I’m looking for ideas for a bachelor party game

[ArkenBrony]

My brother is getting married and as part of his bachelor party i am going to run a 5e game for hime and all the groomsman. I have a basic idea but i want to see if i can get some more ideas.

Background: the wedding cake is a sandcastle with octopus tentacles. The brides really into cows and has a cow wedding topper. And my brother is going to have a gecko one

Ideas: the game starts at the rehearsal or some sort of gathering when an evil wizard/sorcerer/trope comes and transforms the bride and groom into mutations of their animals and the bride is kidnapped. The groomsman and groom must journey to the beach castle of the spellcaster to save the bride and break the curse. Individual encounters i am worried about, but i know the final fight will be against the spellcaster and a dominated giant octopus. The goal is for them to dethrall the octopus to kill the dude. Then the lovers will kiss to break their curse and the wedding is saved

Thoughts and advice?

[Segev]

Sounds fun, as long as the groom is into gaming and the groomsmen are good enough sports to play along.

Probably want only a short dungeon, for a one-shot. 3-5 rooms, 2-3 combats at most.

Are you statting the groom's character's transformation? This is actually a reasonably good excuse to have an imbalance in party power, giving the groom Main Character status, if you want to.

[ArkenBrony]

Sounds fun, as long as the groom is into gaming and the groomsmen are good enough sports to play along.

Probably want only a short dungeon, for a one-shot. 3-5 rooms, 2-3 combats at most.

Are you statting the groom's character's transformation? This is actually a reasonably good excuse to have an imbalance in party power, giving the groom Main Character status, if you want to.

Everyonz involved is gamers so it all works out.

There’s a 3.5 homebrew class my brother loved that I’m converting to 5th for him.

[Damon_Tor]

If there's not a succubus involved, you're doing it wrong.

[Ganymede]

The plot of any of the Hangover films makes a decent chassis for a bachelor party themed one-shot.

[djreynolds]

I want to make a ton of jokes... but I can't

First, congratulations.

Second, I like the idea of having to find a particular flower

Maybe a special ring guarded by a dragon.

A bunch of ingredients they need to find.

ZELDA is a love story

[Sindal]

Pardon my unhelpful comment

But dnd was the last thing i imagined at a stag party. Ah well
I hope he likes it !

[JohanOfKitten]

I didn't had a D&D game for my bachelor party, but had some mini-games and dares while dressed up in the streets relating to rpg world.

The idea was that we started the dressed up like knights and after some activities, we had a lunch and I received a strange call on my voicemail: my fiancee was lure to a fake rendez-vous and was kidnapped during the call, by some evil warlock.

This launched the series of mini-games, with the goal to test my abilities (D&D abilities : Strength, Dex etc...) and investigate the kidnapping.
This ended up with a small certificate with my scores in abilities and with the release of my fiancee.
(then the afternoon was over and we ended up in a bar)

Most of the mini-games would not fit right a tabletop game, due to heavy interactions with random people outside, but some elements can be fun:
- Tracks for the investigation: during the investigation, some mini-games included leads about the investigation
- The cryptic divine help: For me, it was with magic scrolls coming out of thin air, with riddles on it, leading me to find the right rune (it was Algiz) and find the tree with the corresponding shape to make a ritual around it to call Odin to help us and lead us to the last place she was seen. Later, when we found ourselves in a deadend, we went to a magic well that gives truth, guarded by a gargoyle who let only people that can outsmart her at riddles and mind games, and I drop a gold piece in the well to ask were my fiancee were captive. >> Going after some divine advice or an oracle might be a nice step in the game.
- The false trail: When investigating in the district were she was last seen, I found an herborist that said he saw her with some dark dude. But he was antipathic and greedy and was all complaining about the drugstore that opened in front of his shop. I had to help him to gather magic water from a fountain and bring it back quickly enough to add it to a potion before its magic left, to have him willful to help. But in the end, it turned out he was lying and trying to get attention and free help on our back. >> a false trail can be fun for the investigation and add some roleplay encounter about how desesperate or worried the groom is. But it needs to be short and you need to have some backup plan ready when the trail die to avoid the players being completly lost.
- The gem soul: this one is my favorite. The evil warlock trapped her soul in a statue in a church (to hide her in two places and make her harder to retrieve, plus avoid any resistance from her). Thanks to the true love link between me and my fiancee, it was possible for me to try to pull her out of the statue. But being numb, her soul was having hard time remembering our life. Si I had to remind her common memories to get to her (A friend was asking me questions about her like "what did she wore at our first date?", prepared in advance with her complicity). With enough memories to get her remembering, I could gather her soul and keep it in my heart. Later, when we found her sleeping body, I put her soul back in her body by some true love kiss. >> that's a bit meta, but it fits nicely the theme IMHO.
- The enchanted mutiny: Once the soul was taken back, the warlock send a message to bring white flag. He gave us a location where we could find my fiancee. But it was a trap, and the statue of a faun was enchanted by the warlock to mess up our mind. I was protected (due to a magical rosary protecting from mind control that I get in the journey), but all my buddies turned against me. I had to defeat them one by one in a (LARP) sword fight. >> A fight between the groom and his mind-controlled friends could be a memorable encounter (with knock-out option, to keep everyone alive). If the power-balance put the groom ahead, he may be able to face them all together. Otherwise, one by one (the time that the mind control takes total control). There's a risk that things get bad for the groom, but it can turns out great as well. For instance, I won (more or less easily) 5 duels out of 6, but the last one was too hard (he was doing fencing for two years at that time). So we roleplay that when he was about to push the final blow, the friendship between us was strong enough to break the mind-control. (It was my best man, so it was a nice touch).



