Funny / Many A True Nerd

Funny moments from Jon's playthroughs of Paradox Interactive titles can be found here.

Click here for funny moments from Jon's Crusader Kings campaigns.

The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim

• "Part 1 - The Dragonborn Comes":
  • Jon's Skyrim character is a female Breton (also named Jon) with one blind/magical eye with face paint around it.
    Jon: From this side, she just looks like a normal person, then you call her over to get her attention, and boom, wizard!
  • During Alduin's attack on Helgen at the game's start, he manages to accidentally peg himself in the back of the head with his "meteor shower" shout.
  • Upon noticing that cauldrons are carried bottom-up by default, Jon chases after Ralof for a few seconds in an attempt to put a cauldron over his head. He does the same thing to Gerdur later with a bucket, to more success.
  • One of Jon's self-restrictions for the playthrough is "no forging", and as his character proves, that's probably for the best.
• "Part 2 - The Magician's Apprentice":
  • Jon explains the importance of getting on an NPC's good side.
    Jon: Because you know what friends do in Skyrim? Friends let each other steal stuff from their houses.
  • A bar brawl with a mouthy bard ends up going poorly.
    • On Jon's first attempt, he gets so wrapped up in explaining how he's able to heal during the fight that he doesn't actually heal during the fight.
      Jon: ...I forgot to heal. I was looking at his thing instead of mine.
    • On his second attempt, the town drunk runs in front of Jon's fist, turning the whole establishment aggressive.
• "Part 3 - Men and Monsters":
  • Jon's brief befuddlement as a deer randomly runs through the town without anyone paying it any heed.
  • Jon referring to the bandit he raised as a zombie to fight for him (and whom he looted all the clothes off before doing so) as "Zombie Naked Woman".
  • As Jon is looting the ashes left by one of his zombies, it briefly turns back into a normal corpse.
    Jon: Oh! He was very briefly a person again, then he decided he didn't want to be.
  • "Because of the odd way that clothing works in this game, because he had civilian clothing on him, the Belted Tunic, because I hover over it and I'm a woman, I know, therefore, to me it looks like a dress. Which means I now know that Arvel the Swift was just wandering around with a dress on his person, which is fine, because what he does on weekends is entirely his business and nobody else's."
  • Jon navigates a bladed pendulum trap.
    Jon: Right through... And then wait for you... [splorch] No, that wasn't the right place— [splorch] That also wasn't the right place! [splorch] This still isn't the right place! [splorch] ...Okay. That was how you don't go through those.
  • Jon takes advantage of Lucan Valerus's gratitude by helping himself to some choice goods from Lucan's shop, only to have a guard called on him after Lucan watches Jon try to pick a chest. After being hauled to Whiterun for processing, Jon returns to Riverwood and spitefully takes everything that won't be marked copied, and tosses the golden dragon claw into the fire.
• "Part 4 - Dragon Rage":
  • Our hero spends most of his first dragon fight cowering in a tower while NPCs do the heavy lifting, only to rush out at the last minute, whack the dragon's corpse with a mace, and declare it "My kill!"
    Jon: That was totally my kill, I was the one that got the killing blow, alright? That's how the historians are going to tell the story of the Dragonborn.
  • "Was that glorious enough for you? You were killed by the corpse of something you'd already successfully killed, and then finished off by me, lovely."
• "Part 5 - A Mammoth Undertaking":
  • When it comes to his new Flame Atronach, Jon is Not Distracted by the Sexy, but has questions.
    Jon: I'm gonna be honest, I'm a bit uncomfortable, by the way, with how my Flame Atronach is "sexy". I don't want my Flame Atronach to be sexy. Why would my Flame Atronach have boobs? It's not exactly going to feed anyone, is it? [...] Why is my Flame Atronach designed to be sexy and female? That's, that's weird...
  • Jon can't find a single Mammoth Tusk on a mammoth corpse.
    Jon: I am not the brightest Breton in the world.
  • After buying Breezehome (but lacking the money to furnish it), Jon's annoyed that his housecarl gets a fully-furnished room in his home, and that he wasn't consulted on any of it.
    Jon: Oh, it's you! Lydia! You live in the spare room, got it, okay! Well that makes me feel better, but you didn't actually... like, ask. Like, this was actually kind of sold to me as a good thing that you lived here, rather than "by the way, you're gonna have to provide her with lodging." 'cause, this honestly just feels like more of an imposition, like she actually doesn't pay rent. She just lives with me, and takes up a bedroom, but she pays no rent. This just feels like a con...
  • "Come along, naked guy, me and you are going on adventures together, and yeah, hopefully no one, like, you know, asks any awkward questions about why I'm traveling around with a naked elf."
• "Part 6 - The Path of Priest Resistance":
  • Jon ends up wandering away from his quest to explore Shearpoint. Skyrim veterans can guess how well it goes. He ends up pulling a loot-and-dash on the Word Wall and treasure chest, kiting the dragon over to Fellglow Keep in hopes that the rogue mages there will help him kill it, going through the dungeon (if not clearing it properly since he hasn't joined the Mages Guild yet), returning to Shearpoint, finding both the dragon and Krosis hanging out, and ultimately deciding to move on.
  • "And now I've just got a naked woman with a dagger following me around, marvelous."
• "Part 7 - The Ritual":
  • Jon agrees to help Golldir clear out Hillgrund's Tomb to stop an evil necromancer from defiling the place, even though Jon himself regularly raises the dead and loots tombs.
    Jon: Also, by the way, while we're going through this tomb that was kind of all in honor of your ancestors, would you object massively if I, like, you know, robbed all the offerings, and also brought your ancestors back from the dead in order to actually serve as my undead thralls for a short time, about sixty to a hundred and twenty seconds? You good with that? Good, excellent, because that's what we're doing.
  • "Right, we're gonna need extra friends here. I'm summoning something from Oblivion. Don't mind me, I know I am, you know, the sort of terrible, horrible magic-y necromancer whatever you hate, but it's all right."
  • With the enemies scaling up to the point that Jon's having trouble beating them in a DPS race, he resorts to using the Ritual Stone to animate a room's worth of corpses to clear Lost Knife Hideout, laughing maniacally all the while.
    Jon: I've got an undead army! This is the best thing!
• "Part 8 - Unbearable Suffering": After getting distracted and clearing three different dungeons since leaving Whiterun to answer the Graybeards' summons, Jon insists that he's definitely making it to Ivarstead that day. After maybe rescuing Derkeethus. And seeing what's at Mistwatch. And going off the beaten path specifically because it isn't marked by a nearby signpost. And exploring Snapleg Cave...
  YouTube comment: "We're MAKING it to Ivarstead today damn it..."
  "...now I'm curious, what happens if you Fury a goat...?
• "Part 9 - A Lovely Day for a Wedding":
  • While trying to escape from a bandit, Jon runs into a random cart lying around, causing him to clip into it when he gets killed.
    Jon: Aww, I'm dead and inside a cart, that's the ultimate humiliation.
  • Jon gets the random encounter with the Carvains trying to reach a wedding in Solitude, but unfortunately the bear he ran into earlier is still around. In the chaos that follows, Jon accidentally hits the group with a Fus, turning them aggressive, and ends up having to use Sparks to put down the survivor with an "It's treason, then."
  • Jon's plan for Autumnwatch Tower is to sneak up, learn the Word of Power, loot any treasure, and kite the dragon to a nearby Imperial army camp. Instead he misses the Word the first time, gets overencumbered looting a chest so he can only stagger away while the dragon bathes him in fire, and then nearly succumbs to his ADD while escaping.
    Jon: Right, go go go go go! There we go! Now, just start running, there's — Ooh, what's this over here? Don't explore! This is a terrible time to go flipping exploring!
  • After the dragon misadventure, Jon decides to get back on the way to Ivarstead, only to get distracted again by a random cave he finds.
    Jon: Look, Ivarstead is on the compass, that counts! If we don't make it to Ivarstead today, it was on the compass, so that one hundred percent counts!
  • Somehow, Jon is able to reach Ivarstead, three episodes and over three hours after setting out to go there, and actually gets emotional over it.
    Jon: ...That's it. I think that's actually it. I think that's actually Ivarstead! [turns away] On the other hand, there's like this - no, no, no, we're going to Ivarstead! We've made it! [...] I'm somehow genuinely surprised, it just didn't feel like a thing that was ever gonna happen...
• "Part 10 - The Defence of Ivarstead":
  • While plundering Shroudhearth Barrow, Jon easily evades a flooded pit trap, decides to dive in and explore it, pulls a lever within it, locks himself underwater, and drowns.
    Jon: Basically, good job, me, all around.
  • Jon acknowledges the YouTube comments warning that he's creating a Master of None character by spreading his perks among the One-Handed, Block, Light Armor, Destruction, Conjuration, Illusion, and Sneak skill trees. Then he sinks his next perk into Enchanting, the slowest and most difficult crafting skill to level.
  • After learning the Kyne's Peace shout, Jon dismisses it as useless. Ten minutes later, he's fleeing into Ivarstead to escape two bears he encountered on the Seven Thousand Steps.
    YouTube comment: Spends 3 Episodes getting repeatedly killed, chased and fighting Bears, Wolves and Sabercats.
    "Oh, its that shout that makes animals friendly. I would never use that under any circumstances."
  • Jon runs into a Blood Dragon while climbing the mountain, leads it into town like he did the bears, and spends an in-game day playing hide-and-seek with the thing while the guards do most of the fighting.
    Jon: And these guards seem to be quite capable of... Oh dear. I said, "Oh, these guards are totally capable of standing and fighting". No, as it turns out, no they're not.
  • To deal with the infamous Frost Troll on the path to High Hrothgar, Jon lets a nearby NPC do the tanking, which leaves her dead. He's sad for all of a moment before he checks her corpse and sees all the great loot she's carrying.
    Jon: Okay! Yeah, there's so many reasons I'm glad you're dead, sorry!
• "Part 11 - A Night to Remember...": When Jon resorts to using a Staff of Paralysis on his "fiancee" during the "Night to Remember" quest, the viewers don't let the implications slide.
  YouTube comment: And then Jon said to the paralysed Hagraven bent over on the floor, "I prefer you like that."
• "Part 12 - Windhelm Priorities":
  • Jon decides to give adventuring with a companion a try, and recruits Golldir from Hillgrund's Tomb. It takes all of twenty minutes for Jon to tag his companion with the Marked for Death shout during combat, dooming the NPC to an untimely demise.
    Jon: So I feel bad about that, but not bad enough to reload a save. Sorry, Golldir, rest in peace. Anything good on you?
  • Marked for Death continues to cause problems when a dragon buzzes Windhelm and Jon's shout goes through it to hit a civilian NPC, turning the guards hostile even as the dragon's spewing fire.
    Jon: No! No! No, that's not fair! Put them away! We have so, so many, so many more important things to do right now! [...] How can you do this to me?! I saved you from a dragon! You're all gits!
• At the start of Part 14, Jon declares he's continuing the main story and seeking the Horn of Jurgen Windcaller. Less than a minute and a half later, he's going in the complete opposite direction of his quest marker because of something he spotted on the compass.
  Jon: Yeah, I know I said we're going after the Horn of Jurgen Something-Or-Other, but no, I'm a bit distracted, because I like the look of that symbol up there.
• Then he ends up clearing Dead Men's Respite purely because there weren't any guards out front to stop him from going in. It's only after he finds King Olaf's Verse that he remembers the Bards' College quest that's supposed to send him there.
  Jon: (to the ghost of Svaknir) Yeah, um, I'd like to pretend that I came here because I had such a deep appreciation for your poetry or music or whatever, but actually, um... I just came in for the loot.
• Benor's recruitment is a bit of a farce, a fistfight so tediously drawn-out that Jon fast-forwards through it to old-timey ragtime piano music.
  Jon: Screw you, I'm the toughest man in Morthal! Assuming I'm allowed to run away and heal five or six times.
  Benor: You're a real fighter. I like that. You ever need my steel at your side, you just ask.
  Jon: Beautiful, you are my new companion, welcome aboard.
  Benor: You've been a good friend to me. That means something.
  Jon: (cracking up) "You've been a good friend to me?!" We met five minutes ago, I blatantly cheated in a fistfight and copied a hundred gold off you, but nope, I've been a good friend to him, come along, you're coming with me!
• The subsequent murder mystery gets a bit silly, too.
  Helgi's Ghost: Who's there? Is that you, father?
  Jon: Uh, no, random investigator and his supposed friend who he just beat the hell out of, actually. "Who are you?" I ask the character labeled "Helgi's Ghost."
• "We probably shouldn't make assumptions. Just because she sleeps in a basement, in a coffin, doesn't mean she is necessarily a vampire... but I'm going to be honest, it is rather likely."
• Jon is running a lighting mod to make interiors darker, which led him to get a mod to make the Candlelight spell more powerful to compensate, which makes his attempts at stealth a little counterintuitive.
  Jon: Nice and slow... nice and slow... right behind him... ignore the giant floating thing of light, it's not important...
• When Delphine asks whether Jon is indeed the Dragonborn, he has to add some qualifiers.
  Delphine: Can you do it? Can you devour a dragon's soul?
  Jon: I absolutely can, but for the most part I need someone to kill the dragon for me, so we're like halfway there, yes.
  [...]
  Delphine: We're going to go there, and we're going to kill that dragon. If we succeed, I'll tell you anything you want to know.
  Jon: Okay, but if Benor and a Frost Atronach kill it, will you at least tell me half of what I want to know? No, actually, you know what, I'm kind of a team of three - so a third of what I want to know, that seems like a fair deal, right?
• Afterward, Jon has to ask about how Delphine's drawing her conclusions when she blames the Thalmor for the dragon resurgence.
  Jon: And other than your casual racism against elves, what possible reason would you assume the elves are behind the dragons?
  Delphine: Nothing solid. Yet. But my gut tells me it can't be anyone else.
  Jon: Casual racism then, got it.
• After only two episodes with his new companion, "Where's Benor?" and "Is Benor still alive?" have become new playthrough catchphrases alongside "That bear's still around!"
• "Ooh, cellar. Go on them, why not, let's see if you've got any deep dark secrets down here..." (Smash Cut) "No, I think I've just crept into a child's bedroom while she's sleeping - okay, I didn't mean to be that creepy."
• Jon's set on becoming Thane of Winterhold, even though it's three buildings on the edge of an icy cliff. "And I want to be mayor of the world's crappiest town, that sounds fun to me."
• Benor gets stuck in his "downed" stance, making him next to useless, but catching a Falmer sword in the face fixes it.
  Jon: Right, Benor, next time you ask for a sick day, we're trying that first, this is coming back to haunt you, quite frankly.
• Jon happens upon the burning remains of the Hall of the Vigilant, and looks for clues as to what destroyed it on the bodies nearby.
  Jon: Problem is, what killed all of you? And is it still around? And are you going to mind if I steal absolutely all your stuff and sell it later?
• To find a Thieves Guild contact for a quest out of Winterhold, Jon resorts to fast-traveling to the Rift and then swimming down a river straight to Riften, to avoid anything that might distract him.
  Jon: Head straight down here to the river, ignore everything aside from the fact... oooh, there is a bright thing right - okay, no no no, just work around it, work around it, for once don't get distracted. Just for once, do not get distracted, pay no attention to that whatsover, just dive in the river, and go for a lovely swim down to Riften. 'kay? There we are, marvelous, river, swim - who are those guys over there? Like, it's just weird to find two guys just standing in the middle of no- okay, I'm going to speak to these guys, but I'm not doing a quest for them.
• Jon's not sure about Tolfdir, since on the one hand he takes his students on a field trip after five minutes of lessons on the first day of school, but on the other he's happy to take those students into a dangerous, unexplored ruin so they can learn the importance of caution.
  Jon: So basically you're a superficially cheerful old man who's pefectly happy for your students to get horribly maimed and whatever, in order to teach them a lesson. This guy might be Dumbledore in disguise.
• "...And then I exploded, for no reason."
• Jon kicks off Part 19 enjoying his new Orcish Mace of Burning, but the game proves its sadism by pitting him against a Draugr Deathlord that knows ZUN HAAL VIIK.
  Jon: Y'see, now this is a problem, because as you're aware, my Perception is legendarily poor. And right now this is, this is a room which is covered in like, you know, an irregular pattern on the floor, meaning I could look straight at it and very easily overlook it. You've probably seen it and you're probably already yelling at me in the comments, but... I've got no bloody clue where the flipping orcish mace has gone.
• Jon's questing at the College of Winterhold gets derailed when the librarian disappears into the terrain outside the college. One episode later, Jon resorts to console commands to get Urag out, only to later learn that he wasn't moving the NPC, but spawning duplicates of the NPC.
  Jon: This is why I should not be trusted with console commands. Oh god, do not look over there, alright, I think the universe might explode if you do.
• Jon explains why it's fine for him to traffic in Black Soul Gems.
  Jon: I'm a necromancer, I feel like that's fine, that's the sort of thing that doesn't really bother me in the slightest. Like, you know, if I'm going to be summoning the undead from hell to serve me, in many ways maybe it doesn't matter so much...
• Jon comes to an arrangement with the Caller of Fellglow Keep.
• In Mzulft, Jon has fun taking advantage of the Falmer's blindness to sneak up on them with Muffle and brain them with his mace, but complains how Benor's too noisy to contribute. Then Jon whiffs a swing, flees to hide behind Benor, buffs him and the enemies with Rally, heals a Falmer instead of Benor twice, freezes Benor and the remaining Falmer with an Ice Form shout, and thaws his follower by bathing him in the Flames spell.
• One of the Falmer does the Bethesda Corpse Dance.
• Jon spends most of Part 23 tromping around the coast of Winterhold, looking for a dremora's treasure. He's unimpressed with the haul and wishes for more, completely missing the second treasure chest sitting against the one he checked.
• Poor Benor takes a lot of punishment in Part 24, like when Jon Shouts him down a pit to get to a lower floor, or when Jon blasts him through a narrow passage to a troll lair, both ways.
• After completing the College of Winterhold's questline, Jon is recognized as its new Archmage, equips the best magic robes in the game, and continues on with his adventures. Almost as soon as he leaves Winterhold, he's ganked by a bear.
  YouTube comment: Becomes the most powerful wizard in the world. Runs off and gets killed by a bear five minutes later.
• When Jon stumbles upon Septimus Signus' outpost and gets the quest to retrieve an Elder Scroll, the comments section notes that the game's main storyline has interrupted Jon's random wanderings.
• By Part 26, Jon is wearing the Morokei dragon priest mask, the Archmage's Robes, and some enchanted Cultist's Gloves and Glass Boots, so " nothing matches, I'm the most ridiculously stupidly gaudy mage in the world."
• Jon's exploration of Blackreach takes a turn when Benor goes charging off into the darkness and disappears for much of Part 27. When Jon eventually finds his companion stuck on a rock, he has to vent a bit.
  Jon: Do you have ANY idea how worried I was?! I thought you'd DIED!! (Shouts him off a cliff) You deserve this!
  Benor: I'm still here.
  Jon: (choked up) That's good to know, Benor, alright, I was worried. Okay, I'm sorry, I'm just, I'm just a bit emotional right now, I thought you were dead.
• After reading the comments section urging him to do so, Jon uses Unrelenting Force on the glowing orb in Blackreach.
  Jon: To the person who told me to do that and didn't tell me what it was going to do: you're a dick.
• Jon's unsettled when he's greeted by a mass of tentacles and disembodied eyeballs, but does agree to be Hermaeus Mora's servant.
  Jon: As someone who regularly raises creatures from the depths of hell, you look like the sort of god I ought to be kind of following the teachings of. Yes, I am totally your servant, my lord.
  Hermaeus Mora: Indeed. Speak with me when the box has been opened, and all shall be revealed.
  Jon: ...Okay, now I'm really up for opening the box. Let's go murder ourselves some elves, here.
• He's able to find most of his required blood samples from Falmer ruins and bandits without trouble, but Jon resorts to attacking a Bosmer hunter for the last, under the logic that the guy confessed to poaching, so Jon was meting out he jarl's justice.
  Jon: You know, I feel good about this - not only have we got all the blood, I think as far as we can tell - like, you know, some of it might be a little bit on the dubious side - but, pretty much every single person who died to get this blood had it coming in some capacity.
• "...Was that just a bloody bone that just rolled down the hill? Oh, that's a good sign. That's a good-" (to Uthgerd) "Okay, ignore that, ignore that, don't pay any attention to it, I'm sure we're going into a lovely, friendly place."
• Jon's pretty honest with the Daedric Prince of Betrayal.
  Boethiah: Tell me, why have you slain this one, who trusted you, here upon my shrine?
  Jon: I once got to a new town, and she immediately started punching me in the face in a bar fight that took a really annoyingly long amount of time to get done, so... yeah. Kind of that. I have slain her to gain your favor - or rather your priestess said it would gain your favor. Not sure why, I can't remember what the reward for this quest is, but it was here so I thought I'd do it.
• In Part 30, Jon admits that Benor is his one true love, but also that his episode of solo questing proves that "I don't need him, I am, you know, a strong, independent woman, I can go out and handle stuff by myself."
• Jon is naturally fine with converting Azura's Star into a reusable Black Soul Gem.
  Jon: Sure, it's a little bit "evil" and "monstrous" to be capturing the souls of humans, and then using them to just make, you know, slightly good weaponry, that Benor will wear for like, you know, a couple of weeks before I bin it or sell it to Belathor's general goods before I make something else, but... you know what, I summon monstrosities from Hell, I think we're beyond good and evil at this point.
• Jon's still having trouble with traps.
• Goats are unreliable minions.
• "Also, get involved in drama. Drama... drama... that's a chicken. Are we playing the music because of the chicken?"
• Jon climbs a mountain to approach Northwind Summit from the north, finds himself horribly outmatched by an Elder Dragon, flees down the mountainside and runs into Northwind Mine, regroups with Benor and goes through it... and emerges back on Northwind Summit to find the dragon waiting for him.
• Jon, who is still trying to sneak up on people with a supercharged Candlelight spell hovering over his head: "Benor, you're not exactly the most subtle thing in the world, are you?"
• Jon mistakes Black-Briar Lodge for one of their breweries, antagonizes the guards by wandering onto the property with his weapons out, kills everyone and doesn't understand why the lodge's goods are marked as "copied" after he's won them "by right of conquest," and muses about settling down there with Benor someday.
• When Jon finally reaches Riften and begins exploring the city, he discovers the entrance of Riftweald Manor is barred from the inside, and becomes determined to get into it. Through a combination of Shouting and roof climbing he's able to reach the one unlocked door, get in, and find a bunch of incriminating documents and quest items from late in the Thieves Guild questline.
  Jon: ♪ I am the king, the king of doors, the king of doors with dra-gon shouts! ♪
• "...another statue of Dibella, in case I wanted to take that home and arrange them as if they were making out, that might be fun."
• The game breaks in a different way when Jon starts the Thieves Guild quest chain and is directed to open a rock, depositing him in an eerily empty version of Riften for some skullduggery before he returns to the world of the Open Cities mod.
• Jon meets Grelod the Kind and wants to kill her, but doesn't want to do so too soon for fear of breaking a quest.
• When returning to Winterhold on errands, Jon's dismayed that Urag gro-Shub is in a snowbank again, and laments that "We may need to clone more librarians." Then he finds two Urags leaving the faculty dorm.
  Jon: ...Were you guys just sharing a bed? 'cause that's, that's even weirder.
  Urag: What're you lookin' at?
  Jon: I'm looking at an orc who was accidentally magically cloned and now appears to be involved in an incestuous relationship with himself, which is... okay, fine, maybe I should try and just not judge.
• "Oh yeah, I think I accidentally took my clothes off at one point but forgot to put them back on again, hang on. That's... okay, I did not make a good first impression on the jarl, there. Y'know, you could have said something, Benor."
• Jon takes another crack at Mjoll's recruitment quest, which hasn't been working for him.
  Jon: By any chance are you willing to tell me to go and get your bloody blade yet? Ah, possibly she is, yes.
  Mjoll: It was lost years ago in a Dwemer ruin.
  Jon: You say this, but I have been there twice. Look, I'll go and find it for you, but if it's not there again, I'm going to be so annoyed.
  Mjoll: I couldn't ask you to undertake such a treacherous journey. It would be a fool's errand.
  Jon: No, the first two times were a fool's errand, this one might actually take.
  Mjoll: Grimsever rests within the Dwemer ruin of Mzinchaleft-
  Jon: I know!
• In Part 38, Jon's expresses his discomfort with helping the Thieves Guild extort townspeople for protection money by threatening their families and vandalizing their property. The comments section is quick to point out that his character regularly raises the dead, summons demons from Hell, steals the souls of his enemies to use as crafting ingredients, and just nine episodes ago sacrificed a follower to a Daedric Prince in exchange for a suit of armor he's never used. But the deciding factor may be the shortcut to the Cistern.
  Jon: Y'know, I'm feeling very uncomfortable morally with what these guys are doing, but they have a badass secret entrance to their really awesome underground lair, which does help.
• By the time he's done with the first proper Thieves Guild mission, Jon is able to rationalize his actions.
  Jon: Thing is, me and Benor, we kill a lot of people. I had to go in there, and I killed one person, cleanly, and everyone else lived- okay, I killed a lot of bees, too. And bees are our friends, they make honey. So actually I feel more bad about the bees than that one mercenary.
• In Part 39, Jon acknowledges the warnings from the comments section about him breaking into Riftweald Manor, which he looks at as being "too good a thief, because I basically arrived in town and the first thing I did was steal from the Thieves Guildmaster."
• Jon gets a Thieves Guild mission to go to a meadery outside Whiterun, which reminds him to go mine iron in Knifepoint Ridge he can transmute to gold to level his smithing and enchanting while in Whiterun, then he decides to break in his new gear by finding a new word of power at Lost Tongues Redoubt, then he returns to Riften and remembers he has a quest to return a MacGuffin to the dwarven ruins of Avanchnzel, then on the way out of Riften he remembers there's a nearby standing stone he hasn't found yet, then while climbing a cliff to reach the stone he notices some nearby dragon lairs, then...
  Jon: Alright, Benor, this might be a good starting point to... I swear I just saw a really mysterious and suspicious shadow there but- ooh, there's a thing over there as well, ooh, dragon-y thing... okay, I'm liking this - you know what? This episode's a write-off, we're just gonna Many a True Nerd for the rest of this episode, it's fine, don't panic.
• "Um, okay, he wants a good death, that's fine, I can do that. Benor, he's asked for a good death. Now... whether he really meant this or not is highly questionable, but regardless..." (Back Stab) "He did die. Okay? He did actually just die, so... that probably wasn't what he meant, though, was it?" (Beat) "I think Benor is judging me right now."
• Jon somehow resolves "The Cursed Tribe" quest by losing track of the chief NPC he's supposed to escort through a giant's lair, leaving him confused why his character says that the chief is dead when he returns to the orc stronghold. Malacath himself chooses a new chief... and then the "dead" chief comes walking through the gate.
  Jon: Oh, this is really awkward. Benor, we should leave, because I get the feeling our lies are about to get found out. Yeah, seriously, he's actually going into the longhouse, right now, he's actually going in... okay, do you mind the fact that the old chief just showed up, by any chance?
  Gularzob: Yamarz betrayed us all. I will never allow that to happen again, so long as I rule.
  Jon: I think I may have just triggered a civil war among the orcs. Benor, we really need to go right the hell now, okay?
• Upon returning to Narzulbur, Jon finds the inhabitants friendly, to the extent that the chief challenges him to a random fistfight. And unexpectedly...
  Jon: Actually, I might even win this! I'm wearing flippin'... okay, you are pretty feeble for an orc chief, I'm going to be honest. I'm actually beating you one-on-one in a fair fight. Admittedly I'm wearing special gloves that are good at fighting, but you're wearing armor, I'm wearing flipping college robes. I've just come from the library. A librarian just showed up in your town, and is now about to beat the hell out of your chief. [...] I'm gonna guess someone's going to be challenging you for, y'know, leadership for the colony pretty soon, given I just showed up and beat the hell out of you.
• Jon can't find any quest hooks despite some orcs' dialogue mentioning mysterious deaths, so he decides to murder the most likely culprit in case that does something. After disguising the result as a tragic "fire accident," he's surprised that the rest of the stronghold doesn't react.
  Jon: So, I have just solved the mystery, or if I haven't, I've just murdered an innocent woman. But potentially, I've just solved the mystery, awaaaay!
• Jon's conjured Dremora Lord activating a trap: Jon shouts in alarm. Jon pulling a lever to activate the same trap to smash into Benor's face seconds later: unnoticed.
• "Good afternoon, good sir! I, the Archmage of the College of Winterhold, was just passing through with my bodyguard and a demonic monstrosity from Hell, and we couldn't help but notice your rat problem! Would you like us to solve it for you, by any chance?"
• When Jon has to heal himself after falling victim to a mediocre trap, and gains a rank of Restoration from it, he concludes "My incompetence is paying off."
• Jon tells Maven Black-Briar he's seen a particular symbol before - which is to say Jon the character says that, while Jon the player is confused.
  Jon: Oh dear, the protagonist has a better memory than me.
• In part 42, Jon brags to Benor that "I don't need you anymore, I've got amazing skills now." Ten seconds later he's retreating from an enemy to hide behind his bodyguard.
• When he gets to Solitude, Jon tries to reassure Roggvir as he kneels on the block.
  Jon: Actually, it's fine, don't worry, in a second a dragon shows up and then there- (THUNK) Oh nevermind, that didn't happen to him, that was just me.
• "You want me to steal from the jarl? ...Alright, that sounds fun, let's do that!"
• Jon's unimpressed with the half-assed applause he receives at the Burning of King Olaf festival, and afterwards asks if he's an official bard yet "or do I just get to jump straight up to being Bardmaster or something?"
• When breaking into the East Empire Company warehouse, Jon decides to bring Benor, so his attempt at stealth doesn't last long. With the Guild's "no killing" rule broken, Jon proceeds to backstab his way through the warehouse.
  Jon: Aaaand quick slice of throat, job done. I mean, he did specifically say "Hey, don't mess with the East India Company" or whatever - sorry, East Empire Company - it's not the East India Company, it's the East Empire Company - uh, and I am, I know I am, but it's fine, because no one saw me do it, or rather anyone who did is now dead. Alright, Benor kind of ruined it first, but after that, it was all okay.
• "Right, where's that - the dragon's somewhere very close." (Benor is bathed in dragonfire) "Yeah, the dragon's really close by."
• Jon boasts that Ice Wolves used to be scary, but not anymore. Minutes later he's fleeing a snow bear.
• In Part 44, having heeded the warnings about the Thieves Guild storyline, Jon breaks into Riftweald Manor again to return one of the quest items he copied the first time, to make sure it will be there when he's asked to steal it later. He doesn't return anything else he copied, though, leading to Mercer Frey not noticing Jon fighting with Chillrend when the two clear Snow Veil Catacombs.
• It naturally takes eight minutes of Jon boasting that he's leading a four-man assault team for him to notice that Benor hasn't followed him into the dungeon.
• The dialogue with Karliah is interrupted by a trio of Hired Thugs, who turn out to have been sent by a nameless East Empire Dock Worker from the previous episode.
  Jon: Yeah, you know what, that's fair, I did break into their place, murder a lot of people, and steal a lot of stuff. You know what, it's a fair cop.
• Karliah has a problem with a cipher, but Jon has some ideas.
  Karliah: The journal is written in some sort of language I've never seen before.
  Jon: Right, ah... well I do happen to know a really, really good librarian - actually, about two or three of them, I accidentally cloned him.
• While cleansing Meridia's temple, Jon spends a moment baffled by an apparent dead end.
  Jon: Hang on, what am I flipping missing here? Ah, what I am missing is, there's a giant path off the side of this room, right, that would make more sense.
• "Okay, why are there no spikes of death? The fact that there's no blades of death is unnerving me. Unless they're going to open here, okay, fine, where's the trap on this one... there isn't one. Okay, this whole area is really unnerving me because it's not trying to kill me right now, and I don't like that one bit."
• In Part 46, while meandering his way across Skyrim in the vague direction of his next Thieves Guild quest, Jon comes across Northwatch Keep, continuing the "Missing In Action" quest he picked up in Part 4.
  Thorald Gray-Mane: But why would you risk your life for me, a stranger?
  Jon: I don't know - like, I go into Whiterun, begin that quest, and then forget about it. Like, nine times out of ten I don't, so honestly, I'm not sure.
• Jon visits Castle Volkihar earlier than he should and is reminded he needs to start Dawnguard at some point, which he's tempted to play through on the vampires' side, "because at this point I've pretty much given up pretending to be anything other than the bad guy, to be perfectly honest."
• Jon can't get much out of the Penitus Oculatus outpost.
  Penitus Oculatus Agent: I'm fairly certain you wandered into the wrong building, friend.
  Jon: Okay, that's fine, and you know what: to make someone uncomfortable, just sit there with your legs wide open while you're wearing a skirt.
• Jon's wanderings lead him to encounter the unique weapon, The Longhammer, but he isn't impressed with its listed damage and tosses it onto the ground with a "you're probably screaming at me 'that's the best warhammer in the game' or whatever." Sure enough, in the YouTube comments section...
• Jon makes a Persude check.
  Atar: Give me a reason not to plunge a dagger in your chest.
  Jon: Because my friends and enemies alike call me Jon the Soul-Eater, and when people annoy me, I steal their immortal souls and use them to power my infernal devil-weapons, so... generally, people take that as a good reason not to attack me.
• Jon spends most of Part 48 "being a badass" stealth-killing his way through Bthardamz. The comments section points out that technically he's sneaking up on a bunch of sleeping, sickly people and murdering them.
• Jon decides helping a Hagraven take back her lair so she can brew poisons and collect eyeballs is "no less flipping evil than anything I've done, so I'm not going to complain."
• Despite his bosses' warnings to leave the murdering to the Dark Brotherhood, Jon completes his next Thieves Guild quest by slitting the throat of everyone he comes across, and only has some second thoughts at the end of it.
  Jon: Oh, sorry, wait, were you a named person? Did I just kill a name- I think I just killed a named person. Which is fine, probably. I'm sorry, I didn't realize you were potentially important - you might have been important. Okay, hopefully he wasn't important.
• In Part 50, Jon is uniquely qualified to assist an NPC with the "House of Horrors" quest.
  Vigilant Tyranus: We belive this house may have been used for Daedra worship. Evil rites and so forth.
  Jon: Ah, right. By any chance would you like me to help? Because I've got a lot of experience with Daedric Princes. Admittedly, mainly it's doing their bidding and murdering on their behalf, but I'm willing to like, you know, pretend to join you for a bit.
• When Molag Bal tasks Jon with rescuing a former cultist to be sacrificed later, Jon makes sure to emphasize the first part of that demand.
  Jon: Alright, lads, rescue mission! Benor likes that, Benor likes the more moral missions. Like, Benor's, well, a bit... he's not a hundred percent on the whole "blatantly evil" stuff I've been doing recently, but, this is one Benor can get behind, we're rescuing someone, Benor! And then murdering them afterwards. Nono, nothing, nothing, I didn't say anything after that.
• Jon likes the Mace of Molag Bal mainly because it has a demonic face on the weapon "I assume I can just kind of, you know, pick up, talk to, do little comedy routines with."
• In Part 51, Jon returns to Riftweald Manor for the third and final time, and despite his preparations runs into some issues re-stealing Mercer's plans.
  Jon: ...You know what, that's fine, I'll take it. I've discovered the plans, and I've un-broke the quest!
• Since Jon hasn't dismissed his followers, the super-secret Nightingale induction ceremony features Benor and a constantly-barking dog getting in the way. And Jon's not so sure about how it's going to work out.
  Jon: Um, should I have mentioned to [Nocturnal], by the way, that when I swore to serve her in like life and death, I've kind of sworn in life, death, or both to serve at least three or four different gods so far? Soooo this might be sort of an empty gesture.
• On the way to the confrontation with Mercer, Jon's surprised that his fellow Nightingales are horrified that the renegade slaughtered some bandits outside the dungeon.
  Karliah: Mercer's doing. We have to catch up with him before it's too late.
  Jon: Oh what a monaster, killing bandits, I'm sure none of us would ever... do... that just shut up, Benor, shut up.
• Jon mocks Karliah for stepping in an obvious bear trap, and naturally...
  Jon: ...I think that one was a little bit better-hidden. That may be why I walked into it. Yeah, let's just say that.
• After his mission to the Twilight Sepulchre, Jon returns to Riften and declares the Thieves Guild... destroyed.
  Jon: Which is great, they've been a hundred percent neutralized. Their Guildmaster's dead, there seems to be a new Guildmaster who might possibly be me, in which case I just won't tell them to steal things, or it might possibly by Brynjolf, in which case he seems to have a slightly obscure, weird view of the world and seems to think that everything's prosperous when everything's actually been copied from them. They don't seem to have recruited any new people beyond what they already had, as I said the Guildmaster himself is dead, and over there, their storeroom is empty, and no one's gonna be giving them new stuff to do. So actually, I'd say we've pretty much elminated the Thieves Guild.
• Vigilance is a good boy who occasionally falls through the ceiling.
• "Benor, get out of the way of love."
• Jon's uneasy with "The Book of Love" quest line, especially when it sends him to an NPC he has history with.
  Dinya Balu: Go to Markarth. There you'll find Calcelmo, wise, acid, and reclusive. Help him emerge and state his intentions. This is the prayer heard by the goddess and relayed to her servants.
  Jon: Okay, I'm gonna be honest, um, I did kind of actually break into his laboratory, kill all his guards, steal all his stuff, and I think I also murdered his nephew, sort of by accident. So... this might be a bit of an ask, but screw it, we'll go with it.
• "'One peak stands proud against the range \ Invincible, and scaled by none \ Those men who try wash down her slopes \ Their eye-born streams obliquely run.' ...I'm not sure what this poem means, but I suspect it's filthy."
• After rather arbitrarily deciding which suitor a flighty teenager should pursue, and passing off one man's poem as the work of another, Jon isn't impressed by the Goddess of Love.
  Jon: Basically, as far as I can tell, people pray to Mara, they basically say "Hey, I fancy someone, but we've got nothing in common and she doesn't like me," at which point Mara sends an agent to trick that person into liking them. And that feels weird and wrong but alright, fine.
• The randomly-encountered Farmer leading a sacrificial cow to a giant camp is Jon's favorite NPC in the entire game.
  Jon: It's rather nice to actually see in an RPG, you go up to someone and say "Hey, would you like me to help?" and they're like "Nah. It's fine. I've got this. This is actually my job, so I'm going to, you know, do it. Have a nice day!" That's lovely to see.
  Farmer: Thanks. You take care of yourself, now.
  Jon: You know what? I like you, you're now my favorite character in Skyrim, because one, you don't need me to solve all your problems for you, and two, you have a really jazzy cow.
• After roughly forty episodes of shared adventures, Jon and Benor finally decide to tie the knot and move into Honeyside together. Jon makes special wedding rings for him and Benor, and though the ceremony has a few rough spots, the two are wed. Jon steps outside the city to pick a bouquet for Benor, returns home, and then things take a turn for the worse...
  Jon: Right. I see. Iona. Iona. How long has this... actually, no, nonono, that doesn't matter. Benor? Grab your stuff. Me and you... we need to go on a walk.
• Jon starts Dawnguard fully intending to side with the vampires, but the fact that the Dawnguard have adorable huskies almost makes him change his mind.
• Jon has to explain to Vigilance that Benor got sent to a farm where there's no telephones, "and also I set fire to the farm, so there's a very good chance that Benor's not coming back."
• On the bright side, Jon's certain he and Serana can be best friends, since they're both necromancers, are carrying around Elder Scrolls for no reason, and "like dressing ridiculously." Though he is miffed when the game won't let him pickpocket Serana's Scroll off her.
  Jon: I'm not sure why I want two, I don't have a use for the one I've already got, but screw it, it would be nice to have two. I'd probably be the first person in the history of Tamriel to hold two Elder Scrolls simultaneously and have no bloody use for either of them.
• "How are you feeling about sunlight? I can see you've got a nice cowl to cover your face, you also do have... um... a bit of a hole, in your top."
• Jon is somewhat conflicted when he console commands his way into Castle Volkihar.
  Jon: I can't help but notice, um, everyone's eating - ooh, "Vampire Cattle," you're apparently not dead.
  Vampire Cattle: (anguished groaning)
  Jon: Right, they're just tied up and, um, screaming in pained agony. Well, that's... that's good, that's good... arguably, these guys are not the goodies.
  Harkon: After so many centuries, I feared the Elder Scroll and my daughter lost to me...
  Jon: Yeah, his evil voice also makes me think, "not the good guys," but in all fairness, I think it's already well-established, I don't think I'm really the good guys either, so... it's probably fine.
• Due to game glitches, Jon has to resort to teleporting into Castle Volkihar when Serana doesn't properly engage the gate guard, deleting the gate itself to leave it, and for some reason all the NPCs inside freak out when he uses his Vampire Lord transformation on the premises.
  Jon: Okay, sorry, is the castle of vampires prejudiced against vampires?! Because if so, that's... weird! Oh wait, hang on, nono - who are you attacking? Are you going for the dog right - they're going for the dog! Why?! This doesn't - what the - what's happening?! ...And now they've calmed down! What?!
• Since Jon already cleared Redwater Den during his meanderings, the Door to Before is still open, letting him jump right into a proper boss fight from the wrong side.
