The Adventure Zone - Ep. 34. The Crystal Kingdom - Chapter Six

Episode Date: February 25, 2016

Can our heroes achieve a competent victory against three relatively unkillable foes? More importantly: Can they do any sick stunts while doing so? Taako conjures up the ultimate terror. Magnus has a public service announcement. Merle faces a crystal conundrum. Happy MaxFunDrive! Right now is the best time to start a membership to support your favorite shows. Learn more and join at https://maximumfun.org/jointaz

Previously on the Adventure Zone. If his lab touches the ground, whole planet crystal. We're sending you in to detain and extract Lucas for his abuse of confidential information. Standard protocol applies. These suits allow you to cancel out a particular school of magic. Any transmutation magic that tries to affect you or any of the belongings you brought are going to be impervious. The shards, they were all targeting Merle when they flew in your direction. That's just ridiculous, what?

These gemstones, they don't hate Merle. The whole airlock tunnel is just a sheet of ice. You see Killian and you see Kerry just murking some robots in there. They're really better than we are at this stuff. Super better at it. So let's check out the fizzy lifting room. Things in this chamber are just floating. Just floating in space.

Do you see three shapes start to move upward toward the three of you very slowly? Oh, they're just tardigrades. They're just little guys. It's very big. Some water bears have been known to eat entire live organisms like rotifers and other tardigrades. Or elves, or elves, human, and dwarves. Hey, gang, I've got to keep my voice down because I just put the spooky kids to bed. Anyway, enjoy the episode.

It's the adventure zone. So you're in the zero gravity trash room. Fried and grim mammothies? Yes. And these guys have just shown. shot out there, probisc guy at the three of you. And unfortunately, Merle and Taco, you missed your saving throws. And you have been grabbed by these proboscises.

Taco or Magnus, you push off of a box or something and manage to get out of the way of it. It's real cool. Let's roll initiative real quick. Oh, not great. That's a six. Also six. Also six. Fuck me.

Six. No. We're going to dodge. Yeah, but I rolled twice. Remember? Oh, thank God. 19. Nice.

Damn. All right. I turn my special belt to tardigrade. Okay. Yeah, it has a setting for fire, ice, lightning, and microscopic water bears. So, you're good. Who's got the higher decks between Taco and Magnet? My decks is two.

Two modifier. You're not in this fight anymore. I don't know what I'm saying. I can't even compete with my decks because it's like... What is it? I mean, my dexterity is 18. I'm a lot of harsh for it. Is it really?

Yeah. Shit. Your dexterous is a motherfucker. I have really good acrobatics. I've just never used it for some reason. What the fuck? Yeah, I have a plus seven acrobatics. You're a fucking flip wizard.

And you haven't done anything with that. Cool. Wait. Oh shit. Sweet flips. Yeah. Well, that's what I was getting around to with this episode, but I didn't really get to unveil that part of it.

my it didn't have good news you're in anti-gravity now and you're an underachiever yeah uh okay first in the order is merle uh you are uh you you have been grabbed so if you want to try and get out of this thing slimy slimy grasp uh you're gonna have to make a strength check it's starting to pull you towards it though it's retracting this probiscus uh it's it's about 10 feet away from you and it's kind of like eating its own like tongue pulling you backwards into it like like okay bubble tape Yeah. And I don't want you to feel like you're railroading me, but I'm going to make a strength check. Okay. I don't think you know what railroading is.

18 plus two. That's 20. I got a 13. So you've managed to wriggle free of this thing's grasp. You are still kind of slowly moving towards it just because of, you know, inertia, but you are no longer restrained by this thing. Is it moving, are they moving towards us as well? Yeah, this one was also moving a little bit towards you. All right, I am going to cast spirit guardians. Okay. Is this the Delores spell?

No, no, that's different guardians. No, this is, no, no, wait a minute. I'm not laughing, I'm not laughing because I doubt you. I'm laughing because, like, clerics just have, like, 20 different guardians. You're basically a Pokemon master of angels. These, uh, okay. So these are a bunch of little spirits that flit around in a sphere of like 15 feet. Okay.

Around me. And any creature is, oh, for one thing, their speed is halved in the area. And when they enter the area for the first time, they have to make a wisdom saving throw. On a failed save, the creature takes 3D8. radiant damage. Whoa. Okay. And that's your turn, right?

That's it. Okay. Tardigrades are up next. Fuck. So the two that managed to, Yoshi, tongue, you, Merle,

and you, Mag, wait, who didn't get tonged? I did not. Taka's the only one still tongued. Yeah, those two Tartagrades are definitely going to be in that field

just because they were sort of pulling you towards them. So, you four are kind of in the same area. So they're going to roll a wisdom saving throw. Mm-hmm. I'll roll with the one that tonged taco. That's a 19 plus 1, so 20.

That beats it. And then the one that had you, Merle, hold a 4. That did not save it. So he takes what? I rolled 3D8, 2, 8, 8. 8. So 18. Okay, yeah, you burn him up real good.

Your little guardians. Are they actually like little like butterflies? They're tiny deloresas. They're like little tiny. No, who's the Roma Downies? These are little tiny Roma Downey. Okay, a hundred little Roma Downies speaking in a hundred unintelligible accents. All just pierce this thing all at once.

And it looks really, really, really. really, really bad off. So they're all going to take turns now. This thing, Merle, is now, because of sort of the inertia has carried it forward. It's pretty close to you, so it's just going to try and take a big bite out of you. Ha! Good luck. That is a 14 plus 6, 2020. So that's where I take my armor class. That's 18. So I guess that's a hit. Yeah, that is 12 points of damage. Oh, that's not bad. You'll be fine. As this thing just kind of bites Bites under your arm.

It didn't get through your suit, but I guess you're taking crushing damage. And then... Did you say under my arm? So it bit my pit? Yeah, I bit your armpit because it's a fucking nasty, nasty boy. That's awful.

