D&D(or any other pnp game really) stories
- Thread starter The_Lost_King
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There was this one time where my friends and I played an evil campaign in D&D, and we were tasked with assassinating an elf prince and framing a human kingdom in order to start a war. The prince had a lavish birthday party coming up, and a noble from the human kingdom would be in attendance with a contingent of guards. The whole plan was masterminded by yours truly.
The party was off to a good start, there was food, drink, music, etc. Among the guests were various nobles, diplomats, and other examples of the rich and famous. About an hour in, a servant approached the Prince and offered him a drink. As the Prince reached for the glass, a sword appeared out of nowhere in the servant's hand and he ran the Prince through, killing him. The nearby captain of the guard attacked the assassin, and in the fight knocked off the Hat of Disguise that the "servant" had been wearing, revealing him to be a human. A famous elf playwright recognized him as one of the guards that had come with the aforementioned human noble. Several elven nobles cried out that they had thought the human noble had been acting suspicious and that he must have ordered the assassination, and the guards moved to arrest him. At this moment, there was a commotion outside as a group of unidentified individuals began assaulting the mansion from the outside. In the confusion, the assassin slipped out, pursued by the guard captain, and the two disappeared into the forest, where they were later found dead. In the following weeks, diplomatic relations broke down and the two kingdoms went to war. In other news, the playwright was found in his home the next day, dead of a brain hemorrhage.
The party consisted of a catfolk Rogue, a human Ranger, a goliath Barbarian, a necropolitan Dread Necromancer, a Cleric of some sort (I think, can't really remember), and myself as a human Psion. In the days leading up to the party, we lured the human guardsman and the elven Guard Captain into secluded spots and killed them. The Dread Necromancer then used Gentle Repose to preserve the bodies, which we then stored in a Bag of Holding. The Ranger then used a Hat of Disguise to take the place of the Guard Captain (this led to a few amusing moments where he was nearly caught due to us forgetting that elves trance for four hours instead of sleeping). Meanwhile, the Rogue used his Hat of Disguise to insert himself among the servants at the party. Meanwhile meanwhile, having previously learned that one of the guests, a famous elven playwright, lived alone nearby, I went to his house and used my psionic powers to conceal myself as I read his mind in order to learn his mannerisms. Then I mindraped him to death, stole his invitation, and used another Hat of Disguise to take his place at the party. When the party started, I mingled with the guests, using subtle psionic Suggestions to make a number of high-ranking members of the elven nobility suspicious of the human noble. When the time was right, the Rogue drank a Potion of Alter Self to assume the form of the human guardsman underneath the illusory disguise provided by the Hat. He then assassinated the Prince using a short sword concealed in a Glove of Storing. Then he and the Ranger, who was disguised as the Guard Captain, feigned a fight wherein the Rogue's Hat was knocked off, revealing the secondary disguise underneath. I, in my disguise, then identified him as one of the human noble's guardsmen, and the elven nobles acted upon the suspicions I had implanted in them. The rest of the team then attacked the mansion to cause a distraction for the Rogue and the Ranger to run off into the forest. The bodies of the Guard Captain and guardsman were then retrieved from the Bag of Holding and planted for discovery. With everything done, we I slipped away from the party to rejoin the others, and we all ran away laughing.
One of my favorites: a player who didn't have his main character creates a temporary, fill-in almost sort of throwaway character for that session. but it was one of the most unique characters ever that I just couldn't stand to let him go by the wayside, and he is now one of my favorite NPC's ever in my games. Sir Spork (who I renamed Sir Shamus), a gestalt (level up 2 classes at simultaneously) goblin rogue/paladin of Bahamut, the god of good dragons, who wields a medium sized heavy pick he used two handed. the player prestiged him as a divine crusader, and his special mount was a worg. after he was "thrown away" I redesigned him just a bit, using the pick one-handed along with the legacy shield "quickspur's ally," he wears a white Elven darkleaf ring mail, and his special mount is a celestial medium monstrous tarantula named Webby. His personal symbol is an armored grinning goblin standing on a mountain top as the sun rises behind him. Instead of divine crusader, he is a slayer of domiel (an exalted assassin basically). the player gave him leadership, and the cohort was a LG female goblin ranger fighter. I redesigned her to be a rogue/wizard/holy scourge/geometer. She rides a krenshar, and familiar is a raven that does the eyeball trick donkey does in the last Shrek movie, (except he makes them appear in his open beak). His mentor of sorts and close associate is a goblin rogue/cleric named Paul. His full title is Father Reverend Sir Saint Paul the Purifier. Although LG, Paul can be a real arsehole at times. Recently, shamus has also befriended a N bugbear binder named Bulgor, who plays dumb but is actually rather smart
Well I remember this one game where I couldn't make it to a session, and come back to find out that in the session I couldn't attend, my character's foot was severed, and the dm's explanation for how it happened made no sense to me. a bone (i think I remember being told it was a finger or toe bone) went through my character's foot. Fortunately another friend of mine stood up and said that was BS.
