The characters that just don't want to live...

[Hobosub]

So, as people might be aware, D&D is not always unicorns, candy and sunshine.
People fight and sometimes people die.
Some people die a glorious death, some people die a terrible death, others suffer a fate worse than death, the likes the bards will sing about for years to come.


This thread is not about them.
This thread is about all your stories of the awesome characters you made and the complete and utter lackluster ways they died.
I'm sure I'm not the only one being hunted by his dice.



To get the ball rolling, I'll start with a monk I once made as a replacement for someone who died in a worthy manner on a jungle quest.

The monk, somewhere around level 4 or 5, was wandering through the jungle searching for the same thing the party was looking for; a rather simple setup for getting a new character in the group: same destination, same goal, more or less from the same organization.

Of course before actually being able to join the party, you get a few solo encounters and get to camp in the jungle of nastiness all by yourself.
With my decent CON score and high saves, I was pretty sure I would survive long enough to join the party.

One night, I decide to setup camp; I make a nice little survival check to find a suitable location and everything goes awesome.
Until he gets attacked in his sleep by some CR 1/2 poison frog.
DC 10 fort save for 1d2 CON damage, what should be a walk in the park for most people with a +10 bonus.
Of course my die rolls 1, 2, 4 with the DM rolling max on the damage.
With every bite the DC of the poison increases by +2 (multiple doses of poison) while the fort save plummets.
I dispatch of the foul beast and continue to fail a few saves.

The monk survived (at about 4 CON), but this was definitely an example of how well his destiny would be.

Morning came and the monk was a little bit woozy, so he decided to be as paranoid as possible, with more of a flight than fight mentality.
Halfway through the day, I expected to find the party.

Sadly, the only thing I found was a plant zombie.
Feeling competent enough, I decided to simply walk around it.
*SPLASH*
A cloud of Yellow Musk Creeper pollen comes my way; flat-footed touch attack with a +6 bonus...
What follows is a natural 1 on the Will Save (DC 14) and a 6 on the duration.
For the next 6 rounds, all my monk does is walk toward the plant and get its juicy brains sucked out (1d4 int damage/round).
When the party did meet the monk, he was one of the zombies he tried to avoid.

Completely off-screen, my level 4/5 monk went from awesome reinforcement to near-death and eventually plant zombie in two encounters, one CR 1/2, the other CR2...

[WeaselGuy]

Level 1 problems...

Spent about a week working on a sweet OA Samurai for my friends low-magic campaign. Had his progression figured out, was green-lighted for Leadership, and had his cohort worked out too.

Come game day, we set forth on our grand adventure, when we were beset by mounted lancers. Since I was the "tank" (aka, highest AC and HP), I jumped to the front of our little team, and was summarily impaled by 3 level 1 Human mounted fighters, rocking Mounted Combat, Ride-by Attack, and Spirited Charge, each. I did not survive, and the rest of the party ran away to regroup.

[Toilet Cobra]

Speaking of Monks, I've got a pretty good one. I joined a PF game in progress at level 5 as a Master of Many Styles monk. The theme of the game was an alien invasion- neogi and mind flayers and even beholders were landing in huge flying insect ships and hauling off slaves and stuff. Good times.

Anyway, we were investigating this monk monastery that had been overtaken by this alien fungus. Spores were spewing out of a portal on the bottom floor, and if you were exposed long enough to the stuff you would eventually be overcome with parasites and become an alien mindslave.

The DM was trying, I think, to give me a chance to show off how cool MoMS monks were by having me face one: in the final battle, while the rest of the party was trying to take down this huge otyugh-looking fungus creature, I was fighting one of the monastery's prize students, who had been completely taken over by fungus.

I was a strength build, showing off dragon and tiger style stuff (or was it boar? I forget). My opponent was using defensive styles as well as a new one my DM had made up: Illithid Style. Can you guess what Illithid Style does?

