Most Dramatic Moment

[TelemontTanthul]

I hereby dedicate this thread to tales of the dramatic times you have faced in a roleplaying game. Whether it was the time a player threw the table you played on in anger, or the time your character defeated 100 ancient dragons in 1 round (by sheer luck.)

When I say dramatic, I mean, something that got your heart pounding, something that got you excited about the game on that particular day. Something you managed that was totally unexpected, or seemingly impossible at first.

To give an example.

Our DM had been running a long campaign, and he was having our party square off with a huge black dragon as the climax of a quest. I was running a wizard, and my companions filled out the roles of cleric (The Notorious Evan), Druid, Rogue, Monk and a Half-Orc Barbarian named Thok who tried to enslave our party when we first met.

Anyways, the battle began, and raged on for a good 20 rounds or so before we realized we probably were not going to beat this dragon. Our barbarian friend was down, and needed healing. Unfortunately, our party cleric went down early in the battle (surprise surprise) when he was eaten by the dragon.

With our main tank down, the Druid in bad condition, and I was rapidly running out of even 1st level spell slots, I knew that we had to do something, and fast.

I had an epiphany.

Perhaps one of the most rule bending moments in our DnD history was when I pulled out my Necklace of Fireballs (Type IV for those interested), and I declared:

"I throw the entire necklace at the dragon"

After a few moments of discussion, and the DM rewarding my unique thinking, he allowed me to roll an UNGODLY amount of D6's as damage.

The damage total was above 200, if I recall correctly. I rolled especially well.

Not bad for a Level 6 wizard.

Sadly, it was not enough to kill the dragon, and the dragon in question, being quite upset that someone had basically dropped an H-Bomb on it's head, snapped me up as a snack before being dispatched by a very heartbroken party that very same round.

Good times... :smallbiggrin:

[Lycan 01]

Can I post stories about Dark Heresy or Call of Cthulhu? Haven't had many dramatic DnD moments yet... :smallconfused:



Every time my party starts to have a dramatic moment, somebody kill it. The moment, I mean.

Moment 1:

The 4 person level 1 party has been fighting a Kobold Wyrmpriest, 2 Kobold Dragonshields, and a Kobold Chieftan (Elite Skirmisher with a buff or two) for well over an hour. It had been an epic battle, with the Warlock and Wizard hurling spells back and forth with the Wyrmpriest (twas cool), the Warlord holding off the two Dragonshields (his dumb idea...), and the Paladin was locked in Mortal Kombat with the Chieftan from start to near finish.

Its important to point out that everybody was good at the game, and knew what they were doing. Except the Warlord. He was a terrible player. And I mean terrible. He complained constantly, whining about how much he sucked at the game everytime something hit him. He would swear profusely for no apparent reason, making sure to use plenty of profanity every time he hit or killed an enemy or something bad happened. And he didn't know how to play a Warlord. He would run off and chase a minion, while everybody else got owned by the bigger guys. He didn't use his powers, even after I explained the ones he had to him repeatedly, even asking why he didn't have any during one battle. And he never even realized he had healing capabilities, so the party had to rely on health potions and the Paladins scant healing abilities.

At any rate, the Paladin and Chieftan fight for many, many rounds. The battle drags on, with both of them wearing down each others HP into the single digets repeatedly, only to heal back up with powers or potions. (Chief had 40-something HP, plus a healing surge) Roleplay wise, the Paladin's armor was dented and scarred, with blood dripping from some of the joints. The Kobold was covered in open wounds, but he still managed to stay standing and fight heroicly. Finally, the Kobold chieftan gets down to a handful of HP, and the Paladin uses his Encounter power. The attack should have finished the Chieftan, but I gave him an ability that lets him divert an attack from himself to an adjacent target. Well...

The Warlord, wanting to help, had run up to help the Paladin finish the Chieftan. The Paladin had heavily stressed that he wanted to do this alone. Well, when the Pally used his power, the Chieftan made him hit the Warlord. I thought it'd be funny... Instead, they get mad at me! :smalleek: The Paladin was jokingly upset, because he wasted his Encounter power. The Warlord was PISSED, because he got hit for 16 damage, and he began to spout profanity at the Chieftan.

He then proclaims he wants to bull rush the Chieftan. Everybody gets upset. "Oh come on!" the Wizard and Warlock exclaim. "He's been fighting that thing for over an hour, and you're going to steal his kill?! That's not fair! That's not right!" The Paladin is upset, too, but keeping himself under control, simply growling that he'd rather not have his glory taken from him. "Meh, whatever. That *bleed* *bleep hit me! that *bleep* is gonna *bleep* pay for that *bleep*!" He then rolls the dice... and kills the Chieftan by just tackling him. :smallmad: Of course, I made him roll a Reflex save, since he bull rushed the Chieftan near the edge of a cliff, but he made it and didn't fall to his doom. Pity...

