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In general, rolling spot and listen checks work well with messing with your players.
In my case, the players were proceeding up a corridor with a number of rooms in it, each with big pipes and some unimportant cleaning supplies in each. I asked them if they wanted to search each room, and who's going first.
The first two rooms the fighter went first, a bit cautiously, but only finding the cleaning materials and odd noises through the piping, like laughter.
The party never managed to reach the third room, because they all failed the check to spot the Gelatinous Cube that was in the way. They didn't even realise it when I asked them to roll spot the third time until BAM, face full of Cube.
They actually enjoyed that encounter a great deal.
My 3.5 guys got to munchkin'ing their characters to be these ultimate combat monsters, which was frustrating as they were all really good role-players with 20ish years of experience.
So I wrote a mission where they had to retrieve a relic from the tomb of a very overly paranoid long dead wizard. Built tons upon tons of traps and skill checks and not a single enemy to defeat.
Just off the top of my head, it was something like
Balance beam walk over lava
open gap that needs jumped to grab rope
climb check to scale ledge
Reflex save trap
a room of those bamboo poles where you have to walk at the tops of them
a Puzzle Hallway with a series of intermitantly bursting flames and crushing walls, where positioning and movement are really all that matters
An illusionary entrance requiring a will save
A spiral stairwell with traps to slash ankles
Then ending with a cage closing above them for a water-filling room trap that required underwater lockpicking to release the drain and fall through into the room below them where the relic was contained
...along with explosive runes and contact poison all around it.
Oh, and the whole way along, there were these weird floating kabuki head things that chased them spitting 1d4 damage darts, so they couldn't just stop halfway through to rest or re-mem spells.
Every single objective was a skill or feature that one of them had previously had, but neglected for several levels. By the end of the adventure, suddenly everyone was looking over their skills again and trying to find ways to be more well-rounded.
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78% of DM's started their first campaign in a tavern. If you're one of the 22% that didn't, copy and paste this into your signature.
Where did you start yours?
They were in prison cells of a city jail. The party was 3 2E thieves, so we started them off with a jailbreak and ran them as on-the-lam. Obviously this means the gov't must have been corrupt, arresting future PCs.
To my surprise, I could actually come up with two things that worked pretty well in messing up the players and/or their characters. Both are fairly basic, so nothing super-innovative is to be expected, but as I said, both worked fine.
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First one was in the first CoC adventure I ran. It was also the first time playing CoC for everyone in the group, and I think at least some of the players were a bit paranoid and overly cautious about things -- their characters weren't supposed to be, of course.
So, when I introduced a pair of twins, sitting in a train next to their mother, looking at one of the players "in a suspicious, somehow disturbing way" just as the player was leaving his seat, I don't think the players took my word that the "twins appeared perfectly normal and not at all menacing." It didn't help that the twins kept appearing at inconvenient times, like near a murder scene (it wasn't their fault, they lived right by the scene!).
Still, for some reason, not even the players being completely unable to find any evidence whatsoever indicating that the twins had anything to do with the weird stuff that was going on in the town seemed to ease their suspicions! It's not like a GM would ever try to mislead their players, right?
In the end, they obviously had nothing to do with anything, were completely innocent and most of the PCs were fried alive by the Fire Vampires.
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The second one was in a Shadowrun adventure. This one doesn't need as much background information. The only thing you need to know is that two of the Runners went into a house of mirrors, while a third (a not-so-intelligent troll, which made this even funnier for me) stayed outside. The mirror house was, as is to be expected, not a regular thing, and one of the Runners inside got stuck in the illusion-thingy that manifested in the house.
The moment I announced to the player who played the troll that the stuck character stepped outside the house of mirrors was priceless. Shapeshifting (well, Mask in SR4) <3
This might've been one of those "You had to be there" moments, or maybe even a "You had to say it" moment, but believe me, I had fun. Especially since the NPC who did that actually wanted nothing but to mess with the Runners' heads. Well, she also wanted to get them to go away if possible, but mainly she did it "for the lulz".
