Tabletop Squadron Transcript – Season 2, Episode 19:
CRITical Decisions

Transcript by Tyler (Twitter: @Tyler_MoonSage)

## Intro

NICK: Hi everyone, and welcome to Tabletop Squadron, a Star Wars: Edge of the Empire actual play podcast. I’m Nick, your game master. Every other Thursday, our story follows a thief, a bounty hunter, and a slicer as they hunt for galactic treasure, staying away from a bitter rival and growing closer together.

We have a new patron this week. Joran Winge, thank you so much for your support of the show. Tink has been talking about the effectiveness of riding people’s shoulders into battle again, and for the sake of everyone I’d really appreciate if you talked him out of it. He’s in the cargo bay… riding HK’s shoulders.

Music credit and content warnings are available in the show notes this week.

So now, let’s get into the episode.

##

NICK: Hello! Welcome to Tabletop Squadron, Episode 19! … Apparently. I’m your host and game master, Nick. Let’s go around the table and everybody say who you are and who you’re playing today, starting with Cameron.

CAMERON: Hello! I am Cameron, and I will be playing Karma Nailo, a Nautolan bounty hunter.

NICK: Wonderful! Up next we’ve got Hudson.

HUDSON: Hi, I’m Hudson. I hopefully won’t be playing myself too hard, but today I’ll actually be playing Tink, a Gigoran slicer.

NICK: Fantastic. Yeah, don’t play yourself.

HUDSON: Don’t play ya’self.

NICK: [laughs]

LILIT: Don’t play with yourself. [laughs]

HUDSON: I will not do that either.

CAMERON: [chuckles] Also don’t do that during recording.

LILIT: Leave room for Sabos, okay?

HUDSON: Leave room for Sabos.

[laughter]

NICK: Last but not least, we’ve got Lilit.

LILIT: Hello. I am Lilit, and I will be playing Xianna’fan, a Twi’lek smuggler.

NICK: Before we get into the recap, let’s kick it off with the Destiny Roll~!

CAMERON: One dark side.

HUDSON: One light side.

LILIT: Two light side.

CAMERON: Hey~

NICK: Nice!

[groovy western style music begins]

When we last left off you all had landed on Ithor, found a new friend named Meelo Smee, also found a brand new party member in Little Tink the action figure. You had set up an ambush for a molsoom that had apparently taken over the greenhouse where the Oracle had been living, and you decided that the only way to get into the greenhouse and investigate would be to fight this molsoom and remove it as a threat so that you could go and try to find the Stone Breaker, which is the Force-sensitive item that you were here to collect in the first place at the behest of Sentinel. That’s where we’re going to kick it off.

We open on an empty field of rubble. There are small stands of trees around the perimeter. Some larger piles of rubble and some low twisted metal that makes for good cover is scattered as well. A horrible clicking roar pierces the quiet jungle air of Ithor as the most dangerous predator on the planet crashes through an opening of the ruined greenhouse. What was once a peaceful seat of wisdom for the Ithorians and their Oracle is now a den of broken glass and shattered trees. Charging out of this den is the molsoom, your quarry.

Karma, you’re in cover at the edge of the clearing. As this monster begins to come into view, what does it look like as you get ready for this fight?

CAMERON: Karma is doing the typical action hero prepping for an ambush thing of standing with her back against the tree on the opposite side from where the molsoom is coming from, just holding her carbine, just up, so that she can dramatically swing around whenever it actually comes out of the greenhouse.

NICK: Cool. Xianna, you’re in a tree.

LILIT: I am indeed.

NICK: Heh. You’re slightly into this open space. You climbed up a tree after firing your blaster into the greenhouse to anger the molsoom. How are you preparing?

LILIT: Well Nick… I have a gun.

[laughter]

NICK: Great.

LILIT: And I’m in a tree. Xianna is perched up at least a few meters up into the tree, in like the crook of a few branches, has her blaster out in one hand and is definitely holding a grenade in the other.

NICK: Ready to go. Tink, you’re crouched behind a piece of rubble. You’re much nearer to the greenhouse entrance. How do you react as this giant monster charges out?

HUDSON: I look up over the rubble and see the monster coming out, and I clutch Little Tink close to my vibro axe that is clutched close to my chest, and I look, and I find a shinier taller piece of shrapnel about five yards away that provides better cover.

NICK: You action roll to a newer, larger piece of shrapnel to hide behind. As you prepare your ambush, the molsoom exits the greenhouse, and as this creature climbs out of the greenhouse and into your ambush HK also takes aim from on top of his rock where he is positioned.

