@@bluesandman7566 "If you're not completely invincible no matter how much I cheese or cheat, you're not a tank" is honestly a brain-numbing mindset. That DM is just bad.
And the guy's playing a Druid, too. I always wondered how the hell Gothi ended up being a tank in Fool's Gold, but apparently Druids are just like that in 3.5e I guess, lol.
Min-maxer's problem isn't min-maxing, it's why he did it. He wasn't trying to be an effective team member, he wasn't even trying to do as much damage to the enemies as possible. He just wanted to do more damage than his teammates did, and threw tantrums like a toddler whenever he didn't get his way.
Yeah, that motivation is definitely a factor. Probably why min-maxing has a bad reputation, even if it's just one reason. Really bad when the build sounds cool and fun to play.
Honestly the intro about the necklace sounds like it could be a great hook as a villain weakness Imagine - a supremely powerful wizard immune to all spell effects and damage… but as soon as the barbarian swats away his feeble lil wizard arms and just yanks the amulet away, the villain gets smote to smithereens by millions of points of damage taken over the years. Kinda like a lich, but… maybe not *quite* as foolproof of a defense as a phylactery
Just remember that if it's cursed, give your players a chance at a heads up. Maybe it shines weirdly and you hear ominous voices. Suddenly vaporizing half the villains castle and the party along with it would be a bad end for campaign.
i like this idea; i think i'd hint to the amulet and what happens if its taken off after a while just to see if the party is willing to make a heroic sacrifice--but thats for like.. end-game lol
Pay attention guys: If you want to impress a girl, whether in a game or real life, desecrate or destroy something that is culturally significant to her. She'll be all over you!
It's true. I once desecrated something of deep cultural significance to this girl I had a crush on and she was like, "Wow, with this one act you have caused me to reconsider even my most fundamentally held beliefs, things that are core to my very identity and sense of self no longer have meaning to me. Allow me to reward you by taking my top off." Then two other girls came along and because the first girl had her top off, they also took their tops off, and the four of us were called in to save the president's daughter from culturally and regionally ambiguous terrorists. And when we finally pulled 39 year old social worker Ashley Biden from the burning wreckage of the Stockton Town Mall the first thing she said was, "Why aren't those young women wearing shirts?" Which was a fair question, but we all just laughed.
That opening story... I totally knew a DM like that. He'd always tell me stories of how he outsmarted his player party. I never played in his group for reasons that should be fairly obvious.
Yeah, honestly, I like the cursed item. However it deeply needs to be foreshadowed "you have a feeling, a sense of dread before you take it off" Or, like any reasonable person would do, when they take it off to clean it or themselves, they get that feeling. If they Get the first strike when the damage was low enough to survive. They then have a choice, keep it or get rid of it
Or once a few spells get absorbed into it, it starts to crack so that they would inspect it better, or have a reason to take it off before it grows so to out right kill everyone for miles...
My idea for it, as I ALSO love the idea, is to make it a mixed boon and bane. How do I go about that? Basically make it into a glyph of warding (sort of). Each time they try to cast a spell, the Amulet absorbs it. Like one of the other comments said, foreshadow that fact (my idea: something noticeable, but don't just SAY what happened, because that ruins the immersion a little. "As you focus your magic, the Amulet glows, and nothing happens".) Then, my idea is NOT when you take the Amulet of, but rather when it BREAKS. Far more exciting if it basically works like a hand grenade lol. Might even want to add a "fuse" when they figure it out (again, first thing to come to mind: let them crack it. But, once the inlaid stone is cracked, they only have a round or two before the magic rushes out).
@@fragniz the only thing I like about the original idea was that the player can choose to self sacrifice if they want to do a big dramatic saviour moment. Imagine if they carried it for the whole game to the final fight? Of if they are in a no win scenario to self sacrifice. I would have a way to diffuse the stored energy as a remove curse type deal.
Honestly, the curse is really cool in theory. In execution...yeah, no, that was bad. There are definitely some good ways to have that curse and make it fun for all involved. My mind immediately goes to a "heroic sacrifice" type situation if the player knew what the curse was. Just straight up killing 4 players, though? Not fun.
I think the necklace could be and interesting idea but at least they should give hints like "as you absorb the damage you feel as tho you aren't out of danger yet" or "you notice your amulet emitting a slow low yet ominous hmming sound the gem seeming glowing abit to bright in the sunlight" at least something to say "hey ya might want to be careful with that little toy ya got around your neck" and if anything it could used as a final suicide move like vegetas redemption arc in the buu saga
I hate when DMs have a "HAHAHA GOTCHA! YOU'RE ALL SO STUPID" attitude... Ruins the game for everyone if the DM's being a jerk due to some backwards sense of achievement when they screw their players over.
Adversarial DMs tend to result in bad campaigns. The DM can always go "Rock falls. Everyone dies.", so there's no actual accomplishment in killing/maining player characters.
The worst part is it’s easy to fix. Make the player find out how the necklace is cursed, and suddenly it’s not a gotcha, it’s a puzzle to solve. Maybe they just never take it off, maybe they try to find an anti magic field to take this time bomb off inside. Maybe they even find a way to use it to beat the bad guys. Surprises that hurt the players will never be as good as the players discovering a way they could have been hurt, and finding a way to avoid it.
@@JosephCollier-tp3ow Or you could make it suspenseful, tell them it will explode for all the damage it's absorbed when it's absorbed enough magic damage, but don't tell them how much damage it *can* absorb, it'll make them so anxious and excited, the guy immune to magic damage will run away from enemy mages, it'd be so interesting xD
@@PaladinGear15it would’ve been as simple as giving players an Arcana check to see if any of them sensed or understand that the amulet is magically dangerous. The theme of the cursed item is perfectly fine, this DM however has no concept of driving forward a narrative for the players to have fun in. God awful dm
@@junky2fk But why does the dm have to tell their players to make an arcana check for the item? From the info we have, it seems the players didnt try to check if the really powerful magical item might have some drawbacks.
The last story caught me as odd. The DM kinda hijacked the character to have them do awful things, one shouldn't just assume based off of a character being likened to another. The wonderful thing is it was retconned out. The minmaxer tried to use a power move and was soundly put down. Spectacular.
Honestly could have kept the negative reputation by acknowledging that ring would be slavery even if OP didn't intend it that way. Mentioning the inspiration while casually ignoring how it was portrayed didn't help. Not excusing the DM from taking player agency (though I now have a dark chuckle over the former villain tiefling faking it to frame his captor).
My recommendation: don't just foreshadow items to be cursed, treat them like a disease with progressing symptoms. That cursed item could have been cool it it were like a ring with a centipede motif that gains barbs each time it absorbs a spell and gives the wearer nightmares of it falling off into a ghastly vista.
The "teaching a lesson" story sucks because destruction is a BS spell that really should not be used by anything besides boss monsters. Giving it to at least 4 mages when its high level is some nonsense.
So I love how the story with the "reckless" tank, the only thing the dm proved was that op was the tankiest tank who ever tanked. I mean dude tanked 3 destruction spells at the end of a fight and only died on the 4th cuz of a failed roll. Like even if he was playing reckless he could obviously handle it and that just makes the enemies play there cards early.
Ya know, I really like that idea of the item in the first story as something a villain would have. It might create a really cool situation where the party has to kill them by removing the necklace in some way.
I'd give it to a Lich. They made it like this because they will never have to take it off. Any party that fights them will be using a crap ton of attack spells to take them down, so this would serve them well defensively. And if the party does manage to kill the Lich they are going to loot the corpse. As soon as they take the necklace off, which they would as they would have seen it work and know it was magical, BOOM. A final trap to get revenge on the party.
Ooo, then the player that gets it decides to wear it and starts becoming super paranoid about "what if they get jealous? What if they want to take it from me? I've been sponging spells this whole time for them, but what if they dont need me anymore..." and become the next BBEG, creating a viscious cycle.
Yeah the OP in that story totally misunderstood Lenore's character if she thought that ring she gave Hector was just to keep track of him. I'm not saying the DM in that story was in the right, but she shouldn't have compared what she did to Lenore cause Lenore actually did [bleep] Hector in that way.
