Although I'll be posing a question here, this is mostly an open-discussion focused thread.
Mostly to the GMs out there: How do you folks feel about minigames?
A long time ago, when I was a player more often than a GM, I played in a campaign that was based off the Shadow in the Sky module (if I recall correctly). For those that don't know, Shadow in the Sky starts off in Riddleport in the Golden Goblin, a casino. As a result, we, the players, ended up playing poker for about 5 hands. It was fun, since it was different, but also took a long time; we ended up taking about an hour just on playing poker and roleplaying things out.
I'm currently contemplating throwing minigames (though not necessarily poker) in my current campaign.
Have other GMs done similar minigames? How did that pan out for you?
I think it's fun. Adds culture to the gaming world.
I love to change things up, when you roll just the d20 for success every single time things get boring. I love trying to make my players use their other dice for a change. Additionally I'm all about puzzles that players physically IRL have to play with.
My favourites include these games I made for Rise Of Runelords:
Spicy food eating contest
Include npc contestants
Waiters will quickly bring out plates of Curry and remove them all at regular intervals. Players have to roll 3d6 and add either their will save or fort saves to the totals. For every 6 points they get, is one bowl of curry they manage to finish. the player with the most bowls of curry finished by round three wins!
Also at the end make them all roll a DC14 fort save or throw up.
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Junk stacking contest
Include npc contestants
Players have to stack random junk as high as they can and attempt to make the highest tower possible. The player to build a tower 50 inches high wins.
Players play one at a time and roll 2d6 with each 1 point representing 1 inch of height gained. Players have to push their luck or lock in their progress because if they get a 1 roll on a single dice, their current amount of work crashes down and is lost, if they roll two 1 results, their whole tower collapses and they start again.
The trick is for players to roll their 2d6, gather points and knowing when to stop to "balance their tower" locking in their progress. Trying to be too greedy can result in their work being wasted unless they know when to lock in their progress.
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Word making
Randomly grab letters from your scrabble or upwords box and place them in front of the players, give them 5 minutes to make as many words as possible