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The DunJanes take the Gordian Knot approach

The DunJanes discover that there's more to solving a puzzle than knowing the answer.

The DunJanes make their way even farther into the catacombs, and T'Chad plumbs the depths of his musical talents.

Having made it to the other side of the alcoves, the DunJanes take some downtime to get back those sweet, sweet hitpoints.

As the DunJanes continue through the catacombs, they find themselves again in trouble. Yes, again.

The DunJanes get to know each other, which may or may not mean they're now fast friends.

The DunJanes find themselves stuck between some rocks and a lot of angry people with sharp weapons.

The DunJanes get into their first fight. It goes great. There are no problems.

At long last, the DunJanes set out on their adventures! Join Avi, Idi, Lil and T'Chad as they meet, have a drink, and almost immediately get in trouble. T'Chad Has Been... Drinking TranscriptJenna: Hello and welcome to DunJanes and Dragons, I'm Jenna your dungeon master. Cal will be playing Idi, a Human Fighter. Gretchen will be playing T'Chad, a Tiefling bard. Lizzi will be playing Avi, a Half-elven rogue, and Milly will be playing Lil, an elven druid. If you would like to know more about their characters before we start, you can take five minutes out to listen to our bonus episode Meet the DunJanes otherwise, you'll get to know them as the game progresses.We are very aware that we may have some listeners who have no experience in either playing or listening to a D&D game, to help, I will be doing a short DunJanes and Jargons segment at the end of each episode. I'll choose and element of play from the episode and try, as briefly and succinctly as possible, to explain how it works. Veterans, or those who don't feel the need to know the ins and outs, can simply turn the podcast off as the segment starts.This is only my second time being a Dungeon Master and our players are also inexperienced, so this will be a learning curve for all of us. Hopefully we can entertain you along the way.There are some rules that we are intentionally forgetting, as they are tedious for new players; spell components for instance, and some which we will unintentionally forget.We are firm advocates of the story is more important than the rules philosophy. We do want to be super good and stuff so please feel free to feedback to us about anything we do, just don't be a dick about it.[Music plays]Jenna: [1:40] The river Echo churns her way across the countryside. Through the millennia she has carved herself a deep path through the rock and earth. Echo's waters rarely see sunlight as as she is shaded by the great walls of her home.Where we begin, a huge willow tree rises on the west side of the canyon, silhouetted against the cool blue cloudless sky. It sits at the top, fifty feet above the angry water, leaning across as if to get a better look into the depths. The tree herself is tall, over two hundred feet, and it would take twenty men holding hands to surround the base. Roots wriggle and writhe in and out of the ground, some thicker than an orc. The branches drape down to form a curtain over the river, leaving the majority of the east side of the tree open to sunlight.You cannot tell from looking but the willow is hollow almost all the way up the trunk. She is not dead but the magic that maintains her has long been forgotten. Pilgrims come from far and wide to examine her and find no clues to her secret. Is she blessed or under a curse? She has become known as the 'Sky tree', original I know but common folk believe that she reaches all the way to the heavens.Thanks to a gaudy visitor's brochure you have learnt that one hundred years ago, Procto Anak, a canny businessman and all round ambitious character went on his own pilgrimage to the sky tree. Seeing the tents of other pilgrims and the lack of nearby establishments or settlements, Procto saw a gap in the market. A gap in the market that could be filled by the hole in the tree. 'What sort of man would creep around in the dead of night to build an Inn inside a sacred tree for his own profit?'  The pilgrims cried, but they soon gave in to the offer of a cosy bed and a hearty breakfast and thusly you awaken in the Anak Inn, a series of rooms which fill up the hollow in the centre of sky tree. It is cosy and well maintained, filled with simple wooden furniture. There are no windows, but each room is lit by a small glowing globe hovering near the ceiling. All the rooms are necessarily small, including the common room which sits at the base. This is where you are now.What are you doing?Milly: May I ask a point of clarification?Jenna: Yes.Milly: When you say 'wriggling' do you mean like wrigglin' wrigglin', like is it alive?Jenna: Not like moving.Milly: Not like a weeping... ok.Gretchen: Metaphorically wriggling.Cal: Metaphorically wriggling.[Laughter]Milly: So, and then, is it our job to decide why we're there? Or do we know why we're there?Jenna: Yeah, it's your job to decide why you're there.Milly: Cool, cool, cool.Jenna: So, in the room that you're in, you can see that there is a bar along one side. Behind it is a suspiciously tall halfling who you can actually see over the bar, which is... unlikely.