Nerd Poker - Episode 39 - Hidey Sky Hole

Episode Date: October 15, 2019

After the carnage of their last fight, it's time for our heroes to do a whole lot of stealthin' around, as there's an increasing number of gangs hunting around hoping to kill them. Also, there's that whole thing where they promised they'd visit the evil Archmage and they kinda ghosted him. Everything probably fine though.

Hey everybody, I'm Brian Poussin, Comedian, writer, actor, nerd. I've been playing D&D with my friends for a long time. I decided to do a new podcast where we play Dungeons & Dragons in my very own dining room. With my wife, kid, and my noisy dogs. So meet my friends Sarah, Kev, Dan, Blaine, Chris. Now it's time for another episode of Brian Poussaint's Nerd Poker. Season 3. Hello, everyone.

This is Mr. Incredible, and today we're doing an interview. I'm just kidding. Today you're listening to Blaine's birthday, episode 39, season 3 of Brian Poussaint's Nerd Poker. Nice job, dude. Stay in school, kids. Like Dash and Violet and Jack-Jack. Thanks, man.

Thanks, buddy. Mr. Incredible, will you please use your super strengths to close the sliding door when you exit the room? But it's also sponsored by Pixar and also sponsored by Sierra Mist. Sierra Mist again.

Hey, thanks, Rhodes. Blah, blah, right? Bye, buddy. Yeah, and you have to pay for me saying that. Okay. I love you. Sierra Mist implies the existence of a Sierra hit. Bye, everybody, and stay safe.

And if you guys need any help, just call... Ocho, diez, dieciocho, dieciocho, dieciocho, accidentes. Thanks, Rutz. We have to be introduced. No one knows who these weird voices are. Yeah, we got to get to the show, bud. Thanks. Bye.

It's me, Brons the pin show it's me a john alethegao it's me hey everybody that's a guy you'll meet in a minute he's's an old friend. My friends are here. Chris. Hello. Sarah. Hi. What's going on? Sam just unplugged me for some reason. Okay. Dan. Hi. Thank you. I was trying to get him to turn my volume down. Blaine. Hey, hi.

No Ken. Just this one episode. He said no Ken. Oh, yeah. Yeah, you're right. Just this one episode. He said no Ken. Oh yeah, you're right. Just for one. So I would like to thank patrons. We should totally thank patrons. Here it comes. It is Blaine's birthday.

It is. Rhodes is right. It's very special. We deck this place out. We'll post some photos. It's Blaine's 27th birthday. I love it. He loves Harry Potter.

I finally joined that stupid club. You do sort of like Harry Potter, right? Do you like it a little? Harry Potter? Horse hockey. I'll tell you what, Beej. If you and

Pnop Scott don't get your act together, I'm going to hot lift your clingers. That's Harry Potter. I don't even know what reference that could have been. MASH. Oh! Colonel Potter. I watched so much MASH as a kid when I was too young to watch it.

I think I blocked most of it. I was just like, it's like being five years old, seeing a lot of war surgeries. Yeah. The music is like extremely haunting. Oh, God. And then when you find out what the name of the song is,. The music is like extremely haunting. Oh God. Well, then when you find out what the name of the song is,

it's just like, come on. I know. You know what? I went, uh, I have a friend, uh,

Lauren who died and I went to her, uh, her, a service for her and she knew Johnny Mandel and Johnny Mandel sang that song with an acoustic guitar at her, at her wake. And it was disturbingly beautiful. Did anyone else think that Blaine was going to end that very

sincere anecdote with shaving cream? Yeah, that's exactly what I thought. Be nice and clean. Happy birthday, Blaine. Happy birthday. Happy Patreon supporters getting their name shouted out. Yeah, let's do that i would like to thank um spelled f uq fuck fashe thank you fuck fashe thanks for perhaps it's my favorite

beastie boys beast it might be an actual name pronounced fugue i might be butchering their name thank you james enerson never happened thanks james nice thank you sarah's trying to be like did dan do these names already i saw you looking up as if at a spreadsheet. That's what I was doing. I was literally just thinking about spelling that name in my head. I was like. F-U-Q. I was like that meme where the lady is thinking, that's what was going on with my face.

Yeah. Thank you. Snaginthus' blue tentacle beard. Yay. And thank you, Jeremiah Dudek. Thanks, Jeremiah. Was a good friend of mine Um

Last time on Nerd Poker Oh okay It's in your ears It's in your face Yeah all up in your shit Chris Tallman Or should I say in universe TikTok Let's get in universe that might be useful Last time

the Ice Five appeared on this podcast, they fought a dragon named Havocula and they fucked him up real good. Halcine rising from the dead, exploding his neck into little pieces everywhere. With the

shatter spell causing quite a calamitous noise to bounce off the neighboring mountains and across the countryside, our heroes now stand over the pretty wrecked corpse of this mutated by crystal electric blue dragon.

They are now level six. Perhaps we should have a quick conversation about whether y'all's actually leveled up your characters I'm guessing two of you didn't two people named Dr. Uid and Dr.

but yeah jump on in I hate paperwork I don't know I actually like leveling up I just completely forgot that we had done that. We'll get into it eventually.

