Nerd Poker - The Fog Campaign - Episode 15

Episode Date: April 15, 2025

There's a bit of unpleasantness with this bounty hunter to deal with, hopefully everything is chill now that we spared his life. The whole ruining of his reputation is probably no big deal right? Then its off to investigate a way to our next vault heist, and to suffer a deeply unsettling, or depending on your feelings perhaps adorable, cascade of Kua-toa NPC voices. For 3 bonus episodes a month and more, subscribe to our Patreon at patreon.com/nerdpoker . For merch, social media, and more be sure to head to nerdpokerpod.com.

Hey, it's Brian Possein, nerd poker. We're calling it The Sog Campaign. 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 Pasean and you're listening to nerd poker it's the fog campaign episode 15. My friends are here. Dan. Hi.

That's my Dan. Who are you? I normally don't go first so no. This is first Dan. Ken is here. Hi. Hey pal. Blaine is here.

Hey, hi. And Chris is here. Hello, it's me. And running the whole show at the end of the table. Straight out of Coachella. Here he is Sam, everybody. Hello, sweet children. Sweet heat, Sam Keats. No, no bad sunburn. No, I wore sunscreen and a hat. Wow. Oh, tell the listeners what I asked you right before we turned on the microphones oh what the best the best performance was and it was you'll Gabba Gabba and weird Al Yankovic and Paul

Williams singing Rainbow Connection yeah I would have said Belinda Carlisle's Send pics. Oh man. Brian, do you need a minute? Dan, you want to thank some friends? Oh yeah, I'll thank some of the people who support our podcast. Thank you so much to everybody who listens. Thank you to everybody who endures. Thank you to everyone who supports. And those of you who are at our top two tiers on Patreon have usernames. Like Matt Mendoza.

Thank you Matt Mendoza. Thanks Matt. Thank you Kenders Rule. Parenthetical is bad at jumping. Thank you Black Miro. Hi, I'm from Black Miro. And it's back. What's your favorite episode of Black Miro, Blaine?

It's probably the one where to go down the ocean. That's what it means. Thank you Hawkeye Pierce. Wow. Stinks. He's hanging in there with us. Thank you Dink Stein Cooler. Thank you Flat Dick Society.

Parenthetical, now with free bag of penile heroin rub. It feels like a reference I forgot that is not going to... I know what the Flat Dick Society part is, but then Penal Heroine I feel like, I mean, one of us said it. Thank you Blaine's obscure references. I thank you and Porter Waggoner thanks you. And Wings Hauser is appreciating it. Thank you I Bent My Wookie. Thank you I Am The Great Hoodoo. Thank you Chris Ayoo. Thank you, Chris Ayers. Thank you, Josh Wyess, the D is for donuts. So it's probably Josh D.

Thank you, Sackral. Thank you, when are you gonna let Sam play? First of all, we should, second of all, he did play with a live D&D game we did for the descent and official Wizards of the Coast event And that is where a little someone got their demon wings because they played with demon Eicher Hey, Willie stop Willie is so excited to see Chris Talman Well, I mean we've been emailing for weeks, but this is the first IRL I'll throw three more in here just to satisfy my spreadsheet.

Thank you Gus's Free Willy. Thank you Nug Nug's Tug Tug. And finally, thank you Michael Berlecamp. Now my deed is done and I can go back to paying attention to really falling in love with Chris Tom and Blaine. Who are those supporters brought to us by? Supporters brought to us by Twankies. Twinkies full of jizz.

Yeah, we decided to lean into it. Twankies. And P3. When P2 is full, there's always P3. Bark your car. Cass. On P3. Dan? Thanks, Blaine. Today, really, really trying to figure out how Twankies would work. Really missed out. Too much thought. Don't figure that out. Chris's face during that joke piece of work it was probably like ivory dish you ate Twinkies huh normal feeling a bunch of idiots somebody at the factory trying to get it in there and just being like oh this, this is not, not like they're dick, but like they're, they've been given this giant tube of it and it won't stay inside.

It won't stay. Why won't it stay inside? There's something, they need something from headquarters to make this easier. Plus the refractory period. Thank you. It would take like a whole hour just to make two of them. Yeah, they're very hard. You know, I have a pretty good refractory period. I could probably make two Twankies an hour. I'm gonna go home and bake a flesh light.

Ugh. We welcome all of our new listeners. Thanks for joining in. How many flesh lights do you think are buried in the desert of Las Vegas? Not as many as in your backyard. Just the ones that wouldn't shut up. That may be the darkest joke

that we won't believe on this show. Well, not that I want to follow that, but I think it's time to talk about what happened last time on the fog campaign, which we played in person last probably like a month and a half ago. So we're going to just settle in folks while we re-explain some exposition several times over the next 45 minutes. Our heroes, y'all, were attempting to, you know, have a celebratory breakfast after having a decent meeting at the Thieves Guild.