Have a well-lit dungeon decorated with angel statues.
Make it so that something the players do causes the lights to very briefly go out, after which at least two of the statues are gone.
Start randomly asking for spot checks.
You do realise they don't actually have to move from where they are just simply have them notice that some have lowered their hands from where they were originally covering their faces...
You do realise they don't actually have to move from where they are just simply have them notice that some have lowered their hands from where they were originally covering their faces...
Why not have the best of both worlds, and do both?
As for a story to share, I did this to my players in a Desert-based campaign I ran:
Two characters, a pirate and a ninja were both trying to find the same lost artifact, for different purposes (yes, I pitted the pirate PC and the Ninja PC against each other ). It was an enormous (as in, the size of a person's head) ruby called the Heart of Sand. It was an heirloom to a lost empire known as the Sand Shapers, and was essentially the crown jewel of their Emperor.
Throughout the adventure, I seeded clues to this ruby's incredible powers: according to some, it could grant wishes, give the power to resurrect the sand shaper empire, with the wielder at the helm, or even allow someone to ascend to godhood.
Then, some more sinister rumors: they met some people who said they had gone after the gem, and even found it. But everything that they had used to perceive it in any way had been lost in an accident less than a week later: the guy who touched it lost that hand; everyone who had looked at it had lost their eyes. The new rumor was that, with the fall of the Empire, the gem had become cursed, and anyone who perceived the gem would lose whatever they used to do so.
Eventually, they found the Heart of Sand. Knowing the rumors, they were especially careful not to touch it, or even look at it. They wrapped it in layers and layers of blankets and sheets, averted their eyes, etc.
What did this mystical, ultra-powerful MacGuffin do? Absolutely nothing. It was just a big ruby. The curse was merely a coincidence coupled with poor memory .
EDIT: Well, that's not entirely true. It did do something, but that wasn't an intrinsic property to the gem. To get to the treasure room where it was being stored, the characters had to cross a lake of liquid salt on a rickey boat, underneath a storm that causes powerful lightning strikes that are drawn to magic auras. They had to dismiss all their spells and leave their magic items behind to have a hope of making it. The stone was surrounded in an anti-magic field as long as it was in the dungeon - the Emperors of old used it to transport powerful magic items to and from the treasure room. That's it. Once it left the dungeon, that field disappeared for good.
When in a tavern if the parties thief tries to leave in the middle of the night
Hand another player a blank note asking for a perception check and telling them to say nothing.
Then hand a note to another player asking for a stealth check to DC of other players perception.
Results?
A) Nothing happens and you go interesting
B) Have the first player wake up to something breathing on him as a horrific visage is looking at him(Ask if he screams)
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Spoiler
Quote:
Originally Posted by Miscast_Mage
You're a frickin' ninja below me, too!? You got mad skills, Vknight.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Arbane
Rogue vs. Dog. (The new Cat vs. Commoner, only not amusing!)
Quote:
Originally Posted by Jay R
You are making the assumption of rational planning. After 37 years of dungeon crawling, I still have zero evidence that the average dungeon was designed by the sane.
"Sleep is optional, just ask Vknight" Someone I Forget but thanks... I don't
So basically, one of my players in a chat RP had developed a bit of a reputation for being a bit crazy. For having a bit of a tendency to act like Miko from OoTS.
This reputation was completely undeserved, I can tell you, but I decided to roll with it one session when, as he broke down a barrier to a tomb the party needed to reach, he'd accidentally killed a rat that went down in there.
It wasn't as good as what I'd planned (having him accidentally have killed a small child) but I felt a little bad doing it, so...
Funny story. I had a dark tower near a village. It was made of black stone. The PC's learned that evil-gnomes lived there, and, upon torturing one, the PCs learned that a sentient skeleton named the King of Death was at the top of the tower.
