Funny D&D Stories

[Acanous]

I was DMing a campeign about a year back that had a pretty good moment.
My players were:
a Chaotic Neutral Cleric/Sorc who was going for Mystic Theurge
a Chaotic Evil Cleric who intended to go into Khyber and set loose all manner of doom
a Lawful Neutral Dwarven Fighter
and
a Chaotic Good Ranger.

Now, the Ranger's player was new to D&D. We all got together and helped him optimize his build so he wouldn't end up too overshadowed.

Cue the first truly random encounter of the game; The players are adventuring through the swamp and come across a pair of Blue Slaads.
They are pretty far off, and haven't seen the party yet.

Cler/Sorc: I roll my Knowledge: The Planes to know what these are. *Roll* 23.
Cler: I roll mine as well. *Roll* 32
Ranger: I have a feature that lets me use diplomacy on animals. Should I go talk to them?

*Entire party*: Yes, you should go talk to them.

and the rest goes kind of like a bad joke you'd hear at a pub; "So a ranger walks up to a pair of Slaads..."

with their suprise blown and ranged advantage gone, the fight ended up being a lot harder than intended. Oddly enough, the ranger did survive, thanks in part to high dex.

Only to die to an Aboleth later on >.>

[Viktre]

Heh, wonderful.

So I was DMing around my first campaign and one of my player's was running a Dragonkin something-or-other. Suffice it to say this player's MO was the brutey character. So the whole thing is them underground cleaning out a troglodyte infested cave.

They have finished one encounter and have killed all but one of the little lizard men. This one is firmly grappled in the Dragonkin's scaley grasp.

[scene]
Me: Ok so you have him grappled what do you want to do with him?
Player: I want to shove him in this healing potion bottle.
Me (thinking intelligently): So you're going to heal yourself by drinking the potion and then try to stuff him in the bottle?
Player: Nope, I'm gonna pour out the potion and just stuff him in.
Me (blinking): Ok roll your str check. *rolls opposing str for bottle (still new to DMing)*
Player: *rolls and looks up and me with evil grin* I make it.
Me: Ok you just stuffed a 3 foot tall lizard man into a 10 oz potion bottle. All except the femur bone sticking out the top. What are you going to do with it?
Player: Wear it like an amulet for a trophy.
[/scene]

Needless to say he just had to show off his trophy to the trog cheftain later in the camp. Can opened...worms EVERYWHERE...

[Zieu]

So my very first time playing D&D was a long time ago and it's become very fuzzy to me now, but I do remember one specific encounter:

Our party was:

Orc Barbarian
Elf Ranger (me)
Dward Fighter
[All level 2 or so]

The DM was fairly new as well, but had a few adventures under his belt.

We'd come to a cliff with a thick, foggy haze obscuring our view of the bottom. A thick, old-looking rope hung down the face of the cliff with occasional footholds to help out those with pitiful Use Rope checks (me...).

So the Barbarian goes first and has no trouble, and upon setting foot at the bottom of the cliff face realizes he's in the middle of a rat nest. He gets swarmed. The Fighter isn't far behind and they both start swinging.

In the meantime, 20 feet down the 100-ft cliff....
I've rolled some TERRIBLE Use Rope checks. Abysmal. All below 5. The DM has determined that one of my arms is now tangled up in the rope. I take a moment to think over the situation, and:

Me: "I take out my bow with my free hand."
DM: "Sure. It takes two hands to use it, however."
Me: -long pause- ".....I hold the grip between my feet and pull back with my free hand."
DM: -blank stare- "......Alright, fine. For every shot you fire, there's a 75% chance that your bow slips out of your feet and falls."
Me: "Done." -rolls attack- "19 on the die, 20-something total. Do I get extra damage for being above them?"
DM: "Uhhh....sure. Add two extra d8's to damage."

So the two melee combatants are swinging their swords and clubs around when suddenly WHOOOOSH THUMP -- one rat is pinned to the ground through his skull. They hear a far-off sound of celebration above them followed by the clatter of something falling down the cliff face.

Still 80 feet up, tangled in the rope, and now bowless I weighed my options. 1) Try and untangle myself and keep using the rope to climb down, 2) Untangle myself and use the cliff face (and thus a Climb check) to get down, or 3) Cut the rope.

Me: I cut the rope.
DM: You're 80 feet up.
Me: How much fall damage is that?
DM: A lot.
Me: Elves are light, right? I cut the rope.

I survived to fall and survived the rest of the adventure, but since then that character has remained unplayed.

[Iceforge]

Being reading this topic lately. Many funny stories..

Yeah, that thread is so funny, thanks for sharing that.

In the spirit of that thread, I'll share a bit myself:

I never experienced much slack for playing DnD in school. Me and the others I played with, who went over to the local college to play with some others there once a week and sometimes with each other in the weekend, usually kept it to ourselves, mostly because we figured others would be ignorant of what DnD and roleplaying games was and we didnt want to hear it, if they had any misinformed ideas about it, like "DnD=Satans game" stereotypes.

