Tales from the Stinky Dragon - C03 - Ep. 33 - From On Hyra - Seventh Inning Dretch

Episode Date: December 24, 2025

Brutaliteam explores the rest of the Sora's Stump mines and stumbles onto a nefarious plot of peril. Support us directly on Patreon https://www.patreon.com/stinkydragon - get access to ad-free episodes, bonus content like Stinky Dragon Adventures & Second Wind, our patreon-exclusive discord, and more!Check out the Deck of Dungeon's Here!Check out our new merch at store.stinkydragonpod.com ! Follow us on our socials at https://linktr.ee/TalesFromTheStinkyDragonCast: Gus Sorola, Blaine Gibson, Barbara Dunkelman, Jon Risinger, Chris DemaraisWriter/Editor/Composer: Micah RisingerProducer: Benjamin Ernst Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

I'm Alan and I'm Sean and together we host the Prancing Pony Podcast. Every week I explore Middle Earth with Sean or with other co-hosts lately with in-depth analysis and plenty of nerd humor. From The Hobbit to the Lord of the Rings and more, it's a great way for first-timers to experience J.R.R.R. Tolkien's captivating world. And for long-time fans, it's a deep dive into their favorite stories. So if you're ready to take the next step into the most beloved world in fantasy literature and become a part of a vibrant active community of listeners, then look for The Prancing Pony Podcast. wherever you listen. God's child. It's a mixture of a torrent of telepathy-tested tap water, a brew of booming

battle-born tea leaves, a sprinkling of primord powdered sugar, a lashing of painfully puckered lemonade, and finally topped with a sprig of stunning mint and a slice of reality-altering orange. One sip of this celestial sipper and you'll have advantage on never being too far out of reach. Previously, our adventurers Doug and Munther dove down a dank drain, but their deliberate detour delivered a dilemma at a drainage divide. The desired metallic musk was smelt to the left, yet a suspicious shout sounded from the right. B-Team befriended the brothers of Tov, Tio, and Neo.

They were attacked by dreadful dretches who thieved their Thomitek bodies, heads in armor. So B-team braved the musty minds of Sorosump in search of the dretches' den, but have they bitten off more than they can chew? Grab a guzzler, and let's get back to this gassy cause. Hello, everyone. Welcome

to Talesman to Stinky Dragon. I'm your dungeon master Gustavo Sorolla, and I'm hitting Our four players with an arrow. Fair. Chim-chim. That's Natty shooting it out of the sky with her, bounced off. With her Eldridge blasts.

Classic Natty. All right. This week's question is, if you could master one skill, which would you pick and why? And that's submitted by Doug Boone. All right, everyone go and roll a... There's my question.

Yeah, Doug, it is. Everyone going to roll a D20. One. Eight. Six. 17. So 17, 8, 6, 1. Shout out to.

who are a Patreon member, Doug Boone. Love, love Doug Boone. I don't remember who the people are. Because I'm a big nerd, all I remember are numbers. All right, so Mr. 17, you're up first. Hello, I'm Mr. 17. No, I'm 17.

Mr. 17's my father. Hi, I'm John Reisinger, and I play Natty Wonder, who is a drought, warlock, mother, drag queen, and... Saint. Just a nice gal.

If I was able to master one skill, I would say, I mean, there's a lot of skills that I'd like to master. I love getting better at stuff. But at top of my mind right now, as far as importance, is I would master the skill of the magical control of time so that I can cast a spell to go back in time to move my auto harp into a different slot in my inventory so that when that daggum, you know,

group of folks who I'm part of their cult now asked me to sacrifice something and wouldn't have been maybe the most important thing in my inventory. You could also write a song about it and, you know, you're fucking true.

No, but they can't write a song because they don't have their auto harp. Yeah. So, yeah. It's funny that Natty says the most important thing in her inventory is the auto harp and that giggy. Interesting.

He's not in my inventory. What are you talking about? What would he be in my inventory? You lost Giggy. He's in my heart. Where's Giggy in my inventory? Well, then don't be making up lies and then gaslighting me like I'm saying something crazy. All right, it's part of this.

All right, I want to change my answer. I'd like to master the skill of not being gaslit by our dungeon master. And I'd like to master the skill of gaslighting. All right, thank you, Natty. I promise I'll stop gaslighting you. Yeah. You never said that. What?

All right, I believe we had eight next. That's me. Hey, it's your good friend, Blaine Gibson. Yo-hoo, it's me, what? No? Someone doesn't appear with that? Well, no. Well, no.

And, uh, you-hoo, I play Tov, uh, the male Thammatech Barbarian level six. And, uh, Gustago, Vustago, if I had to master a skill, it would be the, uh, the craft of performance art. you know, like acting. You know, I want to be like a bard, like a barbarian bard, a barbarian, similar to like a Dave Bautista or Johnson or Dwayne the Rock Johnson. You know, I just want to act, you know, and unfortunately I have this huge hulking body that makes me good for killing, so that makes me a barbarian. What's the name of the guy that played the president and running man?

Wasn't that also like a wrestler? The president and running man. Yeah, he had to then go and fight and be a gladiator in the running man to fight. You're talking about Jesse Ventura. He wasn't the president, but he was a wrestler. He was a past performer on the running man. Okay. Yeah.

He's the governor of Minnesota. The Baja. Dude, I love Jesse Ventura. Don't even get me started on Jesse Ventura. That guy's a nut. I'm just asking if I actually got that correct. Did I name the right muscle man? Yeah.

Well, yeah. Okay. Yeah. Good. I got one. bleed. I got one. Great example of a barbarian. Yeah. See, I'm interested in your culture, Blaine.

Yeah. Do I multi-class? Is that what I got to do now? Yeah. Absolutely. Let's do it. Finally, one of you, I dare you. All right. We'll level us up. Coward. Watch him do it. This episode brought you by coffee. No. Don't give us more levels, Gus.

No. Chase me. All right, thanks. Blaine. Next up, I believe, was Barbara was a six? It was. Correct. Very good job, Gus. Inspiration died of you. Gaslight him more. I've already got one.

No, you don't. He does. No, you don't. All right, get out of here. Well, hello, everyone. I'm Barbara Dunkelman, professional gaslighter, and also player of Doug Boone, the artificer bug bear.

And, you know, I actually have mastered quite a few skills, not to brag or anything like that, but spend a lot of time like learning and building and doing a lot of things with my hands. but the one thing I don't know how to do and I really, I just, I'm all, I just like butterfingers when I try to do it is play a musical instrument.

And I feel like, you know, if Doug maybe learned the guitar or the piano or something like that, he really impressed people around him. People aren't really as impressed with my intellectual abilities as much as, you know, they are with the arts. So I would like to maybe learn a musical instrument. Maybe Natty could help me with the,

you know, her ardo harp or something like that. This is a bit of a sore spot, but. Yeah, I mean, music is essentially like really fancy math with cool sounds. Oh, and you put it that way, I want to learn even more. There you go. We can make this happen. Absolutely. We can be a little duet.

Can you give us a little ditty right now, Bard? A bit, bu, blah, blah, bud, bud, bud, bud, Doug. Can he give us a little ditty right now, Doug? That was my music. That sounded like a song. Yeah. That's when someone's playing Mario Kart and gets off the track, but just keeps going

and then gets on the track eventually. Yeah, yeah. And that's all, folks. No. I love that. I'm Barbara and I had a character named Bart who was a bard and that was like designed

on purpose to confuse people and it did its job just now after three campaigns. Like three years later, it got me. We just filmed Baldur's Gate 3 as the Infanites. Yeah, so an hour ago. Don't do Bart's voice.

Give you a little ditty right now. Yeah, yeah. Oh. Oh, ding, ding, ding, ding, dong, ding. See, I can't play it. That sounded like Depeche Mode. Was that, don't let me down again, or what's that song, Gagas? Never let me down again.

Yeah. I know, I just, I just play some random tunes there. It sounded like the little piano that they play at the Ruggrass theme song. What is that like a collier or something? Ding ding ding ding ding ding ding. So talented. No, that's definitely some new wave action going on. I'm into it.

I'll buy the record. For sale now, it's store. Thank you, Dragonpot.com. As soon as we get the Toldbeard back in stock, we're going to have Doug's album on there. All right, thanks. That's a promise. That's a promise.

100% promise. All right, thanks, Barbara. Next up with a one, I believe it's Christopher. Yeah, hey, I'm Chris. I play Gunther, the level six male, crook, quote, a fighter. And the skill that I wish I could try, I tried so hard when I was younger.

It's very challenging, but it is very impressive when you do it. It is called tongue rope. And it is where you use your tongue and you spit it out and then you jump, jump, jump, jump, jump, jump, and I always trip. For the first time, I imagined what it would be like to have like a eight foot long tongue. And the idea hurts to think about. Like, imagine your tongue just like, ah. Where would it roll up into?

