Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Bhaal006 02-28-07, 11:32 PM	I would like everybody to post the Most awesome event they've ever played resulting in the death or Near Death of a character. I'll go first. I had a DM once that didn't like Good PC's, gradually during the sessions he would try and corrupt us, bribes and what not. My particular charcter, a CG Dwarf Fighter specialized in the use of Firearms was not taking the Bait, so the DM had an encounter that had us facing a horde of Lvl 6 orc warriors, the option was either die defending a smal settlement of humans or turn tail and run, I sacrificed my self for the greater good, I strapped 2 40lb Kegs of Gunpowder on to my back and ran charging Straight into the orcs detonating myself taking out 27 and saving the poor villagers. The DM was angry enough to never allow guns or gunpowder in any game he ever DM'd, i jowever quit playing with him>
Sharkbite 03-01-07, 01:42 AM	Best near death ever: I DM'd an encounter in 2ndE where the party's halfling thief ran hasted and jumped off the edge of a cliff, making a pretty spectacular jump check, to successfully land a grapple on a flying wyvern's tail. She then made her save versus poison as well as a rough climb check to scale up it's back while it tried to shake her off to reach between the wings. Wyvern's actually having roughly humanoid anatomy, she pulled out the ol' Backstab, crit'd and killed it, then both of them went to plummet to her death. Even her handler thought it was a sacrifice to save the party, and was shocked when the wizard just happened to have mem'd a Tenser's Floating Disc that day, that she manage to catch hold of to save herself. Hands down the best consecutive sets of die rolls I've ever seen. Best Death Ever, I lost my Favored Soul of Bahamut in a recent adventure. I was holding the line against an Adult White Dragon after our Barbarian dropped, and I was virtually full hp. I planted a Deific Vengence on it (Bahamut granting his x2 dmg vengence versus Chromatic dragons instead of undead) so it was hurting, but I was definately not in a place to hold this thing off. So I came up with a hairbrained scheme and told the wizard to fireball on us. I had already taken the Energy Resist to fire for my first class resist, and figured with 50+ hp I should make it through while the dragon would get polished off. Long story short, I failed my reflex save and I've never seen that many 6s turn up in a single throw before. Both me and the dragon were well beyond saving when flames cleared. I loved that finale for ol' Slank though, because he died to save his party, slay a wretched spawn of Tiamat and slight to all Bahamut loved, and directly as a result of his own foolish overconfidence, which is quite fitting for the Chr17 Wis9 Favored Soul.
OutlawJT 03-01-07, 10:22 AM	A quirky and unreasonably daring halfling rogue of mine took part in an assault on a huge towering citadel. The citadel was backed all the way up to a river which ran between it and a cliff. Rather than charge the front gates and try to open them by force (which we could've done at the expense of the small army we were leading albeit at moderate cost to their numbers. My rogue had the bright idea to scale the side of the citadel from the crocodile infested river 'because the enemy will never see it coming' and singlehandedly sneaking through the citadel alone to open the main gate letting the army in to wipe the evil cabal out. So, they raft across the river and my rogue activates his ring of invisibility and starts free climbing (the parties wizard was not present so flying up was not an option). All the way up the unguarded side of the citadel he makes the hefty climb checks, passing a few shuttered windows along the way that he couldn't get a decent grip on to open. He reaches the top and tries to climb the stone 'rail' only to find that it was greased to prevent people from climbing over it. He fails his reflex save and slips off the top of the citadel. Having a generous DM my halfling got a reflex save to try and catch something to halt his fall. He makes it and catches hold of a window, breathing an audible sigh of relief (he took some minor damage from scraping along the wall a bit). Of course, a guard inside heard something (natural 20 on a listen check right in front of all of us) and threw open the shutters on the window to check the sound, knocking the rogue off. Somehow the rogue survived the fall with a few HP remaining and he started swimming back to the party. This is when he was eaten by a crocodile.
periscope 03-01-07, 10:40 AM	OMG! :rofl: the only one i got was, I was playing a fighter named spartacus (it was my 2nd character plz dont kill me). Me, the sorceror, and a rogue were exploring an underground passage and we see this 9 ft tall iron female with halberd. I charged right and started attacking. the wizard fireballed us reasoning that i had a lot of hit points so i should survive. His last words were "OH @#$!!" though the sorceror seemed to forget we were fighting in a tunnel but he made his save (D@#! IT!).
Marcus_Whelan 03-01-07, 10:39 PM	Approximately two weeks ago I lost (sorta) one of my favorite characters of all time. Granted, it was only like the third or fourth game, but I was playing a STONE GIANT monk! FUN! He was virtually unstoppable and tons of fun to RP. Travelling through some random dungeon or another I of course got pushed to the front of the party. The tunnel was pitch black and I had my Dark vision on, unfortunately tarps that are colored the same as the floor are really hard to see with dark vision. A failed spot check, a failed reflex save, and I lost an arm. To a sphere of annihilation. The DM was being oddly generous that day and rolled a d6 to determine what bits we lost when we fell in (3 of us did). I lost my left arm, the druid lost a leg, and our fighter lost both legs. At about this point I noticed two trolls heading our way... peachy. I manage to climb out of the hole and hold them off long enough for the rest of the party to come help out... which they hardly do. In a similar situation to one of the above mentioned deaths the now legless fighter decides he's going to throw his polar opposite OMG destroy the world type relic amulet at the duskblades OMG destroy the world type relic amulet, assuming they would cancel eachother out and cause a nifty explosion. They did. Everyone died except me. I made some damn good fort saves and pulled myself out of the rubble, noticing most of the rest of the party (whose bodies I could find) had landed in the pit next to the sphere. Being the lawful goodie good I was, I attempt to climb back into the pit to carry them out... with one arm... I actually made the climb check, but slipped on the now piled up rubble on the bottom of the pit, and fell directly into the Sphere of Annihilation. For some reason the DM decided that I could indeed be brought back with a reincarnation scroll. I came back as a female kobold. I'm still working towards becoming a stone giant again.
Olidammara 03-02-07, 01:07 AM	oh boy, we get a lot of just odd deaths in my group. first, pirate campeign, the dwarf (he was dropped on the head a bit as a young one) capt. jumps aboard an enemy ship, immeadiately fails his saving throw vs. a polymorph spell, falls to the deck as a 110 lb. halabot, and is then crisped by ma flaming sphere rolling about the front line. second, different pirate campeign, (the group likes our pirates, dont really know why), a new member of our group decided he didnt want to put up with the three necromancers in the group raising all kinds of skeletons (dont know why he wouldnt, i thought 16 undead at the front line was pretty friggin cool) so he starts shxt with the ship's mage. me, being a slightly out there, insane rogue, stroll behind him, plant a dagger in his back, and twist. he turns around, draws sword, rolls a critical fumble on his attacks (1, fallowed by a 1) (this is 2nd ed btw) and ends up implaling himself in the heart. third, our group decided to go with a gimlee vs. legolas theme, and had a party of 1/2 dwarves, 1/2 elves. note, the dwarves are complete pyros, all of them (some sort of family thing) and have a severe phobia of water. so naturally, we get stranded on a 10' x 30' island type thing raised 20' above water level, with no other land in sight, save a 5'x5' rock with a teleporter on it. the water is also infested (like, completely) by crocs. the elves devise a pully system to get one from the first island to the next. the dwarves however, dont like this idea, and abondon it, substituting getting drunk off their arses and dropping to the ground instead. the elves then tie them to a rope, and pul them across one at a time. the last one wakes up in the middle of the air above croc infested waters, freaks out, falls to the sea, down to the floor of the sea (only about 50'), and takes siffication damage while dropping everyhting he has on so he can swim back up. a croc sees him, goes in for the attack, and the dwarf ends up grappling it, force-riding it back up to the rock, adn hopping off safely, only to be pushed back in as a joke by his brother and eaten. those were actually really long, sorry.
