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title says it all. the one that comes to mind for me was from a game my brother ran a short while ago, the party was being hired by a wealthy aristocrat to uproot a cult, and we sat at what the gm described as a "absurdly long table" and the aristocrat kept trying to slide things across it dramatically, but they never reached the other side so he'd have to get up and just hand it to us. eventually he called his scribe in "make a note Sampson, fire my interior decorator"
so what gags have you used or been witness to?
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An NPC told my players to find a white dwarf who would take care of them. That's what they heard. It was a "wight" dwarf who really did do his best to take care of them.
Had my players go after a dragon high in the mountains. The villagers described it as a white dragon of immense size. So they prepped spells and clothing that would protect them from cold, then faced off against the albino red dragon.
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Ball. Duct tape in a pinch. On a succubus for research purposes.
Oh, wait. That type of gag....
Never mind! Carry on, nothing to see here.
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The first session I was running of a home brew campaign setting, the party's night lookout botched his perception and was knocked out by bandits. So he was off to the side, munching on the pretzels while everyone else got through the ambush. Once they brought him back, he joked about having a near death experience of eating pretzels.
We ran with it ever since.
In that setting there isn't a light at the end of the tunnel, there is an empty waiting room with a bowl of pretzels. Pretzels appear over the gates to cemeteries, with both of the end points pointing up, implying a life that begins and ends well. If they were pointing down, how people usually orient them, that is a bad and necromantic sign. The salt on pretzels is meant to indicate a preserved, long life. Adding peanut butter or chocolate implies a full, flavorful life.
We just kept building on the lore for years, and the players knew they were in for a tough fight if I brought a bag of pretzels to the game. That meant I expected someone to die.
I eventually put that world on the back burner, started trying out adventure paths to learn new tricks and styles, but the occasional pretzel joke remained. However, by popular demand, I just restarted working in that world, and I think I may need to go get a big bag of pretzels to bring next session, for old times sake.
The first session I was running of a home brew campaign setting, the party's night lookout botched his perception and was knocked out by bandits. So he was off to the side, munching on the pretzels while everyone else got through the ambush. Once they brought him back, he joked about having a near death experience of eating pretzels.
We ran with it ever since.
In that setting there isn't a light at the end of the tunnel, there is an empty waiting room with a bowl of pretzels. Pretzels appear over the gates to cemeteries, with both of the end points pointing up, implying a life that begins and ends well. If they were pointing down, how people usually orient them, that is a bad and necromantic sign. The salt on pretzels is meant to indicate a preserved, long life. Adding peanut butter or chocolate implies a full, flavorful life.
We just kept building on the lore for years, and the players knew they were in for a tough fight if I brought a bag of pretzels to the game. That meant I expected someone to die.
I eventually put that world on the back burner, started trying out adventure paths to learn new tricks and styles, but the occasional pretzel joke remained. However, by popular demand, I just restarted working in that world, and I think I may need to go get a big bag of pretzels to bring next session, for old times sake.
Reminds me of the oranges in the Godfather film. Well done, sir!
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One player in one of my homebrew games was being such a rules-lawyering annoyance in and out of game that at one point one of the NPCs dropped a giant's boot onto her head.
Every so often, my various gaming groups run into a hill giant with one boot, looking for his other boot.
In the very earliest days of my gaming years our DM had a special "Flaming Couch From the Heavens" that would fall on the PCs of players who were acting stupid and disrupting the game. We carried this on for years.
In nearly every game I've played in with my ages long group there's been a tavern called The Sandy Jackboot.
When pressed to describe contents of a dead NPC's belongings there's always a dead robin, a canned ham, and a ball of string.
I had a GM who, when playing games that didn't use XP system, kept awarding us XP, which was an actual item that we could keep in our inventory and was actually useless and its exact looks were undefined, as its exact measures, weight, etc.
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In a campaign I had a player whose family ran a restaurant.
She was playing a dwarf cleric and during an adventure they found a dwarf Inn inspired by her's family restaurant. She didn't realised that until 1 month later, so during another visit to the inn she started yelling:
"So she is mine Grandma! And the waitress it's me!"
That became the party's motto, and all the other players started yelling it in every inn they met.