Despite a good CMD and Escape Artist skill, I failed three separate chances to escape his hold on fantastically bad rolls (my DM even rolled out on the table, which he almost never did, so I know his rolls just kicked ass while mine sucked). And then he popped my skull open and pulled out my brain. The best part is that I told my party members to focus down the other beast since it was almost dead, and that I would escape on my own. So my awesome monk made it about 3/4's of a level before he bit it.

[WeaselGuy]

Actually, that reminds me of my last monk, which, incidentally, was also my first character I ever made, 10 years ago. He really emphasizes the title of "doesn't want to live".

Started out at level 4, with a game in progress. I decided I was going to play a Tiefling Monk (no LA buyoff or Lesser versions, just regular old Tiefling, with plain old Monk), with aspirations of Prestiging into Tattooed Monk, and then Drunken Master (Drunken Master never happened, btw). So, level 5, we're in a cavern, fighting to free some winged creatures from slavery or something, and I go ham on this "giant cross between a gorilla and a cockroach (an umberhulk)". I bamf in behind it (Cloak of the Mountebank) and initiate my Flurry of Blows (aka Flurry of Misses). Umberhulk looks at me, and steps on me. I die. Rest of the group finishes off the Umberhulk and hauls my corpse out of the cave to the winged guys we just saved, who can somehow resurrect me.

Level 10ish, my monk now has Adamantine Fists (or some such similar feat, I don't really remember) and am now a Tattooed Monk. We're stuck in some sort of decrepit underground elven temple/catacombs thing. Basic maze/dungeon crawl, mostly a bunch of traps and hidden doors. Guess what we don't have? An Elf (I know, the one time they're actually useful). Guess what our Rogue does? Not searching or disabling of devices (Master Thrower Rogues, what are they good for, right?). So, I realize, quite by accident, that my adamantine fist attack can bust through false walls and trapdoors, and our Frenzied Berserker (when he isn't raging and trying to kill me) can actually spot dart traps in the walls. So, we decide that I'll crawl along on the floor, punching the floor to disable the pressure plate traps, and the 'zerker throws his enchanted axes at the wall traps, disabling them. Our DM gets tired of our shenanigans, and suddenly the section of floor we're on (about a 30' strip) drops out from under us, dumping us both in a pit of lava. We had recruited our own druid by this point, and he reincarnates both of us. I rolled 100, and the DM chose Fey'ri (he said I needed flight, and a few other goodies), the 'zerker rolls whatever he got and came back as a Bugbear. He was thrilled.

Flash-forward and the group is at our capstone, level 30. We're travelling through the layers of Hell, taking out each layer's Lord (for some deity given quest). I manage to Quivering Palm one lord and killed him, the next encounter a pack of hell-hounds tore me apart when I got stuck inside an AMF.

The Wizard Wished me back alive in time for the last boss battle, and after that the god that sent us on that mission deified all of us and we became legit demi-gods. I reckon my Monk is running his own monastery in the mountains now.

[oxybe]

I'll keep it in point form:

Pathfinder, Level 3 Fighter.

Enemy Keep.

Kicked our way through hordes of minions, Boss locked himself in a room.

I managed to get negotiations going and got the party in the room.

Parlay was going on and going fine.

Rogue gets bored, launches arrow at Boss (a goblin riding a lizard).

Goblin bum rushes me while riding, crits for max damage. Has Spirited charge feat.

Fighter's leg gets lopped off, died from shock (IE: "HOW CAN A GOBLIN DO SO MUCH DAMAGE?! I WENT FROM SCRATCHED TO -CON SCORE?!").

Body was dragged back to town in a makeshift stretcher and buried in a plot by my old campsite.

[Vhaidara]

Pathfinder Dragon Age (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?389418-(IC)-Dragon-Age-Pathfinder) game. We're still in our first encounter, but just look at the rolls that everyone but our mage have gotten.

[Naanomi]

Back in ADnD days I had a mid level mage who ran into some basic low-level muggers on her way back from a bathhouse. A surprise round and a few crits took me out with a series of crits and nearly killed the DNPC cleric who came *prepared* to reclaim my body.

A ressurection and a few levels later, that wizard burned the city to the ground as part of a falling alignment from CG to CE so... I guess I probably still won?

[Toilet Cobra]

Actually, that reminds me of my last monk, which, incidentally, was also my first character I ever made, 10 years ago. He really emphasizes the title of "doesn't want to live".

Sounds like he did more living than most characters. A few inglorious deaths but overall a hell of a career!

Edit: Keledrath I will be watching the rest of your fight with interest. Take down that bear!

[WeaselGuy]

Sounds like he did more living than most characters. A few inglorious deaths but overall a hell of a career!

Edit: Keledrath I will be watching the rest of your fight with interest. Take down that bear!

Like I said, he sure had a death wish... It's funny, as horribly made as good ole Zinthos was, he was still probably my favorite character...

[Sian]

have one clear in my mind from the first time i tried DM'ing, which i did with Savage Tide, one of the players started out as a Duskblade, and in first session he decided to tumble past the Rhagodessa, fumbles and on its AOO it grabs him and bites him, critting (that group played with open dice, all rolls unless they were on encounter tables or passive spot/listen checks were done in view). Followed by the beasts turn which promptly crits again.

Next session his new character (Duskblade Clone v2.0) promptly dies to a group of zombie pirates ... Decieded then that the game probably didn't want him to play Duskblade and he started stating out something else (can't remember what)

[Karl Aegis]

We had a Knight with grotesque Mary-Sue level fluff join our group as an escort into the western mountain range. We were bringing a herd of goats to some old trading partners in hopes of making some more money. We get to the base of the mountains and make a campfire for the night. While he was on look-out, he spots some ogres approaching us, shouts his knight's challenge and runs into the fray. He gets unceremoniously butchered while the rest of us wake up in no real rush. We may have forgotten to mention that our trading partners in this area were ogres and that the campfire was a signal to tell the ogres we had trade goods for them. Guess he shouldn't have joined a group of Chaotic Evil Traders.

[Thealtruistorc]

It all started when my 3rd-level tengu inquisitor bombed a disguise check.

And then he bombed a stealth check to hide.

And then he bombed an acrobatics check to jump away.

And then he bombed an intimidate check to scare the guards away.

And it was then that my DM got 2 natural 20s in a row (allegedly) and then served the Inquisitor's corpse for dinner

[yellowrocket]

Level 5 fighter revived twice previously by npcs on solo adventures. Another solo adventure. This time alone in a simple dungeon. Nearly killed by 2 skeletons. Managed to finish them off. Go to rest. Dm rolls random encounter dice. 2 rats no big deal right?

Only had an hour of rest. Lost initiative to both. Two critical max damage bites later I'm dead not having swung my sword. The dm even woke me before the fight started so there was no surprise round.

[atemu1234]

I once had a character who died from a spiked pit trap surrounded on all sides by kobolds with polearms.

[Aegis013]

I was really really young, and was playing 3.0 for probably the first time. I created a Wizard, starting at level 1, and was playing alone.

I entered an alchemist's laboratory because he was missing and I wanted to find him to learn from him. I saw a treasure chest in the corner and being a kid went "Woohoo, treasure!" and popped that sucker open. A dart shot out, I failed my Reflex, took the dart straight in the chest, was knocked unconscious and killed by the poison on the dart.

It seemed kind of out of nowhere, but I was actually ok with it. I didn't play my Wizard up to his Int or Wis scores at all, and learned valuable lessons.

[Rakoa]

I was in a room filled almost totally with water. I looked down at my map. I traced the path that would lead me underwater and back to the safety of air and my companions. With some simple math, I figured that I'd be fine. I had no ranks in swim and a -1 to strength, but it's only a DC 10 check. Well, boy howdy, did I not fail 3/4 of those rolls. And even then, I only had 20 feet to go. But my Con score had run out, and so I had to make 2 rolls to avoid drowning (assuming that I made the swim checks). The DC was also 10, and I had a +3 con mod. Then I rolled a 5. And died. The end.