Cruel but clever GM tricks

[Randomthom]

I thought I'd open a thread where people can post tricks their GMs have played on them (or you, as GM, have played on your players).

My contribution to kick this off was for our mid-high level party (13-14 iirc). We had heard reports of a dragon terrorising towns to the North. A great white wyrm was described in great detail. It's breath was destruction incarnate... yadda yadda yadda. We heard the words "Dragon", "White" and knew what we needed to do. We prepped with potions of cold resistance and lots of fire spells etc.

Imagine our shock when it turned out to be an albino Red... We didn't do nearly enough research regarding it, thankfully the teleport spell saved our bacon (very nearly crispy bacon) and we were then able to adjust our tactics for round 2.

What are yours?

[Morcleon]

My favorite trick was during a one-shot I ran at a party. The PCs were tracking down a cult of Orcus and burst into the underground ritual chamber in the middle of the cultists attempting to summon Orcus. Naturally, seeing a bunch of enemies flat-footed and not paying attention to them, the party's psion immediately nova'd them. The lead cultist's last words were "you fool! We finished the rituals of summoning... but not of binding!". And then Orcus appeared. :smallbiggrin:

They managed to kill him actually, but the only survivor was the psion's cohort who was in a magitech obdurium starfighter covered with prismatic walls and walls of force. :smalltongue:

[DirePorkChop]

The worst okie-doke I have ever played on my party was an illusionist antagonist. Everything they came across was an illusion...until it wasn't. They came into a room after "fighting" almost ten illusionary monsters. I'm talking Bone devils, Barbed devils, A Cornugon, some really heavy hitting stuff. There was a nighthag in the middle of this room at an altar, sacrificing an elf. Since the hag didn't hear them (I rolled a one on the listen check), and she didn't acknowledge them immediately, they ignored the hag and her cabalistic chanting for all of five or ten minutes. Then, the cleric went up and attempted to slice his hand through the "illusion" just as she carved the heart out of the elf and was about to devour it. I remember his exact words were "Armand (the illusionist) makes some seriously demented illusions". Que him basically slapping the Nighthag in the back :smalleek:, and her getting a surprise round on them because they were taken aback that "Wait. This ain't another illusion?" Hilarity ensued. Now, they treat everything I throw at them with a skeptical eye, and there is a saying around the table: "Nighthag illusions don't exist." meaning that everything should be treated as real when they confront it.

[BowStreetRunner]

The party was attempting to enter the final room of the dungeon, but could not find the key. All we knew was the correct object needed to be placed on a pedestal by the door to open it. Next to enormous door was a vast cavern filled with saltwater. There was a bucket of bait and a fishing pole there. So the ranger took it upon himself to try fishing. No matter how many times he cast, he only ever caught one type of fish: red herring. Funny, Mr DM, very funny...not. :smallannoyed:

We searched around the cavern and even went back through various parts of the dungeon again, looking through all of the clues. No matter how many times the clues led us back to the red herring, we dismissed it as a cruel joke.

Finally, out of frustration the party rogue grabbed one of the red herrings and put it on the pedestal - and the door opened. :facepalm:

[AtlasSniperman]

The worst okie-doke I have ever played on my party was an illusionist antagonist. Everything they came across was an illusion...until it wasn't. They came into a room after "fighting" almost ten illusionary monsters. I'm talking Bone devils, Barbed devils, A Cornugon, some really heavy hitting stuff. There was a nighthag in the middle of this room at an altar, sacrificing an elf. Since the hag didn't hear them (I rolled a one on the listen check), and she didn't acknowledge them immediately, they ignored the hag and her cabalistic chanting for all of five or ten minutes. Then, the cleric went up and attempted to slice his hand through the "illusion" just as she carved the heart out of the elf and was about to devour it. I remember his exact words were "Armand (the illusionist) makes some seriously demented illusions". Que him basically slapping the Nighthag in the back :smalleek:, and her getting a surprise round on them because they were taken aback that "Wait. This ain't another illusion?" Hilarity ensued. Now, they treat everything I throw at them with a skeptical eye, and there is a saying around the table: "Nighthag illusions don't exist." meaning that everything should be treated as real when they confront it.

I did something similar with a Hobgoblin Illusionist. Illusionists make such great villains. The PC's ambushed and knocked out the poor guy before he could get an action in, carried him up the hill to their nearby basecamp, and tied him up. They rolled really badly on their use-rope check and he slipped the binds basically immediately. With one of the PC's right there looking at him(the barbarian), I had him roll Bluff, Use Rope, and Sleight of Hand. The player failed his Sense motive and Spot checks.

So this Hobgoblin illusionist started by grabbing the PC's attention, tells him that his ropework was pitiful, and proceeds to 'properly' tie himself up in full view (rolling a nat 20 on Use Rope where all the Players can see it). Meanwhile, the gestures he slipped into the use rope were that of Mislead. My Hobgoblin Illusionist then simply walked out of the player encampment while they tried to interrogate the completely-in-control illusion


The party was attempting to enter the final room of the dungeon, but could not find the key. All we knew was the correct object needed to be placed on a pedestal by the door to open it. Next to enormous door was a vast cavern filled with saltwater. There was a bucket of bait and a fishing pole there. So the ranger took it upon himself to try fishing. No matter how many times he cast, he only ever caught one type of fish: red herring. Funny, Mr DM, very funny...not. :smallannoyed:

We searched around the cavern and even went back through various parts of the dungeon again, looking through all of the clues. No matter how many times the clues led us back to the red herring, we dismissed it as a cruel joke.

Finally, out of frustration the party rogue grabbed one of the red herrings and put it on the pedestal - and the door opened. :facepalm:
OMG that's beautiful! I'll have to do something like that in one of my games XD

[Thealtruistorc]

This one is actually for an upcoming game of mine. Everyone in the adventure with guerrilla kobolds and a giant dragon graveyard turn away (that means you, Ramsey and Thunderhoof).

So I have a plan for an entire area that is coated with illusions. The doors are concealed by silent images, pit traps are concealed by silent images, and a whole bunch of other traps, pathways, and materials are all concealed by some illusion or another. Naturally, players are going to just cast true seeing and waltz through, right?

Well, they would, save for the fact that I have a few symbols of death sitting behind illusory walls throughout the area. Looking at it or dispelling the illusion triggers them instantly.

[mabriss lethe]

I constructed several load bearing structures in a dungeon out of Shadow Conjurations. (with party members that liked to overuse things like detect magic and dispel)

[Barbarian Horde]

Stating up a random NPC because player's picked a fight creating a random encounter.

"I punch the bartender"

Kay give me a sec doing something now

Bartender removes a giant axe from under the bar. Roll initiative.

[Crake]

I thought I'd open a thread where people can post tricks their GMs have played on them (or you, as GM, have played on your players).

My contribution to kick this off was for our mid-high level party (13-14 iirc). We had heard reports of a dragon terrorising towns to the North. A great white wyrm was described in great detail. It's breath was destruction incarnate... yadda yadda yadda. We heard the words "Dragon", "White" and knew what we needed to do. We prepped with potions of cold resistance and lots of fire spells etc.

Imagine our shock when it turned out to be an albino Red... We didn't do nearly enough research regarding it, thankfully the teleport spell saved our bacon (very nearly crispy bacon) and we were then able to adjust our tactics for round 2.

What are yours?

Wasn't that one of wotc creature competition? Have a look here (http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/dnd/20060502a). I suppose for novice players who don't particularly do their research, it would come as a bit of a surprise :smalltongue: I know when I DM, my dragon hunters all do thorough research on the dragons they hunt before engaging.

The most evil thing I've done as a DM was when a player was getting back at his cruel father by murdering his friends before his eyes, bam, turned out his father was a cultist of graz'zt, and used their deaths, along with his own personal sacrifice to summon an aspect of his demon lord to the material plane, literally clawing his way out through the player's father's chest. Quite horrific, and a super traumatic moment for the player, turning a moment of absolute triumph into a moment of helpless defeat. Should mention that the player had been slowly turned into a demon by that point, by one of graz'zt's most hated rivals no less, so it was extra frightening for him because of that.

