#meanwhile we are immune to the floating. we just teleport back down

[itsclydebitches]

Um one thing i wanna ask is why do you want penny to stay a robot? She would have been hacked again as it wouldn’t make sense for someone not to try it again... ignoring the pinnochio allusion thing cause of course RWBY shouldn’t follow fairytales like a script, but just thinking about practicality as the problem would just occur again.

Also, people complaining about how its a problem they cured her illness (having the virus)... why would you want her too keep the virus when its literally about to kill her and the cure is right there???? I dunno some of the complaints have me a bit confused and i need clarity on them.

Like, If they didn’t grab the relic for themselves, they would have been hunted by ironwood for penny, she would have been killed for the powers to open the vault etc... if they went to the vault with penny without their plan, she would have died... its all a lose lose for penny to me at least

Questions are genuine and I’m not trying to be rude or anything :)

Happy to explain, anon! :D

I’m going to break this up into three parts: The claim that people are upset about Penny’s virus going away, the idea that she’s in more danger as a robot, and the assumption that she had to be made human to fix this problem. 

The first is the easiest to tackle simply because I haven’t seen any of this myself. I don’t know why someone would “want her to keep the virus when it’s literally about to kill her.” My guess would be that there’s been some miscommunication at play. I’m not saying just because I haven’t seen these takes doesn’t mean they don’t exist, but rather that I have seen a lot of critical takes since Saturday and they all boil down to the fans being upset that Penny’s android identity was removed, not that the virus was removed along with it. Of course we’re happy about that additional outcome, we just believe it would have been possible  — even easy  — to achieve that same outcome without taking a core part of Penny’s identity along with it (more on that below).

Secondly, if one of the main arguments for Penny getting a human body is “It’s less dangerous” then I personally don’t find that persuasive. Yes, it means no one can try to hack her again... but it also means Penny can die all the horrible, messy human deaths that she was previously immune from (within the boundary of how long Pietro can give her aura, anyway). We saw it happen on screen. Penny was able to go from this

to this

purely because she was an android. Penny, due to her synthetic body, was able to be torn apart and then  — pretty casually it seems, based on Pietro’s comments  — be put back together, given more aura, and booted up with absolutely no downsides. Penny shrugged off death with a smile! No human body can do that. So yes, she’s vulnerable to hacking as an android, but she’s vulnerable to everything else as a human, things like Nora’s scars and Yang’s lost arm, things that android!Penny would have shrugged off. Each body has its benefits and its downsides, with my personal belief being that, from a combat standpoint, a synthetic body has far fewer downsides and far greater benefits. But that opinion aside, objectively I don’t think a human body is intrinsically safer for Penny in the long run, especially not after her biggest moment in the series was coming back from the dead. She can’t do that anymore. 

Which then touches on our third topic with the question: Why couldn’t the show have fixed android!Penny in a way that ensures she can never be hacked again? See, we have to remember that RWBY is a constructed, fictional story. Nothing “has” to happen. Or rather, nothing has to happen until the writers impose limitations on the text that the viewer expects them to adhere to. For example, if you impose the implied rules of 1. “Our four main characters will make it to the end of the series” and 2. “A character, without aura, will die from a spear through the gut,” then RWBY has to find a way for Weiss to survive Cinder’s attack (rule #1), but that solution can’t be, “Weiss is just randomly okay after a deadly injury, I guess” (rule #2). Hence, we get the solution of “Jaune unlocks his semblance and heals Weiss for her” and it works! It’s a solution that viewers like because it obeys all the rules, both overt and implied. Meanwhile, the problem with Penny’s solution is two-fold. The first is that it contradicts the entire journey she’s been on of “Android girl learns that she’s real and human just the way she is,” which I’ve already spoken about extensively (there are other posts on that), but the second problem is that the show ignores other possibilities and makes up new rules solely to reach this ending. 

Why is Penny made human? Because of Ambrosius’ rules. Why do those rules exist? Because the writers said they do in this episode. It’s not that they introduced these rules episodes or even whole volumes ago, thereby requiring that they adhere to them once Penny’s life is suddenly caught up in them (like with the Jaune example). Rather, the viewer only learned these were limitations while Penny was being fixed. So the writers could have just... not included those. There’s no reason why, in developing Ambrosius’ abilities right then and there, the show couldn’t have made them into something a little different. Have Ruby go, “We want you to magic up an anti-virus program that will heal Penny completely, with no chance of the virus returning. Thus, when you create something new, it doesn’t matter if that program disappears. The virus is already gone!” If the response to that is, “But Clyde, Ambrosius can’t create something he doesn’t understand” that’s a rule that the writers just made up. No one forced them to suddenly impose that limitation. It was a choice. Or even if we have to have it for some reason, you’re telling that the group gets to have the schematics for their escape route  — essentially inventing a teleportation system because Whitley looked at airship flight paths for a few minutes  — but they can’t have Penny or Pietro draw up an anti-virus program? There’s no reason why these rules couldn’t have been tweaked to cure android!Penny. 

