Nerd Poker - S4E52 The River Experiment

Episode Date: September 7, 2021

After handling the demon confrontation, it's time to see if our heroes sent the right person-creature across the river to the south. Hopefully yes, since she was carrying the thing they slayed that whole army for!

Hey everybody, I'm Brian Pussain, 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

Lee Chris Now it's time for another episode of Brian Poussaint's Nerd Poker. Season 4. Hey, everybody. I'm Brian Poussaint, and you're listening to Brian Poussaint's Nerd Poker. It's episode 52. 5-2.

Last one was 51, so this one's 52. That's how things work. My friends are here. Look at them. Look at them. They're delightful, all of them. Yes, even you. That's right, Blaine.

I'm looking at you. Blaine's here, everybody. Hi, Brian. Hi. Yeah, what's up? Watching him is like watching a Muppet made of flesh. Oh, I don't like how that

sounds at all. It's delightful. Dan's here, you guys. Hello. I'm your friend. Hello. You gotta go back to accent class after this. How dare you? Ken's here, everybody.

Hi, Andy. Hey. Ken's teaching accent class after this. My mini curl. All the monsters. Chris is here, you guys. Hello, Brian. Cup of tea.

Wow, that's the best Rastafarian I've ever heard. I wish you all could have seen the way he brought that accent to his face. I act with my body. It was like being in Jamaica. Bonjour, Paran. Sarah's

in the middle of the ocean somewhere. Well, I mean, yeah, I couldn't remember exactly where we were in the game, but I knew there was dangerous waters ahead. It looks like it. I think that's right. Yep. And our engineer, as always, is here.

Look at him. To take our show and steer. Sam, everybody. Hello, sweet children. And Raman, hanging out? Let's find out. Nope. he's done ramen

you guys gotta go like get things back on the right track with ramen ramen nothing well I think he's gotta take a shit that last time he right after he took a shit he was crazy well I think most

dogs are yeah they're really happy right of right after they dump ramen full mouth drowsy so Dan you've got some business to take care of you here comes the business

yeah I'm going to thank some Patreon supporters and they go by supporter names like Tweez Barbecue Flavored Soylent Green. Aw, kid. Thanks, Rachel. That's it. Just Rachel.

Thanks, Rachel. You thought there was a bit, but there wasn't. Thank you, Bryce Gamble. Thanks, Bryce. Thank you,. You thought there was a bit, but there wasn't. Thank you, Bryce Gamble. Thanks, Bryce. Thank you, Amarthamon's Unfortunate Climbing Mishap. Oh, yeah. Amarthamon. Do-do-do-do-do.

Thank you, Jody Freeze. Thank you, Jody. Mr. Trash-tastic. Thank you. Thank you, Axalon Crane. Oh, that's a good one i like that name thank you ice fives venus member ew that's of course a reference to the character venus which is my fault still great thank you we made our constitution save yay hooray thanks hayashi the magical raccoon dog

who could forget thanks Richard Humphrey thanks Matthew Edwards thank you Matt Longo thank you Trilly McGenest thanks Trilly thank you the most intricate dick tracing of the modern age

like to see that one no I wouldn't Dan no thank you Callum Kennedy age. Like to see that one. No, I wouldn't. Dan, no. Thank you, Callum Kennedy. Thank you, Grim Bacon. Thank you. Thank you, Keith Arton. Thank you, Bojangles. Biscuits and chicken.

Thank you, Brent Krynoff. Is that Mr. Bojangles? Yeah, he did the old soft shoe. Mr. Bojangles is Yeah, he did the old soft shoe. Mr. Bojangles is my father. Thank you, Smackdab in the middle. Smackdab in the middle. And thank you, finally,

Billy's ASMR mixtape. Oh, yeah. And now, a sample of Billy's ASMR mixtape for your listening pleasure. I'm going to put my tongue between these scissor blades. Is this relaxing you to think about my tongue going in between scissor blades? Jesus.

Also, I'm touching your hair. I'm touching your hair i'm touching your hair ah that's just one sample of the asmr mixtape you can get by subscribing to billy's asmr mixtape on spotify it's not a good exclusive to spotify yes we it's crazy how he gets paid five billion dollars a year to move to his studio in Texas and record those ASMR mixtapes. He's doing well. Hey, Blaine, who was that ASMR mixtape brought to us by? Oh, Dan,

that ASMR mixtape was brought to us by NerdPoker. And classic. I'm Scott Joplin. You might remember me from The Entertainer. I don't. I have a line of cough syrup that you would love.

Joplin's own cough syrup. that you would love. Joplin's own cough syrup. A one and a two. You don't hear me coughing, do you? Joplin cough syrup. You don't hear him coughing, do you? Joplin cough syrup. The cough syrup of musicians. Dan? dan forgot how passive aggressive musicians used to be back in the old days it's a hard sell on

that one boy oh boy well on that note it's time to talk about what happened last time on nerd poker no yes it's a ceramic baby face. I'm coming for you, Brian. You're the cutest little ceramic baby. Live in the crawl space, Brian. I am the mask you talked about in that one stand-up comedy bit. No, okay, I can't keep doing it. The castaway cuties finally defeated a large front of the Galaxian army. Those weird

fish people are still somewhere in the jungle getting ready to make another pass. But for now there is quiet on the beaches of Davin Glavin. The river roiling ahead, dumping into the ocean, separating the two halves of Davin Glavin. And somewhere

on the other shore they hope there is a Princess Caspia waiting for them. A giant Bahamut hammer taken out of the Hat of Holding before it grew back to its original size and exploded the hat. We now bring you to the Castaway Caves. Already in progress. So that's what happened last time on Nerdy Pokes. The QB is already in progress. So that's what happened last time on Nerdy Pokes.