But we should update the character sheets on Patreon soon. So there's a fire under your ass. The fans want to see your level six character sheet. And one thing I can tell you is a fan actually brought this up to me on, I think, the Patreon comments. You get three attacks, two with your sword, and one with your offhand weapon. Ooh. So as they put it. It's offhand.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Rangers at this level are like. What's my offhand weapon? Your dagger, right? Oh, right. He said you're like a cheese shredder or something at this point rangers are like are crazy so I can't well do I still

get to two handed attacks and then another no you got a pick okay yeah pick but you can do like two single hand attacks with your sword and then come in with your dagger for a third one which you haven't been doing so maybe if you have been choosing to do two handed attack instead that's fine it's not like you've been doing it wrong but that is an option you haven't been doing. So maybe if you have been choosing to do a two-handed attack,

instead, that's fine. It's not like you've been doing it wrong, but that is an option you haven't leaned on. Right, but we might have been cheating. They're not cheating, but we might have been getting more hits. As they say, the rule of cool says that if it's cool, we'll just do it. So who gives a shit? I sort of care about the rules. I'm trying to play as close to the rules uh

this season as possible uh which makes it all the darker when i joke on social media that i'm going to kill one of you on the show like i did i was going to kill blaine on his birthday what um but uh yeah everyone loves your characters and now i hate it when that happens now if you die i can't i shouldn't really joke about it because i will feel terrible if a beloved character is... Nah, it's gonna suck. And it's episode 39. Yeah. I think the last few seasons...

That's 13 three times. Oh, shit. Last couple seasons have ended around the 40-episode range, so we should just probably end this campaign no matter where you are. Okay. Why? Just keep it consistent.

Everybody just looked accusingly at everyone else on that everyone else it was like an Agatha Christie novel oh no I think we'll keep this one going a little longer let's take a quick break okay we're back we're back uh yeah you guys that was close you guys I can't I can't believe the bad guys that got that close. Yeah, we haven't really played yet, so I'll tell you this. I mean the real ones before we played. Oh, God. You still hear, I mean, that noise is like birds are

flying out of the trees. There's like that weird echo-y post. We should run. We should get away from this spot. Yeah, we definitely, I don't want to fight another dragon. Yes, but we also need to heal up, so let's get somewhere safe-ish. Right, I mean, we're not running to the boat right now,

but we should run to, like, where is cover from here? Presumably from giant four-winged. There's not great cover. You guys moved far enough away from the mountains that it's kind of sparse trees. It is, from what you remember, going to open up into more like the plains and that refugee camp of gnomes

within like half a day. But it's getting late and you just murdered a giant dragon in kind of bad coverage. It's to the east, back where you came from, denser trees, and to the south, some mountains.

The way you were going it gets more and more exposed what if we go towards the gnome camp and then get a little bit of ways and then we isn't there like a you can create a room for like an hour or something that we can hide in there's lehman's tiny hut but i don't think any of you guys have that tiny height something something here's a rope oh he has a rope that's true he has a rope trick so maybe we can go get let's start get like an hour out and then do the that thing for an hour yeah it only lasts an hour but at least that would be like we get away then we get another hour you're sprinting west it sounds like does that sound good yeah let's all right let's get a

uh survival and stealth check from everybody first let's do stealth i'm gonna just take stealth numbers so don't overdo it just yet with uh both roles just do one stealth check 14 okay 25 just yet, with both rolls. Just do one stealth check. 14. Okay. 25. 20. Nice. What you got there, Blaine?

Stealth check. Oh. A natural 20 plus 3. Oh, hello. All right, you guys feel pretty... That means I snuck back in time and I killed Hitler Wow I can't believe I killed Hitler Yeah great role Yay thanks

When he was a baby Yeah well you know what Fuck him The timeline's all screwed up now You all do great I've killed babies before Finding Cover in the trees Let's see how

far you get. How long are you guys doing this, you think? I would say it looks like you're close to sunset at this point. We were going to get out of the immediate danger zone. Yeah, I feel like we should get out of the zone and then go into stealth. Then go into stealth.

Let's get your survival checks. So this is survival now? See how far away from the danger zone you get as you're stealthing very well. 21. What you got there, Blaine? I rolled another 20. Nice! Yeah! Spending them all. I bet if we counted up how many botches in 20s you guys got this campaign, you'd have a hell of a lot

more 20s. It's been kind of a lucky. Another stealth check? Is that what this is? boss it's uh survival of survival 18 fantastic so 24 yeah roll it uh 12. Oh, okay. You guys get pretty far. Darkthor's got a little bit of dragon gut stuck to his boot from being right underneath the dragon when it exploded. Easy grimy dragon guts.

You don't make too many miles away, but you make it pretty far, and then you stop, and you're going to throw up the rope trick? Yeah. All right, so you do that. Is there a tree nearby? You guys, you see, you're all, well, the idea now I believe is you can climb

in a little pocket dimension. Right. So this is now available. You can. But when I do the rope trick, I do it sort of slight handed. Are you trying to stop him, Chris? Are you trying to do something first? Well, what I'm asking is if I sent Gus to be sneaky and hide in a tree nearby,

could he be like the security camera that could broadcast into the rope? If he is still within 120 feet, yes. It wouldn't be far. Even though we're in a pocket dimension? How does that work? Well, because the bottom of it's still open. Oh, okay.

It's like a Bugs Bunny rope trick where it leaves a little hole in space that you can see if you're close, but if you're above it, you the bottom of it's still open. Oh, okay. It's like a Bugs Bunny rope trick where it leaves a little hole in space that you can see if you're close, but if you're above it, you can't see it. I think we would only need to do that if we thought something was nearby, but that's good to know that we could essentially vanish but still keep an eye out.

Right, that's true. It sounds like that's what you're going to do. Yeah. So Gus will fly up into a tree. All right, boss. I'm as sneaky as I can be. Yep, sneak it up, pal. And you wait an hour.

Why don't you do a little stealth check for Gus? Stealth for Gus. I'll tell you, the DC is incredibly hard because he is a little fella up in a tree, but you are dealing with a flying hunting crew. Right. As well as other... Fifteen. Okay. You guys wait.

And it's not long before you just hear noise you it's it's uh it's hard to tell um but you know i would say in the hour you spent you already felt like there was some in like indecipherable noises in the distance coming your way while you were running so now that you're up in the distance coming your way while you were running. So now that you're up in the pocket dimension, you should start hearing stuff. Um, uh,

Gus, like, you know, no, it's like 20 minutes into you hiding in the document. He goes, ah, something real bad is happening.

