Tell me about your best Monty Hall moment!
- Thread starter Gomez
- Start date
humble minion
Legend
We were about 8th level, and the DM had set us up in a prescripted combat against a 20th level drow assassin - we were due to be rescued by an avatar who would explain large portions of the plot to us.
The assassin killed the wizard with his first death attack, then next round beheaded the cleric with a debatably legal +5 vorpal short sword (which he dual-wielded in concert with a +5 wounding short sword of speed...) It was obvious we were completely overmatched, but the monk had a Cloak of Battle that he used to make a successful disarm against the vorpal sword. Then he picked it up, non-proficiency penalties and all, and rolled a 20 on his first attack roll and 20 to confirm the critical. Drow's head bounces on the floor still wearing a surprised expression.
The GM had really tooled the drow up, assuming that we'd never be able to get our hands on his gear anyway. We got the lot, at 8th level. My shadowdancer wore his +5 heavy fortification padded armour all the way to 20th level...
The assassin killed the wizard with his first death attack, then next round beheaded the cleric with a debatably legal +5 vorpal short sword (which he dual-wielded in concert with a +5 wounding short sword of speed...) It was obvious we were completely overmatched, but the monk had a Cloak of Battle that he used to make a successful disarm against the vorpal sword. Then he picked it up, non-proficiency penalties and all, and rolled a 20 on his first attack roll and 20 to confirm the critical. Drow's head bounces on the floor still wearing a surprised expression.
The GM had really tooled the drow up, assuming that we'd never be able to get our hands on his gear anyway. We got the lot, at 8th level. My shadowdancer wore his +5 heavy fortification padded armour all the way to 20th level...
I let my teenage (at the time) stepdaughter DM for me in a one-shot solo adventure back in the 1E days. My 1st-level fighter was up against a red dragon that had been demanding weekly tributes of young maidens from a village. Realizing that she really had no real grasp of the rules (like my 1st-level fighter was going to be able to hold his own against a red dragon), I basically said "screw the alignment penalties, I'm poisoning that sucker!" It involved my male human fighter getting dressed up as the next "young maiden sacrifice," I recall, but hey, it worked. (And the bodice provided a handy place to store the two glass poison-filled spheres I had the village alchemist whip up for me....) As a reward, the village gave me the dragon's hoard, which consisted of one million gold pieces. (My stepdaughter was apparently a firm believer in "more must be better.") My fighter ended up donating the lot of it to the village, as I recall.
Also, I don't recall her DMing after that.
Johnathan
Also, I don't recall her DMing after that.
Johnathan
Chimera
First Post
1979-ish.
Four of us high school buddies played together. We rotated GMing and each played 5 characters. Most of the time we'd travel around together, with our henchmen, fleets, mercenaries, etc, etc; then we'd get to whoever was GMing's Dungeon, where each of the 3 players would chose 2 of his characters to make up a party of 6. (Sometimes we'd all send our parties in at the same time.)
Stan was the Monte Haulest of Monte Haulers. My Wizard got a Staff of the Magi at only 4th level. He'd try to build these outrageous monsters and deathtraps, then fill it with ungodly treasure, rationalizing that we'd never get it. And almost 100% of the time, he was flat...out...wrong.
The climax of this came when we had gotten high enough level to penetrate to the mythical 10th level of his dungeon, which was a great vault of treasure filled with monsters in suspended animation - all the monsters and treasure that was required to keep refilling the dungeon over and over again. Guarding the entrance of this was his most dreaded monster of all....The Solder Monsters. Intelligent bits of molten metal that would burrow into you, causing damage. Surrounding the entrance was a great field of slick ice, so slick that you could not walk upon it (this well before Balance checks and the like).
Well, we got down there and were almost wiped out in short order. So we retreated and spent a couple of months (IC) preparing...
We went to a far northern land and learned how to ice skate! We prepared scrolls and wands and everything we could think of with various Fire and Ice spells. We prepared Wishes, potions, scrolls, everything and anything.