Yeah, you guys see this just bloody mush pile of dead fish people. Oh, Brian showing off the camera, the sword from the baby mask bit that I was just referencing. Yeah. Just threatened me. Brian's always threatening me like that. One time we went to see that movie about the kid who makes a clicking noise with her tongue. And then Brian called me, I think just to make the clicking noise with his tongue at two in the morning after I just rode my bike through the dark.

Didn't like that. That's Brian. Didn't care for it. But yes, you guys see the mushy pile mostly from iva's cutlass of prismatic spray but there's also this big demon that danny just sort of samurai sorted in half tauntaun style with its entrails splayed across the sands of davin glaven uh you're you're fresh from battle there's all these big spears stuck in the beach that were being launched by war machines and yeah you're like oh yeah my hammer is right over there we gave it to that fish princess is the

forest on fire did we cover that so we didn't cover it uh but we did say it was starting the jungle is definitely on fire but it's sort of obscured by this sand hill just to the north of you if you'd like you can go scope it out no I just thought it would be a little stop gap there's a small pillar of black smoke rising from the other side of the you don't know how much of the jungle is on fire

just yet the wind is strong here on the shore so it could be a lot could be a little did you say it was black smoke? Black smoke, indeed. That means they have not picked a Pope, correct? That's right.

And when there's white smoke, it means they've picked some pickled peppers. And when there's a cloud of vape, they're Brian Posehn. Brian just played Chuck Mangione on a vape pen folks Danny I'm Danny Danny there's blood coming out of my face well you're not

is he bound? everybody's bound right? Ken and him I think I asked this the last episode you stopped everybody from having to make their death saving throws. Yeah, but like Nathan's... All we have is the healing pebble. We do have the healing pebble. The healing pebble. And then only, our only healer is

Tootie, I think. Give me a hit point and I'll heal everybody else. Right now, Tootie is out. He's... Yeah, he's used all your hits. Not dying, but he's at zero hit points. I will use the healing pebble. It allows me to cast a spell. Let's not dying, but he's at zero hit points. I will use the healing pebble. It allows me to cast a spell. Let's see what spell.

Healing pebble allows me to cast healing word once per day, which is what I will do. Let me bring that up. See what that does. Hey, Blaine. Oh, this check brought to you by Noagra.

Viagra in reverse of Noagra penis softener. Keeps you free of unwanted erections. Business meetings go smooth as silk with Noagra. Chris? It's 1d4 plus your healing modifier that I need you to roll boss 1d4 plus spell cast is that spell casting ability that's what it says for me is it different because I'm a wizard

yeah yeah you've got your spell casting ability modifier that you add to like a spell attack yeah okay so d4 plus 3 alright so I will do I have to put put in his mouth or something no it just allows

you to like say a prayer of the pedal that's weird why would you even go there you have to put it under his tongue i think nathan will cup his cheeks and just be like oh toody don't worry but he's very carefully trying to like get the pebble in his mouth yeah you get like

i get like at the back of his throat, like the death moth in Silence of the Lambs. I unfortunately rolled a one, so with my bonus, it's four hit points. That's something. He's awake enough to heal someone else. Me, bro. What happened? There's a rabbit

talking about blood coming out of his face. Physician healed thyself, right? Yeah, you wake up, Tootie, to the face of a rabbit with just blood smeared all over it, looking down on you. Hello! That's how I wake up every morning. Yeah, take that mask

away from Rhodes, Brian. I am going to cast Cure Wounds on him. Oh, thank you. Alright. Why don't you let him know how many points that's gonna be for six nice alright well you've both got enough to like stand up walk around and

take a splinter without dying but you're both pretty weak still oh you know what I didn't realize I could cast it at second level so I'm gonna do it at second level just to give him more hit points oh and you know what? Never mind. Somebody else needs healing, yes? Yeah, Danny.

I think his hit points are in his 20s. I'm okay. I think our little rabbit friend needs more. I'll do it again on the bunny. Jeff, what are you at? Hit points wise. Yeah. I feel like I'm down to 38.

36. I need 12 to get back to full. How about you, Iva and Agatha? Are you both alright? We're both fine. Thanks, though. No, not a scratch on you. It seems no.

It's weird. I can't remember this last noodles is fine uh noodles uh was just sort of running around the whole time trying to stay out of the way did we bring noodles I thought noodles was long gone no you brought noodles up to the beach and

left noodles on the beach if I'm not mistaken okay and then when you came out of the lake I just assumed you took noodles unless you want to set noodles free in the jungle i left noodles in my car was good i may be really wrong on danny i'm looking at because the last stuff i did i did in ink and i did circled like like my points were 29 at the last but i'm not sure because there's also a 16 because i remember i was close to death at one point too the fuck yeah and then yeah that was when ken was gone and because i think that was me who had 2d so maybe i got some up maybe i got up and i'm i am at 29. What do you think, Dan? What's your recollection?

