D&D is For Nerds - The Day the Circus Came to Town #4 Tombstone

Episode Date: June 10, 2017

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A whip-heavy circus. Take their mighty heads in my hand and start stroking them and then give them their slop. How dangerous are these kangaroos? Pretty dangerous. Hooch with a kangaroo or just hooch himself

could cause a distraction. Don't bring the kangaroo into it if we can avoid that because that would just be better for all of us. If anything, I should be upping my price for the bullets that I took while enacting your orders. If you're going to fight your way in,

I'll pay you 25 gold pieces for every corpse you bring me. The thing I'm making. And it needs bodies. What thing? Ominous. And a plan to get out of here. I found the blueprints to it in an ancient tomb. You see her eyes dart around like she has a guilty look crossing her face.

If you can, aim most of your bloodshed techniques at the jail. If there is some collateral damage as this happens, you know, profiteering isn't pretty. Amid your distraction of the elven fanatics One of your triceratops Has wandered off in a field Uh, hi Zolas Hi Algenon Alright, you tie it down and as you run back to the triceratops The halflings on the roof of the hotel

Next to the sheriff's house Have shifted from the road To the other side looking at you Mmm Mmm Um, I'll just Wait, so they're actually eyeballing me? side looking at you. I'll just... Wait, so they're actually eyeballing me? Yep. I'll look up to them. Just hide out, take

these particular animal for the rest of the circus around the front. Nothing to worry your little head about. You've seen the halfling here, roughly about as big as... He's roughly about the size of a human man. I swear to God, Hooch, if you leave me this payday, I'm going to throttle you with my bare hands.

They give you stern looks. What are you doing, Flamdangle? So can I climb the hotel on the side, or can I go through the hotel and kind of get onto the roof? You could try either. Probably climb the hotel. So try to do unseen. It's slow going

at first, but you're able to scale your way up the side of the hotel. Hooch, you can see him doing that. Well, have you ever seen a triceratops in his within about the flesh? Let me show you a particular of his horns.

Move along there. I'm going to just keep distracting them with the triceratops and really playing up the simpleton. Playing up or just beating? They're not fooled by your display, but they don't know that your friend is there. So you get to the roof. You're up on the roof.

There's a... You peek over and one of the elves looks in your direction. You duck back down. You're not sure if you were seen or not. Right. Right. One of the elves on the roof? Yeah, one of the elves on the roof.

I just hide down. I know there's going to be a commotion to when to attack, yeah? Yeah. They're waiting for your signal. Oh, I have a signal. The triceratops in place They're where they should be But like Hooch is quite obviously distracted I'm going to give the signal

Which is a code word I'm going to yell very loudly And hope it reverberates over the jail Maybe like as part of the trapeze act, you have a cannon that gets shot. Yes, you fire the cannon. I fire the cannon. All right, get him, get him, get him, get him. Attack, attack, attack.

Get, get, get, get, get. Where do you direct the triceratops? Into the back of the jail. All right, cool. Get, get, get, get, get. The two triceratops stampede towards the jail. Good. How many can I, if I attack with my flurry of blows, can I get people?

You need to not move on your turn to use flurry of blows. Right. So if you get up and run towards him, you can attack him, but not like the multitude of different attacks. You can only hit once. Cool. I'll get one then. All right. Can I use, is I'm better with my fists or with a boaster? attack him, but not like the multitude of different attacks. You can only hit once. Cool. I'll get one then.

All right. Is I'm better with my fists or with a bow staff? It's literally irrelevant. All right. I'll use my bow staff then. All right. You charge in, swing with your quarter staff. You swing low at first, slam into the elf's thigh. He cries out in pain, drops his rifle and grabs it.

Then you jab upwards into his face. Biffing him good. You deal three points of damage to him. He keels backwards but doesn't go down. Right. I have no ranged attacks at all. Arrow deflection. Does that work on attacks at all. Arrow deflection. Does that work on bullets?

