DM: In any case, you have brought death upon the dread goblins and their hobgoblin associate, who had dared to attempt to extract a toll from innocent travelers on this road, such as it is.
Hjalmar: What are you saying?!
DM: No no, I’m saying you did the right thing.
Tywin: It SOUNDED like… ‘They DARED to try to eke out a living…”
DM: You brought justice to the goblins… How dare they have the temerity to shake down innocent travelers!
Tywin: That’s the government’s job. If THEY steal from the commoners, who are WE going to steal from?
DM: You guys hurriedly set up a toll booth at the bridge and move on.

Behind the screen, the DM tosses some dice, then stares at the results.

Hjamlar: Uh-oh.
DM: Yeah, look what I just rolled.
Hjalmar: …huh.
DM: Wow. This… wow.
Tywin: You rolled 21 on a twenty-dieded… dieded die, yeah.
DM: This takes things in an interesting direction.
Tywin: Oh wait, did you roll weather?
DM: Yes.
Tywin: You --!! STOP ROLLING WEATHER! Jesus Christ!
Hjalmar: He rolled a 100.
DM: Yes, I rolled double-zeroes.
Lance: Oh my god, a black hole has opened above the sun.
Tywin: Yeah, that’s like an earthquake or something.
Thanatos: But that means Cuiracaen is pleased!
Tywin: Cuiracaen already struck down an innocent tree or something with a bolt of lightning to let me know “thou shalt not coup de gras.”
Lance: This is only a blood moon has arised and eclipsed the sun, causing eternal darkness for 24 hours.
DM: Also the blood moon is about ten feet from you. It’s following you. If you crit, it fails.

The group immediately anticipates immediate death from the weather, but it does not come.

Tywin: It was already like a hurricane, with random lightning bolts sent by Cuiradick.
Lance: I don’t understand this Cuiracaen. It storms when he’s happy, it storms when he’s angry, it storms –
Tywin: Yes, you just interpret it however you want, like people do nowadays with religion. “The storm’s a good thing, because I’ve done good things, that means God’s happy.

Hjalmar decides his character will worship the god of magic, but he will never speak openly of this while surrounded by Cuiracaen fanatics. The DM attempts to grab the Ruins of Empire book (a Birthright sourcebook), but Thanatos hears “vampire” book and brief panic ensues.

DM: You’re reaching the order of the provinces Duene and Tier on your trip upwards to join up with your army, as evening begins to fall.
Lance: We’re gonna get there… “Ah, glorious! Sunny days all the way! Not a single cloud in sight!”
DM: The weather continues to be relentlessly miserable.
Lance: Two miles west of us… “What a lovely day to be marching north! WOO! Those are some ominous clouds to our east! Good thing we’re not there! La la la la la.”

The DM lays out some shelter options for their evening camp: some foothills, or a copse of trees to the north. Thanatos immediately advocates burning the copse of trees, declaring them evil.

DM: Thanatos lapses openly into madness in front of your eyes. It was inevitable.
Tywin: I knew that.
Hjalmar: Time to usurp!
Tywin: Does that make me mad TOO, Cuiracaen!?

Lance attempts to flee the adventure on the Perfectly Legitimate Carriage, which is pulled by four horses of pure malevolence that have poor dye jobs and taped-on horns. Some brief confusion ensues regarding the ominous copse of trees from the LAST sessions, but the group nonetheless decides to investigate the copse as a campsite.

Thanatos: I will take the lead.
DM: Thanatos, you stride boldly forward, I assume.
Thanatos: (immediately reconsidering) I hold [his henchman] Van von Volkarn in front of me.
DM: He’s not there. He’s getting drunk.
Thanatos: Oy, crap.
DM: You stride forward and hear a splash from the pond as you approach. In fact, several splashes.
Lance: Dire bass.
Thanatos: I need a d20 – dire bass?!
Lance: It’s just one dire bass.
DM: Wait wait, wait. Are koi… dire goldfish?
Maevreen: They’re carp.
Thanatos: I’m being attacked by a dire leech.
DM: Thanatos freezes, apparently, as the splashes echo over the little pond.
Thanatos: Did I freeze because….
DM: You froze because you didn’t dictate your reaction to me, so I assume you just stopped and stood there. If you want to do something else…
Thanatos: I’m walking. I’m walking in!
DM: You did, then you heard a bunchy of splashes. You never told me what you were doing then.
Thanatos: Oh.

Thanatos attempts to listen, forgetting that the storm is still raging around them. He hears thunder. Also rain. He calls out challenge, Somehow, Thanatos believes he’s ended up in the middle of the pond. A sunrod is produced, broken, and shaken like the overblown glow-stick it is.

DM: As you do so, you hear several more bloop bloop bloop. Ripples spreading across the pond quickly fade into the greater ripples caused by the pouring rain.
Thanatos: “Steady yourselves, there’s something in the water.”
Tywin: Hydra! Hydra!!
Lance: Wow, we wouldn’t stand a chance.
Tywin: If it was my game you’d have a chance. You’d stomp it flat in two rounds.

Thanatos continues to call challenge at the pond, to no effect. Paranoid, the group pools its resources to try to find some applicable Knowledge or skill to figure out this mystery. Maevreen rolls Knowledge(nature) while the others compare Swim checks.

DM: If you had to guess, you’d mostly say they were frogs.
Lance: Woo! Good call. Dire frogs.
Thanatos: Okay, I’m going to wade into the water to see how deep it is.
DM: Okay, how far in are you going?
Thanatos: Well… I’m gonna see how far I can go in waist-deep. How far across is the pond?
DM: It’s a good fifteen feet.
Thanatos: I’m gonna go as far as up as my waist. “Hjalmar! Your sunrod. Keep it dry, keep it warm, do as you do.” I’m gonna keep my armor on… 11 on my Swim check.
DM: You… doggy paddle.
Thanatos: I’m only wading out to my waist.
DM: I know. I don’t know why you rolled a Swim check. You don’t need to swim to wade.
Thanatos: I dunno. I wade out up to my waist, stabbing my sword at the water in front of me.
DM: You thrust violently at the water.
Tywin: That’ll aggravate the piranha!
DM: You feel vague hints of motion in the water as you thrust into it through the thickness of your armor, but because of said thickness you’re not able to make out exactly what it is or what might be causing it.
Thanatos: “There’s something in this water! Something foul.”
Maevreen: Is it getting all muddy now?
DM: Yes!
Tywin: “Smile, you son of a bitch!” I shoot my crossbow into the water.
Thanatos: So I wade my way out of the water.
Tywin: Well, you were soaked anyway, so…
DM: Yeah, I would say that you really made yourself wet and miserable, but frankly, it wasn’t really wetter in the pond than it is out of it.
Lance: But inside the pond you did catch an acute case of malaria.

The DM calls for Survival checks. Thanatos tosses out a natural 20, and so sets up camp sheltered from the wind. They set up windbreaks from logs and detritus.

