D&D Court: Razzing Refs, Misty Mysteries and The Triple Trident Proceedings

Audival's romance collection has something to satisfy every side of you.

When it comes to what kind of romance you're into, you don't have to choose just one.

Fancy a dallions with a duke, or maybe a steamy billionaire.

You could find a book boyfriend in the city and another one tearing it up on the hockey field.

And if nothing on this earth satisfies, you can always find love in another realm.

Discover modern rom-coms from authors like Lily Chu and Allie Hazelwood, the latest romanticy series from Sarah J.

Maas and Rebecca Yaros, plus regency favorites like like Bridgerton and Outlander.

And of course, all the really steamy stuff.

Your first great love story is free when you sign up for a free 30-day trial at audible.com/slash wondery.

That's audible.com/slash wondery.

This is a head gum podcast.

Dungeon, dungeon, dungeon, dungeon, dungeon, dungeon, dungeon,

dungeon, dungeon,

welcome to Dungeon Court, everybody.

John!

John!

Yes, we are your Supreme Court justices, Brian Murphy, Emily Axford, and Caldwell Tanner.

Emily and I, Emily and I like shook our clavicles as we said that.

We like locked eyes.

It was honestly intimate.

But like in the way that when you play in a band with other people, it's intimate.

Yeah, like we were sharing.

We basically, I mean, we did like the podcasting equivalent of like bass and guitar, like noodling in perfect.

It really is noodling.

That's what podcasting is, really as an art center.

True, yeah.

We're just noodling.

We're just noodling.

It's kind of like 21st-century jazz.

Yeah, you know, you guys noodled together hard, just

some good noodles.

Yeah, and we've got a lot of in-the-room here, a lot of chemistry, a lot of sparks flying.

And then

over there in New York, we've got the lowly, lowly, lowly, lowly, lowly, lowly, lowly, lowly, lowly, lowly, lowly, lowly, lowly, lowly, lowly, lowly, lowly, lowly, lowly, lowly, lowly, and lonely, actually.

And lonely.

The lonely bailiff, Jake.

A lonely bailiff.

I am in a room by myself.

Nobody to noodle with.

Not even any lights on.

Yeah, the lights are off.

They turn the power off.

So Headcum hasn't paid or been able to pay its electricity

in, I guess, nine months.

Huh.

And with that, we'll have to take it away.

Hopefully, you still have your laptop charged.

Yeah, I might have to run into a hallway to juice up if needed.

But for now, hear ye, hear ye, crit is in session.

The honorable Supreme Crit Justices Oxford, Murphy, and Tanner presiding and noodling.

The first case comes from Connor S., the case of the eviscerated first ever D ⁇ D character.

Oh, okay.

Oh, no.

I love these titles, though.

I just want to shout out everyone.

They're always so good.

This one could have a good ending, though, right?

That's true.

Yeah, you're right.

That would be the most devious thing you could do, Jake, is just sneak in one good ending.

Yeah, don't worry, guys.

This is one of the good ones over here.

Connor S.

writes, Good Morrow, glorious and radiant just now.

This one's going to be bad.

I was playing my first ever DD campaign with a first-time DM.

Before he started, he declared that this campaign would be relentless.

He would be brutal towards us and our decisions.

Are you a high school football coach?

Being a first-time DM and coming out that hard is so funny.

I mean, it's what I would script if I were writing it.

It's just like showing up to a martial arts class having never done it before and just being like, just so you know, I'm not going to hold back.

All right.

I'm going to do things differently, harder than expected.

A few sessions in, we were tasked to investigate a shopkeep spaceman and discovered a cult completing a ritual to summon a demon.

Classic, lovely.

Yeah.

When it was clear the purpose was to flee the demon, the rest of the party fled.

My halfling paladin, who worked to keep the peace in the land, saw the demon standing before me as a threat to the region, and I stayed behind briefly to determine what my character would do.

I decided to run before telling the demon, quote, next time we meet, you won't escape.

Okay.

Okay.

Yeah.

I like that choice.

Yeah.

When I turned to run, my DM stated that I had taken too long.

You have to roll initiative.

Everyone, just roll roll initiative.

And the DM didn't take kindly to my threat.

My character was now dead.

What?

What?

Why?

What did the demon do?

The demon would just one-shot me.

Wait, I did wait.

Did the demon one-shot him?

Or did the DM just say that?

Yeah,

that's a big difference.

The demon would one-shot you.

All right, the demon casts one-shot.

There's no save because it is a one-shot.

Power word, shut up.

I explained that I was just trying to set up a cool role-play moment for the future

and that I at least deserved to roll to see if I got away.

My DM relented and rolled higher in initiative and did one-shot my first-ever character.

Okay, okay.

Was I over-role-playing in this situation?

Was I right to be upset that he just killed my character so quickly?

Or should I have taken his warning that this would be a more brutal campaign and just turned to run with everyone else?

I don't know.

Well, they did roll initiatives, so shout outs to the DM.

Unfortunately, slightly better.

But we're already starting in a negative place, right?

It's not buttoned up.

It's not buttoned up.

It's buttoned up, but they did the buttons wrong.

Yeah, they did the buttons absolutely wrong.

The genes got ordered.

Even if you got a better initiative and got away, you'd still be like, I had to rules lawyer for the DM to not out of character just say I was dead in the most uninteresting way possible.

For trying to insert, it's not even like you were trying to deliver a monologue.

It was like you turned over your shoulder and said, I mean, next time we meet you, you won't get away.

Yeah.

To kill you after that line.

But it's a very funny thing to say while you're running away, too.

Just the instant turn and run after that.

I mean, that's the exact type of roleplay that you want your players to have.

You want them to say things and you want them to interact with your NPCs.

And I understand where the DM's coming from to a certain extent, where it's like, you're setting up a thing to establish a bad guy.

Yeah.

And then they're going to run into him later.

So it's not time to fight the demon now, but they should be able to say something.

The idea that you just have to sprint away from anyone who seems strong instantly.

What do you guys think?

I actually think if I were DMing, it's a free action to speak.

Well, I think, yeah, there's got to be a limit.

I feel like you got to have like a certain number of syllables you can say before the DM gets too upset.

Do you guys think that if you're surprised, you shouldn't be allowed to say one cheeky final sentence?

You should be able to say that.

It's just fun to talk at the table.

You should be able to talk at the table, yes.

It's fun to talk to your friends.

Even if I feel like you could say something and be like, oh, no, if I didn't have time, I didn't really say that.

Right.

Yeah.

You can retcon a sentence, right?

You can also do what I do, which is when Caldwell is rude to my NPCs.

Why are you sealing me out?

Because it only happens with you.

That are extremely strong, and I'm trying to keep like a,

you know, like an aura of cool around them.

I just have them sock him in the stomach.

Yes, I'm helping you tell your story, man.

They sock me, and then everyone realizes.

Then we get a sense of how strong they are.

Right.

It's true.

I actually do feel as though I am going to request more information because I really want to know what the one shot was because that gives flavor to this story, which is already pretty funny to me.

It sounds like he's just eviscerated.

Was your character engulfed in flame?

But it also.

Was it carrying a great demonic maul that he...

It sounds like the DM did not try very hard.

Was just like, this dude's stats are too good.

You're dead.

Wait, what?

Right.

Excuse me?

Like, the DM barely wanted to play.

Like, you can't talk.

My guy's not even going to swing at you.

It's just, you saw him and you're dead.

Yeah.

I feel so bad because when you play at this person's table again, you're going to be so fearful.

Yeah, but that's the problem with this ultimately is that like, even if you make another character in the future, you're just going to be like, do I see a bad guy?

I sprint.

