Welcome to Tales from the Crit Season 3. Bigger,
badder, and stickier. By joining us today, you
have been officially upgraded to Crit Cat status.
So, welcome to the club. Tales from the Crit
is an actual play podcast where we focus on smaller
story arcs from some of your favorite RPGs, as
well as some of the less known or obscure ones.
We also play some highly narrative tabletop board
games and also some micro RPGs. All of those
feature a revolving cast of players, so you're
going to see a lot of variety there. And as always,
I am your host and your Crit Keeper, Riley Groves.
We're so glad to have you here with us today.
Now let's get into the episode. Content warnings
can be found in the description. Welcome back
to Tales from the Crit. We are going to continue
our playthrough of Root. And returning as Peter
is Connor. Glad to be back. Cotton is Tim. And
Bramble is Anna. Awesome. So like the last episode,
instead of answering a question from our pod
deck, interview deck, or that other deck of cards
that I can never remember the name of, we are
going to talk about one of you guys' past. Explore
your roguish backgrounds a little bit more and
make something happen on the map. So to do that,
I need somebody to roll a d6. It's in the corner.
It's a four. I feel like four was a good one.
Yeah, four is a good one. I don't know what it
is, but I'm sure it's good. On a four, you have
defended a clearing from a faction attack. Ain't
that the fucking truth? But... You guys can either
choose a clearing or you can roll for a clearing.
I want to roll. I want to give the dice a chance
to speak. Okay. Give me 2d6 then. 11. An 11.
Okay. Let's talk about your time in Pineborn.
Pineborn. Okay. Which is now under eerie control,
but at some point they must not have been. What
did you guys do in Pineborn to help the denizens
there? Or maybe not the denizens. You could have
helped the Eyrie take it over. You could have
defended it from... It looks like there's mostly
foxes there as well. Is that what it says? That
is true. There's a lot of fox territory. A lot
of fox clearings. Okay. So maybe in the younger
days before it was taken over, we were there
visiting some fox friends. And it was like when
the Eyrie first tried to establish, but they
weren't able to at that point. So we kept back
to force by... throwing rotten pumpkins at them
and discouraging the troops from entering. Okay.
Anybody want to add anything? I don't really
have much to add. I mean, that was a pretty good
description. We were hanging out visiting our
friends and ended off an uprising. Or an attempt
to take over, rather. We were called the Pumpkin
Boys. The Pumpkin Boys. Yeah, they know us there.
The Pumpkin Boys. Maybe that's how Jane De La
Fere originally heard of y 'all. Ah, yes. Okay.
Awesome. So go ahead and take a plus one to Denison's
on your reputation track there and give yourselves
another negative one to the Erie. Pumpkin boys.
Pumpkin boys. With that, let's dive back into
it. It is now nightfall when you guys approach
the clearing of Patchwood. As you get closer,
the smell of blood fills the air. It is acrid.
And the sounds you hear are mostly unnatural,
and a large building rises into the air in patchwood.
And Honey looks at the three of you and says,
if you haven't known, that's the prison. It sure
is ugly. It is. This town has changed a lot.
It used to be so beautiful. I hope Vickery is
okay. Was the prison here before these two evils
came into our forest, or was this something that
was built by the... The felines. There was a
prison, but it didn't look like that. Not last
I saw it, anyways. What is that wretched smell?
It smells quite a lot like blood. I thought maybe
you'd have some sort of intel on events here.
Very little has come from Patchwood. We've tried
to send spies, but none of them have returned.
I fear for our friend's life. How do we get into
this place anyway? Well, we have a plan. Go on.
And right before she is able to, a large cat.
makes its way in front of the prison. It has
an executioner's hood on it. It's a large gray
cat and it drags a very large battle axe behind
it. And it has a necklace on of just a bunch
of different types of teeth. So it's not one
species or another. And he barks orders at some
other troops around him. And you see that there
are several. denizens that are tied up to some
posts and they begin lashing them and he laughs
maniacally as he moves further into the encampment
this is a terrible place now that is one that
we will kill it does seem like we now have two
missions i don't feel comfortable leaving that
cat alive neither do i It would be a bad idea
all around. Well, here's my proposal then. We'll
free Vickery. We know the layout of the prison.
You kill that cat. All right, splitting up the
work. Do you know the layout of the prison as
it is or as it was? We have a good idea of how
it is now. Shovels here is an expert at making
his way through buildings, hence the ram heads,
so... We have no problem getting through doors.
If there's anything in the way, we'll break it
down. All right, well, good luck. Perhaps we
should wait just a little bit longer until the,
you know, some people are asleep. I don't want
to just run out there and attack that cat. I
do not think that would be a wise move for you.
For us either. I would not be going with that.
Well, are the cats all inside now? No, there's
like a lot of movement still here. There's a
lot of troops moving around. Occasionally there's
a cat. There's not that many cats. You've never
seen that many cats in one place, actually. But
you can hear the maniacal laugh of... the cat
that you saw walking through here, you can hear
that occasionally sprinkled amongst the camp.
And actually, as you're hanging out, you can
see that he has several of his troops dragging
two new people behind him towards a house outside
of the prison. Well, we haven't actually slept.
Maybe we make camp discreetly somewhere in the
woods beyond the prison's sight line, and then
we'll go in when it's dark. I definitely think
that it would be a good idea to somewhat survey
our environment and layout before we attempt
anything. We can see if there's any denizens
left in here who are not conscripted to the cats.
Cats also don't sleep at night, do they? They
sleep a little bit at night, a little bit at
day. They might be going to take a nap right
now. Probably a bed in that house, which is something
we should keep in mind. Maybe we can surprise
him while he's napping. True, yes. But let's
first go see if there's anywhere where there
are regular folk in this town. Okay. This clearing.
I thought it was just the whole prison. Is it
more than that? There are other buildings. Oh,
okay. All right. The prison is the largest building
and is centrally located. You move around through
the town stealthily, and you find almost nothing
but pain. You find some denizens. There's a lot
of just slain denizens left in piles. It's pretty
gruesome as you make your way around. There's
several that are tied up, but you don't see any
just citizens or denizens roaming freely through.
Everybody seems to be clad in marquis de cap.
armor or clothing um and there doesn't seem to
be anybody like in the houses that are outside
of those forces such a a grim place none of the
people even the soldiers look happy i mean i
think i've only seen soldiers or at least people
who are dressed like soldiers yeah these people
are miserable i would be too i guess hopefully
if things get out of control in that prison the
denizens will and some of the soldiers will react
the same way as those in Wind Gap did. Yeah.
People are tired. Take advantage of the uprising.
Is there a barracks or something? Is there a
main building where these cat soldiers are hanging
out? They're mostly spread around in all of the
buildings. They've just used the local infrastructure.
It's like the British army during the revolution.
Yeah, pretty much. They've just taken over any
residence that they felt. I would like to attempt
it. using my move create to destroy uh when i
use available materials to rig up a dangerous
device so i would like to try and find enough
various odds and ends to create uh small something
like do small explosions okay um kind of a couple
batches of breach gear so to speak all right
Fuck yeah. Do you have to roll for that? I roll
with finesse. On a hit, I cobble together something
that will do what I want one time. Ten plus,
choose one. Seven to nine, choose two. All right.
Let's see it. I got a six plus finesse, eight.
Okay. So that's a success. You can find something
that will work for that one time. Okay. Can I
say I made, like, three of these devices? They're
not, like, giant. It'd be, like, similar to a
blow. Like, this is something the size of, like,
a door, like a hole in the wall. I think you
need to roll for each one. Each one? Right. All
right. It's a seven plus two, a nine, and a five
plus two, a seven. So I get to choose two, I
guess, for each one, or kind of two, and it would
float through all of them. I feel like you just
got to choose one of these things for each one
to have. Instead of two? Because I got a seven
to nine on each one, so it would be choose two.
Oh. What are the two things that you can choose?
I could choose two out of the following. More
dangerous than intended. Okay. Obviously choosing
that one. Larger or more unwieldy than intended.
Or more temperamental and fragile than intended.
Okay, so you just choose one of those for each
one. All right, one is more dangerous than intended.
One is... Yeah, we give one to each one. One
is more dangerous than it's supposed to be. One
is larger. No, one is more unwieldy than it is
supposed to be. And one is more... We'll say
one's larger than it's supposed to be. Okay.
