Nerd Poker - S4E85 Hole Tactics

Episode Date: April 26, 2022

The Castaway Cuties know where they want to go, but unfortunately it's something they only really visited in another timeline. All they have to do is get past some undead elf soldiers. Seems like not much can go wrong!

Hey everybody, I'm Brian Poussin, Comedian, writer, actor, nerd. I've been playing D&D with my friends for a long time. I decided to do a new podcast where we play Dungeons & Dragons in my very own dining room. With my wife, kid, and my noisy dogs. So meet my friends Sarah, Kev, Dan, Lee, Chris. Now it's time for another episode of Brian Posehn's Nerd Poker. Season 4. Hey, everybody.

I'm Brian Posehn. You're listening to Brian Posehn's Nerd Poker. We're going. We're doing it. It's episode 85. Remember the year 85? Hope you do. It was a good one.

Eh, not really. For me, it was personally terrible shit happened. But, uh, anyway, good shit came out, good movies and TV and stuff, but we're moving on. My friends are here. Look at them. Uh, there's Ken Daly. Howdy.

I'm trying to think of any 1985 movies. Tootily tootle. here. Look at him. There's Ken Daly. Howdy. I'm trying to think of any 1985 movies. Toodly Toodle. Well, no, Back to the Future only takes place in 85, right? No, it came out in 85. Yeah, okay. There's one.

That's Dan. Sorry, I killed you, Brian. Still. Spoiler, if you're a weirdo. Fright Night. Oh, Fright Night. Great movie. Teen Wolf, another Michael J. Fox vehicle. Goonies.

Return of the Living Dead. Teen Wolf's weird. Teen Wolf's got some weird shit in it if you watch it now. What? Like the werewolf? No, just jokes that don't fly and make you feel weird. Your girlfriend, Stiles. Yeah, that was Blaine a minute ago.

Jump in anytime, Sarah, when we talk about a movie. There she is. The Animator, that's a good one. Hello. Yeah, a lot of those 80s movies upon rewatch are suspect. Oh, John Hughes. He's kind of lucky he's not around. Let's not go so far, but I do, yes, I think you'd be surprised. His whole world is problematic.

Nice, Brian. You okay? Did you pull a muscle in your neck? Are you all right? I remember seeing Back to the future wait wait i do want to say i saw back to the future was one of the first movies i remember seeing in a theater and i we had to sit in the front row because we got there late and i always i still think about that all the time about a how sitting in the front row of like an old school movie theater is worthless and pointless you were literally like seven inches from the screen yeah it's nothing's nothing. You don't see anything. I was on Top Gun like that with my contacts coming up. Yeah, terrible. And then like when Arclight happened

and reserved seating became a thing for going to the regular movies, it was just life-threatening. Nice, yeah. That's how I saw Freddy Got Fingered. It was great. That is really important. I'm glad you saw it as it was meant to be seen.

In IMAX. Yeah. It's in a ram of doom. Let's say hi to Sam, everybody, our engineer. Hello, sweet children. What's up, buddy? Hi, guys. How's Raman?

He's fast asleep. Oh, good. He's pooped. I like when he's not mad at you. I always feel bad when he's mad about not getting to eat like a rock or something. Yeah. A couple of days ago, he was very mad because he had found like the end of somebody's key chain, like just basically a chunk of plastic. And he was mad that I took it out of his mouth.

You ever put like some sliced pork and a soft-boiled egg on him? I know. I haven't, but I will. What? Hmm. Oh, on ramen? Yeah, that would be good. Got it.

Incredible energy in here today. Oh, boy. It's not good. I actually have energy. It's not good. I still have. It's not good. I still have not as good. It kind of destroyed my voice the last time,

but I've still got some. I was worried about that. Yeah. I'm just grossed out thinking about it. Yeah. Brian, you know, that was just the first episode you did with that character. No, I've done Goldbar with you guys. I know, but I mean, you have to do another one right now. Oh, no, I know. Yeah. You're going to be like Liam Gallagher guys. I know, but you have to do another one right now.

Oh, no, I know. Yeah. Yeah. You're going to be like Liam Gallagher, man. You're going to have to work your larynx with menthol and stuff. He does that? I don't know. I figure he's a singer, right?

Yeah. I saw them be really, really great one time, and then I saw them be not as great. Ah, I never saw Oasis. I would have loved to. Oasis, I saw, but this is a weird show. I saw Oasis, especially for me, because it's like zero metal,

but people that just know that persona, you know, I mean, my friends know that I listen to everything. There are many petaled flowers. Yes. So I saw petaled flowers. Yes. So I saw one of the greatest shows. It might be top 10 of all time. At the Hollywood Bowl, I saw Oasis and the Black Crows at the height of their powers.

And they were both incredible. And talk about two dueling brothers bands, you know, brothers that hate each other. Yeah, yeah. What a great show that was. No, but it was a weird tour, right? I mean, isn't that kind of a strange combo? That is an odd combo, yeah. Yeah, I don't know how many other dates they did together,

but I was happy to be there. They were a good show. That was a good show. Anyways. Dan? Brian, I bet I know what you want me to do. be there. They were good. That was a good show. Anyways, Dan, Brian, I bet I know what you want me to do. Thanks.

