Tales From the Table 2010

[Dannyalcatraz]

Alright- this is a thread devoted to sharing the funny things that happen when we're playing RPGs. It could be the results of unlikely die rolls, funny quips- in or out of character- or what have you. I'll start with one that happened in our last session.

Our party was searching a torture chamber when we encountered a Mohrg- we released it from an iron maiden in which it had been trapped.* The Mohrg lept out and grappled the human fighter standing in front of the iron maiden, paralyzing him with its first strike. My Geomancer failed to turn it while the Dwarf Fighter moved into position to hit it, and the rest of the party maneuvered to help out their stricken comrade.

It didn't fight back- it just grappled the fighter.

Just as the Mohrg was about to die from the party's assault, it flung the motionless fighter into the iron maiden and slammed it shut.

At this point, I said "And he's so tough, he didn't flinch- not a quiver! And he didn't even make a noise, either!"

(Laughter ensued.)

After we defeated the Mohrg, we began to search. The Wizard's player said, "I search the iron maiden- what do I find?"

Before the DM could respond, I replied, "Well, there's a human fighter in there..."

(Laughter ensued, and after I was called "something anatomical" by the fighter's player, more laughter ensued.)

* In all fairness, we had figured it was some kind of undead, but were not clear on the details...we just wanted whatever magic it had and figured we could take whatever. This anecdote brought to you by GREED, one of the Seven Deadly Sins!

 

[Crothian]

The group comes back to the Inn they have been staying at long term after a day of enjoying the city. They get back to the rooms and I (the DM) inform them that it looks like their rooms have been searched but everything was put back basically where it goes.

One of the players says "I look around, does anything look familiar?"

I answer "Yes, everything does. It's your room!"

laughter from everyone else in the room.

 

[wolff96]

In a Warhammer game, we have a Witch Hunter. After several situations where he wanted fire and couldn't make it fast enough, he tried some shopping in the next town. (It should be noted that in Warhammer, alchemically treated wood slivers -- matches -- are common.)

So Hanz seeks out an Alchemist and asks about scaling it up -- an alchemically-treated torch. I thought about it a few minutes, made a couple of die rolls, and told him that it was possible but they would burn really fast -- kind of like road flares. He had no problem with that. Rather than pay for the (very, very expensive) "sure strike" option, he went with the standard version, which has a 50% chance to light each time, but you can keep trying until they DO light.

His next stop was at a leatherworker's shop to buy a baldric. He asked the leatherworker if he could get the insides of the loops coated with something gritty, like flint or sandpaper. Again, I thought about it and agreed.

So after a few days, he had a leather baldric looped around his chest with easy-striking torches in loops of really scratchy leather -- the idea being that when he pulled one out, the striking surface would light the torch.

Fast forward a few weeks, till the party is fighting what might or might not have been a ghost. (Long story).

Hanz' player says, 'I whip out a torch!' with accompanying dramatic hand-gesture. I roll the dice... and it fails to light. The player says "Crap, I'll try again." This time, the dramatic hand-gesture is him striking it on the ground. Again, the dice do not like him.

The player says "Well, CRAP!" and gestures sticking the torch back into his baldric... I roll the dice one last time. He lights on fire. So do three of the other torches on his chest.

ALL combat, including the ghost, stops as the Witchhunter deliberately and dramatically LIGHTS HIMSELF ON FIRE.

The game couldn't continue for the next 10 or 15 minutes, as everyone in the room was pretty much CRYING with laughter. Spectacular.

 

[jcayer]

My brother plays the wizard in our group and is a vegetarian. A couple hours after dinner, the stinking cloud joke never gets tired.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

The sessions that followed the one I started this thread off with proved to be at least as hilarious.

2 sessions ago, the party's "honest merchant"- on point- managed to fail his save vs a Charm leveled at him by a Vrock, spending the combat trying to convince us that that one was our buddy...while another partymember failed HIS save vs a Charm by one of the Vrocks behind us. Truly it was a mess.

However, it was merely a foreshadowing of THIS week's session. 2 players were absent (along with their Monk and Fighter).

The "merchant," again taking point, and poked his head around a corner...and immediately failed a save vs a BEHOLDER'S Charm, then tried to convince us to come along peaceably...except that one guy had seen the rays strike him, so was on guard.

The party's barbarian got to the corner, and- ignoring the "merchant"- charged a beholder (there were 2) while Raging. He got in a good shot while shrugging off everything the critter threw at him...until the beast disintegrated the floor beneath him.

Then one of our Monks followed up by grappling the "merchant" and bringing him down to the ground while the party's mage kept trying to dispel the charm with his wand of Dispel Magic. My Geomancer followed that by rounding the corner and charging the other beholder...not that I had a decent weapon- I just wanted to get the SOB engaged in melee while the rest of the party closed. It was critical, since, as far as we could see, the barbarian was disintegrated.

