I will always treasure the memory of the first time I played Pathfinder 1e. I rolled a half-orc witch, egregiously min-maxed for a ridiculous +16 bonus to intimidate at level 1.

in the very first encounter, my friend alyssa's dwarf barbarian brutally one-shot a goblin. I was next up on the initiative, with the scene well set for an intimidate check.

as the goblins were a size category smaller than my character, I got an extra +4 to intimidate, up to a truly absurd +20. I made my first roll of the game. I got a nat 20, for a total of 40.

the GM lost their shit, along with the rest of the table. the surviving goblins gtfo'd, and that ended up being impeccable foreshadowing for the utter munchkin chaos that was the rest of that campaign. that group was <3

One time in college, I was subbing in for a friend who was out of town in a cyberpunk D20 Modern game. The goal of this particular mission was to steal a Space Shuttle-style orbiter being transported between two locations on a big truck.

So, we silently boarded the truck. Being a party mostly consisting of college kids, we didn't exactly have the patience to remain silent, so we attracted some attention and they called in reinforcements. This took the form of two helicopters that slowly approached the truck. No worries, we thought, we have shoulder-mounted RPGs, this should be a piece of cake. Except, we kept failing our shots as they approached. Eventually, one of the players nailed a natural 20 right as the two copters were overhead.

We celebrated! Until the DM reminded us that they were directly overhead.

Because of the perfect shot, one copter rolled over as it was hit, taking out the second one with it. They were coming down right on us, the orbiter, and the truck. One character is asked to roll a reflex save, which he succeeds in, and chooses to roll directly under the orbiter. He's immediately crushed and killed, along with the rest of us, as the copters land on the orbiter, taking out the entire party save for one of us in a massive fireball.

The one who managed to escape this parade of bad decisions was running our getaway car. Given almost the entire party had died here, this campaign was over. So, to close it out, he snapped a photo of the wreckage, sent it to the crime lord who hired us for the mission with the caption "here's your space shuttle," and fled the country.

That was the first time I ever played a tabletop RPG.

once i played D&D with some friends in college. i played a few times before/after that but this particular game is the only one i remember with any clarity

while exploring a dungeon, i found a secret passage that led into a long hallway filled with traps. being the incredible rogue that i was, i deftly avoided tripping any of the traps and made it to the chest at the end of the hallway. this chest contained a small bag filled with weird fuzz balls. i removed one to examine it further. this was a mistake.

Bag of Tricks: This small sack appears normal and empty. However, anyone reaching into the bag feels a small, fuzzy ball. If the ball is removed and tossed up to 20 feet away, it turns into an animal.

for the record, i did not toss this fuzzy ball, but our DM was an agent of chaos and i don't think any of us had a solid grasp on the rules. so just ignore that part.

suddenly, i found myself atop a mighty warhorse that barely fit inside this tiny hallway. he immediately stepped on a pressure plate and the hallway began flooding.

i began guiding him out of the hallway, backwards, setting off every trap along the way but once again rolling like a champion to avoid any fatal damage to me or my horse. unfortunately, the exit was already about to close so i had to leave my new friend behind. i am still traumatized to this day.

i continued to push the limits of what is acceptable use for these "Tricks", probably too many times to recall, but here are some other favorite moments:

• the final room of the aforementioned dungeon was a throne room filled with goblins (or something). i opened the door just a crack, dumped my Bag, and quickly shut it. we waited patiently outside while a lion, tiger, and rhino brutally slaughtered the vast majority of goblins (we still had to fight the king tho)

• during our first "big bad" encounter, in which we were supposed to have an early scripted defeat at the hands of the final boss, i had another person throw me directly at the boss. in midair, i pulled a Trick from my Bag and shoved it down his throat. it turned into a brown bear, killing him instantly in the most gruesome fashion. the DM had to rewrite the campaign to account for the main villain being murdered in the first act.

sibelius played an enchanted hurdy-gurdy for bard things and had a rapier for non-bard things. he was very good at hurdy-gurdy, and very bad at using his rapier. like, are-these-virtual-dice-weighted-because-i-can't-roll-a-single-success bad. we were maybe the better part of a year into this campaign when the party rolls up into a new city where we meet a fun new NPC. I can't remember much about her but the important thing is that she was a thief-type and also used a rapier.

commence alleyway fight scene.

in the heat of this fight, sibelius is buffing the squad, as you do (#JustBardThings). he gets an angle on an attack and i figure, you know what, i can end this fight right now with a risky Hack and Slash- so i go for it.

fail. lmao. she gets to make a move against sibelius, as per DW rules. she is much, much better at using her rapier, and sibelius takes some harm.

now, i'll admit i was sort of looking for a way out of this situation. sibelius is a bard! he's got delicate fingers and an artist's constitution. 6 is not a lot of hit points and he's a bit of a weenie. anyway, i'm looking at the armor and weapon descriptions in the sourcebook and trying to see if i can lightly rules lawyer my way out of taking all that harm.

Rapier; close, precise, 25 coins, 1 weight

Close: It’s useful for attacking something at arm’s reach plus a foot or two.

Precise: It rewards careful strikes. You use DEX to hack and slash with this weapon, not STR.

...wait a fucking second.

i look down at my character sheet. as you might imagine, being a bard, sibelius was not very strong (-1). he was, however, pretty dang dexterous (+2). i announce my revelation to the table, head in hands. i don't remember how the fight went after that. sibelius was too embarrassed to care, and since he was basically about to bleed out on the ground, focused entirely on stringing arcane arts together for the rest of the scene.

thus ends this chapter of sibelius bright's journey: the day he got his shit rocked so hard he learned how to use his sword correctly.

we've got a dwarf warrior that's got 18/95 strength (Rook), my poor halfling witch with 13 str (Loda), a gnome, and some other folks who i don't remember much about they had going on.

witch is a weird kit, if you aren't familiar with it. it's somewhat proto-warlock, was originally meant for npcs, and kinda got a player character version later. like most old rules, it is Confusing at best, but there are a few constants. people do not like witches. if people find out that you are a witch, which there is an increasing chance of the longer you stay in place, they will eventually mob to run you out of town. you're also terrible with literally all weaponry, take other huge penalties, but you kinda have infinite spell slots you can change at will and get to do Shenanigans with them.

i've got a chance, so i cast Something fairly sneakily which gets the guard away and out of the room. we know the guard is coming back soon. there's enough time for us to try bending the bars, maybe just barely.

Rook goes for it. something like 95% bend bar/gate chance. fails. we're pretty sure we're dead, but the gnome's like "let the small one try!"

i go for it. 4%. success. but the guard catches me. "she's a witch!"

everyone's stunned because, of course, this is the sort of thing you read about. and also my cover is blown. we get taken to the town's leadership and offered a chance to revitalize the town's failing postal service if we want to live.

so now, we're stuck in a town that is going to steadily be after me, needing to earn the trust of the people, and from there...

we are in the plot of going postal.