I sprint away.

I don't say anything.

I just keep running.

Honestly, to Caldo's point about getting hit by an NPC does show how strong they are.

So you could, if the DM really wanted to show how strong this demon was and didn't want the paladin to get the last word, you could have had him roll initiative and then be like, the demon throws you through a wall.

Yeah.

And like,

your friends find your unconscious body in the rubble.

The demon says, this is beneath me.

Yeah.

This is a little mouse moment.

Yeah.

This is when the demon's just like, oh, go away, little mouse.

I'm not, you're not ready to go.

There you go.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Hit him with that little mouse.

There will be no next time.

Yeah.

Mouse.

And then throw them through the window.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I think that you got somebody else.

Yeah, you got absolutely hosted.

The only thing I'll say in the DM's favor,

I'm going like deep off on a limb into Devil's Advocate territory.

Maybe they were trying to set up like a cold open sort of thing with this villain.

Because

if this was a TV show or a movie, I could see it being like, oh, yeah, you see this encounter.

The Paladin gets absolutely torched.

That shows the viewers how serious this whole situation is.

But there's no viewers here.

Right.

Yeah.

Well, would it, would it.

Well, the other rest of the party, yeah, it's true.

It's like sending a message to them.

Don't talk to anybody.

Yeah, don't talk to anybody is the ultimate.

Don't interact.

Yeah, don't interact.

Is there something fun, though, about like, okay, like if we try to achieve what Calwell was talking about, and if it's like, okay, he hits you for enough damage that you go unconscious, and then you're like, okay, and you lose consciousness, and then it's kind of like

you in the wreckage.

Also, yeah, this DM really wanted to be a hard ass and be like, okay, roll initiative, then described everything that happened and made it super scary, and then killed the PC.

That's one thing because then it is scary and cinematic and stuff.

It's still kind of bullshit because, you know, let your players talk.

And if you want to have, if you want to make sure that your bad guy doesn't get clowned on, you still have him attack and do damage.

But just having your player talk is a pretty silly reason to kill them.

But if you were like, everyone's going to have five characters.

We're all going to keep running through.

Characters are going to die all the time.

You roll initiative and you you describe a cinematic thing where this demon kills them.

You don't just passively say, Up, you waited a little too long.

You're actually dead.

And then argue about it.

There are creative ways to run your brutal campaigns.

Yes, yes.

What would you guys do if you were in this DM situation, you roll initiative, the demon has higher initiative, and then you're like, all right, demon's gonna swing at you.

And then you roll an at one.

That idiot.

But do you think the DM is afraid of this demon?

Yeah.

Oh, no.

Oh, fuck.

You should have gotten my hair.

I think I have food poisoning.

I just got summoned.

Honest, Eric.

Here we are, man.

I was just summoned.

Come on, there's different gravity here than there is in the abyss.

Here we are.

The moment you get used to it,

it feels like I'm swimming or something.

Like, I'm underwater.

Is it oxygen?

Oh, it's nasty.

Oh, it smells like ass in here.

Does it smell normal to you guys?

Is it hot here too?

too?

Is it freaking hot?

I thought.

It's humid.

Yeah, you know, you'd think that, like, I'd be used to the heat, but, like, it's pretty cold where I'm from.

Devil's different.

It is a dry heat here.

It's a dry heat in the thing.

It's wet.

It's wet where I'm from.

I missed the second thing you said.

Next time we meet.

Yeah, what?

What was the other thing you said?

Yeah,

it just pissed me off that you were talking.

I didn't actually hear what you said.

I was supposed to be someone with clothes.

I don't know where my clothes went.

Everyone could just see my wag.

You stand in front of my wagon.

You saw my wagon.

You must die.

Let me cover up my wagon room.

I'm grasping at just an interstatic amongst these compound folk.

Okay, so this DM is getting punished.

DM has to introduce, unfortunately, that demon in his campaign to start a pender greens, the pender blues.

The demon who's not used to the material plane climate.

Who still can't find pants?

Yeah.

Panter greens.

Pants.

Panter greens.

Panter greens.

Okay.

Okay.

So ordered.

Our next case comes from Jake Birdman.

Jake Birdman writes, Two.

Stop.

He's trying to read over here.

So sorry.

Come on.

Distract.

God damn.

That's hard enough.

Emily.

Please.

Or Sultan Murph.

Punch me so I know how strong you are.

I'll throw you through a goddamn wall.

Have we?

Maybe you've gotten this a bunch before, but have you gotten Cocaldwell?

Oh, nickname.

No, I haven't.

I feel like maybe if I showed more of an interest in birds in my public life.

Why would he?

Why would anyone call him that?

Why would anyone call him Coqualdwell?

Maybe if I started talking about Scarlett Macaulay.

A nickname that's longer than his actual name and is so bird-focused.

God, I just love hearing a bird cry.

Just when a murder of crows just circles above me, there's nothing better.

Moving on, J.

Creed the Gast.

I honestly can't what do you say

dropping so many hints being like man I god just it's been a while since I had a good nickname you know

okay Jake writes to the lovely judges and the bailiff whose name I shamefully share

actually though

I bring you the case of the DM referee So, I have been DMing for a group of my very close friends for around two years.

It was recently my birthday, and as a gift, one of my friends DM'd a one-shot where we were all minions in the Big Bads castle.

Fine.

The trouble started when one of my friends, who famously has very strong opinions and a powerful will, showed up in what I thought was a referee shirt, black and white stripes and all.

I asked her if it was a referee shirt, and she said no.

So I moved on and I didn't think much of it.

Cool.

Cut to us playing the one-shot, having a great time when one of the players had to roll a check that he didn't know the stat for.

I quietly pointed out the stat he needed, which was immediately met with my referee friend pulling out a whistle, blowing it loudly, and yellow carding me for, quote, backseat DMing.

She had planned this bit because she thought I might try to correct the person DMing because I was so used to not being a player.

On your birthday?

Although she later admitted I had really good manners during the session.

Judges.

Was Was she right to call my modest advice backseat DMing, or was I right to try and be helpful to another player?

This is a case of wrongful razzing.

Yeah, this is a wrong

razzing.

A wild raz.

On your birthday, doing prop insulting.

And also,

it's not a surprise if you showed up and the person said, are you wearing a ref shirt?

And he's saying.

And they asked if you were a referee and they said no.

So it's not a surprise.

You have to show up in a trench coat.

Are you fucking kidding me?

That's

one-on-one.

If you ripped a trench coat off and revealed a ref shirt, you're wearing just a big sweatshirt over it.

Yeah.

Yeah.

That works too if you don't have time to use it.

Big sweatshirt's going to be tough, though, because you're going to have to like pull that over your head.

And you might accidentally take your shirt off.

That's fun, though.

The zip, a zip could work.

Oh, yeah.

Zip hoodie.

Yeah.

This is so poor.

This is so poorly executed.

I'm going to give a red card to this person.

Absolutely.

A whistle and a card ready to go.

And then, like, not getting enough to use it.

So you kind of get desperate.

Like, oh, shout it.

I have to use it now.

You know what?

That is what happened.

They were so ready to raz you and you didn't end up giving.

So then they had to kind of meekly.

Sounds like you would on a moment of just like gentle health

and high effort joke that just does not land.

Yeah.

This is a yellow card that would be overturned by var.

The worst part is like when somebody says like, hey, are you doing a joke right now?

And you nervously say no.

You can't

get the joke over.

Now you're just wearing a

white strip shirt.

Oh,

am I being pranked right now?

You have to just say yes if you are.

Is it possible that this friend already lived out her punishment?

Because

that's what I was thinking.

