D&D is For Nerds - Jarren's Outpost #1 For Life, For Love, For Me

Episode Date: July 1, 2017

In which our heroes need the gnomish weapon for different reasons. Check out our upcoming lives shows and purchase your tickets for our UK tour right here; http://www.sanspantsradio.com/live/ Want to... help support the show?Sanspants+: sanspantsplus.comPatreon: patreon.com/sanspantsradioPodkeep: sanspantsradio.podkeep.comUSB Tapes: audiobooksontape.comMerch: redbubble.com/people/sanspantsradio or teepublic.com/stores/sanspantsradio Want to get in contact with us?Email: sanspantsradio@gmail.com Twitter: twitter.com/sanspantsradio Website: sanspantsradio.comFacebook: facebook.com/SansPantsRadioReddit: reddit.com/r/sanspantsradio Or individually at;Adam: twitter.com/RetroArchetypeJackson: twitter.com/AlldogsaredeadHandsome Tom: twitter.com/AwkwardTreedZammit: twitter.com/GoddammitZammit Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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Starting point is 00:00:00 SANSPANTS RADIO, CORPUS COLOSSUS available for free on iTunes. Merchant of Greatbirth is a bonus adventure included on all our USB tapes with our third and final campaign of that having just been released. So if you liked our bumbling antics and the rotating cast, you can check them out over at audiobooksontape.com
Starting point is 00:00:38 where we've just released volume 3 of D&D is for Nerds, which we're calling A Song of sand and snow if you use the coupon code dickhead you'll get 10 of the purchase price or if you just like the standalone mp3s you can grab the complete merchant of great birth trilogy at sanspantsradio.podkeep.com also the adventures are available for our sanspants plus members depending on which tier if you'd like to support the show that way and receive a whole slew of even more bonus content. One last thing,
Starting point is 00:01:11 if you're knocking the full episodes or missing an episode, just refresh your RSS feed or delete those episodes, then refresh and download, and that should fix that right up. Once again, extremely sorry for any confusion that this has caused, and we hope you enjoy our next campaign. Welcome to Chapter 1 of Jaren's Outpost Hustle, a D&Dist for Nerds adventure. Previously... You get to Jaren's Outpost. It's part of a nation called Goldcrest, and Goldcrest just went through a massive civil war in which... It was like the French Revolution. They were all put to the sword.
Starting point is 00:01:43 Oh boy. Oh no. Jesus. And mercenary companies have basically taken over, and there's this transitional period. Hey, mercenaries, you're going to give control back to the people now, right? That you've thrown over and you control everything? And the mercenaries are like, eventually. Oh, no.
Starting point is 00:02:00 Oh, boy. It's actually caused some tensions. Should we get involved or show off? All right, so Cassius, what's our next move? Oh, boy. It's actually caused some tension. All right, so, Cassius, what's our next move? What's your next move? I mean... I don't know. I've got to be honest with you. I'm kind of curious as to who Daniel is.
Starting point is 00:02:17 I'm thinking of maybe investigating that some. That's fair enough. I don't really know where that will take me. You're welcome to join me, Leo. I was thinking of going back to Jaren's outpost and looking into the Black Hand. Mercenary group. Yeah, the mercenary group being good shit.
Starting point is 00:02:31 So I was thinking of doing something up that neck of the woods. Is this a goodbye? Or is it a new beginning? Good luck in finding out who Daniel is. I'm out of here. All right, Leo. So long, Leo! Oh!
Starting point is 00:02:41 I'm out of here. All right, Leo. So long, Leo! It's been nearly, I would say, maybe five years to the day now that riots and a massive uprising swept the nation of Goldcrest. A party of adventurers traveled to the capital of Goldcrest, Goldcrest, and killed the king of Goldcrest, King Goldcrest. Well, that's just right. A vain and selfish man, he ruled his kingdom with an iron fist, killing any who opposed him and imprisoning the rest, either in actual jails or just within the country itself,
Starting point is 00:03:27 not allowing his people free travel. After the, shall we say, assassination of the king, things did not immediately become better. In fact, they still are on their way to becoming better. Mercenary companies, under the supervision of the adventurers began the slow transition of goldcrest from a a dictatorship to a more diplomatic country but the adventurers as adventurers are want to do left before the transition was complete. And mercenary companies, understanding that there was more money in overtaxing a population, simply settled in at the position that the king once held. We're going to center our adventure on the city of Jaren's Outpost, specifically within the nation of Goldcrest.
