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Deme
2009-04-02, 10:09 PM
The game I'm running (4ed DnD) has reached a fun time:

having completed the campaign's first adventure, at second level, they are coming to a town. That town is actually somewhat smallish, but in a good position. They are having a spring festival.

I'd normally just do this as a roleplay thing, but I'm feeling like I want there to be some crunchy activities that they can do around the fair.

I already want some sort of lottery, and maybe some sort of "strength-check based test of strength" machine...

so does anyone have any suggestions as to what sort of activities they can have at the fair/festival/thing, and what sort of prizes?

RTGoodman
2009-04-02, 10:24 PM
Well, you could do some kind of Skill Challenge that uses a combination of Athletics, Acrobatics, Endurance, and maybe a couple of others to do a lot of games of strength. For games of skill, maybe do some target practice (target starts out at AC 10, and moves back, adding +5 DC, every round), chess- or card-related games (which you could actually just play with your players), and stuff like that. For games of luck, just do some simple dice games (Liar (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liar%27s_dice) is a good one, as are basic "roll highest" style games).

I'd also suggest something going wrong, where the PCs have to defend the village. If it were a Fall festival, I'd suggest scarecrow golems going insane and wreaking havoc, but for Spring I'm not as sure. Maybe just a Spring raiding party of orcs/gnolls/whatever.

Deme
2009-04-02, 10:29 PM
I'd also suggest something going wrong, where the PCs have to defend the village. If it were a Fall festival, I'd suggest scarecrow golems going insane and wreaking havoc, but for Spring I'm not as sure. Maybe just a Spring raiding party of orcs/gnolls/whatever.

I'm planning to have the festival crashed by a group of goblins (or whatever. I haven't picked yet) trying to retrieve their sacred beasts that the town acquired for a sort of tiny-gladiatorial-thingee. adventure happens from there, basically.

Glyphic
2009-04-02, 10:45 PM
I'm planning to have the festival crashed by a group of goblins (or whatever. I haven't picked yet) trying to retrieve their sacred beasts that the town acquired for a sort of tiny-gladiatorial-thingee. adventure happens from there, basically.

Make a Macguffin out of a plushie!

Assassin89
2009-04-02, 10:53 PM
For prizes, I think some types of weaponry might be a good idea for certain contests. Essentially for an archery contest, a bow could be given as a prize. It would be amusing if the prizes earned by the players helped in the defense of the village.

Colmarr
2009-04-02, 10:54 PM
An eating contest. Endurance checks against an ever-increasing DC. Winner is the last person to fail 3 checks (or if the last few fail at the same time, have eliminator tie-breaker rolls until only succeeds).

A basket of everlasting provisions could be the prize.

The_JJ
2009-04-02, 11:00 PM
Gambling is always fun. Remember, the House always wins.

For double fun, run a shell game, have them roll for perception, (or whatever). They think it's testing wheather or not they can follow the right shell, really, it's wheather they notice the person runnning it palm the pea. If you're feeling nice have an NPC be the poor sucker. A low roll and they lose the shell, but on a mid to high roll they follow the right shell... and notice that it isn't there, and on a high roll they actually spot the fake.

A mind reader/mystic booth. Hack, wizard, or astute observer? You decide.

Pickpockets.

A kissing booth. :smallbiggrin: Describe a succession of woman from 'fat and wrinkly, like yer dear old mum' leading up to 'a vision of innocence in a simple, rustic way, this girl has curly strawberry blonde hair that bounces as she laughs in a tinkly way at the antics of the clown in the booth near by.' And see how much they'll pay. For your lady PC's, describe handsome farmboys with their shirts off carrying heavy objects.

Other (mostly flavor) fun, bobbing for apples, have an auction or agricultural show off contest thingy. You know, 'biggest pumpkin' and all.

Olo Demonsbane
2009-04-02, 11:04 PM
Adventurer's Challenge! (All damage to other characters/NPCs must be nonlethal)

Challenge 1: All characters race to the top of a hill and try to get a boulder into their hole, near where they started. This can either be accomplished by strength checks or just doing damage to it. Character who gets it into their hole wins.

Challenge 2: Characters must destroy the boulder without destroying the explosive magical gem in the center. Character who grabs the gem first wins.

Challenge 3: Characters race back to the top of the hill, where they deposit the gem and pick up bows, then attempt to find ammunition hidden nearby. First character to hit the gem wins.

Unofficial Challenge 4: The gem blows up, alerting whatever monster you want. Character who kills it wins.

Randel
2009-04-02, 11:59 PM
Activities for the festival:

Archery Contest: Archers fire arrows at targets, either stationary 'bulls eyes' where it would mostly be to see who gets the highest attack rolls over several shots. Clay Pigeons where a person throws a disk that the archer tries to shoot out of the air (The AC of the disk depends on the throwers roll). Or they could release birds into the air to shoot down.

Ice Cream: Wizard uses Ray of Frost to make ice, grinds it up and adds it to cream. Then either add ingredients for flavor or magically flavor it.

Tiefling Fire Jugglers: A Tiefling artist does tricks like juggling flaming wooden pins, or walking on hot coals or something.

Irresistible force meets immovable bottles: That one game where there is a stack of bottles that people throw the ball at to knock it down, describe lots of people trying to win, hitting it repeatedly but it not moving. A really twinked-out player might get the needed roll... if they score a critical hit then describe their anime-style meteor strike blowing up the booth. The bottles are still be there until they fail three Death saving throws at which point they undergo critical existence failure.

Silly Hobbits: The festival is hosting a Tricks for Kids program where the poor village children get some nice hand-made toys to play with. Since this is a medevil land with monsters all over the place they need all the toys they can get! Unfortunately, some halflings have decided they want toys as well and are scheming up a plan to get free stuff by disguising themselves as human children... even though the youngest among them is 30! They may think that cheating the system is a victimless crime but it isn't.