Some people knew and one day, while me and a pal was sitting and talking by ourselves, this really pumped guy who was a year older game over to us. Everybody at school was afraid of this guy: He wasn't a mean-spirited bully by any means, but he could kick anybody at schools ass if he wanted to, and he wasn't the brightest guy ever, a bit slow actually (he once headbutted a radiator resulting in breaking the radiator, yeah, scary guy when you are 12 or 13).

We figured this couldn't be good, and he came up close to us and was like "So, you play roleplaying games? Like, where you pretend to be stuff you ain't and stuff?" (or something like that)
We just sighed and told him that yes, we do and then braced ourselves for the worst that could potentially happen.
And turns out he wanted to ask if he could join in on playing with us, because he heard about it and thought it sounded like fun. We got him in on a few games, got him totally hooked and played with him in basicly every single game.

About a year later, his mother actually approached me and a friend who was sort of the leaders of the group, as we took turns on being the DM when we played, and she thanked us for getting him into our group: Turns out that he had low self-esteem, not a lot of friends and did most of the scary stuff to get attention (obvious now that I am older), and now he was a lot better and his grades has improved a lot as well, as now he actually wanted to improve his English and Math skills (non-English country)

Also, while we heard very little slack before that, we heard no slack at all after that, as he made it quite public knowledge that he played DnD now (he would borrow our books and read as much as possible during recees and such, to "catch up" in knowledge about the game, despite him not having the best English skills, he actually did catch up quite nicely) and everybody else at school was still afraid of him, so throwing a harsh DnD comment was not something anyone dared, but he actually wasn't violent in any way, he just got that reputation due to his stupid behaviour he had done to gain some attention.

Sorry if this was slightly off-topic from this actual thread, but hope the story was still a nice read to anyone who read it :)

[Kaww]

I made one of my chars immortal (he dies, he is auto raised, if no lvls and no CON he comes back as a deathless) because he is the plot (it's all about him).

The player playing him killed him in 35 min OOG time. The only valid way possible. I didn't even consider it, I thought nobody would be that stupid. HE WAS...

To have a holy warrior/mage rape people with Evard's Black Tentacles, just sick?!
He went eBil and thus was smitten... Since his deity now doesn't want to have anything to do with the dude - no more raises.

I know you will read this: YOU ARE AN _________.

Regards!

[Kaww]

Cler/Sorc: I roll my Knowledge: The Planes to know what these are. *Roll* 23.
Cler: I roll mine as well. *Roll* 32
Ranger: I have a feature that lets me use diplomacy on animals. Should I go talk to them?

*Entire party*: Yes, you should go talk to them.

THANK YOU!

It's so much fun playing with new players...

[The Glyphstone]

Not exactly an in-game story, but the 'Weirdest D&D responses thread' reminded me of a time that my group was playing (very quietly) in the corner of the school cafeteria. (Un)fortunately, the only table within earshot had this girl sitting at it, who came over...and starting lecturing to us on how we were disrespecting Satanism. I kid you not.

She got offended and stomped off when we told her to go to Heaven.

[AtwasAwamps]

My favorite D&D stories really all involve my non-D&D, non-fantasy-nerd girlfriend and her dealing with the horrible dork that I have become in recent years. She has been with me through magic cards, WoW, and now she shall be with me through this…bless her heart.

Girlfriend: “So how is D&D, now that you’ve played it?”
Me: “Honestly, it’s a lot more fun than I thought it would be, and a lot less awkward.”
Girlfriend: “Oh, cool! So did you play a wizard?”
Me: “A paladin, actually.”
Girlfriend: “…that’s the same thing, right?”
Me: “I love you honey.”
Girlfriend: “…Are you going to say something that makes me punch you again?”
Me: “I…yes.”

Girlfriend: “Oh, oh, do you guys like really act stuff out? Do you hit each other with swords? Do you LARP?”
Me: “…Well, one guy does have a sword. But no, we don’t. No LARPING.”
Girlfriend: “None at all?”
Me: “Nope.”
Girlfriend: “…not even a little bit?”
Me: “Nuh-uh.”
Girlfriend: “…Could you? And maybe tape it? Because it would be hilarious.”
Me: “No!”
Girlfriend: “Okay, how about I buy you a NERF sword and you just beat the crap out of them with it for a while and film it? It would be awesome.”
Me: “I love you.”

Girlfriend: “So wait, the girl in your group has ‘elven armor’?”
Me: “Um, yes.”
Girlfriend: “This is in real life, not in the game?”
Me: “…I guess. I mean, she calls it elven armor. It’s just a leather bustier thing.”
Girlfriend: “I hope it was at least made by men wearing pointy ears or she’s a lying *****.”

[Shademan]

iceforge... that story was beautiful.

[Dziadek]

In the very first campaign I've played with my group one of my friends was playing a Chaotic Evil human rogue named Korlik Talik- and he played that character really well; he was so unperdictable that he always managed to surprise us with his actions, which not only were were destructive but also seemed to be natural to him.

