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goons posted:ideas about life Thanks for these, goons.
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Dec 10, 2017 18:38
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To try and integrate the "Mad Max" and "Baby Bugzilla" parts of the story introduce some crazy tribe that rides the fullsize Bugs. The city was established where it was because any Giant Bug that moves into that area is doomed. The first settlers made their homes in the carapace of Giant Bugs that went astray and ended up in this dead zone etc. The nomads would lose just as much as the city folk if Albert Entomologist succeeds in their plan. But they don't know that, as the city folk have been driving the nomads further and further away from the city. The players should prove themselves to at least one tribe as a "plan B." I don't know what plan A is, but when plan B is leading a nomad tribe's giant bug into a combined PIT maneuver and boarding action it doesn't really matter. Maybe the scientist has discovered that the Giant Bugs are eating their dead now that the City prevents the old and infirm from removing themselves from circulation Think Mad Cow disease but with giant sandworms that entire tribes depend upon. Obviously the Scientist was some sort of ex-nomad and thinks that the sacrifice of some of these giant bugs is worth it to destroy the city.
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Dec 10, 2017 19:02
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OK GM Advice thread, let's do this. This is a loving wall of text and thanks if you decide to tackle it. This Saturday my 5e DnD group is going to wrap up a primary story arc that's been ongoing for ~8 months and that will change everything going forward. Party is 6 5th-level characters, rogue barbarianx2 druid wizard fighter. I'm gonna give you the setup; tell me what you'd do to make this as epic as possible. The world has been suffering through a pretty severe drought for over 3 years now. Various things have recently made it clear this drought is NOT natural. All of the old nations and alliances of the world are cracking under the strain of their world dying of thirst. The party has been working for a mysterious wizard who just appeared in a small town in the far south of the continent. This wizard to all appearances is evil as gently caress (black robe, mask, perfectly willing to kill ruthlessly, won't meet them during the daylight, built a massive tower that looks like a loving black claw). After the players did some important work for him they earned his trust and he revealed to them that he was looking for a way to end the drought, but that he expected that chaos and war would soon engulf the continent as the drought intensified and he wanted to turn this town into a strong, safe place for refugees to come. His literal every action up until this point has been focused on this goal with no deviation whatsoever. One of the early missions the party undertook was to stop some goblins who had moved into the area recently from stealing water/food from the town. Upon approaching these goblins the party was surprised to find a few of them spoke the human language. Language is a major barrier on this world and some races just can't/don't communicate with others. The party, able to talk to these goblins, found that they were the ragged remnants of a tribe that had run more than a thousand miles trying to find safety. They offered the goblins safe harbor in the town if the goblins were willing to work building a defensive wall around the village. The goblins jumped at this, their leader has become a major and beloved NPC, and the wizard was overjoyed to suddenly have this newfound source of labor. One person who was NOT happy was the captain of the town guard, who happens to be a virulent racist who loathes everything non-human. He passionately argued with the party that providing this wizard a bunch of goblin helpers (classic evil wizard poo poo!) was a bad idea, but the party basically told him to give them a chance. The captain is secretly petrified (and completely convinced) the wizard's intent is to build a monstrous army and once he's gathered enough greenskins here the humans will be slaughtered. Several things happened then to increase the captain's (and the party's!) alarm. They discovered the wizard had put some sort of enchantment on the goblins that allowed them to work weeks at a time without rest 24/7, and the leader of the goblins revealed to the party leader that the wizard had told him that soon there would be hundreds of goblins here working beside them. They also discovered the wizard had used magic to carve the goblins a cavern complex under a hillside with room for seemingly a thousand or more goblins. At this time there were only 24 goblins in the town. The captain made a pretty gross "Do you know how fast those loving greens breed?" speech to the party which pissed them all off. The party had to leave town for a 3-4 session arc negotiating with a nearby elven grove, and when they returned they had a new PC with them, an elven mage. My elves are inhuman plant creatures that are exceedingly rare and surprise, the captain of the guard loving hates them. On their return, they were surprised to see the size of the town had more than doubled, the defensive wall was completely finished, and there were more than 150 goblins in the town, along with 12 female orcs, a bugbear, and 2 essentially brain-damaged totally passive ogres. Oh, and in the month they'd been gone a 300-foot tall tower of black stone that looks like a three-fingered claw had been built on top of the hillside the goblin caves were under. More evil wizard poo poo from the seemingly-not?-evil wizard. The captain of the guard corralled some members of the party and pointed out all of these things and asked the party if they didn't think maybe his explanation of "evil wizard building evil army" didn't seem to be more and more correct, but the party again blew him off because of what an rear end in a top hat he's been. It should be noted that at this point all of the monstrous inhabitants of the town have been perfectly law-abiding citizens and in fact have been the reason for the town's current renaissance. At this point the captain threw up his hands and told them that the blood of the town would be on their hands when things broke down. What the party doesn't know is that all that blood is coming on Saturday. The captain intends to purge the town of non-humans in a bloody night of murder. As the population of the town has swelled, he has recruited more and more members into the town guard, and has selected only other virulent racists like himself and has basically built a little secret Nazi army inside the town guard. There are over 200 of them openly serving in the guard and a further 100 disguised among the refugees. Their plan is to wait until the wizard leaves and then have a Night of the Long (Human) Knives. They are going to march in force on the goblin cave while some of them keep the town pacified, patrolling the streets in force. They'll move into the cave and slaughter the unarmed goblins and set a massive fire in there, which will eventually cause the tower to collapse. They are well-trained, well-organized, and fanatically motivated to succeed. Unfortunately for them, one of the party's NPCs has seen through them. This NPC's name is Merris, who has been with the party since the beginning of the game. He is an old soldier type who was obviously once an officer in this world's Imperial Legion but is equally obviously running from his old life. He is an upright lawful good "the strong protect the weak" guy and the party has come to know him as a wise counselor and a dependable sword arm. When they met the elves they discovered this man was famous among the elves as he had served with many during his time in the Legion. But when they returned from their visit to the elves, he mysteriously disappeared. BTW about 3-4 sessions in I asked them if they wanted this guy to stick around or disappear and they all agreed they liked him and wanted to see where his story went. I had this planned from the beginning for him and honestly I've been excited to see what happens here since we started. I kind of hoped he'd get a cool moment before leaving the story and oh boy is he ever. Merris has been the story counterweight to the racist captain of the guard, always counseling the party to look at the actions of these "monsters" since they've come to the town. He has been openly suspicious and hostile to the Nazi captain since his rant about "green breeding." Upon their return from the elven expedition, I made a Perception roll for Merris to see if he recognized any of these new soldiers. Merris rolled a 20. He recognized a lot of these guys as subpar soldiers and members of punishment battalions, and remembered some of them talking poo poo about the elves he served with and basically being Nazis. Alarmed, Merris decided to investigate further. He approached the elven mage, the only one he could be sure had no involvement in what might be a plot due to being new in town, and asked him to alter his appearance and tell everyone that Merris had left town. After some discussion the elf agreed. Merris then went undercover and joined the guard and began trying to find out if his suspicions that something was amiss here were right. At the beginning of the last session I had the party make a blind percentile roll, the higher the better. This roll was to see how much Merris had uncovered and how much he had prepared a counterstroke against the conspiracy. The results could range from "everything that happens comes as a total surprise and it's likely the Nazis completely win" ranging up through a few different better and better possibilities to "Merris saw right through you and prepared to kill you all once you've revealed yourselves." They rolled a 99. This translates to Merris having completely uncovered the plot, identified some of the important leaders among the guard who have responsibilities during the attack, and having time to contact, inform, and prepare literally everyone in the town he wants to. Literally the only thing that's going to go down the way the Nazis intend is the assault on the goblin cave, but even that's going to be a loving goat-rope for them. The goblins, on the long-ago advice of the party's leader, have been quietly arming themselves with spears and bows and training a goblin guard for months now, but only the goblins know anything about this. As far as the town guard knows, only the goblin leader has weapons and armor. so this is going to be a hell of a surprise for them when the poo poo goes down and there are 100+ armed goblins in their loving faces fighting on ground and in a cave they've been prepping for days. There are almost 3000 people in town but only about 1000 of them live inside the inner wall where this will all take place. Merris knows he can trust all the non-humans, the town blacksmith (he adopted two goblin orphans), and the mayor (he has gone out of his way to be welcoming and charitable to the greenskins, and lets his beloved 7 year-old daughter work and play with them whenever she wants), and no one else. He can't be 100% certain of the party's loyalty because the Nazi captain and the party leader have had a respectful and even somewhat friendly relationship. The way this is going to play out mechanically is that I have about 9-10 index cards I'll use as zones. Each labelled on one side with the name of the part of town it represents and important buildings/people that live there. Lake District Mayor's house, jeweler, Mirabilis restaurant On the flip side will be what they encounter when moving through that district. I think there will be a random roll to see what happens, whether they HAVE to engage the encounter or can try and slip past. If they engage and win any goblins fighting their join their party so they build up a little goblin army of their own as they move through the town. Lake District 4 guard infantry, 1 guard archer, 1 guard lieutenant 4 goblin archers in elevated position City Center Defend the mayor! 2 female orcs and the 2 ogres are fighting off a guard assault on the mayor's house. It looks like 10-12 soldiers are attacking the house, and some of them are lighting torches. What do you do? The way I've intended to kick all this off is to have the captain of the guard come to the party leader just as things are about to go down and try to get him to see reason one last time. He's going to straight-up tell him, "We're killing the greens tonight, this is your chance to get in on the ground floor of the new world order," and I am 100% certain the party leader is going to tell him to get hosed. At that point several armed guardsmen will come in to kill him and Merris will also enter, reveal how thoroughly he's undermined the conspiracy, and help the party leader win a quick and easy combat. He will drink a potion of booming voice and shout out to the citizens of the town what is happening, that the Nazis are on one side and he, the party leader, and the mayor are on the other and everyone has to choose. The other party members will then have little scenes where they fight off would-be murderers with help from goblin ambushers, the party will reunite near the middle of the town, cleave their way to the gates of the wizard's tower, and break the blockade there. Behind this blockade of guardsmen the majority of the guard will be battling the goblins, who are giving as good as they get. Once the party breaks the blockade the encounter will be over, as the wizard's hand-picked heroes blasting through the gate behind them is a signal to the rest of the guard that they can't win. So THAT is the scenario, and if you read through all that holy poo poo I'm so impressed, you are a shining star my friend. That said... What would you do?