Yeah. But do you mean it's like a jump rope but with your tongue? Yes. Where do you store it? In my mouth, it is right here. I use it now to speak. How do you have any room for anything else in your mouth when you got an eight-foot-long tongue rolled up in you?

Well, I can sometimes feed food. Eat food. Do you ever choke on your tongue? Eat food. Fit food in my mouth with the tongue. Wow. Yeah, so I could try the jump. Listen, Halsh, I'll show you how bad I am.

It's just licking everything in the room. You also have teeth marks all over your tongue. bite it a lot. Yeah. Yeah, it's a challenging I wish I could do it because it is so impressive. World's worst fruit roll up.

All right, we'll see who masters their skill first. Ready, go. To be or not to be? All right, thanks, Gunther. Appreciate that. Go take a look at the overturned mine cart. Yeah.

What do you want to do? Like, you want to look under it, see what it's covering, or you want to like... I assume, like, without having to lift it, if it's something that's like mate of a few pieces, there's probably cracks I could peek into to see if there's anything

under it. Yeah, that makes sense. Without actually like releasing anything that might be under there. Yeah, make me an investigation check. I have a plus four. That is a nine, so that's a 13. 13, yeah. You go up and yeah, there's a, you know, a small hole punched in the side of the mine car, probably from years of use. And, you know, you put your eye up to it and take a look inside and you see some tools. You see a hand drill and a pickaxe in there. And what appear to be some various chunks of metal.

Oh. Actually, this stuff might be kind of useful. And as you're looking at it and you turn to convey that to your party, the mine cart gets overturned and three armored dredges jump out from under the mine cart. A farce. Monster card! Yeah, holding up weapons and menacing you all. Everyone going to roll initiative. Oh, God.

Oh, gosh. from under the mind cart. So everyone, go ahead and roll initiative. 17. 8. 30, 20. 11. My last one was like 18.

Was, it was. Rest in peace, 18. Is at the end of the last episode I rolled out. Yeah, well, it's last episode. This is the now, get with it, Cunther. The dretches rolled a four, so they are last initiative. Suckers. Losers.

They're down in the dredges. All right, Natty, you see these three hideous creatures threatening your friend Doug. What do you want to do? All right. So there's three of them, and they are gathered up together because they were under that mine card. Yeah, they were huddled under that mine card, so they're all pretty clustered together. Okay, well, first, a little panache. Natty's going to use her elemental gift of flight.

Ooh. And what's so funny about that, Blaine Gibson? Because we're in a cave, you're just going to go, whoop. Yeah, I was going to ask how tall is the room we're in right now? That is a great question. I'll reread the room description, which I probably should have done when we started here. You are in a round cavern with an overturned mine cart, and there's child-sized burrows dug throughout the room

and a giant centipede corpse that was blocking your path when you first came into the cavern here. So it's pretty big. It's a pretty big round cavernous room. All park on height? Let's say, 20 feet. Uh, yeah.

So Natty goes up to maximum height. Uh, now she has Overwatch. And let's bring out... Natty online. Natty online. Let's bring our oldie-goldy and cast a moat of hell. Uh-huh. Yeha.

We're than pirates when we need them. Yeah, y'ar. Let's not be doing that again. Oh, man. Literally. As a reminder, I manifest a pocket of hell that is 15 feet. Uh, it's a sphere. I imagine I could do that with getting all three of them in there and not

Douglas. And they get blinded. Yeah. Okay, yeah. They do get blinded and are blinded while they're still in it. And they also take some damage. A creature who starts their turn in this area takes 3D6 fire damage. A creature who ends their turn in that area must succeed in a wisdom saving throw.

And then if they fail that, they take more damage. And since they're blinded, last time we did it, I think Gus, they had to, like, do a little roll to see if they could get out. Yeah, yeah. But let's deal with this damage first, I think. right? Yeah, 3D6 is of far. Do they get a save or anything on that? No, sir. Sorry. Oh, they do when they start their turn. You want to do it then? But yeah. Since, I can just do it now, since we're talking to me.

I'm gonna do it now. Five, five, three, 13. Have you considered a moat of heaven? No. So they only, it looks like they only save if they end their turn in there. If they end their turn there, they do that wisdom saving throw. And then if they fail that, they take psychic damage. Right, but they don't get a save on the start of their turn. No, they do not. They just take damage.

All right, well, that's yet another broken spell for Natty Wonder. All right, so, yeah, hold on to that for now, and at the start of their turn, they're going to have a bad time. Okay. And once again, Mr. Gigglesworth is going to approach the edge of hell and stand there waiting to try to nick somebody in the ankles if they come out. I'm just standing by it going, like, yeah. I feel like it's like a dog at your front door. When you hear someone outside who's coming home, is like, oh, it's like all excited, ready?

A hundred percent. Tail wagging. A hyperactive Pomeranian holding an axe. What a cute baby. Mm-hmm. All right. You got anything else for a snatty or is that for it for you and Ginky? That'll be it.

All right. And he won't do any action, but Captain Grumbles will yell some stuff at those guys. Make me a, let's call it a wisdom check for Captain Grumbles. Oh, no. This is where we lose them. Four? You don't know this. but a cold shiver runs down Captain Grumble's spine

as he sees the motorpelled manifest in front of him. Because he's a zombie. He doesn't know why, but something's not right with that thing. Something in his past life. Yeah, so he experienced it before. Oh, he was, I forgot, he was literally in it. I was thinking because he was dead. Oh, yeah.

He's born from this. Yeah. In a way. Molded by it. Douglas. Or Doug, sorry. You're up. It's catching.

I keep calling me by my government. name. Douglas Furbune. So Natty cast mode of hell around the three. Yeah, probably not the thing I should have done

at the top of combat so no one can see them. Wondering about that. Yeah. So if you all just want to like maybe take a like a little breather or like ready something you can you can take your time. Decide where you want to stand in the room. You got it all the time. What happens if you like if I wanted to cast a fire bolt in

to the moat of hell, because I could see where the moat is, I assume. All right, it's not area of effect. So it says you hurl a moat, a fire at a creature or object within range, and the range is 120 feet, so that's not a problem. Make a range spell attack against the target. On a hit, the character takes damage. So I think in this case, the way I would work this is you would make your range spell attack, but you would do so at disadvantage

because you can't actually see them. So that's the way it would probably work. Okay, well, I'm going to hold off on that then, and instead, I'm going to cast guidance on... Am I close enough to touch Gunther? Yeah, you can make that happen. Okay. I'm going to cast guidance on Gunther,

which means... D4? Add a D4. Oh, it's ability checks, though. I always forget. It's still good if they get attacked. Yeah. You never know Gunther might want to do a backflip or something cool,

something groundbreaking that we've never seen in our campaign before. That sounds sick. That sounds dope. That sounds cool. Okay. A barrel roll. There it is. And then I'll also bring out Gambot and just, like, come and pop out in front of me as some additional protection.

All right, that's it for Doug. Next up, we got Gunther. Gunther wants to do a defensive backflip. Oh, he was ready. Okay. Defensive backflip. Yeah. I have in mind what that is.

Can you describe that for us, though, just to see if we're on the same page? Yeah. Okay. Defensive backflip, obviously, is where he pulls out a sword and a shield, does a backflip. and so that he's shield, lands, shield facing the enemy, and then readies an attack for whenever they come out. Okay. Can we roll for it?

Yeah, why'd you go ahead and make a, what would you call that? Acrobatics? Yeah, make that an acrobatics check, Ruby Gunther. Put that ta! A one. Oh, my God. But add your D4. So it's a one plus eight plus a nine.

11 with everything. Yeah, the spirit of Khyborg must be here somehow with that one. But, yeah, with an 11... You feel him. With an 11, you don't manage... You manage to at least land on your feet. It's not the most graceful thing. I think it's like the thing you do when you're a little kid and you do something,

like you jump and you think it's really far and really cool. But from an outside perspective, it's like, whatever. It's like you just kind of jump and do a backflip and land unsteadily on your feet. He thought he did a backflip, but all he did was twirl around in place. I love it. Like that kind of thing, right? He kind of like leaned to the right and thought he did it, but all he did was like just kind of turn himself around.

Yeah, yeah, exactly. I'm ready. Sounds about right. Defense. And that's it. Oh, that's it? Yeah, waiting for them. I'm ready to attack as they emerge.

Okay, okay. Cole, what do you want to do? Gunther is showing off some serious skills over there. Uh, yeah. I mean, I feel like we got this thoroughly covered, so why not play around a little, you know? Let's play in the space. So I want to walk up to the edge of the mode of hell.