[western music, having grown more fast-paced, ends]

You can see it has long thick claws that pierce the ground and shatter duracrete and durasteel underneath them. This creature is bigger than a bantha. It’s much larger than you expected it to be even with Meelo’s warning. Really, the only way to describe it is it looks like a centipede and a dragon got together to make a surrealist self-portrait. You can see it’s got large fangs and an iridescent pelt that catches the light and shimmers like rainbows on a long and muscled body. It is a weird scary bug dragon that looks like it could really tear somebody apart, and it’s ready to fight. Someone shot into its house and woke it up. It is looking around frantically, and I need you all to roll initiative.

LILIT: I got one success and three advantages.

HUDSON: I got nothing.

NICK: What?!

LILIT: Blank?

HUDSON: I rolled two greens…

CAMERON: And they’re both blank?

HUDSON: [laughing] …and got blanks on both of them.

NICK: Oh!

HUDSON: [laughing] I don’t have any in Cool, but I have 2 in Presence.

NICK: Okay, zero. Karma, what did you get?

CAMERON: I have a success, a triumph, and an advantage.

NICK: Okay. If you could roll two greens for HK please.

CAMERON: Yep.

NICK: He is not very cool.

CAMERON: Don’t say mean things like that. Three successes.

NICK: See Tink, that’s how you roll two greens.

CAMERON: [laughs]

NICK: Cameron, if you could roll me two yellows and two greens please.

CAMERON: Six advantages!

NICK: And if you could do it one more time for me please.

CAMERON: Three successes, four advantages.

NICK: Interesting. Okay. So the order we are going to have is monster, three friends, monster, additional friend.

HUDSON: Cool.

NICK: So the molsoom kicks off first. It’s going to use some of those advantages to get some blue dice on a Perception check to see if it can find anyone nearby as it whips around much faster than you’re expecting it to be able to for its size, and that’s gonna be a yellow and two green versus—Tink, what’s your Stealth?

HUDSON: Three, and my Agility is 3.

NICK: So versus three red, but he is going to have two blue dice.

CAMERON: A failure and an advantage.

NICK: Okay. This thing is whipping around, smelling at the air, trying to figure out where its attacker is, and it can’t manage to find anything, so now it’s standing in the open right where you wanted it to. Your ambush is as successful as it could possibly be. And it’s a PC slot. What do you do?

HUDSON: I hold up Little Tink and I say:

HUDSON (as Tink): Alright, Little Tink, where’s its weak spot?

HUDSON: And Little Tink says:

[gentle mystical music begins]

HUDSON (as Tink): “Oh man, hold on. Let me just tune into its imagination. I think if you just… if we just… you just think about it, what they’re thinking… Their weak spot is the underbelly and only the top part of their neck.” Hmm, what am I gonna do with that?

[mystical music ends]

NICK: Hey, uh, just out of curiosity, roll me a Xenology check, would you?

[laughter]

CAMERON: What is Little Tink’s Xenology stats?

NICK: No, no, no. We’re diving deep into Tink’s subconscious.

[laughter]

HUDSON: Two successes and two threats.

NICK: One of those facts is true.

HUDSON: [laughs] I don’t know this though, right?

NICK: You’re the one talking to yourself with an action figure.

CAMERON: Do you trust yourself?

NICK: Yeah. Do you trust Little Tink?

HUDSON: Yeah. I think they’re both true.

NICK: Okay, then yeah.

HUDSON: I yell out to everyone.

HUDSON (as Tink): The weakness is in the upper part of the neck and the underbelly! Someone do a distraction then me and little guy will do something.

NICK: So it’s still a PC slot. I’m not gonna say that cost a slot to identify a weak point by talking to yourself.

HUDSON: Okay.

NICK: So if someone wants to attack they can.

LILIT: Xianna is going to take the grenade and throw it at said molsoom.

NICK: So you’re throwing a grenade. We’ll say you’re at medium range.

LILIT: Can I aim? I’m aiming.

NICK: [exhales]

[laughter]

LILIT: [gasps] Ah-ha~ I have a triumph with a success, three additional successes, and an advantage.

NICK: Do you want to use that triumph to crit or to activate Blast?

LILIT: Let’s use it for a crit.

NICK: Okie-dokie, so we’ll need to roll a d100. We’ll just do the biological crit chart not the ship chart.

CAMERON: Okay, good.

HUDSON: It’s not a ship, is it?

CAMERON: [laughs] The molsoom’s engine breaks down.

LILIT: The base damage for a grenade is 8.

NICK: Eight base damage. That’ll be 12 damage coming at it, which is a solid hit. What did we roll on that crit?

CAMERON: Seventy-three.

NICK: Which is?

LILIT: Seventy-three is Hamstrung: Lose free maneuver until end of encounter.

NICK: Oh…

HUDSON: It can’t move?

NICK: It can, it’s just gonna cost it strain to do it which is not good for it being a melee monster combatant. So, this grenade goes off. What part of the molsoom are you aiming for?

