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Message: <blockquote data-quote="fusangite" data-source="post: 1879172" data-attributes="member: 7240">It had not crossed my mind that anyone would react this way. Obviously, if the artifact is taken you have to recover it and complete the quest. Who would want to write-off all their work simply because at one point the quest faced an unexpected challenge. I mean these are heroes, right?How is that the case? Have you ever read a story in which there is a setback in a quest? Let me rephrase: have you ever read a story in which there is not a setback in a quest?They don't need a spell to compel them to do this; simple commitment to the storyline should suffice.So, on what basis have you concluded that the GM has that it will take a year to recover the artifact from the gnomes? Does he strike you as crazy? He seems sane to me so why would he restructure the campaign in this way?Let's wait until we hear from the GM about how the Bluff/Sense Motive contest actually went. The person making the statement may not, himself, have intended to steal from the characters. He may have used a Potion of Glibness. Let's see what actually happened first.If your only purpose as a GM is to please the players from minute to minute, you're not going to be a very good GM. Some players supported the GM; others did not. The role-playing world is full of people who have different tastes in gaming. Some players felt the GM did the right thing. Some did not. Gming isn't about pleasing all of the people all of the time. It is about creating a believable story in a believable world. A world full of flat NPCs with no agenda of their own is not that kind of world.Right. But you have no evidence for the accusation you are making all of a sudden based on the fact that people were under a geas spell. I just don't get it. How does a geas spell cause you to change your view on this?How could people have found abandoning a quest half-done after working on it for a year more satisfying than finishing it? An abandoned half-done quest is not something that produces "satisfaction."Regardless of making a high Diplomacy check, how could the PCs preemptively persuade the gnomes not to rob them? A generalized Diplomacy check does not cause NPCs with an agenda to suddenly abandon it. You know Charm Person is a spell because you need to do actual magic to pull all the NPCs you encounter onto your side.Right -- the scenario seemed standard because the scenario was standard. We were asked about whether the NPCs behaved in a realistic way in the context of the scenario. They did. There are various ways a GM can redirect a campaign towards something the players find more compelling; running NPCs in an unrealistic way is not one of them.We have heard from two players. One has taken that position; the other has not.Indeed. But what evidence do we have that the gnomes getting hold of it will thwart this process? For all we know, the gnomes are the people most capable of repairing the artifact. There may be a delay of 1-4 episodes; there may be no net loss of time. It depends on how the GM adjusts the overall storyline in response to the NPCs' actions.I don't see how you view a setback in the quest as restarting the quest. How many movies have you seen where the good guys lose the object of their quest just before the climax? Isn't this event a recurring trope in the modern quest genre?So LOTR would be a bad story if it were played as an RPG. Funny… I thought it was the ideal everyone was striving for.Why have you assumed that they're not near the climax or that the GM isn't already on this track? All the narrative signs indicate to me that this is the very point the campaign is approaching. Generally, in Hollywood quest movies, the object of the quest being seized by the bad guy is a sign that the climax is imminent.Let me get this straight: the caster of the geas is supposed to anticipate the PCs making bad judgement? How would the caster know, inadvance, what errors of judgement the PCs were likely to make in the course of their quest?So, what you're saying is that the geas should function as some sort of blessing making NPCs more favourably disposed to the PCs? I really don't buy this.No. I don't imagine that being naïve and unsuspecting was how they recovered the artifact in the first place. I don't get any evidence for a good faith belief on the part of the PCs that the gnomes were somehow, unlike all the other NPCs, agents of a benevolent deity.I've never used the spell either but I have played in a campaign where it was used to good effect.Agreed. But I don't think having a Charisma of 20 is sufficient to passively cause NPCs to take on your interests and priorities in place of their own. If someone is planning to rob you if they get the chance, a preemptive general diplomacy check will not stop that. Look at the enchantment spells in the PHB: it takes magic to make people who are planning to exploit you abandon their interests in favour of yours. So, I just don't buy that passive or generalized diplomacy checks can prevent a robbery.Consider, yes. Certainly do: no.No. I'm suggesting that a +4 charisma bonus does not confer Protection from Theft 30' Radius as a spell-like ability useable at will.See above. Empathy isn't the only human emotion. Greed is a well-known emotion too.No. We don't know that. I'm not aware of any lengthy campaign to make the gnomes love them. I'm aware of a Sense Motive roll, a short conversation and a diplomacy check being made. Yep. Let's see why that is. There are a number of possible explanations -- perhaps we should wait to hear them before we condemn the GM for doing something irregular. I have run NPCs who are bards, have potions of glibness or done various other things to mislead the PCs. Accepting the word of one player against the word of the GM and another player does not seem to me to be a wholly reasonable approach. Three people have given us their perspective on the campaign; you are taking the minority opinion as gospel and rejecting the other two opinions that you have.</blockquote>

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