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I once had an NPC pull an incredible deception using a hat of disguise. It was so traumatic for the players that, in the post-campaign "where are they now", the inquisitor had founded an Order of the Hatless. To this day, whenever my players get suspicious, they ask: "And is this NPC wearing a hat?"
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I had a player trying to infiltrate an enemy base with a hat of disguise. I checked that he knew that a hat of disguise has a DC 11 Will save if they touch you to see through it, and he was okay with that. He also was still wearing the armor with a holy symbol that would get him in trouble on sight.
Near the end of the session, someone in the base shook hands with him. I physically offered my hand out, and the player took it. As we were shaking, he realized what happened and cursed. The NPC made their save and the PC was thrown in prison.
The best part of this story? This was the second time I physically shook his hand that session.
Minor Hell's Rebels spoilers
In Hell's Rebels one of my PCs got locked up in the holding house. After she was stuck there the first person she met was the warden Sabo the Spider, who in her description is described as an intense woman who occassionally drops sexual innuendos with no warning.
So as my PC wakes up she hears a voice call out to her.
"Well, well, well, looks like we got some fresh meat.
hehe meat..."
In my friend's games whenever you dig up a foot of earth a pack of encounter scaling hyenas appears and attack. This trend started when he was asked by one of his players asked if he quote "had any rules for digging"
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This was in a GURPS game I ran that was set in 1968, where the PCs worked for a private detective agency...
One of the PCs had the Disadvantage "Weirdness Magnet," which is more-or-less self-explanatory.
Anyway, whenever that PC ended up at a bar (anywhere!), the same weird inventor would be there and start chatting him up, telling him about his "dimensional transporter" device that he was working on. Basically, the NPC was harmless but annoying, and generally spouted technobabble or asked the PC to help him find some component or other.
A couple of years after that campaign ended, the same player was in a D&D 3.5 game I was running. At a bar in a fantasy town, I had the same inventor approach that player's PC, asking if he had any idea what planet they were on, and how he could get back to a place called "Earth."
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What seem to be rapidly turning into one in our 5e group is "Does he have a nose ring?"
First session we're fighting some gobs/hobgobs/bugbears and the Bard wants to cast heat metal.
"I cast it on his weapon."
"He's not wielding a metal weapon."
"What about armor?"
"Hide."
"Does he have anything metal on him like-"
"No, he doesn't have anything metal"
"-Like what about a nose ring?"
"..."
"..."
"Yeah, okay, whatever, he has a nose ring!"
So the nose ring is heated, the bugbear gets burned and has to rip the ring out of his nose, and we move on.
Of course, now every time we come across an enemy the first question after they're described (particulary if it's something like "wearing leather armor and wielding clubs") is: "But are they wearing nose rings?"
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This is in a published adventure...
That is one freaky looking cat...
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Every time I'm running a PFS scenario, and we don't fight the optional encounter, I like to have them show up and say hi to the party, but explain that they don't have time to fight them today. Sometimes the fourth wall breaking isn't appropriate, but a lot of the times its a good joke/oh crap moment.
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Party is about to jump into a "Boss Fight".
The Dwarven cleric, wanting to try out the new spell IronBeard he just discovered, gets the druid to let him cast it on her AC - a Large T-Rex. The Druid player was using a plastic toy T-Rex for her AC, sort of like the toy from Toy Story.
So they burst in on the BBE and rushing into melee is a Bearded T-Rex. To make it worse - the Sorcerer in the party hits the Enemy Boss with a Hideous Laughter spell, and so we have the following....
Judges description went something like this - "As the doors burst open and a Large figure of the T-Rex rushes into the room, (insert BBE name) whips around ready to respond to the threat - only to catch sight of the animal companion and collapse into gales of laughter. Hands clutching his sides he rocks back and forth, drumming his heels on the floor. Every few seconds he draws a breath - only to catch sight of the bearded lizard again and erupt all over again in giggles."
Needless to say - the fight went well for the PC's. The BBE missed the second save and it was all over from there....
I do think that perhaps the T.Rex was a little hurt by the reaction to his charge though. It was kind of a Toy Story moment.
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Party is about to jump into a "Boss Fight".
