Dropping a Bomb
Chapter: Season Six
It is the beginning of a new arc and I’m not dillydallying around this time.
Thanks for your patience with the series of one-off strips. I need to get those out of my system sometimes and with my move to Colorado complete, we’re going back in to see what spins out of the last arc and the T.P.K.
HOVER-TEXT: Yes, Disco Town Taco is a fictitious place in the d20Monkeyverse but if enough of you call for it, I will sketch and post the logo.
If I start the business can I use the logo? (Joking, of course)
I require this logo. And a menu.
I tip well.
FOR IT!
Get it?
I called “FOR IT”!
Ha.
Haha.
Hahaha.
*siiiiiigh*
I am calling for a Disco Town Taco logo!
I want the logo. I want the logo so hard.
Disco Town Taco! Disco Town Taco! Disco Town Taco!
Oh. OH. Oh Sam. 🙁
I am envisioning one of those cheesy moving signs: a taco-shaped disco ball being devoured by a Travolta-in-Saturday-Night-Fever knockoff. With the taco in his hand, moving in that disco dance move from straight up to nomnom mouth. straight up. nomnom mouth.
I think I’m thinking too much about this.
welcome to Colorado Brian, as a local, and a glutton, please let me know if you need help finding some of the best food places, also nerd spots.
Disco Town Taco, where you can go-go-go all night long (DriveThru open 24 hours).
Logo! Logo! Logo!
Disco Town Tacos!
Welcome to Colorado. You’ll love it here.
Take me to….. Disco Town Tacos!
Looks like Sam’s sporting some ever-so-slight stubble to go along with the unkempt hair. Question from the peanut gallery: how many days did that take to grow out?
I wonder what’s bringing on the crisis of confidence. It’s gotta be more than just the last Karthun game session.
I’ll bet the tournament is also a factor, what’s happened to Dallas because of it (maybe).
I think it has much to do with the confinement to the home and the nearest locations because of his knee.
Let’s see, explicitly leave Thunderdome out of your list, then make Bartertown reference. Tacky, tacky tacky. 🙂
I’ll be honest, I did it on purpose just to see who would notice.
Yes please on the logo! 😀
I’d like to see it. It sounds like a nice fast food joint.
Also what Sam is dealing with is common DM Denial. It usually happens when you burn yourself out from over planning, DM for a certain period of time, or not playing in a different campaign for so long. There are many other reasons that this can happen, stress, time & money, amnesia, etc, but whatever the reason its usually temporary.
I ran into it about a month ago. I’ve not run a really successful campaign for about a year, and I almost never actually get to be a player (in part because I’m DMed for so long that I’m bad at ‘just’ being a player)
Unfortunately, running one of the three (sigh) games I was running is actually part of my job, so it’s not like I can stop DMing. Is a horrible realisation though. It’s like…this thing that I’ve defined myself as, and…maybe I suck at it.
Well friend, there are a few ways to making it easier. First, I ask you don’t question your own skills. I know it might be a tad hard, but if you question your own story the players might too and it could add to the stress. Next, If possible try to request the other 2 of 3 games to take a break. That way you can focus on the one, and use the spare time just to socialize, paint mini’s or brainstorm. Also, you are never alone. There are plenty of DM’s here, there and at local game stores. If not, then to the internet!!! ‘Nother thing you can do is if you have any concepts from the other games, don’t be afraid to reuse them and scale up things for the others. It will save you some time and some graphite for bigger and better things. So long as the players are are in none of the other circles of games you should be fine. If none of this works. Lastly, feedback is always good to have. ask what your player would want and see if you can come up with something that on a compressible level meets to their demand.
Thanks. I steal things quite a lot from other stuff anyway (quite unashamedly at times). I think it’s just been that prior to this year, I was either a student, or my work was quite..um..unstressful. This year, though, I’m essentially running an autism support charity on my own. This takes up a lot of processing space.
I’ve put one of the games on hiatus (Seventh Sea, which is a shame, because it was fun, but I’d stopped being able to run swashbuckle), and one of hte players is running WFRP for awhile, which helps. The other one – a Mage variant – I’ve restarted with a slightly different group of players, and the instruction to all of them that while party conflict is fine, it’s their responsibility to make sure they have a group that actually works together this time. 😛
The third one – eh. It’s stressy, but that’s largely because it’s now got 8 (eight!) players in it. It’s part of the autism support thing, and it’s helping them out a lot. Have tried to encourage some of the others to GM, but they haven’t got the confidence. Yet. Working on it.
To be honest, I think most of the issue is that I was a member of a roleplay society for about a decade, and in that time I think I actually played in something like 6 games. I ran about twenty. Never enough GMs, and I like worldbuilding, but it’s a lot more intensive.
