I hate those little bastards.Pugwampi. Those evil little things get such a reaction out of all of us in my gaming group. My dm ran a Legacy of fire campaign in which we came across a church filled with the little buggers. Only being first level we were cautious but figured it would be a breeze. The fight lasted for almost an hour with almost half the party at less than half hit points. And it wasn't even from actual combat damage, their silly little aura contributed to a ton of failed skill checks for fighting in the rafters of the church.
So now my dm will casually throw a pugwampi mini on the field every now and then just to watch us react... usually with overwhelming rage or abject terror. Good times, good times.
I've been meaning to inflict a pugwampi templated into a high level threat every since my group started Legacy of Fire. They are now in the final dungeon, so I'll have to get off my duff and do it soon if I intend to.
I was looking at putting the paragon template(from epic level 3.5) on a pugwampi, but looking at the result, I don't think they would stand a chance. The critter would only be CR 15.5 at that.
That paragon is a pretty nasty template. I might just need to look at stacking more normal templates.
exemplar + eternal (+7 CR) ... you have to strangle it to death with a set of fuzzy dice (garrote) that is hanging in its lair ... the use of the set of lucky fuzzy dice (garrote) in question bypasses the normal pugwampi aura of vicious unluckiness ...
Until then, they can't kill the thing ... it just keeps getting back up ... ^_^
Frakking Will-O-Wisp..
How're you supposed to hit that at level 4!?
How is this an overreaction?
It is due to the fact that the other members of the were a fire sorceress, a bladesinger and a ghaele, all around 6-8th level, and after the brutal death of the ranger they all spontaneously decided to block the way and run away, as if they were helpless against the beasts. Which they were definitely not.
We buff a bit, roll initiative, and kick the door in to find a man wrapped in elegant robes, sitting on a stone throne with 2 beholders beside him and one floating above him.The DM gave us a surprise round, and I had the highest initiative roll of the group, but I couldn't imagine how we were going to overcome this encounter. ONE beholder would have been tough for us to handle. THREE and a sorceror to boot had TPK written all over it.
Wracking my brain for a solution, I finally realized what I had to do.
...
I stuffed that handkerchief, which was actually my portable hole, into my bag of holding.
So the low level old guy who was pretending to be a terrible sorceror, the 3 beholder illusions conjured by the throne, and I were whisked away to oblivion in spectacular fashion.
And all of this without remembering that a portable hole is just a handkerchief, and a bag of holding is just an empty bag before the mighty central eye of a beholder...
:D
In the module they are just that white roses, nothing special.
Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.
Unfortunately, after the Starr report nobody ever believes that anymore!
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In the Demonskar Legacy chapter of the Shackled City adventure path, there is an iron portcullis, with a small 2ft wide hole over the top of it. Guarding this gate is a hill giant behind it.
My party spent an hour and a half of real time trying to figure out how to proceed.
My party consists of:
A Savage Species ghaele eladrin. (Incorporal form, light rays, charm/hold monster all at will.)
A lizardfolk warlock with Flee the Scene. (Dimension Door at will.)
A changling druid with the PHB2 alternate wildshape. (Alter self at will from changling.)
A catfolk monk.
As elven fighter.
A half-elven ranger.
That was the worst fight ever.
Frakking Will-O-Wisp..
How're you supposed to hit that at level 4!?
True strike, magic missile, Base melee thingy...
Str +5 (16 base, bull strength), BAB +4, +1 magic, +1 focus, +2 flank, +1 morale (like bless or bard song) that's some +14 and the cleric or rogue is probably just one point lower. Against AC 26 it's not THAT bad
My favorite party overreaction happened after the party had badly misjudged the threat posed by some aquatic undead - essentially very tough zombies with a drowning aura and fire immunity. They returned to the mainland to find a plague-ravaged empty port ...