Awkwardly kind of like wore, did a bit that didn't end up paying off and had to explain it.

Yeah, the surprise got called out immediately as soon as you saw it.

She had to lie about it.

Then she had to kind of do it for a pretty innocuous appearance, and then come to you after and be like, You were actually really cool.

I thought you were actually,

but I guess I was the one that wasn't.

Somebody at the table actually asking for help and you offering it on your birthday.

Yeah.

Wrong, Tomas.

The, yeah, wow.

It's also, it's just like, why is there a ref?

Why is it like a soccer ref?

What does that have to do with DD?

It feels like a Michael Scott joke.

It's just like almost a bit, and it's just not so high effort.

It's just not there.

It's so high effort for so low reward.

I have a feeling his friend probably knew it wasn't working as it was happening to.

I'm telling you, I think they named him

the ref shirt.

Just casually wearing the ref shirt.

It's just stripes.

I also, I mean, just to go to the...

Dressed as Beetlejuice.

The quote-unquote yellow card, I guess this could be table-to-table, but every table I've I've played at, it's very communal.

We're all like, we're all like, oh, that's this right here.

Oh, yeah, yeah, because I feel like we all learned together.

If we had a new person playing with us and they were like playing a fighter for the first time or something and they were like, what is action, surge?

Don't help them.

Don't help them.

Yeah.

If one of you guys answered and not me, that's not you guys backseat DMing.

That's just being a person.

I also don't think I've ever felt anything to someone like being like, oh, yeah, you can do this.

Like, right, right.

Like, we're on the the

game.

It's also the ref joke is just tough because it's also, you're already playing a game, right?

So it'd be one thing if you're like, okay, the joke is to take like a soccer ref and put it in real life and give people like red cards or yellow cards for like social faux pop or something.

But this is already a different game with different rules and a different ref that already, it's almost, it's the joke is like having a soccer ref at a different game.

If it all went exactly how this friend thought it was going to, it's still not good.

Still not good.

That's what I'm saying.

I think it could have been cute, but I think that the second you said, are you wearing a ref shirt, it was over.

It was over.

And I think your friend knew that.

I'm just spitballing here because I think you just in general shouldn't be mean to your friends who are trying to help.

It would arguably be a better joke if when someone quote backseat DM'd

if you you brought a dungeon screen with you a DM screen with you and then you put it in front front of them

while they were doing it.

And you're like, if you're going to be the DM, why don't you go ahead and do it?

And then you make it into a hat, and they have to wear it because they're the dungeon dunce.

Sure.

Yeah,

we're getting away from us a little bit again, but

yeah.

We could give this person a punishment, but like I said, I kind of

live here.

Yeah,

it's so fucking real.

It's terrifying.

I can see the text in the group for like being like, I've got this great bit I'm going to do, and no one responds to it.

And then they just do it anyway anyway.

because you're like they're just busy i guess but this person buying a referee outfit they obviously had to buy a whistle yeah they had to buy the red cards and the yellow cards online it's also so funny you want to be realistic it's also so funny to go ready to razz someone for something that you haven't seen them do yet and then have them not do it right i showed up in the rep outfit i have to call yeah something i feel like if i make fun of my friends it's like for stuff they already do i don't know if i've ever been like oh my god my friend.

And my friend is going to fucking do this stupid thing.

I'm trying to figure out how much this bit costs.

So, so far,

$15 for a ref shirt.

Okay, sure.

You could go cheaper.

Red card cheaper.

Yellow cards.

Well, you want it to look good.

Okay, $10.

So $25, this person's

bought them.

Let's see the whistle.

Well, maybe the friend gave them the ref costume after.

Oh, that's nice.

Like, hey, we can always remember.

Yeah, whistle.

You get a $5 whistle.

This is like a $30 bit right here figured you want this whistle to commemorate the great bit that we did well what you have to do is yeah you can actually really tastefully frame this ref jersey and the whistle and the cards to commemorate this perfect and then it can say back seat dming actually you were pretty you were pretty chill

and hang it in the room where you play so this player has to see it all the time.

Imagine if in the session, there is a moment where they all exchange gifts and then the referee referee person's like, well, my gift was kind of like the razzing gift.

I'm the razzing ref.

Everyone, get ready for your birthday when I razz you.

I'm not the dungeon dunce.

I'm the razzing ref.

All right, so I sentence this referee to remember this moment as they go to sleep tonight.

I know.

I know.

I would in their shoes.

Although, wouldn't it be equally weird to show up in a ref costume and be like, I got a bail on this?

Unless you panicked.

Or you could just be like, I just wear a black and white shirt.

It kind of really makes me want to wear a black and white shirt to an event sometime and have see like people's instinctual because, like, anyone who watches sports, you see that shirt and you're like, why is this here?

Why is this here?

Sure.

Why are we doing this?

Yeah.

Are you watching me?

Are you going to call me on something?

I think, you know, you just bail and you like put some dirt on it and say, I'm sporty Beetlejuice.

What are you talking about?

You're so right.

Okay.

Yeah.

That's cool.

That's cool.

All right.

Cool.

So worded.

All right.

Our next case comes from Sean H.

To the venerable judges and to the one who lurks in their shadows.

I present you the case of the PCs turned jesters.

I recently joined an online campaign with some strangers, and it has been going okay so far.

This is like my favorite genre is just like online campaign with people I don't know.

We should just have like a series of like pre-made red flags that we can start flipping up.

Online strangers.

Yeah, in a breath outfit, maybe.

Yeah, these strangers get a yellow card.

We are stuck in the underdark searching for gods to give us MacGuffins so we can find MacGuffins, etc.

One session, we came across Carl Glittergold, a gnome god known for being witty.

Oh, I've seen that.

He told us that we needed to tell him a joke that would make him laugh in order to get the MacGuffin.

Oh, no.

Being a minus one charisma wizard, I thought it was a challenging ask, but maybe with some good history or religion roles, I could find out his sense of humor and relay relay that information to the other players.

Oh, that's thoughtful.

There were no roles.

The DM instead said that his sense of humor was the same as hers, so we actually needed to make her, the DM, audibly laugh.

Wow.

Nuts.

Cut to two straight hours of uncomfortable joke time

with little to no results.

The streak was finally fortunately broken by the one PC who has known the DM for years.

So I asked the crit justices, do you think it was fair to make the players players host a comedy night for this DM?

Or do you think some sort of rolling could have been involved in the challenge?

This went really differently than I thought it was going to.

PCs turn.

I thought it was going to be like, I'm a DM, and all of my stupid PCs quit being adventurers to be jesters for a king.

They roll disadvantage on stuff because of all the bells on their suits.

This is bad for like professional comedians.

Yeah, it sucks when someone's like, tell me a joke.

I can only imagine if it wasn't like my job.

That is the worst.

When somebody finds out that you're in comedy and they're like, oh, you're funny.

Make me laugh.

Tell me a joke.

I think make me laugh is different than tell me a joke as well.

Like tell me a joke is like, okay, this needs like structure.

This needs a setup, but like make me laugh.

Like I could just like jump on the coffee table and hurt my arm and everyone's gonna laugh at that.

If you jumped on a coffee table and hurt your arm, you'd have to jump so hard.

I'm not gonna break my arm.

I actually don't know that I would laugh because

I think it would happen so fast that I would

call a quote jumped on a coffee table and hurt his arm.

It would mean he had to like elbow drop onto it, which would definitely make me fucking laugh.

Let me finish.

Let me give you the whole setup here.

Which is that I've gone to the kitchen and I've fetched a snack and I'm like, who wants chickpea puffs?

And as I say that, I go, poo.

Okay, okay, I love it.

And I throw the bowl up in the air.