After the first campaign he decided to switch and tried playing a good-ish dwarven ranger, Balin.

One of our first missions was to save children kidnapped by a satanic cult, so, after we defeated (read: brutally disemboveled) every single one of the cultists, Balin found a small tunnel that was connected to a tiny, stone room in which the children were kept. Seeing an ugly dwarf completely covered in blood, they refused to follow him even though he tried to act friendly and promised them that it is safe now outside. Out of other ideas, Balin tied a rope to an ankle of one of the kids and dragged him outside. He stopped near the massacred cultists' bodies and pointed them to the child, saying:
'Look! We killed those bad people! We are the good guys! You musn't be afraid!'
The kid got even more traumatized...

[Morithias]

Last session me and my friends came across a villain who in the dnd world belongs in the BOVD, our party wizard started to diplomacy (roleplay) with him and offered to summon him some water to go with his...human meals. Everyone looks at the player like he was high.

The player proceeded to summon a wall of water on the guy's space putting him inside the water, and then turned around and summoned a SHARK inside the water.

Needless to say everyone agreed it was a crowning moment of awesome. But it was also funny as hell.

[Kaww]

Well this one was told to me by my current DM, and confirmed by my nephew to whom I DM (he read it in the newspapers).

Quite a few years back my DM and several of his friends were playing a game in one of the other player's cellar. They were hungry, so they ordered a pizza. We all know how fast time flows when we are playing, but after an hour they noticed the pizza guy was really taking his time with the delivery. Someone knocks on the door. They all assume that it's the pizza guy. DM goes and opens the door. Que the police saying: "What corpse are you disposing of?". The dude was shocked, and the cops had three surprise rounds

One of the people inside realized what was going on and he said: "Should we try and explain or do we just go downtown in a police van?"

Naturally they tried to explain what was really going on, but the cops didn't buy the story. "Do you honestly think I would believe that you spent a whole day in a cellar, just so you could tell stories to each other, hmm?" That's how they got to the station (all were 18+) and the story got to the papers.

The funniest part was that the host was hiding his stash in the basement and he was really freaking out, which didn't help when the cops noticed him and thought that they found their man...

I don't know if this qualifies within this thread, but it is funny and D&D related, so...

Regards!

[DanReiv]

Just remembered a nice one.

Setting : Hawkmoon, old times D100 system, rolling 1 is a critical failure on all rolls.

Our heavily armorded (Sea Lion - yeah it matters) Granbretan, pretty adept at kicking stuff barefooted performs a flying kick against a pirate attacking our ship.

Roll 1.

Near the ship's rail. Guess where he ended ?

[Lycan 01]

iceforge... that story was beautiful.

QFT.

Well this one was told to me by my current DM, and confirmed by my nephew to whom I DM (he read it in the newspapers).

Quite a few years back my DM and several of his friends were playing a game in one of the other player's cellar. They were hungry, so they ordered a pizza. We all know how fast time flows when we are playing, but after an hour they noticed the pizza guy was really taking his time with the delivery. Someone knocks on the door. They all assume that it's the pizza guy. DM goes and opens the door. Que the police saying: "What corpse are you disposing of?". The dude was shocked, and the cops had three surprise rounds

One of the people inside realized what was going on and he said: "Should we try and explain or do we just go downtown in a police van?"

Naturally they tried to explain what was really going on, but the cops didn't buy the story. "Do you honestly think I would believe that you spent a whole day in a cellar, just so you could tell stories to each other, hmm?" That's how they got to the station (all were 18+) and the story got to the papers.

The funniest part was that the host was hiding his stash in the basement and he was really freaking out, which didn't help when the cops noticed him and thought that they found their man...

I don't know if this qualifies within this thread, but it is funny and D&D related, so...

Regards!

I'm guessing the pizza guy walked up, heard them downstairs talking about a body, then ran to get the cops?

[Meirnon]

QFT.





I'm guessing the pizza guy walked up, heard them downstairs talking about a body, then ran to get the cops?

Or over the phone when they were ordering.

[Uncle_Brainhorn]

It's not D&D, but it's kind of sort of similar.

My friend and I decided we wanted to try D&D, but instead of buying the books to learn the rules, he decides to make make his own game. It's pretty much what amounts to "D&D for particularly stupid dummies."

There are no real rules, just what the DM says. It's functional, but just barely. At least it has the roleplaying down.

Anyway, we play with my sister and take turns being the DM. The first time I was DM, I had them going to an abandoned fort to kill a group of bandits and their leader.

My sister is a Human Ranger named "Jeka." (It's her nickname) My friend is an Elf Rogue named "Nomad." (I don't think he knows what that means)

So anyway, they kill the bandits guarding the fort.

Nomad: I cut off one of their heads and take it with me.
Me: What? Why?
Nomad: Maybe I can use it to scare the others?
Me: Fine, whatever.

