Arc 5 Ep1: The Pack
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Rotatoes, it's finally here. Arc 5. If you don't know what Arc 5 is, well, it is a very famous arc for us over at Rotating Heroes, DM'd by the one and only Zack Oyama, and featuring Matt Cordova, Izzy Rowland, and Brennan Lee Mulligan as awakened wolves as they go on a journey to return a mysterious baby to their home.

It is a truly spectacular arc, one of my favorite, and I know some of our fans' favorite as well, and I'm so excited for you to listen to it. So as a celebration of this arc coming out, I have made the arc bark for episode one of

of arc 5 available for free over on the patreon. All you've got to do is sign up as a free member over on the patreon and you will get yourself the arcbark where you can listen to this crew discuss this episode over on the patreon. All the links are in the description below. I'm genuinely so excited for all of you people getting to listen to this for the very first time. Please don't forget

If you are enjoying the show, give us a rating or a review down below and whatever podcasting app you're using. It really helps new people find us and...

If you're really enjoying the show, why not check out the Patreon? Like I said, you can sign up for a free member and there's some of the episodes on there that are available for free. But you can also pay just for the price of two coffees, maybe even one coffee, honestly, depending on where you live, a month. You can go ahead and get yourself every single episode of Rotating Heroes that's been released up to now available with a click of a button. So you can listen to the rest of Arc 5. You won't have to wait for it. And you won't get it in part one and part two. No, no, no, none of that. Just...

all the Rotating Heroes goodness as and when it comes out. Which, not to mention, includes Arc 10, which is three episodes DM'd by Zack Oyama once again as he's back in the saddle as GM, giving me a little rest whilst I look after a brand new baby. So, so, so excited to have you here. Thank you so much for listening. You're amazing. Now, let's begin Arc 5 of the Rotating Heroes podcast. Take it away, past Zack.

And welcome back to the Rotating Heroes podcast. I am joined for the first time, as always, so far, for the foreseeable future by the Rotators of the Fifth Arc.

And I realized immediately, I like always forgot to say my own name. I am Zach Oyama, the host and DM of the podcast. But enough about me. Let's get to these rotators. Going, I guess, let's go clockwise. Our first person, and we can save your character introduction until we get started. But writing their own character name down on their character sheet as we speak...

My friend, comedian, actor, writer, one of the funniest people in the world, Matt Cordova. Wow. Hi, everyone. Thank you. I can go home now so that I don't prove you wrong. Oh, okay. Great. Good, good. As we get started, a lot of people are coming to this podcast with different levels of experience and things like...

What would you out loud say is your experience with D&D? Internally, I'm doing it now. Now I'm going to do it out loud. I'm going to probably be scraping the bottom of the barrel of experience. One of the first times I DMed was for you and Thomas, I think Joe Weber. It helped me out a lot to play with you. Yes, so I have done...

done that experience and so up until where we've done now with all of our with our sheet and our numbers that's about all i've done so about a good hour and 10 yes yes and here i am coming at it again i'm very excited to be surrounded by such wonderful wonderful people

are going to just guide me through this. I think it'll be great, and I can't think of a better story to get you into D&D in terms of ease. Great. Wrapping further around the table, we have our next player. You know them from Dimension 20 and from TV and film. Ha ha ha!

We have the amazing Izzy Rowland. Hello. Izzy, how are you doing today? I'm good. How are you, Zach? We're in the center. I should say we are center of the forum. We rented it out. It's going to be the last episode. I know. I'm surprised there isn't an echo. Yeah, it's weird. I think the acoustics in here are different than I thought, which I should have tested before. I know.

Izzy, I am so happy to have you here. Any feelings, any, you know, just sort of gut feelings about how this will go? Please say positive things only. That's all I can take. I think it's going to be bad. God damn it. I set myself up. I'm very tired.

I think we're probably going to make some fun choices. You know, testing the temperature in here. It's going to be fun.

You gotta, we gotta test the temp. You always got to, because sometimes it's too hot in the hot tub. I'm looking around and this is just a little bit of a sight. Now everyone's wearing a shirt like they would maybe, could comfortably walk onto the set of Sesame Street. That's not true. And we're all in a warm colored house. Look at this. Wow. Camera safe. A Bert and Ernie pattern, but I don't know if necessarily the color.

I don't know. Yeah. I just like the solid colors that don't have like a logo on them. And speaking of a solid color without logos and sort of a, I want to say like a raw,

burgundy colored shirt. We have the final player of the fifth arc. You know him from Dimension 20, from College Humor in general, from Dropout, from plenty of other things. A DM, a player, a comedian. He signs for nobody.

A peace sign, a holder for the audio medium. I'm touching the microphone with my peace signs that I'm holding. Gingerly touching. Gingerly touching. I wonder what that sounds like. We have Brennan Lee Mulligan. Hello, Brennan. Hello.

Riding Falkor into the living room. That is my probably number one most used gif on interpersonal text messages. That's true. That was my enthusiasm gif is Bastion Balthazar Bucks punching the air as he rides Falkor. Yes! I can picture it. You know the gif. You know the gif of which I speak.

Amazing. Thank you all for joining us. Us being kind of the idea of the podcast and me specifically as a single person.

So far in the pod, every arc has ended with a character carrying over. So like, for example, first arc, Mike Trapp playing Turbine Spizzlesink carried over and journeyed across the ocean with Allie Beardsley playing Nance Ray and Jacob Wysocki playing Grib, the Luxodon druid. And then Grib carried on to the third arc.

That pattern continued with Freya going to the fourth arc. And here we are going to carry over a character sort of in spirit as the character is not here with a bit of a prequel. And we will get to that when we get to that. No, we will get to that shortly. Yeah.

So, you guys ready to jump in and, you know, play a little D&D? Let's do it. Cool. Well, zooming into this sort of endless forest that swallowed up the world of Amelar that this podcast takes place in, we find an evolving landscape where survival is dictated by those who play the game of the forest best.

We see in a small clearing, a little green field surrounded by trees on all sides, a deer is lapping at a little stream, just drinking up a little water. Here's a little snap of a twig. Looks up, ears perked into the distance. It knows something is in the woods nearby. It smells the air. It flicks its tail and looks around. Everyone make a stealth check if you don't know it.