  Jon: As it turns out, these people have got no explanation as to who they are. I heard something about "Oh, shame about that terrible little accident you had the other week," so, I dunno, one of them still wets the bed but the other is very understanding about it, I guess.
• "But while I'm passing through, Faralda, nice and asleep here, let's just..." (selects "Feed") "Very quickly - okay, we didn't need to bite her thigh, that was just slightly weird. I mean, the neck is traditional, no one asks questions if a vampire bites someone in the neck, but if a vampire bites someone in the thigh, then we just start asking questions whether that vampire has a thing about thighs, and then you make vampirism weird."
• When yet another dragon hits Winterhold while Jon's passing through, the finisher animation gets... weird.
  Jon: Okay... I think I've just basically choke-slammed a dragon out of the universe, but it's okay, it's back now.
• "Also, thing to check: in this mode I've got wings, so presumably no fall damage, right?" (SPLAT) "...No, still fall damage, wings are purely decorative."
• "I feel like I'm now going the right way, which makes me feel like I'm actually going the wrong way, so I'm just gonna quickly nip back and see what was actually down that other branch down in the room below. The answer was 'a complete dead end,' that was mildly disappointing."
• When Jon and Serana explore the Soul Cairn, Jon gets to fully comprehend what he's been doing to people throughout his playthrough.
  Soul: I thought death was a release, not an eternity of torment...
  Jon: Right. So... I'm guessing I should feel bad about all the people that I've actually used to power my weapons, 'cause as it turns out, they stay in this hell forever. But on the other hand, my weapon's pretty bloody awesome, so I don't feel that bad, I think I'm gonna keep doing it.
• And then he finds out he can fill a Soul Gem at one of the area's Soul Fissures.
  Jon: Oh, this is probably even worse than what I was doing originally! So, I kill people, steal their souls, put them in a soul gem, then I send the souls here when I use the soul gem, now I'm having the soul a second time so I can continue to use it.
• "You know, this DLC is really painting necromancers in a bad light. I feel picked on, here."
• On his way out of the Soul Cairn, Jon has one final question for Valerica: "Did you mean to call her Serana, or did you just misspell something on the birth certificate?"
• After Durnehviir names him "Qahnaarin" in recognition of his valor, Jon returns the favor.
  Jon: And I find you equally worthy, by the way. I name you... "Flying Rodent."
• "Right, so apparently, I could actually be wearing light armor on, like, head and body and arms and legs. So if that was true, then, presumably, I could get the benefits from the Light Armor tree."
• A dungeon exit leads to a tiny overlook over a cliff that looks too dangerous to skid down. Luckily Jon has a plan to get everyone down safely.
  Jon: Have a good flight! (FUS RO DAH!) There she goes, beautiful.
• "Evening, officer, don't worry about me, just me and my evil horse come to check out Falkreath. And also my extremely older vampire girlfriend. And my evil horse. Don't worry about us, we're just looking for stabling and a place to sleep and some innocents to - wait, hang on, not that last one, just the first two."
• Somehow the NPCs are able to pick up on Jon's condition despite his mask.
  Bolund: Your skin's as pale as snow. You scared of sunlight, or something?
  Jon: I wouldn't say scared, but I think we do have an evil plan to blot out the su- oh. I shouldn't have told him that. Serana, we need to kill him!
• "Ooh, Bloodlet Throne! Oh, that sounds awesome. That sounds like the soft of place I should really build an evil lair, dammit."
• Serana's willingness to use other NPCs' animation markers leads to a distraction.
• At first Jon approves of Farkas, and likes the thought of picking up another "big, chunky, meaty, two-handed weapons, big armor side" sort of companion. Then he gets a mission from him to take out some...
  Farkas: Rogue wizards. I've never trusted magic types. The College is bad enough. Destroy them.
  Jon: Okay, I've changed my mind, we're not actually going to be traveling around with Farkas.
• "A thought occurs: why am I mining iron ore and then converting it into gold, when I know for a fact the location of several gold mines I've already explored? That would be much cleverer."
• Thirty-seven episodes after picking up his first Elder Scroll from Blackreach, and mere minutes after using three Elder Scrolls in a row to have a vision, Jon is still a little confused.
  Jon: Wait, hang on, wasn't there supposed to be a... don't I need a third one? I was told I would need three Scrolls to understand what was going on, and one of them was at the bottom of a Dwemer ruin, and we haven't got that one yet, what happened to... alright, never mind.
• When clearing Bloodlet Throne, Jon gets taken out of action for a few minutes.
• Jon's initially unhappy that his new property of Lakeview Manor has a conjurer's altar right next to it, but eventually changes his tune.
  Jon: This would actually be useful. If we can just throw up some defenses, so like no other conjurers can use this, I could have my house up there, like looking over the lake, and down here a bit out of the way, 'cause you know company might not approve, I could have my necromancy table, alright, just so I could do human sacrifices a bit out of the way, and that will mean, you know, we don't get stains on the carpet, and people won't get all "Ooh, you shouldn't kill humans 'cause that's bad for whatever reason." Yeah! That could work pretty nicely for me.
• "Okay, Serana, don't stand there, if you stand there it makes it look like I'm arranged it so I can look down your top, and I haven't, you just keep putting them in my face and I don't even want to."
• Jon wants to go down another steep slope, which is bad news for Serana.
• One episode later, Serana gets her revenge.
• Jon had to turn off his more balanced potions mod after getting warnings that "something something something Skyrim versus Special Edition something something 32-bit versus 64-bit something something something increased chance of crashing." But he points out that this won't give him an unfair advantage, because he never remembers to use potions anyway.
• After defeating another orc chief in a fistfight, Jon finds him at a table and takes a moment to further mock him.
  Jon: You're the actual chief, who just sits at this... ordinary table. In front of a wooden plate that nobody's brought any food to. And a tankard that no one can be bothered to fill up anymore, because nobody respects you, because I beat the hell out of you. Man, it sucks to be you right now.
• While going through Darkfall Passage, Jon hopes that he isn't completely Late to the Tragedy.
  Jon: Ideally, there'll be like, you know, one person down here who's like "Oh, oh thank goodness you came to rescue me!" Then I can just feed on that person, and then immediately afterwards murder them for their soul, to keep my infernal weapons going. That would be great.
• "I think Serana's gone for a swim and now she can't actually get out of the water, I'm pretty sure she's just now underwater. That's where she just lives now, under the sea. Well, that's fine."
• Jon insists that walking into a Falmer trap is an important part of "getting the intended experience here."
• Part 68 has Jon wrapping up the Forgotten Vale, with highlights such as Serana showing up late to the boss fight and Jon stripping down an NPC's corpse in front of his brother. But it's his interactions with Knight-Paladin Gelebor that take the cake.
  Gelebor: Well, using an arrow with the bow that's been dipped in blood may cause it to function differently, corrupting its purpose. That's of course is you're foolish enough to try it.
  Jon: I am precisely that flipping foolish.
• Or when Jon reads his character's dialogue after Gelebor admits he may be the Last of His Kind.
  Jon: Now I suppose that line's supposed to be read out sounding like "Then I've contributed to your kind's extinction..." No, I feel like this character is like "Oooh! I've contributed to your kind's extinction!"
• Then Jon decides to test out the corrupted Auriel's Bow by blotting out the sun... right in front of the sun god's high priest.
  Jon: Right, so um, how are you feeling about this?
  Gelebor: It's good to speak to you again.
  Jon: Nope, he does not notice nor care that I have just killed the sun. Marvelous!
  Gelebor: Farewell, friend. May the light-
  Jon: He's still greeting me as friends. "May the light of Auriel fill your darkest hours?!" I've just killed the sun, you stupid bastard!
• The comments section is not surprised, but still disappointed, that after spending so much time and effort hunting down the Ruby Paragon to teleport to a bonus treasure area, Jon managed to somehow not loot the corpse carrying the unique Auriel's Shield.
• With Dawnguard completed, Jon decides to get back on the main quest in Part 69, some 54 episodes and 149 in-game days after he promised to meet back up with Delphine in Riverwood.
• When Malborn warns Jon about "getting fingered as a spy" at the party at the Thalmor Embassy, Jon thinks "this is gonna be a different sort of party than I was expecting."
• Jon insists that despite rumors to the contrary, he is not the villain in his playthrough. Ten minutes later he's discussing his plans to join The Dark Brotherhood to work out some of his anger issues.
• Grelod the Kind has one last message for her children before going to hell.
• Jon disagrees with his dialogue choices after being abducted by an assassin.
  Astrid: But there is a slight, mhmm, problem...
  Jon: Go on, then - "I don't like where this is going?" No, I do like where this is going. This is going fine, this is all looking great. I'm just kinda, you know - I went to sleep, I woke up, there's a nice woman wearing a skintight catsuit praising me for what I've done, this could all end very, very nicely indeed.
• When Arnbjorn talks about "my beautiful wife" Astrid, Jon realizes "You're the guy I need to kill if I want to get with Astrid, got it."
• Jon finds a rather petty use for Auriel's Bow and Blood-cursed Arrows.
  Jon: I just blew up the sun in order to just have my stamina coming back. Nothing to do with the vampire prophecy or anything, I just wanted stamina during the day, dammit.
• Jon's able to reunite Narfi with his sister without any problems, but his assassination of Ennodius Papius is a bit of a farce.
  Jon: I'm really going to regret killing this chicken at some point. Somebody's going to be so mad at me for killing this chicken.
• When Cicero explains that the position of Listener is vacant, Jon's played enough Bethesda games to know that "probably in about two hours, it'll be me, got it." Unless he edited a lot out of his videos, he probably overestimated the time.
• "Also, when she says 'sign of my affection,' I'm not actually allowed to like, you know, help myself to her cheese or bread or whatever, no. 1,200 gold, fine, but not my cheese, dammit."
• Jon's still crushing hard on his new boss.
  Astrid: Now, I need your assistance with a matter of a more... personal nature.
  Jon: I will one hundred percent assassinate your husband and marry you, that is one hundred percent fine, yes.
• At this point, Jon sounds almost bored with Bethesda's writing.
  Astrid: Then what in the name of Sithis is going on? Cicero spoke to the Night Mother, but she spoke to you? Is this just more of the fool's rambling?
  Jon: No, as it turns out I'm gonna be the guildmaster. A-flipping-gain.
  Astrid: And the Night Mother who, according to everything we know, will only speak to the person chosen as Listener... just spoke... right now... to you.
  Jon: (audibly grinning) Yeah, it kinda sucks, 'cause you're no longer queen of the Sanctuary, I am.
• Only three episodes into the Dark Brotherhood questline and Jon's figured out that "it's gonna end with someone turning out to be a traitor, me killing them and becoming the guildmaster."
• Jon explains to Astrid that the difference between the Thieves Guild and the Dark Brotherhood is that the latter "are almost certainly more evil, but screw it, you're kind of the fun evil, so I'm okay with it."
• Our hero's dark deeds come back to haunt him as he passes through Dawnstar.
  City Guard: Wait... I know you...
  Jon: (hurrying past) Uh oh... uh oh! The guards are saying "I know you!" This is that chicken business - do not talk to them. If I simply don't talk to them, it's fine. But I'm pretty sure I'm in the same hold that I kind of killed a chicken in at some point, so I need to stay away from Dawnstar until I can make amends for the chicken murder.
• "You know, we probably shouldn't all go around wearing matching uniforms with massive obvious bloody handprints on the back, like that's pretty bloody obvious. This is why we're not doing well as assassins."
• Jon is baffled when one of the Emperor's bodyguards has travel plans to Windhelm.
  Jon: Wait... you're sending an agent of the Emperor to Windhelm, to the Palace of the Kings, to where Ulfric Stormcloak himself lives, and you're expecting him to get a warm response, him just poking around saying "Oh yeah, I want to have a look at all of your security." Like ... what?
• Since Jon wants to take out his next target when he stops by Whiterun, his character ends up fast-forwarding through several days spent at the local inn.
  Jon: I just basically spent the next four days in the pub, getting really, really plastered, presumably. Let this be known as the Great Dragon-Bender!
• Jon doesn't understand the ideological dispute between Cicero and Astrid.
  Astrid: Cicero's problem isn't his madness, it's an adherence to an ancient, outmoded way of life. The Night Mother's ways... simply are not our ways. He just couldn't accept that. And now he'll have to pay the price.
  Jon: I really feel like we're dealing with a very, very small matter of procedure between the two sides here. Like, we both want to take contracts from people who perform the Black Sacrament, she's simply just a more efficient way of doing that. Just like pretend she's a telephone and it's fine.
• Jon's attempt to be stealthy by casting Muffle on himself ends up breaking his Invisibility spell within sight of a Forsworn guard, which undermines his attempt to sneak into one of their redoubts.
  Jon: (flailing about with a burning mace) No one else pay attention to this! No one else pay attention to this whatsoever! Subtle! Subtle! Assassin! Subtle! Subtle! Assassin! ...Everyone else cool?
• Jon's efforts to hide a body aren't very effective.
  Jon: Down he goes, underwater, no one will find... he's floating. Everyone's going to find that so quickly! I should have like tied him to something heavy first - oh, I'm so bad at this!
• In Part 76, some fifty episodes after his viewers started suggesting in the comments section that he pick up the Fiery Soul Trap enchantment, and after fight after fight where Jon struggled to get a Soul Trap effect in to recharge his weapons, Jon ends up discovering the dungeon with the unique enchantment purely by accident... and discounts it as useless since there's no way to increase the fire damage.
• Jon's not impressed when Astrid declares that he'll have the honor of killing the Emperor.
  Jon: Oh my goodness, you want me to go and do it, what a surprise. Because, you know, the previous task you wanted me to go and do it, and the task before that you wanted me to go - has anyone else actually done anything since I've bothered arriving? Bloody hell...
• After killing several Imperial agents and somehow missing the reveal that he only murdered the Emperor's Body Double, Jon bursts into incredulous laughter after learning he can pay a 1500 gold fine that completely clears his legal trouble from, again, attempting to assassinate the Emperor of Tamriel.
• During the fight for the Brotherhood Sanctuary, Jon naturally hits and kills Arnbjorn the werewolf instead of the two enemies fighting him.
  Jon: I'm so sorry! Uh, actually, if [the traitor] turns out not to be Astrid, then that might work for me. Um, ooops. (loots the body and sees a Werewolf Pelt) Okay, um... how much leather does that give me? Would you mind if I just like - you're already dead, so it's not like it really matters, to be honest...
• After the climax of the attack on the Dark Brotherhood Sanctuary, Nazir and Babette are still reeling from Astrid's betrayal, while Jon...
  Jon: Now, I think the implication there was, I'm actually now the flipping guildmaster, right?
  Nazir: Astrid... by the sands, I still can't wrap my head around it...
  Jon: I'm not sure anyone can, it didn't make a huge amount of sense - um, I'm the guildmaster, that normally comes with some like, you know, special guildmaster armor or whatever. Where's my special guildmaster armor? Or like, is that the... actually, I've already got the Ancient stuff... like, is the guildmaster stuff better than the Ancient stuff? Also, I need a new [crafting] table. Cause right now, I can't see how good this new weapon flipping is.
• The drama of Jon confronting the Emperor is undercut slightly when Jon mistakes a door for a cabinet and leaves the cabin. Luckily the Emperor is still patiently waiting to die when Jon returns, allowing him to rifle through the guy's bedroom before finally finishing the assassination.
• Jon still does his best to slip through Dawnstar undetected by the hold guards.
  Jon: Animal rights legislation in Skyrim is really flipping tough. You kill one chicken in a Hold, they will hold it against you for pretty much flipping forever, until you pay off that bounty, dammit.
• "'Good to see you again, old friend!' Which I'm going to say even if I don't mean it, just so he doesn't stab me."
• Jon's a little disturbed there's a "Torture Chamber" upgrade available for the new Dark Brotherhood headquarters, buys it, and is more disturbed when he tours it.
  Torture Victim: Why are you people doing this?
  Jon: I'm actually not sure! Like, our job is to actually assassinate people. [...] Okay, I feel like in many ways, this was not the right thing to do. Like, I thought we'd just like have the torture chamber as, like, you know, an emergency back-up, if we ever needed to do, like, emergency torture. It actually just feels that you've got four people... strung up. And you did that really quickly. Like you're really excited by the torture. And that feels like a thing that we shouldn't be. Because we're supposed to be, like, you know, professional assasins, where we just kill people that... well, I guess that's not good either... Right, I'm feeling conflicted about all of this!
• Jon, the vampiric assassin-thief who just murdered the Emperor: "I just feel like, in many ways, I'm not actually the good guy anymore."
• "How am I going to get on the top here? On this occasion I don't see an obvious answer - hang on, maybe there's a - nope! When I say "don't see an obvious answer," uh, there's a staircase, which is very often a good way to get up things."
• As part of his Heel–Face Turn, Jon goes on an apology tour, revisiting all the people he's wronged over his playthrough.
  Jon: (to Calcelmo) I am so sorry I copied your research and murdered all the guards in your laboratory - wait, hang on, I got you a girlfriend. Okay, we're probably pretty much even then, that's fine.
  Jon: (to Hulda) I'm sorry for all the murders I've committed inside your pub, particularly in that room over there, because I think there's been, like, three so far, and I've left you to clean up the mess every single time. So, I'm actually really sorry about that one, it was really rude of me.
  Jon: (to the Urag gro-Shub twins) I'm so sorry for messing with console commands when I didn't actually know what I was doing. Seriously, I'm really sorry about this one, I shouldn't have done it, I won't do it again. [...] See, me and him, a hundred percent even. Me and the other one, not actually sure about that.
• Near the end of the episode, Jon reflects that "there are some things we can't undo, some damage that cannot be fixed, some things that are... wait, hang on a minute: I'm a cocking necromancer!" Leading to...
  Jon: Welcome back... Benor.
• Since Jon is a good guy now, he's doing a good guy quest to fight (other) necromancers. "So this, this is morally fine. And because they're morally bad, it's perfectly acceptable for me to harvest their souls while I'm passing through. Because it's not like they'll be using them for much longer, anyway."
• Since Jon hasn't picked up the Necromantic Healing spell yet, he can't do anything for his new Undead Thrall but put him back on his feet when he dies.
  Jon: Benor just has to basically be left to die, then we just re-raise him, to serve me, forever, in a never-ending cycle of suffering and servitude beyond the grave. (beat) But we don't phrase it like that because I'm the good guy now! Speaking of which, those blasted necromancers, eh? Let's go murder them and steal their souls while we're doing it. But if anyone asks, don't mention that bit.
• "Uh, Benor's just died, by the way. But that's fine! Because we can fix that!"
• "This is absolutely the safest way to get companions down a cliff."
• Jon's still struggling with pendulum traps.
• Iona couldn't follow Jon into a dungeon for a Legion quest, though Benor could. Because for "some companions, the bond is just too strong. Like the bond between a wife, and the man who she has brought back from the dead four or five times, I forget."
• While building Lakeview Manor, Jon goes from wanting to keep Benor outside in the animal pen to deciding he can be chained up in the basement.
• In Part 82, Jon gets his Conjuration back up to 100 for the "Twin Souls" perk, so he's running around with Benor, Iona, Moira the Dremora Lord, and Vigilance - or in other words, four people and a dog. Which means it's time to go back to Windhelm to solve the murder mystery quest he picked up ages ago.
  Jon: Now, we were told to question the witnesses. That was admittedly several weeks ago, but I suspect they're still going to be standing in the exact same spot.
• When Jon sees that Hjerim requires a key to open, his first instinct is to look for a balcony he can climb up to and get in that way, but then he remembers the trouble that caused in Riften. He immediately finds an invisible wall keeping him from exploring an alley behind the house, and spends several minutes trying to glitch past it.
• During his investigation, Jon keeps yelling at how incompetent the guards are for not following an obvious blood trail, or how the jarl's steward can't solve such an easy crime. Then he "completes" the quest by accusing the wrong suspect.
• "Let's figure out where he lives, then, let's find where he lives, because we need to get his key off him, and we might possibly need to murder him to do that. If I'm wrong, I've accidentally killed an innocent person, but if I'm right, I've killed a murderer, so in many ways, it's worth the risk. But we're still the good guys, yes? Everyone agree? Look, I'm traveling around with a puppy, no bad guy would ever have a dog."
• "Have I just been walking over this body for a bit? I don't think I've been walking over this body for a bit. I mean, sometimes I suffer from slightly low Perception..."
• When Jon realizes he's accused an innocent man, he has to make another stop on his apology tour.
  Jon: I am so sorry for falsely accusing you of murder and necromancy, which is particularly bad of me, because I am also guilty of murder and necromancy, I mean a lot of murder and necromancy. So, for me to actually get you thrown in prison for that was... I'm still not the good guy, am - okay, no, I'm not the good guy. But, but I'm now gonna help sort this out.
  Wuunferth the Unliving: Oh, isn't that a shame. And here I am in the Bloodworks.
  Jon: Yes, I know I messed up, you don't actually have to be a dick about it!
• "Oh don't say thanks or anything - well, I guess saving her is its own reward, because we're the good guys! I mean, we locked away one innocent person, which inadvertantly led to the murder of another innocent person, before we got the right guy..."
• When Jarl Balgruuf tasks Jon with giving Ulfric Stormcloak an axe, Jon's not sure whether he's supposed to "give him the axe" or "give him the axe."
  Jon: Sorry, how many of those words are supposed to have inverted commas around them? I'm not sure.
  Balgruuf: Men who understand one another need not waste words. There are but a few simple truths behind one warrior giving another his axe. Ulfric will know my meaning.
  Jon: You're making him thane? 'cause you gave me an axe, a few months back, and that was because you were making me thane. Were you actually challenging me to one-on-one combat, because if so I massively misunderstood that gesture.
• After making his delivery to Ulfric, Jon tries to win the war in the most direct way possible, and ends up fighting his way out of Windhelm, slaughtering every guard in his path. Which makes his bounty fluctuate wildly depending on what happened to who last saw his killing spree.
  Jon: If I can just kill all the witnesses, it's not a crime.
• -1 Perception goes to war.
  Jon: Now I had a plan for this, a really good plan if I may say so myself. What would be good at protecting the barricades? I would say... (summons Durnehviir) I would say, a massive great big dragon-
  (the Stormcloaks hack through the barricades, prompting a "Failed: Defend the Barricades" pop-up)
  Jon: -would be good at defending the barricade! A great big, undead zombie flipping dragon!
• Jon has to resort to an odd variety of Percussive Maintenance to make Erandur get a quest rolling.
  Jon: Oooh, I think I fixed him with murder!
• Despite his insistence that he's the Good Guy now, when Vaermina demands that Jon betray his companion to gain a daedric artifact, he responds "This isn't even a tough decision" before getting out his "murder-knife."
  Jon: It's not immoral if nobody sees me do it, and there's no witnesses for this.
• Jon does enough sidequests to become Thane of the Pale, simply to get his chicken-murder bounty waived. Though he's so insulted by his issued weapon that he dumps it in the jarl's fireplace.
• For some reason the Imperial Legion sent all of five soldiers to take Fort Dunstad, so when Jon shows up with his entourage he doubles the size of the attack force.
• "Someone has basically asked me, 'Yeah, that lighthouse we found, put out the light of that, a ship will crash, and then profit something something something.' Now, that's possibly evil, probably, still it sounds awesome, and I would like to do something with that lighthouse."
• When Deeja offers to give him "your share of the reward," Jon hopes he's wrong about what's going to happen next.
  Jon: You know what, I would absolutely love it more than anything in the world if I now just said "So, we're splitting the loot, then?" and she said "Yep, that's perfectly fair, here's fifty percent and the other fifty percent's for us, uh, thanks, have a lovely day," quest complete and we all walk out of here.
  Deeja: Ha! I'm afraid the loot's already been moved. You've been useful to the Blackbloods, though. You've earned a quick death.
  Jon: Never mind, it goes exactly as I expected it to. So, yeah, she picked a bad person to attack, to be honest. Right, let's just start murdering these people...
• Jon's still having no luck using Shouts against dragons fighting in cities.
• Jon tries his hand at extortion.
  Jon: I feel like I'm currently attempting to blackmail a door, and it's a deeply surreal experience.
• Benor dying again gives Jon a chance to make his Undead Thrall equip some better armor.
  Jon: I know it looks weird, okay, that my formerly-dead and now still-dead-again husband, I'm about to strip him naked, I know it's a bit odd, but it's fine...
• While Benor refuses to equip his good armor, Jon notices his thrall somehow regenerates his default Iron Armor each time he's stripped, and every time Benor dies (again) Jon receives another inheritance of 400 gold, opening up the possibility of Jon "farming" his ex.
  Jon: Also, I just want to bring attention to the fact that Benor hasn't actually been wearing his wedding ring, so I don't feel bad about him dying anymore. (beat) Also, add one to the Benor Death Count.
• Jon reluctantly becomes a werewolf, even though he's been burned by blood rituals before, because feeding on corpses to increase his power is "no more evil than I am in general, fine."
• "Benor's just going to stand slightly, uncomfortably, weirdly close to me, and occasionally sort of gyrate against me. I'm going to be honest, I don't mind."
• Since the Dawnguard is still sending hit squads after Jon even after curing himself of his vampirism, he returns to Castle Volkihar to get the quest to end the Dawnguard once and for all. But the NPCs won't help him unless he's a vampire, or in other words:
  Jon: Oh bloody hell. I'm turning myself into a vampire, so I can stop vampire hunters from coming after me for not being a vampire.
• The Open Cities mod messes with another quest, so that the compass and map are pointing Jon in different directions.
  Jon: It would appear that the quest marker is just on top of me with a "go inside" - like the quest marker is telling me to go inside myself. Which is odd.
  YouTube comment: Well, Jon finally did it. He pissed off the game and it's now explicitly telling him to shove off.
• "'Be a vampire,' they said. 'You'll have power overwhelming,' they said. They didn't mention anything about having no stamina during the daytime, thus having to amble along at incredibly slow speed, constantly, forever."
• Speaking of bugs, an axe ascends to heaven.
• "Also, apparently Benor died. How did... I'm not sure how Benor died, but Benor died. Sometimes Benor just dies for weird reasons I can't understand. [...] You really got to keep an eye on Benor, otherwise he is just basically, desperately trying to escape from eternal servitude."
• A quest sends Jon through Windhelm, which involves slaughtering yet more guards, and getting told off by an orphan for running around with a fire-enchanted mace.
  Sofie: You're not supposed to play with fire, you know.
  Jon: You're not supposed to murder police either, but no one tells me what to do!
• After coming up with a workaround for the "Benor dying" problem during certain quests, Jon is able to proceed with the Companions questline and become a proper werewolf.
  Jon: Right, welcome back, Benor, I'm going to be honest, you have missed a bit again. Um, this time, um, we're vampires now - wait, no, sorry, not vampires, the other one - werewolves! Actually, we're both. Um, we are both, simultaneously. Which is probably weird, and that probably makes me hated - wait, what was the plot of Underworld?
• Then Jon checks his Powers menu and learns that no, his werewolf status has replaced his Vampire Lord form. Which means he can't finish a quest to get some magic rings for the vampires.
  Jon: Right, so we're going to have to finish off the werewolf business, so I can stop being a werewolf, then I need to go and re-vampire, then once I've re-vampired at that point I can turn in the ring, and finish off the vampires, then I can de-vampire...
• Jon's not at all impressed with his werewolf form, which is demonstrably weaker than what he can do fighting in his enchanted armor, though there is an unexpected perk from feeding on human corpses.
  Jon: I've now consumed Benor's heart to extend my bloodlust, and now for the rest of time, a part of Benor will always be inside me.
• Jon finds a new way to get Benor down sheer drops.
• Shared suffering may bring the Gray-Mane and Battle-Born clans together.
• Even before he returns to Jorrvaskr after a Silver Hand attack, Jon has done enough Bethesda guild quests to guess that the Companions' leadership position has a new opening. He also doesn't take kindly to Vilkas sassing him for not being around to help during the attack.
  Jon: You know, rather than yelling at me for not protecting [Kodlak], you really ought to be taking a good, hard look at yourselves. Because you were here, Farkas was here, Aela was here, all the other Companion recruits were here, and apparently not one of you was able to defend him? Like, not my problem, I was off on a mission given by him, I am the only blameless person here.
• So Vilkas, Jon and Benor go off on a Roaring Rampage of Revenge against the Silver Hand... until Jon notices something along the way.
  Jon: Now, I know we're supposed to be going and getting revenge for Kodlak, but... there's a mysterious tower, and it has a path leading up to it, and I don't know what it's for, and that intrigues me. 'cause that's like the lighthouse symbol, but, we're very far from the sea... (pans the camera directly over Skyrim's northern coastline) So why do we need a lighthouse?
• "Sorry about the minor detour there, Vilkas. It's just, you know what, there's other people that have been murdered, it's not just Kodlak Whitemane that's been murdered, alright, loads of people have been murdered. Very often by me, but in the instances where it's not by me, I do like to solve those murders. In instances where it is me, generally I pretend those don't happen and I pretend I'm a good person. That's pretty much how I live my life, and it's worked so far. Right!"
• Toward the ends of the Companion questline, Jon starts to wonder whether he made a mistake and The Extremist Was Right, since every time he's raided a Silver Hand camp and freed captive werewolves, the other lycanthropes have been invariably hostile, and he just exterminated Skyrim's premier werewolf hunters. Then he remembers how the Dawnguard kept attacking him even after he cured his own vampirism, and concludes he just saved himself some trouble in the long run.
• Jon decides to make Kodlak's funeral the "best or worst" ever by casting Dead Thrall on his corpse, but after climbing and jumping all over the pyre to get a good angle, Jon learns the devs were one step ahead of him and made the corpse immune to necromancy, or getting blasted off the pyre. He does find that he can use the Skyforge during the service, however.
  Jon: Anybody want a memorial jeweled necklace? Ooh, silver sapphire necklace, good stuff!
• "I don't know where Farkas has gotten himself to. Possibly he had a great big 'You go on ahead, I'll only slow you down, I will sacrifice myself for you!' moment but, if he did, I was scouting ahead or looting at the time and I missed it."
• While he's in the area, Jon explores Yngvild and is Squicked out when he learns what the local necromancer has been up to. The comments section is quick to point out that Jon is running around with his undead thrall husband.
• When the newly-Harbinger Jon returns to Jorrvaskr, he finds it all but deserted.
  Jon: So, um, two of the students decided to stay, no one's in the main feasting hall, the Underforge is locked away from me, I actually can't get in there... Right, so basically everyone just immediately quit the Companions in protest of my leadership, marvelous.
• Now that he's done with the Companions and no longer a werewolf, Jon returns to Castle Volkihar, gets turned into a vampire again, turns in a quest, confirms he's done all the interesting stuff for the vampires, and goes back to Morthal to get himself cured of vampirism for the last time.
  Jon: Okay, uh, Falion - don't judge me on this, but I got myself vampired, like, again. Two times, actually, uh, but the middle time, I just dealt with it myself, by turning myself into a werewolf, but I already sorted that out by like tossing a witch's head into a fire, but now I need your help again for the third instance of vampirism.
  Falion: I know many things-
  Jon: Yes, I know you do, in fact we've done this conversation before.
• At the end of Part 96, Jon declares that he'll be returning to the main quest for reals this time, "because I cannot be bloody distracted by the guilds anymore, there's no more guilds to be distracted by. I run absolutely all of them, okay?"
• Jon impulsively spends several minutes seeing if he can ride Arvak up to the Throat of the World, instead of doing it properly with the Greybeards' latest Shout.
  Jon: Screw your Shout, I have a horse, I have a demon horse from, like, beyond the grave or something.
• By the time he meets Paarthurnax, Jon thinks he has four Elder Scrolls. And for some reason Benor strips naked during the fight with Alduin on the Throat of the World.
• Jon decides to do the "Season Unending" quest to negotiate a ceasefire for the Skyrim Civil War, which is problematic since he's currently wanted in Windhelm. Out of curiosity, he surrenders to the guards and elects to serve his sentence, just to see how many years his assaults on the jarl and his mass murder of guards have earned him. Instead he's quite surprised to see that his sentence was just over a week long.
  Jon: I killed the entire police force, I had a bounty of fifteen thousand gold, and you kept me in jail for eight days?! Eight days was my sentence?!
  Windhelm Guard: You're the one who casts those illusions-
  Jon: And now basically me and the new police are cool! They're basically making nice comments about my Illusion magic! Well that's just... WHAT?!
• While sassing Ulfric for losing all his supporters but the most inept jarl in Skyrim and the jarl of a bunch of frozen shacks, Jon learns more about the Jarl of Windhelm than he wanted.
  Jon: Ulfric, you know, what he gets up to, in his own time when he's not jarl-ing, that's his business. If he wants to keep, y'know, a personal guard, just waiting in his chambers, and also if he wants to get visited by a guy whose name is, um...^note Galmar Stone-Fist let's actually just move on, let's move on.
• Before leaving for the final dungeon, Jon reflects on his Dwindling Party, how Vigilance has gone home to Markarth, Moira is usually hanging around in Hell, and Iona...
  Jon: ...Where the cock did Iona go, by the way? We never actually found her, but, Iona is just... gone, somewhere, I assume she's fine, wherever she is now...
• During his final talk with Benor('s reanimated corpse), Jon reflects how when they first met he needed Benor's help, but now his thrall constantly needs his.
  Jon: And I don't blame you, because much of this is my fault. Much of, you know, your current condition, is my fault. I, I was the one who did kill you, that one time, and then I believe if I'm counting correctly, seventeen times since. I did eat your heart out of your chest, I'm pretty sure I admitted to that. So that's all fine. That's fine too. So, in many ways, if you're feeling fragile these days, it is my fault. It's absolutely my fault. And I'm sorry. I'm sorry for a lot, actually. I could have been a better wife, I admit it.
• When Jon reaches Sovngarde, he greets Ysgramor with "I copied your soup spoon! It was a fork!"
• Jon translates Alduin's dying words as dragon for "Ow, that really bloody hurts! I'm all on fire and wrinkly! Ouch, ow ow ow!"
• Jon's main concern with the quest "The Taste of Death" is that it's going to end with him becoming a vampire again. But he's willing to go through the whole Cannibal Clan murdering and eating a priest thing, becoming another daedric prince's champion... and then he recognizes one of the cultists as the guy who sold him his puppy.
  Banning: You buy a war dog from me? There's a reason my hounds are so eager to bite people.
  Jon: ...Vigilance! He was... fed human flesh... that's... Okay. I'm not sure I'm one hundred percent keen on any of this. [...] As it turns out, I have uncovered a secret group of cannibals operating in and around Markarth, who have been murdering people and feeding the meat to the other citizens, and also feeding it to my dog. Now... (draws sword) I don't know if you know this, but I'm quite protective of my dog.
• Jon explains that a guard might be Bullying a Dragon by demanding he stop snooping around.
  Jon: Go on, what happens, I'm curious? What happens to: the thane of this city, who's also the Dragonborn, who's also the master of the college of the mages, who's also the leader of the Companions, who's also the kinda interim leader of the Thieves Guild, who's also the whatever-it-is related to the Night Mother, the Listener or whatever, and who's also probably seventeen other jobs, including being the preferred champion of seven different daedric princes. Tell me what happens, unnamed NPC?
  Stormcloak Soldier: Funny. This is your last warning, outsider. We keep the peace here. Stay out of our business.
  Jon: I'm the thane! You cocking work for me!
• "You're right, Madanach: one person got a really bad deal. And because of that single anecdote, let's bring down society!"
• After ending the civil war, Jon's disappointed that he can't make Ulfric Stormcloak his new Undead Thrall, but does the next best thing: stripping his and Galmar's corpses to their loinclothes and leaving them in a lover's embrace on the floor of the throne room.
• Jon decides to adopt Sofie into his house in Windhelm, which he admits he'll probably never visit again, and gives some specific instructions on his way out the door:
  Sofie: Did you need something, mama?
  Jon: Yeah, uh, just one thing - the secret cupboard? Never touch Mum's secret cupboard, alright? Seriously, that's where the necromancy happens. Do not go into my secret enchanting room, I will throw you out on the streets.
• The very first thing Jon does after opening a Black Book is fall off a platform into the corrosive sea of ink, ejecting him from Apocrypha.
  Jon: Lesson learned: don't go in the water. Because it's kind of weird and oily and evil and also full of tentacles and whatever...
• Jon's excited to be in Apocrypha, since he's Hermaeus Mora's champion and remembers how well his last quest with the abomination went.
  Jon: Last time I did a big thing for him, and read one of his books, I got like loads of skill points out of it, so, probably a good idea to basically-
  (a tentacle emerges from the oil and slaps at him)
  Jon: Oh, uh, hello! ...Or possibly not a good idea to investigate his library, because it's full of tentacles that want to murder me.
• "I like how everyone here in Raven Rock is basically from the north of England. It's just Yorkshire, in a volcanic island form!"
• While fighting foes who have reanimated the corpses in an old ruin, Jon tries to rebrand himself.
  Jon: Not nice people, those bloody necromancers... I'm not really a necromancer, by the way. I know I do some necromancy, but really, I do more summoning from Hell, and less bringing the dead back to life. So really, I'm quite the good necromancer.
• Jon declares that Master Neloth is the best NPC in the entire game and is all too willing to become the mad wizard's Professional Butt-Kisser.
  Jon: I love Master Neloth, the most blatantly evil bastard in Skyrim, but quite frankly, you know, he's happy being evil! He knows he's evil, he's cool with it! And he lives in a giant mushroom, and everyone else has to live in crappy individual houses!
• Jon describes Hermaeus Mora as his boyfriend, and is disappointed that the mass of eyes and writhing tentacles doesn't make a personal appearance the second time he visist Apocrypha.
• Even in Part 106 of the playthrough, Jon still struggles with pendulum traps.
• "Deeper and flipping deeper... wow, this place really goes on a bit. I thought we were just nipping in to, like, say hello to Miraak and kicking off the story, but no... [...] And yet further and further and bloody further down... at this point this is basically just Drama Queen architecture, okay? You didn't need to keep going further and further down, you just felt like being dramatic, Miraak, admit it."
• "I will head due north, in that case, I'll come back and visit that island later. And yeah, for the moment at least, let's actually just try and head down here, pick up the taproots that I need to fix up the mushroom, because that sounds fun, and then I'll probably save your people, possibly, I'm not sure. I'll do it if I can be bothered."
• The comments section is predictably horrified when the man with -1 Perception declares he's going on a treasure hunt.
• Jon's still besotted with Neloth, even after having to go off and kill one of his assassins that he can't be bothered to handle himself.
  Jon: Also, Neloth is going to be so pleased with me. By which I mean, he's going to be slightly pleased with me, but won't admit it, because he's just too good to actually show gratitude or whatever. And that's fine, he is my master, I am his faithful servant, I shouldn't expect anything better than, ideally, not being murdered, hopefully.
• It takes an embarrassingly long time for Jon to realize the minions he left behind are now in front of him because "Wait, it's a circle! That's how circles work, yes!"
• "So he's got his magic cube, which I can't help but notice he hasn't given to me. Alright, he's just insisting on keeping that for himself, and he's not saying 'I'm going to be your follower,' he's basically assuming that he is the protagonist of this story, and I'm an NPC follower for him, which is marvelous."
• When chosing the reward for clearing the Untold Legends Black Book, on the one hand, Jon often complains that vendors never have enough money to buy his enchanted jewelry. On the other hand, "I honestly can't think of anything I want more than a dremora butler."
• "Well, that was remarkably simple. And I am very clearly the good guy, because I didn't murder anyone. I was planning on murdering everyone, but then I thought, 'You know what, why bother?'"
• When exploring Vahlok's Tomb and its puzzles, Jon is alarmingly quick to assume he needs to kill the questgiver NPC he's been hired to escort through the dungeon.
  Tharstan: "A sacrifice will bring you closer to that which you seek." I wonder what it means?
  Jon: Oh, um, it means bad news for you, Tharstan! [...] Does the game just want me to murder this guy and toss him into the firepit? Because I'm totally fine with doing that, if that's what the game wants!
• After finding Karstaag's Skull in an icy cave after having explored Castle Karstaag, Jon is eager to return it to the rest of the skeleton, "because I'm assuming, logically, that he'll be quite appreciative of that!" After ten minutes of fighting and dying to the Superboss from hell:
  Jon: Right, I've made an executive decision, which is, um, I'm going to basically rule the entire world, and Karstaag can have his bloody frozen courtyard. I don't actually care enough about it. So, have a good life, it's lovely to have met you...
• "The enormity and dignity of your sacrifice, I'll admit, was slightly undermined by the fact that Frea is slighly freaking out and glitching in a slightly hilarious manner in the background."

