What is your best everything-rides-on-this-one-d20-roll moment?

[DRD1812]

Some d20 rolls matter more than others. Maybe you're bluffing an evil god. Maybe you're the last one standing in the face of a TPK. Whatever it was, what was the HIGH STAKES ROLL in your game?

Relevant comic for reference. (http://www.handbookofheroes.com/archives/comic/high_stakes_bluff)

[PunBlake]

Here's one of mine:

I'm playing an ECL 8 human paladin of Kord 2 / sorceror 6 gish, and my party of four plus myself is fighting its first really deadly foe: an adult green dragon. (Before this fight, I tell the DM that as long as the death is in glorious combat, I'm fine with dying here.) I'm one of the two primary damage sources in the fight, throwing magic missile over and over, so the dragon decides to try to kill me. Flyby attack diving charge into snatch, and I'm hit and grappled in the dragon's mouth. My 14 Strength is not much help. We do the math before I roll, and the only way I can numerically have a chance to escape the grapple is a 20.

My first roll to break grapple was perfect, and the dragon rolled low. I escaped in midair around 80' up. Fall damage took me to literally 1 HP. I ran for cover and miraculously survived.
This character lived to the ripe old level of 15 before I retired him.

[BowStreetRunner]

Party was on the outskirts of Myth Drannor. Currently only level 3, so no way are we going in there. But the damsel in distress has been kidnapped by the BBEG and my barbarian is one of those headstrong, fearless types. First reaction is 'we have to go save her'. Everyone else says no way, but they make no effort to dissuade my character and the DM offers no reason why my character (who knows absolutely nothing about Myth Drannor) wouldn't go after her. So the DM and my fellow players basically leave it to me to come up with a reason not to go in there, even though it goes completely against the grain of the PC's personality in every way. (At this point I resolve to make my next character a real pain in the @$$ type to make them wish the barbarian was still around.)

So, it having been decided that my 3rd level barbarian was heading to his doom on his own, the DM offered to solo run me through it while the rest of the party got dinner going (heated up some frozen pizzas). While we were sure my character was going to die, the DM decided to leave it up to the dice to determine exactly how it occurred.

I spent the next hour pulling every trick I could think of to extend the life of the barbarian a couple more rolls. Following the villain into the ruins, I managed to mostly sneak around and avoid combat with anything tougher than I was, and anything else I took out as quickly and quietly as I could. I used a few skills in creative ways, and somehow manage to make it far enough to confront the BBEG, who promptly executes the damsel in distress and turns on me.

Now the BBEG is a dwarf who has one shtick going for him - he wields a vorpal throwing axe that has the returning property. I've decided since the damsel in distress is toast already, there's no reason to stay and fight someone who is obviously more powerful than I am. It's one thing to risk my life to save another, but to risk it pointlessly isn't in character. So I take off and the BBEG decides to take a crack at lopping off my head. Instead, he rolls a 1.

We were using critical failure tables and the DM rolls on the table to determine what happens. The BBEG scores a hit on himself, and it crits. The crit is confirmed and his own head goes rolling.

At this point, I get a gleam in my eye as I look at that vorpal throwing axe lying there on the ground...but, three ice devils suddenly appear (I'm pretty sure they weren't planned so much as the DM really didn't want me to have that weapon) and I chose instead to count my blessings and get out of there as fast as my legs would take me.

While I didn't actually get any XP for the BBEG - the level difference was too high - I still managed to level off all of the little stuff along the way. So that brought me back to the camp ready for level 4. Oh, and I made sure my barbarian reminded the other PCs often just how tough he was to have survived Myth Drannor on his own. :smallamused:

[DRD1812]

At this point, I get a gleam in my eye as I look at that vorpal throwing axe lying there on the ground...but, three ice devils suddenly appear (I'm pretty sure they weren't planned so much as the DM really didn't want me to have that weapon) and I chose instead to count my blessings and get out of there as fast as my legs would take me.



I cannot tell you how quickly I went from grinning "This is awesome I love everything about this" to "Boo the DM. Booooooo!" You put your character on the line for the sake of a fun story, and you managed to walk away with your life. Screw game balance. That's your vorpal throwing axe by rights!

