Nerd Poker - Episode 22 - Morgatholl's Haunted Guts

Episode Date: September 13, 2017

Ahoy! Here we have an episode we crafted deep within the smoldering oven of Brian's living room with great love and farts. This episode our heroes and their new wood elf companions trudge through the ghostly chlorophyllic entrails of what was once Morgatholl, a treat who tried to live forever and instead expanded to the size of a mountain. The elves who once lived inside him no longer seem themselves, and the mission to find the core of the walking city seems to get more perilous by the minute. Will Twee set it all ablaze? Will Bodhi crush an extreme cicada? Only time will tell.  Ahoy! Here we have an episode we crafted deep within the smoldering oven of Brian's living room with great love and farts. This episode our heroes and their new wood elf companions trudge through the ghostly chlorophyllic entrails of what was once Morgatholl, a treat who tried to live forever and instead expanded to the size of a mountain. The elves who once lived inside him no longer seem themselves, and the mission to find the core of the walking city seems to get more perilous by the minute. Will Twee set it all ablaze? Will Bodhi crush an extreme cicada? Only time will tell.

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 everyone, I'm Brian Poussaint. And I'm Rhodes Poussaint. And you're listening to Brian Pain's Dirt Poker. Thanks, buddy. Who do we have here tonight, buddy?

Tell us who's here. Dan Telfer. Who else? Ken. Uh-huh. And? Blaine. And the guy on the computer.

What's his name? Sam. Sam. Why do you know my full name? Do you know my social security number? What's happening? Yeah, it's weird how he does everything about Dan. He's very formal about Dan. Yeah. Daniel Telfer.

Last four numbers of your social security number. 21-12. Which makes you the world's most natural Rush fan. You know about Rush, right? Oh, yeah. You've heard Rush, right, Reds?

Mm-hmm. Do you want to go play and then I'll read to you later? We're going to play Dragon Times. He pulled it up. He pulled up Rush 2112 on his iPad.

Oh. That's a good kid. Good boy. Smart kid. I love you, dude. I'm going to type it again. Oh, no, no. Yeah.

What were you going to say about Rush, Blaine? I was just going to say two in the pairings and one in the searings. That's PTSD. Hey, everybody. Welcome back to Nerd Poker. We're going to go on adventures. Will you join us? Yeah.

That's the stupidest thing you've ever said in your life. Shut the fuck up. I'll stab you. That made me itch. You don't know the violence I'm capable of. Don't cross me. Is this 21 or 22? 22.

Acacia Avenue. I can't drive. 22. Hey, if this bus goes below 22 miles an hour, it explodes. What happened in episode 21? In episode 21, you guys ventured into a giant living tree. Let's see. That giant living tree's name, I think it was Morgothal, but I got to look it up.

Because we're dealing with a lot of wood elven things now. Morgothal the Lost City is this giant expanded treant that got hollowed out and made into a walking fortress. But the magic they performed on it not only kind of made it mindless, but it didn't stay a permanent home. So you guys have been kind of on a quest to kill the Demolith, the dark being who sort of lords over this land. You had recruited Count Barriss, who was like the big underling, the big vampire underling. And you're heading to go recruit some wood elves because he suggested you'd actually need a... Wood elves? If I would an elf, I would never leave the house.

Wood Elves that I could Elf. There you go. It's a flavor I was searching for. Thank you. How much wood would it worth? Boy, oh boy. Go. Wood Elf.

Could Elf. Should Elf. So you finally got inside of a... You jumped up the roots of Morgothal's taint. He was marching... Isn't that... That's my favorite bar. Count Grishnacht's band?

The roots of Morgothal's taint. God, I'm so glad he got the reference. So you got up in his undercarriage and found an opening between his roots. Up in his tinglies. You just got up there and his symbiotic sap started attacking you. That went in my root system. Actually, Bodhi, you had a couple of near misses. You almost didn't get up through the sap sphincter.

Oh, yeah. You had some rolling problems. You almost pulled a... Sap sphincter. You almost pulled an amarthamon. That would have been terrible in there. You fell down a couple of times, grabbed on, and then I believe Twee helped you fly up through the sap sphincter.

Up up through the sky. That's how I remember it. Tweee helped you fly up through the sap sphincter. Up up through the sky. I remember it. Twee just helped you fly. So I didn't lose any health on that, though, did I? There's problems in the Twees. I don't have anything marked down. Well, I didn't mark down that you lost health because that's not my jarb. I don't think I did.

Maybe we should keep track now because there might be some combat in our very near future. I said we keep track of each other's health. Then nobody can cheat. I generally do. I'm guessing that I didn't because I don't have anything to say. Health. The way you said that, Ken, made it sound like bros checking out each other. It's like, hey, will you check me for moles on my back, bro, in the shower room?