I trip over the sofa,

and then I launch myself.

Okay, as long as there's preamble.

The wording was jump onto the cock.

I pictured it literally being me standing in a conversation with you and you just suddenly leaping and me not actually being able to laugh because I went straight.

I was jumping onto it.

And it was your arm.

And this is why this is such a bad challenge is because I really panicked and I had to rethink it.

I'm laughing at him describing it.

To be fair, I actually would laugh a lot if Caw Caldwell fell on a coffee table.

Yeah.

My buddy

Caldwell.

If he fell on a coffee table.

It's also a weird vibe, too, right?

Because we all laugh at really stupid shit.

So if I did have a character do this to you guys in a campaign, you guys wouldn't have to tell like structured jokes.

It would just be like Pawpaw puts on a wimple or something like that.

Yeah, yeah.

Like we would, there's ways for characters to be funny.

I think, yeah, if the DM is going to do this, I think you have to be ready to give like a quote-unquote pity laugh.

It's like, okay, this person actually earnestly tried to give a joke.

I will chuckle.

I know that it can be a bit controversial in podcasting, having like people who laugh a lot, but I am someone who laughs a lot.

It would not, like, the idea of trying not to laugh

seems sad.

Yeah.

Maybe this DM like was really going through something and they just needed to smile.

I don't know.

Some DMs I feel like are just kind of on like a power trip.

And so this, like, make me laugh is really strange.

I think this player went about it a great way, which is going about it earnestly, right?

Which is, okay, cool.

There's this god that needs us to make them laugh.

So I'm going to use my character's abilities to try to figure this out.

Let me find out what they like and give it to the other players.

And then they could do something like.

Moonshine puts a wimple on Papa or something like that.

That's really good.

Yeah, it's really good.

That's really good.

It's funny.

It's really funny.

But just having

it.

Do you see it?

The rat's wearing wearing a wimple.

See, we're laughing.

Here we are laughing.

It is good.

All she had to do is say it like that.

It sometimes is just the cadence.

Yeah.

Hard ones pants fall down.

Yeah.

But that's just, you know,

we're just a laughy podcast.

Yeah.

Yeah.

We have a good time.

That's why I'm trying to put myself in the mindset of like someone who's like, hey, I'm actually going to try not to laugh.

I'm going to like close myself off to joy.

And you guys need to pry the joy.

Imagine being this DM and you're DMing for a bunch of like strangers.

And after like an hour and a half, you go to like, you go to the bathroom and are like, you guys keep thinking of jokes.

I'll be right back.

And you have to like

go do something.

Wait a second.

I bet I know what happened.

Maybe this DM just didn't have anything planned.

Maybe they had a session.

They were just spinning wheels.

This is a bad way to end.

And they're just gaslighting their players.

The session was two and a half hours long because of you, not because of me.

And it was easy not to laugh because you're just thinking of how little you have planned and how underprepared you are.

Yeah, you're so worried.

Yeah.

And how you have an open mic night to go to that night.

And you were so

collecting.

And you're collecting all the good jokes.

You have to bite your lip.

Fucking DM is a fucking huckster.

Stealing these jokes, just mining and farming jokes from these internet strangers.

Writing down trip over coffee table.

Yeah.

Yeah.

All right.

So this DM.

I think I sentenced this DM to come clean at the open mic.

Yeah, to go to an open mic.

Give credit to all the jokes.

A two-hour set at an open mic.

Yeah.

With all the jokes.

Like a tearfully honest, like hour-long set.

Yeah.

Where they're just like really getting into it.

And then you culminate with falling on a coffee table.

Yeah.

You say, even that wasn't original.

Yeah.

You say, did anyone order a coffee?

And then you jump onto the table with a pot of coffee in in your hand.

We had a character named Caca, and we never called Caldwell Caldwell.

Fuck, it's not that it's such a missed opportunity necessary.

Yes, it was

right in front of our eyes.

No, it doesn't.

I think we'll get an opportunity at a live show someday.

Cawkaw comes out sometime.

Yeah, okay.

I'm actually over the door to the podcast studio.

I'm just going to put like a little picture of Kawka, and I'm going to put like my glasses on it.

Oh,

I'll slap it every time I leave, being like, damn, you know what?

You miss 100% of the shots you don't take.

Right on.

So true.

Let's move on.

So true.

Okay.

Hey there, Nadpoles.

This episode is brought to you by AG1.

You all know AG1.

You love them.

I start every single day with an AG-1.

But guess what?

Now they are coming for your nighttime routine with AGZ.

It is a nightly drink that helps you wind down and rest up, helping your body and mind wind down before bed, optimizing sleep quality during during the night, and helping you wake up feeling well rested and without that stubborn grogginess.

So, check them out.

You can start taking your sleep seriously with AGZ.

Head to drinkag1.com/slash pawpaw to get a free welcome kit with the flavor of your choice that includes a 30-day supply of AGZ and a free frother.

Hell yeah.

Stay frothy, folks.

Thank you.

This episode of Nadpod is brought to you by Raycon.

As someone who edits podcasts for a living, I spend a lot of time pacing around my home while listening to cuts of episodes.

I've found a lot of earbuds uncomfortable.

I guess I just have weird ear holes, but my Raycons fit just right.

Raycon's Everyday Earbuds Classic are packed with upgrades, active noise cancellation, multi-point connectivity, so I can pair with two devices at once and a super comfortable ergonomic fit that stays put, as I mentioned before when I was talking about my weird ear holes.

They've got a bunch of colors.

The new cool mint in particular looks rad.

Plus, they've got up to 32 hours of battery life, quick charge for 90 minutes in just 10, and awareness mode when you're out on a walk.

Go to buyraycon.com/slash pawpaw to get 20% off site-wide today.

That's buyr-ay-y-c-o-n.com/slash p-a-w p-a-w to get 20% off site-wide today.

by raycon.com slash pawpaw.

And we're back live during a flex alert.

Dialed in on the thermostat.

Oh, we're pre-cooling before 4 p.m., folks.

And that's the end of the third.

Time to set it back to 78 from 4 to 9 p.m.

Clutch move by the home team.

What's the game plan from here on out?

Laundry?

Not today.

Dishwasher?

Sidelined.

What a performance by Team California.

The power truly is ours.

During a flex alert, pre-cool, power down, and let's beat the heat together.

So ordered.

So ordered.

Our next case comes from Ben C., venerable justices and the infant child baby bailiff Jackson.

He's just a baby.

He's just a baby.

We've all gathered here to bring in the gifts.

Our group is in the early stages of Curse of Strahd and currently at level three.

A strange series of events led us to confronting Strahd extremely early with him inviting us to his keep.

This interaction was clearly meant to introduce us to him and reveal a few other things.

He eviscerated us because

I responded to the invitation and I was eviscerated.

When the interaction was complete, Strahd transformed into Mist and started to exit.

Cool.

Our cleric took the opportunity to cast create/slash destroy water, attempting to destroy the mist.

The DM laughed and said it was a creative play, but clearly would have no effect on Strahd.

He awarded the cleric inspiration for the movie.

Wow.

Okay.

But said it had no effect.

Cool.

The cleric insisted that this should, at the very least, force him to change forms again and should potentially cause damage.

No, he's Strahd.

He's got like 17 legendary resistance.

Legendary resistances.

This is, this is, okay, so this character, if this character was eviscerated, that would be fine.

If the DM was like, okay, let's do this.

Not missed anymore.

You're level three.

Here's Strahd.

Strahd is a vampire.

Strahd's going to take a legendary action to claw you.

You have died.

You saw Strahd's weighing.

You must die.

Strahd took three damage damage from your Mist thing.