Yeah, so you create some explosives. Cool. What
are you going to do with those? Well, my thought
is that we will... Place one in the town somewhere
on the far side and explode it first to potentially
bring people away from the prison. And then we
will use two on the backside area away from where
our cohorts have gone into the building to form
a distraction on the opposite side of the prison
and potentially even free some of these poor
souls that have been trapped inside. All right.
Well, that's great thinking. That means we'll
each be in charge. of one of these homemade explosive
devices. I'm going to be very careful with this
one. Yeah, that last time was scary. You be more
careful than last time, Peter. Live to drink
another day, as you always say. That is the goal.
Real quick, pause. I forgot we did not ever address
the two additional moves that you guys had picked
at the end of last session. So if you could fill
us in real, real quick on that. I took two weapon
skills. So I now have vicious strike and quick
shot. Awesome. I chose the move parkour out of
someone else's hand. Playbook. Thank you. Playbook.
Awesome. All right. Pause on pause. So what do
you guys, do you let the other group know that
you have planted explosives all around the prison?
Well, we haven't split up from them yet, right?
Or did we? i'm gonna say you did just to investigate
because peter peter wanted to look in some different
places so they were gonna hang back there's a
lot more of them so and then we were waiting
for night time to come before we did that all
right i assume that we had a place that we were
supposed to go back and meet up at so maybe we
kind of wait there see if anyone makes it back
before it starts and then otherwise like just
go when it's we had planned on it starting and
just hope that they ended up having to change
to be somewhere else to make their plan work
Honey the Badger comes back with Kirk, Turk,
Shovels, and Wallingford. That sounds right.
And they meet you at the predetermined spot.
Well, are we ready to go? We are. There will
be a few surprises we have in store for them,
but we're going to make a couple different distractions
for you while you're inside. Do not be alarmed
when the noise starts. It is in your best interest
to move forward. Even more diligently on your
plan. What kind of noises? This is something
that we should know. Well, it could be anywhere
from a quiet explosion to a very loud explosion.
Mostly explosions. Lots of explosions. I've only
built a few of these, but they seem pretty good.
Kirk and Turk get very excited at this. And they
just exchange a lot of glances and are high -fiving.
They're very pumped about explosives. I appreciate
the support, fellows. That is very kind of you.
If you have any more explosives, we'll take them.
We'll take them. We'll take them. I have just
enough right now for my plan. But next plan.
Next plan, explosives. How old are you? Old enough.
Old enough. Old enough. That's got me into trouble
before. How old are you? They may be young, but
they're capable. We're making it worse. They're
not children necessarily. Their history has been
complicated. They can handle explosives. But
to be fair, we don't need to give them explosives.
They don't need them right now for this. The
more explosions... Probably the more complex
this whole situation gets. Yeah, I'm sorry. There
are only three boys, and those three are from
my team here. You are strictly on the penetrating
team. Do we go when we hear the explosions, or
do we leave now? What's the timing? You should
leave now while we secure our location. Your
plan starts right now. As soon as we get to ours,
I should have given you enough time to... Be
right ready to infiltrate, and then the distractions
will start going off. If we plan on setting off
one of the explosives far away in town to create
a distraction, maybe they should wait until that
one goes off to see if people run out of the
prison first. Yeah, I was going to say wait five
minutes after the first explosion and go in,
and then we'll have moved on to doing the second
one and third one. Yeah, patience would probably
be for the better. All right. Well, we'll wait
for the first explosion, then we'll head into
the prison. We'll free Vickery. You have to kill
that cat. We're on it. Don't know how yet, but
we're on it. We'll kill any cats we see. Noble
cause, as I think we all should. Well, good luck,
you two. We'll see you on the other side. Well
met, friends. We'll meet in the forest. Between
Limberley and Ironvein. Ah. Whoever, we are familiar
with that area. Excellent. Keep your heads down
and keep your heads on. That guy looked like
he liked to decapitate. That is some sound advice.
Thank you, friend. And they move to a more desirable
location. All right. Here's one explosion for
you and one explosion for you. Who wants to take
the first one? And who wants to take the other
two? I'll probably take the one furthest out.
The first explosion? Mm -hmm. All right. And
which bomb is that, by the way? I was figuring
we're going to go one, two, three. I don't think
technically we'll know until they go off. Okay.
Right? Sure, man. I mean, as far as I'm aware,
I built three solid bombs. So I got the top one
is one, the bottom is two, the third one is three.
One's bulky, right? Yeah. So we'll do yours first
since you're going to explode first. So I'll
just say it's two, four, six. So four would be
a count in the middle one. So yours is more unwieldy
than intended. Okay. So I'm struggling with a
large, obvious bomb. And then let's just do Peter
next. Yours is larger than intended. Oops, that
would leave me with more dangerous than intended.
I don't even need to roll. So mine's the most
dangerous one. Okay. That's fair. What's the
difference between larger and more unwieldy?
That's a great question. Larger explosion? But
that would mean more dangerous, I thought, would
be. Larger would probably be bigger and maybe
not necessarily dangerous. Unwieldy would be
like, maybe it gets out of control a little bit.
Starts blowing out some structural supports or
something that wasn't exactly supposed to happen.
It's made in a really weird way, so it's hard
to hold on to. That's what I was thinking of
it being unwieldy. It's shaped like a boomerang.
Yeah, so that's what we'll say. For Bramble,
you get this bomb and... Although Cotton thinks
he did a really good job making it structurally
sound, it's a weird shape. And you, as you're
sneaking through the bushes, are really unsure
what is the best way to hold this. Making you
really pretty nervous all the way through the
outskirts of town. Yep, that makes sense. Go
ahead and give me a finesse roll. I actually
got something for that. Ooh, chow. Eight. That's
a weak hit. So you get there, but you're going
to take a point of exhaustion. Okay. Just from
being so nervous that this bomb is going to blow
up while you're trying to get it where it needs
to be. But eventually you do make it to wherever.
Well, where are you planning on putting it? Maybe
like on the one side of like a little bridge
somewhere, like a little stone bridge. Ooh, okay.
You want to make it the bridge that goes from
Patchwood to Allaburra? Yeah. All right. You
do that. Okay. Then I race back into the city
because I don't want to get blown up. Okay. The
bomb goes off, destroying the bridge, and it
draws a lot of the soldiers out of the prison
and out of the town towards the bridge. Just
pretend that there's no more path to Allibro
and Patchwood as the bridge is now out. Effectively,
not clearing out the place, but making a pathway.
And you see Honey and her band of vagabonds rush
towards the prison. And you see them. There's
a couple guards, but they easily dispatch them
before moving inside. We head around to the backside
of the prison now. Yeah. So which side did they
go in? The front door. North, south, east, west?
I guess the front door would be at the south.
Okay. I think we should head in, or we should
hit the west and east side of the building. Okay.
I'll go to the west and plant my bomb. I'll go
to the east. And you have the bigger bomb, right?
Mm -hmm. Peter, so I guess you also give me a
finesse roll. I have minus one to finesse. Solid.
It's a six. That's not great. A six is a miss.
You plant this bomb and you go running back away
from the prison. It isn't until you make it considerable
ways away do you realize that you've never set
the trigger for it to actually explode. That's
a good one. Cotton, your bomb is more explosive
than anything else. Way more dangerous. Way more
dangerous. I got an 8 plus finesse is 10. 10
is a strong hit. You plant your explosive on
the east side, and you just manage to get away
before it utterly destroys a large portion of
the prison. Added benefit, you watch as a group
of soldiers are flung from one of the floors
in the prison and crash down dead. Into the streets
below. Nice. Cat -tacular. I run around the prison,
staying wide away from the bomb that has not
exploded to meet back up with Cotton. And I would
have met up with both of them at that point.
Okay. From the furthest part of the city. Are
you guys just standing in the city? I guess we
didn't really make a plan for the next part.
We were worried about the bombs. Right, so we
did the distraction. They're inside. How can
we continue to assist? We have to kill the cat.
The cat, that's right. Do we assume it's in the
prison or should we go check that small house
where it dragged the nukes? Oh, I think that's
a good idea. Let's go check that place first.
It hasn't been exploded yet. You guys move to
that house and you can hear a very loud cat inside.
What is all the commotion? I am trying to have
some fun and these people will leave me alone.
That sounds like our cat. That does. Can I improvise
a weapon from the debris of the prison? Sure
thing. We should burn his house down around him.