Fallout 76: Wastelanders

• Jon dives into Fallout 76: Wastelanders on launch day, and points out how the one-year timeskip has been kind of awkwardly overlaid upon the base game.
  Jon: So all the stuff that people were doing when the game came out, all of that still happened. But characters who are leaving the Vault now, are leaving the Vault... now. So, the robot makes snarky comments about how you've just been hanging out in here. In the Vault. By yourself. For the past year.
  • For his first level-up, Jon focuses on Perception, because "as you're all well-aware, I desperately need it."
  • The awkwardness continues when Jon meets his first NPC.
    Lacey: You came out of the Vault, right? I thought it was empty. Wait, is the door still open?
    Jon: Um, canonically no, after the people left it sealed itself shut. But also canonically, like, people keep coming out of it. Like, loads of people. Honestly, it'll probably be open again in a few minutes, but I'm not allowed to say that.
  • He then chooses the most sarcastic, least helpful response, and is delighted that the NPC actually gets pissed with him and withholds information..
    Jon: Once again, I suffer the consequences for being a dick, which is absolutely beautiful!
  • While wearing a dirty Asylum Worker outfit and a Party Hat: "Okay, general life protip here: if anyone who looks like this comes up to you, you run and find a police officer."
  • Jon has a lot of good things to say about the game, though also criticisms, such as how some "settled" areas lack any indication that the NPCs in them are trying to make them liveable.
    Jon: And down by the river, presumably the fresh, running water they need to survive, Kesha McDermott's corpse is... still there. Because that's where it was in the original game, so that's where it remains. So, they just kind of let a corpse... rot. Next to a river. Which they draw their drinking water from.
  • Jon murders someone over some failed Artificial Atmospheric Actions.
  • "Okay, some things in Fallout 76 still just sort of don't work."
  • "Also, between them they have five Leather Right Arms, but no Left Arms. I feel like I'm coming across some elaborate leather armor-based tax scam here."
  • Jon being impressed with the various ways to complete a quest may be Damned by Faint Praise, but still...
    Jon: There's so much good here! They've actually turned Fallout 76 into, like, y'know, a Fallout game! Not one of the best ones, we're not talking about the level of New Vegas here, but it's still such a bloody step forward!
  • Jon finds a holotape humanizing the Free Radicals as something more than an Always Chaotic Evil gang of Raiders, and spends the time as it plays looting their hideout of everything valuable, while the gang's leader just watches.
• The second episode shows the downside of adding non-hostile NPCs to the game, because "it used to be if you saw someone moving, you could just fire with impunity, but now there's settlers, there's raiders who might be nice..."
  • "This is quite thick fog, 76, are you sure about this? That's a bit better, that was excessive there for a second."
  • At a robotics store, Jon finds a keycard that lets him access secure storerooms.
    Skinner: Excuse me, entrance into the showrooms is for customers only!
    Jon: Quiet you, I'm robbing you right now.
  • When the quest progresses to the point where an NPC leads Jon to a bound Scorch infectee and asks Jon to "give him a little nudge," Jon explains how on the test server, he interpreted this to mean "shoot him in the knee to wake him up," which killed the guy and made everyone else pissed at him. But he learned his lesson this time, and so... pistol-whips the guy in the head, which kills the guy and makes everyone else pissed at him.
    Duchess: What in the name of- the hell do you think you're doing?!
    Jon: I just woke him up! You, you - hang on! That was - I didn't - what? Hang on - no, I didn't - he's fine! I didn't kill him! He's just hostile!^note (The attack did minor damage, turned the NPC hostile, then he died anyway without Jon noticing) Duchess, are you okay? [...] Maybe I was supposed to - oh, I think I was just supposed to... actually speak to him. Right, okay, so don't kill him, that's Step One. Don't be hostile to him at all, that's Step Two. 'cause apparently now I've aggroed him, and that's bad. But to be honest, I kind of thought you wanted me to whack him with a gun to wake him up. I'm really, really sorry about these things.
  • Afterward, the pissed NPCs don't react to Jon blowing the head off the infected man he just killed. Which predictably leaves a breathing mask hovering over the corpse's neck.
    Jon: Fallout 76! Still has the odd problem with bugs and glitches and whatnot, perhaps somewhat unsurprisingly.
  • "Yep, there we go, I officially failed to wake up Crane. Which I disagree with, I one-hundred-percent woke him up, just... a bit too violently, apparently."
  • "You're doing a really terrible job holding that guy hostage."
  • Jon asks Sol to elaborate on Polly the Assaultron "and his 'bot-sister' relationship, because, is this weird?"
    Sol: I don't know if all Assaultrons are like her, or it was something to do with her reprogramming, but she's... like a real lady. Once I got Duchess to see that, well, it was smooth sailing. Or as smooth as this group gets.
    Jon: It sounds like it's pretty weird, yes.
  • Jon's impressed that the Overseer's Home isn't a fake-out, and the NPC is actually there in a fully-furnished house.
    Jon: By the way, I'm going to be looting all your stuff. I mean, you know how it is, we need screws. Screws for everything.
  • Jon points out how some of the odds and ends in the Overseer's house are from the places you find her logs in, retracing her journey across Appalachia. "Also, I'll be having her accordian."
  • The Overseer is shocked that Jon's character is only just now leaving Vault 76, confirming that yes, "Apparently I just overslept. For approximately a year and a half. Lovely."
• Jon spends an hour with his high-level character to see "What's New in West Virginia?"
  • For his third attempt at giving that Scorched NPC a "nudge," Jon figures out "you're supposed to Interact with him, not shoot or batter him in any way."
  • Jon gets annoyed with Joe the wanna-be private, who refuses to do push-ups or go into the wasteland, and when shaken down for supplies only has ten rounds of ammo.
    Jon: (shooting the NPC) Oh my goodness, he's even terrible at dying!
  • When clearing a raider camp, Jon encounters two named NPCs who are both hostile and immortal, and a third who is named but passive.
    Jon: Yes, so there's a Bruiser and a Blackeye over here, you guys just down on the ground for a second, okay, I will be out of your hair in just a sec, I just wanna check who... who the heck is Fishbones, and why aren't you shooting me?
    Fishbones: Mirelurks been giving us trouble. Could use a hand.
    Jon: Okay, fair enough, I will gladly help you out, Mysterious Man Who Isn't Shooting Me.
  • "So, let's head north here, try and find our way to Rollins Work Camp and rescue a... did they say Derek? I think they said Derek. No, Beckett! And you know how I know it's Beckett? 'cause it's written on the screen right now, Jon!"
  • Jon passes a Perception check to make Beckett say what he did during his time with the Blood Eagles.
    Beckett: I killed people, okay? I killed them for as little as looking at me the wrong way. Thanks for reviving that painful memory.
    Jon: Okay, so just murder. That's fine, everyone's a murderer in the post-apocalypse.
  • Forty minutes into his journey, Jon notes that every location he's visited that used to be held by Super Mutants is now controled by another type of enemy, so "I'm starting to get worried about the sustainability of the Super Mutant population."
  • Jon's quest markers get confused, so he goes inside his own face for a second.
• In Part 3, Jon summarizes the situation in Appalachia as "there are large populations who are currently unvaccinated against a contagious disease that could potentially do catastrophic damage to all of the new societies, and this all got a bit too real for me."
  • Rose sends Jon to hunt down a plot coupon, which will involve some investigating.
    Rose: Sooooo I hope you like playing detective.
    Jon: I love playing detective.
    Rose: You gotta get to David's room, get the trophy, and then find something that will tell you where the memorial is. I ain't saying you'll have to trash the place, buuuut you may have to trash the place. Easy-peasy, right?
    Jon: Oh, if there's one thing I love more than being a detective, it's trashing the place while being a detective.
  • The Wastelanders quests are trying to make better use of SPECIAL stats in quest resolution. Key word, trying.
    Jon: Here we go, so, "This painting has a Raider symbol painted over it..." I could "look behind it," or... with Perception 4+, "look behind it" but like, better, I suppose.
  • A mystery from a previous episode is resolved when some weird glows on the ground turn out to spawn Floaters.
    Jon: So yes, that's what those are, they're like traps, but either someone already triggered it or it just, y'know, bugged out. It's Fallout 76, sometimes things just bug the flip out.
  • "So, let's nip north to The Crater! Though I'm going to be honest, that's a catastrophic failure of naming things. Like, imagine you lived in this ridiculous mega-sci-fi wonderland, and you couldn't come up with a better name than... The Crater. That's just ridiculous, Meg, you're letting me down."
  • "Alright, Meg, I'm not gonna lie, I really enjoy saying 'I told you so.'"
    Meg: Look who finally showed up! Where's Aldridge?
    Jon: Oh, dead, super dead.
  • After getting a quest to put down raiders who tried to leave Meg's outfit, Jon turns on one of the game's new companions.
    Jon: By the way, I've got a Beckett living at my camp. Would you like him? Because he technically is a former raider - not yours, but like, y'know, still.
  • Over the course of the episode, Jon grows exasperated at how paranoid the people of Appalachia are toward the concept of vaccinations.
    Paige: Innoculate? This some kind of scare tactic?
    Jon: Okay, why is everybody an idiot?
  • "Also, I'm now curious what happens if I shoot this melon."
  • "Okay, Overseer, while you've been down here just tinkering and eating pies, I have managed to negotiate access for medical assistance for two factions that hate each other. You're flipping welcome."
  • Of course, right after criticizing the Overseer for staying home while he did all the legwork, Jon's amazed when she says to meet her at the next quest objective.
    Jon: Oh my goodness, she's actually willing to leave her fortified bunker and help! Well that's just quite frankly shocking!
    (the Overseer walks across the room and takes a seat)
    Jon: I say that, she's... she's immediately just sat down again. Yeah, sorry, don't, y'know, do too much or anything, you might get yourself worn out!
• Jon starts Part 4 by complaining how last time he met the game's new factions, "offered them, completely for free, life-saving vaccinations that would stop them from turning into zombies, and for some reason they made me do work for them before they were willing to accept the free medication, so what can you flipping do?"
  YouTube comment: Jon, it occurs to me about the two factions, you showed up dressed like that offering to inject things into them... I'd say they had a right to be wary. I'd imagine anyone sane would be.
  Many A True Nerd: Ok, when you put it that way, Crazy Owl Head's Homemade Fizzy Vaccines do sound SLIGHTLY suspicious.
  • Jon defeats an Assaultron by crippling its laser-face and hiding on a rafter out of the bot's reach, which leads it to run off and get killed by the Mr. Handy NPCs from the previous stage of the quest.
  • When Vault 79 is confirmed to have all of America's gold reserves in it, Jon spends several minutes explaining why gold is borderline useless in a post-apocalyptic society, and proposes doing a video later on Fallout economics.
    Jon: ...if we're just talking about trade rather than backing a currency, then I'm not sure gold is actually that useful. Because gold doesn't have any intrinsic value for direct trade, it's just used as a - nevermind, let's just discuss this in detail another day. Yes, how about we just swim in it instead?
  • This continues when Jon goes to the Raiders to see what they think about breaking into a Vault.
    Jon: Here's the deal - I need your help to access a giant Vault full of gold, and after you've done all the work opening the Vault, I'd like to split the gold with you, and like use it to set up a civilization that you actively don't want, and you'll definitely, one-hundred-percent, not at that point go on to betray me and take all of the gold for yourself. Right? Good, good good good.
    Meg: Well if that don't pique my interest. Please, go on. And what exactly, pray tell, is inside this Vault 79?
    Jon: So. Much. Flipping. Gold.
    Meg: This is a fascinating turn of events, ain't it? The things I could buy with that gold...
    Jon: You couldn't buy anything with that gold!
  • "I like that she's open about the fact that she's very tempted to just kill me and take my stuff. It bodes really well for the moment we open the Vault and at that point try to start sharing."
  • Jon notices he's reached a branching point in the game's main questline.
    Jon: Ooh, am I supposed to be potentially talking to Paige before making this decision? Screw it, Raiders it is!
  • When he comes across one of Lucky Lou's suicide machines, Jon immediately sits in it to see if it goes off.
    Jon: Aaannnd... (beat) It's beeping. Is it... is it going to shoot me? (beat) Well I'm not dead yet, maybe he's just really, really terrible at killing himself. Ah! Lucky Lou. So lucky, he's consistantly failed to take his own life. Okay, that's... that's bloody dark, but okay! [...] Now this, this is the sort of pitch-black humor I want in my Fallout games, dammit!
  • Jon's sympathetic when he meets Lou face-to-face, though he has a different view of his problem.
    Lou: I tell you, my luck ain't a blessing, it's a curse.
    Jon: Yeah, but it's really, really good when it comes to high-crits builds. Those are amazing.
  • Jon completes the dungeon crawl, goes through the Skyrim Door, returns to the surface, and remembers something.
    Jon: And there we go, front door is open, and... I forgot to pick up Weasel. Um. Was I supposed to go back and pick up Weasel after we were done? Because I didn't, I just, I just left - I'm sure Weasel's fine!
  • Even though he's favoring the Raiders, Jon decides "screw it" and goes to Foundation with word of Vault 79, and notes it's lucky that he decided to take two sets of blueprints for the Vault.
  • "I mean, it does sound like he's making a more reasonable and less overtly evil offer than the Raiders, but I kinda want to go down the overtly evil path! That sounds fun!"
  • "Still, I would say, ladies and gentlemen, that is enough for now. We now know what we're doing, we're breaking into Vault 79, because gold. Admittedly, we kind of already knew that. But now we know for certain, we saw an educational film and everything!"
• In Part 5, Jon decides to advance the Settlers' questline a bit to see how it compares to the Raiders', and as soon as he enters the Hornwright Estate safe room, he has to spend a bit critiquing its design.
  Jon: Also, you really could have done better than this for a safe room, like c'mon! Like right flipping here, anyone who's walking past would see anyone on the toilet, the shower - sure you could pull the curtain, but still, this is - you could've arranged these things better. Like, move these three [screens] over to here, and you've done a much better job already.
  YouTube comment: The man designing open-plan bathrooms complains about visible toilets.
  • Penelope Hornwright asks why Jon's after the Motherlode, and he specifies that he's helping the Settlers of Foundation, "and doing the good thing, this defnitely isn't me about being filthy, filthy rich."
    Penelope: I don't understand. What do they want with the Vault? I saw Foundation on my way back into Appalachia. They looked pretty comfortable there.
    Jon: Yeah, but they'd feel better with solid gold bathtubs.
  • In the middle of explaining that he's on the clock due to imminent server maintenance, Jon gets distracted by a clown painting, an elephant painting, and a Scorched wearing a trash can.
  • Jon tops up his shotgun shell supply at another player's C.A.M.P. but encounters Commander Daguerre there, who doesn't recognize him despite Jon rescuing her to have her visit his own C.A.M.P. He concludes that her spaceship's crew consisted entirely of clones of Daguerre who are all looking for each other.
  • After learning that Jen's parents were Chinese spies, Jon's none too trusting of her, since he knows from other Fallout titles that there could still be Red Chinese agents in the region.
    Jon: Okay, just so we're on the same page here, I know you just said you weren't a spy, but can you actually, y'know, prove it? Because we don't know for certain there isn't somebody you could be reporting to, potentially, she could be a traitor.
    Jen: I'm telling you that I'm not. Are you exactly like your parents?
    Jon: Well, it's kind of unclear, 'cause we don't actually know anything about them within the confines of the game.
  • Jon's quite impressed with the secret subterranean Chinese listening post's visuals, but he has to ask, "How the hell did you build this underneath the flipping American Presidential Nuclear Bunker?"
  • When Jen and her mom have their confrontation, Jon's not sure what all the tension is about.
    Jen: Just don't move, okay? I'm trying to think of a way where you walk out of this. Where we don't just kill you along with everyone else down here.
    Jon: Okay. So, for some reason, everyone's really on the "Oh, just let me live," and she's the "Oh, we need to not kill you," and you can just... like, leave with her. Like, y'know, just walk out. Like, when you see "We're trying to formulate a way to walk out," like... we can use our legs. Um, just invite her back to Foundation, and we all walk out together. That's... that's it, Jen! We just walk out! Our plan for walking out of this is to walk out, 'cause the door's open, Jen! Why are we struggling with this? What's the problem?
    [...]
    Jen: It's asking a lot for me to forgive her.
    Jon: I'm not actually asking you to forgive her, that's not what I'm saying at all. Just don't shoot her. There is a middle ground between "murder" and "hugging." Like, just walking out, that would work too.
  • After deciding "Everyone lives today, we'll cross further Murder Bridges when we come to them," Jon passes an Intelligence check to resolve the standoff peacefully, and the quest ends without further incident.
    Jon: Alright, I'm gonna be honest - I was expecting these shutters to open, then some evil laughter, then the guys she was referring to to, y'know, start giving an evil monologue, and then he started shooting me with a plasma caster and then all the Chinese agents ran in and started gunning me down, but no. No, it turns out we're just gonna resolve this by talking about stuff. Which is fair enough, I suppose.
    Mochou: Thank you, for sparing my life.
    Jon: I wonder if I could just murder her right now - no, don't do that, just go!
  • Jon is of course thrilled to have another suit of Chinese Stealth Armor, doubly so since its stealth effect works even if he's wearing his Fasnacht Owl Mask.
    Jon: And yeah, with the actual owl head, the silhouette is a bit on the disturbing side. I kind of just want to hang out next to Vault 76 and freak out Level 2 new players. I mean, just imagine: you've just started the game, you're just getting to grips with things, and then you think you see something in the corner of your eye. You look closely at it, and then just as soon as you get a little too close, BAM! All of a sudden, this is there! This is what greets you! It's, it's just perfect!
  • By the end of the episode, Jon admits that he was favoring the Raiders faction due to explosions and violence, but the Settlers have really won him over because of the Chinese Stealth Armor.
• In Part 6, Jon finds that his new Stealth Armor is incredibly powerful, and also that the game can still be "uh, weird."
  • When doing the next Raider quest, at first Jon's annoyed that Ra-Ra spends the first stage of the quest in hiding instead of letting Jon get on with rescuing her.
    Jon: Although in retrospect, yes, I can understand why she might not necessarily immediately trust me, given the circumstances.
  • "So, how about you go and open that door by hitting the big, red button?" [...] "Okay, presumably she's now going to go through over here, and... 'Emergency Response.' Uh-oh. Okay, I take it back, do not push the big, red button. That feels like it would be a bad button. Ra-Ra? Don't do it, Ra-Ra."
  • "Also, seriously, Jon, turn the light off when you're invisible. What would the Stealth Armor from Old World Blues say if she could see you now?"
  • The quest hits a hiccup when Ra-Ra complains she's hungry, and one of the responses on the Dialogue Tree is "Hi, 'Starving,' I'm Jon."
    Jon: Oh my. Have I ever been allowed to do a Dad Joke in Fallout before? Screw it, I'm doing it now!
    Ra-Ra: Come onnnnnn! Do you have any food? I'm soooo hungry!
    Jon: Please let me say "Hi, So Hungry, I'm dad." No, I'm not allowed to, boo!
  • Jon uses his Stealth Suit to sneak-attack and dismantle a Legendary Sentry Bot. Or at least, that was the plan.
    Jon: What we do instead is, start crippling its- (fires the last shot in his clip) I should have really reloaded before- (explodes) oh, bloody hell!
  • Jon, as a Brit, is less than thrilled about Gentleman Johnny Weston's idea of a "character."
    Jon: Okay, um, just FYI, nobody in England actually speaks with that accent anymore, but I suppose nobody here would know that, so fair enough, I suppose.
  • When he's forced into some Gladiator Games, Jon immobilizes all the Ghouls he's supposed to fight by blasting their legs, then takes a moment to wander around, wondering where exactly the audience is.
    Jon: When you say "arena," who's... who's actually watching this? Is, is anybody watching this? I mean there's a bunch of, there's a bunch of heads on spikes, but like, no one seems to be actually watching this- (a Ghoul lunges at him) Oh bloody hell! Sorry, sorry, didn't realize you'd spawn more of them!
• Right away in Part 7, Jon gets a glitch where his character refuses to put down a US flag.
  • On the one hand, the Army specialists Jon is meeting come from the Pitt, which as he knows is not a good place to be from. "Then again, you've got a dog. Okay, now that I know you've got a dog, I trust you a lot more."
  • When Captain Fields demands to know by what authority Jon plans on taking Vault 79's gold supply, Jon responds with "I'm the last member of the Order of Mysteries" specifically because the guy will have no idea what he's talking about.
  • A random Scorchbeast attacks some robots near his next objective, and while Jon could sneak past the fight thanks to his Stealth Suit, "if I could bring down a dragon with a bow and arrow, then that'd be fun, I'd have gone full Skyrim!"
  • When it comes to choosing a donor for an incomplete Robobrain, Jon finds himself drawn to the brain jar labeled "Oh, poor Gina," which manages to "radiate sadness."
    Jon: No, that would be horribly, horribly cruel to do, right? To deliberately bring Gina back, when we know she might be I'm doing it!
  • "You know what, this is probably the most monstrous thing I've ever said, but I'm kind of disappointed Gina wasn't more, y'know, sad. So I was hoping for a bit more of a tragic backstory, but... Gina, are you okay by the way? Gina? Okay, Gina doesn't want to speak to me anymore, and now she's just dragging around, ah, dragging around a corpse, so... okay, Gina just lives here now. Gina's fine."
  • "I'm going to be honest, if I had to join one cult in the world, I would go for a potato cult, because potatoes are delicious and nutritious."
  • Before choosing a side for the gold heist, Jon wants to wrap up the new companions' sidequests, specifically Beckett's because of all the raider murder. Or so you'd think.
    Jon: Okay, so, that's three fetch quests in a row. I would like a flipping murder now, please. You promised me murder.
  • Jon's delighted to finally get a quest to whack somebody, and resolves to take out the target without anyone else seeing. And then immediately brushes up against a Firecracker Berry bush.
    Jon: Okay, so I just walked into a plant that flashes and crackles, but other than that, the stealth mission is still going just. Fine.
  • After listening to an holotape from a Moth Cultist ranting about being "blessed by the air beneath thy wings," Jon assumes the group just has a dream of taking flight.
    Jon: Is that is what this is all about, you want to fly? That's fine, flying is cool, that's a really cool fantasy. Just, y'know, be open about it, don't disguise it behind a moth cult.
  • Jon's excited to get an option to flirt with Beckett... which he won't be taking.
    Jon: Nonononono, I'll be flirting with Commander Daguerre, actually.
• In Part 8, Jon is playing "Silent Assassin" by using his Stealth Armor and bow to sneak through Raider camps, taking out key targets with a silent headshot, and sneaking out. Which, combined with an underground mission site...
  Jon: Wow. Yeah, this is very much like a Skyrim cave, actually. Yeah, we are actually playing Skyrim today.
  • Five minutes into the video, Jon's guessing that the three Blood Eagle bosses are going to be one of the rival Raider bosses they're trying to help, Beckett's kid brother, and Beckett himself.
  • During the episode's second mission, Jon tries to snipe a distant turret with a spray of buckshot.
    Jon: Okay. I didn't realize I had my shotgun out, on account of being invisible. I'll admit, I thought I had the bow out. That's what I was going for.
  • Beckett is apologetic when his next quest is to go find an ally's missing dog.
    Jon: My friend, you do not need to explain further, I will move heaven and earth to get a missing dog back. (sees a related Perception check in the dialogue tree) Indeed, it doesn't take much Perception to see that's the case.
    Beckett: Yeeah. Those people are called "weirdos." I don't care if Edwin wants to marry his dog, right? If it puts his gang on our side, we all win.
    Jon: Beckett, you absolute monster. Dogs are brilliant and I love dogs. Just point me in the right direction, I'm not happy with you right now.
  • Unfortunately, the quest doesn't quite unfold that way.
    Jon: Okay Beckett, puppy rescued, sadly not a puppy, just a mole rat. And I'm going to be honest, in normal circumstances I would've just killed it for the meat.
  • Beckett has some differing moral standards from his accomplice.
    Beckett: I once saw [Star] kick a defenseless woman off a cliff. I mean, who the hell does that? She needs to fall. Hard.
    Jon: Okay, Beckett has clearly never seen me playing Assassin's Creed: Odyssey but, uh, fair enough, let's go kill her.
  • "Now that, that's badass. You murder someone with a bow, then you sneak up to their corpse while they're still surrounded by their confused bodyguards, to get the arrow back. That, that's badass right there.
  • When Jon learns Beckett's brother Frankie has been captured by the Blood Eagles, he can see the plot twist coming.
    Jon: I'm gonna be honest, I'm gonna come straight at you with this one, has he maybe just, you know, joined, willingly? Is he perhaps actually one of their leaders?
    Beckett: Frankie? (scoffs) No. There's no way. They're holding him for leverage, plain and simple. And now that their Buffout supply is gone, god knows whow they're going to mess with his mind.
    Jon: Okay, I can't help but notice you didn't say "No, he couldn't be, he's a really good person and I trust him," you just said "No, he couldn't be," and then gave no reason. Like actually, you're just a bit blind to the possibility, because he's your brother.
  • "Okay, like, but when you say 'help,' you're not actually doing any of it. Like, you're doing nothing, I'm the one do- never mind, I'll get it done."
  • "Oh dear! ...You walked into me and didn't notice me, that's... okay, that's a lot of drugs you're on."
  • As he nears the end of Beckett's quest chain, the former Raider wonders what comes next.
    Jon: I'm gonna be honest, Beckett, I'm gonna break down your stupid stand and then immediately invite Commander Daguerre back to my camp so I can do her quest instead, because I kinda want to romance her, don't want to romance you. So, uh, sorry about that. But yeah, you know what, "You can stay at my C.A.M.P. for as long as you like," I'll just lie to you.
  • "Ohhhkaay. Continue on straight and I'm seeing a, okay, I'm seeing the doom arena. Yes, this is a doom arena. Beckett, you feel like going into a doom arena?"
  • "I feel like the instancing might have gone a bit wrong in this area, because yes, there's definitely supposed to be a fight in this room, but, um... they're all already dead. Possibly someone came in here recently and this area isn't instance, so I just get to stroll on through."
  • Jon's uncomfortable when the reinforcements during the final mission are generic Raider Reavers.
    Jon: Okay, you didn't mention that the people we were working with had titles like "Reaver." I'm gonna be honest, I'm not feeling positive about that in the slightest.
  • When they reach The Claw, Jon can only crow "I flipping called it!"
    YouTube comment: Yes Jon. As one of your dozen scenarios, this was one of them. XD
  • As Beckett tries to process the plot twist, Jon ponders the ethical aspects of whether to spare or save Frankie, then notices a desk fan in the background. And an alarm clock.
    Jon: I'll get back to the moral choice in a second, I'm just looting.
  • Right in the middle of talking about how he'll be scrapping Beckett's bar stand to make way for Commander Daguerre, Jon finds something that makes him glad he handled the quest the way he did.
  • In the end, after helping an ex-Raider work with some other Raiders to take out a different group of Raiders...
    Jon: This isn't really a redemption arc for you, you've just kinda gone from a like -5 to a -4.
• Jon introduces Part 9 by summarizing how last time he helped Beckett deal with his past and rescue his brother...
  Jon: ...and at the end, he asked if he could stay at our C.A.M.P. forever, because I'm now his best friend. And I said yes. And I was lying, because we're now going to kick him out, because you can only have one companion at any given time, and now I want to get Commander Dageurre in.
  Beckett: I'm out of the gang, got a bar of my own, and the drinks are cold. Life doesn't get any better than this.
  Jon: Did he just say "life doesn't get any better than this?" Oh. Oh, Beckett, I'm so flipping sorry. (scraps Beckett's stand) Right! There we go, scrapped him, Vault-Boy is not a hundred percent thrilled about that, but what can you do, eh?
  • Update 19 added the ability to change companion's clothing, so Jon decides Daguerre's silvery space suit has to go.
    Jon: Oh yes, Civil War uniform and top hat, absolutely marvelous! Now she'll blend in much better.
  • "Okay, she keeps giving me a new gauss rifle. Every single time I complete another mission, she just gives me a new gauss rifle. If I keep breaking them down in front of her, do you think she'll get the message?"
  • When Daguerre mentions she's an Unstoppables fan, Jon immediately dresses her up like the Mistress of Mystery.
  • Once again, Jon tries to guess the quest line's plot twist.
    Jon: Somebody has upgraded these things to do what they're not supposed to. Someone who knew their systems quite well, Emerson. Or possibly Dr. Lee. Or possibly Dr. Bernard. Or possibly... the other one, whose name I've forgotten, but who's still suspicious.
  • When Emerson acts shady and tries to get Jon and Daguerre to abandon their investigation, Jon declares "Oh, I am looking forward to shooting you."
  • Between Fetch Quests, Jon checks in on Daguerre and asks about her defending herself.
    Daguerre: Maybe I'll brush off those skills and start practicing. Just in case.
    Jon: Good idea. Also, kissy, kissy smoochy-face. (hits "Flirt" option)
    Daguerre: Call me Sofia... please. After all we've been through. After all, I'm in your "ship" now. That makes you the Commander here.
    Jon: Okay, if you wanna call me Commander, I'm into that, I can get used to it, that's fine!
  • While musing about a holotape, Jon hops off a roof onto a billboard, clips through the billboard because it's not a solid game object, survives a fall with surprisingly little damage, and forgets that it's because of the armor he's wearing, not the game tweaking fall damage.
  • Daguerre describes how her headaches are getting better, and wonders if it's because her brain is thawing from cryo-sleep, before dismissing the notion.
    Jon: I'm gonna be honest, that kind of is how it works. Like, just the other day, I slapped a brain onto a stove to thaw it out, and that worked!
  • "Anything you've thought up, by the way, in terms of questions? Because I appreciate that it's been the apocalypse, and I've got you dressed up like a superhero."
  • After the next fetch quest, Jon hands over some medical records and then realizes he forgot to read them, and can only hope "maybe my character did."
  • "So, I'm guessing next step is going to Arktos itself to, y'know, get a sample of the virus, but I like to be told to do things by Sofia, it makes me feel good about life."
    Daguerre: In the meantime, let's just eliminate that rogue USSA robot that's lurking around monitoring us. Gives me the creeps.
    Jon: I'm gonna be honest, I know where Arktos Headquarters is. It's actually in a fairly low-level area, pretty close by to here, could just nip over - nevermind, I'll wait for you to tell me to do it.
  • "And most importantly of all, wanna play some games when all this is done?"
    Daguerre: Oh, be still my beating heart! That sounds like a dream come true, my dear friend. But also, you don't stand a chance.
    (a nuke goes off in the background)
    Jon: She's not wrong. Red Menace I believe was the rip-off of Donkey Kong, and I was always terrible at that, it took me so long to get the special coins in DK 64
  • Jon keeps finding top-secret, pre-War files in pretty stupid locations.
    Jon: Okay, not where I expected to uh, end up, really. And old abandoned trainyard, and I'm being directed to an old boxcar of some description. So... not sure why a tape about a secret government program to do some form of terribly unethical experiment to their own astronauts would be... in a boxcar, but apparently that's where we're going, so... Okay, this is just where that is, for some reason.
  • The drama of Daguerre confronting Emerson about the truth is undercut only slightly by him being stuck on the other side of a wall during the conversation.
  • As Jon and Daguerre bond over The Unstoppables...
    Jon: This is just downright weird. We're talking about the Mistress of Mystery sneaking in invisible-like, while she's dressed up as the Mistress of Mystery, and I go invisible all the time. So this is... this is just downright weird, but okay.
  • During the climax of the Daguerre quest line, Emerson, Daguerre and Jon end up facing A.T.H.E.N.A., an AI that's been linked to Daguerre's brain. While Daguerre wonders if there's a way to sever the link without terminating A.T.H.E.N.A., and Jon wants to talk about Emerson potentially murdering the other members of the experiment, he notices a Luck 15+ dialogue option...
    Jon: Well, that all seems to have worked out, I think! Right, that's... right? Good? [...] Okay, I'm going to be honest, I just made up some words, and now the robot's... now the robot's gone. A.T.H.E.N.A.'s just gone now.
    A.T.H.E.N.A.: (static)
    Jon: Okay, so A.T.H.E.N.A.'s gone. Um... you're welcome? I think?
    Daguerre: Is it... over? Did she... seem happy?
    Emerson: I don't know if that was a wise choice, friends.
    Jon: I wouldn't say "choice."
    [...]
    Daguerre: Thank you, my dear friend. Thank you for helping me through all of this. I'll see you back at our camp soon.
    Jon: Oh my goodness, she just said our camp! Also, hang on, can we actually... (shoots Emerson with a shotgun to no effect) No, we can't put him down, unfortunately, that's a shame. Seriously, you just got away with several murders we didn't really challenge you about!
  • Jon is surprised that A.T.H.E.N.A. in her new Assaultron chassis is hanging around his camp, then delighted that she's a live-in shop. "Okay, I have accidentally made the right choice!"
    Jon: I mean honestly, if I end up in a polyamorous relationship with a Mistress of Mystery cosplayer and a robot, I'm pretty cool with that, that's fine, that's a good outcome as far as I'm concerned.
  • When Daguerre admits that she forgets Jon's camp is officially his home and not hers...
    Jon: Well, I'm going to be honest, Sofia. You've been here for several days, possibly weeks, and you have been staying here day and night, and there is only one bed. So I feel like if you weren't reading the signals, that's on you, not me.
  • Then Daguerre's surprised at Jon's interest, insisting that she's not "dating material."
    Jon: The tech-savvy, astronaut nerd? No, no, why would anyone ever think that the tech-savvy astronaut nerd would be date material? And also, when you say "you've never," I have been flirting with you, aggressively, for weeks. If there's one problem in this relationship, it's your catastrophically, terrifyingly high level of obliviousness.
    YouTube comment: When Jon commented about her being oblivious, all I could think of was "Pot, meet Kettle." But in a good way. Never change, Jon.
• In Part 10, Jon decides to break into Vault 79 with the raiders of Crater, because even though he knows they're going to betray him, "I wanna see how Lucky Lou's plot ends up."
  • "Okay, Lucky Lou, me and you, step one, blow the bloody doors off, and... does anyone remember what the keypad code was? Well the quest log does, so that's bloody convenient, marvelous."
  • When Jon finds Lou tied up, his instinct is to search the area for notes or audio logs explaining who tied Lou up rather than immediately untying Lou and asking who tied him up.
    Lou: Dunno why [Lev] did what he did. Maybe just hates ghouls. Maybe hates the rest of Meg's gang. Maybe both. I'll 'member to ask him next time he tries to kill me.
    Jon: Okay, Lou, if you have to think really hard about what might be a motive to, y'know, take the detonator that gives access to the Vault that's full of gold, you might be able to figure this out.
  • "Alright, we're putting off the raid for the moment because as it turns out, some of them have flipping betrayed Meg before the event even got kicked off. Which is kind of good, to be honest, because if everyone gets the betrayal out of their system before anyone has a chance to betray me, that could work, I'd be happy with that!"
  • When investigating which raider is Lev's mole, Jon discounts Axel because he's claiming he's working for Lev.
    Jon: We know you're trying to cover for somebody, we know that's a thing you do. So... okay, if that were true, you'd be able to tell me where he is.
    Axel: I uh, I dunno. H-he didn't say.
    Jon: Alright, this - no. No no no no no, you're not the one.
    Axel: No, it's really me, and I'm sorry for it! You gotta believe me!
    Jon: Okay, unless this is a really, really damned good double-bluff, where, by obviously admitting to it, he's rules himself - oh, this guy could be a bloody criminal mastermind!
  • "Also, whoever's playing the piano over there, plese bloody stop, I'm trying to solve crime!"
  • When Jon unmasks the mole, he vows to take word to Meg so she can decide how to dispense justice.
    Barb: Aw, dammit... Meg's gonna be pissed.
    Jon: I suspect she's gonna be more than that, but uh, yeah. Meg's getting told.
    (Gilligan Cut)
    Jon: Okay, Meg doesn't feel like talking right now, so... yeah. We're doing Lev first, gotcha.
  • Jon's actually earned another level-up, so he picks Mister Sandman to boost his nocturnal stealth archery.
    Jon: Yeah, that's gonna make the bow very, very powerful! ...I say it's night, it's actually almost dawn, but screw it, sooner or later it will be night and then that will be very useful!
  • Jon the owl-headed stealth archer vs. trashcan dog.
  • Lev might be in the wrong Fallout game.
    Lev: Bah, only room for strongest, best men in this world! Others have their uses, but they are not equal.
    Jon: Okay, you know what, you would love Caesar's Legion. Just head over to the West, wait about a hundred, a hundred-fifty years thereabouts, they'll be along, you'll love 'em.
  • When confronting Rocco the mastermind, Jon can only ask "Who the hell are you, and how did you do... any of this? And how are you standing inside that chair?"
    Rocco: Shit. What do you want with me?
    Jon: I want to know how in the bloody hell you were able to bribe someone so they weren't interested in a Vault that was full of gold. (hits "I heard you were going to pay Lev for a job. Ring a bell?")
    Rocco: Uh, maybe, what's it to ya?
    Jon: And yeah, honestly I- (sees the only option is "Attack") Oh. Apparently I'm murdering this guy. I would've liked to know more, dig into his backstory, find out about his parents. But, um, apparently we're... we're murdering. Okay. Um. (combat begins) I guess we're just getting into the murder, and you know, raider situation right now. (combat ends) Okay, his head's fallen off. (checks body) No notes... Well that's.... that's interesting. I was kind of hoping for a bit more of an interrogation than that. Did he leave behind a... a-ha! Here we flipping go, he left behind a convenient bloody confession!
  • "Okay, Meg? It turns out this whole thing was orchestrated by... some guy, who just wanted to steal all of the gold, despite the fact that he had no viable way of... getting it for himself. And possibly, he bribed Lev with nonexistant guns, 'cause Lev was too dumb to realize that gold could... okay, basically it's just been a bit of a mess, okay?"
  • When Meg turns out to be a Reasonable Authority Figure, for a raider...
    Jon: Okay, I'm vaguely, conceptually thinking it's possible she won't betray me. Possibly.
  • The Vault door finally gets blasted down, and Jon can only wonder who's going to betray him next.
    Meg: Okay, get to it, Seven-Six! Make us rich!
    Jon: ...Yes. "Us." That's, that's gonna be... that's gonna be a thing that we do.
  • The rest of the team charges straight into the Vault while Jon talks to Meg, then makes his entry.
    Jon: Did you guys not bother taking out the, y'know, actual security? There's [a laser turret] like right there, like seriously, you just walked straight past it, what are you even doing right now? [...] So yeah, it would appear that Gale just sort of ran, straight flipping past, y'know, the turrets. That probably would have been shooting her. So that's good, that's a good start, I know I'm working with quality people right flipping here.
• When introducing the Grand Finale, Jon reminds us that his crew has broken into a Vault full of gold and now all that's left is to "walk in and claim it. By which I mean that's not going to happen, not a flippin' chance in hell."
  Jon: Because, of course, this isn't the first time we've had to break into a Vault chasing gold in Fallout, we've done that before, in Dead Money. Which was a cautionary tale about not trying to chase gold into Vaults and having to, y'know, "let go," leave it behind, because it was going to destroy you if you didn't. So that's, uh... that's one thing. As is the fact that I've also teamed up with raiders, who have already started betraying each other, so someone's gonna betray me. If they do, I'm gonna have no problems with betraying them right back.
  • One problem with the Stealth Suit - accidental weapon discharges.
  • "I always forget Legendaries can do that."
  • Jon is reminded that unlike in the early Bethesda titles, you can't hack while stealthed anymore.
  • "Honestly, the Stealth Archer build is doing a spectacularly good job, here, and..." (laser turrets start shooting) "Okay, they're not firing at me, honestly as long as it's not me that's under attack, I'm broadly fine with this, this isn't an issue in the slightest."
  • "I ALWAYS forget they do that."
  • When Ra-Ra prepares to get at a room from the air vents and talks about stealing stuff, Jon declares he's "playing by Mass Effect 2 Suicide Run rules here."
    Jon: Which is, I don't know whether any of these characters might actually die. Now Ra-Ra probably can't die because she's a child, but... Gail could. So no, we're not gonna touch anything, do the bare minimum, we're gonna get in and get out without getting anybody killed. Except possibly Johnny.
  • "Can my friends help me, by the way? I mean, they're right here. ...Would you guys like to assist?"
  • "Who are you shooting at? Okay, they're shooting at - honestly, that's, that's fine. That's just Johnny, he's been completely cocking useless..."
  • Jon sounds almost bored with Johnny's inevitable betrayal.
    Johnny: Wow, would you look at that! You weren't kidding about this being a big score! Makes me real sorry I've gotta do this to you.
    Jon: Yeah, thought so.
    Johnny: Nothing personal. If I cut you out of the equation, that's more gold for me. Any last words?
    Jon: I'm gonna be honest, I was thinking of precisely the same thing.
  • "You know, I would like to give more gold to Ra-Ra and Gail. Not sure what they'd spend it on or anything, but they were very helpful."
  • At the end of the heist, Jon points out that he hasn't betrayed Meg, "because you know what, I'm the only good person here."
    Jon: Apart from Ra-Ra, who is sweet and innocent and pure and we love her.
  • On the way out, he encounters Pita.
    Jon: Oh my goodness, they have tiny, tiny Secret Service agents in little tiny suits, that's adorable!
  • Even though the game doesn't prompt him to, Jon returns to the Overseer to see what she thinks about his adventure.
    Jon: So yeah, in the end I managed to get hold of, y'know, a small amount of gold, that I immediately traded back to the people who have way more gold, for like a pistol schematic I actually can't produce.
  • The Overseer doesn't criticize Jon for allying with the raiders, but she does worry how much they can be trusted.
    Jon: I'm gonna be honest, they've tried to betray me like three times so far, and every time they've all ended up dead and I've been fine. So probably... sure, I think it'll be absolutely fine.
  • And so the questline comes to an end.
    The Overseer: Come and visit anytime you need me. I'll be here, keeping an eye on Appalachia as best I can.
    Jon: Okay, that's good, because that's the end of Wastelanders, so I'm probably going to be, um, going now? And I won't be back for a fair few months until there's like, you know, another expansion or something.

