Nerd Poker - The Cavern Campaign - Episode 4

Episode Date: September 9, 2026

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It's Brian Possein. Nerd Poker. We're calling it. The Cavern. My friends are here. Chris Blaine. Ken, engineer Sam, and of course our kick-ass DM, Dan Telfer.

Welcome to Nerd Poker. Hey, everybody. It's Brian Passain. You're listening to Nerd Poker. It's episode three of the Cavern Campaign. And my friends are all here. All of us were playing at my house. Just go right, Dan.

Hi. Sorry. We're at your house. Don't be sorry. Catching up. You said me chocolate. Yeah. Ken's here.

Yeah. Hey there, Brian. How you doing? Chris is here. I'm in the house, as they say. Blame. Whoa, whoa, whoa, what's all? And running the show, as always, from the cool part of the table here in Encino, California.

It's Sam, everybody. Hello, sweet children. Whoa. Sam, you brought us babies today. Thank you. Thanks, yeah, thanks, Sam. Everyone's properly lubricated. People know where I live.

Yeah, Mercury's in Astroglide. That's a fucking joke. Hey, everybody. Why don't we thank some people? What do you say? I'm going to thank some folks who are at our top tiers of support. Thank you to everyone at those Stargoyle and Hey Boss tiers. Some of you have usernames like the Electric Bear.

Thanks, Electric Bear. Thank you. Oh, wait, did I do these already? I'm skipping. I went back too far. Thank you. Gooch-Taint-Yambang. That's a new one.

Gooch-Taint-Yamban-Band-Bin. I don't believe we've heard one. It's definitely new. Thank you, DeKef Coffee. Let's just take a moment, really. Thank you, Sean. Thank you, Mannhind steam cushion. Thank you, Broken Strings.

Thank you tripping at Epcot as hell of fun. I bet. It's true. String cushion. Listeners, your name's a broken Ken. You really like that. Thank you. It's like five behind now.

Catch up. I'm on steam cushion still. Thank you. The Sarah Gazardo Rescue and Feets Fetish Foundation. Thank you 15 miles to the Roar Shack. And finally, thank you, Cyrith Bunghole. Everyone's favorite evil town in Lord of the Rings, Sirith Bunghole.

Blaine, who are those supporters brought to us by? Supporters brought to us by Dog LaCroix with the faintest touch of chicken beef. pork, shrimp, and chopped grill. LaGroix for dogs. Dan? Thanks. Hi. Wow.

I just had a couple of M&Ms in my mouth. Sorry, everybody. That's what she said. Oh, wow. She says way dirtier stuff. I was going to say, is it Halloween? What is she talking about? Two very small shriveled testicles.

They're very crunchy. It wasn't very risque, but it was just A couple of little M&Ms. I like to tell you what she said. I don't want to put you on the spot front, but I don't think we've actually ever seen her. She lives in Canada. You guys don't know her.

Oh, the Niagara Falls girl. She puts M&Ms in her mouth? Don't worry about it. Or does she call them Ames and Ames? Does she call it candy? When their name's not made up. What is it? Sinea, don't worry about it.

Why don't we talk about what happened Last Time on the Cavern campaign And then we can keep doing bits if you want Yes, Brian Keep doing bits Are you, bits are coming You guys have had a couple of routes laid out for you to get to the Lost City of Bliss

A city that has been abandoned by time been perhaps occupied by something vile over the years because all adventurers who go there are rumored to de-evolve de-evolution on the way back. So there are many people over the years who've gone there and tried to loot this empty city, empty of people but not loot. And no one has really come back themselves.

The rumors are disturbing, but you heard of a couple of ways in, And your guide, Durkin Risbank, thinks that he can help you find a good path. He's never been, but he did have two routes, and he had a mage who could get you there. You chose the teleportation circle that would take you to a mage tower. And so this place has sort of been abandoned. It's rumored the mage has gone crazy. And you landed in a room next to this hallway.

I have it laid out with minis right now, and I'm using magnetic cabinet clothes. as statues because they stick well to the magnetic tiles and they function about the exact same size. You tried going down. These statues, there's two rows of them, two rows of three. They're about 10 feet apart. The statues are crammed in alcoves, so it's difficult to get around them. And there's a sword in each of their right hands and their left hand is flat at their sides. And 10 feet apart means there are about two tiles between them.

And there was a blast of icy air that exploded when you depressed a plate on the tiles. So we were just about to figure out how to deal with that and perhaps other traps in this hallway. You think that once you get to the other side of here, it could go any way. It could be more traps to get out of the tower. Maybe there will be an easy exit. You're not sure. But you're hoping to get out of the tower and start heading downwards, down, down, down to this lost city, which is underneath the underdark.