[BowStreetRunner]

I cannot tell you how quickly I went from grinning "This is awesome I love everything about this" to "Boo the DM. Booooooo!" You put your character on the line for the sake of a fun story, and you managed to walk away with your life. Screw game balance. That's your vorpal throwing axe by rights!The sword I actually ended up with worked far better for my character, actually. So I've totally forgiven him for that part. (FYI, I called the sword Spellbreaker and every time I scored a critical hit with it, the sword would apply a Dispel Magic effect on the target. My character had "issues" with arcane casters, so it fit his personality perfectly. Plus, I never had to worry about a critical failure coming back to haunt me the way it would with the vorpal weapon!)

[King of Nowhere]

yeah, if critical fumbles could lead to that, vorpal weapons are suddenly much less attractive.

[heavyfuel]

yeah, if critical fumbles could lead to that, vorpal weapons are suddenly much less attractive.

Well, you do have to remember that melees shouldn't get nice things, though.

[Calthropstu]

Well, you do have to remember that melees shouldn't get nice things, though.

To be fair, critical fumbles also apply to ray spells. I want to see a dm explain "I cast disintigrate. I fumble and crit myself with it."

[Saintheart]

It wasn't a high-stakes roll as such, but it was appropriate as hell.

I was taking my party through the Red Hand of Doom. As in, the campaign that prompted me to arrogantly put the Red Handbook of Doom out there.


The party had made its way to Rhest and the Tiri Kitor. On the way there they'd encountered the greenspawn razorfiends and I'd killed one of the PCs, a dragonborn sorcerer who had taken the ritual in downtime during the adventure and whose presence I was playing up as sort-of-serendipitous given dragonborn are agents of Bahamut and the series comes down to an attempt by Tiamat to open a permanent portal to her home plane.

Anyway, the Tiri Kitor had offered to have the dragonborn interred in the same funeral as Lanikar, which the party accepted. Ahead of the funeral ceremony, though, the party went off to Rhest and smashed the hobgoblins there, then returned for the ceremony.

One of my party was also a bard. He was optimising, so his Perform bonuses were already somewhere in the stratospheric range. It was a PbP campaign, and he was doing this wonderful fourth-wall-breaking thing where he'd variously make real-world references and interior monologues with other voices, a little like Deadpool but nowhere near as obnoxious. Anyhow, the party was invited to say a few words during the funeral, and he wrote this beautiful post which more or less ripped off, er, borrowed from Paul Atreides' speech over Jamis in Dune, but he incorporated real sorrow in his address and began to play the most beautiful song he knew in honour of his fallen friend. All of this before he'd gone to make the dice roll.

He rolled Perform (Oratory) and Perform (Lute). Natural 20'd both rolls. Combined with his Perform bonuses, he was hitting somewhere in the 40 range.

His OOC was a capitalised scream: 'THE DICE KNOW WHEN IT COUNTS!'

I ruled his performance was so powerful and memorable the elves would remember it and tell of it for centuries to come, a performance they had never seen in their long lives, enough to seriously make the bard NPC elf in the village recognise him as a master of his craft. Needless to say they got the alliance with the Tiri Kitor and the giant owls.

[MesiDoomstalker]

This was more of a series of rolls.

Playing in my own campaign setting, where the Planes are cylinder-shaped planetoids instead of spheres. The party was returning from Dismanter (setting's version of Hell) back to the Prime, using an NPC Cleric as they didn't have the ability to Plane Shift on their own yet. I ask them to roll their mile off distance. The result is something around 300 miles. I check the world map and determine there are basically 3 general places they could land roughly 300 miles away from their destination. They could either land in the vast, mostly unexplored forest that surrounds their destination, the ocean, or in the neighboring kingdom. I ask them to roll a d100 to determine where they land. The Ocean and Forest are large and most likely option, so I made Ocean 1-40, Forest 41-80 and neighboring kingdom as 81-100. So what do they roll. A 1. I'm floored and go back and double check the map once more. The edge of the planetoid, where the Ocean dumps off the edge of the world into the abyss is within the 300 miles of the destination. So, obviously, I had them appear in the ocean, moments before they spill over the edge.

