Fireside Chat for Chapter 3

Hello, everyone, and welcome to the public fireside chat for chapter three of The Wizard, the Witch, and the Wild One.

I'm your host, Erica Ishi-e, and with me, as always on my fireside jets, Abria Iyengar.

Ha hoohoo!

Crackle crackle!

Congratulations on a beautiful art.

And congratulations to you, too.

Thank you.

Congratulations.

And here, our fearless GM, Brennan Lee Mulligan.

Ahoohoo, Crackle, Crackle.

Thanks for listening to chapter three, y'all.

We're so happy to share it with you.

We're very happy to share it.

And speaking of sharing, our most shareful friend.

Am I myself when we do these?

Usually

for the first time.

Yes, no, you're always yourself when you do these.

Am I?

Yes.

Well, I am.

Your eyebrows are doing something crazy right now.

Because it's me,

Lou Wilson.

Yay!

He's ripped off a mask.

For those that might be wondering about what the hell you're just talking about.

Yeah, why I don't know if I'm me.

Which in a sort of existential sense, I guess, all of us wonder from time to time.

I'm constantly questioning.

Yeah, identity as a project.

Who am I?

Because it's a safe space in which to do so.

Totally.

Well, normally we do these fireside chats behind our little fireside, which is our Patreon.

Firewall.

The firewall.

Have we ever caught?

Oh, my God.

So normally our sort of discussions and doing bits and hanging out and talking about the episodes happens back on the other side of our Patreon.

But this one is for all of you that are listening to the show

out in the main feed.

And Lou Wilson,

you know,

I'll just put it this way.

There's a lot of of very colorful characters that show up in the fireside.

I was going to say I'm a busy man, and I can't make them all, but I've got a large network I can call on in times of need.

Speaking of which, can I just get an update on how the search for Atlanta went?

Great.

I found it, which is kind of exciting.

But, you know, it was kind of one of those things where it was like, oh, kind of whirlwind romance, very fun two weeks.

And then I was like, I kind of missed my bed.

And so I'm home for a second, but Adventure awaits.

as always thank you for making the time wonderful thank you for making the time and i do have to say a lot of your friends that you have called on to fill in for you and the fireside have been uh not only very helpful and insightful in their performances but also uh in helping bring back our boy brennan oh that's right yes yes well i was there for that right yeah was i yeah i was there

i have trouble remembering sometimes you know when you live a life

filled with so much fancy as someone like me does you know with so many amazing friends like uh tomahawk

johnson richard goose uh uh richard oklahoma

god god so many friends of the podcast yoda whale frank

oh yoda we need to get diam pimento in we had to reschedule him oh that's right

yeah he's great but we're here to talk about chapter three of the wizard the witch and the wild one

uh what a delight this chapter was.

Is that the word we want to use?

I think it started delightful.

We're like, we're going to meet witches.

It's going to be great.

And then you made it scary and hard and terrifying.

And then we ended delightful again.

I think I'm still in Suvi to go see her boyfriend.

Yeah.

Amy and Ursulan are doing a yackety sack out of the castle.

It's very, very true.

Yeah, Suvi is in Scary Land, which is where she started

uh uh but it's really really fun this chapter of this story uh which we're sort of gonna talk about and review during our time together and share our feelings about the chapter um which we've been doing over on the fireside and again i'll just mention that this month if you're listening to this talk back this month hit it dude hit those talking parts

these fucking bullets are getting fucking fired out of the brennan gun all of you in the public are in for a real treat right now.

Brennan is going to share with you something that he shares with our patrons usually, only exclusively.

Hit it, Brennan.

For those of us that are considering, we would love to have you come join us by the fireside.

Our Patreon's five bucks a month, and there we share fireside chats where we deep dive into the characters and their motivations.

In the week's previous episode, we often release some bone cones, some bonus content, interludes and side adventures.

This month, September, we have two different interludes coming to the Patreon.

We have character subclasses, the Wizard of the Citadel, maybe a little paladin homebrew subclass,

if rumors are correct.

We're getting an awesome revision post-playtest for the Homebrew Witch class,

which is a playable class in 5e Dungeons and Dragons.

For those that have always wanted to play a witch, now you have a way to do so.

And we also have a 100-plus page lore glossary that will be published to the Patreon.

That's all coming in the month of September, as well as

some video content.

Did you say video content?

Video content over on the Patreon of some, I have to say, top-notch artistic talent

across the board.

Stop that right now.

If you ever want to see uh if you ever want to see i think people really render the heart's sight on the page with the gift of art

quit it man all right

i mean they don't understand why i'm having an emotional reaction but they could uh

lou i need you to know i had the same problem uh i made the same bad guess when watching the video because i forgot the real answer to one of the drawings fucking stop it dude i swear also Abria is such an amazing artist.

It's unbelievable.

You're in for a real treat.

If you get on the fireside, you will watch

an artistic ability emerge that is just unfair in addition to all of Abria's many.

We were all doing a little bit.

We were doing a job.

That's truly what it, like, I thought we were all having a goof.

And then I quickly found out that my friends are actually quite talented.

Yeah.

And I'm the only one.

Stop.

Stop.

You know what I'm saying?

I think you're an artist.

I think you understand

the heart of things.

I'll take that.

What happened between us drawing and then Abria doing what she did was like going to karaoke and finding out that your friend's cousin is Andrea Bocelli.

We've really oversold a thing I was drawing in two minutes.

I don't know.