And then walked directly into a brilliantly set ambush. Unfortunately, the ambushers were merely well-equipped 1st level warriors and rogues, and the party members were all at 12th level. Hilarity then ensued. They couldn't understand why their attackers were all missing with the crossbow volley but they pulled out all the stops regardless :-)
MI
Playing the original Ravenloft module: the party had just faced down Strahd who turned gaseous and fled. Taking off in pursuit, we stumbled upon a rust monster. Shrieks of horror and PC's climbing over each to escape followed. Good times.
Frakking Will-O-Wisp..
How're you supposed to hit that at level 4!?
By level 3 lone Will-O-Wisps stopped being significant threats to my players. It was after they dropped the second one in 2 rounds that they stopped being freaked out by them though. Their first one they met as a random encounter at level 1, and I was nice so it didn't tpk them. It only killed their horse and 1 player left a weapon behind. 1 player even said "it can't be what I think it is, were only level 1"... Oh how he was wrong.
True Strike goes a long way. A tanglefoot bag puts them in medium load and trounces their AC thanks to max dex from encumberance. Obscuring Mist is helpful in giving you some defense against them. And they only have 1 str and a low fort save, so some str damage poison is nasty. Nets are also very useful, as they have issues getting out.
Years ago, I ran a 2nd edition short adventure in which the main villain was a mad druid who had created several new species of aggressive and/or carnivorous plants. After spending hours being ambushed repeatedly by these things, they started to go preemptive and nuke every shrub in sight from distance, burning down an entire forest.
Then I ran a campaign in which periodically the PCs were sucked into Ravenloft. They began to run screaming in fear every time they saw a little bit of fog, once even jumping off of a riverbost they were traveling on and swimming to shore, abandoning a fair amount of their gear.
Good times.
This sort of happened in the Bastards of Erebus when those two tieflings dressed like mummies. My players braced themselves and looked at me like- This is the first of the Adventure Paths? Are you sure? Then they caught on pretty quick.
...(a Norse variant, imagine a mix of werewolf and wight)...When you say a "Norse variant" is that then based on a real folkloric monster or something like that? :) Does it have a name? I'm danish and have my own game system and setting - so I'm always looking for new "monsters" - preferrably from folklore and the like.
It rings a vague bell..I also remember in Dragon Mag back in the 2E days zombie werewolves..when you hurt them then transformed and did the claw claw bite act
I find that the game is a lot of fun when you place a different wrapper on a statblock. Once the creatures stop responding in the way the meta-game knowledge expects, pandemonium follows :)
I remember running a ravenloft game where the PCs were staying at a mountain monastery. The monks began to die suddenly in the night, as they were being beset by a sneaky flesh golem. By the time they faced off with the golem, several monks had died and the creature had shown it was very agile and had made many disappearing acts. They took it down pretty fast, but didn't realize that it could regenerate. Oh the look on their faces when they had to fight it all over again with half their resources :D
Sufficed to say they took nothing for granted afterwords, and many bodies were burned ...
ahhhh for players it is Ravenloft, but for GM's it is RavenLOL
I find that the game is a lot of fun when you place a different wrapper on a statblock. Once the creatures stop responding in the way the meta-game knowledge expects, pandemonium follows :)
+1
I do this all the time when I'm not flat out creating my own monsters. However, I do grant the characters appropriate knowledge checks if they think to do a "knowledge nature" or "knowledge dungeoneering" check, or whatever else might apply.
However, I never reskin extremely common monsters (goblins, kobolds, skeletons, etc) that the characters should reasonably be able to recognize.
I actually forgot about one from a LARP I played many moons ago.
this one is priceless.
You have something called script points, when you play your character you use one per day, if you dont have enough points to play they you are a script (NPC).
OVer a long weekend we were scripting and my group and I always get tooled for good parts (we were always like goblins with 3 hp that got thwacked be everyone even tho 5 minutes ago we were dead...it sucks)
So after a large battle, where we were undead, we go back to script-central to find out what our new parts are and the marshall (like a DM) is standing there holding... wait for it...goblin masks! Ugh.