Starting point is 00:04:20 During the riots and the violence of the uprising, the gnomes in the warehouse section of the city busted out a new and terrifying weapon that they had been working on but never used. None of our current party, who we will introduce in a moment, actually saw the weapon in action. But you all heard that it killed 100 hundred people in less than five minutes. After that initial mass riot, which did last nearly a week, no one saw the weapon again. The gnomes dismantled it and packed it away, it having served its purpose of protecting them and their stock. protecting them and their um stock when mercenaries began pulling out consolidating their findings after the adventurers stopped supervising them jaron's outpost was deemed not worth the time and so it became a kind of lawless wasteland and in that chaos a band of orcs, an orcish tribe, landed at Jaron's outpost at the docks, seizing the docks,
Starting point is 00:05:27 and beginning an awful campaign against the rest of the city. One of the first things they did in this campaign was steal the weapon that the gnomes had created. But because the gnomes had dismantled the weapon, and orcs are not very smart, they have yet to be able to harness the power of whatever this forceful device is. Leo. Leo Shadow. Yes. You came at first to liberate Jaren's outpost from the Black Hand. The mercenary group.
Starting point is 00:05:59 Yeah, they were stomping on the little guy, and I'm a little guy. The mercenary group who were stomping on the little guy. I'm a halfling. It was implied. I figured. That was during the period where the adventuring party was still, well, the adventurers were still supervising the mercenaries. So Jan's Outpost had some, if poor, lore to it.
Starting point is 00:06:22 When you came to Jan's Outpost, however, it quickly became apparent that while the Blackhands were not great, some lore is better than no lore, even if that lore is terrible. And you decided that the lesser of two evils was still the better option. So you kind of just assimilated into Jan's Outpost. You found work in Little Tegelai, Little Tegelai being the halfling quarter.
Starting point is 00:06:47 Tegelai is where they come from. Hey! So does it get like a Soho abbreviation? Is it called like Lai Tai or something like that? Oh, yes! A hipster abbreviation. That's what I'm calling it. Yeah, I'm from Lai Tai.
Starting point is 00:07:01 All right, so Little Tegelai is run by the Halfling families. The Halfling families might as well be Mafioso families. So I fell in with the mob? Yes. Straight up? You literally moved into Little Italy, or Little Sicily, and joined the Mafia. You found that it was easier to assimilate with your own kind than with the rest of the city, who tend to
Starting point is 00:07:25 rightly have prejudices against halflings. You're thieves. By day. Specifically, you work for the Little Lo family. Little Lo? Yeah, Little Lo.
Starting point is 00:07:39 Run by Papa Little Lo. Hang on, wait, wait, wait. Papa Little Lo. Nah, that's wait, wait. Half a little love. Nah, that's not any better. I need like cotton balls to stuff in my mouth. Pop a little love. Pop a little love. That's pretty good.
Starting point is 00:07:54 By day, you work in their restaurant as a waiter. That is good. By night, you go round the back. They roll out a tarp. You cast the grease spell upon the tarp. They apply a gnomish salve that makes the grease spell last longer than a round, I think it lasts. And then you squeeze it into bottles and sell it as little low premium olive oil. Do we form a grease grift?
Starting point is 00:08:22 It's not really a grift. It actually is like good oil. All right. It's just legitimate. Legitimate industry. That's legitimate business right there. Although you don't pay... It builds upon intimidation and extortion, I imagine.
Starting point is 00:08:34 Because you don't import or grow it properly, so there's no one to collect taxes, but you wouldn't be paying taxes anyway. It's literally zero overhead. This is like all profit. Yeah. Except for the Nomi sale, but all profit.
Starting point is 00:08:48 And it gets a tarp. All profit. You started this simply because the Black Hand, when they were around, they were just imposing so many panel or tax rates on this sort of stuff. So you avoided tax by avoiding a paper trail. And instead just have a grease trail. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:09:07 Like a snail. So I can only cast a certain amount of magic in a day, so I have to hold out. Oh, yeah. Or else Lilo's going to be mad at me. You've got to do it and then have an hour nap or however long it takes to get back to it. Papa Little Lo. Little Lo?
