Nerd Poker - Episode 27 - Black Chromatic Army

Episode Date: August 15, 2018

Hello dear listeners! We are sad to be without Blaine this week and next, but excited to welcome back Chris Tallman who will be taking on the role of Typha. And it's a real tough spot the crew is in. Up against a cliffside and hurrying from one town to another, a devastating force of thousands of kobolds, orcs, and wyrms wants to have a word with them. Special thanks to Hal Lublin for the voice of the orc general, and additional apologies from Dan for the bad Blaine commercials.

Hey everybody, I'm Brian Poussaint 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, Ken, Sam, Lee. Now it's time for another episode of Brian Poussaint's Nerd Poker Season 2

Hey everybody I'm Brian Poussaint and you're listening to Brian Poussaint's Nerd Poker. Hi friends I almost didn't say listening right We've got Sarah Ken, Dan, no blame.

Instead, we've got Chris Tallman sitting in. Thanks, pal. You're usually just here at the bonus episode. This is a double bonus. It's a bonus regular one. Chris will once again be taking up the mantle of Typha, the battle cook.

He had a good time doing it before. We discussed a little bit more of her backstory today are you gonna play tweet uh yeah i will i will play tweet uh before we get into our uh patreon helpers uh we got a guy i god i should have done this weeks ago maybe months ago a dude i ran into in houston um and gave me $40 for the show. His name's Charlie. Thanks, Charlie. $40, Chuck.

Oh, thanks. Thank you, Charlie. God, that might be in June, I think I was in. Oh, Charlie, we owe you then. Houston and Dallas, I did some shows. Thanks. That is a thing you can still do. It's been a little while.

Charlie stepped up. But yeah. And then I had the PO box was down. I didn't know you had to pay for it every year. Like most things. So I let it lapse for like two months. Did they just toss whatever was in there then?

They tossed whatever was in there or sent it back. Oh, we need a new PO.O. box for the closing? No, it's the same one. Oh, okay. But it's back on. So if you got something sent back to you saying this is no longer a box, it is a box again. Get some sun, Brian.

Your forehead looks nice. Yeah, I walked through fucking Nashville without a hat. I went to a place called Biscuit Love. It looks good, though. And it was delicious. Biscuit Love. But I had to wait in line. Cut your own hole. It was worth the

45 minutes. Was there a pork gravy? Some kind of meat based gravy in there? Have you been to Nashville? Oh my god. Biscuits with every meal. Really? You get to the airport and they shove hot chicken up your butt. A lot of chicken and biscuits.

I had a lot of family in Texas so I grew up with a lot of chicken fried steak. Oh, yes. Really? I think there would be like barbecue and stuff. There was, but I was a little kid, and I probably was not interested in anything other than chicken fried steak. Too much work. I have somebody I need to thank. Yeah, get to it.

She drew, this will be an episode behind, but she drew the art for Jinrae Dana, aka Zinzarina. Dani Hartel of Dungeons & Dragons. She actually is one of their concept artists and costumers. Holy crap. How'd you make that hookup? I met her. She's a funny, talented human being. Cool.

Thanks, Dani. Yes. So shout out to Dani Hartel. And I'm not going gonna thank any patreon listeners why not you'll see okay something else is gonna happen today all right you're not gonna hurt us are you well i did bring whiskey today uh he thinks he might kill us listening this i brought the uh uh basil hayden's kentucky whiskey that Peter John Burns, comedian out of Chicago, gave me. Oh, yeah.

We hit that, I think, before. Mm-hmm. And there's a... I'm going to just say there's a chance you'll die. There's a thing over there Troman gave me. I really want to hit that Nica coffee malt over there. Oh, baby. I haven't cracked that bottle.

So if you do murder Bodhi um i don't get to drink your coffee i will i will open it over your head and then i will drink the content fair yeah fair is it good with blood is that what you're saying there's a little bit of iron in there and then i'll we'll start a monomarth too you should have given me a heads up i could have ubered here been prepared oh that Oh, that's true. That's true. I won't drink any today because I got to keep my wits about me. So I'll drive you home and take

an Uber home if I kill your character. So you guys, and this is a little bit of catch up for you, Chris, because I don't think you've heard. I'm at whatever's current now. Right. So we're a couple episodes ahead with this. Do we say the episode number?

We're episode 27, if I didn't do that already. That's where we are. Correct. And you guys left the town of Tenshal. It was the only mage college town that didn't yet have a tendril reaching up to yank the moon down into the planet. tendril reaching up to yank the moon down into the planet you guys uh did see a weird green aura coming out of a building where dessa was hiding with her uh with her guardians master jenny and master which magnus master magnus so you guys are kind of on the run right now you uh want to try to get if i'm not mistaken,

and this is party tactics, so you guys can stop me if you think you want to consider something else at any point here, but you were going to Gantham, I believe, where it was just the closest... It's the closest mage town that has already fallen. All of the other mage towns have fallen.

And as you guys started writing uh you encountered a little fellow by the name of yondu i don't know if you remember oh yeah uh but yondu the kobold was a messenger um oh yeah and he wanted to tell you that storm door was approaching the town of potential and you responded uh taifa crushed his skull with an omelet pan and you responded, Typha crushed his skull with an omelet pan. I remember that. You guys kept writing for a little bit.

Dessa was trying to tell you, Bodhi, you know, hey. She was like, hmm. Yeah, she said she's going to get me. I heard it. Yeah. And that's when you guys see some more kobolds. Okay. Right, Typha?