I don't remember you being healed is the thing. So I know you got hit. I think I took some points out of my healing pool. Oh, that's right. Yeah, you did. He did, yeah. Yeah, you got 25. So maybe that is what that

29 is. That's right, yeah. You went up to 29 that's it okay cool we're out listeners we figured it out congratulations to us yeah meanwhile uh yeah so

the spells are you running out yet ken how are you doing i have another healing spell if I could throw that on I think Nathan or you could use it I feel as though

you're now lowest look if we get attacked again it's better for you to be around than it is for me alright you can do more than I can I will heal myself if I can I guess that means myself you can do more than i can i will heal myself if i can make sure you touch i guess that means myself you can uh divinals yourself yes i cover agatha's eyes well then i'll think about you oh my god that's a whole four more hey something okay and now we'll rest long rest right you are on a beach full of guts

where you know an army is coming it's up to you we have to swim for our lives there will be consequences for whatever choice you make next how dare you that's just life Dan I'm here to be your parent

there are no consequences in America shall we swim should we Ken. I'm here to be your parent. There are no consequences in America. Shall we swim? Should we? We're living them, Ken. Uh, yes. We don't have any sort of magical reactivation spell or anything on the water walking or water breathing.

Uh, you definitely had a whole bunch of fun water walking spells available in season 3 I don't know about now you might want to do a quick spell inventory but you've only got I think Nathan is a full caster and you got a couple of holy

spells you might have some weird martyr waterwalking spell 2d that I don't know about but I don't think so I do not no what's particularly fun about this adventure is the different array of abilities you guys have. Yeah, it sounds like a swim might

be in store if you guys want to head south. Catch up to your hammer. Let's try it. I mean, could I use channel divinity to help us swim? Find divine hammer. Your channel divinity does something specific I remember this from

Halcine it's like yeah you use it to do something and there's like a it's a healing thing alright let's see looking it up could you heal the lake into glass it could run across

I can do healing yeah you gain the ability to channel the lake into glass. We could run across. I can do healing. Yeah, you gain the ability to channel divine energy directly from your deity, using that energy to fuel magical effects. Turn undead and an effect determined by your domain. What's your domain,

Tootie? You're not a cleric. This is for clerics. Hmm. Looking it up for paladics hmm looking it up for paladins looking it up for paladins folks I think we did this I feel like I'm having full about this because this is for paladins it's your oath do you know what your

oath is Ken what kind of paladin I don't remember your oath allows you to channel divine energy to feel magical effects it is your oath yes you to channel divine energy to feel meogical effects it is your oath yes where's my oath well you've got a secret oath you choose an oath

of devotion yeah I mean you've got oath of conquest oath of devotion glory redemption the ancients the crown the open sea the watchers vengeance and oath breaker it's an oath of river

walking yeah and I know you're not an oath breaker because you're nice yeah you're not Arkhan the because you're nice yeah you're not arcane the cruel you're 2d the gentle is it in your um where would it be yeah yeah i'm gonna look at oh i'm seeing if i can look at your sheet it's probably on your sheet it's true i'm looking at oaths based on oh oath of redemption your oath of redemption to me it says right there's a little yeah of Redemption. An Oath of Redemption. Okay, so Oath of Redemption features you

get paladin spells listed in the Oath of Redemption spells table. At third, you have Sanctuary and Sleep. At fifth, you have Calm Emotions and Hold Oh, Channel Divinity. Emissary of Peace and Rebuke the Violent. Got it. They're in my spells already. And you've used Rebuke the Violent it they're in my they're in my spells already and you've used rebuke the violent already

yeah yeah okay all right well that was fun everyone yes but you've got yeah sanctuary sleep calm emotions hold person so you've got you've got that stuff you have another healing action swim swim swim swim let's go

let's go all right if you guys are all hopping in the water this is you know a long swim so i'm gonna need you guys to all do an athletics check athletics check only no other option i i i will say you all gotta get in the water and you kind of like look and you're like all right four strong current going in this river, right? It's emptying into the ocean. You got a four, Nathan?

Nathan immediately starts moving sideways with the current. Like, no forward movement. Yeah, as we hear the other numbers, I'm going to want listeners to go ahead and put a little earmark on that. Number four for Nathan. Everybody else. Six. I'm sorry, what are we rolling?

Sorry? Athletics. Athletics. Got it. Nathan. Everybody else. I'm sorry. What are we rolling? Sorry. Athletics. Oh, I can do a luck. I'm going to use a luck point.

I think you might want to. I can too. I will do that. Danny, Jeff, what do you got? 18. 14. 16 plus 1, 17. Unbelievable. What'd you get, Sarah? I rolled the exact same thing. I'm going to use my final luck point

here for athletics. I'm glad you saved those luck points. Yeah, but this is the first one. 19 on that one. Oh, boy, oh, boy. Hey, Nathan, how are you looking? Nathan did much better and got a 13. Wow, I had that you guys

needed a 12, so nobody goes rushing into the ocean. But yeah, and got a 13. Wow. I had that you guys needed a 12. So nobody goes rushing into the ocean. But yeah, it takes a while for those of you on the lower end of that number. So Nathan, you're definitely, you and Danny are both kind of like side by side in the back trying to like, oh, like in the current. Water is not the natural habitat of a rabbit Danny too people had a lot better than 14 everyone else just happened to a little bit a little bit I'm just trying

to make it interesting Brian I'm not trying to embarrass you if I wanted to embarrass you I'd make you roll a 100 and then we know what kind of thing would come after that the botch table but you didn't roll a one you rolled a 16 and 14 and you it doesn't matter

we're having all you come up on the south side of this river and at the moment you do not see princess Caspia there is no she's going to sell that thing on eBay yeah you all take out your phones and you check Poshmark, you check eBay, you check Craigslist, Facebook Marketplace, Cherish in case she's selling the hammer as a nice vintage end table.

