The Adventure Zone - The Adventure Zone: Dadlands

Episode Date: November 28, 2019

We’re off on holiday this week, but we’ve got a special treat to tide you over. See, earlier this year, we developed an ambitious one-page RPG titled Dadlands, a post-apocalyptic dad-based survival sim. Then, in July, we convinced Dimension 20 DM Brennan Lee Mulligan to run a game for us. What you’re about to hear is the impossibly rowdy result of that experiment. 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

There's, we've multiplied via mitosis. Hi, you know us, so let's not waste any time with that. I want to issue a very special welcome to our guest, Game Mom, for this evening. He is much more competent than any of us, so we have invited him to help guide us along. Perfectly enough, he is this evening's Game Mom. Ladies a gentleman from College Himmer's Dimension 20. It's Brennan Lee Mulligan. Please give him a huge...

From the bottom of my heart, I am earnestly just excited that I got into the Adventure's Own live show. Yeah, that's where I'm having. This rules. This fully rules, and I'm having the time of my life. This is a bad idea. It's hitting me now. We've never played this. Not once.

No one has. No one has ever played the Dadlands. A Justin McElroy, original concept. I think we can all remember that I was the one who came up with the name first. and then... Thank you. It's very kind. Did you really? I did. It's been kicking in my head for a while.

I thought it was going to be my Y-A series. My million-selling Y-A series, but no dice on that front. It's turned into a... Well, this. Well, whatever this is. Whatever this is going to be. Going to be. It's nothing now. No one's ever played it before. And I'm sure we don't need to go over the rules.

I'm sure you all already know that Dadlan's rules backwards and forwards. Well, it might be nice to tell some of us a little bit about the game. I mean, I'm just saying. You were there at the game's inception and you still didn't learn how to play.

There is only possibly three people on Earth who know more about the game than you do. Yeah. Yeah. In the power rankings, you are still very high of people on Earth. So basically, here's how the game works. Real quick. No.

What? I thought we were going to talk about it later when we did the play accent. Yes, okay, the concept of the dadlamps. Yes, so we all have fanny packs. It's true. And in these fanny packs, we have green and red chips to represent. This is the law. And this is chaos.

Chaos and law. And when we make a move that has anything to do with chaos and law, we reach into our fanny packs and try to draw the corresponding chip. and you'll find out the rest as we go, but that's the basic game mechanic. Of the Dadlands. Of the Dadlands. Oh, I remember that now.

Yes. Yes. Brennan, whenever you're ready. Start weaving your tapestry. Very well. Without further ado, I invite all of you to envision a land

blasted by the scorching sun. Yes. Tall rocks burned with the ash of a forgotten age. Long ago a hundred, hundred years passed.

Is that 200 years? Or is it, is that like a hundred squared? Like 10,000? And we don't really do voice work. Sorry. No, I'm into it. Resume your tapestry. Yes, please continue weaving.

All right. Continuing to weave. Rising from the bleached white bones of the forsaken earth, a screen rises to the top of the sky, miles tall piercing the veil of clouds above. The plasma screen! Ha! A television so large,

and powerful that to climb its dizzying heights to press the power button invites only death. Okay, yes, death. Big screen, death. Hidden in the valley between the massive towering screen and the sofa mountains across the valley. We see- Griffin can't laugh or smile.

I can't laugh or smile. If he laughs or smiles, his mustache will fall off. and I just watched him like have to fully zen out to keep his facial hair on. To be fair, the same thing is true of me. Between the Sofa Mountains and the massive towering screen,

we see etched into the valley floor ancient runes written by the primeval dads of long ago. They say that when these dads crafted the runes, there were still some that had seen or known the mythical mothers

or even the children spoken of in lore. But these are condemned now as madmen and fools. Oh my God. Come on. Stay on there, mustache. Word has spread throughout the dadlands. A conclave has been called

and the Dad tribes now journey to meet once more, to face a threat to the Dadlands themselves. We begin with the rising smoke of a journeying tribe of dads. From ancient grilled cars, sucking in charcoal briquettes, we see rising fumes of Was that ribs?

That could be ribs? It's ribs. Griffin, this look is really working for you. The hot desert heated even more by the fires of their grill wagons. The grill dads make their way

to the conclave. Oh, Griffin, please introduce your character for us. My name is... Thank you. My name... My name is Brickett Hoggins. You may know me as the owner and proprietor of the Waco Wasteland's number one rated rib joint on future Yelp. It's Hawkins' sloppy doggone hogspot. I'm one of a handful of grill masters that know how to cook the forbidden meats.

Indeed. Brickette, under your arm, you carry the scrolls of the forbidden meats. They're very flammable. It's a whole thing. I've just breathed in one of the mustache hairs, and I'm in hell. But you stayed in character. Love that. Walking through the gray ash and hills that separate the conclave from the amazement park.

Come carrying one of those brightly colored blue ropes that they tie children to, you know, the field trip ropes. A line stretching to the horizon of vacation dads. Walk. Justin, please introduce your character. Well, my name's Chip Hugginsby. My name's Chip Hugginsby. I've been looking forward to this trip all year. And I'll be, goddamned, if anybody's going to ruin it for me.

The vacation dads step in line as they march to the conclave. Their war paint of Zip. ink and sunscreen blotted across their faces. A whistle blows in the horizon from the cracked earth to the waist to the south. Ten hot! A marching rank and file of sports dads, charges, information across the cracked earth. Their visors and hats low to protect their eyes.

