Issue #8: The Beginning of the Beginning

In Memory of Shamus Young, who died 6/16/2022, and also created DM of the Rings, the first webcomic that used the style of taking screenshots and turning them into a funny story about people sitting around a table playing an RPG. He was a great man and without him Darths and Droids wouldn't have existed and therefore neither would have Michelle's Campaign Utility. We owe him a lot and it's too bad his death was so sudden.

Rest in Peace, Shamus Young.

SCRIPT:

8.1

Two weeks later…

Steve: So we doing this or what?

8.2

Michelle: You don’t have to sound upset about it, Steven.

Steve: I’m not. I’m doing you a favor, aren’t I?

Michelle: And I’m still doing this to make you feel better.

8.3

Michelle: I wish you would stop blaming me for making you move out here. It was a mutual decision if you don’t remember.

Steven: I do. And I’m not angry at you… I’m sorry. I appreciate you doing this for me.

8.4

Michelle: Yeah, okay. I’m sorry too. And thanks for giving me another chance Steven. I've been reading up like you said and…

Steven: Oh you picked a system, Mish? What are we playing? GURPS? Dungeon Crawler? D&D?

8.5

Michelle: I read through all those and a few others but none of them felt right to me. So I made my own system.

Steven: You made your own? Wait, you read all the roleplaying systems? All of them?

Michelle: Well, duh, I told you I learned to speed read in college.

8.6

Michelle: Anyway, I have dice this time and-

Steven: Wait, are all those binders full of pages for your campaign?

8.7

Michelle: I didn’t write a campaign. I don’t have to, you know? I figure why write an entire campaign if people are just going to get angry and storm off in the middle of it anyway. That’s the system I designed. It will give us the campaign. It's my "Campaign Utility." You see?

Steven: Um…sure.

8.8

Michelle: Yes, now to decide the setting and everything.

Steven: You're rolling all those dice?

Michelle: Yeah it's part of the utility.

*Roll *Roll *Roll *Roll *Roll *Roll *Roll *Roll *Roll *Roll *Roll *Roll

Steven: And that all tells you something? Do you add them all together?

Michelle: For this roll, each die does something different. Umm, hold on this will be easier if I grab my laptop, I have it all backed up on there…

*Clickety clack click-n-clack

Steven: They all mean something else huh? What does the 4-sided die do?

Michelle: That just decided the time of day. It's the middle of the night, by the way.