Nerd Poker - Episode 18 - The Sacrifice

Episode Date: June 13, 2018

After some experimentation from our heroes, the room is filling up with nasty faerie spiders, and it may be time to figure out what the real function of the Chamber of Forgiveness is. Lucky for them, someone in the party did something impulsive and morally questionable in the campaign, and Dan is ready to leverage it.

Hey everybody, I'm Brian Pussain, Comedian, writer, actor, nerd. I've been playing D&D with my friends for a long time. I decided to do a new podcast where we play Dungeons & Dragons in my very own dining room. With my wife, kid, and my noisy dogs. So meet my friends... Sarah Kev Sam

Lee Now it's time for another episode of Brian Poussin's Nerd Poker Season 2. What's up, guys? It's Roach from Brian Poussin's Nerd Poker. And it's Episode 18 from Season 2. And if you're on YouTube, you should really watch the crappy flute, also known as S-H-I-T-T-Y flute. It's really good. And try the Frozen one.

Me and Brian laughed really hard. Who's Brian? My dad. Thanks, buddy. Yeah. Hi, everybody. Oh, my God. Yeah. Hi, everybody. Oh, my God. Yeah.

Okay, we've got headphones, and I'm very excited to wear them, but they're not dialed in yet. Now he's playing his own version of Crappy Recorder. We did laugh insanely hard today watching this frozen video of bad recorders. Friends. Sarah. Ken. Dan.

Blaine. Hi. And thumbs up from Sam. Hi, Sam. Hi, Sam. Hey, give it up for Sam, everybody. Hey, Sam. Shall I thank him?

Oh. What? Oh. And then what's this? Uh- thank... He's breakdancing. Wow, a triple Lindy. I've only seen one other guy do that dive. I've got some Patreons I'm going to thank. Hey, thank you Bryn Lake. Thanks, Bryn.

Thank Chris DeCosmo. Bryn Lake? Isn't that where that guy drowned 10 years ago tonight uh thank you do not want hey mr incredible thank you a frothing bulldog covered in mayonnaise he's fully dressed as an incredible In his pajamas Alright buddy Thank you I'm not going to say that one out loud right now He's in key We're starting now though pal I love you Thank you

Thank you Cobra Commander Slithering Schmeckle Schmeckle That's Andy Kindler in G.I. Joe. And thank you, Dee Snyder. Oh, wait, I mean Fred Schneider. So you guys are... We're not going to take it.

You know we ain't going to take it. We're not going to take it anymore. Not going to take it. Not going to take it We're not gonna take it anymore. Not gonna take it. Not gonna take it. Not gonna take it anymore. He's very pleased that his username got exactly what he wanted, what he had wished for for his birthday. We're gonna burn in hell.

Hell, hell, hell. Hell. Oh, boy. So, yeah, you guys are both in another dimension and underground so uh you've gone on quite a little uh quite a little quest in this you know you were trying to stop a dead evil god from crashing the moon into the planet and now uh in an effort to find her cloak zinzerina's cloak you went into the feywild dimension uh Tom, you encountered your long-lost love, Nettie, a fellow

tiefling who, in an effort to escape her kidnappers, stumbled into the Feywild, and yeah, you decided you didn't want to go home with her, even though she insisted on it. I'm over it. Wow. Wow. Hey, you know, sometimes people

remarry. Well, good. I thought you know, sometimes people remarry. I thought you were dead. I remarried. I'm just saying this is the star of Girl Fight, so she might remember this slight. But you went down into this cave that does not exist in the normal dimension, and you went deep, deep underground. Thank you, intergalactic. And yeah, you went super, deep underground. Thank you, intergalactic. And yeah, you went super, super low.

Super, super low. It took a portal staff and quite a lot of exploration from twee flying. And you are now deep, deep down in this tunnel. You navigated down into a place called the Chamber of Forgiveness, which we know what it looks like via a beautiful map from Phil. And we went down the pit of the second sky, and you found in the Chamber of Forgiveness, which sort of is this little upper alcove

near the bottom of this little tunnel. An altar. You pushed some buttons in the walls, and you found these sort of sliding drawers full of old, ancient, viscera-covered swords that were all rusted over and disgusting. You gave some small blood sacrifices to the altar, and a sort of white noise started occurring at the edge of hearing.

Then you heard some more noises after you gave it a little more blood. sacrifices to the altar and a sort of white noise started occurring at the edge of hearing. Um, then you heard some more noises after you gave it a little more blood. Uh, and, uh, when Esmeralda, I think it's turning over. When Esmeralda went outside to investigate,

she discovered a giant crystalline spider. Um, it followed her into the room and after it was attacked and, uh, caught up with the doorway, it started sort of breaking apart into dozens of small crystal spiders that are now attacking the party and filling the room and blocking the exit. I hear the recorder in the distance and for a second thought, I was living the game

because in the game, the white noise has increased. There's more howling coming from the tunnels but also spiders fist sized but there's other now um more than 30 okay and i just started bleeding on the altar again yeah esmeralda you're going to roll a six-sided dice to see how many points of damage you take as you uh she's to open a portal. She gave half well. I don't have the thing. I don't believe we gave it to her. As you pour the, I will say this before you roll the dice,

as you pour blood onto the altar, the sort of humming becomes a sort of just a very loud grrrr, like kind of like the whole cavern walls are shaking. Um,

and you guys all here as the white noise sort of completely makes, uh, all other sound impenetrable. You hear, uh, Esmeralda shout portal, portal. Because I,

I gave the, my portal staff, I believe to tweet. Correct. He went down. Correct. And so please roll six-sided. This is how many points you take as you attempt to get halfway unconscious from pouring blood on the altar.

