I was worried about this before it started and it's actually worse than I feared. My worry was that, with an entire town of NPCs to pester, the PCs would be constantly talking to anyone and everyone making planning for an upcoming session quite hard. The worse part is that they (reasonably) keep expecting the powers that be to sort out their problems. In the most recent session, one of the party got taken prisoner by the local gang and after discussing possible options amongst themselves they went with going to the city guard to help them recover their comrade. Absolutely reasonable and, of course, no self-respecting city guard person is going to ignore a cry for help (and it doesn't help that one of the PCs was a member of the city watch, so has contacts). But they're doing it a lot and it's a bit frustrating.
Now I certainly didn't help myself by having them going up against a gang that is much more powerful than them (they're level 3) but instead of trying the softly, softly, sneaky, sneaky approach they went running to the guard for backup (again entirely reasonably to choose that option, but it turns them into bystanders). Amusing anecdote, they tried this a couple of sessions ago when they discovered the identity of a villain (and left a mess in the process) and then while they were off rounding up the constabulary, the villain returned discovered that their lair had been ransacked and made their escape, and is now plotting their revenge... I thought that might have learned them...)
So (and I realize I'm opening myself up to a lot of criticism here) what, if anything, can I do about this? And is this the norm for urban adventures where NPC aid is around pretty much every corner?
Now I certainly didn't help myself by having them going up against a gang that is much more powerful than them (they're level 3) but instead of trying the softly, softly, sneaky, sneaky approach they went running to the guard for backup (again entirely reasonably to choose that option, but it turns them into bystanders). Amusing anecdote, they tried this a couple of sessions ago when they discovered the identity of a villain (and left a mess in the process) and then while they were off rounding up the constabulary, the villain returned discovered that their lair had been ransacked and made their escape, and is now plotting their revenge... I thought that might have learned them...)
So (and I realize I'm opening myself up to a lot of criticism here) what, if anything, can I do about this? And is this the norm for urban adventures where NPC aid is around pretty much every corner?