S1E8 — Fireballs — Grorx v Lord Xiren

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A greedy little goblin who wanted to buy the crown met a winged Aasimar who hadn’t realised a Deathmatch involved dying. Grorx and Lord Xiren were sent to the Grandmaster’s “temple of the lost,” where they fought through barking hieroglyphs, a befriended mummy and a doll with far too many teeth. The match ended with a fireball, a tied crowd and a coin flip, and it produced one of the strangest outcomes the arena had ever seen.

The Story

A Bones Day Decision

The night began in The Dread Fortress, where The Arbiter made his entrance with characteristic grace: “It is I, the Arbiter, of all things. I mean this specifically, but also other things that you don’t know about. Shut up, nerd.” His audience was asleep. The Grandmaster was napping on her throne, and he had to tap his cane to wake her. She was unrepentant. An afternoon nap, she explained, was a requirement for everyone, and it worked best with Doug the Pug beside her. The Arbiter said he had no time for naps, even with time magic, because he was busy finding subjects for her Deathmatches. She dismissed this as “Excuses.”

He had brought a gift. Two goblins staggered in under a painting ten times their height: a giant velour portrait of Doug, painted as an optical illusion. Depending on how you looked at it, Doug either had bones or didn’t. “Grandmaster, the bones now are at your discretion,” the Arbiter announced. Elusia worried this was a lot of responsibility, since things had been “a lot easier when Doug the pug just decided for us.” She shook the real Doug, who rolled onto his back with his tongue out, wheezing, plainly needing a few more hours. She gave her ruling: “Doug the Pug does not have bones today, but perhaps our champions will give me bones instead.”

The Champions and the Crown

The Arbiter ripped open a portal, and out walked the two champions. Grorx, a small goblin in heavy plate, wanted to talk about his fee first. The Arbiter promised he would be “rewarded handsomely” if he survived. When Grorx asked what happened if he died, the Arbiter replied, “I don’t see how paying your corpse would make any difference to you.” Grorx said, “Deal.”

Lord Xiren was having a harder morning. He had been told he would put on a show for the Grandmaster. “Wait. I could die putting on a show for the Grandmaster?” The Arbiter asked what part of “Deathmatch” he didn’t understand. Xiren accepted with “So be it!” Grorx kindly offered to guide the newcomer: “The easy part, you’re just gonna die.”

Introductions went badly in both directions. Grorx’s first question about the throne room was “How much for the crown?” The Grandmaster informed him her crown was not for sale, because it was something she had earned. Unbothered, he introduced himself as “Grox the Great. Greatest of Goblin Kind, Troll Kind, Orc Kind, and Elven Kind. Not Dragon Kind though, I don’t fuck with that.” Xiren, meanwhile, couldn’t find the Grandmaster at all, because his eyes were “only partially working.” She snapped her fingers and a spotlight hit her throne, flaring blindingly off its metal surface. Xiren shielded his eyes and declared himself “Your Aasimar, your protector, your champion!” The Grandmaster was charmed: this was “my fighter on the field,” and not “that other one who’s trying to steal my crown.”

The negotiations got stranger from there. Grorx explained his life philosophy (“you got to keep the standards low. That way you can always rise above the standards”) and his escape plan (“I’m the greatest at running away”). Once the Grandmaster raised the bar, he decided the crown was out of his price range anyway. He had been planning to pay with credit. “You don’t take Omnicard?” Xiren added, “You don’t take Orcish Express?” They did not. Grorx admitted he had used his contract as a napkin, which the Arbiter assured him was still binding. Xiren’s contract only said “please the Grandmaster,” until the Arbiter handed him a giant magnifying glass and pointed out the small print: “not responsible for maiming or dismemberment or death.” Xiren pressed on regardless.

Into the Temple of the Lost

The Arbiter widened the portal, and a wave of hot air and sand blew through. They could not travel by train, because the goblins hadn’t finished it. Grorx, speaking for his people, said goblins were the worst laborers. Above the arena, hordes of Acolytes screamed in mock gift-store copies of the Grandmaster’s crown, paid for in cash, of course. Their fervor had already summoned a chaos event, and the Arbiter announced they had demanded two.

The Grandmaster revealed the arena: “My temple of the lost, Kabehe’s Temple.” The fight began in a cool underground chamber full of sand, lit by a sliver of light from above, with a staircase to a ledge twenty feet up. When she spread her deep blue wings and lifted off to her secondary throne, a cloud of red sand mixed with bone dust rose behind her. She hinted that the champions were “not necessarily stuck here,” and the Arbiter repeated the hint with a wink. Xiren took the high ground on the ledge. Grorx had just discovered he was the only one without wings, and vowed to fire his manager.

The Hounds and the Falling Rocks

The first chaos event woke Doug as if he’d been electrocuted, and he barked his head off. The dog hieroglyphs carved into the temple walls lit up and barked along with him, and the noise drowned out every spoken word. For a while, no one could cast a spell that needed a voice. For Xiren, whose magic was almost entirely spoken, this was a disaster.

The second event set the Grandmaster laughing so hard her feet stomped. “This automatically means the no bones day has turned into a bones day,” she cackled, and rocks fell from the ceiling. Grorx dodged every one of them, explaining that this reminded him of growing up, with dogs barking and people throwing rocks at him: “every goblin grows up like this.” Xiren, busy covering his ears, was hit by the falling rocks. He was then briefly distracted by the protector’s urge to feel bad about Grorx’s very sad childhood.

Hit and Run

Unable to cast over the barking, Grorx pulled out a javelin. “I’d say I’m sorry, but I really want ice cream.” He rolled a natural 20, and the javelin flew out of the dark and straight through Xiren’s shoulder. Grorx then ran for the far corner, as promised. On the way he spotted a sealed doorway and recognised the lock instantly: “Hey, that’s my dad’s door.” His father had designed it, and a hidden pressure plate opened it. His attempt to hide behind it in clanking plate armor went less well. “Clink clink clink,” and bits of goblin stuck out on every side.

The Acolytes loved “the hit and run,” Grorx’s patented move, and granted both champions their favor. Xiren pulled the javelin from his shoulder, broke it over his knee and laughed. His firebolt died in the din, so he yelled, “Dog, shut up! I’m working over here.” Doug barked louder, and the Grandmaster issued a warning. Xiren switched tactics at once: “Doug, you are so wonderful.” He flew off “the top rope” to land a thunderclap on Grorx, which just mixed in with the noise. Then he teleported back up the stairs to drink his tea.

