Gregory 0:00 You have many whirring eyes and strong, beautiful coiled steel legs and were made long ago when the cities still stood. Zoë 0:09 I'm Zoë and I'm playing the Manchurian crane named Tancho. The river is wrong, what have they done to it? Why is there not enough food? There is a small horned thing, making fruits left and right. Melissa 0:23 I'm Melissa and I'm playing the oribi Overrun. Let's go. I want to give you some plants. Gregory 0:29 Are you approaching them with love? Melissa 0:31 With hate. Brendan 0:33 I'm Brendan and I'm playing the kudu named Teacher or Tragos. Someone was attacked and they were gravely injured and I am trying to determine what happened. Gregory 0:40 They weren't trying to steal food, were they? Lucy 0:42 I'm Lucy and I'm playing Trial the Arabian oryx. Well, it seems that these supplicants are perhaps unworthy. The problem is, they are hungry. This is perhaps evidence of their moral failings. We shall see. Melissa 1:00 Oh, boy. Gregory 1:11 Welcome to Tabletop Garden, an actual play podcast where we collaborate on short, self-contained stories about interesting characters, and we do it with an agenda. I'm Gregory Avery-Weir. As always, our agenda will be to honestly portray diverse characters, pursue healthy play practices, and craft story with social responsibility. We now continue playing Mechanical Oryx by Grant Howitt. So is Tonto heading to join the other two? Trial and Overrun? Zoë 1:41 I suppose if they come around more often than I do, they might have more information. So sure, I'll go try to find... I think Trial and I probably share a similar worldview so might be able to chat about some things. I'll fly over and leave this old fisherman who I've just talked to and head over to Trial and see what they're doing. Tragos can certainly see this mechanical bird that that you've seen before flying up and then down to a spot in the city. Then flying up and then down to another spot. Lucy 2:09 Trial will incline its head majestically and say, "Welcome, water bird. I have seen you before." Zoë 2:20 Likewise, great horned beast. Melissa 2:24 Oh god. What...? this... Lucy 2:27 My name is trial. Zoë 2:28 Hello, Trial. I am Tancho. I live in the marshlands to the west and my marshlands are becoming a lake and these people do not understand what they have done. Lucy 2:41 The people have done this thing and it is a problem? Zoë 2:45 It is a problem indeed, if a storm rolls through. They will... Lucy 2:48 That does not reflect well upon you. Zoë 2:51 I do not know how to fix this. Melissa 2:53 I have a fix. I have a fix. Zoë 2:57 Small goat! Melissa 2:58 I'm not a goat! Gregory 2:59 All of the brown people around are kind of looking increasingly uncomfortable with this whole thing. Everyone who's not a guard is sort of giving all of you a very wide berth. Zoë 3:08 Good. Melissa 3:08 But if you want a lake to be a marsh, you ask me to visit. I'll visit. I'll turn it into a marsh again. You want a marsh? Zoë 3:17 I want a marsh! I want I want my same marsh that I have always had. It protects the people from from storms. Melissa 3:25 Well... Zoë 3:25 It protects the dome from flooding. Melissa 3:27 Well... Zoë 3:28 It purifies their water Melissa 3:29 It's... Zoë 3:30 Why would they not have a marsh? Melissa 3:31 It's definitely going to be a slightly different marsh. But it will be a marsh again after we find the thief. Zoë 3:38 The thief? Melissa 3:39 Yes. Lucy 3:40 I am sitting here awaiting whoever it is who is attempting to steal the foodstuffs of these people who have sought out my assistance in becoming more worthy. Melissa 3:54 In such a royal fashion I'm sure. Gregory 3:58 One of the guards whispers, "They keep using words that we don't know..." Lucy 4:01 Yes. Zoë 4:02 Well, the thief is hardly the issue here. If there is a ecological disaster waiting to happen... They think that their food shortage is bad now! Melissa 4:14 I'll fix your lake. I'll fix the lake! It'll be fun! It'll be a great little project. Just... Zoë 4:21 How do you even move around in the place such as a marsh with your tiny legs? You don't have long... Melissa 4:29 Rude! Zoë 4:30 long legs or wings like me... Melissa 4:31 That's incredibly rude. My legs... Zoë 4:35 I am looking at your legs and they are not long! Melissa 4:37 I jumped over the moat I'm just fine. There are tricks. Zoë 4:40 That is an impressive feat, small horned beast. Melissa 4:44 I'm not a goat, at least. Zoë 4:46 I didn't call you a goat this time. Melissa 4:49 Overrun! Would you care to meet this gracious water bird who is suffering from difficulties? Tancho? I feel like we've met. Hi, I'm Overrun. Zoë 5:02 Hello, Overrun. I am Tancho. I live in the marshes to the west. Melissa 5:07 The former marshes. Zoë 5:09 Well. Time... Time passes slowly for us old beings. Melissa 5:16 I know! Isn't it the worst? Ugggh! What are we supposed to do with all this time?! Is only so much surface area and only so many places that can support plant life. You know, I was down south and I just I tried my hardest but it's just like just just permanent ice down there. Just can't get anything to grow or stay growing. It's awful. Lucy 5:39 If you spent more time in my vicinity you would be happier. Melissa 5:43 I do not feel that's the case at all. Because I've been here aproximately 15 minutes and I'm ready to go jump into the lake. Lucy 5:50 That is not enough time. Melissa 5:52 I think it's more than enough time. If it weren't for this thief that we have to catch... Lucy 5:59 The longer you stay in one place the more intense it gets. Melissa 6:02 I know, it's great. Just going to settle right in. I just wish you would go away. Then I wouldn't be so full of thoughts about morals which are a waste of time. Gregory 6:12 Meanwhile, in the village the south people are kind of looking at each other saying, "Where did... Where did overrun go? Didn't they say they're going to give us food?" But in the in the square in the Dome? People are cheering up. The guards have been... are smiling despite looking also a little worried. It's an odd expression. Kind of fatalistic, I guess. They kind of look like, "Oh, well. Something might happen, but nothing we can do about it." That's sort of the look on their face. Lucy 6:39 Que será, será. Melissa 6:41 I need a break from utter pretentiousness. Where else should I help with food and plants other than the lake that should be a marsh? Zoë 6:53 The brown people are carrying just baskets after baskets of fruit in and like starting to distribute it to to other townsfolk, there's clearly some sort of like rationing system going on. They're dividing things very evenly and