That's a nine. Nice. And what kind of weapon
are you trying to improvise? A melee weapon.
Or just a handful of rocks and a piece of cloth
to sling them with. You want to sling in rocks?
Either of those will work. I think you're more
likely to find rocks and bits of material from
a blown up prison. Yeah. There's one bar from
the window with a big chunk of rock left on the
end. All right. So you can get a sling and rocks.
It has a close range. And then it has a beneficial
and a weakness tag. Okay. You can put the tag
fast on it. So you can mark where when engaging
in melee with that to suffer one fewer harm.
So when you're exchanging blows instead of taking
damage, you can mark where. However, it is also
shoddy, which means repairing this item costs
twice as much value per box. For whatever reason,
it costs a lot to repair. Maybe not even worth
it to repair it. So fast was minus one harm?
Yeah, you suffer one fewer harm even on a miss.
Okay. So you can mark where instead? So you mark
where and then? Mark where against the sling?
Yes. How many boxes of where should I have it
for it? I would say two sounds fair. Probably.
It is two. I want to make a tear gas bomb. Ooh.
I have an alchemy kit in my toolbox. Yep. And
I feel like I can make that with alchemy stuff.
Okay. Do you have to roll? I think so. Let's
see. When you open up your toolkit and dedicate
yourself to making a thing or getting to the
bottom of something, decide what and tell the
GM, which I did tell you. The GM will give you
between one and four conditions you must fulfill
to accomplish your goal, including time taken,
materials used, help needed, facilities, tools
needed, or the limits on the project. When you
accomplish the conditions, you accomplish the
goal. Okay. I have to choose how many of them?
Between one and four. Okay. I'm just going to
have you do the materials, which is going to
use up. My depletion. Yeah. So use one depletion.
And, you know, we already established that you
guys have, you know, explosive stuff. So I don't
think it would. Although let's say it also takes
up one time. So if you're doing this, like, let's
just say. And they go to attack. And they go
to attack. Yeah. You're going to be still putting
up. Well, I think it's still worth it to make
a tear gas bomb. Okay. So I'm going to do that.
Sorry, guys. I just got to fiddle with this for
a second. No problem. I'm picking up rocks. Cotton,
are you doing anything to repair? I'm not sure
I have anything at this moment. Okay. I need
to, so I think I'm good. Right on. It's up to
y 'all what happens next, so. Well, I have to
wait until my bomb's done. I was going to throw
it in the window and then further disrupt whatever's
going on in there. And then we can go in. I'm
going to circle around and see if there's an
alternate entrance or if it's just the one way
and one way out. Oh, I made an alternate entrance
myself there. There's a big old hole in the side
of this thing if we want to go in a more... In
the house? That's in the prison. Oh, sorry. We're
at the house. Yep. There's several windows. There
is a back door. Okay. So I'm going to come back
and say there's a back door and a front door.
So I'm going to hang around on the back side.
Okay. We're going to wait for Bramble to throw
the device through the window and then we'll
just wait on the outside and see what happens.
Okay. Sounds good to me. Well, then, with that,
let's just cut to your tear gas bomb being done.
I think it's done, guys. Get ready to see the
throw. I'm excited. I'm going to head to the
other side of the building now. I think I'll
break one window with my elbow and then just
toss it in. I don't want to throw it through.
The weapon skills, like Vicious Strike, that's
a special tag that the weapon also has to have
for me to use it, right? Technically, yes, but
I think for our purposes, I'd rather just let
you guys use your weapon moves if you have them.
Because we're not playing a super long game,
it seems kind of shitty to be like, oh, you can't
use any of your moves, and then it's just kind
of boring. So that's the official rule, but I
don't care for that. Good? Sounds good to me.
All right. Bramble, you run up, smashing one
of the windows with your elbow and tossing this
tear gas grenade in there. You see this cat real...
Around looking at where the noise came from before
the entire room bursts into this noxious gas
Immediately begins to cough and you hear the
coughing of two other people inside as well,
but then you hear a lot of sounds of stumbling
of shit getting knocked over and Clambering before
the front doors swings open and this giant cat
erupts from the building Okay, I'd like to stick
my foot out and trip him. Okay. Because I would
have been kind of close near the door, so I'd
be able to get there and just put my foot out.
Yeah, let's... Do you think that's engaging in
melee or grappling? Grappling, I would say. Okay.
I'm not hitting him with anything. Okay, so you're
going to roll with might. My leather armor also,
when I grapple with someone, mark exhaustion
to ignore the first choice they make. Okay. Yeah,
so the first choice he may make might be something
like elbowing you in the face or throwing you
off. So it's going to just negate the first thing
he does and make it probably a less harmful thing.
Okay. Eight. Okay. On a hit, you choose simultaneously.
Continue making choice until someone disengages,
falls unconscious, or dies. So you can strike
a fast blow, inflicting an injury. You wear them
down. They mark exhaustion. You exploit a weakness,
marking exhaustion to inflict minus two injury,
or you withdraw and disengage. Okay, so I trip
him and I jump on top of him and start punching
him. Okay, so we're going to say you strike a
fast blow, inflicting some injury. Yeah. Solid.
Peter and Cotton. I am at the backside of the
building. Yes. After a few moments, when it doesn't
seem like anyone is coming out, I run around
to the front. Where I see the cat on the ground
giving me enough. Right, so this is happening
outside. So it's a chaotic scene. I would like
to dash my way... Oh, okay. Not exactly what
I thought. Let's go try to dash up onto the roof
and snipey -snipe down. I guess instead I'd like
to... move right in with the bow for a quick
shot. Try to snipe this cat. Yeah. Seven plus
finesse, nine. Nine, okay. So it's a success
plus a complication. Where do I find the complication
thing? In my mind. Oh, okay. So you are successful
if that's what you want to do, and I'm going
to introduce a complication. Oh, I mean, yeah,
I feel like I already rolled for it. It has to
happen. So you do another damage to the Toil
Master, shooting him with your arrow. However,
he stands up after Bramble was on him. He is
much, much larger and much stronger than most
of the cats. And he stands up and he hurls Bramble
off into the building, back through the door.
You're going to take one injury, Bramble, and
he picks up his giant axe. Peter, you've run
around the front of the building. Yeah, when
I see him start to get up, I'm definitely going
to let a stone from my sling at this large cat.
Would you say that he is close or intimately
ranged or far? For you, close. Okay, so if he's
close, I can use the vicious attack, which I
think lets me roll with might, which I have a
plus zero in, so it doesn't matter. Nice. I rolled
a 12. Oh. So let me see here. On a hit, they
suffer serious harm plus one and cannot mark
where on their armor to block it. On a 10 plus,
you get away with the strike. On a seven to nine,
they score a blow against you as well. So they
suffer serious harm and they're not able to hit
me back. So serious harm done to this brute after
he's already taken several points of damage.
You manage to get a rock directly between his
eyes, and you watch his skull cave in a little
as the cat falls flat on his back, dead in front
of the door. Some David and Glyde stuff. Yep.
Nice. He's dead already? He's dead already. Because
Bramble wanted to come out and chop his head
off just for good measure. I mean, Bramble still
can. Okay. You should use his own tooth necklace
as like a handsaw. Oh, yes. Brutal. I like that.
I was thinking use his own axe, but the tooth
handsaw is even more intimate. Oh, they're all
good ideas. Just stare at anyone that comes near
you in the eyes as you're doing it. This needed
to happen. Several troops do run up, but upon
seeing... They do turn and run to another part
of the town. Yeah, they don't want to mess with
that. Simultaneously, you hear a small explosion
go off in the top of the prison. And you see
Wallingford, the goose, flying out of the top
of the prison. He has someone on his back. And
they are making their way out of the clearing.
Looks like they got their friend out. Is it just
those two? I mean, there was like five of those
folks, I think. Maybe they split up. Maybe. Maybe
it was a sacrifice mission and there was only
one survivor intended the whole time. But I do
wonder, did we ever set a rendezvous point for
what happens? Yeah, we did. Yeah? Okay. It's
in the forest. Oh, right. Between Iron Vein and
Limbully. Yes. A spot we are familiar with. Correct.
As I have mentioned before. We might have killed
some crows kind of near there. I suggest we get
on out and go find them. Yep. Sounds good. Or
are we leaving the three in prison, or are we
trying to save everybody, or are we just reconvening?
