Highlights of my DMing Career
A short list of some of my most memorable moments from the games I DM. I'll try to give them proper context.
Campaign 1 Arc 1: The party, being low level, was attacked by a tiger protecting her cub. The Favored Soul used their recently aquired Ring of Animal Friendship to try and charm it. It rolled a Natural 1. It remained her loyal companion and occasional mount from then on.
Campaign 1 Arc 2: The group was sailing towards their foe when enemy warships attacked them. They sank one quickly, but the other rammed them, leading to some amazing ship-to-ship combat. There was an additional level of stress when the warship started sinking, and they realized there were prisoners on board. They saved them, but there was a lot of mistrust about the captives, as there was a Drow, Kobold, Bugbear, Yuan-ti Pureblood, and Satyr amongst them. The party Wizard took the Yuan-ti as a lover, only to eventually learn she was an assassin planted by their enemy. She stole his best spells and used them against him, nearly killing him and severely damaging the ship in the battle.
Campaign 1 Arc 3: One of the party members had been absent a few sessions, and eventually returned as a Vampire. The group was trying to solve a rash of cult activity in the city, and near the end believed that the incredibly antagonistic noble woman, Zatali, was the prime suspect. When they confronted her, she eventually lost patience with them, and order their Vampiric ally to attack them. It was then that they learned that it was she who had turned him, and that he had been her unwilling spy the whole time. It was a tense and difficult fight, and best of all, she was a red herring. The real culprit was a noble who was sponsoring them, who they had dismissed as "too obvious and creepy" to be the big bad.
Campaign 2 Arc 1: While covertly traveling through the kingdom trying to drum up support for a rebellion, the party is tracked down by the right-hand of the king: a Paladin named Broadshield. Their new Dwarf ally attempts to buy them time to flee, but the Paladin uses relics to summon an aspect of his God. The Dwarf is knocked around like nothing, while the party flees. It was then that they truly understood the forces they were up against.
Campaign 2 Arc 1: After following several coded messages, the party found their way to an underground lake, where a Lich greeted them rather hospitably. He had been spying on their progress, and had decided to offer his assistance in the rebellion. He would unleash the army of Undead towards the cause, if they would eliminate the headmistress of the magical academy in the city above. The party had already recruited her, and one of them had started a romantic relationship with her, but others argued towards his usefulness. They turned him down, which lead to a fight that cost the Ranger her hand, but gained them the services of his skeletal butler.
Campaign 2 Arc 1: While trying to secure the aid of a tribe of Lizardfolk, the party set out to hunt the some creature that had been attacking the tribe. Based off of the vague descriptions given, the party expected to find a Beholder. Instead, they came across a twelve-headed Hydra. Its attacks devastated them, causing them to run away before anyone died. Now aware of what they were up against, they returned better prepared and killed it in less than three rounds.
Campaign 2 Arc 2: While attempting to recover an important artifact from a Rakshasa, the Barbarian was caught by his Magic Jar spell (his body being disguised as a corpse in the jail cells). The player was taken over at the end of a game session, so I told her covertly. The next session, she played the Rakshasa pretending to be her Barbarian, with the goal of leading them to the top of the tower to disarm and capture the party. The reveal stunned everyone, as the Player decieved them all beautifully.
Campaign 2 Arc 2: The party was approached one-by-one by a trusted NPC, and asked to do something for her without telling the others. Each received different requests, and when she brought them all to a strange town the next day, they were confused and suspicious. She took them to a brothel, where she had the Ninja search out a hidden trapdoor that lead to an underground chamber. There, the Rogue (who has had a lot of memory lapses and spiky identities) found a statue that resembled one of the personas he disguised himself as. It soon came to light the a Demon had possessed him many years ago, and had been laying low, using his body by night to report the party's actions and plans to their enemies. It ended up fully possessing him, forcing them to trick the Demon into a Circle of Protection Against Evil so that they could fight and defeat its true form.
Campaign 2 Arc 2: The party had infiltrated the castle of their enemy, rescuing prisoners and stealing intel on what his plans are. They fled to a noble that had been helping them, but their foe soon arrived with all his closest lackeys. He had their noble ally killed in front of them (with his wife and son as witnesses, too), and trapped his soul in a gem. He then revealed his true form, that of a Great Wyrm Red Dragon. The party fled, barely making it out alive as he destroyed the whole city in his rage. The party finally knew just what they were up against, and the death of their ally was emotional enough for one of the players to need to step away from the table.