Thanatos: And they ate Thanatos’s minstrels, and there was much rejoicing.
DM: And they ate Inferian’s thralls…

Thanatos realizes one of his blood powers allows him to ask yes/no questions of a body of water, and before they bunk down for the night, he inquires if anything in the water will harm then. The answer is no.

Tywin: Did anyone check the trees?
Lance: You look in amazement as a small triangle appears out of the water. “NO.” And floats back down.
Tywin: We missed the fairy floating around the pond as we came in.
Lance: “Tell me, Magic 8-Ball!”

The DM calls for Spot checks from the first and third watches. Thanatos, on first watch, spots nothing.

Tywin: What we didn’t see was the army on the move in the middle of the night. We come out of the trees and we’re gonna be surrounded.
DM: Tywin, I want you to give me a Survival check.
Tywin: (halfling voice) “Right away, sir.”
DM: As you wake for the final shift of the evening, which you will surely spend in prayer, you realize it’s mighty dark. Mighty, mighty dark. Should be getting toward morning. In fact, perhaps by now the sun should be rising.
Tywin, Hjalmar, and Thanatos: “Cuiracaaaaaaaaaen!”
DM: But as you begin to pray, the wind seems to fade. You’re not taking comfort from this, though. And rather than peace and warmth, as you pray, you feel a sense of urgency, to protect yourself, find shelter.
Tywin: Wait… need to find shelter, we have shelter.
DM: The urge, that’s all.
Calinai: Using my Knowledge(Minecraft) I’m gonna start punching the trees. Mine some wood.
Tywin: It’s too dark… the urge to GTFO…
DM: I need you all to give me a Fortitude saving throw. You have a +4 bonus to it.
Tywin: 18.
Thanatos: 16.
Maevreen: 26.
Hjalmar: 21.
Lance: 18.
DM: All right. Just as your prayers finish and you rise to your feet to begin the business of waking up your companions, the silent wind suddenly becomes a howling torrent that rips through! Even behind the windbreak, several of you are swept up by the pure strength of the wind.
Thanatos: CUIRAAAACAAAAAEN! I weight 235 pounds and I’m wearing chain mail armor, do I get picked up and thrown away with this?
DM: Yes. Tywin, the wind seizes you as you stand up and slams you into the nearest tree. You take 2 points of subdual damage and fall to the ground. Thanatos, you leap to your feet upon hearing your comrade crash violently into the nearby wilderness, but as you do, you have accidentally stepped outside of the windbreak yourself. The wind picks you up, seizing upon your cloak and your clothing, and carries you a full forty feet away to drop you down hard outside of the corpse of trees.
Lance: If HE gets flipped forty feet away I must have been thrown MILES!!
DM: You take ten points of subdual damage from being battered and slammed across the landscape, and you are out in the middle of the wilderness, you may be in trouble.
Maevreen: I’m only wearing studded leather and I weigh 130 pounds…
DM: Lance—
Hjalmar: You’re gone.
Lance: HE’S DOWN TO TWO HIT POINTS! That would knock me out, I would be bleeding on the ground! Oh my god.
DM: You see your friend… or at least your regent –
Lance: I remain still! Fuck him!
DM: Reflexively you try to grab him, not thinking of the consequences of your actions—
Lance: When did I get so stupid?! Look at this intelligence!
Tywin: It’s a Macguffin, don’t worry, he needs to get us to where he wants us to be, so we all have to get knocked cold.
DM: I’m just saying, you instinctively reach for him as he goes flying, it’s what anyone would do. And you are promptly tossed into the pond by the wind. You slam heavily into the base of a tree, taking four points of subdual damage. You two [Hjalmar and Maevreen] cling desperately to the ground and watch as your comrades are scattered like ninepins.
Hjalmar: “That’s a lot of Cuiracaen worshippers being thrown about…”
DM: (bursts into laughter) Apparently worshipping Cuiracaen is bad.
Hjalmar: Ah, this sucks.

Tywin and Lance quickly explain subdual damage to Thanatos, who has never taken this sort of damage before.

DM: The wind almost seems to back off, you all have a moment to act, but you’re certain, especially Tywin who made his Survival check, that you’re going to get more of the same very shortly. Rain continues to lash down, slamming into your bodies like steel spikes.
Hjalmar: “Ow ow ow ow ow!”
Lance: Meanwhile, two miles away… “What lovely weather we’re having today! I think I’ll go for a walk!”
Maevreen: Did we see where Thanatos got blown off to?
DM: Yes, you saw it very clearly.
Maevreen: I’m gonna go try to drag him back before another thing like that happens.
Hjalmar: …good luck!
DM: Give me a Fortitude save.
Thanatos: I’m still conscious, can I get up and start walking back in?
DM: Roll a Fortitude save!
Lance: You might be disoriented though.
Maevreen: 23.
Lance: I proceed to start getting out of the water and rebuilding the hut.
Thanatos: How do you always roll so well? 17.
DM: As you attempt to stand you’re promptly buffeted back to the ground by another gust of wind. Maevreen, you set off into the open area but no sooner do you leave the forest then you’re clinging to the back of a tree against the wind. You’re unable to see far enough to see where he landed, such is the power of the rain and the strength of the wind you can neither see nor hear practically past the reach of your arms.
Tywin: I’ll try to retrieve him and bring him back.
DM: ONE of you has the ability to see through weather.
Tywin: I do, and I’m going to use it.

Lance realizes he has rope, and starts to hurriedly tie himself to a tree as an anchor.

Tywin: But the rope is wet and useless, Lance.
Lance: It’s TWINE!
Tywin: You knew somebody had to say it!
Lance: Damn it, shut up! A 17!
Hjalmar: I follow suit and take my own rope, try to accompany him. 19.
DM: Excellent, you have both tied yourselves to trees.

The party promptly envisions Hjalmar and Lance bouncing off each other violently like a clacker toy. Hjalmar proposes that they turn themselves into a giant Newton’s Cradle.

Tywin: If we had a monk in the party, he’d have an epiphany, like, “Oh, I see!”
Lance: Two of your comrades are dead, you have gained Whirlwind +1. They come back to two bloody messes tied to trees.
Maevreen: Technically, I am the closest thing we have to a monk in the party.
Lance: She’s over here planning out some new moves she learned from our rotten corpses.
Maevreen: Except I’m trying to save your live. Frickin’ tornado.
DM: Quickly, Hjalmar, only the power of magic!
Hjalmar: The one spell I have left at this point…
Lance: Quickly, Hjalmar, magic missile the sky.
Hjalmar: All right, let’s see if I can do this without being meta. Magic missile these people away… Feather fall!
Lance: Maybe I should sing a song to inspire courage.
DM: That DOES give a bonus on saves, doesn’t it…?
Lance: Yes it does!
DM: But no one can hear you. Tywin can hear you sing somehow!
Thanatos: Tywin reads his lips, he’s like, “I’m siiiinging in the rain!” “You son of a bitch!”

Tywin rolls a Spot check, gets an 18, and notices…

DM: The pond is rising.
Tywin: Rising, what do you mean it’s rising? Like the water level?
DM: Yeah.
Hjalmar: That’s some heavy-ass rain.
DM: It HAS been raining for a couple of days now. This is just really tipping over the –
Lance: “I thought he said there was NOTHING IN THE POND THAT WAS GONNA HURT US! WHAT THE FUCK?!”
Thanatos: It’s not in the pond. It IS the pond – (a revelation hits) Is this because I stabbed it with my sword.
DM: You pissed off the god of seas!
Lance: No, it’s the god of this particular pond. It’s a very localized god, whose domain is just this forest, and he’s been itching to kill some people.
DM: That’s Exalted, right there…

Lance envisions brutalizing the god of the dice in retribution for their rolls. Tywin proposes they climb the trees to escape the rushing water.

Lance: That’s what he WANTS us to do.
Tywin: Oh yeah, the pond is going to encompass the ENTIRE countryside. If it’s gonna do that, running away won’t save us.
Maevreen: Suddenly the pond is Trogdor.
Lance: What’s going to happen is, we’ll be, “Hey, why are we dying so much?” We’re gonna erase ‘Dungeons and Dragons’, it’s gonna say ‘Cthulhu’.

The DM allows them Survival rolls to regain the +4 bonus. Tywin abandons the tree plan after realizing that the trees may not even survive the hurricane.

Tywin: (bitter, irritated resignation) Well, let’s fight the water. I’m gonna go swing at it.
Thanatos: It’s water.
Tywin: Yeah, and it’s gonna drown us. I’m not gonna go down without a fight.
DM: It is unlikely to rise high enough to drown you. It’s just inconvenient.
Lance: But he has Belmont blood in him. If water gets above his ankles, he’s dead.
Tywin: If I touch standing water…

Thanatos surveys the terrain for cover, but spies only the foothills. The group realizes they can’t even hear each other and can barely see each other, save for Tywin.

Lance: Dear diary. We thought the boat adventure was bad. This trip in this continuous storm has proven itself to be close to worse. We are only with the godsend that Iglar is not here with us to make this event even worse.
Tywin: Lance. The Watcher in the Pond. The Iglar.
Lance: I just imagine if Iglar was here, somehow this situation would go in the shitter. Even more.
DM: He’d chop down one of the trees and RIDE it to safety!
Tywin: Wind. Wind in the trees. It is coming.
Lance: This isn’t how I wanted to die! (pointing at Tywin) That motherfucker over there may be able to survive anything, but we don’t know!
Tywin: Oh yeah. Well, you know what they key to my invulnerability is, is probably standing water.
DM: You ate the Gum-Gum fruit.
Tywin: Either that or I’ll have an amusing tribute to Highlander at the bottom of the pond.
DM: You’ll have an amusing tribute to Highlander in the pond. Down at the bottom, the one guy who says, “I’ve been looking for you…”
Hjalmar: There can be only one.
Tywin: My body rises out of the water and Cuiracaen’s bolts storm over everything! Windows that you didn’t even know were in the trees start shattering!
Lance: These windows between trees!
Tywin: There’s always windows whenever an immortal dies just so they can explode.
Thanatos: Crap, we have horses.
Tywin: Horses? Oh, they’re gone.
Thanatos: They’re gone, dudes.
Tywin: That’s why there’s no point in spending the gold to buy a horse in Skyrim…

Thanatos braces himself against the wind and slowly crawls back to shelter. Lance vows to retire from adventuring and become a questgiver to get things done from now on.

Thanatos: “I recommend we head for the foothills!”
Lance: “IS HE TALKING TO US?!”
Hjalmar: “WHAT!?”
Thanatos: “READ MY LIPS! NO NEW TAXES!”
Hjalmar: “TYRANT!”
Lance: “I don’t think getting women is a good idea right now!”
Thanatos: I’m frantically motioning – and screaming, but they obviously can’t hear me right now – frantically motioning for everyone to leave the trees and make their way to the foothills.
Lance: Didn’t he say the foothills weren’t that high?
Thanatos: They’ll still provide better shelter than the trees.
Lance: Isn’t that what I suggested before we came to the fucking woods in the first place? And we were all like, “Nope, that’s not gonna provide protection.” I did.

The tree Hjalmar is tied to shifts ominously. Tywin prays to Cuiracaen for succor. Hjalmar furiously checks his inventory.

Hjalmar: Oh boy, alchemist’s fire! That’ll work! Oh, I have acid flasks…
Thanatos: “I have acid flasks—“ (mimes a flask bursting in his hands)
Tywin: The wind takes it away,,, Smashes it into a tree, it’s a whirlwind of acid.
Lance: All of a sudden, the character sheet… Acquired: one level of Two-Face.

A tree snaps in half, and the top is carried off. Lance envisions a hurricane eye that is only five foot in diameter. The DM calls for another Fortitude save from all.

Thanatos: I am out of the trees once more!
DM: You guys see them beginning to slip and slide.
Lance: I’m tied to a tree, I have some protection!
DM: You’re still tied to the tree, you’re going to be yanked to the end of the rope. It’s still gonna be rough, but you won’t go flying.
Lance: Two points of “you threw up” damage.
DM: One point of subdual damage as the rope yanks violently on your waist. And you all see Thanatos, who did not have time to tie himself to a tree, begin to fly. What do you do?
Hjalmar: Can I make a Reflex save, try to grab him?
DM: Yes!
Hjalmar: Rolled a 15.
DM: Thanatos! Reflex save, quickly!
Thanatos: Crap. 9.
DM: You reach out, you grab his wrist, but he is unable to grab yours in turn. The wetness and horrible mess this all is is beginning to cause your hand to slip out of the gauntlet by which Hjalmar is grasping you. You can feel him sliding away!

Maevreen attempts to improvise a lesso, rolls surprisingly high on untrained Use Rope, but is unable to lasso him because of a -8 storm penalty. Hjalmar, clinging to Thanatos with both hands, rolls a 17 on Strength to buy himself some time.

DM: Tywin, you’re witness to this full spectacle at the end of the rope.
Thanatos: “I’ll be taking over the kingdom!”
Tywin: “Now I, Starscream, am leader of the Decepticons! How does it FEEL, mighty Thanatos? EEEYAH!” I kick your hand off the rope…
Hjalmar: Thanatos should make another grab.
DM: Give me a Strength check to haul yourself up bodily.
Thanatos: (rolls) Jesus Christ!
Tywin: Oh no. Get rid of that green die.
Hjalmar: Why do you keep rolling that die?
DM: Natural 1?
Lance: Not that bad.
DM: The strength of your body has failed you. In the face of the fury of this storm, you are not a man.
Thanatos: Apparently not. I appreciate you all trying to help me, as I can’t seem to help myself…

Maevreen tries to lasso him again, but again misses. The players start checking their inventory for something, anything.

Thanatos: Oh crowbar, help me now!
DM: My parasail! I’m safe, thank god, see you in two weeks…

Tywin ponders tying a rope to his longspear and impaling Thanatos, but then realizes he can tie it to the middle and dangle it on the wind to try to fish for Thanatos.

Lance: Mind you, he has two hit points left, so even a couple nicks will knock him out. At that point he’ll just be a kite.
Tywin: Well that’ll put an end to this whole hurricane scenario one way or the other, wouldn’t it? Just go back to the bullshit enemy class! Vampire monk is better than this fighting the hurricane nonsense.
Lance: Has he finally done it?
Tywin: At least we can roll initiative against the vampire monk!
Lance: We’ll never let him go for that monk. And we’ll never let him go for this fucking hurricane!

Lance seizes Hjalmar’s rope and pulls himself along it to the end. He high-fives Hjalmar because they both have only 12 srtrength.

Lance: We do that again, we both let go of Thanatos…

Thanatos rolls a terrible Reflex save. Lance seizes Thanatos’s hand, but Thanatos fails to seize his in turn.

Lance: WE ARE ALL. GOING. TO DIE.
DM: You hear a massive splash behind you, even over the sound of the storm.
TywinL (muttering in the background) I’m gonna take my morning star, bash myself over the head with it…
Thanatos: This is not good. We just heard a massive splash over the sound of the storm.
DM: Tywin, looking back towards the pond, you see one of your horses pushing its head above the water from where it had fallen in. You also notice the rest of your horses are pretty much flat on the ground. They’re not able to get up.
Tywin: ‘Cuz they’re hobbled.

Everyone gets a cheap laugh out of this. The horses are too large to be blown away, only knocked down. Immediately, taking shelter in the horses’ viscera is proposed.

Hjalmar: So a large creature would be unblowable…
Tywin: Are all my spells touch spell, then?

Thanatos continues to slip, though isn’t lost yet. Tywin rolls Concentration to cast a spell… and rolls 10.

DM: That’s just enough! Abruptly Thanatos enlarges! His increased size and octupled mass cause him to crash heavily to the ground.
Tywin: We quickly tie a rope!
Thanatos: I give them my rope!

With Thanatos tied up, Lance hauls himself back to his tree, though once there he sees that the bark is splitting ominously.

Tywin: Face it, guys, we’re getting blown to Oz. Why don’t we just stand up and let ourselves get taken away! After we reach level 15 or something, we wake up back in the camp. “Oh… man, you won’t believe what we’ve been through!”
Lance: We’re still level one! We get thirty levels of shit, we wake up, and it’s all gone. It was all a dream.
DM: Back to level one. And then I was never seen again.
Lance: No no, it goes silent on the transcription for a little bit, then it picks up again. “At this point we proceeded to shove every can of Coca-Cola up the DM’s asshole. We got to about seven before we passed out.”
DM: It goes completely silent. You hear a moment of violence, a strangled scream, silence for a little longer.. garbage disposal. For a very long time.
Hjalmar: Push! Push harder!
Thanatos: What do you mean you’re out of trash bags?!
Tywin: Next week: “What’s for dinner?” “SLOPPY JOOOOOOOOOOES!”

Hysteria. Lance hurriedly ties himself to another tree. The spell wears off Thanatos, leaving him dangling at the end of his rope. Hjalmar’s tree is suffering.

Lance: I wish I had a shovel right now. That would have been smart of us, to dig a fucking hole in our house. Give us some fucking land. Except that hole would’ve been fucking flooded by now.
DM: I roll a Swim check blub blub blub.
Thanatos: It’s okay! I can turn into a dolphin for two hours!
DM: It’s FRESH water!
Maevreen: He’s an air breather, it doesn’t matter!

Hurricane Dolphin is roundly mocked and toyed with. Tywin abruptly spots a massive shadow moving off in the distance.

Hjalmar: It’s a house.
Tywin: Which direction?
DM: In the direction the wind is blowing.
Tywin: And we were heading north. Massive shadow?
DM: You can’t make out much detail. Though you can see through the weather, it’s still quite dark out and quite a long distance away.
Lance: IT’S A FUCKING DRAGON! THIS SHIT JUST HIT THE GODDAMN FAN! All right, talk about being in the fire… while the frying pan also gets set on fire, and the kitchen and the house are also on fire, and the bomb from the Russian plane is landing…
Tywin: A dragon wouldn’t be walking around in the storm. It was a Hurricane Maker… from the Monster Manual.
Lance: The monster I want to see us fight is that monster that just paves road.

The eye of the hurricane, such as it is after having come this far in-land, hits, and calm falls over the group. The wind and the rain both lighten up, and the group is actually able to see and hear again. Lance ropes himself to the horse.

Lance: My unconscious body will be tied to this son of a bitch, when it falls over my leg smashes in half and I take five points of subdual damage, but I’m gonna survive.
DM: You end up in the lake, it’s underwate.r…
Lance; That’s the only part that’s underwater, just my head. “God damn it.”
Tywin: Is there an awnshegh that does this kind of shit?
Lance: NO! I don’t – maybe!

Maevreen knows the respite is only temporary, thanks to a good roll. Lance, possibly reconsidering the whole rope-to-a-horse thing, tells his horse to lie down and stay, but doesn’t have Animal Handling. He furiously berates the DM for the DM”s earlier advice to not take the Jack of All Trades feat. Tywin completely forgets his voice for the character. Yes… in the middle of the game.

DM: “The attempt on my life has left me—“
Tywin: That’s the Emperor’s voice, that’s not Tywin’s voice!
DM: I dunno, for the number of times you’ve used it, it might as well have been.
Tywin: Because it was so much fun! How often do you get to play the Emperor in-character?

The group hurriedly discusses how they should react to the mysterious shadow off in the distance. As Tywin points it out, they can all see it now. Thoughtfully, Lance decides some healing would not go amiss, patching up Thanatos, who thus far has had the worst luck on the saves. Spot checks are rolled; Maevreen’s is the best.

DM: With your keen elven sight, you believe this appears to be a very high humanoid of some point.
Thanatos: It’s a Sentinel coming for Wolverine.
Tywin: It’s a giant waiting to be rained on again… It’s a frost giant.
Lance: “Is it a vegetarian!”
Maevreen: “…I don’t know!”
Lance: “Why don’t you ask him?!”
Tywin: He only speaks Giant. Do any of us speak Giant?

The giant seems to be heading towards the foothills, not the copse. This provides no relief to the party.

Lance: I don’t know if I want to go near this giant. I really don’t want to go near this giant. This is like a twenty foot tall giant, right?
DM: (shaking his head)
Lance: Forty-foot tall giant?
DM: (shaking his head)
Lance: Ten foot tall giant.
Tywin: Eight foot tall giant. Just big enough to be Large.
DM: This thing’s about sixty feet at least.
Lance: (voice rising an octave) I’m not going near that son of a bitch!
Tywin: He won’t even notice us!
Lance: No, he’s tall enough TO notice us, that’s the problem.
Tywin: He could be friendly!
DM: “Me step in something.:
Lance: Last time I ran into a giant, he was like… (grunts, then makes smashing gesture, then indicates a limp figure flying through the air)
Hjalmar: This isn’t Skyrim!
Tywin: Yes it is!

A debate over the actual size category of the giant erupts; it’s Gargantuan. Lance envisions the giant casting Enlarge Person on himself, then dubs the giant “Campaign Ender”. The conversation diverges into a long reminiscence over StupiDuel, but the giant simply sits down on the far side of the foothills, then leans back to use them as a pillow.