They're aviators, enormous. Their knee-high crew socks, thick and white as the salt earth. I can't see what's happening on that side of the table, but I'm pretty sure I hate it. Clint, please introduce your character. I'm Coach Red Ruffinsore. I'm that dad that every time their kid got onto a team

He signed up as the assistant coach, even though we didn't have an iota of athletic ability within his very body. Which is very autobiographical for me. Dad's wearing a hat for the high school that you attended. So this is all very, very hard for us to separate. And as the sun reaches its zenith in the sky, the roar of incredible hemies, engines stretching beyond the edges of the car's hood.

The roar of gasoline being sucked into the engines of these cars. The convoy races and the car dad's approach. Travis, please describe your character. I'm Guy Ferrari. I can fix a car with van parts or a van with car parts or, I don't know, maybe a scooter. I've got to try a scooter one day. I have one of the higher parking spots in the parking garage where the car dads live.

I'm pretty high up there. As the tribes of dads arrive at the conclave, you see waiting for you the tribe that has called this conclave, the drama dads. You see the leader of the drama dad strides to the dais. this is Daddy Diorne leader of the drama dads in a massive palanquin of stitched together baby Bjorns you asked me to do

I was told I was given a brief I wasn't here for the first part I'm wrapped you see in the setting sun Daddy Diorne raises the scepter of a little comedy tragedy mask

on just a long yardstick kind of duct tape together and cries out over the valley of assembled dads foking the sacred right of conclave and in unison the dads respond high invoking the sacred right of conclave we are dads it's a good joke thanks thank you

you see daddy dorin beholds the tribes here and says five tribes there are assembled here and a sixth has not answered the call it is as we have feared far beyond the lumberlands in their capital of Sauburg the craft dads grows stronger and stronger

that they have not come tells us all we need to know there in their monuments of sawhorses and tree houses and dog houses and bird houses mostly specialize the name of all the houses it's the same shape but just where it goes and how big it is

smaller yeah 100 years the screen has been dead the mothers and the children gone we have been left to suffer in these dad lands it has come to the knowledge of the drama dads the remote the clicker

the doodad Modi the troll is what we called it in our house has been discovered the craft dads have taken it for their own now see they're gonna put it on HGTV and I can only take so much of that it ain't bad then property bros

are all right. Yeah, but there's a car auction on today. And I want to watch the grilling channel. The Great British Bake Off is a sin, and you know this. Is that like the forbidden pleasure of the grill dogs? Like, they sneak away? I'd make my pastries on the grill, as God intended. Four must be chosen.

Four must venture forth from the conclave to address the wrongs of the craft dads. Are there four dads here brave enough to... I had a question. There is five of tribes of us. Yeah, why are the drama dads not going? Somebody has to tell the story. Justin, I'm sorry to do this.

That was Justin. Character... That was Justin. Okay. No. You promised. You promised. Everyone hated it.

Everyone hated it. You promised. And that was the only time dad used the whistle. Really? Did you hate this? Now, take it, take it away. You're done. Just nod into the, not into the microphone. You're done, you're done.

Paul. Thank you, Paul. Please replace my days for real, dad. Okay, I'm pretty sure the four of us. Okay, I'm pretty sure. For those of you listening at home. Please. Okay. Please, comedy rule of threes.

Please. He doesn't have a three. third whistle. Now pull out a giant whistle. He has a third whistle. There's a third whistle. He doesn't have a third whistle. I'm going to, for those listening, Clint has pulled out a third whistle from his pocket.

Okay. The drama dads must not go. For this is a mission that requires stealth. And the drama dads don't roll like that. Yeah. Makes sense.

But will one champion from each tribe step forward? I'll go. Yeah, me too. No problem. You, pick me. I guess it's me. Great, that worked out, great. That worked out right away. Excellent. All right. For everybody else, we're going to have, I think this is a little spread,

and we might have some dinner afterwards, but that's sort of all the business that we had on the agenda. Should we pick a restaurant where everyone can get what they want or just go where we want to go? As is the law of dads for time and memorial. We will pick where we want to go and insist it's where everyone wants to go. We're going to Crystal Lake and we're going to have fun.

We, time is of the essence. Make your peace. Car, Dad. Yeah. Guy Ferrari. Thank you. Your war car shall be the vessel of this journey, but we shall

need all of the strength and cunning of the sports dads, all of the wisdom and secret knowledge of the grill dads, and someone to bring snacks and sunscreen. So especially loudly. Very well. Well, here's

the thing. If we're going to get in my Hyundai Elantra, everybody to wipe their feet. Because, listen, It is 10 years old, but I've taken great care of it. Stoop drives like new. So you're saying this apocalypse is like right around the corner right now. Isn't it, though? Okay.

Should I feel bad that I drive a 10-year-old on dial-a-latra? Am I a dad? Sunsets as the dads wander hither and yon. You are met as you prepare for your journey by dads that applause. your courage and wish you well on the journey to come. What do our four heroic dads do in preparation of this journey? I download some audiobooks to listen to as we drive. Mostly Star Trek novels.

I drive down to the post-apocalyptic AAA and get a triptych that shows us how to get wherever the hell we're going. That was so deep dad humor that nobody in the audience got. I know. The orboros has formed. The comedy snake is eating its tail. You know, non-smiling Gripin is really starting to creep me. Yeah.

I keep expecting a shot to ring out. I fill a backpack with snacks and drinks and cool towels and a fan and guns. What? It's canon. It's canon now. Yeah. No, there's no canons. There's no room for that.

Dad joke. Well, you were really leaning into the dad joke. So this is still alpha testing. Maybe that's like a homebrew rule you could go up like if you make a successful dad joke, maybe you get some kind of bonus on the next pole. Write that down, Brennan.

