Pc ingenuity stories.

[RAGE KING!]

I noticed the PC stupidity stories thread and decided to make this thread.

I was once playing at the sentrybox with some friends when we fought...damn i cant remember the name, it was like a bone devil or something. Some kind of spiky devil. And we were losing. Then our rogue's like "Got it!" I'll climb up the devil and stab it through the ear! and we were all like....YES! lets kick its ass! So our artificer cast thundering on the dagger and we also deafened the devil. After the critical hits/deafening we managed to take it out.

[tainsouvra]

(one of the players for this one, and pity the DM...)

Adventure went through some caves and ended up in the sewer under a city, discovering the cause of the unusual decay in the city was an enormous plantlike creature sending out toxic spores. Being in the room forced Fortitude saves regularly, and it had a ton of hit points, but the creature needed to be destroyed so the town could recover.
Wait, we're in a main chamber of the sewers now, where the water is supposed to pool or something?
Yes.
So there's a drainage grate right above us, and that's how the decay is making its way out?
Yes.
I scorch the grate above us. *casts a spell*
Ok...
Alright guys, we're done here. Everyone back out of the caves before we get too poisoned. A lot of flammable material poured down that grate, one fire spell, and a deadly encounter turned pretty darn simple in addition to pretty much ensuring that chamber was sterilized.

[Inane-Fedaykin]

Ok, here's a story of an excellent plan with little thought put towards what happens after.

The setting is a human steam-punk empire attacking an empire made up of all the other fantasy races. So at this point we're epic level and fighting off a beach invasion (more or less by ourselves) and the enemy battleships start dropping mechs into the water. I figure, I've got the right spell for this! and dive into the water. I get near the bottom and into a large clump and cast Frostfell. Good idea, not so great when I'm caught in it...

While I'd normally be stuck in a giant ball of ice for 21 hours but I have a habit of preparing fireball spells.

[blue_fenix]

Evil campaign. Players get hired to take revenge on an old wizard who lives in a tower out in the woods. 3 stories of traps and elementals and such waiting for them, with Alarm on the front door.

Rogue: "How tall is the tower?"
DM (me): "About three stories, 40-50 ft"
Rogue: "Any windows?"
DM: "Not on the first floor, but above that, yes."
Rogue: "I throw my grappling hook up at the third-story window."
Use rope check succeeds. Wizard fails listen check and spot check to notice the grappling hook (he's busy doing research).
Rogue: "I climb up and look in the window"
Warblade: "I climb up behind him"
DM: "Ok, you see a wizard" Rolls, wizard fails spot and listen again. "He appears to be looking closely at something on a table and hasn't noticed you."
Rogue: "I open the window."
Wizard fails listen check... again!
Rogue: "I climb through the window, run into the room and sneak attack him"
Warblade: "I enter the room through the window"
DM: "Ok, sneak attack damage, roll initiative now that surprise round is over"
Rogue wins initiative, sneak attacks him again, and the wizard dies. The players grab the loot in the room and leave again by the window.

Needless to say I gave them full XP for outwitting me - I mean, the wizard.

[Serenity]

The situation: we've been hired by an organization called The Red Library to retrieve a skeleton from the graveyard for them for unknown purposes. Needless to say, the graverobbing didn't go quite as smoothly as planned, and we found ourself hauling both the body of our party wizard and the skeleton out of there. Halfway back to the tavern where we were to meet our contact, we realized that dragging a coffin into the tavern wasn't the brightest idea. Our party rogue (the player known for his rules-lawyering, powergaming, and a semi-saving grace of two-page long character backstories) came up with the solution: he draped an awning over the coffin, hopped on top, and had the rest of us bear him inside, proclaiming him the Lord Thistledown, halfling beer magnate.

The monk was very angry that it worked.

[Jasper Snowe]

I've a great story that happened about a few weeks ago.

During our session we were clearing out a mine of hobgoblins so the caravan we were protecting could pass without fear of an ambush. Anyway we were doing a pretty good job an figured that there were two more left. The PCs came to a small cliff from which they could see a natural stone bridge spanning this pit with water at the bottom. On the opposite wall we also managed to spot two arrow slits that we guessed the last hobs were. We then began to discuss OOC how we were going to get acoss without being hit. There were 4 of us and we were hurt from all the other encounters, but in no real danger. Finally the sorcerer, me, came up with an idea. During an earlier session we came into possession of a book of magic scrolls and I haven't been able to find a situation to use them in... until now. I began by getting our scout across by using spider climb so he could just climb around the arrow holes. Next, I used an alter self on our assassin to make him appear like a hobgoblin and he walked across with no problem. The last part was the most difficult. I managed to pull something like this off(http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0455.html) through a combination of silent image and ventriloquisim. I made a person run across the bridge screaming, he was shot several times, fell of the bridge, and during all that our rogue, who I had casted jump on, lept from the cliff to the other side. So the PCs who made it to the other side burst into the room the hobgoblins were and began to kill them while I simply walked across the bridge.

