Curse of Radiance Chapter 4, Episode 6 - Behold! My Stuff!

Just what you wanted- another episode of mostly combat!

In this episode, the party has slain the High Inquisitor of Bane, just in time for Fzoul Chembryl to show up. But he isn't here to fight- not necessarily- because he knows the Inquisitor's pet beholder, Orox, is on its way, and it has been given instructions to kill everyone. So the party can either work with Fzoul to come up with a plan to escape the many eyes of this ommathur, or they can finish getting their revenge and likely die in the process. Decisions, decisions!

This was a tricky session to plan for, because as I've said several times in the past few episodes, I legitimately didn't know what the party was going to do! So I had to have at least some semblance of a plan for if the party worked with Fzoul, if they killed Fzoul on sight, if they tried to bargain with Orox, if they ran away... on and on it goes. (I alluded to it last blog post but I had been banking on the idea the party would lose the fight against Ginali and they would wake up in a jail cell, stripped of their belongings, and they would have to break their way out of prison. But alas, it did not happen.) I'm pretty happy with what we got, but like every good campaign, there's a million alternate universes where things went differently!

Also, fun fact: this episode marks the third time Ildana has gotten the blessing of a deity in this campaign! Will it be the last? Keep listening and find out!

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Chapter 4, Episode 6: Fzoul Chembryl of the Zhentarim

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Curse of Radiance is a member of the Uncharted North podcast network. For more of their shows, check them out at UnchartedNorth.ca! 

Curse of Radiance Chapter 4, Episode 5 - Tyranny Begets Tyranny

In this week's episode, the party has secured an audience with someone that may be sympathetic to their cause- Genali, High Inquisitor of Bane. But will an alliance with him help them take down Fzoul Chembryl, creator of their third tattoo? Or will it be a can of worms best left closed? Find out for yourself!

This was another one of those episodes that I had literally no clue how it was going to go before it began- I had to prep like four or five potential scenarios because there were at least that many different potential outcomes. I would be lying if I said I wasn't secretly hoping for one of the others (I had my fingers crossed the party might end up locked in a jail cell and they would have to figure out how to escape) but hey, the game did as the game does!

Thanks as always for listening, and catch you next time on the flip side!

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Chapter 4, Episode 5: The High Inquisitor's Demands

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Curse of Radiance is a member of the Uncharted North podcast network. For more of their shows, check them out at UnchartedNorth.ca! 

Curse of Radiance Chapter 4, Episode 4 - The Arena Episode

Our heroes are thrust into the arena (after coming up with a clever group name) and forced to fight for their lives. Will they survive? Probably. Will they attract the attention of someone that can help them take down Fzoul Chembryl? Listen and find out!

I don't really have a ton of banter about this episode- I remember it being pretty fun to record and I'm happy with how it turned out. Unfortunately this is the start of a string of several episodes that are almost entirely combat, so if anyone is particularly unenthusiastic about that sort of thing I apologize. But I assure you, there's still some fun roleplaying and characterization in there too!

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Chapter 4, Episode 4: Trial By Combat

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Curse of Radiance is a member of the Uncharted North podcast network. For more of their shows, check them out at UnchartedNorth.ca! 

Curse of Radiance Chapter 4, Episode 3 - TSA DnD Style

In this episode, the party gets some valuable information from resistance leader Randall Morn, and they then continue on their way to Zhentil Keep, where a lengthy customs process leads to some friction with the town guards. But Torunn has a plan that might get our heroes into an advantageous position- is it a good plan? Who knows! We'll find out together!

This is an episode that had a bit of a troubled production; when we first recorded it there were a lot of technical issues that necessitated some brief rerecords, but also the episode was way too short after editing and I looked back a couple episodes later and wished I had done a better job of introducing the city. So sometime near the end of the story arc I had the players rerecord an entirely new scene or two to slot into the middle of this one (made rather dubious by the fact that Chris was sick during that rerecord) but in the end, through the magic of editing, I think it turned out pretty seamless.

But overall I think this is a pretty solid episode, and it leads right into the latter half of this story arc which will come by like a freight train, so stay tuned!

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Chapter 4, Episode 3: Customs and Laws

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Curse of Radiance is a member of the Uncharted North podcast network. For more of their shows, check them out at UnchartedNorth.ca! 

