make my parents really happy if I tried to do a big art history thing instead of focusing on sportsball so much,” Kevin muses.  “Sure, I know people.  We can probably put an expedition together.  I bet my parents would be happy with that.”

(Kevin and his player do sound enthusiastic about the idea of getting some good research and publishable papers, which tells this DM a lot I didn’t already know about his priorities.  Sure, he likes sportsball, but getting an actual job in art history would make his parents happy.  Kevin says ‘that would probably make my parents happy’ like it’s the only long-term life goal he’s ever bothered assuming he probably needs.)

Third, Kou and her band take a set break.

Lio’s been switching between singing and rocking out on the zither, because even in a cluster of bards, Lio makes a good frontwoman.  She’s a tall dwarf, dark hair, dark clothes, dark eyeliner, dark everything.  She’s a star in the music department, a cornerstone of student activities committees, a manic pixie overachiever, a goth anarchist who knows exactly what’s wrong with the world today, the artificial urban-wilderness divide that’s been imposed on society in the new century, the problems of traditional religion and modern capitalism.  She’s a level 3 bard.  She’s got a townie boyfriend in one of the local guilds who doesn’t mind when she makes out with boys, girls, and everything else on offer at parties.  She is, without question, the coolest person Kou knows.

Lio is drinking water and also taking a couple of shots of Peary’s bathtub liquor, and Kou is hanging out and watching the party, and Lio sighs.

“You want to get out of here?” she asks.  “Not tonight, I mean--the whole University conspiracy.  Just go.”

“Yes,” Kou says, instantly on board without a single detail.  Her girlfriend has been gone for three weeks.  Her body is ready.  Her entire everything is ready.  “When?  Where’re we going?”

“We could totally make it as bandits out by Zakri,” Lio says.  “You know they’ve been doing all kinds of weird construction stuff along the main road between the two seas, trying to restart the canal project, and the main road’s been in shambles for months.  I have a total plan.  We could camp out along one of the smaller roads and take out caravans, be bandits, live like queens.  It’d be great.”

“Yes,” Kou says again.  “Absolutely.  I’m in.  I know some healing stuff, and I have a pocketknife.  Let’s do it.”

(Kou asks precisely zero questions about where, or how, or why, or even who, for the entire conversation.  I knew this would be the case by halfway through session 0, and I am delighted to be proven right.  Kou is ready for absolutely everything and absolutely nothing.  It’s going to be great.)

“Hmm, but we’d probably need more people,” Lio muses, in that way people do when they remember all the practical reasons they’re mostly joking about quitting their job and running away to live in the woods.  “Unless you know how to use a sword.”

“I know some people!” Kou says.  “Let me see who I can talk to.  We can totally do this.”

Fourth, Athen takes a break from circling around the party with an eye out for any serious injuries or alcohol poisoning risk to find Marion in the kitchen, eating cheese and arguing about historical probability and textual interpretation with Wren.  They’re having just about as much fun as an antisocial math nerd with a special interest in history can have at a party full of academics who also have a special interest in history--which is kind of a lot, come to think of it.

The party is loud and boisterous, so they head to Athen’s tiny closet of a bedroom to chat.  There’s something he needs to talk about, and Marion’s a good enough friend to listen.

“So you’ve been talking about doing some fieldwork,” Athen says.  “Have you thought about going west?”

Athen’s family lives west of Karna Vi, in the wide highland plains of the Highnorth, where there’s nothing for miles but cattle, a few sheep, a lot of rye and oats, and the occasional potato field.  In his grandfather’s day, they were part of the Trava Empire, and that was fine.  Theoretically their village doesn’t belong to anyone but themselves, now, and they farm as best they can, and sell what surplus they can at the closest big trade-town to someone who carts it into Karna Vi and sells it to city bakers and and housewives and leatherworkers, and it’s fine too, mostly, except for when it’s not.

Lately it’s not, so much.  The Uvencatra Empire in the western mountains has been making some motions towards marching eastward across the plains, and they’re eyeing the region Athen’s family is from next.  He’s concerned.  He’s really concerned.  He’s maybe about to drop out of school concerned.

“You know how to fight things,” Athen says.  “And maybe you’d find things over there, in the Western Orthodox church records.  I can go home and help heal people, but I don’t know how to protect them.”

“Oh, I am not the right member of my family for this,” Marion frets, and Athen frowns.

“Would any of the rest of them care?” he asks.

“Point,” Marion agrees.

(They’ve got a quiet monotone the whole time, slow to assemble sentences except when they start contemplating the actual possibilities of research within the Uvencatra Orthodox churches, spilling out hypotheses and jargon like water.  Marion’s player has degrees in anthropology.  Marion cares about Athen’s problems, but has no real thoughts about them.  Marion has thoughts about historical research.)

“Let me think about it,” Marion says, and the party goes on.