We go back in. Stan has no idea what we're up to. The Solder Monsters attack. We barrage them with Cold spells, to some small effect. We Heal each other almost constantly. Then....we Wish them all away.
Stan was dumbfounded. He hadn't even considered that option. He tried to limit the number we could wish away, but we were prepared for that, with more Wishes.
Then we get to the Ice Field...and pull out our skates! Man, the look on his face was priceless. Heck, we even had Wishes prepared for that too ("I wish we were expert ice skaters!") if he somehow objected.
The monsters start awaking and attacking in waves, but we're prepared for that too. Fireballs and Fire spells left and right, melting great holes in the sea of ice and killing scores of monsters. Followed by Ice Storm and Cone of Cold to trap the monsters who fell into the pools created by the fire spells.
In the end, Stan threw up his hands and gave us the lot. I think each character got something on the order of 5 million GPs and an open catalog of whatever magic we wanted. Was pretty much the end of the game, since those characters were now invincible!
We started a new game shortly thereafter, with only me as a GM.
Four of us high school buddies played together. We rotated GMing and each played 5 characters. Most of the time we'd travel around together, with our henchmen, fleets, mercenaries, etc, etc; then we'd get to whoever was GMing's Dungeon, where each of the 3 players would chose 2 of his characters to make up a party of 6. (Sometimes we'd all send our parties in at the same time.)
Stan was the Monte Haulest of Monte Haulers. My Wizard got a Staff of the Magi at only 4th level. He'd try to build these outrageous monsters and deathtraps, then fill it with ungodly treasure, rationalizing that we'd never get it. And almost 100% of the time, he was flat...out...wrong.
The climax of this came when we had gotten high enough level to penetrate to the mythical 10th level of his dungeon, which was a great vault of treasure filled with monsters in suspended animation - all the monsters and treasure that was required to keep refilling the dungeon over and over again. Guarding the entrance of this was his most dreaded monster of all....The Solder Monsters. Intelligent bits of molten metal that would burrow into you, causing damage. Surrounding the entrance was a great field of slick ice, so slick that you could not walk upon it (this well before Balance checks and the like).
Well, we got down there and were almost wiped out in short order. So we retreated and spent a couple of months (IC) preparing...
We went to a far northern land and learned how to ice skate! We prepared scrolls and wands and everything we could think of with various Fire and Ice spells. We prepared Wishes, potions, scrolls, everything and anything.
We go back in. Stan has no idea what we're up to. The Solder Monsters attack. We barrage them with Cold spells, to some small effect. We Heal each other almost constantly. Then....we Wish them all away.
Stan was dumbfounded. He hadn't even considered that option. He tried to limit the number we could wish away, but we were prepared for that, with more Wishes.
Then we get to the Ice Field...and pull out our skates! Man, the look on his face was priceless. Heck, we even had Wishes prepared for that too ("I wish we were expert ice skaters!") if he somehow objected.
The monsters start awaking and attacking in waves, but we're prepared for that too. Fireballs and Fire spells left and right, melting great holes in the sea of ice and killing scores of monsters. Followed by Ice Storm and Cone of Cold to trap the monsters who fell into the pools created by the fire spells.
In the end, Stan threw up his hands and gave us the lot. I think each character got something on the order of 5 million GPs and an open catalog of whatever magic we wanted. Was pretty much the end of the game, since those characters were now invincible!
We started a new game shortly thereafter, with only me as a GM.
Let's see:
My very first time GM'ing: I rolled up several orcs in a 10'x10' room. The treasure I rolled included a Helm of Brilliance. The player's wizard cast sleep, killed the orcs, and got the helm.
Another time, I rolled up a Ring of Invisibility for a group of 1st level characters.
While I was at college, my high school group gamed with a GM who gave every character maxed-out psionics (this was 1E). Here they are around 11th-12th level:
A paladin with a holy avenger and an amulet that would resurrect him when slain. (This was hilarious when he was disintegrated. The GM ruled that he was resurrected - stark naked - in the middle of the battle).
