Roleplaying GamesThe all-purpose forum for general advice or system-independent (or multi-system) discussion. Come discuss adventure plots, gamemastering dilemmas, or player advice here. For ruleset-specific discussions, see the subforums.
Hey, I was wondering if anyone out there had any interesting stories about near-death situations that you, or your friends, survived.
Just to clarify, I don't necessarily mean something that the DM set up to kill you. I'm more asking about a character who got in a bad situation, the player was just about to roll up a new character, when he pulled off some crazy move and survived somehow.
For example, I once had a paladin who was about to sacrifice himself to get by a group of ogre magi. He gave one of the ogres his axe and knelt down, completely willing to die. The ogre used a coup de grace on the paladin, smashed it into his neck, but I got a lucky fortitude save and the party rescued me pretty quickly. So, the paladin almost had his head chopped off and survived. From that point forward, he was called The Green Knight.
I remember a fight against a young adult blue dragon and 6 drow slaves. Our party was about 4th level and definitely out classed. However I took leadership position (I was playing an elf cleric of Tamara) and with some team work (and a few lucky rolls) we were winning the fight. The blue dragon was getting torqued off that he was losing minions.
Blue: "Surrender!"
Me: "What, you wish to surrender to us? Very well, we'll gladly accept!"
GM: "Do you actually say that?"
Me: "Yeah well he offered."
This obviously insulted the blue dragon and he dove at me, pinning me to the ground with only 3 hit points to my name. I was pretty sure next round I'd be dragon kibble so on my "last" turn I tried casting a spell (while pinned) called Balor's Nimbus (I think). Succeeded the Concentration check and the spell gave me an aura of fire, causing fire damage to anything in graple with me. Well I maxed out the damage dice and brought the young blue dragon to single digit hit points as well. He was about to bite my head off when he realized that all his drow slaves were defeated and he was surrounded by the remaining party, weapons drawn on him.
The dragon took a double move to make a hastey retreat
And I lived to heal another day.
Last edited by DigoDragon : 06-04-2008 at 07:44 AM.
__________________
"Nothing you can't spell will ever work." - Will Rogers
"What you must learn is that these rules are no different than the rules of a computer system. Some of them can be bent. Others can be broken." - Morpheus, The Matrix
Quote:
Originally Posted by Krellen
Remember, Evil isn't "selfish". It's Evil. "Look out for number one" is a Neutral attitude. Evil looks out for number one while crushing number two.
I allready posted my best "Holy crap, I'm alive?" story, so it's re-produced here in spoiler format.
Spoiler
To keep this from turning into a novel, I'll skim over the backstory about this situation the best I can.
- Around first level, early on in the game, my group (generally chaotic, and good, in various quantities) had to take a low level cleric of the Silver Flame hostage for various reasons I won't get into detail about here.
- We didn't mean this cleric any harm, and weren't planning on hurting him. We just needed a hostage that the authorities would be worried about being responsible for killing to cover our bases.
- The party went out for some business while I kept watch over the cleric. I was our Plan B, as the rest of the party could warn that their failing to return to our hideout, alone, would mean me slitting his throat. A bluff, but that was the plan.
- I'm alone with this sniveling tied up cleric for a good two days. During that time, I kept binding a vestige to keep my power level up and ready in case I found myself in an emergency.
So on three seperate occasions, this cleric of the silver flame sees me drawing an enigmatic seal, and verbally making a pact with a terrifying monstrosity from outside of reality to share my soul with it for 24 hours. He knows my name.
*******
Cut to 3 levels, and a number of months of adventuring later. We're all level 4, and becoming rather notorious. Our group goes by the general style that level 1 is an average person, level 2-3 is exceptionally skilled and noteworthy people, that level 4 is fantastically capable, and that level 5 is the equivalent of an olympic athlete or a noble prize winning scientist or some such. Above level 5 is superheroic to varying degrees.
So we're a bit infamous in some circles. We're not bad guys, but we're certainly not doing things by the book, off the beaten path, marching to the beat of our own drum-... you get it.
My group is trying to pass through a mid sized town without much fuss, maybe pick up some gear and refresh our supplies, and head out to our next destination under the radar.
Because it's relevant to the story at hand, I'll list some facts about me at this point.
- I have a vestige bound that grants 10 fire resistance
- I have a class feature that grants 5 fire resistance
- I have a cute little ring that gives me 10 fire resistance and my DM agrees that they all stack cause he's cool with stuff like that.
- The vestige I have bound brands a symbol into my palm as a sign of our pact (a temporary brand, but still).
- The vestige I have bound also gives me the ability to wreath myself in flames. The flames wouldn't hurt me, so the fire resistance doesn't matter, but it's still relevant info.
- I'm wearing a sort of low-key-but-still-elegant noble outfit, as the partys spokesperson I like to look presentable. My scruffy, scarred up, slightly pungent 'allies' probably look like mercernary bodyguards or something.
On to the story. Our party decides we could use some healing gear, and the logical place to hit up for something like that is the local temple. Which just happens to be dedicated to the Silver Flame. I'm fairly confident that my charisma will get me through this without hassle, and probably at a discount, despite being a shifter (and therefor a second class citizen in most places, especially to the silver flame).
I meet the guard in front of the temple and start smooth talking. I introduce us as a party of adventurers, and ask if we might purchase some healing potions to keep us in one peice if we encounter any trouble. The guard says he thinks he's hear of us.
I put on the charmed/elated act, thinking maybe he'll suck up to the bigshots. I introduce myself as >my name< (DANGER WILL ROBINSON) and reach out to shake his hand.
He asks, "THE >my name<???"
"No one but! :)"
He reaches out to shake my hand. Grabs my wrist. Looks at my palm. Accuses me of being a heretic heathen, declares me guilty on the spot, and tries to abduct me for a swift execution.
Oh boy.
