Nerd Poker - Episode 73 - Frienemy's Frienemies
Episode Date: June 16, 2020The Ice Five exit their awkward Violet Fang conversation only to encounter so many passive aggressive NPC's that they long for a monster to kill. Hopefully they'll find some hot loot along the way, as... well as a hot lead on the altar of the Tenebrous One.
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Congratulations to our June Patreon drawing for the Hey Boss level.
We're going to be giving you some cool treats and junk.
Thank you so much for being our supporter.
Fool of a Took.
Thank you, Fool of a Took. Hey everybody, I'm Brian Poussin, comedian, writer, actor, nerd.
I've been playing D&D with my friends for a long time.
I decided to do a new podcast where we play Dungeons & Dragons
in my very own dining room with my wife, kid, and my noisy dogs.
So meet my friends Sarah, Kev, Dan, Blay, Chris.
Now it's time for another episode of Brian Possehn's Nerd Poker.
Season 3. Hey, everybody. It's Brian Possehn's Nerd Poker. Season 3.
Hey, everybody.
It's Brian Possehn, and you're listening to Brian Possehn's Nerd Poker.
It's episode 73.
We're still quarantine time.
I'm looking at all my friends on Zoom.
They're all here.
Dan.
Hi.
Sarah.
Hello.
Chris.
Hello, friends.
Hello.
Ken.
How goes it?
Blaine and son.
Hey.
Hey, hi and son.
Hey.
And as always, Sam everyone how's it going good awful i don't know
we're all still here looking at our screens can't be that bad
uh dan uh you have some people you want to thank yeah and you know what uh i haven't done
this in a while so why don't i go ahead and explain what's happening exactly with these
patreon supporters i'm thanking so this is the stargoyle and hay boss tier we give you guys a
shout out once a quarter so it you know takes a couple of months before we get to everyone's name
but everyone gets a shout out once a quarter at this tier so hey thanks so much you guys for being at this tier
or two hey boss and uh i'm gonna go ahead and make it worth your while right now by thanking
patreon supporters such as all one word dargthurssourface.jpeg thank you dargthurssourface.jpg Thank you, dargtherssourface.jpg
Good one!
Don't put any spaces in there, it won't save.
Thank you, Sean Dixon.
Thanks, Sean. Thank you, Jack King.
Thank you, Daniel Domingo.
Thanks, T.D.
Thank you, Bixi Tinkertonk.
Thanks, B.
Good job, Bixi.
Ted Glinka, a.k.a. Tetris.
Thanks, Jacka. Thanks, Lawrence Medina.
Thanks, Arc Blast.
Thank you.
Thanks, Paquito Torpedo.
Thank you, Ziggy Kielmeister.
Kielmeister.
Could be Kylemeister.
Thank you, One Quarter Viking, Three Quarter,
and then they spelled pussy with two fives instead of S's.
You can sneak past
the people that are trying to do like
some research for your
gap application.
All right. Thank you
Big Angry.
Thanks Dorian.
And thanks to
Katie Campbell.
Thank you. Thanks
Elisa Gonzalez. Thank you Alisa Gonzalez thank you Alisa
thank you Arrowland
thank you Rando
Cardassian
thanks
Slarg
thank you and thank you
Justin Fells
thank you and finally
this is our last shout out of the
quarter of the second quarter
thank you and they spelled this out of the quarter of the second quarter.
Thank you.
And they spelled this out both the actual way and phonetically.
Thank you, Stefan Vienno.
Thank you, Stefan Vienno.
I'm guessing that's because I have mispronounced it at least a thousand times.
So thanks, Steve.
Well, I'm kidding.
Thanks, Stefan. um well uh i'm kidding thanks stephan
blaine do you have any g-rated
sponsors uh that those patreon
supporters were brought to us by
uh yes uh it's
brought to you by h&r
tactics for vampires
h&r
and
do you like vampires
oliver a little Ben! Do you like vampires, Oliver?
A little.
Last night I fought Dracula
when I was stepping in the bedroom
and I hid in my bed.
Whoa!
You conquered Dracula. That's amazing.
Actually, I was scared.
I thought Dracula was there.
Wow.
I would do that too.
Your fierce vampire hunter
perhaps descended from Van Helsing.
Is that or Van Wilder?
Either one, I think I'm safe.
There's a lot of garlic involved.
Alright, well, without any further ado,
it is, I believe, time for us
to discuss what happened last time on Nerd Poker.
The Ice Five kind of eliminated a boss by walking in and watching someone else having eliminated a boss.
You met up with the Violet Fang in Dame Island after going through a teleportation gate,
and it looked like something real bad happened
to the Arcanist of Dame Island.
He's in a small pile on the floor
and kind of scattered around,
and it turns out the Violet Fang also
may have destroyed Gus,
who was tailing her on the way to Dame Island.
So you agreed.
Tomorrow, you will meet with the Violet Fang at the east gates on the docks of Dame Island to head toward the Archmage of Vanzervale.
So, yeah, she's still kind of walking down the stairs below you.
You guys are in a ruined room full of what appears to be destroyed artifacts
and such. And the Violet Fang just said,
hey, if you guys want to pilfer this junk, go nuts.
Okay. Yeah, cool.
I guess we're done. Good to see you guys.
I look forward to it every week. Wait, what do you see?
Costumes by Bill Blass.
Well, you know, you guys did a
perception check last time for kind of like
coming in the room but i think if this time you're going to pilfer we should get a little
investigation check from everybody investigate chris and i talked about right after we ended
last week um if we can can we do an insight check about what she said about the arcanist that he was
wanted to um what that he was actually planning to turn against us
absolutely let's get
let's get anyone who wants to do that let's do that
first so everyone hold off on your investigation
since
narratively speaking this is something that
just happened we should address it first insight
insight let's get them insight rolling
insight hey it's
an 11 oh hey
Blaine you got your insight?
What do we got for Dr. Wood? Seven.
Seven? Whoa, boy.
Not good. Not very insightful.
Hey, Oliver,
your friend Ken over here is a bird
man. Hey, Queep, what did you
get? A 24!
Ooh! Please do the voice the whole time for Oliver. 24 is very high. Hal Queep, what did you get? A 24! Ooh!
You're gonna please do the voice the whole time for Oliver.
24 is very high. Uh, Halcine, what'd you get?
Uh,
seven?
And then Darkthor, what'd you get? Sorry.
Thank you for apologizing.
How dare you roll solo?
Uh-oh.
Oh, Queep's gonna get a cracker
most of you guys
are a bunch of stinkers this time
around but uh you know when you're
all kind of ponder the thoughts most of you just kind of nod
and are like vaguely suspicious
yeah you know
Queep you think
the arcanist was very shady from the
beginning but also it was mostly because he was acting weird about his loyalty to Dame Island.
He was acting weird about having encountered you guys 10 years ago.
And it seemed like maybe he had been through some rough stuff
in the Baron of Pepper greens kind of thing.
Like it seemed like he was,
there was maybe some violence that he wasn't admitting to or wanting to
especially address.
And that's it.
That would be enough for creep being the honorable Eric Okra hero,
barbarian that he is,
uh,
to kind of go,
uh,
yeah,
he might've been amassing power for weird reasons.
He might've been bad.
And,
uh, but at the same time, like, you time, same vibe you guys have all been getting.
Violet Fang is either evil or does evil things and is kind of not too apologetic about it.
So I would think it could be evil killed evil
is what that 20 insight gives you.
But she's tweaking it to her
own advantage. Not that this guy wasn't
planning that very thing.
Yes, correct.
We don't know. But maybe she's ramping it up.
And again, you've got to really get inside
I'll tell you, you get the sense maybe
looting this room would tell you a thing or two.
Oh, let us loot the room.
So let's get some investigation
checks as you turn over
this very destroyed arcanist's lair
that may have already been picked over by the Violet Fang.
I'm throwing that in because, yes, again,
you rolled a 20 on your inside roll, so you might
think, yes, she had plenty of time, probably,
to kind of go through this room.
What's this next one?
Investigation.
Yeah, ballas.
20. 20.
Nice.
I rolled a 16.
Ooh.
Ooh!
I have a seven.
Is that good?
So does that mean nobody got over a 20?
I got a natural 20 plus two.
Oh, god damn. Yes, I got a seven. That's way over 20 i got a natural 20 plus two oh yes i got a seven that's way over 20 sorry blade should go did i mention that i was homeschooled by mennonites all right and i was in
another tab so actually i was i did a terrible job paying attention ken what'd you get uh 16 okay
sarah what'd you get 20 damn brian what'd you get 12 got. Damn. Brian, what'd you get?
12.
Got it.
Dr. Ud and Darkthor, you're mostly finding burned parchment,
shattered shelves, you know, torched cobblestone,
a couple of chunks of kidney.
You know, the room is pretty bad.
Let's see.
Queep, you're going through some
drawers and you find a couple of healing
potions uh they're kind of wedged in the
back of a drawer uh but there's like it
looks like there were more and they got
broken in the tussle uh this this is a
in a little cabinet like desk cabinet
that got kind of turned over.
But two regular healing potions.
Okay.
That's good. Yes.
We have a bunch of other potions, don't we?
I think you have at least a couple healing potions.
But I make you
track your own inventory and I just make a mark
when you guys have looted something. So I have to kind of
do a weird sideways,
checking my notes.
And we're back.
So,
okay.
So wet.
So wet and gross.
There's food moving through the room.
Oh my.
Who was that?
Just practicing my,
my Rick Sanchez impression.
So,
okay.
Oh boy.
Yeah. So Creep, you found those healing potions. Cool. So, okay. Yeah.
So, Creep, you found those healing potions.
Cool. Mark them in your inventory, boss.
I put them on my notes.
Are we really using that? That gross burp take?
Okay. Of course.
What podcast do you think this is?
Of course we're using that take.
This isn't a professional voiceover.
That's more of a give.
This isn't the Miss Manners podcast.
What are you talking about?
Sarah, you find while you're going
into sort of the back area, like
under a giant pile of junk, a
little bundled up bit
of knives, throwing knives.
So they've got
It's pronounced knives.
There's a leather strapper on them. You think there's 20
of them?
And with close investigation, you're this something is on the tip of these it's it's laced with something oh are these like balanced throwing knives chocolate they are like balanced throwing
knives and i'm going to go ahead and put in the chat uh the arcanist had these that's interesting yeah so he's he's got some shit here um
this is uh it's sort of from tomb of annihilation um so i'm borrowing the stats but
this is what i put in there they They're called like yikawas.
The what-a-whos?
Yeah, but that's the stats for the throwing ice.
Okay, thank you.
And what, 20 of those?
I found them.
Yeah, there's 20 of them.
But they're not actually yikawas. They're not this like D&D lore thing.
They're actually much shorter.
They're kind of square um with like a little
loop that you can put a
finger in to hold it and
chuck it um and
tick tock hello
hello you find
something of particular
note you're kind of
knocking stuff over and
you find a false wall
friends friends
the wall is a lie i read that in david gilmore's autobiography it's cobblestone walls there's these
really large round stones making up all the walls of this tower sort of sort of uh study for the uh
arcanist and as you're just kind of
like knocking stuff around you just see like a piece of paper go right through the wall and you
put a hand through it and it just goes straight through uh it doesn't it doesn't shimmer or
anything it just sort of it looks like your hand disappears when you put it through just quick
guess does this seem to be a small like like do i think this would be a closet size or does this seem like it's another room it's
like closet size okay so then maybe i won't grab my bow i'll get it it's hard to tell right now
you just put your hand through and you can tell the dimensions of it are like doorway size it
could be bigger on the other side you haven't stuck your face on this you want to tell me
you're doing that i will grab pull out my axe real carefully and gently stick my head in and take a peek.
Fun.
You kind of peek in and you see what looked like he may have gone in here to enchant weapons.
And there's a sort of series of single weapon racks that are like pieces of steel
and then like almost like weapon presentational
plates.
It's been ransacked already.
There's a couple of them tipped over, but there's one
in the back and it's
got an axe in it.
The whole thing's been
ransacked already? Yeah, so it's a
small room. There used to be
torches in here. It looks like they're on
the wall, but they've all been blown out. there are about seven weapon racks that look like they've got
like little kind of like like divots like kind of like you would have for like a cup but um instead
they're probably where they put spell components to enchant weapons and uh they're all just knocked
over except one that's knocked over and it's still got an axe stuck in it.
Can I investigate real quick for magical traps
and what not-ery?
Roll it up.
You guys all see TikTok disappear through a wall, by the way.
I won't call to it. I won't be
a goon about it. I'll be like,
it's a magical enchanting
closet.
But someone's already been inside.
I just want to make sure that
she's not still sleeping in bed, that
Goldilocks.
Not good.
Ten.
Doesn't feel too trapped.
So if anybody wants to follow me, they can,
but I'll make my way in
towards the back.
Alright, you approach, and yeah,
there's a couple of brass braces around the shaft of the axe.
Otherwise, it's all locked into place over on the floor.
Can I pick up the axe?
Yeah, so you pick it up and um as you hold it it feels unusually light
for something that looks so dangerous um you get you kind of start to like squint in the darkness
and it's got like this goal inlay of a feather uh on it and yeah and so it's it feels unusually light so so you you kind
of like like you kind of yank it up it would have been a strength check of say
five right to do this so you just kind of yank it up and yeah you get this axe
that looks very very dangerous but almost like it's made of some kind of yank it up uh and yeah you get this axe that looks very very dangerous but almost like
it's made of some kind of special uh metal and it's got like a little gold kind of gold what
do you call gold flake is that what it's called i always forget what this is or like gold inlay
or golden yeah like i mean it's car there's a feather carved into it and it's we've got like
gold plant gold leaf like kind of the gold leaf. I start chuckling
to myself and I'm thinking about
the cuckoo bird and I'm just like,
oh, Coip!
I think I found something
for Coip.
So you join the rest of your party in the main room
and I assume that you are...
I describe the room to them and I say,
look, I found this! And I give it
to Coip.
And I'm
like, wow.
It's got a feather on
it. Interesting.
This is the
dual blade of Kukula.
Oh.
Oh.