Okay. I spend some time with my smoker with, you know, using the forbidden meats to sort of trying to decipher visions of the future in the smoke. Do you have an associated Dad's skill you would like to use to divine visions from the future of your smoked meat?

Yes, meat, smoke, vision looking. Okay. I am going, this is only going to be a difficulty one. Will you be using law or chaos for this? I imagine everything associated with grilling is chaos. It's passion. It is, you know, there's not one way, one rule or recipe to grill. It's all in the heart.

And so I think chaos is more suitable for this. Stop stroking your soul fat. Put it back on. It's very wet. To remind our audience of the rules, red tokens represent the force of chaos. Green tokens represent the force of law. The journey of each dad is to straddle this divide,

to bridge this balance. You may make your draw. Am I just draw on one? You are only going to dream. draw one. It's chaos. It's a chaos pool. Chaos.

Now when that happens, when you make the successful pull, you then get another token. An additional chaos token. So slide one of them red bad boys down my way. Absolutely. So when you say forbidden grill meats, does this just mean meats you genuinely shouldn't grill?

Yes. All right, so you're grilling a bunch of prosciutto. And twisting visions of smoke. Which dad has the secrets of the smoke law To summon us twisted visions of things yet to come? It's me, it's Huggins again. It's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's bricked again.

Pose your questions, smoke shaman, and see what you can clean. Yep. I usually talk to another guy in there. Is he around? You see the smoke parts and a particularly nodded clump of prosciutto kind of pops with some grease and a little smoke thing comes out and says,

Hey there, Huggins. Oh, hey there, man. Who's that other clown? He seemed like a little much, don't you think? I guess so. I don't like to talk bad about my friends, though. You know me. Old Chokie.

Yeah. I know you well. Well, Chokey. Save my bacon from the grill many times. So, yeah, we're about to go on this. Life-Dad Mission for Remote, and

just want to know if there's any sort of bad traps or if we're going to be bad weather or flat tire or a snake. Huh. Well, you know, O'Chokie, I don't like to pretend that I know much more than most folks do, but if I had to hazard a guess,

I'd say journey three days past the setting sun to the canyon of Frisbees, and after that, you should make your weight. You're having a hard time there, Hobbes? Yeah. I've been wrestling with some mustache life. I wouldn't know nothing about that. Old Chokie don't have a mustache. He's just a piece of meat.

Yeah. I'm sorry to interrupt you, Chokie, with my facial expressions. So three days past the setting sun And the Canaan Frisbees After that you should head past the mirage of the deadbeats Look out for hard-ass excursions And then I'd say you come up on the end of the lumberlands real quick But if you don't want to get caught by them Kraftad patrols

Stop at the Tower of the Science Dad He'll be able to help you, son That was extremely detailed, Chokie He realizes that we need to get things fucking moving Yeah Should I have written all that down or, um... Well, I'm sure I don't know.

I don't know how to write none. I ain't got hands. Yeah, you're meat, I know. Oh, Chokey, I'm gonna miss you. You've eaten Chokey. Man favorite. Chokey. You hear a chorus of voices

of Grilledads that have assembled behind you to watch your oracular ritual all chant in unison. Looks like that's about. done. Yes. Is anyone else doing anything either spiritual

or logistical or anything like that? If you want to make a role for assembling your snack pack, if anyone else wants to make any other? Yeah, I'm going to say that a guy is attempting to perfectly pack the car so that all the weights is distributed evenly to

conserve gas and that everyone can sit comfortably in their own spot, make sure we have enough like entertainment for the people in the back so I don't have to deal with them. You know what I mean? Sure, absolutely. Some dad libs? Some dad libs.

Yes, Griffithy, yes. It's okay. It wasn't that good. Cool. This is only to be a difficulty one. Are you using law or chaos for this? I feel like this is law. This is the structure.

Discipline. Yeah. The packing. Yes, this is, okay. All right. Here we go. He wants a green chip. He wants a green chip.

Oh, no. No. It's red. It's chaos. So the game's over for Travis. So, Travis, you're going to lose that red chip. Yeah. Travis is down to six chips now. We should have told you that in advance, but we didn't.

As you begin to pack the car, you see that a group of other car dads assembles around you and begins to watch you pack the trunk. And they don't say anything, but you hear a couple of them once or twice go, ah, hmm. Do you, hmm. Oh, that hurts. It's painful. This is the greatest debasement

that a car dad can perform on another one. Your trunk is packed, but zippers are facing down. Oh, shamed. As the sun sets, you must head out by the setting of the sun. That's kind of like, that kind of like, you know,

God can feel their judgment and know that like next time he won't be allowed to change his own oil. Yeah. You know what I mean? Like, he'll have to watch as another card dad changes his oil. Oh, peer pressure. Excellent.

For Red or Chip, are you guys making any preparations before you guys head out? I want to get out there. Let's go. Let's do it. Let's go. So, you as the sun sets, the dads gather around all of them looking on in somber silence you see that daddy Deorn beholds you and says

these dads are brothers well yeah some I mean some it's confusing honestly right no as in most things I say I'm being theatrical Ha ha ha ha ha

Drama dad I didn't know that was an option I would have chosen that That's why we didn't tell you You got now You see he says This may be the last time We see these four

Oh my end Any dad now That wishes to share Their feelings with these Heroes before they depart may do so. Complete silence. One dad way in the back goes,

well, you know, eh, you better go, better go get him good, get her go get him good luck out there. Brickette, Brickette burst into tears. Your guy's war car, Broom.