The Dwarven cleric, wanting to try out the new spell IronBeard he just discovered, gets the druid to let him cast it on her AC - a Large T-Rex. The Druid player was using a plastic toy T-Rex for her AC, sort of like the toy from Toy Story.
i read "AC" as "armor class" instead of "animal companion the first time, i just imagined a character sheet with an ironbeard :P
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This is from an Organized Play Campaign, so most of the players wouldn't be regulars at the same table together...
During a scenario with a "local thug" encounter, where the PCs are confronted by "hired thugs" intended to warn them off of their research, we captured several of the thugs and were questioning them. Our judge had run another scenario the week before where I had much the same encounter... so he and I (with several "new" players) went thru the "interview" something like this....
PC: "So Mook, we meet again!"
Mook #417: "Yeah, if'n I'd knowed it was yous, I might not've takkan dis job".
PC: "and how's the wife? and the little mooks? three isn't it?"
Mook #417: "same oh-same oh, off visitin' her mum again in Durma, and the lil ones is growin' like weeds..."
PC: glancing at the other mooks - stabilized and waiting their turn at interrogation "So, does the local Thugs Union have ok Medical benefits? Looks like you guys will need it. Wait, you're Rent-A-Thug aren't you?"
Mook #417: "Not w'at it used ta be, w'at wit da cut backs and all. Had to switch over to Thugs-are-Us."
PC: "Tell ya what Mook, I'll pop for a couple charges off my happy stick when we're done here..."
Mook #417: "Hay, you're all ri't! T'anks!"
PC: "No problem! Least I can do. Now, about the guy who hired you..."
All this while the other players just watched kind of glassy eyed. But after all, I had said my guy was the "Face"...
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another variation on the "Thug interrogation" scene....
after being ambushed by mooks - one of whom was throwing Stingchucks (a weapon that just makes you say "Eyuuu", made from humanoid heads...), we started to ask for information.
Three of the mooks are negative HP, but stable, and one is still able to talk, so we start with him and the standard routine...
Social PC, "So, Mook, how's it going? Looks like you guys could use a little healing - your health coverage going to handle this? you with the local Mooks-for-Hire? Anyway, who sent you to put the hurt on us?"
Mook #114, "You'se go'n ta 'ave ta talk ta da Headman."
Social PC, "and who would this boss guy be? how would we find him?"
Mook #114 - pointing at Mook #111, "You'se go'n to 'ave to talk to da 'Head' man - da guy what had da Heads..."
Social PC, "ah! yeah, now I get it... the 'Head' man!"
Mook #114, "yeah, 'e's da brains of dis job...."
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I often use the spell Unnatural Lust
I might cast it on a Mook - sending him after the PC Druids Big Cat companion... SO that he scrambles over and hugs said kitty, and I might then slumber hex him...
This means that later, when he wakes up, he remembers unnaturally lustful thoughts (and actions) toward the Big Cat, just before he blacked out. Only to come to some time later, (and because we searched him while he as asleep) with his clothing in dis-array, with a happy lion sitting next to him purring.
Yah... what happens in Almas, stays in Almas...
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During the Campaign, one of the adventurers picks up a major magic item. It is, in fact an Artifact - though of no use to the party right now, surely it will become important later... and he conceals it in his clothing. His pants actually.
Later, one of the other players says she is casting detect magic and the PC with the Mcguffin is in the area... so... he smiles and says something like...
"Yes, I actually DO have Artifact level magic in my pants!"
;)
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I often use the spell Unnatural Lust
I might cast it on a Mook - sending him after the PC Druids Big Cat companion... SO that he scrambles over and hugs said kitty, and I might then slumber hex him...
This means that later, when he wakes up, he remembers unnaturally lustful thoughts (and actions) toward the Big Cat, just before he blacked out. Only to come to some time later, (and because we searched him while he as asleep) with his clothing in dis-array, with a happy lion sitting next to him purring.
Yah... what happens in Almas, stays in Almas...
I find unnatural lust to be the most useful spell ever for getting through a wilderness encounter at low levels. That random encounter with a couple of bears; instant Nat GO encounter that you can just walk past.
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Okay... this one took a LOT of setup on the GM's part.
This was the biggest RPG mind-fark I've ever experienced. It was simultaneously terrifying and amazing.
It also requires a bit of background to understand...
The game was Amber Diceless Role-Playing, set in the GM's interpretation of the Amber multiverse (based on Roger Zelazny's Chronicles of Amber novel series.