Several rounds of swim checks and acrobatics to grab hold of one another, they spill over the edge. Everyone, NPC Cleric included, are holding onto one another except the Wizard, the one with Teleport prepared. The Wizard rolls his Acrobatics check and gets a 1. He fails to grab hold of anyone and apparently dooms the party to a TPK. But wait! I forgot about the NPC Clerics action! Acrobatics rolled, natural 20 (DC was only 15, but it was still amazing). Much rejoicing is to be had! Until I remind them that the Wizard must still cast the spell, in the last round they had before the abyssal waterfall would make spellcasting impossible. He had to pass his concentration check. I don't remember the DC off hand, but he rolled exactly enough to pass. Sighs of relief from all the players... until the Paladin's player asked me why I have an evil grin. I remind them the reason the Wizard had prepared 2 Teleport spells. His Caster Level was insufficient to carry everyone, NPC Cleric included, to their true destination (they had planned ahead for Plane Shift's inaccuracy). Silence as it dawns on everyone that someone is dying here.

I wait for them to determine who will die. After much deliberation, they decide rolling is the only fair option. There are 6 people, 5 PCs and the NPC. No one wanted to pick numbers, so everyone's name was written on a notecards. The notecard were shuffled, face down and laid out and then numbered. I rolled. The result is 6. I flip the #6 notecard and its NPC Cleric! You could feel the tension leave the room. The PC's successfully teleported off the edge of the world into their favorite bar. The bartender was mad they tracked salt water in.

But of course that isn't the end of the story. The NPC Cleric was a Cleric of the God of the Sea and Seafarers. So it was especially cruel he died a death no seafarer would ever allow themselves to do (who would be dumb enough to pilot their boat that close to the edge?) So of course he came back as a vengeful ghost and messed with them a few times, most notably during the final fight with the BBEG.

[JyP]

note mine, but another infamous webcomics : DM of the Rings CXL:Leave Everything to Chance (https://shamusyoung.com/twentysidedtale/?p=1293)

[heavyfuel]

While I'm sure this has happened many times over the years, the only example I can conjure up now was thus.

We were fighting this evil paladin and a small army of mooks. The evil pally and some mooks surrounded the Fighter and tripped him. Getting up would mean he would take 4 or 5 AoOs and die, and with a -4 penalty to hit from prone he needed an 18 to hit the pally. Everyone else was already down (except for the Ranger who was shooting arrows for like 3 damage)

Fighter says "F- this. I subtract all my BAB for Power Attack AND for Combat Expertise and full attack the paladin!"

DM thinks for a second, I say "there's no rule that says you can't use both feats in the same round". DM agrees and Fighter rolls. A 5 or something on the first attack is a miss. He's now taking like -23 for his second hit. Rolls for it. Nat 20.

He doesn't confirm, but his damage with full power attack is enough to drop the pally. He then cleaves one of the mooks, which drops instantly. Ranger and Fighter clean up the remaining 3 or 4 mooks and we all lived to play another day.

[Psyren]

To be fair, critical fumbles also apply to ray spells. I want to see a dm explain "I cast disintigrate. I fumble and crit myself with it."

Yeah, but the casters can just decide to use something that doesn't require rolling instead. A martial can't really decide to stop using weapons. (And yes, I'm including unarmed strike and naturals.)

[BowStreetRunner]

Yeah, but the casters can just decide to use something that doesn't require rolling instead. A martial can't really decide to stop using weapons. (And yes, I'm including unarmed strike and naturals.)This is one of the reasons why I've always loved RPGs where the casters had to roll to get the spell off. (Basically, successfully casting any spell requires a roll, just like using a skill or making an attack.)

[heavyfuel]

This is one of the reasons why I've always loved RPGs where the casters had to roll to get the spell off. (Basically, successfully casting any spell requires a roll, just like using a skill or making an attack.)

For the longest time my friends and I thought you had to roll Concentration checks DC 15+spell level to cast it. This was way back when we started playing 3.0. Also before MIC came along, so no Tunic of Steady Spellcasting for casters. We also had critical failures on skill checks then, which made casting even more troublesome

[Talanic]

Not mine. But epic and somewhat well-known. Although you may have already encountered it, it's worth keeping alive.

https://1d4chan.org/wiki/Sameo


My Paladin was sitting alone in the tavern while the party was doing some disreputable thing they didn't want me knowing about, when a peasant came in to warn everyone to hide. Scouts saw the orc army that had been alluded to during the campaign was just a few hours march. The rest of the party had no idea and were away (and were actually getting killed by being stupid and being led into an obvious trap.) My Paladin character, who has been laughed at his entire life for one thing or another, stepped up with an air of determination that would have made the most epic veteran of many wars quiver. He told the guards how to set up the defenses as he rode off to prevent this town from being destroyed in any means he could.

