- Welcome one and all to Dimension 20.
Our cast of players will assume the role
of heroic adventurers
embarking on a dangerous quest.
Our story takes place
in the world of Spyre.
Spyre mostly conforms to your expectations
for a world of swords and sorcery
with one notable exception,
and that's Elmville.
Elmville is a little town
in a nation called Solace.
Solace may be home to elves,
orcs, dwarfs, and gnomes,
but it resembles more of a
1950s through 1980s America.
There are several schools in Elmville,
but our story begins at the
Aguefort Adventuring Academy,
the world's premiere training
ground for would-be heroes.
Our story begins with six freshmen
on their first day of school,
and the first bell's just about to ring.
Without any further ado,
Dimension 20 proudly presents,
Fantasy High!
(bomb exploding)
My name is Brennan Lee Mulligan.
I'm the dungeon master
for you guys this evening.
We're gonna be playing a little bit of a
tabletop RPG here with
the CollegeHumor cast.
Say hi, guys.
(all cheering)
(all talking at once)
This is Miss Emily Axford.
- Not today, but yeah.
(laughing)
- [Brennan] Zac Oyama.
- Also not today.
- [Brennan] Siobhan Thompson.
- I will refuse it, take it back.
- [Brennan] Lou Wilson?
- I'll take it.
- Ally Beardsley.
- Sure.
- And Brian Murphy.
- As Riz Gukgak.
(players laughing)
- [Lou] There it is.
- We're gonna be playing
a little role playing game
for you guys, thanks for
coming and playing with us.
This season marks the
beginning of our adventure
into the world of Fantasy High,
where we ask the question
that has long gone unasked.
What would happen if
John Hughes ran a game
of a tabletop RPG, and
we're gonna find out today.
Swords, high school, puberty, magic,
it's all coming together.
We're going to descend to somebody's home,
why don't we have this
decided by roll of the dice?
That feels fine to me.
- Oh no.
- Oh yes.
(dice clatters)
- Hell yeah, we're gonna go downtown.
- Yep.
(dramatic music)
(Lou chuckling)
- As the clouds part,
a flock of gulls flies
over the Marigold River heading down
to an area of wealth and expansive taste.
It's downtown Elmville, and we see
that amongst the manors
there is a colossal
gilded man o'war, a pirate ship,
great and mighty that has been dry docked
and dragged out of the
river, all the way up
onto land and turned into a mansion.
We see vast hedgerows and various bankers
and also pirates dragging chests of gold
up through hedge mazes
and topiary and fountains,
and we see, out on a
little, sort of clay patio,
Lou, would you describe
yourself for the other players?
- Oh, of course, hello, I'm
Fabian Aramais Seacaster,
I'm a half elf, I'm, of course, the son
of the famous William
Seacaster, the great adventurer
who sailed the Celestine
Sea, freeing slaves
and raising up nations.
I'm a fencer by trade, I
also know how to glass blow
and I'm quite good at calligraphy.
(laughing)
And I am absolute thrilled to be here
at the Aguefort Adventuring Academy.
Very excited to kind of
start on my adventure
of becoming an adventurer
much like my father,
that I may too, one
day, take up the mantle
of the Seacaster name and
sow my heroism across Spyre.
- You're out on a lovely day,
you wake up early in the morning,
you had a great green protein shake
made by your halfling maid Cothilda,
and you're out on the patio
with your fencing instructor,
Herzon, practicing.
- Fantastic.
- There's the sound of
swords and sabers ringing off
of each other, Fabian,
what does your character
look like so that we know?
- I'm six one, white hair, a relative,
like a thinner, like a
very, how would you say?
- Lean, athletic?
- There you go.
Lean muscle, that's
what I was looking for.
- Whoo.
- Oh.
(laughing)
- Very lean muscle, very dextrous,
but also incredibly strong.
- Like a soccer player or a swimmer?
- So like a swimmer's body?
- Yeah.
A real Michael Phelps type.
- Oooh.
- Oh okay, shoulders, hello.
- For those of you at home, but yeah.
- [Zac] Picture Michael
Phelps with a sword.
(all laughing)
- And white hair
- Such a tiny sword
in comparison to the size of his body.
- As Herzon and you fence, your mother,
Hilariel Seacaster, a high elf
with beautiful long
flowing hair and sort of,
kind of like a fusion kimono,
some kind of silk garment--
- Oh my god.
I love her.
- Hanging off one shoulder.
As an elf, she's immortal, so she looks
about as, you just like early 20s,
even though she's about 200 years old.
She has just a huge goblet of wine,
it's about 9:30 a.m. in the morning.
- Oh mama.
- She goes,
"Darling, you look wonderful,
are you winning the fight,
"'cause I don't--"
- Oh mama, Herzon is really
giving it to me today,
but don't worry, I'll best him yet.
- Herzon, you let my boy win.
Let him win, my sweet boy, sweet boy.
- Herzon, don't you dare take
it easy on me, all right,
I need to be strong.
(laughing)
- Of course, I would
never take it easy on you.
You are a champion, you have
the gift of your father.
- Yes.
- You hear a voice say,
"Did someone mention
the man of the house?"
- Oh, Papa!
- Stomping out
of a gold archway is the
most piraty fuckin' pirate
you ever seen in your
life, tri-corner hat,
eye patch, saber at his side, a long coat.
In this, weird 1950s suburb, he sticks out
like a fuckin' sore thumb.
Your father made his wealth by means
that some call heroic and
others would call evil,
but those are, anyone's gonna talk
about someone who's achieved greatness.
He swaggers out onto the patio
and says, "My dear
darling boy, there he is,
"the apple of my eye, my pride and joy."
- Oh, Papa.
- As he grabs your head and
kisses you on both cheeks
and goes, "Now, today is
your first day of school,
"all right, now, I never
had much in the way
"of book learnin', never
was raised in no school
"of any kind, so here's what
you do on your first day,
"all right, now I've asked around.
"You find the biggest
and meanest man there."
- Yes, Papa.
- Mmmm.
- Go up to him, and you drive your fist
hard and strong right into his stomach
and send him to his knee.
- Yes, Papa.
That's what I'll do, just
like you would've done
if you ever went to school.
- That's right, my sweet boy.
Now, I have a little present for you,
if you're so inclined.
- Oh.
(players gasp)
Papa.
- You see he reaches
into a bag and pulls out
a red and white Aguefort letter jacket
for the bloodrush team,
the Aguefort Owlbears.
- Oh, Papa!
(players laughing)
- He hands it to you and says,
"Oh my boy, my sweet
boy, now, technically,
"you're not on the team yet.
"They're going to have some
informal tryouts today,
"mainly for people that are comin' back
"and have played earlier season.
"Now, you're a freshman, but I've had
"a little bit of a conversation
with Coach Daybreak,
"who is the coach of
the Owlbears over there,
"and I understand he'll
be accommodating you,
"in terms of a tryout today."
- Oh, fantastic, Papa.
Thank you so much, I mean, the tryout's
just a simple formality,
I mean, we both know
that I have the skills to be a champion.
(Emily laughs)
- Of course, are you crazy?
You're my son, you're a
direct reflection of me.
- Yes.
- You and your glory
is the same as my glory.
- Yes it is.
- That's how we relate to each other.
(players laughing)
- Exactly, Papa.
- That's our goal, now,
in addition to your skill
and your talent and your raw
power as a master of combat,
I've also paid a handsome sum of money
to Coach Daybreak, a bribe.
- Well, of course.
- An illegal bribe.
- I would do the exact same.
- Of course.
- I would have done it
if you hadn't.
- What do we say
is the relationship
between luck and talent?
- 500 gold pieces.
(all laughing)
- My sweet boy, I love you.
- I love gold.
- I love you.
- I love you.
- See, he grabs your head
and kisses you on the forehead
and he looks over, you see that your mom
is just, literally, winking at her son
and waving over at him, until he goes,
"My darling wife, I'll
be dead in the grave
"and she'll still be alive."
- I know that, Papa.
- You know I'll die
before you, long before.
- Yeah.
- The elven blood in you.
- You tell me everyday.
- Time ticks away, grain
of sand by grain of sand.
- Yes, Papa, yes, of
course, of course it does.
- We cannot live forever.
So what must we do to live forever?
Write our name on the face of the world
with our heroic deeds.
- Yes, yes, of course, Papa.
Write my name on the face of
the world with heroic deeds,
yeah, I will.
- Good, that's all,
that's all it is.
- Great, thank you.
- Now get yourself to school.
- Okay, thanks, Papa.
(all laughing)
- We are going to cut now to another one
of our brave adventurers.
- Whoo.
- Oh boy, oh boy!
We're gonna cut over
now to the neighborhood
of Elm Valley.
(inspiring gospel music)
(all laughing)
Oh Lord, save us, we are
cutting over to Elm Valley now,
where we're going to go and
meet our wonderful friend,
it's her first day of school at Aguefort,
it's Kristen Applebees.
Kristen Applebees, you're
in your bedroom right now,
you've got an emblem of a cob of corn
in praise to Helio, the god of corn,
and his father, Sol, the god of the sun.
You have been touched
by his spirit divine,
you have been sent to this world
to share the healing
power of your god, amen.
- It's true.
(laughing)
- You see, describe your character,
and what they look like,
what their room is like,
what's kind of going on.
- Yeah, Kristen Applebees
is always wearing a tie-dye
shirt from a summer camp
that she went to, like
a religious summer camp.
She has red hair, freckles, she's like,
was made for camp.
(all laughing)
She walks around with her leather Bible
that has her name engraved on the cover,
she's always holding it, and yeah,
she's big into the corn god.
- You hear a bunch of noise.
You have a one story,
kinda like ranch house,
a little, that kind of like, Elm Valley
is a super conservative neighborhood.
Out in the living room there's a sofa
and a playpen for your little brothers.
You hear your little brothers,
Bucky, Bricker and Cork
are all out, just rolling
around on the ground.
Their school starts a little
bit later than yours does.
And you hear your dad,
Mac, and your mom, Donna,
yelling out there,
saying, "I swear to God,
"Bricker, if you don't give
your dad back his halberd
"you're not gonna be able
to play when you get home,
"all right, now say your
prayers, wash your hands
"and get ready to get to school."
You hear a knock on the door.
(knocking)
And you hear the voice of your mom say,
"Kristen, you up in there?
"You almost ready to go
to school sweetheart?"
- Yeah, I'm, I just finished praying.
- You see the door opens,
and you see your mom
leans her head in, your mom's
sort of a thickset woman.
She's got those little
sort of short sleeved
mom shirt and the shorts,
she's got hiking boots on.
Your mom and dad are human paladins.
They work for the border patrol,
going and making sure that people
from the Mountains of Chaos and monsters
don't get in, you see your mom says
"All right, say your
prayers to the corn god,
"Helio, praise be."
- I am, I'm almost done.
Just another hour.
- All right, okay,
we're gonna be pretty late if you,
if you were gonna do a whole hour.
- I, okay, I guess I can,
everything is a form of prayer,
so I guess I'll just go, let's go.
- See your mom gets a little
misty eyed and she says,
"Oh, sweetheart, I am so
glad that you were chosen
"and Pastor Amelia is so proud of you,
"listen, it's not too
late for us to send you
"to Sun Peak to go train with the monk."
- No, mom, I wanna rub
shoulders with real people.
I wanna go to parties and dump my beer
down the sink and refill
the beer can with water
so no one feels weird around me.
- Gotcha.
(all laughing)
Look, as you can see, she
says, you see she says,
"Look, Helio asks us to
live a pure life, right?
"I just, you're gonna be goin' to a school
"with elves and--"
- Mom,
I think your and dad's stance is racist.
- I, (scoffs) okay.
- You're only for humans
who look like you, have you
ever looked at all your friends,
mom, do any of 'em look different?
- How can I be racist against an elf?
I never met one, I never met,
I don't even know an elf!
- Exactly, you've never met one.
- Okay, okay, so this is--
- You know what?
If Helio was here right
now, he would pop out
of a corn husk,
(Emily laughs)
he would pop into a million
different pieces of himself,
and he would spread those pieces around
to all parts of the city.
He wouldn't just be hangin' out here.
- I, I, I, I, I, okay.
You know, I'm not smart
enough to go toe to toe
with you Kristen.
- Agh.
- I'm a simple woman, and you
know, I haven't read the book
as close, I'm not chosen, so--
- You're really smart, Mom, okay?
I love you and I think
you're really smart,
and I think you're relying
on I don't know very much,
and I wanna hear you never say that again.
- You see that your Dad
pokes his head and says,
"Everything all right in here?
"We're about to head out, or--"
- [Ally] Yeah, we're
fine, I'm gonna go meet
all my elf friends.
- The hell?
You got elf friends already?
What the hell?
- I hope so!
I hope I don't even have one human friend.
- All right, well you
know what, we're done,
you can talk to Helio, so
you know, you would know.
You get piled into a station wagon,
you can see your little
brothers bouncing around
in the backseat, you hear your dad turn
the elemental rune key
that starts the engine up
and you guys start heading off.
You see your brother, Cork,
who's your littlest brother
and he goes, "You go to 'Venture School?
- Mmmhmm.
- You gonna fight a dragon?
- I hope so.
- Really?
- Mmmhmm.
- You're so cool. (sniffs)
- Do you wanna tissue?
Do you wanna wet nap?
Do you wanna tissue?
- Huh?
(snorts) I'm okay.
- No.
- I've got crayon up there.
- What?
- I gotta whole crayon.
- You have a whole crayon in your nose?
Here, oh god.
- Jesus.
- You see that a small bit
of light covers his nose.
Ahhhhh!
(string fanfare)
- What, you heal your brother back there?
- Yes.
- Well, you know what?
I got no worries about you.
You guys take off, ooh
baby, here's the next one.
(foreboding music)
It's really feeling...
(plaintive music)
(all laughing)
So, it's pretty early.
It's a misty gray kinda
morning over in Little Branch.
Little Branch is the area of
town where the small folk live.
There's a lot of miniature
houses over there,
and we see over in a little
corner of a neighborhood,
sort of far away, there's a tree,
and it's a tree with a little door in it
and there's little
windows and little pulleys
and kites and all kinds
of things of gnomish make,
clever little contraptions
and wonderful things
and there, in the middle of the tree,
standing up from a bed that
fills up the entire tree
at almost, sort of a slant, even,
the face sort of pressed
up against the windowsill,
is Gorgug Thistlespring,
Gorgug, can you tell us
sort of what you look like and
what you're doin' right now?
- Uh, yeah, I'm Gorgug, I'm 14.
I'm six feet, four inches tall.
I'm a lot bigger than
this house that I'm in.
(Emily laughs)
I kinda don't have a lot of friends.
I'm not good, really,
at talking to people.
I like keeping to myself
and just sort of drawing
or something or listening to music.
I'm adopted, by the way, my
parents are little gnomes,
and I'm a lot bigger than them.
Last night I broke my bed in my sleep.
(all laughing)
- Aww.
- Again.
I just like to keep to myself.
- Well, Gorgug is there
in his gray hoodie,
he's got his headphones on,
listening to some music.
- Ahhh.
(Ally laughing)
- Evanescence, no doubt.
(all laughing)
- And you see that it's pretty early
and you see that coming
in from the workshop,
your adoptive mom and dad,
Digby and Wilma Thistlespring
are tinkerers, and you see they come in.
Your dad's kinda got this muttonchops
and he's bald, he's got
these sort of goggles on.
Your mom's kinda like the little, sort of,
workshop bandanna around her head,
they both have aprons on
and have their little curly,
pointed shoes, you see your
dad and mom both walk in,
and your mom goes, "Well,
hey there, sweetie,
"you're already up."
- Yeah, I got up pretty early.
I broke my bed again.
- Oh, sweetheart,
that's no problem, aww, on
the first day of school.
You see that your dad
immediately goes over
and starts doing some gnomish spell,
takes up a hammer and starts
(magic tinkles)
mending it with magic,
and you see he says,
"Hey, you know what?
"Sometimes a thing gets broken,
"and when you rebuild it, it's
stronger for it, you know?
"A lotta things are like that.
"You put a sword in a steel forge,
"you gotta beat the hell outta that thing
"to get it nice and hard
and sharp, you know?
"Breaking things isn't bad."
- I mean, you keep saying that,
but I keep breaking things.
(all chuckle)
- It's always good, it's always good
that you're break, you know--
- I had a weird dream
where I got really mad, and then I woke up
and my bed was broken.
- Okay.
- So you guys have dreams
where you're mad all the time?
- You see that Digby and Wilma
look at each other and go,
"Well, sure, sure."
- Really?
I was just thinking about,
I've never seen you mad.
- Well, you didn't see me
when the, your old Pa here
dropped a screwdriver on my dang thumb.
I was fit to, you know,
I said, "Hey, you know,
"watch it, buster!"
He really got it.
- You were so mad
and you said, "Hey, watch it, buster!"?
(all laughing)
- Well, yeah.
- I feel like my insides are boiling.
- Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.
- When I'm mad.
I'm not mad right now.
- Okay, that's, hey, you know what?
Everybody gets mad
sometimes, and you know,
one thing you can think about
when you're going to school
is hey, things aren't going my way,
I'm getting pretty PO'd.
You know what I'm gonna do?
I'm gonna sing a song.
- Sing a song?
- Your mom grabs a little harp
and your dad grabs a little ukelele
and they start sort of
harmonizing, and they go like,
♪ When you feel a little mad ♪
♪ It's probably because
you really feel sad ♪
♪ Just remember your mom and dad ♪
♪ And then you'll start
to feel real glad ♪
- I'm glad.
- That's right.
That's right, bud, so just sing that song
around the other high schoolers
if you start feeling upset.
(Emily laughs)
- Okay, I gotta go.
(all laughing)
- See, Gorgug, you walk
out, you see your mom
by the door, hands you
a little tin flower.
And you see, she says,
"Now, another thing,
"that back at Oakshield you had, you know,
"it was a little bit of a hurdle
"trying to, it was a
bit, we had a little bit
"of a hard time trying
to make pals, right?
"But making pals is just
like making a flower,
"you know, you think--"
- It's just like making a flower?
- Sure, everything's
just like something else.
- Oh--
- You just--
- Please don't sing another song.
(all laughing)
You see your dad softly puts his ukelele
(players laughing)
put that down,
you see your mom goes,
"Well, with a flower,
"you think, hey, what
should that thing look like?
"And how would I make
it, and what would I do?
"and you're thoughtful, and then, and then
"you're real careful with
it, and then you put the work
"and you put the elbow grease in
"and you do it with love the whole time.
"And if you just go be yourself,
"be your great good self
with your great big heart
"I just know you'll
make some friends, bud."
- Okay, thank you, Mom, I'll go to school
and I'll try to make a friend today.
- Maybe give him the flower!
- I don't--
- Maybe give him the flower!
You know?
- Thanks for the flower.
- That could make a friend.
- [Zac] I'm gonna buy
a friend with a flower.
- Well, it's not buy a gift
as in buying, you know,
a gift isn't buying something, you know,
and you give someone a compliment,
is that buying something something?
Or give you someone a smile?
- No, okay.
- Give someone a smile?
You ever do that?
Wow, yeah them tusks, them
tusks are really comin' in, bud.
- They're so big.
(all laughing)
- We're going to cut now,
let's see here, ooh boy.
We will now go little bit
north of here to Clearbrook.
(bright classical music)
- Oh my goodness.
- Here in the neighborhood of Clearbrook,
we now venture through the lofty woods
and the shaded streets to
the Abernant residence,
where we find ourselves
at the breakfast table
with Mr. Anguin Abernant,
Miss Elianwen Abernant,
Miss Eolwyn Abernant,
and Miss Adaine Abernant,
at a small breakfast nook
with crystalline windows,
small spinning elven pylon
of pure runic magical energy,
small unseen servants,
little air elementals
whisk eggs and tea and
other things like that
to the table back and forth.
You see that your father,
the elven diplomat
from Falinel reads the
paper and ruffles it.
Your mother, a professor at Hudol
looks down at her tea and goes over
her curriculum for the day,
and your older sister,
prim, proper and perfect
in her Hudol uniform, sits next to you.
Describe your character to
us, if you'd be so kind.
I'm Adaine Abernant, I'm the daughter
of the elvish ambassador.
I was at Hudol, but
unfortunately, I failed
the entrance exam to get
into the upper school
because I had a little
bit of panic attack,
but Aguefort's good too, Aguefort's,
I'm happy to be at Aguefort, that's good.
It's like actually, I'm better
at the practical applications
of magic anyway, and I'm good I, I, I,
it's good, I'm excited to go.
(laughing)
- Bloody good.
- So at the table, you
see that your father
sort of ruffles the
paper and says, (sighs)
"Hoo, ghastly business, that.
"I'm sure this will come
out at our next meeting
"at the council, it's dreadful,
that's really dreadful."
(Brennan clears throat)
- I hate it when you do that.
- What's that?
- You say a thing is dreadful
but you don't say what it is.
- Do you want to know?
- I don't know!
- Adaine, an inquiring mind
is one that sees before it
the opportunity for knowledge
and strives to move forward.
Your sister, Eolwyn, for example,
I trust that when she wants to
know something she will ask.
That's the mind of a
researcher rather than sort of
the responsive, more visceral attitude
of a practical caster, you understand.
- If you really wanted us to know things,
you'd get us papers
ourselves, except you sit here
and you say, "Oh gosh, terrible, oh drat,
"what a thing," and
then I have to ask you,
instead of you saying, "Oh
look, here's some actual
"practical information that
you might want to know."
- You see, your sister
says, "I get the paper
"on my crystal, do you not,
I get it on my crystal."
- I'm not allowed a
crystal because I failed
the entrance exam.
- That's right.
You're not allowed a crystal.
Well, I'm sure if you kill a hobgoblin
maybe you'll, what are the sort of things
they do at Aguefort, I'm not sure.
It's an honest question, do
you kill hobgoblins at this--
- I cast Ray of Sickness
underneath the kitchen table.
(all laughing)
(cauldron bubbles)
- You see your sister goes (retches)
(vomit splashing)
and vomits all--
(Emily laughs)
- Oh dear.
I mean, I think that maybe
my sister is too sick
to go to school today.
- Now, now, children.
No offensive spell casting at the nook.
That's going to take a
whole prestidigitation
to clean up, Arianwen,
do you want to do that?
Very well, father.
Your mother swirls her
hand and says, "Adaine,
"I don't understand
why you and your sister
"can't simply get along?"
- Why don't you ask her?
Why do you always ask me?
- Well, I don't know, I
don't choose to examine that.
I'm rather busy, I'm trying
to get this curriculum today.
- Yes, of course, you're
rather busy for me.
- You see that she looks
over at your father,
immediately ignoring that
very pointed statement
that you just made, and says, "Dear,
"do tell me what you see in the news."
He says, "Well, the elven
oracle has died in a shipwreck.
"Very dreadful business,
on her way from Falanel
"to Bastion City, looks
like her ship, the Cerulean,
"just went down, dreadful affair.
"Ought to be dealing with
that, I'm sure the art magi
"will have no end of talking
about what's to be done.
"Terrible."
- She can't have been
that good an oracle if she
didn't see the storm coming.
- Adaine!
- I, what, why?
- You see, Eolwyn goes (smearing)
"Now, really, Adaine,
that's much too much."
- I'm just saying.
- Stinks.
Your sort of breakfast
concludes, your father
gives you a very chaste kiss on the head
and your sister, so your mother gets up
and says, "I trust that you
girls won't see us off."
She says, "Eolwyn, if
you'd like to take the car
"you can do that, and Adaine, I understand
"that there's a bus
that goes to Aguefort?"
- I mean, other people's
parents might have
found that out for them.
- Well, I think
this is a very wonderful
time for you to apply
some of your divination casting,
perhaps gaze into a crystal ball,
see if the bus is coming
to a certain place.
That's sort of the thing
they value there, isn't it?
- Very well, I shall find
my own way to school.
- That's my good girl, so
he kisses you on the head.
You get your stuff and
get ready to head out.
You've got kind of this
little prep uniform as well.
Your father walks over to you and says,
"Oh, Adaine, before you go, I'd
like to give you something."
You see he takes this big crystal orb
out from a satchel, you see he says,
"This is an arcane focus
that an old friend of mine,
"a warcaster from the military in Falanel
"employed for his spellcasting.
"I've had no use for an arcane focus,
"but I understand you'll be spellcasting
"under adverse conditions, so perhaps
"it would be of some use to you."
- Thank you, father.
- Oh, you're very welcome.
Here you are.
- It's very, it's very big.
- What's that?
- Thank you.
- Why would it be impractical to fight
with a two foot diameter orb?
(players laughing)
Wouldn't a large orb, it helps
you focus the spell energy.
I'm trying, Adaine, I
really do try my best.
(Lou laughing)
I don't know what to tell you, Adaine,
this is a touching gift
from a friend of mine.
You don't like it, you can
give it back, that's fine.
- No, I, thank you, thank you, father.
(Emily chuckles)
I'll put it in my backpack.
I guess.
- I don't think it'll fit,
but try your best.
- Then I will, I'll carry it
in my hands to school on
my first day of school.
I'm sure it will make a great impression
with these new people.
- You see that your father
ducks away, you and Eolwyn start walking,
and you see that she looks over at you,
and she says, "That was a
mean trick with the vomit
"and all that, I don't
ever cast spells at you."
- Yes you do, all the time.
- Well, mine are always funnier, you know,
they have a ironic sort of twist.
- I cast Tasha's Hideous Laughter.
(witch cackles)
(all laughing)
- Make a saving throw, if you'd be so kind
for Tasha's Hideous Laughter.
(dice clatter)
- Oh.
- What'd you roll?
- A four, do I have points
to add to it, that--
- Did she reverse it at her?
- That she does.
- Oh, ho ho ho, that's badass.
(all laughing)
- Trying to look like I'm not panicking,
just still laughing like a crazy person.
- Your sister is so cool.
- Oh no.
- I love your sister.
- And on top of it her,
her uniform is just
slightly better fitting.
- Make a wisdom roll for your wisdom save.
- Four plus wisdom, (laughs)
four's not gonna do it.
- Great.
- You start cackling
like a lunatic.
(all laughing)
Also gonna need to have you
make a wisdom saving throw
for your panic attack condition.
(Siobhan sighs)
(die clatters)
- 20, 18 plus two.
- 18 plus two.
Cool, so you don't go into a panic attack
but you do start laughing like a lunatic.
You see, she says, "See, for example,
"I just said that my spells were funny,
"and I've turned your laughter spell
"back on you, which is
both ironic and funny,
"which are the two things that
I said my spells are like.
"And I didn't even have
to use a spell slot,
"isn't that something--"
- I'm going to learn
so many spells and screw
you, this is my only game
in going to this school,
to find a group of people
to destroy your fucking life.
(players chuckling)
- You see she says, "I'm sure you will,
"you're going to join one
of those little arcane
"secret societies, go voodoo--"
- I punch her in the face.
(all laughing)
- Go ahead and make an attack roll.
- Did you use up all your
spell slots on your sister?
(Emily laughs)
- You just died
in your opening.
- Three.
- Three, you, boy, your skinny elven fist
biffs right past her face, and she says,
she says, "That sort of pure
brute physical violence,
"I'm sure that'll earn you all sorts
"of credit at this school
for brawling, that's lovely.
"Well done," you see she says, "Cut,
"before you injure yourself
by trying to attack me,
"can I just be very clear about something?
"Look," she says, "I,
"it's awful that you
got kicked out of Hudol.
"It's awful, it doesn't
reflect well on our family,
"but that's not even the reason."
- I punch her in the face again.
(all laughing)
- Eight.
- Eight, she says, "Really, stop,
"what's to gain at this
point by throwing punches?"
(all laughing)
- The game is me hitting you
in the face.
- And so she says,
"I'm trying to help."
- No, you're trying to help yourself.
- [Brennan] You know, look, all right,
and just let me do, I'm trying to do
a nice older sister thing for once.
Can I do it, can I do that?
- Can you?
(Brennan sighs)
- Good grief, all right.
Look, Aguefort doesn't
work like Hudol, all right,
so all the things about grades and tests
and practicals and exams and all that,
that's all out, it's a nonsense place.
It's all topsy turvy there, all right?
They look differently
on the sort of things
that they value there, so the
things that really really work
for that academy are, sort of,
things that would be
insane to do at Hudol.
I heard that one of the best ways
to get into an arcane
society was to steal a book
from the restricted
section on your first day,
that that's something that they look at
as, I don't know, some kind
of adventurer's initiative
or it shows, I don't know, gumption?
- I don't want to take
any more advice from you,
'cause you probably couldn't
even get into Aguefort.
Just because you're good
at Hudol doesn't mean--
- I couldn't get into Aguefort?
- [Siobhan] That you'd
be good at Aguefort.
- I could get into Aguefort.
- You'd be terrible at Aguefort.
- I'd turn that whole school
around, brick by brick.
I'd lift it up in the air--
- You're too scared to try.
You're too scared to try.
- I am proper and well behaved
and well mannered.
- Meh, meh, meh, meh.
- So I don't care to
engage in this anymore.
- Meh, meh, meh, meh, meh.
- All right, fine, go on your first day,
get partnered up with
some sort of barbarian,
go out into the wilds and get killed
on your first adventure, see what I care?
- Good, I shall.
- You see she turns
and walks away.
(Brennan laughs)
- Whoa.
- Tension.
(Brennan laughs)
- Hell yeah, ba-bum, we now go over to,
(smooth jazz music)
- Oh yeah.
- Oh yeah.
- Welcome to Ballaster, which
is kinda like more rundown,
more seedy kinda place,
kinda bad part of town.
You see Strongtower Luxury Apartments,
with the luxury kind of
arcano-crystal flickering,
(neon light buzzes)
so it just goes ke-ke-ke,
Strongtower Apartments, we see
that there is a small bedroom
and basically, a kind of retrofitted,
it's in a one bedroom apartment
with a kind of cordoned off
bed in the living room with
a fake drywall around it.
Very small apartment,
and we see that there is,
sun's just coming up, there's some smoke
coming from some burning
thing on the oven,
and there's a little
bit of coffee in a mug.
A very sparse, spartan kinda place,
and we see Riz Gukgak.
Brian, go ahead and describe Riz
for me, if you'd be so kind.
- Yeah, so I'm Riz Gukgak.
My nickname in middle
school was Briefcase Kid.
I'm a goblin, and I don't
have a lot of friends
even though I'm pretty
social, which is weird.
(all laughing)
My only real friend is this
halfling named Penny Luckstone
who, technically my babysitter,
I had a babysitter until I was 13,
but she recently went missing, and my mom
is a detective and I'm a (coughs)
licensed private investigator,
so I am gonna find Penny myself.
- So it's early morning, I
assume you've been up all night
working your case.
- I've got my board,
it just has the missing girls
all just pointed at the school.
- Oh, eww.
- That's so creepy
to have in a little boy's room.
- I just have a board of missing girls.
- He's trying to find them.
- Whatever, creep.
- Yeah, whatever.
- You're not here, you're not
here, none of you are here.
- You do take breaks and kiss a pillow.
(players laughing)
- Oh, Penny, babysit me.
- Riz says they're not kissing a pillow.
(players laughing)
Just being a private investigator.
- You see that it's early in the morning,
you're kind of looking at the board.
It's a lot of, it's a really nice board,
you got the yarn and everything,
it's kind of sparse clues wise,
it's sort of just the
pictures and the dates
where they went missing
and stuff like that.
- Tryin' to move it around
to make it different,
but it's, I only have five clues.
(all laughing)
- You see that the door opens
and your mom, Squanda Gukgak walks in.
Now Squanda is a classic goblin,
she's got sort of green skin, yellow eyes,
the big ears that come out to each side,
but has got that classic mom
haircut, you know what I mean?
Kinda like the bangs
and the bob or whatever?
Dressed with the sort of white shirt,
she's got an underarm holster
for a little arquebus,
dress shoes, she's always
gotta have the badge
hangin' off of the belt there.
You see that she opens the door, walks in.
She's been gone all night working.
And you see, she walks in and she goes,
"Oh, Riz, sweetie, are you, you're up?
"What are you doin'?"
- I kind of, I got some sleep.
I slept for four hours, we said
four hours was the minimum.
- Four hours is the minimum.
- I got four hours of sleep.
- Okay.
- And I got up a couple times
to work on the board,
but for the most part,
four hours of sleep.
- Sweetie, you know
that it's not great that
you're doing this, right?
- Well, they're missing, mom.
- Why does it say licensed
private investigator?
- Well, it says un, it's
little, but it's legal.
- Looks like a smudge, oh, sweetie,
that's, that's--
- Technically legal.
- Really skirting the line with a lie.
- But, overall, okay.
- I, look, sweetheart.
You gotta lotta gumption,
but we have detectives
that are working, actually
we have one detective
working this case, but--
- And I can be your man
on the inside.
- Man on the inside?
- Yeah, that Ague, at the school, right?
That's where, the girls
all went to the school.
- Yes, they all went to Aguefort.
- And that's the clue that I have.
- She looks at your one clue,
and there's nothing for it,
she says, "Okay, you could
throw a couple more clues
"on there, that's a probable thing,
"we could, you know--"
- Just read a newspaper?
- Yeah, we'll just read a newspaper,
the dates, right, what
kind of circumstances,
last seen, last person seen.
- That's why it's good
to have you around, Mom.
- Why am I encouraging this?
Don't do this.
(all laughing)
Oh god, okay, you've eaten?
Are you hungry, want something to eat?
- I had coffee.
- That's not food, sweetie.
- I haven't eaten, okay,
I could use something.
- Okay, I'm gonna go get
some, what do we have?
You see she opens the fridge, it's empty.
She goes, "Oh yeah, I gotta go shopping."
You see that she opens the, the thing
and there's some cereal.
She takes a little thing of cereal out,
(spoons clatter)
pours two bowls, pours some milk in.
You see that there's not
enough milk for two bowls,
so then she pours the milk out of her bowl
into yours.
- Oh my god.
- Puts water from the sink in her--
(players groan)
and then she puts
a bit of honey, and you see that she has--
(all laughing)
- Tryin' our best.
- I love her.
- You see she says--
- Shout out moms.
- "All right,
"well, eat up, okay?"
(soft music)
- Okay thank you.
(Brennan and Brian gobble)
- Ah, all right, well I'll go,
I'll find a time to go
shopping and get the rest.
(sighs) Hey, today, first
day of school, right?
- Yep.
- And this Saturday,
it's the five year anniversary,
so if you wanna head over
to the cemetery, we can go visit Dad
and sorta see how things are going.
- Yeah, yeah, we can do that.
- Does that work for you?
- Yeah.
- We can go in the morning,
if you got stuff to do.
'Cause I know you probably try
to make friends at school--
- Yeah, I'm probably gonna
be busy, 'cause I gotta make,
so I figured a lotta kids
would just be giving out
their phone numbers on their phone,
but I made business cards.
- (inhales) Boo.
- So I'll probably be busy Saturday.
- Okay.
- I only get in the morning.
- Ah, sweetheart, formality is great
when you've tryin' to be a professional,
and I know that you seen me work a lot,
and so that's kind of a,
you know, professionalism.
But there's something to be say,
you know, when I go out with the guys,
I'll knock back a beer,
- Right, right.
- I'll kick back a little bit.
It's okay to relax.
- Yeah, get 'em relaxed.
- Get who?
Get them relaxed?
- That's how we get them
to tell us--
- You relax.
- Tell us the secrets so that we--
- It's not, okay--
- So that we can solve the mystery.
- Friends are for more
than clues, sweetie.
Friends are for, there's a lot
of things we use friends for.
Right, so let's look at
that as an opportunity to--
- Start with the friends,
then get the clues.
- Okay. (claps)
Well, I'm gonna, you
good to get to the bus?
- Yeah.
- I'm gonna try to,
I'm gonna catch a little bit of sleep.
Sweetheart, you're gonna do great.
- Thanks, Mom.
- You're the best there is.
I love you, have a great day at school.
Tell me all about it
when you get home, okay?
- Okay, thanks, Mom.
- Gives you a kiss on the
head and she heads off
to her bedroom, and we will now cut over
to our final--
(rock music)
- Nice.
(rock music)
- Ah, hell yeah, we cut
over to the Faeth Home
way over by the highway,
not too many people
live out here, it's kind of a little,
has a chain link fence, it's
got a little attic bedroom
up there.
- Oh, I'm in the attic?
- You're in the attic.
- Fuck yeah.
- Fuck yeah, upstairs is a room
that last year was filled with pastels
and little unicorns,
(Emily gags)
other shit like that, and now
it's all fuckin' band posters,
tour lists for who's gonna
be playin' at the Black Pit.
There's a sick red guitar in the corner.
There's some horn cream,
there's some cream
for your horns that are coming in.
You see, Emily, go ahead
and describe your character
if you would.
- Um, my name's Figueroth.
You probably knew me last year as, like,
that really bubbly girl who was, like,
invited to every party,
but all of the sudden,
my horns started growing in,
and I thought I was an elf,
but it turns out, my dad isn't my real dad
and I have a demon for a
dad, but my mom won't tell me
who he is, so pretty much I'm kinda like,
fuck everyone and I'm just like,
I'm just like, I've got a bass guitar,
I've got some drumsticks,
like, I'm ready to start
a bass driven band, and, just like, yeah,
just fuck everything,
right, okay, that's it.
That's me, also, my name is
Figueroth, my last name is Faeth,
but that is the name
of someone who does not
have anything to do with
me because he's not my dad,
so I'm just Fig now, just Fig.
- You see that, so Fig is upstairs,
you see that there's a knock at the door.
You're in bed, see that your mom leans in,
your mom is a, she's got the mom jeans on,
but is like a, sort of wood elf.
You see that she's got
a bow over her shoulder
and a quiver of arrows,
your mom works as a ranger
that goes and explores
the woods around here.
You see she goes, "Sweetheart,
I've been knockin'
"up a storm, what's goin' on?
"You're gonna be late,
you're gonna miss the bus."
- Oh yeah, um, about that, I'm not going.
- God damn it, you're going to school.
- Yeah, try and tell me even one good bard
who learned how to bard in school.
They're gonna teach me how
to play the bass guitar?
No, if I want, I need
real life experience.
- The school is real life experience.
Sweetie, you're 15.
- Who's my dad?
- Goddamn it, I'm not--
- Who's my dad?
- I can't tell you who your,
your dad is Gilear, who
raised you and loves you.
(Ally laughs)
Okay?
- That tool.
- Look, just 'cause things
aren't great between your
father and I right now
doesn't mean that he
doesn't love you, okay?
- Really, because the look on his face
when my horns started growing in
didn't look a lot like love.
- Sweetie, this attitude
is a problem, all right?
You gotta get it together,
it's your first day at school.
- You know, you're right, I
think I need some instruction,
like maybe from a dad.
- Goddamn it.
I--
- Who is he?
Just give me a name,
I'll go find him myself.
- There are reasons I can't tell you.
- Is he the Nightmare King?
- It's not the Nightmare King,
it's not the Nightmare King.
- I think it's the Nightmare King.
- It's not the Nightmare King.
It's the Nightmare King,
you don't have to say--
- I think that--
- Say it's not
the Nightmare King if
it's the Nightmare King.
- Say, you want me to say what?
- If it's not the Nightmare King,
you could let me know by being like,
it's not the Nightmare King.
- The Nightmare King lives
thousands of miles away
from here, maybe.
- Yeah.
- I did, the Nightmare--
- But he also lives
in our nightmares, maybe
that's where you met him?
- Sweetie, this is sensitive, and adults--
- I light up a cigarette.
(Brian laughs)
- Where the fuck did you get a cig?
She snatches it out of your hand.
I don't, where did you get that?
- I light up another.
- God!
Wow, where did this come from?
You were so well behaved a year ago.
You see she sort of
collapses against the wall.
Look, okay, well, and
she looks out the window
and goes, "Well, there
goes the fuckin' bus, huh?"
(bus engine roars)
"There it goes, you happy?"
- Bye, anyways, so I think I'm just gonna
sorta stay home and work on some music.
I've got a song called My Dad is a Demon
But He's Also a Deadbeat,
so I'll just work on that.
- You're goin' to the school.
- You see that she walks
out, picks up the phone
and she calls someone, you can hear her
speak in elven downstairs.
(speaks in foreign language)
(Zac laughs)
- I can't believe
that I really thought I was an elf.
Elves are so lame.
(speaks in foreign language)
Oh my god, just so many -th soundings.
(Brennan speaks in foreign language)
Ugh, I know you're talking about me!
I can hear you saying Fig.
- It got nothin' to do
with you, get downstairs!
- You see your mom--
- You're like Swedish.
- Comes back upstairs and
goes, "I have to go to work,
"all right, your father is coming here
"to pick you up and take you to school,
"all right, because he--"
- Oh, my real father?
I'm finally gonna meet him, what a luxury!
I can't wait, I'll put
on my best fucking dress.
- Get dressed for school, all right,
and we will talk about this. (sighs)
I love you, and I know
this is hard right now,
but we're gonna get, you gotta put
the cigarette out while I'm in the room,
while I'm in the room you can't smoke.
- I put it out in her coffee.
(cigarette plunks)
(coffee sizzles)
(all laughing)
- God damn it!
(all laughing)
You see that she walks outta the room.
- Just tell me who my real dad is
and I'll call this war off.
(Zac laughs)
- She walks outta the room, she leaves.
You see that she walks
out on the front lawn
and a humongous griffin flies up
(wings flapping)
in the sky going (screaming),
lands in the front yard
and she mounts on its back
and flies off.
- Oh ho.
- That's pretty dope.
- You see that a moment
later a car rolls up
and Gilear, who you, not
your biological father
but the man who raised
you, steps outta the car.
He's not lookin' great,
he's sort of lost some hair.
You've never seen an elf
with a comb over before.
He's got a little bit of a paunch.
He's got a little, sort of
short sleeved button up shirt,
he's working at a different job now,
'cause he quit his old one, and he's got
what look like beans or
something on his shirt.
(players laughing)
He steps outta the car
and knocks on the door, tock tock tock.
- You go answer it, Gilear,
have you been eating
out of cans again?
- What?
My daughter, yes, ehm, I
have been eating legumes
as it were for I have found
that in my new living situation
over at Strongtower Luxury Apartments--
- Wow, you really emphasized luxury.
- They're not the worst in the world.
They're all right, but I've found
that it's, you know, yeah,
I've been eating beans.
Eating beans.
- Okay.
I, so I'm guessing you were sent here
to try and get me to go to school, right?
- Well, I'm gonna give you a ride.
- Okay, let me just go use the bathroom
and then I'll come.
- Okay, that sounds good.
- I go into the bathroom
and cast Disguise Self
to make myself look like my mom.
And then I come back out.
- You walk back out,
and you see he goes,
"Sandralynn, what the hell?
"I thought you needed to go to work?"
- I know, I've changed,
I've changed my mind.
I don't think she should go to school.
She made some really compelling arguments
about how bards, how bards
need real life experience
so thank you so much, and also, thank you
for keeping it a secret
who her real dad is.
- Well, all right.
- But between you and me,
we can say the name out loud.
- You see he says, "Well, he's actually,
"if you wanna go talk to him
about the paternity test,
"he's free today."
- Yeah, yes, I do.
Can we do it in the next hour?
- Sure, that's fine.
- Okay, yes.
- Yeah, that's no problem.
- Thank you.
Thank you so much, she's upstairs
so we can just go, no need
to say goodbye to her.
- Really, no need to say goodbye to her?
- No, I think she's working on a song.
- Okay, that's all right,
I'll talk to her later.
You see he goes and gets in
the drivers seat of the car.
- Okay, I'm coming.
- You sit, what's the duration
on your Disguise Self spell?
- One hour. (laughs)
(Brennan clapping)
(Emily laughs)
- Foolproof.
- Foolproof, foolproof.
- Foolproof.
(players laughing)
- [Brennan] Cool, everyone
else goes to school.
(all laughing)
The sun rises in the sky over
the beautiful dappled lawns,
stone brick walls, ivy
covered trellises and statues
of the Aguefort Adventuring Academy.
All of you arrive by bus, by
car, however you get here.
Out in the front of the building
you see a bunch of students,
people that recognize
each other are clapping
and loud teenagers,
and everyone's kind of gathering.
You're a few minutes early.
You see that your father
pulls up to the front
of the school.
- Oh no oh oh oh!
- You got tricked.
- You see he goes,
"All right, Sandralynn, here you are.
"Your former lover's in there.
"Oh, you think I'm a fool?"
- Oh!
- I raised you.
And don't call me Gilear, all right?
I know that I said--
- What, what else am I
supposed to call you?
Stranger, stranger with
no biological link to me?
I'm willing to make, that's
a lot to say every time
I address you.
(Ally chortles)
- You see a little tear forms in his eye
and you see he says, "I know
that I said some hurtful things
"when I first found out."
- Yeah,
you said, "You're no longer a Faeth,"
and guess what, I'm not, I'm just Fig now.
- Fig, I'm sitting here
with beans on my shirt.
- I know, I saw you ate
one on the ride here.
(all laughing)
- I was hungry, all right?
I've put on some weight.
You ever heard of a fat elf?
You ever heard of it?
I've never seen a fat elf
in my life and I'm here
with a bad comb over
and beans on my shirt.
- Okay fine.
- And I'm reaching out to you.
- I'm sorry, Gilear, I'm
sorry that I got angry at you.
You're just some random man,
I shouldn't be mean to you.
- Oh ho ho ho ho!
- All right,
get outta my fucking car, you demon!
(Emily gasps)
I didn't mean it like,
it's not, no no, 'cause you're
making it a Tiefling thing.
- You know what, I am a demon!
And then I put some horn wax
to really make 'em shine.
(Brennan laughs)
And I'm not ashamed of it.
I just hope I don't also get a tail.
The horns are enough, okay, bye.
- You guys all arrive at
the foot of the school.
What are you guys all doing here together?
- I look around for the
biggest and the strongest man
or student in the, kind
of, the entry area.
- You look around, you see Zac, Gorgug.
He's the tallest person here.
- I'm holding a metal flower.
I was looking for a friend.
- I walk straight up to Gorgug.
I say, hey, how you doin' buddy?
- I'm, I'm good, it's my first day.
I guess it's everyone's first day.
- Oh, oh, it's your first day.
- Do you want this metal flower?
- I swing at you, it's fucking hard.
(all laughing)
I don't fucking care.
(all laughing)
- I see this
just as I'm walking into
the, there where I am.
I'm like, oh my, this
is what this school is?
- Go ahead and roll an attack roll.
- Great.
(dice clatters)
15.
- What's your AC?
- My AC's 13.
- You slug him.
What's your strength modifier?
- It's two.
- You take three points of damage.
- [Lou] And then I turn and I say,
I'm Fabian Seacaster,
son of Bill Seacaster
and I'm here to be great.
(Zac groans)
- Oh!
- I'm trying to sing that song.
(players laughing)
♪ When you're mad ♪
- I run up.
♪ If you're mad. ♪
- Hey, are you okay?
What happened?
- That guy punched me.
- That sucks, you seem really non-violent
and I think that's really cool.
Violence is never the answer.
- I go into a rage.
(all laughing)
- Awesome, what do you--
- I go into a rage
and I attack, I go to punch.
- [Brennan] Go for it,
roll an attack roll.
- Oh.
- 19?
- What's your AC?
- 16.
- [Brennan] And you're in a rage, right?
- Yes.
- So that's gonna deal
three plus two plus one
is six points of damage.
You fucking, Gorgug whips
up and fucking clocks you.
- Wait, no, violence isn't the answer.
- I--
- Is this creating
like, a commotion?
- Oh yeah.
There's a bunch of, you guys see--
- Are there people, are
the teachers all around?
- Oh, you see there's this one kid
who looks like a gnome with that long,
kinda like stoner hair, who's like
"Oh, fuck, fight, fight,
fight, fight, fight!"
(all laughing)
- [Brennan] Fight, fight, fight!