There’s also no reason why Ambrosius needed to be involved at all. As just mentioned, Pietro exists and many fans (myself included) thought he would be the solution. Imagine for a moment we had a slightly different version of these events. Penny’s virus is briefly halted by Jaune and, finally given a moment to breathe, she asks where her father is. Last she saw, he was floating in a dead Amity after Cinder’s attack. This reminds Ruby that hey, Pietro made Penny! He’s just as smart as Watts and is far more knowledgeable of her systems. Maybe he can help? So the group heads to Amity and, due to the same techno mumbo jumbo that launched Amity in the first place, or had Klein heal Penny after her crash, Pietro says yes, he can get rid of the virus. Better yet, he can slightly redesign Penny so that she’s made un-hackable in the future, using (again, mumbo jumbo) parts from the now useless Amity. But it will take time. It’s then that the group receives Ironwood’s message and learns that they don’t have time. The reality that Penny will not be cured before the hour time limit necessitates that they come up with a creative way of dealing with Ironwood. Enter Emerald. Her semblance can make it seem like Penny is there, despite her being fixed by her dad miles away. We get an extended fight with Ironwood and, at episode’s end, the new and improved Penny catches up, ready to open the vault for them, this time of her own free will. 

Now, obviously I just made this up off the top of my head  — far from perfect  — but a scenario like this: 

Remembers that Pietro exists and lets him/Maria as an assistant do something for the plot

Re-uses Amity now that it’s just a floating pile of junk metal 

Creates a scenario where we get to see Penny and Pietro confront the fact that she was created to be a tool (sorry I originally made you so easily hackable/put a self-destruct in your brain) 

Maintains all the main story beats like Penny’s near escape, Ironwood’s message, and using Emerald’s semblance

Makes space to tackle other issues like the complaint that Ironwood was taken down too quickly 

Achieves the desired result of healing Penny without taking away her android identity 

Proves that, because we can easily come up with another solution, the idea that she “had” to become human is inaccurate. There were always other options 

Hell, we can even ask why the story bothered with a self-destruct threat in the first place. Seriously, why did Watts do that? I have my own headcanons, but the show never says. This act is the entire BASIS for Penny’s conflict and the show didn’t bother to a) say why he’d do this or b) explain why he’d do this when Salem would presumably like having a Maiden to control. It’s counterintuitive and the show never grapples with that. We have no canonical answer here. More importantly, what else changes if Penny’s self-destruct order is taken out of the narrative? Absolutely nothing. She’s still hacked and struggles to keep Amity afloat, still flies to Ruby, still wakes up and needs to be calmed down by Nora, still tells Whitley her order, still fights the Hound, still tries to escape, still tells Ruby to kill her so she doesn’t open the vault, and Ruby still realizes that opening the vault might be the answer. They could have taken Penny to the door and nullified the virus by letting her do what the virus ordered. Penny is fine now, they snag the Relic, and the group proceeds to save all of Mantle and Atlas. The only thing this self-destruct sequence brings to the narrative is a reason to give Penny a human body. That plot-point was introduced solely as an excuse to give Penny a human body. That never had to happen. It’s not that the writers had a story where, by the rules already in place, they truly had to change Penny to ensure they didn’t lose her, it’s that the writers carefully crafted a story that existed to justify their desire to change Penny. That was always the end goal. They decided they wanted this to happen and that’s the problem here. That they took a character who has spent her entire, fictional existence learning to love herself as she is and crafted a bunch of unpersuasive, needless, and contradictory scenarios specifically to get Penny to a place where they could erase all that. 

There’s no version of Penny that exists who truly had to get a human body to survive because Penny is a fictional character. Everything she does and experiences is thought up by our writers. Thus, at some point they thought up the idea to erase her android identity for a completely human one instead  — the part a lot of people are upset by   — and then made some messy attempts to write a story to justify getting that ending.  

[fantazeerps]

Last Night in D&D

The One-Shot Squad rolls out! Octavia the Human Swashbuckler Rogue played by @polymorphme, Rattles the Kenku Drunken Monk played by @owlbearwithme, Five the Tabaxi Warlord played by @buniculus, Tola the Earth Genasi Champion Fighter played by @imaneea, and finally Stabitha Ankleshanker the Gnome Thief Rogue played by Me.

