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View Full Version : Gamer Tales the scariest encounter you have found



lolthfollower
2014-03-12, 12:20 AM
the scariest encounter i had was when the dm had us in a tournament because we were captured by goblins and were made to fight a gelatinous cube and a bunch of smaller oozes unarmed. How cruel has your dm been?:smallwink:

Slipperychicken
2014-03-12, 11:04 PM
We all woke up in a prison cell guarded by shadowy figures in raggy all-concealing garments, humanoid but inhuman, speaking a raspy language nobody knew. After escaping, we found a creepy little girl who used a magic amulet to lead us to the surface. The girl reported that she had no name and no parents, but spoke often of elders (who sounded like an unpleasant, frightening folk). The whole land above was unfamiliar swamps with weird trees, and the stars were all wrong in the sky, as if we were looking at them from another angle.

AMFV
2014-03-12, 11:11 PM
The one you haven't fought yet with an enemy you haven't figured out. As Hitchcock said "...Suspense..." so having suspense is more frightening to me than any actual encounter.

Jarred Stone
2014-03-12, 11:23 PM
Funny enough, the scariest encounter I had was a level 1 hobgobling warrior and a level 1 gobling ranger with half-elf as favored enemy... while I was all alone, with 6 hp left... while being an half-elf aristrocat level 1.

Not satisfied enough, my DM dropped an injured level 3 human warrior who was a family traitor and wanted to swing an unexpected attack against me (so, my character was flat-footed) with a great sword. He rolled a 2 in the dice, and, by miracle, I could take him out with my long sword because that warrior had "just" 10 hp left. Yes, I had to roll a 7 in my damage dice to take him down to 0 hp.

That was the prologue of that campaign. I don't know how I am still alive. I think I have too much luck.

Slipperychicken
2014-03-12, 11:30 PM
The one you haven't fought yet with an enemy you haven't figured out. As Hitchcock said "...Suspense..." so having suspense is more frightening to me than any actual encounter.

Building off of this, you get a lot of fear out of the uncertain or unknown.


"Fear comes from uncertainty. When we are absolutely certain, whether of our worth or worthlessness, we are almost impervious to fear."

-William Congreve



Not satisfied enough, my DM dropped an injured level 3 human warrior who was a family traitor and wanted to swing an unexpected attack against me (so, my character was flat-footed) with a great sword. He rolled a 2 in the dice, and, by miracle, I could take him out with my long sword because that warrior had "just" 10 hp left. Yes, I had to roll a 7 in my damage dice to take him down to 0 hp.

That was the prologue of that campaign. I don't know how I am still alive. I think I have too much luck.

The GM might have been fudging it to help you survive the prologue. Once you get more experience, you'll be able to tell when the GM's fudging, particularly if it's a life-or-death roll.

5a Violista
2014-03-13, 12:23 AM
The scariest encounter I've ever found was actually one I gave to someone else, and he said it was pretty frightening. There was, actually, no combat included in it. It was mostly just the set-up that made it scary:
His character was in an abandoned place, and everything built up to there being something insanely terrible just around the corner...and by the time he went there, there was nothing except the possibility of something else around the next corner. Then, he met (had the encounter) a little girl who followed the same pattern: there was the looming chance it was a hellish creature who would betray him at any instance...only to not do so.

Really, I don't think anything there was particularly frightening. The scariest part was that he was always expecting something to jump out of the darkness throughout the entire dungeon, but it was always whisperings just out of sight, and he never knew exactly what it was waiting there.

GungHo
2014-03-13, 10:48 AM
In the old days... any encounter where the monster had level drain. Son of a bucket I hated that.

Red Fel
2014-03-13, 12:47 PM
The scariest encounter would be if they gave Sinbad another TV show.

In all seriousness, while I wouldn't call it "scary," I have one combat encounter I would certainly call intimidating. End of an attempted epic campaign (ended rather quickly because of... reasons), an Archdevil bursts through the ground of a consecrated temple of Pelor just because he can, starts summoning his infernal hordes of minions. When you're confronted with a ruler of Hell standing at full size surrounded by his army, it can be a bit daunting.

Now, in terms of scary non-combat encounters, I remember one oVtM campaign, in which an evil Malkav was being introduced. This was someone who played Malkavs terrifyingly well - even at their friendliest, they were a bit creepy and off-putting. And this one was actually evil. Like, dressed up as a priest and murdered people in a confessional booth evil. Seriously evil. And the ST put on some music in the background. It was a cute little children's song-style piece, with music-box-style music that sort of drifted back and forth, and the sound of a little girl's voice singing.