The DM was insistent that this would not be the case.

We moved on from the interaction, but after the session, the cleric brought it up again, this time in more adamant terms.

He argued that Mist is water and therefore should have done something, all caps, to Strahd.

The Mist is a vampire.

The Mist, this is not real.

What do you want?

A vampire.

Yeah, it's kind of like the Mist.

Maybe the Mist burned a legendary resistance.

Sure, yeah.

Or something.

It's literally fucking magic.

It's just not, none of it's real.

Yeah.

The arguments on both sides became more heated as the day went on.

I'm getting

an effect on the Big Bad, or is our cleric being unreasonable?

Absolutely unreasonable.

Like, the DM already gave you inspiration.

Yeah.

The DM sounds like they went above and beyond.

Yeah.

That's also a thing of a DM being kind of being like, look, this was a moment for Strahd to introduce himself to the party to kind of like flex his muscles and show he's like magic and stuff.

You attacking him or doing something to him could theoretically just get you total party killed right there.

So the DM is just being kind.

Yeah, the DM is being nice by being like, okay, Strahd feels you cast a spell on him aggressively and says that

decides to keep leaving.

I don't know what the plan was here.

Did you think you were going to one-shot the BBEG?

Because even if this mist move was going to one shot him he could legendary resistance it so it doesn't like he could do that three times well there is no save whether you create or destroy water right but no i still think it just seems like

i i mean like do vampires really turn they don't turn into water they actually turn into water i have the stat block up right here so it says uh strahd he can use misty escape if he's at zero hp that's not this case he can shapeshift into a misty form but the only thing it says about vampire weaknesses is they're harmed by running water.

He takes any acid damage.

Yeah, he ends his turn into running water.

That's right.

I thought that they were creating water to try to harm him.

Like, but I don't think that I don't think that when vampires turn into a mist, I never assumed it was a water mist.

Oh, yeah, wait, alt mist isn't water, right?

Whoa.

No, I mean, you can make a mist out of anything.

You could have milk mist, I guess.

Could you have marshmallow mist?

Wait, could you have milk mist?

Oh my god, I'd love to eat marshmallow mist.

You could definitely mist a marshmallow.

People in the comments are going to

murder us.

Yeah, and I love it.

Yeah, tell me.

They're going to be like, wow, Jake, that's a really smart question.

And the answer, according to Google, is yes.

Mist is made up of water.

Oh, it's only water?

So you couldn't have nut milk mist?

There's water, right?

Isn't there water?

Yeah, would the nuts cling to the water?

Would the nuts, I guess they'd be too heavy is the thing.

I mean,

what we're looking at is a million-dollar invention here.

It's like, how do I get the milk to cling to the mist?

Yeah.

How do I get that thick mist that I so crave?

I bet you anything.

That's like a, that's like a fancy restaurant thing.

Yeah.

Like, and for your amouge bouche, here's a milk mist.

Um, if you could please open up.

Oh, wait, here we go.

Another search.

Yes, technically, mist can refer to tiny droplets of any liquids

in the air, not just water.

Okay, all right.

Milk mist is back on the table.

So it could be a mist of oil, chemicals, other liquids, and maybe a vampire mist.

Is there milk just like mostly

liquids or water?

Okay, okay.

There's taking milk off the table.

Yeah, but there's a Googled.

What about, I mean, like, yeah, oil.

I have some definitive.

I googled when vampires mist, are they made of water?

Oh.

When vampires transform into mist in folklore or fiction, they aren't typically made of water in the same way as a natural mist or a fog.

Instead, it's usually described as a supernatural transformation where their bodies become an intangible, ghostly vision.

Yes, exactly.

It's not real.

So for many reasons, this player is crazy.

If they were a movie,

if they were a water mist and they use it to travel, they would be running water, which is like one of the only weaknesses we know.

You can't become your greatest greatest weakness.

Okay.

Yeah,

maybe you can.

I'm going to think about that.

But that's what Batman did.

Who would do that?

Shit.

Shit.

True.

We do have to go by the Batman precedent.

I will become the mist.

No, this is, yeah, this is wrong on so many levels, just arguing.

DM, why didn't you kill me?

Why didn't you kill me?

Why didn't you make Strahd be Strahd and stay and fight me, a level three cleric?

Yeah.

This is, yeah, this makes me mad on like four different levels.

What are we going to?

I dislike this cleric.

Okay, we gotta sentence the cleric.

Oh, we got this, it is kind of like new for us.

We don't really hear about naughty clerics.

I know,

right?

It's kind of like paladin energy from a cleric.

Yeah, for campaign one, there was one very famous one, but I don't remember.

Just kidding, just kidding.

Spoiler, but Thiala is

very good.

Oh, is that how you pronounce her name?

Very good.

Sorry,

Thiala.

Sorry.

Yeah, there you go.

If I remember,

I guess we could just sentence them to invent some sort of like gastro.

Oh, yeah.

Like cotton candy is kind of like sugar mist, right?

So they don't need to, actually, that's been invented.

You don't need to invent cotton candy.

Yeah, well, I mean, again, the milk mist.

Because if you, because like you, you know, you get shaved ice, you can flavor that.

That's really fun.

For some reason, I really want a marshmallow.

Well, maybe cotton milk.

Oh,

cold wool is clearly a variant of milk milk right now.

So maybe there's a combination between

cotton candy and this milk mist.

Do

for milk what cotton candy did for sugar, right?

I feel like such an idiot, but I just, I feel like water is in all of this stuff, right?

Cotton candy is sugar that's making up the clouds.

Right, but you're like, milk mist is still happy.

Water mist, but isn't it, wouldn't it still be water mist?

Yes, we have to make the thick mist where like the sugar and the milk clings to the water.

That's the problem.

Yes, but why does it I think it already does though?

Like if you had a like, okay, so I have a humidifier in my room and we used to joke that I put mayonnaise in it, but we could after this

try to put my oat milk in the humidifier and see what goes.

I guess it's not wrong.

And if you water that on a stick, if you get that on a stick, you could sell that at a fair.

You know what?

I actually don't want to ruin my humidifier, so I'm going to sentence this cleric to put oat milk in their humidifier.

Let me know.

Let me know the results.

There we go.

We found it.

I mean, it's still water mist, but it'll stink.

So, yeah.

Right.

Yeah.

So breathe in, and if you feel full, we'll know it worked.

Yeah.

All right.

Sweet.

That's awesome, honestly.

So I'm very curious, too.

Can't wait to hear.

Our next case comes from Andrew PGL to the honorable justices Murphy, Axford, and Tanner.

And choose your own adventure.

If we're being nice to Jake, turn to page 69.

If we're being mean, turn to page 451.

It seems like we're being mean to me.

I actually think that you've been really nice and supportive of Caldwell's new nickname.

So we're being nice to Jake, right?

Okay.

Okay.

All right.

Great.

Right.

Yeah.

I don't really like Caldwell's new nicknames.

The wise and fair bailiff Jake Hurwitz.

Okay.

Birds of a feather flock together.

Caldwell.

What?

Because Jake's my friend.

Why did he say his fucking name at the end of it, though?

I don't know.

Billy Eilish might, Billie Eilish might have said that.

Billy Eilish might have said that and it got edited out.

Yeah.

Quote the Javen, so ordered.

What is the sense of Billie Eilish?

I don't know what's going on.

Keep going, Jake.

I come to you today with the case of the multiple tridents.

I recently attended an adventure where I played Felix, a Roman gladiator-esque battle master who fought with Tridents and his fists.

During our first fight before entering melee range, I threw my trident at a skeleton, then drew a second trident to throw,

upon which the DM asked how I have two tridents.