Well, anybody need to go to the bathroom before we leave? Because once we get going, we're not going to stop. You know, I'm starting to take a lot of these observations kind of personally, guys. I mean, you're basing these on stories you've heard about other dads, right? Yeah, right, yeah, sure. Yeah, okay. I ain't had nothing to eat but grilled meats for 26 years, so I'm pretty well plugged up down there.

That's hateful. The war car races from the conclave. the massive glittering black of the screen stretching behind you a lone landmark to a long-forgotten age of dads. The sun glints on its plasma screen as the curvature of the sofa mountains obscures it eventually from view. You drive on roadless wastelands as fast as you can towards the tower of the science dad. How's the temperature for everybody? Are we there yet? I could go a little bit cooler.

Here's a fun fact. Did you know chewing gum is not sold anywhere in any of the Disney parks? Oh, that was fun. Pretty interesting. Yeah, I thought that was fascinating. Then I want gummy in the park

and then get away. Did you know that also the Disney parks don't like it when you bring your own open flame cooking methods? No, it's fascinating. They frown on that just very, very much. I'm gonna put that one in my binder.

Justin, is that a true Disney fact? Is that a true Disneyland fact? Everything Justin says is. Oh, you're gonna be getting. A lot of true Disney fact. This episode of the Adventure Zone underwritten by the Disney Foundation. Yes. They own everything else.

Including us. Yes. The car takes off across the wasteland until in the rising of the sun on the next day, you behold, stretching out in front of you, blocking your path, a vast canyon, the base of the canyon, filled with frisbys. I told them not to play so close to the edge.

I told them I wasn't going to go get it if they lost it. Who are you talking about? It's just something we say. Yep. That's the blessing we say when we approach the Frisbee Canyon. Are there dogs in the post-apocalypse? They would still be dads.

There might be dogs, and they would be dad dogs. Can I just say, I am so happy to be running a game in this setting. It's so funny. We are a hair away from Eldritch horror at all times in this setting. Yeah, a bunch of dads with no kids. You hear the reverberations from the canyon wall over and over again of the guttural noises of dads reacting to the frisbees going over the edge. Dang, ding, dang, dang.

Snap it. Prospect your dads. But you see that your way is barred by the canyon. I mean, it's just a bunch of frisbee's, right? I know this ain't the sturdiest car in the world, but you could probably smash on through them, right? Well, it's a canyon. I have confused the topographical feature.

Well, you're not a geography, dad, so... No. I grill me. I mean, we're going to have to jump it, yes? How far are we talking? Two feet. I would say that in keeping with the size and scale of the dadlands, this is similar to a grand canyon-esque.

Jesus Christ. Similar to a grand canyon-esque setting. With variations, I mean, it stretches in either end to the horizon. There might be some areas that the sort of two lips of the canyon are closer. But it is several hundred feet drop to the ocean of like every frisbee in the world has ended up in this canyon. It's like quicksand, the Frisbee Ocean is. You'll get to pull down.

It's like a corn silo. You see intrepid, like, in fact, the entire tribe, like, there's like sports dads down there that, like, I can get it, and they're just, like, bony hands are reaching up. If we had to drive around the canyon, how many days will we lose? I'm going to ask, how many days we lose? guy considers the cost of gasoline. Yeah, no.

You know what I read. This is fun. You know what I read? I read that there are some secret tunnels that some of the staff use to get around through Frisbee Canyon. We can't normally see them because they're hidden. But the staff use them to get around real quick, like. It's a very fun dad fact. Well, I think the, okay, hello, Justin.

Is he there? Justin? Can we speak with Justin? Yes. I feel like the determining factor is, can we find them? Can we find these shortcuts that I've read about in the books? Because we're not going to ask for directions. Oh, fuck now.

Because why did I get the triptych if we're going to ask directions? Yeah, one of the things on the triptych says, inquire with your Disney-obsessed vacation dad about the secret tunnels in space time that will get you through the canyon. But it's stamped on there because they don't use it all the time. Right, yeah.

Wonderful. This is an extremely fun dad fact. This feels like pulling a chaos token to me. Yes, absolutely. What is the difficulty? I'm going to say that the dad fact being, is extremely helpful. So I'm going to say that we actually need two.

We need to pull two chaos tokens here. Okay, so just so you know, two chaos tokens, that's a win, two law tokens is a failure. If I get a mixed success, then I still lose a token, but it succeeds, but I have to come up with some bullshit about why it worked. Yep, absolutely. Here we go. Let's go.

Two reds, two reds, two reds. Come on. No whammy's. That's a green That's one green Not great Oh Jesus Justin That's a red

That's a red That's a red I'm going to I will give away One of my chaos tokens Very well You have lost a chaos token That hurts

You know what I'm remembering Of I had a friend Who went through using these tunnels and he told me that it's behind the rest. Oh, look, the restrooms right over there. You see in the middle of all these like bony hands and like yawning skeletons, there is a pristine outdoor public restroom.

Perfectly preserved. He's gone hard ass now. He got too serious with it because you got to have fun. It's vacation, you know what I mean? You're supposed to be enjoying yourself. He went hard ass, but I'm, I heard tell that he said it's behind a fake toilet. And if you go behind this fake turlet,

you're going to get over there real quick. Can a car fit through this tunnel? It's a really... This car can. It's a really big wall with a fake turlet in front of it. You understand? And it's an elantra.