The Fight

By dawn, most of the party has cleared out, though not quite all of it.  A couple of failed Con saves mean that Kou is dozing in a chair in the living room, not quite with it enough to notice the rest of the band leaving, and Marion is passed out cold in Athen’s bed alone.  Reigenleif has spent most of the party hanging off to the side, watching people and occasionally scooping up anything that appears to maybe be a weapon that’s been carelessly left sitting around, tucking it into the Bag of Holding just to make sure this party doesn’t go sideways in a nasty way; she can’t leave until the kegs are given back over into her keeping, so she might as well help clean up.

Kevin, out on the deck, has not actually realized the party has ended yet.  He’s only just beginning to notice the lack of people as the first rays of sunlight creep over the city, and a very loud bang sounds from the top of the roof.

It jolts Kou dozily awake and Marion tumbles onto the floor in an instant.  Kevin and Reigenleif, already outside along with Riva, look up just in time to see the outlines of Wren and Lisha on the roof in the pale morning sun, alongside some billowing smoke and two cat-sized things skittering along the roof tiles in acid green.

Then Wren falls off the roof to the deck and takes so much damage in a ten-foot fall that her scrawny little NPC self ends up unconscious.  Then combat begins.

There’s a flutter and a flurry as the quasits on the roof hiss at everyone and skitter away.  Initiative is nobody’s friend, and fighting something ten feet above everyone’s head isn’t easy, but Reigenleif upends her entire bag of holding and sends a pile of belt knives, a couple of blunt-ended reproduction historical weapons, and a fancy letter opener skittering out over the desk, and hides behind a convenient barrel.  Riva grabs a sportsball stick.  Kou has enough movement to rush out onto the deck just in time to see Lisha fall; “Oh, fuck!” is now the official incantation for her Healing Word, and Wren is safe, although not very happy.

Kevin tries to intimidate the quasits, all six-foot-seven of burly elf growling directly at them, and it actually works on one.  The intimidated quasit instantly turns into a bat and swoops off through an open window into the living room to Get Away.  The other quasit, annoyed at the attempt, casts Fear on Kevin in retaliation.  It is super effective.

Marion makes it out to the living room, wearing no armor but carrying the heaviest candlestick she could grab, just in time to see an acid-green bat swoop through the window and start destroying things.  It’s very early and she is probably slightly hungover but also she’s a good researcher and knows what a quasit looks like, so she whacks it.  It bites her, poison and all--make that definitely pretty hungover.

Athen made it outside around the same time as Kou, and has been trying to heal people who need it as Riva tries to whack at a tiny demon on his roof, Kevin attempts to cower behind a gnome, and Reigenleif and Kou both throw things.  Kevin succeeds in a wisdom save after another round or two, and manages to do some good thwacking damage.  The quasit turns into a foot-long centipede in an attempt to escape, and skitters along the wall through the door into the house, before Kou Cutting Words’s it to death.

Lisha tries to jump off the roof to get down and help, and sprains her ankle.  Athen is already inside giving Marion a hand, and none of the PCs seem inclined to help.

Between Marion and Athen, the second quasit goes down relatively quickly.  The first one has already disappeared into nothingness, and the second one follows soon behind.  Marion lay-on-hands’es themself, and drinks some water, because they have utterly forgotten that quasits have venom at all and damn, this hangover.  The nauseous feeling passes after a minute or so, anyway.  Athen goes outside to heal Lisha, Peary appears from her own room wanting to know what the hell is going on out here, Kou is jumping between ‘I insulted it and it died and I’m real cool!’ and, ‘did my entire band just ditch me here because I fell asleep?’, and everything is equally as chaotic as it was in the middle of the fight, when the knock sounds on the door.

The Head of Campus Housing brought security with him, and he’s not happy.

The Aftermath

Marion pulls rank and some excellent persuasion checks to keep the entire set of Young Pre-Glorians from getting evicted right now, and everybody else in the room from being put on housing probation.  Marion lives with their parents on the other side of the city, or, more accurately, in the library--housing probation doesn’t mean much to them, but it does matter to everyone else.

Lisha, apparently, was attempting to use the limnal nature of sunrise, sitting over a party that both was and was not a party any longer, with people below who were drunk, and dreaming, and no longer drunk, on a day of particular celestial configuration, to do some magic experimentation, because obviously.  Wren wanted a familiar.  Lisha could totally use a ritualistic setup to cast a spell she isn’t high enough level for and doesn’t actually know, and also alter it to bind to somebody that isn’t even her, and make it work.  Maybe not today, but probably next time, right?

The PC’s are somewhat annoyed with Lisha, but also agree that the university just does not have enough ritual magic experimentation labs, and that really needs to be corrected.  They also figure that, housing probation or no, it’s maybe not a bad time to get out of town for a bit.  They’re good at fighting things together!  They’ve got some options!

