It occurs to me that as far as Trent knows, the goal of the Mighty Nein’s whole Sanatorium heist was the crystals, not the amulets.
I mean, this is a guy who is so controlling and arrogant that he makes his former students live on his estate, keeps sending messages to Caleb just to prove that he’s always there, that he can always reach him. He’s a master manipulator who needs to be at the centre of everything, who keeps everyone’s lives revolved around him. It’s never occurred to him (or he doesn’t want to believe) that there could be bigger things beyond him, that he might not be the most important thing in someone’s life at any given time.
Here’s what Trent knows about the break in. The crystals he uses in his experiments, the proof of his torture of students, have been stolen. Not only have they been stolen, they’ve been brazenly stolen in broad daylight by his former student. Not only his former student, but the only student to have ever successfully gotten away from him and lived, who is now considerably more powerful than he was before and has even learned high-level Dunamancy. Not only the only student to have ever gotten away from him, but one who is now a famous hero in two kingdoms, who’s managed to speak to two monarchs, including Trent’s, and convinced them to do as he says. If you were Trent, self-absorbed and controlling and arrogant, what would you think?
I think from Trent’s perspective, it looks like Caleb engineered the heist to steal the crystals as evidence against him. The amulets are inconsequential - additional loot that they scooped up to stop him tracking them. From Trent’s perspective, the more valuable, more dangerous items are the crystals. He has no idea about the Somnovum or what the Mighty Nein are up to. He know that they had some business up in Eiselcross where Vess DeRogna ended up dead, but more than that? No, as far as Trent’s concerned, it’s all about himself. After all, Caleb now has the crystals. He has prestige and a reputation, he has the ear of two kingdoms, he has Dunamancy, and he has connections with other Assembly members, with foreign archmages, with the Cobalt Soul via Beau. All it takes is a conversation, and Trent’s position is suddenly much less stable than it was before. And as all Caleb’s actions seem to show -from openly walking down the streets, no longer in hiding, to accepting his dinner invitation, to the very loud and obvious heist- he’s seemingly prepared for an open, if not public, confrontation.
TL;DR Trent has no idea about the Somnovum, he thinks the heist was for the crystals, and if the Mighty Nein get ten minutes alone with King Dwendal, with the right words, they could convince him that Trent is using the Volstruckers against him. Which is not an insurmountable challenge for Trent, he is still an influential and powerful archmage, but it makes him vulnerable at the very least, leaves him open to other attacks.
Dinner party! Everyone disliked that. [ id: illustration of the dinner scene from critical role episode 110, camera view over the shoulder of Trent Ikithon. You can see his wrinkly old hands and shoulder in green mantle. Mighty Nein, Astrid and Eodwulf are sitting around the table with lit candles. M9 looks at him with various expressions of disgust, Astrid’s expression is covered by her fringe, and Eodwulf is drinking water. end id ]
I feel like the most fun thing about Calamity is that I can now fully be a little shit to wizards like Trent and Ludinus. Oh wow, you’re what. Trying to get a little juice from a little shape? Trying to do a little time magic with your shape juice? That’s cute. Try moving a leyline. Oh, you’re trying to control a terrestrial government? On the ground? And it doesn’t even have a broadcasting system? Laughable. Nice wizard assembly, did your mom pick it out for you? I’ve now seen the full extent of wizard hubris and arcane development and I’m fully prepared to use this knowledge entirely to bully current exandria wizards.
long range on bad news is 800ft, and because percy has the sharpshooter feat, he rolls normally at that distance (just over two and a half football fields). it’s also worth noting that no fucking wizard spells have a range that long, so if ikithon wants to participate in this “fight” he better be a fast runner. let’s put percy at one end of this frankly absurd distance and ikithon at the other, for the sake of scientific curiosity, and see what happens.
assuming ickythot a) is a wizard, b) isn’t multiclassed, and c) didn’t take the Toughness feat, his theoretical max hp (at lvl 20 with 20 con and 6s on every hit die) is 222. now, that’s just unreasonable, so for argument’s sake let’s say he rolled median hp, his con is 16 (high for a wizard), and we’ll keep him lvl 20. his max hp is now 130. respectable! we love glass cannons!
percy rolls initiative at +11, casts hex, and shoots first. percy is pissed as fuck and blows all three of his grit on violent shot, letting him add three additional damage dice while temporarily raising the misfire score for bad news to 8. he also makes it a sharpshooter shot, taking -5 to hit and +10 to damage. oof, that’ll be a hard shot, but no worries, it’s percy. bang! natural 20! cool!
bad news’ damage is 2d12. as a dm, i would rule that its ‘damage die’ is 2d12 rather than 1d12, but 5e’s rules designer disagrees, so we’ll go with that. it, uh, it turns out it doesn’t matter all that much.
percy rolls 2d12 + 3 additional d12s + 1d6 for hex, doubling that (’double the dice’) for the crit. he then adds 5 (his dexterity) and 10 (sharpshooter). the average result for that is 87. ikithon is looking pretty rough! but he’s a wizard, he’s still got tricks up his sleeve! just wait for the next round!
ikithon spends his turn running towards percy to try and get in range to meteor swarm him, probably, and then he takes 43 points of damage from hemorrhaging critical.
he is now at preciselyzero hit points, falls to the ground, and dies ignominiously and unceremoniously. death in six seconds is probably better than he deserved, but hey, no mercy percy keeps it efficient. he’s got dinner to cook for the wife and kids!
why doesn’t ikithon just heal himself??? cause he’s a nerd, that’s why. you think this bastard man is friends with a lot of clerics? you think he’s learned healing magic from the local druid? nah. he’s a dumb wizard and i hate him
what if he brought friends??? don’t worry, guys– how fast can his friends run 800ft? probably not faster than a speeding bullet!!!
what if he makes his save on hex??? don’t worry, guys, there isn’t one! the warlock class is broken, and so is percival frederickstein von mussel klossowski de rolo iii, and so is keyleth’s heart!
what if he runs out of range after percy’s turn??? don’t worry guys, vex is there and she’s got a broom! or maybe she left that in pandemonium? doesn’t matter! trinket’s speed is 40ft! you can’t run from percy, bastard man!
what if percy forgets to hex him??? what if he’s got gloves of missile snaring??? what if percy rolls below average damage??? what if he doesn’t crit??? what if–
don’t worry, guys, he’s literally got seven more tries this turn!
