Web Video / Adventure Is Nigh

Left to right:Grinderbin, Dabarella, Mortimer, Sigmar.

Adventure is Nigh is an Actual Play Web Video series by the folks formerly at The Escapist. Season 1 is subtitled "The Jade Homunculus," season 2 is titled "The Platinum Heart" (nee "In Search of a Platinum Heart"), and season 3 is titled "the Liar, the Witch, and the Wartorn." It also has a spinoff, entitled "Adventure is Nigh: Sidequest", which sometimes interacts with the main storyline.

The web video features the following:

• Yahtzee Croshaw as an elf-dominant Heinz Hybrid (called a "half-elf" entirely to save time) Gentleman Thief (Rogue/Bard) named Mortimer Rafflesworth Everwind-Smythe.
• KC Nwosu as Sigmar Iceblood, a Jerk with a Heart of Gold Aasimar Archer/Artificer who left his betrothed (it was an Arranged Marriage) standing at the altar when he discovered that she was in love with his sister.
• Amy Campbell as Dabarella Yeetster, a hulking-yet-adorable Tabaxi Fighter who aspires to be a chef.
• Jesse Galena as Grinderbin, a Dikarya Artificer who wants to open a discount-magical-items shop.
• Jack Packard as DM and show host.

Animated in the Zero Punctuation artstyle, the party's adventure begins with tracking down the Jade Homunculus after it was stolen by a flower man with the amusingly inappropriate name of "Davorty Cornhole." Each season follows a different campaign, from stopping a giant worm from tearing up the Earth to negotiating peace talks between warring kingdoms.

The series can be found here.

After the collapse of The Escapist on November 6th, 2023, the future of the series was briefly in limbo. On December 13th, 2023, Second Wind confirmed that they had successfully acquired the rights to the series from The Escapist. Season 3 will be re-uploaded and continued on the Second Wind Youtube channel, with the old seasons planned to be moved there as well.

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Tropes include:

• Abandoned Catchphrase: Dabarella, in episode two, shouted the tongue-twister "How many yeets would a yeetster yeet if a yeetster could yeet yeets?" when performing a feat of strength. It hasn't come up ever since.
• Action Girl: Dabarella.
• Alternative Calendar: The calendar of Angondardii has twelve months like normal, but they have Janbuberry, Febbuberry, Count Chocula, Hoag, Maryfeather, Beatrice, Fergalicious, Sexstilus, Virgison, Dree Monday, Senendu and Solistice.
• An Alien Named "Bob": When asked by Grinderbin if he knew any "dickheads" from his former home in the Ethereal Plane, King Fuzzyhug names the Council of Five as some of them, of which he lists down all their names as follows: Krrrrrggh, Gaaaahk, Vuvuvuvffft, Oernergoergoerg, and Cory (Should be noted that those first four names are just guttural sounds that Jack probably made on the fly).
• An Arm and a Leg:
  • Sigmar gets his hand torn off in a Teleporter Accident while trying to tear off a manageable chunk of King Fuzzyhug's massive platinum heart.
  • Sigmar then gets an arcane tattoo from a mysterious tattoo artist named Sebastian Piss. The tattoo could, as Piss explained it, allow Sigmar to summon a bow magically, but what actually happens is that it turns his other arm into a Meat Bow through a really painful transformation sequence.
• Animate Inanimate Object:
  • The party fights a haunted bed, and later, a haunted stove.
  • Inverted with Albert, who was cursed to take the form of a shovel. He was apparently consious but inanimate during that time.
• invokedAnti-Climax Boss: The party has more issue dealing with Kalandra Ticklepuss (who is a powerful sorceress) than her father Latavia Ticklepuss (who is a powerful sorceror and a bloody, goopy, skeleton-y Eldritch Abomination). When Latavia is splattered into paste with a single action from Grinderbin, the party remarks that they were expecting him to put up more of a fight.
• Armor Is Useless: The last guard of the Forest Keep is shotgunned to death by a haunted bed breaking its footboard to shoot splinters through his chest, despite wearing plate armor.
• Author Appeal: When asked about their inspirations, Yahtzee and KC cite a couple specific things:
  • Yahtzee likes characters who are Gentleman Thieves, Con Artists, and generally characters who "fly in the face of what you'd expect of traditional heroics". This fits his character Mortimer to a tee: a gentleman con artist and the least moral of the adventuring party.
  • KC says that anime was a major source of inspiration for Sigmar, which reflects in Sigmar's incredibly showy battle techniques (like one moment where he rolls with his blades like a wheel of death, or his bow being able to split into dual daggers). KC specifically cites Bleach's Kaname Tōsen as his main visual inspiration, which reflects in Sigmar's design (both being white-robed, dark-skinned, braided warriors).
• Awesome Anachronistic Apparel: Inverted, for Mortimer's party outfit is a be-mirrored lounge suit and star-shaped, pink-framed, mirrored shades. This disco style of fashion only really existed when Disco was popular in the late 1970's, yet Mortimer manages to make the flamboyant appearance work in a medieval setting.
• Bait-and-Switch: Mortimer casts Suggestion on Kalandra. Initially, she complies, about to spill Latavia's weakness... and then Kalandra starts swearing at him again, revealing that she's invulnerable to charm magics.
• Benevolent Abomination: King Fuzzyhug is a gigantic worm with a maw full of needle-like teeth, but he feeds on positive vibes and is very amicable when communicating with Grinderbin, speaking in dopey voice.
• Birthmark of Destiny: Grinderbin has the Jarmie Family Birthmark, proving his royalty.
• Bizarre Alien Reproduction: Flowerfolk mating requires a male and female Flowerfolk, and a bee-person of any sex to be present. Kind of like how real flowers reproduce, except flowers are hermaphroditic and use regular bees.
• Black and Nerdy: Sigmar Iceblood is a dark-skinned guy who can cite a number of "nerdy" interests when he was a kid, like having a "shambling mound" phase where he was incredibly obsessed with these creatures and owned toys depicting them, or having trading cards and fanart of Queen Beyoncé.
• Blatant Lies: Mortimer's bardic instrument is "The Power of Lies." He's able to cast powerful spells by telling absolute whoppers, ex. "I'm 60 feet tall and also the Queen of England!"
• Body Horror: Poor Sigmar:
  • He gets his right arm messily ripped off in a Teleporter Accident at the end of Season 2.
  • In season 3, he gets a magic tattoo that allows him to summon a longbow made out of the bones and tendons of his forearm. Not only is it excruciating, it makes one guard puke and terrifies another into running away.
• Book Ends: Season 1 starts and ends with an episode involving Dabarella carrying a statue and hurling it.
• Boxed Crook:
  • The party wakes up in the back of a paddy wagon, and is shortly told they have to raid a dungeon as punishment. We're never told what they did, but it's implied (by Mortimer's hangover) that drunken shenanigans were involved.
  • When Kalandra Ticklepuss attacks Castle Sasha, Sigmar proposes granting pardon to any prisoner willing to fight in its defense.
• Break Them by Talking: Mortimer does this to Queen Beyoncé, under the guise of telling her of her son's assassination. By the tone of his voice, it's heavily implied that Mortimer has experienced exactly what the Queen is now feeling.
  Mortimer: This must be a difficult moment for you. I can understand. I lost a family, too. Sort of thing that stays with you, isn't it? Stays with you your whole life. You're haunted the rest of your days wondering if there's anything you could have done to make it happen differently. Don't you...?
• Breaking the Fourth Wall: While the party is trying to find a hidden entrance to a secret location, Sigmar asks an NPC follower to do something to help. Jack Packard (in-character as him) says that he won't do that, because it would be Railroading and the party needs to figure things out by themselves.
• Cast from Hit Points: Sigmar's magic bow, Bone-and-Marrows, is summoned and dismissed through a Transformation Sequence that causes him excruciating pain, to the tune of 1d12 damage.
• Chef of Iron: Dabarella is a War Chef. Many of her weapons in a battle are also various cooking utensils. She's also capable of making a very good meal, if called to do so.
• Chekhov's Gun: When the party enters Castle Sascha's courtyard, Grinderbin sees a big stone statue depicting the royal family. Jesse pesters Jack with questions about the statue until Jack relents and confirms that yes, the statue is heavy. Come the final encounter of Season 3, the statue is used to crush the Final Boss beneath its weight. Complete with a flashback of Jesse asking Jack if the statue is heavy.
• Chest Monster: Encountered in S2 E3, when Mortimer makes Dabarella open a chest that turns out to be a mimic.
• The Chew Toy: Sigmar gets absolutely beat to shit during the climax of Season 3—first by Kalandra Ticklepuss, then by her father Latavia, then by his ex-fiancee Eggolier (who had, ironically, been one of the people who healed him from the earlier damage). Oh, and his non-prosthetic arm has just gotten a Power Tattoo that exacts a horrible price every time it's used.
• Cliffhanger: Episodes are usually calculated to end on a cliffhanger.
• Costume Evolution: From Season 1 to Season 2, each of the party members gets an upgrade in their outfit. Dabarella is in armor now, Mortimer gains a cape, Grinderbin replaces his shirt with a scalier one and Sigmar gets too many belts.
• Cute, but Cacophonic:
  • Dabarella is a mild example, having a voice that's slightly louder and more childish than normal, but Jack takes full advantage of this trope for a couple of the NPCs.
  • Toasty Cinnamonbuns, the gingerbread familiar, has a voice like an Ed Wynn character.
  • Anus the siren sounds a bit like one of the Pepperpots from Monty Python's Flying Circus.
  • Both Charon Ferryman^note or possibly Karen, or Sharon and the gang's recurring ally Bread have aggressive Minnesota Nice accents.
• Cute Slime Mook: Oob, a slime monster wrapped around a skeleton and contained in a small wooden bucket. It greets everyone with an excited "Hi!", is dumb as rocks, and addresses its master with an appreciative "Daddy!", generally behaving like a small, stupid child.
• Cutting the Knot: When Grinderbin encounters Bonesy in S3 E10, Bonesy has important information to tell him, but — being a skeleton that doesn't have lungs — he cannot succinctly communicate this. Initially Grinderbin plays charades with him to try and guess what Bonesy needs him to know... until Mortimer arrives on the scene, and bypasses the issue by giving Bonesy a pen and paper to write what he means.
• Delicious Distraction: The heist plan involves Dabarella making some really good gingerbread cookies. All the guards get distracted from their duties because they're really good cookies, and they manage to sneak Mortimer in by having one of the guards share the trolley of cookies with the guards in the vault.
• Didn't Think This Through:
  • Early in Season 3, the party tries distracting the Royal Chancellor, Benndory Tickletoes, with food. Chancellor Tickletoes is a rather grouchy Halfling. They attempt to negotiate as his snacks are being prepared, but he bluntly refuses to talk until he's eaten, complaining at length that it's taking forever. You can't offer a hobbit food and expect him to think of anything else until after he's eaten!
  • After convincing Latavia Ticklepuss to turn Albert the shovel back into a person by showing him the future he and Betty would have had together (including grandchildren), Latavia laments that he didn't use his ability to see the future beyond his daughter running away to get married, as he was too afraid of losing more of his family after being banished. If he had, a lot might have been different.
  • Sebastian Piss gives tattoos that allow the summoning of weapons made out of the bearer's flesh, bones, and tendons, but "the price is pain." 1d12 damage per +weapon level to get the tattoo, and again for the Transformation Sequence. The Religion Check Siggy whiffs implies that Piss is some kind of Evil entity; meaning that Sigmar made a Warlock Pact with him. This being a faustian bargain is confirmed in the Season 3 finalé.
  • What Sigmar intended as an act of good by breaking off his wedding to Eggolier so she could be with his sister ended up "ruining her life" and she'd been wanting to deck him ever since. 1) He "outed" them to what is likely a highly conservative, religeous society, and 2) he abandoned an arranged marriage, which would have rent assunder the alliance their parents intended.