Medieval II: Total War

• Jon decides to play Medieval II: Total War as Denmark, and since he isn't sure how to pronounce the name of his capital, he changes it from Aarhus to "Ourhaus."
• He also gets way too into pondering why a basic Brothel structure only provides a 5% boost to a settlement's happiness.
  Jon: I mean if you think about it, a brothel only having five percent happiness, those are not very good prostitutes. They're just not doing their job particularly well, if you're only five percent happier afterwards. But I guess maybe that's like standardized across the entire population, because only a small proportion of the population goes. The proportion that does is presumably getting a significant happiness boost, but the average happiness - I should probably stop analyzing the happiness produced by brothels.
• The Battle of Antwerp is a bit of a fiasco, with Jon's best infantry taking heavy losses on the walls. But to make up for that, a unit of Peasants that battered down a gate as a diversion on the flank somehow manage to drive off a unit of Armored Sergeants, leading Jon to rename the settlement Peasantville (and later, at the comments section's urging, Peasantwerp) in honor of their valor. The Peasants go on to get retrained and re-equipped, and join Jon's Russia invasion force.
• The Moors spend the campaign trying to win a diplomatic victory, by forming alliances with everyone from Spain to the Papacy(!). When they land a stack outside one of Jon's cities right when Sicily was about to attack it, but without initiating hostilities themselves, Jon thanks the Moorish peacekeeping force for separating the belligerents. Then when the Moors eventually do attack him, Jon's mystified, though perhaps he shouldn't be.
  YouTube comment: Jon doesn't know why the PEACEkeeping force is attacking him even when he is the most warmongering nation right now
• When a Danish cardinal becomes Pope, Jon calls a crusade against Milan, both to draw the Germans away from his borders, and because he just hates Milan that much for its conniving campaign AI and overpowered Pavise Crossbow units.
• After an inept meatgrinder battle against hundreds of Russian cavalry in the castle of Smolensk, Jon renames the settlement Lasagne. Specifically, Tesco lasagne.
• "Because you know what, these guys, they're basically religious fanatics, they came here to die to guarantee their passage into heaven, so I'm gonna give them an opportunity to die! That's the nicest thing I can do at this point."
• While defending Novgorod/Vikingrad, Jon, who has left his heavy infantry on the walls while sallying forth with his ranged infantry, pauses the game a split-second before the Russian cavalry smashes into his archers:
  Jon: Hmm... this has not gone how I was expecting at all.
• While being hard pressed by the Russians in the east, and backstabbed by a Polish invasion into his heartland, Jon decides now is the time to start a war with Sicily in the Mediterranean.
  YouTube comment: So you've started a land war in Asia AND gone against the Sicilians when death is on the line?
  Other comment: "You know what this war needs? MORE FRONTS" - Jon, and no other commander ever.
• Jon decides to send a force south of Cairo to capture the crappy rebel castle of Dongola, which leads to unrest in Cairo after its garrison is depleted and its governor leaves. So he compensates by making Cairo closer to his seat of government, by shifting his capital from Ourhaus, a well-developed North Sea trade hub, to Lasagne, a lump of rock in the middle of formerly-Russian territory. Cue his income per turn plunging from 9642 to 2128 florins.
• Jon is saddened when his best merchant dies after one final buy-out of a rival.
  Jon: Ladies and gentlemen, a minute's silence, for Toke. (beat) Okay, I got bored after four seconds, but it's the thought that counts.
• "As someone said in the comments, 'Stop. Starting. Wars. With people.' I will, I will, I feel like we've got enough wars! Unless of course we perhaps start a war with Milan, so actually, contrary to what I just said, we might be about to start just one more little war."
• Yes, Jon explains that war with Milan is "the natural state of things - sooner or later, there's always a war with Milan." He attacks a Milanese army trying to besiege his ally Venice in what turns out to be a bridge battle, where Milan's army adopts a most baffling strategy.
• A few turns after Jon drags the English into his war with France, the situation around Caen grows incrasingly bizarre as Iberian armies show up to contest the fortress but the English break their alliance with Denmark in favor of Milan, leading Jon struggling to figure out how to save the English from the French.
  Jon: If I could ally with the Spanish, and then the Spanish got pulled into this battle, and then I got pulled in as the ally of the Spanish, then I could aaaahhhh my brain. Uh, no, that's not going to work.
• He still has a plan, though.
  Jon: Send one unit of Spear Militia, so if he dies it's no problem. I'm going to send him here. So hopefully, the rebels don't attack him, because if they do they just win. But if they don't, this guy next turn can make it to the French army, assuming it doesn't attack [Caen] this turn, and that means next turn I can buy a mercenary boat using Sven of Milton Keynes to get the diplmoat from Peasantwerp to London, to offer them the alliance, and if they take the alliance that makes peace with Milan, which kind of works - actually it doesn't work in my favor, I'm about to break it anyway by attacking them a second time - but then, that troop can get over here, attack the French, or rather it can't attack the French, but it just stands next to the French during the assault, then I get to watch the assault, and then I think it's more likely the English survive, because I want them to even if they're not my friends. (beat) I promise I know what I'm doing!
• "I kind of want to offer them the ransom, because I'm pretty sure they can't afford it. Because if I execute them, I'll pick up negative traits, and this guy's a morale guy, so I'm gonna ransom the troops because I assume they can't afford it, and if they can I'm going to be really, really annoyed... Yes, good! That means I get to put them to death anyway, but I don't get negative penalties from it, and I get to stay chivalrous. Because I offered them the chance, it's just they couldn't afford to pay it."
• Jon's disappointed an enemy unit moves off the wall before his catapult can collapse it out from under them, but a freak shot more than makes up for it.
• "You guys are about to shoot a proper volley at these guys, theeerrreee we go. Lovely, well done. Dismounted Polish Nobles, does not help you. You can take as much pride as you want in your social class, when you're shot in the back, it does not matter. I think there's a moral message in there somewhere, but I'm not sure exactly what it is."
• Jon almost attacks the Holy Roman Empire purely to make the Vatican honor its alliance with him and declare war on and excommunicate the Germans, but he has the rare admission that maybe he doesn't need another war at the moment.
• The final battle for Milan has a few oddities, from one fleeing Pavise Crossbowman who wedges himself in a hillside to avoid the Danes, to forty-nine Crusader Sergeants routing after engaging a single Milanese Italian Spear Militia.
• The Battle for Ajaccio is another strange one, due to the Moors' overuse of siege engines at the expense of units that can actually take a settlement.
• "Now that was arguably a stupid, stupid, stupid move, because Antioch, we're never going to be able to hold it. Quite frankly, we'll probably make the money it cost us to take and improve it, just before the Mongol hordes even get here. And if we take Adana and Aleppo as well, it'll probably be worth it just because... then we won't be able to defeat the Mongol horde there, because they'll just be basic castles, it'll still slow them down."
• "I've got a nice, healthy economy here, twelve thousand. I was spending that on infrastructure and improving the lives of my citizens - we're not doing that anymore. Now we're just using that money to build a massive great army over at Madgeburg and Stettin, in order to head over here, toward the Polish capital."
• As the war with the French intensifies, Jon watches to see how his former ally will take advantage of it.
  Jon: If nothing else, I'm kind of curious what the English will do next, because I've kind of drawn a lot of French attention south, so all of a sudden, you'll notice that the French towns, fortresses, even their capital, suddenly look very, very unguarded, and the English have this massive great army, right here. Like if England were looking for a moment to backstab France and get the war back on, this would be a really good opportunity for them.
  (cue England besieging the Danish castle of Iron Bruges)
  Jon: No- guys. England. Seriously? Serious- okay, I wanted to be friends. I wanted to be friends with England, so, so much. But if this is what they want, then I guess we'll have to murder them, along with everyone else. The entire world hates Denmark so very, very much, we'll just have to murder everyone.
• Even after another major front opens up in Denmark's war against the planet, Jon seriously considers jumping on the Holy Romans after noticing the castle of Staufen is currently undefended.
  Jon: Like, some people would say, this isn't the time to start a war, because we're at war with... who are we not at war with? Okay, we're not at war with - assuming we're about to go to war with the Empire - we're not at war with Hungary, we're not at war with Venice, we're not at war with the Byzantines, we're not at war with the Turks. We're at war kinda by default with the Mongols, I know it says "Neutral" but they'll just attack whoever they want, it doesn't really matter. Uh, we are at war with the Egyptians, we are at war with the Sicilians, we are at war with the Moors, we're not at war with Spain or Portu- that's loads of people we're not at war with! That's so many people we're not at war with right now... in return for a castle. Yeah... one castle... plus, if I took thist castle, then I'd have a double castle, which isn't any better, but it's kind of a justification in my own mind for what I'm about to do, which is probably a stupid idea.
• King Charles the Crusader still has the Ark of the Covenant from his adventures in Egypt, which Jon hopes his forces can "carry out into the desert, leave it about here, and whenever the Mongols get close, we just, um, open it."
• Several turns after he noticed it, Staufen is still completely undefended.
  Jon: Why would you tempt me like this? This isn't fair... Oh gosh darn it, it's a fortress. It's a flipping fortress, it would be so difficult to take later on... Like, and war with the Imperials is inevitable. And it's just, like, it's one tiny little extra war...
• The Second Defense of Ajaccio is a close affair, when an ill-advised light cavalry charge costs Jon his commander and triggers the collapse of his left flank. Then the enemy general charges into the right flank, Jon's men start to waver, and out of desperation he fires his catapults into the scrum... and scores a direct hit on the Moorish leader, triggering the rout. What makes it better is one of the traits the enemy character had.
  YouTube comment: It's funny how the "Siege Expert" gets himself oneshot by a catapult.
  Other YouTube comment: He knew siege equipment inside out, then siege equipment knew him inside out.
• After Jon impulsively attacks an Egyptian fleet near allied Papal ships, he realizes "I've just accidentally started a war! Oh, it's not enough that I basically fight every single war under the sun, apparently I accidentally drag other people into my wars, too."
• In Part 35, Jon launches a counter-invasion of his treacherous former allies by landing troops outside London.
  Jon: Hello, England! I'm the Vikings! You might be roughly aware of what happens next!
• While continuing his invasion of France, Jon is surprised to get a mission from the Prince of France asking Jon to assassinate his father. Jon decides to go for it, since the Prince is so incompetent and he's happy to get paid doing what he planned to anyway, except he doesn't actually use an Assassin to do the deed, but dozens of Danish axemen, failing the mission.
  Jon: What? The mission was to kill your father! Does... okay, fine, apparently it only counts if he was assassinated. Okay, so I didn't actually succeed at the mission there, because I killed him in the wrong way.
• Jon's saddened when Boleslaw the Merciless, a Polish noble he wooed with a princess at the beginning of the playthrough, finally dies on campaign out east.
  Jon: He died doing what he loved - putting cities under siege, and bringing terror and devastation to the populations thereof. Rest in piece, Boleslaw Hermann. Rest in piece your merciless bastard.
• One English unit has trouble going somewhere.
  English Armored Swordsmen: March move out march advance move out forward forward forward move out-
  Jon: It's like the Medieval II Total War Dance Remix.
• When Jon's cardinals elect another Danish pope who is totally fine with his warmongering and happy to call a crusade on any of his enemies, he has only one question: "Who do I hate most in the world?"
• Jon moves his armies against the English settlements of York and Caen, which would only leave them with Caernavon, which Jon admits is risky.
  Jon: So basically, England wouldn't be England anymore, England would just be Wales. So we'd have to rename the faction Wales, which would be dangerous, because they might start eating leeks and become superhuman supermen, but... it's worth the risk, I say.
• When taking York, Jon notices that a single Armored Swordsman survived the fight for the gate, and so resolves to shoot the coward down with flaming arrows. The results are... surprising.
  Jon: (to his three units of Norse Archers) You, you are all fired. Every last one of you.
• "Venetians, not expecting much from them at the moment, because they've actually got some rebels at their doorstep, so probably they need to take care of them before they think about backstabbing me, which will probably happen sooner or later, because in all fairness I am very untrustworthy and not particularly well-liked, so sooner or later everyone will declare war on me. Most of these wars - okay, some of these wars, are not my fault, just most of them."
• "Make sure we put the Great Cross right at the flippin' front. That way everyone knows what we're doing is absolutely holy and proper, and in no way like a war crime or something."
• The siege of Angers is tricky since it's a citadel, and at various points Jon attacks the walls his own troops are standing on, or leaves a unit of Viking Raiders taking fire from volley after volley of crossbow bolts without moving them out of enemy range. But in the end there's only one French Peasant left in the keep, at which point Jon pulls back all his melee infantry and orders his crossbows to open fire.
  Jon: He's thinking "Oh my god, it's a miracle! The Danish, they're falling back, they're fleeing before me! I've done it, I've saved the town! I've saved the noble French citadel at Angiers! Truly my name will be-" (thwack!) oh, never mind.
• Despite spending several turns rooting for the Hungarians in their war against the Holy Roman Empire, Jon is at war with them because they decided to blockade his port at Corsica.
  Jon: Yeah, they decided to flipping attack our bloody port for no well-explained reason, with their ship, which they trained in their one port, over flipping here [on the Black Sea], and then sent around the flipping western Mediterranean, you stupid bastards.
• After Jon's Venetian allies ask for assistance against the Polish, but no battle is fought:
  Jon: Did we help? I don't know if we helped. That was really odd. Okay, fine, whatever. I've just been called over there and there wasn't actually a battle. But it feels like the banner was weaker, so possibly I just stood nearby and looked menacing, and that like provided emotional support for the Venetians? I'm genuinely not sure what just happened.
• "I'm gonna move King Steve over to Adana, because his main job actually - he hasn't done much in his life in, you know, terms of being leader. But basically, wherever he goes, there's a great big population explosion. So, he is the most charismatic man that has ever lived, 'cause wherever he goes, everyone suddenly feels... rather randy, and immediately they start popping out children like crazy."
• Jon's plan for resolving his Russian war is pretty straightforward.
  Jon: This is how we're gonna make peace in the world - we're just gonna kill everyone who's at war with me.
• Portugal's behavior continues to baffle Jon, since over the campaign it's failed to expand much in Iberia, but it's attacked Caen, tried to conquer Krakow in a crusade, briefly held Dublin, took over Caernavon, and then picked a fight with Jon. Culminating in Part 44, with:
  Jon: We need to kick the Portuguese out of Wales. That's an odd sentence I thought I'd never say, but here we are.
• Jon's saddened first when the outrageously charismatic King Steve passes away, then doubly so when he checks on the new Prince Skapti and finds him thoroughly disappointing. But with the Mongols so near, he can't afford to just throw away General's Bodyguard units anymore, so...
  Jon: I've got a plan. Skapti, I've got a really nice new place for you to live, it's called Adana! It's up north, and we believe it's one hundred percent, absolutely, totally safe...
• After watching the Golden Horde wandering around the Armenian Plateau for decades instead of attacking something, Jon concludes "The Mongols are just the biggest teases on the entire planet right now. We've been waiting for them for so long..."
• Despite being visible to Jon's forces, and having low stats in general, one of the Hungarians' Assassins manages to kill his target. Specifically...
  Jon: Oh no! Wait, that was our king! That was the king! ...Wasn't it? I think it was! I think the Hungarians just assassinated the king! But that means the new king's OH NO.
• "I think their army has already officially lost, but you know what? No. We actually have to take these guys out to the last man. It's the final Scottish territory - albeit, you know, in Ireland - it feels right for these guys to be killed properly and whatever. And when I say 'properly,' they're still just going to be shot to pieces by archers, but screw it, it's worked pretty well so far."
• During the desperate defense of Hamburg, Jon tries to replicate the trick with flaming catapult shot fired into a mixed melee that won the day at Ajaccio.
  Jon: C'mon c'mon c'mon go go go aaaaand oh yes! That's what I wanted to see! Straight away, one unit - ah, they're all routing! Yes! Yes, Operation Flaming Thing does a good job there, that's - oh no. That's my troops that started routing. That's less good.
• To try to get the Mongols to do something, Jon "ambushes" them with a unit of eighty mounted Scouts, who proceed to get massacred.
  Jon: Okay, I think we lost this one, but that's fine, because now we're at war with the Mongols, which will hopefully draw their attention. (beat) I probably shouldn't have drawn their attention.
• "You see guys, I promised you an adventure, you sign up with me and you get to flipping go and like, you know, skewer the local king in the ass or whatever, great fun!"
• Jon marks the passing of his best Assassin.
  Jon: A moment's silence, please, for Anund the Killer... that's probably not a full minute, but that's close enough, that's fine.
• "Oh, so many dead Germans. So many dead Germans on the field. They should not have attacked me - I wanted to be friends. I was up for what people were saying in the comments, 'Ooh, you should probably be friends with them, no need for war with them,' I was up for it! This is their fault! I was happy to live and let live with Portugal, and Spain, and Scotland, and everyone! Basically, everyone in the world is a dick apart from me."
• "We can just walk straight in, Frankfurt is unguarded, in we go, it is a lovely large city, and we shall be welcomed with open arms! And then we're gonna sack the place, so they'll probably regret welcoming us with open arms."
• After "a long friendship and a longer war," Jon finally puts an end to the last remnants of Poland.
  Jon: I'd say I'm feeling sorry for the Polish, but every time I almost feel sorry for the Polish, then I remember that they betrayed me and they started this.
• Jon plans to wipe out the last of the Holy Roman Empire in a single turn of assaults, "Unless the Pope gets any bloody stupid ideas." Sure enough, before he can attack he gets a mission to cease hostilities against his fellow Catholics. Jon attacks anyway since he figures proceeding with a siege that started before the warning doesn't count as initiating hostilities, only to find that his empire's public order is tanking because yes, he's excommunicated.
  Jon: Yeah, everyone gets a tax cut. Everybody gets a tax cut! So, you may not get into heaven, but taxes are down, so for some people that's probably going to be enough.
• When the Sole Survivor of a unit of Dismounted Huscarls is welcomed into the royal family in recognition of his victory over some Scottish rebels, Jon gushes over how Karl Bengtsson is a better character than his actual king. Said king's garbage Authority leads Karl to go rebel a turn later, but even when Jon has to fight him, Jon has nothing but good things to say about the rogue Karl, how he was so impressed with his previous opponents that he now identifies as Scottish, and how he's willing to ride to the rescue of some mercenary crossbowmen. After the battle, the "Man of the Hour" event fires again, and Jon finds the new Danish family member eerily familiar.
  Jon: Would you believe, after that battle, in which Karl Bengtsson mysteriously fell and was captured, but then sort of disappeared and then nobody knows where he went, suddenly there's some new guy who just actually showed up, Captain Hardeknud, a man who we'd suspiciously not really heard of before today, and that's a suspiciously similar portrait to the one I think Karl used - he's just had a flipping haircut!
• "We've got an earthquake? Oh dear. Right, six thousand people dead in Alexandria. Possibly we're seeing a bit of divine disfavor from the whole excommunication thing, we've got..." (reads an event message for Bologne) "We're had two simultaneous earthquakes. Blimey. On the plus side, that gets the population way down, that's good for me as far as I'm concerned!"
• When Jon assaults the capital of France's King Henry, Jon reminds everyone how he put the guy on the throne like he wanted, but got stiffed for not killing the previous king the right way. "So in all fairness, I don't feel like this is really murder, it's debt collection."
• In a desperate attempt to make the Mongols attack him, Jon captures the Turkish fortress at Caesarea, which is roughly in the Golden Horde's meandering path. Unfortunately he forgot that the Turks and Venetians were allied, costing him his only remaining ally.
  Jon: I've got no friends. I've not got any friends anymore - oh. Now I feel bad.
• Then after Venice blockades his port (while Jon talks about how the Venetians aren't backstabbing him yet), he checks his diplomacy menu to see whether he's got "the full set" yet.
  Jon: So, if I just start a war against the Byzantines, and then the Pope excommunicates me and begins a war - which they're blatantly planning to do - then at that point I will be at war with the entire world. (beat) Well quite frankly, that just strikes me as a good thing to aim for, really, doesn't it?
• The siege of Vienna is very nearly a botch job, with Jon feeding his forces piecemeal into the meatgrinder while his AI-controlled allied army takes its sweet time getting into the city. But the AI proves it did learn something from a previous campaign.
  Jon: Oh, blimey! O-kay, good! So as it turns out, the Danish Army has learned something from the invasion of England, and that is the noble, ancient art of queuing. They are now really good at queuing, even under the most difficult of circumstances. This is extreme queuing.
• "Yeah, the Swordstaff Militia, even though they're militia troops, they'll do a good job - there he is! There's the king! Stab him! Stab him with a big stick! No, don't die! Stop dying, you cowards!"
• "I wanted to be friends with these guys. I would happily have formed a great big Danish-Polish-Hungarian alliance against Western Europe! But noooo, everyone had to hate me because I'm a 'monster who kills everyone.'"
• Jon finally finds a use for the awful King Skapti - sending him and a butt-ton of Norse Archers against a smaller Mongol army that got ahead of the horde, "And if we're lucky, he might be able to kill himself, let's go." Surprisingly, his army manages to shoot down and rout the Mongol force, leading Jon to incredulously report that "King Skapti is the first person to fight the Mongols and... won. Well. That's a turnout for the history books."
• During the assault on León, it takes Jon five minutes to notice that his general got killed by a ballista tower. Specifically, as he was saying "Actually, things are fine."
• When Jon's papal problems escalate into an invasion of Rome, he's shocked at the state of the city.
  Jon: Presumably Rome is... fairly well-developed, it's got a City Hall and, uh... it's got an Abbey. You never built a Cathedral in Rome? You're the cocking Pope, what else were you doing?! Oh, I see the Pope has time to build a Siege Works, but not a Cathedral, obviously.
• Jon has a simple plan to get himself reconciled: destroy other factions until there are more Danish Cardinals than anyone else so they'll elect a Denmark-friendly Pope. And if that doesn't work...
  Jon: If not, we'll just keep killing Popes until eventually I do get a good one, it'll be fine.
• "And the Turks continue to just bumble around. Honestly, the Turks have taken lessons from the Mongols, they're doing some top-notch bumbling right now. And Portugal? That's not bumbling, that's just Portugal-ing, it's not a special thing."
• "C'mon Mongols, do this for me, I'm begging you... The moment they actually do it, by the way, I'm going to regret the fact they're doing it, I'm going to regret it so flipping much."
• The Pope sends a beefy papal army to try to retake Rome, but Jon assembles an equivalent force and marches out to meet it. And then his king's miserable Authority stat strikes again.
  Jon: That entire army just went rogue. The entire army that was supposed to take on the Pope just went flipping rogue. Right. Snorri of... okay. Skapti? I think I've got a mission for you.
• And so King Skapti heroically attacks three Mongol armies at once, nearly ruins everything by trying to rout from the field, but luckily ends up char-broiled. Afterward, the Mongols try to ransom him regardless.
  Jon: Am I willing to ransom King - he was hit by a giant flaming ball! I'm gonna be honest, I don't want to pay ten thousand Florins for what crispy, crispy bits are left of him. Um, no, sorry, how about you keep Skapti, I'll gladly, however, ransom the rest of it!
• "So, that is the Pope dead, like, again. So we'll have another papal election, and I don't want to give the game away, but we're going to keep having those elections until eventually someone votes the correct way."
• The Second Relief of Venice is another awkward bridge battle, this time because Jon's AI-controlled reinforcements are firing cannons into the scrum that are inflicting more casualties upon him than the enemy.
• "Oh, to be a Mongol today! Y'know, you're just walking through a sandstorm thinking 'You know what, the enemy is somewhere over there, somewhere in that sandstorm, hey, what's that weird terrifying sound like thunder in the distance? Oh, why am I suddenly on fire and flat?'"
• Jon is so desperate to have a friend that he pays the Byzantines forty thousand Florins to aggree to an alliance. At the same time he's trying to replace losses sustained from the Mongols finally getting their act together.
  Jon: ...I bet they betray me next turn. I bet they break off the alliance in five turns and attack me, who bloody knows.
• With the capture of Yerevan in Part 65, Jon finally has contiguous borders across his empire! And a host of problems within it, as seen when Jon offers a tour.
• "If they want a new alliance, I'd love to become friends with the Pope again. Me and the Pope get on, for the most part, these days, mainly because he's been given a very clear lesson what happens when Denmark and the Pope don't get on."
• "So, in come crossbows to the front, in come lances to the rear, no one likes a horse up the ass, and these guys will probably break pretty quickly."
• The Battle of Antioch is a comedy of errors, as Jon's AI-controlled reinforcements decide to sally forth to counter-attack, opening the gates so the Mongol cavalry pours in. By the end of the slog, a lone Mongol general without his bodyguard - the only Mongol unit left on the field - is able to make Jon's exhausted infantry flee every time he rides near, just because of his high Dread rating.
  Jon: You know the embarrassing thing is, this one guy, this one remaining bloody king, is actually at this point winning the battle. He's actually winning.
• Just when it looks like Jon's going to have an easy victory against the Mongols in the field, he orders his general to charge an enemy unit he'd also told his artillery to fire upon. Five minutes later, he does the same thing to one of his heavy infantry units.
  YouTube comment: Lesson I've learned from the past several videos: Jon should not be allowed to use artillery.
• Jon's -1 Perception strikes on the strategic layer, when he tries to contain the Mongols by moving his armies via boat, only to find the transports already full.
  Jon: Wait, what? Oh! Apparently we had a massive army in this fleet. Did anyone know we had a massive army in this fleet? That strikes me as useful!
• "And our king, Thorgils the Lawgiver, put his hands to the sky and said, 'Lord, if you approve of what we have done here, over the past few centuries, give us a sign!' And then the plague broke out everywhere in the world, so possibly, possibly we have strayed slightly from the Catholic doctrine of 'Thou shalt not kill.' That was one of the Ten Commandments, we have been ignoring that one quite a lot, actually."
• Jon's actually pleased when King Thorgil's Dread rating starts going up as he picks up traits like "Open to Murder" and "Merciless," since it also improves his Authority. And it means the king's retinue includes both a personal torturer and famed mathematician Roger Bacon.
• "May as well go an mop up the Venetians while we're just, you know, passing the flip by - ooh. 'This will result in excommunication.' (beat) Well, I guess it's time for a new pope, then!"
• The defense of Iconium looks a bit iffy at first, due to the poor quality of the garrison, but between Jon's Ribault and the Byzantine's strategy, it's not too bad.
  Jon: So, the Peasants that were sent up front just to test the waters have not done well, coming up next, however, is... more Peasants! Good! In comes the artillery, and off naff the Peasants. And behind them are... yet more Peasants, good! I'm liking these advanced Byzantine tactics!
• When the Timurids show up with their signature units, Jon goes on a little rant about the dubious historical accuracy, and military impracticality, of strapping cannons onto elephants.
• Jon makes a point of exterminating the population of Nicaea, so the people watching from Constantinople get an idea of what's going to happen to them. After the massacre:
  Jon: Ooh, Karl Milling's gone a bit evil. I swear he used to be good before we started going on genocidal rampages...
• When the Timurids attack Mosul but mostly stand around outside instead of fully engaging his defenses, Jon decides to "gift" them the outer walls by opening a gate to lure them in. Five minutes later, he's forced to admit he "may have made a small mistake letting them into my city." Then when the enemy is gathered outside the final line of defenses, Jon orders his cannon elephants to fire through the gate, which not only kills some of his own elephants, but...
  Jon: I think I just accidentally blew up my own gate, also my elephants are now running amok.
• Jon takes issue when an event tries to convince him that the world is round.
  Jon: No, the world is very clearly not round, because as you can see on this map, the world is very much rectangular. You go north until you reach, like, Scandinavia, then there's a terrifying black abyss into nothingness and we don't talk about the black abyss, which also runs along like Russia and down the Middle East, and also don't even talk about what's going on south of Egypt, and the water basically just plummets off the edge of the world over here. What's this - no no no, what's all this space over here for? Bloody hell, there's a bunch of wasted space on the map now, dear oh flipping dear...
• When the last two Muslim factions declare a jihad for Constantinople, Jon holds off on conquering their remaining settlements, instead merely besieging them, just so he can play a game.
  Jon: Basically, whoever takes Constantinople gets to live for more than like three or more turns, and whoever fails to take Constantinople will be completely eliminated from the game and all of history momentarily.
• "This front line is just being torn apart... oh dear. Oh wait, not oh dear, that's them, not me!"
• One of the armies Jon was counting on to bottle up the Timurids decides to go rebel instead of following his orders, which could be put down to another low-Authority king, or maybe the fact that the faction leader is currently sailing across the Atlantic.
  Jon: I admit this doesn't actually look good - um, the current king, who is kind of terrible, actually, basically decided to naff off to an entirely different continent. It's not exactly a glowing endorsement of how he thinks his troops are going to do in this war, is it?
• Jon's first proper victory against the Timurids comes despite poorly positioning his artillery, and leaving someone very important behind for ten minutes after deploying the rest of his army.
• The first fleet to reach the New World has nothing in it but a unit of Catalans, who wander around Mexico until thousands of Aztecs decide to murder them. In the battle that follows, Jon is impressed by their morale.
  Jon: Apparently they're "Eager," which, you know, due respect, for a guy who's standing in this position right now and decided, "You know what? I'm fresh, I'm eager, I think today is just gonna be a good day for me!" Keep tossing the javelins, by the way, you only have so long to keep doing it.
• Jon barely bats an eye when King Hafidhi dies, but gets suspicious when Prince Halstan dies the same turn. The new King Harald unfortunately is completely terrible due to traits like "Slothful," "Actively Disloyal," and "No Sense of Mortality."
  Jon: Right, lets get him down to those Rebels, because pirates may take a while to kill him.
• It takes 86 episodes, but for the Grand Finale, Jon acknowledges that he hasn't been using the phrase "indirect fire" properly. In a hill battle where he has no actual ranged units.
• Jon admits that fighting the Aztecs is more fun than challenging.
  Jon: I like taking on the Aztecs - it's not always that difficult, but it's very satisfying. It's very satisfying to show up in the New World with a massive technological advantage and be faced with just a massive horde of just tons of tough, fast, but fairly basic troops. It's very, very fun indeed. I mean, you know, kind of historically horrifying, but fun from the point of Medieval II Total War.
  YouTube comment: Jon, your inner Britishness is showing.
• Jon points out that Medieval II's second victory screen, which shows up when you conquer the entire map, only gives you the option to return to the main menu.
  Jon: And with that, the game basically says "Alright, that's it, you're flipping done, Get Out!"

Ride to Hell: Retribution

• Pretty much all of the Ride to Hell: Retribution live stream. The mere fact that its subtitle is "The Livestream of Suffering" should serve as a good indicator of what you're in for.
  • Granted, the "Livestream of Suffering" is very much In Spite of a Nail; Ride to Hell was chosen as a result of a poll, with the other option being Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice - Jon put Ride to Hell as an alternate because he thought Sekiro was a shoe-in, meaning that it still would've been a "Livestream of Suffering" regardless of which title won, it's just it would've been from how difficult Sekiro was as opposed to how bad Ride To Hell was.
• Jon refuses to give his normal intro at the start, because he says the game doesn't deserve it.
  Jon: People know this game is bad, I want you to understand just how bad: this game is so bad you can't buy it anymore. It's not actually on the Steam Store, you can go check, it's not there. Um, it's kind of unclear whether they took it down out of shame, or whether Steam kicked it out.
  Claire: Listen, I can tell you-
  Jon: Claire's here.
  Claire: Hi, by the way, I'm Claire. I can tell you, how much shite is on the Steam Store, how much, like, barely-disguised porn is on the Steam Store, how much... like, there are things on the Steam Store that, when I was just browsing to find games for Jon, I actually thought, "Can I report this for being, like, clearly a Nazi game?"
  Jon: Yeah, yeah.
  Claire: And this? This?
• The Running Gag of Jon and Claire wondering what happened in the game's DLC (which they can't play since it can't be purchased anymore and Jon neglected to buy it with the base game years ago). After hearing it apparently had something to do with nukes, Jon keeps desiring to inflict Atomic Hate on the Big Bad for the smallest inconveniences possible.
• Jon thinks Jake's Big "NO!" after Mikey's murder is delivered with all the drama of "Oh, we're out of milk."
  Claire: Being out of milk is a big fucking deal, Jon.
  Jon: It is. Are we going to challenge them in any way, or are they just going to be gone? (black-and-white flashback begins) Okay, we're going to have a flashback to something we just saw. (in slo-mo) "Nooooooo, now I've only got skimmed milk, it's tooooo wateryyyy!" Then - okay, who are you - then I was shot? Why was - are we seeing a flashback to something we never saw?! This is a flashback, to something that was just five seconds - why would you end the scene to go into a flashback to include details for something that wasn't in the scene?!
• Jon deliberately fails a mission.
  Jon: The only way you can fail is if you slow down, if you go slow then-
  (Jake's bike explodes)
  (beat)
  Jon and Claire: (hysterical laughter)
• The two are mystified by the first sudden, fully-clothed sex scene.
  Claire: Wasn't it nice to meet that lovely lady, and hear about her life and her personality that she totally had?
  Jon: I mean, is that - I don't know if that - is that fine on YouTube? I mean, no one - we didn't see anything...
  Claire: That's not "fine" anywhere, Jon! Don't you see how awkward that was? It's awful!
• Right after that, Jon loses it when he examines the window effects.
• invoked Jon cheerfully singing "Batman!" to the tune of the can-can while beating up Sarah's Jerkass ex-husband before he breaks down laughing over how Jake Conway's character model badly skates over the ground towards his enemies and then aggressively kicks them instead of walking.
• In the following sex scene, Jon thinks the woman is rubbing Jake's tummy like a cat.
• Prepare the hedgehogs
• Jon's reaction when he and Claire realize how even the doors are Off-Model.
  Jon: What's happening?! Why is there - why is the door handle at my shoulder?! Am I playing as a tiny, tiny man?!
  Claire: Maybe, ah, maybe that's why you have all those anger issues.
• Jon goes inside his own face for a second.
• "Claire, I'm vibrating."
• When Jon gets a chance to personalize his motorcycle, he gives it the manliest shade of pink paint, as well as a "fanny pack" strapped over the front wheel.
  Jon: I'm deliberately trying to make my bike look as much like a little girl's tricycle as I can.
• Jon's not impressed by Jake's reaction to some police spike strips.
  Jon: Whaaaa? How I get 'round this? Me motorcycle caveman.
• At first Jon thinks Jake's going to blow up a gas tanker truck to take down an electrified fence (his revenge against all the tanker trucks who pulled in front of him on the highway), only to be mystified to find that Jake's driven the gas tanker to a hydroelectric plant. Then he completes the mission's final objective.
  Jon: Oh my god, that's what I'm doing, I've cut off the electricity to - I've blown up a dam, to cut electricity, to depower one fence!
  Claire: Why couldn't we find the blue glowy box next to that one fence and shoot that instead?
  Jon: What's - what the fuck is happening? ...Okay, Claire, I want to draw attention to what is directly to the left of that gate. It was a stone wall. There was a stone wall right there, I could have just climbed the stone wall-
  (Jake does just that in the cutscene)
  Jon: Look, I could have just climbed - THERE WAS A NOT-ELECTRIFIED PART!
  Claire: Fuck you, game! That's not how electricity works, game! ...I'm so mad. [...] We had a truck, we could have just rammed the fence, it's a FARADAY CAGE!!
• "'Bolted shut, better find another way inside,' oh, how about instead I go and steal a nuclear weapon to blow up the house!"
  Claire: THAT'S WHAT THE DLC IS!
• To add insult to injury, as a stream viewer points out later, the lights are still on and the appliances are working at the house past that electrified fence, allowing Jake to do an environmental kill where he throws someone head-first into a television set.
  Jon: I would have forgiven everything in this game if I shoved him into the TV and he hadn't died, and my character was like "Oh yeah, I cut the power."
• invoked At one point, while trying to get out of a garage, Jon shoots an enemy Mook who then randomly rockets away into the sky, with both his gun and bag of drugs left floating in the air. Jon is left laughing for a good half-minute in shocked disbelief while Claire is immensely disappointed over how she initially missed it since she was busy watching the chat.
• invoked This conversation between Jon and Claire shortly after the abovementioned "flying gun" incident, where one of the people in the live chat questions why Jon's playing such a bad game.
  Jon: Bad game? Well, that's a bit harsh. This game - that's very impolite, the game's fine.
  Claire: Is it, though?
  Jon: (conversationally) No it's not, it's terrible. It's just, it's just - I mean, the thing is, it would be boringly competent if it weren't for the level of bugs, that's what elevates it to something unique and special.
• At one point in the airplane graveyard, Jake remarks "They just keep coming!"
  Jon: Do they? You say that to me, is there anything behind... no, no they don't. (more enemies spawn ahead) He just said "They just keep coming!" before they came, like a few seconds before they actually showed up. It was... it was truly amazing.
• "I swear they just forgot guns were in the game, or else they added it so late that there wasn't enough time to fix it, because it's weird how many enemies run at you melee and, and you have a gun, and a headshot just auto-kills them."
• "This was just... okay this was a completely empty room, I think they forgot to put enemies in that one, or they failed to spawn. That was an empty room, with nothing in it, and I don't know what's happening anymore, that, that just happened..."
• invoked Jon objects to a viewer comparing the game to a B-Movie.
  Jon: This has gone 'round the circle of So Bad, It's Good that I don't understand which it is now, I don't know whether it's So Bad It's Good or not.
• Jon's haunted by some developer text reading "All enemies in the area are dead," even when he's being shot by Mooks.
• An Anticlimax Boss is followed by a goofy-ass grin.
• Jon decides that the Disc-One Final Boss is actually the final boss he needs to defeat before he can declare the stream over.
  Colt: You think this is it? That I'm the last one?
  Jon: Yes I do, I choose to believe that's the case.
• An NPC doesn't care if Jon is shooting him.
  Jon: Wow, he just looked around like, "Ooh, what was that?"
• We end with some Sanity Slippage and more glitches.
  Jon: I will become a professional motorcycle [sic], that is my plan. And my dream is, one day I will become as fabulous as my motorcycle, and we can have sweet, sweet, over-the-clothes, dry-humping love, together, and have tiny, tiny motorcycle babies, which are like little big-wheel tricycles. (impulsively shoots his bike) Wait, what the... Claire, the motorcycle bleeds if you shoot it.
  Claire: (unhinged laughter) You know, maybe it's meant to be oil-
  Jon: But it doesn't matter if you shoot it in the tire. If you shoot the tire, Claire, if you shoot the metalwork... Claire, the motorcycle bleeds! Claire, the motorcycle bleeds! IT BLEEDS, CLAIRE!!
  Claire: Stop shooting it, you're hurting her feelings!
  Jon: I can't take this anymore! I can't take this!
  Claire: You don't have to!
  Jon: (struggling to close the game) No, no stop - I can't escape from the game!
  Claire: Noooooooo, now we're a Ride to Hell: Retribution channel!
  Jon: (waggling the mouse desperately) Oh no, it won't let me escape!
  Claire: We'll just have to buy a new computer!
  Jon: This one's infected.

Rome: Total War

• For his playthrough of the original Rome: Total War, Jon picks the Brutii faction, because they have a good starting position, and because, as the campaign intro narrator shows, "you're blatantly playing as flipping supervillains."
• One of Jon's Velites is overenthusiastic.
  Jon: I appreciate your bravery, Steve, but it's not gonna fly.
• "Do the Hoplite Dance, you magnificent bastards!"
• At first Jon is pleased to hear one of his family members has come of age, then he checks the kid's stats and finds that Cassius Brutus is a "Filthy Minded," "Tedious Speaker" with nothing else really going for him.
  Jon: So basically he's easy to assassinate, easy to bribe, and he's bloody useless. Yaaaaay! This is why you don't let sixteen-year-olds run the Roman Empire.
• Jon besieges the Gallic settlement of Patavium in northeastern Italy, which is safe because as he explains, all the Gauls' holdings are to the west, so there's "basically no reinforcements coming from the north, or the east." As soon as he ends his turn, a Gallic force sweeps down from the Alps, catching Jon's army from two directions and outnumbering him over two-to-one.
• General Jon rallies his breaking left flank.
  Jon: Guys? Guys, guys, guys, don't. Just, just don't, alright?
• The next generation of Brutii continue to disappoint.
  Jon: You only have one trait and it's "Tedious Speaker." That is just beautiful. Well flippin' done, this guy.
• Jon knows all about the game's civil war mechanic, so to nip that in the bud and keep the other Roman factions from expanding too much, he's sent single units of Equites out on the world map to follow around the Julii and Scipii armies to "help" in battles, basically keeping the game from cheating in the Romans' favor when it auto-resolves battles, and ensuring his rival families take maximum losses in their sieges.
  Captain Secundus: We will shed our blood today to aid our Roman friends, the Julii!
  Jon: Ohhh, no we won't. No, no, no, we most certainly won't. So, what I'm going to do right now is, I'm going to go and sit in a niiice corner, in some woods, over there. We're just going to sit right here, in this lovely corner, this is where we're gonna be, this is where we live now, that's fine. And now, we're just going to watch the Julii get on with it.
• Faced with the threat of Greeks attacking from Sicily, Jon realizes he might need to, "for the first time ever in the history of Rome: Total War, actually use my navy for something."
• Jon launches a preemptive attack on a Greek fleet carrying an army, bouncing it between two of his fleets until it's sunk.
  YouTube comment: And thus, Ping-Pong was invented by the Brutii. Greek boat ping-pong.
• "Oooh, what a good omen, the flipping volcano just decided to erupt, lovely."
• The Scipii decide to attack Syracuse despite being badly outnumbered, and Jon is on hand to "help" by watching his "allies" die in droves to the town's towers.
  Jon: Now I'm willing to bet if I'd just auto-resolved that, the game would have said "Hey, the Scipii managed to win thanks to tactical genius or something!" But if I now watch it, then yeah, they will almost certainly lose, I can't see them winning this.
  Captain Decius: We will shed our blood today, to aid our Roman friends, the Scipii!
  Jon: For the last time, no, we won't!
• "Now where the bloody hell is the rest of the Scipii force? Because you had another big force that was - oh, I see! You've decided you just want to walk along here and have a full tour of the city, while being slowly shot, marvelous. All of these casualties, completely unnecessary, this is from walking in front of towers like an idiot."
• Part 8's Battle of Thermon Ridge is a close one, since Jon doesn't get a proper cliff to fight from, but a simple hill that's just enough for his outnumbered army to hold.
  Jon: Ah, there we go, the [enemy] units have decided to start advancing, good, this works for me, umm... I say "this works for me," this is... terrifying, but okay.
• To wrap up the siege of Thermon, Jon decides to "release the hounds!"
• Jon's not able to "help" the Julii with the siege of Massilia due to space restrictions, but he does hold out hope that he might drag his allies into a losing battle all the same.
  Jon: C'mon, Gaul, attack me! C'mon, I'm super-soft and squishy, go for it, Gaul, I believe in you!
• "The War Dogs have eaten their leader. I believe that's the second Greek king, in a row, I've decided I was going to feed to dogs."
• Later in the siege of Larissa, Jon surrounds and dismantles a phalanx.
  Jon: I would say "they've just walked right into a trap," except, it's really more like they've walked past the trap. Like, the trap was there and very, very obvious, but they've just decided "You know what? Screw it! We like the trap! We'll go for the trap!"
• Since Macedon turns down Jon's peace offering, he decides to send a Spy into a settlement with plague, pick up the plague-bearer status, and start infiltrating Macedon's remaining cities.
  Jon: You had your chance, biological warfare it is!
• During a field battle outside Thermon, first Jon leaves his faction leader idle to be charged in the rear by spearmen, then a panicked mis-click almost sends his favorite unit into a losing battle.
  Jon: I just accidentally charged my Cretan Archers into prepared Hoplites, that's good...
• "Guys, guys are you okay? We practiced this in the barracks, like - no, Steve, that's, you're supposed to be facing - I don't know why you three - oh, god. This is the worst unit of Hastati I've ever seen, we just need to send these guys straight back to the barracks."
• The battle's not over until the very last runner-in-place is slain.
• "I think that's the Dacians - sorry, that's the Thracians - Thracians, Dacians, totally different, Thrace is over here, Dace is over here - no, not Dace, Da-ci-a, Dacia. Uh, yeah, I'm pretty sure that's the Thracians trying to kick out the Dacians, that's gonna get hard to say. Uh, so definitely don't record any more of this series while drunk."
• The siege of the Greek capital of Sparta falls to Oppius Brutus, the most nondescript guy in the Roman Empire.
  Jon: This guy has no traits, this is the World's Most Boring Man. He's just followed around by a Quartermaster and Greek Turncoat who presumably have significantly more personality than he does. But no, he's nothing, he's "traits: none." And he's actually fought battles, I'm sure of it! So at some point, maybe, something good will happen...
• At the start of the siege of Corinth, Jon's general shows off his "Tedious Speaker" trait.
  Titus Brutus: Hello. Today we are gathered here to do battle. Regretable, isn't it? But sometimes, you know, life is like that. You have to do something you don't want to do, just because someone is telling you to do it. I didn't want to be here, myself, but then, my mother told me that I better make a good show of it all, so, here we go...
• Just when Jon's mentioning how none of his scaling troops have taken casualties yet...
  Jon: This is the unluckiest man of all. This is the only man who will die as I take the walls, if I play this correctly, sadly. You will be remembered, Stevius.
• "Oh don't worry, my Hastati should be able to hold pretty nicely here- how have my Hastati broken? Oh for goodness' sake, you guys!"
• While carefully picking apart Corinth's contingent of Phalanx Militia, Jon has a friendly fire incident or two, but they're acceptable losses.
  Jon: My archers are shooting my other archers in the back, but that's fine, I'm moderately confident there must be an Archery Range in this place, because it's got the flipping - well I really hope so! You built a flipping Temple of Artemis, I really hope you built an Archery Range to take advantage of it!
• Part 13 is titled "Groundhog Day," because when the Greeks defending Syracuse decide to sally against the Scipii and Jon's "helpful" unit of Equites, their general refuses to leave the city, which means the Greeks outside never properly form up and attack, and since the Scipii hold their ground and there's no battle timer, it turns into an endless stalemate. After three tries, Jon ends up having to auto-resolve the battle and give the Scipii a victory they shouldn't have won.
• Jon decides to send The World's Most Boring man to take Crete so he can get more combat experience, and "maybe at some point, he'll develop a personality."
• When Jon moves against a Greek army outside Athens, he's surprised by his Thracian allies' infantry tactics.
  Jon: Okay, guys, we need to send you back to Phalanx Camp, because apparently, you didn't get it.
• Highlights of the Scipii assault on Lilybaeum include an attack by inbred War Hounds and the world's most placid cavalry charge.
• In Part 15, Jon gets to unexpectedly defend his capital from a Carthaginian assault. At first he wonders how only 25 enemy units are able to attack immediately without laying siege first, then he sees what he's up against.
  Jon: We have to defeat a bunch of elephants, who have just shown up, on their own to take on Croton. Because the computer is clearly biased against me for whatever reason. They could have gone to take back their own cities, but no, they've sent one group of elephants to take me down, by themselves.
• When taking Rhodes, Jon is disappointed that his Equites kill the Greek faction leader before his War Dogs can get him.
  Jon: I'm very sorry, puppies, we tried to feed the Greek king to the dogs...
• Afterwards, Jon discusses the Wonder of the Ancient World he just captured, and how no one is sure what it actually looked like, assuming it even existed.
  Jon: We think, or rather popular imagination assumes, that like it's depicted there, there was like a little entrance to a closed, safe harbor, and the statue had like one leg on each side, so you kind of sailed your boat underneath the statue of the Colossus of Rhodes, and didn't look up because that would be really, really bloody weird while you were doing it, because everyone wore skirts in those days...
• Jon fights a field battle near Thessalonica against a force with lots of dangerous cavalry, and draws his force up around a farmhouse on a hill.
  Jon: That is... ugh, I don't know whether it's a good plan or not. It's a plan. It is a plan. No one knows whether it's a good plan or not, I mean, y'know, fifty percent of plans are median or better!
• When Jon gets attacked by a Macedonian army with a lot of cavalry and heavy infantry, at first he's concerned at his lack of line infantry, but then he sees the battle map and the tall, step hill in his deployment zone.
  Jon: Now - ooh, ho ho ho! Hello, sexy! Hello sexy giant rock that possibly just turned this into a cakewalk!
• "Spurius Scapula, you head on your way, we know where you're going, you're heading down here to murder these guys and then you'll join the Middle Eastern campaigns. That technically we haven't begun yet, but spoiler alert, there's gonna be Middle Eastern campaigns."
• "If you wanted to, by the way, you can use your Ballista to burn the city down, there's nothing to stop you from putting your Ballista into 'flaming bolt' mode and then targetting any building you wish, even buildings with no strategic importance. If you just like, you know, decide you don't like the look of this particular house right here, you can just bring your Ballista up to it and set in on fire. It's damage you'll need to repair later and gets added to the cost of repairing the city, but like, if you just feel like burning the city down, you're more than welcome to do so. Which is marvellous. How many games say 'You know what, you can just burn down the whole city,' even if it doesn't have any tactical advantage whatsoever, just 'cause you feel like it, 'cause you're a monster? Well Rome: Total War does, because it's the best game."
• During the siege of Thessalonica, Jon uses a unit of Hastati to bait a Macedonian general off the plaza, then has his archers shoot into the mixed melee.
  Jon: Guys, keep firing. I know technically you're going to be shooting your own guys, but it's fine, I'm totally cool with you doing that, please.
• What does upset Jon? The Macedonians defending themselves from Jon's War Dogs.
  Jon: You killed my dogs, you bastards! Now you die!
• Jon thinks the Scipii are bottled up instead of making a move against Africa, then scrolls the world map a little further.
  Jon: Oh! I say that, when on-screen, they are invading Carthage.
• With a new expert assassin at his disposal, Jon starts eyeing his Thracian "allies."
  Jon: Because... in some ways, they've outlived their usefulness, the Thracians. Because I feel like, they were useful, once upon a time, when I wanted them to help out against Macedonia, then they just never actually bothered helping against Macedonia, so I'm not really sure what the point of them is now, other than squatting on some potentially quite valuable cities, and also a more secure northern border.
• "Apparently, for whatever reason, the Scipii have decided not to bother taking on Carthage itself. Well, you know what, the Carthaginians are idiots, the Scipiones are idiots, everyone can just have a great big idiot party down here in Africa, yaaay!"
• Jon can't be bothered to fight a rebel force back in Italy, and so sends a Diplomat to bribe them to join his faction with an absurd sum of money.
  Jon: Oh bloody hell... I just paid seventeen thousand denarii for some Velitaes, some Peasants, and some Hastati.
• A battle outside Pergamon looks dicey at first, then the Greek general decides to charge ahead of his army, immediately flee, and trigger rout after rout.
  Jon: Yeah, that was... I was expecting a final dramatic showdown with the Greeks, alright? Sometimes... it's not my fault, I'm just too damn good at Rome: Total War, it's a shame.
• The siege of Bylazora is a scruffy one, with Jon getting his general overextended and routed, but it does mark the end of an enemy faction.
  Jon: I think it's that guy, it was that guy right there! You can't see his corpse anymore because the pile of corpses is too big, but that was the last of the Macedonians. Should've asked him his name, really, could have put it on a tombstone or something, nevermind.
• "There he is, there's our hero, there's... wait, who were you again?"
• Oppius Brutus, formerly The World's Most Boring man, has finally developed some traits as of Part 19.
  Jon: Now he has picked up Draughtsman, Confident Commander, Great Vanquisher... he's possibly just a psychopath, but he's a charismatic psychopath, so everyone's okay with him.
• Jon belatedly realizes that, having torn down a Large Temple of Athena in Athens, "I just kinda knocked down the Parthenon in order to build a crappy, tiny Temple of Mercury, so that's a shame."
• Jon points out that settlements have minimum population caps based on their size, which can have interesting implications if they're conquered.
  Jon: Population for a town cannot drop below 400, if you go into a town with a population of 401 and Exterminate it, you kill one person. Not much of an extermination, the extermination crew must have been feeling a bit lazy, possibly it was a Friday afternoon or something.
• When one of Jon's spies gets eyes on the northern French coast, we get to hear him groan "Oh no, the British are coming!"
• "The Gauls come to us, almost certainly offering us peace again, which I will gladly accept, and then betray as early as possible... Do you also want map information? Trade, sure, why not, woot."
• Thanks to a highly skilled Diplomat and a pair of very disloyal and dishonest city governors, for a bargain of 73,000 denarii...
  Jon: I've just bought 40% of the people of Pontus' empire out from under them, and it isn't an act of war!
• Jon shows the power of archers on a hill.
  Jon: This is what's left. And it's beautiful.
• As he moves more armies into Anatolia, and incidentally toward Thrace-held Byzantium, Jon can't help notice that Thrace's main army is very far away from its heartland.
  Jon: Now, I'm not saying I'm going to betray my allies... but I am going to betray my allies. Sorry, I did say that, never mind.
• Jon also notices that the Spanish faction has actually conquered all of Spain, though without anything like Portugal. "But that's fine, did we really need Portugal? No, probably not."
• After crushing a Pontic army near Nicomedia:
  Announcer: ...and this day is clearly our victory!
  Jon: You are most definitely right, Mr. Man Who Talks In My Ear After Each Battle, whoever you are, exactly.
• Jon gets a "Man of the Hour" event that promotes Captain Lentulus to Lentulus Cicero, who "might have a slightly fat neck," and who Jon affectionately refers to as Chickpea.
• By Part 21, Valerius the Killer has become a master assassin, who "travels around with a monkey, a catamite and a skilled courtesan. Which sounds like the beginning of a joke, but never mind."
• Jon starts referring to the "Thracian bastards" just to get himself into the right mindset for the inevitable war.
• In a coastal battle along the Black Sea, some Pontic infantry run the full gamut of the game's morale status in a single charge. And not much later, Jon has to clarify "that's not actually a battleline, that's just a pile of corpses."
• While watching the Gauls' last stand at Alesia, Jon is indignant when his unit of "helpers" comes under attack while the Julii overrun the town center.
  Jon: I see. I see, apparently, the flipping Barbarian Noble Cavalry went for flipping me, next. Because there's nothing more important you guys could be doing at this moment in time than flipping attacking me and my troops.
• "Now, time to begin Operation Betray Thrace. Though possibly we should give it a more secret name, so in case any of our letters get intercepted, they won't realize what's going on."
• "Oh, this is another general, he is also pushing forward, he is also going to get himself chunked. I've just invented the word 'chunked' by the way, it's a good word - well, it already existed, but I feel like I'm using it for a new purpose right now."
• While taking Byzantium, Jon admits "I like watching large armies of terrible units be slaughtered. Does that make me a bad person? It might make me a bad person, I'm not sure..."
• The siege of the last Pontic stronghold of Mazaka, on the other hand, is a more equal-opportunity sort of meatgrinder.
  Jon: Okay, slight difficulty - at this point, I have nothing left here, aside from indirect fire, 36 hastati, and the general. They meanwhile have nothing left but the remnants of a general who is now dead, a few crappy little bits and pieces, scythed chariots which would be easy to take care of if I had hoplites - but I don't... oh, god, help... At this point, Rhodian Slingers are gonna to have to be my front line. That is now my frontline infantry.
• The siege of Tylis is another hard fight, and it probably doesn't help that Jon's commander underestimates what he's in for.
  Lentulus Cicero: They have been lulled into a false sense of security by a few feet of defensive walls! As if that will protect them!
  Jon: "A few feet?!" (pans over the Large Stone Walls) A few feet of defensive wall?! Chickpea, are you feeling alright?
• In better news, young Leontia stops asking to marry forty-year-old suitors with the Drillmaster trait, and picks out a sixteen-year-old with Good Defender and Bureaucrat.
  Jon: I think she finally got it through her head that we didn't want her marrying someone in their forties. This is more appropriate - I think you're fifteen or sixteen at the moment, Marius is sixteen years old, I feel less skeeved about that.
• Because Jon is swimming in cash, he on a whim bribes Antioch into ditching Egypt to join his faction. Which means he has another city with a big, unhappy population on his frontier, very little troops to keep order, and...
  Jon: Incidentally, if the Egyptians decide they don't like what I've just done, I don't actually have an army nearby... Okay, this possibly could come to bite me, later, but we'll see, it'll all be fine...
• To help keep order in his eastern cities, Jon shifts his capital again to Byzantium, which of course will be known as Jonstantinople.
• When introducing the first proper bridge battle, Jon warns "if you think that some of the battles I've done so far have been one-sided, you ain't seen nothing yet!"
• Episode 25 is titled "From the Jaws of Victory" due to the AI's tactics defending Cirta from the Scipii.
  Jon: There's possibly some form of Walls of Jericho ritual happening here that I'm unfamiliar with, because the reinforcements do seem to be enjoying walking around the walls in a big circle.
• When a young man comes of age but is known as Spurius the Ugly due to his Scares Small Children trait, Jon parks him and an army on a crossing of the lower Danube and declares him a certified bridge troll.
• Jon once again buys an Egyptian province out from under them, except he quickly finds Cyprus is on the verge of revolt no matter how low he sets Salamis' tax rate, he can only build one unit in the city that will be available next turn, and he has no nearby armies to pull units from for garrison duty.
  Jon: Um... slight miscalculation. Guys? We need some troops, like, now, otherwise this place is going to immediately revolt.
• Highlights of the siege of Numidian-occupied Carthage include a superhuman unit of Desert Infantry, a unit of Hastati that isn't sure whether it wants to go up or down some ladders (and gets pursued by an enemy down those ladders, and a Scipii meatgrinder, but ultimately Jon decides to sit back and watch his "allies" take horrendous losses doing the work of capturing the city for him. One "Exterminate Populace" action later and he has a happy new city in Africa.
  Jon: I feel like "Happy" really isn't the best description. Like, "Subservient," because they're too terrified to actually fight back, fine...
• As a bonus, Jon demonstrates how chariots fare against phalanxes.
  Jon: Just lookit the wheels! This is my favorite thing in Rome: Total War!
• When showing off Patavium, his first Huge City, Jon is particularly impressed by the Imperial Palace improvement.
  Jon: Despite the fact that Rome is technically still a republic and not an empire, we just built an "Imperial Palace." The Senate probably have a right to get worried at this point, we did just build something with "empire" in the title despite the fact we're not actually an empire, so we're kinda giving the game away there...
• When sallying forth from Antioch, Jon discovers the Egyptians' strange response to being shot from a besieged city's walls.
  Jon: Okay, so the AI has decided to do something catastrophically stupid, which I am totally one hundred percent fine with.
• The siege of Campus Getae gives us an unexpected example of Gravity Is a Harsh Mistress.
• Part 30 is titled "The Chosen One," after a routine skirmish against a few rebel units leads to the ascension of Captain Julianus Vatinius, a 21-year-old with the Good Commander, Natural Born Leader, Understanding Strategy, Bureaucrat and Outstanding Speaker traits. Despite his early baldness, Jon immediately makes him the new faction heir, and two turns later, Jon's faction leader dies, elevating the brilliant Vatinius to the head of the Brutii, and he's promoted to Qaestor the very same turn.
  Jon: Oh my goodness, the untested guy just became king! Oh, sorry, not king, not king, faction leader, definitely not king, definitely not emperor, we're definitely not going to depose the Senate and impose an autocracy, no no no. If you've heard that, that's wrong.
• "Anyone got any troops to hand over to Julianus Vatinius~? You need to say his name like that, by the way, he's not just Julianus Vatinius, you kind of have to sigh it, like Julianus Vatinius~, that magnificent bastard..."
• Part 31 confirms that the series is indeed now The Adventures of Julianus Vatinius.
• The siege of Tingi should have been an easy win for the Numidians, given their numerical advantage, but instead Jon gets to watch in disbelief as the AI decides to use javelins and archers as the Numidian front line while blocks of spear infantry stand idle in the background.
  Jon: The game just wants the flipping Scipiones to win. When I was taking on the people of Pontus, this didn't happen! The game didn't just decide "You know what, I'm going to cover my breaches with skirmishers and archers," no-no-no-no, proper phalanxes and heavy infantry were set up, really intelligent attacking and retreating taking place, but the moment you're taking on these flipping guys...
  • However, just when Jon thinks the battle is over, he's treated to the sight of a heavy cavalry charge that instead shatters the Scipii army.
    Announcer: (near tears) A defeat! So many good Romans have died, for no purpose!
    Jon: Yeah, but they weren't from our family, so it's fine.
• "Also, I question Oppius Victor's naming-children policy, given he has three boys and one daughter - he has got Marcellus Brutus, age 10, his first child, his second child, Titus Brutus, age 7, and his third child, Secundus Brutus. (beat) Oppius, we need to talk, okay?"
• As the Chosen One's army approaches Damascus, Jon notes he'll be sure to save the game before the imminent battle with the Egyptians, because "I suspect, the moment Julianus Vatinius enters the battlefield, it will just be so awesome my computer might crash."
• Jon, who is sallying out of a fort with 161 Roman Archers against 2,557 Egyptians:
  Jon: I don't think this is a battle I'm going to win. You can do remarkable things with cavalry and archers in Rome: Total War, but this might be a step too far.
• Poor Spurius is somehow under the impression he's lost a battle against Thrace, and also has a bit of a scratch force to finish them with.
  Jon: Now it is true that this is a bit of a scruffy, hodgepodge army, but the same thing has indeed been said of Spurius the Ugly's face, and it hasn't stopped him from bringing the Thracians here to the very verge of defeat.
• "Oh Thrace, you shouldn't have betr- wait, they never actually betrayed me, did they? No, I betrayed them, sorry, I forgot how it went for a second there. [...] I'm sorry you drove me to this, whatever you did, I can't remember. Possibly your cities just looked tempting, I honestly don't know."
• As soon as Jon's done annexing his former ally, he mentions "Now I'm not saying I've already got my next conquest in mind or anything, but wouldn't my empire look a lot more aesthetically-pleasing if Dacia didn't exist?"
• Poor Chickpea is single at 29, unlike everyone else in the Brutii extended family... except for Julianus Vatinius~, of course.
  Jon: That's basically because no one is worthy of him. No woman dares approach him, because all of them think they're unworthy - and in all fairness, that is pretty much true.
• The siege of Corduba could have been a close fight, especially since the Julii hesitate at some odd moments, but once again the AI all but throws a match to the benefit of a rival Roman faction.
  Jon: Don't throw the skirmishers in as a front line! Why are you throwing them as a front line?! No! This is a really stupid idea! Oh no... never send skirmishers as a front line to take out Principes. And don't send in the Long Shield Cavalry, no! This is just stupid idea after stupid idea! Oh no, the Long Shields going in, and they're turning a corner and not get a proper charge in... and their own javelin guys are going to flippin' blunt the charge, nooo...
• By Part 34, young Romans like Nero Brutus are shaving their heads to emulate their hero, Julianus Vatinius~.
• While the campaign's hero gets the glory of killing another pharaoh in the process of taking the Egyptian capital of Jerusalem, the current faction heir gets to lead his army in battle against a single crappy unit of enemy archers, which Jon notes "is not going to improve Oppius Victor's mood about the fact that he's being under-utilized by the empire."
  Announcer: This is a heroic victory, worthy of Roman arms!
  Jon: Oh, that comes across as just horrendously patronizing and sarcastic today, doesn't it?
• While taking the peasant-filled, rebel settlement of Thebes, Jon admits "this is my favorite thing, just ridiculous amounts of indirect fire tearing apart basic crappy troops that don't happen to be wearing armor, marvelous."
• When the Egyptians sally forth from a Roman fort they captured near Palmyra, the battle takes an odd turn after Jon's Equites pursue broken units back into the fort and have the doors closed behind them, trapping them with Egyptian spear infantry. Jon expects his light horse to pay the price for him overextending them, but instead...
  Jon: Spurius Scapula is even now - because he has no idea what's going on inside, the gate's locked - he is just writing the letters of condolences to, you know, the families of the people who belong to those units of Equites. Little does he know they've actually just gone and bloody won.
• Julianus Vatinius~ finally gets a negative trait: Poor Farmer.
  Jon: Julianus Vatinius has no time to farming. He's too busy being goddamn Roman Superman.
  YouTube comment: (Julianus Vatinius weeps in a field of dying barley) "Why won't these accursed crops grow?! I've tried everything; mass cavalry charges, hails of arrows and stones, I even sent my best spearmen to assault their flanks! Nothing!"
• Bowing to popular demand, Jon shows off the Incendiary Pigs during the final battle against the Egyptians, and the blazing porkers proceed to run amok away from the enemy before expiring off the Roman flank. "But on the plus side... bacon for everyone, I guess! Celebration bacon!"
• Spurius the Ugly is as good an inspirational speaker as he is handsome.
  Spurius the Ugly: Three quarters of the enemy's strength is on this battlefield. If we should lose, then the more of them we can kill, the better - those who come after us will have fewer enemies to fight.
  Jon: Honestly, Spurius the Ugly, I have actually heard better speeches. The whole "Hey, if we happen to lose, at least life will be a bit easier for whoever comes next!", not exactly good for morale, to be honest.
• "I like the look of this battlefield, by the way. This, this is what happens when you field bad quality infantry against Romans."
• Even after the Roman occupiers reduce Aquincum's tax rate, the population remains angry with their new governor, "Possibly because Spurius is just so damn ugly."
• In Part 38, Jon is shocked when he's notified that Julianus Vatinius has gotten married, which reminds him that the guy has three adopted sons, one of which is four years older than him. "The wonders of this man shall never cease."
• The siege of Siwa is a close one, whose highlights include Numidian cavalry hiding inside a blacksmith, Jon's army nearly collapsing from one solid heavy cavalry charge, and his archers refusing to fire on a mixed melee despite orders to do so.
  Jon: They're really - they're hesitating to fire, because they see the fact taht there are Romans in the way. I don't care that there's Romans in the way, I'd rather that these guys all died!
• Jon speculates that Julianus Vatinius' son will be the first man to walk on the moon. "Julianus Vatinius will just make that happen a lot earlier in this alternative history."
• A young family member, in contrast, manages to pick up the Social Drinker trait despite Jon trying to get him an education in a prestigious posting.
  Jon: I shipped you to Athens, capital of culture of the world, trading hub of the world, the most prosperous city on Earth... and all you can think to do is sit around and drink. Bloody teenagers...
• Before triggering the Roman Civil War, Jon assuages his conscience by breaking off his alliance with the Julii with a diplomat before sending in his armies.
  Jon: So there are are, the alliance is now in tatters. The Senate will probably get word of that in a moment, but they'll probably figure it out...
• During the siege of Arretium, a Julii legionary cohort comes up with a novel way to avoid archer fire.
• When examining a Julii general, Jon concludes "Good kid. If he was in my faction, he might have a bright future ahead of him. As it is, not really any future at all."
• To add insult to Oppius Victor's injuries, Jon transfers several choice ancillaries from his character sheet to Julianus Vatinius'. "You can, however, keep the Elderly Spinster 'Aunt.' You have fun with her."
• Part 42 has Jon fighting a lot of defensive bridge battles against his rival Roman factions, where all he can do is set up and wait for the enemy to form a marching column.
  Jon: ...no, no marching column, they're just gonna bum-rush the bridge.
• "Bridge battles, ladies and gentlemen."
• First, the Chosen One's conquest of Italy is delayed when Jon forgets to embark the Cretan Archers he was retraining, then the turn after that, it's delayed again because Jon moved the transports without putting the Archers on them.
  Jon: Julianus Vatinius, I am really sorry about this, I'm letting you down.
• The Britons attack Aquincum, having not heard the stories about Spurius the Ugly turning enemy armies to stone with his stare. When Jon sallies, he's able to drive them off, but not after losing a unit to some unexpected enemy infiltrators.
• The battle to take Messana is so scruffy, with the Brutii taking more casualties than they dealt, that Jon exterminates the population "to remove all the witnesses to how embarrassing that was."
• Jon is defensive when his faction leader picks up the Mildly Extravagant trait.
  Jon: "Money is only as much use as the things it is spent on," you can't question that. That makes perfect, absolute sense, and what he spends it on is armies. And trophies. And people to polish the trophies, because there's a lot of trophies, because he wins a lot of victories.
• When sallying from Carthage, Jon gets to see one of the enemy units yoinked back onto the battlefield after being charged on its edge.
• "And I've got ships right behind you, you know what? If you want to retreat any further, I've got sailors ready to take you on, with - oh. Flip, I've got a massive army here, I forgot I had a massive army here..."
• Some of the older Brutii characters pass away in Part 46.
  Jon: Spurius Victor, "A worthy life has ended." Uh, Cassius the Lewd, I'm not sure whether we can necessarily say his life was worthy. It might have been fun, "worthy," maybe not quite so much.
• With the siege (and extermination) of Lilybaeum, Jon declares that Siciliy's "liberation" is complete.
  YouTube comment: (Exterminates thousands of people) "The liberation of Sicily!"
• When examining the portrait of a young enemy general, Jon's immediate conclusion is that "His sixteen years on this earth have been dedicated to eating pies."
• In Part 49, Spurius the Ugly picks up the Minion trait, which the game treats as bad, but Jon thinks otherwise. "Because it means Spurius the Ugly has actually found someone who is willing to have sex with him, which I'm just thrilled about, because it is something he has struggled with in the past."
• While avenging the death of Captain Nero by properly taking Leptis Magna, Jon ends up baffled when the enemy general flees and goes on a little journey.
• By Part 50, the enemy AI is starting to make more questionable decisions, like rushing in to stand still in front of Jon's archers, or obsessing over a cavalry unit while being shot to pieces.
• Rome: Total War - PTSD Simulator.
• The narrator's end-of-battle summaries aren't quite up to date with the current political situation.
  Narrator: All Rome will be amazed at such a victory! The day is ours!
  Jon: I'm not sure about "amazed," they might be a bit horrified, we have killed like three members of the same family in a single battle, along with someone else who was also part of the family but wasn't called "Julius." But you know what, I'm happy with that.
• By Part 52, not only are men all across the Mediterranean shaving their heads in imitation of the future emperor, but the Julii have a character named Julianus Ventidius.
  Jon: He has to die. It's an affront to Julianus Vatinius the Real that this fake exists.
• An attempt to sally from Leptis Magna doesn't go so hot.
  Narrator: Your gallant general has fallen, and caused his troops much heartache!
  Jon: No, no-no, his "gallant troops" murdered him with pila, alright? Let's get the story flipping straight here.
• During the fight for Lemonum, Julianus Ventidius not only ditches his bodyguards when he's attacked by a former ally while entering the battlefield, he wanders off the town center during the closing moments of the siege.
• Jon shows off the invasion force Julianus Vatinius will be leading to Rome, tells them to embark upon a fleet, and... finds the fleet is already transporting units.
  Jon: Wait, what? ...What're you doing there? Oh, is this the army you've been telling me about in the comments for flipping weeks?
• By Part 54, Jon is advising young enemy family members to "just say you're fifteen, because then you technically don't exist and we don't put you to death, okay?"
• "Gaius Scipio, that was the faction leader. Faction leader's dead, so congratulations, you're the new king of the Scipiones. Guess how long your reign's going to last?"
• When taking Dimmidi, Jon offers a Hope Spot to a Scipii soldier, and later takes on Stevius Flagpole.
• For the Grand Finale, Julius Victor finally marches on Rome, routing several Senatorial armies in the field within sight of the city.
  Narrator: All Rome will be amazed at such a victory! The day is ours!
  Jon: They won't be that amazed, to be honest, some of them saw it from the walls, and the rest will roughly figure out what happened when the pitiful remains of the Senate's army come back through the gates.
• Unfortunately, Julianus Victor is just too good, and wipes out all resistance, leaving Rome unoccupied. So Jon delays taking the city for a turn to allow it to train a new garrison, then attacks with his final assault army: Julianus Valentius, his Cretan Archers, his mercenary War Elephants... and, at the comments section's urging, fourteen units of War Hounds.
  Jon: They're just ready to make their noble Last Stand for Rome, and, um... they don't really know what's going to come around the corner, but they're probably expecting legionaries, archer support, a cavalry charge. I don't think they're going to see this coming...
• invoked For the series' "Where Are They Now?" Epilogue, Jon discusses the fate of the various Brutii family members, as well as the Unfortunate Implications of Gnaeus Vatinius beating up on Scythian warrior women and the hidden faction of Amazons. It wraps up with Julianus Vatinius shifting public funds to a secret project, sneaking out of Rome with his favorite untis of Cretan Archers, and blasting off in a rocket to found "Space Rome."

Rome: Total War - The Livestream Highlights

• For his second, live playthrough of Rome: Total War, Jon's picked the Seleucids, who have a strong roster of units and a horrible start position.
• True to history, Jon attacks the Egyptians right away, and also true to history, Jon immediately loses his faction leader.
  Jon: So, that's...
  Claire: Great. Great.
  Jon: It's fine, that's fine. As I've said, we've got twelve Antiochuses to work our way through-
  Claire: Ahahah! Antiochus is dead, long live Antiochus!
  Jon: -this was historically accurate, because Antiochus needed to die! ...Dammit, I was really hoping that wouldn't happen. Yeah, that's one Antiochus down, keep an eye on that. If we lose eleven other Antiochuses, then we officially have to end the run.
• The good news is, since this new campaign is hours and hours away from the Marian Reforms, the Egyptian generals are in chariots.
  Jon: That means, if he can be made to touch this line of spears, he will melt, like butter, butter in a hot knife that spent a while in the microwave.
  (beat)
  Claire: Don't put knives in the microwave, people.
  Jon: I meant butter, but yes, don't do that either.
• In short order, Jon is able to deploy Levy Pikemen, and show their superiority to Militia Hoplites.
  Jon: ...which is basically the Total War equivalent of "You versus The Guy She Tells You Not To Worry About." Levy Pikemen are the best, look at their massive, long spears!
  Claire: Ohhhh...
  Jon: Just look at that, wah, wah, waaaahhh...
  Claire: Yeah, I'm sorry, but they just have massively longer spears.
  Jon: They do have massively longer spears, it's hilarious. And also, they have fifty percent more men inside them.
  (beat)
  Claire: (cracks up) That was amazing!
  Jon: (laughing) It's very important, that there's fifty percent more men inside them, at any one time.
• One of Jon's soldiers is very excited to be on a war elephant.
• When besieging Halicarnassus in Part 2, Jon looks at one of the units of Cretan Archers defending the rebel settlement and wonders whether a young Julianus Vatinius is among them.
  Jon: Maybe baby Vatinius is in there somewhere, thinking "Blimey, it sure is fun being a mercenary over here in Asia Minor, I'm sure nothing important's going to happen in my life..."
• Jon notes during one battle that Claire "is just a city girl. Something something from Detrooiit. She took a midnight train going an-y-where~" Minutes later:
  Claire: The chat is saying "Stop singing, my ears are bleeding!" "Please stop believing!"
• Jon assumes a Parthian general's name is properly pronounced "Ar-SEES," but he's going with "Arse-s."
• A conversation about a rap song's spoken intro leads to Jon imagining the lights going dim, a curtain rising, and...
  Jon: In fair Verona do we set our scene
  Oh my god, Becky, look at her butt, it is so big
  Where like families, equal in dignity, those rap guys' girlfriends
  They only talk because she looks like a total prostitute, cash
  Three times have the authorities warned our heroes not to clap
  Yet civil strife still do they deliver
  I can't believe it's just so round, it's just like out there!
• Jon gets to show off what his Scythed Chariots do to a mass of enemy infantry.
• Jon gets to show off what phalanxes do in bridge battles against chariots.
• Steve succumbs to the horrors of war.
• Weird things happen with combat along a map's edge.
• A field battle outside Memphis exhibits the downsides of Jon's army, such as his Scythed Chariots going out of control and his Elephants running amok.
• When the doorbell rings in Part 4, Jon has a little chat with his viewers about ways to get rid of Claire.
• "The Thracian Mercenaries are great because they're so fast, a fast-moving unit that just slices through anything. They also show up with green hair and skirts."
• While a battle is raging, Jon explains how he once went into London right when a suspected terrorist attack went down, and didn't receive any sort of warning from Claire and the friend he was meeting.
  Jon: However, you did message me to ask me to pick up milk-
  Claire: Because we'd run out of milk!
  Jon: -rather than "Are you dead or alive, are you fine from the terrorist attack?"
  Claire: Oh, I'm sorry, 'cause I knew there was a fist fight, and I didn't assume you'd gotten into one of those.
  Jon: Well, someone might have punched me!
  Claire: ...Yeah, I can see that.
• When taking Mazaka, Jon agrees not to corner-fight the enemy reinforcements. He's very successful.
  Jon: ...I'm in the wrong corner. Right, so we're definitely not corner-fighting, just FYI-
  Claire: (cracks up)
  Jon: Shut up, Claire!
• Jon calls his alliance with Carthage and Macedon the "Alliance of Losers," since "all of us, in our own way, are doing badly."
• "Let history remember Arses, the greatest general of all time."
• "Did anyone else know that we had a massive army just standing here, doing nothing for a couple of turns?"
• When defending Hatra from the Armenians, Jon resorts to layered defensive phalanxes with archer support.
  Jon: My own archers are now returning fire, and when I say my archers are returning fire, they're actually not, I think I just misread the arrows going the wrong direction, my archers are not returning fire at all. That was a lie. I basically said that to boost the morale of these guys. "Don't worry guys, you've got lots of reinforcements!" No you don't, you're alone on the front line, good luck by the way, you're basically being sacrificed, byyyye!
  • His final layer of soldiers doesn't do much better.
    Jon: And now we've got the Phalanx Pikemen, these are the lads whose job it is not to break, and when I say these are the guys whose job it is to not break, they just broke. But, uh, other than that, everything's fine-
    Claire: (giggles in the background)
    Jon: Shut up, Claire, that's not helpful!
    Claire: I wasn't trying to be helpful.
• One bright moment during the fiasco of a fight for Arsakia is Jon getting distracted by what's under a Cataphract's skirt.
• In a field battle near Kotais, Jon's Scythed Chariots are the clear MVP... for the enemy team.
  Jon: I - I can't actually shoot them! Um, I can't shoot them, so basically, your own Scythed Chariots are vastly more effective at killing your units than the enemy's Scythed Chariots are, because I have no control over these guys-
  Claire: That's just amazing.
  Jon: So I can't kill them, they're just running through my line-
  Claire: Oh my god, that's amazing.
  Jon: They're actually winning the battle for the enemy. Now they're running through my archers, I could not have done - like, if the enemy had Scythed Chariots, they couldn't be doing this good a job. They physically couldn't. Just, look at the amount of damage they're doing! This is ridiculous!
  Claire: Oh, just piles of corpses...
  Jon: I hate everything. How- yeah, that's right, go and get their horse archers! No, not back this way! Go away! You work for ME!!
  [...]
  Jon: The enemy got 143 kills, I've still lost 600 men! Three-quarters of my casualties are self-inflicted!
• "Claire! It's happening again!"
• Part 7 is called "The Battle of Five Armies" because Jon manages to start a battle with so many forces and soldiers present that he's worried about his computer catching fire.
  Jon: Look at this! This is ridiculous, and it's beautiful! I don't even know what's happening!
  • Most of Jon's contribution during the battle is micro-managing his general's bodyguard unit, charging the rear of enemy formations in support of an allied general who seems determined to get himself killed.
    Jon: Basically [the AI]'s decided, "Hey, is that your faction leader you've given me control of? Well, YOLO chaaaarrrge!"
• The assault on Sparta is a near-disaster, not only because of the Greeks' unkillable Armored Hoplites, but because Jon's war elephants decide to go berserk right in the gates.
  Jon: ...I hate this cocking elephant so much.
  • "I've actually got reinforcements coming in. I've actually got a good, strong unit of Phalanx Pikemen right here, right the cock here, that can actually hold. I know this is the same tactic I've used the last seventeen times and it didn't work, but this time, this time it's going to work."
• As it to make up for that, a battle against the game's premier light cavalry faction goes a lot better.
  Jon: So fortunately, what the Scythians have decided to do is throw the entirety of their basically uncatchable horse archer corps directly into phalanxes. Basically, yeah, the Scythians have just thrown it away. They've just thrown away everything directly into prepared spearmen. Um, and now they're continuing to do it, because I guess they hate being alive.
• Part 9 kicks off with Jon honoring his alliance and watching the last 500 Carthaginians get killed by the Scipii. Afterward, he can only hope "Maybe Rome didn't notice us there, and won't declare war, and won't mind."
  Jon: I think we don't have any friends left in the world, I think that's actually it.
  Claire: This seems to be a constant of your playthroughs, that you just end up, you know, in Total War games, just not having any friends, for reasons.
• "The Greeks have sort of played into our hands here, look at this, this is cavalry that is just... uh oh... Claire! The chariots have gone berserk!"
• Claire giving economic news leads to Jon giggling over the DoJones stock market/kung-fu dojo.
• Many A True Nerd evidently had a Christmas party, in which Jon pretended he was the head of BoxCo Limited.
• Jon makes Claire give the intro and outro of Part 11.
  Claire: But in the meantime, I've been Claire-
  Jon: I've been Jon.
  (beat)
  Claire: And this has been Many A True...
  Jon: It's called Many A True NERD, Claire! The channel is called Many A True Nerd! Christ, you're so fired!
• In Part 11, Jon faces a fight that the game thinks will be a tough one, though he's more struck by the Brutii fielding almost "nothing but puppies!" In the battle that follows, the Roman War Hounds interact strangely with spears, Jon's chariots predictably go berserk, and reinforcing Incendiary Pigs come to the battlefield already on fire, but Jon wins a decisive victory. And then the game crashes. When Jon reloads the save and runs the turn again, this time the AI moves away instead of attacking him.
  Claire: The AI just savescummed that battle.
  Jon: I think it did. Yeah, pretty much, that's what just happened, yeah, that's really weird. Yeah, it decided to attack, then it lost, then it crashed the game and decided to hang out over here, instead.
• When invading Italy, Jon gets nostalgic when he spots Oppius Brutus, who has quite a character sheet this time.
  Claire: Embezzler...
  Jon: Yeah, in this game he's just terrible.
  Claire: Wildly Extravagant...
  Jon: He Reads During the Races.
  Claire: Casual Adulterer?
  Jon: Yeah.
  Claire: I mean, he's terrible, but it doesn't seem like he'd be boring.
  Jon: I'm prety sure Oppius Brutus was The Most Boring Man in the World in my playthrough, he spawned in, he just had no traits at all, he was so boring. This guy instead is just a dick.
• Part 12 is introduced by "Jen" of Many a True Nerd, until Jon chases her off and Claire returns.
• The grand finale gives us the sepctacle of a pack of War Hounds chasing a squatting charioteer, and Jon's hysterical laughter when he manages to charge his war elephants into the rear of a tightly-packed mass of Roman infantry.
• Jon's convinced the Seleucid general's helmet in the ending cinematic has a screaming chicken on it.

