Fake War Stories

Once we were playing Shadowrun and the GM was running a store bought adventure. Around the half way point of the game, the runners have to travel from one city to the next. Along the way we hear a shot — one the van’s tires has been blown out by a bullet!

The Rigger makes the skill check and stays on the road (reinforced tires, so we didn’t have a flat per say). So we look out of the van (not stopping) and see we are being followed by a glider and the shots are coming from there.

At the same time a large motorcycle gang, waving chains and shotguns, is seen further down the road and gaining on us due to our reduced speed.

We roll for initiative.

Our sniper goes first, leans out the window, and fires one shot at the glider, hitting the pilot in the head, killing him instantly, and sending the glider crashing to the ground.

Next up, me as the mage. I cast a Force Wall across the span of the highway and roll well enough to place the wall close to the bikers.

GM rolls.

Every single biker (all 9 of them) fails their roll and crashes straight into the wall at 95 mph.

Encounter ends. High fives all around!

GM picks up the adventure book again, pauses, then bursts out laughing as he reads us aloud the Adventure Notes on said encounter (paraphrasing):

“This encounter is designed to wear out the runners and use up a lot of their ammo, so that when they arrive back in town they are low on supplies and health and thus more susceptible to negotiate.”

Total supplies used in that fight: 1 bullet.

Susceptibility to negotiations: zero.

(submitted by Vindaloo via MeFi)

(This is a follow-up to the Wandering Plot Hook story)

The players had arranged to help a rich and somewhat crooked merchant family (the Buoanottis) takeover a black onyx mine that had been occupied by a company of hobgoblins. The deal was that the adventurers were interested in loot and riches but not necessarily operations, whereas the Buoanottis were interested in riches and operations but not in getting them or their people killed.

So, the PCs agreed to escort a small mining crew with a supplementary squad of redshirts mercenaries back to the cove, attack the mine, clear out the hobgoblins, ???, and PROFIT!

What ensued was a fairly typical bug hunt\dungeon crawl, and, in the end, the PCs discovered a cache of correspondence between the hobgoblin chieftain\death priest and his superiors.

Turns out that this was also just a prospecting party sent out to test the vein for potential on behalf of an evil monster empire run by a rakshasa with a more than passing interest in necromancy. Since black onyx is a vital spell component in animate dead spells, it is needless to say that the rakshasa emperor was very interested in sending out a full-fledged war party to help secure the mine.

The PCs did the math between when the letters were sent, how far the known borders of the rakshasa empire were, and how long it might take a goblinoid war party to march through the terrain, and figured that they only had about a week.

Cue preparation and logistics montage as the party sets up pit traps and avalanche zones and digs some trenches and fortifications all A-Team style. The goblins show up a day early and the PCs scramble to man their defenses with their mercenary allies. Drums can be heard and everyone gets tense.

Traps go off, attackers impale themselves on stakes planted in front of the trenches, and generally it seems like a plan is coming together.

Then, a boulder flies out of the darkness and hurtles over the fortifications. Drums change their beat ever so slightly, and another boulder comes out and slams into the ramshackle wall, splintering it. Drum tempo changes again and a third boulder flies and shatters the wall.

Then the hill giant shows up, roaring and hefting a new boulder to hurl at someone.

The party is, like, 4th level and a hill giant, by itself, is a 7th level encounter. Backed up by 20 wounded and murderous hobgoblins, it’s TPK territory. So the party retreats and sets off their avalanche failsafe to buy themselves some time.

Over the next couple of sessions as the PCs fight a series of running battles with the hobgoblins, they piece together a couple of things. The giant itself appears to be a juvenile and not a full adult, and it dotes on the hobgoblin drummer (2nd lvl bard, btw) who also appears to be acting as a forward observer (essentially using his drumbeats to guide the giant’s rock hurling).

So, fast forward to the last stand where the PCs have been cutoff from their beach exit and have withdrawn to the mouth of their mine and the remains of the hobgoblins show up with their hill giant artillery. The players figure out fairly quickly that they need to take down the bard and so concentrate all of their efforts on him. The person who kills the bard?

The party wizard.

One hit from the hill giant’s pinky would’ve turned him into paste.

The hill giant loses his shit and starts chasing the wizard around. The wizard has spent most of his firepower on the battle already and is exhausted (we use a spell point system where you can cast more spells in a day but a lot of casting in an encounter will make you fatigued and exhausted).

So he uses a scroll of Expeditious Retreat to essentially kite the giant, interposing squads of goblins between the giant and him and letting the giant trample them on its way to killing him, while the rest of the party does their best to use ranged weapons to whittle away at the mountain of HP that is a hill giant with 8 HD.

The remaining mercenaries try their best to just survive.

The wizard also realizes that once he runs out of goblins to sucker, the giant can very likely charge and kill him.  