They were sent by the regular party to retrieve the corpse of their valued ally, Sizzle. So they track it to a big ol spire of stone... lined with mysterious yellow crystals identical to the ones that lined the massive form of the Tengeriin, including an absolutely massive one that rises floor to ceiling and beyond. Hmm....

Five sees a mysterious silhouette and hears a mysterious voice coming from the central pillar of crystal. No one else does.

A cursory exploration of the room reveals the crystals to be harmless, but curiously humming with energy. Breaking off portions (Rattles ate theirs) of the surrounding crystals, the party finds out that they have a very strange property: by pointing them towards another crystal formation--say, the colossal spire in the center--they can teleport along those crystal clusters. They use this to navigate to a higher floor! Where they discover...

A pair of huge elementals--one Earth, one Air--who warn the party against proceeding! Because some eeeeevil lurks on the pillar! Some sort of blue evil, even!

BUT! We’re here to do a job, and we’re nothing if not professional. Combat begins, with Octavia being flung head over heels out of the group by the whirlwind of the Air Elemental as everyone else sets up!

...With, unfortunately, Tola our big tank, in the back, poking at everyone with her huge glaive. We’re not smart. Five eventually realizes this and yanks her forward, but not before Rattles gets pounded so hard into the soil they start bouncing against the floor from every hammering fist the Earth Elemental unleashes. [squeaky toy noise]

Stabs gets her first natural 20 for the night with her Dagger of Venom and rolls double 10s on the weapon’s bonus poison damage, which bolstered by the crit is potentially enough to cleave the Air Elemental completely in half! ... if it weren’t immune to Poison. Dammit.

Tola, meanwhile, absolutely rips the Air Elemental apart. This girl is the reverse of Jerico in every way--she rolled zero critical failures and landed 95% of every attack she threw out the entire night. I love her. We all love her.

Octavia quite literally rips the Earth Elemental a new asshole, getting back to her feet and tearing the whole thing’s back end off with a single full attack + sneak attack damage. The thing trips over its own fists and lands face-down, Tola finishing it off.

During our exploration of the spire, the party STOLE FIZZY LIFTING DRINKS!!! via finding a mysteriously glowing pool and taking an exploratory sip once we see some animals floating around, finding out the stuff grants 1 minute of flight if drank or spread on the skin. We all take a bottle of the stuff.

Higher up in the spire, we meet a pair of Couatls who warn us against an Evil locked inside the central spire, claiming that they cannot allow us to go further for fear of us releasing it... until Five and Octavia convince the things to let us go anyway, since we’re not here to release any Evils, and in fact offer to kill the Evil if it does end up popping out. That ends up getting them on our side, and they say that they’ll tell the elemental guardians to stand down.

During the talk, we find out that this Evil was responsible for creating the Tengeriin!!! It MUST be immensely powerful!

Not powerful enough to make us listen, though. Sizzle’s body is on top of the spire, practically half-eaten by the birds that stole her in the first place. We stoop the poor, mangled corpse up, and a voice from inside the spire promises us riches and fame should we just obey it and let it out.

Absolutely no one takes it up on that offer, figuring that their gig with the Silver Ox is profitable anyway. It’s powerless to stop us from just walking out.

Quest over! We won!

... but, feeling guilty (or maybe that’s just me) about not taking Hugo up on the boss fight and figuring we’ve got time to kill anyway, we restart our old save and take the voice in the crystal up on the offer in an AU.

The voice in the crystal is a poweful Air Djinni! And he promises us fortune, food, and fffffucking fine clothes! All we have to do is become its slaves. All in all, the word “slaves” is pretty shitty, and we already kind of have a job, so the Djinn drops all pretenses and says “if you will not take the manacles, then I will make you” or something similar.

Too bad it’s five against one. All five of us are martial characters armed with magic weapons and 90,000 attacks each, two of which are further augmented by Sneak Attack. Between that, Tola’s Action Surge, and Rattle’s Flurry of Blows, all supported by Five’s Lead the Attack and Inspiring Shout, the Djinn barely manages to cause anyone major inconvenience before he’s brought to next to no HP and begs for mercy.

We give it to him. And, in return, all five of us get a Wish. Not just any Wish, though, but a Wish that grants us up to 25k gold worth of gear. Hugo, mercifully, decides that this is the Good Ending and deletes our previous save, and we all get to enjoy some overpowered gear for a change as the Djinn piles on our gifts and Plane Shifts away, possibly never to be seen again.