Yeah. Show me pal. Okay. So you see through his eyes. happening. Yeah, show me, pal. Okay, so you see through his eyes? Okay. So you sort of see the sky gather clouds really fast. And it looks like a tornado is forming right about where you guys were. And all of a sudden, it looks like there's a dragon face

at the bottom of the tornado for like a second. It's kind of weird. You're like, it's like a tornado with a dragon face at the bottom. From Yoplait, it's kind of weird you're like it's like a tornado with a dragon face at the bottom from yo play it's the new but like what are the chances of meatballs and then after like that second it turns into this gigantic four-winged dragon um it's like four or five times bigger is it like a teleports in and well the thing is that the clouds almost seem to be gathering inside of it like some kind of camouflage and gathering around it as it sort of sucks the clouds down.

And after a short delay of it hitting the ground, you hear this sort of rattle and shake the pine trees. Sounds like bullshit. So it's finding where the dragon that we killed was? Yes. Is what we think is happening? Yes. And this, yeah, this thing is forming and it looks like it's got basically Predator

the movie camouflage the way it moved. It's dusk so you just sort of, without the clouds, they're not even sure you're in. I'm so fucking dead. Shimmers in the trees. Oh boy.

And yeah, Gus lets you see that and says, oh, boy. Oh, boss. Can you do that, boss? Well, like, suck clouds down? Maybe slightly, but

I'm a little small. Well, maybe you need to level up. I'm a little small. Well, maybe you need to level up. I don't really level. We'll see. You can't die, but then you did. Are you going to homebrew me on this side? I don't know. This is complicated.

I don't know how you work, boss. Anyway, I feel uncomfortable in this tree. I feel uncomfortable for you guys. It seems bad news out here. Oh, man. We can bring him inside, right? Can we still, like, if Gus came in. Yeah, you could go.

We should jet, right? We only have, like, yeah. You have about 40 or so minutes left on the podcast. I mean, what I was hoping was that he was going to fly over our area and, like, clear it. Yeah, that's what I'm wondering. Like, maybe we give ourselves a little more time. I didn't see anything else like fly overhead or...

Good. I don't have a great view. There's enough trees where it kind of blocks off between us and where we came from. We don't want to waste this time by being up here, but what we do want is him to kind of scout this area and say, like, oh, all clear. You want me to scout all clear? No, not guys.

We're talking about... I didn't hear that then. Vocula or whatever zirces avocula is the dead guy you think you know who this new one which is what do we think this one's called uh you you have a hint that it might be zetagog this is zetagog zetagog yeah well why don't we do you want to give it like 10 minutes and see if zetagog clears out or should we i mean i don't think there's any... I think this is just a guess. So, like... Oh, no, the hourglass.

It's like we have... It doesn't... It's random. So, we can either stay here and that might be the wrong decision because he may then come as soon as we get out or we can go and that might be the wrong decision. So, I say we might as well just stay and hope he kind of, like, looks in this area and then go.

Do you want to hold out? I mean, I don't know. Do a perception check for Gus. He does perception. 15. Okay. So are you guys waiting? Yeah. All right.

I just don't have anything left because of that. Yeah. Well, while we're sitting here, this could be a short rest, right? You could do hit points. Short rest doesn't get you hit points. It's long rest. You can do cure wounds stuff. She can roll hit dice to heal.

As soon as you guys are done healing, I'm going to tell you what Gus sees. 8, 10, 20. After 10 minutes. Everybody gets 20. Thank you. Any other spells? Anyone doing anything else? I know, Blaine, you've maybe got another spell. I think you just used your good berries. I don't know

No, that was my cure wounds. Let me do okay How many good berries do I get Up to 10 you cast it since your last long arrest I mean it's just like that again because we leveled up, I picked out, I prepared different spells and stuff, but I can't actually switch them until we have a long rest. Yes, correct. That is the rules.

Do you know off the top of your head what I roll for hit points? I should say your hit dice on there? Another two. Actually, I might have that. It is... 4d10. Yep. Or no, that's not 4d10 yep or no for that's not for d10 a d10 just a d10 okay there'll be one dice does it say yeah mine says 68 so his probably says four uh did you do i'm looking yeah so roll a d. d10 is for a ranger. Okay.

You roll that plus your constitution. Yes, correct. Here, I got a 10 right here. So is that tornado? I'm trying to lay them all out so I have them easily. There's a 10 right now. I thought I had a 10 and I don't. Hey, Blaine, what is this fumbling brought to us by if you're a be so kind birthday boy?

Hey, if you're fumbling rough with dice, hey, why don't you look over here? Maybe you might find a pick a nick a basket. Hey, nothing better for fulling the snacks than a pick a nick a basket. Oh, no, I think there's one over behind that rock over there, Ranger Smith. One of those.

Jesus. Nine. Added to. What happened? What happened? Yogi ate a guy. Yeah, Yogi. They're bears. People forget. 60 possible, but not 60 total just yet.

You have 60 max, but not 60 full. So, 60 possible but not 60 total just yet you have 60 max but not 60 full so you wait 10 minutes Gus says he about half a mile southeast he's seeing a tree move is southeast where

we came from or is that something else that's where you came from a little bit south of where you came from how close is that compared to like half a mile away it is not uh it is closer to us than where you came from yeah more than halfway to you well it's coming this way how long do we have left in this thing uh you have half an hour can he recast it or how it's just once per if he relearns it while we're up here i guess if who relearns the the pocket dimension that we're in like whatever it is oh i think it's once a day was it brian once

a day i'm gonna pull it up so we know but if we do like a fanny pack if we stay in here it might just run right past that's what i'm hoping but if we only have 30 minutes what if it times out that we plop out of there exactly when he that's why I'm asking how far, like how long has it been since it landed? Classic ice five. Yeah. Well, if it's half a mile, he can get here in like no time. Five minutes. Yeah.