[ekarney]

We have an Arachnomancer who had been breezing encounters either by strength drain or baleful polymorph

So, when the party was challenged by some Orc Warlords, he left at the chance to annihilate them.

Turns out undead aren't affected by baleful polymorph and wis/dex based melee characters don't get too heavily impacted by strength drain. (Two separate warbosses)

[BWR]

I thought I'd open a thread where people can post tricks their GMs have played on them (or you, as GM, have played on your players).

My contribution to kick this off was for our mid-high level party (13-14 iirc). We had heard reports of a dragon terrorising towns to the North. A great white wyrm was described in great detail. It's breath was destruction incarnate... yadda yadda yadda. We heard the words "Dragon", "White" and knew what we needed to do. We prepped with potions of cold resistance and lots of fire spells etc.


I did something similar. It was a blue dragon that merely disguised itself as a black one and used magic to make its breath weapon acid instead of lightning. It did this all the time so any rumors about it made it seem like it was a black. The party loaded up on acid resistance/protection and went to confront it. They would normally have made very short work of it but were suddenly taking damage from its breath while it more or less ignore the magus who tried to use the common Shocking Grasp (and metamagiced variants) on it. The PCs were surprised when Dispel Magic didn't remove and spells protecting the dragon from lightning but made it turn blue instead of black.


A few other minor things hardly worth mentioning.

And the party met a couple of druj at one point. I can't really call that clever on my part but it was definitely cruel, considering I still get dirty looks whenever it is brought up.

[Kol Korran]

My contribution to kick this off was for our mid-high level party (13-14 iirc). We had heard reports of a dragon terrorising towns to the North. A great white wyrm was described in great detail. It's breath was destruction incarnate... yadda yadda yadda. We heard the words "Dragon", "White" and knew what we needed to do. We prepped with potions of cold resistance and lots of fire spells etc.

Imagine our shock when it turned out to be an albino Red... We didn't do nearly enough research regarding it, thankfully the teleport spell saved our bacon (very nearly crispy bacon) and we were then able to adjust our tactics for round 2.

Hmmmm... it sounds like the dragon of Nightspire from The Bloodlines campaign. (http://www.andycollins.net/Campaigns/Bloodlines/17_into_nightfang.htm)

Anyway, some of my contributions, not sure if they are "clever", but here goes:

1. Dungeon turned trap:
The party went into a vault of a long dead giant mage, looking for a McGuffin. On the way they encountered undead, constructs, oozes and such. Yet they also found remnants of what looked like nonworking traps, Coffins in which long dead skeletons of giants (NOT undead) lay, and other "flavor" parts...

The vault was a taxing, and after a near TPK, they came upon the final chamber. They saw that there was a throne there, with an adorned giant skeleton, yet unmoving, and behind it a pile of treasure.

The party assumed- Lich! So they prepped a lot, cast their remaining buffs, drank potions ans such, and entered the room, ready for a fight! Only... the skeleton was but a skeleton (Again- not undead). The party was puzzled, and went to look the treasure at the back...

Which is when the REAL trap sprang, and the door they came through closed, and the party could hear MANY noises from behind it, whence they came. The dungeon has turned into a death trap, flooding, animating the skeletons, putting more consturcts, and more. They now needed to escape it! :smallamused: That was fun. Nearly killed them...

2. Parley trick:
In another campaign, the party were sort of pirates vs. The Empire. There was a fleet captain on their tail, due to them dealing with some infamous major pirate. As the party was recovering from a powerful curse, the captain found their location, yet couldn't attack, due to some "parley grounds" and such. He had two ships there, lots of crew, and was way out of their league. SO he came... to parley.

The party was really suspicious, yet they agreed to parley. He sought to converse with them about the pirate, and offered to escort them back to their ship, and even offered absolution for all transgression they did for the pirate. The party was suspicious, but agreed, and so went with him to the ship.

Once on the ship though, amongst all of his crew, he added. "However, for the killing of Empire people X, Y, Z (That the party did unrelated, yet now nearly completely forgot about) I'm going to have you executed. Apprehend them!"