using some sort of like moving pebbles around on markings on the ground to keep track of things. And one of them looks up and says, "Uh, we would welcome more food... tomorrow. We don't want to waste your gift." Melissa 7:16 Hmm. Well, I suppose that's a kind thing of you. I guess I can stick around overnight. I guess I'll just just wander around, I guess. Zoë 7:31 If you say that the south is too cold, I may be able to help warm it up for you. If it is an icy snowy place. Melissa 7:38 Ooo! Significant ecological change? Let's do it. Zoë 7:42 If we're going to do it to the west, we might as well do it to the south as well. If you will help me fix my lake. Melissa 7:52 Hold on. We are the agents of climate change?! Ecological disaster. Zoë 7:57 I think so. I think we're gonna screw some stuff up. But these people... they don't deserve it. Whatever it is, seems like. Brendan 8:08 Feels like you two were designed to try to terraform something and just ran amok. Melissa 8:14 Yes. Zoë 8:15 Yeah, I think so. Melissa 8:17 I mean... Zoë 8:17 I think that is... we're supposed to be on Mars or something like that. Melissa 8:21 Or we're supposed to be like, nice, gentle like farm helpers, right? Brendan 8:25 Yeah, you're farm bots that have just decided, "I'm going to make the... I'm going to terraform the entire planet, whether it needs it or not. Melissa 8:35 I think we have a potentially interesting project ahead of us. Let's do that. Let's fix this problem here and then the problem in your lake-marsh and then we'll go south and we'll have a good time. Zoë 8:48 I do not see the purpose of fixing the problem here since these people are the ones who have already caused so many problems, but... Melissa 8:56 Well, yeah... Zoë 8:56 I suppose for change of pace it would be fine. Melissa 9:00 We could at least let them not die. You know, there's so many of them. Lucy 9:03 Tancho, you make a very valid point: they have proved themselves quite immoral. Melissa 9:10 See, what happens when you say people deserve something. Trial pops up and is suddenly all "moral this, moral that." People are just having fun. They're just living Gregory 9:21 What is Tragos doing right now? Brendan 9:26 Well, okay. So we were supposed to be off like trying to figure out what might have happened to the person who got attacked, so I had asked the guard to like... we're trying to figure out who might have been out there and might have run into them? Because I'm looking at these spears and I'm looking at the hole that was in that person and thinking these two may have a connection. Gregory 9:45 Quite possibly. Trace says no one said that they stopped any invaders last night, Brendan 9:51 Hmm. Well, do any of the villages nearby have the same weapons? Gregory 9:56 They say, "No, no, they don't have the the sharp stuff that comes from the tunnels." Brendan 10:00 So the wound that was on the person: was that consistent with the spears? Gregory 10:03 Could certainly be. I mean, you I don't believe you took a record-- is your recorder always running? Brendan 10:09 No, it's something I gotta turn on. I mean, it's a module. It's not something that's just... I've got to use it. Gregory 10:13 Roughly? If someone kind of slashed with it instead of just sticking straight. It coulda been. It was it was like a gash in the person's side, Brendan 10:20 Okay, well, either someone from your town injured this person or someone nearby has weapons that are fairly similar. In either case, we must find out who committed this act. Gregory 10:32 Okay. Teach us. Brendan 10:34 Well, one way to do this: we'll have to examine all of the spears in town and see if any of them show evidence of having been used as a weapon. Gregory 10:40 Okay, we can... Brendan 10:42 Do you have a count of how many spears should be in town? Zoë 10:44 Yes, yes, I can take you to where the the food stores are. That's where we keep our stores. We can check all of those. And then there should be a shift change this evening. And then those people will bring their weapons in. Brendan 10:58 No, no, no, we... I'm not going to be waiting for hours for this. I need you to gather everyone who has a spear at the stores. And we'll check everything at once. Zoë 11:08 But we can't take the... all the spears off the bridges, or someone will try and come in and take our food. They don't have enough food. Brendan 11:14 And I will be standing right next to the food stores during that time, though, Gregory 11:17 But they could hide! They can come across the bridges and hide in town. And then we would go past them and then they would come and take the food. Brendan 11:25 How about if I promise to stay near the food afterwards to make sure nobody Gregory 11:29 But you said you didn't want to wait for hours? This might be another another check. Brendan 11:34 Yeah, I think so. And another 11. Zoë 11:37 They say, "Okay, I will go around. You can wait at the at the food stores. It will not be long." Brendan 11:44 And see see that it isn't. I do have other responsibilities and having someone that's hurting people is quite worrisome. Zoë 11:52 Yes, we'll have to give them lots of rocks and they can use slings to hurt people who try and come in. Brendan 11:59 No... It seems I have a lot of work to do in this town. Gregory 12:03 Trace says, Do you know the way to the food stores? Brendan 12:05 Yes, I do. Gregory 12:06 We will bring the spears there. Brendan 12:07 Thank you. Gregory 12:08 You probably presumably arrived near the food stores and see the other three standing around. Brendan 12:14 Mm hmm. Lucy 12:14 I'm more like gracefully sitting back on my hunches. Not really standing around. Brendan 12:20 Greetings. Lucy 12:21 Hello. Zoë 12:22 Greetings. You're the one that they call Teacher. Brendan 12:26 I am. Zoë 12:27 What do you have to teach? Melissa 12:29 Hi, Teach! Brendan 12:30 Hello, Overrun. My duty is to teach the humans what they need to know so that they do not repeat the mistakes of the past. Melissa 12:37 That seems unlikely. Zoë 12:39 Indeed it does. Brendan 12:41 And someone has been assaulted nearby. And I am trying to determine who committed this act. Because this is far too reminiscent of the problems of the past. We cannot have them killing each other over food. Zoë 12:53 I remember when the water of the marshes was red after war. And I do not wish to see that again. It is not good for the fishes and the plants who live in the marsh. Brendan 13:03 Precisely. Zoë 13:03 I had a lot of work to do after that. Brendan 13:06 So what are you three... Melissa 13:06 This is how justice works. There is nothing to do except for watch the wheels of justice turn. Brendan 