One Thousand Ways to Freak Out Your Players

[F5]

126: This trick works best on a party who's low enough level to still need to buy horses & mounts, but high enough to have made some enemies.
The PCs are arranging for transport, and they take the best horses the stable has to offer (naturally).
Have them find out an an inopportune time that several of the horses they're riding now are really the band of Orcs that they slaughtered a few adventures ago, who have been reincarnated by an orcish druid, and are patiently waiting for their revenge.
They'll start to look at all of their animal companions a little differently after an encounter with a bunch of raging, vengeful orc-horses with a few levels of Barbarian...

 

[alsih2o]

127i think) give the fighter dude that +whatever weapon he has been dying for, and give it a puching hilt....with a poison needle fitted inside

 

[alsih2o]

128- horshoes of speed, with a pemanent grease when you try to stop

129 let them find a litter of blink dog puppies..hard to keep in a sack, likely to pop out just when the p.c.'s really need to be quiet

 

[am181d]

130) (from my current dungeon) Require players to swim through a pool of oil in order to get through one room, them make them fight a fire elemental in the next.

BONUS POINTS: Place the exit under the surface and put the fire elemental at the bottom of the stairs in the next room.

131) (also from my current dungeon) Place a silence spell on an entire dungeon (or dungeon section) so the players can't talk.

BONUS POINTS: Place improved invisibility on the monsters and give them poisoned weapons. When the PCs start making Fort saves, they won't no if its from a creature or a spell or a trap.

 

[Ghile Morduk]

Drivin your PCs NUTS

132<-- A real handy fairie, with a few levels of sorcerer and thief tossed in, with a few feats to up his save for the sleep spell he likes to use. Have him take an item from one PC and put it into another pack, and repeat to adnosium. And when things get tough drop the dc 24 sleep spell and start over. Worked for my party.

 

[HalfElfSorcerer]

133. Announce you are sick of dice, and are going to use arbitrary rulings instead. Insist that the players are not allowed to do the same thing, because it hasn't been playtested and might be broken.

 

[apsuman]

134?

134. (this was for 2e, don't know if it still works). Have CE NPC "Surrender" to the party, make sure the paladin disarms him of his 17 ego CE sword. IIRC, that would be 34 points of damage just from touching the weapon.

g!

 

[Oracular Vision]

135. Make all your NPC's speak in some sort of moronic code, never saying anything usefull.

Example:
PARTY: Where is the church?
NPC: It is where it should be, but not where it could have been
PARTY: Okay, forget you. You there! Where is the Church?
2nd NPC: It is next to the big tree, behind the other big tree...

136. The Festival - This is from the old Star Trek episode, make the next town the party shows up in have a "festival," where everything is legal, and even murder is not mentioned after the festival. Have the festival start just after the party goes to sleep, they hear everyone in town shrieking, everyone is fighting everyone or stealing everything, the party will not be able to figure it out (outsiders are not invited to the festival)...its all the idea of some CN god of course...

137. Communicable diseases are never used enough in DND I think, so make the next player who fails his FORT save vs. disease be a carrier, spreading the disease through every town and village, and one new PC each day until they get it healed up...

138. The abandoned village, make it like it was in the Bermuda Triangle, with food still on the table, fires still burning, etc., but no people (they were all turned incorporeal by some demon instantly...) If I found such, I'd run for the hills...

139. Templars of the Lich-King - give the party some real enemies who can teleport in and hit them anytime, until they leave the lich-king's abode. Nowhere is safe, and unless they figure out they should turn back, its death death death...

 

[HalfElfSorcerer]

140. Before the session, bake a cake. Do not bring out your D&D stuff. Take the cake to the table. When your players show up, act confused. Ask what those books they have are. Ask why X didn't bring his cookies, why Y didn't bring his pie. Feign ignorance of Dungeons and Dragons. In other words, act in all respects like tonight is the weekly gathering of the local baking club. Keep it up as long as you can keep a straight face.

 

[alsih2o]

141 gelatinous golem, ochre golem, slime golem