Sorry? Arrow deflection. Does it work on bullets? Yes. That's good. You can only do one around. That's fair. That's an even more impressive trick, to be honest.

Maybe bullet catch, actually, rather than arrow catch. Or deflect. Yep, yep, yep. Bullet catch. You let go and it's got the same speed it's like that guy who can catch paintballs that's amazing that's crazy anyway uh the two triceratops break through the the uh sheriff's office the building is now just freestanding rubble and they continue to charge into town. Show me the map and I'll show you what happened.

Oh, shit. This might not have worked out how I planned. Accidentally killed the sheriff! Well, oops. All the elves around the jail are dead. Oh, got them. Good, though. Easy. She's going to be so impressed with me.

You'll be so rich. Everything is working out for Algernon. No, this won't come back to bite him. Not at all. No way. The triceratops continue to move through and break through the bunk bed and

homesteads on the other side. Killing a further three elves. You win some, you lose some. Look, hey, there's more bodies for the fucking pile. So they just, like, break a line through buildings. Is the sheriff visible? In Among the Rubble, it's hard to tell. You'd have to go have a look.

There's three elves still on the hotel. Five, no, six elves on the ground, and one elf across the way on a roof. Was I instructed to get the sheriff? I feel yes-ish. I feel like Algenor didn't plan that far ahead. One of the elves calls out, heretics! Kill the heretics! At this point, I give the signal for my circus people and dire kangaroos and whatever else is on this side to attack while I watch from a safe distance.

Can I hop in the pocket of my dire kangaroo in the pouch? Like, you're little. Like, I'm little and they're big. I'd say I'm roughly Joey size to them. Yeah. That's mad. It's probably one of your tricks. Watch as I get inside

of the hole, the front hole of this particular marsupial. And it carries around and thinks I'm his little baby. Ladies and gentlemen, let me let you in, invite you in

on this particular trick. I'm not his baby. But if he is a small child or perhaps one of my kind, we call them halflings, if you would like to come up here onto this here stage, maybe we could do this here. Can I hit fire blows now? Yeah, you can.

Yeah. Biff buff biff. You whip around with the quarterstaff, slam him once again in the nose, bring the quarterstaff back, kick him in again in the nose. Bring the quarterstaff back. Kick him in that leg that you hit him in the thigh. You hear bones snap backwards. He screams now.

Falls forward. You slam your quarterstaff into his open mouth. You deal in total nine points of damage, killing him. Dead. Wham bam Another body for the list And that's good because that's like not too damaged Like I don't know how damaged she wants the bodies Yeah

Like presumably not very She did not specify The circus attacks There were three of the heretics in the immediate crowd. Hi, Zoloz. Hi. Would you care if your circus people attacked the crowd? Look, you'd be happy for that?

Ideally not, but I feel like the woman of my dreams would be upset with me. But at the same time, I mean, what's more bodies at this point? Upper E, and Upper E, Taller E, and Simple On charge towards those three fanatics and just destroy them. Arpa-E picks one of them up, slams him down once, slams him down a second time, and then throws him into a third. And the other two, like the acrobat Simplon,

jumps onto his head, starts punching him in the face, while taller-E grabs him by one of his arms and starts pulling at him. Those three go down. Oh, boy. Here we go. What have I done? Then,

nah, it's worse. Barlow opens the cage to the dire kangaroos and the ankek. Oh, no. That ankek is such a hassle. You can't ride a bicycle. The two dire kangaroos hop

out. They look at the crowd. The crowd looks at them. They both leap together into the crowd. They crush five people in the crowd. One of them picks up a person in the crowd who is screaming and starts eating him. The other one starts hopping further into town. That's good.

The ankeg burrows into the sand. Oh, goddammit, guys. It's so difficult to get back. It is so hard to get back in its cage. What have you done? It's your turn. Job done, because I broke the bank. That's all I needed to do.

