00:00:05.21 Kurt Crenwelge Hello and welcome to another month's exciting episode of Sidekicks and Sidequests, the best unofficial Dungeons & Dragons podcast in my humbly biased opinion. 00:00:16.78 Kurt Crenwelge I've got an amazing guest for you this month, but before we figure out who my mystery contestant is going to be, you know I have to do it. I have to leave you in suspense with the ad read. 00:00:28.34 Kurt Crenwelge Insert here, for all you transcription readers that are hearing about the ad, plusonexp.com and RPGZine.club, of course. They're great. Tony Vicenda is excellent. He's a good dude. 00:00:42.58 Kurt Crenwelge ah You should support these things, especially because I have a code. If you go plusonexp.com and use the code Randolph, R-A-N-D-O-L-P-H, then you can save some money whenever you purchase a beard balm or a lip balm or a beard-themed RPG or whatnot. 00:01:01.78 Kurt Crenwelge And it'll help support the podcast. And then, of course, RPG Zine Club. We're working to develop cool new indie TTRPGs from up-and-coming creators from all sorts and types. So it's a good time. So I think that's good for the ad break. And now back to the show. 00:01:18.26 Kurt Crenwelge All right. And without further ado, we're back to it. And i turn the microphone over to my guest and I say, hello, mystery contestant. Would you care to introduce yourself? Tell us who it is that you are and what is it that you do? 00:01:33.43 Manda Hello. Um, oh gosh, I, oh shoot. Um, do you, let's see, Kurt, can we pause two seconds? I'm so sorry. 00:01:45.66 Manda yes that 00:01:46.17 Kurt Crenwelge Sure. 00:01:48.92 Manda Thank you. Do you want me to, um, I guess it's more or less like, do you want me to do like myself or are we doing a mystery character? 00:01:56.63 Kurt Crenwelge Oh, no, no, no. Sorry. So this is the personal interview section at the front of the top of the show. 00:01:59.94 Manda I figured it was. Yeah, I didn't know if you had it all in, okay, because you were saying mystery, and I didn't know if it was the randomly generated part. Okay, great. 00:02:07.10 Kurt Crenwelge Yes, my bad. 00:02:07.16 Manda Back to it. 00:02:07.86 Kurt Crenwelge Sorry. 00:02:07.92 Manda Okay. 00:02:08.22 Kurt Crenwelge i I should have explained the format of the show. 00:02:08.36 Manda No, you're good. No, I've listened to it, and I was like, but then when you said mystery character, and I was like, oh, wait, did he do the first part in the beginning? Have we recorded it? and be okay sorry. 00:02:19.18 Kurt Crenwelge Oh, OK. 00:02:19.04 Manda Okay, good to go. Yeah, great. 00:02:25.34 Manda All right. Hey, guys. It's Dungeon Mommy Amanda here. I am so excited to be on Kurt's podcast today. 00:02:33.66 Kurt Crenwelge Yes, thank you so much for guesting. I saw you are an up-and-comer there on Instagram, which is where it seems to be where most people are finding themselves from the hobby. And so you just seemed like a a vibrant ah person ah that was it was cool. You started following me and I started following you. And it's like, you know, I think she's got a good vibe and I think she'd be a fun guest to have on the show. 00:02:57.99 Manda Thanks. Yeah. um That's why everybody's like so nice. I've been playing, you know, D&D for a long time, but I think ah Instagram has really kind of taken off. of The community for D&D is really kind of welcoming. It's nice. Like ah TikTok, is there's a little bit of a um a boom on there, but it seems to mainly be like live play. But I really am enjoying the the Instagram fam. They're fun people on there. So, yeah. 00:03:27.61 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah. And so, uh, and so what is it that you do? I mean, you don't have to say all that you do. Like, you know, we all have professional lives. We all have like, you know, what we do in the hobby lives and stuff like that. 00:03:35.77 Manda Yes. 00:03:38.69 Kurt Crenwelge But you know, what is it, what, what is it that a Amanda sees herself doing most days? 00:03:44.34 Manda Oh, sure. um So i as far as D&D goes, I do host a lot of events here in the Chicagoland area. um I have a game that I host fairly regularly every Sunday night. We don't currently broadcast live, but we will. 00:04:02.71 Manda ah The second we're actually building our own table, which is kind of fun. um So the second we get a table, yeah, I'm... 00:04:07.48 Kurt Crenwelge Ooh. 00:04:11.00 Manda putting my hand in woodworking, which I've never done before. So it's kind of exciting. 00:04:14.99 Kurt Crenwelge That's exciting. 00:04:15.94 Manda I know. Right. But yeah, I do a lot of live events here at bars. 00:04:17.98 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah. 00:04:20.94 Manda I actually work with a couple nonprofits here in the Chicagoland area that do TTRPGs for good. um And then I do some online um gaming and then I also um go to conventions and I game there. 00:04:35.77 Manda So that's, The gaming side of things, my boring day job is i do work in vet medicine, so I save pets' lives on a daily basis. 00:04:44.87 Kurt Crenwelge Well, hey, do not discredit that. 00:04:45.98 Manda Yeah. 00:04:47.20 Kurt Crenwelge I think that's highly memorable and important as a as a as a owner of a doggo. 00:04:47.61 Manda I know, I know. Yeah. 00:04:53.05 Kurt Crenwelge And and I still got one cat left. 00:04:53.98 Manda Yeah. 00:04:55.25 Kurt Crenwelge ah You know, pets are part of the family for sure. 00:04:58.94 Manda It is fun. i have a game I play on Tuesdays and usually those are kind of heavy surgery days. So I'll come rushing home. I'm usually covered in dog hair and probably smelling of different things that I shouldn't be smelling like and immediately have to jump on a game with other people from across the world, like just in my scrubs, like just knowing that i probably smell like what my character that I play smells like in real life. 00:05:24.32 Manda So it's kind of comforting. It's a lizard folk, 00:05:26.65 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah. 00:05:27.77 Manda A barbarian. So, yeah. yeah 00:05:30.20 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah. Talk about immersion. Smell-o-vision. 00:05:32.28 Manda Right. 00:05:32.96 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah. 00:05:33.34 Manda the Yeah. Yeah. i It's more for myself. I just immerse myself in the character of those nights. So, yeah. 00:05:40.15 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah, cool. And ah so, you know, you're explaining that you are you're in the hotbed, it seems like, you know, in the Midwest ah for where where it's all going down with TTRPGs, because I mean, I guess historically not that far away from you is where D&D actually sort of started. So it only be natural that it would just sort a lot of A lot of creators, like I know ah Joshua Simons is up there in Chicago, and Cypher, she's up there in Chicago. 00:06:08.60 Manda you know 00:06:09.62 Kurt Crenwelge And ah yeah, so there's like lots of cool people hanging around the Chicagoland area for sure. 00:06:15.38 Manda Yeah, there's a lot of great groups up here. um ah Rogue is up here and um i I do a lot of games with um or I'm gonna Ben guest and I are starting to do quite a few games here in the Chicagoland area and I know that he's kind of well known so. 00:06:31.42 Manda um Yeah, the it's kind of everybody wants you in the Chicago area, you kind of quickly learn everybody, but it's kind of almost still a niche. 00:06:43.45 Manda um Like we all still know each other, but we're all still like there's only, you know, 00:06:43.83 Kurt Crenwelge o 00:06:50.78 Manda a dozen or two dozen of us. It's not like, and no, no offense to the California kids. 00:06:55.73 Kurt Crenwelge Dozens of us! 00:06:56.07 Manda I love, yeah I love, I love the California kids, but there's a lot of people in California. 00:06:56.93 Kurt Crenwelge Dozens! 00:07:01.76 Manda Um, so it seems like at least Chicago, there's like, I can count us all on um my hands and toes. So yeah. There's probably more, but at least, yeah, for sure. 00:07:11.40 Kurt Crenwelge That's awesome. 00:07:13.24 Manda And everybody's, again, super nice. um And it seems like the bars here are really embracing D&D. Like, I can't tell you, like, especially this summer, it seems to really have boomed with more um wanting to do D&D events and more, like, game shops are opening up here in Chicago that are really doing well, like prison gaming, um things like that. So it's kind of nice. Like, it's it seems to be... 00:07:40.41 Manda um in the like popular. So it's really funny for something that, you know, we've played for a long time that wasn't, I guess. 00:07:52.06 Manda Or at least, you know, for you and i I, I don't know how long you've been playing Kurt, but I've been playing for way too long. but um But yeah, growing up it was, yeah. 00:07:58.97 Kurt Crenwelge Well, i yeah no i've been I've been since the college days. So Halloween night of 2010 was my first time ever playing fourth edition. 00:08:05.78 Manda Oh yeah. 00:08:07.97 Kurt Crenwelge So I got my start in fourth and naturally made the switch into 00:08:09.65 Manda Ah. 00:08:11.93 Kurt Crenwelge five v And I'm just happy to stay in five e So that's that's where I'm hanging out these days. 00:08:13.34 Manda Yeah. 00:08:18.11 Manda I'm going to age myself. I started playing in 94. was 12, 94, 95. And I've been for 30 I'm a little, I'm little old. am a vet. Yeah. started like a 00:08:34.81 Manda so i'm a little 00:08:35.03 Kurt Crenwelge Wow. A veteran. 00:08:36.21 Manda i'm a little old 00:08:37.75 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah. 00:08:37.59 Manda i am a vet yeah yeah i started 00:08:40.31 Kurt Crenwelge Thank you for your service to the hobby. 00:08:40.22 Manda ah like 00:08:43.37 Manda Thank you. Yeah, I think I started at three. I think that was still three back then and in the 90s. Yeah. 00:08:51.77 Kurt Crenwelge Wow. 00:08:52.88 Manda Yep. 00:08:53.24 Kurt Crenwelge Well, not to not to date myself, but you know you're saying since 94, and I was like, oh, was i was i back in the States? Because I was a military brat, so it's like, were we finally back in the States at that point or or not? 00:09:03.61 Manda Oh, yeah. Yeah. 00:09:07.22 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah, because it's like, roughly like oh actually oh we may have moved down to texas by that point if i think of my my timelines correctly because i grew up in houston uh is where i my childhood but i bounced around a couple of places before that so wow the 90s a whole other time a whole other era 00:09:14.23 Manda Okay. 00:09:18.59 Manda Oh, nice. 00:09:22.41 Manda Yeah. Texas is good people. Yeah. 00:09:28.54 Manda like this Yeah. Yeah. I miss the 90s, but mainly the fashion, let's be honest. 