Nerd Poker - Episode 6 - Spelunking Bird

Episode Date: February 27, 2019

Despite not knowing how to speak the language on all the subterranean signs, the party must make some important travel choices as they continue to head west. Luckily they do have many tools at their disposal, like premonitions from a storm god. Also, and this is just a rumor, but it seems that Ken might be a bird.

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, Ken, Dan, Blaine, Chris. Now it's time for another episode of Brian Poussaint's Nerd Poker. Season three. Hey, everybody.

I'm Brian Poussaint. And you're listening to Brian Poussaint's Nerd Poker. Episode six of season three. What the fuck? I just said I'm not. I literally said I'm not going to eat this Starburst. And Ken said, I'm going to. I'm not afraid.

And then he immediately started choking. He's eating it way off mic. He was like as far away from the mic as he could be. You can still hear him. Oh, Jesus. This got so gross so fast. I have PTSD. That character from last episode.

My friends are here. You heard at least three of them already. Sorry. It's all right. Chris. Hello. Sarah. Yeah.

Let's do that again. Sarah. Hi. Yay. Ken. Hi. Hi Dan Hi Do that again too

Hi Go back to the first one This part broke up Hi So neutral He said flatly We forgot to do this last time we've been introducing him lately sam hi sam hi everybody hello sam uh i i think the consensus is that people really like

his wrap-ups oh boy his name is beautiful as you say we should do one where sam does the wrap-up at the beginning and then we try and make all that stuff happen oh man yeah that'll be our Patreon episodes from now on I fucking know he is I know he is I love it's like it's like there's something keeping you from knowing for sure

you know what I just want to thank MC Hoo-Ha for letting me know who's playing at Palladino's. They're going to actually... Got y'all in check. Yeah, and they're going to be playing at Palladino's for the Super Bowl halftime show. It's Maroon Floyd Watch.

Oh, let me back this up. They capitalized the word watch and it threw me off. I think it's part of the band. You can watch Maroon Floyd. You can see Sid Barrett go crazy on live TV trying to play Maroon 5 songs. Maroon Floyd. Boy, people really didn't like them.

You know, I just. For years. I thought I didn't like them. And then I heard what America thinks. Maroon 5 is a band I know best for 15 years ago pretending to play at weddings in a video they did like fake ambush wedding

videos I think they finally put the name and the sound together I knew all five of the songs they played but like not really I couldn't tell you what they're called nobody knew that band was Maroon 5 they just sound like Coldplay at the doctor's office. It's not a big deal, but congratulations on the halftime show,

which they were mad because he took his shirt off. He got to see his man boobies and his tattoos. Is that what people were mad about? Yeah, well, people were just like. They were mad that they were boring. Well, that's the thing. You're so boring that he did that. And he's the douchebag that says that rock and roll sucks recently, too.

He said some whole thing right nobody nobody rocks anymore and then he showed everybody including himself yeah yeah he sure rocked those tattoos you watch me not rock this is I was actually gonna say I'll show you how to not rock this is one of those weird like real life versus

the internet things a one time like 10 years ago I was sitting next to Adam Levine at a restaurant one of those terrible restaurants where you're like pressed up against other people's tables. And his date or whoever went to the bathroom. And so he just went to find her. Whoever he spent like five minutes, like just staring at while trying not to listen to our conversation because it's so awkward. And he finally leaned over and made like kind of a dumb, really funny, self-deprecating joke about his date being gone so long and it's one of those weird things where so whenever i think about him i'm like oh yeah that guy like because i had a 30 second interaction with him and i'm like he's he's probably a good guy and then it's like the twitter is just like they are they are hell people

who need to they're yeah people and i'm like he may be a terrible person but it's weird how much that can override like any kind of, like if you just have like two seconds of a personal interaction with somebody, it's like,

oh, I mean, I don't know. He seemed like a nice person. When people get that famous, I just get judgy because I just, it's like him and Warren Buffett

are like the same. They could both be great people, but they're so rich that I'm just like, what do you even do with your life? You could be cool. I don't know.

Such an interesting comparison. Just so rich. Rich people. Rich people. I rich people i guess rich yeah but i mean to compare do you think warren buffett has tattoos like maybe we don't know yeah he's crazy i heard he's doing the halftime show next year i wish he would did you mean jimmy buff not at all i definitely just meant rich people jimmy buffett is just a beach bum. I don't even think he plays music anymore. No, he's got a whole chain of restaurants, isn't he? Yeah, yeah. Warren G is going to sing Jimmy Buffett songs.

What? What? Our heroes, ladies and gentlemen. Oh, boy. You guys are headed down some tunnels to the city of Bozor. You've encountered an intersection where there are three ways you can go. Dwarven lettering tells you which goes where, but none of you speak Dwarvish. So.

I feel like there's some editorializing by the narrator. God. Isn't that what a narrator does? Editorialize for Christ's sakes? Yes. So the doorway to the right. Burned bodies are strewn about. There are ashes trailing behind them as if something horrible has happened.

The other doors straight ahead into the left. You do not know what lies. But there you are. What will you do? You have met a drow named Hoshinka and her sandwich that she worships like a god. What's his name? Dave or something? Kev.