[Laughter]Jenna: Urm, there are four tables, each of which will seat about six people. So what are you doing?Cal: Well I think I'm probably sitting at the bar.Jenna: okCal: Drinking mead. I mean...Lizzi: I think I'm, like, skulking in a corner. My hood is probably up, I'm looking pretty pissed. As in pissed off [laughter] not... Um. Maybe I'm doing that thing where you like stab a knife between your fingers just to make sure that no-one comes anywhere near me.Milly: I'm gonna say Lil is pacing. Urm, I am not a hundred percent confident that she is actually a guest.Jenna: Um, so you guys are actually the only people that are staying here just now. Well, you're the only people in the common room just now. So it's you guys and the bar tender.Cal: The 'halfling'.Jenna: The halfling.[Laughter]Cal: Air quotes.[General amusement]Gretchen: Uh, I'm thinking T'Chad is artfully draped over um [Milly laugh], either at a bar stool or a chair. That he's kind of off by himself posing and tuning up his lute, really, really hoping that someone would come over and ask him to play them something.Milly: Is it possible to make physical contact with the tree from where we are?Jenna: Yeah.Milly: Cool.Jenna: I mean, it makes up the walls...Milly: Right. I imagine that Lil is like, kind of gently stroking it and whispering to it as if she can communicate with it, which she cannot do, but it makes her feel better.Jenna: Ok, so the um, the bartender disappears briefly, and comes round the outside of the bar so you can see that actually she is a very normal sized...Gretchen: I have a question.Jenna: Yeah?Gretchen: Halflings are short?Jenna: They're Hobbits.Milly: Think Hobbits.Gretchen: Oh ok, ah k.[Laughing]Jenna: So she's probably about three foot tall.Gretchen: Oh, alright. She's...Jenna: She's a lot smaller than the rest of you.Gretchen: ...standing on a box.Jenna: Yeah. So she comes out, she's got a little pad of paper and she approaches T'Chad and says -J as Darla: Well hello there, I'm Darla Dewbottle. Can I take your breakfast order please?G as T'Chad: Uh, yeah. Yeah you can. Um, except that I am just not in the mood for eating right now because music is the food of my soul. By the way... have you thought about your soul today?J as Darla: Ok, but I mean like we make really good eggs. So can I put you down for the eggs?G as T'Chad: ...yeah.J as Darla: You... get right on doing what you're doing.G as T'Chad: Can I take your order for a song, pretty lady?J as Darla: Something... morningy.G as T'Chad: [interrupting] anyway, here's Chosen One[much laughter from all]Gretchen: Ding dingadingading ding.Jenna: Ok, she goes over to um, Avi in the corner next.J as Darla: So, can I take your order? We make real good eggsL as Avi: Take? D.. did someone say take? What?J as Darla: Urm, it means our eggs... I'm offering you eggs.L as Avi: Oh eggs. I... I think I'm good.Jenna: And then, she kinda looks at you (Lil)Milly: I wouldn't.Jenna: Stroking the walls.Milly: I wouldn't.Jenna: Like (tsk, side eye) um, and goes back behind the bar because you're(Idi) sitting at the bar.J as Darla: Would you like breakfast Sir?C as Idi: No, I wasn't planning on staying for breakfast.J as Darla: More mead then?C as Idi: Ah, more mead please. Yes.J as Darla: Ok.Milly: What time is it in the morning? Just out of curiosity...[much laughter from all]Gretchen: Mead o'clock.Cal: Mead o'clock. It's always mead o'clock.Jenna: I mean, you need something to suggest the ba... tragic backstory right?C as Idi: Oh no, I just like drinking!Gretchen: Can we have an embroidered t-shirt that says 'it's mead o'clock' on it somewhere?Cal: I shift backwards slightly, as my weapons clink on my belt.Gretchen: I like the idea that every time you move it's just like abuhbuhbuhbuhbum!C as Idi: More mead please.Jenna: Darla, throws some eggs on the conveniently placed hob behind her bar. Like I said, this is a very small place, she has to fit everything in one bit.Gretchen: Is it a Hobbit hob?Jenna: It's a Hobbit hob.Gretchen: Oh my God!Jenna: And then proceeds to pour you (Idi) some more mead.C as Idi: Thankyou.Jenna: What else would you like to do while you're here?Milly: Um, I guess like, could I get a further description of, I dunno, the rest of the hotel? Or like a little bit more of the setting, like if I wanted to go adventuring, like, you know, maybe, make a friend, destroy a hotel that shouldn't be on the inside of a tree...[merriment]Jenna: Um, so, you've got the bar along one wall and then your four tables. Um, on the other side of the bar from that is the door that takes you up to the rooms. Um, if you haven't been in here before then the others will know that there's basically a really long staircase with a door that periodically comes off it um, to take you into the rooms.Milly: (incredulous) I'm sorry. A door that periodically comes off it?Jenna: No, I mean. Occasionally there's a door and that's the door to one of the rooms.Gretchen: Like occasionally, like the door's not always there? Or the walls...Milly: I'm so confused.Cal: There are multiple doors.Jenna: No, so there's a stair and like every ten stairs there's like a landing that has a door and that leads to a room.Milly: I really liked the like...Gretchen: I was picturing like, Harry Potter where sometimes the doors are there and sometimes they're not there and, you know, if they're not there, you sleep on the stairs.Jenna: YeahLizzi: Can we have that?Jenna: What, magic doors?Lizzi:

No, but really, what are we doing? Sit down with DM Jenna and editor Milly as we discuss some of the many trials and travails of making a D&D podcast. The DunJane Diaries TranscriptJenna: Hello and welcome to The DunJane Diaries. So this is a bonus episode for the podcast that we are about to release. If you're listening to this then hopefully you will continue to listen when the main podcast starts as well. Urm, so DunJanes is a D&D podcast, the DunJane Diaries are where me Jenna the Dungeon Master andMilly: Me Milly! Who is the behind the scenes editor, composer, webmaster etc.Jenna: Uh, this is where we're gonna talk a bit about what we do behind the scenes, any sort of issues and struggles that we have while we're playing and I guess any um, celebrations that we need to have as well. If anything goes real amazing. Um, at some...Milly: I like that you live in hope.Jenna: At some point we'll probably start some audience participation as well. This will be the place where we'll address any sort of questions or audience participation projects that we start.Milly: I just had a terrible realisation that I've been nodding. You know how nodding goes like great audio.Jenna: I mean, nod with sound right? You really need to really hit that chin on your like neck and justMilly: Oh god no, I was thinking on the microphone just like that-[Tapping on microphone]Milly: That's me nodding.Jenna: Um, so how did DunJanes come to be? That was the first question. We had a very, very professional meeting at a coffee shop yesterday.Milly: In like a real coffee shop with real coffee.Jenna: With coffee. Well, I had coffee. You had a very disappointing ginger muffin.Milly: It was true. We don't speak of the ginger muffin.Jenna: We live together in the same house, this is why it was a professional meeting because we went out. Uh, so my dear colleague Milly here, is obsessed with podcasts. Like you actually have no idea.Milly: See I wanna be offended by that word but it's too accurate.Jenna: Why would you be offended?Milly: Go on.Jenna: And I was like, 'you know what the next stage is Milly?'Milly: The next stage is making a podcast yourself but then I was like 'I don't know anything I don't have anything to make a podcast about', which to me is like-Jenna: We need a gimmick.Milly: No reason to let that stop you[Laughing]Jenna: We can make it happen. So then, I dunno, we were talking and we thought about D&D. I've been playing for a while now, well, I say a while. I mean a year which is not actually that long in D&D terms but yeah, and Milly has never played before, which is great interest in such things-Milly: Yeah, so I was telling Jenna before we started recording, that like you know when you normally go on a website and you press a key and your computer auto-completes what it thinks that website is going to be. It used to be, there was a time, when I pressed f and it was like 'Ah! Facebook' Now I press f and it goes to the forgotten realms wiki, which is the D&D wiki, urm, which I'm like a little bit proud of but I feel like I should be publicly ashamed about. So yeah, I don't... I've never played.Jenna: We're all about breaking down those like, social barriers that stop people talking about D&D. I mean, I think the public might actually be sick of us talking about D&D at this point.Milly: They can actually turn off the podcast, not that I'm recommending they do.Jenna: Oh no! I mean like, you know, people we actually know.Milly: Oh, people we actually know in the real world! Yeah, it's harder. I mean, walk away tall, urm so yes, we decided to make DunJanes urm, and do you wanna talk about how we got our players?Jenna: Urm, yeah I guess, so I'm a, I'm the dungeon master. Urm, I put an advert out on facebook um, for people. We didn't like specify anything except that beginners were incredibly welcome to play. And, It turns out that I've got a bunch of really awesome friends um, 'cause we...[Tapping on the microphone]Jenna: Oh! That was Milly nodding. First was Gretchen.Milly: Yeah, I think that's right.Jenna: With whom I work. I work in a library, she works in the basement, making sure that al of the, all of the ancient manuscripts are not too moist.Milly: It's very important.Jenna: And she was very excited. And Cal came round.Milly: Yeah, I think and then Cal.Jenna: She'a one of our other housemate's sisters and we were like 'Hey we're doing this thing' and she was like 'oooh' um and, and then Lizzi was like 'No, I'm not doing it!'[Laughter]Jenna: So it just actually just happened to be all women and... one of things we really wanted to talk about during this was, we had our first character creation party um, just to get everyone started, let them roll their stats and everything. And one of the first questions that came up was... we're all girls, this is not a like, community that's necessarily famous for being nice to women.Milly: Yah, especially, it's like all women who are doing D&D on the internet it's not good.Jenna: And, we're noobs as well.Milly: Yeah.Jenna: So, you know.Milly: I mean I will say we had a uh, very, very enthusiastic housemate who is male who would have loved to play with us but sadly is going back to the Netherlands.Jenna: Say hi.Milly: Actually this very, uh, enthusiastic housemate is like right near the microphoneHousemate: Hello![Laughter]Milly: Our housemate is Reinhardt from Overwatch.