And, you know, earlier I said I wanted to become an actor, okay, so I'm going to try that now. I'm going to lay prone on the ground, close my eyes, and stick my tongue up. And then I'm going to make them believe through acting that I am dead. And when they come out, I'll kill them. Thoughts, thoughts, everybody? No, I love it. It's a faint. Yes.

Like, F-E-I-N-T. Oh, I thought like a good heavens, what a great performance told. You deserve the Oscar. Okay, well, anyways, that's what I do and then I hold my attack. Were you expecting applause or something? Yes, this is my acceptance speech. I'd like to think the Academy. What's your motivation?

Oh, oh, oh. We see. I'm wearing the dead skin of mine. I'm wearing the corpse. Now I must embrace the corpse, okay? I must, I must believe that I am dead man. Wake up, dead man. Beautiful.

But for like a little show for my friends, you know, based on the faint thing, I will go, oh. I love it. All right. Is that it for you, Toll? Yeah. Toll, give me a performance check to see how effective this is and whether or not you'll be considered for your performance in the academy. Oh, la, la, my first break. That is a...

That's not bad. That is a six. I think I nailed it, guys. It's not bad. It's not good, though. No. Benedict Cumberbatch doesn't have anything to worry about next year at the Academy Awards. It'll be fine.

Thanks, Toll. You're welcome. And now with that, I believe it's time for some hell. Yeah, now they take 13 points of fire damage. Woo! If only there was a fire bolt in there, too. Everyone's been kind of waiting and staying at the edge of this moat of hell. But, you know, the moat finally manifests itself with a blast of brimmy.

stone and heat radiating out, incinerating everything inside for 13 points of damage. And what happens? It doesn't just go off right, like the moat stays there? Yeah. Okay. The moat activates and nothing steps out of it. Are they immediately just dead? I don't know. Well, I can ask, should I be rolling for a wisdom check and psychic damage? Let's roll it.

Oh, you have to roll for a wisdom check. I said let's. Then roll. A creature ends their turn to that R and must succeed on a wisdom saving throw. I rolled her one. Roll her one. Is that a success or? Pold opens one eye and says, are they, are they still in there?

Are they coming out? Shh, sh, go back to dead. They're still trying to do his backflip. Hold on, hold on. They failed. That was a role for all of them? Yeah. Let's do them all as a group.

There's only three. Okay, 3D6, psychic damage. As the voices of the damned crowd their minds. Gigi, behave. You know, sometimes I listen. into this podcast and something scary happens in my ear and it freaks me out, IRL. That's going to be that moment for everybody. Way to go, Chris.

You did it. That's good. Yeah. 14 points psychic damage. Ooh. Yeah, still no motion. Nothing emerges from hell. Shall I go ahead and look for them?

Natty, how long until the moat wears off? Is it like an hour or two? I can stay still. Well, I'm a good actor. Watch. It's all dependent upon my car. concentration, I could drop it if you think there might be a mystery of foot. If we take Natty out of her concentration.

I can just end my concentration. Y'all just need to talk to each other. Concentrate on my performance. I don't know how you can concentrate on anything what total is talking to me, to be honest. Acting. Natty will drop our concentration. Motive hell's gone. Right as you drop your concentration, a foot steps out of the mode of hell. Not attach anything, just a foot.

Oh, no. Is it a hairy green dredge foot? It's a, yeah, a disgusting hairy green, postule-filled foot. And you drop your mode of hell and you see what used to be three armored dretches lying in a pile in the middle.

Did I one shot these guys? Yeah, pretty much. Talve admires them. Oh, they're good. I think they were just too scared of giggy. They're better than you. They beat. Wow.

I'm sorry, I have to vote for them. for the best performance. Speaking of Gigi, Gigi does start chewing on that one piece of foot. He needed something. He needed something. Like, you know, like a little dachshund who's got a toy and just like, ah, just like shakes it around.

They're like a squeak in there? Yeah. Can Gungther look around and see if there's anything remains of them worthwhile? It's in Gigi's mouth. Yeah, make an investigation check. I do an investigative backflip. Let us eat.

God. Gunther. Yeah, how'd that go? What was that roll? It was a two. Cool. I feel... Right on part.

I feel a cardboard. Oh, I feel them in this room. Well, that was just for the investigation. But the backflip I didn't do yet. Do you want me to do a back flip? Yeah, yeah, yeah, let's do it. Here comes. 12.

Not bad. Oh. I roll the four. I have it eight to acrobatics. Yeah, that's real bad. Yeah, once again, it's like... It's a little better, but you're still just doing that thing where you close your eyes, jump in place and spin around as opposed to actually doing a flip.

You're turning on the wrong axis. But you think you're doing great. And you do your investigative backflip and turn to face the remains of the armored dretches. And there's not much left other than those bluish-gray metallic pieces that they had covering them. Oh. Would that be pieces of like the thaumatech? Yeah. Is that similar to the metal that we found in the Natty's new church?

Yes. It looks nearly identical. Can we can we, I mean, I'm sure that this is going to be a mystery that unravels throughout the episode. But yeah, is this Neo's parts? Because he was missing his armor. It's the same color, right? He's missed his body. Yeah, he was...

Oh, wait, no. One of them... Tio. Yeah, okay, yeah. He was missing, like, his outer bits. Tio's missing body. Neo's missing it. Yeah, in the last episode,

one of you, whoever had the piece offered it to Tio, who, and then Neo grabbed it and started, like, trying to reattach it to his body. Okay. Could Doug go pick up all the pieces? Absolutely. We can call them Neo pets. How long have you been waiting to make that joke?

Your whole life. Oh, inspiration die. No, no, no. I stand by the lack of inspiration die for that one. I stand by that. Yeah, yeah. Thanks, John. Yeah.

Doug also determined by picking up all these pieces if, like, he could cohesively make it into what he. perceives as missing from one or both of the siblings. Oh, you made this card piece. Make an intelligence check. 18. Yeah, you think you're missing a significant amount of pieces. It's like trying to put together a jigsaw puzzle with only a fraction of the pieces. You find parts that fit together, but other parts that don't seem to fit anywhere.

But you can make some decent progress with how these all are supposed to go together. Okay. Yeah. Could I then just put it in my inventory and collect them? Yeah. I hate collection missions and video games. Does it matter? I don't know if I need to write down a number of how many pieces I have, or is it just pieces?

Just write pieces. Then over your head, the numbers 2 slash 18 appear. That's it? Oh, man. We're going to have to murder a lot of dredges. Time to go farming. Yeah. All right.

Well, I guess just be careful if you lift any line cards up in here. But the question is, how do we get around this giant caterpillar thing? Centipede. Centipede thing. It's dead, right? It's dead. Yeah, yeah. We just go over it.

Yeah, you can just kind of shove it and get around it. Tov, Tov would stand up and dust himself off and then bow. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And seen. Yeah, he pulls his hand in front of his face, see. My flight lasts for 10 minutes and I can just hover. Can I just keep that going for 10 minutes? Yeah, sure.

Okay. Someday we need to attach some string to Natty's foot and pretend like they're a balloon. It's like a disguise, you know? Oh, yeah. Is that how Gigi is traveling? Is Gigi just like holding onto his harness? Dick is just walking on the ground, holding on to Mama. With his mom balloon.

Love it. That's adorable. Okay, we're going back to our dungeon maze mechanic. And correct me if I'm wrong, Doug, I believe you were the one who drew this monster card and triggered this? I believe so, yeah. I tell you. Since you made an intelligence check to put this stuff back together, Doug, I want you also to make me a survival check as well. Okay.

And do. 19. Oh, that's really good. Okay, as you're collecting and putting together these pieces of blue-gray metal, you find a few other smaller pieces that lead off down one of the tunnels in front of you, which is you feel like it's kind of leading you in the correct path you need to go. Guys, I have a feeling that this is the correct path we need to go, and I've found more pieces down this way.

Follow the leader. Good job, Doug. All right, so that means next up would be toll. Yes, I will pursue pitfalls, wisdom. That would be peruse, but sure. Peruse pitfalls. Myca, my God. Percy.

Oh, my God. Leave that, Michael. You don't know to do that. Which, uh, you reveal two cards in the river. You choose one to discard and shuffle the two remaining cards and place them face down in the river. Yes. That's the one. All right.

Wisdom check? Yeah, make me a wisdom check. Whatcha. Ooh, that's a Nat 20 baby, yeah. What is that, like an 18? No. No, I have a plus zero. Thank you very much.

Zesty Gus is here. Now I will pursue this path. All right. You pursue the path. Which two cards do you want to reveal? It's not mean when I embrace the insults. Yes. It's so good that we figured out a way to make a living being idiots because we're so good at that.

We might as well get paid. man. I'm actually a scientist on the side. Yeah. Blaine's hobby is science. Yeah. Yeah. All right.

