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<blockquote data-quote="barsoomcore" data-source="post: 910781" data-attributes="member: 812">I like to freak out my players. Not with the sorts of mind-bending plots like PC's above, but by just outright telling them they're hosed.Anyone who's read my Story Hour has heard this one: Party heads up to a remote mining town to find out why silver production has dropped off so drastically. They find the town is under the thrall of a vampire child who was sealed up underground for three thousand years. On the other hand, she looks like a six-year-old.Now, this is Barsoom so everything's a little wacky. Vampires walk around in sunlight no problem, but they can't go near water that has never seen the sun. It's complicated. Fortunately, our heroes hook up with a bunch of northern barbarian types who know all the old secrets about these monsters, and so they're getting themselves prepared.Of course, they think they're playing D&amp;D and assume their goal is to kill things and take their stuff, so they make the mistake of asking these knowledgable barbarians how one kills a vampire.The answer?&quot;You cannot kill them. Only the goddess who created them can kill them.&quot;Of course they don't believe a word of it and proceed to get their butts handed to them by a giggling six-year-old with fangs. Once they figured out that I was in earnest, that they really weren't going to be able to kill this thing they freaked out.It was great because it really played with their expectations. I mean, when you start a D&amp;D game you think you know how it's going to go, sort of. DM throws monsters at you, you kill monsters. Watching my players realise that Barsoom wasn't going to be like that, and the panic in their eyes when they realised they had no idea how this was going to work out or where it was going to go, is something I will take with me to my grave.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="barsoomcore, post: 910781, member: 812"] I like to freak out my players. Not with the sorts of mind-bending plots like PC's above, but by just outright telling them they're hosed. Anyone who's read my Story Hour has heard this one: Party heads up to a remote mining town to find out why silver production has dropped off so drastically. They find the town is under the thrall of a vampire child who was sealed up underground for three thousand years. On the other hand, she looks like a six-year-old. Now, this is Barsoom so everything's a little wacky. Vampires walk around in sunlight no problem, but they can't go near water that has never seen the sun. It's complicated. Fortunately, our heroes hook up with a bunch of northern barbarian types who know all the old secrets about these monsters, and so they're getting themselves prepared. Of course, they think they're playing D&D and assume their goal is to kill things and take their stuff, so they make the mistake of asking these knowledgable barbarians how one kills a vampire. The answer? "You cannot kill them. Only the goddess who created them can kill them." Of course they don't believe a word of it and proceed to get their butts handed to them by a giggling six-year-old with fangs. Once they figured out that I was in earnest, that they really weren't going to be able to kill this thing they freaked out. It was great because it really played with their expectations. I mean, when you start a D&D game you think you know how it's going to go, sort of. DM throws monsters at you, you kill monsters. Watching my players realise that Barsoom wasn't going to be like that, and the panic in their eyes when they realised they had no idea how this was going to work out or where it was going to go, is something I will take with me to my grave. [/QUOTE]

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