I just, I just re-watched it as well, and I was like, damn, Abria.

So so much fun stuff is going to be by the fireside on our Patreon.

And whether you join the Patreon to get all that amazing extra content and to help support the show and help support the people who make it, including not just the four of us, but our amazing producer and production staff and all the awesome people that work at Worlds Beyond Number and Fortunate Horse, we would just be delighted to have you come by.

And even if you just share the show here at the end of this amazing chapter, consider sharing with your friends because we love to get new people by the fireside from word of mouth and have had their

pals vouch for it.

So thank you so much.

Every time we sit down at a fireside, I strap in in the vest of we are going to work.

It is time to promote the podcast.

And you do it beautifully.

Yeah.

We appreciate you, Brennan.

And we appreciate all of you listening.

Wow.

That was an alley hoop.

Oh, my God.

Dang.

They play them out.

And today, on this public fireside, we are here to discuss the entirety of chapter three,

Witch Con, as we so

cutely call it.

So, this is the craziest part of this chapter to me.

The time span of this chapter is so radically different.

This was essentially 48 hours.

One sleep.

One sleep right now.

Or in Subi's case, none sleep.

I got one sleep.

Three days, one sleep.

Isn't it two sleeps?

No.

You guys all got two sleeps.

Okay, I got one sleep.

It's kind of, I think it's more, yeah, it's like 36 hours because it's like day one, you roll up, the witches roll up, Hakeea goes like, I'm tired, and then goes to bed.

And then the next day is the big day where everything fucking happens.

Yeah.

So we all got there and then went to sleep.

And then

like day one, the witches all get there and have the first part of the conclave.

And then night party,

big fight.

We find out everything in the world.

One sleep, day two of WitchCon, and we all leave on day two of WitchCon.

Well, I, though, also am lucky enough to get to use switching between time zones to get one more sleep in in the first episode.

Yes,

I sneak in, and I, but it's it's all about time zones.

Where we actually started, like, this chapter starts with Ame deep in the frozen valley with the orchard of icy trees, yeah.

The wizard sky aboard the meridian flying to the north, and Ursulan in a burrow in Galilee.

At the International House of Pancakes, just fucking live in Wales.

Roro

Pancakes.

Boy, we're a long way from Roro and his pancakes.

I'll tell you that.

Man, what a strong, sweet start.

It was lovely.

But we had the,

so

to give our sort of like overview of the chapter, right?

Ursulan connects with his family and then ventures towards the near spirit, gets some gifts from Callias, a magical artifact,

comes close to almost hearing or seeing the man in black, and instead peels off and ends up finding Orima, who gifts the horse Haliman, the spirit horse, solar horse that takes him across the world.

That music was so incredible, Taylor had for that.

The horse.

And then Suvi arrives.

We meet Indri, the witch of the wind and stars,

and there's the negotiation of how the Citadel wizard may be allowed into the witch's keep, and that's navigated through Suvi and Amay and Indri.

So much tap dancing.

Oh, yeah.

I love that you were like, welcome to this palatial, glass-like ice palace.

Erica, Ahme will be tap dancing for the next 72 hours.

Begin.

Double off the buffalo.

First, get your friend inside the door.

Oh, WitchCon.

She did not buy a badge.

Yeah.

The, uh, that's so funny.

And then, yeah, WitchCon really kicks off in earnest.

We meet Costa the bear.

We meet Aura, who's sort of like the Aurora Borealis spirit that is in the retinue of Indry.

And you guys are all in sort of that main hall.

We see the Keep of the World's Heart.

We see the Tower of the Crescent Moon.

And then the other witches arrive.

Grimoor and Hakeia arrive with their retinue.

Socorro and Badze.

They didn't arrive till after the first night.

Uh, no, I think you guys get there earlier in the day, see your chambers, and they arrive that night, I think.

I could be wrong.

Well, Ursulan arrives first

after after uh interrupting a very tense moment between uh suvy and ame

yeah you don't you uh suvy doesn't sleep until

uh i don't think so at least but maybe i'm wrong um but the uh

you guys this too is part of our normal fireside chat

it's actually unimportant but yeah yeah uh and then the because i because i think that the witches arrive sort of towards the end of the day which is why Hakea calls the meeting.

Gotcha.

Right?

Like, their retinues arrive, witch of the wild hunt, witch of the woodland green, and then Marara, witch of the waning moon in the conclave chamber, calls the meeting, and we see that they're going to destroy Ame.

We unfold from there.

I think after that, it's like

dinner together.

There's the attack on the wizard straw from Grimoire.

We hear about the antivolist.

We go to the library of Stars, the music box,

the scarf with Neif and the Scarf.

The Scarf bug and the scarf.

I mean, I think for non-fireside patrons who might be listening to, I mean, I don't think we probably, they probably haven't heard us discuss at length the fact that Abria was fully Manchurian candidate id

and that we had no idea the entire time.

time.

That's right.

We're just watching Abria be like, what if we all sang a song at dinner and going, what the fuck are we doing?

Well, yes, of course, we should sing together.

Truly, some hoodwinkery by two persons at this table that I may never forgive.

Oh, no.

That's right.

The gayest spell and the modifying memory that were placed on Suvi, that was run in a scene without Lou and Erica being in the room.

So the entire chapter, they were unaware.

But it makes for very good fireside content, y'all, because like getting when like Suvi's sort of plan, now that it's like understood, watching my friends go,

That's what you were doing, worth its waiting.

I thought it was just because you thought Andrea was hot.

