How do you scare your PCs?

[Warrior Poet]

My ace-up-my-sleeve is to pull out the two books of Brom's artwork that I own, flip to a page, hold it up, and say, "This emerges from the darkness." My players hate that.

It's been mentioned before, but dress classic monsters up in different forms. I disguised a shadow as a floating, iridescent sphere one time, and the players didn't know what to make of the new and terrible monster that drained strength but looked like a floating marble! It's fun to watch them try to figure out what they're fighting, and it gives them a good puzzle (and frequently a good scare).

For more good scare the PCs stuff, hie thee to the Story Hour forum and search for JonRog1's "Drunk Southern Girls with Guns" story. Read it. Learn. Pay particular attention to the section he describes where he (the DM, JonRog1) was holding the different highlighters/pens in his hand. There's some brilliant stuff in that story hour, both at a story/PC level and a psychological/player level.

Edit: Oh, yeah. Forgot the hurricane. I threw a hurricane at a party once. They were in an inn on the coast, and it rolled up and hit them full force. It was great, building slowly until the storm really got going. They were doing o.k. until the trees started hitting the inn. Not branches, but the actual trees. Later a boat hit the building. Good stuff. A great challenge that can't be overcome with weapons.

Warrior Poet

 

[Fieari]

I can't be the only DM who scares players merely by smiling.

 

[Dr. Strangemonkey]

Marriage, I'm not even kidding.

The merest potential of a shotgun wedding has proven far and away to be the best motivation for an adventure that I have yet found.

And without a doubt, the brides make the very best villains.

 

[Arbiter of Wyrms]

1) comedy.
once the players have had some laughs, there can be more room in their minds for horror. This juxtapositioning is the most effective way I've seen.

2) separate the party.
Once they're apart, they begin to doubt their own efficacy.

3) Needless Spot and Listen checks
Knowing something is there that you can't see is what makes encounters creepy. A lone adventurer, slowly creeping down an abandoned tunnel, making Move Silently checks to avoid detection. . . call for a spot check, opr even just ask the player for their character's modifier and roll behind the screen. . . no matter what's rolled, they see nothing. Or worse yet, they see a dark shape, indistinct in the darkness, poised, but not moving. . . make listen checks, hear what sounds like the breeze through an empty tunnel. . .

The unknown is scarier than any stat block.

 

[Arrgh! Mark!]

The call on comedy is interesting.

Some of the best Call of Cthulu sessions I've ever run started as a barrel of laughs where everyone was preparing to go "Argh! Giant elder god from the skies! WUBBLE!" or some such.

After we laughed ourselves silly, it was out of the system. Funny things aren't funny when they keep going past the laughter.

 

[frankthedm]

The soft black puppy sounds cool. My some of my players would want him for thier mascot.

 

[Kae'Yoss]

Go like this:

Have the enemy wizard (or whatever, it has to be a guy in big robes, though) use paralysis (hold monster, whatever). Then, say something like this: "When the wizard sees that you stopped moving, he smirks. He than opens the front of his robe, and you see he's naked underneath." That will keep'em on their toes

 

[Jdvn1]

That's cool - what was the next session like?

Well, it started off grim and the players asking questions (of course I let the experience soak in their heads for a week). Few answers were available, so they got few (it was monsters in the night). The remaining priests, clerics, and paladins were clearing debris, looking for survivors. But, y'know, after something like that, you know you're safe. For two reasons: one, the monsters aren't going to camp out too near; two, when a major temple goes down, all the paladins within an x mile radius rush there to beef up security during the trying times. Looots of full plate armors around.

 

[jerichothebard]

Well, it started off grim and the players asking questions (of course I let the experience soak in their heads for a week). Few answers were available, so they got few (it was monsters in the night). The remaining priests, clerics, and paladins were clearing debris, looking for survivors. But, y'know, after something like that, you know you're safe. For two reasons: one, the monsters aren't going to camp out too near; two, when a major temple goes down, all the paladins within an x mile radius rush there to beef up security during the trying times. Looots of full plate armors around.

which really just means, this was the diversion....

 

[Jdvn1]

which really just means, this was the diversion....

Well, the party can think whatever they want. Either way, important people were killed and at least one (important) item is missing. Doesn't mean other stuff wasn't happening too. What caused them to miss the destruction of the tower was also a sort of diversion, though.

That gamed died because I was leaving town, so they'll never know.

There was another bit where, during a downpour, they saw a light in the distance. It flashed off, then back on a distance down the road. Flash on and off, now closer. Closer, and closer. It keeps coming, the party gets off the road, and the light goes past. This was in 3.0 when Gith had dim door at will. But it really freaked the party out.