I think we should just go. They had to take care
of that. Yeah. Figure it out. They know where
to go. Yeah, I'm good with that. We took out
the big cat. Some other cats got blown up, probably,
or at least guards did. We don't want to cause
any more collateral damage than we have to. And
they're cut off from the other place there. Stick
to the plan. All right. And you guys make for
the forest. hopefully those guards that ran away
when they saw our brutality over here have uh
turned against the cats yeah i mean we did it
once i don't see why i couldn't do it again all
right you guys make your way through the forest
a forest you guys know quite well um you did
just slaughter some crows in here but it's hard
traveling through although it offers a lot of
protection did uh as we're going into kind of
the finale here did anybody complete one of their
drives No. I did. Awesome. Peter, so why don't
you go ahead and take an advancement now for
that? Okay. I will take Desperate Smile. When
you trust fate to see you through by begging,
pleading, or abasing yourself, roll with charm
instead of luck. Okay. Do you have a plus to
charm? Yeah, you've got like a plus two, right?
I have a plus two to charm, yes. When you trust
fate to get through trouble, roll with luck.
On a hit, you scrape by or a barrel through.
The GM will tell you what it costs you. On a
10 +, fortune favors the bold. Your panache also
earns you a fleeting opportunity. You guys need
to roll lower than 10 through 12. Kind of beneficial.
It doesn't take too long for you guys to meet
up with Wallingford and who you now see is Vickery.
He's a large bullfrog man and he's standing there
talking to the goose. Well, it looks like we
got y 'all out safe. Well, two of you out safe.
Well, my, my. I didn't expect to see some rogues
here outside of our own group. Who, may I ask,
are you? Well, I'm Bramble. This is my friend
Peter and Cotton. You've come to join the cause,
then? We supplied the explosions. I did thoroughly
enjoy those explosions. They helped out tremendously.
I couldn't thank you all enough. We were originally
sent to find... Watkins. And that led us to finding
you. And here we are. We were sent by Jane. And
we believe that the Woodland Alliance thinks
you have some sort of pertinent information to
this war. That is what Wallingford was telling
me just now in between his honks. You know. But
I do believe you could be some help. I know where
the cats need to take their serious blow. And
that's where we're headed next. Excellent. We're
headed to Limberley. We just got to wait for
them other folks to make their way back here.
What's in Limberley? I've been there a few times.
It's mostly rabbit folk. I can't think of what
would be there. There wasn't anything there before.
Just a plain run of the mill clearing. However,
now this is where I got caught during my scouting
mission to try to figure out what they were doing
with all that coal coming down from Milltown.
They built a factory there. A factory that needs
to be blown to hell. Well, I think we're the
right guys for that. After some of those explosions,
especially the one that blew apart part of that
prison wall, I do think that you may be just
the men I'm looking for. Perfect. This factory
wouldn't happen to produce some sort of large
metallic fire -breathing cat, would it? Well,
I can confidently say that I didn't know that
they breathed fire before. I can also confidently
say that yes, it does. Okay. All right. Which
is why we need to stop that. That makes total
sense. Yeah, that is just plain not good. Some
evil, pure, pure evil. The cats, the cats are
evil. The birds are evil. The cats are evil.
Some other people might be evil too, but we're
going to deal with all that at another time.
Yeah, I mean, so far I've only seen the fire
-breathing cats, so we should definitely stop
that first. That seems like one of the biggest
threats to the whole woodland. Yes, it is not
ideal to have them roaming around. Makes sense,
though. The cats' forces have been dwindling.
I don't know if you've seen fewer and fewer cats
themselves wandering around, but they certainly
will make up for that with them big metallic
bastards. We did come across that in Wind Gap.
we were able to get some of the forces to turn
to our side because they weren't cats. Well,
that is a fantastic move. Sure was. I always
liked killing cats. As a frog, I enjoy killing
cats. It's kind of the opposite of the way that
you'd think it'd go. We weren't necessarily up
for the killing part until the horrific atrocities
that we witnessed at the hand of those in charge
there. The cats are downright evil. Although
I did see what you did. With that head as I was
flying off with Wallingford, that was kind of
gross itself. I do applaud the excitement of
the situation, though. He didn't need it anymore.
Certainly probably not. And that's good, because
that cat was a bastard. He looked it. He killed
a lot of good folks. So now I just say we sit
and wait until Honey and the others get back.
Hope it's soon. They were still... emotion once
you left the prison it was a equal escape that's
excellent nope i was asking you did they make
it out or i thought we thought it was just you
the others were still there however wallingford
can't fly that many of us on his back so hope
they got out well i hope so too because we would
have tried to help had we known i guess we will
simply wait for them to arrive This is right
around the area we were a couple nights ago when
there was a loud crashing, so I do suggest we
be on the lookout. What's the definition of loud?
I would not say earth shattering, but somewhere
within trees falling. He gets. That is not that
good. I'm going to take a little nap while we
wait for the others. I'm plum tired. That was
a weird follow -up statement after the fear of...
The giant smashing. It's all right. I can tell
by each one of your faces that you are filled
to the brim with excitement and staying upness.
And you will watch while I take a nap. Take a
nap. We'll watch you. I appreciate that. Must
have been hard to take naps and get any sort
of shut eye when you were trapped in a tiny room
in the dark. Yes, they did not actually let us
sleep for quite some time. They burnt us with
lit cigarettes. And you look down and he actually
is covered in burn marks. Oh, I'm so sorry they
did that to you. Me too. My skin has not been
so dry in quite some time. Gonna have a hard
time with the ladies after this. Well, worry
about that when it comes to it. There's always
coin. Don't I know it. I like you. I like you,
fox person. Whose name I didn't catch. It's Bramble.
Thank you, Bramble. I'm going to go sleep by
some brambles over there. We'll shake you up
if anything comes stomping through. He plops
off. Plop, plop, plop, plop, plop, plop, plop.
It takes several hours before the other vagabonds
make their way to you. And most notably, there
is only three of them that make their way to
you guys. The honey badger. There's honey the
badger. There is one raccoon. And there is the
ram shovels. Only one raccoon made it back. And
you can see that this is definitely taking the
toll on Turk. Oh, that's so sad. Yeah. We've
taken some losses here, folks. I'm deeply sorry
about your loss, Turk. Brother. Yeah, he ain't
too talkative. Hmm. I do suppose that's how it
should be. But... Mission accomplished. I saw
the aftermath of what y 'all did on the way out.
At least I assume it was you. Oh, yes. My friend.
Yeah, we may have played a little part in slowing
some people down. Well, I made sure to take his
axe. It seemed right fitting for a badger of
my size. I'm glad it didn't go to waste. It did
not. We also freed those two little salamander
people that were in there. Oh, I guess we forgot
about them. They were knocked out when we found
them. The whole room smelled disgusting. That
was us too. Well, whatever you got going on inside
you, that's your own thing, but I don't smell
like that. Oh, all right. It was for warfare.
I mean, come on. It's always for warfare. I'm
afraid we're going to see a lot of that coming
up. And with this, Vickery wakes up and the five
of them. Lament over Kirk's passing. It's always
so sad when the young go. Unfortunately, he had
to go for the cause. Not everyone makes it out.
Well, it will be easy to remember the name now.
True. Only one to remember. One raccoon surviving.
Have to keep the memory of his brother going
and fight twice as hard. Well said, Peter. We'll
have to make an explosion for little Turk. A
really big one. Lots for him to decide. Maybe
even too big. And bulky. Now that's what I'm
talking about. And Vickery walks over. We're
going to make an explosion so big, those cats
are going to feel it. And those people around,
they're going to see it. It's going to be a spark
that lights this revolution. I could tell there
were several cats that felt the bomb I made earlier.
That one was larger than I would have expected
it to be. Not that I saw the size. No, I was
also surprised. It seemed very dangerous. You
murdered lots of folks. It was more dangerous.
Maybe more than you meant to, but... Well, you
can't make a strawberry cake without eating some
strawberries. His chest expands like a frog's
would, and he lets out a large croak at that,
but doesn't respond in any other way. All right,
now, I do believe we need to rest up and get
on to Limberley. And we need to plan how we are
going to do this bomb thing. You guys said you've
been stockpiling explosives here? Oh, we have
a bunch. And he, like, moves aside some very
thick foliage, and there's just, like, a few
boxes of explosives. Oh, wow. Yeah. This'll do.