00:09:34.94 Kurt Crenwelge ah So, I mean, that ah yeah that seems to segue beautifully into the question. you know So, currently or ever you know currently and ever playing D&D, obviously you're doing it now in the bars and you're veteran since 94. 00:09:41.78 Manda Yeah. 00:09:47.83 Manda Yeah. 00:09:49.67 Kurt Crenwelge How do you feel like the hobby's been? How it's grown? Like, you know, you and and Tanya DePass, Cypher, you know, you're these veterans in the Chicagoland area that have played your way through the additions and and stuff like that. 00:10:02.47 Kurt Crenwelge How do you feel? Because I guess you got it on, yeah you know, your you're a femme, you're a lady, and you've been in the hobby long enough than me. 00:10:07.67 Manda Yeah. yeah 00:10:11.18 Kurt Crenwelge How do you feel like everything's changed since then? 00:10:15.12 Manda It's kind of, and i like I'll admit, like I think back when I was younger, it definitely wasn't as inclusive. I definitely have a lot of horror stories um about ah you know a lot more kind of um essay topics, I guess, that you know the boys would like to play when we were all playing the game. 00:10:36.38 Manda um and that 00:10:36.77 Kurt Crenwelge Mm. Mm. 00:10:39.33 Manda you don't hear that as much anymore, which is fantastic. And I just think like D&D has just kind of evolved into something that's more accessible to like all ages. 00:10:43.67 Kurt Crenwelge Mm. 00:10:50.03 Manda And like, and I mean, as much as like people kind of, you know, harp on the, you know, five, 5.5 rules, in my mind, they're kind of easier than, you know, 00:10:59.84 Kurt Crenwelge Hm. 00:11:03.67 Manda three. ah So I think like the rules have at least gotten like, for example, like I have my group that plays on Sundays, there's seven of them. And I think only two of them have actually played before. So five of them are brand new to the game. 00:11:17.71 Kurt Crenwelge Right. 00:11:17.75 Manda And, um and they pick it up pretty easy. So it's kind of nice. I feel like um and maybe it's my explanation skills, but I would like to think it's also the game has just gotten a lot more accessible to people. 00:11:30.71 Manda So yeah. which I love. And I, and also like, you know, you think about like the stories have grown and like homebrew has just gotten so big. And like, I definitely, I do like a, for my campaigns, like a hodgepodge of both. But I think like, it's kind of, it's opened up its own. 00:11:49.82 Manda People can expand their imagination. i think back in the day it was sticking more to like what specifically was, written in like the specific campaigns but now it's kind of like nope just do whatever is fun and i think that's great yeah 00:12:00.76 Kurt Crenwelge even 00:12:04.88 Kurt Crenwelge That's awesome. And ah yeah, no, that's so cool to hear. Yeah, we're we're grateful for the age where we don't have a page and a half on the rules for grappling, apparently, is you used to be a thing, or Thacko. 00:12:15.29 Manda yeah yeah oh yeah yep yeah oh man i remember yep 00:12:19.30 Kurt Crenwelge Don't have to worry about that. 00:12:24.50 Manda And it's funny because I'll forget on occasion. And when I DM, like, and I luckily I have another DM who plays too. And I'll accidentally throw out an old rule every now and then. And they'll look at me and they'll be like, man, and then I'm like, oh, wait, nope, that's old school. Forget what I said. You're fine. Yeah. 00:12:41.35 Kurt Crenwelge Although with your veteran knowledge, I've seen this thing online where people share the stories of like, oh, my group is fighting a lich. 00:12:41.21 Manda yeah 00:12:44.02 Manda test 00:12:50.04 Kurt Crenwelge But this isn't like a fifth edition lich. This is like a third, second, first edition lich that has access to spells that no longer exist. 00:12:55.28 Manda Yeah. 00:12:58.20 Kurt Crenwelge And so that's a way to really throw your players for a loop because they're like, what do you mean this lich can just like do this thing? 00:12:58.78 Manda yeah 00:13:05.54 Kurt Crenwelge That's not in the rules. It's like they're working on a different level of magic than you are. 00:13:10.23 Manda Yeah, I, there's a couple of things I'm hoping by not to, ah you know, I'm going to have a few of my players wait to listen to this podcast until later. But um there's a few things that I think I'm going to throw in that are kind of old school that I, I will throw in like ah old spells that aren't around anymore. 00:13:28.16 Kurt Crenwelge Oh, 00:13:27.99 Manda um Which I kind of like. ah And yeah, like sometimes like old, like, um, even like races that aren't around that much anymore. 00:13:39.77 Manda I'll occasionally have them run into them and they'll be like, what is that? 00:13:40.41 Kurt Crenwelge yeah 00:13:42.65 Manda And i'm like, Oh, Oh yeah, i guess that isn't really popular anymore. Um, yeah. So it's kind of nice to kind of have like bringing in like little hints of back in the day to now So yeah. 00:13:54.87 Kurt Crenwelge yeah 00:13:54.84 Manda Yeah. 00:13:55.64 Kurt Crenwelge Which I guess is what makes the the strength of the homebrew and the third-party content ah market it's out here now helping to make all of our games and our tables more rich and more diverse in their storytelling. 00:14:01.27 Manda Yeah. 00:14:09.27 Manda But I also just love kind of all the other games that have kind of like come off of like just D&D itself. Like, cause like, yeah, like i I do a lot of like horror. 00:14:23.13 Manda And so like, you know, sticking in D&D, like I like Crooked Moon and like campaigns like that. But I like, if you ask me to GM Call of Cthulhu, oh, I'm there. 00:14:33.88 Manda You don't have to pay me. Like that's... 00:14:35.93 Kurt Crenwelge I would be intrigued to play it. I know after listening to the the third season of Dungeons and Daddies, I was like, oh, this is this is cool. 00:14:39.92 Manda Oh. 00:14:45.28 Kurt Crenwelge Like how they made like a whole campaign out of it. 00:14:46.39 Manda Yeah. 00:14:47.68 Kurt Crenwelge And, you know, no spoilers for how that campaign ended. But I was like, wow, that was like, you know, that was a heck of a story. So for sure. 00:14:55.96 Manda Yeah. I'm a big H.P. Lovecraft person. So I think like that when that came out, I was like, oh, sign me up. I played that a lot actually during ko um That's when I started ah playing Call of Cthulhu was online because none of us could hang out with each other. 00:15:14.79 Kurt Crenwelge Be in person. 00:15:15.18 Manda And I i do feel like that also kind of was part of the you know boom was everybody having to be online for a second. And I think people kind of getting back to our gaming roots of like, oh, we can still do this. 00:15:24.73 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah. 00:15:29.78 Manda Like, this is still fun. 00:15:30.49 Kurt Crenwelge yeah Yeah, it was definitely a perfect storm back in 2015 where it's like new edition, ah critical role, ah you know, stranger things like this perfect storm meld mesh of everything. 00:15:31.38 Manda Yeah. 00:15:41.40 Manda Yeah. 00:15:44.19 Manda Dimension 20. 00:15:44.42 Kurt Crenwelge And then it's yeah. 00:15:45.14 Manda Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. um yeah I'm a big D20 fan. i I like more of the humor side. 00:15:55.96 Manda um Not that I don't love Critical Role. I think they're great. I think I tend to lean more towards like the comedy um side of things. 00:16:02.36 Kurt Crenwelge Oh, like Dimension 20? 00:16:03.88 Manda Dimension 20 cracks me up. They are just, like yeah. 00:16:05.98 Kurt Crenwelge Yes. 00:16:07.36 Manda um Legends of Adventurous. Those guys are so nice. um And I have like tears in my eyes whenever I watch their YouTube. Like, because it's just so ridiculous. 00:16:15.13 Kurt Crenwelge Their shorts are very funny, for sure. 00:16:18.27 Manda It's so, and I love how quickly they get those animated. 00:16:21.85 Kurt Crenwelge Yes. 00:16:21.79 Manda Like, yeah. 00:16:23.00 Kurt Crenwelge It is quite a turnaround, for sure. 00:16:24.66 Manda It's so accessible. Yeah. 00:16:27.26 Kurt Crenwelge Well, of this podcast being called Sidekicks and Sidequests, we like to focus on the other. And so for the first of these kinds of questions, I always ask my guests, who happens to be your favorite NPC or sidekick character, whether they be from video games, movie, film, literature, RPGs, the very manyest ones you've played. 00:16:33.43 Manda Yep. 00:16:48.99 Kurt Crenwelge And, ah you know, why is this character your favorite sidekick or NPC? Yeah. 00:16:54.74 Manda Okay. ah I love that question. So i love Chainsaw Man. um I think it's kind of a ridiculous show. ah It's you know very like, it's a teenage boy. He loves boobs. It's kind of a silly plot quest. But um 00:17:14.78 Manda like I like power. i think like for her, as like... a character like cause she's so she struggles so hard with like her internal demons and the fact that she's kind of manic and um she knows how easily boys can be manipulated but there's a part of me that I just always really like power. 00:17:37.98 Manda um and you know, not spoilers out there when she dies, I was kind of devastated because I just genuinely thought she was a better character on the show and in the in the manga. 00:17:47.60 Kurt Crenwelge Hmm. Hmm. 00:17:49.00 Manda um But yeah, I just, I, for me, I think that she was like, for a show that was kind of written for boys and she was very much a character who was also written for boys, but then they kind of like, 00:18:03.86 Manda wrote her again for women. Like, cause they made her, there was like an empowering part of her, which power is in her name. Um, so yeah, so I really love power. So yeah. 00:18:15.45 Kurt Crenwelge Okay, so this is an anime manga, then. 00:18:16.38 Manda Yeah. Anime manga. Yes. 00:18:20.47 Kurt Crenwelge Okay. 00:18:20.27 Manda Yup. 00:18:21.56 Kurt Crenwelge Okay, yeah, i don't know if I've ever heard or or seen that one before, but now I'll be on the lookout for it, I suppose. 00:18:21.81 Manda Yeah. 00:18:24.53 Manda Oh yeah. just It's a fun one. It's, you know, demons hunting demons. So, 00:18:34.26 Kurt Crenwelge Demons be hunting demons, for sure. 00:18:35.99 Manda Demons be hunting demons. 00:18:38.97 Kurt Crenwelge And then on the flip side as well, what happens to be one of your favorite side quests B-plot elements? Again, whether it's from an RPG, video game, movie, film, literature, etc. And why is this your favorite side quest or B-plot? 00:18:55.06 Manda So Lord of the Rings, um it would be, ah and this always upset me that it wasn't featured in the movies was um Bill the Pony. 00:19:05.78 Manda And his story getting back to the Shire in the, I don't know if he, yeah, like for me, that was like really kind of important. And I just, and the fact that he wasn't featured in the Lord of the Rings, um because to me, he's, he's part of the fellowship. Like if you see like a lot of the, especially like tattoos or like images of the fellowship, there's always a horse and it's still Tony. 00:19:30.65 Manda um But when they, you know, um he has to go back to the Shire alone. It's, you know, if you read the books, it's kind of dangerous and he gets back there by himself and it's great. And I'm like, I love his little, his little journey that he has. yeah. 00:19:46.81 Manda yeah 00:19:47.63 Kurt Crenwelge I remember in the movies, or maybe it's the extended version, but because they're they're at the gates of Moria, and that's when Sam tells. 00:19:53.39 Manda They show him briefly at the gates of Moria when they tell Bill to go home. Yeah. And then that's it. 00:19:58.52 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah. 00:19:59.29 Manda But they don't even like, That was it, yup. 00:19:59.58 Kurt Crenwelge And then that's it. 00:20:01.89 Manda And I was so upset because I really... 00:20:03.63 Kurt Crenwelge I hear your animal lover-ness in that answer, your vet science ah advocate answer, because it's like, oh, Bill the Pony. 00:20:09.82 Manda Yeah. 00:20:12.57 Kurt Crenwelge And then it's like, we just have to go to the appendices and read how the professor wrote about how Bill's journey ah you know from the Gates of Moria back to the Shire, yeah. 00:20:20.05 Manda Yup, yup. that's my favorite side quest. 00:20:28.02 Kurt Crenwelge I think that's a perfectly fine answer and one that we could probably learn a great lesson or two out of of ah perseverance and sticking with your friends and all that good stuff. 00:20:30.84 Manda Thank you. 00:20:35.53 Manda Thank you. 00:20:39.45 Manda Yeah. And when you have to do it by yourself, you can do it by yourself. 00:20:40.44 Kurt Crenwelge And then the... 00:20:43.96 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah. 00:20:44.92 Manda Yeah. 00:20:45.14 Kurt Crenwelge Perfect. And then, Amanda, the way that we round out the personal interview section of the podcast episode is we ask the question, what are you passionate about and why? 00:20:53.10 Manda Yeah. 00:20:58.12 Manda Yeah, so I think for me right now, I've been seeing a lot of using TTRPGs for like healing mental health purposes. 00:21:11.09 Manda um And I have a reason for this. 00:21:11.56 Kurt Crenwelge Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. 00:21:13.51 Manda So what I played when I was 12, it was know making new friends. I moved around a lot, not military brats, but just family we moved around a lot. um So it was a way for me to make friends. 00:21:24.85 Manda um But I started playing again in college and it was mainly because a friend of ours was ah suicidal and he played D&D. And so a group of us decided we would get together a week. He was the DM. It kind of gave him something to focus on. 00:21:41.27 Manda um And so I think like there's a big kind of push right now for... TTRPGs, especially with like mental health. And I think it's really important. Like I've seen a lot of people use it for like vets dealing with like pts t PTSD, 00:21:59.90 Manda um like the stronghold d D and D Tim, he does great stuff with that. um And like, especially in like the LGBTQIA plus community, like, 00:22:14.62 Manda For me right now, yeah, i think it's, it's, I've seen a lot of groups that are in nonprofits. And I want to try and do more like events where, you know, money is going towards like mental health awareness they and more hosting more events of games that are focused more on groups that could probably use TTRPG and like D&D and like as a way of um coping mechanisms or to help with therapeutic reasons in some way. 00:22:46.38 Manda So, yeah. 00:22:47.35 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah. Well, I think you would benefit from talking with ah fellow Chicagoland Joshua Simons because I'm pretty sure he's involved with TakeThis.org. 00:22:55.13 Manda Yeah. 00:22:58.42 Manda He is. Yeah. 00:22:59.90 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah, so he does work with them and um and I know we did have previous guest Fenway Jones on the podcast and of course she's the one who founded um Jasper's Game Day um when they were in operation. 00:23:10.84 Manda Yeah. 00:23:12.74 Kurt Crenwelge I know she's since gone on to college and she's focusing on that and so um The charity work has kind of been put on pause, but hopefully you know Fenway will make her way through college and she'll be right back at it. 00:23:24.16 Kurt Crenwelge you know We'll all be cheering and supporting her for sure. 00:23:24.89 Manda yeah 00:23:27.29 Kurt Crenwelge um But yeah, no, I think that's a great answer. i yeah For sure, yes, the the vehicle of D&D is a great way to not only tell a great story, but to connect with people um on and ah on a deeply human and emotional level. 00:23:43.19 Kurt Crenwelge And to help people be seen and validated and and heard um in their experiences and to allow other people to kind of share in that as well, to be able to empathize more fully and to like better understand and they be able to help another person. 00:23:43.64 Manda Yeah. 00:24:01.48 Manda And I think more people are kind of realizing that. um It's, you know, you can use it as a way to connect with people. And like, not I'll do a little bit of a couple of plugs. 00:24:13.03 Manda um I have ah a friend out here who does like beef boards and brushes and they, you know, take um different board games being one of them to like marginalized communities um out here in the Chicagoland area. 00:24:14.42 Kurt Crenwelge Thank you. 00:24:27.31 Manda So a lot of like, ah you know, the black and brown communities, um we go and we play games out there, which I think is great. So I think it's finding like a a new home and like it's finding like new ways that you know TTRBGs are beneficial other than just having and it is just having fun with your friends but there's also different ways but it's also useful so yeah. 00:24:53.58 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah. 00:24:56.41 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah. And it not it doesn't always have to be um you know chasing an algorithm or chasing a dollar down. 00:25:00.70 Manda fifteen 00:25:03.11 Kurt Crenwelge It could just be like, we're just trying to help people. 00:25:04.02 Manda Right? Yeah. 00:25:06.77 Kurt Crenwelge We're just trying to have some fun. The world's a crazy place. Let's ah let's try to make our days a little bit brighter instead. 00:25:11.35 Manda Yeah. Yeah. Especially right now. um i did just do an event recently where I was actually in ah Puerto Rico and ah we did like a fundraiser for an animal shelter out there and they are also kind of getting into um gaming, which is really cool. 00:25:23.33 Kurt Crenwelge Ooh. Ooh. 00:25:32.66 Manda And we ended up and it was a, it was kind of a hodgepodge of an animal shelter and then also like a marine wildlife center. And um so it was neat. 00:25:44.30 Manda It was using it, you know, for a different reason. Yeah. So that was really fun. And I got to use my absolutely terrible, but decent bilingual ah GM's quilt. 00:25:50.46 Kurt Crenwelge yeah 00:25:53.18 Kurt Crenwelge I was going to say Lin-Manuel Miranda and... ah 00:25:56.32 Manda Yeah. 00:26:01.56 Kurt Crenwelge Well, I was going to say hopefully... um Well, I mean, maybe you did or maybe you didn't, but it'd be cool if like Lin-Manuel Miranda or Bad Bunny, I suppose, hopped in a game ah when you were there in Puerto Rico or something. 00:26:11.58 Manda Right? Yeah, that would have been cool. No, um I wish they were there. But it was it was really funny because my Spanish is okay. 00:26:25.92 Manda it's um It could be better. But that was a good learning experience to kind of also and do they do gaming in ah in Spanish too. So that was neat. 00:26:37.59 Kurt Crenwelge Well, i mean, that's better than me. I live here in Texas. And so it's like we're surrounded by Spanish and it's like ah I can I can say beer. 00:26:39.93 Manda Okay. 00:26:45.53 Kurt Crenwelge I can say bathroom and I can ask where the library is. So, you know, that's all you really need to know. Right. 00:26:52.61 Manda Yep. Biblioteca Banyo and Beru. 00:26:54.33 Kurt Crenwelge yeah 00:26:56.27 Manda Yep. 00:26:57.09 Kurt Crenwelge Biblioteca. ah Well, wonderful. 00:27:00.09 Manda yeah 00:27:00.53 Kurt Crenwelge We've done it. We've made it through the personal interview section, and now it's time to head into some NPC creation. 00:27:01.85 Manda did it fifteen 00:27:09.24 Manda oh 00:27:14.55 Kurt Crenwelge And NPC creation is brought to you by you, the podcast audience and our patrons from Patreons. And now's the time of the show where we give a shout out to our comfortable patrons and above. 00:27:25.56 Kurt Crenwelge so And we give them a loud hurrah. So thank you, Anson Jablinski and good old mom and dad. We say cheers with cup of coffee because you can have coffee. You don't have to have beer all the time, but we love beer. 00:27:38.72 Manda Thank you. 00:27:39.90 Kurt Crenwelge Anyway, ah yes, so for $2 or more a month, ah you can get your name shouted out on these episodes. All these folks I named are actually among my wealthy tier level of patronage, which means they get to introduce an element of chance to our random tables, which we have here in this section of the show. and We might get to hear some of the responses used today. 00:27:58.26 Kurt Crenwelge So ah we've got great rewards waiting. We have people in the free tier. um We've got people on the Kofis and all that stuff. But basically all this section and ad space is meant to do is just to encourage you and thank you for your support of the podcast. It's a fun thing that I enjoy doing. And the more but support we can get, the more cool things we can do. 00:28:19.26 Kurt Crenwelge So if you want to learn more, ah go to the show notes below, go to my podcast website, or just go directly to patreon.com forward slash sidekicksandsidequests. Learn about all the different levels of patronage and rewards we got for you. and help us to grow and expand our operations in the levitating platter in this demiplane and worlds beyond. 00:28:39.32 Kurt Crenwelge Okay, so now is the fun part of the show. We get to make up an NPC, and we've decided that today we're going to go down the path of randomization. Is that correct? 00:28:51.33 Manda yes please. 00:28:52.66 Kurt Crenwelge Okay, so you've got all of your standard array of dice at the ready, and we'll walk our way through the questions, and we'll we'll begin. 00:28:56.82 Manda Yes I do. Okay. 00:29:00.93 Kurt Crenwelge So for the first of these, what is going to be the name of our character? The way we determine that is we roll the d20. 00:29:10.62 Manda fourteen 00:29:13.06 Kurt Crenwelge 14. right. Well, this is a response given to us by our Patreon supporter, my dad, Wayne Krenwogie. Thank you very much, dad. 00:29:19.77 Manda Oh, yes. 00:29:22.15 Kurt Crenwelge Digger. d Digger. Yes. D-I-G-G-E-R. Like... ah Maybe it's their name. Maybe it's their nickname. Who knows? But we'll learn more about Digger here as we keep rolling along. 00:29:35.32 Kurt Crenwelge And let's see ah what is going to be the ancestry of Ye Digger. 00:29:35.54 Manda right. 00:29:41.56 Kurt Crenwelge ah This we roll two d ten s ah for a effect. 00:29:46.81 Manda Okay. 00:29:54.68 Manda A six, two sixes, okay. 00:29:58.68 Kurt Crenwelge Ah, 66. 00:30:00.27 Manda Let's see six. 00:30:00.82 Kurt Crenwelge Ooh. Okay, well. ah 00:30:03.27 Manda Oh. 00:30:04.54 Kurt Crenwelge Digger it is ah Rakshasa. 00:30:04.63 Manda Oh, nice. Yeah. 00:30:12.86 Kurt Crenwelge So Rakshasa is certainly popular on this podcast. um You know, you can go through the back catalog and find all the different Rakshasas. 00:30:17.18 Manda yeah 00:30:22.75 Kurt Crenwelge If your campaign needs a Rakshasa, guarantee this podcast has one that you can just drop right in. but And here's a new one that's in the process of being made right now. 00:30:32.83 Kurt Crenwelge So Digger is a Rakshasa. 00:30:33.96 Manda Yes. 00:30:35.32 Kurt Crenwelge Okay. And the next... 00:30:36.74 Manda But they're so pretty. 00:30:38.39 Kurt Crenwelge Yes, yes. They're they're so pretty with their backward hands. 00:30:39.61 Manda ah somebody who used to work with big cats, yeah, I like Roshan. 00:30:42.65 Kurt Crenwelge yeah 00:30:45.53 Kurt Crenwelge and then the next thing we get to roll for is ah what's the job or occupation that we're going to find Digger the Rakshasa doing just we roll a regular d10 for this one six again okay 00:30:55.93 Manda Okay. 00:30:58.40 Manda A six again? Okay. I'm rolling different dice, by the way, like different sets. I have four different sets of dice and I'm trying to try each of them out. So that's bizarre. 00:31:08.09 Kurt Crenwelge yeah 00:31:08.38 Manda I've rolled three different D10s and they've all rolled six. I don't know how i feel about that. 00:31:15.26 Kurt Crenwelge There's something about to something to be said about the law of averages, I suppose. But... 00:31:20.15 Manda it's very true. Okay, fair. 00:31:22.01 Kurt Crenwelge With a six, your answer provided to us by Nicole, the Game Master Mom, a student. 00:31:22.22 Manda Yeah. 00:31:28.02 Manda who 00:31:29.21 Kurt Crenwelge So Digger is a student, maybe appearing as a student, question mark, but they are a student, and they're a Rakshasa. 00:31:29.90 Manda Oh, okay. 00:31:32.79 Manda Okay. All 00:31:38.46 Kurt Crenwelge All right. And then the next thing we roll four is the range of the character, and this we roll a d eight 00:31:50.19 Manda A five. 00:31:51.83 Kurt Crenwelge A five, a midlife. So Digger is a middle-aged Rakshasa, however that means for a fiendish creature, but middle-aged, a Rakshasa, and they're a student. 00:31:58.12 Manda Okay. 00:32:03.58 Kurt Crenwelge So with these details in mind, can you describe to us, paint us a physical picture of who who Digger is? Who is he? 00:32:15.48 Manda Yeah, so I think Digger might actually be an undercover cop. um I'm thinking of you know this Steve Buscemi meme where he's got the backwards hat and he's holding the skateboard and he's like, what's up, cool dudes? um So in my mind, like Digger, is yeah he's like ah like black but like has a little bit of gray set in that he obviously like tries to like probably um you know cover up with. 00:32:45.05 Manda ah hair dye. um And he definitely like looks like he's a little bit older, um but he like dresses like way too young. like Tries to dress like in all of like whatever's most popular at the time. 00:33:00.70 Manda um So he's like trying to follow like all the TikTok trends. 00:33:01.40 Kurt Crenwelge Okay. 00:33:05.33 Manda like just He looks honestly like probably a little ridiculous and slightly pathetic, but in a lovable way. 00:33:12.76 Kurt Crenwelge Interesting. Okay. And so are we imagining, so, and you're, are you describing Digger's appearance as like how his Rakshasa form would appear? Or is this like one of his disguises that he employs? 00:33:23.61 Manda Even his rakshasa form. 00:33:25.53 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah. 00:33:26.17 Manda No, I'm thinking like even like his like fur would be like black, but he's like trying, but you can see like the gray of like the middle age coming through because you would start to get those gray hairs. 00:33:39.16 Manda um And he is like desperately trying to cover it. And so maybe he's using hair dye that's like slightly off color, like what his fur naturally is. So he'd be slightly two-toned. 00:33:49.50 Kurt Crenwelge Okay. 00:33:50.81 Manda Yeah. 00:33:52.17 Kurt Crenwelge Ooh. And so, and you're thinking instead of like a traditional tiger stripe sort of a pattern, you're thinking like he's actually like got block fur and stuff. 00:33:59.06 Manda Yeah. 00:34:01.67 Manda I'm thinking like, yes, because like rock shots is like, cause you can go tiger, but you also, I've seen the Panther type rock shots is in my mind. 00:34:08.75 Kurt Crenwelge Ooh. 00:34:08.63 Manda I'm thinking more of like, yes. 00:34:10.83 Kurt Crenwelge He's a more Panther-looking Rakshasa in his natural form. 00:34:13.22 Manda Yes. 00:34:14.23 Kurt Crenwelge And he's going gray, and he's, of course, being a fiend and vain and all that stuff. 00:34:14.14 Manda Yes. 00:34:19.36 Kurt Crenwelge Okay, wants to like try and keep up appearances, but seems to be maybe struggling a bit. 00:34:26.05 Manda Yeah, 100%. Yeah. 00:34:27.16 Kurt Crenwelge and okay and then as far as a student is concerned is is is he under you you know you were saying you envisioned him like an undercover cop or the steve buscemi meme from ah i now pronounce you chuck and larry uh which is where that i remember that coming from a is he like infiltrating like a university like a magic school setting or is this 00:34:43.22 Manda yes 00:34:51.03 Manda I would think it would be like, yeah, i think it'd probably be, um, in my mind, I immediately went to like Bard College. Um, and he's like trying to, there's obviously cause it's Bard College. 00:34:58.09 Kurt Crenwelge Ooh, okay. 00:35:03.82 Manda So there's probably some sort of drug ring going on. Cause we all know our Bards are a little fun. 00:35:08.65 Kurt Crenwelge Ah. 00:35:11.02 Manda Um, so yeah. So in my mind, uh, he's at Bard College. I wonder which one I would put him Um, um ah 00:35:21.26 Kurt Crenwelge Isn't it Whispers is the one that's like more espionage and stuff like that that seems to maybe fit his MO? 00:35:25.69 Manda That's true. Yeah. That could fit. Yeah, you're right. Okay. Yeah, we'll go there. And um yeah, he's probably like pretending to be a bard, but actually probably like more of like a paladin fighter. 00:35:43.90 Manda um because he's like, there's a drug ring and he's trying to bust it. So he kind of has like that cop mentality. um 00:35:53.24 Kurt Crenwelge Interesting. 00:35:53.24 Manda Yeah, that's where Jinger's going. 00:35:54.42 Kurt Crenwelge So is he part of the is he part of the staff? Is he part of the staff of the school or is he there for his own fiendish purposes? 00:36:04.01 Manda I think with like, Rakshasa, I think he'd kind of be there like as his own fiendish purposes. Like, I don't think he would, like, if anything, he might be hired, like, by the university, but I don't think he is somebody that works at the university. Like, it might be he was, like, you know, a like a fighter for hire or something. Like, he was probably, like, a retired fighter, and he was asked to come bust up this drug ring at the Whispers Bard College. 00:36:37.69 Manda And, yeah. And he's trying to blend and he's doing a terrible job at it. 00:36:40.76 Kurt Crenwelge Okay. 00:36:44.34 Kurt Crenwelge I see. Okay, so he's employed or he's been merrk mercenary hired or whatnot. 00:36:45.66 Manda Yeah. 00:36:50.49 Kurt Crenwelge So you're you're envisioning... 00:36:50.71 Manda Yeah. 00:36:51.61 Kurt Crenwelge So he's undercover as a student at this Bard College. 00:36:51.55 Manda Yep. 00:36:56.18 Kurt Crenwelge So he's in he's embedded in the college, but i you know he has this name Digger, whether that's from before, that's the persona that he's invented. 00:36:56.41 Manda Yeah. 00:37:06.49 Kurt Crenwelge Because a name like Digger to me sounds like 00:37:08.63 Manda It kind of makes sense that it's a nickname. 00:37:09.88 Kurt Crenwelge and coming I'm thinking of like the frat bro like hey I'm on the football team they they call him digger you know because he he they he digs around in the ground and stuff like that ah he like really gets in the ground when he when he gets set for the play and then like takes off or whatever 00:37:13.59 Manda Yeah. They call him Digger. Yeah. 00:37:22.36 Manda Yeah. 00:37:30.14 Manda Yeah. I, in my mind, like that's, yep. I think Digger, Maybe that's his fake name. Maybe that's his like fake ah student name. 00:37:39.51 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah. 00:37:41.26 Manda Yeah. 00:37:42.14 Kurt Crenwelge yeah That's his persona, if you will. 00:37:44.56 Manda Yes. Yeah. 00:37:46.49 Kurt Crenwelge So, okay, so he's the student. He's like trying to fit in. So in some aspects, maybe it works. In others, he doesn't. So he's just kind of like this awkward student, but he's obviously like a middle-aged, powerful rakshasa. 00:37:58.01 Manda Yeah. 00:38:00.34 Kurt Crenwelge So kind of kind of kind of interesting there how that all works. 00:38:01.50 Manda Yeah. 00:38:04.57 Manda Yeah. Yeah. And like in my mind, like it's what the, um then the, the, what are they called? The Naz, Naztharun's, that's the Panther-y ones that are the, so that, and that would make sense if he's faster and on the football team. 00:38:21.17 Kurt Crenwelge Oh, okay. 00:38:23.19 Manda So, 00:38:25.34 Kurt Crenwelge Okay, the Panther ones. 00:38:27.10 Manda yeah. 00:38:28.86 Kurt Crenwelge Okay, that's cool. 00:38:29.44 Manda Aren't they called the Naz, aren't they called the Naztharun Rakshas's? 00:38:30.39 Kurt Crenwelge And, um... 00:38:34.01 Manda Correct? 00:38:37.61 Kurt Crenwelge Uh, well, I can... We have the power of the internet at our fingertips. Uh, Panther-like rock. 00:38:42.30 Manda Yeah. Yeah. 00:38:44.57 Kurt Crenwelge Uh, uh... D&D. 00:38:48.87 Kurt Crenwelge Uh... Oh, it does say a panther-like fiend is almost certainly a rakshasa. Well, okay. ah where Well, where panthers? Okay, all these other things that the search engines are trying to tell me other things, but I would totally believe you. 00:39:03.53 Kurt Crenwelge I mean, you're the veteran here, so if you say that there is like a specific branch of rakshasas that are more panther-facing than tiger-facing, then I will take your word over it. 00:39:04.38 Manda know 00:39:16.86 Kurt Crenwelge so ah So, perfect. 00:39:17.98 Manda I'm pretty sure, yeah, they were in a specific, yeah. 00:39:18.65 Kurt Crenwelge Okay, so we got this idea of like 00:39:25.91 Kurt Crenwelge Like a specific module or adventure of yours or something like that. 00:39:32.73 Manda Ooh, um, hmm, that's a great question. um 00:39:44.18 Manda See, with him being a Rakshasa, I immediately think of him of Annihilation, but that mean that doesn't really fit with him wanting to be a student because I don't think there's a college there. 00:39:53.62 Kurt Crenwelge Right. 00:39:55.86 Manda Yeah. 00:39:56.76 Kurt Crenwelge Right. Well, I mean, he he sounds like he could be easily so he could easily be snuck into Strixhaven, maybe. 00:39:57.14 Manda ah Let's see. Yeah. so alone 00:40:04.15 Manda we 00:40:07.62 Manda That's true. Let's do that. Yep. 00:40:11.13 Kurt Crenwelge Okay. All right. So kind of like a contextual point. If someone's like, well, where would I fit him in a campaign? 00:40:17.23 Manda Yep. 00:40:18.62 Kurt Crenwelge It's like, well, you could slip him into Strixhaven or something like that. Or if you're doing some sort of in-depth, oh, we're at Bard College campaign, it's like, okay, well, here's a guy that's been hired by the university. 00:40:23.69 Manda Yep. 00:40:31.29 Kurt Crenwelge He has his goal of, you know, busting up this drug ring, um but he's trying to blend in as like this frat boy bard student guy that seems to flounder about 00:40:35.96 Manda yeah 00:40:45.12 Manda Yeah, absolutely great at drinking though. Like he just demolishes the other kids like at the frat parties. So keep just keep that in mind like Digger. 00:40:52.63 Kurt Crenwelge I would believe a guy named yeah yes 00:40:57.54 Manda Yeah. Like if you need somebody to like do any sort of drinking game, you know, at a tavern or anything, Digger's your man because he's a full grown man. Yeah. 00:41:09.62 Kurt Crenwelge Yes. 00:41:10.97 Manda Yeah. 00:41:11.54 Kurt Crenwelge Yes. do not send Do not send a boy to do a man's job sort of a thing. 00:41:15.84 Manda Man's job. Yep. Oh, that's his catchphrase. Yeah. 00:41:18.89 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah. 00:41:18.97 Manda but 00:41:21.78 Kurt Crenwelge All right. Well, we as we're describing the character and kind of working to get the vibe, obviously it helps us with role playing. If we can kind of narrow him down with three adjectives. So what three adjectives do you think best describe Digger, this undercover Rakshasa? 00:41:39.45 Manda Yeah. Gruff. Um. Um. 00:41:51.36 Manda Trying to think. 00:41:57.34 Manda Tired. 00:41:59.59 Kurt Crenwelge Mmm. 00:42:02.26 Manda And. 00:42:10.63 Manda Fed up. 00:42:12.74 Kurt Crenwelge Ooh, okay. 00:42:13.14 Manda Now. 00:42:13.66 Kurt Crenwelge Gruff. 00:42:15.98 Manda Gruff, tired, fed up. 00:42:18.07 Kurt Crenwelge Fed up. ah 00:42:19.83 Manda and Did I immediately go with Danny Glover from Lethal Weapon? 00:42:20.21 Kurt Crenwelge Okay. 00:42:24.22 Manda Yeah. Yeah, 00:42:26.42 Kurt Crenwelge Ah, okay. There we go. yeah and Now we know how to roleplay him. I'm too old for this. 00:42:30.02 Manda I did. I'm too old for this shit. Yes. 00:42:35.48 Kurt Crenwelge All right. 00:42:35.38 Manda Oh, sorry. Bleed me out. Yep. 00:42:38.10 Kurt Crenwelge Oh, yes, yes, we can do that. 00:42:39.84 Manda Yeah. 00:42:40.21 Kurt Crenwelge ah Okay, perfect. and And now is the part where I say, and now we get to go back to some dice rolling, because obviously we want all of our NPCs to have something cool on their person. 00:42:51.88 Kurt Crenwelge So what's going to be a valuable item, piece of lore, secret, or ideal or concept that Digger would have? 00:42:52.66 Manda Yeah. 00:43:00.69 Kurt Crenwelge And you do a combination where you roll a D4 first for the category and D6 for the particular thing. 00:43:09.61 Manda Okay. Two on my d four and then D6 was a three. 00:43:12.06 Kurt Crenwelge Okay. 00:43:16.06 Kurt Crenwelge All right. So this is going to be a piece of lore. And your answer was provided to us today ah by my cousin, Seth. 00:43:21.42 Manda That's what I wanted. 00:43:26.12 Kurt Crenwelge Seth Cranwogie. Thank you very much. ah So the piece of lore. Oh, interesting. Okay. So Digger knows where a talking grave is located. 00:43:39.82 Manda Okay. 00:43:41.30 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah, so is that involved with um you know with just him personally as a fiend, as a rakshasa, or is it like some local legend, or i don't know. How does that inspire you? 00:43:56.73 Manda I think like Obviously he has some sort of tumultuous past. um I think it probably has something to do with his past that he doesn't like to talk about. 00:44:07.80 Manda ah 00:44:08.11 Kurt Crenwelge Hmm. 00:44:09.34 Manda You know, Rakshas is, you know, in the roguish fiendish realm, but like with me wanting to make him more in a fighter, i guess like trying to have some sort of redemption arc. I wonder if it's like he almost feels guilty for what happened. 00:44:27.16 Manda um with the person who died. Yeah. 00:44:33.98 Kurt Crenwelge I was, you know, interesting idea bringing in like a redemption arc possibly for a fiendish type entity. But a talking grave has me thinking of, you know, if it's part of a sordid past, oh, the talking grave, maybe it was Bacchus. 00:44:43.09 Manda Mm-hmm. 00:44:51.26 Kurt Crenwelge someone who had killed him in one of his forms. And then obviously it took him time to reform. 00:44:54.69 Manda Mm-hmm. 00:44:56.54 Kurt Crenwelge And then he got revenge on that person. 00:44:57.18 Manda Yeah. 00:44:58.42 Kurt Crenwelge And then wherever that person was buried because of, you know, maybe they were like some sort of, uh, celestial packed warlock, or they were, you know, like a, a very, uh, deific aligned bard, or if they were a cleric or a paladin or something like that, um, then maybe that grave just talks. 00:44:59.31 Manda Ooh. 00:45:16.00 Manda Mm-hmm. 00:45:18.02 Kurt Crenwelge Um, Like that soul is there able to communicate on at specific times, specific seasons, you know, whatever reason that a DM wants to invent, but he knows where this talking grave is located. 00:45:26.81 Manda Yeah. 00:45:29.94 Manda Yeah. 00:45:33.53 Manda Yeah. Or it could even like, i mean, adding a bunch of different options. Like what if it's also potentially like he's maybe he's very lonely and he just happened across the talking grave and he maybe found companionship, you know, like a friendship and like whoever he talks to and yeah, that' just, 00:45:50.17 Kurt Crenwelge yeah 00:45:56.22 Manda can kind of see like, yeah, let's keep going. 00:45:56.47 Kurt Crenwelge Or... 00:45:59.54 Kurt Crenwelge yeah or I definitely had two ideas that popped up. One being, oh, the reason why it's a talking grave is because someone put a magic mouth on the grave, and so based on certain conditions or ah requirements being met, that's the reason why the grave talks and is able to provide... 00:46:03.18 Manda Yeah. 00:46:09.69 Manda oh Oh, yeah. 00:46:18.99 Kurt Crenwelge answers and and and stuff like that. So maybe that becomes like its own tangential side quest of like a buried treasure side quest because you have to ask this grave specific questions and it'll lead you to a dungeon or a tomb or a treasure or something like that. 00:46:21.59 Manda Yeah. 00:46:31.67 Manda Yeah. 00:46:33.27 Kurt Crenwelge That could be one. 00:46:33.69 Manda Yeah. 00:46:34.62 Kurt Crenwelge Or since you were talking about your love of like the more comedic sorts of things, I'm reminded of the movie Three Amigos and the fact that there was a bush that just kept singing. 00:46:45.91 Kurt Crenwelge She'll be coming around the mountain when she comes. 00:46:45.86 Manda The bush. Yup. Yeah. 00:46:48.76 Kurt Crenwelge And it's just a grave that just talks and it's like it's part of some other kind of a quest like, hey, you got to go find the grave that talks. And then once you're here, then you head south for three days or whatever. 00:46:59.42 Manda Yeah. Yeah, or I like that. I kind of like the idea of maybe it just i could lead them on like just an absolutely terrible quest. um 00:47:11.54 Kurt Crenwelge Oh, yeah. 00:47:12.66 Manda so ah Shout out to the unethical but dungeon master because he could see he would do something like that. um But i also, because we were talking about it earlier, I was like, what if it's a lich? Yeah. 00:47:26.08 Kurt Crenwelge No. Well, there you go. Yeah. Yeah. The lich is just hiding in the grave, just doing his own thing, I guess. 00:47:30.29 Manda They're just hiding in the grave. Yep. Yeah. yeah Just, you know, digging some souls. 00:47:34.26 Kurt Crenwelge It's like, what are you doing outside my house? Go away. 00:47:36.99 Manda Yep. Yeah. 00:47:38.14 Kurt Crenwelge yeah 00:47:40.12 Manda And Digger just keeps bugging him. I mean, his name is also Digger. 00:47:44.31 Kurt Crenwelge Ah, maybe he had a job in this in the graveyard. 00:47:45.75 Manda Could we... Maybe he's a grave digger. 00:47:48.12 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah. 00:47:49.77 Manda Maybe it could be Double Whammy. Maybe it could be, you know... it's Actually, they think it's a weird crap boy name, but it's actually because it was his job at the cemetery. 00:48:00.54 Kurt Crenwelge Oh, or maybe, you know, he is a student. And so it's like, obviously you have to have some sort of income to be able to afford afford tuition. 00:48:08.40 Manda Yeah. 00:48:09.14 Kurt Crenwelge So he knows like, oh yeah, I go work at the cemetery. 00:48:09.48 Manda There is. 00:48:12.89 Kurt Crenwelge And then because he works at the cemetery or he works at the graveyard, I know there's a, there's a distinction of like, oh, a graveyard is attached to a church. 00:48:13.24 Manda Yeah. 00:48:19.26 Manda there is Yeah. 00:48:20.53 Kurt Crenwelge Whereas the cemetery is its own location. Okay. He works at the cemetery and he just happens to know where the one talking grave is inside this place. 00:48:23.13 Manda yeah 00:48:29.21 Kurt Crenwelge And it's like, it's mysterious and maybe it spawns another side quest or it's just a weird quirk of the world. 00:48:29.85 Manda yeah 00:48:35.61 Kurt Crenwelge Who knows? 00:48:39.11 Manda All of the above. Yeah. 00:48:40.44 Kurt Crenwelge All of the above. There's no wrong answers. 00:48:42.90 Manda Yeah. 00:48:44.28 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah. 00:48:44.15 Manda I like that. 00:48:44.68 Kurt Crenwelge Okay. Okay. 00:48:45.30 Manda i think I'm going to bring Digger into my campaign. I'm not going to lie. I like him. 00:48:49.40 Kurt Crenwelge That's what we love. That's what we love on this podcast is we love inspiring dungeon masters and and all alike. 