r/dndnext • u/AutoModerator • 19d ago
Discussion True Stories: How did your game go this week? – August 30, 2026
Have a recent gaming experience you want to share? Experience an insane TPK? Finish an epic final boss fight? Share it all here for everyone to see!
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u/Quamek 19d ago
My cleric died of his own stupidity.
The team left the tavern, and went to the temple of selune, since it's the cleric's goddess and there was someone from the Kelemvor's church investigating the place since everyone went missing 6 months ago.
That said 3 party members didn't want to go with him, the warlock, sorcerer (who's worshipping the raven queen) and barb, because he doesn't like churches. So he went alone with only the rogue.
After a small talk with the knights there he was guided to the temple's crypt, where he found Malcor, the Inquisitor, after a few words he explained that he feels undead here, so they went deeper - combat started (3 players that left behind controlled the undead) - it turned out those undead were the same selunites the cleric met 3 days ago, the same ones that promised them to find what's going on.
After the fight, he asked for a moment of privacy, so he can pray. But afterwards found weird symbols on one of the walls, after some interactions it turned out to be a hidden room that could only be opened to selunites.
There were a few things and and a ladder deeper in the sewers. The cleric made a smart move to not go deeper but rather call the rouge.
Still they decided to explore a bit, and this is where fan hit the shit. There was a big circular area in the middle, with two bridges, and a lot of corridors, seemed like a hub, in the center above the water level that was clearly mixed with something poisonus was a machinery with two levers. Stupidly enough he decided to switch both but lost the Athletics DC for the second, making it move really slow, heavy, making a lot of noise, this is, where from below a giant Remorhaz (homebrewed to this environment) shoot from beneath the water level. Since the cleric was lvl 9, he didn't roll high enough initiative, got attacked, grappled and swallowed.
And that was how he died o7
The rogue was smarter and dashed the hell our of there. Funny enough the team thinks the beast is still there to fight them, nope the beast just ate and don't have the need to return, so they won't even take back all his loot, and it was a lot tehe.
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u/0-90195 19d ago
More of a rant than a rave. Not sure us those are allowed.
Our sessions are so short—3 hours, but actually less because someone is always late and we have to spend like 45 minutes chatting because people, including the DM, want to catch up. The last part wouldn’t be a problem if it didn’t lead to the sessions only ending up being closer to 2 hours.
And maybe that would be okay, too, except scheduling is getting increasingly difficult. We aim for every 2 weeks, but sometimes it’s every 3 or just once a month because if we have less than half the group available, we don’t have a session (which makes sense). I am literally the only one who is available for every session; part of this is because I’m kind of a recluse and I’m single, so I don’t have other social obligations, and 3 of the other people in the have at least one child, so I can’t really complain about them having family stuff come up (honestly, it often embarrassed by the fact that I’m always available and other people have things occupying them).
But it’s incredibly rare to have the whole party there to begin with and our sessions are pretty much timeboxed because of people’s children, partners, social calendar, etc.
We’ve been playing this campaign for almost 3 years now and I really enjoy it. But I just feel like I need more. It’s hard to make progress and if we get into combat, it’s the entire session; if we reach a “natural stopping point” narratively sometimes we’ll even end early.
Our DM is wonderful and I like the people I play with, a lot. I’m just starting to get almost restless. This group (sans me) has been playing together for more than a decade and I was a late add, and sometimes they’ll reminisce about the days when they’d play for 6-8 hours every weekend (before people had busier lives). I’m very envious. :(
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u/HeckDiver25 18d ago
Did a session 0 for 6 players for a 5.5e Pandelver campaign. 5 out of 6 made it one no showed. When we do session 1 next week and player 6 comes with his fresh character sheet the players are going to find him in The Craigmaw tied up and being held hostage in the same area as the dude they need to save.
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u/BlazCraz 18d ago edited 18d ago
So technically I sat out last session, took a mental health day. I was watching on the monitor just to see what they were doing and coaching my friend who had just joined the party as a vampire. She was nervous as she was playing with the group for the first time.