They walk inside, and see three more bandits.

Nomad: I try to bluff and trick them into thinking I'm here to join.
*rolls a 3*
Me: The bandits see you standing there covered in blood, holding the severed head of one of their friends. They don't believe you.

At least that went along with his 8 intelligence.

Later, he was DMing, and I was just trying my hardest to break the game. I made a human fighter. He made up his own feats, one of which is where you choose a weapon you can specialize in and get a plus 1 on damage, except he allowed them to be stackable. For some reason, he left all the other weapons alone, but made the spike chain a 1d10 weapon. So, I took three feats of Specialize Spiked Chain.

He has a rather simple system to see what's in chests: You roll 1d6, and what you roll determines what weapon you get. Yes, it's only weapons. After that, you roll to see if there's a bonus. If you roll a 20, you get a high bonus and an element effect. (determined by ANOTHER roll. How MUCH the element effect does is determined by YET ANOTHER roll)

After a few times, I got a spiked chain. I rolled a 20, +3 spiked chain. Rolled a 3, +3 spiked chain with +3 fire damage.

I have 18 strength, so plus 4 str bonus plus 3 bonus for using spiked chains. My spiked chain does plus 3 damage and 3 fire damage.

My character is at level 3, and even if I roll a 1 on my weapon roll, I do 14 damage. Full damage is 24.

His version of the game is broken beyond belief.

[Arceius]

It was the very first game I had ever GM'ed and it was the first time playing for both me and my players (oh this is going bad already isn't it?). So the players fight their way up through a tower filled with enemies, and use a teleporter into a large room with a raised area in the center. Standing upon said raised area is a powerful Lich and a handful of his zombie/skeleton minions.

Now, the character were all much to low to be fighting a Lich. He was intended as a "enemy of my enemy" type of friend. After conversing for a while with characters (during which they managed to piss him off quite a bit) he turns to leave through a portal in the center of the raised area. At that point the rangers player says:

"I shoot the zombie in the foot."

*collective group stare*

Thus ensued a mad scramble of checks to stop the player from attacking the immeasurably powerful Lich's pet zombie and the following wholesale slaughter of the entire party. Unfortunately a strength, reflex, and another strength check were not enough to wrest the bow from his hands or knock the arrow off course.

So the Wizards wolf ate the bow.

Crisis averted and pet fed. All in a days work. Needless to say, "I shoot the zombie in the foot" is now a saying synonymous with "I do something really stupid." XD

[Desril]

It was the very first game I had ever GM'ed and it was the first time playing for both me and my players (oh this is going bad already isn't it?). So the players fight their way up through a tower filled with enemies, and use a teleporter into a large room with a raised area in the center. Standing upon said raised area is a powerful Lich and a handful of his zombie/skeleton minions.

Now, the character were all much to low to be fighting a Lich. He was intended as a "enemy of my enemy" type of friend. After conversing for a while with characters (during which they managed to piss him off quite a bit) he turns to leave through a portal in the center of the raised area. At that point the rangers player says:

"I shoot the zombie in the foot."

*collective group stare*

Thus ensued a mad scramble of checks to stop the player from attacking the immeasurably powerful Lich's pet zombie and the following wholesale slaughter of the entire party. Unfortunately a strength, reflex, and another strength check were not enough to wrest the bow from his hands or knock the arrow off course.

So the Wizards wolf ate the bow.

Crisis averted and pet fed. All in a days work. Needless to say, "I shoot the zombie in the foot" is now a saying synonymous with "I do something really stupid." XD

That scene was hilarious. The fighter and cleric both failed to shatter the bow, I (the wizard) tried grab the arrow before it was launched, and we all failed. The wolf familiar succeeded where a dwarf, human, and tiefling all failed.

What's funny is the ranger is one of our best players.

[Kaww]

I'm guessing the pizza guy walked up, heard them downstairs talking about a body, then ran to get the cops?

How did you ever guess?
It turned out it took him 15 minutes to deliver a pizza, and it took 45 minutes for the police to answer a potential murder call.

The pizza guy overheard the DM saying: "What will you do with the body?" The party just finished an encounter in back ally or something similar that needed corpse disposal.

[Koboldshroud]

First time i played dnd 4e ever, my friend played everyone, and i dm'ed. There was a sorcerer, a fighter, a rouge and a cleric. The enemies were 3 kobolds and two orcs. The rouge killed an orc after a few rounds, the fighter didnt hit a single enemy, the cleric... bleh... but the sorcerer... killed.. everything.. in.. in.. melee combat! i was practically screamiong at him "Dude! dont put the sorcerer in melee! he'll die! gaaah!" yet he did.. We started calling him Garez le smite :D!