Sizzle’s body in one hand and a shitload of treasure in the other, the One-Shot Crew returns triumphantly to camp as the main plot moves ever further ahead...

[donegeonsndragons]

Narratuary: Session 6 Highlights

The party attempts to befriend a golem, magical effects are shrugged off at crucial moments, and more of the retrieval quest unfolds.

Premise: last we left off, the group had just woken up to alarms going off and made their way to the towers, finding Lerissa in her storage room knocked out with a crystal golem standing over them that disappears before their eyes...

A little bit of retcon in here: during the free time organized out-of-game, everybody did some tasks and shopping so you’ll see some new items and information pop up in here that weren’t mentioned before

The group cautiously makes their way inside the room, checking it out

Lerissa is clutching the mirror, and nothing seems to be damaged

In fact, most of the damage in the room has been to the door, as well as piles of books and the table knocked over

They do notice that the pile of crystals that lay on the ground by the table is missing, and so is the talisman

After finding that Lerissa had been likely knocked out by being slammed against the wall, they give her a healing potion and wake her up

She tells the party that she was here retrieving the mirror for research when she bumped the table and something activated, the crystals forming into the golem they saw

The party tries to think hard on what crystal golems are immune, resistance, and weak to

Igtbtgh, the most magically illiterate person in the room, rolls a nat20

He remembers talking with one of his buddies (a magic wielder) during his service who mentioned everything that crystal golems are immune to (poison, psychic, piercing, charmed, frightened, paralysed), resistant to (bludgeoning and slashing from non-magical weapons), and that it’s not weak to anything in particular

Everyone can hear footsteps below, not sure which way it’s headed

Carlin sneaks down, and the golem (which was descending) stops in front of Lerissa’s office as it senses Carlin nearby

Carlin immediately scrambles back up the steps 

 Aurora asks Lerissa if there’s any items in the storage room that can let them escape, and she says that anything that might be of use is in her office still

The golem’s footsteps are heard again, but moving much farther down

Carlin sneaks again and follows the golem down the stairs, where it seems to be stopped at the door to the bridge 

He goes back up and relays this information to the group 

The party gets to Lerissa’s office, where she’s able to find a scroll of teleportation that leads to the High Council building they were staying at, but it’s only for one person

They tell her to use it and go get help, and she disappears into a puff of smoke

The party then tries to find any useful objects in the room, but only find 2 scrolls of greater restoration (which Baldwin pockets)

Aurora: what if the golem is actually just scared? Me: *drinks water to prevent breaking my poker face*

Granted, my poker face isn’t super great in the first place

As they discuss what to do next (which includes the action code word “PANIC”), they hear the sound of stone shattering from below

The group descends, reaching the landing that leads to the bridge

They see the rubble of what used to be the door leading to the bridge, mixed with bits of crystal

Aurora: oh no it’s bleeding 

They examine the crystals, and Aurora is able to tell that there’s a much stronger magical presence coming from them that wasn’t there before, specifically transmutation magic

Carlin picks one of the crystals up, and I (gleefully) tell him to roll a constitution saving throw

He rolls a nat20

Carlin feels a slight tingle in his fingers and there’s a light pink glow before it fades away

Now knowing that they shouldn’t touch the crystals, they start to plan how to confront the golem

Some of the party is able to insight check and see that this golem is mostly scared, looking around frantically, and that it seems unused to its body (walking a little like a newborn deer)

Aurora immediately wants to take care of this golem as her own pet/baby/thing(???) and attempts to make cooing noises at it (but it’s too far away to hear)

Carlin sneaks within 30 ft of the golem and casts minor illusion to create a bouquet of flowers in front of it (which he can’t exactly see since the golem is facing away from the party)

The golem seems fascinated with this magical floating bouquet, though its hand passes through it

Carlin is able to see that there’s a chain around the golem’s neck, identical to the one attached to the talisman

Innchie sends out her familiar Rupert to swoop under and then over the bridge and try to grab the talisman

Rupert swoops in, and as he starts to pull, the golem immediately grasps onto the talisman around its neck and turns around to face the party

At this point, Carlin unleashes a bag of ball bearings (without “PANIC”), causing the golem to lose balance and fall, holding onto the sides of the bridge in an attempt to stay standing

Baldwin digs into his newly acquired bag of tricks and throws the fuzzy object inside, which transforms into a giant badger mid-air

He gives the giant badger the command to go get the talisman

Aurora rushes forward as well, preparing mage hand

Carlin runs back to the doorway, ducking out of the way of the incoming giant badger and Aurora

