u/thescottishgeek

Hey Drake and Draklings!

Been a long time listener, first time poster here. I'll start by saying two things. One, this story is a wee bit long as its a 3 parter. And two, the reason we didn't ask this guy to leave was because he was a great friend before shit hit fan in part 3.

So with that out of the way, the title is the TLDR - The worst DM, turned worst player, turned worst guest.

I give you, the Echo Saga.

Part 1 - DMs DMPC is a God....we're just the side characters for 9 months

I want to start off this story by saying this was my first ever experience with D&D. I had no prior exposure to D&D so thought everything the DM done was normal at a table. Oh boy, how wrong I was.

So this happened back in 2021, we were fresh out of lockdown and starving for some friend time. One of my friends, we'll call him Big Tat, owns a tattoo shop and tells us his apprentice was wanting to run a D&D campaign. So myself and 4 of my friends decided to join. They are as follows

Paladin, a long time player and previous group DM. Kinda the dad figure to us newer players.

Monk, long time D&D fan especially Critical Roll.

Warlock, the wise cracking and Monks boyfriend (now husband)

Bard, Big Tat, this was his first time playing D&D too.

And finally me playing an reborn sorceress who had been sacrificed to the Raven Queen but brought back for reasons you'll find out later. I had just wrote it that she had unfinished business but the DM had other plans.

So we got together and began our story. Our DM proudly proclaimed that we would be playing through Princes of the Apocalypse and that not to worry as he knew the story was pretty bare bones but he had a way to flesh it out. The way he decided to flesh it out you might ask? Was with his DMPC Echo. And let me tell you, Echo was about to become our worst nightmare. For you see Echo wasn't just a DMPC, he was a character our DM had been sitting on for quite some time. He was actually writing a whole book series around him unbeknownst to us. And he would go on long tangents mid game to tell us about all the awesome and cool things Echo could do. I remember once just straight up asking him "so what exactly is Echos class?" And I kid you not the DM said something to the effect of "Oh, Echo doesn't have a class, hes faaaar beyond that in terms of power".

Anyway, our party all meet and deside to travel together. It gets to night and we decide to stop and make camp. We set up a watch rota and the first person to take watch was me. As im making my rounds a mysterious dark hooded figure approaches from the shadows. I naturally ask them who they are and what they are doing here. The figure then lunges forwarded and attacks my level 1 sorcerer. The commotion wakes up the rest of the party and we roll for initiative.

Our Monk rolls high and gets to go first landing a good blow, then our Paladin steps up to the mark and strikes the enemy, our Warlock goes next and sends Eldritch Blast towards the foe. It was then the DMs turn. With a grin he describes how like a shadow of death this man slices through our Monk, Paladin and Warlock effortlessly leaving them unconscious in one swoop. He then points his sword at Bard and me. It's my turn next and I do what I think is the logical thing to do and put my hands up to surrender asking him what it is he wants? He simply replies "this is a test my dear and you have all failed". Bard goes next he goes to attack but is stabbed and left unconscious along with the rest. BUT!!! Surprise everyone!!! It was only a shared dream.

We all wake the next morning to find the hooded man in camp making us all breakfast with a wide grin on his face. I could tell that Monk and Warlock in particular we're unimpressed with the shenanigans that had just happened but we proceeded anyway.

The mysterious man then introduces himself as Echo. And Echo is a (hold on to your hats for this) time traveling, multiverse hoping, wormhole riding, reality bending, all knowing, super dooper edgy and cool GOD!!! and he needs our level 1 parties help to save the world or something.

Me being new to D&D though this was cool. I immediately became infatuated with Echo and would ask him lots of questions with DM just absolutely lapped up. The rest of the party, we're less than impressed. There were concerns raised but DM assured us that Echo would just be a bystander as we were the real hero's.

And in a flash 6 months IRL passed and we had done zero of the actual objectives of PotA and just been Echos servants. Fetching him items, finding his lost relatives and just meaningless tasks. And everything we done had zero impact on anything as it was like we were playing character from one of DMs books and it was the Echo show. Eventually the bubble burst and it all came to a head one night during a level 20 one shot.

We had been combat starved for weeks so I suggested we do a level 20 one shot and done a full blown boss rush relay. Everyone was excited and on board as it was just meant to be us 4 facing off again progressively harder and harder enemies. It was meant to be Echo free, but of course the DM couldn't help himself and Echo poped into the pocket dimension we had been sucked into and scolded us saying we were "wasting time" and that the "real fight" was happening in our world. Apparently the moment we stepped into this level 20 one shot pocket dimension was the exact moment that the actual story of the campaign started and the Princes of the Apocalypse were released and wrecking havoc in our world.

Basically the DM was trying to press fast forwarded on our level 20 one shot so we could go back outside and play with Echo again. But we were having none of it, we told Echo to shove off and we'd be back once we were done here. So, what did the DM do in order to force us back? He Power Word Killed our Paladin, had an enemy one shot my sorceress and dispatch the rest off the party in various ways.