Yes. I use my perception. I am very perceptive as well as I make a nice gumbo. You guys are heading through some woods and you're coming up on what almost looks like a little bit of a cliff face. You don't have a map. So, you know, you'll probably have to ride off to the right or left to get around this cliff but as as it's starting to come more to view from the trees and you realize you're gonna have to make a bit of a turn to get around it to get to gantham you see just dozens of kobolds guys i see dozens of kobolds uh and and you are already gonna have to kind of turn to the

side a little bit uh so you can go right or left, or you can tell me what else you might want to do. Last time. I think Tom just like burn through. Yeah. Intimidated them. We just were like, yeah.

Oh yeah. They're easy to intimidate. However, there's a kind of a little, it's a cliff face. That's about 50 yards high. You guys wouldn't be able to take your, so we just had to pick right or left. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Flip a coin. it's a cliff face that's about 50 yards high you guys wouldn't be able to take your horses up this

flip a coin you can also just look around more you have multiple options you can investigate I know I've got all this perception stuff is there anything I can see as far as which way gets us roll a 20 because I have a list of just stuff

that you can look at. And depending on how high any of you get your perception roll. I have a nine plus that. So it's a 16. Great. So Typha, you notice there's more kobolds in either direction, whichever way you go. Oh, are we surrounded? Not as far as you can tell, but you do think they will catch up to you no matter which way you go. Can Tui fly up to see?

So you ask him if he wants to do that. He plays a little ditty. Shoots up. He rolled a Sorry. It's taking me a second to look up Tui stats. I should be more ready with that since I'll be driving him.

He rolled a 13, so he comes on. He's like, yeah, I see a whole lot of kobolds. Seem to go on for a while, and it looks like there's maybe stuff besides kobolds. Not sure what. I rolled a 20 on that. What do I see? I rolled a 20 on that. What do I see?

You definitely see, no matter which way you go, you're going to encounter more than dozens of co-op. It looks like they're starting to come over the cliff a little bit. Why do they want us? You were getting the impression that they were going to raid the city you just came from? They have like a dragon. And you did just hear a dragon roaring overhead that you suspect is Stormdoor, the black chromatic who has been leveling at least one town. You know, this is the thing.

It's like, is our choice to like stay and save the city or try or do we want to try to get to that next town and take the moon elevator? Yeah, I say fuck these little guys. Okay. So left or right? Did you say? I forget. Tweeted and have an opinion? He says, I think we're going to maybe need to fight either way.

Okay. I think it would take a bit of a ride. That's not a bad plane. Right. All right. You guys head right. right. All right.

So you guys head right. And you, you don't get too far in the woods before you do feel like, unless you double back towards Tenshal, you will be surrounded. Is there any way to hide? Like, is it,

this is, this is, they see you. Oh, all right. Tom, Tom, right now they're just be like, yeah,

we're going to, we're going to pile through them. Listen, you little cobalt motherfuckers. And as you plow through, you're going to try to just go right to keep trying to get to a more cliff face. Twee says, yeah, let me see how much longer we have to do that. Oh, I don't want to fly that high because I think there's a dragon circling over us right now over us yeah but uh it looks like this this is a weird cliff that's gonna it's like a little bit

of a like we're in kind of a canyon right now and the other side was just like a gentle slope down and this side's sharp so we're gonna can we climb up the cliff face um it's about 50 yards high and you feel like you could do it, but you'd lose your horses. And also, there are kobolds spilling over this thing. I'm losing these goddamn horses again. You want to go back? We can go back. We didn't go that far.

No, I think we just keep going, right? All right, if you guys want to plow through, it's up to you. We're plowing through over a cliff? No, I thought he was saying that it made more sense to go the other way. I didn't mean that I made a bad choice by going right. No, it's not that you made a bad choice. It's just you feel like this may have been inevitable. You feel like these guys were already marching on the city no matter what,

and you just kind of wandered right into them. All right. Burn them up. Well, I don't care about them. I'm just trying to make sure we can get through. If we kill all of them, we can still get through on the ledge, right? Everybody do a perception check. It's like 100, right?

Exactly. I'm going to tell you how many you can observe, depending. If anyone gets over a 20, you'll get a very precise number. Typha got a 23. Well, well, well. Okay. Anyone get a 18? Typha, you think you see over 100.

If you had to guesstimate, based on when you've seen a riot in the city of Tenet. There's about 130 or so in visible range and probably more behind you and on the other side of this cliff. So it seems like the numbers are overwhelmed. This is not a fight we can win. Well, they're little kobolds, and I'll say this. These are little lizard people about four and a half

feet tall. They're wearing ramshackle junkyard armor. I'm more worried about the dragon. And they've got little spears that look like sticks. Well, that's why it's like, can we just... It worked last time. They ignored us. They just went to pillage and plunder your hometown. If we cheer them on and say, good luck, go get them.

They couldn't... Nothing we could do with those guys. Hope you have better. If we just go single file and try to go as fast as you can through them, I'll take the lead. I'm going to need everybody to do an intimidation check. Tell me what your number is and we'll go with what the highest is.

I'll say whoever gets the highest roll, you know automatically you're feeling the most intimidating and you would ride your horse to the front through these guys. Some of you, Tom and Bodie, have very high intimidation bonuses, if I'm not mistaken. 13. I just have a 10 on this one. With your bonus?

Yeah. All right. Unfortunately. 13? 23. Jesus. All right. What you got?

Typha got a 19. Well, hell yeah. Okay. So, Tom with Typha right behind you. I'm waving a pan behind him. Were you about to say something, sir? No Okay, so As you guys go through

These guys at first Are looking at you And they put their spears up So You guys So, you guys, your horses take a little bit of damage that I'm going to track. Oh, sorry. I have a 25. I thought it was 23.