And then the volume increased slightly, and we could hear the lyrics. "I'm going to kill you, when you least expect it..." Between that, the atmosphere, and the seriously freaking evil Malkav, there were some frayed nerves in that room.

Ashus
2014-03-13, 12:52 PM
And the ST put on some music in the background. It was a cute little children's song-style piece, with music-box-style music that sort of drifted back and forth, and the sound of a little girl's voice singing.

And then the volume increased slightly, and we could hear the lyrics. "I'm going to kill you, when you least expect it..." Between that, the atmosphere, and the seriously freaking evil Malkav, there were some frayed nerves in that room.

Please, please, please tell me you know how the rest of us can get our hands on that music...

Fabletop
2014-03-13, 01:03 PM
I've never really played, growing up in the hobby as a DM/GM.

Scariest things
Running Tomb of Horrors out-the-box and watching players embrace a slow TPK
Running the original Ravenloft to see a 5th-7th level party I'd run since level 1 embrace TPK
An M&M game where I had the foe stats too high & the heroes fell like dominoes


As the person running the game, watching the party get 86ed is always horrific. But it happens. Bad decisions across the table is all it takes. To this day I still remember the screams.

-ugh-

Defiled Cross
2014-03-13, 01:06 PM
Anything that involved children.

Nasty, devilish little buggers.

:smallbiggrin:

Jarred Stone
2014-03-13, 02:28 PM
The GM might have been fudging it to help you survive the prologue. Once you get more experience, you'll be able to tell when the GM's fudging, particularly if it's a life-or-death roll.

I am pretty sure he would be fudging with the hobgoblin but, that last roll with the level 3 warrior, was in front of me. He smiled me as he rolled in front of my eyes. I saw the 2 in the dice and he described how the great sword passes over my head. He said some guards were going to storm into the room in four round so, there was just a 20 % of chances to die horribly there. Even with that... holy crap, dude!

Spacebatsy
2014-03-14, 11:31 AM
And the ST put on some music in the background. It was a cute little children's song-style piece, with music-box-style music that sort of drifted back and forth, and the sound of a little girl's voice singing.

And then the volume increased slightly, and we could hear the lyrics. "I'm going to kill you, when you least expect it..." Between that, the atmosphere, and the seriously freaking evil Malkav, there were some frayed nerves in that room.

I want that song. So badly.

Mastikator
2014-03-14, 11:43 AM
We once encountered a *gasp* Gazebo!
Needless to say there were no survivors.

Lord Torath
2014-03-14, 01:50 PM
Fun fact: Dread Gazebos, while being nearly immune to just about everything, are surprisingly susceptible to fire. :smallamused: So Belkar is unlikely to have trouble with one.

Kane0
2014-03-15, 04:15 AM
Well this one time we were looking or a plot hook so we went to the nearest tavern.

When we arrived there was a bar fight happening with an erinyes and a pair of succubi. So yeah, at level 2 we were pretty terrified.

Prince Raven
2014-03-15, 09:34 AM
I had a reasonably powerful psyker fight my Dark Heresy players in their first adventure, one of them got up close to her and was blasted of his feet by bio-lightning (while screaming "unlimited power!" :smallbiggrin:). They managed to make it out of the combat, well, not unscathed, but they had the same number of limbs going into the combat as they did going out of it.
They found the encounter quite scary, but it doesn't compare to what these monsters have done to my poor NPCs.

Melville's Book
2014-03-15, 10:01 AM
Well this one time we were looking or a plot hook so we went to the nearest tavern.

When we arrived there was a bar fight happening with an erinyes and a pair of succubi. So yeah, at level 2 we were pretty terrified.

Sadly, the bar did not survive.

... Anyway, @OP, mine was probably when the DM dropped us in the torture room of the complex we were breaking out of. Ran by a Mindflayer with a level of Druid. Who was in the middle of surgically removing as many of somebody's organs as they could while the person remained conscious. He then told us to sit down and wait our turns, and threw an Entangle at us, which only the NE wizard managed to evade. He then turned tail and ran.

The only reason we survived was coolness fiat, as I used Still Burning Hands and the DM had agreed prior that that would work for exactly this sort of thing. And even then, I only succeeded because I rolled four fours and a two. I then freed the others and we fought the Mindflayer. Accidentally stepped in surgery, which was described a little too vividly for my tastes. Yuck.

Envyus
2014-03-15, 10:44 AM
My party got in a fight with Charon as we wanted to kill him because he was a super evil and powerful Yugoloth despite the fact we could have used his help to out of Hell. We killed him and eventually escaped back to the martial plane the next day. Then we found out Charon's main power.

He can't be killed permanently and he just comes back to life the next day when killed more powerful then he was last time until he pays back the ones that killed him. So each in game day we had to fight Charon and after beating him for the 3rd time until we realized we were screwed as he knew Blasphemy and he would be strong enough to just instant kill us next time around. So we had little choice but to beg for forgiveness from him and pay him almost all of our money so he would spare us.

Big Fau
2014-03-15, 12:27 PM
The scariest encounter would be if they gave Sinbad another TV show.


We seriously need a "Like" button...

GPuzzle
2014-03-15, 04:02 PM
The scariest encounter?

Not exactly the scariest encounter but the most tense, rather.
We were part of this spy agency, and we were field agents.

The team:
-Oleg, Russian, our sniper and navigator
-David, Israeli, our pilot and heavy weapons expert
-Anja, German, our hacker and mechanic
-Doc, Canadian, our medic and commander
-And me, Thomas, British, our sneaky guy and field hacker

So, we're trying to figure out why did the plane I arrived in Tel Aviv exploded, and we ended up in an abandoned city in the middle of Bahrein that also was the base of operations for ruthless mercenaries. Our plan was to get the records and get out.

If it only was so easy.

Now, I'm in the armory of the edifice, Doc is trying to delay the mercenaries long enough to bring the fight from 1v3 into 1v1, Anja is currently figuring out the server's password so I can get acess to the files, Oleg's trying to aim at one of the mercenaries holding Doc and David's setting up the ambush using C4 and a Jerp.

I get in position, pull out my pistol, and me and Oleg simultaneously fire. I hit the head of one of the guards, he hits the chest of the other, and Doc breaks the other's neck, picks up his AK and starts firing.

3 minutes later, all the other buildings start exploding. Anja and David, in the Jeep, have to dodge the tons of rubble falling from the skies, and Oleg is trying to escape the place he was. I lose communication with him.

Now Anja gets the password right and I start getting the files. Doc descends the edifice and brings ammo, guns and grenades with him for Anja and David.

Doc barely escapes the fall, but I'm still in, and bringing the information with me. And all the mercenaries are on the ground.

Now, I'm scared ****less. Our sniper's dead, our driver, our hacker and our doctor are barely alive and I'm running through a collapsing building with nothing but a flashbang, my trusty pistol and the records. I literally manage to arrive at the last second. I'm fallen on the ground, and a legion is against us.

Suddenly, we hear a shot.

Oleg's survived the collapsing building.

"OLEG! HOW THE **** DID YOU SURVIVE?!"
"I've got some tricks up my sleeve."

Now, we ended up in a crazy complex plot in the style of Tom Clancy, but nothing was scarier than descending the building while it was collapsing.

Khedrac
2014-03-15, 05:27 PM
The most worrying one I can remember was in D&D 3.5. The town we were in was being attacked by swarms of baby stirges...

For those who don't know 3.5 the blood drain is done as Con drain so one's hit point total means nothing...

In actuality the babies didn't have a con drain like the parents (locust swarm stats), but it was still pretty worrying until we discovered that - we were expecting character deaths.

YossarianLives
2014-03-15, 07:04 PM
Kobalds,
Heavy Crossbows,
Towers Shields,
A Narrow Corridor,
And a 2nd Level Party.

AGHGUGHGHGRR

Knaight
2014-03-16, 12:17 PM
The one you haven't fought yet with an enemy you haven't figured out. As Hitchcock said "...Suspense..." so having suspense is more frightening to me than any actual encounter.

They aren't mutually exclusive. To use an example from a game of mine, there was a homebrew creature called a nodefish. One of them came up, and it just seemed like a typical flying fish, pretty good with movement but not all that impressive of a combatant. Then a second one came up, they were joined by an arc of electricity, and they started trying to position themselves in a flank to electrocute people between them. Suddenly, there was suspense, as a lot of questions came up: What happens with more than two of them? How many of these are there anyways? Just how nasty is that electricity of theirs anyways? What do we do? The first of these was answered when a third nodefish came up, and added another two lines of electricity between both of the existing ones, and suddenly the question of how many of them was much more important, and it ended with the characters making a run for it. It worked as a scary encounter because of the suspense, even as the actual encounter was going.

Said characters later came back with a whole bunch of rubber insulation and an anti-nodefish strategy involving trapping them under rubber sheets to cut them out of the electric network, and because they were a known entity by that point they didn't manage to be all that scary.

I've also seen this with mechanical things in futuristic settings. Yes, it's a robot, and yes, you know it's general form. You can also reasonably intuit that the tubes pointed in your general direction are guns. Does that mean you have any idea what it's actually capable of, and what it's packing besides just guns? Nope.

Laserlight
2014-03-16, 05:28 PM
Not an "encounter", exactly, but...we went into a dungeon and found a fair amount of skeletons. Not animated, just lying there. One who had apparently died trying to lift the portcullis which stood between him and us. We opened a door and found a couple more laying on the other side, with finger marks where they'd clawed at the door. One who'd been crawling down the hallway. Like that. Eventually we realized they'd all died trying to get out....and we decided we didn't really need to investigate that dungeon any further.

The Fury
2014-03-16, 11:03 PM
For me the scariest encounters were the ones where something was just wrong for some reason-- things being as they shouldn't.

I remember a Call of Cthulu game where in our investigation one of the PCs found a spell that allowed him to "view the past." That is he could witness what events transpired in the area where he cast the spell but he couldn't interact with objects or people and nobody in the past could see or hear him. The PC used this spell in a place where we knew a murder happened, the spell worked as advertized until it got close to the point where the murder happened. The PC saw a creepy-looking middle-aged man grinning and staring at him, which I remind you was not supposed to be possible. I remember the PC exclaiming "What? You can see me?" The middle-aged man made no comment but continued to eye the PC and grin at him. Creepy!


Not an "encounter", exactly, but...we went into a dungeon and found a fair amount of skeletons. Not animated, just lying there. One who had apparently died trying to lift the portcullis which stood between him and us. We opened a door and found a couple more laying on the other side, with finger marks where they'd clawed at the door. One who'd been crawling down the hallway. Like that. Eventually we realized they'd all died trying to get out....and we decided we didn't really need to investigate that dungeon any further.

That reminds me of another "encounter" that really creeped me out. Quotes are because the scary part didn't involve us encountering really anything. In fact, we encountered nothing at all. In a D&D game we were traveling to a city which we were told was quite a large, populous one in the middle of Summer. When we got there, we found it unseasonably cold and surprisingly desolate. In fact it was snowing and the whole city looked abandoned. There weren't bodies or anything around, nothing that could tell us what happened. Everyone was just gone.

DigoDragon
2014-03-18, 09:46 AM
In the old days... any encounter where the monster had level drain. Son of a bucket I hated that.

THIS! ^
Ugh, the old AD&D days were like... ugh, the GM I played under loved the freakin high level udeads that did that. I think I remained 4th level for like... 3 levels one campaign.




Running the original Ravenloft to see a 5th-7th level party I'd run since level 1 embrace TPK

Half my players survived the Updated 3.5 version, but I had made it really scary with a bunch of added monsters, puzzles, and traps I had taken from games like Silent hill. The fact I also had an MP3 player with Silent Hill style music didn't help either. The icing on the cake was this program I had that simulates sounds like thunder storms, a forboding forest at night, cricket chirps in a swamp, etc.

Scariest experience EVER they told me. Crowning moment for me was when the party wizard encountered a Wall Master for the first time (yes from the original NES Zelda game). When I described this giant severed hand phasing through the wall toward him, the MP3 player suddenly hit a violin shriek sound. The player panicked and had his wizard throw an empowered fireball at it. Point blank. Nearly took himself out. :smallamused:

Even things like passing a suit of armor, then hearing something crash behind them and there's the armor all over the floor with the helmet crushed in... They stopped sleeping in the castle after the first night. They just... stopped sleeping in that castle.

Out of a party of 8, the party lost the Bard, Wizard, Ranger, and one of the two Rogues.
Only one of them died from fighting a creature. The other three died getting away from fear (like jumping out a window and failing to think of the 100 foot drop below...). And no, not once did I make them roll any kind of fear check. :smallbiggrin: