"4-Sided Dive: From Dusk Till Faun" (4SDx05) is the fifth episode of 4-Sided Dive, discussing episodes of the third campaign up through "Dark Portents" (3x29) with guests Taliesin Jaffe, Ashley Johnson, Erika Ishii, and Matthew Mercer.
Synopsis[]
Provided with permission by Loquacious Quark.[1]
Tonight’s guests: Erika, Taliesin, Matt, and Ashley, with Tal landing host on a nat 20, ha! Dani got a haircut and it looks great. The producers have used the extra prep time well to insinuate quokkas are actually enormously evil.
What the Fuck is Up With That?
The Deathwish Run came out of Matt’s collaboration with Bashir in the development of the Bassuras region. They needed a death race to entertain the people who chose to live in such a hellish place. He hoped they’d wander into it but wasn’t sure it would happen. Taliesin asks for skyship combat & Erika points out she & Matt did airship combat in their “Escape from the Bloodkeep” series with Brennan Lee Mulligan (very highly recommended!).
Matt’s favorite part was All-Minds-Burn tossing the boulder down the hill, not realizing that Bells Hells were the only ones left to be hurt by it.
Taliesin loved how dangerous it felt. Having FCG present & casting was an enormous help. Matt didn’t see the wheel cosplay coming, ha! He was excited to bring out the kagaronk (mini designed by Crystal Sully).
Ashley loves the Fast & Furious movies & has seen every one of them in the theater. I’m so sorry, Ashley.
Erika & Matt have been talking about Yu since October. Later, Ashley & Erika were talking at a bar & Ashley mentioned how she wanted to get nasty & bad this campaign, and Erika loved that idea. Matt gave her a bunch of options, including some fey narrative threads, and Erika decided to use a changeling she’s wanted to play for a long time. At that point they tied into Ashley’s backstory, and Matt gave her options for the courts & factions. When he said Yu would be sent to kill Fearne’s parents, Erika got very excited. Not even all the crew knew that Erika had two characters in the bank. She deliberately played Dusk a little stupidly to help sell the bit (”I bet Erika doesn’t know that elves don’t sleep!”).
Neither Tal nor Ashley suspected ANYTHING. Matt thought Travis & a bit Liam were clocking Erika & wasn’t surprised at all that Travis full-on figured out her plan. He and Marisha both are the red-thread-conspiracy board-pinners of the group, even though Travis presents himself goofily.
Erika talks about the importance of emotional prep work outside of the game. She and Matt strongly recommend against coming in as a secret antagonist for a party unless you know the other players very, VERY well and are assured that they would be down for that kind of roleplay.
They had no idea how BH’s reaction would go. Matt & Erika had contingencies if it turned to a full battle, though Erika didn’t actually want to kill anyone and it would be almost impossible for one level 8 character to win against multiple level 6/7 PCs. They even had plans of her potentially killing (or “killing”) a cast member’s character and replacing them. She guesses that 30-40% of what Yu says is true. She put a lot of attention into pushing the boundaries of the character while still making sure the players were having fun OOC.
Morticia & Gomez are Erika’s favorite fictional parents. Tal likes the parents from Spy Kids. Joan Cusack from Addams’ Family Values was part of the inspiration for Fearne. Nice!
The Tower of Inquiry!
After Matt struggles for several minutes, Dani reveals they’ve glued all the blocks of the tower together. Ha! She brings out a new (non-sticky) set and eight blocks are pulled to match the previous tower. We eventually get to the real question: how much backstory should be left to the DM? When Matt plays PCs, it’s almost all of it. Tal tries to only give backstory from the perspective of his character–if he doesn’t know the motivations or details of something happening, the character doesn’t either. Matt: “They know I’ll never do anything to harm them, to traumatize them, to rob them of agency. But I will fuck with their expectations and twist things to make it interesting and fun for them based on what I know about them. That just comes with the experience of knowing these people, of loving them and playing with them for so long. It takes time to earn that trust and understanding, so you can’t expect it at the beginning of the table by any means.”
Taliesin writes about two solid pages per character. Ashley doesn’t do detailed backstories but continues to permutate & touch base with Matt for Fearne. It blew her mind when Sam told her he was adding stuff for Nott mid-campaign in C2. She likes to be surprised by her character & absolutely adores “yes-anding” with Matt. It’s her favorite kind of tightrope walk.
Matt talks about not getting to have Ashley as much as they wanted for C1 (Pike) and C2 (Yasha). Yasha was quietly tragic and learning to come out of her shell, which aligned well with Ashley’s real life at the time. Watching her be unleashed as Fearne now brings Matt immense joy. Ashley adores playing something light and fluffy after her last few dreadful years.
Erika talks about the limitations of being contracted for a certain number of episodes (and the limitations of live/streamed D&D play); you have to hit all your arc beats in a regular pattern because you have a hard stop. She writes out very extensive notes for public games moreso than her private ones.
Second question! What would Kiri pick up from your characters? Ashton: “fuck shit fuck fuck, shit.” Fearne: “I was just lying. I don’t know!” Dusk & Yu: there’s nothing to grab onto. They’re a fully fluid experience.
Eshteross’s baking was an in-the-moment improvisation. Amazing.
The Deep Dive!
Ashton hasn’t fully processed the reveal of the night he fell. Taliesin is still very interested in some stuff they found in the museum. He’s curious about where the rest of the Nobodies are, but is waiting for the story to allow some conversations with the party.
Sam had mentioned playing an automaton from Aeor in the Aeor arc of C2, but never circled back to the idea. Ashley remembers he was obsessed with Devexian. Matt kept it in the back of his head, and when months later he began to develop FCG, Matt decided to tie that in. They just had to wait for the group to run into someone who’d know enough about Aeor to reveal it. Dancer? Sam had left a lot of his backstory open and told Matt he could do whatever he wanted with it. Tal & Sam did have a session zero covering these events; “we saw some shit!” Matt: “You did.”
Erika could tell Travis was still slightly guessing because he wasn’t showing his work, so she wasn’t going to give it all up that easily. She whispered in his ear that Yu was totally going to kill Ashley’s parents. Dusk immediately running to Fearne was Yu attempting to control the narrative; Erika thought it was hilarious that Fearne immediately assumed Chet was just joking. She thinks that the group was willing to forgive some of her more blatant hints that Dusk/Yu were not what they seemed because they’ve played with the group offline for so many years.
When Fearne met Dark Fearne in ExU, Dark Fearne revealed that the postcards weren’t from Grandma Morri, so Ashley’s had that in the back of her mind since then. However, these were her only connections to her parents, so she was still holding onto hope & liked to show off how much her parents loved her. She’s excited to see what this implies about Morri.
Ashton showing BH around Bassuras was very different from Percy showing VM around Whitestone; he had been much more active in the development of Whitestone, including vibes & structure, whereas Bassuras was made by Matt & was kind of Tal’s Milwaukee–there’s four good bars and you just don’t want to go back. Every NPC in Ashton’s world that Tal created is based on real friends of his.
Matt: There are lots of facets in C3 based around the idea of coincidence and fate. Some things have been brewing from C1. Time will reveal which is which.
Matt loved revealing Birdie. “I am a creature of impulse, and if something gets in my way I get around like, like water around a rock.” Her characterization is based partly off Fearne (though the voice is a bit different as he imagined Fearne’s voice comes more from Morri) and partly from other influences yet to be revealed. He did NOT expect the group to doubt Birdie as much as they did–he thinks the Dusk factor made it ten times more interesting, especially given the lack of aggression.
Matt mentions that he had conversations with the group offscreen between Erika’s penultimate and ultimate episodes. Given the setup, there was a great potential for multiple violent/weird/intense outcomes, and he made sure everyone in the group was okay with that; he made it clear that at any point someone could let him know if anything got to be too much. However, Erika ended up going a non-violent route instead, which really surprised Matt and took the encounter in a completely different direction. Given Imogen’s flash of Ira in Birdie’s mind & all the information being withheld, Yu felt like they could manipulate the situation and didn’t have to resort to violence. “Birdie came out looking bad.”
During character creation, Matt had to limit her inventory “because I cannot give you anything I don’t want the party to eventually have.”
Tower of Inquiry, Redux!
