Hope and Heroism is the fourth and final episode of seasons 25, Titan Takedown.
Synopsis[]
The session begins right after the Party Animals' victory over Head 2 Head. The audience in the stands is chanting for the Party Animals, and Zeus begins raging at the crowd over being booed for the first time. He intimidates the crowd into silence with lightning and thunder, and descends from the skybox to confront the party with the other gods. He and Aphrodite taunt the heroes, and get defied, but Poseidon suggests withdrawing. He's also brought a board with pieces to represent various factions and players, and Zeus is particularly careful to put his and his allies' pieces back in place before moving the Party Animal's markers in to the spot for the Titan Takedown Finals. Poseidon acts gracious and tells the party the finals are their day, and the gods won't even be attending. Zeus is surprised and Julius goads him, but the gods withdraw and take the board with them.
The party retires to Thea's bar, when Hippolotamus buys them shots in celebration. They also ask him if they must fight each other, and Hippolotamus reveals that the Fates gave the gods a gift to help manage the world and specifically the Titan Takedown: the Board of Fate, the same board the Party Animals saw the gods manipulating before. With their piece moved into the final position, they are fated to compete if no other competitors are moved to challenge them. Hippolotamus recommends speaking to the Fates directly if the Party Animals want to know more. Julius wonders what happens if the gods' pieces are laid face-down. The party learns that the Fates live on Mount Olympus, and go there in their stolen carriage the next morning.
They sneak into the house of the Fates, and one of them decides she's willing to talk to the Party Animals. She warns them that the Olympians have only drawn back so they can smash down on the party suddenly, and the Olympians are planning to punish the losers of the final, along with Athens. The Party Animals ask about the Board of Fate, and the Fates answer that even the gods are bound by Fate, and the Board is on Olympus, but moving even a single piece requires as much strength as a mortal can muster, so the Party Animals must choose who they face carefully.
The Party Animals press for more information, but the Fates wish to demur. With a mighty shine-powered persuasion and the services of one of Adonis' subjects--a chiropractor to give the bent-over old Fate an adjustment--the Fates reveal more: The gods have already captured the Party Animals' loved ones and they're prepared to torment them. They will hear their loved ones on the way to the Board of Fates' resting place, but they must not stray from the path because if they challenge the Olympians on Olympus, they can't win.
The party walks the path to the Board of Fate, and hear their loved ones' imprisonment, but forewarned by the Fates, they have the willpower to keep to their path and reach the board, kept in the hearth of Olympus. They're almost immediately encountered by Hestia, who kindly chats with them and reveals why she doesn't use her Olympian throne: the power unbalances the wielder and will eventually make them mad. She gifts them with an ember of her hearthfire, wrapped in a scarf. She also approves of them challenging the others, and looks the other way as the party goes to use the board.
They each move their rivals' piece into confrontation with their own, deciding to challenge Zeus, Poseidon, Hades, and Aphrodite, and then they lay the pieces face down on the board as well. The Olympians realize the board has been manipulated, and the party escapes with Seth down to Athens.
They arrive at the Coliseum, and the Party Animals initially play along with the setup for the final round, but then Thea takes the mic and calls out Zeus and the gods and challenges them to come down. Zeus' team, the God Squad, comes down and answers the challenge. Zeus threatens the characters and crowd. He proclaims that he's never gone down before--and right as the starting bell rings, two of the Fates with a golden thread of fate stretched between them use it to clothesline the God Squad from behind so they start the battle prone.
An intense battle begins. The gods have mighty powers, and quickly gain the upper hand with their vicious, high-powered attacks. Julius is injured into the negative hit points, and Kronos in the underworld plucks a scroll of Haste from him and casts on him. Thanks to selfless teamwork and the support of the crowd, the Party Animals perform spectacularly--Adonis resists being charmed by Aphrodite, Thea obliterates an empowered Hades, Julius uses Haste and all of his monk abilities to great effect in one critical turn, and Tabatha (and her bag of cats) turn in a stellar offensive performance. By continually using shine and getting recharges of it from the crowd, the party is indeed able to dethrone the gods.
Eventually, Poseidon is the last one standing, and he tries to talk his way out of things but then tries to kill Thea with a portal to the ocean depths. The party opens a portal to a desert a long way from the sea, and drop him through it. Kronos is freed from his prison, and the party's loved ones are returned to them. The Party Animals opt not to take the Olympian Thrones, and instead release their accumulated shine back to the people, to empower the populace to choose their own way. Adonis could have used the ambient power to break the curse on his kingdom, but decides it's unimportant now that his people (and himself) are learning to be at peace with themselves and their new circumstances. With Hades deposed, Adonis also becomes the ruler of the Underworld, and his Lagnosian subjects become able to move back and forth over the border, as merchants and messengers of the dead. The party makes a plan to help Thea's bar make back the money from the staggering amount of free drinks given out over the past few days, and hordes of cats are drawn to the arena by Tabatha's where people begin to adopt them.
Featured Characters[]
Party Animals[]
Returning[]
- Zeus
- Poseidon
- Hades
- Aphrodite
- Hippolotamus
- Asterius
- Argus
- Medusa
- Arachne
- King Midas
- Kronos
- Chimedes & Arimea
- Dana
- Queen Alexandra
- Sofia
- Dmitri
New[]
- The Fates
- Seth
- Hestia