Stupidest things PCs/DMs have done

[Black Omega]

The PC's decide to sneak in to the base of the cultist villain by sealing themselves in wooden crates, that are then loaded onto a truck to be taken in. The crates are unloaded at the base according to plan. At that point it's realized no one decided ahead of time how long to wait before opening their crates. Each crate gets to hand in a note on how long they wait. One person waits 5 minutes, one waits 10 minutes, one waits 30 minutes. Making too much noise foils the ruse so there's no easy way to alert the others when one PC has emerged.

After much confusion, the PCs regroup, knock out some cultists and steal their black robes. They are trying to get to the badguy using this disguise when their desert tribesman allies attack and start trying to kill everyone in black robes, just like the PC's had asked.

 

[Ravenknight]

Sorcerer grappling a vampire.

 

[Kafkonia]

This seems to start with two of my fellow players single (well, double-)handedly derailed the adventure our DM had planned in the first session, but it actually goes back to the beginning. It's an adventure the DM had printed up from the 'net, so y'all might recognize it.

See, there was no shared backstory, no relationship between our characters, nothing. They were just all standing in the market when some kooky monster broke loose, and hey presto we're an adventuring party. Including a brooding Drow who hates clerics because she was supposed to be sacrificed to Lolth, a rogue/cleric Tiefling impersonating a local noble, and a Hexblade named Diabedes (I love my goofy names.) The characters were all very... antisocial.

But hey, we had a campaign to start, so let's get to it -- we're hired to investigate who, or what, is killing the gladiators. So we go undercover as gladiators, and we start getting stupid nicknames from the fat guy who runs the place. The Drow looks at him and says "Give me a nickname and die."

"I'll call you Stabs."

Poor Diabedes, being my first foray into something vaguely fightery, got himself killed within two hours of start by a Dwarf barbarian two levels below him. I decided to let him rest in peace and come up with a new character who might fit in as more of a team player... a Cleric of Death and Suffering.

While I'm creating my new character, and our poor good horse-riding barbarian does... something or other... the Drow who hates clerics and the Tiefling cleric decide to take matters into their own hands. After all, Stabs told the fat man he'd die, and the Tiefling is convinced that the fat man is behind the deaths. So, using some ungodly combinations of spells and skill levels, they sneak into his home and butcher everyone (except one servant) in the place. Everyone.

At this point, the DM looks from one player to another, looks at the printout, and tosses it over his shoulder. But we shall soldier on!

Fast forward through one session where nothing overly derailing happened, mostly because the DM really did toss aside that pregenerated adventure and switched gears.

This weekend, the barbarian's player can't make it, so we've got a Drow ranger, a rogue/cleric, and my fighter/cleric going on a dungeon crawl. Against a bunch of orcs. Not too bad. We get some flanking on one barbarian, things are going okay.

Except that the rogue/cleric doesn't mention when he's low on HP, and doesn't do anything about it himself -- and the barbarian rolls well. Not critical hit-well. But -12 HP well. And me one level shy of being able to cast animate dead.

So 3 sessions into the campaign we've lost two characters (both to 3rd level barbarians!) And with two of the players leaving at the end of the month, it looks like we're done.

 

[Natural 20]

somewhere deep ...

... in a dungeon our party came across a puddle on the floor - there was an empty vial next to the puddle. Our fighter, in need of some healing, and thinking it was a potion of cure whatever, actually took an action to lick up this substance right off of the floor. Do I even need to tell you that he was wrong and that it was poison? That's what it was - things got worse for him from that point forward. Funny though... we still laugh about that one!

 

[spyscribe]

"I know, let's scry the evil high-level necromancer to see if he's involved!"

Not my finest hour.

 

[JollieRoger]

The party is sneaking around old catacolms when they come across a shabby looking robed figure seated behind a pedastool with thier back toward the party reading from a very large tome. The room is filled with arcane symbols on the floor and walls and has a very potent almost overwhelming smell of decay and spices. The Dwarf fighter decides he would approach this figure quitely so they don't hear him and tap them on the shoulder. The figure mumbles a few words, wiggles their fingers, touches a stone and throws a powder, causing a green ray to hit the Dwarf. Poof the Dwarf disappears and all his equipment falls to the floor. The figure goes back to reading.

