Fun ways to endanger or kill players in 5E

[Mr Compassionat]

As the title suggests I am currently thinking of fun ways to attack my players that isn't just "throw hard monsters at them". I have a Shoggoth on standby for brute force but I would like a variety of fun tricks to try. The party is currently level 5

So far my plans are
1: A pit trap covered in a sheet that looks just like regular floor.
Under the sheet is a drop into 30ft deep liquid faeces full of disease. If they'r wearing heavy armour there is a strong chance they'll also drown in excrement. There is a strong chance they'll smell the trap before seeing it.

2: Three or four level 1 wizards with Sleep/Tasha's Hideous Laughter backed up by a Spawn of Kyuss. Once they're unable to use an action to scrape off the Burrowing Worms that'll cause !!!FUN!!!.

3: Randomly generated boss monsters (forgotten beast style). Player rolls 8d20s on my chart and I throw whatever the result is at them.

4: Disguised Intellect devouter ambush.

5: Night Hag infiltrates their base (they run a mine currently) and drains their max HP every night (they have NO CLERIC for greater restoration).

6: Rot Grubs in general.

Any advice on other fun things to do to them would be very much appreciated.

Edit: Worth mentioning I like being fair to my players. I never throw anything at them that'll either just murder them for no reason or at least ot without fair warning. This isn't so much "murdering players for lols" as throwing unique threats their way.

[JackPhoenix]

7: Rocks fall, everyone dies

Look, I like to throw dangerous situations at my players, but most of these doesn't sound like fun. At all. There's a reason 5e moved away from save-or-die abilities, which pretty much everything except 1 and 3 from your list is.

[Sariel Vailo]

Dead man walking frankenstenian abomination and finally kill their emotions vampire has been turning children only because of an incurable disease not even clerical magic can cure the disease curing them of vampirism causes the children to die in 3 days.

[SaA]

Have them cross a magical threshold that they were warned about being dangerous but having great treasure or a big bad on the other side

Have it curse each of them with a different curse of undeath or something , like each of them starts to slowly turn into a type of undead , like a Vampire, Wight, Ghoul, etc

but dont tell them this, just have them roll a Dwhatever to decide there fate, then give it a few sessions and have them roll con saves, start it off easy with a DC 5 for the first save, a pass is a pass a fail and effects start showing. like for example they go to sleep one night, but when they wake up one of the party has wondered off and he wakes up in someone elses house covered in there blood.

then proceed to introduce, holy drugs to keep them from turning, which in turn get them addicted to the drugs, and if they dont take the turning into undead starts again. gradually increases the DC save over time every once in awhile.

[GorogIrongut]

Think laterally. So put them in a situation where they have no control of their environment. My favourite was to put them over a bottomless pit, standing on top of 3' diameter thick, rusty old chain that reached from the wall and suspended a titan's skull in the middle of the room. Suddenly, the game was less about hit points and more about not falling off the chain.
Nothing scared them more than when I first introduced them to grappling automaton scimians. They would run up and grapple the player and then deliberately jump off, taking themselves AND the player with them. If they couldn't do that, then they were 'programmed' to explode as close to the player as possible.

So yeah... think laterally. Or use Rust Monsters.

[KorvinStarmast]

Give 'em enough rope and they'll tend to hang themselves.

[SociopathFriend]

Ye old Cursed Weapon is always a fun trick:
A sword and sheathe combo where the blade is +1 but only if it's put back into its sheathe with blood on it. Be sure to ask all players if they're taking care of their equipment and such (and note the no doubt responses of, "Oh yeah, totally") so you know whether it's being cleaned before being put away or not.
The sheathe would actually be the magical item as any sword in theory will do. It consumes the blood left on the sword and in turn grants it magical power so the sword will be drawn clean whenever sheathed with blood.

Or boots that give +5 feet of movement but need fed just as often as the adventurer- not feeding them results in them chomping on your foot for 1d4 damage per boot (or 1d4 total + 1 for a minimum of 2). I imagine the player will then lose a round trying to yank the things off.

Or a necklace that looks pretty but if it's scared of nearby enemies (specifying what counts would be on you) it clutches the throat of the wearer tightly enough to choke off air- rending any spellcasting that requires speech invalid. A variant of this would be a shield that, when splashed with blood, becomes frightened and shrinks to provide only 1+ AC instead of 2.

