Monsters and Mazes, one of the world's oldest and most beloved table top games.
Its system and rules are convoluted, there's barely any detail or art, and campaigns can very from an hour to several years.
Yet somehow, it appealed to everyone, and it's all thanks to the freedom the game offers.
Want to save a kingdom from being destroyed by demons?
Rally your comrades and charge!
How about venturing deep into a dragon's lair to steal their treasure?
Absolutely, just be sure to have a Bard to seduce it things go awry.
Sacrificing an entire city to an Evil God in order to become a Lich?
Nothing's stopping you from doing so, short of a bad dice roll.
The amount of freedom this game offers is limitless.
However, there are those who take it too literally.
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Far away in the Kingdom of Marovas, a group of adventurers stormed the King's castle, ready to dethrone the tyrant and his corrupt generals.
Before the entrance to the Throne Room a brave paladin led the charge alongside his comrades, "Onward my friends! Today is the day the banner of tyranny falls and the symbol of freedom shall take its place!"
With a mighty swing of his battle hammer, the giant double doors came crashing down and the adventurers swiftly rush through the gap like mice smelling cheese.
The Evil King rose from his seat to confront the intruders who raised hell in his castle.
"Evil King you will pay for what you did to the people!"
"Ha! Like some filthy mercenaries could topple me. Soon enough my troops will smother the embers of this hopeless thing you call a rebellion. For now, I'll personally deal with you lot and adorn your heads on my front gates."
"Though we may fall today, so long as someone out there utters the word 'freedom' from their lips. The flame of justice-"
Out of the blue, a cheery voice disturbs the tense and serious atmosphere.
"Thanks to the Feature, Vigilance, from my Twilight Priest subclass, and my Alert Feature. I have both advantage and five bonus Initiative Points!
By the way, I rolled a seventeen, that added with my Agility and points from Alert brings my Initiative Points to twenty-five, so I believe I go first!"
"Aww, Hell no!"
'Thump!'
Akira brought his fist down on the table, causing the figurines and game pieces on the board to be displaced.
"You better not ruin this for us, Ren! We waited weeks for this final showdown!"
Ren, a black-haired oriental much like the rest of his friends, nonchalantly waved off Akira.
"Of course, I wouldn't dream of it!"
"Oh, really?"
"Really, name a single time I ruined a session for everyone."
"That time you sacrificed an entire country to ascend to Lichdom?"
"We defeated the final boss didn't we?"
"How about when you blackmailed a noble and nailed the disemboweled body of his only daughter to his front gate?" piped Sunny
"The guy deserved it for his horrible attitude toward us."
"Dude, you made a cheating joke that made him divorce his wife."
"It was funny wasn't it? You all laughed your heads off when I made fun of his sausage "
"Okay, to be fair, it was."
"See? Aside from the disemboweling and some collateral damage. There's no problems so far."
"Oh really? Did you forget the session where you caused a famine by burning all the town's wheat fields and storehouses?" asked Ryoshi.
"The town did not agree to give me their artefact. All I did was teach them a little lesson."
Amiya threw out another question, "What about the time you ripped off a child's head in front of their sick mother?"
"We all knew that sick mother was a Demoness in disguise and the child's just some unwanted little brat born from some prostitute who forgot her birth control pills are expired. I did the kid a favor by sending him to Heaven before he got devoured by a cougar from hell."
"Desecrated the main temple of the Goddess of Marriage and making the entire church our enemy?"
"They were suspicious!"
"Instigated a Witch Hunt that made several innocent women burn at the stake?"
"None of you had any better ideas on how to identify the witch."
"Destroyed an entire orphanage and made the children work in the mines to have them pay off their debt to us for a construction of a new orphanage?"
"Okay! Okay! I get it! I have a tendency to make morally ambiguous choices!"
"Morally ambiguous!?! Calling you a villain is an insult to villains! Everything you do is completely illogical and unwarranted! You are a whimsical, unsympathetic, power-hungry, sadistic hedonist!"
"Ouch. Couldn't you have put it more lightly?"
"That was putting it lightly."
"Okay fine, I promise, I'll behave."
"Look, I swear upon my favorite gacha game, I won't pull any evil shenanigans like take over the kingdom and continue to exploit the masses of Mavoras."
"Don't forget, no sacrificing them."
"Okay."
"No making unwarranted insults."
"Sure."
"And subjecting them to cruelty like Witch Hunts and torture."
"Fine."
"Most importantly..."
""DON'T desecrate a temple!""
"Okay, yeesh fine, I swear upon Grand Eight I won't commit any evil atrocities! Heck I won't even steal candy from a baby! Happy now?"
"Fine, but if you break your promise, you're deleting your account in front of us or we're never playing with you again."
"First off, thanks to the feature, Sanguine Exchange, all the extra health I gain from my Moonlight Priest subclass can be converted into Sanguine Sigils. These Sigils allow me to deal bonus damage. Every d6 of HP I exchange, I can deal 2d6 extra damage using a spell or weapon."
"How much bonus damage do you exactly do?"
"Near the end of our short rest, I used Moonlit Sanctuary for one minute. My Cleric level is six, so that means I've accumulated a total of 30d6 roughly."
"So for every d6 of health you sacrifice, you can deal an additional 2d6?"
"Exactly."
"So basically, you can deal 60d6's worth of damage?"
"Yup!"
Akira turned to the host of the campaign,"Ryoshi! He can't possibly do this can he!?! Isn't there a limit to the amount of Sigils he can have right!?"
Ryoshi, the glass-wearing host, shrugged, "Well, it doesn't say how many sigils he can have, it's only limited by the amount of HP a character has, so technically he's allowed. Although there is a time limit, it's only a hour. Ren developed the sigils near the end of the short rest, and it's only been ten minutes since you guys continued on your way to the throne room."
"Damnit!" Akira tugged at his hair, visibly upset at his friend being up to his usual power-gaming antics.
"Don't forget about my Spirit Cloak, I can deal an additional 4d8 per attack."
"That's it? Just an extra 4d8?"
"Also, I'm using Magic Missile at the seventh level, which is actually nine attacks. Meaning I'm dealing 36d8's worth of damage."
"Well, can't get anymore broken than this."
"I mean, sure that instant-kills the boss, but at least we can fight the corrupt generals-"
"Oh! By the way, thanks to Magic missile, I can split the damage I deal."
""F*ck!""
Ignoring his friends, Ren asked Ryoshi, "Ryoshi, how much health does the Evil King have?"
"293 HP."
"His four generals?"
"Half the Evil King's"
"Alright, so I send half of my Magic missiles to go take out the Evil King and half to
"Roll to hit please."
"Nice! Natural twenty!"
"Well, the Evil King drops dead and his generals are grievously wounded."
"Ha... At least we can all still have some fun fighting the lackeys."
"Oh! I almost forgot! I use Action Surge!"
""F*ck!""
Everyone except Ren and Ryoshi simultaneously slammed their heads against the table.
Funnily enough, their head-banging caused all miniatures to fall over. All miniatures except for an intimidating robed figure with a plague mask, Ren's.
Ryoshi let out a sigh, as the Maze Master, no matter how frustrated he is by the players, he must finish the story.
That is the duty of the Maze Master, to oversee the adventure from beginning to end.
"Ren, what do you do?"
The power-gamer gleefully replied, "I'd like to cast magic missile again, this time on the fifth level."
"I'm not even going to have you roll to hit, just tell me the damage you rolled."
"two-hundred and fifty-six."
"The damage will be split between all of them right?"
"Yup."
The Maze Master let out another defeated sigh, "And with that, the Evil King and all his generals get killed instantly."
After Ryoshi brought a closure to the campaign, Akira lifted his head and let out his frustrations, "Goddamnit! The entire session lasted for less than an hour!"
"Yeah, I planned today's final campaign session to last at least five hours, but Ren just blitzed through all the enemies. Anyone got any ideas?"
"How about playing the new VRMMO version instead? It'll be fun!"
"Why not? The online version should have restrictions that prevent Ren from pulling off his usual BS."
"Sure, I heard it's a lot more skill-reliant compared to what we're playing."
Ren excitedly chimed in, "Let's do it! I've been playing it solo for a bit, it'd be much more fun with friends."
"I somehow have a bad feeling about this."
...
Boom!
Boom!
Boom!
Explosions lit up the entire village, people screamed, limbs flew and fires devoured entire buildings.
No, the village isn't being raided by bandits, sacrificed by cultists or massacred by Demons.
The entire settlement is being flattened like a clothes iron on a wrinkly shirt by none other than a group of five adventurers.
More specifically, by one member who stood in the village square cackling while his comrades, a warrior, druid, monk, and bard stared at him slack-jawed.
Unironically, the member committing such awful atrocities is Ren, who just so happens to be dressed up in a priestly garb.
"Burn in the Holy Flames of Heaven, pagans!"
An adventurer next to Ren, a man in scale armor with a longsword across his back yelled at him over the din of explosions and dying screams. "Oi! Ren! This is a fantasy game! Why the hell do you have grenades!?!"
Ren coolly replied. "Oh, I commissioned these beauties from an Alchemist."
"What!?! How is that possible!?!"
"I own shares in a mining company, so it's pretty easy to the materials needed to make the explosives."
"How did you convince an Alchemist to make bombs for you!?!"
"Thanks to my multiclass in Bard, I just rizzed her up real good. Don't worry I didn't do anything explicit with her."
"That only leaves us with more questions!"
"But most importantly..."
""Why did you have to bomb the entire village!?!""
"Remember how we're hunting cultists? Well a bunch of them are disguised as villagers, it's a hassle to unmask all of them. Besides! The quest didn't say anything about collateral damage. So as long as the cultists are eliminated, the quest should be considered complete! Plus, we get to loot the village as well! A win-win situation!"
"Screw it! I'm done with your bullshit!"
The warrior threw down his longsword in frustration and taps something in the air.
Mousey1405 has left the party.
A scantily clad male druid wearing nothing but a bush around his waist raises his hand in agreement, "Same."
ClassyMoustache has left the party.
"Come on! Don't be like that! Sure there's some collateral damage, but we got the job done didn't we?"
The monk lets out a sigh, "Ren, you massacred an entire village."
"Technically my Familiar did the massacring. All I did was provide him with the means to do so."
"Doesn't matter, you still gave it the means to do so."
"You don't see people blaming gun manufacturers for the deaths caused in WW1 and WW2."
"Wh-!?! Dude!?! How is that even relevant!?! This and that are completely different things! You purposefully ordered your Familiar to bomb the village! Screw this! I'm leaving as well."
The monk, Amiya stomped away in anger as he to left the game.
Bamdooch has left the party.
The last of Ren's friends, the bard and the sole female in their group shook her head, "Sorry Ren, but playing with you isn't fun anymore."
"What!?! How could you say such a thing, Sunny! I'm the life of the party!"
"This is precisely why everyone quit. You're always thinking about yourself, you never give a thought to others."
"Ridiculous! Didn't we have fun on Akira's campaign last summer break?"
"Yeah, after we spent five sessions helping you build a criminal empire, and another three sessions where you seduce the princess and have her help you overthrow the kingdom where you had your Simulacrum rule in your stead as King."
"Come on! I helped you slay the dragon to avenge your family, didn't I?
"Slay it!? You literally solo-ed the beast! None of us got a single hit in! The entire encounter was over in less than five minutes!"
"Wait! Come on! Sunny, don't-"
SunnyEggs has left the party.
"Damnit!"
As the fires finally die out, and the screams of innocents slowly came to a halt. A single lonely player stood amidst the carnage, bemoaning his loneliness.
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Sigh, this always happens.
Whenever I want to let loose and have fun, I always drive my friends away from me.
All I want is to be filthy rich, nigh omnipotent, immortal, raise an unstoppable army, conquer other lands and see bodies fly.
I can't blame them, my desires are a tad bit extreme, but still, all I want is a bit of fun.
Maybe I should quit playing MnM for a while.
Sike! Why should I quit playing MnM? Just because those sore losers can't handle my awesomeness?
Hell nah!
"If they don't wanna team up with me. I'll just play the game solo!"
"A fantastic idea! With your skills and cunning, I'm sure you'll do just fine!"
"Of course! I've defeated several Dungeon Bosses all by my lonesome in the game!
Okay to be fair, I had some help from a horde of Undead I controlled with my Necromancer Subclass, but those guys were just meat shields. The real DPS champion was me!"
Wait.
All my friends logged off, and I'm pretty sure everyone in the village is dead. So who's speaking to me?
Out of the blue, a bright flash of light momentarily blinds my eyes. An orb of light descended from the skies.
As the orb got closer and closer to the ground, I could make out a figure.
Crap! Are my power-gaming habits catching up to me! Am I about to receive divine retribution!
"Behold! It is, I!
The Patron Lord of Heroes!
The Giver of Quests!
The Recorder of Legends!
I am The Maze Master!"
...
What the f-