Well, here's the thing. You guys rolled high enough that these guys are going to part a little bit after you crush a couple of them. Sure, they better. But they're still kind of like around. And the rest of you are fine so far behind them. But you get through a swarm of about 20 kobolds, and you crush a couple under your horse's hooves. And you're like, oh, they are starting to kind of like turn around

and like face you. And they're starting to like bang their spears on the ground. And some of them are starting to crawl of like turn around and like face you and they're starting to like bang their spears on the ground and some of them are starting to crawl over each other so they're getting taller like you know world war z zombies shut up they weren't intimidating keep it down uh well they part of the way and so you guys got about 100 feet through these things on your horses out of how many feet uh well that's the thing it's reasonably feet through these things on your horses. Out of how many feet? Uh, well, that's the thing. It's reasonably thick forest and based on your recon, you're not sure, but at this point you think it's rough terrain.

Uh, if you made it another hundred feet, you could get over this sort of cliff face a little bit, but it's rocky and your horses might not like it, but they would potentially be able to get up over this thing okay we're halfway there yep uh you notice there is a whole lot of kobolds in in there too you're sort of seeing this rocky i'm gonna uh incline underneath uh a hundred or so kobolds that are marching over this cliff yes i'm gonna scoot up about 15 feet and cast a Thunder Wave. All right.

Wait, isn't that just going to incite them to attack us then? I don't care. All right, roll for damage, please. All right. I got to get back to it. What are you doing on your... I'm looking at my thing. Your wiener? Print out your character sheet

Remember we had a rule I know No phones at the table I don't have human time For anything Did you send yourself A dick pic I don't get it

Yeah Is it your character sheet In your book You have what looks like Seven character sheets Wedged in your playtime I know They're all different

And different Kind of a mess Are you cheating on us Yes I'm cheating You're playing other characters Thunderwave is... Oh, if you're just trying to look up Thunderwave, I can look it up on my laptop. 2D8, okay.

And you're trying to hit the rocks you're trying to climb, right? Seven, yeah. Eleven. Eleven. Okay, I'm going to roll. To get there, you're going to have to lead the party sort of through another 100 feet. Your horse takes some more damage. Poor horse.

From bouncing off of kobolds? Yeah, and it creates uneven ground horses don't necessarily like uh shuffling stabbing with their little spears right yeah so um yeah your your horse is not in great shape at this point but you cast thunder wave and you nuke about 20 of these things nice uh and as your thunder wave hits you hits, you have executed kobolds named Josh Banebane, Alex Rogue, Jafraze Coxfired, Mick Flaley, Parker Andes, Nay Grunklet, Whale Keys, Leapin' Zig, Dianamats, Galebraith gail braith coffee mat and remriff sire thanks these are not usernames these are people's real names that i tried to turn into fantasy bullshit so this is okay you are weird yeah well i went on patreon today and i said uh hey everybody did anyone want their real names turned into dumb fantasy kobold names i love it and uh i got a

bunch of them and now they'll forever be heroes to the executed kobold army that's great so okay you cast that and you clear some space the rest of you guys feel like you suddenly see an opening that's not going to last very long are you all going to try to rush your horses through and onto this rocky outcropping. Right now, based on visibility, you're not sure what's on the other side of this hill. I will, as we go, and I'll try and perceive

every step of the way. Everybody, roll dexterity for your horses. All of you guys have horses with a dexterity bonus of two, and you have a difficulty of 12 to get over these rocks. So let me know if you pass.

12. Ooh, I got a natural 20. So did I. Holy shit. Our horses fly. All right. Esmeralda and Typha are just booming up these things. I made it. Sweet. Jess made it. Yeah, 12. I'm going to roll for Tweed. His horse is very nervous because he keeps climbing off of it and flying.

He rolled like a one on our high five. Yeah, I'm going to roll for Jendi. I think it was gentle. It was a gentle high five. It was gentle. It needed to be like a clattering. If there's another one. You guys haven't talked to Gago in a couple episodes, but he's with you.

He's just nervous and kind of not talking. Oh, Gago. All right, so you guys all make it up, and I'll say Typha and Esmeralda, couple episodes but he's with you he's just nervous and kind of not talking um all right so you guys all make it up and i'll say typhus and esmeralda as you make it up you see a full-fledged army um you get this you can see once you get over this hill because there's not really any trees on it the city of gantham and the yellow fungus-like spire that is sticking up into the clouds is not that far away. Not that far. It's a couple miles away.

How far does the portal wand reach? You don't know. But you do know that in front of you, there are hundreds and hundreds of kobolds. There are orcs riding on the backs of large wolves. There are large dragon-like creatures that are more wormish in shape, like long serpents that are also wearing armor. Quetzalcoatls?

Yeah, kind of like Quetzalcoatls. And other sort of, but they're all black. They're all jet black. The orcs are wearing a lot of armor and as you get up over the hill they notice you. Okay, we gotta get someone to get that portal stick, right? Yeah. How fast can

can... Oh, then they could just follow us through the portal though. How fast can what? I was thinking like Gago or somebody could fly we could set the portal And then someone could fly Super quick to the town And get us at least inside

But I can't fly I can levitate Gago can go pretty fast Gago can go pretty fast Should we pause? Sure What?

What is it? It's a nutter puff A nutter puff? Yeah They're delicious You found them? No Oh my god Just trust me on this It looks good What is it? It's a Nutter Puff. A Nutter Puff? Yeah, they're delicious. You've had them? No.

Oh, my God. Just trust me on this. It looks good. It has peanut butter covered puffs. Oh, yeah, they have those at Trader Joe's. They're really good. Bamba. Nutter Puffs. Yeah, pop goods.