A Fighter followed me closely, also engaging the 2nd beholder. THAT SOB Charmed the mage!

Since the mage had a whole bunch of "major artillery" spells, there really wasn't much he could do with his magic to slow us down...so he polymorphed into the shape of a female elf caster with whom we'd had some battles before, but who had escaped our wrath. He figured this shape would present "a distraction."

The Monk & "Merchant" continued to grapple.

The beholder the barbarian was after decided to flee and started flying up an escape tunnel. The other one gave my Geomancer a nearly fatal wound before being felled by...no...EXPLODED by the Fighter standing next to me. However, due to some magical effect of which we were not aware, that guy was in the grips of his own berserker frenzy, and flew off after the fleeing beholder while my guy was lying on the ground in a pool of his own sap. (Thank goodness for the Geomancer Drift ability that slows wound damage.) Since the beholder and the fighter had the same fly speed, he was NOT going to catch him...but in his blood-frenzy, he didn't care!

The barbarian turned and saw the "elf" and charged. He nearly one-shotted the mage, who then let his polymorph drop in order to save his life. Only the shouts of the Monk saved his life.

The barbarian's rage ended, so he collapsed. The mage flew after the the beholder and fighter, only to be hit by an anti-magic ray that knocked them both out of the air. The mage caught the unconscious fighter and dragged him back to the party.

The Monk, in the meantime, had released the "Merchant" and went to stabilize my PC (who was 1/2 a HP away from death...). No sooner had he done that than the charmed "Merchant" sapped him from behind, then Webbed him to my unconscious body.

The exhausted barbarian, leaning against the wall, merely sat and laughed.

One of the best and most entertaining combats I've ever had the privilege of being part of.

 

[Evilhalfling]

I have been playin LFR games this year. You really have to work hard in some of them, for any fun RP, but sometimes its worth it.

Being part of an adventuring company was required for one game so we hashed out the ground rules charter at the begining of the game. We were kinda done, and the DM asks about a name and "local 5321" pops out of somebodies mouth. Two of us collapsed into hysterics.
The adventure reward included tabards. So my character wears a t-shirt with local 5321 embroiderd on the back. Along with the name of a merchant trading house. It feels like a union softball team.

He spent a lot of time braging about his home city, the great waterdeep, and finally I play in a game set there.
He ends up on a street, face down, unconcious, in a puddle, and on FIRE.
his adventure summary " They say you can't go home, but what they mean is that you shouldn't. At least the last time I was face down in a gutter in Waterdeep, I wasn't on fire."

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Last night, we were fighting some Salamanders & Hellhounds, and we're smack-dab in the middle of the combat (as in, the Hellhounds were dead, 2 Salamanders were down and all were in melee) when one of the players halted everything with a series of questions...

"Wait...they're Large?"
"Wait...they're bipedal?"
"Wait...they're intelligent?"

And so forth... Finally one of the other players said:


"As the wise Sun Tzu once said, 'LEARN SOME S**T ABOUT YOUR ENEMIES!'"

There was much laughter. One guy even turned to the color of his shirt.

 

[Fate Lawson]

There was much laughter. One guy even turned to the color of his shirt.

Blue or Red?

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Red...we've never gotten him to blue, but we've been close. And considering he's a staunch conservative Republican, that's pretty amazing. There were other comments that got him that night, too.

Another guy was talking about how dwarven females looked a lot like short, fat Rollie Fingers, and demonstrated the proper use of their handlebar moustaches... THAT nearly had him- he was on his side on the bench upon which he had been sitting, inches from falling.


He's a great audience- any comedian of quality would kill for people like him. You get him going, and he's on the floor in a ball. Blazing Saddles nearly killed him...I kid you not, at one point, he was crawling away from the TV, laughing himself red.

OTOH, if you're off...he will tell you how badly you suck. In detail. Loudly.

 

[Legildur]

A party of six 3rd-level characters (3.5E) are scouting a 10-foot wide corridor in an underground establishment. The party encountered an owlbear, which was a mean encounter for us.

I can't remember how the party ended up in this configuration, I think the fighter and cleric had been forced to withdraw, but we had the rogue now as the sole melee type between the owlbear and the rest of the wounded party. The sorcerer was paranoid that the owlbear was going to come straight over the top of the rogue and get to the soft juicy bits - namely the sorcerer! It came around to the sorcerer's turn and he says "I cast Enlarge Person...... on the Rogue." - this was purely to block the corridor, not for the extra damage the Rogue MIGHT do.

The Rogue player, who'd been looking to retreat with his next action, was mortified as there was no space for him to now retreat to, while the rest of us rolled about laughing.