The ensuing chaos was remarkable. This bumpkin town is immediately whipped into a frenzy, with people shrieking "Witch!", "Heretic!" ect. so a full on city street full of 1st level commoners, a handful of silver flame guards of undetermined class or level, and a few more higher level tempalrs coming out of the temple. All trying to abduct me.
In the frenzy, my group has managed to keep a low profile, and comes up with a fantastic idea. As I'm attempting an acrobatic escape/dodge/jackie chan style climbing running and sliding scene, the party rogue comes up, sneak attacks me with a blackjack to the back of the head, and knocks me out cold.
And they PRESENT ME TO THE GUARDS SAYING THEY CAPTURED ME.
THOSE RAT BASTARDS.
They get REWARDED for being the ones to bring me down, and I'm immediately tied to a post and a pyre is built. I wake up as they give a small speech about impurities in the world being cleansed with holy fire, and they light the bonfire. It flares up, and I am officially being burned at the stake for being a heathen.
While my party looks on with a sick shrug.
But wait. My story gets better.
The DM declares that the open flame, combined with my 25 fire resistance, isn't enough to actually do me any damage. The fires flare up, and my poofy noble clothes are now aflame.
The fire burns through the rope (met with open mouthed staring) before it actually hurts me, thanks to the fire resistance. I crawl down OVER the bonfire, looking for all the world like some japanese horror vision, while literally engulfed in natural flame. I activate my vestiges halo wreath of fire, doubling the intensity of the flame visually, and give my best feral roar while shifting (+2 strength yay) and strike out at the nearest person, a random guy standing in the street in terror. The Dm decides that no real dice roll is needed, as he's frozen in terror, and my clawed, flaming hand rakes most of his face off and drops him. Things near me are starting to combust, and I'm leaving scorching footprints.
The crowd scrambles like a cattle stampede. All but two of the silver flame templars turn tail and run, screaming into the evening. My 'friends' immediately do a double double cross, the rogue slits ones throat and they all beat the other one to death there in the street. While I stand there. On fire. Staring angrily.
They tried to play it off that they knew I was going to get out of the situation.
"We knew you'd be fine, we remembered you had all that fire resistance"
"no you didn't. You didn't know they would use fire. They could have cut my head off."
"Oh come on, they ALWAYS burn heretics at the stake..."
"..."
"We remembered the fire resistance!"
"No you didn't"
"...hmm."
"*stares angrily*"
"You know you're still on fire."
"I am aware."
Picture this: my character was a force-using dragon with a flying body tank. Not canon, but very freaking cool.
Unfortunately, I had taken an extreme Primitive flaw which meant that bows and arrows were about space-age technology for me. Yeeeaah...it was only a matter of time before I lost control of the body tank and crashed...on a high-gravity world...at top speed.
Fortunately, I just happened to land in a bog. The rest of the party, when they finally unearthed me, needed the Jaws of Life to get me out of the 'tank before the medics could do anything. Fortunately, it turns out that a body tank works surprisingly well as a body-cast in such a circumstance.
In the end, I came away with an Old Injury flaw and my body tank was pretty much just scrap metal.
I think the GM had really been regretting letting me have that body tank anyway.
I allready posted my best "Holy crap, I'm alive?" story, so it's re-produced here in spoiler format.
Spoiler
To keep this from turning into a novel, I'll skim over the backstory about this situation the best I can.
- Around first level, early on in the game, my group (generally chaotic, and good, in various quantities) had to take a low level cleric of the Silver Flame hostage for various reasons I won't get into detail about here.
- We didn't mean this cleric any harm, and weren't planning on hurting him. We just needed a hostage that the authorities would be worried about being responsible for killing to cover our bases.
- The party went out for some business while I kept watch over the cleric. I was our Plan B, as the rest of the party could warn that their failing to return to our hideout, alone, would mean me slitting his throat. A bluff, but that was the plan.
- I'm alone with this sniveling tied up cleric for a good two days. During that time, I kept binding a vestige to keep my power level up and ready in case I found myself in an emergency.
So on three seperate occasions, this cleric of the silver flame sees me drawing an enigmatic seal, and verbally making a pact with a terrifying monstrosity from outside of reality to share my soul with it for 24 hours. He knows my name.
*******
Cut to 3 levels, and a number of months of adventuring later. We're all level 4, and becoming rather notorious. Our group goes by the general style that level 1 is an average person, level 2-3 is exceptionally skilled and noteworthy people, that level 4 is fantastically capable, and that level 5 is the equivalent of an olympic athlete or a noble prize winning scientist or some such. Above level 5 is superheroic to varying degrees.
So we're a bit infamous in some circles. We're not bad guys, but we're certainly not doing things by the book, off the beaten path, marching to the beat of our own drum-... you get it.
My group is trying to pass through a mid sized town without much fuss, maybe pick up some gear and refresh our supplies, and head out to our next destination under the radar.
Because it's relevant to the story at hand, I'll list some facts about me at this point.
- I have a vestige bound that grants 10 fire resistance
- I have a class feature that grants 5 fire resistance
- I have a cute little ring that gives me 10 fire resistance and my DM agrees that they all stack cause he's cool with stuff like that.
- The vestige I have bound brands a symbol into my palm as a sign of our pact (a temporary brand, but still).
- The vestige I have bound also gives me the ability to wreath myself in flames. The flames wouldn't hurt me, so the fire resistance doesn't matter, but it's still relevant info.
- I'm wearing a sort of low-key-but-still-elegant noble outfit, as the partys spokesperson I like to look presentable. My scruffy, scarred up, slightly pungent 'allies' probably look like mercernary bodyguards or something.
On to the story. Our party decides we could use some healing gear, and the logical place to hit up for something like that is the local temple. Which just happens to be dedicated to the Silver Flame. I'm fairly confident that my charisma will get me through this without hassle, and probably at a discount, despite being a shifter (and therefor a second class citizen in most places, especially to the silver flame).