Echo then reappeared, brought us all back to life, killed the remaining enemies and with a snap of his fingers brought us back to our world. That was the final straw. The campaign very unceremoniously came to an end after that with everyone basically saying they were bored AF of the campaign and of Echo.

Oh and remember how earlier I mentioned that my character was brought back to life by the Raven Queen because she had unfinished business. Well the DM decided that wasn't enough. Not only was I his OTHER DMPCs love interest (boak I know) but I was also Echos long lost great great great granddaughter and I to WAS A SECRET GOD! I was mortified.

Part 2 - The worst DM is also the worst player

Ok so after that awful campaign came to an end we stopped playing D&D all together for about a year. That was until my friend moved close to us and asked if we would be interested in starting a new D&D campaign with him as the DM. We'd heard from other friends that he was a great DM so we we're all excited to get started.

The cast are as follows with some previous players not returning.

Me playing Eileen, a elf Blood Hunter/Ranger

Big Tat playing Yhoona a big blue sexy Goliath Barbarian

Paladin from previous game now playing Akkan a Fighter Yuan Ti

And finally Echo.......playing Sparky, a Twilight Cleric. His choice of class will become important later

So we start off the adventure and for the first few weeks everything goes well. Until it doesn't. Sparky for some reason despite being a good aligned character insists on picking fights with guards when he doesn't get his way, freeing trapped angry polar bears and being surprised when they attack and just generally being very antagonistic towards things he doesn't like. All these actions have a roll on effect as we are a group. We try to have a chat with him about it and his behaviour improves but not for long.

His character for some context was just all over the place in general. He kept on asking the DM to make "sanity checks" even though that wasn't a mechanic we we're using and then using his results as an excuse for whatever nonsense he was up to.

Then there was his class. Now spoilers for Rime of the Frostmaiden here so skip to the next part if you want to avoid any spoilers. We were infiltrating a Duergar strong hold in the mountains and Sparky kept on insisting we went a certain route even though once again as a party we had decided to go another. He was huffy but relented. When we got ambushed by the Duergar, Sparky made a comment like "should have listened to me". We went into initiative and started fighting. But when it came to the Duergar's turn they went invisible and got the upper hand. That's when Sparky with a massive grin on his face case fairy fire. But the DM had other plans. He then describes the Duergar running away leaving us to chase after them, right onto a massive trap. We ended the session there and Sparky made a comment about "thats not what was meant to happen there".

After he left me and the DM sat and discussed his behaviour and why he was so tilted by some encounters we've had. It was then that the DM dropped the bombshell, Sparky had read the module and was trying to bet the game. It all suddenly made sense. His class choice directly countered a lot of the enemy types in the module, his constant forcing us in certain directions to avoid traps and ambushes and the way he would insist on interacting with NPCs only to be disappointed with the outcome he got. I was annoyed. What's the point if your just going to "cheat" and try to "win" the game while making it miserable for the rest of us. The DM assured me he had a plan and that Sparky was not going to get the module as written because he had tailored it to our way of playing and our characters back stories. And sure enough as the weeks went on Sparky frustrations became more and more apparent as things he expected to happen didn't.

Personally I was loving it. Our DM had obviously put in a lot of time and effort to make the story connected to our characters rather than just as written. But it all came to a head during an encounter that once again the party wanted to deal with one way and Sparkey decided to deal with his way.

So picture this. You've just rocked up to a suspected Hags cave in an isolated icey mountain. Outside you see the remains of the previous adventuring party who dared try and enter smeared all over the ice. You deside to send the stealthiest character in to have a snoop around before charging in. While inside you find more humanoid remains, a butcher room and the most disturbing thing, a 30 ft undead frost giant intombed in ice. You report back to the rest of your group and deside that stealth is very much the correct decision.

Now, does your Cleric

A - follow the plan and help your characters stealth their way in?

B - Ask their God for guidance before blessing your fellow party members?

Or

C - ignore all the other party members, run up to the entrance of the cave and shout at the top of their lungs "Hello, you in the cave".....

If you guessed C, you are correct. We all asked the DM if there was any way to stop this but unfortunately Sparkey had made it clear that he had ran ahead. So, out comes the 30ft undead frost giant and initiative starts. I rolled super high and went first. I turn to the DM and say "I use the Dash action and use my full moment to get away from Sparky because let's be honest here, theres no way my character would put her life on the line for him after repeatedly not working with the team and putting our lifes in danger. As she runs away you hear her cursing your name Sparkey and she gives you the finger".

He was stunned and I was done.

The other two players love a fight though so we did end up fighting the UFG and ai got the killing blow from a distance using my bow. Sparky spent the whole combat unconscious as right after I went it was the frost giants turn and he used all 3 of his attacks to turn Sparky into Twilight Paste. (Very satisfying).

After the session we all had a chat with Sparky telling him its maybe best he retire the character as clearly he wasn't working. But in the case with most of these D&D horror stories the trash took itself out. He permanently stepped away from the group. After a few weeks we brought in a new player and she has been the best addition to the team ever! So happy ending.