Will you check my testicles for lumps? Bros don't do that, do they? I sure hope not. Bros have changed. So you're inside Morgothal now, and we haven't really set the scene, because you're kind of attacking a spider symbiote. You lopped off a couple

of its arms, but I'm going to go ahead and say Why did it have to be spider symbiotes? Well, okay. A couple of your NPC pals, I'm going to say since they didn't take a combat round, they just went ahead and finished this thing off. Because I think we need to kind of talk about the scenery

a little bit. So your friends Pendeth and Vorkid, the wood elves, they're the only wood elves in the encampment who had the guts to do something about Morgothal. Everyone has sort of been living a nomadic lifestyle for a couple of generations, but these guys had gathered enough intel. They believe, they tell you after they take their long knives

and dispatch the rest of this sap symbiote, that there is a nerve center for this thing. You look around and there are very thick vines going up. You can see sunlight peeking through the vines, but there's trees growing inside this tree.

There are Is it still moving? It is. You feel the ground kind of shifting back and forth like a boat. And that may affect your ability to focus at various points. It may affect your stomach if you're here for too long.

Sorry about the crunch, everybody. Oh, we're eating delicious peanut butter pretzels. The crunch always gives you away. God, the bane of the craft service table. Peanut butter pretzels. heavens to betsy so what's the goal on this guy the goal in this guy is to do something to shut him down the head of the wood elves told you they thought maybe one day you might be able to uh his name is foreign meyer

and he said you could possibly redirect him uh but pendeth and Vorkid say, you know, that might have been wishful thinking. That's what a leader tells everyone. Those are the dreams that civilization were made of. I don't think we do that, that there's some sort of vines that we pull on or something. They point up and they say, that's the sky. Remember the sky because the openings between the trees

will help you remember where you are and orient yourself as this thing lumbers around the woods. You look around, there's trees everywhere. It looks like there's ruins of tree houses, actually. You heard that there was a couple hundred wood elves living inside Morgothal at one point. You're not sure if you'll encounter them. But you do sort of see your way around the heavy vines. So you're beyond this map.

You've kind of moved back to the main map. And you're in the middle of the wood. So we're going to look at stars? We're on the Wu-Tang Forever map. Even more than stars, just look for breaks in the sky because in the middle of Morgathal, they think... I was going to say, because we can't see the sky.

Aren't we in some sort of destruction bubble? He thinks there's like a big... The Langoliers are coming to get us? We're in a Middle Earthen rendezvous with Rama. Oh, when are they going to make it? We're in the sky earth and rendezvous with rama yeah oh when are they gonna make it this guy right with the rock yeah you're inside him and so pendith says in the middle the very center there's something like an oaken rib cage uh there's an atoll of sorts something you might have to climb and get inside there'll be a cave inside this sort of mountain

within a mountain this hill within a mountain. And if you can get to the center of it, there should be a nerve cluster. Every single one of us has a cave inside. Some of the insides you'd expect to see in a living tree ant. He kind of sheepishly admits that his predecessors

did something akin to necromancy on this tree ant to keep it alive and make it expand as huge as it did. It would have like wooden organs right like a the heart would be like a grandfather claw there's a running theme to this game of don't fuck with nature yeah these guys are very anti necromancy and he said they did everything they could not to do straight necromancy they tried to just perform a spell that would help this tree ant live longer and in the process kind of ruined it. Kind of screwed it over. WTG.

He says by that logic, if they get to the nerve cluster and there doesn't appear to be a simple way to save this thing through prayer or some miraculous means, he recommends they put it down. This thing has already become a bit of an abomination,

like your friend Shmoo. Some things have been done to it. Well, and, you know, you've held tight to Shmoo. You got some behind-the-scenes experience points for denying them the opportunity to slit his throat. Oh, good. But, so now, yeah, Pendith and Vorkid say

hopefully we'll have just a little bit of navigating to do before we get to the sort of the oaken plateau, the ribcage, if you will. Go in a cave, find the nerve cluster, get out of here, Mission Impossible style.

As quick as we can because this thing will probably make it to our encampment soon. We had to do a bit of traveling to get from our encampment to this guy, but now that we're inside, he's going to start destroying our homes. And if we really do want a fresh start, we really want to get to work.

Okay, let's get up there. Alright, so... It's all 319s at once, by the way. Sorry, just a weird thing. I would like everybody to pick your jaws back up and continue listening. Gago's kind of mumbling nervously

to himself, sticking close. What's going on, Gago? You knucklehead. Also, I did a bit of chatting over the old text message with Ken. I just wanted to confirm, two of you do speak Elvish, not just Blaine. So I won't do any weird note passing. These guys don't speak Common at all.

But as you're kind of... Who else speaks Elvish? He speaks Sylvan, which I guess is a form of Elvish. So he also understands, perhaps not quite as fluently, the sort of regionalized version of Elvish so okay he he uh he also understands perhaps not quite as fluently the sort of regionalized version of elvish um so yeah for a while you uh you're kind of hoping for no random encounters so i'm gonna go ahead and check uh so far so good you get to learn a little bit about Morgothal, and these guys tell you he is a good creature.

They believe that it was a sort of immune system response that kicked all the elves out and started attacking them. It's good versus good. So he wants to remind you that it is with regret that we might have to put this thing down. Yeah, it happened to a cat once. A wayward soul. No encounter yet.