Taco, the one that has you all tonged up is going to quickly retract its tongue, bringing you right into its mouth zone. And he's going to take a big bite of you, too. Gosh, that is 21. It's going to hit your AC. Yep. For 15 points of damage.

Okay. As this thing takes a big old bite out of you. All right. And then Magnus, the one that missed its tongue attack on you, looks kind of sad. He's just going to hawk a big black, tar-like

lugi in your direction. So make a dexterity saving throw to get out of the way of his projectile black spit. 13 plus 2.15. That's not going to do it. Damn it. Yeah. You are hit by this poison spit. Two points of damage.

It actually heals me. Weird. It heals you. It was healing poison. No, that is 19 points of damage. What the fudge? as this black goose sort of sinks into your suit and gives you bad feelings all over your skin. But it also kind of recoils because of that spit and is now sort of floating backwards into the big pile of debris that it climbed out of.

It's sort of flowing backwards. There's some, there's a couple, let me explain some of the things that are in this room that if you want, you can take advantage of. Like I said, a refrigerator, a large paint of glass, three broken cages, some microscopes, two fire extinguishers, a set of weights, a giant industrial fan blade, wooden crates, and a red barrel. Great. That's it for the tardigrades. Next up is fucking Flip Wizard McGee Taco. Flip Wilson. Popular Flip Wizard.

The devil made him do it. Okay. There's a hit. Flip Wilson impression for everybody. Probably want to enjoy. Something the whole family can enjoy. Wilson. I do flip it.

I love it when you do your FM DJ voice. Coming over next. More Philip Wilson impression. I am going to cast one of my famous, as they say, spells if you're ready. This spell is called Fantasmal Killer. It's the coolest spell I can find. You cast spells like purred happily. I am now going to cast a spell.

The podcasting has a name. Okay, so I just want to educate real quick everybody about tardar grades, okay? They can survive a few minutes at 30-4 degrees Fahrenheit. They can survive 30 years at negative 20 degrees Celsius. They can survive a few minutes at negative 1,000 degrees Kelvin. They can survive a few days at negative 328 degrees Fahrenheit. They can go without water for 10 years. These are savage beasts, and I'm going to haunt them with the only thing that can

stop them their own fears. What is the tardigrade fear? I can't fathom it because it's unkillable. How about a dentist? Because it all those teeth. It is unfathomable what I'm about to conjure, but it is a phantasmal killer. I'm going to tap into its nightmares and create of the one that fucking attacked me and Natch. And it will create a illusory manifestation of its deepest fears visible only to that creature. It must make a wisdom saving throw, which if tardar grades are wisdom rich, you can go fuck yourself. Okay. On a failed save, the target becomes frightened for the duration.

At the start of each of the target's turns before the spell ends, the target must succeed on a wisdom saving throw or take 4D10 psychic damage. Fuck me! On a successful save the spell ends. So at the start of its next turn, it would take that damage. Yes, correct. Okay. But I have to make a save right now to see if I can get away from it.

Jesus. It's a critical failure. He's super scared. This thing makes a noise, because like you said, they're unkillable, just like emotionless monsters. This thing makes a noise that makes you think that the Satan that Satan's afraid of just appeared in front of it. And who is it he dreaming of?

It's not another than Johann August Ephraim goes his discoverer. This thing is scream gurgling, and it's a horrible, horrible. horrible, horrible sound. And it actually unlashes its tongue from you and kind of like pushes you away from it to try and like get away from this this double Satan. Enjoy your taste of taco. Yeah. That's what I say to it. Is that your new?

Well, only for things that bite me in the dick. Is that where to bit you? And right in the dick. Oh my God. I edited it out, but yeah, it bit him right in the dick. Ah. Magnus, you're up. How close are the fire extinguishers?

One is right next to you I grab it Okay And I'm going to use it To propel me At like Wally's style At At I don't know

Let's say the one that just bit Merle's armpit No that one took some damage already At the one who's sad About not getting to bite me With my shield in front of me So I'm basically like cannon balling into it Okay yeah

I like the Wally comparison and Beth. Thank you. Yeah, so you're going to launch yourself at this thing. I'm going to, I'll give you advantage on the attack, because this is cool. Great. What kind of attack do you think would be? It's up to you. If you want to try and, like,

hit it with your axe as you go flying by it, or if you want to, like, try and just bash it with your shield. I want to bash it with my shield in the face. Okay. Real good. I don't really know how attacking it with the shield. Go ahead and make the, you're definitely proficient in shield, so. That was not great.

that one's better. So that's 15 plus 722. Yeah, that's a hit. And we'll say, let me think. What's your axe do? One-handed is 1D8 plus 6. Why don't you just do 1D6 plus 6? We'll just take it one dice down. Great. That is 5 plus 6, 11. Okay. This thing takes 11 points of damage.

And you send it like flying backwards towards the big, sort of thing of flotsam and jetsam that the the other guy ran off ran off too. So yeah, they're all kind of towards the bottom of the room now. That's it for... Well, I get a second attack. Come on. Oh, yeah. keep shooting towards them.

Okay. Let go of it. And then I'm going to shoot the fire extinguisher with my bow and air, with my crossbow. Okay. That is 16 plus 7, 23 against the fire extinguisher. You send the fire extinguisher flying at all of them, and you shoot it with your crossbow, and it does burst and send white foam all over the three of them and the bottom of the room. and that white foam

is going to blind them, but they're not going to take much damage from it because there's just a little fire extinguisher. Yeah, but now they got disadvantage. Well, they're blinded. I think that's a different thing. But that would probably give disadvantage, wouldn't you say? Yeah, sure.

