welcome to The game master Monday, the podcast that plays a
new one shot in a new system with a new cast every episode.
I'm your game master Grant and today we are playing a very Mork
Borg Christmas and original adventure written by me based on
Mork Borg by Pele Nilsen and my players are.
Dungeon dropouts brand new, up and coming AP with the small
group of mighty misfits playing Milky or the King of Thieves.
He's going to be bringing gold with him, hey?
Everybody, how's it going? I am GM Justin.
You can find me at all my socials at Forever GM Justin.
You can also find me over at Roll D5 where we specialize in
playing NDT TRPGS. I use he him pronouns.
I'm playing Balthazar, who goes by any pronoun.
I'm kid they them. If you'd be so kind, you can
find me places like dareful archives in the show Bloomin
Blight or editing TPTTRPGS like Cottages and Cerberus.
And today I will be playing Casper of the King of Beasts.
Let's go, let's go. He they, I'm feeling like a he.
They vibe. And he's the bearer of
frankincense. Let me tell you about the game
we're playing here today. So this is a very Morc Borg at
Christmas, which was written by me, and we're playing it in Morc
Borg. In case you couldn't tell, this
is a very simple system. It's a brutalist TTRPG.
We use AD 20 system. Anytime we need our characters
to make a role, we're going to tell them to roll the D20.
You get 4 stats in this game. They are Agility, Presence,
Strength, and Toughness. Everything in this game will
revolve around those 4 stats. Prior to recording, they also
loaded themselves up with a variety of items and spells and
abilities and modifiers in those stats and a little bit of HP.
And boy, we'll see if they make it across what's happening here
tonight, but we'll get into specific mechanics as we go
along here tonight. For now, are you all excited?
Yeah. Let's go.
This is going to be all right. Heck yeah.
We have some tiny fingers in We're going to mork these
boards. Maybe let's begin the adventure.
And lo, the star which they saw in the East went before them
till it came, and stood over where the young child was.
When they saw the star, they rejoiced with exceeding great
joy. We open on a desert of pitch
black sludge, a small fire roaring in a pit in an attempt
to keep those who gather around it warm.
You have been travelling E spurred by what you do not know.
It is dark, It is often dark, but perhaps a light is coming.
The world as it stands now has been devoid of hope, devoid of
light, living in a society where it seems darkness and evil rule.
And yet those who are wise know to look for the signs that hope
and light may be coming. Those who are wise, though, may
not be who you expect. We see three figures huddled
around this fire, each with their own collection of fancy to
not so fancy regalias and supplies, each of them kings of
their own dominions. Why don't we meet some of those
kings? Shall we Danny?
Tell me who we see when we see Melchior.
Melchior is a he's the king of thieves, but she wouldn't notice
it at first glance. You would have to look a little
bit closer to see some fire details.
He's kind of dusty looking. His brown skin put the bride
dirt on his skin makes getting kind of a Gray tin.
He's wearing a a almost like a burlap cloak in in the hood and
spilling out from underneath the hood is these long tangled Gray
locks. Of all intents and purposes, he
he looks like a peasant. But if you look a little bit
closer at his dusty and scarred face and and underneath his
nappy beard, he would see a mouth full of gold teeth.
Every single tooth has been replaced by gold.
His he's wearing leather, woven, very simple leather woven
sandals, and the cloak's sleeves hang down almost past his
knuckles. But when you see his hands, he
has gold plated fingernails and toenails.
And you can see him sitting at the camp, right in front of his
donkey, kind of mumbling to himself some questions as he
flips a coin, catches it, puts it on his wrist, contemplates
it, asks some more questions, asks flipping and going the
right way. Will we survive the next 5 miles
was all right, hum. Looking around the other guys is
I choose the right companions? You look to the sky as you
contemplate these questions, and hanging high above it, for the
past day or so at least you hope it's only been a day or so, has
been a bright star and you've been following it for as long as
you can remember in this journey.
Tell me, what drew you to the star?
Why are you following? Milky or is getting older.
He's been the king of thieves for quite some time.
It's not that he's not any good at his job anymore and he has a
band or a few bands of thieves working underneath them.
But he's gotten into a few intense scrapes the last few
times and his mortality is starting to be a little more.
He become a little more aware of his mortality.
He's seen some crazy things in this world on on the dark side
of what is to offer. And when he saw this star and
got word of what is to come, he figured, well, if all of this
has to exist and this underworld that I've been able to thrive in
exist and there has to be something on the other side.
And if there is, well, maybe I can put my chips in early and
get a pass when this is all said and done.
An early form of indulgence, if you will.
So we see you at this campsite, surrounded by two other
companions, flipping a coin back and forth.
If you open your ears, if you will hear the small but heavy
footsteps of something growing closer to camp.
But before we can talk about what that is, we have two other
kings to meet. Justin, who do we see when we
see Balthazar? You just.
See a mass of black clothing that is shaped around a figure
that no one else has really seen What they look like underneath.
In fact, you felt the cloth that some point just didn't like by
passing or by moving around. And that cloth is thicker than
what you would expect to be worn here in the deserts of the
Middle East. No one should be wearing these
type of garments, but Balthazar is is a dark very thick leather
cap on that expand about to about to their shoulders and a
mask that goes all the way out into that of a beak and you just
see as with his vision to on that mask there you don't can't
even see his eyes very dark what they look like underneath has
not no one has been able to ascertain when you go to sleep
at night. He's he is still wearing those
clothes. Anything could be underneath
them. But all he talks about, even at
this moment as he's sitting there is So one time I was
mixing up some herbs and I was putting a little bit of, of, of,
of rat of rat tail. And then I, I boiled it up and
then I figured this should be the cure for leprosy.
It turns out it amplifies it, but you would have known unless
we had actually done something about it.
Stranted. Several 1000 people died, but
that is a mistake that I was willing to to make.
And who knows if humanity will ever figure leprosy out?
Who's to say? Balthazar, You've been
travelling with this trio here for a little while.
It seems you've all become unified of purpose, if not on
purpose. When you first saw the star in
the sky that's been hanging over the land for the past however
long it's been, you hope merely a couple of days.
What drew you to it? What Wisdom told you to follow
it? I had heard that there was a
little patch not too far from like King where there were talks
of these spices that you can mix together and they were to make
this delicious remedy for malaria.
And when I went to go check it out, I stumbled upon some random
scroll that said some kid was coming here and you'll see the
sign of it based off of a off the star.
And I'm like, maybe, maybe the cure is there, or I continue to
spread tuberculosis, one of the two.
We'll figure it out. A healing childhood, a concept.
You will also hear the small heavy footsteps slowly
approaching your camp. You are mid storytelling tale of
the various concoctions you've been able to create in your
lifespan. But this light thumping comes
and you hear what you can only be describing as the flap of
large bats wings. But before we can do anything
about that, we must meet our final Magi kids.
Who do we see when we see Casper?
When we see Casper I, it is somehow still in stark contrast
to the other two that we're seeing.
We're already in stark contrast to each other.
This person looks like he hasn't seen the sun in ages.
He has sort of hair the color and perhaps also the feel of
damp sand. Looks a little unkempt and
there's a a depth to his eyes that hits it.
A lot of sleepless nights on this journey I think.
Much like Balthazar. Also dressed in robes that cover
a good portion of his body. Lots of layers.
Not as thick of a fabric, but lots of layers.
And they kind of seem to move of their own accord.
Even when he's standing still. Occasionally, you know,
something will reach out from the robes at a hand to make a
trade. A sandaled foot, a tail.
We don't need to get into all of that.
And there's always sort of a vague sound of it's like you can
hear him think. There's always just sort of a
vague chittering. It's not really words.
Sometimes it's coming from him, sometimes you can't quite be
sure. There's always just a little bit
of noise. You've been in their company.
You're a master of beasts, a wise man, journeying,
travelling, locating the star. What drew you to that star?
Where were you when you found it and why are you still following
it? Casper has seen a star like this
one time previously, and the night that that star showed up
in the sky, something great and terrifying happened to Casper.
He was awakened to the voices of beasts and given this gift
curse. Depends who you ask and on what
day. And so seeing this sort of star
again, hearing talks of this event, there's something in the
back of his mind that somebody else is going to be in a similar
position. And if people are going to be
expecting things of whoever this is, they're going to need some
help, you know, becoming the, the God that people are going to
want to see. Because there's been a lot of, a
lot of talk about this particular guy, kid, baby.
So he's, he's coming offering frankincense, you know, for, for
purification, for meditation, for spiritual awakening, all the
things that it's used for, but also maybe to offer some advice
to somebody with these new and weird and terrifying abilities,
where to take his place if he's taken a bit better by the
public, we'll see. We shall see indeed, and you
also begin to hear the thumping of feet, the flapping of wings,
and the small hiss of a growl beginning in the back of a
throat that is slowly approaching your camp.
You cannot see what this is, but you all can hear it.
So my Magi, upon hearing these sounds, what do you do around
your campfire? Milk your looks towards Casper.