And yet,

and yet,

you're gonna leave a music box for her.

That's so nice.

She's describing so specifically where she wants to be.

Yes, when you were like, I'm leaving her a gift, I was like, oh,

that's so nice.

Julie chapter three,

to sum up so far,

chapter three, witchcon,

a lot of politicking, and treachery amongst friends

at this table.

We have

the scenes from this chapter, the battle in Hakea's keep,

being approached by the man in black with the sword of knight.

Being swallowed up into a lady's torso.

How about her?

Yeah, Bate Bate fully kind of folded you in.

Yeah, man.

Hey, I bet nobody knew that Ursula was that flexible.

You know what?

We didn't talk about that enough.

No one's ever asked Ursula to hit a split before.

Wait, can Ursula do the like side Z and middle Z splits?

Oh, of course.

But he can only do, he can do the side Z he has to kind of get into, but the middle Z, he can do the full kind of jump into, you know?

Hey, wow.

Yeah.

You know, hey, he's a spirit, you know wait so are all spirits flexible uh i don't think so but i think ursalon is ursalon is especially bendy oh no he is his father's son yeah it is exactly

the uh we had the following that we had of course the vote for um we we had the the library of stars and that information came together with ursulan and suvi to discover the nature of the coven of elders yewola the tree of worlds the wand of covenant

We did a lot.

We really did a lot in 36 hours.

Yeah.

Covered your tracks with Vandal the Ink Dead.

Yes.

We met, Tefmet, the antivolist.

I don't like them.

They are very cute.

They're so kiss them.

I'll kiss them.

I'll kiss them, but I'm not a fan of their ideology.

And then we had the vote.

Ame's station was not destroyed.

Unanimous, unanimous vote.

My first vote.

I wonder what.

I'm excited to see which way you'll go.

Yeah, God, so fun.

After which we saw the presentation of the Antivalist,

the lenses of

the Scepter's Chorus in Port Talon,

and

powerful confrontation between our heroes in the Keep of the World's Heart about the future of Umora, the nature of the Citadel, and the Coven of Elders joining the Man in Black to wage war on the citadel a second vote was held and the coven voted for war suvi fled to the meridian and discovered that silver her love was in danger in the shroud mountains at the frontier of war as ursulan ame the fox

uh and uh an unconscious apprentice neif with a chamber

on her head and a brand new lion door knocker got on a magical rock after being uh awakened by the diamond spirit/slash coal spirit Toph and flew for Toma as the Witch of Wind and Star's wrath echoed out, that's a big old chapter, gang!

But wait, there was more.

A post-credit sequence that we didn't know about.

Is this how you all felt the whole time?

Because I felt betrayed.

I didn't know this was coming.

Exactly.

Now you never know what is, you know.

What was decided in a room that you were asked to leave and you went on a long walk up to the Batman cave during, you know, you just never know.

There was so much delight in all the little hidden pieces of information.

The scene between Suvi and Steele, that last little post-credit scene with the man in black there in Brock Vale back on the Isle of Acom.

I want to kick us over to our first question.

Thank you for everyone who submitted questions.

Yeah, thank you.

This first one comes from Abigail.

Thank you, Abigail.

When you think back to the very beginning, what are the aspects of your character's arc or growth that surprise you most or make you most proud in this chapter?

How did the characters change this chapter?

You're not allowed to go first, Abria.

Okay, no, you go first.

That's okay.

You can go.

I mean, you can go first.

You should go first.

Sure.

I I think

it's nice that we just wrapped the chapter because for me, for Suvi, it was the acknowledgment of the justification machine and the decision to go like

click and turn it off and be fully present for everything that was said in the letter from Silver.

Not just

close to dropping a really important L-bomb that Suvi just desperately needs to hear,

but

realizing that there were things about the Citadel's intentions that were like shared there, that Suvi would normally just go, huh?

War be Warren.

And instead, going, like, what is happening?

And what, what are we doing?

Yeah.

So that's my answer.

Respect, respect.

Her friends taught her to care.

It was a bad fight and not fully resolved, especially between Suvi and Ahme.

But like with a little bit of time and safety and like processing, the point remains.

Like look at the Citadel, see what they're doing.

And if it's as bad as Tefmid is saying and like the witches are believing, do something about it or walk away.

Keep your promise to your friends.

There's something in that tiny moment that Suvi takes where she describes being back on the ship.

And I thought that the moment was so fascinating and provided such a deep insight into Suvi and maybe even by extrapolation, sort of like a read of human nature.

Suvi, on the back foot, exhausted, in deep danger in Indri's castle, is in full-throated defense of the citadel.

Gets on the ship,

just bodies Rasper to the ground, asserts her authority, has sworn come back in and be like, we've got your back, commands the ship to change course, and that ship fucking changes course and has a list of every promise you were supposed to keep, you kept.

It is not the feeling at the end of chapter two where your friends have escaped or the feeling of chapter one where you didn't keep Port Talon on ice.

We see Sufi keep it on ice, no pun intended with this North Pole chapter.

So the fact that Sufi gets to the place of ultimate security,

ultimate status that she has achieved thus far, earned status, where she has like not only the station, but the authority and commands the respect of people underneath her.

And that is the moment where she says, I turn off the justification machine.

What was that moment about?

Why do you think that is the moment of, because I know you're saying like her friends taught her to care, and obviously it's informed by those experiences in

The Witch of Wind and Stars Castle, but I thought it was so fascinating to depict

someone

opening room for doubt, not at their lowest or most frightened point, but actually at the moment of utmost control and comfort.