[nihilism]

i have mostly played in bizarre anarchic frequent pvp groups

the wizard of an old group had the idea to use the spell nystals magic aura to fake magic items and scam the arcane merchants it worked and he went off with 30000 gp a few days later 2 high level npcs with a dragon came and took every thing he owned including clothes he traveled to ravenloft naked as the day he was born.

that same day my wizard decided to also try a scam. i was more cautious than my fellow spellcaster and fearing retribution from the merchants i transformed into an old lady selling the supposed +4 flaming greatsword as a family heirloom. the shopkeeper was eager to purchase it. i managed to bluff my way through several questions such as why he had never heard of the incredible hero who must have wielded the sword. eventually he agreed to buy it and said he would raise the money by the next day which would have been great if he had actually managed it not knowing how to react i had my fighter cohort threaten him needless to say i didn't get any money.

[nihilism]

one other funny (stupid ridiculous) story happened when i was dming. the players had defeated a bug bear hunter who kept cured human skins the pcs asked what he had done with the genitalia they left the encounter carrying 150 dried scrotums and a jar of 300 preserved testicles. the kobald was having some trouble getting into towns and they decided to use the scrotums to make a human costume it understandable didn't go well.

[Gravious]

You guys are giving me ideas. Wonderfully wonderful ideas.

Inspired by the "Giant block of butter" story, I myself got a giant block of butter.

Which saved my life.

One of our friends was grabbed by 2 guys in black coats because he was carrying so much money (He was carrying about 100 million GP). We followed them to the hall of the Merchant's Guild. As we open the door, we see several trapped squared on the floor (Undisguised), a caster across the room, and a Salamander Archer.

The players:
Me, a human sorcerer.
Player A, a Lizardfolk fighter (He was a Dwarven barbarian, but he died).
Player B, a Human Cleric (worships the DM as a god). [He was kidnapped so it was just A and myself]

DM: The Illusionist raises his hands. Both of you, make a Will save.
Player A: [18]
Me: [3] Crap!
DM: Okay, Player A, you make it. (to me) You don't. You feel inexplicably compelled to step into the trap. [moves me onto a trapped square] Make a reflex save.
Me: [16]
DM: You just manage to hit the floor as a scimitar swings above your head. Roll for initiative.

The turn order was this: Me, the Illusionist, Player A, salamander archer.

(I should note here that the DM allows us to create things that we want, either with crafting or paying a Gnomish engineer. I payed a Gnome to make me a gauntlet that unfolds into a six shot repeating crossbow. It can fire 3 shots a round, and I have some nice special ammo, including Alchemist's Fire explosive shots, and arrows with tips that open into 3 blades on impact. We call these the "Katar Bolts" as the tip opens like a mechanized Katar)

Me: I shoot 3 normal Bolts at the Illusionist. [rolls]
DM: You miss with all 3. He runs through the door. A's turn.
Player A (INCREDIBLE move speed): I run across the floor (traces a path that has no traps to the Salamander Archer) and grapple with him. [rolls]
DM: He is grappled. What will you do?
Player A: I shove a flask of Alchemist's Fire down his throat!
DM: ...okay. Make a reflex save to avoid damage form the explosion.
[player A rolls]
DM: You take no damage.
Me: I walk up to the door where the Illusionist escaped and try the handle.
DM: It is locked.
Me (With feeble strength mod): I try to kick down the door, or at least break the lock.
Player A: WHAT?!?!
DM: Roll strength.
Me: [rolls a 3] Okay... that failed.

After a bit of kicking at the door, we decide to look around in the bits 'O salamander for a key.

DM: You find a key, surprisingly undamaged by the blast.
Me: I open the door, naturally.
DM: You see 2 Human crossbowmen in the far corners of this room. They have their crossbows raised, because they heard you kicking at the door.
Me: Magic missile time! [kills both]
DM: There are two sets of stairs, one going up and the other down. There are also 2 exits that leave the room. (Points them out on the map)
Me: We go up the stairs.

[Up the stairs]

DM: You see a man on a throne with a cane. He has two bodyguards here and here. (Puts out the map and places all the characters)
DM (As the throne guy): I know why you have come. I will release your friend for that sword. (Motions to the awesome Dark Matter longsword Player A is holding. Apparently it is Unique and he can never get another.)
Me: I grab player A's sword.
Player A: HEY!
Me: Shut up, I have a plan. I walk towards the man with the sword.
DM: The guards close in. They demand that you give the sword to them, and you may not come close to "The Boss". You recognize them as the ones who took Player B.
Me: I start to hand the sword to them, then throw it in the air. I use Mage Hand to send it through the head of the Throne Guy. (Mage hand is likely my best used spell)
DM: Right as the man dies, he reflexively pushes a peddle on the ground. A spiked pit opens on the ground behind you.
Me: I use Jump on both of us, to get back across the pit away from the guards. [we both roll and make it]
DM: A panel in the wall slides open. The Illusionist walks out.
Me/Player A: CRAP!
DM: Your turn. (To me)
Me: I use my one remaining cantip for today to butter the floor with Mage Hand and my butter.
[everyone laughs]
DM: Okay, I'll roll balance checks for all of them. [rolls for the Illusionist. Natural 1.] The Illusionist slips, and in his attempt to get up slides into the pit. [rolls] One guard falls over. Neither have ranged attacks you know.
Me: I summon my familiar. (A flying python with an EPIC grapple modifier.) He grapples the fallen over guard. (Prone, instant grapple) and drags him into the pit, then releases.
DM: The man falls into the pit with the Illusionist. Both are dead by the way.
[rolls] Also, the other guard just fell over.
[python drags him into the pit]

The thing is, the Will DC for resisting the mind control was really large. Chances are, without the butter we would have died.



Sorry about the really long post guys.

[Lycan 01]

How did you ever guess?
It turned out it took him 15 minutes to deliver a pizza, and it took 45 minutes for the police to answer a potential murder call.

The pizza guy overheard the DM saying: "What will you do with the body?" The party just finished an encounter in back ally or something similar that needed corpse disposal.

I just hazarded a guess, using my inner DM talents to surmise what the best explaination would be.


@ Gravious: Don't apologize for epic stories, no matter how long they are.

[btemple0]

I once played this druid, who I played as thinking he was literally a tree, screaming photosynthesis at every inopportune moment, he was supposed to be the party healer, but did little other than cast entangle and summon fire elementals.

The party hated this character because I always went by my weird antics versus the party's plan, but because of all my weird antics i avoided a lot of negative effects from encounters, and whenever i got into melee combat, someone in the party died.

[rat-morningstar]

8 normal, non-magic rats were hard to take down for me and my party members
4 of us, elf sorceror, half-elf cleric, human fighter, and me, a tiefling rogue

we kept rolling 1-5, and the rats never rolled under 14 or so


it was hilarious, a party of brave adventurers getting their asses kicked by a handfull of scrared rats

[NowhereMan583]

Our DM for this particular campaign feels that having loads of minor magic items in the world makes magic items as a whole seem less important. To rectify this, he only gives them to us once in a long while, but they're always relatively powerful items, and sometimes somewhat more powerful than we should have at our level. He also makes an effort to tailor the items to the characters' personality. It's actually a lot of fun, but this is a story of the one time it nearly went horribly awry.

Now, two characters in this campaign figure in this story:

• Me, a LG gnomish cleric of Glittergold named Carl McPhee. (We have... issues with names.)
• A CN elven sorcerer named Nihilus the Arbitrary, also called the Wanton. (Like I said, issues.)

I've been spending pretty much the entire campaign reining in the other players' wanton violence, and trying to minimize casualties. I constantly advocate capturing evil individuals and bringing them to the proper authorities rather than killing them ourselves. This has been an uphill battle for some time, since most of the other characters are Chaotic, and have little respect for the proper authorities. The only exception is the paladin, but she's generally in favor of slaying evil beings outright, and is easily distracted by the other party members when they have to do something morally ambiguous. (The "rustic architecture" line from Gamers 2 gets a lot of mileage).

Nihilus, on the other hand, lives up to his epithet. He's impulsive, hedonistic, and has a twisted sense of humor. And, thanks to the aforementioned policy on magic items, he's carrying the single most appropriate item for his personality... the Rod of Wonder. At 5th level.

Up until now, the dice gods have smiled on us, and the Rod has been useful. Except for a couple minor incidents (turning an attacking monstrous spider green, accomplishing nothing; accidentally hitting one of our summoned animals with a Lightning Bolt) it's been to our advantage to let Nihilus set it off as often as he likes.

So, we're trying to eliminate a slave trading ring, and this requires a great deal of interrogating underlings, finding out to whom they report, tracking down their superiors, etc. We've finally found the guy who's in charge of a particular city's branch of the slave trade, and we're approaching his home. We have two prisoners with us, whom we've intimidated into acting as guides. One of them, a random thug/enforcer we christened Thomas One-Ear after the halfling got too enthusiastic in an interrogation session, I have tied up and am leading around on a rope. The other, a random low-level contact we call Shady Dave, has been shrunken down by the Rod of Wonder, and is in a glass jar (with airholes) hanging around Nihilus's neck. (We are, of course, moving under cover of darkness, so nobody stops us and asks why we have these two restrained.)

We manage to get into the house, but most of us aren't optimized for stealth, and Thomas One-Ear isn't trying too hard to be quiet (we needed to keep him with us until we determined that we were, in fact, in the right place). So he hears us coming, and is prepared by the time we find him... and, surprise, he's a necromancer. (The implications of a necromancer working in a slaver ring should probably not be thought about too much.) After a long, drawn-out battle, we have him subdued, and we're trying to figure out to whom he reports, so we can take out the slaver ring entirely.

The interrogation is not going well, because he can tell that I won't seriously harm him, as I have to forcefully prevent my party members from doing so. Finally, we give him an ultimatum. Option one: he tells us everything he knows, and we leave him here, without alerting the authorities, allowing him to escape in his own time. Option two: I leave the room and let my party members do as they will. The paladin is itching to smite evil, the rogue wants to take another ear-trophy, and Nihilus is toying with the Rod of Wonder. Thomas One-Ear is still bleeding from the wound on the side of his head, and Shady Dave is banging on the sides of the jar, desperately trying to get out. I get a huge circumstance bonus to Intimidate, and he gives us a name, but claims not to know where we can find him. According to our Sense Motive checks, this is indeed the situation. At least we got the name.

We start to leave, as per the deal, but I make a Spot check and realize that Nihilus is pointing his Rod of Wonder straight at the necromancer and is clearly about to say the command word. The rest of the party notices too, and hurries out. I turn around, run towards Nihilus, and try to get the Rod from him before it goes off. "Roll Dex to react quickly enough," says the DM. Dexterity was my dump stat. I let go of Thomas One-Ear's rope and fling myself at Nihilus but miss completely, and fall to the floor. The Rod goes off: fireball.

There are five people within the blast: Me, Thomas One-Ear, Nihilus, Shady Dave, and the necromancer. Three of us fail our Reflex saves. Shady Dave doesn't get one, since he's hanging from Nihilus's neck. The necromancer was given a massive circumstance penalty for being tied to a chair, but rolled a natural 20. The DM ruled that he managed to tip the chair over and duck under the worst of the blast.

Thomas One-Ear is a charred corpse. Which is somewhat depressing, since I was going to let him go as soon as we left the building.
Shady Dave is a tiny skeleton inside the melted remains of the glass jar.
Nihilus is at -7.
I'm at exactly -10.
The necromancer drags himself from the scorched remnants of the chair, only a few hp left, and gets the Nine Hells out.

The players are somewhat stunned. The Rod has betrayed us, and due to a freak accident, Carl is dead and Nihilus is dying. Then the paladin's player spoke up. "Do you really only have [x] hit points? I thought you should have more by now."

Carl's always been somewhat fragile for a cleric, due to extremely poor dice rolls when he levels, but we check the total to be sure, and she's right: it is mathematically impossible for a cleric of Carl's level and constitution score to have hit points that low. I'd forgotten to roll for new hp when we leveled at the end of the previous session. So I roll then, and instead of being dead, I'm left in the same position as Nihilus: dying in a scorched room. (Thankfully, the house was stone and not wood.) Thanks to some high heal checks (the paladin had used up her Lay on Hands), we manage to stabilize, and both of us pull through.

The DM ruled that due to my extremely close brush with death, I retained some permanent scarring. Carl has burn scars all over his face and hands, and is unable to grow any hair on the burnt areas. Ever since, he has been called Carl the Burned.

(I apologize for the length; I couldn't decide what details to leave out, so I put them all in.)

[~Nye~]

in the first big game I DMd for (about 10 players) they were all in a cavern, it was a nest for fell drakes, this was the first big boss encounter they had all experienced in D&D. They bust in it was basicly a massacre, they took out 2 of the three drakes on the ambush round, the last surviving drake bolted towards the rogue which had sneak attacked and killed her mate. This is the funny part, the rogue was at the back of the marching order, the drake was on 5 hit points, it dashed past 9 people provoking quite a few attacks of oppurtunity. all horrifically missing, tripping and rolling natural 1s. The drake crit the rogue killing him instantly, I think the she got her revenge

[Zieu]

Spoiler

Show

Our DM for this particular campaign feels that having loads of minor magic items in the world makes magic items as a whole seem less important. To rectify this, he only gives them to us once in a long while, but they're always relatively powerful items, and sometimes somewhat more powerful than we should have at our level. He also makes an effort to tailor the items to the characters' personality. It's actually a lot of fun, but this is a story of the one time it nearly went horribly awry.

Now, two characters in this campaign figure in this story:

• Me, a LG gnomish cleric of Glittergold named Carl McPhee. (We have... issues with names.)
• A CN elven sorcerer named Nihilus the Arbitrary, also called the Wanton. (Like I said, issues.)

I've been spending pretty much the entire campaign reining in the other players' wanton violence, and trying to minimize casualties. I constantly advocate capturing evil individuals and bringing them to the proper authorities rather than killing them ourselves. This has been an uphill battle for some time, since most of the other characters are Chaotic, and have little respect for the proper authorities. The only exception is the paladin, but she's generally in favor of slaying evil beings outright, and is easily distracted by the other party members when they have to do something morally ambiguous. (The "rustic architecture" line from Gamers 2 gets a lot of mileage).

Nihilus, on the other hand, lives up to his epithet. He's impulsive, hedonistic, and has a twisted sense of humor. And, thanks to the aforementioned policy on magic items, he's carrying the single most appropriate item for his personality... the Rod of Wonder. At 5th level.

Up until now, the dice gods have smiled on us, and the Rod has been useful. Except for a couple minor incidents (turning an attacking monstrous spider green, accomplishing nothing; accidentally hitting one of our summoned animals with a Lightning Bolt) it's been to our advantage to let Nihilus set it off as often as he likes.