It's very far down. You've already teleported so far down. You're technically in the underdark, but the lower layers of it. Like P3. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Hit P3. Where do we park down? Back corner.

You don't get a signal down there, so your phone might not remember where you left your car. Dan, how far is it from, is it more than 30 feet from like the end? edge to get past those guys? Yeah. So the very edge before the stages is 5, 10, 15, 20, 25, 30, 30, 40. Got it. So it's 40 feet. Okay.

Just a little bit extra because I'm a jerk. Because you're thinking about stuff that you can cast up to 30 feet, right? Like a jellip. Or jump or like misty stuff. Okay. So we know the pad right in front of us shoots the blast. Can we test another? Wait, did we test two of them?

The first one didn't and the first one did. Is that how it activated? First one didn't, second one did, yeah. The first one did not. Correct. So we're safe to step on the first one. Can we step on the first one and use the 10-foot pole to push the third one? If you do an acrobedics check DC-10, not very high, but it is a check.

You could reach it. Which of us is acrobed? Oh, yeah. Yes, of course, Luther, you are an acrobat. Let's see what I got. I have 13. 22. Okay.

You take the 10-foot pole and you reach over the 10 feet of tile to just beyond it using the length of your arm. You have to kind of balance on the wall. And you all hear a clink. I'm going to say all of you decided, based on the blast of icy hot air to be back here, but you would have to get all the way up to here, Ken. Can everyone grab a mini for me and hand me a mini to represent their guy? Durkin is way back here in this room already represented by a little mini. I haven't made a new guy yet.

Will you know that? Would you like to borrow? Here, Brian, use this huge mini my driver's like a large-sized bag of peanut in America. That looks. Both of these are creepy. Blaine or Brian? Can you just Dan, can you select

Can I have a chef's choice? Yeah, yeah. I'm going to put them back curiosity. Anybody watch those recent Mortal Kombat movies? Yeah. One and two. I kind of like both of them. Yeah.

Carl Urban and two. Two are fun. Two are good to me. I didn't just see it. Two was fun. Yeah. That was Carl Urban. You can be this very practical on them

because I hadn't seen it the first one. So I watched him. Oh, I watched one and two. But I, but, you know. They got bad reviews, but I don't, you know. I also like those 28 years later. Oh, man.

Bone Temple was an amazing. And somebody told me to see it, but they said go see the other one for or watch the other one first. And I did. God, I love both. Yeah, yeah. Bone Temple is better than like some non-horror movies this year. It was really like powerful. Some fucking main thing alone.

Oh, my God. Are you kidding me? That was one of the best music sequences. So cool. Ever. Yeah. The commitment of like the, the design department to, like, help the acting that he was doing.

I mean, that actor. Yeah. Oh, my God. That was good. I already love him. Yeah, he's a weirdo who, like, cheated on his wife in an airplane bathroom. Yeah, I bet she's not a good dude. But, Brian, you're in love?

That's great. You said you love him. Yeah. Ray finds excellent kisser. Can you do a dexterity saving throw, Ken? you did push a plate here at clink and share this week's episode of Stuart Fittaker saving throw are you right are you probably your elbow uh if you are within 10 feet of me I give you a bone use or a protection uradiate a protective aura emanation there

everybody gets plus three to saving throws nice ooh we'll get to add a three to this then oh jesus good thing so got an 11 we're a three plus five eight nine ten eleven so I just said to meet a ten though I thought you said no that was the acrobatics check

this is the dexterity saving throat because you push the plate this was we're going to happen a regard maybe I brought my flame wall minis but I don't see them anyway thank you for the bonus

it is my radius you will take 3d6 plus three fire damage. Shit. How are you with fire damage? Take nine points of fire damage. Roll a death save.

You guys just see this huge wall of flaying go out of the doorway. Yeah, you're like a thief. Yeah, I have like reaction shit. Oh, yeah, you might have uncanny. It's Asian. Oh, can you down. Fast hands.

Uncaddy Dodge, yes. So have the attacks damage. Four points of fire damage, you precious child. Only four. I thought it was dead and now it's on. I mean, yeah, almost a little wily coyote moment of just like looking like a burned little crisp. Because this thing just rockets down the hall. It comes out this doorway you're standing next to you.

You're a little fried. But because you're a very elocutist thief, Is that a word? You kind of dove to the side in time to not get completely scorched. You might be missing one eyebrow. Dan, I have a question for the Dungeon Master. How immediate are the effects? How immediate is the effect of the plate from the time the plate is depressed

to the time that the effect is shown? Was Sean Nongah, I hear you? Dirty Dave. Dave, Dave. Dave. Yeah, there you go. It's maybe like half a second. There is a little half a second.

