Pants people! How you doing? I just want to thank
you guys so, so much for leaving that review.
Wait, what? What? You didn't leave a review?
Well, I'll forgive you. I'll forgive you. This
is once because I'm a benevolent DM. Get out
there. Leave us a review. Enjoy the show. We
love having you and we love doing this. Let's
go! the good royals. We, the network, have been
as well. To lose a family member is, uh, well,
there's no pain like it in the world. Believe
me, I know. And, uh, and to the royal family
of Cerule, all the lives of all those they governed
were as family. The loss of Tithos, of their
home and their people was absolutely devastating.
But they carry on. Queen Cerise has returned
to her mortal town, to the manor of Nice, Speaker
Cirilla, where she spends her days in quiet grief,
mourning the loss of her people. Cirilla herself
has been doing everything in her power to see
the survivors of the tragedy relocated to other
worlds. She stands strong amongst these tides
of sorrow, a true testament to the resolve of
the Rose family. Much in the same as Samuel LaRoche,
who has relocated himself and his staff to the
world of Sanction, where he has been working
with the Tricenna to bring aid to the victims
of Serenno. And while he has had a troubled history
with his family, Jules LaRoche lives on as well.
As you all know, he has worked to redeem his
former crimes. He has become a luminary adventurer
and has, uh... has brought much honor and glory
to the Roche family name. Who's got the gun to
your head while you're saying that, Oren? These
segments have gotten so meta. I heard that. I
heard what's happening. What'd you hear? Everything's
good. And good on you, Jules, for standing up,
you know? Yeah. Being a beacon of hope for your
family. Yeah. Finally seeing all the wrongs in
your life. Yeah. Good on you. Good on you, man.
Yeah, I know. Yeah. I know. Make them proud,
buddy. How you guys doing today? No complaints.
Yeah. Smooth day. Good day. It was beautiful
out. It wasn't humid. Well, we were supposed
to be in the middle of thunderstorms. They keep
saying it and they don't. Oh. They don't show
up. It looked like they were going to show up
today. The late morning was super dark and ominous,
but it never came. They knew it was my day off,
and I was not running the smoker outside. They
took the day off from me. They were like, we'll
hold off until tomorrow. David's back at work.
We'll storm then. We'll double storm. You know,
in my almost seven years of living here now,
I have not experienced a genuinely really good
thunderstorm here. It's been a while, huh? Sunday
was crazy. No. No. I grew up in Michigan, and
our thunderstorms were gnarly. So I have a buddy
who lives in the southern part of the state who
used to be a meteorologist, and he said that
on Sunday, his weather station clocked the highest
rainfall amount in a single hour that it ever
has. Damn. For his particular weather station,
for wherever he's been living and moving around.
Holy hell. Yeah, I think Sunday, at least in
parts of the state, was pretty serious. Oh, wow.
I mean, I want it to be like a safe banger of
a thunderstorm. I don't want to get hurt. I don't
want anybody else to get hurt, but I'm talking
like really loud cracks of thunder, really good
lightning. So who's going storm chasing? Man,
I would. The Fantasy Space Crew. I would. Would
you go storm chasing like with professionals
or like would you just be like, I want to get
into storm chasing? I'd be the idiot that just
says, let's go storm chase. You know me. I'm
reckless. I do things. I've only... witnessed
one good hurricane, and I was inside, and I was
getting really bored, so I went outside into
the hurricane to hang out. It's still kind of,
I don't know, could have been more exciting.
Fancy Pants does not condone this behavior. Do
not go outside during inclement weather. Unless
you're a hero, then do it. Were you a hero, David?
Do it. I'm always a hero. Wink. Okay. Yeah. All
right. Yeah, that's one for you. All right, with
that, let's get to the battle. No more kisses
across the table. Save it for dance. Oh, we're
not getting to the battle quite, quite yet. At
least not the battle that you're thinking of.
Oh, great. What now? Oh, a little something I
cooked up in between episodes because I want
to have a little fun. You guys like fun? Not
your brand of fun. Oh. We're going to have my
brand of fun today. Let us picture a scene. Now
that's ominous. We're going to open up to this
great open chamber inside the Tower of Authority.
Back on the doomed city of Sarul. On the doomed
world of Tythos. We see this great space of stone.
Great pillars surrounding it. One central at
the room's center. huge and thick and dark, with
points of black sticking from the stone like
short spines running up its length. We hear the
clashing of metal. Bang, bang. We hear a crack.
We hear the sound of a body thumping to the stone
floor. And we pan down to this room's center
to see two figures, one standing and one fallen
to the ground, both encircled by a crowd of armored
men in white and blue tabards. and we see a great
chair resting amongst this crowd, stone sculpted
and inlaid with shining gems, brutally heavy
by the looks, and yet the short poles that jump
from the front and back signify that it was made
to be carried. We see a man in this chair, a
man with a ruddy, sweaty face, tongue lapping
at greasy fingers as he vacantly hands an empty
plate to a nearby servant. Eyes dark under bushy
brows, thick robes do not hide his great belly
that strains against the fabric. A crown rests
at the top of this man's balding head, tilted
lazily to the side. He is Samuel LaRoche, sovereign
king of Cerule, and essential ruler of the civilized
world of Tythos. We hear a large belch fill the
room as he pounds a stone. Silence. His thick
lips purse into a look of frustration. Then,
curve upwards into a smile showing too many teeth.
