Memorable pen and paper gaming moments

[Darkandus]

Why are you still playing with that group? Actually, let me rephrase that. Why are you still associating with these people in any way?

[Arganaut]

Allow me to put it to you both this way: the DM is actually a very skilled one, and is a lot of fun to play D&D with, so that's one reason I've stuck with the campaign thus far. I don't really hang out with either weird guy or patronizing SOB or Leeroy in real life, and up to this point I've been able to at least tolerate their stupid.

Edit: Plus I'd like to think that he's just as stressed with this as I am, and is, at this point, just frantically reaching for anything to get this back on the main plot line.

The only reason I know them in the first place is through two other guys who I'm decent friends with were once friends of theirs. Once being the key word. They actually played in this campaign before I joined in, and quit over the patronizing SOB and the weird one's stupid behavior in game.

They pretty much rag on weird one to the point where they just barely like having him around anymore (because he's just as annoying and frustrating in RL), and they've just outright severed ties with patronizing SOB because, surprise surprise, he's an asshole in RL as well.

At this point, I'm in this campaign on the slim chance that I can kill all three of their characters, cause them to quit, and then invite some of the other guys back into the game, who only quit in the first place/avoided it like the plague because of weird guy and patronizing SOB.

Otherwise, like I said, I'll just quit the campaign. There's other groups on Campus and somewhat outside of campus.

[Dechstreme]

My friend, you have my condolences. WHO THE HELL ARE THESE IDIOTS?!?! CHAOTIC GOOD DOESN'T MEAN COMPLETE DISREGARD FOR THE RULES AND DOING WHATEVER THE HELL YOU FEEL LIKE!!!! They are acting more like Chaotic neutral characters than chaotic good. Actually, they are acting like deluded-chaotic-neutral-brain-dead-douche bags.

Arganaut. You make me proud with your previous role playing anecdote. A summoned lute to smack people around! I want a folding chair weapon! And just READING about what you have to put up with in your current group....

I hope their characters get their comeuppance.

[Atharyn]

Arganaut, this sounds like a small group communication problem. The two people causing the problems want to be in charge. They want things their way. They don't want to listen to anyone else, because letting anyone else lead is unacceptable to them. Look at your example of finding a cure, on your own, and having it ready in three days. You had it covered, but they decided to chase down something that in a logical world shouldn't work. Not only that, chasing after the "crazy" plan would preclude using the cure you already had. Reasonable people should be patient enough to wait. If the sensible cure fails (the 3 day cure) then you can fall back on crazy. Crazy shouldn't be your first choice unless:

1: You are chaotic neutral.
2: You are neutral evil and want the infected person to drop dead.
3: You already know that the sensible cure won't work.

I think you should just try and form your own group with the decent people. Don't waste time on the idiots. They played your character out, which is completely unacceptable in my view. Any time you invest in trying to "save" the GM from these people is a waste. If he wasn't having fun, he would just stop GM'ing for them.

And, just because it fits:

[Greybane]

Well, my most recent session of DnD ended on a down note, in character. Out of character, while I am unhappy with what is happening to him, it is all done fairly, and makes great sense in story. No problems with the DM, just a bad day with low rolls the entire time, that had worse consequences than the usual need to drink an extra potion or two..

I am playing a Bard, with a one level dip of Mindbender, currently total level 8. I am the party face naturally, and most of my spells are utility sorts, with very little in the offensive action department. I end up in this town (well, trying to get in) and am taken to be questioned by the Inquisition. SOP apparently for this place, so I go along with it. No problem, I got insane Diplomacy and Bluff and other skills. Bard after all. Well, after leaving me in a sweat room for a bit next to all these lovely torture implements, some of which glisten with magic for extra fun!

After a bit of time, an imposing inquisitor-lady comes in and begins lying her but off about some facts regarding the former country next to us. A truth potion is forced down my throat, which doesn't sound so bad for experienced DnD players. After all, that is only something like a DC 13 potion to resist, which as a level 8 character with good will save progression is no problem. Except that this potion is the dire half dragon version of that, And I barely pass it. And still have to make bluff checks even when I tell a half truth.

Well, things are going smoothly with my interviewer, I feel like I am just about to convince that yes, I am not a heretic, not about to commit evil, blah blah blah. My bard is a CN with quite a few mind affecting spells, which are almost universally evil in this universe, Detect Thoughts is a dark shade of gray, let alone Charm Person. So I am eager as all get out to not be handcuffed to the chair, and get the hell out of dodge. The party is days away, with plans to meet up later. Of course, at that moment someone bursts in to the room saying they found a heretical Holy Symbol in my bag. The god I worship (and not exclusively) is a True Neutral minor deity of timing of all things, dramatic and otherwise! Barely counts, and certainly not evil.

I forgot to take it out ahead of time. Poop. Somehow, I don't think the Inquisition likes me anymore.

I admit to this, pointing out that I said I was a wandering minstrel (I am, and easily proved), that I have yet to lie (technically true), and I have all sorts of random crud in that bag, I pick up everything! (also true). Roll Bluff Check. My pattern of rolling low continues, and I roll an eight. I have a +16 modifier. I come up ONE Short of the DC! At the end of this session, I am being tortured by implements that magically heal me as the damage is being done, so I don't die. Burned by pokers is the least of it, the DM likes looking up this sort of stuff. I *may* not scar. If I do, I will have symbols of being a heretic burned all over my body, and there goes being the parties face.

Due to some other stuff about this town, I managed to extend my telepathy hundreds of miles during the night via a concentration check (actually, a perform check in place. I have a feat that usually lets me use it instead of concentration, and the DM threw me a bone) to basically singscream to the paladin ohgodithurtstheyarehurtingmehurtingmehurtingmehelpnowpleaseohpleasegod. The session ended there.

I am currently alone, being tortured, my allies hundreds of miles away in the mountains, known outlaws from this church (I don't know they just found scrolls of teleport, even before all of this happened), making will saves to avoid my mind going kaploie with none of my gear. The paladin and another PC loath my character, and wouldn't piss on him to stop him from burning to death, and one of them actively is contemplating shooting him in the back. (in game of course, not out of it) so the Bard isn't even sure help is coming.

Memorable. I can actually applaud the DM for not pulling his punches on this one, even as I curse my fate.

EDIT: This is all especially funny due to the reason for the split up. I wasn't going to be able to make a session, so we decided for the bard to act as a Gather Information check basically (we have been traveling without stop, walking, for about 3 weeks, only camping for breaks ingame, before the split). When asked why he should do it, he stated that they would likely be arrested by the authorities, while he wouldn't be. Granted it was the DM controlling him at this time, but it is hilarious in hindsight!

[Aldraia Dragonsong]

Sweet mercy, I just got out of the most awesome D&D session I have played in my life.
So it started out with us trying to figure out how to rescue the bard from the Inquisition.
It quickly became clear that we are our own greatest obstacle. Our party consists of a Lawful Good Paladin of the local dominant religion, a Neutral Good Dragon Shaman, a Lawful Neutral Rogue/Avenger/Sword Sage, a True Neutral Barbarian, and a Chaotic Neutral Bard/Mindbender. In addition to that, the paladin's religion is immensely suspicious of mind-magic, the paladin dislikes the bard on a personal level, and everything about the bard is basically anathema to the avenger's code. So when the bard called for help via a telepathy spell, he was not sure what kind of response he would get.
Luckily, letting an innocent be tortured is massively against the paladin's code regardless of her personal feelings. So after some arguing it was established that yes, we were going to rescue the bard. Then we started arguing about methodology.
As previously stated, it quickly became clear that we are our own greatest obstacle. Among other issues, our transportation method was teleport scrolls and the barbarian is afraid of magic.
Eventually, we settle on the plan "Show up, scout the place, then come up with a better plan". This was a good thing, since any plan we had was shot the moment we arrived.
I must here pause to commend the DM on his descriptive ability.
We arrived to chaos. Demons were attacking the town and the moment we showed up we were attacked by six drones. About halfway through that fight the bard showed up, apparently having managed to escape on his own. The exchange that ensued was entertaining. The bard rolled a natural one on his Dynamic Entry roll and fell off a roof. The shaman's reaction was "<bard's name>? Well, that's relief. Are you in one piece?". The paladin's reaction was "Bard!". The avenger's reaction was "Fop!". The barbarian's reaction was anger, because the magic was necessary because of the bard.
The barbarian rolled a massive critical and described it brilliantly. The paladin's god seemed to approve of being invoked, because whenever she muttered prayers or bits of creed she rolled well.
After the drones were slain, the bard explained what was going on to the extent that he had any idea, and we discussed what to do next. It was here that us being our own greatest obstacle once again arose.
You see, the paladin is from the same religion as the Inquisition. She disapproves of them but is unwilling to fight them due to the whole "serving the same god" thing. On the other hand, she was falsely convicted of demon-summoning, making any dealings with members of the Church... iffy at best. The avenger, meanwhile, thought we were here to exterminate the Inquisition. So when the bard suggested that we go kill the demon that was threatening Inquisitors, the avenger was inclined to leave the situation be. The paladin disagreed. Vehemently.
An epic shouting match ensued. The problem was quickly established to be ideological: the paladin wants truth and justice, the avenger wants vengeance. Alas, the argument was cut short when the paladin declared that she did not have time to argue and went off to fight the demon.
It was odd. Out of all the party members, I would have thought the paladin and the avenger were among the least likely to quarrel. Shows you what I know.
Many amusing things were said out of character in reference to the demon battle.

"Oh come on! I rolled a natural twenty on initiative and I go third?"

Paladin: "I should invoke my deity in game more often, clearly I have his favor."
Barbarian: "Clearly."