Have another Nutter Puff. I try these out. Yeah, I'm glad. You know, you've got to buy these. It's amazing. I like I like Rhodes approved

We didn't need to pause That was delightful That was just Leave that in Yeah It was just a little Puffs break That last break

Was brought to you By another puff However You gotta buy these He took up some Hourglass time That I want to start Because you guys

Are completely surrounded If we go through This portal thing Yeah they can come through, they can come through, but they can come through a controlled opening. We have to get the portal to open somewhere else, though, and we don't know how far. But how fast, how long do we think it would take

if Gago or Tui just... Flew it out there. Let's say Gago, because he's so small. The dragon might not notice him. Can we carry it? Gago, do you show like a staff and ask him yeah when you do that gago says i'm out i think i can carry that thing but like i don't want to do around your guys you know like i'll just like i could i could totally bench this shit but i just

feel like i'm i can't perform under pressure so so tweet maybe tweet go how fast could he go well we have to set the thing first right how far can you send a tweet here's you and he says real quick I just wanted to say I think if I take this thing my horse is gone yeah I think we have to assume the horses are about to become a liability

yeah he says maybe we wanna I don't know uh And he says, maybe we want to, I don't know. Hang on. I'll try this. He grabs the sword and he flies off. Wait, no.

What? Or the staff. The staff. Wait, but if he's doing it, we thought he'd have to do one here first. Do you call after him and tell him? Well, that's what I feel like. He goes, wait. Oh, oh. He goes, right, right, right.

I got it. I got hasty. I got excited, like back at the stables. I don't want to send tweet to his dad, like, especially with Blaine not here. So, you know. Okay. So he says, are we doing this? Because I feel like shit's about to break bad.

Yes. Okay. So he waves the staff at the ground. I didn't. And against a large boulder Yes. Okay, so he waves the staff at the ground. I said Brian did it. I didn't. And against a large boulder. Well, we're doing it the right way. Yes.

Against a large boulder where there's like a nice side to it. It's like about 10 feet tall. He hits a portal and a woman's voice says, Zoop. And the portal opens up and it's blue right now. It doesn't look like it goes anywhere. It's just sort of like a blank opening. That's my favorite thing about this game.

And Tui flies off with the staff as far as he can go. The rest of you notice that one of the orcs on a wolf starts trotting through the crowd. The crowd kind of parts a little bit, and there is a big motherfucking orc that is about 15 feet tall, has steel bands bracing his spine into his armor. He has a steel plate over one of his eyeballs,

and he is ugly looking. What's your name? You must be the one they call. Brian, roll a history check. I botched it. You botched it? Yeah. He's never got a history.

This guy doesn't look familiar yet. I botched it. You botched it? Yeah. He's never good at history. This guy doesn't look familiar yet. And he's about 20 yards away, but you hear him. I rolled a 19.

Let's see if I recognize him. You rolled a 19. He looks like a recognizable orc, but you don't have the ability to recognize him you can get closer to him but that'll be what about my arcana my knowledge and my studies of war and war magics great uh why don't you roll a 20 and i will give you your arcana bonus but i'm going to give you an Arcana answer, not necessarily like a history social kind of answer. With my bonus, it's a 17.

Great. You recognize that he seems to be in some sort of magical enslavement. Like a zombie army? Not zombies, but like... Not necessarily undead, but you think he is magically bound to some greater beast. And I would say that you have a very strong suspicion that it is Storndor, the black chromatic dragon.

Maybe we should demand to be... Should we go see Storndor? Or is that a bad idea? I mean, this guy's looking at you with great interest, and he's signaling to his army. Hey, man, I'm going to talk to him. Uh-huh.

What do you say? With intimidation, I'm going to say, hey, we're not here to fight. We're just going through you. We've got another mission. What was the name of that town we were just in? Tenshal. Go to Tenshal. There's plenty of people ready to fight you there.

Roll a 20. Tell me what your bonus is. I'll give you his response. Why don't you do that again? No shit. Who's a 20 count? That's, I think is 17 yeah alright

he responds more chunks for the mud more chunks for the mud fuck you we're going through you say fuck you yes fuck you we're going through we don't want to fight.

Just get the fuck out of our way. That was a 22. Okay. So you see him wince a little bit, and he says, Listen, you snot-nosed little shit. I was absorbing magic missiles in Glock while you were crapping in your hands and lubbing it on your face. So you're old.

I get it. Get the fuck out of the way. That one's a seven. Oh, really? Okay. Well, then, if you rolled a seven. I'm going to step up on the second here too. He says,

Respect for your elders, plain and simple. And he draws a sword. Quick question. Do I have a sense of what would happen if I pointed the bone wand at a magic bound orc? Roll a 20 and use your arcana bonus. Because I've got all kinds of answers for that one. 22.

Yeah. All right. You are 100% sure that he gets a savings, like a special bonus on a saving throw against the bone wand. However, you do think it would affect him if he failed it. Okay. Duly noted. And he hops off the wolf.

He feels like because you step to him, he's making a show of making everybody sort of step aside, and he's got eyes on Bodhi. He's walking over. He's about 15 feet tall, though, so he's just a big armored motherfucker. Yeah. Can I try to dispel magic on him to try to take the spell off?

Uh-huh. All right. I shall then. Hey, Blaine, what's up? Hey, what's up? What's this brought to you by? This saving throw is brought to you by we're all gonna die it's a really gross soda that you

drink when it's got enough corn syrup to kill a horse Dan stop doing this shitty commercial so he fails his saving throw and as you hit him with dispel magic he blinks for a second and he looks at you and he And as you hit him with dispel magic, he blinks for a second. And he looks at you.

And he just, he's like mad. But he can't form the words. He's just really focused on you and confused. We've saved you from your. You're under a spell. We've saved. You're fighting against your will. He looks around him and he sees the sword in his hand uh and he just roars at us or at the universe at the sky he looks enraged

this army has been trying to take your brain over he's not listening to you. He starts carving up kobolds. But they're not fighting back. They're kind of stunned. Everything's still really quiet. They don't really know what you guys did to their general. Good job with this. Simple to spell magic. Everybody get behind your horse.

Brian, roll a 20. Oh, we don't want to go there. What was that? What was I rolling for Yeah we can't Add your history bonus If you got one Let's help him do whatever he's doing

You have a plus zero to history It looks like Okay yeah What'd you get Just a three Yep No new insight into who this guy is But

I leaned into a kobold I'm like Who's this guy He goes I will I leaned into a kobold and I'm like, who's this guy? He goes. I will fight at his side and help him do what he's doing. Really? Yeah.

All right. Go for it. Just so he gets the idea. Roll 20. We're on the same team. Six plus whatever I needed. Oh, boy. Okay.

So you managed to just with one swipe of your weapon, take out six of these little things, because they're all just kind of like, what the fuck? And so you kill some kobolds named Barret Jare, Gorley T, Fel Just, Walking J, G and Ellie's, Stay Dinkins, J Brad's, Jambrant, Booshadam, Hagen D, Juvenia, and Ling's stay. Dinkins, J Brad's, Jambrant, Busha,

damn Hagan, D juvenile and the lingus. Excellent. Uh, I turned to the guy, I said, I should, I should,

I should, I should, I should, I should, I should, I should, I should, I should,

I should, I should, I should, I should, I should, I should, I should, I should,

I should, I should, I should, I should, I should, I should, I should, I should,

I should, I should, I should, I should, I should, I should, I should, I should,

I should, I should, I should, I should, I should, I should, I should, I should,

I should, I should, I should, I should, I should, I should, I should, I should,

I should, I should, I should, I should, I should, I should, I should, I should,

I should, I should, I should, I should, I should, I should, I should, I should,

I should, I should, I should, I should, I should, I should, I should, I should, I should, I should off his wolf and draws a sword and starts running towards you guys and uh you see a couple more guys get off their wolves and start marching towards you a little slower but one of them looks agitated and he's not sure what he's going to do but how many can you can you disball again or no yeah he's their general though uh you you see there's about six orc champions that look like they're a little smaller than they're this general guy and uh they. And they're all kind of like shoving kobolds aside to get to you. Tell your men to command them to stand down. I'm going to do the same. All right.

And roll an intimidation. Okay. 15. He's frenzying, so he's... What'd you roll? Lower. Yeah, he doesn't even hear you. He's just hacking at things.

And Tom, roll a dexterity check, please. Four. All right. What's the wall like? Is it still blue? He hits you for three damage just with the side of his sword while he's hacking at all the guys around him. What's that? What's the wall like is it still blue he hits you for three damage just with the side of his sword while he's hacking and all the guys around him what's that what's the wall like is it still blue uh yes the portal is still blue can i can we try and intimidate instead of him the generals can

can we be some of the other guys yeah or whatever the subs be like follow your general he's leading you. Roll your 20. That's intimidation. 19. You get a plus four, right? Yeah, 19. All right. So the guy who's running towards you slows down and kind of goes like. I'm like, look what he's doing.

He's your general. Now he's walking towards you. Yeah, I say the same thing. Follow your leader. And then that was high. I just rolled a 17 on him. Okay. So follow your leader. And then that was high. I just rolled a 17 on him. Okay. So,

one of the Orc champions looks like he is charging towards Typha. Two of them stop in their tracks. And the general guy is still just enraged and blindly frenzying and hacking against guys. Yeah, do it. That's a 26.

He stops and looks at you and you just see just like black eyes, just completely blood frenzying. Command your troops. He says a thing to you I'm going to bury you so deep your body would be as lost as famous goblin mobster Jimmy Harfog and so

he takes a swing at you And misses What an idiot He's very stupid And he's an asshole Does he have his attention On Ken right now? Uh huh

Is he still killing kobolds? No he stopped and now he's swinging it I'm gonna sever his Achilles tendons Go for it What'd you roll? Is he still killing kobolds? No, he stopped and now he's swinging it. I'm going to sever his Achilles tendons. Go for it. What'd you roll? 13. That's a miss.

Just goes clank off of his armor. Okay, I try again. That one hits. Well, you tell me what, because I know what his armor class is and you don't. What was it? It's a 23. Yeah, that's it.

It's very much that way. Roll for damage. Roll for damage. Roll for damage. He has good armor on him. That's there. I changed it. Now I don't like

the D&D Beyond thing. You don't like the new printout? No, because I know where the other shit was on my old page. Yeah, you got to like add the new armor class bonus

you have and all this other shit. Yeah, and it'll be easier. Well, then I had my Herald of Kilmar all the way in. Click on stuff, too. Like, to look it up. Oh, yeah, right. Man, you guys are such a bunch of millennials. Yeah, that's totally what I am.

Whatever, mom. Eight. All right. On his Achilles tendons. He's gonna do a check to see if he yeah so you don't sever his tendon but you give him a big old gash back there and he is pissed but doesn't know what happened to him because he's having a hard time focusing on anything except for the gent in front of them, which is Tom. That's me.

Okay. Well, I was raging. Next time I'll frenzy so I can get three attacks on him. Sounds good. Who's up? Well, we haven't rolled for order, so I'm going to just give it to you guys in the order that you've attacked. I'm going to go and do that real quick.

All right. And also, at this point, that you've attacked, I'm gonna go and do that real quick. And also at this point, so I'm gonna go Tom, Bodhi, Twee is out of it, Typha and Esmeralda, you've not attacked yet, correct? Right. Okay. I'm gonna say though that I'm going to say though that Magnus and

Jendi are taking attack positions you guys notice Magnus is very nervous but he pulls a wand out and Jendi starts hovering off of her horse.

I wish we had a commercial right now. This check and running order is brought to you by... Pee-pee. Pee-pee. It's not water. It's pee-pee. Hey, where'd that liquid asparagus come from? Pee pee. It's, it's, it's, it's not water. It's pee pee. Hey, where'd that liquid asparagus come from?

Pee pee. Um, all right. So, uh, can I ask a question? Yeah. Typha and Esmeralda,

you, you are, I'm giving you, um, a place to do stuff, even though you're not in the combat order. So I'm going to Typha, you're, you're inquiring.

So just by a random chance, I'm letting you go first. Go. Oh, I'm just wondering, is our plan're inquiring so just by a random chance I'm letting you go first. Go. Is our plan to basically fight them until this portal opens up? Are we just sort of keeping our turf? Yes. Okay, great. That was my question. I'm into that one.

Esmeralda, is there anything you would like to declare before we move into more combat type stuff? We rested in between. We rested after we got Dessa. You guys are up to full health. Okay. Why is that important?

Oh, reasons. Can I try to do, can I try to stand behind the orc a little bit so that when he's facing the other orcs, I can do my actor feed and yell um stan you know attack the kobolds we've been charmed or whatever using that guy's voice uh yes that's what i'm interested however it's gonna be tricky because you're gonna have to kind of get next to bodhi right um because that's where bodhi is so you're gonna put yourself in whatever aggro he might draw. But, uh, what is it?

What is the performance role? Do you remember? I, I know I've looked this up three times now, but, um, I can find it. I know. We need to get like Eldritch Knight spell cards.

Um, I have an advantage on deception and performance checks. Charisma plus five. Oh, the charisma is my fault. It's an actor feat, though, is the thing. Yeah, I know. Oh, well. Hey, Brian, what's this person?

This is brought to you by Greta Van Fleet. Meh. It just says... Oh, you have an advantage. So, okay. It just says you can mimic the speech of another person. It's a regular performance, but have an advantage. So you can mimic the speech of another person. It's a regular performance, but you get advantage. Successful wisdom check contested by my charisma deception check

allows a listener to determine that it's fake. So they would have to, their wisdom, it's a wisdom check for them against my deception check. Well, I get to pick if it's performance or deception. And I'm going to say because it's a big crowd, it's performance. But it doesn't say anything about performance. Oh, I see. Okay, I see what you're saying.

Yeah, because this is more dramatic than just straight up mimic. You've got to convince multiple targets. You're the DM, man. That's what I'm saying. And I'm ready for the hate tweets. So roll 20 and he's going to... I'll have them resist one at a time here. I mean, it was a very bad roll what was it it was a four you're never they all failed except one so the name of the guy who failed oh no that's those are

well he's one of the guys who got off of his wolf but he's like walking and so the name of the guy who failed oh no that's those are well he's one of the guys who got off of his wolf but he's like walking and so the guys who are closer i'll i'll hear uh in that voice uh we've all been shunned and uh they all go oh fuck and um uh they you just see them kind of like doing like a weird like, huh, and they were kind of doing what he was doing in his second one. I said, attack the kobolds. We've all been charmed. Right. Attack the kobolds.

We've all been charmed. And one of them is like, wait, what the, like just narrowing his eyes, but the rest of them all start looking angrily at the kobolds and like looking at their hands and they're not attacking yet, but you do feel like things are next turn going to get real, real, real insane.

Tom, you're up. Well, shit. I don't want to attack the guy. At the kobolds. I will say this is a very full battlefield and this is maybe the last round before you're all no matter what going to just get fucking swarmed

so now is the time to use your non-combat actions because it will be like a relevant next round anything going on with the blue wall? Nope. Is there any way we can put our backs to the blue wall so we're at least

all physically close to it for when it opens up? Yeah, the only trick is so it's kind of like, it's kind of it's kind of behind some of you so by engaging the main orc, you three are a little farther away from this portal. Typha, you're kind of with the two mage college folk

and the horse that's got Dessa sloped across it. So you're kind of close to all that stuff. All right. I want to cast a ray of sickness across a little field of kobolds. Great. Fail. Fail. Fail.

You see 12 kobolds start just, like, puking their guts out. Cobalts start just like puking their guts out. Cobalts by the name of Jaybrads, Jambrant, Bushadam, Hagen D, Juvenia, Lingus. Oh, we already killed them. You guys are dead. Those cobalts are alive. The puking kobolds are Brad Nickfor, Graflex, Aramat, Goodymans, Risenjack, Hassan the Raheemer, Cayman the Unterborn, Langton Kay, Fried and All, Karwaka Waka, Megby Burnt, and Air Jess. Fantastic.

Thanks, you guys. You're up, Rob. This is how we repay you. Is that me? Oh, okay, great. F You're up, Ryan. This is how we repay you. Is that me? Oh, okay, great. Frenzy. Sounds good. Three attacks per round.

I attack. Well, no, the big guy's not on me anymore, huh? I will say the big guy's in some insane frenzy of his own where he seems to be attacking anyone who talks to him. But he did have his sort of spell dispelled. So he's not enthralled by the dragon anymore. I'm going to throw a pouch of oil on a bunch of these kobolds. Sure you are. Yeah.

And then I'm going up light them up with terribly chemo i think i'm gonna massage them yeah so i'm gonna massage the oil across a bunch of them yeah and then i'll just kind of look and then i prick my finger and the blood sacrifice creates a holy flame i'm also screaming fuck you at the top of my lungs um yeah 20 all right uh so as uh Yeah, 20. All right. So as you do that, you light a flame. Kobold's named Brigbran, Wenis, Karzam, Martimax, Saechi, Alabaster, and Martom. And you light a flame.

Higsybert, Joeskertay, Wadilek, Broman, Luke McFierdson, and David Harris Jr. Nice. And, yep, that is a bunch more kobolds you're hacking through. Up next, we have... Well, I have another action. Yeah, that's right, third. I'm going to swing the other way. That one's not as good.

Ten. Does a ten work on them? Yeah. You only take out two of them, though. By the name of Cleaver Sear and Cunningham. Cunningham? Yeah. Mr. C.

Steve Cunningham. I'm barely alive. All right. That's all three attacks. So that brings us to Jendi. She is attempting to cast against everybody. You guys see what looks like a thousand knives splash into a bunch of kobolds that all fall down. Master Banus takes his wand and tries to cast at the orc that looks displeased.

Nothing happens. Okay. Typha, you're up. Is there anybody close to me? There's like one or two kobolds. You're part of a path that sort of was cleared by a thunder wave a while ago i'll swing at whoever's near me i almost wonder if it's more of more value for me to hang on can i can i do like a suspend in action and then

well no but you mean you can you can try you know doing any number of non-combat things if you don't want to engage yeah i don't really have any mean, I don't have any range attacks. I feel like I'm almost of more value of keeping all the horses by the portal for when it opens or maybe helping the wizards call shots. Like if somebody's attacking Esmeralda, could I like somehow support that? You hear coming from Bodhi's horse, hey, let me out.

Let me out of this thing. Why would I let you out? I'll help you. You think I want to die? No, I don't think you want to die, but what happens when you immediately turn on us? You already said you're going to fuck over Bodhi. This would be a really convenient time for you to do that. I mean, I wanted to make this hard

for you, so I... Hit her with a frying pan. Really? I would. Okay. Bodhi calls over his shoulder. That's an easy one. I'll brainer on the fucking head with it. Really? I would. Okay. Bodhi calls over. That's an easy one. I'll brain her on the fucking hand. Will you? Yes.

All right. I hit that kobold. Roll a four-sided. I'm not trying to kill her. No, no. You just knocked her out. She's been knocked around a bunch. Comedically.

It's not that traumatic. Danny DeVito style. If you get knocked out Three times in one evening I feel like She goes I think it's kind of on her At this point Oh listen

I don't like her I asked her to help you You will see We might play that card Right now You get a Hand to the noggin It's comedic

Come on It goes clang when they hit her it vibrates in your hand I know Gago's just buzzing around big guy just utterly

decapitates like just a shitload of these guys. And as he does so, he says, I was beheading Azimar while you were still popping zits on your funny face and jacking off the lingerie section of the modern Canaan catalog. Who is this? That is voice actor Hal Lublin of the Thrilling Adventure album. Oh, sure.

Welcome to Nightfall. Wow. Did he know you were recording him when you were saying all these things? No, it was weird. I came over to his house when his wife wasn't home. You were just playing Fortnite with him. I hid in his closet. How'd you know? Yeah, you were playing fortnight and i was like hey could you just read this real quick like recorded it on my playstation's uh headphones um so yeah he takes out a bunch of uh guys he's still frenzying he's super pissed off and that brings us um around to is it esmeralda

i should hope so what you're gonna do uh is my am i still able to speak as the guy or is that part over now i have to do something else um i think you can do it again. I think it's just, it's like, it's a, I don't think you have a. A time limit. Wait, wait, wait, let me see. You can. What are you looking at? How long may. Oh, you can't, you can't use it again until you.

Yeah, I know it's a once a day thing, so. Yeah, yeah, yeah. These are feats? Yeah. No, I don't think it'll work again. Okay, then I'm going to go ahead and cast Chromatic Orb. If you don't mind. No.

I don't think you've cast that one yet. I don't think I have either because we've had a weird... So, Chromatic Orb. It's a ranged spell attack. You can choose the damage type, which is fun. It goes 90 feet if you like. Right. And it does 3d8 damage to the type you choose. Nice.

I don't heard that. What slot level is it? That also affects... It has to be first because I to the type you choose. Nice. I don't heard that. What slot level is it that also affects? It has to be first because I've already used it. Okay. Yeah. Four inch diameter sphere of energy. So I'm going to go ahead and send... Do I have a sense of what kobolds would be most susceptible to?

Well, why don't you do a perception check and I'll tell you everything you see in the way of what be most susceptible to well why don't you do a perception check and i'll tell you everything you see in in the way of what is uh most susceptible nine uh doobie doo doobie doo uh you get a sense that they would not respond well to um acid that's what I was thinking. These are the kinds of creatures that usually come from a swamp. So if you had to guess, you would think probably, you know, nothing heat related would necessarily do that well either. As long as it's not heat or acid, you think it might.

Oh, wait, it shouldn't be heat or acid. Correct. You think these guys might have some acid tricks up their sleeve. They're acid-y. Got it. You think they might have resistance to acid and fire? The kobolds? But I just fucked them up with fire.

Yeah, well you lit them on fire. They're still burning, but they took less damage than they... Cool, I'm just gonna're still burning, but they took less damage than they... Cool. I'm just going to free... No, poison. All right. Poison?

Yeah, I'm going to try poison. All right, roll 3d8. Poison what? It just says poison. It's one of my choices. Oh. Oh, did you... Yeah, got it.

Brett Michaels comes out. Chromatic poison. Everybody leaves. of my choices. Oh, did you? I got it. Brett Michaels comes out. Chromatic poison. Everybody leaves. C.C. DeVille. You had to just shoot me with that. Oh, man. Was he nice? He was very nice.

11. That's the one time we are on. It's a hit. It's a hit. Oh, with eight. I thought you said 3D8. Mm-hmm. Oh, yeah.

That was 11 total of my 3d8. Yeah. I mean, but you hit, you hit like three groups of them with this stuff. This like purple, uh, fluid just sprays out across all of them.