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Dec 10, 2017 19:08
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JonathonSpectre posted:What would you do? Try to join your gaming group.
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Dec 10, 2017 19:16
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JonathonSpectre posted:What would you do? That really depends. If the PCs weren't there, how do you see these events playing out? If the answer is "Merris wins," then I'd recommend you work on your scenario to make the PCs' actions the most important part of victory, without whom the day would be lost. That said, maybe breaking through the blockade qualifies and no one else would be able to manage it? If so, make that very clear to the PCs.
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Dec 10, 2017 19:45
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This sounds like a fantastic game. All I’d suggest, is that Racist Guard Captain might have some kind of secret weapon that suddenly makes the help of the PCs really important again. Give them some Nazi mad science to battle, if things are going full Wolfenstein. Merris was so focused on dissecting the conspiracy, he didn’t realize the ringleader has an iron flask stuffed with a nasty demon or two he’s gonna unstoper when he KNOWS that he’s losing?
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Dec 10, 2017 20:09
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Alternatively, if you have the time to implement it, I would also suggest having the party stumble upon the plot without realizing what Merris knows and is planning, so that they can try to implement a counter plot that collides with his at an inopportune moment and they both have to work together to salvage the remainder of their respective plans.
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Dec 10, 2017 20:17
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The scenario is dope as hell, but yes echoing the sentiments above configure it so that the PCs need to be instrumental in breaking the back of this coup. Depending on how far you want to go have Merris uncover the whole thing and then get totally obliterated, having served his purpose but now being unable to coordinate the innocent defenders. At that point the PCs can take the helm as the impromptu leaders of this chaotic defense, and indeed be required to smash through the barricade which ought to be a difficult as gently caress battle. The idea of Captain Goebbels having some 11th hour trump card is also good. Even if he gets nuked make sure his villainy reverberates through the whole battle.
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Dec 10, 2017 20:19
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To echo the thread, the PCs are the only ones Merris can trust to take out the Elite Squad, but after they beat them,d the last one concious laughs at them: "You're too late! By now my captain has the Dragontank (or whatever) operational! You monsterfuckers are about to be crushed beneath pur superiority!" Then it's a race or W/E.
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Dec 10, 2017 20:46
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Moriatti posted:Are your players theorizing? Are any of those ideas cool? I havn't heard theories realy yet, but I should maybe ask. I was thinking it was a wanting power thing, (he says as much when he transforms). But I didn't really think through the whole reason for the transformation thing, and it feels pointless (why not just transpoport the injured baby bug?) but I had the transformation because it was part of the module I was using for that session). Moriatti posted:As for a side story arc, go for it? Having stuff not related to the main villain makes the world seem bigger, plus, then he can do stuff while they are away. True, but I feel like it's at the point where the quests the players go on should be at least somewhat linked to the BBG (goiing after artifacts the BBG happens to also want). habituallyred posted:To try and integrate the "Mad Max" and "Baby Bugzilla" parts of the story introduce some crazy tribe that rides the fullsize Bugs. The city was established where it was because any Giant Bug that moves into that area is doomed. The first settlers made their homes in the carapace of Giant Bugs that went astray and ended up in this dead zone etc. The nomads would lose just as much as the city folk if Albert Entomologist succeeds in their plan. But they don't know that, as the city folk have been driving the nomads further and further away from the city. The players should prove themselves to at least one tribe as a "plan B." I don't know what plan A is, but when plan B is leading a nomad tribe's giant bug into a combined PIT maneuver and boarding action it doesn't really matter. I was stuck on the cars automatically (heh), but bug riders is great! When you say "scientist" you mean, the BBG, not the PC's ally scientist who sent them on the quest, right? Thanks for the feedback, I got a good general direction of where to go now. (Of course any further ideas are welcome)
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Dec 10, 2017 23:52
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JonathonSpectre posted:What would you do? Merris is smart and dope as gently caress, but he's one guy. He has the intel, and he should absolutely impart that on the players - they're the PCs, there's no reason for him to play coy around them or not trust them. But at that point, it's up to the PCs to stop things, not Merris. Sure, he might have a good idea or a suggestion, but he's not the hero. As for how the PCs stop things, I'd do it as follows: take all of your various districts and their associated encounters, and for each one assign a time-to-completion (for the bad guys) and a consequence. So for instance, in the City Center, it could be something like "20 combat rounds" and "Mayor dies." For the Goblin caves, the goblins have been warned and will put up a fight - that one will be something like "100 combat rounds" and "1 goblin dies per round." Maybe tell the party each of the things that are going to happen and where, and maybe give them some idea of the consequences, and impress upon them that time is of the essence but don't actually reveal the countdowns. Now it's a loving race! The players have to split up and prioritize what to do when. Like, sure, we could go all the way out to the Lake District to secure water to put out the fires the Nazis will start in the monster-district, but if we all go there the Mayor is loving toast. And so on. This will encourage players to get super creative, and try to cut up the tasks in such a way that it plays to each one's strengths, while at the same time giving very real consequences if they fail. And bonus points if there are so many irons in the fire that no matter what the PCs do, they'll have to let something fall through the cracks. After all, they let this Nazi joker build the SS under their noses without taking prior action, and that poo poo has consequences.