It feels like this mage tower is so old. That's all I need. Okay. Thanks, sir. Oh, that's a other voice. Well, I feel as though I could make my way down there safely, but for the rest of you, I do not know. So we now know these two tiles are trapped.

Nothing? ice fire. And then, as Andy Kiddler would say, a third thing. How far is it to the... 40 feet to the end? But with the first five feet being blank, 35 feet. Uh-huh. So you're basically...

Like if I, for example, do my sort of misty step thing, I'll probably, let's say, odds are not in my favor, land on a trap. Not necessarily. Not necessarily. What's your passive insight? Great question. 11.

I would make you also do a check, but there might be a way. Dan, I'm happy to do a check. Okay. Well, if you wanted a misty step, there might be a way to do it without even risking hanging a tile. I just with that low passive insight, I can't tell you. If you ask me a more specific question, I can give you an insight role. Well, just in the sense of, well, because the first one's blank,

is there some sort of craftsmanship thing that means the last one would also be blank? That's the only thing I can think. Not that you can tell. It seems like because it was the second set of tiles and the first set of tiles in front of these statues, it's deliberately irregular. I see. So each trap Or each

You could maybe throw Oh yeah You're good throw I'd give that to you at the passive 11 Not you arrange Yeah Perhaps we could do Is there like rocks

Is there rubble or anything around you Yes Yes It's fun It's broken down There's bricks basically You could chuck I'll pull a piece of the wall off

And hand it to my Ranged friend Okay sure So you chuck it And I'm gonna say roll any dye. Tell me if it was odd or even. Odd. Okay. So that's going to land here and it goes click. Nothing happens.

Okay, that's good to know. Safe. Hey, Dan. How much room is behind us in the hallway leading up to this? Oh, good call. 20 feet here and then once you get through the doorway another 10 feet. 30 feet. Should I try to do a jump to the other end?

Can you jump? Can you long jump 40 feet? If I get a running jump, I can, I can, I can leap my strength. What's your strength? My strength is 18. So I can, I can jump at least 18 feet with a running start with 10 feet of running start. Well, you can get past the first two and the, You would land here.

There'd still be a chance you would set something off when you land. If you let's say, if you start from here, because you know these are... But you could get past. Well, that's true. Those traps have been sprung, so you can go past those and start from there. Well, do their reset. What's that they reset? Everybody roll an inside trap.

Everybody roll an inside check. All right. I can also be helpful. Nice. Acrobatics-wise. Oh, yeah? What are you for acrobatics? What?

I have like a plus seven for... I got an 11 insight plus six for acrobatics and plus seven for athletics nice I got a natural 20 for insight plus one 20 I got six stealth and a six 11 you're great so I think a dirty 20 is our high one

right now yes yeah it's got an 11 no I'm a natural 20 what's your bonus plus one 21 21 21 All right, well, with the 21, there is one downside to this. I'm marking it with odds and evens. So if there's an even number, you know if you land there, nothing will go off. If there's an odd number, if you touch it, something will go off.

However, there's no guarantee that other tiles won't go off just because these two go off. Does that make sense? So if you were, you try all the tiles, basically. You know, well, and here, actually, that does mean I can put one more down. So maybe we should just keep 10 foot pulling it. This is our way across. These are the only two you know. Any of these four could set.

Or actually, yeah, any of these four. I mean, does it? We could just keep using the pole. Yeah, let's see a foot pole our way across this thing. I'm happy to. Okay. So, grab the pole. Just do, where do you, where do you want to stand?

You show me exactly where you want to stand with one of these markers. So these have been sprung? If you use a marker, it'll be easier for me to understand which one you're pointing at. The ones with dice on them have been sprung. These have not. So I would probably want to stay on these. Those are the two that will set up. The odd numbers are bad.

Got it. So then the good odds are... You don't know any of this. We don't know these. So I guess I'll test them all then. Great. So... Test that one.

Do a dexterity saving throw, please. All right. I mean, unless you're scared. I ain't scared of nothing. I am dare to all the men without fear Oh Dexterity or Hal Jordan That's a 2 plus 9

That's a fail Great You will be able to have this because of uncanny dodge Yes So it is down from 11 You take five points of fire damage There's a lot of fire damage So far this is not going well

To have And then it's this one Would you like to go again? Yeah. Which one? Next. The one right in the corner there? I mean, I guess I can, yeah.