Starting point is 00:09:22 Can I call him Lilo? No. You're not that friendly with him But like Lilo from Lai Tai You are not that friendly with him His son calls him Papa Little Lo His wife calls him Papa Little Lo And his grandfather also calls him Papa Little Lo
Starting point is 00:09:41 What his wife calls him behind closed doors is none of your business And if you even speculate Also calls him Papa Little. What his wife calls him behind closed doors is none of your business. And if you even speculate, you're going to wake up with a fucking owlbear head next to you. I like that especially because horses exist. But an owlbear has had a better message. It is more terrifying seeing that bear beak. It's really large, so to take up most of the bed. The fear there is that not only did they kill an owlbear,
Starting point is 00:10:11 a quite fearsome creature, but they were able to sneak it into your bed without you noticing. That'll take like five halflings. They actually just could have killed you. It would have been so much easier. But you wouldn't have been as scared. Yeah, it's all about fear. I think the message that sends is that they, like, want to send you a message, but they, like, the point of the message is, we're not going to kill you, because it would have been
Starting point is 00:10:32 easier to kill you. Just so you know that. And if you had to kill him after, you'd be so mad. I don't want to say necessarily reputation as a thief or anything like that, but you were once a member of a very prestigious thieves guild known as the Shadow. They currently want you dead, but the fact that you were once a member is kind of still a big deal. And that's probably why you got the job with the Little Lo family. They respected your past.
Starting point is 00:11:04 Now, you're in a little bit of a pickle right now. Oh, geez. Because a couple weeks ago. Is it a Little O bit of a pickle? It's quite a big little pickle, actually. Papa Little O personally called you into his office, and that's like a big deal. You've spoken with Papa Little O maybe four times
Starting point is 00:11:24 in your however many like a year now in Jaren's Outpost. He called you in to tell you Leo I need something from you.
Starting point is 00:11:35 Yes. You were once a member of the Shadow the Assassins and Thieves Guild. Yes. In a way, yes. Yes. You have
Starting point is 00:11:44 experience. Do they know that i like got like ran away or got kicked out it's probably a little bit of a secret that you're yes i was in but like maybe they know you don't know 100 in a way then i keep it vague i keep it very vague that you were like i said that you were in it all is kind of a big deal. Yes. The orcs, they represent a chaos I cannot abide by in my town. I've been thinking on this for quite some time now. I want you to steal or destroy whatever it is they have, this gnomish weapon. Okay, Little O.
Starting point is 00:12:27 I do not. Little O. Papa Little O. Papa Little O. I do not care how it gets. I do not care how it gets done. Only that it is done. Yes, yes, Papa Little O.
Starting point is 00:12:40 I will do this thing. Do I kiss his rings? Is that the. He reaches out he reaches out with a ring of protection they say this ring of protection offers me a plus five ac but kissing it technically offers you thank you little little little out of my office i I scurry out. All right. So. Like, for copyright reasons, we obviously can't play the Mafia soundtrack. The Godfather soundtrack. But, like, I'm imagining you walking out dressed as, like, a old-fashioned newsboy.
Starting point is 00:13:24 Because you're a butter halfling. I imagine, like, still in waiter gear. Still, like, an apron on, but, like, you're an old-school, like, Italian waiter. Anyway, you walk out the back of the restaurant, maybe to have a smoke, because, fuck, that was stressful. Calm those nerves of yours. Yep, not fair.
Starting point is 00:13:40 Out of nowhere, you get grabbed by two thugs. And thrown into the back of a carriage. What kind of a day is this for you? It's like, oh, no, jeez, oh, jeez. Go for the, yeah, send me smokes. By the time that you get your bearings, another halfling has a knife at your throat. And you're looking Across the carriage At Papa Quiet Knife
Starting point is 00:14:09 Hi Papa Quiet Knife Do I know him? Papa Quiet Knife is the patriarch of the Quiet Knife family You don't know him very well You know him more by name than anything else Would I recognise that it is Papa Quiet Knife? You don't really recognise his face You recognise the methods
Starting point is 00:14:23 The Quiet Knife family There are three big families In Little Teagulai But also Jan's Outpost I like that you guys are either taking notes Or just drawing doodles Surprisingly Jackson is also taking notes
Starting point is 00:14:40 I'm not just drawing sausage man Or whatever The big families are the Little Loaf family Which is the smallest family, but the oldest family. And it commands the most respect. There's the Shorefoot family. The Shorefoot family is the biggest one, but the youngest. They don't have a lot of respect.
Starting point is 00:14:59 Okay. It's all about respect. And the Quiet Knife family is the strongest family, but the violentest family. They're the ones most in trouble with the law, the most consistently, because they just, like, every punishment is a Colombian necktie. Sorry, a, um, a orcish necktie. Orcish necktie So you recognize this family You recognize who you're sitting across from And which family you're dealing with
Starting point is 00:15:32 Simply because of the methods that they grabbed you Alright And also one of the thugs who grabbed you Was a half orc And none of the other families employ orcs of any type Hello quiet knife Quiet knives I understand that you None of the other families employ orcs of any type. Hello, Quiet Knife. No, Quiet Knife. Yep, Quiet Knife.