And he speaks. Real blades now? We hear a wave
of nervous murmurs pass through the crowd of
Roshgard. And then they quiet. Only the soft
scrapings of metal armor can be heard. In the
circle's center, the figure that had fallen has
climbed to his feet. It is Dresden Kellig, currently
13 years old. And what's Dresden look like at
13 years old, Jeremy? One second. You could have
warned me. You could have warned me. It's what
I do. His skin is pretty dirtied up just as it
is, you know, as an adult. He doesn't have as
long hair, though. I think it's actually buzzed
right now. Oh, all right. Yeah. I like that.
I like that. Almost like he kind of sees the
long hair as kind of a point of honor of, you
know, after you've gone through the trials that
you need to go through kind of thing, maybe.
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. But he also
does not have a scar or an eye patch just yet.
Not just yet. And then we see he's about 10 feet
away from Dresden. We see, panting and grinning,
hands still gripping the handle of his practice
sword, a young Jessenth Kellig. His radish features
only accentuated by his youth. His childish glee
at this little victory in the last bout just
really bringing out that snide, gross face. Jessenth
at this time has the advantage of about two years
on his younger brother. He is taller than you,
Dresden. He is stronger than you. He is better
trained than you. Though, even he seems to shrink
just the tiniest bit as the king's words sink
in. And all focus goes back to the ruler. What?
Does that make you nervous? When killers come
for myself, for my darling wife, for my niece,
or my son? Do you think they'll come wielding
blunted blades? Strength requires risk. Risk
is the benefit of those with nothing to lose.
Remember that my hand pulled you both from the
filth and detritus that surrounds our noble city
of towers. You came from nothing, were nothing,
and I can make you nothing again. Or... You can
show me blood. Real blades. There's a sound of
metal sliding on leather as two guards pull swords
from their sheaths and move to deliver them to
you combatants. You see the king turns his head
around the back of his chair to a 13 -year -old
boy with ragged clothes and a messy pompadour.
Jules Laroche is being held, hands gripping arms
and shoulders by two guards at his sides. Watch
this, boy. The king snarls at his son. Learn
something about being a man. And the weapon is
brought to you, Dresden, and offered. Ahead of
you, you can see Jessenth takes hold of his own
offered blade. No hesitation, and he looks to
you. And you know. You know that he will do anything
it takes to ensure his rise from the low city
slums. That he will go for the kill. He smiles,
showing his prominent front teeth and the gaps
surrounding them. His eyes are eager. Do you
take the sword? Yes. I think Dresden is just
as eager, but he knows how to not show his hand.
and he doesn't show it nearly as much as Jessenth
does. Wow. You reach out, and your hand grips
the pommel. From there we cut to black. We skip
ahead just a few moments, and we fade back into
the scene, now seeing it through the eyes of
Dresden. Well, the eye, anyway. We are kneeling.
Hands pressing over our face as we stare through
open fingers. And there is blood. It runs down
our face, pooling on the stone floor. We taste
it. We feel the pain blazing down our forehead,
eye, cheek. Our face burns with it. And Jesseth
is there, sneering. He looks down at the blood
-covered edge of his own blade, then raises it
in triumph over his head, letting red beads fall
onto his face, running like tears of joy down
his cheeks. We hear booming laughter as the king
just... And it's accompanied by nervous laughs
and cheers of a surrounding guard. It all begins
to fade again, darkness pressing in. But the
last thing we see before he passes out, Turning
to the side of the king, we see his estranged
son. We see Jules. We see him standing behind
the throne, eyes on us. And Jeremy, what is the
look on Jules' face? It's a blank stare, but
I think he has locked eyes with Dresden. And
even though he has a blank stare, he knows that
between the two of them, They're going to make
things right. Two victims in this cruel, cruel
place. And with that, everything fades away.
And that was at the end of your torments, Dresden.
As years passed, as training persisted, Jessenthaler
became more and more brutal in his efforts to
prove himself. To bully and scar and hurt you.
But you trained as well. You worked hard. Perhaps
pressured by the fear and rage towards your brother.
Or perhaps fighting towards that look in the
eyes of the young prince. That promise to make
things right. And now that has brought you here.
To an alley in Aurora Town. to once again facing
down the ire of your older brother, his weapon
drawn. He's got two cloaked allies by his side.
You recognize them as likely powerful cult magicians
working for the LaRoche family, allies of Cerise.
And then, behind you, this 15 -foot -wide alley
is starting to fill as four LaRoche guard begin
to press in. You see all of this. You do not
see the small, furry form of the Haringan peeking
around the edge of the alley, having just come
upon a strange and dire situation. And I want
you guys to roll for initiative. All right, here
we go. Oh, my goodness. That is a 16 for Dresden.
14 for Crispin. Now, I don't normally give up
the goat like this. I'll tell you what my own
initiative rolls were. I actually rolled them
just before this session as we were all setting
up. I took the Zoobeard Goldvein D20 and decided
to roll my initiatives with that. Each group
getting one roll, right? Two ones and a seven.
Get out. No way. No way. Zoobeard, your dice
are now banned from my side of the table. You
take your gold vein dice. I curse them. Oh my
god. For now. For now. I will gladly take them
back this way. They're serving you. They're clearly
serving you. We'll play with them. Yeah. We know
who they're loyal to. Yeah. I have only one set
of dice loyal to me and I'll use them now. Yeah,
you know what it was. I mean, did we not bless
the gold vein dice too? You did bless the gold
vein dice. That was your fuck up. Damn it. Huh.
Yeah, interesting. All my forces of darkness
can't stand this holy water. Okay. You got a
map open? Good. Okay. I see the map. As you can
see, right in the scene, 15 -foot -wide alley,
just below the alley on the street, we see Crispin
Dubois looking up. About 10 feet away from him
is a horde of guards looking the other way, facing
down Dresden Kellig. Dresden, you're in the center
of this alley, about 40 feet away from these
guards, and 40 feet ahead of you, we see Jesmith
Kellig and these two sort of magicians at his
side. Okay. That's 20 feet both ways. 20 feet
behind you, 20 feet ahead of you. And with that
being said... That is a big difference. It's
a big difference. Yeah, I was counting 10 foot.