[Draig]

Lol im the insane cavalier in Jaspers group. Another story was in that same cave with the hobgoblins we were trying to think of a way to get into a sealed room where we knew that a group of them was hold up. Well instead of hacking through the door like i normally did (or kicking it down) Jasper made the joke of "Hey lets just knock and ask them to come out" well our group suddenly all had the same "OMG THATS A GREAT IDEA!" look on their faces. So we had our Rogue and Assassin get bows ready and stand across the room to fire at the door and I ready an action to slash the first thing out. Well i walked up to the door and knocked while jasper made his best impression of a wounded hobgoblin, To our luck the DM rolled a natural one on their opposed check and so the hobgoblins opened the door and all of us nearly died laughing.

[Prometheus]

I throw a third-level party into an encounter with a Water Mephit (CR 3) while they are traveling on the river by boat. The problem? the Water Mephit has DR, regeneration, and flying and all of my PCs with +1 weapons are Melee. So they try and fail their jump checks (the Mephit is happy spitting at them from above). So next the rogue tries to first jump on the fighter's shoulders then jump - he succeeds the first and fails the last. Then he gets a great idea. He uses Use Rope (high skill points + high roll) to lasso the Mephit, allowing the Monk to grapple him while the Fighter plunges a sword into it. Mission Accomplished.

Party Druid complains I never throw her animal encounters, so I give her an encounter with a giant lizard. She cast Charm Animal and it follows them for a while. Next they encounter a salamander and decide that no one wants to touch it. So instead they splash Love potion in its mouth to distract it by attracting it to the lizard! That poor lizard...

I show the PCs a magic items that periodically generates pigeons - the problem, its guarding itself by filling the room to the brim with them. Party Cleric cast Darkness, tosses in a rock, and puts them all to sleep while he nonchalantly strolls in to pick up the item.

The magic item described above was used to take out a swarm of ravenous and diseased maggots that they PCs found themselves surrounded by when they broke through the floorboard into a forsaken food storage area.

Casting Find the Path that got them inside of a building guarded by magic because he didn't trust humans. It told them the password for the Alarm spell, it told them how to boat across the river to avoid the Dancing Light search lights, about the guard dogs (Calm Animal), where the traps were, what the password for the Symbols of Death were, and not to mention which room in the mansion their target slept in. They kill him, but one of the two bodyguards (in his room) cuts off his head and escapes (it turns out he never actually resurrects the body after all, and the PCs eventually get him too).

[Jasper Snowe]

I'm not entirely sure that you could call that ingenuity. That was more like a stupid idea that some how ended working. I'm mean come on! The DM said, and I'm quoting, "Wow... that actually worked."

Anyway after they fell for it one came out, saw us, and tried to retreat, but found that the others had closed the door on him. We then proceeded to Intimidate it like nuts while Draig swung away with his battleax. We were making jokes that he pretty much crapped its pants and when the other hobgoblins opened the door and pulled him back we were saying that he probably broke down crying in abject terror.

[SalientGreen]

We have a party that is stalled at a bridge - we're trying to get to a bandit stronghold and we know that the bandits know we're coming - because it's thought that the bridge is probably trapped. I don't remember the exact order, but the bridge was checked over by the rogue (nothing detected!), the dwarf (no untoward stonework) and the mage (no magic auras). So, the party's just sitting there, stumped. Do we cross and risk it? Or what? What do we do? So my character, a half-orc barbarian, rides his horse (newly gained - it was a present for completing the earlier part of the adventure) to the entrance of the bridge, dismounts and smacks the horse on the rump as hard as he can. The horse gallops across the bridge safely.

"Bridge ok", says the half-orc and walks across to get his horse.

We, of course, were attacked as soon as we crossed by the bandits who were hiding in the forest on the other side....

[Stormcrow]

*Puzzled half-orc look*
Half-Orc not strong enough.
When Bash hits his horse as hard as he can, horse break!.

I had a party fighting a Greenspawn.. the flying one and they were having all manner of trouble with it hammering them from the air when my sister says "I've got a harpoon with 40ft of rope on it...." Rolls and crits on her throw, thus I rule the harpoon head went right through it. She rolls a strength check, natural 20 with a plus... six at that stage I believe.. I ad-hoc'd that she pulled it out of the sky. Much death ensued.

[Chronos]

I didn't witness this one firsthand, but a friend of mine tells a story of an adventure he DMed. The dungeon as written had a back entrance that led right to the goal, but he decided that was too easy, so he'd close it off. Except instead of just a solid stone wall, what he did was plant a vampire tree there (it's stationary itself, but its leaves can fly off to some distance, attack and drain blood, then fly back to the tree), and modified it to give a longer range than any of the spells or weapons the party had. That way, he figured, the party wouldn't be able to beat it, but they'd have no problem just avoiding it and going in the dungeon the normal way.

Well, the party's druid cast Protection from Fire on himself, doused himself in oil, and lit himself, then walked up to the tree and hugged it. We're both waiting for the day when a computer game would be able to handle an off-the-wall plan like that.

[kieza]

I was dm'ing an evil campaign, and the PC's were breaking into a temple of Heironeous to kill an archon that was rallying defenses to a demonic invasion. I had all sorts of defenders worked in, including a really nasty bronze dragon setup, and I was hoping that I might be able to give them a run for their money. What do they do? Kill the guards at the door, climb onto the roof, and start poking holes in the shingles until they spot the archon. Then they hack a 5-foot hole in the roof, drop down a rope, and slide down so that the barbarian and rogue are already flanking the Archon. It lasted all of 2 rounds, at which point they took the loot and left.

Edit: Oh, and the guards couldn't come help, since the archon had barricaded the door to keep the party out of the Sanctum.

[Burrito]

This one took some creative liberties with a spell but the DM loved it so much he let it stick.

We were doing the Menzoberanzen (sp?) adventure (AD&D), and the party was a mix of Drow and Duerguar. Anyway on of the dwarves had a habit of whistleing. His character shistled, so he would whistle. all the time. It sucked. Anwyay, in the middle of one of our encounter battles, there would alwasy be a few shot thrown at fellow party members. Someone cast Dimension Door on the dwarf. Normaly the door opens in front of you, but we tweeked it so that it opened up under the dwarf, then the other side of the door opened up a few feet above the first door. The dwarf kept falling and falling through the two doors until he reached terminal velocity. The Dimension Door was then turned off. The guy playing the Dwarf was mad, but we were all laughing too hard to care.

[DraPrime]

This is less a story of ingenuity, and more determination.

My character (a dragon shaman) got his mind taken over by some sort of magic crystal, but the DM let me control him. So my character is on the street, and the other character (a ranger) is in a room in the inn that I'm standing next to. I rush into the inn while the ranger is making preparations for when I bash through the door. My character goes into the adjacent room. The ranger is still watching the door. Then, with an amazing natural 20 on my strength check I bash through the wall. Ranger sees me and jumps out the window and has a 20 ft fall. He manages to avoid severe damage with a tumble check. That's when I push the bed out the window. Unfortunately the ranger moved and the bed just hit the ground. I did manage to jump out the window and land on the mattress unhurt. Then the ranger shoots the crystal controlling my mind with an arrow and everything goes back to normal.

[Nero24200]

A paladin player of mine was hunting a vampire on the city docks. He steps up to the pier and scores a good smite against the vampire, so the vampire decides to run by using spider climb to scuffle under the peir. The paladin then takes off his holy symbol and slams it on the ground in front of him, forcing the vampire into the flowing water beneath.

[Generic PC]

I noticed the PC stupidity stories thread and decided to make this thread.

I was once playing at the sentrybox with some friends when we fought...damn i cant remember the name, it was like a bone devil or something. Some kind of spiky devil. And we were losing. Then our rogue's like "Got it!" I'll climb up the devil and stab it through the ear! and we were all like....YES! lets kick its ass! So our artificer cast thundering on the dagger and we also deafened the devil. After the critical hits/deafening we managed to take it out.

Actually, it was a Barbed Devil. The Rogue actually missed his attack, critically fumbling, so the dagger went off anyway, but defeaned both the Devil and the Rogue. then the Devil had another critical fumble, and stabbed itself through the head. ouch. insta-kill.

[RAGE KING!]

really? i thought he got a crit on it...oh.

[Clovis]

D&D 3rd ed. Mystara campaign. Our party were investigating missing ships and piracy. We found out that there was a gnome-built metal submersible in the wrong hands, sinking ships.

We got the idea of destroying the submersible with rust monsters. Finding these monsters was a very nice substory. We staged a decoy ship and went submarine hunting. When the sub finally emerged, we threw two rust monsters on top its hull. To secure the beasts the wizard had created very sticky resin-like substance with which he liberally coated the monsters' feet. The monsters, in their feeding frenzy, made a sizable hole into the hull in no time. End of piracy.

[Morty]

Hmmm... does throwing a burning sack full of crap through the window into the tavern room inhabited by five 9+ level barbarians(one of whom is also Frenzied Berserker) while being on level 3 counts as "ingenuity? Because that's what our party rogue did. In fact, through the entire campaign my party didn't run from one town. But from the other town we were forced to run twice, so it balances out.