Thunder rolled and lightning struck as Discord, wearing long blue robes, a crown of antlers, and a necklace of bells, cackled madly in a world of dust and rain that fell up.
"Fools! Do you think you can stand against he who has power over life and death?! With a wink, I can turn your blood to ketchup! With a snap, I can turn your brain into an Etch-a-Sketch! My power is absolute! Aha! Ahahahahahaaaaa! Now come and join my armies of the corrupt and the defiled!!"
At his side, a small dragon in illustrious red-and-gold robes with gold spaulders shaped like angel wings looked over his laminated, waterproof papers, with half-lidded eyes. "Grogarus rolls Twilight for intimidation," Spike said in a monotone, sighing. "+2 for that speech. Roll 17 to succeed."
Discord looked down at him with a frown. "O.O.C: Is something wrong, Spike?" he asked suspiciously.
"No, it's fine," Spike mumbled. "It was a great villainous boast. You basically can't roll lower than 16 right now."
Discord's suspicious pout moved to the side of his face and then right off of it. He grabbed it out of the air and slapped it back onto his head. He then waved a paw. A 20-sided die levitated over to him. It bore the numbers 2~19, as well as two small images of Twilight Sparkle's face - one ashamed, one terrifyingly elated.
The die grew wings much like Twilight's and flew into a dice cup. "Books!" it cried in a high-pitched voice.
"Do you really need to cheat," Spike groaned, "You've got like a 1 in 5 chance of a 20."
"O.O.C: Cheat?!" Discord gasped, leaning back scandalized with one paw over his heart. "Why I never cheat at O&O. Do I ever cheat at O&O, Big Macintosh?"
"Eeeeee... nay, laddie," Big Macintosh said. He was covered in massive plate armor and had a huge orange beard. There was a hammer and an anvil strapped to his back.
"O.O.Seeee?! Big Macintosh, brother of Honest Applejack, says I don't cheat." Discord said in a matter-of-fact voice, hands on his hips. "I don't know why he said it in character when I was speaking out of character, but... so there. Now what is your problem, Spike? You're acting like you don't like this game anymore."
"It's not that," Spike said. "You guys just kinda... play the same characters every time."
"I... beg your pardon!" Discord scoffed. "When have I ever played a necromancer before!"
"You're always a nuke mage and Big Mac is always a warrior."
"No he's not!" Discord turned and gestured. "He's a blacksmith right now. Look at him. Aren't you a blacksmith, Big Mac?"
"Eeeee... och aye."
Spike rubbed his temples. "A blacksmith fights the same way a warrior does."
Discord sniffed haughtily, then snapped his fingers. They were all sitting around the Cutie Map again, out of costume. "Well! What are you trying to say. You're tired of us?!" Big Macintosh jumped, then looked at Spike with big puppy eyes and a trembly lip.
"N-no, no, that's not it!" Spike stammered. "I mean... Well... Maybe I just need a break. We do play this game all the time."
"Seven hours a session, four times a week is not 'all the time'!!" Discord objected. "Is that 'all the time', Big Macintosh?"
"Eeeeee... it kinda is," Big Macintosh countered and began to speak quite rapidly, "Applejack's madder 'n' a wet hen on 'count of I'm so far behind on m' chores." He started counting on his one hoof over and over. "I've got apple-buckin', rotten-old-fence-kickin', field-plowin', clothes-washin', alien-watchin', cow-milkin', carrot-pickin', 'n' aw heck she ain't half as mad as Sugar Belle --"
"Oh fine!" Discord made a big show of getting up and sashaying towards the closed door. "We will 'take a break', Spike. Big Macintosh, let's go! We are not wanted here. Hmmph!" He snapped his fingers again and they both disappeared.
Spike sighed sadly and started to clean up the game. On the other side of the closed door, Twilight Sparkle slowed her breathing, stopped panicking that Discord was about to catch her eavesdropping, and had many worried-snooping-sister-mom thoughts about Spike's obvious Friendship Problem.
"You were eavesdropping?!" Spike roared.
"Yes I was!" Twilight Sparkle admitted firmly. "Because some-dragon has been in a really bad mood all week and you wouldn't tell me what it was!"
Spike opened his mouth to yell more, then closed it and nodded his head. "That's fair." he said calmly. "I woulda done the same thing."
"And do you wanna know what else?" Twilight said, spreading out her wings and putting on her proud-of-herself face, standing as tall as she could. "I can solve your Friendship Problem!"
"I... don't think this is a Friendship Problem. Not with the capitalized letters, anyway," Spike objected. "I mean the Cutie Map didn't glow or anything --"
"Ahahaha, oh Spike, the Cutie Map wouldn't formally send me to my own house." Twilight laughed and patted his head. "That would be too silly even for my life. Nope! I'm already here, and we're gonna solve this problem together."
Spike sighed, defeated. "Okay, fine, what's your Friendship Solution." he mumbled reluctantly.
"I thought you'd never ask! You're gonna love it, it's so elegant and logical."
"Sure." he deadpanned.
"Okay, listen. Fact #1: You're getting tired of playing O&O with Macintosh and Discord. Fact #2: They're upset and won't want to play with you for a while anyway. Fact #3: You don't have any friends closer to your own age."
"Do you even remember what my age is?" he asked.
Twilight stopped with her mouth open and started counting on her feathers. "... Thirteen..? I got you when I was eleven I think, so... I swear I remember when your birthday is."
"I'd hope so. You've already bought calendars for the next ten years and marked everyone's birthday on all of them."
"Enough-about-my-weird-quirks-let's-talk-about-my-solution!" Twilight stamped her hooves. "I have here a list of good candidates for you to play your next session of O&O with." She summoned a parchment and let it drop open.
Spike cringed and leaned back.... but for once, Twilight's list was short. It didn't even touch the ground. Spike blinked at it, disbelieving.
Twilight blinked too, a big nervous smile on her face. "There are a finite number of residents in Ponyville, as opposed to the infinite capacity of my brain to give myself more arbitrary and often redundant work to do."
"Sounds legit."
"Anyway." Twilight cleared her throat delicately. "While I have studied the rules of Ogres & Oubliettes indepth - very indepth - I was unfortunately not able to decisively determine which of the four vital party roles each of these individuals was likely to play. You'll have to..." Her face twisted into a grimace. "Y-you'll have to guess, I'm afraid." She made a distasteful face and stuck her tongue out.
"... You're supposed to have a party of four?!" Spike wondered aloud.
"Spike, haven't you been playing this game for like... a year? You should know that the bare minimum viable party is 3 ponies: an attacker, a tank, and a healer. It helps a lot to have a fourth character for support skills. Those could be status effects, civil skills, trap detection, et cetera."
"Well no freaking wonder the game's stopped being fun!!" Spike pulled at his crest. "Macintosh and Discord can't fill all the party roles! They're always opening mimics, and walking into quicksand, and murdering entire towns I spent days writing stories for with a single mispronounced word. Every single encounter is a huge chore! Agh, we're so stupid!"
"Nope," Twilight shook her head. "Just stubborn as heck. Here," and she put the list into his paws, "Think it over. Don't rush. Oh, and one more thing, Spike?"
"What's that?" He said absently, looking down the list.
"Don't let them make just any insane character they want. There's gotta be party cohesion. You gotta put your cute little feet down sometime."
Spike was pretty bad at that when everyone he knew was either bigger, stronger, or louder than him.