This should do, yeah. And I know just the place
to put them. You see, there's a big coal deposit
at the back of the factory that I think we could
exploit to blow that whole place sky high. Well,
yeah, let's do that. Sounds like a great plan.
Y 'all are very good with explosives, so I guess
I hate to say split up, but I feel like some
of us should make it a distraction while the
others plant the bombs. I do have to agree that
in our conquest so far, Having two teams to split
up and create a distraction has worked out very
well for us. I would say we could use a bomb
to make the distraction for us. Then there's
more hands on deck to lay the other bombs. That's
a theory. I mean, I think just the bombs are
good. We should have a different distraction
for the distraction. Hmm. Because I imagine the
factory has some slaves working there? Oh, most
definitely. Just about the whole town is under
their strict control. Well, if we maybe freed
the slaves, that would cause a distraction. I
agree. We'll start some sort of rattle to be
roused. We have little Turk there. He's feeling
pretty tough. I would like to be on the explosive
team for my brother. I think that would be the
right thing. I say we take some explosives, put
them all strapped into little Turk here, just
have him wear a big old... Jacket and head on
in. Go see Dirk. He'll look inconspicuous. But
how do I get back out? I think it's time to go
see your brother, son. Oh, my God. Well, well,
wait. That's not what we're going to do, Dirk.
He looks... Victory looks at Cotton. I think
maybe we devise a different plan. Without the
exploding raccoon. Without the exploding raccoon.
The raccoon can explode things, but he doesn't
need to blow up himself. He's just a young boy.
You can't make a blueberry cake without eating
some blueberries. I don't know how many times
you can use that same analogy. It's always this
different fruit. I'm pretty sure I can keep going.
Anyhow, maybe it's something a little bit less
suicidal in nature. But at least we have a plan
B ready to go. So we can keep brainstorming.
Yeah, we'll call that plan D. That one can come
way, way at the end. Well, some of us can head
into the town and see if we can rile up some
of the folks there and, you know, lead a charge
to the front of the factory. Maybe there's like
barracks with all the slaves that are kept. We
could go in at night and release them and then
they can help us in the morning. We could always
use some recruits. Recruits could be very helpful
to our cause. Y 'all volunteering for the distraction
team then? We'll place the bombs? I'll get my
vest. Once again, the vest seems unnecessary.
It's a distraction. I plan on making it back
out alive. Along with all my friends. And we're
included in that, right? I do hope y 'all survive
as well, which is why I'm going to suggest not
putting the bomb vests on anybody. Yeah, yeah,
no, that's right. At least somebody's thinking
right. Well, we can't have the whole forest burned
down. That would be tragic. It's already mostly
there. There do seem to be a lot of things on
fire around here. It's true, but I mean, the
cats really did a number on that town anyway.
That clearing was... Gross. Gross, yes, that
is the word for it. So should we head into town?
Yeah, I think we should head into town and maybe
try to get a slave revolt going. All right, we'll
move along with the explosives to near the back
of the factory. What time should we strike? Good
question. I don't know what time it is now, so.
I'd say give it about 15 minutes. 15 minutes?
You're going to do it. Five minutes. Five minutes
to do a whole slave uprising. I think we need
a little more time. I thought we were just doing
a brazen speech, and if it worked, it worked.
Otherwise, we would probably have the authorities
on us pretty quick anyway. We should make it
as fast as possible, I would imagine. Oh, I don't
disagree. I'm all for striking. I'll also just
take a couple steps back. You guys can get right
in there and take as long as you like. No. You're
going to come in later? Is that what you're saying?
No, I'll just make sure that the back door is
open. That's all I'm saying. How about first
light? First light. Everything explodes? Everything
explodes at first light. All right. Or at least
we move into explode things at first light. Yeah,
yeah, that's fine. That's fine. Let's do that.
That gives us enough time to, you know, poke
around, see what kind of sentiment we can find
and stir up and... Exactly. Bolster our numbers.
I agree. First light sounds good. All right.
Meet you in the middle, my friends. Sounds good.
And we head out. to go check it out yeah so i
think that first we should look near the factory
to see if there are like workers quarters there
yeah i think that's a good idea maybe we should
also go to the town maybe if there's any stores
or something where people might be as you guys
move through the town or around the town very
stealthfully you notice that this town in particular
has a large number of cats in it larger than
you have seen in other clearings You can also
see that there are several unfinished giant titanic
metal cats outside of the factory, which is just
an immense building, the biggest building you
have ever seen previously. Dotting the landscape
of this clearing, which seems to have been, the
size of it has been increased dramatically by
a bunch of trees being chopped down. There are
several camps and barracks all around the perimeter
of this town. What if we split up and we go and
talk at the different barracks and be like, hey,
we're trying to get rid of the factory. It's
no good. It's creating weapons of mass destruction.
And we'll, like, release you and you help us
destroy it. I think that that's a good idea,
but I think that we should not split up in case
it does not go well at one of them. Okay. All
right. Yeah, that's true. It's better to be together.
Okay. We're like Mormons knocking at the door.
We'll just have to move. quickly make our speech
if it goes well good move on the next camp if
not we'll resolve that these camps do have uh
high fences around them however you can see there's
at least one denison making his way through one
of these camps uh just like out in the yard there
are you know several guards posted around in
watchtowers throughout this area and you can't
see like too many people moving around yet because
it's like very very very early morning Okay,
so in the camps, is it mostly non -cat creatures
in there? Yes, in the camps, it seems more like
prison camp situation, so it's definitely filled
with denizens. But it's behind a fence, you said?
It is. There is a fence. Okay. Okay, so then
I'm going to alter what I said about us all going
in together. We can all try and talk to that
guy together, but I have sneak. So I could probably
sneak into one of the prison camps without being
seen by the guard tower. Okay. I don't know if
all three of us will have as much luck with that.
Yeah, probably not. I have sneak and I have hide.
Oh, okay. So I could, and acrobatics. I'm pretty
good at the whole get where you gotta go thing.
All right. I also have sneak and, oh, I don't
have hide. I was going to take it, but I didn't.
I'm not that sneaky. I think I probably jangle
because I have my alchemy kit and some glass
vials. And your toolbox is a little unwieldy,
too. Toolbox. All right. I'm not a sneaker. So
does the denizens seem like they're headed towards
a specific camp? Maybe you could talk to them
and we'll go into a different one. Okay. Cotton.
We're all going into different ones? Oh, that's
true. Me and you could go into different ones
because we... Okay. Yep. Back to splitting up
again. Okay. So Cotton and Peter, you two are
planning to go into different camps? And Bramble,
you're not going into a camp necessarily, but
trying to find some denizens outside of it, correct?
Yes. Okay. So Bramble, we will say you see like
a line of denizens leaving the factory and headed
towards one of the camps. They're only loosely
guarded at this point, but there seems to be
like a line of them going into one camp and a
line of them leaving one of the camps headed
towards the factory. So it's almost like an exchange
of workers. Yeah, a change of shifts. Okay. Loosely
guarded, is there like one guard per line or
something? Like two. One in the front, one in
the back. Okay. So probably in the middle is
where they would least likely to hear. Actually,
you know what I'm going to do? I'm going to quickly
write on a piece of paper, slave revolt, first
light, be ready. And I'm just going to slip it
casually to one of the... I'll have two copies
so I can slip it to both lines of prisoners.
Ooh, right on. You're going to run back and forth?
Well, I'm just going to be like passing through
and just be like, boop, boop. Okay. Yeah, we'll
resolve that later on. So very cool. And? Cotton
and Peter. Yeah, I guess Cotton would find one
of these buildings or there's just the one line
of changing shifts and there's another building.
There's two lines of changing shifts, one going
in, one going out. All right. And you're bopping
in between? Yeah, I just handed in the middle
of both of them lines little notes so they can
hopefully pass it along. I guess I'll see if
there's like a barracks situation that's getting
there. Yeah. Yeah. Well, not barracks. You know
what I'm saying? Like living quarters? Living
quarters, yeah. Okay. I'm picturing like rows
of cots or something stupid. Yeah, sure. What
do you need to do for a sneak? So for a roguish
feat, you got to roll with finesse. And if you
achieve your goal... On a hit, you achieve your
goal on a 7 -9 mark of exhaustion or one risk
of your feat. GM's choice. Come to bear. When
you attempt a roguish feat, you are not skilled
and you are trusting fate. Awesome. So... Sneak.