I think it has to do with exactly that.

And there's also that idea that when you're fighting for the ground that you feel like you have to defend, you're like, God, if my friends had just listened to me, Port Talon would have been different or the exit from the Citadel would have been different.

but she never had the proof of her own like competence in that way.

Like the very, like the first time we meet Suvi, she wants to prove herself.

And I think it was at the end of this arc where she's like, I kept a promise I don't remember and I kept them safe and I.

saved like my crew that I could and I locked it in and I wasn't overly ambitious to go do something crazy with the wand, even though I wanted to so bad.

I got it done.

And now here, I know that I'm right when I say I can do this.

And I think there is something in the like internal security of like, I am on my throne of I trust my mind and my ability to get shit done.

That now I can like turn on doubt and feel like I can weather whatever that will be because I'm strong enough and smart enough to handle whatever will come of that like curiosity turned on my home.

Yeah.

I definitely have felt that in my

own life,

where if you feel like you owe a bond of loyalty to a person, an institution, think about like friends where you're out in mixed company, a friend of yours gets criticized, you leap to their defense, and you're like, hey, hey, hey, I'm sure this is a misunderstanding.

We can work this out.

And then get in the car and drive home.

And on the drive home, you turn to your friend and you're like, what the fuck did you do?

A thousand percent.

You do.

I really think there is that, those concentric rings of belonging and mutual obligation and loyalty and how you like manage those.

I don't know.

It just felt so profoundly true.

I never would have foreseen that, but I just love that moment of.

My friends have asked me to at least be critical.

And I am going to begin that process now at my apex.

And it kind of made me go back and go like, yeah, there is sadly like an unreasonableness to ask that level of scrutiny from someone who's scrambling for their very life.

Yeah.

You know, like, because that, that becomes like, well, if I, if she commits to it, then

the like critique and

ire only lasts as long as she feels bad about the citadel.

Like, that's not a permanent change to her disposition.

If you go from my high point, I am different now.

I've done everything.

I like, I know I'm going home.

If I just go home right now, big party, probably a fucking parade, maybe.

I don't know.

It's going to be great.

That's the moment where you go, like, I'm different.

And this will weather highs and lows because I've put this on myself when I could load it.

Like I could load it and it can become something internal to me all the time and not just a reaction.

I love that.

For Ame or for Ursulan,

what feels like

a growth in this chapter?

Ursulan has aim, baby.

I think there's something, you know, it's funny to do like the whole recap

because it is like, oh, that's, it feels so fitting that Ursulan finds aim in

the chapter where he finds home, you know, where it's like the space is created for him.

And there's, uh, there's that comfort that comes at the beginning of the chapter that, of course, is the foundation that once Ursulan learns about these

issues around that are that Tefmet is revealing kind of just a glimpse of that there is this there is this now desire to be like I can take more on or want to do more because I now have a foundation that's not just I hope that these two people will let me hang around them for as long as they

you know aren't so taken by their institutions that they have space for me there's just this like kind of like, okay, what's up?

I've got that

beautiful home in Gauthmai.

I can go and ask for more from myself and from the world.

God, I love that.

There's something, again, just making realizations even as we're sitting here, like the fact that Ursulan's big like gain is aim and like the symbol of it is like that compass and you got it at the magnetic north of the world is like sometimes things just hit, and you're like, fuck.

We got layers on layers on layers.

Layers.

So it just feels, you know, I think it's.

Chapter three feels like such a turning point in this story, kind of in the larger sense, just with how potent all three characters feel.

And I think that that's reflected in Ursulan in this, like, what's up?

I'm no longer just like somebody's protector.

I'm that.

And in addition, I have my own wants and needs.

It's so interesting because we talk a lot about

the games that we play and the framework of our storytelling being aided and abetted by the mechanics of D and D.

And I think it's interesting that thus far, you know, in Arc 3,

our characters are still young.

you know, their 20, early 20s, and they are still what we would think of as lower level,

but are starting to come into themselves emotionally

and mentally and in terms of navigating the world around them, and that the mechanics have slowly started to

tell that story as well.

Suvi's secrets for

dear public, the wizard of the citadel subclass,

it fucks.

It fucks so hard.

You would know that if you joined the Patriot.

Yes.

During this moment,

the idea of knowledge being power and having the

design of it reflect that.

And then of Ah learning witch things and being able to enact, we saw the first time Ahme's curses, retributive curses from witches, which is part of the mechanics of witchcraft,

kick in at a

gasp dog, right?

Like at a moment, like a climactic moment, at two climactic moments.

And it's in some ways,

yeah, both in a storytelling manner and finally in a combat manner.

And Ursulan getting the kind of gear that a gearhead would need to put him on his quest.

A gearhead, dude.

Absolute gearhead, Ursulan.

Ursulan's just hunting for artifacts now.

how many swords can uh can can we get you some extra arms yeah and ursalon knows that in this world there are plus one plus two and plus three swords and he knows he needs a plus four sword because he's already got a pretty he's already got a pretty dope sword

yeah dude oh the minute i i can gear up wave breaker's like an artifact and you're like Anyway, expect they get better.

You can get something with a little more juice in it.

Well, for sure.

But Wavebreaker, it's also about the utility of it.

Like, Wavebreaker is a plus three sword.

That's his.

I mean, I'm not saying I get rid of it.

Ursula's always been bound to be a two-sword guy.