So we are all B*tching and complaining and I said something like "You know I'm dead before I even out this mask on,right?"
And the Marshall says 'not this time' ....hands us script cards....GOBLIN ASSASSINS! ok so they only had 9 hp which still sucks but a random rock cant kill you and they had sneak attack goodies and did more damage.
So we all kinda put our own personalities into a special little 'goblins' one guy went so far as to put on the mask and then take a black cloth and wrap it around his face to make him a goblin ninja, and ran around with two foam clubs calling them nunchucks.
Anyway... this was a mistake on my script card that gave me spells, so i was a spell chucking assassin.
We all went out, crawling through the bushes, scampering under cabins, we spread out everywhere.
Over the course of time people bumped into us here and there and were knocking us off, a buddy and myself were running a successful "highway man" scam by demanding money or other tribute to be paid if the goblin was to let the people pass, the people who attack the goblin and I would huck spells at them from concealment in the bushes, they would freak out and pay a few copper and move on.
But we did eventually get killed.
ALL of us except this ONe guy who waited under this cabin ALL night, he had this ridiculously long semi broken club we all called the "fun-noodle"
when the people who were sleeping in the cabin stepped out (75% of them female Players) he thwacks them in the shin from under the cabin and shouts "three damage!"
Chick #1 Freaks (goblins do 1 or 2 damage normally, but it was a "sneak attack"..which is called back attack in this LARP) and runs back int he cabin shouting "there is something out there! I need Healing!"
they ALL plan in there (you can hear them and there cabin was the closest to script central) for like 45 minutes until you here someone say, forget this, it's probably gone! Im gonna go pee! Dude throw open a window and plops down on the ground and turns around for someone to throw him his sword and shield,,,goblin ninja tools him "3damage 3 damage 3 damage 3 damage!" the guy drops.... hillarious.
Now they are ALL frreaking, the goblin jumps up (this is the guy with the black mask over his goblin mask and hes rather tall but skinny) and looks in the window to laugh at them. They all scream OGRE.
the dude drops down and crawls under the cabin pulls off the shroud taps on the other window and looks at them with his normal goblin mask.
"the ogre has goblins with him!" (more feaking out) spell casters try to open the windows and peak out but the goblin assassin is laying on his back and they poke out to find a target he thwacks them with the fun-noodle "3 damage!"
this goes on for HOURS....with you guessed it, the paranoid adventuring party holded up in their cabin and the 'dead guy' whining "someone heal me so I can go pee!"
The goblin starts kicking at their door speaking russian or some random slavic language "they are still out there!" people inside the cabin are shouting...
During this entire seige, no one ever though A) the main fighter does 4 damage ow tough can these guys be? or B) let's all rush out to find them.
Finally, the goblin actually gets bored and leaves....it takes two hours for the party to emerge from their cabin to be convinced the "menace" is gone.
The Goblin sets up shop in the INN. higher level players stay in the INN, as they can afford it, so when the goblin dressed as a ninja walks in, they just ignore him (largely because he just isnt worth their trouble)
Eventually, the high levels go take showers, dress up and head out for their evening of adventure, ignoring the goblin and letting him sit there in the inn.
Well, the inn is also where you buy out of game things like candy bars, juice etc.
With no high levels in the INN, the goblin proceeds to waylay the NPC barkeep and take over the bar (we all ehre this through second hand stories because we werent there, our goblins having been killed hours ago)
the goblin hides behind the bar, newbs walk in to the bar to get their candy fix and up pops the goblin with his best bettle juice voice says "heh what will it be?"
startled, the newbs give them their order (candy bars were a buck) and he says "three dollars and a silver piecce" (three dollars being the right price and sp, obviously in game money)
"wh wha what?" the newbs ask..."three dollars and silver peice!" the goblin demands.
"but the price says three dollars right up there!" the newb says pointing to the price list behind the bar.
"Silver SILVER I said" says the goblin slapping the fun-noodle on the bar.