That led to one of the best party splits and rescue in our gaming! :smallamused:

3. Demonic dealings:
This actually was a random encounter, that turned into a major event in the campaign. The party was in Golarion, travelign through The Worldwound (A cursed blasted land, twisted by demonic magic), when they come upon a Glaberzu in magical chains (A form of imprisonment spell). The Glaberzu asks them to release it, which can only be done by someone touching the chains with the intent to release it. It promises to award them with a wish, and no tricks! (I play wish spells as being useful, and not with endless lawyering about "what was said" vs. "what was intended").

Some in the party don't want to deal with it, while some say that they NEED the wish (They've been tryign to find a location, yet missed the clues, and the demons were gaining advantage). Some sense motive checks and more, and they decided to go for it, asking to be teleported to the location they sought.

As one of the PC touched it, the glaberzu was released, only to be replaced by the PC. (A little fact the glaberzu didn't think to share at the time). The glaberzu then looked at the party "and now to grant your wish!" and teleported the rest of the party away.

The look on the player's face! :smalltongue: He still holds a bit of grudge over that. The party manged to get a vrock to replace their friend, but it was memorable.

4. The blood ship's price:
Near the end of one campaign, the party had to retreat to a looooooong distance away from the BBEG, as far as another continent. Yet, the BBEG found them, and they learned that it's forces were coming soon. By that time they learned of a place they needed to go to find a clue of defeating the BBEG, but lacked the means for such fast and long distance trasportation (Way out of teleport's range).

But in the local they were in, there was a special way to travel (established much earlier, only not used then)- a ritual to summon "the blood ship", which was a unique ship, with one captain, that could reach any body of fluid, if there was a dire need, and enough blood has been split (Taken from one of the Eberron's books). The ship's captain offered an accurate, safe and fast voyage to any local they chose, but for a price- a challenge, to kill a creature. It would offer 3 potential targets...

The party agreed, figuring this means some special fight with a tough beasty (As is the suggestion in the Eberron book) but I twisted it. The 3 choices were in fact not that tough of a fight, but tough non the less- they were NPCs whom the PCs became attached to- The last vestige of the cleric's faith (and a child to boot), an NPC that another PC was in love with, and the wife of a retired PC, (Just married).

The players were NOT happy... They found another way of dealing with it, but that's another story...

5. And my favorite:
A long time ago, one of the best GMs I played under, and one of the cruelest, meanest SOBs out there, had some of our team captured by some cruel sadistic bastards. After one of the characters challenged some, and won their respect, the leader of the capturing group, gave the character a choice:
- One of your team members will be freed, with you, and allowed to go away. :smallconfused:
- Another will be sold to slavery, hard slavery, for a life of toil, suffering and dread. :smallfrown:
- Another will be killed, right here, right now, in front of you all, in the most painful and gruesome way imaginable. :smalleek:

And that character had to choose which of his team mates will get what, and have to explain why... :smallamused:

The bastard! It was one of our most memorable and tense moments, we knew what a tough decision the player faced, yet we assured him we were ok with it, and he was encouraged to make the decision fully from the character's perspective.
It was tough, it was beautiful. And yet... right after he had chosen, the leader of the capturing group switched! The one that was to be killed was set free, the one that was to be enslaved got horrendously killed, and the one who was supposed to be freed, got enslaved... We nearly crapped our pants! And it led for VERY charged group dynamics after that!

It was a master stroke! I don't think we've ever wanted payback on someone like that group! Great game! :smallamused:

[Bucky]

The party came across a plain dungeon room, with a fanged corpse in the exact center propped up in a sitting position and an exit on the other side. They try to sidle along the wall only to find out that the room is packed wall-to-wall with traps. The cadaver didn't react at all. After multiple party members were seriously injured, they discovered there was a trap-free path leading straight towards the corpse.

They tried to take it by surprise by rushing past it, knocking it over. It reacted like you'd expect a cadaver to, by doing nothing. And the trap-free corridor did indeed lead all the way to the exit. So they breathed a sigh of relief and continued their dungeon crawl.

They passed through the room again later, strolling straight past the corpse. Which promptly bit one of them.