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Dec 10, 2017 23:56
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Wow, what great advice! OK so here's how I'm going to modify things so far: I'm still going to do the setup as I intended, Merris shows up to save party leader etc. It's totally reasonable in the story that Merris can't be sure of the party's loyalty because the party leader is a pretty lawful guy and while he doesn't appreciate the Nazi captain (whose name is Ryman so I can stop calling him the Nazi captain) is a racist he completely understands the dude is responsible for the safety of the town and that there are legitimate concerns about bringing goblins and orcs into a human settlement, and several others in the party have agreed with this in earshot of Merris. Let me tell you a bit more about Merris and why he's so loathe to trust anyone he can't be 100% sure of. This world has a Worldwound similar to Pathfinder's. This one is a flickering portal to various layers of the Demonic Abyss that randomly opens for minutes or hours at a time. Sometimes demons wander out, sometimes they don't, sometimes it's a handful of vrock, sometimes it's a huge demonic undead warband. The human (Donador) and elven (A'La'Estfel) kingdom on this continent formed a joint Imperial Legion and built a fortification around the Worldwound and constantly station troops there to keep it under control. Merris is the eldest son of a noble family and was a high-ranking officer in the Legion with extensive connections to the mysterious and reclusive elves and was obviously being groomed for high command. On a trip to the capital city to meet the king and his advisers, Merris stumbled into discovering that the High Mage of the entire kingdom was summoning demons and had obviously been compromised by some demon lord. He barely escaped with his life and fled south, hiding his identity and wondering if any part of the Donadoran government has not been infiltrated by agents of the Abyss. Merris is therefore pretty paranoid about almost everyone and the PCs being somewhat understanding of Captain Ryman is enough for him to be uncertain of where they will stand when this particular balloon goes up. Merris is also 100% behind the wizard's idea of building the city to be a strong place to survive the coming chaos, because he expects a lot of chaos and really really soon. He is also a very close friend of the goblins and actually stood up to one of the more brutish party members who suggested killing the goblins even after they proved not to be hostile and able to communicate. He will trail Captain Ryman to the party leader's house the night of the attack and lurk in the back listening, and until he hears the party leader turn him down he just can't be sure they're fully on his side. He is also attached to the idea that he wants all the bad guys out into the light where they can be seen and destroyed, and is going to be completely loving merciless with everyone who sides with the Nazis regardless of who they are. I'm incorporating the idea of each zone having a timed pass/fail state, and definitely incorporating the fact that you won't be able to do everything. I'm scrapping the idea that they will inevitably all move to the center and meet up for a charge up to the blockade and instead going to balance some carrots and sticks in the zones around where each of them start that are short-term goals like "save the mayor 10 turns" and "don't let the market burn 12 turns" etc. and make them choose which of those they will try to stop, while in the background is the ticking clock of the assault on the goblin cave. There will also be a nice tension between "Let's hurry the gently caress up and get there" and the fact that every time they clear one of those other zones they'll gather a few more goblin archers to help them in their assault on the blockade. I do take to heart the idea that the PCs need to be the heroes and it needs to be clear that without them all Merris's sleuthing and Batman-prep would fall through. Here's how I plan to do it. It will be made clear to the party when they approach the blockade that it is more formidable than Merris expected, and that without them it couldn't be broken. They will break the blockade, and it will be a tough fight, but man, these players are seriously lucky (and good, honestly). So there they will get a little shot of "You're the heroes." But that's just a little shot because... Long story made short, Yeenoghu, Demon Lord of Gnolls, covets this world, and everyone on this continent knows it. Gnolls are the orcs of this world, and they're just a merciless force of destruction. The demon lord ruling the High Mage of Donador is Yeenoghu. A cult has been working on a ritual to actually summon the Beast of Butchery to this world in physical form, and they've been getting closer and closer to success. Captain Ryman's second-in-command, a brutish basher named Benja, is in reality a high-ranking member of this cult and was essentially sent to help destabilize and destroy the town from the inside to help clear the way for Yeenoghu's legions. After the blockade is broken and Ryman and his men are captured, the bad guy "super weapon" will reveal itself as Benja sacrifices himself to become a John Carpenter's The Thing nightmare avatar of Yeenoghu, just dozens of snapping gnoll faces and tentacles and hooks for hands and oh God it's just gonna be the shits. The party is gonna have to rally with Merris, the surviving goblins, and a few terrified members of the captured guard to try and kill this living wave of blood and nightmares. I'm going to set this fight up where there are some environmental things that my players will be able to use to make the battle easier if they're quick-witted that play to at least one unique strength of each of them so that hopefully each gets that "Take that motherFUCKER" moment everyone loves and it is gonna be awesome. This is gonna be the big shot of "You're the heroes," because it will be made clear in the first combat round when this thing kills like 4 or 5 mooks at once that there's no way anyone in town but them could possibly stop this thing's rampage. What say you? Good changes? Oh and btw, one reason I'm so wedded to Merris getting his Stone Cold moment is because this is in many ways the end for him. After this he will be asked by the wizard to take command of the town guard (soon to be an army... isn't that... evil wizard poo poo?) under his own name and will move from being a DMPC the party has complete control of in combat to an NPC who will likely never adventure with them again. After the fight is all over I plan to have him tell the PCs that he couldn't have done it without them and that he had learned a lesson about trying to go it alone and that they now have his undying trust and he hopes they will stay and help make the town better and stronger than ever. I think this will put a neat little bow on Merris's story, from frightened man running from who he is back to the commanding officer of the law, the protector he was always born to be. Of course, Merris openly revealing himself this way this will eventually provoke a response from the High Mage and his demonic master, which might lead to a war between Donador and the wizard... ... but surely the wizard cannot have foreseen such a thing... ... surely he couldn't have... planned all this... all along... could he?
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Dec 11, 2017 01:39
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Something that I had great success with is taking cues from the game Diplomacy. You control like 5 or 6 lieutenants of the captain, Benja included, and write down which districts they will be focusing on. The players then decide which districts they will send their members to. If you send a captain to a district that the players don't focus, roll two opposed d20s with bonuses that reflect preparation or army composition. The side that rolls better locks down said district. For districts the players go to, give them a hard limit on combat of like 5 or 6 rounds max to really put the screws to them. DnD rounds are long and 5e PCs are powetful so that's plenty of time to slam some assholes. Then after like 3 rounds of that go into your endgame with the avatar of Yeenoghu making an appearance and loving everything to hell, which then dovetails nicely into your proposed "poo poo, could the wizard have prepared for this?" cliffhanger.
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Dec 11, 2017 02:31
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Edit: thread moved on.
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Dec 11, 2017 04:11
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merris needs to die imo. or at least put him in the crosshairs: he sounds like the hero. do your players love him as much as you? the campaign sounds great, just a note of caution.
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Dec 11, 2017 06:05
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sebmojo posted:merris needs to die imo. or at least put him in the crosshairs: he sounds like the hero. do your players love him as much as you? I wouldn't necessarily go this far - from the first post, it sounded like your players like the character, so you don't necessarily have to kill him, but have contingencies for it. Be careful about coming up with a strict plan for how the session will go down and then constructing the rest of the story around it, because players have a tendency to introduce chaos at exactly the right moment to send all that crashing down around you. What's your plan for if the players decide to just try and take out Ryman and Benja immediately, and hope the rest of the stuff he set in motion collapses without him? What if they go along with Ryman's plan, either to try and sabotage it from the inside or just as a "you know what I'm not sure about this wizard guy" whim? Whatever happens, you have to make sure that the players are the centre of attention - if Merris ends up in a situation where the only way he'd live is by doing something that would make party superfluous to what was going to happen, then he has to die. Be prepared to throw out all the prep you've been making and just start improvising.
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Dec 11, 2017 12:52
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The only thing I'd add to all the great advice so far is that if Ryman goes up to the party in person and announces his plan...he's not getting out of that room alive/uncaptured, right? But then you've lost the "face" of this racist army (I don't know how much you've been role playing the various sub-captains of the guard or whatever, but surely Ryman is the guy). So maybe have Ryman send a lieutenant to the party with his offer/demand so that you still have the big baddie saved for the actual crisis.
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Dec 11, 2017 14:37
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A more general GMing lesson from this is try not to roll dice unless you have something exciting happened for each possibility. This is especially true when the things that are happening are off-camera. If my players are following a map to buried treasure, I'm not going to roll Cartography for the guy who drew it to see whether it points them to the right place, because if I fail there's no adventure. On the topic of the lieutenant -- you did mention that Ryman's second-in-command is Benja, this awful demon cultist. You could pull the bait-and-switch of having Ryman show up in person. Then they can stab him and think they've taken out the ringleader, whereas all they've done is put his army into the hands of someone who wants to use it to summon Yeenoghu.
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Dec 11, 2017 17:17
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This subforum has radicalized me in the tabletop systems department and I'm going to try to transition my campaign to Dungeon World once the current "chapter" of this campaign comes to a close. I'm just tired of people getting glassy eyed whenever, "ok roll initiative" comes out and I've realized that 5e's combat system is just boring trash That said though, I've got to finish out the next few sessions in 5e and have been thinking about some ways to make fighting faster and more interesting and dynamic. What's everyone's thoughts on guaranteed damage? A successful attack deals full dice damage and a failed one deals half? Anyone got anything else that has been good at keeping things moving?