deadmetal 03-02-07, 03:21 AM	I've had quite a few great characters suffer untimely demises, but I'd have to say the best one was one of my more maniacal Rogues. Now, this Rogue was somewhat obsessed with collecting bits of dead enemies, pelts etc. so he could one day have them forged into a particularly grotesque suit of enchantable armor, and before the fight in which he died, we had waded hip-deep through a huge dungeon. Naturally, he was loaded for bear (least I think there was a bear in there) by the time we found our main target - a young Black Dragon. Now, the cave we were in - it was deep inside a mountain stronghold, positively massive in scale, with an equally deep underground river running through along one wall. Big cliffs, and a long fall to the water, that fun kinda stuff. The party charged into combat, and, being the Rogue, I hung back shooting it until I could swoop in and sneak attack the bastard. It didn't like that. Now, to get the right angle to keep shooting without much risk of hitting my party members, I got dangerously close to the edge of the cliff, so what does the dragon do? It bull rushes me, I naturally fail resisting, and get flung into the abyss. Party kills the dragon, leaves and heads towards the nearby bog the river drains into. They eventually found my rogue face down being gnawed on by a croc, though not after 5 or 6 false alarms - you know, pelts and hides caught on rocks and logs, that kinda stuff.:D
FrostWolf 03-02-07, 04:13 AM	Thlarook. My Barb2/ Sor4. NG human. We had crossed a swamp to get to a cave. After entering the cave, we quickly dispatched the henchmen of the Blighter, only to come up against her Trent. My spells managed to keep us (I enlarged the Dwarf barb)alive while the druid drove it back with her bow. I lead the charge after it. Right into the Blighter. I used my last enlarge on myself, then went for the Dire wolveine (Can't remember if it was fiendish or not...). The Dwarf dropped the Trent, then assisted me with the beast. At this time, (3 rounds in) The blighter lit the room on fire, driving me back to the edge, and dropping the dwarf. A few rounds trying to get to the dwarf prooved useless as he kept slowly bleeding out, but the flames had burned out. The Blighter Wild shaped and promptly went after the Dwarf. She took several arrows from our thief and druid's magical bow. I charged before she could close the final gap to the dwarf and dropped her with a Crit+ arcane Strike (I had a ring that gave me access to it, despite not being able to cast third level spells). The dwarf was at -9 when I stabilized him, then I advanced in a charge on the last foe. A gnome figher with a crossbow who had been plinking us the entire battle. I missed her by 1, and on her next action, she stepped back and Shot me through the heart with a crit and max damage. It was a good death, filled with honor and pride, and it was the only thing that prevented me from giving up gaming for ever. For you see, that was going to be my last session. But it was so good, that I decided to keep playing:)
TheCrawlingSpleen 03-02-07, 04:18 AM	...scale the side of the citadel from the crocodile infested river... the water is also infested (like, completely) by crocs. They eventually found my rogue face down being gnawed on by a croc... Wow, crocodiles are more popular than I would have guessed. Somewhere, sharks are getting jealous. Somehow the rogue survived the fall with a few HP remaining and he started swimming back to the party. This is when he was eaten by a crocodile. :D I love scenes that could involve the "I'm okay" curse. Rogue falls several hundred feat and hits the water. Party: :shocked: Rogue: "I'm okay!" Crocodile chomps Rogue Party: :doh:
3DJutsu 03-02-07, 04:33 AM	I had a Spirit Shaman that died and took out his foe. Party is inside the dungeon and we know this tunnel that breaks off is trapped(compacting walls), so I summon an earth elemental and have it hold the walls apart, I step inside only to be dual critted by an equinine (?? freaking horse skeleton with a halberd) and with us that meant instant death. DM did however let me cast a Flamestrike in response as my dying action. The only thing the party ever saw was me walk in, cry out in pain, and then a big-arse collum of fire :D
dark_nony 03-02-07, 07:10 AM	I was a Level 12 OA samurai. I was my lords Elite soldier and his head gaurd. The lords castle was under sige when I spoted a few assassins going for my lord (Spot Check). I told my lord that for his own saftey Im poting him in a small room. He whent there. And when i gaurded the door a assassin made a hole in a wall and killd my lord. I killd the assassin then and his team. I was left wounding to death (0 HP). As i whent outside to loke at the window I sow all my army dead. As a samurai with only a broken sword i piked up my lords katana and killd my self. Yea the point is a samurai killing himself for not turning ronin is cool...
Devlonir 03-02-07, 08:48 AM	In a fight against a basalisk in the top of a mage's tower my fighter gets petrified. Not having anyone with a stone to flesh spell, the party decides to take me to the city to get me turned back to normal. The tower itself was too dangerous still inside, so they lowered me down the side. They all worked together to slowly let me-turned-statue down the side of tower.. Everyone aids the strongest in the party that wasn't me (str 14) and succeed, so he had a +8 total on his roll. Because of my weight, the DM already said the DC would be 20, so he couldnt take 10.. he then rolled a 1..., I fell down 50ft and shattered on the stone ground. Let's just say that after the stone to flesh, it was a damned mess! We just started the campaign at lvl 7 or 9 or something (high lvl high power campaign to be planned) The first door we see is a heavy metal door and locked from the inside. So my high Con, high Wis and bull strenghted Dwarven Cleric steps up with his adamantine Warhammer and smashes it in (this was literally the first closed door we encountered in that campaign) This action triggered a finger of death spell with a DC of about 16 or 17.. and my Dwarf had a Fort Save of around +14 against a save or die spell with a Fort Save... I rolled a 1. Actually, all my best deaths come unexpected.. and usually because me or someone else rolls a 1. It's all in the game and I've learned to accept it.. My coolest near death in which i actually saved the party was: We were walking across an enormous elephant graveyard to reach an old World Tree (DM created setting). Suddenly, from behind us, a few of the dead elephant's rise as huge elephant skeletons, our party begins to run. Me, being the Psychic Warrior Archer, See I am under a branch of the tree i might be able to reach with a dimension door. My DM asks me to make a concentration check to see if i can get the distance to the branch right while both running and avoiding attacks from the elephant. I fail it by 2, so I get up there, but just a few feet away from the branch i wanted to get on. I then also fail my Reflex Save to maybe get a hold of the branch still. So I fall down... During the fall, I start Manyshotting the elephants with my undead bane arrows, slaying 2 of the three elephants during my 300ft fall. Finally, the DM says that I will probably fall on top of the final elephant the next round and I grin. I enlarge myself to Huge size and squash the Last elephant skeleton under me, we both share the falling damage and i manage to just survive it (thanks to the psionic power vigor!).
FrostWolf 03-02-07, 09:03 AM	My coolest near death in which i actually saved the party was: We were walking across an enormous elephant graveyard to reach an old World Tree (DM created setting). Suddenly, from behind us, a few of the dead elephant's rise as huge elephant skeletons, our party begins to run. Me, being the Psychic Warrior Archer, See I am under a branch of the tree i might be able to reach with a dimension door. My DM asks me to make a concentration check to see if i can get the distance to the branch right while both running and avoiding attacks from the elephant. I fail it by 2, so I get up there, but just a few feet away from the branch i wanted to get on. I then also fail my Reflex Save to maybe get a hold of the branch still. So I fall down... During the fall, I start Manyshotting the elephants with my undead bane arrows, slaying 2 of the three elephants during my 300ft fall. Finally, the DM says that I will probably fall on top of the final elephant the next round and I grin. I enlarge myself to Huge size and squash the Last elephant skeleton under me, we both share the falling damage and i manage to just survive it (thanks to the psionic power vigor!). Freaking Awsome!
JarionSilverblades 03-02-07, 09:24 AM	In DRAGONLANCE I had a Kender Ranger/Rogue. During a nasty battle with a Dragon, I let it swallow me, and then once inside the dragon I place a portable hole inside another portable hole. Now that’s a Spicy Meatball!
Tuah 03-02-07, 05:00 PM	My friends and I failed our reflex saves, and fell down a slippery shaft into a pitch-black room with goo all over the floor. I failed another reflex save. I casually walked into a geletinous cube with two of my allies. Our containers of geletin-destroyer stuff leaked out and damaged it, but we were still stuck inside. My friend and other ally teamed up and killed it, but everyone inside died too. Luckily, it was RPGA, and this one guy I hate was in it with me. I was done with that character anyway. xD
Jaxgaret 03-02-07, 07:06 PM	This one time my character failed an SLA Finger of Death save. Then my party betrayed me and took my corpse to the enemy. The enemy leader even used "Speak With Dead" to gloat. I love evil campaigns :D
3DJutsu 03-02-07, 07:34 PM	*I posted this one in the wrong thread, so it goes here now* Ohh, I got another one: Me: Mortimer Thunderfist, Dwarven Barbarian Situation: Critical, dwarven city is being overrun by Drow and the main preistess leading the invasion has just transformed into a Draegoloth (???). We are holed up in citidal on a hill. Mortimer: *puts on a helmet with a spike on it* Alright lads, toss me at tha witch! Party: ?!?!?! What?!?! Mortimer: Ye heard me lads, doit, im gonna bury me axe in her! ---After a little argument and what-not, Mortimer is loaded up in sling/catapult/balitsta-thing (i forget)--- Mortimer: *gets launched at preistess/Draegoloth* Hey you! MORADIN SENDS HIS REGARDS!!! ---Later on the Draegoloth broke through with my Dwarven corpse in it's hands, but she got f*cked up in the proccess, DM ruled she was at a fraction of her hp--- Mortimer, the most bad-ass Dwarf I've ever created...
FreAkOuTRG 03-02-07, 08:31 PM	Every game is a near death experience for my group. Every time someone rolls a 1 they catch on fire. Story: Druid cast a flame spell and rolled a natural 1 on his ranged attack roll. The DM ruled that the forest burst into flame. Me, and I believe the druid, died in the fire. But so did the tendroculos (is that how it's spelled?). It was so funny that the next time someone rolled a 1, the DM said "Ok, you burst into flames." We've had a lot of milage with this one.
