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Awesome: Dungeons & Dragons

     The Animated Series 

  • In the very first episode, the kids decide to pull an Enemy Mine on Venger, and sic Tiamat on him by opening the trapdoor she had been locked in.
  • In "Valley of the Unicorns", Eric gets one for dashing in and protecting the others from falling boulders. Everyone is surprised by his action.
  • In "Search for the Dungeon Master", Sheila, despite her Shrinking Violet tendencies, manages to evade capture, retrieve her friends' weapons, and free them.
  • Again, in "The Girl Who Dreamed Tomorrow", Eric once again rushes headlong into danger to save Bobby and Terri.
    • Later in that episode, the team sends Terri home, and then come up with a Fastball Special technique to destroy the portal that Venger had been using to lure heroes to their deaths.
  • Eric attempts to pull a Heroic Sacrifice in "Day of the Dungeon Master" to get the others home.
  • Bobby gets a great one in "Dungeon at the Heart of Dawn". He and Eric are snarking at each other as a massive tower collapses behind them. A massive stone falls, seemingly on top of Bobby from the viewpoint of the others, only for Bobby to nonchalantly smash his way through and keep up his snarking with Eric as if nothing had happened.
  • After being tricked by Kareena in "Citadel of Shadow", Sheila manages to get back at her, infuriating Kareena who lashes out with her magic against the invisible Thief, until she accidentally reveals the hidden door. Sheila's snark after is classic.
    Sheila: Your magic is as reliable as your friendship.

     Games and Guidebooks 

  • How many people are known that have rolled three twenties during a single session, and have all of them instant kill something?
  • In a D&D game, the heroes managed to surround Irontooth from Keep on Shadowfell, and blind him, stun him, and stab him to death. Then Irontooth revealed that worshipping Orcus means you can become an undead. Right then. Irontooth attacked the rogue who killed him, managed to reduce this minotaur to near True Death Negative Hp. exactly. Minotuar rogue then pointed out that he gets one last attack...but so does Irontooth, an attack that had damage prerolled, to "True Death". Minotaur rolls the attack, kills Irontooth first. So, basically, he killed the guy who KOed him, SECONDS before the guy who KOed him could coup-de-grace.
    • This minotaur then managed to infiltrate a Cult of Shar, as he is Chaotic Neutral, borderline evil, and a TRAINED ASSASSIN. Said cult recruits him, and even forces him to perform the ritualistic sacrifice of an innocent. They offer him immortality and NOT as an undead, along with a ridiculous sum of gold and custom magic items. All he has to do is kill a PC. His response? Through sheer diplomacy manage to convince them AND THE GM that he is going to do it, go to the PC he was hired to kill, explain the situation, go back to the cult, and beat them down. Oh, and he managed to do this WITHOUT swearing a magically binding vow to Shar. (Other PC who swore said vow...went blind and died during the cure disease.) His sheer honesty and wordplay made the HIGH PRIEST impressed, (it used elements of the High Priest's sermon)and sure he would join. (Without a roll, it was good RP.) End result: Cult went poof.
    • Oh, as for the PC he was hired to kill? That PC was a half-dragon fighter. Loosely worshipped Bahamut. Against a white dragon, he fought said dragon by STRANGLING IT TO DEATH WITH HIS FLAIL'S CHAIN! Dragon casts Aura of Fear, which will stun anyone who it hits. I roll to hit on entire party, only half-dragon's roll is left. Everyone in the party: "Roll a 1, it'll be dramatic!" "Aw, come on, roll a 1. Roll a 1." I smile, roll it in full view as a joke...IT ROLLS A ONE! My RP? BAHAMUT HIMSELF, BY DIVINE MIRACLE, SHIELDS PC WITH HIS WINGS! (Character ends up multi-classing to paladin based on this incident.)
    • As for the cult? On the way to the cult, one PC, mage, rolls a series of 30+ checks, along with a natural 20 on Religion, to devise how to use a certain mirror for a ritual. Thus, said PC knows how to use light reflecting from the sun to form a beam that can close rifts to the Plane of Shadows/Shadowfell. Then they fight the cult, and cult leader mutates into a being of shadows, blinds fighters. Dragonborn fighter's response? Pulls out a sunrod, not 100% effective. Mage then pulls out the mirror, and rolls very high on invoking said ritual. Cult Leader is stunned, but claims that Shar protects him. Figher invokes prayer to Bahamut, rolls it...Natural 20. Light from sunrod becomes holy fire. Cult leader pile of ashes.
  • In a recent D&D session, a Barbarian (4th ed) was riding the shoulders of an ogre, the ogre rolling a 20 to get the PC off threw said PC 45 feet, into the Big Bad Hobgoblin mage, dealing the last Hit point of damage need to off the bastard, note Hobgoblin Mage Level 7, Barbarian Level 5.