Starting point is 00:15:47 Good. I understand that you once were part of the Shadow. Yes, totally once was. Yep, that was me. As you, in your carriage, go around the block once, Quiet Knife asks you to retrieve for him the gnomish weapon. Oh, you're in quite a pickle, buddy. And if you tell Papa Little, I will, well, let us say, acquaint you with the orcish way of dressing.
Starting point is 00:16:21 Gotcha. You want it. You want it not destroyed. You want it. I want it for myself. Oh, all right. Gotcha. You want it not destroyed. You want it. I want it for myself. Oh, alright, yep. They pull up at the restaurant and shove you out of the carriage.
Starting point is 00:16:35 They do not slow down. Sorry, I say they pull up. They do not slow down. Hopefully at the exact same spot so I can scramble for my drop cigarette. You grab your still lit cigarette and take a lot of puffs very quickly. Ah, jeez. Well, one wants it destroyed and one wants it...
Starting point is 00:16:56 There's an out. There's an immediate out. Greg Pierce. Yeah, right? You're a lowlife handsome tom what's your character's name perry winkle o'rourke oh this is gonna be interesting that's good perry winkle and greg all right all right perry winkle you were way back like before the black hand came into the picture. You were a member of the town guard. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:17:28 You were quite a respected member of the town guard, to be honest. People knew that if they needed a problem solved and they didn't care how it got solved, they could come to you. You're a good cop, but you do bad things. That's what I've got tatted on my back. In August, obviously. Out of the entire town guard, you were the only, you were one of like a handful that the Black Hand didn't try to like hire. And that's simply because people, if they know two things about you, it's that first thing that you can get a problem solved. But also that Jaren's outpost is where you have roots
Starting point is 00:18:06 yep as a half-orc it's hard for you you're always fighting uphill against the prejudices of the people but in jaren's outpost people maybe they don't like love that you're a half-orc but you command a bit of respect especially among the town militia, which was once the town guard, because they're your mates. You saved their lives, they saved your life. You're like Titan, man. Yeah, we play poker and stuff. Yeah. Camaraderie. No one cheats.
Starting point is 00:18:36 No one cheats. Your half-orc also wife, Gragia, little G G has been berating you for the last fortnight. Every night when you come
Starting point is 00:18:52 home from helping however you can at the town militia, she will not shut up. This gnomish weapon, it is going to destroy this town. We can't have it out here. It's just the worst. The worst, the worst.
Starting point is 00:19:07 And maybe every night you're like, well, what should I do about it? Jesus Christ, woman! I am but one half-orc man person. And she tells you, give it to the church. They'll know what to do with it.
Starting point is 00:19:27 You and your goddamn church. We're there every Sunday. This is where we have our roots. We can't have some gnomish superweapon floating around here. Yeah, my wife's a little bit, like, junky.
Starting point is 00:19:44 We go bowling with them. Is this about the Fergusons having a better house than us again? I'm just saying. They have a bigger flower bed. If we had a bigger flower bed, we could grow our own crops. And then maybe you wouldn't need to work such long hours because we'd have our own crops. You could be home with your kids more often. Such long hours because we'd have our own crops.
Starting point is 00:20:04 You could be home with your kids more often. Speaking of your children, your twin girls, who you may name, but just not at the moment. Your two little girls were being, you found out a couple days ago, were being bullied at school. Oh, no. And instead of... I bully so much. Instead of coming to you, they went to your mum, their nan, and asked her for help first. A fairy. For someone who was, like, the go-to guy, that was very emasculating. Why would they go to their...
Starting point is 00:20:38 I don't know what, like, the nonner equivalent of an orc would be. A knock-rock. A knock-rock. Why would they go to the knock knock instead of me? You're knock knock and you're pack pack. Come sit on the pack pack lap. I like that you've got, because you're a half orc, you've got nan and pop and you've got knock knock and grack.