[D.M.Hentchel]

My players came across a narrow corridor with *steep* staircase going down at the end. Working carefully they searched the squares leading up to it and discovered a swing block trap that would knock them down the stairs, the rogue promptly disabled it. The rogue continued to the stairs noticing there was a handrail and descended the stairs. The handrail had a contact knockout poison on it. The rogue failed his save plumeted down the stairs and sprung the trap at the bottom, which caved in the the entire stairwell (which just lead to a dead end) buring and killing the rogue.

[GreyBlack]

One that I have personally used....

Setting up a hallway of armors. All of the armors have either an Illusion spell cast on them, or are actually Guardian Phantom armor (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/monster-listings/undead/phantom-armor/phantom-armor-guardian). We play in Pathfinder, so Detect Magic is spam castable, so until the players tried to focus in on the actual auras of the armor, the casting only revealed that they armors were all magic.

[J-H]

I included a giant gouge in the floor, a broken sword, and a discarded torch in my description of a room.

The party almost left the room without checking the sword out at all.

It was a broken adamantine shortsword. The 5" of blade left attached to the hilt is enough to make it a masterwork adamantine dagger (3302gp value), plus they got a pound of adamantium that might be useful later (restricted availability of special materials).

They're level 4.

[Gallowglass]

I included a giant gouge in the floor, a broken sword, and a discarded torch in my description of a room.

The party almost left the room without checking the sword out at all.

It was a broken adamantine shortsword. The 5" of blade left attached to the hilt is enough to make it a masterwork adamantine dagger (3302gp value), plus they got a pound of adamantium that might be useful later (restricted availability of special materials).

They're level 4.

Okay, I get that the sword probably broke while digging the gouge in the floor.

But what was the torch for?

[J-H]

This is a thousands-of-years-old continent-sized complex. Unless an area is dusty, the torch, sword, and gouge could be from a hundred years ago or more.

All they know is that someone was there, their sword broke, they dropped their torch, and something big and presumably strong made a 10'-15' long big gouge in the stone floor.

They found no traces of blood, except for a couple of dark spots on the leather wrapping the sword/dagger hilt.


I have no idea what the story is, but it sure sounds like somebody got killed there by something big and scary.

[Arbane]

They passed through the room again later, strolling straight past the corpse. Which promptly bit one of them.

This is why experienced adventurers know to dismember all corpses they find. It's just common sense.

[OldTrees1]

This is why experienced adventurers know to dismember all corpses they find. It's just common sense.

Note to self: Stitch together the various "part of a body" undead. Have only the zombie torso attack unless the other undead are separated from the zombie.


One I am still refining: The reverse Shadow Illusion
If you believe in it you cannot affect / be affected by it
If you disbelieve in it you can be affect / be affected by it

[trikkydik]

1.) Our first session in a current campaign, we started at essentially "boot camp"

where i had planned on making the PC's run 30 miles, while being chased by a deadly insect swarm. (started lvl5)

As soon as the trial begins, they summoned riding horses and completely destroyed my plans.

So i threw in a mine field, the horses exploded. the swarm caught up, and they were trampled by the other 30 contestants.

(I thought theyd be smarter, considering theyre experienced players, but they never once used detect magic/detect anything.)

Someone got their leg blown off, the "hopping" motion the PC made still makes me laugh.

They barely survived the run, but it was fun watching them squirm on the floor while getting run over.

2.) (same session) When the run ended, they came to a 1 mile vertical climb. There was magical climbing gear for each contestant.

The PC's didnt even touch the climbing gear. Instead one cast earth walk and the other summoned a flying bird. (I had fun destroying those plans.)

They ended up stealing other contestants' climbing gear. (out of desperation.) They finally found out the climbing gear was magical, but they had reached the end of the climb by time they finally got the gear.

I guess the moral of my story is... traps are way funner when being chased by death.

I think it's funny, the things PC's will completely ignore. oh so much fun.

(Also, thanks for starting this thread, everyone's stories were fun to read.)

[Bucky]

This is why experienced adventurers know to dismember all corpses they find. It's just common sense.

In this case, it was an actual corpse the first time through, which was replaced by a monster after their third or fourth time traversing the room. So if they'd hacked it apart the first time, they would have seen it apparently reassembled for the actual encounter.