But at the moment, you don't see Princess Caspia. I have faith she is one of us. She's simply hiding. We told her to find like a big tree or some sort of landmark. That's what we need to search for. How long has it been? I mean, could she still be

under there? It's possible. She had to drag the hammer with her, so someone could maybe scout out and see if she's still down there yeah i'll go i'll swim out a little bit and see if i can see her in the water like great well i'll give it i'll give you that you're just going natural like the sense of how far you can go without it really being a huge strain uh will make you roll

athletics again but let's do uh an investigation check as you try to find the water iva something in the water 20 wowzers okay uh yeah you just kind of like duck under the water, scan left to right, move around after another duck, scan left to right, and after some very thorough searching, you determine Princess Caspia is not in the water in the immediate area. That's probably good.

Sure. Where does it look like? Oh, Nathan, can you message her or scry with her uh yeah let's check out the ball yeah nathan will reach into his little bag and pull out the crystal ball of mind reading um i'm just checking to see how long it takes at will so i will uh scry on her all right you scry and you feel like she must be nearby as the image of her comes into focus your eyes are rolling back in your head too right nathan i see her i can't miss an opportunity like that thank you um but i've been, I, as the improvers say, Chris,

I've pimped you several times. The vision comes clearer into focus and princess Caspia is up in a tree and she is tossing little sticks that she's breaking off the tree down on what looks like a large worm that is trying to wrap itself around the hammer and pull it underground but she's like distracting it and like whipping little sticks at it it feels like she's nearby i will relay that to everybody there's a worm uh i'll sort of like snap out of it and like, she's up in a tree. There's a giant worm trying to steal the hammer. And I will look around and I'll sort of describe the tree to everybody.

It feels like it's somewhere, somewhere probably deeper inland to the west. I send Agatha out to, to, I ask her to look and see quickly if she can find it. So yeah, no, no trouble at all.

Agatha does a little loop. It looks like princess Caspia is a couple hundred yards to the east. Not quite the west. There's a small cropping of trees that you wouldn't have guessed at first would be where she is, but she's very small and the worm is close to the ground so it actually is kind of

a hiding in plain sight situation. I'm going to shoot it with an exploding arrow. Can I do that? Yeah, roll to attack. 16 plus 4, 20.

Roll your damage. Do longbow 1d8 plus 4. That's my song I say when I roll 1d8 plus 4. 1d8 plus 4 6 plus 4 is 10 and then the exploding thing is another

2d6 that's a 6 and a 6 that's nice that's an unholy Dan so that's a 12 plus 10 22 great so you guys are running up to this outcropping That's an unholy, Dan. So that's 12 plus 10, 22. Great.

So you guys are running up to this outcropping of trees. There's, you know, like 10 trees in this patch of sand. And once you get close, like 60 feet away, Jelf, you pop off this arrow and it just nukes this worm. It doesn't kill it, but the worm kind of squeals and goes back underground. You guys all come up and Princess Caspia climbs down the tree, handing you, Jelf, the hat of holding that you lent her. Oh, great.

Thank you very much for this hat. It was very handy and holding this hammer until I knew the time was running out and I reached in and I grabbed the hammer and my hand hurt really bad and I just dropped it. It wasn't in the best place, but at least it was in the trees. Yes, I would say you did better than any of us could. Congratulations, adventurer.

Oh, thank you, Nathan. Oh, the title you just gave me. Well, that's your dream, isn't it? To run off with a bunch of adventurers and have adventures of your own? It is. Thank you for noticing. I'm going to need you to do really quick, Nathan, a insight check. Insight check. Oh, that's a sweet, too dan yep she seems super grateful and uh seems like she is not in any sort of uh other situation see when you say it like that it makes me think there's another

situation opposite it was a complex it was a complex episode that she just went through it's possible she uh has more to, but she's not immediately saying it. You did not notice any cues that would lead you to believe one way or another. And though she is not appearing to lie to you or anything, she's definitely not giving you any cues. My passive insight is 15. My passive wisdom is 15. And my passive insight is 15 my passive wisdom is 15 and my passive wait yeah insight investigation 16

did I notice anything I am a very do you think Iva would be keeping an eye on Princess Caspi right now I think Iva keeps an eye on everybody so I feel like she would probably notice if there was that would be her natural she seems to be

kind of like holding one of her hands underneath her robe. Oh, because she said she touched the hammer. Oh, no. Yes. Are you okay? I'm quite alright. How's your hand?

It did hurt. I'm quite alright. How's your hand? It did hurt. I'm sure it will go away soon. And she just kind of waves it around quickly and puts it back in her robe. Does it look like anything bad? Move too quick, really. Oh, maybe our healer can take a look at it.

Tuti is quite adept. I feel like it's turning to stone or something. She very reluctantly, Tutti shows you her little fishy hand. She's smaller than any of you remember. She's a little fish person. And her hand appears to be made of solid stone and goes right up to the wrist. Is it progressing at all? I'm sure it will go away soon.

What? Is it progressing? I don't notice it progressing, do you? It's probably temporary. Is it worse than when you first got it? Is it moving up your arm? Just got it a few minutes ago. I'm sure it's going to go away. Okay, it's not going to go away,

so let's be real here. I found most of my problems go away okay it's not going to go away so let's let's be real here i found most of my problems go away if i stop paying attention to them completely i'm writing that down hold on um what one of our other campaigns someone got petrified right yeah well first they were if i throw cure wounds on her i heard a plan uh yeah i mean this is i just got it too it's good work good work best best play uh cure wounds is more about regaining hit points this is this is uh yeah like about a more of a lesser restoration but it doesn't do... No, it doesn't. Paralysis.