So the dual blade of
Kukula gives you a plus four
to attack
in addition to
regular sort of great
axe stat
and it
also you
realize it can create a glow
of 30 feet
on command
and we read all this down
okay you've got to shine like a
diamond cuckoo bird I love it
uh you can throw it
up to 30 feet and it will return
to your hand wow
oh my god and it
also has sentience
oh no so it will
listen to you and it's passive
sentience um and it doesn't it doesn't uh so much
have like words that it can express but feelings it can express feelings you can get like a vibe
from it but also you can put a message in it that will echo back in your voice to someone else who
finds it what the hell it's fantastic The dual blade of Kukula.
This is an Eric Ogren artifact
that you TikTok found.
And so
you went into it that the reason it got
left behind is he was
trying to do something with the enchantment that
was already in it. He was trying to alter the
enchantment and he couldn't put his own
enchantment on it, but he must have been back there doing
some sort of custom personal enchantments on other weapons. Did his own enchantment on it, but he must have been back there doing some sort of custom personal
enchantments on other weapons.
Did he leave us a message through there?
Ooh.
Is there any way
to find out?
Hey, Queep.
Yeah. Do what
Queep is best at. Do an Arcana check.
All right, then. Ice 5,
you're my only hope. Can I help him with doing Arcana check. All right, then. Ice five. You're my only hope.
Can I help him with his Arcana check?
Hmm.
No.
I'm going to say no, just because he is the only one who can.
I'm giving him an automatic attunement to this because it's an Eric O'Kern weapon and you gave it to the right guy.
Normally, I might be a little more fussy with that shit but got it 14 all right it's
pretty good all things considered um yeah you know you hear this uh very very distant uh
like voice kind of come out of it um but it is the voice of an eric okra oh it's not the arcanist
uh and they say luka lakai which as you of course know of course uh is just a battle cry from your
people so right okay but do we think do we think he could have done that to other weapons here
maybe left a message Left a message?
Was he trying to figure out how to reverse engineer that? Or no?
Let's get
insight checks of what exactly he was up to in this closet.
Oh, I like this.
What was
he doing all hidden in the dark?
13.
Unfortunately.
20.
22. 13 unfortunately 22 I think
I think Blaine was talking but I didn't hear him
oh Blaine no no words
came from you
thank god that joke
like even just died
here in my room
that mannequin
behind you loved it.
I got to say,
I was trying to drop an Ellery Queen reference
in there and it just clanged.
I can't believe
that didn't land.
Anyway, yeah,
it was pretty good.
Let's take a look at that clip.
What was your insight check
there, Blaine?
I had an 11,
sorry,
11,
15.
What'd you get, TikTok? 13. 15. What'd you get, TikTok?
13. Darkthor, what'd you get?
Oh, 17 plus 3. Oh, great.
So, I'll say
this.
Darkthor, you know, you're kind of kicking around the room
thinking, and you definitely think the Arcanist
was up to no good. There's something real shady
about this room, because this is, know you've you've got a runic sword you've spent
some time with your runic sword and it seems like it had uh you know pretty pretty cool enchantment
on it you're not sure where the enchantment came from but it was pretty cool that the baron of
pepper green gave it to you and it also just feels like a normal thing. So I'm about this room. It just, it feels almost like enchantments are being taken out of things.
Oh no.
Yes.
Um,
and,
uh,
get out of the room.
Well,
I think maybe he was in there doing that.
Right.
That's what this room is for.
And that he was like,
he was like,
uh,
stripping and collecting parts to maybe,
you know,
to feed and power something else.
Yeah, so Queep, actually,
you would think that they didn't get to this one.
He would have eventually gotten to this,
and the reason everything else is missing
is not because it was looted by the Violet Fang,
but because he managed to successfully
take enchantments out of everything.
Got it.
Oh, okay.
Cool.
What he was doing with this or why,
it's not immediately clear uh there are some notes in this room in a little pile uh that you know you would just notice uh as soon as
everybody came in the room doctor or halsey whoever is like the most note-minded do one of
you want to devour those notes I'm proficient
in Arcana so I don't know if that matters
or what this will be an Arcana check
okay I can do that
yeah me
too can I
also take a swing at this thing
I'd like to sit down and maybe
read something for a couple of minutes
I feel like Blaine's dice are
significantly better than mine always.
So, but I got 18 total.
Oh, well, Blaine, I'm not sure you'll need.
I'm going to give Sarah pretty much the full deal.
All I wanted was a 15 on this one.
Okay.
Yeah.
All I got was a 21.
He was stripping out enchantments from weapons and artifacts from non-human races.
Apparently, the sort of leaders of Dame Island
were trying to come up with magical protections
that would guard the city from non-human races
and keep them out of Dame Island.
Oh, fuck.
So Dame Island's just humans only?
Thus far, you did observe there was something strange about that, yeah.
I hate it when these campaigns address contemporary issues but they didn't have a problem they didn't have a problem with like us and we're no and you're
not sure that like this is necessarily to get all races out but it like it could be trying to keep
the path of the von der tusk out of town because the vonda tusk and the giants were both after them right so as far as you know that they're just
trying to get some anti-giant magic going maybe some anti uh anti-narwhal folk let's go to weird
to talk to the mayor anyway right so yeah we have to rest who's after we rest and get our
shit together and get attuned to all these magic items and everything, who's the
big cheese that we have to
light up later on?
To light up?
That's what he said.
He means we have to talk to the
mayor here, but then the Archmage
is what we're discussing
how we're going to deal with him.
Whoever's got the policies of the island.
Yeah, so the policies of the island
are sort of currently under the very badly wounded
Lord Husterbus, who lives in the Viridian Keep.
Can we heal him anymore?
Is he still wounded?
Maybe. It's been a while since you've seen him.
It's been, let me see, I can tell you exactly.
It has been a week since you've seen him, it's been, let me see. I can tell you exactly. It has been a week since you've seen him.
All right.
Well, we need to visit him anyway.
We also need to rest up and we need to decide what we're going to say to the
Violet Fang when we meet her in 24 hours.
Right.
If we meet her in 24 hours.
Right, right, right.
Oh, and you have to call it, see if you, if Gus is truly dead or just.
I was thinking as soon as we get to, and you have to call it, see if Gus is truly dead or just a while.
I was thinking as soon as we get to wherever we're going to long rest, that's when I would, the thing I need to do to try to summon him takes an hour.
So I need to sit down somewhere to do that.
Okay.
I mean, if we go to the mayor now and we're like, the Arcanist is dead, that's going to be a whole thing, right?
Everybody liked the Arcanist is dead, that's going to be a whole thing, right? Everybody liked the Arcanist.
Yeah, but we can't stay here
and rest because then if they find us here, they'll be like,
what the hell?
Why'd you find him dead? And then you guys took a
You guys also left fingerprints all over
this place. Oops.
Alright, so I think we need to go straight to the
mayor, right?
Tell him what we saw, be clear that we need
to rest and see what his reaction is and
go from there question mark i like that all right well you guys all head down the steps
of the arcanist's tower and you know people have already started freaking out because last episode
you warned the city that invading forces were on their way from the giants and the
path of the vaunted tusk so that you can already see there's like a couple of soldiers in the street
just to keep civilians indoors and you guys walk down to the verdian keep which of course incurred
some damages uh last time you were here uh well actually two times ago because you did stop by
briefly if i'm not mistaken um you defeated the Aboleth.