Starting point is 00:20:57 And pock pock. We're going to your grandparents. Nan and pop orc. Knock knock and pack pack. Go on a knock knock. They went to knock knock instead of me yeah they would have gone to you if you had a bigger flower bed that's the conversation that i'm i think actually the little niggle that you got in your head is that if you take the if you were able to get the the gnomish super weapon back to the gnomes the gnomish superweapon, back to the gnomes, the gnomish kingdom has a lot of power and a lot of sway,
Starting point is 00:21:26 but they never throw it around. And if you could get the gnomes to help you fix up the problems around the town, because the town has been, I'll explain this later, divided into factions, like warring at each other constantly. But if the gnomes helped out, the town militia could just like... Go back to normal. Everything could go back to normal. You would actually be the hero of the town militia could just like go back to normal. Everything could go back to normal. You'd be the, you would
Starting point is 00:21:46 actually be the hero of the town. And my kids would stop going to Knock Knock for advice. But if you got the gnomish superweapon and didn't give it to the town militia, your mates if you gave it to the church or if you gave it to
Starting point is 00:22:02 the gnomes, the town guard, the town militia, your mates would be like, what's that about, man? You could have helped us out. I thought we were close. Your mates, your wife, or your pride? My kids. My kids.
Starting point is 00:22:22 That's what it's about. You've got to do what's best for the family. That's also my wife. La famille. I like what it's about. You've got to do what's best for the family. That's also my wife. La famille. I like that. La familia. Two of you are fighting for la familia. I've got to go talk to my knock-knock.
Starting point is 00:22:35 Knock-knock. Just imagine, like, Pack-Pack, like your grandpa, like, fishing somewhere, and you're, like, both fishing together. You're like, we've got to talk. I need some advice, Pack Pack. I believe that Knock Knock and Pack Pack would also only speak Orcish. Oh, yeah. They would float in and out of English.
Starting point is 00:22:55 I like the idea of them being mad that you haven't taught your daughters Orcish. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because my wife doesn't want them to know it. Like a common argument is like, why don't you teach your children our language? And you're like... The language of their home country. She just thinks that they'd fit in more at school
Starting point is 00:23:17 if they were... Hang on, something just occurred to me. So, if there are two... Because you and your wife are both half-orcs, so how do you have one set of human parents and one set of orphan parents? I would have... You'd have one of each.
Starting point is 00:23:33 You would have a knock-knock and a papa. Yeah, you'd have a knock-knock and a papa. Knock-knock and puppy. Yeah, knock-knock and puppy. Fuck, that's good. So, where the fuck was I? La Familia. Basically, I'm either going, I've got to get the thing back.
Starting point is 00:23:51 It's either for the town, the church, or my mates. If you don't give it to the church, your wife, you will not hear the end of it. If you don't give it to your mates, you will not hear the end of it. If you don't give it to the gnomes, you might feel emasculated for the rest of your life. Your kids don't respect you. Well, it's not that they don't respect you. They just don't think that I can help
Starting point is 00:24:13 them fix their problems. Knock, knock, though. He's got it covered. I just end up lying awake at night crying about a flower bed that I don't have. I like that you probably went round to your parents' place. You're sitting there at this table with all these little doilies, but they're kind of sewn.
Starting point is 00:24:32 Or doilies. So maybe they're a little threadbare, and it's not a pattern, but the war history of your mother's tribe. That's so good. Imagine her knitting that. Sitting in a big duck tank. You really captured Thug off the beheader. She's like pouring you maybe
Starting point is 00:24:50 a cup of herbal tea or something like that. She sits down and she's like, your kids came to me. It's like her knitting with battle axes. Battle axe knitting thing. In my head, the way my family works, it's like, knock knock, she's the boss.
Starting point is 00:25:06 And Poppy's in the background cooking. Yeah. And he's like a really thin, weedy guy. I like to imagine he likes to grow tomatoes. I like to imagine he grows tomatoes. Yeah, I imagine him having a veggie patch out the back and he's quite timid and just like, no, that's your knock-off. Or he's in a white singlet and shorts. Always.
Starting point is 00:25:21 Always. No matter what kind of climate it is. Finally, Greg Pierce, the lowlife. Yeah, that's me. You're a lowlife. So, going back to the halfling families just briefly, you're in a lot of debt. A lot of debt to a lot of bad people.