00:48:52.32 Manda Yeah. Bringing him in. 00:48:56.52 Kurt Crenwelge So obviously we want Digger, our Digger, to have a bright gold exclamation point over his head offering a side quest when a bunch of characters stumble upon him. 00:48:57.38 Manda Yep. 00:49:07.22 Kurt Crenwelge So what is going to be the side quest that he offers up? 00:49:07.83 Manda Yeah. 00:49:10.51 Kurt Crenwelge Now, if you're inspired, you can certainly lay it on us. Or if you want to roll the last dice, you can roll a D12 and figure out what's his side quest he's going to offer up. 00:49:15.40 Manda Let's roll. 00:49:19.86 Manda D12. 00:49:23.74 Manda Oh, it was cough. 00:49:29.26 Manda I don't know what that is. I got these beautiful, absolutely stunning dice um from Revenant Foundry, but they're like, they're play doctor dice. And sometimes I like, I need my glasses. Oh, a 12. 00:49:42.14 Manda oh at twelve Okay, cool. 00:49:44.98 Kurt Crenwelge 12. Okay. um Excellent. Well, you tell me if you think this one is going to be one. ah it It was submitted to us by, of course, our Patreon supporter, Anson Jablinski. Thank you, Anson. 00:50:01.01 Kurt Crenwelge It says here, negotiate with the local library on the characters. 00:50:07.38 Kurt Crenwelge have to cut that out in post. 00:50:09.39 Manda evening. 00:50:11.32 Kurt Crenwelge It says here, ah negotiate with the local library on behalf of the character to get out of some exorbitant overdue fees. 00:50:21.85 Kurt Crenwelge Now, does that sound like something Digger would be willing to offer up, or do you want to try re-rolling, or do you want to go with it? 00:50:31.74 Manda Okay. I actually kind of want to go with it and I have a reason. 00:50:35.29 Kurt Crenwelge Okay. 00:50:35.10 Manda Okay. Digger is a lonely man. Um, Digger is actually in love with the librarian. 00:50:37.75 Kurt Crenwelge Yes. 00:50:40.42 Manda He kind of gives them a stupid quest. Um, he has been racking up these fees. Um, but that's also because he's trying, you know, to, he secretly just really wants attention from the librarian. 00:50:54.46 Manda um, And I think it's more or less he wants more. it ends up like he doesn't necessarily want a love match, but I think it could potentially be more of an actual love match ah for the quest givers between the librarian and Digger. Because Digger's a lonely man, and he has been racking up these fees. I don't think he's done it like on purpose. I think he's been doing it maybe subconsciously because... 00:51:20.34 Manda he gets nervous around her. So he forgets to bring the books back. He'll go and he'll check out books, but then he doesn't want to bring them back. Um, because you she makes nervous. Um, or he, or they, or whatever, in whatever university at the university. 00:51:31.74 Kurt Crenwelge the In the university? In the university library? 00:51:36.04 Manda Yep. University library. Um, whoever the librarian is. And, um, yeah. And so Digger just secretly is in love with the librarian and, um, Yeah, I kind of like that for Digger. 00:51:49.38 Manda I think he needs a happy ending. I feel like he's had a rough life. 00:51:54.06 Kurt Crenwelge Well, I do have to, I mean, i i mean we can take the lore. 00:51:56.18 Manda And it might not end it might not end happy. depends on how the quest goes, but yeah. 00:52:02.39 Kurt Crenwelge Very true. and And you tell me 00:52:03.76 Manda Yeah. 00:52:04.89 Kurt Crenwelge um You know, on this podcast, we go with the lore or we, you know, we pick we cherry pick or we we take it or we leave it or we abandon it completely. 00:52:13.43 Manda Yeah. 00:52:14.25 Kurt Crenwelge But, you know, typically it's like, oh, Rakshasas are like these master manipulators. You know, they're just pure creatures of chaos and emotion and they don't like being slighted. 00:52:26.40 Kurt Crenwelge They don't like ah you they certainly don't like being killed and they'll seek revenge against those who kill them for sure. 00:52:32.34 Manda No. 00:52:32.95 Kurt Crenwelge Um, the idea of a rock having a love, ah like a, a pining or a longing for the librarian. 00:52:32.90 Manda Yeah. Yeah. 00:52:40.26 Kurt Crenwelge It just makes me wonder, is that the, is that the disguise? Is that the persona that he's putting on? That's like, oh, I'm longing for the librarian. Or is it really that like, she's this pure soul and he's like, oh, I must corrupt her and I must do it, uh, you know, through the most heinous way possible or something. 00:52:55.18 Manda I 00:53:01.94 Manda Oh, that's a good thought. Because I wonder if, like, for me in Digger's mind, like, I feel like he had a very horrible past. Like, terrible. Absolutely terrible. 00:53:12.62 Manda And he's kind of doing this job just to do it. 00:53:13.14 Kurt Crenwelge Mm-hmm. 00:53:14.94 Manda Like, he doesn't, like, and, you know, him being a middle-aged man pretending to be a student, he can manipulate his way through it. He doesn't look the part, that's for sure, but he can definitely manipulate everybody around him to convince the students whatever he wants to. But I think there's something about this librarian that like maybe Caesar is bullshit and maybe it's more, it could be, and you can turn it either way. It could be a he wants to manipulate that person or he finds them intriguing that they kind of like don't put up with his shit as opposed to everybody else in his life. Yeah. 00:53:56.70 Manda yeah, so You can kind of tweak it how you want, but I do. 00:53:59.99 Kurt Crenwelge Ooh, so so she's she's she's like a bold, brassy librarian. 00:54:06.65 Manda Yeah. 00:54:06.94 Kurt Crenwelge Is that what you're saying? 00:54:07.21 Manda Yeah. Yeah. Like, I think it's like definitely like a, Matt, like a like he's met his match with this one. Like, yeah. 00:54:19.19 Manda Like she she doesn't put up a BS. 00:54:19.61 Kurt Crenwelge Interesting. 00:54:23.51 Manda So she's a librarian. 00:54:24.66 Kurt Crenwelge Hmm. 00:54:25.57 Manda She doesn't have time for that. 00:54:26.46 Kurt Crenwelge ah yeah Especially at this bard college. you know She has to deal with bards make it out she has to deal with making out everywhere in the library. 00:54:31.03 Manda Yeah, she deals with bards all the time. Yeah, doing whatever else they want to do with the playing music. 00:54:36.63 Kurt Crenwelge yeah 00:54:39.74 Manda She just wants them to be quiet. Like, I'm sure she just she is her she is not easily persuaded or manipulated. So I feel like she is definitely like just, yeah. 00:54:49.50 Kurt Crenwelge o 00:54:54.07 Manda And however, Digger, whether it's he wants to corrupt her or whether she could maybe teach him to be less terrible. 00:54:54.71 Kurt Crenwelge okay 00:55:05.55 Manda Probably not. He's too, again, he's too old for that S. 00:55:09.50 Kurt Crenwelge yeah is is this is this is she his Persephone and he's Hades sort of a thing where it's like 00:55:10.13 Manda Ooh, yeah. Yeah, that might 00:55:16.63 Manda be it. yeah 00:55:18.01 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah. but But she has like that dude she has like the attitude of, like ah you know, Wazowski, you didn't turn in your paperwork. 00:55:19.19 Manda yeah and i might be it 00:55:27.00 Kurt Crenwelge You know, it's like, oh, I'm in love. She will complete my evilness. 00:55:29.88 Manda I'm in love. Like when he looks at her, he just sees that's my retirement plan. 00:55:31.17 Kurt Crenwelge Yes. 00:55:35.99 Manda Like, I don't know what that is, but that's my retirement plan. 00:55:40.53 Kurt Crenwelge When I'm done with this job, when I've when i've finished busting up this Bard College drug ring or whatever, you know that's my that's my ticket out of here. 00:55:42.34 Manda Yeah. Quit this job. 00:55:48.50 Manda Yep. 00:55:50.15 Kurt Crenwelge Okay, interesting. 00:55:50.89 Manda going take it out of here. Yeah. Yep. 00:55:53.62 Kurt Crenwelge And Digger, again, and remind us again, because obviously we know how he appears in his Rakshasa form, but when he's when he's in his student persona, what is the librarian actually seeing when she sees Digger? 00:55:59.17 Manda Yes. 00:56:07.00 Manda I mean, she and probably also like her being somebody who works at the school. I'm sure she's well aware that there's some sort of undercover student who is a grown, grown man or grown Rakshasa man, you know, so she sees him just like, she thinks he's very uncool, like dressed up and like his, like trying too hard outfits and like, 00:56:34.26 Kurt Crenwelge m 00:56:34.20 Manda Yeah, she, she, maybe, maybe she's also mildly disgusted by 00:56:40.82 Kurt Crenwelge Is it all humans? 00:56:41.33 Manda it. 00:56:42.39 Kurt Crenwelge are we talking like some elves, some dwarves? 00:56:43.51 Manda No, i would, I think there'd definitely be elves and dwarves and a goblin or two. And I mean, it's, it's a bard college. You can get everybody in there. So yeah, she's seen it all. 00:56:53.64 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah. 00:56:55.32 Manda So yeah, she's probably like not fazed at all. She knows he's a grown man. 00:57:02.30 Kurt Crenwelge Okay, so Digger might be like some kind of humanoid pick your flavor for your game of how you would appear, and then the librarian is also some sort of humanoid pick your flavor, I guess. 00:57:02.22 Manda Yeah. Yeah. 00:57:16.70 Manda See, I still want to be a Rapshapa, though. I still like him as an old... When I was saying old man, I'm just thinking like an old cat, I guess. I should say old cat. 00:57:24.28 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah. So maybe he's more comfortable appearing as a tabaxi, maybe. 00:57:26.14 Manda and 00:57:29.82 Manda Maybe. yeah yeah Or maybe she's a tabaxi. 00:57:33.90 Kurt Crenwelge Ooh. Yeah, Rakshasa, Tabaxi, Love Affair. 00:57:38.10 Manda Yeah. Yeah. 00:57:39.45 Kurt Crenwelge a A Romance Faded on the Stars. 00:57:42.90 Manda Yeah. 00:57:45.08 Kurt Crenwelge Okay. 00:57:45.14 Manda yes 00:57:46.81 Kurt Crenwelge All right, but we got the side quest, so Digger's going to ask the party you know to go on this, you know maybe on the surface, silly side quest, but if they go and talk to the librarian and they figure out how she is and negotiates getting out of these library fees, exorbitant overdue fees, mind you, um and they report back to Digger what they've done, yes, ah how how is he going to reward the party? 00:57:56.60 Manda o 00:58:00.31 Manda ah fifty 00:58:06.17 Manda yeah 00:58:09.14 Manda Absolutely ridiculous. Yeah. 00:58:15.50 Manda Well, I think that would be him then informing them of the talking grave. Because the grave, I would hope, yeah, would lead to something good as far as, I mean, it could be a villain. 00:58:20.84 Kurt Crenwelge Ooh, okay, so he's gonna... 00:58:28.70 Manda The grave could be a lich. But I would like to think that the grave, you know, if we're going back to the Three Amigos, would lead to some sort of treasure. 