The funniest part about this is that Brennan says later that he knew they would have fire immunity specifically for one of porter's attacks which he was totally ok with. His mistake wasn't forgetting that they would get immunity to fire damage, his mistake was forgetting that lava does fire damage which is way funnier
Zac: "(charmed) Mistress, should I go into a rage and fuck them up?" Brennan: "Yes, go into your rage! And fuck them up!" Zac: I go into a rage, and since I have Mindless Rage, I can't be charmed or frightened... :-O
just incredible sequencing by ally. Starts to read off the spell, people are not into it, gets a die, rolls damage for the whole party to take, people are trying to distance themselves, and THEN say what the actual good parts are and everyone gets back on board. pausing to find a d12 to roll damage kills me
Also the fact that Brennan gave them the spell card in the beginning of the season and Ally themselves only read the first part and didn't read the rest for the ENTIRE season
I love how he's always a mixture of annoyed, amazed, and delighted in these situations, and then he leans into it in the narrative. He loves it when his friends pull one over on him 😂
It’s every DMs favorite when their players just do some absolutely fucked shit we weren’t expecting. So long as it fucks, they can fuck up the plans I had as much as they want!
@@ClintYeastwood420as a newbie DM, I have never been both happier and more frustrated then when my players fuck over my immaculate schemes to fuck them over. It’s a great feeling
Brennan's "I ge- I don't know how many times I have to say you gotta read ice feast!" Cracks me the fuck up. His exasperation and joy that they're finally using his homebrew spell comes through so clear.
And he’s so excited about it he doesn’t even for a second seem to think about… oh wait… this combat is highly fire related… maybe I should change tactics…
@@catherineelmore2004 Exactly! If even a seasoned DM like Brennan can overlook some things while in the thick of things, I find it somehow reassuring about my own fears as a new DM.
I also have a kind of fun little conspiracy theory about this in Brennan's case. Think about it: 1. Brennan is a well-known master of the rules who has played D&D, mostly as a DM, since childhood. 2. He is also famous for his deep preparation hidden behind tiny little details, like the Lava monster or the Vulture Dimension. 3. He has talked before about how he hams up his reactions for dropout and D20 because it's fun for the audience and the players. I think sometimes (not always) when he has those shocked Pikachu moments, he already knew they were possible and set them up so that if someone figured it out that player would feel amazing.
@@jonathankorman4031 He says in an afterward he was aware Ice Feast would make them immune to the stun and fire damage of the boss, but he forgot about lava, hence the "This [stage hazard] is only bad for my guys?!"
Ice Feast having a 24 hour duration means you can cast it right before a long rest which cures the exhaustion and 1d12 cold damage, then wake up with 16 hours of only the benefits. Then it expires right when you're about to start another long rest, so you cast it again.
YOOO!!! That's absolutely OP!! You're right!! My new head cannon is that they kept that strategy up during the night yorb quest (I'm assuming Kristen somehow somewhere got Ice Feast during that) hence the absolute EXHAUSTION at the beginning of Junior Year. Then finally, after recovering from basically months and months of constant exhaustion, they were finally mentally ready to continue that strategy; that's why they hadn't cast it until now!
Yeah, it’s extremely powerful. It’s similar to a 17+ level Wizard casting Simulacrum via Wish every day, like if you’re playing “optimally” it would 100% be a part of your character’s daily routine. The only “downside” is that you basically lose a (presumably) 6th level spell slot, since you want to ensure you have the ability to cast Ice Feast right before your long rest. That said, we don’t know what the spell components are, if we assume it’s similar to Heroes’ Feast, it’s a 1000gp commitment every time you cast it.
@@weepingwalnutdefinitely! I’m pretty sure that’s why Brennan decided to make Porter show them the stun ability, when he thought he got the goddess’ name. Then, his fire attack was gonna be the surprise “you take 50 damage of a type you’re immune to, thanks to a bit you made a season ago” moment, but he completely forgot lava too deals fire damage, making the absolutely clever and mad arena into a hazard only for his villains. Genius of unplanned entertainment
@@hiimshana The thing is; lava should deal more than just massive Fire Damage, but also a mild amount of Poison (and maybe Acid) Damage from the toxic gasses releashed, and a moderate amount of Bludgeoning Damage if you're submerged in it from the fact that you're getting 'crushed' on all sides by molten rocks. Also, depending on how you're immune to Fire Damage (in this case with a Cold/Ice spell), this would mean that you're likely not taking damage by remaining perpetually colder than the lava. This means that the lava closest to your body would start to solidify, hindering your movement, making you sink as the hotter lava would rise to the surface to take your place. Basically; 1. If you're standing or walking (not running, jumping, or falling) on the surface of already semi-solidified lava, you're 'only' at risk of Fire and Poison (and maybe Acid) damage. 2. If you break the surface of the lava and are at least ankle deep, you'd have severely reduced movement, and need a Strength or Dexterity check to stop from sinking further. (In addition to the previous effect). 3. If you're more than waist deep, you are now Restrained and need to make a saving throw against Strength or Constitution to keep from being Petrified. (In addition to the previous effects). 4. Failing this, you are both Petrified and Suffocating, and begin Bludgeoning damage. (In addition to the previous effects.)
I have two competing images in my head. One is Riz frantically trying to swim under the surface and getting nowhere because he definitely doesn't have the density to actually sink in lava. The other is Riz slowly rising up out from under the surface like Martin Sheen in Apocalypse Now with a deranged "cut his head off so they can't revivify him" look on his face.
I absolutely adore that he completely gets so distracted with the fact that Ally never read the team the spell before that he doesn’t stop to think “Oh wait… this is a fight where immunity to fire is going to *really* help them and screw my villains… Oops!” He’s so focused on “Yea, they’re finally using the spell I made them!” that he doesn’t even have time to contemplate how that’s going to affect this particular combat!
not enough love given to the like. 2 full seconds where Brennen is going along with Murph’s call but has not remembered they are immune to fire damage yet. Truly what a face at 15:23
Its such a beardsley thing to be like "i cast a spell to give everyone a level of exhaustion and take 7 points of cold damage" and then does nothing else just to fuck with you, so i too was excited when the spell went on
@@Loumenn Dropout Discord is switching to read-only, then shutting down soon-ish. It's sort of splintering into a few different servers now that you can join from the main one.
I'm so glad that Brennan doesn't pay attention to, like, equipment and clothes and shit, because Riz has so much non-lava-safe shit on him when he just jumps on in there. I was so scared the whole time that Brennan was gonna go "okay, your gun melts now what".
@@keithkent366 this is the right take, if you had fire immunity and got hit with a fireball, I'd be hard pressed to find a DM that would then say "okay well all your clothes burn up and you're naked now." At the end of the day it's a game, and the assumed mechanics of items and clothes is that they are all a part of your person. We can interpret that however we want (i.e. magic shielding, tough clothes, etc.), but thems the mechanics.
people get so pressed abt it but like. fantasy high is not a setting where 1) death is all that permanent and 2) death is a genuine threat like ACoC. and even IN acoc, when murph succeeded on the roll, brennan honored his cleverness!! so it didn’t surprise me that brennan let everything on riz be fireproof for the Rule of Cool!