Merle, you are next in the order. All three of them are actually pretty clustered up right now. Okay, so they're more than 15 feet away. They're about 15 feet, like, below you. but they're not they're not in your your sphere no they've moved out of my zone of romas not in my Roma zone if it helps down they have a single gonad located above the intestine am I the only one that didn't go all crat brothers on these things I have a point they're like they're like putties from money more from power range you just hit them once and they're single I hit them

they can live for a billion years at 300,000 degrees Fahrenheit but one good nard shot I have a question. Is Magnus still poisoned? No, no. Okay. Largely because I don't know how to resolve that. Well, I was going to protect him from poison because I... But I won't waste a spell on it if that's...

No, no, that doesn't sound like a thing you'd do. I was going to. Okay. So they're all kind of clustered together, right? Yep. Tell me again what's floating around? Once again, there's a refueling. Refrigerator, a large paint of glass, three broken cages, some microscopes, one fire extinguisher, a set of weights, a giant industrial fan blade, wooden crates, and a red barrel.

Griffin, does the refrigerator still have its door on it? Yeah, sure. Okay, well, I chastise Lucas heavily. Never throw away refrigerators with the door on. Learn that from Punky Brewster. Okay, but we're not really afraid of like babies playing hide-and-seek up here or whatever. Well, were you afraid of a crystal creature? Because that happens.

I guess you're right. I guess, no, you know what? Point for Magnus. Do I have advantage now? Yeah, in future arguments with me, you have advantage. Okay, I have another question. Do these vagina dintrata things? Do they actually have eyes?

Yes, but they're all, they're covered in fire cream. What's inside of a fire extinguisher? Does anybody actually know? Anti-fire. Whip cream? Oh, gosh. We've gone from crap brothers to build nigh the science. guy. Well, no, I mean, it's, I mean, I feel like this is something a lot of people, I mean, it's a dry chemical carbon dioxide or water. I mean, it depends on if it's an A, B, or C. Okay, so when I said fire, when I said fire cream, it was pretty like, yeah, that's sort of like the colloquial term for it. Okay, the one that was I was all chewed up from, from the Romazone. Yeah. I'm going to take that crummy axe with all of the names. Okay. Of what's his name. The child axe. The child axe.

With all of the power. This is like a Stephen King novel, you know, where a kid at the end does something. I'm going to throw that hand axe, and I'm going to throw it right down the ugly, gaping, toothy mall of that one that's all beat up from the Roma zone. Okay. Cool. You probably have to roll something. Hey, Treb, listen, do I get a, do I get me? No, no, no, you know what?

You're right. Go for it. No, that is going to be a range attack. Oh, God, Travis. God. I'm just going to be... It's a rage attack. You want to be a freebie?

No, you weren't. No, you weren't. It's just because Travis said so. Oh, great. It's a... No, it's a six. Plus? Oh, yeah.

Plus 14. No, that's a six. Yeah, you throw the acts of children, the child's acts of wounding. But you don't throw it very... hard. It just very slowly. It takes like 10 minutes as it just kind of floats towards the squatter bear.

And it hits it and just like, bink. No, doesn't it go in his mouth? Yeah, it opens its mouth and it fucking eats it. Okay. It is a choking hazard then. It's fine. He digests it and shits it out and this shitty axe comes out and kills you. That's fine.

Everybody else is allowed to think outside the box. No, you can think. outside the bun all you want Taco Bell you just have to do the shit good he's Taco Bell it still comes down the rolls Next in the order of these tardigrades I guess I'll roll a saving roll against fire cream The one that's got shoot up by the Romozoan is saved The one that well the middle one that attacked Taco did not And the one that attacked Magnus did not so those two are gonna be blind

Um They also I'm gonna need the middle one To roll a wisdom saving throw Oh fuck that's right Because spooky Johan is stalking his dreams right now Get real spooky oogie Real spooge

Uh 13 No What? No Okay Hell no So he takes Oh shit

Okay 4 V10 Hold on one second my lovely So let me give you 4D10 The damage We got

Three Ten Ten To five say, 16 and 24. Okay, yeah, that middle tartar grade tries to wipe the fire cream off his eyes and fails to do that, and he looks really pitiful, and then his head just scanner style explodes. So that's one down. Nice.

Well, that's mine, fellas. So the other one that did save, Merle, he's going to push off the floor of this room away from the big ball of debris and come at you. And as he flies at you, he's going to try and take another bite. That is a 19 versus AC? Now, to be fair. Yes. When he enters the zone, is his speed halved?

Well, it's the first time a creature is. No, but anytime it's in the zone, their speed is halved. Yeah, I haven't really been tracking speed because we're in a weightless zero-g like inertia. But that's what I'm saying. So he would slow down enough. Okay, yeah, no, that's fair. That's fair. Fair play.

He's not going to be able to get close enough to take a bite out of you. So instead, he's just going to try and Yoshitanya to try and bring you in range. So make a dexterity saving throw moral with disadvantage because you don't have anything to get your body off. So I roll it twice. Yep. Take the worst result. 15. Yeah, that does it.

You get out of the way of this thing's tongue. It actually licks back and misses you with its tongue and his tongue keeps going. And it actually sticks. on to the big refrigerator. And you hear him go like, Oh! Not again. Uh-huh.

And the one that is blinded is going to try and spit acid at Taco. Um, with disadvantage. Uh, that's a 17 plus 6, so 23, but disadvantage. 10 plus 16? 16. Rusei. Taco? Uh, that will...

I'll let me grab my sheet real quick. I knew offhand that... Oh, no, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I fucked up. This is a dexterity... This is a dexterity saving throw. Not an attack. Not a range attack. Okay.

Um, but I'll give you advantage since he's blinded. So I need to make a dexterity saving throw? Yes. Okay. Just trying to get out of the way this big black ball of spit. Uh, 13? That ain't gonna do it. Plus your decks.

He has disadvantaged that, right? Yeah, so I'm gonna give you advantage. I don't know how to do disadvantage if you're the one making the ball, except just to. And then we have 16. Nope. Well, plus your dexterity. Are you doing that? Yeah, I added it.