I hear a lot of strange noises when I hang around you.
Is that coming from you 2? Any kind of points around
everywhere? No, no, that, no.
We have a new patient. This is concerning.
Sounds big. Better constitution, maybe you
can handle the stuff that I have.
There's that. What if we can't handle whatever
he has or it? We'll make note of it documented
and maybe we can find a cure. Or he is the cure, in which case
we kill him and take it his blood for studying.
You 2 have fun with that. Casper is going to hightail it.
There is a small wagon parked just a bit away from the
campfire, hightailing it over towards that y'all have seen
while we've been traveling. Taking that, Milky is going to
kind of get up, stretch. All right, well, on that note,
going to salute Beltazar and I'm going to jog over towards
Casper. He turns in the direction of
where this is coming from and says the doctor is in.
Please come join us into the light.
I would love to to to do your intake please.
For Melchior and Casper to make the inaugural role of the game
here, I need you both to make me an Agility check.
That'd be your D20 plus your agility modifier, or possibly
minus your agility modifier. I don't know your life.
That's between you and God. The DV to clear here is 10. 17.
That's going to be a three for me.
OK, you start heading towards your wagon.
Milky or you jump in there no problem, the heavy armor
clanking as you scatter and collapse into this wagon.
As for the other two of you who either failed to get away or
simply chose to see what up with that you hear a small voice call
out of the darkness saying. Fear not, for behold, I bring
you good tidings. Tidings of what?
Is it a new cure? A new disease?
Tell me it's a new disease. I need one.
Tidings of great joy which shall be to all people.
So so no, no cure disease. From the shadows you see an
entity known as a pale 1A smaller creature, but definitely
a heavy 1 of presence. It is completely bass in an off
white color. It has large ragged bat wings,
no face but a mouth, and is constantly dragging and thumping
ethereal feet, kind of dragging behind it.
Some may call it an Angel, some may perceive it to be a devil.
What you perceive is up to you. As far as levels of safety.
We will say Melchior is the furthest back and the furthest
away from any kind of potential danger here.
But being the wise men that you are, you would probably
recognize a pale 1 as a messenger of tidings for sure.
The kind of tidings they bring up for debates and the level of
threat they pose, entirely up to you.
Shit, I've dealt with these things.
I don't, I don't make deals. A lot of people I've met who
make deals with these things, they get rich, but they don't
keep it long. I, I tend to keep my riches to
myself for as long as possible and those deals, those deals are
sour. I was debating in my head how
I'm taking this, this hiding. It was either going to be me
getting the running start and then just dolphin jumping into
the back of the wagon or was going to be a baseball slide
underneath. I think I'm going to go with the
dolphin jump just because the visually I, I, I like the way
that feels and I'm kind of going to be peeking over the back of
the wagon and kind of whispering that to to Casper.
Casper is absolutely ass over tea kettle on the ground, the
robes sort of all akimbo and just probably, you know, 20 feet
away from the the the wagon and in spilling himself has spilled
the contents of his robes, which is to macaque monkeys about
about, yeah, big, you know, moderate dog size.
I don't know how big a monkey is.
Just little guys. They're all kind of scrambling
to like, hide under the robes, and then that doesn't work.
So they're hiding trend to hide in Casper's hair.
They're too big for that. So that's all happening and
being very conspicuous. And Casper is stage whispering.
Do you think if we leave him alone, we'll go away?
I guess that depends. That thing is here which is
going to make one, at least one deal.
So as long as he's our friend over there can square some away
with him, we might not have to deal with it.
I like that. I like that plan it he seems
down. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I think he's, he seems real down.
So I think I'm just going to leave him to it.
I trust him. He seems like a smart guy, you
know? OK, but like tellings of of
tithing? Cool, got it.
But what about a worldwide epidemic?
The. Tidings I bring you both herald
the beginning and the end. The cure to all and the Earth's
destruction. I'm listening.
You've piqued my interest. A tiny, long wretched finger
comes from the end of his arm as he starts stretching it out
towards the sky and points directly at the star and says
you have. Found the path.
You're going to see as Belthazar kind of reaches into his robes
before he pulls out of scrolls, like, oh, you're talking about
that one kid that's supposed to do something.
Yeah. And he's just going to toss it
at that, at the being in front of him.
It's just like, it's it's nothing.
There's no God. It's fine.
He catches it in his little shitty hand and he's whole.
He's clutching it like he's angry at the newspaper, like he
read something that has deeply soured his mood.
And he says. The child you seek is the Prince
of Peace, the future King, the Herald of destruction.
You say a lot of things right now.
I don't know if like, are you sending us to kill him or to
welcome? You're going different
directions. I come with a warning, two to be
exact. OK, we got 2 warnings the.
First warning, of course, is following the star will lead you
to the Savior, the Messiah, the Prince, asleep among sloth and
filth. Follow the stars.
You find the child in the Manger.
What you do with the child? Is of no.
Consequence to me, all I know is He will save all of mankind and
yet He will damn all of mankind. That is the first warning, so
you may understand what it is you seek.
Speaking in paradoxes and random shit.
OK, got it. Hypocrisy is at the core of the
child, unfortunately. The second warning, however, is
that Hell's Angels are well aware of what you seek and will
do everything in their power to stop you from finding him.
Your gifts. Magi.
Are essential to the Prince's ascendance to his Kingdom.
OK, so if I get this straight here, it doesn't matter what we
do, but as long as we follow the star to this quote UN quote,
baby, the Prince of Peace, if you will.
Quote, quote. End of times.
Quote quote. That's the first warning.
It's going to save your damn humanity.
I've been trying to do that for years.
I haven't even gotten that close.
Prodigy, am I right? Second one, Hell's Angels.
Someone should make a group about that.
Mark that down. We'll try to come and stop us
from getting there, even with the intentions of potentially
no, you know what? We'll ignore the last part.
But yeah, they're coming to stop us.
Got it. Cool.
Anything else? Your gifts.
What gifts? Who said anything about gifts?
Another little finger raises and points towards Melchior there in
the back and says 1. Of you has already planned to
give the child a prophesied gift.
And I kind of look over the thing, look down at Casper, look
around, point for it at me. You're going to see as belt
Lazard like turns over like even with the mass though, like you
can see expressions coming out. So like their eyes are like wide
eyes, air quotes, but he's like curious and then looks back like
OK, so gold, I'm assuming an. Ancient prophecy from an ancient
people says the child will be given gold, frankincense, and
myrrh, all of which the wise men carry.
OK, gold Frankincense. You know, murder.
There's only. I only brought it enough so that
way I can get to and from. I didn't.
I wasn't expecting to get you know what?
Nope. Nope.
That's fine.
It's fine. It's fine.
We'll figure it out. Got it.
Cool. 2 warnings. Give the things.
Maybe kill some things. Maybe spread some disease?
What you do with your lives and your gifts is up to you.
Whether you find faith or favor or opportunity or simply choose
to walk away from this mission, it does not matter in the Red
Divine Plan. All I can tell you is on this
day, a Savior born in the city of David, and should you choose
to seek Him, He will accept your gifts.
He will save us all. He will doom us all.
And he flaps his wings, blowing sand and dust with like strong
blistering winds directly at you, putting out your fire and
vanishing into the sky. Seat belt Bazaar's mask
seemingly blink blink before turning around.
It's like, OK, did anybody catch that?
It seemed there was a whole bunch of mumbo jumbo and on top
of that he's they said words. I understood what some a lot of
those words meant, but put together seemed like gibberish.
Yeah, Milky is going to hop on the back of the wagon.
Kind of does itself off, shake his head that that's not a good
sign for a lot of reasons. He just fanangled us.
We're we're we're in shenanigans now.
They, they act, they act like they're coming in altruistically
to give you some information. But by giving you the
information, they said she wore a path.
It's we're here now. I don't know, you said the two
warnings follow the start to to this to this baby and and then
then times. But Prince of Peace save us.
Well, actually, no, it should be save us, but also do us and
Hell's Angels will come. This is a really cool name to
stop us. If you'll write that down in a
little notepad, save that for later.
I'm so confused. So essentially it has told us
nothing. It told us everything.
The kid is good, the kid is also bad.
We are doomed but also it doesn't matter.
But also it does matter and our gifts are prophesied.
But it doesn't matter if we if we give up the the journey, I it
has told us nothing. But told us everything.
I still don't understand the prophecy bit.
That would require there to be some sort of higher being.
There is no God here, we're just existing.
Did you see that thing? I'm guessing looks over it,
Casper. I'm guessing you've seen things
weirder than that, haven't you? There's a long, heavy pause.
Depends on your definition. I'm more concerned about what
it's said than what it is. I mean it's things look odd all
of the time. Things say wild shit slightly
less. Yeah, I think it's the nature of
the thing, not necessarily the look of it.
And that thing's nature was manipulative.
If I could put a flavour to it. That is even more common.
I don't think those angels, those hills angels he's Speaking
of, they're going to be pushing us away, They're going to be
pushing us towards no matter which direction we go hear.