None of these should kill your players but they definitely might put them in situations there weren't prepared for and make them think twice about, "MAGIC ITEM- GIMME!" mentality for sure.



Ghosts. Ghosts are fun and you pointed out they don't have a Cleric if they get negative hit point reduction or to turn away undead. Properly build up the atmosphere and mention a little bit of wind going over someone's neck and they might panic and throw something around without looking- promptly smacking their teammate in the face with a weapon.

[Mr Compassionat]

They would run up and grapple the player and then deliberately jump off, taking themselves AND the player with them. If they couldn't do that, then they were 'programmed' to explode as close to the player as possible.

So yeah... think laterally. Or use Rust Monsters.

I love it. Actually I had a similar idea already. You know all those fun For Honor videos like How To Disrespect?

Inspired by them I was already planning to have a hip thrusting barbarian on a thin bridge over a hazard who charges, grapples and distributes them off the side.

He would be from the "Order of Salt" who worship a chaotic evil god of anger and sadness so they do evil things just to upset people. Their motto is "Git Gud".

[jaappleton]

I just want to point out the irony of the topic title and your username. :smallbiggrin:

[Mr Compassionat]

I just want to point out the irony of the topic title and your username. :smallbiggrin:

Heheh true :).
You're not the first to notice that the name is quite ironic, had the name for a long time for exactly that reason.

[Kuulvheysoon]

I love it. Actually I had a similar idea already. You know all those fun For Honor videos like How To Disrespect?

Inspired by them I was already planning to have a hip thrusting barbarian on a thin bridge over a hazard who charges, grapples and distributes them off the side.

He would be from the "Order of Salt" who worship a chaotic evil god of anger and sadness so they do evil things just to upset people. Their motto is "Git Gud".

Make sure to give him regeneration. You go the way of the Black Knight (Monty Python) and/or tell your players that he’s half-troll.

[The Shadowdove]

Just ran one of seven tables at a d&d epic.

The current theme is heavy in dinosaurs and pirates.

There was a room with a key on a pedestal at the other end. Key is wired. Not noticing the wire and disabling caused a pair of blades to traverse back and forth either side of the room at ankle level.

The first was dc14 to avoid damage.

Not noticing the second blade bumped the DC to 18.

Going unconscious from damage had an interesting story reward.

You automatically lost a leg and gained a pegleg story reward, with a hidden compartment.

Similarly answering a pirate captain wrong later in the module resulted in them chopping off a hand. Hook hand story reward.

A later trapped chest removed the eye of anyone looking into it without disarming it. Eyepatch story reward.

Any of these requires a regeneration, wish, or resurrection related spell/item to fix.

Traps in 5e are brutal and can have more realistic results that open possibility for fun rp disfigurements as punishment.

Some can be minor. Some major. Some merely inconveniences. Magical one's can be implemented for curses and such.

In short, even adventures that wotc deems appropriate for their "balanced" organized play have some crazy traps and encounters.

I've tpkd a handful of parties without trying to.

[nanoboy]

You shouldn't kill players, ever, unless you want to serve time in prison. It's more acceptable to kill their characters, though.

[Laserlight]

Give 'em enough rope and they'll tend to hang themselves.

If you put the PCs in a room with a big red button labeled "Do Not Push", quite often they will fight each other to be the first to push it.

[Droodicus]

Zombie room where the players have to fight through to the other side of a chamber packed wall to wall with undead that are continually replaced, eventually they'll figure out it

[Malifice]

You could stab or shoot them I guess.

It's a bit full on though.

Shouldn't you be looking at ways to endanger their characters instead?

[Kane0]

If you want to get inventive heres a couple ideas:

- a sort of ‘life drain’ that decreases proficiency bonus instead of max health

- drowning, toxic fumes or similar that forces a save or fail one death saving throw. Three strikes and you’re out!

- heat, cold, necrotic energy, etc that hands out exhaustion levels instead of (or in addition to) straight damage.

- a magical creature that can only interact through dreams. It’s tough but cant actually hurt you, if it wins you lose out on some spell slots or other resources you would otherwise recover from your long rest.

[EvilAnagram]

Give 'em enough rope and they'll tend to hang themselves.

This is probably the best advice here. Give them a Wand of Wonder and see how they mess things up for themselves. This way, you'll be surprised, too!

[Deleted]

Throw something impossible against them, that they think they have a chance against, but after their characters die have them run through the afterlife by hopping around and working for a deity/powerful demon who also wants the same group killed (the group that killed the players). Why use the players and not people who failed? The enemy did something weird and the players are the last souls that went to the correct afterlife.