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Dec 11, 2017 18:01
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D&D combat can get extremely boring unless you work really hard to make encounters interesting, which generally means one or more of the following: • multiple types of enemies that have dramatically different attacks and spells • super detailed environment that players and enemies can use (climbable furniture, windows you can throw things or people out of, etc) • something happening concurrently with combat (ticking time bomb in the background, ceiling collapsing, a set of npcs fighting nearby, room is on fire, etc) Also try your hardest to avoid easy encounters: combat that's "a bit too difficult" is 10000x more memorable than combat that's too easy. And if you gently caress up and make an encounter too easy, feel free to "cheat" to speed it up (for example, if the players are just stomping all over an enemy and there's really no risk of the players taking significant damage, I'd just cut the enemy's hp so he dies earlier - that's way more fun than spending 10 minutes rolling dice again and again) JonathonSpectre posted:OK GM Advice thread, let's do this. This is a loving wall of text and thanks if you decide to tackle it... This is good poo poo. I want to know how the story ends! Is the wizard actually evil? Polo-Rican fucked around with this message at 18:40 on Dec 11, 2017 |
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Dec 11, 2017 18:23
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So this is where I'm at now with this: The party will discover the BBG, Pothes is after an artifact that will allow him to control the forest combined with his bug transformation, or at least lead them to where he's going to get it, the High Druid (Who I guess would be living with the Elf Queen, since her wood was made uninhabitable?) The party will also find out, when they touch bases with Teddy the scientist that he wants them to get a magic water filtering artifact from some bug-riding bandits on an island. His plan is to wall in and flood the blood-wild forest with clean water from the ocean using a giant water pump, covering it all with about 2' of water (which will require about 33 trillion gallons of water, and will take about 7 years to complete!). The bandit king has the artifact, using it to supply his men, giving them water like the Immorten Joe in Fury Road. There is a competition, a bug race (using Formula-D mechanics) and arena combat, and the prize is a day access to the palace (which would let them get close enough to steal the artifact). The other lead would be go to the High Druid. There they would find Pothers in his human form at the druid's side, as a knight. He served her well in some critical way. Obviously he's biding his time when he can get close enough to the staff and steal it (possibly killing the Druid). So the party would have to convince the Druid that he's evil, though I'm not sure what kind of evidence they can bring. They don't have any rpoof that I can think of, besides the three of them saying he's evil. Maybe it doesn't matter, and I can simply lead the Druid into desciding they need to do some sort of trial by combat. I feel like it's more interesting with Pothes directly there, but I really don't want the party to fight him again until the very end. He'll either be tough and squish them like he did last time, which would be boring (he gets the artifact, and it will feel very rail-roading), or he's beaten which is dumb because that makes the villain seem weak. So maybe instead I need it to be an emissary (sort of Darth Vader to Pothe's Palpatine) to who's somehow obviously (to the party) through some symbol or tell an ally of Pothes. One idea that just occurred to me is it's the somewhat cowardly Mushroom-person Portabella, who hired them to kill Teddy in the first place, and then lead some bigger mushroom-people goons to attack the party on their escape. Though Porta isn't really directly tied to Pothes, I could maybe make it work.
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Dec 11, 2017 21:39
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Polo-Rican posted:This is good poo poo. I want to know how the story ends! Is the wizard actually evil? Why would you need to ask this? He's a loving wizard. 
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Dec 11, 2017 21:44
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My sister just sent this to me, some of you may have it but for those that don't, here, have this big repository of RPG tools: http://donjon.bin.sh
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Dec 11, 2017 21:46
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sebmojo posted:merris needs to die imo. or at least put him in the crosshairs: he sounds like the hero. do your players love him as much as you? As a pan-gaming note, DMPCs are generally just the worst. They steal the spotlight from the PCs. I get that you have this complicated, in-character back-story for why Merris wouldn't trust the PCs, but frankly it's beside the point - if he doesn't spill the goods to them, then there's no adventure. That's like the GM locking content behind a pay-wall. So rather than try to justify why Merris wouldn't trust the PCs, figure out why he finally overcomes his reservations and shares the info with them. Then, during the fighting to come, you should totally kill him off.
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Dec 11, 2017 21:46
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Well, I don't actually care about Merris very much, or any DMPC, and I didn't make up his backstory, my players did. Whenever I make an NPC or DMPC who's going to be around for a session or two and interact with the PCs, I'll roll a couple of random traits and then a background item or two. For Merris, I ended up with something like, "valiant, merciless to enemies, aloof," and for his background item it was something like, "running from a dark secret, powerful enemy from his past, comes from a wealthy noble family." After the session where the PCs decided they wanted him to stick around they fleshed that out to, "He knows someone important is evil, probably connected to the Abyss, and they are out to get him." Then I just fit that to the lore of the world and Merris himself. I'm not planning on Merris dying, but he will be there at the big fight with the Yeenoghu-Thing and it's entirely possible it will kill him. If it does he dies a hero who warned the town, if it doesn't he gets to live as the guard captain until I need a Dumbledore-goes-off-the-tower moment with a character they care about. I'm not a big fan of DMPCs myself because they turn into Mary Sue wish-fulfillment poo poo and I'm way too old for that. I mainly handle mine by playing them as an NPC and then if they end up in combat alongside the party I just hand over the character sheet and someone runs them without any input from me or we do the well-used "Merris and Ha Ha swing out to fight the gnolls on the flank, see em after the battle!" dodge. I also never have DMPCs help make any decision, ever, outside of answering lore questions. This is why when they decided to have Merris stay with them I emphasized how much he refuses to be in charge, "I'm just a swordarm now, someone else makes the decision" etc. He'll be happy to tell you why the elves are xenophobic, but gently caress you if you want him to come up with a plan to approach them anyway, figure that poo poo out yourself, I'm retired. It's actually been great watching the PCs roleplay with him to try and find out why he acts the way he does. Usually 2-3x a session we'll have a campfire/night in town scene where I just ask, "Who wants to talk to someone?" Players will RP with each other and fill in things about their past in conversation and sometimes say, "I want to ask Merris about this," or "Hey I ask Gazrah about that." Merris has been so closemouthed and reticent about his past that the party is currently speculating that his disappearance is actually a "heel turn" from wrestling and he's coming back at the head of an enemy army.  They are also bummed out about this, "I never thought Merris would turn on us." Guess what motherfuckers! I'm actually kind of surprised they like him because he's a pretty bog-standard fantasy trope. Guess I'm just a phenomenal actor.  Now Gazrah... I understand why everyone loves Gazrah. Even I kind of hope he lives through Saturday, although it'll be some good emotional devastation if he dies. If he does live the party's going to see a different side of him when it comes time to punish the Nazi prisoners they've taken who tried to kill his whole tribe. Of course if he dies the party's going to see a whole different side of these friendly, hard-working goblins he led as well. Captain Ryman may or may not get out of the room with Merris and the party leader, he's gonna have 2 mooks between him and them and the door at his back when poo poo goes down. As soon as the fight starts he's going to try and flee but it's entirely possible he loses initiative and eats an arrow through the eye. If he dies, that's fine, if he makes it out he'll show back up to be killed or captured at the blockade. I'd prefer captured but c'est la vie. Benja will not be accessible to the PCs until they have broken the blockade as he is commanding the assault on the goblin cave, so he is not going to die early or be forced to reveal himself prematurely. BTW the party already loving loathes Benja because of what a poo poo-fucker he's been to Gazrah and the goblins and I'm hoping one of them will talk some trash to him before he turns into a bunch of gnollish amoeboids. Do YOU think the wizard is evil? Let's just say that based on what we've played so far and what's ahead, the last session of the campaign will probably be July-August of 2018. They won't find out for sure if he was good or bad until the very last session when he'll reveal his true allegiance with the very last word spoken in the whole campaign. That is, of course, if the wizard survives until then... and if they do...