That's a dirty 20. Okay. 10. 13. 10. Let's see what it got. It knows something is there, but doesn't see anything. We are going to do this a little differently than a normal thing. We are going to roll initiative and do this sort of as a skill challenge. So everybody roll their initiative. Oh my God, I'm hunting a deer. It knows that there's something in the woods nearby and we see something

rustling of leaves and things that's a 19 for me okay natural 20. six so how this will work is about 60 feet away from you in the center of this clearing is a deer perked up kind of worried about if there is something nearby but didn't see anything uh so for the first round of this

let me know what skill you're using in order to try to close the distance. Effectively, we are in a skill challenge that is a chase, but you all kind of bypassed it immediately running away because it did not see you. Gotcha. So going through the initiative order. Let me roll a deer. Okay. Deer's pretty good. The deer actually is very good. Going through the initiative order, up top with the dirty 20, hiding. I got a natural 20. Oh, yeah. Hiding with a natural 20.

Almost. Which doesn't really matter for an initiative. But ready to hunt, perfectly hidden in a little bush with a little two canine eyes peering out from it. Izzy, would you describe your character and tell us who they are and what they're doing? My character is Harland. Mm-hmm.

And he is an old wolf, not the alpha male of the pack, formerly the alpha male of the pack. Must be hard. It is hard. He is grizzled.

He was once handsome. He's got a lot of scars from his heyday and from, you know, probably the fight losing his alpha male status. Okay. You know, he's got some patches of fur missing. Yeah.

But there's something still in there that propels him forward day to day. He's not done yet. He's not done. Harlan looks out at this deer in the middle of the field. You are part of a larger pack and you are this group of...

wolves is off hunting in a little bit like a smaller like hunting party everyone is going out to hunt for the pack and come back and you know uh divvy up the the meat etc and but um this is a pretty good opportunity for harlan to prove his worth you see this deer about 60 feet away from you in this clearing what skill would you like to use to approach um i would like to use stealth okay

So should I make a stealth check? Since y'all already rolled the stealth check, does that make sense, you think? Yeah. Carry that score over. Oh, I had a bad one. Oh, you had a bad stealth roll? Yeah. You still beat this deer's initial roll. So I think you're okay to carry that skill forward. So would you do probably a full movement closer? Just try and get as close as possible.

With your full movement, able to close the distance to this deer in front of you. Okay. I think with the full movement, like going over 40 feet, you won't have an attack, but you are right next to this deer in the brush. It has returned to drinking water without noticing you. Okay. Moving down the order. Gray. Hi, I'm playing Gray. Gray is another wolf of this pack. Okay.

She has that sort of classic, like a little bit Arctic looking of like very slate gray fur on top of her body with like the white fur under her chin and like belly. She was never an alpha or omega. She was like, has always been kind of like a beta in the pack. Just someone who like slipped into the mass of the rest of the wolf pack as a mix of like two things, which is she's a very proficient hunter and,

But the reason that her status in the pack has never been higher is she's not the most sociable. She doesn't do a lot of the grooming back. Not that she is a malicious wolf at all, but just comes back from a hunt and will often lie down off in a corner by herself and is a little bit reserved. Not gregarious or forward.

Yeah. I could see Gray like looking at this deer and just sort of like noticing the coloring on it. Yeah. Yeah. Like inquisitive feeling nature of Gray. Very inquisitive. And one of those wolves that I think is very percept, like, like people in social circumstances, she is focused on perception and noticing things, which can sometimes be a disadvantage in social situations. She's,

shy, perceptive, looking at what's going on, which means that most of the time she's being quiet and not making an impression on other wolves in her bag. The skill challenge I'd like to do is either perception or survival, because I think this is the way Gray tends to hunt. She looks at Harland and knows that he has fully closed on this deer and that he is a more powerful wolf than she is.

So she is going to think, narrow her eyes, and move in the best direction for the deer to escape if Harlan doesn't connect. So she's going to move to the deer's most likely avenue of escape and wait there. Okay, cool. So yeah, make your check and see if you're able to find the most effective place to hide.

14 plus three is 17. Okay. That is a success in terms of this skill challenge. So you see that the way that the field kind of grades, like it kind of goes down to the left, like maybe to the east, there's more of a clearing for a deer to just like sprint away that way.

And I think a deer is just, you would all know this all out faster than you. It's like top speed is higher than you. So like if it, if you were just in an opening with it, like it's going to outrun you probably. And especially in the short term. Now it is the deer's turn and it is going to roll to see if it notices anyone. Okay. What was your stealth score again? As a,

Harlan sneaks up so close to this deer before it could even notice anything at all. It's looking the distance. It doesn't look down until you are right next to it, Harlan. It looks down, sees your canine eyes hiding through these kind of wispy blades of grass, and it turns and tries to run. You will get an opportunity attack, though. Okay, great. So, yeah, roll an attack if you can.

Okay, so I add plus four. That's a 23. 23. Harlan, you burst out of this. Out of this. Kind of like those hot dog looking strands by this creek. You fly through there. You immediately attack this ear and take it down. We're all damaged. Okay. Dead. 2d4 plus two. Eight. Harlan, you pop out of this.

You pop out of this tall patch of grass, fly through the air. You take this deer down, bite down, and immediately kill this deer. Everybody make a perception check. Old man still got it. Still got it. Seven. 17. Me too, 17. 17. So Harlan, as you...

take this deer down, you hear a snap of a twig in the distance to the east, like where it seemed like the deer would run. There's another deer over there. This deer is a huge get for the entire pack, but it's a big pack. This is like, you prove that you can hang, but if you want to prove that you're a top dog, there's another deer over there. But this deer is going to, I'm going to...

Yes. It actually got the same initial. Wow. It's going to take off. Okay. After Harlan, you've taken this deer down. You've proven with your like old man wolf strength that you got what it takes to be here. It's going to take off toughy. You watch your old man friend wolf take out this deer in one bite. It's kind of incredible. Yeah.