That's what I'm thinking. If it's half a mile, we're okay. Okay. So we're just going to wait here. I have that it has to be slotted. So I think it's like once per long rest. Okay. So we're going to hope that he goes through here in our next half hour.

And Gus is definitely inside now. He's coming. Okay. Here I come. Okay, so we're going to hope that he goes through here in our next half hour. And Gus is definitely inside now. He's coming. Okay, here I come! Hi, guys! So you're all just going to come hold out? Why don't we get a perception check from everybody? Okay! As things get eerily quiet in your gray little pocket dimension, a circle of light showing you

the forest floor. I love it. How high up off the ground are you doing it? I've had Brian's call, right? It's up to you. It can be up to 60 feet off the ground that you climb this rope. 17. So we don't want him to go under us, right? And you pulled the rope up after you.

Yeah, of course. If he's under it, can he see up inside? Yes. So actually we don't want it to be very far. It's like 10 feet up. What if we were real tricky and made it like one foot off the ground so we actually had to like stoop to get into it.

So, do you know what I mean? Okay. As long as we still, like a diving bell. As long as we still come in from underneath. Yeah,

that's cool. Does that help, would that help hide it? Yeah. Don't, don't make your eyes at me, Dan.

I rolled a 20 for perception. Okay, what, what rest of your perception? I'm saying you're doing it a foot off the ground because you all liked it 11 yeah i think i said okay 17 17 for me tip all right uh tiktok you hear uh very quiet but persistently sounds like something knocking over some gravel nearby. Oh.

It's right there. And that is after five minutes. After Gus comes in. It continues for another five minutes. I mouth at them. It's still right there. Can I, should I, like, should I use thaumaturgy to, like, make a sound to try to draw it? mouth at them. It's still right there. Should I use thaumaturgy to make a sound

to try to draw it? What's the range on your thaumaturgy? Yes. We want it now to come here, right? As opposed to in 20 minutes? It's here. It's right outside the door. It's not right outside, right? Is it? He said I heard quiet grapple. You rolled a 20 with your bonus?

No, with a bonus, I got a 20. It's hard to tell. You think with how close this is to the ground that you are, it's hard for a lot of sound to kind of like bounce up in here. You know, there's not a lot of acoustics that can make it a foot off the ground and up. Did you ever learn about science of acoustics? We should have made this into a parabola.

Oh, my God. Did Billy go to physics school i'd make science uh you make science acoustics are difficult if you're close to the ground um so like see how this is a couple inches off for any sound to hit the bottom of it it's got to bounce off something underneath it so because you're so close to the ground it doesn't have a ton go up into the hole so it must be close okay so how long do we have left in here 20 minutes okay all right okay fingers crossed right outside for about 10 okay fingers crossed uh how much do you want to take it minute to minute oh i think we take it all the way yeah i think we're just if we're hearing let's just fast forward if we can till the last minute. 19 minutes left. You're still here.

Nearby. Quiet wrestling. 18 minutes left. Nothing changes. 17 minutes left. Nothing changes. You know who else heard quiet wrestling? It was Bill Cosby. When he was growing up. Oh, Russell.

His brother, whom he slept with. I mean, I know he turned into a serial rapist. He's in prison in his 80s and blind, but we're just saying. Anyway, so we're back. Are we? Are we back? 14 minutes

left. 13 minutes left. You still hear noises. This is like that show 13. What's the range in the film? 30 feet. 12 minutes left. Still noises.

11 minutes left. Still noises. What are the noises? Is it some sort of crazy? It sounds like, yeah, you know what? Why don't you do an insight check, everybody? You're listening to this a lot. There's 12 minutes left on your rip trick.

I got a natural one. Barf. 17. Guys, I'm pretty sure it means it's gone. Sorry, was that perception? Insight. Insight. 15.

Yeah, 17. Roll for it, Darkthorne. 11, I already rolled. Oh, you did? Okay, and you got a 17, Blaine? Yes. Dr. Ilyd, you know enough about the forest. You know nature.

Yeah. This is... It sounds like something is hunting you. It's not moving around like a wolf, but it's got that kind of wolf-like following a trail sense. It doesn't seem like it's getting closer, but it does seem like it's moving around in the immediate area like it has tracked something to this point okay all right big small um with that insight check it's definitely at least as large as one of you. Okay. Oh, so it's not the monster.

It could be. Like I said, hard to tell because not a lot of sound. It could be an owl bear. 11 minutes left. 10 minutes left. I can press to digitate if that helps. When there are nine minutes left, you kind of dies off a little bit yes let's just wait yeah of course eight minutes left seven minutes left

six minutes left still silent five minutes left still silent. Five minutes left. Still silent. Should I change into something quiet? You don't hear anything still at four minutes left. Let's give it the maximum time. I think so. Yes. Three. Okay.

Everybody put your booties on. Two. Get ready. I always cook stuff an extra minute or two just to be safe. One. I hold an to be safe. One. I hold an action to attack. Okay. You're all going to hop out? You're all going to get your little quick crawl out of the hole?

Let's go. Everybody do a stealth check. Okay. I keep rolling 20s. I'm sorry. Nice. I've been rolling for Queep. Does somebody want to roll for Queep? Not me. I'll roll for Queep.

Five. Okay. I just got a 26. I rolled a 22. Did I roll for Queep? Yeah. Because it was a 20. What?

Another one? You've got to get rid of that die, right? I'm serious. No, or make that the good one. What was everyone else's numbers again? Five. Okay. 26.

22. All right. So Halcine, much like she was for the Havocula encounter, is the least stealthy. You just kind of, you know, knock some dirt around noisily on accident as you're on your knees and hands getting out of the rope trick pocket dimension. Dark Thug rolls his eyes and goes, shh. At you. I've never done that to you guys.