They toss some ideas around--Kou’s option involves banditry, and Marion’s pretty sure they’re not allowed to do that, but Reigenleif’s has, like, three weeks in the mountains, and that sounds pretty awful too.  Athen and Poppy both need help, and they’re both friends--Kou doesn’t care where they go, and Reigenleif is up for whatever sounds interesting.  Poppy’s research trip sounds like a good way to make the university like them, which after this display might be particularly useful.

In the end, the decision comes down to Marion, who’s happy to help people but is mostly only considering either of these treks as a road to more god-research, to help define the variables to determine the maximum number of gods the Church of Lost Things still has to discover.  There’s a western orthodox church in the Uvencatra Empire, out past where Athen’s family lives, and they could have all sorts of records and knowledge that Marion doesn’t...but nobody knows what the hell is going on in the Iris Peninsula.  The entire place is apparently a forest, and that means people don’t travel it much for some reason?  It’s all sort of unclear and difficult to understand from this side of the continent.  So what the heck, Poppy’s thing it is.

Poppy is somewhat taken aback to be woken up slightly hungover at 10 AM by Kevin and also a random human knocking on her dorm room door to tell her that yes, they and two other people she’s never met are in for her expedition, and also can they leave tomorrow please?  But also sure.  Why not.  These things happen when you ask Kevin for help.  She’ll talk to her advisor to push those expedition grant funds through, and they’ll leave on Monday.  Maybe let’s have lunch or dinner this afternoon?  After Kevin and Marion sleep?

Reigenleif, meanwhile, takes Kou along to return the bag of holding and empty kegs to Milosh, in the hopes that having a highly charismatic good-persuasion bard along might just increase their chances of persuading Milosh to let them keep the Bag of Holding for this journey.  Little does she know that, while Kou is fun and delightful and good at persuasion, she’s also an awkward flailer who doesn’t entirely understand what they’re supposed to be convincing Milosh of in the first place, and has no proficiency in deception whatsoever.

The conversation stumbles and bobbles a bit, before Reigenleaf gets to the meat of the situation: they’re not going to Ormiras, but does Anna maybe need something delivered or picked up from another of the Nine Cities?  Perhaps something on Iris?  Like, say...

“Cloud Bay,” Reigenleif says, naming the only city on the Iris Peninsula she can remember at 7 AM on zero sleep, which is unfortunately not the same one Poppy mentioned to Kevin earlier.

“Cloud Bay?” Milosh says.  “Shitty weather and elves?  What’re you going there for?”

In an attempt to leverage her higher Deception score over Persuasion, Reigenleif starts to spin a relatively believable lie about engineering research and her own degree work.  Unfortunately, she doesn’t roll particularly well.  More fortunately, or perhaps more unfortunately still, Milosh doesn’t actually care ‘why Cloud Bay’, aside from as a rhetorical question, so it’s not particularly useful in any case.

“Look,” Milosh says.  “Let me talk to Anna about Cloud Bay.  Check back in tomorrow or Sunday, maybe we have a job for you there, maybe not.  A’right?”

They snag a couple of muffins on the way out.  Kou feels a little useless, but so be it.  Marion crashes in Kevin’s room, since he just needs a corner to meditate in anyway, and everyone naps until the meet-with-Poppy time in the evening.

The Campaign Plan

Poppy is just a little taken aback at the new crew she seems to’ve acquired, but she’s ready to go and they’re game, so, sure.  Let’s do this.

She elaborates a little on what she told Kevin, in some angles, and says less in others.  The Glorian Empire, as some of the party know better than others, stretched out from here in Karna Vi across most of the Attiks Sea and around the continent.  They sped the civilization in the Midlands, they spread the Eight Churches throughout the continent, they founded cities, they built roads.  They founded Port Charé on the coast of the heavily-forested Iris Peninsula and began to build in, cutting trees and building roads and forts and towns as they went.  Kera the Conqueror, famed emperor, oversaw the expansion across easily half of Iris, naming literally everything after himself as he went.

Iris was hard to conquer, and the Empire began to pull out not long after Kera died.  They left ruins and roads, and the people of Port Charé, who’d lived in this city for two centuries at this point and were not about to move back to the other side of the sea, even if this was going to be the only bastion of civilization for a thousand miles.  There was a working road to Ormiras.  They’d manage.

As for those ruins, deep into Iris--who knows what’s there?

Sober and in front of three strangers, Poppy doesn’t say anything about pre-Elven Incursion elven aesthetics.  It doesn’t really matter, because Kevin told everybody everything, but some things are just too historically improbable to admit you believe.

“So,” says Poppy.  “Are you in?  I can get grant funds and our travel paperwork Monday morning.  We circle into Port Charé and follow the roads as far as they go.  I have an old map, Imperial-era.  We can find things nobody’s seen in hundreds of years.”

The party doesn’t need to ask each other.  They’re in.  They all know they’re in.

Six months on an archaeological expedition in a forest for four city kids, three of whom have never seen anything more than a single ten-acre orchard in their lives?

Oh yeah.  Total piece of cake.