[Eddieddi]

I've only had 2, The first one was where the DM just LOVED to give out awesome weapons, but take them away a few sessions later, so I came up with a plan, I simply sold the weapons, He'd give us all high power weapons, I'd sell it for a bunch of gold, and then he'd come up with some method that stole all our gear, often leaving us to hunt for the thieves or something. I started putting the gold in the bank, so it couldn't get stolen ect. After some time I started buying powerful gear, and at the end of each adventure, I'd store it in the bank. feeling smug about it I encouraged party members to do the same. The bank got robbed.

The second isn't so much cruel and clever, More just a unfair DM.
The DM was playing a from-book campaign but he kept taking out magical items that the party would find useful, for instance we had a rouge who was dual wielding daggers, the book gave us masterwork silver daggers early on, he took them out and replaced them with a ring of water breathing. We just started selling things with the intent to purchase useful things. he THEN told us that the town we were in was too small to have the things we wanted. So we ended up with a pile of pointless gear.

[Spore]

I don't want to rain on your parade but many things mentioned here are cruel but not clever. Alas, I shall try my own example.

So our Sorcerer learned Create Pit and gushed about the spell being great because people fall in it and it is basically a save or loose. We also had a Monk (me) and a summoning Wizard. We had to attack a Drow Sorcerer Lich and his castle. He summoned a few demons to stop us. Not wanting the spell to fail from a Reflex save he often cast the spell behind the target, allowing my Monk to bullrush them into the pit. My character was not trained in bullrushes and the AoOs would have wrecked my weak HP reserves (remember, no healer and I traded in wholeness of body). I grappled it mainly to allow the casters to finish them off.

Deeper in the castle we scouted out the desperate Drow Lich who was trying to cast Scrying and Message to call for help. He could buff up, and I am very happy to have received Fire Resistance 20. So the sorcerer and wizard go invisible, the sorcerer is surprised to see only a measly monk attacking him. With me being Catfolk, burning Ki for extra run speed I barely reach him in time to try and grapple him, barring any spells. It's the sorcerer's turn who loudly exclaims: "Now I want to see what the Pit can do on a class who has pitiful Reflexes!" he says and casts create pit.

I expect the unprepared caster to fall. But he has Boots of Levitation. The Wizard starts to summon something and then the Sorcerer casts Dimension Door. the DM ruled that I still have momentum from the charge and have to roll Reflex in order not to fall into the trap. I barely suceed. Our pyromantic sorcerer then exclaims: "Maybe I need to use my old tricks." first uses Scorching Ray and on the second turn (with the Wizard's Haste) I reach the Lich by climbing up the walls and jumping on his back. Why does the sorcerer THEN use his maximized quickened Fireball along with the Elemental Blast SLA which is another scaling Fireball? I barely survived the fiery onslaught.

But I liked how the DM turned the sorcerer's metagaming and love for tricks that disable the enemy in the simplest way possible against him, even though my monk nearly paid the final price.

[Herobizkit]

I don't know how cruel or clever this was, but when you give a handful of kobolds the regenerative powers of a Troll (creating, yes, Trollbolds) and harass the party with the same group for 4-5 consecutive fights before they catch on...

Made my day. ^_^

[GreyBlack]

1.) Our first session in a current campaign, we started at essentially "boot camp"

where i had planned on making the PC's run 30 miles, while being chased by a deadly insect swarm. (started lvl5)

As soon as the trial begins, they summoned riding horses and completely destroyed my plans.

So i threw in a mine field, the horses exploded. the swarm caught up, and they were trampled by the other 30 contestants.

(I thought theyd be smarter, considering theyre experienced players, but they never once used detect magic/detect anything.)

Someone got their leg blown off, the "hopping" motion the PC made still makes me laugh.

They barely survived the run, but it was fun watching them squirm on the floor while getting run over.

2.) (same session) When the run ended, they came to a 1 mile vertical climb. There was magical climbing gear for each contestant.

The PC's didnt even touch the climbing gear. Instead one cast earth walk and the other summoned a flying bird. (I had fun destroying those plans.)

They ended up stealing other contestants' climbing gear. (out of desperation.) They finally found out the climbing gear was magical, but they had reached the end of the climb by time they finally got the gear.

I guess the moral of my story is... traps are way funner when being chased by death.

I think it's funny, the things PC's will completely ignore. oh so much fun.

(Also, thanks for starting this thread, everyone's stories were fun to read.)

If I may ask, why did you have fun, "destroying those plans"? I, for one, applaud the PC's ingenuity in accomplishing the task in an unorthodox way. Especially the Earth Walk and the summoning the mounts.

[Nousos]

If I may ask, why did you have fun, "destroying those plans"? I, for one, applaud the PC's ingenuity in accomplishing the task in an unorthodox way. Especially the Earth Walk and the summoning the mounts.

Because someone running an adventurers boot camp clearly would hate out of the box thinking and ability to think for yourself. If you are in a dungeon and there's one obvious method you should never ever be clever. I think that's the lesson he wanted to show them.

[icefractal]

That one did bug me a bit; I don't think retroactively adding things can be called 'clever'.

I mean of course, YMMV - some of these are more cruel than I'd consider at all fun, but if the group likes that sort of thing then more power to them.

But I would say to really count as clever, it needs to be a situation where the PCs actually would have been able to succeed, and were fooled without the use of GM fiat or things they had no way to know.

[Chronikoce]

The DM fiat ones just seem cruel not clever.

I feel like to be clever the DM needs to have anticipated what is likely to occur and have designed a scenario that takes advantage of that prediction.

[Spore]

I feel like to be clever the DM needs to have anticipated what is likely to occur and have designed a scenario that takes advantage of that prediction.

I'm going a step further. I would like for the DM to think about what his NPCs would have prepared instead of the meta entity that is a DM. It is very easy for a DM to prepare infallible traps (as is it for PCs tbh) but I rather dislike that part that reaches too far into meta gaming for me to be comfortable and immersive.

[Ninjaxenomorph]

I once ran a haunted house that doubled as a serial killer's base of operations. He boobytrapped the stairs to have two traps. Basically, a couple steps caved in. Depending on your reflex save result, one of two things happened.

If you bombed it, you fell flat on your face and take some nonlethal damage. If you make within 5 of the save, you grabbed the handrail... which had been covered with broken glass. Dex and bleed damage. Another trap had a similar idea, but it was spotted by the PCs; however, it wasn't intended for them, but rather for the killer's kidnapped (literally) victims.

[Chronikoce]

I'm going a step further. I would like for the DM to think about what his NPCs would have prepared instead of the meta entity that is a DM. It is very easy for a DM to prepare infallible traps (as is it for PCs tbh) but I rather dislike that part that reaches too far into meta gaming for me to be comfortable and immersive.

I didn't say impossible scenario. I said one that goes against the expectations of the party. A perfectly surpassible encounter that is beaten by the option nobody considers is what I'd say is clever.

That red herring example that was given previously I think is a great example. The solution was simple and concise, it was right in front of them, and it was completely ignored because they all thought it wasn't the solution. Perfectly done

[prufock]

One of my cruelest tricks is No Happy Endings - basically, the situation is set up such that the PCs must choose between various less-than-perfect outcomes. Some are better than others, but that's up to the PCs to decide. Think Dark Knight, when the Joker sends Batman and the cops off to two different locations to save Harvey or Rachel, but lies about which one is where. Think Spiderman, when Goblin forces Spidey to save Mary Jane or a gondola full of civilians (except without the possibility of saving both).

The best example of this I can give is a superhero game I ran. There was an anti-mutant group that protested for registration, imprisonment, or worse. They assassinated mutants they judged to be the biggest threats. The heroes confront the leader at the end, and he has digital files full of data collected on mutant crimes, psychology, and so on. Thing is, the mutant group is right: mutants have higher rates of all kinds of crimes and mental illnesses, as well as devastating accidents. The PCs are offered a choice, to let them continue their work, protesting and killing (but only targeting the truly dangerous ones); or stop them, in which case the data will be leaked to the public, causing more hatred toward mutants.