They also give you a little bit of an idea of the timeline of this place. I don't know how much you guys might remember, but you get the feeling that it's been a couple of hundred years since the demolith took over you've you've slipped in and out of time a little bit trying to escape either through some drow caves early on or on a boat uh you notice time kind of shifts when you

try to leave the island uh and fast forward or fast rewind but uh right now you you feel like it's been you know a few hundred years since uh and so a lot of these events are starting to line up you know how long supposedly count amalegda was in his castle uh how long count barris has not appeared to be a dwarf and now how long these guys are telling you Morgothal has been stomping around. You're like, okay, it seems like the Demolith showed up like say 500 years ago and things have

been screwed up for like 200 years. So you're not sure where your life sort of falls on that timeline. You don't know if you're in the distant past, the distant future, but. Well, how long does it feel like we've been here?'ve really only been here a matter of days right yeah but you're kind of living outside of a normal timeline and everyone keeps harping on about how the world ended off this but we're still sleeping every 12 hours yeah you're maintaining your sanity for the most part you're not you're not we're also eating right, too. But these wood elves

kind of are grateful to talk to you because they're kind of the only good aligned stuff. Jeez, Blaine. Yeah, Blaine just... You gotta go to a chiropractor. Yeah.

He just stood up and took his spine out and shook it around. I really threw my coccyx out. Ask me, say coccyx? You say your coccyx? You take that back. I got nothing.

I got a coc 7, so. Anyway, here's a quick impression. Honey, I think we have to get some new milk. Ugh. Oh, God. That's me as a married man from the 50s. So you see...

I've made myself laugh pretty hard with that one, you guys. Pendeth and Vorkid sense your tiring of their history lessons, so they run ahead a little bit between the vines. You don't lose visual on them. And you don't want to either, because you hear noises that sound like they could be chattering bugs or even monkeys, and you don't want to either because you hear noises that sound like they could be chattering bugs or even monkeys and you don't hear any human yeah like monkeys the vines it sounds almost like those whoops you encountered a while ago inside this thing inside this thing there seems to be a whole ecosystem so um how well lit are we did what did i light a torch i

talked about it uh you yeah you actually did light a torch when you were trying to climb up. And so you've got that. And it's definitely helping, although the obscuring roots and vines that are kind of strewn everywhere, like mussel sinew, are kind of in your way more than darkness. So you're doing a lot of reaching out and using your sword as a machete to cut through stuff I feel we want to avoid burning this whole thing down it's so funny that you mentioned that

you're pretty sure you need your guides to find your way back Ken's played D&D with me for a long time that was him like hey idiot in case you were thinking of that and I know you were. That was a good idea, actually, lighting this whole thing on fire.

No, Blaine. Ken just said we can turn it around and use it to fight against. Yeah. Everybody do a perception check. The shit mother. Shit mother. Well, you know, the bad guy. 15.

Great. Nine. Ten. 15 great 9 plus 7 you notice that your guides are stopping and hiding between the vines oh okay what do you guys want to do stop and hide between the vines

you're not hiding from us I'm hiding from something ahead it looks like I'm guessing right yep so everybody if you try to conceal yourselves You're not hiding from us I'm hiding from something I had Yep so Everybody if you try to conceal yourselves I'm going to ask you to do Either a Do A stealth roll

Difficulty Of 10 So if you got a stealth bonus great If you don't, you don't. It's in your... It's your skills next to your abilities. It's near the bottom. Yeah, yeah.

We gotta take another look at some character sheets now that we have access to D&D Beyond because I'm pretty sure you in particular must have a better than one stealth bonus that we've got to figure out. Well, I rolled a 14 plus 4 plus 1. Great. What do you got?

Didn't make it. I had 4 plus 2. You're a big dude, too. I probably should have given you a penalty for that one. I'm playing a very quiet little plucking pizzicato thing. Invisible. So, around

the corner... Where the fudge is made? No, no, no, no. It's lemonade. You see an elf. It runs into the sort of... Elf around the corner. Elf around the corner.

Elf around the corner for me. Elf around the corner. Elf around the corner. Elf around the corner for me. Elf around the corner. It wheels into the opening. We're going to owe like $20,000 for that. Between the vines. It's a girl's story. And Bodhi, you hope it doesn't see you just because something about

this encounter just feels so awkward. It's going to feel gross to have it lock eyes with you but it does unfortunately your big old half orcish shoulders are sticking out between the vines a little bit and you're not concealing your awesomeness

as well as you might like okay is the noise you make as this elf locks eyes with you. That's the noise you made. And it says, oh, you have to get out.

That's not a thing you want to hear from a stranger. You have to get out or it will find you. What's it? Morgothal will find you. We're inside Morgothal uh it covers its eyes and says you have to get out you have to get out it'll find you I'm gonna pretend to get out what are you gonna do to pretend to get out what do you do right maybe it's with the things that move move away move back towards my friends. Okay, do another stealth roll. Difficulty 15.

