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dehro
2013-07-08, 05:27 AM
which one of the characters you've played has had the most epic/hilarious/mention-worthy demise?

my Dwarven Cleric was just shoved off a bridge by a skeletal dragon, straight into a river of molten gold. the combination of the dragon's attack and the molten gold (which is probably pyrite, but a dwarf can dream) killed him stone dead.
so he passed away encased in gold.
appropriate ending for a dwarf?

Traab
2013-07-08, 08:38 AM
I played an mmorpg called everquest a number of years ago. My guild had decided it wanted to transition into raiding, but we wanted to practice, so we would take over a lower level zone and work on our coordination in relative safety. I say relative because of what happened to me. We had spent a profitable couple hours in this zone when the call to pull out came in. I was busy typing something in chat and missed a turn, running face first into a group of monsters. Now, my character was a druid, we have a spell that lets us run pretty fast, so I was able to get away.

The downside is, in everquest, things dont stop chasing you till you hit a zone line, or they kill you. So I run for it. Unfortunately, this section of the zone is called the maze for a reason, so I am not only hopelessly lost, I am managing to grab the attention of everything in the area. I finally manage to escape and head for the zone line, bringing a few more groups I run through along the way. I have warned my guild about the huge swarm coming with me, but like idiots they stood at the zone line waiting. When the full swarm showed up, everybodys computers bogged down, and with collision detection, noone could run out the exit because of all the other players standing there. I managed to wipe out 45 guild members by pulling an army of monsters so low level most of them werent even worth experience to kill.

The only equivalent I can think of is wiping out an epic level D&D group with an army of cats and commoners. It took an hour for people to stop running back into the zone and getting killed again then having to sort through the mountain of corpses to find our own bodies so we could pick up our gear and leave.

dehro
2013-07-08, 08:56 AM
that's.. well.. hilarious comes to mind.

Traab
2013-07-08, 09:14 AM
that's.. well.. hilarious comes to mind.

I actually did something similar in world of warcraft. Back when the game was new there was a zone called upper blackrock spire. And at the time you could run it with 40 people. Now, my guild had cleared most of it when someone had to leave, so they invited me to finish off the job. I agreed, entered the zone, and made my way to them. Now, I admit to not paying attention.

At one stage I apparently ran up the wrong side of a staircase and got the attention of a small group of monsters. Not realizing this, I proceeded to jump off a cliff ledge to keep on going towards the raid. Unbeknownst to me, this squad of monsters proceeded to take the LONG way around, through a section of the zone we didnt clear. Equally unfortunately, a number of the monsters have an ability they cast a lot that summons another monster. I had just crossed a narrow bridge and joined up with the raid when I hear over vent, "WHAT THE HELL IS THAT?!" There was a MASSIVE swarm of monsters, summoned and otherwise, following me in a huge train stretching back so far they were out of clipping range.

It was probably the bloodiest battle ever recorded in that zone as 40 raiders (oddly enough people I knew from everquest) proceeded to wage war against the equivalent of an entire zones worth of monsters. We got wiped out in the end, but had a MASSIVE pile of random junk loot to sort through. And as punishment they made me have to resurrect everyone in the raid. (it was a joke punishment, everyone else was laughing too hard) From that day forth, any time I was invited to join a partially finished raid, they made sure to send a character with a lantern in their offhand to guide me safely to the rest of the raid. :smallbiggrin:

Rater202
2013-07-08, 01:33 PM
The Best example that comes to mind, comes from my first ever new world of darkness game.

We were a coterie of neonate vampire.

Me-Ventru Ordo Dracul-BP1-Dominate 2- Coils of Blood 4 coils of banes 4

Ventru-lancea sanctum-BP2(Diablery) Dominate 3 resiliance 4

Meket-Circle of the Crone-BP1-Aspex2 Cruac 5, knew all of the rituals in the core book and a few more

Meket-Ordo Dracul-BP 2 Obfuscate 5 auspex two

Noferatu Ordo Dracul BP1 Vigor and nightmare both 5

Gangrel-Ordo Dracul BP1 Protean 3(palyer did not show up often.)

The basic plot was that our group, the Burnt Church Coterie(named after our Communal Haven) wre charged with investigating the a group of Vampire terroists who worship an ancient vampire known only as "It"(based on prophetic dreams, We never learned his real name)

Eventually It apeared in the city (Bloodpotency 10 Gangrel, 5 dots in every core non covenant disceplline) and our group had to fight him.

We were joined by the Prince of the City(Blood potency 5 Deava with a bloodline that gave him resilience in clan. 5 dots in Majesty, Celerity, Vigor, and Resilience) and a mysterious elder who sealed it away centuries ago(Blood Potency 7, at least 6 dots in Obfuscate, at least three dots in coil of blood)

Most of us died in the fight, Because It had White Prosperous grenades. eventually it came down to me and No name( Mysteriouse elder) verses It.

Because of the coils I took less damage from the fire(coil of banes tier four, mortal burns, I take lethal instead of aggravated), I was able to heal myself from injuries more quickly than the others, and because me and the elder had the third tier of the coil of blood, we were able to set up a Hungarian marriage to keep ourselves with full blood pools(third tier of the coil of blood means that a Vampire with it gets twice as much Vitae when feeding from a vampire, A Hungarian marriage is two vampire with this ability feeding from each other an abusing a loophole in the rules to gain infinite blood. It is entirely rule legal and is mentioned by name in the Ordo Dracul covenant book)

however, eventually It took of No Names Head with his Feral Claws, and I was left Alone, but, I managed to take one of his grenades. then the sun came up. the third tier in the coil of banes Makes it so that the vampire takes bashing damage from the sun at dawn and dusk. It was burning up faster than I was, and I managed to hit him with his own grenades, which coupled with the damage he had taken from the sun light killed him.

I ran out of blood to heel myself with though, and a Swat team showed up to investigate the explosions. I was Shot in the Head by a Mortal Cop literally 2 seconds after killing a Fricking Methuselah.

I do not game with that Story Teller anymore.

Jormengand
2013-07-08, 04:00 PM
Probably goes to the Honour Guard in a no-magic campaign who saved his party by standing on a 25 ft wide bridge (any wider and he wouldn't have had reach to everywhere) and making stupid numbers of AoOs at everything which went near him. He also Irrisistable Force'd some people off the bridge, which conveniently led them to their doom in a volcano (which was actually why the bridge was so wide, so that people wouldn't fall off). Upon being surrounded and reduced to about 5 health, he made a full-round attack action against the bridge. Bridge falls, everyone dies.

The rest of the party did all die within a few minutes (this was a sort of "survive as long as you can" type of game, and they screwed up a lot, not just by losing their HG) but I bought enough time (and killed enough enemies, and blocked enough paths) for my party to live just that little bit longer.

Arkhosia
2013-07-08, 04:45 PM
Probably goes to the Honour Guard in a no-magic campaign who saved his party by standing on a 25 ft wide bridge (any wider and he wouldn't have had reach to everywhere) and making stupid numbers of AoOs at everything which went near him. He also Irrisistable Force'd some people off the bridge, which conveniently led them to their doom in a volcano (which was actually why the bridge was so wide, so that people wouldn't fall off). Upon being surrounded and reduced to about 5 health, he made a full-round attack action against the bridge. Bridge falls, everyone dies.

The rest of the party did all die within a few minutes (this was a sort of "survive as long as you can" type of game, and they screwed up a lot, not just by losing their HG) but I bought enough time (and killed enough enemies, and blocked enough paths) for my party to live just that little bit longer.

The only way that could be more epic would be if he collapsed the bridge by smashing a large boulder that kept a massive deposit of lava (boulder smashed easily thanks to lava corrosion), causing the deposit to cascade down upon him/her and the opponents, collapsing the bridge into more lava.

Toliudar
2013-07-08, 05:15 PM
Tabletop D&D game. One of the players has just had their long-time character (built up from level 1 to level 10) fall 100' out of a massive tree house, through a trap door on the lower level. He stabilizes at unconsciousness, but because the rest of the group is back up in the tree house, there's not much they can do for him in the short term. I as DM hand the player a sheet for one of the NPC henchmen, and he takes over that character.