00:58:36.82 Kurt Crenwelge Hmm. 00:58:37.09 Manda Hopefully. Yeah. 00:58:38.39 Kurt Crenwelge Okay. Alright, so he gives them the the plot clue of like, oh, hey, if you're interested in this treasure, i know where this grave is you should go investigate it, and then that'll be your reward from me. 00:58:39.67 Manda Yeah. 00:58:47.77 Manda Yep. 00:58:50.95 Manda Yes. 00:58:52.41 Kurt Crenwelge Okay. All right. Cool. And then as far as like, you know, the opposite, what's going to be the consequence of failure or refusing the call to the adventure? 00:59:04.09 Kurt Crenwelge How is he going to react to that? 00:59:07.16 Manda I mean, he is pretty grizzled and like, I think you would have an enemy now. Like, I think like if you do anything against, yeah, I think if you do anything against Digger, he's just gonna like, he's gonna come and haunt your dreams. 00:59:16.50 Kurt Crenwelge He is a work shot, sir. 00:59:24.30 Manda Like he's gonna come after the party. so like He's just, he's no longer, and you know how they get about vengeance. Like he's no longer like gonna care about his college job. 00:59:36.18 Manda He's now just gonna go after the party. Like they, Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. 100%. 00:59:40.86 Kurt Crenwelge And then they're like, great, now we have to go take a detour into the Nine Hells, and then we're going to have to slay Digger in the Nine Hells, so he will stop bugging us. 00:59:48.12 Manda Yeah. 00:59:49.50 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah. 00:59:49.89 Manda Yes. hundred percent yeah 00:59:51.86 Kurt Crenwelge ah All right. Yeah. Okay. And then ah and so. Okay. So any condition, whether he they fail, they they tell him no, or like they go to negotiate the fees and she adds on more fees or she's like, no, you you don't get to pay for him. 01:00:01.34 Manda yes 01:00:07.47 Kurt Crenwelge He has to pay. That's just going trigger him being like, all right, sorry, you guys messed up. 01:00:09.08 Manda Yeah. 01:00:13.02 Kurt Crenwelge And now you're on now you're on my dead to me list sort of a thing. 01:00:17.43 Manda Yeah, because I think in his mind, it also ruined whatever he was plotting in his head with this librarian, which he obviously, like, whether he was going to manipulate her or not. 01:00:24.31 Kurt Crenwelge Mmm. Ah. 01:00:27.83 Manda So I think you it's, like, a big deal for him. So I think he's now, yeah, it's vengeance now. 01:00:32.60 Kurt Crenwelge it It plays on to his vanity or his ego because like even this slight... 01:00:36.86 Manda Yep. Mm-hmm. 01:00:38.81 Kurt Crenwelge you know slight you know ah The word i is escaping me, but it's like, oh, you were mildly inconvenienced by the... It's like, she's just asking for 20 gold. 01:00:50.46 Kurt Crenwelge And he's like, no, you're my mortal enemies now. 01:00:50.68 Manda Yeah. No. 01:00:53.98 Kurt Crenwelge will crush you. 01:00:53.85 Manda Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. 01:00:56.66 Kurt Crenwelge Okay. 01:00:56.55 Manda I kind of like that it just like snowballs so quickly for him. 01:00:56.86 Kurt Crenwelge Okay. 01:01:00.47 Manda Like just, yeah. 01:01:04.22 Kurt Crenwelge And it's a wonder that there's any students left in this college with his investigating. 01:01:08.67 Manda Yeah. 01:01:09.06 Kurt Crenwelge If he's that easy to be offended, it's like, wow, you know, Digger enrolled. But it's like there's also like 12 students that have gone missing ah because we have no idea where they are. 01:01:19.75 Kurt Crenwelge They just like went off on a bender or something. And it's like Digger's the one responsible for them going missing. 01:01:26.95 Manda Jigar's also just like now a serial killer. yeah it's just like He gets so easily offended. just started murdering students. that The second anybody points out like how lame he is. 01:01:37.40 Kurt Crenwelge Well, if he's got his contract, if he's got his contract and it doesn't specify how he's supposed to go about the job, it's like, well, if they get in the way, it's like naturally. 01:01:44.92 Manda That's true. Yeah. And you could just say, 01:01:48.07 Kurt Crenwelge Rokhasa gets hungry. Yeah, I need to eat too. 01:01:50.90 Manda yep You could just be like, they were all drug dealers. Like, yeah. 01:01:56.95 Kurt Crenwelge and the And the administration has no choice but to accept it. Like, well, we hired you for this job and there's less drug use happening in the college, I guess. 01:02:03.57 Manda Yep. 01:02:05.79 Kurt Crenwelge So that that's a win. 01:02:06.58 Manda Yeah. 01:02:11.77 Kurt Crenwelge And then, ah yeah, so do you feel like this well rounds out Digger? ah We have optional questions, but I mean, if you want to head into the next section, I'm happy to go to the next section. 01:02:22.18 Manda No, I'm excited to go to the next section. I feel like Jigger yeah sounds it sounds accurate. 01:02:28.86 Kurt Crenwelge All right. Well, then, without further ado, we take the NPC that we've made here today and we throw them into a random encounter. 01:02:37.54 Manda Woo! 01:02:44.34 Kurt Crenwelge And final insert here, ad break for Zencaster, the service that helps me to be able to record these awesome episodes and get them out to you. If you're looking to do your own podcast, I would recommend Zencaster. 01:02:59.70 Kurt Crenwelge You can go to Zencaster.com forward slash pricing and use the code SideKQPodcast and save 30% off your first month of any Zencaster paid plan. It really goes to help me if you support the sponsor. 01:03:13.75 Kurt Crenwelge And I definitely like the tools that Zencaster has to offer. So thank you so much. ah Sponsor of the podcast. And now back to the show. All right. 01:03:23.90 Kurt Crenwelge So now we are here in the part of the show where we get to do a role play, a vignette, a scene with the character that we've made here today. 01:03:28.81 Manda Uh-huh. 01:03:31.27 Kurt Crenwelge So I think Manda is going to do a wonderful job portraying Digger. But the question becomes, who am I going to be in the scene? Is it Digger meeting one of the adventuring characters ah to get the side quest from? 01:03:47.89 Kurt Crenwelge Is it going to be Digger speaking with like other bards because it's him in the midst of his like operations of like trying to find out more about like all these drugs, all the drug dealing that's going on in the college or... 01:04:02.10 Kurt Crenwelge Is it him and the librarian having a tiff or like ah a back and forth as far as like, or I don't know, what kind of scene are you interested in showing off Digger in? 01:04:06.14 Manda who 01:04:12.56 Manda I kind of wanted you to be the talking grave. I kind of want to hear what the talking grave has to say and what, um, and what, uh, digger and the talking grave to talk about. 01:04:18.10 Kurt Crenwelge Ooh, okay. 01:04:24.15 Kurt Crenwelge Okay, cool. All right. So you, okay. So I will be portraying a talking grave and then you'll be Digger. ah Okay. Would you care to set the scene or shall I? 01:04:36.47 Manda I can set the scene. And I think how... Yeah, I'll set the scene. Yeah, okay. It's nighttime. 01:04:48.50 Manda Dark, in the graveyard, flickering lights. um Digger, old, gruff, Raksasa, working his way on the night shifts. 01:04:56.16 Kurt Crenwelge Thank you. 01:05:00.73 Manda He sits down next to one of the graves just to take a rest. You know, he's got basically he's cleaning up at night, you know making sure there's like no graffiti on the graves. A lot of people, like hooligans, come and try and like ah mark on the graves or like try and dig things up. So he's almost more of a security guard, um but he's exhausted. So he goes and he just sits like sits down like 01:05:33.78 Manda just a big thud like on the ground. 01:05:35.84 Kurt Crenwelge Thank you. 01:05:37.09 Manda It's cold. It's hard. Um, next to this huge stone. It's almost like, um, like not quite like, uh, it's like a pillar, uh, 01:05:49.59 Manda with like the words at the bottom. It's so old. Like you can't see whose grave it is. And, but it's big enough to hold, digger's weight so he knows that he can like lean up against this so he you know sits down on the ground and he just like sets all of his body weight like up against this like huge pillar of a tombstone like and 01:06:16.27 Manda then he hears kind of probably mumbled at first like he kind of you know hears a voice And he looks around because he now he's worried that there's people in the graveyard. 01:06:30.84 Manda um Just like looking in every direction. Concerned like, oh god, there's hooligans here. 01:06:36.22 Kurt Crenwelge um bubble 01:06:37.59 Manda Hooligans? It's late, we're closed. 01:06:41.72 Kurt Crenwelge Ah, no. 01:06:42.07 Manda Get out of here. 01:06:44.47 Kurt Crenwelge Ah, no, it's just me. Ah. Hello? 01:06:48.26 Manda What? 01:06:48.98 Kurt Crenwelge who Who do I have the pleasure of speaking with today? 01:06:49.84 Manda What? 01:06:54.42 Manda What is... the point What? Is this the body? this the grave? What's happening? new 01:07:01.34 Kurt Crenwelge Ah no, it's just me. You have found the tomb of Sir Laniel Nathanielson. 01:07:10.33 Manda Laniel Nathanielson? What kind of a name is that? 01:07:15.16 Kurt Crenwelge It is an ancient name, a great name, a name for treasure. 01:07:26.21 Manda Treasure? What kind of treasure are we talking about? 01:07:30.65 Kurt Crenwelge Ah, the most ancient kind! I was a great warrior of old! And oh it would only be too foolish of me to have all my treasures buried here with me. 01:07:43.32 Kurt Crenwelge And so I made it so that ah i could I could talk to people, those worthy who could find the clues and the way and the means ah to go get my treasures. 01:07:58.30 Kurt Crenwelge Because, you know, I was pretty cool back in my day slaying dragons and Hydras and Beheers and he starts going on a whole long list and yes and 14 minutes later he's yes and that was all the kills I ever did ah good times lots of good loot I pillaged and got from all the beasties that dropped ah 01:08:33.84 Manda Where do you think this treasure is located? What kind of beasties were you dropping here, friend? 01:08:40.85 Kurt Crenwelge Were you not listening to the last 14 minutes when I was telling you the exact list of everything that I killed? Okay, and let me start again. And he goes through the whole thing at the top. 01:08:50.20 Manda No! I wasn't. I fell asleep. I'm sorry. it was very boring. Go again. 01:08:58.46 Kurt Crenwelge Oh. Well you are certainly one of the strangest Rakshasas that I've ever come across. Oh, I see that look on your face. You didn't think I could figure that out one. Ha! 01:09:09.86 Kurt Crenwelge disguising shape-shifting's getting pretty lazy. i can tell you I've had to deal with a rakshasa or two in my time. 01:09:19.20 Manda How'd you know I rakshasa? Are you calling me fat? 01:09:24.92 Kurt Crenwelge No, I'm just saying that your hands are backwards and weird, man. 01:09:31.14 Manda You even have hands. You're just a big-ass pillar. 