Some people. Yeah. Hey, everybody. I'm going to thank the patron supporters who actually allow us to record this by keeping us afloat. Thank you. Willie Nilly Nelson. That's a good one.

Thank you. Kyle Wolfilly Nelson. That's a good one. Thank you. Thank you, Kyle Wolf. Thanks so much. Thanks, Zach Hagen. Thank you. Thanks, Zach. Thank you, Sarah Pinged My Hole at Palatwinos. Oh, no. What?

Comment? That's a little gross. Thank you, No Signal. I like that gross. Thank you NoSignal. I like that one. Thank you, Alex. Thanks, Alex. Thank you. Thank you, Gago's 38th

husband. Thank you, Stringbean. Thank you, Mark Elder. Thank you, Jeffrey Myers. Thank you. Thank you, Jeffrey Myers. Thank you. Thank you, Odin's Eyehole. Oh, dear. Hmm.

This person put their personal email address as their name. So I'm going to just say the beginning. We'll say thank you, Daniel. Thank you, Daniel. Daniel, you might want me to plug your full email, but I feel uncomfortable. So next time I'm going to ask you to not just include your email, but your blessing to share it on the podcast. Feel free to message the nerd poker,

Patreon account. If you would like me to reverse this decision. Um, but otherwise I was like, what? Thank you. Also turns out I can stick two fingers up my ass almost any time.

Oh. Lucky him. Or it. What a revelation. Thank you. Thank you, Barf the Mog. Thank you, Peter Bartlett. Thank you. Thank you. What?

Thank you, Garblocks. Yeah, Garblocks. Thank you. What? Thank you, Garblocks. Yeah, Garblocks. Thank you, Sean Allen. Thank you, Mick from The Itch. Thank you, Mick from The Itch. Thank you. Thanks, Jessica Olenek. Or Olenek.

Thank you, Ben Feltz. Thank you, Veggie Beef. Thank you, XBB. Thanks, Adam. Oh, my God. Adam Common. Oh, no. Adam Common, man. felts thank you veggie beef thanks adam oh my god adam common oh no adam common man adam common man i think is what it is but it's dealt with a whole lot of variety in vowels thank you ucla fudge and ollie thank you david profilly thank you william Sager. Thank you, Dipo. Thank you, Zach Davis.

Thank you, Greg. Thank you, Herculoid. He was a Herculoid. Happier than Gloop and Gleep. Herculoid. And finally, thank you, Terry's reassigned public defender. Blaine, who are all these folks brought to us by? Well, Dan, those listeners are brought to us by

General Motors Breakfast Division present Chevrolet O's, Holly's Spread Boar Carburetor, Flowmaster's Isky Cab Chef, Eight Vitamins and Minerals, Edelblock's Sling Shop, Manifold's Hearst Hooker Headers, Nat's Five Sl, slingshot, manifolds, hearse, hooker, headers, gnats, five slack crackers on

Goodyear Meats, part of this balanced breakfast from General Motors Breakfast Division. Dan? Thanks, Blaine. Thank you for bringing that energy to this otherwise sleepy episode of Nerd Poker.

That's right. Nestle your head in this pillow blaine why what is happening sorry i couldn't get the music turned off that's all right all right so you guys are beneath the ruins of the temples of flayzacola you're in sort of a sub-basement for the god Torm, where a priest has very slightly been able to patch some moons. And you still have the unconscious body of Dany and are debating how to heal yourselves

up, I think without resting. I think you guys are trying to not rest. I did a little healing. How would you like to proceed? Head down the fissure yeah there is a big open fissure awaiting your entry there are two soldiers

guarding it the priest can relate that they are each armed with a halberd and are there able to call more soldiers this priest is unaware of the mayhem but he heard, you know, some noises in the distance.

He, when you confirm that there was a fight, he's like, Oh, okay. There is blood all over your clothes and you have a dead body. But, um,

yeah, you get, you guys need to decide a plan of action. You feel free to ask me questions. You saw some stuff while you were up there. I can get into some detail about, um, can we just sneak, sneak up on them and take them out?

Sure. Or try to do so? Yeah. Let's leave Danny's body with the priest and sneak and murder. Should I shoot them from a distance like I did before? Oh, when you brought on the whole army on your head. Yeah. I think once you guys sort of peek up, you can see, you know, there are lines of soldiers running all around the temple, not paying the temple area specific mind because it is rubble full of poor people.

a specific mind because it is a rubble full of poor people but you know as the soldiers run past you see more than one of them kind of glance over their shoulder and stare suspiciously at the rubble that you guys are peeking your heads out of and i'm not making you roll stealth here but you're getting a lay of the land this is a big big area that takes up a very large city block and you can see there's room for at least a dozen different temples, but the building has been raised. There's partial walls in some spots and you found at least one entryway underneath the rubble. And yes, this fissure is on the north side of the complex and is supposed to lead to several areas, including the underground temple of Bahamut, whose original stairwell, you're told, has been caved in.

temple of Bahamut, whose original stairwell, you're told, has been caved in. Okay, so we can't just attack them because it's in an open air situation, like if we just start shooting arrows. You could potentially... Alright, everybody do an insight

check. 1 is the loneliest number. 14. 5 and 6, 11. 14,eliest number. 14. 5 and 6, 11. It's 14, the high number. We're pretty dumb, Dan. Now it's 16.