Okay. Okay, you are hit by this poison spit as well. 14 points of damage for Taco. Okay. And that's it for the Tartagra Gets Taco, you are up. I am going to cast. Are they still clumped or what's the deal? How close are they?

Not really. Not anymore. One of them is, they're probably about 10 feet away from each other. One of them has a tongue attached to a big refrigerator, and the other one is sort of still back towards the big pile of debris. Okay, and how close are they to me? They're both about, they're about 10 feet away from you also. Then I am going to cast this as a, I'm going to cast third level thunderwave and hit both of them.

All right. So you have to make a Constitution saving throw. For both of them. Okay. 12. We'll say that one was for the one back near the debris. That's not going to do it. Nope.

And then the one that the Roma zone. Wow, Jesus. Roll the seven. Certainly not. No. Okay. So now they are both going to take a thousand points of damage. 4D8 Thunder damage.

Fuck me. Wow. Man, really makes my axe seem not so great. This really isn't Magnus's area to really shine. 17. 17 wins of damage. Okay, the one that was in the Roma zone, you blast him backwards with your wave of thunder wave. Doesn't there, isn't there a push effect, too? Yes, 10 feet away. Okay, yeah, the Roma zone one gets blasted backwards. He just collides with a wall, and you see some pink fluid come out of his snoot and he stops moving.

Dead. He's dead. He died. The other one that was back towards the pile looks pretty bad off. Magnus yells, push him towards me. Well, no, I don't think you can choose which way to push him. I think you just push them away. Can you? Can you Thunderwave pull it?

It's not telekinesis. It's trajectory away from me. Any time I've done push with Phantom Fist, I got to choose where they went. Sorry. You're more in control of Phantom Fist. Then it's more like an explosion. Yeah. Imagine like a Fusraudda.

You can't be like Fusroda. Fusroa. Over there. No, Fusro over there. Also, all of the debris in the back of the room has also broken up. And now this room kind of has like a snow globe thing going for it. We're just like, there's just shit flying around all over the spot. Yeah.

So next thing The Order is Magnus. You got one grade left. I got what? Oh, gotcha. There's Tardigrade. I'm going to, is there anything I can push off towards it? Yeah, you're pretty close to the giant industrial fanblade. Okay, I'm going to push off of that towards the Tartagrade. Okay.

And I'll just tell you what I want to do, and you tell me what I have to roll to do it. Okay. This is the Tartagrade that, oh, no, no, no. The Tartagrade that just died was the one that was attached to the refrigerator. Yeah. Okay, yeah. I want to grab it and throw it at Murrow. Okay.

Oh, good. So I bounce off and I grab it. Okay, yeah, so he's pretty much right up against the wall. So you push yourself off the fan blade and get to the wall right next to where he is. That would be a strength contest. Good news. Yeah, you're real good at that. Yeah, so that's 16 plus 723.

I got a 19, which would have been good against an mortal man. Yeah. Except I work out every day. Yeah, you get those fucking sick gains for throwing microscopic science creatures. Yeah. So I throw them at Merle. Okay. You chuck them real good.

You chuck them real, real good. Now, Marl, you got a fucking fastball special coming your way. So it's going to enter the Roma zone for the first time. Exactly. Oh, yeah. Okay. Yeah. Yeah, so we don't even need to get to that turn.

What does he do? Wisdom saving throw? He has to make a wisdom saving throw. Yes. 21. Oh, snap. Sorry, we're all.

Smart Tarnagrade, huh? Smarter grade, if you will. He had a stroke of, he had a flash of genius. Does he not sell a disadvantage? He does on attacks, not on Roma avoidance. Not on angel dodging.

Roma has a way of short-circuiting all of our defenses. I get, I have a special called Commander Strike. So for my second attack, I'm actually going to command Merle to attack, make a weapon attack, and then I add my advantage, my dice to his damage. Okay. Yeah, this thing is going to be in melee range of Merle, definitely. So wait, I don't, what the fuck?

You're like pulling, you're controlling his mind? No, I'm basically saying, like, attack that guy. And then he's using my second attack to do it. Interesting. That's neat. Okay. That's great. It's working on as well as the first part, I hope. Murrell make a melee attack against this water bear. If only you still had your romper room axe.

I've got little choppy, my real axe. Little choppy. I don't know how many times I have to tell you you don't have an axe. You got that battle wrench. You got the battle wrench. You got your warhammer. I have an axe. I've had an axe from the beginning.

No, I have an axe. That's my stees. No, I think that has an axe. All right. I'll hit him with my Warhammer, but we will discuss this in the off season. We'll talk about it in the zone zone. You had an axe, and we'll talk about how just like Lucy Goosey you are with your belongings. Come here, Scuddle, buddy.

Bye, get on that train to hell. See you later. Axe. Oh, Axe, I found you. I love you. Bye, I threw you. You'll see. And I'm going to get an apology on the next episode from you because I am right and you are wrong.

Super unlikely. All right. I'll hit him with my Warhammer. Okay. Do I get to name that? Yeah, if you want. Smusher. Okay. I feel like you've already busted that out.

Okay. What did I just roll for? Oh my gosh. Hurting. 17 and none of my modifiers? That's what that plus three is. Okay. 17 then. Yeah, that's a hit. Excellent.

All right. My superior dice. So whatever your damage is, plus four. Okay. Five plus four. Nine points of damage. Okay. Okay, yeah, you guys basically just did a, like a quick little. baseball game. You need to name it something, Tram. In this zero... Yeah, you guys are just invented a new hot zero gravity water bear sport.

That only works on smart ones. Yeah. Yeah. Smart water bear. You... Yeah, you club this thing with your bat and you hear it grunt and cry sadly and some pink juice comes out of it and it hits the wall and is dead. We just Joey Votto dead thing.

