Episode 12 - Rocks'll Kill Ya

[00:00:01] Speaker A: What? [00:00:01] Speaker B: Oh, sorry, Jeremy, not one. You know what that means. [00:00:06] Speaker A: No, please. [00:00:07] Speaker B: I have three kids. [00:00:08] Speaker A: Whoa, whoa, whoa. Hold on a sec, Kayla. This podcast is not for kids. Content warnings can be found in the episode description. Go ahead. [00:00:25] Speaker B: Jesus. Everybody, welcome back to another episode of Tales from the tabletop. I am your favorite DM, Kayla Williams. [00:00:58] Speaker A: And I am your ICE cold, ICE ICE baby DM Jeff Lenter. [00:01:03] Speaker B: Okay, under pressure or ICE ICE baby? [00:01:06] Speaker A: Go between the two of them. Obviously, our boy fucking Freddie Mercury every say, was I trying to guess which one that was? [00:01:16] Speaker B: No. Like, which one do you prefer? [00:01:19] Speaker A: Vanilla ICE can suck my balls, bro. He is worse than most rappers. Yeah, that's a very jaded opinion. [00:01:27] Speaker B: ICE ICE baby scratches my brain in a way that the other song does not. [00:01:32] Speaker A: Yeah, but we also have David Bowie in that other song too. Come on. [00:01:35] Speaker B: David Bowie was my first love. [00:01:37] Speaker A: Explains a lot about Kayla. [00:01:40] Speaker B: Y'all ever see labyrinth? That was my awakening, yo. [00:01:44] Speaker A: Jim Henson also awoken something in me, but it was my love for puppetry. I love puppets and Muppets. Most specific. Oh, dude. Oh, my God. I had the dumbest debate at work the other day when someone was like, yo, the Muppets and Sesame street are two separate entities. They do not exist in the same world. I'm like, but the Muppets live on Sesame street. [00:02:05] Speaker B: They literally live there. That's their home, bro. [00:02:07] Speaker A: No, two separate things. They're two separate. I'm like, I fucking was so mad. [00:02:12] Speaker B: Maybe your weak little mind can't comprehend the vastness of the universe that is the Muppet cinematic universe. [00:02:20] Speaker A: They just live on Sesame street, bro. [00:02:23] Speaker B: I don't know what it's like being a simple ape when I'm so evolved that I can comprehend that two things can exist at once in the same universe. [00:02:32] Speaker A: The Brooklyn Dodgers, because they are in Brooklyn, not because they're still a baseball team, bro. Like, goddamn. [00:02:38] Speaker B: God damn. [00:02:39] Speaker A: What were we talking about? We were talking about a podcast. What's up, everyone? This is a d D podcast, not. [00:02:45] Speaker B: Dungeons and Dragons podcast, not a Jim. [00:02:49] Speaker A: Henson David Bowie Love Fest fan club. Yeah, honestly, I'm the Jim Henson fanboy. [00:02:54] Speaker B: Speaking of Dungeons and dragons, I saw Kyle over the last week. Kyle David Perry. If you haven't watched that episode, watched. Listened to that episode, you're making a mistake. Kyle David Perry is a fantastic DM. But, yeah, I saw them. They did a live performance at a local theater near me. They did a live play session with some choreographed fighting. [00:03:17] Speaker A: They did it on stage. Like, that was the improv thing. [00:03:21] Speaker B: Yeah. So the way it worked. Was Kyle was dming, and they had three actors playing the game, and then the way the dice went and the way they role played it, they had endings planned of like this. What happens if this dies? This is what happens if they die. Blah, blah, blah, blah. And the audience got to pick certain things as well. [00:03:40] Speaker A: Interesting. Okay, good for them. That's, like, the perfect place to do d. D is just improv theaters. [00:03:47] Speaker B: I told Kyle, too. I was like, I cannot wait to tell Jeff about this. But I had to save it for the podcast, of course, so I could. [00:03:53] Speaker A: Get your genuine reaction. That is so fucking like, I was. [00:03:58] Speaker B: Buzzing the whole time because this shit is right up my alley. And I was like, this is so fucking cool. This is so fucking cool. [00:04:06] Speaker A: Like, everything about it sounds fucking beautiful. It is funny, because I would love to make an entire audience cry like I did to you guys last session. [00:04:14] Speaker B: Oh, my God. [00:04:16] Speaker A: If you've made your players cry, you're doing something right. [00:04:19] Speaker B: Yeah. Confession. Last session, I cried in case anybody was wondering how our DND sessions were going in our personal life, built this. [00:04:26] Speaker A: Campaign together, and she still got surprised enough to cry. She cried. And our buddy, the younger players cried, too, because it was involving his character, and it was very touching, and it wasn't even something. [00:04:39] Speaker B: It wasn't supposed to be happening. You were surprised as well. You were just lost in the sauce, so you couldn't cry. I get it. [00:04:46] Speaker A: No, I heartless. That's me. I go in everything with no caring. I can't leave DNd with it. We leave us DMs. We leave it on the field every time. 100%. [00:04:59] Speaker B: Yeah. Can you edit my voice to make me sound like an announcer? [00:05:03] Speaker A: Why do I got to do this again? Why are you doing this? [00:05:06] Speaker B: Flag on the play. Crying cannot comfort you. Back to first down. [00:05:14] Speaker A: You can't force a joke to be funny. [00:05:16] Speaker B: I can force you to edit it, though. [00:05:19] Speaker A: Yes. [00:05:19] Speaker B: Now edit the sound of a gun clicking. This is a gun check. [00:05:27] Speaker A: We're not going to be one of those podcasts that do a long intro, literally, last episode. [00:05:32] Speaker B: People literally like it, though. It's like we like when they answer. We're so funny and original and cute and hilarious. I can't help being hotter and funnier than everybody else around me. [00:05:44] Speaker A: I can't be all these things at once. Guys, it's a lot of work. [00:05:48] Speaker B: My doctor told me I have funny and sexy disease, and it's terminal. [00:05:54] Speaker A: Well, one less DM in the world. Great. [00:05:56] Speaker B: The reason I haven't DM'd in two. [00:05:59] Speaker A: Oh, hey, was that you, Kayla, or. This is our story. [00:06:02] Speaker B: This is our story. Okay. [00:06:04] Speaker A: Okay. [00:06:04] Speaker B: The reason I haven't dmed in over two years. Yeah. The podcast we're doing, Jeff, the whole reason we're here reading Reddit stories. [00:06:11] Speaker A: You mean we're not just talking? [00:06:13] Speaker B: No. This is what happens when we save stuff for the podcast and we don't talk all week. We literally just start yapping. Yappy. [00:06:22] Speaker A: The only time we talked was through tears, and it was not good. [00:06:26] Speaker B: It hurt my feelings. For real, bro. [00:06:28] Speaker A: It was good. It was good. I like doing that. [00:06:30] Speaker B: Hurting my. This. I don't know. I'm bad at these. [00:06:34] Speaker A: If you can pull your players into a fucking scene, into a world so much that it draws a reaction, like a physical reaction, you're doing something right. [00:06:45] Speaker B: I was so impressed by our youngest member because he was doing so well. I can gush about it later. But anyway, we all like our own stories a little too much. [00:06:59] Speaker A: Yeah, a little bit. [00:07:01] Speaker B: So let me preface this by saying it happened a long time ago, Kayla. [00:07:05] Speaker A: Jeff, you just did that thing that a lot of people do when they haven't heard the word real life and have just only read the word. What was that word again? Preface. [00:07:16] Speaker B: Preface. [00:07:16] Speaker A: There you go. [00:07:17] Speaker B: That's what I said. [00:07:18] Speaker A: No, you said, let me preface this. [00:07:20] Speaker B: I literally said preface. Play it back. [00:07:23] Speaker A: So let me preface this. And I was right. [00:07:27] Speaker B: Fuck you. So let me preface this by saying it happened a long time ago, and I still play with the group. They're generally good people, and I actually get along with them fairly well as a player. It was just incredibly stressful dming for them. You're telling me, buddy. [00:07:43] Speaker A: Fucking tell me about it, bro. [00:07:45] Speaker B: I've been playing with the same general group for several years. It consists of me, 30 F, my partner, 31 m, and his friends, all m around the same age. I mention the genders purely because I want to note that I'm the only woman in the group, and I could be wrong if I feel like that did play into what I experienced over the years. Several people joined and subsequently left, but there are five of us who have stuck it out and play together pretty consistently. [00:08:15] Speaker A: How many more have joined? I need names. What is several to you? Is that, like, seven more people? [00:08:22] Speaker B: At least three. [00:08:23] Speaker A: At least three, but that's, like a few. Few is three. Several is a lot more than a few. [00:08:30] Speaker B: Then six. [00:08:31] Speaker A: Yes. [00:08:31] Speaker B: I'll say six. That feels good. [00:08:33] Speaker A: Six more people have joined and left. [00:08:35] Speaker B: We have the opposite problem of most groups in that most of us actually like Dming and running homewritten campaigns, so we tend to take turns. When my turn to DM came around, I was super excited. I DM short adventures before low levels and one shots, always up to level five, Max. [00:08:53] Speaker A: That's the right way to DND. [00:08:55] Speaker B: This was my first time dming a full blown campaign. I put a lot of effort into world building and creating individual character arcs for everyone and couldn't wait to see how it played out. The problems actually started before the campaign began. I'd give a lore dump over discord way in advance before starting the campaign because I wanted everyone to give me their characters fairly early so I could do a thorough job of writing them into the story. [00:09:23] Speaker A: Oof. Big oof. Right off the bat, you do not lore dump. First session, even session zero you don't lore dumping. Lore dumping. I'm a fan of explaining lore through play and discovering the world as you go along, which is where Dresden does that because you guys don't know what the fuck's going on. But you're like figuring out little that I did that when you guys were in the war campaign exposition. Yeah, fucking figure it out through character interaction. Sorry. [00:09:56] Speaker B: Everyone should know I'm really smart right away. [00:10:00] Speaker A: You bring a PowerPoint to session zero. I'm falling asleep, bro. I'm sorry. [00:10:04] Speaker B: That's when I get the stun gun, bro. [00:10:06] Speaker A: That doesn't help. It knocks both knock me out. [00:10:08] Speaker B: Well, I guess you're just weak then. I was going to say, dang, you're like that. But no, you're just weak. [00:10:13] Speaker A: Woogie, woogie, woogie. [00:10:14] Speaker B: Everyone got me their characters eventually in parentheses, and I spent a lot of time and effort writing them all compelling stories and trying and tying them all into the main quest, so to speak. That's something I really like doing. Like, give me your characters, please. I want to write everything in. [00:10:31] Speaker A: I want to plan for your happiness and plan for your distrust and plan for everything that you're going to emotionally feel through. [00:10:38] Speaker B: How can I hurt you if I don't know? [00:10:40] Speaker A: You just improvise it like I did. Boo. I'm riding that fucking high, bro. You don't understand how happy I was walking into work today. And I was like, I made my players cry. [00:10:51] Speaker B: Oh my God, you actually work with another DM too. [00:10:54] Speaker A: I work with multiple DMs. [00:10:56] Speaker B: We always say, oh my God, there's not enough DMs. And here we are running into fucking all of them. [00:11:01] Speaker A: I can name like four off the top of my head. Then that's just people I work with. [00:11:04] Speaker B: I can name three and one of them is Brennan Lee Mulligan. [00:11:09] Speaker A: See you soon, Brennan. [00:11:10] Speaker B: A couple weeks before we were set to begin playing, we did an official session zero, mostly to talk about homebrew rules. We wanted to incorporate consent, checklist, etc. However, I decided to repeat my lore dump just as a refresher of the other world we'd be playing in. After the session zero, one of the players contacted me and let me know he wanted to change his character