I think petrification is like, turn to stone is like serious. There are things that reverse it, but they're like archmage level. Isn't that right, Dan? Like there is magic that fixes it, but it is not... Yep.

What if we cut her arm off? Yeah, that might be the thing. I don't think this is progressing. I think this... Look. Do you see it progressing? Do I? I'll let you choose. You can do medicine or insight.

Alright. I'm going to pick the one that's higher. Alright. Insight. Seems like it's not progressing at the moment. I'm going to pick the one that's higher. All right. Seems like it's not progressing at the moment. Give it like 30 seconds where you just sort of squint your eyes and it seems like it's fine. All right. What if we start moving and we'll just keep a very close eye on this before we start talking about chocolate? Like make a marking on it?

Yes. Like mark it so that we can just sort of keep track of it. All right. Sounds good. And I will say to we can just keep track of it. Sounds like a sharpie. And I will say to her as we're sort of... Ken, fantasy sharpie, please. Fantasy sharpie? Yes, Chris.

I will sort of say to her as we're helping her out, say, now also remember, when you become whichever form you ultimately wish to be, a damaged limb I believe could easily be part of the bargain. So, if there is something that happens to you, perhaps it could be fixed.

Oh, I see what you're saying. Be optimistic. Well. Oh boy. Oh boy. Oh, is that not what you were saying, Nathan? Nathan just kind of like, OK. Yeah, she's definitely like not quite piecing together the folksy wisdom of Nathan, the cottage rabbit. But do your best to sort of give her a sense of the direness of the situation. And she listens as well as she can.

You guys start heading southwest towards Bling Bottom. If you choose to look at a map, which you can, of course, do through Roll20 right now if you like. Or just pull up a PDF that you may have printed by your computer. I will link Roll20 in the chat just in case you need it uh the david glaven map shows that you guys are currently just southwest of the shell's lament on the other side of the peel you're kind of making a little zigzag on the map around to some cliffs these cliffs sort of spill down into more of a forest than a jungle. And as you get to that cliff,

you all just kind of go, oh, it's getting real late. We're all still pretty beat up. Tootie's still dragging this 250 pound hammer. You're like, oh, fuck. We might want to camp soon. Perhaps we should suspend the hammer with a rope and all of us should follow

Princess Cospia's good lead and stay up in the trees for the evening. Yeah, that might be smart. Yeah, like tie a rope to the hammer and just dangle it off the cliff? No, throw one of the rope over a branch of a tree. Like with a bear food or whatever.

Yeah, exactly. So Hammer is now hanging suspended from the tree and we all sleep in said or several trees. Okay. Who would like to tie that knot and do a survival check? I'll do it. Alright, Jelf, let's see it.

I'll let you do it with advantage because I assume everyone's trying to gather around you and help you do this right and you've got many cooks in the kitchen right now yeah and I have a plus 6 survival proficiency so 15 plus 6 so 21 nice great I would have asked for

at least an 18 to do this without the rope just shredding it's 250 pounds 250 pounds and you need to combine a couple lengths of rope to make this work so it takes some very careful and elaborate knotting to get this nice and stable and finding a tree branch that'll hold 250 pounds but you get it all sort of hung up about 10 feet off the ground and you you set up camp? Yes. All right. Who would like to take watch first?

I'll do a watch. I'll do first watch. Danny's up too. Great. Why don't you both do a perception check? No. I refuse. I refuse. All right.

I got a one plus six. Okay. I got a 10. So both of you don't really notice anything. It's very quiet. A lot of woodland crickets, other animal noises, definitely some weird creatures native to Dave and Glavin that sound sound very exotic you're like what is those noises he's like just weird like sort of cackling cacaws in the jungle but you get to the end of your shift and both of you got to go to the bathroom

pretty bad and you've already kind of gone to the bathroom once during your your uh shift and you're kind of like ah this, this is weird. And you notice everyone else has been tossing and turning during their sleep. Hmm. Is there some sort of a... Do we

get a vibe from the ground that we're sleeping on or plants or anything? Why don't you and Danny do an insight check? That's an 11. I got an 11 plus 3, 14. Yeah, both of you are just kind of like,

eh, this is annoying, but we should go get whoever is on watch next I'll be on watch alright how can you not sleep well Nathan no I'm tossing and turning I wonder if my rucksack

had a mosquito possible are there bugs in the tree you don't see any bugs does everybody have to pee Dan does everybody you all kind of wake up and it's just sort of like

you feel some like needly pains in your stomach Danny and Jelf as you lay down and Nathan as you get up you're just like it just feels like needles in my stomach did we have parasites from the water or something could be

what did we all have I had the fish as far as all of you can remember you just had the standard food and water in your bags is it the tree am i feeling fine uh do you wake up i'll let you uh decide well i said i was gonna do that watch but i can do the next one yeah i mean you oh you did go ahead we could say all of you uh just sort of like half awakes they're whispering to each other and you're like, ah, fuck. So anyone who's awake you want, you haven't done an insight

check already, you can do another one right now. Insight. Yeah. So maybe this going up in the trees is the problem. Maybe the trees are poisonous. Fine. Let's see. I can only hope. Whose idea was going up in the trees? Me. I rolled a, oh no, I got a 12.

Insight. Okay. Whose idea was going up in the trees? Me! I rolled a... Oh, no, I got a 12 insight. Okay. Yeah, none of you are quite piecing it together yet. We've got all under 15s, yeah? Yeah, but can I look at the tree? I would like to look at the tree and see. You look it up and down. I give you a nat 20 on this tree. Seems normal.