This orc army had been devastating the lands. Since the beginning of the campaign we have heard about their Epic level Half fiend orc Fighter specced cleric of Orc God leading the campaign on his invulnerable Vampire Fang Dragon. His army of ten thousand marched to the town to claim it for their God.

And my level seven paladin rode off to stop their reign of fear and destruction here.

I met an orc scouting party and told them to go tell their boss to surrender. Otherwise this will be the last day he sees on this Earth. They laughed, so I fought and broke their squad and won the fight against the ten of them by being smart and getting lucky.

In the meantime, the rest of the party had wiped by falling in the most obvious of traps and getting backstabbed. I so wanted to scream at them for being so stupid and warn them, but I wasn't about to meta game.

So the DM concluded that the campaign was over. But I told him I wanted to continue, and if I died, I died, I would at least see the rest of the story be told damn it.

So there I was, at the edge of this forest, watching the orc army move past me.

I took out my bow, and fired a shot into the mass, killing something.

Then again.

And again.

Until they realized someone was killing them from the forest.

They sent in a group to find who it was. I hid from all of them, and killed anyone who found me. I continued shooting into the mass, and they sent more into the forest.

I continued this for a few more minutes, until finally I saw the vampire fang dragon in the sky flying towards the forest. He used some sort of fire breath attack for some reason and started burning down the forest.

I took pot shots at the dragon until I pissed it off something fierce.

I ran through the cover of the forest, and searched for a fallen sturdy log, and a high Y shaped tree bearing. I lifted the log using all of my strength to drag it onto the tree bearing. I fired flame arrows into the air to show the dragon where I was.

I mounted up as I saw it approach, and when it was close enough, I did something stupid. Compared to everything else, it really was.

I rode my warhorse up the log and jumped into the air as high as it could go and then jumped off, passing the necessary rolls to do so, and jumped on top of the dragon, grabbed the evil orc cleric's boot, and made him fall. In the meantime, the dragon bit me, doing a lot of damage and two negative levels. My horse died from its fall. I rolled to hit, and luckily, did max damage on my called shot to its wing, tearing it out. It plummeted to the forest below, staking itself into the trees.

In its death throes it breathed an everlasting curse against me and screamed to its master to avenge it, breathing fire everywhere.

And now in the clearing, I grogged in pain and attempted to heal myself while standing and watching through hazed eyes as the Half-fiend orc approached me, giant bone tower shield and great war axe in hand. I saw orc warriors circling the area.

The Orc warlord said something in orcish and the warriors stopped, circling us.

"I hope your ancestors grieve at the knowledge of the stupidity they have sired. You will die this day, and not even in death will you escape the fate that you will face. An eternity of pain beyond your comprehension awaits you. Your soul will be forever engulfed in suffering, knowing no release." as he heals himself and buffs himself up. "All you will find this day is death, and forever on.... only pain."

Initiative.

I win.

But I miss. So I draw back.

Move and attack, one attack hits, and brings me down to 15%.

I slam against a tree and am brought down to 4 hit points. I pass my fort save versus massive damage.

New round, I hold off my turn until he is close enough to attack, as he comes near.

"Feel accomplished, Paladin; you made this day memorable -- for myself at least. And I will make sure that there will be no one left to remember you, your name, or what you did here. That village will burn, and all within it will die. You are nothing but a stain on my blade. Nothing."

I knew it, this was it, there was no way I was going to live through this. Not even with a crit. I was going to die. But dammit, I was going down swinging.

So he spoke my Epitaph to my own thoughts and memories, detailing everything he knew, and why he had became a paladin, and even though everyone had laughed at him, and ridiculed him, that he would save them, even if they never cared, even if no one cared, or would ever care.

He walked up to deliver the final blow. And I screamed out loud and swung...

