Nerd Poker - Episode 28 - The Obsidian Curse

Episode Date: November 1, 2017

Finally our heroes emerge from the ghostly ring of ghouls to find an ancient battleground that causes concern among the wood elves (WOOD ELVES?) and one of Blaine’s most sincere sponsor ads yet. Will our heroes get sucked beneath the wastes? Will a new non-player character become a new creepy-ass foe? 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 fifth edition, and we're ready. So are you ready? Here's Brian Poussaint's Nerd Poker. Hey, everybody. It's Brian. He just asked me to do a weird one So that's what I did Brian Pussain

You're listening to Brian Pussain's Nerd Poker Oh boy it's a heck of a kind of poker I've got some friends here Same friends as usual We've got Ken, Dan, Blaine Hi We go back a long time.

We've done so many shows. We did Nerd Uno. We did Nerd P-Knuckle. Yeah. We did Nerd Bridge. Nerd Backgammon. Yeah, we did Nerd Pai Gao. Yeah.

Nerd Cribbage. Nerd Cribbage. Yeah. Yeah, some amazing, Nerd Old Maid. Nerd Tennis back in the 70s. Yes, yeah. Good stuff. Been through a lot.

Let's take a look at that clip. Hey! You guys, we have some serious new loot. Oh, yeah, we got some nice stuff. You've heard us give verbal blowjobs to Elderwood Academy before. But holy shit. Thanks, Elderwood Academy. Yeah, thank you.

So it's basically like this. I had this sweet-ass Cthulhu dice tower. They sent us all the books that you could put your dice in and roll your dice in. But everybody was always like, hey Dan, you got a dice tower. And then they would just kind of quietly stare at me

for a second and then we would change the conversation. No more of that, son. We all got dice towers. Elderwood came through. Everyone's got dice towers. And they've got the Nerd Poker logo or emblem on them. Not too shabby. They're pretty cool.

Amazing. My likeness burned into wood. They did a beautiful high-res wooden burn of our logo into these dice towers. It is the greatest like... The thing I really love is

if you look into it at the right angle... No, look, I'm looking into it. I can hear the Family Affair theme. They look a little like a leather and wood kaleidoscope. But they might sell those eventually. We're talking to them about it. Sorry, I'm looking at this racy picture of Miss Beasley. In the meantime, if you guys...

Whoa, take off that blue polka dot dress. I'd love for them to sell some nerd polka dot dress. So here's the deal. They sent this to us because they were super happy with the promotion we did back in August, early September. And so what they said was, hey, why don't we set up a little link and we'll give you some of the proceeds if people use the link. Because they said they noticed people were writing in the notes when they made orders like we heard about you through Nerd Poker. So, hey, why don't you go buy some more stuff or if you haven't yet go for it these dice towers are really awesome but go to elderwoodacademy.com slash nerd poker yeah they make great stuff and uh we'll tweet out a link around the time this episode drops this is

like the kind of stuff it sounds cheesy but you never knew you needed until you have it you know what i mean you know what I mean? I know a lot of people think that maybe I haven't played Dungeons & Dragons for 30 years because I still don't understand the fucking rules. That's because I've smoked pot for 28 years.

They also resell you a $50 set of rules every 10 years. Keep changing them. Yeah. I'm going to stop asking. There's a particular listener who doesn't want me to ask about raging anymore, so I won't. He looked like he was a disappointed lover just then. But what I'm saying is this stuff, I've never had a tray like this.

I've never had the, you know. When you started the podcast and, like, you started getting a huge fan base, did you feel like you had leveled up as a nerd a little bit? Yeah. Do you feel like maybe you leveled up again now that you have your fucking face burned into a dice tower? That's pretty cool. Yeah, you never realized you needed that until that happens.

Oh, man. I needed that. I think you've got a variation, too. Like, my dice tower is a clear shot all the way down, but you look like you guys got a ramp. Yeah. We have a thing that kind of... That gives it a little click.

It flips the die on the way down. He does a triple Indy. I saw one guy did a dive. That must be the experiment, because they told me they wanted to try an experiment with the dice. And it rolled a 20. I just did a triple Indy into a 20. Oh, man. That must be the experiment, because they told me they wanted to try an experiment. And I rolled a 20. I just did a triple Indy into a 20.

Oh, man. That's pretty sweet. I just did an 18. And a 16. A 17. 11. 5. This is great.

Welcome to the Rolling Dice Podcast with your host. Watching somebody play Metallic Electronics football. We sure will. Hey, Patreon. Oh, by the way, the people that won, I finally sent out your prizes. Yeah, you can stop emailing

the NerdPoker account saying, hey, did it get lost? Can I have a tracking number, please? They probably smell like my dog Ernie because they were sitting where he sleeps for several weeks. That's true. And I saw you express his anal gland on all the boxes.

That was my anal gland. Oh! Yummy. Hey, Patreons, you know what? You make this podcast what it is. So, hey, thank you, Templeton Peck. Templeton? Templeton Peck?

That's from a thing. He's an explorer. Thank you, Torgo Love thing He's an explorer Thank you Torgo Love Ah Sweet Torgo Love The forbidden Torgo Love Thank you Riley Van Riley Van

What Thank you Andy Gladys. Thanks, Andy. Are you sure that's not and why Gladys? Why Gladys? Why? Why glad why is?

All right. And thank you, Rex. Thanks, Rex. Rex. Thanks, Rex. You're great. I didn't know the Secretary of State listened to Nerd Poker.