You just got a little Darkthird. Darkthird. Halsey makes like a slitting the throat motion. Like she gets it. It's time to be quiet. But also, it's not time for sour jokes. What? I beg to differ.

It's always time for sour jokes. Tick tock. You have to be so quiet. I'm sorry. It might be time for sweetie jokes. But yeah, you all get out.

You don't see anything immediately. I'm not going to make you roll perception, but just in this quick moment, it's like you look around and there's nobody right in visual range.

Tree. We want to hustle. Is there cover? Is there? Barely. uh barely so you can see about um uh 30 yards in any direction and then uh the pattern of trees begins to block any further view to the south and the east where the noises have been but because you weren't sure where exactly the noises were when you're in the hall you don't let's just go go go go go right right uh due west is the gnome encampment so and we were we going north of that i'm sorry i'm talking still quietly we were going north to try to get to where we thought the boat

yeah so so uh if anyone wants to bust the map out i can give you the exact sort of idea of where you are i have it here fantastic boss. That's the old one. Maybe like a pencil handy I can just point. So. Who needs toenails when you've got fingernails? Toenails from the makers of hair. I don't think I've heard the first half of a Blancho Confirm. It's fucking blowing my eardrums up.

It just shouts it at you. I know. All right, so you guys are... I had a cold open with that one. Guys, it's Blaine's birthday. Happy birthday. You're at 3-0, you guys.

You're like right here. Oh, we're that far up. It's quick. Oh, what? We are? We were so far down. We were trying to get to the river, so. Well, you parked down here, and I thought you were going farther north. We were, yeah.

I think we didn't realize we were so far north, yeah. Well, the gnome encampment, which is where I thought you were going, that's up here. Oh, I think you're right. I think we are learning what we thought. The gnome encampment's a bit north of where you- Yeah, I thought we were way further south. Yeah, we thought we were way farther south. Yeah, we thought we were way farther south.

So yeah, that's fine. We just were mistaken. You were going to eventually go that far south, but We never got there. Well, that was when if you were going to

head to Dame Island instead of Wex Hall, you would have been farther south. Okay. Dame Island, here we go! Yeah, so we're heading that way.

So we're just trying to hustle quietly. Stealth and survival again from everybody. She's hilarious. Stealth first. Stealth first. Stealth first. I only have one 20-sided, so.

I started at Montreal. She was fantastic. Stealth, Brian. There you go. 14. Seven. Roll for Queep two, please. 16.

Queep has a plus two to stealth. Queep got a seven 2 to stealth Queep got a 7 Alright 12 Funsies You will now roll survival This is for how far you get Natural 20

Plus 5 21 17 14 And what's Queep got? Plus 1 21. 21. 17. 14. And what's Queep got? Plus one. Seven. All right.

So you get outside of where most of the trees are and you can see the gnome encampment, but things look quiet, unusually quiet at the gnome encampment. When you say quiet, does it mean like no fires? It's kind of a shanty town. You know, you did a montage of cleaning it up, if you remember. Yeah, we fixed the rec center. Yeah, and played in the background.

What was that song in like summer school when they were like cleaning everything up? I was always thinking the one from Revenge of the Nerds. I was always thinking the one from Revenge of the Nerds. You see black smoke in a couple of spots going up. You don't remember seeing that before. I think we have to pick a new pope. Yeah. Let's skirt the town, right? He's a Nazi, right?

Heading to the river. Yeah, maybe we should just go around the town. South around town. Okay. Have everybody do a stealth again. I'm not going to make you do a survival at this point because you're close enough to your goal. Fuck's sake.

I think it might be my box. At this point, it's about midnight. The sky... Survival? Yeah. Survival or stealth? I thought we were doing stealth. Stealth, yes.

I got a five. Queep got a 17. 14. I got a five uh queep got a 17 14 i got a five also cool 17 well a little tricky uh you get to the river um as you get to the river you get you get like a little bit more of a view i mean it looks like um something bad happened in the encampment but you also uh just basic perception notice it looks like there's tracks headed south that don't necessarily look like dragon tracks, like humanoid tracks coming from the encampment going past you farther south.

Okay. A lot of them. And yeah, you get to the river. Mm-hmm. No sign of timeout. I think we were going to send either Queep or, no sign of time I think we were going to send either because we're not where we docked

you're pretty close you're not sure should we send Queep in one direction and Gus in the other direction with the survival rolls you got you weren't going to nail it perfectly maybe we should let's just send Gus at first

if something happens with Queep we do not know queep is gone that's true okay i just think you go both directions you know yeah we can do we can do that too i just if there's if there's monsters in the in the zone okay so you're gonna do both or one one let's just do this okay uh it's very generous of you to not send Ken's character to his death while you're... He heads south, flies for a while, flies out of communication range. I'm good with him for

a mile. Okay. He gets a mile. Yeah, just past a mile. Comes back after he realizes he's gone over a mile because he doesn't know exactly. And then he's like, oh yeah. So I don't see timeboat. Okay. Do you see anything?

I think I see there's like some more camps farther south. And yeah, I mean, there's stuff. There's like, I don't see any monsters. But go north. Okay. Once you come back and we'll go look the other way for the boat, buddy. Okay. He goes north.

This is a little more of a hot zone why don't you roll a stealth check for him time boat you guys you know this is a hot zone oh he got uh 11 all right so uh he flies and he tries to keep low to the ground. He goes, ah, there's still a couple of gnomes in that area. One of them might have seen me. Okay. But it does look like there's not really a lot of gnomes to the north. I don't see timeboat.

All right. Why don't you come back? Okay. He flies back. Sorry, there's no boat. Where would time boat be? Why do we think it's gone? Why don't everybody do an insight check? Some of you might already need this.

Oh, the guys that somebody took it from us? 11. 18. 12. Dr. Ud, you're familiar with betrayal. 18. 12. Dr. Ud, you're familiar with betrayal. Yes, I am familiar with betrayal. It's called faculty. I'm not exactly saying that they betrayed you.

That was more of a joke. But I think you do get the sense, Dr. Ud, that you had people on the boat who were on your team, and they may not have meant anything by it, but when they saw something bad happening at the gnome encampment, they may have quietly, as best they could, try to take the boat out of here, in addition to the possibility that, yes, someone could have taken

it. I don't think so much as they abandoned us, so much as they realized, oh, we gotta get out of here. And then once they were gone, they're like, well, now what? Yeah. You were gone for almost a week.

Happens a lot. How the fuck do we get it back? So it was probably when they probably went South. Well, the gnomes went anyway. So that's where we were going. So, yeah,

because North means going back towards the, um, beholder mother thing. Is there a place to camp here that is sort of covered that we could at least get our rest? Yeah, so there's the riverbanks at some point closer to the encampment. You have to go a little closer to where the gnomes had their shantytown. You can get like under a high riverbank where there's like a mini cliff. Let's do that, right?

Yeah, some cover underneath. And then figure out what we're doing. Let's do that. All right. I'll let you automatically have that. By the time you can find a good spot, it's about two in the morning. Are you guys going to go for a long

rest in the morning? Why don't we long rest, then when we wake up, we can make a plan. I can sit up with Gus if anybody else wants to sit up, I'm happy to. Doesn't everybody rest at all? I almost died. Sarah's like, I have shit to to do why don't you roll your perception

checks watch man mine is crap my perception was a 13 Gus's is oh boy worse Gus's is a nine all right deadly quiet for the first Gus's is, oh boy, worse. Gus's is a nine. All right.

Deadly quiet for the first four hours. Why don't you roll again for the next four hours? That's better. I got a 23. 23? He got a 19. Second hour goes by. You think you see way up north in the river something very small floating over the river doing a circle and then floating to the north but it's it's uh

not quite sunrise heads north what do we think smaller than a person let's say like um gazer size like one of those little guys an insight check this is uh tiktok a world high right yeah you needed a 20 to see it let's see what your insight is uh 15 uh yeah it's about gazer size could be a little bigger could be a little smaller okay all right well i'll let them sleep just keep an eye on that. Okay. Sun starts to rise, but your companions are rested. There was a thing over there. A what? I can't hear anything until I have my first pot of coffee.

Oh, all right. Are you a Sankham man? Just a reminder. No. Sankham very much. All right. We are on a little clock real quick that I want to say something about but yes Blaine I was going to say if you want me to

just run to a coffee bean and tea leaf write everything down at the app oh nice the information you got from those two drow assassins let you believe there is going to be a core shift now in two days, whatever that core shift is,

as opposed to three days. I think maybe we on the Rocky talkie call the arch major Van Zervale. Cause I think if there's anyone we share core shift information with, it would be him because Israelis, because he's probably, well, okay. they already know. It seems like if anyone can do anything about it, it would be him. And if anybody needed to know about it, he would know who would need to know.

But didn't we just establish also that he was like a super bad guy? I think he's a total fucker, but I think he's a total fucker who's trying. He definitely betrayed the druid yeah Zuck's on but he's trying to stop the arch he's trying to stop the this is the problem where we're on like he's a bad guy and this is where we went down the whole my enemy's enemy and yada yada yada but we have to stop a lot of bad dudes in that part of the story I mean like you've met some good people and those well we, we can phone stone him and just be like, hey, what are the words? Phone stone?

Or what is it called? Rocky talkie. I like that better. We took a poll. We've taken polls and had so many arguments. Rocky talkie. I forgot phone stone. They all work. I liked Rocky talkie, though. Rocky talkie. Dick! Is that your new character?

I like that. They drove Dan crazy that they didn't rhyme. You're like Don and Pascal. Um, so, uh, this is a new character. I like that. Well, they drove Dan crazy that they didn't rhyme. I don't care anymore. I just like that. You did a voice that made me think you're like, like the, the sassy detective partner to Billy or something.

That was weird. The Sanchez, we got to get down to the dock. Um, okay. So, uh, but we could just say like do the words

core shift mean you know to you and that's not we're not really giving him anything necessarily but he might give us

something so it's time to ring a dingham why don't you count out your 25 words you can do once per day you're attuned

I don't want to be responsible for this unfortunately you are you are yeah how did that happen you're attuned I know but I didn't

mean I didn't know that would only be me I think it was based on you having a good bonus for the Arcana check. Brian yawns like a cat. That's a vampire.

Okay. Culling the Archmage. Let's do it. Please do that voice the whole time. Culling. Which annoys you more? Rocky talky or like racky tacky? With the accent, I find the first one. Both of them are fantastic in that voice. Which annoys you more? Rocky talky or like racky tacky?

Like what is the first one? Both of them are fantastic in that way. Okay, so we're going to say what? Guys, can we at least brainstorm together? Core shift. Yeah, but we're going to say do the words core shift mean anything? Core shift. We can't go back and forth. So I think we just have to decide do we tell him there's one coming

because you you only get one okay like what is this John and we're okay uh core shift happening

just do the thingy for my core shift happening in two days what does this mean to you I thought we were not telling him when though okay right

or I will count out your I upped because the hourglass got flipped okay and it's actually a minute glass right or yeah hey what's up do the words core shift mean anything to you

question mark question and what else right uh can we can we split them up like can we do more words great question i'll allow it oh okay then take off the what's up okay thank you okay okay so it's 10 use 10 of your 25 words so now we get to decide depending on what he says whether or not we tell him when uh all right he says um and and of course, I would think he knows how these work. He would recognize you've clipped your message perhaps and that this is urgent information.

