Screwin' over the DM! Share your stories

[zergrusheddie]

Ok, everyone knows that the DM's job is to make life a living hell for the people he is controlling so that they never have him DM ever, ever again. Therefor, I have no problems with messing over the DM. One of my stories:

We are in a Fort, running from an entire brigade of soldiers, a few Dire Gorillas and a 'Pygmy Giant' {Like 13 foot tall and fat}. We decide to run towards the "Toilet House" so we could jump down the seats and get the river where we can escape. We get to one of the doors and run through the Giant runs towards me and attacks. My argument:

"You said that this thing was 13 foot tall and is wider than a person is tall. How can he get through the door in one round with difficulty?"
The DM decided this made sense and ended the round with the Giant slowly forcing his way through the door. One my turn, instead of running, I cast Tasha's Hideous Laughter on the Giant and anounced that "we should have a few safer rounds with fatass laughing in the doorway!"
We were out of the Fort before the soldiers managed to push Fatty out of the way.

While playing in a different campaign, I decided to be a Rogue who specialized in using Archer with a Sneak Attack. Since the DM let me take a feat that increased the Range I could get a Sneak Attack by 30 yards, I was pretty scary. There were plenty of times that I would be in a tree and open up with 4 Sneak Attacks on someone walking by. I had Improved Iniative, so I got another 4 more most of the time. I think we managed to steal like 9k from this one Merchant City just by having me snipe all the Horses on the carts and have the other party members load up their own wagons.
Well, we were fighting a Dragon. Since there was a stone table in the room, I went prone and started firing off my arrows at the Dragon has the rest of the team kept fighting it. I made my reflex saves when he breathed fire but stayed under shooting my 4 arrows each round. It wasn't until after the session, when we were driving home that the DM {My father} asked, "Did I leave you out of ever roll the dice to see who the Dragon was going to randomly hit every round?" My reply:
"The combat lasted nearly an hour, and you never noticed that?"

What about y'all?

[Arch Lich Thoth-Amon]

We had a DM that liked to give us diseases, curses, et al. That's how he messed with us. So when i had to make a mid-level cleric, i took all those defense spells. When he found out, he got pissed and acted like a child. Funny stuff. Needless to say, we quit his game one hour into the second session. He now sits at home wondering why no one wants to play DnD with him anymore. Pretty pathetic! He's over 30, and needs to grow up!

[kirksmithicus]

We had a DM that liked to give us diseases, curses, et al. That's how he messed with us. So when i had to make a mid-level cleric, i took all those defense spells. When he found out, he got pissed and acted like a child. Funny stuff. Needless to say, we quit his game one hour into the second session. He now sits at home wondering why no one wants to play DnD with him anymore. Pretty pathetic! He's over 30, and needs to grow up!

LOL, I haven't had a DM that bad since the 8th grade. He herded us to and through the dungeon with blue lightning bolts from the heavens.

[Grumpy Old Man]

DM had a love for wild magic areas and other little tricks that would cause discomfort for the characters. Her favorite was a little dragon who would hiccup a pink cloud on a player and make them insane for an hour. She inflicted us with them often and it was getting old. Then she made the mistake of doing that to my Halfling Rogue while he was up in a very large tree and 2 gals on the ground. They were told they were now enamored of the Halfling and had to get to him anyway they could. Turns out Gnome Clerics and a Gnome Sorcerer aren't such good tree climbers. My Halfling jumped from branch to branch singing silly little ditties and urinating on the two hapless women. The women had a talk with the DM after that, (my niece by the way was the DM), mysteriously there were no more wild magic zones and no more pink cloud puffing dragons to the relief of all of us.

[Arch Lich Thoth-Amon]

That's hilarious. I almost coughed up my soda.

[Arch Lich Thoth-Amon]

LOL, I haven't had a DM that bad since the 8th grade. He herded us to and through the dungeon with blue lightning bolts from the heavens.
Yeah, he was linear. Apparently, if it didnt go exactly as according to plan, he'd get mad.

Ah, i just remembered something. He had a DM shirt that listed monsters. When we were being attacked throughout the 1st day of his campaign, i noticed and mentioned to the others that he follows the monsters listed on his shirt, in the exact same order. Everyone laughed. He was pissed, especially since he had to change the next encounter immediately. Freakin' hilarious! Some people i just dont get, not unlike cheaters. Oh, btw, he was a cheater too. Go figure.

[nijineko]

i have been informed by players that one of my trademarks as a dm is magic pools. i tend to inflict them on players in one form or another in every campaign. a lot of them do weird off the wall things that give the players incentive to find a use for the effect. ^^ and i've been made to briefly regret certain effects i've put in them... at least until i come up with something even better to counter. =D

[kirksmithicus]

Gotta love the Railroad Barons. That, combined with a friend who ALWAYS played a hafling thief who stole from the group, and always turned on the group, and got killed by the group, and whined about as he rerolled his characters stats, in every campaign for 4 YEARS! makes me wonder why I stuck with it.

The best thing that DM ever did was dis-allow haflings altogether. I think the rest of us clapped when he told us that house rule.

[Arch Lich Thoth-Amon]

Gotta love the Railroad Barons. That, combined with a friend who ALWAYS played a hafling thief who stole from the group, and always turned on the group, and got killed by the group, and whined about as he rerolled his characters stats, in every campaign for 4 YEARS! makes me wonder why I stuck with it.

The best thing that DM ever did was dis-allow haflings altogether. I think the rest of us clapped when he told us that house rule.
Railroad Barons? Great term. I'll have to remember that one.

Seems half of my campaigns had someone amongst them that stole whenever possible from the party. In fact, i encouraged it. Of course, they were rarely caught and had an alibi ready in case they were caught. Only seen one rogue get killed by the party. Of course, smart players wont even try to steal unless they were comfortably sure they could get away with it.

[MuslixtheMighty]

I don't know what is worse, the DM that throws the entire world at the party with no chance or victory or the DM that throws the entire world at the party with no chances of failures. I am more common with the latter of the two. Level five parties taking on dragons, using caltrips to defeat trolls and killing hook horrors with only a couple of weak hits.

[Arch Lich Thoth-Amon]

I don't know what is worse, the DM that throws the entire world at the party with no chance or victory or the DM that throws the entire world at the party with no chances of failures. I am more common with the latter of the two. Level five parties taking on dragons, using caltrips to defeat trolls and killing hook horrors with only a couple of weak hits.
Explains why i run my games like i run WFRP. Anyone here that has ever played WFRP knows what i mean.

[Webhead]

LOL, I haven't had a DM that bad since the 8th grade. He herded us to and through the dungeon with blue lightning bolts from the heavens.

I once knew a DM who didn't even resort to the old "bolt of lightning" trick. If a PC attempted to wander away from the path of the adventure, he would just announce that said PC was magically teleported back. If the PC tried to kill themselves or otherwise struggle against the "plot", his sword would magically turn to cotton or some other such nonsense rendering his actions moot.


I don't know what is worse, the DM that throws the entire world at the party with no chance or victory or the DM that throws the entire world at the party with no chances of failures. I am more common with the latter of the two. Level five parties taking on dragons, using caltrips to defeat trolls and killing hook horrors with only a couple of weak hits.

I can agree with that. Case in point, I played in a AD&D 2e game where the DM had declared that all PCs got max Hit Points each level and by Level 6, our party was establishing their own kingdom, had built a castle, captured and raised dragon hatchlings into loyal, young adults and had treasuries of magic items to their names. My character alone had 4 of 5 pieces of the set of a unique (one-of-a-kind) artifact, all acquired by simply "stumbling across them" over the course of the game. There were some memorable role playing moments, but the DM definately suffered from "handout syndrome".

[Arch Lich Thoth-Amon]

Had a DM years ago that favored his brother, he also had hand-out syndrome. He would, for example, let his brother find a Deck of Many Things... long story short... his brother was allowed to wish for more wishes. Yep, that's what he allowed. His brother always had more magic and gold than the rest of us, including a seemingly endless supply of potions of healing. It was funny at first, but after a while, we all left to form another campaign. When one looks for a game to play, you can run across these kind of jokers. Worst part? They were both mid-30's.

