Cause of Death

[Goonalan]

I just wanted to share with you some of the spectacular and not so spectacular deaths of my players-

Last week "F... Off Pete" met his unmaker, Pete is, or rather was, an Orc Monk 1, rescued the week before by "Ono" a Half-Orc Cleric played by Wayne.

Anyway

The players head off into an uncharted cavern, after finding a treasure map to the place in the last adventure. The cavern entrance is littered with bodies- Kobolds, Goblins, Orcs, etc. It smells real bad- there are two passages, the left one stinks to high heaven, the right is a little fresher, also there's the drip... drip of water.

Pete leads the way.

He exits into a larger cavern, water reflects in the torch light, more bodies... it smells kinda burny, acidy- there's a definite tang to it, you can almost taste it.

There's lots more bodies, a ledge goes left and right circling a fairly deep looking pool of clear water.

"Wait there..."

Pete heads in when...

SQWWWWUCH

A large blob like creature flops down from the cavern ceiling above the entrance to the chamber, some sort of Ooze.

AAAArGBLUBBLBLUBB

Covering Pete's head, the Orc Monk flails about trying to grapple the Ooze, trying to scrape it off his face- which is beginning to smoke and burn.

Langley, another freed prisoner from the last adventure, steps in- Langley's an experienced caravan guard and a Fighter 1 (Human). He takes aim and swipes above Pete's head, slicing through much of the Ooze- good work.

"Let me."

Sodov, played by Tomo (never a good sign), steps upto the plate, she swings and connects- with Pete's head, Pete flops to the floor unconscious. Sodov is a Sorcerer 2, not a warrior.

The Ooze rolls over the prone Monk, detaching itself from the ceiling altogether.

"Quick, oh Pelor sorry..."

Sodov reacts quickly and fires off a Ray of Frost, completely encasing Pete's head in a giant snowball.

The Ooze takes to lashing out at the other party members, having made base camp on Pete.

"Kick it into the water."

And after some excellent dice rolling that's what they do.

"Whew, that was close."

Wayne stares at Tomo as he watches Pete sink below the crystal clear waters.

Cause of death.

Strangling (Constriction- Ooze), Burns (Acid- Ooze), Wounds (Morning Star to the head- Sodov), Cold (Ray of Frost- Sodov, again), Suffocation (as Cold & Ooze) and finally Drowning (Water).

Needless to say five minutes latter Langley kicked the bucket, similar causes just not as spectacular.

Over to you, give it your best shot...

Queen Twinkle DM

 

[DarrenGMiller]

Sorry to be picky, but you scared me for a second with the line "deaths of my players". You meant deaths of their characters. <relief> Good players are hard to come by.

 

[Thalantor]

I think the most spectacular death one of my PC's evert had was when they were at the end of a 2 and a half year campaign and all around lvl 18 ish. The 5 of them came back full circle to the village they started at some years back to find out that the cathedral of doom and despair(TM) was actually under the village with it's clocktower peak the inn in thr middle of the village. After calling in some divine help and some draconic favors they had outstanding, they wanted to enter the inn, when two balors gated in and pretty much stated that it ended here. Paying no heed to that threat as they had heard that countless times before, they went and attacked.

Since they were fully buffed and it was still 3.0 at the time, the amount of damage the cleric and the wizard could pull off against the demons with maximised, empowered flamestrikes and maximised widened horrid wiltings, that not inly a few dragons kicked the bucket because of collateral damage, but most importantly, the two balors died in the first round.

Now, that is certainly not a bad thing for the players, and especially the mage and cleric felt rather good about themselves. But then I described their death throes and the massive blast attached to that act of demise. And the fact that both the wizard and the cleric hadn't moved yet and were in the range of the blast damage of a dying Balor. Twice.

The collective cling-clang of armor, body chunks and magic items getting flung against other partymembers is still a sore point for the players who were aghast at the untimely death of their PC's by so much damage. Still, they took it like a man and showed the ever present forethought in the session when they simulaneously blamed the other person.