Adding in the gorgug getting his axe in sophomore year and then every time he crits on a 19 or knocks someone prone (or just the bits from the last stand episodes) would be the cherry on top to this video.
@@futchslug The irony being that there's a joke out there somewhere about... Iyengar & Mulligan & Thompson being the name of their rules lawyering firm (I remember this from somewhere and I don't know what but I swear it's real, Iyengar of course being Aabria).
@@jdk2535 It originally started as Iyengar and Mulligan in the D&D Beyond short series Battle for Beyond. Thompson was added during Burrow's End, and I believe that Nick Marini has also made partner after that insane build he had going on in Downfall on Critical Role.
so, I had completely forgotten that Ice Feast was a random guess at a spell Ally made and thought the spell was a reference to the time they tried to eat the melting ice cream in their bag after getting downed. Made the unseasoned ice part much more confusing
2:25 I like this talk about tanks. It goes for all kinds of games, not just DnD roleplays, and it's tricky to discuss because hundreds of games, hundreds of diff mechanics and ideas, but most designs are pretty similar I suppose. One thing that can expand on the usefulness of tanks is to make them more active disruptors on the field instead of merely being passive disruptors. Some games will use taunt as a distraction, but tanks can be more flexible. Have them disable skills. Have them stun. Have them repeatedly react to incoming damage as counter measures for both themself and allies as they take damage. Tanks don't have to just be a wall. They can be actively mobile traps that can frustrate and dismantle/disable opponentw for the team.
TF2 does this by making Ignoring the Heavy a really bad thing to do if you want to survive for more than 0.3 seconds Pokémon does this by having tanky mons be really fucking annoying to leave alive, dropping all kinds of status moves and making the life of the person ignoring them a living hell Inscryption does this by making cards that are super bulky usually have another very bothersome or impactful utility those are the only 3 examples of games that make tanks anything more than "lots of HP lots of defense go nuts"
Yep, and you can just look at most mobas (I'll mention Heroes of the Storm because that's the one I played) and games in general, but tanks, beyond great survivability, need to be threats, and that often comes up in crowd control and initiating skills. That way, you can't really avoid tanks, as they usually control the battlefield and engagements. Their job is to get on the frontline, lock an enemy in place, or maje it extremely dangerous to dive past them. I mean Diablo has two control spells that will either stun or displace an enemy, Imperius has a dive that roots, Varian has a taunt, Stitches has his hook + eat, Tyrael can jump across, lock a zone and boost movement speed, Rexar has an easy to hit stun, D-VA reduces the enemy damage, Muradin has a stun, a zone slow, a jump to initiate or flee, and his ulti to strand an enemy hero, ETC is basically only CC, Anubarak has two stun, Arthas roots, Garrosh can grab and throw, Johanna has a blind as well as a tool to group enemies on her... Basically, tanks shine most when they need to be taken care of because they enable plays.
In the MMO Rift way back in the day, Rogues had a tanking skill tree which is something I'd never seen before. And like you said, they weren't a wall. Warriors were the wall. The rogue tank tree was about throwing up energy shields to absorb hits and teleporting to a targeted ally to pull heat off of them. It was incredibly cool.
You know, Gorgon from Lancer does this very well. It can jump in front of allies being targeted and then make the enemies lifes a very short lived hell
The Adversary Toolkit book for the FATE rpg system even describes the conceptual template of the Threat - an enemy whose job is twofold; they have to be able to soak damage whether by means of a stunt or just having more stress boxes and/or consequence slots than average, but they also need at least one stunt that’s designed to make the players want to prioritize taking them out of the scene as fast as possible (whether it be AOE attacks, reinforcement timers, creating/enforcing really debilitating aspects, etc.). And I’m sure a player can use those same principles when designing a protector-type character.
The whole 'Reaction to move and block an attack with your body' is *extremely* useful - Been play a ruleset for some time that has something like that as one of the core class features, and it's always been super clutch
can't believe i slept on a crown of candy for so long. i thought the candy setting would be too whimsical for me but it's easily become my favorite season
Love that these examples weren't just the two main clips on their own, but that you gave a bunch of extra context/clarification to these moments that explain to anyone that doesnt know whats happening, and elevate the moment to be more exciting as a result
I don't know if it counts, but in Bloodkeep Ify uses his homebrew sword to stab himself while falling into the abyss to teleport himself back 'safely'.
I know Brennan is emotionally attached to his clothes but he needs to seriously consider getting rid of that one maroon raglan shirt. It's clearly cursed, my guy.
So fun fact, there was a case where I was trying to convince a player to give up an artifact to try and further a certain subplot in the narrative of a campaign. The player really had not much use for it, but was mostly keeping it around since it could use things like raise dead and animate dead for an HP cost. Eventually, I gave him a potent boon from the NPC he gave it to that did the following... He had immunity to cold and necrotic damage. Additionally, all undead would not attack him. Needless to say...this resulted in a few instances of...shenanigans leading up to the campaign's conclusion.
I think the logic is "if you've eaten that much ice, then you've powered through world-ending brain freeze, and it'll take you 24 hours to be able to deal with anything else." I however have never gotten brain freeze in my life so not sure if that's how that works.
I wondered if gorgug axe that can auto crita on inanimate object in the last episode of nightmare King arc is also homebrewed Since it also taken Brennan into surprised when gorgug hit the tree
If I recall correctly- the gnomes gave him an option to choose between two different axes , both of which were homebrewed by Brennan with different stats. And he got to pick the one he liked better- and went with the gravity axe.
While it may be homebrewed that effect is a property of any adamantine weapon in 5e (source: Xanathar's guide to everything) so it might just have been made of adamantine in addition to its homebrewed features
2:05 In D&D 5e, you can make a character tanky, but there isn't much to support the actual role of a tank. Aggro control/taunting just doesn't really exist in a meaningful way, so while you can survive almost anything, everything can just ignore you until you're all that is left. The closest you can get to an AoE taunt, is the Barbarians Reckless Attack giving enemies advantage against you. Other options like Panache, the Sentinel feat, or the Compelled Duel spell, are only able to effectively taunt one enemy, which still leaves the rest of your team open against a lot of threats.
@@fugyfruit I did not know about that one. Thanks for pointing it out! It's still not great though, only keeping them from leaving your area of influence rather than incentivising them to fight you, meaning you either want to be fighting alone on the front lines with ranged support, or you use it to allow allies to potentially escape a dangerous situation while you sacrifice yourself. It being a Paladin Channel Divinity is also a downside, with you only being able to use it once per short rest, and it competing with a bonus action AoE healing for any targets in range that can hear you (ask your DM for whether this applies to unconscious characters; if so, it's insane, but if not it's still okay and likely better than the taunt; notably, the design intent according to Jeremy Crawford is that being unconscious does not deafen you, which is why it's not part of the description of the unconscious state).
Paladins, clerics and artificers make weirdly more effective tanks than straight class fighters. Paladins get compelled duel, clerics and artificers get warding bond, Sanctuary and command (halt buys you 6 seconds to get your principal out of there). Artillerists can use their turret to cast a protestive bubble of temporary hit points and refresh it every round. 3 levels of one of these classes in your bodyguard build makes a big difference
Honestly I think Swirlwarden was actually a great method for Brennan to make a bodyguard into something useful to the whole team. That it came with a fun corner case use is just gravy.