CheeseMan 03-03-07, 12:23 AM	OMG! :rofl: the only one i got was, I was playing a fighter named spartacus (it was my 2nd character plz dont kill me). Me, the sorceror, and a rogue were exploring an underground passage and we see this 9 ft tall iron female with halberd. I charged right and started attacking. the wizard fireballed us reasoning that i had a lot of hit points so i should survive. His last words were "OH @#$!!" though the sorceror seemed to forget we were fighting in a tunnel but he made his save (D@#! IT!). leeeroy jenkins!!
mc_thac0 03-03-07, 10:29 AM	It seems that rogues are disproportionately represented here in spectacular deaths. That means they are either a noble, self-sacrificing lot or they just lend themselves to spectacular deaths. I tend to think its the latter. I, myself, have had what I thought was a spectacular death/Big-Bad-Evil-Guy kill involving a wizard/rogue being gnawed upon in a green dragon's mouth while fiddling with some fireball device, but that kind of pales in comparison to some of these other stories. One of my favorite near-death stories is anything but spectacular. A buddy and I were playing in a new dnd group and in one of our earlier sessions. My friend decides he's going to play the sleazy rogue, Hector, who eventually became infamous for betraying his companions (e.g. selling magical items we discovered, giving away important info. ,etc.) and for being totally useless in combat given his propensity for looting corpses while the rest of us were fighting and dying. Proving that karma is real and that Constitution is somewhat important to a rogue, my buddy only gave Hector an 8 Con (he easily could have improved this, but he felt Dex. and Int. were better suited for his intended dastardly deeds). Needless to say, we got into a minor skirmish with some kobolds...kobolds, I say. In a flash of uncharacteristic bravery, Hector pulls his magical dagger (one of our only remaining magical items) from its sheath and wings it at the nearest kobold. He misses, of course, and the dagger flips end-over-end off the edge of the cliff. Buh-bye. Soon (by soon, I mean immediately), Hector drops from the mighty offensive capabilities of the kobolds. He spends the rest of the combat crawling around the skirmish area alternating between conciousness and unconciousness. I believe he drank a couple of potions and had a healing spell or two sunk into him, but he kept getting hit by the kobolds' ranged weapons. We laughed our a$$es off. I guess you had to be there. I think we sometimes have fond memories for characters for exciting deaths and for exceptional effectiveness, but I'd also say that some of the more memorable and loveable characters are the crazy, inept, and poorly constructed ones as well. I still love Hector. Might name my first-born after him...
Fenris_Lathiin 03-03-07, 11:09 AM	None of the deaths in my games are ever spectacular. In fact, they're generally quite embarassing. First, one of my players was playing a blind Samurai (yes, he's a huge Zatoichi fan) who had initiated an honorable duel with a skullcrusher ogre for control of the ogre's tribe. Normally, the skullcrusher ogre wouldn't have agreed to this, but the samurai had already killed one of the ogres of his tribe in single combat, and was impressed. During the fight, the party rogue, who's player should probably win some kind of disruptive player award, decided to sneak off and kill the skullcrusher ogre. Anyway, he managed to succeed in killing the ogre and ending the fight. The samurai was injured and attacked the rogue, but he was injured and the rogue pretty much mopped the floor with him. The rest of the party was trying to break the fight up and they were trying to convince the samurai to calm down. Someone finally got the samurai with a tanglefoot bag. Since the samurai was the only eastern character on the team, he tried unsuccessfully to explain to the party that the rogue had dishonored him and he should be allowed vengence. The party just thought he was crazy. The rogue also convinced the party that he thought he was helping the samurai (we would later find out that he was lying and he just wanted to dishonor and kill the samurai). The samurai soon broke free of the tanglefoot bag and attacked the rogue again, so the party just stood back and let the rogue set him on fire with alchemist fire. The poor samurai burned to death in what was probably the most undignified fashion imaginable. That rogue never died, but his player left the party due to problems with school, removing the character from the game. I had a city watch member (who was a serious Sam Vimes rip off) who had been a recurring character in trying to hunt this rogue down, finally corner him and subdue him with a swift kick to the nuts. The party would later come down to the watch building to loot his stuff from the evidence locker, with the full blessing of the city watch.
crimsonwolf 03-03-07, 11:37 AM	the classic of rolling a 1 on a vorpral and rolling a 20 on the crit
MarduktheDestroyer 03-03-07, 11:59 AM	One time i ran a underdark adventure in an abandoned underground city populated with spiders. when the battle against an advanced huge size spider eater arrived, the psion ended up being grappled under the flying spider eater at the moment it died. I allowed him a reflex save, which he failed by one, so i ruled the spider eater fell only on his legs, which were no longer connected to his body. (Those suckers are heavy) Thankfully some local Myconids crafted him a wooden wheelchair but the PC was still pretty distrought. After trying to kill several party members out of spite (He actaullly managed to mindcrush the ogre, which was reincarnated as a Gnome. Go reincarnate!), the druid baleful polymorphed him into a rabbit, although he successfully retained his mind, if not his legs. Another Campaign saw a half-orc monk leap onto the back of the adult red dragon, nearly breaking its spine (It had 1 hp left). The dragon, fearful of death, took his next turn to dive 150f down into the rift with a river of lava below, monk and all. Not even a grappling hooking Swashbuckler could save him, although we couldnt find the speed of falling, can anyone tell me where that is? The point is the monk got fried :weep:
bobothechimp 03-03-07, 12:18 PM	Rogues do really seem to pull a lot of heroism out of their $#%, when the situation calls for it. Note: The DM did ignore some rules about liches and their phylacteries for the sake of the story. A campaign I was playing quite a while ago involved the party going up against a necromancer attempting to become a lich. How creative. We're inside of the necromancer's tower/castle at this point. The party got themselves into a bad situation, and were forced to run. I was a CG rogue, and the first to get out of there. Also the first to fall into a pit trap. The rest of the party stops, I simply tell them to keep going, I'll be fine. They run off, and manage to get away. Undead can't shamble that quickly, you know. I'm left in the pit. Standing there, my bit of heriosm used up, and really regretting that I did this. The gaggle of zombies and skeletons shows up, drags me out of the pit, carry me to the roof of the tower and bind me onto some altar. The necromancer walks up to me, says something about preparations being complete, laughs. Generic evil guy drivel. I spit in his face. Then an ornate ceremony, lasting several hours. I spend the entire time insulting the necromancer and his ancestors. Around the time ritual ends, the party crashes, well, the party. The necromancer-now-lich cackles maniacally at how they've failed, how he has become immortal, and how he's sure they will enjoy his choice of phylactery. Me. Gasp! Horror all around! How do they defeat an enemy that will constantly ressurect as long as their lovable scoundrel still lives! They can't kill me, so they'll have to find some other way to defeat their foe. (The party was almost exclusively LG, with a NG and me being CG. Two paladins, a cleric, a wizard, and a fighter.) The group charges the lich and his minions, easily carving their way through the peons and begin to slaughter the lich. He simply stands there and laughs at their futile effort as he falls and reforms, completely fine. (Ignore the rules here. It makes for better story.) Now, as far as everyone knows, I'm just hanging around, chained to the altar. While they've been having their epic battle, I slipped out of the chains, walked over to the ledge, and stood there for the moment. The lich begins his speech, saying he will allow the party to live, so long as they become his minions. Never! We'll never fight for evil! Blah, blah, paladin speech. Then, you shall die. The fight continues. The lich cackles, taking a step back from combat. He begins another speech. What a bore. You can never defeat me! I can not be slain, as long as your precious scoundrel remains alive. As he gestures towards the pedestal, he becomes confused. The party turns as well, and is also lost. Here's my time to shine! "Hey!" I yell. Everyone turns to see me, standing there. "You're saying that as long as I'm alive, you can't die?" Everyone is confused for a moment, then a look of horror comes over their faces. I simply smirk, lean back, and fall off the tower. A few screams of No! from the party, followed by an elongated NOOOOOOOOOO!!!! from the lich as his phylactery is destroyed.
Bhaal006 03-03-07, 12:22 PM	fall speed is 60ft per round, however the dragon was diving so it was moving at double its speed, 300ft per round, that monk was dead in three seconds.
MarduktheDestroyer 03-03-07, 12:47 PM	Thanks for that, that may have actually saved him as he would have fallen off the dragon when it bombed down. Mind you he was a terrible player and left after his monk got deep fried, so no big loss.
Isomer 03-03-07, 03:41 PM	i ran a game where the dungeon the party went into was this this huge multichambered iceburg that housed a breeding pair of adult white dragons. In the bottom chamber of the ieburg was the treasure hoard. Normally it would be pitch black but they brought a light source with them which cast beautiful reflections off all of the gold and icy walls. This in turn drew the attention of a number of aquatic trolls that were swimming in the water beneith the iceburg (remember the floor is only ice after all). The trolls began to punch up through the ice floor breaking the very ground the pc's were standing on and causing the room to flood with very very cold water (this made for a fun and dynamic encounter). One of the trolls popped up right under the feet of the platemail ladden fighter, a reflex saved followed as he tried to dive away from the now cracking floor. The player rolled very poorly, i can't remember if it was a 1 or 2, but at any rate he went under. With his heavy armor he sank like a brick into near depthless fridged waters. He tried and failed swim check after swim check, to his credit he did manage to hold his breath for some time before dying. Another note, due to this and a few other painful (but not as lethal) experiances with water all of my friends have an absolute rule that when i'm running a game you take at least 1 rank in swim if not more, even when it's not a class skill.
