Top Ten Lists with King Arthur!
King Arthur’s Top Ten Lists:

How to tell that the Goblet your knight brought you is NOT the Holy Grail:
  1. Elven or Dwarven craftsmanship.
  2. The TSR logo stamped on the base.
  3. The stem is in the shape of a naked woman.
  4. Encrusted with Cubic Zirconium.
  5. ‘Property of Wizards of the Coast.’
  6. Gag ‘dribble-holes’ in the rim.
  7. It comes as part of a set of four.
  8. It’s date-stamped “30 Common Era.”
  9. The beer-stein style lid.
  10. Bumps on the sides spell out religious aphorisms (“This is the Holy BRAILLE, you moron!”)


Additions: From The SAB:

Last person to drink from it aged rapidly and disintegrated in seconds.
Noble Savage1


How to tell one of the Royal Guard is in cahoots with an assassin:
  1. No longer jokes with the Royal Food Taster about trading jobs.
  2. Wears full plate armor, but covers your back with a leather shield painted in concentric circles.
  3. Has a numbered bank account in Mercia.
  4. The king stamped on his spending money is not you or a predecessor of yours.
  5. Keeps measuring the exact bearing and distance from the window to your pillow.
  6. No longer argues with you about walks among the peasants being unsafe for royalty.
  7. Suggests you need a new physical activity like ‘naked boar hunting’ or ‘blindfolded cliff diving.’
  8. Has started collecting traveler’s scrolls about reaching and living in distant lands for extended periods.
  9. Has foiled three assassination attempts this year, but only after asking the attacker: “Is it you?”
  10. Announces his movements loudly (“I’m walking away from the door, now! Should be TEN MINUTES before I complete my rounds.”)


Ten best things about using ‘trial by combat’ for a justice system:
  1. Speedy trials. Once the bleachers are up, the corn popped and the beer poured, you’re ready to begin.
  2. No lingering precedents. Today’s combat is not pre-decided, although a string of wins may affect the betting.
  3. No lawyers.
  4. No jury deliberations. Two men enter, one man leaves, 12 peers sit on the bench and toast the winner.
  5. No one complains about the king’s judgement being biased or reflecting poor listening. All I do is say ‘start’ and ‘that’s it for him, then.’
  6. No overturns by higher authority. Beheadings limit the usefulness of an appeals process
  7. No need to ask legal experts who is winning.
  8. No lawyers.
  9. Far far fewer frivolous suits.
  10. No perjury. Or, none that matter. Guy wants to claim his falchion is a scimitar, no skin off my teeth.




Ten good names given to swords (Besides Excalibur, of course):
  1. Exit:: Because it’s my opponent’s way out of the fight.
  2. Swiss: Because like the cheese, it will make them full of holes.
  3. Chink: Because everyone’s helpless if there’s a chink in their armor.
  4. Central Air: Because I’m going to ventilate someone.
  5. Nothing: Because when the monsters come, nothing can save me.
  6. Butcher: Because of the excellent chops it provides.
  7. Tarot: Because it figures heavily in your future.
  8. Incriminating evidence : Because it’s going to put you away for good.
  9. Bad Golfer: Because sometimes there’s just no cure for a wicked slice.
  10. POINTY DAMN SWORD: Because Thrud suggested it and I’m not going to tell a Troll her suggestions aren’t good ones.




Ten signs it’s time to hire a new cleric:
  1. All the COMMAND words he knows are obscene.
  2. Claims that tossing coins to belly dancers is ‘just like tithing.’
  3. Keeps asking about your HMO’s policy on partial resurrections.
  4. Often confuses patron deity’s sacrifice with the party’s lunch.
  5. Asks you to hold his coin pouch whenever the Inquisitors are passing by.
  6. Last time he ‘turned’ the undead, they broke into a musical number.
  7. Answers theological questions with ‘Eh, what does it all matter?’
  8. Introduces the novitiate he recruited: Elsie (a Cow).
  9. His prophecy and divination spells involve rolling dice and consulting notes jotted on a betting slip.
  10. He owns a holy relic that’s sacred to his deity, but his hands start to smoke if he touches it.




