In this episode you or your players are approached by two different gentleman. One that appears to be trying to lure you into a dangerous quest by insulting your abilities and downplaying just how dangerous these rats truly are. Luckily the smaller cloaked gentleman gives a brief explanation that these rats are anything but normal rats and that what is behind these rats may pose a greater danger, one that even his giant buddy Bramute is afraid to figure out. Now of course we aren't talking about any normal rats we are talking about Cranium rats! These rats traditionally according to Volos guide to everything created by a Mind Flayer in order to carry out simple recon, spying, or whatever else the Mind Flayer needs done that is within their realm of capabilities. Now if you're a DM/GM that has a Mind Flayer as your BBEG this episode gives a plot hook that will lead your players to a journey of figuring out that there is indeed a Mind Flayer but what they want and why they're controlling these rats is still unknown. I also would like to point out that Dungeons and Dragons or any other TTRPG are made for us as DM/GMs to alter according to the needs of our campaign so if these rats interest you but you don't want to run a Mind Flayer you could absolutely make it so any BBEG that know magic (or maybe one that doesn't but has a sidekick that does) created these rats. You could even make it so the rats were created by a Mind Flayer or whatever else but their creator died leaving them to their own devices, maybe their creators death made them go into survival mode so now they are just doing what rats do with slightly enhanced consciousness or, being left top their own devices allowed them to truly think for themselves so now they are trying to take over villages while recruiting rats building a RAT ARMY!!!! There are plenty of incredibly unique and creative ways to use these rats and they pose a unique challenge to the players because one rat alone is just as easy to take care of as a normal rat but a swarm of Cranium Rats is far more deadly. With unique swarm abilities and magic Cranium Rats are fun monsters to run in a game and hard for players to forget after. Thank you for listening to my podcast and be safe adventurers!