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[E23 Q&A] Take a Bao, Birdman

As far as the money for Snidge goes, I think this made perfect sense. After all Berg is a raging Barbarian who is a slave (even if at the moment he is ‘free’); he’s not the type that would know about building costs or anything of that nature. Likewise Azriel is an angel descended from the heavens. He was in the mortal world purely to help Raziel, so it’s unlikely he’s spent a lot of time learning about mortal architecture and building practices.

That, and realistically the amount of gold they had wouldn’t actually accomplish all that much if he tried to be that realistic. For example, in the DMG to build a simple outpost or fort is 15k gp, and a simple trading post is 5k gp. So even if they’d given all the money to Snidge, by the rules of the DMG (and they are trying to stay relatively by the rules in CoS) the money was chump change. So by keeping it vague and open ended, Adam has the freedom to do more with less.

As for the gang situation, we seem to have understood it differently. From what I remember (and it is the next day, so maybe I’m remembering it wrong) but the thugs that showed up didn’t know the house was sold and weren’t the brains of the outfit. They were sent to get the money, demanded it, and when they realised they were in over their heads, they left, saying they’d bother the Blacksmith’s family instead. So as far as I’m aware the party isn’t expected to pay her debt. They’re mainly involved in this issue now because they want their armour, and the thugs fucking with the blacksmiths puts their investment at risk.

As for why the gang corruption thing is going on, that’s just Adam making his world breathing and real. He could have just hand waved a week of their lives and said ‘Yeah, you wait for your armour and then it’s done; now what?’ but instead he’s letting them live out that time and in doing so making the npc’s and the city matter. They now know more about who these smiths are, how worshipper’s of The Lover’s behave, and it also tested the morals of the party. I certainly didn’t know if any of them would just try to murder the thugs, or if they’d try to talk their way out of it. I didn’t know if they’d try to protect the smith’s, raid the thug’s base, or simply gamble and hope for the best.

That’s part of what I love about Adam’s style. The world grows and lives beyond the scope of the party, and not everything they see or encounter has to have some grand quest hidden inside of it. Sometimes it’s just the lives of the pc’s and some npc’s crossing paths, and it’s entirely up to them whether or not they get invested in that or not.

So to answer your question I don’t think Adam really has a plan for this gang situation. He’ll end up making one now I’m sure, but I assume it came up because the party asked for immediate housing with no questions asked, and someone trying to escape debt collectors certainly would fit that bill.

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All of this. I totally agree, well put.

It’s a testament to Adam’s ability to craft story on a whim. I doubt he had much of the gang interaction planned ahead of time. All around great session :itmejp10:

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one thing i will say is i am super surprised how chill everyone was with the blacksmith basically seeming to intentionally foist the pc’s (and her very well paying customer pc’s ) into this situation with yee olde mob. I would have some serious words for her.

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It feels so good to be understood. Like, seriously thank you.

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Yeah, if I were the PCs I would wonder about why the blacksmith didn’t tell me about this whole situation.

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I’m thinking that eventually Jubilant will collect enough words to speak normally but each word coming out in a different voice.

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Precisely how the elder bird spoke.

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I think we’re in agreement. Thank you for reminding me of some things. I was just remembering the first campaign and someone wanting full plate and a fiasco because of it. As I said above Adam is lovely and the way he crafts worlds is lovely. The party just has a chance to make a mess and parties have a tendency to make messes. Not that that’s inherently bad either when it happens.

Also what if JP could learn his INT in phrases per episode (or 10 + his int mod?) and retain say…the last month (four weeks) of phrases? He mentioned he wasn’t sure how he wanted to handle it.

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Adam I have a question regarding how the people of the town approached Azriel.
The first time they came there they blended in fairly well, even if the Aasimar came off as attractive in a primal manner.
However this time everyone seems to be able to identify Azriel as Tianshi without much trouble.
If it’s not a huge spoiler could you elaborate on this change?

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Thinking about it, that’d be an awesome reason for a young Kenku to go out and adventure. Get out there, adventure, see the world, get them words.

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So Adam, I had a question about the previous arc so I dunno if you wanna answer it here or not, but:

I wanted to know the reasoning behind using the Deep Gnome block and abilities as opposed to the actual standard rock gnomes?

Did it have to do with rock gnomes not having an actual stat block in the MM?

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I wanted to deepen the split between the two and show them mechanically being corrupt and having magic. I think these dudes were just the elite forces of the King. Good eye, though!

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They made a much bigger deal of their arrival this time, plus rumours had been circulating since their last visit. The tian shi are not unheard of but very rare and folks have been keeping an eye out.

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Don’t forget the orcish for great warrior or something that the tea maker also said.

Amazing character, I’m loving it so far.

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I think it’s pretty smart they decided to purchase that apartment from a meta perspective. The town is a great place to spend time in between having guests on the show and it’s also pretty easy to introduce new guests when in a town since there’s so many people coming and going.

Do 5e equipment lists include the pricing of things like
*throw pillows
*half-orc sized beanbag chairs and/or futons
*framed posters of musical groups
*a sign to hang on the outside door that says “Date Night - I need Privacy”?

They’re going to use the sock over the door handle trick. :slight_smile:

Here’s one for @AdamKoebel. More related to the whole show rather than this episode specifically, but anyways.

How far has the show deviated from your original idea? Like, due to how the story has progressed, are you still introducing your original ideas just in a more roundabout way? Or have you basically sidelined them until an opportunity comes along that you can wiggle it in there? Or has it basically been a clean slate since the first tpk?

next 4 episodes is dan reading the dictionary to jp.

Hey JP, here are some extra phrases Gale heard, just in case you want to expand your list.

azriel

  • You disgust me!
  • How dare you!
  • You can’t just take what you want, you have to earn it
  • Do you understand me? (threatening)
  • Only the evil ones
  • Cutting off the hands of this creature will do nothing, we need to cut off the head

5 guard captain

  • wheres the girl?
  • Pay up!
  • You are new in town
  • If you wanna be our friend, that’s fine.
  • We can always use more friends.
  • We don’t have names
  • Many thousand gold
  • No need for any of us to die
  • Tian shi had a change of heart?
  • You can’t change the will of the devil
  • People are bound to what they owe
  • Okay big boy, you’ll kill everyone in town (condescending)
  • the debt’s not ours, we’re just here to collect
  • maybe, maybe, what are you offering?

Blacksmith (June)

  • That one’s not done
  • Be quick there is work to do.

Masked Kid

  • Yes, elder sir, but in the year 912, did not the philosopher Yang say “…”
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