Phantom Nirvana: A Dungeons & Dragons Podcast

S2 Ep2 - A Rough Introduction

• Phantom Nirvana • Season 2 • Episode 2

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In our last episode our adventurers found themselves back in the museum. With no apparent means of escape and pursued by otherworldly creatures they somehow fled to the fantasy world within a painting. Our adventurers are transported to a barren desert landscape where they must fight for their lives against a trio of fiery sand snakes. This is Season 2 Episode 2: A rough introduction. 

Music in this episode by: Sun Umbra, Sagey and Gypsy Vision

Warning: Contains dark themes that may not be suitable for all audiences. Instagram @phantomnirvana
Email phantomnirvana@gmail.com

SPEAKER_00:

Close your eyes and open your mind. This is Phantom Nirvana, a Dungeons& Dragons podcast. Be advised, this story contains dark themes that may not be suitable for some audiences. And now we present

SPEAKER_01:

Phantom Nirvana. Phantom Nirvana

SPEAKER_00:

In our last episode, our adventurers found themselves back in the museum. With no apparent means of escape, and pursued by otherworldly creatures, they somehow fled to the fantasy world within a painting. Our adventurers are transported to a barren desert landscape, where they must fight for their lives against a trio of fiery sand snakes. This is Season 2, Episode 2, A Rough Introduction.

UNKNOWN:

A Rough Introduction

SPEAKER_01:

And out from beneath the sand come curling and whirling these large fire-like creatures. They spin and swirl up. And they stand all around you. There are three of them. These they look like snakes. They're like on fire, though. You can see that their heads and they've got these big whiskers. They have like these big flaming whiskers that come off of their faces and these snake like bodies. And you are now in combat with the three fire snakes. And I would like for you to roll initiative. there won't be more there won't be that much combat this time we're not gonna do combat uh mike what do you got with joshua ames 21 wow coming in hot yeah um dm a camel it said right here there's no uh initiative just use your decks mod okay camels aren't very dexterous well that's on you big dog I rolled a nat 1. Minus 1, it's a 0. A 0? Wowee. Okay, what about Ben? What did Sam Campbell get? Sam has a 9. Kevin, what'd you have, buddy? A 13. Okay, Marcus is on a 13. And Mallory Reed, Courtney, what did you have? A 10. Okay, fun. Let's have Joshua Ames. Again, you're surrounded by these fiery snake-like creatures. They are standing around what is a clutch of their eggs, which you have jabbed your heel into, Marcus. Oh, gosh. They are taller than you and they look angry. They look really angry. Let's have Mike with Joshua Ames take a very first turn in season two. It's an honor, everyone. Thank you. I don't know if these fire snakes have testicles that you can try to... I don't know how that works. I think it's all internal with snakes, bud. Yeah, probably. Dang it. Well, we're going to try and find them. Josh is going to run up to the closest one and pull his half spear out and sort of underhand aim where the groin might be. Oh, jeez. What a way to start the pod. Wasting no time. Yes. Make your attack roll, bud. 20. Dirty. A dirty 20 hits. Yes. It's what? All right. Dirty 20 for dirty moves. That's it. Dirty 20. Dirty 20 for dirty moves. Oh, heck yeah. What'd you get? All right. So we got 11. Okay, wow. And I'm going to flurry of blows that, of course. So as you jab the, it was the spear, correct? The spear, yeah. You jab the half spear into this thing. First of all, it doesn't seem like it does a heck of a lot of damage. Certainly not the same satisfying crunch and squish that you got from the Vargan in your last adventure. The second thing that happens is that you feel this intense heat rack through your body. up the spear and up your arm and into your core, and you take six fire damage. Oh. And I think out of frustration from not getting that satisfying crunch, I will flurry of blows and punch twice as I back away and get away from this. Okay. One is a seven, and the other is a 24. The 24 hits. Six hits. damage and again you're seeing that it doesn't uh react the same there's sort of a sound that's sort of do i feel like it's doing any damage you do you do feel like it's it's hurting it i mean the thing rocks back and gives sort of a sound but it's not the same as punching a bargain is it it's really not and you take another four fire damage ah Okay, well, Josh backs away. With my drunken technique, with flurry of blows, I can disengage. Are you backing away up to your full movement, or what are you able to do here? They were probably only about 10 or 15 feet away from you to begin with, so... Are they surrounding us or? Yeah, they're surrounding you. I think there's probably the first one is next to you and Axel. The second one is next to Sam and the third one is next to Mal and Marcus. I'm going to back up like 10 feet. Good. Let's have them take their turn. The first one is going to slither its way towards you, Josh. It's going to attack with fiery teeth. You see the jaws open in this sort of elven-like mouth as it opens and breathes These hot breath and bites towards you with a 19 and three is 22. Oh, yeah. God, are we going to get a first battle death? Three more piercing damage this time for you. Brain piercing damage. And also you will take. Another attack. The tail, it whips around its tail. 15. Does that hit? I believe that's my AC. Yep. I got you again, my dude. That's another two bludgeoning damage this time as the tail comes around and there's like these embers that off into the air as it hits you. The next one is going to move towards Sam Campbell and dives, you know, curls back like a snake does and dives towards you with its jaws and rolls a three. And the second tail attack as it whips forward is a 22. You're taking seven bludgeoning damage from this tail attack, Sam Campbell. The third one is going to move towards Mal. It rolls a five, which is not enough. With the tail, it swings and jumps and rolls a three. The whole thing whips into the air and flops down onto the sand in a big boof. Having completely missed you, jumps entirely over you. And let's have Marcus take a turn. All right. Marcus is going to cast Earth Tremor. Okay. That tremor in the ground within range, each creature other than me in that area must make a dexterity saving throw. All right, I can make a dexterity saving throw. What's your spell save DC? Spell save DC is 13. I'm rolling five, so I fail and I take how much damage? I rolled a five. All right, so that was the one that had jumped over Mallory just for clarification. What kind of damage was it? It is bludgeoning damage and is knocked prone. Okay, it is knocked prone, but you're seeing that it doesn't seem to be damaged as much as you would have hoped. Okay. Let's have a turn for Mallory. Mal? I want to Eldritch Blast somebody. What? No way. What? Wow. She's doing the thing. The one that jumped over you? Oh, yeah. I think the one that jumped over me really got my attention, and that one's now down in the sand. Yep, yep. Got it. I'm just going to aim right at it. Make your attack roll. Okay. Natural 20. Oh, yeah. I'm going to take a picture. Roll your damage, your double damage. All right. Oh, come on. Serious. Eight total. Okay. Eight damage is not that bad. So don't get it twisted. Do you want to move? Can I get safely away from? I think you could move away from the clutch of eggs if you wanted to back away a little bit. Oh, for sure. If I can take any kind of cover, including behind a camel, I'm game. I like that. Okay. Let's have you run behind Axel. As long as I can have sight