Yeah. Tootie. Coming in. All right. So basically in these situations, I am looking for something over a 15. And yeah. I got one. That'll do it.

over a 15. And yeah. I got one. That'll do it. There's enough rubble and partial walls where you guys can sort of plot how you would sneak up to the north end

of the structure and potentially drag these guys behind some rubble. It could be done. They're about, however, 10 feet away from reasonable cover. So there would be,

you know like six seconds of like sneak, sneak, sneak, grab, drag in an ideal situation you could all of you sneak up within 10 feet and hide but it would be tricky to do it without these two noticing you

they're also amongst the rubble this fissure is in the middle of what used to be a building it's not like in the street. So they are a reasonable distance from the street. There's no reason to assume you would get away with knocking and dragging these. What is happening? Sorry, I'm

looking at my app. The visual of pointing your phone at the camera was so distracting. I was seeing my own face reflected in your phone. Weird. Oh, yeah. Weird. Whoa. Oh. Okay, guys. What if we...

What if I walk up beside... Can I walk up beside them? I'm too small to do this, but maybe Golbar or somebody could just walk up, put his arms around them, and then just with one shove of each meaty arm just shove them into the pit. Would it help if Golbar was invisibule?

Yeah. How far away are they? Golbar could be invisibule. They're a few hundred feet away. You'd have to do tiptoe, tiptoe, tiptoe past a bunch of unhoused folks and priests and tents. Like if they fall down into the hole, do we think that... How far?

Are there stairs? Or do we think they'll be hurt instantly if we do that? Yeah. They might scream on the way down. From where you guys are, several hundred feet away, you have no scope

of even how big the fissure is. You just see these two distant figures with hallbirds. We could try to put them to sleep. We could try to distract them, get them away from there, and then use some type of...

I was considering common motions, which makes them not care about us. What is the deal with common motions? Could we just do that and then just proceed down? The 20-foot radius, 60 feet away, each humanoid must make a

charisma-saving throw. You can suppress any effect caused by a target, or you can make a target indifferent about creatures of your choice that are hostile towards us. It should leave us alone. So if we all stay together and we just casually

just scroll up. You'd still need to engage it on some level. We'd just be like, oh, we're just going to go check out the fish. There's a difference between being indifferent and bad at your job altogether. They won't have an emotional reaction, but if you tell them that they yeah they won't become like

we're friends with michael he just said to go through right let's have a plan a and a plan b we could try it we'll just try to do that and then if it doesn't work then we'll just try to push them down in the hole okay does that sound good that sounds like some classic nerd poker and i feel like we already know that plan a is not gonna work that great but i love oh nathan why don't we what if we double up and whatever we're gonna tell them you do your bunny charm when you're telling them so we've got the calm emotions and then you also are telling them that michael sent us or whatever to that sounds great um to check the perimeter of the i don't know what you want to say you're smart you'll figure it out sure first things first all

of you are going to try to stealth close right within spell and sneak range without either these two guards or the many, many guards in the streets seeing you sneak through this area. That sounded like a good idea. We're all going to roll a stealth check. Difficulty seven. Lucky number seven.

23. Originally 10, but I am reducing it because you guys spent so much time getting a lay of the land. Thank you. 11. 8 plus 4, 12. Using my last lucky point. Oh, no.

Because I rolled a 5. Good job. 8. Well, that should do it, right? So you guys, including Golbar, who's bent over with his giant hulking Goliath frame, kind of like dart between these broken walls and tents. There's even another fruit cart.

You get this momentary memory of Danny as he fell in battle next to one. And you get within about 10 feet of these two, you see this fissure. It is just this rocky crag where it looks like some sort of massive weapon or spell caused an explosion that was maybe the epicenter of this temple structure being raised right um you get you get a little bit of a sense too it looks like it's been maybe like a year since this happened um these two guards are facing the street they look like they're watching all the other guards run by and kind of like muttering to each other whether or not they should leave their posts call for more people to help guard um do they even do a couple of glances in your guys's direction as you sneak up as if they're

saying like should we go into the encampment and hunt someone they're they're not sure what's going on but they're facing the street away from you to the north. And they are glancing regularly in your direction. You guys are behind a rocky wall that is five feet high. It is broken and uneven. So it's pretty easy to like sneak slightly obscured peaks over the wall. The fissure is about 20 feet wide and five feet long, or reverse those. Okay, guys, I'm going to whisper. Before we even try, do you want me to try to do a sound illusion and see if they're already looking towards what's happening?

Maybe we can just, maybe we get away with it with them just going to check it out. Absolutely. Can I hear them talking enough to can i use my investigation skills to maybe be able to read their name tags from here and you know what their names are so you seem to be pimping me to say do an investigation check but this is clearly a perception check um okay can i perceive their name tags? If you roll for it. No.

Well, I didn't receive them. What did you roll, though? I rolled a three. Thank you for giving me some narrative rails to blabber on. So, yeah, I mean, you're really trying to listen. You hear they're definitely, like, agitated and unsure of whether they should stay in their posts or do something more aggressive but that's all so how far are they from us about 10 12 feet okay i guess i'll still try because there's really no harm in me sending out the sound of the captain's guard again, calling out like, uh,

uh, we need all hands here. All, you know, everybody needed the center square or whatever. I think that that area is called the center of the town square. Yeah. Like where we were. Yeah.