All hope resided on this die, I wanted some memorable scar to leave him with. Up to this point, this die I had used always failed me when it mattered the most. But I kept using it for the day that for all its bad luck, hoping it would one day churn out unbelievable luck and count at the right time.

So I rolled to make it spin, making it last forever. and it finally came out.. . . . ... .....

.......

It had rolled a 1.

I groaned and the DM laughed at me.

He told me to roll again to see how bad I fail.

I rolled again.

Another 1.

I groaned again. The DM laughed again, and told me to roll again. If I got another 1, I was dead.

I rolled and thought about how embarrassing it was going to be to die by my own hand.

... 1.

I sat there in complete pissiness and threw my die in the ****ing trash as the DM laughed and consulted his book of critical failures.

He rolled his dice, referenced the book and froze.

"What, I decapitated myself didn't I?"

He didn't say anything.

"Well, what is it?"

He just looked up at me in a look of befuddlement and spoke words that I will never, ever, ever, ever forget.

"Character and adjacent target die."

[Psyren]

This is one of the reasons why I've always loved RPGs where the casters had to roll to get the spell off. (Basically, successfully casting any spell requires a roll, just like using a skill or making an attack.)

Indeed; the Dragon Age TTRPG by Green Ronin does this for example. The problem I have with this though is that many spells (particularly healing, buffs, and utility) can have disproportionately negative consequences when they fail. If for example you pull off a badass maneuver to traverse the battlefield and get to your dying companion, only to whiff your casting roll and have them bleed out right next to you, it's not particularly conducive to fun. It also makes the caster more conservative - a weaker buff for the party that is easier to cast reliably will become preferable to the more dramatic and interesting one that is likelier to fail, and the game's math needs to take that into account to avoid being punishing. (If the monsters are tuned such that big buffs are needed, but they have a chance to fail, combat becomes very swingy - and if they're tuned so that the buffs are not needed, it can become easily trivialized.)

There are ways around all that, but I can see why designers just opt for the easier solution of not baking failure into spellcasting without there being extenuating circumstances such as distractions.

[BowStreetRunner]

Indeed; the Dragon Age TTRPG by Green Ronin does this for example. The problem I have with this though is that many spells (particularly healing, buffs, and utility) can have disproportionately negative consequences when they fail. If for example you pull off a badass maneuver to traverse the battlefield and get to your dying companion, only to whiff your casting roll and have them bleed out right next to you, it's not particularly conducive to fun. It also makes the caster more conservative - a weaker buff for the party that is easier to cast reliably will become preferable to the more dramatic and interesting one that is likelier to fail, and the game's math needs to take that into account to avoid being punishing. (If the monsters are tuned such that big buffs are needed, but they have a chance to fail, combat becomes very swingy - and if they're tuned so that the buffs are not needed, it can become easily trivialized.)

There are ways around all that, but I can see why designers just opt for the easier solution of not baking failure into spellcasting without there being extenuating circumstances such as distractions.You just described every single encounter...for a skill monkey or a martial character. Only the casters get automatic success. The flavor text talks about how difficult it is to master magic - but magic is easy. It never fails. It's skills and attacks that are hard.

[Psyren]

You just described every single encounter...for a skill monkey or a martial character. Only the casters get automatic success. The flavor text talks about how difficult it is to master magic - but magic is easy. It never fails. It's skills and attacks that are hard.

And again I'm fine with letting magic fail, but I don't think it's as simple as slapping a roll onto every cast. I think some kinds of spells probably should auto-succeed, and that good design would mean figuring out which ones those are.

[BowStreetRunner]

And again I'm fine with letting magic fail, but I don't think it's as simple as slapping a roll onto every cast. I think some kinds of spells probably should auto-succeed, and that good design would mean figuring out which ones those are.I think the same is true of skill checks. I always hate it when you pull off a badass maneuver to traverse the battlefield and get to your dying companion, only to whiff your heal check and have them bleed out right next to you. It's not particularly conducive to fun. It also diminishes the importance of skills. Everyone puts all of their faith into magic instead, because skills are so much weaker and less reliable. The game's math pretty much punishes anyone who doesn't play a caster.

I've heard all of the arguments against weakening casting before. You know what? I've played plenty of game in plenty of different systems going back to the mid 1980's and all of the times where magic was weak or unreliable we just found other ways to do things. No one wants what they have taken away - it will always make things worse if it happens - but if they never had it in the first place they wouldn't really miss it at all.

