Like any tabletop gamer, I’ve got my share of amusing and exasperating anecdotes. Dungeons & Dragons seems to play best when everyone participating can commit completely to the air of high violence and low humor that has characterized some of my favorite sessions, responding with a grim sort of elan to even the most outrageous vagaries of the dice. Stories that last a lifetime are spawned with a roll of the dice, and even a character who meets his doom may be remembered favorably should he pass into the great unknown with a jest upon his lips.
One of my favorite D&D stories involve a small party of adventurers who had decided to brave the dangers of a certain cursed chateau in hope of winning the treasure rumored to lie within. Three adventurers entered, none left alive, but by the end of the game we were all left in laughter at the hapless characters’ fates. The gods can be cruel.
I was the Dungeon Master of this particular game, and the three characters – a fighter, a cleric and a mage – had just found themselves locked in the grounds of the chateau after entering through an open gate. A melee began immediately as a pack of hell hounds charged the interlopers. The cleric, regrettably was bested by the beasts, and the other two characters ran for the main building of the chateau itself, entering its inner sanctum and slamming the doors behind them. With the hell hounds scratching and howling at the door, the characters tended their wounds as best they could and proceeded to explore the manse. Sadly, they wandered past a small party of ghouls who then gave chase. Again, the characters were forced to make a hasty retreat and found themselves barricaded in a small gallery. The mage, being of an acquisitive sort all too common among adventuring parties, decided to pass his time investigating the paintings. One in particular, a portrait of an old man, seemed to hold his attention more than any of the others. He gazed upon it and fell victim to a curse, his mind overtaken by a suicidal impulse. The other surviving character, the fighter, managed to overtake him and bind his hands before any harm could be done. The mage seemingly safe for now, the fighter began his long vigil into the night, occasionally reinforcing the barricade against the ravening ghouls outside. What the players didn’t know was that the manse was haunted, and that certain behaviors – destroying things, shedding blood – provoked the spirit, who responded by manifesting auditory and visual illusions – for instance, blood running down the walls and eerie screams – as well as very real random items, useful and otherwise. About an hour into the fighter’s watch a magic item known as a “Deck of Many Things” appeared at his feet.
A Deck of Many Things is a blessing and a curse, depending on what cards you draw. Some can spell ruin, others grant boons, and as a character draws more cards, his or her chance of ruination becomes higher. The fighter, figuring he had nothing else to lose at this point, pulled a couple of cards. I don’t remember the exact results, but they were of middling value and not especially important to this narrative. However, the mage’s player suddenly had an idea: what if one of the cards might be capable of removing his curse? If his luck improved and he drew such a card, he would be free of his death-wish. Perhaps then they could best the ghouls outside and find a way to escape the chateau. The fighter grudgingly agreed and positioned the mage’s fingers so that he could pull a card.
Pull a card the mage did, and what a card it was! A toss of my dice revealed that the mage had pulled a “wish” card, granting him one free wish. The fighter grew extremely excited: this could be their way out of here, and possibly, send them on to even greater fame and fortune. However, in an act of outstanding role-play and perverse humor, the player of the mage said that there was only one wish that the mage would want right now. The mage smiled and said “I wish I was dead!” leaving the fighter alone to face the ghouls. With a roar of laughter from everyone at the table, the fighter made a last effort to escape from the barricaded gallery, only to meet his fate at the claws of the ravenous creatures outside.
What about you? Do you have any good role-playing stories to tell? I’d love to hear about your players, DMs, characters, anything you can come up with. Pull up a chair around the virtual fire here and regale us with your adventures.
I was playing a Daeva named Lavender Ashe in a Vampire: the Requiem chronicle set in Chicago for over a year. During that time, our coterie got word that someone was running around diablerizing (e.g. drinking their blood to consume other vampires and gain their powers) other vamps. We had helped a couple of other vamps who managed to survive one of these attacks and was careful to keep him at arm’s length. We suspected that one of the elders was diablerized for her stash of secrets stored in caches within the Chicago river.
As paranoid and as careful as we had been, one of those vamps, named Kyle, turned out to be a traitor. He set up an ambush at Elysium, which was held at Shed Aquarium, while we were transporting some very dangerous contents. e.g. an immortal sealed away within a canopic jar. We weren’t sure what he was, but we let him loose and managed to survive.
Mind you, I roll for shit… Pissed off, and literally unable to help (Thanks to my crappy dice), we managed to survive. Only to learn Belial’s Brood, the worst sort of demon-worshippers possible, were behind all of it.
Very powerful moment in a very intense horror game. Never forget it. We wrote up some of the campaign sessions at http://www.flamesrising.com
While stationed in Germany in the late 80’s I had the privalege of Dm’ing for a bunch of guys who had never played DnD befor. We had a blast they actually tried to role play their characters and didnt know what to expect most of the time two stories come to mind.
They rode and marched through knee deep muck and mire to the burrow of Akrid the dragon. Akrids home was a mound of mud and trees on a high spot in the swamp. Akrid was awakened from his nap by the noise of sloshing water and the smell of fresh horse meat.
As the party approched closer to the mound they heard a rasping voice inquire from within
“Who disturbs the rest of Akrid”?
The Paladin in a very paladin like manner stepped even closer to the front of the mound, drew his sword held it aloft and said, “Tis I Pershious the dragon slayer.”
Apparently Pershious’ reputation as a dragon slayer had never been relayed to Akrid, and in truth there was no reputation to have been relayed. Akrid thought it over for a second and stuck his head out of the front of his mound, and breathed his acidic breath over the entire party, amazingly the paladin lived, but the cleric and a rouge were not so lucky. The rest of the party pulled a brave Sir Robin and fled the swamp. I asked the Paladin player what he was thinking and he said, “I dunno it just seemed the heroic thing to do.”
The other time was same grp. of guys they were fighting a group of water weirds and the mage had recently gotten a Staff of the Magi. The group is getting pummled and the mage for some reason decides to summon a water elemental using the staff. Because every one knows you use water to fight water. The water weird promptly takes control of the water elemental and the route is really on then. Once again using the Brave Sir Robin technique the party manages to save itself, but the real fight took place when the fighter in the group tried to break the Staff of the Magi over the mages head.
Was DMing for my group and had a new player starting. She was playing a house rules fairy (think Barbie with wings). The party had won a treasure trove at the end of the previous session after a hard running battle. They return to find the fairy sitting on their new riches saying “Salvage Rights!”. The party Mage said “Magic Missile!” and I said “Roll up a new character.”
One of my players was a necromancer. They were in front of a king, around them were about 20 soldiers from the guard. Nobody knew that this player was a necro and they tried no to mention it. The daughter of the king made herself scarce because of them.
The king said: Fetch my daughter immediately.
Necro: “Dead or undead?”