Third and final part - The worst guest and his dad

So by now we've all established just how bad it was to havd this guy at the table, but the straw that really broke the camels back was his birthday game.

So I have the luxury of having a spare room that is completely devoted to hobby stuff. D&D, tinkering and miniature painting and its always available for any of my friends to use as well. It was coming up to Echos birthday and he asked if it would be ok if we used my spare room to host his birthday party. He wanted to give our DM a break and have everyone over at mines for pizza and games because his flat didn't have room for everyone. Fair enough I thought, we'd get to hang out together and celebrate his birthday with everyone.

He asked if it would be ok if his dad came. Now ive never met his dad before and neither had the rest of the friend group apart from big tat on a very rare occasion. I asked why he wanted his dad there to which he said "because he's going to run a game for us".

Ok, I thought its his birthday and if he wants to do a one shot with his dad as the DM to let our DM join in then why not......foolish me.

So the night rolls round and everyone piles in and Echo introduces his dad who it turns out was also called Echo (not real name but they had the same name.

Now Echo Junior is a wee bit odd, but we're all a bit odd in our friends group. But Echo Senior is veeeeeery fucking odd.

He's never met any of us before but to break the ice makes an inappropriate joke about one of our players wife's having an empty and saying to her husband "Oh well, you knoooow what she'll be doing tonight! Im a right?"

To which the player replied "eh, how about we keep the 'your wife's a slag' jokes to a minimum".

I was out the room at the time and missed the interaction but the atmosphere was definitely a bit frosty after that and we hadn't even went upstairs to the games room yet.

We get our pizza, go upstairs and set up. Now here's the thing, we were all expecting to play a D&D 5e one shot. But Echo Senior pulls out a 12 page document, cards and character sheets for us all and tells us we will be playing Pandemonium. I've no doubt that Pandemonium is a fantastic game when people are prepared to play it but what follows is an absolute cluster fuck of us having to try and learn a new system, understand what we've to do as players and read through rules, characters, secret objectives and so on.

After scrambling through all the paperwork to try and understand even just the basics, we began. And Echo Senior does not have an indoor voice. Im sitting two seats away from this man in his 50s and hes screaming at the top of his lungs pretending he's our jailer. So I said to him "I have neighbours, their bedroom is right through the wall can me keep it down please", it lasted about 5 minutes before the shouting started again. Thankfully my husband came upstairs and commented on the volume and he finally quietened down.

Im also not sure how long a game of Pandemonium should last but we were about 4+ hours into the game and getting nowhere. Anytime we tried to do anything like complete an objective or try to do one of our secret objects there was always something in the way that Echo Senior put in our way. I have NEVER been so frustrated in a game. It was completely pointless because no matter what we done nothing made a difference.

And finally, the kicker. So for those of you reading this you should know im very dyslexic. Maths in particular is difficult for me. So I ask Echo Senior if I can make a roll, I roll and very softy start counting out the results out loud as it helps.

This fully grown man shouts at the top of his lungs "AGH I HAAAAATE IT WHEN PEOPLE COUNT OUT LOUD INSTED OF IN THEIR HEADS! ITS SO ANNOYING "

stunned silence fell upon the table. Apart from Echo Junior who was laughing his head off.

So I turn round, look this man dead in the eyes and say "well, im dyslexic, so it helps if you really must know"

To which he replies "well my daughter is dyslexic and SHE doesn't have any trouble counting in her head"

The actual brass neck of this man! Not only did he insult me once but twice in my own home! For his kids birthday! As a guest!?

I dont think ive felt anger like it before. It was like a slap in the face, and all the horrible comments teachers used to make to me in school came flooding back.

So I said to him as calmly as I could, "well, good for your daughter. But do me a favour. Fuck off"

I mean fuck off out my house. Pack your shit and leave. But as it turns out social ques are lost on Echo Senior and Junior who started laughing again.

I wish I could have seen my face because my friend told me afterwards "I thought you were about to fly over the table and deck him"

Echo Junior wanted to continue the game but myself and the others had well and truly checked out. I said "my character pulls the pin on her grenade, holds it close, and blows herself up"

"What! You cant do that!" Shouts Echo Senior, "you'll be out the game"

"Good because I think the games over fir tonight. Time to pack up" I said

As he's packing up and leaving he decides to tell us all how shit we were at playing the game and how "we were only half way through" and that "none of his other parties had this much trouble playing the game"

The man was like an insult generator but totally oblivious to the reactions of the people they were aimed at.

Needless to say Echo Senior was never welcome in my house again and about 2 weeks after his birthday Echo Junior removed himself from the group.

I head through the grapevine that both Echos had tried a few times to set up games in a few gaming stores but were told no. I wonder why?

So that is the conclusion of the Echo saga! I hope you enjoyed this torture as much as I did! Wishing you all  happy gaming 🖤

Hey Drake and Draklings!

Been a long time listener, first time poster here. I'll start by saying two things. One, this story is a wee bit long as its a 3 parter. And two, the reason we didn't ask this guy to leave was because he was a great friend before shit hit fan in part 3.

So with that out of the way, the title is the TLDR - The worst DM, turned worst player, turned worst guest.

