D&D General Advancing the Plot when the PCs don't take the bait. . .

[Imaculata]

Well...the PC's took other plot hooks that lead them down different paths...and allowed the fleet of "wave-men" (oriental pirates, basically) to pull off the most elaborate and profitable heists in the history of Kozakura! This "ruse" even caused the direct death of one PC...a Samurai who was given the choice to swear fealty to the new daimyo, or commit sepukku; he chose the later. The other PC Samurai refused both and became a Ronin!

That is epic! I love it when the villains achieve a victory, in part due to poor decisions made by the players.

 

[Imaculata]

Then I tried it again, this time with much more subtle nuances because I thought it would be cool to have some magic coins infected with a lycanthropy curse. I also wrote three or four other adventures they could do outside the city rather than track the coins. I figured the coins would infect 1d4 people a day. Well, they did two of the adventures outside, which took a week. I thought, okay, 1 werefolk (each coin had the curse of the actual creature on it). I had someone run into them in the wilds (where they were) and tell them about the strange things going on in town. They chose the third adventure. It took 2 weeks! Then they stayed outside of town to rest. Another day. Now there were 44-66 werefolk in town. I had the guards kill some off, but they were neither the level nor able to prevent the carnage. So I had a choice. Should I just say 2 or 3 people got infected, and have them deal with it, or stick to what I originally had planned. Because when I planned it I meant for there to be a change in environment or consequence/reward due to time. I chose the latter.

This honestly doesn't sound terrible, except for the idea of presenting the players with an unwinnable scenario, and not foreshadowing the spreading curse enough.

As a consequence though, a werewolf plague sounds like it could make for an epic adventure. I'd probably task the players with hunting down a famous werewolf hunter, to aid them against the lycantrope horde.

A scenario like this does not have to be unwinnable. As a DM I would simply change the objectives, now that the situation has changed. A quest to defend a town, now becomes a quest to take back a town. A quest to prevent a curse, now becomes a quest to stop the curse from spreading further. A huge werewolf plague could cast a mighty shadow across a campaign and really raise the stakes. Maybe now the players are able to recruit unlikely allies, such as a local vampire lord, who does not like the werewolves either?

 

[Scott Christian]

I meant nothing so onerous as the Sophie's Choice you described. Nor am I so beholden to arbitrary frameworks like how quickly lycanthropy spreads that I'd let it outweigh keeping things a reasonable challenge for the player. I mean more like, advancing things so that they are challenge. Maybe what was a 2nd level adventure is a 4th level one now because the bandit band recruited new members or the party's rival took over as the leader of the scheme, stuff like that.

Some kind of stakes to give the choices meaning without being too grimdark, is what I mean.

Then again, based on what you described Aragorn having to decide between going after Merry and Pippen or Sam and Frodo would have been a hated experience - and I agree, if I were actually Aragorn, but for drama? I love it, both as a player and a DM.

Yeah, sorry , I must have misunderstood.

Your example seems to be behind the screen. Most DMs I know handwave. Alter the level of the thieves, after all they have been training and there are few more of them now. I guess I don't really even see how that would be visible to the players outside of them hearing rumors about them spreading. (If they encountered them earlier, and took an inventory of their experience and size, why not deal with them then?)

I personally have learned (just my experience) that the best consequence is actually the loss of a reward. If I set something up where they are making a choice, it will look like this:
- The players have a chance to go to the Jarl's strong man competition and maybe earn his favor (which results in things like free lodging, free food, and access to gear)
or
- The players have a chance to hunt down the winter hag that has been collecting a lot of "shiny objects" as of late (which would result in a couple magic items)

I have done that a few times, and it didn't leave a bad taste in the players' mouths. In part because they knew something similar to their missed chance might arise in a few levels. But I even use these sparingly.