The Paul Lynn Memorial Chapel. Uh, everybody needed the gallows or whatever. Right, yeah. And then how did it sound coming from that area? As far away, I think it's 30 feet. So it's like, I'll just have it coming as opposite us as possible. If it works, it works great.

If not, then we go with art. I would definitely say like gallows because that was the most significant thing in the square. You automatically cast it and then they are automatically deceived unless they investigate and beat it. Right. So they're going to, I'm going to just do an insight check from them as they decide.

So they, they both hear and kind of perk up. One of them like goes, like puts the hand up and like puts, puts the hand on the other guy's shoulder and he shouts something you can't quite hear, but he's like yelling over the din of all the other soldiers. And then they both nod reassuringly and stay their post.

Hmm. All right. So I guess. Hmm. All right, so I guess plan B. All right. Everybody ready? Yeah, which is what? That charm thing? Yeah, casting.

We're going to do charm and Tootie's going to do... We're double charming them, basically. But Tootie has to do his first. Tootie's going to do his, then you're going to chat with them about whatever,

using the bunny thing. And then we're all gonna slip inside this hole in the ground. This fissure. Fissure. Slip in the hole. Fissure. All right, so... Just five guys

going into the hole. Taking turns. Oh, damn. I'm just talking about reality. You've got to make it real. Okay. Sarah's just talking about five guys in a hole. It's five guys going into a hole.

I don't know why you have to make it sexual. Okay. So I believe you're starting with column of motions, correct? Yes. Charisma saving throw. column of motions, correct? Yes. Charisma saving throw. Group of people, charisma saving throw. They have a charisma penalty.

It's negative three. Same. We've got a zero for one of them. Ah, gee. And what do they have to beat, Ken? 13. Oh, and 11 for the other one. Nice.

All right. So now they're primed to be indifferent. And then we're going to scroll up. So, yeah, you cast Calm Emotion and both of them just kind of like make a face like they're hit with overwhelming sleepiness and the guy who put his hand on the other guy's shoulder again just kind of does it again like hmm yes and they both kind of like nod to each other like yes

yes we're good good night work man and so now we're strolling up all of us together and Nathan is getting ready to cast his spell. Yeah, my unwavering cuteness. So you're leading the conversation, basically. Yeah.

So the two of them have to make a wisdom saving throw, DC 13. Wisdom saving throw DC 13. Wisdom saving throw. All right. This is going to be a plus one bonus DC 13. We've got a seven and a three. Cool. Nice. Yeah.

So with the combination of that, Cool. Nice. Yeah. So with the combination of that, it's basically the effects of a charm person spell, Dan. Okay. They regard me as a friendly acquaintance.

And I'll just be like, Oh, hello, boys. They probably didn't send you the note. They're sending us down there to make sure there's no more rabble rousers to keep you boys safe

they're sending us instead who's sending you? some elf captain back over there shouting instructions hmm maybe we should go check with them and they kind of look at each other.

No. Check with Viviord. He said for us to go down there to spare you the work. I mean, yes. Go ask the instructions if you want to go down there, I suppose. Oh, I don't know. I don't. I think you're good.

All right. Well. You're rabid. It sounds great. If we need anything, we'll yell for help. Will you please? Of course. Good.

Oh, we're just, it's crazy out here. Dude, you and me both, pal. How about this heat? Wowzers. We're both undead and we still feel it. They both just kind of like look away like they never even talked to you. Nice. Let's get to work all right you guys

is everybody undead and can do something about that in our next battle with all these do you have told this I know he's done some stuff what do you put a pin in that and come yeah divine smite I think you get an extra d8 against Undead.

Yeah. Okay, so we're... Pretty much everyone you've seen seems pretty Undead. Yeah, you guys... The fissure has left a giant pile of rubble that you guys can kind of just hop on top of and slide down. Once you guys are down there, it's pitch black. There are no torches

of any kind. You think you hear, you know, running water, some squeaking rats. But it's pretty dark. Luckily, all you guys have night vision except Goldbar. I believe I do not have night vision. I'll light a torch. I'll sort of hold the torch in my paw. Okay. Oh, I do have darkvision. Sorry.

That's what fans of folk are about. The reason I keep forgetting is I'm like, well, he's rabbit folk. Animals see in the dark. I keep doing that. You guys, yeah, to kind of lay the land it looks like this area used to be a very specific temple but it is smashed to shit there's like nothing here it's been completely cleaned out and it looks like at some point somebody cleaned a lot of these hallways there is a staircase going up and then a few smash walls off to the side. It looks like it goes into some more dark areas. Does it look familiar at all? Like,

cause we did come through the basement. Do an insight check. Everybody. Oh, for a lay of the land. Oh God. That's a nine. Eight. 22.

12 plus 6, 18. Insight, right? Yep. Feels right. 15. Well, you guys all did pretty good overall, but 2D, the guy looking for his temple, rolled real high.

So that narratively is easy to explain. 2D, you just feel like you know from your earlier prayer last episode, like Bahamut is, there's some sort of Bahamut vibe down through these dark smashed walls. This is not currently Bahamut vibe down through these dark smashed walls. This is not currently Bahamut's temple. There's no real sign of whose

temple this used to be. This place got so cleaned out and destroyed, but you feel like if you go through some walls, you'll see something resembling Bahamut's. Bahamut's vibe. Maybe his temple, maybe something else of his. You're not sure. Let's head in that direction where I feel it to start.