The giant badger attempts to leap and grab the talisman but misses completely

Aurora casts mage hand and grabs the talisman, and as it pulls away the talisman from the golem’s neck it starts crying with sounds like crystal grating against each other

As the cord finally snaps, the life from the golem vanishes, and it collapses into a pile of non-living crystals

Aurora and Carlin are immediately sad at this happening

As mage hand disappears, the giant badger grabs the talisman and scampers to Baldwin

Igtbtgh picks up one of the crystals to see if the same thing happens

I get excited, only to have Igtbtgh roll a nat20 as well

At this point, they hear shouts moving up from the ground floor and a group of guards go onto the bridge

Immediately suspicious, they question the party as to what they’re doing there

Carlin speaks up and says that the party will only speak to Councillor Astorio 

The party gets escorted to the High Council building, where Councillor Astorio is there with Dee tending to Lerissa who is lying down with an ice pack

Councillor Astorio immediately shoos the guards away and thanks the party for getting Lerissa and retrieving the talisman (which she takes from the giant badger’s mouth)

The party tells her what happens, and she tells Lerissa they should get the clean-up crew first thing in the morning

She tells the party to rest up, and everyone goes back to sleep

In the morning as they eat breakfast, Councillor Astorio gives Carlin a bag of the ball bearings that were retrieved by the clean-up crew

She sits down with them, and Dee walks in and whispers in her ear

Councillor Astorio says they finally have all of the information on the next item that’s on their list, an item in the possession of Councillor Galanodel (the councillor of a city close to the capital Salv) who is unwilling to give it up and doesn’t like Councillor Astorio

She says that there will be a ball in 3 weeks time, and she leaves the plan on how to get this item to the party

She also says that Dee has just received word that Councillor Galanodel received a letter from the infamous thief “The Serpent” declaring that The Serpent will be stealing the item themselves

As Councillor Astorio stands up, she tells them to be in Fortuna in 2 weeks, but they have time to do what they’d like until then

She and Dee leave, and Carlin attempts and fails yet again to trip Dee

The party spends another week in Arca, which will be resolved again out-of-game

They head out after a week to Fortuna, and they end up stopping at another town for the night (after a few days of traveling)

In the tavern they stop at, Carlin tries to perform harmonica and ends up just making dissonant sounds

Baldwin preaches, and a group of farmers ask him if his goddess can do anything to dragons

Aurora immediately butts in and asks about dragons excitedly

The farmers say that there’s rumours of a rampaging green dragon to the west of Fortuna that’s been wreaking havoc

Meanwhile, Igtbtgh grabs a drink from the bar, where a half-dressed elven man addresses him and offers him a job

He promises good payment and that the job won’t take too long, and so Igtbtgh calls over the rest of the party

The elf introduces himself as Kevamros Silentread “The Great Transformer,” and he explains that he was camping half an hour away from the town when he was ambushed by some thieves the night before

They took his familiars (a raven, a cat, and a snake), as well as his clothes and money and he wants the party to get them

The party accepts, and they decide to head out immediately to make sure that the thieving group isn’t too far away

As they head in the direction that Kevamros pointed out, they eventually come across sounds of howling from a nearby encampment 

And because they’re not sneaking, they hear someone call out as to who’s there

Carlin sneaks and starts investigating the perimeter of the encampment while Aurora steps out and the rest of the group hides and prepares

Aurora lies flawlessly, saying that she’s a lost traveler

The man sheathes his weapon and invites her to come by the fire in the most sleazy way possible

Both Carlin and Aurora see 2 tents, a campfire, and 3 cages hanging on a tree with animals inside

Carlin is also able to tell that there are 2 people inside one of the tents talking 

Aurora smooth talks her way to ask about the animals (which the man says are just normal) and away from the sleaziness of the guy

She declines staying and slowly walks away backwards toward the entrance of the clearing back towards the hidden group

As the man stops at the clearing and watches her disappear, Baldwin charges forward and tackles the man, placing him under arrest as he shouts for help

And that’s where we left it off for the night!

[boobtubedude]

The Tournament Of The Archomentals: Part 1

As background, which I may spell out later: I started DM’ing a game of Dungeons and Dragons last summer. It was my first time ever playing the game, AND I was running it. I got a few friends who were interested and we all kind of learned as we went. 