Curse of Radiance Chapter 4, Episode 2 - Old Blood for New Money

In this episode, the party stops off in the town of Dagger Falls to rest their horses and wash the road off themselves. But seeing that the dale is under the iron fist of the Zhentarim, they learn of an underground resistance fighting back, and naturally they decide they need to get involved. Where might this ragtag group of adventurers end up? Find out by listening!

I'm going to let you all in on a little secret: I'm pretty sure this is my favorite episode of the entire campaign. Whenever I would plan a session it was always kind of difficult in situations like this, because I don't want to force the players on a specific path but I want to have something prepared for anywhere they go. So whenever the party didn't have a clear goal in mind or when they expressed some interest in going somewhere but they weren't really sure, I always had to prepare like four or five different potential sessions. In this case, I didn't know for sure they were going to stop at Dagger Falls- I know I set it up as the cliffhanger ending of the previous episode, but at the start of this one I was being genuine when I told the players they could just continue on if they wanted. So while I wasn't going to plan out an entire session in Dagger Falls, I at least needed to read up on it so I could improvise some content if they did. (And, spoilers, in next week's episode, they had a similar choice- and you'll see whether they take it or not.)

So the end result is that this session is, basically, 100% improvised from all of us. I didn't have anything prepared, I just knew who the important NPCs were and the general vibe of the town. (Maybe that shows. Maybe someone out there is an expert on Daggerdale and they're going to spend the whole time going "That couldn't have happened in 1357 DR. Randall Morn was off in Mulmaster at the time" or something. I don't know.) And I absolutely loved what we got out of this. I think everyone was on their A-game, and we were all playing off each other the whole time. It was great.

There's still a bunch of episodes to come that I really like, but listening back this one is probably going to stay at the top for me. Hopefully you all feel the same way!

Thanks for listening, and catch you next time!

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Chapter 4, Episode 2: Dagger Falls Resistance

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Curse of Radiance is a member of the Uncharted North podcast network. For more of their shows, check them out at UnchartedNorth.ca! 

Curse of Radiance Chapter 4, Episode 1 - Nothing Seems to Go Right

The start of a new story arc, the Zhentarim arc, is upon us!

In this episode, the party tries to secure an appointment with Elminster the Sage, but they fail spectacularly. They they try to save some people attacked by some giants, but they fail spectacularly. At least maybe they can just find Dagger Falls to be a safe and friendly place... and you can guess they probably fail spectacularly.

Real talk for a moment: I think this story arc is my favorite one from the whole campaign. Don't get me wrong, there's still some great episodes and chapters to come- but I really have a lot of fond memories of these next few episodes (though a lot of that goes hand-in-hand with some fraught conflicts we had while making them; I might go into these in a future post or something, or I may not). I am VERY happy with how this one turned out, and I hope you all like it too!

Also, one more thing- every October I watch and review 31 horror films and post them on my blog, Gabe Reviews Horror. This year I'm reviewing 31 holiday-themed horror films, so if that sounds interesting, give it a look!

Enjoy, and see you all next week!

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Chapter 4, Episode 1: Too Little, Too Late

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Curse of Radiance is a member of the Uncharted North podcast network. For more of their shows, check them out at UnchartedNorth.ca! 

Curse of Radiance Chapter 3, Episode 7: The Lore Dump Episode

We're back in the present! Finally, we're back!

After a month of dungeon crawling and an extra week of travel, the podcast has arrived back in the present day in the town of Shadowdale. Fennec was instructed by an old goatherd to go meet someone in the Tower of Ashaba, where he met the Nameless Bard, whom the party met on their way to Tilverton. So this week, they're going to hear a tale from this enigmatic figure that might shed some light on the situation they'd been dealing with... or it might raise more questions. The operative one being, can they trust this guy at all, after he admits to being involved in the creation of their tattoos?

This was an interesting episode to make, because on one hand, I was really happy to be able to get out some of this exposition (most of which was just describing the plot of the novel Azure Bonds by Jeff Grubb and Kate Novak), and see what the party did with that information. But on the other hand, can I really release an episode that's just 75% me rambling about a bunch of plot that doesn't directly involve any of the players? I don't know, but we're going to find out together.

I hope you all enjoy this episode, and really I hope you all enjoyed this entire story arc. Because next week, we're starting on the Zhentarim arc! And after that... just you wait!

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Chapter 3, Episode 7: A Lasting Legacy

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Curse of Radiance is a member of the Uncharted North podcast network. For more of their shows, check them out at UnchartedNorth.ca!