BRIAN MURPHY: Hello, orcs and gentle-dwarves, it’s Murph — your Dungeon Master for this D&D play podcast! I’ve got some solid players lined up: Emily Axford, Jake Hurwitz, and Caldwell Tanner. You’ll be hearing from those guys in just a few minutes, and you can hear our first full episode this coming Thursday. If you’ve never played D&D before, don’t worry, ‘cuz neither has Jake, and he’s one of the hosts, so… y’know. It’s just collective storytelling with some dice-rolling; you’ll pick it up fast.

For this mini-sode — that’s what I’m calling it: a mini-sode — I wanted to give you a little preview and talk about our game. So, this campaign takes place in a world that has already been saved. The idea is that three legendary heroes have already gone through, defeated the big bad evil guy, and righted wrongs along the way. Jake, Emily, and Caldwell will start their campaign is this morally-grey post-war world, and have to deal with all the problems caused by the legendary heroes on their adventure.

So… I’ll get more into the backstory about the world in our first episode. Right now I’m gonna play for you a little intro that introduces the party, then I’m gonna join Caldwell, Emily, and Jake as they talk about their characters! So, let’s cue the temporary intro!

[epic music plays]

Welcome to the campaign after the campaign — this is Not Another D&D Podcast! Let’s meet our party:

JAKE HURWITZ: [as Hardwon; gruff voice] Hardwon Surefoot, the bastard of the mountain: a human Fighter raised by dwarves. Thick of calf and quad, six-foot-six of muscle and beard. The greataxe of Irondeep. Pride of the dwarphanage. Having dug further into Irondeep than any man or dwarf before him, Hardwon believes his next great adventure lies above-ground and has set off to see the world.

CALDWELL TANNER: [as Beverly; high-pitched, excited voice] Beverly Toegold, pure-hearted halfling youth from the city of Galaderon. A five-leaf Green Teen novice Paladin in pursuit of the ultimate merit patches! Beverly has never disobeyed his mom, and is an extremely good boy.

EMILY AXFORD: [as Moonshine; southern drawl] Moonshine Cybin, Crick-elf Druid; lover of fungus and ambassador of decay. Her people were ostracized by the high elves to the dank shores of The Crick, but now sumthin’s amiss at the ol’ Crick! Accompanied by her loyal possum, PawPaw Gump! Freckled, ferocious, and dangerously fertile.

MURPH: Do you guys wanna talk a little bit more about your characters? Emily, did you wanna talk a little bit more about Moonshine before we get started?

JAKE: Cybin is my favourite last name.

EMILY: Yeah, Moonshine Cybin. Moonshine Cybin, y’know, she’s sort of a backwoods elf; if she met a high elf they’d probably turn their nose down at her, but Moonshine wouldn’t really give a fuck. There’s some unnatural happenings down at The Crick, so the Crick-elves are looking for a place to stay, so..

MURPH: [southern drawl] Yeah, I heard that some of them animals are dun dyin’.

EMILY: Some of them animals are dun dyin’. The Crick-elves are startin’ to get worried, they’re fixin’ to make a move.

MURPH: [southern drawl] Crick’s dryin’ up.

EMILY: Crick’s dryin’ up! [laughs]

JAKE: [southern drawl] Sumthin’s happ’nin’ down at The Crick!

EMILY: Sumthin’s amiss at The Crick!

JAKE: [southern drawl] “Pa, come quick!”

EMILY: [laughs] “MeeMaw, come quick! Sumthin’s amiss at The Crick!”

JAKE: [laughs; southern drawl] “What’s the matter, PawPaw?” [laughs] “Is it The Crick?”

EMILY: [laughs] “MeeMaw, PawPaw ain’t actin’ right!”

MURPH: [laughs] PawPaw, of course, is the possum, right?

EMILY: Yeah, PawPaw is the—

CALDWELL: How likely is it that PawPaw is just a stuffed possum? [laughs]

EMILY: [laughs] — is just a stuffed possum!? [laughs]

CALDWELL: “He’s always getting into trash, so—“

EMILY: He is always gettin’ into trash. But now she’s wandering the world of Bahumia. She’s got a side project, which is collecting a spore library — which is: basically any time she sees a mushroom, she collects some spores from it so that she’ll always be able to make more of it. But she’s got an overall-bib pocket of mushrooms that are native to The Crick so that she can plant them in other climates to see what sort of an environment they take a shinin’ to, ‘cuz maybe the Crick-elves can move there.