I'm not going to have a bunch of people telling me I'm not. missed another great Travis joke. So Travis, smart water bear is a very funny joke. Yes, it is. Thank you very much. That is good. Well, just because smart water is an extant product? Yeah. But smart water bear, and it was a smart water bear. This portion of Adventure Zone brought you by Smart Water. So Smart Water Bear and gummy bears. Also, the National Bear Council. Hey, guys, can we chill out a bit on bears? Hey, get me cool on bears for two seconds. If you see a bear, it's time to fucking go, man. Get out of there. That's the bear. That's the bear.

house unless the bears in your house then call somebody don't try to take care of it on your own let's not gloss over the fact that we just won a battle yeah legit one because that doesn't that doesn't happen all the time normally a much better equipped woman has to come in and save us simply the way we could do it all three tardigrades burst open and a million baby tartagrades a swarm of now they are eggs and it takes 14 days for the eggs to hatch Do your fucking research. Hey everybody, this is Griffin McElroy, your dungeon master, your best friend, your partner in crime. Let's do some crime together. Thanks for listening to episode 34 of The Adventure Zone. And I have lost track where we are in the Crystal Kingdom Mark, but we're somewhere deep in it.

I want to thank everybody who has been tweeting about the show using the Zonecast hashtag. If you use that hashtag, you might end up as a character on this show. I don't think there's any new characters in this episode. but in my defense there were like nine new characters in the last episode. But yeah, if you want to end up as a character like a Jamie Green or like a John Cook or like Chloe Noelle, then tweet about the show using the Zonecast hashtag. We also appreciate you, you know, spreading the word because we don't advertise this podcast in any conceivable way.

And so you telling people about the show who you think might be into D&D or people who you know are into D&D or who people you think hate D&D. We really appreciate it, any of those three ways, and thank you very much. I got a few Jumbotron messages to read to you before we get started. Well, no, we've already gotten started, but here's some Jumbotron messages. If you want to get one on the show, just go to maximum fun.org slash jumbotron. Here's the first one. It's from Evan Jones, who wants you to start your family adventures together at TogetherTales.

Ah, this is a really neat one. I was on this website, TogetherTales.com. I was researching it. It is, well, I'll let them talk first through these words. I'm going to actually talk, but they said, this is a story about a dungeon master dad who decided story time could use a little more adventure and created Together Tales. Together Tales is a collection of interactive books that parents bring to life for kids age 7 to 12. Each adventure kit includes a book split in chapters along with treasure hunts, digital games, cute coincidences, and clues

that put your child at the center of each story. I got a lot of people telling me that they listen to the adventure zone, and sometimes they let their kids listen to the adventure zone, and we are glad that that is happening, although certainly we say some objection stuff here on the program. This sounds like a really fun and cute way to do some adventures with your kids without having four adult men cursing at them all the time.

It's really neat. They send you an adventure kit that comes with a personalized book. You can get your child's name in the book. And then you can customize like little activities that you have to do while reading different chapters of the book. Go to TogetherTales.com. They can explain it a lot better, but it looks really, really neat. Next up, I've got a message

here for Kathleen Kruk Esquire. and it's from Mario who says, thanks for being an amazing friend and DM. I wish I could keep you in Chicago, but wherever you go this year, I know you'll be a zealous advocate for those in need and have fun doing it. Thanks for making me listen to the Adventure Zone

and Mbim Bam, happy birthday. Macaroys, would Magic Brian and or Geryl please wish her a happy birthday? Well, Justin does Gerole, but... It's me, Magic Brian, back from the grave. I think this is what I sounded like. I forget it's been like two years.

Happy birthday! I'm pretty sure that it's just by Emo Phillips impression. And one last message here. This one's for Fergus, and it's from Glenn who says, Happy Eternal Candle Nights, Baby Brother. You've already got the D&D source book.

So the next best gift is well wishes from Griffin on one of our favorite Macquarie podcasts. Plus the chance of your name possibly being used in game. Our shared brotherly nerdiness brings me joy and is now stitched into the fabric of podcast history. Geryl lives. He does. I mean, he's a ghost.

He's a spectral equine being. So if you can consider that, being life, then yeah, absolutely, Garrell is alive somewhere in the ethersphere. But happy eternal candlelights, Fergus, I think that means I'm wishing you like a belated happy holidays. And if that's the case, I like that spirit. Christmas and February. We have the Max Fun Drive coming up very soon here in just a few weeks. We've got a lot of really fun plans in store for the Max Fun Drive, including a bonus episode for donors. The bonus episode It involves a one-shot story that Travis actually DM'd with whole new characters, a whole new setting.

We recorded it last weekend, and it was extremely super fun, and we're already trying to figure out a way to do more of that. So we will let you know more details when Max Fun Drive is coming up. It's going to run from March 14th to the 25th. We have a lot of really fun stuff planned for it. And last year, everybody was so super supportive of the show during the Max Fun Drive. We are a donor-supported network at Maximum Fun, along with. with the few ads that we do. We really rely on your donations

to be able to put more time and energy into this thing, and you guys were all so super, super great to us last year. So, again, coming up, March 14th to the 25th, lots of fun, the Adventure Zone stuff gonna happen during the drive. Hey, speaking of Maximum Fun, why don't you go to the other shows

on Maximum Fun.org and just start clicking and listening to them. We got shows like Bullseye. We got shows like Getting Curious is a fairly new one. We got shows like Lady to Lady. We got shows like, oh no, Ross, and Kerry. There's a ton of shows on the network. Justin and Travis and Dad,

And, well, not dad. This is the only show dad does. But Justin, Travis and I have other shows, too. We got shows both on and off the network. I have one that I do with my wife, Rachel, called Rose Buddies, where we talk about The Bachelor. I've got a new video game podcast called Cool Games Inc. that I do for Polygon, in which me and Nick Robinson come up with pitches for video games. Travis has a brand new show called Interobang that he does with his friend Tybee Dyskin, where they get angry about stuff. And Justin and Sydney do Sawbones, which is a medical history show. Sydney also just launched a new podcast called Still Buffering with her little sister Riley, where they talk about, Hashtag teen life. Got our fingers in like 16 pies at this point. You can find all those at macquarie shows.com.