My character was an Amberite named Aleister. He was raised on Shadow Earth by adopted parents, and did not know of his heritage. After he was found and brought back to Amber, he came into his birthright, and then stepped out to explore Shadow. Since he had been raised in late-20th-centry Earth, and since he'd been a science fiction fan, he sought out a Shadow where the United Federation of Planets actually existed, and he joined Starfeet Academy, becoming captain Aleister Sheffield of the USS Essex. This was all in the character's background story.
Over the course of the adventure, Aleister did return to the Star Trek universe for a few things... primarily high-tech healing, but also to access a starship's computing power.
Eventually, the PCs obtained an extremely powerful artifact that granted its weilder the ability to manipulate the fundamental laws of reality. . To make a long story short, Aleister ended up using it in a magical battle with the Big Bad of the campaign, who was weilding a similar artifact. In the battle, Aleister was using the artifact to summon greater and greater magical power, until...
The GM said, "Suddenly, you all hear a beep, followed by a disembodied voice say, 'Captain to the bridge.'"
At that, one of the other players said, in character, "Computer, freeze simulation." At that, the universe all froze, with the exception of the other PCs. Another player said, also in character, "Arch!" and the GM described the arch of a Federation holodeck appearing. Another of the players turned to me, and said, "Duty calls, Captian. I guess we'll have to return to our holonovel later. Computer, end simulation." At that, the entire world disappeared, to be replaced by a large black-colored room with a yellow grid pattern.
At this, the GM and two other players each pulled out copies of the Last Unicorn Games Star Trek: The Next Generation Role-Playing Game rulebook, and all of the players took out character sheets for the officers of the USS Essex. And then the GM handed me a character sheet of Capt. Aleister Sheffield, for the ST:TNG RPG.
I was completely dumbfounded, and was just looking at the other people in the room with an incredulous look on my face.
At that, one of the other players fixes me with a serious look, and says, "Sir, you should get up to the bridge. Is everyting all right?"
To which I said, "Uhhh..."
And then everyone burst out in laughter.
It turns out that the GM had conspired with all of the other players that if I ever turned up the artifact's power level to 11, then something would happen that would cause us to be playing Star Trek: The Next Generation RPG for a few sessions, and NOT to tell me about it.
I have a half comic story going where everything that goes wrong has the result of killing a cat in a creative way.
Botched attack roll? Dead cat.
Throw something out of a window? Smashes a cat.
Failed perception roll? Step on a cat who runs into a furnace and is charred to death.
I have to be very imaginative to device new cat deaths to keep the joke going.
I have a half comic story going where everything that goes wrong has the result of killing a cat in a creative way.
Botched attack roll? Dead cat.
Throw something out of a window? Smashes a cat.
Failed perception roll? Step on a cat who runs into a furnace and is charred to death.
I have to be very imaginative to device new cat deaths to keep the joke going.
I take it you don't like cats.
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I have a half comic story going where everything that goes wrong has the result of killing a cat in a creative way.
Botched attack roll? Dead cat.
Throw something out of a window? Smashes a cat.
Failed perception roll? Step on a cat who runs into a furnace and is charred to death.
I have to be very imaginative to device new cat deaths to keep the joke going.
BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO OO!!!!!!!!! ):(
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Back when I was able to play Pathfinder Society in person, my Cavalier was in a situation a couple times where we had some kind of big obstacle, somebody else's potion of fly, and my Mount, an exceptionally strong Camel. C + B solved for A. One time this involved a few quick return trips up and down a ledge (bypassing the otherwise-necessary creation of a huge complication to the final fight in the process), the other time it involved everyone but me tied up in a long rope and dangling over a long stretch of swamp as my Mount, who the rope was tied to at the top, flew over it.
We called it the "Camel-Copter."
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I take it you don't like cats.I have a half comic story going where everything that goes wrong has the result of killing a cat in a creative way.
Botched attack roll? Dead cat.
Throw something out of a window? Smashes a cat.
Failed perception roll? Step on a cat who runs into a furnace and is charred to death.
I have to be very imaginative to device new cat deaths to keep the joke going.
I love cats. It was accidental at first. The first dead cat had probably a perfect explanation for being there. Then, as a joke, I added another dead cat for some reason. Soon dead cats were everywhere.
