Party thief, as voice of illusion of Satan to now-disbelieving priest: "So, you have turned against me. ...In a way, this pleases me."

The party roster, sung to the Gilligan's Island theme song: "The wild mage... the crazy elf... the paladin... and his bug!"

On, what, exactly, one got from the orog nation in a trade agreement: "Orog ale! Orog beer! Orog grogs!"

Missing the point of *secret* character backgrounds: "You would know this, you've spent the past five years with the lich."

On attempting to retrieve 2000 marbles dropped to gain tactical advantage versus ogres: "You recover maybe twenty. The rest remain behind. Ogre after ogre trips and falls on them, injuring itself. Over the years the population of ogres in this regions drops to nothing.

Draconians, after a ranger fails an attack roll to swing into them on a vine, and sails harmlessly into the night: "Must be a bird."

Draconian, after a ranger fails another attack roll to swing into them on a vine, and sails harmlessly into the night: "Must be a bat."

Draconian, after a ranger fails a third attack roll to swing into them on a vine, and sails harmlessly into the night: "Must be a bug."

Draconian, after a ranger fails the FOURTH attack roll to swing into them on a vine, and sails harmlessly into the night: "Must be a pig." "...a pig?"

On party members who have been stripped down to their underwear: "I search his underwear for secret doors!"
"...You find one."
"I open it! ... ... ... do I find treasure?"

The first dwarf and the first cleric I ever played, he was great fun and became a great figure in Krynn. I give you: Therimith!

Much of this campaign has escaped my memory. I recall that Theremith and his party were brave and noble adventurers, questing through the world for reasons I can't quite remember.

For some notable deed, Therimith was awarded the powerful Stoneshield. It had the powers of one of the Bigby's Hands spells, usable offensively as a shield rush, or defensively as a barrier. He used this to save a silver dragon (and himself) from an avalanche once.

The greatest adventure (in other words, the only one I can remember!) was their infiltration of the ogre lair. Therimith climbed up a secret ladder which was known to enter the ogres' lair -- and discovered himself in a pot in the kitchen. The ogre chef, blaming fairies for the noises he heard, dumped a pot of boiling water on Therimith. Angered, Therimith leapt out of the pot when the chef's back was turned and retaliated in kind. The party quickly slaughtered the chef, making a lot of noise in the process, and realized that other ogres had heard them. Quickly they used a giant spoon to engineer a "Lard-a-Pult," and pelted the onrushing ogres with gobs of lard. The adventure ended with Therimith dumping 2000 marbles at the lair's entrance and recovering only 20. The DM described, in graphic terms, how the ogre population lost so many members to tripping injuries over the years that it dwindled to nothing. We all enjoyed that touch.

Therimith eventually found his way into 5th Age, the card game, where he was a renowned hero for his magical work. He also invented the 5th Age Flying Carpet... :)

Nine more Memories to go!

Baro Rasahk, The One Who Is Just Plain Not Nice
3rd level Lawful Evil Death Knight

The evil game! Party vs. Party! Players vs. Players!

Two of our more sadistic group members decided to run a game which pitted two powerful parties against each other, in a giant mazelike cavern. Rasahk was my character for this particular jaunt.

I recall two memorable things. The first was the boulder. Having suffered damage to his knee earlier in the game, Rasahk found himself too slow to run out of the way of the giant boulder rolling his way. Just as I was preparing to give up, the DM was called away to run an NPC for the other group. About ten minutes passed, and when the DM returned I casually pointed out that Rasahk's high constitution would have allowed him to regenerate that injury during the time he was away. The DM, on a whim, agreed, and a now-healed Rasahk bolted out of the boulder's way.

The other memorable thing was this exchange:
"I search his underwear!"
"You find a secret door."
"I open it! ... ... .. Do I find treasure?"

The background of the ninja known as Banjo Karlile is shrouded in mystery. Born in the Sarayami family, known traditionally for irs exceptional ability in martial arts, he was gifted with a secret name known only to the village soothsayer. This name was highly important to the Sarayami family, as it revealed what the future held for its recipient. Unfortunately, it was lost when the Sarayami family was attacked.

The Takarisha clan revealed that the Sarayami family was really a ninja clan, and blamed them for the recent troubles the elven village had been having. The clan was attacked by angered villagers. The elf's parents, Kintana Aruka and Thessalia, fled into the forest. They encountered another elven town and quickly integrated themselves. A few survivors from the clan also made it to the village, including the elf's half-sister Kintana Amyana and the clan leader's daughter Taruka Rishell, who as a capable leader reformed the clan. The clan became larger by accepting renegade elves without homes into their ranks.

Unfortunately the elf's parents were lost, although how is unsure, to the humans. Without older people around, the clan (which was mainly formed of young elves now) had no call for him. He adopted the name Banjo Karlile, as he now saw no hope of recovering his true name, and set out for the Human Empire, swearing vengeance. Rishell, who know she could not stop him, sadly promised him aid, although fully expecting him to be slain quickly.