[morrithal]

Please, please. I require more Magnus Archives and Critical Role cross-over content. Didn’t realize how good this mash-up would be until that ask of yours. 😭✨

Alright yall let’s do it. I’m going to put it under the cut because I’m going to do both TMA-in-CR and CR-in-TMA because that’s who I am as a person

Also it’s very important to me that you know that @trashprinxe is homebrewing custom Warlock patrons based on the 14 fears and I’m shook

Very important to this crossover is the fact that I think that there are a lot of parallels between the Cobalt Soul and the Archives. They’re both very knowledge-based, employ spies, keep records, and most importantly try to keep corrupt powers in check.

Listen. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, but Jon Sims is a wizard who studied his ass off, wondered why his magic was acting weird, and then realized that he accidentally became a warlock. Very inconvenient. Also he’s a wood elf.

Martin Blackwood has POWERFUL hobbit energies. I don’t really get very strong class energies off of him to start, so he’s lowkey an NPC who accidentally became a party member. Also Blackwood is already a fantasy name and I just can’t get over that.

Basira (half-elf) and Daisy (human) are oathbreaker paladins who were meant to be upholding the law against these patrons but that kind of… all went to shit, didn’t it?

Basira is going to multiclass her way out of this mess if it’s the last thing she does

Melanie is a dwarven ranger who multiclasses as barbarian. It just feels right in my heart. Listen, I know rangers sort of fall under the Hunt category rather than the Slaughter (and Daisy is definitely also a ranger) but ghost hunting is a viable ranger career, okay??

Tim is a tiefling who chose his last name (Stoker) to reflect his habit of upping the ante on situations (like “stoking the flames”) but literally no one gets it and he’s honestly a little grumpy about it.

The Magnus Archives is an institute based in Zadash, but features satellite locations across the empire. While they don’t deal so much with magical beasts, they do record instances regarding otherworldly beings with the intent of understanding and keeping tabs on them. Of course, why wouldn’t the Great Old Ones take notice?

Georgie Barker says Fuck Magic. She’s a rogue with a familiar because Fuck Magic Rules.

AAAAAAND Critrole in London!! I can’t really see them working for the Archives, but Beau has big archival assistant energies so she’s mostly their correspondent, if that makes sense?

Listen. I know I said that Uk’otoa is a stand-in for the Buried in this post but honestly?? The eye imagery is kind of throwing me off. So straight up the Falchion is straight up a sword that Fjord has and it’s influenced by both the Beholding and the Buried

The Cobalt Soul is still a library, but it also doubles as an archives ruled somewhat by the Beholding. It has given Beau the ability to analyze her enemies and compel truth Jon-style, but she’s not super happy about it.

It’s very easy to say that Caleb is tied to the Desolation, but more than the fire thing I think he has a deep connection to destruction on a personal and inter-personal level. So, Desolation.

It literally cannot be clearer to me that Jester is an avatar of the Stranger and she SUPER digs it. The only thing keeping her from going Full Monster honestly is her love for her friends

Molly seems very The Hunt to me, not just by virtue of being a blood hunter but also in the sense that he’s running from something unknown. I get the vibe that in this AU Molly had a run-in with the hunt years ago, but now finds himself tied to it. He also has powerful Web energies.

I struggled with Nott but in some ways she seems very The Lonely to me. She’s isolated from her past in a way that very much affects her present, and it’s interesting to me that the Lonely seems to attach itself to individuals, if that makes sense? I’m not saying Nott has claimed Caleb as Her Person because of the Lonely’s influence but it definitely helped.

Yasha “Orphan Maker” Nydoorin as a quiet and controlled but still massively dangerous avatar of the Slaughter HELLO???

Caduceus just thinks the Corruption is neat

[ghosty-schnibibit]

finally found time to listen to the first ep of graduation and holy shit!!! i love it so much!!!!! liveblog below ^u^

so i’ve stayed off tumblr for the last five days to avoid any spoilers and damn it was both hard and worth the wait, i am so hype for the rest of this season!!! i think this may be the longest liveblog i’ve ever done so apologies in advance to mobile users if the readmore doesn’t work.

oh dang! starting off with narration!

newa? oh cool we're not in faerun

“a blessing of unicorns” travis i am in love with your world already

loving the spookiness of the place names

trav i love it but this is so much lore so quickly bud i've had to pause to take notes like three times

"and our deaths become all but inevitable" jesus travis

i am so excited, this is going to be so much fun

this music is giving me such dreamworks vibes

AND A CAT :D

SPECTRAL CAT :O

and here's the other three boys!