Nice. You all kind of like push your way through this rubble. Again, it's very dark with no torchlight. And a couple of hollies. You feel like you're starting to recognize that this was some sort of maintenance hallway. Um, and,

uh, you do some searching, just some basic searching and finally find, um, another set of stairs that go down yet another level. Um, you have not been down two levels before. Okay.

Would you like to go down that or there is more like winding maintenance hallways on the, we'll call it basement one. I say we go down. Yes. Yes. Absolutely. Tootie, you're leading us to success. Let's do it. Vigas to success.

Let's do it. You guys head down and it's really, really quiet down here. All the sounds of rushing water and rats quickly fade as you start heading down this hallway. There are ladders every once in a while. You guys went down originally like just shattered rock. Every once in a while you see a ladder that looks very um dusty uh those of you who have night vision can just see like no one's been here in a long time and uh the ladders go up to a wooden cellar door you hit about three of them that are not that far from each other and just get the impression like whatever this is

maybe sewers that have been sealed off. Like there's kind of this really disgusting ammonia smell. You're like, all right, you know, not sure. But these cellar doors look like they go up to parts of other temples. Hmm. Do I feel like... Go ahead. I was going to ask, I think, exactly what you were going to ask. Go right ahead. Do I feel like strong Bah i was gonna i was gonna ask i think exactly what you're gonna ask go right ahead do i feel like strong bahamut sense in any direction unfortunately like something about going

down here in the smell whatever prayer you had whatever insight you had it starts to fade it just feels really maybe we should go back up and distracting i mean like you it doesn't feel like we're in the sewers right you're in the sewers um and if you guys all did an investigation check and rolled high i could i could maybe give you like more a sense of what you'd accomplish by going up these ladders but you all figure out like these ladders they at least some of them go to temples you do think if you keep going down here you might find sewers away from the temples so okay so we're basically though we're still looking what are we looking for we're looking for an altar or some sort of right yeah i mean your area bahamut yeah your ideal situation is to find like a bahamut altar or temple or room

at least so i'd like to use my um never tell me the odds feature um where figuring odds on the best plan i can get a solid sense of which choice is the best and which opportunities are too good to be true at the dm's determination all right um this is my gambling background so you all see um iva turn into a Zach Galifianakis gift with like chalkboard equations going past her that she watches as they go left, right, and above. And I've, uh,

you feel like if you head West, um, maybe North a little bit, you'll get kind of to the area where you think Bahamut's temple was based off of where you came out of it. When you teleportation circled, um,

you're, you're, you're able to kind of like get your bearings that much. And you feel like you could narrow it down to a couple of ladders at least. Okay. So let's try that. I mean,

right. Yeah. After you, yeah. Everybody do a constitution savings row. Excuse me? Oh. 13 plus 4, 17. Great. Nice.

6. 17 plus 3, 20. Great. 13. Great. Goldbar, what'd you get? 20. 22.

Is this against magic by any chance? No, it's not. Oh, bummer. I have advantage. It's against piss and shit. Who are you? Where'd you come from? My name is Nick. I live down here.

This is my room. Nick? Yeah. It's alternate timeline Billy. Nicholas William something. My great grandson Billy someday will rule this kingdom. Sarah, you double over and throw up. You six points of uh poison damage the fumes down here are overwhelming so as you guys travel uh you try to suppress it for a while

everyone else you kind of manage to steal yourselves but ivah it's too much for you and yeah so little you you throw up and throw up until you're just raw in the throat and everybody's got to kind of like grab that. Why are you doing this right now? That's the worst. Until it just feels. No, I won't be doing it. Yeah, it's bad. She throw it up out of her bottom too or no?

No, not yet. Fingers crossed. Never. So it's not like when you have bad linguiça or something. No, that's a felony. But you do have a trouble breathing at this point i've uh i'm not gonna have a uh you be um

poisoned but you do feel like maybe uh this is something you can only tolerate for a little bit longer fine let's find that ladder yeah so you you make your way in that direction, Iva. You're still conscious and everything.

So you can be like, okay, here's this intersection, north, south, east, west, one of these four ladders. You're at like a cross intersection, right? There's a ladder in each direction and you feel like you're about as close as you're never telling me the odds can get you. And in what, like about 10 feet in either direction of this intersection, there is a ladder going up to a closed cellar door. All right. So we just got to pick. Does anyone else have a sense? Can we look at the ladders and see if any of them are worn more than the other ones?

Sure. Do an investigation check if you want to examine a ladder. I'll check your ladder. 17 plus 320. Nice. They seem so similar. I can... Should we just roll a four-sided?

24. Oh. They seem so, so similar. How many ladders are we looking at? Four. Four different ones. How about four of us each climb a ladder? 2D, perhaps you pick the one you think is most likely.

Okay, I want to get out of here, so I'm just going to take that noon o'clock ladder. Noon o'clock, that would be the north ladder, yes? Yeah. Okay, you guys see Iva scramble up. Do you just immediately pop the door open? No, I was waiting until everybody's in position and then... I'll go to the south. We're going to pop them open at the same time like the monkeys.