That kind of got a little weird, where you got a little frustrated. You managed to get a couple of heist maps for some temples underneath Del's Myth. But during the conversation, you got the sense that the head of the Thieves Guild, the sort of anonymous head of the Thieves Guild, was not giving you quite the props you were hoping for, the reassurances you were asking for, because he was like, you guys kind of have a mark on you now because you blew up a mansion of the cranky old drow in town, and you're like, oh the drow, we made up with them, and you still blew up the rich guy's house, and some other things are true about that moment that have not been completely revealed, but

you did go to the local tavern, the pasted almond and attempted, this is the campaign with the pasted almond, right? Yes. Okay. I'm so glad you remembered the name of the tavern, Brian. I have no idea. Yeah, I looked it up just now and that's correct. But you went in there and there was a different bartender and you realized a little too late

that it was a trap. There was some sort of bounty hunter that had tracked you guys, tried to blow you up with a fireball spell and then had some sort of familiar that you killed in the kitchen that looked like a giant hellhound. You then managed to chase him through the streets to the roof of the drow whose place you blew up. And after a fight where he tried to take you out but then ran, you chased him down, pinned him to the ground. And I believe Spicoli is the one who's pinning him to the ground. Is that correct? Who was pinning him? Do we remember? There were two of you.

Yeah. I think it was Little Peepers and you. Yeah, I think so like little peepers had a little elephant foot on him he was little peepers in in in Shalhoub yeah we were going to uh tear you a little bit right and he was spitting up blood and he was not being super cooperative but uh it is now time but I think I like bound bound wounds. So he wouldn't die. Yeah, he was very close to dying. Yeah. And you kept it from happening.

Why don't bound and wound rhyme? That's true. That's a great point. What am I, Gallagher? That's a good Gallagher voice. Bound is wound or wound is wound. We'll be right back with more Mike Douglas. So where physically are we? We've got this guy in our clutches, but are we on a roof?

Are we in an alley? We're up here. You're in the street. You're kind of northeast of the center of town. Should we like grab him? Like get this at least into an alley so we're not in the middle of the road trying to interrogate a dead man that we brought back to life? Sure. Also, who killed one of the guys who was watching the man.

So, you know, he's he was a naughty boy. Yeah. So you drag him into an alley. He's just sort of I believe you gagged him temporarily. I'll look over at our sorcerer friend and be like do you have like a way of perhaps meddling with this guy's mind to make him a little more friendly, compliant? I mean certainly we have you know these murderers here with us but perhaps a subtler touch is what we need. Let's see. I can give you And also if we could talk mechanics for a second I can You know how I gave you guys a bardic inspiration. I can give him like a bardic anti-inspiration

So he has to lose a d8 to a saving throw. So if you have some kind of sweet talk Well, I can detect thoughts and I can command him but I would I think that's not bad. I know you guys did talk about how there were interrogation spells or trick like class tricks that you had to go with all of your thieves. Well I'm super charismatic so I feel like I can do well on that side of it but also like you're saying your detect thoughts yeah I'm gonna read his thoughts okay and I believe he has to make a saving throw to try to resist if you go deeper

okay so can I before that happens I want to give it the it's called a die oh it's unsettling words. Okay. As a bonus action, I can spend one use of my bardic inspiration and choose a creature. So he will lose a D8 from his next saving throw. All right. Well, you know, I'm going to require you to tell us what those unsettling words were.

I'd be like, friend, do you want to go back to death again? Choose your next words carefully. Okay, the d8 is now loaded. He is unsettled. The value is not established until he has to roll. What is the... Wisdom. Okay, so he's gonna first roll And it's gonna be a five plus one a six This could be great. He's already failed, but will he get like a negative three? Two he got a two on a second so My probe into his mind to see what he's doing. Will he know?

No, will you distracting Brian, please? I ask him why is Willie doing that? Hmm? I ask him why is Willie doing that to Chris? Um, love. You just see a heart-shaped emoji. Oh. You see this smiley with the eyeballs of a heart. He's got, I believe, a two yes we just said. Yeah, failed miserably. He got a two on his wisdom saving throw. You're reading his thoughts. Yes. He was not so much like sent here directly as he paid some sort of group. You can tell that like he's feeling

like he will be compensated. He's getting this sense of abundance that he'll receive for killing all of you. You sense willpower against what you're trying to do to him. He seems to have very numbed feelings in general, probably from some sort of life of nonstop murder, typical drow shit. of nonstop murder, typical drow shit. Can I sense who sent him? Let me look up the rules on what's, yeah. The tech thoughts might, I think limit like exact sentences, but that's just because my brain is not present.

Presence of thoughts and then dig deeper. Yeah, I can try to probe deeper. Just sort of the target's reasoning, emotions, something that looms large in its mind, such as a worry, love or hate. Yeah, I mean, what's looming large is the abundance that he's missing out on and sort of just like the the petty sneering he's planning like he's just he just has a lot of like shallow revenge in mind for when you try to interrogate him. Can we ask him directly who hired you?

Does that show? Is that something? Yeah, you absolutely can. Who hired you? Yeah. Interrogation check, please. That's a good old intimidation. And I'm hoping his mind reading thing is kicking in while this is happening. Intimidation use. Mm hmm. Plus this.

Oh, nine, nine. Not very good. Why should I even bother telling you you're gonna kill me either way? Well, actually to be fair, we're a little surprised that we're being attacked. So your value is way more Who hired you? We're not angry at you. We get something has happened and we're in trouble We don't know why and we would love to fix it You killed someone who is important to someone and now they want you dead. If you kill me the bounty's just going to go over to someone

else. I don't even know. Can you tell us, you know, you're obviously an important bounty hunter. What's your name? Hi, by the way, I'm Twedden. Dreath. Dreath. Dreath. Is there some way you can put us in contact? Because I know you want to be a professional, but like, let's say you walked away from this. How can we speak or communicate with whoever is trying to kill us in a way to understand why they're trying to kill us without screwing you up? We don't want to screw you up. I'll let you choose, Chris. You can do an intimidation check or a persuasion check with disadvantage.

I will take persuasion at disadvantage. I thought you might. I thought it would be a fun offer. Because you're trying to be a little sweet to them. And a three, but because of my thing that becomes a 10 and that becomes 10 plus 13 so 23. Holy shit. With disadvantage. Well because I have this weird jack of this what I don't know what it's called I have a. What would it have been if it wasn't with disadvantage? Well it would have been 3 plus 13 it would have been a 16. Oh because you still ended up taking... Because I have the disadvantage which is a three but I have this weird ability with charisma where is it Barney's inspiration, unfailing inspiration... Yeah because I think I would you might say might have negated what I was trying to do. Yes it's

silver tongue when you make a charisma persuasion check you can treat the d20 a nine or lower as a ten So even on this advantage my god it boosted it through the lower one becomes holy shit. Oh wow That's that's almost better with disadvantage sometimes sometimes It's like bad situations is when the silver tongues come out. So yeah, he He's like sneering but then there's just something about the tone of your voice where he believes you. It was Mod Nibble Nubbin. Mod Nibble Nubbin.

Now we want to press our luck with you here. Do you guys know that name? Does anybody know who that is? Sounds right up. You check your notes or roll an insight check. DC 18. Insight. And anyone can do this? Yep.

You all heard, mod Nimble Nubbin. I only got an eight. Can I cast Legend Lore? What is that? Legend Lore is a name we describe a famous person's place or object spell brings to your mind a brief summary of the significant lore about that famous thing is described by the DM. I don't think this qualifies as lore of the famous. Okay 16. We got a 16. We went for 18. Oh where are we? Sorry. Inside 18. 22.

12 plus 10. We're gonna have some great news for Siam in a moment. But we still have a Ken who wishes to participate. Yeah! That's a... 13. Well, I hope you feel bad about taking your time with that, Ken. No. Siam, you hear it.

Hairs go up on the back of your neck. The fur on the hairs. I know, like the whole. Hairs go up on the back of your neck. The full hairs. I know like the whole scruff. You go full scruff. My tail puffs out. Yeah. You heard a cricket outside

and all of a sudden you inflate. Your fur just expands to Michelin man level proportions. Bbibbendum. Bbibbendum. Bbibbendum. Bbibbendum. Bbibbendum. Bbibbendumbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbb friend of the drow, the like the lone friend he had in this world came in on that mech.

You murdered him in fairly cold blood and then sold his mech on Carvana. Yep, exactly right. So it's funny. It stands good reason either his widow or his relative mod is sending bounty hunters after you. Well, you know what? We could give her the mech. Sure.

You haven't sold it yet. Yeah. Yeah, it's actually back at the drow's place. That's where we were hanging on to it. Cause we were sort of like, we didn't know what to do with it. I don't mind. Do you guys care about giving it to her?

Give it to her, she can sell it. Yeah. To get compensation. We tried to bring it to the thieves guild and they seem to be real uncool and free money. Yeah. So then they're not carvana.

Well, I'll say you're asking to take on a carvana business. But they do still have merchandise. I don't think they have seven Max for drought. One eight seven seven Max. It was new for them. The size and the scope of the sale. They used to fencing things that can go under the table, not maybe a house.

Maybe we should go visit Maude now. Maybe we have this guy tell her that we're not interested in being dead, but we're also not interested in killing her. We feel like this is a huge misunderstanding. Are you guys cool with that? Otherwise, I mean, this guy could at least be told, he could at least go back to her and be like,

they wanna meet with you. And then, you know, he's in the wind. What do you think about that? Yeah. Yeah. Let's do it. Nice sense. So this is gonna be another persuasion check. Let me hear how you'll say it.

And what's your passive insight, Chris? Oh, passive insight is 16. You know this would be a pretty dangerous thing for him to go back with his tail between his legs, but. Oh, okay, well then I don't wanna get him in trouble. I just thought because- He got hired for a hit job and he would be going back and saying,

the hit actually would like to say hi at McDonald's and hang out for a second so what about this what if we just let this guy go could you tell us where she is we want to try and figure out a way to you heard the plan we wanted you to contact her that'll get you killed we're not into that we won't you know we hope you'll think twice about coming at us next time. Can you tell us where she is? Can you tell us how we could reach her? She's in one of the big houses north of the Kua Toa district near the piers. OK, she's one of the richies downtown.

She has a big kind of steampunk looking house. Does she have a scoop machine? Mech too. She has a lot of machines. Oh, she's like a mech head. Does she have a scoop machine, Mac too? She has a lot of machines. Oh, she's like a Mac head. She is one of the greatest Gnomish inventors. Her husband was driving one of her inventions when you killed him. Understood.

And you should be that interested in getting it back. Yeah, maybe not. Maybe she just wants us dead. The resignation was adorable. I guess we can just go kill her too. I mean, yeah, well, let's do this. We can let this guy go, right? And then we can decide how to handle it. Seems like the best thing to do is to say, Hey, we got your message. Leave us alone. Sure. You know, we don't want to send her your head. Right? We're not into that. Well, you understand if you got a message with a head of the assassin, not you. You understand what we're saying.

Let's let's let's let this guy go. Yeah. Are you are you down to leave and just we'll see you never? Is you're intending for me to send Ma a message or? No, we're saying- Good, because I'd like to live. Yeah, yeah, no, you said if you talk to her, that's bad. So I'm like, okay, you get to go and we got to figure out what to do with her. Please think twice about coming at us.

I certainly won't be welcoming Del Smith again. Oh because of her. She's that powerful. Is she like a failed hit. Well is she like the mayor of the town? Is it like that big of a deal? She is on the council. Oh shit how many people are on the fucking council? Do you want to ask him? Yeah hey man if this guy's gonna tell us how this city works let's squeeze his nuts. Uh that'll be we'll make it a relatively I woke up achievable but difficult 20 persuasion check because now you're just sort of asking him for town history stuff. Three persuasion. The numbers are getting crunched.

Yeah. Okay, so three becomes a 23. OK, great. So there is a mayor and then species liaisons for the different trade districts. I think this guy's going too deep. No, OK. He gets bored and he wanders off. No. So there is a Wood Elf mayor

and then there's a liaison for Halfling Town. Wood Elf! Back it up again. There's a Wood Elf Mayor. There is a liaison for Halfling Town, a liaison for Tabaxi Town, a liaison for High Elf Town, and a liaison for Saggy Town. What's Saggy? Is that Kua Toa? Yeah. But they don't call them by their race like everybody else. They call them soggy. Yeah. Copy.

Nobody likes the Kua Toa and they make fun of the Kua Toa who shows up for liaison meetings. I've got to leave for soggy town. What if we murdered everyone and just left the Kua Toa in town? That might be a funny. The Kua Toa liaison has a funny name, too, if you want to hear it. Is it Big Mouth Billy? It's the Gloggle. The Gloggle.

All right. So the Gloggle or the Kua Toa. Well, planning to think about what was your name again? Griff. Dress dress. I think anything they want to Dress dress. Anything else? Anything they want to say to dress? Never want to see you again. Thank you. Thank you, Dress. You untie him.

And he just sort of like nimbly pops up a brick wall and disappears. You would all sort of passively know that you've you've made this conversation available to the thieves guild for better or worse. Or in the alley. Yeah, you're in an alley that has a magical ability to transfer the information. I think that's good. Let's get out of the alley.

We go into the street now. We can't be heard. Is that correct? What do you mean can't be heard? that correct? Maybe you can't be heard. Because of the magical thieves guild is it is the enchantment on? It's in the alley yeah yeah you're worried about if you're talking about that part of it being yeah I just thought you're talking about something more active and dangerous or something.

Oh sorry. The thieves guild's not pissed at you or anything. So let's go out in the streets. We're not in the alley. So guys, okay. So now fucking robot Sally from the mayor's office wants to kill us. Why was she so her husband? So she's working with the drow. I really feel like it's, it's, it's just all the rich people are terrible. Right. And we have to, we have to go make friends with the Kua Toa. Is that the deal? I'm into that. What do you think?

Yeah, I'm starting to get the damn get the vibe. Maybe Saugy town could bring us to the meeting. If we want to really shake shit up. Yeah, maybe let's go talk to some cool. It's an interesting idea. Wait, do we have to ask people like, are we trying to get treasure? Like, you know, we can certainly bring this town to its knees wherever we want, but we want treasure, right?

If we were to go visit the Ku'otoa, they would definitely know their way into the sunken swamp temple that we have a map for. Oh, all right. For these maps are quite valuable, but they mostly are about the chambers and traps within. Not how to get there, all right. Well, there are hints, rumors that are scribbled

in the corners, but yes, I believe they would at least be able to help with that one, if not both. The Kuwatoa would be an interesting ally. There are quite a few of them. They are not overly aggressive as far as we can tell, but they are being accused of creating the physior in the ocean that has been causing the fog and other horrible, nightmarish things in town.

And Spagoli, this might be your chance to like, you know, befriend the locals. You know what I mean? Find some of that good stinkweed. Yeah, let me be that. Stinking eggy. Yeah. All right. So should we head to the, I don't know, soggy town? I like it. Let's go to the THC.

Soggy Town, if you or listeners would like to refer to the map, is this mushy area in the far southwest corner. There are a lot of shacks half sunk into the swamp you have been told. So Frankenstein's neck. Yes, Frankenstein, Bartonstein's neck. So you head down. Dr. Barton Steins next monster Shrek, excuse me Mary Shelley. So you guys start heading down through the streets. You're currently Mary

Woollancraft, you can come out pencil Brian and uses a pointer on my phone for this map. So like thank you boss You guys you know this big sort of mansion looking thing is the drow house and you're in an alley over here. You're inside an alley. You're over here. You all start walking around the fountain. The mist, as you may remember, the fog gets much thicker in the south part of town and it's a big reason why the Kuwatoa are accused of being the source of this. People going crazy and committing murder. From the fog. From the fog, which you haven't seen firsthand yet but definitely weighs on you every time you go outside and realize how impossible it is to see more than 15 feet. So you start walking down, make your way, and it's not long

before you start seeing some soggy town guards. You get the impression that the city guards of Delsmoeve never are willing to come down here where the poor Ku'otoa are. And you see one of the Ku'otoa guards right at the edge of this block. This bottom block before the roads start getting twisty. Marching down the street, his arms are kind of permanently like far out at his sides and they kind of waggle around as he stomps his short little fish legs.

And he's got these giant saucer like fish eyes on the sides of his head. And he kind of like bops his staff on the ground and goes, hello. Hello friend, we are looking for your council member of a soggy town or let me ask you a question. What? Do you prefer to call this soggy town

or is there perhaps a name preferred by the inhabitants? We call it Kwakwak. May I meet the council member for Kwakwak? Thank you very much, yes you may. All right, this may. All right. This is a little respect goes a long way. When you talk to the fish heads. Sam found something for a new tattoo.

Kwakwok. Fish heads. So eat them up. Yum. He tells you that Kwakwok is very open to outsiders coming to visit, but no one comes to visit Del Smith anymore. And many of the wealthy locals despise the Kua Toa. So it is a tradition that has not been invoked in quite some time to take you down

to the tourist office of Kua Kua and meet the liaison who again, whose name is Gloggle. Gloggle. G-L-O-G-G-L-E? G-L-L-G-G-A-L-G-L. I'm just gonna write what I said. That's why I said it was fun. That part.

It's the sound that Jerry Lewis makes when he gets his dick caught in a zipper. Everyone here talks like Tom Brokaw. My name is Guga. Sorry, what now? My name is Guga. Guga. Okay, well. It's four G's.

Guga, Guga. Just four G's. Well, Guga, I'm looking at the Gloggle. Probably get a good reception. No, but there is another one of us whose name is Five G's and she can control your mind. Wow. Just kidding. That's what the Republican said.

That was a frightening up first. He takes you down to the bottom of Soggy Town, also known as Quack Quack, where you kind of get down to Soggy Town. Guide into this really sad flop house, kind of half in sticky mud. At this point, you've already gotten mud up your boots, up to your thighs, and he's kind of half in sticky mud at this point you've already gotten mud up your boots up to your thighs and he's kind of gesturing mud up to our thighs

huh there he said mud is up to our thighs it's splashed up to your thighs but now you'll have to walk so deep in mud it may very well get up to your thighs I am desperately fighting there just to vomit the town flop house is half underwater is it is this old building that looks like it was designed by the your thighs. I am desperately fighting there just to vomit. The town flop house is half underwater. It is this old building that looks like it was designed by the Ku'otoa. Like they don't particularly care. There's no stilts or anything, but there are these large struts that appear to be balancing it so that people can go there. But there have been several points where you've seen buildings. It looks like there are Ku'otoa living in the mud with a roof over them for scouting.

And so you'll see sort of Kua Toa walking around in mud and then diving underneath and this wooden ceiling floor kind of bobbing in the mud for a moment. As you realize they're like beavers just kind of like going. So they like the mud. They love the mud. To them existing in the mud is part of it. Okay, great. Would you like to come in?

Uh, I think, you know, we're pretty muddy. Uh, Yeah, that's right. And you said that you would like to be W a lot and I will allow it. Thank you. Uh, do we have to, it's a building. It's a building. Oh yeah. Let's go in the bill. I suppose. I wasn't sure if you're sure you all started the mud under the hut. You all, uh, start going full never ending story

as you start to descend into this mud and feel the childhood trauma come back. No one's sinking yet. No one's having the reins pulled on. They can't come out here. Arnax, Artax. Artax. No, Artax, fight Artax, no.

Story's over for Artax. Yeah, he's, he was guiding you and you're not- It's Robert Picardale. You're not worried, but you notice his mouth and his nostrils go completely submerged while just like the top quarter of his saucer eyes are above the mud and he's just kind of wobbling. We can't communicate in here, Ken.

Like, is it, are you serious? This is like an under mud room? We can't go in there. It's not going to go all the way under. The reason part of the building is above the mud is so you can visit. But you do have to walk. And it-

Why? Hey man, we're walking. At one point it's up to everyone's like pectoral muscles and you're all kind of good. That's as deep as it gets. And the door is kind of like yanked open. You can tell it's hard for your guy, Gug Gug, like to like trying to pull it open with all the thick mud. They apparently don't normally have doors in the mud. They just have gateways. But for you air breathers, there is this luxury and walks you in. There is a kua to a sitting on a little throne that

holds him up above the water. So he may easily. He has a very ornate headdress that sort of goes up the back of his head and over the little hump on his fish body. So there's just this lion zebrafish kind of like resplendent headdress coming off of him. He's got his own staff that looks much more like a shaman staff than the city guards Hallberg like staff. And he says says hello. Hello we are here we have understood the plight of the poor the the Kua Tua here in Quack

Wah. Oh my goodness thank you for your empathy. So we wonder if you might share some empathy with us because oh do you want to show them uh Shalab do you want to show them the map? Yeah we have a map right? You have the map to well you have two heist maps that are very uh secretive vaults and you could straight up show it to them. Of course. I just want to show it to them about like we need their help. It one is here. One is for here. Well, you, you, you suspect that they would be able to help you because there's

a sunken temple underneath the city that they might, but we have a map to that. What's inside? Yeah. We have a map of the temple. We got to figure out where the temple is. Got it. Yeah. So I. What's inside? Yeah, we have a map of the temple. We gotta figure out where the temple is Yeah Empathy that will get to a thing. I mean we don't have to show them. We're wondering about the old Kua Tua temple. Oh

Well, there's not a Kua Tua temple But there were once a very evil race of fishy people who did live here and build a city underneath the city. I see. And there is their evil temple underneath us now? Yeah. How hard is it to get to such a place? Oh, well, you would normally have to swim through the mud, but we wouldn't

perhaps be able to get you down through that with um we call them tourist helmets and is the entire time we're there in mud no just for a while there's a lot of mud in the temple because nobody goes there and is full of dangerous murder traps but you know it's not it's kind of like when you walked up to the building it goes up to your movies. What do you guys say? What do you guys think? That's a noisy mix. I like to check out this place. Yeah I mean if you wouldn't mind perhaps there's a way we could establish a way that people of Delelsmouth could come to appreciate the Kuatauans. Well, what are your kind of names? Well, of course, I'm Twidden.

This is Shlop. Spicoli. Spicoli. Joffrey. Siam Spades. Little Peepers. Little Elephant Trunk is the only thing sticking up out of the mud. Oh, God, he's completely submerged.

Takes his little swashbuckler cap and doffs it and then sticks it back in the mud. Like R2-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do the heroes who protected brave bull bull. Oh, with the drow house meow. There was bull bull at the drow house? Yeah. Oh, at the bar meow. Oh yeah. Meow meow.

Oh yeah. That's us. That's right. Yeah. It was actually you. Yeah. Although the level of enthusiasm for some reason sounded like you were like,

faking it. Lying. Yeah, yeah. That's what his weekly remembering is. Yeah, it's the Royal Titan Bomb's line. He realized as soon as after he said it that it was true. He's like, he lies, yes, and then goes, oh yeah, that's true. Yeah, that's such a fucking great line. Yes, you saved way below. Oh, we all you were going to. Bala Bala has actually become the first city god who is a bull, who is, who is one of our people. Oh, we also a person of quack quack. We also met gig.

Gig, gig, gig, gig. Oh, that is the god who brought you here. Yes. From Family Guy. She is only a foggy. No, we don't like... We are a Simpsons house. So, no, he's the God. Yes, the God who brought you here. He is merely a soggy town god, not recognized by our Widow from here. Yes. So, but... So you think maybe we could go check out this temple? Yes, the temple of the Saguen. The Saguen?

I pronounce it Saguen. Say it again? Saguen. He was saying that it's a good one. It's Saguen. You can stop saying that. It's a real Saguen. No, it is a race of fish people.

Oh, right. Like nasty fish. S-A-H-U-A-G-I-N. Nice. It is it is a race of fish people S-A-H-U-A-G-I-N Nice There may still be Some undeads to go in but that is not an active city. They would all killed off probably Unless the undead ones have a resemblance of sentience. So you're telling us that while we're down there though we would be kind of in mud.

That would be a lot of deep mud. With that. There'd be pockets of air you could move around in a lot of the time in high ceilings but the floor would not be visible. Plus we'll have the tourist helmets. You will have tourist helmets but they will not give you good visibility I'm just thinking also like that the sonar abilities of our people when we get into actual combat to get to get Level of game for a second when we get into combat

Our people as well as a sagoo and use echolocation. So we don't need the vertical visible space sometimes All right, and you would maybe have a guide or someone a few people could help us sort of make our way? We could send you with a guide. Unfortunately, a person in the Foggy Town of Clocklaw is guarded by the Brave Gugug, and we must act to keep him. Oh, of course. Of course, he has not begun patrolling the streets. If you could ask Brave Bullible,

or we could ask one of our warriors. Sure. Just somebody an extra pair of hands. They could. Brave Bullible is a silly man who just went to a bar and everybody liked him. He's not as strong. What an asshole. Yeah, I think we want to. He's a silly boy. He's got a bad boy. I think we want a mighty warrior's a silly boy. He's not a bad boy. I think we want a mighty warrior.

Right guys? Yeah. Make a be left. James is pissing himself. What a weird bunch of people. Welcome to Dungeon and Dragons. Yeah, I mean, is everybody down with that? We get a guide and go looking for.

I personally, if you, if you're a nostalgic person would say, otherwise get a warrior. I think a warrior, I think we would want an extra pair of hands. Warriors. And get a warrior. All right, well, I will personally recommend Gluge. Sure, Gluge. Now, how do personally recommend the glug. Sure.

Blue. Now, how do you spell that? 10 H isn't a K. You got it. I know. G L U U G. Of course. You're a Swedish boy. We give our brave lawyer every time a brave lawyer wins the battle in the

octagon. This is true in more, but I can't see it. I can't say it in the voice. It's hard. And we talk about a boy who went to battle. The octagon, we let him add a vowel to his name. So good, good, good. Is one to break bottles and the octagon. Catch it.

OK, well, she's got a irritable who's won the most people and then a lot of me to this is a brave little. I said brave glug. Excuse me, my voice got a little from me there for a second. You can't tell. I'm glad they couldn't tell. I died. Wouldn't die. Oh well, the game has ended because our brave warrior heroes could not stand these NPC voices anymore. down these PC voices, Andy, boy. He takes you through Muddy Sagitan himself,

his resplendent headdress sticking up out of the mud as he jumps down into the mud, hiding most of his eyeballs. And now you're just sort of following this like fan of headdress that is floating in the mud. Gluk is, none of him is above water, but you can just see a fin, like a jaws fin, is floating in the mud. Gluge is it. None of him is above water, but you can just see a fin like a jaws fin just sort of sticking out. He's just like sitting there for some reason.

You can't tell why, because most of him is under mud and you sort of see bubbles start to come up like churning mud and you can tell they're talking to each other under the mud. Guys this is going great. When the bubbles pop do words come out? Can we tell what they're saying? No but but but Gloob does kind of hop off of what must have been a chair and stand up. And he is much taller than the other Kuatua. His entire head sticks above the mud. All right. He's got these like big underbite piranha fangs on his lower jaw.

And he kind of like looks at all of you and says, hello. We introduce ourselves. My name is Luke. And he'll agree to take his time. He will take his time. Very dangerous from the temple. All right. Right. Just head there.

Now be very, very much. You are down there. There will be traps, but I will help protect you as much as I can. Thank you. I can be a loyal scout and I can engage in combat. Wonderful. And also we have a map that's going to hopefully help us with some of the traps and such. May I see the map?

It's fine if you don't want to show it to me. I do not need to see it, but perhaps I can provide insight. Alright, do we trust this guy? I mean, I guess we're walking over to these people. Alright, we trust this guy. Alright, yeah, we'll show it to him. He has everything under the arm. Well, the downside of this map was made when the Saguen were alive and well. It will not take into account the amount of mud in there. Although Saguen can see in the mud,

they're concerned not to have it all over the goddamn place. Like we love it. So they would normally have clear water. That means this map represents being able to see the floor. It will likely look like a big old mug and a poop. Do we have any listeners left? Listen, they like it. I've gotten zero feedback either way.

So I'm going to cross my fingers. I think Roads still listens. Hi Roads. Hi Dylan. Roads just signed off. Oh no. All right. Well, I mean, I feel like as long as we know generally where we are, we can search for

traps and like you say, if the water is clear, that's certainly going to help us out. Oh, no. Oh, I'm sorry. I'm going to try to speak with a more humanoid accent this time. The map reflects when the water was clear, and now it's full of mud. Right. Oh, geez.

Oh, the water is no longer clear. This will give us a very good sense of where many things are, but we will not be able to line certain things up visually. But you'll be able to see, obviously, better than... Pretty well, yes. But if there is ancient mud caked upon traps, you may not see them as well. Okay.

But we know where they are. I have a little windshield scraper we not see them as well. Okay. We know where they are. I have a little windshield scraper we can do on the wall. A what scraper? A windshield scraper. Can you say squeegee? Yeah. Hold bottles if you want me to rip a hole in the space time continuum by saying that word.

Squeek. I say it quietly. It's forbidden in this place. Alright, hold on. saying that word. I think quietly it's forbidden in this place. All right, let's uh, is there anything we need to bring with us down there? I assume torches would not provide any help. I'm so used by how stupid I am. You can, torches may indeed be valuable, but you'd be best to cover up the part that lights up as you take it down.

And when there will be pockets of air that are totally unlit. So unless you have dark vision, you will not see dark vision. No, I do no natural lighting in this temple. I think and you have dark vision. Yes. Koli, can you see in the dark? I think I can. Yeah. How about you? Shalab? I don't know. I will do my best to affect a humanoid accent. Well, and also I feel like if three of us have dark vision,

we can help you in a little bit. Yeah, we can use, I can cast light. Do the helmets themselves, oh, you can, there you go. You can probably cast light like on your helmet or something if you want. Let me see if I have, I need. So that the bad fish know where his head is. We can all get behind Ken.

Ken will be the beacon of death. Now I'm gonna take some lemon and capers with me. Newspaper. Malt vinegar. All right, so there's going to be some preparations made. He does tell you he can take you to a shop in Soggy Town. They will not have a lot of things that are designed for adventurers who are not Kuatowans, but there will be some Kuatowan survival gear as well as some knickknacks for

tourists. I do have dark vision. Nice. Excellent. I still like my fey and so skinny. I thought I had something to do with water breathing. Do you have any sort of like suits, like a rubber suit that I can put over my fur? Because I'm gonna be licking my fur for a week after this. And I don't.

I mean, though, there is the ancient skin of the gods. Oh, okay. Can I get one of those? That is one of our beloved artifacts. I mean though there is the ancient skin of the gods One of those that is one of our beloved artifacts What about do you have any like soft-contained underwater breathing apparatus? In of the what was it the ancient skin of the gods ancient skin of the gods. What's that? It's made by bodyglove. Now you press your hand on it and it changes colors. A cult of personality. Why? It's an old Coca-Cola shirt.