LILIT: I think in Xianna’s logic Xianna would be aiming towards the butt.

NICK: [laughs]

LILIT: Not for any butt-related reasons, but in Xianna’s mind maybe if the explosion goes off near the butt the molsoom will run away.

[electric guitar led metal music begins]

NICK: The grenade bounces right off one of the haunches and then explodes very close. This was a very, very accurate throw of yours. It puts a large burn into the back of its leg, and you can see that it’s really upset, and it seems a little slower, but overall it’s still moving. So it took this grenade and doesn’t even look super injured. Like, you definitely hurt it, it didn’t shrug it off, but it’s still very much ready for a fight, and it continues to look around frantically to find something to attack, because the grenade went off on its butt so it’s not tracing that trajectory particularly well. We have another PC slot.

HUDSON: I start to grab my vibro-axe and Little Tink says:

HUDSON (as Tink): “No, no, no. What are you doing?” I’m about to go melee this boy over here. “You don’t wanna do that. You wanna stare at its underbelly and light fires of flames in your eyes and they’ll transfer. They’ll transfer through the air and they’ll hit the underside.”

[metal music ends]

I’ve never done that before. Um… Medically—I am a doctor, I forgot to mention that to you. Medically, that doesn’t line up with how normal Gigoran bodies work. “Oh no, you can do it, Tink. I believe in you.”

HUDSON: So I stare really hard at the underbelly and really try to focus on thinking about fire, and nothing really happens.

NICK: No.

HUDSON: [laughs] Wait, actually. Wait. Can I roll for—

NICK: No!

[laughter]

HUDSON: Okay, so nothing happens.

HUDSON (as Tink): Little Tink, I don’t think this is working. I’m just gonna go swing at it. “Alright, suit yourself.”

HUDSON: So I grab my vibro-axe, I put Little Tink in my pocket? And run towards the monster.

NICK: Well you have pouches and stuff.

HUDSON: Oh, good, okay. Is it at a height where I could jump up and get its upper neck with my vibro-axe, or is that too tall?

NICK: It’s upper neck, you would probably have to climb it or jump off of something, but you could hit it from underneath or hit its legs or even its face, but hitting the top of its neck is gonna be really hard. This thing is bigger than an elephant.

HUDSON: Okay. I go for its underbelly and try to do a ‘hiyah’ slice and chop.

NICK: Alright. Make me an attack roll. Tink, this will have a black die, because this does have 1 in Melee Defense, and it is an Adversary 1, so one of your purple dice is upgraded to a red die, so it’ll be one purple, one red and one black.

HUDSON: Two successes and three advantages.

NICK: Nice. So… is that enough to crit?

HUDSON: My axe has Monomolecular Edge as Crit 1.

LILIT: Oh my god.

NICK: Oh… What?!

HUDSON: Wait. Okay, hold on. I just have been not using that for a long time.

LILIT: Have you just never been using that, Hudson?

CAMERON: Yeah!

HUDSON: Yes. A long time I have not used that.

[laughter]

LILIT: That means every single advantage you get is… you could have crit. Every time you had an advantage you could have been critting.

HUDSON: [exasperated and embarrassed wail into his hands]

NICK: Okay, so if it’s Crit 1, this is going to do 10 damage base with your Brawn and the damage your axe does, and because your axe is Crit 1 and you got three advantages you can crit +30 if you want.

HUDSON: I would like to do that.

NICK: Okay, so we need to roll another crit.

CAMERON: This one is a 39, plus 30…

NICK: Which is?

LILIT & HUDSON: [gasps]

CAMERON: Sixty-nine.

LILIT: Sixty-nine!

HUDSON: Sixty-nine. Nice!

NICK: Nice!

LILIT: Nice!

[air horn stinger]

LILIT: Super noice, 69 is Scattered Senses: Gains no boost die until end of encounter.

NICK: Okay, so it won’t be aiming I suppose. So, you hit this thing almost as hard as a grenade. What’s interesting is that you are able to gash this thing’s underbelly open a lot more than the armored outside under the fur would lead you to believe, so it seems like you were right, the underbelly is actually a weak point.

HUDSON: No, I wasn’t right, Little Tink was.

NICK: There is a horrible ear-shattering roar as you draw blood from this creature, and are standing right next to it, and we have one more PC slot.

CAMERON: karma’s gonna pop out from behind her tree and shoot it in the face.

NICK: Okay. Did you set up at medium or long range?

CAMERON: Medium.

NICK: Okay, so you’re pretty close.

CAMERON: Yeah, I’m just behind a tree.

NICK: Okie-dokie.

CAMERON: Can I get a blue die because it hasn’t actually gone this encounter?