The group is engaged in a running battle in a store-room area (same place the PC fell through the trapdoor). Player has the NPC look down to check on the fallen PC, and discovers that a couple of minions are working their way over to check on the fallen figure. Ignoring the battle in progress around him, the player has the NPC start to throw things down at the minions.

The minions reach the PC and pick up the unconscious PC away. Player becomes enraged and has the NPC push a crate down the trapdoor.

There is a stunned silence at the table as everyone except the player in question realizes what this would mean. I gently ask the question that DM's ask when a player does something unutterably stupid: "Are you sure you want to do that?" Player nods emphatically.

Crate of apples crashes down from a height of 100', killing the minions and squashing the unconscious PC like a bug. Capping a career of really unwise choices by the PC. This is the most complicated accidental suicide I've ever seen in a game.

Slipperychicken
2013-07-08, 08:47 PM
Probably goes to the Honour Guard in a no-magic campaign who saved his party by standing on a 25 ft wide bridge (any wider and he wouldn't have had reach to everywhere) and making stupid numbers of AoOs at everything which went near him. He also Irrisistable Force'd some people off the bridge, which conveniently led them to their doom in a volcano (which was actually why the bridge was so wide, so that people wouldn't fall off). Upon being surrounded and reduced to about 5 health, he made a full-round attack action against the bridge. Bridge falls, everyone dies.

The rest of the party did all die within a few minutes (this was a sort of "survive as long as you can" type of game, and they screwed up a lot, not just by losing their HG) but I bought enough time (and killed enough enemies, and blocked enough paths) for my party to live just that little bit longer.

Please tell me he shouted "YOU SHALL NOT PASS!" before smashing the bridge.

CarpeGuitarrem
2013-07-08, 09:03 PM
This sorta counts, because I was GMing (game: Burning Wheel) and it was an NPC, but it was still epic.

So the characters come up to a castle; all you need to know is that there were things to sort out with the Lady of the castle (the Lord had been assassinated previously). The first character, Tomar Leo, got up and was being reprimanded by the Lady when he burst in there. He laid his cards on the table, claiming that she was a lowborn and a sorceress (he had circumstantial evidence of the latter, concrete evidence of the former).

The archer who accompanied him had an Instinct and a history about hunting witches. She opted to shoot her right in the middle of the castle courtyard. This is a character who has a trait called Cipher: when blending into a crowd, she gets a special mechanical boost to the attempt. I called for an Inconspicuous test (the skill you use to blend into a crowd), to represent her getting a shot off with nobody noticing. I set it ludicrously high.

She got it off. She then proceeded to deal full damage with her massive bow, enough to skewer the Lady through the head and spray blood everywhere. Everywhere. It was hilarious and an epic death. They're now on the run for their lives.

LibraryOgre
2013-07-08, 10:18 PM
Single-handedly facing down the king of demons and several of his henchmen, having just reneged on my deal to sell my soul, so the rest of the party could escape with King Arthur through the dimensional portal I created for them.

We awoke at dawn of the last day. Something about that dawn seem crisper and purer than any dawn I'd ever seen before, and I knew that the day would be momentous beyond imagining.

We knew where the tomb was, roughly, so Nightfall and I flew in slow passes over the plateau, seeking out a magical signature that would tell us where He lay. Once we had him, we could go home. On the sixth pass, Nightfall motioned me down. He'd found the tomb. A rough hole cut into the wall, bearing a faded inscription. It was beyond my ken, until I flipped down the optics on my helmet, translating them from arcane script to my native Egyptian. "Let only he who is true enter here, for he who knows maliciousness shall surely fall." I knew maliciousness, that was before the Village of the Damned... not anymore.

We retrieved the others in quick order. Only Maelstrom, Nightfall, and I felt up to the task of going in... too main stains on the other's souls from this campaign, I suppose. A quarter mile in, we came to an archway. Nightfall read the Gaelic inscribed, and we found the trap... one set for he who entered with an impure heart. I stepped through, even though I knew my heart wasn't pure. I had to. My family, my clan, my people... my homeland... depended on us waking the man who lay in that sarcophagus. I passed through with nary a scratch... I wish I'd had time to wonder why.