griffin is getting out years of dm saltiness and i love it

a handsome half elf boy, neat

agro keen! nice name clint

his voice is like griffin put artemis sterling and indrid in a blender

sir fitzroy maplecourt, i love him already

clint no, i am too a ace for this

water genasi, that sounds fun

i cannot wait to see the fanart of this dude, he sounds so pretty

"you had me until the mustashe" same griffy, same

JUSTIN THIS CANNOT BE THE VOICE YOU USE FOR THE WHOLE CAMPAIGN, JUSTIN W H Y

clint started off vaguely crunchy and veered right into ned

this is untenable justin

just throwing this out there, just purely based on the voices, i think fitzroy is my fave so far

oh fun! like caduceus 

"that's an absolute unit!" mood

i need art of this dude so bad

... so the same name you gave the nitpicker lol

GARY THE GARGOYLE

fitzroy you precious baby boy

oh god this is bringing back memories

"what is a bunked bed?" says griffin 'every fantasy world i create contains elevators' mcelroy

"there is no shame in this" what does that mean justin

fitzroy is my sweet boy and i love him so much, my wee aristocratic dipshit

nice! 17 for the first roll of the campaign!

huh, nice! i like this mechanic

clint ilu

you mentioned maps in the ttazz trav, give me the maps

loving the verb usage lol

oh god its hagrid

i'm loving bud more and more each time he talks

"that's groundsy's place" that's where groundsy hides the bodies of students who displease him

ARGO WTF ARE YOU DOING

"both in different ways" dang

barn and battleground side... this sounds fun

does fitzroy want to be a knight? i love this

love the use of the word smooshed

hippocamp? oooooh horse mermaid, fun

BABY :D

nice, that sounds cool as hell

TRAVIS HOW HAVE YOU MADE ME CRY, THIS IS LITERALLY THE FIRST EP AND I'M LITERALLY IN TEARS OVER THIS BABY

y'know what, his voice has grown on me

justin you are crushing this entire scene and i love it

we're already getting some foreshadowing here and i am loving it

oh this music is so choice

YEAAAH first competent woman of the arc! :D

nice, go argo

"oooh, you're sir fitzroy" why does my boy have a reputation already

did my boy get kicked out of the hero tract without knowing it???

is he crying?????

"i had my feelings hurt by a strong man" b a b y  b o y

who's the asshole?

argo my sweet sarcastic boy

oh fun, new npc buddies :D

i'm getting some wicked malfoy vibes from this guy

argo is being a dick but in a very deserved way

travis was not kidding about the sheer volume of npcs, holy shit, i'm only about 45 minutes in and i think that's seven different npcs with names and distinct personalities

oh fun! fantasy wheelchair 0u0

make that ten named npcs

his full name is argonaut, cool!

i am so excited for her holy shit, i need to draw every single pc and npc but i want to draw her the most, i love her so much

fitzroy is a dipshit and i love him

ooooh i get it now, so it's almost more like an acting school, i am digging this setting so much trav

damn that is confident

... are they the only ones clapping?

higglemis is such a mood

justin ilu holy shit

i love leon so much already, he's so soft spoken and sweet

"you would not survive that" fair call lol

griffin no you're going to destroy me with second hand embarrassment

what are you doing fitzroy my dumb dumb boy

"i'm in heck" g r i f f i n

oh my sweet summer child. oh my poor baby :(

yes, what is your class my sweet failure boy

so he's a wizard boy, love it

thank you for trying bud ilu

f i t z r o y  2

druid boy!

rouge buddies :D

so we've got a druid, a wizard, and a rouge, nice balance, a little heavy to magic users but so was balance lol

... i am terrified to know what this squirrel thing is

never mind that is actually freakin adorable, and i love her so much

oh goody malfoy's back

... it's hazing. he's going to haze them.

trav’s doing a really good job of giving npcs with similar pitches of voice different cadences to their speech

the fuck griffin

"that would put me right off lemons" a r g o

oh he has a cape... i know i kept thinking of him as a sort of malfoy character but now i can't stop picturing eridan

i am genuinely loving all the hp digs, this is so good

SNEAKERY

oh nice! birdy teacher :D

griffin what owl character are you referring to??????

i love how mundane this is, no joke, it makes it feel really grounded

good to know since they don't really have a healer

they have a dedicated party class, i love this

are they actual skeletons??? holy shit travis i love this so much

he's such a nervous baby, awww

DAMN GRIFFIN NICE

i love how supportive these boys are

how did you manage that trav, dang

HE'S A WHAT GRIFFIN??? I'VE BEEN PICTURING HIM AS A LIL NERD BOY THE WHOLE TIME, HE'S A BARBARIAN????? H O W

"we don't talk about it" i love this

is that a spell? i need to look that up

i love this skeleton friend so much

clint's tradition of naming his weapons continues and i love it

clint what are you d o i n g

NICE! go argo :D

"fuck life lessons!" jesus fitzroy

so it's more of like... a vocational school, size-wise, which aligns with a lot of the background info trav's given us. nice, easy to mentally picture

blame taking???