Thanatos: So… it’s just enjoying the cool gentle breezep.
Tywin: If we had a rogue… “I’m gonna go rob it!

The wind picks up again, and the DM calls for saves once more. Once again, Lance and Thanatos are the losers on the roll.

DM: (too fast for his own goon) You take three points of dubdual damage as the rope
Lance: Dudual damage.
DM: Dubdual damage. It’s like subdual damage with dubstep added.

Lance, who finally clarified he was tied to his horse (despite the DM not believing he was serious), does not blow off. A tree blows over, slamming into the pond. Outside the trees, the irritated giant moves to the other side of the hills, the wind having changed directions.

Tywin: I’m going to have to, like, make some changes in the national theology.
DM: Cuiracaen hates storms!

Time passes miserably and the DM demands one more run of saves. Tywin fails, smashing into Thanatos’s tree and taking 12 points of subdual damage. That in turns breaks the tree, and Thanatos is flung 10 feet away, taking 4 points.

Hjalmar: Cuiracaen is punishing his worshippers today.
Tywin: Fuck Cuiracaen.

Tywin is out like a light. Lance and Maevreen desperately attempt to seize Tywin and save him from being hurled away once more. With some effort, they haul him into questiomable shelter. Thanatos, however, has to make another save… and yet AGAIN fails it.

DM: Damn.
Lance: (yelling at Tywin) “A guy stabbed you in the heart and you survived, but a fucking storm knocks you out?! Wake up!”
DM: Thanatos flies off into the distance, outside of all of your sights.
Lance: “Somebody’ll need to pass his succession again! All these poor people have to deal with a new ruler already!”
Tywin: Not our problem.
Thanatos: So I’m… flying.
Tywin: You’re dead.
DM: You are seized in massive hand.
Thanatos: Huh -- wait, is that – is that a joke? Or is that seriously what happened?
Tywin: He doesn’t joke.
Thanatos: So – a giant, like, frying pan?
DM: Hand! Hand!
Thanatos: Oh!
Tywin: No wonder he thought he was joking.
Lance: You watch in horror as big eggs get cracked on the side. I love this giant all of a sudden, he’s a monster.
Tywin: He’s gonna kill us all, I like him even better that that silly awnshegh.
DM: You are being held in an open palm. You have a chance to act if you so desire.
Tywin: STAB IT.
Lance: Openly attack it! That’s nothing but a good idea!
Tywin: Act cute. Act as cute as possible.

The hand begins to lift Thanatos, and he elects to just roll with it. The giant lifts him to easy eyeballing height.

DM: As he’s looking at me, I’m gonna raise both hands to show that I mean no harm, I’m not gonna attack him.
Lance: Oh, well you just made the international sign of “I’m going to fucking destroy you” in Giant.
Thanatos: …Huh. INTIMIDATION ROLL!

Lance starts rolling damage for the fall. Thanatos attempts to thank the giant.

DM: “Your words are too small, I can’t hear. You don’t look like you should be flying around down here…”
Lance: “Maybe me put you wings on you, make you fly better!” Another giant comes out. “We play catch with little thing!” “Ah, ah, ahchoo, oh man!”
DM: You take 10d6 booger damage.
Thantos: “No! No, good giant, I was picked up—“
Lance: He can’t hear you. That’s what he was saying.
Thanatos: Oh, he can’t hear me?
DM: “You’re much too small… Should I put you down somewhere?”
Tywin: “Yes, you should take me to my home in the Spiderfell. If the Spider attacks, you should just squash him, because he’s in my house.”
Thanatos: He can’t hear me at all?
DM: Yep, you’re too tiny.

The giant is friendly, though, and cups Thanatos protectively in his hand, shielding him from the wind, warm and snug.

Lance: “I can’t believe he’s dead!”

The players lampshade their own ignorance, and the DM cheerfully lampshades Thanatos’s unlikely survival.

Tywin: I’m gonna enjoy my slumber, ‘cuz there’s no hurricane in Unconsciousland.

A few hours pass, and then, so too does the hurricane. Maevreen immediately decides to go look for the giant, to the rest of the party’s horror, claiming she thinks the giant might have seen Thanatos flying by. The others regard Tywin’s unconscious body skeptically.

Lance: I try to make him comfortable.
DM: You position him with his ass up in the air for some reason.
Hjalmar: That’s how he likes it.
Lance: (a beat) I coax the horse into mating.
DM: (a long pause, before turning to Tywin) You have curious dreams.
Tywin: Not as curious as the sudden disappearance of my urge to heal my comrades from now on.
DM: And then centaurs came upon the land.
Lance: Oh, this is the worst fanfic ever.

Maevreen spies Thanatos coming around the giant’s leg, and soon so do the others. After a brief period of comedy and torturing the DM, they finally meet up.

Thanatos: “Maevreen! Maevreen, you’ve survived.”
Maevreen: “We all did, though Tywin is unconscious.”
Thanatos: “But he lives, Cuiracaen be praised!”
Tywin: By all means, keep shouting.
Maevreen: “How did you manage to survive?”
Thanatos: “THAT! Caught me in midair.”
Tywin: Oh man, you better hope he doesn’t roll good on THAT Listen check. “Oh, I’m a THAT, eh?”
Thanatos: “That good gentle giant protected me from the storm and sheltered me through the night.”
Maevreen: “Amazing!”
DM: Except it was a day.
Thanatos: “Day, night, I couldn’t tell, it was so dark and cloudy! Come, I suggest we go back and get the others.”
Maevreen: I’m trying to get my horse to carry him too.
DM: Carry him? At this point riding your horse is practically the next thing to animal abuse considering the beating it took. Carrying him as well is probably gonna make the poor thing drop over dead.
Thanatos: We’re not that far! We can walk! Or I can walk.
DM: You’re talking about a distance of a hundred feet tops… (sneezes violently)
Thanatos: THE GIANT’S AWAKE! RUN FOR YOUR LIVES!
Lance: The sneeze starts another hurricane…
DM: Maevreen returns shortly after you left, bringing with her, to your surprise, what is surely a ghost!
Hjalmar: DOPPELGANGER!
DM: Better give him the doppelganger challenge.
Thanatos: Lance is like, “Crap, I was gonna take over the kingdom while he was gone.”
DM: He still could.
Hjalmar: The Perfectly Legitimate Kingdom.
DM: “He looked fine on the surface, but he’d taken grievous internal wounds, that was why he didn’t survive the night.” “And the knife mark in his back?” “That was… euthanasia, I wanted to end his suffering. He was in great pain, he was clearly out of his mind, he was clearly no longer a thinking rational being that could be healed by magic, so I had to end him.”
Thanatos: “I was testing him to see if he actually was dead.”
Tywin: “Definitely dead!”
DM: Your cleric lies unconscious! Does anyone have Heal?

Maevreen does, and rolls; she estimates he will be up in an hour. Lance ponders writing a song about being rocked like a hurricane, while Thanatos envisions the entire group being scattered like Dragon Balls. Thanatos strongly suggests going to speak with the giant.

Thanatos: “The giant does not mean harm. If he did he would have killed me during the storm.”
Lance: “I’m not worried about him meaning harm, I’m more worried about him rolling over and destroying us.”
Thanatos: “I’m not saying we camp right under his foot, okay?”

Lance and Thanatos verbally spar over this before Thanatos attempts to drag Hjalmar and Maevreen into the discussion, calling for a democratic vote with no small amount of irony.

DM: I have good news and bad news. The good news is that this is a very stupid giant, he thinks that normal humans are just really young giants. The bad news is, he’s a pedophile.

This earns much more laughter than it should.

Lance: Oh man. So he puts us in his peehole? I’m afraid I don’t understand.
DM: I’m afraid you take 7d6 bludgeoning damage.
Lance: ONLY 7d6?!
DM: He has lube.
Lance: “Me all lubed up for you, little man.” He’s just holding us all five like this… Oh yeah, go near the giant.
DM: Even better: create a Human Centipede, for his pleasure.
All: (extremely pained groaning)
Tywin: All of a sudden, being violated by your horse doesn’t seem nearly so bad.
Hjalmar: I have never actually heard a collective groan like that before. That was great!
Lance: Normal people just go to the wrong place and just set up camp. We get to that wrong place and we keep fucking GOING, go past the wrong place, go to the terrible place…
Tywin: Let’s go camp in the Spiderfell, it’s probably safer.

As they slowly pick up the camp, and Lance furiously rants about going closer to the giant, Tywin wakes up! They quickly bring him up to speed, then attempt to loot the hurricane. This obviously fails, so they clamber up a foothill to camp outside of the danger… as the giant wakes up.

Lance: I kick [Thanatos]. “Go ahead and talk to the giant. Go talk to your best friend.”
Tywin: Damn! Your bard is so contemptuous!
Thanatos: “Good morning! Or evening! Good giant, master giant.”
DM: The giant appears not to hear… continues to mutter to itself, just a sort of sleepy “I’m just waking up from a nap” thing as it picks itself up. It wrings out its clothing.
Thanatos: We get washed away!
DM: Then it takes a whiz on the hills. No… He stands up, looks around, and then his gaze falls on all of you. It puts its hands on the hill you’ve been resting on and leans down. “There you are. Thought you’d blown away again.”
Thanatos: “No. Thanks to you, master giant!”
DM: “What were you doing out in the storm anyway? Seems a bit big for little ones such as yourself.”
Thanatos: “That it is. That it was.”
DM: (noticing Lance, who has been agonized by the DM’s choice of voice for the giant) “Is your friend all right?”
Thanatos: “He will be with a night’s good rest.”
DM: “He seems quite in pain.”
Tywin: “Oh that’s nothing, he’s just racist towards giants.” I roll a 6 on my intiative…
Lance: You didn’t read my history, my father was killed by a giant.
Tywin: Probably for saying racist things to the giant.

Lance continues to rant about an evil giant war written clearly in his history in invisible ink. Hjalmar compares him to angry Willy Wonka; the DM, to Hitler.

DM: “I mean you no harm.”
Lance: “Oh, that’s good to know.”
Maevreen: “We appreciate very much that you caught him.”
DM: “It was luck. Nothing more! I saw something flying past and thought I’d grab it.”
Tywin: I like this guy.
Maevreen: “We’re lucky you have such a gentle touch.”
Thanatos: “I ask a question though, master giant?”
DM: “What would that be?”
Thanatos: “What brings you out here away from…” I don’t know much about the D&D world, does anyone have Knowledge(History)? Could someone do a roll just to see where giants live…?

Lance rolls Knowledge(geography), and knows that the giants generally live in the mountains, though most Anuirean giants had been eliminated as they came into contact with humans.

DM: “I was headed home. I was visiting my family up in the north.”
Thanatos: “That’s funny, we were also heading north.”
DM: “When you’re this far south, there’s not many other places to head? A ha ha ha ha ha ha.”
Lance: “That’s a knee-slapper, giant.”
Thanatos: I want a consensus from the group. I’m gonna ask the giant to give us a ride.

The DM clarifies that the giant is heading south, spoiling Thanatos’s plans. Thanatos thanks him again, the giant merely asks that he put in a good word for giants the next time a giant-slaying campaign erupts. The giant introduces himself as Raanulf. At last, the giant finally waves and ambles off to the south. Thanatos curses, realizing he should have asked about tidings up north.

Thanatos: I doubt some random giant just shows up, saves me, and is like, “Bye!”
Lance: I’m pretty sure in the big grand scheme of things, the giant was there, because of the DM, to catch someone if they flew the fuck away.
DM: I think Hjalmar caught the little hint of what the giant might become.
Hjalmar: (whose holdings are… in the only real mountains to the south) Mmm.

Thanatos is thrilled that they’re friends with a local giant! Tywin notes that giants aren’t exactly popular with most people, to which Thanatos cheerfully suggests what most people can do to themselves.

Thanatos: So we’re camping down for the night?
Tywin: Well, assuming he doesn’t roll up another hurricane we should be able to get some—
DM: (rolling) Uh-oh!
Tywin: Hey, then it’s meant to be. I’m just gonna lay down now and dig a hole.
DM: The dice just killed this campaign, it wasn’t my doing.

They get a good night’s sleep after that long, rough day, awaking refreshed and healed. The DM calls for Spot checks as they awaken. Lance spies that the pool they had spent the prior night next to is roiling as if it the depths were being stirred. Tywin demands they investigate.

Thanatos: Now that we’re at full health, we’re gonna get attacked or fight something.
Tywin: I’d rather fight ANYTHING except a fucking hurricane ever again.
Lance: Don’t say that. He’ll be like, “tornado!” “Random hailstorm!”
DM: Hey look at it this way, at least it wasn’t three sessions long, ah ha ha ha!
Tywin: I didn’t mind the boat thing so much, because Iglar did provide something in the way of breaking it up.
Lance: This whole hurricane campaign would’ve been 100% different if Iglar had been there. At the beginning, during the break period. And giant talk time. Giant talk time would’ve been a whole other game.
Tywin: Yeah, it would’ve been like Hagrid and Grawpy all over again.
Lance: It would be my campaign of Black and White. He’d befriend the giant, and he’d immediately grab one of us and eat us.

They spy some sort of wildlife get bitchslapped by a water tendril as it attempts to drink.

Thanatos: Water elemental? …oh shit, I’m leaving!
Lance: What, you don’t wanna go talk to it? It looks like a friendly puddle of monster water!
Thanatos: The giant actually turned out to be friendly!

With a shitton of bitching, the group finally agrees to go investigate the now-mysterious pond. The DM starts to draw the map; Lance nearly kills him for attempting to put out the tree models. Lance bursts into song.

Lance: About how we survived the hurricane.
DM: “Fuck that hurricane, and the DM who sent it. Fuck that hurricane!”
Lance: “And boats!”
DM: “Vampire monks can also go to hell!”

Initiative is rolled. (Hjalmar gets a rock.) Most of them only advance forward cautiously, the water elemental in the pond not being visible. Thanatos at last advances into range of melee, and a water elemental erupts upwards to face him, clocking him for nine damage with its readied action. Thanatos slashes back, but misses. Tywin attempts to move forward, a huge debate erupts over where exactly he’s moving to, and finally a grim Tywin manages to heal Thanatos entirely. Maevreen uses her Shadow Blade technique, mourns the loss of a crit because it’s an elemental, but does 8 points of damage.

DM: (splashing and crashing noises, as if of an injured water elemental)
Maevreen: Isn’t it plus one to damage, because he’s singing?
DM: Yes.
Maevreen: Nine points of damage.
DM: (splashing and crashing noises, as if of an injured water elemental, that are more vigorous than before)

Lance fires into melee, while Hjalmar fires a magic missile into the elemental. (I should mention that this entire time, people have been singing their actions and miscellany.) The water elemental swings at Thanatos, misses, and steps back five feet. Hjalmar beats the crap out of the DM, I’m not entirely sure how or why, as Thanatos steps into the pond.

DM: As you step deeper into the water, another surge comes up, as another elemental emerges… and splashes harmlessly off your armor.
Thanatos: 18 attack.
DM: WHACK!
Thanatos: Oh no, I didn’t do damage, that was the roll…
Lance: That hits. He’s doing the—
DM: WHACK is the hit noise.
Thanatos: Got it. Nine.
DM: Your greatwhatever-weapon-you’re-using hews it. It bursts apart like a popped water balloon.
Tywin: He uses a greatstick, actually.

Tywin moves to strike at the elemental, but also misses in turn. Maevreen steps up, though everyone worries about the threat of the third one, and uses Clinging Shadow Strike to deal 12 points of damage, though it saves against the miss-chance effect. Lance fails to fire into melee, muttering about his attack bonus.

Maevreen: I don’t have a base attack bonus.
Thanatos: Yeah, but you have magic dice.
Maevreen: Yeah, I do…
Lance: 19. 21. I got a rock.
Hjalmar: 3 points of acid damage!
Thanatos: Crap, I’m in the water, my hands are burning!
DM: It almost appears to be dissolving as you see it. It melts back down into the water, and then abruptly the water begins to swirl violently. Let’s see here… Thanatos and Tywin both need to make a Reflex save.
Thanatos: Crap! Reflex?!
Tywin: Yeah, really… I fail.
Thanatos: 13.
Tywin: Lower than that!
Lance: How low?
Tywin: Much lower.

The vortex attacks deals four points of damage to Tywin and sweeps him in. Tywin bitterly discards his d20. Thanatos strikes it.

DM: You slam your greatsword down. Like Moses parting the water you send a rippling sheet of force through the vortex.
Thanatos: “Let my people go!”
DM: The pond abruptly falls still.

Tywin, with a decent Swim check, doggie-paddles to shore, sighing wearily as he comes to grips with being soaking wet AGAIN. Thanatos gets stuck in combat somehow.

DM: A day delayed, you set off for the north.
Tywin: The war is over.
Lance: We lost.
DM: You travel the remainder of the day without incident.
Lance: We avoid all rolling ponds, mysterious forests, dank caverns, haunted castles…
DM: Strange lights in the sky…
Lance: Villages on fire…
DM: Princesses begging for rescue.
Tywin: Well we tried, but she wasn’t in that castle.
DM: Giant flagpoles… BoBombs… Bullet Bills..
Lance: Triforces…
Tywin: Shyguys.
Lance: Giant pipes with plants coming out of them…
Tywin: Piranha plants.
DM: Wave Beam…
Lance: Crappy water levels – like what just happened.
DM: (bursts into laughter)
Lance: And a boat level is another form of a shitty water level!
Tywin: Ridley AND Kraid.
Thanatos: So we travel the rest of the day…

The DM fastforwards through the day, resting that night, and their arrival at the army camp the next day at noonish. A pair of guards call out challenge!

Thanatos: “I am Thantos Stormrisen! Arriving—“
Lance: “Our lord was killed by a giant in a hurricane!”
DM: Roll a Diplomacy check to see if you can convince them of your identity!
Tywin: “Barrel-rider?”
Thanatos: 21.
DM: You remember to show your crown and signet. “My lord, welcome! I assume you come with orders from your father?”
Thanatos: “Alas…” Wait – how would they – how would they – how would they not know?!
DM: How WOULD they know?
Lance: It only happened, what, a few days ago?
DM: Yes!
Tywin: They’re in the field. And they don’t have cell phones.
Thanatos: I would’ve thought that word would have gotten to them by now.
Lance: I doubt that even minor villages outside the town have heard about the king’s death.
Tywin: Or would even care. Kings come and kings go, all they care about is their crops.

The soldiers direct the party to Captain Varain in the command tent. The camp is also showing signs of the hurricane damage. Thanatos and Tywin roll a Listen check.

Thanatos: Thanatos hears the beating of his own heart and NOTHING ELSE.
Tywin: 22!
DM: The guard leads you up to the command tent, and speaks a few word to the soldiers outside. Thanatos moves to enter, but as he does, you hear voices lifted in anger inside.
Tywin: “Hold on.” Oh… “Wait a moment, my lord. Listen.” Does he hear them now?
DM: You can all hear just one voice at this point. You can hear vaguely, “…like a conspiracy! I have no cause to believe this is justified, or justifiable! You, sir, I should have imprisoned, and you I should have drummed out of this army for attempting to defraud our lord!”
Lance: …who?
Tywin: Let’s get to the bottom of this!
DM: You kick open the door.
Thanatos: I just walk in!
Tywin: We kick open the tent flap, then immediately get tangled in it as it swings back. How’s that for an entrance?
Thanatos: Reflex save so I don’t get strangled on the cords! (rolling) I rolled a NATURAL ONE!
DM: Thanatos bursts inside the tent! His gauntlet snags on the fabric, he stumbles forward! He pulls down one of the support rods, and the tent collapses on you all!
Thanatos: This is like Final Destination, this is horrible! I was supposed to die in that storm, I knew it!
DM: There’s a long silence from inside the non-collapsed portion of the tent.
Tywin: You’re not going forward with this, are you?
Lance: Apparently he is, because Thanatos foolishly rolled! You never roll with this DM because he makes it happen! You knocked over the fucking tent… (dissolving into hysterics)
DM: I’ll give you the chance to not have done that if you want.
Thanatos: Seriously?!
Hjalmar: Just take a mulligan.
Thanatos: I’ll take a mulligan!
DM: As hilarious as that would be, as entirely suited for this THIRD-BORN SON who was never meant to take the throne…
Thanatos: We WALK INTO the tent.
DM: You step in to see the man who is unquestionably the captain berating a young female soldier and an aged, wizened man who looks like he’s about to collapse from a heart attack. As you step inside, he breaks off his tirade, recognizing you, and immediately bows. “My lord Thanatos. We did not have word to expect you.”
Thanatos: “Naye.” (immediately trying again) “No, no, we traveled quick to get up here. What is going on, Captain? What is this shouting I am hearing? About?”