Jerk DM after 7 rounds focusing on one Character: see I told you your not a tank The targeted character: Dude if you needed 7 rounds and focused primarily on me then you proved that I am indeed a tank.
lol the DM "teaching them a lesson" isn't even teaching them anything. They literally created a situation where the person was going to get jumped regardless of what they do and then had to spend forever focusing them to even get the job done. If you need to go through that much effort, then you're the problem, not the player.
Lesson story: I mean, the shait DM had to pull out a nasty spell that honestly sounds a fair bit busted just to put down OP. I mean, come on. Failing the saving throw results in instant death with no way to survive. OP tanked 3 hits that avged 30 damage per spell and had enough HP left to tank two more hits of avg damage before being in danger of going down. That sounds pretty tanky to me. So, yea. I agree with Crispy that this was just blatant targeting and bullying of a new player.
There are times and places to make players paranoid. Like in horror campaigns. That said adventurers are *already* healthily paranoid. If they are *extra* paranoid *all* of the time, it's because you're like that all the time instead of when appropriate.
Cursed amulet; Overpowered cursed item that's hilariously easy to abuse. There's no good use for this outside of making it a villain's signature thing. Story one; Min-maxer complains that someone else is "overpowered", fails to pass irony check. Story three; Tanky melee focused character gets told they should stop doing what they're built for. Story four; The comparison to the slave ring was a mistake. The DM making a player's character commit horrible acts offscreen against said player's will was a much bigger mistake.
@@AtelierGod fat lot of good that would do against a wall of force, like in the second story lol. Also they're still not resistant to psychic damage. Having run a multiclass build with a Totem Barb in it, I can say one run in with a mind flayer and their pets/friends would still be a brown pants moment for them.
@@seandenton8148 easy enough to deal with, there’s a feat called fey touched that gives you misty step, drop your rage and teleport out next turn just rage again. As seen with most sessions according to D&D creators there’s like 2 battles per session and at higher levels you have more than 2 rages.
With all due respect to the writer of the final story: yeah maybe comparing the funny ring to The Slave Ring from the Castlevania anime was... a bit of a bad idea? But yes as soon as the DM gave that description they should've given a hard no.
So the Mando story, Joseph was wanting to “retire” the character after one game? Dude, what the hell? While I know you don’t normally like solving out of game problems in game but I think in this scenario it would be fitting for Raven or the OP to even justify attacking the character with that age old adage “it’s what my character would do!” Also with how important these sessions were for Raven’s character and how bad Joseph was simping you’d think he’d have been a little more aware of his actions but for some stupid reason he thought this was how to show off? 🤡
Honestly, I think the kid just had autism and he didn’t know how to deal with it (at least based on the information available). I say this as a person with autism
Story 1: The necklace could have been an awesome moment if the player had known the curse. In a no-win situation, they tells everyone how he has enjoyed their journeys together and to retreat. Then, when everyone else is out of range, they go up to the BBEG and smile as they remove the necklace, saving his friends through their sacrifice.
My Dm did a nasty cursed item that ended up blinding a character. But it was foreshadowed by the player getting it from a deal with a devil, who it was made pretty clear couldn't be trusted. And getting his eyes regenerated turned into a side quest that created some memorable content.
Mind you this player had left the game for life reasons before the curse went off, so I have a feeling the dm would have just had it be a humbling thing rather then destroying the characters eyes if he was still in the game.
Gold can be hammered quite thin. The entire room, floor to ceiling, could be less than a pound. Or Do a Pirates of the Caribbean Player steals gold Magic Mouth intones: ‘You are now Cursed. [insert specific debilitating Curse] And you will remain so until you make amends’ “No, no save. You picked up a magic item. No, dropping the gold does not take off the curse. No, the Curse can only be lifted by a Cleric of the people that set it, or a Limited Wish, Miracle or Wish.” You Joe have a bunch of plot hooks.
The one about the amulet could have been either foreshadowed, which the DM didn’t do, or maybe while they go to each encounter, he mentions how that one guy is feeling a amount of pressure building up on his shoulder or something weird/ominous each time they go into combat. Then they could feel that something is going on with the player either a curse or maybe something else as strong is building up in a negative way.
I think the cursed amulet could've worked if identified... Imagine if a Zealot Barbarian has it and tanks magic on top of physical stuff then in the thivk of enemy lines, removes it and wipes out alot of em... Then the cleric resurrected them cheaply.
That first item I could totally see my younger self make assuming they would examine it and space out the damage outside combat. Only to have sessions pass without them looking at it and me slowly panicking as I realize the moment they take it off it will be a tpk.
The necklace releasing the stored damage would've been a cool idea... if the DM hinted that something was off about the necklace (i.e. the jewel glows sinisterly as it absorbs the attack. You feel an intense heat build before you attempt to remove the necklace, and you notice the birds begin flying away in droves, etc, etc).
About the preamble story: I had a long payoff magic item once. It was a friendship bracelet that one player got for helping someone. It detected as very faintly magical but couldn't be identified. Months IRL later, the wearer took a hit that would drop him, but instead that hit was negated and the bracelet drained of its magic and fell off.
Better idea for the necklace: eventually it just stops working and the player has to deal with taking magical damage again in the middle of combat. Not an instant death, but at least 'instant' damage or status.
Regarding the "Mando" story: Not only is the player being a jerk, he's not even being in any way accurate when he says that "it's what the Mandalorian would do"! Mando has always been extremely respectful of other cultures. Not only that, his personal religious devotion is a notable character trait. Finally, he's most definitely not all about the money, or the series wouldn't have happened - he'd have left the asset behind with the Client and gone on with his life with a sweet camtono of beskar!
The necklace is actually balling. I’d probs say something the “necklace glows with the stored power of the spells” and “trying to take it off you can feel the seal over the power loosen, you’re not sure where the spells will go if you take it off” All they have to do is suppress the necklace magic to take it off, through i’d probs put a flat damage limit on the necklace of like150 damage and when it reaches that point you get smacked down to -1 hp and the necklace resets
So I’m going to admit I’ve never played D&D, would love to one day! In the case of Joseph why not continue without him? Why let the plot Raven was so invested in die? I feel so bad for her, the DM couldn’t retcon what happened?
I think what would be interesting are cursed items that when you put them on you know their cursed, but they always have a positive ability you might want to do, but using that ability triggers the curse. Like a ring that gives you bonuses and advantage when speaking at the cost of having to perform a check thats DC increases each time you use it that will slowly turn your character into a self center ego maniac if you fail too many of the checks. Like I think there's a magic item that absorbs half of the magical damage you take, but in exchange at a later time it will expel that damage and hit you with it, if you know about that effect you start thinking about if or when you should use it.
For those of you who don’t speak power gamer, the phrase “PAM + Sentinel + GWM” means Polearm Master + Sentinel + Great Weapon Master. A broken combination made to maximize damage output, which with Barbarian, adds on rage damage for three degrees of hurt. In raw melee power, cannot be beat. Sucks that Wall of Force doesn’t give two whiffs of a rat’s ass about your damage output. 😂 ngl, that was beautiful.
Amulet sounds cool item if used properly. I once gave plaers a cursed cape of a shadow that was turning the one who wear it into shadow creature slowly. With each day I was describing as their skin turning pale and itching, feeling of cold, visions of ghost around them etc. until they realized that they could either take it off or turn into monster.
That amulet actually sounds pretty cool. I might use that, but make it only hurt the wearer and make a lot more foreboding descriptions about it, rather than make it a secret time bomb for everyone. Comments like “it’s almost too good to be true!” And “why would the previous wearer have ever wanted to put this away in that lockbox?”
That cursed amulet could've been cool if the stored damage only affected the wearer and if it could be seen as super obviously cursed by detect magic and such, and maybe would have side effects like the wearer feeling a lingering pain as though getting hit by the absorbed spells, the pain flaring up as a warning when they start to remove it.