We started playing the pre-made intro adventure “Lost Mine Of Phandelver” in June, and segued into the “Curse of Strahd” about two months after that. I led a five-month campaign in which the vampiric Big Bad ended up sneezing to death, because Dungeons and Dragons is a weird game sometimes. This is the third arc, which narratively connects the adventures of four players and everyone they’ve met along the way. It’s my first attempt at a fully original campaign, although it borrows themes and plot points from some familiar pop culture pieces, as well as using some canonical D&D lore. 

At this stage, everyone is a Level 10 character. These are the notes I normally type out to the players, as they literally cannot remember things between biweekly sessions, but thought it might be fun to start posting them for all to read. We had two new players decided to join the game this time around, which is why a tournament celebrating eight gods has six participants. I bet you’d ask because the players asked and were kinda asses about it.

The story picked up right at the end of the last session, with the gnome Garrick hurrying over to your campsite. He noted that he was excited but a little annoyed you guys waited so long to come back. Turns out what felt like a few weeks for you was 10 years in Neverwinter. During that time, your efforts at Wave Echo Cave have essentially turned Neverwinter into a rich, bustling ecosystem. And since then, you have become folk heroes that helped turn this place from Brookyln in the 1980s to Brooklyn now. (Lots of skinny jeans in Neverwinter now.)

Garrick had been holding your place in The Tournament of the Archomentals, which celebrates the 1,000-year anniversary of the defeat of the god Asmodeus. Asmodeus arose thanks to the assassination of Mystra, a goddess in charge of maintaining The Weave. The Weave is like the Force, only for magic, and killing her set off a chain reaction in which reality itself was warped and changed. Asmodeus was a decently powerful wizard before Mystra’s death, but The Spellplague (also known as the “Blue Breath Of Change”) then ensued after Mystra’s assassination turned him into a god-like figure. He turned the lands into hell itself with his empowered Ruby Rod, and was only defeated when the 8 archomentals (beings of supreme power in the earth, air, water, and fire planes of the multiverse) combined for the first time ever to defeat him.

The tournament involves four contests, after each week one of the five remaining teams is eliminated. Each contest celebrates of plane of elemental existence. Garrick’s an organizer, but not an architect, of the arenas in which these contests take place. He’s sort of a coach, but more of a fanboy at heart. (He may or may not have playing cards of the four heroes of Wave Echo Cave.) However, it won’t just be you in the contest: Since the challenges are designed for parties of six, Garrick has two more people that he’s gotten to fight along side you in order to balance out your team’s strengths and weaknesses. In no way did anyone think this was all major foreshadowing for the return of Asmodeus at the end of the tournament, which pleased the DM as he did not have to massively rewrite the narrative he had been planning for a month and a half.

As he takes you into the cathedral in which the tournament’s festivities are arranged, you see Mystra’s symbol above the cathedral door: it’s a red mist rising to the heavens, with seven stars surrounding it. The seven stars represent the seven schools of magic in this universe. 

Inside, you see that Gundren Rockseeker (who gathered you all together on your adventure to find the Lost Mine of Phandelver) is one of the architects, along with three others: 

 Artin Battlehammer (Dwarf): A stout, keenly intelligent creature with an eye towards designing strongholds than looting them with treaure

Theren Amastacia (Elf): Think Cate Blanchett in LOTR, but somehow hotter

Kallista Orianna (Tiefling): about 6’, purple skin, horns that extend out from her eyebrows about 15’’ in a 45 degree angle. A large tail slinks back and forth behind her. She seems to regard you with distrust, whereas the others barely acknowledge your existence

From there, after exchanging pleasantries with Gundren, you met your two other teammates: a half-orc Fighter named Kieran Lonesword and a human Bard named Danfielding. You also meet a halfing named Vivienne, a gruff fashion designer/wizard who allows you all to create your own hero within the world of the Tournament. (In real-world parlance: This is a chance to re-spec your character.) Arzgarth Riffrocker the Paladin stayed the same. Peter Dinklage the Cleric switched his Domain to “Tempest” in order to indulge his inner Thor. Chad The Conqueror switched from Paladin to Warlock, which was badass on all levels. Demora the Rogue did not participate in this, as in real life she was very sick, so everyone established the canonical fiction that she had consumed room-temperature shrimp as her first meal in Neverwinter and was horrifically nauseous. This was not badaass on any level.

Vivienne also gave everyone a pin to help brand this team: a silver pin with the face of the monkey the group adopted in Barovia, Piccolo. Chad was greatly delighted by this development, as he loved Piccolo more than anything in the world. Garrick led you all the antechamber, a long hallway with paintings of the Archomentals on each side. He explained that this first exhibition honored the Earth Archomentals, Ogrémoch (generally eeevvvviiiiil) and Sunnis (generally pleeeeesssaaant). He told you that the fight was based on “Rock, Paper, Scissors,” and to avoid the dome protecting you from the audience that would be watching. Also, he noted that there was audience participation: Above the arena would be a wheel that would spin after everyone had completed a round of combat, in which something fun or terrible might happen.

You walk up to the final painting of the antechamber, and it’s of none other than Asmodeus himself. He’s painted as a twenty-foot figure crushing the hordes of fighters that had assembled to defeat him. In his hands is the Ruby Rod to which Garrick alluded earlier. This painting lifted up to reveal a circular platform inside, and a bright light illuminating it from above. Peter Dinklage kissed the three middle fingers of his left hand and held them up, because he’s a dick.

You all get on the platform, and ride it up. You see you’re in a dome that’s about 30 yards in diameter. On the periphery, two smaller but similar looking trees reside. In the center of it is a huge, beautiful tree. Facing it at forty-five degrees on each side are two stone statues, reminiscent of the Terracotta Army. It’s a beautiful, lush landscape, and your eyes go from that to realizing you’re surrounded on all sides by spectators. You can hear them, but the sounds are muffled due to the invisible dome. Due north in the crowd is a smallish section for the Tournament Architects, and the Wheel stands above them. The options on the wheel read:

Hale and Hearty

SkullCracker

Flight of Fancy

Ring Around The Posey

Amor-All

Broken Mirror

Well of Haste

Electric Slide

The fight begins when the fighters try to use magic to assess the area, which wakes up both the central tree and the stone golems. The tree does a lot of damage when it hurls a boulder at the entire party, forcing Danfielding to heal everyone up quickly. Just when it looks like the initial flurry was over, a dozen ropes descended from the top of the dome, and twelve men looking like Santa’s Elves gone to seed landed with a thud on the ground, wielding large sickles. “We’re the Scissors Gang, here to kick your ass!” the leader declared. Much head shaking was done by all at the DM’s voice for these creatures, but they said nothing, for lo, the DM had bought the pizza that night. Rock (golems), Paper (tree), and Scissors (Bastard Keebler Elves) had finally all assembled.

Combat continued for a few rounds. After the first, the audience wheel landed on Ring Around The Posey, which had the effect of switching all the elements to which these creatures were either vulnerable or immune. That wasn’t too obvious to the heroes, who mostly marveled at the fact that Kieran could seemingly roll nothing but twenties on her first night. The initial batch of Scissors Elves were eliminated fairly handily, as Peter and Danfielding teamed up to essentially roll the elves into the electrified dome like bowling pins, but the group couldn’t make their way to the tree (which had raised up the other two to help attack) nor make much headway with the golems.

Round two started with Flight Of Fancy, which made the entire arena zero-gravity. A new group of Scissor gangmembers floated down like a group of skydivers, which the DM erroneously called “plane jumpers,” because the DM had had a fucking week, so back off. Once again, Peter and Danfield feasted on these creatures, singeing them all with fire. Arzgarth teleported on top of a golem, and struck him down towards the earth. Kieran then curbstomped this sucker to death, and wove the newly-formed floating pebbles into a cape, because apparently half-Orcs have proficiency in Etsy. The DM granted Kieran a point of inspiration, because holy crap, you guys. The audience, on the other hand, threw up in their mouth a little at the violent (albeit creative) display before them.

Meanwhile, Chad decided to use his Warlock abilities to take over the mind of the tree, which it then ordered to hit itself with the boulder over and over again. Not only did the central tree take damage because of this, but so did the other trees. Everyone enjoyed telling the tree to stop hitting itself.

With the combatants earthbound for the next round, the wheel landed on Electric Slide, at which point lighting emerged from the Piccolo pins and singed every player. No one enjoyed that, not even Chad.

Finally, Chad realized he had a Warlock spell that could essentially incinerate plant life, which probably would have helped them out in the first round of combat. Game, set, match, ex-masochistic sentient tree. Garrick ran into the arena, pleased by the results. He noted that they came in second overall in terms of quickest victory, as another team had used that plant spell off the bat, which made things much easier.

Just then, the sky went dark, the wheel started spinning of its own accord, and glowed red from its central point. Just as soon as it started, everything went back to normal. The architects retreated hastily, and a nervous Garrick told the group to rest up for the next event in two weeks’ time.