I mean, broke the jail. I guess I go and try and find those Triceratops. Do I see my creatures getting loose? Yeah. Oh, boy, that's going to be difficult or hard to get that particular ant cake back in the cage. Can I see where it's burrowing? Is it like a hole? You think it's like you haven't fed it in a day?

You think it's burrowing? It it in a day You think it's borrowing It attacks like a trapdoor spider Right You think the second someone goes to investigate That hole it's going to get them Is there like a way that I get it back in its cage Like I hold up the meat and it goes for the meat You can't entice it with food yeah

Alright I'll go get some meat Well you're just out in the street now You walk over the wreckage of the jail and they're standing in the street. Where's the sheriff, by the way? You haven't seen him yet. Oh, good. Algernon, you just, like, back up and you're, you know, egging people on from behind. Yes, good.

Unless you want to do something, that's okay. Sorry? Do you just want to be egging it on? No, that's fine. You're just egging it on from behind. Oh, what has he become? Oh, man. When we started, I was just a simple circus ringleader.

The town of temperance ever recovered from this. The day the circus came to town. Flandangle? Yep. The two other sharpshooters on the roof with you level rifles at you. One misses, but the other one hits you. Deflect it. Hey!

You, yeah. You knock the bullet aside. Man, I'm amazing. Monks are cool. The elf looks down at his rifle and up at you. I give him a wink. Then an elf across the way on one of the buildings across the street fires at you, Hooch. Oh, dear me.

He misses as well. The three elves in the streets, the three elves left in the streets, one of them charges, no, two of them charge you, Hooch. Both of them wielding spears. One of them goes after the circus performers. Upper E gets skewered in the belly with a spear. Oh, no, not Upper E. Oh, no.

And so do you. Oh, no, not me. So do you, Hooch. Hooch, you take six points of damage. How am I going to get that damn ant keg back in its cage? I'm just consuming my every thought right now. The dire kangaroos, whatever whatever They'll come when they're called They're very well trained

I'm going to go over towards You can take a five foot step and then do Flurry of Blows on the next guy Yep Alright, take a five foot step Flurry of Blows him Yeah You leap at him with your quarterstaff held high Slam it into his head

He drops his rifle, stumbles backwards. You whip around, go low, knock him off his feet. He falls to the floor. You kick him once and he rolls off the building. Good. You deal 10 points of damage to him in total. He hits the ground. There's blood all around where the impact point is and he's very dead right i'm just gonna

point my bow star for the next guy uh then a little bit of like you know that come here yeah like your classic matrix then it is uh the circus's turn oh dear the three performers descend upon the one fanatic they're just tearing him apart. Upper E grabs the spear, breaks it with his hand, and then moves, like, along the harp towards the elf. Jesus Christ! He takes the spearhead out of his belly and stabs it

into the elf's chest. The elf goes down. There's a reason you hired us. Yeah, I get the sensation that the sensation, the... Highs or lows? Lows, I get the sensation. The sensation. The... Highs or lows? Lows. I get the feeling that this is just like not the first time something of this caliber has happened to us. One of the dire kangaroos...

Oh, the people are screaming and running away. One of the dire kangaroos hops towards a saloon, sticks its head in. You hear screaming inside the saloon. The dire kangaroo like... Like tries to get its way in through the door it breaks the doorway apart gets inside the saloon you just hear screaming from inside the other dire kangaroo is chasing people down as they run eating the first person that it got and hitting, just hitting other people as it goes.

It gets to a horse, puts a paw on the horse's back, pushes down. You hear a snap and the horse doesn't literally break into, but you can tell under the skin it's been snapped in half. A poor horse. One of the fleeing elves gets too close to that hole that the Ankh-Egg dug and just pinces in a head, come out, grab the elf, drag him under. There's no screams there. And the sheriff, is he out yet?

Hooch. Yeah? You hear from behind you a gunshot. The elf standing next to you, or one of the elves standing next to you, crumples. I gotta get me some meat. You whip around. Standing in the wreckage is an elf wearing a poncho and a big wide-brimmed, like, Mexican hat. What do you call a sombrero?

Sorry, a sombrero. In his hands is a revolver. You would call it a clockwork pistol. They're called clockworkero. In his hands is a revolver. You would call it a clockwork pistol. They're called clockwork pistols, but it is a revolver. Mad. Then it is... Hooch. Where do I keep my meat?

You keep your meat in the circus. Way back where you made camp. I'm going to head that way. All right, everyone sees Hooch just meandering back towards made camp. I'm going to head that way. All right. Everyone sees Hooch just meandering back towards the camp. Everything I do is slow and methodical. Algernon,

you're just still egging people on, I suppose. That's it. Who's imagining him like standing in the middle of all this bloodshed and wreckage

kind of just... I feel like I'm getting to a point now where I'm starting to be a bit like, oh no. This isn't quite how far I wanted this to escalate. I'm but a simple circus ringleader.

The elf that was fighting you, Hooch, turns his attention towards that, presumably the sheriff in the wreckage of the jail. Charges forwards with his spear, but that's his turn. Cool. Then the two elves on the roof, rooftops, both of them are going to fire. Oh no, one fires at Hooch. Misses. The other one on the roof with you, flipped angle, fires at you. Can I deflect this time

or can I only do it? He's going to hit you and you get a chance to deflect. Awesome. That's mad. Yep. You're slowly making your way towards him. Do monks just always get a chance to deflect a bullet? No, it's an ability. Yeah, okay.

Anyone can technically get this ability. Really? Yeah. It's a feat, yeah? Yeah, it's a feat. Deflect arrows. And then later on it becomes snatch arrows. I remember there's also like a really high levels.

There's a feat that's like deflect magical energy. I had a character that just like anytime a projectile came towards him, he had like a decent chance to just reflect it. That's cool. Sometimes they could throw it back at them. Yeah, I was going to say, is there like the final feat of that? It seems like you grab, catch, and whoo, right back at them.

That's mad. Weird with a bullet. But whatever, I'll allow it. I'd catch it in my mouth and spit it back. Sure. I'll allow it. I'd catch it in my mouth and spit it back. Sure.

Bing! It's less impressive if instead of the pew, it makes a pfft. Well, what's stupid about it, though, actually, is that if you're trying to catch it in your mouth and you fail, surely you take more damage. You would think so, but that's not how the NDE works. That's good and stupid. Yep, so flip dangle, it's your turn. That elf is slowly just backing up like, bang, bang, bang.

Deflect, deflect, deflect. Can I get fire blows in this turn? Not on this one. Right. I'm just going to try and disarm him. All right. You charge up. You take penalties to disarming people, just letting you know.

That's all right. All right. You grab the rifle and try to wrest it from his grasp. I'm going to smack him with my staff. You grab the rifle, try to put your staff into his chest to center yourself, and push and pull. But when you do that, he instead jams his rifle butt into your chest and pushes back. Neither of you...

Oh, well, you don't take the weapon from him. Damn. Bummer. Then it is the circus's turn. Classic circus. I see with, like, the madcap circus music in the background. They're like... It makes it, like, all the more...

Like the Benny Hill theme song. The performers just kind of, like... Well, they start moving towards that elf that was near Hooch, but they don't, like, they're kind of moving safely now, or trying to move safely as possible, because they don't need to worry too much about Hooch being in trouble. He's not in trouble anymore. Instead, real action in the circus is just the animals. Bits of bone, gristle, and blood spit up from the hole the

ankh egg dug. Inside the saloon, you hear a tremendous creaking and a crashing sound, and you can tell that the... Oh, you can probably see through the doors, like the two swinging doors open, close, open, close. When they open, you can see

straight through the saloon to the other side where the dire kangaroo is broken out the back and is just hopping into the night. Oh, crap. It's going to get eaten by the worm. Oh, man. They're a breeding pair. The other kangaroo keeps hopping. Another

horse is like hitched nearby and is trying freaking out to get away the kangaroo grabs the horse's head jams it into the water pail and holds it down until the horse stops breathing at a certain point it just turns into cruelty like it's not just animalistic rage it's just like watch this thing suffer kangaroos are possessed of a frightening intelligence. It's about respect. We'll attack you guys. About a simple understanding

between two beings. They're very gentle, delicate creatures. A lot of people screaming and running around. They're scared. Also, they were directed to attack. You're not wrong. They're the only trained ones and they were told to attack

The Ankeg was told to attack But it's attacking just like out of a primal thing Ankeg is hard to train It has not been fed You'll get him teaching At this point Now that the town is sort of No longer really a town

Can I direct Hooch To start rallying the animals back together? Because we're losing animals left, right, and center. Yeah, you can. Hooch, you hear Algernon call out to, well, what do you say exactly? Get the animals back. We've lost a kangaroo. Another one's drowning a horse over there. The Ankh-keg's underground.

You turn around. Where are the Triceratops? Where are my Velociraptors? The Triceratops are in one direction. The Velociraptors, oh, did you want to release them with the thing? Preferably not. I'd rather they were intact. Because they're also well-trained. If you told them to attack, they'd be running among the people right now.

You know what? At this point, I don't think we need it. They're probably back at the tent. Okay, cool. Well, them being okay gives me some peace of mind. With the Diplodocus. But I'd really like it if we got the rest of the animals back. One of the Triceratops is tied in a field. The other two are just doing circles around the top.

One of the dire kangaroos looks like it's actually trying to make a break for it and might try to hop out of the town city limits. The other kangaroo, who has been... Drowning the horse. Seems to be content just doing that. He's happy.

She's happy. Murtaugh always be the most flighty of the two dire kangaroos that I have. Somewhere. Ankhag's not going to move. That's the good of the ant keg. Okay. What do you want to do, Hooch?

If I called now, would the dire kangaroo be able to hear me? Yeah. I'll do like a special call. I mean like a come back to me. From the other side of the saloon, the dire kangaroo stops hopping turns around with its ears pricked up and starts moving towards you the one drowning the horse let's go the horse like

turns around and he's uh she starts hopping back towards you as well bring come back to me don't be drowning the horses. That ain't the correct way, though. If you're gonna, in this town, you gotta get the food that you get. You don't need to be drowning the horse. You can't even eat a horse. You hear several more shots in rapid succession.

Flandangle, the elf... Oh, were you still fighting one? Yeah, yeah. The elf that you were fighting, like, wrestles his rifle from you, backs up against the edge of the hotel, is about to take another shot when a bullet rips through the base of his skull and he topples backwards off the building. Three quick shots and there's no more enemy fanatics. Good. We've won.

Victory. Victory. I'm going to climb down that hotel. All right. You climb down the side. A little bit of a roll, a little bit of a tumble. Victory. Victory. I'm going to climb down that hotel. All right. You climb down the side. Do a bit of a roll, a bit of a tumble. Ta-da. You see that sheriff as well with the sombrero and the poncho.

Give him a curt nod. Like, thanks, man. Well done, partner. He grabs the sombrero and tips it to you. Is the sheriff okay with this? Because we've just killed half the town. He's just watching the carnage unfold around him. Right, you must be the sheriff.

Sheriff Alfwood. Sheriff Alfwood. Well, lovely to meet you, Sheriff Alfwood. My name is Flandango from the amazing... Can I guess his first name? Go for it. Is it Clint? Sheriff Clint Alfwood. Lovely to meet you, Sheriff Clint Alfwoodwood I love it Meet you Sheriff Clint Elfwood

We are from the amazing Hoggling Family Circus I do flourish as I bow You best get them creatures under control Fair I try and get the triceratops The sheriff walking down the street Makes just a solid like

Ching, ching, ching His spurs He's walking towards you um algena oh good okay the dire kangaroos are under control hooch all right okay now i need to go get that meat honestly you could probably just use a bit of body yeah oh yeah true is it like just like a spare arm probably yeah i'll pick it up. I'll go over... Not within the boundary of his little ant lion nest. Oh, we're no longer in initiative.

So what do you want to do as well? I'll go and try and wrestle one of them triceratops. All right, cool. So you're trying to get the ant keg. You're trying to get the triceratops. Just hold the meat over its... You're maybe like a little bit scared of the sheriff. I freed you.

Ta-da! he looks around I can see that so the question of payment he doesn't say anything he walks right past you because I freed you out of the goodness of my heart I wasn't promised any payments or anything. So if you could see... He is not paying.

He's walking towards the church. Oh, okay. Rude. So I've got... No, I've just got bad news. Which one do you want first? One really bad, one slightly bad. I'll get the slightly bad first.

Slightly bad? Yeah. You're not unable to wrangle the triceratops. As you approach them, they run from you. Drat. Well, now come back here. What did Hooch say? Gotta whisper sweet nothings.

Gotta be loving with them. Come here. Come on here, baby girls. Come on now. Come on. We got some primo grass for you lovelies. You know, come here. Come on.

You ever say... And the really bad news. You got beautiful horns. Everyone will tell you that, man. You approach tentatively with the arm outstretched. Oh, no. Not your arm, the arm outstretched. What a great line.

Is that like the noise that they make? Like what noise... Come on now I'm gonna get eaten I got a bicycle in one arm An arm in the other arm The NK sticks its head out Opens a tiny little hatch in its maw

And you know what's about to happen It spits a line of acid at you Always a problem You duck out of the way The acid splashes next to you Spits a line of acid at you. Always a problem. You duck out of the way. The acid splashes next to you, but splash back hits you still, and you're going to take damage.

Come on, Miss Marple. All right. Don't be attacking me with that acid there. I don't need my money maker burned here. You take five points of damage. Does its head stay out, though? Yeah. Do I have like a... You know your classic animal catching loop on the end?

Do you? Well, no, but I have elven rope. You can lasso it. Yeah, I'll lasso it. That's what I'll have to do. Like the pioneers of old. It looks like a spider pole. Maybe Gabe's got one. I've got a spider pole. Maybe Gabe's got it.

I've got a spider pole. What's a spider pole? They're just like little poles that you can stick into each other and form like a lattice of any shape or size. Oh. It's good for climbing. Okay. Yeah. You throw the lasso.

It wraps neatly around the Ankh-Egg's head. You pull taut the rope and it latches around. You've got to hold on it all right so come on miss marble back in this year marble you're going you made a terrible mess it starts pulling you into its uh into its nest again always a risk but boss wants this damn your options are let go of the rope bicycle rage to try and help, or you're going in. So, Adam, using my very extensive knowledge of how the ankh egg works, could I pull out my flask of acid, fling it at the ankh egg's face,

and then make the noise of, like, a dominant male? I'll give you a bonus to the handle animal Yeah I'll take it You throw the flask of acid in its face It starts bubbling Like the ankeg is in pain You make that sound And then it like Flattens itself against the floor

Lowers its antennae And you know you can get it in the cage now. There now, there now, Miss Smart Boys. Okay, okay. You've made a terrible, not particularly good mess of this town. Put it back in your home now. You lead and put the Ankeg back in its cage. Okay, then.

I give a little pat on its head and shut the gate. Fuck, that was good. Ankeg tamed. the gate. Fuck, that was good. And keg tamed? How will our heroes deal with the aftermath of setting the sheriff free? Find out next time on The Day the Circus Came to Town. A D&Dist for Nerds Adventure.

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