Four. Okay. So you all noticed the crushed spiders, there's a handful of them that have been defeated by the party, are all sort of lying in pink dust now. And as the noise increases, they all start to shake. And you see the spiders are starting to lose their footing as they kind of like bounce around, but they're still attacking you.

Okay. And there we are. Do we already have an initiative order? We do. I'm going to pull that up. order? We do. I'm going to pull that up. Blaine, what is him pulling up in an initiative order brought to you by?

Oh, hi, Mavis. Hi there. This initiative roll brought to you by Blaine. On our next Excite Blaine, Blaine gets worked over by Lou Ferrigno at Sugarfish after he says some shit about his dumb jacket on an all-new Blaine gets worked over by Lou Ferrigno at Sugarfish after he says some shit about his dumb jacket on an all new

Blaine. Join us online too for all new Blaine. Then Esmeralda Tweed Bodhi Tom. Typha, I'm going to say, as the noise increases and she sees what's going on, runs over towards Esmeralda and kind of gestures towards you. The altar

is far enough away from the doorway where you kind of exit combat if you head over to the altar. It's about 20-30 feet into the room and these guys are all kind of gathered around the doorway fighting. She kind of like points at her own arm and is kind of like, I mean, did it seem like, what did it seem like the effect was? You increase the noise and the spiders seem to lose their footing, but everybody, I think, feels like they might be losing their footing a little bit. I'm trying to make eye contact, as I am right now, with the actual players. Did somebody bring the noise, would you say?

Are you saying it looked like she was offering? Yes. Esmeralda brought the noise. Was she offering her own blood? Typha's, yeah, she knows that no one can really hear each other anymore. So she's trying to just like non-verbally, and it's pretty clear she's implying, should I cut my arm open too? It's a terrible time to shoot up.

I give her like a shrug like, I don't know. I really don't know. I don't know what we're supposed to be doing. Rule number one of comedy. All right. So she tries something similar to you. She takes the dagger out that you gave her, and she cuts her arm open and pours a fair amount of blood on the altar

and then kind of she pulls out like a little twine and needle and starts to really quickly try to military style like stitch herself up. And as she's doing it, she kind of of like gestures like I can do this to you in a second but as she does that you start to hear a screeching noise on top of the white noise yeah yeah I guess

I'm cool with this but yeah that's weird and before you take your action Esmeralda because you still haven't and you're at the top of the order this is just sort of type of filling in the narrative gap here you all feel like something is primed you don't know what is primed here in the chamber of forgiveness but something feels primed and the screeching noise is the sort of thing where you're like oh i don't know how long i can put up with this. The spiders continue to sort of shake on their footing,

but they're all still coming at you. And Esmeralda, you're up. Forgive it. I mean... Typha finishes the stitching on her arm and sort of holds up the twine and needle and kind of points at your arm. Yeah, I guess.

And I'm gesturing to, I'm trying to make a gesture like a shredder. Like the portal, like I'm trying to be like portal, like shredder. Because we could use the portal. I'm just trying to remind Tui that he has the portal. I think it's fair, even though you guys can't hear each other,

that you would all sort of remember the last thing you heard was, and I will remind you, Esmeralda yelling, portal, portal, portal. Yes. And then, but beyond that, so the guys are still pouring into the room. Yeah, I mean, there's this Lexus-sized spider kind of splitting itself up and is making itself scattered. I'm going to, because i think my last action was

cutting my arm open on the it sure was thing so i would think i don't have that is my action then right no we'll call that last last i mean i guess we ended with you doing something so maybe that was your turn but i'm not sure what to do after i do that because i thought it would have some effect which it doesn't seem to have you Do we want to start with the plot? It seems right now like you've had some sort of geological slash acoustic effect on the room. Right. However, it has not stopped the spiders. Okay.

Then I guess what I'd like to do is cast catapult. How much do you think one of those little fist-sized spiders weighs? About five pounds. Okay, I'd like to cast catapult on one of the spiders and then send it out at the big spider that's out. Okay.

Okay. That would be a... Do you have an active thunder Wave, Ken, Tom? Yeah. I think I used mine. Is there any chance that we would be able to, after this is going on, that we might be able to hole up and take a break

and just kind of regain some hit points? This is going to fly at the spider. It failed its saving throw. Roll 3d8, please. And each, both the projectile and the projectee, take 3d8, right? Mm-hmm. Okay.

Just letting everybody know. 11. The spider shatters as it hits the larger mass of the spider, but even though you're sure it took damage, all you sort of see are more small crystal spiders pouring out of this thing. It's the Swarovski effect. Bodhi, you are up.

You're being stitched up. Although you have another... I guess you have two attacks or that was one i'll say the bloodletting was one it was one action all right uh i'm gonna um rage i think you've been raging you and You and Esmeralda are both. I think we were. That makes sense. I'm going to hack at these things with Harold and Kumar. Great.

Roll for attacking. If this van's wrecking... We talked about Cobra Kai, right? Yes, you said it is fantastic. Yeah, I really liked it. Reckon. We talked about Cobra Kai, right? Speaking of Star Trek. Yes, you said it is fantastic. Yeah, yeah, I really liked it. And I am actually in it.

But it was the Elton Kumar guys. I'm in it, but in the background. Oh, you are? Yeah, yeah. Really? Yeah, because they use old footage. Oh, of course. Yeah.