So you scoot a little farther back in the vines, and you're pretty sure it could see you if it took its hands off its eyes. It starts shaking its head and saying, no, no, no, no, you have to get out you have to get out I just said this to Ken but I think that whatever lives in here Morgothal can use it as it senses

inside itself and see if there's anything inside it covering its eyes and giving us a chance to get out I'm going to stab its face off yeah yes go for it yep it puts up uh no fight that's over its ac uh you slash down this thing and it cries out as uh it hits the ground and bleeds out through its neck and then i grab its mouth and cover it

okay okay and then slowly passes away. You feel its life force exit. Don't care. Pendeth and Vorkid walk over. I mean, Brian doesn't care. Bodhi cares a little. And they say, we believe you've just extinguished one of Morgothal's lights. He'll notice what just happened.

We need to move with haste. Okay, cool. Why'd you tell us not to do that? Well. Why'd you tell us not to do that? Well, why'd you tell me not to do that? I mean, we're using the same intuition you guys did when you hid. An alarm was about to go off, and you cut the wire. Unfortunately, the wires and the alarm are the same thing for the most part here, and it'll notice that something is missing.

Well, shit. How would you have handled it? How do we handle that in the future? Well, they point at the body, and they say, if you'll notice, this elf's skin has what looks like wooden bark growing over parts of its body. Hey, how about that? It appears to have been partially absorbed.

Once again, I did something and with haste and yeah and they they head off sprinting through uh the underbrush again okay well i'm right behind them great uh so you guys make it around another corner and almost right away you see another elf. This one is a little less cordial and it says it is time to join us. What do we do? What do these guys think we should do? Pendeth and Vorkid have their knives drawn already and they

look like they're about to stab this. Kill it. To see some. They actually um to see so they actually hang on a second they've got their knives that they look like they're about to stab it but that's not exact they're a little hesitant based on the conversation they just had with you they know this might be a little tricky um pendeth goes to stab it they stab it with their steely knives well pendeth is about to do it and vorkid puts a hand on his shoulder

puts his knife away and very quickly draws an arrow even though they're only a little bit farther away with a pencil and paper did I say pencil it's stupid oh god I thought I had one of those stop gaps

in your speech pattern where you say, hey, everybody, I'm going to go on a date with a really pretty cheeseburger. And you're like, what? I'm going to go on a date with a really pretty girl. What? And you just say fucking cheeseburger? I thought I did one of those.

Okay, why not? David. So do I. Get his nose bitten. He manages to put an arrow in this thing's face and take it out really quick. an arrow in this thing's face and take it out really quick. Vorkid turns to you guys and says

the farther away we can be from these things, the better. I'm worried there might be some kind of infection going on. Yeah, I'm all about this. Get away from them. What are we doing?

Keep moving. But are we just moving it? do we do get in there to the nearest center so but are we just moving should we cover ourselves in branches assassinating these guys just moving through and what are we doing they say yes

and they they say they're beginning rather grimly to doubt there really is any hope of prayer that you can save I must say

this Morgothal thing they they round a corner you don't see anything but you you've made it to the sort of atoll The sort of hilly chunk Where there's a cave

It's not the no bikini atoll No, no That's where naked people are It's because there's no bikinis What happened? You know what, if it's from where I am Somebody must have Ate all the cupcakes.

I love cupcakes. Oh, my God. You notice as you approach this... I do, too. This wooden hill, this giant stump in the middle of Morgathal, you're hearing sort of more ambient noise, this sort of locust tweeting

that was very randomized at first is now beginning to sound like a chant everywhere. No water on the phone? We all good? We all good? So, yeah, it's almost beginning to sound like a pulsating alarm all around you. But the good news is this thing looks like it's easy to scale. But the good news is this thing looks like it's easy to scale. They point upwards and they say, you know, only a few minutes climb and we should either be able to get to the top or find an opening of some kind.

We're not sure. All right. So they show you there's big knots in this wood. You can get a grip and start climbing. And they don't have any idea how to reverse the spell. Or do they? They say they're versed in some basic ranger magic. They sort of

know a little bit of Druish magic. Like, they think that they might be able to try some stuff. But these were pretty massive spells. This was a huge deal, and it was a generation or two ago that this was done. I mean, it was like I was saying before.

It was about a couple hundred years ago, so it was their grandfathers who did this to the treant, and it'll take a bit of experimentation. They had all this time to figure out a way to reverse it. We'll take a bit of experimentation. They had all this time to figure out a way to revert. So you start climbing up and they whisper down to you guys, look for an opening yourselves. We don't know how we're going to get to the center,

but there should be some kind of opening. We can either widen or fit in as is. I think we can lick this. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to have you guys do alternating perception dex checks with these guys. And I'm going to keep an eye on how many

turns it takes because at a certain point some symbiotic sap or other sort of immunization of Morgothal may come after you. So these guys actually find something right away. So if you guys can roll a dex check difficulty of 10, you can no problem hustle up there. Yes. Yes.

Brian's writing a script while we play. Now I'm pulling out Bodhi-isms. Oh, thank goodness. What does Bodhi say as he pulls himself up to the opening in the atoll? Little hand says it's time to rock and roll. 100% pure adrenaline.

And so, yeah, this is an A-tall. What did I roll? Did you see what I just rolled? No, what did you roll? Damn it. You didn't even look at your own roll? No, no. You're just fucking cruising.