I told him I have three on my character sheet, two from the fighter starting gear, and one purchased pre-game for five gold.

That's true.

He told me it would be way too difficult to carry three tridents.

Oh, come on, why?

Why?

You're playing a buff person.

Who cares?

I argued I was well under my carrying capacity threshold, so it should be fine for my 18th strength half-elf.

He insisted I correct my character sheet.

What?

I didn't press the issue, and I made corrections, and the session was otherwise great.

But I asked the court, is it fine to delve into dungeons with three tridents on your back?

Or was my DM correct in keeping my character realistic?

You were so right.

It's a case of mistaken tridentity for sure.

Oh,

Caldwell.

Stop, everybody.

The Javen approves.

Hey, when he finds a treasure, he's got a squirrel and wings.

Dude, edit it into the old episode.

The Blue Jake loves it.

I forgot what happened with that.

I mean, I do.

I personally, it is like ever so slightly silly to keep taking out tridents, but in a way that I really like.

I think if it's a throwing weapon, I mean, like, yeah, you think of it as like a javelin.

It's right.

Characters have multiple javelins.

It's not weird.

Although, let's say,

I actually am not saying this to weigh in on the case.

I'm just saying that I think it would be way harder to throw a trident because of aerodynamics than a javelin.

Yeah, I guess so.

I think

it would be a really different.

It's like three prongs, but it's a really different throwing experience.

This is not about the court case.

That's right.

I just don't want to get into questions.

I don't want to get into the aerodynamics.

I don't want to get into whether how much water is in milk.

What?

You hate science.

Why do you stand on the side?

I know that I don't know.

I know that someone's writing paragraphs about what the moron we are.

I just know what I do not.

I know that I do not know.

But we love them for being smart.

Oh, for being dumb.

Our molecular gastronomy restaurant could be called the Misty Escape.

Ooh.

And Murph's uninvited.

Yeah, because he hates science.

Yeah, dude.

You'll fucking destroy us with one Yelp review.

Damn it.

I don't hate science.

So I did look it up.

A javelin weighs two pounds, or it just says two, which I imagine is pounds.

And then the trident weighs four pounds.

So it is heavier than a javelin.

You can carry so much.

Yeah, you're not sure.

Honestly, I'm going to say this.

I'm not an adventurer.

I could carry 12 pounds around with me and be fine.

Yeah,

it's true.

I wouldn't be an issue at all.

I would need to rig some kind of little satchel for myself for easy access for throwing.

You need a trident B or that would be forethought that, yeah, I would need a trident B.

Of course, it's called a Trident B or Yeah.

People at Starbucks would look at me weird, but like I would be able to carry that.

Yeah, that wouldn't be the issue.

You would have to duck when you have a fire.

How very of a trident would you have to have to be stopped walking around with a trident?

Because a sword, they're going to stop you pretty quick.

Like you walk around a mall with a sword.

I think you get stopped immediately.

Are you the trident?

Yeah, I think so, for sure.

I think you get pretty far with a trident.

I think it might be all right.

Because it kind of looks like a tool.

Yeah.

It almost looks like a pitchfork.

Pitchfork having multiple is the issue.

You could be like, no, sorry, it's a tool.

And they'll be like, For what?

And you're like, I'm the god of the sea.

Yeah.

And then you walk away.

My father is

pretending to swim.

For stirring up the wave.

I also got a tall latte.

I think you could go into a Starbucks with a trident and order it.

I mean, this time of year, a Halloween costume is on the table for the next month.

Yeah, the order was for Neptune.

I got the sea bead egg bites.

Could you just put those on the tips of my trident, please?

Just getting egg bites

in the Neptune costume.

Somebody at Comic-Con has done that.

That's just happened 100%.

Oh, yeah.

Yeah, just going to Starbucks and just getting food and no coffee is an interesting thing.

On top of being Driftstaz, the god of I mean, their cake pops are pretty good.

So you stop in, you get a little cake pop.

I don't think you need a coffee for that.

So it seems like the DM is kind of at fault.

Yeah, sure.

Yeah, I think so.

I can't even understand their reasoning for it, really.

Because, yeah, encumbrance doesn't come into play here.

It's like not that heavy.

It's like maybe a little awkward, but I don't think so.

It's weirdly just drawing, it's just weirdly being like, you can't do that in real life.

Yeah.

But you can, right?

Yeah, you could.

First of all, you kind of can.

Yeah.

Second, yeah.

It's like it is.

You definitely can't.

That's why I'm playing DD.

Right.

There are rules for this.

Yeah.

Not only you definitely can, I could.

I, as a commoner, yeah, could.

Yeah, with just

a javelin.

It's harder to turn milk into mist than carry this.

Yeah.

I feel like if you were in an actual gladiator pit, it wouldn't be like, it wouldn't be out of the ordinary to see someone walking around with three tridents because you're going to throw it.

Like, you're going to need extras.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

You're allowed to throw three tridents around.

They also kind of like built their character to be a trident hucker.

Like, yeah, that's kind of what they, what they were hoping for.

So it feels extra cruel to be like, no, it's, I'm just not going to allow that.

It's not realistic.

Is there anything with object interaction or anything that you think could actually be?

I have no clue.

No, I mean, there are, yeah, there's rules for object interactions, but this is literally, this player is just doing it by the book.

They're not over-encumbered.

There are weapons that have the throne property that can be thrown.

I think that, I guess, let's look at the javelin, maybe the DMs being a stickler and it can't be thrown, or let's look at the Trident.

It has to be thrown.

Does it say that it can be thrown?

Trident has the throne property.

There you go.

So you're good.

Wow.

That's it.

This is so.

You've been so wrong, Michael.

This is so buttoned up.

My assumption is that your DM is just a new DM.

They didn't know all these details, but you were doing a bad thing.

And they should be my friend.

They shouldn't have such hard opinions if they're like brand new.

Your DM does need to dress up as Poseidon and go to Starbucks.

Yeah, and don't order egg bites as Starbucks.

Right.

And you can't get coffee.

You just have to get food.

Yeah, just get the eggbooks.

Just the egg bites.

Dressed as Poseidon at a Starbucks.

So ordered.

So ordered.

Okay.

We've got another case from Taylor C.

Taylor C.

writes: Dear Emily and those other guys, my friend.

All right.

Yeah.

Whoever you're mad at is wrong.

So ordered.

Whoa.

My friend and new DM set up a gladiator one-on-one battle with our barbarian in a bar's underground fighting pit.

Cool.

Cool.

Right.

Yeah.

He explained it to me before the session began, as he often went over broad strokes of his ideas with me as a more experienced DM.

I love that.

I had a bit of concern on how he would run the fight mechanics because I know one-on-one battles without weapons to unconsciousness using standard 5E stats can be a slog.

Really?

Oh, yeah.

You do like the only, you only do the amount of damage equal to your strength score.

It's like 1d4.

No, no, no.

You don't even roll.

Yeah, you just do your automatic strength.

Yeah.

So if you had a plus one to strength, you'd do a damage.

My God.

He seemed excited and said he'd built the opponent specifically for Arbarian.

So I held my tongue.

What followed was an absolutely brutal brawl between two barbarians in rage, resorting to eye gouging, nose biting,

and lasting nearly three hours oh what

what my friend did not cut away from the fight to visit our warlocks shopping spree and my paladin was bound by the laws of the pit from interfering our barbarians glee faded to frustration as did the players around the table he finally succumbed to his injuries losing the fight and our dm cut to the rest of the players for the last bit of our session He apologized during and after the session, explaining he tried to match our barbarian stats one-to-one in his opponent and thought it would be a fun fight.

We've had many great sessions since then.

Oh, judges, I ask not that you cast your judgment on my inexperienced DM friend, but on myself, for I was the most experienced person at the table.

Should I have consulted more with the DM, pushed harder for him to try implementing brawl mechanics?

I humbly await your judgment.

See, here's no problem.

You could have gotten a yellow card.

Oh, if you were to, you know,

you never know when your friend's going to bust out a yellow card.

Yeah, you have to get a whistle and a yellow card.

I think this is just like a comedy of errors.

You know, everyone was trying their best.

I feel so hard for your friend that they were apologizing during it.

But also, like, you don't want to be the person who tells them what to do.

You can't tell them what to do out of the game, but like when you're in the fighting pit, like maybe you can kind of try to take control of the combat a little more and like grab a microphone and turn it into like a pro wrestling match.

But it's not the paladin.

It's frozen on your shoulder.

Also, once it's going several hours just for the player to lose, lose you gotta understand as soon as the losing is the most brutal yeah as soon as as soon as you're going and both people have resistance to damage and you're doing like four damage per attack and everyone's got you know 80 hp and it's taking forever like you know you're fucked right so introduce new rules say like you can take an extra attack or both of you do double damage yeah for this or like i don't know

you have to pivot i think though like it sounds like this is a new DM.

It sounds like they should have pivoted.

It sounds like they knew they should have pivoted, especially early on.

Like, some sessions just aren't as fun as others.

Sometimes you take a chance and it works out.

Sometimes you take a chance and it doesn't.

It sounds like they felt really bad that it didn't work out.

So maybe no one's to blame.

Yeah, it seems like the DM's.

I feel bad for this.

You're just saying that because you were complimented in the intro.

Oh, no, no, no.

The person who wrote in is like, I feel bad I didn't tell them not to do this.

Right.

Yeah.

But it's also not your fault.

It's not my fault.

Sorry.

Yeah, I think it's not your fault.

I think, unfortunately, I am going to rule against your DM.

Yeah, I mean, that's who I would rule against.

But sometimes you just learn those hard lessons.

Three hours.

I know, I know.

So long.

That's the kind of hard lesson that you should learn after an hour and a half.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Because maybe they're a slow learner.

You know,

I feel bad.

But if you're in the point where you're apologizing, you're kind of breaking that fourth wall anyway.

Yeah, you're right.

You're like, okay, I'm acknowledging to everybody here that this is taking way longer than I thought.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Maybe that's the lesson: is if you, as a DM, feel like you want to apologize, it's time to pivot.

Yeah,

you could also be like at a certain point when everybody's at half HP and it's already been an hour and a half, you could be like, you know what?

We're going to bring this down to three roles, contested athletics chips, to see who like wins the last couple rounds or something like that.

Yeah.

No one minds that.

Like no one, no players don't mind when you see the DM like change it to be more fun in the end.

Yeah, I make bad decisions all the time where I'm like, oh, I've got this super complex thing.

And then I see like, this is actually incorrect.

This is actually how it works, everybody.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Don't be afraid to like have a bathroom freak out and then come back with new rules.

Yeah, just time out and

do what I do.

Have a bathroom freak out.

You have a bathroom freak out.

Yeah.

The toilet will absorb all of the sound.

Scream into it.

Scream into the toilet.

Rip the rip the towel bar down from the wall.

Oh, yeah.

I guess you could scream into a towel instead.

But no, it's got to be the toilet.

Because

you are Poseidon, God of the world.

Yeah, right.

And it's you.

Shout out the water that betrayed you.

Exactly.

But yeah, I mean, yeah, this is a new DM and they apologize and everything.

Right.

But yeah, three hours is a really, really long time.

Okay, so you got to slap him him on the wrist a little bit yeah i know you did you did request that we not punish the dm but ultimately we do have to punish the dm yeah i don't think we punish a light warm you know what instead of doing a full poseidon cosplay at starbucks you're just going to do some poseidon bounding which means you can have some like flares maybe you got like a little dolphin pendant or something on you and you could do like a fork instead of a trident yeah you do a fork instead of a trident and you can order a coffee if you'd like when you're not a plastic fork it needs to be yeah we need to be able to reuse it come on because like yeah we're doing this for the ocean here.

We're doing this for the ocean.

But you do need to mention that your fork is a trident.

You need to actually just flip it in the conversation.

Or just you go, you're Poseidon bounding and then you give the name Neptune.

Yeah.

Yeah.

That's cool.

The coffee should be half calf.

Let's do half calf.

Let's do half calf because, you know.

It's still a punishment.

It's still a punishment.

But again, we love your energy.

That's why we only want to get half calf.

That's why you're just

we don't want to change it that much.

Just Poseidon bounding.

Yeah.

If If it was full Poseidon, you'd have to ask for whale milk, but we're not going to do that today.

Or whale mist.

And with that, why don't we step into church for a confession?

Please.

From one Emily S.

Emily Rice.

Hi, Emily.

Emily S.

Saxford.

Holy shit.

Holy Saxford.

We had no idea.

The confession is: I'm in love with my DM.

Oh, my God.

His name is Kakaldwald.

Whoa.

The Trinavale guy.

Whoop it away with him.

Most highly esteemed, honorable judges and their human footstool.

I have a confession.

Years ago, I was playing my first campaign and I committed a deadly sin without ill intent.

I'm used to playing video games with large wikias where you can look things up and learn about the deep lore of monsters and places.

Yeah, I love that show.

In my unholy ignorance, I didn't realize that that wasn't part of DD.

Oh, yeah.

We were leading up to our first battle with some goblins, and some of the players were trying to talk to them to find a peaceful solution.

I looked up what language they spoke online and shared what I learned with the table.

I was immediately, forcefully, and loudly shamed.

I felt humiliated, and I've carried that around like an albatross ever since.

I fear my friends actually think less of me as a person.

So strong was their reaction.

Will Dice Christ forgive my transgression?

Already.

Of ignorance, hold up in the most divine divine court of law?

Yeah, if you go to Dice Christ Wikipedia page, if you go to the Dice Christ Wikia,

you will see at the very top is an entry about how Dice Christ forgives those who act with good intentions, but still ignorant nonetheless.

Yeah.

Yeah, you've already punished yourself enough.

You're way, way overthinking this.

Yeah.

And there is a personal life section for Dice Christ.

Yeah.

You get to find out who Dice Christ has dated.

Exactly.

Dice Christ lore.

Yeah.

Dice Christ was very promiscuous.

Also, also you just looking up stats, you like learn as you are playing the game that you probably shouldn't do that.

But you, you know, as soon as you found out that that's not something you're supposed to do, you knew not to.

So you're all good.

You made a mistake and that's your friends shouldn't go in on you about it.

And I bet you they haven't really thought about it.

I was going to say, I guarantee they all had a big reaction in the moment and like 10 seconds later had zero emotional thought about it.

Yeah.

Yeah.

You didn't get yellow carted.

Nobody blew a whistle on that.

Your friends never think about you, but in a good way.

Right.

Well, no, they think about you in a good way.

I'm saying like the things that you're insecure about, your friends aren't.

Not dwelling on it.

Right.

Totally.

No way.

Not in the same way.

Not in the same way.

You're all good.

This is such a also, like, right at the beginning of the campaign, just like looking up that a goblin speaks goblin is.

Yeah, you're good.

You're good.

It's very innocuous.

It's fine.

It's such an innocuous thing to quote mess up.

Yeah.

That big reaction was good because now you didn't accidentally learn like an enemy's health problem.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah.

Which ultimately, as it as a DM, you do learn a lot of that stuff and you do have to kind of like rattle your brain to get rid of it and also like rely on homebrew and all of that.