I meet the guard in front of the temple and start smooth talking. I introduce us as a party of adventurers, and ask if we might purchase some healing potions to keep us in one peice if we encounter any trouble. The guard says he thinks he's hear of us.
I put on the charmed/elated act, thinking maybe he'll suck up to the bigshots. I introduce myself as >my name< (DANGER WILL ROBINSON) and reach out to shake his hand.
He asks, "THE >my name<???"
"No one but! :)"
He reaches out to shake my hand. Grabs my wrist. Looks at my palm. Accuses me of being a heretic heathen, declares me guilty on the spot, and tries to abduct me for a swift execution.
Oh boy.
The ensuing chaos was remarkable. This bumpkin town is immediately whipped into a frenzy, with people shrieking "Witch!", "Heretic!" ect. so a full on city street full of 1st level commoners, a handful of silver flame guards of undetermined class or level, and a few more higher level tempalrs coming out of the temple. All trying to abduct me.
In the frenzy, my group has managed to keep a low profile, and comes up with a fantastic idea. As I'm attempting an acrobatic escape/dodge/jackie chan style climbing running and sliding scene, the party rogue comes up, sneak attacks me with a blackjack to the back of the head, and knocks me out cold.
And they PRESENT ME TO THE GUARDS SAYING THEY CAPTURED ME.
THOSE RAT BASTARDS.
They get REWARDED for being the ones to bring me down, and I'm immediately tied to a post and a pyre is built. I wake up as they give a small speech about impurities in the world being cleansed with holy fire, and they light the bonfire. It flares up, and I am officially being burned at the stake for being a heathen.
While my party looks on with a sick shrug.
But wait. My story gets better.
The DM declares that the open flame, combined with my 25 fire resistance, isn't enough to actually do me any damage. The fires flare up, and my poofy noble clothes are now aflame.
The fire burns through the rope (met with open mouthed staring) before it actually hurts me, thanks to the fire resistance. I crawl down OVER the bonfire, looking for all the world like some japanese horror vision, while literally engulfed in natural flame. I activate my vestiges halo wreath of fire, doubling the intensity of the flame visually, and give my best feral roar while shifting (+2 strength yay) and strike out at the nearest person, a random guy standing in the street in terror. The Dm decides that no real dice roll is needed, as he's frozen in terror, and my clawed, flaming hand rakes most of his face off and drops him. Things near me are starting to combust, and I'm leaving scorching footprints.
The crowd scrambles like a cattle stampede. All but two of the silver flame templars turn tail and run, screaming into the evening. My 'friends' immediately do a double double cross, the rogue slits ones throat and they all beat the other one to death there in the street. While I stand there. On fire. Staring angrily.
They tried to play it off that they knew I was going to get out of the situation.
"We knew you'd be fine, we remembered you had all that fire resistance"
"no you didn't. You didn't know they would use fire. They could have cut my head off."
"Oh come on, they ALWAYS burn heretics at the stake..."
"..."
"We remembered the fire resistance!"
"No you didn't"
"...hmm."
"*stares angrily*"
"You know you're still on fire."
"I am aware."
What I want is a post with links to all your cool stories . I'd missed this one somehow, and it's great.
System: Delta Green (modern day Call of Cthulhu). Situation: I'm the GM, the players are on a boat over an oceanic trench. They've just sent a cybernetic dolphin with a nuclear depth charge on a suicide run into the Deep One city far below (don't ask, far too much backstory to explain).
Boom. The ocean roils, boils, and suddenly a massive tentacle, hundreds of feet high, breaks the waves. The players on deck wisely abandon ship. One PC, who was below decks at the moon pool, getting ready to dive, doesn't know anything's wrong until the tentacle sweeps away the top of the ship. Now he can see the sky from four decks down, can see the giant tentacle getting ready to smash the ship to pieces.
"What do you do?," I ask.
A long pause. "I put in my rebreather."
Smash, down comes the tentacle.
An hour later, the survivors find the player, floating unconcious but alive, because he had been smart enough - or stunned enough - to put in his rebreather.
My players have infiltrated the frosty lair of a Mature Adult White Dragon hidden high up in the mountains. By "infiltrate", I mean they had the Rogue infiltrate it, and before he got back, they got bored and decided to kill every living thing in the entire cave complex. Chaotic Evil Arctic Troglodytes and what-not.
Anyway, the final confrontation with the dragon has the Cleric out of healing spells, followed by him getting walloped with a Full Attack directly to the face, dropping him to exactly 0 hit points. The other three players do their stuff, but the Cleric is the one who carries all the healing items, so they're kinda stuck in that regard.
The Cleric uses his one disabled action to cast CLW from a wand to get him back to 13hp (he rolled max). Now that he is no longer disabled, he uses a move action to flee the immediate vicinity of the dragon (who had used his AoO for the round on a different PC). The dragon leaps into the air and Crushes (as in the attack) the Cleric and the nearby Ranger. He rolls near-lowest, dealing exactly 13hp, bringing the Cleric back to 0 and disabled.
The following round, one of the Cleric's magic items kicks in, casting a Freedom of Movement spell on him automatically, getting him out of the Pin, and he casts CLW from the wand again, getting him back up to 10hp this time.
The dragon decides to use his breath weapon rather than continue to pin the Ranger, as he can simultaneously hit the Cleric, Rogue, and Scout all at the same time. The Cleric rolls a 19 on his reflex save (he needed a 19 or 20) and takes exactly 10 damage, dropping him to 0hp.
The next round, the Cleric wands himself back up into the positives again and moves farther away. The Dragon, more than a little annoyed at this point, decided to just Full Attack the Ranger, killing him instantly, and then leaves.
The funny thing is that we've never had anyone dropped to exactly 0hp before, or since. These were all 3 occurrences, bam, bam, bam, all in one session.
Well, you see... I had this Living Greyhawk character named Viktor Greyseed. Viktor was a pretentionous elitist wizard of the highest order... his best friend (and i use that term loosely) was a cleric of Boccob. One day, we were attacked by these rediculous dire wolves with spell resistance (at like 4th level). EVERYONE was almost dead... Viktor, with a mighty sigh, moved up to the last dire wolf (who had yet to be touched) and proceeded to beat on it with his quarterstaff. The dire wolf crit him and took him to 3 hit points... but he faught on, not getting hit again and beat that dire wolf senseless.
From that point forward, his nickname... as given by the cleric of boccob... was Viktor the Invincible.
It later proved true when he was charged by not one... not two... not three... but FOUR fiendish girralons and they all missed. He moved back, cast on the defensive and fireballed them into oblivion.
I've been dropped by Vampires several times now, on my poor half-orc (who has since been retired). Almost dropped by Shadows several times.
First time: We're trying to move around a city that's been captured by Bugbears and their undead "allies". (long story, they're pretty unwilling allies.)
We're ambushed by a Vampire (probably not a vampire lord, but a pretty powerful full-fledged one. I fail my will save.
He doesn't tell me to attack my friends, but rather to ATTACK THE BUGBEARS. My half-orc is a tribal enemy of goblinoids, so...
I go running off, to jump into combat at the city.
Our wonderful awesome Cleric of Pelor puts a Hold Person on me, so I'm stuck. I can't run, which is good.
I can't move. OH CRAP. Mr. Vampire decides to come over and take a few bites out of me.
I was at -6 after two hits (due to negative levels and hitpoint loss). If he crit, or just rolled higher...
The second I got dominated, I started rolling up a Spiked Chain tripper fighter to pass the time.
Occasion 2: We return to this city, after handling another vampire at a small town, by taking out more than 50 vampire spawn. Yea, wizards are that cheesy. After teleport-killing the Cleric of Nerull in command at the tower, we go down and begin peace talks between the Bugbears and Humans. On the way down the tower, I got dropped to 2 Strength by a couple of Shadows. o.o (If you didn't know, when a Shadow drops you to 0 Strength, you become one.)
After beginning peace talks, I got ambushed by a Vampire. Again.
Slam, Slam. Down to negatives. Again.
The group scry-teleported to me, found me (and a bunch of people) in carts being pulled by skeletons, while a few clerics of Nerull and a Lich watched.
They "killed" the Lich, while I got paralyzed by the lich's touch.
Yea, I retired that character.
__________________
Play a wizard. Be the Goddamn Batman.
I allready posted my best "Holy crap, I'm alive?" story, so it's re-produced here in spoiler format.
No offense, but that party was definitely not good. Neutral, probably. I mean, you killed a civilian whose only sin was being an ignorant commoner watching a public spectacle.
My current character: Guy, the Human Druid//Ninja, banished warrior of the peaceful tribes, disgraced by an overpowered/underaged mage. (Backstory)
Guy and company are searching for a pirate hideout. We standing on a sandbar about 50ft from shore, which is actually a cliff face that we climbed down. We see a hole, and decide to investigate...tomorrow. (We're not stupid. We needed to prepare.)
While swimming back to the cliff-and-rope from the sandbar, wouldn'tcha know it, but we're attacked by a monstrous shark. HUZZAH! So, I ended up getting knocked to 0 hp a couple times, healing myself with my disabled action (this was the first time I'd ever seen 0hp, too). Finally, I get up the rope and to the top of the cliff. I look down and our cleric's legs have been practically stripped of flesh, and our meat-shield is trying to axe-hack and swim at the same time. (Maybe the other way around...)
So, I swan dive onto the shark, battle fans a blaze with everything working in my favor for my coveted Sudden Strike.
(I'd like to take this moment to say that I had maxed out my Jump check, cause...y'know...Ninja.)
I fail my jump check, horribly. Natural 1, which put me at an 8 or something. I headbonk the shark, dealing 1d4 falling damage to it, and 4d6 to me. 0hp again. I used my disabled action to stab a fan into it as deep as I can, since I'm tied to the fan. I'm now being dragged around by the shark.
The cleric, who is still alive somehow, heals me with a wonderful houserule that Cure spells work from 15ft away. I come up to about half hp. Then, the spellthief//shugenja took the gnome rogue//sorc's (new to the group that session) crossbow, leaving the gnome to...throw big rocks.
Guess what didn't hit the shark...The Big Rocks.
Guess what did hit me...The Big Rocks.
I ended up pulling my fan out of the shark to just run.
Guess what killed the shark... not the fan, actually. It was rounds later that we finally cut it up enough that it died.
I hate the ocean.
__________________
Avatar by Lindorm. Doll by Recaiden. Thanks, guys.
Spoiler
I am the Burley, formerly known as Burley Warlock. I got my name changed. Please remember me...
No offense, but that party was definitely not good. Neutral, probably. I mean, you killed a civilian whose only sin was being an ignorant commoner watching a public spectacle.
No offense, but that party was definitely not good. Neutral, probably. I mean, you killed a civilian whose only sin was being an ignorant commoner watching a public spectacle.
To be fair, since the spectacle was his own execution, that is a neutral action at worst.
Now if he had been randomly killing at a random public execution, that would be bad, but participating in public spectacles like that is hardly a good aligned action.
Last edited by Norsesmithy : 06-04-2008 at 11:41 AM.
No offense, but that party was definitely not good. Neutral, probably. I mean, you killed a civilian whose only sin was being an ignorant commoner watching a public spectacle.
I'm sorry? What was that?
I couldn't hear you over the sound of us saving the world at great personal cost.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Chronicled
What I want is a post with links to all your cool stories . I'd missed this one somehow, and it's great.
I don't have THAT many stories
But since you're interested, here's the revenge I brought on their heads:
Spoiler
So I got my revenge tonight, and it was sweet and tasty.
One common trait of our games is that we leave a MOUNTAIN of notes after each session. We all carry a small notepad, and anything we need to discuss in private, we scribble on the notepad. Helps keeping out-of-character knowledge from becmoing an issue, because you didn't hear that information in the first place. The most common notes are between the DM and players, but if characters decide to head off to discuss something alone, we can actually plot without the DMs fore-knowledge of our plan. Makes things interesting.
And we recycle the massive amounts of paper we tear through, don't worry.
Anyway, the end result is that we don't really raise eyebrows when secret notes are being passed. It's a given, and it's not necessarily something sinister, just a roleplaying aide.
So my party (now level 5, the last level before we become engines of superheroic destruction), finds a relatively quiet out-of-the-way corner of the world to crash in for a few days and collect our bearings after some particularily BAD planning went south. We had a mini quest in the town helping out a gnome stage magician (this was NOT something I set up, the DM dropped it on us as randomly as anything else, I had no prior knowledge about it).
Then we planned on relaxing for the evening. While the party started a brawl in a bar for entertainment (really.) I headed out for a shopping excursion. Since this was all out-of-character stuff for the other players, it consisted of me and the DM passing notes about what I was hoping to accomplish, while he DMed a random bar fight.
As a side note, the vestige I had bound gave me a number of random abilities, one of which included being treated as a wizard of my level when it came to using spell trigger items like wands, so I could use em freely same as a 5th level wizard.
Now, what I did, and the DM approved readily, was find the gnomish stage magician we'd helped earlier, and talk to him about buying some of his stage magic stuff, which the gnome was fine with (he was a real spellcaster who just happened to use it in theatrics instead of adventuring, putting on a 'brilliant' show for entertainment purposes).
So I came back to my party with
- A number of wands that did various useless magical tricks
- A few pints of flammable oil
The local authorities (with a semi-southern sherrif twang, which was a ncie touch) were berrating my party for causing such a ruckus. He let them go with a slap on the wrist cause he could tell 'they didn't mean no real harm', along with a warning to keep their noses clean until they passed to the next town. My party sheepishly agreed that the fun was over, and we headed to a nearby inn for the night.
We were going to get seperate rooms, but I suggested we'd probably feel fine with crashing in a room together (we did it in dungeons and the wilderness anyway) and it'd keep our cost down, which in the long run could give us more cash for crucial gear, so my party agreed that we'd just rent a sizeable room and work out some sleeping arrangements there. We roleplayed it, arguing over who was gonna sleep where without letting it get too heated, with people arguing that they weren't sleeping on the floor until the party wizard reminded everyone (me included) that we all have bedrolls and blankets and sleeping gear in our packs, like always. Having a pillow makes sleeping on the floor more bearable, and we let the fighter (swashbuckler, actually) sleep in the bed cause all the extra physical stress was worse on the joints and back ect.
So the Dm tells us we all fall asleep while I'm handing him a note. The party starts describing waking up, and he gives us the always ominous "Oh no, wait." Which means he's being the devil.
Or in this case, that I'm being the devil.
And he starts making them roll listen checks over the swashbucklers snoring, which they fail, and are very freaked out about.
Especially when they realize, the DM didn't make ME roll a listen check.
The DM makes them roll a few more, which made me nervous, but none of them passed. They were starting to get nerve wracked, with the rogue actually grabbing his character sheet and yelling "WAKE UP MAN, WAKE UP, FOR THE LOVE OF GOD!" but it was too late. I abandon the notes and say aloud to the dm "I splash the rest of the oil in the swashbucklers face".
Jaws drop.
DM: You wake up with a cough and a snort, immediately assaulted by the overpowering smell of violatile, COMBUSTIBLE chemicals.
Swashbuckler: I shout "What in the hells are you doing?!" loud enough to wake the party.
DM: Sure, I'll give you that. Everyone stirs, the smell of flammable oil permeating the room.
Me: I wave my crossbow pistol around and say "No no one move, or this is liable to get very messy very quickly" with a sweet smile.
DM: Nate roll a spot check (Nate's our wizard, and he passed the check). You notice the bolt loaded into the crossbow pistol is glowing faintly, a dull red tip that, even in your groggy state, realize is probably ripe with magical fire.
Nate: I say aloud "For the love of god no one move"
Swashbuckler: Screw that! Roll initiative, I jump out of bed at top speed and attack with my fists!
DM: Jump out of bed at top speed?
Swashbuckler: Yeah
DM: what's your Dex? *rolls a secret dice* take 5 bludgeoning damage from smashing your face into the wall of force over your bed
Swashbuckler: you've gotta be KIDDING me. Where the hell did THAT come from.
Me: Out of character (which we just say out loud) The gnome uses moveable walls of force to roll marbles over the tops of the audience
Swashbuckler: What the hell? what's that mean?
Me: I'll explain later. Back in character now though. I figured you'd be the one to try something like that. Aren't swashbucklers supposed to be INTELLIGENT?
Swashbuckler: Fine, back in character, what do you want from us?
So I went on to explain that I'd gotten some unique magical gear while they were all wasting their time peaking under waitresses skirts and smashing mugs of ale on random passers heads. I tell them that they're all allready under the effect of one of the spells. Which is controlled by me. And that if I decide, they will immediately take 1d2 points of fire damage any round I decide I'm unhappy with them. A weak effect... except that they are all soaked, along with the room, in torch oil.
I also tell them that, while they get will saves against the second effect, I can try to force any of them to freeze, or pick the direction they run in (which will be away from me, requiring them to close the distance if they want to attack, if they get a chance to).
Wizard: Ug. God. Allright. What do you want us to do?
Me: Burn for me.
Wizard: ...what?
Me: I activate the fire ability. "BURN FOR ME!!!!!!"
DM: everyone flip a coin for damage, and then roll 1d6 for fire damage as the entire room flares up like the pits of hell themselves.
Rogue: Oh *EXPLETIVE* Oh *EXPLETIVE* THIS IS NOT HAPPENING.
DM: No, it is, you're very much on fire.
Swashbuckler: I roll off the bed, avoiding the wall of force, and ATTACK.
Me: Not really.
Swash: huh?
DM: Roll a will save.
Swash: Oh you've gotta be *expletive* kidding me. *rolls and fails, by a wide margin*
Me: He runs out of the room
Swash: Runs out of the room screaming "OH GOD I'M ON FIRE"
The DM goes on to explain that everyone in the inn goes into panic mode as the flames spread out of our room and a group of random people run by FULLY engulfed in flame. Along with making them roll 1d6 for fire damage randomly (about once a round). All while I run behind them, laughing maniacally, making them run in random directions and freezing occasionally, while on fire, screaming "DANCE MY PUPPETS, BURN BURN BURN. BURN AND DANCE! HAHAHAHA"
Then I cast invisibility on myself and dissapear into the alleyway (we're outside at this point, along with the evacuated inn).
DM keeps making them roll 1d6s while they dance for me unable to put out the flames, and freezing anytime they try to stop drop and roll or go for something that might help. when the wizard is at about 1/5th of his hitpoint total, the DM gives them this.
DM: Suddenly, the illusory flames wink out of existance, and you're left standing, panting in terror, under the night sky. In your skivvies.
Rogue: WHAT?!?!?!
DM: Good question, I'm sure you'd be wondering what the hell that was about in character too. But there's no time for that, the local authorities show up, and immediately place you all under arrest, dragging your protesting forms into the night, saying he knew you were trouble and that he shoulda locked you up after the barfight.
Jaws still dropped.
Me: I watch and wait while everyone tries to figure out what happened, until the crowd starts shuffling nervously back into the inn or leaving as warranted, and sneak back to my room, locking the door and curling up in the bed.
I slept soundly (though the room did still smell of oil) and got up bright and early to wait by the jailhouse for my party.
The local lawman and his goons escorted them to the front, and told them he wanted them out of town by nightfall, or they'd spend a lot longer than one night in the pokey.
I asked them if they slept well, with a huge grin.
I explained to them that the ILLUSIONIST I'd gotten all my magical gear from assured me that none of it would cause any real damage, but that it still felt "hot enough to make the front row break a sweat when it flares up on stage".
Swash: I guess I don't really need to ask WHY...
Me: No. You DON'T. back in character. I lean in to the party and look the rogue dead in the eye, and say in a small, friendly whisper, "don't *expletive* with me." and walk away.
Jaws are still mostly dropped here. Rubbing forheads and eyes in great annoyance/recovery.
Me: I shout out "Are we gonna have any more problems? Or do we know who's the baddest dog on the block now?" (I'm a shifter and all).
Rogue: We'll be good.
And there was much rejoicing. By me. I've got my eyes peeled for them trying to turn this into something more, but I'm confident I can stay one step ahead of them if they try to. Hopefully they'll realize they had this coming, and that I didn't have to use FAKE fire, and was being very generous to them in how I got my revenge. Afterall, it wasn't FAKE fire that was burning me. Or my clothes at least.
Good times, good times.
Last edited by SilverClawShift : 06-04-2008 at 12:13 PM.
SilverClawShift, I'm amazed that you didn't post the "I HAVE A PORTABLE HOLE. I HAVE A BAG OF HOLDING. WHEN YOU PUT A PORTABLE HOLE AND A BAG OF HOLDING TOGETHER, STUFF HAPPENS!" story. You've got about a hundred of these stories, don't you?
__________________
Quote:
Originally Posted by Thespianus
I fail to see how "No, that guy is too fat to be hurt by your fire" would make sense.
Wizard: Ug. God. Allright. What do you want us to do?
Me: Burn for me.
Wizard: ...what?
Me: I activate the fire ability. "BURN FOR ME!!!!!!"
Can I make that my signature?
Could you please just post a thread and fill it with your stories? I love reading them, and they never fail to entertain me. I could not stop laughing through both of the stories you posted in this thread. Seriously, do you have any way to just make a collection of them so everyone on this site can see how awesome your stories are?
Hmmm... Random survival stories........ I got nothin', cause all I play in terms of RPGs is Arkham Horror, and in that game you either live or die. There's no "close calls" against Cthulhu.......
Actually, wait... does this count?
Spoiler
I was playing a PbP game on the Official Elder Scrolls Forums, which I was the co-Host of. I was still able to play as a character, but I had to Host/DM when the real Host was away. Anyway, the story was an Elder Scrolls / Fallout cross-over, which sounds really messed up unless you know how much work I put into it. (Yeah, I wrote the backstory and everything, too...)
Anyway, my character is a Bosmer - 4"5' wood elf - who's packing a .357 handgun and a sniper rifle, and has skills with lockpicking and first-aid care. He got shot in the leg earlier on with a .357, so even with all the healing that's been done, the most he can do is hobble. His friend is an Imperial - normal human - wielding a Jackhammer automatic shotgun. There are several other characters with us, but they don't matter right now...
Anyway, my guy gets cornered in a room with a big lizard monster that takes a lot of ammo to bring down. The rest of the players try to flee, but my guy can't run due to his leg injury. So he draws his .357, takes a shot at the Death Claw to get its attention, and screams for everyone else to run. You know, I figured that a full clip from a Desert Eagle would drop that thing, but in retrospect, I realize that the thing could survive stepping on land mines, and thus would probably not have even noticed my attacks.
Anyway, before it can attack me, my character's friend runs over, stands next to him, and exclaims that he's not letting me hog all the glory of a heroic death. So we both stand there, waiting for the creature to charge at us.
Here's where it all falls apart.
Some new player had just joined, and he had no idea what he was doing. >.< His character, due to the skills he picked from the sign-up sheet, started out with 3 sticks of dynamite. Well, thanks to his timing, his character starts out right outside the room we were all in, and he decides to mossey on in. As it turns out, he's also the guy who woke up the Death Claw... Anyway, he walks in Death Claw follows him, and he panicks and tries to run. Well, being a cliche RP idiot, he decides to light a stick of dynamite and throw it at the monster. Which is, at this point, closest to mine and my friend's characters.
Needless to say, we get kinda upset, but we figure we'll survive it. The Host is the one who decides what damage comes out of an attack, and he can do character-control, such as making us dive for cover before the dynamite explodes. Well, that is what we figured he would do, so we decided to wait for the Host to post.
Well, the new guy gets bored with waiting, so he decides to keep the game going by throwing another stick of dynamite. Me and my friend are getting kinda upset now, since we're literally backed into a corner with a Death Claw and 2 sticks of dynamite near us. We figure maybe we can still survive, somehow.
Finally the new guy throws the last stick and runs from the room laughing, which leaves me and the other guy with this expression:
And wouldn't you know it...? The Host gets banned that day! (The Mods let him stay online to watch the RP and keep me updated, though... Thank God...) Anyway, I ask him what I should do, since I'm the co-Host. He tells me what should happen... So I went and wrote the outcome of all of our actions.
I died.
Badly.
The explosion shredded the Death Claw, a piece of concrete ripped off my friends arm, and I got pinned to a wall by a piece of rebar through my chest.
I know what your thinking: What does this have to do with the thread? You died!
Well, as it turns out, the Host liked my character enough to let him return to life. Just... not as a human...
Several robots prompty entered the room, pried my corpse off the wall, and dragged it away. Some time later, I returned to the group... as a brain in a robot. Not a cool robot like Robocop, but something more like a cheap rip-off of Wall-E.
So now my character is currently still "alive" and trying to learn to use his new body, and hoping that when they return home to their base he can get a new clone body to wire his brain into.
So yeah. Stupid guy blew me up, and some robots turned me into a cyborg. Yay for me...
SilverClawShift, I'm amazed that you didn't post the "I HAVE A PORTABLE HOLE. I HAVE A BAG OF HOLDING. WHEN YOU PUT A PORTABLE HOLE AND A BAG OF HOLDING TOGETHER, STUFF HAPPENS!" story.
That story would have been more surprising if I HAD died. Dying wasn't the worst case scenario there.
Quote:
Originally Posted by SurlySeraph
You've got about a hundred of these stories, don't you?
No way. Only a few dozen
Quote:
Originally Posted by Lycan 01
Could you please just post a thread and fill it with your stories?
I'd feel pretty pompous doing soemthing like that, but I'm glad you like the stories.
I AM going to start a campaign dairy about our current game, since it's going to be a long running full blown story and looks to be pretty interesting.
My friend was a suicidal bounty hunter. We were on a skiff being chased by the bad guys (2 of them) on speeder bikes.
We managed to get one of them with the skiff's blaster. It ended up getting disabled. Before the rest of the party could blink the bounty hunter takes off at full speed on his jet pack smashing into the speeder bike. Through good dice rolls (and a force point) by the bounty hunter and lousy rolls by the DM the speeder was smashed to bits killing the driver. The bounty hunter went away without a scratch.
One of my characters once ended up bearing witness to a massive, all-out showdown between Tiamat and Bahumet. Rather than staying far away - the sensible thing that my GM presumed we do - my character couldn't just *sit* there. So he pulled out a scroll of teleport, summoned a flying mount, and ported himself into the fray... the fray between gods.
(I know, I know, okay? But my character was lawful good-ish -- well, except for being a necromancer, long story that -- and an overachiever to boot. And it seemed like the heroic sort of thing to do, okay? You don't just sit around and let a freaking god of goodness and light die right in front of you - not without at least trying to do something.)
Basically, the GM had mercy on me; when I (naturally) failed against Tiamat's Fear DC, he had me pass out, and a passing paladin managed to save me.
so me and my party wound up in this fight with a huge dragon at level 13
fairly easy combat for most but we were two drow, ghost of some sort, and a hobgoblin
now this would be fine but we had as a party two spellcasters, a ghost who couldnt possess non-humanoids, and me the poison ninja....
naturally the hobgoblin ninja winds up doing all the close combat
so we get it going down and were going fine for awhile and it goes tramples and grapples me on a fluke shot
so I'm there 60 or so hp and its about to breath weapon me in the face with no possible options, I take the breath weapon to the face leaving me with 3 hp and still pinned
they killed it before the next turn and i automade the dc to get out of the way of the corpse
afterwords i remembered i had an adamantium pop up house cube that would have made it easier to get out.... well, i'll remember that next time
Playing RHoD, my Cleric of St Cuthbert got zapped by a lightning Bolt, thanks to a Bugbear Sorcerer.
Failed my save, and the damage (rolled out in the open) brought me to exactly -9 hit points, with the rest of my party embroiled in the fight, and no other healer in the party.
All I can say is: thank St Cuthbert for the Diehard feat!
During one extended battle in which we assaulted a tower guarded by goblins led by a barghest, we managed to kill the barghest outside of the tower. When he went down my monk, who spoke goblin, ordered the goblins to surrender as we'd just taken out their leader. They responded by launching a simultaneous volley of arrows at my monk. Four hit - one critically. I think I had 12 HP at the time so I figured I was dead. The DM rolled up damage and it put me deep in the negatives. I was about ready to write my character off but I decided I'd try my deflect arrows ability to reduce the damage a bit. The roll succeeded. So the DM rolled damage again and reduced the effect by that amount. However, it occured to me that I should be able to pick which arrow to deflect - so I'd deflect the one that would have critically hit.
The rules say that I can pick one ranged attack to deflect - and technically the DM shouldn't have been rolling the attacks all at once. If they had come one at a time I'd have been able to pick the critical hit as I'd be watching my HP after each attack. Anyway, he rerolled the other 3 hits for damage and it left me with 2 HP.
