I would like to hear some of yours. I’m not talking about just lucky dice rolls (although they too can change a character’s career). I am more interested in those defining moments of brilliant role-playing.
I would regale some of my namesake's, but this is a family board.
Yes, I am aware that’s not how the “official” version went but that was before the LG Gazetteer was published.
Anyway, one of my players was a paladin of Pholtus. Up to then, he had always been torn between strict adherence to Law and his innate desire to temper it with Good. When the revolt began, the head of the local temple put him in charge of a squad of templars to fight rebels and help protect the palace.
He was running in the streets when, suddenly, I described a group of rebels heading their way. I anticipated a battle but the player surprised me by turning to the templars and telling them to return to the temple. He would handle the rebels by himself.
At this point, I thought he had lost his marbles. As heroic as it was, that gesture was doomed to failure and, indeed, smacked of undue pride for a paladin.
But when the rebels finally surrounded him, he simply said “Give me an armband, I am on your side” (all rebels wore a green armband to distinguish themselves from “loyalist” soldiers)
Let me tell you, I was floored!
Even though he knew it would cost him his paladinhood, he had decided to do the “right” thing because, in his opinion, letting Archbold lead the country was a disaster.
Years later, it’s still one of my most cherished campaign memories
Being Dm for 15 years+ i've lived greats moments, in battle or in roleplay, it will be long to enumerate them all, but i love this story (i must admit i like paladin, thief, bard, and other strong role play oriented class)
“Protect me!” he yelled.
The orcs saw the remaining bulette and clustered around the mage.
“Kill that!” he yelled.
Protesting that they could better protect him near him, they moved forward and attacked the creature. The rest of the party was hacking the thing to pieces and the mage cast vampiric touch. Just then they party killed the creature. The mage looked around, shrugged, and touched one of the orcs he’d just summoned, draining all of the life out of the creature and leaving little more than an empty husk. The rest of the orcs moved away from the mage.
A hush fell around the table (except from the guy who’d run outside for a smoke break right after the second bulette had fallen). I gave the player of the elf mage a saving throw and when he flubbed it, I told him to change his alignment to NE. He was pleased until he learned about the xp penalty.
When the last (most experienced) player got back from his smoke break and I told him what the mage had done, his draw dropped open. He agreed completely with the alignment change.
Originally posted by makoma
Really a good episode Mortepierre. I would have liked one of my Pc paladin to act this way, i find it quite clever, responsable, and sincere. I am not sure i'd have made him loose his paladinhood!
In the name of my player [Gilles], thank you
Actually, I was a bit torn as a DM about what to do at the time. On one hand, I very much agreed with what he had done. It was the "right" thing to do. On the other hand, when you serve the Lord of Law, turning against your king (not to mention not following the orders of your high priest) is a major infraction.
I solved it this way. On one hand, he lost his paladinhood. On the other, he gained the respect of both the future king (Lynwerd) and lady Farenne (of the White Tower). Later on, the cult of Pelor recruited him because they place the emphasis on Good rather than Law. He went on a quest, received an Atonement and became a paladin again
Originally posted by Max_Writer
The mage looked around, shrugged, and touched one of the orcs he’d just summoned, draining all of the life out of the creature and leaving little more than an empty husk. The rest of the orcs moved away from the mage.
Priceless! Tough life being a summoned monster... :D
She wasn't bad at first, in fact her nature was lawful good. She adventured with my party as a trusted and valued companion for several adventures. But she went off by herself and acquired a set of bracers that changed her alignment to evil. Slowly she began to stab my party in the back by spreading rumors behind our backs, she would adventure with us and steal from us when we were not looking, she made arrangements to have us ambushed, and would keep evil artifacts that we had found rather then destroy them, all the while steadily growing in power.
By the time we realized that it was she who was behind all our misfortune (she had been most subtle and clever in covering her acts), Vermai was at the pinnacle of her power and a spy for Iuz. Because the magical bracers were originally created by Vecna, the DM ruled that to break the curse would require much more then simply removing them or casting a spell.
What came out of this was an epic quest not for wealth or power, but for the saving of this character's soul. The DM played this up and I found myself becoming rather surprised with how attached I became to both the concept and to this NPC. Many times we could have either dropped the quest or simply have killed Vermai, but we never did. It became less about an NPC and more about saving a wayward friend.
Finally my wizard Osmund battled his way into Vecna's citadel to destroy the bracers. Breaking the curse required a word from the one who created the bracers, Vecna. It took a lot of epic negociation and role playing (as well as fullfilling a quest for the maimed lich as well! we had to strike a blow against Iuz, so we were able to atone for assisting an evil diety), but finally the word was given.
When Vermai revived and became whole again, she had to atone for her misdeeds and go into seclusion to recover, but our adventuring party was never the same again. All this work and sacrifice to save an NPC really made us think on larger perspectives on what role playing was about. Saving the world was almost insignificant next to saving a friend.
O-D
I really made our DM suffer for that decision by making Rando the most annoying PC possible. Later in their careers they encountered Iuz and for some reason lost to memory Rando was naked and we were protected by a Cube of Force. Rando pressed his bum against the wall and was taunting Iuz ;) . But Iuz still had them trapped and the wizards couldn't teleport the party out thanks to Dorakaa's magical barrier but we found a loophole and used Word Of Recall to get the Wizards to safety back in GHC. Before they left the Wizards handed over their Staves of Power to the BIG fighter in the group who knew exactly what to do with them. Rando climbed up on the big mans shoulders and as the wall of force faded the warrior broke both Staves over his knee. Again the DM intervened and allowed us to be sent to different Planes, and Rando went to Hel.
The DM did get his final revenge: I went on to play Rando to level 16 until he was changed into a python in the jungles of Hepmonaland. My friends like to say he's now a pair of boots.