Me out, though, if we go, there are there are some new things
I've been testing out, so maybe I can spread some of those
things around every chance we get and we'll see whatever
happens from there. Maybe I stumble upon the cure of
leprosy. Maybe I come up with anthrax.
I don't know. We'll figure it out.
Maybe there might be some gold. It's definitely gold.
But also, I don't know what I'm supposed to give up.
And then you'll see as like, you pull out a little pouch and just
says mirror on it. And then he'll like grab a
little goop from the bit of the beak in the very front.
He's going to like lift it up just a smidge, put the little
goop in there, close it. And then you'll hear like a loud
This smells good. Yeah, if you, if you say so.
Kind of smells like like, you know what?
Never mind. Casper, didn't you bring
something? Casper makes eye contact with
one of the monkeys, sort of orbiting around his ankles.
Did you tell him? And the monkey points to the
other monkey chitters. The other monkey points to
Casper and Chitters. They're doing the spider man
meme at each other. Did you tell, did you tell them
about I checked in both of your pockets when we first met.
I just I was just checking. I didn't take anything but.
That makes more sense. If we're going to be traveling
together, it's it makes sense to know who's who's carrying.
What about their person? Point is, we're already we're
already doing it and I'm going to saddle to my donkey and jump
on back and on the side has two big ass bags of of of gold.
So what's the point of stopping now?
What's the point? Indeed, May as well journey.
To follow the star, to pursue a prophecy that may or may not
exist. To see what exactly destiny and
quote UN quote God might have in store for you.
Why? Not a good enough reason to go
anywhere. To follow the star successfully,
you must all pass a DV12 presence role.
This is going to determine if you can stay on course or if you
get lost. With my handy dandy smoking glue
guns dice, that's a 17. OK, a same.
OK I I got A7. OK, well, I'll tell you what
that means for you, Melchior. The other two are pursuing the
star, mapping things out using animal intuition, if you will.
They understand the astronomy of the whole thing, but you're the
king of thieves. You recognize an opportunity.
Your eyes are trained to look for glints in the sand and
diamonds in the rough, potential threats and enemies.
And as you venture, your eye is distracted by the vision of
three figures also traveling together, also appearing to
follow the star, although in a completely different path and
direction than you 3 seem to have landed on.
And it feels like your feet betrayed you as you can't help
but wander towards them. Do they look like our group?
Is it like or is this a separate group?
Does it look like a copy of our group?
Oh, vastly different from your group I would say.
In fact, if you would like to, you can make an additional
presence role to see if you can get a good grasp on these three
figures. That'll be a 10.
Let's do. That is a net 20 even.
A critical success in this game. You're going to see it with
perfect clarity. You see three other kings.
Although they don't appear as you would appear, you would see
one who seems to have the appearance of a a nude creature.
A long stretching nose, rib cages completely exposed, a
really tight waist, and carrying a large butcher's knife.
You recognize this creature as a goblin, but not just any
particular goblin. This one is where a large crown
on its head made of sticks and feces and dirt and grime and
Moss and all sorts of things that hold the sticks in place
together, thorns around the brim of it.
Standing next to to that that handsome devil, you see
something that looks at the physical manifestation of hate.
It looks like it may have been human at one point, but only in
the face area. It's face looks carved up and I
missing the rest of him completely covered in shadow.
You don't know if this is a creature or not.
At the top of its head does form a crown shape, the last thing
you see. Of course.
Pretty self-explanatory this one.
It is wearing a crown that it doesn't look like one it earned
and may have picked it up from somewhere, maybe from a dungeon,
raid, or a fallen victim. But that is quite simply a
skeleton covered in blood. The air of being kings, all
three of them, How some kind of symbol is showing me that
they're. That's certainly how they've
chosen to present themselves, at least.
OK. So that's skeleton King, goblin
king, and the ugly King. I don't know what the second
would be. For for a natural 20, I'll tell
you. He exudes an aura of of hatred,
of despising his fellow man and those around it.
A king of hate. Milky or is going?
How far away is my is is my original group?
I would say they are far enough away where they would notice
your absence, but not so far that you could not call out to
them. Milky is going to head over to
these new kings peacefully and calmly, kind of riding up on his
donkey. But as he does, he's going to
give out a little. Yeah, yeah.
But I'm going to give a little call in hopes that my original
group catches it. And I'm going to kind of sidle
along this group of monster kings.
And I'm going to kind of walk on something like, how's it going,
you guys heading over to head following the star.
Then I'm going to kind of point up to it.
But I'm going to keep a nice, just charismatic face.
The Goblin King is at least acting like he's in charge
around here. At least it's the most vocal 1.
He starts jumping up and down all around you.
You see pieces of skin kind of wriggling around on him and he
goes, we are, what are you up to?
It's with the star. What's your whole end game has
like waving a little kitchen butcher's knife around very
haphazardly. If he was in the Boy Scouts, oh,
they would take away his toten chip so fast.
There's no knife safety here. Oh, I'm going to black.
I got lost out in the desert, was following North Star but
that one seemed a little more reliable so I figured I started
making my way back towards civilization.
But I've seen a few other groups out here traveling this way as
well. Just curious.
Beautiful, make your presence roll for lying for me.
You got it 16. Beautiful Casper Balthazar you
hear you hear a bird call coming in from Milky or a previously
agreed upon signal if something were to happen or if one were to
spot danger. Balthazar would be in the middle
of telling a story and saying so yeah, no, he showed up.
He had all these symptoms, like, it's fine, don't worry about it.
I grabbed his arm and the next thing I know it slid off and I
told him it's fine not to pay a way.
What the hell was that? That bird.
Huh. Do you hear?
The bird. I think if Casper does hear the
bird, I think it's, it's sort of wrote at this point.
We'll just respond in kind, which is not exactly the
stealthiest move, but it's, I feel, I fear it's a force of
habit at this point with the amount of creatures that just
sort of hang out around me. There's just sort of a call and
response and I'm like, oh, shoot, that was that was Milky.
That was that was the bird. Oh oh.
That was the other bird. So oh, OK, got it.
Oh, OK, cool. You're going to see is he kind
of like looks around like this? It's like where is it?
Where? I think that's them over there.
As I'm talking to the goblins I I try to keep it subtle enough
to where the group come out. I talk with my hands a little
bit, so my gold plated nails kind of glint in the Starlight.
We've got the plague Dr. mask looking, and then we've got just
two monkeys stacked on top of each other, sort of appear
behind him on top of Casper's head, trying to get a glimpse of
of our friend. You are glimpsing towards your
friend. Given earlier successes, I will
say you are able to spot your friend and you see the glint of
golden nails from across the the desert and you can see three
figures standing next to them. And since you can see the glint
of fingernails, I think it's only safe to say you also see
the glint of a frantically waved around butcher's knife and the
goblin. Here's what you're saying
Melchiori kind of like lowers the knife and goes out.
So you're just regular wanderer then?
You're not trying to take something.
No, no, of course not. Actually just kind of looking
for safe passage. These, you know, these these
these deserts get quite prickly, you know, at night.
And you guys look, look tough enough.
Nice to meet you. Name's name's Belkior.
You just call me Bell. And what, what what can I call
you? A three fine looking gentleman.
We are the three kings of legend.
The the goblin says holding his knife.
I call myself Seth. This here the king of hates.
We call him Bent. And this here is the King of
Skeletons who we call. Bells.
Seth bent in bells. We seek to kill the Messiah.
OK, that's that's one. Yeah, that's one thing I suppose
reasons. I'm just curious again, just you
guys have a issue with babies not, you know, not kid friendly.
The shadowy figure who you now know is bent, opens his mouth
and you see thistles and thorns where teeth ought to be, a
tongue that looks like it dried up a long time ago.
And they say by order of King Herod, there's been a reward
placed on the thirst born of all in the city of David.
We figure that must be for the child who is going to bring
peace and topple his Kingdom. So why not cash in?
At the at the mentioning reward milk, you're going really
healing. Yeah, you want him?
You want anything like like pointing at you later excitedly
with the knife? I've heard a lot of different
things about this situation. No, I me personally, I'm just,
I'm just on my way home. But it's nice to meet you guys.
And it looks down at the goblin and he says, tell me something.
Yeah, I've, I've met a few people in of your, of your kind.
You really plan to split the reward with these guys?
Make a presence roll. Right.
Or teeth. As you sew distrust and doubt in
Seth the Goblin King, your compatriots start appearing
behind you. This is going to be seen as a
beneficial thing. They're not giving away your
position or exposing your lies. Because you see Seth's eyes
darting back and forth as he throws the knife in between his
hands back and forth at the same rhythm as his eyes darting.
And he turns to bent and bells. And he says, hey, yeah, why work
together when only one of us can collect it?
What were you going to do with us?
And Bent goes, oh, I was planning on killing all both of
you, quite frankly, if he was involved.