I have talked for ages. We're going to get back to the episode now. The next episode will be up on March 10th. God, that seems like forever away. I mean, it's not. It's just two weeks, but still. Anyway, we'll see you then. And then a week after that, it's Max Fun Drive time.

So start getting psyched out of your mind. You've exited the Zero Gravity Room and made it through the airlock into what looks to be the main lobby of the lab, which isn't crystallized. It is still in its normal laby form. And there's a bunch of different airlocks leading to a bunch of different chambers from this central hub. You can see an airlock leading to the main entrance of the lab.

What's wrong? I'm just thinking this is like our bottle episode where we just reuse the airlock set over and over again with just a little like hang a different sign on. on it. Yeah, this is basically like old school Doctor Who. Like, I've only got the one airlock. One of them is labeled to head to the main entrance. And that airlock is actually shut down. It's powered down. There's another airlock on the opposite end of the room that you can't really make out that's also powered down. There is the airlock you just came from. There are three airlocks leading to the Medbay, one leading to, one label to go to the main elevator, and one

heading to a room called Cosmoscope. And then right next to you, right next to the door that you just exited from, is the airlock leading into the thermal regulation chamber, which also has a layer of ice around it. But as you enter into the room, you hear coming from that door, you hear some banging and shouting and chopping coming from that iced over door. I start chopping too. Okay, yeah, you get your axe out and start chopping on the other end of it. You guys hear Killian and Kerry going, uh, uh, Merle, Taco, Magnus, is that you guys? Is that you guys?

Yeah, it's, it's Killian and Carrie. Oh, I was thinking of different guys. No, no, no, we're, can you help us get out of here? We've been chopping at this ice well for forever. I'm chopping too. Okay, let's just hurry. We're running out of time. I get my axe ready so I can help him.

You don't have an axe. Um, talk, you hear a... Taco, do you have any, like, fired stuff you can do? Oh, sure. What good is an axe? And there's magic around. Yeah, everybody's step back. I got fire.

I got fire. You want me to use my fire? I know, you guys have fun. Yeah, go for it. My firearm is a little... Well, so you don't, you know, burn a spell. Sure. And since I don't use mine right...

Okay, I cast sacred flame on it. Okay. Sacred flame is sort of fire of a divine origin. I'm a divine god. I know this. I know this very much about it. Would radiant damage not help? No, but you did teach the ice like a quick parable about Pan and his divine, his divine guidance.

Okay, fine, I'll use a fireball. Fuck. Okay. Yeah, you blast the door with fireball and Magnus, you're chopping away with your axe. Merle, you hear a voice in your head. You hear a whisper come from behind you. Kill again. No, it's

It's, uh, it's, uh, the, the voice sounds like, Merle, Merle, Merle, behind you, Merle, Merle, damn it. Muril, look behind you. Mm-mm, yep. Merle, it's Pan. Look behind you, you fool. All right, all right, I turn around and look behind me. Um, you look behind you while everybody's busy,

get into this door, um, uh, heeding this voice that apparently only you can hear. and you see a small rift open in space and you see the crystal with the white fire starting to come through it. And that voice says, Merle, listen, you have to trust me. It's me, Pat.

You have to grab the crystal. Grab it with your hands before it touches the ground. You can stop this room from getting crystallized. You can save your friends. Grab the crystal. and the thing is starting to pop out of this rift womb and make its way out. Well, that certainly is a conundrum.

All right. I grab it. Okay. Yeah, you catch the crystal before it drops to the ground. Yeah, the rift closes up and nothing gets crystallized. as you grab this white fiery crystal. And as soon as you grab it, you hear that voice again. And it goes, oh, well, this is going to be a lot easier than I thought.

And you hear a sound like a light bulb shattering. As the crystal in your hand just kind of shatters and fractures into splinters, and you feel a sharp pain in your hand. and that sharp pain is kind of replaced by this strange numbness and as you open up your hand you realize that you have a few little needles of this crystal sticking out of your hand okay and chopping away the door and your hand is uh your hand is starting to get starting to change your hand is actually starting to turn turn uh the suit i should say around your hand and your arm you can feel it like it hurt you

It's a whole bunch. I can't even describe how bad it feels. But yeah, your hand is starting to turn into pink toronto. I turn around and chop it off. Ben, wait. Okay. Yeah, it's growing up to his forearm. How do you, I guess my question is, how would you know?

Well, he's probably screaming by this point. Unless he's just super cash about the whole arm turning into Crystal thing. Huh, that's weird. What's turning into Crystal, the suit? or my arm. All of it. The whole kitten caboodle. It's growing up.

It's up your wrist now. It's about halfway up your forearm. Would it help if I took the suit off? It's like already in your body, it seems like. Okay. It's going up you. It's about to your elbow now. I turn and say with a calm but manly voice,

Noel, check this shit out. Oh, my. God, guys, he's crystallizing. I turn around and I chop it off. I chop it off. Quit chopping me off. I'm going to chop it off. No. Let me chop it off. Travis, that seems like a very personal character choice that you're making for dad right now.

I don't think you should decide whether or not he wanders this earth as a one on the door. No, but I want you to know that Magnus In character is screaming. Let me chop it off. That's fine, but you can't say you chop it off. I'm saying that in character, I have a history of arm removal. I will give Travis advantage on this story. He is an arm removal specialist.