I give you, the Echo Saga.

Part 1 - DMs DMPC is a God....we're just the side characters for 9 months

I want to start off this story by saying this was my first ever experience with D&D. I had no prior exposure to D&D so thought everything the DM done was normal at a table. Oh boy, how wrong I was.

So this happened back in 2021, we were fresh out of lockdown and starving for some friend time. One of my friends, we'll call him Big Tat, owns a tattoo shop and tells us his apprentice was wanting to run a D&D campaign. So myself and 4 of my friends decided to join. They are as follows

Paladin, a long time player and previous group DM. Kinda the dad figure to us newer players.

Monk, long time D&D fan especially Critical Roll.

Warlock, the wise cracking and Monks boyfriend (now husband)

Bard, Big Tat, this was his first time playing D&D too.

And finally me playing an reborn sorceress who had been sacrificed to the Raven Queen but brought back for reasons you'll find out later. I had just wrote it that she had unfinished business but the DM had other plans.

So we got together and began our story. Our DM proudly proclaimed that we would be playing through Princes of the Apocalypse and that not to worry as he knew the story was pretty bare bones but he had a way to flesh it out. The way he decided to flesh it out you might ask? Was with his DMPC Echo. And let me tell you, Echo was about to become our worst nightmare. For you see Echo wasn't just a DMPC, he was a character our DM had been sitting on for quite some time. He was actually writing a whole book series around him unbeknownst to us. And he would go on long tangents mid game to tell us about all the awesome and cool things Echo could do. I remember once just straight up asking him "so what exactly is Echos class?" And I kid you not the DM said something to the effect of "Oh, Echo doesn't have a class, hes faaaar beyond that in terms of power".

Anyway, our party all meet and deside to travel together. It gets to night and we decide to stop and make camp. We set up a watch rota and the first person to take watch was me. As im making my rounds a mysterious dark hooded figure approaches from the shadows. I naturally ask them who they are and what they are doing here. The figure then lunges forwarded and attacks my level 1 sorcerer. The commotion wakes up the rest of the party and we roll for initiative.

Our Monk rolls high and gets to go first landing a good blow, then our Paladin steps up to the mark and strikes the enemy, our Warlock goes next and sends Eldritch Blast towards the foe. It was then the DMs turn. With a grin he describes how like a shadow of death this man slices through our Monk, Paladin and Warlock effortlessly leaving them unconscious in one swoop. He then points his sword at Bard and me. It's my turn next and I do what I think is the logical thing to do and put my hands up to surrender asking him what it is he wants? He simply replies "this is a test my dear and you have all failed". Bard goes next he goes to attack but is stabbed and left unconscious along with the rest. BUT!!! Surprise everyone!!! It was only a shared dream.

We all wake the next morning to find the hooded man in camp making us all breakfast with a wide grin on his face. I could tell that Monk and Warlock in particular we're unimpressed with the shenanigans that had just happened but we proceeded anyway.

The mysterious man then introduces himself as Echo. And Echo is a (hold on to your hats for this) time traveling, multiverse hoping, wormhole riding, reality bending, all knowing, super dooper edgy and cool GOD!!! and he needs our level 1 parties help to save the world or something.

Me being new to D&D though this was cool. I immediately became infatuated with Echo and would ask him lots of questions with DM just absolutely lapped up. The rest of the party, we're less than impressed. There were concerns raised but DM assured us that Echo would just be a bystander as we were the real hero's.

And in a flash 6 months IRL passed and we had done zero of the actual objectives of PotA and just been Echos servants. Fetching him items, finding his lost relatives and just meaningless tasks. And everything we done had zero impact on anything as it was like we were playing character from one of DMs books and it was the Echo show. Eventually the bubble burst and it all came to a head one night during a level 20 one shot.

We had been combat starved for weeks so I suggested we do a level 20 one shot and done a full blown boss rush relay. Everyone was excited and on board as it was just meant to be us 4 facing off again progressively harder and harder enemies. It was meant to be Echo free, but of course the DM couldn't help himself and Echo poped into the pocket dimension we had been sucked into and scolded us saying we were "wasting time" and that the "real fight" was happening in our world. Apparently the moment we stepped into this level 20 one shot pocket dimension was the exact moment that the actual story of the campaign started and the Princes of the Apocalypse were released and wrecking havoc in our world.

Basically the DM was trying to press fast forwarded on our level 20 one shot so we could go back outside and play with Echo again. But we were having none of it, we told Echo to shove off and we'd be back once we were done here. So, what did the DM do in order to force us back? He Power Word Killed our Paladin, had an enemy one shot my sorceress and dispatch the rest off the party in various ways.

Echo then reappeared, brought us all back to life, killed the remaining enemies and with a snap of his fingers brought us back to our world. That was the final straw. The campaign very unceremoniously came to an end after that with everyone basically saying they were bored AF of the campaign and of Echo.