And yeah, the Viridian Keep has mostly been repaired
at this point. It's not looking quite as nice. It still looks like they're deciding
what to do with it.
There's familiar captains and after just some
sitting around in some nice velvet
cushioned love seats and you know,
lounge's on the big open floor of the viridian
keep the lord husturbus returns he is walking with a slight limp it looks like he is definitely
like a little screwed up he's got a big scar down the right side of his face uh it looks like maybe
it's magic from the bomb that went off and a magic scar yeah like he can't get it looks like maybe it's magic from the bomb that went off and a magic scar.
Yeah.
Like you can't get it off.
Like whatever,
whatever the priests tried to do,
they couldn't get it off of them.
You knew the priests were trying to heal him and it was not a,
not a great time.
How seen also almost died.
So.
Yeah.
He says,
oh,
well,
well,
what can I do for you?
Good to see you again.
Of course.
We need to speak somewhere.
Are we somewhere private?
Sorry. Not right now. You're kind of like in a big open area private oh okay by the way thanks for not saying what can i do you for oh no problem i'm not a dirtbag means a lot oh
all right well uh so he invites you guys all up to his uh personal study up in the veridian keep
uh you ascend a couple flights of stairs
and you're not far from where the
priests are. Invites
you to sit down. He sits down himself.
Where's the Baron also? Didn't the Baron come here?
Yeah, he's supposed to be here. Oh, the Baron.
Yes, he's actually at the top of the tower. I gave him his own
private quarters. He's actually been
very quiet.
And you think he's still up there? Probably.
As far as I know,
we've been bringing him food as early as this morning.
We have.
Some news.
Oh,
tell me.
I'll subscribe.
Who wants to share?
We made our first stop.
Are you sitting down?
We made our first stop here.
The, uh, we wanted to speak with the Arcanist.
I don't know when the last time you spoke with him was, uh, last evening.
Um, he is dead.
Yeah.
And, uh, yes.
Uh, it's quite a mess up there.
And, um, I don't know if you know what circumstances might have led to that
you tell me well i'm already giving you information which is that we were horrified
to discover when we walked up there to speak with him that he could not speak due to being dead
who do you think killed him you is the likely culprit, given that you're telling me this.
Standard procedure is to consider someone telling you of a murder that they could be a suspect.
This is outrageous.
But were you your number one suspect?
It's also very dumb.
I'm sorry.
You think that we came to town, went I murdered somebody then went came directly to you
and we were like oh
hey this guy's dead the
circumstances part was really strange
before you said it I
tell me why would you say who do I
think killed
him when you're telling me my friend
is dead this is very strange
circumstance what is you said you spoke to him
last night I did I think you're acting
very weird.
All right, well.
He who smelt it, right?
I would say that you smelled it,
sir.
Anyway,
I'm merely expressing
suspicion. I'm not putting you under arrest,
but the way you're
sort of accusing me of something
as you break the news to me that he is dead is well we were told by the guards that he was
speaking to the woman who had come to town the the strange oh is that right i didn't know that
the strange lady oh yes yes you didn't know that but the guards knew uh no i don't I don't know who this strange lady is what tell me more about this strange lady
edifying well I'm confused as to
why your your guards know
things about what's going on that you don't
told everything I don't know everything that the guards
do I'm the lord of Dame Island I don't
yeah
whether they put bananas in their peanut
butter sandwiches who gives this shit I don't
know strange lady there's a lot of strange ladies on Dame Island some of them cards about whether they put bananas in their peanut butter sandwiches. Who gives this shit? I don't know.
Strange lady? There's a lot of strange ladies on
Dame Island. Some of them have too many cats.
You know, some of them push little shopping
carts around. I don't know. There's strange ladies
in Dame Island. Does somebody else want to have somebody else do this?
I can't with this guy.
All she can do is throw shadows at you, but
she's always a woman to me, Dan.
So you've got some invading forces
coming, Dutch.
I did hear this. We've tried to
allocate troops and
I did hear that you were here and I did hear
that you told my troops this. It's interesting.
Maybe we sent them.
Maybe we sent the forces.
That's how an invader does. The first thing they do
is they say, okay, everybody go invade.
I'll go tell the mayor of fuckface town
so he can accuse us like a real pal.
Did you just call me the mayor of fuckface town?
Jesus Christ.
Dude, they're coming.
The giants are coming.
The vaunted tusk is coming.
Let's, come on, man.
All right, well, I guess i'll get to it uh still feel like you're
holding something back what do i need to know about this crazy woman this this strange woman
what is did she kill the arcanist it's possible certainly she had been according to your guards
she had been up there speaking with him for a very long time uh and then you went up there and the arcanist was dead yes we we passed her she went out as
we were coming in so we expect that she may well have done it i mean i didn't see it happen but
give me a description uh what what did she look like
she was a cool woman in a black dress do you describe what the vile thing looked like to him
i think i said about yay hi that was as much information as i know sure i'm just asking if
you want to give like a proper description or not or if you're looking at everybody i don't know
what guys why am i the only person talking i'm not gonna like make you role play saying it but
i do want to know if you're gonna try to throw the mayor off the track or actually give him a description
of Violet Fang.
Well, you describe the Violet Fang
to Lord Husterbus. He writes it all down.
He calls a guard in, hands it off
and says, please, if you find this woman on the city limits...
Slow down, slow down.
There's a reason Hal seems being coy
about this. Let's honor that.
Please, let's hear about reasons for
being coy. Alright, well, I'm looking at the mayor.
Just calm down
a second. We're trying
to help you. And I look at Halcine and I'm
like,
what do you want here?
So it's TikTok and Halcine just
looking at each other like, eh? Eh?
The rest of everybody, nobody's paying attention, I guess.
They're like picking through the hors d'oeuvres.
Everyone else is just picking their ass with their new weapons.
No, I'm just here to see how this plays out.
Well.
I'll tell you, my inclination is to arrest this woman
and at least interrogate her.
She's not necessarily going to be killed or tortured,
but I'm very suspicious of what sounds like.
I think if you arrest her,
she will eat and murder everybody that comes near her.
She's less of a woman and more of a...
Interdimensional god.
Demon bat.
Think of it this way.
You're aware of the fact of Manzikorian and the Tenebris one and all that.
You know what's going on, right?
I've heard legends of something called the Tenebrous one and all that, you know, you know what's going on, right? I've heard legends of something called the Tenebrous one. I don't know what a Manzikorian
is. Is that like an accordion? Like it's got keys and you kind of squish it around.
Look, look, I'm going to make it simple for you. It's a cannonball run. Everybody's trying to
become new God. So far, everybody's Jamie Farr.
Everybody fucking sucks.
Nobody should win,
including her, but we don't know how to
beat her yet. So we're trying to get in the race,
but if you attack her, it's going to
fuck it all up. So do
us a solid.
Fight off the giants. Fight off the
fish people. We'll get back
to you. Do a persuasion
check with advantage. That was awesome.
Jesus Christ, this fucking guy.
Also, we gotta ask him about his
discriminatory
island practices, but
Persuasion.