Story 1, 2, and 3. Isn't he voiced by... I always forget the guy's name, but he's a playwright, too. It's Wallace Shawn. Yeah, Wallace Shawn. Inconceivable. Rhodes looked like Wallace Shawn for the first four months

of his life. Oh, you know what? Most babies do. I would hold Rhodes up when he was tiny and go, inconceivable. And he would be like, let me tell you about the screeching eels. So, hey, why don't we catch everybody up on the story thus far? Sounds good. If this is your first episode, what a weird time to jump in. But why the fuck not?

So you're on a weird dark island called Minna. You're hunting the Demolith, a guy who's sort of the dark lord of the island. Would this be the most dangerous game? According to some

chick tracks, I think a Demolith would be more dangerous than that. Man is the most dangerous game. But a Demolith, I think, would be more of a...

Yeah, let me say it one more time. Man is the most dangerous game. Oh, but a demolith, I think, would be more of a... Yeah, let me say it one more time. Man is the most dangerous game. Oh, man's the most dangerous game. I thought it was highlight. Amy Mann is the most dangerous game. Highlight is pretty dangerous. And if rollerball was real, that would be the most dangerous game.

Fourth grade smear the queers, actually. Oh! Problematic, Brian. Problematic. I said fourth grade. Sorry, Brian. Problematic. I said fourth grade in the 70s. Oh, God. I had to play that game a lot against my will.

Oh. They had their own rules at my school. Believe me, I got smeared quite a bit. Hey, everybody. So we've got some vampires you've been killing. And you're actually, you got this little army, and you're traveling across the wastelands through some ghosty mists. And you just emerged from the mists after killing one of the vampires, and you're trying to meet one you're kind of friends with.

You kind of made an alliance with Count Barriss. We're looking for him. And you're heading back to an abandoned dwarven city that he has been hiding out in. So you don't know much about it other than you passed it on the way down to recruit the wood elves. You saw a large

stone gate in the side of a mountain. You're approaching that area right now. Ken has got his map out if you want to share with the group, Ken. Our beautiful map drawn by listener Sean Bryant.

There's the gate you're approaching right there. What's in front you're approaching. Right there. What's in front of it? Looks like Yucum. And that's what you're seeing, actually. The Yucum. So the ground has been sandy, dusty. I love the other map.

The main Wu-Tang style map? Yeah, the Wu-Tang map ain't nothing to fuck with. That's what I like to see. Is that the shirt we're making? We're going to put that on a... I'd love to have a shirt that says, WuTang Map Ain't Nothing to Fuck with the map. That would be really funny. Yeah, I was thinking maybe we could do it on a brown shirt

and ask Sean to remove the border so it's just the island floating on the shirt and then you put in a solid black font under it like Wu-Tang Map font under it like routine mapping. Is this going to be instead of my happy fisherman shirt? Yeah. You get a free happy fisherman shirt when you get the routine mapping. Fans, the next fan art we need is

we need twee fishing. Where's the four of us doing the happy fisherman thing on the back? I don't know what that is. Or we can all fly united. Yeah, what is the Happy Fisherman thing? Because I'm just envisioning just like a cute Norman Rockwell thing. If I ever produced a show, that was going to be my card. Oh, really?

Yeah. What is it? The Happy Fisherman is like a really stupid drawing, a funny drawing. It's a guy standing in the water fishing, and he's got a big smile on his face. And then you see under the water that is there's a fish sucking his dick and then there's three bubbles coming out of the water

there it is classic Lucas toes yeah and I saw variations on that on that shirt I take it back nobody draw this yeah don't anybody draw us as the happy fisherman no no no edit point Take it back. Nobody draw this. Yeah, don't anybody draw us as the happy fishermen.

No, no, no. You can beat that. At any point, it would be good. Or making bacon. Or being so happy we could just shit. We're approaching the wall. Yeah, you've got a small army with you, and the ground changes. Stuff on the ground, right?

Yeah, it's not stuff on the ground, but rather the ground has been changed somehow. The ground is a different kind of rock. It's a shiny black rock. Like an obsidian almost? Yes, like an obsidian almost. Burnted. And as you approach,

Gago kind of wakes up and he starts fluttering over Bodhi's shoulder. He's kind of sleeping in a purr. What is it, Gago kind of wakes up, and he starts fluttering over Bodhi's shoulder. He kind of was sleeping in a purr. What is it, Gago? He's like, I don't know, man. I just got a weird vibe, and I woke up. What kind of vibe? I don't know.

Just a magical vibe, I guess. And the deer and the wood elves that are riding them all kind of stop your steeds weren't stopping those so you guys unless you want to stop your steeds are just proceeding over the shale as if nothing has happened yeah let's keep going oh that's a good question uh not at the moment no unless you got to cast the spell to I mean you don't just have like a sonar hat on right um who can bestest now man I just got kind of like an innate soft sense magic thing cuz I'm a fake creature.

Is it getting stronger as we get closer to this thing obviously? I feel like it's the ground. You're continuing on. The wood elf army has stopped completely and you're leaving them behind.

Let's ask them what's going on. Why are they stopping? Forenmeyer calls out and says, my steeds don't want to cross this rock. There's something that's frightening them. It's going to turn liquid and then engulf us and then turn solid again. You notice some of the druids are getting off their mounts and examining very closely without touching the ground.

Yeah, let's get off. You going to head back or you going to just dismount? the druids are getting off their mounts and examining very closely without touching the ground. Yeah. Let's get off. Let's head back. You can just dismount. No, head back. Yeah. Head back.