NICK: Sure.

CAMERON: Because it didn’t, like, hit anybody.

NICK: Yeah, it hasn’t attacked.

CAMERON: It hasn’t attacked. Okay. Then I’m gonna aim.

NICK: Great.

CAMERON: Three successes, five advantages.

NICK: Wow. SO how much damage is that?

CAMERON: Sixteen.

NICK: So you’re able to hit it pretty hard.

CAMERON: And uh… I do crit.

NICK: Are you gonna crit? Yeah. Is yours Crit 3 or Crit 2?

CAMERON: Crit 3.

NICK: Okay, so you don’t get additional, but it is +20 because it’s already been crit on twice.

CAMERON: Oh, Nicholas…

NICK: Oh…

CAMERON: I also add +40 to that +20, because I have 4 ranks of Lethal Blows.

NICK: Oh!

LILIT: Ha-ha-ha~!

HUDSON: Ooh.

CAMERON: Yeah!

NICK: Okay!

CAMERON: So I’m adding 60 to this roll.

NICK: Okay.

LILIT: So roll a 9.

[laughter]

CAMERON: I will try. A 50, plus 60. [laughs]

LILIT: One-ten is Horrific Injury: Minus 1 penalty to random characteristic until injury is healed. Does someone want to roll a 1d10 for that random characteristic?

CAMERON: Sure.

HUDSON: I really want it to be emotional stability or…

LILIT: Eh…

CAMERON: [laughs] Its Presence is just gone. That is a 10.

LILIT: A 10 is Willpower, so…

[laughter]

NICK: Okay.

HUDSON: I was right! Kinda.

LILIT: Yeah.

NICK: Well, it was going to shoot Force Lightning at you, but now it doesn’t have the base stats to really pull that off.

[laughter]

LILIT: Hey, now it has no Vigilance.

NICK: Yeah. [chuckles] So, describe this shot that lowers its Willpower, hurts it very badly. It still seems pretty functional, it’s just you are very rapidly picking it apart with this ambush before it can really get its legs underneath it.

CAMERON: Karma steps out, pivots around the tree, head tails do a really dramatic swoosh, pops the carbine up and then just nails it right in the center of the forehead with a blaster shot, then swooshes back behind the tree.

NICK: Some of its iridescent fur chars away, and you can see it flinch and step backwards, and it steps on the leg that’s been injured by the grenade, and it’s mad. It lets out another roar, and you can see its chittering mandibles and fangs pull back and there’s some sort of dripping venom between them. It’s looking around for something to attack, and it looks down, and it sees Tink having just run out from underneath it, and the molsoom leaps to attack. It’s going to be rolling three yellow and two green against average. Do you have any Defense?

HUDSON: I do not.

NICK: Okay.

CAMERON: Three successes and two threats.

NICK: So that’s 8 damage coming at you, Tink.

HUDSON: Owies.

NICK: Yeah. On top of that, I need you to make a hard Resilience check for me.

HUDSON: One success, two advantages.

NICK: So, this creature, almost as a full 180 it whips around so quickly to where you’re standing after your attack, it plants these fangs into your shoulder and you can feel your blood begin to burn as you are hit with some sort of toxic venom. You lose 4 strain, and you are now poisoned.

HUDSON (as Tink): Ahh… I feel funny, everyone!

NICK: And it’s a PC slot, so I guess HK will go. HK, from his position on this rock, he has been aiming this entire time. HK takes careful aim and he rolls to shoot. It’s two yellows and two green, but also flip a light side point to add his Agility to the damage. It is going to be average.

CAMERON: A success, a triumph, and one advantage.

NICK: Okay, so he’s gonna crit as well. With the success that’s 11, plus an additional 4, so that’s 15 damage coming at it. So it’ll be +30 for the previous critical hits and he has 2 points in Lethal Blows, so it’ll be +20 more.

CAMERON: A 48! Plus 50, 98.

LILIT: A 98 is the one we have renamed Harmed: One limb is impaired until healed/replaced, plus difficulty to all checks using that limb.

NICK: HK hones in on where the grenade went off on this thing’s rear, and it shoots down through its hip, and you can see that the leg can’t hold weight anymore, so this thing is now attacking with just three legs and seems very slowed down and like it’s not going to be able to attack as fast. But, it does roar and spin around, and it still can’t find any of the people who are hiding on the edge of this clearing, and its eyes are clouded with rage at this point, so as it looks around to find what just attacked it its eyes fall on Tink again and it goes to attack Tink. It’s gonna be three yellow and two green against average difficulty against Tink again, except it’s gonna be against hard difficulty because he has been hurt very badly.

CAMERON: Two successes, one advantage.

NICK: So that’s 7 additional damage coming at you, Tink, minus your Soak.

