Nerd Poker - S5E31 The Verdant Swirly

Episode Date: March 7, 2023

We left our last episode on a cliffhanger- will Queep and Friar Jolly survive the low roll in the swirling green magic tunnel?! Well, Dan kind of cut Ken off so, Ken might actually have a plan. Also first we have to get to a particularly ribald round of listener thanks with a special visit from Billy. We missed you Chris! For merch, social media, and more be sure to head to nerdpokerpod.com. And for 3 bonus episodes a month and more, subscribe to our Patreon at patreon.com/nerdpoker.

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

Lee Chris Now it's time for another episode of Brian Poussaint's Nerd Poker. Hey, it's Billy. Season five. Hey, everybody. I'm Brian Poussaint, and you're listening to my show, Nerd Poker. Episode 31, I believe.

Or is it 57? Who knows? Could be. Season 5. And all my friends are here. Oh, wow. That's true. We're all here.

It's been a while. No one sings Stained. Well, not. They're here. Dan's here. What's up, buddy? Yeah, I know you're a bigger Olympus kid. Yeah yeah I was just doing it I won't do that for our listeners

I really hate that band but I can yeah anyway get on it Ken's here yes hello how are you Brian there was a limp biscuit Fred Durst directed a movie a couple years ago and the main character in the movie

Is driving with this kid And for no reason goes Oh man I used to love this band And Limp Bizkit comes on And it's It was so like Cringy Like Fred Durst put that in

To make Devin Selwa or whatever his name is admit to being a Limp Bizkit fan in this movie. And it had no business. That scene. And yet there it was. Thanks, Fred Durst. What movie was that?

He made a movie about like... Oh, it was Travolta too and it was terrible. It was that stalker thing that Fred Durst directed a couple of years ago. Travolta plays a stalker and he's stalking Devin Selwa. The hell? Yeah, it was so bad. Watch it right after this.

Sarah's here. I'm here. How are you doing? You know, I'm OK. I was going to say you could sing the kinks. You could sing. All of my friends were there. Let's hear it.

Yeah. My friends were there. Blaine's here. Stand and stand. Say what they may. One of the best songs about show business, by the way. Oh,

is that what it is? Okay. Yeah. It's a guy who, uh, he bombs on stage and all his friends are there. And so he, he freaks out about it.

He beats himself up. And then it turns out he doesn't care. Nobody cares. They're all still his friends. Blank, come at you, everybody. Hey, I want to see Limp Bizkit with Will Durst. Oh, my God. Hey, Chris, how are you doing?

Hi! Oh, you know, just busy stalking Devon Sawa. Yeah. Somebody auctioned my life rights too, by the way. Nice. Thanks. Sam. Hello, sweet children. How you doing, buddy?

Doing good. Doing good. Cool. Well, let's, uh? Doing good. Doing good. Cool. Let's I guess it's official. We can kick off episode 31. Hooray. Where's Ramen? He's

right by the edge of the bed. He just got a little he got a little good breakfast food this morning. He's very excited. Has he been outside already? Is he going to walk? He hasn't been for a walk yet. No, he hasn't been. He's been outside to pee, but he hasn't been outside for his walk yet.

Right. Yeah, you let him go out just for a minute. But yeah. Did you give him a dog McMuffin? Yeah, I went to the place by Brian's house. They love animals there. 50% of their employees are stray dogs uh i told you that that guy uh i went to that mcdonald's night shift which you guys were used

to and uh i ordered two two large diet cokes and he goes two large diet Cokes. And he goes, two large diet Cocks. And he was very amused by himself. And then when Melanie cheerfully said, these are large diet Cocks. And he handed them over and he was so damn happy that he picked the exact right customers to try that hilarious gag on.'s the d and mcdees yep these nuts dan brian hi want to talk about rick dees for a while he's very popular at the local vinyl shop. Rick D's nuts. Remember when he did Disco Duck?

Disco Duck? Yeah. Let's go. Do it. I don't remember the lyrics. Oh, you want me to think listeners? I'll do that. Disco Duck. Do we have any listeners in Disco Duck? We sure don't. But you know what? If everybody could change their Patreon name to a Disco Duck joke, that would be very interesting. No. go duck we sure don't but you know what if everybody could change their patreon name

to a disco duck joke that would be very interesting at least something down in the disco duck district oh my god hey just try your luck don't be a cluck you heard it listeners blaine promised to have a disco duck district joke ready to go by the time i'm done reading these names so an extended one yeah yeah that's what you just said i would like to thank patreon supporters at our hay boss and stargoyle tears because they are very very very generous they go by names like nakama toys chicago unlimited toys thank you james hadaway thank you carlos amel mahey thank you a taint joke thank you jones face jones thank you pratt dudley thank you snagging this is southerly tentacle well thank you eric wortley

thank you jim kubak in donkey land thank you 69 71 milf tits avenue thank you i'm hung like a bull a gerbil thank you spunky hanky panky cranky stinky dinky lanky honky tonky winky wonky donkey congrats to both of you thank you gazzardo's veiny cerulean feet fetish jesus thank you luke husband Tron jib jab is prime. These are getting to be like transformers. Like, I don't know some of these. All right. Thank you.