A cleric with a belt of storm giant strength, gauntlets of ogre power, and a hammer of the thunderbolts.
A wizard with a rod of time stop, a cube of force, and a portable hole.
Another wizard had a staff of the magi.
The fighter we called "vegematic" - dual-wielding +5 weapons, belt of storm giant strength, ring of vampiric regeneration, boots of speed, and several other things I don't remember.
This was the group I sent through the Greek Dungeon, fighting representations of the Greek gods. The party won...
My very first time GM'ing: I rolled up several orcs in a 10'x10' room. The treasure I rolled included a Helm of Brilliance. The player's wizard cast sleep, killed the orcs, and got the helm.
Another time, I rolled up a Ring of Invisibility for a group of 1st level characters.
While I was at college, my high school group gamed with a GM who gave every character maxed-out psionics (this was 1E). Here they are around 11th-12th level:
A paladin with a holy avenger and an amulet that would resurrect him when slain. (This was hilarious when he was disintegrated. The GM ruled that he was resurrected - stark naked - in the middle of the battle).
A cleric with a belt of storm giant strength, gauntlets of ogre power, and a hammer of the thunderbolts.
A wizard with a rod of time stop, a cube of force, and a portable hole.
Another wizard had a staff of the magi.
The fighter we called "vegematic" - dual-wielding +5 weapons, belt of storm giant strength, ring of vampiric regeneration, boots of speed, and several other things I don't remember.
This was the group I sent through the Greek Dungeon, fighting representations of the Greek gods. The party won...
Barendd Nobeard
Explorer
40 x 40 room. Tiamat. 'nuff said.
Turanil
First Post
The day when my 16th level or so, AD&D 1e cavalier found the King of Shortswords. The principle was a Sun Blade in that it was a short-sword acting like a bastard sword. However, powers were weird and uber-munchkin, making look Stormbringer like crap in comparison. For example, aside all the spells and powers, it dealt 2d10 of damage instead of 1d6, and once per year could summon 1000 identical flying short-swords (except they wouldn't cast spells) attacking in concert. This was meant to emulate Elric Necromancer's stories when Stormbringer summons other demon swords to kill Arioch (if I do remember well), and indeed my character used the King of Shortswords to kill a god in the nine hells... It wa so awful that when the nine-hells campaign was finished, I discarded the awful artifact alltogether (and reverted to my plain good old vorpal longswordGomez said:
)
Turanil
First Post
I had a good laugh reading this one.Voadam said:
It reminds me, that in the campaign where I did found the King of Shortswords, we were three characters, and each of us had three artifacts!! I remember that in the fifth hell, we had to fight underwater a Tarrasque and four krakens in a cavern filled not only with water, but also anti-magic so only artifacts would operate...
How good this one too!!Chimera said:
BTW: Frankly, I wouldn't want to play again in a Monty haul campaign. But why reading this thread recalls me all those wondrous moments when the game was new, something I cannot get back to despite all that plethora of excellent rules that have been produced for d20?
Last edited:
The Shaman
First Post
1e AD&D game. I was running a 12th level ranger (having worked up from 1st level, I might add) and we slew a cloud giant and seized control of his magical cloud-castle, complete with ballistae, catapults, Greek fire dispensers, and a dragon stable (which I used for my ranger's griffon). The castle has a "bridge" with controls to make the cloud move like a ship.
We flew that damn castle everywhere for the next four or five years.
We flew that damn castle everywhere for the next four or five years.
Aris Dragonborn
First Post
Barendd Nobeard said:
What an odd coincidence. Our encounter was with Bahamut.
20th level paladin (began life at 10th level).
After that encounter, had a +6 Holy Avenger, the Bloodbrand, the complete Regalia of Might (Orb, Scepter, and Crown) which, incidentally, and IIRC, transformed me into a Solar, had gained Excalibur in a previous adventure, also +5 Full Plate, +5 Shield, had millions of gp's.
All this in one summer back in 1988, using 1st Edition rules. God I miss those days (sort of).
Similar Threads