All right.

Let's get rid of that.

I'll say this.

Wavebreaker is clearly like a gentle, great spirit sword because it's like, remove curse, dispel magic.

The sword's whole energy is, hey, man.

Hey, man.

Whereas that sword of knight who knows what that's got going on

can cut the apple from a man's eye and spring from his stomach.

Yeah,

we all want that sword, though.

We want him to have that sword a little.

He's not going to have the sword.

I'll take

the man.

He'll take the man in black.

I was going to be a little more vulgar than that, but yeah, that's what we were saying.

That's what I'm saying.

The subheading for this chapter, I'm realizing in terms of what everybody walked away from this with, because of course, this chapter three of the Wizard of the Witch and the Wild one, you all got the wand, the watch, and the win.

Yay!

Shut up.

Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.

We're fun.

Big W's all around.

Big W's.

Big doves.

All doves all day here on Worlds Beyond Numbers.

I would say for Ahme, Ahme's arc is

that, I mean, she's spent this whole campaign so far kind of being on the back foot.

She's had massive shoes to fill.

She's a new, like, essentially a new witch.

She's new and a young adult and hasn't figured herself out yet, much less being, like, being able to step into the shoes of one of the most powerful stations of witchcraft in the world.

And so she's been trying to get rid of a curse, trying to find her way back home, trying to get to a meeting where she's told that if she doesn't show up, she'll die.

And, you know, sort of, it's coming from all sides for Ahmed.

And I think by the end of this, understanding her power, like it all came together, like with all of us, you know, we started out in the North Pole absolutely on the back foot with these mean witches and like trying to kill Ahme, try like

breaking open and drinking one of the wizards in the retinue.

Too soon.

I know.

Poor one out of the wizard's draw.

Poor one out of the wizard's straw, yes.

But I think by the end, Ahme realizing the importance of her station and how she relates to it, because she really can't fulfill it in the way that Grandma Ren did.

She has to find her own spin on the station and for her i think you know escaping death and uh making friends in the castle uh and then of course leaving it in an absolutely unhinged fashion is Ahme being able to reconcile her station and who she is.

Because as we have said on the fireside friends, Ahme

was not born responsible and caring.

Like Ahme had to have a reminder next to her bed, be kind.

She's a little trickster.

Her thing that she needs to work on is

in her familiar, a fox, the mischievous, stealing little

ne'er-do-oh.

I think there's something too.

Yeah, like the beginning of chapter two in the flashbacks to Ahme's training, we see that little scene where she's like, I could make them.

think I'm normal.

Like, you know, have there's a little, that little opening.

Yeah, injury.

But there's something, there's something to thinking about it as well.

Like, we see Wren,

you know, like, like, how much.

So, so we meet her in the children's adventure.

By the way, for those listening that have listened to the public episodes, if you remember the very first episode of the podcast where we see the little interlude of the characters as children, we have eight full, beautifully scored and sound-designed episodes that are the full story of the magical summer where Suvi, Ame, and Ursulan all met and became friends.

That's all available on the Patreon, on the fireside.

It's like one of the best

that I've

ever been a part of.

100%.

Sign up.

Sign up for a month and then listen to it and then bounce.

We recommend anything you want to do.

Like,

we're totally fine with that.

Come check out the stuff.

We have some amazing stuff on the fireside.

We just want you to come hang out and see it all.

And

the children's adventure is so, so special and very near and dear to my heart.

But in that flashback, you know, so what?

That was like 14 years before the events of the main campaign.

So we saw Grandmother Wren in the last 14 years of her, you know, century-long service as the witch of the world's heart.

And I think that like even her familiar, which was Taro, the rooster, the difference between a rooster and a fox as your sort of like spiritual symbols for what the world's heart is.

I think that there is something to Wren.

And obviously, I think Wren is like, I love Grandmother Wren so much and she's such an important mentor figure for Ahmed.

For Ahme's arc in this,

people were asked to question a lot of things here.

Ursulan has only ever been treated kindly and respectfully by the man in black and had to

ask,

what's going to happen to my friends?

And he got a straight fucking answer, man, for whatever he said.

My man did not lie.

I was like, why?

Nothing but respect.

Nothing but respect.

That's your name.

Brother Ursulan.

Ursulan.

There's a, I do love the man in black.

And in terms of wanting to, wanting spirits to be inhuman in the positive way, they are not human beings.

There is no fucking hustle from the man in black.

There is no like, well, well, well, if you think about it this way, it's like, oh, yeah, they got to go.

Yeah, for sure.

It is, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

It's honesty.

But

the,

and then Suvi's reckoning with the gayest and this strange thing of having a compulsion to do something that she can't understand, this incredible mission for these stars.

For Ame,

the original push in the council meeting of like

you saying Ren is the greatest witch ever, and getting this pushback from these other four witches being like, I mean, she was all right, you know, like, uh,

and then

it was wild,

And then in the final vote, where you were like, do I not have time to try and find some other way?

And the coven saying that was Wren's exact request, and she did not find it.

And then the scene with Marara in her keep, where she was like,

you might not like what I represent, but I'm a good witch, and Wren was a bad witch.

Is there

being like, being like, you cannot claim to represent the whole of the mortal togetherness and of and of humanity and of the things that work side and side with each other and represent that solely as wholesome, not when great empires and dominions march to war with each other?

And there's a

is there any part of Ahmed that in thinking about the years Grandmother Wren had to try to find some other way out.