Kev. Perhaps we should investigate the other two doorways. Sure. Do an investigation check. Come on. Twelve. They all kind of turn as you go through the archway they all it's almost like a circular thing and it looks like they go to different uh levels uh so levels meaning they all they all like if you go if you go left if you go straight or you go right once you go through the archway

they all curve to the left and in different sort of spirally kind of ways. Any of them downward? All of them downward. I am going to cast augury. Okay. And ask and with the. Can you remind us what augury does? Because I think I knew what that meant a year ago but it's sort of like a fortune telling kind of spell so i can with a specific

action in mind um get an answer about whether it would be good let's see there's a weird oh that's right yeah this is like a uh um i receive an omen from another worldly entity about the results of a specific course of action that you plan to take within the next 30 minutes. Great. DM chooses from the following possible omens. Weal for good results, woe for bad. Weal and woe for both good and bad. Nothing for results that aren't especially good or bad. Spell does not take into account any possible circumstances that might change the outcome, such as casting of additional spells or loss or gain of a companion. So I was going to ask about going through the fire doorway. a companion so i was going to ask about going through the fire doorway um okay and i'm looking to see um the spell does not take into account any possible circumstances that might change the

outcome uh if you cast a spell two or more times before completing a long rest there's a cumulative 25 chance that'll be random reading all right so uh you're trying to just get a sense from the one to the right yeah just i mean like is there a role involved i know i was i'm it looks like maybe is it just it's just divination so is it just you decide it would be an action yeah i think i just get to decide if it's wheel woe or uh wheel and woe um the fire door you get a whole lot of woe whoa you get a premonition of of a first person uh view of someone just going through this for a very short period of time and and uh just sudden blackness okay did i look very cool when i was rolling my bones or whatever yeah oh absolutely she just takes out a bunch of weird little bones and rolls them on the ground and

then her eyes i say whoa yeah my eyes go black she is cool valker delivers a message of whoa so so maybe either that doesn't have to be a hard no but it does mean that without changing something we should not just venture down there it is curious that there is a large pile of bodies as though everyone went that way also while you do that hoshenka is like looking over your shoulder and after you say the whoa thing she kind of like points in that direction too and goes i got a bad feeling about that direction and you guys all have a pretty strong feeling at this point something horrible happened to her down there right and like she doesn't remember do you want to leave here i'm not having a lot of fun here can hmm can someone try to heal

her brain or is that not a thing oh that's absolutely a thing that certain people could do. You would know. I might want to all do a little inventory of your spells and abilities. If you really want to. If there was a cleric. Well, I already tried to pray about it and it did not work. And I have the healing. You did a pretty broad religion check, though.

It wasn't like a spell or anything. Well, do you have, could you try your cure? Watch this. Oh, though. It wasn't like a spell or anything. Well, could you try your cure? Watch this. Oh, hey. What you gonna do there, Dr. Wood? I'm gonna go over and produce a handful of good berries. Aw. Yeah, it's very nice.

That's just food, right? Yeah. I'm okay. Okay. Did those come out of you yes his hands produce a series I'd rather have a good burger instead yeah they come out of my hand don't ask me how

I do not want to know good because I wasn't going to tell you that's why I said don't ask me oh boy and the good berries do sorry Don't ask me. Oh boy. And the good berries do.

Sorry. Halcine, the only spell I think you have that. I have the prayer of healing, but. Yeah, or a zone of truth. I don't have that anymore. I unprepared it. All right. Seven berries, one point each.

All right. So you give her these berries and she just slams them down. You're welcome. And she says, oh, thanks. I've just been eating that stuff over there. She just points over there. Oh, and Kev.

I've been trying to, you know, heal with Kev. Does she have like a backpack or a bag or anything like that? She's got a little hip pouch. Yeah. Can you show us what's in your... We might be able to help you figure out what happened if we could see what else is in your... Do a persuasion check.

It's a body glow on it. It's a fanny pack. Eleven. She goes, I don't wanna. That's where Kev lives. Well, you could take Kev out and keep him safe. I'm holding Kev right now. Okay, yeah.

But that's his house. It's holy. Could I? Probably it would be best. Do you think that he might want us to make sure that it's clean and safe for him? She gets really freaked out and she's just like, Kev is important very important yes yes you didn't detect evil on anything did you detect magic at all i mean she looks like she's had a series of real bad uh mojo spells cast against her you feel like her mind is just either shattered or warped somehow you should cast

detect scrambled eggs because that is what is in her egg brain. It was almost a metaphor. Is it a salad in scrambled eggs? Oh, saladinos. So when she pointed at the ground, there's a thing you can notice. I hate to bring this up, but I didn't get to

paladinos this week. Oh no. Yeah, I did get to fouladinos. week oh no yeah i did get to foul adinos foul adinos yeah i saw some some pretty good bands i gotta be honest well i saw a henya chick chick korea oh my goodness uh marilyn mccoup and billy davis jr billy davis jr was just like a normal guy it was weird i saw a bucket head and uh the beak g's what's the beak g's it's a bg the beak g's the beak g's foul adinos they were all this is all foul adinos related bands the foul i didn't know what was happening

i thought i was having a brain aneurysm. Not gross Adinos, but... I love that club. Ka-kow! Ka-kow! I know. I was supposed to meet you there, and you never showed. Did you work late, or what happened? Oh, queef. I had a bent wing. Aw, boy. Anyway, sorry. I just had to... Do a perception check, Dr. Uwud.

Dr. Uwud. Dr. Uwud. So... You see Dr. Uwud feeding these good berries to hashinka and 12 rock me on a dance you just she seems to be pointing at something else sort of around she does a weird little gesture which talks about what else she's been eating you can't quite figure out what she's talking about i'm gonna throw up a detect magic spell. Yuck. Do I detect any magic? Only on you guys. She actually

doesn't radiate any magic. What about the... What about her pouch? Nope. She seems like a real sad sack. What about the doorways the doorways anywhere you can look for tracks like you can't really get a sense far enough down the doorways let's throw something down one of the the fire hall and see what happens to it

or roll something all right wait tell me exactly what you're talking about dan has a look well there's all these bodies i'm trying to just be a good improviser and pretend to be interested. Could I grab something off of one of these bodies and chuck it down the fire hall? I do so. You bend over and there's a heavy glove on one of them. On one of the bodies. It's badly damaged. It looks like maybe once it was magical, but now it's just ripped in half.