Starting point is 00:25:35 How deep am I with the halflings? Well, it's not just the halflings. It's the halflings. Wow. There's a list Right You decided that probably the best way to solve some of your gambling debts There is the daughter of a very wealthy merchant She's kind of pretty as well
Starting point is 00:25:56 But you probably picked her because she was kind of pretty Yeah, yeah, right, right You decided that you're going to marry rich Best move in the game And let him worry about your debts No, you're going to marry Rich Best move in the game And let him worry about your death No you're not, you marry Rich You're in the family, family take care of you That's what it's all about
Starting point is 00:26:11 Through a series of you bungling But also lying pretty well You were able to actually organise a date with her You were like Everything's coming up piss Everything's coming up piss Sittingiss. Everything's coming up. Sitting a little ways outside of Jaren's outpost, just like in an,
Starting point is 00:26:29 under the shade of a nice tree. You roll out a little mat or something like that. Having a picnic, turn it on the charm. That's what it's all about. Turn the charm up to 11 and you start chatting her up. But the only goddamn fucking thing on her mind that she will talk about is a militant religious group right yeah that are one of the factions that have taken up in the city known as the sabers
Starting point is 00:26:55 really interesting though yeah okay just the sabers as you learn and maybe you knew already but as you learn certainly in the day, over the course of the day, follow the teachings of a goddess known as Lady Willow, who in all things exercises a certain level of militancy and rigorous, like,
Starting point is 00:27:18 adhering to rigorous religious standings. So they're a new kind of religion, at least to Jaron's Outpost. It's kind of religion at least to jan's outpost it's an old religion overall but it's it's only since this chaos has kind of erupted that the sabers have been able to actually secure a part of the city for themselves and begin spreading the religion and this religion is like with the all the crime and everything going to shit, people are like, yeah, a little bit of militant religion is what we need. And this religion has grabbed a large part of the city.
Starting point is 00:27:51 Why? Yeah, yeah. Specifically this girl, Laura. Is this the same religion that my wife keeps taking me to church to or are we just a different church? No, that's the old religion. Gomes and Pena. Yeah, cool, cool.
Starting point is 00:28:06 They don't even know the name of it because they don't care about it. They are. Go keep her happy. In church, you've probably heard a couple sermons about Lady Willow and her violent ways. Uncouth ways. Yeah, yeah. If they've been spoken of. False idols, etc.
Starting point is 00:28:20 Not really false idols. False idols, etc. Yeah, I get it. It's fine. Yep. The teachings of gnomes and Pena, who your wife and by extension a lot of the people you go bowling with follow, is very peaceful, like a spiritual religion. Yeah. Whereas.
Starting point is 00:28:34 A bit Buddhist. Yes. Whereas Lady Willow and the sabers by extension exercise more of a like, if you want God's will in the world, you've got to cut some heads off. Right. It's not like evil or anything like that. It is still like, it does preach helping those. Fairly dogmatic. You can't make an omelette without bedding a few chickens.
Starting point is 00:28:56 There's not a lot of bending in the religion. As it goes. Yeah, but I'm with you. I've heard that saying before, yes. Yeah, that's a very interesting religion. Nonetheless. Laura, yeah. Nonetheless, the date goes very well saying before, yes. Yeah, that's a very interesting religion. Nonetheless. Laura, yeah. Nonetheless, the date goes very well.
Starting point is 00:29:08 Oh, good. That's a Greg Piss charm. And you float the idea of getting married. Maybe. Or. She seems. After one date, you or. Greg Piss works fast.
Starting point is 00:29:17 You are very charismatic. Now, she does not say yes straight away. My love. But she floats the idea back that if you were to convert to Lady Willow, she would be more receptive. Or like she certainly tells you with no uncertain terms that if you are not of Lady Willow, of that religion, she would never marry someone like you. Yeah, right. Understood course. Course, darling.
Starting point is 00:29:43 With this information You went To try and get Converted because As if you fucking Hello I love your religion I'm down for Lady Willow The paladins
Starting point is 00:29:54 Get them good Whatever's happening Yep The paladins there Saw through you In a fucking instant But They saw a man
Starting point is 00:30:02 Who knows this town A lot better than they do they have not been here for very long and greg piss has a reputation for being a part of jaren's outpost and jaren's outpost being a part of greg piss everyone everyone in town knows greg piss if not by reputation then in the very intimate and carnal sense, knows Craig piss. You either know me by reputation or biblically. Those are the two ways. There is no third.
Starting point is 00:30:34 So it's almost both? Sometimes both. Sometimes one leads to the other. I want to think it's biblical leads to reputation rather than the other way around. I'm sure it is you were brought before paladin commander evelyn plane uh she's the leader of the sabers at least in jaren's outpost a very strict and sometimes brutal woman she told you that they kind of interrogated you about why you wanted to join. Maybe they didn't necessarily get the full story, but they certainly got a part of it. And they don't care about some merchant's daughter.
Starting point is 00:31:14 What they care about, they tell you. The gnomish weapon. Yeah, but get a feel in the heartbeat. The weapon has too much power, you were told, to be allowed into the hands of anyone except the Sabres. You guys will do it right, won't you? If you can bring them the weapon, they will pretend that you are part of their religion, so that you can marry the merchant's daughter, so you can pay off your gambling debts. That's relatively few steps, to be honest.