There's a big hole in Ame's knowledge there and a question about what Grandmother Wren was doing.

Because obviously you knew that she was up to quests and adventures all the time, but is there any, is Ahmed walk out of chapter three with unshakable faith in Grandma Wren?

With any questions about

how to live up to her?

Or is there some doubt in Ahme or a question of if I don't like if the way Grandmother Wren was doing this, I don't understand or don't see how it works, how do I do this in my way?

Yeah, I think it's that last bit of that I think Ahme reveres and loves Grandmother Wren as a mentor and as her only family figure,

but that I think she understands that if it took her 30 years and she was not able to convince the witches or enact the kind of change that she wanted, that there was some that there's something else.

Like, Ahme, I think she has read the letters between

Stone and Wren,

and

Ahme has sort of been raised for this, for this role.

in the way that Grandma Wren thought was important.

But I think that there are things that Ahme values and finds important and is willing to do, I think, that Ren couldn't have seen.

Yeah.

And

I think Ahme is starting to realize that.

Even aside from them being different people, I think their comparative age matters.

You know what I mean?

Like we saw in Hakea

the downfalls of even as great as it is to have a powerful witch.

Like there's some shaky ground when you transition to a new witch of a station.

You're low level.

You don't have the experience.

You don't have the jobs.

But we also see on the flip side, Hakeea, who was asleep, who had infiltrators in her retinue, who had

nothing worse than being like, oh, Hakea seems fun.

Oh, she's awake.

No!

No!

Go back to bed!

No!

Well, and I think what we saw with that too, and

the whole problem with having people, with not having fresh blood in any administration, is that you lose touch.

Yeah.

You lose touch with the world.

You lose touch with what is possible.

You don't want to act.

You want to, you want to take your time.

Or when you act, you, you make these broad, sweeping generalizations.

Like there,

I'm sorry, there the alter covenant is just really old, really like famous comedians that used to do stand-up come back now.

And you're like, none of your material is relatable.

Yeah.

It's true.

It's true.

It's like, yeah, of course, you can't say those things.

It's not that nobody was offended before.

It's just that you didn't have social media for that you don't know about.

You can't cast any of the spells you used to be able to cast these days.

Let me tell you.

You go to on a college campus and try to cast some of these spells,

all the wizards, they yell at you.

See, I don't know.

When you guys talk about Morning Ren song, you know, you're talking about that old Morning Red song.

I always think just about that 5'2 Batty

in that corduroy hat.

That's what she'll always be for me.

I only got one morning red song in my head.

The hottest person in this campaign, according to Brendan Lee Mulligan.

Yeah.

I think so.

I think so.

Physically incapable of rendering her in art.

That's how hot she is.

No one can do it.

I haven't seen anybody do it.

I dare you to render a 5'2 baddie in a corduroy hat.

Well, I think, too, that even looking at Aime's adventures, it feels like, you know, zooming out for a second on this chapter, because it was so fun and it was so, again, like wild how short the time frame was and how much it was accomplished.

It also felt like a kind of adventure I haven't done for a very long time in D ⁇ D, which is the idea of...

As whimsical as this wasn't a palace of ice and da-da-da-da, this was a like political intrigue chapter.

Yeah.

It was a spy, political intrigue.

This was like the kind of King's Landing vibe, but just without sort of like grotesque, steeple-fingered, like,

power, Miley.

It's like, you know, a lot of those.

Chaos is a lot of.

Yeah, Chaos is a lot.

A lot of those stories are like

oops, all Grima worm tongues, you know, like as opposed to.

Oh, sorry, hold on.

I don't get that reference.

Come on, weird.

I don't think we saw that one.

Rod Doris, no eyebrows.

Did you just hard stop the podcast to go, wait, hold on, I missed my cue.

I missed my cue.

I I missed the on-ramp for my bit.

But to zoom out,

the global implications of this adventure, right?

The Citadel now firmly knows the Coven of Elders.

That wrinkle of power has been like explored by an agent of the Citadel.

The library of stars captured, right?

I want one.

In my tower.

So

I will say one of my partners made a meme that is like, you wouldn't download a star, would you?

I love it.

Totally.

We hard drive copied outer space and we're out of there.

But

also, Sly's prophecy was fulfilled.

This is what I wanted to talk to you about.

So let's use that as the like,

how did it feel setting up like...

In no uncertain terms, like it wasn't vague enough prophecy that anything could fill it.

Like, how did it feel feel in the execution of Arc 3, like landing and nailing Sly's prophecy?

Because at one GM to another, prophecy is so

fun and scary because all of a sudden you're like, it's a, it's like a sticky note on top of your game where you're like, gotta make sure I'm not dropping the ball on that.

Yes.

I think that the nice thing you do,

the way that I felt about Sly's prophecy was

looking back over it, the prophecy he gives in chapter two,

the things

that

were actionable for you guys were firmly on the side of things you would do anything to avoid.

Ames, in other words, in other words, if you make a prophecy that's like the next time you go get ice cream, you're all getting pistachio.

That is a thing where the PCs are like, like, fuck I am.

I'll get mint chocolate chip to prove a point.

But the idea of my favorite, what are you saying?

Like, but being like, hey,

a failure to do these things results in Ahm's death.

And the fact that that is close enough to a prediction as a prophecy.

In other words, once you realize that he's telling the truth and that there is clearly a conspiracy to destroy Ahmed, then avoiding it is more about using the prophecy for the information it communicated than it is about whether it comes to pass or not.