Barbarian: "If it's regenerating, that means that you didn't hit it hard enough. Obviously the only solution is to apply more choppa."
Paladin: "Kill it with fire!"
Bard: "No, no, my holy water would put out the fire...electricity is conducted by water! Well... non-pure water."
Paladin: "Not pure water though! And holy water is very pure I suspect."
Bard: "Does holy water count as pure?"
Paladin: "I think blessing it purifies it."
DM: "It does until it hits a demon. Then after burning the demon it becomes impure. There, we happy?"
Paladin: "So it would work. Kill it with holiness!"
Barbarian: "And after the high energy of lightning passing through it causes the water to evaporate, then we can use fire?"
DM: "Sure why not."
Paladin: "I like this plan."
Avenger: "I'm excited to be a part of it!"
*Avenger remembers that he is not currently with the party due to ideological differences*
Avenger: "Oh, wait..."

[someone]

Ok, I lol'd at that last conversation.

How did the bard escape?

[Greybane]

For the record, these players are all members of the forum.

The Bard got out due to the help of an Inquisitor with morals that he had met before on the way to town decided to free him when the town was going to hell in a handbasket. I think his decision to sing country music to his captors telling them that they suck may have had something to do with the decision. Probably not.

All the party but the Rogue/Avenger went to fight the demon, with of all things the Bard leading the way. Naturally he managed to do absolutely nothing in combat later, but it was funny to imagines everyone's reactions when the horribly morally suspect bard said "Well, I am going to go fight the demon, you can all come if you want." before the paladin was able to. He is currently not in his right mind.

My favorite moment though was definitely Thog (the barbarian) smash thorough two of the Drones at once. Given how frustrating these things had been before, it was immensely satisfying.

[Vael]

Okay, quite frankly, I know that this post is against the rules of this thread, but...I just have to share this.

Now, I play(ed) a lot of different gaming systems, from Windows to the New World of Darkness to DnD 3.5 (I think?) and I found that I utterly love the character creation process, and that as soon as I'm done with creating a character for one system, I would look for ideas for another one. Say you will about me, but if I ever get involved in a game, I'm instantly prepared ^^;

This is one of those times, just finished with a DnD Human Rogue/Wizard/Weapon Master, and I found myself feeling rather nostalgic for Scion so I start surfin' the nets for ideas. For the record, my craziest idea happened to be creating a Scion Kamen Rider, son of Susano-o, so as you can see I wanted a properly original idea...but then I came across something completely and utterly beautiful, and has prolly changed the way I would look at the Pantheons (especially the Amatsukami and Amaterasu):

This Troper played a truly fantastic game of Scion that once featured a God-Scion of Amaterasu attempting to rally the people of Japan to help her mother who was currently suffering a Heroic BSOD courtesy of Mikaboshi as a means to drive her past the Despair Event Horizon by blocking out the sun and planting gloomy thoughts in the people of Japan. Additionally, he constantly mind-raped her with images of her children suffering caused by her decisions. Through creative use of The Way and The Wyrd (courtesy of her bandmates) her player delivered a Rousing Speech to everyone of Japanese ancestry in the world. She even cued up this to help her stunt.

Scion of Amaterasu: "People of Japan...please hear me. I know n-none of you know who I am but I'm here today on behalf of my mother. No doubt you've all felt the cloying grip of despair and confusion in the past weeks and some of you have even taken to the shrines of the various gods to lodge your complaints. You have all sacrificed and suffered only to be rewarded with silence. Today, I aim to break that silence but I cannot do it without your help; with your prayers.

Today, we live in an age of sense and rationality and few people believe in the old stories; heroes and gods have become the playthings of children and we forget them as we grow up. But...they do not forget you! The pain you feel now is their absence! The pain of a child separated from their parents! Our parents! All of us! It doesn't matter if we really descended from gods...The Queen of Heaven Amaterasu...she continues to watch over you as if you were, even if you don't believe in her. Throughout our history...the history of the Japanese people...she's watched over all of us as though we were hers. Isn't that what a mother is supposed to do?

Amaterasu...is my mother. She's...bossy and stubborn and at times she can be totally set in her ways...but that's us. She is Japan. And everything she's done...all the mistakes she may have made in the past...they were done out of love! Love for a people who regard her as a myth! So please...I beg you! She needs your prayers...no...she needs your love! She needs the love of the ones she has chided and encouraged and loved like her own flesh and blood! Our mother needs to know that her children have not forsaken her!"

Storyteller:...

Our Group: *sniff* ...

Scion of Amaterasu:...so? What happened?

Storyteller: A sense of heartwarming coursed through the blood of Japanese people everywhere. Old men in Kyoto, children in Osaka, Japanese-American teenagers in New York, all felt a stirring of pride warm their hearts. The enchanted melancholy lifted and they spoke the words that their freed hearts commanded them to say. On the High Plain of Heaven, two words were heard by every god and goddess. The shadows that clung to the mountains and castles dispelled in the light of the rising sun. And in the gloom of her cave, Amaterasu lifted her heavy head in tearful, joyous disbelief as millions of her children called out to her with two simple words...two words she hadn't heard in a very long time.