And it's an elantra works. Dependable. That's the thing about a Hyundai allantra. Dependable. Listen, it's not as flashy. Dependable. Collapsible. It's an incredible.

car. Listen, I have made some improvements on the car. I'm turning into magnets. I've made some improvements on the car. I put in these air fresheners, I put in this beaded seat cover, and I can collapse the car. Driving the car towards the bathroom, you indeed see the ground yawns open and a huge

tiled secret tunnel that says, welcome to Frisbee Canyon. Don't let your bones get turned into a mockery of the life you once led. But that is once a civic song. And sure enough, with the cranking of gears and motor oil, you all get folded into a weird MC Escher, non-Euclidean.

Dependable. A dependable, you And you indeed drive through secret tunnels underneath Frisbee Canyon. You erupt unfolding on the other side. Can you just say that I've solved your Frisbee Canyon puzzle? It's a thing. They need it. It's an affirmation.

Yeah. Well, Justin. Yeah, Brendan. It seems you've solved my Frisbee. Canyon Puzzles. I am about to ascend into heaven. My work is done on this earth. If you're listening to the podcast later, Griffin's leaping.

You guys continue to drive through the desert. As you do, you see a flickering mirage out in the desert sands. And you see that there is a what looks like a young, Hot Dad out there. Nice. You see this dad's got tight jeans and cool boots. These boots don't even look comfortable. Whoa.

And heresy. He's got a guitar, and you see that he's got some, like, records that are just out. Oh, no. It's a deadbeat. you see that pure chaos energy emanates from the mirage. I will need all of you to make a poll in a second. But you see that the mirage looks out and says, Hey there, fellas.

No kids out here. Why don't we break out a bottle of jack? talk about shows we saw when we were young. What? Guy Ferrari would never drink and drive.

I saw the Alman Brothers back in 60. All right. So we're going to do this a little bit differently. I'm going to do kind of a house ruled role here. Which is, I'm going to need everybody to attempt to pull a law

token to resist this. Now, if anyone is feeling heroic, you can attempt to pull more than one law token to cover for one of your buddies. Coach, yeah, I'll do it. Put you in, coach. I'll step right up. I'm going to say, I'm actually going to say that if Red is able to pull two law tokens, red can get the whole gang out of this situation. Red, come on.

Come on. Please. Jesus. I'm lured in by a siren song. Please, please, please, please. Fannie packs on his ass. You know, that's not why they call it that, right? Yeah.

Okay. That's a chaos. That's a chaos. That's a chaos. Oh, okay. Yeah, that's not good, because he only has one more chaos token there. Uh-oh. Wait a minute.

So what if I do pull another chaos token? You've gone hard ass. No, no, he doesn't lose them. He doesn't lose them, but. Right, right, you'd only lose one. Okay, but a mixed success here would be pretty choice. Okay, that's agree. All right.

Now, I would recommend you lose that green one. Yeah, or else you're boned. But like, on a group, does he have to lose one on a group poll? We're making this up as we go. I think it's my house rule. I think I'll let him not lose one, but then you all have to do it. So in other words, Clint can choose to burn one of his tokens to save all of you right now. Hell yeah.

Red is a team player. That's right, boys, because team sports builds character. So, what the hell? Yeah, I would burn the green one because you have a lot of other long ones, but you've only got two red ones. Don't meta game. Burn what feels right. Here you go, kid.

That was a coin toss, by the way. Sports reference! Yes. You know. I would just like to point out that I've never been more stressed than having to catch a throne object in my life. Yeah. My stepfather and father in real life

are a stand-up comedian and a former interpretive dancer. So you can imagine that a lot of this I'm just using from cultural osmosis. You see that the Mirage says, come on, Red. You know you want to have a little nip of the bottle.

Maybe we can stay up till 12.30 a.m. You'll die. But I'm already tired now. And Miss Sports Center? Hell no, boy. Drop and give me 20. Red's bark command.

The Mirage shudders, a slaps to the ground. And the Deadbeat Dad does one push-up and explodes into light. Well, put that one in the W column. With that, you leave the Desert of the Mirage. You are now entering hard-ass country. On the horizon, soaring above the line of mountains and hills and scrubland,

a glass tower full of chalkboards, beakers, and textbooks, the dwelling place of the lone and only science dad, where you have come to find the hidden path into the lumberlands, home of the craft dads. You have arrived at your destination to seek the knowledge that you need to complete your quest. Guy finds really good parking. I'm going to say, Guy, you pull up, it is hundreds of miles of open expanse, and you still parallel park. And not in any space that's close enough to where you want to go.

But guys' word, there won't be a better one. There's an open one there, and I'm taking it, we can walk. as you exit the car and approach the tower of the science dad a reedy bespectacled figure wearing a dirty lab coat and no shirt just like fractals and mathroons carved into his chest

with only one glass lens and then an empty lens in his spectacles is the science dad ah Dads, Welcome to my tower. I've been expecting you. And that's where we'll take our break.

We'll be right back after our mission. Thank you. Hey, everybody. It's Griffin. Your grandpa, I guess. I don't know. Travis started doing this. I've lost my touch, you know.

I don't know how to open these ad segments anymore. If I can one month, I'm all out of practice. But I'm going to tell you about our sponsors this week. Boy, I hope you're enjoying Dadlance. In case you're missing some context here, this is a role-playing game that we made up ourselves during the most recent Max FunkCon. And Brennan was kind enough to come and run it for us. Brennan runs Dimension 20 over at College Humor. He's incredibly talented, best in the biz.

We got to do a little mini-series with him called Tiny Heist that's going to come out next year. We're really excited for that. You can find a trailer for it online. But we had a lot of fun, and I know it's weird. And yeah. This week on Bullseye, Lynn Manuel Moray. Miranda on his dark materials, hip hop, and life after Hamilton. I know it's the first line of my obituary.