[Big laugh]Jenna: I don't even play Overwatch... but that was funnyMilly: It's ok. Thank you, I made a joke! Ahh! Um, cool, so actually I think I will maybe dive in a little here and talk about some of the stuff that I do. Um, because I kind of think of it like Jenna's job is to make like a really cool game and make like interesting story and my job is to take that story and make it podcastable in all of the ways. Um, so some of that is I've done a bunch of research, we're calling it research. I've listened to about ten podcasts in pretty good depth, uh, other D&D podcasts of various varieties um, and I've listened to like bits and bobs of other D&D podcasts so I've tried to really get a sense of what's out there and what I think is good um, what maybe could do with improvement uh, which is not to say that our podcast is gonna be perfect when it first starts...Jenna: This is one of the reasons that you wont find and D&D podcast reviews on www.millyspodcasts.com and that's because she doesn't want to critique something that we are then gonna be in sort of competition with. I like to think of it as a community, we're not in competition with any other D&D podcasts and you will find lists of D&D podcasts on our website that you should go list to.. listen to as well as ours because.Milly: Yeah, for sure. Um, so yeah I do  kinda that aspect of making it a podcast, I'm also responsible for uh, all the editing all the music, uh, I am the webmaster so all the bits and bobs that go into taking this conversation that we're having here and many other future conversations and making them hopefully interesting and fun to listen to. I am [laughs] uh, one of the other things that I do is kind of uh, like the stage manager shall we say, I think of it as herding cats. So my job is to message poor beleaguered players and be like 'So you know you still haven't told me about your proficiencies' [Laughs] to try to get everyone kind of nudged in the direction of getting everything ready before the podcast has started. And on that note, I do think having listened to loads of other podcasts, that one thing we have done a bit differently is we've put a lot of preparation, like a stupid amount of preparation into it before we started um, which  is not to say that you have to do it that way. But like, I was listening to a D& D podcast the other day and one of the players said that she had made her sheet an hour ago. And I was like 'oh my friend...'Jenna: We have literally been doing this for four months.Milly: Yeah. We also have I think a pretty nice range of player, I mean I know that we are all female and maybe people will think  that that is an insufficient range but-Jenna: Yeah, I think we've got a good well-balanced part. Um, when I first, when we first started talking about this I was like 'guys, guys just do what you want. Like choose a character that you identify with like that you're gonna be comfortable with. Don't worry about having a balanced party.' And then while drunk I was talking to a person about this and they were like 'you're stupid' [Milly laugh] and I was like 'fair' and they were like 'make sure you have a balanced party' and I was like '...fine.'Milly: Uh, we did also have like a test game that we did and we had a good time but like man we did not talk to each other at all before we chose who we were going to be and... doors. I'm telling you doors were the worst, none of us knew how to open doors in any capacity. So I came as like the big half-orc fighter um, and I'm gonna say that I spent like eighty percent of my game smashing down doors.Jenna: I mean, this is partly a DM flaw because there were so many doors.Milly: I think that my half-elf should have been like 'fuck all of you guys' and just wandered off into the wide world, smashing doors as she went.Jenna: You were an orc.Milly: I was a half-orc.Jenna: Yeah, you just said elf.Milly: Oh! Uh.... redacted.Jenna: When I went in to make the test game I was like 'Dudes, I'm planning DunJanes as well at this time so it's gonna be as simple as possible. It's gonna be a dungeon you're gonna have to get out of the fucking dungeon and like there will be monsters and there will be traps and there will be some puzzles and that will be it' and it turns out that actually that's really hard. Um, because you wind up with a lot of rooms where not very much happens um, and if you accidentally add all of your modifiers to your damage dice as well as your hit dice then uh, intellect of ours gets killed in o