Good move getting that meta out there and established up front.
I can totally relate, dude. Sometimes, when some of my players did something stupid and got punished in-game for it, they react very frustrated, which makes me think about maybe I should let better GMs do the work. I mean… it should be fun to play, right? So if the players are frustrated instead of having fun, it has to be my fault for not being a good enough DM. It also adds up if the colleagues are criticizing some minor detail about something I’ve done, even if it is entirely unrelated to being a DM.
I then have to remind myself about the fact, that even the most frustrated of players comes back to ask me about a new adventure to start and my colleagues being people who are also getting criticized sometimes by me, but it seldomly occurs to me right away, so there is at least one or two days of me contemplating about stopping being a DM.
Who run Disco Taco Town?!? Poor Sam, been there, done that.
Oh man, I feel Sam’s pain. I’m so loaded with work potential that I don’t want to commit to anything like that.
Welcome to Colorado, a magical mountain wonderland of beautiful vistas, cultural clashes and wonderful weeds. I love it here personally, I hope you do to. If you don’t mind saying, about were are you? The Denver area or elsewhere?
Aww, big guy is all down because he had a TPK.
With respects to Sam’s mid-20’s crisis, I would like the taco logo, restaurant, seating, and a young fella up front asking if I’d like fries with that for just $1 more.
I love how most of the comments are doing their best to ignore that Sam doesn’t want to GM anymore and instead just REALLY wants the taco place logo.
It’s not that he doesn’t *want* to – it’s that he feels like a failure (as previous commenters noted, not just from the TPK but from the backlash from the Dungeon Run as well).
Wait, you’re in CO? Where abouts?
Here in Tampa and St Pete Florida area we have a place called the Taco Bus and they are freaking awesome, Side note Sam is dead serious like 5 o’clock shadow serious it time to get him a GM pick me uppers.
Disco Taco Town!!
Feeling bad for Sam, a TPK is tougher on the GM than the players imho.
My inquiry is this;
Who runs Discotown?
“we’re going back in to see what spins out of the last arc and the T.P.K.”
Totally misinterpreted that line for a minute as “This is the final arc of d20 Monkey” and I got sad.
Then I realised you meant ‘most recent arc’, not ‘final arc’ and I am happy again. Thank you for making my life happier, Sam.
Bah he can dm plenty i would kill to be in a game with these guys. bad rolls dont ruin dnd.
I NEED THAT LOGO.
Now that you’re in Colorado d&d is on Friday in Lakewood. And it’ll be right by tacos. What an amazing coincidence!
I may be kicked out of here for this but Sam is rocking some severe David Tennant as the Tenth Doctor glasses and hair.
And now that I’ve seen it I can’t un see it.
Aaaaah, so THAT’s where the TPK storyline was headed. I knew Brian must have a purpose to telling that particular story. 🙂 I’m looking forward to seeing what comes next. (And yes, I feel Sam’s pain too.)
That logo needs to be sketched. This shall be the new cantina in my campaign. Also cannot unsee the Doctor’s face now!
Seriously, how can you leave Beyond Thunderdome off the list of excellent Mad Max movies? I disagree with Amy’s choice here….
i know that can’t dm anymore feeling. if you’re invested in a game it can be a terrible thing. my long running campaign used a really crunchy detailed system until my brain got messed up. unreliable memory, bad attention span, can’t do mental arithmetic anymore. i thought i would have to end the campaign, but i decided to try to find a system i could work with. fate fit the bill, and converting the campaign and characters was doable so i’m back in business.
Go go on the logo!
Taco logo please.
But I have been where sam has been before, will likely be there by end of year with the four games a week I am running burning me out pretty soon (two of them should have ended a month ago but we keep getting delayed). Every gm has this crisis. We get through it eventually, and having a good group helps.
Yes…want the logo, please.
Hey Brian, Can I ask you something ? I’m a recent fan of yours and a lot just misses me, so … Why do you moved ? I dont’ suppose it’s a coincidence that Denver seems to be a Mecca for webcatoonists, is it ? Thank you for your great job with D20Monkey !
Yeesh DMing doubts. I feel for you Sam. Been there.
There is a Disco Taco in New Mexico, but it’s a tiny red shack and has a very boring logo.
On the other hand, it’s on a road called “Billy the Kid Trail,” which is kind of cool.
New Amy hair. New Amy hat?
SOOOOOOOOOOON
The logo must be revealed. My near future sci-fi city requires a highly regarded eatery.
Is…this a reference to Demolition Man? +1
The King demands both the logo and a number 2 to go.