Starting point is 00:31:46 It's much more straightforward than that. Last thing I had to do. Last old mess I was in. That's pretty easy. You left the district controlled by the Sabres on cloud nine. Happy as a fucking clam. That's like a week. I can do that in a week.
Starting point is 00:32:00 End of the week, I'm good. Half of it, really. You were so pleased and excited with yourself that you decided that for tonight, you're going to shack up with a lady of the week, I'm good. Half of it, really. You were so pleased and excited with yourself that you decided that tonight you're going to shack up with a lady of the streets. Oh, yeah. A comely strumpet. But you're not going to pay her a goddamn cent.
Starting point is 00:32:15 Greg Pierce don't pay for strange. By hook or by crook, you will not pay for strange. Oh, God. And you know what? The first streetwalker you propositioned was very receptive. Excellent. You're having
Starting point is 00:32:29 an amazing day. Yeah. Except after the first drink with her, you fall unconscious. Fuck. And wake up somewhere dark and unpleasant. Men and women in awful black robes with arcane symbols scrawled across them
Starting point is 00:32:48 are standing around you chained to a table. Yeah. All right. Is this the deluxe package they were paid for? A ritual is conducted. Right. Through the sounds of chanting, a goat is slaughtered, and its blood is smeared upon you
Starting point is 00:33:06 As the goat's blood Touches your skin It burns And tattoos your skin They conclude the ceremony Do you know Draconic, the language? I don't They conclude the ceremony in Draconic
Starting point is 00:33:22 And their final words In the ceremony in common are, and bind his soul. What? Hey, why'd you just? That was the only thing I heard. That's the only thing I understood. To what? To what?
Starting point is 00:33:40 Please don't be the goat. Please don't be the goat. Please don't be the goat. Maybe in your still kind of groggy mind, it vaguely occurs to you that these people are probably the blood cult that owns a section of the city. Oh, no. The mystic order of the holy blood.
Starting point is 00:34:02 These, shall we say, priests of a long-dead god believe that they can bring their god back to life by sacrificing enough blood to him. They sacrifice their own blood and very often the blood of others. Right, right. Like it was just a goat got better
Starting point is 00:34:20 than me. Your soul has just been bound to something that you don't know. Yeah, but I could have had my blood taken. And I need, frankly frankly this is a win one of the cultists holds up a profane looking holy symbol and when he holds it up you feel an icy coldness in your heart as if the warmth were leaving you oh and then you feel the warmth out of your body and leave your body and bind itself to the holy symbol or the unholy symbol if you will yeah you have the weirdest sensation of you can feel warmth that was once you, but is now the holism. This is an odd week. Yep. Right.
Starting point is 00:35:09 The cultist pulls back his hood. And you recognize Ralph Moroney? Ralph Moroney. Ralph Moroney is a local lord. Ralph! You were part of the blood cult. I am Father Moroni I'm Father Ralph, thank you very much
Starting point is 00:35:28 That's Mr. Ralph, Father Moroni Father Moroni of the blood cult, right Twist We will be making a sacrifice And you will be helping us Yeah, right Alright, not of me, yeah? Not if you can get us
Starting point is 00:35:45 the gnomish weapon oh boy would you believe I was gonna second person today it was told and I myself saw with my own two eyes that the gnomish weapon bled the streets
Starting point is 00:36:02 the streets ran so red with blood it was seen deep within the sewers. He gestures around you. And you notice that you are in the sewers of Jaren's outpost. Alright, okay. We wish to bleed this town dry. Would that be enough blood?
Starting point is 00:36:20 Perhaps. Secure us the gnomish weapon and you may have your soul back. Yeah. Well, I was going to manage to choose from your dicky soul. Antonio was back in the streets. Oh, good. I think you're going to be like
Starting point is 00:36:38 into the sewers. Good luck, Greg Piss. So, Greg Piss, either pay your debts and don't die Or get your soul back It's your choice Bit of a conundrum So many conundrums
Starting point is 00:36:54 That's a thinker Right there I nearly have two conundrums And I have three With one of my options I get laid With the other Less so Can you enjoy being laid Without your soul? One of my options, I get laid. With the other, less so.
Starting point is 00:37:07 Can you enjoy being laid without your soul? Well, that remains to be seen. Your options don't rely on one of yours. If you don't do it, getting dead. Ours do. Both of you get three. It doesn't say my mates won't kill me if I don't give them the thing, though. It's true.