Do they bring you back? No, no. No, but they use flashbacks. They use old footage. I have to watch the movie again I haven't watched the movie Since I was a child I did that

Well, I know that movie Like the back of my hand Similar to Rocky If you've seen Rocky I remember it I don't like Karate Kid I love the part Where you run up those steps

Well, my favorite part about it Is living where the show takes place Oh, right I got a second level Of enjoyment out of it Because there's all these jokes about it is living where the show takes place. Oh, right. I got a second level of enjoyment out of it because there's all these jokes about Encino, like you don't want a kid you don't want to raise your kid in Encino, and I am raising my kid

in Encino. How accurate is the movie Encino Man? Does that actually have Encino? Not at all. Okay. Thirteen. Stab, stab. Ah! Uh...

That's a hit. Okay, good. Sorry. I don't know what's going on in that other room. Sorry. It sounds like a mongoose is fighting a zeppelin. He had a little bit of sugar. It's a classic mongoose versus zeppelin argument.

I've had that so many times on the way back home from Vegas. Who's better, mongoose or zeppelin, man? I think Mongoose is underrated and overlooked. I've always been a fan of the Snake. It's 13. Okay, so one of these

things explodes. Is that Don Perdue? Tom, the Snake Perdue. Tom McEwen was Mongoose. What? I don't know what's going on next.

I'm not sure if the headphones make it worse or better. It's going to take getting used to. It puts it right in your ears. I know. Now Blaine has to hear himself talking over people. Now we hear it the way that the listeners hear it. Yes. I'm sorry. I have no idea.

Let's all apologize on three. One, two, three. Sorry. Jesus, what am I doing? There we go. That's a miss. 14. Oh, no, no.

That's a hit. Yeah. I forgot to get a huge bonus to attack. I thought it was smaller. I do have a huge bonus to attack. That's what she said. And tiny balls. 11.

Another one explodes. Okay. I'll take it. Sweet. Tui, you're up. I'm at the bottom of a thing, right? Yes. Also, by the way, I messed up the order earlier. We're at the bottom of a thing, right? Yes. Also, by the way, I messed up the order earlier.

We're in the correct order now. Okay. Well, I'm going to do the portal thing. What do I have to do to get this portal thing activated? Do I have to agree to terms of service or something? You remember all you have to do is sort of wave it at something with purpose. And that every time you do that, it does a different thing. Okay.

So there are two open right now. I don't know how much I can tell him, but we each got this. No, you remember. This is all stuff you remember. All right. I'm going to find the most accommodating area. You remember what would happen when you do this a third time, because you've got two portals going is a third portal opens

and these portals are now going to cause damage to anything that goes into them. However, when you open the third portal, something a little different happens. What you used to remember is that they would all just sort of change color and that it would turn into almost like a matter shredder now um how where are you pointing it i guess it far away you said it like a a wide open easygoing wall okay

right or left well wait wouldn't if he's he doesn't i don't think he remembered what it was gonna do do you know what i mean i'm telling him does. That's fine. But then if he does, then he would point it somewhere else. I guess that's my point. If he knew that it was going to cause damage to anything that fell in it, he probably wouldn't be... That is correct.

You would remember that point. Yeah, I'm just trying to let you like the optimum place for this portal to be placed. Does that make sense? Yeah, it makes sense to me. Dan, where would that optimum place be? I feel like you and I have a different idea of where optimal would be than Blaine. I got a pretty good idea of where an optimal place would be.

You know what? Something's going to happen that might make you not worry so much about the planning that would have gone into this moment. So, Blaine, the reason that she seems a little uh like she wishes she could influence where it is because going into the portal is what would cause particular uh particular damage correct it was normally it used to be passive you'd have to throw stuff into it to get shredded however uh when you open this third portal something different happens it becomes a sort of gravity well uh if you've seen solo oh no, no. And you feel an irresistible pull as you start to see dust and spiders

fly towards this portal. Okay. Where do I want to get this portal going? I'm just trying to figure this out. I'm not good with this staff. It's already going, I think. Yeah. It sure is...

So now we're all being sucked into a shredder. Not quite yet. You definitely... But the little guys are too, right? You see one spider kind of go... Okay, so it's a... And you see a lot of...

A lot of the dust of the ones you've crushed so far is starting to pick up off the groundfly as the walls continue to shake. Tom, you're up. I want to hang on to something, I imagine.

Are these things still attacking us? Oh, they sure are. They rolled low for initiative, as seems to be a tradition. How far is the big one? The big one is in the doorway about 10 feet away from you. All right. That's too far away. I am going to cast some fire bolts Adam.

Okay. For now. I can't find my thingy. What do you got written on that piece of paper there, Blaine? Hope you're tuned in On the next Blaine Blaine trips up the steps in front of a girl he likes On an all new Blaine

Blaine Do you need help with them stats? Is that what's happening? Yeah, exactly Alright Fireball, right? Yeah Into the main spider area?

Yeah. Several D10. I think it's like three, four D10. Target takes eight D6 fire damage on a failed save. Had that audition for Roseanne go. That is a failed save. You know what? They said they were going in a different direction, which was down.

Six. Six. Eight. Twelve. Okay. How many? Five D6? Boy, oh boy. You said eight D6.

You're asking the guy with not good memory for this stuff sometimes. Eight D6. That's a lot of damage. So many damages. Lots of damage. So many damages. Lots of them. So much. 28. All right.

So Thunderous Caduceus just barely pierces above. My favorite wrestler. Just above the white noise and screeching, you hear this as this spider gets pushed back and splinters of crystals fly everywhere. And for a second you feel a sense of victory. And then you notice what looks like

about 30 more spiders rushing through the doorway through the smoke where you hit this thing. You no longer see the big one because of all the smoke in the doorway. But here comes some friends. Brian, you've got three of them attacking you.

Brian, you've got three of them attacking you. Roll a dexterity saving throw. Remember, I've also got that... That's right. You get an advantage. You get to roll twice. You're going to need to do one more roll. Because that's a 13.

You need a 15. Is it decks or athletics? This is decks. If it was athletics, you wouldn't get to do advantage. That's for sure. All right. So it's a 5. I had a 13.

It was that first one? It was a 15. Oh, okay. So you have a five, an eight, and a seven damage as these things start... They're on your torso stabbing at you. So a negative five, a negative eight, and a negative seven. Okay. Tom, you've got two of them jumping on you. Awesome.

Do a dexterity saving throw, please. All right. Oh, you dodged this. No, no, no, no. These guys miss. They try to jump at you and they... You see three more of these things fly in the hole. The hole doesn't seem to be sucking them in that great.

But it's definitely... It's like my goddamn Roomba. It's definitely pulling some of them in. And you notice there's... You're kind of starting to lose count of how many spiders are in the room. There's more than 50. And they're still coming in through the doorway.

Esmeralda, you are up. I'm going to... 750, and they're still coming in through the doorway. Esmeralda, you are up. I'm going to... Gago is up at the top of the room, just flying in a circle, by the way. Okay, and so the room is just like a dome? It's kind of like a big cube. Okay. I'm going to go out the door into the hallway area. Okay. You're going to have to run through about

50 spiders to get there. I do it. Wow, nice. I don't know if I can successfully do it. Do a roll for dexterity saving throw difficulty 20. Uh-oh. This is to see if

you hit any. 16. So you're going to hit four. So four of them jump on you as this happens. And they're not going to... I guess, no, they shouldn't attack until their turn. But you've got four of them. I'm covered in glitter and crystal just like a girl always wants. And so you don't quite make it to the doorway because they're attached to you.

You feel like maybe next turn you could get to it, but you've got four that kind of glom on you and slow you down. Do I get a bonus action? Actually, yes, you do. We get a bonus action uh actually yes you do um we get a second action okay and i can't use my second action to continue going towards the door but i could um correct okay so what i'd like to do is then just try to rip off two and smash them together damn okay strength Difficulty 15. And then you roll for damage. Do it. Uh, no. Okay.

Do a dexterity saving throw. Difficulty 15. Oh, my God. I guess the lesson here is don't write strength checks that your strength ass can't cash. As you pick these things up, you take... 17 points of damage as they stab through your hands. Hey, before we leave you, Esmeralda, I brought this up earlier, but we have not heard what your character looks like at all.

All the other characters have been through this, and when we tried to do it, I think in the first episode, we started riffing over you. What does Esmeralda even look like? She's covered in blood. There's blood coming out of every... Okay, so she's blood. Let's remember that, listeners. She's just a cloud of fog

and mist. Well, I mean, I think she's a half-elf. She's a... She's an eldritch knight. I mean, does she like have any kind of magical regalia in addition to normal armor? No. I mean, that's true. I don't have any magical regalia.

She does have a regal bearing, if that's what you're asking. Oh. She has sort of like, she's small because she's a half elf, but people kind of like want to listen to her. She just has that look about her. Regal. Oh, I see. So perhaps her backstory. Is she like the lady in New York that was the socialite

that was conning everybody, the grifter lady? What was her name? Anna? Is that her name? Anna? I read that story too. I have not read that story. No, she's nothing like that.

Okay. I have not read that story. No, she's nothing like that. Okay. Yeah, she's got spiky hair and piercing eyes. Well, okay. And hands filled with blood. Face filled with blood, arms filled with blood.

Well, the hands in particular, yeah. I mean, your arm just got stitched up, and you immediately got fistfuls of crystals. She has really well done brows. Is this what you were asking? Yeah, yeah. This is some long overdue episode one stuff, so if it feels awkward it's because... Like her eyebrows are really

dramatic looking. Yeah, they look really... She has threaded brows. Sculpted. Yeah, there's some... People do some weird thing where they... Microblading or something. You guys don't know about this. Yeah, microblading. They throw it in with the mani-pedi. I literally could be making that up.

I know threading is a thing. We never got into this, but Bodhi has a bleach butthole. Oh, beautiful. That's cool. That's first episode stuff. I know, it is. It's long overdue. People wanted to know. I just have some Tide Pods up my ass. I know, it is. It's long overdue. People wanted to know. I just have some Tide Pods up my ass.

I literally, and I'll tell, I told her this too, but like, one of the people who does fan art was asking me. Oh, what did you perceive him as? Yeah, he was like, I don't even know, and when I listened, I was like, oh yeah, we talked over her trying to describe her character. Of course we did, sorry. Wamp, wamp.

You're up, Bodhi. I hate these little fuckers. You all get a sense you're getting to be a little overwhelmed. Yeah. I wish I had one of these things that my friends have where I could take out multiple people at once

other than just hacking at them. You mean Tinder? This is what I am. I hack. So I'm going to hack. All right, roll to attack. I swing Harold and Kumar at them again. Okay.

It's the Harold of Kelmar. I know. So does our audience. It's the Herald of Kelmar. I know. So does our audience. Oh, that's a really high one. You hit the shit out of him. Yeah, they said 24. That's what that would be. Wait, you know what? You're over 20, so okay.

That means if you... If your damage exceeds the maximum hit points, it'll carry over to another spider. Okay. Well, I have a brutal critical. Oh, no, that's... That's a natural 20.