We lifted the lid from the sarcophagus, and gently lifted out Arthur Pendragon, greatest warrior of Old Atlantis. He awoke, slowly, shaking off the dreams of twelve thousand years, looking at us quizzically. The others, Bagh-Dach, stood in awe. I kept my head, as Acheran do, and stepped forward with a bow.

"Arthur Pendragon, I am Harakhamis Arimi Acheran. May I present to you Nightfall and Maelstrom, of the Bagh-Dach clan?"

He seemed more at ease with his own clanmates there, and questioned me about the date. "It has been twelve thousand years since you last breathed, Arthur. There is much to do, and we will explain later."

He hesitated, wanting his sword, his armor. Why is it that warriors always want a sword? The Bagh-dach found it concealed in the room, and he seemed much relieved to have it on his hip, clanging against his armor. As we walked up, we spoke briefly of the situation with Atlantis, telling him of the loss of Atlantis and the ongoing campaign to reclaim it. He was not comforted by our news, but I did not expect him to be.

When we stepped onto the ledge overlooking the valley, the scent of evil was palatable in the air, even to those of us with normal senses... the presence, though, was enough to send Nightfall reeling for a brief moment. Before us, in the quiet air, hung a man, long hair and wild eyes. Some part deep within me, some stain I had long tried to purge, knew this man to not be a man... he was a god, one of evil and deceit. I shoved to Gecko all but a tiny portion of my power, whispering into the radio that they should leave, now, through a portal I knew Zoderhan could make. In that instant, the man spoke, his voice like a roll of thunder across the plains.

"Harakhamis! You owe me a debt, the debt of a life! You will slay him, Harakhamis, to pay your debt to me!" I didn't even need to look to know that he pointed to Arthur. Time slowed to a crawl, and I knew that all debts must be paid. Quick as thought, I flew along the wall to stand in the empty air across from him.

"You know I can't do that, Mephisto." Please, gods, let them have the time. Let them have the time. A crackle in my senses told me the Rift was opened... they could go home. Maelstrom spoke to me in the radio, asking me if I was sure. I had no choice... I had to pay my debts. I sent them through the portal with my blessing, until only Zoderhan remained.

"Then you know the cost." Mephisto's words contained more hate than I had ever known, and his negligent gesture summoned nearly a score of deevils to stand before him. In the corner of my eye, Zoderhan blinked out of sight. For an instant, I thought he was gone through the portal, and wished him well. I felt his parting gift materialize around and inside me... armor of pure energy, and a bubbling, magical strength. I knew the cost.

With both hands, I raised my sword. A thought sent the energy of life running down its blade, and it glowed green in the light of an early morning. As I raised the blade higher, over my head, the sun crested the cliffs, bathing me in its light. The exultant energy was too much for me, and a word rang out of my throat. "HORUS!" I charged into melee, a mortal against a god, and knew that I would never die.

And then I knew no more.

Arkhosia
2013-07-08, 10:55 PM
This sorta counts, because I was GMing (game: Burning Wheel) and it was an NPC, but it was still epic.

So the characters come up to a castle; all you need to know is that there were things to sort out with the Lady of the castle (the Lord had been assassinated previously). The first character, Tomar Leo, got up and was being reprimanded by the Lady when he burst in there. He laid his cards on the table, claiming that she was a lowborn and a sorceress (he had circumstantial evidence of the latter, concrete evidence of the former).

The archer who accompanied him had an Instinct and a history about hunting witches. She opted to shoot her right in the middle of the castle courtyard. This is a character who has a trait called Cipher: when blending into a crowd, she gets a special mechanical boost to the attempt. I called for an Inconspicuous test (the skill you use to blend into a crowd), to represent her getting a shot off with nobody noticing. I set it ludicrously high.

She got it off. She then proceeded to deal full damage with her massive bow, enough to skewer the Lady through the head and spray blood everywhere. Everywhere. It was hilarious and an epic death. They're now on the run for their lives.

