One Thousand Ways to Freak Out Your Players

[River]

164: have the PC's encounter an awakened warhorse with 5 paldain levels on a quest to find its "Special Rider." If any PC steps up to the plate 4d6'em and have the character dragged off on a horse quest.

165: Rust monster wave assault.

166: Night of the full moon, Pc's encounter an undead too powerful for them to deal with. Have it throw a bag of coins at a particular players feet and say "My master is much pleased with your services."

167: Have the main villian scry on the players constantly.

 

[The Root Of All Evil]

168: Have the PC's attend a social call of some might-be enemy of unknown hostility as host. The event is set in a large locale with lots of witnesses and non-combatants but also quite a few servants and well-behaved guards. When socially engaged, preferably with the host, have them note that said buffer, witnesses and non-combatants, is gradually and discreetly filtering out and leaving the scene...

 

[Heretic Apostate]

169. Have the players fight the dreaded "gazebo." (And I'm STILL trying to find that particular comic, either the KotDT or the Hackmaster....)

 

[HalfElfSorcerer]

170. Whenever the PCs go to a place like a carriage depot, rent-a-horse, etc, have them be accosted by proselytizing (sp?) clerics who try and get them to convert. If the PCs refuse, have the clerics attack immediately.

 

[Ashrem Bayle]

171. Tell your players you can't run a game this week because you have to spend all your free time working on a new setting for a contest..

 

[333 Dave]

172. Make a room a perfectly sterile white cube. When you finish describing it take out your stopwatch and time how long it takes before the wizard says "I cast Detect Magic".

 

[Xarlen]

This may not work in a Fantasy campagn but...

173) Blood. When they wake up, there's blood in the sink, the toilet, the shower, the pool (We slept in waterbeds with fish at a hotel; the fish were dead, and blood was in the water).

 

[clockworkjoe]

174. In the next room the players explore, have a human butler stand there at perfect attention. He is just a butler, waiting to serve the players drinks.

 

[Tolen Mar]

175

In the middle of a pitched battle, just when both sides have started skirmishing:

A strange little man appears from nowhere, looks around at the chaos and then says "You all are making too much noise! Cant a guy get some quite around here?"

At which point all sound is eliminated from the battlefield, regardless of how much armor is moving around, or swords being struck against swords, or people shouting.

Then he says "Much better!" Smiles and vanishes...

 

[Cullain]

166: Night of the full moon, Pc's encounter an undead too powerful for them to deal with. Have it throw a bag of coins at a particular players feet and say "My master is much pleased with your services."

I did something similar to this to my players, once. They had just finished a quest. The big bad of the campaign teleprted in, told one of the players "you have fulfilled your end of the bargain magnificently," tossed him a bag of coins, and teleported away. The resulting confusion on my players part was priceless.

Cullain