Newbs give the goblin a silver peice, take their candy and run.
In the mean time new script goblins (normal ones) come to the inn (it's common to have random monster assaults on the inn, and the normally get tooled quickly)
But this time there are no PCs, and the three goblins poke their head in andd find a goblin bar keep.
So the goblins set up shop.
More PCs come in, goblins start throwing rocks at them from under tables shouting "1 damage" PCs freak, back up to try and get angle at them to toss spells and the assassin pops up from behind the bar and takes one of the spell casters out. the other kid runs out of the inn schreeking "goblins have taken over the inn"
By this time there are reports of goblins swindling people at the inn for extra money, goblins in the inn under tables and goblins and ogres under cabins attacking people.
The Grand Knights are summoned (all who swing for ridiculous 6 magic damage before being buffed) they gather for council and decide to cleanse the town that has been over run by goblins and ogres, starting with the Inn.
a Large group of mid-high level PCS gathers behind the knights and they all march to the INN, first knight steps in the door and gets hit with like 6 rocks all the goblins shouting "1 damage" except for the sneak attack rock that shouted "three damage"
The knight back peddles out and stops and says, "did I hear 3 damage?" and beetle juice the assassin goblin says "yea punk three damage come get some"
The knight turns around and announces to the crowd "there is definately an ogre in there!"
the funny thing is, before the Players could assault the INN, the weekend came to a close and the game stopped.
the next planned event, goblins are running the Inn. Last I hear, goblins in that game still ran the Inn.
Was frikken hilarious.
RPG Superstar Season 9 Top 16, RPG Superstar 2015 Top 32
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I seem to have a knack for causing my players to overreact.
I once filled this giant maze full of gelatinous cubes, and had one of them advanced with the fiendish template and additional hit dice. On top of that, it had a drow sorceress riding it with the amulet of ooze riding. This duo was enhancing all the other cubes with different potions, giving them abilities like spider climb, increased movement, the ability to jump 10 ft. pits, and so on.
The party walked into thinking it was going to be a walk in the park, but it almost became a total party kill. The whole encounter ended with them blowing up the fiendish cube and drow with inventive uses of alchemists fire, feather tokens, spells.
Every one of those players freak out at any gelatinous cube they run into in my games. Sometimes they run, but mostly they expend unneeded resources to defeat the cube.
I also worked alongside a really great DM who helped me run a wilderness encounter with a Purple Worm. We both knew the party could handle it at their current level, but we wanted them to overreact.
We had the encounter happen in this canyon that the worms lived in, but the party needed to cross it. We set up an NPC to act as a guide, an old man who we hinted was a higher level ranger who just retired to this area. They followed him into the canyon, and he started telling them tales of his adventures just build his credibility. He then warned them to walk where he walked or they would be eaten alive. The other DM was acting out the part of the guide and in the middle of his safty speach, a purple worm burst through canyon wall and ate him whole. The party freaked, and instead of trying to fight the thing, ran the entire length of the canyon.
I had a character once burn two action points in two consecutive rounds thinking he was saving against a Bodock's death gaze ability. Funniest part was, it was a dretch using stinking cloud. (DC 12 or 13, He was a 8th level druid!) He was saving from that! The fog would have obscured vision even if there was a bodock there. I laughed my bum off when He told me that he though that was what he was saving against.
Also somewhat related, I had a funny trap that keep the party occupied for 90 minutes. It was a simple locked door. When the player's tried to force their way inside, a large, magical, micky mouse like hand would push them right back out, slam the door, and re-lock it. No matter what they did, they could not get through. finally, the youngest member of our group walked up to the door and knocked on it. The door opened and the hand ushered him inside.
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RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32
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The party had a map of an abandoned fort and were exploring to see if the BBEG was holed up inside. They were searching the last basement on the map and in the final room ran into a spriggan who had heard them coming and prepared. Apparently they had never heard of one before and the player failed miserably on his knowledge check to identify it. The spriggan was covered in runes and animal hides. He surprised the party by tossing a spell at the party, then changed to his large size, and charged. They fled. Running all the way back to town with the wizard being carried the final mile.
