Sometimes, a player does something remarkable that’s worth telling everyone about. Actually…I have a lot of these moments…not sure if that means my players are brilliant or maybe a tad broken…
Either way, I think they’re awesome!
This is a story about a character named Kryn.
Kryn is a warlock who has proficiency with alchemy tools. She’s a tad prone to considering strange ideas (like jumping into the fast moving underground stream because it looked like fun), and some odd hobbies (like flirting with hostile troglodytes). And that should give you sufficient backstory about Kryn.
Recently, the group Kryn travels with fought and killed a black dragon. Seeing an opportunity for interesting and potentially powerful gear, the group stripped with carcass of bones (for weapon hafts), hide (for armor or cloaks), its head (as a trophy), and its eyes, which Kryn made a point of taking (not entirely sure what she hoped to do with them).
I was actually really interested to see what she might do with them. Enchant them as permanent arcane eyes? Badass arcane focus? Super cool weapon pommels? I have a lot of ideas myself, but never mind that. It’s what Kryn did with them.
The group was pretty battered, and the paladin and barbarian passed out in the back of the covered wagon as the group headed back to town. When time came to make camp, they left the two sleeping and divided the watches up among the rest of the group and their hirelings. The first watch ended uneventfully and Kryn took her turn.
As soon as I told her that it was her turn to take watch, she described how she took out one of the eyes, sliced into it with a knife to remove the cornea and pupil, sprinkled some salt on it, and ate it.
It took me a second to bring my faculties to bear on this. Some background might help.
Black dragons are extremely acidic. Their breath weapon is acid, their drool is acid, their faces literally get eaten away by acid over time…you get the idea.
I hadn’t made the group make any checks or saves when they dismembered the creature, figuring that they deserved a bit of a reward, and wanting to get them on their way without too much dice rolling, but this…this was specifically handling hazardous goods.
Anticipating some playful antics along the way, I worked out some mechanics in my head: mostly what happens if you ingest a dragon’s eye?
So we backed up a bit. I told her to give me a dexterity saving throw as she cut into the eye, DC 15. She rolls 14. So close! I rolled a d12 and got a 6. Too high for playful antics, so I cut it in half and told her she took 3 points of acid damage. Fair warning before eating it, I thought.
In response, she cleaned the acid off her skin, rinsed off the eye, salted it and swallowed it whole.
OK…so…game on?
I figured ingested acid could last a while, so I rolled 2d4. The acid would last for 4 hours, with a constitution save (DC 15) for half, DC 20 to end the effect. I rolled another d12 and it came up 11; saving throw? 3…
I described how Kryn was violently ill, emptying the contents of her stomach and feeling greatly weakened as the acid continued to burn.
Second hour, another failed save, another 11 damage. I describe how Kryn vomits again, this time bringing up a vile black discharge that doesn’t seem normal.
In response Kryn asks, “Can I try to collect some of this in a vial for later?” I laugh and tell her how she manages to fill a vial with the purulent, malodorous, black discharge from her stomach.
Now at this point Kryn has been reduced to 3 hit points, and I know that she’s going to make two more saving throws. I’m specifically NOT trying to kill her, so I casually tell her that she thinks that the paladin has probably slept enough by now, and that it might be a good idea to go wake him for his turn on watch (and the fact that he’s the party’s only healer might keep her alive).
So Kryn wakes up Liam, who (in character) is somewhat surprised to fins Kryn in her current predicament.
He attempts to spend five points of lay on hands to purge the poison, but I inform him that it’s not poison, but acid. He instead heals her for 10 points, and the next (and final) two rolls for the acid have Kryn take another 7 damage.
The acid has run it’s course, and Kryn remains alive. A bit irate that she would endanger herself like this, and concerned she might eat the other one, Liam asks Kryn for the other eye. She hands it over and he quickly disposes of it in the fire, destroying it even as it billows forth a reek of acrid black smoke.
I tell this story because, honestly, Kryn is one of my favorite characters to have in a game. She is impetuous and curious, and obviously anyone who eats a dragon eye isn’t meta-gaming.
The same goes for Liam, destroying an item that I’m sure the player knows could be used to create a magic item of some sort, but instead doing what the character’s personality would dictate.
For me at least, the best and most memorable moments in D&D aren’t when someone does a ton of damage, but when someone does something in character that is out of the ordinary.
Nothing particularly good came out of Kryn eating the eye of a black dragon, but the group was in stitches for the ten or so minutes that it took for us to play through this little episode.
I’m sure that there will be any more stories to come.
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