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[Colmarr]

One of my players (who is taking the Yerasol Veteran theme), just sent me this email:

"I'd say it would be an idea to have some Level 2 Soldiers ready as we will be (with a [Hard DC] Diplomacy roll) able to call in 12 lvl 2 Soldiers within a few hrs and I'm a big fan of backup "

Is there anything to stop my players from going into every "slow" encounter (ie. ones where there's no time pressure to start the encounter quickly) backed up by 4 (or 12!) members of Risur's military?

Ordinarily I assume this would be accounted for by the PCs receiving less xp for the encounter (a la mounts), but I'm not planning on awarding xp; just levelling the PCs as they reach the appropriate adventure.

If the answer is "DM prerogative", I'm fine with that. And yes, I realise this will really only be relevant for the first 5 levels or so. After that, those level 2 soldiers are more set dressing than anything else.

 

[Morrus]

Is there anything to stop my players from going into every "slow" encounter (ie. ones where there's no time pressure to start the encounter quickly) backed up by 4 (or 12!) members of Risur's military?

A plot.

 

[RangerWickett]

You can't use prestige for anything in the first adventure. By the second adventure, there are a handful of situations where you could plan to bring along a squad with you for an event that takes place the next day. Indeed, if you do well enough on some of the investigation to know about events that far in advance, you get rewarded by having more people on your side.

Usually, though, at low level you might get one or two guys as back-up in a fight. At higher level you might get a bunch of guys to be look-outs as you go do the heavy lifting.

Plus, you tend to be disliked if you keep bringing guys to situations you could handle yourself, or if you keep getting innocent coworkers killed by dragging them in harm's way.

 

[Riastlin]

Plus, you tend to be disliked if you keep bringing guys to situations you could handle yourself, or if you keep getting innocent coworkers killed by dragging them in harm's way.

As a mostly DM, I never consider the party's "co-workers" to be innocent.

That being said, I think like many things that could potentially become cheesy without too much effort, this is one of those things where you simply tell your players "Don't abuse the privelege." My players at least are pretty good with that but obviously every group is different.