Which cards do you want to reveal here? My job is beach. I mean, that energy is us, Barbara. That energy is us. We are all kinds. Yes. There's three cards to choose from, correct? The different paths.

Okay. What are the left in the right cards reveal? Oh, you sure about that? Okay. Left and right. Left and center. Left and center. Left and right. Left and right. Okay. Left and right. You evaluate the dangers ahead and do a little bit of reconnaissance and scouting. And you feel you ascertain that going either to the left or the right would both lead you on the correct path. Oh.

That makes no sense. Geographically speaking, what are we talking about? It's like fork. What's in the center? You didn't peruse that one. A dairy queen. You can still go in the center if you want. So basically, Blaine, you can just pick one of those, put it back down, and just take that path. Hmm.

Hmm. You. Boom. Da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da. Left. It sounds like Mario every time. Left, left, left. Yeah, I'll put one down and I guess.

Yeah. What happens is you pick one and then shuffle the other two. Choose one to discard. Yeah. That's why I do. So you're discarding left. I discard center. Is that possible?

No. But you know that there now is a correct path in the river. Yeah. We're just discarding one of those and then shuffling the other ones. All right. Sure. So you still have to pick left, center, or right. Left.

So he just made our chances worse. Yeah, I guess so. That's not true. That's not true. I'm a scientist. Go left. Is that your final answer? Yes, Regis.

Lock it in. All right, locking in left. It's the first that can happen. Quite a lot, actually. You pursue the left path, and you see a shadowy figure with a glint of metal, quickly shuffling past the tunnel, glowing with firelight. Hey, come, come back. Where are you going?

You-hoo. You-hoo. You turn a corner down a dark set of stairs, the stench of rotting flesh and moldy sewage filling your lungs. The sounds of thick, bubbling fluid echoes all around, as you're in a wide and deep cavern and without warning, a blazing fire illuminates the far side of this den. A pole of pure fire burns

as a short-clooked silhouette stands over it. They address the pool. My overlord, we have procured the gemstone. It was right where the fire-eater said it would be. With your permission, I shall start the ritual immediately. Do it.

I will need all of my underlords for the next move. You are sure this will be an improvement? I have no doubt. So, is it true then? Have you indeed found the Pathfinder? They are all but within my grass. We storm the gates in one week.

Then there is no time to lose. Indeed. Oh, and one more thing. Make sure our guests burn. With pleasure. The silhouette turns around revealing them to be a greenish gorilla like Undari and covered infested pustules and boils, with some kind of druidic dredge wearing a cloak of rags. Their gnarly curled claws hold up a rod set with a pulsing fiery opal.

A fanged smile comes across their face and they pound the rod on the ground and the pool of fire transforms into floating flames, lighting the entire den. A horde of Gretches surround you snarling, clad in blue-gray armor. The pull behind the Gretz druid now bubbles with black oil, and a single demonic horn is curiously poking out from the crude. Let the ritual of resurrection begin. Everyone, go ahead and... Sorry, wrong room.

We were looking for the bathroom. That's down the hallway, isn't it? Actually meant to take the other path. That is our bad, so sorry to have interrupted. Yeah, we'll be going. Bye. See you later. Okay.

Why don't you roll me a, what do we call it, initiative? And we'll see if you're able to say that before they're able to act. While we're all initiatives, since we don't have the pleasure of listening to our voice actors with playing, did that voice in the pool sound like Wesser Face? Infernes? Infernice. In the yes. Okay.

Oh. I rolled a 24. 11. 21. That would be a 4. So before we really get into any decision-making, combat or whatever it is, you guys decide. I'm going to read a little bit of description of the room

and let you know about what's going on. Thank you. Cool. Okay. So this room reeks of rotting flesh and moldy sewage. There's a large ceremonial pool that overflows with boiling crude oil. There's a demonic horn sticking out from the large pool and two small pools in the corners with a drain gate on the far side.

There's rotting support beams that crack menacingly in piles of rocks and piles of bones. Okay. This ceremonial pool, is it like elevated like a bird house or bird bath or is it in the ground? No, it's in the ground and that's where that druidic, I'm going to refer to it as a druidic dredge, like that one that was talking to the pool. That's where that one is situated and it appears to be performing some kind of ritual. Metagame-wise, I've started a timer and as time progresses, that druid is like trying to, it appears they're trying to do something at that pool.

Sounds like you're just describing Six Flags Fiesta, Texas. Where's the Iron Rattler? I went there. I went there. Okay, sorry, as our timer's going. Our timer's going. San Antonio sucks. And the other two pools are just like chilling off to the side. Yeah.

I mean, I don't know if I'd say chilling, but they are to the side, to the left and the right when you enter. And do you, did you give us a number of how many other dretches there are that are not the Druid ones? Oh, I did not, but there are eight. Cool. That's manageable. Jeez. How far am I? from the one summoning, Gunther.

From the bottom of the stairs where you enter to that pool is probably about 40 feet more or less. Okay, Gunther is going to run forward, jump, and then mid-air cast Misty Step. Whoa. So that he lands with his sword onto the guy casting or summoning. That's pretty sick. Okay, FYI, there are those other eight dretches as well

that are between you and that druidic dredge. So I'm assuming you want to like just run, a little bit, avoid any attacks of opportunity and then try to jump in Misty Step. Yeah, pass. Around them, avoiding the attacks of opportunity to get to the Druidic dredge. I just want to make sure I'm understanding correctly. Okay. Yeah, what's the range on Misty Step?

Is it like 30 feet or something? It is. Misty Step, briefly surrounded by Silvery Mist. You teleport up to 30 feet to an unoccupied space you can see. Yeah, I don't see why not. That should absolutely work. So yeah, you take, you know, five or 10 feet of movement up ahead. And I think the dretches, the armored dretches, they think they're going to be able to

attack you, they look at you menacingly, and then you jump up and disappear, reappearing behind them all by the giant boiling pit where the druidic dredge is, and you attempt to strike at him. Is he holding anything, this creature? He's holding a rod set with a pulsing, fiery, opal. Okay, well, first I will attack. Does an 18 hit? Yes, an 18 does hit. As I stab down, I want to use a superiority dice to use a disarming attack. When you hit a creature with the attack roll, I can attempt to disarm the target. Add the superiority die roll to the attack's damage roll,

and the target must succeed on a strength-saving throw or drop one object of your choice that it's holding. Oh, Gunther's learned his lessons. Okay, yeah. Go ahead and get that role. You use your superiority dice, right? Yeah. That's 13 damage.

Okay, and I have to make a strength-saving throw, you said? Mm-hmm. What's the DC on it? It doesn't say a number. Okay, we'll roll and see what it is. Is it a counter-roll against me? It's an inferiority die. No, it's just a saving throw.

It's not an opposed roll. It doesn't matter. I rolled a three, which is probably not enough for whatever your check is. So what item, I have no idea what item you're going to choose. What item do you choose for this druid address to drop? Whatever that thing, that you said it was holding something kind of glowing or whatever? A rod with a fiery opal?

Yeah, that would be it. Yeah, that one. Using the... Who taught you this lesson? Do you remember? Yeah. It was Thode at Renesis.

Renaisus? Renaisus. You remember Renaisus teaching you this lesson and you focus your weapon on the hand of this druidic dredge and use the leverage to force the rod with the fiery opal out of its hand and it clatters to the ground at the druidic dredge's feet.

Nois. I do have a second attack. For my second attack, can I try and kick the thing towards my party. Is that an option? You can, I will warn you, those eight dretches are between you and the party. So even

if you kick it in the direction of your party, there's no guarantee it's going to get to them. Then I guess picking up an item is a free action, right? Well, in this case, we'll say it's an action because this is kind of important here. Oh, wait, so you attack, which is an action, you can attack again

as part of that action, but you can't take another action. I'm going to say you don't have another action. I'm inclined to give it to you. I'm looking for a way to make it happen, but I don't think I think you're out of actions. Okay. Then can I just use my action to kick the thing as No, but you're out of actions. Well, I guess like an attack against the, can I attack? Yeah, we can call it an attack on the item, but we'll say like an unarmed attack on the item. Yeah, I'm trying to push it away, you know. In what direction? I'll kick it west. Let's say you're

going to kick it east. To the west, there's like a little pile of rocks. It's not, it's probably not that important but we'll say you're kicking it to the east just because it's a little more clear in that direction yeah make a like an unarmed attack on it just to see if you're able to to hit it a 13 yeah we'll say you're able to make contact with it at that point yeah yeah yeah so make it roll a d6 just to see like how strong you're able to hit it okay that's a one uh yeah it's a thing like where you wind up a really mighty kick but most of the force goes over the rod and you barely get a little glancing blow on it. And it skaters a little bit.

It moves about five feet to the... It's basically Charlie Brown. Get the rod. I have made it very easy to get. Yeah, it's like Lucy was holding the football and pulled it. And Gunther takes a big swinging kick and misses it. Oh, man. All right, and that is my turn.

All right. That's it for Gunther. After Gunther is dug, then some enemies, then Toll. Is anyone really hurt right now? How's everyone doing? trying to just do some support. I want to support. Good.

Now, meta-wise, I barely got any damage taken from me. Okay. Do you have mage hand? Uh, do I have mage hand? That's a negative. Speaking of mages, that one took a damage. You can heal them. Oh, wait, there's one of us who is flying.

That's very true, and it's not me. Could I just cast that firebolt that I wanted to cast last time? Absolutely. Can I just cast? Can I just catch this firebolt? You're going to touch that dog? Can I touch that dog? Can I bet that dog?

Um, which I guess is the, the dredge closest to me. It would be one of the armored dretches. They look very similar to the ones you fought that were in the mind cart previously. Okay. I will shoot the one closest to me then. All right, go ahead and, uh... Let's say he has a mustache, so he's a little different from the other ones. Okay.

I'll shoot the mustachio dredge. Secretly in dredch society. All the others are very jealous of it. this mask. Yeah, I are. You can grow facial hair they can't. Does a 16 hit? Yes, a 16 hit.

Excellent. And then that will do 2D10, fire damage. Yuck. 4. Total? Yeah. I rolled a 1 and a 3 on my 2D10s. Hummer.

But... Gambot's here. Show me the Gambot time. This classic entrance catchphrase. Gambot too. And he... is, I guess, going to go after me because I'm done my turn.

Yeah. Could he do roll up to the same guy in the mustachio fella and do a force-empowered rend? Ooh, that sounds, ouchy. A 19. That hits. Yeah, that hits.

And then 1D8 plus three force damage. Come on. Come on, Gambot. Six points of damage. Dang, it's Gambot. Right up in the jaw. Uh, yeah, I, uh, is it in the jaw? Gambot, for some reason, I think a lot, because he of the size, I think a lot of like he goes up and hits people in the shins and they're just like, ow.

Or like that crotch. Yeah, he crits, it's the crotch. He definitely is crotch height at full extension. Gambot extends, uh, what, what kind of rend was then? Say, uh, uh, force empowered rend. Force empowered rend, uh, right into the nether regions of the moustachio dred. Although, I will say, I imagine these dretches are kind of like, little hunched over, kind of gremlin-y.

So I think it would hit him in the chin. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, no, no, no, no. Let's go over the crotch. Okay. No, no, no. Yeah, for sure, for sure. Barbara's character, she gets to make the call.

The jaw. Right into the chin. Although hitting him in the crotch and him going, Mamma-mea would also be a very funny moment. Gambat hits him in the jaw, and he falls, he becomes stiff as a board and falls over backwards, unmoving on the ground. And then Gambot celebrates but going,

like, tiki, tiki, tiki, tink, like bouncing? Yeah. All right. So that's one of them. Is there anything else you can do there, Doug? Um, I think that will be it for me. All right guys, there's one down.

It is the armored dredge's turn, but before they're able to act, the druidic dredge that's close to you, Gunther, closes his eyes and stretches his arms out and begins panting under his breath. In a language you don't understand. And behind him, a fiery ruin ignites at the edge of the pool. Mama say, mamma sava, ma poohs up. A roon ignites at the pool? At the edge of the pool. A roon? Yeah.

Okay, it is the armored dredge's turn. But they've got a target-rich environment. They've got a frog behind them, three people, and a giggy, and a gambot in front of them. Trying to get them to fight gambon. I'm just imagining his head extended and stayed extended. and it's just like d'i-na-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-k-k-k. Okay, we're going to, they're going to split up, I guess. Some of them are going to go after Gunther,

and the rest are going to go after the party. We'll deal with three of them are going to peel off and go after Gunther first. Smart. Okay, I'm going to have fun with this. No, no. Two of them begin very, like, almost like an animal, a very, what you say?

Like, a very feral-like state begins slashing and grabbing at you, Gunther wildly. Let's see if either of them hit. That's going to hit. Yeah, one of them's a Nat 20. That one hit. It was. That one, Gunther, hits you for six points of slashing damage, and this dredch, you know, grapples you and drags you to the ground with it. Cool. The other dredch that went up there begins, like, hopping up and down in place, and an incredible stink begins emanating from its body.

What? What's with all the stink? Make me a constitution saving throw, Gunther. Okay. 14. You try to hold your breath, but a little bit gets in your lungs, and you begin coughing uncontrollably as you're being grappled by this other stretch. And I think as Gunther is scratched,

he looks down at that gash on his hand that had halved his max HP a while back, and then like, oh. And just feels the, feels the, scratch even more. It's even worse now. Okay, the other four go in the direction of the party down to the south.

I'm going to roll a D20. If it's 1 through 10, they'll go after Gambot. If it's above, they're going to go after the rest of the party. What did Gambot do? Yeah. She's goofing off. What did Gambot do? Gambot down to the mustachioed Dress. The cool one. This is a high

crime. Yeah, they rolled a 1, so they're going to go after Gambot. Alpha dredge. He's just smiling because it's painted on. He has no other face, yeah. It's just a decal. They're going to all do one shared attack just because they're all attacking the same way. Merit. How many spare parts you got for a Gambot?

So much. Enough to build a new one? I could build infinite. What was that? I rolled a one. I rolled a one. Oh my God. You can't hurt him.

He's just so happy. He's the mascot of the show, Gus. Scambot. Sweetie, squeaky. All right. I think they're so enraged at the mustache view of dread falling that they don't know what they're doing. They close their eyes and begin slashing and grabbing blindly,

but they're just like attacking the air directly in front of them, missing Gambot entirely. Blind Ray. I like that the Gambat's like bouncing, but like just kind of casually left to right, but just keeps swiping. My God, he's skilled. It's like at the end of the Matrix when Neo just kind of,

kind of like steps to the left calmly, steps to the right calmly. Yeah, and then like kind of just bats the agent away, like nothing. He's starting to believe. Give yourself an inspiration die. That's really good. Yeah.

There is no spoon. All right. Next up is the druidic dred. It's going to walk over and pick up its rod because there's only five feet away. Wait, no, tack a... Oh, wait, no, I'm Gunther. Yeah, you're grappled and on the ground now.

That's why I'm making this move. It reclaims its rod and walks back over to the pit. Once again, it begins chanting and points the rod at the pit of boiling crude oil. And another fiery ruin ignites. What happens if all the... How many ruins are there? There are four more remaining. Oh, no.

They summon a little Caesar's $5 hot and ready. Light them, light them. Light the torches. Metagame-wise, I guess I should tell you, I have a ten-sided die I'm moving for a countdown. If you all interfere with the ritual, the count goes up. If the ritual's uninterrupted, the count goes down. And when the countdown hits zero, the ritual's complete.

Very dagger-heart of you. There's a, yeah, we got mechanics we're working with back here. A little peek behind the curtain for everyone. It then turns around, pointing the rod in the direction of the three of you down south by the entrance. It's ignoring Gunther. Begins chanting and waving the rod around. and a fiery mass erupts from the end of the rod

traveling towards B3. All of you, except for Gunther, make me a dexterity saving throw. I've got advantage on that. Form of a gambot. Squeakig, squeaking, squeaking, squeaking. I rolled a net 20. Very nice. 22.

7 and an 11. Oh, thank Kevin. I'm going to die. 18. Actually, I can use my inspiration die. There you go. I just earned. I burn.

Oh, burn them. Oh, no. Oh, 19. 19? Okay. All right. A fiery mass, which you recognize as a fireball, erupt in your midst. But you all are able to die behind piles of rocks and, you know, you're able to, you take some damage, but not all of it.

You're able to mitigate the effects of some of the damage. So instead of being fully affected by it, you all succeeded on your saving throws, so you take half damage. So each of you take 12 points of fire damage. Even with a 920? Ooh. Yep. That's half damage. So that's 12?

Why did we dodge that? Yeah. So it would have been 24. It would have been 25, but I rounded down for you. Wow, what a generous God. I'm a kind giving DM. The Druidic Dredge cackles with glee. Next up is Tollv, and after Tov is Natty.

All right, shield, holster, gavel of Gailstrom, two-handed, activated. Glutes, engaged. Ooh, I rage. Ooh, I'm raging. And how far away is the mage from me again? Was it 30 feet, the full? The druidic dredge is about 40 feet away. 40 feet, okay.

I want to, like, walk into the bulk of the enemies, the dretches that are in front of us. He said there was eight there, and I know that some went over to Gunther, like... Three went to Gunther, four are in front of you. I want to get away from Natty and Doug, but be within the center mass of those guys because I want to use this power that the gavel gives me. Is that possible? Yeah, absolutely. So you want to walk into the middle of them?