13:14 And action without information is not justice. It is vigilantism. The difference between a murder and an execution is information. Lucy 13:20 Overrun lays down and looks like they're watching a movie as they watch this exchange happen. Brendan 13:26 So why are you three in town? Zoë 13:28 The river has been diverted and the marsh is becoming a lake. My home is flooded. And I fear that these poor people will end up repeating, as you said, their past mistakes. The land cannot hold all of this water and I cannot stop from spreading it. Melissa 13:46 We can fix their mistakes. We fixed it before. See? More plants fixes the problem. A little bit of warmth fixes the problem. A little bit of... ahh... maybe even moral critiquing, fixes... some... maybe some someone's problems. Not mine, but-- Brendan 14:04 Different definition of "fixed." Lucy 14:06 I do not critique anyone's morals, I simply observe. Melissa 14:10 Oh, is that what you're doing? Lucy 14:13 Yes. Melissa 14:13 Well... Lucy 14:14 Correct. Melissa 14:15 Regardless, I think we can... I mean, you know, the humans just need some... shepherding. Some shepherding. Brendan 14:23 Trial, do you have the ability to calm the humans? Melissa 14:27 I suppose, in a manner of speaking, I do. If you stay here long enough, you will experience great joy. Brendan 14:35 They seem to be very paranoid and frightened about this issue with the food. Lucy 14:39 But, but joyful, really about it. Brendan 14:42 I have not observed joy, I have been observing paranoia, and a willingness to do bodily harm to protect the food. Melissa 14:50 Well, I do not know if you are aware of this, but they need the food in order to live. Brendan 14:56 That is true. Lucy 14:56 So it is likely that they feel a sense of urgency around this issue of food stores. Brendan 15:04 So, Overrun, are you here about the food as well? Lucy 15:07 I am! I have just made them a bunch of food. Well, made the trees give them a bunch of food. And I mean, you know, to catch a thief is exciting. But I was also going to go outside and maybe make some more plants and then go fix the marsh with some more plants. It's kind of my thing. Brendan 15:23 I wonder if perhaps whoever is taking the food lacks food of their own and could use a visit from you. Lucy 15:29 That's possible, in which case I would give them some plants. I might also be angry that they're hurting people. I haven't decided yet. Brendan 15:38 Well, I think we need to find out who's hurting people over this food. Because that might be helpful for all of our problems. And that would get them to calm down and then maybe we can get them to undam the river and the marsh'll go back to normal. Lucy 15:51 For the record. I have no problems. Melissa 15:55 You have... you have no problems. Because I could list a few. Lucy 15:58 I have... no. I have no problems. Melissa 16:00 I could list several, in fact. Brendan 16:02 Well, how about this, if they are no longer afraid about the food, they are more likely to be joyful. Melissa 16:07 I really have no stake in that. It will be or it will not be. Either way I will be here. I have decided that I will look here until I see the person who is thieving from these foodstuffs and that is what I shall do. Brendan 16:23 Excellent. That actually is quite helpful. Melissa 16:25 Except that if there are perhaps four of us standing around the barn then someone's going to be a lot less likely... We should hide. We should hide. Brendan 16:36 Oh, I'm not planning on staying here; I'm here to examine the spears to determine if any of them have been used in the assault and then the other folks with the spirits are going to bring them here so I can check those as well. The spears could have caused the wound that I observed. Zoë 16:50 Around this time the guards are arriving. They arrive around the same time; they're coming from different places but they're all generally equidistant. The Dome is almost exactly an oval. And they're all carrying these these Spears with the glass tips. And they kind of walk up and Trace kinda gathers them around and and they lay them out and then they open up this trunk made from a hollowed out tree trunk. A chest, I guess? They lift the top off and it's full of these spears. There are a lot of them. In terms of the population of this area, this is like a small army's worth of weapons. Brendan 17:23 Why have you made so many spears? Gregory 17:25 They break. Melissa 17:25 Ooo, spears! Zoë 17:26 Why do they break? Gregory 17:28 We don't know. And they... Lucy 17:31 It is evidence of your moral failing. Gregory 17:33 They turn to Tragos. Teacher, why do they break? Brendan 17:36 Because you're using glass. Glass is fragile. Gregory 17:38 Is that what this sharpness is? Brendan 17:40 Yes it is. Gregory 17:41 Oh. Lucy 17:41 They break because you are unworthy. Brendan 17:45 They break because of physics. We have... I haven't taught you physics yet. That's that's a ways off. Gregory 17:49 How do we make things that are this sharp that won't break? Brendan 17:52 That's not the immediate problem. Gregory 17:54 Oh right. Right... And Trace says, "Okay you wanted to see the weapons. These are, these..." Brendan 18:00 Yes. Gregory 18:01 And Trace like takes a bowl out and says, "Okay, everybody line up in in hands." And then each guard goes into groups of five, each one holding a spear, and Trace looks at each one and every time they look at each one they take a rock out of the bowl and set it at their feet. And then they look into the box and start taking out rocks and like they're taking out bundles of five spears at a time. And then when they're done they hold up the bowl and it's empty. And they say, "These are all the spears. There are broken ones but these are all the ones that that work." Brendan 18:35 Were any reported is broken this morning? Gregory 18:37 No. Brendan 18:37 Okay. So we are not missing any spears. Gregory 18:39 Correct. Brendan 18:40 Okay, then I will examine these. So I'm going to start looking through them to see if there's any that have you know, blood or viscera or whatever on them. Gregory 18:47 Okay. You look through. Two of them have what seems to be old blood on them. Like, not from last night. One of them looks like, on the shaft of the spear but not on the blade, there's blood, like the blade's been replaced. Brendan 19:02 Yeah Gregory 19:02 And another one just kind of you can see a little bit of of dried blood kind of in some of the broken crevices of the glass. Brendan 19:09 I do not see any blood that could be from this the attack last night. But at some point, we do need to discuss why there's blood on these other spears. It's very worrisome. Zoë 19:19 We put them in people and animals to hurt them. Melissa 19:21 What else do you think spears are used for? Brendan 19:23 Humans have historically used spears to get food but I've been trying to teach them better than to use them on other humans. Melissa 19:29 Well, humans will eat food. Gregory 19:31 Trace turns to Overrun and says, "Sometimes Teacher asks us questions that it knows the answers to." Melissa 19:36 Oh. Rhetorical questions. Yes, it's very teacherly of them. Lucy 19:41 It does not seem that their teaching is going particularly well. Gregory 19:45 Oh no. They're very well... thanks to their help and teaching us things and teaching us how to count... teaching us all of these things. We've been able to make many many spears and keep track of them all. Without their help we wouldn't have been able to say that we had all the spears. Lucy 19:58 But they are not very good spears. Melissa 20:01 That's good. Zoë 20:02 These people are even worse than the people before. Melissa 20:05 Oh, not yet. Zoë 20:07 This why I stay in the marsh. Brendan 20:09 Oh no. Not even remotely. Melissa 20:11 We'll get there. Lucy 20:12 Oh, they are very unworthy. Melissa 20:17 Um... Brendan 20:17 Some of them apparently are. We'll have to work on this. Well, it doesn't appear that the assailant was one of the guards here which means someone outside of this town has started making weapons and is attacking people. Gregory 20:29 Trace says, "Can we get back to guarding?" Brendan 20:32 Yes. Gregory 20:33 Okay. Brendan 20:33 Do not hurt anyone. Gregory 20:37 We will not hurt anyone that isn't trying to take food. Melissa 20:39 Excellent. Brendan 20:39 And be very sure they're trying to take food before anything happens. Just because they come to the town does not mean they are necessarily trying to take food. Zoë 20:47 Yes, we will be very careful. And we will remember what you said: that people can say things that are not true. Brendan 20:53 That is not... Gregory 20:53 We'll collect all of the datas. Melissa 20:55 You're a good teacher. Gregory 20:57 And they disperse, taking the same number of spears that they had. They just take the same spears. And Trace lingers a bit to like carefully put all those rocks back in the bowl and put the spears back in the box and put the bowl in the box and close it. Zoë 21:09 Out of character: Do we know about the phantoms? Are we, like... are they a thing that we know about and don't care about or is it something that we don't know about? Because there's not very many of them, or we sort of know of, but not really...? I would say, unless anyone objects, that probably the brown people call different things phantoms? And sometimes they say something is a phantom that you're pretty sure it doesn't exist. Sometimes they say "phantom" and they mean one of you. Sometimes they're talking about people. So it's a very fuzzy ter-- it's kind of a term for like, "we don't know what's doing this but it's doing something bad." Brendan 21:50 Boogeyman kind of thing. Gregory 21:52 But sometimes they're talking about something real. Zoë 21:54 Cool. Brendan 21:55 If the humans here did not commit that attack either someone else in the area has weapons or there's a phantom nearby. A true phantom. Zoë 22:03 That is unfortunate news. Melissa 22:06 We can handle it. Zoë 22:06 We? Melissa 22:08 Oh, are you gonna fly away? Zoë 22:10 Well, what responsibility do we have for these people? Melissa 22:14 It's not about respons... It's fun. It's fun. It's interesting. Brendan 22:19 Of course we're responsible for them. Melissa 22:22 Boring! Brendan 22:23 Just because you lack imagination doesn't mean it's boring. Melissa 22:26 Uh... Oh. Oh! Zoë 22:27 Must be difficult... Melissa 22:28 Would you like to see something new I made? Brendan 22:32 Not particularly. Melissa 22:33 Oh, nope! Come on. I have imagination. Look, so I said what happens... Brendan 22:37 Let me guess. Is it a plant? Melissa 22:40 Harsh! Zoë 22:40 It must be tiresome to be so long lived with, uh, with such an attitude. Lucy 22:48 I will say this for Overrun, though. They are so upstanding and so worthy. Melissa 22:54 Yes! Brendan 22:55 Worthy of what?! Lucy 22:55 Really admirable. Melissa 22:56 Worthy of all the things! Like this plant I made! Okay, imagine. Imagine. If you took a Venus fly trap, crossed it with a crested Saguaro... and then add in a little bit of something from the kalanchoe family and see what you get. It's... Look, it's beautiful. You want me to make one? I can make one. I can probably make one. Brendan 23:19 I believe there's probably a reason that that did not evolve on its own. Melissa 23:23 Because boring! You need some creativity to come up with the good stuff. Brendan 23:28 In any case, we need to figure out what's going on. Melissa 23:31 So do we just hide until night? See who comes by? Lucy 23:36 I am going to continue to sit here until I discover who has been taking food from this food containment area. Melissa 23:42 You're going to scare them off. They'll see you and be like, "Oh, it's a big goat! I should not come here." Lucy 23:48 It is true that I'm quite imposing. Zoë 23:55 Lucy, you're amazing. Brendan 23:56 Lucy makes the best characters. Melissa 24:00 So you need to hide or we can ma... oh, we'll put a drop cloth over you. We'll just... Brendan 24:09 I know why don't you draw... Why don't you grow a bush that will cover them? Melissa 24:13 Ah! Um, yes. Yes. Lucy 24:18 I do enjoy a nice bush. Melissa 24:20 Wha... uh... welp. Gregory 24:32 Give me your roll to grow a Trial bush. Brendan 24:39 It's going to be a topiary! Lucy 24:45 Please make it an especially luxurious bush. Brendan 24:49 Put some flowers on it! Melissa 24:52 Can I... so none of my modules... Oh. Yes. I will use a module to assist by pulling nutrients close enough that it can help with like insta-growing this weird ass thing. ...not great. So that was out of hate in case anyone missed it. And I'll settle in again. Sit down. Put some prongs in the soil. Think real hard again, look very serious and this bush will start to grow. And it doesn't grow... its it grows almost like a stop motion type thing where it's clearly going way too fast and a little a little shakily, but... it's it's a little a little thin, but it grows and it's it doesn't have a particular shape. It isn't like look like an oryx or anything because that's not how plants work. But... of course none of this is how plants work, I guess. But it will it'll grow big enough to... from where Trial is sitting... Oh, hell yes. Okay, so. Gregory 26:16 Brendan just posted a picture of an antelope topiary. Melissa 