Have them run across the different afterlife planes of existence looking for clues, artifacts, knowledge, and fighting a long the way (don't make it about good and evil but more about Law and Chaos with good and evil thrown in).

The BBEG could even be the head cleric of a chaotic god who wants to take out a lawful deity for whatever reason.

You could even send them to Athas for a few sessions, perhaps make some stuff up about how this is the original downfall of the athas world (someone did the same thing there)... Send them into space on a Spelljammer mission. Send them to Greyhawk and then to Ebberon. You can mess with the setting info as much as you like.

Make it an epic.

The players will need to role play their characters accordingly of course...

The BBEG has found the Cosmic Rubix cube and has jumbled it, which it then exploded going over the multiverses and cosmics. They need to find pieces of the cosmic rubix cube and then put it back together. However the cosmic rubix cube isn't just by color, it's made up of "how things should be and how things shouldn't be". Tale a normal rubix cube, make all the colors gray and write numbers under the stickers and try to put it together after jumbling it up... That's easier to fix on the first try perfectly while blindfolded than fixing the cosmic rubix cube (even for the smartest of deities).

Make sure to have sub plots, involve their back grounds, have a few twists and turns (heh), and all that good stuff.

Once they get a few pieces you can have the players end the campaign early at any time if they want to try fiddling with the CRC. Once they decide to use the CBC it disappears and their lives are reset to the point where the BBEG messed with things... However there can be a hell of a lot of changes...

Maybe one of the players is the BBEG (turn control over the BBEG amd minions to that player for the fight), maybe they're set in the world of Athas or on a huge Spelljammer, or maybe you just have them swap characters with each other. Wheatever you do, it will not only effect the BBEG fight but the world around them so feel free to just screw the setting around. You can make it where the players kinda know something is off, but not directly as everything should be normal, and have them go look for their messed up memories (use memories of their adventure to tie into gaining advantage/disadvantage via quick flashbacks).


Edit:

For fun, make 2e, 3e, and 4e versions of their characters and have them either hop into them for a session (use simple characters amd don't be too harsh if they don't know the system) or have it if they mess with the CRC too soon, y'all are playing 3e or 4e for a couple sessions till they fix the problem.

[ImproperJustice]

Go the superhero or Order of the Stick route and make them fight counterparts of themselves.

In one campaign, their most feared enemy was an evil Bard that frequently used disguise self and illusion to pin crimes the evil party committed on the NPC party, and they sowed rumors to ruin they’re reputation.

Subtle environment changes like Zombies that attack and are supported by a stinking cloud attack.

Or try movie style zombies, that were created by a Druid virus. They move fast, gain bonuses when attacking in groups, are very strong, can’t be turned, and any wounds give a chance of infecting PCs with Zombie virus.

Give them non combat missions:

The local familiar merchant’s shop had a magical mishap and we need you to track down a pack of magically enhanced, intelligent animals roaming through the city.

PCs are sent to go back in time to make sure a king and queen fall in love, but they have nothing in common at first glance....

Honey, I magically shrunk the kids (or PCs)....

The city’s garbage disposal a massive black pudding, has escaped.
Can you return it, alive?

The player’s are enjoying lunch when a meta-magical rift opens in the city, tearing it apart.
There are hundreds or thousands of people in jeapordy as buildings collapse, prisoners escape, ships explode in the harbor.....
How are you going to save people or escape?

And your counterparts are racing to what looks like the only exit.

[Mr Compassionat]

UPDATE: Players killed the Shoggoth by throwing trained Giant Boars at it. All the boars were decapitated but it took so long they managed to whittle it down with range and kill it. Great job by them.

I almost managed to get a worm into a player using sleep/Kyuss worm but he woke from the 1 piercing damage and rolled an 18 medicine to frantically cut his arm open and extract it.

My third evil plan is going strong though. They met two new masons for their base, a husband and wife named Ino and Tagghinha. Once they figure out that Ino is just Oni backwards and Tagghinha is an anagram of Night Hag they'll feel like idiots. The evil barbarian of the party has already gained 1 point of exhaustion and lost 1 max HP from the Night Hag and the Oni turned invisible in the night and murdered two people. They still don't understand what could have done it.

[Vaz]

Do you want something for you achievement of annoying your players?

