Great "had to be there moments"

[DarkJester]

So last night the group was playing through another session of my "Pirates" game. The PC's are currently in a large port city, originally having come there to look for some lost crew that they heard with in a pretty rough spot. They'd had some dealings with some of the local political powers and were not making many friends to say the least (I mean, come on, they are pirates...). Last night was great though.

In their wheelings and dealings in the city they've had a couple run ins with the city's captain of the guard, and they have been getting some spooky vibes from the man. Their have been hints of the man being wanted for murder and one of the PC's had something of a strange late night encounter with the man as well. Additionally, this man had only taken power after the mysterious death of his predacessor. Needless to say they have their suspicions about the guy.

Anyways, last night they were snooping around in an abandoned temple of pelor just to check out the place after meeting someone in the courtyard. In their searches of the first level of the place they notice a really dusty engraving on the wall. They clean it up a bit and it says "Children of the Dawn, First order of Pelorite Knight's of Zorzk" and has names engraved on it. I start throwing off names and and slow my speak as I come to some "name bombs". Just as soon as I name previously mentioned Captain of the Guard as being on the list there is a flash of lightning (in real life) and a crack of thunder. I couldn't help myself but say "And the plot thickens" and give a mini evil laugh.

Good times.

How about you guys, any moments that just struck you as the perfect timing or play out?

 

[DarkJester]

A small bump, to try against the wave of 4E.

 

[Man in the Funny Hat]

A small bump, to try against the wave of 4E.

Good luck.

Best example I have is the night we learned of the treachery of Bored Flak. He was a mage PC in our large adventuring party in a lengthy (10yr+) ongoing campaign. We had long been plagued by a group known as the Red Brigade. They were kidnappers and assassins who specialized in kidnapping and assassinating only OUR PC's. A PC would disappear and ransom would be paid for the corpse which was always stripped of all magical items. ALL PC's really had to take notable home-defense precautions and never travel alone. Those who did fell victim.

We had a lot of high level characters in this group. In fact the roster occasionally went from 1st level to 19th or 20th and often operated in two seperate groups - high level adventures and lower level adventures. Anyway, one day we had cast another Commune spell trying to learn answers to various ongoing mysteries. We had questions left over and they turned to attempting yet again to discern who was behind the Red Brigade. Well somebody FINALLY asked the right questions and the last one asked was "IS Bored Flak the leader of the Red Brigade?" "YES."

This was a player who had communicated secretly with the DM for months, even years maintaining his little band while continuing to masquerade as just another PC. COUNTLESS times he had nearly been caught or identified. Yet he'd also been smart enough to keep JUST above the radar. He'd never kidnap anyone unless there were plenty of other events occurring to keep our interest diverted. We'd always intend to hunt him down but he always was the least of our active concerns, while still BEING a concern.

Well when the DM stated the answer the room erupted. We always had a lot of players in that game. That night I think there were 8 or more people at the table. When we finally all recovered from the absolute shock we all stood and shook the players hand. And don't think that in the past there hadn't been some harsh words about the Red Brigade and whoever ran it. Players were being forced to re-obtain hundreds of thousands of gp worth of magical items in addition to paying for Resurrections and ransoms. But the way it had all played out was ultimately FAR more gratifying despite the cost that had been paid. Even though we'd all been hoodwinked and used we no longer minded.

And Bored Flak just happened not to be there at the time. It was a total fluke. Completely unplanned. But he got away and became a PC/NPC who continued to fight us through his Red Brigade for years - albeit rather more openly than before.

It was one of the most memorable game experiences of my life, but you kinda had to be there.