That was the end of one session, in the next session he asked us to roll initiative. I wasn't happy about that since our previous initiative put us ahead of the goblins and it would have been our turn next (allowing me to head for cover). The DM had lost the initiative sheet from the previous session though so we rerolled. I did badly - about 3 or 4 IIRC which meant I was dead last. Fortunately the party rogue (who'd been well outside of the tower sniping from range) fired at the goblins and they had a readied action to strike at the next attacker. The other goblins picked targets other than me. Big mistake, I ran up through the tower and began tossing alchemists fire and oil flasks onto the roof where they were - and they were standing on a wooden floor. From the first toss I took 1 HP of splash damage from the alchemists fire as I hadn't considered that the square I was throwing into was right next to the trapdoor I was underneath. The goblins were soon too busy fighting fires to attack back. Eventually they began trying to climb down the tower - and failing their climb checks badly.
Only three survived the fall (because they were level 2 fighters). My monk ran down the stairs and back outside the tower. He fired his heavy crossbow at one survivor - natural 1, thankfully I didn't hit any party members. Rather than using a full round to reload he walked over on the next round and tried his stunning fist attack. The attack was a hit, but the goblin made his saving throw. On his next turn, the goblin hit my monk and dropped him to negative HP. Thankfully our cleric (who was out of spells) made a healing check to stabilise.
In the last session I was playing the characters where flying Griffin back across a less-than-friendly place known as the 'Desolate Wastes' when they attracted the attention of a hungry Blue Dragon, who proceeded to blast the rest of the party to the group before pursuing the remaining two.
They swoop down and try to hop off as fast as possible so the Griffon can take off again. The Rogue screws up and takes some falling damage but the Barbarian is fine. The Dragon closes on these two and unleashes another breath attack, which the Barbarian dodges the bulk of. The Rogue is less lucky and drops to -8. With no time to lose the Barbarian jumps in to attack the Dragon alone, and gets in some great hits. On the last round before it unleashes another breath weapon on the two of them...
DM: It has 61hp left, and this is your last attack...
Barb: *Rolls crit on greataxe* 62 damage!
[Much cheering takes place]
__________________
Spoiler
Behold Nosferatu, the Plant Vampire:
Spoiler
Thanks Kpenguin!
Thanks Serpentine!
Referring to Pop Yule Ashun:
Quote:
Originally Posted by CyberRebirth
evisiron, that is the most awesome character idea I have ever heard of. I'm going to subscribe to this thread and look forward to updates.
lets if i can remember...
Luciano Seaside. warrior/thief lv 3/3 neutral evil. 2nd edition.
Bitter mercenary/bounty hunter with no eyebrows! they were burned away by a CERTAIN noble. freak accident.
the grand adventure had JUST started and i had allready made a enemy of the counts stablemaster assistant. Carl.
so Luciano was escorting Jacinthe (a mage/fighter that had charmed him and had him as her servant and teacher for QUITE some time, Luciano broke free of the spell but pretends he is still under it) to the officers bar, but he staed outside because he had made some enemies the last time... cough.
anyways. then a large shadow falls on him...
He twirls around, axe in hand! it is Carl! "you pull weapon on me, boy?" (boy? luciano is 30 years) "yeah i do!" Luciano answers and slashes for his gut. MISS! slash again! HIT! Carls entrails are spilled out on the street, offcourse the guards with chainmail and bastard swords (chainmails are VERY expensive. i barely have a leather armour!) so Luciano is surrounded and try to escape by climbing the wall. YES THE CASTLE WALL! he gets three bastard swords rammed up his... buttom. so with half his ass off he keeps climbing. he gets to the top of the wall ond climb down to a roof (under constant crossbow fire) and jumps over to the other side of the street on another roof and hides in some shadows. he looses the guards and rendevouz with the party shortly after. he didnt know that the cleric WAS a cleric (magic is illegal . think medieval europe) so the cleric had'tha' make a choice. clap his ass and heal it, pretending he on,y did it for... well you know. or actually tell that he's a cleric.
he did the latter.
next: PRISON BREAK!
__________________
Need a setting for your game? a character concept? any gaming related ideas? I make far to many to eat up myself, and therefor I am willing to share them. Free ideas! Get yer fluff here! PM me.
The friendly neighborhood gentleman perv is always ready to help!
on M&B:
Quote:
Originally Posted by Celesyne
oh, and looting villages is REALLY good money, if a nearby lord doesn't stop by and give you a daily dose of rape.
I'd feel pretty pompous doing soemthing like that, but I'm glad you like the stories.
I AM going to start a campaign dairy about our current game, since it's going to be a long running full blown story and looks to be pretty interesting.
Hmph. It's not being egotistical if you're doing it by popular request!
And I'm quite happy to see that there'll be another superb campaign diary to read.
So, we're in this primordial jungle fighting monsters of various sorts, including a large dinosaur that could breathe fire. It wasn't a dragon, but it looked like one. Like a T-Rex that breathes fire maybe, I forget.
Backstory: The DM and the group had been arguing about the source of fire-breathing in D&D. A player had tried to use an anti-magic field to stop the magical fire, and the DM ruled on the spot that it was a natural ability (I agree). We discussed it, and we went with the good old glands that shoot two explosive liquids that ignite when they mix.
So here we are, fighting a giant dinosaur that breathes fire and is wrecking shop. We are at its mercy, except it has no mercy-- only hunger. So, being the party Wizard, I step up and start taunting it to get its attention. And by taunting it, I mean shooting it with my crossbow and praying my 3 spells left can get me through the fight.
Then it ate me.
Well, technically it grappled me in its throat. I wasn't down the gullet yet, but it was a matter of a turn or two before I was lunch. So I fireballed myself. The DM ruled that the fire would ignite the glands and blow the dinosaur's head off like a rocket. I went from full HP to -9.
Of course my friends are jerks and refuse to admit that I did it on purpose.
I need better friends.
__________________
Being a jerk to people on the internet does not make you cool.
RSS Feeds: 
You didn't die?
Thanks Kpenguin!