Yeah, so there was like a demi-god, Kua Toa, many centuries ago and we keep his skin. It is sometimes worn by a warrior once he survives in the octagon 10 times. But for now I am the bravest warrior. I only have two vowels. Right. Um, could one of us possibly, that's could our friend Sam wear that skin to protect his beautiful fur? Yeah.

Oh, I mean, he could, he'd have to ask to borrow it because it is all one of our more treasurer's artifacts. Yeah, of course. I would be delighted to ask nicely. Meow. Let's wait. Let's wait over to our brave leader in Alaska. You guys luck your way back through the mud. Have you guys ever considered a room without mud? Just in terms of speed, moving things along.

The whole time, little peepers, just a trunk. Yeah, you make your way across the corridor back to where you just were to talk to the sort of liaison slash chieftain of the Kuwatoa. How do you pitch this? He goes, hello. How do you pitch this? He goes, Hello. Now, I was wondering,

to give you inspiration. Well, it's, it's rough for us to make our way through the mud meow. Especially me with the fur meow. It sounds like more of a metal concern than the Dungeons and Dragons mechanics concern, but I follow you. I was wondering, Meow, if I could borrow the shimmering suit, Meow. Well, of course you can, if you can survive in the octagon.

Oh boy. And who would I be fighting in the octagon, Meow? G'doog! Oh, I don't wanna kill our friend! I don't want to kill our friend. You don't have to kill him, you just have to win. It's an octagon, you throw him out of it. Are you some nerd who doesn't know sports? I don't know if you know what game we're playing here.

Yeah. I am that nerd you told. I, you know, I'll give it a shot as long as we're not playing for for keeps mouth. Very well. Break his nose. So it's possible. Why?

Break, Luke, put on your mother's suit. It is time to step into the. I went to murder suit. Well, I've found out what that is on the next episode of. Yay. That's one buddy. Do you want to plug anything? You can hire me at dantelfer.com. I'll be your dungeon master.

I would do it. If you throw in an extra hundred dollars, I'll kiss you. Whoa. Whoa, that's not D&D. No, but you know what? It's hard to be a straight guy in OnlyFans. So I'm just trying to spread that business around. Yeah, I'm not making shit on OnlyFans.

I'm making lots of shit. That's why I'm making shit on OnlyFans. Specialty. I just go to brianpessain.com. I have a convention in a week and a half up in Winnipeg. of a convention in a week and a half up in Winnipeg, it's up in Canadian territory. Looking forward to that, maybe never come back. Burner phone.

Yeah, I've heard. Every phone I use is a burner phone, right? Yeah. I'm a stoner and I love Bernie's Mountain Dogs, right? Oh, what? Elbow drop? Elbow drop. Elbow drop.

Oh, bruh. Oh, bruh. And Rifter's Trey Paperback is out any day now. I already have my copies, but please pick them up. You can probably pre-order it at a place you would do that, but I prefer you go to a comic book store and give them some business and pick up some other comics while you're there.

What about issue seven of Gromitz? Issue seven is finally dropping in May. And then the trade paper bag for Gromitz is coming in the summer. And we have skateboards available very soon too. So BrianPasin.com will show those skateboard decks. We have three different decks that are beautiful. Like, I collect decks and I can't wait to own these because they're so cool. And like, I'm on them. Like, I never thought I'd be on a skateboard deck.

People told me I would never be on a skateboard. Tony Hawkins. But yeah, I'm excited about that. Don't have a ton of standup coming up in. Um, I got my next gig is in July, which is months from now. But BrianBusain.com for all that information. Thanks for listening. And hey, Blaine, tell us what's happening next week.

Oh, we attribute the success. Save mankind from it. Thanks for joining us on this episode. You got walls and a roof. Well. save mankind from it. Thanks for joining us on this episode. You got walls and a roof? Well... On the next episode of Nerd Poker The Nerd Poker gang

gets hit with an evolution card and Munchlax and Toxapex have to rescue Flittle and Tickatink from the Omega Ruby get Spoink fine parking in time to save them before mom gets home. All this and Brian Schroedel's on his Poke Balls wrong. On an all new NerdPoker. 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 and Sino California 91416. Thanks for listening. When I was working on At Midnight, I got there early and Like 11? Yeah. Nobody on the lot and Paul Williams walks by because he was going to do Chris Hardwick's podcast. Holy fucking shit, it's Paul fucking Williams.

Yeah, I looked at him, I said, you're Paul Williams. And he went, yeah, I said, you died with your eyes open on Beretta and it really affected me. I've been waiting his whole lifetime. He kind of goes, he goes, I had to fight the producers to do that. Oh, nice. We had a huge argument, but they finally, they didn't want to let to do that. Oh, nice argument. But they finally they didn't want to let me do that.

But I'm glad you liked it. I was like, yeah, I think about it a lot. But like, come on, you shouldn't have said liked it. My wife isn't as happy about it as I am. But thanks, you asshole. I was 11 years old. Yeah, I was like it when my victims die with their eyes open. I'm like, yeah, Beretta.