Demonicazura 03-03-07, 04:20 PM	Alright, this one was when I played a gestalt swordsage/ SA Fighter. We had just faced some undead in the underground tunnels of some ruins. We fought the BBEG's minions and he flew away. We were exploring the tunnels again to see if we could scrounge up some loot. We found some, then decided to keep going. We went down a hallway, my character was a little hurt, but only a few off of his total. Seeing as he had the torch, and was most eager about finding stuff, he went first. Triggered a trap that sent a brick swinging into his chest. The damage rolled was just enough to kill me, not a single point more. That moment taught me to befriend the cleric in the party and by cure light wound wands. ;D I have a few more, I'll share them another time.
RuckusFox 03-03-07, 09:06 PM	Hrm...well. We have a quickest character ever one in our group... A level 3 fighter is made in Sharn, the city of towers. Immediately after walking into the town, he sees a ninja do several wall jumps off of one roof to get to an even higher roof and elude guards. "COOL! I WANNA DO THAT!" yells the fighter. He immediately crawls to the top of the building, runs at the wall, fails both checks for jump, balance, and tumble, and lands face first. No one helps him; he is dead within minutes.
periscope 03-03-07, 09:32 PM	Hrm...well. We have a quickest character ever one in our group... A level 3 fighter is made in Sharn, the city of towers. Immediately after walking into the town, he sees a ninja do several wall jumps off of one roof to get to an even higher roof and elude guards. "COOL! I WANNA DO THAT!" yells the fighter. He immediately crawls to the top of the building, runs at the wall, fails both checks for jump, balance, and tumble, and lands face first. No one helps him; he is dead within minutes. :eek: :rofl:
Darkness is good 03-03-07, 10:20 PM	a half orc monk, 26 orcs, one ancient text. The monk had to to read the entire text *which would take several rounds* While battling the orcs hord. he never failed a concentration check, and finished reading the text, AND killed 17 of the orcs. But died before he could tell the other party members about the text. *was in abbysal, and he was the only one who could read it* more for irony value than a best death ever tho'
Edda 03-03-07, 10:50 PM	One near death: We were running City of the Spider Queen and we got to Glauroth's Chasm. The DM was very excited as he said to me later, "Glauroth was so cool! It was going to be an awesome fight! And then I fumbled almost every single roll ... it was embarassing!" The sorcerer/dragon disciple cast Fly on a couple of people, but being the party's druid, Shai wild-shaped into a Dire Bat and with her Dire Bat animal companion, they made it up to the top quickly. When Glauroth showed up and did an amazing feat of catching his claws on the uneven rock and slamming into the walls. The DM realized he was doing more damage to himself than to anyone else. Things started looking pretty shady for a bit, so Shai took a flying leap off the top of the chasm and dove down the wall, handing a Staff of Light to the cleric on the way. We calculated that on the third round, she would be 10 feet from the floor - the Dragon flew at Shai who blew him a kiss and in the last 10 feet, wild shaped into a hawk and flew upward. The dragon failed his turn check and went barreling into the ground. Actual Death: I had a bard who grew up in a carnival. I was pretty excited about her, but she ended up never making it past level two. Everyone in the party had taken a pretty serious beating in each fight, but I never lost a single hit point (I played a lot of psionicists and thus got very good at keeping out of the way). Everyone was grumbling at me, so I decided to have Asha do the honorable thing and check out an opening at the top of a ladder. Well, 12 seconds later, the party heard a scream as Asha's body landed in front of them, missing a face. The rest of the party died in the next room. When we rolled up new characters and approached the opening to the cavern, the DM had us roll a Listen check. The ranger managed to hear a faint "AAaaauuuugghhh!" as the bard went falling (faceless) to her death.
starvinmarvin07 03-04-07, 12:43 AM	Near death for me.. I'm a lvl 8 catfolk rogue/invisible blade, and we're assaulting this town hall turned fortress in an abandoned/flooded city. While in combat, enemy goblin Mindbender suggests me into going into the next room to get a treasure. I go in there, find the box, and open it. Orb of acid. No biggie, I reflex/evasion out. Here comes the dangerous part; In file 2 lizardmen, 3-4 hobgoblins, and a ogre barbarian that could probably 2 shot me, and the mind bender (through telepathy) says they're there to help me find the treasure (obviously, there was no treasure in the chest). So, its me in the back corner with enough mobs to kill me three times over, and they're all going for weapons, and I make my will save. How the hell will I get out? I throw the chest I'm holding (was holding it out to the ogre to smash it for me) into the face of one of the hobgoblins, Use absolutely INSANE tumble checks (+15 plus action points, hooray) to dive past 4 monsters and leap through a 2 foot by 2 foot window as the ogre is smashing the wall behind me. Most awesome, cinematic escape of my life.
Bhaal006 03-04-07, 01:03 AM	this is the reason i use action points in every game i DM
crowclub 03-04-07, 03:48 AM	My Barbarian should have taken the money....but no , He opened the box! He failed his Will save and ended up as a carving on the side of the box!
periscope 03-04-07, 03:54 AM	My Barbarian should have taken the money....but no , He opened the box! He failed his Will save and ended up as a carving on the side of the box! Go into detail I need to hear this one...
Drausktanchache 03-04-07, 01:45 PM	I had a group of PCs neutral in alignment, lvl 12, a barbarian/frenzied, sorcerer, cleric, and a fighter. They had been in battle with a cleric, who had necrotic cyst prepared, one got its head blown clean off by a cyst exploding, two other were dominated. The fourth on managed to get away, but later in the city, he died to the words: "Don't worry I am a doctor." As a surgeon tried to remove the cyst, *rolled a 1*.
underscore_ed 03-04-07, 10:39 PM	I was playing my first third addition character, a half-orc ranger. The party consisted of an halfling rogue and an elf cleric. Upon reaching third level, we were in some generic dungeon when I came across an intelligent, extremely jealous bastard sword. I slowly over time kept losing my Will checks and the sword was taking over. Towards the end of the dungeon we came across three treasure chests. Each of us opened up a chest and I got an intelligent, halfling hating kama. There was a battle of wills in my head to which I was lost. The kama beat the sword which I tossed in disgust. The other party members didn't know what was happening and didn't know either of the weapons were intelligent and slightly evil. The halfling rogue picked up my old sword, lost the will check and was filled with hatred towards me. I was filled with hatred towards the rogue. We ended up fighting an incredibly long battle, each wielding a weapon we sucked at. The halfling ended up with a natural 20, confirmed crit and finished me off right there.
Aminvelos 03-05-07, 01:09 AM	I'm running a game where a group of adventures rummaged through some ancient ruins. The battles were difficult, every one of the players were under 7 hit points, all except the level8 warblade which was at 48, and they had already retrieved the baron's helmet.(Their quest item) As they entered the second to last chamber they noticed the door blocked by a huge boulder so they natural started turning the two cranks at the side of where the door should have been, with the warblade taking point. As Devon slowly walked in he noticed the a barbed Devil hanging from the ceiling with a grand smile upon its face. Luckily for devon the Barbed Devil was quite suprised it would finally be released from the lifeless ruin. Devon threw his dagger(made his roll) and hit the rope that held the great stone up which loudly fell back down enclosing him in the room, but saving his other companions from any possible threat. He then won his initiative and charged the devil doing 24 damage after damage reduction. Next it was the barbed devil's turn and he crit doing 48 damage to the warblade and amazing failed his follow up grapple with a natural 1. In one last ditch effort the warblade dropped its shield tumbled away, while charging up the wall and jumping back at the devil critting it for 117 damage dropping the devil. Unfortunately he was unable to make his balance check on the landing and was dealt 1 in damag, bringing him to a -1. Devon was unable to stabilize before his allies reached him. But he took his death well.
Fnep Wigglesworth 03-06-07, 08:52 AM	Well this isn't actualy my death but one of my friend's death during a typical dungeon crawl. There we were, looking for goodies, me the halfling rogue sent ahead to scout for monsters and traps and we reach this hallway with a door at the end. As I advance, I notice a pressure slab on the floor and a hole on the wall (clearly a poison dart trap). Thinking it'd be funny if my friend got shot with an arrow, I keep quiet and walk beside it letting my party follow. As I start inspecting the door, I hear a thud. I turn around and see my party member collapsed on the floor, blood coming out of a hole in his head. o.O In game mechanics, what happened is that the dart trap needs an attack roll to hit a PC. Unluckily for my friend, the DM rolled a 20, then another 20 and another one! In 3rd ed, this is immediate death. So my friend is forever known as the guy who got killed by a dart that deals 1 dmg. (must have entered the head from the ear and made soup with his brain or somethign) This remains the greatest death to have occured in our party.