01:09:35.35 Kurt Crenwelge Well, that may be true, but I see what I see and I calls it like I calls it. 01:09:42.62 Manda Okay. Back to the treasure part. So, one more time, bub. Tell me about this treasure. 01:09:51.61 Kurt Crenwelge It is a treasure worth all of the epicness of the ancients. For I lived in the times of the before when the dark gods fought the the gods of the light and I was a champion of the light. And he goes on and on and on. 01:10:07.70 Kurt Crenwelge And that's the treasure. It's like a really cool setup. You know, they tell you you can't take it with you. And it's true. And, you know, this is... Sort of like a magic mouth enchantment thing I've got going on here on this grave. 01:10:22.38 Kurt Crenwelge So I'm only assuming that my soul is at rest in the afterlife with my god. I hope so that I wasn't some latent curse came into effect and I'm somewhere else. 01:10:34.38 Kurt Crenwelge But yeah, like that's the. 01:10:35.90 Manda Is this going to take like a lot of time for me to get through? Or can I get like other people to go get this treasure for me? 01:10:47.13 Kurt Crenwelge Oh, well, I mean, I suppose only the brave and worthy would be able to best all the traps and the the puzzles and the who's, the what's its and all that stuff. 01:10:58.93 Kurt Crenwelge And it's like, it's ah it's a very complicated mega dungeon of of a tomb of sorts. Because, you know, back in the day, we never did anything, ah you know, halfway. You know, if we were going to make something of a vault, you are going to make a vault. 01:11:14.71 Manda Yeah, yeah, that sounds overly complicated, but I think what I can do is I can get a group of kids to just go do this for me and get this treasure and then bring it to me. 01:11:28.60 Manda And, yeah, i can I can get this, bud. I can get this for us. 01:11:34.84 Kurt Crenwelge Oh, okay. Well, I mean, I guess... Hmm. He'll indicate to another nearby grave. He's like, you know, the dirt's kind of uneven over there. 01:11:46.22 Kurt Crenwelge I don't have much to do this voice, but, you know, you know you see you've been working, you know, your you're shape-shifting your disguises, and you're more comfortable in your naturalness here in the nighttime, and... 01:11:47.11 Manda So 01:11:58.26 Kurt Crenwelge You know, it's just bones and ghosts around here that, you know, ethereal plane-wise, but yeah, the ground looks a little uneven there, pal. 01:12:09.53 Manda so you're telling me to dig this Is what you're telling me? 01:12:13.34 Kurt Crenwelge No, I'm just trying to micromanage you and tell you how to do your job better. 01:12:16.03 Manda Ugh. Wow. Wow. Okay. Wow. All right. Good chatting. I'm going to find your treasure. I'm not going to give you any of it. Then goodbye. All right. Done. 01:12:26.87 Manda He just walks off. He's like annoyed. i think the, yeah, the first half he just kind of, you were going on and on and that he kind of got bored. And then, yeah. And then he was treasured, sounded too complicated. 01:12:42.20 Manda And yeah, but he'll get those kids to go get it for him. 01:12:46.33 Kurt Crenwelge And the final thing, just now it's just like this disembodied voice just talking in an empty graveyard, just like, wow, just really going to walk away. 01:12:46.83 Manda perfect 01:12:54.81 Kurt Crenwelge and ah I'm so incredibly bored and lonely around here. But all right, you've been a lovely audience. And ah make sure to tip your waitresses. 01:13:06.68 Manda perfect 01:13:11.80 Kurt Crenwelge and scene. So it's always fun to get to play with a little bit of a voice changer there a little bit. I just figured it was a magically echoing stuff. 01:13:17.88 Manda That was fun. 01:13:20.85 Kurt Crenwelge But yeah, how do you think it was getting to be Digger? 01:13:21.98 Manda I, yeah. That was fun. I don't know if you saw in my background, I had an absolute moment of panic where I have, and you earlier had mentioned you have pets. um I have a very large German shepherd who does not get along with my other small dog. And they were in the room at the same time. So i was trying to knock them to eat each other. But that's the joys. 01:13:44.85 Manda Role playing while existing in real life at the same time. 01:13:48.85 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah. 01:13:50.01 Manda Yeah. 01:13:50.39 Kurt Crenwelge it's It's an authentic experience of like when you're running a game at your house. 01:13:52.53 Manda It was authentic. Yeah, exactly. 01:13:54.81 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah. 01:13:57.97 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah, so... 01:13:57.97 Manda But no, that was really fun. I like Digger. He seems kind of like a jerk, but that's okay. 01:14:02.49 Kurt Crenwelge Yes. 01:14:03.13 Manda Not all NPCs are going to be lovable. 01:14:03.48 Kurt Crenwelge A curmudgeon. 01:14:05.29 Manda He's a curmudgeon. 01:14:06.97 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah. 01:14:06.97 Manda but um But yeah, he's giving Danny Glover, Danny DeVito, all the Danny vibes. 01:14:14.71 Kurt Crenwelge All the Danny vibes. 01:14:14.55 Manda And his name is Richard G. Yeah. 01:14:17.56 Kurt Crenwelge m Donald Glover, Danny Glover, and Danny DeVito all in one. 01:14:23.89 Manda Yeah, exactly. Yeah. 01:14:27.54 Kurt Crenwelge Well, perfect. So yeah, this is the part of the show where it's called Final Thoughts. So I always like to check in with the guest and you know ask them how their time was on the podcast and you know what they thought of their their time getting to make the character here today. 01:14:42.24 Manda That was so much fun. um i I kind of like the random generation. I'm not going to lie. um Because you don't know what you're going to get. So I like being kept on my toes. 01:14:51.52 Kurt Crenwelge exactly 01:14:52.32 Manda I loved it. But yeah, that was absolutely a blast. 10 out of 10. Would recommend. 01:14:58.62 Kurt Crenwelge yeah yeah and so yeah so it sounds like you're already you're already brewing up like where you're gonna stick digger in your campaign and what this uh this statue this tomb uh this headstone mausoleum monolith pillar thing is gonna be like in your game and stuff 01:15:11.99 Manda Yeah. 01:15:15.13 Manda Yeah, I'm going to use them and I'm going use the pillar. I think I actually have an easy, easy, ah easy spot for them to go in. So I'm excited. 01:15:23.32 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah. And then there you go. That's the way to plug in your module for that. Like, man, I really wanted to run this mega dungeon the thing. And it's like, all right, well, here's the random side quest that's going to send you into a mega dungeon. 01:15:34.90 Kurt Crenwelge And then halfway through and the players are like struggling and they're like, I don't even know why we came here. It's like, yeah, the treasure, so the treasure of this guy is like waiting down here. 01:15:44.60 Manda Yep. 01:15:45.69 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah. 01:15:45.56 Manda Yep. Yeah. yeah And I do like the idea of it being just like an absolutely old school dungeon crawl. So I'm excited to kind of do that to my team. so but 01:15:56.38 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah. 01:15:56.98 Manda Yeah. 01:15:58.62 Kurt Crenwelge So here, as we're as we're in the final moments of the podcast, I always like to give the microphone, the stage, the soapbox, and the platform to my guests. 01:15:58.55 Manda Cool. 01:16:03.32 Manda Yeah. 01:16:08.77 Kurt Crenwelge So certainly, you know thanking you for your time of being on the podcast, but I want to turn it to you and... 01:16:10.42 Manda Yes. 01:16:14.87 Kurt Crenwelge So where can you be found on social media? What projects or things do you have got going on that you want us to ah promote and share? And then finally, any passions or causes that we need to be made aware of? Let us know. 01:16:29.50 Manda oh sure um dungeon mommy manda on all i think all the platforms discord twitch tiktok ah um Instagram. um And then I've got a couple, if you're in the Chicagoland area, a couple events coming up. Scissors Forks, Grayson Levitt, um Demon Tap, things like that. 01:16:51.74 Manda I will be at Gen Con, so if anybody else is going to be at Gen Con, I'm running some games for Splatterdink, so I'm super excited for that. 01:16:57.86 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah. 01:17:01.30 Manda And as far as like passion projects go, I guess I'm just, I'm excited about other people. Like I want to kind of give a shout out to other people's projects. Cause like, um, yeah. 01:17:11.64 Kurt Crenwelge yeah 01:17:13.06 Manda So like Beatsports Brushes, like he's kind of doing some cool stuff right now. Um, with like, like I said, like him and like serving like different communities that don't necessarily get to play TTRPGs. 01:17:26.34 Manda yeah. um big shout out my friends over at Titmouse, like, uh, draw your weapons just got picked up by Amazon prime, which is premiering on June 3rd. So that's really awesome. 01:17:37.21 Manda I'm super excited to kind of see, I know we've got like Bach Machina and mighty nine in animation form, but to actually kind of see like D and D like played out on prime is going to super cool. 01:17:50.23 Manda And they're like in a neat way. 01:17:51.61 Kurt Crenwelge Ooh. 01:17:52.51 Manda i know. Yeah. Um, and think, I think that's it. Like, Everybody's great. I love the whole D&D community. So, yeah. Everybody's doing awesome things. 01:18:04.83 Manda Everybody's ahead of the game. 01:18:05.46 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah. 01:18:06.51 Manda So, yeah. 01:18:08.28 Kurt Crenwelge And we'll be hearing this episode ah November eleven 01:18:11.03 Manda Probably after it premieres, I was going to say. 01:18:11.83 Kurt Crenwelge so 01:18:13.33 Manda It'll be done by then. but um But, yeah. So, let's see. Oh, I'll be then heading off to GaryCon. 01:18:22.34 Manda Next year. 01:18:22.68 Kurt Crenwelge Well, there we go. 01:18:23.02 Manda So, yeah. see you there 01:18:26.01 Kurt Crenwelge Perfect. So Amanda, thank you so much for being a guest on the podcast. 01:18:27.16 Manda yeah 01:18:29.85 Manda Thanks, Kurt. 01:18:30.41 Kurt Crenwelge I i cant can't wait have you back on making even more interesting NPCs. 01:18:31.36 Manda Thank you. yeah, next time I will ah make sure the dogs are um not going to murder each other in the background because that was that was a fun moment for Digger. 01:18:50.52 Manda But yeah, that was so much fun. This is such a fun podcast. I absolutely love it. you This is so great. I think everybody should be on here. 01:18:56.71 Kurt Crenwelge Thank you. 01:18:57.86 Manda So, yeah.