I can stil picture two arguing ex-PC's sitting on a cloud somewhere, sulkily looking down on Faerun.

Of course, they were raised by another player after combat and could still finish the campaign, but the moment was brilliant.

 

[Hand of Evil]

The mountain pass was not the best place to be, the wind was whipping, ice was everywhere, the ice ledge that the party was on was slippery and at a angle, sixty feet away the ledge ended in a shear drop of 500 feet of broken rock.

The party was slowly making their way up the pass, the wind pushing them back a foot for every two forward. They realized they were ill prepared for this trip and wish they had now listened to the old man whom they had meet the night before, but Hator (Fighter 5 – CHR 17) had argued against it, most of the party had come to the conclusion Hator was not that smart but wonder what that made them, as they always seemed to do, listen and follow his plans.

As the party struggled forth a large rock came crashing down beside them, sending shards of ice and rock flying, the party looked about in fright and apprehension as another came crashing amongst them, hitting Valor the Cleric a glancing blow, spinning him to the ground. Before the party were two frost giants, stones in hand!

The party went in to action, performing task from number of adventures, Hator (fighter 5) and Cockrell (Dwarf barbarian 6) drew their weapons, Fail’in (Elf Rouge 4/fighter 3) ready her bow, Mudd the wizard was waving his arm in arcane gestures. Valor the Cleric…

Valor the Cleric was on the ice, his footing gone the wind blowing him toward the ledge, his voice rang out in alarm, his hands grabbing out for purchase and found only Mudd the Wizard.

Mudd’s arcane gestures came to a stop, becoming the whirling of a man trying to keep his balance but the effort was for naught as he dropped to the ice, his spell lost and forgotten.

Hator and Cockrell moved forward slipping and sliding on the ice but managing to keep their feet to engage the two giants, Cockrell bemoaning Hator about trying the pass. Fail’in arrows passing over head to strike one of the giants, again and again and again.

Valor and Mudd found themselves in a different battle, one that was starting them to panic, for they were sliding back down the pass to the ledge and a drop of 500 feet. Mudd came to realize that no spell that he had set for today’s travel was going to help him and his ring of feather fall was on the finger of Cockrell, who did not return it from the last adventure. Valor was looking for some way to stop his slide, grabbing at the ice, his hands slapping for purchase to no avail. Both raised their voices for help!

Cockrell was in rage and his world was only the death of the two giants as he hacked and slashed into them. Hator was yelling and cursing, cutting and sparring and did not hear the cries of help from his fellows over the crash of battle. Fail’in was the only one to hear and turned to see the magic user and cleric sliding to their doom.

Quickly thinking, Fail’in fired an arrow into the ice before her, then took her rope and knotted around the shaft and threw the other end to the siding pair! The rope fell short…crap, she had cut her ropes to bind a number of robbers and never replaced it. She had to do something and fast as it would not be too much longer before they where at the edge. Arrow to bow she started to fire her arrow into the ice near her friends only to see the first one rebound from the ice and slice by Mudd’s head, the angle was not right to penetrate the ice! Maybe she could get behind them and create an anchor, quickly grabbing her rope, she lets the wind grab her cloak, pushing her to her friends, with skating sliding of her feet she gains speed and then the thought flashes through her brain, this is a freaking Hator plan…how was she going to stop!

As Fail’in passes Valor and Mudd she fires an arrow into the ice, her rope about it, she lets go of her prized bow holding the rope, tumbling to the ice, behind and to the side of Valor and Mudd, her roll and progress stopping just before the edge! She reaches out grabbing at Mudd and Valor as they slide by, at a pace picked up from momentum, their combined weight snapping the arrow, sending all three over the ledge.



Bad roles, bad planning but a lot of fun, so much so I could not kill them, I had them fall to another ledge 30 feet down.