In other words, if I give you a prophecy and I'm like, I have seen the future, a train is barreling down the track you're standing on, and your shoes are stuck.

But if you reach behind you, there's a rope back there.

We cut back to you in the moment, and you're like, well, I sure as shit can't move my feet.

And there's the train.

It's not.

unusual for you to look for that rope I mentioned.

Right?

Does that make sense?

Like in terms of how you construct prophecy, I think as in constructing prophecy is the same thing as constructing adventure paths in general, which is follow not your logic of the scene you want to see.

Follow the logic of what your players are going to want to do.

Yeah.

If I'm thinking about your guys' wants and needs, that is the path the water wants to travel down.

That is, that's where the groove is.

Yeah.

So I think that's the trick with prophecy.

But how would you know, Brennan?

How do you know?

Typically, people don't want to die.

Typically, people want their friends to okay.

And also, we've played a fair amount of games together, so I feel like at this point.

Do you feel like you have good like

LLMs of like each of us?

Oh, yeah.

Yeah.

Oh, yeah.

That's one of my favorite things where I'm like, I think I can do a lot of things.

You don't fucking know me.

The cosmic surprise will never go away.

I swear to God, if I had a notepaper in front of me, I would have written down, Lou has a problem with this.

Of course.

I would have written down.

What am I going to do?

No, no, that's not cool.

That's not cool, dude.

Even your rebellious streak is predictable.

No, we didn't just say that.

You're just saying that.

Fuck you, dude.

I'm fucking with you.

If you're editing these podcasts, I would edit in right now a supercut of all the times that Brennan has called a loose shot.

Taylor, if you do that, I'll fire you.

You can't do that.

I'll figure it out.

I'll figure out a way to fire you.

The idea, the idea of.

But yeah, so that

coming true for Sly.

And then on the flip side of that,

we it so it feels like this huge global turning point for the Citadel.

And in fact, again, this is allegedly.

Yeah.

I have not seen enough proof.

Yes.

But this is a

any.

No, but I mean a turning point for the Citadel in terms of like what of the mirrors, right?

Yeah.

The but it's a huge victory for Suvi.

It is something that Suvi, like Suvi has had wins in the previous chapters, but those were wins on her personal efforts as a hero.

This was as an agent of the citadel you succeeded.

And on the flip side, Ame saved her station, saved the station of the world's heart.

And I think what's also crazy is in Suvi being the counselor and advisor to Ame here,

you saved your friend, and saving your friend was a direct precedent to the coven not achieving achieving unanimity in its vote to go to war.

That so, and then with Ame preventing unanimity for the covenant to go to war with the man in black, and and again, like you know, getting these, like, and getting the wand, getting this wand of covenant, which feels like in you are the only other person that knows what injury truly wants for the coven of elders, which is for all of you to go away.

And you now have the fucking whack-a-mole wand to run out here and just make witches I can just make them just make them um but you don't want to destroy your coven because you could just snap it and it feels like a lot of Suvi's stress would go away just a thing to think of

does

I never pitch Suvi's thoughts to Amate do I no I don't think so I never like I don't think not yet

no and you haven't you haven't and you haven't pitched um the thing about the chalices either oh yeah which Suvi mentions at the end um

but I'll also say, and then for Ursuline as well, whose very first steps into the world of Umora were about a quest.

Finally, you have a ticket to a train in a far-off land, and

you have a watch that lets you find those in need.

And a bridle that lets you hitch a ride.

Bridles high key, my favorite thing.

That's so fucking good.

Anybody who's down, it's like, what's up, bro?

What's up?

What'd you think of it?

What'd you think?

think can i got can i get a ride real quick so could that work on what could what else could that bridal work on it could work on you said man in black well see

cowboy shut up yeah

save a spirit horse

ride a cowboy ride a spirit let me be so clear if ursalon was like the cost of me like buddying up to the man in black and getting his very close sword is suby's dad but she'd be like how hot is he okay i mean okay like subi will take one for the team that's her her brother.

I'm sure we'll get into it.

I'm sure that's what chapter four is about, right?

It's just Ursula and Subi.

I don't know.

I guess he's

pretty tall.

Question.

So, like, can you kill me?

And then...

Then he gives you the sword and then you kind of bring me back with lay on hands.

Like, do I have to stay dead?

Oh, we're sword.

Because we can get you that.

I'll give you a sword.

Yeah, exactly.

If I could just get revivified, then we're all.

Yeah, then we're fine.

Let's get that sword.

Okay.

We're going gonna do a bunch of diamonds yes let's get toff back get him in here oh my god sweet toff such a good boy didn't he he like turned into a super hot guy yeah

that's a hand record i heard super hot

beautiful diamond spirit wait can i can i do a little reveal here in the public

because we

in the first episode of the next one oh do we reveal some reveal where

oh we do okay so we'll hold off we'll hold off okay but well if you'd like to edit that out

well, or you could do another reveal.

I'll do another reveal here of the public for all you watching, which was there was a connection between Toph, who was

in the bucket at the bottom of the staircase, and the missing gem on the horn up at the top.

So the horn of the watching fire originally had a diamond set in it that tumbled down the stairs into the bucket of coal and became a little coal star.

I love it.

Oh, it's so good.

He's just a little guy.

He like rolled off and went, fucking I'm coal.

Everyone's victory was so of their character here because Suvi's victory was so much about diligence, cleverness, and

like that, the work and effort and persistence of wizards.