Aage 03-06-07, 10:14 AM	Well, not a death exactly, but it probably should have been... Our party was at the top level of some tower, my fighter walks strait into a trap and falls down through the floor (we kind of didn't have any rogue)... My buddies look down at a 300 feet fall past sharp razors and figure "ah well"... an hour later they are caught up by my fighter... not only did he survive the fall, he climbed all the way up again :D Dwarf with massive constitution :rolleyes:
Squirrelloid 03-06-07, 12:15 PM	I was the DM, but this really wasn't my fault! (Ok, the first death was my fault... the rest of the party... not so much.) Some things to remember: (1) this is 2nd edition, so fireball expands to fill its volume of space in closed quarters. (2) In 2nd, when a wand is destroyed, it detonates dealing 1d6/charge remaining damage to everything within a 20' radius. (3) We were using wildmagic from ToB combined with a huge surge table (that i think is on the internet somewhere) for when a spell would wild surge for 2 reasons. (Ie, Nahal's getting a surge result on the level variation table). That's where the Winchester Aught-6 (loaded) came from. In the words of one of the players: The party is close to the end of their epic quest. They just have one room to complete in a dungeon before they pick up the second half of a major artifact, and can conclude the story, saving the world in the process. They open the door to the room. It smells *really* bad. The mage immediately casts a fireball into the room. (He realizes that the smell means Neo-otyugh, duh - DM) The party is standing far enough back that it can avoid the fireball; however, they are all caught in the massive methane explosion that it precipitates. The mage dies. The remainder of the party is pretty seriously wounded. Because of this, and because they're running out of air, they head back to the surface. Upon reaching the surface, an argument breaks out between the elven fighter, who want to loot the corpse, and the death priest, who both refuses to raise the corpse and insists that it remain unlooted, so he can perform the appropriate funeral rites on it. When the elven fighter persists in attempting to loot the corpse, the death priest casts Hold Person on him, successfully. He then spends the twenty minutes until the elven fighter wakes up performing the funeral rites, which involve igniting the corpse in the middle of a pentagram sketched on the ground. (Those dang death priests - DM) Unfortunately, the mage happens to be carrying a wand of fire and a loaded Winchester aught-6. The Winchester goes off in a random direction, and manages to catch the bard in the leg, leaving her prone and near the body. The wand? All of its charges go off, incinerating the entire party, with the exception of the elven fighter, who's still standing paralyzed thirty feet away... (end player description) Some amusing notes: (1) The bard and the chaos mage had quite an adversarial relationship. The Winchester getting the bard was truly appropriate, even if it was generated randomly. (2) The Death Priest had a covered item of continual darkness that was not destroyed in the explosion, but its covering was. The fighter regained motor control in pitch blackness. (Also amusingly, the item of continual darkness was the "Hand of Vecna" - well, an authentic looking forgery - that they had found and cast continual darkness on). (3) Additionally, the Death Priest had an artifact that forced a save or die on anyone not of appropriate alignment that touched it. The fighter, after regaining motor control, attempted to cover the "Hand of Vecna" before touching the artifact. He succeeded. (4) This was considered a fitting end for a campaign that had been full of silliness.
Tante_Frigide 03-06-07, 12:16 PM	The best death ever: DM: "In the middle of the room hoovers a black sphere!" Paladin: "I cast a detect evil spell. Is it evil" DM: "Yes. And you are stunned" Wizard: "I cast detect magic. Is it ...." DM: "You are getting blind!!!" Player: "'Come on Alex - your rogue can touch it, haha!" Alex: "Ok, I touch it..." Do I have to say more?
Ozzymandias 03-06-07, 12:45 PM	I designed a dungeon that was composed of three levels: the first was all traps, the second all roleplaying and the third all combat. The trap level had a couple of monsters that could be fought, but they were all designed to be overcome primarily by playing smart. The main threat of this level was a dwarven master trapsmith who had died while building the traps; thus his ghost lived on, inhabiting the traps, keeping them in good condition and resetting them. One PC near death involved a rope bridge that, when weight was evenly placed across the center, would twist at one end, creating a pretzel-like effect across the whole. A character caught in the middle would be squeezed rather painfully, but wouldn't die (or even take much damage). However, the players reacted quickly and cut the rope on their end. This caused the climbing character to fall and hit the wall, where he let go of the rope. They saved him with a casting of featherfall and a rope tossed down. The deaths of this level were far more sinister. The players found their way into a hidden room, where a monstrous scythe-blade trap was housed. The ghost possessed the trap and began to animate it. One PC threw a bead of force at the machine, not realizing that it created a ten-foot bubble as a secondary effect. The machine was damaged, and two-thirds of it were trapped inside the sphere. So was another PC. Since the machine was mostly intact, the ghost animated it again and sliced the PC to bits (as he was unconscious). On a second time through this level, the player whose PC was ribboned had a new PC (a relative of the first), who was possessed by the ghost. One room was trapped with a crushing ceiling. It only worked under a set of specific conditions. After being possessed, he reset the trap and waited for the party to return. Since their path required them to pass through the room to get where they were going, it was pretty much assured that the ghost would kill the entire party. The players were a bit too wise, however, and guessed that something was wrong. Instead, only the new PC died when the ceiling came crushing down. Finally, and this is the best part, this same player's third PC tried a teleport trick to save an NPC who was falling to his death (this was on the second level). What the player didn't realize was that he couldn't manifest his teleport power quickly enough (according to the rules) to grab the NPC and leap back before falling some 500 feet. Since the floor was 250 feet below them, they both fell and hit rock bottom. Because it was the player's third character, I decided to be a bit lenient and allowed another PC the opportunity to save his companion. He managed to throw a rope, which he had been holding, and the falling character caught it. As the player indicated that he wrapped it around his arm for support, I had him make some rolls, and, as he rolled really bad, it happened that the rope wrapped tight and ripped the flesh from his arm. He lived, but his arm was crippled as a result. It was a good dungeon :)
BioEngine 03-06-07, 12:49 PM	Our group of level 1 child-age characters went up against some huge snake tail / humanoid torso thing at the top of a tower, so I cast a spell that made the roof it was curled around slippery (can't remember the name, iirc it was a Cleric spell) and while it fell it took two of our party with it.
foxtail 03-06-07, 01:08 PM	Playing a published adventure recently, our group snuck up on a band of orcs, their cheiftain, and their ogre slave partying it up in a ruined castle. Our front-line fighters stayed on the ground floor ready to rush them, while our spellthief and sorcerer climbed to the upper level to get a clear shot on ranged attacks. The two of them came across a sentry on the balcony, and having been spotted gave the signal for the rest of us to attack. The melee types charged into the room, hacking up orcs and heading for the boss. The sorceror hit the sentry with a scorching ray, setting his clothes aflame, and the spellthief nailed him in the head with a sling sneak attack. The flaming orc fell off the ledge to the floor below... right as our ardent was moving under that exact spot. Having been seriously wounded the previous round, the impact took him out.
Rontric 03-06-07, 01:46 PM	i play and bard and me and the rog decided it would be fun to play a joke on our pally since he was getting his speical mount and what not we where thinking yeah he gonna get a horse and the idea was disable device on the saddle fall off in mid ride all the party gets a good laugh at his expence.....so the DM gives him a griffin flying mount and well the idea just keeps getting funny so we set in the direction of a green dragons lair our pally decides to fly up above the tree line to scout a bit so he spots the dragon comming for us and engages mid-air dog fight with us shooting from the ground....well we made it through most the battle when the DM looks and me and the rog and smiles his its time to roll new char smile as the pally rolls a one in which he failed again leans to much the the right saddle comes undone free fall dragon dives to attack while the pallys in mid fall but the pally is just out of reach the pally and dragon both dive head 1st into the ground the dragon to the side of our wagon the pally right through the middle of the wagon dragons got about 10 hp left the pally is now a can of soup i run over stab the dragon call shot to the brain through the eye the dm looks up at the rog and tells him to make a reflex he fails and is knocked out by the pallys saddle this is how 90% of our fights go we patch up the rog and have to rez the pally so far we are in dept 5 wagons and about 3 rez scrolls and one true rez:D
DareDevil3 03-06-07, 01:56 PM	was playing a fighter and our group was battling a dragon. both sides badly hurt the dragon tried to fly away. i made some outragous roles and was able to scamper up his back. made another outragous role, planted on of my 2 swords in his back to keep my balance. Went to strike, and i fumbled, we were using the a fumble chart at that time and i cut my wrist off that was holding on to the sword i planted in his back and fell off the dragon 200 feet and splated when i hit the ground
aibohphobia 03-06-07, 03:00 PM	Our DM was giving us subtle hints to stand down in a battle, and let the enemy pass - putting a Demon of his own design at the head of the column should have been a hint. Anywho, one of the leaders of the party was playing a knight, and he'd been given a Giant Eagle mount. He'd been taking extra-special-wonderful care of the bird the whole damn campaign, and the mount was practically a member of the party in its own right. ...and then the demon evicerated the knight in two rounds. Realizing how badly we'd screwed up, and how dangerous the demon was, our DM figured losing one of our players was enough of a lesson in almighty DM power. The Giant Eagle flipped out. Not worrying about dice rolls or stats, our DM had the eagle perform a kamikaze dive. It shattered the demon and itself, whooping both, and saving us from the real threat of the encounter. Was it awesome roleplaying? No. Was it (unfortunately) a high point of the encounter? Yep. Proof that a DM with his back against a wall can make anything happen - or at least make it awesome.
xithor 03-06-07, 03:09 PM	Wayyyyyy back in a second edition Birthright campaign I was running Voldam Wulfsblud a LG Azrai blooded Vos Cavalier kit of about 12th level or so. I get caught with out my full plate, and we have to raid a house to rescue a party member NOW. As we approach I get nailed by a magical crossbow bolt that a) will seek my heart & b) will give the launcher or the bolt my blood power when it seeks said heart. As Azrai blood is the "corrupt" variety, there is a real chance that the guy with the bolt will be corrupted by it, and could likely turn into a horrible monster (an awnsheghlien in Birthright terms). So as I've probably only got a few rounds before I'm dead and the party has an even bigger problem on their hands, I charge the house to get to the guy who shot me. On the way I run into his thugs. I start taking them out, but they slow me down. I get down to the last thug (the rest of my party is still cowering and trying not to get shot by the crossbow guy. Wussies) and my time is up, after my next initiative I'm dead, and the big bad gets my blood. So I say to the DM: "DM,I want to hit this guy, and try to end my sweep with my sword in my own heart." *Gasps of shock from my fellow players, as they yell at me to not do it from behind their cover* "Okay, try it. Called shot with extra negatives" says my DM I then rolled a Natural 20, grounding my own bloodline, and saving the party from having to potentially fight an awnsheghlien. They then proceed to let the guy get away, and get themselves banished from town.
kadeity 03-06-07, 03:13 PM	Has anyone mentioned that this post belongs in the GENERAL FORUM? guess not. anyway i had a monk who found a hole in a wall with a guillotine trap, and it had a gem on the other side and he said "nah the rogues busy. besides, im fast enough to grab it." and he reached in and jerked out, determining arm movement speed by dodge ac only to armor class.... and lost his arm. and was piosoned. then bled to death.
Moccanime 03-06-07, 03:41 PM	I was a fighter/order of the bow initiate (I think). My character had some homebrew feats that allowed me to ready a ranged weapon against a charge, gaining improved damage and crit. We also used action points and was allowed to stay consious below 0 hit points by spending a action point every round. We was running trough large tunnels, trying to escape a red dragon we had fought earlier, when we ran around a corner a meat a dead end. Swearing I went back around the corner and raised my bow looking the charging dragon straight in the eyes. Just before it reached me with jaws wide open I let the arrow fly. The arrow hit the dragon right between the eyes and I disapeared from my team's view at its jaws closed around me. The dragon got back up on its feet and turned its attention on the rest of my party now that I was swallowed and out of the way. That was when it did a few spasms and fell back down dead. The party could only stare bugeyed as my dagger sliced the dragon's skin from the inside, making a neat little oppening for me to crawl out of. I only managed to mutter the following to the cleric "get over here you walking bandaid, I need Heali..." and then crash to the ground a -9 HP. The shot against the dragon was the most insane I ever made, my damage roll was just short of 200 hp :eek: __ The only bard I ever played had a great one involving a dragon too. The battle was the reason his tombstone read: Anamil the Dragonslayer. The story was that we where tasked with transporting an artifact of legendary power, that had become extremly unstable and needed to be brought back to where it was originally crafted to make it stable again. It was a short sword and we where told that if any spell came in contact with it something bad would happen. When we asked what the oracle meant with bad... well: Try to imagine all life as you know it stopping instantaneously, and every molecule in your body exploding at the speed of light (the GM was a ghostbusters fan). So fastforward to a battle onboard an airship. A two headed half red/half black dragon had been hunting us the entire adventure trying to get its dirty claws on the artifact. Now we where at what would be the last stand. we where down for the count, sorcere nearly out of spells, the ranger in the -hp and the favored soul trying to keep the ranger alive. Most crew was all ready dead or had abandoned ship (some even without feater fall). The dragon dived below the ship, apparently decieding to finish of the ship from a angle we couldn't defend from. So Anamil sees this, decide that he dosn't give a damn anymore. He retrives the sword from the ranger's bag and jumps over the side of the ship muttering; "come to pappa". Now Anamil is falling rapidly torwards the dragon, and the GM decide that we should both roll an attack roll, first the dragon to see if it can get me with a bite attack. GM rolls a 1. then I get to see if I canhi it with the sword, rolls a 20. The swords digs deep into one neck of the dragon, and I now hangs from the handle of the sword. The other head of the dragon tries to bite me, but the last thing the dragon hears is me asking; "do you know what cantrips are good for?" then I cast light on the sword.
mittenninja 03-06-07, 04:01 PM	Our party's gnome illusionist was out and about talking to some of the local farmers, and this particular gnome was very well known for making others very angry. So our cleric thought it would be funny to have the farmer get mad to the point where he would try to run the gnome over with his plow. So he cast charm person, the farmer shoved the gnome over and rolled a 20 to hit with his plow. rolled a 20 on the confirm. and then rolled a 20 after that. death by commoner via plow. P.S. the cleric felt REALLY bad afterwards.
Eriotac 03-06-07, 05:28 PM	Ok so my best near death was on my ridiculously powerful drow monk. Our DM got into all this big political war junk so we decided to leave and start some huge crusade on the orc continent. Sounds fun After landing on the continent and taking an entire city we end up having to defend it against a horde of an orc army.....this is like the fourth time this happened. We make some crazy traps start fighting then out of nowhere this orc general on a black dragon appears and starts destroying our lines. As a lvl like 17 monk I decide heck i can take it. DM says "Ok jump check"....psh I got +50....I roll a natural 20...."Ok so now you make it to the dragon" I make some more crazy checks, I'm on the dragon. The orc laughs and lets the dragon deal with me, thats a mistake. I strap myself to the saddle and begin pounding away at this dragon. Several checks later and now were like 1000ft up above the battle. I use this energy enchant on my arm plus my regular damage to finish off the dragon, it rips open. I almost fall in and end up losing 30 hp.....now we plummet to the ground...Ok so i think I'm going to die and thats when I remember my abundant step. I wait and use it at its max distance and find myself slightly above our wall. I hit the ground, tumble and survive with 10 hp and go on to survive the battle. Our DM soon gave up on that campaign because we were 2 players and we were able to kill entire armies. One of the funniest near deaths was my friends rogue. They decide to go steal from this random rich guys house(the rogue and a few others) they get there and its well guarded. The rogue scales the wall while the other 2 wait, if theres any trouble they come help. After getting inside he finds the guys bedroom kills him and takes his money and a few jewels. He gets outside, is spotted and gets on the wall.(at the sound of the alarm the others just leave him, how nice) One guard hits him with a crossbow and nearly kills him. Now you would think he'd jump off the wall or something but no he decides to run along it. The guard gets him again. Hes now down to 2 hp, bad shot from the guard did 1 dmg. This he falls off, luckily outside the wall, makes his tumble check to not take and sort of dmg. He runs to an alleyway gets a natural 20 to hide and pulls out the bolt. He passes out from the pain and comes back the next morning to get our help.
