-10 HP.

[gridlore]

Gary Gygax has failed his last saving throw.

For those of us of a certain age, D&D was, if not the first, one of our early gaming experiences. Yes, the man could be an opinionated bastard, but he was a creative, generous, opinionated bastard. And that makes the difference.

So, as we gather at the tavern to wait for the inevitable adventure hook to walk through the door, relate you favorite D&D tale. In character, table talk, odd events with dice.. whatever.

You enter a 10x10 room, an orc is guarding a chest...

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[grimmwire.livejournal.com]

My favorite tale would take at least half an hour to recount face-to-face. Remind me about it when you're in town for Worldcon. It's a full-on epic complete with prophesies fulfilled (purely by chance), disastrously failed quests, a Dark Lord, and some major unexpected twists...

Instead I'll just mention the time in 1982 or so, when I was reffing a popular AD&D campaign at the Forest City Gamers club in London, Ontario. A halfling thief attempts to climb down a well -- the well being a completely unnecessary bit of dungeon scenery leading nowhere interesting except a large tidal cave partly full of lake-water. But the players don't know that, so the thief is sent down the well just to have a look-see. (They also have yet to find the nearby stairs.)

The thief -- a veteran of countless infamous heists whose calling-card (a simple silver ring) is known and hated by embarrassed crowned heads all across the known world -- suddenly and badly flubs a roll.

He falls two hundred feet into ten feet of water. I roll twenty D6 damage. The halfling actually survives the impacts (first hitting the water, then the ground under the water) -- but now he's unconscious and rapidly drowning. Kinda sad, because this character's been around since the start of the campaign, years and years, and he's a near-mythic Robin Hood type.

I check his character sheet to see what he's carrying. He's got two Potions of Healing in his backpack. Doubtless they broke on impact. I let the player roll to see whether, in the process of drowning, he happens to ingest some of the Potions. He does, and survives. In a world of pain, but alive.

I was always such a softie.