Great. Who's... Yeah, you're west, 2D. Who's south? Who's east? I went south. Or I'll do east. Okay.

The four of you, please do a strength check. You have different DCs. How long are these ladders? They're tall enough that you couldn't reach the ceiling. It's like 20 feet up. They're long ladders.

8 plus 4, 12. They're old, weakened wooden ladders. When you were looking at them, you could tell the bottoms of them were worn away from chemicals, possibly sewage. What was that, Blaine? What did you roll? I'm sorry. That was a 12. All right.

You pop yours open. How about the rest of you monkeys? What did you roll? Eight. I got a nine minus one. I got an eight. Same. Was it an investigation?

I botched. Strength or what? Strength. I botched. Okay. I botched. You also broke. I've been throwing up for 20 minutes or whatever,

and now I just tried to open a door and just... Blaine, yeah up you pop the you're east right Blaine I'm east yes yeah you pop that up no problem Chris and Tootie you have trouble but you just barely

push yours open Iza I'm gonna need you to do a dexterity saving throw. Great. Love it. Fantastic. 19.

Great. You catch yourself as you slip a couple of rungs down the ladder. You push really hard and just, like, it completely, like, overwhelmed you because of your sick stomach. And you just go like, and, like, grab yourself as you almost hit the ground. Okay. Blaine. Jelf manages to pop this cellar door thing open. It's just dead silence.

You can hear your blood pounding in your ears. Your elf eyes manage to scan the room. your blood pounding in your ears, your elf eyes managed to scan the room. You see a banner on the wall of a God. You do not immediately recognize there is an altar and what looks like, um, you know, like just like a tiny little prayer bench.

It's a small little temple room that looks like it's designed for no more than four people to pray at at once but it has an altar yep very small and i and i don't recognize the the banner on the wall the god uh have like an iron an iron glove or a glove on it or something like the the other priest no it is not torn on forge and you saw what the banners would look like in the bahamut temple yeah yeah you all you all would recognize it's a platinum dragon you know yeah um this is just like it looks like a sun you're not sure which god that indicates so some hippie uh but 2d nathan um let's see 2d you were you were the west right nathan the south yes yes i went south okay 2d you pop your

head up um this room is just rank and disgusting it smells just as bad in a completely different way. There's this rusty iron smell and the ground is goopy. Uh-oh. It looks like there's just mounds and mounds of trash and organic matter. It's just blackened. You can tell even in

the near darkness, there's very little variation to all this just black goop and um yeah you see there's uh there's like this banner on the wall you don't quite recognize it's covered in smears it's um i'll let you actually roll to recognize this because you're a religious fella covered in smears.

I'll let you actually roll to recognize this, because you're a religious fella. It's long. It's like a gold sun, too, but it's got kind of lines in more of a dividing way. Roll, and we'll let you pick insight or religion.

Insight? Okay. That is a 12 okay um i'm gonna give this to you um almost so this is either palor or lathander you're not sure i figured it was one of them either way it's them. Either way, it's definitely a good god. But this room, you can't even tell if it used to be a prayer room. It is absolutely desecrated and it feels a little dangerous. Like there might be something living here in the dark. Backing down. Great.

And you let the door close behind you? Blink, blink, blink, blink, blink. All right. You let the door close behind you? Bink, bink, bink, bink, bink. All right. Nathan, there is a very strange, like, sight when you come up there. It's a very stark room.

And on the wall, there is what looks like a white mask. And there is nothing in the room except for a door. The room is about 10 by 10 feet. And the white mask is like on like a tabard or something like it's like a Decker, like it's clearly the room of the white mask. It's on a white mask is on a gold plate. You have to squint to see it too. Like the, the, the light coming up from, uh, there's almost no light at all.

Like you just see this like reflecting light kind of coming up and the white and the gold is just giving it enough. Is the mask a decoration or is it like an actual, like I could put on a mask? Do you have any light source with you? I have the torch.

It's almost, oh, you're holding a torch? Yeah. Do you want to go up and like get closer or you want to just do this well i want to determine the nature of the mask is it a decor is it like painted on the wall is it painted on a decoration or is it it is um a humanoid size mask so it would be a little big for your little bunny face but you think you could take it off and put it on. It's very, very, very ivory white. There are holes for the eyes, but not the nose and the mouth. There is also what looks like a black bird's beak coming down the middle of the forehead that is made of.

It looks like similar white material, but it's been painted black. And then black feathers coming down off the sides of the top of the head. It doesn't sound like the helmet. No. The helmet. May I take the mask? Yes.

Perhaps I'll put it in my satchel and climb back down the ladder. You reach up. You also realize like, oh, I could take this gold plate Perhaps I'll put it in my satchel and climb back down the ladder. You also realize, oh, I could take this gold plate, or I can just take the mask. They both kind of lift off. The gold plate is affixed with a little hook, and then the mask is on a little knob. Maybe just the mask. Okay.

Are you going to go through the door or head down through the cellar you came? Oh, no, back the way I came in. Okay. You get his gold bar, and Iva, you see him head back down. Where'd you get there? I think I've stolen the totem of a god. Oh, dear. Look at this.

And I'll sort of show it to them. It's like, it's certainly not Bahamut. Did anyone find Bahamut's house? So you just took it? For now. Okay, just checking. Might as well just put it on your face if we're going to. Oh, all right.