I remember a World of Darkness white wolf game where my friend had 3 characters die in one session. I think all 3 were werewolves, or 1 might have been a hunter. One was a headshot by a sniper, another which I know was a werewolf, failed in rage roll in a taxi, went ballistic, and another player was forced to tear him in half with a point blank shotgun blast. Can't remember how the other was killed.
I was running a sort of Deus Ex game, and one player just ran into a string of bad luck, poor rolls, and a couple questionable decisions, and he had 3 characters go down. I really felt bad for the guy there, but he was good natured about it.
Then my buddies and I were all playing Mage: The Ascension. the same guy who defended me in story 2 was storytelling. We were fighting a werewolf in a park. Nothing we tried was working. Holy bolts, life magic, whatever we threw at it he just shrugged off. He even killed one of us, and another almost killed himself by paradox using time magic to reverse the event. So this one player, whose character was hopped up on PCP, and was a paranoid schizo, throws a rock. A normal everyday rock. He took out a flipping werewolf with a rock. Then he tries driving away in a van, but the tires blow out, so this character is trying to evade the cops in a van driving on the rims, high on PCP.
Running a mechwarrior game, my character was inner sphere, and was being treated badly by an npc, who was clan, this npc was a sickly kid, so it was probably very dickish of my character to do so, but he imprisoned my character, forced this death device on him, and was kicking my guy, tasing him, and spitting on him so I headbutted him. well another player took out a gun a shot my guy. Only time one of my characters as died, and it was by another player. Story 3 was the only other time in my gaming history i have seen character death by another player.
Yet another game, a character died by a most devious of trap. One that no "find traps" spell or search check or even trap-finding ability. a young blue dragon disguised as a helpless human infant. It's breath surprised us and completely fried our cleric. We did slay it, only to have mommy show up seconds later. Never have I seen characters run so fast!
Also, squirrels. my one friend has had so many bad roleplaying experiences with squirrels, such as the time his character nearly died because nearly got in a wreck because I kid you not, a squirrel threw an acorn through the windshield, that he went out and bought a shirt that says "Evil squirrels are after my nuts". Also one dm created the "squirrel of anti-perversion". Get too frisky with an attractive female npc? this squirrel magically appears and mauls your face, permanently reducing charisma. In my friend's stormwrack game, the captain of the ship the PC's work for is a weresquirrel.
I took a monster from the game torchlight, the varkolyn, and made it into a new playable race, and even two sub-races. I made a varkolyn duskblade for a new version of that stormwrack game, and using scorching rays and a dire bat steed, set fire to an entire enemy fleet.
My first ever D&D character, a half-orc barbar, Thaak, playing in my friend's garage. well another party member thought it would be funny to piss on a wolf. it was funny for the rest of us when the wolf tore out a mouthfull of that character's pubic hair! then he pissed on a magic statue and got his junk burned by a fireball.
My first ever role-playing game was vampire the masquerade, with 3 friends in my basement on my birthday. I remember fighting a mage who had an amulet creating a magic shield, and throwing fire. Vampires-fire RUN AWAY. fire makes them roll courage or flee like bats out of hell. Another game where we made ourselves as various supernaturals. I was a Mokole (think werewolf but crocodiles and lizards instead of wolves, and halway between a dinosaur and dragon instead of the hybrid form. Mokole essentially "build" their archid from from various dinosaur/lizard/dragon traits) my suchid, or animal form was a gila monster. A gila monster in Alaska. Burr!