[Psyren]

I think the same is true of skill checks. I always hate it when you pull off a badass maneuver to traverse the battlefield and get to your dying companion, only to whiff your heal check and have them bleed out right next to you. It's not particularly conducive to fun. It also diminishes the importance of skills. Everyone puts all of their faith into magic instead, because skills are so much weaker and less reliable. The game's math pretty much punishes anyone who doesn't play a caster.

I've heard all of the arguments against weakening casting before. You know what? I've played plenty of game in plenty of different systems going back to the mid 1980's and all of the times where magic was weak or unreliable we just found other ways to do things. No one wants what they have taken away - it will always make things worse if it happens - but if they never had it in the first place they wouldn't really miss it at all.

Putting an arbitrary miss chance on magic isn't the way to weaken magic. Changing spells is the way to weaken magic. But nobody wants to go to that trouble, so they half-ass it and it turns out the same way every time - a system that either doesn't go far enough and people just game it, or it goes too far and becomes too boring to take off. Fix the spells.

[BowStreetRunner]

Putting an arbitrary miss chance on magic isn't the way to weaken magic. Changing spells is the way to weaken magic. But nobody wants to go to that trouble, so they half-ass it and it turns out the same way every time - a system that either doesn't go far enough and people just game it, or it goes too far and becomes too boring to take off. Fix the spells.Oh, but an arbitrary miss chance is fine for skills? Why? Why should something that is supposed to require a great deal of skill (spell casting) not be treated the exact same as everything else? Why is magic the one skill that you cannot fail? If you put a Spellcraft check on every casting attempt, they can take 10 like everyone else - except when they can't...like everyone else.

It's patently unfair that all of the other skills require a check but casting a complicated spell is something that never does. Tying your shoes (Use Rope check) is harder than spell-casting (no check).

So if you don't want to hinder casting, fine. No more skill checks. All uses of all skills automatically succeed. Where there would be an opposed check, there is now a saving throw by the target of the skill use. Same as spells.

[Psyren]

Yeah, you're not listening to me so I'm done here. Play with whatever houserules you want.

[BowStreetRunner]

Yeah, you're not listening to me so I'm done here. Play with whatever houserules you want.
You're the one not listening. You want to fix the spells. I heard you. I get it. Fine. Whatever. But I don't like to play spell casters. So I really could care less. It's really not going to make the game any better for someone like me. See, I like to play skill monkeys. The skill system sucks. House ruling the spells isn't going to make the skill system any better. But you go play with whatever house rules you want.

I'd prefer if they would have just fixed the skills.

[RoboEmperor]

There's already a mechanic. It's called spell resistance. Auto-success of spells is only for really early levels. And yes there are SR:No spells and those spells do pathetic damage which means martials get to hog the glory.

In any case spellcasting is limited. More powerful effects for limited daily use. It's not the designers fault people nova.

[Warchon]

I'm playing in my RPGA group, and it's literally my first D&D character ever--so it's anything but optimized. Halfling Cleric of Kord (drastically underpowered, but I still love the guy) around level 7 or so.
RPGA rules are ridiculously strict, and basically if you don't finish a module in exactly the way the writer expected you to, you often receive no rewards at all--no xp, no gold, and any gold you've spent is in fact spent anyway. (There is NEVER any item loot at all in an RPGA game--any items gained are automatically vendored, period.)
So my group is fighting air elementals that keep picking people up and carrying them waaaay up in the air, then offering to let them go if they will submit. This is on a one-by-one basis, so the rest of the party is free to continue the fight.
Since the fall would have been lethal for any of us, obviously nobody has turned down this offer, but somehow my little halfling has continuously made his reflex saves and is the last man standing.
The party fighter('s player) looks at me and goes "It's all up to you now." I have no spells left that will do anything meaningful here. I look back at him and say "I do D6+1." These things have DR 5/- so that's basically it. I'm just about to declare surrender--which means we've wasted our entire night, our whole party gets nothing--when the fighter declares "I charge."
Now, if this gambit fails, his character is most likely dead. (None of us knew that the elementals have limited use of the whirlwind ability, and I think the DM may have missed that detail as well). The rest of us may also be killed, depending on how the elementals respond.
There's two elementals left at this point, and he charges the larger one.
He rolls a natural damn 20, then he rolls high on damage. The DM nods and says "it's down."
Before the word is even out of his mouth, the fighter excitedly declares "I cleave."
The whole table cheered. I don't recall if we even remembered to make him roll to hit.