When they reached the top, I described the King of Death as wearing tattered black robes, having glowing tattoos on his skin, and standing in a pentagram. After a combat, I revealed that they killed the King of Death, giving my real villain the time to burn the village next to the tower.
My best 'messing with the PCs' thing ever had to be the "Tests of Ability."
Spoiler
Long story short, the PCs had defected from an evil empire to an order of Paladins of Freedom who opposed them as part of a plot to kill a powerful Sorcerer resistance leader. Because they had, you know, been special forces for the evil empire of the setting, the Paladins required them to complete a series of tests to determine their worth. The 'Tests of Ability.'
My players liked to metagame, and (with a few exceptions) were a little dim, so I decided to mess with their expectations. While they didn't know the content of the tests, they were told their names; the Test of Strength, the Test of Speed, the Test of Endurance, the Test of Intelligence, the Test of Wisdom, and the Test of Heart. They immediately began looking at who had the best scores in each ability.
For the Test of Strength they were brought to a waterfall, and told that they had to jump into the mist. They could hear the crashing of water on rocks, and they decided it was time for a pow-wow; determine how to survive, maybe use spells or ropes to get through it alive (the falling damage would have easily killed about half of the party from that height). Except for the meat-headed Flind and the Paladin, who just ran and lept off.
When the other PCs heard their voices calling out it was okay, their guide explained that the Test of Strength tested the strength of their faith; if they would trust the guide with their life. There had never been any danger, as nets just below the mist kept the jumpers safe from harm.
For the Test of Speed, they were placed on a racetrack shaped like a huge Omega and told they needed to beat a mechanical horse to the finish line. This time, they figured it out pretty quickly; rather than running along the track, they could just cut across the grass and beat the much faster opponent there. As their guide explained, it was a test of their Speed of Thought; as CG Paladins, they value effectiveness more than hide-bound tradition and like improvisation in their employees.
For the Test of Endurance, they had to fight a massive swamp full of trolls. As they 'killed' one, it would sink into the swamp until it regenerated it's hp and attacked again. It took them FOREVER to actually take charge and not let the trolls dictate the pace of the battle; gathering the bodies and burning them while fighting off the ones who were still alive.
Like the other tests, this one wasn't just about slogging theough a fight with their Constitution scores. It was about how they endured hardship; if they took charge and fought back, or just played by the accepted rules. To my chagrin the Players still had not figured that out yet. They still thought 6 'Tests of Ability' meant one test per ability score. Ugh.
For the Test of Intelligence, they had to play chess against a Gold Dragon. In a room full of lava. Since convection works in my games, they were taking continuous fire damage (1d6/round) for several minutes. They probably would have died if they didn't have the intelligence to work as a group; using aid other checks to beat the Dragon's much higher int, and healing magic to keep them from roasting before they won. After all, as their guide said, only an unintelligent buffoon would refuse help to complete their mission.
For the Test of Wisdom, they had to move a massive Sphere of Annihilation across a chamber and through a hoop. This one... did not really have a lesson; I BS'd them something about how the wise solve problems, but it was really a chekov's gun. The Sphere of Annihilation was going to be used by the BBEG Sorcerer to trash the place later, and I didn't want it to seem like an ass-pull.
When the final test, the Test of Heart, came up the players started figuring out who had the highest Charisma score. Still, one of the players had grown a brain and pointed out that none of the previous tests had been about their ability scores, and were supposed to be lateral thinking puzzles. Finally.
The actual Test of Heart consisted of a locked wooden door, which they had to pass through to complete the test. There was also a small child sitting on a stool near it, with a key around his neck. They asked the kid to give them his key, but he said the Paladins had told him not to give it to anyone. This completely stumped them.
After about 15-30 minutes of in character debate, the majority of the party had decided to kill the child and take the key. To pass a test, so they could join an order of paladins. A test called the Test of Heart.