You know what? I'll do, hmm. I'm going to do the one I can reach and the one I think I can jump to. So I don't have to do them all. So what can I reach this? That is an acrobatics check to reach that far. Anything? I mean, with the pole.

Yeah, with the pole. So the pole's 10 feet. So you can reach 15 feet away from you, but you have to stretch your arm out. Can I get, sure. Can I be within, can I be close enough that my plus three radius thing can help you? Sure. It's plus three. No, it's plus three for saving throws.

But what is the distance? 10 feet. 10 feet. That's what I'm saying. Can I get 10 feet? Tell me where you're standing and then we'll just, I need to see where you're saying to see if you have to also run. Standing here, reaching here. So I want to be 10 feet behind.

You want to be even. You want to stand here. Even. Reaching here. Okay. So. Yeah, you can be, then if he's standing this. far, you have to be within savings throw range.

Okay. I'll come in but I would at least share my... Yeah. I just want to make sure you understand that you would know you're going to have to potentially jump out of the way. So, um, Agamatics check. That's 15 plus 13. Ooh, it's a success.

Nice. So I will, you'll be able to, um, that's can you roll a Dix 30 saving throw? Me? Yeah. Yes, yes. Oh, probably not good. Two, four. That's why did I take clothes off?

Four, six. Okay. And then can you roll a dexterity saving throw? Yes. 19. No, sorry, it's 23. Okay. So you will completely dive out of the way and not take any damage.

Chris, you will take 14 points of acid damage. Acid, interesting. So the third one is, it goes frost, fire, acid for the third one? This one. Yeah. Oh, but we're still living the second one.

That means poison is the next one. You said 14, right? Yeah, and this just wave of acid goes, and it's like sizzling on the rock now. Sizzling. Terrific. Well, now we've active, act that we can keep

So far you only know that two tiles are safe and they're pretty far away from each other they are 510 15 20 20 foot they're 30 feet across so you know that would mean Chris you could Misty step at this point because you could you could walk all the way to here and then Misty step to here and then you don't have to do a little five foot jump to get out

but I'm going to keep my time being I'm going to keep my uh paladins whatever the plus three bonus you're giving them yeah all right what's next oh okay so this sprung but i can get to this you said right um you don't know that springing it's going to mean it won't spring again right you can test it to find out that's an odd right uh well then i guess i'll check this one okay uh that is another 15 footer please roll an acrobatics check to see if you reach without falling down. Can I get 10 feet from you?

Yes, you can. That is 13 plus 1326. Success. You don't fall down on a bad tile. So now that one is going to be safe. So nothing happens. No deck saves. This one is safe.

I'm like to jump onto it. Okay. So you jump. Everyone can jump across if they have a strength of 11 or higher, which I believe is everybody. I'm jumping. I hope. I'm jumping.

Do you all want to make the jumps? Yeah, I will jump. I think that's yours, actually. I don't know where my... Yeah, yeah. It's all good. It doesn't matter, yeah. It doesn't matter at this point because you're all going to successfully get out of this hallway.

All right. And you've only taken a little bit of fire damage. You get to the other side. There is a stairwell going down. There's a spiral staircase. why doesn't everybody do a perception check? Because I don't want you? There was a question.

Why don't you? I'm going to use my passive perception of 15. Nice. Eight. It's kind of starting to see cool. One plus three. Staying aware, what you can do? So 13 can?

What was this? Perception. Oh, perception. I should use my passive. Do I have any? You can see it, Flint, iron fist. It's a low of 10. What did you got, Blaine?

15. Okay, so it's pretty hard for everyone to tell, even with Dark Vision, but this sort of like a broken spiral staircase going down. There's a lot of missing steps. And it's all slick with this moisture that's sort of dripping down the walls. You think you might be under a body of water. Slick moisture. It's slick munch.

I hate when you do it, and I did it for the first time. Welcome aboard. Moistures Express, Dan. Let's all slide down and get some oysters. For a moister oyster. Punch everybody in the neck. Thank you. So if you'd like to descend the stairs the organic way,

You will have to make a track. It'll be a bit tricky, not too fall. And there's a big empty expanse down the middle. So if you want, you can somehow repel down. Yeah, let's use our climbers kits. Isn't that exactly why we got them because of stuff like this? Yeah, buddy. So you can set up a grappling hook.

I'm just going to need someone to roll a survival check who's doing it. These are steps, but they're slick. Slick steps. All right, let's see. I have clawed feet. Nice. You do. Look this guy.