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Dec 11, 2017 23:44
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Nice, that sounds like you're on solid ground then. Putting him at genuine risk, particularly if the party have to give up something else to save him, could be really effective.
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Dec 11, 2017 23:51
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Merris is the one guy who knows the bad guy's secret plan top to bottom, and he's undercover behind enemy lines. Hate to say it but pretty much the entirety of secret conspiracy narratives dictates that this will not end well for him. e: the traditional task for the PCs would probably be to find his backup info cache after he dies in their arms, hinting at the conspiracy with his last breath, or to join him undercover and find out what he knows (but how will he react once he sees the party he doesn't fully trust among the ranks of his enemies?). My Lovely Horse fucked around with this message at 12:49 on Dec 12, 2017 |
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Dec 12, 2017 10:46
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I am making a dungeon from scratch to indulge my players desire to explore things that aren't in the book, and had the idea of an inverted wizard's tower that hangs down into the Underdark rather than pointing upwards into the sky. As they progress I plan to have them to find notes from an elven noble about his research which will become darker and darker until they eventually encounter him in lich or wraith form at the top (bottom) of the tower. I want each level of the tower to have a theme and so far came up with the following: - entrance hall/guard level - magical item storage - alchemy lab - menagerie - library - spell research area - living quarters - "hydroponics" area for growing fungus Anything else? I'd like to have more than I need so I can extend it if they're enjoying it, or go straight for "hurray, you're at the top" if it starts to drag. Edit: I realise this is very cliched; I'd welcome any suggestions for twists I can throw in to keep things interesting.
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Dec 12, 2017 11:57
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JonathonSpectre posted:They won't find out for sure if he was good or bad until the very last session when he'll reveal his true allegiance with the very last word spoken in the whole campaign. "Hail Hydra."
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Dec 12, 2017 12:26
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Sanford posted:I am making a dungeon from scratch to indulge my players desire to explore things that aren't in the book, and had the idea of an inverted wizard's tower that hangs down into the Underdark rather than pointing upwards into the sky. As they progress I plan to have them to find notes from an elven noble about his research which will become darker and darker until they eventually encounter him in lich or wraith form at the top (bottom) of the tower. I want each level of the tower to have a theme and so far came up with the following: An Underdark tower with no spider breeding chamber? C'mon son. Also, there could to be some kind of pneumatic tube system for moving garbage into either a chamber with a gelatinous cube or an otyugh for waste disposal, otherwise the wizard's trash will flow down to his own bedroom. Fire elemental central air heating chamber. Hook Horror kitchen staff. A gallery of bewitched golems / automata intended to be the new staff of the tower, since the living are so inconsistent and untrustworthy. Unfortunately the wizard can't quite control them, and the Drow artifact he stole to make them causes them to act weird. Thriving tribes of grimlocks living like rat-people inside the walls of the tower, feeding on residue from the mush-room.
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Dec 12, 2017 13:58
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Did your wizard have any other hobbies besides obtaining ultimate arcane power? Did he have any meaningful relationships that still motivate him? Does he have any goals for what to do with his ultimate arcane power? Adding little bits like that -- statues of long-dead lovers, political tracts with twelve-step plans for implementing his perfect society, music rooms, a gallery of his failed artworks -- all add character to the dungeon, even if they don't pose a direct threat to your players.
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Dec 12, 2017 17:22
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Whybird posted:Did your wizard have any other hobbies besides obtaining ultimate arcane power? Did he have any meaningful relationships that still motivate him? Does he have any goals for what to do with his ultimate arcane power? Adding little bits like that -- statues of long-dead lovers, political tracts with twelve-step plans for implementing his perfect society, music rooms, a gallery of his failed artworks -- all add character to the dungeon, even if they don't pose a direct threat to your players. This is also awesome. I had a powerful bard in a tower keep a hidden room filled with portraits of the old adventuring party he betrayed in order to become a great musician. Personal touches, making your locations reflective of the person inhabiting them, are always great for dungeons.
