Video episode originally posted Feb 22, 2023
Before we get started, this town with the factory and the wizard tower needs a name.
What’s the town’s name?
- Story Cubes: [well][angry face]
Madwell.
Magnaza and Pointage have the Explosive Suit and need to get it back to Myconet in Troika. But it might be complicated to get the suit out of Madwell, because we learned in the last episode that this town is filled with burglars fighting each other to get the suit.
It’s still night. They have the suit, in pieces. They need to get back to the shoutpod. It seems unlikely to me that a smaller town would have 24-hour transport service (or however many hours we have on this sphere). So they’re going to need to find a place to hunker down and stay safe for the night.
Was there lodging available when they arrived in town?
- Oracle: Yes.
What’s the name of the inn?
- Story Cubes: [telescope] [race car]
The Speedy Scope.
They already made arrangements at the Speedy Scope, so they’ll go there and hide out for the night.
What event is going to impact the scene?
- Event Table: Threads
- Thread Table: Magnaza’s goal
This is a placeholder thread that represents Magnaza’s personal goal or ambition.
What is Magnaza’s goal?
- Story Cube: [dancing person]
Magnaza wants to be a dancer. This is her last job. If she can finish it, then she can quit wizard hunting and pursue her dreams of being a dancer. We’ll replace that thread with a new one: Magnaza dreams of dancing.
They arrive at the inn and smuggle the pieces of suit up to their room. They are very aware of other burglars in the town, or in the inn itself, but so far it seems safe and they make it to their rooms, stash the suit, and settle down for the night.
There is a little music box in the room, with an enchanted mechanical fairy. Magnaza winds it up and it plays. The little mechanical fairy dances and sparkles magically. Then she starts to dance along. Pointage watches.
Pointage: “Oh, you dance very beautifully.”
Magnaza says, “Thank you. This is my final job. Once we get paid for this, I can finally stop hunting wizards and pursue my dream, which is to dance.”
We know that dwarves also have artistic goals and ambitions.
Is that Pointage’s goal?
- Oracle: No Plus.
Pointage is very different from other dwarves. He does not want to create. Pointage is a destructive dwarf, and wants to destroy beautiful and unique things. If he’s that different from other dwarves, he doesn’t really understand Magnaza’s dream, but he watches anyway.
He says, “That reminds me of the other dwarves from back home. Always making things, and seeking beauty. I never understood these things. In fact, I think I was made to destroy. I think maybe I was not made like other dwarves. Perhaps there is an error, or perhaps I am an improvement.”
Magnaza is trying to keep dancing, but is a little disturbed by Pointage. She says, “Tomorrow, all we have to do is get this suit back to Myconet.”
Here’s an interesting question. We know Pointage wants to destroy, and we know that this suit is incredibly destructive.
Does Pointage try to take the suit for himself?
- Oracle: Yes.
He wants to take this suit and go use it to destroy things. Is he able to succeed in the night? He doesn’t have any specific sneaking skills, and Magnaza doesn’t have any specific awareness skills. We’ll just do a straight up roll, because they both have a skill of five.
- Pointage vs. Magnaza: Magnaza wins.
In the middle of the night, Pointage gets up, and very sneakily tries to take all the pieces of the suit and stuff them in his bag, but he is not quiet enough.
Magnaza wakes up, and she says, “Oh. What are you doing?”
Is Pointage honest?
- Oracle: Yes But.
He is honest, but he gives up. He says, “I was going to take this suit for myself. I cannot lie. But I see that I was not able to do that, so I will just go back to bed now and we will take it back to Myconet in the morning.”
Pointage goes back to sleep, but Magnaza is not able to sleep, now that she cannot trust this partner that she’s been thrown in with. She keeps a watch for the rest of the night.
The next morning, they wake and they need to get to the shoutpod station.
Is the town crawling with burglars?
- Oracle: Yes But.
But what?