I don't know if any of these will feed your scenario, but I hope i would help you.

Have fun!

[ArkenBrony]

If there's not a succubus involved, you're doing it wrong.

That’s an interesting idea, I’ll have to think about that, maybe sirens instead for the beach theme?


The plot of any of the Hangover films makes a decent chassis for a bachelor party themed one-shot.

Very true, but I don’t know haw to apply that to what I’m already trying to do


I want to make a ton of jokes... but I can't

First, congratulations.

Second, I like the idea of having to find a particular flower

Maybe a special ring guarded by a dragon.

A bunch of ingredients they need to find.

ZELDA is a love story

I do like the ring idea, thank you

And JohanOfKitten, wow! That sounds amazing! I don’t think i can transfer much of it over, but it does give me some ideas for real life puzzles to solve. Thank you!

[xroads]

Sounds fun! Is the cake the battleground where the encounter takes place? If so, here are some ideas for individual encounters...


Cake elemental
Cake sharks
Cake avalanche
A house cat (which appears giant to the shrunken party).

I wouldn't worry to much about puzzles. And I recommend giving the groom some plot armor (nudge the rolls in his favor :smallwink:).

[Pex]

I like D&D, but a bachelor party I think is one occasion where you need to put the nerd glasses away and pretend you're a jock.

If you can have a one shot adventure in a tavern where you roleplay serving real beer that gets attacked by goblins played by a female stripper or two you hired you may get somewhere.

:smallbiggrin:

[ArkenBrony]

Sounds fun! Is the cake the battleground where the encounter takes place? If so, here are some ideas for individual encounters...


Cake elemental
Cake sharks
Cake avalanche
A house cat (which appears giant to the shrunken party).

I wouldn't worry to much about puzzles. And I recommend giving the groom some plot armor (nudge the rolls in his favor :smallwink:).

it's not gonna be a real cake, it's just the same design as the cake. but i do like the theming. and definitely


like D&D, but a bachelor party I think is one occasion where you need to put the nerd glasses away and pretend you're a jock.

If you can have a one shot adventure in a tavern where you roleplay serving real beer that gets attacked by goblins played by a female stripper or two you hired you may get somewhere.


I appreciate the opinion but I know for a fact my brother will love this more than traditional stuff. what i'm getting from this though i do like, doing real things in accordance with the game. alcohol heavily

[lordarkness]

Might be nice if your plot centered around the groom such as everyone helping to turn him into the weapon or key they need in order to break the BBEG's otherwise invulnerable defenses and make him killable (by all of course). This could be anything from defeating the evil ex'es ala Scott Pilgrim to unlocking the 7 seals of the bride's "chastity."

Could just be gathering magic items he needs for a "killer" wedding night.

Maybe the octopus is in love with the bride, jealous of the groom and turns the bride's family into brainwashed guardians that must be defeated in unique ways but not killed or the bride won't be happy.

The sub quest items they need to gather/create/unlock could be related to the groom and bride's past or personalities.

[xroads]

I like D&D, but a bachelor party I think is one occasion where you need to put the nerd glasses away and pretend you're a jock.

If you can have a one shot adventure in a tavern where you roleplay serving real beer that gets attacked by goblins played by a female stripper or two you hired you may get somewhere.

:smallbiggrin:

Classic stag parties are overrated. I had one friend who chose to have his stag party at a theme park. No strippers obviously, but very entertaining and memorable. :smallbiggrin:

[Damon_Tor]

Maybe the octopus is in love with the bride, jealous of the groom and turns the bride's family into brainwashed guardians that must be defeated in unique ways but not killed or the bride won't be happy.

It fits better with the desired theme of a bachelor party if the villains are motivated by a desire for the groom, not the bride. Jealous succubi, sirens and so forth who are distraught over the prospect of the groom going off the market. A bachelor party is about what HE'S giving up. It's about him, not her. A siren might get an octopus to kidnap the bride, sure, but it should be because she wants the groom herself.

[ArkenBrony]

It fits better with the desired theme of a bachelor party if the villains are motivated by a desire for the groom, not the bride. Jealous succubi, sirens and so forth who are distraught over the prospect of the groom going off the market. A bachelor party is about what HE'S giving up. It's about him, not her. A siren might get an octopus to kidnap the bride, sure, but it should be because she wants the groom herself.

That’s actually really clever. Thank you so much

[Akal Saris]

Sounds like fun! Reminds me of my best friend's wedding - on his wedding day I said, "Well, what do you want to do on your last day as a single man?" and he said "Let's play some board games!" :D

I'd plan to make it even shorter than your usual game, 2 combats at most. The reason being that people are probably going to want to chat and some may be drinking a lot, so you probably won't make as much progress as you expected. If you finish early you can always play some board/card games.