dc_quicksilver 03-07-07, 03:37 PM	I was a level 4 monk. We were in an abandoned underground city being chased by a warforge. We were looking for an artifact and found the abandoned building that the artifact was located in. The only way into the building was from the top opening. After getting the artifact we noticed that the entire room was covered in oil. I climbed back to the top of the building when I noticed that a fire arrow was shot into the room. At this time fire was enveloping everything. I managed to get all of by companions out of the room. Two problems. The fire was affecting the stability of the building and second was that the warforge archer was in total darkness waiting for either us to come from the roof to pick us off or for the fire to consume us. I found where he was and using a running start I jumped from the roof on top of the warforge. Pretty heroic huh? :D Just three problems. He got a shot off while I was in air and hit me for about ¼ of my life. Second, I failed my tumble check and took 3d6 falling damage taking me down to about ¼ of my total life. I grappled the warforge, however this lead to my third and final problem. He had spikes with a bane against Lawful :eek: . I was down to about 3hp at this point. I maintained the grapple long enough for my actions to have saved the party. To this day my group always tells me that monks just weren't meant to fly. :P
atomisk9455 10-18-07, 05:15 PM	our partys rouge dicided he would sneak past our samurai who was gaurding our camp the rouge rolls a 20. Then goes to the orc camp nearby knocks on the door and sets an alarm off. Hes chased 30ft up a tree and dicides that he should shoot the orcs he rolls a nat 1 balance and falls. Then hes taken to the clarics room whare hes healed. He wakes up then asks the orc in vary nasty orcish if he would like to see him dance the orc beats him to 0 lol later in that adventure our bard is eatan by a sheep not demonic or dire just a sheep
The_Apologist 10-19-07, 02:23 AM	God, where to start? I have three players who REVEL in their ridiculous deaths and near-deaths, and the other six members of the group love nothing more than to get in on the action. First, some near deaths. Our longest-running campaign is the Exalted (long story behind the name; suffice to say very good-aligned, epic, fate-of-the-world-at-stake stuff.) One of our characters is a cocky bard named Dalamar (player doesn't have much name creativity, unfortunately.) To be flashy, Dalamar has taken improved unarmed strike, has a decent strength and is a two-fisted brawler, even though he's Bard/Holy Liberator. At the time this anecdote occurs, an ancient red dragon named Dier'fashke has awoken from his thousand-year sleep and begun levying taxes upon the entire world and burninating those who dare oppose him. His four half-dragon sons have gone out into the world to mete out his justice, and his hoards of dragon-winged human soldiers are enforcing his laws. Well, of course, the party will have none of it. They liberate a major town from his influence. In retaliation, Dier'fashke sends one of his sons to go pillage the party's home town. They return from their exploits to find a half-dragon with monk levels tearing their church apart as their families flee in terror, winged soldiers picking them off for sport. Trying to get to the half-dragon as quickly as possible, the druid summons a Hippogryf and sends it winging toward the half-dragon at low altitude at an aerial run (400 feet per round.) Dalamar, not content to move 60 feet per round, makes a jump check and several climb checks to grab on to the Hippogryf's talons, leap free at the last second, and drop-kick a half dragon monk in the face at 45 miles per hour!! Oh, he broke both his legs, but LORD did he make a half-dragon shaped dent in the side of the church. It was AWESOME. Another story involves a halfling rogue named Deuce. This is a completely different, balls-to-the-wall campaign where a low-level party of 7 regularly had run-ins with a Worm That Walks. This particular Worm had been revived by an evil cult that the party failed to stop, but he had lost his spellbook. The campaign turned into a race, as the party tried to recover/destroy the pages of the Worm's spellbook before he could get to them. Now, when you've got something that can deal 100 damage flat with a touch attack versus a low-level party, you get a lot of uncomfortable running. Well, Deuce was about one of the most awesome character's we've ever had in a game. Deuce's player is notoriously, amazingly lucky, especially when it's life-and-death, and he rolled something like a cumulative +16 for his starting stat modifiers (and that's with a wisdom of 7.) So at one point, the party rumbles with the Worm underground. The Worm hits Deuce with something that drops him to 2 hit points in one shot, so Deuce makes a bluff check to play 'possum. Of course, next round the Worm tries to cast Animate Dead on Deuce. Deuce uses his one rank in spellcraft to successfully identify the spell. Get this: instead of giving up the game, Deuce rolls a bluff check to pretend to be a zombie. He followed the Worm's "orders" while intentionally failing every attack roll against his allies for several rounds before he failed a bluff check, and the Worm wasted a lot of time on him while the party made good their escape. It was fantastic. One last near-death for now (although I've got dozens of these.) During the course of the Exalted, the party heard about an axe that was specially forged by Demons to kill Dragons because of an ancient war between them. The most important aspect of the axe was that the demons weren't particular about who would be able to use it, so it was accessible to the party. They tracked its whereabouts to the summit of a high mountain. While climbing the mountain to reach the axe, the party ran into Dier'fashke's servants attempting to gather the axe first. There was a knock-down, drag-out fight involving all sorts of fun tactics. When the dust settled, the party emerged with two captive winged humans. The party eventually reached a point, however, where they could not climb any higher. The paladin did the only thing he could think of: diplomacy to gain the trust of a winged human, and get them to fly him to the summit. Predictably, the winged one got a ways up, then shot two-hundred feet out and dropped him from a mountaintop. This was low-level, so there were no fly spells to save him. Instead, the party pooled what ingenuity they had, and the ranger tied a rope around a harpoon, fired it out of her bow and, with a natural 20, shot the paladin right through the chest. The party pulled him up into the cave as he was reaching -7 HP, and the cleric used cure minor wounds to stabilize him. It was incredible, and awesome.
jubjubdestroyer 10-19-07, 09:09 PM	This Wins: My character Aramill Evershifter had to swim to the bottom of a lake of **** to activate a rune that would clean the water supply. to do so, he turned into an otyugh and ate his way to te bottom. At the bottom he met you're generic dwarven vampire that lives at the bottom of a lake of ****(my Dm was nuts). to combat the vampire he turned into a lich and the fecal matter that he had consumed burst outward causing Aramill to explode. If you do not understand there was a very large fecal matter explosion that killed a lich and a vamire. I WIN
Nikolus23 10-19-07, 11:31 PM	Our party was fighting three Behirs. My rogue amazingly took no damage the entire combat from any of them. This is partly due to the fact that I was standing on one of their backs almost the entire time slashing at it, as the frenzied beserker and ranger took down the others. After the one I'm standing on dies, I run, jump off of it at the last Behir, and land right in front of it. I also land right next to the frenzied beserker in our party. He kills off the last Behir with his first swing, fails his will save, and finishes his full attack into my chest. I went from max hit points to dead.
Threefists 10-20-07, 02:51 AM	I remember a very cool character death. Not my character, but a friend of mine. Still touches a cord in me to this day. After a considerably trying battle with a Cult of Dagon, the party has just emerged from the hidden shrine, only to see our town on fire (I say 'Our', but I mean it in 'Our base of opperations' ) with what our Elven Wizard believes are Harpies swooping overhead. Now, we're spent, physically, magically and item-wise. We don't even have a single Potion of Cure Light Wounds left. All our spellcasters have run out of spellslots, our Barbarian has 5 hitpoints left, and the only PC left with some fight in him is Muajan the Ogre Mage, a LN Fighter/Rogue. Muajan had long been a very complex character, caring in private but stoic and very 'elitist' in public. A very strong follower of Bushido. So as the party sets off to rush to the Dryad's grove to get some emergency healing, Muajan volunteers to fly to the town and try to buy some time. The other players protest, pointing out that Muajan has no chance against scores of Harpies. Muajan responds with "Neither do the people there, but they must still be fighting. I cannot wait and do nothing, not while there is even the slightest chance of victory!" And so saying, Muajan takes off into the air with only thirteen arrows, a +2 composite Longbow and his +3 Falchion. It took a hour for Muajan to fly to the town, at which point the militia and surviving townsfolk have taken refuge in the Temple of Heironeous, and the other PCs are at least another hour away from the town, and the Dryad will be able to heal only some of their injuries at best. Using Invisibility, Muajan sneak-attacks several Harpies in the air, then a few on the ground before finding the first of the Bugbear and Human Mercenaries. He's fighting the good fight, but his Regeneration can only take him so far, and Muajan is burning his Invisibility and Darkness spell-like abilities for all they're worth, saving his more potent spell-like abilities for tougher opponents. Finally, he takes a arrow hit to the shoulder. Turning around, Muajan decapitates the mercenary with his sword, pulls out the arrow, and realises with a shock that the injury wasn't healing. The arrow was coated with a poison that temporarily negated his Regeneration. When he attempted to fly next, he floated only a few feet into the air before tumbling back to earth...and he could no longer turn invisible. Here was the point where we fully expected Muajan to turn around and head back to the Temple to await for reinforcements, but instead Muajan charges forwards, cutting a swath through the mercenaries and finally fights the Leader of the raiders head-on and alone to save the lives of several captured children. The other PCs arrive just in time to see Muajan topple to the ground, covered with mortal wounds, the Leader of the raiders nearly dead himself. Needless to say the PCs weren't in the mood to offer the Leader terms of surrender, and backed up by the Dryad and a band of centaur, storm the town and catch the raiders from behind, butchering every last one. By the time they return from the mop-up, however, Muajan's body has been consumed by a flaming building that had fallen over ontop of the fallen Ogre Mage, and nothing remains but ash and smoking rubble. The DM flashed forwards 6 months, and the town is slowly being rebuilt. On the site where Muajan fell, a state of white stone has been built, depiciting the Ogre Mage with sword upraised in defiance and a smile on his face, and a mithril plaque in front of the monument, holding the details of his sacrifice and praising his name. Thus, my ever-burning love for Ogre Mages. Several campaigns later, and that statue is still there, always kept spotless by the families of the children he saved.