So if that line is handled, then what else can I do with my time here? It's Bullseye for maximum fun.org and NPR. Before you. Tell me more about this sexy science dad. Bear sure. This dude, in my head, the science dad looks a lot like the other father from Coraline. You know what I mean? I mean like...

I already said sexy science, daddy. Everyone knows what I meant. You see that he looks at you and says, please enter my tower of science. Yeah, I think I'm happy to. Yeah, let's go. Fellow dads, my name is Professor Peter Poppins. All right.

That's a name. You had a bunch of penguins, didn't you? That was a good joke. I liked it. You see, he gestures to a wing of beakers suspended with like half-formed penguin abominations. All dads, important to note, all dad penguin abominations.

Little moustaches on their beaks. You see, Professor Peter looks over at you and says, I take it you have come. in search of the remote. Am I much mistaken in my calculations? No, that's correct. We're looking for the remote, supposedly the craft dance habit.

We drove through some secret time-space tunnels to get here, and I think that catches us up to present. Just in case you came in during intermission. Yeah, right. Splendid, well, we find ourselves here in hard-ass country. That's the name of my first country rock album, by the way. Hard-ass country. Big old stadium country.

You see that Pater goes over and pulls a giant lever and types something in on an ancient stone keyboard. Wait, why? Why couldn't it be a regular keyboard? Why is it more ancient than the last version of keyboard that was created? Oh, are you asking why? I have a stone keyboard rather than just using a plastic keyboard. It's weird, man. Gentlemen.

One, one keyboard. You see that pay to go over you and says, I don't have time to go into the details. You don't have a fucking answer for your rock keyboard made of rocks. You can just say that. That's fine. If you say, like, I don't know why I use it either. Do you know what the melting temperature of plastic is?

Do you? He does have a laptop in front of him. Searching. Yeah. This particular plastic's melting point is 170 degrees Celsius or 338 degrees Fahrenheit. It routinely gets hotter than that in this room. What?

We gotta get the fuck out of here. You need to move. Well, you aren't just a giant glass tower. probably gets pretty warm. Yeah. Oh, sure. When the sun gets up there, I have got to hide.

Like a lizard? Hey, friend, this is a bad house. And don't throw any stones. Yeah. Don't throw your fucking keyboard anywhere. It'd be the end of all of us. I would like to leave this tower before the show ends. You see that the professor looks at you and says,

I did not welcome you into my home to have it belittle. or mocked based on its composition of materials, nor the temperatures that some rooms get or don't get at which and what times. Yeah, there's Zillow for that. Yeah. Solid. Tell me your plan.

You've come here to, what? Make war on the craft ads and their tower of lumber and very, various power tools? Yes. Just a straight yes. Just a 100% across the board, yes.

We're here to kick dad ass and take dad names. Which I know is a little aggressive. But I'm leaning into the character. Red green. Yeah. Fucking Travis made a worse reference than dad, everybody. Write it down.

I mean, I mean, there is only just the four of us, and I'm assuming the Kraft Dad army is bigger. Six or seven. Yeah, six or twelve. Yeah, I was kind of hoping we drive in, get the remote and then leave, like, before they

noticed us. Yeah, we're pretty inconspicuous. We could drive in, diner, and pipe our way out. Oh, don't cheer. He's got it written right here. He does not. It seems, for the time being, we may be working at

same purpose. Perhaps I could be of some help. Yeah, that'd be great. If you've got any tips or anything, we always welcome that for sure. Ray guns or something. Yeah, if you have any laser swords. Laser beam, laser lightsaber, lower. Yes, my house naturally produces lasers. You have to move. This house is not good for you, Fran. Speaking of which, we have absolutely got to go. Everybody up, everybody up.

Oh, shit, oh shit, oh shit. Oh no, your Hummel figurines! No! I should never put the Hummel figurines in the laser room. All right. Very well. I would be more than happy to help you. I can tell you the exact location of the remote within Saarberg.

I have measured and calculated. I have a number of low or... low orbit satellites and I have been able to triangulate. They made a stone too or... Griffin, he is our guest. You are my guest. Oh, yeah.

And no, Grilled Dad. They're not made of stone. They're birds with disposable cameras tied to that. With what I've got too, all right. All right. Hey, listen, we're kind of pressed for time. Just give us the location We'll be on our way, partner

Very well. Come with me to the birdroom I will show you what I've collected. And we're there. You come to the birdroom. You see there's a small stack of photographs over behind a little metal encasing and you just see ash and burnt feathers everywhere and he goes, no!

My satellites! How is this the first time this has happened? The mathematics of which rooms do what, when is so complicated. I ran out of chalkboard space, hence the chest runes. Of course, the logical next place for her. Wait, you carve into your own chest to figure out when your birds would die? I'll say this, it smells incredible in here. He collects the photographs and says,

Here, this is the secret path into Sawburg. Cool. If you go now, you'll be able to. finish before the show ends. Yes, that. You'll be able to do, you'll be able to get it without the craft dads noticing. Remember, at dawn and dusk

is when the craft dads are at their most industrious. The sound of their power tools shall obscure the engine of your car. Be quick. Let the sawdust kick up and disguise your approach. Okay. I know we're in a hurry, but how did the birds take the pictures?

Now, Brennan, to give you a little context, this is what we do to Griffin every. It's so good. I get it now. I fucking get it. Isn't it rich? Isn't it rich? It feels good, right? It feels real good.

Bullying is so fun. No, it's not. Hey, it's me. Guy Ferrari. Don't bully. The more you know. You see, says, to answer your question,

there is no way to be sure that the birds will take the pictures at the right time. My path of least resistance approach to this dilemma was just to make so many damn birds. If you

release a couple thousand, some, you know, some will A, come back. If you get an infinite number of birds taking an infinite number of pictures, eventually one's going to write He's going to get a picture of the remote. Yeah, exactly.

You guys have your picture on your way into Sauburg as you guys return to your parked car. Where do we park? And he just starts hitting the remote button listening for the beep. One car in the vast yellow waist. You guys pile in the car. Who's got shotgun?

Do we need to rotate so no one gets mad? No. No. Apparently not. As you all approach, you guys hear the noise of drills and tools, and you see a massive fortress

in the heart of the lumberlands, petrified forest around you as far as the eye can see, the gaunt towers of dead trees waiting to be harvested by the craft dads, sawdust and wood all around. You hear the troning chant of the miserable craft dads, Dads, measure twice, cut once.

Measure twice, cut once. You guys know the secret way. Are there any... Who's taking the charge? Who's taking the charge? What are you doing to hide yourself, retrieve the remote? What are you trying to do?

Well, let me sort of get things going. I'll kick things off. You know, speaking of measuring, here's a fun fact. Oh, Jesus. Jim was the Main Street in Disney World and Disneyland. It's constructed at a three-fourth scale to give a little bit more of a sense of Granger. Did you know that?

I just thought that was fun. Of course, we did not know that. Well, I thought that was fun. Anyway, that's my contribution. Cool. To help distract, Guy Ferrari reaches into the glove compartment, pulls out a pine air freshener

and hangs it on the rearview mirror to help disguise the car, because now it smells more like wood. That's very good. I'd like to suggest that the engine's not on, and I'm using all of my beef strength to push the car from behind. Incredible.

I would love a poll from Travis for disguising the car. I'm going to say that using an air freshener to disguise a car is definitely, going to be two. Are you using law or chaos? I feel like that's a chaos move. Yeah, that's a chaos move for sure. So we want two red. So in act two, we're not standing. That's a law.

That's a law. That's a law. It's a green. Oh God, Travis, please. Please pull one chaos. Chaos. You see the craft dads. Their various welding masks and visors, giving them limited tunnel vision, have overdeveloped noses over the years to develop

a mostly scent-based lifestyle as they mutter and wander around. And you see they go, Mmm, fresh pine. Completely normal. Propelowing the car forward, I'd love a beef roll.

Yeah. Just one beef roll. Give me a beef, a beef pole. Yeah. Is that, what color chip is beef? If it's rare, it's rare. I'm going to say that I'll leave up to you is your character pulling on the powers of law or chaos

Oh man It's such a wild idea I think cars are not meant to be I think it's I think it would be chaos Yeah all right so I'm going to need two I'm going to need two tokens Really dig in there Chaos

That's one chaos One more chaos baby come on Come on Ditto A chaos Two Beef, beef, beef, beef. Give the man his money. I've just got a steak,

and I have my grill with me. We've been towing it the whole time, and I just throw that shit on for like three seconds, and then just, and then I go beef crazy. A perfect stealth car being rocketed forward on pure beef strength. My mustache grows two sizes. I'm horny as hell.

You push your car and rising above you a insane tortured tower of carpentreed tree houses, decks, patios, birdhouses. It is a towering colossus of varnished wood sticking out like a raised middle finger into the face of God. And the car pushes into the darkness of Sawburg.

With that two chaos pulls, your car does not stop. And you begin to hear the calls ahead of you of Kraftads leaping out of the way. Fresh wood, fresh wood. Make way for fresh wood. You arrive. in a... No, it's just nice. I just like the fresh wood.

It just made me happy that it worked. You arrive in a room where a single spotlight illuminates a really lovely turned resin piece of wood carving. You can tell a lot. This is like a nice walnut or something,

like a really nice carving wood. He's actually kind of interesting to look at it. It's really well made. It's quite beautiful, actually. Let's spend some time looking at it. And on top of which you see glistening with the same black plastic. I kneel. Yeah.

Yeah, I can't look at it directly. God begins to weep. Yeah. Chip Huggins takes a lot of pictures. I'm going to need you to. make a pull, you won't lose a token on this one, but I need you to make a pull for taking those pictures. Let me know,

and if it's a chaos token, something's going to happen. Okay, great. Something good? But Chip Huggins is all chaos. Chip Huggins B. Thank you. Chip Huggins B. Not Chip Huggins A.

Chips Huggins B chaos? Chiafins A is dead. Law! That's a law token. Incredible. You go to take your picture and you snap, and right before

you're about to set the flash, you hear something, and instead, just actually set the light balance on your own camera manually, as you've learned how to do. Right, get that ISO, so right. Open up that aperture

nice and slow. As a result of not using the camera's built-in flash, Oh, who needs it when you got an F-stop? The lumbering guardian of the room is not alerted to your presence. I mean, you didn't fuck up a completely unnecessary action. The Guardian wanders out.

Tied and bolted and welded to the bones of this dad's arms are saws and hammers and drills. and you can see a pair of pure steel safety visors have been nailed into this dad's skulls. This dad stands 12 feet tall. Guy reaches into Chips backpack and shoots the guard. Give me a roll.

I'm going to say, okay, here's what we're going to do this. I'm just ad hocking the hell out of this game. this definitely feels like a chaos move to me. Yeah. I would say pulling a gun shooting the 12-foot wood saw mound. It's probably pretty chaotic. I'm going to let you pull as many tokens as you want. Oh, shit.