Eventually, after five rounds of this hilarity, the hill giant finally goes down and the player running the wizard just collapses in his chair, exhausted and weakly high fiving everyone, like he just spent that last hour running around himself and not just moving a piece of plastic across a table.

(submitted by spokenword)

I’m running a Pathfinder game with my kids and some friends. 

Malgus the Barbarian Sorcerer and the rest of the gang (two Rangers, a Fighter, and a Cleric) have to go into a mausoleum to seek a book. Currently the gang is in the mausoleum looking at a chest and a sarcophagus. 

Malgus: “I’m going to check the chest for traps.”

Me: “Um… ok. Roll.”

Malgus: ::roll 8:: “So…”

Me: “Cool bro. Chest looks great to you.”

Malgus: “I look at the lock. What’s it look like?”

Me: “It has a key hole, but underneath it there are three pins.”

Malgus: “Ok, I pull one.”

Ian (fighter standing next to him): “That’s a bad idea Noah..”

Malgus (Noah): “No, I checked for traps. There aren’t any.”

Adam (Cleric): “What are you doing over there…?”

Malgus: “I’m pulling the pin.”

Me: “Which one?”

Malgus: “Third one.”

Me: “Ok. Uh….roll 2d4.”

::5::

“Roll a d20. You want under your constitution.”

::17 = fail::

“Ian, you’re next to him, roll a 1d4”

::1::

“Okay, so you both get blasted back and quickly blinded. When the blast clears you have this tingy taste on your tongue and weird iron smell in your nose, but other than that you feel fine.”

Malgus: “Cool.”

“I pull the other two.”

One of my very first campaigns took place in a small town— a humble location with little more than an inn, blacksmith, and church. One day, upon returning to town after a small skirmish, one of our fighters was taken to the local church for curing and healing.

After making the appropriately large donation and waiting for the services to be performed we “split the party” and wandered around the church halls admiring the paintings, stained glass, and other works of art. Once our fighter was back to himself we took him to the inn and spent the rest of the evening drinking and telling stories.

The next morning before heading out our halfling (thief), who decided to use the outhouse before leaving, began to inquire about how to value some items while I waited for him just outside the door.

It became apparent that the items he was asking about were of religious origin and, right before I was able to put two and two together, a substantial group of armored riders from the church crested the hill.

“What have you done!” I yelled and, before he could answer, I instructed him to run.

He flung open the door and told the DM that he was running down the hill towards the creak, heading under the bridge. The ever-creative DM told him that was fine but, because he took action in such haste, and he was hung over from drinking, and was reasonably in fear of his life, that he forgot to pull up his pants and therefore began to tumble out of the outhouse and was rolling down the hill.

It was chaos from there on out and I don’t recall much of the rest other than we were all in tears and our sides hurting from laughter the rest of the evening.

The thief (Noose) was from then on known as Noose Tumblefoot.

God damn it Leeroy.

Our group, the Heroes of Vindale, had just rid the countryside of—not one—but several goblin tribes. With our hearts bolstered by our success, we set forth in our crusade against evil. When we discovered that a large tribe of Orcs had a slave-powered mining operation in the hills we decided to bring the fight to them.

The setup was elaborate: terrain depicting the hillside, decorated with tents, buildings, and towers.

And lots of Orcs.

Our party was set up on an overlook to size up the situation and form a plan of attack. Being the party’s magic-user, I was to lob fireballs from the overlook. I would be accompanied by Narn the Blade, a thief armed with a Wand of Lightning. Meanwhile the warriors would rush in from another direction to put the Orcs to the sword.

A viable plan. Save for Narn’s wand.

As experienced gamers we all knew that the wand’s command phrase:

“Wand of wonder, wand of light, smite my enemies within my sight.”

…means the wand is not what it appeared to be.

Of course our characters didn’t know that, so when it spit out a Lightning Bolt the first time it was used, our characters assumed it was a Wand of Lightning.

We prepared for battle, and Narn the Blade took up his position and recited the words.

The DM rolled the dice and…

Narn the Blade was surprised by the sudden appearance of the huge grey ass-end of an elephant right before it tumbled off the cliff. The fall only injured the beast, sending it into a rampage throughout the compound. It destroyed many tents, several more permanent structures, and drew the attention of the three ballistae crew that did their utmost to bring the damned thing down.

That distraction did far more damage than a couple of fireballs could ever have managed.

(Submitted by mikebrendan)

If you guys read my previous story—Magic Items save the day!—you heard something about an evil turnip killing me.

This is what happened.

So I was out the week before (or not paying attention) and we were on a small boat on the way to some desert where the final stereotypical Lich wizard was waiting for us. We decided to be good little trains and follow the railroad to the front door of the boss.

Upon leaving the boat our party followed a trail to a large 60 ft diameter clearing in the trees. Directly in the center of this clearing was a giant turnip/parsnip. It didn’t seem very active so I decided to slowly advance towards it.

(Editors note: this is why knowing about the deadly Gazebo is so important! Never underestimate your inanimate foes!)

After moving in a good 10 ft the turnip burrowed underground! My character had reached pretty much his max speed at this point and decided to take evasive maneuvers. He ran around the outside of the circle and reached the direct opposite side.

Upon reaching the other side of the circle the ground under my character’s feet erupted and I got swallowed by the turnip.

The next few minutes go as follows:

Me: “I get swallowed by the turnip?”

DM: “Yep.”

Me: ::Thinks back to previous situations:: “Ok I’ll use my cape next round and escape!”

DM: “Hold on there. You take swallowing damage first!”

Me: “Doesn’t that take effect next round?”

DM: “No.” (Yes, but I don’t like you foiling my plots)

Me: “Whatever.” (Has about 40 HP and 15 CON)

DM: “You take 37 damage and 4 Constitution drain.”

Me: ::math, math, math:: ”Ok. I’m still alive!”

DM: Great!

Me: “Wait………” ::math, math:: ”Nope. I’m Dead. Constitution drain killed me. -11.”

So my character was digested and sat in this turnip’s stomach waiting to be rescued by the party. Which again will be another story. (Yay series of stories?)

After the other characters killed said turnip and cut him open to rescue my body… (Did I say body? I meant magic items…) They discovered that all the virtually indestructible magic items I had on my person had been destroyed by the turnip’s stomach acid.

So remember kiddies: if you piss the DM off, don’t be surprised when a giant turnip eats you and steals your magic items.

(Submitted by mrevand6, submitter of Magic item saves the day!)

Early in my first experience with D&D, our party was looking for a particular mine where orcs were doing some bad things.

I don’t know, who cares.

Anyway we came across two of the guards but kept our distance to stay noticed. We decided our best chance of finding the place was to listen in on their conversation. Unfortunately, all our Orcish speaking characters were too big and armored and terrible at espionage-related tasks to pull this off.

We debated a while until I had an idea: I asked our DM if I—a gnome bard (shut up)—could sneak over to them, listen extremely carefully, and come back and repeat the sounds I’d heard to the rest of the party for them to translate.

He glared a DM-glare at me and said simply: “I’m thinking of a number.”

I took the die in my hand and calmly rolled a natural 20 of pure destiny.

(submitted by brennathings)

We had a party (D&D 3.5 campaign) that was working directly for the king of the country. The two main party members, as far as the kingdom story line was concerned were:

• Lord Hek, Captain of the Guards (lvl 12 fighter), and;
• Mobius, High Inquisitor (lvl 11 Diviner, with no offensive spells, to this day one of my favourite D&D characters)

Anyway, the PCs were following up on a series of murders and the trail led them to one of the large noble houses. After breaking into the house the party found its way to the 3rd floor and were faced with a massacre: body parts and blood of the house guards were everywhere. We were stunned.

With this evidence we were sure that the lord of the house was the guilty party. Then, out of an adjacent room came streaming a bunch of royal guards along with the lady of the house (who had an evil snarl on her lips).

She shouted out: “Guards! These men have come to my house and killed my men as you can plainly see. In the name of House Raven, arrest them at once!” 

Just as Mobius starts to speak to try and Diplomacy his way out of the predicament, Lord Hek yelled: “Off with ‘er head!” and picks up the die.

Rolls a natural 20… With his Vorpal Blade.

With the mage still at a loss for words and Lady Raven’s head falling from her severed neck, Lord Hek declares: 

“I am Lord Captain Hek, and this is Mobius, the High Inquisitor! By order of His Majesty the King we have tracked and found the instigator of the serial killings, Lady Raven who is now dead at our hands. You will secure these premises and await further orders while we report back to His Majesty.” 

…pause, gaping maws all around… 

Lord Hek: “IS THAT CLEAR?”

All the guards, in unison: “YES SIR!”

And that is how Lord Captain Hek saved the entire party from a long series of adventures focused on imprisonment, false accusations, and fall from grace.

All hail Hek!

(Submitted by Vindaloo on MetaFilter)

A number of years back my regular D&D friends and I teamed up with a classmate we hadn’t played with before. He had arrogantly said something about kicking our asses with the kingdom he’d developed, so naturally, challenge accepted. One of our friends agreed to be the impartial DM.

I was playing a super-powerful anti-paladin at the time, and, in a reconnaissance foray, he was promptly killed when we discovered the entire kingdom was protected by an anti-magic shield.

My buddies strategized and attacked using a high-level druid and his acolytes. First the druids summoned a hurricane, which made short work of the kingdom’s anti-magic shield using tornados and non-magical lightning strikes.

After weakening his kingdom’s defenses, the DM revealed to us the kingdom’s power source for the shield was tapping the soul energy of prisoners – and this was long before the Matrix movies.

The moral of the story, I suppose, is don’t challenge a druid without a clear understanding of their capabilities.