- I'm gonna sneak into
the teacher's lounge
while there's a commotion and
steal from the refrigerator.
(all laughing)
- You sneak in.
You guys see that wading
through the crowd of students
is this hulking dragonborn, right?
For those who don't
know who dragonborn is,
humanoid dragons with long tail,
no wings, these big claws,
wearing a full suit,
like a gray suit and a blue tie,
big horns sweeping off of this,
he's red scaled,
anthropomorphic dragon guy.
You see he's holding just
a straight up cricket bat
in his hands, and he walks up and goes
"All right, all right that's enough!
"And on day one, the bell
hasn't even rung yet."
Effortlessly hoists you
two up off the ground,
sheathing his cricket
bat before he does so,
and goes, "Now look here, what
are, what are you, freshmen?
"How, why did this even start?"
- Well--
- I don't know!
He hit me.
- Well, I had to let
this one know that I wasn't
going to take any of his shit.
- It looks like he's holding a flower.
- Hey, the greatest attackers
sometimes put up a facade,
that they might sneak their way.
I don't need to explain myself
to you, I'm Fabian Seacaster.
- You 100% need to explain yourself to me.
I am Vice Principal Goldenhoard.
- I'm sorry I got mad at you.
You can still have the flower if you want.
- Don't, kid, don't give him the flower.
(all laughing)
- Well I'm done praying.
(Brian laughing)
- He has absolutely not
earned any congeniality
from you at all.
- I hit him too,
so we're even.
- All right.
That's immediate
detention for both of you.
First day, after school.
- Fine.
- All right, you see he gives
you each a little red slip
then says, "Good grief, is there any
"other nonsense happening here?
"Good, behave yourselves.
"I'll see you at detention after school.
- I'm so sorry.
- Right, you go to sneak in.
And give me a stealth check?
- Oh, I don't know if that's
really a skill I have.
(players laughing)
Ooh, okay.
(die clatters)
I got a nat one.
(all laughing)
- You're just instantly in such trouble.
(all laughing)
- You walk into
the teacher's lounge,
you are in there for,
what do you steal as you go in there?
You just see those little, like--
- I'm just going through the fridge,
seeing what kind of food there is.
Elf food, elf food--
- You see that there is
a, you see that there is a
little Tupperware container
with a transparent steak in it.
You can just like, partially see through,
or ethereal, and you see it says
"Ghost steak, please do not eat.
"For a ghost professor."
- Um yeah, I'm gonna eat that.
I take the ghost steak and
I just start eating it.
- You have a very fuckin'
hard time grabbing it.
- Fuck, fuck.
- You see the door opens.
And this Vice Principal guy walks in
and goes, "Okay, immediate detention.
"We are three for three, and it's,
"I mean, I'm about to
ring the first bell."
- The crazy thing is, you're
just playing into my hand.
Welcome to my game, and
you just did exactly
what I wanted you to do.
- I, I, I, I don't know
you, right, it is baffling.
- I know, that's why I was
able to two-step around you.
- Describe your two step to me.
How do you bamboozle me in this moment?
Walk me through how you've bamboozled me.
- All right, my plan all
along was to get caught
so I would get kicked out, and you
are just scooting me along.
I put my combat boots up on the table.
What's the deal with that steak?
I can't pick it up.
(all laughing)
- Right, it's for ghosts,
that's ghost food.
Now, I'm gonna be very honest with you.
I don't think you fully
know what detention means.
You're not suspended.
- Do you recognize me?
- See, he looks at you and says, "Uh, no?"
- 'Cause last year I
was on the cheer squad.
I was one of the girls
that they used to throw up
into the sky 'cause I was
so teeny tiny and cute.
- I shouldn't be having a
conversation with you alone
in the teacher's lounge,
get the fuck outta here!
Get outta here, get out of here!
- Okay, I'll leave.
- Go, all right, good good.
- Bye, what's your name again?
- I'm Vice Principal Goldenhoard.
- Okay, he's kinda cute.
- Don't!
Don't say that, shh, don't say that.
Get out, he shoos you.
- Well, maybe that's part of my plan too.
- Shuts the door.
(door slams)
The rest of you guys walk through
and you hear the PA kinda
starts as the kids start,
the first bell rings,
(bell rings)
kids start running off to class.
You guys hear a little voice saying,
"Students, one and all, welcome
to another exciting year
"at the Aguefort Adventuring Academy.
"I am Vice Principal Goldenhoard,
"here with some announcements
on your first day.
"Everyone should have received
your locker assignments
"in the mail, make sure to
go and put your things away
"for your first busy class day.
"Bells are five minutes between classes,
"and hall passes are in
Sorcehood, so no funny business.
"I've been told that lunch lady Doreen
"has made fine creamed
corn and tuna surprise.
"Surprising indeed, what
mysteries await in that dish."
(Emily laughs)
"Also, during your time here,
"any matters of curriculum can
be brought to the principal,
"Mr. Arthur Aguefort,
matters of discipline
"will be brought to me,
your Vice Principal,
"and Ole Hawthorne, my paddle
friend and cleaver of heinies,
"don't worry, we use
corporal punishment aplenty
"here at Aguefort, ha ha ha ha.
"Welcome, welcome, new class of heroes!"
(feedback shrieks)
(bell rings)
Ring, everyone files to the classrooms.
- Whoo!
(clapping)
- Oh, Riz is clapping, he decides clapping
is gonna make him seem cool,
he's excited, right, no?
Okay.
- I'm clapping
a little bit too, 'cause
then I picked up on.
- Just working so hard to
suppress a panic attacck
and hide the stupid fucking
orb that I'm carrying.
(all laughing)
- As you go to walking up the steps,
those of you who are from,
sort of like the kerfuffle
that happened out here, you guys see
that there are two seniors, one of them
is a blonde haired giant
looking senior jock kid
whose wearing his letter jacket,
and the other one is a beautiful half elf.
They're both seniors, and you see
that they're handing out little fliers
that have ballots attached to them,
and you see that the young woman,
who's sort of half elf, again,
has got sort of the long,
sort of brunette hair,
a little flower tied into it, is going,
"Hi, we're voting today to
reinstate prom king and queen,
"Hi, we're voting today,
we're having a vote today.
"Hi, can I interest you in a flier?"
- Yes, actually, hi, Riz Gukgak.
Nice to meet you.
- Oh, a handshake.
- Hi, yes--
- That's fun.
- I actually have some literature for you.
So I am, kinda open my briefcase,
I am kind of in the business
of fun making right now.
This has my phone number on it
if you, platonic hangout.
- Sure.
- Yeah.
- Yeah, for sure.
- Kinda interested
in getting in with the seniors
and the jocks and whatnot.
- You see that this big
jock paladin looking kid
comes over and goes,
"Hey babe, what's up?"
- Hi, Riz Gukgak, so great to meet you.
How are you?
- Good.
- Would you like a card as well?
- Wazzup?
- I open my briefcase
and I give him a card, that
has my phone number on it.
- Oh, okay, do I throw this out right now?
- No, we can start a group text, perhaps?
We can send each other funny memes.
- Sure, okay, you see he puts it away.
You see that the girl says, "Oh my god.
"You are so friggin
cute, what is your name?"
- It's Riz, Riz Gukgak.
- I'm not gonna remember that
but you are fucking amazing.
- Thank you.
- I'm Penelope Everpetal.
- Hi.
- And I kinda run a lot of the clubs,
and yearbook and stuff
here, so if you need
any help, like, learning of ropes
or learning about the school and all,
- Yeah.
- I'm like happy to do that,
and this is my boyfriend Dayne Blayde,
who's the captain of the bloodrush team.
- Dayne Blayde.
(all laughing)
- Dayne, you are freaking cool, man.
- Wazzup.
- You seem cool as hell.
- Fuck, what's that?
- Yeah, dude, yeah.
- Oh, sure dude, hell yeah.
- Yeah.
- Do you, do you play bloodrush?
- Mmm-hmm, go Owlbears,
right, that's the team!
- You see a huge beefy looking half orc,
either a junior or a
senior in a letter jacket
comes over and slaps Dayne
on the back and says,
"Yeah, he fuckin' plays bloodrush,
"he's the ball, dude, he's
the fuckin' ball, dude,
"he's the fuckin' ball, dude!"
- I'm actually not the ball.
- You're the ball, that's
your fuckin' name now.
You're the ball.
- Well,
it's actually Riz Gukgak, if
you'd like some literature,
and I open my briefcase and hand--
- He, make an opposed athletics
check, if you'd be so kind?
(Brian laughs)
- It's a minus two.
A four!
(all laughing)
- You see that this half orc grabs you
and then stuffs you, as a
ball, and just dunks you
into a trashcan.
(trashcan clatters)
Boom, that's what's up, dude.
You're the ball now, everybody,
this kid's name is Ball.
If I hear you call this
kid anything but Ball,
it's your fuckin' ass!
- I suppose I'm technically
the ball this time,
but not always!
(all laughing)
- You see, Penelope goes
"Dayne, get him to stop."
And you see him go, "Huh, oh sure.
"Hey, Ragh, dude, it's chill."
And you see Ragh goes, "Grr, yeah, okay.
"Sorry dude, just, like,
I see people fuck with you
"and it makes me wanna
go fuckin' nuts, dude.
"I just fuckin' can't take it, man.
"Fuckin' love this team, go Owlbears!"
You see that they walk away.
You see that Penelope looks over at Adaine
as you sorta walk up the steps.
You see she goes, "I
frickin' love your orb.
"That thing is huge."
- Thanks.
My dad gave it to me, I
don't want, do you want it?
Do I want it?
- I don't--
- No, I'm good, but thank you.
(all laughing)
You can keep your orb.
Listen, I don't know if
you have enough space
to carry this with that
giant orb you're carrying,
but this is, it's a little ballot,
we're basically having a
vote, because for a long,
it's like never, Aguefort
hasn't had a king and queen
at prom, and me and my boyfriend Dayne
are trying to run part
of the yearbook club,
and we're basically
trying to get that back,
bring that tradition back.
- What does that mean?
What does being prom king and queen mean?
- Well, there's a vote, right, that has
if enough students say they want it,
we'll do a like a vote and people can vote
for prom king and queen, and they'll like
have a special dance
and it'll be really fun.
- They just get a special
dance, that's what that means?
Is that, yeah, okay, I'll vote.
Yeah, I don't really understand.
- If you vote for it, and
just like, as an aside,
it's gonna be a lot easier
for you here at Aguefort,
'cause I can tell you're a freshman.
It's gonna be a lot easier
if you ask less questions,
'cause like, probably
like, it'll become clear
the more time you spend.
- That's actually fewer questions.
- Sorry?
- No, okay, I'll sign it.
Dayne looks at the other guy and says,
"Babe, it's fewer questions,
"less questions is wrong, grammatically."
You see she's like, "Fine, Dayne,"
she says, "Okay, so why don't
you just take the ballot--"
- Yeah, I'll take it,
I'll take it, thank you.
- And you can vote--
- Yeah, I'll vote.
Where do I, where do I, where do I vote?
- There's little boxes out
in front of the assembly
which we're going to now.
- Oh great.
- Welcome.
- Thank you.
- Cute outfit, it's like you go
to a different school than here. (lalughs)
Fun, and if you need
help stashing that orb.
(Siobhan pants)
You just walk along,
you see that at that main
hall, this guy comes over
and he's this big human
wearing sweatpants,
got a little baseball cap
and a whistle around his neck
and a giant glowing spear with holy light.
You see that he claps
Dayne and Ragh on the back.
You see that, he, Ragh is
looking at you in the trashcan
and the guy goes like,
"Ah, there are my boys,
"there are my bruisers, there's
Ragh and Dayne, heck yeah!"
You see he looks around
at the two players,
and he looks over at you,
and you recognize him
from church, from the Cathedral of Sol.
And you see he goes, "Ah,
that's great, Kristen!
"What are you doing here?"
- Oh, I go here now, it's my first day.
Good to see you.
- Ah, it's great to have you,
kiddo, that's great, I love that.
I'm gonna need you to make
an opposed athletics check.
- Great. (chuckles)
(die clatters)
Uhhhh, what is, where's athletics?
Oh, two, seven.
(Brennan guffaws)
- We're all just getting our asses kicked.
- Yeah, yeah.
- You see that you are shoved
to the ground and your
backpack goes everywhere
and your Bible sort of
spills out of your hand
and you see that there is a tall,
looks like an elf, but
his skin is deathly pale,
he has black hair hanging,
and he's got a mesh shirt with a belt,
kind of diagonal across it,
and sort of bondage pants,
like, used for that
kind of Hot Topic look,
and you see he's got
a rat on his shoulder.
And he's got spiderweb designs
on some fingerless gloves.
And you see he goes, "What's up, cleric?
"How's it goin'?
- Did you do that on purpose?
- I don't know, did God
curse us to live on purpose?
- Ooh, let's see, let's start
from the beginning, okay?
Any curse you may feel
is probably human made,
because we were all made
just a little bit off.
- Oh, I know I was made off,
my heart is fuckin' broken.
- Okay, look.
- You see that the coach
helps you up and hands your Bible to you
and goes like, "Hey, Zayn, do
me a favor, pal and beat it,
"huh, why don't you beat it?"
You see that Zayn says, "I don't know,
"why don't we all just beat it?"
(bats fluttering)
He turns into bats.
- I'll pray for you, Zayn.
(Emily laughing)
- You see that the coach shakes his head
and he goes, "That kid is a piece of work.
"He got kicked out of
the theater department
"and he's taking it hard."
- Who gets kicked out of
the theater department?
That's where you go when you're
kicked out of anywhere else.
- Yeah, exactly, he's having a hard time.
But hey, it's really
good to have you here.
You know, if you ever need anything,
come talk to me, man, I am happy
to help you out, all right?
- Yeah, thanks, it's good to see you.
- Good to see you too, and wait,
you can't say it too loud,
'cause there's a bunch
of people of all kinds here,
but praise be to Helio, huh?
Go corn god!
- Yes, yeah.
Praise be to Helio.
- You guys all leave
this place and end up
in the assembly hall.
It's a big auditorium, you
guys are all there together.
Riz, I assume you get
out and covered in trash.
(all laughing)
- I couldn't get it all off.
- You guys gather, and
you see a man step out
in a purple corduroy suit,
and he's got an umbrella.
Very dark dark skin, and a monocle,
and this long white beard
that goes past his waist.
He's got a little watch fob and a monocle
on a little chain, and
you see that he steps out
to the podium, you see he produces,
as if from air, a little
saucer with a teacup on it
and steps to the podium, being introduced,
of course, first by, from off stage,
"Ladies and gentlemen, your principal,
"Mr. Arthur Aguefort!"
(clapping)
You see that the, sort
of this old wizardly man
steps out and says, "Welcome, one and all
"to another exciting year here
"at the Aguefort Adventuring Academy,
"where we train the next
generation of adventurers.
"And what is an adventurer?
"One who goes on adventures.
"I say that an adventurer is
a hero, and what is a hero?
(inspiring music)
"A hero is someone with
the strength of heart,
"courage of spirit, and the might of will
"to go to strange lands and
enact violence on things there.
"We go to places where there are things
"that must be destroyed,
and we destroy them.
"Wandering from town to
town, getting into trouble,
"meeting in drophouses and taverns
"and getting into scrapes with the law
"and otherwise finding ourselves
"engaged in all matters of
tomfoolery and shenanigans,
"sometimes violent, sometimes fatal.
"Yes, fatal, and a hero
is a violent wanderer
"who enacts their will bodily
"and with strange magicks upon the world.
"But does a hero truly stand alone?
"Ha ha ha, no, the strength of the hero
"is the strength of the
party, and what is a party?
"A gathering of friends, perhaps
"with some alcoholic beverages,
"some fun music, ha ha ha, a jape!
"For all of you, a party is a group
"that comes together to
embellish each other's strengths
"and eradicate each other's weaknesses.
"A party is composed of those
who have sworn themselves
"to each other, to make themselves greater
"than the sum of their parts.
"Perhaps we have flaws within us,
"perhaps we don't cast magic and we need
"someone who can cast magic
to help us when we need magic.
"Perhaps we're very
tough and we can sustain
"a lot of injuries, but we need somebody
"who is very good at hurting
people there with us as well.
"Perhaps we need a sneaky person to sneak,
"not always, sometimes
you don't need that,
"but occasionally, in circumstances
where you do need one,
"you really need one, right, with traps
"and other things like that.
"That is the meaning of party,
and party is the meaning
"of hero, and never forget, all of you,
"ugh, it's bad, never forget
that the greatest magic
"of all is chronomancy, the magic of time.
"Welcome to your first year, freshmen,
"at the Aguefort Adventuring Academy!"
(vocalizes)
He turns into light,
(magic tinkles)
and disappears.
(clapping)
- My hand
was on the fire drill the whole time,
to pull it, but I was so moved by that
that I actually took it off.
(all laughing)
- I was looking for a
pencil that whole time.
(all laughing)
- Really cool.
- After that, a bunch of
different classes open up.
You see that Goldenhoard sort of says,
"We have some orientation events today
"for those that are interested
"in matters of the arcane,
we'll have an arcane orientation
"happening in room 212,
we'll also have a number of
"tryouts and battle orientations
and things of that nature.
"Please file out, obviously
we don't want to corral you
"into a class without your own choosing,
"so be wise and find the best fit for you.
"Very well, enjoy, students."
You see that students
begin to sort of file off,
the freshmen, at least, sort of filing off
towards the different
orientations and things like that.
- I wanna find lunch lady Doreen.
- Cool, yeah, you can go
find lunch lady Doreen,
you go over to the lunch and
you see the lady Doreen there,
if you're looking on that
with a little cigarette
hangin' out of her lip,
she looks over at you
and as you walk into the cafeteria
and goes, "Oh, lunch is not
served for awhile, sweetheart."
- No, I came to talk to
you, because I feel like
you have the only honest profession here
and, also, you're allowed to smoke at work
which I think is really cool.
- I'm not allowed to smoke at work.
- Oh, well, but you do it anyways,
which shows that you have a
spirit that I really admire.
So I was wondering, maybe I
should just be taking classes
with you.
- You wanna be a lunch lady?
- Maybe.
- Okay.
- I just respect what you're doing.
Everyone else is trying to
do all these lofty things,
and you're just being you.
You're just so true
compared to everyone else.
- Okay.
- So real.
- Okay, you wanna do
while, you wanna work?
- Mmmm.
(all laughing)
- You see she tosses a
crowbar to you and says--
- I don't, I just let it drop.
(glass breaking)
(all laughing)
- There's an industrial,
we gotta buncha drums of
creamed corn off the back
of a truck--
- Drums?
- Yeah, for like a drum?
- Yeah, okay cool, yeah.
I'll go work with that.
- Yeah, yes,
it must have fallen or something,
'cause the corn was all dinged up
so I had a fucking hard
time opening that thing,
but you're welcome to go try.
- Wait, so that you're havin' a hard time
opening the drum, there's
a big old drum right?
There's a bunch of drums?
- She points to a bunch
of metallic oil drums
in the back, like big metal canisters.
- Cool yeah, I just go there
and start playing the drums.
- She looks over and she goes,
"What the fuck are you doin'?"
What the fuck are you doin'?
- Music isn't, music isn't
confined to the stage
at the Black Pit, you know, it's anywhere.
(vocalizes drum fanfare)
- Make a performance check.
- Whoo, yeah!
Oh come on, hook me up, 17.
- It gets really stop in here,
(Brennan beatboxes)
and you see that she
goes like, "Okay, okay,
"that is a little funky,
that's good, I like it.
"You know, I wasn't always a lunch lady,
"I used to get around when I was young."
- Whoo!
- "Ah, they'll talk about it
"sometime, listen, you
got a gift for that.
"You're really talented."
- Thank you, I know
that I'm not gonna learn
any of that here, I'll learn stupid stuff.
Well, actually, I kinda liked everything
the guy was saying.
- You see she says,
"You know, you might be right,
"there might not be much
for you to learn here,
"but you know what,
it's not gonna hurt you
"to go see what the bullshit
is they're sellin', right?
"Why not go check in on the enemy,
"see what all the skwales
are talking about."
- Oh, shit, there's so
many good role models here.
I'm gonna take you up on that.
- Hey, you're a real sweet
kid, come back anytime.
- I will, I bet I'll come back once a day.
- All right, oh, because
you eat lunch in this room.
- Yeah.
- Yeah, that makes sense.
- Yeah.
- Okay, you have a good one,
sweetie.
- Okay, bye Doreen.
- You can call me Doreen.
- Okay, bye Doreen.
- Adaine, you are
walking past the library,
as you are walking past it,
roll a perception check.
(die clatters)
- 12?
- You notice very old,
sort of a very old woman
human librarian, who
has a little velvet rope
and closes it over a
little restricted section,
and you see that there is a book
lying on a little table
right near the entrance
of the restricted section.
- Oh.
Is it light enough that
I can use Mage Hand?
- You need an investigation check
to try to clock the weight of the object
at this distance.
(die clatters)
- 16?
- Yeah, for sure.
- Great, I cast Mage Hand
as her back is turned
and I take the book.
(magic zapping)
- The book zips from the
restricted section of the library.
The book that now rests in your hand
is titled Wards and Watches,
and it's an abjuration book,
it's a very very powerful abjuration book.
- Great, I very quickly
put it in my backpack,
and then I panic, 'cause I'm like,
why am I doing this,
nobody can see me do this.
My stupid sister just told me to do this
and I don't know why I'm doing it,
and now I have a book that
I've definitely stolen
and I can't tell them that I've stolen it.
- Please make a panic
attack check, like a--
(die clatters)
- Five.
- You go into a full blown panic attack.
- Shit, oh god, oh my god.
- I come up.
- You wound up in the hallway.
Yeah.
- Hey are you okay?
- No. (exhales)
- I saw what you did
and I thought it was pretty awesome.
- Oh god, no, the goth
kid thinks I'm cool.
- That was so cool.
- Oh, I like your giant orb.
Here, let me make it glow.
I cast Light on her giant orb.
- You are now glowing in the
middle of a crowd of children.
Vice Principal Goldenhoard
walks up and goes,
"Very nice use of the Light cantrip.
"What is your name, young student?"
- Oh, I'm Kristen Applebees.
- Kristen Applebees,
wonderful to meet you.
I'm Vice Principal Goldenhoard.
- [Ally] Oh, hi.
- Young lady, are you all right?
- I found this book.
- You found--
(Ally laughs)
- Make a bluff check for me,
with disadvantage.
- What's dis, what what?
- You roll two d20 and
take the worse result.
- Okay, great.
(dice clatter)
- Oh my god, a 20 and a two.
(all shouting)
- That's just a two.
- Just a two (says word
in foreign language).
- You see that Vice Principal says,
"Sorry, you found a book?"
- She's covering for me, I stole it
and she caught me stealing it.
- No, I didn't, I
didn't, she didn't steal,
I stole it, I'm so sorry, I was, I was,
I'm sorry I'm new, I
don't know what I'm doing.
- We all fall short of the grace of God.
- Mm, you know I wouldn't,
that's a bit strong
for this, I would say,
that's a bit strong.
This is not appropriate,
that you've done this.
Kristen, would you mind taking the book
to Principal Aguefort's office for me?
- Yeah, sure.
- Go ahead, take the book.
You see that he looks at you and says,
"Now, young lady, what was your name?"
- Adaine Abernant.
- Miss Abernant.
Oh yes, you come to us from Hudol.
I'm afraid I'm going to
have to give you detention.
So you'll be staying
late after school today.
Do you understand?
All right, this is not fun for me.
You're clearly having a bad time.
(Ally giggles)
I'm second guessing
what I'm doing, even as I'm doing it,
wondering if there's some
medical stuff going on
that I don't know about,
but I'm going to do it,
as I've already talked out loud
and other students can hear this.
- Yeah, I can hear it all, hi.
- Hey, for real, we're not gonna do this.
You think we have a thing,
but that's where you're wrong.
We don't have a thing.
You have a thing.
- Who's running detention?
- Good grief, all right,
you are going to detention,
here's your slip, hands you the slip.
- Bloodrush trials?
- Bloodrush trials, yes!
Let's do it, we are
all on the field, baby.
Everyone's out there,
Dayne Blayde is out there,
Ragh Barkrock is out there, and you see
that Coach Daybreak is out there as well.
You see that, what you do
is you approach the pitch.
- Well, uh, hello comrades!
- Gru looks at you
wearing the letter jacket.
(all laughing)
- Dayne, good to see you,
saw you and your friend
deal with that little goblin earlier.
Oh hohoho, good stuff.
That was miraculous,
you just crushed him up,
ball, that's, I like that.
I'll call him Ball when I see him.
- Oh, okay, what's your, Dayne speaks up
and says, "Okay, I'm super confused,
" 'cause you're talking to
me like you're important,
"but I don't know you."
- Oh, heh heh.
It's my first day, you probably,
I'm Fabian Seacaster,
Bill Seacaster's son,
the great adventurer, Bill Seacaster?
I'm his son Fabian, and I'm going to be
on the bloodrush team, so it's exciting
to meet you and get to know you and--
- Make an insight check for me.
(die clatters)
See, 15.
- You notice that these players
look to Coach Daybreak,
that, whose jaw is set
as you mention your
father, and you see that
Dayne looks up at you, looks at the coach
and sort of, all of these
boys are looking off
their coach's expression, basically.
You see that Dayne turns to you and says,
"Oh, that's right, yeah, your dad's
"the richest guy in town, right?"
- Yes, that's him.
- Yeah, pirate.
- Yes, what, I'm sorry,
I'm sorry, I'm sorry.
Privateer, my father's a privateer.
- You see Ragh says, "I don't
know what that word means."
- It means where you would, in conjunction
with different enterprises and things,
he wasn't just running around
just raping and pillaging
like pirates do, that's not my father.
My father worked, he was charged
with tasks and adventures, ah.
- For real, dude, I've
never heard somebody
that plays bloodrush talk like you.
You're using all kinda
words that are just like,
sphew, shwee, sphh.
- Well, I mean, yeah, I'm one of a kind.
- You see Ragh says, "Yeah,
I bet you are one of a kind.
"One of a kind of a bad person."
- Ah, what a witty barb.
That's good stuff.
- You see that Coach Daybreak
leans in, says, "All right, guys,
"we're gonna have some tryouts now.
"Let's everyone lay off of Fabian here.
"Fabian's father made his money outside
"of the nation of Solace.
"Part of the laws of Solace
is that the things you did
"in the outside world can be forgiven
"under the national amnesty
if you swear on the charter,
"right, we got people
that live in the forests
"of the Nightmare King
or in the Red Waste.
"They wanna come here and make
a better life for themself.
"The council forgives
that, they allow people
"not have to live down there past,
"even if they did all kinds of things,
"that they're still benefiting from."
- Yeah, well, it doesn't
matter anymore, right?
- That's right, kid.
Well, let's get this tryout started, huh?
- Yes, let's get this tryout started.
- You see he says, "Well,
why don't we start you out
"with some running drills, huh?"
- Fantastic.
- Go ahead
and give me some athletics checks.
- Great.
(die clatters)
- Oh, and a nat 20.
- Oh, you run the fucking
field on these guys.
You're 16 and you are
fully flatlining seniors.
You take Ragh Barkrock,
who's the huge half orc,
second in command guy, fling
down to the ground, no sweat.
He looked up at you and says,
"This guy fuckin' cheated, dude,
"fuckin' cheated, man."
- Oh, Ragh, another one of
those witty barbs of yours.
I did not cheat.
(Brennan snarls)
(Brennan roars)
- You see that he goes
into a full rage and
Dayne says, "Just do it!"
And jumps on him and his
friends all restrain him.
Coach Daybreak comes over and he says,
"All right, well there, fancy boy,
"you got some moves on
you, I'll give you that."
- Fancy boy, that's a fun nickname.
Is that gonna be my nickname, like Ball?
I'm Fancy Boy?
I like it.
- Well you gotta,
you got real chops, let's
see how you do throwin'.
You see Dayne looks up and goes, "What?"
You see he says, "Yeah, let's
see how he does throwin',
"I wanna see it."
The coach sets up a play with people
running around you, so
there's a scrimmage,
there's the other side
of the bloodrush field,
big stone, you're not on
grass, it's a weird stone.
This is actually it, right there.
The coach sets up a scrimmage
where you're gonna make,
the idea is for you to pass
to somebody, basically,
you're sort of
quarterbacking, effectively.
As you get started, go ahead and make me
a perception check, real quick.
(players groaning)
- I fucking failed it.
- You're havin' a day.
- That's so funny, 20 to one.
- 20 to one, okay, now
go ahead and make me
an athletics check.
- Oh great.
That's what I prefer, 22.
- Fuck yeah, he gets you the ball
and he's like, "We
wanna see how you pass."
You, roll a little opposed check, mmkay.
He sets you up, you survey the field,
and you see a bunch of people
that you could pass to,
but all the people that you could pass to
are kind of like losers
that you just fucking
either clotheslined or rope
a doped or moved around.
- Of course.
- As the lines charge
each other, you see a little opening
that you could break through.
- Oh, I'll take it.
(all laughing)
- You charge forward,
your team looks like,
what the fuck is going on?
You effortlessly dodge and weave
through all of the other athletes
and fucking get to, what do you do
when you get to the end zone?
- I place the ball down gently.
Say good game, I liked that,
those plays went real nice, Dayne?
Dayne, good stuff, my man.
- Ball, you didn't throw the ball, dude.
- Well, it worked out best,
I thought, for the play.
- Yeah, you know what?
You didn't throw the ball
because you have bad thoughts
about what to do.
- Ragh, this is funny.
Does he, do we all, does
Ragh roast us often?
This is funny.
- Coach Daybreak looks at you
and says, "You can hit the showers, bud."
- Oh great, great, does anybody,
I'll see all you boys on the hill.
- Nobody else starts to
leave and you notice it.
- I'll meet you all there.
- He says, "You're not on the team."
- I'm sorry, what?
I'm sorry, what?
- You're not on the team.
(Lou stammers)
- I ran faster and I, my father paid you.
My father paid you money.
- What the hell did you just say?
See all the other students look around
and he says, "Buddy, you got a big mouth
"and no heart, you will
never be an Owlbear."
You see that he goes,
he takes a red slip out,
"That's detention, pal."
- You know what, you
know what, that's fine.
'Cause clearly, clearly
I'm better than all of you
and bloodrush, right, you know what?
I don't need this, I
don't need any of you,
and you know what, Ragh,
none of your jokes are funny.
I didn't like any of them.
- What the hell, that's not what you said!
And Ragh bursts into tears, and the other,
Dayne goes like, "That's fucked up dude.
"It's fucked up to tell a
guy all his jokes are bad."
You see that coach says, "Good luck.
"You got all the moves in the world,
"but it means nothing if you
don't play on a team, kid."
"You'll learn that the hard way."
- Oh, I'm sure I will.
- Fabian heads off.
We'll move over to Riz real quick.
Riz, you are walking
down the hallway towards
one of your other classes,
nobody's been able
to find the rogue teacher anywhere,
and then it, sort of, word
started to spread around
that that's the deal on the first day,
is you have to find the rogue teacher.
- All right, so I'm just,
can I do a roll to--
- Do an investigation check.
- Investigation check, okay.
Lookin' around the halls,
sniffin' around with my,
(die clatters)
ooh, that's not good.
What'd I get, 11.
11, you are out near
the front of the school
and you see that one of the students
is talking to, he looks like a
sort of lavender skinned elf,
very beautiful, and she's
speaking to this guy
who's like, got a black leather jacket
and a white t-shirt, and tight jeans,
who's next to a big motorcycle
and he's this Tiefling, big horns,
he looks like--
- Daddy?
- [Brennan] He looks
like, a little bit too old
to be a student, he's kinda got an arm
on her waist, and he's leaning
against his motorcycle.
They're out in the
front, near the driveway.
And you just see this, sort of, couple
and she's kind of talking to him,
and he's sort of like
greaser looking Tiefling guy.
A big old horns swept back,
and she's sort of giggling
and he's sort of smiling
and laughing at her,
and you see that Penelope Everpetal
who was sort of the popular girl
who was handing out fliers, walks up
and says, "Hi, Sam, can
I talk to you real quick?
"I don't mean to interrupt
you and your boyfriend
"who hangs out around the
school and doesn't go here."
What are you gonna do as you see this?
- I guess I'll try to
kind of hide and sneak up
and listen to their conversation.
(die clatters)
- Awesome.
- So that is a 23 for stealth.
- Awesome, 23?
- Yeah.
- Oh, fuck yeah, you see that,
as you get closer, you see
that it's actually not an elf,
that Sam, her hair is flowing slightly,
and she's a water genasi, right,
so she's like a water
elemental kinda thing.
You see she says, "Penelope,
I'm busy right now.
"Johnny is just stopping by real quick
"and I can talk to you after school."
And she goes, "Um, now,
Sam, would be good."
You see that the guy, the Tiefling,
sorta looks over and
he's looking at Penelope
with that face of a
weirdo adult hanging out
at a high school, just
like, you're not the person
I'm dating and I have no facial expression
as I'm watching you, just like.
You see that--
- I guess I'll try
and I'll sneak up behind him
and I'll tap on his back.
- His arms are engulfed with green flame
and he turns around and says,
"Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.
"Watch the jacket, kid."
- Sorry.
- "You have any idea
who you're talking to?"
- Johnny?
- Johnny Spells.
- Do you go here?
- You see
he puts on sunglasses,
"Hell no, I don't go here."
- No?
- No, that's my girlfriend.
You see that Sam waves and says,
"Hi, can I help you?"
- I'm friends with your friend
and I point to the cheerleader girl.
- See, Penelope says, "Oh my god,
"are you the ball from earlier?"
- Yeah, I do not know this,
but they call me Ball.
- Why do they call you Ball?
- 'Cause I ball, dude.
- I don't believe that.
- Ball.
- I don't believe you.
- I got shoved in a
garbage can, okay, man?
- Tough, I know what
it's like to get shit on.
- So you, where you from man?
I live at the Strongtower
Luxury Apartments,
just me and my mom.
- Where I'm from
is the same place I'm
goin', buddy, nowhere.
- Could I get a perception
check if this dude
actually rules or--
(all laughing)
'Cause right now, I think he rules.
(die clatters)
That is a, it's only a nine.
- This dude fuckin' rules.
(all laughing)
- Cool.
- You see Sam says,
"Johnny, I gotta go deal with Penelope.
"Are you okay if we meet up later?"
And he goes, "Yeah babe,
maybe, I don't know,
"I might be busy,"
(motorcycle engine revs)
"I'll see you around kid."
(motorcycle engine revs)
He fucking takes off on his motorcycle.
- Johnny Spells!
- You think Johnny Spells rules.
(all laughing)
- You see that Sam looks
over at you and goes like,
"He totally rules."
- He seems pretty cool.
- Johnny Spells.
- How did you meet Johnny?
- He hangs around the high school.
- Whooo.
(all laughing)
No, he seems awesome, how old is he?
- I don't know, I think
he's, he had a birthday
and I think he gave a
real ID and could drink,
so, I think 21, maybe?
- Right, cool.
Do you know, has he dated
anybody else at this school?
- You see that Penelope
says, "Sam, we're going,"
and make an insight check.
(die clatters)
- 18 plus, 22 total.
- Penelope didn't like that.
- Mmkay.
- She didn't like that
you said that at all.
She grabs Sam and runs into the school.
- Not so sure about Johnny Spells.
Cool, so I guess I will follow them in.
- Cool, you follow them
in and you see them
duck into the girl's changing room
and you hear Sam say,
"What, Penny's gone."
And you see she says,
"I fucking know, Sam,
"but now we need to talk
about what happens next."
And the door closes.
(door clicks)
- Are any of these guys around?
- Nope, not that you can see.
I guess I, oh boy.
Riz runs to try to find
a girl to help him.
- Make an investigation check.
- Cool.
(die clatters)
(Brian hums)
18.
- Cool,
make a persuasion check.
- Okay.
(die clatters)
21.
- Awesome, ah cool.
You see that there's this
extremely bejeweled dwarven girl,
she's got little sideburns that go down
to these little wispy
strands, jewelry everywhere.
She's hanging out with some
friends near the water fountain
as you approach her.
- Okay, so.
You've got a lot of jewels, and I can tell
that you like stuff, I will give you my,
I will give you my frickin' briefcase
if you'll go into that changing room
and tell me what those girls are saying.
I think one of them has a
crush on one of my friends.
- You see, she says, "Your briefcase?"
- Okay, well, what do you
want, what do you want?
- You see that she says, "I don't know,
"give me 20 gold pieces."
- Fuck it.
I know, what if I, I, is
there anything from the school
you want, I'll take something for you.
- She says, "Okay, yeah, steal me a teabag
"of that gross tea that Principal Aguefort
"is always drinking."
- Yeah, sure.
Okay, will you go in there now?
- Go give me the teabag.
- Fine, okay.
- I run off to go find a teabag.
- Cool, you go, you find
Principal Aguefort's office.
Go ahead and tell me
how you're getting in.
The door is locked.
- Mmmmm.
I guess I'll try to, try to unlock it?
- Cool.
- I guess,
what skill would that be,
like sleight of hand or?
- Yeah, make a perception
then make a sleight of hand.
- Okay.
- That actually
is a tool proficiency
that I think you have.
- Ah, okay.
(die clatters)
So I did bad on whatever that
was, perception was a four.
- Cool, four is bad.
- It's a door.
- And then roll again.
- Okay.
(die clatters)
(Brian snorts)
Oh boy, sleight of hand, seven.
- You mess with the door,
and the door actually opens.
(door clicks)
- Sweet, I look for this tea.
- You walk in and see Vice
Principal Goldenhoard.
Immediate detention!
(all laughing)
- All right, look at that, wild.
We are up to five on day
one, these just happened
during the day, that's good, all right.
I run and try to grab his tea.
- He looks at you, yeah.
Go ahead and make an
opposed athletics check.
You can do acrobatics.
- Okay, good.
(die clatters)
21!
- You grab it and bounce.
- I'm so sorry.
I'll go to detention later, I promise.
- You have to go to detention!
You see he's just barreling
down the hallway after you.
You run, find the dwarven girl.
She says, "Oh my god,
you actually got it?"
- Yeah, I got it.
- You're a fuckin' freak.
Riz Gukgak!
She goes, all right, I'll
go listen, fuckin' weirdo.
And she heads off, you see Goldenhoard,
you see there's sort of fire
coming out from his mouth.
(fireworks burst)
Makin' me run, that's
wild, that's a wild thing
for you to do.
(Ally laughs)
Oh, here we go, detention.
- Thank you, sir.
Well deserved.
- Cool, towards the end
of the day, when you're all
back in the assembly hall,
and Principal Aguefort
says, "Concluding this,
"our first day today, at the
Aguefort Adventuring Academy,
"we will now begin the wonderful process
"of the day of fellowship,
you all have the rest
"of the afternoon to meet with the friends
"you've made and form your
first adventuring parties.
"This, most critical afternoon
"will be you banding together
for the rest of your time
"here at Aguefort, I hope
you will find the people
"that you have the most in common with
"and that you feel the most excited about
"becoming heroes and solving
the problems of the world
"through violence and strange arcana."
You see that Vice Principal Goldenhoard
grabs the mic and says,
(feedback squeals)
"Except for those with detention,
"you will be expected in detention."
You see Coach Daybreak
comes over to you, Kristen.
"Hey, Kristen, I wanted
to talk to you real quick.
"A lot of the adventuring
parties are kinda forming
"this afternoon, do you have any idea
"about who you'd wanna maybe
"form an adventuring party with?"
- Anyone who isn't already religious.
- Sorry?
- I really like the church,
I really like the community
and stuff like that,
but I really wanted to come to this school
and meet people who are not non-believers,
just not believers yet, pre-believers.
- Okay, well, I was thinking about
maybe getting you with some other kids
that really love Helio
and kind of already--
- Agh, no.
- No?
- No, no, no, no, that's
just an echo chamber.
I mean we've all heard of that, right?
I wanna get out there, meet new people,
I wanna, that's the sound of chimes, baby,
bouncing off each other,
creating a beautiful noise.
- Kristen, you see these
five are being talked to
by Goldenhoard about how
there's gonna be lunch
and then after, the afternoon classes
there's gonna be--
- I wanna go
with the bad kids.
- What?
Kristen, you don't
belong with the bad kids.
You're a good kid, you
went to church camp.
- Yes, exactly, you know
how much yeast you need
to make an entire loaf rise?
Just a little pinch and I
can be that little pinch.
- I don't think you're yeast.
I feel like you have more--
- I think so.
I think so.
- Oh god, oh god.
- Please, please, give me detention,
the four who are going into detention,
just give me detention
and I can go in there.
- I can't give you detention, for what?
- The other day I went
to a party and I drank
what looked like a bottle
of vodka, but it was water.
I keep putting water in
alcohol things to fit in.
- You want me to give you
detention for not drinking?
- I want not just to give me detention,
I want you to yell right now
and make a really big scene
and make it seem like I
did something terrible.
- I, all right, everybody listen up.
Kristen Applebees, bore false witness.
- Take this, a cardinal sin.
- Yeah, well, you lied because
you weren't drinkin' vodka
and you should always, I can't say this.
- At least you coulda said I stole some,
you coulda gone way, coulda
been way easier than that.
- Well, you know what?
- Bore false witness!
- You bore false witness!
You see that Vice Principal
Goldenhoard looks over
and says, "Coach, that's
not, that's a religious rule,
"that's got almost nothing to do."
- Well, you heard the man,
sounds like I got detention.
- You see he hands the red
card to you, all right, kiddo.
- Where do I even go with this?
Hey guys.
- What did you do?
- I bore false witness.
- What is that?
- I wanna do that.
- It means she lied.
- Yeah, I--
- To who?
To anyone, you just talk about that?
- To, before a higher power.
Yeah, it's kind of compli,
what do you guys do?
- We punched each other.
- Oh yeah, I remember.
- I'm too good at sports.
(all laughing)
- I couldn't eat the steak
that was a ghost steak,
I couldn't pick it up.
- I stole a stupid book
because my stupid sister
told me it was a good idea.
- I tried to get you out of that.
- It was really cool how honest
you were about that, though.
- I stole some tea.
- Wow, a lot of thieves.
Comin' on just like Jesus.
(all laughing)
- Just like Helio.
- You guys get in line for lunch
and you start going
through the lunch counter,
and you see the lunch lady, Doreen,
starts puttin' creamed corn
and stuff on your guys' trays.
- I've never eaten a surprise before.
- Well, it's tuna
surprise, very surprising.
Okay, here's your tray, here you go.
(food splats)
You see this tuna surprise,
and you see that there are
just chunks of ham in the tuna.
- Ooh, it's sour somehow.
- Riz just gobbles it down.
- Excuse me, Miss, I can't eat this.
Do you have something,
what are the other options?
I'd like to eat another option.
- Another option?
- Yeah, is there,
I mean, I'm assuming there's a menu
that I can order from, or
something I can make a choice of,
assuming there's
something else, all right?
- There's no way that I
could, you want me to get you,
I could get you ketchup, like--
- Ketchup is not a meal.
- You picked, like to ketchup?
- For, as a meal, is ketchup
a thing in your culture?
- I don't know!
- All right, Jesus.
- I down my whole tray as well.
- I'm gonna need Kristen to make another,
sorry, an opposed acrobatics check,
so this is a dexterity roll.
- Oh boy.
- Good, I have negative three off the bat.
12.
- Ah, cool.
You see that Ragh, the half orc jock
grabs your Bible out of your hand
and tosses it into the kitchen.
And you see, it goes
whoosh, whoosh, whoosh
and spins and lands in a big vat
(creamed corn bubbles and splats)
of the creamed corn and sinks into it.
And you see he goes, "That's what you get
"for boring what you, what you did,
"that's what you did, that's
what you get for that."
- Good thing I already know
the whole thing by heart.
- I cast Mage Hand and pull the book
out of the creamed corn.
- Cool.
You see that as you go
to start pulling the book
out of the creamed corn, (sucking)
the book pops out, it's
covered in creamed corn.
And there's a ton of goop all over it.
You see the lunch lady says, "All right,
"all right, everybody you all gotta go.
"Everybody go sit down."
Ragh says "Think about it next time."
- Who the fuck is that guy?
- Don't even bother, he's a fucking oaf.
- A freaking idiot.
- You guys have your lunch,
and after lunch you guys are in detention,
you see the lawn outside,
beautiful afternoon,
filled with students all like
"Oh, you're my new best friend
"and we're gonna be adventurers, yeah,
"let's make an adventuring party."
(soft music)
And you see that Vice
Principal Goldenhoard
and a sort of young gnome
who is a very rosy cheeked
and he's got sort of
watery blue eyes walks in.
See they step in and Vice
Principal Goldenhoard says,
"Well, well, well,
troublemakers, yeah, and Kristen.
"Troublemaking bothers me at a deep level.
"This school can be a dangerous place.
"Students put a lot on the line here.
"And you, with your
tomfoolery, your jackanapery
"and your shenanigans are a liability
"that cannot be allowed.
"Mr. Gibbons will handle your disciplinary
"action while I'm gone."
So he turns and walks out,
and you see that the gnome
hoists himself up so he's
sitting on the edge of the desk
and he goes, "Okay, so how
do we feel about what we did?
"Yeah, right here."
- I technically have diplomatic immunity
and, do I have to be here?
- I feel bad.
I didn't mean to punch you.
I got so mad.
- I didn't do,
I did punch you, but it wasn't worth it,
but I shouldn't be here,
my crime was being too good
for the bloodrush team.
- You punched him.
- Okay.
- Yeah, you punched him.
- Yeah, you punched him.
(overlapping shouting)
- You're not objective.
- I also admitted that
(coughs) I also admitted
that I punched him, I said that.
- Wow, okay, so that's
a lot of feelings, okay?
How's everything at home, guys?
Everything good?
- It's great.
- Everything good at home?
Okay, now he, now--
- Why are you crying?
- Why am I crying?
- Mm-hmmm.
- Because I guess you
tapped into something
that, you know, maybe home's not great.
- Okay.
- Maybe home's not great.
- Okay, now those are
strong feelings, okay,
and I'm here to talk about anything, okay?
If you have any problems, yes, right here?
- Can't we just do lines
instead of talking?
- Yes, Jesus Christ.
- Wow, wow, strong feelings
all the way around, now there's something
that I wanna talk to all of you about.
You guys hear a scream.
(woman screams)
A bloodcurdling scream
from down the hallway.
Mr. Gibbons whips his
head around and looks.
What do you guys do?
- Riz takes off.
- I follow him.
- I'll go.
- Same.
- What?
- I mean, I guess if everybody's going,
we should go?
- Now, hold on guys,
nobody's doing anything.
- There ya go.
- I just see them running
and I think we're making
a jailbreak.
(all laughing)
- You guys sprint, you
run as fast as you can.
The scream comes from the cafeteria.
(all gasping)
- Doreen!
- [Brennan] You burst
forward, the doors open,
you look ahead of you and flitting around
(gremlins flitting)
the cafeteria are horrifying
little shapes with long wings.
You see corn gremlins, cobs of corn
with malevolent eyes and wide mouths.
(Brennan gnashing)
Tearing at the walls and ripping banners,
and following them into the cafeteria,
you see Doreen, the lunch lady,
with her back turned to you, slowly gazing
behind her shoulder, deep sunken eyes,
malevolent yellow as spell energy
pulsing with arcane power wraps her ladle.
"Hey kids, it's lunch time again,
"because we had lunch earlier,
but bad lunch this time."
- If you explain the joke,
it's not a good joke.
- It was bad last time.
- It's a bad lunch.
It's a bad lunch.
- No.
- A monstrous pulsating
mountain of creamed corn
(Brennan roars)
rises up, towering behind her
a colossal ooze begins to
pseudopod its way forward.
And I'm gonna have you
guys roll initiative.
(ooze gurgles)
(dramatic music)
(dice clatter)
- Ooh, okay.
And that's where we'll leave off this week
On Fantasy High.
