Nerd Poker - Episode 14 - Shrug To The Camera

Episode Date: July 19, 2017

Our heroes formally initiate a raid on Count Bariss' castle, leaving a mess on his doorstep before heading through the north tower window. Will they murder everything? Will their alignments change? C'mon, you know the answer. They kill a lot of gross stuff. Bodhi stomps.

Hey, it's Brian Possehn. I used to have a podcast where I played Dungeons & Dragons with a bunch of my friends. I missed it, so I decided to make a new one. It's called Brian Possehn's Nerd Poker. It's myself, a couple of my buddies, Blank and Patch, Dan Telfer, Ken Daly, an occasional guest or two, and we're gonna be playing in a new setting, my dining room. Each week you'll hear my wife, my son, my dogs, and we're gonna be playing in a place that I love and playing the game that I've loved half my

life, Dungeons & Dragons. We've got 5th edition, and we're ready. So are you ready? Here's Brian Poussaint's Nerd Poker. Hey, it's Brian Poussaint. And you're listening to... Brian and the Lobster. It's the morning zoo. Flappy.

Fat Steven. Hey, it's me, Fat. And Stacy. Hi. I prefer to just go by Fat. All right. The worst morning show. Hey, everybody.

I once wrote a Higgins, Boys, and Gruber sketch for them on something that we did, and it was Steve Higgins and Gruber and Dave Higgins, and it was them morning zoo during the apocalypse and i forgot where that is but we did that 20 years ago or something yeah we shot it for comedy channel or yeah wow we've got an apocalypse episode about midnight coming up i'm real excited this was my this was my sketch idea it was a it was a morning zoo like still trying to be cheery while the world's ending. And they were doing like... That's every radio show.

Playing little clips of, I don't want to work. I just want to bang on my drum all day. Just dumb late 80s, early 90s shit. Because I worked on one of those radio stations. That was before I did comedy. That was one of my jobs. I answered the phone and played Milli Vanilli and shit like that and hated it. So you're listening to Brian Poussain's Nerd Poker.

These are my friends. Yeah. You turned the radio dial into the weird zone. Ken Dan Blaine. Black blue cap. And me, Terrence Trent Darby. Terrence Darby? That's me.

This is the second episode of the night, so it's always the loose one, if you notice. If you listen to these in order, it'll get stiff and then it'll get loose. Yeah, stiff and then loose, and then stiff and then loose. Yeah, stiff and loose. I don't want to say this show's going to get a little dirty, but cock. I don't want to say this show's going to get a little dirty but cock we were going to maybe plug a couple of things always like plugging

the Patreon account that's been really great we've got some fun bonuses coming up soon so far if you haven't joined us if you do you can hear Sarah and and sark uh we've got so many fun hello already uh those two episodes we've got the stuff that uh rick and uh drucker did with us we we're at a point where if you join you get five whole episodes you haven't heard before in

addition to what we haven't recorded which really isn't much two and for two and uh we're trying to throw a little extra stuff in there once we hit a thousand subscribers we're gonna do a bunch of really cool shit so if you're not on board get on board because it's gonna benefit you we're gonna yeah we've got more people coming up people that people have been asking for uh wink forget. Forget about who? You know who. Albert Einstein. Don't forget about him.

He's coming. Yeah, he's coming. And me, Terrence Trent Arby. Yeah, and Terrence Trent Arby, always. But yeah, join us at Patreon. That'd be great. And I've got a live date I wanted to plug in LA. Like once a year I do a thing at the improv and I've also done shows at Largo.

This is a show at Largo and it's Brian Pessain and friends. And it's going to be my 30th year in standup in July. My anniversary, my 30th anniversary is July 12th, but we're going to do a show on July 25th. And it's me, my friend right next to me, Blaine Kpatch. Blaine Kpatch will just be doing Terrence Trent Darby jokes. I'm just going to do wishing well over and over until people remember who I am.

When is the show? It's July 25th. Yeah, this will drop on the 17th and 18th. Oh, cool. So buy tickets now go but i've also been plugging it in uh you know the little pre-tape things that i'm wrapping around the show uh and a bunch of funny guys greg proops dana ghoul my very old friend well these are all old friends uh karen kogar karen kilgareth correct from my My Favorite Murder and from Being Friends for a Long Time.

And Guy O'Belum, Derek Sheen, and maybe some added bonus guests. Hey, you know who else has a comedy birthday on July 12th, Brian? Who? Bill Cosby. Oh, my God. But that's his actual birthday. His actual birthday. Comedy birthday on July 12th, Brian. Who? Bill Cosby. Oh, my God. But that's his actual birthday. His actual birthday.

