Aerois - Episode 153: Assault on Nightbloom Hold

Kim Richards as Nova V'ger

Mark Hulmes as Aila

Rhiannon Frost as Sentry

Tom Hazell as Qillek Ad Khollar

**Assault on Nightbloom Hold** is the 153rd episode of the Aerois Campaign. It was broadcast live on the highrollersdnd Twitch channel, and hosted on the Yogscast Twitch channel, on 10th July 2022 from 5PM to 8PM BST.

*Time to begin the assault on Nightbloom Hold...will the Stormchasers be able to sneak their way in?*

## **Summary**

### **Announcements**

* Mark welcomes everyone and introduces the players. Katie is away this week as she is not feeling well.
* The sponsor this week is D&D in a Castle. Mark made the viewers imagine participating by doing a guided meditation.
* Kim has a new t-shirt available on the Yogscast store. Nina-Serena designed the shirt which features Chinese and English lions as well as hibiscus and roses to represent Kim’s mixed Malaysian and English heritage.
* TwitchCon is next week. High Rollers will appear on the main stage at 2.15pm CEST (1.15pm BST) to play through a prologue of the c3 campaign. They will be joined by Myre and Smajor. This is their first live show in three years. There will be no regular High Rollers next week.
* Thank you for the HR Wiki team. The wiki is fan-run with summaries of every episode, facts about the world of Aerois and the one shots that HR does. Mark uses it all the time and even used it to prep today’s session. Tom uses it to get correct spellings for things in Aerois (which are sometimes not canon or how Mark spelled things, but they are canon once they are written!). Kim just enjoys winding the wiki team up...

### **Recap**

*"The champions were ambushed deep in the jungles of Jakkesh, pursued by an endless horde of hive-mind undead. They were attempting to reach a place called Nightbloom Hold with the aid of a small specialist squad of Guardian scouts, but their efforts to be stealthy were not enough and the group were engaged by a mysterious figure the Guardians called “The Stalker”. Attacking from hidden positions, expertly camouflaged, the stalker evaded and frustrated the party. Slowly chipping away at them, already drained and tired from their previous battles, things did not seem to be going well until Quill, aided by the Wayfinders Guide, spotted the Stalker, and unleashed a powerful Guiding Bolt that then aided a blinded Nova, Lucius, Hotshot and various others in unleashing a barrage of attacks on the foe, revealing their position, and allowing the melee fighters to engage.*

*"The Stalker was revealed to be a Wild Elf called Serrise Fairwind, a Knight of Kellara, now transformed and cursed with a sickly, pestilent form. Despite some very close calls, and with some creative use of their powers and items, the champions prevailed. Serrise was slain, but as her body decomposed, she assured them that she would return and that they would begin this game all over again. Desperate for rest, the party sought out somewhere to hide and tried to gather their strength. Whilst the others were asleep or unaware, Aila was informed by Hotshot and the Guardian, Protector, that undead hive were close to discovering them and that the others would not get a chance to rest. Protector made the offer to sacrifice themselves to lead the undead hive away and giving the champions time to regain their full strength. Aila, unhappy but understanding of the situation, bid them good luck, and promised them that they would find them to make sure that they re-joined the Matrix later.*

*"After their rest, the champions, unaware of Protector’s sacrifice (save for Quill), began to prepare to head out. Quill used the prophetic power of the Eye of the Storm to learn more information about these knights sworn to Kellara, and learned of four key knight commanders: a furious Orc warrior woman decked in smouldering black plate mail, a gaunt, hollowed Ember Elf covered in blackened ice, Serrise, the Wild Elf that they had previously encountered, and finally, the commander of Nightbloom Hold, the greatest of Kellara’s champions, an older Human man with grey hair, a skeletal arm, and a wicked scythe."*
### **Part 1**

*Quill receives some new information thanks to the Storm Eye and the team make plans to assault Nightbloom Hold!*

The party is making their way towards Nightbloom Hold, about two hours distant, led by Hotshot and accompanied otherwise only by Shade. Of the party, only Aila and Quill are aware of Protector’s sacrifice, and in order to keep Sentry’s morale up, neither has said anything other than that Protector has gone on ahead and would hopefully meet them later. With Protector’s sacrifice and Hotshot leading the way, the party is able to make their way safely to their destination. Quill tells the party about what he has learned from the Eye of the Storm: there are four knights, and he has seen them as they are now and what they were before.

All four of them now appear to fight with reckless abandon with no care for their own safety, Quill saw one of them die only to be reborn about half a day later, and he thinks that this will be the case for Serrise, He has seen how they all fight – one summons brutal maces to smash into their foes and disorient them, using curved swords to rip and tear at armour, using jagged spears to pierce and leave lasting wounds on their opponents – this Half-Orc, wearing full black plate mail, he believes to be the Knight of War. If she is attacked and the attacker cannot land a blow, she may be able to damage or break the attacker’s weapon as he had seen with countless knights in his vision. She spreads an aura of rage to everything around her including the undead horde following her, making everything stronger and more brutal. She can also summon four ghostly hounds and can plunge her spear into the ground to summon a pillar of fire.

Following War, he saw an Ember Elf wearing a breastplate, the Knight of Famine, who has a whip of ice and bone which could wither, decay, and weaken an opponent on a hit – the victim’s muscles would wither, and they would become slow and feeble. As a spellcaster, this knight can cast walls of ice, teleport, slow, and insect swarm. Another mage attempted to banish them and instead had their own magic drained from them. There is a suggestion that an aura of withering and weakness surrounds them. The last Quill saw of this knight was them covering themselves in ice armour (similar to Lucius’) and then their mouth opening wider, and wider, and wider… beyond any human potential to do so.

Finally, Quill saw the leader of the group, the Knight of Death clad in chain mail with a giant scythe. He saw knights that fought against Death, pleading with him, begging for mercy from “Sir Godric”. Death is always accompanied by an undead horde that is strengthened in his presence, and he can command these to charge forward and explode, the resulting shattered bones can be used to cage or restrain people or can be called back to armour him. His huge scythe crackles with necrotic energy, and every time he strikes a foe, he seems to be empowered by it or healing himself. Death has a skeletal hand that, when it touches the living, leaves festering wounds that are unable to be healed magically. He has an undead skeletal steed. Death also casts spells, and is able to create areas of silence, raise the dead, send waves of deathly necrotic energy, dispel magical effects, and summon a pillar of light that knocks out anyone in its path. Quill saw a group of militia surrounding Death – he was unperturbed, raising himself in the air, and with two mighty blows of his scythe, destroyed everything around him utterly. Unlike the other knights, Godric has never been bested, while the others have succumbed to exhaustion, being overwhelmed, or beaten in battle.

Lucius considers the dual vision of the knights – what they were before and what they had become – it looks as though Sir Godric was a true champion of Kellara, a good and holy warrior fighting against undead. Lucius wonders if this is a message from H’esper and whether the message from Serrise about being forced to follow this path might be a way for them to deal with the knights. He wonders if they can remove the compulsion whether they can appeal to the knights’ humanity. Aila points out that Serrise said that she did not know of a way to free her, although she thinks that Lucius might be right. Nova thinks that the key is Kellara herself since Skaldi said that all she knows now is grief and sorrow, as if Kellara’s aura is tainted.

Lucius considers what he learned as a young Elf when he was dreaming of being a sky jouster and reading stories about knights, heroes, and people of the lowlands. While he does not know the name Serrise Fairwind, he recognises the name Sir Godric Graves, the Knight Commander of the Order of the Blackened Rose, the ultimate Champion of Kellara. Known for putting down necromancers that have tried to rise up and establish their own order in Aerois, and for stopping planar forces from making their way through the Archways and other ways past the Cradle, he would now be in his late 60s, but decades ago he was one of the premier heroes of Aerois. The Order of the Blackened Rose was created by his forebears – Godric rose up through its ranks and was destined to become its commander. A pious man, dedicated to Kellara, he was known as a serious and stoic but friendly man – a classic knight. It is unthinkable that he has become the antithesis of what he was as a man.

Quill wants to help the grief knights find their humanity, but he is not sure that they will be able to, and he thinks that while they may be able to fight one of them alone, taking on many would be dangerous and the only option if they face multiple may be to run.

Nova knows that Kellara has been changed and warped by the feelings and thoughts of grief, sorrow, and a sort of madness that has overtaken her. They have seen the effect that Kellara’s changes have had on Skaldi and the other priests, but Nova realises that what has happened to the knights is more than that: to have turned someone as powerful as Sir Godric into what he is now would have taken an act of Kellara’s will. For some reason, she has picked these four knights of all of the Order for some reason, and she has given them the four aspects of spreading death and far greater powers than most. Nova does not know why these four specific champions have been chosen over all of the others, however. Nova wonders whether there is something about the aspects that the champions exhibited in their previous life (for example, Serrise may have been plagued or diseased in life). Aila reminds them that she called Serrise a coward, and that she agreed with that assessment – Aila feels that this is significant somehow. Nova thinks that there may be a connection between Godric having such prowess as a knight and the number of people he had to kill to claim it, and that the others have the same qualities that, enhanced, make them the perfect choices to be the knights of each aspect.

Quill is interested but wonders if Nova’s theory is able to be exploited in order to get past them. Aila reminds them that something was also said about a Celestial and wonders if that is one of the knights, but there was nothing particularly Celestial about Godric or any of the others that Quill could see in his vision. Hotshot tells them that she had Stave scan the Hold using a unique ritual and he said that he could detect the presence of a Celestial in the Hold itself – it never moved, never left, but the champions and other knights did. The regular knights have left the Hold for days on end and returned, the main grounds were maintained by friars and squires when the Guardians were first investigating. The keep is on a hill with a small moat around it and a massive tree growing out the back of the fort and it may be a massive Rot Heart (which may be the source of all the other Rot Hearts).

Lucius wonders if destroying the Rot Heart will loosen the hold of the corruption on the surrounding lands, and Hotshot has noticed that destroying a small Rot Heart completely disrupted the hive undead in the area (they stopped acting with a hive mind, fled, and had no coordination), and killed any Deadroots in the area which would rot and die, finally once a Rot Heart was destroyed, the oppressive feelings of sadness would be temporarily alleviated. Hotshot thinks that Kellara can grow more of them although it takes time. Destroying them, she tells them, is not easy – Tinker had to rig a magical explosive of aetherium charges, and they cannot be destroyed from the outside. Hotshot thinks that there may be another way to destroy the Rot Heart but says that she would need to get inside it. She thinks that if the party can engage the forces at the keep, she and Shade may be able to sneak in and get to the Rot Heart unimpeded.

Quill realises that whatever Hotshot’s plan is to destroy the Rot Heart, he believes that she thinks that it will be a suicide mission. They travel for another hour and follow Hotshot to a cliff that overhangs a deeper part of the valley, and they are now at the heart of it. They immediately notice that the area is almost pitch black, and even with darkvision, they can only really make out vague shapes: Hotshot describes the area and draws a rough map in the dirt on the ground for them. Hotshot describes what once would have been a beautiful monastery behind keep walls on a small hill. In front of them are well-tended vegetable gardens and flower beds, mixed with graveyards and mortuaries, statues, mausoleums, and gravestones. Iron fences enshroud various areas and paths run between them, leading up to a small hill with a large moat around it. The hill has a stone keep with a portcullis and a raised drawbridge. Beyond the walls, Hotshot describes two buildings and an attached structure: there is a barracks used for trainees and recruits, the keep itself, and behind that is an enormous and ancient tree (reminiscent of those they saw in the Feywild) – its branches stretch out and cover the entire garden valley with its canopy, completely sheltering it from the light. Particles, like pollen or petals, drift down from the tree, and these absorb the light, creating the darkness around them.

Hotshot tells them that there are between fifty and a hundred hive undead around in the gardens where previously they had been friars and squires, as well as a couple of Deadroots; Quill counts a total of 72. She thinks there are living (but haunted) sentries with bows on the walls as well as a couple of ballistae on the fort itself. She indicates the tree and tells them that it is the Rot Heart and that it is what is creating a lot of the problems in the valley. She points to the main keep and tells them that somewhere inside it is the Celestial.