• Does This Remind You of Anything?:
  • When the party first encounters Prince Chisarick Thathird the Second, he makes a number of race-oriented social faux-pas like remarking that seeing the uncommon Flora-folk is "unusual", or wanting to touch Dabarella's hair because hers is different from his, as a cheeky joke about certain uncomfortable real-world behaviors around minorities.
  • To steal a magic amulet, Mortimer is snuck into a royal vault beneath a linen-covered service cart. Jack didn't have the graphics for a service cart at the time the episode was recorded, so Mortimer represents the cart and the cart is drawn over him in post. The amulet is guarded by shirtless, ripped-muscle men in denim shorts known as "Himbos". When all the Himbos get distracted by the Delicious Distraction placed atop the cart, all of them surround Mortimer — at which point the players start remarking that it strongly resembles the classic pornography trope of an oblivious character being flanked from behind by a number of male porn actors.
• Durable Deathtrap: The first obstacle the party has to overcome is a hallway full of spinning blade traps, in a dungeon that's indeterminately old.
• Eat Brain for Memories: Invoked. When Oob steals a memory, that memory is sucked out of the victim's head, eventually killing them when it takes all of them. It's shown gnawing on Sigmar's boots in an effort to get his memories, implying that it actually does at least eat their bodies in the process.
• Emotion Eater: Celestials eat good vibes, to the point that Happiness is used as a Currency Cuisine.
• Exotic Extended Marriage: For dwarves, it is common to be polyamorous and the most prominent example is the royalty of the kingdom, consisting of a queen who is married to three other dwarves.
• Expy: Prince Chisarick Thathird II for Prince Charles, both of whom are (or were, in Charles' case) prince-heirs poised to become king when their mother dies, but said mother is unusually and exceptionally long-lived.
• Familiar: As of S3 E1, Dabarella gets Toasty Cinnamon Buns, a living gingerbread man decorated as a wizard, as a familiar. Sigmar is somewhat creeped out by Toasty's excessive cheerfulness, while Mortimer immediately jokes about eating him for lunch before Dabarella points out that Toasty is sentient.
• Fantastic Racism:
  • At least the guards of Borthelmoore Keep are prejudiced against Flower and Faunafolk, as well as Celestials. Basically, anyone non-human.
  • Elderly Dwarves refer to non-dwarves as "Upsiders" and immediately distrust them. Jack illustrates it by invoking the Racist Grandma trope. "There's your really racist grandma, your kinda not-racist but still kinda-racist mom, and then there's you."
  • Mortimer on occasion will say something horribly racist, usually resulting in offense from the people around him, especially Grinderbin.
  • While the Elves have been integrated with the human kingdom for a long time, and the Aasimar are allies, the Flora and Fauna folk are noted to have been enemy countries for a long time. Queen Beyoncé uses this to justify several unspecified atrocities against them.
• Fantastic Slurs: The slur "upsider", used by racist dwarves against non-dwarves. Younger Dwarves just use it out of cultural habit with no real malice behind it.
• Fantasy Gun Control: Averted. Several guards are seen armed with blunderbusses. They don't seem very effective, since the one time we see one fired, it misses the target.
• Fluffy the Terrible: The primary antagonist of season two is a huge, wormlike Eldritch Abomination called "King Fuzzyhug."
• Foil: Eggolier and Sigmar are opposites. The Chessmaster versus the Spanner in the Works. Eggolier always thinks ten steps ahead, while Sigmar is impulsive and brash. She's not afraid to manipulate to get her way, while he's always trying to do what's immediately good. Eggolier is always putting up a friendly facade to achieve her goals, while Sigmar is irritable and no-nonsense but amicable deep-down.
• Friendship Moment: There appear to be a couple between Mortimer and the others, during Season 3, but one is immediately subverted, and the other is one-sided at best.
  • Before Dabarella attempts an extremely risky Fake Memories gambit on one of the season's main antagonists, Mortimer pulls her aside for a pep talk, where he praises her abilities to the sky—then gives an Aside Glance to the viewer and quips "I can bullshit with the best of them, can't I?"
  • In the finale, after Mortimer is forced to reveal his Changeling abilities to impersonate Queen Beyoncé, he threatens Grinderbin with a horrible fate if the secret ever gets spilled. Grinderbin responds that if he were interested in spilling it, he wouldn't have let Mortimer know that he knew about it.
• Frying Pan of Doom: One of Dabarella's pieces of equipment is a big cast iron wok. Naturally, she hits a few people with it.
• Giant Enemy Crab: A battle with such a crustacean takes up the entirety of S2 E5; "The Battle of Piss-Off Bridge.".
• Go Mad from the Isolation: While it's mitigated by the presence of his daughters, Latavia Ticklepuss didn't handle being banished to Destiny's Keep very well, becoming fixated on happy memories and eventually becoming an infovore, literally eating the happy memories of others.