Intro: I think, "Why didn't the party cast Identify on the item to discover it was cursed?" Then I conclude, "Whether they did or not, DM would probably pull something like the curse hides itself from that spell." 1st story: Even if the player's a salty jerk, I like his build. And great solution from the players, even if Pass Without Trace was blatant meta-gaming. While DM should have handled it better, at least DM didn't side with the problem player. Second story: Saw a thumbnail that I think was about this story (didn't watch it). Definitely makes me notice a common tabletop horror story is more "list of reasons the problem player is a problem". Third story: Seems like DnD in the workplace is a bad idea. Too many power dynamics with people you can't just choose to never see again. DM saying OP would have to probably beg to get the character back felt especially low. Fourth story: Oh that cursed ring, bringing back maddening memories regarding that situation. As bad as a scenario such an item could cause, DM assuming and then forcing the player character to be that horrible was definitely worse. At least it got retconned. Hopefully OP would be able to enjoy their owlin Dhampir rogue again. Hopefully.
I really like the idea of the cursed necklace as long as my players know about it. That way they could remove the curse or use it to their advantage if they wanted to.
While I agree with you about checking what folks are cool with first, I do think the OP in the last story was asking for trouble by specifically comparing the ring to such a jerk-move item used by an evil character. I've had a couple of times in different games where players have claimed to have built unstoppable characters (admittedly less maliciously than in the min-maxer story) only to discover than game I'd planned before even seeing the character in question was able to taker them down quite effectively (bear-totem barbarian vs mindflayer civil-war :) )
True, the 4th OP was sketchy for using such an item while invoking a horrid scenario. Though that doesn't justify making her character act without player permission (msybe unless the ring was cursed to make the "master" do such things). Could have just let the player's original plan play out while other characters point out the unfortunate implications.
ok the amulet one is an interesting idea but its too high a possible damage out put, plus you need some indication like the amulet seems to contain the spell or something so they have a clue as to what their dealing with, personally i think the cursed boots of spider climb are better those were at least survivable in most cases, though i felt it was funny they didn't figure that one out till someone pointed it out
Normally I'd agree with what you said about in-game solutions, but in this case the SorLock said it was ok and the players were perfectly willing to to deal with it their way. Usually it's only a problem if the DM imposes their own in-game solution.
Being in a D&D group is like being part of a car. The engine may be able to function on its own, but alone, it can't do anything usefull. In this case moving forward. So the engine has to distribute the energy to the transmission so that the wheels can turn. But soon, the engine will be filled with exhaust which will make the engine filled with smog and be useless. To combat that, the exhaust pipe helps take that exhaust out of the engine so it can keep going. Long story short; everyone must work together to complete the task put before them.
For the Leroy Jenkin story, I think what was happening was that most of the group just wanted more rp among their characters, and less combat. While OP and that other player just wanted to get the story moving.
Ummm, no, Mando would not have done that. He gets his money honestly and even if he doesn't understand your culture he isn't going to deface your historical site (damage from battles notwithstanding)
Anybody who didn’t immediately clock that necklace in the opening as suspicious deserved what they got. Always suspect anything that seems too good to be true
When it comes to a minmaxer, the important thing though, especially if they decide to play a flying character is put their foot down. I had a player who played a fairy Dragon Sorcerer/Arcane Archer fighter, and they decided that at the start of every combat that they'd fly "Up as high as they can go." And they never RPed. I didn't want to put my foot down, and as a result I enjoyed nothing with that character. She was just there for chessing encounters and that was about it.
Take my 5 cents on the cursed amulet, just give it a twist and turn it into a gambling and story opportunity device at once: don't just nuke anything around the PC, instead let a visual Copy of the PC emerge from the amulet. The Copy then walks/flies/swims away, war ether floats your boat, to get to an area with as much exposure as possible. On its way it may even ignores walls or any other obstacles. And then.. the "fun" begins, because now the Copy will use the absorbed spells on any target IT wants. Maybe even take the PCs preferences into consideration, Paladin or Cleric? Burn down some temples and churches. Druid? Destroy the nearest forest. Bard? There are no Bars left in town. You get the picture. Now you have a lot of NPCs furious in believe one of the PCs destroyed a lot of placed and maybe even injured or killed their loved ones getting the party into a lot of trouble really quick. If they are lucky they finished what ever took them here and "only" need to get away unseen. If they aren't they need to be extra cautious moving around the area till they are ready to go. Could it be used to kill a bunch of people in favour for the PCs? Maybe. But are you willing to try..?
I feel like Min-Maxing in any normal dnd module is a lot more asking for trouble. Especially 5e since there are saves that can impact any of the attribute stats. Pathfinder and 3.5 is where min maxers can actually be an issue.
I min/maxed a character before. All designed to be an unkillable tank that reflects the damage back to the attacker to punish them. The whole point, though? He's a bodyguard. He didn't want to fight; that wasn't his job. He was there to protect and serve another party member and that VIP's entourage (the rest of the party). He was all about trying to de-escalate, and able to step in immediately when it was needed. The party rogue get himself into trouble? The bodyguard quietly sighs and vortex warps the rogue out of the way, stepping up to sort things out. The VIP sorcerer gets kidnapped? Divination to track them down, ambush the cart, and brace himself for the horse running into him and getting knocked out as his shield retaliated. Things like this.
I've actually experienced and did something similar to thay firdt story, and all I'm gonan say is. You have to foreshadow it or like what I did and basically: Context: I made mine a cloak that had a glyph on it "You feel overwhelming sparks of pur arcana when your hands reach towards the clapse, and feel an oppressive wave of energy over you as if pent up pure elemental furry is ready to burst, is [insert character because I forgot their name sorry I love you] wish to remove the cloak?" They said yes, thinking I was bluffing or being dramatic as I've been told I tend to be flowery when DMing "As you do, everyone notices the glyph starts to distort as you see a number pop up" Rolls a 1d4 forgot the exact number but it was like 1 or 2 "Roll initiative as the glyph is clearly unstable and you all can start to see several lines of text of recorded spells appear as magical sigils begin pointing several directions and notice the ground is even being covered in various over lays of arcane symbols" Boom No players dead, just a few heavily injured...tho the local merchant trade stop they were parked at didn't seem fond of their fire work display of magic.
I dunno man, the cursed necklace sounds like a pretty fun item to me. The surviving players can just pay to have them revived and now they know they have a pretty amazing bomb they can use. Just zap it with tons of damage and then boop it right into an area with guys you want to annihilate. It's honestly no where near as awful as.. well every other cursed item I've heard of, since getting cursed items off tends to be incredibly difficult and what they do tends to cripple your ability to play your character. It's just a long ass debuff you can't do anything about almost every time. Burglar traps like this are clever, get rid of NPC thieves over time in lore, punish the players in a very sudden and surprising way with out forcing them to just drag it around like a weight. There's a ton of game mechanic pros to this little piece, and because it's so vicious (in character, not mechanically) it'd be a great intro to cursed items once your players are higher level and getting into more dangerous stuff. The best part about it is that it has very little viability as a cursed item at lower levels, so there's not even a point to use it before they can begin to afford paying for resurrections. The number of offensive spells they're going to encounter will mostly be limited to boss fights, as at lower levels most spells they get hit with are debuffs, or the enemies tend to focus on buffing themselves with blur, mirror image, darkness, haste, etc. So it's hard for a DM to really fuck it up on accident when using it. There's just so many ways for players to weaponize it and it is so scary to accidentally run into, and a player who uses it to tank but then heroically sacrifice themselves during a huge boss fight that they can't seem to get the upper hand on? Would just be great for RPing. I give it a solid 8/10, if only because its mechanics seem a bit shallow. But we really don't know anything else about it, if saves are involved, how to take it off with out triggering it, how to identify it, etc.
I didn't think terms like tank and spec were used for tabletop games but these tend to be mmorpg terms. As a former World of Warcraft player and a current Final Fantasy XIV player I can't help but find this neat. XD Anyways, spec = specialization if no one else has noted this yet. In mmorpgs where one class can take up multiple roles they say specialize as a way to note that they've built their character up for healing or tanking or damage dealing etc.
Yo im not gonna lie........ Having a magical object thay absorbs every spell you recieve and deals it at some later point CAN be a fun and cool game mechanic if implemented correctly. And maybe tweaking it to be more of a "when you do somethig out of character during combat" situation. I dont know but honestly the concept is cool for sure.