I'm still not there. So, yeah, you kind of slipped down a little bit that was a six i saw what you did you you silly boy um it's a i missed the first time because uh i was looking up what atoll didn't yeah and i was looking for quotes like a fucking idiot all right it's like i think it was an 11 which is what i meant yeah i mean like i was thinking um this is kind of like in the desert when you see one of those plateaus like rising up like in australia yeah uh where you you see like a mountain with a flat top that's kind of what's a desert yes or west world episode this rises out of the core of morgothal and reaches up into the sky in his center. So, Bodhi, you slip a little bit. Whoops-a-doodle. Roll a six-sided die and if it is a high number, over three,

something heard. Uh-oh. You hear some clicking noises behind you roll another dex check and see if you can get up back into the hole before nope so you don't fall but as you climb up you you uh you notice out of the corner of your eye there is something flying towards you out of the trees right everybody uh right everybody uh roll to attack you two are with pendeth and vorkid in the opening in the tree you managed to pull yourselves up there so you're able to do ranged attacks or attempt to reach out but there's going to be a bit of a sightline difficulty depending on what kind of attack you want to do if you're going to try to fly, et cetera. Bodhi, you're going to have to try to keep an arm on the side of this thing because you are about 20 feet off the ground. Okay.

Everybody, yeah, roll for your order. I'm going to wait to see what's going on, what this thing is before I make a move to attack because I'll lose my invisibility 20 22 great

would you guys roll off for me real quick these two what did you roll Ken 14 2 go again These two. What did you roll, Ken? 14. 2. Go again, Glenn. Beat a 2.

No problem. 18. Great, so we're going to go Twee, Bodhi, Thing, Pendeth, Tom, Vorkid. This episode was brought to you by a new podcast called Mission to Zix.

It's a new improvised sci-fi podcast. And it's a bunch of UCB guys. There's guests that have been cast members of SNL, Kimmy Schmidt, the Chris Gethard Show, Search Party. We like all those things. Yeah, you probably like all of those things too They follow the misadventures of Ambassador Plek Decksetter and his crew as they attempt to establish diplomatic relations with the inhabitants of a distant, uncharted corner of the galaxy

a quadrant often referred to as the ass end of space so like Richmond, Indiana or something like that So, uh oh referred to as the ass end of space so like richmond indiana or something like that uh so blah uh-oh that was our engineer uh kicking something over uh i'm sure uh mission to zix will will not have anything that i'm professional uh uh hey brian. Do you like federated alliances? Certainly. Do you like galactic monarchies? Yep. What about when R2-D2 got shot in the taint by that restraining bolt?

Did you enjoy that? Who are you talking to? I'm talking to somebody who likes getting shot by restraining bolts in the undercarriage. Well, Brian, if you like that restraining bolt to the taint, you'll love it when the droid C-53 manages to remove one from his bits, uh, so he can experience real emotions. Uh, they have a sentient starship named the Bajarian Jade that will reconcile with countless ex-husbands, maybe? Uh, will Ambassador Dexeter figure out how the window controls work, let alone pull off a mission. The only way to find out is to subscribe now to mission to Zix. That is Z Y X X because Hey Brian,

do you talk about Zix and casual conversation? Fuck yeah. Do you whip your Zix out all the time? Whip it out in the podcasting player of choice. You can listen for free and Apple podcasts or whatever the hell else you use and support nerdery. You guys get into it. So, you see what looks like, Twee, a hexagon with a rhinoceros beetle

on every side of it spinning around like a disc towards Bodhi. The fuck? Hmm. Really? Kill it, burn it with fire, right? Like how fast? Is that what people say?

Pretty fast. It's hovering, so it doesn't look like it's going to slam into him, but it does look like it might be trying to take some spinning bites out of him in just a second. It's got six heads. It's got legs dangling off the bottom of it. And some kind of, uh,

yeah. It's gross. Like a lot of my monsters. It is gross. What you going to do? Tweet. What you going to do? It's about the size of a Rottweiler.

I'm going to throw up a little cloud of daggers at it. Go for it, please. Hey, you like clouds? It says... How about daggers? You like those? Because if you like clouds and daggers, I have a thing for you.

It's called Cloud of Daggers. Boom! Cloud of Daggers. Boom. Cloud of Daggers. Cloud of Daggers. It's before Conjure Elemental. I think I told you before, but I saw Cloud of Daggers open for... I believe it's 44. It was great, though. I saw Cloud of Daggers open for Damon Wayans, It was great, though.

I saw a cloud of daggers open for Damon Wayans, which was a weird show. 44 slashing damage. 44 slashing damage. If it's a third... Is your spell slot third level or higher? This is... Let me check.

How far away is this thing? Probably not, because you're only level 5. How far away is it? It's about 5 feet away from Bodhi. How far away from Bodhi? Like 5 feet away from Bodhi. It's coming at Bodhi. It's not even looking at you guys.

I'm just wondering what the range is of the attack. Like 10 feet away from you, 5 feet away from Bodhi. Okay. Alright, so 4d4 and my invisibility is totally... It's going to pop, yeah. 5, 7, 11. Great. Thank heaven.