I was going to walk. Okay. Someone's going to do a grapple. It sounds like in Repelda. All right. Dan, with our climbers kit as a utilize action, you can use the climbers kit to anchor yourself. When you do,

you can't fall more than 25 feet from the anchor point, and you can't move more than 20 feet from there without him doing the anchor as a bonus action. So can we do that, like at least anchor ourselves so nobody dies? Let's do that. Sure. Just someone rolled survival check to see how well you can anchor it on the wet rock.

He's good on survival. I have a plus two who has higher? Plus three? Nice. If anybody wants, I can just tie a rope around my waist. He's feeling very... All right. Yeah, I know, this guy's lead.

Clause underspeak. Mr. Bight show me all anchor. Now, are you... Are you suggesting everyone tie themselves to, or one person tie themselves to you? No, in a time, maybe. Oh, yeah, maybe that's a good idea. I don't know that.

I am wearing armor. I mean, I am a little guy, but I'm not that little. Mm-hmm. You want to take one person? All right, so you tie a rope around your waist and who? Whoever wants. Someone's got to take initiative here. All right.

So tiny. Just roll survival check to see how tight this rope is. 18. Excellent. Very tight, secure rope. You guys head down about four flights and there are a few times where you would slip and slide, but you're big and heavy and you have catadigil too, right? So much like your character,

last campaign you're able to get through some situations where other people might not be able to climb a wall or merge the surface after about four flights there is a big hole punched in the side of the tower oh no you two roll a persuasion or not persuasion this is the mistake i everybody uh hears differently and i said it differently perception the other per i'm going to use 15 my passive perception sounds good all right So do you have dark vision? Yes. Do you have dark vision?

Great. So both of you can see about the same. Outside there is this huge cavern. And it looks like there is a walkway over a very deep, like, mind-out pit. So there's sort of like a narrow stone walkway, sort of like in the minds of Moria, where like the thing goes way deep down, but it's not very wide. It goes from what looks like the base of this tower out to. towards this little smaller cavern.

And then it sort of forks off to both sides and goes around some rocky bends. You're not sure where they go. But there's this big empty expanse under all of it. And you're about 100 feet up. So you could go out this hole on the side of the tower and repel down from 100 feet if you wanted to. Take a look at what's down the stairs.

Yeah, that's a little farther than you have dark vision for. And given the fact that it's pitch black, Like all you can really see is the outlines of things. There's plenty of ways you could light up to the cavern if you like. And draw attention to ourselves. That's just what the cavern wants us to do. Let's go out to say, there's a higher chance of less traps outside. I'll just be having everyone else for a survivor check for their ropes as Blaine walks them down unless there's another way you want.

Super duper. Let's anchor every 20. I don't want to fall off this thing or have it. Once you get down, you're going to stay down there? As opposed to? Go back the road. Right. So you're going to stay by the hole while Blaine goes up to spiral stairs.

Yeah, yeah. Who's going next? I will. Okay. All right, one of you, you two roll or one of you, anyone but can roll survival check to tie this. I'm plus one. What are you? For survival?

Yeah. Plus five. Oh. You've been hiding that one. Very secure rope. So, yeah. Hold on, we're going down to steps, down the steps. On the steps, you say.

Down the steps. So down there. All right, again, that high, it's not a problem. Why don't you go back up and get Brian one of your rolls? It sounds like you would be best rolling the survival check. You want to roll again for Bruns rope? Any day now. That's a natural 20 plus four.

All right. I taught you a little slip knot. I know you like the bands like that with the masks and the slipping and the nuts. Never heard of them. Durkin also has very high agility. With his deck score, I'm not going to make him roll. He's just going to find his NPC way right down. Why don't you remind?

I'm loving Brian's voice so much. Let's go around the table and remind everyone, whoever one is. Durkin, this NPC I just talked about, is a male drow, swashmuckler rogue. He has been, you know, giving you as much help as he can. He's heard rumors about this place, but it hasn't been here before. Brian, who is your character? Flint. Iron fist.

Oh, they call me Flint. No one says Flint to Iron Fist. Unless I'm doing something for him anyway. So just refer to you then as. Flint, yeah, or buddy or pal or, you know, whatever. But not Flint, iron fist. No, not that. Such a small no.

All right. Chris, who are you? I am a called Bo. I am a Shadakai paladin. Remind people what a Shadokai is. Shatter Kai are like elves that were banished to the shadow fell. Um, and so kind of stand in that between life and death, but they're sort of punished eternally. And so he has kind of like shadowy elfie, elfie.

You worship the raven queen, right? Yes, they are worshippers of the raven queen. They are essentially, yeah, her, she, she tried to lead a revolution. It didn't work out. And as their punishment, they now are at the shadow, or shatter khan, I should say. Yes. And, uh, he, Ken, who are you? Ah, I am Luther.