I made an amulet like that but it only gave a raw 30 hp boost and when they take it off they loose/ take 30 hp. It wasnt really a gotcha moment more so it should just be obvious.
That Barbarian... Ugh. I see this sort of thing in From games when people rave about how magic is stupid and overpowered when their attacks can easily oneshot most people. People like that genuinely infuriate me.
Intro Story: "Boom. 4 out of 6 players dead." Hold on. I thought that per the description of this amulet's curse, the character wearing it would take all the accumulated spell damage when they finally removed it. How did splash damage happen? Did the spells all go off as if fresh? Did the player character explode so hard the DM started rolling for the surrounding environment? At least be consistent in your attempts to screw over your players.
I feel like I’m in a weird place where the amulet thing makes sense to me. Like why would you think I’d give you an item that hard negates 30-70% of the damage you would be taking?
Ok with the last one I don't really blame the DM because OP themselves said it was essentially the slavery ring from Castlevania and that is what that ring entails.
The cursed amulet idea could have been cool IF THE PLAYERS KNEW ABOUT IT. If they did, you could've had a cool moment where one of them performed a heroic sacrifice or something to kill the BBEG, but nope.
Is just me or people never complain what the DM does to a character´s characterization? In the last story they could have call out on how your character is not a sexual assaulter in the first place and what the DM did is wrong. I know the ring thing might cause some misleading interpretation (I´ve never saw the Castlevania anime, but how the player didn´t realise the problematic nature of the ring? Did they ever bother to watch the entire episode?) but using it to give some grimm characterization out of nowhere can be off putting. I guess like always they should put boundries on what can or cannot do to a character.
I'm totally fine with cursed objects and openly told my DM I'm absolutely playing the kind of character that would just put stuff on/touch things. Hell, he had never even seen ice before in his life so when they encountered a frozen meat storehouse in an abandoned village he tapped it with a club and got blasted down by ice mephits in one turn. And I knew it was going to be a bad thing but it was too good narratively to pass up. But if you're rolling subtle curses like that, as a DM, you seriously need to drop hints and prompt the players to doubt the object.
00:00 Our DM throws us a few cranium rats in a sewer, which, for whatever reason, began to squeak and as if calling for us Lo and behold, the monk who were the first to respond to the furious squeaking got PWK-ed (power word killed) by the rat To be fair, it was a bizarre campaign where anything goes, and we all laughed about it, but it was truly a warcrime against the monk (we're level 6) 😂
Honestly, that necklace story seems fair to me. After all, its magical effect is _completely_ broken - seeming immunity to all magical damage is wild. That should have raised a few eyebrows, and been a big tell that this thing was too good to be be true. For all we know, the DM tried to hint at its true nature, but if the players never tried to investigate this suspiciously powerful artefact, that's not the DM's fault. A powerful curse for a powerful effect. It is what it is. If they'd just handwaved the curse, the party would've had an utterly broken item for the whole rest of the game.
I had heard a version of the intro story, and I think the object was balanced, in no way bring a horror story. Supposedly, it had absorbed so much spell damage that it cratered several city blocks; if the party had the item for *that* long, absorbing hundreds if not thousands of points of spell damage that the player would have otherwise taken in the course of his adventuring career, without once using Identify to find out what it is/does, then yeah, that's on the party, not the DM.
I don't know, I thought it was extremely clever. However, using it as a trap to off the party? Not cool. Plus, the party would've figured out it was cursed by that point and dispelled it. If it were me, on the off-chance the party didn't discover its cursed nature, I definitely would've made it to where all the damage "prevented" would fall on the player in question, or something to that extent.
More than likely it wouldn’t go as it was told in the story, you usually take stuff off yourself while sleeping so he would’ve taken the damage in small bursts or at the very least learnt of its function and not taking it off later on in the campaign but this DM sounds like, the type to say “But you didn’t specify that you took it off” like the players need to state that they breath or kill them in the first minute of the first session.
@@AtelierGod Now that you mention it, the DM likely didn't even tell them it was cursed to begin with for the same reason; "Well, you checked to see if it was MAGIC, not if it was CURSED."
@@MrCrunchytime Yeah, that’s the whole POINT of cursed objects. If you make it obvious that they’re cursed, NOBODY is gonna use them. Some of the best cursed items are ones that trick you into thinking that they’re beneficial magic items. In a book of magic items that I used to have (sadly the book disappeared years ago) there was an item called The Ring Of Trollish Regeneration. When worn it works as a regular Ring Of Regeneration. However, the more hit points it regenerates, the more troll like your character becomes. It begins subtly. A wart here, a wart there. Your character gradually begins to crave meat that’s cooked rarer and rarer. Your eyes become more and more sensitive to the light. Your teeth gradually become fangs, your fingernails gradually become claws. What’s worse, cutting off the finger wearing the cursed ring doesn’t help. You simply grow a new finger overnight, which has the ring firmly attached. It requires a combination of Dispel Magic and Remove Curse to properly remove the ring. Any physical changes made to the character by that point are permanent and can only be reversed by the use of a Wish or Miracle spell. You see? Tossing a Ring of Trollish Regeneration into the treasure doesn’t do any good if you describe it to your players by saying “You find a cursed Ring of Trollish Regeneration”. Even if they go through the effort to identify the ring, in order for it to do its job (mess with the PCs) it should register as just a Ring of Regeneration. If someone asks to borrow it and the character can’t take it off, then it’ll become pretty obvious that all isn’t as it seems with the ring. But cursed items should NEVER be obvious that they’re cursed.
@@Thundarr100 indeed however the trigger for the magic item in the video is taking it off, like the character slept wearing it, bathed wearing it, and never accidentally unhooked it at any point before the explosion like 3/4 of the campaign complete. It’s weird none of that ever happened in return for just screwing over your party.
![ROSÉ(로제) - APT. (Band VER.) (With. 이영지) [더 시즌즈-이영지의 레인보우] | KBS 241129 방송](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/IW8qaemx74g/mqdefault.jpg)
>Barbarian player attacks another player from the same party
>Player defuses the aggression with a spell
>"hE cAn'T dO tHaT!"
What a joke of a player.
Dude had to focus fire on OP for like seven rounds to prove his character wasn't a tank. 😂
Yeah. Kinda the definition of TANK.
And when that wasn't enough he had to cast an "instant death not even ashes remain" spell on the guy... four times...
@@bluesandman7566 "If you're not completely invincible no matter how much I cheese or cheat, you're not a tank" is honestly a brain-numbing mindset. That DM is just bad.
And the guy's playing a Druid, too. I always wondered how the hell Gothi ended up being a tank in Fool's Gold, but apparently Druids are just like that in 3.5e I guess, lol.
@@ethanrose9682 Druids can be deceptively tanky
As a DM, I freaking thrive off these videos, gives me a confidence boost knowing there are WAY WORSE DM's out there.
Legit. I've been dming for 26 years and I still watch them for advice and examples
And strategies for how not to panic when your BBEG gets one-hit.
You ARE the game. Thanks for your hard work. 🙏
Min-maxer's problem isn't min-maxing, it's why he did it. He wasn't trying to be an effective team member, he wasn't even trying to do as much damage to the enemies as possible. He just wanted to do more damage than his teammates did, and threw tantrums like a toddler whenever he didn't get his way.
Yeah, that motivation is definitely a factor. Probably why min-maxing has a bad reputation, even if it's just one reason. Really bad when the build sounds cool and fun to play.
Unga big number go up.
Honestly the intro about the necklace sounds like it could be a great hook as a villain weakness
Imagine - a supremely powerful wizard immune to all spell effects and damage… but as soon as the barbarian swats away his feeble lil wizard arms and just yanks the amulet away, the villain gets smote to smithereens by millions of points of damage taken over the years. Kinda like a lich, but… maybe not *quite* as foolproof of a defense as a phylactery
I agree!! It's a cool concept! And can be for some excellent role play!
Amazing for a villain, an overpowered deathtrap in the hands of a PC.