Quill and Sentry notice that the way the keep is built is odd: there is seemingly only one entrance, the main gate, and no one would build a keep like this with only one point of egress – there must be another, hidden entrance or exit to the keep. Quill thinks that the exit must be connected to the outer walls and could be used to allow non-combatants to escape.

When they look tactically at how to approach the keep, it appears that even if they attempt to stealth towards it, using all available cover, they would still have to deal with at least two or three packs of hive undead. Hotshot believes that the sentries on the walls are living squires, but they are gaunt, ill-slept and ill-fed. It is believed that there may be more of the regular knights within the keep along with 15-20 squires and 10-15 friars. They decide to update Valla on their situation and send a quick message to Oriya.

After a minute or so, the space around them shifts ever so slightly: there is a little more ambient light, almost as if the door to a lit room adjacent to them had been opened. They hear the sound of rushing wind and the Wolf Pack in the distance – next to them is a slice of space from which they can feel a wind blowing fresh air in. They hear Valla speak to them from a distance asking if they can hear her: she tells them that she has been able to connect their spaces for a short time, that the Stormchaser is a little distance from them, but is close to the centre of the darkness, and that she can sense Kellara’s presence and the breach point below her. She thinks that the breach point will be within whatever fortified building they have and tells them that while it will not take her long to breach the demi-plane, that any distraction (even a minor injury) would stop her and make her start the whole process again, which would delay them by a day, so she needs to be kept safe.

Valla does not know if there is a way to save the knights but knows that Kellara is far gone. She thinks that if the knights have sworn an oath to Kellara, and are devoted to her, they cannot want this situation either. Unfortunately, they would need to be restrained or distracted enough to allow Valla to safely open the breach point. Lucius thinks that if they could free Sir Godric that he would make a formidable ally, but the rest think it is risky strategy. Max, having overheard their conversation reminds them of what they discussed with Skaldi Ravenscar: some elements of Kellara’s teachings must be at play, both with the individual knights and within her demi-plane. He urges them to consider what they know of her lore, teachings, and ideals because those will be the best thing to use against her. Titans are what they are and cannot change their natures like people, so he thinks a clue to their victory may lie in what they know of Kellara.

Max says further that he and Valla are happy to help them enter the keep; Max has knowledge of sieges and Valla has her powers. They formulate plans to get across the moat (25 ft across) and over the wall (20 ft high) given that the drawbridge and portcullis are down. They decide to try to sneak as close to the keep as they can, to use *Passwall* to get into the grounds and to create a ruckus to draw people out away from the Rot Heart; Hotshot will sneak in to destroy the Rot Heart (or mark it so that the Stormchaser can destroy it from the air), they will see what happens when it is destroyed, then improvise from there. Sentry has no idea that Hotshot is planning a suicide mission, only that she will do whatever she has to.

Nova takes them through what they have heard about Kellara:

·        Ebon, a Knight of the Order of the Blackened Rose told them that Kellara was a guide to travellers lost in the night

·        Skaldi described her as a life maiden; not actually the bringer of death, she guides souls to the beyond with her lantern (as she did with Quill)

·        Her symbols are flowers (tomb lillies), the light – Skaldi said to trust the light

·        She is the god of trickery, twilight and darkness

·        Along with Atelicus, she is the oldest of the titans

·        Her holy symbol is a lantern with a light inside it

·        Her temples all have gardens (like Gravebloom Hold), are areas of pilgrimage for her worshippers

·        There is some significance to the flowers, light, and life: she wears a mantle of flowers

·        Skaldi suggested that grief and sorrow have overtaken Kellara, that she has succumbed to them

·        Skaldi advised them that her priests could summon Celestials as a champion

·        She has always been a guiding light in darkness, so the fact that the area around the Hold is surrounded by gloom is not right (Kellara’s temples almost always have a light beacon – a large lantern that hangs outside the temple and is always lit in order to guide people). There are no lights in Nightbloom Hold – it is pitch black.

·        It seems that these symbols have all been corrupted: the flowers are controlling in an insidious way, her knights are knights of death, she is no longer guiding souls to the afterlife, she is harvesting them, and it is not known if she is taking them to the dark beyond or collecting them

Nova suggests that everything around Nightbloom Hold is the opposite of what Kellara stands for. She wonders why, when her symbol is a lantern, there is no light there: Skaldi told them to trust the light, but there is none. Hotshot recalls seeing poles with lanterns on them before it became so dark, but they were all unlit, and Stave reported that the friars and squires were taking the lanterns down from the gardens and took them into the keep. The plants, while they are not dead, have also not withered, but have all turned black, as if the colour has gone from them. The plants are living but they are not the same and something has changed them. Nova wonders if bringing light to the knights might at least distract them. Hotshot tells them that they had lights when they fought the regular knights and undead before, but neither normal nor magical light seemed to do anything. Nova thinks that a divine light or something from a believer may be required, and Hotshot thinks that she may be onto something.

Lucius wonders where Protector is and whether they should wait for them to turn up but Hotshot says that they cannot afford to wait and need to keep moving. She says that they need to focus on their own plans, that there are too many dead Guardians already.

### **Part 2**

*With a plan in place the Stormchasers charge forward and assault Nightbloom Hold! Time for more stealth checks!*

Sentry summons Alnysix and leaves them on the outcropping overlooking the valley. The party is going to sneak down to the Hold, Shade and Max will go with them, while Hotshot will make their own way down so that they can sneak past the commotion that the party plans to create.

The party attempts to stealth in through the gardens, but mere minutes after they try to use the low stone walls and vegetation to hide their progress, Sentry, Max, and Quill stumble into a pack of hive undead who are just as surprised as the party at the intrusion and they also see a Dead Root nearby. They are in the mausoleum gardens surrounded by 10-12 ft high mausoleums, as well as stone fences and statues, but there are not many places to hide.

Aila charges the Dead Root and slams into it with The Howling Tempest: her two mighty blows and the lightning aura barely damage it while a pack of skeletal minions swarms and surrounds her. Nova summons Tiangong and swipes at the Dead Root, slicing into it twice, and another of the minion packs moves up and surrounds Nova. Quill casts a *Sacred Flame* at the Dead Root – he realises his error as the buds and plants that had not yet bloomed begin to glow from the radiant damage, and he puts *Shield of Faith* on himself before the last pack of minions swarms him. Sentry moves to the last pack and starts to attack them, slaying two of them and wounding another – Quill is overcome with a wave of sadness as he is tarnished with grief rot. The Dead Root lashes out at Aila and Nova and then pulses, making the undead surrounding it quicker and tougher looking. Lucius quickens his cantrip and casts *Acid Splash*, targeting two of the undead near Nova, the Dead Root absorbs some of that, then he does a second *Acid Splash*, hitting two of the undead near Sentry – he destroys an injured one and injures a second. Max makes two greatsword attacks against the skeletal minions around Sentry and Quill, finishing two of them off and leaving only one barely alive – Quill gets affected by grief rot again (twice!).

Another group of minions arrives near Lucius and swarms him before Aila strikes the Dead Root three times with massive blows – she takes damage from the surrounding swarm. Nova is attached by the minions around her before attacking the Dead Root and destroying it – it falls apart and the minions surrounding it return to their normal state, Nova moves next to Sentry so that she can assist Lucius. Quill annihilates the remaining skeletal minion near him with *Sacred Flame* and heals himself to remove a stack of grief rot. The pack of skeletal minions that was around Nova previously breaks away to attack Sentry and Nova, Tiangong manages to down one and injures another: Sentry casts *Aura of Life* that heals him and removes another stack of grief rot. Lucius is shredded by the slashing damage of the pack around him before he puts a quickened *Armor of Agathys* on himself and slashing at one with The Captain’s Command. Max destroys one of the minions near Lucius.

Two more minion waves arrive, as does a new Dead Root and the skeletons near Lucius are all empowered. Aila recklessly attacks the minions around Lucius but being empowered, they are much harder to kill, so she switches to the Dead Root and attacks it instead. Quill hears shouts and cries coming from the direction of the fort. Nova attacks the new Dead Root and starts the slow work of whittling it down, Quill casts *Destroy undead* which is largely absorbed by the Dead Root which erupts with bright light: the dropping petals of the tree in the courtyard absorbs some of it but the area is briefly illuminated and nine of the undead are destroyed. While the light is not bright enough to signal the Stormchaser, they soon hear two ballista bolts flying in their direction. Quill is hit by the first (taking massive damage) but manages to shield the second and is somewhat stunned by the impact.

Sentry destroys another two skeletons and injures a third before doing some minor healing to Quill, Max joins her, destroys one and injures another. Sentry and Lucius receive a stack of grief rot. The four remaining skeletons attempt to attack Lucius, the *Armor of Agathys* explodes around him and all are destroyed. They see two more packs approaching and Quill hears a faint horn call from the fort behind them. He thinks that he may have seen Hotshot through the gloom getting over the moat and up to the wall of the fort but is not sure. Sentry heals Lucius with *Aura of Life* and tells Alnysix to make a diving attack towards the packs that are incoming and then lure them away. While it is being chased by the undead, it is seen by someone in the fort, and it does not take long before they shoot a ballista bolt and destroy it – fortunately the two minion packs are distracted enough that the party can skirt past them. As they head towards the moat, which is more of a boggy obstacle, they see the last two minion packs and the last Dead Root moving along its banks and forming a last barrier for them to pass.

They decide to charge through the last packs to try to cross the moat, and Quill sees that atop the walls are twelve squires with bows, with six more ready to join the fray as required. Aila charges forward into the minions to try to thin their ranks out a little – being empowered by the Dead Root, they are more resistant, but she still manages to wipe out four of the skeletons with two great hammer blows and a blast of lightning. The other pack swarms behind her and Nova attacks the Dead Root, slashing at it twice, missing once and getting Tiangong to hit it as well. The squires shoot a volley of arrows at Aila – she dodges most but takes a small amount of damage on the way through but takes a stack of grief rot from the dying skeletons. Quill hits the Dead Root with a lightning *Chromatic Orb* while the archers hit Nova with a volley of arrows. Max offers to deal with the archers, conjuring flame in his hands, Sentry tells him to do so as she calls forth Starbreaker and charges into the remaining pack of skeletons. She destroys one, and heavily injures another. Max moves up behind Aila, Nova, and Sentry – he raises his hand and creates a wall of fire all along the wall, shouting, “Flames of Gideon!” which destroys twelve of the archers.

Lucius quickens a *Chromatic Orb* and throws a lightning orb at the Dead Root along with dichromancy, he follows up with a *Firebolt,* but the Dead Root is still alive. The Dead Root activates and targets Nova and Aila – it misses Aila but hits Nova, poisoning her. The ballistae shoot at Max and Lucius: Max sees the bolt coming, Sentry reaches out and smacks the back of the bolt as he parries, bringing his great axe down and splits the ballista bolt it in half. The second bolt is heading directly for Lucius’ chest when suddenly, Tiangong teleports in front of him and takes the hit as a shadow martyr.

For the first moment, they see a brief moment of light – it seems to be coming from the great temple keep: through the gloom, they see a great stained glass window, and through it they see two short pulses of faint blue, Celestial-looking light.

## **YouTube Timestamps**

0:00:00 - Intro
0:08:18 - Dun Duns
0:09:16 - Part 1
1:26:46 - Part 2

## **Featured Characters**

#### **The Stormchasers (Player Characters)**

* Aila (played by xxx)
* Lucius Virion-Elluin Elenasto
* Nova V'ger
* Qillek Ad Khollar
* Sentry

#### **Returning NPCs**

* Hotshot
* Shade
* Valla
* Max

#### **Mentioned NPCs**

* Kellara
* Skaldi
* Protector
* Serrise Fairwind (Knight of Pestilence)
* Sir Godric Graves (Knight of Death)
* Knight of War
* Knight of Famine

## **Featured Locations**

* Jakkesh
	+ Gravebloom Valley
	+ Nightbloom Hold

## **Trivia**

* There was an irregular camera freeze of the bottom camera (with Tom and Rhi) throughout the stream, possibly due to the heat.
* According to Mark, the image of the Knight of Famine opening its mouth ever wider was inspired by the scene in The Mummy where Imhotep unhinges his jaw.
* Kim wanted it recognised that Brendan Fraser is amazing.
* When the Knight of Death’s undead hand is mentioned, Lucius says that it sounds familiar, looking at Nova. She denies that they are similar because she never touched anyone with hers and caused unhealable damage with it.
* Sir Godric Graves is described by Mark as looking a bit like a Death Knight from World of Warcraft (just with less of a blue glow and more of a glow of black necrotic energy).
* The Messenger Rings work in the jungle but *Sending* and scrying spells do not work. Quill does not know why.
* Mark says that Lookout describes the monastery in the dark. He does, of course, mean Hotshot.
* Valla is nowhere near as durable as the PCs and can be hurt badly, although maybe not killed.
* The party is offered a team of Wolf Pack members that would act as their own minion forces, but they would be stronger than the undead minions.
* Because it is not a teleportation spell per se, *Transport via Plants* (or *Tree Stride* in Sentry’s case) would work in the valley. Tom is thrilled – he loves that spell. No, really, he does.
* As the team were making their final plans for their infiltration of the Hold, Mark asked, “Does anyone remember the Abbey?” referencing episode 26 where Sentry died. Too soon, Mark, too soon!
* Mark advised that because they were fighting near the Hold, more hive undead would show up every turn regardless of whether they used light or sound attacks. The only real difference is that here, there is a set number (only 12 packs in the area) with three packs engaging them in the first round, then more would turn up every round after that.
* The Dead Root seems to absorb some of Lucius’ *Acid Splash* that he does on undead minions – it had given them temporary hit points.
* Mark mentions Max not being told to activate, at which Kim ejaculates, “Maxtivate! Wait, that sounds really bad. That sounds really dodgy…” – dick joke number one of the episode.
* Chris Trott had hot chocolate to drink in part 2. He declared that it tasted like celery.
* Tom misspoke “3d6” as “3 dick six”. This was the second dick joke of the episode.
* Empowered hive undead do 7 points of slashing damage per creature within 10? feet of the target.
* Nova refers to one of her dice being “massively cocked” which has Tom sniggering like a schoolboy: dick joke number three.
* The Dead Root has an AC of 19.
* Tom says that Max “got a natural 20 last time, that was furious Maxtivation!” – number four.
* Quill takes 74 points of piercing damage from a single ballista bolt – it is a normal hit.
* Empowered minions have 27 hit points instead of 17 (the Dead Root gives them 10 temporary hit points).
* Mark tried out some different rules on how minions attack towards the end of the combat: rather than being an automatic hit at the start of the turn that is reduced by the target’s AC, the minions get to make an attack and they get bonuses to their attack roll for the number of friendly minions around them in a certain radius (up to a certain maximum). He did not like the AC reduction method.
* After Max destroys the archers with his wall of flame, Tom says that he’s going to “Maxturbate thinking about that later”. The fifth, and last dick joke of the night.

## **Quotes**

* **Not our forte...** (Link)
**Mark**: Are you taking any steps to try and do anything to help yourselves, or are we just going straight into rolling stealths?
**Kim**: Nah, what’s the point? What’s the fucking point?

* **Please Tom, there's a time and a place...** (Link)
**Kim**: Maxtivate!
**Tom**: I’m going to Maxtivate!
**Kim**: Not here! Not now, not live on air!

* **Remember, crying is a free action** (Link)
**Mark**: End of your turn, Quill?
**Tom**: I mean, I do have a bonus action...
**Mark**: Sure.
**Tom**: ...however, I was just shot by a ballista.
**Mark**: I mean you can still act!
**Tom**: I think I spend my bonus action... **getting shot by a ballista.**