And, yeah, I mean, I thought you would recognize your lack of
power here, Seth. And the bloody skeleton puts,
like, a single dripping hand on Bent's ethereal shoulder.
And that's cute. Real cute that you think you can
handle us. Yeah.
Wait a minute. I think we're overlooking the
fact that you said you could kill the Goblin King and they
just start bickering among each other as Casper and Balthazar up
here behind you. As I see Mike appearing, I'm
going to kind of back. I'm going to slow down and let
them continue on their way. Saddle up with my group.
All right, you guys. May the best man win.
Enjoy that reward. I think I see my family here.
Yeah. Enjoy yourselves guys.
They don't even hear you. They continue arguing with each
other. As you're walking away you see a
butcher knife like kind of flying across the night sky and
landing straight up in the desert and Calisper and
Balthazar find you. Don't worry about that.
Was that Seth? Oh, you know him.
Yeah. What is it?
Little guy, big nose. The crown made out of feces and
all sorts of other things. Yeah, I helped.
Him. Yeah, yeah, No, I helped him
with the what is it, the old one, the old goblin, quote UN
quote king. Really.
They just take turns killing each other and taking the hat.
They are very fascinated by hats.
The last one was named Kevin. The guy before that was
Jonathan. Oh my God, Jono.
Oh my God. Yeah, yeah.
That's I may or may not have been hired by every one of them
for a specific thing. Listen, I in this day and age,
I. Mean you got to.
Get yeah in this economy too. Like, I mean, the least I can do
it. You can't you can't spread
global pestilence without a little bit of money to it.
So. Eggs.
Right, they pay good. They're at war.
If if you did, if you didn't do it, they were going to do it.
Somebody else is going to do it. You know it's rough, but you do.
What you got to do a? Small crown made of twigs and
feces and Moss now flies across the sky, a smattering of blood
across it, a new goblin King somewhere chosen, and a bloody
skeletal hand plops in front of all of you.
Drop it, drop it, drop. Just pointing at one of the
monkeys. Leave it.
And approaching the three of you is the king of hate bent.
Oh, hey, hey, Bent. Looks like looks like the
reward's all yours. Not quite.
Say again. You are following the star,
correct? I was just following stars in
general, not necessarily the stars, but it did seem like the
one to follow at the moment, that's all.
Important to not take chances, I fear.
Yeah, Yeah, I think the same thing.
I don't really take too many chances either.
I really tend to play it safe. Did you have you met my my
friends here? The king?
I mean, I mean, this is this is the Doctor and this is this is,
this is the monkey man. He's a they're, they're a
circus. They're a circus person.
Wait. We're heading home.
Well, now it's ADV of 14 for for presents for me.
Nope, that is a nine. Let the story be told.
Bent holds up a small clean
looking knife and is going to challenge the three of you now
knowing that you are competition for reaching that city one way
or the other and is. I know not if you follow
prophecy, I know not if you seek reward.
But you are heading my direction and you have seen what I am
capable of, so you must be removed.
Right guys, bit the king of hate.
This is the hate looking guy as you can.
I kind of just give him a quick up and down and I'm going to
kind of back away and it seems like you know, I'll let you guys
chat about that. Just start backing ways slowly.
Well, that's the. Question then for you 3, this is
quite literally a fight or flight situation.
Would you have to enter initiative or would you have to
find another way around the King of Hate?
I mean, the only way to stop hate is with love, so.
How would you like to love Casper?
I fear this is going to be something that requires
initiative, but I want to get rid of that knife and then go in
for the hug. Is it a hug?
Is it a grapple? Depends on how he responds, you
know. OK, we're going to try and
disarm him. Essentially, this is a flexible
system. I'll tell you what, roll AD 20
with your agility for me. Must it?
No, it should be. Actually I forgot zero's my
highest at. Wild.
I love work. Oh, that's ADV of 12, by the
way. No, that's a 7 for me dog.
I could help. I have two uses of my scrolls.
I'm going to burn the first one which is grace for the Sinner
and I can give you AD 6 on this roll.
Cool. You roll A7 earlier, right?
I was. Going to say, is that going to
be enough? I'm going to have to roll pretty
good or all right? No whammies, No whammies.
My brother in Christ, that is A5.
That's friendship. That is friendship.
How do you disarm the King of Fate?
With a hug and like a well placed like elbow to the wrist
sort of knock that, knock that knife away and then just just
we're bringing it in, bring it in buddy.
And then 2 monkeys I think 1 grabs sort of either ankle and
just also sort of hugs. Fantastic with with that
disarming and A and a hug given and and honoring the the nature
of what we're doing here, hit points be damned.
The King of Hate opens their mouth, let's out a terrible
scream. If there's one thing hate cannot
stand in the presence of, it is the unabashed acceptance of
kindness and love. Terrible words spewing from
their mouth like a volcano's eruption.
They dispersed and ethereal blackness overwhelming the all
of you and the 2 monkeys. A small face plopping into the
sand as the darkness forms back under the face grows 6 little
skittering legs and traverses the desert, going the opposite
direction of the star. That's right.
Let it out dude. You know, it probably for the
best that that happened because let me tell you, if one of the
if you are not a goblin and you were the one that took out their
king, like they're like roaches, then once they've invested like
it, it's bad. Like once they catch the scent,
it's nice. No one's stuck.
What are the odds that that's the, the, that's it.
And that's, that's the welcome party and that's the only one
that we have to sort of do. Low, Very Low very.
If I was a gambling man and I'm I'm a gambling man, that is a
low they. Keep talking.
They keep talking about these prophecies like, again, where do
these come from? As you ponder where prophecies
come from, the star begins to glow brighter.
That's probably fine, right? I'm sure there's a reason behind
it. How's it going, true believers?
It's me. You're Game Master Grant, and
I'm here in the middle of the episode to yell at you about
cool podcasts, starting with our friends over at Cybertopia AP.
Off the cool place treated under the bus, all four more amazing
cool traders are trying to make sensible and find their place in
the world once more. Last thing I remember the office
was going fine and then everything is going so it's time
to recover. I mean, so far I've been
hangover, beaten up, stole food, had an hour and a half hike,
dragging myself half to dance, got zapped half back to life,
everything stopping to rebuild. Well, I can dispense eggs again,
but the lemonade dispenser is doing steak sauce.
And we can make the friends, old and new.
Well. Fortunately not, not
everything's been lost. The T dispenser still works.
Search for subject your AP anywhere you find your podcast.
I started checking out Cybertopia this week in my never
ending quest to listen to every podcast, and I got to say, it's
pretty fun. If you're into sci-fi action, a
savvy game master who weaves their way through the rules with
beautiful understanding, table with good chemistry and
characters who have no last names, Cybertopia is probably
the one for you. I started on season 2 and yeah,
I know stuff happened in season 1, but you know what?
I didn't feel too lost. They're pretty good about
catching you up, so hey, why don't you so dive into that?
While I have you here, I want to talk to you about a new
miniseries that we're launching over at Game Master Monday
Presents this week. Join us this Wednesday, December
3rd at 5:00 PM Pacific Time for the first episode of In the
Bleak Midwinter Tales from Ghast.
In the Bleak Midwinter Tales from Gassed is going to be a
four part live miniseries from Game Master Monday Presents.
We are presenting this in partnership with Hatched Games
in anticipation of their upcoming horror scene collection
Gassed. We will be doing four solo, one
shot with a new storyteller every week on every Wednesday in
December of December 3rd through December 24th.
You will be hearing from some amazing storytellers during the
course of the series. We'll be kicking it off with our
own Co GM Supriya or Zoop with Red Skies by Finley.
Jinley will then be having Shaggy money from Rolling by
Myself performing Bog Berries by Gabriel Robinson, Yours truly
will be running Tanned Faye by Cat the Lore Mistress, and we'll
be closing out the series with Children of Heaven by S Kaya J,
presented by GM Justin who you're hearing on this episode.
That all begins this Wednesday, December 3rd at 5:00 PM Pacific
Time, with the Vauds being uploaded next day on YouTube.
If you're looking for something a little horrifying and chilling
to keep you warm this winter, look no further than Tales from
Gassed. Wow, so many cool things to
check out on the Internet. How lucky are you?
And you're even luckier still, because now I get to return you
to a very Mark Borg Christmas. Let's find out what it is, shall
we? That is a presence rule to
follow the star, or to continue doing so, at least.
DV is still 12. My God.
Oh no, I rolled another 7. OK.
So I rolled a 13, but my presence is a -2 so I don't
think that. I don't think that cracks it.
It does not. It's.
A 14 for me. Melchioran, Casper Perhaps
you're getting lost in conversation.
Maybe you're celebrating the bloodless defeat of rival Kenya,
seeking to kill your the the the, the, the child, the
Messiah, the Savior, the whatever that guy was talking
about. And before you realize that, you
find yourself not on the path that you seek, but surrounded by
a flock of sheep. You have lost track of Balthazar
as far as the eye can see. You see sheep with no shepherd.
Though he's, as far as they're concerned, like they're telling
stories and they're just like off on this tangent.