The deep, deep, deep gnome rose. Thief. Deep. Deep. Deep. Deep. No. Cool.

And Blaine? I'm a saber-toothed tabaxi barbarian. Smiling Don, but you can call me Mr. Bites. Smiling Don. Jesus Christ. Well, none of you know each other that well. So you're welcome to reintroduce different aspects of yourselves at any time to each other. Because you don't know who the hell each other are yet.

You guys are all fairly new acquaintances. You're friends of people in the last campaign, so you know them. We don't know that Luther, Mr. Bites, and flint iron fist. Brian is giving him a look. About to get an elbow-decker. His characters tend to love paladins. Historically, Brian Plessane, affectionate towards paladins. That means true at all.

Oh. I have to change my research. Just ask Jerry. Who? Oh, I forgot. No, no, no, no, don't. Don't. Don't forget about Jerry.

No. The audience knows. So now you have a hundred foot drop. You can make a grapple. It's straight down. You're all gathered around this opening in the side of the tower. The tower looks pretty big, but this hole got punched by someone or something. It does not look like it just fell apart.

Well, we have enough rope for a hundred feet. Sure. Is there rubble heading inward or outward? outward. Well, with your dark vision, you don't see enough evidence underneath you, like a ground level 100 feet down to know if it went out. But there's not a lot of rubble inside, just a little bit. And I don't know if there's any outside.

Does anyone have a passive insight of 18 or more? Hell no. A passive insight. No way. No. Well, then why don't Ken, since this is your thought, you roll the insight check manually. All right then. It's a 15.

You can't quite figure it out. There's just some rocks and broken bricks like around your feet and you can't tell from below could go either way. Gosh, darn it. Does there seem to be anything else? Outside? I mean, you should. Yeah, you might want to let everyone know why you were curious about that too.

Just I wanted if it was an attack from outside or something busted out from inside. Perhaps a trap? Maybe a trap. Well, shall we climb down? Let's descend. Let's do it. There's a couple of ways you can attach your grapple.

You can attach it to the broken pieces of wall, the step underneath you, or a sconce. There are some unlit sconces on the wall on either side of the opening. I'll check to see whatever seems the most secure. Do an investigation check. All right. Ooh, that's a good idea. Yeah. 16.

Wonderful. Sorry, 18. Oh, 16. Okay. Can't see 18 again. It looks like the most secure place would be the stairs you're standing on. They're built into a larger stonework bottom underneath. Stone bottom.

But the worst would probably be, the sconces all seem oddly loose. Okay, let's not do the sconces. Can we, we could also secure with a peaton maybe? Sure. Yeah, then our climbers kit. Why not? Yeah. So if you use a peaton in the grappling hook, which is designed for this stuff and the step,

it would just be a survival check. And, you know, it doesn't have to be high to be secure, but I'm making you roll it anyway. So we have Mr. Bites be a peaton master. I'm keeping the DC secret, but it's, again, it's high enough that if he rolled a one or two or three, it wouldn't be good. how about 16 plus 5 that'll do just fine so you feel very confident about it 21 it's a 21 um does anyone have an athletic score of that guy plus zero or lower oh mine's eight uh athletics no plus seven plus eight plus seven plus eight plus seven plus six 10-06.

Great. Then you guys have the easiest time rappelling down something like this. Not necessary to roll. Much better than that ship. Let's buy a picture of us ride down the road

when we get off the ride. When you get to the bottom, there is a question of whether you're going to try to loosen so you can get back your PTA and grapple. Let's do that. How are you going to do it?

With our climbers kit. Okay. Well, everyone roll a perception check first. Perception. Perception. 18 plus 5. 23. Nice. 21.

Holy shit. No. No. The 20, 21, 23, and a no. So you guys all at the same time, except perhaps Flint, who's busy assessing all the rocks on the ground around him. There is a dried out husk,

almost mummified corpse of a beholder. that's on the ground. Looks like maybe he died and, like, desiccated across the rock you're standing on. So you all kind of like, like walk around him. His bones are just this skull, right? But you can see the mummified flesh stuck to the stonework of his eye stalks. Like it fell? Yeah, maybe bashing the wall.

It fell. Came out of the tower. One of those seems plausible, yeah. But it seems like he could be related to whatever punched it and he did not survive. Now, as far as just like grabbing the rope and whipping it, it's 100 feet, it would be too difficult of an athletics check to just like grab it and like whip it 100 feet up and pull it out. That's physics-wise, like a DC-32. Well, I guess we could leave it there as a way out, but we can't. If you can think of a way to fly up or climb up and grab it or something, I would allow it.