Yeah. That will provoke some attacks of opportunity. No, you're moving in. You're not moving through it. You're moving into it. So we'll say you can do this. Yeah, okay, cool. Yeah, I'm going to use the gavel of Gailstrom, two-handed attack.

Let's actually just see if this hits first and foremost. I guess I'll aim for, like, if this is like a quadrant, quadrant, top left guy. So I'll take a swing at him. Sure. Okay, cha-ch-ch-ch-ch-pout. 21. That hit.

Okay. And then I'll do 1D10 plus three bludgeoning damage. Very nice. That's a 12. And then I have this thing that I can use once per long rest called Stromstrike. It might be misspelling. It could be Stormstrike. I don't know.

With a strike of your warhammer, a blustery gale incites a howling rage into all enemies and allies within a 10 foot radius. All creatures within range must take. a DC-14 charisma saving throw on a failed save. The creature is knocked prone by the blustery gale and becomes enraged for up to one minute. On a successful save, the creature is just knocked prone by the blustery gale.

The creature can repeat the saving throw at the end of its turn. The creature automatically succeeds if it is immune to being charmed. And then it has this thing called blinded by rage. Enrage creatures lose the ability to distinguish friend from foe. Regarding all creatures, it sees as enemies.

Okay, so I got to start off with charisma saving throws, sounds like. Okay, what have I done? Additionally, a protective gale surrounds the creature granting them resistance to bludging, piercing, and slashing damage. What have I done? What did I do that for? That's too late now.

Let's see how it goes. What's wrong with it? What's wrong with it? I don't want to give them a resistance. Wait, you gave them resistance? That's what it says. Additionally, a protective gale surrounds the creature. Is that the creature being me?

It's the enraged creature. Enraged creature. Yep, yep, yep. It's them. That's fine. At the very least, it's going to make them the enemies of each other. So it'll distract them from us. So I still does the job.

All right. So I'm doing a charisma saving throw. What was the DC on it? You're doing a DC-14 charisma saving throw for the four? I'm going to roll them all. One roll for all of them. Okay. They have a plus zero, so I need a 14 or better.

Don't roll that. Or do. Actually, do. 11. Sorry, it was my decision, not yours. I did not roll it. They failed. So once again,

On a failed save, the creature is knocked prone by the blustery gale and becomes enraged for up to one minute. Okay, so they're now, it's just that one creature that got hit is prone, right? All four of them, because they're within a 10-foot range. Nice. Wow, okay, so all four of them are now prone and enraged. Ah, cha-cha-cha. Super cool.

So now you can keep running past them, right? Yeah. You opened up a lane. Oh, I also have plus two melee damage because I'm raging. Oh. So I guess on that first guy, so that was like what, a 12, so plus two. So 14 on that top left guy. Got it.

All right, riding it down. Yeah, so Toll spins around, enraging all the enemies and forcing them to the ground. They're just kind of rolling around now at this point, at your feet, Toll. That one guy didn't die? He's still up and he's fine? He is still up for the moment. Well, he's down, but you know what I mean? You knocked him down.

You knocked him prone. For sure. And then I am going to use my second attack. I'm going to avoid these guys. These guys are knocked down. Times of the essence. I need to make it to the main. So I think...

Druid. Druid, that's totally what I said. And instead of attacking anybody, I guess I'm just going to... Can I double speed to get to them? Actually, no, I've walking speed of 40 feet, so I'm just going to go up and knock that guy. Power walk, yeah? Do it.

Yeah. Chip Haney. Here you come. Channel the chip. Okay, cool. Yeah, so you do this, then continue your walk and do your second attack over there on the druidic stretch. I would like to, if that is possible, Your Honor.

Yeah. I'm just clarifying that that's what you're doing. Yeah. Then I'm gonna roll. That is a 11. That does not hit. I'm sure about that. Yeah, I'm pretty sure.

Yeah, you... I give you my inspiration die. Chris gives me his inspiration die. Gunther, what do you say to toll to inspire him? I don't want to die. Wow, inspiring. It was inspiring enough. That's an eight.

Oh, no. That's even worse. That's still a miss. Gus, do you want to give him your inspiration? Gosh, come on, please. I forgot. Maybe I'll use mine this combat. No, I'm not sharing mine.

This holiday season, your support can help Cam H transform mental health care. From now until December 31st, every donation will be tripled for three times the impact. That means your generous gift goes even further to help. help create a future where Canadians can get the help they need, when they need it, no matter who or where they are. Together, we can forge a better path for mental health. Make three times the impact with a donation today at camh.ca slash holiday. That's it for Toll. Next up is Natty, and then we go back to Gunther at the top of the initiative. Natty puts out her palms out to the side upwards

and like Magneto lifts up off the ground and just floats towards the druid out of reach I would assume of any of the other dredges that are standing Yeah well the four closest to you are all on the ground prone yeah one of the other ones by the druid is currently grappled with Gunther on the ground which leaves two of them when you're able to float over them

out of range of attack of opportunity Cool. Nandy's going to square her hands then straight towards the druid and do some Eldridge Blast in hope of breaking his concentration. All right. Roll that beautiful bean footage. First one is a Nat. 20. Beautiful. Beautiful. That is a hit. That would be a D10 plus four.

And then what do I get another, like a, like I get 10? You get a full, like, crit dice. Yeah, yeah, exactly. So 3 plus 4 is 7 plus 10 is 17 17, ouch, yeah, it strikes the druidic dredge who winces and kind of nurses his arm where he's hit, but he is still standing and glares at you. Well, and that he glares back.

Ooh, oh, oh, oh. And goes, don't glare at a lady and does another Eldridge blast at him. 13 plus 7, so dirty 20. That hits. Plus 4. is 11. Oh wait. I did forget that I have agonizing blast, which means when you cast elder's blast, you add plus four to the damage it deals on hit. So it's 11 force damage and then add another

eight total to him for that agonizing blast that I did twice. Okay. The druidic dredge doubles over in pain, but it is still standing. Now he's kind of propping himself up with that rod. He's struggling to stand, but he is still there. Well, from behind Maddie's wig, you see, a pair of eyes peek out. Oh no. And Gigi lunges down towards the Druid and tries to rend him. And that's a 13 plus 5, 18.

Whip, whip. Yeah, that does hit. Giggy's rend is a D4. It's two, plus three, so five slashing damage. And the target has the poison condition. To start, uh, Gigi's next turn. All right, yeah, the, uh, druidic stretch clutches at its chest and stumbles, seemingly unable to keep its feet, stumbles forward to step, and then falls into the pool of boiling crude oil.

Whoa. Oh, and then another face peeks out from behind Maddie's wig, and it's a pirate, and he's sad that he didn't get to health. It's a carrying capacity of Natty's wig. Yeah, hey. It's industrial strength. Natty, make me a perception check. Love to. My perception is plus three, so 14.

You see a hand reach out from the pool and grasp onto the edge of the ground and you recognize it as the druidic dredge his hand and it pulls itself up out of the pool. Is that what the horn also was? Yeah, the horn is in that pool. Glares at you and smiles a disgusting, jagged, toothy smile. Natty just tries to kick him down under the water or more.

Oh, okay. She's just taking her boot and she's like, no, you're done, you're done. The druidic dredge pulls itself out of the pool, ready for more. I can do this all day. Okay, well that's the end of my turn. It's a good turn? Yeah, you did a lot, Maddie, but we are back up to the top of the initiative and it's Gunther's turn. Okay, so I got the one that's got me grappled.

Can I try to attack that one? Oh, I think you can. Yeah. You have disadvantage on tech rules against any target other than the grappler. Yeah, yeah. You are correct. Yeah, so you can. Then I shall.

Nat 20 for 28. Beautiful. Wow. Yeah, you're able to, you know, in close in, I don't know how, managed to get your reapier around and poke the grappler. So how does that work with rolling? Oh, and then I'll take a look. That's right.

It's critical. Let me take a look at it. Yeah, because D&DBion automatically adds the second one, but we homebrood it. that one of the dyes maximum. So it'll be... It's actually 18 points of damage. And then is it still up?

Yes. Yeah, you're able to stab it with the rapier and it's significantly hurt, but it is still holding on to you. And it's still holding on. Okay, then I want to make it a use of superiority dice to make it a menacing attack, which I add my superiority die to the damage rule

and they have to make a wisdom saving throw. DC-16 on a failure, it's frightened of me. Okay, let me roll that first of all just to get that out of the way. It's a DC-16 wisdom. And it'll be an additional, I rolled the two of my damage, but I have that. I can re-roll one dice, damage dice per attack. Puncture. So yeah, puncture.