I’m stealing it
Just remember that if it's cursed, give your players a chance at a heads up. Maybe it shines weirdly and you hear ominous voices. Suddenly vaporizing half the villains castle and the party along with it would be a bad end for campaign.
i like this idea; i think i'd hint to the amulet and what happens if its taken off after a while just to see if the party is willing to make a heroic sacrifice--but thats for like.. end-game lol
Pay attention guys: If you want to impress a girl, whether in a game or real life, desecrate or destroy something that is culturally significant to her. She'll be all over you!
Nope, best way is to challenge her father in combat
It's true. I once desecrated something of deep cultural significance to this girl I had a crush on and she was like, "Wow, with this one act you have caused me to reconsider even my most fundamentally held beliefs, things that are core to my very identity and sense of self no longer have meaning to me. Allow me to reward you by taking my top off."
Then two other girls came along and because the first girl had her top off, they also took their tops off, and the four of us were called in to save the president's daughter from culturally and regionally ambiguous terrorists. And when we finally pulled 39 year old social worker Ashley Biden from the burning wreckage of the Stockton Town Mall the first thing she said was, "Why aren't those young women wearing shirts?"
Which was a fair question, but we all just laughed.
@@Keram-io8hv Isn't that the traditional marriage proposal in Scotland?
"I want to marry your daughter!"
"Let's take this ootsoid!"
No joke, that's how I've met my wife 😂
@@bantamsertoriusnow I want to hear about how that happened
That opening story... I totally knew a DM like that. He'd always tell me stories of how he outsmarted his player party. I never played in his group for reasons that should be fairly obvious.
Yeah, honestly, I like the cursed item. However it deeply needs to be foreshadowed "you have a feeling, a sense of dread before you take it off"
Or, like any reasonable person would do, when they take it off to clean it or themselves, they get that feeling. If they Get the first strike when the damage was low enough to survive. They then have a choice, keep it or get rid of it
Or once a few spells get absorbed into it, it starts to crack so that they would inspect it better, or have a reason to take it off before it grows so to out right kill everyone for miles...
I wonder if the players tried identify on that amulet. DM would probably cheat them out of avoiding that trap, but it's still a thought.
My idea for it, as I ALSO love the idea, is to make it a mixed boon and bane. How do I go about that? Basically make it into a glyph of warding (sort of). Each time they try to cast a spell, the Amulet absorbs it. Like one of the other comments said, foreshadow that fact (my idea: something noticeable, but don't just SAY what happened, because that ruins the immersion a little. "As you focus your magic, the Amulet glows, and nothing happens".) Then, my idea is NOT when you take the Amulet of, but rather when it BREAKS. Far more exciting if it basically works like a hand grenade lol. Might even want to add a "fuse" when they figure it out (again, first thing to come to mind: let them crack it. But, once the inlaid stone is cracked, they only have a round or two before the magic rushes out).
@@fragniz the only thing I like about the original idea was that the player can choose to self sacrifice if they want to do a big dramatic saviour moment.
Imagine if they carried it for the whole game to the final fight? Of if they are in a no win scenario to self sacrifice.
I would have a way to diffuse the stored energy as a remove curse type deal.
Honestly, the curse is really cool in theory. In execution...yeah, no, that was bad. There are definitely some good ways to have that curse and make it fun for all involved. My mind immediately goes to a "heroic sacrifice" type situation if the player knew what the curse was. Just straight up killing 4 players, though? Not fun.
I think the necklace could be and interesting idea but at least they should give hints like "as you absorb the damage you feel as tho you aren't out of danger yet" or "you notice your amulet emitting a slow low yet ominous hmming sound the gem seeming glowing abit to bright in the sunlight" at least something to say "hey ya might want to be careful with that little toy ya got around your neck" and if anything it could used as a final suicide move like vegetas redemption arc in the buu saga
I hate when DMs have a "HAHAHA GOTCHA! YOU'RE ALL SO STUPID" attitude... Ruins the game for everyone if the DM's being a jerk due to some backwards sense of achievement when they screw their players over.
Adversarial DMs tend to result in bad campaigns.
The DM can always go "Rock falls. Everyone dies.", so there's no actual accomplishment in killing/maining player characters.
The worst part is it’s easy to fix. Make the player find out how the necklace is cursed, and suddenly it’s not a gotcha, it’s a puzzle to solve. Maybe they just never take it off, maybe they try to find an anti magic field to take this time bomb off inside. Maybe they even find a way to use it to beat the bad guys. Surprises that hurt the players will never be as good as the players discovering a way they could have been hurt, and finding a way to avoid it.
@@JosephCollier-tp3ow Or you could make it suspenseful, tell them it will explode for all the damage it's absorbed when it's absorbed enough magic damage, but don't tell them how much damage it *can* absorb, it'll make them so anxious and excited, the guy immune to magic damage will run away from enemy mages, it'd be so interesting xD
@@PaladinGear15it would’ve been as simple as giving players an Arcana check to see if any of them sensed or understand that the amulet is magically dangerous. The theme of the cursed item is perfectly fine, this DM however has no concept of driving forward a narrative for the players to have fun in. God awful dm
@@junky2fk But why does the dm have to tell their players to make an arcana check for the item? From the info we have, it seems the players didnt try to check if the really powerful magical item might have some drawbacks.
The last story caught me as odd. The DM kinda hijacked the character to have them do awful things, one shouldn't just assume based off of a character being likened to another. The wonderful thing is it was retconned out.
The minmaxer tried to use a power move and was soundly put down. Spectacular.
Honestly could have kept the negative reputation by acknowledging that ring would be slavery even if OP didn't intend it that way. Mentioning the inspiration while casually ignoring how it was portrayed didn't help.
Not excusing the DM from taking player agency (though I now have a dark chuckle over the former villain tiefling faking it to frame his captor).
My recommendation: don't just foreshadow items to be cursed, treat them like a disease with progressing symptoms. That cursed item could have been cool it it were like a ring with a centipede motif that gains barbs each time it absorbs a spell and gives the wearer nightmares of it falling off into a ghastly vista.
Or have merchants look at the amulet in horror, trying to get away from the PC wearing the amulet as fast as possible
The "teaching a lesson" story sucks because destruction is a BS spell that really should not be used by anything besides boss monsters. Giving it to at least 4 mages when its high level is some nonsense.
I feel like the necklace could make a *very* cool cursed item plot if the player gradually figured out what would happen if they took it off.
So I love how the story with the "reckless" tank, the only thing the dm proved was that op was the tankiest tank who ever tanked. I mean dude tanked 3 destruction spells at the end of a fight and only died on the 4th cuz of a failed roll. Like even if he was playing reckless he could obviously handle it and that just makes the enemies play there cards early.
Ya know, I really like that idea of the item in the first story as something a villain would have. It might create a really cool situation where the party has to kill them by removing the necklace in some way.
I'd give it to a Lich. They made it like this because they will never have to take it off. Any party that fights them will be using a crap ton of attack spells to take them down, so this would serve them well defensively. And if the party does manage to kill the Lich they are going to loot the corpse. As soon as they take the necklace off, which they would as they would have seen it work and know it was magical, BOOM. A final trap to get revenge on the party.
Ooo, then the player that gets it decides to wear it and starts becoming super paranoid about "what if they get jealous? What if they want to take it from me? I've been sponging spells this whole time for them, but what if they dont need me anymore..." and become the next BBEG, creating a viscious cycle.
**taking notes**
Interesting idea, but once it got into city-killing level, the DM should've started dropping hints and made a side quest about safely getting it off.
Crispy taking time out the vid to roast Lenore simps is ICONIC
Yeah the OP in that story totally misunderstood Lenore's character if she thought that ring she gave Hector was just to keep track of him. I'm not saying the DM in that story was in the right, but she shouldn't have compared what she did to Lenore cause Lenore actually did [bleep] Hector in that way.
Jerk DM after 7 rounds focusing on one Character: see I told you your not a tank
The targeted character: Dude if you needed 7 rounds and focused primarily on me then you proved that I am indeed a tank.
lol the DM "teaching them a lesson" isn't even teaching them anything. They literally created a situation where the person was going to get jumped regardless of what they do and then had to spend forever focusing them to even get the job done. If you need to go through that much effort, then you're the problem, not the player.
Lesson story: I mean, the shait DM had to pull out a nasty spell that honestly sounds a fair bit busted just to put down OP. I mean, come on. Failing the saving throw results in instant death with no way to survive. OP tanked 3 hits that avged 30 damage per spell and had enough HP left to tank two more hits of avg damage before being in danger of going down. That sounds pretty tanky to me. So, yea. I agree with Crispy that this was just blatant targeting and bullying of a new player.
Gms that make their players paranoid are the same ones that complain about the players spending an hour checking a chest or empty hallway.
There are times and places to make players paranoid. Like in horror campaigns.
That said adventurers are *already* healthily paranoid. If they are *extra* paranoid *all* of the time, it's because you're like that all the time instead of when appropriate.
Sometimes I wish I had a horror story just so I could hear crispy read it. Then I remember how good my group is and how I don’t want that to change
The part where you mimic the intro story was a nice touch! It extend time and I enjoyed it!
Cursed amulet; Overpowered cursed item that's hilariously easy to abuse. There's no good use for this outside of making it a villain's signature thing.
Story one; Min-maxer complains that someone else is "overpowered", fails to pass irony check.
Story three; Tanky melee focused character gets told they should stop doing what they're built for.
Story four; The comparison to the slave ring was a mistake. The DM making a player's character commit horrible acts offscreen against said player's will was a much bigger mistake.
A perfect build doesn't exist. Everything has a weakness.
Kalashtar Bear totem Barbarian have resistance to every type of damage in the game while raging.
That's what the party is for, different strengths and weaknesses to cover for each other.
@@AtelierGod fat lot of good that would do against a wall of force, like in the second story lol. Also they're still not resistant to psychic damage. Having run a multiclass build with a Totem Barb in it, I can say one run in with a mind flayer and their pets/friends would still be a brown pants moment for them.
@@seandenton8148 easy enough to deal with, there’s a feat called fey touched that gives you misty step, drop your rage and teleport out next turn just rage again. As seen with most sessions according to D&D creators there’s like 2 battles per session and at higher levels you have more than 2 rages.
@@seandenton8148 Kalashtar are resitant to psychic damage.
With all due respect to the writer of the final story: yeah maybe comparing the funny ring to The Slave Ring from the Castlevania anime was... a bit of a bad idea? But yes as soon as the DM gave that description they should've given a hard no.
So the Mando story, Joseph was wanting to “retire” the character after one game? Dude, what the hell? While I know you don’t normally like solving out of game problems in game but I think in this scenario it would be fitting for Raven or the OP to even justify attacking the character with that age old adage “it’s what my character would do!” Also with how important these sessions were for Raven’s character and how bad Joseph was simping you’d think he’d have been a little more aware of his actions but for some stupid reason he thought this was how to show off? 🤡
Honestly, I think the kid just had autism and he didn’t know how to deal with it (at least based on the information available).
I say this as a person with autism
Destruction just sounds like 5e’s Disintegrate.
Story 1: The necklace could have been an awesome moment if the player had known the curse. In a no-win situation, they tells everyone how he has enjoyed their journeys together and to retreat. Then, when everyone else is out of range, they go up to the BBEG and smile as they remove the necklace, saving his friends through their sacrifice.
My Dm did a nasty cursed item that ended up blinding a character. But it was foreshadowed by the player getting it from a deal with a devil, who it was made pretty clear couldn't be trusted.
And getting his eyes regenerated turned into a side quest that created some memorable content.
Mind you this player had left the game for life reasons before the curse went off, so I have a feeling the dm would have just had it be a humbling thing rather then destroying the characters eyes if he was still in the game.
Gold can be hammered quite thin.
The entire room, floor to ceiling, could be less than a pound.
Or
Do a Pirates of the Caribbean
Player steals gold
Magic Mouth intones:
‘You are now Cursed.
[insert specific debilitating Curse]
And you will remain so until you make amends’
“No, no save. You picked up a magic item. No, dropping the gold does not take off the curse.
No, the Curse can only be lifted by a Cleric of the people that set it, or a Limited Wish, Miracle or Wish.”
You Joe have a bunch of plot hooks.
The one about the amulet could have been either foreshadowed, which the DM didn’t do, or maybe while they go to each encounter, he mentions how that one guy is feeling a amount of pressure building up on his shoulder or something weird/ominous each time they go into combat.
Then they could feel that something is going on with the player either a curse or maybe something else as strong is building up in a negative way.
I think the cursed amulet could've worked if identified... Imagine if a Zealot Barbarian has it and tanks magic on top of physical stuff then in the thivk of enemy lines, removes it and wipes out alot of em... Then the cleric resurrected them cheaply.
The intro story was an obvious screwjob. How any DM could think that kind of thing was a "big brained" move is beyond me.
Amazing intro. Had me chuckling.
Is it just me, or is this the ttrpg horror story reading channel i listen to the most often?
So cool Crispy cam turn into a real life person
That first item I could totally see my younger self make assuming they would examine it and space out the damage outside combat. Only to have sessions pass without them looking at it and me slowly panicking as I realize the moment they take it off it will be a tpk.
The necklace releasing the stored damage would've been a cool idea... if the DM hinted that something was off about the necklace (i.e. the jewel glows sinisterly as it absorbs the attack. You feel an intense heat build before you attempt to remove the necklace, and you notice the birds begin flying away in droves, etc, etc).
There was a ring in older additions that did something similar to absorbing damage, however it only effected the wear and no one else.
About the preamble story: I had a long payoff magic item once. It was a friendship bracelet that one player got for helping someone. It detected as very faintly magical but couldn't be identified. Months IRL later, the wearer took a hit that would drop him, but instead that hit was negated and the bracelet drained of its magic and fell off.
Better idea for the necklace: eventually it just stops working and the player has to deal with taking magical damage again in the middle of combat.
Not an instant death, but at least 'instant' damage or status.
I like this skit with the opening story
Regarding the "Mando" story: Not only is the player being a jerk, he's not even being in any way accurate when he says that "it's what the Mandalorian would do"! Mando has always been extremely respectful of other cultures. Not only that, his personal religious devotion is a notable character trait. Finally, he's most definitely not all about the money, or the series wouldn't have happened - he'd have left the asset behind with the Client and gone on with his life with a sweet camtono of beskar!
The necklace is actually balling. I’d probs say something the “necklace glows with the stored power of the spells” and “trying to take it off you can feel the seal over the power loosen, you’re not sure where the spells will go if you take it off”
All they have to do is suppress the necklace magic to take it off, through i’d probs put a flat damage limit on the necklace of like150 damage and when it reaches that point you get smacked down to -1 hp and the necklace resets
So I’m going to admit I’ve never played D&D, would love to one day! In the case of Joseph why not continue without him? Why let the plot Raven was so invested in die? I feel so bad for her, the DM couldn’t retcon what happened?
Woohoo!!! No SA in this episode!!!
I think what would be interesting are cursed items that when you put them on you know their cursed, but they always have a positive ability you might want to do, but using that ability triggers the curse.
Like a ring that gives you bonuses and advantage when speaking at the cost of having to perform a check thats DC increases each time you use it that will slowly turn your character into a self center ego maniac if you fail too many of the checks.
Like I think there's a magic item that absorbs half of the magical damage you take, but in exchange at a later time it will expel that damage and hit you with it, if you know about that effect you start thinking about if or when you should use it.
For those of you who don’t speak power gamer, the phrase “PAM + Sentinel + GWM” means Polearm Master + Sentinel + Great Weapon Master. A broken combination made to maximize damage output, which with Barbarian, adds on rage damage for three degrees of hurt. In raw melee power, cannot be beat.
Sucks that Wall of Force doesn’t give two whiffs of a rat’s ass about your damage output. 😂 ngl, that was beautiful.
And he was getting angry at a sorlock, one of the most aggressive blaster multiclasses available in the game.
Amulet sounds cool item if used properly. I once gave plaers a cursed cape of a shadow that was turning the one who wear it into shadow creature slowly. With each day I was describing as their skin turning pale and itching, feeling of cold, visions of ghost around them etc. until they realized that they could either take it off or turn into monster.
Let’s go more live Crispy!!!!