But it's not an easy just like whip and pull. Who can fly? I don't think anyone can actually. I can climb. I have a very high accent. Oh, yeah, you can climb up and down. You can just grab them up and climb back down, I imagine. Is that something you want to try?

Why didn't they just make the plane out of blame? Yeah, I'll do it. I'll go on. So that'll be an athletics strike. You can do it, but it's still an athletics trek. That's an 18. Great. Yeah, it's not too difficult with your ability to just sort of climb up there.

It takes a while. It's pretty high. Not all the rocks and bricks are uniform. It's tricky. but you get up and down with the equipment. I can't see our house from up here. Oh, no. You're all standing on a platform.

Not that dissimilar from this, we're just going to take away all these bits of hallway that don't apply to you in the current situation. So it's like this long... Pathway, thanks. And you're all here, right? Mm-hmm.

Can we hear it? Is it just sort of like the huge echo of a cavern? Is that sort of what, there's no sound of creepos digging around or anything? Why isn't it? Just rolled a perception check. Yeah, I'll roll this into the role you already did, so to speak. The, there is some very quiet, distant dripping noises. Whatever was leaking into the tower is also coming down from above and stuff.

several different places. So it'll echo. It's from behind you, ahead of you to your right, to your left. It's just everywhere. Like I said, it seems like you might be underneath a body of water. It's a huge, huge cavern, hundreds of feet tall, but there is a rock ceiling to it because you're underground. Rock ceiling? So it could be some sort of underdark lake or ocean, and it's dripping. And that's why it's so hard to get here, why it's so secluded. this path goes a few hundred feet. It's very narrow. It's only 10 feet wide. And as I said earlier, it's a little tough to always have the right tiles at the right moment. But it does like a T intersection, and then you can't quite see where it goes.

T. So I'll do this quickly at the pace of conversation, but basically like that way. and then the other way. I'll put it up this guy. And that's 100 feet away. We've gone on that. If I can just get one more. Yeah, like,

well, we should probably make our way towards whatever kind of intersection that is, right? Do we want to... It feels very time banditzy. Yeah, so these go in every direction and there's like a gap. So like this goes for like a while before it gets to this intersection.

Okay. Do you think we should secure... ourselves with rope. Yeah. Let's tie ourselves to each other. Yeah. Okay. That's a good idea. And this thing is, this elevated this pathway? Yes. It's over a big chasm, yeah? Yep. So, Blaine, you can't see the bottom. Would you like to do a survival check to secure everyone's ropes? It's a bottom-blish chasm. That's an 18 plus 826. Oh, that's secure. Excellent. You feel very confident that you have a good system. You know who's best to tie in ropes and that. That guy. It's not too...

That one right there. I'm doing a string. Crait with string. Everybody roll an inside, Chuck. Oh, all right. 15 plus 3, 18. Nice. 10.

Natural 20 plus 1, 21. Damn. And Brian did well, too. 19 plus 2, 21. We're twins. Yeah, you two notice the most. You guys, you know, I'm still getting everybody's names.

Ken, what's your character's name again? Luther. And it's like Leuther. How's it spelled? In lieu of... Luther. So you're not going to tell me. You're going to make me look it up.

Luther. In lieu of Luther. L-I-E-U-T-H-E-E? Yes. But he's not going to say what it really is. It's Luther. In L-U-L-A-L-S-A-U. Which?

How do you spell in lieu? L-I-U. T-H-E-R. Fland-A-N-D-R-S-S. Lai Uther. Smiland-Don, aka Hutt. Mr. Bites. Mr. Bites.

And the Mr. Bites dancers. Darsall, Bairley, Mark Ely, and Nicole. I haven't access to all this information, but I'm going over it for both listeners, and so I can rewrite it in this new tab I have open. When I lived in Baltimore,

there was a, like a cleanup crew that would go around the city. Really, huh? Yeah, and they had these shirts. It was a solid waist, and they all had these shirts that said solid waste. Every time I see me, I'm a solid waist dancer. Solid waste. And Denny Terry will come out with his elbows straight out of it. Brian, your Flint Iron Fist.

Yeah, what about him? And Chris, your whom? Corbo, C-O-R-B-E-A-U. Great. I'm a visual person, so I appreciate hearing other people spell things to you because the word sticks in my head. When I hear people talk, I have this weird brain where like every letter of the word appears in three dimensions in my imagination. It's a burden. I think it's part of why my memory is so bad because it is photographic, but I can't carry a lot of gigabytes. It's opening to the panic room. You should delete some pictures of your cats so you can remember people's names. Tell me about a bigger SD card.