Quandi 10-21-07, 04:07 PM	well im my quite short D&D career ive never had a character die per say, either the game puters and dies to early or ive simply "retired" my characters. But i have been witness to some hilarious and interesting deaths of other PCs and NPCs. Well one very memorable one happened about 2-3 months ago in my friends campaign. We were using an adapted LO5R mass battle system for the war in his world and our party recieved a mission which was to kill a commanding officer of the enemy army, stationed somewhere in a cathedral in the enemy territory. Well we make our way to the rooftop of this cathedral with little trouble but after arriving there we realize that the officier isnt there. Instead the hulkling monstrosity, created uniquely by ours truly my DM. This thing was an amalgamation of parts, lions head, giant eagle wings, treant arms, earth elemental legs, snake tail, dragon torso and it was called Bios, based off the 4 spheres of the world form ancient Greek creation myth, leothos, hydros, atmos, and bios. Well this thing was a tank that just happened to be abel to cast like a druid but despite this our 5 person team was able to hold off w/o serious problem for the most part. After a few lucky rolls we dealt a serious blow to this thing and it took to the air, and between our cleric and wizard we had no flight spell or flying chjaracter so we were at an impass. But my DM had a sudden, and fatal, stoke of inspiration and causes Bios to cast summon natures ally 5/6 not sure but uses it to summon a polar bear, then follows up with a quickened animal growth spell causing thie Huge animal to come plumeting down at insane speeds. The dmg was ad-libed but it was ebough to kill the elf wizard, human cleric and half dragon fighter and collaspe a good portion of the roof as it crushed it all underneath its massive body, not a way to go :P Another time before then my friend had recently jopined our game but due to bad luck his first character died abruptly so he created this flambyoant and fansifal CG halfing rogue. well our party decided to ambush an enemy camp with the intent of killing its leader and crippling their forces in a preemptive strike, unfortunately after making short work of the henchmen we realize the leader is away convening with his superiors (in our game if the guy ur looking fopr isnt there be afraid). So we start romaging through his tent looking for plans, maps wtv something useful, we then find this chest, locked of course, even too difficult for our rogue (dont remember what was iin it but thats not important). Well he says hes going to go outside and check bodies for keys to open the chest. as soon as he steps out side he sees the leader, typical anti-paladin BBEG and the rogue doesnt even have time to react becasue in that slipt second of the surprise round he rhino rushes + sprirted charge + unholy smites the poor rogue dealing 151 dmg, this was at like lvl 8 so that was alsmot 2x his HP. the way he explains it though was that as we step out of the tent the boss collides wit the rogue dealing so much dmg that his body simply explodes coveing us with gore, our ranger then procceds to start FREAKING out. But the all time favorite of mine involed the ranger and the rogue form above, happening sometime bewfore his untimely demise. Our party had been transported to an extrplanar realm to compete in a tournament, no threat of dying becuase it was more for the prize at the end then XP. well in the semifiansl the rogue and ranger get paired off to fight and for the most part its kind of even, the ranger hitting often but the rogue relying on SA dmg. well the rogue disappears behind a rock formation, the landscape of the arena was ranmdomly chosen and changed each fight. The ranger is systematically hunting him down so the rogue does some quick thinking. Taking his bedroll out of his backpack he takes spare clothes and dresses it up and thurst it out fomr behnd the rock, the DM tells him to roll disguise vs. the rangers sense motive or spot. point is he fails the spot/SM check horribly and procceds to launch a volley of arrows. He starts to dance around and isng because he thinks hes won so hes not paying attention. he then hears 2 thuds and looks down to find that the rogues enchanted javelins have been inbeded in his chest and he promptly slumps over and the rogue is declared the victor of the match
BananaB 10-21-07, 10:51 PM	Worst Deaths Ever. Lvl 4 party of a cleric, barb and rogue are face to face with 3 gnoll barbs. They all rage. Me, the cleric, and the barb go into melee as the rogue stays back with his bow. First barb attacks the cleric, crits with his great axe, 54dmg and the cleric is killed outright. The DM laughs in his chair. Now its the next gnoll agains the barb, he crits too, 51dmg, barb is also killed outright. DM trows his head back as he rolls the damage. then the rogue finishes off the gnolls and drags us to the high lvl clerics so we can get ressurected but the only way to get revived is by giving up all out stuff. The campaign ended shortly after that.
eleyas 10-21-07, 11:43 PM	Back when i was first starting to play i was the rogue for the group, and people were getin anooyed at me because i was doin more damage than the warrior and taking less damage than the mage, so my group was mad at me, we found a chest and the warrior opened it before i could check it cause he was an idiot, i walked in right as the posion trap went off, and was the only one able to jump out of the room in time, that really ****** off my group, but me and the DM were laughin so hard we were crying.
AlphaAbbott 10-22-07, 06:36 PM	A guy i used to know was playing an evil rogue. He and his party saw something glinting at the bottom of a deep well so most of the party decides to climb down the well using a rope. My friend the rogue volunteers to stay on the surface and guard the party's gear. As the rest of the party is climbing down this well, he runs over and cuts the rope they're all climbing down. They all fall to their deaths. He then lowers another rope, climbs down to the bottom and picks up the armor and weapons each character was carrying into the well. After climbing back up he goes to the nearest town and sells the loot, leaving his dead party members at the bottom of the well. campaign over.
war_thog 10-22-07, 07:21 PM	I was playing a dwarf man, fighter barb. Low level party. We were captured by some "forest goblins". Long story short we were imprisoned in these treetop structures. Brought out for questioning and possible execution. Basically noosed up over the old trapdoor floor, up in the treetops, except tied around hands and feet, not neck *not very smart goblins* Halfling rogue manages to slip the knots while the paladin was being questioned in a different bit of the room, big fight starts, halfling cuts the bonds for all but the dwarf. Goblins decide this is enough. Trapdoors away! My dwarf manages to hold onto the edge and doesnt fall. Then the halfling decides that now is a good time to leave as the fight was going bad..... and decides to grab some rope and jump down the hole my dwarf is hanging onto. He crashes into me, knocks me down..... the rope im tied to snaps from the fall and I go crashing to my death. The halfling man ends up using me to cushion his fall and runs off. Saved a party member! Died from stupidity! YEAH!!
Taldren Li 10-22-07, 08:08 PM	I had a lvl 7 dragon fire adept in an undead heavy campaign. A castle we were defending was under siege and two of the party members had been captured. The remaining party members went out to rescue them from the enemy camp they were kept in. My job was to swoop in and toast tents and enemies and pretty much make a big distraction while the rest of the party went in from the back and rescued the two people. We had very good intelligence that only about a dozen of the skeletons had ranged weapons, which I would take out in a round or two. So after I fly in and create a distraction, 50+ skeletons come pouring out of the tents with crossbows. By the time I died I looked like a pin cushion.
Damien_Blood 10-22-07, 10:38 PM	This Near-death happened just last weekend. So, I'm playing Rathash, an Orc Paladin of Kord. Through miraculous events, I have ended up with wings, but that doesn't really matter here. Anyway, My party (Me, Raptoran Cleric 8, Halfling Bard 8, Human Evoker 8, Goliath Scout/Peregrin Runner 8 & Half-elf Warmage 8) have been drafted to venture into a Dragon Boneyard to squash some growing evil. Well, shortly after entering, we encounter 4 Wraiths who demand a relic that the Evoker is carrying. We, of course, refuse to give them the relic, which causes them to attack. Nothing unexpected here. So, I do the Paladin thing and charge one with my Greatsword. I connected with a Smite Evil. Fast forward about 5 rounds. Almost everying, save the bard, has failed atleast one fortitude save vs. the Wraiths touch attack. The Cleric didn't prepare any Restoration spells (she's still new at this) for the day, but I just happened to have prepared two Lesser Restorations. So, I put a plan into action. I use 30 out of 40 points of my lay on hands, and connect with the wraith. I fail a fortitude save and take 8 points of Con damage. My Con was 18, reduced to 14. This takes me to 6. I can barely stand at this point. The other three wraiths gang up on the Cleric who just unleashed a Light of Irian spell. She goes down to -1hp, 1 Con. They are about to kill her. My wraith is still standing, somehow. I swing my massive sword and it backs off a moment. Next opportunity, the Evoker yells "If you want the Relic, Come and Get it", then casts a fly spell, and takes off. Seizing my opportunity, I run over to the nearly dead Cleric and cast Lesser Restoration. I get 4 and she returns to consciousness. She then procedes to use Cure Serious on me. With a 6 Con plus damage, my 95 hp was reduced to a mere 4. I don't think I have ever been so close to death without dying in some explosive way.
krallek 10-24-07, 09:32 AM	I was a level 13 rogue back in the old AD&D system and I snuck up on an huge set of double iron bound doors. By huge I mean ENORMOUS. Far larger than any human, bipedal, or otherwise normal sized creature would actually need. Well apparently I failed my "move silently" check because just as I put my ear up to the door to listen, the bloody doors opened and the head of an ancient white dragon snaked out of the doorway and snatched me up (failed grapple check of course). It pulled me into the room and shut the doors behind me. When the rest of my party got into the room they saw the dragon using his breath weapon to spit me out where I promptly bounced off the far rock wall at high speed and fell into a nearly bottomless chasm. *426 pts of damage* :eek: