"Are you sure you want to do that?"

[pennywit]

GMs: Ever had cases where a player does something that's completely insane? Something that you knew was a bad idea? Something where you gave the universal GM signal ("Are you sure you want to do that?") but the player did it anyway? And how did it go? Awesomely? Badly?

I share this story:

The faerie duel:

My players were at a faerie party. All of them were interacting with the various fey guests. Some of these guests were below the party's level, some at level, and some were far beyond the party level, meant to be introduced now, and maybe used later. When this player saw one of the faeries trade in human slaves, the player (whose character opposed all slavery) challenged an immensely powerful faerie to a duel.

I gave the GM Signal, but he went ahead with it. He said, "This is consistent with my character."

It actually went pretty well. I decided right off the bat not to insta-kill the PC; the player made a decision that was consistent with his character, and I didn't want to punish him for it. So ... this faerie hit him with a quickened charm person and humiliated him in front of the faerie court. Meanwhile, the other players, who were trying to accomplish some vital sneaky stuff, did their sneaky stuff while the hapless barbarian provided a distraction.

Barbarian's player, later: "I had the situation under control until we rolled for initiative."

[Zhayne]

Typically, I only break that phrase out if a player has clearly forgotten or ignored something his character would be fully aware of, like grappling a spiky or fiery creature. I also make it clear precisely why it's a questionable plan.

[Create Mr. Pitt]

So I am of two minds on how the faerie duel went. I think this was a really great outcome. It was probably a lot of fun and it sounds good. And, the reason it happened was character-driven in a realistic, I'm not just a crazy, violent character way. So I think it was really nice. How would you handle this same situation, minus the slavery, but just an overboard CN character who just decides to attack a more power faerie on a whim? There I might be concerned that a lack of long-term consequences would promote this sort of behavior. Anyway, this is a fun notion and always a difficult decision. Do I warn them? Do I mitigate the consequences of a mistake?

[Splode]

I grant this opportunity only if it's something that's a patently stupid idea based on something easily observed about the situation, or information the character definitely knows. I'll usually follow the "Are you sure you want to do that?" with a second description of the situation, with emphasis on the factors that make the character's proposed actions seem extremely stupid.

"That's cool. I do it anyway."

The best character deaths are the ones that make the controlling player, along with the rest of the table, laugh hysterically.

[Snorri Nosebiter]

guy with a negative dex modifier, fullplate, and encumbrance, totaling his sneak skill modifier at around -15, was going to sneak past a few dwarven defenders to steal their casks of dwarven ale...

[MagusJanus]

I sometimes use it to mess with a player's head when the scene calls for it. I will ask if they're sure they want to do anything, including if they want to do nothing.

But my favorite one is this one...

Me: The back yard is empty, save for one structure. On top of the backyard's grassy knoll is a gazebo.

Paladin: A gazebo? On a grassy knoll? Oh &^%^!

Me: Yes. Now, what are you going to do?

Paladin: I unsheath my sword to see if it reacts.

Me: Are you sure you want to do that?

Paladin: No. I call a challenge out to it.

Me: Are you sure you want to do that?

Paladin: Um... I step closer to it!

Me: Are you sure you want to do that?

Paladin: I start praying and call for the wrath of my god to destroy the foul abomination!

Me: Are you sure you want to do that?

Paladin: *moment of silence as he considers* ^&^$ it. I flee in terror.

Me: Are you sure you want to do that?

Paladin: Yes! And screaming, too! So the party can avenge me!

Me: ... Are you sure your name isn't Eric?

[Rynjin]

Playing Carrion Crown.

"I open the box."

"A monster pops out and tries to eat you."

*1 round later, the Beheaded or whatever it was is dead*

"Okay, what's in THIS box?"

*Describes contents*

"I open that container."

"You sure?"

"Yeah."

"Make a Fort save vs bad s+$@."

"Success! Cool. So what's in the next one?"

"Okay seriously, two in a row have been bad. Are you CERTAIN you wanna open this one?"

"You betcha."

"More bad things. Gimme a Will save this time."

"Success! Barely."

"So what's in the NEXT container?"

*Facepalms*

Kept intentionally vague.

[pennywit]

Create Mr. Pitt wrote:

So I am of two minds on how the faerie duel went. I think this was a really great outcome. It was probably a lot of fun and it sounds good. And, the reason it happened was character-driven in a realistic, I'm not just a crazy, violent character way. So I think it was really nice. How would you handle this same situation, minus the slavery, but just an overboard CN character who just decides to attack a more power faerie on a whim?

Interesting question.

In this particular scenario, the players were at a faerie party, with lots of faeries of various power running around. Thanks to a couple Knowledge (nature) roles, the players knew that if they simply attacked somebody, the all of the faeries (hosts + guests) would consider this a breach of protocol and stomp on them.

If this player had gone with "I attack the faerie!" for no particular reason, I don't think I would have given the GM Signal. The lead faerie host would have declared a breach of protocol, AND the rest of the faerie troop would have piled on.

Incidentally, since that encounter (and a couple others where his character was on the wrong side of some mind effects), that player has made a point of picking pushing up his Will save as high as he can.

Interesting, that scenario ended later (after the powerful faerie had left the soiree) when the PCs' leader provoked the head faerie into assaulting her. That turned into one hell of a combat encounter.

PS. My players recently met a mysterious woman who made oblique references to challenging the powers of faeries. They're giving this woman a WIDE berth right now.

[Thomas Long 175]

GM: Are you sure you want to bull rush the purple wurm off the side of the cliff. You know its already clinging to cliff sides, you'll have to go over it with it.

Me: YES, DOWN WITH THE WURM, LET THE TERRIBLE BEAST LAND IN THE MIDST OF MY PARTY AND MAY THEY AVENGE ME.

PS: I lived. Wurm didn't.

[Rynjin]

Did your GM know that you can choose NOT to follow your Bull Rush target?

[Thomas Long 175]

Rynjin wrote:

Did your GM know that you can choose NOT to follow your Bull Rush target?

Yes, but he was hanging on the side of the cliff and shoving rocks down on us. The GM wouldn't allow me to stop midair in throwing myself off a cliff :P

Edit: Though it was fun to tease him with "but the rules don't say I have to follow!"

[Hama]

Let's see. Yeah.

PCs are at a fancy party of a local lord. One of his most honored guests is the guard captain, who is known far and wide as an expert swordsman, great warrior and all around folk hero. Who is also a raging racist bigot against anything that is not fully human.

So, of course, the half-orc Barbarian fighter decides to teach him a lesson. He tries his impressive intimidate check, which fails (the captain is level 14 and the half orc is 6.
Seeing that he's not budging, he tries to engage him in conversation, but the guy says something along the lines of "I do not talk to lesser creatures" and turns around.
So of course, the half-orc immediately challenges him to a duel.

ME: Are you sure?
PC: YES! I WILL SHOW THE BASTARD!
ME: Are you really sure?
PC: Yes!

Duel begins, they are both in civilian clothes with their favored weapons.
Round one, captain wins initiative, vital strikes the half-orc (and crits) killing him instantly.

The player was silent for the rest of the session. He just asked me for the captain's character sheet.

[DrDeth]

MagusJanus wrote:

I sometimes use it to mess with a player's head when the scene calls for it. I will ask if they're sure they want to do anything, including if they want to do nothing.

But my favorite one is this one...

Me: The back yard is empty, save for one structure. On top of the backyard's grassy knoll is a gazebo.

Paladin: A gazebo? On a grassy knoll? Oh &^%^!

Yes, the original occurred in a game with my friend Richard Aronson.

[Avatar-1]

My group was playing Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil (3 of us, plus our GM), and we were trying to warn the villagers of some bad things going down that we'd found out were going to happen, but couldn't really prove to anyone. We were trying to explain it 10 different ways to sunday but the whole village was determined to be as ignorant as possible, and we didn't know why. Cue my 8 wis/8 cha wizard to the rescue:

Me: (to the guards, exasperated) "The return of the temple of elemental evil is nigh!"

GM: "Do you say that?"

Me: (without hesitation) "Yes!"

GM: "The guards disappear from the battlements, reappear at the bottom, approach you, arrest you and lock you in a prison cell"

The other 2 guys berated my wizard for the latest mess I'd put them in, I easily explained this was the only way we were making any progress, and I'm sure the GM loved the whole thing.

[Tormsskull]

I had an NPC in one of my campaigns that was an arrogant noble that was a few levels ahead of the PCs, plus he had four mounted guards with him. As the entourage moved down the street, all of the commoner NPCs scattered out of their way. The players decided that their characters wouldn't budge.

So I described in great detail all of the weapons and armor that the entourage had, as well as how they seemed incredibly comfortable with them. The PCs still don't budge. The noble then had his guards attack the PCs, and defeated the PCs pretty quickly.

[Umbranus]

Sometimes this question arises because the player and the GM have a different world view.

Dark heresy story:

Dark heresy plays in the warhammer 40k universe. The players are acolytes of the holy inquisition.

We were on some feral world where the population should not know that technology exists. We were in a church that was about to be blessed to the holy god emperor. The artist painting some walls had had a vision that drove him mad. And in his madness he had painted scenes from his vision where the planet is engulfed in some big war where the imperial guard comes along with guns and tanks to save the day. So he had painted tanks and guns. Things the population should not see.
When we entered the church to question him on some occurrence he attacked us and died.
Now we had a corpse there in with us and those pictures.
I opened the portal and yelled out for someone to fetch the guards because there had been a death we had to explain.

GM: Do you really want to do that?
Me: Yes, I do not want to be found with the dead painter so I rather call the guard myself.
GM: But they will see the paintings.
Me: Can't help it. We tried to take him alive which you prevented.
GM: You could just burn the pictures. They are still wet and it is oil based color.
Me: You want us to burn down a church? Of the god-emperor?
GM: But it's not sanctified yet.
Me: But it is supposed to be a church to the god-emperor, I can't burn it down. I'd rather kill everyone on the planet.
GM: Ok, you call for the guard.

Most times I've heard this question asked it was cases like that.

[Cintra Bristol]

I have a player in my group that, in any given situation, will always come up with the worst possible thing to do - and do it. And she's incredibly stubborn.

They were in Magnimar, and had figured out that a bunch of the noble families were being mind-controlled and used by some strange cult. They found their way to the cult headquarters. They realized that wholesale slaughter of a bunch of nobles would cause them major problems, and they found strong evidence that the nobles never acquiesced to being in the cult or being controlled - it was definitely something that had been done TO them. So the nobles were mind-controlled, dangerous, but innocent. Everyone was very clear on the mission - kill the aberrant beings running the cult, and use non-lethal damage on any humans in the place.

They get into the cult headquarters, and things are going well. Several aberrants dead, and at least a dozen humans have been taken out - and every time one goes down, I confirm "Alive or dead?" and they confirm they want the humans alive. (4E, so the person who strikes the final blow makes that call, and can do so regardless of type of attack, rather than tracking lethal vs. non-lethal damage.)

My stubborn player has been having a frustrating time, though - she keeps rolling 1s and 2s for her attacks. Finally, she throws a fireball at a group of humans and manages to hit several human cultists, dropping them below 0hp.

I reach to take the minis off the board.
DM: Alive or dead?
Her: Dead!
DM: Um, are you sure?
Her: Yes, dead!
Several other players talking over each other: We're supposed to... They're mind-controlled... Wait, remember... No, don't do th...
Her: Dead, dead, dead!
DM: Okay, they're dead.

She was really upset that when everyone else got a blessing for resanctifying the temple to Abadar, she didn't get that benefit. (Abadar apparently didn't like her murder of rich people.)

We can still get the whole group to laugh by reciting "Dead, dead, dead!" But even reminding her of that event won't make her reconsider one of her crazy decisions...

[The Gazebo]

MagusJanus wrote:

I sometimes use it to mess with a player's head when the scene calls for it. I will ask if they're sure they want to do anything, including if they want to do nothing.

But my favorite one is this one...

Me: The back yard is empty, save for one structure. On top of the backyard's grassy knoll is a gazebo.

Paladin: A gazebo? On a grassy knoll? Oh &^%^!

I HUNGER!!

[lucky7]

So THAT'S where the alias came from!