It's so bad. So I'm going to chuck it down. Chuck it. It goes clang. Chuck it down. Chuck it. It goes clang. Chuck it down. Chuck it down. Silence. I feel for you. Silence both for the reaction to that glove

and Blaine's joke. Perhaps it must be living. Also, it feels like, I mean, you may have to go down these hallways to really find out. Maybe throwing something down is not enough. It's a vibe you get. In terms of these trails we've been trying to follow, is there a path

of people going down either one of the other hallways? You really don't see a lot of foot traffic down the one to the right where all the charred bodies seem to have crawled out of. You just see evidence that they crawled out of that pathway. You get the sense that most travelers saw the bodies, charred stuff didn't even bother putting more footprints in the ash it seems like the charred bodies you find um what looks like it

maybe used to good armor but it looks like maybe some travelers have as well as haushanka have picked these bodies clean it looks like most of the footprints uh seem to go straight ahead or to the left and not the right hallway. My curiosity is piqued, but my common sense says we should just take one of these other halls. Ashinka, can we bring you to safety? Can Kev come?

I guess. Sure. Keep him in your stupid pocket. She puts the sandwich really close to her. She goes, keep them in your stupid pocket. She puts the sandwich really close to her face and goes, I have something. She tucks Kev back in her pouch, claps it shut. It's weird.

I would have named him Ruben. She stands up and starts to follow you guys and trips and falls down and goes, where'd my leg go? Oh boy. Can I pray more specifically to Valkyr with, can I? Yeah,

absolutely. Okay. I'm going to, I tell her that I'm going to just. By her, do you mean Valkyr or Hoshinka? Well, yeah,

no, Valkyr's a man. I mean, he's a male God. No, yeah, I do. Okay. Nevermind. I leave Hoshinka alone. I was going to involve Kevin. This was probably not smart. No, Valkyr's a man. I mean, he's a male god. No, yeah. Okay, never mind.

I leave Hachink alone. I was going to involve Kev in this, but it's probably not smart. Oh, no. This guy's definitely curious. So, no, I'm just going to talk directly to Valkyr and ask if there's anything I can do for her or he can do for her. Okay. Do a religion check. Yeah, sure. 16. You suddenly get a vision of

someone being lifted onto a boat from open sea. Okay. We're like, we're supposed to save her and get her out of here. Is that what I think? I will pick her up. It's a basic impression you get. Can we fashion her a peg leg?

I will carry her. Oh, TikTok can carry her. I will put her hand, hand here. She's relatively small. I mean, yeah, she's, you know. I'll get her sort of piggybacking on me. That way, also, I can keep my hands on her arms. All right.

She is composite. You guys notice she does make a lot of weird, repetitive small talk. She seems pretty out of it. I would role play all of it, but you would just be like, how come she says hi so much? She does seem to vaguely recognize you after a while, though. So as you stand around with her on your back, she doesn't seem incredibly bothered by it, but her mind is wiped. That's okay.

Do we try healing her? Yeah. Yeah, and it helped. I mean, she seems a little more focused. She will need to be restored, I think. So, you've narrowed it down to two ways.

There's footprints going down both. Can I tell one more travel than the other? They're about even. Any magic? No magic. Any magic? No magic. Any magic from the runes above the doorways?

Hey, Dr. Udua, nature check. 19. Interesting. You notice you kind of are looking 19. Interesting. So you notice, uh, you kind of, you kind of like are looking around for magic and,

something about the magic that you learned kind of triggers something in what you're seeing as you look around. Triggers. Yeah. Triggers. Uh-huh. And you, you look around at the beam of sunlight coming from way up above.

You kind of look down and you just notice, it beam of sunlight coming from way up above. You kind of look down, and you just notice it seems to be moss growing on one side of the room. Moss, huh? Mm-hmm. Moss. Moss. Kind of towards the stairs and one of the walls. Towards the stairs.

So that's going to be the north yep side we want west um you put together moss uh would grow on the north side of a tree in this hemisphere but you're the inside of a circular room and the sunlight's in the middle of the circular room so it's like the opposite of a tree so uh So the side of the room with the moss on it is probably the south side of the room. Hmm. That tracks. I think you should stand in the place where you live.

And we want to go west, right? We do want to go west? Yes. Or what are the archways in what would be the west position? Yeah. You feel like one of the archways in what would be the west position? Yeah. You feel like one of the archways is sort of to the west. One of them kind of heads north, and one of them heads sort of southeast,

and that's the fiery one. And that's probably the elf. So we want to go west. Yeah, we want west. I want to copy down the words over the archways. Sure. You make a note of the words. Oh, good idea.

Because maybe one of them. Eventually you can figure out what it means. Great. He said it would say like humans and elves and stuff. So maybe if we recognize that again, we'll know. Or can show it to somebody. So you guys are going to take a left? We'll hang a little way. Yeah. Great. will know or can show it to somebody so you guys are going to take a left um angle that way yeah great so you you um you take uh this it curves downwards for a while you feel like maybe you're

just going sort of one level low and then it kind of curves back so you do feel like you're heading west but it took you a solid like city block of like trusting this tunnel for it to sort of write itself. And you're back in a very, it's a smaller, more narrow tunnel. It's about a 10 foot tall ceilings, 10 feet wide. There's no decorations.

Um, and it looks like it goes on for a really long time straight ahead, but you think you see a little pinprick of light in the, in the very, very far distance. Do we have torches and stuff going? Do we have any light source? We have that magical torch.

A couple of us have dark vision too. What do I detect with my dark vision? Anything else? You feel like you might see some imperfections or shapes in the walls far ahead, but it seems like this is just a long, narrow tunnel. You going to head down it?