I only know that from his snowball routine. Well, I started stand-up on his birthday. Somebody had to. When did you start putting pills in girls' drinks? We're going to... So on that note, on our last episode... Oh, man. so on that note on our last episode oh man uh you guys had just avoided uh getting into quite a skirmish with uh 24 moon elves and you parted ways with lekis uh you ran in ways with us he did he did he decided that he didn't want to have quite as violent the shenanigans

as he had been having um you ran into torso the phantasmal um who alerted you that you are not welcome near so lucky he's not dead i've never been more impressed with a freaky he was yeah i hated him what do you read you hated me no i'm sorry he's not here he's not here um but uh you also ran into gago after you almost you came very close to splitting him well i took my hatred of wazoo or whatever the fuck on uhago. Sorry, Gago. But Blaine healed him, so. And now we filled him full of

whiskey. Oh, and then we left. Blaine scouted into... Ken and I went out and made out by my pool. So while you two were blowing each other by the light of the moon me and Blaine had a little chit chat

and do you want to fly back to the party and tell them what you saw Blaine? sure hey it's Blaine it's Twee hey Twee what the hell happened? what'd you see? yeah Tom that's not how you would say hi to Twee

what'd you see? gotta be right what happened sorry i really had to be uh so i was flying around the flying around the castle as i do sure uh very top i found like an observatory it looked like I went inside there were there was an alcohol cabinet oh there's an alcohol cabinet yeah no I mean more like they got hurt more like Kitty Dukakis rubbing around kind of cabinet and I got out of there because I had a feeling that if I touched anything, that I would have been the last thing I touched.

So, but anyway, what I'm thinking of is maybe we could get in that observatory. I don't know how to get in there or not. If we could maybe go up there. So there was a balcony that he went in through. He actually went in the room, and there were no immediate repercussions. He didn't notice any traps go off.

He didn't encounter anyone. But he got right in the room and was floating around. But it felt evil? Yeah, it felt like I didn't want to. Like, if I would have messed with anything, I would have... Wouldn't send your kids there for the summer. Yeah, it was not conducive to hanging out and looking around. And you guys...

How big is the castle? It's very big. It's taller than Count Amalegda's castle. And it's on a rocky spire. How many entrances? Only one that you can see, the drawbridge. But didn't Gago show us the way in? He said he would try.

Do you see anything still with us? You're just within visual distance of the gardens, and he said he's up for scouting ahead and checking out to see if there's any entrances you guys haven't seen yet um but you yeah okay yeah there was a table up in the the room that was a little weird too it had a like a table like this with a lot of chairs i don't know if it was a dining thing or not or if it was a maybe it's uh there were also like a lot of chemicals and stuff up there. So if there is some sort of Castle of Dr. Moreau thing going on, maybe that's where he has people up to, you know,

hey, have a crazy hungry man dinner. Sort of an alchemist maybe. Yeah. Let's kill him and free these creatures, or kill these creatures and free him. You see ahead in the garden too, there's some rustling. It looks like there's some kind of creature. Let's say you're like 200 yards away from the garden

and you see some shuffling around in the garden. You're not sure if somebody spotted you. Is there any way to get above the castle or is it above everything? Yeah. Can you fly above this big thing and see what which thing the thing that we just saw in the garden 200 yards away i don't want to spoiler you think you could you think you could climb up um so there's sort of a rocky pass leading up to the gardens so there's two cliff faces you feel like there's paths where you could actually scale on either side the castle itself is in the middle of kind of like a crater so like

so there's not a lot of approach no but you definitely go up around the side he's a tiefling can i carry him he's really big okay, you're the smallest member of the party. Ah. Can I make myself lighter? Nope. Yeah, I don't know if you'd be able to carry him too easily. But, yeah. You do have flight on your side. The drawbridge is currently down.

You can't cast flight on someone else. I could, yeah. Or on an object. I also have a levitate. I'm just thinking maybe we can find a log or something and ride it in. Or, why don't I, if he's up for it, why don't I just cast levitate on him and fly him up there? Yeah? Just him?

Yeah. And his stuff. Just because he's a rogue, you think he'll be able to... Well, he's the one expressing interest in this. Maybe we could go up and see what's going on. What do you think, Bodhi? I want to go up too but uh i'll keep marching up there or can i climb fly us both up there i think so we have to wait

i feel like you could probably cast levitate on both of them and carry both of them yeah i could maybe have to make two trips. And if not, it'll be fun. Okay. Yeah, you could do it in two trips. Tom first. Oh, sure, yeah. Okay. You hear from the gardens a... kind of muffled noises. You're going to fly them up?

Is that a guard dog? They might have some big guard dog. Yeah, I'm trying to stay away from anything that will my attention that will draw my attention I don't want to be noticed

so do I can I control my direction or is he directing me to where I'm going if I'm being levitated it's up to you guys I mean you'll

you're if you're levitating that makes you weigh less and so he will be the one guiding you he's basically he's still got to grab you by your clothes and kind of hoist you around yeah you're that works yeah yeah just take me up yeah zip I'm gonna drop you off come on I'm saying if you let if you got levitate you weigh zero right but i can't control my when you're being pulled above a certain height you you do weigh something it's just less all right and yeah so um how are you gonna do this you're gonna go i'm gonna drop him off go back down do the same thing with uh with bodhi

okay why don't you roll uh do you have can i see a character real quick i want to look at the abilities list now that i'm trying to do this properly somebody anybody let's do tweet because i'm talking about tweet so let's say you do not have a stealth rating. He's just talking about tweet. I can dig it. Roll a dex check. And let's say you're carrying him and you're trying to be stealthy. It's a difficulty of 15.