Rome: Total War - Barbarian Invasion

• Jon, being Jon, is playing the Barbarian Invasion expansion on its hardest difficulty, and has picked the hardest faction to win with.
  Jon: And then, of course, there was one other thing. There was the campaign that people do not dare to speak of. The campaign for people who have had enough of winning Total War campaigns, and wanted to lose. Like, really lose. Like, they just enjoyed the sensation of a boot stamping on their face, forever. I'm talking, of course, about the Western Roman Empire campaign.
• When Jon starts the campaign, he explains that the incoming barbarian hordes and risk of widespread rebellion are only secondary concerns compared to the state of Rome's economy.
  Jon: You see, I have an empire of this size, which is massively undeveloped to represent the decline of the Roman Empire, and I've only got a thousand denarii to start me off. And if I just actually nip over to my financial tab over here, that situation's not going to get any better. Even if I don't spend any money this turn whatsoever, next turn I'm gonna have 138 denarii, and then that's going to be it, I'm going to be into debt. So basically, I'm pretty much bankrupt. (laughs) Economy, that's the big one, that's the big one right there. So: hordes are coming, my empire is pretty much all gonna revolt against me in two turns, thereabout, and I've got no money to fix it. Oh, and basically no armies, either.
• To make matters worse, the Western Empire has a terrible roster of starting leaders, to the point that "many of your cities are better off if you just take your governor and have him stand in the middle of nowhere so he can't mess it up anymore."
• It takes forty-five minutes for Jon to try to start salvaging his empire, deciding which cities are lost causes, and letting his first turn end.
  Jon: So now, now we see what happens next. And what happens next is everything catches fire. But now we get to figure out exactly what catches fire, and how bad the fire is!
• "Some people are gonna die. And it means I'm not paying their salary anymore. It's not so bad."
• When Rome's garrison has to venture out to quash some rebels, Jon points out it's "a rare example of a good army. We won't be seeing many of these."
• "Okay, here it comes the empire falling apart in three... two... one..." (hits "End Turn" button)
• "...oh wow, we're at -8000 [denarii]. Yeah, that's because like, you know, about a third of my entire tax base just decided it wanted to be part of an unrelated empire. So, we need to counteract that..." (cracks up) "That's fine, that's one hundred percent fine."
• When taking the Alemanni's city, Jon points out their archers and notes that they're superior to his own, "which is going to be universally true. If you're playing as the Western Roman Empire, and you see any other archers, you can just assume ahead of time that those archers are superior to yours. Because that's just how it flipping goes, alright?"
• Only twelve minutes into Part Two and "Now about a third of our empire has actually broken away. Which is fine, this is all completely expected!"
• When retaking Cathago Nova, Jon points out the downside of starting a new Christian religous building line in an already-Large City.
• "There we go, they get hit in the back and now they are breaking, so we can very, very quickly - why are you guys taking losses? Hang on, who's actually hitting you guys? How are you losing against routing Peasants, how - okay, Limitanei do kinda suck, yes."
• Limitanei suck so much, in fact, that even when Jon's plan requires them to rout, they manage to screw that up.
  Jon: There we go, so they're routing, this is their job, this is what they're supposed to be going, if we're very lucky indeed they'll rout in this direction and the general will... no, or they can just all die, that can happen too.
• "I'm feeling good about this, this has been a good few opening turns for the Western Roman Empire. This is... looking promising. Still, now that I've said that, it's going to fall apart immediately, so let's end this turn right here and see what catastrophe's about to happen next."
• Jon kicks off Part Three by moving his spies eastward in search of the barbarian hordes, but those aren't his immediate concern, "Because the threats never stop emerging when you're the Western Roman Empire."
• When retaking Avaricum, Jon's lucky enough to avoid the Rome: Total War bug involving troops not boarding siege towers, though one soldier is strangely quick to get on the walls.
• A unit of barbarian mercenaries getting all but wiped out in the siege is no problem, since "I was planning to break them up anyway, so these guys being dead just means I don't have to pay their salaries."
• The leader of the Frankish army threatening Colonia Agrippina is just "a seventeen-year-old kid, so I feel like he shouldn't really be invading foreign nations. Maybe he just snuck out one night and his dad doesn't know where he is. But screw it, you're going down, you stupid bastard."
• "Now for whatever reason, the Franks seem obsessed with this one unit of Limitanei, who have... immediately broken in the face of Peasants. Because of course they have."
• By the end of Part Three, the Franks are on the ropes, the Berbers and Celts are holding back, and Jon is one siege away from reuniting the entirety of the continental Western Roman Empire, so things are "actually perfect. And when I say 'perfect,' we're now at war with the other half of the Roman Empire, and as you've probably noticed, they'e actually brought a lot more men than we've got."
• The good news about a Roman civil war is that your opponents have some of the same weaknesses as you do.
  Jon: Okay, we've got a bit of a problem, which is you guys - back away, back away, fall back toward the walls, I don't want you guys - oh, those are Limitanei. Screw it, kill 'em, just kill 'em, those are flippin' Limitanei.
• At first Jon is happy to see the Huns at war with the Vandals, which is driving the Vandals south toward the Goths, who are right on the borders of Eastern Rome. Then he remembers that would also put them right on his eastern frontier.
  Jon: So, uh, the Goths - their capital is about there, I believe - they're a horde faction. So, if the Vandals decide to sack their capital, that's a brand new horde on the field, which is worryingly close by Aquincum.
• To make matters more tense, Jon notices another barbarian faction is floating a navy.
  Jon: The Saxons are in boats. Now, why would the Saxons be in boats? Unless they're planning on doing the thing that, you know, Saxons try to do, which is try to become Anglo-Saxons. Okay, I'm a little bit worried the Saxons are looking at London and seeing it a little bit on the vulnerable side.
• Jon's able to retake Salamantica, though not without a hiccup.
  Jon: We can see these [Foederati] slowly chunk their way through the Peasants, there'll be casualties and they... did you all just break?! Excuse me, you are proper hardcore flipping infantry! This is not what you were supposed to do! Unfortunately, this is just what happens with Very Hard battles, sometimes you get completely screwed over by the fact that the AI just does not want to lose.
• Jon thought things were going as well as they could go for Western Rome, then the Huns go and attack the Sarmatians.
  Jon: This is actually a disaster. So the Huns are attacking the Sarmatian capital somewhere around here. They will win, and that will mean the Sarmatians become the third horde. The Vandals, meanwhile, are attacking the Goths. The Goths will then immediately become a horde, that is horde number four on the field. Oh, this is actually - okay, we're actually dealing with the worst-case scenario. [...] There's gonna be four different hordes on the field. Simultaneously. Oh, bloody hell...
• Salona was one of Jon's starting settlements that went rebel almost immediately, but due to a plague outbreak he left it alone while he focused on retaking the rest of his empire. Then he notices a Rebel Roman army on his borders.
  Jon: So it turns out the forces in Salona most definitely have been rebuilding, because they're sending an army that's actually got barbarian infantry presumably towards Aquincum, because of course they are, why wouldn't they be doing that? I think that makes perfect bloody sense, absolutely!
• Part 5 kicks off with a battle for Carthage... or not.
  Jon: I think the AI's decided it's made a catastrophically stupid mistake.
• Jon's happy to see an Eastern Roman army near a stack of Goths.
  Jon: Sure, we hate them, but right now, my enemy's enemy is my friend. Or to be more precise, my enemy's enemy is also my enemy, but they're both dicks so I hope they kill each other.
• "Alright, time to figure out what's going on next with the hordes, because arguably, that's the biggest, most important question of all. And the answer is... I don't know what the Huns are doing right now, and... where did the Vandals just go? And where have most of the Huns gone? Oh flip, I've lost the hordes!"
• Marcus the Gambler lives up to his name by choosing a route between cities that takes him dangerously close by the Frankish capital.
• While taking Campus Quadi, it's not enough that Jon's Foederati get routed by Lombard Archers, they proceed to flee through the town gate while he's trying to move the rest of his army through it.
  Jon: Right, would you please just recover if I use Rally on you? Please chill out, stop running away, in case you haven't noticed, I'm bringing in reinforcements. Or I would, if you weren't blocking them!
• Jon's greatest weapon may actually be the general Spurius Flavius, "the most Christian man who ever Christian'd." As in, two turns after taking Campus Quadi, the previously 100% pagan settlement is 65% Christian. He is in fact dangerously Christian, as seen when Jon moves him near Vicus Alemani, whose pagan religious buildings he's relying on to give his soldiers increased experience, and in the space of one turn converts 54% of the population.
• The Sarmatians manage to fend off several Hun sieges, so that they've created a "seriously badass, hardcore army, that might themselves decide to go attack the Goths. Or just walk along this road and attack my very softcore eastern territories over here, who bloody knows."
• While probing the contested lands near Salona, Jon's army of 2,896 elite soldiers encounters 241 Barbarian Peasants.
  Announcer: This is a heroic victory, worthy of Roman arms!
  Jon: I'm gonna be honest, Narrator Man, "heroic" is not the word I'd go for. Like, "amusing," "target practice," sure, both of them. "Heroic," not so much.
• Jon gives a history lesson when discussing Gratianus the Lily-Livered, who is modeled after the historical Emperor Gratian but was inexplicably given a bunch of contemptible traits. "I just don't know why they decided to character assassinate an unremarkable emperor who died over a thousand years ago, I'm just not quite sure who decided to do that."
• When the Vandal hordes try to force a river crossing Jon's holding, he has his army's Catholic Priests start up a chant to bolster morale.
  Jon: There we go, some nice, generic chanting. We're not really sure what they're saying, honestly, they just seem to vaguely mumble. That's fine, it's Latin, no one speaks Latin - oh wait, hang on...
• "Also, I'm not convinced this was really much of a river. I feel like they could have walked over at this at any point, I'm not sure they needed to swim."
• The best part about defending a crossing is riding down the fleeing enemy after they fail to make it over.
  Jon: (as his Sarmatian Auxilia charge fleeing Steppe Archers) Come on, lads, where do you think you're going? No no no no no, you were so keen, so keen to invade Roman territory, hang around a while! You like horses so much? Say hello to ours!
• The Huns keep smashing their heads against the walls of Vicus Sarmatae, while the defenders never seem to lose much strength.
  Jon: I feel like the Sarmatians are actually going to defeat the Huns. Which is... baffling, but there we flipping go!
• When Jon sallies out of Carthage again, the Berbers continue to make questionable tactical decisions.
  Jon: Uh, hello? They seem to just be charging! Which is... highly convenient, because they're just charging into prepared spearmen, when I've actually got the gateway, right here [behind me]. So... I mean, I guess if they want to I'm not gonna stop them... They've even got their flipping archers charging up, I have no idea what's going on here. [...] Oh-kay, what on Earth are you bastards doing? And now they're yelling "retreat," which makes sense, yes, because you've just decided to run directly into the walls and straight into my troops. Well done, everybody, great job all around!
• The Vandal hordes march through Dalmatia to threaten northern Italy, so Jon sends Emperor Caius Flavius to pursue. The Vandals counter with an army containing their entire ruling family, and Jon notes that it's quite convenient that the battlefield contains a cemetery in one corner, because "I feel like, yeah, we might have a few bodies to add to that at the end of this." The battle is the decisive end to the Vandal War, as the Emperor's bodyguard charges into the last barbarian Warlord unit.
  Jon: Aaaand... down. He. Goes. Caius Flavius just won that one, single-flipping-handed. Technically it was his bodyguard, but you know, when we record this in the history books, we won't mention that bit. [...] Oh, and extremely bloody conveniently, guess what direction they're fleeing in? Oh yeah, straight toward the bloody graveyard!
• So Jon gets to wrap up Part 6 exulting that he has defeated one of the game's horde factions.
  Jon: And that means there is now nothing threatening us, aside from the Celts, the Berbers, the Huns, the Goths, the Franks, and the other half of the Roman Empire, plus a bunch of stuff I probably haven't thought of yet. Okay, quite a few things.
• Fresh off defeating the Vandals, and after handily beating one Saxon army, Jon might have gotten a bit overconfident and careless fighting a second Saxon force...
  Jon: This might not be precisely the walk-over I was expecting, but they won't be able to get through the Comitatenses!
  (one minute later)
  Jon: My archers are a little bit exposed over here, which is a shame, but what can you do?
  (30 seconds later)
  Jon: Wait, what the hell is going on here? What is happening?! Why are the Comitatenses breaking?! Whoa, whoawhoawhoawhoawhoa, whoa, the front line has just collapsed! The front line has just collapsed! What the hell is going on here?!
• The YouTube comments section has a discussion over whether the battle is Jon's Teutoburg Forest, due to the general location and the massacre of his prized legion, or the equivalent of Cannae, since the part of his army that didn't manage to retreat was enveloped and crushed.
• "This is not the end of the world, there are some advantages. Number one, we don't have to pay for those guys who just died, we don't have to like pension off their families or whatever."
• The Berbers continue to show off their unique battle tactics, first by deciding to rush across a bridge even though Jon is the attacker, then by trying to have some Peasants swim right in front of Jon's archers. Though Jon's cavalry decides to take a dip as well.
• The Burgundii send an army with Lombard Berserkers to besiege Jon's northern frontier.
  Jon: Right, so the guy I just sent to Campus Frisia, he's dead, he's one hundred percent dead, there's nothing we're going to do to these guys.
• When Marcus the Gambler decides to sally out of Aquincum, Jon's plan to bait the Goths into getting close to his walls so he can pick off key units with his cavalry ends up going in an unexpected direction.
  Jon: Everybody get inside the city, and then close the door behind you, because there's quite a lot of barbarians behind you, actually!
  • "No, don't get yourselves flanked, fall back right against the wall, I want you flipping fighting with your back pressed to the wall, please. Go for these guys and - you've immediately broken. Okay, well done, well done for immediately breaking despite being Comitatenses, and thus your one job being 'don't immediately break.'"
  • The biggest surprise of the battle may be that the Limitanei actually held, against an enemy general, no less!
• "There is actually one other mystery that concerns me, a little bit. Remember that Saxon army with loads of heavy infantry, Sarmatians and multiple generals? I don't actually know where it is right now."
• "Alright, big sandy dunes and... excuse me, who are - sorry, I accidentally left one of my archers behind, just a second." (cut to a redeployed army) "As I was saying, big sandy dunes..."
• Jon explains that the Shieldwall ability is like a rebalanced Phalanx formation from the base game, because "like the Phalanx it turns this unit into an excellent defensive unit, but unlike the Phalanx it doesn't turn it into an unstoppable killing machine that can take out anything else in the game."
• After ending his turn, Jon's outraged that the Huns have turned away from Thessalonica to head toward his territory, but warns them that "if you're coming for Aquincum again, well... you can't, the Goths aren't done with it."
• Part 9 opens with Spurius Flavius striking back against the Burgundii at Campus Chatti.
  Jon: What's that, guys? You don't want to be exterminated? Well that's a shame, because I still want to own Campus Frisia, but we don't always get what we want, do we?
• The Huns at this point "are officially Horde Bumbling right now, so who knows where they're going to end up, precisely."
• The Carriage Ballistae do not have a good debut battle, as Jon moves them away from one unit of enemy horse archers on the right flank to the left flank, where there are two units of enemy horse archers.
  Jon: I don't want these guys taking light knocks, if they're currently involved in fire and counter-fire, I'm pulling them back.
  (forty seconds later)
  Jon: Oh flip, what happened to the Carriage Ballistae?! Oh, the Carriage Ballistae are basically dead.
• "Hang on, why are the Franks moving?! Oh, the Franks have been peaceful for so long, I don't like that. Okay, why has everything gone wrong simultaneously? Bloody hell... Alright, check down here [in Africa], I like this front, this front seems to be bloody working."
• Jon tries a night fight to snipe one Goth army, but the AI shows it's smart enough to quit the field, while Jon's cavalry displays an extraordinary ability to kill units not actually on the battlefield.
• While picking apart scattered Goth armies, Jon gets to enjoy ranged superiority.
  Jon: So, how do you guys feel about that? Just give it a second, I think we've got some questionnaires coming in for ya...
• Jon dispatches a single unit of cavalry to be "big damn heroes" and assassinate an isolated Goth leader, and is pleased when the "Man of the Hour" event fires and he gets a new general.
  Jon: Right, you, my good man, are the biggest hero who ever existed! Apart from the Emperor himself, who is standing right there, so we really shouldn't say that out loud.
• Part 10 starts off with the Sarmatians, fresh from driving the Huns out of eastern Europe, moving west.
  Jon: Right, well that's... that's a problem I wasn't expecting. Good, add a new problem to the bottom of the problems list. Oh no, there's no room on the list, it's already full.
• When retaking Campus Frisia, Jon takes some heavy losses to Berserkers, which doesn't leave him with much to make the final push.
  Jon: Oh no. No, I'm not thinking what I'm thinking, am I? These Archers have a Melee Attack of 6 and a Defense of 10. They can actually fight! Okay, my Archers have just been promoted to frontline units, because they can actually flipping fight. So... okay, then! In we go, I suppose!
• And then when Spurius Flavius reaches Vicus Saxones, he finds that his spies have gotten the gates open.
  Jon: (cheerfully) So basically and in conclusion, the trebuchets we trained in Rome and shipped to northern Europe were completely flipping useless!
• Jon's worried when fighting the Goths in the open field, because his "'Varus, give me back my legions!' sense is tingling and I don't like it."
• Happily, he's able to score one decisive victory after another to break the scattered Goth armies and kill their leaders. The fights go so well, in fact, that everyone in his army wants in on the glory.
  Jon: In come the - in come the Archers! The Archers are running forward to stab the Gothic king in the face! Well done, lads! Medals for you!
• "Salona's just been sacked, again. So wait, Salona belonged to me, then the Western Roman Rebels, then it was sacked by the Vandals so it belonged to nobody, then the Eastern Romans moved in, now it's been sacked again by the Huns. So yeah, generally not a fun time to live in Salona, these past few years."
• Vicus Saxones is too big to stay stable after Jon takes it, so he has his army step out, let it go Western Roman Rebel, then attack it again because "The first time we sacked the place didn't take." And he's able to show off what happens if you trap an enemy unit on the walls by knocking down all their escape paths.
• Part 11 starts on a sad note with the death of Emperor Caius the Horde-Slayer, who could defeat any enemy "but the horde of time."
• A chaotic field battle against the Huns comes down to the wire.
  Jon: Everything is under control, aside from the fact that my army is now not facing the right way. Which is a mild concern.
• In the aftermath, the Huns are scattered and weakened, allowing Jon to pick off their surviving warbands one by one with massed arrow fire.
  Jon: Right, [Warlord] number one goes down, these idiots conveniently step forward... it's like they want to die, marvelous!
• Young Zeno Flavius ends up fighting the last battle against the Goths with a very scruffy army, forcing Jon to throw everything against the Gothic warlord in an attempt to kill him and finish off the faction. Then he notices he has a group of horsemen standing in the distance.
  Jon: This is... this is not enough here, these guys are about to break apart - wait, who are you? Oh, there's more flipping cavalry! Right, get everyone involved!
• Part 12 opens all but one of the hordes on the map all taken care of, so Jon feels pretty good about the situation. "Which probably means something completely unexpected and unpredictable is about to go wrong, because I'm playing as the Western Roman Empire, and that's just how it goes."
• A Hun army that retreats when Jon attacks on his turn goes after that same army on its turn, which Jon puts down to "short-term memory problems."
• Emperor Spurius Flavius ("the most Christian emperor who ever Christian'd") lands in England to begin its conversion by sword, though Jon is still nervous, as "let's just say it wouldn't be the first time that Spurius Flavius has managed to lose against a large barbarian army."
• After the tragic loss of Marcus the Gambler while sallying from Aquincum, and the game once again trying to make Cassius the Lily-Livered the new faction heir, Jon has to find a good candidate for the next caesar. There are three notable young Romans to choose from, but Jon picks the other general in Aquincum, because he inherited the late Marcus' retinue right before the fatal battle, and because...
  Jon: And he does have the best name of all. Because he's Gundobad Norbanus, which is just really fun to say.
• Jon starts Part 13 by introducing the next generation of Roman leaders: Zeno Flavius, "the man who can win a victory no matter what weird army I decide to give him," Licianus Alimentus, "the man who specializes in jumping into battles that have already been won and then pretending that he won them," and of course "Gundobad Norbanus, that sexy, sexy devil!"
• Another sally from Aquincum goes poorly.
  Jon: That's caught their attention, now we can get a couple of rounds off, and then we can just back off immediately.
  (enemy cavalry begins to charge)
  Jon: Alright, I don't really want to have to do this, and now guys, probably fall back at this point just for safety-
  (enemy cavalry hits and immediately routs Jon's Comitatenses)
  Jon: You guys stay right... okay. So, this hasn't exactly started desperately well, to be honest...
• Meanwhile in Britain, Jon catches a Celtic army on a river crossing between the Emperor's army and Londinium's garrison, meaning that he'll be attacking from the other side of impassable terrain with ranged superiority, while his allies charge the enemy in the rear.
  Jon: Oooh! I'm accidentally a tactical genius!
• "Screw you, you stupid bastards! Shouldn't have attempted to defend... your own homeland, technically. But you know, it was my bit of your homeland! I had it for a while!"
• The Eastern Rebels send their leader, alone, to attack Leptis Magna, so Jon sends his garrison out to massacre him with an arrow barrage.
  Jon: Sooner or later, one of you guys has to die, right? ...Sooner or later? Guys? At all? Maybe?
  • As a back-up plan, he has his Limitanei's pila.
• Most of Part 14 is devoted to a desperate bridge defense, where Licianus Alimentus tries to hold off two Eastern Roman armies, one led by their Emperor himself. Jon resorts to throwing everything he's got into the meatgrinder as the Eastern Romans push across the bridge, and has his general charge into the fray again and again, while bemoaning "I don't have enough cavalry for an effective counter-charge." Then, fifteen minutes into the battle, he notices a unit that's been standing off to the side, hidden in the woods, the entire time.
  Jon: We've got - oh, bloody hell, I've got 93 cavalry! There's just 93 cavalry standing over there! Why were you not involved earlier?! Get in there! Licianus, pull back, we've got some Sarmatians, I don't know whether I was holding them back in reserve and I just forgot about them, or if they actually broke and just recovered, but screw it, get in there!
  YouTube comment: My mind just brings me this nice picturesque image of the Sarmatians dozing under some shady trees, drinking cool lemonade, looking towards the bloodbath on the bridge, wondering why they aren't being called up.
  Other YouTube comment: Sometimes when you read about big battles, you see "and at the last moment, the commander sent in his fresh cavalry, hidden in the back, such a tactical genius!" Looking at Jon, I think they may just simply forget they have cavalry standing around.
• Jon gives us another example of why siege towers were nerfed in later Total War games.
• "Hang on, wasn't there another general who actually came of age last turn? Who I immediately forgot about? I think there might have been - hang on, I'll go and find him..."
• Part 16 features several engagements with the Eastern Romans, first when they attack Appius the Honest as he's trying to besiege Jerusalem, a battle that very nearly gets away from Jon.
  Jon: Why are you guys breaking? Nononono, don't do that, this is - oh no, we're Saxon-ing again. Right, we've just Saxon-ed...
  • Jon manages to hold his force together, but has to abandon an attempt to get the army back in formation.
    Jon: Form into a new line, if you can't, then - what even is this? [...] Okay, um, new tactic - everyone just charge down the hill at these guys. Just charge down the hill, murder them, it's gonna be great, it's a good tactic, and actually it seems to be working.
    [...]
    Announcer: The gods have favored you! The enemy are destroyed! Your victory is complete!
    Jon: Aww, Voice-Crack Narrator Man, thank you! This is actually a Heroic Victory! I feel like - is it a Heroic Victory? I feel like it's a victory we clutched from the jaws of defeat that we clutched from the jaws of victory, but you know what? I'll take it.
• Meanwhile in Greece, Zeno Flavius manages to drive off the army that besieged him in his fort, and moves to retaliate
  Jon: So they've decided to fall back to Athens, in which case, can we now immediately - aww, we can't quite turn the tables on them straight away, but, we can close in. We're ready at this point - wait, hang on, there's more there. Right, they may be about to turn the tables on me a second time, this is a bit of a switchy-roundy sort of day.
• "You know, it is lovely to just see some Scorpions that have a clean line-of-sight on the enemy for once."
• The siege of Athens turns out to be an absolute mess, which starts with gravity-defying siege towers, all but one of which proceed to break from enemy fire or break in a coding sense. Which leads to Jon making some questionable tactical decisions to compensate for his infantry's inability to get on the walls.
  Jon: So now I'm actually going to throw Zeno directly into spearmen, because... screw it, why not? Let's just see if we can actually knock them back.
• When taking the final Celtic settlement in Part 17, Jon decides the last pagans in Britain deserve a pagan funeral.
  Jon: I like setting units on fire. It's good, clean fun!
• Though between that and all the exterminations, it means Spurius Flavius, the most Christian emperor who ever Christian'd, has picked up the epithet "The Butcher."
  Jon: Right, but when we actually add that to the history book, let's note it was only pagans he butchered. So it's okay.
• Jon takes a moment to load an early save and show off an "alternate universe" where Rome was driven out of Britain, allowing the Romano-British faction to spawn, then reverts to the original timeline, where Britain is secure under the leadership of Emperor Spurius Flavius, "who is also sometimes referred to as 'The Butcher,' but don't say that to his face because he gets very angry at times."
• The siege of Thessalonica features Steve, "the wisest Peasant of all."
• The Emperor returns to the mainland after his crusade, so that he might live out the rest of his life in peace.
  Jon: ...maybe even enjoy some retirement, take up knitting, I don't know, something that just doesn't involve thousands and thousands of gallons of pagan blood anyway.
• For the conquest of Constantinople, Jon brings an excessive number of siege towers to use not as transportation, but as rolling gun platforms.
  Jon: Oh, just look at them fly! We're littering the Limitanei with corpses! We're using their own men as projectiles!
• With the Eastern Roman capital taken, Jon has won the campaign, and a pop-up exults that the Roman Empire is officially reunited.
  Jon: ...aside from, like Asia Minor, and other bits of the Middle East. But, y'know mostly a united people. "The barbarians have been kept out, and a new age stretches before you as ruler of the known world!" Aside from huge parts of it that we blatantly don't own, but whatever!
• Sadly, in 405 AD, Emperor Spurius, "the most Christian butcher who ever Christian'd," passes on before the game's final horde spawns.
  Jon: He was just chilling out in Augusta Trevororum. He did indeed take up knitting - admittedly, all he made were dolls of pagans that he then went on to crucify, it was a little bit on the weird side, but... he had a happy retirement, dammit, it was what he loved doing.
• Remarkably, the turns Jon spent inactive while waiting for the Slavs passed uneventfully, because the Sarmatians decided to "go for someone other than the player, which is absolutely remarkable."
• As the Slav arrival becomes imminent, Jon explains that despite appearances that his Western Roman Empire is in very good shape, things could actually go very wrong very quickly, due to the standard tactic of driving the starter horde factions back to crappy backwater cities in the east.
  Jon: So sure everything looks good right now, but everything's also been horrendously set up for a terrifying cascade effect. Because what happens if the Slavs knock over the incredibly-vulnerable village of the Burgundii? Well, the Burgundii are gonna horde. And what happens if they knock out the one remaining village of the Lombardii? They're gonna horde as well. What happens if any of those hordes knock out the one remaining town of the Franks? They horde too.
• As the Slavs enter the campaign map in Part 18, Jon looks over his empire and is underwhelmed by the next generation of Romans.
  Jon: Okay, so, due to a lack of competent applicants, I've slightly lowered the entry criteria for being a front-line general in the upcoming war from "being good to fighting" down to "just being not actively terrible at it."
• As for the previous generation, Jon's disturbed that Licianus Almentus has not only picked up the Doubtful Loyalties trait, but he's grown a beard "that makes him look even less trustworthy, dear oh flipping dear."
• In an attempt to improve his officer corps, Jon sends Oppius Maluginensis to study at Rome, but instead of becoming a better general he becomes "more and more Christian, also... do you have the Pope with you? Why do you have the Pope with you?! Put him back in the Vatican where he belongs!"
• Campus Burgundii, one of the few remaining pagan settlements in the empire so Jon can take advantage of its pagan religious buildings giving bonus experience to his troops, is in danger of converting due to the number of Christian generals Jon sent there.
  Jon: Aww, Spurius Flavius is smiling at us from heaven. And I bet it's flipping Gundobad, because he's got really Christian in his old age. He's currently traveling around with an Anchorite, an Augustine Hippo, the most Christian hippo that ever Christian'd...
• In the midst of his preparations for the Slavs, Jon is unexpectedly attacked by the Franks, with...
  Jon: ...okay, your army is really dependant on Peasants and Levy Spearmen. I would not have done this if I were you, but, alright then, I'm willing to murder you if you insist. I mean, all these years they've just been sitting there, not attacking Campus Quadii. This is the moment they decide to make their move.
• The (first) defense of Alexandria goes back and forth, alternating between Jon's crossbowmen forgetting they're a ranged unit, Jon's camels saving the day by breaking Eastern Roman Comitatenses on the square, and then Jon's camels breaking before reaching a fleeing Onager crew.
  Jon: Ah, it's victory from the jaws of defeat from the jaws of victory from the jaws of defeat, if I'm recalling correctly.
• "Also, hang on - does anyone know what happened to the economy? Because I swear I used to have more economy than this."
• Early in the episode, Jon notes that one of his generals, Vetranio Flavius, has the Good With Cavalry trait and announces he has a plan for him. At the end of the episode, as the Slavs approach the empire's borders...
  Jon: Still, if the problem is that we're being outmaneuvered, that means I need a more maneueverable army. So it sure would be convenient if- (reveals an all-horse doomstack) -the massive, hardcore, heavy cavalry elite force of Vetranio Flavius were completed, right now! Yes, that would be really damn good, actually! With over a thousand heavy Sarmatian Auxilia, with good experience, weapons and armor, bit of light cavalry for the flanks, and horse archers, with silver weapons, for the first time ever in my armies! Ah, that's just beautiful!
• The grand finale kicks off with the Slav horde marching south over the Carpathian Mountains.
  Jon: You know, I've got a horrible feeling that at the end of the day, it's all going to come down to a big scrap outside Aquincum. Again.
• Oppius Flavius of the Oppius Flavius Catapult Delivery Service passes on at the very end of the campaign.
  Jon: Still, he did his job. His one task in life was making sure [Campus Burgundii] was not taken by the Burgundii, and indeed, it has not been. Well done, Oppius.
• Since Jerusalem was going to revolt on him, Jon simply sent its full-sized garrison out in search of a new homeland, taking over Antioch. The very next turn, he notices some Sassanid armies approaching his new borders.
  Jon: If they're about to attack me, I'm going to be really annoyed. Because you guys could have been invading the Eastern Empire with those troops any time. But no, obviously it's Very Hard/Very Hard, so the AI's going to wait for me to show up before it bothers attacking. Do bear in mind, just a couple of turns ago, Antioch was basically unguarded - four troops present, one of them was Peasants, and the Sassanids did nothing. Now it's fortified by me with twenty troops, yeah, they're going to throw everything they've got at me, because I'm the player. And the Sassanids aren't even at war with me. They are at war with the Eastern Empire right now, they just don't bother attacking them.
• "When you look up the word 'overkill' in the dictionary, it's just going to be a picture of Zeno Flavius' army today."
• Jon continues to order his artillery to shoot into a mixed melee.
  Jon: And I'd like the Onagers to fire anyway, please, I don't care if we hit our own guys at the back or whatever, doesn't really bother me. Just like, keep shooting anyway, because it strikes me as amusing. [...] The boulders are doing some good work here, because even if I kill my own troops, every kill against these guys is more valuable. So this here catapult support is definitely a good thing.
• The siege of Campus Iazyges features a novel use of siege equipment... by the defenders.
  Jon: Okay, they're new to cities, sieges are probably confusing to them, they may have read the rules slightly wrong here. It's fine, we'll just pretend we don't see that.
  YouTube comment: In Slavic Dacia, cities siege you!
  • "So this force over here, it's now going to chunk its way through all of this. I haven't been using the word 'chunk' anywhere near enough, by the way. Great word, I should bring it out of retirement."
• The Slav horde conquered Dacia and settled in it one turn, only for Jon to take those cities from them during his turn, leaving him unsure what happens in that situation. Turns out yes, they spawn a bunch of new armies for him to deal with.
  Jon: Yes, they have now decided to re-horde! So we've just got to exterminate that population, so they're now back (cracks up) on the field...
• "'The Hordes Arrive! A foul horde of unwashed barbarians has arrived in Roman lands.' I'm going to be honest, that's a little bit of a generous interpretation of what happened there. It's kinda our fault."
• What follows is the biggest Total War battle in Many A True Nerd history, in which 7,000 Romans fight 11,000 Slavs in a wild field brawl, with Jon commanding a pure-cavalry force of hundreds of elite horsemen. It's such a clusterfuck that Jon's general somehow gets himself embedded in the middle of the enemy line on the other side of the battlefield, and his units stop responding to his orders.
  Jon: At this point, I think there's so many units on the field, the game is - I think there's actual command latency problems going on right now. Nobody knows what the hell's going on.
  YouTube comment: You spent so much time fighting hordes full of cavalry, but you gazed too deeply into the void. By the end you became the cavalry horde.
  • "So Lethu's dead. That's sad for him, whoever he was. I'm hoping he was an enemy. He definitely wasn't one of mine, so presumably by process of elimination..."
  • "So many corpses! The framerate's recovering, and I think that means we're doing well, all things considered!"
• While wrapping up the campaign, Jon moves the empire's capital back to Rome itself. Which immediately causes unrest in the British Isles, which would cause Jon to lose Ireland and Scotland, "and with that, we'd actually be coming full circle, that's just flipping beautiful."

