Greatest roll ever

[robberbaron]

As a bit of an aside, the worst series of rolls I ever saw was one player rolling 7 (seven!) 1s in a row.
Best was 3 20s followed by a hit - back in 1e when rolling a 20 to confirm meant rolling again so, quad damage!

Then there was the time we walked into a hanger with a Rancor in the middle (did I say this was Star Wars?) and Plane Sailing takes one shot with a blaster, critical hit = dead. I think we were all a little stunned for a second or two.

 

[Thornir Alekeg]

Great stories thus far guys

Playing a group of monsters in one campaign back in the day. There was a Xill Ranger, a Half-Red Dragon Fighter, Death Slaad caster of some sort, and me. a Doppleganger Rogue with a warhammer.

We were all evil badasses and were going into this city. We get stopped at the gates by the town guard.

The DM describes a "regal figure, the head of the town guard, come out the front gate. He asks you, "why do you beasts wish to enter this fair city?"."

The Half-Red Dragon then reveales his true form. The player was the DM's best friend, and it turns out he's actually no a half-dragon, but a full-blooded dragon. He yells out as he's morphing back into his form, "to burn your city to the ground!"

Then there's me. I'm pretty close to this Guard Captain fellow, so I roll for init, win (over everyone) and run over, yelling out that I'm hefting my warhammer two-handed for a mighty overhead blow!

DM: roll to hit.

Me: 20!

other players: awesome!

DM: roll to confirm!

Me: Another Frexing 20! Hells yeah!

other players: *cheer*

DM, slying: roll another 20,and I'll give you the auto-kill.

other players: naw, it'll never happen...

Me: Time to brain this guy!

another nat 20 follows


Best part was the DM describing me utter pulverizing this guy with my warhammer. Man, that city was a carpenter's dream after that - flat as a baord


I still talk about that one

cheers,
--N

Nice, three 20s in a row.

My best was in a TMNT game a long time ago. We were being attacked by these large robots with tentacle arms. One of them had picked up my character and was holding him right in front of the rocket launcher in the robot's chest. I knew I was dead meat from that rocket, but I had initiative on it. I knew I couldn't break the hold, so I told the DM I was shooting the rocket as it lauched. He told me that I could hit the rocket on a natural 20. I rolled and got the 20. He then told me if I rolled another 20, the rocket would detonate inside the robots chest. I rolled and got the second 20, setting off a chain reaction as the remaining rockets in the laucher detonated.

That GM hated it whenever I pulled out that same die in critical situations.

 

[Slife]

The monks player and everyone at the table is just like "Aw no, he's dead." I roll the critical damage, get an 18, and say "Tom I'm really sorry, roll a DC 28 fort save..." He half heartedly rolls... and get's a NAT 20! He has a +8 fort, barely making it! We all went nuts.

Are you playing with the nat 20 always saves rule?

 

[Atavar]

Sorry to nit-pick, but....

I roll the critical damage, get an 18, and say "Tom I'm really sorry, roll a DC 28 fort save..." He half heartedly rolls... and get's a NAT 20! He has a +8 fort, barely making it! We all went nuts.

Barring some house rule, a natural 20 always succeeds for saving throws.

The monk then wakes up, tumbles away, and next turn hit's the half drow with a stunning fist, then coup de grace's HIM.

Was the drow simply stunned? If so, then he was not helpless, and thus he was not subject to a coup de grace attack. Also, the stunning effect only lasts to the beginning of the monk's next turn, so the next time the monk had an opportunity to take a full round action (which is required for a coup de grace) the stunning effect would've been over.

As for a memorable roll from my campaigns, I had to roll a 17 or greater for the Rod of Seven parts not to shatter, and I rolled a 17.

Later,

Atavar

 

[Engilbrand]

Just last week, our DM was joking around. He told us that we found a bag.
DM: "Who opens it?"
Rogue: "I do. I check for traps."
DM: "No traps that you can see."
Rogue: "I open it."
DM: "It explodes. Make a DC 41 Reflex save."
Rogue: "Oh I go that." Said nonchalantly. It comes up as a natural 20. "Oh my God! I got that."
We all started roaring in laughter. None of it was real. We like to just throw things out sometimes that are immediately understood to be jokes. The DM likes to joke about traps. It was perfect timing.

 

[Darklone]

Atavar is right about the rules...

Good roll stories? Check my sig, there's more than one natural 20 from the PCs and more than one nat 1 from the NPCs ... I think the statistical probability would be close to our solar system working by the D&D rules.

Another good story: Gaming here at the SPIEL in Essen, LcKedovan here from the boards wasted a hostile fireballer wizard with ... AN ICESTORM! At least the icestorm required a high conc check which the dude didn't make.

 

[Delta]

1E: Queen of the Demonweb Pits. Party is fighting Lolth in the conclusion, and getting beat very badly. Trapped in an antimagic zone, fighters held down by spidery monsters, Lolth casting spells, etc. Primary fighter throws his magic sword at Lolth in desperation move... I allow it, gets about 8 hp damage (Lolth 66 - 8 = 58 hp).

Now the high priest of Heironeous goes. In 1E Greyhawk, such priests get a positive energy blast 1/day, nonmagical, that does 1d6x10 points of damage. He launches it at Lolth, it gets out of the antimagic zone because it's nonmagical, and he rolls... you guessed it, 6. That's how Lolth got vaporized in my 1E campaign.



3E: Party is fighting a demon and his underlings (possibly a Balor, I think?). The underlings get wiped out but the party is getting beat down by the fire-powers of the demon. Everyone but the paladin goes down. The paladin's sword melts away in the fire. He rushes the demon bare-handed.

He rolls 20-20-hit. We always use the DMG instant-kill variant. He snaps the demon's neck with his bare hands!

 

[Thomas Percy]

My players sometimes can foreseen the roll. I don't understand how it works, but there are moments when everyone at game table know someone will roll 20 or 1.

 

[ashockney]

Nice thread.

Best ever for our gaming group: the DM is known for being rough, he sends in a cleanup crew of two big bad giants. The PCs having just completed an exhaustive fight should absolutely take the opportunity to turn tail and run. Did they? Of course not.

First archer: to hit 20, confirm 20, awesome...one more...auto kill 20! Hell yeah! Hi fives all around and the party starts to get cocky and consider staying.

Second player: to hit 20, confirm 20, WHAT???? Unbelievable. One more...you got it..nat 20. Unreal. Back to back, without any PC or NPC interaction between. They called it for the night after that.

 

[Garnfellow]

The best roll for my current group came in our last session before we went on hiatus. I was running the group through a conversion of the old G/D series of modules, and the 12th-level PCs had just sacked the Fane of Lolth and had stolen one of the Temple's ships when they ran into a powerful aspect of Lolth (a more-or-less straight-up, CR 17 conversion of the original, non-divine Lolth from D2).

She webbed the entire river passage, and then moved in to attack with her fiendish spider minions. It was a hard fight because she had such a distinct advantage of mobility, but eventually the party's tank fighter got into a position to do a full attack action. Lolth had just gotten knocked down to below 100 hp and was about to heal herself on her next turn, right after the fighter went.

The fighter critted on the first attack (no huge surprise there), did close to maximum damage. He critted on the second attack, also close to maximum. And then he rolled a natural 20 on his third and final attack, with another natch 20 on the confirmation, and again doing just massive amount of damage. Taking into account her damage reduction and whatnot, all this added up to the exact amount of damage needed to drop her to -10 hp.

If she had had a couple more rounds (including healing herself) one or more PCs would have certainly died. As it was she did kill the tank's bard cohort. It was an awesome way to end that campaign arc.