26:21 It's beautiful. Lucy 26:22 However my two long, straight antlers emerge out of the topiary. Melissa 26:29 Excellent! Yes, so a huge, huge bush big enough to to encompass Trial. Antlers can poke out if you want them to. And I will again bounce up as if I weren't... hadn't just done something interesting like, "All right, well, here we go, now... it's hidden. Goodbye, Trial!" Gregory 26:52 As they were drawing those nutrients you could sort of hear this like rustling and... and noise in the ground as like actual matter is being redistributed all all in there and probably... You probably notice, Overrun, that as you were kind of... the sense that you have where nutrients are? There's... there are spaces underneath you that don't have any nutrients at all. Or that have nutrients that are like, "Oh, that's air." So you're definitely feeling pockets of space down below the Dome. Melissa 27:32 Just due to weird geology or... stolen? Gregory 27:38 I don't think you can tell with detail from up here. Melissa 27:42 okay Gregory 27:42 Could be caves, could be, like, burial chambers, could be a lot of things. Where cities are there often voids in the earth that... people make tunnels, people make... made tunnels. Brendan 27:53 Sewers and such. Melissa 27:56 Hey, what's under the town here? Village? People who live here or people who go there? Gregory 28:05 One of the guards kind of looks up and says, "Oh... what? Oh, uh, tunnels. It's where we get the glass." He kind of says "glass" like he's trying out a new word. Melissa 28:17 The glass. Gregory 28:19 Did I say it right? Melissa 28:21 Probably. Brendan 28:21 Yes you did. Melissa 28:22 What glass? Gregory 28:23 "Good." Smiles and nods to himself happily. Brendan 28:25 What they're using for the spearheads. Gregory 28:28 So are y'all going to settle down to wait for night for now? Zoë 28:33 Oh, I was gonna say if we're hiding around I'll probably head back to the water so I don't just create huge puddles underneath me wherever I am. Gregory 28:40 Have you been sort of dripping this whole time? Zoë 28:43 Oh yeah, for sure. Gregory 28:45 Okay. Zoë 28:45 Well I've tried to drip in the direction of wherever Overrun is growing plants. I think I think I was quite impressed by this plant thing and wanted to help out when I could. Gregory 28:56 Okay. Zoë 28:57 ...where I could. Brendan 28:58 The idea the idea of you two joining forces is just terrifying. Zoë 29:02 Hahahaha. Melissa 29:03 Might very well be having gotten the situation in the first place. Brendan 29:05 Yeah, quite possibly. Zoë 29:08 It was so long ago. Can hardly remember. Melissa 29:11 Of course, yeah, you know, just did a whole bunch of very reasonable things and then here we are. Lucy 29:17 I will wait here in this bush then, while everything else happens. Gregory 29:21 So Tancho's going to the water, Trial's going to stake out the the food stores, Overrun is...? Melissa 29:30 I will spend a while going orchard to orchard or farm space to farm space... plots of land... and just make shit just grow. Gregory 29:42 Are you making it grow so much that you're going to make the soil lose all nutrients? Melissa 29:49 Yes. Look, y'all, let me show you the shape of this character. Zoë 29:55 No, that's good. Good. Gregory 29:56 And then Tragos is investigating... what do you want to check out? Brendan 30:03 I guess I'm going to be going around to the different guard stations: "Did you see anything?" Tragos cannot abide ignorance. They hate not knowing something. So they don't know who's doing this, and it's driving them batty, so... Gregory 30:17 Okay. Brendan 30:18 So just going around and asking everyone like, "Did you see anything? What was going on last night?" Gregory 30:23 Sounds like you should make me a roll based on hate. Brendan 30:27 I'm gonna run outta fuel... based on hate?! Gregory 30:30 Yes. You said you hate ignorance. Brendan 30:32 Oh yeah, yep. So... Oh, no. Gregory 30:36 Okay, so you rolled a 15. But two of those dice were sixes. Which means you got a double. Brendan 30:44 Yeah, I did. Gregory 30:45 So you go around. You're asking more and more information. And let's see... a double in this case means that your solution causes an unexpected problem and something is lost forever. So... Melissa 31:03 Goodbye, village. Gregory 31:03 You go around asking, "What what did you see?" They tell different stories about the thieves they've seen. In some cases, there are brown people stealing. There are people from neighboring villages that are coming in and taking food because they're hungry. But there are also some weirder stories. They say that there is a person who knows how to how to disappear or can who can hide in the shadows. They, some of them, say that there are phantoms coming and taking the food that there is a person who can climb up walls like they were trees, the buildings like they're trees, the shacks. That that someone can jump, there's someone who can jump really far; there are very big strong people. They talk about a giant which as you get more detail, they're talk about some who's like eight feet tall. And as you're going around, clearly kind of word of your investigation is spreading. By the time you kind of finish your circuit around the various guards and people around this the kind of the edge of this Dome, the bowl of the Dome, the kind of final guard station you go to, there are a few other guards from the other ones, from the other stations who arrived there with spears. And they say, "Teacher, we know that you have been finding data; now that you have found it, who is responsible? Who do we have to stop?" Brendan 32:39 I do not yet know. Gregory 32:40 But you're the Teacher. You know you know things. How do you not know this? We've never asked you a question you didn't know the answer to. Brendan 32:48 This is an unusual situation for me as well. I am trying to discover what happened last night and so far there's very little information. Gregory 32:56 We will get you more. If you need information we will make sure that you get it. Brendan 33:02 Oh, no no no, that's that's that's okay I'll continue to look... Gregory 33:05 No, no you've done so much for us, Teacher. We must do this for you. We can tell that this bothers you and we will give you the gift of knowledge that you have given us. And they kind of look at each other and start heading on the bridge out of town carrying spears. Brendan 33:20 Oh no. Gregory 33:21 What do you do? Brendan 33:22 I guess I'm going to try to follow behind them and make sure that they don't do something incredibly stupid. Gregory 33:27 Okay. So you follow these these soldiers into the night. Brendan 