They went back to the town and spent a week researching and preparing. They bought 2 fey bane weapons and 4 scrolls, depleting their extra funds and selling some valued gear as well. After hiring a couple NPC archers they went back.
The plan was to use the monk to lure the spriggan into the hallway and then everyone open fire with readied actions. 1 fey bane 2-hand sword, 1 fey bane composite longbow, 4 scrolls (2 used to buff before the encounter) and 2 NPC archer shots later, the spriggan dropped.
The 5th level party of 5 players and 2 1st level NPCs defeated the CR 5 spriggan sorcerer 1/barbarian 1 in 1 readied group action. Boy were they pissed. At least the fey bane weapons were useful for the rest of the adventure.
The original encounter was him taking about 25% damage, then fleeing to the new tunnels not on the map to warn the other followers of the BBEG.
Best encounter I had was at Shadowrun:
We were infiltrating a old oilrig (now research facility), the DM managed to create a thrilling atmosphere like I never encountered after it again.
As we entered the rig, one of us opend a small door and then...
"You were attacked by hundreds of small tentacles, they fall onto you and try to bring you down"
The player empty his both guns into this... "thing" only to realise a second alter that it was only a broom and he had found the broom closet.
after 3rd edition came out, i had converted Return to the Keep on the Borderlands and The Caves of Chaos. the group consisted of a human rogue, dwarven fighter, elven mage and a human samurai(using the Rokugan samurai). all were still first level.
they were scouting the area heading into the cave complex (for those that have never played this module, its basically a closed-end valley with various cave entrances at various heights along the slopes). they found some tracks of some small creature heading into one of the lower level caves.
as only the dwarf was able to see in the dark, the rogue decided that it would be best to light up a torch so that they could all see. as they entered the complex, the rogue was checking for traps and found a 10' deep pit right near the entrance. after searching for about 2 hours, they found some wooden planks outside the complex at an old unused campsite, they were able to cross the pit- for whatever reason they decided to not try jumping over it or climbing down and crossing over to the other side. then i sprung the real "trap"......
first the mage crossed, then the cleric, then the rogue, leaving the samurai for last. as the samurai was halfway across the planks, kobolds started using commando tactics on the party- poking them with short spears from small holes in the wall, launching crossbow bolts from down the hallway, etc. the party rushed up the slightly sloped hallway into the room where they saw the majority of the attacks coming from.
as they rushed up the hallway, the kobolds pushed a rather large "boulder" down the hallway towards the onrushing party, all Indiana Jones like. they see this boulder rolling towards them and relize they will be squished it if hits them, so they turn and run back towards the entrance- forgeting about the pit. the samurai fails his jump check, the other 3 make their checks (mostly due to having the bonus for running- the samurai was at the edge of the pit so couldnt get the bonus).
as they get to the other side of the pit, they dont look back at their friend who has now fallen into the pit, thinking more about the huge rock tha i chasing them away. they continue to run out the door into the valley. at about this time they hear the screams of their samurai friend they left in the pit. after a minute or so they can stil lhear him screaming so they get the nerve up to go chack on him and see if he can be saved.
as they reach the pit, they see the samurai covered by hundreds of BEES, his face and other exposed skin areas covered in hundreds of stings. they dropped a rope down to him, which he scrambled up quite quckly and they all ran outside into the valley and jumped into the stream that flowed nearby to get the bees off them.
what had actually happened was 4 kobolds had used their tiny holes built into the walls with multiple holes to attack the party and make it look like there were 20 or more of them attacking not just 4. then they pushed a paper mache ball filled with bees down the corridor.
to this day, just mentioning kobolds causes chills to run down those players spines and a smile to cross their faces.
