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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Serpreme" data-source="post: 2621716" data-attributes="member: 30812">(Oct 5th is our next game session)Question is past the Background Info. Skip if you don’t have a high Will Save. Its kinda dull.Background (<--------)     I’m running the Night of the Walking Dead, an old TSR mod I brought up to D20. I’m enjoying myself, My pc’s are enjoying themselves. Heck, the crocodile in the swamp is enjoying himself. (Full Tummy)     Then we hit the town, Marais d’ Tarascon. I switch it up, I say it is a swampy town located at the end of a delta. I treat the town like a Cajon community. Makes the Catacomb searches that more interesting. (Yea… you are bellow sea level… don’t hit the walls, ok?) As a Typical TSR product I am given a list of locations and a town map.      This is my 5th time bringing a group of PC’s through this town. This time the PC’s run to the chapel with their now one legged henchman in tow, hoping to get some decent healing out of that priest.... When we start on Wednesday, it will be time to explore the town.     Now I have shortened the timeline of the mod to just over 2 days. Got some plot going down, got between 0-3 PC’s that are infected with licranthopy (The end fight with the full moon you ask? Yea, it becomes a much cooler an encounter.) Everyone just hit level 2 (Ding!). They keep asking me to GM twice a week. (There hooked, they love Ravenloft)Problem (<--------)     Question, there is some valuable information in this town. Heck, You can solve the whole thing and have a mound damning of evidence just by talking to a Sweets Shopkeeper, a worried mother and walking down the road to have dinner with some ghouls.     The first 3 times I ran this I kept up the crazy dictator look. I handled each encounter and towns person and role-played them all. Its harsh, something like 14 personalities. (14 accents, 14 voices, 14 histories, 14 role-playing quarks) Many have nothing to say. PC movements where controlled and precise.      It got old.      Fast     The fourth time I ran the mod I gave up and said “Point and Talk!!!” They point at the map and I run about 60 seconds of dialogue and another 30sec-ish of role-play. Instead of a whole night of hunting for obscure clues, my PC’s moved on with plot and still had great time. Literally a fraction of the interaction and the PC’s never knew the difference. Why should I throw out the effort? What is the trade off?     I hate towns.     I am learning to hate PCs.Question (<--------)     How do you guys handle normal towns and role playing towns in your games? My PC’s always spend so much time fooling around…. and how do you handle the game mechanics? Do you throw them a PHB and say buy what you need, or do you go a little more in depth with item lists? How do you handle the old TSR mod towns if you even bother? Do you turn them into a giant description or do you handle it building by building like a crazy dungeon crawl?     I really want to know what other GM’s do with this necessary element of the AD&D game! Tell me how you handle it! I am almost at a breaking point!</blockquote>

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