The Hidden Chamber

Grorx serpentined across the floor until he found his father’s pressure plate. A carved stone lifted into the ceiling and revealed a ceremonial chamber. A great statue stood in a sunbeam, with a hieroglyph-covered plate beneath it, broken columns, and the bones of long-buried attendants in the dirt. Grorx’s knowledge of history let him recognise the place as the set of The Mummy starring Brendan Fraser. He went in search of Rachel Weisz. In the quiet away from the barking, he wrapped himself in a coat of magical frost.

Xiren, abandoned on his ledge, made a friend instead. Holding Doug up, the Grandmaster listened as Xiren told the pug, “You’re a good boy, no matter what the Grandmaster says about you.” Doug went quiet and gave him his blessing. It turned out he also liked praise.

Friends in Low Places

Xiren followed into the chamber and hid behind a pillar, shouting that the game was rigged because Grorx’s father had built the arena. The pillar crackled apart, and a mummy trapped inside lurched out and grabbed him. He was strong enough to shrug it off. Then, being Lord Xiren, he tried to make friends with it: “My, you have such smooth bandages. I do enjoy them.” He suggested they team up against the goblin on the stairs. The Arbiter warned that the mummy would know it had been manipulated when the magic wore off. The Grandmaster noted, “That’s also how friendship works. When you manipulate people, they find out.” Xiren then announced, “I wish to run and hide and touch myself,” and ducked behind the crumbled pillar to lick his wounds.

Grorx answered with a superhero landing from the ledge. It was a bow-legged, spider-like waddle that frightened Xiren badly. He set his sword alight with a branding smite and carved into the mummy. When asked about the numbers, he said, “I don’t know math. That’s why everything’s on credit.” Through it all the mummy stayed Xiren’s friend, and Xiren named him Michael Jackson, for “Smooth Criminal,” and announced he was starting to turn Russian.

Dolly Joins the Fight

The Acolytes demanded another chaos event and got “a classic friend of the arena.” A tiny sarcophagus rose from the dust, its lid creaked open, and Dolly floated out. “Will you be my friend?” Xiren was overjoyed. Meanwhile MJ fixed Grorx with his dreadful glare, which failed. Grorx shrugged that his mother had one too. Then he confessed he “may or may not have slain seven or eight of my siblings,” adding that “It was at home, so it doesn’t count.” Xiren offered him a great lawyer and handed MJ a business card “for that asbestos abatement.” MJ tried to eat the card, bit off his own fingers, and gave a thumbs-up as his thumb fell off.

Xiren took Dolly’s hand. Her fingers clamped in a death grip and burned a friendship mark into his palm, and she joined his side. He loosed a storm of magic missiles at Grorx. Grorx replied, “I will show him what D&D is,” and threw up a shield spell that stopped every dart. Dolly’s jaw dropped eight inches to reveal rows of sharp teeth, and she snapped at Grorx twice and missed twice.

The Grandest Spell

Stuck between a mummy and a doll (“clowns to the left of me, jokers to the right of me”), Grorx blinked away. He blasted both MJ and Xiren with eldritch blasts, and the hit shattered the magic holding MJ’s friendship. The mummy realised he had been “gaslit into friendship,” moonwalked toward Xiren, and landed a natural 20 punch. He punched Dolly for good measure. Xiren fled up the stairs and hurled a fireball, which Grorx caught mostly on his shield.

Then Xiren made his stand. “I would plead for my life, but that is not the way of Lord Xiren. I do hope that I’ve put on the performance that you wished.” He called on the Acolytes’ favor, and the crowd chanted “do it, do it, do it” as twelve scorching rays erupted from his hands. Eight struck Grorx, and stray rays bounced off the goblin’s shield and burned MJ to a crisp.

The Collapse

The hype triggered a fourth chaos event. Doug spat out a small d20, and the temple began to come down. Sand poured from above, cracks raced along the walls and scarabs fled the stone. A doorway of light opened in the far corner and both champions ran for it. Grorx begged the Acolytes for a second chance, and fate “found you unworthy”: a lump of rubble conked him on the head. Both burst out into the sunlight before a great temple carved into a mountainside. Behind them, Dolly was seen reaching out as the rocks came down. “We don’t know the fate of Dolly.” Xiren wanted to petition for a rescue. The Grandmaster said that “We will remember Dolly in our hearts.” Xiren cried, “For Dolly! For Dolly!”

Mercy in the Sun

Outside, Xiren took the high ground once more. Then he asked the Grandmaster for mercy on Grorx’s soul. She answered only to her Acolytes and put it to them: should both live, or must one die? The crowd split exactly in half. A coin flip ruled that death was asked for. “Whether you will give it to me or I will take it on my own, you must give it to us before this round is over. This is Deathmatch.”

Xiren obliged in the grandest way he could think of. He wanted “big booms,” so he dropped a fireball right next to himself: “And if I happen to blow myself up, then so be it!” Grorx was left one point from death, Xiren was badly burned too, and both were thrown into the rubble, dying. The crowd showered them with hot dogs that dried out instantly in the desert heat. One landed in Grorx’s twitching hand. “This is how I always thought I would die. I’m still the greatest.” Xiren praised his rival’s glorious bow legs. Then both slid toward death in perfect unison.

The Grandmaster descended. “Never! No!” Their fates were tied, she declared, “two phoenixes circling each other throughout eternity.” The Arbiter admitted he would have loved to see a death, and that he enjoyed “the sounds of the death rattle, the gurgling of one’s last gasp of breath, blood in the windpipe,” even the stuff that happens afterwards with the bowels, but deferred to her. Asked whether they wished to live together or die together, Xiren said Grorx’s name right for the first time all match. He said he “would be honored to live out our remaining days discovering what makes us both champions.” A second coin landed on one: they would both live, “but in only one body.” The two were pulled together and molded into a single creature with two heads and one leg slightly shorter than the other. The Grandmaster raised it to her crowd. A voice from the new body wailed, “Kill me, kill me now. Where did my wonderful legs go? They’re hideous bowed and green. What am I to do with these? How can I touch myself?” The Grandmaster promised an ice cream after-party. At the table, the hosts admitted that even the Grandmaster hadn’t known what the other side of that coin would have meant. The fusion was permanent: the two champions would live on as one.

Notable Moments

• The Grandmaster’s velour painting of Doug turned the whole night into a debate over whether it was a bones day.
• Grorx recognised the lock in the arena as his own father’s work, and then failed to hide behind it in clanking plate.
• MJ the mummy bit off his own fingers trying to eat Xiren’s lawyer’s business card.
• Grorx blocked an entire storm of magic missiles with one shield spell.
• Lord Xiren ended the Deathmatch by fireballing himself along with his opponent.
• Spared by a coin flip, the two champions were fused into one two-headed body with mismatched legs.