By the way.
16. Spike Lee.
16? Yeah.
He narrows his eyes and says, very well, I will trust the Ice Five,
who, of course, have done their best
to protect Dame Island
with this crazy demon bat lady.
You go ahead and handle her.
I will continue to reinforce the city
against the giants
and the path of the vaunted tusk.
We'll do our best,
and you do your best.
And it's been a strange meeting.
Thank you very much.
Is there anyone we could speak to
about what the Arcanist was up to
before potentially he died?
Because that may have some bearing
on how and why this happened.
Well, you know, the Arcanist
was a very powerful wizard.
We curated him into service
and his specialty was providing
magical protections that would you know sort of create auras like darkness uh he could create
the spell known as darkness on physical objects he was very good at it and uh he could also create
sort of auras or protective fields so he was trying to protect us via magic.
Hmm.
It's a coincidence
that so many people around us love darkness.
Did he successfully find a way to
cast those protections or auras or
blessings onto things?
Well, we should be protected from giants
entering city limits. Whether the
giants will do things
anyway that could potentially break the
magical barrier is one thing.
Giants also have these creatures called
behirs that are sort of like centipede
dragons that could break the barrier.
We know. Centipede dragons
you say. Let's back up to the centipede
dragons. Are they like insects
with, are they like dragons with a lot of legs
or are they like insects that have like brief fire they're dogs remember the they call them
the giants dogs yeah and one of them i think swallowed dr uid at one point yeah um all right
right they can like breathe lightning but um my favorite movie is human centipede dragon
human centipede dragon part two is actually really well written. So you, you know, he tells you that this protection against giants of some of the Arcanists created a couple of years ago,
but that he was trying to adapt it for Behirs and the Monodonts.
So those two things were unsuccessful and they were trying to hasten that recently.
And he's rather disappointed the Arcanist is dead
because that means there may any moment be monodonts walking the streets.
So he starts freaking out about it.
Well, we did prevent, I don't know if you've heard,
but we did prevent there was going to be an attack from the north.
It looks like we've at least stopped that.
Thank you. You're welcome.
I did hear something of that from the guards, but hearing
it from you, it's more clear. Thank you.
Dratlata and the mother brain. The deuce.
Wow.
You don't say. So the
mind flayers and the drow
pirates, they're all
out of commission. Well, they're all out of commission.
Well, they're without a head.
Wow, wow.
Thank you.
You're welcome.
Sorry.
We may need to go speak with the Archmage next.
So I know the Arcanist is gone now.
We're going to need to rest.
We're going to need to recuperate.
And if possible, if there's anybody here besides the Arcanist who might be able to identify objects or sell us some things that could help, we would really appreciate speaking with them.
Well, the Baron of Peppergreen is currently staying in the visitor's dormitory, and I believe he might know how to identify objects.
By himself himself you said
he has a small tool that can do it once a day he is a small tool that's how he's sort of been
earning his keep actually yes he's been sort of studying objects that we that he was on our list
to speak to anyway so great very well uh there's room for you to stay in the dormitory you may stay
there tonight if you wish. Thank you, sir.
We're sorry about your arcanist.
No, it's cool. He was weird anyway.
Just kidding. We loved him and I feel
weird about this whole conversation, but
it was good to talk to you. You did save Dame Island
from the Aboleth.
Again,
come back any old goddamn time.
Are you sure?
Okay.
Sorry, I'm just trying to try those.
The Dungeon Master definitely just trying to be funny
as you segue out of this.
So, yeah, you guys head up one more flight of stairs
and there is a dormitory for visitors to Dame Island.
The door leads to another chamber with a fireplace
and another series of doors.
There's like bookcases.
And yeah, you you know you figure
these are like men's and women's dormitories so like one side goes uh for men once goes for women
and um there's there's not a clear uh sign of which is which except for that there is sort of
like a little table with dainty women's things next to one so you're guessing that's like the
the women's dormitory that's got like you, you know, toiletries and what have you.
So you're up here.
You can rest in the study.
You can go look for the Baron of Peppergreen in his dorm,
whatever you like.
Well, we want to rest.
Yeah, rest first and then talk to the Baron, right?
Okay.
Sounds good.
And do we feel like we're in okay sounds good and are do we feel
like we're in danger in this place do we feel like it feels pretty cozy i mean there's like a few
dozen guards between you and the outside world so okay like we're not gonna get knifed or we don't
have to worry about like a bead of poison coming down from a fishing line right above our bed while
we sleep and we're about there's spiders drinking from our eyes or any of that kind of stuff. Let me just type
bead of poison
spiders drinking from
I love it. Okay, that's going to happen eventually
but probably not tonight.
Okay. How about the thing about
eight tons of mites in my mattress?
Is that thing true? Oh God, what's that?
Look, we're not in
Manhattan. You're fine.
How about a butt-eating snake in my toilet
oh god you ever read those snake in my toilet those like reddit stories about ringworms that
climb up your butt when you go in the toilet jesus christ i was about to tell a actual story
about someone that i know who they found and i hate that i have this information that this
is possible and now you guys will have to know too that is this a cursed episode they their
kid came to them in the morning and were like and was like um there's there's an animal in our
potty and they went to like the bathroom that their kids used there was a live rat in the toilet bowl
and apparently that's a thing that rats can hold their breath long enough to get under the water
trap and come up and then just be chilling in your bowl toilet what yes you remember that part
rat tattooing yeah i heard that was just what Patton did on the set Isn't it possible
It came into the bathroom and fell in the toilet
No but I mean
Apparently it's like a thing like you like if you google
This like I didn't I wish that I hadn't
But yeah there's like there's like diagrams of how it happens
And yeah
Because there's like air I don't know it's a nightmare
And I don't know about the mold in the breath
Because I get dead rats in my pool
All the time
That's the thing it's just enough there's just a tiny Spot where they have to go through I don't know about the mold in the breath because I get dead rats in my pool all the time.
That's the thing.
It's just enough.
There's just a tiny spot where they have to go through.
And the reason you find dead rats in the trunk of my Cadillac every time I go up to Angeles National Forest.
Know what I'm talking about?
Oh, yeah.
Yeah. I just feel like you changed my life.
Yeah, this guy is.
And now I have to look every time.
Oh, my God.
In the middle of the night?
Now it's just like there could be a rat in there at any time, guys.
Now you know.
Yeah, but just poop on it.
It'll go away.
Well, I guess, yeah.
I guess you guys don't have to sit down to pee, so that's lucky for you.
Hopefully it won't leap out at you in the darkness.
I don't even sit down to poop.
Oh my God.
Wait, how did we get here?
I just wanted to talk about rats.
I just wanted to talk about rats in the toilet
Why did we get to pooping?
Now we're talking about
I've been
Hover shitting since 99
I'm a flinger
I was talking about
Mites in a mattress
Feeling safe in this place
Mites in a mattress
Well anyway are there rats in the toilet In this place. It's in a mattress.
Well, anyway,
are there rats in this room?
No, there is a bathroom.
But again, like, yeah, there's two main areas of sleep.
You're assuming there's just beds
in both of these sort of side rooms.
And yeah, you can take
a long rest right now.
Let's.
Let's do it.