Screw Joseph, he did my boy Mando WRONG.
That amulet actually sounds pretty cool. I might use that, but make it only hurt the wearer and make a lot more foreboding descriptions about it, rather than make it a secret time bomb for everyone. Comments like “it’s almost too good to be true!” And “why would the previous wearer have ever wanted to put this away in that lockbox?”
That cursed amulet could've been cool if the stored damage only affected the wearer and if it could be seen as super obviously cursed by detect magic and such, and maybe would have side effects like the wearer feeling a lingering pain as though getting hit by the absorbed spells, the pain flaring up as a warning when they start to remove it.
Intro: I think, "Why didn't the party cast Identify on the item to discover it was cursed?" Then I conclude, "Whether they did or not, DM would probably pull something like the curse hides itself from that spell."
1st story: Even if the player's a salty jerk, I like his build. And great solution from the players, even if Pass Without Trace was blatant meta-gaming. While DM should have handled it better, at least DM didn't side with the problem player.
Second story: Saw a thumbnail that I think was about this story (didn't watch it). Definitely makes me notice a common tabletop horror story is more "list of reasons the problem player is a problem".
Third story: Seems like DnD in the workplace is a bad idea. Too many power dynamics with people you can't just choose to never see again. DM saying OP would have to probably beg to get the character back felt especially low.
Fourth story: Oh that cursed ring, bringing back maddening memories regarding that situation. As bad as a scenario such an item could cause, DM assuming and then forcing the player character to be that horrible was definitely worse. At least it got retconned. Hopefully OP would be able to enjoy their owlin Dhampir rogue again. Hopefully.
I really like the idea of the cursed necklace as long as my players know about it. That way they could remove the curse or use it to their advantage if they wanted to.
While I agree with you about checking what folks are cool with first, I do think the OP in the last story was asking for trouble by specifically comparing the ring to such a jerk-move item used by an evil character.
I've had a couple of times in different games where players have claimed to have built unstoppable characters (admittedly less maliciously than in the min-maxer story) only to discover than game I'd planned before even seeing the character in question was able to taker them down quite effectively (bear-totem barbarian vs mindflayer civil-war :) )
True, the 4th OP was sketchy for using such an item while invoking a horrid scenario. Though that doesn't justify making her character act without player permission (msybe unless the ring was cursed to make the "master" do such things). Could have just let the player's original plan play out while other characters point out the unfortunate implications.
That Dm-player skit in the beginning 😂😂😂😂😂
ok the amulet one is an interesting idea but its too high a possible damage out put, plus you need some indication like the amulet seems to contain the spell or something so they have a clue as to what their dealing with, personally i think the cursed boots of spider climb are better those were at least survivable in most cases, though i felt it was funny they didn't figure that one out till someone pointed it out
Normally I'd agree with what you said about in-game solutions, but in this case the SorLock said it was ok and the players were perfectly willing to to deal with it their way. Usually it's only a problem if the DM imposes their own in-game solution.
It was the OP's Bladesinger who said it was okay. The "SorLock" was another party member.
Being in a D&D group is like being part of a car. The engine may be able to function on its own, but alone, it can't do anything usefull. In this case moving forward. So the engine has to distribute the energy to the transmission so that the wheels can turn. But soon, the engine will be filled with exhaust which will make the engine filled with smog and be useless. To combat that, the exhaust pipe helps take that exhaust out of the engine so it can keep going.
Long story short; everyone must work together to complete the task put before them.
For the Leroy Jenkin story, I think what was happening was that most of the group just wanted more rp among their characters, and less combat. While OP and that other player just wanted to get the story moving.
Ummm, no, Mando would not have done that. He gets his money honestly and even if he doesn't understand your culture he isn't going to deface your historical site (damage from battles notwithstanding)
Anybody who didn’t immediately clock that necklace in the opening as suspicious deserved what they got. Always suspect anything that seems too good to be true
When it comes to a minmaxer, the important thing though, especially if they decide to play a flying character is put their foot down. I had a player who played a fairy Dragon Sorcerer/Arcane Archer fighter, and they decided that at the start of every combat that they'd fly "Up as high as they can go." And they never RPed.
I didn't want to put my foot down, and as a result I enjoyed nothing with that character. She was just there for chessing encounters and that was about it.
Tbh in the first story if the amulet's effect wasnt hidden, it could have actually been a fun magic item with some modifications xd
Take my 5 cents on the cursed amulet, just give it a twist and turn it into a gambling and story opportunity device at once: don't just nuke anything around the PC, instead let a visual Copy of the PC emerge from the amulet. The Copy then walks/flies/swims away, war ether floats your boat, to get to an area with as much exposure as possible. On its way it may even ignores walls or any other obstacles. And then.. the "fun" begins, because now the Copy will use the absorbed spells on any target IT wants. Maybe even take the PCs preferences into consideration, Paladin or Cleric? Burn down some temples and churches. Druid? Destroy the nearest forest. Bard? There are no Bars left in town.
You get the picture. Now you have a lot of NPCs furious in believe one of the PCs destroyed a lot of placed and maybe even injured or killed their loved ones getting the party into a lot of trouble really quick. If they are lucky they finished what ever took them here and "only" need to get away unseen. If they aren't they need to be extra cautious moving around the area till they are ready to go.
Could it be used to kill a bunch of people in favour for the PCs? Maybe. But are you willing to try..?
Just yesterday (from me posting this message), my group spent an IRL hour to get across a 60 ft hallway. Good times
I feel like Min-Maxing in any normal dnd module is a lot more asking for trouble. Especially 5e since there are saves that can impact any of the attribute stats.
Pathfinder and 3.5 is where min maxers can actually be an issue.
I min/maxed a character before. All designed to be an unkillable tank that reflects the damage back to the attacker to punish them.
The whole point, though? He's a bodyguard. He didn't want to fight; that wasn't his job. He was there to protect and serve another party member and that VIP's entourage (the rest of the party). He was all about trying to de-escalate, and able to step in immediately when it was needed.
The party rogue get himself into trouble? The bodyguard quietly sighs and vortex warps the rogue out of the way, stepping up to sort things out. The VIP sorcerer gets kidnapped? Divination to track them down, ambush the cart, and brace himself for the horse running into him and getting knocked out as his shield retaliated. Things like this.
I've actually experienced and did something similar to thay firdt story, and all I'm gonan say is.
You have to foreshadow it or like what I did and basically:
Context: I made mine a cloak that had a glyph on it
"You feel overwhelming sparks of pur arcana when your hands reach towards the clapse, and feel an oppressive wave of energy over you as if pent up pure elemental furry is ready to burst, is [insert character because I forgot their name sorry I love you] wish to remove the cloak?"
They said yes, thinking I was bluffing or being dramatic as I've been told I tend to be flowery when DMing
"As you do, everyone notices the glyph starts to distort as you see a number pop up"
Rolls a 1d4 forgot the exact number but it was like 1 or 2
"Roll initiative as the glyph is clearly unstable and you all can start to see several lines of text of recorded spells appear as magical sigils begin pointing several directions and notice the ground is even being covered in various over lays of arcane symbols"
Boom
No players dead, just a few heavily injured...tho the local merchant trade stop they were parked at didn't seem fond of their fire work display of magic.
I dunno man, the cursed necklace sounds like a pretty fun item to me. The surviving players can just pay to have them revived and now they know they have a pretty amazing bomb they can use. Just zap it with tons of damage and then boop it right into an area with guys you want to annihilate. It's honestly no where near as awful as.. well every other cursed item I've heard of, since getting cursed items off tends to be incredibly difficult and what they do tends to cripple your ability to play your character. It's just a long ass debuff you can't do anything about almost every time. Burglar traps like this are clever, get rid of NPC thieves over time in lore, punish the players in a very sudden and surprising way with out forcing them to just drag it around like a weight. There's a ton of game mechanic pros to this little piece, and because it's so vicious (in character, not mechanically) it'd be a great intro to cursed items once your players are higher level and getting into more dangerous stuff.