CALDWELL: So, like, any time we kill someone during the campaign, you’re just gonna plant a mushroom on their corpse? Is that kind of your calling card?

EMILY: Yeah.

CALDWELL: [laughs] Okay. [laughs] I love it.

EMILY: Oh, yeah. Yeah, I’m just gonna sprinkle a couple spores, and then when they see the dead body and they’re like, “There’s mushrooms growin’ out— …Moonshine’s been here!”

[all laugh]

JAKE: [raspy, menacing voice] “CYBIN!”

EMILY: Cybin! [laughs]

MURPH: Caldwell, did you wanna talk about Beverly a bit?

CALDWELL: Yeah. Beverly is a fourteen-, fifteen-year-old halfling from the city of Galaderon; kind of a privileged and pampered youth. He comes from a long line of Beverlies — he’s actually the fifth Beverly in his line — and, as I mentioned, he’s a city halfling, which is a specific kind of subset of halfling, that, unlike most halflings, shaves their feet and paints them a colour. They paint their toes and the tops of their feet.

MURPH: [laughs] Yeah.

CALDWELL: Since they live in an urban environment, they have no need to keep that hairy… kind of, like, rough… y’know, look about them.

MURPH: Right. I—

EMILY: I do wanna warn you that Moonshine’s feet are dirty and calloused.

[Murph laughs]

CALDWELL: Yeah, and that’s gonna take some getting used to for young Beverly.

EMILY: [laughs] Mine are like—

JAKE: Did you pack a razor to shave your feet, even on your journey?

CALDWELL: Absolutely!

JAKE: [crosstalk] Keep ‘em prim and proper—

EMILY: [crosstalk] — or do you wax? Or threading!? You could get threading. [laughs]

JAKE: [crosstalk] That’s cool. That’s city-living. [laughs]

MURPH: [crosstalk] Have the Toegolds evolved for their foot-hair to grow slower than a normal halfling, or does it grow in pretty much every day?

CALDWELL: I think it still grows in. It’s just like, y’know—

MURPH: — kind of like a five-o’clock foot-shadow?

[Emily laughs]

CALDWELL: — yeah, and I think Beverly is very excited that his foot-hair has just started growing in. He’s, like, just been shaving for a year, I think, maybe?

EMILY: Ohh… it’s like a point of pride.

CALDWELL: So this is like a point of pride for him, for sure. And, like, his dad took a—

EMILY: [crosstalk] So, like, maybe he doesn’t get—

MURPH: So, maybe he only has like… little peach-fuzz feet.

[Caldwell laughs]

JAKE: [laughs] Aww, that’s cute!

EMILY: Yeah, he’s got little peach-fuzz feet, but he’s, like, making a big deal — he’s always like, [imitating Beverly] “Oh, before we go, I mean, I really gotta shave my feet…”

CALDWELL: Yeah! “I really gotta shave… it’s getting—”

JAKE: “It looks like you already have.”

[Emily laughs]

MURPH: But, yeah, he’s also like a Boy Scout.

CALDWELL: Yes.

MURPH: He’s part of the Green Teens.

CALDWELL: He’s part of the Green Teens, which is like a junior paladin organization. He’s a five-leaf — it’s a six-leaf system the Green Teens are on, and when you reach six leaves you become a full-fledged Junior Green Knight — and all of the Beverlies in his family have been Green Knights, and that’s sort of the path he’s on. He’s not sure if he actually wants to be a Green Knight, but being a six-leaf Green Teen is very good for your academy application.

MURPH: Wow.

EMILY: Flash-forward fifteen years from now, when Caldwell has three boys and has started the Green Teens for real.

[all laugh]

JAKE: [laughs] — and he’s shaving all of their feet.

CALDWELL: Oh, absolutely.

MURPH: On our other podcast, the 8-Bit Book Club, somebody on that subreddit suggested the name — instead of ‘Green Teens’ — ‘Boy Pals’, for ‘boy paladins.’

[Jake laughs]

EMILY: [laughs] — for ‘boy paladins’!

MURPH: I really like ‘Green Teens’, so I think what it’ll be, it’ll be sort of: ‘Boy Pals’ is sort of the ‘Cub Scout’ to the Green Teens’ ‘Boy Scout’.

JAKE: Oh, yeah! Okay.