Perhaps we should wake everyone. Let's wake up Tootie. Let's wake up Princess Caspia. Well, has everyone been... Has anyone got... We need to be healed up, right? Yeah, I mean, none of you have gained any hit points yet. You all feel really restless.

You're a 24 on your insight. I didn't hear that. Yes. Okay, so yeah, you feel like something happened, especially when you start talking to Princess Caspia and she seems fine. She's like, I don't have any needle pains in my stomach. During the fighting, something must have happened

to your supplies. It seems like you've all been poisoned and it's just starting to settle in and it's some sort of very deep kind of digestive poison that's affecting all of you. Awesome. Cool. Wait, what happened? The demon poisoned our supplies somehow?

Or something, some spell poisoned us? Bizarre. Alright. Does anybody have our supplies somehow? Or something, some spell poison. Alright. You and mine? I wasn't there when they were fighting the demon, right? No, yeah, you don't feel it, and that is part of how you piece it together. Thank you. Thank you for reminding me. So sorry, guys. Is there a

reverse poison spell or anything? Say again? A reverse poison spell of anything? Say again? A reverse poison spell of some kind? Anybody? No, I don't because I've used up my spell slots. But if we go for a full rest now, in the morning, 2D will have spell slots.

If it's a slow enough poison, yeah. Good luck. Try it. We'll know soon enough if it's working or getting worse right yeah so are you just going to try and go back to sleep yes I'll take second watch or wait no I have a you want to take second watch

can I do a medicine roll and try to go for it something together well that's a four you really don't know what's up to see if I can put something together? Well, that's a four. You really don't know what's up. You also, just from trying it and being a paladin, you're like, this is some kind of you know,

magical poison and it sucks. Yeah, it's serious bullshit. Yeah, and none of you have taken hit points yet, but you're all like, ugh, fuck. So try to rest, right? And then we gotta get going. Then we can get to town, if you can. If we can rest long enough for 2D to get spell slots, otherwise we have to

just start running. But I think it won't even fix poison, right? You can't. Minor restoration will. Oh yeah. Or won't even fix poison, right? Minor restoration will. Oh yeah. Or lesser restoration will. Yeah, poison. But it can only be one person. I guess I can do it twice. Close your

eyes. Ah, shit. No? So we just run? It didn't work. I thought we were trying to rest yeah you you rested but i just said he only has two spell slots so he can only heal two people so that one yeah but we've had our rest no you you're you're doing iva's perception check if she's on watch i got it i was waiting to hear that number i apologize i'm sorry i missed i completely missed that um 11 okay uh yeah you don't notice much except for the pains in your

stomach uh i didn't have any pains oh that's right god sorry it's hard for me to keep track of who this is happening to because this is a group with this weird malady okay it only affected three out of uh no it's just you that doesn't have it um you you and princess caspia iva i'm reminding myself when i'm saying this are the only two who have who are not feeling these needling pains um are you gonna swap out with somebody else yeah because i need to get i would i mean i don't need to but ideally i remember jelf only needs four hours right so you could wake jelf yeah yeah yeah okay uh jelf why don't you roll a perception check for me i would love to uh 16 plus 622 yeah um you know you you just hear weird noises as far as scouting goes and and watch watch but as the sun comes up and everyone starts to wake from their restless sleep with uh

you know uh not a great feeling uh you all notice that uh you have full health, but a great mood has fallen over all of you who are feeling these poisonous effects. And all but Iva, I'm going to need you to do a charisma saving throw. Ooh. I remind everyone, if we stay close to Tootie, his natural, lovely aura shall give us all a bit of a boost. Isn't stay close to Tootie, his natural lovely aura shall give us all a bit of a boost. Isn't that right, Tootie?

I don't know. If we're all within 10 feet of you, you give us some saving throw bonus? Oh, yeah. You've got an aura. I feel like you would announce that a couple games ago. Oh, oh, oh, oh. That's if I cast it i think and i will

well unfortunately you don't see this coming you're not in combat so i don't think i can allow you to set this up this is this is happening as wake up. So everybody is in a super grumpy mood because I'm making them do this. But still, if you would please tell me what you got on your... Seven. Oh. Twelve. I heard a seven and a twelve, but I didn't hear... Seventeen minus one, sixteen.

Sixteen, fourteen. Okay. that's 116 16 okay so it looks like jelf you kind of uh rub your eyes and you're able to shake off this horrible feeling uh especially after you just did watch and you've got that amazing perception check you just feel like steely eyed and like you just sort of you know pulled your soul up by its bootstraps and you you kind of organize your thoughts and you're able to shake this horrible feeling that you feel like came from either the food or the water uh that you consumed after your battle um but the rest of you uh you three nathan 2d and danny i'm gonna need you to roll a d10

10 is basically the opposite of how i feel normal and Danny, I'm going to need you to roll a d10. 10 is basically the opposite of how I feel normal. Four. I rolled a 10 and a four. Six. Six. Six. All right.

So I'm going to be sending some secret messages to the three of you. Blaine, I don't know if you have any spare commercials, but I'm going to need to do some super secret DM shit that I haven't done in a long time. So I would love if you could have my back. Ken, I'm going to whisper to you first. Please check the Zoom chat. Brian, I'm going to whisper to you next. Please check the Zoom chat.