Ame's success, I think the biggest Ame's success, honestly, is coming back to the vote on her life

and the letter from the antivolist, Hakea putting an arm on Suvi, Heinrule thanking Ursulon, and just walking in and having these three elder witches be like, Are we absolutely getting sunned out here?

Are we

fucked?

We've been fucked

in eight hours, you know?

I love that you like had Indri say it specifically, too.

I was like, this is why you don't give the fucking witch of everyone will like me time to make everyone fucking like her.

Yeah, truly.

Promise of the premise.

Fuck this bitch.

Perfect.

Yeah, truly.

Truly, truly.

Yeah, really hard to navigate against your friend the power of working together in a democratic system.

That's a bad, it's a bad look for that to happen.

So injury Stratt is correct.

She's like, I know how to solve this.

Covenant won.

Covenant won.

Yeah.

But

the,

so that's, yes, so that's it.

That's a, and then Ursulan's victory, I think, very much being about like

big big

choices.

The choice to turn down the man in black, the choice to pursue the antivalist, right?

Like, I think that there's a

mythological, like the fairy knight, like old Arthurian stuff.

The scarf toss.

The scarf toss.

Oh, my God.

Tossing the scarf out the window.

There just feels like a connection with Ursulon and the idea of...

making a damn call.

Be like, okay,

I see walking by the man in black's black side, and I understand that this is a large choice, and my choice is no.

And I understand going to the end of the list and them being like, Hey, do you, who am I helping?

And you'd be like, Me, you're helping me.

Like, just, I think there's something so profound about that

call and the idea of like, I'm like under my own head of steam now.

And I feel like, especially

chapter two, you know, like Ursulan's chapter one was like the, like still had like straw and booze on him from JB Adelaide and like finding his breath for the first time.

And chapter two was sort of like, it's like the great thing of like, yes, the journey has begun.

And the first step on the journey is doldrums and listlessness.

Like, okay, good, you're on your way, but what if you stop and had a drink on your way?

Like, what if, like, like, you know, pull out of your driveway, hit the road, and pull into the first

service station.

Sit it down.

Attack me like this.

Like, service station, I found my spot.

Like, and it feels like this is at the end of this chapter, it's like, oh, home means I have something to lose, means I have to do something.

Yeah.

And it was just beautiful.

Gorgeous.

The fox learned nothing and changed not at all.

That's not true.

The fox learned tremendous sacrifice and ate helices.

He did.

I don't think nobody asked him to eat.

I think he's actually more of a team player.

He doesn't think he learned.

yeah and he he learned about uh lying about lying snakes or snakes in a river snakes in a river oh you know what he actually did he did learn when when amend when ame and suvy had that beautiful embrace that ursalon could see the like tapestry between them and the fox was like we shouldn't run

which is the first time the fox has ever said that the fox is becoming a team player like i think that's as like a self-interested little animal who's like i'm not a pack animal i'm on my own i have to do the things that i want to do because those are tied to my survival.

My wants are survival needs.

And now it's the like, well, no, boss, I want to do things that make you happy and I'll allow space for the people you care about to have like their own things too.

And like he has different relationships with Ursulan and Suvi and like has like different boundaries and like he is growing and changing in like the most fun little way.

He actually did have a great bonding moment.

So he's had many bonding moments with Ursulan through just being like, hey, it's the big guy and then being like, being a wild thing and talking about bath.

I think he had his first bonding moment with Suvi in a real way in this chapter, where he was like, oh,

the thing, where he's like, he's like,

obviously, Ame is his whole world, but

he's like, oh,

the boss should learn.

from Suvi to keep secrets.

Yeah,

that was right.

You have to keep secrets.

You have to not tell people.

And that is, but I always think about the fact that the intelligence version of Enhanced Ability is called Fox's Cunning, where he's literally like, don't be telling people the shit, you know?

That's fucking, yeah, like, everyone knows a secret is a good thing to have.

Yeah.

So good.

Oh, man.

So thank you so much to

the dear public who is listening to this.

Yeah.

We really appreciate you taking the time.

And you can hear more deep thoughts and silly thoughts and different segments like Bagget or Taggett, the horner corner.

No one knows when the horner corner is coming.

Oh, my God.

You never see it coming.

So exciting.

Got him.

We got him.

We got him.

Great video game.

Great video content.

We have a video game coming out.

I just wanna say box.

It's coming out.

It's coming out.

I would say great video content coming out.

Great game content coming out.

We have some great classes.

Carrow's Gate 3 coming out.

Carrow's Gate 3.

Carrow's Gate 3.

We got fresh DLC for everybody.

Please be there day one when it drops.

Romancible Will Gallows.

What a joy and a delight.

We never talked about.

Okay, sorry.

I just realized the one.

I know we're exiting.

Make this a stinger later.

We all have our one foot out the door and a breath.

I just realized the one thing I never asked about this entire arc.

Why didn't Ame ask Marara about fucking the man in black?

That is such a good question.

Damn it!

Because I want to know, and now we may never get the answer.

No!

How do they do it?

What that arm do?

What'd that arm do?

That knee's so high up.

Well, I'll tell you where you can find that answer.

And it's...

Over by the fireside.

Yeah, there he is.

All right, everybody.

Thank you so much for joining us.

I'm Erica Ishii.

I'm Abri Iagar.

I'm Brendan Lee Mulligan.

And I believe, I'm quite certain I'm Lou Wilson.

But who can say?

Good night, everyone.

Crackle, crackle.