You are hiding nearby. You see this happen and you see this other deer take off. Describe your character and tell us what you end up doing. Well, my character's name is Tuffy. And Tuffy is a...

enthusiastic athletic scout for the group. He enjoys going off on his own outside of the pack to, you know, look for danger up ahead to make sure they're, you know, whatever basically his pack leader asks him to do, which, so Tuffy, he idolizes the pack leader, Roan, and does dream of one day leading his own pack and,

but doesn't really think too much about it ever, really, because he could never imagine not being a follower of Roan as his idol. He loves animals, much to the dismay of a lot of his pack mates. He doesn't really love...

the thrill of the kill. I mean, he loves to eat, so he knows it's necessary, but the danger that he sees in the animal's eyes in the middle of it isn't his favorite, so he loves to aid in his packs. Hunting is

but always tries to find a way to be the one that doesn't make that final blow. I see. Yeah. He's got all the makings to be a leader, but maybe missing a little bit of that killer instinct. And he struggles with that because he knows maybe he looks a little tougher than he is. Amazing. In a haunting way, you see this deer go down, but then you see this other deer fly by. You guys are kind of like of the hunting parties. Yeah.

I think you would probably think that like there's some, there's probably a little bit of politicking going on where there are like some more like straight up like these, that's like the cool hunting party. So like it's almost, it's probably a little bit of surprise to just immediately take down this deer. But like, yeah, this is going well. And you see this other deer fly by. What do you do? Well, like I said, this is kind of pretty great for us. We've already got one.

deer so I know that the one thing that does drive me is is it being a good pack mate and so I know that I have a job to at least try and pace this deer and corral him back into the area where we were

were basically, you know, taking Gray's idea, but not knowing you're already there, but I'm, I'm basically trying to cut this thing. You're just kind of headed out back. Cool. So, um, was that a survival for you as well? Yeah. Okay. So make a survival check to see if you can catch up. So how this will work now that the deer is taken off, it's faster, but if you can make a good survival check, that means you keep up with it. Angle it out. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

So, so 16. Cool. So yeah, with the 16, you're able to see the path that this deer is taking off straight down this hill and know that it kind of, the way the terrain turns, like, like it's actually quicker to go like a little bit to the left and kind of cut off where this deer is. So you keep pace with this deer. You,

You are running after this deer. You both see Tuffy take off after this deer. You've handled this deer here. Would understand if you wanted to see that through, but also there's this other deer. So back to the top, it would be Harland. Harland really wants this second deer, really wants to bring that home, but doesn't want to leave this place.

catch you could take it with you you'll just be slow yeah i think i am gonna do that and shoot gray a look to see if she caught the other deer like running off caught on to that i'm gonna look at harland i did not catch the other deer my perception check but i think i see toughy running after something i'm going to relax my body language and just start walking to the deer you

and just show you like, I got it. Okay, Harlan's going to take off with Chuffy. Cool. So Harlan, you've sprint off. Yeah, so this deer is going fast. Holy shit, he's fast. For the way these skill checks will work, you can use any skill you want, but you just can't use the same skill twice. So we basically just covered stealth already. So yeah, let me know what Harlan does. I think full athletics. Cool. Now it's like, it's all...

This old man is feeling himself. Yeah. He's got a drive. He's got a knee. And that's an eight. Okay. He's a little tucker. So it's like that kind of thing where you immediately run and you feel like a pop. You know? You're like...

Nothing really happened, but you're like, ow, what was that? Am I okay? And so Harland, you are feeling equivalent to a 20-year-old man. Just suddenly you get humbled immediately with your old man. You're still chasing after it. It has just outpaced you a little bit. Yeah, yeah. So going back down to Gray. Gray, you have this deer that you caught here. Are you just going to stay with it? Is Miko here with us? Yeah. There.

Thank you so much. Fully forgot to roll for Mika. I'm going to roll for Mika for last round to see if Mika gets a nat one. Mika is taking a shit. So I'm going to... Taking a shit. Eating it. Okay, I'm going to look at Mika. Is Mika near the kill? Yeah. Okay. I'm going to do a short...

like, uh, bark at Miko to be like, get your head back in the fucking game. Um, Miko looks up. Everybody heard Harlan's joint pop as soon as he took off. Extremely embarrassing. Right after that. So for Miko, he is dumb. Miko looks up. Miko's like a little scraggly, like a bit of a mutt of the pack. Um, you know, just by the good graces of, uh,

I think all of you are a little more kind than the average hunting party. And so it was a little like, yeah, we can let Miko come with us. Miko's a little scraggly looking, like almost a little bit of like a mange kind of situation, but looks up and looks at you like, oh. I'm going to do whatever the nod is to be like, even though you're low status in the pack, it's your turn to eat. Okay. As a way to be like, stay here with the deer.

Like Miko looks up like, don't mind if I do. And Michael walks over. Just made some room. And I'm going to take off. And I would love to... I can roll for this if you need me to. But what I would love to do is looking at Tuffy, knowing that he's trying... I didn't see the deer, but I can see from where Tuffy is trying to corral that he's running this deer in a curve. Yeah. And I think...

gray, again, as this wolf that's like very focused on perception is gonna go with this like intuitive understanding. If you're running a deer in a curve, it means I can go in a straight line to where that deer is gonna be and beat it there.

- Cool, it's like, yeah, like if you like play football, you know the play. - Yeah. - What role would that be? - So I made a survival, could I do a perception? - Yeah, for sure. - I wanted to see like, where is the point where if I run there in a straight line, Tuffy and Harland are gonna bring the deer right to me. - Amazing, yeah, you see Tuffy run one way, you hear Harland's popping joint in another direction. - Cool, all right, here's my perception check.

It's a 14. Okay, cool. That clears it. You see that actually if you kind of head in a similar trajectory to the deer, but slightly angled out, like it's going to be pushed that direction by the way Tuffy is running. So you keep pace with the deer. The angle of everyone running has pushed the deer in sort of a different direction. It is now like running along kind of like a rocky bed. Everyone make a perception check.