Memorable Quotes

• The Arbiter: “I don’t see how paying your corpse would make any difference to you.”
• Grorx: “Greatest of Goblin Kind, Troll Kind, Orc Kind, and Elven Kind. Not Dragon Kind though, I don’t fuck with that.”
• Lord Xiren: “Wait. I could die putting on a show for the Grandmaster?”
• Grorx: “See, you got to keep the standards low. That way you can always rise above the standards.”
• Grandmaster Elusia Skypiercer: “That’s also how friendship works. When you manipulate people, they find out.”
• Grorx: “I mean, I may or may not have slain seven or eight of my siblings.”
• Lord Xiren: “It has been my honor to do battle in this dusty, crappy temple. And I would be honored to live out our remaining days discovering what makes us both champions.”

Grandmaster Elusia Skypiercer: “It is as if their souls are twins, two phoenixes circling each other throughout eternity. Clearly, these are bonded souls, and I will not be the one to separate this.”

Who and What Appears

Characters

Grorx (“Grorx the Great”) (TimothiustheGr8). A small goblin in heavy plate with a shield and longsword.

• Abilities: casts as a 4th-level warlock (Armor of Agathys, eldritch blast, misty step, shield) and uses Branding Smite and Shield Master. Throws javelins.
• Claims greatness over goblin, troll, orc and elven kind, but “not Dragon Kind.” Sets standards low so he can rise above them; “the greatest at running away.”
• Money: tried to buy the Grandmaster’s crown on credit (Omnicard, Orcish Express). Resells things. Holds many credit cards and throws them away when maxed. “I don’t know math.”
• Lactose intolerant.
• Goblin childhood: barking dogs and people throwing rocks at him.
• His father designed the locking mechanism of the door in Kabehe’s Temple.
• Claims he “may or may not have slain seven or eight of my siblings… at home, so it doesn’t count.” His mother has a dreadful glare.
• Used his contract as a napkin. Without wings (“I gotta fire that guy,” of his manager).
• Moves with a bow-legged, spider-like waddle that intimidated Xiren.
• Hit-and-run style; his “patent move” per the crowd.
• Ends fused with Lord Xiren in one two-headed body.

Lord Xiren (DadGotGameTV). An Aasimar, “your protector, your champion”, with wings.

• Abilities: a sorcerer (twinned spells, firebolt, thunderclap, misty step, friends, magic missile, fireball, scorching ray) with the healing hands feature (never used).
• Came believing he was only there to put on a show; his contract said “please the Grandmaster.”
• Eyes “only partially working”: he couldn’t find the Grandmaster until she lit herself with a spotlight.
• Promised a cookie and cold milk if he survived.
• A friend-maker:
  • Praised Doug and received his blessing.
  • Befriended the mummy MJ.
  • Bonded with Dolly, whose mark burned into his palm.
  • Wanted to go back for her.
• Knows “great lawyers” and asbestos-abatement people.
• Started “turning Russian” (needs vodka).
• Deliberately mispronounced Grorx’s name (Granshain, Grorix) until the end (Dried Blood).
• Blew himself up with his own fireball to end the match.
• Fused with Grorx. He laments his lost legs (“hideous bowed and green”).

The Arbiter (Mudcat).

• Carries a cane. Doesn’t nap; time magic aside, “time waits for no one.”
• Gifted Elusia a giant velour optical-illusion painting of Doug the Pug (bones / no bones), carried in by two goblins.
• Says the goblins are behind on the train (“public works”).
• Hands out giant magnifying glasses for the small print.
• Loves the sounds of death (“the death rattle… blood in the windpipe… the bowels”) but defers to the Grandmaster’s ruling.

Grandmaster Elusia Skypiercer (Caustic Phoenix).

• Takes a mandatory afternoon nap with Doug and needs at least six hours of sleep (“beauty sleep”).
• Her throne has a metal surface. She has a secondary throne above the arena.
• Her crown “is not for sale. This is something that I have earned.” Acolytes wear gift-store replicas of it.
• Deep blue wings.
• Called this temple “my temple of the lost”, “my pyramid”.
• Let the Acolytes vote, flipped coins, and spared both champions by fusing them (“two phoenixes circling each other throughout eternity”). She draws “this wellspring of inspiration” from her Acolytes.

Doug the Pug. The Grandmaster’s pug, who naps with her and decides bones days.

• His barking (plus the barking hieroglyph dogs) silenced verbal magic.
• Likes praise; blessed Xiren.
• Spat out the d20 for the final chaos event.
• “Bones day” was declared mid-episode.

MJ (Michael Jackson) the mummy. Trapped inside a pillar in the ceremonial chamber.

• Befriended by Xiren’s friends cantrip (“such smooth bandages”).
• Moonwalks. Bit off his own fingers eating Xiren’s lawyer card, and his thumb fell off.
• Turned on Xiren when the spell broke, with a nat 20 punch for 47.
• Burned to a crisp by stray scorching rays.

Dolly. “A classic friend of the arena”: a small hovering doll that rose from a tiny glowing sarcophagus.

• “Will you be my friend?” Her death-grip handhold brands a friendship mark.
• Has an eight-inch dropping jaw with sharp teeth.
• Probably crushed in the temple collapse; her fate is officially unknown. “We will remember Dolly in our hearts.”

The goblins of the Dread Fortress. Painting carriers and the (slow) train workforce.

Places

• The Dread Fortress, the Grandmaster’s halls and throne.
• Kabehe’s Temple [spelling uncertain], “my temple of the lost”:
  • Underground chamber: red sand mixed with bone dust; a second story 20 ft up a small staircase; walls with dog hieroglyphs; a door whose lock was designed by Grorx’s father (pressure plate).
  • Ceremonial chamber: large humanoid stone statue lit by a sunbeam; a hieroglyph-carved ceremonial plate under it; broken columns; bones and bodies of long-buried champions/attendants; the mummy’s pillar. Grorx’s history check identifies it as “the set of The Mummy”.
  • Outside: the front of a desert temple carved into a mountain, in hot sun.
  • The temple collapsed in the final chaos event.

Items

• The velour Doug the Pug painting (optical illusion).
• Gift-store replica crowns of the Grandmaster’s crown.
• The champions’ contracts. The small print reads “not responsible for maiming or dismemberment or death.”
• The giant magnifying glass.
• Xiren’s lawyer business card (eaten).
• Dolly’s tiny sarcophagus.
• Ice cream after-party (the winner’s prize, given to the fused pair).

Lore statements

• The Arena “has no escape”, and the Grandmaster sets traps.
• The arena does not take credit; Acolytes pay cash.
• A train is planned or under construction, worked on by goblins (not ready).
• The Grandmaster can fuse two dying champions into one body.
• Goblins are “taught from a very young age” to keep the bar low.
• Acolytes’ chaos events can be voted and polled; a tied poll was settled by coin flips.

Full Round-by-Round

Every beat of the episode, with timestamps (click to expand)

Opening: the Dread Fortress

1. 0:00:16 The Arbiter opens: “It is I, the Arbiter, of all things. I mean this specifically, but also other things that you don’t know about. Shut up, nerd.”
   • We are “in the Dread Fortress, in the halls of Elusia Skypiercer”. The Grandmaster is napping on her throne.
   • The Arbiter taps his cane to wake her.
2. 0:01:03 — The afternoon nap. Elusia insists an afternoon nap is a requirement for everyone.
   • “It is at least a bare minimum that everyone gets at least six hours of sleep, and I can’t get that at night.”
   • It works best with Doug the Pug beside her.
   • The Arbiter says he has no time for naps, even with time magic (“time waits for no one”), because he is busy procuring subjects for her deathmatches. She calls it “Excuses” and says she is “not as pleasant” without her sleep: “beauty sleep”.
3. 0:02:08 — The gift. The Arbiter claps his hands. Two goblins struggle in with a painting about ten times their height: a giant velour painting of Doug the Pug.
   • It is an optical illusion. Depending on how you shift, Doug “either has bones or doesn’t have bones.”
   • Elusia: “So we get to decide if it’s a bones day or no bones day.” Arbiter: “Grandmaster, the bones now are at your discretion.” She worries that this is responsibility: “It was a lot easier when Doug the pug just decided for us.”
4. 0:03:08 Elusia shakes Doug, who also napped with her. He rolls onto his back, little giant tummy out, tongue sticking out, wheezing. He needs a few more hours.
   • The table debates whether you can paint on velour (“magic somehow”). Elusia says she will commission the Arbiter to create something like that.
   • Her ruling: “Doug the Pug does not have bones today, but perhaps our champions will give me bones instead.”
5. 0:04:39 The Arbiter promises she will be pleased “even on a no bones day”. He rips open a portal, and Grorx and Lord Xiren walk out.

The champions arrive

6. 0:05:09 — Grorx’s payment. Grorx: “Where am I?” The Arbiter reminds him: “We talked about this. The Deathmatch.”
   • Grorx: “I’m to be paid for this.”
   • Arbiter: “Should you survive, you will be rewarded handsomely.” Grorx: “And if I die?” Arbiter: “I don’t see how paying your corpse would make any difference to you.” Grorx: “Deal.”
7. 0:05:41 — Xiren didn’t know. Lord Xiren had been told he would “put on a show for the Grandmaster”. “Wait. I could die putting on a show for the Grandmaster?” Arbiter: “What part of Deathmatch do you not understand?” Xiren: “So be it!”
   • Grorx: “New to deathmatches, I see… Grox the Great will guide you through the whole time. The easy part, you’re just gonna die.”
8. 0:06:30 — Grorx’s presentation. Told to bow before the Grandmaster, Grorx first looks at the goblin carrying the painting (“is it this one?”). Then: “Throne, crown. How much for the crown?”
   • Elusia: “My crown is not for sale. This is something that I have earned. You little peasant here in my dread fortress.”
   • He introduces himself as “Grox the Great. Greatest of Goblin Kind, Troll Kind, Orc Kind, and Elven Kind. Not Dragon Kind though, I don’t fuck with that.” The Arbiter: “That’s a very specific line.”
9. 0:07:57 — Xiren can’t find her. Xiren stares at the pug and a “dark figure”, unable to spot the Grandmaster. The Arbiter asks her to make herself known.
   • She snaps her fingers and a spotlight hits her throne. It reflects blindingly off the metal surface of the chair.
   • Xiren shields his eyes: “There you are, Grandmaster! … I am Lord Xiren! Your Aasimar, your protector, your champion! My sole purpose tonight, to please the Grandmaster! Whether in victory or defeat, in life or death…”
   • Grorx: “It’s definitely going to be death. Just predicting it now.”
10. 0:09:22 The Arbiter is “beyond confused” and offers to take Xiren back. Elusia: “Arbiter, shut it… My protector. My fighter on the field. Not that other one who’s trying to steal my crown and doesn’t even know who I am.”
11. 0:09:48 — The crown negotiation.
    • Grorx offered “a legitimate sale. Proof of ownership.”
    • He doesn’t want her title, though. “The great is a good title for me.” Elusia scolds that “great is just okay of a title… awesome, fantastic, fantastical, wonderful, amazing, phenomenal.”
    • Grorx: “See, you got to keep the standards low. That way you can always rise above the standards.” If he doesn’t, “Then I run away… I’m the greatest at running away.”
    • Elusia: “Make sure there is no map where he can greatly run away.” Arbiter: “There is no escaping your arena.” She adds that there are “plenty of traps”.
    • Curious, she asks what the crown is worth. Now that “the bar is so high”, Grorx no longer wants it: “It’s out of Grorx’s price range.” He looks “for things that I can resell.”
12. 0:11:32 — Credit. Grorx: “I was gonna use credit.” “You don’t take Omnicard?” Xiren chips in: “You don’t take Orcish Express?”
    • Arbiter: “The fees are outrageous.” Elusia: “We do not take credit.”
13. 0:12:24 — The contract. Grorx: “I used my contract as a napkin and it got stained.” Arbiter: “It’s still binding.”
    • Xiren rereads his contract: “all it says in here is please the Grandmaster.” Elusia: “At least we know he’s literate.”
    • The Arbiter points out the smaller print, “not responsible for maiming or dismemberment or death”, and hands Xiren a giant magnifying glass.
    • Xiren: “That was not communicated to me, but I will proceed anyway because I’m here to please the Grandmaster.”

Travel to the arena

14. 0:13:16 Elusia asks for “a particular map of grandness, of perhaps mystery hidden away in time.” The Arbiter widens the portal, and a wave of hot air and sand blows through.
15. 0:13:51 — The train. “We’re not traveling by train.” The train isn’t ready and none of the carts are. The Arbiter: “We’ll have to get the goblins on that. Should have been done months ago. You know, public works.”
    • Grorx: “They are the worst laborers. You should not hire them.” The low-bar thing “is taught to us from a very young age.”
16. 0:14:28 — The crowd. Elusia: “The bar here is set high.” She points to the sky. The hordes of Acolytes are vicious and screaming, and they all wear mock versions of her crown bought in the gift store, paid in cash “because we don’t have credit here.” Their fervor has already summoned a chaos event.
17. 0:15:13 — The arena. “My temple of the lost, Kabehe’s Temple.”
    • Plenty of sand, and a small staircase to a second story 20 ft up.
    • It is cool, with a sliver of light from above. “You are clearly underground somewhere.” Every sound echoes.
    • “You are not necessarily stuck here, but it is a good place to begin.”
    • Her wings pop open, bright and deep blue across her feathers. As she lifts off, a cloud rises: red sand mixed with bone dust. “This place is ancient.”
    • She takes “her grand seat high above in her secondary throne.”
18. 0:17:22 “Arbiter, get this map started.” Arbiter: “In this economy?”
    • He wants “the dirtiest, messiest fight that you can muster in this hall of death.” He announces that the Acolytes have demanded two chaos events.
    • With a wink he repeats the hint that they “may not be trapped in this room”, then vanishes in smoke.
19. 0:18:17 Grorx to Xiren: “You’re a lot bigger up close.” Xiren(?): “You’re green.” “I mean, that’s racist, but that’s fine.”
20. 0:18:38 — Milk and ice cream.
    • Xiren admits his eyes are “only partially working.”
    • Elusia promises that if he survives he can read the rest of the contract with a cookie. He asks for a cup of milk: “Fine… But it will be cold, not warm. I don’t know who those weirdos are that like to drink warm milk.”
    • Grorx: “my stomach hurts talking about milk.” He is lactose intolerant (“Oh, man, you have no idea”). Arbiter: “You shouldn’t have told us that.”
    • Elusia: “The winner only gets ice cream at the end. That’s also at the end of the contract.”
21. 0:19:38 — Placement. Grorx: “Two managing expectations here… No, the expectations are too high. Gotta go.” Both start in the same quadrant. Xiren has the high ground on the ledge.
22. 0:21:12 — Wings. Grorx: “Am I the only one without wings? Is that something I miss in the contract?… Where’s my manager?” Arbiter: “You were able to bring your own wings.” Grorx: “I gotta fire that guy.”
    • Xiren: “Never trust a kobold community [?]… It said bring wings.”

Chaos event 1: Doug’s barking (0:21:39)

23. The champions roll a 5 and a 6 (“So you’re a twin”). Doug the Pug pops up as if electrocuted and barks his head off on his tiny struggling paws.
    • Dog outlines and hieroglyphics on the temple walls light up and bark too, echoing through the chamber.
    • Elusia fumbles the phrase: “You have loosed… Let loose the hounds of hell.” “Unleashed would have been the right answer, damn it.”
    • Effect: no verbal spells for four rounds, because no words can be heard.

Chaos event 2: Bones day (0:24:09)

24. Elusia laughs so hard her feet stomp. “This automatically means the no bones day has turned into a bones day.” Rocks fall from the unsteady cavern ceiling.
    • Grorx dodges every rock (24). “This reminds me of when I grew up, the dogs barking at you all the time, people throwing rocks at you, trying to kill you… every goblin grows up like this.” “What childhood did you have?” “Goblin childhood.” Elusia: “This suddenly got very sad.”
    • Xiren, covering his ears, is hit (9 damage). “Don’t look at the ground, keep your eyes up, even if they’re only partially working.”
    • 0:26:43 Xiren realizes Grorx “had a very sad childhood”, and the protector in him is slightly distracted (“That’s how we get you”). Then he wipes off the dust.

Round 1

25. 0:27:48 — The nat 20 javelin. Unable to speak spells over the barking, Grorx pulls out a javelin: “I’d say I’m sorry, but I really want ice cream.”
    • Elusia admits the ice cream is “a verbal contract. I can break it.”
    • Nat 20. Grorx: “He should probably look down right now.” Xiren looks down just in time to see something flying out of the dark.
    • Caustic Phoenix: “Pure desire in his eyes… in his tiny goblin body, yeets that far high above him, stabbing straight through the shoulder of Lord Xiren.” Arbiter: “It’s just a flesh wound.”
26. 0:29:55 — Grorx runs to the far corner, under the shelving, as promised. Passing a seemingly closed doorway, he rolls a nat 20 perception.
    • The door’s locking mechanism was designed by his father. He knows a pressure plate on the floor opens it. “Hey, that’s my dad’s door.”
27. 0:31:57 — Hiding fails. He hides behind the lintel at disadvantage in heavy plate and rolls a nat 1.
    • Caustic Phoenix: “Fate has called upon you and taken back what she owes.”
    • Grorx: “clink clink clink… you can just see little bits of me sticking out.” Xiren has been staring straight at him the whole time.
28. 0:32:57 The crowd loves “the hit and run… the patent move of Grorx” and chants both names over Doug’s barks. The Acolytes give each champion a hero point.
29. 0:34:18 — Xiren’s turn.
    • He pulls the javelin out of his shoulder, breaks it over his knee and laughs at Grorx. Grorx: “It sounds like you have a cold.” Xiren: “The dust is settling in my throat… You and your shrinkity, clinkity, clankity armor… I will find you.”
    • His firebolt fails because of the barking. “Dog, shut up! I’m working over here.” Doug barks louder, and Elusia warns of a wisdom save.
    • Xiren reverses at once: “Doug, you are so wonderful.”
    • Almost all his spells are verbal. The one that isn’t is thunderclap (5 ft range).
30. 0:36:49 — Off the top rope. “I have wings, and I shall jump from the top rope.” Arbiter: “You are the top rope.” Gravity lets him close the distance. “Lord Xiren gallantly flies from the top rope and lands next to Grorx.”
    • Grorx withstands the thunderclap (Con 17). It just mixes in with the noise.
31. 0:38:43 Xiren misty-steps back up to the stairs: “Is everyone doing a hit and run?… Take my misty step to the top of the stairs and drink my tea.”
    • He tried to use healing hands, but it was too late in the turn.
    • “Thank you, Grandmaster, for being so gracious.” Elusia: “Ah, yes. This one gets it.”
32. 0:40:19 Elusia: “Movement! And then a lot of running away… this game of really intense tag.”
    • The Arbiter’s end-of-round d20 is a 10. “Your average is likely a five. C minus, buddy.”
    • Xiren: “C’s get degrees.”

Round 2: the hidden chamber

33. 0:41:36 Grorx serpentines in front of the door until he finds the pressure plate. A carved hieroglyph stone lifts into the ceiling and reveals a larger ceremonial room with a large stone statue at the far end.
34. 0:42:27 — History. “Is that also part of your childhood, reading lots of history books?” “No, I’m very dumb.” He saw it “upside down” in a book: “I think you guys need to get your money back.”
    • Mudcat: “With a 10, you recognize us as the set of The Mummy starring Brendan Fraser.” Grorx: “Where’s Rachel Weisz?… I’m gonna go in there in search of Rachel Weisz.”
35. 0:43:44 Running in, Grorx taunts Xiren: “you’re still late because you didn’t hit me.” Xiren: “Oh, I’m just biding my time, Grorx.”
36. 0:44:52 — The chamber.
    • Sun beams onto the statue’s carved humanoid face. Columns are broken and sand filters down from above.
    • A large ceremonial plate covered in hieroglyphics sits under the statue.
    • Bones and bodies of long-buried “fast [past?] champions, attendants to this statue” lie in the dirt.
37. 0:45:49 “There’s no dogs in here, right?… So quiet, so peaceful.” Grorx self-reflects and casts Armor of Agathys. Mudcat narrates the reflection “very literally: left foot, right foot.”
38. 0:47:13 — Xiren befriends Doug. He flies five feet down from his perch and realizes “the other champion has left the building.”
    • Elusia holds Doug up. “Doug. I do appreciate your wonderful fur and that you take care of the Grandmaster so, so well. Thank you for all that you do. You’re a good boy, no matter what the Grandmaster says about you.”
    • Persuasion with advantage, 16. Doug quiets for a moment and grants Xiren his blessing (a d4 for one round). “Turns out he also likes praise.” Xiren: “Lord Xiren is forever grateful.”
39. 0:50:09 — The pillar mummy. Xiren runs through the door to hide behind a pillar. Speaker 01 (likely Xiren, speaker uncertain) shouts: “This game is rigged! He knew! His father built the arena!”
    • The pillar crackles apart, and a mummy trapped inside breaks out and grabs at him.
    • Strength 18 vs the mummy’s 5: it can’t hold him.
    • A new room means initiative is rerolled, and the mummy joins at 12. Elusia: “This is not the cool, awesome mummy from the mummy.” Grorx: “It was one of the really bad mummies.”

Round 3: Friends

40. 0:53:50 — Befriending the mummy.
    • Xiren wants to “take a healing hands on the mummy and make it my friend.” Healing hands would do nothing to a full-health mummy, so Mudcat points him to his friends cantrip. “Did you mistake the grapple for a hug?”
    • The touch-yourself jokes: “If you want to touch yourself, bud, you go…” “It’s that kind of place.”
    • Xiren: “this is my first time, and I’m, like, a little overwhelmed. There’s, like, 500 things to read.”
41. 0:57:16 — The speech. “My, you have such smooth bandages. I do enjoy them. I also know that there’s a guy named Granshain [Grorx, deliberately misnamed] over on the stairwell. That wishes to do you harm. And I do believe that if we were to team up, we could take him down.”
    • Elusia: “So that’s the recipe for friendship. A compliment of some sort and then a similar goal… Who uses sandpaper these days?”
    • Mudcat warns that when the spell ends, the mummy will know it was manipulated. Elusia: “That’s also how friendship works. When you manipulate people, they find out.”
    • The mummy turns its eyes toward Grorx.
42. 0:59:31 Xiren: “I wish to run and hide and touch myself.” Elusia: “Making friends is hard, okay?” He hides behind the crumbled pillar (half cover) “while I lick my wounds.”
43. 1:00:19 Elusia needs a drink of water for her and Doug. She proposes a “how to friend a mummy in a pyramid” 101 book, and the Arbiter will talk to “our publisher”. The break is cut (“Name That Monster!” bumper).

After the break

44. 1:01:13 The Arbiter: Xiren is still bleeding profusely; “you’d think it would be clotting by now.” Xiren: “My mummy friend is keeping me company with his bandages.”
    • The mummy makes “very uncomfortable eye contact” with Grorx.
45. 1:03:18 — The superhero landing. Grorx jumps 10–15 ft down: “Iron Man stance… A tiny little, like, little bowed legs to the side. He just waddles… almost like a spider.”
    • Intimidation 26 vs Xiren’s insight 9. Elusia: “This awesome, badass, superhero freaking landing… This is not how goblins would move from what you know of.”
    • Xiren is frightened and has disadvantage next turn.
46. 1:05:47 — Branding Smite. Grorx plants himself between them, stares at Xiren, and swings at the mummy, lighting his sword on fire with Branding Smite. It hits for 20.
    • Grorx: “I don’t know math. That’s why everything’s on credit.… Orcish Express tells me how much to pay.”
    • Elusia: “I’m concerned about your financial literacy.” Grorx: “I have so many credit cards. They’re so nice… When they reach the top, I just throw them away. And then I get another.”
    • He turns the blade on Xiren: a glancing blow for 3. Elusia: “More pain!” (speaker 01: “More blood!”). Xiren holds concentration, so the mummy stays his friend.
47. 1:09:36 — MJ. Xiren names the mummy Michael Jackson, “for smooth criminal”. “I do believe I’m starting to turn Russian.… I just needed some vodka for my shoulder.” Elusia: “He’s evolving. It’s not even his final form yet.”

Chaos event 3: Dolly (1:10:15)

48. Xiren(?) announces that the Acolytes demand a chaos event. The Arbiter rolls a 14. Elusia: “A classic friend of the arena.” Mudcat: “Oh, God.”
    • A tiny sarcophagus rises from the dust. Its hieroglyphics light up, it glows, the lid creaks open, and a small doll pops up.
    • Mudcat: “She’s always giant when I pull her up.” Elusia: two of the same adjective “negate each other… I learned it in Hallmack [?].”
    • The doll, in her sweetest voice: “Will you be my friend?” Grorx: “This guy loves friends.” Xiren: “I do love friends. Oh my, another friend has joined the arena. I’m so happy.”
49. 1:12:55 — MJ attacks Grorx.
    • Its dreadful glare fails (Wis save), so Grorx is immune to mummies’ glare for 24 hours. “So does that include my mummy?” “Yes, you’re immune to your own mummy.” “She has a dreadful, dreadful glare.”
    • Grorx: “I mean, I may or may not have slain seven or eight of my siblings.” The Arbiter advises against confessing in public. Grorx: “It was at home, so it doesn’t count.” Arbiter: “Of course. I forgot the law.”
    • Xiren: “Lord Xiren is a protector. I know great lawyers. I’ll hook you up after this if I’m not dead.” He forgot his cards; Grorx: “I’ll get it off your dead body.” Xiren: “Take it out of my wallet. With all the money, too.”
    • The rotting fist lands a glancing blow (necrotic and bludgeoning). Grorx resists mummy rot.
    • Grorx: “This place is bad for you. There’s probably a lot of asbestos.” MJ does a small moonwalk. Mudcat: “and if you or somebody you know has been diagnosed with mesothelioma…”
50. 1:16:58 — The business card. Xiren hands MJ his card “for that asbestos abatement.” MJ puts it in his mouth and bites off his own fingers trying to eat it, then gives a thumbs up as his thumb falls off.
51. 1:17:47 — Holding Dolly’s hand. Dolly is creepy and hovers. Xiren takes her hand.
    • Her fingers close in a death grip. A small circular burn forms in their shared palm, marking him as her friend, and she will fight alongside him for three rounds.
    • Xiren: “Listen, I’m full of charisma, I make all the friends, okay? I read the contract and didn’t see Deathmatch in it!… now I’m trying to make as many friends as I can!”
    • Armor of Agathys deals 10 ice damage to MJ, leaving him “bloody… thank goodness they’ve got smooth bandages.” Mudcat: “We murder people and we educate.… We value friendship and blood.” (01: “Bloody friends!”)
52. 1:21:15 — The twinned magic missile. Xiren spends sorcery points to twin a 4th-level magic missile at Grorx: eight darts, 31 damage.
    • Grorx: “I will show him what D&D is, and I’ll cast Shield.” Shield is the only counter to magic missile. Mudcat: “I fucking love D&D.”
    • Xiren: “This is literally rigged!” Mudcat: “You have two friends! What are you complaining about?”
    • Grorx’s shield: “It looks like a giant meme… Gandalf doing the head shake… every time the missile hits, the finger moves.” Mudcat: “Fuck you, fuck you, fuck you…”
53. 1:25:25 — Dolly’s turn. Her jaw drops eight inches, sharp teeth slide down, and she snaps at Grorx “for funsies.” She misses twice. Her eyes glow in frustration and her hair floats up.
    • Elusia: “Holding hands is a good way. Just start holding hands with people and that’s how you make friends.” Grorx: “Or get arrested… If you look like me, get arrested.”
    • The Arbiter rolls a 1, then rerolls a 5. Elusia: “Let me just freak out here and pull out the confetti.”

Round 4

54. 1:28:04 Grorx: “I got clowns to the left of me, jokers to the right of me… I’m stuck in the middle, so I’m going to cast Misty Step.”
    • He lands, then throws “his shield Captain America style” as eldritch blast: one beam at MJ, one at Xiren.
    • Both hit. Xiren fails concentration and MJ is no longer his friend. Mudcat: “realized that it has been manipulated just like its mother used to do to him all the time. Gaslit into friendship. Forced into biting his own fingers off.”
    • Xiren: “MJ, let’s talk about this.” MJ moonwalks toward him.
55. 1:31:15 — MJ’s revenge. A natural 20 rotting fist on Xiren for 47. “Remember, friends take work.”
    • MJ also punches Dolly (7 bludgeoning; necrotic doesn’t affect her). Xiren: “Don’t you touch Dolly.”
    • Mudcat suggests healing now (“that Lay on Hands might be a good time”). “Friendship is dead.” “So is he. Yeah, basically.”
56. 1:33:37 Xiren flies up to the top of the stairs: “His wings are gone. But his charisma will never die.”
    • MJ’s opportunity attack misses (13). Mudcat: “Welcome to D&D, bitch!” Xiren: “Dolly, you better charm that mother trucker.”
57. 1:35:23 — Fireball 1. A 5th-level fireball at Grorx. Grorx’s shield (Shield Master) halves it: the fire engulfs him and scorches around his shield for 20.
58. 1:37:28 — The hero point Scorching Ray. Xiren: “Grandmaster, I would plead for my life, but that is not the way of Lord Xiren. I do hope that I’ve put on the performance that you wished. We’re going out with the grandest spell that I can conjure.”
    • He spends his hero point and sorcery points on a twinned 5th-level scorching ray: 12 rays.
    • The Acolytes chant in hushed tones, “do it, do it, do it.” Mudcat: “It’s just like DBZ.”
    • Eight rays hit for 61 fire. Grorx’s shield can’t withstand it: “You’re gonna need some aloe.”
    • Stray rays bounce off Grorx’s shield and burn MJ to a crisp. “Murdered.” “Burned your friend alive. Sorry, ex-friend.” (01: “MJ, call my lawyer!”)

Chaos event 4: the collapse (1:44:00)

59. The hype triggers the fourth event. Elusia gives Doug a small d20, and he spits it onto the field. “We’re not doing another dolly. There will not be two dollies.”
    • The ground shakes, sand pours from above, cracks race along the walls and far columns crumple. Scarabs scamper out of the cracks to escape. “This whole place is going down.”
60. 1:45:34 A makeshift doorway of light opens in the far corner, and they flee with Dex saves.
    • Grorx rolls a 7 and spends his hero point to reroll (“my leg that locked up”). Another 7. Elusia: “Fate has looked down upon you and found you unworthy.” He’s conked on the head by a piece of rubble.
    • Both escape into the sunlight in front of a large desert temple carved into the wall of a mountain. Dust billows behind them, “crushing the doll, perhaps? We don’t know the fate of Dolly.”
61. 1:47:33 — Dolly. Elusia: “You just saw her reaching out as the rocks crushed her.” Xiren: “I was going to petition Grandmaster to go back in for her!”
    • Elusia: “The doll has done her job. We will remember Dolly in our hearts… Do you dare look back?” Xiren: “She was my friend… For Dolly! For Dolly!”