I had a natural, yeah, yeah. A lot of guys have 20 implants. He's got natural 20s. 11. All right. First one. Yeah, one explodes. That's an 18.

That's another hit. Alright. Two more go down. You have a third attack, actually, don't you? Yeah, sometimes, right? When? When do I get the third attack? I think every...

At your level, I think you get a third attack, period. You get a crop dusting. We didn't do it on last one. We didn't do it on last one. I was thinking that. Alright get a crop dusting. We didn't do it on last one. I was thinking that. All right. People must hate us.

So that was 13 on that second swipe. Another one explodes. Take a third. Because they're having a hard time. The ones that attacked you are now off of you. And that's a hit, too. All right. That's a 15 on that one

And then That's 11 again Alright You're popping these things off But you got a bad feeling that there's more on deck than just Do I have a bad feeling about this? Sure does

You are up twee I'm at the bottom of the shaft, right? With the portal? No, you're in the room with everybody. I'm in the room with everybody. Bottom of the shaft. Well, you know what?

The bottom of the shaft is a bad mother... Shut your mouth. I'm just talking about the bottom of the shaft. That's literally what I just did. I know. These speakers are so fucked up, dude. I feel like I'm at the Bose store trying to get out of... These head speakers you mean? Headphones? Yeah.

These head speakers we got. Oh my god, these ear speakers. These tiny speakers are attacking my face. They're clinging to my ears. These yell clamps I put on my ears. These clamps that yell. These yell clamps. Take off these...

Why are you becoming Gilbert Gottfried? Oh my god. These clamps that yell. These yell clamps. Take off these. Sam, these yell clamps. Oh, my God. Now I'm going to get myself banned for joking about a tsunami. Blaine. What do you wish you could do? Go to Paris, France. Go to Paris, France. I'm going to.

Are there spiders around me coming towards me? So many spiders everywhere. There's spiders. I will say. This room is mostly spiders. Okay, okay. There's no part of this room without spiders. I mean, you know what?

You know what? Roll a 20. I just activated. I just activated. You're getting a freebie perception check because you asked this question. 16. You notice, much as everyone does,

because you're all in the room and I won't make you leave, that it looks like upwards of 10 spiders are going to attack each of you on their next turn. Okay. And you get this sense that as the room continues to vibrate beyond auditory lessons that you might start taking damage to your ears soon because of the noise. Things seem to have reached quite a crescendo and a lot of damage is going to start happening to everyone very soon. And where's the sound coming from?

The walls. The walls are made out of crystal? In here, it's almost more of a dark gray rock. But it doesn't look like... There's pink crystal out in the hall, and there's still a faint glow through the smoke. Is there some kind of release switch or button on the... Is there an off?

On the altar? You do feel like you've primed the altar for something, but you still haven't quite done what the Chamber of Forgiveness is meant for. Hey, you guys, I forgive you all. What's... So there's an altar in the middle of the room. Correct. With blood on it.

With all of your blood, as well as a long, dead, ancient corpse with an axe stuck in it. And the axe doesn't do anything. No, but I think we're supposed to kill somebody. I think it's supposed to be like a full sacrifice and not just bleeding. well you know what i gotta be honest you guys i've had it i've fucking had it i'm underground with crystal spiders coming at me normally i would be into that. But I don't know what's going on with the portal staff. I killed a child. I do not

know what to do anymore. I'm going to lay down on the altar. And I'm going to... That wasn't what I was getting at at all. So you use your first action to go to the altar. I'm going to the altar.

And I'm going to the altar. Okay. And I'm going to get married. A beautiful elven woman suddenly... No, no. Okay. So what are you going to do? I'm going to get on the altar, and I'm going to tell everybody to shut up.

And no one can hear you because of all the noise. Sure. That's what I figured. What are you saying? What are you... He's trying to Sure. That's what I figured. What are you saying? He's trying to say something. You've used your non-combat action to get onto the altar. Do you do anything else?

I'm going to get into the middle of the altar and I'm going to see if I can determine if there's some sort of focus going on in here where I can maybe stop the sound. Maybe if I could tune in here where I can maybe stop the sound. Maybe if I could tune the sound, if I could direct the sound. When you get on the altar, all you really notice is that it doesn't seem to be shaking like the rest of the room.

Okay. Good. I'm going to get out my ship in a bottle and I'm going to work on my ship in a bottle for a while. You're just going to stand on the altar and not use your action? What do I do on an altar? Do I lie down? Do I cut myself open? I don't want to get weird about it.

I'm not that emo. and I don't want to get weird about it. I'm not that emo. But it's like, do I just lay down and go, enough. Enough. Take me instead. Who are you saying this to?

I'm saying this to myself, and I'm hoping that the altar amplifies it through me into the universe. I'm done being sad. I'm done fighting. I'm tired of this. Do a religion check. Difficulty 10. You have a bonus four on religion checks.

Eight. With the bonus? That's what I rolled, an eight. You rolled an eight plus four, that's 12. So you make it. All right. As you say this to yourself, you get the sense that you need to ask somebody for forgiveness.

Who's here that I ask for forgiveness? Perhaps a god of some kind or... Like Zinzerina or somebody? Would Zinzerina forgive me for being a child killer? You don't know. For all the weight of the bullshit I put up for all these different times? As you stand on the altar of sacrifice and you yell this out to yourself, you get a sense that there is some sort of divine sacrifice necessary.

Zinzerina! Zinzerina! sense that there is some sort of divine sacrifice necessary. Censorita! Censorita! Censorita, I'm sorry. Please forgive me, Censorita. Oh my God, Censorita, please. I mean. Are you done? Yeah, well, you know, I go through some histrionics.

It's very impressive. You're not going to do, like, any kind of sacrifice? You're just going to stand on it and yell? Man, Dan, stop trying to get him to kill himself on his altar. I'm just, last chance. That's all I'm going to say. You know what? If that's what it's going to take, I'm going to do it.

I'm done. Jesus. No. I'm down to, like... I'm gonna do it I'm done I'm just trying to be sure I'm down to like 16 hit points I'm going to I'm gonna get out my acid wand and I'm going to put it against my temple

and I'm going to say Zinzerina please forgive me I'm gonna make it Zinzerina, please forgive me. I'm going to make it rhyme like an old Dean Martin song. She's a bad guy though. Can I throw one of these spiders at him to try to stop him? We must all see this, right? You see a spider fly by you. As you reach for your acid wand, do one more perception check, please. Roll a 20.

Seven. It's a low difficulty. You got this. With your bonus, you've got a perception bonus of plus six. So you got it. As you reach for your acid wand, you realize it's not where you left it. acid wand, you realize it's not where you left it. You go back

through the last two days and you realize that child that you killed pickpocketed your acid wand. And you no longer have the acid wand because that child stole it from you.

That's the worst day ever. And so when you sense that there was something strange about that kid, it's because he was there to pickpocket you. And then when he asked for a hug, he was trying to steal more than the wand from you.

And he was a little asshole. And in that moment, Zinzerina forgives you. You don't hear her voice. You just feel a deity's intervention. And all of you notice the crystals are no longer animated. The sound is gone, but your ears are all ringing too much to hear anything. And you start to see all the crystal as it hits the ground start to get pulled towards the portal that is sucking everything in the room towards it wait wait wait wait wait it worked the kid took my wand yeah i like that wand yeah that's right but he for sure took it and you haven't tried to use it

since then. He was a little fucker. Oh. And as far as you know, until now... Well, in some cultures. Yeah, absolutely. Wait, so I've been worked up and losing sleep in real life

over killing a kid that stole my cool wand? A pickpocket. The remains of your wand are in a smoldering pile that you left in the city of time. You killed one of the Oliver Twist kids. Okay.

You killed the Artful Dodger. Alright, okay. Okay. Okay. Give me a minute with this. If you guys want to do some funny ads or something, I'm going to have a cigarette. Esmeralda, the spiders that were clinging to you just sort of lifelessly plop to the ground and you see them start to get dragged towards the portal. Do we need to turn the portal off?

Do we need to turn the portal off? None of you can hear each other talk. You're going to only be able to communicate in sign language for at least a little bit longer. I don't have it. Tweet has it. Everybody points at you, Tweet. For a second, you think it's gratitude, but then you realize, oh, you need to do something else with this.

How do I turn the portal staff off? The way it used to work is if you swung it a fourth time, all the portals would seal into white magical barriers. Well, there's one for the money, two for the show,

three to get a swing, and there's close a portal. As you do that, for a second, everything stops, and the portal looks placid, and then all of a sudden, shards of pink crystals start vomiting out of it at a high rate of speed. Everybody roll a 20. What?

Things work differently here. You all realize as this happens that the Scarab of Farseeing roll a 20. What? Things work differently here. You all realize as this happens that the Scarab of Farseeing did not work at all in the Feywild and that perhaps certain magical items follow different sets of rules here. 10. 14.

Success. Success. Success. You all hit the ground as just a moment. Oh, thank you for reminding me about the NPC. She's fine. As yes, the walls just get coated. He's out of range.

Okay. And yeah, this stuff just gets spit everywhere and you just feel hot air blowing after all the crystal is gone and you're not sure where the air is coming from. But all of a sudden, it's as if a giant 10-foot-tall blow dryer is just blowing hot air into the room. It's like walking into a Starbucks,

and that fan blows on top of your head. You remember, after this has happened, and you're out of combat, so I'm a little less stressed about who goes when. Normally, if you were to wave the staff one more time, the three portals would collapse into a sort

of black gravity well, and start to damage the distance between the three portals. And then if you did it one more time, it would close all the portals. What do you think, you guys? I think you should do it and then do it again.

Do it. If it's good, leave it. If it's bad, do it again. I'm going to close the first portal. Well, the other two portals are not in visual range. Just doing it makes another portal, basically. Yeah. Or does something to them. I'm it makes another portal, basically. Yeah. Or does something to them.

I'm going to close them all up. How's that? You wave it another time, the hot air stops blowing in, and a cascade of rainbow-colored lights, very dim at first, but very quickly getting brighter and more manic,

start to gleam out of the portal. Oh, pretty. Leave it like that. Is that good or bad, though? I don't know yet. It's all sealed. Can we get out? Is that enough time for us to get out?

Prismatic spray. Is that what it's called? Yeah. That is the name of the spell. Yeah, let's get out. That could be bad. Or do it one more time. Do it more of the wall close.

Yeah, let's... Can I... Yeah, yeah. Really quickly do it again? Yes, yes, yes. The portal disappears. Okay, good. Jeez.

Now we know what they all do here. That may have been prismatic spray about to go off. Yeah, I thought I pressed it one more time. Sorry. Yeah, sure, sure, sure. I like to torture you guys if you don't do exactly what you have to. I'm still pissed off about that fucking kid. It's probably where he killed him.

