Schemes Too Crazy To Be Carried Out

[Sparky McDibben]

So I recently read the book Nuking the Moon which is about all kinds of whacked-out government / military projects that were deemed too crazy to be useful. A few brief samples:

• Project Acoustic Kitty: The CIA's attempt to turn stray cats into listening devices
• Project Habakkuk - The British scheme to turn an iceberg into an aircraft carrier
• Project A119 - The USAF idea to nuke the moon in a display of spectacular nuclear dong-measurement

To loop this back around to RPGs - what are the plans so crazy that even your zaniest villains would go, "Naw, son, leave that one in case we get stranded on Athas."

[animorte]

What... is this ridiculous magic?

"If RPG nonsense be something you wish..."

So, a couple years ago (in a very slow moving campaign with my brother as DM, ongoing) there was a big bad monster thing trampling its way effortlessly through an army. Our goal was ultimately to figure out what it was up to. Naturally a couple newer players wanted to engage it. (Like, do you NOT see this thing wreaking havoc?)

Anyway (once we argued some sense into them), our plan was to follow at a safe distance without engaging. This thing leads us to a smaller, much less threatening looking individual that it... cowers from (?) This new thing performs a ritual with some sort of birdbath portal and original big trampling bad guy NOPES the F out of there so fast. If that wasn't an indicator...

Well, it seems we found what we're looking for, that thing's boss... So we follow into the portal.

DM: The mysterious dude you just followed informs you that you have just punched a one-way ticket into his servitude to conquer the death realm.

[Slipjig]

Being stuck in the middle of a fight between Vecna and Grazzt, and deciding that the best solution available involved summoning the tarrasque so they could escape under cover of the resulting chaos.

[noob]

Being stuck in the middle of a fight between Vecna and Grazzt, and deciding that the best solution available involved summoning the tarrasque so they could escape under cover of the resulting chaos.

That would be insane because I am pretty sure the tarrasque can not even hit them, this makes this plan hard because how would the tarrasque distract them?

[King of Nowhere]

I don't know if it can be called crazy, because it was actually working quite well, but I had a couple of not-really-villains perform one of those in a bid to reach godhood.

Step 1: there is a huge, dangerous magic warp area. even 20th level parties have disappeared in there. but those two brothers are a high level wizard and druid; the wizard has figured out some custom protections against the wild magic that work well enough that the druid casting regeneration daily on both of them can compensate the ill effects. So, set up a hiding place in that area. Even the gods cannot see inside the place, and they need a way to hide a crapton of divine energy
Step 2: devise a zombie pandemics bacteria. But not too dangerous, we don't want an actual zombie pandemic. Release it into the wild. Now the cities surrounding the warp area will be randomly attacked by animal zombies (yep, only animals. and they don't get too aggressive; those two brothers are decent people and have worked very hard to minimize collateral damage).
Step 3: Adventurers will be called to deal with the zombies. Turn undead will follow
Step 4: the bacteria are engineered to absord divine energy from the turning. Once charged, they will leave the host.
Step 5: as a highly resilient spore, the bacteria will wait for rain to collect them into the rivers, which eventually run through the warp magic where the brothers have the means of collecting them
Step 6: You have a way to steal some divine energy, and nobody is figuring it out. Nobody is suspicious either, everyone knows that the wild magic produces all kinds of weird monsters.

the two brothers have calculated that they will take a century or two to gather enough energy to attain immortality; they are elves, so they will be fine. After that, they will take many millennia to gather enough for actual godhood, but one step at a time.

the scheme is quite crazy, but provided that nobody else has the abjurations to live in the warp magic, nobody investigates too hard on the suspicious behaviour of the zombies, your hideout is never attacked by monsters stronger than you can deal with, and nobody figures out how to actually heal the warp magic, and everything keeps going for at least a couple centuries, then everything will work out. What could possibly go wrong?

It was a nice investigation plot for the party.

[SimonMoon6]

Okay, so like, there's this monster. It can change its shape into almost anything. It has a clever plan. It will disguise itself as a shape that will attract humans (and other humanoids) towards it, where it can then grab them, kill them, and eat them.