I KILLED A FROST GIANT WITH MAGIC MISSILE! FEAR ME! I made an Aassimar sorcerer. I don't know why, but the dm started me at level 1 with a pair of 12's. but in fairness he did a good job of devising split encounters or protecting me against foes way above me. so we are fighting this frost giant. He backhands one with his axe, does huge damage, but it's subdual. Does the massive damage rule apply to subdual damage? In any case it was enough damage to jar his brain anyways, and then he fells the other character, slicing him up badly. my missiles did just enough to drop the giant to -1. fortunately I found a button on a giant gold idol that summoned a solar to chase off his pet white dragons and ressurect the other two. The one character died and came back at least 4-5 times in that game Then we enter a town where the other two guys are well known, but the guard stops me. He doesn't believe them when they say I am their companion, and asks me to prove it. The guard shat himself when my character fired a lightning bolt straight into the air.
Well I remember this one game where I couldn't make it to a session, and come back to find out that in the session I couldn't attend, my character's foot was severed, and the dm's explanation for how it happened made no sense to me. a bone (i think I remember being told it was a finger or toe bone) went through my character's foot. Fortunately another friend of mine stood up and said that was BS.
I remember a World of Darkness white wolf game where my friend had 3 characters die in one session. I think all 3 were werewolves, or 1 might have been a hunter. One was a headshot by a sniper, another which I know was a werewolf, failed in rage roll in a taxi, went ballistic, and another player was forced to tear him in half with a point blank shotgun blast. Can't remember how the other was killed.
I was running a sort of Deus Ex game, and one player just ran into a string of bad luck, poor rolls, and a couple questionable decisions, and he had 3 characters go down. I really felt bad for the guy there, but he was good natured about it.
Then my buddies and I were all playing Mage: The Ascension. the same guy who defended me in story 2 was storytelling. We were fighting a werewolf in a park. Nothing we tried was working. Holy bolts, life magic, whatever we threw at it he just shrugged off. He even killed one of us, and another almost killed himself by paradox using time magic to reverse the event. So this one player, whose character was hopped up on PCP, and was a paranoid schizo, throws a rock. A normal everyday rock. He took out a flipping werewolf with a rock. Then he tries driving away in a van, but the tires blow out, so this character is trying to evade the cops in a van driving on the rims, high on PCP.
Running a mechwarrior game, my character was inner sphere, and was being treated badly by an npc, who was clan, this npc was a sickly kid, so it was probably very dickish of my character to do so, but he imprisoned my character, forced this death device on him, and was kicking my guy, tasing him, and spitting on him so I headbutted him. well another player took out a gun a shot my guy. Only time one of my characters as died, and it was by another player. Story 3 was the only other time in my gaming history i have seen character death by another player.
Yet another game, a character died by a most devious of trap. One that no "find traps" spell or search check or even trap-finding ability. a young blue dragon disguised as a helpless human infant. It's breath surprised us and completely fried our cleric. We did slay it, only to have mommy show up seconds later. Never have I seen characters run so fast!
Also, squirrels. my one friend has had so many bad roleplaying experiences with squirrels, such as the time his character nearly died because nearly got in a wreck because I kid you not, a squirrel threw an acorn through the windshield, that he went out and bought a shirt that says "Evil squirrels are after my nuts". Also one dm created the "squirrel of anti-perversion". Get too frisky with an attractive female npc? this squirrel magically appears and mauls your face, permanently reducing charisma. In my friend's stormwrack game, the captain of the ship the PC's work for is a weresquirrel.
I took a monster from the game torchlight, the varkolyn, and made it into a new playable race, and even two sub-races. I made a varkolyn duskblade for a new version of that stormwrack game, and using scorching rays and a dire bat steed, set fire to an entire enemy fleet.
My first ever D&D character, a half-orc barbar, Thaak, playing in my friend's garage. well another party member thought it would be funny to piss on a wolf. it was funny for the rest of us when the wolf tore out a mouthfull of that character's pubic hair! then he pissed on a magic statue and got his junk burned by a fireball.