    • About two days afterwards, said barbarian took out 2 Bronze Warders at the same time(taken from H2 Thunderspire Labyrinth) dying 9 times in the process.
  • The epic tale of Sameo. Because even an Epic Fail can be a Crowning Moment Of Awesome.
  • In one battle in a Eberron campaing, there was a civil war on a big city. It's was a 5 vs. 5 plus the pc's. In one moment, some enemies npc broke in the barricades were the archer were. just one was able to survive the first strike. He sweared in a big manner that would not die in vain. And you know what? He was able to finish off 3 guys who were surronding him. The kicker? it was a group of level 1 warriors against level 1 warriors. All my group was amazed of the great fight a bunch a guys of cr 0.5 could do and one of them said "A epic level guy watched this fight and said 'that one has potential'". Cue to a bunch of "hell yeah!"
  • The party consists of a (somewhat portly) Human Warlock, an Elven Scout, and a Human Healer, all second-level. Well, they're participating in this three-day festival, containing, among many other things, bloodsports, an archery tournament, and a jousting tournament. Of all people, the Warlock decides to sign himself up for the arena battles. The premise was explained to him: it's a fight to the death. The participant is pitted against three of the more violent criminals in the Imperial prisons, who start out unarmed (but there are weapons dropped into the center of the Arena at the beginning of the match). The participant is allowed to bring in whatever equipment he desires, but there's no healing magic allowed during the matches (or afterward, if he wishes to participate in another bout after the first). Of course, since this event panders to the lowest common denominator, extra payment will be awarded to the participant if the match is particularly impressive and/or gory. In order to keep things fresh for the spectators, the officials have some surprises thrown in. For instance, the prisoners might get replaced by nasty beasties (such as giant scorpions, skeletons, bears, or even a chimera). If the participant ends up pitted against these creatures, he is paid double... if he survives. Another entertaining bit is the heavy square metal grate resting on the ground at the center of the arena. At the whim of the officials, it will be hoisted fifteen feet into the air by the pillars at each of its corners. If a person is under it when it falls again... well, it won't be pretty. Anyway, the Warlock borrowed the Scout's magic sword (it lights up with electricity when you say the Abyssal word for "shock"), rented a chain shirt, and entered the arena. The gates opened up, and in came an ogre and two orcs. The ogre ran in, standing on the platform and grabbing a warhammer. The Warlock didn't realize how far the ogre could reach, and provoked an attack of opportunity from the ogre when he approached. The ogre dropped him dwn to 2 HP with that one attack, so the Warlock, with his magical talent for wall-crawling, decided to beat a hasty retreat, climbing up the pillar as fast as he could. The two orcs make their way to the platform and pick up the remaining weapons, a dagger and a heavy pick. The ogre starts trying to climb the pillar to attack the Warlock, but he keeps failing his Climb check to get up the pillar. The Warlock remembers a wand he had taken from a fallen opponent, and activates it. Suddenly his hands start sparking with electricity, much like the sword. One orc starts to climb the pillar, and attempts to push the Warlock off. The Warlock, however, manages to push the orc off, electrifying him in the process. Things take a turn for the worse, however, when the platform begins to rise. Thinking quickly, the Warlock climbs under the platform as it rises. He fires off an Eldritch Blast through the grate... well, the Warlock's player got a 20. I asked him to roll again, to confirm a critical hit. He rolls again... 20. I ask him to roll one more time, "to confirm." He doesn't get a 20, but he rolls high enough to break the ogre's AC, so I tell him, "Your Eldritch Blast suddenly flares as it emerges from your fingertips, violently bisecting the ogre in a shower of gore." The remaining orc is utterly terrified, and starts scrambling up the far wall of the arena, pleading for his life all the while. The Warlock fires off another Eldritch Blast... 20. Seriously. I ask him to roll to confirm the critical hit... 20. He rolls one more time... and again, doesn't get a 20, but broke the orc's AC, so I tell him that the orc was decapitated by the Eldritch blast. The Warlock's player is looking at the d20 with awe, and he picks it up. "I just want to see..." he says, and rolls the d20 again. Bam! 20. We decided that he got a new nickname amongst the spectators; they started calling him "The Lightning Blood."
  • A group of level one adventurers exploring their first dungeon found themselves faced with a small Death Course in the form of a dangerously narrow walkway across which pendulum blades swung at intervals. The intent was clearly for the party to try a fast run across and dodge the blades, but with only one or two exceptions - being a bunch of level one characters - nobody was confident in their ability to try it, especially not after the first character across nearly got cut in half. Instead, the party's paladin-in-training got the dwarf cleric, the only character in the party with any skill in Dungeoneering, to call out to her when and where to expect the blades so that she could attack them with her sword as they swung. Repeatedly. For hours. Until finally all of the blades had been broken off and the way was safe to cross. It may not have been an exciting feat of badassery (and would have no doubt taken an obnoxiously long amount of gameplay time had the DM not handwaved the rest of the rolls once he realized the players were serious about it and let them fast-forward to the other side of the walkway), but it was a triumph of patience and stubbornness on the parts of the characters.