HUDSON: Ouch. Yep.

NICK: And you lose an additional 4 strain as you feel more of this venom continue. With your medical knowledge, you would think that falling unconscious due to venom from a giant predatory creature is probably bad.

[quirky upbeat music begins]

HUDSON: So with my medical knowledge, but also a combination of that and being a bit woozy, I actually turn my head to the side and try to suck the venom out of my own body thinking that I can extract it from my body and it won’t go back into my body. I’ll either spit it out or it will go away somehow. I didn’t get that far in the plan.

NICK: Would you like to spend a PC slot to do a Medicine check to try to negate the venom?

HUDSON: Yeah, that’d be great.

NICK: Okay, go ahead. This is gonna be hard difficulty. Do you maybe wanna flip a light side point to make this more likely to be successful?

HUDSON: Nope! Nah.

NICK: [grinning] No? Okay.

HUDSON: Two failures and an advantage, though.

[laughter]

NICK: So, you didn’t get threats so the poison doesn’t get worse. You do just what you described. You try to suck the poison out of your own shoulder and you discover two things. It’s very hard to put your mouth on your shoulder, and also, even if you could the poison has been pumping through your bloodstream for about three initiative slots at this point, so that ship has kind of sailed. Little Tink looks up at you with a new life in his eyes and he says “maybe you should’ve tried to negate the poison rather than just remove the poison.”

HUDSON: I look up at Little Tink and he’s kinda blurry and going in and out of vision because of the poison.

HUDSON (as Tink): Why don’t you just grow big and grow your wings and fly and fight a beast yourself?

NICK: “Alright, maybe I will.” And we’re onto another PC slot. This giant monster is still rampaging around screaming and being very dangerous.

[quirky music ends]

LILIT: Technically I do have more grenades. Xianna will go next, and Xianna aims while thinking:

LILIT (as Xianna): Did Tink get into the glitterstim or something?

LILIT: Well I got one success and one advantage.

NICK: Alright.

LILIT: So that is 8 damage, and it is Pierce 2.

NICK: So the Pierce 2 is very important, because a big part of why this creature is dangerous is it can soak a bunch of damage. So you shoot it and it stumbles backwards and you actually make it rear up on its hind legs and it reveals its softer underbelly, so the advantages will be that whoever attacks it next will have a blue die and also will get to hit it in the underbelly where it is weaker. We are to another PC slot.

CAMERON: Can I shoot it in the tummy?

NICK: You may absolutely shoot it in the tummy.

CAMERON: Thank you.

NICK: You pop back out of cover?

CAMERON: Pop back out of cover, aim, shoot it in the tummy. Whoa… two successes, five advantages.

NICK: Two successes, five advantages.

CAMERON: Mm-hmm.

NICK: So how much damage is that?

CAMERON: Fifteen.

NICK: Okay. You hit it very hard, and I’m assuming you’re going to crit on it.

CAMERON: Uh-huh.

NICK: Okay, so it’s +40 for the amount of crits it’s gotten so far.

CAMERON: Plus another 40 for me~

NICK: Okay, so it’s +80?

CAMERON: [chuckles] Yes. An 87, +80.

NICK: Oh…

HUDSON: One-sixty-seven.

CAMERON: [laughs] The crit chart doesn’t go that high.

LILIT: So 151 and above… Dead.

[laughter]

LILIT: No further elaboration on that one. It just says “Dead.”

NICK: Okay! It wasn’t doing well anyway, but I guess you hit it somewhere very important. So how do you kill this thing with a 167 on a crit?

[drum led metal music begins]

CAMERON: I shoot it in its tummy.

NICK: Okay.

CAMERON: Probably along one of the gash lines that Tink had made with his axe so it goes even farther into the tummy and it just hurts really, really bad, and then he dies.

NICK: Yep, and then this molsoom, this massive example of predatory grace, dies before it hits the ground.

[metal music ends]

You very efficiently end its life and it collapses with no sound, and you can tell from where you are it is completely done. You have slayed the beast. Congratulations. Tink, take another 4 strain damage as the poison continues to course through your system.

HUDSON: I’m now at -2 strain. [laughs]

NICK: Alright! Tink collapses to the ground unconscious. Well, swimming in and out of consciousness. You can tell that whatever he got hit with he is not doing well, and it’s not just the severity of his injuries. You’ve seen him shrug off worse than what he got from the physical wound, but Tink is on the ground. HK stands up from where he was lying on his rock and says…

NICK (as HK): Boss Man has perished.

NICK: …and starts to slowly climb his way back down the rock. He doesn’t look particularly hurried.

LILIT: Xianna hops down out of the tree and then goes up to Tink.

LILIT (as Xianna): No Hank, I do not think he is dead. I think he is just, like, unconscious or something.