I don't know why. With that being said, the first
move is going to Dresden Kellig. Let's see what
these new characters can do. Seems to me you're
just refusing to fight me like a man. Why do
you need all your goons with you here? Come on.
A duel. For old time's sake. Anything else is
fucking weakness. Give me a persuasion check.
Make it a good one, Jeremy. No, it's three on
the die minus one. So it's a fucking two. You
see, brother, I stand by the belief that it's
our allies that make us strong. And you are so
very, very alone. That's what you think. Where
are they then? Where's your miracle friends come
to save you from me? You call these guys friends?
You are alone. Kill him. Now. I'm going to start
my turn by manifesting my echo directly behind
Jessen. Oh, shit. It's suddenly right in the
midst of Jessen and these men. What does it look
like when this echo appears? A shimmery orb forms
directly behind him. And the orb gradually expands
in a shimmery mist until a ghostly form identical
to myself appears. Holy shit. Fucking badass.
He spins around, startled by the sudden presence.
What? And the two, like, sort of cult fanatics
beside him just spin and look, staring. And then
my echo is going in for an attack. Oh, shit.
With his war pick. Ooh, that's a cool choice
of weapon. Oh, dang. And he is attacking Jessinth.
Do I get some sort of advantage? Um, hmm. Normally,
well, I'm willing to say no. I don't want to
say a precedent where this becomes a constant
advantage machine. I do love the idea of the
surprise. I mean, I can understand, you know.
allowing something more like flanking with it.
I will say that since the Echo is targetable,
it will give you flanking bonus if you are up
with it. That makes sense to me. Right, okay.
Yep. Okay, so he's going in with the Warpick.
So he just spins around, sees this copy of you,
just tries to raise his sword to block. And that
is only an 11. And ping! Parries the attack at
the last second. Yeah. He just turns between
the Echo and between yourself like, And here
you are with the tricks. They won't save you
from me. Okay. With that, with him sneering between
you and your echo, with the cult fanatics finally
kind of recovering, but still slow on the uptake,
and the guards moving in, it's Crispin Dubois'
turn. Oh boy. I was hoping that I would start
a little closer, but let's talk, David, about
moving through occupied spaces. Yes, occupied
spaces. This is one of those things where rules
as written, you just can't. I don't like that.
Isn't there an exception for small creatures?
Can't small creatures move through? Oh, it's
two sizes different. Two sizes larger if I'm
correct. Two sizes, you're right, I think. But
I would like to make this a possibility because
I think it's cool. One thing I've done before,
and I think I will continue to do this, is you
can use an action. to force a athletics or acrobatics
check contested against a foe to push past them.
I'm going to allow this. Yeah. So you can jump
seven feet into the air. If you use your rabbit
hop, I'll give you a seven -foot height on it,
as that's like a special ability you have, and
you're jumping. It's ten -foot length. I think
seven feet is the sort of central high point
of the art. Sure. Okay. Wow. That's huge. That's
generous. Now, if you move away from figures,
you're still taking AOOs. I'm not going to clear
you to the point where you don't take the AOOs,
but you can move past them without making the
athletics or acrobatics check. Okay. All right.
Just to clear it up, that's part of rabbit hop
is provoking opportunity attacks. Oh, that's
true. Oh, you bastard. You're right. I didn't
know if it was like, I'm going to give you this,
but I'm going to take that. No, no. I'll give
it to you. Oh, shit. Rules is written. I mean,
like, it's one of those things where I'm going
to interpret it that way. If you're using rabbit
hot and you're jumping 10 feet, I'm going to
say that it's a thing you can do twice a day.
Right. I'll let you jump to your apex, which
will clear a six -foot -tall person. Wow. Nice.
Yeah. I'm into it. I'm into it. I think that's
cool as hell. Okay. Yeah. Well, Crispin isn't
really interested in just letting this clearly
unfair fight happen. It would also mean just
like, okay, Jeremy, roll up a new character if
Crispin walked away. Also, let's be real. Crispin's
a luminary. He's not going to just walk away
from this. So he will expend a use of rabbit
hop as a bonus action. Hop by these guys. And
let me see where 35 feet gets me. Just up behind
Dresden. So out of nowhere, these guards lined
up just. This figure leaps over them, a small
ball of fur just launching. You hear just startled
screams and gasps as this figure lands down in
the middle of the alley. Skids to a stop. Skids
to a stop. Behind Dresden. Dresden turns around.
What the hell are you doing here? I don't care
to allow an unfair fight. Do you want to get
out of here? What's your plan for that? I'll
show you next turn. I'm shutting this shit down.
I don't know what that means, but okay. I can't
get any closer. Sorry, let me just figure out
what I can do with the rest of this turn that
might help us. Dance party while Stephen does
research. Yeah. Dragging you in, Jeremy. Dragging
you in. I'm not. Dragging you in. Nope. Come
out. Nope. Come out. Nope. I'm staying put. Damn
it. I'm staying put. So after conversing with
Dresden there to the rest of the crowd around
him. As a luminary of the people, I order you
to stand down. And he's going to ready an action
to attack if anybody comes within range. Okay.
All right. I'm into that. I will say another
thing to your benefit, Crispin. Real quick, just
for knowledge's sake, give me a history check.
