RPG Horror Story Speed Run! w/ Mike Cortese [RPG Horror Story]

0:00 Sometimes talking with friends feels like role playing. Sometimes it feels like combat. Join us at the round table and roll an ishato. This is Curmudgeons and Dragons. Hello adventurers, Welcome to Courmudgeons and Dragons. I'm Jason Fortiso. I enjoyed live by Jim Crocker. This episode of Commugison Dragons Live is the last day he gets to use that. Joe, it only took me five episodes to train you to do that, so that's good. I'm really glad to be here. I hate being recepted to training. Cool. Yeah, Josie, he has is with me, huh by with us? I mean she's very far away in England, but coming to us live over riverside here in the ways that matter. Any spirit with spirit? And did you imagine if I could just haunt you at this level all the time, you Paris, if you taught me all the time, but not to this extent.

1:04 Story today, somebody from our guests, Mike Cortiz, Mike, how you doing doing pretty good? How we all doing? I'm listening with this our fifth episode we're recording in a row. We're doing fantastic, living the fucking dream, My guy living something we love having guests live in the dream surviving the nightmare. Yeah yeah, so here you go. I guess that is one of our favorite things. So that's great. This is this is usually not like a guest having type of show, but to have so many this month has been great. So thank you so much for joining us, and thanks for us submitting what it seems to be a completely batshit story that I cannot wait to get into. I'm so ready. So Mike, real quick. I met you through the one of the Facebook groups I believe I met you through New Jersey D and D players. Um ye, seems to be a pretty good in active group. So any other any of the localists want to join that? Which is all I was wondering why we were getting so many people from New Jersey. Was all right, because that was the responded to me way way back in the day. Jason posted a message to that group saying, hey, we're losing someone from our podcast. Anybody might be interested in That was how the show yet from a group? Yeah? Also how I found that about the Keep, which is where we're recording from right now. This is Go through the keephobby dot com and support my friendly local game store because they are supporting us by giving us space to record today.

2:21 So thank you to our friends of the Keep. And you go back and listen to the first two episodes this month where we had Tony and the owner not only giving his story but giving his well, you know, his his DND story and then his story, yeah, about owning stores and stuff like that. Really cool episode, so make sure you go check those out. But today we've got Mike with us. Um. So I you sent me, but kind of like the TLDR, which was still like seven paragraphs, um, and it just got wilder and wilder, to the point where one of your other players, your friend Andrew also DMed me to say that whatever story you told me, as as wild as it is, is one hundred percent true. So I have to hear the rest of this, and so I'm just gonna I'm gonna back off. I'm gonna let you just kind of take it away. So, uh, Mike, the floor is yours, all right? Uh? Flow is that this was probably back in September ish of last year. There is a message on the same group that you and I found each other on that an individual was looking to run a five E homebrew campaign looking for players. So I signed up the person that DMU Andrew signed up, and a few other people signed up. Cool, we're all set to play a few weeks before playing, um, you know, we all get together on the on the thing we're talking and he sends out a seventeen page PDF on his world. Okay, okay, I like it.

3:45 That's dedication, but also like, oh my god, it is dedication, and if it's a strange world, hey, it could be Okay, it could be legit that this is going to be interesting I've seen or heard of longer. So, but that is like, that's that's not like so no. Um. So. The PDF included, but not limited to, certain rules that he was going to be using, such as a new monetary system using pieces of eight rather than tens, a new calendar which had six days rather than seven, not even the ten day that D and D is known for. Okay, a list of weapons, all of which did the exact same damage with the exact same damage type. Everything was exact and there was no change. It was just the change of the names of the weapons, such as like pistols, using a baretta, using a nine male, using different stuff, all the same damage type, all the same firearms on top of that too, Yeah, firearms and whatever else, all sorts of different stuff. He had a list of the items that were purchasable in game.

4:57 He had a list of magic items available in the game, whereas he didn't even know what some of these did. Okay, um, and they were all available for purchase. Whenever you got to a town, there's the magic store. Just had portals that you could get stuff from and pick it out. Weird stuff. Okay, I'm sure they'll end up fine, go ahead. Yeah. Um. So this seventeen page pdf was just interesting reading. Nothing really came of that session. Zero comes in and he just he tells us it's a kind of a five E based game, but it's going to use mechanics from three point five Pathfighter two E and five E. So he's just built a new game and was like, come play. Yeah pretty much.