[cosmic-tale-blog]

CosmicTale - Red Code

CosmicTale part 7 "Red Code" Gaster blinked. Then blinked again. Where was he? He could barely see. Maybe his vision would adjust to the darkness in a few moments. He looked around. Had his machine worked? If so, what part of the code was he in? His vision was somewhat adjusted. Now that he could see a little better he realized he was surrounded by code. Nothing but code. Gaster studied the code for a few weeks. He was confident if he could find a- he touched a line of coding. It disappeared. What had he done? "Oh dear. Thats not supposed to happen." he said to himself. He made a mental note not to touch any more coding. Suddenly, he had a burning sensation in his hand. He looked down to see it slowly being replaced by code. In shock, he grabbed his hand, but nothing was there. Luckily for Gaster, only his left arm transformed into code. "This is not good." he said to himself. Suddenly, he realised that some of the code was glowing red, instead of the blue it usually was. He was worried, but curious. He reached into his pocket to find the only thing in it was a picture of him, Papyrus and Sans. Gaster shed a tear, then threw the picture into the red coding. As soon as it made contact it disappeared. Gaster now has to choose if it was transported somewhere else or entirely vaporized. Gaster prayed for the former, and jumped into the red code. Back in Alphys's lab, Frisk, Alphys, Mettaton and Napstablook were all sitting across from one another on a table. Frisk thought to herself, "if this is the best they can get, this place really does need help." Napstablook was a dark blue instead of white, and Mettaton had Blue replacing most of what was formerly pink. Napstablook looked cheerful, but Mettaton looked very shy. "H-hello..." Mettaton said twirling his hair. "Hello!" Frisk responded cheerfully. For a moment, Alphys looked at Frisk confused, and then she stood up. "People. I think I know the best way to develop a cure." everyone asked Alphys what that way was, to which she responded "Frisk here, is not affected by the disease at all. If I research the human body, I may be able to develop a cure from whatever makes them immune." Napstablook floated upwards with a smile. "Yay!" he shouted. Alphys smiled. Frisk quickly asked how she would be studied. Alphys replied with "Just a check up every day. A quick examination. And a blood sample." Frisk shuddered at the thought of blood samples. She hated needles. "A-Alphys... Is there another way to get what you need without a blood sample?" Frisk asked hopefully. "Well... Yes. Come here. Ill show you." Frisk approached Alphys cautiously, but all of a sudden Alphys struck Frisk lightly, causing her soul to appear. Alphys grabbed it softly and examined it. "Ok. Thats all I need for today." Napstablook smiled cheerfully. "That wasn't so bad, was it?" he asked. Frisk shook her head. Suddenly, in the middle of the table, a line of code appeared. Alphys grabbed her new pair of glasses and put them on. "I-I made these to help me see after I was infected." she said. Frisk walked up to the code and touched it. As soon as she made contact with it, it disappeared and was replaced with red coding. Meanwhile in quarantine. Sans was relieved. He could finally sleep. His insomnia disappeared over night. Sans paced the room. He should be happy, he thought. But the voice kept saying that he shouldn't. Gaster got away. The mission failed. The voice told him that he shouldn't let anyone near him. He should be alone. Sans laughed at that. Why would anyone go near him? He was a MONSTER. Suddenly Sans snapped. He picked up his metal shelf he was forced to sleep on and crushed it. He broke down the door. He left his little room. He walked towards where he KNEW Alphys was. She locked him up. She was afraid of him. "She should be" he thought. "She WILL be afraid of me after this." Sans walked up a set of stairs. In the meeting room in Alphys's lab, Alphys heard footsteps. She quickly looked around nervously. While the others were expirimenting with the red code, Alphys was praying that the footsteps didn't belong to Sans. Alphys quickly turned around and asked the others, "What does the red code do?" to which Frisk responded, "It moves things. It teleports them. Or gets rid of them. We don't know." Alphys sighed. And suddenly she heard a door swing open. She turned around to see Sans standing in front of her. "Hello Doctor." he said with a laugh. Frisk was confused as to what was happening, but by the horrified face Alphys was making, Frisk new it couldn't be good. Suddenly, Mettaton started crying and Alphys yelled "Into the code!" Frisk didn't hesitate, leaping into the red coding, followed by Mettaton and then Napstablook. However, Alphys wasn't so lucky to make it into the red coding. As she ran towards it away from Sans, she was picked up by a dark blue magic and thrown into the wall. "Doctor. I think we got off on the wrong foot." Sans said before kicking Alphys. Alphys groaned in pain. She stood up and softly said "S-sans... P-please... I c-can explain e-everything." The code was disappearing. Sans looksd interested. "Im listening." he said. Alphys then said "W-well... If y-you want t-to know w-what went w-wrong... Then..." At that moment, Alphys jumped into the red code, leaving Sans in the destroyed meeting room.