Well, disadvantage on all ability checks from exhaustion is brutal, so they had to spend 6 high level spell slots to cancel out that exhaustion. It’s a huge investment with an opportunity cost that is essentially All of Kristen’s high end firepower.
Also, this is the absolute ideal battle for it. The stunned condition was bound to come up and the floor is lava. There are much more busted 7th level spells. Such as the being casting ice feast. A simulacrum.
It's basically based on Heroes Feast, and the damage and exhaustion absolutely balance it out, maybe even to the point that it's underpowered and niche compared to Heroes Feast. But Brennan gave them the spell for a reason!
Ice feast should be a reflavoring of Create Food and Water for a winter-themed cleric that creates a bunch of food made out of snow. (Still fills you up like food)
It really feels like ice feast should have had teifling rules where you just take half damage or something lol, like come on he should have known that total immunity would bite him in the ass
There's a homebrew kamen rider class (Masked Hero on Homebrewry) and it's main secondary ability is an ability that lets you make an attack against an incoming enemy attack as a reaction. This will allow you to take the damage like with swirl warden, but on critical hits you just completely negate the damage. It's a very anime, power of friendship move and honestly very fitting for D&D
To be fair to Brennan, even if you don't take from the heat of lava, that stuff is like the worst sinking sand ever and putting off toxic fumes and heavy AF (its literally molten rocks) so it probably should still be a hazard, even if it doesn't kill them like it would normally. Like really bad noxious mud.
Lava has a density about 3.1 times greater than water. This means that even perfectly fluid lava is going exert enough force to expel anything with the density of water real quick. With lava being viscous, though, it is also going to resist that force. If you have great force propelling you and great force resisting you, that is called getting crushed and you will suffer crushing damage (which a fire immunity won't help you with). Buoyant force is the density of the fluid times the displaced volume of fluid times gravity. If the average human displaces about 0.1 cubic meters, then the force that will be acting on the human to expel them from the lava will be 3100 kg/m^3 * 0.1 m^3 * 9.8 m/s^2 = 3038 Newtons. The weight of my own body would "cancel out" about 900 of those Newtons and so I would need to exert enough force to lift 2.6 times my own body weight in order to HOLD POSITION if I were fully submerged, much less continue to go deeper into the lava. How far would I sink into lava if I just stood on it, though? That is going to be the point where the my buoyancy in the lava cancels out my weight. My weight is roughly 90kg. 90kg of lava is 90/3100kg/m^3, or 0.029 m^3 of lava. If I am 0.1 m^3 as a whole, then I am probably going to sink in to about halfway up my thighs if I give it time.
The other thing to consider is that your relative body temperature compared to lava is freezing cold, so the lava is literally flash freezing around you as you attempt to move, so you're getting surrounded by solid rocks (which ironically would offer you a little protection from the burning even if they weren't immune to fire damage) as you attempt to tread lava, which is pretty difficult to do and something anyone can try out by climbing into a rock pile and attempting to swim through it.
Brennan writes a spell that makes the party immune to fire and stun effects. Makes the final battle against a giant (that will surely stun) and over lava Was he drunk when writing the ending? Lolol
HOW DOES ONE HAVE THAT MUCH STORAGE IN THE BRAIN?! I simply cannot. After a long life and death finally succumbs this man- we must examine his fucking brain. It’s too complicated.
15:35 I feel like Ice Feast's effect wouldn't protect against 'lava'. Ice Feast makes you immune to 'fire' damage. Lava is exponentially hotter than 'fire' damage (you could even say that it's 'heat' damage), not to mention all the other deleterious effects of lava. If it's Aa type lava, it would be like trying to walk on oobleck, with each step releasing noxious gas. You would have to constantly move in order not to sink. If it's Pahoehoe, then it would be more like quicksand (and only marginally less toxic), you would slowly sink into it as your 'perpetually cool' body would be drawn down into the pyroclastic ebb and flow as the hotter lava bubbles to the surface. If I had to put it in D&D terms, you'd probably take 1d4 of bludgeoning damage per turn (from the pressure of the molten rocks), have drastically reduced if not zero movement speed.
I think it should protect them from the fire damage, but yeah the lava should have still been an environmental hazard that counted as water that halved movement through it, and ending your movement in/on the lava would result in making a con save to resist toxin damage and gaining the poisoned condition. I would probably also require an athletics (Str) check to even attempt to swim through it as the stuff is going to be like quicksand, but worse. I probably wouldn't make it worse than that though, as you still want to give the players a bit of a reward for their outthinking your encounter, and make it fun, however, in the real world lava would be much worse as it essentially "flash" freezes around you since your body temperature is significantly colder than the lava, so you are essentially getting covered by solid rock and are literally going to be just swimming through rocks with a density much greater than water.
5e player, listening to Ice Feast, "Lasts 24 hours"... What's keeping this from being a nightly desert just before bed? Long rest to get to full HP and recover from exhaustion. That is extremely OP unless it's a single use ability.
Ok while very smart of Emily/Murph to do with the lava, and to be fair I don't know how the rest of the fight plays out, BUTTTTT at the very least the characters would now be technically swimming which would limit their movement a bit and the most important thing hinder the usage of certain weapons. I would also as a DM probably say there is some sort of sight issues that come up going both ways with the characters in the lava limited by its thiccness/bright limit and similar the enemies having a harder time making them out amongst the lava especially while being partially submerged.
The combat wasn't concluded by the end of the episode, but so far, I think Murph is the only one who has actually gone in the lava and he just basically submerged himself as a form of cover because he'd already used his bonus action and thus couldn't end his turn by hiding normally. As far as visibility, Riz does currently have True Sight active, so it's probably fair if he can still see where people are via seeing in to the ethereal plane, but yeah, we'll see how Brennan handles it!
At episodes end, murph got out of the lava with i think half movement/dash and is pretending to hide kinda badly to reaction cast a spell on kipperlily
Texas is larger than Spain, slightly smaller than France. Yeah, it's big enough to be its own country as it used to he for a brief period. Parts of it have nothing to see do, some have nothing to see, but we have every kind of terrain, every type of weather and weather event (except tsunamis). It snows in the panhandle every winter, it frequently goes above 100° in most of the state during the summer. How long you want to spend here depends on what you actually want to do. You could spend more than a month here and still not see everything, but a lot you may not care to see, depending on your interests.
