We Liked It Our Way Better! [RPG Horror Story]

Narrator: Sometimes everything goes according to plan. Sometimes they go horribly. Join us while we tell tales of Games gone wrong. This is Curmudgeons and Dragons, R P G, horror Stories.

Jason: Hello, adventurers and hello, Josie and Jim.

Jim: Hello.

Jason: Hello, I'm Jason Portizo. This is Curmudgeons and. I am here joined by Ms. Josie Diaz. Yes,

Jim: Mr. Jim Crocker. I'm excited I get to read today.

Jason: Yeah, Jim, uh, Jim brought us a story. It was his turn. Um, you know the drill. We do stories from R PPG horror stories on Reddit and, uh, Let you know what we think about 'em.

So Jim, what do you

got

Jim: for us? So I've got one that is not necessarily uh uh, I mean, given some of the issues that we covered, people getting kicked in the balls and defecating in themselves at the table and stuff like that, this is uh, oh one time. One time, Jim, and we will never forget this. This doesn't rise quite to that level, but, but it has, there, we can derive some good advice from it.

So I feel like it's, it's valuable. Let's, in that, in that regard, so this

Jason: is called I love deriving Jim.

Jim: Yes, yes. Derivation is, uh, is the name of our game here. We're all talking about words that we have on the brain. So, uh, Similac. Sim. So I'm, uh, as , I'm gonna pre performing a, a, a Similac of, of Jim, of an Ssat version of myself, if you will.

Perfect. So, yes, uh, this is called, it would've cost you nothing to keep that to yourself. Posted by Reddit user, cosmic Thief, which is a great name for a Reddit hand. Oh, by the way. So that, that's probably something that got on early to get in a, a good name like that. But, uh, so this has the medium length tag, which I think is about right.

This happened eight years ago, give or take. But I remember the events fairly well as I was enthralled by the game setting. , but I only recently thought of it like a horror story. And to be fair, it isn't horrific, but it just pisses me off to no end. That's which is, which is its own, it's its own kind of horror story.

Yeah, so, so the game is a home brew setting and system. We're playing in a post-apocalyptic earth where magic and fantasy race to merge after the world's end. Simultaneously, the leftovers of the old world meant that the countries were quickly propelled. Into the state of the 17 to 18 hundreds with steampunk vibes.

In addition, some historical and mythical figures have been resurrected, including Queen Victoria Rasputin, George Washington, king Arthur, Holger, donkey, et cetera. Jesus

Josey: Christ. Could you possibly go to dinner with all these people?

Jim: I, it would be interesting. Certainly. I desperately

Josey: wanna hang out with

Jim: Russin.

You would dude have another drink? Yeah. , you would. That would be it. Tell me more about having two dicks, my guy eat all the cake and stuff like that. That's, yeah.

Jason: also, if we go to 17, 18 hundreds. Is King Arthur from the 17,

Josey: 18 hundreds? No, he's from earlier than

Jason: that. I

Jim: like way earlier. Right. Neither is, neither is George Washington, I guess.

George Washington is, is 17. The person is very much in the 17 hundreds. 17. 17. Been born yet. I guess, yeah. Yeah.

Josey: So, well, sput has not been resurrected. He's been time traveled.

Jim: Everybody just, okay. So, so that, that's not what the horror story is. Uh, so, um, I disagree, sir. Due to time travel shenanigans, our characters died, but our souls were given the chance to fix shit by pe, be by being put into different people's bodies.

Let's got like a little bit of a quantum leap kind of vibe going on, it sounds like. So this part is important. Little assassins c. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Maybe a little of that. Yes. Yeah. We're in the, it's not the matrix. Where the hell, the animus Little Wayne's world.

Jason: Yes. Yeah. Not Waynes World. Not Waynes World. A little Bill and Ted, the other.

There

Jim: you go. Yes. We're all in the animus. Yeah. So, uh, this part is important. It was our souls. S O U L S is in bold there to make, to indicate that we under we're supposed to understand. That's the important part. It was our souls with knowledge of what had happened, but we were these new people with their memories and everything in effect.

We were these new people Of these new characters. Two are important. One is an Elvis demon hunter, and the other is a human Murad, as in Achilles's, also resurrected warriors. Achilles, definitely not a 17, 18, hundreds character. So, Just putting that out there. Now he is. I mean, I guess anyone ever drop in, do what you want.

You know, it's this League of Extraordinary gentleman type stuff, it sounds like. So to fix stuff, we've been traveling around finding McGuffin and we figure out that one of them is held in the Vatican. We know from previous fluff that the Papa guards are hardcore motherfuckers super tanky nights with Fire Magic.

We're thinking we need to be really clever about this. We strategize and consider multiple avenues of stealth, but seen flaws in the plans, sort of as a joke. Someone can't remember who says, Hey, murmur dun. What would it take for all your brothers to join us in assaulting the Vatican as a distraction while we get the.

Whatever the McGuffin is, what ,

Jason: you know, sorry. It's a hell of

Jim: a distraction. Yeah. Well, yeah, A joke becomes a plan and we all get super invested in it. So we go to Greece first, call up the Murad, duns, and then sail for Rome. It's whatever. It's like, it's right across the, you know, it's right across. It's to be right there, a GNC there, so that, that's easy to get to.

Yeah. So I won't go into the details, but battling the Papa Guards in St. Peter's Square with 30 MEMS by our side while two PCs sneak into the Vatican itself. Easily a highlight and fond memory of that entire game, and I completely, that sounds awesome. That sounds, sounds amazing. Yeah, I, I, you know, like, do you know what, that sounds like a really cool Assassins Creed mission.

Not to put, you find a point on it where like I just, you get your gang to attack and then you sneak in through the roof or whatever. Oh, yeah, that's,

Josey: yeah. I'm just picturing King Arthur and fucking Rasputin. Fighting the Papel guards in St. Peters Square, and I'm losing my entire fucking mind. .

Jim: Yes. Yeah.

Standing back to back with, you know, while, uh, you know, Arthur is, has Excalibur and is yelling for Avalon while Rasputin is just like chugging vodka and like getting shot to hell. That would be are are

Jason: you re casting, are you re casting sidekicks that Chuck Norris classic

Jim: maybe. . Um, so, uh, this

Jason: sounds amazing, Jim.

How could this possibly go wrong?

Jim: Uh, easily a high point and fond memory of the entire game. That is until we're post session and our GM smugly laughs and then reveals this gem, you know, demon hunters work for the Vatican. He could have just walked in and taken it and he says it. Like we're supposed to know that.

Yeah, but

Josey: that's dumb and not fun. And we would've had the beautiful battle scene with the Papel guards in St. Peter Square

Jim: and we feel stupid and we also laugh a little, but I recently remembered that little tidbit and I cannot help but be super pissed off those absolutely no reason for him to say that.

And he stained what was otherwise a super fun battle there that. No other horror than a blemished experience.

Jason: Yeah, it was. I would actually even argue whether the experience is blemished. Cause you had this excellent battle. You did it better than he had planned. And like, I think it's kind of funny that he kind of went the long way around.

I don't know. I, I don't think that would've ruined it for me.

Josey: It is annoying to like, be super excited about how well something went and just for your GM to be like, well, you could have solved this much easier. And it's like, well, we didn't, so fuck you. Right. Find your business.

Jim: Yeah. Well we, we did the fun way instead, demon hunters worked for the Vatican.

You, you cla clads . I like, I I, that feels like maybe like a tone of voice thing as well. Yeah. Like if they're really nasty about it. But, but like, um, I will say this, if it were me, I wouldn't say shit about that. I would go, that was awesome. Holy cow. What an amazing session. See y'all next week as the

Josey: title suggests.

Yeah. It would've cost you nothing to just keep it to your fucking self. G i

Jason: I might, I might actually hate the step to tell my players like, wow, that was so much cooler than what I had planned. Yeah,

Jim: you don't have to. That's OK for it. Nothing wrong

Jason: with that. I think they appreciate that. There, there's, I saw this going.

Yeah. I saw this going very differently. And I like your version . Yeah. Yeah. I think they would appreciate that. Mm-hmm. . Mm-hmm. . Um, so yeah, no, it's just, that's,

Jim: you're putting,

Jason: it's, the story could have gone a lot worse, obviously, but like, it was, it sounds like they had a, it sounds like they had a great game.

Um, this is a very unique. And, uh, and it alls well then ends well, right? So

Jim: like, credit to the, so here's the thing, like the thing where you're cool about letting the players do what they want, as long as it doesn't, you know, derail the game or go against any of your safety and consent tools or anything like that.

Like the DM did that part. Write, yeah. Let them do this crazy thing and go off. , you know, whatever, bring Alexander the greats army into, you know, whatever. Or not Alexander, but I guess it's what Achilles Love it. Yes. Yeah, yeah. You know, whatever. Bring the Peloponnesian War to the steps of the Vatican, which is kind of awesome.

Mm-hmm. . Um, but yeah, then just, then just let it ride, let it be a cool thing they did. Um, I'm looking through, um, don't, don't, don't be s smug about how, how they made it harder on the. I'm looking

Josey: some of the comments here and somebody that the OP responded to asked, uh, did at any point previously in the campaign you learned that demon hunters worked for the church.

If not, that's a bullshit reveal for something your characters should have included on before they stormed the Vatican. Uh, but if so, the blemishes on you as a DM who has players completely dis. Mountains of valuable intel. He has every right to point out. You guys made a big event out of a civil pickup to which the OP responded.

Nope. Like I said, we have our own characters whose soul was then dumped into these new characters, bodies and minds. This meant that we, as the players, got verbal cliff notes on the new characters' personalities, but almost none on the background except what formed the group. Our characters knew because they were these new characters, but we didn't

Jason: know.

So we got reverse meta gaming going on. Yeah. Where we have in-game knowledge that the players don't

Jim: know. Yeah. Mm-hmm. , um, which is just like having no knowledge at all.

Jason: So, uh, from the DM side, I would maybe at certain points make them real history checks or, um, to see if they recall that information. Um, or like, or just straight up tell, like if, if the players al if the character already knows it, like, Hey, you actually.

Know that these guys work for these

Jim: guys. Oh, for sure. Yeah. No, like if it's not supposed to be like a puzzle or a challenge, don't present it like it's one. Um, yeah. If, if somebody would know that, you can just walk in and say, Hey, can we borrow this stuff, fight some demons, and you know, and the Pope would like, you know, throw a few Hail Marys at you and say, go with God.

Then, then let them know that just, yeah.

Jason: Right. This kind, this is kind of turning into now like I'm trying to like make a, uh, a non-game analogy for this. So like, let's say, uh, someone gets dropped into my body and my brain and they want to go rob my dad's house. Uh,

Josey: they have your memories. So they like, right, you have a garage

Jason: code instead of.

instead of using the idea that like my dad would just let me in the front door, , they instead go get all their friends to break in the windows. Like . Mm-hmm. .

Jim: Yeah. Do a home invasion. Yeah. Exactly.

Jason: Okay. I understand now why? It's weird. Yeah. Um, but I still like their version better. So good on

Jim: everybody. Yeah.

Sounds like it was great if your players, I mean, if your players do something cool, let it ride. And like, so like that's a thing where, like that DM. Just like couldn't let go of that little bit of their ego that they had to get the dig in at the end. Right. Get the,

Jason: get the little smug little last word.

Yeah, exactly.

Jim: Couldn't just let it, let it ride, let it go. And under understand that they did a good job because the players did an awesome thing and they let them do it, and they facilitated it and everybody had an awesome obsession.

Jason: So yeah. What, what they turned into, uh, had very, had the vibes of like Jo Josie, do you remember my favorite phrase to say as a D?

Josey: It's not, you can certainly try.

Jim: Is it, it's close to it. Like

Jason: Craig's . It's close to it. That's Greg's. That is absolutely Greg's favorite actually. Yeah,

Josey: I know it's Greg's cause I bought him a shirt that says it,

Jason: right? Mine. Mine is, I'm gonna allow this bullshit. . Yes, yes. And this, this screams, I'm gonna allow this bullshit and like Okay.

As smoke as the DM was in the. Even allowing it and having it play out and turning it into that bravo. Yeah. I'm, I'm not, I'm not even mad.

Jim: Yeah.

Josey: Mm-hmm. , I'm sorry that this sued an otherwise great experience for the op, but I don't think cosmic thief, you should let it ruin What a good time you had battling alongside King Arthur.

Yes.

Jason: Stewing on it years later. I think that's the, that's the biggest problem here. Like, just take you, you got the w do you got the win? Think like look back on it fondly and think of how much better you made that

Jim: game. And this is also your. Permission to just say, dude, don't be a dick. Yeah. You like, you can push back that way.

That's totally fine. Like, it's not like you're arguing about the rules with them or anything. Just, you know, like, Hey man, next time just, just keep your app shut and let us enjoy it . And that's totally like, that is totally the kind of like argument you should have with your friends on a regular basis to tell them what you want so that you can all understand what's going on and you're on the same page about it.

Josey: Be the designated American in that Japanese boardroom, , ,

Jason: or just come up with more bullshit and see who allows it. .

Jim: I like the fact that somebody. Uh, like, like halfway down. It, it doesn't take like a dozen posts in this thread to get to somebody saying the highlight of Assassins Creed two is bear knuckle boxing the Pope, which is absolutely true,

Josey: So I would bear knuckle box the Pope in real life. I don't need it to be a video

Jim: game.

Jason: Uh, don't tell my got on this one. Yeah, right. . Uh, that's all we got on this one. We're gonna have stories like this every single Friday. Uh, subscribe to the podcast and, uh, we'll see you next time. Thanks for listening.

All right,

Jim: Take care.

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