Thread: Gaming Stories

I hope this hasn't been done lately (though I bet I'm wrong), but I figured a good way to get laughs going is to find out any funny moments from gaming. Or you can go for epic moments, utterly stupid ones, moments of unreasonably bad luck, whatever comes to mind.

A science fiction campaign. The team of explorers is stranded in the wilderness
because their all terrain vehicle (ATV) has an engine problem. While the team's
robot (an NPC) repairs the ATV, the player characters establish a temporary
camp for the night.

Player character: "Hey, robot, forget about that ATV and help me to carry this
stuff."
Robot NPC: "Task One completed, file ATV deleted. Task Two, transport of ma-
terial initiated."

Without the robot's data about the ATV a repair was impossible, and the team
had to walk back to civilisation ...

More of a snide comment moment really, but I still chuckle at bit thinking about it:

Star Trek: Prime Directive campaign. The Prime Team characters were at an M class water planet, other than a few island chains it was 98% water. A huge drilling submersible vehicle (with a laser drill capable of cutting through the planets tectonic plates) had gone missing for a week. Taken by rebel group? Too deep and too magnetic to get any decent sensor scans, the players were going over the planetary map and caculating the search radius. Then this conversation:

Player: "Hey, look, this doomed city is within the search zone! We should go there!"

Me: "Uh, yeah, that's actually domed city, but if your characters are heading there... it probably is..."

The underwater city actually survived the adventure.

Ten points for the scathing retort. Got any more?

I heard a Cthulhu one from my old group. They had been investigating a lot of strange, horrible events etc and got almost right through the adventure. They got to the edge of the woods and saw a huge hole in the ground, knowing that whatever was causing the hassle was down there. So, faced with the entrance to this...thing's hideout, what did our gallant heroes do?

They decided "**** this" and went home.

This one needs a little language lesson. In German "ivory" is called "Elfenbein", which
means "elf's bone".

In a fantasy campaign a player character had the mission to establish contact with
a somewhat hostile tribe of elves and to win them as allies for the fight against inva-
ding orcs. At first it went quite well, he was captured by an elven patrol and taken
to their tribe's leader for questioning, and thanks to the elves's traditional dislike of
orcs the idea of an alliance was considered favourably. Then the elven chieftain at-
tempted some friendly small talk and asked the player character for his profession,
and in a temporary mental blackout he answered "Elfenbeinschnitzer" - "carver of
ivory / elven bones". This ended the negotiation, and minutes later also his life ...

Hahaha! That's harsh, but I'd have killed him too.

I should elaborate more on my Chthulhu story from the other thread. Here we go.

I was a private investigator, hired to look for another PC. After establishing contact in a way that made my GM giggle like a schoolboy (confronted him in a café toilet, telling him "This isn't usually where I conduct my business, but..."), I was taken away at gunpoint where I was then pulled into THEIR investigation.

A bunch of children went missing and we got a lead taking us to an ice cream van. We decided to stake out the area in different spots, with me in the doorway of a tenement building. I was seen by two police officers and asked what I was doing. My lack of confidence then, combined with brainfarting like a fucking pro, led to them taking me to a nearby police box. I was told to empty my pockets onto the tabe while my details were taken. The officer didn't bat an eyelid at the revolver (it was 1930s Glasgow, so maybe it was normal), but was very disapproving of the sap/blackjack. One cop put on the kettle and then went out to use the phone on the back of the box. Cue my desperate gambit to get back to the investigation in my greatest moment of madness to date.

The remaining officer turned away from me to make tea. I grabbed my sap and belted him in the back of the head, knocking him out. I was pleased at the result, but the cop falling to the floor made a noise, attracting the other one who I heard coming. I flattened myself against a wall and swung at the perfect time, hitting the second cop in the face. Two knockouts! YES!!!

I then ripped out the page from the notebook with my details, thinking I was being very clever at this point. I then cuffed them and took their keys and locked them in. Oh yeah, I'm feeling like a fucking genius at this point. So, I'm ready to leave and I can hear whistles. It's the cops, who have now woken up! Shit! Then, the blue light at the top comes on, which is sure to attract attention. So, I go to the back of the box, climb partway up and rip out the cable, letting it fall onto tram lines (I had totally forgotten we had trams back then). People come to their windows and shout out at me, asking what I'm doing. My ninja-like escape from any problems had just been undone and become even worse.

I fled to the waitng car, where I had to be driven off and quickly. I was then told I had to remove the character from play as he'd be wanted all over the place. So, he fled, having been given money by another character. But at least he didn't die in the game

The character I used to replace him was later grabbed by the balls by a strange blob discovered in the aforementioned ice cream van. I just cnnot catch a break.

Another science fiction campaign, the setting is a frontier colony. The wreck
of an alien starship is drifting into the colony planet's system, and the cha-
racters are sent to investigate the wreck. The alien ship is badly damaged,
the outer rooms have lost their atmosphere and there is no artificial gravity.
Moving slowly through the ship, the characters open the bulkhead to a room
which still has atmosphere and which contains the mummified corpses of so-
me members of the alien crew. As the atmosphere rushes out of the room,
the weightless corpses are sucked towards the bulkhead and drift towards
the characters standing there. The security officer of the team immediate-
ly draws his weapon and fights a heroic rearguard action against the many
advancing corpses ("Run, I cover your retreat !") while the other members
of the team fail to understand his problem and just stay there and watch
in disbelief. Shocked by the fact that the corpses continue to advance des-
pite being hit over and over again, the security officer finally runs out of
ammunition and prepares to use his unarmed combat skill to defend against
the first corpse that drifts close enough to him. He only ends his private war
when the team's engineer calmly remarks: "Hey, Mummykiller, this is not the
D&D campaign, they are dead, not undead."

Hahaha! That's as close as he's gettng to gratitude then

1st Scifi campaign (group players did NOT get along with each other. Really, it was like herding cats). Group is on a large deserted alien space station near the stations power plant. Two players get into an argument and then a firefight with each other. Rest of the group is trying to calm things down (and/or seeking cover). Player #1 says, losing the firefight, "Are those fuel cell tanks Rafael is taking cover behind?" I say "Yes, you are all in the fuel supply room, right next the the power plant. He is hiding behind very explosive fuel cell tanks from what you can tell." Player #2 (Rafael) laughs, "I'm a freaking merc. You can't beat my ballistics skill and I'm wearing body armor. You're a dead man walkin!" Player #1 grins evily, "I shoot the fuel cell tanks with my blaster!!!"

I take it that ended the scenario rather quickly.