I gave the Paladin most of the XP for it, as well as the loot. It was only fair...

So yeah, dramatic moment ruined by the worst player in the party. Huzzah... :smallannoyed:



Moment 2
The next encounter had the party fight a Young Black Dragon, since most of them made it to level 2. Or they should have. I think the XP got distributed unevenly, since some people did more work than others. And yes, I do realize now that the encounter was still WAAAAY too much for them. But newbie DMs make mistakes, especially when only considering the stats on paper, and not in play.

At any rate, the encounter was over before it even got started. The dragon got suprise on them when they entered its cavern, since nobody looked up at the ceiling where it was hiding. In a flash, it had the Pally and the Warlock near death and/or stunned, which took the two best players out of the battle. The Wizard can't decide if he wants to run or not. The Warlord... I think he just yelled profanity at it.

Oh yeah, that was the worst part. The Warlord INSISTED on cussing out the dragon, even when it wasn't near him. And it was awkward, since by extension he was yelling his profanity saturated tirades across the table at me

I finally had to call the encounter off. The Paladin was almost dead and had no powers or potions left, the Warlock had run off to check for items or special weapons in a pile of skeletons, the Wizard jumped in the dragon's mouth and sacrificed himself with a Force Orb attack to severely wound it, and the Warlord had been so busy cussing it out and hitting it with basic attacks that I finally lost patience and had it grab him and tell him to shut up. He used his breath attack on the young black dragon's face... which somehow only did 1 or 2 damage.

Like I said, I just stopped it there. Dramatic moment turned into a nightmare, and I realized how much I hated having the Warlord in our group. I stopped running the group after that, since we only had a week of college left and I'd lost most of my confidence as a DnD DM due to that one encounter.


On the plus side, I have a new group this year at college, which features the Paladin, Warlock, and my GF as a Druid. Our first session last week went quite well, I'm happy to say. :smallbiggrin:

[Melamoto]

Stuff

Ouch, that Warlord player sounds like a horrible player. I don't know why you'd put up with him. Perhaps if he was roleplaying someone who couldn't help cussing, but seriously man. He was a major ****** to the Paladin there.

[TelemontTanthul]

Yeah, I think I will allow all role playing games. Since DnD is only one of many.

[Thajocoth]

It looks like that Warlord thought he was a defender. Fighter would've been a better choice.

[Paulus]

Snip of warlord



Sounds like that warlord of yours had some pretty serious RL problems he used D&D to work his aggression out on. Not bad per say, but damaging to the party if it hogs the spotlight from everyone else and or ruins it for them.

As for myself? Well my first game session involved doing nothing more then meeting everyone else. In a campaign where spys are prevalent and any new character played by PC's regardless can be captured and tortured by the party (happened to a wizard). So my character and a friend arrive to an abandoned town, take refuge in an abandoned building, and unknown to us the rest of the party is slowly stalking us thinking us to be enemies. So they have the building surrounded, and we being clueless of the danger, my friend says "take a peek." And my poor character being a good-natured (CG) Favored Soul, generously sticks his head out of the window and yells asking if anyone was out there. One of the party then makes the mistake of jokingly(?) saying they are vampires, and that we should come out or invite them in. Well.

My Favored Soul of Bahamut absolutely hating the undead with a fury befitting the angry Irishman he is. Naturally be begins cursing, in gaelic, while trying to pull himself out of the window. It was then the DM actually described the overall proportion of the building and what I thought was a pretty nice sized window was actually more of a hole in the wall. And being the RPer I am, I made it clear my character was clearly stuck, and didn't know it. Then he found out. Cue further cursing and blaming the vampires, and by cursing i mean speaking in such a way as to be cursing in a kid friendly way (flim flamming rickles snickle snack! etc only Irish) at which point the actual party is too stunned to belive what is happening and all gather around to look at the cursing Irishman stuck in the window yelling about smiting them with the power of the "great shoiney dragon". At which point most are too busy laughing and therefore not seeing the newcomers as threats.

Now, I had already established my character as being good willed enough to trust EVERYONE until they smack him one, and being a clerical type, he could afford to take a few hits and wasn't afraid of death. And established his temper as being strong enough to the point where if it got mad enough he would challenge a minotaur in a bare knuckle fight, add his absolute hatred for evil dragons and undead. And you can see how such jokes would lead to such a situation. It was the crucial point of informing me at that instant the actual proportions of the hut simply because my partner decided, you know, to look around and thus gave the DM the opportunity to describe it.

Well it was the first time the party had ever so easily and willingly allowed new players and character to simply join up with them. No torture, no fighting, no mistrust. The fact my character has a higher charisma than wisdom or intelligence score kind of helps I suppose.