"Okaa-sama!"

So yeah, with that as my next inspiration, I really hope I can contribute to this thread soon.

Ja ne!

[Tempest Kitsune]

Okay, so I was GMing for our group a couple days ago in our ongoing Shadowrun game, and had ended up making the entire run out of whole cloth. We had managed to get to Minsk from Prague and deliver the goods that we were smuggling. On the way though, the crew had gotten fairly irked at an up-and-comer Red Vory and were attempting to track him down to let their displeasure be known. We were casing the area and weighing our options, while Forbin's Technomancer was attempting to hack the security. She found two feeds, one weaker than the other, both encrypted. She decided to crack the weaker signal first. It was a snuff BTL in the process of being made, being streamed live to the second floor office. All plans that the group were making were immediately dropped in favor of bum-rushing the place. And it worked in the end due to a combination of surprise and overpowering force (both Viridian and Runsamok are playing trolls). The fact that I was able to throw them into that kind of situation and catch them off guard makes it a real personal achievement for me as a GM.

[Darkandus]

After several years of adventuring my Barbarian finally achieved his goal, I don't really have time at the moment to go into details but he intimidated a Dragon into being his mount.

[Aldraia Dragonsong]

That is pretty awesome, Darkandus. Our Barbarian tried to get a triceratops to be his mount, but alas only the paladin made the Handle Animal check.
It might have worked better if the Barbarian had not attacked it first.

[Aldraia Dragonsong]

My apologies for the double post, but something very amusing happened recently.
A surprising number of natural twenties were rolled this night, but the funniest was definitely when the Paladin rolled a natural twenty on the Handle Animal check to get a cow to track the missing member of our party (the Dragon Shaman, who was absent because his player was out of town). Of course, we could not actually find him for the aforementioned reason... so as we followed the cow, a giant spider ate it. We ended up fighting it.
Post-fight, we had another one of our amusing exchanges...
DM: "I think surviving that... despite the umm... interparty conflict... deserves a level up."
Barbarian: "How could you doubt the awesomeness that was this fight?"
Paladin: "Hey, we were surprisingly cooperative today! As intraparty conflict goes, we barely pinged the scale, for us."
DM: "...Thog threw an axe at Colma... sadly, that is probably still true."
To be fair, the barbarian threw the flaming axe because he was trying to free his trapped party members from the sticky spiderwebs. The fact remains that he threw a flaming axe at one of his own party members.
Said party member then used the axe to kill the giant spider in a blaze of glorious violence so awesome that the spider exploded, so it was not all bad.

[gamebrain89]

I am a newbie to the whole pen and paper game. So I think this counts as one of my first memorable moments. While running the RP for what happened to said Dragon Shaman that Aldraia mentioned(My character), I experienced the astral plane for the first time. And this ultimately culminated in me deciding Why the Hell NOT?! and having my Shammie try and will himself to turn into a dragon, which he pulled off to my delight and maniacal laughter. He then proceeded to fry what he was fighting with a maximized breath weapon, ending the fight then and there in a massive blast of lightning. My reaction involves a fist pump and a big smile on my face. It was awesome.

[Atharyn]

In the campaign I am currently playing one of the characters is pretty much attention deficit "oooh, shiny!" In his case it always involves women. We were on a quest to retrieve a legendary sword from the tomb where it's wielder had been buried. When we finally got to the tomb the ADOS character decided he was going to lead the way. After all, he was the hero, right?

Out of the treeline comes a gorgeous woman - we think. She's wearing a golden choker that covers some things, but that's it. He, of course, heads out and tries flirting with her. It isn't until he's about 20 feet away from the rest of us that he sees she isn't a woman - she's a lamia. (Snake from the waist down.) He tries convincing her that he's the hero sent by destiny to retrieve the sword. When the lamia tells us to leave "or else" he pulls his sword out and begins to try and intimidate her.

.. at which point the priestess of destiny in the party points out that my character is the one destined to retrieve the sword ..

Surprisingly, the ADOS character puts his sword away, bows politely, and offers to let her play through. The lamia blinks at him a few times and then attacks with her spear. Without defenses, she got a high result D critical - we're using Rolemaster. That translates to "strike destroys multiple important organs. Die in 12 rounds, stunned and unable to really act until you die."

The party blitzed the lamia and incapacitated her. (Our sort-of-possessed undead librarian killed her when she was down.) We got into the tomb and did everything we could to stabilize him. He still died. Fortunately we had his soul trapped in an evil artifact when he died - why? Oh, he was carrying the evil artifact because he didn't trust the rest of us with it.

We managed to get the sword and get out of the mountains. The first big city we found, we tried to get the local healing priests to fix his body so his soul could go back into it. There was a local mining guild leader who had them all under contract. We managed to convince said guild leader to get the ADOS character's body repaired so we could rez him. Long story short, we owe said guild leader a favor.