The group just starts snickering over Thanatos’s odd pause and phrasing.

Tywin: Maybe the whole tent flap thing wouldn’t have been bad…
DM: “A minor disciplinary concern, my lord. I imagine you wish to hear a status of our current campaign?”
Thanatos: “I do…? But I AM curious as to what this shouting is about.”
Tywin: “Yeah, what in the name of Cuiracaen is going on here? Who is this old man?”
Lance: (feebly) “Don’t mention Cuiracaen…”
Tywin: I’m done with him! He’s cut off!
DM: That’s ironic, surrendering your faith to Cuiracaen was the only thing that could kill you!
Tywin: (death cry)
DM: As you step inside and loudly attempt to take command of the conversation, the captain looks at you with befuddlement, then looks over to Thanatos.
Thanatos: “Answer the man, Captain.”
DM: He bristles briefly, unused to hearing this tone from the third-born son, who was never meant to take the throne! Completely unaware you’re his lord at this point.
Tywin: Kiss the ring, motherfucker.
DM: You actually can see his mustache quiver.

Lance intercedes and promptly cuts through the crap, explaining Thanatos is the regent now. The captain immediately rolls a natural 20 on his Sense Motive, and shock and horror race through the NPCs.

DM: “This is dark news indeed. My lord, I can only pray I serve you as well as I served your father.”
Tywin: What did he roll on his Performance check, incidentally?
DM: A natural one, he’s stroking the knife that was used to kill your father.
Lance: You should run your empire like the Empire did. Look how that turned out for them.
DM: Let me fast-forward this. Fifteen levels later you’re standing on the brink of claiming the Iron Throne when abruptly your son heaves you down a shaft. The End.
Thanatos: “These are dark times, captain, but now is not the time for grieving. Though again I am curious, what is it that these individuals are guilty of?”
DM: “My lord, the lieutenant here promised a much larger sum of the kingdom’s gold than she had any right to, to this man in exchange for his services.”
Thanatos: ”Good sir, what serviced were provided?”
DM: (old man voice) “My lord, I was providing… THESE!” He lifts up a vial of what is clearly alchemist’s fire.
Thanatos: “Captain, did you order the procurement of this?”
DM: “I had no such intention of doing so. I might have done so had it occurred to me. The problem is not that it was done, it’s that it was done without permission and the payment was done without proper authorization.”
Thanatos: “Lieutenant, what say you about this?”
DM: “If we had waited for the proper authorization, my lord, it would have taken too long. At any time these spiders could reach forward and ravage us. I thought it necessary to have us prepared.”
Thanatos: “And how much did you promise this man? And for how much of the substance?”
DM: “My lord, I asked for every man to be given at least one flask. I have been stationed on this border for a while and I have seen the spiders fight, I thought it was necessary.” Thanatos: “Every soldier.”
DM: “Yes my lord.”
Thanatos: “Captain, how many soldier do we have up here?!”

They quickly count and come up with 1200, putting the total damage at about a gold bar, or 2000 gold. Lance offers to pay, since the cost is trivial. The merchant explains he was selling at cost, being generally in favor of this move, while Thanatos and Tywin drop into a huddle in the back.

Thanatos: “For violating the chain of command, I have to hold her guilty for that—“
DM: You’re chaotic, no you don’t!
Thanatos: That’s true!

Lance gives the alchemist a writ for his money while Thanatos and Tywin continue to mutter about whether they should reward the lieutenant for initiative or punish her for defiance.

Lance: I’ve taken care of it.
Tywin: We’re not really arguing over the money. What’s money to us? We’re like NFL players of the kingdom. We’re not even under contract, we just own everything.
Hjalmar: “She proved outside-the-box thinking, that may save several lives, my lord.”

Not even noticing Hjalmar has spoken, Tywin and Thanatos continue to mutter to themselves.

DM: He ain’t listening.
Hjalmar: Nope.
DM: The wizard attempts to advise Thanatos, but Thanatos has nothing for it. He’s cloistered in religious discussion.

The alchemist tells them he has supplied almost all of the melee units with flasks. Tywin and Thanatos insist on punishing her, while Lance argues strenuously against it.

Thanatos: She went without asking the Captain’s permission to order supplies for the front line.
Maevreen: She’s thinking outside the box and taking care of her people.
Thanatos: But she still violated the chain of command.
Lance: If you want to punish a soldier for going out of his way to do this, I think that’s fucking stupid.
DM: The captain clears his throat slightly. “It would’ve been inappropriate of me to have spent any of the kingdom’s money without authorization from my lord. She did make the request of me. I denied it.”
Thanatos: So… she didn’t violate… okay, she disobeyed a direct order.
Tywin: This is the problem, the captain may be an asshole but he’s still the captain.
Lance: You know what ? You go ahead and punish her and we don’t buy the flasks.
Thanatos: “Sir, we will pay you for your services, we will pay you the promised amount. Aside from that, I would like you to order another one flask for two more units’ worth, to keep in reserve.”

…some more squabbling over the nature and severity of the punishment…

DM: The lieutenant straightens up a little and says, “Permission to speak freely, sir.”
Thanatos: “Granted.”
DM: “Before you decide on a punishment for me, I realize I disobeyed a direct order, but before you decide on it, I would like you to witness a combat in which our soldiers had these supplies, and consider what would have happened if they didn’t.”
Maevreen: “I think that’s a personally reasonably request.”
Thanatos: “I don’t. I agree with her – I was going to give her something of a boon, but at the same time, punish her.”
DM: Beheading!

Lance insists that by agreeing to her idea, they accept that she did the right thing, while Thanatos counters that they need to punish her for violating command. Disgusted by the Captain’s refusal to trade money for lives, they all agree the girl IS right, at least…

Thanatos: I’m leaning towards promoting her, and giving her public lashes.
Lance: That’s… very backwards.
Thanatos: Public lashes for disobeying a direct order.
Lance: More than likely she would quit the military for that.
Tywin: Or he could move her past the captain.
Lance: The soldiers are really confused by their military now.
Maevreen: I think that would be part of the problem. If you publicly lash her, and then promote her…
Lance: You are discrediting open thought.

The conversation starts getting increasingly out-of-character, which in retrospect was a bad thing… Maevreen advises him to defer judgment.

Tywin: Put the captain in the field when the battle comes. And he can be in the front line with no alchemist’s fire. He’s a bean counter. You want a bean counter running your army?
Thanatos: Not really.
DM: On the other hand, he sure ain’t gonna buy no gold-plated crossbows for ya.

Finally they decided to kill the entire army out of pure frustration. Or… do as the lieutenant asks and defer judgment, if for no other reason than the captain might die during the skirmish and this will somehow solve their problems. With that FINALLY decided, Tywin contemplates whether Cuiracaen would wish them to attack or defend.

Lance: He answers with a hurricane. I don’t know why you ask. All answers lead to a storm on us.

The evening slowly winds down with discussion of tactics, strategy, and debate on what will happen in the battle due to come…