Let's see. He would say, I suggest you hurry. Bring me the eye. Just you. Hurry. Bring me the eye. So he's been watching us. No, because we talked to him after we... You told him you were actually...

Oh, we bring it to him. Oh, we did? All right. No. Core shift? Do an intimidation check. Or I'll let you do intimidation or persuasion it's up to you okay i'll let you choose the reaction and the bonus might be different okay then i'm

gonna do persuasion because i have a proficiency so we're getting fancy oh um so 23 he pauses for a second and he says, there is something beneath this world. It will move soon. Well, I know my friends aren't going to help it. You have room to say a few more words. Can we stop or ride it out? Riding out is the only option. How many awards do we have left?

Have you been counting? Yeah, I think you have seven. What will happen? He doesn't say, chaos, destruction, survivable. Ask if they're going to go see the,

at the drive-in concert. Where should we, where is best for us to be? He's going to say with him. It's too many words playing. Oh God, you're right um where survivable

stay far from the ocean where the rates are cheaper that's my dan impression it It's good. Thanks. So that means go back to Queep's house. Have you seen Karen? Yeah, he's out of words. I think you have a couple more, but yeah. We're going to go south, right? Away from the ocean, down the river. But also, if water is the issue, we should also maybe...

Well, he said ocean specifically. I'm thinking like tsunami or maybe one of your guys coming out. Yeah. But, but also if, if water is the issue, we should also maybe, he said ocean specifically, I'm thinking like tsunami or maybe one of your guys coming out. Yeah. No, I don't think, I think core shift means tsunami. I think core shift means earthquake. Yeah. Would everyone care to make an insight check to see if they can put anything

together from all the ridiculousness? They, I can't. Okay. 18. That's high enough. I'll tell you a little something. Anyone be 20?

17. Oh, Queep. Roll for Queep. Oh, yes, please. Queep has a... Three plus... Four. He actually has very good insight.

Seven. Yep. So, you gather that um yeah i mean a tidal wave might happen but also the ocean north of you is already pretty fucked up there's like that giant like uh yes we're many many many uh mountains wide sort of hole in the ocean that is swirling. So they make a wave when they can. A tidal wave might not necessarily happen, but you you would you would. Enough has happened to this planet.

That's something. Yeah. Dire. A bigger hole could happen. Yes. That hole could get crazy big. Another. Yeah.

OK, so let's get away from all that. Do south. Towards the trident coast yeah and dame island and stuff yeah dame island will be at the very least some sort of landmark let's do it all right so why don't we uh are you just going to try to spend the day traveling yes okay let's uh let's do the old duo let's do a stealth and survival for everybody please roll for creep 23 for stealth stealth 20 wow 19 badass what you got ooh it andep 7 and 17 oh and uh and for

queep it is oh natural 20 for queep on stealth and a 17 plus everybody else yeah everyone else for your survival if you haven't i'm rolling for hoshinka by the way she's been quiet and you can always chat her up if you want 14

22 nice you have like a plus 10 to survival or something insane chatter up if you want. 14. 22. Nice. You have like a plus 10 to survival or something insane, don't you? No. Bottom one. Oh, shit. It's... Alright, yeah, I do. Well, not 10, but yeah, so I have 18.

Okay. Fuck, I think I've been counting it wrong. Have you been using poison ivy to wipe your little bottom? Whoa. One, two. It sounds to me like the Mechanical Man gives you a zinger. What's your bottom?

Your sour bottom? Who are you? I'm Hoshinka. Hoshinka woke woke up i didn't know she talked like you're a sour bottom boy hello sour bottom boy she talked like jamie lee curtis and fucking yeah she played the east german lady in operation penny coat in trading yeah yeah sw Swedish. I'm from Sweden. It is a bad accent that I'm doing. Trading places. I sat five feet away from Jamie Lee Curtis on Friday. It was amazing. Really?

I was at the Saturn Awards. Yeah, yeah. She's one of my favorite humans. She's fucking great. She won Saturn for Halloween. Oh, that movie. I did not want to like it, but i actually really did some parts of it tried very hard to match the tone yeah even though it wasn't like a copy really dug it felt retro in a great way uh to me so you has not canon though anyway is any single canon anymore it's like

whatever the corporations say Halloween the real canon is Congress or something so you had silver shacks that's my favorite I love that three I love that movie dorks only dorks like that movie. Say it with words. Tell everyone. Dorks. Like what? Dorks like what?

Fucking Halloween 3, Season of the Witch. Two minutes later. You head all day south. And you make it pretty far. You don't make it as far as Dame Island, but you feel like you're making pretty good progress as night falls once again. Speaking of Dame Island, I i gotta go to ikea and get some of those little toffee things sticking to the river geography wise hey hoshinka

uh yes seeing as that third assassin's probably pretty tight on our scooter right now it's not an unreasonable uh assumption you probably do a great protocol be attacking us at some point like it's been a couple nights. Would tonight be a good night for your pal to swing by? I do not know. Much may have changed. I actually rolled her insight and it was a one. So she seems at least to be like, I don't know.

Okay. You might have lost us too. There was a lot going on, right? A lot was going on. You did hide. We did go up into a little sky hole near the ground. Okay. You might have lost this too. There was a lot going on, right? A lot was going on. You did hide. We did go up into a little sky hole near the ground. There's a chance.

Sky hole. Oh. A stooping hole. There's a chance that we lost this drought. I didn't. Remember, I never saw this drought. It is just an assumption that they were tracking me when I was with the other two. Yeah. I saw something last night.

I don't know what. Yes. tracking me when I was with the other two. I saw something last night. I don't know what. Yes, this thing, it sounds like it probably is not a draw, but it could be some sort of tracking, either creature or construct. Something. All right. Are we camping?

