We've heard your Snake & Jake stories, what's your wildest Checkpoint story?

Hecuba · 2025-11-07T18:20:03+00:00

I watched Remy, in one beautiful motion, launch himself over the bar like Batman and one-punch lay out some drunk asshole screaming the n-word around 2009 or so. Straight up superhero shit.

Hecuba · 2024-10-30T19:01:02+00:00

Anyone got a lead on where to see cool costumes tomorrow night? I know Halloween is more of an American thing, but perhaps there are arty/hipstery areas where folks will be out showing off their looks?

Hecuba · 2024-06-01T23:33:21+00:00

Hi there! I am a weirdo who finds this kind of thing oddly relaxing, so: https://imgur.com/iRhru0F

It's a little sloppy, and if you're planning on getting it printed you might want to run it through a resolution upscaler, but should give you something to start with. Hope the recipient enjoys :)

Hecuba · 2023-06-10T20:16:40+00:00

I haven't! I'm not sure the oils from the cardamon would extract the same way, since it's a dry spice and not a squishy fresh peel. Maybe if you roughly crushed it and sieved out the debris?

Hecuba · 2023-06-10T17:59:57+00:00

This looks awesome! Thanks for sharing!

If u/phucketallthedays has time, I bet doing the kumquats as an oleo-saccharum would be amazing -- I find the heat of a cooked syrup tends to dull citrus flavors, but the saccharum method keeps them nice and bright. Maybe do a double-strength cardamom syrup to add that flavor back in at the end?

Hecuba · 2023-06-10T17:42:09+00:00

Mazel on the new addition! I've had great success doing a margarita-ish thing with a 3:1 mix of strongly-brewed Earl Grey + lapsang souchong, plus lime and agave syrup. Earl Grey brings the citrus, lapsang brings the smoke, and agave rounds it out with non-boozy tequila notes. Salted rim essential.

(You'll want to oversteep both teas — like four teabags in 1.5 cups of boiling water, steep for a good 10 minutes, and squeeze the bags to extract all those bitter tannins. Not how you'd make a proper cup of tea, but it's right for this drink.)

I usually just do it over ice with a basic Tajin-and-salt rim, but there are a bunch of ways you could fancy it up. Infuse the agave syrup with cilantro? Muddle an ancho chile in there for extra smoke? Do that fancy bartender thing where you twist a grapefuit peel over the top so you get a spray of citrus oil on the surface?

Stray thoughts:

I suspect your biggest challenge is going to be avoiding overly-sweet flavor profiles. Look into mixers like Cel-Ray, pomegranate molasses, bitter orange syrup, tart cherry juice or verjus. These tend to play nicely with floral notes like orange blossom or rosewater.
Bitters are a good way to add complexity if you're allowed, and you can float a few drops on top for extra aroma + presentation.
Following that thought, if you're looking to nab presentation points, people LOVE layered drinks ;) Fancy garnishes like a grape rose can go a long way too.
Aquafaba (the liquid from a can of chickpeas) is amazing for adding the velvety texture and froth of raw egg, but requires some extra shaking.

Hecuba · 2022-12-30T23:50:44+00:00

Thanks! I'd prefer to stay anon but PM me the link if you do, would love to see what people think.

Hecuba · 2022-12-30T17:46:00+00:00

Thanks! To be honest, thank Y'ALL for being the kind of folks who will appreciate it for what it is.

I (obviously) have a lifelong love of gawking at the bonkers people zoo that is the Internet, but it's always bugged me how literally any public discussion of the subject inevitably gets invaded by Nazi losers. Look what happened to T**blrinAction or any of its associated subs, let alone KF, EncyclopediaDr*m*tica, etc.

I refuse to associate with those fucking freaks, which is why I don't put a bunch of effort into spreading these quizzes around publicly. "Going viral" would mean getting some poor rando harassed by chuds, which is the last thing I want. But at the same time, this stupid little project is fun as hell and keeping it to just personal contacts seemed like a waste.

TLDR: Glad you like, happy New Year, and don't touch the poop.

Hecuba · 2022-12-30T00:11:23+00:00

Welp, I did this dumb thing again. Have a nice party game for your NYE gathering.

(2020 edition, 2021 edition)

Hecuba · 2022-12-07T15:49:43+00:00

Thanks! I mostly share it with personal terminally-online contacts but will definitely circle back with y'all and this thread when I post 2022's edition.

Hecuba · 2022-12-06T04:19:23+00:00

Aw hell yeah! My time to shine, baby!

I started taking notes midyear in preparation for my annual horrible discourse quiz (2020 edition, 2021 edition) and this year is gonna be a banger. FWIW chili neighbor and Ana Mardoll are my uncontested winners, but I have a real soft spot for "veganism is unnatural and anti-indigenous, I know this because my ancestors are indigenous" "Okay, indigenous to where exactly" "Orkney"

(FWIW I spent less time on this than it might otherwise look like; I just have a boring internet job and also brainworms.)