5:48 Yes, Okay, that's exactly that's exactly how it is. That's exactly how it turns. Great, go ahead, design your design your own game. Love it. I'm sure Jim would play it. So some of these mechanics, none of so background on it. All of the players that came into this have never played three point five or Pathfinder. We're all relatively new to D and D five coming from around twenty nineteen. We all started right before Fair three point five and Pathfinder the same thing, so still yeah, Okay, again, I'm not familiar with that. I haven't played either one of those, so I don't know. Yeah. The TLDR on that is that Pathfinder was a response to fourth edition and was essentially kind of a rewrite of three to five with a couple of things, though maybe a little crunchier, and that hardcore Pathfinder players will get cranky if you say it's just three point five. Yeah, yeah, which is the most important party. So then I'm guessing you guys are already familiar with a fortitude save that he wanted to put in place, combined with constitution saves, like an additional saving throw that he would use with other that in addition, so you had your con save and then you would have a fortitude save which had a different a different mechanic for calculating that using your constitution model. Yeah, because in three point five you would have fortitude reflex and will saves as opposed to as opposed to just rolling on the stats, which is the thing that makes the most sense.

7:20 Yeah, right, so he wanted to implement that as an additional saving thrown. Oh my god. He also had different calculations for your AC, whereas he would on his armors. He just made different armors have different modifiers. Then you would add ten and that's your AC bonus. And instead of the traditional five E disadvantage on stealths, you would have a movement penalty if you weren't proficient, okay, which did not make sense to us, as you're not supposed to use armors that you're not proficient. I'm already I would have been out of this game, like, I'm so sorry, I'm too stupid, too stupid day. So he again in this list that he had it in his pdf, he had the different armors listed. This armor has a plus one, this armor has a plus two, all the way up to like a plus nine for your AC. So the calculation was ten plus whatever the armor modifier was, that's your base AC. And again these were all purchasable at a shop. The strange things really started to take place during the campaign. In the throes of the campaign, we had some interactions with NPCs that my character as the I rate asshole. Yes, I was the problem player started calling this guy a different name in a in a way and kind of made the DM turn him into like a mafia don. Okay,

8:52 so far, I'm in. So eventually this mafia don became a benefactor and allowed us to purchase go to the stores and purchase things at his expense, not hours. Okay. So basically we got the run of the mill of every Magic guy and we wanted every armor. We wanted everything within the first three sessions. Okay, so what did you end up with? I was playing an artificer, so I ended up with like a nineteen AC nine plus nine armor. Then with all the infuse, Um, I'm sorry, what is the artificer thing? Yeah, it is infusion. Ended up with like an AC of like twenty one, twenty two somewhere around there. Level three.

9:37 Yeah, yeah, that's great. God, sorry, had he had rings of invisibility, We had all sorts of stuff, and he had no idea where this stuff was. It's like he had never played five he before or even read the DMG. Probably didn't probably not. Um, Well, the DMG wouldn't help if he's building out of three different games. Oh yeah, tree, but it would still give you a basis on what these magic items are supposed to do. God okay, but initially we were supposed to have five pieces, myself um, the one who messaged you, Andrew, Um, we had Bill CJ. And then there was supposed to be Kate.

10:20 Kate for whatever reason backed out last minute, but due to she was unable to commit to playing, but would still end up showing up every now and then on this on the discord that we were playing on m HM, just just to hang out, just like a lurker. We love a lurker, a lurker and having her camera on still as well. Okay, I'll picture that happened in like an IRL game, Like I was like, yeah, I can't make it tonight, and then they just show up at your house and just watch you play at the table, just watch. Yeah, it was. It was definitely weird because she would come in at strange times and you hear the escort ding ding and there she is, well him as she wouldn't mute herself either, so whatever she's got going on in the background, children screaming her driving her car having almost an upskirt view of underneath the steering wheel while she's driving down the road. Very distracting, very distracting of this at that point, just listen to an actual play podcast. You don't have to You don't have to subject people to the going abouts of your life.

11:28 Yeah, he had, the DM had, you know, spoken to us about our what our characters are, you know, the individual session zeros along with the session zero for all the PCs. Apparently, over the course of his with another one of the players, the DM decided to give one of the PCs a strange colored birthmark without telling the PC what it was about or anything about it. Then, when it came time for him to describe his character, the DM said that there was someone with a birthmark, and when the PC did not respond, that's your que dude, excuse me, Oh my gosh. So, by the way, you got this birthmark.

12:09 Now it's like, well, yeah, if it's a birthmark, shouldn't I know about it? Right? Yeah? Um, let's have a birthmark and more of the last five minutes mark, like if it's on if it's on your back, and you know, with like D and D technology, you would never see it. You would only have to take people's word for it that it was there, right, yeah, I honestly don't remember where it was. I honestly I think it may have been on his neck, like like something like right over here, yeah, or something I can't quite remember, but that that's not the egregious one. The egregious one is where he changes a PC's race prior to a session, just for from it, from a human to a damn fear. So like mid game or before you started playing, UM mid game? Oh okay, did he have did he have an explanation or was he just hoping you were going to roll with it?

13:07 He had an explanation for it. But this happened to a PC who UM was brand new to the game, had never played before our first session, and missed UM all sessions in between, so that it was only their second ever session. What the fuck? Okay? Apparently they did have a conversation about it, but the DM did not tell this this person what it meant for their character, what abilities they would have, anything about it. It's a major change. Just expected him to know. I are you impressed yet, Josie? I am. Let's see. Uh yep, strange color birthmark?

13:58 Uh human to a dam fear. I'm so glad you have a list. I had to, I had to do something. They would just be all over the place. I made bullet points of everything that I told you. But there's more to it. Oh my god. Um. For whatever reason, and I still don't understand this, he wanted the cleric of the party to either choose religion or medicine as their base of healing, like he wanted to change up the cleric class. Put his own spin on things. Yeah, put his own spin on things. If it ain't broke, my guy, Oh he broke everything. Oh god, Okay, all right, things are so broken you have to break other things that they work in this new broken system, right, Hey, that's gotta be it. Um.

14:50 We there was an entire session that was a shopping day now as it was just RP and shopping. There was a little bit of RP, but not very much, just a shopping day list. I don't mind like five minutes of like trying to talk to a ShopKeep if the shop keeps interesting. But this is why I hate shopping. Yeah, man, you and I are on so much on the same page that between sessions, well on record hating shopping in game. And this is why, because it turns through a whole fucking day. And let me guess most of that time was spent with them haggling and not getting anywhere. No, most of the time it was him looking at his notes finding out how much everything cost. We had a bad shopping trip, and it wasn't the player's fault. Yes, he had a notebook, and he showed multiple times on screen, you know, a notebook entirely that thick of all of his notes of every shop, everything, everywhere, alphabetized, different menus, different things of how much everything cost, to the point where when an NPC we were going into a colosseum and he described that there were vendors up and down the sides of the street. Entering the colisseum, saying that there were food vendors, an NPC asked what do they serve? He took five minutes outside of game to go and find specific as to find out what they were selling and how much it costs to answer his own question, yes, my god, no, no, no, I'm

16:22 sorry, the the PC asked this, not an NPCs still ridiculous, him still ridiculous to find out, you know, take ten five, five, five or ten minutes whatever it took for him to find these in his notes. Yeah, if you're gonna have um a binder full of your new game to play, you should probably have some tabs to make it a little easier for yourself, right, thinking like five five whole minutes flipping through pages just to be like be like, oh, yeah, they have falafel today. Pretty I mean, was was it that or was it like, well, this vendor has falafel which you can order in three sizes. You can get it with or without Tazeki sauce. You can get it with fries or without steak fries, your season fries. Like was it I think granular level of detail? That's yeah, that's so much. He did so much work they did. He did so much work at one point stress At what point does prep turn into mental illness? I think is the question that we're trying.

17:29 This is the line I'll try trying to figure out. Oh my god, see our last episode about the importance of keeping your mental health outs are in the game game. So so here's here's Mike. Here's what I'm curious about, Like, there must have been something compelling about the game that kept you playing through all of this or was it just like like it hit that tipping point where you're like, I just we gotta stick around just to see what happens next, like like sunk cost fallacy baby yeah, or like like like watching the like like not being able to look away from the train wreck kind of thing. I think it's a little bit of not being able to walk away from the train wreck and find out what There's got to be something to this story and the third part of it has to lead somewhere. Fees doing this for the Falafel stand. Imagine when we get to the big battle, but what it's going to be, like that's it that battle will be.

18:29 And not to mention that I was, um, I think I was just coming off being a d M in a campaign and I just wanted to play as a as a PC for a little while. Yeah yeah, yeah, and having the idea of my PC um imbued into my head just stamps right in there. And I love the character. I just wanted to continue playing character. Yeah yeah, yeah. This is this is where it really starts to get batshit crazy with this spectator. So it's just the same spectator or us a new spectator, No, the same spectator from moving Okay, So I mentioned that she would pop in at strange times, you know, leave the mic on, leave the camera on. So right after session four, the day after our fourth session, she comes into our discord text chat and says that um, she and the DM have gotten messages about foul language use in the discord. Now here's here's here's a quick thing about that. We were not using what the hell is it? We were on a video We were on a video call very similar to what we are now. Okay.

19:37 We were not in a we were not in a server. We were in a at a video voice chet like like like a room like a breakout, right, Yeah, yeah, yeah, we were. We were in a group DM voice video chat. Okay, yes, we were in discord. Um and she this person claims that they had gotten a message about foul language, saying that if it were to continue, we would all get a band. Yeah, I've been in discord service before. That's not true. Were not We were not in a server. Sure, we were just in Okay. So, Josie, I know your next question, and you're like, well, how is that possible? It is not. Okay, I'm just making sure I'm not the crazy one. No, you're not the crazy one.

20:26 Okay. So and and she kept with this. So over we played every two weeks when we were playing UM. So over the course of the two weeks, I do my research and I find out that her what is spewing from her craw is absolute horseshit, and I completely plan out on calling her bullshit out the next session whenever she was in. So the next session comes in, she's not there. UM and I have the good graces of the rest of the PCs. We're all talking back and forth throughout the whole time, saying, we all know this is bullshit. So we talked to the DM and we say, all right, we come to what we have a fifteen minute civilized discussion. So for next time, for this session, we will do as she asks. But for next session, we will build our own server, set it to age appropriate so that there is no thing that can go wrong, so that we can do we can play as we want. Yo, that's it, That's what we'll do. The DM starts his recap of the previous session and she comes in. She says to us, now, we are all grown adults in this game. Grown. We are all for own adults out at least twenty nine years old and up.

21:51 She says to us, she's not going to be in, but she's going to be monitoring us for a foul language. If she finds any or here's any is going to take us aside and talk to us about it, and if it continues after that, is going to put us in a time out and immediately leaves the chat. Oh suck my dick, Oh my god, shit, we flip shit coming into that and telling us that bullshit. No, we're done with you. So we'd take a ten minute break to cool off. And I have a separate server that I have played on for other you know, D and D play you through as before. So I send everyone minus her an invite so that we could play in mind, not have to deal with her fucking bullshit, and we could play as we want.

22:41 Cool. Everything's hunky dory. We get in now. On the previous session, we knew we were going to be accosted. We were on a ship that was being bombarded by other people, so we knew immediately we were going to be in combat. So that's the first thing that happens, is we getting to combat. It's seven on four, not bad odds. Two rounds in. He brings in other NPCs that are of significantly higher CR rating we have we probably have a combined total of around one hundred hip points. Ish. Each one of these new ones has at least one hundred each. So he had he had this on Albert Rodeo so, and he had their hit points listed so we could see what they were using. And I so we knew we saw their hip points, saying we knew what was going on.

23:34 I knew where this character class was coming from because I tried to help him develop a character class for what was going on, what he wanted to do in here. So I knew exactly where these were coming from, and I knew that they were at least level twelve whereas we were level three. Yeah yep, So but for why why what was the point of that? Hang on? I'm getting to it. So only a couple rounds of combat in Everyone's Dead, my character has one hit point, jumps off the front of the boat, flips off the middle finger, and away we go naturally into the drink because he tp hate us and ends the campaign. What the hat?

24:23 It was New Year's Eve? What the okay? It was New Year's New Year? Yeah, new year, new campaign? Yeah whatever? He asked me, as I was the last one in the discord, if I would like to play again? What'd you say? Maybe I would like this game to continue so we can get more content out of it. Each of each of these, each of these individually could have been an episode. Oh, I'm still trying to process all of this information. He puts so much work into into world building to such an extreme level, only to be like, now you're all dead and system creation. Don't forget that part. Yeah, he built a new five type of sessions, five five sessions that was only five. Wow, that's impressive for five does a whole lot of horror.

25:30 So a lot of time. So I don't know. You got you got your you got your your cheaching in front of you. So we've got a very long backstory m or very very long like like world building, Uh, required reading pdf document lots of world building is great, required reading multiple page document. Stop, I'm not going to do it. Maybe what's that'll be? Like? Wait, I don't understand. Is that Duke new Coomb. He's like that's a lot of words. Too bad, I'm not reading them. Yeah, you get one paragraph and done. Yeah, I'll give you. I'll give you a page. Yeah, and if it's great front and back. Um, so that's that's number one. Then we got a mishmash of lots of different systems guarantee taking the worst of each one. Yeah, okay, we got charts and graphs uh, filling up entire binders that you can't sort through. Um, every every item available to you at all times, whether or not you deserve it, completely breaking everything, which is fine because he didn't read the rules and doesn't know how bad they actually are for the game. Um weapons that are all redundant. Uh, and that's just the game itself. Then we got a I'm even gonna say, a player, she didn't even play, just a nuisance, just someone coming in, just a hall monitor they want to show up, a troll. Yeah, it's literally just somebody to come in and be like me, me me, me me me ye. Unfortunately she wasn't random. She was supposed to be the dam's girlfriend. Well, that explains how we got lays a lot.

27:03 Actually, yeah, it actually kind of explains for me why the campaign ended after you were like, let's move away from here. Huh yeah, yeah, why he blew it up at that point. Yeah, I didn't want to assume that was the case, but like the whole time, I'm thinking that's gonna be the case. Yeah. That was my first question was were they Oh yes, they were in Okay. She she wanted a she wanted like a squeaky clean server and couldn't get it. I am no, she was not going to get it with me. Yeah no, and not mynas Yeah. Ridiculous. Uh So, luckily that game is far is well well over by this point. Oh yeah, well over. Are you in better games now? Um? Actually I am dming a Lost Mine of fan Delver campaign for the other PCs that were in that group, along with a few others, and fantastic story. Yeah, giving them a good campaign.

27:56 One of the morals of the story is that if you want to be assured of a good game, you run it yourself. That's yeah. And that was one thing that I told him I did not want, as I said, one of the pcason that had only played two sessions. Yea, ever, I want right in the morning and there's a lizard person. Yeah. Yeah, I Lost Mines is such a good one for new players too. Yes, that's that that worked out really well. Um yeah, the story is absolutely nuts. Um like, uh, yeah, it's absolutely delivered. So they forgot the worst part though, which was that they did a full session shopping montage. Oh, because I blocked it from my memory. A full session of shopping God. Oh that's yeah, I blocked that out.

28:47 That was that. I'm still stunned. Honestly. Good for you. You put up with a lot of shit. I don't know how I just did. I just wanted to play my character because I thought he was cool. Mike, when you got to the young said, it was only five sessions for all of that. That was. It packed a lot of bad into a very little bit. Time. Is the Horror Story speed Run? Sort of a yeah? Yeah kind of? Yeah? That that that the Horror Story Speed Run? Yeah that's a title. Um. Uh the character that you that you kept it? You said you're stuck around because you enjoy your character. Uh. Is that character involved in your in your current game?

29:30 Ums? Not currently okay, UM, somewhere he is saved. That character will make an appearance somewhere and has made an appearance somewhere as UM one of the PCs in the campaign that I'm running. UM for a one shot d M something for me and another player and brought that character to life in that in that in that one shot, we'll make sure that character is okay. Oh yeah, no, yeah, that character is great, great, survived. Hell, he's got to stay alive. Off the starboard bow, you see someone clinging to a piece of driftwood. He seems to be giving the sun, giving the sun a finger. He's swearing at the sharks that are swimming around him. Mike, thanks so much for your story, man, Thanks for coming on, Thanks for listening. Um, thank you for having me. Yeah yeah, very cool. Thanks for actually responding to to my call for stories. I'm gonna throw us out there. I couldn't let that one pass up. Couldn't let that pass so glad you didn't know what a story about. I'm gonna throw this out there to anybody who wants to come on and tell their story, or at least just send us their story.

30:40 We can read it for you if you're If you're camera shy, and that's cool too, but I love to be performative. Go reach out to us. Curmudgeons and Dragons pot at gmail dot com is how to reach out to us. Everything we do is on Curmudgeon and Dragons dot com. Um, Mike anything. Are you doing anything you plug anything or uh or just I don't do anything. I just have some of my fancy some of the stuff that I'm into, m D and D related nad pod if that's allowed, or Dungeon Run. Yeah, I'm sorry, don't you run enough familiar with but nad pod to listen to daily. So Michael, thank you so much, James, Josie as always, thank you so gay so much for being on the show with me and keeping this thing going. And thank you adventurers, thank you for listening to Courmudgeons and Jagons. Please share this with your favorite adventures, leave a review on Apple, and follow us on social media.

31:32 All links to be found at Courmudgeons and Dragons dot com. Practice Safe Adventuring my Friends,