Six? So what's your bonus there? It's a difficulty of 15. Six. So what's your bonus there? Is it plus five? So no. Okay. So here's what happens. You get him above the garden and somebody sees you. You're being very careful.

You're looking to see, you know, like, how can I cling to the cliff face? And then kind of like arc across when nobody's looking. And you're so far away, you can't really get a good look. But you feel like everybody has stiffened up. All the shapes stop at one point. And you start to see them collect themselves inside the castle. Okay. Drawbridge is still down and there's

there's the garden is on the other side so like this is the garden this is the drawbridge this is the castle and it's still down and they're shuffling around over here in the garden uh should i go down and get this guy yeah drop me off all All right. So you drop him off in the tower? Yeah. Great. I will try and lock the door to access it. Lock the door? I'm going to go inside the room and lock whatever door is leading to that room from inside the castle. All right. Go for it. Can I see your skill sheet, please?

Something's coming up. Yeah. Let's say... What is that? There's not a lockpicking skill. What is that? Like traps or something? I so i have an arcade trickster so it's all about yeah yeah yeah i'm just trying to figure out what this what i should have you roll to figure the lock out because it has a lock on it doesn't have a key handy intelligence

yeah let's do intelligence that makes sense um well no it's dexterity it would be dexterity right let's do dexterity that makes more sense because you're a thief yeah that's their big skill uh let's say um make sure nobody comes in while we're working yeah yeah yeah yeah let's do difficulty uh 10 with your bonus okay Okay. 14. Boom. So you get it locked. Tweed goes back. And hey, Bodhi. Yeah. So while you're hanging out with Gago and you're making small talk,

you notice a shape come out of the garden and start lumbering towards you. Hold on. I'm pouring Ken some water on you right now. Oh, thank you. Okay. Ken's getting some... Should we pause? Yeah.

Let's pause for just a microsecond. Hey, Bodhi. Yeah. You and Gago, you're hanging out. You notice something. It starts... It pops its head out of the garden and starts lumbering towards you. How big?

How far away? It's about 200 yards. And it looks like a big human with a weird head. So like me? Yeah, like you. Except there's some stuff sticking out of its head. Hmm. Okay. So before I go to floyd's barbershop yes when you're real scraggly when you're in total scarecrow mode right how i look right now yeah yeah i'm about to go to floyd's tomorrow yeah oh for sure i like i go from

professor to crazy professor in just a couple of weeks. Gago says, that shit looks gross. And sure enough, it is a large human body with broad shoulders, big beefcake arms, total Magic Mike shit. And then it's got some kind of rhinoceros-like head on top of it. So it's kind of like a minotaur, except instead of – He's ugly? Yeah, yeah. Is he extremely ugly?

He's extremely ugly. Cool. And as soon as he's within earshot, he stops and he calls out, Who goes there? You talking to me? Would you tussle in my garden? You stay out of my garden.

No. Was I walking towards his garden? I was already yeah that's where i was going tweed whispers from afar a message that somehow reaches your ears upon the wind to send you a text yeah yeah this is light them. 4G is actually pretty good here, you wouldn't think. Okay. I'll go to the parking garage. I'm not going to light him on fire. Is that what you're... He's just saying, fuck him up.

I'm just going to fight him. Okay, yes. Yeah, I would say Blaine is making his way back to you, but he is three combat rounds away from you. I'm not worried about it. So he'll be there soon, but no, you're not worried about it? No. So this guy is 150 yards away.

Okay. What are you going to do? He's coming for you. He's yelling nonsense about his guard go go Yeah, man. I want to see something awesome Does it include getting a sword in my stomach again? No cool cuz I I'm not doing of that jackass shit Why don't you see me do it to this guy? Do you want to help me? Yeah, come on. Let's go. What's wrong? Do I want to do? I don't know. You want me to cast a spell on him?

What do you got? I got stink cloud. Okay. What'll that do to him? It'll make him think that he just ordered guac. If I hit him right, he'll throw up and shit. Okay, do that, and then I'm gonna stab him a bunch. He goes,

He flies ahead of you and casts stink cloud right in this thing's face he pulls a little wand out of his belt and does he say anything funny he's real far away but you hear pump you hear him say, as he pulls his wand back, he says, I'll suck on this bitch. Okay. And it's in the original Latin. It does some damage

sorry I was eating peanuts eating peanuts eat that dick but also this thing starts waving its arms in the air and you hear it go and then it starts

throwing up in the air and just vomit lands all over its face as it's waving its arms just completely thrown off its guard he flies back to you and says oh shit well

I'm gonna rage and just run at him. Go for it. I've been watching Vikings finally. Oh, how's that show? It's pretty good. It's like four seasons in, but I started on season one. It's inspired my Bodhi a little bit, so let's see.