  • So skipping a lot, The party is in a heavily armed airship that's inbound to attack a city (they're at war). If it could successfully pull off the attack, the war would be over. The general of the opposing army (along with a few lackeys) manages to break into the airship and slaughters the majority of the crew, with his goal to take over the airship and use it to win the war. The party and the last few crew members (5 left out of 100 or so) are in the bridge, with the door locked and sealed with a spell, but the general carving through it easily. One party member sets the ship to crash into the city and then destroys the controls. Someone points out that they could use a escape hatch that leads to the cargo bay and use the last flying mounts to get out of the airship, but theres no way they'd make it from how fast the general is breaking through the door. One party member (an elf) tells them to go on ahead and that he'll take care of this. They start rushing into the escape hatch just as the door is cut in half. The elf charges at the door and attacks the general just as he gets through. They start to fight and the elf can barely survive against him, the general being literally twice his level. He lasts a few rounds, and it ends with him thrown across the room and barely conscious. The general closes in on him preparing to finish him off, and asks him for his last words. "Might want to close your eyes for this one". He stabs his sword into the ground and blasts the windshield (or equivalent to it) apart, sending glass flying through the room, at the general and his lackeys and blowing them to the back of the room. One ally contacts him via telepathy and explains to him that they got to the mounts safely and took off. As the general is closing in on him (by stabbing his blades into the floor), he throws himself out the window and is caught by one of the mounts, and just in time to see the airship crash and its payload explode, taking out a notable portion of the city.
  • Spending a few night in town, the Dwarf fighter decided to hustle at the bar with the typical drinking boast. over the course of three night he lost progressively more money (totaling a hundred copper) losing just to set up the fourth night, where he bet ten gold (about a week's wages in the port town we were in) he could drink anyone under the table. Three men went up. All told, he downed more shots than the three of them combined, making up for his indiscriminate spending earlier. The next night, stone sober, the three men came to get their gold back. Having watched the spectacle, my Elf Drunken Master downs his bottle of fire whiskey (making the DC to only have a strong buzz), took the bottle, and rolled an 18 crit because of a homebrew feat that gave a high crit to any improvised weapon to hit the biggest guy in the face. This gave me a surprise round as the bottle broke stunning the other two guys. A flurry of blows with three nat 20's brought down the second guy, and the Dwarf finished off the third. My drunken master didn't say a word and sat down and just held up two fingers for two beers.
  • Another 1st Edition memory, with the group whose thief slew the dragon with only a dagger above. It takes place immediately after the Dragon incident, and while this isn't quite as epic, it still serves as an awesome moment for this DM. The party has been hired to deal with a cult group in exchange for a Raise Dead spell on their Dwarf Fighter (this is after the Dwarf was killed by the Dragon). The cult is made up by about a dozen level two fighters a level four fighter, and a level six cleric. The group is only around level five at this point, and despite there being five of them, the battle starts to get a little out of hand. The Dwarven figher is having terrible luck and the thief is being beaten up by three of the fighters. Down to two hit points he does the thing that players always do when they're desperate, and begins searching his inventory for something that might be useful. No healing potions are on his person, but he does have two unidentified potions, both clear like water that he has been carrying on his person for a year. (There are no identify spells in my game. The only way to identify something is to use it.) In desperation he grabs one and drinks a small mouthful. He turns invisible. The perfect thing for a thief. He proceeds to use this to backstab a bunch of fighters, and really turns the fight around, saving the life of at least two of the other characters in the process.
  • A lvl 6 paladin who took the vow of poverty. That paladin used his horrific charisma and diplomancy boosts to talk down several bosses - including a pair of evil lvl 10 Clerics of Bane. Paladin worshipped Helm.
  • A lvl 7 Monk that took the vow of peace. Said monk also worshipped Helm. Began preaching on the steps of the temple of Bane, much to the annoyance of the chief cleric, lvl 18. Cleric stepped out to challenge the monk. Cleric could not affect the monk due to the vow of peace (and a couple of lucky roles for will saves). Cleric finally decided to murder the monk outright, wielding a very nasty mace. The Vow of Peace states that any magic weapon used to attack you in melee must make a save or be destroyed. Yes, the weapon failed it's save and detonated... the ensuing explosion formed a chain reaction, exploding most of the other magic items the Cleric had on his person. One dead lvl 18 cleric, one alive lvl 7 monk. At this point, Bane notices, and starts sending extraplanar minions... Helm notices as well, sending minions in response. Cue new Holy War, starting in Tantras. Again.
  • Chaotic neutral rogue and ranger, fed up with the goodie two-shoes Paladin and Monk, decided to rob a magic items store. Rogue camoflauges both with a wand of improved invisibility. During the insuing randomness, they wait for the Priest of Bain to finish loading up a bag with weapons to distribute for the War now starting. One murdered priest later, and the rogue and ranger find themselves in possession of a LOT of valuable goods.