Okay. Just a nine. Never mind, then. Cool. I
was going to see if you recognized the LaRoche
family colors in the guards' taverns. Since your
employer would be kind of interested in knowing
what's going on here. Right. But you have no
idea. All right, and with that, I get to go.
This is tricky. This is tricky because I got
this spectral figure behind me. Jessenth turns
to the road figures and just says, Protect me
and kill the interloper and just runs to Dresden.
If your Echo gets an AOO, he can take it. I don't
know. Let's look it up. Did we ever explain what
Echo Knight actually is? I don't remember if
we did it in our episode that we rolled up. I
don't think so. I think I just said Echo Knight.
Long story short, I can summon... a ghostly carbon
copy of myself that I can also control. As long
as it's within 30 feet, I can do fun stuff with
it. It does have only one HP, though, so if it
takes one hit, it's gone, but I can also resummon
it as a bonus action on my next turn. And luckily
you have 18 AC, so it's not a walk in the park
to just hit it. Nope. Nope. Yeah, the AC for
this Echo is 16. Oh, it's not the same. Okay,
gotcha. Even still. It's two donks, but 16's
not bad. Yeah, it's not too shabby. Your echo
also gets to take AOOs when I move away from
it. Oh, fuck yeah. It costs your reaction, but
you can use your reaction to let the thing fight.
Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Man, I'm looking
at how this is playing out, and I'm like, jeez,
I hope my plan's going to work. I hope so, too.
Ooh, that is a dirty 20 to hit. That's going
to hit. So that damage is... 1d8 plus 5. Holy
crap. That's pretty solid. It's a 3 on the die,
but I am going to use my little thing that I
get here to reroll damage as a piercer. Yep,
I took piercer. So once per turn, when I hit
a creature, I can reroll the attack. So I'm going
to reroll it. That's interesting. Wait. Yeah.
It says once per turn. I'm on an AOL right now.
It's not my turn. Um, yeah, it's fine. It's fine?
Yeah. Okay, sweet. That's a five. So plus five,
that's ten damage on Justin. Okay, all right.
That's not bad. That's a solid swipe. He begins
to move away and just right down his back. He
just keeps running, bolting towards you. Come
on, you little fucking weakling. Come at me.
I will see how weak I am after this! He goes
to attack you twice with his longsword. Very
good rolls. A 23 and a 21. Hey, those both hit.
Damn. Very good roll. That's gnarly. He does
not wield a shield, so he's going to hit you
with... He doesn't have the gold vein dice to
protect us anymore. Good damage, too. Okay. Ooh,
gold vein. You're holding me back! That is going
to be, in total, 19 points of damage from both
the attacks. Holy shit. Pretty solid over. Yeah,
wow. Comes in, like, you get that first, and
you got a good cleave on him, but he swings in
and just, like, two bam, bam hits. Just solid
rolls there. That went really well. All right,
I'm glad I'm doing what I'm planning on doing,
because this is sketchy. Let's see what you do
when I do this. Now it's time for the two cultists.
Oh, my God. Yeah, there's still six more combatants.
They're going to step forward, and I'm going
to cast Shield of Faith on Jessent. You see,
like, this aura moves out of this thing's hand,
covers Jessent, and he has, like, a small kind
of, like, almost like a spectral shield kind
of around his body, like an aura of protection.
Oh, my God. Kidding me. Oh, yeah. It's going
to be a little harder to hit. Oh, man. What do
I do? What do I do? Do I go all out mean? I could
go all out mean. Have you ever not? You're right.
The other one steps forward, and I'm going to
need Crispin Dubois to make a wisdom saving throw.
He's pretty good at those, I think. I'm glad,
because if you fail this, it might be over. Okay.
It's a plus seven. Plus seven's pretty damn good.
Yeah, I don't think I'm going to use a button.
I mean, things can still go wrong with a plus
seven. 22. You're fine. That's great. As you
embrace yourself, you see this attack coming,
and for a moment, you feel your limbs start to
lock in place. That would have been bad. As hold
person is cast on you. That would have been real
bad. But you break through it, asserting... dominance
over your body, asserting control. The figure
almost staggers back at the powerful resistance
it feels against this spell. And that's all these
guys are going to do. Now time for the other
four guys. Time for the other four guys. Let's
see here. I'm going to have all of them move
up. One of them moves right behind Dresden. Five
feet away from both Dresden and Crispin. Yeah,
I had a ready to action. Oh, you did. Okay, yeah.
You can attack that guy first. He's the one that
goes First. All right. So the small -sized Haringan
is going to pull his great club off his back.
Holy shit. And wield it with two hands and make
a swing. 22. Holy shit. That's going to hit.
So that's a D8 plus four. Just a two on the die,
so we got six damage. Okay. Six is not nothing.
This guy runs up to you and, like, hear clattering
of metal on the crystalline ground as these figures,
like, start rushing in. The first one that comes
in, trying to slide past you, between you and
Dresden, you just swing out and clock him hard.
just to stand just barely afterwards, still wobbling,
and the rest kind of fall in around you. So Crispin
is now nearly surrounded. Dresden's got a figure
in front and behind him, and the two cultists
are staying at the back of the alley. I'm going
to make four attacks, one on Dresden, three on
Crispin. Holy shit. Wow. What the fuck? Oh, I'm
going hard tonight, boys. With my plus two flanking,
I miss on the attack on Dresden. Oh. And actually
only one of the three attacks on Crispin connects.
Wow. That is incredible. That is wild. Give me
those gold vein dice back. They were better.
These figures with their spears cut into you.
They work opposite for you. So that's one spear
hit for only five points of damage on Crispin.
All right. You're kind of weaving around these
blows, but with all of them coming at you, you
can't quite make it out, and you get like a cut
right across the arm, blood running down your
fur. He can take it. And that is going to be
Dresden. So I got Justin right in front of me?
Yes. How far is he from my Echo? He is currently
20 feet from your Echo. 20 feet. He also has
shield. I do have a shield up. Okay. But I'm
going to command my Echo to come up behind Justin.
Which requires no action. This is wild looking.
Just this huge cluster of folks gathered in this
place. Oh my god, what a fight. Just surrounded
by these vibrant, colorful sides of structures.
Just pulsing with light in the middle of this
fantastical, very high magical city. This scene.
I want to see a movie of this. You have no idea
how much I've watched. How much I've learned.
And Dresden goes in for a swing. Okay, okay.
And that's a dirty 20 to hit. That will hit.
Now is this Dresden attacking or the Echo attacking?
This is Dresden attacking. Hell yeah. So here
comes Dresden's attack. And I'm going to re -roll
the damage. Oh my gosh. It was worse. So that's
only a 6 for damage. Okay. And then I am also
going to unleash Incarnation. What? Which allows
me to, whenever I take an attack action, I can
take an additional melee attack action from my
Echo's position. Oh my gosh. Just surrounded,
getting attacked on all sides. Justin's just
turning around, fear entering his eyes as he
realizes that his brother is not so alone after
all. Look what's behind you. Holy shit. And that's
a 23 to hit. Oh, my gosh. Yeah, it hits. Wow.
Even with the shield, I wasn't expecting it to
go that well. Me either. Yeah, you are crushing
the shield. I have really high AC right now.
Doesn't mean a damn against you guys. And that's
max damage. That is 13 damage. Eight on the die
plus five. Brothers both are looking pretty messed
up right now. And when he gets hit with that,
I look directly into his eyes. I see nothing
but weakness. Screams out. Crispin, that's you.
So, David, you were marveling at the scene that
we find ourselves in, this alley. Yes. Can you
describe it a little bit further for me? I'm
mostly interested in knowing how high the walls
are. Sure. Okay. The walls where you're standing
are, I will say, about... 30 feet tall. You know,
we're kind of in these big crystalline structures.
Maybe I'll say like one's 25 feet on one side,
the other is 30 feet on the other side. And then
as far as length goes, it's about a 80 foot long
alley. Okay. Well, risking it for the biscuit.
Let's see if the numbers work out. I hope that's
a really tasty biscuit. What madness are you
planning? I mean, it's really not. As crazy as
you might think, I just hope it works. I'm going
to use my other instance of rabbit hop to jump
out of this bullshit where I would face four
opportunity attacks to land right next to Dresden.
The spears go out, and you just launch right
over them, like all the wood clattering against
them. They all just bump, but Crispin is already
gone. Crispin then touches Dresden and says...
Get out of here. And casts jump on Dresden. What?
What? Your jump distance is tripled for a minute.
What? And then Crispin is going to continue to
use the rest of his movement speed to continue
forward down the alleyway. So I'm trying to get
past Jessenth and past the cultists. Damn. Sorry,
I'm still lost on the jump bit. That's all right.
We'll figure it out. Take it slow. All right.
Holy shit. That is wild. Okay. First and first,
let's calculate what your jump looks like now.
So what is your strength modifier? I believe
it's a plus three. Let's double check. Yeah,
it's plus three. Okay. Plus three. If I'm correct,
that means your jump height. with like being
able to look kind of like set up is going to
be 18. Okay. Okay. Well, you can jump over everybody
and run. Yeah. If I make it. If you make it.
If I make it. See you later, kid. I'm going to
do this too because it's fun. Because it's fun.
About 20 feet above your current position. Between
these two buildings, we mentioned the cables
that run data information between all these buildings,
between different structures. You see one such
cable there. You could feasibly jump and grab
it, but it will require an acrobatics check to
go for that. So that's something I put out there
as another possibility because I think that's
cool as hell. That'll be your turn. Crispin,
what are you doing again? I want to use the rest
of my movement to get out of here. Okay. Past
Jessenth and the cultists. The problem with that
is it takes an action to force past figures that
are in your way. Okay. You can move up to the
cultists and kind of like... All right, that's
fine. I'll do that. I'll move here. Oh, wait,
no, sorry. The Echo is there. The Echo is an
ally. It takes double the movement to get through
his space, so it'll cost 10 feet to get through
his space. All right. I hope it works out, Jeremy.
All right. You... Jump out of the way, dodge
these spears, cast the spell, and begin to move.
I think I only avoid the opportunity attacks
from the jump. I believe so as well. So I think
I get one from Jessent and one from the cultist
there. Okay. Well, thank you for your honesty,
sir. Let's do some attacks, huh? I don't want
no wedgies, yo. That's a miss from Jessent. Thank
heavens. Weak as fuck, boy. Oh, you. Let's see
if these guys do better. But they're daggers.
It's a miss on one. Why are my rules so low?
Keep it going. It's a miss on all. Yeah. That
was brutal. Keep it going, please. Right. Now
this turn is where it all. Yeah. Because I think
you can get out in one turn. I think you could
just straight up just from your standing position.
I could jump over them. Just jump over them and
be in the alley. Right. I have to check one thing
before I make sure of that. Maybe a big wedge
you were going to miss if I don't check this.
Let me double check this real fast. You might
need a certain amount of run speed in order to
jump, which means you probably can do it, but
you might take a couple AOs in order to pull
it off. You might need 10 feet to get the momentum.
Run and jump, sure. Yes, we'll check this. Okay,
jumping. Your strength determines how far you
can jump. Long jump, we're not worried about
that. High jump. When you make a high jump, you
leap into the air. A number of feet equal to
3 plus your strength modifier if you move at
least 10 feet on foot immediately before the
jump. If you make a standing jump, you can only
jump half the distance. Half the height or half
the distance? I think distance in this case means
how far high or lengthwise. And how high are
these cables? The cables are 20 feet up. Because
you can basically just barely get high enough
that you need to reach out to get them. You need
to get the 10 feet movement. You could do it,
but you're going to have to take AOs from a few
guys. Well, we'll get to that point when and
if we get to my turn. You also could disengage.
Because the jumping is part of your move action.
Oh, disengage is an action, right. Yeah. So you
could disengage, take no AOs. You just got to
get a running star. I just want to make sure
we get that right. The cable runs the length,
so you could still reach the cable if that's
what you want to go for. So I could disengage
and jump. Yep. Okay. Yep. Okay. That would just
be your action. Okay. Cool. All right, that's
Crispin. Now I get to do my stuff. Oh, man. I'm
going to make a quick judgment call here. I'm
going to roll a... I don't understand your magic,
your Echo Knight. It just did more damage to
me than you did. Yeah. So I'm going to roll to
see. Actually, you know what? Give me the pick
of Minor Destiny to see who I attack, you or
the Echo. You don't get to touch this pick. I'll
let you roll it then. Your heads. No, you can
do it. All right. All right. You already had
it in hand. Holy shit. You're ready to go. It's
my fiddler. Oh, damn. It's sizzling as he touches
it. Yeah, I know. It's burning his skin. Heads
is Jules, tails is Echo. Sorry, Dresden. Cut
down Jules. That was awesome. I don't do this
so many times. What's that? Heads or tails? I
can't tell. Ah, that is heads. It is heads. All
right. It is heads. Jules dies. Where is he?
I think you just forfeit your turn at that point.
It's not a valid target, right? I'm going for
some attacks on you. Okay. That will be... One
hit. Another good roll, another bad roll. What
would you get? It was an 18 on the die and a
6 on the die. Goddamn. At least got one. That
is nine more points of damage. Oh, I'm going
to die. Cuts in. What do you have left? Okay.
Okay. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. We made a bad party.
I think we made a bad party. This is not good.
Okay. This is not good. Well, I mean. It's all
right. I mean, Crispin ran away. All right, Crispin.
Oh, Crispin's not running away yet because my
cult fanatics get to go now. And they're not
into this running away business that you're going
about. So let me see here. The only thing that
would have changed if Crispin was still standing
there is nothing. Yeah. I just shouldn't have
gone into the alley. I knew that was a mistake.
If he gives me a choice of walking past, like,
two people who I don't even see clearly yet.
or going in an alley, I should have just walked
past the two people. Oh, no. No, they were part
of the party, so they probably would have grabbed
me. They were also in this. There was no way.
Okay, there we go. There was no way out of this.
There were two of these guards in the bottom.
There was no way out of this. This is just David
being an asshole. All right, Colton, I'm actually
going for you, Crispin. They're going to try
to cut you off and be slowly ahead of you. Sneaky,
sneaky, huh? They also, let's check and make
sure they can do this in the same square. Yeah,
do it in the same square. Um, as you move, you
suddenly see these large, sort of, spectral,
we'll say, like, it's strange, these spectral
horns, two of them, side by side, curling, and
just vile, appear just in front of you. They're
sharp ends. Basically, these two cultists kind
of run ahead of you. They stand each side of
the alley. They put their hands out, and these
horns appear and stab into you. I'm using spiritual
weapon with both of them. Holy shit. I'm not...
My touch screen broke, so I'm now using my touch
pad, and I hate it, and I just accidentally X'd
out of the entire encounter. I guess it's over.
Fight's over, everybody. We win. All right. We
got it. That's it. That's the fight. All right.
Where's this fight? There it is. Okay. Spiritual
weapons. They land in the area just in front
of you. Two horns, the chosen form of the deity
for this cult. I'm going to make an attack on
you with these horns. First one's a natural 20.
Oh, that's no good. No fucking way. Second one
is a natural 20. Oh, fuck. Holy shit. Are these
characters really going to die? Holy shit. I...
Good news is... Holy shit. I've only taken a
little bit of damage. Holy shit. That's a lot
of rolls. That was a lot of rolls. Yeah, see,
even if we stayed to fight, this is how it was
going to go. Yeah. We can get away. It's just
a matter of how many turns is it going to take.
As long as I can get to my turn, I'll get away.
That is 21 points of damage. Oh, boy. Holy. As
these two special horns tear into you. It's a
good thing that he's got huge con, a lot of HP.
It's a very good thing because that spell casting
time is a bonus action, which means I still get
to make my attacks on you with these guys normally.
What? That's fucked. What? That's so fucked.
So I'm going to make some dagger attacks on you
now. Can we combine our buttons for disadvantage?
Right? I'd allow it. No, not for this. That's
two hits. Oh, no. Oh, my God. I have 17 HP left.
That is only... It's never only. It's always
like a high number. It's only 16. Eight points
of damage is just too... Great, excellent. Okay,
yeah, now I'm down to single digits as well.
Starting at 17, that's not an only thing. Yeah.
All right, nine for Crispin. Holy shit, this
is wild. Holy shit. And I have more guys I can
go, don't I? Yeah, four more. All right. I'm
going to be fair here. Okay. I'm going to use
the pick again to determine how many of these
guys attack you and how many attack the Echo.
Actually, a pick's not a good way of doing it.
I have a D4. I have four guys. The number I roll
is how many attack Dresden. Sound fair? The Echo
is still a threat, and they don't understand
the magic. It only makes sense I got to split
this up. Fair. I think that's fair. Not being
nice. Well, yeah, because you could just be like,
all four attack Dresden, and yeah, fuck all.