Once per turn, when you hit a creature with an attack that deals piercing damage, you can re-roll one of the attacks damage dice, and you must use the new roll. It's a two, and it's a two either way, so it doesn't matter. So it's two extra damage. Okay, and I rolled a 17 on the Wisdom Savantau, which succeeds, but that's irrelevant because with your additional damage, the armor dredge loses its grip on you and falls unmoving. Woo-hoo.

Now, is the whatever emperor, whatever guy summoning thing, is he still around? Is he within reach of me? Yeah, he's probably like five feet away. Okay, I want to use my second attack to attack him. From the ground. Oh, I was grappled, right? Yes. On the ground?

Yeah. I'll tell you this. I didn't say it explicitly because I thought it was understood with the grapple when you started coughing as well

when that... Oh, oh, that... That smell got in your lungs that would have put... That would have made you prone. I didn't say it because I assumed you were prone already because of the grapple

I probably should have explicitly said it so that the prone wasn't understood but that did put you on the ground if nothing else. Okay, so... And then your badge, Gus. So then can I stand up and attack within that reach?

Yeah, so you're able to use half your movement and then you're able to stand up and you can make that attack Because within five feet, I mean, that's pretty much there. Okay. And then I'm going to run and attack the, what's the one going to go? No, no, no need to run. I'm just right next to you.

Slow down. That is very crisp to run everywhere, but this person is only five feet away. All right, 15. That is a miss. All right, I'm using another superiority die to. Can use multiples like that? Precision attack. When you make a weapon attack rule, you can spend one superiority died to add to the roll before, after the roll.

Okay. So I'm going to add another eight. Does a 19 hit? A 19 does hit. All right. So now it's going to be a 16 damage. Nice. That's a lot of damage.

He'll run the five feet forward and attack the druidic dredge doing 19 points of damage. It is still standing, but he wins his in pain. All right. I use my final superiority die to do disarming attack once again. And I add the eight damage as well. Okay. And I got to make a, was it a strength save? Strength saving through. And I rolled it eight. So it's another eight damage. And just for reference, the DC on that is 16.

Micahoul. No, Gus, you knew that. Off by heart. Always say you just knew it. All by heart. Yeah, yeah. I've got, I don't have an incredibly helpful team helping me out every step of the way that we're doing this. No, no, no, no. It's all you. No, it's all me. I rolled a 17. So, uh, I think this time the jury. Druidic Dretch knows your game, Gunther. And puts two hands on the rod and holds onto it firmly and is able to hold on to the rod despite your best effort to disarm him.

Clever. But he still takes an extra eight damage. Yes, I have written that down. All right, anything else? Any more superiority die? You want to throw up me, Gunther? No, I'm out. That was impressive.

That was a great turn. You and Natty, back to back, great turns there. That's it. All right. Next up should be Doug, but once again, the Druidic Dretch, grasps onto the rod, pulls it close to his body, and then raises it in the air, chanting in another room illuminates around the pool.

Cool. So that's three? That much closer to our hot and fresh ready pizza. Oh my gosh. Doug, you are up. It is. It's like the little domino tracker. Yeah.

Preparing. You're checking the quality. Yeah, yeah. Dretches, cooking your pizza. And our bones. That might be one of the best features ever, was just that little thing. because you're like, yeah, it's honest way.

It's all a lie, though, because if it's... Oh, totally. Someone ordered, like, a two-liter Coca-Cola, and it was like, cooking your thing. And it was like, better not be it. I don't mean to interrupt you, Barbara. But years ago, when we were doing R.T. podcast, down to the studio down south,

we were in the area we called the Annex, and we would order pizza sometimes from delivery places before the podcast. And we thought it would be fun to, like, have a celebration for the driver when he showed up. So we put up, like, party celebration stuff. Yeah. Like, when he got there, he walked in the door.

We're like, yay, yeah, the pizza's here. like everyone was like super excited and confetti poppers and confetti yeah and then the driver was like how did you know it was my birthday we were like we did it

it's just a happy coincidence meant to be some things in life happen as they're meant to happen just like that yeah all right I'm sorry Barbara it is

it is Doug's turn and after Doug is some armored dredges I think Doug would want to see what's up with this horn that's in this pool is there any way that he could go over there to like try to pull it up

yeah you could go over in that direction, the armored dretches that would have had an attack of opportunity on you are currently prone in front of you, so you're able to walk around them. Oh, excuse me, sorry, pardon me. You walk up to the pool of bubbling, boiling, crude oil, Texas tea. And you try to take a look at that horn. What do you want to do, like an investigation check or something? Yeah, I'll take an investigative look at this thing.

Look. Well, that's a seven. I don't have any inspiration dive. Yeah, you take a look at it, and you see that there's other stuff floating in the pool besides the horn. You can't really tell anything about the horn specifically, but you see maybe, like, rocks and pieces of wood also in that boiling oil. So it seems like maybe this is just, like, debris, like, maybe nothing special. Maybe? Maybe a really bad soup or stew of some sort. Could I try to reach in and grab it out? like not actually put my hand in the water,

but just like grab the tip that's, like, coming out. Yeah, I'm going to make you make a dexterity check, though, just to see, like, I picture it to like when you're boiling pasta, like boiling spaghetti and you want to get like one piece out to test it, and you're like, don't touch the boiling hot water. Like, uh, so late, let's see if, uh, if you, if you burn your hand. I probably will. Yeah.

Oh, 18. Oh, okay, yeah. You're able to latch onto the, the tip of the horn and yank on it and pull it free. I know, and what are you want to try to take a, look at it again, you said? Yeah, I just want to see, like, what it is. Okay, yeah, you start pulling on it, and it ends up being way heavier than you expect. Make me a strength check now that you've made that dexterity check.

Also, just want to confirm, is this, like, helmet horn or, like, playing horn, like instrument horn? Oh, like rhinoceros horn. Important distinction. Or trumpet. Oh, please be trumpet. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's like a animal horn. Animal horn.

Like a, it's not, yeah. Like a curved kind of. Okay. So an animal playing a trumpet. It's just a trombone that's been sticking out of this pool the whole time. And he said a strength check? Yeah. At 20.

I have no modifiers on my strength. You're still strong. You gingerly reach out and grab the tip of the horn and pull, and it's much heavier than you expect. And as you begin pulling on it, you start to see the top of a, like a demonic head that is attached to. That was coming. It's in the pool.

Doug will immediately drop it back into the water. Oh, God, never mind. Crude oil. Liquid. It's attached to a head of some kind. That's gross. I'm scoured for life. When Mushu's looking for Luon and the avalanche and pulls up and it's just an angry hon, he's like, nope.

And he puts it back down. I remember that. Yeah. I guess then could I finish up my turn by casting Detect Thoughts. on those druid? Yeah, yeah. I want to read thoughts. And I can read that for you if you want me to.

But yeah, why don't you read it out loud just to be safe for any listeners as well? On target one creature you can see within 30 feet of yourself to do the sense thoughts option. You learn what is most on the target's mind right now. If the target doesn't know any languages and isn't telepathic, you learn nothing. Oh, so maybe I have to sense thoughts then because I doubt he's telepathic. Eggs, 2% milk, toilet paper. No, he's like, I hope my pizza's coming soon. Yeah.

You can do this. It's if the target doesn't know language and isn't telepath. Okay. So if both of those conditions are met, it's not a matter of either or. Yeah. Either or. Okay, cool. Then I will try to read thoughts.

And what's most on its mind? You reach out and try to read the thoughts of the druidic church. And you hear chanting in a language. You don't understand, but you also hear the thought. Must complete the ritual. must complete the ritual and I don't understand

could I at least tell what language the other thoughts are in? It's some kind of demonic language that you're not familiar with. It sounds abyssal but maybe not abyssal exactly. You hear one word

Azuzu and that will be it. I have had that Michael Jackson song stuck in my head ever since you made that joke play I just want to say you like earworm it right in. Mama say, mamma say, mamma say, mamma son. That is a good definition of an earworm.

And it's just that, that, that's not even the chorus of the song. It's like whatever, a refrain at the end or something. Mm-hmm. That's it for my turn. All right. That is it for Doug. It is the armored dredges turn. Man, those four down south. We'll end up to you with them first because that's the funniest to me. They're rolling around enraged and they're immune to like slashing and piercing. damage. Resistance. They are. Protective Gale surrounds the creature, granting them resistance to bludging, piercing, and slashing damage. All right, anybody got some lightning or fire and thunder? Well, they're all enraged and they're all closest to each other. So I figured they're just like all slashing at each other rolling around on the ground. Natty throws them a bunch of pillows. It's like the most disturbed. It's just a mess of claws and teeth down there to

put it mild. Call that a mosh pit? Gigi, get in there. Yeah. He's like, come on, come on. He's like holding him back with their leash. No. Making some rolls for fun.