Ruroni. Colleen. There would have been far fewer dwarf guts in the walls. If Sarah had been there to remember, they were there. I mean, fair. Thank you.

Ed Gein's leather jeans. Thank you. Oh, Sarah. No, i mean fair thank you ed gein's leather jeans thank you oh sarah no uh thank you druzel thank you sir swedish sirloin meatballs thank you wv french fried thank you this name's brought to you by vanch the the ranch-scented douche. Ban. Thank you, Michael Bennett. Thank you, visitvorpalbook.com if you contracted Vorpal Botch due to exposure to fantasy asbestos. Thank you,

the other Zach Ward. Thank you, Post Encounter Dungeon Cleanup Enterprises, you slay, we scrub. Thank you, the surgeon left a sponge in me. Thank you, Jockey Chan. And finally, thank you, Jim Hollingsworth. me thank you jockey chan and finally thank you jim hollingsworth thank you all so much especially those of you who made me think of veiny uh thrombosis jokes those were upsetting uh blaine who were all of those patreon supporters brought

to us by uh patreon supporters are brought to us by the discoco Duck District, home of Saltwater Daffy, McDonald's, Ritz Quackers. That bill's all available on our website. Send us the bill. That shit is whack. The Disco Duck District, Dan. Oh, good work. Good work, Blaine. That's impressive.

I just feel like everybody needs to celebrate it and you, Blaine. Congratulations. I think listeners and you, Blaine. Congratulations. I think listeners and I all learned a valuable lesson. We can pimp Blaine into any complex joke with very short notice at any time. I'm just distracted now by Sarah and her pirate outfit. I've got a corny old scratch. I thought I would put on a fake eye patch for the Zoom to remind you all. Happy Suffer Like a Pirate Day, everybody. No, I'll i'll take it off it's gonna slow my computer down too much the graphical prowess

i know sarah look i'm not gonna bully you into getting a new computer but how bad is your computer that i can't handle an eye patch no it. But yeah, the Zoom filters take up a lot of processing speed. Do they? How could it be? I feel like. Don't they? I'm just making that up. You'd think Snapchat and a phone wouldn't be that much more hardware power than Zoom.

I heard Microsoft Word takes blood from your system if you use it. It runs on platelets. Yep. That's just how I use it. It runs on platelets. That's just how I heard it. Speaking of blood, it's time to talk about what happened last time on NerdPoker. Ken did a really good impression of me for like half a second there.

Our heroes made it down a spiraling green magic tunnel heading deeper into the Lich's Keep. Pretty much everybody made it across except... Whoopsie doodle. Queep was carrying Friar Jolly and it didn't go perfect. We take you to the spiraling Aarakocra already in progress. First, I would like to use a lucky to rer roll you don't say you don't say i do say

you have luck i have lucky yeah all right well let's re-roll it what was our athletics yes it is athletics yes come on baby i have those weedies the rolls are so bad okay 23 yeah oh wow what a great cliffhanger to just wait until the next episode to use a luck point. Nice. Well, you ended the episode before I did. I know. That's because I'm delightfully cruel, but now it is exciting. Yes.

So I got a 23. Well, that's plenty. And I will now take the map from an alternate dimension i had and just quietly throw that in the garbage all right well you all make it from that other episode we all make it yep yep sorry brian i thought you're on the phone for a second we won we all you all make it to the other side of this spiraling expanse. And yeah, nobody is dead.

Nobody has been ripped to shreds by the violent magics. And there is now in front of you a door. You have already descended down a magic, you know, like magically tricky spiral staircase. And you are now down here. Way on the other side of this tunnel. tricky spiral staircase. And you are now down here way, way on the other side of this tunnel. And, uh,

this, this door, I would say seems a little, uh, normal for your tastes. It would set off everybody's sensitivity alarms as probably not being as simple as it seems as given all of the trickery you've been through. And just like every step of the way for the last bit.

And we think it goes to like another plane of existence. Or are we already in the other plane of existence once we got to this landing? Well, you know what? Let's all do an insight check because we all deserve to know what plane we're on. It's time for everybody to look up at the departures

board up there. 25. Settling my dice work. Okay. 16. 10. And I rolled a one, but I have a good bonus. Just so you know, Dan.

Oh. Good bonus. Well, I wanted to know about the one. All right. Well, I wanted to know about the one. All right. So it seems to all of you very likely that you have passed into some sort of other dimension. Anybody be a 20?