So, with your high run. flint Corbeau you as you get to the end of this path and it's just the echoes are unsettling there's nothing but the sounds of your footsteps on this pathway

you think you hear some like heavy breathing coming from the cavern as you approach it it sounds like it's around a corner the cavern has a bend in it not far in it's not like something that you would immediately be able to see or notice you

where is the bend in relation to this intersection that we're approaching you would have locked past it. So you can go back to the intersection if you want. But I'll say you guys pick that up once you get to the end. And you can go back. But as you go through the intersection, you'll kind of like look to your left and to your right.

And there are, it looks like more caverns. Oh, boy. So there's three caverns that lead to this pathway up to the tower. Hip, hip, loray. Nice sense of pervert. And you know what? With your insight check, I'll say it doesn't seem like this is intended to be the main entrance to the tower. You look behind you and notice there's no door against the tower where you like repelled down.

So this might be this back area on the front of the tower is in the complete opposite side of where you repel down. This might be like a back alleyway behind the mage tower. How big around is the tower? Is that wall behind the minis there? Is that the tower itself? Yeah, again, it's because it's so dark, it's hard to tell. But the mage tower is made of several giant pillars that are about 100 or so feet across.

That sort of asymmetrically lean into each other. Well, I mean, we could search the grounds. We ultimately want to go down, right? Duragar You're familiar with this world How do we go down This hobby flame Roll a nature check, Brian

All right Duragar Iron fist Definitely his name Nature This is plus fun That's low 10 Well with a 10

I'll at least give you the basics Of what a Dwergar would know This is a very low levels of the under dark, so there is a risk of flooding down here. All the water does go down here. So you think at the bottom of these bottomless pits, there's probably more water that's been collecting, even if it keeps dripping, just because it's hard to not retain water once you get to the bottom layers. As far as which way is down, it could be any of these three caverns. It does look like the one you're headed towards has enough flat surface that when you sort of look

down into the bottomless pit, it has room to go down. So the one ahead of you could go down. So basically straight. You have to kind of backtrack a little bit and look at the fork's other two options and get close to know if they go down. I am content as long as it seems like we're going down to continue. Friends? Yeah.

I'm thinking of using my cartographer's map case to map a shortcut. You need a map. It generates maps. It does? Tell me how it generates maps. I forgot about this. I forgot it was a... 3D printer.

It's AI. Don't say that. This campaign's over. Your cartographer's map case can be used to generate a special map identifying a shortcut. You can use your action to make a DC-15 perception check with success revealing a map buried in your cartographer's map case. Wow. If you succeed, because we're about to end the episode, I'll draw it between recordings.

Excellent. perception good luck with this yeah you have to dig around in there ah five you reach in and this seems like it's not going to happen so we'll have to figure out whether the path ahead

with the strange heavy breathing is the way to go on our next episode of nerding pokes okay Sam what do you think happened today by the way this is episode four I lied to you guys you son of a fuck that's why I read the old names you guys I'm sorry you son of episode four

We're attempting to move down a hallway without getting lit on fire. We took a rope down four flights. We learned everyone's names again. We discovered more caverns. This map, sorry. This map generates its own map. This game is cool as fuck. I've got, at the end of September, I've got the Ventura Theater with J.T. Habersat.

And then I've got in October, Montana, Seattle, a couple other places. So check up Brian Passain.com. Follow me on Instagram if you don't already. And stay tuned. And then keep watching Stuart Fails Save the Universe. There's a couple episodes left. Yeah.

How many of this season? We did 10 total. Nice. But they're probably on seven or eight right now. I think five. Five just air. I think five. Yeah.

Yeah, yeah. In our world. But the people that are listening are in the future. Whoa. You guys? What's going to happen? This is a show for people from the future. Glein, you want to tell us what's happening in the future?

Oh, September 13th, I will be doing comics reading comics at Dynasty Typewriter, where a bunch of people read comic books live. Like a radio play? Yes, like a radio play. And Emo Phillips is going to be the Joker, and I'm going to be one of his goons. And I also play the super genius baby in an old Superman. So comics reading comics at the Dynasty on September 13th. That sounds fun.

Sounds fun. It should be good. Oh, and let me see what's in the Nerd Poker Mailbag. We attribute the success. Save mankind for joining us on this episode. You got walls and a roof. Dear nerd poker, I have been kidnapped by Bow and Luke Duke and locked in the trunk of the General Lee. And I just wanted everyone to know that first of all, I do not condone the Confederate flag.

Uh-oh! Sheriff Roscoe P. Coltrane and Enis are shooting nectar at us. I hope the driver does it. Not sure if that was a question. But we'll call an ambulance next month on an all new nerd poker. 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.