Ten really horrible battlecries for an army:
  1. We’re fairly confident of triumph!
  2. We come in peace!
  3. GET RECIEPTS!
  4. The Lawyers are watching! The Lawyers are watching!
  5. There Are A Few Atheists Acting As Forward Observers!!
  6. Remember the ….Uh…
  7. Last man to die horribly at the pointy bit of their pikes is a wussie!
  8. Roses are red, violets are blue, we’ll fight to the last man to make sure you guys never get across the border where you could inflict incredble harm on the infrastructure of our society with fiscal repercussions inflicted on our neighbors in every direction, and screw up the dynastic succession! So there!
  9. SPOOOOOON!
  10. Red Rover, Red Rover, Shoot your artillery over!




Ten things that are better after a dungeon delve:
  1. Bathing – or just general feeling not filthy
  2. Campfires – especially with a breeze to blow the smoke away
  3. Starlight – just seeing it after a while down below
  4. Fingers – having them, not having to use them to find traps
  5. Fish – fresh caught, from a stream, not blind, not albino, not surviving on eating The Lord only knows what
  6. Air – that doesn’t smell of orc, torch, blood, fear, mushrooms, or the cleric’s aftershave that could etch his chin cleft into a diamond
  7. Maps – above ground, they’re amusing souvenirs, not our one hope of ever finding the exit, or a display of the elf’s failings in matters of direction, scale or landmarks.
  8. Encumbrances – cause they’re all on the mule, where they belong
  9. Ballads – after the delve, you can stop worrying if the next dirge the bard sings will be yours
  10. Co-delvers – sitting wayyy over there, not stepping on your ankles, with a torch in one hand and an edged instrument in the other


Signs you may be too old to tourney
  1. Last time you drew your sword you lost your balance before it was halfway out of the sheath.
  2. Eyesight so blurry you can’t tell the end of your lance from the end of you opponent’s.
  3. You beard’s so long it prevents more than two pieces of armor from clanking.
  4. You carry the favor of a lady most often referred to as ‘Granny.’
  5. Your plate armor has to be reworked for the hunch in your back.
  6. You remember when ‘all of this was woodland…’
  7. …and tell people constantly.
  8. You think the lute music today’s kids plink out is obscene.
  9. You had them let out the seams in you chainmail so it would fit your ‘ale-belly.’
  10. You don’t recognize the new-fangled metal they use for swords these days.


Ten things that I, Arthur, King of the Britons, am legally able to define as an act of Treason, earning the traitor the fullest possible punishment under the law, as sentenced by me, if found guilty by a judge, which would be me:
  1. Taking up arms against the Crown, or actively supporting those that do
  2. Any discussion of political theory that includes an idea that a mandate from the masses has any importance in the rule over the Land
  3. Worship of any god other than the one and only Real One, or worship of God in a manner different from the religious tradition of my church
  4. Stand-up Jester routines that depend on a shared perception of clichéd behavior on the part of the governing body, or some agency of that body, for humorous effect
  5. Political cartoons which misrepresent the proportions my bodily characteristics and/or show interaction on my part with personifications of government policy, for the purpose of humorous effect without regard to national confidence in my rule
  6. Farting
  7. Spending money stamped with a depiction of anyone other than me
  8. Spending money stamped with a my representation, but not on my good side
  9. Being a Saxon, or of Saxon descent
  10. Overcooked hash browns: making, eating, or slinging


Ten things that seem to sound different if the Paladin says it or the Thief
  1. There’s no change. The money you gave me was exactly what it cost.
  2. I searched the room for treasure. Nothing you’d be interested in.
  3. I was just curious how much your sword cost?
  4. Go ahead, I’ll stay here and guard the exit.
  5. Sorry I’m late, I was helping the Watch with their inquiries.
  6. Missing Jewels? I don’t know anything about them.
  7. Oh, yeah, I know all the security guards in market square.
  8. Would I lie to you?
  9. I was confessing my sins. It took longer than I’d expected.
  10. Now how did that get into my pack?


Alignment answers to ‘Why did the chicken cross the road?’
  1. Lawful Good: Because an inner voice in it’s soul drove it to seek the perfection of the other side.
  2. Lawful Neutral: Because it was told to.
  3. Lawful Evil: Because I told it to…got a problem with that?
  4. Neutral Good: To benefit the greater number, of course.
  5. Neutral: To see if the other side was any different. It wasn’t, of course, disparity is an illusion.
  6. Neutral Evil: To make someone swerve into the moat.
  7. Chaotic Good: Because that’s where the party was! Ha!
  8. Chaotic Neutral: Because ice cream don’t got bones! Yee-Ha!
  9. Chaotic Evil: Because the blood of the chicks on this side of the road had made its feathers sticky! HAHAHA!


Ten signs you’re an NPC
  1. No one remembers your name until right after someone says ‘I wouldn’t touch that with a ten foot pole.’
  2. New nickname: The Walking Potion Miscibility Table.
  3. No one keeps track of your encumbrances, so you’re carrying a statue, the axle of a stagecoach from two adventures ago and a rowboat through a dungeon.
  4. The Chevalier’s squire looks down on you.
  5. The party leader seems certain you’re intelligent enough to perform adequately at spying, surveying and reporting, but lack the math skills to calculate the odds against your survival.
  6. When the party meets with royalty, you’re led off to the stables with the mules.
  7. …and the Paladin’s horse gets a better stall than you do.
  8. Your ‘share’ of the treasure is the restocking of your first aid kit, camping supplies, and the big bag of torches.
  9. You have the same name as the guy that died just before they hired you…and a number. (4th Jeeves, Cookie 7, Tonto the third)
  10. When captured, they never torture you for information. Except the drow, of course, but the only questions they ask are sarcastic ones about your comfort, hunger, ability to blink…


Ten talismans no dungeon delver should be without:
  1. Ring of Free Movement
  2. Bracers of Initiative
  3. Fotheringay’s Compass to Nearest Exit
  4. Neverending bottle of Troll-B-Gone
  5. Talgin’s Hearing Aid of What ‘n hell was that?
  6. Boots of Legs Don’t Fail Me Now.
  7. Wheeled Treasure Chest with Ergonomic Handles
  8. Tessa’s Trustful Truss of Trysting
  9. Saint Kevorkian’s Portable Sanctuary
  10. Pearl of Appeal


Ten signs you might be a little TOO into gaming
  1. If you hear that people in a different (modern) country use mayonnaise instead of ketchp on their fries and go ‘Eeew!’ but when you find out that during your favorite historical period they used children’s urine to flavor foods, you wonder what age child would be the most historically accurate….
  2. If you build a 1:50th scale catapult model in your room, and use that as a template for a 1:1 scale catapult in your backyard….
  3. If you’ve ever tried to convince the bartender, your parents or the traffic cop that you ‘can’t be drunk, I made my save against intoxicating beverage!’….
  4. If you tick off a voodoo priestess during a game and spend the rest of the week making sure to guard your shaved hairs and fingernail clippings…..
  5. If you’ve thought up later what you should have said in the earlier argument …and gamed it out to see how her reaction would have changed…
  6. You’ve ever argued about verb tense in dwarvish, elvish, orcish or any other language not spoken by a UN translator…
  7. You’ve reported dungeon earnings to the IRS…
  8. You’ve asked the pet store clerk what special abilities the iguana would grant if used as a familiar…
  9. You’ve asked the guy at Footlocker for Boots of Speed…
  10. You’ve ever calculated your dwarf’s inseam…


Click to return to the Fun Page!

Click to return to the Dungeon Follies Index!