Wow, that's a really good point. Merle, do you want me to freeze it? Maybe I should freeze it? I don't know. Freezing it would do any good. I mean, it's better than chop it off. Wait, is that all Noel did? You bitch at us for not using her, and then I try to use her, and she just goes,

ho, poopie! That's it? I can't, like, I can't anti-crystal. Somebody do something. Chop the damn thing off. Chop it off. Just chop it off. Yeah, I roll.

Chop it off. Hey, wait, no, I got a deal. Chop my head off. I roll 15. suffer. Here, chop off. Here, right here. Chop it off here. I rolled a 15 plus 7. It's 22. Okay. You're chopping off my damn arm. Seriously.

Noel floats over to you, Merle, and opens up your helmet and puts a little wooden spoon in your mouth. Bide a pat down on this. You're not going to lack this next part. Why did Pan lie to me? Oh, it wasn't Pan, was it? Shit. And that is your last thought. as a two-armed man, as Magnus brings Reels, Magnus brings Merle splitter down

just above the elbow, and you hear a grizzly Chris-knump. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, at least below the elbow. Come on. He gets, he actually very artfully carves it just about where the crystal was. I'm really good it does. Yeah, and go ahead and roll damage, Magnus.

Okay. Let's see. Two-handed. that is seven plus six so 13 I feel like damage should be reduced though because it's he's not aiming to cause damage to I don't wanting to half cut off my arm

I guess but like okay well I guess that's true yeah all right yeah matter of fact when he brings the axe down I'm throwing the arm up in its direction I'm leaning into the child okay okay clang clang clang

your arm falls to the ground and Merle make a constitution saving throat just to see if you can like stay conscious during all of this because this is like I don't want to be conscious

I don't want to look down to see my arm okay no I'll do it Constitution this will be a sick roll you watch this Natty 20 I can smell it

no look at it juice look what is it that's a critical miss okay yeah Merle you're down you're down for the count

Merle is unconscious now. He just falls backwards, sees what's just happened and faints. And Killian and Kerry have just like gotten through the ice and look over. He's like, oh, I'm so glad that you guys. What the fuck? Step two. Somebody heal him. I don't have any, my, have my med, my med spray ready yet. Ah, shit. You hear, you hear Lucas say, oh, what just happened? Get it? You're close to the med bay. Bring him in. Did you just cut his fucking arm off? Yes. Okay, I pick him up and I run in the med bay. Oh. You pick him up, Rescue 9-1-1 style and run them over to the Med Bay, maybe singing a sweet lullaby to him.

Oh, shit. Wait a minute, who's carrying me? The guy that just chopped my arm off? Or the guy that just let it happen? You basically just begged him to. It happened really fast. In fiction, it happened really fast. I don't know how.

I will, as we're running, I'm. mentioned that to, uh, I mentioned to Merle that if we need a new arm, the good news is he's got lots. Yeah. So if we could figure out a way to make that work, that would be rad. Yeah. I'm unconscious. Thanks. Now I'm not, okay, that's not what unconscious people say, but let's keep moving.

Hey, hey, if you're a word good from input from me, you're not getting it because I'm out of it. I'm totally unconscious over here. I'm not going to add. Your whole party, the three of you, Merle, your unconscious, with Noel and Carrie and Killian, rush in through the airlock towards the Med Bay as just chunks of this room that has become crystallized start to break up and start to... It looks like this thing is self-forming again, but you don't really stick around long enough to watch it, put itself together into some sort of grisly monster.

With Merle's arm floating in the middle. Yeah, Merle's arm is actually part of the Met. You see this thing using Merle's arm as part of its form, but you don't really see how it ends up in the production. And yeah, you huff it through the med bay. As you go through the airlock, before you actually get into the med bay, you reach a sign that says decontamination chamber. And as you open it up, it's actually a pretty small chamber that has some medical equipment in it and what looks like an observation bay. but this whole room has also been completely crystallized. Oh, bummer.

And as you pass through that and through another airlock, you do actually make it into the med bay. And there you see Lucas for the first time since you met him in the Void Fish's chambers. Lucas, fix my friend. I don't know what happened. Lucas has a big bandage on his head. He has a big, like, bloody bandage on his head.

But he says, like, what did you do to, to that dwarf. Well, you said you needed us to give you a hand. Ah. Seriously, what did you get? Before you can finish that sentence, Killian actually grabs him and picks him up and is like,

this has been the worst, shittiest day ever. We are two people down. Your lab sucks. Fix my friend. He says, you better put me down if you want me to help him. Killian. And Carrie's like, yeah, guys, can we take this thing? Just bring it down just a little bit.

Let's figure out how to help Merle out right now. Meanwhile, bleed, bleed, bleed, bleed, bleed. Lucas grabs you. He's like, help me, help me put him up on this table. Magnus, use your big strong, your big strong arm removing arms. I do it. Yeah. How ironic that your big strong arms are only good at one thing, and that's removing other people's arms.

Yeah. It's very ironic. I put him on the table. Okay. Yeah, he starts to wrestle around in a drawer. Full of spare dwarf arms. Full of spare dwarf arms. And he just like sticks one on, and you're just fine.

Um, uh, no, he actually pulls out a syringe and jams it into Merle's arm. Um, and, uh, you, uh, it regrows. No, it's, uh, the, the, the bleeding starts to slow a little bit. Merle, you actually wake up a little bit. You gain a little bit of consciousness as you feel this needle go into you. Oh, shit! But the, I can't tell if that was real or not. It's a very good actor. That's because I'm an actor. Yeah, that was really terrific. But actually, this thing is actually numbing your, your grisly wound pretty significantly. It's bringing you some pain relief.

Not so much HP relief, but you're not in a horrific amount of pain anymore. And Killian's in the corner. She's using, she is speaking to the director. Through a stone and just like checking in, letting them, letting the home base know the situation. And Lucas asked like, what has been going on out there?