Starting point is 00:37:23 It's true. That's a good point. It doesn't say my mates won't kill me if I don't give them the thing though It's true That's a good point Independently, all three of you decide that Tonight is the night After some planning You're gonna steal away into the docks
Starting point is 00:37:34 This is it The heavily orcish fortified docks Now Anyone who has been able to sneak their And some people have tried sneak their way Into the docks Has not been heard from since. The orcs haven't made an example of them or anything like that. They've just kind of disappeared.
Starting point is 00:37:54 Right. I'm very un-orc-like to not make an example of someone sneaking where they shouldn't. It is actually a bit, yeah. You decide that... If I was smarter, I'd suspect fair play, but I'm not. There's the map of the city, where, divided off into the sections that each faction owns.
Starting point is 00:38:11 Okay. Man, the blood cults go quite a... like a lot of... They own a lot of the upper or the fancy section of the city because the entire... What do you call them? The lords and ladies? Yeah, the gentry. The gentry lords and ladies? The gentry. The gentry.
Starting point is 00:38:32 Nearly the entire tree of the gentry of Jaren's outpost were members of this blood cult. Back in the days when King Goldcrest was around, the blood cult was kind of encouraged. Of course they were. That's rad. Golly in the blood cult. It was seen as a hip and cool thing to do. So the gentry did it I love I love because gnomes
Starting point is 00:38:47 Is a religion in your world But it's N-O-M-E-S I know what you're about to point out But then It's right next to gnomes The people who own One area So I'm sure if you were
Starting point is 00:38:56 Giving directions You'd be like Go to the place You know where the gnomes is Which gnomes The people The people who worship The god or the
Starting point is 00:39:02 Little lads The little lads Yep so Also tigalai Not spelled how I imagined But I like the way it's spelled The people. The people of worship. The god of the... Little lads. The little lads. Yep, so... Also, Tigalai, not spelled how I imagined, but I like the way it's spelled. The, yeah, the halfling sort of section is, covers pretty much just little Tigalai. The gnomes, gnomes and penia, which is kind of up the top, that's the slums and the poor district, opiate of the masses joke, if you will. I will.
Starting point is 00:39:21 district, opiate of the masses joke, if you will. I will. The Sabres centre around a small fort, Fort White, which was kind of like a secondary sort of combat location which was once controlled by the Black Hand, but when they moved out, the Sabres
Starting point is 00:39:38 kind of moved into that, and they used that as that base of operations. The town militia occupy the most populous part of the town, so where you find the most people. That is not the slums. So like the middle class area, if you will. The blood cult own, obviously, the upper part,
Starting point is 00:39:55 the part where all the fancy people live. The gnomes have the warehouse area, and the orcs control the docks. Cool. Finally. I was about to say, what's that bit in the corner? There's one last section. Rhodes Keep is the major castle of Jaren's Outpost where Lord or Mage Damian Eaton lived.
Starting point is 00:40:16 Lives, I should say. When King Goldcrest was in charge, Damian Eaton was the local regent. And he ruled Jaron's outpost with the same iron-handed style that King Goldcrest ruled the nation. He was a very unpleasant and unpopular man. When the uprising happened, him and his loyalists retreated
Starting point is 00:40:37 back to the castle keep, and they've been there ever since, just quietly watching the rest of the town. Immediately distrust them. Well, rightly so. pretty much distrust everyone although he was once your employer so i immediately distrust him he didn't give me good dental oh man he did not get any dental they're a mess exactly so uh you'll notice there's a wall blocking off the dock area. You jump that wall in the night.
Starting point is 00:41:07 All three of you independently. The orcs have no use for a lot of the supplies, the shipments that were coming in and out through the docks. So things like maybe like designer goods, if you will, like nice clothes from the elven places, nice construction work from the dwarves, stuff like that. That's all been shifted to one side because orcs just fucking don't like dwarves and elves. And they refuse to use any of their stuff. The boxes of this stuff are packed high.
Starting point is 00:41:54 And moving in between these boxes to get closer and closer to the Orcish camp, the large tribal looking, well, sort of string of tents and such in the docks, all three of you bump into each other. First, maybe you wish to yell, say something like, what are you doing here? But then an Orcish patrol passes very close and you instead just decide to keep quiet. What words do our heroes have for each other? Find out next time on Jaren's Outpost Hustle, a D&D's for nerds adventure. Thanks for listening. If you want to help support the show, why not become a member at sanspantsplus.com
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