21. 21. 22. 15. Oh, pretty good. I'll roll for Miko. Oh, wow. As you're chasing this deer, in the distance, you hear... It's pretty far away, and maybe on the other side of a cliff or something, so you kind of don't hear whatever it is directly, but you hear sort of a loud, unusual sound to you. As wolves, you're like, I don't know. That wasn't usual.

Maybe akin to like a tree falling or maybe something louder and sharper than that. But yeah, you're still chasing this deer. After the deer goes, we're back to the top of the order with Harlan. Okay. I'm still going. And maybe I'm trying to sort of, I'm like, okay, fuck. And so maybe he's going to make a survival check. Cool. Like to sort of be like,

How we doing? Yeah. Harland, oh boy. So your fuck is like more about your own body? Yeah. Should we let the kids? Sometimes you can like run it out. Who knows? Should we pretend like we didn't try and go back to the kill? You did pretty good. Yeah. Okay. So I got a 12. Okay. So on a 12, you're running. You're not going as fast as say these other two.

Uh, so you're being outpaced a little bit still, but you're still headed in the right direction. But yeah, on a 12, you aren't quite going as fast as the other two. Mm-hmm.

So after that, we're going to circle back around to Gray. Gray, it's your turn. Have I managed to keep pace with the deer? You have. It's still a little ahead of you, but you are keeping the distance locked. So you're just kind of waiting for the deer to make a mistake. Awesome. I've used survival and perception.

And you now are going sort of up a hill that like, it's kind of like rolling in this area. Like you've been through this terrain before, but it is now like trying to like charge uphill. Can I make, I want to try something. So I'm going to actually try to make a nature check. Cool. Which I still get a big minus two, but I do have proficiency in it. Okay, cool. Let's see here. Ooh, that's not great. That's a seven.

Yeah, you were trying to see if there's like in this hillside, maybe like some kind of cut through or something like that. Yeah, exactly.

After that, Tuffy, it is your turn. You see this deer coming up. You see Gray closing in from the right. You are on the left. What do you do? Well, I am kind of filled with glee that I see Gray coming because that means that I've kind of successfully done my job of kind of pushing the food to somebody that's better at killing. And seeing that, I can't help it, and I know that he's probably going to yell at me, but

I almost do a U-turn to go and check on Harlan, who has fallen back. And that's kind of where I'm at with my pack. Harlan's a very old dog, and he just had a great kill. But now I lost him. He seemed to be right next to me. Okay. So you can maybe make a...

or insight check to see if Harlan's good to like have the motivation to keep running forward or yeah. Yeah, or does he need somebody to walk him back to the deck? Okay. Oh.

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Tuffy, you look back at Harlan. Harlan, what does Tuffy see? Harlan is huffing and puffing.

Hey, boy. How are you? What are you doing? I just wanted to come check. Go get it. I knew you were going to say that. Don't you have any kind of grateful boat in your body? I think Harlan's going to try to go past Tuffy. Yeah, you gleaned from this that checking on Harlan was maybe the bad. Socially, you stepped in it, but...

Making the check, you were also like, maybe some weird kind of sense of social shame has pushed you to run just as fast as you can. So, yeah, like in an embarrassed way, you run after this deer. Okay, great, great.

Okay, point taken. So yeah, Tuffy, you are able to keep pace with this deer, the best of everyone in this last beat. It is going over this hill and you are popping up over the hill. And as you crest this hill,

You see sort of a plume of smoke in the distance. You don't know what that is. As you see the deer running forward, it maybe is still just in survival mode, not even paying attention to that, but you happen to notice that. We've hit the end of that round. Miko is going to slowly saunter after where you guys are. Gray whiffs her head around to look at Miko. With the deer, like dragging the deer. Yeah, yeah.

Looks at Gray like, basically like when a human and a dog interact. Like Miko's like, your dog. That's fine, Miko. That's fine. Just like kind of gnawing at this, like the antler on it. That's not even the part. So after that, we're going to go back to the top. Izzy, I think I maybe wrote it down. You got the nat 20. Okay, yeah. So yeah, now Harland...

is upset that someone has noticed that he was doing poorly. And so he's trying to overcompensate. So I think that's going to be a performance. Great. Barking. Seven.

Harlan dies. Harlan has a heart attack. Tuffy, you hear Harlan just like, you know, old man yelling at cloud energy from the city. It's like,

Just like howling, like still, you know, really just like milking, having killed the deer. You know, I mean, it was seconds ago. You just got one. I mean, like that was pretty fucking good. Harlan has been outpaced. He tries to pretend he's digging. Like, oh, I found something. Harlan's just digging down. This is equally important. Like, yeah, make a like perception check just to see if you, or, you know, investigation check just separately. Yeah.

Harlan, there's like kind of a rock or something. Like it's like. Okay, great. Well, yeah, Harlan's a little fallen a little bit behind. And now we're back around to gray, gray. Okay, so is it are me and Tuffy still kind of neck and neck? Yeah, you are both in it still. Tuffy's I think a little further ahead of you.

Cool. Copy that. Thanks to my shame boost. Yeah. Yeah. I am going to actually on my turn, I'm going to, we already got a deer. Yeah. So on my turn, I actually am going to give the help action to whatever Tuffy is going to do on his turn. I love it. And I think I'm going to look at Tuffy with, or I'm going to come up behind Tuffy and I'm

silently fallen behind you in this way that's sort of like you're going to need to take the lead eventually and fallen behind Tuffy wow

Tuffy, you feel Gray kind of drafting behind you and, you know, in your shame spiral sprint, you feel that like, yeah, someone in your pack has your back and you are doing the right thing chasing after this other deer for the good of the pack. You can do your roll with advantage, meaning you'll roll two d20s and take the higher one. So whatever you do, you are emboldened by the support of your packmate. Wow.

Well, it feels a lot better than I thought it would feel. I was scared about being in this position, but definitely feel emboldened. I think that what I'm going to do is kind of flip a switch, as they say, and squint my eyes a little bit, and I'm going to lunge for the front left leg of this deer before it reaches the...

brush that can catch us up a little bit. Cool.

For our purposes, what skill do you think that could be? Did you take athletics? Was that one of your ones? You haven't used that yet. Maybe that's it. Yeah, let's do athletics for that. You're trying to finish the race, essentially, power through and catch this deer. It's kind of like when the guy's getting away from you in football and you try to sweep his leg or whatever. Yeah, that last ditch, like shoelace tackle.

Yeah. So Tuffy, make your roll with advantage. That's an 18. With that, I won't even make you roll for this because it is an in place of attack. You lunge out, you knock this deer down, uh,

biting at its left front leg it tumbles this isn't the most fun thing for you but it had to be done it's very much the the realm of survival and and you for the good of your pack could take down this deer ending this skill challenge you know it it's heavy

-The deer? -Yes. Part of the reason I don't like to hunt is carrying it afterwards. -After you take this deer out, I'll say that Gray and Harlan and Miko dragging the other deer catch up and see that beyond all odds for this crew compared to the more jockey young hunters of the pack, you have taken out two deer.

Harlan's going to look at Gray and say, good work. We all did it. I'm going to look over at Miko and kind of go like, drop it. Miko is taking the deer, is like trying to go up a tree with a deer. Looks back at you and just... Drop it.

Drop it. It shakes his head. And Gray is just going to park it, like immediately focuses on catching her breath after a long hunt. And I think Gray is very like laws of the pack kind of thing where she goes like, Harland and Tuffy eat first. They brought the deer down. We wait. Miko begrudgingly just-

Opens his mouth and lets the deer fall to the ground. Your pack is kind of divvied up hunting in different areas around here. You're here with two deer and everybody make another perception check. Natural 20. 13. 13 here as well. So two 13s and 20. I'll say that all of those are pretty good. I think Harland, you look up because you hear in the distance a

Y'all heard that muffled noise earlier, but a stifled cough coming from straight ahead, kind of in the direction of where that explosion was. That cough was not necessarily close, but it was like someone who kind of couldn't help it. It sounded like kind of like a wounded creature. Harlan's going to go towards it stealthily. Okay. Okay.

Gray falls in behind. Yeah. Yeah, Tuffy's very, very interested. Miko goes back to the deer. Yeah, that's Miko. But it's dragging it. That's Miko's job, yeah. Both? Has two deer in its mouth like it's some weird sled, a deer sled somehow, and is following. As you continue down this trail, you see where the smoke is coming from.

splintered pieces of wood just kind of shattered about. And then as you get closer, you see humanoid bodies with these sort of pointed ears and sort of green cloaks. They look to have been in sort of a defensive formation just on the ground having been killed by something. There's a little wagon or remnants of this wagon that

that has exploded near them. It was like... Yeah, roll an insight check. Fifteen. Nine. Seven. It's still really confusing to you guys because you are... This is like seeing...

It would be like if a human saw an alien craft that blew up for some reason. You don't really know why, what the inner workings of this is. Like something went really wrong here. And it does look like they...

tried to defend themselves in some way but were not able to there's like about a dozen or so like of these humanoid like warriors like they look like they have those like long pointed uh teeth that you you you know of and have seen from a distance but probably not tried to be any anywhere near this close to something like this and you continue to hear this like like just like

a cough nearby and you i think you would notice with that perception check from earlier it's coming from a bush off to the side of where this is like further down to the side um so harland you hear this coughing coming from a bush nearby it feels to you as though like something was a part of this like this whatever the aftermath of this explosion was was injured and

Maybe there's like a bit of a dragging trail where they maybe dragged themselves away from this. And there's a bush nearby where it seems like that is the source of what that trail is. I'm gonna still slowly move towards it and give Gray a look like...

I feel like she'll like this shit. And head on. Cool. So you look to Gray and head forward. Are you doing anything right now? We're out of, I should say, we're out of this kind of initiative period. So just let me know if you want to do anything. You don't have to wait for this order or anything more, I should say. Oh, cool. And you know what? Harlan will look at Tuffy too.

And be like, sort of like, you like to go check things out. Yes. I think I'm going to look over at Harlan, who's clearly noticed something that I have not, and trust the old wolf's experience that something strange is going on. I think that Gray is very distracted right now because...

She is more, I think of her companions, she's probably the most cautious, but also does have a deep curiosity about these things that is in some ways a little bit un-wolf-like, where she knows like, hey, anytime you smell smoke, that's bad. Like the best thing smoke can be is lightning struck.

And I think Gray also, again, having that sort of weird intelligence is like, it's not raining. So that means because it's not raining or it didn't rain, smoke is even worse. Like the smell of smoke is even worse because it means... I can see that. Yeah, that like, this means like people are nearby, two legs are nearby. Smelling the unnatural smells of like worked wood and metal. It's like all of this should be instant runaway, but all there's blood here. So I think Gray...

snaps back into like is in that loop of like what are all the things this could mean yeah and gets brought back to the present moment by harland uh and is going to soften her focus is going to leave her eyes and just go for her ears and nose and try to soften her perception and say what's the thing i'm missing yeah make a uh you can make a perception check if you'd like and i'm going to do that with advantage yeah hearing and smell um

Okay, that's going to be a 14. Yeah, it's like you're smelling the aftermath of whatever kind of explosion happened here. Like that kind of treated wood burning is kind of a strange smell. It's hard to necessarily...

to parse what happened here. It is quiet here though now, so that's good. On a 14, do I hear other breathing other than that coughing nearby? You don't hear other breathing in the immediate area. So you are saying it's, you've only done the hearing portion of perception. Yeah, I'm trying to like, yeah, I'm trying to feel out as much as I can, like if there are other breathing two-legged things nearby. I am like,

pretty opposite of Grey in this situation. I feel like Grey likes...

to hang out with me in these situations because all of the reservations that she has that are probably intelligent to have, I kind of miss. And I think that my like nose is going crazy with new things that I've never smelled. There's a lot of new smells here. Some are not good. It's just like, like that, like kind of chemically fiery, uh, smell of like the smoldering treated stuff. So, uh,

Do you want to make a perception or investigation check or anything like that? Yeah, I feel like I want to do an investigation check of like... Especially like the blood. Yeah. The seemingly living things that were there. Cool. Yeah, make either of those. And that was investigation. So, 15. You see the aftermath of this and notice...

Yeah, if you're paying attention to the blood and stuff, there's a little bit of a trickling trail going towards where Harland is going. But you also know there's a little bit going... If that's to the right, to the left, there's another trail that does not have signs of a body dragging, has signs of a body running or two legs sprinting away from an area.

That trail, like the blood and stuff on it, like seems to have dissipated as it like gets further away. It seems like maybe something was like less injured and got further away. But in the immediate vicinity, all you see that is like explorable in this specific spot you're in is probably what Harlan's like going towards. But there was a path going the other direction. Okay. I'm going to look over at Tuffy who's and can see that Tuffy like

Basically, if I look at you sniffing out of this other path and nod to you like, that's good to find that. We should follow that later. And I'm going to follow after Harland up this like blood soaked trail. Now, would we want to eat these people? I...

We'll leave that up to you. I'm going to bark at you and basically being like, these will make you sick. Oh, okay. Don't eat these. Okay. We don't know what, everything from these places is bad. Oh, okay. And then I take a little nibble and immediately second that. Oh, yeah. That's terrible.

Really lean meat. Elf meat. No good. Well, yeah, you see, you hear sort of ragged breathing coming from this bush nearby. It seems like something is kind of trying to cover itself up. That's probably all you can see from this angle unless you take a closer look. Yeah, Harland goes in. He's sort of like with every step mitigating risk.

until his nose is like in the bush. As you do that, put your nose toward the bush. Are you two nearby? I'll like come up, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I feel like we have to.

triangulated around it. Harland triangulated with Tuffy and Gray. Miko kind of popping their head in behind. Also eating. Eating a full deer. An elf. No. It has an elf leg and two deer legs in its mouth. As you get closer to this bush, a hand kind of pushes it out of the way and holds up a gnarled staff.

with sort of this green glow on it, sort of shaking. And you see behind that the face of just this old man druid. He's very injured. He looks to be clutching some sort of wound inside. His head is bleeding. He's breathing really raggedly. And he says something to you that you can't understand. And he's just talking. You're like, what? And then he looks at you for a second.

And then his staff glows again with this green charge and he's like, there. Is that better? Can you understand me now? Yeah. You guys hear that? And you do understand it. I think Grey's... My eyes immediately go wide. Like...

I immediately know that this shouldn't be something we can do. And so there's a sense of real fear that something I don't understand has happened. Yes. You don't feel like necessarily something has changed in your body or anything like that. You feel like this creature in front of you has figured out a way to tap into you. Almost like it has some sort of rock and roll persona that you can kind of feel. Can't quite describe.

You haven't changed at all, but they're Laura. Yeah, you feel their charisma. Yeah, but this druid has tapped into you in a way that is able to communicate. And he's like, can you understand? Okay, I fear that we do not have much time. Who are you? Just quickly tell me who you are. Can I trust you? Can I do an insight check? Yes. Yeah.

- 13. - Okay, it's hard to tell. He looks worried and desperate and it feels like he's covering something. He is defensively kind of guarding something. - I think I'm gonna approach because it means something for a two-legged creature to be able to communicate to us. - Yes. - All of this thing's language indicates that it is not a stranger to wolves or to our pack.

So I'm going to step forward and look over at Harland to see if it's okay with you that we stay here, if you feel this is dangerous. I think Harland is just like in a zone, just like...

- I think that I, I think that-- - Like so confused, not wanting to run away from this man and sort of like stopping his instincts to lick his wounds. - Yeah, I think I see that from both of them and realize that I might have to be the person that communicates back. And so I just wanna let the creature know that they're in no harm from us and that he can trust us.

You can see that he feels that, if not exactly words, that vibe from you. And feels Harlan sort of licking at him and knows that it's... It feels like this two-legged creature was trying to figure out if it can trust you or if you were kind of corrupted in some way or something. But it seems like the situation is as plain as they thought. We just doggie.

Are we able to, I mean, the way that we communicate with each other? You can talk to this person now. Just the same way we can talk to each other. Yeah, you feel as though you can communicate in that way. You hear the voice of this person again say, like, I know we live very different lives and you have no reason to help me, but as a protector of this natural world, I must ask for your aid.

in protecting the forest from those who'd seek to corrupt it. And he looks to you to see if there's any recognition or any... I feel like Gray looks...

out because we can speak to each other but we're still wolves so even even in how we there's that thing of like you know you're watching star wars and they're speaking english but you know that theoretically they're speaking galactic basic yeah you're like millennium falcon probably refers to some weird alien bird we've never heard sure sure they might not have falcons so there's this thing of i think like looking at us when this person says like i protect the forest that i

our entire world is the forest and the idea of like, what are you protecting it from? There's like all these huge concepts that this hurt creature is trying to communicate to us. But I think that you said this is a Druid. I don't think gray knows what a Druid. Yeah. But I think she smells the woods on him. Yes. And goes like, and looks over at you and goes and lies down and lays her head in the lap of this hurt person and looks at the two of you and goes like,

I know it can't be true, but this man is a wolf. He's one of us. He hears that and you see this like old injured man, like breathe, like almost a sigh of relief, like kind of touched by the connection that he has made with you. And he says, in some ways, yes, I'm sorry. There's a lot to explain in a short amount of time. And in some ways, I guess I am a wolf. And I would ask that.

And he, like, kind of moves to the side, and he has this basket. Harland goes off, and, like, Harland is fucked up. He, like, trusts Gray to know what to do in this moment and, like, believes everything that's going on. And he does that weird dog thing where you're like, that dog does not know what to do, where they just sort of, like, jump in the same place with their front feet. And it's just like, okay.

What? What? What? Especially when he moves to take something out. Harland is just like, fuck. Like, doesn't know whether to bite. Heal. Heal. Heal. Good boy. My friend. Good boy. I know I promised not to check in with you again, Harland, but you okay? Harland stares daggers. Okay, I get it. I get it. I get it.

You see this injured man pull out this basket that has a little swaddled, maybe one-year-old half-elf wrapped up in a little basket. Uninjured, totally fine. That's why you don't want us to want to eat elves. I mean, up to you. But he looks at you and he's like, will you protect this pup?

I think Grey gets very silent. She's never had cubs of her own. She's very young and also very antisocial and not like a high status wolf in the pack. And I think that she like pokes her head into the basket and tries to like nuzzle the blanket away to smell deeply of whatever is in there. You smell a sweet little half-elf baby.

That's like stirring, but was asleep against all odds. You don't know if maybe the druid did anything to like help calm a baby in this frightening time. You think that, yeah, it just feels like any pup you've seen before. It's of course different smells like these two-legged creatures in front of you, but there's like an innocent little creature here. Harland is sort of making...

you know, uncontrollable like noises and like approaches the baby and does that thing where dogs sort of just can't help but lick a baby. And this is, this is very profound for him to be offered a pup. He wasn't allowed to have children anymore. Yeah. Um, for the pack. So, um,

This whole experience is very overwhelming for him. Gosh, yeah. Harlan, you see once again, you know, it's been a long time since you interacted with pups to this degree. And you see, you lick this little baby's face and it's like uncomfortable. Like it starts to like kind of fuss a little bit. Like kind of grabs at your tongue. And Harlan loves that. Yeah.

Yeah, a little baby just grabs your tongue. It's like strong. It's like a strong baby. And as you start to sniff and interact with this baby, the druid looks down at you and says, he's breathing his morag, and now he looks pretty desperate. He's like, this is not going to be an easy task. I fear we are too far from our home, but...

we were on it i'm realizing these comp these concepts are probably too complicated but i'm just going to say them and hope that you glean from what i'm talking about but we were on a diplomatic mission or trying to be friends with humans in a place called fort cutler and one of the few human forces in amalar that we think we can trust and it's at the edge of the forest further to the east of here it's a few days from here but

There you will find the nearest ally of Zophine, the goddess of the now, you know, past goddess of the forest. And if there's any way you can take this child there to get it away from here, I fear we have been betrayed and I don't know if he will be back soon. The guardians here are all dead, all except for her. And you're now all that she has left. I ask you as denizens of the forest to protect the child. She is part of your pack now.

Will you do this? He looks at you. His eye is kind of full of fear at this point. I think Harlan tries to pick her up by her neck. Oh. And sort of can't. Yeah, there's not really... It's a smooth, hairless body versus...

Gray looks over at you and nudges her nose against the handle of the basket. Okay. Okay. Sees that you are up to the task. He looks to you, Miko, Gray, and Taffy to see if there's any sort of hint of understanding or welcome.

Grey does a little circle around the basket and leans her head against it. And I think in her head, again, this druid clearly cast magic to be able to communicate with wolves. And it's that, there's like that old thing about like a sphere appearing in a two-dimensional land. It just looks like a circle to everything there, but they know it's this bigger shape. And this druid is communicating all these enormous ideas. So I think,

I think Gray gets like 50% of it where it's like, I don't know what a human is, but that could just be another pack that's different from yours, another pack of two-legged. And I don't know what a diplomatic mission is, but I know that you wanted to be close to them. You didn't want to fight with them for territory. And I don't know what, and just get this idea of like, you understand more than I do, but I know that if your mission doesn't come to pass, the whole forest dies.

And that is the end of the pack. And that's all I need to know. That is like way bigger thinking than Tuffy is capable of and is just completely infatuated with this new creature and wants to learn everything about it

shows signs of maybe knowing how to interact with the smaller thing due to you know having many many cousins you know that as during you know his younger days in the pack he was charged with looking after a lot of the young cubs so seems to have a little bit of a familiar you're tapping into that energy yeah like kind of like babysitting almost kind of yeah he sees that

That Harlan has the care thing there, but maybe not as much of the gentle touch. And so they kind of balance each other out, but both ecstatic for their new partner. The druid looks to all of you, nods.

Miko kind of pops in over the shoulder like a little less like clearly defined energy, just kind of also there. And the druid looks at you all and says, Light of Zophine, shine upon you, proud wolves of the timber. And he points his staff out and glows with like a deeper green and flashes as he says, awaken. And with...

everybody make a constitution or an intelligence save and then a constitution say intelligence for me i got a three and then constitution yes dirty 20 and constitution okay so 10 so 11 okay what'd you get for intelligence 11 okay cool

I got a two for intelligence and a 15 for constitution. Cool. So you both had good, pretty good concepts. Yeah. Okay. Has this green kind of torch in front of you lights. You are hit in your mind with this blinding, like green light.

as it like expands your consciousness. You feel like almost like a fizziness of like a carbonated soda in your brain as like your brain expands and like you feel like more tracks forming, like everything within the chemistry of your head is changing. Whoa.

With that, those are... So the fail of the save is like, this is a painful experience. It's not like easy. The constitution saves is just like, it turns your stomach to feel this. So you two don't actually throw up, but like, yeah, Tuffy, you just, you've experienced this and also just barf a little bit. Yeah.

Miko clearly has the same kind of twitching headache as they keep themselves from throwing up against all odds. After eating elves. Yes. A little ear out of its mouth. It's horrifying. As this happens, you hear a twanging thud, and you are still feeling the effects of whatever has just happened to you as your mind expands.

uh you look forward and you see a black and blue fletched stick coming out well not a stick probably um like a projectile you're finding like kind of new words for describing things as you see this thing but it is sticking out of the chest of this druid what

You look behind you and I think under normal circumstances, it would have been hard for something to sneak up on you, but you are undergoing this transformation and you see a figure dressed head to toe in like beaver pelts. Still similar, like similar ears. You think it's the same race as the person you were just talking to. Notching another arrow. He looks down at,

At the now dead druid next to him, you see this like some familiar to you, not totally different than what you are. You see this big canine creature with sort of almost elven features as well. Sort of this sort of like sylvan looking dog with like kind of longer ears and like a kind of a long tail that's like kind of whipping around in the air.

And it looks at you and he says, sorry it took me so long, Bara. A couple of the guardians went the opposite way when my trap went off. So I'm here now. Maybe you shouldn't have trusted old Oscar. Looks at you all, laughs a little bit. And he's like, oh, look at that, cute doggies.

"Hey little fellas, I love doggies, ain't that right, Tupelo?" And his huge hound kind of rustles up to him and then looks at you all kind of challenging you. - I attack. - I'm going to, if you, do I see you squaring up to attack? - Yeah. - I look at you and say, and for the first time I'm going to say with words, "Run." And I'm gonna grab the basket and take off into the woods. - Cool. - Okay. - So you run and do you attack?

No. Okay. I'm going to see Gray do that, and then I'll choose not to. Okay. It's hard for this old dog to back down from a fight. Yeah. But there is something changing in your mind. There is a different priority in this moment. He sees you two take off. Tuffy, what is Tuffy doing? I'm going to try and...

On my way out, because I know that there's something that we might not have figured out. I want to try to just grab anything off of the druid that we were just speaking of. And I know that's going to be chancy, but just try to get anything that I can to help us along the way that he might have left behind and then use my speed to catch up with him. He has this kind of large staff that you know that he used for the purposes of

his magic, but like, it's, yeah, it's a big stick. Yeah, yeah. I think that I'm going to try to grab the stick. Okay, cool. And, and, and fall. Yeah, he has a, you know, like a six foot long, like a pole in its mouth, like when,

And you take off. He's like, hey, come back now. And what's happening? And he looks out at you like he's not intimidated by this at all. Like he seems to maybe have missed what has happened here. And he's like, he's chasing after you alongside his dog. He's like, come on now. I need the little baby or I'm going to be set up for life if I bring that little baby back.

Come on! You feel him chasing. You see the dog just disappear out of the air and catch up to you immediately with the puff of smoke. Then it is right on top of you, growling at you. You don't feel the same sort of mind that you feel like you guys have now. It's all happening too fast. As this happens, this thing starts closing distance. You see an arrow hit a tree next to your head, Harlan. Okay.

This guy's trying to stop you without attacking you, it seems like. He doesn't like love killing wolves or whatever. He looks out at you and is like, come on now. He has also appeared near you. Roll a perception check, I guess. Nine. Nine. Okay. He's caught up to you in a way that doesn't seem possible as well.

You all look out at him and see this hunter with an arrow notched once more. He's kind of done playing, but then you hear...

You hear the yipping of tons of wolves in the distance as the rest of your pack charges over this hill, having completed their portion of the hunt, and looks down to see this man maybe threatening you and starts charging after him. Oh, sick. Drop the basket, turn on the man, attack. Cool. Yeah. Once the numbers... Oh, great. Sick. Yeah, yeah, for sure. Make your attack.

I think, well, yeah, so I'll drop the... Oh, Harland is actually going to stay with the baby. You do? Okay, cool. Yeah, seeing the wolves come over, Grey, she snarls and is just like, looking at the rest of the wolves coming is like, it's...

The running was because I knew we couldn't win that fight. And now this one is like some weird maternal ferocity comes over her where she's like, I can die here. I can die here tearing this right out. Incredible. Yeah, roll your attack. Is he within five feet of any other wolves right now or no? I would say so, yeah. Okay, cool. We whip around a corner and I'm gonna just leap right for this guy's throat. It's cocked.

That's gonna be a 17 to hit. - 17 to hit. Yeah, you snap at this man and connect, biting down hard into his arm. - Here we go. Oh, that's gonna be five points of damage, and he's gotta give me the strength saving throw or go down. - Cool, wow.

He gets knocked to his ass by Gray as Gray takes him down with the five. And has a pack of wolves coming towards him. And he looks up full of fear at this point. And he and his dog gather up. Like, his dog, like, runs up, kind of barking, like, kind of looking up at the whole pack coming in. There's, like, 20, 30 wolves heading down. And with that, he is going to...

Dang it.

And as he uses an ability that he has to blink away and he and his dog are gone. You hear running in the distance though, and you hear the wolves that have caught up to you chasing after whatever happened. Or, you know, it seems like maybe he has gone this further direction, but it's hard to tell. And he is out of the picture at this moment. Was that pack tactic? Yes. Advantage. That was pack tactics. You see Roan...

proud alpha wolf of the pack approach look around sniff everybody he's like he's looking at you and he can tell like something is different with with you all he's like what you got the deer roan roan we have updates things you want to catch your breath things have changed in the forest oh with that we will end the first episode

very, very fun. We now have a pack of awakened or a pack of wolves here with a little offshoot of awakened wolves and a little baby. We're all Bradley Cooper limitless right now. We all, we all, uh,

Gosh, well, that was a very fun first ep. Thank you once more to Brennan, to Izzy, to Dova for joining us. Is there anything you want to plug or let people know where to follow you? You can check out this past season of Miracle Workers on TBS. I get to play a fun bandit named Hates Checkers Kevin on that series. Wonderful. And I think that's...

I think it's on demand on TBS apps and stuff.

I absolutely love it. Maddie Cordova on all the things. Cool. I am going to be on the Sex Lives of College Girls on HBO Max. I love it. Check it out, November 18th. Not in that first episode, though, so keep going. And Dimension 20, The Seven. Hell yes. Yes!

at BrennanLM on Twitter, at BrennanLeeMulligan on Instagram, and check out Dimension 20, youtube.com slash Dimension20Show or TrapHut.tv. Cool, cool. And I'm at Zachary on everything. We will, you know, stick around next week where we will talk about the events of this episode. And, you know, never has the arc bark, the title of the talkback made more sense than this. Yeah!

Thanks for listening, and we'll see you next week. Thanks. Bye. I hope that you've enjoyed that episode of Rotating Heroes. This has been Arc 5 with Matt Cordova, Izzy Rowland, and Brennan Lee Mulligan with Zach Oyama as your Dungeon Master. As always, please, if you've enjoyed this episode, take two seconds to drop us a review and help not only

new rotators find the show and if you're enjoying it and want more rotating heroes in your life then make sure you check out the rotating heroes patreon which is patreon.com forward slash rotating heroes pod or just in the description below you right there we also have a discord there's loads of other ways that you can get involved with the show so make sure you go check out those links thank you so much for listening to this episode and i hope that you have a wonderful time