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Dec 12, 2017 17:24
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Nothing says insidious horror like finding an entire vault full of slightly-used anime figurines.
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Dec 12, 2017 17:24
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Sanford posted:I am making a dungeon from scratch to indulge my players desire to explore things that aren't in the book, and had the idea of an inverted wizard's tower that hangs down into the Underdark rather than pointing upwards into the sky. Freudian posted:Nothing says insidious horror like finding an entire vault full of slightly-used anime figurines. 
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Dec 12, 2017 17:44
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I haven’t really thought about the motives of the wizard, I just need somewhere for Vibram Monkey-Toes Michaels to have betrayed Henry’s Heroes, resulting in the death of Nikki Eyes and the fracturing of their adventuring party. Then I need to work out why he betrayed them, and why he’s back in the picture 100 years later. I was fretting over tying him back into the Lost Mine of Phandelver quest but I’m pretty sure none of my players gives a gently caress about that any more. None of the players is familiar with Forgotten Realms, so Drow, Underdark, etc will mean little to them. Noble intentions leading to ever-increasing corruption should do it; I might try and make the dungeon start off nice and get increasingly corrupted as they proceed. Glukeose posted:An Underdark tower with no spider breeding chamber? C'mon son. Edit: all this is great and I am going to try and make the dungeon fully staffed, but all with monsters/undead/elementals/automatons. Sanford fucked around with this message at 19:03 on Dec 12, 2017 |
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Dec 12, 2017 18:43
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So while we're on the topic of game advice: I'm currently in the middle of running Curse of Strahd, and two of my four players just contracted lycanthropy (I kind of fudged the rolls because I really wanted it to happen, one of the chars is a very meek elf who is terrified of everything, and the idea of him turning into a raging werewolf was too fun to pass up). Now my group is pretty new (myself included) so we haven't really had anything like this occur before, and I want to make it a memorable experience. Reading over the DM's guide for PC lycanthropy, it seems pretty barebones and not super interesting, so I'm taking it as open season for me to add my own spin to it. The main thing is that I want the session to be fun for both the werewolf PC's and the non-werewolf PC's, and I want their rampaging to actually be played out and not done in a "you wake up covered in blood and don't remember what happened last night" kind of thing (though I'll prob still make them do a Wis check to see if their characters actually recall what happened). I'm thinking it goes one of two ways: 1. My players are already a bit suspicious about possibly being infected, so they may ask to be tied up, or restrained in some way, but I really don't want that to be the extent of it (how anticlimactic), so I'm thinking if they're restrained they start to make so much noise that the town guards are alerted, and they try and kill the werewolf pc's, putting the party in a bit of pickle. The town (Krezk for people familiar with CoS) had to be convinced to even let the PC's inside to begin with, so they sure as hell aren't going to let werewolves just hang out within the walls. 2. They aren't restrained, and the non-werewolf PC's are woken up to screams outside, where they find the transformed PC's causing havok and doing general werewolf things. I guess my main question is that I want the encounter to be somewhat engaging for the werewolf NPC's, but giving them full control doesn't make sense. I'm thinking that I kind of narrate what they are doing, but let them make Wis saves to try and influence the outcome (please lathander I don't want to eat that baby), and let them actually do their combat rolls (I know that in the end it's essentially the same thing, but the idea of them hoping to roll misses and low damage is a fun bit of subversion). Maybe even have them turn on each other? In the end I don't have a super concrete plan for how it'll go, since I want to stay flexible and not create too strong a narrative in my head since it'll inevitably go off the rails, but does anyone have any good ideas that might be fun for everyone involved?
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Dec 12, 2017 21:37
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I disagree on the player control thing. If your players are role-playing you should be able to encourage them into making really bad decisions. Maybe offer some Inspiration or XP if they give in to their instincts. After they transform, have the guards attack and see what they do. If that's not the case, like if the elf is meek because the player doesn't like taking risks, I'd slow-roll the transformation. Start emphasising smells, mention the moon, hair standing on end, and later start pushing aggressive actions and animal instincts. Either the players figure it out and reach for the silver handcuffs and try to hide it from the town, or they don't and you mention the full moon and everything goes bad. I'd advise against number 2 specifically, it's going to end in PVP which should almost always be avoided in D&D.
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Dec 12, 2017 22:21
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I probably should ease into the transformation stuff more, but from a "cool story" perspective they're in such a good spot (both location wise and narrative wise) for a full on werewolf rampage I don't know if I can bear to slow roll it. If they did turn against each other, playing RAW werewolves have immunity to most physical damage (which is kind of dumb because how do werewolves actually fight each other?) so their fighting would be more flavor and a way to let them have a bit of the excitement of pvp roll contests etc. without actually murdering each other. Their fighting would probably wreck complete havoc on the town though, which is expected, and it would be interesting how the non-werewolf PC's handle stopping it all without getting themselves or their changed party members killed.
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Dec 12, 2017 22:34
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Two werewolves fighting forever, unable to hurt the other sounds like a greek punishment in hell.
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Dec 12, 2017 22:35
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For the first possibility, why not have the party get attacked after the infected PC's are tied up, but before they turn and make them choose between fighting at a disadvantage or possibly letting a werewolf free?
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Dec 12, 2017 23:48
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