Get to know the DunJanes! Who are the adventurers you're going to be following on the podcast? Meet the DunJanes TranscriptJenna: Hello and welcome to Meet the DunJanes, a bonus episode of the DunJanes and Dragons podcast. I'm Jenna your dungeon master. In this very short episode each of our characters are going to talk about themselves for about a minute. If you would rather learn about them during play then you can skip this episode and start with episode one.[Music plays]Lizzi: Hi, I'm Lizzi and I'm going to be playing Avi, our half-elven rogue.[Avi's theme starts to play]L as Avi: Hi, it's so nice to meet you, I'm Avi. Oh, that's a, that's a beautiful ring, can I just have a look at that? Hmm wow! It's be a shame if you lost that! Anyway, what do I do? Well, you could say I'm a thief but I don't think that's a very nice word. I prefer to say I 'give people a helping hand in mis-placing their belongings'. For example, one second it's in your pocket and hey! Maybe later it's in my rucksack?.. my rucksack, how did that happen? Normally this doesn't cause too many problems. Normally people don't come looking which is a good thing because it takes a lot to anger me but man, you do not wanna see me when I lose it, I do not know where to stop. But look, best not think about that. Me and you, we should get along just fine.So at the moment I'm in a little bit of trouble. Let's say I 'borrowed' some things from a group of dwarves, maybe I shouldn't have, and I'm trying to stay away from the city, lie low. I guess there's only one other important thing you should know about me. Some time ago I lost something very important and I'm going to get it back.Milly: Hey everybody! I am Milly and I am going to be playing Lil, who is a high elf druid. Um, so yeah![Lil's theme starts to play]M as Lil: Hi, I'm Lil. I am a moon elf which is a type of High elf, if you didn't know. I have blue hair and alabaster skin which I think  means it's very shiny. That's weird so don't think too hard about it. I'm six feet tall which is really super, super, stupid tall if you're an elf but I'm only a-hundred-and-twenty-six pounds so there's not too much going on here. I am rocking that minus three strength! The operative word for me is definitely 'floof'. I'm born into  a family of fighters and they had high hopes I'd carry on the family tradition but it's never going to happen, that ship dun sailed. I've gone off in search of adventure, meaning and hedgehogs.Cal:   Hello! My name is Cal and I'm playing Idi who's a human fighter.[Idi's theme starts to play]C as Idi: Hello, I'm Idirmil and I like nothing more than cutting people up with all my swords. I may not have much in the way of book smarts but I make up for that with my, one, two.. five, seven weapons! I have seven weapons on me at all times. My two swords, my two axes, my dagger, my bow [whisper] and my self. For a small amount of coin I'll get you where you need to be and I'll keep you safe on the way, especially if there's booze at the end of the journey. So long as you're not a total arsehole we'll definitely get along. Then we can drink mead, play cards and make merry! I'll drink you under the table and beat you at cards but, then I'll walk you home because I'm quite a nice person. I did used to be a soldier but I've been working as a sell-sword for quite a few years now just wandering around the place. Really, it's quite interesting. Meeting new people, drinking new meads, killing new bandits. My mother always told me 'look after your weapons, look after yourself and buy some good boots', so I've done all three.Gretchen: Hi my name is Gretchen and I'll be playing T'Chad, the Tiefling bard. Anyway, here's Chosen One[Chosen One starts to play]G as T'Chad: Ladies, Gentlemen, everyone else. Wink. My name is T'Chad Noeliam T'armac. The first T is silent, the second one... it's not. I am the favoured only son of a secret Tiefling lute cult deep in the mountains, no you haven't heard of us we're pretty underground. But fear not, it is my job to spread the good news of our lutey demonic lord and saviour down below. My coming was foretold... and so is yours e-eyyyy wassup! And it is my first day out. My lute is my most prized possession, in fact it says so on my character sheet. Along with the fact that I am six foot tall because apparently that matters and that's uh, not including antlers. I also have long flowing hair, red skin and golden eyes. You know why? Because I'm fucking special. And it says I can have them in the player handbook. I have never experienced rejection because everyone loves me and I love everyone, especially you. Wink.Jenna: Thank you for listening. If you've enjoyed this podcast please rate and review us on iTunes/apple podcast. Check us out on twitter Instagram and Facebook at dunjanes.and.dragons and our website www.dunjanesanddragons.com. Now that you've met the characters it's time to join them for their adventures, so see you again for episode one 'T'Chad Has Been... Drinking'.