• Good All Along: King Fuzzyhug is too lazy to do anything evil, being a Sleepyhead who just wants to snooze in his lava cave. He was only causing the earthquakes because he was being disturbed.
• Good-Guy Bar: The protagonists run the "Adventure Is Nightclub", the club-slash-tavern where they kick back and unwind between adventures.
• Guest-Star Party Member: Susan Sheerfist (played by JM8, of another The Escapist/Second Wind show Design Delve) briefly joins Dabarella and Grinderbin in one of the side stories, and leaves by the end of that arc.
• The Great Offscreen War: Apparently the kingdom is in semi-open war with the Flora- and Fauna-Folk; at least according to Egelier. The Season 3 finalé reveals that the Flora- and fauna-folk are at war, and Dehidré's daughter wants the party to guard the Peace Talks because she fears that he may attack it.
• Heinz Hybrid: Mortimer is "a mix of genetics" and referred to as a "half-elf" to save time. He doesn't mind being called a "mutt" to his face either. According to the season 1 recap, Yahtzee figures there have to be people in D&D whose ancestors were multiple parings of several different kinds of Half Human Hybrids.
• Hidden Elf Village: Ironically, it's the dwarves who hid their capital, not the elves.
• Hufflepuff House: The Faunafolk and Elf factions exist (Dabarella and Mortimer evidence their existence), but have little bearing on the central conflict. Although an adventuring party of centaurs is met at a couple of points in season 1.
• Humans Are Warriors: The Human Kingdom is noted to have entirely subsumed the elven nation, and driven the dwarves into an isolationist Land of One City. There is also tension between the human, flora-, and fauna- folk nations.
• Human Weapon: Sigmar jokingly calls himself this in S3 E8, and then actually becomes on in S3 E10, when his other arm becomes a Meat Bow thanks to an arcane tattoo given to him by a mysterious man named Sebastian Piss.
• Hurl It into the Sun: While discussing Queen Beyoncé's very powerful magical amulet, Pikeworth says that he'd want to destroy it, but it would take some effort to do. Amy jokes that they could destroy the thing by throwing it to the moon.
• Ingesting Knowledge: Latavia Ticklepuss's slime servant Oob eats memories, especially happy memories, which it brings back to "Daddy" Latavia, as a way to deal with the isolation of banishment.
• Inherently Funny Words: The magic word Mortimer uses to activate his Stone of Detect Truth is the goofy sounding "buggernuts". It comes in handy at relatively serious, plot-heavy moments.
• It Seemed Like a Good Idea at the Time: Played With and Lampshaded in one sequence: Dabarella casts Augury to predict that the group's plan (distract Lativa Ticklepuss by convincing him to prepare for Albert and Betty's wedding at their shelter, which they actually don't plan on having yet) will be immediately useful, but once Lativa finds out, he will be very, very angry. Dabarella sums it up as "good for now, probs bad for later". Mortimer responds that taking immediately-useful decisions with significant negative long-term consequences is "the story of my life".
• King Incognito: Bonesy is the peaceful yet undead remains of the King, who went missing a long time ago.
• Left Hanging: At the last episode before The Escapist collapsed, it was revealed that Eggolier pinned the theft of the Jade Homunculus on Mortimer's criminal friend Domino Fantastic. Literally three days later, TE went under. If not for the series later returning with Second Wind, that cliffhanger would have been the end of the series.
• Let Me Get This Straight...: Eggolier falls back on this, when she learns that Latavia Ticklepuss may be headed for the castle the main characters are currently in, at the exact time when (due to Reasons of Plot) the magical barrier that would normally repel him is severely weakened.
• Lie Detector: Mortimer's Magic Item is a Stone of Detect Truth, a rock that turns green when someone tells the truth, and red when someone lies. Like a real "lie detector," it's not 100% accurate.
• Line-of-Sight Name: According to Jack, the name of "Angondarii, the Land of Red Grass" was vaguely based on a species of prairie grass^note Andropogon gerardii/big bluestem that he encountered while landscaping his garden.
• The Magocracy: Only the Nobility has any magic in human society, and even then, it comes from some kind of Magical Accessory.
• Mistaken for Gay: After Grinderbin takes Mortimer into a room for a talk, Sigmar sees them walking out cheerily acting casual, and leans into Dabarella and whispers "I think they're fucking." Mortimer later uses this as part of his cover story as to why he and Grinderbin swapped outfits as part of one of his schemes, claiming that "This is what happens when you get dressed in the dark."
• Murder by Mistake: Mortimer acquires a needle laced with Perfect Poison. By hiding it in a forgery of Queen Beyoncé's amulet his intended target is made quite clear. However, the needle instead ends up poisoning Prince Chisarick Thathird, when he attempts to usurp control from Beyoncé using her amulet. Mortimer makes the most out of the situation by guilting his intended victim over the sudden death of his actual victim.
• Named After Somebody Famous:
  • The ruler of the humans is Queen Beyoncé Knowles, appropriately located at Castle Sasha, with a nearby disowned keep called Destiny's Keep.
  • The twin Aasimar cities are named Venessula and Hudgnes, for Vanessa Hudgens.
• Never Mess with Granny: Kalandra Ticklepuss is an extremely powerful magic user. She manages to hold her own against a platoon of guards, and treats being set on fire like a painful annoyance. She's also quite old, and Jack Packard gives her a very "crotchety old woman"-type voice.
• Non-Human Non-Binary: Jesse sees his Mushroom Man character Grinderbin as using they/them pronouns, although this doesn't always come across since the players (including Jesse) will accidentally refer to Grinderbin with he/him, and in-character Grinderbin doesn't care enough to correct people if they refer to him incorrectly. For the later-introduced flora-people, it's subverted in that they do present as masculine or feminine.
• Not the Intended Use: Queen Beyoncé's necklace is actually the power source for the robot army, which itself is only supposed to be bodies for the dead who don't want to move on to reincarnate into. Karen Ferryman is mildly annoyed when she finds out one of her acolytes built the facility with a way to control the robots into it, and she asks that its punch card reader be removed.
• Obnoxious Entitled Housewife: Charon^note or possibly Karen Ferryman is voiced and animated in a way that references this trope, but in reality she's quite nice. Ironically, when Chisarick Thathird the Second dies and gets sent to the netherworld, he's the one bothering her with demands to speak to the manager.
• Odd Friendship: Moped, a crazy, senile peasant, and his shovel friend Albert, who is a guy forced into the form of a shovel and is completely inanimate. When Albert is given his original body back, taking the form of a proud Aasimar warrior poised to marry into royalty, he greets Moped with a charismatic, appreciative "My man." and thanks him for keeping him safe and using his shovel body to do various wacky tasks.
• Off the Rails:
  • During one of the sessions, the party takes a moment to visit general store-owner Bread and talk about the weird skeleton friend he has. They manage to uncover the identity of Bonesy (he's the previous king long thought to have disappeared) when that's not the party's immediate nor long-term goal. Once the group concludes they need more evidence, Jack Packard admits that he wasn't expecting they'd be going this direction during the current campaign.
  • Jack Packard was expecting the party to fight Lativa Ticklepuss, who is an Eldritch Abomination Blob Monster responsible for forcing Albert into the form of a shovel. Instead, the party convinces Lativa to return Albert back to his normal form, a detour Jack admits was unexpected as he describes Lativa opening a puzzle he expected the party would need to do themselves.
• One-Steve Limit: Thoroughly averted throughout Season 1, where many of the male NPCs share the given name of "Jeremy".
• Only One Name: Grinderbin, unlike all other Flowerfolk shown so far, has no discernable surname. Even the only other known mushroomfolk, Celia Sporefold, has one.
• Parasol of Pain: One of Grinderbin's weapons is the Umbrella of Foul Language, which he uses to cast spells.
• Party of Representatives: Dabarella is a Faunafolk, Grinderbin is a Flowerfolk, Sigmar is an Aasimar and Mortimer is a half-elf, half-everything else.
• Perpetual Frowner: Well, he doesn't usually have a mouth, but the same emotion is communicated: Sigmar's default expression is an unimpressed, annoyed glare.
• Pimped-Out Dress:
  • Dabarella's party outfit is a pink, Disney Princess-esque ballgown.
  • Grinderbin's party outfit can only be described as the men's equivalent of this trope.
• Pointy Ears: Mortimer's family tree is such a mess that it all averages out to a regular guy with pointed ears.
• Power Tattoo: During Season 3, Sigmar gets a tattoo that lets him conjure a bow whenever he wants one.
• Precision F-Strike: Eggolier comes out with one, when Grinderbin questions her scheming ability.
  Eggolier: You saw my plan.
  Grinderbin: That was it? I don't believe that.
  Eggolier: (splutters) Oh, I'm sorry, "that was it?" "That was it?" You mean returning a precious item under the guise of someone else (who I know didn't steal it) so I could make an alliance with the most powerful—wizard—in—this—land?! Oh, "that's it"—fuck you!
• Product Placement:
  • The series is sponsored by dice company Dice Envy starting with the third season. Sometimes they cut to the dice cam — a camera positioned over a box with the Dice Envy logo on it — to show off the result of important rolls.
  • In one bonus video where the players receive miniatures of their characters, Jack mentions that a 3D modeller named Sam Elliott created them. Each time anyone mentions his name from that point onwards, it's announced alongside some very prominent links to Elliott's social media to contact him by.
• Race Fetish: Prince Chisarick Thathird is absolutely smitten with Dabarella; entirely because she's a Tabaxi.
• Rage Breaking Point: Egelier has one, albeit into total frustration rather than rage, when Sigmar and Grinderbin tell her that they helped free one of Latavia's daughters, after telling her that Latavia might be coming straight for Castle Sasha
• A Rare Sentence:

"I will absolutely not fuck a shovel!"

Betty Ticklepuss

"We should be putting on puppet shows for gingerbread men to appease an eldritch horror, and we're going to make some fucking visuals of that!"

Yahtzee Croshaw

• Really Royalty Reveal: Grinderbin turns out to be the recently-sprouted heir of Queen Cillia and King Jarmie.
• Rolling Pin of Doom: One of Dabarella's weapons is a giant, wooden, metal-studded rolling pin.
• Royal Brat: Chisarick Thathird the Second (son of Queen Beyoncé), who is slightly racist and constantly demanding attention. More worryingly, he attempts to steal his mother's magical pendant and force her to abdicate, which gets him killed.
• Running Gag:
  • In season 1, every second NPC was named "Jeremy." Even the minor god trapped in the Jade Homunculus.
  • Dabarella cooking a meal for an NPC the party has befriended. This culminates in her causing the party to have A Moment since King Fuzzyhug is an Emotion Eater who feeds on positive emotions. She has his essence imbued into her wok so he'll be warm (from cooking) and be able to partake in the meal somehow (everyone nearby enjoying themselves).
• Secret-Keeper: Grinderbin knows what Mortimer really is, which they talk about in S3 E8, but only refer to via allusion to not give the twist away yet. It comes out in S3 E10: Mortimer is a Changeling, and the massive stakes at hand lead him to finally put his shapeshifter powers to use when he's abstained from them for the whole campaign thus far. He also tells Grinderbin that if he ever tells anybody about it, he'll never be safe again.
• Ship Tease: Mortimer hits on Dabarella during Season 2's victory party. She lets him down gently.
• Shout-Out:
  • KC has admitted that Sigmar's original design was based on Kaname Tosen from Bleach. His redesign in Season 2 also took inspiration from the album cover to Bad by Michael Jackson.
  • Amy's initial concept for Dabarella started as a female version of Meowscles from Fortnite.
  • Mortimer's catchphrase for activating his stone of truth is "buggernuts."
  • The minigun-wielding centaurs are modeled after Alan "Dutch" Schafer, John Rambo, and John McClane.
• Spell Book: Part of Dabarella's backstory is that she read a necromancer's spellbook after mistaking it for a cookbook. She was looking for cookie recipes.
• Sidekick Creature Nuisance: Dabarella's familiar has a shrill, grating, Bozo the Clown voice. Mortimer takes one look at the little bugger and immediately proposes eating him, while Sigmar is highly uncomfortable with him getting into his personal space.
• Simple, yet Opulent: Sigmar's party outfit is just the same kind of jacket he always wears, just 1) clean and 2) closed.
• Simpleton Voice: Dabarella is noted to have a low INT score, and Amy gives her a childish voice you'd expect from someone half her age and a quarter her size. (She tends to stammer a bit as she talks, which gives the impression of her brain running to catch up with her mouth.)
• Sudden Anatomy:
  • The Zero Punctuation-esque artstyle used for the series usually omits limbs except for their extremities. When Sigmar gets a magical arm tattoo, he suddenly has an arm for Sebastian Piss to paint onto.
  • Grinderbin has no face, for his entire head is a mushroom. According to the official promotional expansion for Red Dragon Inn, Grinderbin does have a face in his mushroom cap's ridges, it's merely not drawn most of the time.
• Suicidal Pacifism: The party is generally against hurting important NPCs whenever possible. They try to avoid killing Latavia Ticklepuss despite him being an Obviously Evil Eldritch Abomination, and keep Kalandra Ticklepuss alive for way longer than they need to, despite the fact she's made her intent to kill everyone in the room quite clear and refuses to cooperate in any capacity even if it means her certain death. The only exception is Mortimer, who very nearly does kill Kalandra, and has previously stated that murdering the entire adventuring party during their sleep to cover his own ass is an actual consideration he once had.
• Teleporter Accident: Mortimer has the idea to use Sigmar's Blink Arrow to harvest some platinum from King Fuzzyhug's corpse. Sigmar leaves his hand behind.
• That Came Out Wrong: A man named Sebastian Piss gives Sigmar a magical tattoo that allows him to summon weapons. When trying that goes wrong (a bow is created from Sigmar's own flesh and bones, which is extremely painful), a nearby guard vomits at the results. Sigmar is irritated, stating that he needs to see (Sebastian) Piss; the barfing guard gets ticked off, questioning why Sigmar wants to see piss.
• Tiny Guy, Huge Girl: Downplayed with Sigmar, who is canonically the shortest of the group, although it is brought into focus whenever he's next to Dabarella, and especially Eggolier.
• Transplant: Jesse's character Grinderbin is transplanted from a separate D&D material Jesse wrote: Grinderbin's Mobile Market of Ridiculous Magical Items, in which Grinderbin peddles strange magic trash.
• Trash the Set: At the start of Season 3, Jack Packard blows up the original Adventure is Nigh viewer interface and replaces it with a smoother new one, which they can use now that the whole group is playing in-person.
• Trauma Conga Line: The finale of Season 3 puts Beyoncé through an extensive one. First, her son is killed by a weapon meant for her, and Mortimer really twists the knife when he gives her the news. Then her father dies, although she wasn't on great terms with what was left of them anyway. Finally, she's forced to kill her half-sister Kalandra, since she's the only one in the room besides Mortimer who realizes that they can't be talked down from trying to kill everyone else.
• Tuckerization: One of the members of the Ticklepuss family is Kalandra Ticklepuss, named for Second Wind founder Nick Calandra.
• Unfortunate Names: Jack LOVES giving ridiculous names to his NPCs, partially because it means they players will have to repeat the names during dialogue. Some notable examples include...
  • An NPC the party meets when they wake up in the back of a paddy wagon is a goblin named "Jeremy GoodSex." He turns out to be an, er, adult entertainer later, and they guess it to have been his "pornstar name." The Side Quest spinoff reveals that there's an entire commune for clan GoodSex.
  • The primary antagonist of season 1 is a Flowerfolk rogue by the name of "Davorty (pronounced "Dafferty") Cornhole."
  • A River Siren who tries to seduce and eat Sigmar is named "Anus Quiver" (pronounced exactly how you think it is), presumably because her mother hated her.
  • At the Flowerfolk hideout is a grunt named "Jeremy Nagginwife."
  • One of the Dwarf Kings is named "Verri Longdick."
• Unscaled Merfolk: River Sirens are elven women with technicolor hair from the waist up and freshwater octopi below that. It's stated that their horrific main jaws reside at the center of their tentacle cluster.
• Upper-Class Twit: An Invoked Trope. Part of Mortimer's plan for the Moonlight Ball heist involves acting like a boor, then disappearing with Dabarella ("his chef"), in the hopes that nobody will worry too hard about where he's gone, just so long as he IS gone, and might (hopefully) be gone a long time.
• Verbal Backspace: At one point Dabarella offers to pick Oob up and hug him. He cheerfully responds "Oob will hug your memories!" and she quickly reconsiders.
• What Did I Do Last Night?: Mortimer's first words of the campaign are "Oh, God, what was I drinking last night?"
• What Could Have Been: In-Universe. The party's plan to get Albert turned back into a man is to show the Evil Sorceror who turned him into a shovel how happy Albert and the sorcerer's daughter could have been, and creating new memories for the Sorcerer to enjoy with them and their children (the sorcerer dealt with his grief by sending an infovorous monster out to steal happy memories), if only Albert wasn't turned into a shovel. It works.
• You All Meet in a Cell: The party wakes up in the back of a paddy wagon, being driven to a Dungeon they've been sentenced to loot for one of the local nobles.

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Tropes in Adventure is Nigh: Sidequest include:

• Armor Is Useless: Averted, Grinderbin's new suit of armor actually saves his bacon during the battle with the Ghost Knight.
• Buried Alive: How Suzan kills Moll Cutpurse. Justified, because her Magic Item, the Spade of the Grave Digger, prevents any corpse it buries from being Raised as an undead, and he's an extremely evil wizard and an Asshole Victim.
• Comically Small Bribe: Aaron Mooney is willing to work for three heads of lettuce a day, and rotten lettuce at that.
• Ghostly Goals: The Ghost Knight fought in season 2 feels he needs to commit at least one heroic deed to be let into Warrior Heaven.
• Innocent Fanservice Girl: Season 2 Episode 3 has a faun who goes bottomless as a matter of course.
• The Family for the Whole Family: Catholics in Angondarii are actually more like mafiosos. They speak with Italian-American accents and set up illegal tollbooths on bridges.
• Undeath Always Ends: The Ghost Knight is finally defeated by Dabarella, Grinderbin, and Susan Sheerfist, along with Susan's Spirit Guardians, the ghosts of a hedgehog and a cyclops (who have made their peace with dying, but help Susan because she helped them).

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