Yep. Let's do it. You go down for a few hours, and finally you encounter a little room to the right. And it seems a little strange how you've been going down this forever with no change in the pinprick of light. And you just think that, God, this is a long, long tunnel. And this little room to the right looks like some sort of a dwarven residence or almost an in a, you encountered something like this in the dwarven city where there's like

an archway, some writing above the archway. And then when you look inside like a counter where sort of the owner of an in would keep shop, you think you see some tables, everything's very dusty, though. And it looks like there's a large dining area. And you can see all of it by just kind of like waving

your magic torch in the doorway. This is like that gas station outside of Las Vegas. This is like that one place to stop. Totally the vibe you get. Yeah. Don't go in there. No. Loose slots, though. Loosest in town. Do you guys keep going?

Can we look around, see if there's anything you gonna step inside yeah I still gotta detect magic going up don't I or that would've worn off it's been hours

yeah okay so you gonna step inside I will stay outside Darkthor has warned you against it that's been his vote Darkthor why not

why do you think we should not go in? Well, he's a drow underground man. He might be a little suspicious, right? So. Get a bad vibe. Hmm. I will stay outside with Darkthir. I mean, he would know.

And yeah, I mean, if the dwarves abandoned this city, something might have happened to it. And this tunnel seems far away from the main city like a sort of travelers tunnel but at the same time if it was an empty in and you just see footprints you see maybe like a a few footprints go inside the end and do they come back out uh

do a perception check 13 not sure I'm gonna just give it a quick scout inside because we could use some provisions and things I did a 17 do I proceed anything you get to say but he kind of walks over and he makes too much of a stomping around for you to be able to tell

he kind of ruined the whole thing you're gonna step in Halstein yeah I meant to help it's okay you can talk you think you see um says brian some stairs that go up it does indeed look like an inn once you step inside uh and yeah there's a big dining area the this sort of main landing area is small at first and then it opens up into a sort of dining hall that is as big as you would see in any outdoor in and there's dust over a wooden table and stools and it looks like rock has crept in here somehow there's like boulders

sort of bursting out of a couple of the walls what the hell it's odd i examine one of the boulders do an investigation check. What's the head shake? Trouble. What was it? A one? It was a eight. Okay.

I mean, it does look like it's just sort of a pile of rubble that's kind of burst out of the ground. Okay. Does someone with a natural touch

want to, you know, like a druid or a bird? A doctor? A druid? I don't know what I would look for. Is there a tunnel over there? I would make you

do a different check. I wouldn't let you do an investigation check. I would like to do an investigation check. I know she already did an investigation so... And then what kind of check should I do? Maybe a nature. How about a nature check? Yeah, that's what she suggested.

I liked it. Nature, check yourself. 22. Is that good? Wreck yourself. That's correct. Dr. Wood, you walk over and you examine this pile of rubble and you're fairly

certain some sort of underground creature has been bursting out of the floor and walls of this room. Creature bursting out of the walls, eh? Hmm. Well, I think that's all I need to hear to get out of this room. Guys, there's a creature that burst in and out of this room. I don't know if I need to tell you this, but it can tunnel through rock. Anybody here rock you?

What are you made of, TikTok? Me? I have some rock. Some rock? Mostly metal and wood, right? Yes. You're dead. How about you? Excuse me? Dead? Jesus Christ.

Dead? You're dead. You're totally dead. Bird guy, you're dead. Well, we're only... DM might live. Burpee. And Danzig Drow here

probably dead. So what I'm saying is let's get out of the snack bar and keep moving. So he says get out of the snack bar and keep moving and all of you kind of go like, oh, Tremors. Go ahead and everyone do a stealth check if you want to try to exit the inn. Oh, Tremors the movie or Tremors are actually happening right now?

Do we all go in? Tremors are happening right now. I Do we all go in? Tremors are happening right now. I just rolled a 17, but I was already outside yelling. We're outside. Do we roll too? I'm going to say this is a stealth check specifically of you guys trying to find sure footing

as the ground begins to shake a little bit. Even outside? It's not decks? It's in this inn. You're not outside yet. We didn't go in. Who went in? You three? It was just me, we didn't go in. We didn't go in. Who went in? You three? It was just me.

And then I was like, hey, does someone want to do a nature track? You two. Then just you two. You two are. And I did a 17 with a 20 with my stealth. 18. You guys get out and you just hear crashing noises inside the inn. But you're all out in the hallway. Okay, moving on but you just a big pile of dust and gravel starts to go out of the no thank you i open the door and there's a

train coming at me and then i shut the door and i kind of like uh look around then i open the door again there is no door but you feel like there's maybe a 10 second window where it'll see what's on the other side as soon as the gravel and dust clears let's go let's go yeah i don't want to see what's on the other side of this cool as gravel and dust clears. Let's go. Let's go. Yeah, I don't want to see what's on the other side of this. Cool. As you run away, Hoshinka is just like, what's happening? And you guys. Dark Thur was right. All right.

So you travel for. It happens from time to time. You travel for a nice chunk of time without any consequences of that little adventure. But you definitely feel like something real shitty was in that end. And you make it a couple of hours what you are pretty sure is west when you see a very interesting site i should say it appears something like a south of the border east coast joke something has severed this tunnel but you can see the other side. There is a 50 foot gap in this tunnel where it's almost like a giant knife has cut this cake and left a 50 foot gap between the tunnel. As you guys sort of come up close to the edge of it, you realize, like, it's again, it's really high. You knew it would be really high based off of that shard of light that came down in that circular room where you found how Shanko.

But, you know, it looks almost as if part of the comet say like a knife had cut into the earth here and you see sort of parts of the landscape tree roots way up above even but bits of rubble everywhere and it's you know

collapsed a little bit but you feel like you could get across this gap and I'm gonna ask you all to do just a perception check see what everyone thinks and i'm there's real specific stuff for all of you 18 15 18 13 also 18 wow and what did you get blaine 15 okay yeah blaine you um you you you you smell the air a little bit and you smell silver henny woods you recognize you you might even be near where you keep all your stuff uh my stuff huh you just get a real strong. My books are my records, my clothing of the giant pine stuff I had, my belongings, the years and years of things.

Is your tenure in there? Oh, boy, I goosed that one. Those of you who got an 18 get a sense that you could cross this gap, but you would maybe need Queep to help lift you across. Queep. The air is coming from up there, right? It's a strong, hot, whistling wind coming in here. By hot, I mean fast. I don't mean temperature.

It's a very cold wind, of course. There's a sort of tundra above. Would you like me to fly you guys across? Would you mind, bird friend? I think I can take one at a time. Sure. I'm just going to make you do a little examination of carrying. Your heaviest party member is carrying a second person right now.

Maybe I would pass her off, or we could do her separately. I'll let you all do it without a strength check, except for when you do TikTok, you got to do an athletics check. Okay. I mean, I've had you do a strength on last time, but we're going to switch it over to athletics. All right.

So just do a check for TikTok. 18. Yeah. You make it across. Hmm. And yeah, all of you notice, like if you really wanted to,

it'd be tricky. You think you could maybe even get like up. So yeah, as you're all flown across, if you really wanted to, it'd be tricky. You think you could maybe even get, like, up. So, yeah, as you're all flown across, you feel like you see enough insets in the sort of cliff face that you're trying to get past that you could take breaks and maybe make your way up if you really wanted to get out of this tunnel or you could go straight ahead. How bad do you need your stuff, doctor? It'll be there when i get out of here maybe it has been 10 years since you've seen your stuff well you know what then my stuff is is fine as uh you you continue down the tunnel you do not see light ahead anymore it is all all behind you. So the farther down you go this tunnel, you realize you're heading into,

as far as you can tell, unending darkness as you continue west. Promising. Nice. It only takes a couple more hours before, you know, you guys feel like it's, you kind of look behind you, you see the pinprick has dimmed

and it seems like it shouldn't be completely distant. You feel like you've completed a day and it's probably getting to be about night time um and the hallway uh you do eventually you know get to what looks like another inn um at another you know gas station same sort of thing you can see from just the basic doorway it's it's clearly built by different dwarves but just as abandoned um you can't tell if it's infested with burrowing creatures or anything like that just from a casual glance but uh it is when you would normally rest you can either continue or we could camp in the hallway i will keep watch yeah maybe that's best are there any footprints in the hallway

that we've seen? You've seen, yeah. I mean, you feel like there's enough footprints that you wouldn't be surprised if someone called out to you or acknowledged you. Someone has made it across that gap as soon as you land it. Dark there, get a sense of this place. Of the inn? Yeah. Why don't you do an investigation check? And this is just

looking in the doorway without going inside because that would be presumptuous of me. Four. Nothing. No, I mean, you don't see any smiling faces, just Tashinka with her weird face,

unusually pleased with herself. I should have killed her when I had. Are you going to continue? You're going to camp by this doorway. I say let's camp. I mean, you know, you've got a long journey ahead of you. We've got to camp somewhere. But maybe let's not

camp right outside that doorway in case there is some kind of creepy crawly. Maybe we should be like 25, 50 feet off the door just so we could sure you can tell it's coming are you gonna go past the door or yeah you're gonna go past the door let's go past the door all right and you're keeping watch

tick tock yes all right roll a perception check this is gonna cover the whole swath of rusty times that is a quality six with a bonus of anything? Oh, yes. That's with the bonus.

Oh, dear Lord. You don't notice anything. Until. Meanwhile, we all get killed. Friends, put your heads back on. Oh, no. Until you hear footsteps coming out of the inn at like a completely loud volume all of a sudden.

It sounds like and I'm sort of freezing time here for you. Steps just mere inches from that doorway where the rest of us asleep. I kick them awake. Okay. The steps stop as soon as you do.

They make noise. I just had the weirdest dream. I was being kicked. Someone is inside. Going back to sleep. You see a figure come out of the doorway. Can I press to digitate a light right next to them so we can see them. Yeah,

I do it. Um, a light flashes and, you see a goblin, uh, the goblin, uh, has got like a little,

a little, uh, what do you call it? Like a, like a short sword. And he kind of looks at all you and he sprints the other way back inside no down the hall like he's heading towards the gap

back where we came from all right good day to you sir run away there is a passage through the inn well he might have just been inside this whole time how long have we been there for this would be about halfway through the night.

It's now about one in the morning. He was standing perfectly still for at least four or five hours. I think there is a passage inside. What, couldn't he be sleeping? He could be napping. Let's take a look. But let's definitely go inside.

I love to explore. We are learning so much about Halcyon. I like to dragon, but I also like to dungeon. It's true. You go inside, and so far, it looks like a normal inn. They're in different places.

It's not like a carbon copy, but there's stairs going up, presumably to rooms. And there's a dining area. The dining area does not have bulging rocks coming out of it. That's good. Remember last time? Did I hear all flashback? You do see a lot of footprints in here though. There's more footprints in the dust than there was in the last place.

When I heard his footsteps did I hear a lot or a little? It's almost as if it came out of nowhere. So I'm going to start searching right by the door searching for hidden something or other there's something here do an investigation check can we light up this room at all that's a seven i'm rolling so poorly uh i'll say everyone's helping you you can just do it with advantage i mean you're in a big group and they're all

gonna just want to do their own investigation oh that was worse yeah i mean you're in a big group and they're all going to just want to do their own investigation. Oh, that was worse. Yeah. I mean, you're feeling around the door and you're just using your big old mechanical man hands and just slapping around. Curse these metal claws. I'm going to look up the stairs. You look up the stairs and you notice it's blocked off. There's a weird,

like wooden structure stopping you from going all the way up. Hello? It's the Winchester Mysterian. Yeah, I mean, it looks nailed shut. I mean, as if there might be some sort of construction going on. From the inside or the outside?

From your side. Like someone has nailed wooden planks up. Pardon our dust. To keep something in. And what else is... And we searched the main area here. He searched it really badly with advantage.

I'll let one more person do an investigation check. Who has the best investigation? I'm just plus one. I got a bird brain. Ka-ka! Ka-la- a bird brain. I got a nine. That's German for God damn it. Did you roll with advantage? Yeah, you can roll with advantage because your party's helping you.

But you're the only person to do before something else happens. That's a 15. Oh, so you're feeling around and all of a sudden you notice there is a peg in the wall above the the doorway on the inside of the inn a little sort of stone peg that's sticking out and you're you look at it for a second you're like stone pegs don't pegs down that's weird it doesn't look like anything hangs from it. It almost looks like a button above the doorway. I'm going to take my quarterstaff and I'm going to...

Heads up, you guys. I'm about to do something dangerous. I'm going to press it with my quarterstaff. When you press the quarterstaff, the wooden ceiling of this part of the inn um suddenly kind of goes and a little doorway opens above the door almost like an attic door and as you hear us flick uh how how close am i to the you're right under. I'm going to thorn whip up and try to whip around this guy's neck. Pull him down. Why?

This is going to be fun. A child? Roll to hit. I love it. Michael? Michael, is that you? Another kid? 19.

That's just a poor little gobby. All right. is that you another kid 19 it's just a poor little gobby all right so you see um dr ua just yeah like take his thorn whip up rips the head and it rips down he pulls down this goblin that uh you guys all saw just as he did it it was peering over the edge so it set itself up for this and you get it right around the neck and just yank it down and it thuds on the ground it's you know old for a goblin it looks like it's it is like late 20s early 30s which is pretty old um he's wearing sort of heavy armor though and um he's armed sure it's okay i'm a doctor uh. You hear from the now that the wooden door is completely open. You hear like a bunch of little goblin voices. Does anyone speak goblin?

I speak murder. Do you speak common? Common. The guy in the ground. He's like looking at you just absolutely freaked out. He was not ready for this. What's under common? Under common, I believe is he's like looking at you just absolutely freaked out he was not ready for this what's under common I believe is that's like a

like a if you live in the under dark it's sort of a unified language for the dwarves and and drow and stuff so you're gonna give a shot yeah what do you want to say to him uh what should I say I don't know figure it out man

what are you guys doing ask him how many guys there are he splayed out on the floor where did you come from yeah where are you from what are you doing in undercommon he he says

what do you mean man what am I doing this is our base of operations what do you mean, man? What am I doing? This is our base of operations. What do you mean your base of operations? You gonna kill me or not, man? I kind of want to. He reaches for his sword. He reaches for his sword?

Uh-huh. How many are in here? You can't tell because they're all in the ceiling. I'm asking him how many are in here. He says, hey, says hey guys you gonna come help me or not I wouldn't advise it tell them till they

get an intimidation check I'm not Bodhi I know six plus three nine the goblin on the floor spits in your face oh hey do we have any any way to like like uh light up the ceiling like

lob something in there like I can press I can predict you guys throw oil up there I can I can make fire okay okay let's just try to de-escalate for a moment because we don't know anything. Is he translating for us what the guy's saying? There's not enough time really going back.

He's got a hand at his sword. You feel like there's only seconds before something's going to break. Can we throw something? Darkthor, tell his friends to lay down their arms or their friend will suffer the consequences I tell them that they don't react but you can tell

that they are still speaking goblin as opposed to like undercommon they're either ignoring you or lay down your arms or I stab your little friend in undercommon? yeah so there's a beat where they all kind of like start shushing each other

and then you hear them whisper. And then you hear what sounds like clattering noises going into the distance. Like they're leaving him? Yes. Hey, I think your buddies

are leaving you. A small puddle Appears on the ground As he's peeing himself He's very frightened right now Ask him what they do here What do you do here I ain't telling you shit man

You should Well you are telling us pee I kick him in the neck And then I say ask him again Oh Halcyon You're I kick him in the neck. And then I say, ask him again. Oh, hell, see. Do an intimidation check. You're finally kicking people in the neck. Do I have to?

No, she's doing it. She just kicked him in the neck. Right. What am I doing? Intimidation. 17. He goes, ah, fuck. We just rob people, go past.

We were going to try to wait for you to sleep and then they're some there's a guy who's a traveler he's he's he's a really shitty scout and he ruined the element of surprise oh you mean the guy that ran the other way yeah he blew it

he sure did how long have you guys lived down here I ask him to ask him I don't know how long have you lived down here a couple years does that does our drown know these goblins oh yeah yeah ask if he recognizes her um he doesn't he kind of looks at hoshenka and he's like it's a drow i don't know man where were you when the comet hit he kind of looks at Hoshinko and he's like, it's a drow. I don't know, man. Where were you when the comet hit? He kind of like actually gets really like, like, Ooh,

I like to ask everybody. I know. I know. My friends called me and told me to turn on CNN. He says, well, we used to live in the rusted mountains, you know,

where, where this guy's people live. And then, uh, we had to get out of there. The rusted mountains are a bad place. Everything up north is real bad right now. Why is it bad?

Well, you know, they cast a lot of magic on the mountains now. Is that where the wizard is? Yeah. Hmm. Do you, that tunnel's where your friends just ran away peeing yeah it goes up to the surface how far to the surface i don't know a while not as long for you because you're not a goblin oh right human addicts how long until bozar bozar is like uh i don't know, like another day or something.

Through this tunnel. Yeah. What if we went up through the silver hidden woods? Tiny baby legs. It's just woods up there. You know, tiny baby legs. Yeah, it's about, he gets like really like, oh, I see what you did. And he's like, he looks like if his friends had come down to help him,

that he would have been able to put up a good scrap but you feel like you could crush him real easy okay why don't you show us your wares he goes shing takes the sword out he's like you wanna fucking go man we will eat you alive maybe we run out of cliff bars. So. You take five points of damage

as he lunges at you and plunges a sword in your leg. Ruins your velveteen pants. You owe me. Can I thorn whip this guy absolutely 10 plus so 13

is there other information we could get out of this guy before we kill him or is there nothing we need from him are you just trying to hit him oh no 6 I was going to try to do the that was a 16 i tried to want to get get around his neck yeah 16 you're around his neck that's what you need

that's like the minimum on this guy all right uh now i'm gonna uh pull it really fast he spins around like a top do an athletics check uh that's probably going to be an eight is a no so he does like a half pirouette and he goes ah fuck you you guys are really nasty like rope burn on his neck yeah do roll 1d4 because he has a thorns a thorn whip

like the way you say whip like that it's like your word orange Julius yeah he just takes two points damage I mean I'm not making you go into combat because it's pretty pathetic what you batten him around. You don't feel like it's... We have nothing to gain from this.

Yeah, but he's done talking. All right, I attack him. Are you killing me or not? I'm going to go down fighting. All right. I swing my axe at him. Sweet. Roll to hit.

Goodbye, friend. The word friend here is a little weird. Shit. Friend-o. I don't have it on here. Hold on. I got to say, I tried to get a Palladino's last weekend. 11.

That's a miss. Yeah. Yeah, he dodges to the side. He swings back you and misses. I mean, this is just sad. I just tell him to stop. I'm like, just stop. We're not going to kill you.

We don't want your weird petty theft stuff. We're just passing through. Can we just call it? The world is terrible enough. He says, okay, I'll tell you what. I keep my giant pile of diamonds over there and he runs. He just straight up runs out the doorway. I'm OK to let him run.

Fine to chase him down. That's fine also. But if one of you tries to stop him, he will do a roll to try to get past you. But otherwise, we don't care. You just hear like forever. Just he's cursing. Just going to say, you're welcome. Fuck you. Does anyone have club soda?

I'm going to try to save these pants. Yeah, mostly. You know what? You know what? I reach over and I can't mend on his pants and I fix them. Your pants are fixed.

Thank you. Hoshinka goes, look at that. Wish you could do that with my leg. I've tried in another lifetime. I did try to fix

somebody's messed up brain. And it did. It did. Yeah, it did almost seem like you could do it. But you would know as a cleric, you cannot use men on medical problems. So shall we check out what the goblins had upstairs? Yes.

But he's mechanical, right? Wouldn't men work on some sort of repair thing? No. wouldn't men work on some sort of repair thing no oddly enough um he he responds to healing and such uh like an organic being oh well good for you all those other goblins are still up there somewhere so somewhere are you gonna peek in there it's like a little square opening in the ceiling above the main doorway to the end i mean they probably have a lot of trinkets and sure stuff but also do we want to get into the they probably have a lot of trinkets and stuff, but also do we want to get into the whole thing

with a bunch of goblins? You feel like... They ran away. You heard them going away in some capacity. You don't know if all of them ran away? Is the entire ceiling wooden or is it just the one little area? One little doorway.

The whole ceiling is wooden so we could just start like either like sticking our swords up through it or lighting it on fire or something I have to keep going back to fire but there's wood well do we want to look up there first it's just a matter of like do we want to look up there

you know sure I will I will poke my head up in there. Do a dexterity saving throw. No. All right. This is some heavy dice. You take 18 points of piercing damage. Oh my God.

As a wooden trap slams through your neck. And you guys see Queep go like, and like something just slams into his head when he sticks his head through there and he lands on the ground. Are you okay? Yeah, I'm alive. But yeah, there's just blood splatters everywhere.

Oh, cuckoo bird. I'm going to hit him with a cure sweet do a roll up that hill is he still impaired no I mean it goes like shink it resets oh no

I have thieves tools can I investigate and deactivate this thing there'll be a slight hand check sir thank you that's a 16 yeah you uh you get up there and it doesn't take too long but after about 10 minutes of everyone just kind of you telling everyone like, I don't know, just a minute, just a minute, you managed to hear a spring pop and you can see, like, you can even like lift out these big sort of like, um,

they're, they're all like as long as javelins, but, um, Jesus, they're, they're like embedded in some weird sort of steel grid and you kind of can pull them down and drop them.

So like the thieves tools, like extend out of my fingers and so it's like my hand is like thing that put them away. So can we have spears now? Disarm the trap. They would be sort of found object on traditional spears, but if you wanted to, you could chuck them for damage.

All right. Can I look? Am I up there now? If you want to go up there, just say the word. I mean, you reached your hands to disarm the trap i'll go out and put your okay uh you get up there and yeah it looks like they abandoned the area and took most of their fun stuff with it i perceive just to be sure yeah do an investigation check so 19 there's a bunch of foot lockers everywhere and they all look like they've been popped open and cleaned out all of them except for one foot locker so there are about

10 little bedrolls once you go up there pull them whoever wants to come up i pull up you get up there and it does look like an attic it looks up there too it looks like this is some sort of area that either the goblins found or hollowed out above the inn it doesn't look like this was originally part of the inn you feel like you're in a dusty room that was a makeshift room you see uh what you must assume the goblins took up this this is a vertical shaft that kind of like goes up for a while and then turns and there's like built into the rock like a really shitty wooden ladder that goes up then there's a series of bedrolls that have been left with these foot lockers and the foot lockers are bolted to the ground and they're all open clean except one it's got a lock on it

uh that's been smashed in a little bit can i pick it forgot his yeah slide a hand check uh 21 oh you needed a 20 oh good uh so you you pop it open and inside there is a dagger the dagger has a strange curve to it where it actually like bends twice it's it's got a really weird snake-like bend like a little flambourge kind of thing. Doctor, do you want to investigate this? Sure, why not? How are you going to investigate this? Well, here I am investigating Indeed a Dagger, and it's got curves in it. Begging your pardon, ma'am.

Two. This is the dagger-iest dagger you ever daggered. Investigate. Alright. Should we add to the list? Daggeriest dagger you ever daggered. Investigate. Right? Should we add it to the list? I'll write it down. I mean, it's...

Yeah, write it down. It's yours. It's yours, buddy. And yeah, other than that, it just looks like a bunch of bedrolls. You see just a couple of torn bits of clothing and it looks like a broken up bag that suffered some damage and they ditched it behind. Which way does it looks like a broken up bag that suffered some damage

and they ditched it behind. Which way does it look like it ran? It looked like they went up. It looked like they all clambered up this makeshift wooden ladder up the tunnel. It's a shame we can't light the ladder on fire. We can't?

You could, but it's built into stone. It's like a vertical stone shaft and it's like wooden things kind of jammed into the rock and you know so shall we continue on to bozar yeah i mean you could follow the goblins up supposedly towards the surface or you can go back to the main tunnel let's keep going down the tunnel. Let's leave the main tunnel. Mm-hmm. Sam? All right. You're going to do this in the night or are you going to finish your rest, hoping the goblins don't return? Now, you were

halfway through a night's sleep, so there is that. Has everybody healed, though? Ken just got fucked up by the witchcraft. But then I got healed. I do need some more, but I'm okay for now. I was trying to get my slots back. But what happens if we get interrupted? Get a healing rest.

You can resume. Okay. Well, what if we go further and we keep two people on watch and we rotate more? I think we probably should have been having two people on watch, frankly, anyway. Sure. Yeah. You get a sense that. I don't want to say anything, but yeah.

I'm okay. I'm hit points, so I'll watch. That was not... I will speak to you privately. No, no, no. It's too much to ask of one man. I am doing a great job. Well, what... It's not fair to have one person responsible.

You get a sense that if you had rolled better on your perception check while you were on watch, you might have seen that, or heard that goblin coming sooner. But it's not fair to have one person on watch we should never do that that's not a smart that's on us we are us

yes we are us I am you I'll sit watch on somebody me one of you do perception with advantage while you finish your rest and learn your spells. Ooh, that's a good start. That's a 20.

And a much worse one. Yeah. So. How much do you heal from a long rest? I like to stick with my old rule, which is a long rest, full health. Oh, wow. Which is a little generous, but I mean, it's a long rest. All you really notice, no goblins, very quiet.

And with that, you get a really high perception. Towards the city of Bozer, you smell ocean air wafting down the tunnel. Hold on. Something air wafting down the tunnel hold on something is wafting bode would have loved it and uh you all get up you've uh relearned your spell sarah yeah and uh a new day has dawned heading west to bozor indeed so you had what feels like almost an entire other day without much more incident. There's no more inns. In fact, it looks sort of like the infrastructure

gets a little shitty after a while. You get the impression the dwarves weren't as concerned with the, let's call it, back end of this tunnel, farther away from the dwarven city that you originated from. And at a certain point you see some short stairwell like just a little bit going up

and a stone door yay let us ascend you head up the stairs say anything on the door or around it electrical room the stone door has some dwarven writing on it

copy it down does it match anything from he's seen before that he wrote down do a insight check me with my bonus that's a five you generally none of you recognize uh this writing

so it doesn't look like what i wrote down before it doesn't look like what you wrote down before but i will copy this down too sure should we check the door for traps and such and such do a slight hand check are you just rolling your dice out no just I'm perceiving I rolled a one what is your perception check Brian 22

you feel like you feel like there's there's an ocean nearby and if you could just get through this door you'd be outside I tell them that it's gonna be one of those doors that like we go out and think And if you could just get through this door, you'd be outside. I tell them that. Okay. It's going to be one of those doors that we go out and it's like,

gong, gong, gong, gong. Yeah, go slowly. But there's no obvious way to open the door. It's like a stone wall. We should try to get through this next episode. Sounds good. Hey, Engineer Sam, what do you think happened to this episode of Nerd Poker? Oh, well, this episode,

I forgot to take notes for about 20 minutes. So it picks up with TikTok. There's an insane sexual energy to TikTok that I admire. Still, still, he's very... We're going through paths... We're like Dick Talk.

We're going through paths and hallways that have charred bodies. There's moss growing on the walls, which means it's north. And we're trying to go west, which I don't know why, because there's just going to be a goddamn dragon or something. We're in a big dining area. And then a creature burst through the room and Blaine had tenure. There's a cold wind.

Ken offered to fly people over because he's a bird. I think Kishinka is the sandwich lady from the other episode and we're feeling around for a door and then we found a door above the door but it's full of goddamn goblins i really want to thorn whip something uh somebody gave us diamonds and then ran away and tiktok saved his pants and ken poked his bird head in the door and got it stuck in a bird head trap uh there's foot lockers with a dagger in it and now we're in a tunnel with ocean air. Cool.

Thanks. Sounds about right. And I thought we could maybe end on this too. I just mere seconds ago got the final character art from Aaron English who did our logo. So you ready to see it, Sarah? I've been letting other people get peeks at this shit.

This is the final? Yeah. Ooh. Wow. Ah, he's a fucking bird. I knew it. Can't fool Sam. Dude, that rules.

Wow. It's a t-shirt. That rules. I think a TikTok looks like lurch. That's about right. Oh, I love your suit in that. It looks great. That is so cool.

Yeah, he spent a ridiculous amount of time on this uh i think it turned out looking group yeah uh in the game thanks so much everybody thanks for listening to another episode of nerd poker you can follow us at patreon.com slash nerd poker and you get bonus episodes from there. And you can also send us anything at P.O. Box 16069, Encino, California, 91416. Thanks for listening.