Quote from: danskmacabre;576241Dunno really, I've Gm'd for 95% of my RPGing life (at least).

I feel you on this one. One of the few times I did play we took down a 20th Level "punishment" fighter the GM sent after us. We were level 8 by the way.

I don't remember the toughest monster my D&D groups took down, but I do remember the one Champions campaign where our superheroes met Dr. Destroyer (their Dr. Doom ripoff) on neutral ground and one of the PCs still pissed him off to the point that DD smacked him with a 20 dice Energy Blast and he pretty much woke up the next Tuesday.  Which is not "the Biggest Bad You've Taken Down" so much as "the Biggest Bad Who Ever Pimp-Slapped Your Characters."

JG

We were playing a Dragonlance campaign.  I'm not super familiar with the settings canon, but this was after the events of the events of the first novels.  We ended up fighting Lord Soth in a dungeon with a portal open to the Abyss.  

We didn't know it at the time, but the DM had gotten tired of playing, and was looking for a satisfying conclusion to the game.  In his mind, the easiest way to do that was a TPK, so bear in mind, that's what he was gunning for.  The game up to that point was pretty good, though, and we didn't really know that he had this tendency until a much later game (the ending there inspired by the SAW franchise).  

In any case, the party was overmatched.  We were close to a TPK.  The cleric was dead, the rogue was dying and initiative was not our friend.  I was playing a two-weapon-Fighter and even if I hit on my attacks, I wasn't going to take this thing out.  The only chance was a weapon that the cleric had cast a spell on that has a chance to destroy undead in a single hit (basically a Disrupting Weapon).  I had to spend my action grabbing the weapon and giving it to the Wizard.  

The Wizard had to succeed at hitting, and Lord Soth had to fail his save.  We had already given up, but all the rolls were in the open.  The wizard pulled a 20 out of his ass and hit.  We calculated the saves, and Lord Soth would survive on a roll of 3 or better.  I survived!  So did the wizard.

Unfortunately, we couldn't get out of the room.  We were sealed in with the only exit onto the Abyss.  The DM ruled that we could level, but it took months of game time.  He thought we would starve to death instead, but we had an item that provided enough food and water for one person to live comfortably (or two people to live on half rations).  

Since we couldn't teleport out of there, we had to wait for the wizard to successfully research plane shift.  Then, when the moment was right, we had to step into the Abyss and cast that spell before we were swarmed by the demonic hordes.  

It felt pretty good to be one of the survivors.

I'm not sure if he counts as a bad guy but one of my characters killed Elminster once. If the DM was going to use high level NPCs to railroad us then maybe he should have not started us at 18th level. Or instructed me to bring a high powered character to the table.

I was expecting Pundit to answer "the Forge".

For myself it was some big whale in Mentzer-D&D.

I was a participant in the death of an avatar of Gruumsh in a 3.5 game. It was a last ditch effort to stop an orc horde since the army we led was losing the battle.

To be honest it was pretty dumb move, since we were a mixed level party and the highest level characters were a 23rd lvl monk and my 19th level paladin and the setting was magic item poor. We really didn't have the kind of gear you might expect from your average D&D game. However, we had to try something, and the game had a house rule where if you could roll two natural 20s in a critical hit, if you could roll a 3rd 20 or a hit, the target died. We thought it was worth the gamble, and we were right. The killing blow was landed by the usually cold-rolling 10th level dwarf cleric, in what felt like a mind bending act of open rolling. We called him "godslayer" after that act.

Quote from: JamesV;576444The killing blow was landed by the usually cold-rolling 10th level dwarf cleric, in what felt like a mind bending act of open rolling. We called him "godslayer" after that act.

Awesome, but there's an epithet that probably didn't sit well with his clerical superiors.

Quote from: Sope;576433I was expecting Pundit to answer "the Forge".

I was assuming they meant in the game, not in real life. And obviously I wouldn't have ever let the Forge be anywhere near one of my games.

RPGPundit

A few years back we played an awesome Rolemaster campaign which took us from around 8th level to over 50th. Our characters got embroiled in a conflict with invaders from beyond a supposedly impenetrable barrier which split the world in two, and also some strange anti-energy god known as 'the Entity'.

My character was a child of the God-Emperor and had succeeded in taking control of the Empire. The other PCs had risen to Demi-god status. We had a campaign finale against the invaders (we beat them and their mechanical land-dragons) and then the Entity turned up.

At this point, the original god-emperor whispered to me that I should persuade the other PC Demi-gods to channel their divine essence against the Entity, but that I should not do this personally. I did as asked, and the other PCs and the Entity were mutually-destroyed as god-head and anti-god met.

So technically I killed a mega-anti-god and an entiry pantheon of Demi-gods in a single master stroke...

Best campaign ever!

Quote from: RPGPundit;576949I was assuming they meant in the game, not in real life. And obviously I wouldn't have ever let the Forge be anywhere near one of my games.

RPGPundit

That gives me a great idea for a sci-fi setting bad guy organization.  Bumbling pseudo-scientists trying to mind control the population!

Under the Storm Giants Castle. We killed Satan.

Quote from: Tetsubo;577385Under the Storm Giants Castle. We killed Satan.

That's  pretty good one. Not too many can say that.

RPGPundit

It's been my experience that encounters with demon lords, devils, gods etc are usually anticlimactic and decided one way or another in one, maybe two rounds, tops. Either the archvillain annihilates the PCs in a round or two, or the other way around.

As a player I've seen both Lolth and Iuz get whacked almost instantly with a vorpal sword. As a DM I've seen Demogorgon get snuffed out in the first round thanks to an arrow of demon-slaying (on his own plane!) that I forgot the PCs had, and another lesser deity killed through an ingenious countermeasure against his anti-magic shell.

Quote from: Elfdart;580097It's been my experience that encounters with demon lords, devils, gods etc are usually anticlimactic and decided one way or another in one, maybe two rounds, tops. Either the archvillain annihilates the PCs in a round or two, or the other way around.

As a player I've seen both Lolth and Iuz get whacked almost instantly with a vorpal sword. As a DM I've seen Demogorgon get snuffed out in the first round thanks to an arrow of demon-slaying (on his own plane!) that I forgot the PCs had, and another lesser deity killed through an ingenious countermeasure against his anti-magic shell.

Yes, I remember some similar experiences in my epic level 1-36 RC D&D campaign.

RPGPundit

well, the literally biggest was a creature that was basically a sentient universe. The entire population of the planet was launched against it in a giant final assualt to save all reality.

The most "legendary" though I guess would have to be Venger, from the D&D cartoon, riding Tiamat, backed by an army of Beholders.