Final round: outside the temple

62. 1:48:05 Initiative is rerolled, and Xiren goes first for the first time.
    • He climbs the rocks: “I’ve got the high ground! You underestimate my power!”
    • “Grorix! I would like to petition the Grandmaster for mercy on your soul. What say ye?”
63. 1:50:33 — The poll. Elusia: “The two of you have fought well and danced through the halls of my pyramid… I answer only to one group.” She puts the choice to the Acolytes: let both live, or must one die, “either by each other’s hand, or mine.”
    • The poll runs 53–47, then ties 50–50. “The crowds divided half on one side, begging, screaming for the survival of both and on the other demanding more blood, more broken bones.”
64. 1:53:25 — The coin. “In the truest of fashions, flip me a coin.” One means yes, two means no.
    • Elusia: “Death is asked for. Whether you will give it to me or I will take it on my own, you must give it to us before this round is over. This is Deathmatch.”
    • Xiren: “As the Grandmaster and the crowd wishes. We shall end this.”
65. 1:54:47 — Fireball at his own feet.
    • Xiren starts with “one bolt” of firebolt to show off, then switches: “No, I want big booms.” A 5th-level fireball “right next to him. And if I happen to blow myself up, then so be it!”
    • Xiren: “That’s a hell of a way to end a deathmatch, isn’t it?” Elusia: “It evens the odds. This is a fair shot for both.”
    • Xiren rolls a nat 1 on his save, Grorx a 12. Xiren takes 39. Grorx takes 69, one point short of dying outright. Both are blown back into the rubble, dying but conscious.
66. 1:58:25 — The death saves. Both roll a 10 on the first, a tie.
    • The crowd showers them with hot dogs (“Frankenweenies”) that dry out instantly in the desert. One lands in Grorx’s hand, and he twitches and closes his hand around it.
    • Grorx: “This is how I always thought I would die. I’m still the greatest.”
    • Xiren: “Grorx… Your bow legs were glorious in battle. The way you jumped from the top shelf, it scared me but inspired me at the same time. Grandmaster, I do hope [I gave you] the show that you desired.”
    • The garbled “Your both legs” is read as “bow legs” (inferred, from the landing at 1:04).
67. 2:00:17 Both roll natural 1s on the second save. Each is at one success and two failures; one more failure and they’re dead.
68. 2:00:35 — The Grandmaster intervenes. She comes to the ground. “Never! No! The fates have spoken. And their lives will always be tied… We shall not be the ones that will cut their thread tonight… It is as if their souls are twins, two phoenixes circling each other throughout eternity. Clearly, these are bonded souls, and I will not be the one to separate this.”
69. 2:01:45 The Arbiter defers: “These are your games. I would love to see a death. I can’t lie. I do enjoy the sounds of the death rattle, the gurgling of one’s last gasp of breath, blood in the windpipe… Even the stuff that happens afterwards, you know, with the bowels.”
70. 2:02:17 Elusia: “Do you wish to live together or die together?”
    • Grorx: “Live like he’s the Magneto to my Mr. Professor… Or live like best friends forever in a field?”
    • Xiren, pronouncing the name correctly at last: “Grorx. It has been my honor to do battle in this dusty, crappy temple. And I would be honored to live out our remaining days discovering what makes us both champions.”
    • Grorx: “Cool, that makes me Magneto.” Xiren: “I will be the Professor X to your Magneto.”
71. 2:03:53 — The second coin: one body. It lands on one. “That one means that you will both get to live, but in only one body.”
    • The two are pulled together by “the magnetism between the two of you”, meshing and molding into “some foul mixture with two heads… one leg is slightly shorter than the other. You will walk slightly askew.” Or they’ll need “one shoe with a really big pump on it.”
    • Someone shouts “My legs are better!” (speaker uncertain).
    • “You will live as one.” She raises the new monstrous being to her crowds.
72. 2:05:14 Speaker uncertain, probably Xiren: “Kill me, kill me now. Where did my wonderful legs go? They’re hideous bowed and green. What am I to do with these? How can I touch myself?”
    • Elusia: “This is the friendship that you have chosen and has fate drawn you together. We will celebrate this with an after party of ice cream.”
73. 2:05:53 — Sign-off. “To my acolytes, my dearly beloved, it is from you that I draw this wellspring of inspiration. It is for you that this heart of the arena still pumps blood… Welcome and good night to D20 Deathmatch!”

Full Dried Blood notes (click to expand)

• Mudcat opens: “Welcome back for another episode of Dried Blood… this is episode eight.”
• Tim’s name: “It’s Timotheus, just think like Greek.” Mudcat had been saying it wrong.
• This was DadGotGame’s (“of Mixer fame”) first time ever playing D&D, apart from prep with Mudcat. His character was “almost all verbal spells”, so the barking event hit him hard. Tim: “If you really want to fuck your players, take out their verbal components.”
• Grorx had no backstory. Tim plays one-shots pure “yes and” (the credit cards, siblings and so on were improvised). He’s doing the same for Bruce’s character in Wild Beyond the Witchlight (“Robert’s game”).
• The fusion:
  • Tim thinks of Quaid and Kuato from Total Recall.
  • Dad is “totally fine with it… I came out of this with a new friend.”
  • Mudcat was as surprised as the players.
  • Caustic Phoenix: “I had no idea what was going to happen if he flipped a two.”
  • Mudcat jokes “It was always going to be two people in one body… we were going to railroad you.” Flipping bodies or “parent trap action” were floated.
  • Dad: “I ended up with orc legs bro. I slaved over my character.”
• Caustic Phoenix: Xiren mispronounced Grorx’s name on purpose the whole game and said it right only “at the very final end” while dying.
• Dad’s concept: he took the protector idea literally: “this is a Deathmatch, but what if we don’t die?” The mummy did more damage to Grorx than he did until the big spell. Then he aimed for “this dramatic place of mercy.”
• The self-fireball: someone (speaker uncertain, labelled Caustic Phoenix) says “I had no idea there was a 20 foot radius,” then “It was on purpose. It’s always on purpose.”
• Grorx had 110 HP and took 109. Tim had planned ahead: a passed save would have meant Xiren killed only himself, and against a lighter attack he would have used Hellish Rebuke to kill them both.
• Rerolling initiative on map changes happened by accident (Mudcat’s setup didn’t carry initiative over) and was kept on purpose. Tim compares it to older editions.
• Caustic Phoenix counts three map changes and four chaos events.
• The guest whiteboard has dozens of names, including Danny Trejo (“He hasn’t answered any of my reach outs”). Tim reached out himself (“former touring musician”), though he was already on the list.
• A return is planned: “We’ll have you both on again sometime… since you are survivors.” Caustic Phoenix: “This is like the Chimera mix-up that will haunt people’s dreams. I don’t even know how we’ll make this visually for a character.”
• Final words:
  • Tim: “Play D&D. It’s the way to Satan. And it’s also the way to fun.” The game saved his life twice; he mentions being 38. He has made lifelong friends through it.
  • Dad: find people who will guide you through your first game. He wants to play more.
  • Tim praises Dad’s story foresight: “that’s a DM, really.”