33:32 Yes. Gregory 33:33 Meanwhile, Trial and... sorry, Overrun is waiting with Trial? Melissa 33:38 Overrun is hugging a bunch of plants. Gregory 33:41 Oh, that's right. Overrun's going around ruining things. Melissa 33:45 Making... is keeping people from starving. Gregory 33:47 Yes. Uh, Trial you're sitting in this bush as it gets dark and you're seeing... Lucy 33:55 Yup. Gregory 33:57 ...fires and and other, you know, lights here and there. But but here there's just these guards and they've got a fire up. As they're standing guard, you kind of notice them staring off into space oddly. Like, they kind of stop shifting and are just gazing out. And then out, like, from a row of of shacks, you see a dark hulking shape larger than a brown person kind of hunched over and moving oddly with a with a strange gait. And we'll pause there. So we want to talk about another of our agenda principles. Our second principle that we're talking about is Pursuing Healthy Play Practices. What I've written on that is we'll consider each other as people first, and make sure that everyone is comfortable with how the game is going. We'll actively use the tools we have to improve the play experience. Games don't have to be fun, but they must not be toxic. So how's everyone doing? Is everyone comfortable? Brendan 35:26 The characters are a little frustrated but I'm doing fine. Lucy 35:31 Not all of the characters are frustrated. Zoë 35:33 Hahahaha. I think this is a this is an interesting... as someone who has only done role playing games in a sort of like Dungeons and Dragons type universe with humanoid characters and sort of familiar plot elements... This is a a fun new experience. And I'm interested to see where we take it for the rest of the session. Gregory 36:04 What are some of the tools that folks like to use for like making sure that out of character problems don't happen. I guess, first, things that you have seen gone wrong, and then tools and techniques that you've used or that you want to use that would kind of help address those issues. Melissa 36:21 So one thing that comes to mind is something that can happen in this story -- in this kind of story -- is like one person who wants to make everything burn down or run away and do something by themselves. Right. So we have an... we have a potential for that here. One, in the sense that Brendan's character is working pretty solo, and two, that I am almost burning everything down. But keeping it contained in a way that doesn't derail the plot, right? Like, sure, I'll take the nutrients from your soil, and we don't have to deal with that in this game. Most assuredly, right. Like, I have just done something awful that doesn't change the plot at the moment in particular. So I don't think we're going to zoom out and look forward five years, or even next season, poor folks. But we're still managing... Brendan 37:18 You'll just have to come back and give them more plant later. Melissa 37:20 Exactly. See? Job security. Managing that, I think... I don't know, part of me is kind of tempted to say, well, that's, that's courtesy, right? But obviously, courtesy is in the eye of the beholder. Gregory 37:31 And "common" courtesy isn't. Melissa 37:32 Isn't, exactly, and that's okay. The way we established the game, the way we said like, are we actually oryxes? Like, what is the... what does post apocalypse mean, in this world? That kind of sets off boundaries for us already, like, "what does it mean to put the world on fire" is particular to the setting. Gregory 37:53 Yeah, there are a few techniques that that I've heard folks talk about, of like, sitting down, especially for longer campaigns, sitting down just being like, "Hey, what's what level of violence are we comfortable with? How do we want to handle inter player conflict, like, are we allowed to bicker amongst ourselves, are we allowed to fight amongst ourselves?" and framing the world can be part of that. Brendan 38:20 I think most of the problems I've run into in the past was just was avoided by just: we stopped gaming with the toxic person who didn't listen to requests to stop doing things. So I haven't had a lot of experience with tools or techniques per se, because it's usually been the case of like someone who just was doing this stuff that Melissa was talking about, of just like doing their own thing, or trying to ram the story in a particular direction the rest of us didn't want to go, that kind of thing. Gregory 38:51 Is there something that would have kept those players from becoming toxic in the first place? Brendan 38:56 In these cases, I am really not sure. This, this was a weird dude. The one I'm thinking of most recently. And, you know, there our our GM had several conversations with him about, "Hey, you need to stop doing this stuff." And he just didn't. So we stopped playing with him. We decided that was, you know, we were willing to give up the game to not have to deal with that environment. Melissa 39:21 Sometimes there are unmet needs in that case, right? Like that player wanted a different kind of adventure than it turned out they'd signed up for, and... Brendan 39:30 He was he was definitely looking for, "I need, I want a place where I can let my dark side run wild without consequence." And that was not the kind of game the rest of us were there for. Melissa 39:39 Yeah. So having those conversations early can help. Now, they might not know, or they might lie, but assuming good faith, then you have that conversation again, right? Like, this is like the same thing with people who min max to an extreme degree. It's like, "What is it you're trying to get out of this game?" You know? Gregory 40:00 People who pick unrealistic choices or focus on one thing to the detriment of others, because they want to be real, real, real good at hacking, even though like that makes a boring character. Melissa 40:10 Right. Can I ask... speaking of, I don't know, this, what do y'all think about the fact that this game... that the people in the game are brown people? So my initial take on it was, "Oh, cool. A game with brown people in it." But what is happening is people are saying in character, like, when we talk about the game, we're playing it, we say, "Oh, and there are some brown people over there doing a thing." And that sounds very different. To me. Brendan 40:43 Yeah... Melissa 40:43 It sounds much more, you know, little brother, whatever, our little brown brothers kind of stuff. Gregory 40:49 Yeah. Lucy 40:50 Yeah. I'm a little bit concerned about the primitive thing. Gregory 40:55 Yes. Brendan 40:55 I was very deliberately referring to them as humans. But yeah, the, the