What are you guys doing? What happened to Merle? Well, he got disarmed. Pretty good. He started to crystallize. We were chopping on a door and magicing a door. Then we heard Noel scream. And we turned around.

His hand was turning to crystal. And then his arm was turning to crystal. and I heroically, valiantly, chopped his arm off against my wishes. He begged me, and I cut his arm off so that he wouldn't all crystal. And, hey, listen, let me stop here right there. This, Lucas, isn't your dad?

You chopped your dad's arm off. You don't know Lucas any explanation. Get us the fuck out of here. You dirty prick. I can't believe you did this to me. And now he's drunk. I can't. We can't get out of here.

We can't get out of here until we managed to stop the base from sinking into the sea and crystallizing the whole world. You forget why we're here in the first place. It's because I, well... It's been like four episodes, my dude. It's because I fucked up at experiment pretty bad. But that's not... The arm thing's not on me, I don't think. Well, it was crystallized.

I think I'm on everybody. Merle, can you hear me? Yeah. Why was your arm turning to crystal? What happened? God lied to me God lied to you God lied to me

You have the prettiest You have the prettiest eyes Okay yes I do but focus up What do you mean God lied to you I'll say it a different one Yes God lied to me I turn to Lucas

Well there you have it Okay, I guess God lied to him That's what I'm picking up for the situation And then some British guy Thucca a crystal at me And I grabbed it And it hurts Some British guy

No, I heard all of that Okay, it's that It's that being It's that being that's been attacking my lap I don't know what the fuck that thing is But I'm so sorry that you guys had to get mixed up in this I didn't want any of this You have to believe me

I think it was that guy that was married to Katie Perry. Russell Brand? It sounded like Russell Brand. It sounded like Russell Brand took my hand. Lucas, is Russell Brand here? No, he's not. Hold on. He rustles out and gets another syringe out and gives Merle another shot.

In my butt. Give it to me in my butt. As you shout, give it to me in my butt. You feel much more sedated. There's a lot of shit going on, Lucas, that I feel like you're not being honest about like this compact oh god you went in my room i did it was a fucking mess and it looked like somebody stole all your gyms before we got there dirty boy wait wait wait all my gyms are guys all my gyms are guys listen let's priorities i'll explain the compact i'll explain what you saw in there i'll explain everything

we got to get this guy taking care of first tell me about the compacts bleed bleed bleed he uh he gets out a uh a not a note pad uh write something down i bleed all over it and enhance the note to to uh to uh Carrie, it says, uh, Carrie, I need you to get over to the bug bears and tell, tell Jamie Green to to bring me these supplies right now, or you can bring them back. Tell her to give you these supplies and get back to me as quick as you can. She says, oh, you got it. And she grabs the note and just like darts out of the room with blindings. She's gone. Oh. And, uh, he's, he's doing some work. Uh, the, the bleeding is stopped. He's wrapped a big bandage around it, Merle. Uh, so it doesn't seem like Merle's going to die. Um, and he goes over to a dead. And he goes over to a

desk in his corner and he starts tinkering with some stuff. So he takes off his belt. Whoa, whoa, whoa. No, don't worry about it. I've got a plan. And he's he's working with it. He's, he's got this petri dish that he's like mixing some sort of fluid in. And he's like, as much as I want to, we can't leave. We can't get him out of here until we stop this thing from spreading. I, I was down in the lower chambers in my lab. Late one night. One night and monster boy. How does it, anyway, I was attacked by one of my robots and I came up here to the med bay

to, you know, treat my wound. And when I tried to leave, I found that crystal monster or whatever it is. It's not, the monster itself isn't crystal. It was inhabiting the crystals. It attacked me in the decontamination chamber. And so I made my way back here into the med bay. And I flooded the room with anti-conjuration energy because obviously he's traveling between planes to move from spot to spot. So I blocked it.

Obviously, come on. That's like 101. You guys, I'm just so sorry. I promise I'll get him patched up. I have an idea for how to patch him up. And we're going to be able to – you'll see if we're getting out of this and we'll get down to my lower levels and I'll stop the crystal from spreading and mission accomplished. Great. And you guys will say good work, Lucas.

Thanks for the good teamwork. Sounds like us. Yeah, it sounds like something we do. Shut up. Let me say one more thing. Okay. Hello, beloved fans of Adventure Zone. It's me, Clint McElroy.

Please write and drastically protest the treatment of your favorite dwarf cleric in this episode. Thank you. No, I think I think... Listen, we've had a lot of fun here today. Listen, we've got a lot of fun here today. But I really want to just drive home the point. take the doors off your refrigerators before you throw them away. Because somebody could get their arm chopped.

That's what it always leads to. Hey, everybody, this is Lucas, a fictional character. I do want to step outside of Cave Fabe for a second and tell you, for real, though, the thing about the refrigerators. That one was on me, and if I had taken it off, I'm pretty sure Merle would still have both of the arms. I'm not sure how it's connected, but hey, sliding doors. Have you seen that movie? Anyway, later, this is me, Lucas, for. on the sliding doors.

The sliding doors council. Hi, this is Justice McElroy. I'm an actor who plays the role of Taco on the Adventure Zone. I just want to say, I don't feel like I really did anything that funny this time around, but hey, you get them next time, I guess. Maximumfund.org. Comedy and culture. Artist owned.

Listener supported. You guys, I'm so excited to introduce to you my new baby, getting curious with Jonathan Van Ness. This is going to be a really fun look at things that I, I find curious. Whether it's a menstrual cup, it might be the Romanov family, it might be fracking, it could be Carly Theorina. I don't even know.

Who knows? It's going to be whatever I think is interesting. I can't wait to bring it to you guys. We're going to be bringing in content experts. I'm going to be learning the things. It's only going to take about 30 minutes for you to expand your baby brains with me and have a super fun time. So I can't wait to see you on our first episode of Getting Curious.