"you're the one whose magic came and ruined everything!" i am so eager to know this magic barbarian boy's backstory

agro's going for a more errol flynn aesthetic lol

puppy :D

"we feel settled on bud" i just realized this is the second character justin's playing that we don't know the real name of lol

i am so eager to learn what the heck this is and i just know it's going to end in a cliffhanger with only 11 minutes left in the ep

"does a plant cry out? it is plant!" i love this sweet firbolg boy

awww, ranier is a sweety, i love her so much, she's my favorite npc so far

bud’s giving himself some larry bird boots lol

everyone but bud are dumb dumbs lol

this music is so good

i am so intrigued travis holy shit this is so good

a credit to trav, this is the first npc that's made me think of magnus in terms of vocal cadence and tone

oh groundsy

poor fitzroy lmao

I AM SO READY FOR THIS

in conclusion: i am so incredibly hype for the new season!!! i know this ep was mostly setup but i’m already super interested in everyone’s characters and the mystery of whatever’s going on in the spooky forest, and i’m loving the direction travis is taking with the world and how he’s combining the magical with the mundane to make a grounded yet fantastical setting! i can’t wait for the next ep and for all the great things to come this season with everyone ^u^

[solarianradiance]

Jellyatinous Rose

Calliope: Welcome lovelies, to oUr little get together for an adventure throUgh the Use of a Role-Playing Game system called DUngeons & Dragons! Tonight we have a new player joining in oUr dUngeon delving, oUr lovely friend, Roxy.

Roxy: hey erebody, its ur gurl roxy!

Dave: hey rox

Rose: Welcome to the game Roxy, nice to see you came tonight~

Kanaya: Pleasure To Have You Dear Roxy!

Jade: nice to see you again!

John: glad you could make it tonight!

Roxy: tnx 4 the warm welcum gaiz, makes me feel good bout this venture here

Roxy: so, when do we start playin?

Calliope: Shortlym bUtt first, we shall introdUce oUr varioUs party members for the road ahead, so that we may give oUr newest addition a chance to Understand her new chUms? Jade, why dont we start with yoU?

Jade: ok!

Jade: im a level 5 chaotic good gnoll ranger called groche’a, and i was ousted from my tribe for not wanting to plunder tombs for bones because i was scared of waking the dead and having them get revenge on us... which they did! im the only survivor!

Roxy: wats a goll? Roxy: *gnoll

Jade: a gnoll is a dog person

Jade: like this!

Roxy: oh so ur a hyna furry basically then?

Jade: well no, im more like a malamute husky, i actually based my character off of bec and what jake told me about my scratched other self

Roxy: yeah, ur gilf self was pretty smokin for an old lady, so i can c y u chose her

Jade: ...what?

Calliope: Lets keep this train of introdUctions going, Dave YoU’re Up love!

Dave: im dave, and im a barbarian. im a level 4 chaotic good guy i guess, gettin my rage on with my magic shit talking sword and doin all kinds of awesome shit!

Roxy: u men like connan the barbarian?

Dave: no, not liek conan Dave: *like Dave: fuck

Roxy: wats ur backstory?

Dave: im a kickass barbarian, i showed up one day and started kicking ass, what more backstory do you need?

Roxy: that sunds lame

Dave: youre lame

Calliope: Moving on, John, how aboUt we introdUce yoUr character?

John: im Salamon of the Hearthlands, a level 4 neutral good halfling jester!

Roxy: wats a halflin?

John: they’re pretty much just hobbits but a bit more... “earthly” i think would be a good word to describe them? they’re sort more vice than virtue and do things like eat a lot of food, take whats not theirs and breed like rabbits.

Roxy: le gasp, ur a bunny boy! that sounds adorable!

John: heh, no, im not a bunny, but i guess i am bunny-like in that sense

Jade: you know, that would actually be a good fursona for you

John: eh, nah, its not really my thing, besides im more like a tiger

Jade: hahahaha! no you’re not!

John: in fact i think would be more like tigra from thundercats

Jade: i said no. you’re fucking. not.

John: uuuuh!!!

Roxy: calli!

Calliope: Yes Roxy, what is it?

Roxy: can u make jon into a bunny boy?

Calliope: I... can, bUt I need a good reason like a magical invocation or something like that, I cannot simply do as I wish with the players whenever I wish.

Calliope: Besides, the game has not started. Rose, why dont yoU go next?