Regarding your consequences, I would think its really in the manner in which you portray it:

• Faction gain or faction loss
• Item gain item loss
• Experience reward increase vs a lesser experience gain
• Places unlocked vs other places unlocked

I can give you a great example that follows your consequence:
We once entered an old ruin that had dwarves (they were evil) excavating some dragonish lore. We weren't really sure what was going on, but we knew they were up to no good. We infiltrated but could not finish the job. The dwarven cleric (a worshipper of some devil) was just too strong. We retreated and headed back after gaining some experience. When we got back the dwarven cleric was the slave of a bone devil. The dungeon was harder because it was now under the bone devil's control. The DM painted the scene very vividly of the dwarven cleric enslaved and hypnotized and just laboring away with hammer and steel. This both increased the stakes for us (tougher opponent), but now we really didn't want whatever dragon lore was in the cave to fall into a bone devil's hands!

 

[el-remmen]

That last example is great!

Similarly, in the scenario I was referencing in the OP (which I think I can share b/c none of my players visit these boards), they got a note from an old acquaitence asking them to return for help, but really deferential and saying "I know you are really busy big time adventures now, so you probably have other stuff to do, but please come as soon as you can."

They took this to mean they had time and went off to do another adventure first. When they return the acquaintance's house is burned down and he is missing! (He is in hiding b/c of what is goin on in the town). So before they would have someone to help guide them as to what is going on. Now when they arrive things will seems a bit more serious and they will need to risk more investigation to figure it out, potentially bumbling into the scheme as opposed to being guided to opposing it.

 

[Scott Christian]

This honestly doesn't sound terrible, except for the idea of presenting the players with an unwinnable scenario, and not foreshadowing the spreading curse enough.

As a consequence though, a werewolf plague sounds like it could make for an epic adventure. I'd probably task the players with hunting down a famous werewolf hunter, to aid them against the lycantrope horde.

A scenario like this does not have to be unwinnable. As a DM I would simply change the objectives, now that the situation has changed. A quest to defend a town, now becomes a quest to take back a town. A quest to prevent a curse, now becomes a quest to stop the curse from spreading further. A huge werewolf plague could cast a mighty shadow across a campaign and really raise the stakes. Maybe now the players are able to recruit unlikely allies, such as a local vampire lord, who does not like the werewolves either?

It was a fun idea, but I was too green to foreshadow everything correctly or adjust it all on the fly. If I were to do it now, I would make this the one and only adventure presented to the players. A bit of railroading? Yes. If they didn't seem interested, then I would just leave the coins in a lockbox somewhere. I would also probably write a description of each person that came into contact with the coins and a "scene" for the players to investigate or alter with their actions.

 

[Scott Christian]

That last example is great!

Similarly, in the scenario I was referencing in the OP (which I think I can share b/c none of my players visit these boards), they got a note from an old acquaitence asking them to return for help, but really deferential and saying "I know you are really busy big time adventures now, so you probably have other stuff to do, but please come as soon as you can."

They took this to mean they had time and went off to do another adventure first. When they return the acquaintance's house is burned down and he is missing! (He is in hiding b/c of what is goin on in the town). So before they would have someone to help guide them as to what is going on. Now when they arrive things will seems a bit more serious and they will need to risk more investigation to figure it out, potentially bumbling into the scheme as opposed to being guided to opposing it.

That is a great example too. As long as he didn't die, then the players feel their actions can be redeemed.

 

[el-remmen]

It may be a tangent, but I think GM comfort with running a game of multiple (potentially complex) threads has a big role in pulling these kinds of things off and not letting what you imagine as GM behind the scenes be the final arbiter of results, rather than just changing how the PCs may engage with the issue, which allows the PCs to still have an effect and not feel like they are destined to lose. As I said in a thread a few weeks back about more mechanical notions regarding how hard or easy it is to challenge players in combat, there are different kinds of failure (not just death) and the best kinds lead to new opportunities and motives, not dead ends.

 

[el-remmen]

That is a great example too. As long as he didn't die, then the players feel their actions can be redeemed.

They may think he's dead, but like in superhero comics, no body? No death.

He is just hiding to keep the bad guys from killing him. The PCs will now have to figure out where that is so they can mutually aid each other against the threat.

 

[Oofta]

They may think he's dead, but like in superhero comics, no body? No death.
...

In D&D even having a body doesn't necessarily prove anything.

 

[MarkB]

It can make it seem that way, but consequences is a neutral term - there can be positive consequences or negative consequences.

Yeah, but players will tend to default to thinking that any possible situation would have turned out better if they were involved. They're heroes, after all - how could it be otherwise?