[kirksmithicus]

Had a DM years ago that favored his brother, he also had hand-out syndrome. He would, for example, let his brother find a Deck of Many Things... long story short... his brother was allowed to wish for more wishes. Yep, that's what he allowed. His brother always had more magic and gold than the rest of us, including a seemingly endless supply of potions of healing. It was funny at first, but after a while, we all left to form another campaign. When one looks for a game to play, you can run across these kind of jokers. Worst part? They were both mid-30's.

That's funny because my younger brother complains whenever he plays one of my campaigns that I'm the stingiest GM he's ever had with magic items and money. He calls my games Monty-not-at-all games, as opposed to a Monty-haul game. :D Imagine if you will, a group of fifth level adventurers with 100 gp each and a magic + 1 sword for the group.

[nijineko]

that is pretty low, or at least it's low for the "standard treasure" for a fifth level group. none the less, it tends to force people to be more cunning in some respects.

[Arch Lich Thoth-Amon]

That's funny because my younger brother complains whenever he plays one of my campaigns that I'm the stingiest GM he's ever had with magic items and money. He calls my games Monty-not-at-all games, as opposed to a Monty-haul game. :D Imagine if you will, a group of fifth level adventurers with 100 gp each and a magic + 1 sword for the group.
I'd play in your campaigns any day, distance not withstanding. I'd prefer a stingy DM any day of the week. It's about the game, the adventure, even the glory...for some, but to me, its never about accumulation.

[Webhead]

That's funny because my younger brother complains whenever he plays one of my campaigns that I'm the stingiest GM he's ever had with magic items and money. He calls my games Monty-not-at-all games, as opposed to a Monty-haul game. :D Imagine if you will, a group of fifth level adventurers with 100 gp each and a magic + 1 sword for the group.

I like magic items in my games to feel "magical" and, as such, I want them to be harder to come by and thus more valuable and impressive. I have a hard time giving non-consumable (ie those with infinite/permanent abilities) magic items to a 1st or 2nd level party. Most often, they'll get a few potions or minor Wonderous items with limited charges. Usually by 3rd level I allow a couple "permanent" items into circulation, but even then, I like them to be unique and inspiring. Just giving the group a +1 longsword is a last resort for me. "Magic" should never be boring or totally predictable.

[Arch Lich Thoth-Amon]

I like magic items in my games to feel "magical" and, as such, I want them to be harder to come by and thus more valuable and impressive. I have a hard time giving non-consumable (ie those with infinite/permanent abilities) magic items to a 1st or 2nd level party. Most often, they'll get a few potions or minor Wonderous items with limited charges. Usually by 3rd level I allow a couple "permanent" items into circulation, but even then, I like them to be unique and inspiring. Just giving the group a +1 longsword is a last resort for me. "Magic" should never be boring or totally predictable.
Agreed. Magic in moderation is definitely key. Too bad so many DM's out there play it like magic falls off trees. I'd play in yours and kirksmithicus' campaigns any day.

[Webhead]

Agreed. Magic in moderation is definitely key. Too bad so many DM's out there play it like magic falls off trees. I'd play in yours and kirksmithicus' campaigns any day.

Yes, the PCs should stop and admire a magic item when they find one. Not, "oh cool, another Bag of Holding"...

That's actually one of the reasons I don't like the item creation rules in 3e...except for potions, scrolls, wands and minor Wonderous Items.

[Grimwell]

He calls my games Monty-not-at-all games, as opposed to a Monty-haul game. :D

I motion to the bench that henceforth we all refer to stingy GM's as "Monty-not-at-all" GM's your honor!

That is hilarious. :lol::lol::D

[Foki Firefinger]

When I game with a group, I usually ask the DM or GM what character race and class he wants me to play. That way, the DM better not complain how I player the character. For example, my paladins are more faithful than their NPC leaders or running a good con with my thieves-- not only did I cheat with my invisible imp at the dice games, but I won so much that I became a partial owner of the gambling house. What, u want me to play a barbarian!--well I guess I have to beat up the mages and destroy their magic items. What, I can successfuly break into that jewelry store, I guess I will buy the store with all its cool traps! U want me to play the druid-- do u realize what being true neutral means! No problem!