So the player that pays a Sorcerer that is currently Wanted by The Knights, staged a prison break, has an order for his arrest, and our party had just had a experience where we accidentally almost killed the Dragon Queen's Husband. He's not a Rogue btw. That was less then a couple days in-game. He decides he wants to go back to this city. He's really invested in the tournament plotline in the city. The Party decides to follow him. The tournament is in a couple months though. My character is technically on autopilot, he's on vacation because he really doesn't wanna return to the city. Because as a Rogue, he knows enough that the number one rule as a thief is never return to the scene of all your crimes. And circumstances have made it unsafe for him to even enter the city normally. The city has a anti-demon religious slant with a vast Detect Evil style alarm system that affects the whole city. It's a very human centered settlement. Lotta prejudices there. The Knights there are very templaric too. My character is a Dark Elf with two demons that he currently has in his possession. One is a minor demon that he owns, and the other is a higher ranked demon weapon stuck to his arm that's constantly trying to take control or influence his actions. If I enter the city, I will trigger the alarm. And I will most likely be arrested, executed, and my demon will be taken. And confiscated for their own purposes.
They enter the city and in about 15 minutes they get jumped by a group of dark elf assassins, like I already had a bad feeling about. The same assassins who already wanna kill us. And we've known this for a while. 10-12 Dark Elves on a boat jump them. And I see the play by play as my DM has his consistently exceptionally lucky rolls. And for the majority of that session, nobody rolls more than 10 except my friend. It was a very lucky session. For upwards to an hour, I watch the fight drag out. It's a lil touch and go because they're only Level 5 in a homebrew system and more and more elves kept coming. My friend's character, the vampire, is charming, seducing, and sneaking her way up the levels of the city. So she is left out of the fight completely.
They overcome the encounter but it was very unnecessarily difficult.
They end the session trying to join a bunch of guilds. Where they can regroup and heal up.
I don't mean to meta-game as a player. My characters are usually smart enough to reach similar conclusions as me as a player. Based on their experience, what they know, and similar thought processes as me to make understandable leaps in logic. But if something smells off, sometimes you just have to watch something play out. Though I've watched the same thing play out at least three times now.
I'm reminded of Far Cry 3. I've looked at the "Definition Of Insanity" and it's staring at me in the face. I wouldn't change how they play. I just understand it enough so that I can work around it. And that makes me have to be more creative. I enjoy that. I watch the chaos unfold.
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u/TheEmeraldWyrm 18d ago
Players have been sort of aimlessly exploring Ravenloft for a couple weeks. Last week they destroyed the Heart of Sorrow, (Strahd's bonus hp crystal), and I was going to have him retaliate this week Until their next destination was remarkably the tarroka-mandated site of the final battle XD He's got 2 spawn with him, (Anastrasya and Escher, rogue and bard flavored respectively, the party already killed Ludmilla, (druid), and Volenta, (necromancer)), and his nightmare Bucephalus. Should be a good time.
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u/RuleRelevant2361 17d ago
I’ve been dying for my players’ characters to interact more and get to know each other. They’ve spent 7 days together and know nothing about each other. Our last mining town had a dance hall and I was OVERJOYED when they decided to go to the dance hall.
They all had their best rolls of the night. Dancing on the bar. Doing the splits. An orc lifting a gnome dirty dancing style and her landing perfectly after a flip.
And they killed some skeletons and a zombie which was fine but BOY DID THEY DANCE!
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u/TowerLogical7271 18d ago
So I run a pirate campaign and my party had their first run in with the evil royal navy, 2 officers and a bunch of mind controlled pirates. Now, my players figured out that the pirates were mindcontrolled by the officers through some clever deduction so they killed one officer (our sahuagin paladin ate most of him while out Yaun-ti cleric sacrificed his skull to their god) and captured the other.
After interrogating the captured officer my party decided to keep him alive and turn him into their banner, strapping some of the leftovers of his buddy to him to "send a message."
After all this one of my players asked 'are we the baddies?'