You ask him? Yeah. All right. You guys had a reasonable survival check. I will go ahead and auto give you a decent camp for the night. If you're going to have TikTok do all the surveillance, let's get those rolls from him, please. I could take one too.

Sure. Yeah? 18 for me and 20 for Gus. Okay. And, darth now if you're gonna do with them i would say you would consider it slightly redundant um unless you want to move so when you're on watch with them do you want to like go up and down the river do you want to like peek to the east or west yeah okay you know maybe circle around okay go Go ahead and roll a stealth and addition then, please. Okay. So stealth and survival?

Stealth and perception. Oh. Oh, okay. You're looking for trouble. Stealth. It's 14. Okay. And then what's the other perception?

Perception, yeah. Oh, 19 plus three. three oh badass okay um so when he's flying around gus sees another thing floating by the river um sounds very similar it heads up north uh he can potentially uh follow it if you want i'll let you decide once a small thing like the yeah okay yeah um he's he says it's somewhere between um like uh a gazer and maybe a little bigger um what do you think maybe human size but floating nobody on our boat has a gazer now right no you just left it We had some gazers earlier. Yeah, those gazer guys, as far as you know,

didn't come with you. You left on the boat just your chef and your weapons master. So their names were Jonkel and Ma. Wish there was a way to get a hold of them. You noticed, Arthur. Yes. Do your little roundabout. Dame Island is in the distance to the south. Dame Island.

Alright. And are you going to go to sleep so you get some rest or are you going to risk exhaustion? I'll go to sleep. Okay. Why don't you roll your perception check? Can I ask Darkthor one question before he goes to bed? I'll tell him Dame Island's down. Not too far away.

Do you think your mother is really dead? I don't know if I would share with him. Do you want to... Why don't you roll an insight check? Tell me what it is, and I will secretly tell you what you think. Oh. This is Dan's dream. What are you, Nancy Pelosi?

What? I don't even get that one. Hey, look at Ben Folds over here. Insight. Yeah, roll your insight, please. That's exactly what I got. It's low. Six.

Oh, he's a regular Mark Lynn Baker. Off the rails. Everybody step outside real quick. Oh, really? Go out on the porch, yeah. But my insight's so low. It's pretty low. I mean, you're not going to get much, but i want to give you a quick secret and then everyone come right

back in and we'll finish this up take a swim you guys sam you can stay if you want it's probably pretty cold please close the door behind you though hey can you clean up the dog shit out there Hey, can you clean up the dog shit out there? All the way. There you go. Thank you, Sam. Dark Thur, you think she has enough resources that it's highly unlikely she would let herself be killed easily. She's very much about dodging trouble.

Yeah, I was kind of. I never got sad yet because I. Yeah, you know, I see the body. She possessed, and this is why I wanted everyone to leave the room, you don't recall what they are exactly with that role. And you've had roles in the past where I have written down don't tell Dark Thief all of her secrets.

But you think she has at least one artifact that you'd heard about that sounded pretty powerful and her favorite thing to do was run away and survive. plus plus an aquaman uh he thinks his mom's dead yeah and she's not there although this did happen mid-story that's right this is i know events you chose may have caused her to die and it does sound like there were eyewitnesses that saw her die so that's that's what you're up against right now it's one one of the other things. Uh, Sam, could you wave everybody back in please? And we'll wrap up the episode.

Thank you. So before, when they come back in, Dark Sir owes some sort of explanation to TikTok and it can be a one word dismissal, a sour answer if you like. All right. So, um,

the rest of you are sleeping. Uh, TikTok, you ask, uh, Dark Sir, uh, whether he thinks his mother is truly dead. And Dark Sir says. Not sure.

And we'll end the episode. What a payoff. Well, the listeners got something. I'll say. Hey, Sam, what do you think happened? Hi, guys. In episode 39, these are my notes. Fuck, now I don't think I would have given that to him.

What would you say? Oh, was that more than you wanted? More than I wanted to give him. I just wanted to give him kind of a fuck off, mind your own business. What else would Darker say? Sam, you still have to write this down. I mean, not sure. So he's taking over.

He's about to do this next shift, right? Yeah, by himself. And then he asked me. And then I just blow him off. Have a good shift. I haven't even answered. Oh. Okay. Keep us safe. Well, okay.

Keep us safe. Hey, Sam. Spree to Skellige. Hi. We added 90 more seconds of sour to this episode. What do you think? Great. Episode 39. It seems when we're introducing people today,

there's no one sitting at the end of the table. Oh, shit. Even worse than Seth. Okay. I got thrown off the Rhodes thing, and then no can, and yeah. No excuse. Oh shit. Dragon tornado cupcakes. We're hearing noises in the

distance. Why are we counting down from 13? I don't see why Blaine doesn't just roll like this all the time. How do you play this game without a gust to send out? If someone has hurt timeboat, I will kill myself. I heard Blaine say Donna Pascal, the actress known for Saturday Night Fever.

I think there is an energy to Sarah's accent at the drive-in is an American rock band from El Paso, Texas. That is now the Mars Volta. Everyone keeps see, excuse me. Everyone keeps saying core shift and there is a concerning energy to Dan's accent and that's it. Maybe it was a little energy to Dan's accent, and that's it. Maybe he was just a little flirty tonight.

I will be at the Mercury Lounge in Santa Barbara on October 18th. I will be at Laugh Seattle the 24th, and I will be at Curious Comedy Theater on the 26th in Portland. BrianPersane.com for dates. That's it. Sweet. I'm going to get kicked out of DuPars in a couple of days. Speaking of which, happy birthday to you.

Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday dear Blake. Me? Yeah. You. Happy birthday To you

Thanks you guys I'm gonna be 28 this year Yay 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 uh send us anything at p.o box one six zero six nine encino california nine one four one six thanks for listening

yeah like about boobs or farts. Happy birthday, man.