No. You put it on? Well, I don't know. He just said he put it on. I mean, I don't know. He just said he did. I mean, Iva told me to. I heard you did. Joking. That was more startling than confirmation.

I'm giving Sarah a moment to tell me not to. I mean, I believe that I was joking. She didn't say no. I believe I said, you might as well just put it on your face, is what I said. Yeah. That's actually what I said. If he's going to take that to mean... He said, okay.

You should know. You know I would get excited about a moment like this regardless of whether it had consequences just because of the daringness of it. So please, Chris, tell me what Nathan does when the curious topic of putting it on you. I guess if Iva goes no, I guess he would stop and be like,

I just, I mean, you know. Do you want to examine it? Definitely curious. Let's find Bahamut's house. Much more important. I'm just puking. I'm just constantly vomiting anyway, so my advice is probably worthless at this point. So where else

can we go at this point? There could have been more doors in the, um, Also my door, I didn't, I opened her door.

Iva's door, Iva's, Iva's cell door didn't pop open and also the three of you all saw doors in those rooms. You could go up there

and try to exit and like look around and see. Got it. Someone stronger can try where I was trying and then. Yeah,

did, did, Brian, do you want to try Sarah's door? Yeah. So Sarah Iva descends the ladder and Golbar, you're going to go up a 20-foot ladder and try and smash this thing open. Please roll your strength. Just straight

strength. That's my favorite thing to do for a stuck or difficult door. Oh. Not that time. Oh, wow. Yeah. Yeah, plus four to your strength. What did you roll?

Five. It's pretty hard. You'd like throw a shoulder, but you can't really get it and keep your grip on the ladder. You can try one more time, but it's going to get more difficult. Okay. I'll try again, though. Okay. Come on. There we go.

Sixteen, please. Okay, so you go with your shoulder, and you feel like all of you almost can hear the sound of like something's rocking back and forth on top of it then there's a crash and uh go bar you very you can feel a weight has kind of fallen off the the door and you can pop it open now but you for right now you just dislodged something that was on the door you haven't quite popped it okay cool uh pop it open

yes once you get this door open you start uh peeking up um it's it's dark do you also have a torch i don't think i know i didn't earlier so no okay. Okay. I mean, I will give you, you can choose because you came up with this ladder. I'll take a torch from somebody. You know you don't have a dark... I can hand mine up to you. I can climb the ladder and give it to him. Yeah, because you're... It's dark up here.

Anybody have a torch? Hold on. Don't let it burn your chi-chis, though. Be careful. You're funny. He is funny. Yeah, you... You get up there and there is...

It looks like a common meeting room. No direct signs of what God would be. And there was a bit of a boulder laying on top of the of the cellar door that you're trying to push up that's now like just a couple inches to the side you can see parts of the roof has like been kind of smashed in but you don't quite see the sun um you do see a white sort of crack where some light is piercing the roof. There's a door to your left and to your right like that are, you know, you'd walk

through them. They have a handle on them. Hmm. Okay. What would you tell everybody? What would you do? Do we feel like all these rooms are connected upstairs somehow?

They, you're okay. So, um, 2d, you feel like the gross room, you couldn't see the doors, but you felt like there had to be doors.

They were just covered in slime. The room was so filthy and desecrated. It was very difficult to get your bearings. You think there was more symbolism was not, was not bahamut the the symbolism was not bahamut it was a good god but something very bad happened in there right um and you couldn't even really get a sense of what the purpose of this room was blaine the one that you opened up i, it looked like a good god wasn't Bahamut. And Goldbar, the one you were looking at that Iva tried first, it feels very neutral and you're not sure.

Okay. Nathan, you could go up too and just see what's through that one door. Yeah, but it's the white mask. Does the white mask mean anything vaguely like Bahamut? Why don't you all, kind of like as you're thinking about this, do an insight check to just gather all your thoughts. Insight check. 16.

12 and 6, 18. Oh, 20. Nice. Natural 20. Holy shit. I got a 19 plus 1. Nice. What did, 20. Nice. Natural 20. Holy shit. I got a 19 plus one. Nice. What did you roll, Chris?

Natural 20. Nice. Do you get a plus for that? No bonus. Oh, okay. Sarah blamed. I didn't catch yours. I'm sorry. I'm just puking.

Just puking and getting a seven. I got 18. Well, okay. Well, a few of you got pretty high, especially Golbar and Nathan. You guys turn to each other and you just generally feel like, if we ever go in the desecrated one 2D found,

let's try that last. That just seems like so dangerous compared to our other options. Let's go explore elsewhere. You feel like the safest route is probably the one that Blaine found. You know, it's the wrong god, but it's like a prayer room for a good god, and it doesn't look desecrated or fucked up. And the one that Goldbar and Iva sort of found,

it seems pretty safe in that it's very neutral. You didn't immediately see any signs of people, but also you're not sure what God it was. And you don't know if the cave in was deliberate, like someone pushed the boulder onto the cellar door. So there's just a little bit of uneasiness there. And anything about the mask? The mask. a little bit of uneasiness there. And anything about the mask?