  • Lastly, the party's druid, uninterested in the proselytizing, heads to the local equivalent of a Zoo. When the insanity strikes, the Druid befriends a Rhino, and goes in search of the rest of the party. The druid convinces the rhino to charge a rather angry Barbed Devil that was commanding troops of its own. Rhino charges. Bull rush succeeds. Devil trips, falls, and thanks to the Rule of Cool, is trampled by said rhino. The rhino opens up the gap as it dies, allowing the Paladin and Monk to escape the increasing madness.
  • The party links up and makes it out of town together. For the rest of that campaign, every Saturday's session started with the "Weekly War Report."
    • Shortly before permanently outlawing the Book of Broken fore use when constructing characters, the DM finally averted another town being completely ravaged by the Paladin (now on a crusade against Bane and close to attaining the template for Sainthood). This CMoA goes to the Players, who through their combined efforts, got the usually unflappable DM to say "YOUR POWERS DON'T WORK ON THE BOSS!" Much fun was had by all, and a new campaign was started the next week. For the next few campaigns, the characters would make cameo appearances, being Heroes of Legend mentioned in stories told by the NPCs (and in one case were stumbled upon during a campaign that had us planes-hopping for a high-level quest).
  • During a 4th edition campaign that consisted entirely of people new to roleplaying, Awesome moments were surprisingly common, and usually revolved around a wizard named Thaxan. Among them:
    • During the second session, the party rogue, a halfling named Pervince(Perv for short) was killed by goblins. After barely killing the goblins, stealing their equipment, and making coats from their skin, Thaxan picked up the corpse of his fallen friend and returned to town. He then took the crappy weapons to the local weapons shop, casts Prestidigitation on them to make them appear clean, shiny, and new, and sells them to the shopkeeper for enough money to get Perv raised from the dead.
    • A Changeling framed Thaxan by stabbing a Captain of the Guard while in disguise. When confronted by guards, Thaxan agreed to come along quietly, but had something much more insidious planned. He stabbed a guard with a poison ring, used prestidigitation to convince him it was a poison wasp, then used Ghost sound and more prestidigitation effects(Including setting the man who turned him in on fire) to convince the guards the house was a "Weak point in the Veil etween this World and the World of Magic" causing them to run around in a panic until Thaxan was able to convince them he was being framed by using prestidigitation to alter his face. Not only was he released, he lead the search for the Changeling.
    • After defeating a necromancer who knew no fear of pain or death, it became clear interrogating him would be difficult. Thaxan instead decided to convince him that he was the avatar of Vecna, God of Undeath. To the surprise of all, and the frustration of the DM, it worked perfectly, and he told the party everything.
    • Chasing a Tiefling through a mysterious portal led the party roughly 500 years into the past. Upon meeting a few locals, Thaxan walked up and said "Hello, I'm the Doctor. Just the Doctor.
      • Upon catching the Tiefling, a Smug Snake named Art, Thaxan walked up and had this exchange:
    Thaxan:I think you have something that belongs to me.
    Art: Oh? What could that be?
    • During a visit to Thaxan's home city, where he is a powerful and popular noble, the city's warforged guards begin rebelling, including a new prototype that's just been made. The rebellion was eventually put down, including a "Designated Armored Lifeform Ersatz Knight, which came very close to Exterminating Thaxan.
    • A group of necromancers had settled in with a tribe of hobgoblins near the city. Not liking the idea of fighting them, Thaxan negotiated an alliance with the necromancers. They agreed to consult their leader. Thaxan's response?(Keep in mind, the Hobgoblin chief is still in the room.)
    Necromancer: We will send a message to our leader, communicating your... proposal.
    Thaxan: Okay. Well, while we wait, mind if we wipe out this hobgoblin tribe?
    Hobgoblin Chief: What?
    Necromancer: No, no. They are nice. They let us stay in this cave.
    Thaxan: It's my city. I'll let you have the cave.
    Hobgoblin Chief: What?!
    Necromancer: Can't argue with that. Go ahead.
    Hobgoblin Chief: WHAT?!?!
    • After finally catching up with(and subsequently losing track of) the Changeling who framed him in the midst of the capital city, Thaxan used his clout to earn an audience with the queen to solve the problem. Within a few hours, he had cast arcane lock on a nearby door(Set only to open for humans), crammed every single person in the castle inside, and invited the queen to open the door, to demonstrate how easily a human could open it. It didn't open.
    • In the ensuing Dual Boss fight(The Changeling was working for Art, who also showed up to fight.) Pervince killed each of the bosses with a single sneak attack. The sole remaining Mook who worked for them simply dropped his weapon and surrendered.
    • Thaxan went on to meet with the elderly chancelor who would decide on a successor to the missing queen. While his noble status was enough to render him eligeable, the chancellor(not to mention the DM) was dead set against it. Thaxan also happened to have a boobytrapped box that sprayed sleeping gas. With a good bluff score, a disguise kit, and some borrowed clothes, he was able to declare himself King in short order. Afterwards, using an excellent bluff check, he was able to convince the chancellor(who was tied up in the closet) that he had tasted a mysterious liquid, gone insane, declared Thaxan king, and retired to his chamber with a 'promiscuous looking woman' and some rope.
  • Might as well ad examples from my group featuring Jumor the Dragonborn Paladin (me), Solo the Hafling Rogue, and Javar the Ardent.
    • The first one is how our first combat ended. We were facing a single mook with Solo being blocked by Javar. So he decided to jump over Javar and hit the mook. While he doesn't do damage he gives Javar and I a chance to take down the mook. Which we succeed at doing.
    • Later when traveling with a group of NPC soldiers consisting of: Redgar, Marian, Wesley, and Garrett we were attacked by a drake. Throughout the entire fight it focused on Garrett, but when the beast was slain who killed it? Garrett was when then decided to be second best to Redgar.
    • A little bit before the previous one our camp was attacked by goblins. Solo was the one who noticed them and woke everyone up. He also scored the last kill so it was decided that Solo woke up warned everyone fired a random shot in the following chaos and then went back to sleep.
  • In my 4E Prince of Undeath campaign, our minmaxed Cleric and Wizard, using a sixth level ritual, managed to bypass nearly a dozen encounters by pretending to be undead and bluffing our way past everyone (in the Ghoul King's palace, we claimed to have important information about the adventurers who were screwing up their plans, but we could only divulge this information to the Ghoul King himself) until the Ghoul King (we got the experience for beating these encounters, the logic being that we managed to defeat the encounter, though the penalty is that if we were to screw up and the cavalry came charging in, we'd not get the EXP for defeating the encounter a second time). We were brought before the Ghoul King (having managed to bluff the Phane, who was supposed to be a mandatory encounter) and he asked "What brings you before the Ghoul King?", to which we answered "We're here to kill you." After the hardest fight we had (I rolled suck and the Phane was stun-locking the wizard), we finally have the Ghoul King beaten after I used a Blood of Penance-Enhanced Sever The Source (meaning he was taking 10+2x my Wisdom modifier for a total of 26 extra damage per hit) the wizard's Abyssal Horde summon tore the Ghoul King to shreds (the Phane ran away after this). After bypassing all the encounters and defeating the end boss, we decided to, as the capper, use Raise Land to lift the Ghoul King's palace and everything within a 10-mile radius into the air, then we sent it careering into the Abyss, which has this giant open portal leading into it. By my calculations, we just caused the equivalent of a 41 gigaton asteroid impact into the top layer of the Abyss.
    • We also caused a massive riot in the City of the Ghouls by trading a large number of rats for the prisoners we wanted to rescue (blood is blood to ghouls), then released the rats, causing the ghouls to become frenzied in their attempt to track them down, tearing apart everything in their path to try and pry them out.
  • How many players can say that they one-shotted a demigod? The entire situation that is about to be described sounds like the storyline of Elder Scrolls Oblivion. The players started out the quest in prison (for various crimes and misdemeanors) and then got conscripted into the military, then sent out to investigate a series of attacks by giant spiders. The group eventually finds the spider nest, only to discover that there was a cult behind the attacks. They were trying to create a new god from a giant spider magically altered and raised just for that purpose. By the time the group had gotten there, it had the power of a minor god. The fight starts and progresses for a while. Then the wizard rolled three nat 20s in a row, and hit divine intervention, Wee Jaas empowered his quarterstaff with her power. Originally, the quarterstaff was just a stick with a torch tied to it. With the divine intervention, it morphed into a flame-covered weapon of the gods' wrath. After completely annihilating the two mooks in front of him, the wizard slowly walked up to the massive alter, staff in hand and tried to strike at the high priest. He missed, but he slammed the quarterstaff onto the alter. The engravings on the alter, centered on the fifty foot by fifty foot platform and carved to look like spiderwebs, ignited and create torrents of flame. The party proceeded to wipe the floor with the demigod's cult. They then opened up the trap door on the alter leading to the spider demigod's lair and dumped a lot of explosive liquid, along with the body of the high priest of the spider demigod, which was on fire, into the pit. The sheer amount of explosions managed to daze the demigod, and the entire party jumped in for a coup-de-grace. The wizard rolled another nat 20 with the already-empowered staff, in addition to everyone else's attacks, killing the demigod instantly. Its death echoed across the spiritual world and proceeded to scare the ever-loving crap out of most of the minor gods and got the attention of the kingdom's demigod rulers. That made turning one of the cult's priestesses to the party's side and break her faith in the spider demigod seem so easy, not to mention punting dog-sized spiders. The funny part? Everyone was level 1. This was the first adventure, and now the DM has to go restructure the entire campaign. He didn't expect the group to be so suicidal, and thought they would run away from it. And the quarterstaff exploded inside of the demigod's body. It is presumed that it died from the sheer awesome of the moment. The party consisted of Jabor,a rather smart half-orc barbarian, Brother Rayne, a promiscuous cleric of Pelor (with no physical strength to speak of), Davorick, a twitchy mage-hating ranger (dumb as a bag of rocks), Lucy, a...busty elf rogue (that we found tied up in a basement of a cottage in the middle of the forest), and Roderick, a snarky, yet strangely enthralling, lawful evil human wizard (former noble that got chased out of his home for influencing the minds of officials to advance his family). They went from conscripted prisoners to godslayers in less than 2 days. The group has yet to get experience from this quest. The DM is probably still crying in a corner somewhere. -Troper 67
    • From the same group of Godslayers, we found that our group has done something epic at least once per adventure, not to mention that there are more explosions than a Michael Bay film. We were on our way to our next assignment when our caravan was robbed while we stayed the night in a town. We tracked the thieves to their camp, which was up the side of a mountain, with the only obvious path to get their was an extremely windy road covered with traps. Well, they didn't expect Jabor. With his absurd amount of ranks in climbing, we scaled the mountain and bypassed most of the traps and patrols. When we got up to the top, Jabor (being a follower of Kord) challenged the bandit leader to a one-on-one fight. Using several bluff rolls, he accepted. The bandit was named Hammer, and carried a maul that was about the size of Jabor. The fight went back and forth for a while, though Hammer did more damage to Jabor than he received. When he got to low health, Jabor went rage and proceeded to rip Hammer's arms out of their sockets and beat him to death with them. After impaling the body with the haft of his opponent's weapon, he made an intimidate check. He rolled a natural 20. Activating the divine essence that he had absorbed from the spider demigod, he let out a roar that leveled all of the buildings in the camp and knocked just about everybody from their feet.
    • With each mission we take, our dm keeps trying to find interesting ways to kill us. This time however, he threw creativity out of the window and threw a horde of undead at us. About ten skeletons and five zombies, along with the necromancer controlling them. Brother Rayne boldly steps forward and brandishes his holy symbol. With the combination of exalted turning and empowered turning, he destroyed all of the skeletons and stunned the zombies, which were then quickly dispatched. In the same fight, Davarick (the ranger) had been shooting at the necromancer. We were pretty sure he was on his last legs, so Jabor threw a borrowed magical hammer at him. The hammer had been enchanted to let out a sonic boom on each hit. Jabor scored a nat 20 and blasted the necromancer's head off. We then nicknamed the hammer Mjolnir.
    • We managed to find yet another agent of the gods to fight. We had been tracking the missing patriarch of a noble family. It turned out that he was the avatar of a forgotten death deity. It was a relatively short fight, and we did enough damage to him with holy spells and fire that he disintegrated on the spot. That scared the crap out of the Abyssal shadow hound that had been working with him and it ran off. We poured a vial of holy water on the ashes, scooped the ashes into a jar, cast Bless on them, and filled the jar with more holy water. Later, we had a lead vault made to house the ashes, filled that with even more holy water, inscribed protection from evil runes on the outside, and stashed it in a church of Pelor. When we kill anything related to a deity, we make sure it stays that way.
  • With the same group that brought you the godslayers, but with different characters, this group started up an evil aligned campaign. The group was made up of Grugg (male half-ogre barbarian), Dair (male halfling druid), Reginald (male human sorcerer), and Verr (male Catfolk swashbuckler). Everyone except for one was Chaotic Evil. We started out as the underlings of a local drug runner. Our first assignment was to wander around and try to expand on the drug runner's territory. While we did that, being chaotic, we decided to cause some havoc. First, we went to the bar that served the strongest drinks in the city and started a bar fight that ended with the deaths of all of the opposing combatants, including the barkeeper. Afterwards, as no guards were incoming anytime soon, the bodies were arranged to look like the patrons had attacked the barkeep. Later, we listened to rumors that stated that the tavern had been attacked, with the barkeeper fending off twenty men single-handed before succumbing to his wounds. Verr broke into the barkeeper's apartment, cracked open his safe, and stole the deed to the tavern and one hundred gold. And the spare key to the apartment.
    • Later, we finally started on what we were assigned to do. Mostly. While Grugg and Dair tried to hook customers, Verr and Reginald set off to the other side of the city. Choosing a random building, Verr sneaked in and started a slow burning fire. By the time help arrived to put it out, the entire back of the housing building was in flames. Reginald cast Summon Undead, and a zombie stumbled out of the flames to face some very surprised fire-fighters. The two quickly booked it away from the scene of the crime. This gave them an inspiration for a later shenanigan. That night, Verr and Reginald went to a sorority house, and Grugg and Dair went to a fraternity house to set up some buyers (To be honest, we are not quite sure why the DM put those places there, but we weren't complaining). The former succeeded with benefits, and the latter got completely smashed.
    • The next day, the group returned to the tavern with a plan in mind. First, Verr climbed up into a tree and played the part of an actual cat (part of his personality is that he is bat-shit crazy, so this was completely normal), and pretended to be stuck in the tree to draw attention. Reginald convinced the guards at the crime scene to go help him out. While they were gone, he quickly cast Summon Undead again multiple times. When the guards came back, they found a zombie (which looked like the dead barkeeper) standing behind the counter cleaning glasses and another sitting on a stool waiting for a drink. As they checked more, they found a literal skeleton in the closet. One of the guards laughed at the implied joke, while another stabbed the zombie-barkeeper in the face in frustration.
    • Following the shenanigans in the tavern, the party decided "screw this following orders crap." Verr started burning down random buildings around the city and sneaked into the docks to poison the guards' food supply. While most made their saves, the result was that most of the guards were incapacitated with explosive diarrhea. With the chaos already present in the city, it quickly escalated into a full blown riot. Grug filled up barrels with his own excrement, stuck a fuse into them, and chucked them at the guard towers. The horrendous stench forced the guards to retreat into the basement while the towers burned down around them. Later, the former drug-runners ambushed and killed the drug dealer that they had been working for and looted his house. After that, the group decided to simply wait out the riot in the dead barkeeper's apartment.
    • Because of the sheer amount of destruction that they had caused, the group was forced to steal a ship and escape from the island before the army showed up to restore order. So they went down the docks. With Grug waiting in the crowd, Verr swam up to the side of a nobleman's yacht and climbed up. Hanging off of the side, he knocked out three guards with poisoned darts until the fourth resisted the poison and spotted him. He promptly drop-kicked that one off the side of the ship with a nat 20. Grug came barreling out of the crowd and plowed through the three guards on the dock, killing them all in two round before tossing their bodies up on the deck (we wanted loot) and hopping up on the ship himself. The guard in the water managed to get to the dock, but Grug killed him by chucking the severed heads of the three unconscious guards at him. Then, by sheer luck as none of us had Profession (sailor), we managed to get the ship under way and sail to the opposite end of the archipelago.
  • In 4E, sorcerers tend to lean towards Crazy Awesome in the fluff, being more the "dramatic wielder of lightning from the hands" rather than the "study a tome for hours to learn one spell" of wizards. They're not particularly well known for their durability. So when a party gets ambushed in the middle of the night in an inn, with the group split into, say, the rogue and fighter in one room, the paladin and monk in another room, and the sorcerer in a room with a hybrid-class whose player no-showed 4 out of the last 6 weeks and that night was the "his character dies and we don't let him back" night, it looks like all hope is lost for the plucky spellcaster, especially when the DM states that only weapons/implements are allowed, no armor or other magic items. Nobody expects to see the squishy little storm sorcerer to be the first one to clear out his assailants, nor to one-shot 10 out of the 12 minions charging up the inn's staircase with the Leaping Lightning attack that has never bounced off more than one target in the last 5 levels of having the spell. Amazingly, everyone in the party ended up having at least one "Oh my god did he actually just do that?" moment over the course of the campaign through sheer random dice-roll epicness.
  • While not as jaw-droppingly awesome as the other moments of this page, our Pathfinder group recently had one. We were running the Severing Ties adevnture, and had come to the bar, where they were running a contest of who could balance tankards of ale on top of a stool, table, or showboard. Everyone picks a size for things, and, being quite stupid, I decided that my wizard will try to lift up the showboard, with nine tankards. So everybody rolls strength, and somehow, the wizard managed to lift the showboard. Then we rolled dexterity to balance the tankards, and the wizard wins that, as well. It came down to there being two people left: the wizard, and one NPC who had done the same things as the wizard. So it comes to the point where they have to drink the ale, and whoever lasts wins. The wizard drinks his nine, and comes out slightly drunk, while the opposition drinks two or three and passes out. Our group takes the prizes and leaves, having won a contest of strength, dexterity, and constitution with a wizard.
  • While running a 4th Ed. campaign, a warforged barbarian named Rangarth the Descent split from the group while they were invading the mansion of the minor big bad. He passed me a note asking if he could scale the building and hang outside the bad's office. I told him I'd require a massive stealth check and he rolled a natural 20. Once the battle started and the baddie showed himself to be a blood mage and summoned a few minions, Rangarth leapt out and came crashing through the window. He took out the desk on the way in, splintering it and sending shrapnel toward everything in the room. He took out the two minions, wounded the blood mage, and wrecked up half the party. He stood up, roared "BOW TO ME" and proceeded to lay a solo beatdown on the blood mage that lasted two more rounds.
  • During a general Walking the Earth campaign, the party came across a city that was being run as a grotesque combination of Nazi Germany and a slave planation - the top ten percent using the bottom ninety as slave labour to mine for precious gems. One member, a Shardmind, who to this point had been played as something of a combination of Data and Legion, as a blank slate, in that they were somewhat ignorant of organic nature, largely unable to comprehend their own emotional responses and had no sense of morality that wasn't taught by experience or other party members. On seeing a group of about ten "citizens" whipped by an overseer, he asked "Why do they not fight back? They have the severe numerical advantage". The party had a few answers, such as a lack of weapons, leaders etc, he deduced that what they meant was that the workers had no hope. When they agreed, he paused, then said "Then I shall give it to them", walked up to the overseer and punched him in the face. He then pretty much became the leader of the cities resistance movement, and it became a pivotal point in his development into a Chaotic Good anarchist.
  • While still new to tabletop gaming, my first D&D 3.5e character an alchemist by the name Brofenbrener survived having his soul ripped out. To keep this short, I'll start with the fight. The fight was with a hell hound that came out of a painting in a magically darkened room. The only source of light was my sword which I had placed a light potion on. After the hell hound came out of the painting, he looked at Brofenbrener and decided he was going to eat his soul. Being slightly insane, Bro didn't really take this threat seriously... until the hound bit his arm and took health from 28 to 5. Seeing that this is serious, he dropped his sword and hid the dark only to still be seen by the hound. The hell hound decides that now is the time to eat Brof's soul and uses an ethereal projection to rip out his soul. While this is going on, both our bodies are limp and defenseless and the other party members are in a panic. That is when the bard does the most stupid, crazy, yet AWESOME thing ever. Using a snowglobe that pull beings out of the ethereal plane and into the physical plane, he threw it at the direction in which the two souls were grappling. Everyone was afraid that this could open some sort of rift, but he managed to succeed his roll checks and the two souls were now physical. The binder used a lightning bolt on the hell hounds soul, the soul popped out of existence, the hound's body collapsed, and my now physical soul went back to it's home. As of now, we still have no idea how this is going to affect him.
  • In a sandbox Pathfinder session, me and a few other players were in the arena, fighting the Empire's monsters. This was the last round. We were all out of energy,low on health, and I, the party healer, ran out of heals. We had fought harpies, slugs, cactus superheroes (yes), and two hippos, respectively. We were all level four and had very little armor. Our cavalier, his pet, another animal we had with us, and magician was down. It was me, a Dwarven Cleric with no heals, a ninja, and a Deer person monk who was only three feet tall. You would think that, after fighting two hippos, we'd be done, right? Nope. The GM thought it would be a perfect time to throw a FIVE-HEADED HYDRA at us. It was at this point we were all saying our good byes. We still fought it, but luckily for us the monk had scored a crit and it was nearly dead. It was at this point it grew seven head. It was the monk's turn, who used flurry of blows. Both hits crit and we kill it. As is tradition with our group, the monk describes their kill. The three foot tall deer person proceeds to describe crushing all of its heads, leaping into the air, and crushed its body into fine dust. No joke. Sufficed to say, we were all pleased with ourselves.
  • In a 4e session of Dungeons and Dragons, a Tiefling Trickster Bard Straw Feminist (that was played by a PC) manages to convince a Queen to let her cast a spell that would effectively genocide every single male, the Queen's cousin included, with a number that the story teller admits would sway even Orcus. Not wanting this to happen, a PC Thaneborn Barbarian went over and started beating her to near death with his lowest level rage dailies, but the character who manages to land the killing blow is a female Fighter. The session ends, but the Fighter gives one Post-Mortem One-Liner:
    "Some of us like MEN attached to dicks, you selfish cunt."
  • The Elfslayer Chronicles, 4e. The DM was a blatant yaoi fangirl who absolutely loved elves, and threw in overgenerous amounts of Humans Are Bastards and Can't Argue with Elves into her story. The story itself was that, some time before the campaign started, a human prince had been hunting in the Elvish forest and was seemingly killed by xenophobic elves. What really happened, however, was that the prince was taken in by the elves and nursed back to health, and was in a gay relationship with the Elvish captain of the guard. The PCs, now guests of the elves, were tasked with sending the prince back to the human lands to cease hostilities, as the Elves were losing the war. However, one PC, a Human Illusionist Wizard, did not want to play that way. Given his character's patriotism and the fact that the war was great for the Human Nation, he didn't go along with this, murdering the prince and framing his lover, the Captain of the Guard, to force the war to continue. The posted threads ended with his having murdered the Captain of the Guard murdered to cover up any evidence contrary to the situation the PC had set up, and framing the one PC who disliked his plan (and was bringing it into the Metagame; distrusting the PC's character when, in character, he had no reason to). The awesome part was that at no point in the plan could he have ever been caught by anything other than DM fiat, which the DM, to her credit, was unwilling to do.
  • This troper had a barbarian named Ichi. Ichi was swallowed by a shark. He climbed out.
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