Luckily, reason prevailed and the Flind asked if the kid could open the lock for them. Seeing no reason why not to, the kid unlocked the door with the key still around his neck. There was literally only one possible way to fail the Test of Heart; by hurting the kid. They could have broken the door, used social skills or RP to convince the kid to help them, picked the lock, even stolen the key secretly or used magic. But you have to have a pure enough heart not to hurt a child. They barely passed.
This all took place over one 8-10 hour session, and an in-game week, but it was definitely one of the best adventures we'd ever had at that point. I still count it as one of my favorite bits of DMing, and it really helped lighten the mood after the relentless darkness of the campaign up till then.
TL;DR: It takes a party of ten elite adventurers about five days in game, and their players 8 hours out of game, to figure out not to judge a dungeon by it's moniker.
Water Bear, that is awesome. I'm definitely going to borrow that one in the future.
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I am not seaweed. That's a B.
Praise I've received
Spoiler
Quote:
Originally Posted by ThiagoMartell
Kelb, recently it looks like you're the Avatar of Reason in these forums, man.
Quote:
Originally Posted by LTwerewolf
[...] bringing Kelb in on your side in a rules fight is like bringing Mike Tyson in on your side to fight a toddler. You can, but it's such massive overkill.
If I wanted to keep it secret, I wouldn't have posted the story. Go for it.
One suggestion though; work on your poker face or get a large DM screen. It's really hard to watch your PCs talking about improvising mountaineering gear or getting chased around a room by a Sphere of Annihilation without cracking up and inadvertently giving them hints. I had to bite my tongue soo many times.
Also; don't play for 10 straight hours. It gets absolutely brutal after hour six, and your girlfriend will get really angry when you blow her off to keep playing D&D. Then again, I have no regrets.
I agree with Kelb_Panthera' sentiment, but I'd like to ask permission to borrow before doing so. :)
Bah. Haven't you ever heard that it's easier to get forgiveness than permission.
__________________
I am not seaweed. That's a B.
Praise I've received
Spoiler
Quote:
Originally Posted by ThiagoMartell
Kelb, recently it looks like you're the Avatar of Reason in these forums, man.
Quote:
Originally Posted by LTwerewolf
[...] bringing Kelb in on your side in a rules fight is like bringing Mike Tyson in on your side to fight a toddler. You can, but it's such massive overkill.
On topic: I don't usually mess with my players much. I certainly don't do random things just to do random things (like all those proposals made that have no in-game explanation - I go with Tolkien here, that there may be mysteries in the created world, but there should always be an explanation, even if it's hidden), I'd feel like a moron.
One gold piece in the middle of a bare room (placed there by someone who wants the PCs to burn time). Simple and inelegant.
I once ran a module (alas, I can't remember the name or publisher) where they had to pass through a dungeon full of horrible, deadly traps as part of a test. The PCs were mid-level, and had no access to resurrection magic while adventuring. In the very first room a PC died horribly, impaled on spikes at the bottom of a pit trap. When they finally got past that room, they found that their dead companion had been somehow resurrected and restored to full health. Another PC died in the next room's puzzle-trap, and again was resurrected once they succeeded in passing through the room. I made sure to describe each death in excruciating, painful detail.
The catch was that the dungeon would only perform a limited number of resurrections. If the PCs remained wary, and stayed in character (nobody likes dying painfully) they were almost certain to make it through without running out of resurrections. If, of the other hand, they started treating it like a video game, dying willingly rather than figuring out the traps, they were almost certain to run out of resurrections halfway through. Leading to the following scene:
"Where's Bob?"
"Back in the last room, with his head cut off."
"He didn't rez?"
"Nope."
Players slowly realize how screwed they are...
My best 'messing with the PCs' thing ever had to be the "Tests of Ability."
Spoiler
Long story short, the PCs had defected from an evil empire to an order of Paladins of Freedom who opposed them as part of a plot to kill a powerful Sorcerer resistance leader. Because they had, you know, been special forces for the evil empire of the setting, the Paladins required them to complete a series of tests to determine their worth. The 'Tests of Ability.'