Nathan, I'm going to whisper to you last. Please do not just repeat out loud what you read. Interpret it for your character. Blaine. You get the body we get the genes avocado avocado we get the body we get the genes avocado avocado genes they're pretty nice guac don't run to get avocado jeans avocado avocado

avocado jeans hey you got any more this is like some this is one of those like long things tell a story somebody maybe while I'm doing this tell me about olden Dungeons and Dragons times promotional consideration maybe while I'm doing this? Tell me about old Dungeons and Dragons times. Promotional consideration for old Dungeons

and Dragons times brought to you by low volume agree shampoo. Keep the volume down. Agree. Low volume shampoo. That was a big thing about old Dungeons and Dragons. They didn't want big hair. They wanted low volume. Yeah, well, I think that's when Nirvana

came along. Snap the hair farmers out of it. Ken, I've given you your secret. Brian, you're up next. Okay. Also brought to you by that Kentucky Fried Chicken near Sark's house. Pointed it out to my kid the other day. Yeah.

Was that a common stop for you guys? I was at Subway on the way there. Do you remember the sketchy neighbor that one time we felt kind of freaked out we were playing? I don't remember. There was a thread or something. No, Sarks. Oh. Wasn't there a guy with his shirt off or something? But no, but it was like Somebody in that apartment

Next to him had said like Something threatening Or something, super vague To you guys? Because you're playing D&D? Wow No, I just remember like a weird night But who knows I think, yeah, and we went out back to look at the gate or something

Yeah, something I don't know what's that all. Didn't he have a sword? Didn't Sark have a sword out? Or was that just something he did all the time? Brian, I've sent you your whisper. Nathan, here comes yours. That was something.

We went back to the gate. Maybe like somebody tried to steal one of their cars. Something. Yeah, yeah. Oh, interesting. It was somebody in the building that had sketched out, though, and then they were gone. They had a sketchy incident and took off.

Yeah, I remember. Exactly. When I was young and lived with Pat and we, our neighbor in San Francisco threatened us, and then my uncle came down and had a talk with him. Is that Wayne? Yeah, yeah, exactly. came down and had a talk with him. Straight into my mouth. Yeah, yeah, exactly. The dude that lived underneath,

because I moved in when you moved out. And then it was, the dude had a guitar shop. He made his own guitars and he had a Corvette. That's the only thing I would, I was like, hey, how's the vet? So he wouldn't talk about anything else. And Greg Barron thought he had, because he had a bunch of guns too

and he and uh i went in there once and all his windows were blacked out and he had booze bottles everywhere and and guns on the table and shit and uh baron said because he rebuilt guitars that baron said that he would shoot his guitars and then fix him and apologize to him. Nathan, I've sent you your secret. I'm reading it now. Alright, so you guys notice the three of these folks, they seem upset to varying degrees. They know something

has happened to them in the night. Should they choose to share this? It's up to them, but they don't feel right. Nathan gasps and goes, I've been possessed! There is a dark

spirit inside of me. Oh, friends, I may not be able to control myself. I think you're fine. I think we just... I mean, I think that you're fine. I think that you did eat some bad shrooms or whatever, and it's going to be a tough trip,

and then we're going to go find you a doctor, a healer. Yes, great magic can help me, but I'm just warning you, at any moment, probably an inopportune one, I might turn on you. What makes you think that? Because I've been possessed. I have the knowledge. I have been told. I have been possessed.

I feel it in my body. Ah, well. feel it in my body. Uh, well? Um. I hear its voice in my large ears. What's it telling you to do? Eat your face. I won't!

Oh, God. Uh, hey, uh, Danny, please do a religion check. Checking my religion. That's me in the coat room 20 total 17 plus 3 oh nice who are you praying to we're label us an earth oh that's right the the that elven god um you you hear them whisper uh very quietly uh with with a sort of sad sternness only a spell cast by someone powerful can remove this from you can remove this from you.

I tell the guys that my god said that only a spell cast by somebody powerful can remove it. Hey, Licky. Lick. Licky, come fart on Brian's character and get the weird juju out. We must seek Licky the wizard. Lick.

Lick. Stop. Good girl. we must seek Licky the wizard Lick stop good girl sorry so you've all got full hit points and varying levels of unpleasantness oh that's good for three of you what about the princess

she wakes up with a stone hand and a spring in her step not possessed no again you feel like something happened to your food and water during that fight should feel like you you consumed something that was tainted somehow well right but what about the voices telling us stuff uh it's different for each of you there's no answer for you that i would want to say out loud to everyone um the the thing you're hearing right now uh danny is a voice of a god but before that what i whispered to you is a feeling you have it's it's not a voice it's not like a schizophrenic hallucinogenic voice okay cool cool cool um so i've those are no

fun no and i'm keeping track so if you guys like um at any point in one of our games i can whisper back to you this same sort of uh wording for your predicament as a reminder but i would recommend you read it and reread it between uh battles and such until this is fixed um and yeah you guys sort of begrudgingly look southwest towards bling bottom um how would you like to proceed uh there's this cliff ahead of you will you untie the hammer from the tree and find a way down the cliff do we have to way down the cliff? Do we have to go down? Can we not? Do we have to go down the cliff to get to bling bottom? Well, you have to get past.

You could travel all the way to the shore. You guys did not know this cliff was here. So you haven't followed the shoreline exactly because that takes you a little farther away from bling bottom. You can travel east along the cliff face until there will be some kind of beach. You don't know how cliffy that beach will be. Does it seem

a cliff is inevitable, Dan? Is that what you're saying? It seems like there might be an inevitability to the cliffs. You see them sort of turn off around a bend in one direction and go for at least a few miles in the other

direction. Perhaps our more forest-minded friends could sort of scout ahead and see if there is, if a cliff isn't inevitable, perhaps there is a path. Yes. Jelf, why don't you go ahead and do that scouting? I'd love to.