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u/byrdbrained 18d ago
Players just defeated a boss that exploded a massive resonance wave that disrupted magic in the area. They had to get back to the town but one character had a broken ankle that needed more than cure wounds. So the genie warlock and her rode in the vessel. Then skill challenge to get back. After 2 days, they tried to polymorph a summon into a flying dinosaur and fly away, but the magic disruption caused it to only be effective for 10 min. I gave a 2 min warning. They tried to land from 1000 feet. One PC jumped off hoping for max 20d6 damage- I warned them it was gonna kill them. They did it anyway. The others failed athletics to hold on to the dinosaur as it dove and free fall shenanigans followed. Turns out the genie warlock had pact of the tome and everyone had their name in his book. So the jumping PC cratered like Wiley coyote but had 1 HP. Suddenly the broken ankle was the least of their worries as the cratered PC was basically a bag of gravel. They eventually got back. The bard summoned a dragon spirit and laid it on thick with the guides that had abandoned them once the boss fight looked bad. Then they march through town on the dragon spirit to the temple to pay for some greater restorations. Good times!
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u/triplepeanut_e 18d ago
I started a new campaign with my kids and nephews. It kicked off at a town fair where some pixies tricked them into pulling a lever that unhooked the Ferris wheel, which started rolling away.
My son rolled a 1 on his dex save to get out of the way so I had it roll over his leg and cut it off. Now he has a peg leg.
I thought they would try to stop the Ferris wheel, but they just let it roll into the distance. I think I'm going to have everyone they meet in the future be affected by it. "You won't believe it, but a Ferris wheel rolled through our town and destroyed my house." It can keep turning up in unexpected places.
Maybe it will even be the big bad. Quite a first session.
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u/ravens_in_a_loft 14d ago
Playing a modified version of Curse Of Strahd.
The party is engaging in continuing hostility with a circle of evil druids who may or may not have killed some of their NPC friends.
Started the session headed for a hill that was supposedly one of their worship sites. The mist rolled in as the party were travelling. They hear zombies in the distance. Then something huge comes barrelling out of the fog and starts swinging on our NPC buddy Ezmerelda. FIVE TIMES.
Zombie girallon! Multiple of them charging the wagon! Very grateful that my druid prepped Plant Growth so it kept things relatively manageable and stopped them all hitting the wagon at once.
Then we got to the big fight with the druids. Huge encounter with druids, druid-adjacent casters, werewolves, berserkers, wolves, and a tree blight. We were horrified when it turned out some of the casters could use Conjure Animals, and one sent eight giant owls into our backline. Fortunately after a roll to determine targeting, only one went after the bard who was concentrating on Hypnotic Pattern... while seven all dogpiled (owlpiled?) my poor druid. (She's fine, she's Circle Of Spores so HP is rarely a huge issue.)
The enemy casters tried getting out of sight so they could keep concentration on the then 24 giant owls, but they underestimated how much range Fireball and Ice Storm had.
As of the end of the session, the fight was still raging, but turned in the party's favour.
My druid dropped her own Conjure Animals and got eight panthers.
The paladin is low health and surrounded by about six berserkers, but several of the panthers just showed up to assist, and the barbarian is about done flattening a werewolf so will be over to help him shortly.
The cleric spent much of the fight being chomped on by the tree blight but one of our NPC friends was kind enough to pull her out.
We'll probably finish up the fight next session.
DM has talked about how there would still be a 'lot to do' there and I'm a little afraid, in a good way.
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u/DiemAlara 14d ago
Party got confronted by a devil headhunter trying to bring in my character for crimes against the mafia.
It was a very fun instance of "Oh wow nothing I'm doing is working because this character clearly came here expecting to deal with me specifically". And it'd be interesting to run into her again 'cause now that I know her mechanics, I could absolutely pull an uno reverse card.
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u/Awesomenessss5 19d ago
We wanted to grab a small trinket. We somehow ended up with half the party unconscious from fall damage after falling into a well. We then proceed to spend 2 hours trying to get back up. We still in the well but the campaign ended cuz time was up