Dragons and Things - Backstory: Before The End - Episode 2

<infobox>
 <title source="title"><default>*Cold Open*</default></title>

 <image source="image"></image>
 <group>
 <label>Season</label><default>*1*</default>
<label>Episode</label><default>*1*</default>
<label>Director</label><default>*Adam Rady*</default>
<label>Writer</label><default>*James Rodehaver*</default>
<label>Producer</label><default>*James Rodehaver, Adam Rady, Jared Hoy*</default>
<label>Starring</label><default>*Diana Restrepo, Ben Burch, Eric Radic, Ashley Seal, Adam Rady & James Rodehaver*</default>
<label>Guest Starring</label><default> </default>
<label>Runtime</label><default>*2:26:30*</default>
<label>VOD</label><default>*Season 01 Episode 01*</default>
<label>Website</label><default>*https://www.twitch.tv/datdragonshow*</default>
<label>First Aired</label><default>*January 26, 2018*</default>
 </group>

### **Opening Text**

*"Last week...GM Beard Ben ran his first game...Biggest surprise? No one died. Expect that to change tonight. So, be prepared to say goodbye to: Pre-hammer Krag...Ret's sexy scars...Neriti's love...K'eera being alive...And Hunter raging...more! That's right adventurers...It's going to be a blood-bath. Evil Jim Jam would be proud. It's time...For...There are no trees...Dragons and Things.Backstory.*

### **When Last We Met**

*When last we met we went into a journey into Krag's backstory and we saw a young Krag on the eve of his 18th birthday. He was sparing with his mentor Arfad and Arfad taught him many things about what it means to be a barbarian.*

*Then we followed Krag along as he went into the elder tent and got quested by the test of the totem by the elders. The elders that were there were his uncle Droku, his aunt Kintrona. You had Quack the medical...guy. Medicine man! That's the word I was looking for. The medicine man and we also had Frotl the leader of the tribe militia.*

*And during that time we got glimpses into Krag's backstory as we followed along and met all of his companions. We met his best friend Ret, who told this great story about how they fought a giant scorpion together. We met his better in Hunter. We found out that he knew that Krag had not destroyed that scorpion. We met his sister K'eera who was lovingly told she could NOT go on the test of the totem. And we met Krag's ex-girlfriend in Neriti, who gave us a great story about the last time that they saw each other.*

*Then a feast commenced and the rest of the night was crazy, chaotic, but also fun as the group got to finally meet each other. All of this, I forgot to tell you last time, Krag had no idea that we were doing any of this.*

*Eric: No idea.*

*Ben: He had no idea that we were going into his backstory. All he knew was that he didn't have his hammer and he was level 2. So, uh, that was a lot of fun for me and especially early on in the show...*

*Eric: Was it?*

*Ben: When I was like, hey what do you do and you were all like, "I don't know, I have never been here before!!" I really enjoyed those moments.*

*Adam: I like his Krag voice. Do Krag again.*

*Eric: I wasn't that upset about it.*

*Ben: Anyways, the next morning.*

*Adam: Do, do Krag again.*

*Eric: That's next week poll when Jim's back.*

*Ben: "Ahhh, ahhh, arghh".*

*Adam: Aw shucks it's a real shame we're not going to get that.*

*Ben: So you all left the next morning and went out. You followed your companions lead as they lead you towards the ancestral totem. But right away things got pretty strange. You met up with K'eera, who had snuck out of town to come join you and you were instantly attacked by a group, a pack of hyenas and a dire hyena and K'eera noticed that they had a strange look in their eye.*

*Then we traveled along and Hunter fell into a pit and suddenly there was a rock slide that was coming over. He majestically leaped out of the pit, without any struggle what-so-ever, but it was very clear that something was happening up cliffside.*

*The mystery was growing more and more and you decided to go asleep and then during Ret's watch, in the middle of the night, Krag was attacked by some vicious...*

*Eric: Ambush.*

*Ben: Ambushed by some...*

*Eric: It was no mystery Ben, it was an ambush all along.*

*Ben: It was an ambush, all along. A vicious, small dark creature who, when it was killed, exploded in a blast of force, leaving nothing behind but pain.*

*Adam: You call all of this unexpected? I mean I expected just pretty much all of this, you know, just constant attacks..can't rest...can't rest...*

*Ben: You expected an exploding person? Ya, you can't rest.*

*Adam: She showed up, yeah it was unexpected she showed up...*

*Eric: Well?*

*Ben: Anyways, then you showed up and you found the only tree in the Windscourge Wastes and it is actually a dead desert willow and you looked around and there were signs of yet more to this mystery. (Points at Adam) You're shaking your head.*

*Adam: There's no trees in the Windscourge Wastes. We were obviously outside of the Windscourge Wastes. It's obvious we were outside of it.*

*Ben: There is one dead tree. It was dead! It wasn't a living tree. All right, I'm going to move on. So you looked around and saw that two people must have entered the pit into the ancestral totem and then one quickly followed behind as if they were watching them. This is where you were supposed to meet Arfad, your mentor, but he was not there. You then went down into...*

*Ashely: Wait! There were footprints!*

*Ben: I just said that.*

*Ashely: No you didn't.*

*Ben: You then went down into the pit and...*

*Eric: You're telling it wrong.*

*Ben: You went down into the pit and you started working your way forward. You saw a totem within the room but your companions told you that this is obviously not the ancestral totem. However, you were able to quickly go ahead and decipher the puzzle and make short work of that puzzle.*

*Ashley: That was good.*

*Ben: As you did it sunk into the ground and giant centipedes came out*

*Diana: Yeah, gross!*

*Ashely: Yeah that was not good.*

*Ben: And they started attacking you and you all were able to defeat 'em. You destroyed them...*

*Eric: With a mattress...*

*Ben: but more and more kept coming out, so you had to plug up the hole, so Hunter took his cots and shoved it in the hole and lit it on fire.*

*Eric: I call ah...*

*Ben: You call Frotl?*

*Eric: BS on that.*

*Diana: Why?*

*Eric: He was raging. There is nothing cognitive happening in your brain when you are raging.*

*Ben: But Hunter is one better than you. So then you traveled, traversed along into the next room where you saw yet another totem. This one looked extremely different, as instead of covered with animals and certain depictions of plants, this was scratched and carved out. In the back there was water and a root coming down over where there should be a door and on the bottom it said, "An unopen mind is insanity baptized by horrors within".*

*You walked in. Krag touched it. Instantly went comatose, and all he could see were his companions had turned into horrors of the dark into shadows and demons.*

*Ashley: No, no, no, no. We're all gonna die! We're all gonna die!'*

*Ben: And now our tale continues. Now normally when I run a game I tend to like to start out with backstories. I start out with a backstory each and every session, however, because this is a backstory I made it a little bit different. Um, I had you guys tell the backstory which I thought was a fun unique kind of thing, but one of us didn't get a chance to tell any of the backstory and so today we will flip around and Krag son of Horace, will give you a glimpse into his backstory that he wants to share with you.*

*First of all...*

*Eric: Excuse me?*

*Ben: Wait a second. Also, we will have...*

*Adam: This is the first he is hearing of this.*

*Ben: We will have Jack Conway here. Jack Conway is our guest star today. He will be here. Ret will be here.*

*Adam: I don't think that's true. Logan Nation is already in the chat saying, "Coming back for a second week in a row, is anyone else surprised that the special guest is a no show?"*

*Ben: Uh, he will be here.*

*Adam: Are you saying that the backstory comes first before we...read..comments.*

*Eric: No.*

*Ben: Yes! Yes!*

*Adam: Erroneous. False.*

*Ben: Frotl! Frotl! Frotl on all of you. Give me the backstory!*

*Adam: Are you going to allow this?*

*Eric: It's Ben's show. Jim, you're not here. You put us in the hands of a lunatic.*

*Diana: Ok. I'm listening.*

*Eric: Let's go back, a long time ago.*

*Diana: How long ago?*

*Eric: To a very little Krag. (Hearing a sudden shift in the music to that of the highlands) Not from Scotland?! Keep the music the same. I like the music. The music was good. All of a sudden I was transported to Scotland. Talk about a young Krag. Just think about when you were a kid. For Krag, everything always so much bigger than him. Everything was huge. The tents, his dad, Horace was huge. Horace isn't a big man, if you know Horace. He's a little guy. But remembering my dad and his hammer and I was just always in awe of how huge his hammer was and it was amazing.*

*I remember Horace taking me out hunting and I was probably around four years old and we're going through the Windscourge Wastes and he's scramblin' around on rocks and I remember him picking me up by the belt and climbing up the rocks.*

*Ashley: So you rolled well then. For the climb?*

*Krag: I wasn't rolling anything.*

*Adam: Yeah he rolled very well. Horace would have just rolled him down the...*

*Krag: Yeah, exactly. Yeah I have a lot of fun memories of my dad, watching just destroy things. Crush large animals, squash little things with that hammer. It was always amazing to me. And I remember finally getting old enough and one day I decided, I had to tell him, I said, "You know dad. One day I want a hammer as big as yours." And he laughed. He laughed at me and he said, "Son. One day you will have a hammer as big as mine. You will have this hammer. This very hammer that I hold, and you will be the leader of our tribe. And it will be up to you to lead with wisdom and strength. But always remember. Always, remember son, hat the tribe is your family. The tribe is your life. The tribe is everything."*

*And then he gave the hammer to me. He let me hold the hammer. It was the most incredible thing. It was heavy. I mean it kind of...it took me a little by surprise. I couldn't believe he gave me the hammer and then he said, "Have you seen my cup anywhere?"*

*Diana: Ram Cup?*

*Krag: Have you seen my cup?*

*Adam: Was it like a manly cup?*

*Krag: Yeah.You know the big manly cup, Krag.*

*Adam: Right.*

*Ben: And we will end this backstory on that image of Krag, holding this war hammer and we'll fast forward to our current time where Krag has touched this totem and while he is comatose, while he is not moving, he does have a slight movement to him, as he picks up the totem itself, off of the ground and holds it like he was holding that hammer.*

*What do you do?*

### **Episode Description**

#### **Sponsors & Prizes**

GM Beard Ben read the prizes as Frotl.

* Brick Warriors – Warrior Packs
* Syrinscape - $20 Gift Card

Bestiary – Pocket \* Paizo - [ Pathfinder Bestiary - Pocket Edition

### **Trivia**

* Ben Burch hosted this episode, which was the second episode of Dragons and Things to ever not to be run by Evil Jim Jam. This marks the second episode in the "Backstory" story lines.