EMILY: Oh, yeah. That’d be funny if everyone was like, [deep voice] “Oh, you’re… you’re a Boy Pal?”

CALDWELL: “Nope!”

MURPH: [crosstalk] He was already a Boy Pal. He graduated from Boy Pals.

EMILY: [crosstalk; imitating Beverly] “No, I’m with the Green Teens!”

JAKE: [crosstalk; belittling voice] “Well, isn’t that cute. It’s a Boy Pal!”

CALDWELL: “I’ve graduated from Boy Pal! I’ve got all my patches from Boy Pal!”

EMILY: — and that’s what sends him into a barbarian rage. [laughs]

JAKE: [growling voice] “DON’T CALL ME ‘BOY PAL!’”

[Emily laughs]

CALDWELL: “Just look at these beads that I have here! Each one represents a year as a Boy Pal!”

[Emily laughs again]

CALDWELL: So I’m kind of trying to get the last required merit patches necessary to become a six-leaf Green Teen.

MURPH: — your Junior Green Knight.

CALDWELL: Yes. But those are very rare patches. So that’s kind of, like, why I’m going on this journey: it’s to try and claim those last patches.

MURPH: Yep. And you guys are Level—

JAKE: [crosstalk] — and you have the patches; you just haven’t sewn them on, right? Like you carry around a lot of patches?

CALDWELL: [crosstalk] Oh, I have a lot of patches.

JAKE:[crosstalk] Okay.

EMILY: [crosstalk] Just imagine if that was like the last year of going from Cub Scout to Eagle Scout; if it was like, “Cool, now in your sixteenth year you leave and live in the woods,” and that’s how you become an Eagle Scout.

CALDWELL: [laughs] I wish, yeah.

JAKE: [laughs] “— if you’re seventeen and not dead.”

CALDWELL: Yeah, your parents strip you nude and give you a knife; that’s how I got my Eagle Scout badge.

[Emily laughs]

MURPH: So the badge you’re looking for is probably — since you are a Level 2 Paladin…

CALDWELL: Right.

MURPH: At Level 3, if you take the Oath of Ancients and become a Green Knight, you can speak to animals — so that’s probably the patch you’re looking for. ‘Speak to Animal’—

CALDWELL: [crosstalk] Yeah. Like, Animal… ‘Animal Relations’.

MURPH: [laughs] ‘Animal Relations!’ [laughs]

JAKE: [crosstalk] ‘The AR patch.’

EMILY: [crosstalk] I hope that PawPaw — like, when you speak to PawPaw, my possum — he has a really eloquent voice. [laughs]

CALDWELL: Oh, absolutely.

EMILY: Mmm!

CALDWELL: He is so wise.

MURPH: I can already tell you that PawPaw is a dumb hick. He’s so stupid and crazy.

[All laugh]

JAKE: [crosstalk; imitating Moonshine] “Oh, tell me the wise things PawPaw says!” [imitating Beverly] “Moonshine, um… he was very eloquent.”

MURPH: [crosstalk] You’re gonna see how sick PawPaw is.

CALDWELL: “I think that he’s… I’m like ninety-five percent sure he’s dead.”

[Emily laughs]

MURPH: [as PawPaw; unintelligible gibberish in a southern drawl] “Wait-wait-wait, no, oh-wai—, wh— wh—, we’re—, we— [possum noises]”

[all laugh]

EMILY: [laughs] He’s just, like, incoherent!

MURPH: He’s just Boomhauer on meth, essentially.

[all laugh]

JAKE: PawPaw sounds the same after you can speak to animals as he did before.

EMILY: [laughs] — with a mouth full of garbage.

MURPH: Guys, don’t I — at my battlestation with my DM screen and stuff… I’m like a dorky Howard Stern.

EMILY: [crosstalk] Yeah, you are!

MURPH: [crosstalk] I’ve got this stuff, like, behind the glass back here…

EMILY: [crosstalk] Dang, you are!

MURPH: [crosstalk] Right!?

JAKE: [crosstalk] This screen is dope. I feel like that guy—

EMILY: [crosstalk] ‘A dorky Howard Stern.’ I’m gonna chisel that on your gravestone. I already bought it, I just haven’t chiseled anything on it yet. [laughs]

CALDWELL: [crosstalk] Murph, do a roll to see how powerful your ‘Baba Booey’ is.

EMILY: Yeah! [laughs]

MURPH: Alright, first roll: [rolls die] …fifteen!