That spray is poison. none of them die, but you do feel like you've got them all kind of like hissing at you and screaming and they look upset. They are not great. And that takes us back to the top. And a lot of things happen at once. You hear a great roaring in the sky.

And you see three very long serpent-like mini dragons that had stopped and been watching the action from a distance. Kind of raise up on these tiny little legs, and they're like 50 feet tall, and they all kind of slam their head into the ground, and you see mud kind of splatter out as they look like they have buried their heads in the ground and their tails start going. Like digging? Yeah, like digging.

You see all the kobolds just rush towards this sort of nexus that you guys have created, a few hundred of them. The orcs, however, are in deep shit. So all of them, whether they were on your side or not, they were about 50 feet away, and they're all just buried in kobolds. The kobolds are panicking. How's the portal looking portal still blue is twee somewhere like standing at like a fork in a road going like no um i will give you guys a little freebie hint though twee can fly for 10 minutes outside of the feywild and so that's how long he is probably

going to fly unless he can get to the city first so it's 10 minutes worth of turns before he's or him getting to the city before okay so i'm taking the distance of him flying to the city or hitting the limit on his fly that's how many turns you guys get before this portal will suddenly go zoop. So that's the... We're only at like three, I think. It's been like nine minutes and 45 seconds, right? You feel like you might be a third of the way into the clock. All right.

Ken's up, right? Ken is up. Ken's up right Ken is up Ken you see about what looks like a 20 foot tall wave of kobolds just hustling towards all of you might take a turn to get to you but there's immediately a new dozen kobolds

stabbing at your legs that are gonna hurt little fuckers I will gonna hurt little fuckers i will slash at them with my sword go for it plus yeah put what plus your uh strength right that's a plus one so that's a miss you just swing and you just clack off their ramshackle armor they kind of dodge around it all right and that puts you up bode uh frenzy izy. You're still frenzied, yes. Yeah. I'm off my horse.

I'm wading through these guys. Right. The horses are back with Typha. Yeah. And I'm just going to kick and slash as I go towards. I'm going to try to make my way towards the blue wall. OK. So I'm close to it and then have my back against it and still kill guys.

OK. But I'm heading towards there. OK so i'm gonna slash once with herald of kilmar that's a crit that's a natural 20 yeah so that i have uh all right this is gonna be pretty brutal critical right roll 100 please it is a brutal that's that is his first brutal critical so you he gets to get was it good to do i don't know where's the other all right yeah to the listeners come on come on 99 brutal critical oh shit 90 90 damage yes oh 90 on the critic okay okay so critical and um this also means that you get

an additional damage dice in addition to what is also happening. Yeah, because you told me to roll a percentage. So... Jesus Christ. Damage? Or no. I will say right before you get this damage, the head of a dragon worm bursts out of the ground in front of you,

and a bunch of kobolds get knocked to the side as this medium-sized black dragon appears right in front of you. Okay. Roll for damage. He's laying it out for you on a silver platter. All right. Eight, nine, 13. 13 damage?

Well, yeah. Okay. Is that worth the extra dice? Yeah. Okay. In addition to that, roll 3D6. Six, eight. Okay. Oh, 12. Oh oh that's a lot more all right so as this thing comes out of the ground you just hack this thing's jaw off and a bunch of uh acid uh just green flowing blood just kind of

pours out of its face and it just starts whipping its head back and forth okay uh do a dexterity check because things might get cronenbergy yep what'd you get uh is it dex or athletics it's uh this is dex you're avoiding so 17 all right so you just managed to step out of the way as a huge uh of alien-like acid blood just splashes around your boots. Danger sense would have helped me with that, too. Yeah, you had advantage. You would have been able to roll a second time to dodge it. All right, that'll take us to your next attack.

That was your first attack. Jesus Christ. 15. Is that a hit? Yeah, you're going for the kobolds with this big fucking dragon in front of you. I'll take him again. Okay.

Roll for damage. That's a hit. 9, 13. All right. 913 alright plus fire or does he not take fire he seems to take a little bit of resistance against it just kind of poofs against his armor a little bit third attack is up

alright that's 16 poofs against his armor a little bit. Third attack is up. All right. That's 16. That's a hit. Roll for damage. 13. Nice. A big old piece of pink meat sort of appears in this thing's belly,

but it's real tall. I mean, it's sticking out of the ground about double your height still thrashing around from when you knocked its jaw off. So it's pissed. It's maybe close to death but it's not done attacking. That'll put us at It could blow wind on him. What can I do?

That'll put us at Jendi. Are we at an hour oh okay just about uh jendy fires a bunch of magic missiles at kobolds and manages to clear some space for you guys it looks like she puts off the wave that's gonna hit tom bodie and esmeralda first by at least half a turn-ish. Maybe you won't take quite as much damage there. Magnus is just sort of firing his wand and he cannot get a response from anything with his wand. He's just panicking. And so you feel like you're fending him off, but it might be a couple more turns.

It's going to be a big cliffhanger for this episode. You guys have got still hundreds of kobolds coming down on you. And you saw three large, not large, large enough to be terrifying, but smaller than Stormdoor. Serpent-like dragons go in the ground, and only one has come up out of the ground so far right in Bodhi's face. Bodhi relieved it of its jaw. He did.

And there is also a few other beasties in this thing that could come right after you. So we're going to hit pause there, you guys. Thanks for listening, guys. That was episode 27 of Brian Poussain's Nerd Poker. BrianPoussain.er. BrianPersain.com Pick up Mad Magazine. Anything else anybody wants to plug? Chris, your new show

on yet? New episodes will probably be on what is this on? August? New episodes will be on next month. Probably September. Cool. Cool.

Thanks, guys. Thank you. 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.