But I actually love animals, cats too. I'm more the kind of person that would live with 50 cats than the person who'd harm one.
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O.o
That's the best idea ever.
There is a PC in that setting (same workld, more serious ampaign) who is an antipaladin who protects all kind of life (undeath is life too) so I can see him bringing a plague of undead cats just for bringing the poor creatures back to life.
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In a game of Ravenloft I ran, the PCs were attacked by mooks wearing masks. The masks were locked on their faces, with the keyhole and locking mechanism on/in their mouth. They manage to capture one of the mooks and take him back to their base for questioning, made all the more difficult because the mask prevented the mook from talking.
They searched him and found a key. When he saw the key, the mook started panicking. The PCs, emboldened, grabbed him while he thrashed about, making muffled screams, and held him down and triumphantly stuck the key in the mask to unlock it.
He screamed in terror. The mask exploded.
Definitely my favorite gag.
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Okay... this one took a LOT of setup on the GM's part.
This was the biggest RPG mind-fark I've ever experienced. It was simultaneously terrifying and amazing.
It also requires a bit of background to understand...
The game was Amber Diceless Role-Playing, set in the GM's interpretation of the Amber multiverse (based on Roger Zelazny's Chronicles of Amber novel series.
** spoiler omitted **
My character was an Amberite named Aleister. He was raised on Shadow Earth by adopted parents, and did not know of his heritage. After he was found and brought back to Amber, he came into his birthright, and then stepped out to explore Shadow. Since he had been raised in late-20th-centry Earth, and since he'd been a science fiction fan, he sought out a Shadow where the United Federation of Planets actually existed, and he joined Starfeet Academy, becoming captain Aleister Sheffield of the USS Essex. This was all in the character's background story.
Over the course of the adventure, Aleister did return to the Star Trek universe for a few things... primarily high-tech healing, but also to access a starship's computing power.
Eventually, the PCs obtained an extremely powerful artifact that granted its weilder the ability to manipulate the fundamental laws of reality. . To make a long story short, Aleister ended up using it...
i aspire to be this kind of gm, that's hilarous!
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I had a judge for a game I was going to play send out the following in an email as a reminder to "prepare" for the game... and I found it very "Awesome!", so I thought I'd share it with my friends here (and the rest of you too!).
(in the email sent to all the players before the game):
I will remind you to be prepared for the basics.
Disease
Poisons
Ability damage (potentially drain)
Swarms
Invisible opponents
Incorporeal opponents
Extremes in temperature
Being grappled
Religious extremists who do not like you
Travel in an area where Pathfinders are not legal
Then AFTER you leave the venture captains office...
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I have a (Bard) "Face" PC who is very good at what she does, but she has almost no combat abilities. (Most of the people at the table know her, my Chalaixian Whip using "lady of the evening"). She OWNS face skills, and she can really buff, but she has never done a HP of damage to anything other than herself. I'm careful to tell this to eveyone at the table when I sit down and we go thru introductions.
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Anyway, in the middle of a nasty encounter, the bad guys start tossing out Dominate Persons. Three saves later (plus one reroll) my lady is dominated and told to attack another PC.
Judge "Do you have a weapon?"
Me "She's got a silvered spiked gauntlet - but it's more jewelry. It does 1d4-1. OH! And her whips - though those are more 'day job tools'...".
Judge "That's it? No other weapons?"
Me looking down at my character sheet trying to come up with something "Wait! I've got a dagger written down here, so I must have one someplace ..." flipping sheets in the folder to my equipment sheet. "Yeah! here it is! I've got a dagger! I bought it when I was first level. It must be in my pack someplace ..." I get an image of this lady digging in a shoulder bag muttering something about - "I know it's in here someplace...".
All this while the Tank in the party is doing 50+ HP around the corner and out of sight of these Bad Guys.
So she takes a couple swings at a friend (and the Bad Guys take AOOs at her), with everyone cringings with me - afraid that I'm going to hit and spoil her "record" and do actual damage to someone!
A few rounds later and the halfling Life Oracle in the party get's dominated and anounces that he is even MORE combat useless than my harlot. "I've got a spear on my back, but I only do a 1d4-2..."
Tank in the next room - "76 points of damage with the crit..."
Talk about a polarized party.