I roll a 17, whatever that means. What am I, what's my scouting? Am I looking for something? Yeah, I mean, you're just sort of running up in east and west along this cliff you you can tell this cliff goes kind of all the way you're on like a bluff this cliff goes kind of all the way back towards the peels on on the west side and it does zigs and zags you kind of see over you get like a couple of views by climbing up a tree all jelfy um and then you you kind of run back uh east and kind of look and it looks

like yes there are sort of cliffs that go down onto a beach and you would either have to swim through some treacherous waters again or lower yourselves over these cliffs at some point to avoid either going all the way back to the peel and ascending a cliff as well or uh having to swim or or lower yourselves down those are sort of your three options okay uh uh what are we how what are we doing with this hammer right now you're looking at it mindfully and worriedly, this albatross around your goddamn neck. If only one of you, probably Tootie, could attune yourself to this goddamn thing, maybe you wouldn't waste so much.

Well, I will certainly try to attune to it, then. And we'll have to find out if you can on the next episode of Nerd Poker. Hey, Sam. Hello, everyone. What do you think happened today on nerd poker on episode 52 nathan's sweet beautiful body has been injured so we're helping him we're looking around for princess caspia uh and i think i heard someone say a big worm has taken

our hammer uh which i forgot i think we left in a hat uh something is wrong with princess caspia and she won't take it seriously because everyone we meet is frustrating. We are taking a rest in camping. Someone has poisoned us. It appears we've made an enemy somehow during our travels of killing almost everyone we meet. And lastly, Brian played his soda like a saxophone for like two full minutes on Zoom and no one said anything. It was great. That was me in my happy place. Melanie just brought me

a fresh soda from a place around the corner. Played it like a saxophone and we all pretended we didn't see it. I didn't see it. Somehow I missed that. Look at that guy. He loves the blues. I can't wait to set that to madness

hey you take a dip well i'm gonna talk about some plugs oh god i got a really good sip i'm glad i i i have not had fountain soda since the last time I went to Gorilla Mall like in May. I need to get me one of those. Gorilla Mall. Uh boy. I'm one of the gorillas. No. That's a bit bananas.

I am nominated for an award for writing a tabletop adventure. Cool. The thing I plug on the show all the time is nominated for Best Family Game for the Any Awards, which are usually given out at Gen Con. You can actually vote if I win this thing.

So if you want to go, do it. It's the Any Awards, E-N-N-I-E. And the website is any-awards.com. yeah it's uh again with an n like nancy not an m like uh mary tyler moore who won emmys this is an any and yeah like it fucking i don't know i got i wrote a 45 page adventure and it got nominated for shit my uh my co-workers also got nominated for a bunch of stuff for cortex which is a role playing system i contributed a little bit to that but mostly that's my co-workers so i would love if you guys would vote for that that'd be pretty rad that's my plug congratulations cool thanks cool

uh um i've got uh some road gigs coming up ryanpersane.com uh not till oct, I've got, uh, some road gigs coming up. Brian for sane.com. Uh, not till October. I've got all of September off. Uh, so come hang out at my pool. Oh, but noted. Um, that's like it. Well, Oh no, I've got tons of comic book shit coming out.

Um, currently in comic book stores. I i mean you can buy it on amazon but i prefer you go see those weird guys in that in that uh you know that mini mall or uh wherever it is in your hood go see those guys and uh they'll hook you up with the anthrax book among the living it's available in a lot of different ways paperback there's a nice hardback graphic novel and then there's a really insane deluxe slipcase hardback graphic novel that's fucking beautiful and there's some great stories in there and myself and Scott Koblish I'm really proud of what we

did together he's my buddy from Deadpool we should have him play sometime he's awesome great artist and a funny guy dude the thing he's doing now we're doing this book for Heavy Metal Magazine called Axe and Joe and I wrote it together and it's basically so good dude the thing he's doing now we're doing this book for heavy metal magazine called axe

and joe joe and i wrote it together and it's basically the whole premise is three kids find uh the necronomicon of guitars at an old guitar shop the at an old guitar shop and it it's uh evil dead 2 with heavy metal and it's like uh you know we put these things that we love in a blender and koblish loved metal too and killed it so so much on the anthrax thing he was like a perfect guy to do this and we've been writing together for fucking eight years now since deadpool so uh it's it's a good fit uh but those are two things I'm really proud of. I can't wait for people to see Axe. Axe is fucking, I hate the expression chef's kiss,

but these pages I'm seeing, like we did these like Clive Barker like villains, these demons and shit that are fucking so creepy because pushing the heavy metal magazine shit. Like I remember going into reading it the heavy metal magazine shit like I remember going into reading a heavy metal magazine at 7-11 as a kid and seeing like a vagina with teeth

and shit and going what the fuck you know like so we wanted images like that we wanted to have shit that will make you feel like a kid reading something you're not supposed to read that's my plug. Blaine.

Oh, uh, uh, Stacy. He's just got tapped to direct the baby Huey movie. So we're going to a Pinewood studios in England, baby. I do it.

I do it. I can't wait to meet Steven Seagal. It's going to be awesome. Oh, that's awesome. I appreciate your whatever you do with your ears or however you consume this.

Amazing. Thanks for listening to another episode of Nerd Poker. You can follow us at patreon.com slash nerdpoker, and you get bonus episodes from there. And you can also send us anything at P.O. Box 16069, Encino, California, 91416. Thanks for listening. listening