So, then, it thinks about what location would be the best place to set this trap. Finally, it decides to go live in an abandoned underground setting where no humans (or humanoids) have been in hundreds of years. After all, if no humans have been here in hundreds of years, then this location is overdue for humans to come, right?

So, then begins the waiting game.

And this monster is considered normal enough that it has its own entry in the Monster Manual. It's not a bizarre freak who is a strange insane member of its race. Every member of its race thinks this way. And it has average human intelligence.

And sadly, the story usually ends with "A chest? Oh, I'll shoot it with an arrow just in case it's a mimic."

[animorte]

So, then, it thinks about what location would be the best place to set this trap. Finally, it decides to go live in an abandoned underground setting where no humans (or humanoids) have been in hundreds of years. After all, if no humans have been here in hundreds of years, then this location is overdue for humans to come, right?

That's hilarious. This is why I prefer to find reason for common settings as tables, doors, and such.

[Pauly]

Okay, so like, there's this monster. It can change its shape into almost anything. It has a clever plan. It will disguise itself as a shape that will attract humans (and other humanoids) towards it, where it can then grab them, kill them, and eat them.

So, then, it thinks about what location would be the best place to set this trap. Finally, it decides to go live in an abandoned underground setting where no humans (or humanoids) have been in hundreds of years. After all, if no humans have been here in hundreds of years, then this location is overdue for humans to come, right?

So, then begins the waiting game.

And this monster is considered normal enough that it has its own entry in the Monster Manual. It's not a bizarre freak who is a strange insane member of its race. Every member of its race thinks this way. And it has average human intelligence.

And sadly, the story usually ends with "A chest? Oh, I'll shoot it with an arrow just in case it's a mimic."

About 95% of the. Monster Manual can be summed up by an article I once read called “Excuse me Mr Gygax, but a Mr Darwin would like a word”.

[Jay R]

We found the Ring that has a lot of the Dark Lord’s power. If he gets it back, he will conquer the entire world. It corrupts anybody who holds it. Let’s let the weakest person we know carry it for hundreds of miles towards the Dark Lord, into the Dark Lord’s lands, through all his armies, to his own private forge, where it has its greatest power, and try to destroy it there.

He should be safe enough; when he gets near the Dark Lord’s lands, and all the great warriors leave him, he can take his gardener with him.

[GloatingSwine]

We found the Ring that has a lot of the Dark Lord’s power. If he gets it back, he will conquer the entire world. It corrupts anybody who holds it. Let’s let the weakest person we know carry it for hundreds of miles towards the Dark Lord, into the Dark Lord’s lands, through all his armies, to his own private forge, where it has its greatest power, and try to destroy it there.

He should be safe enough; when he gets near the Dark Lord’s lands, and all the great warriors leave him, he can take his gardener with him.

And this was still the least worst available plan. Given that the ring corrupts its holder proportionally to their personal ambition and strength.

[Khedrac]

We found the Ring that has a lot of the Dark Lord’s power. If he gets it back, he will conquer the entire world. It corrupts anybody who holds it. Let’s let the weakest person we know carry it for hundreds of miles towards the Dark Lord, into the Dark Lord’s lands, through all his armies, to his own private forge, where it has its greatest power, and try to destroy it there.

He should be safe enough; when he gets near the Dark Lord’s lands, and all the great warriors leave him, he can take his gardener with him.

This wasn't the plan. The plan was to travel with the warriors to where they were going, then for the powerful "mage" (who had a record of sneaking into the Dark Lord's strongholds undetected) to sneak with the ringbearer (who needs to be fairly weak due to the corruption property) to go on to the forge. The plan went wrong in two ways - 1) the mage "died" and 2) the corruption was more powerful than they expected and infected one of the strong warriors causing the weak guy and his gardener to flee from the rest of the group.

[kieza]

I once destroyed the villain's lair and everything within a 1-mile radius of it using 10 ranks of knowledge (astronomy), two scrolls of teleport, a bottle of air, and a decanter of endless water.

Orbital kinetic bombardment solves many problems, although it did lead to several more down the road..

[animorte]

And this was still the least worst available plan. Given that the ring corrupts its holder proportionally to their personal ambition and strength.

Well, they should hand it to me. Relative to this qualities, it would have little to no effect.