Yeah, I was going to watch it. I just start running right towards him berserker I'm raging cool roll to attack you would have to time that right so you didn't like run out of energy like about 50 yards

away well how long did it take me to get to him 150 yards away it'll take a turn okay so twee's not there yet not that you give a shit uh what's my friend tom doing uh tom is finishing locking a door up in uh count barris's citadel so all right let me know when I'm yeah roll roll to attack man he's

still throwing up all over the place now is this an actual attack roll or is this something else this is yeah you're rolling to attack it's you and him in combat so he gets a 20 strength bonus right on that?

Yeah. So that's a 17. Cool. He's still going to go first. He knows you're approaching. Don't I have another? I'd get a plus two on my initiative though. Oh, yeah.

But he still rolled a 20. I think that gives you a 19 i think you're really close you're really close that said he's he's yeah he he's he's knows he's engaging in combat but he's blinded with uh with stink and you see just this dark like a deuce this dark brown shit cloud just like tracing around his face i'm still chaotic chaotic, but I don't give a fuck what's going on with him. Chaotic ugly. I'm just going to fuck him up. Piper Parabo. He tries to, he's got no weapons, so he tries to take a swing at you.

He's got a garden, what do you call it? He told me to stay out of his garden. He's got a trowel in one hand. Oh, so this is like the Dumb Gardener? Yeah, yeah, yeah. But he's muscular as fuck. Well, he was being intimidating. I took it as a threat.

I wish I would have gotten more love with my trowel-y joke. He misses, but he tries to stick you with his trowel. Mr. Trowel-y. He tried to stick you with his trowel, and he missed. He tries to stick me, and he missed. He tries to stick me and he missed. Well, this is a shape. And as he does it,

he swings, he, he, the trowel goes right past your head. And he says, he says, God, give that the green banishes.

You stay out of my garden. Right. Well, he's got a weird rhino head. It looks like one of those prehistoric rhinos where it's got forks in its horns. There's not just two horns. There's a bunch of horns.

Did you do anything to him? That was an initiative. Now you can attack properly. It's just an eight. properly yeah you get them real good roll. Where are you aiming? A little closer. Oh, is it? Well, we're playing two games, yeah. Our box has lights. Our dice tower. Six plus.

Oh, raging, so ten. Damn. All right right so you stick him in the gut uh he is still alive it doesn't quite spill his guts out but blood splashes across the grass and he goes how dare you how dare you he's still kind of swinging blindly so this is going to be a minus yeah he fucking swings with his other fist and misses you again fuck him that's his spirit roll that again

that was on its side eleven sixteen shit that's a hit okay 11 16 shit that's a hit okay what you trying to do this time where is he right in front of you

I'm gonna stab him in the fucking nuts jesus 7 plus 4 11 so big ol rocky mountain oyster goes flying over your shoulder as you pull your sword out from between his legs and he goes god dearie dearie dearie dearie oh my and he puts both his his big meat fists in his crotch and topples uh gardener over and he's wiggling around the ground cursing you oh good

um i'm gonna stab him in the fucking face go for it yeah he's he's not taking this turn he's he's uh incapacitated oh 20 20 go for it i was gonna kill i was gonna pet cemetery i was gonna just cut his achilles tendons so he went no fair and fell over by the way as you roll this 20 twee uh you you managed to catch up to bode so you're you get to kind of hover over this he's coming down to go don't kill him he's good do you want to do you want to roll to attack are you just gonna watch him finish this well i i think i think he's done right with this. I'm facedown I'm just trying to get a feel for what tweeze doing as he approaches I saw this happening. So I'm just sort of slow in my approach a little bit. Great. Great roll roll

This is double Double damage you roll the 20 get him hot 10 and you're raging so I should actually be giving you an extra attack each round I mean but you just did you just did

yeah so I'm basically oh yeah you don't need it that much because I didn't need it he was You just did 20. Yeah. So basically. Oh, yeah. You don't need it that much because. I didn't need it. He was. He's blinded.

Yeah. You just did 20 and then you get a bonus. My rage and then, yeah. So you just did 28 damage. Let's see. Oh, you would double that? Yeah. Okay. Yeah.

Okay. It's a 20. 14 plus. What's. 14 plus 11 is 25 plus 28. 53. On his face. He had 48 hit points. That is more than 48. So where are you swinging this time?

Just where was he? He's on the ground on his side grabbing his ball hole. I'll just chop his head off. Yeah, his head comes clean off and gristle in blood and like a vein just gives a little arc across the sky. You see a little blood rainbow as his head just sort of rolls down the mountainside. Okay, cool. Good good let's keep moving as you do decapitate him um you notice it it was not his rhino head was

not necessarily stitched it looks as if there were two animals that became one there's something very fishy about his anatomy speaking of fishy i'm to cast a little floating spell on Bodhi here. Okay. No one take me up. Yeah. Good. Gago follows you as you fly up. As you catch up, nobody's...