Rose: 𝐼 𝒶𝓂 𝒶 𝒩𝑒𝓊𝓉𝓇𝒶𝓁 𝐸𝓋𝒾𝓁 𝒟𝓇𝑜𝓌 𝒩𝑒𝒸𝓇𝑜𝓂𝒶𝓃𝒸𝑒𝓇, 𝒞𝓎𝒶𝒾𝓃𝑒 𝑜𝒻 𝐻𝑜𝓊𝓈𝑒 𝒢𝓊𝓁’𝒢𝒶𝓃. 𝑀𝓎 𝑀𝑜𝓉𝒽𝑒𝓇, 𝓌𝒽𝑜 𝒹𝑒𝓈𝒾𝓇𝑒𝒹 𝒻𝑜𝓇 𝓂𝑒 𝓉𝑜 𝒷𝑒𝒸𝑜𝓂𝑒 𝒶 𝒫𝓇𝒾𝑒𝓈𝓉𝑒𝓈𝓈 𝓉𝑜 𝐿𝑜𝓁𝓉𝒽, 𝒶𝓃𝒹 𝒻𝑜𝓇 𝓉𝒽𝒾𝓈, 𝐼 𝓈𝓁𝒶𝓎𝑒𝒹 𝒽𝑒𝓇 𝒶𝓃𝒹 𝓊𝓈𝑒𝒹 𝓂𝓎 𝒩𝑒𝒸𝓇𝑜𝓂𝒶𝓃𝒸𝓎 𝓉𝑜 𝓇𝑒𝓈𝓊𝓇𝓇𝑒𝒸𝓉 𝒽𝑒𝓇 𝒶𝓈 𝓂𝓎 𝓅𝓊𝓅𝓅𝑒𝓉, 𝒷𝓊𝓉 𝒶𝓁𝒶𝓈, 𝓂𝓎 𝓅𝓁𝑜𝓉 𝓉𝑜 𝓉𝒶𝓀𝑒 𝒸𝑜𝓃𝓉𝓇𝑜𝓁 𝑜𝒻 𝓂𝓎 𝐻𝑜𝓊𝓈𝑒 𝓌𝒶𝓈 𝒻𝑜𝓊𝓃𝒹 𝑜𝓊𝓉 𝒶𝓈 𝐼 𝓂𝒶𝒹𝑒 𝒶 𝓂𝒾𝓈𝓉𝒶𝓀𝑒 𝒾𝓃 𝒸𝒶𝓈𝓉𝒾𝓃𝑔 𝓂𝓎 𝓈𝓅𝑒𝓁𝓁 𝒻𝑜𝓇 𝓀𝑒𝑒𝓅𝒾𝓃𝑔 𝒽𝑒𝓇 𝒻𝓇𝑜𝓂 𝓇𝑜𝓉𝓉𝒾𝓃𝑔 𝓉𝑜𝑜 𝓆𝓊𝒾𝒸𝓀𝓁𝓎, 𝒶𝓃𝒹 𝐼 𝒽𝒶𝓋𝑒 𝓈𝑒𝓃𝓈𝑒 𝒷𝑒𝑒𝓃 𝒾𝓃 𝑒𝓍𝒾𝓁𝑒 𝒻𝓇𝑜𝓂 𝓂𝓎 𝒽𝑜𝓂𝑒 𝑜𝒻 𝓉𝒽𝑒 𝒟𝒶𝓇𝓀 𝐸𝓁𝒻 𝒞𝒾𝓉𝓎, 𝑀𝑒𝓃𝓏𝑜𝒷𝑒𝓇𝓇𝒶𝓃𝓏𝒶𝓃, 𝒶𝓃𝒹 𝓃𝑜𝓌 𝓅𝓁𝑜𝓉 𝓂𝓎 𝒾𝓃𝑒𝓋𝒾𝓉𝒶𝒷𝓁𝑒 𝓇𝑒𝓉𝓊𝓇𝓃 𝓉𝑜 𝓇𝑒𝒸𝓁𝒶𝒾𝓂 𝓂𝓎 𝒷𝒾𝓇𝓉𝒽𝓇𝒾𝑔𝒽𝓉 𝒶𝓈 𝓉𝒽𝑒 𝓈𝓊𝓅𝓇𝑒𝓂𝑒 𝓇𝓊𝓁𝑒𝓇 𝑜𝒻 𝓂𝓎 𝐻𝑜𝓊𝓈𝑒, 𝒶𝓃𝒹 𝓅𝑜𝓈𝓈𝒾𝒷𝓁𝓎 𝒶𝓁𝓁 𝑜𝒻 𝒟𝓇𝑜𝓌𝒹𝑜𝓂~ 

Roxy: ur kinda given me the willies theres rosie

Rose: Hah! Thank you! I try to accentuate the nature of the Dark Elves as much as possible~ I am a Level 5 Necromancer by the way, just so we are clear.

Calliope: That was a nice sUrprise, always good to see dear ole Rose to give Us a performance and bring a little life throUgh characterization. Now, for oUr last member, Kanaya!

Kanaya: Salutations, I Am Mildred Of Baldurs Gate! A Neutral Good Human Cleric Of Lathander. I Am Level Three And I Am Looking Forward To Keeping You Out Of Trouble, As I Am The Primary Healer Of The Group. Though I Can Take A Swing With My Shredder Axe If I Wish, I Can Be More Than Helpful In Most Situations! 

Roxy: i dunno boit that but i think ill be hpy 2 have u round when the magical shit hits the fan! Roxy: *about

Calliope: Well, now that we have oUr standing party’s introdUctions oUt of the way, how aboUt we have Roxy introdUce Us to oUr newest member?!