My players liked to metagame, and (with a few exceptions) were a little dim, so I decided to mess with their expectations. While they didn't know the content of the tests, they were told their names; the Test of Strength, the Test of Speed, the Test of Endurance, the Test of Intelligence, the Test of Wisdom, and the Test of Heart. They immediately began looking at who had the best scores in each ability.
For the Test of Strength they were brought to a waterfall, and told that they had to jump into the mist. They could hear the crashing of water on rocks, and they decided it was time for a pow-wow; determine how to survive, maybe use spells or ropes to get through it alive (the falling damage would have easily killed about half of the party from that height). Except for the meat-headed Flind and the Paladin, who just ran and lept off.
When the other PCs heard their voices calling out it was okay, their guide explained that the Test of Strength tested the strength of their faith; if they would trust the guide with their life. There had never been any danger, as nets just below the mist kept the jumpers safe from harm.
For the Test of Speed, they were placed on a racetrack shaped like a huge Omega and told they needed to beat a mechanical horse to the finish line. This time, they figured it out pretty quickly; rather than running along the track, they could just cut across the grass and beat the much faster opponent there. As their guide explained, it was a test of their Speed of Thought; as CG Paladins, they value effectiveness more than hide-bound tradition and like improvisation in their employees.
For the Test of Endurance, they had to fight a massive swamp full of trolls. As they 'killed' one, it would sink into the swamp until it regenerated it's hp and attacked again. It took them FOREVER to actually take charge and not let the trolls dictate the pace of the battle; gathering the bodies and burning them while fighting off the ones who were still alive.
Like the other tests, this one wasn't just about slogging theough a fight with their Constitution scores. It was about how they endured hardship; if they took charge and fought back, or just played by the accepted rules. To my chagrin the Players still had not figured that out yet. They still thought 6 'Tests of Ability' meant one test per ability score. Ugh.
For the Test of Intelligence, they had to play chess against a Gold Dragon. In a room full of lava. Since convection works in my games, they were taking continuous fire damage (1d6/round) for several minutes. They probably would have died if they didn't have the intelligence to work as a group; using aid other checks to beat the Dragon's much higher int, and healing magic to keep them from roasting before they won. After all, as their guide said, only an unintelligent buffoon would refuse help to complete their mission.
For the Test of Wisdom, they had to move a massive Sphere of Annihilation across a chamber and through a hoop. This one... did not really have a lesson; I BS'd them something about how the wise solve problems, but it was really a chekov's gun. The Sphere of Annihilation was going to be used by the BBEG Sorcerer to trash the place later, and I didn't want it to seem like an ass-pull.
When the final test, the Test of Heart, came up the players started figuring out who had the highest Charisma score. Still, one of the players had grown a brain and pointed out that none of the previous tests had been about their ability scores, and were supposed to be lateral thinking puzzles. Finally.
The actual Test of Heart consisted of a locked wooden door, which they had to pass through to complete the test. There was also a small child sitting on a stool near it, with a key around his neck. They asked the kid to give them his key, but he said the Paladins had told him not to give it to anyone. This completely stumped them.
After about 15-30 minutes of in character debate, the majority of the party had decided to kill the child and take the key. To pass a test, so they could join an order of paladins. A test called the Test of Heart.
Luckily, reason prevailed and the Flind asked if the kid could open the lock for them. Seeing no reason why not to, the kid unlocked the door with the key still around his neck. There was literally only one possible way to fail the Test of Heart; by hurting the kid. They could have broken the door, used social skills or RP to convince the kid to help them, picked the lock, even stolen the key secretly or used magic. But you have to have a pure enough heart not to hurt a child. They barely passed.
This all took place over one 8-10 hour session, and an in-game week, but it was definitely one of the best adventures we'd ever had at that point. I still count it as one of my favorite bits of DMing, and it really helped lighten the mood after the relentless darkness of the campaign up till then.