You're up up Bodhi 6 plus 5 11 roll to attack first oh yeah that's what I was doing yeah that's a hit so are you going to try to claim the damage you rolled before your attack?

No, I was rolling. Roll your damage, honey. Okay. Okay. Blaine, what is me taking my sweet-ass time brought to you by? Oh, this take your sweet-ass time is brought to you by big 69 full release sporting goods oh yeah

can I just say what I discovered when we don't neglect the ball when we uh we're looking at uh uh Bodhi quotes the other day uh it was his reference to the ultimate that really jumped out at me I'm really hoping you go for the ultimate, Bodhi, in all your adventures.

For sure, always. Five plus... It wasn't raging. I had thought that I was going to, but I didn't tell you I did. No, you did not. So it's just 7 Got it Pendeth Volley's an arrow

For the love of god Oh Big joint And does 10. That's good. You're up, Tom. I'm casting poison spray at it. Oh, boy.

Wow. That's... Well, it has to... Here's what it has to do. I think that after the creature must... Yeah, once once bitten twice shy is that poison it made it's saving throw

it's great white oh I'm gonna stay away from that sorry about the saving throw vorkid is up he tries to volley an arrow at it and it misses this thing heads to Bodhi He tries to volley an arrow at it And it misses This thing

Heads to Bodhi Rolls for critical It critted you Stupid thing Let's see what this little fella does. Octagon, Beatles, hexagon, whatever it is. Yuck. The hate you thing.

Here we go. Well, here's the thing, man. If you want the ultimate, you've got to be willing to pay the ultimate price. It's not tragic to die doing what you love. He says as a critical hit is rolled against him I like the sound of that I'd like to die doing what I love Great, so this thing rolled a four

Masturbating when a nuke goes off That means you're going to be annoyed after this, emotionally You're going to be annoyed after this happens Happens all day, every day I'd like to die doing what I love. Losing control of my bladder and bowels in front of my loved ones at a hospital.

It bites down on your shoulder with its big old mandibles and exoskeletal jaws does 12 points of damage. Shit. That's a crit for you. I'd like to die doing what I love living forever

Tui you're up do it Tui do it to it like Prue used to do it I am going to use this you know what I am going to hit it with a little firebolt do it I them i can

never remember what fire bolts do are they six or eight firebolt is 1d10 oh wow probably goes up per levels nice uh so 10. what what i really like about google as creepy as uh they can be sometimes is i can now google almost any keyword and it'll automatically offer up 5e with whatever i'm googling um so i got three that was a shitty roll god damn it what a shit yeah i have one more at fifth level i hate shitty rolls one more bode you're up 2d 10 and he gets one more because 5th level. I hate shitty rolls. Bodhi, you're up. 2d10 at 5th level. He gets one more because he's at 5th level. Get some more damage. Oh, that's right.

How much damage do we get? 8. 8 damage. So, 11. Way. I'm just adding up some damage. Bodhi, now you're up. Okay.

I'm going to rage. Good one, Bodhi now you're up okay I'm gonna rage do it Bodhi and uh I'm gonna bat at this thing with my greatsword I bat at thee with my rage from hell's heart

just a nine uh yeah that's gonna kinda glance off of its shell unfortunately well I get to hit it again, don't I? I'm raging. You do.

You get to give it a double swat with your sword. Well, that's not going to glance off it. That one connects. I only get past an AC 50. How about that damage? Please. So first time you swing, it goes clang and it uh goes to bite your shoulder again the second time your sword goes chunk and then uh nine uh beautiful so it goes chunk and then

into the exoskeleton it gets stuck for a second you got to shake it off your sword and it goes chunk and then into the exoskeleton it gets stuck for a second you gotta shake it off your sword and it goes shake it flies off in the woods you you guys wanna help Bodhi up into the hole now we'll call it even on the dex checks

if you wanna it goes like it flies like a discus off in the forest. A bit of a quiet carapace laying in the grass. Reaching out a hand to Bodhi to pull him up. You guys whittle through some narrow

winding passageways. Thanks brother, that was pure adrenaline. And you get to let's see you get to... Let's see. Anytime, my friend. You guys talking about adrenaline? Yeah.

You feel like you're making really good time. And then, yep. Right sort of before you feel like you must be at the middle of this thing, you hit basically a wall of wood. I love these walls. And Pendeth and Vorka turn to you and say, all right, we got to figure something out to get through here, but we feel we're close.

We're very close to the center of this thing already. We've actually gotten much luckier than we thought. The downside is we think Morgothal is on to us, and we're going to have to do this pretty quickly. Okay, let's do it. Why don't you flip that bad boy over for me, please? All right. We got this hourglass in our Patreon from Rob LaDuke.

It's beautiful. Hourglass. It's a very gothic-looking with dragons and blood red sand, and the five-minute timer is now ticking down for you guys to figure out how to get through this thing. Can you start carving through the wood? Choppery chop. you guys to figure out how to get through this thing start carving through the wood choppity chop yeah what would do the most damage of my um what is a halberd of them what's that oh halbert is in bonus episodes only unfortunately damn it would my gauntlets of ogre power do any damage on the wood?