[Kane0]

Keep us posted!

[Mikal]

Just give em a deck of many things and let rngesus do the rest

[Mr Compassionat]

Update: My second group (I have two groups playing the same Dwarf Fortress style D&D campaign) are more adept at killing themselves than I could ever be. One lost a character to Lizard Men by splitting from the party and taking on two by himself. Then he lost another by running in alone into a room he knew for a FACT was infested with kobolds. Have you ever seen a level 3 paladin killed by just 6 kobolds? I just have. I've only ever killed 2 characters in my brief career as a DM and he's both of them, in only 2 sessions no less. I can't help these people.

The other guy thinks he's a master manipulator. he insists his character knows a Dragon, no idea why he thought I, the GM, would be okay with that but I let it pass without comment. Now that they've struck mithril (by a very lucky roll) in their mine he sent a message to his chromatic dragon patron telling him he's found mithril and also has a bunch of slaves and willing kobold allies. He seems to think his dragon friend is going to show up and become an... ally or something? Whatever he thinks is going to happen what's actually going to happen is the chromatic dragon is gonna show up and decide he's their undisputed god king.

Despite the name of this thread I don't actually want to kill my players, just introduce adversity. But I swear to god have you ever met players so dumb as to tell a chromatic dragon where all their money and treasure is at level 3?

I know I sound like a killer DM or something but I insist I'm not. I give them more than every chance to succeed. Plenty of magic items, plenty of warning, intel, free reign in character creation. There's no saving them from themselves.

[Kane0]

There's no saving them from themselves.

Truer words never spoken.

[The Shadowdove]

One of the hardcovers has given my players a new appreciation for revenge.

There is an option to have the players encounter a big greatsword wielding halfdragon (22 damage breath weapon) who challenges them to a duel at level 1. Fighting him saves an already injured townsguard from doing it to save his family.

It's written in that, once he defeats the player character, he immediately plunges his blade into their chest to finish them off. Resulting in a failed death save.

Emphasis on the NPCs victory as he gloated and spared the rest of the party, as well as the scar that remained after healing, made the players more than delighted to finally encounter him again later. Until that moment, four sessions or so in between, they grinded their teeth whenever they happened to bring him up in conversation or he was referenced by another npc.

I actually accidentally killed one of the players before they could meet this rival again and replaced him with another (we're recording our sessions so it was good opportunity to mix things up).

In short, one of my favorite ways to endanger or kill my players is now to give them a rival that they hate. To maim or traumatize them with a nearly unbeatable, yet mortal, foe early on. Then reintroduce this foe later so that they can risk their lives again at a higher level , just for that sweet satisfaction. Players who are vengeance hungry become rabid beasts.

[Mr Compassionat]

snip.

I strongly considered doing something similar in my game, after all who doesn't like a great rival? Unfortunately in reality I think it takes a more experienced DM than me to pull it off. The NPC I had for this purpose with cut in half by one group and befriended as a weed buddy in the other.
She had a staff that can be used as an escape tool but they bogged her down so quickly it didn't help. Low initiative rolls are the death of any spellcaster.

As for this dragon they're for some reason seeking out he said he serves a dragon but he didn't say what colour. After a session or two of a young black dragon being a horrible tyrant to their settlement I have no doubt they'll try to engineer it's death. Maybe I'll leave some Rot Grubs around in case they want to infest it to death? Or maybe they'll find the elemental gem and just summon it to death? Either way I have the other group tomorrow, lets see how the deal with the Night Hag and Oni infiltration.

[KorvinStarmast]

This is probably the best advice here. Give them a Wand of Wonder and see how they mess things up for themselves. This way, you'll be surprised, too! It's funny that you mention that. The DM who taught me that approach "give 'em enough rope" also ended up including a Wand of Wonder in a treasure pile. And you are absolutely right. My hobbit thief, Hayseed Lindensap, found numerous ways to mess things up with that Wand of Wonder.
Insane fun, too. :smallbiggrin:

[Mr Compassionat]

My Sunday group just ousted the Night Hag and the Oni but not before 11HP was permanently drained from the Barbarian via Night Haunting and 4 of their workers were killed and eated by the Oni. Now they're talking about going on a road trip to town to get the Barbarian some Greater Restoration.
See folks? This is why you're horrible to your players. It sets up fun stuff like this, a roadtrip!

They've also just met a devil and they're gleefully accepting suspicious rings from him, destroyed a noble celestial guardian construct for him and soon bequeathing to him a shield that unbeknownst to them has trapped within it an Efreeti who the devil can bend to his will.

To clarify they're stealing this shield from a cabinet that they know is labelled in celestial "Warning, Forbidden Items" and then giving said items to a devil. SMART PLAYS.

[Kane0]

I cannot even comprehend the genius of their actions.

[Mr Compassionat]

Managed to get the paladin to sell his soul to a devil and blindly give the devil the magic items from the forbidden cabinet. In return the devil helped him kill a tribe of goblins.

Little does he know the shield from the cabinet contains a trapped efreeti. With enough time and magic the devil will convert the shield into a weapon, able to summon a bound efreeti.

One of the others says he's gonna sell his soul to the devil too for free Warlock levels.

Another has the ring still on his finger that the devil can control him with.

Soon they'll all be in checkmate.

[SirGraystone]

A monster always fun to use against peoples in heavy armor is a rust monster.

In a mine, it can be fun if the workers dig into the bottom of a lake or some underground river.

[Eradis]

Ye old Cursed Weapon is always a fun trick:
A sword and sheathe combo where the blade is +1 but only if it's put back into its sheathe with blood on it. Be sure to ask all players if they're taking care of their equipment and such (and note the no doubt responses of, "Oh yeah, totally") so you know whether it's being cleaned before being put away or not.
The sheathe would actually be the magical item as any sword in theory will do. It consumes the blood left on the sword and in turn grants it magical power so the sword will be drawn clean whenever sheathed with blood.

Or boots that give +5 feet of movement but need fed just as often as the adventurer- not feeding them results in them chomping on your foot for 1d4 damage per boot (or 1d4 total + 1 for a minimum of 2). I imagine the player will then lose a round trying to yank the things off.

Or a necklace that looks pretty but if it's scared of nearby enemies (specifying what counts would be on you) it clutches the throat of the wearer tightly enough to choke off air- rending any spellcasting that requires speech invalid. A variant of this would be a shield that, when splashed with blood, becomes frightened and shrinks to provide only 1+ AC instead of 2.

None of these should kill your players but they definitely might put them in situations there weren't prepared for and make them think twice about, "MAGIC ITEM- GIMME!" mentality for sure.



Ghosts. Ghosts are fun and you pointed out they don't have a Cleric if they get negative hit point reduction or to turn away undead. Properly build up the atmosphere and mention a little bit of wind going over someone's neck and they might panic and throw something around without looking- promptly smacking their teammate in the face with a weapon.


I like the way you think. A recurring cursed black skull appeared in many campaign that some of my friends and I played. The skull itself was most of the time something we has to acquired just to be scare to death for our magic items when we realized what it was. The item was a magic seeker that devours any magical item it gets close enough to and alienates its carrier into helping it if held for too long. That did some fun time forced to RP something we all knew was terrible to keep around out of character.

[Mr Compassionat]

Okay guys I've figured out the trick for guaranteed hilarious party chaos. Just put a friendly soulmongering devil in their path but importantly don't let him block their path. Just leave it there and let the party destroy itself.

I literally have players making deals with their soul to counteract the effects of soul deals other players have made even when they don't know the details of the deals they're trying to counter. I have players killing their own blood relatives, sacrificing their own workers and even killing eachother for this devil. I have players giving this devil everything they own for almost no return of investment. Even better none of the players are salty and they're massively enjoying it because they're all faintly aware it's their own fault.

[EvilAnagram]

Okay guys I've figured out the trick for guaranteed hilarious party chaos. Just put a friendly soulmongering devil in their path but importantly don't let him block their path. Just leave it there and let the party destroy itself.

I literally have players making deals with their soul to counteract the effects of soul deals other players have made even when they don't know the details of the deals they're trying to counter. I have players killing their own blood relatives, sacrificing their own workers and even killing eachother for this devil. I have players giving this devil everything they own for almost no return of investment. Even better none of the players are salty and they're massively enjoying it because they're all faintly aware it's their own fault.

...it's beautiful.

[Battlebooze]

If you want a dangerous pit, fill one with shaving cream!

You can't swim in it.

You can't breath it.

It blocks line of sight, though you can still hear though it.

It leaves you nice and clean afterwords.

[Gtdead]

Arenas, Duels, Fighters against other Adventurers, Encourage PvP. These are fun ways to die. Not the damn traps..!