SPEAKER_02:

lines on the

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flame snakes.

SPEAKER_01:

The three of the flame snakes. Yeah, I got you. Okay, great. Axel is freaking out. He is not a target. More tongue, more tongue, more tongue. There we go. There it is. Okay. I love it. Sam, you're up.

UNKNOWN:

Okay.

SPEAKER_01:

Sam is reaching for his weapon. A little disappointed to find the flail instead of the sword that he was becoming familiar with. Indeed. And as soon as you touch it, you feel the creepy whispers in the air. It seems to be whispering, feed me. So Sam is going to take a swing with that flail at the snake in front of me. Go ahead and make your attack roll, sir. okay a total of 21 to hit that's enough 12 damage but it is bludgeoning and uh as soon as you hit that thing there is like a spray of fiery uh viscera that sort of splashes out uh from within this snake-like body and you can see that it sort of ripples up into the air this glowing orange blood and all of a sudden it gets sucked into one of the heads of that flail. The blood just out of the air. Just right into the thing and you can see that that head of the flail glows green so you're adding a d4 to your damage the next time you attack uh let's have a turn unless you're wanting to move and risk an attack of opportunity let's have a turn from reagan the camel axel kaxel i prefer um are any of those snake things like still prone i remember one was prone Yeah, there's one prone, but it's a fair distance away from you. How far? I have a 50 speed as a camel. Yeah, you can get there. Okay. You can get there as a camel and try to stomp it out or something. I have one attack. Because there's nothing a camel loves more than stomping out a snake. I have one attack. It says bite. Okay. I'm going to bite this thing. Okay. You get advantage on... attacks for prone enemies isn't that so ben yeah the first one's uh 17 17 hits 17 is the best one okay two one two total wow doesn't really have much effect unfortunately and we're gonna go to mike beginning of turn two or round two josh ames Fire away. Locked in combat with this one fiery bastard. I'm going to... I know it's going to hurt, so I brace myself, but I try to stick my spear down its throat. Okay, I like that. Go for it. And that's a 20 to hit for eight piercing damage. Okay. Okay, this thing looks like it's on its last legs. That heat explodes from within it and up your body. as you deal this damage and you take another four fire damage. It is their turn, it lashes back at you. Its teeth sinking in for 18 to hit and you take five more piercing damage. Its tail whipping around for a 17 to hit and you take four more bludgeoning damage. Where does that put you, sir? You must be close. All right, I like it. It's a little dicey. A little bit dicey. Okay, the next one is going to lash out at Sam Campbell. Ooh, it's a 15 to hit with your half plate. Does that hit? It does not. Ooh, unfortunate. The tail whips around, flames licking through the air. It rolls a 17 to hit. and that does it okay you take only two bludgeoning damage from the fiery tail and the third one is going to get up from prone which is a snake really always prone i mean Hey,

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no, I don't think this is the moment to dissect this. They're

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sort of permanently in a prone state, snakes, aren't they? I think if you... Well, if they're always prone, doesn't that mean they're never prone? Never mind. I'm going to stop the slang question. I think you can put a snake on its back and it takes a moment to like... wiggle around. It shimmies. There's a shimmy that happens. It shimmies up and I think the camel's next to it so it will attack Caxal with a 20 to hit. A dirty 20. The teeth sinking in. The fiery burning teeth. You take 4 piercing damage and the tail whips around. 13 to hit. What's the AC on the camel? A nine. Okay, you're taking another three bludgeoning damage as well as the fiery tail. You feel that heat sort of radiating through your body. Okay, so this snake has basically wrapped itself around Caxle now. Let's have Kevin take a turn. Marcus Cask, am I close enough to touch Josh? Josh? No, I don't think you would be. I'm not sure where we are. You could dash over there. You're not in combat. Okay. I want to cast Cure Wounds on Josh. Okay, go run over there and then cast it. Go ahead and roll your dice. Four plus three is a seven. Okay, so you get seven hit points back. Mal, coming to the end of round two, let's have your turn.

SPEAKER_00:

Where are my snake friends in relation to me now?

SPEAKER_01:

One of them is in close combat with Axel. It's kind of wrapping itself around the camel. The other is in close combat with Sam Campbell, who just has got the glowing head of his three-headed flail. And then the third is adjacent to Josh and Marcus.

SPEAKER_00:

Okay. I'm going to Eldritch Blast the one attacking my camel friend.

SPEAKER_01:

Okay. Fire away. That's so dumb. I'm a camel. That's so dumb. You did it immediately upon entering. You're like, oh, desert, camel, got to be camel. Hold, please, hold, please. 12? No. Let's have any movement from you. Are you good where you're at?

SPEAKER_00:

No, I'm good where I am.

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Okay, Samuel Campbell. The last hit seemed to do pretty well, so he's going to do a repeat of that and take a swing at the snake in front of him. You hear these whispers in your mind as you swing and make your attack roll. Total of 15. 15 hits. I would like to use a trip attack on this snake. All right. I don't know how that would work because again, they're always prone, but fair enough. Go ahead. So I have already hit. So I'm going to add superiority die to the damage and the snake will make a strength saving throw DC 13 or be knocked prone. 13, 13. I rolled a 12 plus one. Well, I guess the... Suck on that. The tripping action was not so effective against the snake. But you still do damage, right? Yep, I'm counting it right now. The bonus damage was very helpful for a total of 24 damage. Holy Christ. Whoa. Okay, so basically, this thing explodes into a ball of flame when you blast it with the three-headed flail. Completely immolated. Like, if you were to take a sledgehammer and hit a... A campfire. That is basically what has happened here. He gone. Let's have Axel take a turn. So can Axel get out of this? Like you said, it's wrapping itself around. Yeah, it's not grappling you. I'm just more going for the visual. You can still make an attack if you want or even run away, but you'd risk an attack of opportunity. So is it like a ring around? Sure. Okay. Can he like jump out of the ring and then turn around and bite it? Yeah, I like that. Go for it. Okay. Sixteen. 16 hits. Nice. Another one plus two. Three damage. Three bludgeoning damage. So you've bitten the snake again. Let's have a turn from Mike with Joshua Ames. Josh just can't back down. He can't help himself. Hitting this biggest of the snakes here. Go on then. Yeah, so Josh is going to Try and spear it and pin it to the ground, like straight down. Okay, I like that. Go ahead. That is a 16 to hit. Oh, I like that. Okay, that hits. We got eight damage. Oh, yeah. It is enough. You're going to take, yes, another seven fire damage as you issue this blow, but it dies. Do you want to describe how it dies? Yeah, so Josh... is in a lot of pain and is feeling burning all over but in rage just sort of like brings the spear straight down and he feels the spear like enter this snaky thing and go all the way into the sand below. Yeah. And you can see that the flames, the embers, again, like a bonfire burning low suddenly extinguishes. There are embers. Let's have the last of the snakes. Lunges toward Reagan with Axel Johnson. A final attack. It rolls a one with its fiery jaws. And a ten with its tail. It is just thrashing. The ten hits. The ten hits the armor class of a camel is a nine god you love to see it give me six more damage as the tail whips across you it lives a big burnt camel hair swath across your your flank there yeah a capsule has deceased he's you are you returned back you turned back into regular axle yeah it just uh I like to imagine it as a camel. He was going, and then when he turns back, he's just like, Oh my God.

UNKNOWN:

You know?

SPEAKER_01:

Okay. Great. Marcus, the last, the last fire snake flailing around at your camel friend. What are you going to do? I'm going to fire at my short bow and I will roll a 19. And hits. So a three plus two, five. That is enough, sir. You have killed it. Describe for me the death of this creature. So it's flailing around and this arrow goes through. I know a snake doesn't have a neck, but like it doesn't go through the head, but below the head and just clean through and fire shoots out. Yes. From the entry points and then the head falls down and then there's flopping. Yeah, a lot of flopping. Fireworks. So as combat ends, the flames still burn Actually, your character kind of shuffles away from this pile of flame. You can see that the body of the snake and the flames that are coming up from it, they bring upon you sort of a flashback. And before you know it, you are standing barefoot on wet grass and you're in your front yard and you're a kid again. You're watching your childhood home burn to ashes. The interior of it is illuminated, and the front door is ajar, and smoke billows from the windows, and you dash towards the open door. Can you tell me what you were seeking inside? Axel really wanted to find his little sister in the flames. And when he got to the room, he couldn't get inside because it had collapsed in. And there was nothing he could do. And he tried reaching in. It was sort of like a bookshelf. Half of the door was covered. And he tried to reach in underneath, trying to find her. He couldn't find anything, but he grabbed her favorite teddy bear from it. And that's all he could do before he was carried out by a fireman. And with that memory, you're brought back to the sands of the desert of Taxus. And you're looking at these three piles of flame there around the clutch of eggs. One of them have been stomped. And you can feel suddenly a wind whip across the desert and it quenches the flaming carcasses of these snakes and they crumble to sand. You look off in the distance in the opposite direction from the caravan and you see a wall of blowing sand in the distance. It is a gigantic sandstorm, and it is making its way across this endless desert toward you, hundreds and hundreds of feet tall, moving. It looks slow from a distance, doesn't it? It's so large. It looks like it's moving slowly, but you can see it approaching this sandstorm. There is lightning crashing within it. in these clouds of sand up hundreds of feet off the ground. You see this huge sandstorm moving towards you. Glancing around, there are lizards burrowing. You see a desert hare running away towards the oasis. It appears to be the only shelter. Now's the part where we run. Josh is going to run and pick up one of the eggs and then start booking it towards the oasis. How many eggs are there, do we see? If you want to spend some time digging, you could check. but two that you can see, one crushed and one intact. Axel's emotionally flustered. He runs after that impactful flashback. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

Mal's following Marcus.

SPEAKER_01:

When you approach the oasis, you are met by a group of what look like armed guards. They wear sort of flowing leather armor and robes, longish robes that billow and... in the wind. When they approach you, the first one comes up and says, What are you doing out here? What are you doing in the desert? They've all got long spears. One of them has a halberd.

SPEAKER_00:

Not this again.

SPEAKER_01:

Marcus casts Charm Person. Okay. I think I make a check for that, don't I? Wisdom. Wisdom, saving throw of 13. 14. I'm aware that you tried to cast a spell. He says, Listen, there's no time for this. You've got to come. Come now. This is the only shelter. Just come with us. Please. Thank you. They usher you through. They bring you towards the caravan. Just come in and find shelter. The sandstorm is going to overrun the whole caravan here shortly. You've got to find some place to hide. There's some rocks there or a tent. If you know someone, I don't know who you are, but we've got to figure this out afterwards. There's urgency to cover... All kinds of different tents. People are tying things down, running in this way and that. There's one particularly large tent with pelts, and you can see that certain people are tamping down the pikes that are holding it down into the sand with big hammers, trying to put weights on it. They're throwing what looks like bags of sand on top of this tent to try to hold it down, the whole thing. Others are taking tents down and packing them up. Some people are running underneath the rocks, trying to hide beside rocks. This caravan, whatever it is, these people who it's difficult to see now as they run this way and that, they are preparing for this in a method that looks practiced. Sam tries to pull his friends towards the largest tent.

SPEAKER_00:

Mal smacks Sam on the arm and says, go offer to help.

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Sam will go and try to help tamp down any of those pikes or... heave any sandbags that are available. Josh sees what Sam is doing and follows suit. The largest tent, whatever it is about that that seems important, you're trying to help. The franticness of everything going on, the chaos, is a little PTSD for Marcus, so he freezes. It reminds him of Wolf's Water and the scene when we came out of the temple. So he's just standing there in the middle of all this fray. Just standing. You can see that a couple people rush into the tent. They seem to be holding a large glass orb. Looks like a fishbowl. What about Axel? What's Axel doing? He's pretty distraught having relived his worst ever memory. I think he would try to find the best place for shelter for himself, probably to deal with everything. Where would that be? Where my friends went to that big tent. You think he would go inside? Yeah. Okay, you step inside the tent. And inside, it's royal, opulent. There's pillows everywhere. There is some tapestries that are hung. There's a circular sort of motif to it around a pedestal at the center of it. And on the pedestal is a single candle. And there are... several people bowing to this pedestal, this candle, and two people who ran in with the fishbowl seem to be trying to place the bowl over the candle, maybe to protect it or something. There's some kind of great concern going on. You see one woman standing there directing the action, and she is explaining to them what they need to do. There are also two other people who are older Standing beside her, they wear long orange robes and they are trying to explain to her something and she's trying to tell them you can see her body language. She's like, would you shut up to these two older people as she's trying to direct the action about the candle. And Yvette, can you tell us what your character is saying to them as they are working with this fishbowl to cover the candle?

SPEAKER_00:

Yes, I am telling them, make sure you don't put it out. Leave room for air circulation. The flame needs to stay alive.

SPEAKER_01:

And the older gentleman who's standing beside you says, we have to take it out of here. There's no way for us to keep this sandstorm from blowing it out. Please

SPEAKER_00:

stop. We deal with this on the regular. I know what I am doing. Go and help patch down some tents.

SPEAKER_01:

And the other one says, yes, why don't you listen to her? She knows what she's doing. She's her father's daughter. Just let her handle things. We're doing it here. We're handling it the way we always have. Put the glass bowl on top, just like she's told you. And you can see, Axel, as you step inside, that several people look at you, and they are very confused that you are there. And you sort of wander in into daze. You move towards the candle and what they are doing with it. And what do you do as you approach? I want to figure out what's up with the candle. Can I take a closer look at it? Yeah, as you step closer to the candle, you lose your balance on one of the rugs that is on the floor and stumble closer and knock one of the attendants who is holding one of the sides of the large fishbowl. That person slips, drops the fishbowl. The candle topples off of the pedestal, flickering down as if in slow motion to the ground and it is extinguished. The flame goes out and everyone stares in horror. The people who were bowing sit up on their heels and they look at the candle lying on the ground out.

SPEAKER_00:

I'm completely frozen in shock and then I turn around in utter anger to this newcomer and I say, do you know what you have done?

SPEAKER_01:

All of a sudden the sandstorm hits the caravan. You feel the earth shake completely. there is a rumble there is a rumble deep from within the ground and the tent you see the pelts go flicking up and you're looking out suddenly axle at the rest of the desert the others wherever you are hiding you are completely exposed and boom it's like nothing you've ever seen the sand is around you it is inside of you it is all everywhere it's blowing all over you and lightning is crashing All around you, you are within the sandstorm, and you hear that same rumble, and you look up, all of you look up into the sandstorm, and towering over you, standing over you, 70, 80, 100 feet tall is this titan there's no other word for it it is a titan it is gigantic it looks like it's made of stone and it is lumbering towards the caravan you're looking up at this thing it is the sand is like obscuring your view and so all of a sudden this gigantic what looks like rock foot just crashes down on one of the tents completely flattening it comes down on another one smooshing some people you hear screams it's like absolute pandemonium destroying the caravan and You can see as it leans down, reaching to grab this candle from the pedestal, sweeping its hand in one big motion and destroying a whole swath of the caravan. You look at its head and it has this triangular crevice in its forehead before it goes completely black. And you are all lost in that same inky darkness. the world around you vanishes.

SPEAKER_00:

Thank you for listening to this episode of Phantom Nirvana, a Dungeons& Dragons podcast. Our cast is Reagan as Axel Johnson, Michael as Joshua Ames, Ben as Sam Campbell, Kevin as Marcus Burkhead, Yvette as Rayanna, Phil as the Dungeon Master, and myself, Courtney, as Mallory Reed. Our music is by Seiji, Sun Umbra, Gypsy Vision, Gang Colors, and Turn Try.