Is it bad that "Grunt Birthday Party" immediately came to mind?

Rater202
2013-07-09, 11:14 AM
two dungions and dragons examples from the same G.M.


1. We somehow ended up in the Spelljamer setting, and we had to stop a flying enemy, I had my Elf Fighter(I was a Noob) Thrown to said opponent, by his ogre party member.

The Ogre gaot an natural 20 with a plus 15 modifier.

I rolled a one on my reflex save to keep my balance in the air, and we were at a Spelljamer dock.

Went flying through the astral realm for all eternity.

2. My first 4th edition game. My level 2 tiefling warlock, was being grappled by a Giant Snake with about 90 hit points. thaanks to some luccky rolls, my warlocks curse, and burning an action point to atack it again, and abusing that hellish rebuke does not give a limit for how close you need to move for the second burst of damage to happen. Because of all that, I did about forty damage in one round.

now, you would thin that seeing as how I was in the smnakes mouth, me thowing that much hellfire at it would have made it drop me. nope, net rounf it bites me and I die.

This was the same guy from the vampire example above, me thinks he had something agaist me.

In the fourth edition game, he gave my character an obsession with an artifact in the parties possession, and punished me for role playing it. and had my tie fling come back as a villain, with out my permission, and after his soul was taken away by the raven queen, who forbids resurrection.

in the vampire game he made my character lose all but three dots of his merits(losing his resources, allies, herd, and retainer but keeping his haven and status) By having his gang arrested(He was a Drug dealer) No compensation, and it had nothing to do with the plot.

so yeah, i don't game with him anymore.

Fighter1000
2013-07-09, 01:06 PM
I was running a homebrew game system. One of my PCs was a noblewoman, and had a little sister who was about 5 years old. The player wanted that little sister to be an adult so she could adventure with her. Well, the noblewoman PC did a task for the King, and the King, being the master wizard he was, used chronomancy to go forward in time, grab said little sister as an adult, and bring her back in time. So that little sister, I think her name was Theresa, was very out of place but could tell the PCs about events of the future.
To prevent a dark and grim future, the PCs had to take down a crime lord known as Arthur, who supposedly assassinates the king and kills said noblewoman PC. To find Arthur's location, the PCs had to close an Abyssal portal in some ancient ruins for a seer NPC. The PCs went to said ruins and used a magic stone given them by the king to close the Abyssal portal. However, before they closed it, a Balor managed to get through. The PCs ran away from the Balor, and despite noblewoman PC wearing steel plate armor and Theresa wearing only studded leather armor, the Balor caught Theresa and did a critical grab on her, causing her to explode in a blaze of demonic fire. It was horrible, and the PCs lost sanity points.

Souju
2013-07-09, 03:46 PM
It's not a DEATH per se, because of the way hero points work in pathfinder (you can spend 2 to survive an encounter...sometimes it stretches plausibility but hey, Gandalf) but my group had a run in with some trolls that actually lasted so long the party members who said they were going to be a few hours late actually arrived. We "lost" 2 members of our party in the battle (thankfully the ones WITH hero points...strange how the anti-heroes seem to survive these encounters)
One of them, the great dwarven monk Wrasslor, went down wrestling trolls. All of the trolls. His noble sacrifice of grinding up against all these trolls for the sake of the party (and actually managing to consistently counter the troll's regen by overdamaging it each turn) and then taking an attack from the boss that killed him but let the stragglers arrive and help mop up.
Dude got a statue erected of him for that. Well, not directly but we all agreed that the next statue should be of him.
Also, thanks to that experience I (the healer) took the Reach Spell feat first chance I got.