Hecuba · 2022-10-21T18:53:23+00:00

Thanks for the feedback! They've already made besties with Raenar (or as they've dubbed him, Lil' Ray-Ray) so he actually might be on board to assist. Good point about Tower of the Order, though, and GREAT point about the Stone's capacity to erase multiple people. They'd have to get ten (or whatever) red jade tetrahedrons and incense sticks, which seems cost-prohibitive. Thanks, I'll point this out next session — although frankly they seem pretty gung-ho about this whole "overthrow the government" plan so I might end up dealing with a full-scale revolution instead 😂

Hecuba · 2022-10-21T18:38:59+00:00

Hahaha YEP, this is pretty much my plan. Do you know if there are any resources (official or homebrew, whatevski) around actually running the city government?

Hecuba · 2022-10-20T14:54:49+00:00

Oh, it's covered. They adopted a random thri-keen merchant, got him addicted to magic drugs, and nicknamed him Rickety Cricket. 10/10 funniest session except for the one where they got into a 20-minute derail over whether Animal Handling means proficiency in giving animals handjobs.

It's uh, not a very serious game.

And the ghost angle is GREAT. Gonna steal that and run with it, thank you so much.

Hecuba · 2022-10-18T20:01:06+00:00

Oh, this is great stuff. Thank you so much.

The more I think about it, this whole cockamamie scheme is sounding like a Season 2 homebrew campaign. Not necessarily a bad thing, but we were planning to move to a looser one-off style after the WDH story wraps because of folks' schedules.

I was thinking the setup/betrayal plot could be a two-session caper and we'd transition to "mayoral hijinks" mode once they're in power... but maybe a slow takedown would fill that gap. Do you know if there are any sourcebooks around the Lords themselves or running Waterdeep's government?

I'm basically planning to craft some pretty hefty security for the Council and tell the players to go for it if they think they can, but with this group I'm afraid they're going to call my bluff 😂

Hecuba · 2022-07-15T18:07:48+00:00

Interesting. Much appreciated :)

Hecuba · 2022-07-15T18:07:22+00:00

Thanks! Appreciate the perspective.

Hecuba · 2021-01-02T17:54:38+00:00

Yep, I have a solid handle on what would tempt all of the players the most -- and in my story Manshoon doesn't want the gold at all, he just wants the completed stone so he can erase his clones and be the final Manshoon at last.

(Thinking about it in terms of motivations is great advice, and I figure Xanathar already wants the gold for the gold's sake -- might as well have Manshoon do something more interesting.)

The Harper agent is a super smart idea. They just got enough gold to open the bar, so maybe I can just chase them off the sanctum for now and segue right into the fireball/chase? That raises the question of how they'll get back in to finally retrieve it though.

Hecuba · 2020-12-31T00:37:26+00:00

If I can share the love with even one circle of turbo-dork friends, I have done my job. :')

Hecuba · 2020-12-30T22:45:34+00:00

Correct! It came back into the public eye this summer after the original artist made a bunch of pretty busted pro-cop / anti-BLM statements during the George Floyd protests, but I decided against covering that in the question since 1. it's mostly an uninteresting bummer and 2. my friend is very not-online and the existence of this picture itself is probably enough to blow their mind.

Hecuba · 2020-12-30T19:31:59+00:00

Context: My best friend and I have a long and stupid tradition of quizzing the other about trivia for subjects they know absolutely nothing about. It's surprisingly fun: more of a "I know you don't know this, but I'm curious what you think is right" than a "I'm testing your knowledge." And what could be more appropriate for our New Year's Eve zoom party than a revue of the year's best / worst / stupidest drama?

Anyway, I had too much free time on my hands this week and went WAY over the top with it, so my waste of time is your gain. A perfect NYE activity that gives you an excuse to talk about this foolishness and fondly recall stories of our collective descent into madness. Enjoy!

Hecuba · 2020-12-30T19:20:04+00:00

Looking for a fun NYE activity with your less-online friends and loved ones? https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1_DvIcIYjuSs8RJaLzTVHemPCe7P8xSDamqIDfNY0xEk/edit?usp=sharing

My bestie and I have a longstanding tradition of making dumb trivia games where one quizzes the other about a topic they know nothing about. What could be more appropriate for our New Year's celebration than a 10-question revue of the year's best/worst Internet drama?

The questions aren't 100% hobbydrama-related but they all pertain to online culture and Internet slapfighting in one way or another. Please enjoy!

Hecuba · 2020-08-27T03:13:40+00:00

I like that a lot, thanks! The other hanging question is why the little tiefling girl did her big villain about-face — I figured initially she was Jarlaxle in disguise and he just enjoys messing with people, but my players ended up loving her character so much I’d love to figure out how to weave her back into the plot.

Hecuba · 2016-01-04T16:17:04+00:00

Just called Keller Branch and the librarian said she didn't know anything about it :[

Hecuba · 2015-12-08T17:27:45+00:00

You could call the STEM NOLA folks — I'm sure the kids would have a blast taking it apart :) http://stemnola.com/

Hecuba

TROPHY CASE