Or should I hack at it with my sword? You'd be much better hacking with your sword, I think. Alright, is there any area that seems like a better a good area to start? These guys are like, we're at an impasse. We could go back and try to find a fork, but going through here was pretty much a straight shot.

What did they suggest? What was their question, Ken? I forgot. Is it just a big solid chunk of wood? They said they're worried that'll take a long time, but if we don't think of something fast, we should get started. Okay. I'm sorry, Ken ken what did you is this just a big chunk of wooden firm is this a wooden wall or it's a wooden wall

but you don't know if there's going to be a thick core to it with sap running through it that'll make it resist your swords you don't know if it's like a dead chunk of bark really when you punch it kind of testing it it feels really hard but but they think this is the only way through yeah okay well they're like we've gotten so close all right let's start backtrack we might be able to find another hole in the side of this thing that's it's probably random you know this tunnel we found but we actually found a really good tunnel and the odds of us surviving climbing out are not great we can they're like we'll try if you want. Okay, let's try. Yeah, let's chop. Climb back out or... Chop at it. Chop at it.

Go for it. 19. That's a hit. I'm going to say you only need to roll over a five to really get a good hit in. But let's say you only get to roll, if you're just going to chop at this thing six times. And just roll for damage each time. What happened? What's going on?

Blaine, what the fudge? Nothing. Is that one of the members? Is he just watching a baseball game? Ten. On that one. You take a big chunk out of it and some black sap starts to drip out of it black sap so now again i like black sapith

no one i botch oh no i don't with the strength check, right? Mm-hmm. Six. That doesn't... I mean, you can't really botch this attack because it's not fighting back, at least not yet. Okay. Oh, nice. Eleven.

Take another huge chunk out of it. Can they alternately chop. 17. Yes you may, but you're coming in round 3 of 6. 11. 10. Success, give me your damage. I got a 13 now. 6. Give me your damage got a 13 now 6

give me your damage 6 8 8 with your bonus 15 that's a success how many more do I get 6 you just get one more

20 got one hit hit 6 Jesus get one more okay 20 got one hit hit six jesus 17 yep 10 so you how many more you're done okay so you uh you hear something is definitely coming down the tunnel towards you at this point. Behind us? Yeah.

You've made serious progress. You've cut basically the length of three people into this wood. And the guys are like, oh, God, we must be so close. We must be so close. There must be something we can do. Oh, what could we do? Could we firebomb it? Could we, oh.

They say it's probably time for drastic measures. They're going to head down the tunnel and try to head off whatever's coming towards you. Okay. Can I sort of. Well, that'll get me a couple more hacks, right? That's the idea. You could do that

or you could try something magic at this point. The timer's run out. What would you try something magic at this point. The timer's run out. What would you magically do? So at this point, you're going off the DM judging how many... I only have fire damage. I'm afraid to use that. Can I... Don't you have a thunderclap or something? Yeah, but that's a 10-foot radius and it'll hurt other people.

If they're within 10 feet there, you know. So everybody back away. I'm going to go ahead and lob you a real obvious. Just because. I wanted to use it, but I thought. I was wondering about it too, but that's cool. Let's back off. So Tui and I move back 10 or 15 feet.

Go for it. Okay, I'm casting Thunder Wave. So you give it a big shock, and sure enough, a big split kind of forms in the vein. And you can't see if you've gotten to an open space on the other side of the wood, but something in the middle of it has cracked like a walnut. Okay. Can I do a strength check on it to try to get get through myself like try to squeeze through please do do a do a strength check uh difficulty 15 all right

oh that's in the corner do it again yeah that would make it yep so you get it in there and sure enough you feel like the the tip of your sword is on the other side of something and when you jostle it back and forth you pry it in there and sure enough you feel like the the tip of your sword is on the other side of something and when you jostle it back and forth you pry it open yeah all right so this is gonna be sorry about these fucking pretzel bites they're so good they're really good and we ate light before this episode we should get rid of them though yeah because i'm i'm eating them now and that's so delicious i have very bad impulsive behavior. Hi, Rhodes.

So what happens? You're going to need to do a strength check to try to pry this thing open. Another one? Oh. And it's going to be... Because this is about... Let's say your sword is what? Like three and a half, four feet long? I'll say.

You feel like... You don't have one of those chode swords, do you? You've got a solid two feet of wood that you're trying to split open. That's what you just said. You can do this, but it's going to be you can take three rounds put your sword in the hole

and if you use your sword it's going to be a difficulty of 18 but you run the risk of breaking your sword if you use your gauntlets of ogre power you don't risk breaking anything, but it's going to be a difficulty 20.

Okay. So what are you going to do? Hands or sword? I'm going to try it three times with the gauntlet. Well, I'm going to try it twice with the gauntlet. And then save the sword

try for last? I don't know. All right. First time with the gauntlet. Yeah. Difficulty 20. All right. But if I get a 15,

that's right, right? Yeah. Oh! 12. So close. but if I get a 15 that's right yeah oh 12 you farted really loud it shudders in your hands yep boom it cracks open you also farted on that one

you're able to haul the wood to the side so I'm going to do a quick pendith and vorkid fast forward over here to see what's happening. If you guys could just talk amongst yourselves briefly. Peas and carrots, peas and carrots, peas and carrots. Wugger, wugger, wugger, wugger. Oof. Can't believe Glenn died on Game of Thrones, huh?

Glenn. Are you enjoying this season? I am, but I'm not going to give any spoilers. But yeah, well, people are probably way done listening or watching by now. But yeah, I just caught up. I saw it two days late. Luckily, no one ruined any spoilers for me. That was exactly what I wanted to happen.

I don't know what happened, though, to a certain person. You're not sure what happened, but you hear... Oh, that thing where that thing happened? Yeah, I've been wanting that thing to happen since season one. Oh, boy, what a satisfying thing. What sounds like the crying out of a single wood elf

down the passage. Wood elf? You're not sure. I'll think of a comeback for a riff off of that wood elf bit that you're doing. How much time do we have to kill this wood elf? We're at five left.

Okay, cool. What do we hear? The crying out of what sounds like one of the wood elves. Just one. One of the guys that was on our side. You can't quite make out what was happening because echoing down this cave has been a lot of white noise. How do we let them know that we got through?

It's up to you. I'll use my, what the hell is this called, this new thing, Thermaturgy. Thermaturgy. I can amplify my voice. Okay. And I'm yelling, we're through. What else? We're through.

Hi, Mavis. Hey, what else is in the news? I'm going to say you remember to do that in Sylvan. To Maturgy, yes. Someone else... I actually learned Sylvan at the Sylvan Academy. Someone else made an interesting role while you were doing that everybody do a perception check

difficulty of 12 please nope yeah oh you got it wisdom it's wisdom nope I got it. Oh, you got it? Yeah, I got it. Wisdom. It's wisdom.

Uh-uh. Great, great. Nope. It's just as well for you, Bodhi. What about you, Tui? What did you get? What was it? Twelve.

Intelligence. Get an R plus something. Yeah, yes. Excuse me, Mavis. You guys both hear a clear voice in your head say, I think I can help. Oh, is it Shmoo? You think it's Shmoo.

Hey, Bodhi, turn Shmoo around. Bring him over here. Okay. The new Shmoo. What is it, Warchild? The wonderful new Shmoo. Ooh, Warchild. Roll a, roll, you guys, roll Perceptionild. Roll a... You guys, roll Perception.

Roll Perception. You two, roll Perception. Yep. What do you got, 15? What do you got? Trying to beat 12s here. You guys both hear Schmoo say, I like Warchild as a nickname much better than Schmoo.

No, he says, let's get inside this chamber ahead of us. I'm not sure how, but I think I might be able to help. Okay, let's do it. Let's go, let's go, let's go. And his words are sort of broken. You're not entirely sure if you're going to keep, you know, speaking on really specific terms. He understands everything you say. Right.

But complex ideas are going to get difficult if you ask him complex questions. We're taking you in, War Child. Oh, hang on. We have a special guest who wants to say something. Oh, Mavis got really shy. Brian was holding the mic up to Mavis because she was getting friendly. If you hold it up to me, it'll be the same sound. The second I said that, she turned her head away as if she got stage fright. Brian was holding the mic up to Mavis because she was getting friendly. She told her to be, it'll be the same sound. The second I said that, she turned her head away as if she got stage fright.

It was very cute. So you head into this chamber, and you see very plainly in the center of it, there's this big pulsing sack of sap. Yummy. Sort of fluttering on the ground in a bed of wood and and uh and dirt sure uh it's a very small chamber the three of you barely fit in here it's literally looks like it's sitting on a nest um what do you need us to do war child um oh yeah you're talking to smith uh roll roll perception he's he's trying to tell you

yep no wait no that's a fail what do you got twee yeah it's 11 uh that's uh i got it uh he says um you're not sure exactly what he says, Tweed, but he says something like, replace, replace, replace. Is he talking about Obamacare? I'm going to flip the timer again. Take the heart out and put him there. Right, War Child?

Oh, yes. I think that's what he means. Roll your perception. He got a really good roll on his attempt to talk to you. He says yes. Okay. But he also says something along the lines of... Special ritual.

Okay. What's asking what's special? We need the other elves probably. Are the other elves coming? Roll another perception. You don't know. No sign of the other elves. He says,

don't need them. Try what you can. This is like that time that Hawkeye helped Radar give the guy a tracheotomy. Or Father Mulcahy. Remember that? You didn't know you could give a guy a tracheotomy. Does it require a sacrifice?

Why don't we talk about that on the next episode of Nerd Poker. Darn it. Yeah, but. Thanks for listening. This was a very satisfying Dungeon Master episode for me. I hope you guys. Rhodes. Hi, Rhodes.

Should we let Rhodes say goodbye? Yeah. Goodbye, everyone. Thanks for listening to another episode of Nerd Poker you can follow us at patreon.com slash nerd poker

and you get bonus episodes from there and you can also send us anything at P.O. Box one six zero six nine Encino, California nine one four one six

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