I once destroyed the villain's lair and everything within a 1-mile radius of it using 10 ranks of knowledge (astronomy), two scrolls of teleport, a bottle of air, and a decanter of endless water.

Orbital kinetic bombardment solves many problems, although it did lead to several more down the road..

I love that decanter. I'm curious how long this took accomplish.

[GloatingSwine]

I have a feeling that the decanter trick wouldn't actually work, unless you got a really *really* long way away and used the "geyser" mode as an infinitely efficient but very slow engine to accelerate the decanter itself.

But good luck aiming that at a target smaller than a planet.

(You might think you could use it to generate a large quantity of ice, but it would do the opposite, the lack of pressure in space would cause the water to instantly boil away)

I love that decanter. I'm curious how long this took accomplish.

Even if you allowed for the maximum flow rate not just being an engine and shooting the decanter away (with infinite but very slow acceleration due to having infinite reaction mass and efficiency), to get about a 1 mile crater you'd need a 200m ice impactor, which means about 950 million gallons. If you allow for the maximum flow rate of 30gal/round it would take 6 years. At the 5gal/round rate it would take 30 years.

NB Also you need an older edition for this to work, the 5e decanter needs to be reactivated each round it doesn't flow until stopped like the 3e one.

[King of Nowhere]

(You might think you could use it to generate a large quantity of ice, but it would do the opposite, the lack of pressure in space would cause the water to instantly boil away)

not sure on this. sure, the water would boil away for lack of pressure, but boiling subtracts heat, so some of the water would evaporate but the rest would freeze. and it would still evaporate after being frozen - freeze-drying is exactly that - but it takes time. I wouldn't rule out being able to create a chunk of ice that can last for some time. of course it can't get too big, else it evaporates faster than the decanter can replenish it.

you are, obviously, correct on all the other criticism. it would be virtually impossible to aim that thing - anyone who have played kerbal space program knows how difficult it is to pinpoint a landing spot from orbit when there's an atmosphere involved. for those who haven't tried it, missing by 10 km is an amazingly accurate shot - and that's with a real spaceship with actual engines and a mission control to calculate the trajectory.
it would take years to get a chunk of ice big enough to deal that level of damage, even discounting the evaporation.
and a smaller chunk of ice would melt in the atmosphere.

[PhoenixPhyre]

not sure on this. sure, the water would boil away for lack of pressure, but boiling subtracts heat, so some of the water would evaporate but the rest would freeze. and it would still evaporate after being frozen - freeze-drying is exactly that - but it takes time. I wouldn't rule out being able to create a chunk of ice that can last for some time. of course it can't get too big, else it evaporates faster than the decanter can replenish it.

you are, obviously, correct on all the other criticism. it would be virtually impossible to aim that thing - anyone who have played kerbal space program knows how difficult it is to pinpoint a landing spot from orbit when there's an atmosphere involved. for those who haven't tried it, missing by 10 km is an amazingly accurate shot - and that's with a real spaceship with actual engines and a mission control to calculate the trajectory.
it would take years to get a chunk of ice big enough to deal that level of damage, even discounting the evaporation.
and a smaller chunk of ice would melt in the atmosphere.

And it wouldn't stay together. You'd get basically snow, plus propulsion. And even an ice bolide generally just burns up in the atmosphere unless it's just right.

As usual, trying to make real-world physics work with D&D magic is...problematic in the extreme. And usually does great violence to both of them in the process.

[Rynjin]

Okay, so like, there's this monster. It can change its shape into almost anything. It has a clever plan. It will disguise itself as a shape that will attract humans (and other humanoids) towards it, where it can then grab them, kill them, and eat them.

So, then, it thinks about what location would be the best place to set this trap. Finally, it decides to go live in an abandoned underground setting where no humans (or humanoids) have been in hundreds of years. After all, if no humans have been here in hundreds of years, then this location is overdue for humans to come, right?

So, then begins the waiting game.

And this monster is considered normal enough that it has its own entry in the Monster Manual. It's not a bizarre freak who is a strange insane member of its race. Every member of its race thinks this way. And it has average human intelligence.

And sadly, the story usually ends with "A chest? Oh, I'll shoot it with an arrow just in case it's a mimic."

Carrion Crown (a Pathfinder Advanteure Path based around horror tropes) has on two occasions, mimic disguised as coffins, far enough apart that the PCs will forget the last time.