[all laugh]

JAKE: Wow!

EMILY: That’s a pretty good number.

MURPH: [imitating the Baby Booey bit from the Howard Stern Show] “Baba Booey, Baba Booey!”

CALDWELL: Say it fifteen times…

MURPH: [imitating Howard Stern] “So, Hardwon, tell me about yourself. You fuck any, uh… any chicks at a brothel?”

JAKE: [laughs] Oh, Jesus Christ.

[all laugh]

MURPH: [imitating Howard Stern] “Tell me, what was that like? Do you, uh…”

JAKE: [laughs] This is… it is… there’s something about the, like, ‘Howard Stern’ thing. I’m like… I really do want—

MURPH: [crosstalk] I’m really, kind of… you guys are back in couches, and I’m at a desk, and it’s a real position of power.

CALDWELL: [crosstalk] Yeah. Yeah.

JAKE: Yeah, for sure. You’re higher up; you’ve got, like… there’s literally a fire-breathing dragon staring at me, right below you.

EMILY: Do you guys think it would be distracting for the podcast if I just had a lip full of chew?

[Murph laughs]

JAKE: I don’t think so.

EMILY: — like, during it, would the mic pick it up? I just feel like Moonshine would.

CALDWELL: [crosstalk] I mean, if you’re gonna share it, yeah, it’d be fine…

JAKE: Yeah, people do hate, like, chewing on podcasts, so if you did it would just be like… [loud chewing noises]

[Emily laughs]

MURPH: Okay, Jake, did you wanna tell me a little bit about Hardwon?

JAKE: I would love to.

MURPH: So he was raised in a dwarphanage?

JAKE: Yes, he was left on the foot of the Irondeep Mountains, and as Emily — I have to give you credit for ‘the dwarphanage’, ‘cuz it’s my favourite.

[Emily laughs]

JAKE: So he was raised in the dwarphanage; he was almost raised by the entire community of dwarves under the mountain. Raised by the mountain, you could say.

MURPH: Wow.

EMILY: Ooh!

JAKE: He made a real name for himself because he’s a big, strong human towering over the dwarves, and he’s amazing at mining the mountain.

EMILY: [laughs] I’m just picturing him at a bar talking to a woman, being like, [imitating Hardwon] “I guess you could say my father was, like, a mountain. Was… the mountain.” [laughs]

JAKE: [laughs] Yeah, and that’s exactly the kind of thing he would do. To Hardwon, he’s like… the best high-school athlete at a really shitty school. Like: big fish, small pond.

[Murph laughs]

EMILY: Oh, my God.

JAKE: He thinks he’s—

MURPH: Right, ‘cuz he’s around all these real heavy dwarves that can’t climb or anything, so he thinks he’s like the best rock-climber and everything?

CALDWELL: Uh-huh.

JAKE: Right. In the mountains, he leaves and is like, “I am the most famous person in Irondeep,” and everyone’s like, “Well, we’ve never heard of anyone that came out of there.” To everyone else, he’s just a big, dumb dude walking around, like “I— I’m a legend!”

MURPH: You’re like a really tall American in another country… and all the tourists are asking to take pictures with you and stuff.

JAKE: [laughs] Yeah, that’s it.

EMILY: [laughs] Yeah, you’re like a traveling blond. I feel like blonds, when they travel to other countries… people are like, “Wow! You’re magical!”

JAKE: [laughs] That’s what I’m hoping for.

CALDWELL: I feel like you started track and field at your school, just so you could be better at it than everyone else.

[all laugh]

JAKE: “Watch me throw a javelin!” “What’s a javelin?” “IT DOESN’T MATTER. It’s a fucking stick I can throw!”

MURPH: [laughs; imitating Hardwon] “Just watch it, man!”

EMILY: [laughs] Just Hardwon racing a bunch of dwarves and being such a poor-sport winner, just being like, [imitating Hardwon; grunts] “Yeah! Suck it! You can’t keep up!”

JAKE: [laughs] Just running up the glide…

[epic music plays]

MURPH: That is it for Episode 0, guys! Hope you enjoyed hearing us talk about our party. Please subscribe to the podcast, and listen to our first episode when it drops this Thursday — that’s when we’ll actually be playing the game. So… thanks for listening! May Bahamut keep you; may the Baba Yaga not take you this night.

[Transcribed by Redditor siilhouette.]