What facet of the character would annoy you as a roommate? Ashton: everything. He’s an amalgamation of all the worst roommates Tal’s ever had. “Why are you awake at this hour and why did you decide this was the hour to turn on the stereo? I am aware that you’re drunk and have had a bunch of coffee and it’s four o’clock in the morning and I’m aware that you don’t have work in the morning, but I do. Please take it to the fucking basement.” Fearne: random things going missing constantly. Ashley remembers Ariel combing her hair with a fork; that’s an energy she loves. It wouldn’t even be expensive things. “What happened to the salt and pepper shakers?” Dusk: would break everything out of inattention. Yu would be a terrifying manipulator. Matt: Essek would be a person that constantly sits around and mopes emotionally and needs help, but absolutely refuses to let anyone ever help or do anything about it. He’s the kind of person who labels the level of the orange juice. Caleb can be passive-aggressive, so they all think they’d actually live together quite well. Ha! They’d be very organized with matching labels. Ashley badly wants the Caleb/Essek Marie Kondo home decluttering fanfic.
Codenames!
I love this game. Questions after every won card.
The assassins were birthed for C3. Ruidus & the forgotten gods were born around the end of C1/start of C2.
Was Yu actually attracted to either Laudna or Orym, or was it part of the manipulation? A little of both. Ashton doesn’t like having a real job now that they’ve joined the Paragon's Call. They’re just kicking the consequence can down the street.
Matt loves the idea of war-scarred, dangerous, mature women characters. Otohan does have ties to BH stories which are not in Bassuras.
Erika successfully leads Taliesin with “stitch 2″ and gets both “line” and “needle,” and then a leg of her chair breaks off! Oh no! Kyle sweeps in and removes it immediately, and Erika perches on the arm of Tal’s for the rest. I fear her presumption of stability is unfounded.
Taliesin loves taking people to the CIA Club, a gross venue in Burbank which was famous for having a collection of bizarre carnival paraphernalia including real Fiji mermaids and cursed dead clowns under glass. This 100% tracks with everything we have ever learned about Taliesin.
Yu’s offer to take Fearne to the Feywild was mostly genuine. Yu did genuinely like Fearne, though that doesn’t mean they won’t be an antagonist in future.
Choosing between Yu & Birdie was very hard for Fearne. She made a connection with Yu but Birdie is her mother, but she doesn’t know Birdie at all…you never want to think your parents did the wrong thing.
Tal gets asked for the worst piece of life advice he can give. Erika mentions that two of her characters (Yu & Sasha from "Cinderbrush: A Monsterhearts Story" (Sx51)) directly came from discussions she’d had with Taliesin saying that a great way to manipulate someone comes from setting their expectations low. Matt: “Some of the most complicated and terrible people I’ve met are the first to diminish themselves. [They] beat you to the punch to hold them accountable for their actions in a way that is dishonest and takes the wind out of the sails of trying to hold them accountable. I hate that.”
Eventually, Taliesin lands on advising that if you want to quietly undermine someone’s self-worth, when they get into the passenger seat of your car, just reach across them and re-close their door.
Fearne is Ruidusborn! Ashley did NOT see this coming! She didn’t even imagine it as a faint possibility.
Yu really does love the lights, wildness, and beauty of the Feywild. They don’t have days off. Yu has trained to be part of the court from a young age. Taliesin: “So you’re saying that life ain’t easy for a fey named Yu?” Sheesh.
The Taste of Tal’Dorei! Erika lauds Matt for coming up with so many puns and theme ideas off the top of his head. He loved the deliberate misinterpretation of historical aspects. “There’s a joy to embracing the absolute failure.” There’s probably a Whitestone-themed meditation room. All four of these LA-born people (well, Matt moved there when he was eight) talk about Bobby McGee’s and themed restaurants where improv actors honed their chops and moved on.
Ashton doesn’t know much about All-Minds-Burn. Justi was a friend from their youth before she went cuckoo and joined a commune. She was the friend with money who paid for them to get into cool places.
They belatedly discover they’ve messed up the game because blue mistakenly went first. I’ve played this game a LOT and I still can’t quite follow these improvised rules, ha.
Fearne doesn’t really feel bad that her parents are doing something potentially terrible; she’s much more affected that she doesn’t know them as people.
That’s it! Gosh, that was fun. Is it Thursday yet?
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