Oops. Greatest DM accidents/oversights.

[Blackfang108]

OK, so I ran a update to the "Wreck of the Mindspider" adventure from Lords of Maddness last night for a level 9 party, while the normal DM sat to get a chance to play. (The umber hulk gave them much trouble.)

Forgetting that they do have the resources to repair it. Eventually. (They already know it'll be repaired at the speed of the plot. And I've determined that it will be repaired in stages. Airship -> Planar Dromond -> Spelljammer(probably ~level 25). The original DM is cool with this in general, and loves the idea of the functioning "levels." Thank the Raven Queen.).

I see vast possibilities with this, altough I'm not going to give it airship capabilities for at least a few levels.

Can anyone share stories with this kind of "What did I just let them do?" factor?

EDIT: also, if anyone has any ideas for other levels between Airship and Spelljammer, please share them.

I'll be DMing this group until at least low-mid Paragon. I have a feeling this'll be the least of my oversights.

[Dienekes]

A GM of mine used to run that if he made a mistake it's his fault and therefore if it's in your benefit you get to keep playing with the mistake.

This resulted in the entire party being put into a mass slave pin, with full armor and weapons.

They didn't stay in there for long.

[dsmiles]

"What did I just let them do?"

I ran a post-future DnD campaign once. Once. The players found a time portal that they were supposed to close. They went through it instead. They brought back from the "past" a Jeep Wrangler with a lightbar and a winch, several hunting rifles, one character (a rnager) was dual wielding Desert Eagles, and they all had "modern" swords (as in our current forging techniques are better than what they initially had). :smalleek:

Fortunately, the Jeep would eventually run out of gas, the guns would eventually run out of ammo, and the swords...well...they were easy...a nonmagical +2 to damage (only).

As far as your spelljammer goes, if you don't want them to go, don't give them fuel (if they're using an artifurnace you're in trouble, unless the Neogi sent the artifact with a scouting party for some reason), if they're good aligned, they won't use a life-helm in any way. Easily controlled, until you want them to spelljam.

[Blackfang108]

As far as your spelljammer goes, if you don't want them to go, don't give them fuel (if they're using an artifurnace you're in trouble, unless the Neogi sent the artifact with a scouting party for some reason), if they're good aligned, they won't use a life-helm in any way. Easily controlled, until you want them to spelljam.

The nice thing is, as per the adventure, the ship is currently broken.

As per LoM, only Neogi know how the ship works, and they won't help the party fix it. They had the resources to transport the wreckage quickly, but fixing it will take MUCH longer. (This is 4e, so a lot of this is winged, but they DON'T have the furnace. They all know that the repairs will be in the tier format, and they're all cool with it.)

They'll have the non-present PCs (such as my character while I'm DMing), as well as most of their Keep's NPCs, working on reverse engineering the ship. I actually have the next adventure or two outlined as gathering things and people to help with the ship. And then, the Main DM and I have to create an Expansion Pack World (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ExpansionPackWorld).

[Zeta Kai]

I believe that this recently-reposted strip from Chainmail Bikini (http://www.shawntionary.com/chainmailbikini/?p=63) is rather relevant to the topic at hand.

From my own experience, I tend to allow my players far more freedom than I probably should. In one notable campaign from a few years ago, the PCs were officers on a pirate ship. The captain was a weak-willed always-drunk DMPC who didn't help the PCs much, but didn't get in their way (much), & was too high-level to mess with (yet).

The ship was going from one city to another, & I intended to give the PCs a few interesting sights & encounters to make the relative down-time interesting. One set-piece was a burning village on the coast. It was supposed to just be a non-interactive part of the scenery, something for the players to look at & say "Huh!" as the sailed past on their way to collect the next plot coupon.

The players got very interested in this plot-hook-that-wasn't-a-plot-hook. They unanimously voted to dock the ship & investigate; some to rescue damsels, some for the mystery of it, & some for teh lootz. The only problem: I had NOTHING planned for this town. I knew its name, & that's it. It was a blip on the map, & now the PCs were sailing right toward it. :smalleek:

Luckily, it was at the end of a session, so I had a whole week to concoct an entire adventure in the burning town of Hilhod (http://zeta-kai.deviantart.com/art/Hilhod-Burning-98177595). I didn't panic, & I was able to pull some things together to make the whole thing work, but it was a huge upset to my plans. :smallsigh:

I learned that it's very important to only show your players places that you are prepared to let them go to. Or have a great reason for why they can't. :smallamused:

[Blackfang108]

I learned that it's very important to only show your players places that you are prepared to let them go to. Or have a great reason for why they can't. :smallamused:

Oh, I had a reason that they couldn't get it back to the keep: they needed a bigger Dinosaur.