Roxy: what bout u calli, whats ur character?

Calliope: I am the DUngeon Master, I recant the tale to the party based on the actions and decisions they make. Technically, I am all of the characters that are not part of the party! BUt I do have a rather sUltry lass that i have been meaning to play for a while. When my tenUre as DUngeon Master is Up, I shall pass the responsibility of rUnning the game onto others and break her oUt!

Roxy: rly? what is she? tell me!

Calliope: She isn’t finalized, but shes a YUan-Ti Magician, specifically an assistant. Haven’t qUite figUred oUt if shes a fUll-blood or a half-blood.

Roxy: a yankee?

Calliope: A YUan-Ti is more or less a snake person, mUch like myself I sUppose. I’ll admit shes a bit of a self-insert, bUt I made her for immersion for flarping. John helped me in crafting her!

Roxy: oh... he did now, did he?

John: yeah! it was actually pretty fun! learning about the lore of the snake people was kinda neat!

Calliope: Indeed! And in retUrn, helped John create another character to pair alongside with her! He is also a Magician, and she acts as his assistant!

Roxy: assistant huh? does that mean you can make his magic wand

Roxy: disappear?!~♥

John: whoa! roxy!

Calliope: Making a Magicians Magic Wand disappear is childs play.

John: uh calli, thats not what she mea-

Calliope: BUt making his wand spit magical glowing seed, now thats the magic~

Calliope: Mwah!~♥

Dave: whoa-ho, damn!

Rose: Ooo, how racey~

Kanaya: I Must Admit, That Got Quite Raunchy Awfully Quickly!

Jade: you can do that?!

John: ok! moving on! time for your introduction rox, before this turns into a smut campaign.

Roxy: how do u know that it wont turn into 1 when i do get my intro on? ;)

John: rox!

Roxy: relax! im jus teasin y Roxy: *u

Roxy: ok, my character is xerox gundalf the pink! shes a level 1 chotic good gun wizard!

John: gun wizard?! that actually sounds cool!

Jade: that actually sound cool, maybe ill roll one next campaign!

Dave: gotta admit, that does sound pretty bitchin rp as

Rose: Um, Roxy, as creative as that is, “Gun Wizard” isnt a valid class within the ruleset of DnD.

Roxy: wat? naaah, its fine! got xeroxs character shit filled out and everything! even drew her!

Roxy: c? kickass sex witch! put a spell on u make u her enchanted slav! put a magic bullet in ur butt and set her enemies on fire! abraka-sexbang!!

Rose: But we already have a Wizardess! Why don’t you be another class, a legal one such as a Rogue or a Thief?

Roxy: those dont sound legal 2 me sister, sides im a rogue in real life! i dont wanna play a rogue i wanna b a badass gun wizard! calli help me out here

Calliope: Mmmmm, well, while technically “GUn Wizards” are not what they are called, “GUn Mages” are in fact an actUal class! So I sUppose thats no significant issUe

Roxy: gasp YAYS!

Rose: Wait, “Gun Mage” is an actual class?

Calliope: Why yes, it is! QUite the interesting one too, might even roll a character to play as one myself at some point!

Rose: Well, anyways, as I said, we already have a Wizardess, which is myself. So how about you roll Up a Rogue? John can moonlight as one, but he isnt able to specialize as one. Here, lemme just get you started and roll you a character right now!

Roxy: uh, no, imma play a wizard!

Rose: We’ll make her Neutral Good, for maximum opportunity while still being approachable. Some good Dexterity for all of that lockpicking you’ll be doing.

Roxy: rose, water u doin?

Rose: Dump all the skill points into stealth, traps, and lockpicking!

Roxy: ross! Roxy:*rose

John: you know i could just spec into those skills myself, i was planning on doing it anyways!

Rose: We can make her pink, with some blue trimmings~

Roxy: stahp!

*Roxy latches onto Rose’s pen hand, preventing her from drawing further. The two devolve into a bit of a struggle*

Rose: Stop... getting... in the... way, Roxy!

Jade: you do know you can multi-class in this game, right? as in you both can have both.

Roxy: well i don.. wann play... fuckin rogue, i wan be... a wizard of bullets!

Rose: We need a Rogue to-*is bitten*-FUCK! ROXY!

Kanaya: What Is Happening?

*Roxy and Rose devolve to a mother/daughter/sister squabble between petty bitches who both want the same thing, but are unwilling to share, complete with hair pulling, bites, scratches, clothes ripping and an assortment of name calling.*

*Its a good ole fashioned cat fight yy’all!*

Jade: shouldnt someone stop this? like kanaya, isnt this your thing?

Kanaya: ...I... Want To, But I Think I Am Enjoying The Sight Of This Conflict? Should I Do So Anyways?

Dave: with them? nah man itll sort itself out eventually. just let em get tuckered out.

John: ... roll for initiative?

Calliope: Haa! Hahahaha!