The first has mimicked the sarcophagus of a mummy, and goes out of its way to jumpscare people who've already triggered the mummy.

The others (there are 3 or 4 of them) have taken on the form of vampire coffins in a room full of them, and ambush the players when they try to track the vampires back to their coffins to stake them after defeating them in combat.

The latter is one of my favorite WTF published encounters of all time, because this is a pretty high level game at this point (the PCs are like level 12) and to compensate for the low CR of a Mimic, each of them just has a bunch of Rogue levels and Sneak Attack the ever-loving **** out of the players who had been lulled into complacency by how easily their party full of undead-hating holy crusaders had smashed through the vampires.
----------------------

One of my own villain plots is pretty wacky. In a homebrewed version of the Golarion setting, the conceit of the campaign is that the players have all sold their souls to various forces in the universe for whatever reason and all have had their contracts bought out by a particular Devil.

Throughout the campaign they went on a number of seemingly unrelated adventures, gathering the pieces (including a piece of the Codex of the Infinite Planes) needed for the Contract Devil to carry out is plans to turn the country of Cheliax (an empire that has diabolism as a cornerstone of its power) into the "10th Circle of Hell". Literally: the Empire and everything it conquered from this point out would be legally, backed by the fundamental laws underpinning the universe, considered one of the Circles of Hell but conveniently located on the Material plane. This comes with it everything you might think it would imply.

I have a followup campaign planned for...some point, whenever I feel like running it, to deal with the aftermath of this worldchanging event.

[kieza]

I have a feeling that the decanter trick wouldn't actually work, unless you got a really *really* long way away and used the "geyser" mode as an infinitely efficient but very slow engine to accelerate the decanter itself.

But good luck aiming that at a target smaller than a planet.

(You might think you could use it to generate a large quantity of ice, but it would do the opposite, the lack of pressure in space would cause the water to instantly boil away)



Even if you allowed for the maximum flow rate not just being an engine and shooting the decanter away (with infinite but very slow acceleration due to having infinite reaction mass and efficiency), to get about a 1 mile crater you'd need a 200m ice impactor, which means about 950 million gallons. If you allow for the maximum flow rate of 30gal/round it would take 6 years. At the 5gal/round rate it would take 30 years.

NB Also you need an older edition for this to work, the 5e decanter needs to be reactivated each round it doesn't flow until stopped like the 3e one.

It was 3.5, and I did use the decanter as a very small rocket engine. It wasn't something I came up with on the fly, either; I was planning this out with the DM's permission in between sessions, and there were a couple of spells I cast myself to make it more likely to work.

This was set in a world with a moon that had, centuries back, been shattered into pieces, so there were lots of fragments already in low orbit, some of them periodically falling out of orbit and making craters (hence how I was able to justify that astronomy was advanced enough that I could come up with this trick: astronomers were very interested in predicting impactors).

I picked an in-universe well-studied fragment that had a nickel-iron core and was already on the verge of scraping the atmosphere. I worked out the orbital mechanics ahead of time, and then teleported up and cast fabricate to create a metal framework containing like 15 one-ton metal rods. The shell had a recess for the decanter on one side and a few "bomb-sights" for navigation. Decanter goes in the recess, and then I cast lesser planar ally to get...I forget what exactly, but some kind of small but clever fire elemental. I bargain with it and it agrees that, when things start getting warm and the wind starts rushing past, it'll keep an eye out for certain landmarks and adjust the decanter to provide some kind of terminal guidance. Then I teleport back.

So then the rest of the party wants to know where I went for most of a week and why I was dehydrated and starving (I had a mask connected to the bottle of air, but it didn't let me eat or drink). I make up an excuse about going on a bender after we figured out the villain's world-conquering plan, we spend the next 3 months pretending (well, I was pretending...) to desperately try to stop it, and then his lair unexpectedly gets hit by an orbital shotgun blast while we were on the other side of the continent. Everyone stops what they're doing, goes "...huh." and we take a well-earned vacation during which everyone keeps asking why I'm smirking.

This later bit us when someone else figured out the trick and we had to deal with them while their finger was hovering over the figurative big red rune. I'm fairly sure that's the only reason the DM let me do it.