I'm going to like,
you know, I'm going to need
a half an hour in the bathroom
just to kind of hang out and steam a little bit. It it's near sunset it's a little early to go to bed
uh but not if you guys have been in I don't know two boss fights in a row without
taking a long rest so we're bushed yeah uh once we get to wherever we are I'm gonna try and start
casting uh are you gonna split up with Halc seen and respect the weird ass gender norms of dame island uh sure let's uh maybe is it good to be paranoid the night before we go meet her
i'm staying in the room it might be good because maybe i'll get more information
you know like there'll be maybe there's people to talk to you guys can talk to i can talk to and uh let's not try to like create more drama i guess okay
all right cool well you guys split up and um the gentleman you head into the men's dormitory and
sure enough the baron of pepper green is sitting at a small table uh scrolling around at something
and he doesn't turn around when you come in.
There are also what looks like
a couple of half orcs
standing there talking to each other.
They do kind of look at you when you come in.
Sarah, you go in and
there are a few people
getting ready to crash
for the night. There is
a drow sitting at the work
desk.
What does the drow look like familiar no you've never seen this drow before it's also the only non-human you've ever seen on dame island
that wasn't hostile uh am i in the room nope this is a women's dormitory that's what i thought yeah
but you guys i would say the half orcs that you see
are also not...
You've never seen half orcs in Dame Island before.
And the Baron of Peppergreen that you see
is the only gnome that you've seen on Dame Island.
Right?
Okay.
You guys go because there's more of you,
so you should just interact first.
Howdy, fellas.
Yeah.
OK, all right.
I think I was going to be one of those.
What you want?
I think we're crashing.
I think we're all bunking up together.
Cool, bro. Cool, bro.
Hey, Dad.
Well, you know, you bro. Hey, dad. What are you doing?
Oh, you're not talking to us.
I'll be your daddy if you want.
Just kidding.
You're talking to the dome.
Anyway, yeah, the Baron of Pepper Green turns around and says,
oh, I didn't know we were on that familiar terms.
Hello, TikTok.
Cool.
I leave.
What do you want him to call you Baron
I
can call me whatever he wants that's fine
all right
we've got quite a history at this point I don't want to make it
any weirder than it already is
I sit down with him and I tell
the guys to come sit with us
hey guys
do you remember the Baron of Peppergreen
he does that he did that thing about the soul coins and reading people's minds.
Do you guys remember all that?
He'd never been near a university, never got a paper or learned a degree.
Oh, sorry.
That's Mayor of Simpleton.
Can you tell us how to do that now?
Could you listen in on somebody's thoughts now if we asked you to?
He kind of looks around and says,
why don't you do a persuasion check with advantage?
You've got him kind of surrounded.
So if you want, you can do intimidation.
I think they're all, oh no,
my intimidation is actually a little bit better.
Happy to intimidate him. That's a Oh, no. My intimidation is actually a little bit better. Happy to intimidate him.
That's a 10, Dan.
With advantage,
that's a 10? Yeah.
It was a 7 and a 3.
He kind of gulps and says,
Sure, sure.
I
can listen in. Who do you want to listen to?
I look
at the guys and say,
excuse me,
who should we,
do you guys,
would you like to listen in on
the Archmage of Vanzerale right now?
Would it be smart to listen in on
the Violet Fang?
Who do you guys think would be a good person for us to?
Oh, I don't have contact with them.
No, no, no, no.
But if you want...
I have eyes in different settlements. I could get you
a settlement kind of close to
the Archmage of Angeveil.
Or who's the other person you're looking for?
Where are they?
I'm not sure where she is. I think maybe
Dr. Kwee?
Who is?
What do you guys think? Archmage of Angeveil?
Or who's the other person?
Violet Fang. Oh, I've never heard of them. Uh-huh. Well, I guess it guys think? Archmage of Angevale? Or who's the other person? Violet Fang.
Oh, I've never heard of them. Uh-huh.
Well, I guess it would be the Archmage there.
Definitely never heard of that other person.
Wow, you're really very gullible
bird. Yeah, we got you.
Hey,
hey,
you never heard of her? Nope.
What's up?
What's that other person's name?
The Violet Fang? The purple nope what's up what's that other person's name the violent fang
the purple
thing she's a pan dimensional
being who came here to try and see the
throne same as everybody else
oh okay
she's not giving off any body language
tell she's not lying to us is she
this is a
this is a male this is the Baron of Peppermint
why don't you all do an
insight check okay
a uh 20 plus a 4 is 24 oh hello well you get a sense dr uidid that the Baron of Peppergreen is 100%
lying about not knowing who
the Violet Fang is
but it seems like
genuinely he wishes he knew what the Archmage
of Anzervale was up to these days
do I have a gun on me
can I use a gun to shoot
the Archmage
yeah so you take out a glock and you put a cap in his ass.
I love it. I got to roll for damage.
13.
So,
I say we intimidate him
into telling the truth about the
Violet Fang.
You're the admiral.
Does this mean that the violet
fang is is allied with the
the island people against all these other
things
is that the vibe we're getting or
that there's some sort of shifted alliances
going on or you
could ask him are you sure you don't
know the violet fang
I say
intimidatingly.
Let's say
is anyone
going to be the one to put a weapon to his
throat with this one? Or are you going to do any
kind of physical? Because you've
already tried to intimidate him and honestly it didn't
kind of perfectly pan out.
Queen, you got that cool new
feather axe, right?
You going to put that shit right up to him? Yeah. Alright, let's get it. You get intimidation with advantage. Oh. Right. You put that shit to it. Right.
Right up to him.
Yeah.
All right.
Let's get you get intimidation with it.
Oh, my goodness.
Oh, the tables have turned.
But it's a higher difficulty because he's playing his cards closer to his chest.
The second time you try to intimidate him.
If I already have advantage, it doesn't matter.
Right.
You don't get to roll three times.
Got it.
Fifteen.
He gulps and says uh okay okay i know who the violet fang is well that's what you know uh jesus christ
uh well um the uh the violet fang is a creature from another dimension. Uh, she's, she's basically a drow from another dimension where drows are just different.
Uh, are you in contact with her?
Can you tell us what she's thinking about?
I am.
I've been in contact with her recently.
Uh, I, I do not currently have a way to be in contact with her.
Uh, but, uh, yeah, you know, she, uh, she's, she's sort of been trying to, you know, she's sort of
been trying to, you know, bring other
beings to this dimension.
I don't know exactly what she's up to, but
yeah, she's kind of
evil.
She worships some kind of
drow god that she big sacrifices
to. It's really gross.
And yeah, she's got
those wings. She's got those wings. She's
got her own agenda. I'm not sure what's up.
Do you think
it has something to do with those crystals underneath the
ground that everybody wants so bad?
Oh, well.
Yeah, those.
I can tell you about those.
I wish I was there.
I just take some dainty toiletries from the ladies' table yeah we were I wish I was there well those are sort of
like
I just take some
dainty toiletries
from the ladies
table I guess
while you guys
do the manly
investigating
go
that makes sense
we'll get to you
in a second
but I will tell you
me and Scooby
are gonna check out
the snack tray
I know it's my fault
I said let's split up
he takes a deep gulp
um
and he asks you
to all get closer
and he says
uh
the
the core of this world contains a being that is larger than anything that could even fit on the surface of this world.