Oh and remember how earlier I mentioned that my character was brought back to life by the Raven Queen because she had unfinished business. Well the DM decided that wasn't enough. Not only was I his OTHER DMPCs love interest (boak I know) but I was also Echos long lost great great great granddaughter and I to WAS A SECRET GOD! I was mortified.

Part 2 - The worst DM is also the worst player

Ok so after that awful campaign came to an end we stopped playing D&D all together for about a year. That was until my friend moved close to us and asked if we would be interested in starting a new D&D campaign with him as the DM. We'd heard from other friends that he was a great DM so we we're all excited to get started.

The cast are as follows with some previous players not returning.

Me playing Eileen, a elf Blood Hunter/Ranger

Big Tat playing Yhoona a big blue sexy Goliath Barbarian

Paladin from previous game now playing Akkan a Fighter Yuan Ti

And finally Echo.......playing Sparky, a Twilight Cleric. His choice of class will become important later

So we start off the adventure and for the first few weeks everything goes well. Until it doesn't. Sparky for some reason despite being a good aligned character insists on picking fights with guards when he doesn't get his way, freeing trapped angry polar bears and being surprised when they attack and just generally being very antagonistic towards things he doesn't like. All these actions have a roll on effect as we are a group. We try to have a chat with him about it and his behaviour improves but not for long.

His character for some context was just all over the place in general. He kept on asking the DM to make "sanity checks" even though that wasn't a mechanic we we're using and then using his results as an excuse for whatever nonsense he was up to.

Then there was his class. Now spoilers for Rime of the Frostmaiden here so skip to the next part if you want to avoid any spoilers. We were infiltrating a Duergar strong hold in the mountains and Sparky kept on insisting we went a certain route even though once again as a party we had decided to go another. He was huffy but relented. When we got ambushed by the Duergar, Sparky made a comment like "should have listened to me". We went into initiative and started fighting. But when it came to the Duergar's turn they went invisible and got the upper hand. That's when Sparky with a massive grin on his face case fairy fire. But the DM had other plans. He then describes the Duergar running away leaving us to chase after them, right onto a massive trap. We ended the session there and Sparky made a comment about "thats not what was meant to happen there".

After he left me and the DM sat and discussed his behaviour and why he was so tilted by some encounters we've had. It was then that the DM dropped the bombshell, Sparky had read the module and was trying to bet the game. It all suddenly made sense. His class choice directly countered a lot of the enemy types in the module, his constant forcing us in certain directions to avoid traps and ambushes and the way he would insist on interacting with NPCs only to be disappointed with the outcome he got. I was annoyed. What's the point if your just going to "cheat" and try to "win" the game while making it miserable for the rest of us. The DM assured me he had a plan and that Sparky was not going to get the module as written because he had tailored it to our way of playing and our characters back stories. And sure enough as the weeks went on Sparky frustrations became more and more apparent as things he expected to happen didn't.

Personally I was loving it. Our DM had obviously put in a lot of time and effort to make the story connected to our characters rather than just as written. But it all came to a head during an encounter that once again the party wanted to deal with one way and Sparkey decided to deal with his way.

So picture this. You've just rocked up to a suspected Hags cave in an isolated icey mountain. Outside you see the remains of the previous adventuring party who dared try and enter smeared all over the ice. You deside to send the stealthiest character in to have a snoop around before charging in. While inside you find more humanoid remains, a butcher room and the most disturbing thing, a 30 ft undead frost giant intombed in ice. You report back to the rest of your group and deside that stealth is very much the correct decision.

Now, does your Cleric

A - follow the plan and help your characters stealth their way in?

B - Ask their God for guidance before blessing your fellow party members?

Or

C - ignore all the other party members, run up to the entrance of the cave and shout at the top of their lungs "Hello, you in the cave".....

If you guessed C, you are correct. We all asked the DM if there was any way to stop this but unfortunately Sparkey had made it clear that he had ran ahead. So, out comes the 30ft undead frost giant and initiative starts. I rolled super high and went first. I turn to the DM and say "I use the Dash action and use my full moment to get away from Sparky because let's be honest here, theres no way my character would put her life on the line for him after repeatedly not working with the team and putting our lifes in danger. As she runs away you hear her cursing your name Sparkey and she gives you the finger".

He was stunned and I was done.

The other two players love a fight though so we did end up fighting the UFG and ai got the killing blow from a distance using my bow. Sparky spent the whole combat unconscious as right after I went it was the frost giants turn and he used all 3 of his attacks to turn Sparky into Twilight Paste. (Very satisfying).

After the session we all had a chat with Sparky telling him its maybe best he retire the character as clearly he wasn't working. But in the case with most of these D&D horror stories the trash took itself out. He permanently stepped away from the group. After a few weeks we brought in a new player and she has been the best addition to the team ever! So happy ending.

Third and final part - The worst guest and his dad

So by now we've all established just how bad it was to havd this guy at the table, but the straw that really broke the camels back was his birthday game.

So I have the luxury of having a spare room that is completely devoted to hobby stuff. D&D, tinkering and miniature painting and its always available for any of my friends to use as well. It was coming up to Echos birthday and he asked if it would be ok if we used my spare room to host his birthday party. He wanted to give our DM a break and have everyone over at mines for pizza and games because his flat didn't have room for everyone. Fair enough I thought, we'd get to hang out together and celebrate his birthday with everyone.

He asked if it would be ok if his dad came. Now ive never met his dad before and neither had the rest of the friend group apart from big tat on a very rare occasion. I asked why he wanted his dad there to which he said "because he's going to run a game for us".

Ok, I thought its his birthday and if he wants to do a one shot with his dad as the DM to let our DM join in then why not......foolish me.

So the night rolls round and everyone piles in and Echo introduces his dad who it turns out was also called Echo (not real name but they had the same name.

Now Echo Junior is a wee bit odd, but we're all a bit odd in our friends group. But Echo Senior is veeeeeery fucking odd.

He's never met any of us before but to break the ice makes an inappropriate joke about one of our players wife's having an empty and saying to her husband "Oh well, you knoooow what she'll be doing tonight! Im a right?"

To which the player replied "eh, how about we keep the 'your wife's a slag' jokes to a minimum".

I was out the room at the time and missed the interaction but the atmosphere was definitely a bit frosty after that and we hadn't even went upstairs to the games room yet.

We get our pizza, go upstairs and set up. Now here's the thing, we were all expecting to play a D&D 5e one shot. But Echo Senior pulls out a 12 page document, cards and character sheets for us all and tells us we will be playing Pandemonium. I've no doubt that Pandemonium is a fantastic game when people are prepared to play it but what follows is an absolute cluster fuck of us having to try and learn a new system, understand what we've to do as players and read through rules, characters, secret objectives and so on.

After scrambling through all the paperwork to try and understand even just the basics, we began. And Echo Senior does not have an indoor voice. Im sitting two seats away from this man in his 50s and hes screaming at the top of his lungs pretending he's our jailer. So I said to him "I have neighbours, their bedroom is right through the wall can me keep it down please", it lasted about 5 minutes before the shouting started again. Thankfully my husband came upstairs and commented on the volume and he finally quietened down.

Im also not sure how long a game of Pandemonium should last but we were about 4+ hours into the game and getting nowhere. Anytime we tried to do anything like complete an objective or try to do one of our secret objects there was always something in the way that Echo Senior put in our way. I have NEVER been so frustrated in a game. It was completely pointless because no matter what we done nothing made a difference.

And finally, the kicker. So for those of you reading this you should know im very dyslexic. Maths in particular is difficult for me. So I ask Echo Senior if I can make a roll, I roll and very softy start counting out the results out loud as it helps.

This fully grown man shouts at the top of his lungs "AGH I HAAAAATE IT WHEN PEOPLE COUNT OUT LOUD INSTED OF IN THEIR HEADS! ITS SO ANNOYING "

stunned silence fell upon the table. Apart from Echo Junior who was laughing his head off.

So I turn round, look this man dead in the eyes and say "well, im dyslexic, so it helps if you really must know"

To which he replies "well my daughter is dyslexic and SHE doesn't have any trouble counting in her head"

The actual brass neck of this man! Not only did he insult me once but twice in my own home! For his kids birthday! As a guest!?

I dont think ive felt anger like it before. It was like a slap in the face, and all the horrible comments teachers used to make to me in school came flooding back.

So I said to him as calmly as I could, "well, good for your daughter. But do me a favour. Fuck off"

I mean fuck off out my house. Pack your shit and leave. But as it turns out social ques are lost on Echo Senior and Junior who started laughing again.

I wish I could have seen my face because my friend told me afterwards "I thought you were about to fly over the table and deck him"

Echo Junior wanted to continue the game but myself and the others had well and truly checked out. I said "my character pulls the pin on her grenade, holds it close, and blows herself up"

"What! You cant do that!" Shouts Echo Senior, "you'll be out the game"

"Good because I think the games over fir tonight. Time to pack up" I said

As he's packing up and leaving he decides to tell us all how shit we were at playing the game and how "we were only half way through" and that "none of his other parties had this much trouble playing the game"

The man was like an insult generator but totally oblivious to the reactions of the people they were aimed at.

Needless to say Echo Senior was never welcome in my house again and about 2 weeks after his birthday Echo Junior removed himself from the group.

I head through the grapevine that both Echos had tried a few times to set up games in a few gaming stores but were told no. I wonder why?

So that is the conclusion of the Echo saga! I hope you enjoyed this torture as much as I did! Wishing you all  happy gaming 🖤

They are stacked! Id love to see what he has on!

The 3rd and final installment of The Echo Saga

I'll link part 1 and two below but the TLDR for both parts is we had a DM who brought his DMPC to the table, Echo. He was basically a God and totally broke the game. Our characters were like side characters in The Echo Show. When that campaign came to an unceremoniouse end he was invited back to be a player in a new campaign where he decided to be the most confrontational character that didn't work well with the party and he read the module ahead of time, trying to win the game.