Some of the most fun and easy ways to get players to freak out is to simply add a template to an existing creature. Players tend to take for granted how creative DM's can get, and assume everything they fight is straight out of the Monster Manual, Bestiary, etc. You give a general, vague description of a creature, and the metagame experts go to town.
Half Dragon template + Dire Animal = Dime-store Dragon.
DM: You guys see 3 creatures, 4 legged, skin covered in glistening red scales, large bat-like wings, long horns on their brow, with tufts of black fur at the base of their fanged, toothy snouts...
Player: Holy crap! Dragons? Are you kidding?
DM: They hear you moving, and all raise there fanged snouts to meet your gaze... and take flight.
Player: RUUUUUUN!!!
In reality, all the template did was beef up their stats a little, give them wings(they end up in melee anyway), and a 1/day weak breath weapon. But go figure, a Dire Wolf's body shape is similar to that of a Dragon... Only upon closer inspection do the players realize these aren't true dragons. That's when you drop the real dragon parent on them.
Blast from the past:
The Vargouille from AD&D MHB2 only did 1d4 damage per bite with a bad ThAC0, but due to some special poison this damage was pretty much permanent.
Gave my players the creeps like no Rust Monster can.
A massive zombie horde at the bottom of a chasm (which one of the easiest ways to cross was to climb down and then cross the bottom, because there was an antimagic effect in part of the area that made flying difficult). Granted, it was massive, but they were 16th or 17th level at the time. Enough channel energies and fireballs would have destroyed them easily, and barely depleted the party of resources. But the description of "a writhing sea of undead" spooked them that they rigged a different way across the chasm.
Had a party of 6th level characters holed up in an underground gatehouse while a half dozen darkmantles circled overhead. They worked out this elaborate scheme to lure them to one side, then make a mad dash out the other side (following a few buff spells). They ran for a shelter some 100' away, but the last guy, a fighter, got attacked. None of the darkmantles hit him, and he felled three of them before the other players relaxed and said, "Just ignore them."
I was in a group that got faked out by some goblins in a cave with a very convincing dragon head puppet.
All human party 1st level, exploring a cave where some herd animals had been near before they went missing. We go in and after some misadventures due to traps were down to candles for light the MW sculpted dragons head megaphone at the back of the cave (the door to another chamber) had us convinced that a dragon was responsable especially as there was a greek fire projector mounted in it. A dragon who's head was as big as a standard door yea not happening we fled like the little peons we were. The game ended before we ever got close to what we felt was a level we could go back and take it. The looks on our faces when the GM told us I bet was priceless.
Definately illusion. Oh how I love them.
However, this leads to paranoia, when used too much ("I disbelieve the entire room!")
When one of my players does this, I always want to reply "You fail. It's a real room. On it's turn, the room disbelieves in you. Roll a will save to avoid disappearing." I never have, though.
I think I did once tell someone who rolled a 1 when they tried to disbelieve the room: "You've thoroughly convinced yourself the room doesn't exist and you're not in it. You don't get to react to anything that happens in it, because you think it's all just illusions."
Rofl.
Reminds me of a certain GAZEBO, for some reason ;-)
An even better cure, might be - after some rooms with regular illusions - some semi-illusional ("shadow") floor, which - when disbelieved - actually vanishes and has a nasty spikes pit or something beneath it >:)
I did have an illusionary bridge over a chasm once. I was using a Bridge Haunt from MM5 - they got mirage arcana 1/day, which creates an illusion which includes tactile elements. So he disguised the hole in his bridge with the spell, and when the PCs made their will saves, they realized they weren't standing on anything and fell. I forget exactly how it went (it was effectively a random travel encounter, so it wasn't important), and no one died from it. But it was amusing.
Be careful what you disbelieve.
And all of this without remembering that a portable hole is just a handkerchief, and a bag of holding is just an empty bag before the mighty central eye of a beholder...
:D
Ah! But I wasn't in any of their terrible anti-magic cones, which is why I thought I was so clever. They were all facing the door, and I was directly beneath one and on the left side of one and the right side of the other. I put myself in a happy, unfortunate little pocket of space wherein magic functioned normally. To my utter undoing.