All right. So you head back and yeah, the druids are casting some, you know, sort of detect spells. Uh, they say there's definitely some kind of curse on the ground here. Um,

they wonder if your steeds are unaffected because they're undead. Hmm. Oh, maybe. Hence why you were able to travel over it before without really stopping. That's why they didn't stop. Yeah, but they're wondering if something will happen if a living creature touches it. Where is Barriss? Let's throw somebody on it.

So the gate, you see it in the distance, but it's really far away. It's a solid five miles across this. Are there any sort of stepping stones in the middle of this blackness? A couple, but they're real far apart. Like you see there's boulders that kind of jut out of it, but they're like, you know, 100 yards apart at least. Yeah, I'm going to go up and take a look around. Okay.

Tui, as you fly over, you see it's just a wasteland like the one you came from, except here the ground is different. How high up are you? I'm going to kind of fly high enough that I don't get spotted by anyone over at that gate. Okay. I'm going to go up far enough and fly around fast enough

to kind of take a look around to see if there's any paths or any place where there's regular ground closer to the gate. Yeah, you'd have to fly a lot closer to get a good look at or make any observations about the shale itself uh or the obsidian or whatever you want to call it i can tell you right now it's neither but uh it it looks like something between those two things my word and your word and uh yeah there's a small patch outside the gate of regular ground um you definitely uh looking at the gate it looks like it descends a little bit maybe there's some kind of door you can't quite tell from where you're at nothing unusual other than just sort of

the ground is different and it's open space there's no trees there's no there any there's no way to get around it and come down from above? No, in fact, once you do a complete circle, you realize it looks like sort of a splash zone. It looks as if this shale has splattered outwards from around the gate, almost as if the gate is wearing it like a long beard. So the gate is up against the side of the mountain uh the the black rock uh up goes up the wall around the gate a little bit but not all the way up as high as the gate is the gate is a couple hundred yards high and the black rock goes up the side of the mountain like 20 yards um and then

five miles in every direction in a semicircle around the gate, there's just this black wasteland. Okay, let's go back to the other continent. The continent? You mean like just don't go see Barris? Yeah. Can we create some kind of a magical bridge or something? Yeah, I'm trying to think if,

I don't think I could levitate a platform and take you guys across it, because then we'd... Well, the Druids are having a conversation. They said they think they can concoct a combination of spells, like Dispel Evil, and maybe even levitate,

and try something on all the steeds, but they would pretty much want to race across and have to be really careful. And yeah, they say if you give them about an hour, they should be able to... Oh, what did you just... Oh, do you just figure out how to take your plank out? It's a magnet.

Oh, it's a magnet. Oh, so it's removable. Elderwood Academy, you make some fancy shit. It's great. And I mean the good kind of shit. Just like synonym for stuff. Are you seeing if it fits in mine? Oh, it does.

Look at that. I just didn't get one. You guys got prototypes, basically. Prototype. So yeah, what do you want to do? Wait an hour? Prototypes. It's a real crapshoot.

Formeyer tells you you can trust his spells, but he barely trusts them. He's conferring with the other elder in the group and wondering if they should just camp here, unless you have a better idea. What do you guys think? Should we risk it and go on these?

He says they'll follow you if you want them to. Send dead steeds and just go? If you let them make a decision, they're 50-50 right now. Is there anything we can test it with? Yeah, there's little rocks everywhere. Throw a rock on it? If you wait around, you can see, there's little rocks everywhere. Yeah, throw a rock on it. If you wait around,

you can see if there's any wildlife. We walked out. How far did we walk out? But we were on dead steeds. So if you look at the map again, you walked across the edge of it. So for like about a mile of it, you crossed it.

You saw the gate and decided not to explore it so you walked southeast across it now you're going straight north and um yeah you know the uh if you you've got an hour while they cast spells on their steeds if you want you can wait and i can uh roll to see if any wildlife shows up. Yeah. All right. So this is a wasteland. I'm going to say it's got a, I'm going to give you three rolls. And if it goes over 16, something will show up. I'll roll a dice to see what.

Oh, you're wrong. Yep. Okay. And then I have four kinds of wildlife that might show up i'm gonna roll a four-sided okay so something that looks like a large two-headed lizard about the size of a toaster just sort of casually is wandering by about 20 yards away from where your group is. How big is it? About the size of a toaster. And what is it? A lizard?

A two-headed lizard. Oh, weird. I'm going to try and catch it. Hmm? I'm going to try and catch one. Catch it. How are you going to? Take some food and sort of maybe lure it.

I mean, usually if you catch one. It's like a big juicy fly, Ken. I used to catch horny toes and I would just run up and grab them. Is that what you're going to try? I'm fairly dexterous. All right. Why don't you roll a dex check. What's your modifier?

Oh, you know what? I should be a good DM now that I've got D&D Beyond. You know what it is. I forget a new part of my setup is busting out all your characters in my browser. It's a four in my paper. I think it's a five in your paper. It's a seven if you had a couple of drinks. Oh, God.

Brian, are you okay? Nah. You were out for a while. Is he all right? You're the only one who actually made their character with one account, so you take longer. Okay, you have a modifier plus four. Go back into your medically induced coma.

So you need to catch him on first try, and you need 15. Bam! All right. I caught him twice. You do like a hop and a skip and a scoop and you just grab this guy right below the jawline so he's completely helpless all right uh what you want to do with him toss him onto the obsidian

i approve of that it's how are you going to throw him? Should I do it? Not far enough to kill him. Why don't you guys take a second to decide who's throwing it and how you're doing it. I don't want to kill him, though. I just want to get him onto the black glassy part. You can try to skip him like a stone. No, no, I don't want to injure him.