Somebody be a 20? 25. Okay. It feels like, Kweep, based on your adventures through time and space you feel you feel as though going down that tunnel was was um a sort of limbo between planes and that you are now in a destination plane where the true lower keep lies whether or not that's uh you know good thing safe thing seems pretty irrelevant it's like this is going to be bad news bears either way but you're uh definitely in a new place because so should we try to okay so should we try to mage hand the door first to see if there's anything trappy or anything else on it and then i can do knock if it's locked if that's the issue nice i like both of those ideas okay so we made hand the door all right um as the mage hand um touches it it uh oh i don't want the mage hand

to open and i just wanted to like stroke the sides of the panel oh sorry i just said mage hand the door like as if that meant open it yes i wanted to open it that's correct okay well we can talk about the weird stroking plan also. The Mage Hand really likes its hair. Yeah. The Mage Hand signs I love you at the door. It actually does try to open it. Dan, I'm sorry to interrupt.

Please tell me what happens. Please. It's locked. It goes... Okay. So do you guys want me to cast Knock, which will open both magical and unmagical, or do we want to try to...

I mean, it didn't trap it. It didn't go off a trap on it, right? Do you want to try those lockpicks first and save yourself a magical spell just in case? I think so. Let's do it. I say we let him go. Winifred's got a weird new voice. I was inspired by Farajali.

He's so... Oh, I see. I'm trying something out. This is for... You have to understand that most of the shows I do are one-woman shows, so I need to be playing

every character. So when I do my performance about these events, I will be playing each of you. And you really should think about that with each and every decision that you make moving forward. And so you're saying that's your version of

my voice? Sort of. I'm working on it right now. Whoa. It's not there yet. Sounds like Walt. Okay. So I'm going to try to lockpick the door. All right. That'll be a sleight of hand check my friend

i will give you guidance cool on the impression or the like the spell guide i need it on the impression for sure um actually winifred doesn't she has performance okay so that's a 32 that's decent we're rolling so high all the time. Alright. Alright. So you hear a click, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck, marked. Okay. Seems super safe. Great job. Open it?

Yeah. Is that what you would like? Yeah. Do you want someone else to open it? I'll open it. Yes. I rolled a one on my inside, so fuck it. Yep, I'll open the door. There's a train coming at us. Okay, so Friar Jolly goes

To open it and um It starts to open and I'm gonna have you do A dexterity saving throw Friar Jolly Winifred fuck me Dexterity you say I do say Oh Well I rolled a one And with my bonus it's a four oh my gosh uh one's not great so

that's a four you get it open just a little bit and a lot of your body frame is sort of in the crack of the door as a huge metal spear just goes through the crack in the door and you're going to take oh no a break by the pool nice take a break by the pool. Nice. Take a break by the pool. Welcome to Palm Springs, where everyone's a hero. Let's see. That's going to be 22 points of piercing damage. Oh, oh, I, I, I too many. Okay. 22 points. Ouch.

Does it then retract out of me? It goes back out of the door. Is the door open now? It goes back shut. Hmm. Tricky door. Definitely a trick to it. My cat doesn't like it.

Uh, I would like to investigate the door without opening it. Okay, I will allow it. Do your investigation check, yes. You stare hard at the door, running your hands over it. Well, that's... clearly I've solved everything with my four. Oh, boy. I don't know if you could hear it. The cat is on my head right now. So, with a four,

you're kind of, yeah, not 100% sure. The door seems fine to me, guys. I don't know. He says, winking at the camera. Everybody's tried? Nope.

No. Just queep. Can I try investigation? I would love if you did. I welcome it. Oh, wow. 19 plus 1, 20. Alright, you think by looking at the door running your hands over it

just with tenderness Ronnie there is some sort of large spring loaded device on the other side of it that is what pierced Friar Jolly Friar Jolly how are you doing on hit points real quick?

Aside. I'm at 61 out of A3. So, you know, you're bleeding a little bit, but it didn't destroy you. This thing appears to be mechanical in nature, which I think would be some sort of a relief because magic traps just tend to be more complex. But it does seem like every time you open the door, a large metal spear is going to pop through unless you can somehow disarm a contraption on the other side of the door.

Should we try to trigger it and trap the spear? Yeah. Can someone very quick with almost monk-like abilities, grab a spear in mid-staff, you wonder? Isn't the spear currently out? Because it's in Prior Jolly. It retracted. I made a little sound effect, and it went gunk, gunk, gunk. It went back, yeah.

Sort of reset, I think. Yeah. And the door kind of very slowly shut. But, like, you do think, yeah, if it was set off, you could potentially grab it or do something. I'm going to try. I'm going to try, but I'm also going to keep my body out of the way. Right.

I just grab it with my hands because I know where it came from. Cool. This will be a sleight of hand check as you pop the door open and try and snag it. Can I give him guidance before he does it? Please. Come on. as you pop the door open and try and snag it. Can I give him guidance before he does it? Please. Absolutely.

Come on. The flame courses through your body. So how much guidance do I get out of that? You get to add a d4 to your roll. Oh, perfect. Yes. D4 Est Kelly?

Cal? E I'm not a joke doctor D to his friend Oh nice 14 Okay Is that with the D4? 15 15 with it yeah Nice. 14. Okay.

Is that with the D4? 15. 15 with it, yeah. It was 12 plus 3. Oh, no. No, it isn't. It's 14. Sleight of hand was 11.

And then, yeah, the custom roll was 3. Awesome. And then the door opens. You're out of the way of it. so the spear does not lodge itself in you but you know very quickly it goes and like sticks out of the door by about six feet and you manage to plant your hands on it what do you want to do now that you've got it in your hands it's going to retract soon shit what would i do break break it yeah yeah can we attack it i mean i'll help you grab um

i would say it's very quickly going to jump uh back in while he is holding it so if any of you guys attack it other than him it's gonna put him in danger yeah i'm gonna grab onto it with him okay do um if you're if you're gonna try to yank it or do anything, I'm going to need a strength saving throw from both Queep and Rotten. Okay. Wee. Wee. Wee.

13. This thing is a machine and it will try to rip your arm off. Seven. It starts going through the door and you're getting yanked into the door um the door is not opening all the way it is kind of in a fixed position so the crack of the door brian and ken it's only about 10 inches wide long enough for the metal spear to go through and you're being being pulled through it with your shoulders, you're going to take damage

unless you can do something or let go. I got to let go of this thing. Let go. Okay, so... And it goes all the way back through, and the door goes... Son of a... Let's blow the door up.

Yeah, what if we just break this fucking door down? I'm an air elemental. Can I just go in there and see what's going on? Sure. I mean, tell me how. I'm not going to do all the work for you. I was just expecting you to just tell me what I do to be a hero here. Oh.

Can I go through this 10-inch thing here and get into the back and see what the device looks like? And maybe I can destroy it or disable it or something. Yeah, sure. You want to set it off and just whoosh in there? Yeah, why not? So Dr. Uid cracks the door open, taking a step back naturally, of course course and it goes clang this big thing sticks out and as it starts to click click click back through you turn into an air elemental and just fart your way in through the door yeah yeah yeah all right you enter a large chamber that seems to

have a big door on the back of it as well as two prison cells there are four tables with what appear to be bloody skeletons and torture devices hooked up to the skeletons there are six smaller cages there is a torture wheel in the corner there is blood from the four primary torture tables leading into a large pentagram in the middle of the floor nice uh there is a metal spear next to the door that is pointed at the doorway and there is also a bubbling magic orange cauldron next to the door that appears to be probably unrelated, but there are, you know,

many torches on the walls here. There are blood drains, animal cages, uh, eerily quiet. And, uh, the blood is fresh or dried.

It is. Hmm. It's dry. Okay. D D DD is too satanic take that churches from the 70s

and you're just hanging out sort of by the door trying to scope out the trap that's basically what you see with the whole room playing if you want more about the trap it does look spring loadedloaded it looks like the door is also hooked up as such that when it opens a certain amount it only stays open for a second long enough for the spear to pop through and then retract so there's a spring-loaded device for the

door so it always only opens a little and then shuts and there is a spring-loaded device for the door, so it always only opens a little and then shuts. And there is a spring-loaded device for the spear, so that when the door is opened, a trigger is pulled. It's like the door at Target, right, guys? Oh my god. Every time. I take 22 points every time I go through that door.

Oh my god. Can I... I'm trying to think if I can do anything as an elemental. Is there any damage do you think I can do to this device? Let's see. What's your damage?

You are a funneling cloud of air with a face. Tell me about it. I mean, you could, I think you can attack it. Um, well, I'm seeing,

uh, I could just do bludgeoning stuff and I do, uh, 3d eight plus two bludgeoning damage. Yeah. So you can just start wailing on it if you like okay I'm going to try to do that alright let's get that melee attack

roll 3d8 plus 2 876 so 15, 21, 23 points of bludgeoning damage on this thing alright yeah it is not broken but you've taken some chips out of the wood

uh it looks like maybe one of the the uh spring load devices is a little crooked does it look like it would uh if it got activated again, it might screw up or get jammed? It looks like if it were activated again, it could work exactly like it used to. It could work like it used to and then start to deteriorate quickly. It could completely misfire. All kinds of things. I'm going to tell the guys to activate it again from the outside and get out of the way. Okay.

Okay. All right. Is it my turn to open the door? I will stand clear of where I got stabbed and do what... What if that happened twice, though? It's true. It's a good point. I'll peer through the crack.

Yeah? You're just going to look right in there? I'll open the door and try and do what Dr. Wynn said. Okay. Okay. So you're going to probably want to do a dexterity saving throw here. Oh, Christ.

Eleven! Friar Jolly! Stepping into harm's way. Alright, so you take a big step back. Right? You're giving lots of clearance to this door you pop it open and as it starts to open there is a click like the spear falls off of its mount as it shoots through and it just dashes your arm for three points of slashing damage

my arm uh it is now busted the door goes back shut but the spear is now on the outside of the room detached from its trap detached from its trap excuse me it worked so the spear is gone but the door is still the door is shut is there still that 10 inch

space no like the door is shut. Is there still that 10-inch space? No, the door is shut. It feels like you could smash the door open fairly simply at this point without setting the spear off. Yeah, let's do that. Smash! Smash the door! Smash it up! That's my fart voice. While doing a weird fart voice, Dr.

Uid as an air elemental just bashes the door contraption and you are all able to open it. Should you choose? Sure. Yeah. Also, should you choose? We can head on over to roll 20 and I will show you the very satanic chamber you are all walking into. Excellent. Yeah, that's just a map

of Chipotle. One moment while I move out the map from our recent bonus episode with Jen Kretschmer. That was fun. She was great.-hmm she's good at the dungeons it's a fun guest oh here we go

And revealing a little more of the map. Yeah. Oh, dear. Oh. Wow, that is what I saw. Looks like something from the Chiller, the video game. You know, Bunk, being unnerved by it, grabs his swords and is sort of shakily looking around. He's still fucked up from being inside a worm's stomach, but he's on guard.

Ew. Dan, on the north side directly across from us, is that a doorway? Mm-hmm. On the north side, there is a giant steel door with what appears to be some sort of demonic skull mounted on it. That's probably where be some sort of demonic skull mounted on it.

That's probably where they keep all the demonic skulls. To the right and the left of it, there are some sort of prison chambers. Should we mess up this pentagram of blood on the floor? I mean, I don't

know what could go wrong. The middle is like a portal, it looks like. Mm-hmm. Maybe. You'd have to get closer to see that right from where you're standing. It's like a little pool. Oh. Does it have those little goldfish that

nibble the corns off of your toes? Do you step into the pentagram no what are you crazy oh you said you wanted to get a good look at the little swirling pool in the middle of the pentagram look I said look alright so you peer timidly across the room towards it

it looks like maybe there is blood in a pool, a stone basin, and that it is swirling in a counterclockwise direction. It's a portal to Australia. Are there any signs of life in here? Let's have everybody do a perception check.

Cage buddies, as we said. Cage buddies. Cage buddies. 3 plus 4 is 7. Preception narration. 21. 17. 10.

18. All right. You're looking around. Not a lot of signs of life there is some sort of uh non-moving pangolin like creature in a pangolin in a uh cage on the left side of the room and you think you hear uh friar jolly some very quiet breathing in the far right side of the room. Northeast on the map. Can I see what's in that cage?

Would you like to approach? Carefully. You think you see kind of curled up in a little pile, a scaly being. Possibly a little pile. A scaly being. Possibly a reptilian. It's curled up like a cat. So you can't see its features very well. It looks like it's asleep. Well, what do you guys think?

Pangolin? Scaly? It is red. There's a sleeping creature in this room? Yes. In a cage. About the size of a cat, but red and scaly. Is it over here where I'm clicking?

This cage here? It is this cage that I'm pinging. Way up here. Does it look like Noodles or whatever that guy's name was? Your character wouldn't know. Noodles? She would know because she's heard all of the stories of the incredible travels. Okay.

Do an insight check, Winifred. I will tell you something if you can beat a 15 and something if you can beat a 20. Two things. Oh, you should beat a 20. It's a good goal. 17.

Okay. You think in the nearer cage off to the left, there is a pangolin-like creature, not unlike what you had heard adventurers in Davin Glavin had encountered. Mr. Squeep and Uwud. Yes, sir. Does this look familiar

to you? They did not encounter it. Nobody from that season is in this adventure. What season was it? Four. God damn it. What characters are four? Who do we know that wouldn't know? That was the one where you burned down the jungle, Sarah. Yeah, I'm always burning shit down.

That's every season. Oh, maybenie's cousin knows about it then right yeah maybe his dead cousin um tell you about a pangolin but yeah the the breathing sleeping creature is up here to the right and i would i would say winifred um you would be excited that maybe it's a creature some of your heroes have heard of, but you can't quite piece anything together. Let's talk

to them. Yeah, I'm going to approach the red sleeper in the northeast corner. The red sleeper. Episode 31. The red sleeper. Okay, what would you like to do? Is sleeping?

Apparently. I'll be like, hey there! Do you need some help? Do a persuasion check, please. Certainly. I'm going to give myself guidance, Dan, if that's all right. Yeah, I like it. Okay, so it's a 12 and then adding a D4.

A 16. It wakes up and you hear a very quiet voice say, If you truly befriend, get me out. What's your name there? Gus. Gus? Gus? All right, I will carefully...

I'm first going to check out this thing to the right. Well, they would recognize that. Right? They would recognize that. Right? They would recognize that. Friar Jolly wouldn't, but Queep and Dr. Uwud would, yes. Yeah, and they didn't, right? They did not take the lead on exploring the room. If they like, they can take note that this is happening.

We didn't hear the voice. It's up to you. As a player, are you invested enough to interact in this mode? Yes, I am fully invested. Yes. And I will come and listen to this voice. Oh, let me out, boss. Oh my god.

I'm going to look over here to my right to whatever's chained to the wall. Is that thing for sure dead? It is some sort of automaton that looks like it is no longer in motion. Automaton. Yes. Is that the thing that Luke Skywalker got shoved into to keep him warm on hot? Is that the thing that Luke Skywalker got shoved into to keep him warm on hot?

Well, little guy, I want to let you up, but I'm worried that this room seems to be lined with automatons. Yeah, there's a lot of dead things here, boss. Well, I don't know those guys are dead. Couldn't that thing come and kill me if I try and open your cage? He kind of looks over at the thing and says, Oh, maybe.

I think it was tortured though. I don't think it's like a gargoyle. I'm going to let Gus out. All right. Gus starts shaking himself off and then kind of proudly starts like strutting around the room. He's just like, all right, here we go.

What happens? How is this not a huge reunion? I don't understand. What's happening Gus is Gus was in the Gus is like waking up he doesn't really know what's happened yet how you been what you doing okay does he know

us it's Dr. Owen there we go he probably recognized me dressed like a fart. Whoa, that was a big part of it. And then Queep was like pussyfooting around the beginning of the room. Well, here we go. Where are we going?

Time to slay the evil king. Let's do it. Who, what? What happened to you? Huh? What happened to you? Huh? What happened to you? How'd you get in here? I flew in here as a scout. It went terrible.

I'm very sorry to hear that. Are you okay? No. What's the matter? I got tortured. Oh, no. It went bad. Oh, no. Poor Gus bad. Oh, no.

Poor Gus. Now, what did you tell them when you were tortured? I told them I didn't know these guys. They were torturing over here on these wheels. And they were like, okay. And then they poked them a bunch until they stopped moving. Oh, no. And who was doing this?

I don't know. And who was doing this? This guy, he had like a weird metal mask on that looked like it was nailed into his skull. And he had this big axe he was dragging around on the ground behind him. And he would sometimes take the axe and just like swinging at things and cutting them in half. But he also had this weird table

full of tiny knives he would use on people. When was the last time he was in here? Oh, boy, like yesterday? Oh, shit. How long have you been in here? A week.

Oh, boy. Alright, what do we do. Where did the nail face go? He went through that big metal door over there with like a... a deer head on it. Is there a lock on the caves that Gus is in?

There was a very small lock. It's already been smashed he's strutting around the room with his hips just rocking back and forth and his head held high just god damn weirdo how dare you

see the big bloody pentagram on the floor did you see anything happen with that anybody go in that anybody come out of that anything happen yeah they kill people on those tables their blood drains into the pentagram and then weird beings come out of that? Anything happen? Yeah, they kill people on those tables. Their blood drains into the pentagram and then weird beings come out of the pool. Oh, God. And what do the

weird beings look like? Ah, tall. They got arms and legs and they kind of hover and then they start to like clot or congeal and be less liquidy, but still look like they're made of blood. And then they start to like clot or congeal and be less liquidy, but still look like they're made of blood.

And then they walk out of the room with male face. So everybody went through that door to the north. Uh-huh. Oof. You don't want to fuck with those two doors with the cages. Don't go to the, don't go to the prison cells. Why? There's undead things.

Undead things. What do you know about this guy? Experiments in undeath, what? What do you know about this guy over here, the Pangolin, I think he's called? Oh. He's a little dead boy, I don't know. He's dead?

I don't know him, but I don't feel great about his current state of being. I don't know. He's dead? I don't know him, but I don't feel great about his current state of being. I don't know. Well. I'm going to check out the pangolin. Okay. Please tell us his name is Stuart. He's kind of like a pinkish blue color. Has a duckbill snout,

a little unicorn horn, and he's just laying on his side motionless. Can I touch him and cast Spare the Dying? Sure. Spare the Dying. I touch a living creature that has zero hit points. The creature becomes stable. The spell

has no effect on undead or constructs. You place your hand on him and nothing happens, unfortunately. It feels like the life has left him hours ago. Uh-oh, guys. Well, we could grind him up

and make aphrodisiacs. True. I'd be careful. Everything in here is designed for turning things into zombie stuff. Yeah. I didn't have a great feeling about this room. No,

they made... What does Nailface call them? Uh, Bluggums or something. Bluggums? Bluggums? I don't know. They sound adorable. I mean, I'm wondering if we should

somehow interfere with the pentagram just so nothing else can come through. That's why I was saying like smear the blood on the floor to prevent it from being a bloody pentagram anymore. It looks like the pentagram and the runes around it have been carved into the stone and some sort of magical material has been painted or dripped into the carving before the blood.

So you can sort of see through the blood. There's some sort of, you know, white pearly substance that has been. But what if we like dilute the blood? Like we pour like Mountain Dew or something in there so that it doesn't have the same effect. I forget. Yeah. Your friend's from West Virginia and uses mountain dew to solve a lot of problems um yeah you could there's all kinds of things do i'm just trying to give you a lay

of the land i'm not trying to tell you it's impossible to fuck with the pentagram you know is there if like brian has that does brian have the axe is this the axe guy does anybody have a huge edged weapon we can sort of like smash the smash the pentagram a little bit? It's 55 feet in diameter. The little basin in the center is 10 feet

in diameter. The outer edge the lip of it is about 5 feet or less. Well, could I maybe try and bless some water, and thus creating holy water, and we use that to do what Winifred said, and sort of dilute the blood?

Ooh. Absolutely, you could try. All right. I always like cockamamie plans that could be very successful, or not. I would like to pray over this water and infuse it with the spirit of the silver flame cool uh you now have silver flame holy water and is it a vial or something i'm assuming we have like water skins and stuff like that so I would just I'm gonna sneeze too he sneezed

listener he sneezed where is it where is it no I sneezed you don't gotta bless for me god damn it I didn't hear it thank you you can't just walk around saying you sneezed

well I muted my microphone for your benefit. Hopefully, it got muted on Sam's end as well, and our listeners weren't like, ugh. But nothing. Yeah, you've got like a little vial or a canteen. All right, so I will try and pour that wherever it seems the most vulnerable spot of the blood going into the pentagram i'll try and pour the holy water on that okay if you look at the the blood um the most vulnerable spot might be the etchings near the base and it seems like it's it's definitely gotten gummed up and clotty around those runes

a lot of blood has collected there and also when they start to touch the runes with the very outer edge it looks like the blood has maybe been spinning in a circle when it's wet and there's kind of a swirl to it so i would say say the outer edge or the inner pentagon. They're not making tie-dye t-shirts for tourists in here, are they? Among other things. No, they do that at the Gilda Bear. Oh my God, they're building bears. Build a bear.

Oh my god, they're building bears. Alright, can I pour this holy water and try and mess up this pentagram? Yeah, so you're not going to step into the pentagram, correct? No, Dan. Fun. You can do a roll to try to

splash it into the center, or you can just pour it right over the outer edge oh what do you guys think center or edge start with the edge i'll start with the edge i'll give myself guidance and try and put it on the edge you start sprinkling holy water on the edges of the pentagram and it smokes immediately black smoke rises up off of the blood and a very low green flame briefly burns where you dropped the holy water on the blood and then it goes out hmm that wasn't silver it It was green. Maybe it was like dying off. Yeah, does it seem as though it's washed away anything?

Yeah, so it looks like the dried blood is just missing as if the green flame removed it from the ground. Oh. Can I bless everybody's water? Can we try and hose it down? Yeah. Yeah, does anybody have... It would be helpful to have like a,

I used to have all this water magic. Can you bless my bladder? I bet Dr. Ulin's got some water stuff. Yeah. I'm going to gently reach up uh, Queep's cloaca and try and bless his prostate. Queep's cloaca!

I feel like, something... His prostate. What do we roll for that? Isn't that how he's peeing? I don't know bird anatomy, but... I don't know bird anatomy. I don't know. Somebody would sneeze.

I'm sorry. Cloacas are not found in mammals, and prostates are only in mammals. Okay, so Dan does know bird anatomy. Dr. Dan. You're welcome. All right, well does know about mammals. Dr. Dan. You're welcome. Alright, well I bless whatever has water.

Okay, everybody has at least a canteen and Dr. Lewis... Do you bless the rains down in Africa? Bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop bop I'm going to bird pee on this thing. Try to spread it around. I'm just going to spray. Oh, I'm serious. I have holy water in my bladder. Queep is going to pee holy water. All right. I'm going to reach further.

I'm going to be this guy. The blessing is removed from holy water when you drink it. I didn't drink it. It was already in my bladder. You had your bladder blessed? Yes. Were you not paying attention? That's why we're talking about prostate. I put my hand in his cloaca.

I thought prostate was not the correct thing. I thought 100% that was a bit. No, no. Okay, canonically, Friar Jolly. I'm trying to get some distance on this holy water.

Okay. I mean, this is absurd, but I yeah. No, this is the kind of absurd that you're absolutely going to have to choose Friar Jolly. Is this a medicine or a religion check to stick your hand up his coica and bless his bladder water? This is not going to be that much water.

He only is going to have... I'm going to look for a spell, a water spell. I will say to Winifred's point, it does occur to you that a bladder's worth of water is about as much as a canteen you could just fill and lob. You know what I mean? You could do it. I guess we don't want to have fun then fine no i do want to have fun so no he said he did it i want to find out if it

worked yeah i will use uh my uh medicine and give myself guidance wonderful so go ahead and roll yes this is for you listeners this is for you all right so i with my bonus i got a 10 and then adding my plus 13 is the total um i mean i feel like you definitely touched some kind of tube whether it was a ureter or another part of a bird's anatomy, you'll never know. I don't know. Alright, I'll try anyway. Alright, the mighty Queep flaps his wings and prepares to arc his cloaca's

spout across the pentagram. Can I get this check? What is this? Yeah, I will let you choose you could do uh slight of bland you could do a um god that's funny i made my brain blank what he could do you could do either a either a medicine check or you could do an acrobatics check

to get your pee real nice all over the pentagram. I'm going to go acrobatics. Make it fancy. I'm going to give you some guidance. Are you going to try to pee right on the middle or are you going to try and really lay it all out as you fly in a circle? Just across. Yeah, some in the middle.

Really crumb dust it. As much as I can. It's like decorating a cake. Just across, yeah, some in the middle. Really crumb dust it. As much as I can. Alright. It's like decorating a cake. He's gonna try to outline the thing. Oh, thank you. I really needed that visual. Thank you so much. It's like the old Are You John Wayne joke.

I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm your role tennis. All right. Acrobatics.

Here we go. That's a 18 plus. Oh, yeah, this is gonna be

nice. Plus 220. Oh my gosh. Well, it's a true golden

shower as as sweep ascends to the height of the room, begins his his formation around and you just you just pee your your hopefully holy pee on the pentagram. your hopefully holy pee on the pentagram. It sizzles a little bit, but it doesn't do a whole lot. It really feels like it's moderately blessed. It feels, you know, like this was really fun,

but not really doing a lot, magically speaking. It's like summoning fajitas. Alright, somebody else throw some holy water in there. Yeah, I guess, can you bless my canteen? I do! do okay i'm just gonna double check that i don't this is so frustrating because i used to have spells that would have been so great for this but um i don't really have anything i think anymore that's gonna do it um just triple checking here. No. Let's see.

I can chill, warm, or flavor a cubic foot of something. I mean, I could make it, you know, Baja Blast flavor, but no, I can't. Let's see. Yeah. Is there a way to... I have Ice Storm. Could we bless the water and the ice? Yes, something like that.

Yes, you could. Yes, you could. All right, well, we'll have to hear how that intense, holy Ice Storm goes on our next episode of Nerd Poker. Sam, I really hope you are listening to some of the bird shenanigans in this episode. I believe I was. All right. Episode 30.

Are we in another plane of existence? No, we're at another door. A door with a spear that's attacking us. There's a torture chamber inside full of torture stuff. Blaine flew inside. We're attacking the door. We broke in. There's some cool swirling blood.

There's a pangolin. There's a scaly person. Our buddy Gus is in here. And there's someone else in here who's dying. We person it's our buddy gus is in here uh and there's someone else in here who's dying we're gonna try and dilute the blood with holy water queep is gonna pee holy water on it we all heard chris say slight of gland right uh queeps magic pee didn't do what we were hoping so we're blessing sarah's canteen that sounds right love beautiful dan anything you want to plug, my friend?

Yeah. If you would like to check out the role playing game company that I launched, please head on over to Patreon dot com slash Grim and Whimsy. That's Grim with one M. And I'll be plugging that a lot on social media, but I've already put some stuff out. Hopefully you will have some fun over there. Also, I am doing some standup shows around LA. I'll have just done the splendid show.

I'm going to be at the lyric Hyperion theater doing standup. Yeah. Where's, where's my plug for that? Don't, don't know where my poster for that is, but yep. I'll just be posting about that on Instagram.

So check it out. Cool. I got tour dates, uh, coming up. Brian for saying.com. I'm in Tacoma. Um, and April I've got, uh, Oklahoma city coming up and I've got San Diego again, uh, comic con and, uh, more comic books coming out soon too. Oh, and posting it on Grata on YouTube if you want to check it out.

Blaine, what's happening next week? We attribute the success to save mankind. Thanks for joining us on this episode. You got walls and a roof? Well... On the next episode of Nerd Poker, Blaine is replaced with an AI that can only sing Bellini and the Jets. Say, Candle and Rodney, have you seen Helen yet? Oh, they were so spaced out. Bl-bl-bl-bl-bl-Bellini and the Jets. Oh, but they're weird and they're wonderful. Oh, Bellie, she's a really good lady. She's got the electric boots.

Every boy hit her soon. You know I read it. The little bad guys are like he. No. Benny. Benny. Benny. 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. And you can also send us anything at P.O. Box 16069, Encino, California, nine one four one six. Thanks for listening.