The DM totally used me against myself that day. He's a sneaky one. I underestimated his sneakiness.
I really thought I heard the DM say "shimmering and a +5 Holy squirrel appeared".
Now I'm rolling. That's hilarious and totally something that would happen at our table. Classic!
Hrm...well, I was DMing one night, a homebrew game, with nothing but the sickest concepts the players could bring to the table. I had a vast library of gaming books, and opened it up to them and told them no holds barred. They could bring whatever they wanted to the table. This was 3.5 and loosely based within the Forgotten Realms setting.
Every DM should try this at least once! Very challenging to provide good encounters for a party of serious POWER GAMERS!
Did I mention that there were 7 players? =
I fondly called this dungeon the Dungeon of Doom. Each night a new level down, and each night, it was my solemn duty to come up with whatever I could to get to a TPK, within the rules. Each level had its own theme, a way to foreshadow what the BBEG was for the level.
I spent one whole night, setting up the BBEG fight for an Great Wyrm White Dragon. This thing had a pet drake btw.
One player had a Monk Spellfire Wielder. Really a great character, optimized to the hilt, and well done.
He spent the whole level absorbing magic cast at him, and having the group cast magic at him to keep storing up mojo. Just before the drake fight, he finally topped out, where if he had absorb any more magic, he would have exploded...no seriously. It was in there in 3.5 FR. Look in the books, man.
Anyway, I describe the room they step into, the interior of an icy glacier. I describe the drake coming on scene...scales, toothy maw, screams, that kind of thing.
The players assumed it was a Dragon and UNLOADED! The spellfire wielder gave it literally everything he had, and ripped this thing to shreds in one blast basically. He laughed, stating that he was essentially useless for the rest of the level compared to what he had done. High fives around the table, and calls for entering the next room to get at that hoard.
They slipped on the ice in the next room, and another character fell and slid all the way to the bottom of this little hill, right into a Great Wyrm white dragon, waking it up.
As I described this dragon roaring, and the bits or roof of this cave coming down...you should have seen their faces...especially spellfire-boy! That moment made all the years spent gaming up to that point TOTALLY worth it!
I did not succeed that night in my quest for a TPK, but boy did I make a good run for it!
Please note: the tpk thing is not my usual policy, but it was a way to spice things up for the players.
EDIT: Punctuation...it saves lives.
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I once had a campaign where the PCs came across twin children (a boy and a girl) in an underground lair. The kids claimed they and their parents were captured by the same villain that the PC's were looking for. The area contained a torture chamber where the kids said they were forced to watch the villain torture their parents to death.
They promised to help the kids get to safety and proceeded to lead them back to the surface. Somehow they became lost and separated. Long story short, the kids were actually demons who had been trapped in the bodies of twin kids by a wizard. The PC's found themselves prisoners in the kid's underground torture chamber. The villain that the PC's were looking for was also captured and had been tortured to death by the kids. The kids then took turns torturing the PC's.
Eventually they escaped, as did the demon children. The kids were actually in the service of the main "big boss" villain of the campaign and had several run ins with the PCs through the course of the year long campaign.
Since the demon kids always managed to slip away the PC's never got revenge. Because of the extent of the torture several members of the group became jumpy around kids. One PC developed an extreme phobia of children.
So in future campaigns/adventures if I wanted to put the group on edge all I had to do was say that they heard the laughter of children or something else about children being present. They wasted a great deal of time obsessed with even the slightest hint that the demon kids may be present. They chased and frightened many children in their search for their tormentors and gained quite the negative reputation. They were often banned from entering cities and chased out of town.
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Once a party member went ahead, shifting into earth elemental form to see what was behind a wall. He saw what he thought was a lich, waiting for the party.
So he tells us, and we run in all ready to wreck havoc. The fighter takes it down in one swing, declaring himself the slayer of liches.