because of the lore I'd share, which, again, I'd share months previously. [00:11:35] Speaker A: You can't expect people to remember things for months, bro. Come on. [00:11:39] Speaker B: I'd like at least the gist, bro. [00:11:42] Speaker A: You guys barely remember things week to week. I have to sit there and review it like it's a fucking true detective episode. Like, previously on like, bro, listen, the. [00:11:52] Speaker B: Only reason I don't say anything is because I can't be teacher's pet always, okay? Also, I forgot I allowed it because I didn't want to pigeonhole anybody into a character they didn't want to play. See, she's nice, but a little bit. I had already written an arc for their previous character that not only tied them into the main story, but was deeply intertwined with another character. I wound up having to stop that thread and write a new arc quickly, which was a lot of work and felt like a waste of all the work I'd put in previously. I think that's kind of an issue of, like, yes, you can write a general arc, and it is a lot of work to write as a DM, but keeping it. I feel like this is a common young, not young, but new DM issue where they put too much detail into it. [00:12:45] Speaker A: Yeah, this is one of those things where it's just so much detail right off the bat and you're writing yourself into a corner at that point. It's too much. It's too much for you to work with. You can't expect everything to be and work out the exact way you want it to. [00:13:03] Speaker B: Right? The more work you do initially, the more work you'll have to do to undo anything that your players exactly do. How many times can I say do? Take a shot. [00:13:12] Speaker A: Yeah. Honestly, no, don't. Please, guys. We do not condone drinking. Vikayla. I edit out most of them. I can't do every do. [00:13:23] Speaker B: It doesn't even sound like a real word anymore. It felt like a waste of everything she had put in previously. After we started playing, I constantly felt like I was being passively disrespected. One player liked to push the boundaries of what their character could do. I generally like to be fairly lenient with stuff because I want the characters to have their moments to shine and have a spot of glory. But this one player would try to do things that were way op several times a session, and it became exhausting having to try to rein him in. He liked to say, is there a world in which I can. Oh, that phrase. I don't like that phrase. [00:14:01] Speaker A: That's a very condescending way to put it. [00:14:03] Speaker B: I don't think it's condescending, but is there a world in which I can and then insert insane thing here? Just say what you want to do, and I'll tell you if it fails or succeeds. This may be controversial, but I don't like when people ask the DM for permission before they do shit. Just say you're trying to do something. [00:14:23] Speaker A: There are systems set up that literally tell you what you can and can't do. That's what five e is. That's what a lot of that is. And, of course, you could do things through roleplay, but at the same time, I don't know. I like openness. I like letting people be creative with their own shit, but you don't approach it that way. [00:14:42] Speaker B: Yeah, I don't like when somebody is saying that, is there a world in which I can do XYZ? Because they're not going to attempt it. If the DM says, no, I'm not going to let you do that. You should try to do it. It's interesting. And if you're thinking of this bullshit, then you should face the consequences of your actions. [00:15:01] Speaker A: Do don't ask is what you're saying. [00:15:03] Speaker B: Exactly. I don't want to sit here and wait for my turn to come around while one person is asking the DM a bajillion hypothetical questions. It's like, can you just play the game? Maybe that's just me as my perspective of an impatient player at the table. And I take that. [00:15:20] Speaker A: You got to let people know they're coming up. You got to let people know so it makes it, like, smooth like butter. And don't ruin everyone else's fun with your stupid questions. [00:15:29] Speaker B: Amen. [00:15:30] Speaker A: I'm fucking saucy tonight. I'm sorry I'm so spicy. [00:15:32] Speaker B: You're so spicy. You guys should have heard him before we fucking started recording. Okay. [00:15:36] Speaker A: He said a lot of it's filmed. [00:15:38] Speaker B: He says all of the crazy shit before we start the podcast. [00:15:41] Speaker A: To me, I'm a civil liberty boy. Wait, no, I'm a civil guy. [00:15:46] Speaker B: He's a rude little sassy bitch. [00:15:48] Speaker A: Yeah. Just exhausted. I can't fight it. I'm old now, Kayla. I turned 29 this weekend. I'm fucking old. [00:15:59] Speaker B: A yo, you couldn't have waterboarded that out of me? She says she remembers one time she's so annoyed, she literally responded. There may be a world where you can, but it's not this one. Amen. That's how I would fucking say it. My partner is one of those people that knows the rules like the back of his hand. So we often turn to him if we need clarification and don't want to take the time to look something up verbatim. I'm fine with this. But eventually devolved into players asking my partner if I was right when I made calls they didn't agree with, which was incredibly frustrating, especially because a lot of the time it was in gray areas where the DM should use discretion. It got bad enough that I remember one instance where I made a call. The player didn't like it. Then all the players got into a discussion about the rules and decided with absolutely zero further input from me that I was wrong and they were going to do what they decided was right. [00:16:55] Speaker A: Oh, fuck off. The DMs, right? Every time, dude. It doesn't matter how much you memorize. Of course you can turn to that person. They're like, oh, I forgot this. Oh, good. Thank you for correcting me. But also, if I make a decision, I say it's there. That's it. It is our world. It is the DM's world. You can make any call you want. And that's probably another scary thing that keeps a lot of new DMs away because they feel like they need to know every single rule, and that's just not the case. That's not the case at all. [00:17:28] Speaker B: That's so irritating and condescending to me. I think it's because we have a dynamic where you and I, DM, and also we ask questions when we're playing too, because a guy in our group is very knowledgeable about the books because he's a big fucking dork. So we all ask each other questions all the time. And maybe it's also because we have such homebrew roots that we're okay with sticking to the flub side of things, but I just cannot stand that. [00:17:58] Speaker A: There's a lot of moments when I'm dming that I'm just like, well, what does that spell do? What do I have to roll for? What do I have to do to save like, I'm not going to know every spell ever, so I need some kind of clarification. Of course, I'll look it up myself. If the player is taking too long and just said it without really thinking about what they were doing, I do fireball. Okay, well, what's the save, DC? And I'm like, okay, well, fuck, now I got to look it up myself. But exactly. You don't need to know every spell. You don't need to know every single detail about the rules. I mean, I fucked up the action economy for probably the first two seasons, and then I also fucked up cover. We never used cover. And just a lot of stuff that I was just like, shit, this could be a bonus. Honestly, we didn't use reactions until season three. Like, help actions and shit. [00:18:49] Speaker B: Yeah, I mean, fuck it, right? Who gives? [00:18:52] Speaker A: We didn't know y'all were fucked. Y'all were fucked. And it's like, it didn't take away from play, and there wasn't someone there. That's like, you made a call, and I hate that shit. It's okay if you don't know every rule. It's your world. [00:19:04] Speaker B: She mentioned it earlier. But as a woman, I specifically feel particularly frustrated that it's a group of men being like, oh, God, fuck what? You say? What is the man thing? And then, yeah, we're just going to disregard you. [00:19:19] Speaker A: We're going to ignore the woman and just talk amongst men. Guys, this is a guy's game. She's just here to be the God or whatever, bro. But, Kayla, I'm sorry if I triggered you. That was a long just. [00:19:31] Speaker B: I had to come back, bro. [00:19:32] Speaker A: It hurts. It hurts. I'm so fucking angry for you. As you could tell by my tone. [00:19:36] Speaker B: Of voice, it's disrespectful if they did it to anybody, not just because she's a woman, of course, but I don't think they would feel as bold to do that. And it sounds like from the rest of her story that they don't do that to the other players. [00:19:49] Speaker A: I was about to say they feel very comfortable doing this to her. [00:19:53] Speaker B: Hello. [00:19:53] Speaker A: Very easy for them to just turn around and say this and then, oh, okay, let's talk to anyways. [00:19:59] Speaker B: Anyway. Take a shot. Every time I say anyways, too. [00:20:04] Speaker A: Oh, bro. Please, guys, don't listen to Kayla. [00:20:07] Speaker B: We're not gonna have a viewership left, bro. [00:20:10] Speaker A: This is a borderline advice show, but don't listen to Kayla. [00:20:15] Speaker B: My partner even fell into this behavior a couple times, and it made it worse because I felt like, I had no one to back me up and support me. One time I made a call he didn't like and he tried to argue with me. And when I stood my ground, he said, I'm going to google it. Fuck you. No one googles shit except for me, bitch. [00:20:35] Speaker A: That's my computer. Why do you have your computer? You have a physical character sheet. Fuck you. Put it away. [00:20:40] Speaker B: That's literally my one DM rule. There's many, but there's one. [00:20:45] Speaker A: Look, it's hard. Look, it's like when you're a kid in school and your teacher tells you not to do shit and then turns around and does not. There's no way. You can't, kayla, turn around and say, hey, put your phone away, and then turn around and tell me you're on Tumblr. Every time we're in a fucking. [00:21:05] Speaker B: Don't want. If I say, hey, Jeff, can you google that for me? That's one thing. But if somebody is like, I'ma google it. [00:21:11] Speaker A: Oh, yeah, that's fucked up. [00:21:13] Speaker B: You can do whatever you want. I don't give a shit if you don't look at me. I get it. I don't like eye contact sometimes, but don't. Don't question me. You can ignore me, but do not question me. So she confronted him after the session, and he acknowledged that he shouldn't have done it, but that it was kind of the straw that broke the camel's back. I canceled our next session last minute, which I hate doing because I literally had a panic attack at the thought of having to deal with all of that for a full session and knew I couldn't DM in that state. I think that's when my partner realized how bad it was for me because I kind of dumped all my feelings onto him about it. And he did what he could from then on to support me and confront his friends when they behaved poorly. But I was already kind of at the end of my rope at that point. L partner. Tbh. He should have noticed. [00:22:05] Speaker A: Yeah. What the fuck? Why didn't he notice? And why did he almost encourage it by being like, I'm going to google it. That's a person you trust at the table. See, Kim talks shit a lot while we're playing, but it's, like, lighthearted. It's not like you're fucking wrong. And I ask for guidance, too, because she's playing what is an artificer now? I don't know anything about artificers, bro. I'm going to take you at your. [00:22:29] Speaker B: Word and why would we lie? I feel like everybody in our group has a good grasp of lying. Does not make the game more fun. And these are all, like, 30 something ass adults. Older than even Jeff, which is crazy. [00:22:44] Speaker A: Shut the fuck up. You'll get here one day. I can't wait. [00:22:48] Speaker B: Do you ever try to annoy people so you can hear a new tone of their voice? [00:22:53] Speaker A: My voice didn't like. [00:22:55] Speaker B: There's certain sounds people make. That is so nice. [00:22:59] Speaker A: Nice, bro. [00:23:00] Speaker B: Yeah. I'm like, ooh, you're mad. [00:23:02] Speaker A: That's the most kayla thing you've ever said on the podcast. [00:23:06] Speaker B: I'm exposing myself a little bit here, how much I love to annoy people, but in a fun way. [00:23:11] Speaker A: In a fun way, you're not kayla the character anymore. You're Kayla. [00:23:14] Speaker B: Oh, shit. [00:23:15] Speaker A: It's bleeding in. [00:23:16] Speaker B: Oh, no. My Persona all said to say, I think a partner definitely. Even if you don't agree, you should present a united front in front of people, because they will wiggle their way in and just be so shitty to you guys. I mentioned previously that I thought my gender played into this a bit. And I think that because I never saw any other DM in our group be treated this way, even when they had less experience dming than me and made calls the party disagreed with, they consistently challenged me, spoke over me, or outright ignored me. I don't think it was a conscious thing. Like, none of them are outwardly sexist, but it did feel like it was a factor. [00:23:58] Speaker A: That's definitely it. They may not be outwardly sexist, but this is sexism too. [00:24:04] Speaker B: Internalized misogyny and stuff like that. It's a systemic problem, and you cannot help how you were socialized. If you were socialized to act a certain way. Of course there's going to be subconscious biases that not even you are aware of. We all have it, and I think growth is looking within and dissecting that within yourself so you don't accidentally hurt the people you care about, because I have no doubt they care about, but. [00:24:30] Speaker A: So on this episode of Maury, we're going to be talking about people that were raised to be the hunter gatherers, bro. [00:24:38] Speaker B: Jeff. [00:24:39] Speaker A: Yep. [00:24:41] Speaker B: And you can add booing after this too. [00:24:44] Speaker A: Boo. Hey, Maury. Oh, wait, that's the wrong one. He retired, by the way. [00:24:49] Speaker B: Yeah, we got the tests in. You are not the father. [00:24:55] Speaker A: Yeah. Worth it. [00:24:56] Speaker B: It was worth a shot, being the father. [00:25:00] Speaker A: Well, I don't know. No, I'm good. [00:25:02] Speaker B: Absolutely. [00:25:03] Speaker A: What's happening? What's the bit? [00:25:06] Speaker B: We've lost the plot, bro. Couldn't take me being too serious about my women's studies. Societal affairs. [00:25:13] Speaker A: Let's go back to jokes. [00:25:14] Speaker B: Wow. During Women's history Month. That's fucking crazy. [00:25:18] Speaker A: Oh, it is. Women's. Hey, happy women's History month. [00:25:20] Speaker B: Yeah. Thanks, Jeff. [00:25:22] Speaker A: Name one history woman. [00:25:24] Speaker B: Name one woman, Jeff, right now. [00:25:26] Speaker A: Name one woman. Go. [00:25:27] Speaker B: Name one woman. I dare you. [00:25:29] Speaker A: Oh, I have to do this. Meryl Streep. I don't know. That's in my head. I wasn't expecting Meryl Streep out either. Just came out. Barbara Streisand. [00:25:39] Speaker B: Oh, she wouldn't be happy with that. [00:25:41] Speaker A: Queen Latifah. Whoa. [00:25:43] Speaker B: What's the one? [00:25:44] Speaker A: It's all musicians and actors. Hold on. [00:25:46] Speaker B: So they reached the end of their first story arc and took a break to work through the rotation and let someone else DM. I originally planned to continue my story and had lots of ideas, but I was so exhausted and emotionally drained, I haven't even reached back out to the campaign in over two years. I haven't dmed since either. [00:26:07] Speaker A: No. I'm so sorry. [00:26:10] Speaker B: I know what it's like to mourn a story that you were crafting as well. I had a beautiful story that I was building, and I was dming for this group of people, but it just kind of fizzled out, and we've never played again. And now I have this gorgeous story that I planned. Secrets and plot hooks that I have written down all in this book that have nowhere to go. And it was a long form one as well. [00:26:37] Speaker A: Kayla, I'm right here. I know we literally said, nope, we're not doing your one shot anymore and left, but you don't have to be that upset about it. It'll be fine. [00:26:45] Speaker B: We'll revisit it soon. It wasn't even that, bro. [00:26:49] Speaker A: We were supposed to revisit it at Christmas, though, so I did feel I almost took all of that to heart for a second. [00:26:55] Speaker B: Oh, my. [00:26:56] Speaker A: Dude, that is really, um. [00:26:58] Speaker B: Jeff actually helped me craft it along with Tony too. It's the one with Robbie. [00:27:03] Speaker A: I'm glad. Honestly, I don't remember it. I dm so many things that it all blends together. [00:27:08] Speaker B: Just means I can run it for you. Dm smear just one Dm cocktail. All the alcohol that's left in the bar mat at the end of the night, they just scooped that shit up and pour it into a glass. And that's Jeff. [00:27:21] Speaker A: Maybe when we finish dressing, you can do a five e campaign. Oh, man. On this spicy evening, after having some of that Melinda's fucking pizza. Hot sauce. Dude, that shit's fucking fire. [00:27:37] Speaker B: Literally. [00:27:38] Speaker A: I got a nice little tale from RPG horror stories, and it is called anyone have a game master that insists on holding onto everybody's sheets and uses it to cheat? This is by user world gone away. [00:27:51] Speaker B: Yeah, I got one of those. [00:27:53] Speaker A: I'm already on the fence. I have asked for everyone's character sheets just to make sure that they were. I don't even know why I asked for them, because honestly, I only look at one of them, but still, it's good to have them. Just in case you're trying to work. [00:28:06] Speaker B: Around shit or in case you're trying to cheat. [00:28:08] Speaker A: Jeff, I am cheating. Fuck you. Oh, what is your worst? Oh, dang. It happens to be that role. [00:28:15] Speaker B: That's crazy. [00:28:16] Speaker A: I was talking to a friend of mine that I haven't played games with in years. While we were catching up, he, out of the blue, asked me a question. Hey, whatever happened to Jordy? It brought back some horrible memories. My friend and I joined some of the guy's games because he was about the only person willing to run them back when DND 3.0 came out. Kayla, you remember that? [00:28:39] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:28:40] Speaker A: Most of the players that were regulars in his games said that he was a tough DM, but through our experiences, we found out that he was a cheating bastard. He was the kind of guy that delighted in putting player characters in bad positions that would either get them killed, tortured, oh, God. Or really cause great dissatisfaction for the players. He had pretty much conditioned his three regulars to expect that this is how you were supposed to play DND. But my friend and I weren't too sure. One of his gimmicks was that he didn't trust players to not fudge their sheets. Get the fuck out of here, bro. You can't trust your players to actually have a character sheet that's. Oh, my God. I'm all, fuck you, dude. No. Kayla, give me your sheet. [00:29:26] Speaker B: Oh, no, it's not ready. [00:29:29] Speaker A: Why do you have a plus 25 to fuck? [00:29:31] Speaker B: Jeff, don't worry. Jeff, don't worry about it. That's my secret ability. [00:29:36] Speaker A: So anytime you don't like a role, or if it's a role that you feel is very important, you roll that. [00:29:41] Speaker B: Kayla, in fate, that could be one of my aspects. Fuck you, Jeff. [00:29:46] Speaker A: Jesus Christ. So his solution was that he would watch you roll stats after you pitched a character concept to him, let you set up your character sheet for about an hour, and then he would insist that you give it to him and he would manually transcribe it. [00:30:03] Speaker B: Wait, transcribe it to what? [00:30:05] Speaker A: I don't know. Manually transcribe it to pen and paper. Bro, what are you doing? [00:30:09] Speaker B: Don't we have those little, like, printouts? Does three not have little printouts like five e does? [00:30:15] Speaker A: I didn't start until Pathfinder, fourth edition. Remember Pathfinder? [00:30:23] Speaker B: Back in the day? Pathfinder? I've played so much of that shit. [00:30:27] Speaker A: He would hold onto his own handwritten copy and let you keep the other one. There it is. And he would compare them at the end of a session. Wait, what? [00:30:35] Speaker B: In case you were added things. [00:30:39] Speaker A: Oh, that's so much more work as a DM because then you have to write down all the loot. Motherfuckers. I don't know what your loot is. [00:30:45] Speaker B: I don't even know what my loot is. Tony knows what my loot is. [00:30:50] Speaker A: Tony knows what the loot is. [00:30:52] Speaker B: Every time Tony makes a character, I'm like, can we give him the bag of. Yeah, yeah. I wrote it down right here. [00:30:59] Speaker A: Every character, even if they were characters that were intelligent, he's just like, fuck it. Give me the bag of holding. [00:31:05] Speaker B: Yeah, I got the bag of holding. I got Gum's character sheet in there. I got Kayla's will to live. I got everything. [00:31:14] Speaker A: Oddly enough, he used to always find something wrong and mandate that you make adjustments at the end of every session that would make. Sessions go on so fucking long the group never even seemed to get the 10th level because the guy really loved TPKs. And finally, my friend ended up pointing out during a game that it looked like Jordy had actually doctored his sheet overnight to diminish some of his combat abilities and saving throws. He flatly denied it. But for that whole session, all of the monsters took special attention to him. And he was the first one to go down. During that TPK, my friend decided that he didn't want to come back after that. [00:31:52] Speaker B: Yeah, I wouldn't want to fucking come back either. Don't kill my shit. [00:31:55] Speaker A: Look, killing your shit happens, Kayla. [00:31:57] Speaker B: I decide when I die. [00:31:58] Speaker A: Accept it. Well, no, the dice do, but fuck the dice. [00:32:04] Speaker B: I'll eat them. [00:32:06] Speaker A: Oh, don't do that. [00:32:09] Speaker B: And good luck editing that bitch. [00:32:12] Speaker A: Yeah. It's twice. God, what am I going to do? [00:32:14] Speaker B: You sound so tired. [00:32:18] Speaker A: Afterward, Jordy rather condescendingly told me that he didn't think that I was mature enough to be playing with that group and said that I had better go and find a different game to play. [00:32:28] Speaker B: Co playing the kiddie pool, bitch. [00:32:30] Speaker A: Get the fuck out of here, this is the big boy table, the big boy league. I asked him if I could just try one more, and he just contemptuously said that he'd give me one more shot. So I made a cobalt sorcerer, pitched this to him, rolled stats with him. When he approved everything, he hand wrote a copy, gave me back my original, and said that he would be playing the following Saturday. Then I went downstairs to the LGs and asked a good friend of mine working there if he could photocopy my sheet for me. What is lgs? [00:33:02] Speaker B: Little gamer sweetheart. [00:33:06] Speaker A: Little gamer school. [00:33:07] Speaker B: My little gamer school. My little pogchamp copied it for me. [00:33:12] Speaker A: He did, and I asked him if it would be okay if I left another copy with him so I could compare it. He said it was, and I got ready to go home immediately. During the session the following weekend, Jordy became aware of the fact that the way I had built the character, their starting AC was 20. For the first half of the first session, most of the monsters couldn't hit me, being largely level one and all. Magically, about halfway through the first session, maybe an hour and a half, I started getting hit very often. I asked him at one point in time how they were so easily able to hit, even though they were mostly the same monsters as before. His excuse was, of course, bad luck, but I implored to find out the bonuses, which he wouldn't tell me. Finally, he rolled his eyes and said, I don't know why any of this surprises you. Your AC is only 16. [00:34:03] Speaker B: Magic trick girl boss. [00:34:05] Speaker A: Oh my God. So of course I smiled and told him he was mistaken. He was probably forgetting my Dex bonus or the fact that I was wearing a chain shirt because of the good Max decks in arcane spell failure percent. You don't have a chain shirt and you can't wear one. I don't know where you got that idea. So we pulled out the BHB and showed him, and I explained that I was able to get it with the starting gold he gave me. He demanded to see my sheet. Then he laughed to himself. So I guess we know who's cheating. You don't have one. According to the sheet I have. So I laughed and pulled out the photocopy and put it on the table so all the other players could see. I explained that there was a second photocopy that I produced immediately after character creation previous week, and if they doubted it, they could ask the game store clerk downstairs who made the copy for me. One of Jordy's friends leaned over and peeked at this copy of my sheet? Yeah, man. Looks kind of like you erased it. And then he kind of threw a temper tantrum. He picked up one of the books and threw it at me from across the table and screamed something to the effect of, rocks fall, everyone dies and demanded that I leave and not come back. [00:35:15] Speaker B: That's so fucking funny. [00:35:18] Speaker A: Baby Dm. I love him. Baby DM wants his bottle. [00:35:22] Speaker B: I just imagine Eric Cartman. Fuck you guys. [00:35:26] Speaker A: Roxva. Everyone dies. [00:35:28] Speaker B: Fuck you, cow. Your AC is not 20. [00:35:31] Speaker A: AC 16. [00:35:33] Speaker B: You can't wear a t shirt. Cow. Even close it off. And it was so fucking fun. [00:35:44] Speaker A: Going back to the beginning of the story I told my friend that I didn't know. I hadn't seen him since then, and I didn't really want to go looking for him either. He's not the first person like that that I played with. He definitely wasn't the last, but he was probably one of the most obnoxious. If he had problems with the way people actually wrote their sheets or wanted to remedy something they felt was a shortcoming, he could just talk to the players. That's not what he was doing. He was just being a dick. [00:36:11] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:36:13] Speaker A: To pick up this fucking. Oh, my God. Did I tell you about my rocks fall story on the podcast? [00:36:19] Speaker B: No. [00:36:20] Speaker A: So I was dming a Pathfinder campaign, and it's funny that this came up the rocks fall, everyone dies thing. Me and my buddy had planned, like a this is my own horror story because it was a horror story for me as a DM. I was so nervous. Jeff Lore, Jeff Lore, Jeff Lore. But me and my friend had planned, okay, I want you to kill my character so that I can come back with all these mechanical parts, because I found these really cool things that I wanted to try, but I didn't want to make a new character. I'm like, okay, so we're in this cave. They're trying to extract this thing, and the cave starts to crumble and shake as soon as they remove this magical device and cracks start to form and they all leave. And one person fails their dexterity saving throw. I think it was the NPC failed, and they were about to get crushed. And then that player dove in, knocked the NPC out of the way, and rocks fell on them, and they died. So one of my players, I don't know why they did it, but they looked up rocks falling DND. And the first thing that came up was, when a DM hates a player enough, they will use rocks falling as an excuse to kill them. And I was like, oh, no, and everyone's looking at me like, what the fuck, dude? And I couldn't say anything. I didn't want to ruin this dude's thunder of them coming back later in the campaign. So I had to sit there and get fucking just like, jeff, why would you do this? This is terrible. [00:37:51] Speaker B: I just want to be like Indiana Jones, please. [00:37:54] Speaker A: It's like he made the decision. It's like, well, the rocks didn't need to fall in the first place. I'm like, well, it's a falling cave. This was a part of the main quest. I'm like, yeah, but people die sometimes. At least they get the save. It was literally like, I was arguing with you and I hadn't even met you yet. [00:38:12] Speaker B: That's fucking crazy that you would say that. [00:38:15] Speaker A: How dare you kill my player? I'm like, but it was okay. Kayla and I have had beef before. It's why we're doing a one shot where characters getting a fucking wedding gift, bro. It's literally all the final. It's the final thing in fucking two year apology, bro. It's the final little thread Kayla's character. [00:38:37] Speaker B: Gets to get, bro. I just. I just need this. [00:38:43] Speaker A: Kayla got mad at me because the way the season two ended, it ended like everyone. There was no good ending. Everyone died or got frozen in stone or whatever. [00:38:54] Speaker B: I wasn't, like, mad at you. [00:38:58] Speaker A: Kayla was so mad that she wasn't going to play the next season of the campaign. [00:39:02] Speaker B: Listen, that makes me sound really was not. It wasn't that deep, okay? I just wanted to make a really dramatic entrance at the. [00:39:12] Speaker A: Kayla really did not like the falling rocks. She was pissed, bro. Was that the whole plan? You should have told me that was the plan. [00:39:20] Speaker B: It was not the plan. It was not the plan. I was actually plan. I was actually bad. [00:39:25] Speaker A: It's okay. It's understandable. I mean, I was your first DM, and I killed your player. [00:39:31] Speaker B: Okay. When we met in person, Jeff had to make a rule that we weren't allowed to hit me. I don't know where he got the idea that we would ever hurt him. We're just a bunch of small, petite little girls. No, I want that twink obliterated. [00:39:53] Speaker A: I want that twink tet. [00:39:59] Speaker B: Start the music, Jeff. [00:40:01] Speaker A: Yeah, I have to add a lot in this. Oh, we're doing this. We're in it, guys. Hey, you know what? Thanks for listening to this podcast. We're tired, actually. No, we reversed roles. You were sleepy last podcast. Now I'm the sleepy and I'm the spicy one, and now I'm raring to go and ready to fight. [00:40:18] Speaker B: We're literally recording. Like, it's 09:00 for Jeff. [00:40:23] Speaker A: It's pretty late. Used to going to bed at 930. [00:40:28] Speaker B: Because you're a grandpa also, guys, I. [00:40:31] Speaker A: Just have a shitty job. [00:40:32] Speaker B: It was Jeff's birthday on Saturday. [00:40:34] Speaker A: Well, yeah, I turned 29. We made a joke about it, but it really happened. I'm a 29 year old, actually. [00:40:40] Speaker B: 29. [00:40:42] Speaker A: 29 and feeling great. [00:40:45] Speaker B: I think that's the sound of a little horn thing. [00:40:48] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:40:48] Speaker B: And I definitely remembered his birthday. [00:40:51] Speaker A: You wished me a happy birthday after I got back from my backpacking trip. [00:40:55] Speaker B: Listen, I didn't want to interrupt your backpacking trip. That's what it was. [00:41:01] Speaker A: I appreciate that's what it was, 100%, but yeah, remember, guys, we're not at that point yet. Kayla, what are we doing? What do we do? [00:41:10] Speaker B: So fucking tired. [00:41:12] Speaker A: I'm like, fucking on fumes, dog. I've been working so hard editing for school and shit like that. Have you ever made a bouncing ball? Animation. I'm sure you have. It sucks. [00:41:24] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:41:24] Speaker A: Animating motion graphics are terrible. I hate it. But I have to have some semblance of it for editing. Fuck it. [00:41:30] Speaker B: Fuck it, bro. Fuck it. We'll do it live. Thank you so much for joining us for another week. You guys are truly fantastic. We appreciate everybody who listens, even those of you who I know in real life. Aha. I know who you are. Happy birthday to Jeff. Thanks for keeping on living. This podcast wouldn't be possible without you. [00:41:54] Speaker A: Thank you for living. [00:41:56] Speaker B: Now get back to work. [00:41:58] Speaker A: Thanks for living, bro. [00:42:00] Speaker B: Thanks for being alive. So proud of you for that. I'm dead, so I don't know how. [00:42:04] Speaker A: You do it 30 years next year. Doug, we doing this? [00:42:08] Speaker B: Please follow us. On all of our social media accounts, we're tales from the tabletop pod on mostly everything. TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, Twitter. We're tales from the TT because the other one was too long. I post memes a lot of the time. If you're here from TikTok specifically, I love you. You're my favorite. Don't tell. [00:42:29] Speaker A: You're my second favorite. Sorry. [00:42:31] Speaker B: Jeff's just salty because he's old. He doesn't get with the times. He doesn't know what skibbity toilet is. [00:42:37] Speaker A: I've heard of it. [00:42:38] Speaker B: Oh, have I've heard of. [00:42:41] Speaker A: I heard the term, but I do not know what the fuck it means. [00:42:44] Speaker B: Jeff. Shh. I'm mewing. [00:42:46] Speaker A: Is it the so skibbity? Yeah, I know that one. [00:42:52] Speaker B: If you have your own story to submit to us that you would like us to read on the podcast, please submit that to tales from [email protected]. That is [email protected]. [00:43:06] Speaker A: And if you have any comments or anything that you feel like yelling at us through your microphone or through your computer, go ahead and send it to us at the podcast email. But also on Spotify, they have this little thing that's called the Q A section where it asks, what did you think of the episode? We would love to hear that. We read through those. I check it every week, and every week I'm reminded how great of a person Kyle David Perry was. I mean, they're still alive, and they're still doing d d stuff. Yeah, they were wonderful. They posted our first review, and it made me so happy. And I love seeing comments. I love seeing your response to things. Kayla sends me screenshots of the TikTok every so often, and I have to pull out my readers and squint at my phone to be able to read what you guys are saying. But I'm sure they're great. [00:43:55] Speaker B: Yeah. So we got to go put Jeff back down for bed. Got to tuck him in and let him go to sleep because he's bedtime. I can feel in my wheel, bro. [00:44:07] Speaker A: My wrists have been hurting since I turned 29. I don't know why. It's just a new pain. You got to go to the doctor. The older you get. They're just like, yep, that's it. That's what it is now. [00:44:18] Speaker B: Appreciate you guys so much for being here with us. [00:44:21] Speaker A: Thank you. [00:44:21] Speaker B: Soon. Once I hit a thousand followers on TikTok, I can post a link in my description that's clickable. [00:44:28] Speaker A: So I'll stop fucking wild. [00:44:30] Speaker B: I'll stop only posting memes once I get to a thousand. So that's your motivation to follow us on TikTok. Enjoy the memes in the meantime. That's all I got right now. [00:44:40] Speaker A: We'll do behind one day. You'll get one where I record something. Maybe I'll be the so skibbity. [00:44:46] Speaker B: It's so hard to post behind the scenes shit because Jeff and I live in literally different states. It makes it very convenient to record. I don't get the podcast that they record their faces while they also record the podcast. It makes it very convenient for posting shit and clips on social media. But I don't know. I just like looking like a slug while we record. [00:45:09] Speaker A: Absolutely. Look, we've taken behind the scenes photos and put them up on the what is it? Site formerly known as Twitter. And it has been. They're not good. We don't want to have a whole episode of us filming behind underneath our fucking dog blankets, bro. [00:45:28] Speaker B: Yeah, and nobody cares yet. So if you guys start caring, I'll start posting. [00:45:33] Speaker A: There you go. If you want to see our dog blankets, maybe we will start posting. Make sure to comment on the video and mentioned hashtag dog blankets. Beautiful. [00:45:41] Speaker B: Hope everybody has a wonderful night day whenever this gets posted, because we have day jobs. [00:45:47] Speaker A: Yes, we're busy, but we might not have to be forever. Good night, everyone. [00:45:53] Speaker B: Good night for now. [00:46:00] Speaker A: Nah, tuba's the best. [00:46:02] Speaker B: That's so rude. [00:46:03] Speaker A: It's like. It's like a horse. That's why I could do a horse impressions, because, listen, we can't talk about. [00:46:11] Speaker B: Horses anymore on the podcast. [00:46:13] Speaker A: Yo, after that episode, I'm fucking Winnie'd up, boy. Let's go. [00:46:19] Speaker B: Fuck. [00:46:20] Speaker A: Guess how many horsepower I have. [00:46:22] Speaker B: No. Shut up. Shut up. Stop talking.