Giant ants ate my characters!

[Trainz]

I almost TPK'd my group last night with giant frogs. I found that really funny. We're playing the Temple of Elemental Evil, so I figure the encounters are only going to get harder from here on in.

I played it two years ago, and we finished it. Well, I didn't finish it with the character I started with, but some of us did, and we saw the end of this dreadful adventure. It's the hardest adventure I have ever played, and from what I read, we are the only ones who successfully finished it.

It's unbeleivable. There are a lot of death with no save situations. You really have to use your brains and gaming experience.

It's an exercise in patience and perseverance. So many times we said "ah skrew this, we don't want to play it anymore" but we always managed to find a little energy to do another game session.

And another.

And another.

.....

 

[Al'Kelhar]

I almost TPK'd my group last night with giant frogs. I found that really funny. We're playing the Temple of Elemental Evil, so I figure the encounters are only going to get harder from here on in.

Spoiler...

Spoiler

IIRC, after the giant frog (singular) in Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil, comes the blue dragon. Facing 4th level characters.

Cheers, Al'Kelhar

 

[Piratecat]

Al'Kelhar, I added our cool new spoiler tags to your post!

I loooove giant ants. You ever kick over a nest of fire ants, and see them all pour out like tiny red death? I once had a nest of giant fire ants in the way of the PCs, and for some unknown reason one of them decided to smack it with a mace when crossing over it. It was fantastic; one of the clerics actually had anti-vermin barrier prepared, and they cowered as thousands of ants clambered over their spell effect. Very fun.

 

[ArielManx]

While most of our party of 11 was battling a trio of trolls, a few went to investigate a noise down the hall. There they found our Bad Guy du Jour, an evil priest, and his three dire weasels. The fighter entered the fray, greatsword swinging...and was promptly dropped into unconsciousness by the dire weasels. (the priest cast a spell or two and then ran away). The cleric barely made it to the fighter in time.

So now whenever we approach a new battle there's always a mutterance of "so long as there're no dire weasels".

Ariel

 

[evildm]

Spoiler...

Spoiler

IIRC, after the giant frog (singular) in Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil, comes the blue dragon. Facing 4th level characters.

Cheers, Al'Kelhar

Yeah, thankfully they're not playing the Return to the Temple of the Elemental Evil, but the original one by EGG (modules T1 to T4). Thus, they MIGHT survive a bit longer. But I wouldn't count on it.

 

[AuraSeer]

You ever kick over a nest of fire ants, and see them all pour out like tiny red death?

Yes. I was 6 years old, on vacation in Florida, and I had no idea what those funny little red bugs were. Even when they started climbing my legs I wasn't worried... until they started biting.

::twitch::

I'm feeling much better now.

::twitch::
::twitch::

But I'm still not fond of encountering giant ants in D&D.

 

[Welverin]

Well, I just started up a 3.5 campaign after running an Exalted campaign, which I ran after a 3.0 campaign that ended with most of the PCs in the 18-21st level range...

Well there's your problem, after Exalted it's not surprising they thought they could take anything.

 

[green slime]

I played it two years ago, and we finished it. Well, I didn't finish it with the character I started with, but some of us did, and we saw the end of this dreadful adventure. It's the hardest adventure I have ever played, and from what I read, we are the only ones who successfully finished it.

It's unbeleivable. There are a lot of death with no save situations. You really have to use your brains and gaming experience.

It's an exercise in patience and perseverance. So many times we said "ah skrew this, we don't want to play it anymore" but we always managed to find a little energy to do another game session.

And another.

And another.

.....

Check over on Monte Cook's boards. There are a couple of campaign stories there I believe. I have a group of players who are almost finished: they are at present well into penetrating the outer fane, having battled various nasties, and are doing quite well actually. Should be finished by Christmas.

 

[Nightchilde-2]

Well there's your problem, after Exalted it's not surprising they thought they could take anything.

No kidding.

They got cocky at the end of that campaign, too. Three Solars, a fire-aspected Dragonblood outcaste and 7 followers vs. an army of 5,000 or so zombies and 2 Abyssals (one in a noble warstrider; ex-circlemate turned traitor).

The zombies were no problem. In fact, the party sliced through about 4,000 of the zombies without taking a single hit (Extra rules, gotta love 'em). The Abyssals minced the characters.

Shining moment was when the ex-circlemate used Glorious Carnage Tyhpoon to cross a few hundred feet of the battlefield in one turn by slicing through his own zombie army, then proceeded to lay the smack down on the DB and one of the Solars at the same time.

 

[Nightchilde-2]

While most of our party of 11 was battling a trio of trolls, a few went to investigate a noise down the hall. There they found our Bad Guy du Jour, an evil priest, and his three dire weasels. The fighter entered the fray, greatsword swinging...and was promptly dropped into unconsciousness by the dire weasels. (the priest cast a spell or two and then ran away). The cleric barely made it to the fighter in time.

So now whenever we approach a new battle there's always a mutterance of "so long as there're no dire weasels".

Ariel

Haha. That's funny. My group has a problem with portcullises..they can never get through them for some reason, so the phrase "f*n portcullis" (you can prolly fill in the *) has come to stand for "this really shouldn't be this hard."

I almost had a twinge of compassion to rewrite this week's adventure not to include a nest of ghouls, but...naaaaah.