I was worked up for months now. No, it's a bummer for all of us. You now put together he put, I mean, look, he might not deserve to die. But you put together that he came into the courtyard because he was hearing commotion and thought he could trick someone into pickpocketing. So he's a little fucker. Yeah. Maybe not worth it. I didn't want to kill him, but seriously.

You should feel a little better. Yeah, I feel a little better. I mean, I don't think you should feel like shit. I feel a little different. I feel good. I feel real good. We should go find that kid's corpse And take that

Also Zinzerina is like an evil Murderous nightmare goddess Right no I know We probably don't want to be like Team Zinzerina And also why would she Does he know for sure he was praying to her Because it doesn't seem to make much sense

Her cloak is trapped He knows he did. So that's weird. Roll a 20. Again, you're doing another religion check. Maybe for him. Let's see, maybe not either. We're going to find out.

How about 20? You feel that Zinzerina very passively, almost as if from a great distance, acknowledged the sacrifice, but that you are not bonded to her. All right. I get it. She filled in at the altar when she was called upon.

Okay. I understand. This altar demanded a sacrifice. Evil adjacent. I think I understand this, but I got to be honest. This is a tricky world with tricky shit going on. And I'm done playing footsie with it.

Done playing footsie with this crazy world, Dan. You guys all take a look at your map and realize you're not sure what happened in the binding place now that you gave the sacrifice, but there are three rooms beneath you. All labeled the three guardians. Are any of these rooms smoking? I smoke now.

I don't know if you noticed on the altar, I started smoking. The smoke starts to clear from the doorway of the chamber of forgiveness. You don't really see anything. Last year, remember, there was howling coming from. We have to go out there to see, so let's head out. You head out, and you realize, yeah, there's sort of steps of stairs that you came up,

and then there's sort of a sheer drop where you could either go up to leave the way you came, go back to the chamber, or go down towards the three guardians. If you need a reminder of what that looks like here is the, yeah, you've got to print it too, but these guys don't, we haven't accomplished what we came down here for. So we got to keep going. Right? Yeah. Right. So we have to go hit those three car. You got to get to that first guardian. Let's do it.

Repel or how do we get down? You could repel or you could take turns having someone float you down, whatever you want to do. Why don't we take a... You see a sheer drop. Oh, yeah, can we rest up? Why don't we do a little Leomund's Tiny Hut? Oh, yeah, that's a good idea.

And heal up and just sort of take stock of shit. Yeah. Great idea. All right. This might be very great. So, uh, you throw up Lehman's tiny hut,

um, and, uh, Typha immediately, uh, your ears are still ringing, but she kind of like asks you guys to like huddle up and she says like, like,

I've got cooked stuff in my bag. Do you want food? Taco Tuesday, please. Cool. Um, she gives each of you guys this, um, I've got cooked stuff in my bag. Do you want food? Taco Tuesday, please. I'm super hungry. Cool. She gives each of you guys this sort of leaf-wrapped grub that she prepared on the surface. Never mind.

And it's fat. It's like a burrito size. And she's like, I had one of these. They're safe, I think. Oh, like a grub, like a larva grub. It's a big grub that she caught in the Feywild. And it looks weird. That's why they call it grub.

But she seems very confident about offering it up to you guys. And you do know she's an experienced cook. I'll eat a grub burrito. Who's eating a grub burrito? I'll have one. That's three yeses and a no from esmeralda not really hungry right now i don't know why is another vegan she might be now after being offered a giant grub burrito uh okay so you guys each get um

from resting uh roll a six-sided i'm gonna eat hers by the way. I'll give you... That's how many you heal. I feel like I eat nasty, horrible things. They roll six-sided. You roll a four-sided. And this is an hour. Okay. Okay. I'm going to get back to my... Three.

Two. Good points. Blaine, do a do-do-do-do-do. You know what? I'm going to actually give this to you because you rolled so high on that religion check. You feel your conscience may be clear enough to cast spells without a penalty. Really?

Yes. Interesting. Interesting? Interesting. Interesting, Dan. Casting spells without a penalty. Q-U-I-E-S-C-E-N-C-E quiescence. Wow, there's a spelling without a penalty. C-O-U-T-U-R-E

couture. Spelling without a penalty. You know what? I like this, Dan. I like the feel right now. I like that burrito. Can I have another one of those big grub burritos? I had four of them. I got one more I had made for Esmeralda.

All right, that's cool. I understand. I mean, she's like, I mean, I ate one and I feel a little bit. She's like, I'll give it to this guy. He looks pretty screwed up. So she gives you another one. Okay feel a little bit. She's like, I'll give it to this guy. He looks pretty screwed up. So she gives you another one. Okay, you know what? I'm also going to sing a little song to these guys.

I'm going to sing a song of healing. I am the sun and the air of a shyness that is criminally vulgar. Reminiscent of nothing in particular. Everybody wants to roll some points? Dan? What do we roll? I'm looking that up right now.

What do we roll to Morrissey? He's so disappointing. It's like disappointing Please stop Please stop You have to look up He's the new wave Ted Nugent If anybody is really hurt I also have cure wounds

I'm all healed, thank you. How are you doing, Brian? I got another 11 on that one. Are you healed up? No, not quite. I'm pretty low. All right, why don't you... I'll do a cure wounds on you.

How long before I can roll again? How long are we staying down? I'm calling this after two hours. This is your short rest. At this point, you could continue to sit under Lehman's tiny hut, but Gago flies up.

He did a little bit of recon, and he says, there's a door underneath us that's open, and there's something in there oh okay where in one of the you mean in these caves there's three doors if you go yeah if you go down there's two closed doors and one open door okay how big is the thing that's in there i got a little scaredy pants on for the way. Really? You did?

Well. I didn't think you were scared of anything. I mean, it depends how drunk I am. I'm all over the place. By the way, you're right. This is very weird, the short rest thing about spending hit die. I mean, it just gets more complicated than anything else in the game. There's so many things about 5th edition where you're just like, yeah. In your defense, I don't understand the spend to hit die and you reroll and stuff.

We'll have to figure that out later. Right. Like if all the classes are assigned to hit dice and you add your constitution modifier, that's simple enough. But then when you get into the rules of resting and stuff, it's like. If we had to leave now.

You just got 11 points. I'm only 10 down. I'm only 10 down if we had to go now. Okay. I was hoping to get those. Okay. And I just want to say to everyone out there who knows the rules better than me,

you're genetically superior to me and I concede this point. So yeah, you know there's supposed to be three doors and he implies that, yeah, they're sort of stacked on top of each other somehow, these doorways in the sheer drop. And he doesn't really,

he's having a hard time articulating more than that. You feel like you might need to check it out yourself. Well, let's go down to this third door. Is this going to be like an Alice in Wonderland drop? Should we go into the closed doors? So you guys are kind of like at the bottom of a series of stone steps, and then there's this drop,

and you could go up back the way you came, or there's this drop. It's like a well. And you know the door is somehow in the wall of this well underneath you. That's open. Okay. I can fly, and I have levitate.

Great. Congrats. So if anybody wants to levitate down with me. Yes, let's go. Your hearing is starting to improve as well. I'll go with you. Everybody's. I'll go first.

Okay. What's that about our earrings? You head down and you see there is, it's weird. It's not symmetrical, but there is like this sort of, it's almost like an octagon. It's got eight sides to it, but they're all kind of uneven. And there's almost like a little doorstep, but it's not like level on the ground.

So it sort of looks like it was put into the wall of this drop without regard to which way gravity goes. And inside it, you see a shape in the dark shifting around how big with your elf eyes you can see there is a shape but you but it looks like it's sort of concealing itself and quietly shifting around shifting around how like flying just a blob is it no it's not I mean real no it's real it's real looks like it's about uh eight feet tall eight feet wide okay i'll bring the other guys down yeah i'll wait here okay i'm gonna go up and uh let's get some ropes going how far down is this is there like a a place where i can yeah

there's like a yeah the stoop is kind of like at a weird sort of angle, but you can kind of put your butt on it and sit. I'll be down and go up. As he goes up and you're left alone, you feel the shape shifting slowly towards you. Okay.

And how far up is this again? Sorry. You're only going about 20 feet down. Okay. I'm going to go up. We're going to get some ropes established or something. Okay. Secure some ropes and go down, and I'll just sort of guide these guys down,

make sure that they don't fall as we're... Okay. Everybody gets down there, and you all see... Does that make sense? I don't want to force you guys see you all barely fit on this little landing it's really not meant to like hold a bunch of people so you're all kind of like bracing yourselves against the sort of

stone octagonal opening and inside you see the shape is almost close enough to really make it out but it almost looks like a big spider are we at an hour? just about you want to do anything first is this where everything came out maybe i mean maybe the guardians were the spiders or something oh yeah maybe and the other

two are gone this is what is one of the guardians yeah maybe yeah we just know the doors are shut that doesn't mean that there's not anything in there right it's it's about to reveal itself right well the door is shut i'm sorry the door is open yeah yeah the door is open yeah to this one underneath you the other two were sort of stacked vertically underneath you there's two more shut doors i think probably we released the spider with the blood oh okay hopefully but you said there's something inside? Yeah. Yeah, that's right. It's coming up. It's close. Yeah, you see starting to pull itself into the glowing light of the shaft,

there is a drider. It is the upper half of a drow elf fused onto the lower half of a giant spider. Okay, so we can try to communicate with it. It looks very old. Yeah. Um, it is, it is dressed in a simple robe and it is slowly making its way towards you. Greetings.

Hello. It very quietly just sort of nods at you all. And it says, uh, my name is Belson. I am doomed to live here. Belson? Belson.

Like Jerry Belson. He doesn't repeat his name either. You just sort of, you say, you say, you say Belson with a question mark and he just sort of stares at you. He says,

tell me, in what place does a confession transform from mere words into a living thing? Is this a riddle? In what place does a confession

turn into a living thing? No idea. And I think we're going to end on that note. Confession turned into a living thing. Holy riddles, Batman. Let's all pee and think about this word game. Was that episode 18? What were we at?

That was episode 18, sorry. Thanks for listening. See you on episode 19 whoo-hoo-wee brianpassain.com uh patreon follow us there

we got the bonus all these episodes are fun but the bonus episodes have been crazy silly lately and uh

a lot of fun the one where uh our friend uh joe lynch came and hung out and played a mini boss. That was fun. And Joe Troman from Fall Out Boy and Being My Pal.

He came and played a bad guy. That's who was the mini boss. Yeah, Joe Troman. Joe Lynch played a character from a movie that you were in. Sure. Oh oh yeah he did and Chris Tallman but they've been really funny

and I've got some you guys are funny some people planned we're going to have Will Wheaton in here soon and some people I haven't mentioned yet but he's going to come hang out with us very soon so follow us on Patreon thanks you guys.

Thanks for listening to another episode of Nerd Poker. You can follow us at patreon.com slash nerdpoker, and you get bonus episodes from there. And you can also send us anything at P.O. Box 16069, Encino, California, 91416. Thanks for listening.