[Eldariel]

Well. This one actually happened in PFS, level 1 run in God's Market Gamble. Basically, there's a warehouse where the villain keeps their loot and the party has to find it, standard search prcedures. It just so happens though, there's a trap that lights the warehouse entrance on fire that quickly spreads. Smoke forces increasingly difficult Fort-saves vs. inability to act and nonlethal damage accrues due to heat. At my Wizard didn't have trouble with at first so I kept searching as the character with the highest modifier. Smoke quickly began to force nearly impossible Fort-saves though and my Wizard was coughing her lungs out while searing of heat.

At the 11th hour I roll good Perception to locate the box we need. Only prob is, I need to get to act to get it and then get the box AND get out. And it's more than one turn's trip.

Last possible turn before I fall unconscious to nonlethal damage (Cleric is even out of channels), Fort save...natural 20! (about the only way I could make it at that point too) Then I go past the box; I don't have the turn to pick up the box but the DM rules I can pick up one item at random with my standard action. I'm Osirion and our faction quest is one of the objects in the hoard; I roll 1d8 and hit it! Then I manage to make the check to jump to a window with my remaining movement and use the Teleportation school power to 5' teleport out as a swift action. I botch the safe landing and fall unconscious but outside the burning warehouse an ally waiting outside can easily poke me with a Cure wand. All of this pretty much required that Nat 20 Fort-save and would've amounted to nothing without the 1d8 roll.

[legomaster00156]

Not a personal story, but that of someone I was GM'ing. Their arcanist had wound up grappled by a succubus who was rapidly draining their levels, and eventually settled on a huge gamble to save their own life: trying to cast the Suffocation spell. First, they had to pass a caster level check to cast while grappled - low odds, but they passed. Next, they had to pass a concentration check to avoid provoking an AoO - they failed. They took damage, and had to pass a concentration check to not fizzle the spell, which barely passed. They had to pass a caster level check to overcome the demon's SR. This one, we thought had failed, until we remembered he had a +1 CL to necromancy spells, which turned a failure into a success. Finally, the demon had to fail its FORT save, a strong save. It failed.
With 5 consecutive amazingly lucky rolls, the arcanist survived.

[DRD1812]

note mine, but another infamous webcomics : DM of the Rings CXL:Leave Everything to Chance (https://shamusyoung.com/twentysidedtale/?p=1293)

Goddamn I need to get back to Darths and Droids. I left off somewhere in Episode II and haven't been back for years. I need to correct that ASAP.

[Arkhios]

Playing an "end game" Pathfinder Society scenario with my 12th level halfling barbarian/rogue/halfling opportunist, who had (still has) very little instinct of self preservation, we were on board an airship, well over 300 feet above ground, chasing another airship around 200 ft. ahead of us. My teammates were discussing magical means for boarding the other ship when I get this insane, yet characteristic, idea to shoot myself flying on a ballista bolt on the other ship. The other players gasped when I said that, and tried to reason me out of it. But, I had decided to stay in-character with that plan, and the little guy couldn't be swayed from doing a leap of faith (in lady luck).

Aiming and shooting was child's play, but I had just one chance of succeeding or falling on the ground mid-flight. 300+ ft. falling damage would've been max. 20d6, but even the maximum damage wouldn't have killed me so I was confident with it. Sure, if I failed the stunt, I'd be stranded for the rest of the scenario, most likely. But who cares!

So, odds against me I succeeded. The look on the other players' faces made it worth it! :smallbiggrin:

PS. Everyone, in and out of character knew that my character was mad and foolhardy. I've made dozens of crazy stunts with him, and while I've failed a fair share of them, he had always survived in the end. Fool's Luck, I suppose?

[MesiDoomstalker]

Goddamn I need to get back to Darths and Droids. I left off somewhere in Episode II and haven't been back for years. I need to correct that ASAP.
Oh boy you've got quite the backlog. There through Episode 6 and currently doing Rogue One (and most the way through that).