Y'all clearly don't DM enough if you think Ice Feast is in any way balanced fairly -_- Unless you're running 3 combats per long rest, you'll always have the spell slots available to offset exhaution off anyone affected *if they really really need it*; for the most part, 1st level exhaustion isn't even that bad. Look at Riz, the person most likely to suffer from disadv ability checks (stealth checks) - because of Reliable talent, even with disadvantage, the lowest he can roll is an average of 26 (expertise, and a plus 5 to DEX) or so (so, nobody's seeing him, ever, exhaustion or no). Spellcasters will be casting spells still, and frontliners will be attacking (which isn't penalised by the exhaustion at all). Furthermore, it actively increases your hit point max by a not bad amount (significantly better than plain temporary hp) And Immunity to fire (which is fine, it's thematic, but also it's the most common immunity one can find), and more importantly, immunity to stunned (the main tool for any high level fight encounter to slow the party from Steamrolling any opponent) is absolutely busted. But the worst part, is it basically gives you War_Caster/Eldritch_Mind for free (arguably one of the best feats that any serious caster is *going* to take 10/10 times). Advantage on constitution saves? That's ridiculously powerful! For a comparison, let's look at Investiture of Flame, a 6th level spell that emulates some of this stuff; You get resistance to cold, and Immunity to Fire - makes sense. Plus, you deal a little extra damage to folk as they draw close, and can do a mediocre amount of fire damage as an action now. Compared to: Increased max hp equal to the average warlock's eldritch blast, The effects of a free feat (arguably one of the most powerful feats in the game) Immunity to the main mechanic of most high level enemy fights, Immunity to one of the most common damage types, and this can be applied to 12 different people, with no material cost. And the only cons are: a teardrops' amount of damage which gets outhealed by this same spell after it deals the damage, and easily reversible exhaution, that isn't going to meaningfully affect any class in any serious way. Is it a fun spell? Sure; it gives the player's an overwhelming advantage going into any late-game fight. Is it balanced? - not in the least.
Statistically the DC 25 option has a higher chance of success because the DC 20 option is at disadvantage(although technically he rolled flat, which would have made the DC 25 check at advantage). The chance of rolling a flat 13(or higher) is 5%(1/20). The chance that you roll an 18 is 8.75%(already more than rolling a 13). A 19 has a 9.25% chance, and a 20 is a 9.75% chance(almost twice as likely as rolling a 13).
Ice feast is such a dumb fucking spell. Take damage, gain hp max Get immunity to the most common elemental damage type Get immunity to a status condition that he has already shown was gonna be a pretty big deal on the boss. And a single lvl of exhaustion? Basically nothing as seen here
nothing says pettiness than changing the text on an item because you dislike how it was used. nothing says he needed to roll athletics, nothing says the distance changed based on move speed or terrain, it just says 30 feet as a reaction to any ally.
A homebrew item trashing an encounter is funny, but trashing the climax is just tragic. It ruins the arc and all the work the DM put into the battle, and kinda robs the players of satisfying closure...
I certainly wouldn’t say it “ruined” anything, half their party has still gone down (and been brought back up) during that same battle. They’re still having to hustle to keep going toe to toe with Brennan even with Ice Feast’s crazy benefits.
Not really, they still had to stop the bad guys. Also, if it was actually an issue, Brennan could have just said no. They are all trained storytellers and clearly know when something will actually be an issue for the story.
not to mention, its definitely fun and satisfying to watch the players stump a powerful boss. (and not in a boring, op way either. as the previous comment mentioned, they were still struggling)
Again, Zac has been killing it this season. "Loser says what?"
He’s gone full bully!
OHHHHHH
What?
Zack has been killing it all season. Especially after figuring out barbificer. Damn near soloing a purple worm is ridiculous in the first place.
"Do you have a warrant?"
love that it's always murph figuring out how to manipulate Brennan's homebrew stuff against him
iyengar & mulligan have acquired a new partner at the firm for rules lawyers
Friendly fire between DMs
Tbf Mulligan came on NADDPOD with one of the most broken characters I ever heard of.
I mean, the lava protection was all Emily.
@@MrBEEOUTCH all i need to hear to get into NADDPOD immediately, thanks
The funniest part about this is that Brennan says later that he knew they would have fire immunity specifically for one of porter's attacks which he was totally ok with. His mistake wasn't forgetting that they would get immunity to fire damage, his mistake was forgetting that lava does fire damage which is way funnier
That "Losersayswhat" moment is so real highschool energy. Like, in that moment Zac became a highschooler
Literally he was possessed by the spirit of a 16 yr old
No, Junior year? Nah, Ghost of a 17 year old
@@christiangarza8122 plenty of ppl r 16 in junior yr loll
Zac: "(charmed) Mistress, should I go into a rage and fuck them up?"
Brennan: "Yes, go into your rage! And fuck them up!"
Zac: I go into a rage, and since I have Mindless Rage, I can't be charmed or frightened...
:-O
The best part is that isn't even homebrew... that's the sixth level feature for Berserker Barbarians.
Them's the brakes... 😂
just incredible sequencing by ally. Starts to read off the spell, people are not into it, gets a die, rolls damage for the whole party to take, people are trying to distance themselves, and THEN say what the actual good parts are and everyone gets back on board. pausing to find a d12 to roll damage kills me
“Nah, here you go guys. 7 points of damage”
Brennan’s face while Ally read it off cracks me up every time
They are the true embodiment of gremlin energy
Also the fact that Brennan gave them the spell card in the beginning of the season and Ally themselves only read the first part and didn't read the rest for the ENTIRE season
Absolute baller confidence
I love how he's always a mixture of annoyed, amazed, and delighted in these situations, and then he leans into it in the narrative. He loves it when his friends pull one over on him 😂
It’s every DMs favorite when their players just do some absolutely fucked shit we weren’t expecting. So long as it fucks, they can fuck up the plans I had as much as they want!
@@ClintYeastwood420as a newbie DM, I have never been both happier and more frustrated then when my players fuck over my immaculate schemes to fuck them over. It’s a great feeling
As he said in an Adventuring Party, he loves it because once the players do it it becomes fair game for _him_ to do it as well
@@bubbledoubletrouble as I have reminded my party consistently over the years. “You can create water in someone’s lungs, yeah. But then so can I.”
He's like one of those trickster fairies from old folk stories who are more impressed when the hero pulls one over on them than upset.
Brennan's "I ge- I don't know how many times I have to say you gotta read ice feast!" Cracks me the fuck up. His exasperation and joy that they're finally using his homebrew spell comes through so clear.
And he’s so excited about it he doesn’t even for a second seem to think about… oh wait… this combat is highly fire related… maybe I should change tactics…
@@catherineelmore2004 Exactly! If even a seasoned DM like Brennan can overlook some things while in the thick of things, I find it somehow reassuring about my own fears as a new DM.
Broke: thinking players are fucking over the DM
Woke: the DM is giving his players things that are actually useful for the game.
Yeah! Eg using the power of protecting another to drag yourself out of the water to defend them is very flavorful, actually!
Bespoke: The DM is giving his players things that are better for the game than he intends.
@@Landis963 After a toke: What?
I also have a kind of fun little conspiracy theory about this in Brennan's case. Think about it:
1. Brennan is a well-known master of the rules who has played D&D, mostly as a DM, since childhood.
2. He is also famous for his deep preparation hidden behind tiny little details, like the Lava monster or the Vulture Dimension.
3. He has talked before about how he hams up his reactions for dropout and D20 because it's fun for the audience and the players.
I think sometimes (not always) when he has those shocked Pikachu moments, he already knew they were possible and set them up so that if someone figured it out that player would feel amazing.
@@jonathankorman4031 He says in an afterward he was aware Ice Feast would make them immune to the stun and fire damage of the boss, but he forgot about lava, hence the "This [stage hazard] is only bad for my guys?!"
Ice Feast having a 24 hour duration means you can cast it right before a long rest which cures the exhaustion and 1d12 cold damage, then wake up with 16 hours of only the benefits. Then it expires right when you're about to start another long rest, so you cast it again.
they couldnt go for a long rest because they only had time for an hour of short rest.
@@santiv4 Depends when Ice Feast was made available.
YOOO!!! That's absolutely OP!! You're right!! My new head cannon is that they kept that strategy up during the night yorb quest (I'm assuming Kristen somehow somewhere got Ice Feast during that) hence the absolute EXHAUSTION at the beginning of Junior Year. Then finally, after recovering from basically months and months of constant exhaustion, they were finally mentally ready to continue that strategy; that's why they hadn't cast it until now!
Yeah, it’s extremely powerful. It’s similar to a 17+ level Wizard casting Simulacrum via Wish every day, like if you’re playing “optimally” it would 100% be a part of your character’s daily routine. The only “downside” is that you basically lose a (presumably) 6th level spell slot, since you want to ensure you have the ability to cast Ice Feast right before your long rest. That said, we don’t know what the spell components are, if we assume it’s similar to Heroes’ Feast, it’s a 1000gp commitment every time you cast it.
@@DuckDoolittle 1000gp? that's about 3 Gilear Revivifications and some change right? hefty commitment
"Fight me in the lava" is the new "Fight me in the sky!".
Ice Feast hard countering the final boss’s status effect AND the final boss arena’s hazards is just…
Beautiful
I’m pretty sure the status effect counter was planned by Brennan, but the hazard counter definitely wasn’t.
@@weepingwalnutbrennan says as much, actually! he says it was to counter a fire attack the BBGE has, but he just didn’t account for the lava.
@@weepingwalnutdefinitely!
I’m pretty sure that’s why Brennan decided to make Porter show them the stun ability, when he thought he got the goddess’ name.
Then, his fire attack was gonna be the surprise “you take 50 damage of a type you’re immune to, thanks to a bit you made a season ago” moment, but he completely forgot lava too deals fire damage, making the absolutely clever and mad arena into a hazard only for his villains.
Genius of unplanned entertainment
@@hiimshana
The thing is; lava should deal more than just massive Fire Damage, but also a mild amount of Poison (and maybe Acid) Damage from the toxic gasses releashed, and a moderate amount of Bludgeoning Damage if you're submerged in it from the fact that you're getting 'crushed' on all sides by molten rocks.
Also, depending on how you're immune to Fire Damage (in this case with a Cold/Ice spell), this would mean that you're likely not taking damage by remaining perpetually colder than the lava. This means that the lava closest to your body would start to solidify, hindering your movement, making you sink as the hotter lava would rise to the surface to take your place.
Basically;
1. If you're standing or walking (not running, jumping, or falling) on the surface of already semi-solidified lava, you're 'only' at risk of Fire and Poison (and maybe Acid) damage.
2. If you break the surface of the lava and are at least ankle deep, you'd have severely reduced movement, and need a Strength or Dexterity check to stop from sinking further. (In addition to the previous effect).
3. If you're more than waist deep, you are now Restrained and need to make a saving throw against Strength or Constitution to keep from being Petrified. (In addition to the previous effects).
4. Failing this, you are both Petrified and Suffocating, and begin Bludgeoning damage. (In addition to the previous effects.)
@@IronDinoit’s technically the blood of the goddess in the form of lava, but whatever, that’s also just not how d&d lava works
Antiope's bow from the seven also screwed him as a homebrewed item
Honestly that’s on him for making an item that Insta kills flying creatures and then making the first fight a flier
I have two competing images in my head. One is Riz frantically trying to swim under the surface and getting nowhere because he definitely doesn't have the density to actually sink in lava. The other is Riz slowly rising up out from under the surface like Martin Sheen in Apocalypse Now with a deranged "cut his head off so they can't revivify him" look on his face.
both are truly wonderful. lives in my head rent free now.
I absolutely adore that he completely gets so distracted with the fact that Ally never read the team the spell before that he doesn’t stop to think “Oh wait… this is a fight where immunity to fire is going to *really* help them and screw my villains… Oops!” He’s so focused on “Yea, they’re finally using the spell I made them!” that he doesn’t even have time to contemplate how that’s going to affect this particular combat!
not enough love given to the like. 2 full seconds where Brennen is going along with Murph’s call but has not remembered they are immune to fire damage yet. Truly what a face at 15:23
He is TRULY like “what a wild fucking choice, but who am I to stop you”
Its such a beardsley thing to be like "i cast a spell to give everyone a level of exhaustion and take 7 points of cold damage" and then does nothing else just to fuck with you, so i too was excited when the spell went on
real "i fall from the crow's nest" energy
"Theo taking that damage for you just saved his life" that's the funniest shit.
The immediate turn around as soon as Ally said "Immune to being stunned." This party has PTSD when it comes to being stunned. 😂
Someone on the discord mentioned that one is emerging and the other is submerging
Whether it’s e or sub, Murph always be mergin’
RIP Discord 😢
@@NiaNeuman wait what
@@Loumenn Dropout Discord is switching to read-only, then shutting down soon-ish. It's sort of splintering into a few different servers now that you can join from the main one.
I'm confused; what is emerging and what is submerging?
I'm so glad that Brennan doesn't pay attention to, like, equipment and clothes and shit, because Riz has so much non-lava-safe shit on him when he just jumps on in there. I was so scared the whole time that Brennan was gonna go "okay, your gun melts now what".
I mean it's magical fire protection, I'd assume that like invisibility, it'd apply to your clothes and gear if we're gonna be fair
NSFL - Not Safe For Lava
@@keithkent366 Like--we Could? But it doesn't say anything like that on the card so I dunno.
@@keithkent366 this is the right take, if you had fire immunity and got hit with a fireball, I'd be hard pressed to find a DM that would then say "okay well all your clothes burn up and you're naked now." At the end of the day it's a game, and the assumed mechanics of items and clothes is that they are all a part of your person. We can interpret that however we want (i.e. magic shielding, tough clothes, etc.), but thems the mechanics.
people get so pressed abt it but like. fantasy high is not a setting where 1) death is all that permanent and 2) death is a genuine threat like ACoC. and even IN acoc, when murph succeeded on the roll, brennan honored his cleverness!! so it didn’t surprise me that brennan let everything on riz be fireproof for the Rule of Cool!
8:25 "That'll teach me for homebrewing magic items..."
It, in fact, did not
Adding in the gorgug getting his axe in sophomore year and then every time he crits on a 19 or knocks someone prone (or just the bits from the last stand episodes) would be the cherry on top to this video.
The knocking people prone on a crit is from a different item. But that combination is a sweet set of bs.
@@stevenharper9108 ah, thank you. I didn't know that. What part does the knocking prone on a crit?
The mixtape he got from Zelda makes people go prone.
That's what you get for homebrewing items with two Supreme Crit Justices (and one lower magistrate) at your table
I think literally everyone at the table has been on dungeon court except Brennan & Siobhan, we got a party full of rules justices
@@futchslug The irony being that there's a joke out there somewhere about... Iyengar & Mulligan & Thompson being the name of their rules lawyering firm (I remember this from somewhere and I don't know what but I swear it's real, Iyengar of course being Aabria).
@@jdk2535 One of the stoatal recalls iirc
@@jdk2535 It originally started as Iyengar and Mulligan in the D&D Beyond short series Battle for Beyond. Thompson was added during Burrow's End, and I believe that Nick Marini has also made partner after that insane build he had going on in Downfall on Critical Role.
so, I had completely forgotten that Ice Feast was a random guess at a spell Ally made and thought the spell was a reference to the time they tried to eat the melting ice cream in their bag after getting downed. Made the unseasoned ice part much more confusing
“the kramer of dice rolls…”
“you can’t call *yourself* the kramer of dice rolls”
“AND I DIDNT”
such a good beardsley bit
Between using Swirlwarden to leap out of the ocean and that scene when he used Knock, Theobold was an absolute beast this season
Same shirt, different incredible homebrew moment
As soon as it’s pointed out to him, he’ll never wear that shirt and have a homebrewed anything at the same time XD
2:25 I like this talk about tanks. It goes for all kinds of games, not just DnD roleplays, and it's tricky to discuss because hundreds of games, hundreds of diff mechanics and ideas, but most designs are pretty similar I suppose. One thing that can expand on the usefulness of tanks is to make them more active disruptors on the field instead of merely being passive disruptors. Some games will use taunt as a distraction, but tanks can be more flexible. Have them disable skills. Have them stun. Have them repeatedly react to incoming damage as counter measures for both themself and allies as they take damage. Tanks don't have to just be a wall. They can be actively mobile traps that can frustrate and dismantle/disable opponentw for the team.
TF2 does this by making Ignoring the Heavy a really bad thing to do if you want to survive for more than 0.3 seconds
Pokémon does this by having tanky mons be really fucking annoying to leave alive, dropping all kinds of status moves and making the life of the person ignoring them a living hell
Inscryption does this by making cards that are super bulky usually have another very bothersome or impactful utility
those are the only 3 examples of games that make tanks anything more than "lots of HP lots of defense go nuts"
Yep, and you can just look at most mobas (I'll mention Heroes of the Storm because that's the one I played) and games in general, but tanks, beyond great survivability, need to be threats, and that often comes up in crowd control and initiating skills.
That way, you can't really avoid tanks, as they usually control the battlefield and engagements. Their job is to get on the frontline, lock an enemy in place, or maje it extremely dangerous to dive past them.
I mean Diablo has two control spells that will either stun or displace an enemy, Imperius has a dive that roots, Varian has a taunt, Stitches has his hook + eat, Tyrael can jump across, lock a zone and boost movement speed, Rexar has an easy to hit stun, D-VA reduces the enemy damage, Muradin has a stun, a zone slow, a jump to initiate or flee, and his ulti to strand an enemy hero, ETC is basically only CC, Anubarak has two stun, Arthas roots, Garrosh can grab and throw, Johanna has a blind as well as a tool to group enemies on her...
Basically, tanks shine most when they need to be taken care of because they enable plays.
In the MMO Rift way back in the day, Rogues had a tanking skill tree which is something I'd never seen before. And like you said, they weren't a wall. Warriors were the wall. The rogue tank tree was about throwing up energy shields to absorb hits and teleporting to a targeted ally to pull heat off of them. It was incredibly cool.
You know, Gorgon from Lancer does this very well. It can jump in front of allies being targeted and then make the enemies lifes a very short lived hell
The Adversary Toolkit book for the FATE rpg system even describes the conceptual template of the Threat - an enemy whose job is twofold; they have to be able to soak damage whether by means of a stunt or just having more stress boxes and/or consequence slots than average, but they also need at least one stunt that’s designed to make the players want to prioritize taking them out of the scene as fast as possible (whether it be AOE attacks, reinforcement timers, creating/enforcing really debilitating aspects, etc.). And I’m sure a player can use those same principles when designing a protector-type character.
The whole 'Reaction to move and block an attack with your body' is *extremely* useful - Been play a ruleset for some time that has something like that as one of the core class features, and it's always been super clutch
Is this a ruleset for DnD or a different system? If so what is it cause it sounds damn cool 😮
can't believe i slept on a crown of candy for so long. i thought the candy setting would be too whimsical for me but it's easily become my favorite season
It is the most emotional and devastating season they’ve made
"Hey! I fucked myself!"
-Brennan Lee Mulligan 2024
Love that these examples weren't just the two main clips on their own, but that you gave a bunch of extra context/clarification to these moments that explain to anyone that doesnt know whats happening, and elevate the moment to be more exciting as a result
his evil grin when ally read ice feast vs his look of defeat when it is used against him
I forgot how bad the old captioners were at captioning Siobhan, these people had never heard a British person speak in their life.
No need to find somebody to blame, it was just auto generated.
Fight me in the lava......the most D&D line in this entire video
lol, I didn't even catch that Ice Feast originally started as Ally just fully making up a spell name
Love your segment titles. "oops yogurt" "bamboozled" and "bamboozled again" are all very good
I don't know if it counts, but in Bloodkeep Ify uses his homebrew sword to stab himself while falling into the abyss to teleport himself back 'safely'.
swirlwarden causes some of the best moments in the whole season i love it
I have had Ally saying "Fight me in the lava!" stuck in my head since Wednesday and I want it on a shirt or a sticker or something.
I know Brennan is emotionally attached to his clothes but he needs to seriously consider getting rid of that one maroon raglan shirt. It's clearly cursed, my guy.
Or it's lucky... Just for his team and not him.
So fun fact, there was a case where I was trying to convince a player to give up an artifact to try and further a certain subplot in the narrative of a campaign. The player really had not much use for it, but was mostly keeping it around since it could use things like raise dead and animate dead for an HP cost. Eventually, I gave him a potent boon from the NPC he gave it to that did the following...
He had immunity to cold and necrotic damage. Additionally, all undead would not attack him.
Needless to say...this resulted in a few instances of...shenanigans leading up to the campaign's conclusion.
The fact that he's wearing the same shirt
omg there was an ice feast origin story? With how badly Brennan got fucked by that it just makes it so much funnier
Brennan didn't have to make Ice Feast make one immune to stun - like, it doesn't make as much sense as immunity to fire - but he did
I think the logic is "if you've eaten that much ice, then you've powered through world-ending brain freeze, and it'll take you 24 hours to be able to deal with anything else." I however have never gotten brain freeze in my life so not sure if that's how that works.
unseasoned ice. not unflavored. unseasoned.
Not Brennan wearing the same goddamn shirt for both of these clips.
There's a reason that only, like, 1-2 things in the entire game give you immunity to fire damage. Even WISH only grants resistance
Love that he's wearing the same shirt both times
"why did i do this?"
lmao lol, even hah
I wondered if gorgug axe that can auto crita on inanimate object in the last episode of nightmare King arc is also homebrewed
Since it also taken Brennan into surprised when gorgug hit the tree
If I recall correctly- the gnomes gave him an option to choose between two different axes , both of which were homebrewed by Brennan with different stats. And he got to pick the one he liked better- and went with the gravity axe.
While it may be homebrewed that effect is a property of any adamantine weapon in 5e (source: Xanathar's guide to everything) so it might just have been made of adamantine in addition to its homebrewed features
2:05 In D&D 5e, you can make a character tanky, but there isn't much to support the actual role of a tank.
Aggro control/taunting just doesn't really exist in a meaningful way, so while you can survive almost anything, everything can just ignore you until you're all that is left.
The closest you can get to an AoE taunt, is the Barbarians Reckless Attack giving enemies advantage against you. Other options like Panache, the Sentinel feat, or the Compelled Duel spell, are only able to effectively taunt one enemy, which still leaves the rest of your team open against a lot of threats.
The Oath of the Crown Paladin can taunt in a 30 ft radius with their channel divinity
@@fugyfruit I did not know about that one. Thanks for pointing it out!
It's still not great though, only keeping them from leaving your area of influence rather than incentivising them to fight you, meaning you either want to be fighting alone on the front lines with ranged support, or you use it to allow allies to potentially escape a dangerous situation while you sacrifice yourself.
It being a Paladin Channel Divinity is also a downside, with you only being able to use it once per short rest, and it competing with a bonus action AoE healing for any targets in range that can hear you (ask your DM for whether this applies to unconscious characters; if so, it's insane, but if not it's still okay and likely better than the taunt; notably, the design intent according to Jeremy Crawford is that being unconscious does not deafen you, which is why it's not part of the description of the unconscious state).
Paladins, clerics and artificers make weirdly more effective tanks than straight class fighters. Paladins get compelled duel, clerics and artificers get warding bond, Sanctuary and command (halt buys you 6 seconds to get your principal out of there). Artillerists can use their turret to cast a protestive bubble of temporary hit points and refresh it every round. 3 levels of one of these classes in your bodyguard build makes a big difference
This is literal journalism my guy.
Couldn't stop singing "Piragua, piragua. New block of ice, piragua..." at the time for Ice Feast.
The fact that he has on the same shirt 🤣
It’s that two tone red shirt, both times!
After having watching the Ravening War. Seeing Matt just pull the rug on Brennan multiple times was so great.
Honestly I think Swirlwarden was actually a great method for Brennan to make a bodyguard into something useful to the whole team. That it came with a fun corner case use is just gravy.
For a 7th level spell - Ice feast is absolutely broken
I mean if immunity to stun wasn’t so good it probably wouldn’t be
Well, disadvantage on all ability checks from exhaustion is brutal, so they had to spend 6 high level spell slots to cancel out that exhaustion. It’s a huge investment with an opportunity cost that is essentially All of Kristen’s high end firepower.
Also, this is the absolute ideal battle for it. The stunned condition was bound to come up and the floor is lava. There are much more busted 7th level spells. Such as the being casting ice feast. A simulacrum.
It's basically based on Heroes Feast, and the damage and exhaustion absolutely balance it out, maybe even to the point that it's underpowered and niche compared to Heroes Feast. But Brennan gave them the spell for a reason!
@@jtjpro13 Exactly
Love Brennan’s react to Murph saying he wants to submerge himself in lava. Going from “okay, where’s he going with this?” to “OH FUCK.” Was so funny
You know, Brennan.. Maybe Ice Feast should have given RESISTANCE to fire.
honestly I am just happy with a anti-stun spell because a whole ep of stun PC is boring to watch
Yeah, Stunned is such a frustrating effect as players, too
It's always Murph that figures out how to take advantage of something he has in a situation that would be dire otherwise. Good shit.
Ice feast should be a reflavoring of Create Food and Water for a winter-themed cleric that creates a bunch of food made out of snow. (Still fills you up like food)
It really feels like ice feast should have had teifling rules where you just take half damage or something lol, like come on he should have known that total immunity would bite him in the ass
I fucking love "a member of the house of rocks is in danger" as he bursts out of the water.
There's a homebrew kamen rider class (Masked Hero on Homebrewry) and it's main secondary ability is an ability that lets you make an attack against an incoming enemy attack as a reaction. This will allow you to take the damage like with swirl warden, but on critical hits you just completely negate the damage.
It's a very anime, power of friendship move and honestly very fitting for D&D
To be fair to Brennan, even if you don't take from the heat of lava, that stuff is like the worst sinking sand ever and putting off toxic fumes and heavy AF (its literally molten rocks) so it probably should still be a hazard, even if it doesn't kill them like it would normally. Like really bad noxious mud.
brennan wearing the exact same shirt
There has to be an animation of the Swirlwarden moment somewhere right?
Prestidigitation to season the ice feast
This season was so stressful but damn was it incredible
"Jet what if you immediately die"
Oh honey
Lava has a density about 3.1 times greater than water. This means that even perfectly fluid lava is going exert enough force to expel anything with the density of water real quick. With lava being viscous, though, it is also going to resist that force. If you have great force propelling you and great force resisting you, that is called getting crushed and you will suffer crushing damage (which a fire immunity won't help you with).
Buoyant force is the density of the fluid times the displaced volume of fluid times gravity. If the average human displaces about 0.1 cubic meters, then the force that will be acting on the human to expel them from the lava will be 3100 kg/m^3 * 0.1 m^3 * 9.8 m/s^2 = 3038 Newtons. The weight of my own body would "cancel out" about 900 of those Newtons and so I would need to exert enough force to lift 2.6 times my own body weight in order to HOLD POSITION if I were fully submerged, much less continue to go deeper into the lava.
How far would I sink into lava if I just stood on it, though? That is going to be the point where the my buoyancy in the lava cancels out my weight. My weight is roughly 90kg. 90kg of lava is 90/3100kg/m^3, or 0.029 m^3 of lava. If I am 0.1 m^3 as a whole, then I am probably going to sink in to about halfway up my thighs if I give it time.
The other thing to consider is that your relative body temperature compared to lava is freezing cold, so the lava is literally flash freezing around you as you attempt to move, so you're getting surrounded by solid rocks (which ironically would offer you a little protection from the burning even if they weren't immune to fire damage) as you attempt to tread lava, which is pretty difficult to do and something anyone can try out by climbing into a rock pile and attempting to swim through it.
Brennan writes a spell that makes the party immune to fire and stun effects. Makes the final battle against a giant (that will surely stun) and over lava
Was he drunk when writing the ending? Lolol
Brennan needs to stop wearing this red shirt, it's his "I'm about to be bamboozled" shirt apparently
13:25 I wonder if they could stack ice feast, 2 feasts in 16 hr, potential 40 extra HP max for the next 8 hours.
HOW DOES ONE HAVE THAT MUCH STORAGE IN THE BRAIN?! I simply cannot. After a long life and death finally succumbs this man- we must examine his fucking brain. It’s too complicated.
wait, ice feast lasts 24 hours. theoretically couldnt they cast ice feast and *immediately* take a long rest?
Flat immunity of any kind is super busted
I'm still not used to hear Siobhan cussing
Swirlwarden is basically the Pariah's Shield but with extra movement attached
One of the paladin subs also has a similar ability
The lava shit is so good
15:35 I feel like Ice Feast's effect wouldn't protect against 'lava'. Ice Feast makes you immune to 'fire' damage. Lava is exponentially hotter than 'fire' damage (you could even say that it's 'heat' damage), not to mention all the other deleterious effects of lava.
If it's Aa type lava, it would be like trying to walk on oobleck, with each step releasing noxious gas. You would have to constantly move in order not to sink.
If it's Pahoehoe, then it would be more like quicksand (and only marginally less toxic), you would slowly sink into it as your 'perpetually cool' body would be drawn down into the pyroclastic ebb and flow as the hotter lava bubbles to the surface.
If I had to put it in D&D terms, you'd probably take 1d4 of bludgeoning damage per turn (from the pressure of the molten rocks), have drastically reduced if not zero movement speed.
I think it should protect them from the fire damage, but yeah the lava should have still been an environmental hazard that counted as water that halved movement through it, and ending your movement in/on the lava would result in making a con save to resist toxin damage and gaining the poisoned condition. I would probably also require an athletics (Str) check to even attempt to swim through it as the stuff is going to be like quicksand, but worse.
I probably wouldn't make it worse than that though, as you still want to give the players a bit of a reward for their outthinking your encounter, and make it fun, however, in the real world lava would be much worse as it essentially "flash" freezes around you since your body temperature is significantly colder than the lava, so you are essentially getting covered by solid rock and are literally going to be just swimming through rocks with a density much greater than water.
5e player, listening to Ice Feast, "Lasts 24 hours"... What's keeping this from being a nightly desert just before bed? Long rest to get to full HP and recover from exhaustion.
That is extremely OP unless it's a single use ability.
Ok while very smart of Emily/Murph to do with the lava, and to be fair I don't know how the rest of the fight plays out, BUTTTTT at the very least the characters would now be technically swimming which would limit their movement a bit and the most important thing hinder the usage of certain weapons. I would also as a DM probably say there is some sort of sight issues that come up going both ways with the characters in the lava limited by its thiccness/bright limit and similar the enemies having a harder time making them out amongst the lava especially while being partially submerged.
The combat wasn't concluded by the end of the episode, but so far, I think Murph is the only one who has actually gone in the lava and he just basically submerged himself as a form of cover because he'd already used his bonus action and thus couldn't end his turn by hiding normally. As far as visibility, Riz does currently have True Sight active, so it's probably fair if he can still see where people are via seeing in to the ethereal plane, but yeah, we'll see how Brennan handles it!
At episodes end, murph got out of the lava with i think half movement/dash and is pretending to hide kinda badly to reaction cast a spell on kipperlily
Everyone so mad about ice feast like this isnt a game Brennan wrote to play with his friends, and he clearly isn't mad about how it went. Chill.
8:35 excuse me BRANDON ?
"secret service leap" well that aged funny
Same shirt too, wow.
even same fucking shirt
Texas is larger than Spain, slightly smaller than France. Yeah, it's big enough to be its own country as it used to he for a brief period. Parts of it have nothing to see do, some have nothing to see, but we have every kind of terrain, every type of weather and weather event (except tsunamis). It snows in the panhandle every winter, it frequently goes above 100° in most of the state during the summer. How long you want to spend here depends on what you actually want to do. You could spend more than a month here and still not see everything, but a lot you may not care to see, depending on your interests.
Y'all clearly don't DM enough if you think Ice Feast is in any way balanced fairly -_-
Unless you're running 3 combats per long rest, you'll always have the spell slots available to offset exhaution off anyone affected *if they really really need it*; for the most part, 1st level exhaustion isn't even that bad. Look at Riz, the person most likely to suffer from disadv ability checks (stealth checks) - because of Reliable talent, even with disadvantage, the lowest he can roll is an average of 26 (expertise, and a plus 5 to DEX) or so (so, nobody's seeing him, ever, exhaustion or no).
Spellcasters will be casting spells still, and frontliners will be attacking (which isn't penalised by the exhaustion at all).
Furthermore, it actively increases your hit point max by a not bad amount (significantly better than plain temporary hp)
And Immunity to fire (which is fine, it's thematic, but also it's the most common immunity one can find),
and more importantly, immunity to stunned (the main tool for any high level fight encounter to slow the party from Steamrolling any opponent) is absolutely busted.
But the worst part, is it basically gives you War_Caster/Eldritch_Mind for free (arguably one of the best feats that any serious caster is *going* to take 10/10 times). Advantage on constitution saves? That's ridiculously powerful!
For a comparison, let's look at Investiture of Flame, a 6th level spell that emulates some of this stuff;
You get resistance to cold, and Immunity to Fire - makes sense.
Plus, you deal a little extra damage to folk as they draw close, and can do a mediocre amount of fire damage as an action now.
Compared to:
Increased max hp equal to the average warlock's eldritch blast,
The effects of a free feat (arguably one of the most powerful feats in the game)
Immunity to the main mechanic of most high level enemy fights,
Immunity to one of the most common damage types,
and this can be applied to 12 different people, with no material cost.
And the only cons are:
a teardrops' amount of damage which gets outhealed by this same spell after it deals the damage,
and easily reversible exhaution, that isn't going to meaningfully affect any class in any serious way.
Is it a fun spell? Sure; it gives the player's an overwhelming advantage going into any late-game fight.
Is it balanced? - not in the least.
Statistically the DC 25 option has a higher chance of success because the DC 20 option is at disadvantage(although technically he rolled flat, which would have made the DC 25 check at advantage). The chance of rolling a flat 13(or higher) is 5%(1/20). The chance that you roll an 18 is 8.75%(already more than rolling a 13). A 19 has a 9.25% chance, and a 20 is a 9.75% chance(almost twice as likely as rolling a 13).
The lava under the gym was a really cool design and provided interesting obstacles. Sad to see it reduced to nothing
"Digene" these captioners need to get cultured
Ice feast is such a dumb fucking spell.
Take damage, gain hp max
Get immunity to the most common elemental damage type
Get immunity to a status condition that he has already shown was gonna be a pretty big deal on the boss.
And a single lvl of exhaustion? Basically nothing as seen here
nothing says pettiness than changing the text on an item because you dislike how it was used. nothing says he needed to roll athletics, nothing says the distance changed based on move speed or terrain, it just says 30 feet as a reaction to any ally.
A homebrew item trashing an encounter is funny, but trashing the climax is just tragic. It ruins the arc and all the work the DM put into the battle, and kinda robs the players of satisfying closure...
I certainly wouldn’t say it “ruined” anything, half their party has still gone down (and been brought back up) during that same battle. They’re still having to hustle to keep going toe to toe with Brennan even with Ice Feast’s crazy benefits.
Not really, they still had to stop the bad guys. Also, if it was actually an issue, Brennan could have just said no. They are all trained storytellers and clearly know when something will actually be an issue for the story.
not to mention, its definitely fun and satisfying to watch the players stump a powerful boss.
(and not in a boring, op way either. as the previous comment mentioned, they were still struggling)