- Story Cubes: [counting money]
There are burglars and pick pockets everywhere, some more concerned with stealing money than the suit.
This is really funny to me. This is a town with an inordinate number of burglars and pickpockets constantly stealing from each other.
I wonder if Cagalympus has sent up an alarm now that the suit is missing. We established that he’s not on the sphere. He’s on a ship, far away. I don’t think he’s back yet so I don’t think an alarm has gone up.
Magnaza and Pointage need to get through this sea of burglars. We’ll have Magnaza roll under sneak.
- Skill roll: success.
The town is full of burglars pick each others pockets, but Magnaza takes some side alleys and Pointage is hobbles along, and they make it to the shoutpod station. They load in and make it back to Troika.
They arrive at Myconet’s Palace, display the suit, and Myconet looks it over. He’s checks it all over with his magical seeing devices, and says, “Were you able to put in the replacement?”
Magnaza says, “Well, no. The plan changed quickly, and we took the opportunity to steal the suit rather than make a replacement.” Is this a problem?
- Oracle: No Plus.
Absolutely not. No problem at all.
He says, “Good. I just wanted to come up with a plan that made use of your skills, but it seemed like you were able to improvise in the moment. Very well. Thank you.” He hands them both very large sacks of gold and says, “I may call on your services in the future. Thank you very much.”
So the question is, what happens now? Magnaza has got her money. She’ll go off and do her dancing thing. Pointage will go find things to destroy. Let’s roll on our event table and see if anything else comes to bear on the scene.
- Event table: NPC
- NPC table: Cagalympus the Mercurial
Magnaza and Pointage go off, but a few days later, Cagalympus becomes aware that his suit has been stolen, obviously. He suspects Myconet.
How strongly does he suspect? Is he pretty sure, or is he going through the usual suspects?
- Oracle: No But.
He’s not sure that Myconet has done it. He’s got a strong suspicion, but he doesn’t know for sure.
Cagalympus comes to call on Myconet, and they’re being wizardly polite, but actually speaking in veiled barbs. Myconet, of course, has sealed away the suit from prying and magical eyes. We know Cagalympus is mercurial.
Myconet says, “What do I owe this honor to host the great Cagalympus?”
Cagalympus says, “I’ve had something go missing recently, and I was wondering if perhaps you have heard anything? Or do you know anything?”
Myconet: “Oh you’ve had something stolen? Well, there’s enough burglars in Madwell to fill a sack, as they say.”
Cagalympus: “Why yes, they do say that. That’s a very common phrase. So you don’t know anything? Are you sure?”
Myconet: “Me? Steal from the great Cagalympus? How could I even conceive of such an idea?”
At this point, Cagalympus’s mood changes and he casts a spell, and he looms over and towers over Myconet, and says, “If you took it, I would rend you limb from limb!”
Myconet is totally unperturbed by this, as he is also a wizard of great power, and says, “Yes, well, good luck. If I do see or hear anything, I will be sure to let you know.”
But Myconet is a little worried that Cagalympus is on his trail.
Let’s call this Time to Reflect for Magnaza and Pointage, so we can roll for Getting Better. Pointage increases strength and hammer fighting, but Magnaza does not improve.
We’ve resolved the thread of stealing the Explosive Suit. But we know that Cagalympus has some suspicions. Because Magnaza fired so many bolts in the wizards tower, and these were not retrieved, Cagalympus can cast some sort of spell on them, and track her down. I don’t know if he can do the same for Pointage, if there was any evidence that Pointage was there.
Is he also able to track Pointage?
- Oracle: No.
We’ll make a new thread: Cagalympus hunts Magnaza.
Magnaza and Pointage didn’t really form a bond of any kind, and I don’t know if Pointage is capable of that, so we’ll follow Magnaza. She got her money, and she has a dream of dancing, but will be hunted by the agents of Cagalympus. That seems interesting enough for me to follow.
How far away does she need to go?
