5 Embarrassingly Fun Things to do to Characters during D&D Games

Want to have lots of laughs during a D&D game? Here is a quick guide of what to do.

#1. The Smell of Fear

Introduce a monster that has a powerful Fear Aura. eg. A Dread Wyvern, same stats as a regular wyvern but give it a fear aura and its tail produces a poison that causes people to run away in fear.

However when describing the fear effect when it happens use the following words "You sh*t your pants and run away!" or "You p*ss yourself and run away!"

Afterwards have the party encounter NPCs who mock them and joke about the smells coming off of them, saying things "You smell of fear stranger." or "Maybe your wet nurse forgot to change your diaper?" or "Wow, I guess cowards really do have yellow stains on their pants. Yellow and brown stains."

#2. Mushrooms and Diarrhea and Polymorphing

The party makes camp in the woods. Nearby is a patch of delicious looking mushrooms. Now if they choose to eat them any number of things could happen. The least of which is Diarrhea - which is both funny and embarrassing.

One of the things I did once to a group is that they developed a voracious appetite for eating mushrooms and began slowly polymorphing into giant mushrooms themselves. All it took was the initial bite and there was a feeling that the mushrooms were healing them. Several were severely injured and thus party began eating the mushrooms to heal their wounds faster. Fortunately not all of them were injured and those who were not noticed how their friends started to change colour, and started slowly transforming into mushrooms... They then burnt all the mushrooms and managed to save their friends. The good effect from that mini encounter was that the most injured people got some healing, but they suffered from the effects of a Slow spell for 12 hours until the shape-changing effect wore off.

I used the same mushrooms again years later, but instead made the mushrooms talkative and removed their healing properties. They still caused people to transform if you are the mushrooms, but there was less incentive to try eating them. That time was still funny as they had to carry the fighter away from the mushrooms and hold him down. He still suffered Slowness for many hours afterwards until it wore off.

Another time the party met a talking Oracle Mushroom which had developed interesting powers that it could imbue people who breathed in its spores. The spores would cause a random Divination spell on the person to last for 1d6+3 x 10 minutes. The effect could be Detect Evil, Detect Magic, Detect Undead, ESP, Clairaudience, or even Identify (allowing them to basically hold any item and identify its magical properties). The Oracle Mushroom was later killed by a shadow dragon, so it was really a one time thing.

Thus diarrhea doesn't sound so bad when you consider the number of benevolent / malevolent things that can be done with mushrooms.

#3. Food Poisoning

Okay, admittedly this is just dungeon dressing to tell you that the innkeeper is a horrible cook. But it can still be one more way to give your PCs diarrhea and let the hilarity ensue.

I recommend combining the diarrhea with a run in with the city guard and the guards putting the PCs in a separate cell at the far end of the cell block just so they don't have to smell them - which will coincidentally put them next to an old man who has been in jail a long time and can give them a new quest.

#4. Take Away their Clothes

Nothing says you got drunk last night and don't remember what you did when you wake up naked in a hut next to a NPC you don't know. The NPC might be attractive or ugly, it doesn't matter. I say roll 3d6 and make it a surprise.

If the whole party wakes up like this they made need to go on an adventure to get their stuff back, or maybe their stuff will be waiting for them at the inn where they got drunk last night. Certainly does give some interesting options.

Note - Some players will complain that their character wasn't drinking that much and that they should have got a saving throw. If you have troublesome players like that in the group ask them to roll 3 d20s at various intervals and pretend to consult a chart. Then ask them to roll percentile dice twice and make groaning sounds as you pretend to read the chart. Honestly, the things you have to do to make players loosen up and have some fun once in awhile...

2nd Note - The Tomb of Horrors has some teleporters in it that takes peoples clothes/belongings away during the teleportation process. I love that part. Best part of the whole adventure. That and the gem that provides a wish... ;)

3rd Note - Introduce the party to a tribe of nudists and have them take part in a traditional ceremony, which means no clothes but weapons are okay. Maybe even a Vulcan-esque marriage combat and you could play Star Trek fight scene music in the background... Have fun!

#5. Public Speaking Vs Rotten Tomatoes

Sometimes characters like to make speeches, often the one time that they try to use their Charisma in order to get a crowd to go in their favour. If they use their Charisma often and wisely, and through roleplaying, I don't have a problem with that, but if they try to do it as a gimmick only to get out of trouble for getting caught doing something nefarious then I recommend having a penalty for speaking to an angry crowd and give that angry crowd some rotten food. Rotten tomatoes, rotten onions, old potatoes, basically any kind of rotten vegetables will do.

In the words of Penguin in Batman Returns, "Why is there always someone who brings eggs and tomatoes to a speech?"