fact that the, that's the only thing we know about the people is that they are soft, brown, and they don't seem to know a heck of a lot. Melissa 41:06 Yeah, it's... and this is a critique of the system, not our playing. Gregory 41:10 Yeah, and I think that I think that it's also how I'm interpreting this, like, I am doing that deliberately. Melissa 41:16 Okay. Gregory 41:17 In part because I feel like that's a really evocative phrase from the source material. Melissa 41:21 It is... Gregory 41:22 Um, but... Brendan 41:24 I think I prefer the original, as "the soft, brown people" feels different from just "the brown people". Gregory 41:28 That's true. I haven't said soft people. I've said brown people. Lucy 41:32 Hmm, the sentence from the source material is, "You walk the green places where soft brown people tend to fruit trees and sing songs they don't understand." So I actually think it's more of a concern from the system, because it's talking about the soft brown people and equating them with some kind of ignorance, or maybe primitive nature. And I think that is kind of problematic stereotype. Melissa 42:03 I definitely think it's a flaw of the system. And, and it's especially like, yeah, you say, okay, like postapocalyptic, what's the average human color if you if you have everyone bone down? But if you... It's especially problematic if you look at it as a projection of current humanity. Right? And you're like, "Oh, well, as we homogenize our skin colors, we're going to become dumber." Right. Gregory 42:26 Yeah, there's, there's that implication. Lucy 42:27 Ooo. Melissa 42:27 Yeah. Brendan 42:28 Yeah... Gregory 42:28 So so I think that this sort of conversation is a good thing to have. We can be conscious of this. Like, as we move on, we can subvert this or just be like, "Okay, let's not... let's kind of let that fade into the background, that aspect of it." But I think that when we talk about our third principle, there's going to be good opportunity to talk about, like, primitivism and the weird... the way in which post apocalyptic stories tend to portray people. Melissa 42:52 Cool. Gregory 43:04 So Trey ghosts is headed off into the night with this group of three people with spears. One of them is is Trace and then there are two others. And they go into a small village to the south. Are you walking with them? Or are you like, following from a distance? Brendan 43:23 I'm trying to keep up with them and talk them into not doing whatever it is they're trying to do. Because I can tell it's not a good idea. Gregory 43:30 Okay, so they, they march into this village and this... people look, not starving, but pretty skinny here. Brendan 43:37 Mm hmm. Gregory 43:38 And they've got these baskets of moss and like scrabbly vines and stuff that they're putting in a stew. It doesn't look like great quality stuff. Around here, plants can grow. But this looks like stuff that would only grow in very cold climates. Which, you know there's, there's some tundra further south, but that's a, that's a decently long walk to go to forage. Brendan 44:02 Yeah. Gregory 44:04 And the folks march in and they say, "Listen, we need information." And someone who's who's cooking looks up and says, "We need food. Why are you keeping all the food for yourself?" And the guards say, "We can't spare any. We have to look after ourselves first. You don't live in the Dome. Why should we give you the Dome's food?" And the villager says, "Why should you get to live in the Dome?" And they start bickering among themselves. And things are getting a bit heated. Brendan 44:33 I'm going to try to step between them and to break their line of sight. Because I'm real big. And I'm going to use "teacher voice", that way of projecting to get a class to quiet down. I taught you both better than this. Gregory 44:45 And the villager looks at you, as you kind of step into the, into the firelight and says, "Oh, so Teacher, you're with the Dome now too?" Brendan 44:53 I am not with them any more than I am with anyone else. You know that my duty is to teach humanity. You are grievously close to repeating many of the mistakes of the past. Gregory 45:03 Overrun said they'd help us and they left to go to the Dome and there have been helping the Dome. We can see. You can see them growing things and now you? Did you teach them how to make those weapons? Brendan 45:13 No, I did not. Gregory 45:14 Why should we trust you anymore. Brendan 45:16 Because of the many years of the past where I have taught your people as well. Gregory 45:20 Maybe you've taught us all you need to. Lucy 45:23 Oh, snap. Gregory 45:24 Maybe we have to look after ourselves. Brendan 45:26 I would be happy if that were true. It is the goal of any teacher to no longer be needed. Gregory 45:30 The villager looks at the guard and says, "We don't know anything. You can see. You can look at our at our stores. All we have is the moss that grows in the cold places. We don't have any of your fruit. We don't know who's taking it. Leave. We don't have weapons like you do. But we can still make you leave if we have to." And the guards kind of go around poking through stuff, making sure that they don't have any food. Brendan 45:53 Stop that... it is clear they have not been taking your food because otherwise they wouldn't be this hungry. This is why I told you not to do this. Gregory 45:59 Guard says, "You'd said we needed to gather information." Brendan 46:01 Yes, correct information. This is just harassing some people who are already in trouble. Gregory 46:06 You said we should always check things twice. We heard them say it, now we are seeing it with our own eyes. The villagers are just looking increasingly betrayed at you. Brendan 46:16 I'm going to try to physically get between them and, you know, trying to herd the soldiers back out of the town. Gregory 46:23 The guards say, "Fine, fine. We've we've seen enough." And they head back to town with you. Brendan 46:28 I'm going to talk to the... turn back to the villagers and say, "I will remind Overrun of their responsibilities. They have clearly become distracted again." Gregory 46:36 They kind of look at each other and then turn their backs on you and go back to cooking. Brendan 46:40 I'm gonna head back to the Dome. Trying to keep an eye out for Overrun. Melissa 46:44 I'm prancin' in the moon light. Brendan 46:46 Overrun, did you promise to help the people in that village back there grow some plants? Melissa 46:50 Oh, is that what that village was? Brendan 46:52 Yes. Melissa 46:53 Huh. Sure! I'll help them too. Before I do the lake? Brendan 46:57 They say you're supposed to have helped them already. They're