The mask. Yeah. You think it is some sort of religious mask to connect to a god, but none of you are completely sure which. And it doesn't feel good or evil

or... It seems dark. I would say the image of the black bird's beak and black feathers on a stark white mask kind of creeps everybody out a little bit. Well, let's... Shall we go into the sunroom? There's probably a door in all four options.

Yeah. So if you go up, you can probably go into yet another room. Blaine's room is the most positive, right? That seems like... Yeah. At least a good place to start. Well, a good place to start. Yeah, I think so.

And if it's got an altar, can't we just use any altar? There also, though, were other ladders, right? Yeah, but you do think... any altar? There also, there were other ladders, right? Uh, yeah, but you do think you're, you're as, based off of Never Tell Me The Odds, you think you're as close to Bahamut's as,

Got it. Okay. So yeah, so we'll do that. Because these are very like, like narrow sewer tunnels. They might not go directly under Bahamut's. I wonder if the one that was blocked,

was blocked because they were trying to get to the Temple of Bahamut. But they were trying to protect themselves. Do you want to try Blaine's first? Maybe the sun can pass a note to Bahamut. And if that doesn't happen, then we go up the rock one. That sounds good. Yeah. All right.

So you all head up to Blaine's? Yes. We're all heading up to Blaine's. All right. All my rowdy friends are coming over tonight. Are you ready for some football? As soon as you get up there, Tootie, you piece together that the one you were just in was Lathander,

and this one is Palor. Okay. You immediately recognize the sun as the symbol of the god of agriculture, and you're like, okay, Blaine, you found Temple of Palor. This is the god of agriculture. The 4-H club. There's a couple of doors. Which one do you want to try?

Left or right? The one that goes to Bahamut. Okay. So you open the mystical door inside your mind. So close. I was so close to fooling you. What's our choice? Right and left? Right. Check for traps.

Oh, okay. Roll an investigation check, Judy. You got this, Judy. Ah. Here we go. You can do it, Noonan. Sixteen. No traps. Seems safe.

Opening the door. Slowly. Okay okay you very slowly push it open and you see two glowing green eyes in the dark kind of like flicker towards you as you open the door it's far down some sort of hallway that you can see the walls of for a while, and then it goes into pitch black. So something alive, I'm looking. Two glowing green eyes. I will close the door.

Back, back, back. And tell everybody what I saw. Okay. Okay. Perhaps we should go say hello and you'll get to say hello on the next episode of nerd poker see so close you're so close sam what do you think happened hey everybody episode 85 uh we're learning more and more about that tent city and the explosion it's centered around uh we're looking around there's some cellars and ladders it's uh i've got a little bit poisoned and jelf opened a door and we found a little mask i don't know if

i can handle the cuteness of a bunny in a mask gold bar is smashing down a door and we saw two green googly eyes sarah can i request a piece of merch you know that meme that's like inside you there are two wolves can we have a shirt that's like inside you there are five guys and then it says like one is in a cone and then one is in a fissure it'll be a very specific piece of merch

that's a lot who's good at drawing that can draw some line drawings a comic of this or something everyone please do that. You can! The end. Alright. Excellent.

Well done. Dan? Hey, check out my book, TalesOfZadia.com. Keep an eye on my social media. I'm doing a bunch of stand-ups, especially in the LA area. I would love to see you come out. I would love to sign your book if you get a physical one and you put it in front of me at a show. Don't do it if I go to 7-Eleven.

I am there for a Slurpee, and I need my Slurpee time. T-shirt. Wilbur Theater in Boston, April 29th. That would be me. Come see me there, please, Boston. Buy tickets now.

It won't sell out because the theater's fucking massive. But buy them so it looks good and so they don't cancel it. Being honest. BrianPersine.com. Spokane dates coming up. That'll be fun. It's been a while. That was one of the last things I had booked before COVID.

And I'm going back. Let's see. And then also information. Follow me on any of the social media. The Brian Persane on Twitter. And get any news about any of my comic book stuff coming out. I've got that earth to signing on Jan or April 20th for 20.

And a secret history of the war on weed. And it's a super fun book. Like also the fastest comic books usually take a long time to produce. This is the fastest thing I've ever done with anybody. Image asked for it, I believe, January or so, and we made it that quick. Maybe it was even after that. They were like, hey, Jerry Duggan, you got an idea.

We cobbled this thing together really quickly. Scott Koblish was putting out three pages a day. It was crazy. That's it. I'm rambling. Thanks for listening, everybody. Blaine, you got something? Anal Fisher King

held over. People love live porn at the Pantages, so come check it out. It's great for me. I got my own dressing room now. I don't have to share with Kim Cattrall anymore. Oh, wait. She's not there anymore? No, I just got my own room.

I'll DM me. It's crazy shit. More importantly, Kim Cattrall just got her own room. Jesus Christ, you would think. Who's her manager? I think it's some guy she met. His name's Thad. I want to say Thad.

That's terrible. When Thad's there, I leave. I'm not a Sex and the City fan, but Big Trouble, good lord, one of my all-time favorites. I'm certainly not a Sex and Her Dressing Room fan. Yeah. Oh, this isn't a bit, right? You're actually doing this thing with this actress I look up to, right? You're not like, oh, and it's not like some comedy bit.

No, no, I don't do bits. Okay, well, say hi. oh i will thanks for thanks for listening hey kim bron says hi bye 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.