But these guys don't have the metagame knowledge
that this is like. Not the main body. You just
see a dark, scary thing. And always, it's scarier
than you. D4. That's three. Holy shit. Whoa.
I am going down. All right. The nice thing, though,
is if you survive, you've got an open stretch
to just get out. Do I? No, I don't. Talk about.
They're right behind me. No, that's you. Oh,
that's me. Okay. Okay, this is going to be. I
can't see. Echo. The slightly darker eye. That's
too close. That was a lot of rolls. Four attacks.
My highest roll was an 11. I didn't even break
the echo. He's a survivor. Didn't even break
the echo. That is incredible. All right. Okay,
okay. You guys are still in it. You guys are
still in this fight. It looks rough. I'll tell
you that one of these guards looks bad, and Justin
himself does not look great either. But most
of the folks here are just entirely untouched.
Way to try to goad us like, oh, the big bad guys.
Holy shit. Well then, Dresden, that's you. You
have Jumpcast on you still. Yes, and now, are
you going to be fine? Yeah. I mean, maybe. We
just have to, it's every man for himself right
now. Yeah. I go next. I know. That's true. Okay.
So I can't just run out the back of this alley
without getting... Disengage and just jump. Disengage,
run, jump. That's where I was going to go. Oh,
yeah. Sorry. I thought you were like, oh, I've
got no options. All right. So, yeah, I'm going
to look Jesseth in the eye. Come back and find
me when you're ready to die like a man. And I'm
going to disengage. and run toward the back of
the alley, 10 feet, and then jump forward. Holy
shit. And get the fuck out of there. Okay. No,
no, no! He just tries to swipe, but you're already
out of the space. A little bit of your hair just
shaved, floating in the midst of the alley. As
you turn, run 10 feet, spears fly out to try
to strike at you, but you're already airborne,
launching yourself, flying across the buildings.
With that jump, that should land you. Straight
out into the street, out of the alley. And currently,
decently far out of their range. And then does
he get movement on top of that? Yeah, because
I want to start moving around the building as
much as I can. Let me make sure. Because my intention
now is to get around the outside of the building
toward the side that Crispin should be coming
out of, hopefully. Well, that's the thing. Yeah,
it's like, do we know which way the other one
is going? Like, David might just have to find
another way to bring us together. Or, well, I
mean, we're both heading for the gate. I think
we were both heading the same place anyway. We're
both heading for the gate. Yeah. Yeah, you know
what? It doesn't make sense that Dresden would
try to meet up with Crispin after that just happened.
Yeah. He's just some random guy that... This
is survival. Yeah. So yeah, so Dresden's continuing
on toward where he was originally going. I want
to get this as right as I can, but also trying
to maintain rules that I think are stupid. So
jumping is supposed to count as part of your
movement. Oh, bummer. But what I want to do,
because the jump spell triples your jump amount,
I think it's stupid to limit it. I think what
we'll do is I'm going to count your jumped distance
as... I think it would be like normally 10 feet.
Yeah, your single jump distance, you get the
double or the triple jump, whatever distance
for free. Yeah, that's what I think. I think
that makes sense. That makes sense. You run 10
feet down. You jump, and let's make sure we get
this exactly right. Your long jump is a number
of feet up to your strength score. Score. What's
your strength score? 16. 16. So we'll call it
15 feet of movement. cost, because that's what
you would normally use, but we're going to triple
that, and I'm going to give you the full movement,
because you used a spell on this. I think it
just makes sense. I like this ruling more than
what the book would say. So for 15, the cost
of 15 feet, which puts you at 25 feet having
moved this turn, you're going to move 1632 plus
16. I'm bad at math. I'm 48. That's ridiculous.
You can jump 48. Is that for reals? Hang on.
Well, slow down. Slow down. Pull the calculator.
That's unbelievable. No, I think that's it. Like
16. I mean, regardless of what happens, am I
still getting away? I mean, unless they have
some crazy -ass moving speed. Then I don't care
whether it's 30 or 48. Right. I want to know
how fucking far this guy jumps. If I'm still
getting away, I don't give a shit how far I jumped.
I need to know. If I'm still getting away, it
doesn't matter. Okay. Jumping 50 feet matters
because it's absolutely goddamn wild. Hold on.
Is it the jump that's 48 feet? the total movement,
including the long jump. So the movement, I'm
going to cost it for the movement of a normal
jump, which is, for his case, 15 feet. I'm going
to say he gets the tripled version of that for
free as part of 15, as part of the spell. Oh,
his normal long jump is 15 feet? Yes. Oh, fuck.
Wait, what? Yes, that's a thing. Holy shit. That's
wild. Is that like... That's wild. What are like
Olympic long jumps? When you make a long jump,
you cover a number of feet up to your strength
score if you move at least 10 feet. Wow. Your
strength score is the actual number. It's a 16.
This fucking guy just jumped 50 feet out of this
alley. That's wild. You turned to your brother.
You give him those parting remarks. You run 10
feet, and you jump 15 feet. You're just an ant
in the distance. Oh, my God. What the fuck? That's
so far. Give me just a moment. Okay, everybody.
I took a second. I cooled down. I was a little
excited, and I was going to make a call that
may have been very dangerous for me in the future.
Jump spell is a pretty low -level spell. I don't
want to let it increase movement speed generally
regularly throughout the campaign, so we settled
on something that's really cool, which is if
Dresden uses action surge, then scene still plays.
You can get that 10 -foot run to a 50 -foot...
jump into the street, which is absolutely bananas.