starving. Melissa 47:00 And these people are too. Everyone is starving. There's enough plants... Brendan 47:04 These people have a huge store room and tons of... and all of these orchards. The folks in the south are clearly malnourished. Melissa 47:10 I will make enough plants for everyone. Brendan 47:12 Well, you need to do some to the south because those folks are in trouble. Melissa 47:15 How long is the walk down there? Or whatever travel method? Do I have time to visit this evening? Gregory 47:22 You're pretty fast. It's, I mean, it's, it is on the rise over looking the Dome. Melissa 47:25 Okay. Yeah, I will hoof it. Ha, ha, ha. Gregory 47:29 All right. And you're going to... what what sort of plants are you gonna grow? Melissa 47:32 Um, I'll produce or urge into creation some good good staples. I don't know: if it's corn, then corn or like whatever kind of keeps good steady, complex carbs chugging in a society that is appropriate to this climate. Gregory 47:49 Okay, and just a good a good amount for that village. No funny business? Melissa 47:55 I mean a lot for the village. A lot! Brendan 47:59 Overrun doesn't do things by halves. Gregory 48:01 Okay, so you make lots and lots of plants. The people in the village scamper out and run they they say, "Thank you. Thank you. I knew you wouldn't forget us." Melissa 48:11 It might take a day or two for some of those to finish coming in. But I did my job. Gregory 48:15 They say, "Thank you. We we found these out in the the wastes." And they look kind of awkwardly and hold out this this metal case. Melissa 48:27 I will take it and... Hmm. How do we pick up things? Zoë 48:32 You could use your mouth? Melissa 48:34 I will take it in my mouth. The handle in my mouth, I guess. And I'll set it down, open it, whatever. Gregory 48:40 Okay. It has three fuel canisters in it. Melissa 48:44 Yesss. Oh! Brendan 48:46 Wait, wait, wait. So I'm the one who gets the food to go to the... and they're the one who gets the fuel! Gregory 48:51 You rolled doubles! Brendan 48:53 Agh! Melissa 48:53 I'll actually go, "Ooo!" and I'll put the fuel cells in my belly. Wherever they go. Gregory 48:59 Okay, so Trial sees this hulking figure approaching and the guards are just staring off into the distance. Don't seem to notice it at all. Lucy 49:09 Oh... Zoë 49:10 Can I see what's going on from where I am? Like, we said I'm... the rivers pretty close to where this food store is and stuff right? Gregory 49:18 Sure. Yeah, I mean if you want to be like making occasional trips up into the air... Zoë 49:21 Yeah, I'm just hanging out. I don't have to sleep. Gregory 49:24 Soon, you see this the shadow emerging into the light. It is sort of human shaped but its skin is black metal and its legs are strong coiled steel and it's got 18 eyes spread across its face and it slowly approaches the food store walking on back legs and front knuckles and doesn't appear to see Trial. Lucy 49:54 I'm gonna wait until it is like right at the food container area. And then I am going to spring forth from my shrub and say, "Pardon me, I'm going to have to ask you to pause for a moment. Trial is now in session." Zoë 50:15 Gaaahhh! Melissa 50:22 That happened. Gregory 50:27 So Zoë, you can see... Tancho can see this emergance from the bush as Trial confronts this mechanical gorilla. Zoë 50:37 And I leave because I heard that joke. Lucy 50:46 To be fair, it was not a joke in character. Zoë 50:49 That's true. You were being totally serious. Lucy 50:52 It was completely unironic. Gregory 50:54 So give me a roll, Lucy! Lucy 50:55 Ooo, I get to roll! Gregory 50:56 The outcome of this is surely uncertain. Lucy 50:58 I guess I'm acting with hate. ...oof. Gregory 51:01 That's 5, 1, 1. So that's a seven, which is a success. But it is a double, which means that your solution causes an unexpected problem and something is lost forever. Lucy 51:12 Alright. Gregory 51:13 So the the gorilla stops and looks at you and kind of tilts its head and says, "Trial. Are they still feeding you?" Lucy 51:25 I... well, actually do I know this person? Gregory 51:27 How... how long have you been in this area? Lucy 51:29 Well, I don't get out of my grove much. So I've been there a very long time. Gregory 51:35 But do you visit the Dome? Lucy 51:36 Not not. Unless there have been other times like this where they come and get me Gregory 51:41 Okay. Then no, you don't know this person. Lucy 51:44 I incline my head toward the mechanical gorilla and say, "Well met. I did not get your name. But to answer your query: Yes. I take it that you yourself have not been so fortunate?" Gregory 52:04 No. They call me Sunny. Called me Sunny." And it looks at the food store. And it says, "I have to break this." Lucy 52:15 I'm afraid to inform you that choosing to do that would be indicative of your moral failing. I hate to be the bearer of bad news. Gregory 52:26 And? Lucy 52:27 No, that's really it. Gregory 52:29 Okay. And it lifts up one of those big fists and there's like a whirring sound, some steam comes out, and it just like punches a hole in the cage and then it... Zoë 52:44 Oh, boy. Gregory 52:44 ...stomps in. Are you doing anything? Lucy 52:47 Umm... gosh! I'll say, "Please do not take that food. It is not yours." Gregory 52:56 It says, "I'm not." And it lifts one of those big feet and just like stomps on a pile of fruit and like grinds it into the ground. Next time on Tabletop Garden: And you see like torches starting being lit as people are woken up. And you can see this kind of trail of steam moving through the dome village. Melissa 53:25 If I am asked to help with scenario like starvation, I will help them with the problem of starvation. Gregory 53:32 Everything's cracked and worked and dripping and you can still see things lighting up the dark a bit. Mechanisms that are still working, some of the stuff that sort of keeping this this ecosystem alive. Zoë 53:45 I have heard of a concept called "hangriness." Gregory 53:50 In the middle of this open space is a shrine but it's in enormous disrepair. Mechanical Oryx was written by Grant Howitt and was a winner of the 2017 200 Word RPG Challenge. For more by Grant Howitt, visit: rowanrookanddecard.com Tabletop Garden was created by Gregory Avery-Weir. The music for this campaign is "Amphibian Circuits" by Dirtwire, available under a Creative Commons Attribution Noncommercial Share Alike 3.0 license. For more Tabletop Garden and to find out how to follow us, visit tabletop.garden. Check out the other podcasts created by people who participated in this campaign: Ludus Novus, Audacious Compassion, the Future Proof Podcast, and EXO 101: Introduction to Exobiology.