- Distance: Nearby Sphere
- Travel Between the Spheres: Golden-sailed barge
She will have to find and hire a ship that will take her to a nearby sphere where she can pursue her dream.
She is at the shipyards and we’ll roll on our event table to see what comes to bear.
- Event: Book enemy.
That makes sense. Let’s see what kind of monster Cagalympus has sent after her.
- Book enemy: Sympathy serpent
“Dark, thick as a man’s thigh, and as long as three destriers, they crush their prey as you’d expect such a snake to do but their hunting style is idiosyncratic: they do not wrestle with their quarry but offer a gentle embrace telling them it’s okay to let go, they’re here now. Together prey and predator mourn the crushing awfulness of reality as one swallows the other whole.”
- Mien: Shy
Magnaza is at the docks. There’s a lot of bustling. There are giant ships with golden sails flying off to distant spheres. There are barrels and crates and sailors and a lot of activity. She’s looking for passage to whatever this particular sphere is that’s nearby.
Through the crowd, the sympathy serpent slithers up and approaches Magnaza.
It says, “Oh it’s quite busy here, isn’t it? It’s just so busy. I don’t know if I really even fit in here.”
Magnaza wonders, “Why is this serpent trying to talk to me? This is so bizarre.”
Does she suspect anything? We gotta roll under skill. She doesn’t have anything specific.
- Skill roll: success.
She is immediately suspicious. She’s got her hand on her sword. The sympathy serpent tries to curl up and say, “It’s okay, you don’t have to worry about anything. I’m right here.” But because Magnaza is suspicious, she draws her sword and strikes the sympathy serpent. We are in combat.
- Stack: Magnaza.
- Magnaza vs. Serpent: Serpent wins.
Magnaza brings out her sword and tries to strike, but the sympathy serpent comes along and bites her arm, dealing damage as a small beast.
- Damage: 5
Ouch! It takes a big chunk out of Magnaza’s arm.
- Stack: End of round
- Stack: Magnaza
- Magnaza vs. Serpent: Serpent wins.
- Damage: 5
This brings Magnaza’s total stamina down to seven.
Magnaza tries to swipe and swipe again but the sympathy serpent is just holding on. He’s got her arm and is just wrenching it around, taking even bigger bites, and even taking more out of her arm. Remember when I said Troika might be lethal?
- Stack: End of round
- Stack: Magnaza
- Maganaza vs Serpent: Magnaza wins.
There we go. There’s a good roll, Magnaza. There we go. She’s able to deal damage with her sword.
- Damage: 4
Bringing the sympathy serpent down to two stamina. She finally breaks free and slashes down at the sympathy serpent.
- Stack: Serpent
“It’s okay. You don’t need to fight. Just relax. You don’t need to fight or struggle at all.”
- Serpent vs Magnaza: Magnaza wins.
“Don’t tell me to calm down!” she says, dealing damage with her sword. That’ll do it.
She slices off the serpent’s head. But now she’s suspicious. She knows that someone is after her.
Does she suspect that it’s Cagalympus himself?
- Oracle: Yes.
The snake is wearing a collar, and the coloration of the collar reminded her of something she had seen in the factory. She’s got a pretty good sense that Cagalympus is after her. All the more reason to find passage.
Is she able to find passage that leaves today?
- Oracle: No.
It’s going to take a while for her to find passage.
How long before the next ship?
- d3: 1
Tomorrow. She just has to hunker down for today. She finds lodging. She needs to rest to recover her stamina. She recovers 5 stamina, which will put her back at 12. Still not fully healed. She’ll eat one of her provisions. 13. Still not fully healed, but better than she was.
As she sits in her room in the inn near the docks, she wonders to herself, what trouble has she brought down on herself? She’s so close to getting to her goal, but now there are complications.
Continue, following Magnaza: Troika Episode 3 Burgled!
Pointage’s next appearance: Troika Episode 4 Godsrain