My first ever role-playing game was vampire the masquerade, with 3 friends in my basement on my birthday. I remember fighting a mage who had an amulet creating a magic shield, and throwing fire. Vampires-fire RUN AWAY. fire makes them roll courage or flee like bats out of hell. Another game where we made ourselves as various supernaturals. I was a Mokole (think werewolf but crocodiles and lizards instead of wolves, and halway between a dinosaur and dragon instead of the hybrid form. Mokole essentially "build" their archid from from various dinosaur/lizard/dragon traits) my suchid, or animal form was a gila monster. A gila monster in Alaska. Burr!
I KILLED A FROST GIANT WITH MAGIC MISSILE! FEAR ME! I made an Aassimar sorcerer. I don't know why, but the dm started me at level 1 with a pair of 12's. but in fairness he did a good job of devising split encounters or protecting me against foes way above me. so we are fighting this frost giant. He backhands one with his axe, does huge damage, but it's subdual. Does the massive damage rule apply to subdual damage? In any case it was enough damage to jar his brain anyways, and then he fells the other character, slicing him up badly. my missiles did just enough to drop the giant to -1. fortunately I found a button on a giant gold idol that summoned a solar to chase off his pet white dragons and ressurect the other two. The one character died and came back at least 4-5 times in that game Then we enter a town where the other two guys are well known, but the guard stops me. He doesn't believe them when they say I am their companion, and asks me to prove it. The guard shat himself when my character fired a lightning bolt straight into the air.
I once lockpicked a trapdoor with my private parts.
From then on I would be known as Aelar Dicklock the Elven Ranger.
I attempted to do it again while doing a handstand, and failed miserably and got it stuck in the lock of the trapdoor, i took one damage pulling it out. We have a generous DM who allows stupidtacs
From then on I would be known as Aelar Dicklock the Elven Ranger.
I attempted to do it again while doing a handstand, and failed miserably and got it stuck in the lock of the trapdoor, i took one damage pulling it out. We have a generous DM who allows stupidtacs
I remember being told by a friend of this one game he was in where they encountered a red dragon, and he snatched up the party's fighter. The fighter nails him with a max damage critical hit, does 50 damage exact, and forces a massive damage save. The dragon fails. A ****ing dragon failed the bloody massive damage save. The DM was just stunned. This dragon was going to be his campaign boss.
Another group I was gaming with ran into some kobolds. Blacky, who was playing an arcane archer, was rolling miserably. Nothing he was doing was working. So finally he says "I kick the kobold in the junk" Natural 20. Roll to confirm. Another natural 20. Rob, the dm just picked up the die and stared at it in stunned silence for two minutes. "you blast the kobold's junk into his mouth and send him flying."
Another group I was gaming with ran into some kobolds. Blacky, who was playing an arcane archer, was rolling miserably. Nothing he was doing was working. So finally he says "I kick the kobold in the junk" Natural 20. Roll to confirm. Another natural 20. Rob, the dm just picked up the die and stared at it in stunned silence for two minutes. "you blast the kobold's junk into his mouth and send him flying."
Oh no offense takenLawyer105 said:
I've been playing pnp games for almost 20 years, I just have a strong opinion about it. 9/10 times, a Storyteller or player believes they are suddenly capable of Game of Thrones levels of "evil". Lying, cheating, backstabbing etc etc etc. It always inevitably leads to the death of the character(s). Even in evil campaigns, I've never seen evil pay off like being a hero does. It always dissolves to petty infighting and betrayal (a testament to evil destroying itself). I'm not saying it can't be done, but it *RARELY* ever works (usually its the Lawful Evil Assassin pc or something similar) because as you said, everyone does it wrong - Chaotic Stupid, the secret 10th alignment.
Rare is the player or DM that can do it well, bending the laws to their advantage, trading in secrets, using others lives as currency, etc. An Evil character needs not only a player capable of doing it, but a DM capable of making it work. Usually the closest you get in a game is players doing bad things for good reasons.
These stories are from PbP rather than tabletop but I don't think that matters. Anyway one is from me being a GM and the other is from being a player. But they are both about dealing with locked doors.