That's an 11 plus finesse. 13. Okay. You're able
to get in or out of places without being seen.
Perfect. All right. Yeah, do I see anyone who
kind of looks more sure -footed than the rest?
You see a large beaver man standing in the corner.
He looks very sure -footed. He's very fat. Okay,
not exactly what I meant, but yeah, all right.
I'm going to make my way over to the beaver.
Pardon me there. Oh, who are you? My name is
Cotton, and I come from a few different areas,
but would you say you kind of know the ins and
outs of what goes on around here? I know as good
as anybody. All right. Well, so I'm just trying
to see here if y 'all are happy working for the
cats. Happy? We're prisoners. That is what I
figured. Would you prefer not to be a prisoner?
That would be my intention, yeah. All right.
Well, can you keep a secret? I've never been
known to be able to do so. Perfect. All right.
So what's happening? It's right around daybreak.
There's going to be a giant uprising. Of who?
You and all your friends here against the cats.
Oh! There's a secret force among us that is planning
to do this. It must be a big secret. I don't
know anything about it. That's why I'm letting
you know. I think you should be in on the secret
there. Oh. All right. All right, my beaver friend.
You should try to tell as many of your friends
quietly. Nope. Quietly. Preferably one at a time
and out of sight from any of the felines. You
said tomorrow. No, at daybreak. In the morning?
Daybreak does seem to be in the morning most
times. We don't have any weapons. And there's
a fence. Well, it seems like knocking the fence
down and making some weapons out of it could
work. Or you have your tools. Or you could break
these cots down and steal these and make them
into spears. You're going to have to do... Uprising
is not as organized as we would all like. I thought
usually these things had a bit more planning,
but that's okay. I'll go find the wolf boys.
Oh. They can dig holes. They often do, but several
of them have been shot. Oh, I'm sorry to hear
that, but... Me too. Yes, if we do not want to
be prisoners anymore, we'll be. Some casualties,
but we will have to fight. You don't look like
a prisoner. Yeah, okay. I guess I said that a
little bit wrong. If you and your friends do
not want to be prisoners... And who are you?
All right, friend, I'm going to head on out.
My name's Clive. Clive, again, my name is Cotton.
And I will see you at daybreak. I'm going to
go find some more people to share this message
with. Well, all right. Daybreak. Like, in several
hours. That is correct. Well, all right. I'll
try to wake back up for it. And he wanders deeper
into the barracks. All right. I'm just going
to try this again with a couple more people.
Just passing the message on. And then I am immediately
going to start working on another some sort of
explosion to guarantee that this barracks does
in fact wake up. Okay. You roll for your explosion
stuff and we'll jump to Peter. All right. So
I'm going to try and sneak into another of the
camps. Five, six, seven, eight. Ooh, a seven
for my finesse roll because it's a minus one
on a sneak. So I get in, but I think that means
there's a complication. Yeah, you get into the
living quarters and tell us what goes on. And
in that, I will tell you what else goes on. Okay,
so I'm sneaking into the camp, trying to find
a place that seems like it is populated with
a lot of the prisoners. And I'm going to try
and introduce myself into a group of them that
I see that does not contain and is far from any
cat guards, if there are cat guards here. Hopefully
they're just outside guarding the gate. And I'm
going to just start talking to them like, hey,
are you guys happy with the situation here? If
there was some way to change your situation,
that's something you would be. Yeah, we'd like
to change it. All right. So there is an ongoing
effort from the Woodland Alliance to free this
clearing. from the Reign of the Cats, and it's
going to happen today, this morning, at Daybreak.
I can help! Okay, so what I need you to do is
to spread the word amongst the other people here
in this camp that at Daybreak, they need to revolt,
go to the gates, attack the guards. They're farly
outnumbered by you guys, and the same will be
happening in the rest of the camps, and outside
will be explosions happening, and we'll be trying
to take out the guards in the towers. Everybody
will rush the factory. and take out all the cats.
Do you have any daggers? Any knives? I'm real
good with a pointy object. I don't have any of
those on me, but I can tell you a vast number
of ways to make improvised weapons from what
you have available to you. You can stick things
in any pillowcases to make a heavy thing you
can swing at people. Like doorknobs. Doorknobs
are great. Rings of keys, if it's like a gender
-sized one, if you know about those. But, you
know, you can knock the legs off of chairs to
make a sharp stick. A lot of the prisoners begin
to crowd around you while you're talking about
how to create improvised weapons, and you have
them fully engaged, which makes it difficult
for any of them to realize that one of the doors
in this quarters has opened, and in is marching
a cat guard. What's going on in here? Everyone
to their bunks! And the prisoners begin to scatter,
leaving you there. You, get back to your bunk.
Okay, I just go to some random bunk area. Are
they all in this building or do I get to leave
the building? They're all in this building. What
are you doing here? Where is your prisoner's
garbs? Um, I am going to throw sand in this cat's
eyes. Are you actually using pocket sand to accomplish
this? Yeah, I'm going to use pocket sand. So
confused sense is roll with finesse. That's a
good one for you. But I can roll with cunning
instead of finesse. So I have a plus two in cunning.
So that's a critical. That's a 12. Oh my god.
Okay. Sweet. So what do you accomplish? On a
10 +, they have to take some time to get their
bearings and restore their senses before they
can act clearly again. On a hit, you've thrown
them off balance, blinded them, deafened them,
or confused them, and given yourself an opportunity.
So I'm going to choose to have him just stumble
back and be a little blinded, and decide if I
should run away or try to subdue him. I'm going
to try to subdue the cat. Okay. So I'm just going
to hit him. With an unarmed strike. I don't have
any weapons on me right now except for the sling.
Let's just engage in melee. Yep. And that is
a six. So a six is a miss, which is embarrassing
because this cat is blinded. However, you've
inspired... several of the denizens that are
uh enslaved here and you hear the coyote guy
go it's an uprising and he leaps onto the cat
as well as several of the other of the other
prisoners and they begin to just attack him viciously
and they end up killing him there and the coyote
guy pulls the dagger out of the cat's waistband
i've got one excellent we'll fight at daybreak
at daybreak yes But, you know, if any other cat
guards come in here, maybe put this guy's body
underneath one of the bunks or something. We
never saw him. They, like, try. The cat's larger
than, like, any of the bunks would support. But
they try to hide as best as they can. But you
see them. They begin to pool up near the two
entrances of the bunkhouse. Excellent. Bramble.
Yeah. Give me two charm rolls. Nine. Okay. And
a five. And a five. Okay, cool. So that's just
going to help dictate some stuff in the future.
I did roll a 10 on my bomb making, so I made
a larger bomb than intended. Okay, and what do
you plan to do with that larger than intended
bomb? Blow up the fence, right? Is that near
the barracks? That's surrounding the barracks.
Or not the barracks. Whatever, the camps. Slave
camp. Yeah. Okay, so you're going to try to blow
up just the fence part, a gate. How far away
is a watchtower? Is there one of those close?
Maybe you can put that down and it can crash
into the gate. There you go. Yeah, essentially
it's doing two things. Creating an opening and
it's that dude's alarm clock because he is not
going to wake up in time. Okay, awesome. So go
ahead and give me another sneak roll for that
if you don't mind. Oh, that's a 10 plus whatever
I add to it. Goddamn, all right. I'm assuming
it's a finesse. It's a strong success. So you
get a success plus a benefit. So you sneak in
and out and are able to plant your bomb in like
the most opportune place to do so without being
caught. Nice. Hell yeah. Excellent. How many,
are there a bunch more camps we should go into?
There aren't a bunch more. We'll say you've covered
a good amount of them. Yeah, I feel like that's
good. If everyone sees them do it, they're going
to join. I mean, no one's going to sleep through
the explosion. Yeah. We got a couple people in
each camp. My next move is I feel like we should
try and sneak into one of the other guard towers.
I'll say that or start making our way... Can
we get to the factory? You make your way to the
factory. Maybe it'd be worth getting over there
and trying to find where to... Because once the
bomb goes off outside, people might get curious
in the factory. So if we can work our way in
to start yelling like uprise, like rise up, rise
up, rise up, we might be able to get everyone
in the factory and outside the factory kind of
just a full. I definitely like the idea of that.
Yeah. That's so much emotion. If we could locate
like a barracks or something where they have
a stash house of weapons, grab those and when
the uprising starts, spread that throughout the
crowd. Okay. So I can actually. Maybe that would
be a good idea. So you guys are running low on
time. Okay. As it's getting very close to morning.
All right. Do I see anything that looks like
it could be an armory? Not out here. Okay. So
I think we should make our way to the factory.
I'm going to stay behind and sneak up to one
of these guard towers that you haven't planted
an explosive at. Yes. Very good call. Don't sneak
up to the one with the explosive on it. I just
feel like it would be better for morale if we're
not getting like, you know. arrows rained on
them from above so you're gonna try to get in
there before and take out some guards or are
you gonna wait until things kind of are popping
off i'm going to wait until it is almost daybreak
where i can see that like okay daybreak is coming
and then i'm gonna go and and do that okay so
we'll say you're posted up near a guard tower
and cotton and bramble okay i guess cotton would
have met me back outside and yeah We're discussing
this plan to try to infiltrate. Okay. I think
we should get ready for the factory uprising
and be the first in there to let those inside
know exactly what is going on outside. I did
pass a note to one of them on their way in, but
yes, we should definitely try to get more help
from inside. I think we've done a good job out
here, but we should make sure that they are also
in the fight. How do we plan on getting in? Pretend
we're guards or something? We don't have the
right colors. I think as soon as that explosion
goes off, doors will open and we will find a
way. Okay. All right. So we're waiting for the
explosion. Hmm. I think it would be best to make
our move immediately after the distraction. Okay.
Wait for daybreak. So we're loitering until then.
Okay. So we'll cut to the explosion. It's moments
before and you're eagerly anticipating a large
explosion. And suddenly it comes. And it destroys
the guard tower, killing the guards in it, as
well as blowing apart the fence. And for a moment,
there's just an eerie calm that comes with it.
Until suddenly an alarm begins to go off. And
very tentatively, you can see that there are
some prisoners poking their head out of those
bunkhouses. Peter, you want to invade a guard
tower? Yep. I'm going to sneak in and try and
be able to surprise them. Nine. What do I roll
a feat with? Finesse. So it's an eight for sneaking
in. All right, that is a success but a complication.
So you get in, but one of the guards definitely
does see you out of the two guards that are in
this watchtower, which is probably why you didn't
make it in successfully because you only knew
that there was one guard in this watchtower.
What are you doing after that? I'm going to immediately
attack him with pocket stand. That's a 12. Oh
my god. All right, so you're able to blind one
of these and disorient them. What do you do next?
Is the other one in close range? Yeah, they're
both like right there. All right, I'm going to
viciously strike the other one with a 10. Push
him over the railing. Strong hit. Yeah, so you
get a success plus. Yeah, so it's a plus one
harm, and they're not able to attack me back.
Okay. And they can't mark where on their armor.
They're definitely right on. So you manage to
kill the one guard, and he goes sprawling over
the edge of the guard tower, hitting the ground,
landing on his neck and his shoulder, and you
hear him die with a sickening crunch while the
other one screams and is blinded. These are cats,
right? These are not cats. Oh, okay. Oh, no.
There are a lot of cats, though. And now, after
the explosion, there are a lot of cats coming
out of the factory. The doors to the factory
have opened, and there's a bunch of guards and
armed guards and cats running from the factory.
Okay, I feel like we should just stay behind
the doors. When they open it, they don't see
us, and you hold it, and when everyone goes out,
then you just kind of zoop in. Okay, so you guys
just duck in afterwards. The factory is filled
with these... titanic metal cat there are a lot
of workers inside that are looking around they've
stopped their work now because obviously a fucking
explosion has gone off and the guards are shouting
there's still a lot of guards inside all armed
um there's several cats also that are patrolling
around trying to get people back to work and
get order but they are more concerned with what's
going on outside i'd like to fire the cat using
uh one that's kind of closer to a group of people
or as soon as it hits the ground people are gonna
be very aware that that cat just dropped dead
meaning like like the workers yeah using any
weapon moves or just i'm gonna do quick shot
okay uh so i got a six plus four which is a 10
plus 2 is it 12 this should just be like a narrative
podcast how you guys just you know succeed without
any complication there have been so uh two or
three sixes today yeah i think two or three last
session I think the first one we actually went
golden. I do think that six has been the lowest.
With a minus one, I got a five once. Yeah. I'm
going to knock on wood. We haven't actually totally
addressed that to that extent yet. But yeah,
so I'm going to try to quick shot this guy. Got
a 12. Is there any way I can do a follow -up
shot at that point with that one? That would
be targeting a foe, right? Would be the follow
-up shot. Yeah, I mean, there's target someone,
and you can inflict injury again. And then, yeah,
quick shot is something different where you don't
mark where. Okay, so it just does damage. Oh,
okay, that's fine with me. You plunge an arrow
into this cat, and it is definitely seen by a
lot of the workers who are now very confused.
Oh, and then we yell, It's an uprising! It's
time to fight back! Grab whatever you can! Kill
all the cats! Death to all cats. Death to all
cats. Shit, okay. Roll some charms rolls, I guess.
Ten. Five plus four is nine, plus my one charm
is ten. The workers immediately begin attacking
cats, and you guys can hear a large crowd outside.
And if you're able to look through the doors,
you see that the prisoners have ran out of the
camps and are making their way towards the factory.
I want to start working my way around the perimeter,
just opening every door, fighting my way to open
up every door that I can. And windows. Sure,
yeah, everything. Finally, the cats catch on,
and the doors in the factory are open, and you
hear a loud steam engine begin to roar, and suddenly
you see several cats climbing inside one of these...
metallic cats that were parked outside and the
wheels begin to churn as the Titan moves closer
to the group of people, to the group of denizens.
I have a roguish feat that's disable device.
All right. I want to use that. Fuck yeah. How
do you plan on doing it? I guess that's my question.
I would want to like maybe try to scooch under
it a little bit. Like as it's coming towards
me, like go underneath and then try to like pull
something out or like un... loosen something
so i will say for this cat in particular what
they didn't do what they failed to do is close
one of the loading doors so there is a door that
is open to the inside of the cat okay if you
want to try to do that yeah yeah i do okay there
are guards inside okay um so you will you may
have you may face some resistance before you're
able to okay to turn it off sure all right so
you don't have acrobatics do you i do not Okay.
Well, you can still roll for acrobatics. You'll
just have to roll with luck. Roll for acrobatics,
I guess. Okay. Oh, that's a two. Oh, that's an
utter failure. So you go running up and you misjudge
your jump to get inside the door. And this thing
just runs right over you. You're going to take
one injury. And whoever's looking at the cat
sees the red eyes glow, and it lets out a burst
of flame. And it begins to burn not only prisoners,
but also some of the guards and the cats. It's
indiscriminately beginning to kill people that
are between the factory and the prison. Do I
see any coyotes or moles, anything that would
be good at digging? Sure. All right. Diggers,
start surrounding. Create trenches around it.
Make it unmovable. Roll me a charm, actually.
Oh, a five plus one, a six. A six is a failure,
mostly probably because of the amount of noise
that's going on and the prisoners being really
tied up and dealing with their captors. Also,
they realize they probably can't dig trenches
quick enough to stop this cat from rolling. I'm
going to... Yell to the other guard that I have
blinded. Like, oh, I'm so sorry. I didn't know
you weren't a cat. I just threw sand as soon
as I got up here. There's a rebellion going on
right now that you should join in on. I'm not
the part of the cats. I'm going to leave now.
I don't know if you're going to charm that person
or not, but you just run away. I'm just running
away. Just run away. It sounds good. Are these
cat machines on, like, wheels or are they treads?
Wheels. So there's like four very large wheels.
Are they metal wheels? They are metal wheels.
They are. Yeah. Everything is metal on them,
so. Okay. I'd like to shoot at one of the glowing
eyes, see if anything happens, if I can hit it.
Okay. That's an eight plus finesse is a ten.
All right. Yeah, you hit the eye, and you kind
of see whatever is... whatever the eye is made
of kind of falls backwards into what you would
assume is the cockpit. And you can now see into
the cat's eye and into the, um, into the cockpit
itself. You see three cats in there manning the
machine. Um, I have an esoteric hand tool and
I want to use it to like, um, maybe cut the wheel
in half or something. What is it? esoteric hand
tool it doesn't give me a lot of description
it's just okay that's what it is so i assume
it can do what i would like it to do which is
like maybe like a little laser or that sounds
dope yeah all right roll for it okay seven uh
so it's successful but it also brings about a
complication you managed to take cut this wheel
we'll say in half and the back end of this cat
falls to the ground. It is now just spinning
in a large circle. However, the complication
is that in doing so, the cat is now aiming directly
at you with its mouth agape. Okay. And a burst
of flame comes out directly at you. Your tail
and your back end catch on fire. You're going
to take another injury. Okay. That puts you in
a not great position, right? Correct, yes. I
am going to run down into the battlefield where
I see this giant cat mechanism that's mobilized
and now doing this weird circle thing. And is
the door in the back open? Can I shoot into there
when it's moving around? It's like a side door.
On the Millennium Falcon, you know how the door
comes down on the side? It's one of those situations.
So you can shoot into it for sure. However, you
could probably only hit one of the cats that's
in here. yep still gonna try and fire something
into there using target someone do i have to
pick one of them there's only one that you can
hit so okay yeah i'm just gonna roll with mike
then uh it's an 11. okay damn and what are you
using uh the sling so you do great harm uh no
it just does one regular okay so we'll say you're
in an advantageous position as well if you if
you want to stay on the cat like you can be on
the loading ramp thing without anybody seeing
that you're there. Or you can help Bramble to
their feet. Definitely. We'll say that's a much
better one. I appreciate it. Bramble's tail is
like pretty burned. It smells gross. It smells
like Bernie fur. I feel like barbecue. Cotton?
Do I see... So my thought now is maybe I can
make something that's like a Molotov cocktail
and throw it into the side hatch. Is there anything
around me to be able to use my create to destroy?
I mean, you can mark depletion and find what
you need. Perfect. I'm going to find some hidden
thing of brandy or something. These spirits I
have ought to do the trick. Here you go. There
you go. What about the fact that they have tanks
that breathe fire? They probably have flammable
liquid in the factory. I mean, in that case,
yeah, I wonder if I can just pierce a tank. Is
there any tank, like, do I see any tanks on the
outside, like a propane type thing or anything
like that? It's powered by coal, not fuel. That's
right, they wanted coal. Yeah, I'd rather actually
just, I'd rather take another shot at the eye
if I can see it. I think that that would be...
Okay. Alright, let's take a little shot here.
Oh! Nat 1s. So two total. Twos. Well, plus the
twos of four still total. Still total kerfuffle.
Yeah, not good. Well, you're shooting at the
eye, so you're right in front of it. Am I? Usually
when you're looking at something's eyes. I thought
they were giant tanks. Yeah, they look like cats.
Big red eyes. Inside, the cats are just, like,
kind of furiously pulling on levers. And even
though it's still immobile, it can't move forward,
it begins to turn. And it's just spraying fire
back and forth. You're going to take one injury.
All right. And one wear. And where does that
go? You have armor or robes? I'm wearing robes.
It'll go on your robes. Your robes are all burned
up. By the way. They're all burned up? Yep. Robes
only have one wear to them. That's embarrassing.
I'm feeling very hurt. I don't know that I want
to do much. What if we just get out of here?
Because they're going to blow up the factory
soon, right? I thought they already blew up the
back of the factory. The factory has not blown
up yet. Oh. The only explosion that's gone off
has been... Cottons. Cottons. Although you do
expect explosions soon. Yeah. So I feel like
we should get out, especially let all the slaves
know it's time to leave. We don't want to stay
in this building. Sounds good. I'm going to throw
another slingshot into the fire -breathing cat.
Okay. That's a seven. On a seven, you kill the
cat that you hit before, leaving just two in
the cockpit, and the cat now moves towards your
direction. It completely throws you off. where
you were standing, and, like, it's moving, it's
circling towards you. If you stay where you are,
you're gonna get crushed. So I gotta move. Alright,
so I'm gonna run serpentine away. Alright. And
you guys take off towards the forest? Um, we're
gonna go into the factory and try and, like,
rush people out or encourage them to leave first?
Yeah, I feel like we should shout to them, like,
it's let's get out, because there's a force outside
as well, like, we could all meet up. Yeah, so
I run towards the factory. to help encourage
people to leave. You are met in the middle of
the factory by Vickery. We have to get out of
here. It is time to go. That shit's gonna blow.
Everybody out. Cats, you can stay. And you guys
go running out. And as you just make it to a
safe distance, you hear and see the factory explode
behind you. It goes up in such a large burst
of flames, and Kirk is just sitting there next
to you, laughing, wringing his hands together,
and crying at the same time. Wallingford, Honey,
and Shovels are trying to get people that are
injured out into the forest, while a large group
of the prisoners kill the remaining guards that
are here. And Victory walks up to the three of
you. I couldn't have done better myself. Except
for the explosions thing. I did very well on
that. It was a very large explosion. I didn't
expect you guys to make that much of a distraction,
but it worked quite well. Couldn't leave all
these people behind. Very noble. There were heavy
losses on both sides there. At least we stopped
the manufacturer of these titanic cat behemoth
abominations. That blast was so big, hopefully
it took out some of the ones that were still
in the yard there, semi -finished. I think we
can take care of those. Either way, Turk's got
a little bit of a hot streak in him now, and
he's very eager to revenge his brother. But I
do believe this is the spark that's going to
light the revolution. I couldn't thank you enough
for your contributions. As such, I brought this
flag, and he produces a Woodland Alliance flag.
I think it would only be right for us all to
go stick it in that burning pile of rubble, once
it's no longer burning, of course, so the flag
doesn't burn up. and claim this as the first
clearing for the Woodland Alliance. We got a
lot of cleaning up to do. We do. It's probably
mostly unusable here. This place has been devastated,
but I think it's more symbolic than anything.
Wingap wasn't in that bad of shape, so maybe
have your headquarters there, but I symbolically
claim this as the first and most glorious victory.
We should get more flags, I suppose. This is
only the first of many. This was fun. I think
there are a lot more denizens that we can free
from the clutches of these horrific cats and
these pesky birds. And together, we shall. Any
hand to you guys, the Woodland Alliance flag.
Hear, hear. Now I need some ice for my tail.
Good job, old chaps. Thank you. Good job yourself
with that explosion. His chest puffs up. And
he lets out a large croak. And that's where this
story ends. Nice. So good job, guys. It ended
in explosions, as it should. I mean, I think
it started, continued, and ended with explosions.
There were a lot of explosions. I did not anticipate
so many explosions. I did. Fuck yeah. So what
did we think of Root? It was fun. Yeah? Yeah,
I liked it a lot. I also liked it a lot. Very
enjoyable. Nice. Fun little system. Yeah. uh
i enjoyed it a lot there are i'm definitely glad
that we kind of put a little bit of training
wheels on it because it's like it is widely in
depth and even the amount of like when you look
and look up various things throughout the the
rules the amount of information it gives you
just describing one possible way to use the mechanic
is like can be very overwhelming yeah it is a
very beefy book for how like actually small it
is but it's like 200 pages i think at least which
is a lot to try to get through which is a lot
of what we run into a lot on this podcast was
trying to deal with so many different rules and
trying to keep it you know fun and exciting and
not murder you guys all the time although you
guys rolled really really well which made it
difficult to uh really do too much damage to
y 'all but you're very confident vagrants We're
the pumpkin boys. Pumpkin boys. Pumpkin boys
for life. Fuck yeah. Well, that's that. Next
up, we're going to be playing the Last of Us
narrative board game. Oh, nice. Yeah, just in
time for that show to come back out. So I'm very
excited for that. So go check out season two.
If you haven't watched that, watch season one.
And we will see you next Tuesday. That's it for
today's episode. We hope you've enjoyed listening
as much as we've enjoyed playing. If you have,
go run and tell all your friends so that we can
turn as many people into CritCats as possible.
Tales from the Crit is a Wolfbeard Games audio
podcast. And if you like us, please subscribe
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and head on over to our Instagram page and our
YouTube channel. Both of those are at Tales from
the Crit Podcast. All right. Bye -bye. Penetrating
team. I'm usually on the other side. She doesn't
say that. All right. All right. Man, there's
a lot of frog talking Tales from the Crit. Yeah,
at least somebody's on thinking. Wow. I'm just
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