The best part about it is that it has very little viability as a cursed item at lower levels, so there's not even a point to use it before they can begin to afford paying for resurrections. The number of offensive spells they're going to encounter will mostly be limited to boss fights, as at lower levels most spells they get hit with are debuffs, or the enemies tend to focus on buffing themselves with blur, mirror image, darkness, haste, etc. So it's hard for a DM to really fuck it up on accident when using it. There's just so many ways for players to weaponize it and it is so scary to accidentally run into, and a player who uses it to tank but then heroically sacrifice themselves during a huge boss fight that they can't seem to get the upper hand on? Would just be great for RPing.
I give it a solid 8/10, if only because its mechanics seem a bit shallow. But we really don't know anything else about it, if saves are involved, how to take it off with out triggering it, how to identify it, etc.
I didn't think terms like tank and spec were used for tabletop games but these tend to be mmorpg terms. As a former World of Warcraft player and a current Final Fantasy XIV player I can't help but find this neat. XD Anyways, spec = specialization if no one else has noted this yet. In mmorpgs where one class can take up multiple roles they say specialize as a way to note that they've built their character up for healing or tanking or damage dealing etc.
Yo im not gonna lie........ Having a magical object thay absorbs every spell you recieve and deals it at some later point CAN be a fun and cool game mechanic if implemented correctly. And maybe tweaking it to be more of a "when you do somethig out of character during combat" situation. I dont know but honestly the concept is cool for sure.
I made an amulet like that but it only gave a raw 30 hp boost and when they take it off they loose/ take 30 hp. It wasnt really a gotcha moment more so it should just be obvious.
Dude didn't sound anything like Leroy Jenkins, DM was being a satchel of Richards
That Barbarian... Ugh. I see this sort of thing in From games when people rave about how magic is stupid and overpowered when their attacks can easily oneshot most people. People like that genuinely infuriate me.
Intro Story: "Boom. 4 out of 6 players dead." Hold on. I thought that per the description of this amulet's curse, the character wearing it would take all the accumulated spell damage when they finally removed it. How did splash damage happen? Did the spells all go off as if fresh? Did the player character explode so hard the DM started rolling for the surrounding environment? At least be consistent in your attempts to screw over your players.
I cast Temporal Shunt on the necklace to send it into the future and runs away.
I feel like I’m in a weird place where the amulet thing makes sense to me. Like why would you think I’d give you an item that hard negates 30-70% of the damage you would be taking?
Ok with the last one I don't really blame the DM because OP themselves said it was essentially the slavery ring from Castlevania and that is what that ring entails.
The cursed amulet idea could have been cool IF THE PLAYERS KNEW ABOUT IT. If they did, you could've had a cool moment where one of them performed a heroic sacrifice or something to kill the BBEG, but nope.
Is just me or people never complain what the DM does to a character´s characterization?
In the last story they could have call out on how your character is not a sexual assaulter in the first place and what the DM did is wrong. I know the ring thing might cause some misleading interpretation (I´ve never saw the Castlevania anime, but how the player didn´t realise the problematic nature of the ring? Did they ever bother to watch the entire episode?) but using it to give some grimm characterization out of nowhere can be off putting. I guess like always they should put boundries on what can or cannot do to a character.
I'm totally fine with cursed objects and openly told my DM I'm absolutely playing the kind of character that would just put stuff on/touch things. Hell, he had never even seen ice before in his life so when they encountered a frozen meat storehouse in an abandoned village he tapped it with a club and got blasted down by ice mephits in one turn. And I knew it was going to be a bad thing but it was too good narratively to pass up. But if you're rolling subtle curses like that, as a DM, you seriously need to drop hints and prompt the players to doubt the object.
Who would win? One big, strong, min-maxed to the hilt Barbarian? Or one wall making casty boi?
What Joesph did sounds more like what another Mandalorian would do but no Din Djarian. A Mandalorian from the KOTOR period would certainly pull that.
00:00 Our DM throws us a few cranium rats in a sewer, which, for whatever reason, began to squeak and as if calling for us
Lo and behold, the monk who were the first to respond to the furious squeaking got PWK-ed (power word killed) by the rat
To be fair, it was a bizarre campaign where anything goes, and we all laughed about it, but it was truly a warcrime against the monk (we're level 6) 😂
Honestly, that necklace story seems fair to me. After all, its magical effect is _completely_ broken - seeming immunity to all magical damage is wild. That should have raised a few eyebrows, and been a big tell that this thing was too good to be be true.
For all we know, the DM tried to hint at its true nature, but if the players never tried to investigate this suspiciously powerful artefact, that's not the DM's fault. A powerful curse for a powerful effect. It is what it is. If they'd just handwaved the curse, the party would've had an utterly broken item for the whole rest of the game.
Story 2: This is NOT the way.
A classic you have no power here moment
Should check to see if your items are cursed. And dms should have elaborated on if items are cursed or nor
I had heard a version of the intro story, and I think the object was balanced, in no way bring a horror story. Supposedly, it had absorbed so much spell damage that it cratered several city blocks; if the party had the item for *that* long, absorbing hundreds if not thousands of points of spell damage that the player would have otherwise taken in the course of his adventuring career, without once using Identify to find out what it is/does, then yeah, that's on the party, not the DM.
I feel like the intro story could have gone good or bad. It just went bad in this case.
I don't know, I thought it was extremely clever. However, using it as a trap to off the party? Not cool. Plus, the party would've figured out it was cursed by that point and dispelled it.
If it were me, on the off-chance the party didn't discover its cursed nature, I definitely would've made it to where all the damage "prevented" would fall on the player in question, or something to that extent.
More than likely it wouldn’t go as it was told in the story, you usually take stuff off yourself while sleeping so he would’ve taken the damage in small bursts or at the very least learnt of its function and not taking it off later on in the campaign but this DM sounds like, the type to say “But you didn’t specify that you took it off” like the players need to state that they breath or kill them in the first minute of the first session.
@@AtelierGod Now that you mention it, the DM likely didn't even tell them it was cursed to begin with for the same reason; "Well, you checked to see if it was MAGIC, not if it was CURSED."
@@MrCrunchytime Yeah, that’s the whole POINT of cursed objects. If you make it obvious that they’re cursed, NOBODY is gonna use them. Some of the best cursed items are ones that trick you into thinking that they’re beneficial magic items.
In a book of magic items that I used to have (sadly the book disappeared years ago) there was an item called The Ring Of Trollish Regeneration. When worn it works as a regular Ring Of Regeneration. However, the more hit points it regenerates, the more troll like your character becomes. It begins subtly. A wart here, a wart there. Your character gradually begins to crave meat that’s cooked rarer and rarer. Your eyes become more and more sensitive to the light. Your teeth gradually become fangs, your fingernails gradually become claws. What’s worse, cutting off the finger wearing the cursed ring doesn’t help. You simply grow a new finger overnight, which has the ring firmly attached. It requires a combination of Dispel Magic and Remove Curse to properly remove the ring. Any physical changes made to the character by that point are permanent and can only be reversed by the use of a Wish or Miracle spell.
You see? Tossing a Ring of Trollish Regeneration into the treasure doesn’t do any good if you describe it to your players by saying “You find a cursed Ring of Trollish Regeneration”. Even if they go through the effort to identify the ring, in order for it to do its job (mess with the PCs) it should register as just a Ring of Regeneration. If someone asks to borrow it and the character can’t take it off, then it’ll become pretty obvious that all isn’t as it seems with the ring. But cursed items should NEVER be obvious that they’re cursed.
@@Thundarr100 indeed however the trigger for the magic item in the video is taking it off, like the character slept wearing it, bathed wearing it, and never accidentally unhooked it at any point before the explosion like 3/4 of the campaign complete. It’s weird none of that ever happened in return for just screwing over your party.
I made it to the end of the video and already forgot the catch phrase. :o
its okay if it took a little longer than usual to get out, im sure none of us noticed because we were all playing Zelda too
How do you even check to see if an item is cursed? That's not supposed to work with identify spells.
love the barbarian one.
Honestly the main issue with the amulet is that it didn't only effect the wearer, and instead exploded. That's kinda bullshit.
Command is a fun spell concerning story 1. Just say "Vomit" or "Crap" while pointing at the target and watch them suffer. 😂