[Cofniben]

I once did a one shot where I had the players in a room with 15 doors. All the doors had stupid things that did nothing behind the door (like a fake spear come out and not damage them, or some vague but pointless words in elven) and the one in the very middle would close by itself. Now one of the players was someone who ran a game for years that I was in and he always made the assumption that if the players opened a door, it would stay open unless a player said they closed it. So the way to make it through to the next room was to say they leave open all the doors and then open the middle one.

Another one I did was to get through a door you had to pull a level next to it and hold it down to keep the door open. Past that door was a 5ftx5ft room with another handle in it. If both handles are held down the door closes and three rounds of traps goes off. To get through the room you have to hold down the first level, allow a player into the small room, let go of the first lever. Then when the second player is alone, they pull down the second lever to open both doors and they hold it down while their team mates pass. After moving through the 5ftx5ft room, there is a third lever that will open the second door as long as the second level is not being held down. If it is, 3 rounds of traps.

[GreyBlack]

One of my cruelest tricks is No Happy Endings - basically, the situation is set up such that the PCs must choose between various less-than-perfect outcomes. Some are better than others, but that's up to the PCs to decide. Think Dark Knight, when the Joker sends Batman and the cops off to two different locations to save Harvey or Rachel, but lies about which one is where. Think Spiderman, when Goblin forces Spidey to save Mary Jane or a gondola full of civilians (except without the possibility of saving both).

The best example of this I can give is a superhero game I ran. There was an anti-mutant group that protested for registration, imprisonment, or worse. They assassinated mutants they judged to be the biggest threats. The heroes confront the leader at the end, and he has digital files full of data collected on mutant crimes, psychology, and so on. Thing is, the mutant group is right: mutants have higher rates of all kinds of crimes and mental illnesses, as well as devastating accidents. The PCs are offered a choice, to let them continue their work, protesting and killing (but only targeting the truly dangerous ones); or stop them, in which case the data will be leaked to the public, causing more hatred toward mutants.

I like this as long as there is no mechanical drawback to the choices. For example: forcing a Paladin into that circumstance could cause them to fall, especially if a player is actively trying not to fall. Association with this group of mutants would cause the paladin to fall, due to the need to respect legitimate authority.

But, with no paladin or other mechanical hindrance? Go nuts!

[Spore]

One of my cruelest tricks is No Happy Endings - [snip].

While I like the notion of making Happy Endings hard and nothing the campaign (or in extension the movie) rolls inevitably towards I prefer the fact that perfect happy ending would have been possible. Why? Well, then the PCs can contemplate where they did a mistake and you can create drama that way.

If there is no way to achieve total success the consequences don't lie as heavy with you. Example from Undertale:

You CAN save Flowey from his eternal damnation of being a soulless object but if you have killed even ONCE during the game you lack the amount of souls needed for Flowey to transform. You have to redo the whole game - which as a P&P campaign is possible, but irrelevant - which by the multverse theory that is even used in the game itself makes you simply switch to another timeline instead of fixing your past mistake.

[prufock]

I like this as long as there is no mechanical drawback to the choices. For example: forcing a Paladin into that circumstance could cause them to fall, especially if a player is actively trying not to fall. Association with this group of mutants would cause the paladin to fall, due to the need to respect legitimate authority.
As a DM, I'm pretty forgiving for mechanical drawbacks like this. I've never really liked the "lose all your powers forever" idea. In this scenario, though, it's a M&M game, in which you have Complications, which give you a hero point in exchange for somehow hindering you. So if one of the PCs had a complication like "Hatred: Leader of Anti-Mutant Group" or "Responsibility: Protect Mutants," they could choose to play up those complications, but they have no long-term mechanical effect.


While I like the notion of making Happy Endings hard and nothing the campaign (or in extension the movie) rolls inevitably towards I prefer the fact that perfect happy ending would have been possible. Why? Well, then the PCs can contemplate where they did a mistake and you can create drama that way.
I think that could have been possible in this game, though it wasn't set up to be obvious. If the PCs had backed down from the fight, said they would choose the "let them continue" option, but then made it their mission to destroy the data that had been collected instead, they could have then turned around and fought the group outright for a possibly more satisfying ending. But like I said, it wasn't really made obvious, and in the heat of the moment, it didn't seem to occur to them.