Part 1 - https://www.reddit.com/r/rpghorrorstories/s/UWWLyR0jkw

Part 2 - https://www.reddit.com/r/rpghorrorstories/s/VezuO9Fylg

So by now we've all established just how bad it was to havd this guy at the table, but the straw that really broke the camels back was his birthday game.

So I have the luxury of having a spare room that is completely devoted to hobby stuff. D&D, tinkering and miniature painting and its always available for any of my friends to use as well. It was coming up to Echos birthday and he asked if it would be ok if we used my spare room to host his birthday party. He wanted to give our DM a break and have everyone over at mines for pizza and games because his flat didn't have room for everyone. Fair enough I thought, we'd get to hang out together and celebrate his birthday with everyone.

He asked if it would be ok if his dad came. Now ive never met his dad before and neither had the rest of the friend group apart from big tat on a very rare occasion. I asked why he wanted his dad there to which he said "because he's going to run a game for us".

Ok, I thought its his birthday and if he wants to do a one shot with his dad as the DM to let our DM join in then why not......foolish me.

So the night rolls round and everyone piles in and Echo introduces his dad who it turns out was also called Echo (not real name but they had the same name.

Now Echo Junior is a wee bit odd, but we're all a bit odd in our friends group. But Echo Senior is veeeeeery fucking odd.

He's never met any of us before but to break the ice makes an inappropriate joke about one of our players wife's having an empty and saying to her husband "Oh well, you knoooow what she'll be doing tonight! Im a right?"

To which the player replied "eh, how about we keep the 'your wife's a slag' jokes to a minimum".

I was out the room at the time and missed the interaction but the atmosphere was definitely a bit frosty after that and we hadn't even went upstairs to the games room yet.

We get our pizza, go upstairs and set up. Now here's the thing, we were all expecting to play a D&D 5e one shot. But Echo Senior pulls out a 12 page document, cards and character sheets for us all and tells us we will be playing Pandemonium. I've no doubt that Pandemonium is a fantastic game when people are prepared to play it but what follows is an absolute cluster fuck of us having to try and learn a new system, understand what we've to do as players and read through rules, characters, secret objectives and so on.

After scrambling through all the paperwork to try and understand even just the basics, we began. And Echo Senior does not have an indoor voice. Im sitting two seats away from this man in his 50s and hes screaming at the top of his lungs pretending he's our jailer. So I said to him "I have neighbours, their bedroom is right through the wall can me keep it down please", it lasted about 5 minutes before the shouting started again. Thankfully my husband came upstairs and commented on the volume and he finally quietened down.

Im also not sure how long a game of Pandemonium should last but we were about 4+ hours into the game and getting nowhere. Anytime we tried to do anything like complete an objective or try to do one of our secret objects there was always something in the way that Echo Senior put in our way. I have NEVER been so frustrated in a game. It was completely pointless because no matter what we done nothing made a difference.

And finally, the kicker. So for those of you reading this you should know im very dyslexic. Maths in particular is difficult for me. So I ask Echo Senior if I can make a roll, I roll and very softy start counting out the results out loud as it helps.

This fully grown man shouts at the top of his lungs "AGH I HAAAAATE IT WHEN PEOPLE COUNT OUT LOUD! ITS SO ANNOYING "

stunned silence fell upon the table. Apart from Echo Junior who was laughing his head off.

So I turn round, look this man dead in the eyes and say "well, im dyslexic, so it helps if you really must know"

To which he replies "well my daughter is dyslexic and SHE doesn't have any trouble counting in her head"

The actual brass neck of this man! Not only did he insult me once but twice in my own home! For his kids birthday! As a guest!?

I dont think ive felt anger like it before. It was like a slap in the face, and all the horrible comments teachers used to make to me in school came flooding back.

So I said to him as calmly as I could, "well, good for your daughter. But do me a favour. Fuck off"

I mean fuck off out my house. Pack your shit and leave. But as it turns out social ques are lost on Echo Senior and Junior who started laughing again.

I wish I could have seen my face because my friend told me afterwards "I thought you were about to fly over the table and deck him"

Echo Junior wanted to continue the game but myself and the others had well and truly checked out. I said "my character pulls the pin on her grenade, holds it close, and blows herself up"

"What! You cant do that!" Shouts Echo Senior, "you'll be out the game"

"Good because I think the games over fir tonight. Time to pack up" I said

As he's packing up and leaving he decides to tell us all how shit we were at playing the game and how "we were only half way through" and that "none of his other parties had this much trouble playing the game"

The man was like an insult generator but totally oblivious to the reactions of the people they were aimed at.

Needless to say Echo Senior was never welcome in my house again and about 2 weeks after his birthday Echo Junior removed himself from the group.

I head through the grapevine that both Echos had tried a few times to set up games in a few gaming stores but were told no. I wonder why?

So that is the conclusion of the Echo saga! I hope you enjoyed this tournament as much as I did! Wishing you all  happy gaming 🖤

I do miniature painting and my old Samsung A53 is starting to struggle but also the cameras just not good enough for my hobby. I really dont want any AI crap like Gemini or anything forsed onto my phone. Any suggestions? Thanks 🖤

TLDR at the end

Part 2 of the Echo saga

So here it is the long awaited follow up story of Echo our terrible DM. I'll link the previous story just below for context. But the TLDR is Echo the DMPC is literally a super God and we spend 9 IRL months being his lackeys and not playing the module -

https://www.reddit.com/r/rpghorrorstories/s/QIAtJqtqus

Ok so after that awful campaign came to an end we stopped playing D&D all together for about a year. That was until my friend moved close to us and asked if we would be interested in starting a new D&D campaign with him as the DM. We'd heard from other friends that he was a great DM so we we're all excited to get started.

The cast are as follows with some previous players not returning.

Me playing Eileen, a elf Blood Hunter/Ranger

Big Tat playing Yhoona a big blue sexy Goliath Barbarian

Paladin from previous game now playing Akkan a Fighter Yuan Ti

And finally Echo.......playing Sparky, a Twilight Cleric. His choice of class will become important later

So we start off the adventure and for the first few weeks everything goes well. Until it doesn't. Sparky for some reason despite being a good aligned character insists on picking fights with guards when he doesn't get his way, freeing trapped angry polar bears and being surprised when they attack and just generally being very antagonistic towards things he doesn't like. All these actions have a roll on effect as we are a group. We try to have a chat with him about it and his behaviour improves but not for long.

His character for some context was just all over the place in general. He kept on asking the DM to make "sanity checks" even though that wasn't a mechanic we we're using and then using his results as an excuse for whatever nonsense he was up to.

Then there was his class. Now spoilers for Rime of the Frostmaiden here so skip to the next part if you want to avoid any spoilers. We were infiltrating a Duergar strong hold in the mountains and Sparky kept on insisting we went a certain route even though once again as a party we had decided to go another. He was huffy but relented. When we got ambushed by the Duergar, Sparky made a comment like "should have listened to me". We went into initiative and started fighting. But when it came to the Duergar's turn they went invisible and got the upper hand. That's when Sparky with a massive grin on his face case fairy fire. But the DM had other plans. He then describes the Duergar running away leaving us to chase after them, right onto a massive trap. We ended the session there and Sparky made a comment about "thats not what was meant to happen there".

After he left me and the DM sat and discussed his behaviour and why he was so tilted by some encounters we've had. It was then that the DM dropped the bombshell, Sparky had read the module and was trying to bet the game. It all suddenly made sense. His class choice directly countered a lot of the enemy types in the module, his constant forcing us in certain directions to avoid traps and ambushes and the way he would insist on interacting with NPCs only to be disappointed with the outcome he got. I was annoyed. What's the point if your just going to "cheat" and try to "win" the game while making it miserable for the rest of us. The DM assured me he had a plan and that Sparky was not going to get the module as written because he had tailored it to our way of playing and our characters back stories. And sure enough as the weeks went on Sparky frustrations became more and more apparent as things he expected to happen didn't.

Personally I was loving it. Our DM had obviously put in a lot of time and effort to make the story connected to our characters rather than just as written. But it all came to a head during an encounter that once again the party wanted to deal with one way and Sparkey decided to deal with his way.

So picture this. You've just rocked up to a suspected Hags cave in an isolated icey mountain. Outside you see the remains of the previous adventuring party who dared try and enter smeared all over the ice. You deside to send the stealthiest character in to have a snoop around before charging in. While inside you find more humanoid remains, a butcher room and the most disturbing thing, a 30 ft undead frost giant intombed in ice. You report back to the rest of your group and deside that stealth is very much the correct decision.

Now, does your Cleric

A - follow the plan and help your characters stealth their way in?

B - Ask their God for guidance before blessing your fellow party members?

Or

C - ignore all the other party members, run up to the entrance of the cave and shout at the top of their lungs "Hello, you in the cave".....

If you guessed C, you are correct. We all asked the DM if there was any way to stop this but unfortunately Sparkey had made it clear that he had ran ahead. So, out comes the 30ft undead frost giant and initiative starts. I rolled super high and went first. I turn to the DM and say "I use the Dash action and use my full moment to get away from Sparky because let's be honest here, theres no way my character would put her life on the line for him after repeatedly not working with the team and putting our lifes in danger. As she runs away you hear her cursing your name Sparkey and she gives you the finger".

He was stunned and I was done.

The other two players love a fight though so we did end up fighting the UFG and ai got the killing blow from a distance using my bow. Sparky spent the whole combat unconscious as right after I went it was the frost giants turn and he used all 3 of his attacks to turn Sparky into Twilight Paste. (Very satisfying).

After the session we all had a chat with Sparky telling him its maybe best he retire the character as clearly he wasn't working. But in the case with most of these D&D horror stories the trash took itself out. He permanently stepped away from the group. After a few weeks we brought in a new player and she has been the best addition to the team ever! So happy ending.

TLDR -

So yeah I didn't think it was possible for Echo to be a worse player than a DM but I was wrong. He cheated, he didn't work with the group and he tried to outsmart our DM and "win" D&D.

There is one more horror story involving Echo that's probably the worst offence of all but this story's already long enough so I'll save it for another day.