So we go help him make noise at the other local mining guild leader's house. Scare his guardsmen, knock a couple of people out. Sort of a drive-by-shooting. So we figure, okay, two corrupt guild leaders. We leave in the morning. During the "drive by" ADOS chats with the other guild leader. Convinces ADOS that the first guild leader treats women badly, is corrupt, and evil! Don't forget the evil!

What does ADOS do? Heads back to first guild leader's house and kills him. In cold blood. In front of witnesses.

While I know I'm not exactly unbiased, does anyone else think this sounds like a hyper active 3 year old who can't understand there are consequences for actions?

[Flux_Blade]

Well, last weekend we had probably the most memorable quote of, "Just as long as you don't roll a critical here." And said player then did in fact roll said critical. Said weapon he was wielding does necrotic damage on a critical, and he was swinging at a zombie. We had thought it would heal the sucker, but it ended up that it had just resistance. But still funny as the three of us starting laughing at the sight.

[ShonenHero]

So a few weeks ago I got to sit my butt in the DM's chair, and it indeed was a memorable experience. I was running a 4th ed adventure, something I can't remember the name of. My friends were given a selection of pregen characters, and the party ended up boiling down to a typical dwarven fighter named Creek, a womanizing, ginger-haired half-elf rogue named Eruteron, and a haughty, tongueless eladrin wizard who's name escapes me (I am not good with names, which is sad because the Eladrin by far was my favorite of the PCs. xD)

The adventure hook was that the party had to go rescue a couple of kids from a dark elf wizard and his band of hobgoblins who were planning on using them for some ritual related to the shadowfel. Yada yada, a crazy homeless man NPC later, they find out the dark elf's whereabouts are at some abandoned mausoleum. So like good adventures, my party gathers up, and heads for the mausoleum so they can really begin the adventure.

Upon entering the strangely unlocked mausoleum, they are greeted by a wispy specter and an empty tomb filled with sarcophagi and a plaque/memorial dead center. The specter, a natural native to the tomb, was a recurring NPC for the adventurers. Once a spirit to some long-deceased line of warlords, years and years passed and the spirit soon forgot its origins. It only remembered that the mausoleum was important, and in that train of thought it protected it and warded potential looters and squatters away from it. The dark elf used that to his advantage, and after bending the specter's will began using it to protect his own affairs in the mausoleum. However, the will bending was only half effective, and while the specter wouldn't raise a hand on the dark elf it was in no way beholden to him.

Anyway, the specter sees the PCs as its last chance at stopping the dark elf from completely desecrating his home, but is doubtful of the PCs intentions. So he test them with a riddle, that, upon solving will open the memorial in the middle of the room and allow access to the lower levels of the mausoleum.

The riddle was your typical puzzle fair, something to do with aligning Bahamut and Pelor statues correctly over adjacent sarcophagi. Did my best to involve the dwarf, who was randomly looting the sarcophagi. I was immensely proud that they solved the puzzle, especially since I thought the specter's riddle as a whole was far too cryptic and dated for them to figure out. But with enough hints, and decent skill checks they managed to solve it and improve the spirit's attitude a notch.

With the riddle solved, they head down to the lower level of the tombs, and end up encountering a couple hobgoblins with rigged sarcophagus oil traps. Fun was had, let me tell you. The hobgoblins would just not die, even after having one of their traps sprung on 'em. The dwarf finally managed, after running into the fire, kill the last one standing while he tried to get out of the flames via attack of opportunity. Cleaved his head right off, and got hobgoblin gore on everyone. Was a very fun encounter.

The next encounter was located via a section of natural caves connected to the mausoleum, and...well, was much more chaotic due to time constraints and sequence breaking.



See, my party managed to find the two boys behind a iron bound, demon-decal door. They just could not get through that damn door. In hindsight, I realized that what should've happened was the adventures would have to find another way in the door, and end up encountering the dark elf who had the means to free him... yeah, well, it didn't go down like that. I ended up letting them do a group strength check, again, after a rest. This time, they busted through the door, and got in and confronted the kids.

With sufficient rolls, the guys knew the room was trapped, and the boys (bound in irons, and stuck in a magic geometric circle) told the adventurers that the wizard said that if either one of them left the boundry of the circle, something bad was going to happen. What rolls couldn't tell my party, was that something bad was going to happen if they entered. And oh boy, was it bad. Did I mention the room was aligned on two sides with a row of three statues on either side of the boys? Well, upon entering the ritual circle, guess what? In typical Tomb Raider/Indie fashion, two of them came to life and proceeded to attack the ever living crap out of the first person who entered the circle (in this case the dwarf).

Due to some poor coordination of spells on the eladrin's part, she ended up casting an icey, knock-you-prone type of ability which the statues saved on and the dwarf failed. So he was knocked prone, and took a little damage. Still, no big deal, right? Errrr, well... Unfortunately for the dwarf, the statues had some weird immediate reaction ability that allowed them a basic attack role to keep a target prone if they tried to stand up near them. So a crit later, poor Creek is laying unconscious and on the floor, while the rest of the party has no clue what to do. Then, well, the statues turn come around, and coup de grace later we have one very dead dwarf with a head now in the shape of a mixing bowl (AWESOME) Bad indeed. So bad, that I even threw in the specter to help, not that it did much.

After some out of game discussion, and some shuffling of the pregen characters (only two real life players, and three toons) my friends were ready to continue. I wish they hadn't. Eruteron, our half elf rogue, is sweating bullets. He contemplates just leaving everyone, because the silversmith who hired them was willing to also pay a sum for any whereabouts of his kids whether or not they were alive. But he stayed, oddly enough, and fought against the statues valiantly... until the Eladrin wizard tried to leave the room to rest up and avoid more damage. He, in his paranoid mind, thought she was leaving. So in a big FU moment, he takes his crossbow and shoots her. Oh, lots of arguing was had after that. xD

The eladrin's player was trying to explain that, no, she wasn't bouncing out all together. Eruteron's player argued that being mute, how could she let her intentions be known? Ultimately, DM fiat was needed. I ruled that the Eladrin probably would've made her intentions known to Eruteron that she wasn't leaving for good, just resting (with sign language, or ghost sound. Really, anything to avoid PvP) Grumbling aside, the ruling was accepted, and no actions were taken against one another.

...only, now the Eladrin's player is a bit cheesed at the attempted betrayal, and meta games a bit. He decides, no, he really is leaving. Only, he's going to take out that bastard Eruteron first. I was speechless, and Eruteron's player was calling total bull (all in good sport, mind, no one was really angry). However, we were really running out of time, and I wanted the adventure to end SOMEHOW. So I, well... I let it happen, just this once.

The Eladrin used her special Thunderwave ability to attack Eruteron, and as if karma were balancing the scales it backfired magnificently. Nat' 1. Laughs were had, let me tell you. Eruteron suggested it backfire on her, and while I knew mechanically that wouldn't happen I allowed it just this once. The damage knocked her unconscious. Eruteron was the only one left standing.

So, with just Eruteron, a specter, two boys, and two statues (one only barely bloodied) the adventure sort of came a part. It got to Eruteron's turn, and he decided he might as well try to rescue the kids. So enters the circle again, rolls pathetically on breaking them free (but, with time constraints I allowed), and dragged them out of the circle... Bad stuff happened. The natural cavern they were in? It's collapsing. And while Eruteron was trying to be heroic, he gets decked across the face by a statue and then another. He's knocked unconscious as well, and by this point I ruled the party wiped. xD

However, feeling pretty bad about the whole mess, and some of my rulings I decided that the specter, out of respect for the valiant heroes efforts, led the two boys out of the cavern and mausoleum safely (a function he would've served the PCs, if they had survived) With the boys rescued, and the grip of the mausoleum waning due to its imminent collapse the spirit is finally allowed to move on to the afterlife.

As for the boys, they come out of the whole thing traumatized and shellshocked by their kidnapping and the brutal deaths of their wannabe rescuers (they were unaware the Eladrin tried to betray the half-elf) What details they gave to their father, the silversmith, were short and terrifying. Saddened and horrified at the death of the adventurers, and believing that it was one of their spirits that led his boys to safety, the smith ended up molding and casting three silver statues of them in their idealized likeness to honor them. The statues were considered to be the best of the smith's work, and with the attention they brought to his little smithy he ended up renaming his shop 'Three Silver Linings' and became somewhat renown. The success and work the fame brought to the shop also helped the boys get over the trauma, and now as men they reminisce over it fondly.

And what of the dark elf, that started all this mess? Did he manage to escape in time before the natural cavern collapsed and entombed him? I still haven't decided.

[Thozmp]

So the group I was playing with played Warhammer 40K the rpg version (we had our last session of the campaign two weeks ago and are playing Pathfinder this weekend), and there are a few memorable moments, especially near the end. For those unfamiliar with the game it is percentile based and low numbers are good. Also our particular group was a kind of mix of all the Roleplays: Dark Heresy, Deathwatch, and Rogue Trader. The group consisted of an Explorator(mechanically inclined folk), an Assassian, a Psyker, a Rogue Trader, a Storm Trooper, a Desperado, A Dark Angel Devastator Space Marine, and a Blood Angel Assault Space Marine

Near the beginning of one session our group was called up to a Prince/Govenors office at the top of a very tall tower, thankfully elevators are functional, to ask our group a favor. The prince had very little in the way of actual power and was more or less a figure head, but we agreed to his request when we hear explosions coming from the base of the tower, it's under attack by some of the home guard rebelling. Now the Assassian, the Psyker, the Explorator and the Blood Angel went to talk to the prince and the rest are exploring the grounds so the Blood Angel decides to jump out the window to get down faster. This isn't as bad an idea as it sounds considering the Blood Angel has a jump pack that lets him make such jumps regularly anyway. The Psyker and the Explorator decide to go down with him and hang on (they both have ways of making themselves effectivly weightless so it works). The Assassian takes the elevator down and the others are coming from the otherside.

At the base, there are soldiers everywhere, and it's hard to tell who are the rebels and who aren't, so preception tests for everyone to identify them. The rebels are carrying bombs, rather big ones and one of them drops one pretty much at the feet of the Blood Angel and his two hangers on. The Blood Angel kills the rebel and is then given the option to throw himself on the bomb to prevent it from hurt anyone else, he does and has to burn a fate point (he should be dead and only survives by a twist of fate but can't do anything until he's healed). The Psyker uses an ability that selectivly renders everyone within the area of effect unconscious (meaning he can choose people not to effect such as teammates) and knocks out a good two thirds of the soldiers, rebels and all. The Explorator identifies a rebel and kills him before he can set off his bomb. Assassian is in elevator, and the rest of the party stumbles onto the scene. The Psyker then heals to Blood Angel and the party procedes to play identify and kill with the rebels. One of the rebels falls his attempt to throw his bomb and it then blows up at his feet, the blast sets of another couple of bombs which blow up more bombs and so on and so forth. This is not a first for the group. At the end of round four, all the bombs have gone off, the party is alive, the soldiers, rebels and all, are pretty much salsa, and the Assassian finally steps off the elevator.

The Assassian is now confronted by two soldiers, and falls his preception to tell if they are rebels or not, as they insist on making sure the Prince is all right. The Assassian relents after they vox their commander, and lets them on the elevator with him to keep an eye on the soldiers. In the mean time The Blood Angel desides to jump back up to the Prince's office and takes the Psyker and Explorator with him. Back in the elevator the Assassian is still unsure of the soldiers; Intelligence test; turns out the commander they called isn't a real commander, they are rebels. Assassian kills both before they know it, and is left with a bomb he doesn't know how to disarm. His plan: Use power swords to cut a hole in the top of the elevator, grabbing the cable, and letting the car and bomb fall while he shoots up to the top ala Matrix style. The GM makes it a Hellish test(-60 to his ability score). Assassian rolls a 1. So at the top of the tower, the Blood Angel, Explorator, and Psyker are greeted to the sight of the elevator doors opening to the Assassian dangling from the cable and asking, "Gonna help me out?"

[Kodra]

While LARPing at GenCon this year, there was a game I was in called "High Noon at Terra Firma: The Wild West adventure that almost isn't...". There are enough twists and turns in it that I won't reveal them outside of spoilers. Those who like LARPing, check this event out at GenCon or Origins.

Spoiler: show

The game takes place in the town of Terra Firma, an old west town. There was some strange things happening and we wanted to figure out what was going on, when a pair of bandits opened fire on our Captain.

Before they could kill the captain though, he turned into the Hulk, and began to rip apart the bandits. This was a rather interesting event until at the end of the session it came to character confessions. That's when we found out the true nature of the game.

The game's actual name is "High Noon at Terra Firma: The Wild West adventure that almost isn't a fuck you game", because Terra Firma is actually just a wild west city made from a holodeck. Almost everyone in the town wasn't real. Only a handful of characters were.

When I played, the three flesh and blood characters were the Captain Kirk character who's goal was to sleep with as many interesting women as possible, an Alien Dignatary on her way to a peace conference who wanted to seduce and impregnate the captain with a stomach burster baby, and Professor What, a completely original character with no reference to any outside material, who just happened to be a time traveler.

The captain found out a spy was on board and had to leave Terra Firma to deal with it. But he was the sheriff in town and didn't want to confuse his poor holograms. So he created a hologram of himself to go in.

But since a Hologram couldn't be nearly as awesome as he was just with default settings, he had to cheat a bit. He put in a special piece of code: "When attacked, become Incredible Hulk".

That was how the Hulk became a main plot point of a Wild West / Space Opera hilarious comedy LARP.

[viridian]

Okay, so I was GMing for our group a couple days ago in our ongoing Shadowrun game, and had ended up making the entire run out of whole cloth. We had managed to get to Minsk from Prague and deliver the goods that we were smuggling. On the way though, the crew had gotten fairly irked at an up-and-comer Red Vory and were attempting to track him down to let their displeasure be known. We were casing the area and weighing our options, while Forbin's Technomancer was attempting to hack the security. She found two feeds, one weaker than the other, both encrypted. She decided to crack the weaker signal first. It was a snuff BTL in the process of being made, being streamed live to the second floor office. All plans that the group were making were immediately dropped in favor of bum-rushing the place. And it worked in the end due to a combination of surprise and overpowering force (both Viridian and Runsamok are playing trolls). The fact that I was able to throw them into that kind of situation and catch them off guard makes it a real personal achievement for me as a GM.