Total War Saga: Troy

• As a longtime Total War fan and a trained Classicist, Jon is of course thrilled to be given an early demo of A Total War Saga: TROY, which he refers to as The Iliad: Total War.
  • He isn't sure that the demo battle is taking place in front of Troy proper, though.
    Jon: This might be Mysia, the city that Achilleus just sort of took by mistake, because he thought it was Troy, but it wasn't... yeah, Achilles, good warrior, not always the brightest bulb in the shed.
  • Since the game is set in the Bronze Age, cavalry options are limited, and the difference between the various infantry types' speed becomes much more significant when it comes to flanking tactics.
    Jon: So, when you're talking about light infantry in this game, just kind of imagine they're like small, bipedal horses.
  • When discussing Achilles' Myrmidons, Jon advises his audience to "set yourself down, get yourself a glass of milk, 'cause, this is one of the most weird stories in all of Greek mythology, and that's saying something."
    Jon: ...and Aeacus prayed to Zeus and said, "Dad, come on, this isn't cool, can you please put this right?" And Zeus said, "Yes, I know precisely how I'm going to fix this. I'm gonna fix this, with ants!" And Aeacus said "Wot?" And Zeus said, "Yes, ants! I'm going to make ant people! Look at me making annnnt peeooplle!" And basically yes, ants started becoming people and, um, in some versions of this myth, they had six arms. Unfortunately, these people [in the game] don't have six arms, they've only got two, but what can you do? [Creative Assembly's] decided to go for a slightly more "realistic" portrayal. And Aeacus was apparently thrilled with his new ant people subjects, or rather he said he was thrilled, but he was probably terrified. Because if that's what Zeus does when he's trying to help you, just imagine what he does when he's annoyed.
  • "By the way, they've also got a Minotaur. Sorry, should have mentioned the Minotaur. It's not a real Minotaur, instead it's like a ten-foot-tall barbarian who enjoys dressing up like a Minotaur. He's just really into cosplay."
  • Jon's first battle as the Greeks goes well, but when he cranks up the difficulty for the rematch, things get challenging.
    Jon: Achilleus is actually... Achilleus is going to lose to some random bandit chief, which is just embarrassing for him, but, uh, Achilleus needs to turn and run.
  • "Uh oh, I feel like Hektor's coming for Achilleus! It's Book 22 but in reverse, dammit!"
  • "It's time for Achilleus to try and basically, yes, win but die gloriously. And what could be more Iliad-ic or Achillean than dying gloriously by the walls of Troy? Then again, the one more thing we could do would be like, y'know, winning as Achilleus..."
  • "The Minotaur is down, well done, Pythians! You guys, get over here and now just move 'round in this territory, okay we've got you guys over here... did you just break? Why are you breaking, you just won!"
  • "In! Comes! Swift-footed Achilleus! He's only got Speed of 32 right now, which is not that swift-footed. He should really have swifter feet, this is an important part of his character, Creative Assembly, please fix."
  • In the end, Achilleus is too badly-wounded to actually help wrap up the battle.
    Jon: Oh, this is very Iliad-ic too. So basically, um, the rest of the Greeks are going to fight and die to glorious Hector, and Achilles is just going to stand here and not get involved because he's sulking about his girlfriend and/or boyfriend. So basically, yes, this is perfectly the Iliad, I've accidentally created the Iliad!
  • This means when the Trojans break, we get to see Achilleus jogging after his nemesis as Hektor tries to flee the battlefield.
    Jon: Okay, point of mythic accuracy, Swift-Footed Achilleus is faster than Hektor.
  • And the cherry on top is that, since Jon got all his chariots killed earlier in the battle, there won't be any corpses dragged around the city.
    Jon: So actually, we've just done the Iliad a favor. Because now, Achilleus can't commit hubris that annoys the gods. So, thumbs-up all 'round.
  • When switching sides to play as Hektor, Jon adopts a much more defensive strategy based around using his hero unit's healing ability, which is fueled by Rage generated in combat. It could only go wrong if, say, Hektor was left behind the front line...
    Jon: ...send the spears after the chariots, they're losing health fast. Uh, Hektor- (cracks up) I've completely forgotten - okay, I completely forgot everything there. Right, get in over there, Hektor, you need to get some Rage up, because seriously, it's time to heal your units...
  • "You guys just... I don't know why you guys are over there, but please come back - actually, um, actually keep going. You're leading some spear-fighting Myrmidons away, that's really good news! Right, get over here, hit these guys, get over here, hit these guys. Does anyone know where, um, where Achilleus is? I think he's dead, which is really good news. Okay, so that's got to be a bit of a blow..."
• Jon gets exclusive access to a sneak peek of the Aeneas campaign, which he summarizes as "I've got a flipping captive audience now! I can do what I flipping want!" Which is talk about the Iliad, mostly.
  • "Just FYI, most of this video is going to be a character assassination against Aeneas, who 1) is 3,000 years old, and 2) is fictional, so that's just what we're doing tonight, so look forward to that."
  • At first Jon is incredulous at the game describing Aeneas as the second greatest warrior on Troy's side, but "then I realized something even more horrifying, from the Trojan point of view - it's actually quite possibly true! Somehow Aeneas might be the second-best Trojan warrior!" He then summarizes Aeneas' two duels described in the Iliad, both of which involve him being rescued by Divine Intervention, and one of which involves him getting hit in the groin with a boulder.
  • Jon also takes issue with Aeneas' victory condition requiring him to hold Knossos among other settlements, given what happens in Book Three of the Iliad.
    Jon: That just feels weird. Like, there is canon that says that Aeneas can't live on Crete. He tried, he wanted to settle there, he was like setting up laws and building a palace, but then Apollo said "No, you can't." Okay, in the Truth Behind the Myth, Aeneas has to have, like, a summer home in Knossos.
  • The game insists that Aeneas was pious, prompting Jon to warn "I'm about to character-assassinate Aeneas some more."
  • "I'm not saying that Aeneas intentionally left his wife behind, because he wanted to just go around the Mediterranean, having sex with every queen or princess that he comes across - which he pretty much does. And I'm not implying that in fact he might have murdered her himself. I'm just saying, that Occam's Razor is something he might have stabbed her with, yes. Oh yeah, pious, pious Aeneas, the man who can be trusted to do the will of the divine and earn the favor of Olympus. Aside from that one small, small year where he decided he was going to shack up with Queen Dido of Carthage and forget about Italy, because he was having too much fun sleeping with the Queen of Carthage. For a year! An entire, flipping, year he did that, the gods had to go down and remind him he was supposed to be getting on with founding Rome. "Pious" Aeneas, whatever!"
  • "So basically yeah, Aeneas is not pious, he's an incompetent warrior, don't pay any attention whatsoever to the last six books of The Aeneid that say he's an amazing super-fighter, he's not, and the last six books of the Iliad are boring, anyway. No one cares about Books Seven to Twelve. Seriously, I'm a classicist, you can take my word on that. Just don't bother with Books Seven to Twelve, they're dull. That's Troy: A Total War Saga! The world-exclusive reveal of Aeneas and... some other stuff, because I love talking about classics."
• Jon gets to play through the early part of Paris' campaign, who "is basically a Saturday morning cartoon villain. I don't know why they're character-assassinating Paris, especially since, y'know, Aeneas is right flipping there, so we could be character-assassinating him instead, that'd be way more justified, but screw it."
  • Jon reminds us that the Trojan War was more than just the siege of Troy itself, since the Greeks had to "rally their allies, get all their ships together, and also, comically, try to figure out where Troy was, because they didn't know where Troy was. They knew that Helen had been taken to Troy, but they didn't actually know where Troy was, so they set out without knowing and accidentally sacked the wrong city, thinking it was Troy. This is a real thing that happened in the epic cycle, it's great!"
  • At the start of the campaign, Jon doesn't quite control all of his starting province, and there's a hostile force within range of his starting stack. "Because it wouldn't be a Total War game if we didn't need to take out some stupid little rebel army on Turn One."
  • With Troy's new multi-resource economy, some of the loot you can pick up after a victory is Food, which Jon finds unnerving since "there's nothing on the battlefield but the corpses of my enemy, but Food just goes up. So maybe we don't ask questions about that."
  • "Okay, if you just want to throw away your entire army without reinforcements, that's a much more manageable proposition, so that's going to work out way better for me!"
  • "Paris is keeping this nonsense going, you guys are... (sees several routing units) Okay, so my infantry is basically hopeless, that's what I've learned here. My infantry is hopeless, and that's really something we need to be working on. 'cause it turns out my infantry is complete total flipping garbage."
  • Controlling the isle of Lesbos gives Jon access to "Harpies," superior skirmisher units.
    Jon: Now you might be asking, "Jon, why are Harpies on this one particular island?" To which I would reply, "I have no bloody clue!" Because as far as I'm aware, harpies are tied to two locations in the mythic corpus. According to the Aeneid, they live somewhere over here [to the west], close by to Greece, the very far side of it. And then there's the myth of Phineus, who basically yeah, he encountered the harpies in Thrace, when they were tormenting him. Why are harpies down over here [in Lesbos]? I don't know, maybe just because "It's an island, so harpies."
  • Paris has a campaign questline involving his marriage to Helen, which means he has to do something about his previous lover, the nymph Oenone.
    Jon: So, um, he's kinda got to go and break up with her, because they didn't have mobile phones, so he can't just be a coward and do it by text.
  • "Ooh, and here's fun! Pandaros has gotten in touch! Yeah, I mentioned him last week - this is the guy who Aeneas gets killed through his total flipping incompetence. So uh, yeah, okay, sure, I'll be friends with you for your remaining years, before Aeneas effectively murders you."
  • "Also, I completely forgot to actually bother to set a Commandment in my starting territory, which I should have done five turns ago, but whatever."
  • "Okay, Priam just gave me a mission to capture the territory that I just actually, y'know, declared a nonaggression pact with. So at this point, Priam's just being a dick."
  • "Okay, I'm gonna be honest, I may have made some slight tactical errors during this game, on account of the fact that I'm still very much getting used to it. As it turns out, ah, yeah, the Isle of Lesbos is probably about to have a rebellion, may have ransacked that one a little too much, so that's a problem. Also, may have purchased too many elite units back over here [in Troy], because as it turns out, I'm now actually losing Food every single turn. Part of that will be because I decided to have a second character so Paris could go over here, which he can't get to, because these guys over here we're now at war with, because this guy decided to go and start a war with them, and I'm allied with him because I just wanted to bloody confederate with him. So basically, everything's gone wrong..."
  • "Who are you, precisely? I don't know, but you've got a really nice hat."
  • "Also, does anyone know why I've got a Polydorus in my empire and how long he's been there? Um... okay, I think this might have been a reward, for a quest, but I'm not a hundred percent sure, and I'm not convinced I actually want him here, because I feel like he's screwing up my Food income, quite a lot. No, I'm sorry, you're going. I don't know how long you've been there - sorry, my mistake, there's a lot of pop-ups in this game, and I just sort of missed one, sorry about that."
  • Jon uses one of Paris' special attacks, Apollo's Aim.
    Jon: And... there it is! Took him a bloody while! And... did it hit? ...I think he missed, well bloody done.
  • The battle narrator warns that "Your warriors are losing heart!"
    Jon: My warriors are not losing heart, or if they are, it's the trash ones that nobody cares about, whose job is to die. So honestly, they're doing a perfectly good job.
• When Jon gets his hands on the full game, he chooses to start a campaign with Odysseus, due to his sneaky, clever playstyle. Though he also has a "Coastal Mastery" mechanic that makes him more effective along shores.
  Jon: Now to be honest, canonically that's not really true. Like, there's there's an entire epic with many books in it describing in great detail how Odysseus is very, very bad at sailing places. But sure, Odysseus, coast, islands, et cetera, et cetera.
  • "Odysseus just said 'I have a plan!' So yes, this here, this is why this is the faction for me, dammit."
  • "Oh? That's Nestor! Nestor just showed up! Hello, Nestor! Right, he's in the Illiad! And also in the Odyssey, which is more important since this is Odysseus. Right, um, hi! We should be friends, because you're friends with my son in the epics!"
  • When choosing which god to honor, Jon tries to Set Right What Once Went Wrong.
    Jon: I've decided what we're going to do is, we're gonna yeah, make sure we do not make Odysseus' critical mistake in the Odyssey, which is, we're not gonna accidentally disrespect Poseidon in any way. In fact, you know what? We're building a Shrine to Poseidon right now, we're gonna make an offering to Poseidon like, immediately, let's just pour some food into the Poseidon, spectacular. Alright, that's actually going to get me Campaign Movement Range at Sea, good, that's what we need, and Siege Holdout Time, spectacular. In fact, weirdly, yes, that gives you more Food at Level Two for each coastal region, so that really feels like a thing you absolutely would want to do as Odysseus. Which is weird, because the whole point is that Odysseus just sort of annoys Poseidon, and yeah, that causes a lot of trouble in the Odyssey. But instead, they sync up rather nicely - so okay, we're playing an alternate universe where Poseidon and Odyssues were best friends.
  • Jon's excited to have access to units of "Giants," and zooms in on the battle map to see how they compare to his normal infantry.
    Jon: So they're about... maybe a foot-and-a-half taller. So - okay, "giants" might be overselling them a bit.
  • "Right, I see what they're planning to do, they're gonna try to flank me, but I'll bring my own skirmishers to deal with them. Odysseus, meanwhile, just move forward until you're in range to take out... that's not the Ajax, is it? I really hope that's someone called Ajax and not the Ajax, 'cause otherwise we're about to seriously mess up the Illiad!
  • Jon decides to take a foothold on Crete by landing an army at Kissamos, and gives his fleet an attack order through the Fog of War.
    Jon: Oh, it turns out they had an army here, actually. Which I missed, 'cause my Spy was too far - oh, this is - okay, good, good start. But on the plus side, we kind of needed to... we needed to take these guys out - you know what? It's fine, everything's under control, we'll just settle in for a nice siege, Sparta will be here to help out any minute.
    (one turn later)
    Jon: Okay, Sparta's army naffed off down south somewhere...
• The livestream gets off to a good start when Jon immediately goes on a tangent about the game's name.
  Jon: This is Many a True Nerd and welcome back to Troy: Total War! Or Troy: A Total War Saga. Or A Total War Saga: Troy. Because I think they renamed the Total War games to be Total War Colon Something rather than Colon Something Total War, so they'd all sit next to each other in Steam. But they they named the new ones A Total War Saga, which totally ruined it, but then like, I think they're referred to like Total War Saga, pretty sure it's Total War Saga: Thrones of Brittania, like so it still fit the theme, but then why is it still - welcome back to Iliad: Total War!
  • The stream is taking place four hours after a review embargo lifted, so Jon is able to finally give his verdict on Troy: 17. "Alright, that's the numerator. If you're all good and behave and make Claire's life easier, you can have a denomenator later."
  • Jon recaps his previous progress with Odysseus, who is all about owning coastal territories, "because when The Odyssesy starts he's going to cocking need it."
  • When people in the stream chat asks the fuck/marry/kill question relating to Classical Mythology:
    Jon: Fuck Aphrodite, marry Athena, kill Hera, because Hera generally causes a lot of trouble, and does a lot of murder, you want her out of the way.
    Claire: Hera is very jealous.
    Jon: Yeah, you got to get her out of the way. Plus, Zeus would probably thank you for it.
    Claire: Because he can keep going around the human world, and seeing a tree, and going "I wanna shag that."
    Jon: And like in the event that Aprhodite's pissed because, like, you shagged her and ran, I'm confident Athena can protect me, right there.
  • Jon notices that an army on Raiding Stance starts "Scrooge McDuck-ing" on the world map.
  • Jon could build a Pyrrhichios Arena in Kissamos, which would give him access to korybantes Dance Battlers, except since it's in Crete they would properly be Kouretes, "and I'm furious about this!"
    YouTube comment: Creative Asembly meeting:
    1: And we will put those dancing unit also on Crete
    2: But they should have a different name then.
    1: Oh come, who would notice?
    2: That English youtuber?
    1: He's only interested in game exploits and tea
    2: No, I mean that one interested in history
    1: The beige one?
    2: No! The other one, that one with a girl and...
    1: The bald one? He only rants about polearms.
    2: With an European girl and a cat...
    1: The retired sailor? He plays mostly simulators
    2: The one with minus 1 perception!
    1: Oh, you mean Jon... Well, we have to brave that storm.
  • Jon accepts an alliance with Agammenon of Mycenae (after they pay him for the privelage) because "You know, we're gonna go sack Troy together. We're gonna go on a holiday to Asia Minor, we're gonna burn it down, it's gonna be good fun!"
  • Jon notes that the AI is getting some pretty hefty bonuses, since Sparta is fielding three armies while Jon can only afford one.
    Claire: When does Total War not cheat?
  • Forty-five minutes into the stream, the chat starts snarking about Claire ditching it forty minutes ago.
    Claire: If I had left, I could be sitting in front of a fan with no clothes on!
    Jon: You are sitting in front of a fan, you're blocking my access to the fan, in fact!
    Claire: I told you we should have two fans, and you refused because you're a monster!
    Jon: Because that's pure decadence!
    Claire: Also, I have to wear clothes, it's so hot!
    Jon: Oh I'm sorry, Captain One-Percent! Two fans?!
    [...]
    Claire: Shout-out to Urban Cohort who gave us fifty dollars and says "I'm donating this so the MaTD crew can live in the sheer decadence of two whole fans." We own two fans! He's just not letting me bring it from the living room!
    Jon: "Letting" seems such a bad way of putting it. I just think that seems a bit excessive, we don't need the two fans.
    Claire: Yes, but you said that after I asked-
    Jon: Would you like to go and get the second fan?
    Claire: Yes!
    Jon: Go and get the second fan, Captain One-Percent!
    Claire: This was my plan all along, and it took forty minutes to do it because you wouldn't fucking let me talk!
  • "Oooh, I've got a Gorgon! Right, so she's a booby snake lady, as you can see. You can't zoom in any more than that - loving her lovingly-rendered cleavage. She's supposed to be horrendous to look at, but she's sexy anyway!"
  • Jon continues to exalt Poseidon, god of the seas, even though he's playing as Odysseus.
    Jon: Yes, what we want to do is hecatomb [Poseidon]. +80 [Favor], and now he's up to Celebrated. So now Poseidon is yielding +100 Food in every owned coastal region, and when I get him up to Worshipped, I can have a Cyclops. And it feels appropriate that Odysseus and a Cyclops are going to be best friends-
    Claire: I'm sorry, what? What?!
    Jon: Odysseus and his best friend - it's just a guy wearing a skull.
    Claire: No no no no no, Odysseus and the Cyclops-
    Jon: ♫ BFFs, best friends, best friends forever whodon'tstabeachother. ♫
  • "Odysseus and Cyclops, best friends, that's my goal. We're gonna fix The Odyssey!"
  • "Agamemnon just gave me 10,000 Food for Military Access - I would've given it to you for free! It's just because he's got 30,000 Food so he doesn't care about it, uh... to be honest, doing a dumb thing like that that's ludicrously costly is kind of an Agamemnon thing to do, he's kind of being Peak Agamemnon right now."
  • "I'm really scared, because the cocking army of Knossos just went missing, and I don't know where it is anymore. It just sailed off up here, and it just pissed off, and I don't know where it is. Did it just turn around and go down here? Where are you, you mad bastard?! I don't like it!"
  • Jon spots Knossos' army embarked in a fleet, heading to the western edge of the map for some reason.
    Jon: Where are you going? This guy's heard there's Sicily DLC, and he's on his flipping way! He's off on an adventure, and no one can stop him!
  • Jon laments the fact that Achilleus is already marching around on the world map, which skips his favorite Iliad story about how young Achilleus was Disguised in Drag by his family to keep him from getting dragged into the Trojan War.
  • Turns out that Gorgon agent Jon got has a limited lifespan, and since she spawned way over at Ithaka...
    Jon: I don't think she can make it to Knossos! (cracking up) She's gonna despawn before she makes it to Knossos!
  • The stream chat is linking pictures of their cute puppies at a bad moment.
    Jon: I'm trying - I'm keeping an eye out for their army, but it's super-cute. Where is their army?!
    Claire: It's a puppy with an older dog friend!
    Jon: I know, but I need to know - tell me if I just missed their army!
  • Jon wants more Giant units, since they only cost an upkeep of Food.
    Claire: Aren't you losing a hundred Food per turn?
    Jon: Eight hundred Food a turn, thank you very much. Uh, yes, like if you - oh, we're about to lose Poseidon's blessing, which is quite a bit of our Food, actually. Okay, we're about to lose a lot of Food actually, uh... this is fine. [...] Everything's under control, Claire, stop panicking.
  • When asked who his favorite Iliad character is, Jon mentions that he likes Sarpedon the best, but Diomedes is also amazing because "he punches gods in the dick and doesn't get punished for it! He just gets to retire to Italy!"
  • Before letting his Spartan allies do the heavy lifting during his siege of Knossos, Jon takes a moment to examine the capital's architecture to make sure it stacks up with the city's historical royal complexes.
    Jon: ...Acceptable. Not exactly spectacular, it should be more extravagant than this, but I will accept this.
  • While watching the Spartans take the city, Jon recounts how the great Euripides went through a stage where he "wrote some very good shit, which everybody hated because it was too clever, where he won nothing. Then he basically - this is hilarious, this is my favorite Euripides fact. At some point when he got older, he thought 'maybe if I wrote crowd-pleasing shit it'll be more welcome,' and he started winning everything!"
  • With Knossos captured, Jon expects that huge enemy army that had been menacing western Crete will disappear along with its faction.
    Jon: ...Uh-oh. (high-pitched) Ahhh, they don't seem to be dead. They seem to be suffering attrition. We might need to go and deal with that!
  • "We're technically going to starve in nine turns. Technically."
  • "Oh for fuck's sake, the epic agent disappeared before we could fucking do anything with her!"
  • "This is excellently good news - oh shit, we're back at -1000 [Food]! ...Oh shit, because we lost Poseidon! Shit, shit, shit, get Poseidon back, Poseidon, Poseidon, I can't Poseidon for one turn. Uh, uh, uh, uh, this is - everything's, everything's, everything's, we can't, can't anything for one turn. Okay, Food's going down a bit - we're now dying in six turns, we're now dying in six." (to the Knossos rebel army) "You'd better not go for Gorthys - if he goes for Gorthys, oh no..."
    • "They're going for Gorthys, you absolute fucking dicks!"
  • During a battle, Claire explains that they've got a better litter box for Tabby, so she has room to turn around in it and properly bury her business.
    Claire: Anyway, aren't you all happy that we're telling you all the details about Tabby's litter box? Um, this is what your money goes to, by the way, when you donate. It goes to buy increasingly more expensive things for Tabby as she gets older and has more difficulties with everything.
  • Jon finally catches up with the rampaging rebel army, and has some good luck when his Spy poisons it before the battle.
    Jon: CRITICAL SUCCESS! Oh yeah, whaddya say now? Now, now my friend, ho ho, row, row, row your boat straight up my dick!
    Claire: (laughing) Oh my god, Jon!
    Jon: Wait, that doesn't even mean anything.
    Claire: (still laughing) The fuck, Jon?
  • During the battle that follows, Jon gets a good look at his Heavy Sword Skirmishers.
    Jon: Well it says "Heavy," but I can't help but notice they're showing up wearing fetish gear and very little armor. But like, you know, I'm sure it's fine.
    Claire: You're not wearing pants right now, Jon.
    Jon: That's, that's a minor consideration, under the circumstances.
    Claire: He's not wearing American pants, he's wearing British pants, obviously.
  • In the same fight, Jon initially thinks the enemy somehow Forward Deployed some troops behind his army, and it's up to Claire to read the chat's warnings that Jon missed the "The enemy has sent reinforcements!" message several minutes prior.
  • After crushing that capital-less army, Jon wonders why the Knossos remnant isn't disbanded yet.
    Jon: He's not dead yet, officially he's got one - Knossos owns a region. Oh, shit! It's the region [they captured last turn] I'm standing - it's fine. I found it! (auto-resolves the Battle of Gorthys) I found it.
    Claire: You found it?
    Jon: I was standing next to it.
  • Jon's excited to mop up Crete with the help of his Giant Archers...
    Jon: They're going to do some work - well, hopefully. They'd better do some work. (cracking up) We've spent several thousand Food just shipping them from one side of the world to the other, they'd cocking better!
  • The big bowmen make their debut in the Battle of Lato.
    Jon: They're just giants, and they've got bows, and they're very, very happy to be here. And they've drawn eyes above their nipples, which is lovely as well.
  • "Deploy the Giants! These are - oh, they're already dead. Deploy the Giants over here, I think that's a better bet! Right, you've already broken over there. Uh, deploy the Giants at these guys - oh, you've broken as well. Right, ah... you guys, deploy the Sword Skirmishers up against that, and then we can start sending the - oh, wow. They've just broken. They've just absolutely broken. Right, bring the [Giant] Archers up. Don't win the battle too fast! We've gotta, we've got flipping Giants to test out, this was important to me, emotionally."
  • Diplomacy in the game may still be a bit broken.
    Jon: Oh, look at this, look at what we've got here, we've got ourselves a Sparta that's got so much cocking Food, that they're willing to just... they'll just give me Food. They're just willing to give me 110 Food for 10 turns for free. For nothing. For, just for funsies. In fact, if I give them Gold they're more offended.
  • After getting dragged into a war with another island nation in the process of mopping up Crete, Jon shows his folk music chops.
    Jon: How many Rhodes must Odysseus burn
    Before his Odyssey is done?
    The answer, my friend, is burning up on Crete
    The answer is burning up on Crete
  • After an over four-hour stream, the capture of Setaea means "We've finally got a seaside province that's a capital! (choked up) It took us so long! It took us so cocking long!"

Other

• Jon's livestream of Skyrim Survival Mode with a Perma-Death stipulation comes to a close in the funniest way possible. After three excruciating hours where he triumphs over the cold, hunger, and the occasional glitch, Jon reaches Riften and marries Benor. Right as they leave the wedding hall, Jon is instantly attacked and killed by thugs due to something he copied hours ago, ending the run.
• Jon's subdued Oh, Crap! reaction when he learns that there's a difficulty setting for the tutorial for Ever, Jane (a Jane Austen-inspired MMO).
  • There's also his utter glee over the fact that you can walk up to anyone and either tip your hat at them, bow to them, or deep-bow to them.
  • invoked After getting indoors within the Lessons in Sophistication school, Jon somehow manages to ride a horse up a staircase, complete with the horse's head badly popping into existence whenever he looks down.
• Jon's Kill Everything run of Fallout 3 sees his character, Evil Jon, allow Butch's mother to be eaten by Radroaches and proceeds to use her corpse as a puppet to mock him.
  Jon: (falsetto) Butch? It's your mother. You are a huge disappointment - oh no the roaches are eating me... (drops her)
  Jon: Oh... oh, Butch. Those last words...
  Butch: She's dead! She'd dead, and you could have saved her!
  Jon: (holding up Ellen's severed arm) Ah, come on, Butch. You can't blame me, she was completely unarmed!
• The name Jon chooses for his character in his Fallout: New Vegas You Only Live Once playthrough is "Please Don't Shoot" - Jon imagines that that would be the first thing his character says to Doc Mitchell, and because of a misunderstanding it is now his character's name.
  • He then notes that, since middle names are generally not said, Jon jokes that when his character is introduced at parties they'd be called "Please Shoot".
  • Jon flagrantly ignores Doc Mitchell's advice to "Take it slow."
    Doc Mitchell: It ain't a race.
    Jon: Yay! Race!
• In Episode 17 of his New Vegas No Kill Run, Jon notes that he can't complete Boone's initial sidequest, as it requires that he lead somebody to their death, but he muses on the possibility of a parallel universe where he manages to showcase how he would do Boone's other sidequest, "I Forgot to Remember to Forget." Cue a cut to this alternate universe, where Jon is replaced by Claire speaking entirely in French.
• The Radstag Cat Scare in Episode 3 of Jon's Survival playthrough of Fallout 4.
• From the playthrough of Fallout: Frost, we have:
  • During the first episode, Jon's creeping through the starting area and trying to find the way out. He finds a key next to a door, unlocks and opens it, and sees a swarm of Ghouls on the other side.
    Jon: I made a mistake I made a mistake I made a mistake!
  • In Episode 6 of his playthrough, he goes half-mad from starvation and attacks some cows for food. What makes it even better is that the episode had been rather serious up to that point.
    Jon: Die, you mooing bastards! Die! Die! You mooing bastards! Die!
• The funniest part of the "Level 1 Nuka World" challenge is right in the first six minutes, where Jon speedruns his way through the game's intro, all the while roleplaying as the Sole Survivor, who is obsessed with getting to Nuka World.
  Nate: (as the nuke goes off) OH MY GOD!
  (Beat)
  Jon: Okay, but we're still going to Nuka-World later, right?
• When Jon takes a crack at the original Half-Life, there are inevitable comparisons to Freeman's Mind, though as viewers point out, "instead of a lovable asshole losing his mind we have a British intern kinda just bumbling his way though."
  • "Ooh, I recognize you! I've seen you before! Um, F-Man! G-Bloke! H Bomber Guy! Whoever that is, he's important for some reason!"
  • After ruining Magnusson's casserole, Jon apologizes that "I'm very sorry, but I just enjoy pressing buttons."
  • Jon's HEV suit rave.
  • "Um, when you say 'work,' what precisely is my job?"
  • "Okay, everything's now exploding, which is fine, and that's... sorry, did that explosion blow his skull out of his head?!"
  • After reflexively shooting his first Vortigaunt, Jon immediately has second thoughts.
    Jon: Oh, I really hope that wasn't First Contact, 'cause if so, I've seriously just screwed humanity. I mean, I might have just accidentally teleported these guys here. If that what's going on and I immediately started shooting them, then - oh this is, this is really on me, this is my fault.
  • Jon mistakes a Barnacle for a rope he's "accidentally climbing."
  • "Right, this is why you don't hit people while you're wearing the power armor."
  • Jon ignores a setpiece in favor of recharging his suit.
    Jon: Yep, aliens, that's fine - ooh, I can finally charge up my bloody suit! Okay, I'll be with you guys in a second, I'm just a bit busy.
  • After encountering a hostile soldier, Jon concludes "got it, right, now we got to start shooting humans, too. Shoot everybody."
    Jon: (to friendly scientist) Not you, though. Maybe not you. Actually, maybe you. (murders him) Yeah, you know what, you too.
  • "It's my first day!" (dakka dakka) "I'm just the intern!" (dakka dakka) "I'm just here to make coffee!"
  • "I mean, my original objective was 'make it up to the surface, so we could tell the soldiers people need help.' Is my plan at this point just... murder? Am I just murdering everybody? Is that what I'm planning to do now, just basically try and kill cocking everybody?"
• Jon playing Half-Life 2 is described by some viewers as the battle between a master of Instructive Level Design and the man with -1 Perception.
  • Jon's initially happy to see a Vortigaunt pushing a broom in a train station instead of trying to zap him, before noticing the guards, chains, and barbed wire.
    Jon: Are you a slave by any chance? 'cause if so, I'm sorry if that was my fault.
  • An attempt to carry along a glass bottle for self-defense ends up antagonizing a Combine cop.
  • Jon doesn't like it when he puts on his HEV suit, because it means "now I've got a health meter, which means it can start going down."
  • After being accidentally teleported into Dr. Breen's office, Jon muses that "if I could just bash you with a crowbar right now, I bet it could end the game nice and early."
  • Throughout the episode, and to viewers' exasperation, Jon completely ignores the supply crates containing health and ammo, despite having to break one such crate and receive goodies from it to get through a crawlspace.
    Jon: Wait, what... oh no, that just says "Supplies," I thought that was important.
  • After taking over a Combine gun emplacement, Jon plans to hold his ground and wipe out the entire alien police force. Then an armored car with a rocket launcher drives up.
  • Jon keeps interpreting the lambda symbol as the "Valve symbol."
  • After getting stuck in a dead end, Jon's miffed that there are invisible walls blocking him from progressing after he constructs a staircase of debris, and the game instead wants him to push past some barrels into a tunnel.
    Jon: I mean seriously, I'm quite proud of this!
  • When manhacks swarm him and a civilian, Jon takes a few potshots at the things before cheesing it.
    Jon: They seem to be very immune to ow. Oh, as in "hack man," okay well you have fun with that, I'm just gonna start running. So... (cracks up) Gordon Freeman, big damn hero, as it turns out.
  • Jon discovers the Combine can't shoot you if they can't see you.
  • "Okay, they're dropping bombs. That feels not as bad, in a way oh cock!" (BOOM) "I say as I explode."
• His hour-long episode for Half-Life: Alyx is about 50% Jon marveling at the game's immersion, and 50% Jon freaking the fuck out as headcrabs attack him.
  • When Russel asks him to choose an item to represent them on his holographic rescue plan, Jon picks a desk fan, since "I love fans! Fans are brilliant! Because fans contain screws in Fallout."
  • The first sign of the trouble to come is when Jon encounters his first barnacle.
  • Then he gets nervous when he sees headcrab-less headcrab zombie corpses.
    Jon: You, stay the flip down! Okay, everything's fine, everything's... I made a mistake, I shouldn't have played a Half-Life game in VR!
  • "Also, I'm really worried about the fact that the game has been giving me so much flipping ammo, and so far nothing to use it on."
  • His first face-to-face encounter with a zombie results in a 50% accuracy ratio and Jon leaving a strong language warning in the video comments section.
    Jon: I wasn't emotionally ready for this!
  • Half an hour into the video, Jon realizes he's been aiming with his left eye after telling the game he'd be using his right, resulting in some weird footage.
  • After another headcrab encounter, Jon does an instant replay emphasizing that yes, he fumbled two full pistol clips while trying to reload in a near-panic.
  • Jon is initially eager, after walking through the dark, to get a zombie's flashlight, but after getting it concludes "That just made things... creepier, actually. That just made everything creepier."
  • By the end of the episode, Jon's running past swarms of barnacles and headcrabs, nearly out of ammo, dropping a Cluster F-Bomb as he flees.
• A livestream of House Flipper had Jon enjoying a house renovation without Claire, who is on holiday. He promptly turns the garage into a sauna, puts knives, guns, and a first-aid kit in the tiny children's bedroom, and adds a gun range with a picture of his cat in it. As he is working on the last one, he figures out, much to his horror, that Claire has been watching the stream, is in the chatroom, and will be home in a half-hour. He panics, bricks up the children's room, and proclaims that shooting the picture of the cat will give you negative points. Claire is still not impressed after she arrives home and he gives her a tour of the nearly finished house.
• In his Mario Party 4 video with Claire, Jon decides that he can't allow Claire to earn enough coins to buy a star, so when the two get paired up for a minigame, he decides to throw it. Said minigame is a rowing game where you row by repeatedly pressing a button, so Jon decides to simply refuse to press the button. Claire's solution is to reach over and press the button on Jon's controller herself. The best part is that since there's no facecam, the only way you can tell what's happening is from Jon's protests and Claire's laughing.
• In his playthrough of Before Your Eyes, Jon's character is at art school painting a nude model. Jon decides to use a fruit bowl to censor the model's non-existent genitals. However, the semi-randomly generated fruit bowl the game gives him is rather... elongated, giving it the exact opposite effect. Jon decides to go along with it by putting as many phallic objects as he can in the painting. After that, he makes an abstract painting that Jon decides to name "Sad Clown Is Bad at Juggling".
• As part of a Valve game binge, Jon takes a crack at Portal, where a lot of the humor comes from Jon overthinking a puzzle before noticing a sign explaining what he should do to solve it.
  • He gets along well with the only voiced character.
    GlaDOS: As part of a required test protocol, our previous statement that we would not monitor this chamber was an outright fabrication. Good job. As part of a required test protocol, we will stop enhancing the truth in 3... 2... fzzzz.
    Jon: Y'see, she's even promised she's not gonna lie anymore! I'm liking GlaDOS, me and her can work together.
  • Jon interprets the "do not drink" warning sign as "don't release bees."
  • "The better option might be to... and then I shot myself in the face."
  • Jon finds his first Ratman stash.
    Jon: Who lives here, and did he do his business in this... I just stepped in the bucket he did his business in. That's unfortunate.
  • "I mean, I knew GlaDOS betrayed you, but I kind of assumed it would be more subtle than this, but okay, fine, what have you."
  • "Hop on top of here... where is this taking me? This takes me to the top of the - uh oh." (splat) "Oww."
  • After finishing the game, Jon's actually annoyed about one of its memes.
    Jon: Oh! Okay. So for all the "cake is a lie" memes, actually the cake, the cake wasn't a lie. The cake was not a lie in any sense, the cake was there all along. It's just, I never got to it, but the cake was demonstrably not a lie - there it is, right there. Okay, why is "the cake is a lie" a thing when the cake is, y'know, blatantly, demonstrably true?"
  • "And you're about to sing me a song, but sadly, YouTube Content ID means that you can't sing it to me, sorry about that."
• Jon's Angrish over the many Anachronism Stews found in just the first episode of his Ryse: Son of Rome Let's Play.
• Two episodes into his Subnautica playthrough, Jon has his first two encounters with a Reaper Leviathan.
  • Jon kicks off Part 4 by sarcastically introducing it as the series finale, since obviously the Sunbeam is about to land and rescue him. Twenty minutes later...
    Jon: ...Okay. Um... so, just a quick note for Claire when she's editing this: uh, yeah, we don't need the "Grand Finale" thumbnail anymore.
  • Part 7 is entitled "No No No No No", since it includes his first encounter with a Crabsquid while trying to find another Degrasi sea base.
    Jon: These idiots went "Oh, you know what? No, we're not gonna stay on our tropical island covered in fruit, no! What we're gonna do is, we're going to build a base in the middle of the cocking sea-spider, electric-stringray and teleporting-dick-bastard cave!"
  • In Part 9, while following the story breadcrumbs, Jon gets it into his head to go the complete opposite direction as was indicated, so he can get to the described depth as quickly as possible. Which leads him over the Crater Edge, where the fully-grown Ghost Leviathans live.
  • In Part 10, Jon explores the Lost River with insufficient supplies, leading to him trying to race his Cyclops through the tunnels before he dies of dehydration... while he also stops every few minutes to scan interesting bits of scenery. He ends up collapsing at the steering wheel and dying from lack of water shortly after escaping the tunnels, only to immediately respawn on the Cyclops, right where he was.
  • In Part 12, YouTube commentors point out that Jon's accidentally done a Subnautica Challenge Run by 1) all but forgetting the Seaglide for the later half of the playthrough, 2) never building planters and growing crops on his Cyclops, forcing him to regularly return to base for food and water, 3) not building an outpost in the Lost River to make exploration and resource gathering easier, and 4) making it all the way to the Active Lava Zone without building a Prawn Suit, meaning that the only Kyanite he's harvested has been from the few lone crystals in the lava castle tunnels, instead of the more plentiful resource nodes all over the Inactive Lava Zone that can only be collected with a Prawn Suit's drill arm.
• Jon plays Ultimate Fishing Simulator, and near the end of the video, is targeting a specific species of fish with no luck. He directs a question to his viewers that actually fish in real life.
  Jon: Do you hate fish? Like, by about the midpoint of the day, do you absolutely flipping despise fish? And are you driven by your hatred of fish, and by your desire to eventually see one pulled out of the water and gasp its last as you bat it to death with an oar? Because I'm starting to feel that way about the entire species of the black crappie.
• Jon vs Claire in Who's Your Daddy? is a whole lot of... well, Dead Baby Comedy. The twist is that they're playing in separate rooms, though sometimes you can hear Claire's yelling through the walls.
  • Baby Jon finds the toy gun.
    Jon: I wish I could just eat all the foam balls, that would be marv- actually, screw it, I'm going to find Claire. I was actually planning on showing off some of the things, but now I'm just going to find Claire and shoot the hell out of her with a gun.
  • "The baby can reload a gun, this is one hell of an advanced baby."
  • After distracting daddy Claire with the toy gun, Jon gets into the cleaning supplies left on the closet floor.
    Claire: (panic-firing the toy gun) Nonononono don't! Don't, stupid baby!
    Jon: You're trying to shoot your baby into behaving, that's not gonna work, Claire.
  • Jon shuts baby Claire into the fridge, wonders whether it's a good idea, but finds that the baby doesn't take any damage from it.
  • "Can I not grab my child and get it out?!"
    Claire: Why couldn't I grab the baby out of the oven?!
    Jon: Cooked baby! Hahahaha!
  • While cooking, Jon sees a terrifying shadow.
  • Jon pins Claire down with a trash can to win a round.
    Claire: Did you actually drop something on my head to stop me from moving for five minutes?
    Jon: Yes.
    Claire: I hate you!
  • To heal baby-Claire after she poisons herself, Jon makes a point of feeding her bananas, which she hates. Then he tortures her with his cooking.
    Jon: Claire's French, and you know what I'm gonna do? I'm going to take this steak but cook it really well. Oh, is it a well-done steak? Here, have some well-done steak!
    Claire: No, stop feeding me you horrible monster!
    Jon: Oh yes. I am the daddy. I am the daddy, Claire shall bow down and obey my commands, for I am daddy.
    YouTube comment: TMI Jon, TMI.
  • Jon attempts to put a hammer on a table and instead makes things a lot harder for himself.
  • Jon tries to put his baby in the trash can.
  • Jon initially reacts with Stunned Silence when he finds the "Mysterious Rubber Object" in a bedside drawer, but in a later round he decides to distract baby Claire by waving it in her face. It works.
    Jon: Father of the year! That is how I win!
  • In the final round, baby Jon cooks himself on a stovetop right in front of daddy Claire.
    Jon: I just like his sad look, as the smoke rises from the corpse of the cooked baby. The slightly sad look, but also slightly determined. Like "You know what, never let a good baby go to waste, I'm going to eat that baby."
• In the 2021 birthday stream special, Fallout New Vegas - You Only Everything Once, Jon is low on health and no longer allowed to heal by any method other than drinking water from world objects. He goes into a bathroom and finds a working toilet, is delighted and proceeds to drink from it for two minutes, making jokes about how gross it is. After his health is fully restored, stream chat informs him there was a sink he could have used instead. Claire and Jon laugh their heads off.
• When playing a 'Legendary Roulette' mod in Fallout 4, Jon complains about an explosive gas canister never exploding in the way he wants. Immediately afterwards...

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