If you pull any law tokens, you immediately lose them. If you pull and the success of this. attack will be determined by how many chaos tokens you are able to pull. So you can call it at any time. You can call it anytime. Let's do it. Oh God, this is good. We want to see chaos. Show me chaos. Chaos, chaos. Chaos, chaos. No, my God. I am having the worst pulls. How many more law tokens do you have? You just have to make sure you haven't gone. Yeah, no, I have two and two. Okay. Oh, my gosh. Here we go. All right.

Oh, yeah, I can keep going, or you can stop it there. Really? Yep. Law. Oh, my God. Now I have one, I only have three tokens. Stop. Now, listen, if you pull a law token, you go full deadbeat.

Don't. Please, God, don't. Please don't turn deadbeat, Travis. I mean, there's only nine minutes left. Let's see it. You whip the gun out. BAM! You catch this carpenter dead.

across their shoulder. No horsing around in the shop. I'm going to need actions from the other three dads. Okay, Red looks over at him and says, hey, want to have a catch, buddy? Oh, shit. Then what does he do? I can't just say some shit.

You got to do something. Come on. He's going to see if he wants to have a catch. So that was a literal. So that was a little... So a 12-foot wood saw bionic man. I'm going to make a pull. Okay.

Because all dads are governed by the rules of law and chaos. This carpenter dad, though monstrous, is not immune to this. If this dad pulls a red chaos token, this dad's down for a catch. He's DTC. Just everyone watching. That's a handsome fanny pack. Brennan, where did you get it? I got this downstairs.

Because it's from magroymerch.com as of August 1st. That is an adventure zone, a fanny pat. It's so good. This is not a merch spotlight. Come on. All right, you ready? You ready for the poll? Here we go.

Oh, God. Get rid of it. Chaos. Chaos means it's time for a catch. That's a success. While the guard is distracted. The ball is destroyed as it touches its buzzsaw hands. Wait, I can get it. Give me a chance.

While they're playing catch, there's one thing I'm good at, it's line jumping. I'll leap right up there and grab. I did not catch that, bud. No, it kind of sounded like all the air was escaping. I said, um, I'll go out there a mile weak enough. Every dog in the neighborhood went, what? Yeah. Hey, fuck you, whistle lord. on.

There's a fourth whistle. There's a fourth whistle. Fuck this is a rowdy show. Okay. Yeah, I want to leap up there and grab the remote while they're playing catch. Fantastic. Go ahead and pull,

I'm going to say chaos token probably, right? Yeah, absolutely. And I'll say, yeah, this is, we just need one. Blasted by the shotgun, you see that distracted, the carpenter dad looks out and goes, I'll go long. What?

Runs. I'll go long. Got it. I'll throw it to you. As the guardian disappears into the darkness after the ball, you see that Chip rushes up, leech to the top of the podium, grabs the remote. you have retrieved the treasure of the dagger. Listen, if we don't hit the road soon,

we're not going to get there before dark. Yeah. Also, this whole time, I've been very setting this tower on fire. Tiger can't change his stripes, man. Okay, I'm going to do the same thing we did for Travis. You can pull as many chaos tokens as you want to see how much it's set on fire.

Chaos. Fire enough. That's on fire enough. Come on. Yeah. Come on. Chaos, chaos, chaos! Three! That's three!

The chaos opens! And we all die. What a way to go, though. Now I have become ribs. Destroyer of worlds. The remote, resting comfortably in a place of honor on the captain's seat, aka the middle back seat of the car. All of your faces glow with raging orange light reflected from the rear view mirror of the car

as every last measured inch of Sauburg roars in hellish flame. I feel bad now. Yeah, me in the backseat, I go, what just happened? Did I go back to the dark place? As you look and see on the horizon, the Tower of the Science Dad, and beyond that, far past the mountains and the canyon,

the tiniest glint on the horizon of a screen that may now come to life. You see rising up over the ashes of Sawburg, a curling plume of smoke. And you see Chokie looks out at you. Oh, Wow, hey there. Huggins, thanks for releasing me unto the world.

Well, damn it, Chokey, I keep my promises. I would say that the last thing with the remote guy turns on the plasma screen and sets it to the one show every dad could agree on, Myth Busters. Yep. Yep. Yep. Yep. With one colossal, exhilarating rush, the dads spread across the sofa mountains. The screen, oh, L-E-D, roars to life, myth-busters. Oh, it's a marathon.

Yeah, all right. And in unison, all the remaining dads of the dad tribes grunt and sit down. And undo their pants. Yeah. What? That's not a big. Just the top button. Just the top button.

When you're older, you'll know it's a dad thing. Then I'll start masturbating to Mythbusters? I don't want to get older. And that sadly is the note will have to end on. Good night, everybody. Thank you. Maximumfund.org. Comedy and culture.

Artist-owned. Audience. Audience. Audience supported. Hey, it's Jesse Thorne. We're very happy to announce that tickets for Max FunCon 2020 will go on sale Friday, November 29th, at 11 a.m. Pacific. I also want to let you know. This coming year, Max FunCon 2020, will be our last Max FunCon, 2020, will be our last Max FunCon. for the foreseeable future. For 2020 and beyond,

we're going to be looking for ways to connect with more of you in person and spread the spirit of Max Fun farther than it's ever gone before. In the meantime, if you want to join us at the last Max FunCon in Lake Arrowhead, June 12th through the 14th,

you can find details at maxfundcon.com.