Okay. Then I won't do it. Unless you want to skip him like a stone. No, no, I don't want to injure him. Okay. Then I won't do it. Unless you want to fly him. No, I don't think that's safe. I don't want you to get close to it. I don't want him to get close to this stuff. No, I'll stay with him. That's up to you.

Just toss him. Yeah, I'm just going to toss him. How hard are you going to throw him? Give him a nice lobby throw. All right. I'm'm gonna say roll a six sided. Not overhanded. And it's gonna go two feet for every number on the dice. From the edge of the... From the edge. So six feet. Okay so So it goes thud, and it lands on its back, and it turns over. It kind of looks around for a rock to skid or two.

It starts heading away towards you, away from the gate, kind of running back. And the ground starts to rise up a little bit where it landed. And it takes the form of an obsidian humanoid shape that looks vaguely dwarvish. Bigger? It's holding in its hand some kind of stone club, and it crushes the lizard in one hit. And descends back into the obsidian.

Weird. Huh. Well, that's something we could potentially fight if we had to. But if we're on our horses, we could get to the door. Yeah. I'm for going. With or without your friends? They're not that good of friends.

Do you want them to stay or do you want them to try their spell and come with you? They'll go either. When will they? But I thought we had to wait another hour or something. You basically waited an hour for wildlife to show up and they're ready to go now. Okay, let's go then.

They're up for trying it, yeah. Yeah, I was just saying I didn't want to fucking wait anymore. Now you know what may happen if any of their reindeer's hooves accidentally makes contact with the obsidian. Yeah, okay. All right, so there I'm going to do a group of wheels. I thought it was shale. So we're going to have them follow us or not?

Yeah, they're going to follow you, and basically you're going five miles, so I'm going to do... Five miles? Yeah. Yeah, you said it was about five miles. You're five miles away. Wow. Yeah, and if you were by yourselves, there would basically be no chance of an encounter

because your steeds are undead and they're not going to trigger this. That's why I don't necessarily want to bring the army with us. Oh, okay. Oh, shit. Yeah, wow. Those magnets are strong. Holy crap. This stuff is just fun to play with. yeah i'm like these magnets are strong holy crap this stuff is just fun to play with i wish i knew how magnets work if only there was a video

if only someone would wrap it to me uh so yeah uh i would basically do a roll uh uh during to to equal the five miles as a check to make sure that their deer were dexterous enough to make it across. Oh, you're going to do that. I'll do it. Yeah, okay. You game? Yeah.

How many? I don't know. You got 17 soldiers coming with you, so I got to roll. It's too big of a chance. I'll give you a better chance if you want to bring fewer people. But the more people you bring the greater the odds that one of them one of their hooves is just gonna yeah let's split them because you look at the steeds and you see that they're all like

hovering six inches off the ground and he says they've got a dispel evil on them as well um a special kind of dispel Evil that's got someone dead in there. Let's take half. He picks eight of his bravest soldiers, tells a couple of the braver ones to stay behind as well to protect, and they

said they're going to set up a camp. Four of Mire will accompany you as well. Cool. I'm going to roll and I'm going to roll, and I'm going to say their overall dex evens out to pretty good, but it's only a 15. So I'm going to roll five times for each mile and let you know what happens.

Success. This is going to take a while. I might want to mention that it's a good time to get some tickets to an exciting new musical, Snap, Crackle, and Pop, a very special one-woman show. Seats still available at the Montalban. For some reason, they can't seem to sell any tickets for the Snap, Crackle, and Pop, very special one-woman show at the Montalban.

So please help them out. Please help them out at the Montalban. So please help him out. Please help him out at the Montalban. They really need this one. They need this one. The guy put his heart and soul into it. I don't want to tell you who it is. Somebody very near and dear to me wrote, produced, directed, starred, and reviewed this amazing, amazing one-woman show,

Snap, Crackle, and Pop at the Mont snap crackle pop last one it's not me I'm not talking about myself I would never do such a thing it's not my wife and it's nobody that's related to us directly so anyway but still just to get tickets snap crackle a pop is an exciting bio musical what sorry what's the story about who's it tell the story of Oh snap crackle, sorry? What's the story about? Who's to tell the story of? Oh, Snap, Crackle, and Pop. Well, it's the story of three siblings.

They get magical powers when they get soaked in milk. Oh, I see. That sounds amazing. Yeah. I want to hear how they discovered these powers. It's a musical? Well, they all got jobs. They were in Alaska, and their father was one of those ice road truckers. I was really hoping.

Swallowed up by the ice. For a different kind of getting soaked in milk story. Mom had hepatitis real bad and died when they were young. Hey, Brian, wake up. Wayne's almost done with this bit. Anyway, then they sold themselves into milk slavery, and that's when they found out when the milk hit them that they got... There's pizza coming, Brian.

There's pizza coming. That they hated the milk so much they started yelling and snapping and crackling and popping. This bit. I don't want to spoil anything. So you get... That ended on a great milk joke. Anyway, there's still some tickets available. I'm not sure why or how there would be...

Our audience wasn't able to see my eyes roll into the back of my fucking head doing that. You get about half a mile away from the gate. Big black expanse behind you. You're real close. You start seeing a little deep into the gate. There are indeed doors. The gate itself looks like it's thousands of years old really old stone the top

of it's been uh severely damaged the bottom of it's been severely damaged you're wondering exactly why the middle is the healthiest part of the gate but uh it looks like there was some sort of ground battle at some point and something either collided with or happened near the top of the gate as well. Partially caved in, you see a wrecked cart covered in rubble. You see what looks like a door that's maybe only a couple centuries old as opposed to thousands that's been fixed to the gate. So it's not new, but it's not old like the rest of the gate. And it sort of stands out a little bit. And right when you notice that door, one of the reindeer trips over one of the rocks that's sticking up out of the shale city.

Shale. that's sticking up out of the shale city in shale and uh its knee plants right right in there um uh quickly it regains itself and hovers up again uh i bet you one of those creatures they all start booking it towards the gate um None of them are touching the ground because of the speed, but you can tell they've been careful so far and kind of going slow, and now they're trying to reach as close to fuck it speed as they can without accidentally touching the ground. It's tough because the reindeer seem unsure how to hover walk. They're kind of like over the ground. to hover walk. They're kind of like over the

ground. You guys make about half the distance before you realize you're being chased by one of those obsidian dwarves. Who cares? It's moving

real fast. You make it right to the gate and it gets past just as you passed the obsidian. It walks off of the obsidian. I want to attack it. Yeah, roll for initiative.

Fifty. Twelve. Ten. 12 10 12 10 15 oh wait don't I have 12 bonus yeah you should all have some kind of modifier still I still just rolled a 12 so 10 probably goes first I think that's one of my bonuses I think it's right there, you got a 4 Oh, initiative, plus 4 That's a 19

Wow, hear that listeners? I told somebody something I actually knew where something was on my page okay sheet so he rolled real low a bunch of arrows immediately go against this guy like six of them most Mostly archers are with you. And they all just bounce right off and snap as they hit the obsidian. Forenmeyer goes into bear mode and dismounts.

And he grabs hold of this thing by the neck with his jaw, just as you go, Tom. He's grabbing it? Yeah. I can't really. I'm going to shoot a firebolt at it, I guess. Go for it. Sure, sure.

Isn't that going to hit him? I'm going to say if you roll a one or a two, it's not gonna hit him um i'm gonna say if you uh roll a one or a two okay it's gonna don't roll a one or a two roll you roll 20. roll 20. roll 20. yeah yeah you're fine you're fine so roll roll for damage foreign the bear's okay he is uh i don't know save it save it down save it save it they back this is name wrong for Meyer 17 all right so he resists a nice chunk of that because he is made of stone and I you shot fire at him. As you... Your fireball goes

into him. Fortenmeyer whips his neck, and he goes flying and lands back in the obsidian. Fortenmeyer? No, the stone dwarf. Twee, you're up.

Fortenmeyer? Fortenmeyer. And so this thing is back into the obsidian, right? He's about 20 yards in. He looks like he took a lot of damage from getting tossed. Is he getting up and coming back? He's getting up, but he lost his turn. Are you saying a dwarf got tossed?

Is that what you just said? No. Okay, that's what I said. That's what you said, you fucking asshole. I'm going to go fly directly over it, and I'm going to fire a thunder wave directly on top of its head. Cool, let's find out what happens

with that thunder wave right after this. Nerd poker break for pizza. Hey, Sam, wake up, motherfucker. Oh, you were ready. You're giving me the finger. Let's pause. We're back.

Baby back. It's not real smoke. Blaine, you're descending on this guy about to cast Thunderwave. Sure. Why don't you roll for damage, fella? Why not roll for damage? It's 2d8, I believe, unless you get an extra dice for your level. I'm not sure.

Cream on the exit. Second level or higher. Damage increases for every... Thunderwave. Hell no! Somebody's stealing my Ducati! Slow it down. A little Fast and Furious happening. That was the most engine noise I've ever heard at your house.

That was amazing. You told me about the kids who live nearby. Eight. Do I get another one? Because of level. I'm sixth, right? I'm looking it up. another one?

Because the level... I'm 6th, right? I'm looking it up. At higher level, when you cast a spell using a spell... Oh, what's the spell slot? Is it second level or higher? I think it's... Tell me what spell slot level it is. It's probably just on one or two. I think it's... Tell me what spell slot level it is. It's probably just on one or two.

So it's just those two then. Eight. Okay. So, yeah, you crunch him. Looks like part of his hand falls off. He gets on his knees, stands back up, and starts walking back towards the group without acknowledging you. What could I do to this guy?

You are up, Bodhi. I wish I had something special for him. Other than just raging. Yeah, you don't have a lot of distance weapons. He's kind of marching in, so... Right, well, I'm going to go hand-to-hand with him, but... All your compatriots are pulling out either swords or a couple of them have

uh hammers well they got maces they're not really people of hammers is this like a tall guy yeah big guy no he looks like a dwarf I just have my I mean he's stout but that's why you think he's a dwarf because he's short and he's got broad shoulders do I have

a uh okay alright um I'll wait till the next thing I'm gonna rage shoulders. Do I have a, uh, okay. All right. Um, I'll wait till the next thing. I'm going to rage. All right. How many do I get? Fuck all of you. I wish you could have seen just the quizzical look on Brian's face.

And then angry as fuck eyebrows. He said that I'm a good actor sometimes. I got my one note. You go to Paris, France. That'd be 22. At his face. Cool. He's not in range yet.

So. I was. Why'd you let me do that then i don't know it's fun not for me i was waiting to see exactly what you thought you were doing i thought i was close to him i i said i was gonna go hand to hand he's like he's like 10 yards away so he's close but you'd have to step i mean like if you want to step onto the black rock, you get to take that swing you just rolled. Hmm. Oh, but he's... I thought he had walked off of it.

No, he's marching back. I mean, he got thrown far enough it's going to take him a turn to get all the way back. Okay, well, I'll wait then. I don't have a ranged weapon. So you're just going to hang out at the edge? Are you going to go right to the edge, or are you going to back up a little bit? Wait for him to, like, set foot, or are you going to try to knock him back again? Yeah, right up to the edge.

Okay, cool. All the other elves wait as well, and they're not firing arrows or anything. Once he gets in there, pardon me while I do the little auto-roll, I have an algorithm set up to automatically do a dice roll when there's this huge number of elves because it just would be tedious if you watched me roll dice eight times um so uh for that you know i guess they're like scimitars they're no scimitars are swords what do you they're like a small mace. They're longer than they are heavy at the end.

Yeah, scimitars, yeah, the curvy sword. This looks more like, I don't know, like a long bat with a knob at the end of it. Like my dick. Yeah, bro. Wow, it got me to the trademark. Welcome to jock poker. We should make football jerseys. They go right up with Bodhi, and the ones who get a roll, the four, all wind up.

And as soon as this guy is in range, they thud almost in unison into this guy. So there's like three elves with clubs wait for him to get close. And in an attempt to knock him back again, kind of just crack into his torso. And they take some chunks out of him. He wheels back a little bit, but then he starts marching forward again. Vormeyer backs up behind Bodie Tom Europe yeah I'm gonna pop it with my sword go for it I've been range yeah yeah all right this would be a good time to mention tickets still available for the snap crackling pop musical very special one woman show it's not the one

who's playing snap crackling pop you said it's a one-person show right one woman show you know what there's a lot of things that uh you just have to kind of go and take a roll 13 to understand oh no that's actually yeah that's uh can I start guessing sure that's a. But yeah, roll for damage. Share. So yeah, he doesn't take six. That was easy. She's one. You knock a couple of pebbles off of him.

Nice. Well, there's also Crackle and Snap. Well, that's a three-person show. What would you like to do, Tui? Well, she's the woman in it. Hey, Tui. Oh, what? Sorry? DM takes over the woman in it. Hey, Tweet. Oh, what? Sorry?

DM takes over your character in three, two, one. I am going to cast my little friend, Unseen Servant. And my friend, Unseen Servant, is going to try to do this. Remember, you've got a new trick you can do with him. He can manifest from a distance. He can also hide his penis between his legs. Up to 30 yards. Can he sing that song from a distance?

About having... From a distance. God, I wish. Oh, dang it. Him just sort of being a nuisance that might trip this thing and maybe get it on the ground a little bit so that we can... Are you going to have him kneel behind him?

Yeah. Oh, is he going to kneel behind him or is he going to just straight up try to trip him? I think he's going to stay unseen and then try to trip the guy. He's going to... So he's going to plant and then we'll see what happens? Yeah. Great.

Is he going to snicker while he does it? Take himself away. Foren Meyer is using his turn to see what Bodhi does. He's in bear form. He can't really reach out and attack unless he waddles up with his big old bear body and swats at him. So he's going to let Bodhi have first. I'm going to hack at this son of a bitch.

Go for it. Oh, by the way, are you going to prick your thumb and send a line of blood up your sword and have the hell of Kelmar burst into flames? I said I was going to rage earlier, I remember. But I'm talking about setting your sword on fire.

You're doing that, right? Oh, yeah. Blood sacrifice to Kord? Yes. Yeah. Alright, great. doing that oh yeah blood sacrifice to cord yes yeah all right great that would be a 19 all right so that's a hit so you got that. Roll for damage please. Remember you've got a plus one greatsword now so add a one to whatever you roll for your attack. Yeah Cher plays pop. Oh okay.

Five, nine plays Pop. Oh, okay. Uh, five, nine, ten. So, as Bodhi winds up and plants the Herald of Kelmar right in the torso of this obsidian dwarf, the sword kind of lands with a chunk, almost as if he's made of wood. Oh, no. The fire seems, for just a second to get sucked out of his sword and into the body of the door of good and he explodes

backwards and flaming charcoal across the waist is he dead he's obliterated now he's 50 dwarves you get the sense that maybe he could have taken a lot more hits because he didn't look in rough shape, but maybe that he is extremely weak to fire. I don't know if you caught that because you were enjoying your riff. Listeners, Brian was smiling and letting the engineer know what a great joke he'd made while I was explaining something. Sam got my stupid Wu-Tang reference. Anyway.

You go to Paris Fritz. I obliterate the fucker. And you think he might have had a lot of hit points left, but maybe your fire did a little. Oh, wow. Okay. The listeners knew that about two minutes ago. Right.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because I explained it into the microphone while you were completely ignoring it. I can still hear when I'm riffing. I don't know how. Really? Yeah. Do your ears shut down when you're saying funny things?

Yeah. They do. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Mine don't. Oh, really? They're still wide open, see? Okay. Because what I'm going to do from now on is while you're riffing, talk a lot of shit.

Like a lot of shit. Yeah. Like a lot of shit. Yeah. So you now turn around, and you notice you've got a small audience at the gate. Okay. You see... Tickets still available.

More of these guys? No. No. But at the gate, giving you a little bit of a golf clap, there are three drow. Oh. Kind of just very snarkily going they're dressed in shoddy leather armor

and there's a large spider with them the door is closed there's three of them their names aren't Snap, Crackle, and Pop their names are Snizzap, Krizakle, and Krizop. No, no. Absolutely, that is not what it is.

I was going to say, that would be weird. I wonder if they know my... I used to have a friend named Blacky Green. I wonder if they know... Well, they're drow. Blacky Green, I believe, was a straight-up elf. Oh, I thought he was a drow. No.

I played a drow. I played Feng. Oh, Feng was a drow. Feng was a drow. Yeah. I played a drow. I played Feng. Oh, Feng was a drow. Yeah, yeah. Drows are a lot of fun. Yeah. I like drows. They're like goths, but elves.

That's why they show up in this campaign once in a while. So, yeah, they're... Is one of them wearing a Sisters of Mercy shirt? No, but one of them's wearing a Scissor Sisters shirt. Don't you mean a Scissor Sciss wearing a Scissor Sisters shirt. Don't you mean Scissor Sisters? Scissor. Okay, how are they? I'm fine.

They look like they're in rough shape. They have bad haircuts. One of them's missing an eye. Their skin looks kind of weather-torn. You get the impression that they've spent more time above ground than most drow would care to. The spider looks a little battle-worn. What's up, fellas? They're very dusty.

Do you know where Barriss is? They say, Barriss? Who's Barriss? That's who we're looking for, right? I mean, where is he supposed to meet us? You were told by Torzo the Phantasmal, the disgusting toad creature, that Barris was holed up in this city. Oh, okay, but the city's beyond the gate.

In this dwarven city that he was in hiding. Beyond this gate. Beyond this gate. Yeah, okay, cool. These guys are just camped. Not camped, but outside. Do you guys live here or are you just hanging out? What's going on?

We're here for the trade. The trade? Yeah, we trade with the city. Oh, interesting. Why don't you just help us open this door? I don't know about that. We're just merchants.

Just like all the other people who come through here. Why don't you just let us... You've probably been trying to get in here for a while, huh? Yeah, where have you been able to get in? Oh, you see, that's the thing. One of our party who knew how to open the door, he just... He didn't make it all the way, so we just, we lost our ability to get in the door. We just lost the guy who knew the combination.

That's funny. You look, the door's got a strange lock on it. The middle of it's got what looks like a series of, like, not needle holes, like finger-sized holes. Like in a round lock. It looks like maybe 16 of them. And it looks like either some kind of insertion or twisting or what have you is involved.

They introduce themselves as Cud, Lufts, and Hext. Hi, fellas. Hi. Why don't you open this door for us? Can we try knocking on the door? Oh, we tried that already. I'm saying we could try that. Yeah, let's do it.

Walk up. You're okay with that, right? You knock and nothing happens. Is this some kind of horror or something? We told you we tried that already. Should we... Is this sort of a dig-dogger? Can we, like,

buzz the manager's office? Yeah. There's a sort of a bell. You notice the wood elves are shifting uncomfortably and not putting away their weapons. No, I'm not comfortable. You also get the feeling these guys,

unless they've got some hidden secret, are way beneath you. They seem really cocky, but you feel like, especially because you brought an army, you could crush them no problem. Yeah, I'm not afraid of these guys. I normally wouldn't tell you that,

but these guys look like they're fucked up. They're lost. You said they had bad haircuts. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Somebody want to try to pick this lock? Yeah, I'll do it. I'm not going to try, I'm going to do it. I like the attitude

of your jib. Yeah, I would like to examine this lock, figure out what's going on with it. Use my lock-a-pick-a-lease. Unplug my sinuses at some point. Alright.

What's your thieves tool proficiency? Oh, my thieves tool proficiency. Your thieves tool proficiencies. Is I had that written down. I don't know where it is. Oh, shit. write it down add your thieves tool proficiency to your dexterity modifier

and you'll roll let's see I have it somewhere if you want to hang on hey Blaine what is this proficiency check brought to us by this is brought to you by Brian's next guest who do you think Snap and Crackle are

oh Roseanne and Paula Abdul Paula Abdul's right Roseanne and Paula Abdul. Paula Abdul's right. Roseanne's wrong. Paula Abdul is Snap. Okay. What?

This riff. I'm just saying. One more. Just guess. Guess. You'll never guess. You'll never guess who Crackle is. Oh, okay.

just guess guess you'll never you'll never guess you'll never guess who crackle is okay you have an expert you have two rogue expertises you haven't used since you've leveled up would you like to stay these tools in there nope how many damn it first ones thieves tools and the other one you got to pick deception that's the one yeah yeah one. It's staying from WWE. Paula Abdul and Cher at the Montalban. Tickets still available. I don't know why you wouldn't

buy a whole row and take your friends. Just to see Cher for fuck's sake. For sure. Roll a 5. Bonus, you need to roll a 20. You guys still talking about dnd so that's a no uh you stick a what's the opposite of 20 um you break off uh fingers no well you try with some lockpicks, you break off and lose

three of your lockpicks. Oh, no. Your lockpicks... The guys laugh at you. You think we haven't tried that? You think we don't know how to pick a lock? I usually do. I just rolled bad. You idiot.

Well, I can try again. Or try again. Do you have any? You can try again. That's a no. So you don't break a lock pick this time, but you just fuck around and you feel like this lock is way beyond you. I have special flashy hands.

You do, you do, but this is a real intense lock. I've got cool-ass flashes. So while you take a break, they say, you might not want to mess with that too much. Let's just say some bad stuff we've heard happens if you fuck with that lock too much. All right. They all kind of snicker at you.

Hmm. One of them gets on the spider and starts pacing back and forth. That's freaking me out. Should we pound on the door again? Sure. I'm going to hit it as hard as I can. Roll strength. I'm going to pound on it.

And I'm going to say it as hard as I can. Roll strength. I'm going to pound on it. And I'm going to say, what knockers? Let me see what happens when you roll a 20-sided and add your strength modifier, which is a four. It would be 15 plus four. Oh, that's right, plus seven. So that's an over a 20. You bang real loud and you hear what sounds like

stone sliding against stone. The drow guys all back way up from the door. As do we. Yeah, I'll back up too. Get away from the door!

The lock slides in a circle, the gate opens, and out comes a dwarf that is not made of obsidian. I like those kind much better. It's an older female dwarf. She is wearing really nice armor. She's got a real nice war hammer. And she

sees the drow and starts chasing them. Yeah, they're not friends of ours. We don't know them. Do you guys seriously? Yeah, fuck them. These guys are fucking assholes. Get them.

Get this drow. Oh, wow. That's perfect. So this is going to be as hilarious as I had hoped. Someone cue up yakety sacks. So, well, it won't even last that long. Fuck a planet. Two of the drow pull out arrows and fire off

they both miss the one on the spider tries to lunge at her and as it goes midair she smashes its head in half and the spider just kind of falls to the ground and the

drow that was on its back kind of just tumbles off the three of them run and press and the drow that was on its back kind of just tumbles off. The three of them run and press themselves up against part of the rocky gate and beg for mercy. The aristocrats. So, yeah. How'd that work out for you guys? the dwarf is cursing

at them and asking why I shouldn't kill them and they're like please you just killed our only way over the obsidian we have no way back please let us inside and she straight up executes one of them

Jesus she just slams the warhammer into its head And she straight up executes one of them. Jesus. She just slams the war hammer into its head and splatters it across the wall. The other two go running across the obsidian, and you see two obsidian dwarves rise out of the ground, chase them down, knock them to the ground, pummel them to death, and drag their corpses underneath the obsidian. Wow. That went rough for those guys.

Sorry, guys. Coming up next, the comedy of Brad Poseidon. The dwarf turns to you and says, Oh, hello. What's up? Nice work with the hammer there. Were you...

Do you know those gentlemen? Oh, they've come here many times. Welcome to the city of Glornadan. Glornadan! I am Queen Grisma. I bet you are. Hello, Your Highness. What business do you have? Are you here for the trade? Abysma. I bet you are. Hello, Your Highness.

What business do you have? Are you here for the trade? We're on a mission from God. There's a whole lot of you. I'm not used to seeing such a large group. Hey, old boy Nazis. Used to just merchant here, merchant there. Those drow, you can usually tell right away if they're worth trading with or not,

and those were clearly not drow that carried money. They were here to loot. We're looking for an old friend of ours. Oh, no. You don't mean the coward, do you? The who? The coward. I don't know.

Arfret is not a coward. Count Barriss? Don't tell her the name. When you say Count Barriss, she throws her head back and laughs and says, yes, yes, the coward. You're here to see the wee little coward. Good for him. The little boy has visitors.

Oh, glory, glory. Sounds like some issues. Things didn't work out with Barris. She explains Count Barris is her great, great, great grandfather. Oh, wow. What? And she is the last of their line. Holy crap.

Did he seem dwarven to us? Yeah, you actually knew. You figured it out. He explained it to you, and you deduced that through necromancy he had made himself appear much taller and undwarved himself. He was a very self-hating individual

and tried to make himself more imposing and basically live out some sort of creepy uh dr moreau fantasy and change his appearance and uh you suspect through dwarven pride uh queen grisma is not impressed with what he has done to himself and if he's come here with his tail between his legs uh grisma is not impressed. Not impressed at all. She says, oh yes, the coward is in the depths. He's

greatly increased our population. We're so thrilled to have him here. Greatly increased your population? Yes. Oh, is he doing his experiments again? Oh no, we wouldn't allow any of his disgusting abominations

inside the city gates Do you have any sex with a lot of women? Oh, you misunderstand He's increased our population from seven to eight Wow, that's a hell of a place you got here Thanks So, if you like Wow. That's a hell of a place you got here. Thanks.

So, if you like, I'm still willing to trade. I have the stores of Glorinden available for anyone who I deem worthy of trade. That sounds interesting. I'm happy to take you down to the shop and we can talk business before you meet the pathetic, yellow-bellied coward that is my great-great-grandfather. Let's do a shopping montage. She invites the elves down. Everyone seems glad to be away from the gate.

It's got a very bad vibe. And so even though the elves would normally be distrustful of the dwarf, you don't sense any animosity between them. Clearly a lot has gone on in this world where they're willing to just sort of accept. In fact, Vorenmeyer tells you as you go down the stairs, he had no idea there were any non-undead dwarves left in Aminah. And he's very surprised. He thinks this gate was a well-kept secret from the wood elves,

and the people she trades with must be quite few and far between right well it's been somebody yeah um and i think we'll probably do that next episode you guys thanks for listening uh was there anything we wanted to plug uh no although I'll say I've got some real cool announcements coming up in my comedy life, so keep an eye on my social media feed, you guys What's your French password? You're about to find out

Also, check BrianPassane.com for dates I've got some things coming up Philly, Chicago places like that You know what you should do when you coming up Philly, Chicago places like that you know what you should do when you're in Philly is get one of them deep dish pizzas

oh my god they're famous for that I'm gonna be on Standing Against Evil oh nice oh hell yeah it's a very small part of Philly you're in Philly, get a big cookie hey uh I have three words cool. It's still pretty cool. When you're in Philly, get a big cookie.

Hey, I have three words. Snap, general pop. Thanks for listening. T 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. I'm a fighter.