It is not known what happened to Rishell or Amyana, although it is quite probable they perished in the fiery distruction of the clan.

After the ninja set out, he was determined to slay every human he encountered. Upon reaching the outskirts of the human land he plotted to destroy a human farm when he was set upon by goblinoids. Although he attempted to fight them off, he was brutally beaten and left lying in a bush. Although his family katana was broken, this turned out to be a blessing, for the farmer encountered it, and being unfamiliar with elven weapons, attempted to find the rest of it, so his son (who had an interest in weaponsmithing) could look at it. He found the rest of it grasped in the ninja's bloody hand.

Luckily this was a kind farmer, who helped the elf to recover. And although the pieces of the katana were stolen, another one was made for him and is the one he still carries today. This experienced tempered his hatred with reason, and he decided to move on.

His next journey led him to another town. Instead of burning the place down like he normally would, he decided to only slay the town wizard, a man known for evil. Unfortunately it didn't go well, and when he regained consciousness he found himself suspended in midair with a bunch of other oddballs....

* * * * *

Wow. This brings back memories. This was the "high-level" campaign, so named because our characters shot up to insanely high levels before perishing in the Tomb of Horrors. In his heyday he had a list of martial arts skills from The Complete Ninja's Handbook running off the character sheet.

The other characters were the ludicrously overpowered archer (6 arrows a round?!), a thri-kreen priest, a wild mage who specialized in fast-drawing Wands of Wonder, and a wemic who got snuffed by Finger of Death and was quickly swapped out for a paladin. We made up a song to the tune of Gilligan's Island:

The wild mage
The crazy elf
The paladin,
And his bug!

I don't remember too much about the game. My ninja only survived because I tricked the DM into giving me a kickass katana which let me fly and shoot the occasional lightning bolt. I recall vaguely defeating some velociraptors with metal armor. We kept skipping around time in Athas, and no one knew what the heck was going on. Evil wizards kept draining the sun. At one point Banjo had five psionicly-empowered, intelligent swords which kept arguing amongst themselves. He also had the proficiency "Wakazashi Throw."

That was such a fun game. I wish I could remember more of it.

Drake von Dalis. 2/2 fighter/cleric of Heironius(3rd edition). Master of the longsword. Eldest son and heir of the von Dalis brothers, and leader of the Brothers von Dalis adventuring party.

This was just a one-shot game. Drake and his brothers set out into the woods, intent on rescuing their family friend. In the course of it, they slew kobolds left and right until they reached the cabin in which their friend was supposed to be. He wasn't there, and they realized that the kobolds would assault it. Quickly, they dug pungi pits and rigged traps.

The first victim of the pungi pits was the person they were looking for. Ooops. No sooner had he arrived than the kobolds set the house on fire (after stepping in the pits. All of them. The DM was just staring at his dice in disbelief.) The Brothers von Dalis burst from the house and lay about them, slaying the foul fiends!

Good game.

Matar Lin. Thief... sixth level or so. From one of the neatest games I've played.

Matar was a thief's thief. He had eleven different thief skills. He couldn't do them very well, but he could sure do a lot! In the beginning he was a quick thinker. He outwitted and shamelessly taunted an elf who captured him. In the course of the celebration that followed, he cut off a raid on the fort they were in by firing an arrow at the portcullis mechanism, causing it to fall. (Of course, his first arrow went into a guard... natural 1 and natural 20.)

Soon things took a more sinister turn. After entering a forbidding tunnel complex, heavily pursued by guards, the party resorted to desparate measures such as buttering the stairs behind them. They stumbled upon an ancient, abandoned Temple of the Earth, and Matar made a fateful decision.

"Okay boys, get the looting sacks!"

Within minutes, evil undead took out the rest of the party, leaving Matar to face the dungeon alone. Undaunted, Matar stumbled upon a room full of glass caltrops, which he crossed by tying a six-inch steel square to one boot and hopping across. Cleansing the temple of all valuables, he stepped into the other room and faced -- an earth elemental.

One poor thief was no match for an earth elemental, but this one had a weakness -- four stone pots filled with sand. Quickly, he launched an arrow into the air with a rope attached, skittered across it, and pushed the first one over. The second one required help from Ol' Prybar. The third he stood in front of until the earth elemental punched, then leaped out of the way. The fourth wouldn't go over for anything, so he finally tied a rope to his waist and around the pot, then jumped.

With the temple cleared, Matar dragged his friends free and helped them to recover. The earth priest kept giving the treasures suspicious looks. (Matar: "It was him." ::pointing to the paladin::)

I don't remember much more about the campaign, except that he got roughed up by some barbarians and convinced them to teach him how to use the bola. I also have to wonder why "farm implements," "clock", and "spice rack" are items in his inventory list.

But damn, that was a good game.