So how many sheep before it's not a coincidence?
I started counting sheep. How?
How many sheep? There's just too many to count.
It's an overwhelming number of sheep.
Even if there were a shepherd here, it would be hard to
wrangle them all up. They do seem single minded in
purpose. They are all kind of marching in
the same direction, but you feel as if you've been trapped in
some kind of crowded subway and especially aggressive mosh pit.
Just a collection of bodies bumping you, rocking you back
and forth. The softness of wool begins in a
way that might feel soothing, but the longer it's in there,
the more it irritates, the more it itches, the more your skin
begins to crawl, and it becomes very clear you're just trapped
in a sea of sheep. And if you look into their
little sheepy eyes, they don't seem to have pupils.
Their mouths are all open and drooling and they just seem
lost, disoriented, throwing you to and fro.
This mini sheep. This mini sheep is when it
starts to be not a coincidence in the morning.
Specifically this mini, if I had to, yes.
Also, they look like they're on some of Beltazar's serums, if
you take a look. A little drippy, yeah.
Yeah, I don't think that's how sheep normally sort of sort.
Of do. Glancing around, do any I can't
believe I'm saying this. Do any of these sheep have crown
looking implements on there? Is there a sheep king that we
need to be sort of aware of? I'll tell you what Casper,
you're the king of beasts. If anyone can identify a sheep
king, it's you. Make me AI guess your brain
rolls present thinking we have presence roll.
DV is 8. OK.
All right, OK, all right, 15. We got ourselves a classic sheep
with no master here situation, no shepherd, no king lost,
unwashed ruling masses seeming to have no aim, no direction and
they are continuing to Rock You 2 back and forth.
If you don't find a way out of here soon, these sheep may begin
to cause harm. So while you contemplate how you
can possibly escape a sea of sheep, Balthazar, we return to
you, the bleating of sheep far in the distance, you mid story
with no audience. And then that's when I said,
what if we? And then you'll see as they turn
around, like ask where everybody go.
Have I gone off on a tangent again?
That happens. Silly me.
I, I'm going to say, I think what they do is backtrack to
where he last remembered talking and seeing with the with the
rest of the group. That could be maybe 5-10 minutes
away. That could be about 3 days away,
Who knows? Because he goes, he goes on
tangents, and that's the thing that she does.
So we're just going to turn around and then in pure silence,
start walking backwards. Very curious about all the
sheep. But that's yeah, it's fine.
An unusual number of sheep. Again, not an uncommon sound to
hear out in the desert. There are, after all, shepherds
guiding their flocks to where they ought to be, but there's
not normally an Armada. Sound of sheep.
I feel like I'm having this role of law, but it is the the brain
1. So I need you to make a presence
role to see if you can find your friends.
That's a nine. OK, so with a nine, as you scour
and search for anything, all that begins to happen to you is
you are overtaken by a separate collection of sheep.
I think as they walk up on the second thing of sheep, he's
going to take a look and he's like, are you guys my new
patients? I think you are.
And then yes, yes, you guys are all healthy.
And then as he's just continuing to giggle, he'll pull out like a
little vial and he'll it'll just simply say Q fever.
I'm going to pop the thing out. And then just like right on the
lips, like you have fun, closes it up, puts that away.
We're going to call that a strength role to see what this
does to a flock of sheep. That's. 19 to 19.
Wow, that'll do her describe to me that that vial, that illness
that is spreading like a wildfire amongst the population
of. Sheep, well, that's it's, it's
not, it's, it sounds bad, but it's really it's just the flu
that can also be transmitted from sheep to sheep herder.
So it's going to fly on by that. I don't see a shepherd around
that's good. Maybe they won't catch it.
Maybe I've missed them. And all he's going to do is just
tap one of the sheep on the head and it's like, you have fun.
Hopefully we survived this. I don't know, we'll see.
And then he just goes off whistling A jaunty tune.
Yeah, the the illness spreads quickly and aggressively through
this herd. You never stop to see the
aftermath of your work, it would seem, but they have slowed to
the point where you are able to cross the desert and escape, and
at this point you will now see your friends caught in a
separate herd for Melchior and Casper.
I will tell you that you didn't get to see any of that because
you've been overcome by sheep in the time it took for a Plague
Dr. to introduce a new illness to an entire community.
What schemes have you concocted to escape your personal sheep
purgatory? I have I have two thoughts on
this because I'm getting bumped around.
First off, I have a friend named Frank W used to hang out with
them robbed the graveyard bunch of zombies.
He used to jump over their shoulders.
I figured we could just jump from sheep to sheep until we get
out of this second idea. And I kind of look at Casper and
I looked at their their monkeys, and how would the king of Beasts
like to be in control of or heard of even sheep?
Control is such a such a strong word, but I I could befriend
some sheep. Yeah, I don't know that I have
much in the way of like command sheep.
That's not really a spell that I've got sort of unlock, but I
do have this scroll and I don't think I don't think Casper pulls
the scroll out. I think one of these monkeys
pulls it out and this is the scroll of Lucy fire levitation.
I think these these two monkeys sort of sprout wings all of that
super popular IP of and just grab a hold of Casper and just
pull, pull them up. Yeah, you can hover for presents
and get out of this whole mess. Roll the D 10 for me.
Sure, that's a nine. However you want to measure this
length of time, you can hover for 9 rounds, which means you
and your flying monkeys wherever they come from.
Surely that's something we can reference?
You have escaped. You're there and you look down
and you see Melky, or you look down and you see Balthazar.
So I guess the question. I probably can't lift another
guy. I would consider that a round,
but I would make you make a strength check.
I can check. We can check that out.
We can check, we can see if we've got some strength in the
back. Great.
Hey Melky or Romeo D12? OK.
We're going to see how heavy you are.
Oh no. There's a just a straight D12.
There's just a 2. All right, we'll make a strength
check. The DV is 2.
Watch me crit film. Oh God.
Could you? Could you imagine?
No, we're good. That's 18.
You see Melchior in a CEO sheep asking for uppies.
Just a very easy person to pluck out of the sea of sheep.
And you do so and you are able to return to the path to the
star. In true Casper fashion, it is a
bear hug to sort of grapple him up into the air.
Oh. Yeah, this is this is good.
I I understand what happened to Ben now this this is nice.
This is nice. Don't don't turn into a bug.
I'll try. I'm still I'm still figuring out
how bugs. Is that a thing that happens
that would? Be kind of like a whole ordeal.
I would like to. Well, I don't think I don't you.
Can put me down? We can stop this down, OK?
Yep. We will say for the foreseeable
future your monkeys have wings and whenever you want to use
that there is a certain number of times you can do so.
So we'll say your winged monkeys, your your lucifier.
Levitation has eight more uses. In this one shot you are
reunited with Balthazar and it is that time where we make a
third and potentially final D20 role for presents to follow the
star. 7. 513. Starting with you though Casper,
you are able to locate Bethlehem, the city of David, a
bustling town that has had a sudden influx in tourism
recently after a certain Angel and a certain star and a certain
amount of livestock. It also so happens to be the
city where King Herod has asked people to meet to pay their
taxes this year. So on top of an already bustling
administrative trip for many people, there's also a spiritual
significance to the city here today.
And as you enter its gates with your winged monkeys in tow, you
note the lack of Melchior and Balthazar.
Awesome, guys. I think we're here, damn it.
On the outside of the city, you 2 would recognize soldiers of
King Herod. They are dressed in the armor
and the weaponry of the King's servant, the previous kings you
encountered. Melchior noted that there was a
plea to locate and execute the first born child of several
families. And these soldiers look like
they have been indulging in said activity.
Blood at the tip of their Spears.
And they have not seen Casper entering the city, but they have
seen you 2 and have pulled you aside for questions.
What business brings you to Bethlehem?
Just looking to check up somewhere taking a trip and this
is the first stop on the one of the you know stop on the way so
I'm just trying to find somewhere to get some rest of a
spike. And your travelling companion.
I'm the doctor. He's the doctor.
He's a doctor. Yes.
How are you feeling today? Oh, that's a great question.
Give me a presence role for me. That's a six.
A6 I keep meaning to mention the DV, but a six is going to get
you something for this one. As a matter of fact, as you
asked this person how are you feeling today, you are able to
get like this glimpse behind the armored mask the helmet brought
down. You see the classic signs of
decay on the skin, A yellowing, A greening, the eyes no longer
symmetrical. These are not merely soldiers.
These are zombies. Some of your handiwork.
Unfortunately, no, I've not. I don't dive into the world of
necromancy mostly for principle. You would you would figure like
there would be kind of like some some crossover with what I do.
No, I only look to save the living or bring around their
death instruction. It's one of the other.
I don't look to do like the whole rebirth kind of a.
Deal. You like to mix, you don't.
You got a peanut butter chocolate kind of guy.
No, it's just like it's either one or the other.
Got. It in this case, this is my
peanut butter and that's someone's chocolate.