The party rogue wants to know what happened to the Dwarf, before the party wizard can tell him, the rogue aproaches the figure and taps him on the same should demanding to know what they did with the Dwarf. The figure wiggles his fingers and mumbles some words and touches the thief. The rogue falls over and dies.

Rest of the party decides they are in way over their heads and promptly leave the area.

The Dwarf fighter was a lower level NPC that was being played by a visiting friend and who wanted to sit in on a few games. The rogue was a PC who was always getting into trouble so it was just a matter of time before something like this was going to happen.

 

[FalcWP]

We've had a few real gems...

In a Weird Wars game, a character decided to throw a grenade at a Nazi. In and of itself, not that stupid. Except said Nazi had already taken a couple bullets, and was closed to dropping... so a rifle butt was probably enough. No need to waste the grenade.

Plus, there was the fact that we weren't in that large of a room... and grenades are poor close-combat weapons.

We later lit our medic on fire in this game because he was being attacked by some sort of "mist" that we couldn't attack. Which, honestly... seemed a *lot* more logical at the time.

Now, me, personally... I tend to have problems with doors. Watched a party member walk through a door and trigger a magical effect - believe he started glowing. Watched a second party member walk through the door, and another (different) magical effect (can't remember what). I decide, what the heck, I'll have my elf rogue walk through the door. The rest of the party was arguing over who got my equipment before my charred corpse hit the floor.

Funny story. The fireball that killed me also hit the player of the medic in the Weird Wars game, and nearly killed him (stupid wizard actually made his reflex save, while my rogue failed his). Which made it the second time I'd caused him fire damage in a couple weeks. This became a bit of a running joke, and I do look for ways to light his characters on fire (hopefully, without killing him) whenever we play together.

So, a couple weeks after this incident. Another D&D game, same group, different DM. We're in a dungeon/shrine type set up. There's a door that only a pious, righteous type can walk through. The party's paladin attempts to walk through... and is gently but firmly pushed back. I decided to have my wizard walk through the door. I was promptly thrown across the room and suffered a broken leg.

In an Arcana Evolved game, we discovered a man who had, apparently, been in a magical trap. For a long time. After freeing him and somewhat claming him, I (and I'm still not really sure why) said, "Everyone you ever knew or loved is dead." He... kind of went nuts after that.

Well, we didn't want to leave him behind, in the wilds, while he was nuts. So we kept him tied up. To our horse. (This, thankfully, was not my plan.) While we were camped, a small rodent was discovered in our food. It bolts towards the horse. The totem warrior sent his wolf after the rodent. Again. Towards the horse.

That NPC did not have the best of days.

 

[B9anders]

- The entire party goes back to the tavern the next morning, finding it closed. They break in and ambush the barkeep, attempting to murder him in his sleep. The bar was named the Old Adventurer's Tavern. The barkeep, who is a former adventurer as advertised, grabs his two-handed sword and proceeds to gut their fighter.

http://www.thealexandrian.net

Brilliant stuff, Bacon!

The above is just totally random. Why on earth would they do such a thing?

 

[Lalalei2001]

^ Because they were morons.

 

[rgard]

Star Wars: The party of rebel PCs were sneaking around the massive hanger of an imperial supply station on a mission of sabotage. After the ground shakes for several turns, suddenly, an AT-AT (one of those giant assault vehicles that walks on four legs) thunders into view on its way into the hanger/garage. Instantly, the players scramble to hide behind various machinery, crates, etc. and avoid detection. As I’m in the middle of describing the AT-AT docking procedure...

NEWGUY: Can I attack it?

ME: ...You mean, attack the AT-AT!?! With what!?!?

NEWGUY: My wrench!

ME: (After long, dumbfounded silence) Well, technically, I guess you could... But it will cost you an intelligence point.

NEWGUY: (Fumbling with character sheet) What’s my INT score?

ME: 13.

NEWGUY: So, you’re saying I can attack it 13 times?

At this point, we took a break, so that the other players could explain a few things to our newest member (who had only played hack & slash style D&D games until that point.)

Similar thing happened in my campaign played at my store. We were paralleling the movie sequence of events and the PCs were drafted to fight along side the Hoth Rebels. They see the advancing AT-ATs and AT-STs and the clever Wookie (Sol1) charges the closest AT-ST.

When the PCs later went back to Hoth they were able to find the frozen red spot.

Thanks,
Rich