It was indeed full of win. That group tended to over-plan to the extreme, and tapping into that signal threw everything out the window with "Chaaaaaarge!"

[Atharyn]

I'd like to get a second opinion, if anyone has the time. One of the other players in my current group has been driving me (the player) up the wall as well as driving my character up the wall. A few things happened in the last two sessions that I am interpreting one way.. and it is not going to go well for the other player, I think.

So, two sessions ago my character was proposing to his girlfriend. A band of mercenaries interupted and grabbed her. My character challenged the leader to a duel - winner takes the girl. For various reasons my character was winning the fight. As soon as it looked like the mercenary leader was going to lose his men tried running off with her. The GM basically told me after I stopped fighting to try and stop them that she was taken. Nothing I could do.

The party decided to help get my character's girlfriend back. We got our game faces on, broke into the mercenary compound, and rescued her. During the rescue the second player's character was trying to engage in witty dialogue with the mercenary leader. We eventually got out and started trying to high-tail it out of town. Before we got very far the local king's guards, with mercenary back up, arrested us. We were slightly outnumbered. The GM basically railroaded us into being arrested en masse. The second player's character asked my character (telepathy) for a power boost and told me he'd be headed out to the local fort to round up the army for back up.

(It's important to note that in our party is a government official who can call on military back up.)

Second player's character gets away. The next time my character sees him we are being marched to the capital. Every other party member is disarmed, bound, and has guys with sharp pointy things close-at-hand. Second player's character is in serious talks with - wait for it - the mercenary leader. No sign of the army anywhere.

We get to the capital and are lead into the king's audience chamber. The government official, the mercenary leader, and the second player's character all get a chance to speak. We find out that the king has been bribed to take my character and his girlfriend into "protective custody" until the mercenary general can stop by. Oh, and the mercenary general is a shape-shifting dragon. The mercenary leader tells the king that he only wants my character and his girlfriend held. He has no interest in the rest of the party. The second player's character gives a rather impassioned speech about our goals - and pauses several times to check with the mercenary leader that he isn't saying anything that will anger said mercenary leader. Second player's character also talks about getting the rest of the party, but specifically not my character, free. The government official gets off by promising to pay for the damages we inflicted. The rest of the party is also released.

My character is still in jail when the session ended.

In the second session, the party does a bunch of running around. It is only when the rest of the party members come down to visit my character in the jail that the second player's character shows up. They see the "mob lieutenant" from one of our antagonists leaving the cell. I straight up tell them that the mob wants my character to do something, but neither the lieutenant nor myself know what that something is. Second player's character keeps cutting me off and saying things to the effect of "they are our enemies - you can't do that." Basically ordering me around. He also points out, repeatedly, that the party cannot break my character out. (Note we broke someone out the session before rather easily..) Second player's character admits he never even tried talking to the army. He then leaves, chatting with the other party members about how he's been spending time with the mercenary leader.

There was other things that went on in both sessions, but I can only base my character's actions off of things he has witnessed. At this point, I can't think of any reason why my character believes that the second player's character has his best interests in mind. I feel like my character has been sold out so that the second player can advance his personal, character goals by making nice with the mercenary leader.

Does this stance seem completely beyond the pale? I am concerned, because I am playing a morally gray character. This is also not the first time the second player's character has run around behind my back to advance his own goals. There's been a long string of incidents - at least once every other session. At this point, I think my character should view second player's character as an expendable resource.. and one that should be expended as quickly as possible. I would appreciate a second opinion before doing anything .. abrupt .. to another player's character.

Thanks!

[Wittgen]

Sounds like traitorous scum to me.

[Lthayer3]

Expendable resource sounds like a polite way of putting it. Going just by what you know about that character, it looks like he can pretty clearly be classified as an enemy. I'd see about quietly hiring people to do away with him.

[Tempest Kitsune]

Yeah, it sounds like this second character has thrown you under the bus. The fact that the rest of the party is content to go along with this smacks of either coercion, or simply them not caring if you live or die. If you get a chance to talk to the other characters again, and the second character keeps on interrupting you, I would suggest some very vocal role-playing to silence him, preferably using the words "traitorous wretch" to get your point across to the other players that this guy is bad news. After all, if he gets away with caging you like this, what's to keep him from simply getting rid of the rest of the party when it suits him?

[Kodra]

So let me get this straight:

You are in jail, your "allies" refuse to help you, admit that they are working for your enemies, and expect you to rot in jail?

Sounds like you need some new friends. This Mob Lieutenant sounds like a good friend to have.

If I were you I would work with the mob to escape, and either get out of dodge with your girlfriend, or if something untoward has happened to her (seems likely), swear vengeance on everyone responsible starting with your treacherous allies. You probably know quite a bit about their misdeeds, as you once adventured with them. You likely know where the bodies are either buried or lying of the folks they probably shouldn't have killed.