TuggyNE
2013-07-09, 04:50 PM
I was running a homebrew game system. One of my PCs was a noblewoman, and had a little sister who was about 5 years old. The player wanted that little sister to be an adult so she could adventure with her. Well, the noblewoman PC did a task for the King, and the King, being the master wizard he was, used chronomancy to go forward in time, grab said little sister as an adult, and bring her back in time. So that little sister, I think her name was Theresa, was very out of place but could tell the PCs about events of the future.
To prevent a dark and grim future, the PCs had to take down a crime lord known as Arthur, who supposedly assassinates the king and kills said noblewoman PC. To find Arthur's location, the PCs had to close an Abyssal portal in some ancient ruins for a seer NPC. The PCs went to said ruins and used a magic stone given them by the king to close the Abyssal portal. However, before they closed it, a Balor managed to get through. The PCs ran away from the Balor, and despite noblewoman PC wearing steel plate armor and Theresa wearing only studded leather armor, the Balor caught Theresa and did a critical grab on her, causing her to explode in a blaze of demonic fire. It was horrible, and the PCs lost sanity points.

That seems less "epic" and more "scarring".

Arkhosia
2013-07-09, 06:25 PM
It's not a DEATH per se, because of the way hero points work in pathfinder (you can spend 2 to survive an encounter...sometimes it stretches plausibility but hey, Gandalf) but my group had a run in with some trolls that actually lasted so long the party members who said they were going to be a few hours late actually arrived. We "lost" 2 members of our party in the battle (thankfully the ones WITH hero points...strange how the anti-heroes seem to survive these encounters)
One of them, the great dwarven monk Wrasslor, went down wrestling trolls. All of the trolls. His noble sacrifice of grinding up against all these trolls for the sake of the party (and actually managing to consistently counter the troll's regen by overdamaging it each turn) and then taking an attack from the boss that killed him but let the stragglers arrive and help mop up.
Dude got a statue erected of him for that. Well, not directly but we all agreed that the next statue should be of him.
Also, thanks to that experience I (the healer) took the Reach Spell feat first chance I got.

Reminds me of the death of someone's character via wrestling a Deep One.
I think the post was in a 4e thread about funny rules (pixies grappling dragons!).

kaaskeizer
2013-07-09, 06:32 PM
haven't experienced much character deaths myself since ive been a DM most of the time

this of course doesn't mean i dont have any good story's involving character death

(side info, this is my own world, not a pre made 1 like faerun)

My party started off following a paladin into an outer section of the under dark. he was trying to save a village of orcs that were dragged down by half fiends, what they found,, wasnt too pretty. after a long day of fighting (alongside with some other men from a town nearby) they set up a camp. during the night the fiends were capable to capture both the paladin and the druid, which they dragged off into the slave pens, where they worked for days. only after earning friendship with the orcs by saving their chieftain from execution, they managed to constructed a plan to get them back outside, once outside they started to rally a small army to push trough the half fiends defense. when the demons released a crazed up beholder, it was pretty much over. the paladin got turned to stone together with the bard (which was playing a summoned pipe organ) and their companion the very young gold dragon. the pixie and the druid decided that it was far to dangerous to either stay or come back. and so they fled north from the deep forests of aurora, to the lush green hills of furnet...


after 2 months of traveling the pixie and druid thought of looking for some fun, and decided to go on a ship. in search for mermaids and new strange water creatures they did not see before. they went to elder storm, the biggest city within 1000 miles, and the only place big enough to be capable of supplying them witha boat. when reaching the harbor a little man was thrown trough the window of a pub, a man was yelling at the little guy that he would regret that he ever cheated.. the lil man ran away with the bag of the druid. after a full on chase the druid and pixie smuggled themself on board the ship. they didnt stay hidden for long. they partied up with the little man whom seemed to be a jolly gnome pirate captain along with as second in command, an orc and professional rogue ghost.

they played around my world for 8 real time months in search for godhood. but when they found the deck of many things up on a flying island the ghost went mad and killed the entire party

now theyre playing a vampire, a vampire spawn, a lich a dread necromancer a succubus and a monk for 2 months or so...
still thinking of a good way to rid my D&D world of them ^^

CarpeGuitarrem
2013-07-10, 08:52 AM
Is it bad that "Grunt Birthday Party" immediately came to mind?
BAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

Arkhosia
2013-07-10, 11:14 AM
BAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

http://youtu.be/QtEljxur6eI

Jormengand
2013-07-10, 11:27 AM
Please tell me he shouted "YOU SHALL NOT PASS!" before smashing the bridge.

No, but I did. :p