But that's your choice. Otherwise, I would have
to limit it so you'd still be mid -air at the
end of your turns, mid -jumping, but you'd be
moving out into the street, and that's how that
would look. When I was making this plan, I just
did the very... Actually, when you click on it
on D &D Beyond, that's the only thing it says.
You touch a creature, the creature's jump distance
is tripled until the spell ends, and then we
started to get into it a little bit more and
realized that just because you can jump, further
than your movement speed doesn't mean that the
game allows it. So, yeah, it would be stupid
not to use my action surge, which allows me one
additional action on my turn. Oh my gosh, I still
love it so much, though. You say these parting
words, you run 10 feet, dodging out of these
attack ranges, and then you jump 50 feet. Just...
God, wind blasting as you just like, I don't
know what this looks like, your legs just pump
on the ground, just like, I imagine this is almost
like this force, this pressure that blows behind
you as you launch taverns flapping. Your brother
just like covers his face like, as you are gone
and into the street. Now far enough away that
I'm going to have a hell of a time doing anything
about it. Get out of there, Crispin. Oh, that's
pretty good. I think Crispin's okay. Okay. I
think Crispin's okay. Cool. Speaking of Crispin,
that would be your turn. So I can just disengage
and get by these two, right? Yes, you can. Even
though the spiritual weapon before you wouldn't
really do anything, you can just get out of there.
Right. Opening right in the middle. Okay, so
I'm just going to disengage and move my 35 feet.
So Crispin gets to the end of the alley and his
little rabbit feet scurry on the cobbles as he
tries to change direction and starts to run towards
the gates where he was heading. And I'm sure
that everyone will chase at least for the next
turn. But once it becomes his turn again, when
he double moves, he'll have 70 feet of movement
speed. So he's a fast little guy. Okay. All right.
Where do I feet? You turn the corner, you begin
to run. You are making your way out of this alley.
Okay. Oh, wait. As a Circle of the Moon druid,
Wild Shape can be used as a bonus action. Oh,
shit. So as Crispin turns the corner, finally
gains his footing and starts to run, his body
morphs and shapes into that of an old God's Breath
favorite. The Dire Coyote. Holy shit. Holy shit.
Who has 50 feet of movement speed. So, yeah,
you can just add 20 more feet to that because
we'll see the Dire Coyote's speed for this turn.
That's 20 more feet you can go. And you have
Dire Coyote's HP right now, too. Holy shit. Yes,
that's right. I'm back up. Oh, my gosh. Yep,
HP is back up to 37. Wow. That is insane. Yeah.
Wow. He's going to be fucking strong. Oh, my
God. And so if he was a Dire Coyote first, he'd
have the 37 HP. Oh, my God. And then when he
gets to zero, he reverts back to his form. As
is before. Holy shit. Druids are incredible.
What the hell? Yeah. He's going to be really,
really powerful. That is nasty. Yeah. You hit
the street in this direcordy form. You are running,
running. You're basically going to be out of
this fight. I can't do much to you here, but
for the sake of flavor, give me two deck saves
as I'm going to try to cast two bouts of Sacred
Flame at you from these guys. Oh, that's good.
This burning black flame tries to light you up.
I have something for this, too. What? What do
you have on this? I'm just still so hurt that
the first fight... as these new characters, and
we have to fucking run away. Yeah, but we're
doing it really cool, though. Or, I mean... Okay.
So I have lucky footwork. It costs a reaction.
When you fail a dex saving throw, you can use
your reaction to roll a d4 and add it to the
save, potentially turning the failure into a
success. So let me know if I fail one. Yeah.
I'll tell you right now. It's a dc11. Okay. He's
only got a plus 2, so let's see. 10 plus 2 is
12 for the first one. 19 for the second. Okay.
Yeah. You just see this blast of fire just almost
appearing right beside you as a small sparks
that quickly like rage out of control. Just boom,
burst. And you weave to the side once. Another
one tries to hit you. Weave to the side again.
And you are tearing, tearing down the crystal
streets surrounded by vibrant light. The figures
behind you falling back, fading down the road.
Holy shit. We cut down to the other edge of the
alley as four guards and Jessenth Kellig begin
to pound out into the road, turning and watching.
And Dresden, do you continue your flee? Oh, yeah.
Abso -fucking -lutely. Just fucking, like, 50
-foot jumps at a time. Seriously. He's not even
looking back. I mean, he got the last word in
with Jessenth. He's feeling pretty... I mean,
he's running away, but he's feeling pretty fucking
confident. You know the old, like, it's like
a 2008 Hulk movie? No, the older one. The really
old Hulk movie. When the Hulk would just jump,
like. Yeah. That's all I'm seeing. It's just
like, boom, boom. You reach the streets. You
begin to jump. You hear these figures pounding
down the road after you. Trying to give chase.
And then, at the apex of one of your jumps, you
look down. And it's weird. Maybe you missed them.
You're not sure. But suddenly there's a figure
down in the street. You skate into a hole, landing
just behind them. Their dress sort of flowing
in the wind of your actual jump. As she turns
and looks down the street, you see all the other
figures stop in their tracks and begin to scatter
down nearby alleys, leaving immediately. You
turn around to see Sholay. It's fucking Sholay!
Well, Mrs. Interesting, we should talk. And we'll
call it there. Let's do this voice right. I'm
self -important. I speak and the world listens.
I have a drama in my voice because I am a monarch.
I sound a bit silly, but not to myself. To me,
I sound wise, strong, a pillar from which the
world stands. Okay, let's go with it. Let's go
with it. Did David just spend like the last 30
seconds talking about himself? And the king speaks.
And there's our post credits.