A look around if there are any signs of our heavenly armored
friend Casper. You see Casper just absent
mindedly with no problems, walk through the front gates in a in
a crowd of other people. I'm going to just tip my hat,
tip my hood to these fine zombie guards and I'm going to say
mother as my mom over there. This is her doctor.
Actually, we keep him on standby.
They're they're very, very ill, very ill.
So we just was going to go catch up with him.
If you don't mind. She can't be on.
They can't be on their own for for too long.
Mother. Mother dearest.
The guards cross their Spears as you try to convince them the
third wise man is your mother, and they say if this is true
then that would make you first born.
Second born actually, my my brother actually just got
killed. One of your guys got him on the
road and yeah, that was that was traumatizing.
So you can imagine I'm not in the very, you know, emotionally
well placed at the moment. Mom's sick, brother's dead is
you know. Give you a choice here.
You want to roll Presence or Agility?
Shit, I'm going to roll agility. Oh, that's ADV of 10.
Oh OK, I got a 12. 12 it is How do you outrun a zombie?
I am going to, as he moves forward to try to grasp me, I'm
going to say ah, and I'm going to take his arm and kind of judo
move him out the way using his own momentum and kind of just
slink past them. Just follow my lead Belthazar.
And I'm just going to start booking it down as far as I can.
That brings me to you Balthazar. You watch Milky or book it for
lack of a better turn here, leaving you with two zombie
yards. One of them begins to hoist
their spear to throw and the other slowly puts a hand on them
saying no, no, we rolled A5, we wouldn't reach him anyway.
I'm going to go. I have things I got to do.
I hope you understand. You're a doctor.
I am, yes. The zombie leans in very close,
big big heavy smell of death and Nikkei on this guy's breath, and
he whispers quietly in a way that he hopes the king won't
hear and says, can you restore us?
No, no, you all are dead. I don't like I said, I don't
mess with necromancy. And to be very frank with you,
whoever brought you back to life is like a 1 trick pony.
That's like once you guys like brought back to life, it's like
you guys are stuck kind of stuck wandering here.
And it's like if you ask them, hey, can you put me out of my
misery, they're like, oops, sorry, can't do it.
And then they'll Chuck deuces and then like leave you to deal
with that on your own. I like I said, at least with me,
I it's one or the other, but it's always with an intense
purpose. I can't help you, I'm sorry.
The other zombie pulls out a small knife and cuts his
friend's hand off, watching it plop onto the ground, picks it
up, scoops it into his and he in a way where like if you gave
someone a handshake and they slip the fiber into your hand as
a thank you. Does that but with a decayed
zombie hand and does bring this to the savior.
I will do that. I will definitely do that.
Be on the lookout. I'm cooking on some stuff, maybe
some more of you guys later depending on your who your one
trick pony guy is. We'll see.
And you are excused thanks to your your status and your friend
and some bad roles from behind my DM screen and.
You are rejoined with Melchior and Casper now in the city of
Bethlehem, in a large crowd, people seeking places to sleep,
people seeking places to eat, people in long, long, long angry
lines to pay their due to the Kingdom of Herod.
Well must be Prince, but they said it's the just as such these
rolling around in shit. But didn't that a baby anyway?
That is. That is a baby.
That is fair.
If he is a baby, we should look for a baby.
And babies cry and scream. We could listen for a baby.
I put my hand to my ear. I love this baby.
OK, we're listening for a baby. Could be any baby.
Anybody's got a baby? Looking for babies here folks.
That'll be ADV 14 presence roll for me please.
Can I get a baby check? Don't check the corners because
nobody puts baby in the corner. Roll for babies.
That's a 13 to baby. OK.
That's a six to baby. Nice.
OK. That's a net 20.
What do you know? What do you know?
I don't, for an AT20I won't even make the other two get lost.
I'll simply tell you what you can find or hear.
So we have three strange men wandering around the city of
Bethlehem asking for any clue of a baby walking up to Italy,
sobbing babies, some mothers kind of slowly turning away from
them as the inquiry gets stronger and stronger.
But then it becomes apparent through interviewing certain
people that there's been a tale of an inn somewhere in town that
was accepting families for a while.
So if anyone was going to have babies as lying around for what
you potentially seek, there may be an inn in town.
And for a natural 20s, you might find just the person who has the
information you're looking for, an innkeeper, standing at the
reception desk area, brushing people off, letting some people
in, several small burlap bags of gold scattered across their
desk. And for those who may be so
inclined, you may notice of that natural 20 the occasional spark
of magic coming off his fingers. Can I tell what he's doing with
this spark of magic? Is it just like, is it just me
noticing magic on him or is he actually doing something?
It doesn't appear to be doing something that seems to be just
sputtering out of his fingers every now and again, The magic
landing kind of generally nowhere like a campfire
sputtering or a firework sparkler.
Well, guys, I think I think this is the place that guy up there
is looking like a sweet lick to be honest, if you don't.
But he's doing something and I'm not 100% sure what it is that
makes me uncomfortable but I got a feeling with everything going
on this might be might be it. An old decrepit voice.
Next, next, please. For the love, just get up here.
Who is next? Next please.
Is this the line for the baby? For the baby.
Do. You need a place to sleep or no?
We're, we're looking for some friends who I think are already
sort of in here. So like not a new, not a new
sort of get up. OK, fine.
He puts his fingers to his forehead.
You see like magic imprints left behind on it.
And let's see, he has a little like soft spots still on his
forehead that leaves like a weird like millimeters, like
deep in dents when he moves them and they kind of slowly fade
back into place. This body might not be
completely dead, but it's not completely alive either.
And they say, who are your friends?
Who are friends? Depends on how much room is in
the room. Sorry, are you are you good?
You seem like you're having a, like you're having a rough
night. I have been creating
availability throughout the day, so I'm going to require your
money, I'm going to require your names.
I need your time. Do you have the things I need to
put you in the inn? Casper sort of turns glances at
the other two. Like thumbs up, thumbs down.
OK, yeah, yeah, yeah. How much what, what is it?
What is a room cost for the? You talk slow.
Room cost. I require silver.
You tell me how much you have. It determines the room.
What's like a good is like 10? Is that a good amount?
Like looks at you counts 123 and then 2 monkeys and a donkey, no.
30. 30 pieces of silver. While you start raising them up
because that's a very bad haggling that you're doing.
I'm not the business king, I'm the beast king. 2 distinct areas
of expertise. Puts my hand on on Casper, sort
of. Whoa, whoa, wait, won't
everybody friend? Do you have something maybe a
little more downgraded? Maybe like we got a lot of
animals and stuff with us. You got something like because
we can stay in a barn. What is with people than barns
today? There is a Manger in the back,
but it's occupied. I mean, if they don't mind the
company, I we just need somewhere to settle down.
At least in between you and me, I have no problem with you going
in there. I'll take the tents a little for
that. Easy.
There's just there. There's like those others,
There's a new baby or something back there, and it's been
screaming all the night and it's starting to give me a headache.
He taps his forehead again, a little dense pop up in there
again, little sparks of magic fiddle fizzling in there, then
sparking out. I'll.
Give Casper a little squeeze on the shoulder and once he starts
mentioning all that. Yes this.
Yes, we need Manger for the creatures.
Saves me from having to create a room again for the evening.
Fine. You may use whatever part of the
Manger is still available. Be warned, a lot of people have
come asking about it. So there's all sorts of smelly
animals and shepherds and unwashed masses there.
I'm not responsible for that. That's on.
My kind of people, you know. So be it.
Next, please. Please with the next.
Come on. You are brought to the back of
the Manger. It is the dark of night.
There is an angelic glow to this place, a strange sense of peace.
Perhaps he really is that Prince.
You see shepherds knelt in prayer.
You see a father dutifully making sure that his wife has
everything that she needs to handle the newborn child,
directing traffic, simply whispering in unhashed tones to
those who are coming to see the child.
But you 3, you 3 are denizens of the dark, no stranger to the
oddities of the world and it's wicked magics.
And before you can even reach any of this beautiful tapestry,
this nativity, you see a creature only spoken of in
legend, a large white Wyvern, completely wrapped around the
entirety of the stable, guarding it.
Who's to say? Waiting for a meal?
Who's to say? But this is the great Wyvern
Ulotha, Asleep. Asleep near the Christ child.
Does do the people in the barn notice you love them?
Are they? Are they, How are they reacting
to this presence? They don't seem to pay it any
mind if they can even perceive it.
The mother is staring happily into the baby's eyes.
The baby is not making even a peep.
Shepherds are praying even be animals present seem to have
knelt in its presence. Something about the baby seems
to either be distracting them or shielding them from the
knowledge of this Wyvern. That's a big baby.
If that's the baby, that's the biggest baby I've ever seen.
We should really check out the mother.
So I have thoughts. The first one is to tell who all
of those people who are praying to get up because they're like,
I don't know why they're even. No, I'm sorry, I'm sorry.
I'm sorry. I'm going to go on attention to
you. Not going to do that.
I'm going to do that. We should, yeah, we should
probably try and figure something out.
Should I break out a new disease?
You have a new one. I'm cooking on a lot of things.
Called an. I'm thinking of naming.
It Enola. You know, I would say when I
leave. I think you you can do whatever
you want to do. But while yeah, yeah, yeah.
But it looks like it's sleep and they don't seem to mind there.
Maybe, maybe it's not a threat. Maybe it's just of mass
hallucination, maybe it's friendly.
I do a lot of things. I experiment a lot of things.
Hallucination is one that's done purposely, and I could tell you
I've not done any of that. How comfortable are you with
your monkey? Getting closer.
I mean, I feel like that's up to the.
Monkey sort of just squats. Down eye contact direct.
With the monkey, the monkey seems to not want anything to do
with. This my the my notes say that
the monkeys. Ignore but love me so down to
clown but only only vaguely, but the monkey so the.
Monkeys can fly. Currently, still currently, yes.
They have 7 flies left in them. Seven whole flies.
I I perhaps. I I wonder if I if I may, could
we fly a monkey over this this creature, this large baby?
And into. The sort of Manger proper to the
secret second baby Milky or you you've you've been flown by the
monkeys. Is that would you like to do
that sort of thing again? Is this a bring the baby to us?
Did you I feel like that's going to start some some shenanigans.
Oh yeah, if we if we sort of bring the baby out.
Oh yeah, 2. Little shenanigans.
We could bring the gifts in. If it's more of just sort.
Of like a a delivery, sort of a drop.
Off situation I'm of two minds. We could.
Deliver these. Gifts.
And I'm just simply looking for favor.
I'm I'm good with that you get. Much more favor.
If if the baby is ours, that's that's a lifetime worth of
favors. He doesn't know who his daddy is
right now. I see the vision.
I see the vision and I do I appreciate.
The sort of the. Sort of hutzpah that we're we're
putting on it all of the King's horses.
And all of the King's men are sort.
Of in town right now and I, I fear we may need to get the baby
sort of out of that vicinity before we could be raise it as a
sort of 3 1/2 wise men sort of thing.
Do you think we can do that? I'm not saying no.
I'm just like reading the room. Can we do you know at this
point? We've made it through a lot,
seen some. Crazy things and haven't got a
scratch. I am tending to believe that we
can do pretty much anything we want.
I think this is destiny. OK, so one vote for.
Kidnap the baby and fight our way out.
Doc, how you doing? OK, but like hear me out though,
what if? You're going to see as he like
pulls out a pouch and it's a. Zombified hand.
It's like what? If right, we switch out the baby
for the hand and then run away while tossing in my my.
Enola virus, OK. Slow things down.
It's really, it's really fast. Question.
Yes. Sort of a follow up, have you?
Seen a baby before? That's a.
Complex question to ask, could you clarify a?
Little bit more like a human baby, like a humanoid, like an
alive baby is. I think living like just are you
familiar? With this the general size and
shape of a human child, I think. Is sort of where I'm outside of
a jar going with that situation. Oh no.
No, no, they're. Generally inside of.
Jars or they've. They've they've ceased to to
exist. So yeah, no, only pickled then
yes, I fear they they look a. A bit different.
Sort of UN unpickled, fresh it in the flesh.
I can't. There's not a good way to say
any of these words. If there were like a good a good
book of good things. None.
Of these words. Would be in them that's.
If only, what so OK, then look. All I know is follow star elites
that leads to this Prince of Prince of Peace.
But end times. So why don't we just go in
there, say, hey, we've been we've been sent by God to come
by and raise the child on our own and we'll bring it back
after he's. A adult?
I don't know. We'll trade him.
Yeah, that's. What?
That's what the. That's what they're all about,
right? This.
This God thing. It needs a montage and I think
we can give that to him, yes. A sort of a sort.
Of a training montage. I mean, it's to raise the.
Baby, that's if he survives. I don't know I'm.
Like I said, I'm. Working on stuff.
You know what? Damn it, I'm with it.
I'll start walking. Yeah, yeah, I guess I'm free for
the next 30. Six years.
For your game masters. Benefits.
What I'm? Hearing is we are walking into
the. Manger we are convincing Mary to
just hand over that thing and raise it as our own, and we're
walking out. We're going to train it to be
Samurai Jesus. For the record, we're just
walking on in. Which means we are walking past
a sleeping. Wyvern, I'm going to need you
all to make ADV 12 agility roll. Can I get advantage for monkey
crimes? Of flight, yeah.
Yeah, OK. Yeah.
You can sure we. Got the wings?
Why not? Kind.
Of jazzing this a little bit I've been rolling really good
but I'll also. Been rolling really bad.
Guess which one it is this time? Good.
So 6 6. OK. 16.
For the monkeys. 16 for monkeys with.
The assistance of flying monkeys Casper will get past. 12
Balthazar and Casper while you. Discussed this Balthazar
waltzing. In and his.
Plague, Dr. Way and Casper floating in on the wings of a
monkey. I need you to make a toughness
roll here for me, Melchior. And remind me what your armors
deal is. What's your minus on arm?
I can roll a D6 and I decrease the damage taken.
By what I roll, I believe the first thing I needed to do is to
see if you're going to take damage in the 1st place.
That's the toughness. Roll the DV.
Is 14 Wyvern wakes from its? Slumber.
It bites you. You.
Feel the pressure of a large creature holding you in its
mouth. You will avoid paralysis, so you
will not be stuck in this situation.
But go ahead and roll that D6 for me 6.
I only will have three. You will not take damage.
From the. Bite.
It will chomp. At you, you, the armor chipping
its teeth, it dropping you on the ground and then going back
to sleep. A small little trickle of blood
on its pure white face, but you're alive.
Breathing heavy on the ground with my hands just kind of
looking. Up and slowly compose myself,
dust off and just continue to walk forward a little shaken,
the Wyvern asleep in a Manger, no straw for it's bed and.
You find the child. One more time for funsies
everyone. I need you to make a a presence
roll. To see if you can even be in the
same vicinity of something so pure, so holy.
And that is ADV of 14 for presents, Nat 20, baby bestie 2
for two. There's also.
A Nat 20 I got a. 14 on the diet.
I guess the stories are true three wise.
Men finding the Christ child. Asleep in the arms of his mother
Mary, you are all able to stand in its presence.
And there is, in fact, in this moment, an aura of peace, of
calm, of tranquility. This baby, this child has been
described as many things over the course of your adventure.
The Prince of Peace, the Savior, the Messiah, the bringer of
destruction. For some reason, a baby born
that will be spoken of hypocritically in life and after
its demise. But right now it is a child.
You each carry a gift and you all have an idea.
What do you say to Mary previously?
Nothing was previously shaken up from this.
Insane. Wyvern attack, but any?
Steps inside. The Manger that that fear and
anxiety that that shaking is. Completely washes away.
And just looking at the scene with that, it's just.
Those devious thoughts? That were here before.
He begins to almost question a little bit and he doesn't.
Necessarily understand why. He's just able to be in the
presence, but it's still kind of in awe.
And considering everything, that's.
Happened it like just being protected and all those insane
moments and to make it to this point and he's or once in his
life he doesn't know? What to?
Do flips a coin, grabs it, considers looking at him, just
puts it back in his pocket and he kind of just walks forward to
the family and gets down lowers itself.
Sorry, I don't mean to intrude or anything.
I'm Milky. Or how.
How are you folks holding up here?
The mother nods at you. Makes eye contact with you.
And then simply looks back down at the smiling, glowing baby.
Yeah, I. You know, crazy, but I guess
but. It's a lot of people out there.
Looking for this baby I think you know they want.
To do some. Really bad stuff to it.
They're doing some. Really bad stuff to a.
Bunch of other babies. Is this is this a burden for
you? Are you scared?
Mother Mary looks at you and she.
Ponders that for a moment and she says to you, I think all
mothers are scared, but this one's important.
So I can be brave. So I'm.
Guessing you know, right? Mary, did you know?
I've been told. Some.
Something. Came to speak to sorry these are
these are my friends some other kings.
We spoke to something and it told us that this child would be
great, do some amazing things, usher a time of peace, but would
also be some not so great things that would.
Come along with that, did you? Did you get that same story?
We were visited by an Angel, told that.
This child would be king. Of the Jews would.
Be a Prince of Peace would be the savior to free us from the
clutches of the emperor's we deal with and would be a guiding
light for humanity. We were also warned that there
would be those who would seek to.
Harm him and misinterpret. Him and use his words against
humanity so in a sense we've been told I.
Don't know in this. Moment what he will be.
He still has a life to live. Can I be honest with you?
Mary, yeah, you know, first. I.
I brought something. I've been collecting gold.
I don't really make the I'm more of a taker.
Than a, than a giver? I've never really.
Given away anything in my life, but this is a good amount of the
gold that I've saved up and I was I've I've been a bad man for
a long time and. I was kind of looking to seek.
Favor I've seen a lot of weird things and I figured this isn't
as weird as the other things, so I figured you know why not.
Then had the idea of. This is more recently, it's
kind. Of spurs, the moment, impromptu
things. So, you know, it's not
necessarily been stewing, but we were.
I was planning on taking the baby for myself in order to keep
that favor. Joseph turns around.
Sir, you know, just being honest.
Look, I don't know what's going on, right?
But. Think, I think I'm just going
to, I'm just going to leave this with you guys and do it what you
will. Something just tells me that
this is just going to play out like it's supposed to and it
doesn't matter. What I do in this moment?
Drop the bags of gold and just start to walk away.
She accepts it happily, kindly Balthazar.
And Casper, you watch the King of.
Thebes for the first time As for as long as you've known him,
leave gold behind, no baby in hand.
Now walk out and I'm I'm still not concerned about the wife and
I. I don't even look at.
It and I almost look. Past Beltazar and and Casper and
say, well that was that was an unexpected feeling.
I guess if you guys had managed to.
Take the baby, give it a shot. So we're not taking the baby.
I couldn't. Baths are just going to turn
over to Casper and be like, what do we do?
I'm going. To level with you.
I don't know that I'm ready to be a dad.
OK, that's fine. You know, we'll just.
We'll. We do have to give if we're if
we're going to. Leave the baby with the mother.
We got to at least give the. Gift.
So let's Casper go give them your gifts and I will be the
last one to do it. That's fine.
Casper will be voluntold. I I think sort of walking up a
little hesitantly, realizing the sort of weight that must be
present if it. Turned somebody.
Like Melky or from from his ways, Casper's sort of doesn't
seem to want to go up there. And is beat.
To the punch by those 2 monkeys that I think sort of skitter up
past from under. His robes.
And sort of up to the feet of the mother.
They know better than to grab for the baby, but they do seem
very interested and probably start doing that thing that
monkeys do of like picking little critters off of like
Mary's clothes or whatever. There's something that has
changed in these monkeys, these devious little monkeys that is
maybe similar to the thing that has changed in Belky or and
Casper's not really sure how he's been feeling about all of
this. He was just.
Kind of along for the ride. And felt the need to be here,
but doesn't really know what to do anymore now that the moment
is sort of there and just sort of approaches the collection of
folks around the baby and just sort of kneels down your.
Mother nods at you. An acknowledgement.
Of. What this moment means for
others as opposed to for her. Casper sort of Pats the robes a
little. Bit frantically.
Looking for something and then looks back up and the monkeys
are both offering little pouches in their little monkey hands up
towards the mother Mary. I I'm not.
Certain of the protocol for. This but I know that we are not
alone in. Having burdens, being born.
Into this world and if the prophecy.
That we have been. Told if what has LED us here has
any weight, yours will not be an easy one, and yours looking to
marry has already not been. There is not so much a
difference between beasts and man.
And that can be both a blessing and a curse.
To both of us. But it seems he will be good.
To both the. Mother.
Accepts the pouches of frankincense from the two
winged. Monkeys and the wise man
Speaking of human nature and she she smiles at you with a smile
that. Completely and.
Utterly agrees with you and must stay strong regardless.
You'll see Balthazar just take a look as.
They begin to head on up to the major and you'll see.
They'll get close. They'll.
Get. Really in the space to like
take. A look at the baby.
And then look at the mother. Baby again.
And then they'll. Stand up and.
You'll see as. They grab the beak of the mask
that they've been wearing this entire time and then they'll
pull it off and you'll just see like long black hair, kind of a
mix of of femme features with a little bit of mask, dark tan
skin, as you'll see as they reach in and pull out like the
little bit of mirror that they had at the tip of the beak.
And they'll say, there you go. Take that.
Don't know what it's going to do but.
If you need a. Paternity test let me.
Know hand that over puts the thing back on.
And then starts walking off, but as they do right before they're
completely exit, they'll just grab a vial and just flick it
back behind them. And then just like, well, I gave
my gift or to next a. Vial in a holy place.
Designed to spread illness, but as is often the case, we'll
never know what happened in the wake of the visitation of
Balthazar. 3 wise men visiting the child in the city of
Bethlehem, giving him gifts of gold and frankincense and myrrh.
Much will be written about this child.
Not much will be written about the three kings who came to
visit. Their royalty brought into
question, their origins brought into question, their names
debated for eons, but their gifts always remembered.
And that is a very Mark Borg Christmas.
They got more sentimental than you were planning on, wasn't it,
buddy? Yeah.
I love that. So, so very good.
We got cute and. Festive.
We did it, yeah. We remembered the reason for
the. Season we got sappy.
All over your. Morkboard.
You got Morkboard. Go look for my sappy anyway.
A very Morkboard Christmas. That is an original adventure by
yours truly using creatures and stats and rules from the
wonderful game Marc Borg. One of my favourites is a link
to purchase the game in the description.
Why don't you do it and have a holly jolly fucked up time with
your friends and family? But thank you everyone here for
playing with me here tonight. This was a hoot and dare I say
maybe even a hoot and a half. Where can we find more of you
fine folks? Danny, thank you for playing
with us here tonight. Where can the good people at
home find more of you? Thank you for having me, it has
been a pleasure, very fun. Shout out to to my Co stars
here, Kit and Justin. First time playing and meeting
both of you guys. Appreciate you so much.
You can find me at Dungeon Dropouts on Threads or
Instagram, Dungeon Dropouts LLC or Dungeon Dropouts on YouTube.
We'll start putting more clips up there, but you can find me
personally at Danny the Storyteller on Threads and
Instagram. You'll find all my posted all my
goods on there. We got some cool stuff coming up
next month, so stay tuned. I adore dungeon dropouts and I.
Love everything they're making over there so.
If you got half a brain in your head, you should be handed over
there and checking out other stuff.
Justin, my friend, thank you for playing with us here today.
Where can we find more of you? Yeah, the big shout out to my Co
stars as well. It was amazing playing with you
guys too. I am GM.
Justin, you can find me at all my socials at Forever GM Justin,
you can also find me over at Royal D5 where we specialize in
playing in ETTRPGS. Not only can you find me there
where we where I where I'm an admin, narrative designer, tech
and player, but you can also find me at a variety of
different spots to include Rebels without a castle, smoking
glue guns, Channel Whitney for the ATM series that we have, and
I'm sure there's plenty more. You can also find me over at
somebody's heroes too. We have things coming up here
soon, so won't go into details, but thank you so much and follow
me on my social stay in the loop.
I am a simple man audience. If I see Justin as in something,
I assume that thing fucks, so you.
Should give Justin a follow on socials kit.
Thank you for joining us here today.
Where can we find more of you? Thank you for joining us today,
Grant, and also again to the. Entire cast.
This table has been an absolute hoot.
I am kit performer, designer, producer, other things. 3
monkeys in a trench coat. Perhaps you can find me most
places on the Internet at kit role role as in role play.
And you can find me making and editing games kind of all over
the place whenever I have time and people let me get my grubby
little mitts on them. You can also find me producing
things over at Dareful Archives, titular among them.
If you like magical girls and queer stories and like getting
really sappy like we did tonight, you can catch
Bloomenblatt anywhere you get your podcast.
It's a Girl by Moonlight podcast that we do over on Dareful
Archives. But that's sort of the the thing
that is taking all of my time right now.
Yeah. So keep an eye on socials and I
will drop more as. I am legally allowed to ah the.
Old legally allowed to bloom and blight.
You mean the award-winning Bloom?
And Blight podcast. That absolutely, you know, one
of my favorites and I'm glad to have.
You on today. Thank you all again for.
Playing if this is your first time listening to Game Master
Monday because you were rightfully a fan of one of these
three. Hi, I'm Grant, I'm one of the
game masters around here. Stick around, why don't you?
Game Master Monday has a lot of cool stuff to wrap up the
holiday season. Be doing a Christmas fighting
game in two weeks. It's going to be a blast.
And starting this Wednesday will be a live miniseries called In
the Bleak Midwinter Tales from Ghast, which we are doing in
partnership with Hatched Games. It's going to be 4 solo games, a
thing we don't normally do here in Game Master Monday.
And hey, if you like Justin, Justin's going to be in that
one. It's a lot matter than what we
did here today. It's a lot sadder.
As for the rest of you, long time fans, new time fans.
Medium Time fans, thank you for listening.
This has been Game Master Monday and we'll see you at the next
one. Bye bye everybody, bye bye.
He looks tired. Someone should admit invent a.
Beverage for that those are you got anything for that today?
We even we've invented Reese's. We've invented Monster.
Energy. Actually, no, I do.
As a matter of fact, both our website 5 hour energy.
On the spot. It is a.
Poison of the sort. Drink this rather large
container. It's called the Beast.
And unto you, my child, a Baja. Blast.
Behold in the. East, a savior born this day.
He has a Baja blast for you. And Bahabi that blast.
We can't flavor blast the child. It's.
Uncouth. It's not even the fourth worst
thing that will happen to him in his life.
So.