I momentarily forgot that they're being bankrolled by some lazy epic-level casters.

So I had them make a Diplomacy check to see if they could convince their Supervisor to magic it back.

He decided to fund the transportation instead.

So the Knights of the Hourglass Mage (Yup. He's their supervisor. Not my contribution. This has been in the story since level 1 or 2.) are now the proud owners of the SS Esse(drydocked). (I wish I was joking about the new name.)

[Asbestos]

I don't think that giving them access to a possibly repairable spaceship is an accident so much as awesome. At Epic levels they can fly around in their stolen warbird spider-ship and visit various Astral or Chaos locales.

[Blackfang108]

I don't think that giving them access to a possibly repairable spaceship is an accident so much as awesome. At Epic levels they can fly around in their stolen warbird spider-ship and visit various Astral or Chaos locales.

The ship was meant to be more locale than loot.
Don't get me wrong, I'm loving the idea and glad they did this, but my jaw hit the floor when they started trying to figure out how to get it back home.

[Ormagoden]

OK, so I ran a update to the "Wreck of the Mindspider" adventure from Lords of Maddness last night for a level 9 party, while the normal DM sat to get a chance to play. (The umber hulk gave them much trouble.)

Forgetting that they do have the resources to repair it. Eventually. (They already know it'll be repaired at the speed of the plot. And I've determined that it will be repaired in stages. Airship -> Planar Dromond -> Spelljammer(probably ~level 25). The original DM is cool with this in general, and loves the idea of the functioning "levels." Thank the Raven Queen.).

I see vast possibilities with this, altough I'm not going to give it airship capabilities for at least a few levels.

Can anyone share stories with this kind of "What did I just let them do?" factor?

EDIT: also, if anyone has any ideas for other levels between Airship and Spelljammer, please share them.

I'll be DMing this group until at least low-mid Paragon. I have a feeling this'll be the least of my oversights.

Mindspiders use slave helms...Slave helms kill the pilot.
I've never actually read the adventure in question though so I'm basing it off spelljammer [2E] rules.

[Dr Bwaa]

I'm not sure where the thread went, but there was a fantastic story a while ago that someone posted about the DM somehow allowing the party's Warforged something-or-other to get a portal to a demiplane in his chest, where the PCs then proceeded to start to colonize...

Our DM gave us a deck of many things, once. 'Nuff said.

I homebrewed an Endless Sack of Flour for a character in a game I ran and never looked back. (Note: applying fire to the flour jet results in a flamethrower). He blew all his money on buying it (he was in the market in the City of Brass; of course it exited for sale there), but neither of us have been dissatisfied =P

[Blackfang108]

Mindspiders use slave helms...Slave helms kill the pilot.
I've never actually read the adventure in question though so I'm basing it off spelljammer [2E] rules.

We're using 4e, so I'm handwaving that part as: It's buttons an levers. Or will be in a few levels. DM alpha and I both think this is too awesome to just drop.

[Volos]

I let the party's rogue use improved fient, critical hits, and sneak attack on undead for about half of a campain day untill I realized what happened. Then I had him roll intelligence. By the time his slaughter was over he realized that it wasn't zombies he had been fighting, but the villagers of Orinshin. They had been without trade for weeks due to goblin banditry and were almost out of food. Most of the moaning and stomach growling was mistaken for the common zombie "Oooahhhaaooohh!" Needless to say he was suddenly risking alignment shift. The players never caught my mistake.

[Talbot]

The game I'm currently playing in keeps getting derailed because 3 of the 4 party members are Chaotic Neutral, and generally run like mad from any given plothook. The best/worst example is the BBEG, who we met early on, realized we were nowhere near a match for (and, aside from the one NG member of the group, no interest in becoming a match for), and promptly hopped a boat to another continent.

Occasionally one character will have a legitimate in-character reason to bite on a plot hook... but the other two CN characters will invariably overrule him. It's making for a fun, unpredictable campaign, but it's forcing the DM to think pretty quickly.

Another note of why we're horrible to DM for. A, NPC Homunculus was introduced to provide exposition/further the plot/give us magic items. We stuck him in a box and refused to listen to him for about three levels because the entire party (minus, again, the NG Elf), is violently paranoid and knows next to nothing about magic.