And those crystals are sort of like the teardrops of this god, this creature, this being.
And forces are trying to harvest this power.
It's like a beholder.
Yes.
Universal transdimensional beholder.
Yeah.
Well, remember, remember we met that beholder over in a creeps town and it,
every time it fell asleep, it made little gazers.
I believe the archmage is trying to collect enough of this power
that he can open a gate to Gehenna.
Yeah, so then he can ascend and become the Tenembris one.
Yes.
So it's just about a gate to Gehenna?
Yes.
Is there any way to block this gate?
Well, you could try to stop him from opening the gate.
You could try to take away the crystals that he has amassed in his keep.
Uh,
you could,
I don't know,
get there first,
uh,
to the,
the,
the,
the altar on pandemonium's Fang,
um,
you know, where the Tenebrous One
has visited in the past, where
Manzikorian has once been.
I kind of like that idea.
When you say go there first, you mean go there
first with... You could destroy the altar, and in
theory, it would be difficult for him to open the gate
where he planned to, yes.
And then Manzikorian would remain the Tenebrous one.
No one would be the Tenebrous one.
Manzikorian is sort of the dead Tenebrous one,
and he is trying to get enough power that he can claim it back.
Get it.
You know what?
Hang on a sec.
I'm going to go next door and grab Halcine.
Halcine,
while these guys are doing all of that, you walk in.
Oh, I do declare.
A man.
TikTok is not to you yet. I'm going to have to
pause him a little bit. He can be, he can
come in at the end of these next
few minutes. Okay, I hold my I do
declare. Well, exactly.
That would be very forward. But again, he's sort
of like a genderless mechanical thing more than a mechanical man. Oh, that. That would be very forward. But again, he's sort of like a genderless mechanical
thing more than a mechanical man.
Oh, that's not what the fan art
says.
Wow. You're a regular pregnant
Sonic. I have not
visited deviantart.com in a long
enough time. I gotta go check that
shit out. Yeah, Halcine, you
walk in. There's, you know,
a few people getting ready for bed and
then a drow sitting at the desk oh so i have to have this interaction okay you can or you can
just skip it no no i definitely want to i love to talk um hey how's it going you're talking about
oh she she says oh hi
are you already mad at me? We just met.
Sorry.
Well, what's your name?
I'm Dessa.
I knew that was coming.
Great to meet you, Dessa.
What are you doing here in Dame Island?
I'm an ambassador from the south
where in the south oh it's uh it's south of cloudenheim it's uh it's a different it's a
different continent was it called maybe i've heard of it i've read a lot
uh i have to go look this shit up. I forgot what that continent is called.
Didn't brought you by
Leslie's quick
turns your milk. Oh, bloody
bless.
He's quick. Chocolate's
well for vampires.
I really
wish someone had built out the nerd poker wiki enough so that I could know
all right so she's she's from the continent that we used to be on what are you ambassadorizing
what are you what are you here to do well uh you know I took a boat kind of around everything
and uh just kind of hitched my way here with some pirates.
I'm trying to get aid.
You know, this whole comet thing affected us down south too.
So I'm just trying to get something to the mage college where I teach.
Just trying to get some assistance.
Dame Island sucks though.
I've been going from town to town and they're very reluctant to send any kind of aid.
Hmm. going from town to town and they're very reluctant to send any kind of aid i mean apparently you know they're they're not even going to be able to take ambassadors for
much longer so oh is that what they said yeah they said something about because of upcoming
magical protections all non-human races are going to have to vacate the city within the next
24 hours something like that this is like another thing.
Well, that's too bad.
Where are you going to go?
Well, I was going to try to find a drow known as Drotlana.
She is a powerful pirate.
One of her lower level people kind of took me in her boat
up to Dame Island and dropped me off.
So hopefully if I can find Drotlana herself,
she can give me some information.
Oh, okay. I've heard of Dralana.
Yeah. What kind of
information would you be looking for from her?
Well, you know, trying to just find
a few drow, just trying to
see if anyone can sympathize
with my college. We've gotten
into quite a lot of trouble down south
and people don't generally trust us.
So I'm just hoping we can get a mage to come down
or maybe-
A lot of drow colleges down there?
Well, there's one drow college.
There's a lot of mage colleges down there.
Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.
Well, this has been fun.
I forgot that I left my wallet with my friend.
TikTok comes through the door.
Oh, do you have my wallet?
I said, oh, what are you talking?
We're talking to the thing.
You don't have a wallet.
You want to don't you remember that one time?
You're like, Jesus Christ, I ever meet somebody as a wallet.
I'd like to kick them in their figurative nuts.
Hi, I'm TikTok.
Oh, hello.
Oh, fuck you. Let's go.
Wow.
So I
follow him, yeah.
When Mike DeBone brought up Mark Ratner's
wallet, it was way smoother than this.
Nice. other fucking guy
Damone
yeah Damone
he was a good actor because you really
hated the character you genuinely hated
are you like dragging the
arch the not the archmage
the fucking Baron of Peppergreen like
out into the study area are you gonna just go
meet up in the dorm and have him talk to Alcindor
I will bring her up to speed and say
what do you want to do I think they were just bringing me
into the men's chambers right
well there's those half orcs there so I'll sort of
maybe yeah there's two half orcs to go oh
yeah maybe in the study I'd be like
why don't we should I bring him out here
I guess so just so you know that
Drow is here looking for Jotlana.
I take my jacket and squeeze some of the blood out of it and go,
yo, here's some of her face.
Do you give that to Dessa?
No, no.
This is after we're out of the room.
Yeah.
You just leave it in like a little bowl and like write like Jotlana's face
droppings like on the side.
You drag the Baron of Peppergreen
kind of, not literally, but
semi-against his will
out into the study.
He says, okay, so the Violet Fang.
Yes, yes. I know the Violet Fang.
I know of her.
They filled me in on what?
You said you saw her recently. When did you see her?
Yesterday.
What did she ask you to do?
She asked me if I knew anything that could help her ascend to the Drow Pantheon.
Yep.
And who is the god that she currently worships?
Some dead god.
I'm not sure what its name is.
It starts with a Z or something.
Yeah, Zinzerina.
Oh, God.
Okay.
Now we got Dessa in one room.
We got this guy and his...
We can't get rid of that particular pantheon.
What did you tell her about how she could ascend to the drow pantheon?
I kind of just did double talk.
I didn't want her to kill me.
That kind of a thing.
She appeared in the middle of the night.
I think she kind of broke in here.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
But I've heard of her before.
She just told me not to say anything.
What do you think?
What's a good way if we needed to handle her, let's say?
If you had any pointers for this
group of ragtag sons of bitches
he like looks around
making sure there's not like a drought
clinging to the ceiling and listening
or anything and says
oh you should you should probably
either
kill her that would be good
or
somehow trap her or paralyze her.
If you have anything that can turn her to stone,
that would be great.
Not because she's especially vulnerable to it,
but I'm just trying to think of random ways
to stop a bad person.
No, we want to hear...
Aren't you a learned man?
Oh, ha ha.
Yeah.
I mean, there's...
Here's the thing.
Do you have plans with her do you have plans are
you about to do anything with her do you know her for coffee yes we're meeting in the morning so
here's the thing um there is a sort of place you could take her there where there are stone
statues it's east of town on the other side of the river uh there's these stone statues you could tell her that these
statues will somehow come to life and uh provide you with information on the archmage of anzalabia
but the truth is at midnight every night these statues all turn and look at anyone who is in a
circle and if anyone in that circle makes eye contact with any of these statues, they become one of the stone statues.
You could lure her there.
Thanks.
That's cool.
Interesting.
It's called the Glen of Remorse.
It's about five miles.
It's sort of hidden in between a couple of hills.
Can it be freed?
What?
You said every night they come to life.
They're statues.
They look like all kinds of races.
It's because they're previous people who've been stuck in the Glen of Remorse and made eye contact with other statues.
I'm not sure how it started, but it's been there for centuries.
But once you're there, you cannot get out.
No.
Does everyone know about it?
Would she know about it, do you think?
I don't think so.
It's very privileged knowledge.
She's new to this plane.
I doubt she's explored that area before.
That's great.
Just don't be stuck in this circle.
You'll see it.
It's sort of like,
it looks like someone's freshly dug a circle
into the dirt in the grass,
but really it's been there for a very long time.
And then when she's a statue,
do we destroy her?
Do we just keep her just uh no one has ever
escaped the clan of remorse after yeah she would be the first to escape if she does knock it over
just paint her yeah so you just stay there um well this is great does what other questions do
we have i guess we can think about it well you know what let's sleep on it well if we have more
questions for you we'll speak in the morning great uh. Before you rest, are you going to summon Gus to talk?
All right.
Oh, and also if the Baron...
Wait, before you do that, just because I want that to be what we end on,
but if the Baron can identify one thing a day,
we should get him tonight and tomorrow, right?
Sure. What do you want him to identify tonight?
The goblin ear necklace.
We never have done that, right?
It's a good idea.
So he takes the goblin ear necklace we never have done that right it's a good idea so he takes the goblin ear necklace from you and he sort of runs it over his hands and he says oh this is a this is a very
important artifact where did you get this don't worry about it wow the passive aggression with
npcs this episode is pretty intense, but I get it.
It's like they've all got the same passive aggressive voice.
So, yeah, he tells you that this is a druidic artifact
that was created to protect Clottenheim
made from the mummified ears of ancient goblin chieftains.
The wearer of this can step outside of time
and go 30 seconds back.
Oh my gosh.
However, once they collide
with the next 30 seconds, they
blink out of existence and appear
30 seconds in the future.
So what this means is you can
relive the last 30 seconds,
but then
you're going to be missing for the next 30
seconds.
Interesting. And he tells you this can
this effect can only be used once a year
oh okay
that's fair
okay
the year starts every time you use it
but he's like oh it's got to charge life
interesting
okay well that's good to charge life. Interesting.
Okay.
Well, that's good to know.
Thank you.
Pretty good.
And yeah, you're going to summon Gus.
Yes, please.
Which room are you doing this in?
You're going to do it in the study?
You're going to do it at the dorms?
I guess wherever is the quietest.
Probably the study.
No one's in the study.
Everyone's getting ready for bed. So you go sort of in the main dormitory area.
Dark, will you hold my hand?
I'll have your back. How about that?
Well, I'm just worried.
I mean, I hope he comes back safe.
It would help to know there was a pal
there. Sure.
So, yeah,
you spend an hour
going through the incantation
you speak the power word and
little Gussie
kind of just blinks into existence
he looks at you he smiles
and then his cheeks get big and go
and he horks up what looks
like fairy dust out of his mouth
oh buddy he goes
oh man sorry I've been at the Feywild
it's crazy
oh you've been there
yeah
are you okay yeah I got
killed but luckily there's magic protection zombies
do you remember Darksir
I remember all you guys
what are you talking about
I give him a hug
he really appreciates the hug and he does like a weird little
like a French bulldog face
where he goes like happy smile little, like, uh, like a French bulldog face where he goes like, like happy smile.
Oh buddy.
So much has happened.
Well,
did you try to get her attention and she just killed you?
Oh yeah.
That weird drought killed me.
I was trying to sneak.
She set up a campfire,
like,
like right at the edge of town.
Right.
I tried to get all sneaky and she was weird.
Right.
Like she looked like all jet black, like, like all her skin was of town, right? I tried to get all sneaky and she was weird, right? Like she looked like all jet black.
Like all her skin was just this like,
just like inky onyx color.
And she just looked over her shoulder
and she opened her hand
and a little mouth appeared on her hand
and she sprayed acid out of it and I died.
Wow.
That's a good heads up.
Good note.
I'm all right on that note. On that note, hey Sam, that's a good heads up good no I don't know
I'm alright on that note
on that note hey Sam what do you think happened
this episode Jesus Christ
alright this
week uh Queep found a
healing potion like a very good bird
uh we found
a weapon with a feather on it if this
is a bird axe I'm gonna lose my mind
get ready to lose it it is a bird axe, I'm going to lose my mind. Get ready to lose it. It is a bird axe.
This is the best game I've ever
played.
I'm getting real tired of this
mayor.
All of us. I don't know
if you name campaigns, but I'd like to
nominate Sarah's sentence. Are you
mad at me? We just met.
And if somebody does use that goblin ears thing to go back in time i hope they
go back before i learned about the rat toilet oh boy uh anything you want to plug dan or anybody
else sure i'll plug some stuff my first comic book that I wrote came out on DC Black Label it's called
The Last God Sourcebook and I helped come up
with a bunch of monster statistics and moves
for a bunch of stuff for The Last God Universe
you should get it on
Comixology the app
or you could buy a physical copy if
you're in one of those retail stores that's still open
during the apocalypse
BrianPossain.com for
tour dates and stuff and
and then uh youtube i've got that pussain channel now oh and i'm on uh gimme metal doing my show uh
every tuesday morning at 10 i'm having a blast doing that uh blaine what's going on with you
and the kitchenator oh we're doing Book Dragster.
We're going to just drive by your house really fast and throw books at you. Good luck catching us.
Book Dragster.
Any kind of book? Just a
mostly hardcover? You know what?
Whatever hits you,
you're going to like it. He has really
good taste in books. He's just getting rid of a bunch of stuff
he found in his garage. But it's all
really good stuff. I think I saw Confeder bunch of stuff he found in his garage. But it's all really good stuff.
I think I saw Confederacy of
Dunces was in there someplace.
I think it's going to replace the sharing.
Like Deadeye Dick and
some Galapagos.
Oh, I love Galapagos.
Yeah, so there's some good stuff in there. I guess you just
got it like as swag, probably.
But it's good.
It's like getting a loot crate thrown at you by
a by a detective
oh
but anyway good luck
I know exactly what that must be like
I'm so glad for all the new listeners who are
hearing this bit and going
what is going on
right now because this is a really
easy show to understand episode 73
of yeah episode 73 of you.
Episode 73, thanks for listening.
Thanks for listening to another episode of Nerd Poker. You can follow us at patreon.com slash nerdpoker, and you get bonus episodes from there.
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