I'm going to refresh my memory. I know listeners are going to hate me, but how long does Rage last? I think just one encounter. But I get three. Encounter. Yeah, it's like three per day, right? Right. Three per day, it lasts an encounter, and then it's done.

Okay. So as you fly away, your Rage effectively dissipates. Okay, okay. You get to the top of the tower, and yeah. What happens if there's multiple targets, though, in a room, and I'm trying to kill a couple of them? I think if they're in melee range, you get to use your bonus action to attack one of them.

But it really would only last per target? No, it would last the whole encounter. It would last the whole fight you're currently in. Oh, okay, so whoever's in the room, I can... I think multiple targets is actually what it's good for. If you're within striking range and you're in rage, like let's say I'm you, I could chop at you and then with my bonus action, chop at him.

Okay. Ken's just stretching. You've been in a lot of one-on-one fights so far. Yeah, that's true. So it's hard to tell. Okay, cool. As you fly away, you see something that looks suspiciously like four little badgers with human faces scurry out of the gardens and examine the corpse of Geved the Green, who you just decapitated. I hate this place you notice

all the faces are the human faces on these animals are very pale and uh and uh yeah they've been you know there's human faces on a giant toad human faces on badgers but it was a rhino like a prehistoric rhino's head on a man's body. And you're getting a very Dr. Moreau vibe about Count Barrus' place. You meet... Also, during all this, I'm scouting around the room and just seeing what's there. Yeah, there are a lot of strange tools in the alchemy side table. Once you open it up, you realize it's not all for potion mixing.

There's a lot of strange. You're not going up there to fish, are you? Arcane instruments, little tools that look like they're surgical, but with runes carved on them. A lot of strange little necromancy type stuff. And yeah. So they catch up to you. They get to the top of the tower.

And yeah, Tom has locked himself to the top of the tower. And yeah, Tom has locked himself in the top of the tower. Okay. How do we get in? You came in through the balcony. I came through the window. I just locked the way in. Cool. Oh, yeah.

He's coming in. Cool. Okay, now. Hi. All right, so we're all here. Now I'm going to. I just killed a big gross thing down there. Okay.

I'm going to tell everybody that we need to be very quiet. Where's Gago? And then I'm not a little bitch. And then I'm going to turn around and drag my sword across a bunch of glass. I'm going to turn around and it's going to knock over some glasses. And I'm going to... Are you really? No.

No. Okay. I'll catch it as it goes. My sword will grab it. I will grab it before it hits the floor, and I'll look at camera and go... All right, so you're locked at the top of this tower. What do you want to do?

Let's find Barriss and kill him. I'm just doing it for security measures, just to be sure. Take a little extra time to get in. So we're going to leave this room. You're going to unlock the door? Alright. You unlock the door. There's a little spiral staircase

with stained glass windows. Seems like a very nice castle. Sounds pretty. Is this the tallest spire in the castle? Certainly. Yeah, yeah. In this castle. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

There's a south tower, too. This is the north tower that Tui had picked out for you. It's like cedars. All right. So let's head down. Great place to go in if you're in a car accident in beverly hills we're all old by the way because i said cedars yeah cedars

all right so yeah so yeah head down the stairs uh you get a few flights down before there's another doorway and you realize you could potentially visit a room or keep heading down the stairs. So far, everything is quiet. How quiet are you guys trying to be? Super quiet. Because you're a bunch of clunky motherfuckers. Are you still levitating?

I'm super dexterous and lithe. I mean, what's going to be loud about me? My rain stick collection? I mean, I brought my rain sticks. your spell your spells will wear off pretty soon um if you're going to keep going down the stairs you can't keep floating down them forever uh without casting spells again sure i'll start walking at this point okay what about the this first door you're going to keep heading down you're going to get the door to see if i hear anything um you don't hear anything but it is closed and locked and you you think you can start to hear a little bit of voices far far down the staircase it doesn't sound like they're getting closer you

think you're just approaching something okay okay pick the law go for it roll your decks difficulty of 10. You nailed it. You pop the door open and inside there is what looks like a gurney, some buckets, and another door.

This room's very dark. There's one window, no torch. It's a very simple room. There's light coming in, though. Limited light. It's not a bright and shiny land you're in right now, but you're in the mountains, so it cuts through the mist a little bit.

Okay. This door is also locked. the other door this door um you you've encountered something like this before recently or maybe you'll remember where but there's no handle there's no uh signs of how to open it exactly and it's all it's all wooden but is there any space under the door yes let's look at look through the space uh there's something alive inside twitching twitching oh it's like a experiment room probably probably experiment room probably probably uh how do we open this door before uh checking around the door for a loose stone tell me if you think you remember the last time you saw this door and i'll tell you what you did all right i can't remember um but yeah i'm trying i'm just feeling around stones or do an intelligent intelligence check difficulty of 12.

10 plus five great um you find on the other side of the door there's some sort of latch that you think people were magically moving around at about arm's height the way a normal doorknob would be. So it has to be open from the other side with magic. It has to be moved from the inside with magic, yeah. Can I stick a dagger through the door and flip it up or anything like that? You can try, but I don't know how that's going to go. Okay.

Let's see. I can cast Mage Hand, I believe. Can you? I know Blaine can cast mage hand can you i know blaine can cast mage hand that's a basic that's just an automatic for me i believe yeah what a cantrip is it one of your cantrips blaine is that blaine cantrip that shit excuse me if you don't have it as a learned spell yeah i can just like cool um little mage hand it you pop it open and um you see something with uh long wires stuck into it it looks like almost human it's it's fleshy it's got no arms no legs it looks like a torso and a head it's propped up with a simple pile of straw uh the wires that are hooked into it go into

a small box in the wall and it appears to have a something like a, but it almost looks healed over, except it has eyes. It looks like a human head and torso. No limbs, just eyes and its face. Looks like or is a human head and torso? You're pretty sure it's a human head and torso. And it looks alive. Nice. It's got a simple sheet over it well does it see us yeah

what's it saying put me out of my misery you're not sure um it depends do you want to go in this room you want to look at it you want to try and talk to it what do you want to do fire let's talk to it first um yeah it doesn't have a mouth it's got flesh sort of healed over it but uh gago looks at you guys and says i think this thing is trying to send a telekinetic message to me i don't know what the fuck it's saying telepathic message what do you call that shit when it talks to your inside brain? That's right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. What's it saying? I think it's saying, get me out of here. Is it a celebrity? Let's go to another room. Before I do that.

Before you put it out of its business. I'm not going to bring him with us till we kill everything right exactly um all right let's uh any other doors in this room uh no it seems it seems as if this level of the tower is almost exclusively for the keeping of this of this person interesting tell them we'll be back can um it actually when you say that it turns away from you as if it understands hello also when when you say that and it turns away you guys feel like you get a little ping inside your head like maybe you understood what it was saying a little bit.

You don't quite hear a voice, but you get like an affirmative, like, like, okay. Affirmative. In particular, well, in particular, Blaine, you think you can hear very quietly in your head. All right. Oh. Apparently it's being turned into dick Cavett he's doing fine he's just very pale so yeah you want to get out of here and head back

down the tower right let's see which one of these is coming up the stairs because something is coming up the stairs. They're wicked. They come. Coming up the stairs in a formal robe is a person. It is carrying a long staff, and it has a long serpent-like neck uh it's sticking out of its robe is this sort of leathery neck that goes three heads high off and and it sort of cocks its head at you as it rounds the corner and grabs its staff uh close to its body yeah

i think it's time to roll initiative, ladies and gentlemen. This thing rolls a four. I got 14 on him. Did you roll yet? Why don't you roll that again? Why don't you roll that again? Hey! 11? let's roll that again 11 so I think we're we're going Brian do you have any plus on your initiative what's that my dexterity yeah oh you do. He's ahead of me.

I had 14 and he has... Cool. So we're going Blaine, Brian, yeah, then Ken, then the thing. So what are you going to do, Blaine? Uh...

It has very thin human lips and it purses them as it i'm going it doesn't show this is barris no no what is what should we say what is it what is your name i mean we're sure yeah you can use that as a reaction and this room no I'd rather attack who are you and what are you doing here it says you're not welcome here the governor would not allow it I'm gonna thunder wave him down the steps go for it okay I mean I know you thunder wave it we'll see what happens to him all right to him he's gonna try to roll a saving throw cause he's ready sure do it

he braces himself and he slides down a couple of steps and takes some damage but he's still in there glaring you down. All right. Interesting. Who's that? These are like, how are these steps?

What do these steps look like? They're a spiral stone staircase that you've been walking down. They're very narrow. And his head peeked around the corner before the rest of them. Is there a railing there? Yep. It's a wooden railing. A thin one.

Very, very elegant wooden railing along the curves of the tower. What you looking at, Blaine? Hmm? What you thinking? Oh, no. Just stuff. Just thinking about stuff. tower what you looking at blaine what you thinking oh no just stuff just think about stuff uh i'm just gonna run at him and swipe at his long neck go for it my long sword my great sword

uh i also probably should have had you guys roll to brace for the Thunderwave but I'll say Tui you were ahead of everybody and a little farther down the stairs oh did you cast Thunderwave? yeah yeah also it's a Spirally Staircase wouldn't travel that well around the back of him.

I forgot to cast Rage on him, but I'm going to save one of my Rages, or my other two. What did you roll to attack? 15. Oh, yeah, yeah. That'll connect. What about that damage, son? All right.

Why did I call you son? That's gross. Because you're from Chicago? I don't know. That was gnarly. I'm from the streets. Five. And then

seven. And where are you aiming? Neck. Great. You take a big old chunk out of it, and he kind of flops against the side of the tower, but he's still doing all right. He's still in the air.

Do I get another attack on him? Yep. I do. If you're raging. Oh, I wasn't. Then you're not. No. Okay.

Damn it. Should have. Like, once I roll, I can't, right? i do if you're raging oh i wasn't no then you're not no okay damn it should have like once i roll i can't right like because i had already said that's why i didn't that's when the fans will get mad at you right right right they heard you i say lay down casting sleep you're casting sleep on him all right let me see what the saving throw for sleep is what did hey hey Blaine can I ask you for what the savings versus sleep 276 you say saving First-level enchantment, range of infusion. Roll 5d8. The total is how many hit points of creatures this spell can affect. I'm only casting it on one.

Right, right, right. Well, it's a first level of enchantment, so that's got its own difficulty. All right. Ooh, well, he failed a saving throw. Maybe. He falls down in a clump. Do as you will.

No, I'm not going to kill him if he's sleeping. Really? I hadn't thought about it. I'm going to wake him up. Are you? Yeah. Just so he'll kill him? Yeah. You're going to slap him up. Are you? Yeah. Just so he'll kill him? Yeah.

You're going to slap him around? Nah, then. Hey. Hey. How long does he stay? One minute. Gotta go, girl. Should we kill him?

Should we kill him? Let's kill him. Let's kill him. Let's kill him. Let's kill him. Let's kill him. Let's kill him. Let's kill him.

Let's kill him. Let's kill him. Let's kill him. Let's kill him. Let's kill him. Let's kill him. Let's kill him. Let's kill him.

All right. Yeah. I'm just finished cutting his head off. It works. Yeah. God, you guys. Keep going. Let's go down the hill. Or, you guys. Keep going. Let's go down the hill or down the stairs.

As you go farther down the stairs, you reach a landing where there's people out there. There's humanoids. They don't see you yet. You manage to kind of sneak off to the side. It looks like there's four beings out on this landing. It's still pretty high up

in the castle, but it's bigger than a balcony. It's like what you would throw a barbecue on. It's like a little porch. And you feel like if you go farther down, you'll get closer to the keep proper or you could try to... Is it high enough barbecue on it's like a little porch um and you feel like if you go farther down you'll get closer to the keep proper or you could try to high enough to push somebody off yeah okay if you this guy i'm gonna push off are there any doors or anything roll to it uh no this is the one door in and off of the landing that you can see okay um so if we're rolling to attack let's roll to attack everybody

a stealth bonus you do well for a big guy what's your bonus just a two but okay great well uh my boys over here are gonna roll their initiative um just have they seen this yet no but i'm gonna just see what the see what I was gonna try to do this before before they saw us fair yeah before I roll initiative my idea was to push one so then we only have three to contend with all right so let's bring this down to bullet time let's slow it down you round the corner you're about to go into full-on charge, and you see four humanoids. Four French schoolgirls.

They're in the same kind of robes as the guy with the serpent neck, but they've all got weird sort of animalistic fleshy heads. None of them look like anything that belongs on a human body. You see some horse kind of shapes on a couple of them and you see some broader stranger, but you don't get a good look cause you're rounding them looking off in the distance or what are they looking at? They're all talking to each other animatedly on the landing.

They're all, they're all wearing robes and carrying the same sort of staff. Three of them, four of them, four of them. Two of them are thicker. Two of them? Four of them. Four of them. Two of them are thicker. Two of them are taller. Yeah.

Kill the last one. Yeah, okay. So what are you going to do? I missed that because I was talking. We're going to split to three. We're each going to take one and then each try to just push them off and then kill the last guy.

You want to pick one of the two horse-looking motherfuckers or two of the hippo-looking motherfuckers? Well, whoever's biggest. One of the hippo-looking motherfuckers? Well, whoever's biggest. One of the hippo squatter guys. So they still don't see you. You get right up next to them. And I just push them with two guns of ogre power.

I just shove. And you get an automatic success because with that bonus and stealth they're fucked so uh one one dude just as he's just sort of like almost registering you you connect both your hands into his shoulder fling him in an arc over the wall he passes the keep and just sort of tumbles down into the crater and out of sight he doesn't even get a word out he doesn't even make a noise he just

silently disappears into the horizon I forgot to rage damn it you did forget to rage and these guys are gonna roll initiative so why don't the rest of you he spoiled the element of surprise oh I see

oh shit well no I thought we were all three we were all three on one are you yeah that was the idea all right all right yeah we all were gonna act out once yeah i mean why wouldn't you yeah of course you are of course you are what do you do but i'm just saying that's what i'm doing okay uh why don't we have a roll for initiative between the two of you, at least, so I can tell Blaine or Ken who's going next. Yeah, just real quick, real quick. 20. Four.

Blaine, what's Tweed going to do? I'm supposed to push one of these guys, right? Yeah, we're all doing the same thing. Yeah, I'm going to go push I'm going to push this guy. Whoever's closest to the edge. Just try and give him a shove? Yeah. Great.