Yeah.

You got to throw yourself into a coffee table to scramble your brain.

You got to break your arm on a coffee table.

That's right.

Pluck the feathers out of that albatross around your neck.

Yeah.

That's true.

And you know what?

Cook it up for the holidays.

Yeah.

That's right.

Yeah.

Enjoy that albatross.

Your

social style.

What do you guys think about

Albatross?

No more virtual virtually.

No more cooking.

Albatross.

Oh, my God.

Why am I being punished?

Why am I being punished?

I don't understand.

All right.

So forgiven.

We're going to go ahead and wrap this one up so I don't have to listen to Cocaldwell anymore.

I think he's going to come out on the short round.

He's going to come out on the short round for sure.

You can head on over to our Patreon, patreon.com/slash nadpod.

That's NADDPOD.

Don't sing yet.

Stop, stop, stop.

You can't.

You can't.

You can't keep doing this.

I guess, yeah, listen to that over there.

You can follow us on social media that we're mirroring at use, at C's for SME, at Calde's Caldwell, AddieX for ZEMI, and Atchikurt's Jake.

And you can tweet about the show using hashtag NADBOT.

That's NADDPOD.

We are we are

the COVID-19.

We are the

nation.

It's the end of the show, and you know what that means?

It's time to shout out our benevolent council of elders, starting with Brad D.

Jeffrey S., Lord of the Fjord.

Happy birthday, Murph!

Later, Mix Skater, Matt M, Gooder W, Jeff C, Daniel G, Danielle the Dastardly Dame, Beardman Dan, Danny P., Carpe Liam, Bryant, Victor T.

Balnor's Boy, Hoyd's Friend, Justin I, Danny Danster, TJM, Trele the Crayfe, Christopher B., Daniel R., Jordan L., Cyborg Version of Josh the Cobalt, Targot,

Stevie Waggs, Hellish Rebuker, PhD, Princess Yar, Jory S., Rachel from Animorphs, Jack L., Nicholas C., Star of Every Film Ever Made in Bohumia, Samuel B., Mike H., Elka Smeltzer Plus, Great Value Gemma, Tyler F., Fightin' Favorites, The Favorite Things Podcast, Nabadger, Panama James, Herodrian, Carborough Chapel Hill FPV, Rex Thaniel the White, Cece Lulu, Old Cobb's Duncle, Older Burn, El Cupra, the Habit Folk Detective, Timmy R.

Reiko, Calder Cumps, Cold, Shoutout to the Cold Companions, Frosty Facial, Taylor B., the vengeful one-winged angel, Cass, Strong, Grinch, Steven, Starspawn, Starspawn, Starspawn, C!

Mike K, Lady Taco, your girl got knocked up.

Congrats!

Nick W, William W.

Big Bat Bird of the Mad, Eric McD, Ananorama, Percival, Frederick Stein, von Mussel, Klausowski, Derolo the Third, Jay Dragonborn, Guardian of the Vibe, Honoring the Cock, Phoenix, Ben A.

Dave H, Dustin S.

Danny F, Hawkeye Pierce, Bookfire's Assistant, Izzy F.

DPC is awesome.

Hashtag honor the cock Shown the shade tree mechanic of Zeldar Summer Rose Grantaire Cat C Misa of House and Zunza Ariel the occasional mermaid Selena and Valacey Raptor

B Perky Oways

Pat L Maxwell J Lauren H Serve 16 Annie the Fay Wild Therapist Skillful Ferret Connor Connor S.

Salil, BioQuirt 7, Amber Dextrous, Bean Rat was Innocent, Trub Hop Dropper, Jack H.

King of the Mole People under Iron Deep, dressed in blue and fighting his way through a bracket style tournament, Lindsay W.

Valen, Paj, the bitch and bunny bard, Carlin C.

Noah the Bullywog Boy, hashtag honor the cock, James G, everything Bago the Eladron who just wants to hang out with his pet badger Stripey Daddy Master Dandy Han Eric B Marcos Learns the Balanced Druid Frida M Pagos Self-Proclaimed Fae King asking you to watch the Disruptors starring Allie Beardsley and Grant O'Brien Tracy P the Crick Alf Librarian Maggie S.

Holly the Green Laughing Hyena finally caught up to the duck team Akash the car Cal just Cal Aaron B Russell H a monk named Dilgo Cody C Lorelei the succubi and Kira the succulent snack McKenna Stout Your friendly neighborhood Yan and Yunkel Andrew and Sid John Adams the write-in candidate for 2024 Meg the Mail Carrier Manager of Bahumia James F Austin S Wayfair now has to do something with the trolls.

Get rid of them.

Turn to page 42.

Keep them.

Turn to page 69.

Shane C.

Burpo Good Barrel Barbarian.

Welshlander.

Garrett G.

One Big Curd.

Havey the Half Orc.

Renee the Monster Captain.

Box Clifton.

Olivia the Enchanting Bard.

And Jared the Soap Opera Cleric.

who are playing stick it to the man down with the monarchy.

Winter Slade.

Fico.

Garrett, the artificer, Damon J, Anthony the rattest of duds, Josh H.

The fairies say, Whoop that trick, yeet!

Cantrip Dumbledore, the bare onesie-wearing barbarian, Lexi H.

No Drog, the pass-a-fist barbarian, Gino T, Jean Luca, Tristan the talentless honk, Shenanigans O'Connor, Mios the Great, Joshua S.

Alexander, Linz W.

Angel the Pamela the forever vindicated, Pavu Eskinar, the Goliath Paladin, providing service with a smile, Tim M.

A cat napping in a sunbeam, listening to a podcast, MLG Cheeto, CJ Hampton, Shall B.

Kenna's now first favorite sprite girl, manifesting the return to Twank and Hot Boy Summer 3 80s Ski Lodge Winter Jambourine, Jackson R.

Snailess, who's who's infecting Worcestershire.

I just have never learned how to say that.

For within.

Official Ned Flanders, Papa Sky Dace, Mima Sky Dase, Megan N.

Anthony B.

Savannah H.

Balnor's best friend, Steve, Stephanie of House and Zunza, Benjamin A.

Gimli the Corgi, Papa and Foster's canine friend, Mickel A.

Josh H.

Pilot of the Nightmare Verse Flight.

Froakie, the two crew blew through.

Jennery, Ethan, the mailman, Maple, the shy bookworm, Ashosaurus, Seth E.

Billy Batson, Alternate Universe, Jake Hurwitz, Snake Jerkwitch, Michael Lyle S II, Carl B.

Plumber of the Realm, Parcel, Dex Riddlewell, Hannah A, Ra, Ace Dreggs, High Lord of Gritzburg, Darius D, Troy's Mom, Vin Diagram, GKC, T He Tee Hee, Cadamilius the Consumed, Bard of Holding, Clinton P, Spooky Cam the Undead Frogman,

Dean, Jake W.

High Mom, Tuesday Cross, the Choose Your Own Adventure Writer, Not the Pornstar, Steve L.

Alex G, Zipper Backery, Nicole, Katerina C, Jacqueline P.

And finally, what a nice one to end on, potato punk.

Thank you all so much.

We love you so much.

And thank you to Potato Punk because what a really fun one to say last, potato punk.

Okay, we love you.

Thank you for supporting us.

Goodbye, sweeties.

That was a Hitgum podcast.

Wherever you go,

whatever they get into,

from chill time to everyday adventures, protect your dog from parasites with Credelio Quattro.

For full safety information, side effects, and warnings, visit CredelioQuattrolabel.com.

Consult your vet or call 1-888-545-5973.

Ask your vet for Credelio Quattro and visit QuattroDog.com.