TL;DR: It takes a party of ten elite adventurers about five days in game, and their players 8 hours out of game, to figure out not to judge a dungeon by it's moniker.
Cool story bro. Still, experience has taught me you should not overely on the morals of your players.
Have a well-lit dungeon decorated with angel statues.
Make it so that something the players do causes the lights to very briefly go out, after which at least two of the statues are gone.
Start randomly asking for spot checks.
I'm using this, if you don't mind. One question though- How do I block darkvision? Half the team has it, including the Whovian in the group.
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Spoiler
Quote:
Originally Posted by The_Tentacle
Often in the Lord of the Rings, if people need a Deus ex Machina: Gandalf. But if Gandalf needs a Deus ex Machina: eagles. And if the eagles need a Deus ex Machina, then you should probably just pledge undying loyalty to Sauron right there and save yourself the trouble.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Razanir
Everyone knows frying pans are actually weapons that people repurpose for cooking
I'm using this, if you don't mind. One question though- How do I block darkvision? Half the team has it, including the Whovian in the group.
Either magical darkness, or the feat Darkstalker. I believe the feat is in Champions of Ruin. Or, I suppose, the statues could be just out of darkvision range.
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Jonny was a chemist's son, but Jonny is no more.
What Jonny thought was H2O, was H2SO4.
I've got one that I'm currently planning. I've got a campaign setting I'm building that's inspired by V:tM, where Vampires run civilization from the shadows. However, I'm going to convince each player individually that they are the only one who knows this, and that there are in game reasons why they can't tell the other players, and also out of game reasons (I want it to be a surprise, but don't want to entirely blind side them). Also, one of the players (she's already agreed to it, in fact it was her idea) is going to secretly serve the Vampires and be aspiring to become one.
Their first BBEG is attracting them because he's a changeling, and they are universally reviled (also because he's actually succeeding at creating a new faction in a setting where the existing factions make it very hard for newcomers in order to improve their chances of "winning".) Of course, what they won't know is that he's also a vampire.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Ertier
A good background is like a skirt. Short enough to keep my interest, but long enough to cover the important bits.
Let's see, full list of scares/mindscrewy stuff I pulled on my first 3.P game:
1. Two story, sky blue New England style home, complete with large grassy field and a large oak tree in the middle of Carceri (The layer that's all jagged mountains and swamps).
2. The first floor of the house is lit up by gas lamps and there's evidence that someone was recently there.
3. Front door slams shut and perma-locks when party heads upstairs. Efforts to break it down prove futile. Ditto with windows.
4. Located door behind wallpaper on the second floor. Leads to little girl's room.
5. Impossibly long closet in girl's room.
6. Closet lined with big plush stuffed animals that progressively get more dark and grotesque the deeper you go.
7. Tea party set up at the back of the closet. Attendants are a skeleton (Knife in head, angle suggest that second guest killed them) and a patchwork little girl that seems dead. Girl holds a key.
8. Upon taking the key, the lights go out, they hear a pitter patter of feet, a girlish giggle, and the stuffed animals come alive.
9. Upon killing the stuffed animals and leaving the closet, the door slams shut. Upon opening it, a small floor of blood rushes out. Stuffed animals replaced by body parts hanging from meat hooks.
10. Found second door behind wallpaper. Used key to open, leads to an office.
10A. A previously investigated locked bedroom had a woman in white with white hair and pale skin. Upon second examination, keyhole was covered with a red material.
11. Journal located in office details fall into madness of the father ad his wife and daughter die from mysterious illness. Goes on to describe lengths he went to to get them back including but not limited to murder, reading of eldritch tomes and crude necromancy.
11A. Also makes mention of his wife's albino sister taking up residence in the guest room, then succumbing to the same illness his wife and child died from.
12. While reading the journal, a player's summoned creature was murdered, assumingly by the previously mentioned patchwork girl.
13. Upon heading back down stairs, windows and door are bricked up. In addition, large painting of horrific monsters that was in the dining room is now empty and bricked up, leading players to suspect that it was not a painting but rather a window, and they were being watched.