[raven21]

I was playing a dwarfen trader, pulling a cart of wears and everything to trade from my cart with a second dwarf comanion. We go into a the first twn of the game run into the captin of he gaurd that questions what 2 dwarves are doing in the city, so of course I reply I am a trader good sir and before I could get any more out we where attacked and forced to flee from the city. We mange to get away and meet up with the rest of our group on our way to then next city.
We manage to get to the next city just after dark, so being dwarves we head into the pub for some rounds with an elf from our party. Get a table and a few drinks when a guy gathers a group of men and we over hear him say to them thoes are the traders from (what ever then name of the last town was called) pointing at us. We look at each ohter like what the hell is this crap, but it happens anyways. Where pulled into a brawl then when the guys start to lose the pull knives and swords to fight with. The bartender atempts to intervien and gets attacked so I takle that guy wrestle his sword away and in the process he gets killed. Right after that they city gaurds come in and imedatly move toward us. The bartender explains that we just saved him and the gards don't care the decide we are to be arested and tried for killing that man at this time the group of guys also tell them that we are traders and not to be trusted.
Having enough of this nosences the party as a whole decides that we should engage the gaurd and flee the city. We fall most of the gaurds and flee, thinking that we are now going into the wilderness and wll be rid of the stupidness of this and the game can get going we press on.
Oh but we where wrong for the next 4 games we where hunted group after more powerful group, untill we decied that we will not let the DM have his way and kill us so we head for the coast to bard a ship and flee from this land all together then quite playing. So he puts together the most powerful group of men that he can think of to meet us at the docks (we where 3rd level and it was 2 7th level clerics, an archer, a fighter, and a paladin). They see us coming and charge us and cut everyone down except me and I only survived because I ended up with an oil of etherealness (that when we got it no one wanted so I got it as the short straw). I rubed it on and ran for the boat as it was leaving. And that was the last time we ever played with that guy. All that over the misunderstanding of the word trader.

[DeathByDM]

That last story, which was hilarious, reminds me of one of my first games with my current group. My character was a gnome illusionist. Well, we were walking along the road and we encountered a pair of traveling merchants. I immediately asked what he had for sale. Among the random adventuring gear that the guy sold, the DM said that he was selling a *New York Yankees hat*.

I'm sure he was joking, but I decided to take advantage of the situation. Being the chaotic neutral crazy gnome I was, I decided I wanted the hat. While the group was talking to the merchants, I decided to cast invisibility on myself, in full view of the everyone present, and proceed to steal the hat. I snatched that sucker and started running. One of the merchants apparently made a natural 20 spot check to see exactly where I went and tackled me (I still don't think the DM actually rolled for this).

The group was totally divided from that point on. Half of the group, including the leader, a goodly ranger, decided to leave me to my fate. The other half, a chaotic barbarian and a necromancer, decided to openly attack the merchants.

I slipped away from the merchant who tackled me and he proceeded to defend his companion. Meanwhile, I jumped on their unattended horse-drawn carriage and started riding away.

The goodly folks that wanted to walk away, at this point, had no choice but to help the merchants. They KILLED the necromancer and convinced the barbarian (who was in full-on rage mode) to calm down, but it was too late as the merchants were dead.

The ranger, who's player was way too confident, decided he was going to single-handedly stop me. He ran and tried to jump onto the back of one of the horses. He rolled very poorly and ended up getting run over by the horses and wagon. OUCH. Well, the DM rolled damage and he survived it, so he tried again (how he got up and caught up with me again I'll never know). This time, he jumped onto the wagon. Since I was not much of a physical character, I responded to his threats with groveling and pleading with my life. He showed mercy and allowed me to continue with the group. When he went back to the rest, I looted the wagon and got my hat. :D.

Ahhhh...memories....

Don't even ask about the time he attacked a treant in the forest with a fireball, in front of the party druid.....the horses didn't make it out of that one....

[raven21]

Yea its funny now, but at the time it was very fusterating.