GM:
I was running a Fallout RPG. The PCs got a mission from the local sheriff to go rescue the daughter of the leader of a local church that hated ghouls. She was kidnapped by a group of ghouls and taken to a petrol station in the ghoul quarter of the town. They were told in advance that if she was dead they'd have to cover it up, because if the church found out they would attack all the ghouls in the ghoul quarter not just the ones who kidnapped her. So they got to the petrol station, dealt with the ghouls, killed some, talked down others. Anyway the danger was pretty much over and the kidnapped woman was in the bathroom and the door was locked. Now some of the PCs were skilled in lockpicking, one of the dead ghouls had the key on their body, but none of the PCs bothered searching them and one of the PCs had a fire axe. Now the door was a light wooden door, one of the PCs named Sweeney who couldn't lockpick decided to kick down the door rather than wait for someone else to deal with it. Now he was fairly confident that hostage was on the other side. But first he decided to shoot the door with his rifle hoping to weaken the already weak door. But the bullet passed right through it and hit the hostage, killing her. I was almost speechless because it really wasn't what I thought would happen. So he kicked down the door to find he'd killed her. The PCs started arguing and then they realised they'd have to dispose of the body to stop a load of innocent people being killed. They talked about how to do it and decided to chop her up with the axe and burn her and had Sweeney do it seeing as he was the one who killed her.
So the story is pretty much the PCs show up to save a kidnapped girl only to accidentally kill her once they deal with the kidnappers. It is such a great part of RPGs, you don't know what is going to happen and what they players will do.
PC:
It was superheros RPG and I was in a group of superheroes, mostly PCs but there were also a couple of NPCs with us. Anyway we had all sorts of powers, one of us could shapeshift in just about anything as long as it is the same mass, one could shoot frost, one had super strong punches. My character was immortal, but that was it. He wouldn't grow old and if he died all his wounds would be healed and he'd come back to life. If you think that is similar to Nathan from Misfits, it's because it is. Anyway one of our friends had been kidnapped and we were in a base where the people were working for the main villian of the campaign, our friend was in one of the cells so we went to the control room to open the cell and save them. The metal door to the control room was locked. So first the shapeshifter tried picking it but it didn't work because the door was bolted shut from the other side. The guy with frost powers tried to freeze it, that didn't work. Then he thought he might try to go off and find the armoury to get explosives. So they weren't sure what to do so I went, "I know what to try." Then I walked up and knocked on the door. The exchange was kind of like this:
Me: "Hey sorry I'm late, overslept, drank too much last night."
Guard: "Eh okay, show me your ID card."
So I kept up the act and felt my pockets and then was like:
Me: "Crap, I left it at home. Come on man, please let me in, this is my first day, I can't lose this job."
Guard: "Um, yeah alright."
So then he unlocked the door, we walked in, the woman with super punches knocked him out and we unlocked the cells so we could safe our friends.
Everyone seem impressed by it, particularly the GM who was happy somebody tried a non-violent approach, then again I always love to go for non-violent approaches. Everyone else is there trying to figure out how to open a door and I walk up, knock on it, say I'm a new guy and ask them to let me in. Most intruders wouldn't knock. Anyway that was probably my favourite thing I've done as a player.
GM:
I was running a Fallout RPG. The PCs got a mission from the local sheriff to go rescue the daughter of the leader of a local church that hated ghouls. She was kidnapped by a group of ghouls and taken to a petrol station in the ghoul quarter of the town. They were told in advance that if she was dead they'd have to cover it up, because if the church found out they would attack all the ghouls in the ghoul quarter not just the ones who kidnapped her. So they got to the petrol station, dealt with the ghouls, killed some, talked down others. Anyway the danger was pretty much over and the kidnapped woman was in the bathroom and the door was locked. Now some of the PCs were skilled in lockpicking, one of the dead ghouls had the key on their body, but none of the PCs bothered searching them and one of the PCs had a fire axe. Now the door was a light wooden door, one of the PCs named Sweeney who couldn't lockpick decided to kick down the door rather than wait for someone else to deal with it. Now he was fairly confident that hostage was on the other side. But first he decided to shoot the door with his rifle hoping to weaken the already weak door. But the bullet passed right through it and hit the hostage, killing her. I was almost speechless because it really wasn't what I thought would happen. So he kicked down the door to find he'd killed her. The PCs started arguing and then they realised they'd have to dispose of the body to stop a load of innocent people being killed. They talked about how to do it and decided to chop her up with the axe and burn her and had Sweeney do it seeing as he was the one who killed her.
So the story is pretty much the PCs show up to save a kidnapped girl only to accidentally kill her once they deal with the kidnappers. It is such a great part of RPGs, you don't know what is going to happen and what they players will do.
PC:
It was superheros RPG and I was in a group of superheroes, mostly PCs but there were also a couple of NPCs with us. Anyway we had all sorts of powers, one of us could shapeshift in just about anything as long as it is the same mass, one could shoot frost, one had super strong punches. My character was immortal, but that was it. He wouldn't grow old and if he died all his wounds would be healed and he'd come back to life. If you think that is similar to Nathan from Misfits, it's because it is. Anyway one of our friends had been kidnapped and we were in a base where the people were working for the main villian of the campaign, our friend was in one of the cells so we went to the control room to open the cell and save them. The metal door to the control room was locked. So first the shapeshifter tried picking it but it didn't work because the door was bolted shut from the other side. The guy with frost powers tried to freeze it, that didn't work. Then he thought he might try to go off and find the armoury to get explosives. So they weren't sure what to do so I went, "I know what to try." Then I walked up and knocked on the door. The exchange was kind of like this:
Me: "Hey sorry I'm late, overslept, drank too much last night."
Guard: "Eh okay, show me your ID card."
So I kept up the act and felt my pockets and then was like:
Me: "Crap, I left it at home. Come on man, please let me in, this is my first day, I can't lose this job."
Guard: "Um, yeah alright."
So then he unlocked the door, we walked in, the woman with super punches knocked him out and we unlocked the cells so we could safe our friends.
Everyone seem impressed by it, particularly the GM who was happy somebody tried a non-violent approach, then again I always love to go for non-violent approaches. Everyone else is there trying to figure out how to open a door and I walk up, knock on it, say I'm a new guy and ask them to let me in. Most intruders wouldn't knock. Anyway that was probably my favourite thing I've done as a player.
I guess I've just been really lucky in the groups I've gamed with then...FrozenLaughs said:Oh no offense takenLawyer105 said:
I'm not saying it can't be done, but it *RARELY* ever works (usually its the Lawful Evil Assassin pc or something similar) because as you said, everyone does it wrong - Chaotic Stupid, the secret 10th alignment.
Rare is the player or DM that can do it well, bending the laws to their advantage, trading in secrets, using others lives as currency, etc. An Evil character needs not only a player capable of doing it, but a DM capable of making it work. Usually the closest you get in a game is players doing bad things for good reasons.
You've got to have the right players and GM and (if there's intra-party aggro going on) you've all got to have a sense of humour and remember that it's a game. "Don't get mad, get even" became the watchword when we played evil
Since this is story thread, I'll share a few of my eeeeevillll anecdotes.
One fully evil party of characters I played with were primarily LE/NE, with a single CE member. Many heroic deeds were done, many monsters were slain, many damsels were saved..... and then we would present the bill... with an easy installment plan, for those with limited cashflow. We extorted, bribed and intimidated our way to the top of the heap, and then we stayed there through the judicious use of random acts of violence (and the large portfolio of secrets we'd uncovered along the way).
The CE party member was kept permanently chained to this animated chair we had, to make sure he was under control. We used to use him as the ultimate boogeyman i.e. cooperate, or we let "Lenny" (don't ask, seriously) have "playtime". The player didn't mind, of course... meant he never had to walk anywhere and, since we all believed he was a magic user *lying-git*, we figured the chains etc. would hold him. Of course... he wasn't. He was psionic. His curses had a nasty habit of coming true...
Then, of course, there was the pretty-much-all-CE party I played with. They hated each other. But they hated nasty do-gooders just that little bit more - and so they swore a solemn oath of loyalty and recorded it in a "Code of Conduct" (doesn't get more evil than that, right?
). Breaking the Code would result in an immediate party-trial, which usually resulted in *substantial* punishment.... so the trick was to never get caught (or, if you did get caught, to make sure that there was no evidence).It was truly remarkable how quickly the law-abiding, good-aligned morons fell before us. Before long, we were squinting into the unaccustomed light that comes with being the Kings of the Hill. And then we realised the problem... 6 Kings. One Hill. Of course... the Code was still in play and an epically Game Of Thrones-esque campaign followed as we fought over Ultimate Dominion (all while scrupulously avoiding any provable breaches of the Code).
The combat monster quickly realised he was outmatched (stupid quadratic wizard types) and, in the interests of survival, aligned with one of the magic types (I forget which). The sneaky-type tried to play the various magic users against each other, selling information etc., probably hoping that they'd kill each other off and whoever was left standing would be weak enough to eliminate. Unfortunately (for him), he couldn't keep all his balls in the air, and he was soon found out and *punished*. By this time, our game had evolved into a bizarre mix of table-top RPGs, strategy boardgames and table-top wargaming.
And then the GM made his best (or worst, depending on your point of view) ruling : Since it was only the magic users that were still in the running for King of the World, he ruled that the levels of magic being deployed (what with Wishes, Divine Intervention etc becoming an almost hourly thing) were becoming sufficient that, and I quote : "Anything you can logically justify, you can have." The campaign quickly came to a close, with escalations on all sides rapidly devolving into the magical equivalent of a thermonuclear holocaust as life was extinguished and the world ripped apart by the out of control forces being released. Everyone died. Best campaign ender ever!
And as an aside - the non-magic users weren't being ignored. While they might have been out of the running for "big boss", they were busily fighting amongst themselves, betraying their various "masters" or "allies" for a better position (and/or benefits) on the other side etc.
My personal favorite is the Dire Wolf story.
So I'm running a campaign where the local Wizard has asked the party to go retrieve some notes from a colleague of his who vanished some time ago. So they set off to the tower in question and I decide to throw a wolf pack at them as a little in between sort of encounter, with the leader as a dire wolf for a little more challenge. However upon seeing the dire wolf, the party Assassin squees and decides he wants to try and make friends with it.
Not wanting to be the kind of DM that just says no that's impossible, I decided that despite the party's incredibly slim chance of success I'd set a DC and let them try it. So I asked the assassin how he wanted to try and befriend the wolf and he said it looked hungry and he would like to try and give it some food. A quick inventory search revealed some beef jerky as part of the rations they had packed. I told him that if he wanted to use the beef jerky to tame the wolf it'd be a nature roll with a plus 2 item bonus since success was unlikely but not impossible.
Given that the character knew fuck all about wolves (see low nature score) he promptly turns to our elven cleric and says something to the effect of "You're good with animals right? I think we can make friends with the big one, it looks smarter than your average wolf. Here take this jerky and go win him over for me." The bit that caught me by surprise was when the cleric wholeheartedly agreed to wade out into the middle of a pack of wolves holding nothing but a fist full of jerky. So of course she rolled a natural 20 and won the fucking thing over through sheer elvish charisma. However she did not win over the other four hungry wolves who promptly dogpiled on her until she could be extracted by the rest of the party. It's a miracle no one got killed.
So I'm running a campaign where the local Wizard has asked the party to go retrieve some notes from a colleague of his who vanished some time ago. So they set off to the tower in question and I decide to throw a wolf pack at them as a little in between sort of encounter, with the leader as a dire wolf for a little more challenge. However upon seeing the dire wolf, the party Assassin squees and decides he wants to try and make friends with it.
Not wanting to be the kind of DM that just says no that's impossible, I decided that despite the party's incredibly slim chance of success I'd set a DC and let them try it. So I asked the assassin how he wanted to try and befriend the wolf and he said it looked hungry and he would like to try and give it some food. A quick inventory search revealed some beef jerky as part of the rations they had packed. I told him that if he wanted to use the beef jerky to tame the wolf it'd be a nature roll with a plus 2 item bonus since success was unlikely but not impossible.
Given that the character knew fuck all about wolves (see low nature score) he promptly turns to our elven cleric and says something to the effect of "You're good with animals right? I think we can make friends with the big one, it looks smarter than your average wolf. Here take this jerky and go win him over for me." The bit that caught me by surprise was when the cleric wholeheartedly agreed to wade out into the middle of a pack of wolves holding nothing but a fist full of jerky. So of course she rolled a natural 20 and won the fucking thing over through sheer elvish charisma. However she did not win over the other four hungry wolves who promptly dogpiled on her until she could be extracted by the rest of the party. It's a miracle no one got killed.