14. Figure found in dining room tied to chair. Figure released, only to be pulled into the walls by a black amoebic...thing.
End Part 1 of "The Mad House" (A 1408 inspired game)
Keep in mind we were playing with the lights turned down, there was like x8 more descriptiveness, and I had the "Fragment" album by Musica Cthulhiana playing on repeat in the background. By the end of the first proper session, i had 3/5 of the players outright refusing to make spot or listen checks due to fear.
10A. A previously investigated locked bedroom had a woman in white with white hair and pale skin. Upon second examination, keyhole was covered with a red material.
Been reading the creepypastas, haven't you?
__________________
Jonny was a chemist's son, but Jonny is no more.
What Jonny thought was H2O, was H2SO4.
Let's see, full list of scares/mindscrewy stuff I pulled on my first 3.P game:
1. Two story, sky blue New England style home, complete with large grassy field and a large oak tree in the middle of Carceri (The layer that's all jagged mountains and swamps).
2. The first floor of the house is lit up by gas lamps and there's evidence that someone was recently there.
3. Front door slams shut and perma-locks when party heads upstairs. Efforts to break it down prove futile. Ditto with windows.
4. Located door behind wallpaper on the second floor. Leads to little girl's room.
5. Impossibly long closet in girl's room.
6. Closet lined with big plush stuffed animals that progressively get more dark and grotesque the deeper you go.
7. Tea party set up at the back of the closet. Attendants are a skeleton (Knife in head, angle suggest that second guest killed them) and a patchwork little girl that seems dead. Girl holds a key.
8. Upon taking the key, the lights go out, they hear a pitter patter of feet, a girlish giggle, and the stuffed animals come alive.
9. Upon killing the stuffed animals and leaving the closet, the door slams shut. Upon opening it, a small floor of blood rushes out. Stuffed animals replaced by body parts hanging from meat hooks.
10. Found second door behind wallpaper. Used key to open, leads to an office.
10A. A previously investigated locked bedroom had a woman in white with white hair and pale skin. Upon second examination, keyhole was covered with a red material.
11. Journal located in office details fall into madness of the father ad his wife and daughter die from mysterious illness. Goes on to describe lengths he went to to get them back including but not limited to murder, reading of eldritch tomes and crude necromancy.
11A. Also makes mention of his wife's albino sister taking up residence in the guest room, then succumbing to the same illness his wife and child died from.
12. While reading the journal, a player's summoned creature was murdered, assumingly by the previously mentioned patchwork girl.
13. Upon heading back down stairs, windows and door are bricked up. In addition, large painting of horrific monsters that was in the dining room is now empty and bricked up, leading players to suspect that it was not a painting but rather a window, and they were being watched.
14. Figure found in dining room tied to chair. Figure released, only to be pulled into the walls by a black amoebic...thing.
End Part 1 of "The Mad House" (A 1408 inspired game)
Keep in mind we were playing with the lights turned down, there was like x8 more descriptiveness, and I had the "Fragment" album by Musica Cthulhiana playing on repeat in the background. By the end of the first proper session, i had 3/5 of the players outright refusing to make spot or listen checks due to fear.
This is great. Creepypasta or not, I fully applaud your actions.
Put my players down a hallway where every perception check pointed towards a dart trap (holes, plates, control panel, ect). Gnome fails his Athletics check, the holes spew poisonous oatmeal out the holes, forcing them to wade through the gooey crap and lockpick their way out. Into an Ogre den.
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Re: Hilarious Ways to mess with your players.
). It was an enormous (as in, the size of a person's head) ruby called the Heart of Sand. It was an heirloom to a lost empire known as the Sand Shapers, and was essentially the crown jewel of their Emperor.
.
Still, one of the players had grown a brain and pointed out that none of the previous tests had been about their ability scores, and were supposed to be lateral thinking puzzles. Finally.
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