Okay, after they're done rolling around, slashing and attacking each other, a couple of them are left unmoving, but a couple of them are still rolling around. And they'll stand at that point. There are two of them standing now and two of them that are unmoving. And they hug each other.

Winner! Tryouts. Okay, and then now we're left with the ones up here. Here, Gunther, you killed the one that was grappling you. Oh, and they have to repeat their saving throw at the end of their turn. Let me do that again. What's that saving throw, 12? DC 14, charisma.

Oh, I rolled a 14. Yeah, so they break free. They have zero, so they got a 14. They are no longer affected by that effect. But now they're stunned because they killed their comrades. They look at their hands in the blood. Yeah. And Mr. Mustache is gone.

It's the worst day of their life. I'm so glad you ran with that. So we're left with the two up here by Gunther and Toll. One of them begins emitting a foul stench from all of its pores and its mouth. Gunther and Toll make me Constitution saving throws. You got it, dude. 16. 11? Okay.

It's a DC-11, so you barely got it, Gunther. Yeah, the two of you try to hold your breath, but you're just surrounded by these fumes. And eventually you have to take a breath and the smell enters your lungs, which makes you start coughing. Both of you fall to the ground prone. Eek. I mean, technically, Tolv can hold his breath under water, but I'm going to roll with it.

You're right. I'm all prone. Look at me go. Thanks for being a good sport there, Toll. Give you some inspiration, though. Now use it to re-roll. It's after the fact. We're going along with the DM.

I'm going to reward that. Wait, so what would have happened if we'd failed? You fall to the ground and you're poisoned. I'll take that. I'll take a prone. Okay, that's one of them. The other one is going to attack Gunther, just slashing wildly with his claws. These things are no joke.

We've got four down? Three, three. It rolls 12, which I assume is a miss. Gunther, you've got good ace. That is a miss. You're prone, so he casts advantage. Gambot killed one, and then Gunther killed one. Oh, four down.

And then the two killed each other. Oh, you're right. I forgot to mark the Gambot one. So there's only one down to the south in that point. How dare you? He worked hard on that kid. Yeah, you're trying to take away Gambot's murder. He does a thing like the mayor in A Nightmare Before Christmas

where his head turns around and it's a sad face. Yeah, he's sad. Your favorite character from Nightmare for Christmas. Oh, he's so creepy. So that's an 11, which is also a miss it. So there's only one down to the south and two up here. And even though you're prone, this one misses you, Gunther. And then falls in the boiling oil pool.

It worked out well for the druid. Speaking of the druid, it's its turn. It once again turns to look at the pool. He's poisoned. Metagame-wise, he's immune to poison. Oh, well, so is geeky. So, you know. He turns to look at the pool and points the rod at the pool,

chance something in abyssal, and another ruin illuminate. Two left? Two. He's off of delivery. Is it approaching my neighborhood yet? Yeah. Then he turns to face you all, aims his rod down low, and then raises it from the ground up to the sky.

And you hear in a guttural voice, he just says, Rise. Rise from your grave. Love that game. Right. Guess gets it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Alter beast. Love that game.

That's what I was thinking of. And two of those armored dretches that were out of commission near him rise from the ground and rejoin the fight. Oh, necromancy. So there are now four up by him and then one down to the south. Wait, I take it back. There was not, or there was only one by him to begin with. One there and then one to the south.

Right. There's three by him and two to the south. There's so many of these guys. Okay, that's it for the druid's turn, which means it's toll and then Natty. Yoo-hoo. Okay, I don't like this druid, so I'm going to make an attack on them. Mm-hmm. With the gavel of Gales.

Smart move. Uh-uh. So that is a 19 plus 6.25. Uh-huh. 25. That connects. Big damage. Two, uh, handed attack. No whammy. That's a three plus three, six, plus the two, because I'm raging.

Eight. Eight. All right. You bring your gavel around striking the druidic threat for eight points of damage. Ouch. Woo-woo. And then I have a bonus action that I'd like to use. It's the storm aura.

You gain a 10-foot aura effect when you start your rage and is a bonus action on each of your turns when activated one creature of your choice in your aura takes lightning damage. It's a Dexterity DC-14, half damage on success, full save. You said it was a 14? Correct. I rolled an 11 and I have a plus 2,

so that's a 13, so that's a failure. Woo-woo! So sorry, sir. And then let me see, that's a third level, 1D6. All right, so I'm going to roll my 1D6 so how much damage it takes. Whatcha-cha-cha.

Four points of lightning damage. Four lightning. I don't think I'm immune to that. Let me double check. I'm pretty sure you're not. I don't think so. Yeah, I talked to Mike earlier about it. He said no.

Yeah, I'm not. Okay, yeah, four points of lightning. Got it. That's legit. Cool. And then I'm going to keep attacking because he needs to stop those runes. Another swipe with the gavel of Gailstrom.

All right, make that attack roll. Ha, shasha. That's a... A 16. That's exactly what you need. 16 is a hit. I'll take it. All right.

And then... That's a 1d10 rolling that. Not my best. Seven. Plus two from Rage, nine. Restracted Druidic Gretcher drops to one knee near the edge of the pool supporting himself with the rod.

He looks at you, tries to mouth something told, but is unable to get it out and falls face down on the edge of the pool. Releasing the rod, which begins rolling over towards the edge of the pool about to fall in.

He whispered, Will you bury me? I'm going to grab it. Can we try and grab it? I got some distance that I can travel, so I'll go for it. Yeah, why don't you make me a toll, since you're right there, if you make me a dexterity check to see if you're able to grab it before it falls in. That is a 15.

You reach out and grab it, and just as the rod is about to roll into the pool, you get your fingers on it and roll it away from the edge and get it into your hand. To celebrate, Tov spikes it into the oil pool. Woo! I'll get it. You go to spike it and celebrate and you're immediately surrounded by dreads who begin trying to grapple. Make me three grapple checks. Wait, actually?

Yeah, they're alive still. Oh, it's this AC. Yeah, you can oppose, you can oppose with strength or dexterity. I'm going to do dexterity because I have advantage. Okay, roll me three. Okay, it's a Nat 20 for one. Check not save, no advantage. So take your first three rolls.

Check not save. Got it. All right, so. Let that be saved, though. Come on. I rolled a seven and a three and a four, so I think you're probably okay. So I got it. I got a 21.

I got a, what was this, 12? I might rerold that with my principal. I got an 18. You're good. He just said his numbers. You beat all his numbers. Okay, sorry. I can't do math like Gus can.

I'm not that good. 7, 3, 4. Uh-huh. Yeah, you, uh, the Gretches begin trying to swarm you and grab. you, but you use your might to push them away and shove them to the ground. And make me a perception check hole. Okay. Sorry, it took me that long to find where the perception is.

It's always one that's hidden away. That's a 17. It's hidden in that alphabetical order of your kids. It's alphabetical? Yes. Oh, God. Guys, did you know? Where were you going to tell me?

Oh, my God. That's incredible. This is our job. Incredible. As you shove the dretches to the ground, something catches your eye in the western pile of rocks by the pool. A glinting blue-gray metal. It's not just a piece of metal, though.

It looks like a head? Oh, Neo's head. I thought Tio was the head. Well. Find out what it is on the next episode of Tales on the Stinky Dragon. He sat there the whole time not saying nothing. Brother. Maybe we'll find out why.

All right. Well, thanks for listening, everybody. We had a very productive episode. Lots of combat. Lots going on. Everyone getting to use their abilities. I look forward to talking. all about this in our next episode

of the second wind, which is available for patrons over at stinky dragonpod.com. Until next time, stay stinky. Situation, stinkers. It's me, Micah,

Rysinger, and I'm here to tell you about a tavern tale. That's right. Meal Walkers, the one I-GMed, is all out now. All episodes are available

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Find them at twitch.tv slash Quix 18. That's QUI-X-18. Infernes, voiced by Laurel Rothamel, at Laurel Rothamel. This episode of Tales from the Stinky Dragon was produced by Ben Ernst and Micah Rysinger, written and composed by Micah Rysinger and edited by Alina LaCorchick.

Tune in next time for another thrilling episode of Tales from the Stinky Dragon. Using the... Who taught you this lesson? Do you remember? Yeah. It was hold. Yeah. Hold.

Oh, yeah. Hold. Hold. Must have been an important lesson, huh? Uh, hold. Holding my breath. Hold. Oh, we're holding.

We're holding. No, Chris is holding. Don't hold too long. Don't do that. Hold. I got it. It is. It is.

Where's my... Ah? Shoot. Epe, deep. Thode, uh, uh, uh, uh, reneesis. Renasis? Renaces. Yeah.

I want the, the outtake at the end of this episode to be that searching in real time, unedited, just waiting. Well, Gus, we, that would make our podcast a four hour runtime, so...