One roll of strength check. 12. Jeez. What's your bonus for strength? You got one? For strength? And you have a stealth bonus. I don't have a strength bonus. No, I don't have a stealth bonus uh i don't have a strength but i no i don't have a

strength bonus i don't uh i don't have a stealth bonus either okay so so i do not i'm not very successful it's a six you you thud into him and um he reels backwards and and there's, you know, like a hip height stone mini wall, and he kind of leans against it and almost goes over the edge, but he's staring at you in horror as his friend goes flying in a spiral. Is it too late for me to do a little mage hand to go up and just kind of like... No, absolutely, you can do that. Like slap his face a little bit. Actually, wait, and it's kind of like no absolutely you can do that like slap his face a little bit actually wait let me think so you're doing stealth i'll give you um you get an i'll give you an extra action so okay so he starts to go backwards and then i'm gonna mage

hand him like to slap his face a bunch let's give it kind of like uh disorient him why don't i roll another 20 and if it's over a 10, it'll do something interesting. A 12. You kind of go slap, slap, slap, slap, slap, slap, and he goes to swat at it, and the momentum makes him keel over, and he flips down, and you hear a crunch as he hits the keep floor. I'm going to look at camera and shrug.

Ken, what are you going to do? Charging the next guy closest to the edge. What are you going to do? Just try to give him a shove like the other? Yeah. Great. Roll a strength check. Difficulty 12, please.

Five. No. Same thing happens. You knock him into his shoulder. He kind of lands on his side and for a second he almost does like a dance move and he looks at he's like well you get a bonus action i'll let you you can you can do one more okay you have a mage hand he got the mage hand and i'll give you something

yeah twist is nuts fireball do it i'll fire both of them in the nuts great so yeah he misses his saving throw obviously because he's surprised yeah what is that six great so uh six great so uh the crotch on fire yeah so and he's he's screaming on the ground uh he's extremely uncomfortable uh but he's not flown over uh his robes are on fire but he's gago comes out of the gateway wailing um and he pulls his wand out and fires right into the other hippo guy's face and uh uh does he

he shoots a stink cloud up this guy's nostril and he goes reeling back he he doesn't manage to get him over the railing but the guy is swatting furiously

at his face and gagging and puking and and all the stuff that uh uh geva the green the rhino minotaur guy in the garden was doing um but then he comes back um he pulls knives out of his belt and just start little tiny tiny nail clipper size knives and just start stabbing the shit out of this guy's face. Just like... Yeah, yeah, yeah. And he does only one point of

damage to this guy's face, but he freaks the fuck out and falls over backwards off the railing. And you got one guy left on fire on the ground. Brian, you are up. Chop his head off. Why don't you roll for it, buddy?

Because the guy's already on fire. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I was all ready to go. Where are you looking up? Layton guy guys on fire. If there was a fourth guy left, I was just going to tell him to join his friends and jump, but he's left.

Do you mean you want to tell him to jump? No, because he's laying on the ground. I was going to have this guy just get up and run, but well, you could still, you could try to pick him up and just Chuck him off the side

Well, we're at time so I'm basically just waiting at this point to see how you murder this guy I Just stomp on his head like it's a bag full of shit on my porch I just stomp on his head like it's a bag full of shit on my porch. All right. Roll to attack, sir. Roll to stomp. You're an expensive Italian loafers. 14 plus five. Yeah, he's on the ground.

That's 19. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's a success. So why don't you roll stomping damage. What is it? It's like a one plus your strength bonus I think So it's

It's six damage on his head So you hear a wet crunch But he's not dead He's just kind of screaming Do it again When can I do it again I mean do they want to do it Are you just letting him curb stomp this guy to death?

Yeah. Cool. I'll say you just get it a couple more in and just splats all over the place. Ken and I are going to look at it and wince kind of like when Ryan Gosling killed that guy in the elevator and dropped it. Gago flies in and teabags the guy's puddle of a head. I just yell you shit on my house from you can't buy me love uh i think that'll do it guys you just cleared this landing um there's a bloody mess uh below you and um if you peek over the side of the landing you'll notice there is now a crowd uh

gathered in the in the little hollow walkway there's not a lot of room down there uh where where the couple of the bodies are where the bodies are piling up um but there's bodies at least a dozen creatures uh looking at the the mess you've created and staring up at you all right uh let's call it that was uh episode 14 thanks for listening thanks guys uh patreon nerd poker on uh all the social media stuff and yeah look look you know uh shit's getting real exciting on the patreon you guys we're getting real close once we hit a thousand subscribers for real like it's we're gonna give some books away we hit 1,000 subscribers, for real, we're going to give some books away. We're going to do some more Twitch video streaming.

We're going to make it worth your while. But, yeah, get on it. We'll come to your house. Thanks, guys. Push you off the dock. Suck your dick. Bye. Thanks for listening to another episode of Nerd Poker.

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