[Xandros]

In an early part of an ongoing campaign, My character was a halfling/rogue/fighter/adrenaline junkie who was more action than thinking. Our group had been been hired by a higher level wizard for a quest to retrieve a mystic orb. At the end of that session it turned out the wizard betrayed us, took the orb for a kingdom conquering plot and then took a step backwards into a very, very, very deep pit (apparently planning to cast feather fall near the bottom). Without taking time to think I dropped the end of the rope that was at my belt and held onto the grappling hook and bungee dived down the hole after him (hoping someone in the group would grab the other end before I ran out of rope. I passed my checks and snatched the orb from the wizards hand before my rope reached its 50' length and the wizard continued his fall. The DM just stared at me. Apparently he had this long campaign plotted out with the wizard as our nemesis and I had foiled all his plans. He had to replan the entire storyline of where to go from there. He was actually pretty cool about it though and gave me bonus experience points.

[Grandore The Giant Killer]

I got 2 hilarious stories from when I play with my DM.

The first story is a story where we went through this ENORMOUS maze. My friend who is specializes in contracting drawn it with multiple pieces of graph paper taped together and my DM literally had to jot down book and page numbers on the map there were so many monsters. There were demons, Minotaurs, Rage Walkers, Will O Whisps, Stitch Devils, even 2 Juggernauts were running around trying to crush us, and in the dead center of this maze was a sleeping black dragon. So I started out at th ebeginning and went through... Everything is fine. I pretty much so rolled solo for this one while everyone else stuck together. I took a turn and it was a room with a huge pile of corpses and bones in the middle. There also was like 15 Treasure Chests all around. In the dead center was this gigantic demon weilding a scythe sitting on this mound eating a severed arm. So a huge fight broke loose and about 30 minutes later I killed this thing. I go over and collect a lot of stuff from the chests and I turn around and look at the mound to see this Rod hovering there and that demon reincarnated. Needless to say he was pretty pissed at me. And at this point I didn't feel like going through round 2 with him. So I start booking it with him chasing after me. Eventually I come across a dead Stitch Devil and I look back to see I have a good distance on him. So I cut off the Devil's arm with my sword and I continue running. I ran into a 4 way area where I attracted some Giant insect creature's attention by now as well as 4 Rage Walkers and a created monster called a Hildetorr (For anyone that has ever played Phantasy Star Online you'd know what this creature is.) I plopped the arm in the middle and to put it bluntly a huge fight cloud broke loose. I slipped out of the battle and ran back to where the Demon's plot was and I snatched up The Rod Of Infinite Reincarnation. So not only did I get a rod that pretty much so makes my character immortal, the huge war woke up the Black Dragon and some idiot players stolen it's eggs. So The Dragon is flying around killing anything in it's site including any monster it ran across. Including the Minotaurs and Will O Whisps. I casually walked through the maze seeing the coast was clear. My DM was laughing so hard he was about to fall out of his chair over that.


Another thing that recently happened just last week actually that had my DM on the brink of grabbing a bottle of Tylenol was this. Ok so he wanted to start something new and he drawn up a map of a completely different Realm. He told us to draw up new characters. So I made a Gnome Cat Burgler. I was sent out on a mission to go retrieve this stolen orb from my homeland. So I headed through these woods slaying some Babboons and a Gorilla. My DM was like "So how the hell do you plan on carrying the hide?" I literally forged the hide into my own armor right then and there. Hey it's AC 2... Better than nothing. So I continue going through the woods killing some monkeys on the way and I came across a cemetary. I met up with another player and we spotted a pile of dead corpses in this cemetary with a club sticking out. My friend tried to pull the club out but a hand stuck onto it. I walked over and tried to cut off the hand with my sword and suddenly the pile came to life in the form of 3 Zombie Ogres. These things were 10 feet tall and i'm just a 3 foot Gnome. Now I have the new 4th Edition spells and It was hilarious because I lowered the Ogres' Dexterity to the point that they couldn't move AT ALL. So my DM just shut his book and was like "Congratulations... They can't move at this point. Have at it." And so we slain them with ease while my DM reached for a bottle of head ache pills.

[Grumpy Old Man]

My group popped one on me as a DM. I had envisioned a terrible classic battle of the party vs an army of lawful/evil undead. Instead the Cleric in the group took the enhanced staff I had created and blessed the ground the undead were approaching from. I threw a low die, she throwed a large die and my army died for permanent right in front of them.