So, we're trying to eliminate a slave trading ring, and this requires a great deal of interrogating underlings, finding out to whom they report, tracking down their superiors, etc. We've finally found the guy who's in charge of a particular city's branch of the slave trade, and we're approaching his home. We have two prisoners with us, whom we've intimidated into acting as guides. One of them, a random thug/enforcer we christened Thomas One-Ear after the halfling got too enthusiastic in an interrogation session, I have tied up and am leading around on a rope. The other, a random low-level contact we call Shady Dave, has been shrunken down by the Rod of Wonder, and is in a glass jar (with airholes) hanging around Nihilus's neck. (We are, of course, moving under cover of darkness, so nobody stops us and asks why we have these two restrained.)

We manage to get into the house, but most of us aren't optimized for stealth, and Thomas One-Ear isn't trying too hard to be quiet (we needed to keep him with us until we determined that we were, in fact, in the right place). So he hears us coming, and is prepared by the time we find him... and, surprise, he's a necromancer. (The implications of a necromancer working in a slaver ring should probably not be thought about too much.) After a long, drawn-out battle, we have him subdued, and we're trying to figure out to whom he reports, so we can take out the slaver ring entirely.

The interrogation is not going well, because he can tell that I won't seriously harm him, as I have to forcefully prevent my party members from doing so. Finally, we give him an ultimatum. Option one: he tells us everything he knows, and we leave him here, without alerting the authorities, allowing him to escape in his own time. Option two: I leave the room and let my party members do as they will. The paladin is itching to smite evil, the rogue wants to take another ear-trophy, and Nihilus is toying with the Rod of Wonder. Thomas One-Ear is still bleeding from the wound on the side of his head, and Shady Dave is banging on the sides of the jar, desperately trying to get out. I get a huge circumstance bonus to Intimidate, and he gives us a name, but claims not to know where we can find him. According to our Sense Motive checks, this is indeed the situation. At least we got the name.

We start to leave, as per the deal, but I make a Spot check and realize that Nihilus is pointing his Rod of Wonder straight at the necromancer and is clearly about to say the command word. The rest of the party notices too, and hurries out. I turn around, run towards Nihilus, and try to get the Rod from him before it goes off. "Roll Dex to react quickly enough," says the DM. Dexterity was my dump stat. I let go of Thomas One-Ear's rope and fling myself at Nihilus but miss completely, and fall to the floor. The Rod goes off: fireball.

There are five people within the blast: Me, Thomas One-Ear, Nihilus, Shady Dave, and the necromancer. Three of us fail our Reflex saves. Shady Dave doesn't get one, since he's hanging from Nihilus's neck. The necromancer was given a massive circumstance penalty for being tied to a chair, but rolled a natural 20. The DM ruled that he managed to tip the chair over and duck under the worst of the blast.

Thomas One-Ear is a charred corpse. Which is somewhat depressing, since I was going to let him go as soon as we left the building.
Shady Dave is a tiny skeleton inside the melted remains of the glass jar.
Nihilus is at -7.
I'm at exactly -10.
The necromancer drags himself from the scorched remnants of the chair, only a few hp left, and gets the Nine Hells out.

The players are somewhat stunned. The Rod has betrayed us, and due to a freak accident, Carl is dead and Nihilus is dying. Then the paladin's player spoke up. "Do you really only have [x] hit points? I thought you should have more by now."

Carl's always been somewhat fragile for a cleric, due to extremely poor dice rolls when he levels, but we check the total to be sure, and she's right: it is mathematically impossible for a cleric of Carl's level and constitution score to have hit points that low. I'd forgotten to roll for new hp when we leveled at the end of the previous session. So I roll then, and instead of being dead, I'm left in the same position as Nihilus: dying in a scorched room. (Thankfully, the house was stone and not wood.) Thanks to some high heal checks (the paladin had used up her Lay on Hands), we manage to stabilize, and both of us pull through.

The DM ruled that due to my extremely close brush with death, I retained some permanent scarring. Carl has burn scars all over his face and hands, and is unable to grow any hair on the burnt areas. Ever since, he has been called Carl the Burned.

(I apologize for the length; I couldn't decide what details to leave out, so I put them all in.)

Epic. Did that necromancer end up becoming a recurring villian?

[Yukitsu]

*Pokes three guys, who all fall over, stunned*
"Wow, what did you just do?"
"Think of it as a very selective flash bang grenade that goes off when I deactivate my spells."
"Can't you think of something more dark ages appropriate?"
"Well, let's toss these dwarves overboard, see how well they swim in plate."
"... Fine, you toss the stunned dwarves overboard. They drown."
"Because of their plate."
"Shut up you."

"I'm thinking of calling my ship "Jidaisakugo", which means anachronism in Japanese."
"Why would you call it that?"
"It's a 1650s Japanese warship set in 1250 Norway, crewed by horn helmeted vikings in plate armour using Greek 500s siege weaponry under the 1800s codes of naval laws. And I have a tazer."
"Point."