HUDSON (as Tink): “He’s taking a nap, a real hard nap.”

CAMERON: Karma trots over. [chuckles]

LILIT (as Xianna): I think he is whispering something under his breath.

HUDSON (as Tink): “No, no, it’s just Little Tink here.”

NICK: HK walks up next to Karma.

NICK (as HK): He appears to be under the effect of some sort of venom.

CAMERON (as Karma): Yeah, that venom’s bad news. It’s not fun.

HUDSON (as Tink): “I don’t go over and piss in your sand castles.”

LILIT: Xianna has leaned down and has gotten real close to Tink’s translator.

LILIT (as Xianna): He said something about castles. Does that mean anything to anyone?

HUDSON (as Tink): “I said…”

CAMERON (as Karma): I do remember it being slightly hallucinogenic, but it was a bad time, it wasn’t a fun trip.

LILIT (as Xianna): Did this not start before he got injured?

CAMERON (as Karma): Which part?

LILIT (as Xianna): The whole Little Tink thing.

CAMERON (as Karma): Oh no, that started earlier.

LILIT (as Xianna): Yeah.

HUDSON (as Tink): “$4.99 for the buffet. $4.99 for the buffet. Space Corral, all day.”

LILIT (as Xianna): I cannot understand him anymore. I think we should maybe get him immediate medical attention.

CAMERON: How do I wake Tink up? Does a stim pack heal strain?

NICK: Stim packs heal strain, yeah.

CAMERON: Okay. I’mma stab Tink in the leg with a stim pack.

HUDSON (as Tink): “Wake me up inside~ I can’t wake up! Wake me up and—” SAVE ME~! [stammers and groans, confused and dazed]

[laughter]

NICK (as HK): Boss Man, you appear to have returned to the land of the living.

LILIT (as Xianna): He was never dead, HK.

HUDSON (as Tink): Was I dead?!

LILIT (as Xianna): No, you were not. HK—

HUDSON (as Tink): How would you know?

LILIT (as Xianna): Because I was here and I was listening to you talk, and dead people do not talk.

HUDSON (as Tink): I didn’t talk.

LILIT (as Xianna): Yes you were. You were saying something about castles, and I think a buffet.

HUDSON (as Tink): You sure that wasn’t Little Tink?

LILIT (as Xianna): Oh my god. Tink, I thought you were straightedge, but…

HUDSON (as Tink): What do you mean? I am straightedge. I’m keeping the edge.

LILIT (as Xianna): No, I am pretty sure you got into some glitterstim or something.

CAMERON: Karma walks over to Tink’s shoulder and takes out her emergency med kit and starts bandaging his shoulder.

NICK (as HK): Boss Man, it appears that your edge has been dulled.

HUDSON (as Tink): Oh no! How could this happen?! What’s next for me? “Murder! Drugs! Everything bad. Just get on a bike and go. Just ride off into the sunset and just destroy and pillage. Pillage!”

NICK (as HK): I’m beginning to feel that this action figure is a bad influence on the Boss Man.

CAMERON (as Karma): Mm-hmm!

LILIT: Where is the action figure?

[intense dramatic music begins]

NICK: I’m assuming he’s holding it.

HUDSON: Yeah, I am. [chuckles]

LILIT: Okay.

CAMERON: He’s been like moving it as it talks. [laughs]

HUDSON: Yeah.

NICK: Yeah.

LILIT: Okay. Xianna takes the action figure out of Tink’s hand…

HUDSON (as Tink): What?! [stammers, flustered]

LILIT: …reaches into her pocket, grabs a grenade…

NICK: [laughs]

LILIT: …smashes the two together, and then throws.

[laughter]

HUDSON (as Tink): Nooo~! “You can’t kill me! I AM god!”

NICK: [explosion sound] And little tiny bits of duraplast rain down around you as Little Tink meets his end at the end of a grenade.

[intense music ends]

HUDSON (as Tink): Aw man. Why did you do that?

LILIT: Xianna turns back around.

LILIT (as Xianna): There. We do not have to deal with the weird action figure anymore. It was a bad influence on Tink.

HUDSON (as Tink): I don’t think it was that bad of an influence, and it was a fan favorite.

CAMERON (as Karma): Was it?

NICK: [laughs]

LILIT (as Xianna): No. Tink, you have to stop with this whole thing that we have fans. We tried doing the blogging and it did not work, mostly because I kept changing my name every time and you did not want to be on the camera. It’s very difficult.

HUDSON (as Tink): I just don’t like that we named it OnlyXianna’fans.

[laughter]

LILIT (as Xianna): Yes, it is a very funny joke. It just did not work for many reasons.

HUDSON (as Tink): Alright. Well, Little Tink, may you rest in peace and reign over all of us as you have told me you would before.

NICK: Little bits of plastic continue to tinkle down around you.

LILIT (as Xianna): Okay then. So, let’s go get the Stone Breaker and then, I don’t know, we should come back and collect the molsoom…

CAMERON (as Karma): [out of breath] Yup.

LILIT (as Xianna): …and maybe sell it so it does not go to waste, because I don’t know, it feels kind of bad that we have just been trespassing on this planet and killed a big old animal. Seems not good, right?

CAMERON (as Karma): Mm-hmm.

HUDSON (as Tink): A lot of noise was made earlier, I think.

LILIT (as Xianna): Seems disrespectful is all I am saying, so maybe at the very least we should not let the animal go to waste.

NICK (as HK): That seems an appropriate assertion.

NICK: So you all continue into the greenhouse that was once the seat of authority of the Oracle of Ithor, and you can see things that spark your memories of the last time you were here on-planet. What is one reminder that you all see as you continue deeper into the jungle in search of the Stone Breaker?

HUDSON: I move a log over and I say:

HUDSON (as Tink): Hey look! This is where I etched in ‘Tink was here’ with a knife.

NICK: [laughs]

CAMERON: As we’re walking through the greenhouse there’s part of the wall that Xianna and Sabos tagged to get arrested.

[laughter]

LILIT (as Xianna): Oh yes, I did that.

NICK: It’s probably a little bittersweet considering the last time you were here this was a living breathing city and now it is just wreckage and rubble. You’re very easily able to make it to the molsoom’s den, because it tears big rifts in the trees around it as it charges around, and you find the skeleton of what must have been some sort of space adventurer or poacher because it’s wearing a vest and pants still and is holding a blaster, but the molsoom obviously got to it and dragged it back.

You can see bits and pieces of tracks and dropped equipment as what looks like a group of poachers was running away, and in their path is the case that you delivered the Rock Breaker in, and it’s been pried open and whatever was in it is now gone.

CAMERON: Is the blaster in good shape?

NICK: No.

CAMERON: Dang!

NICK: It’s got like vines in it and stuff. This happened a while ago.

CAMERON: Dang. Can we go a-lookin’?

NICK: Yep. You can absolutely make me a Survival or a Perception check to try and track where these other poachers went.

CAMERON: Okie-dokie. What would the difficulty be on it?

NICK: Difficulty would be a hard Perception or an average Survival.

CAMERON: One success!

NICK: Awesome. Karma, you lead the way. The trail has been overgrown, this must have happened some months ago, but it’s still fairly obvious because it’s clear they were being pursued by the molsoom.

You find a couple of more skeletons in adventuring gear scattered through the jungle, like the molsoom left them where they were. You figure that these must have been people who came, like Meelo said, to be big game hunters and then they discovered things worth scavenging and sort of changed objectives, and then it didn’t work out for them very well.

You go deeper and deeper into the jungle until you find one last poacher leaning up against a tree, and you can see that it must have been bitten by the molsoom because there’s marks in the tree behind it where the fangs would have pierced all the way through, and it’s clutching to its chest something that looks like a tablet made of stone.

CAMERON (as Karma): Hey look.

LILIT (as Xianna): Ooh! Neat.

CAMERON: I pick it up.

LILIT: And Xianna starts going through the pockets of the person holding it.

CAMERON: [chuckles] Karma just lifts the tablet out while Xianna’s pocket searching.

NICK: You could find a deck of Sabacc cards. You could find some chance cubes. You could find a bunch of random objects from springhole.net, items, get: a lemon, a bag of cotton balls, a package of crisp and crunchy edibles, and a rolling pin. A pair of earrings, a bandana and a pasta strainer!

CAMERON: [laughing] What?!

NICK: A quartz crystal, a wedding ring, and a container of pudding.

HUDSON: [laughs]

CAMERON: [laughing] It’s a pudding cup!

LILIT: Oh, Xianna wants to find a wedding ring.

HUDSON: [laughs]

NICK: Okay. Oh, that’s great.

LILIT: Pack of Sabacc cards and a glow stick, like a rave style glow stick necklace.

NICK: Has it been popped yet or is it still…?

LILIT: No.

NICK: Okay. A somehow—in this person’s last moments—unpopped glow stick necklace. You’re patting through the pockets and you find a wedding ring that’s a simple gold band, otherwise unadorned, but you can tell it must have had some emotional value because it’s on a thin chain, and a pack of Sabacc cards that, to your practiced eye, look like they may have been marked in some way although you haven’t figured out exactly how yet. You also find a glow stick necklace, still in its packaging, and it looks like it has not yet been cracked to begin lighting yet.

As you pull that stuff out, Karma reaches over you and pulls the Stone Breaker tablet out from the skeletal hands clutching it. It almost doesn’t let go. There’s a brief moment where you have to kinda jiggle it to make the hands pop free.

LILIT (as Xianna): This was a good find. Very excited to use this glow stick necklace.

HUDSON (as Tink): What are you gonna use the ring for?

LILIT (as Xianna): Oh, I don’t know yet. I’ll keep it just in case I ever decide to, you know, propose to Nolaa.

HUDSON (as Tink): [mockingly] Settle down? Ha.

LILIT (as Xianna): To settle down or anything. Then I have it, you know, just in case.

HUDSON (as Tink): Huh.

LILIT (as Xianna): [gasps] Or I could put it on Creamsicle’s tail.

HUDSON (as Tink): Oh~

LILIT (as Xianna): That would be cute and fun. Or I can always sell it to a pawn shop. There’s a number of possibilities with this, so…

CAMERON (as Karma): I’m excited we found the Stone Breaker, which is what we were here for.

HUDSON (as Tink): Oh yeah, that’s why we’re here, yeah.

LILIT (as Xianna): That is also cool. I am just glad that there was a poacher for me to steal from, because you can’t really steal from the rest of the herdship. That’s like weird, because it’s like cultural artifacts now, so you can’t do that.

CAMERON (as Karma): Yeah.

LILIT (as Xianna): But a poacher, that’s free real estate.

[laughter]

HUDSON (as Tink): I think the Stone Breaker’s a dumb name. It needs to be something snazzier, hipper, something that’s today, you know, the kids can get into.

CAMERON (as Karma): Why?

HUDSON (as Tink): I mean like, if we’re ever gonna sell it.

LILIT (as Xianna): Like Greg.

CAMERON (as Karma): Why are we… I don’t think we’re ever gonna sell it. Sentinel has a plan for them I think.

HUDSON (as Tink): Hold on. Hold on. Hold on. We may sell them if Sentinel decides not to need it anymore, and I think Greg is our number one choice right now.

LILIT (as Xianna): What about Luke? It is a very popular name.

HUDSON (as Tink): Luke Stone Breaker…

LILIT (as Xianna): Yes, Luke.

HUDSON (as Tink): Luke…?

LILIT (as Xianna): Luke.

HUDSON (as Tink): Yeah!

NICK (as HK): I would disagree with naming it Luke. I have never met a good organic named Luke. They always whine a whole lot.

LILIT (as Xianna): HK, you say that about every organic.

NICK (as HK): This is true, but Lukes especially.

LILIT (as Xianna): Okay fine, we won’t name it that.

HUDSON (as Tink): Okay wait, compromise. It’s still the Stone Breaker, but there’s a number 8 in the middle of Breaker.

LILIT (as Xianna): Oh, so it is like a DJ. [gasps] It makes perfect sense because I got the glow stick necklace!

HUDSON (as Tink): Yes.

LILIT (as Xianna): Now the rest of you just have to go get glow stick necklaces and then we can take— [gasps] Oh! Because we are going to take Sentinel to a rave once this is all done!

HUDSON (as Tink): Yup.

LILIT (as Xianna): This is perfect. Tink, do you want us to order you a pair of the fuzzy rave boots or do you want us to just dye your feet a color?

HUDSON (as Tink): I’d like both, but the boots need to be space boots that let me fly.

CAMERON (as Karma): Um…

LILIT (as Xianna): I don’t know if we can trust you with that.

NICK: And that’s going to be the end of the episode.

ALL: Ba-naaa~!

## Outro

CAMERON: Thanks for listening to Tabletop Squadron. If you enjoyed our show, please consider leaving a review on your podcast listening app of choice. Reviews help new listeners find the show, and every time we get one the squad does a special secret dance.

If you’re so inclined, you can also help support the show through our Patreon which can be found in the show notes, on our website, and basically anywhere else we post things. We have all sorts of fun Patreon levels including Hot Tub Hangout, a level that gives you access to monthly movie nights with the squad, livestreams, extra Q&A sessions, and bonus extra Discord channels.

Xianna’fan is played by Lilit Penrod. They can be found on Twitter at @cheerio_buffet.

Tink is played by Hudson Jameson. He can be found on Twitter at @hudsonjameson.

Karma Nailo is played by me, Cameron Robertson. You can find me on Twitter at @midnightmusic13.

Our game master is Nick Robertson, and you can find him on Twitter at @alias58.

Our intro song is Space Jam by Pablo Ribot.

Additional music by James Gunter.

Follow the podcast on Twitter and Instagram at @Tabletop_Squad and join our Discord and share all your cute pet photos with us. We also sometimes talk about Star Wars. You can find a link to join our Discord on our website and in our pinned tweet. See you next time.