Dealing with logical but gamebreaking requests

[Havrik Stoneskimmer]

How do you deal with players trying to obtain resources from NPCs that they shouldn't really have at their level?

I've seen this come up many times before, but a good example came up in last night's game.

The PCs were working with a group of scholars and researchers at a university library in a major city (this is in D&D 4e). One of the researchers and an important document were abducted by villains. This is kind of a big deal to the university people, who are hiring the PCs to help them out.

So the question from the players is: This is a major university full of sages - someone must be able to cast some kind of scrying ritual. It's logical enough - the sages want their researcher back more than the PCs do. But you can't very well let a level 3 party get level 10 rituals done for them for free. The game is supposed to be about the exploits of the PCs, not the NPCs they ally with, but I don't like the NPCs coming off as chumps either, so it's hard to come up with a compelling reason that the sages can't or won't offer this kind of help. I kind of waffled something about the ritual taking time to prepare in hopes it wouldn't be needed (and it turns out it wasn't). I probably shouldn't have even made a big deal out of it (there really aren't any heroic tier rituals in 4e that would have really broken the game here), but the basic issue always kind of bothers me.

It's absolutely logical for the players (and by proxy the PCs) to want to exploit every possible resource, but obviously there's a need to maintain some balance when the market price of the desired ritual is higher than the PCs' combined wealth.

How do you deal with this kind of thing? "The sages are busy with more pressing matters"? (Even though one of their own was just kidnapped?)

How flexible are you with player requests like this? If the PCs are defending a town from goblin raiders, do you let them ask the town guard for a dozen soldiers to accompany them?

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Allowing something like this is probably not going to break the game because it's unlikely they'll be able to ask for this over and over again. This scrying is a one-time thing, for the express purpose of retrieving someone the NPCs who hired they very much want retrieved.

If I were running a modern campaign in which the PCs had to rescue the kidnapped daughter of a black market arms dealer, I'd expect the players to ask for munitions...and not giving them SOMETHING would be bad GMing On my part since it would beg so many questions that it could break the players investment in the campaign.

So let them get whatever assistance from the NPCs that makes sense. They STILL have to complete the mission, and scrying doesn't tell you what is happening after the spell is over. Perhaps the researcher gets moved to another place between the scrying and the PCs' arrival. Or reinforcements arrived.

 

[Jimlock]

How do you deal with players trying to obtain resources from NPCs that they shouldn't really have at their level?

Permit me to alter the question:

How do you deal with DMs (ourselves) when PCs try to obtain resources from NPCs, which is only normal?


It is a problem, and can really break the realism of a game...


"Why do they need us for? Doesn't the city have guards to deal with this?"

"Can't the wizard go after this on his own? What does he need us for?"

"Can't the wizard/cleric provide us with some scrolls/potions, after all it's his life at stake!?"


...Things like this will come up most of the time.

I don't think there is a recipe other than a well constructed story.

DMs should think of these things from the start, cause when that happens during game time, there not much to be done:

a)Either you provide the help the PCs asked for, so as to keep things real,
b) or you deny it so as to keep the story challenging, thus losing on realism.
c)Do Something in between... however it will always smell kinda funny...


IMHO, only the story's backbone is the only solution.


Off the top of my head:
Regarding your example, I'd make it look as if the PCs are not the only ones looking for the stolen stuff.
Perhaps there is a big prize for bringing the stuff back, BUT the library is not going to spend its resources on every adventuring party that's gonna go looking for the stolen goods. Perhaps the library's wizards have their own people involved in the search and don't really think they need outside help... perhaps they don't really trust the PCs... or perhaps they trust them but cannot afford to tell them for some reason, and somehow the PCs find out about it some other way and decide to go after it for some OTHER reason...

There are solutions... but I'm not sure of how they can be "injected" in the middle of a story, without sounding fishy.

 

[S'mon]

Plausibility always trumps scripted gameplay for me. If the Sages would logically help the PCs with Ritual X, they do it. If the town guard would logically help the PCs with soldiers, they do it.

Don't give the Sages' Guild powerful rituals if you don't want them used. Don't stat the Town Guard as 3rd level soldiers if the adventure involves 1st level PCs defending the town from 1st level goblin minions & skirmishers. In the latter case (which is relevant to my Loudwater FR occasional campaign) I stat typical small town guard militia as eg 3rd level minion soldiers, and use the MM/MV town guard soldier-3 stats for sergeants & leaders. Players who take along a dozen minion guards have to bear the consequences when most of them get killed by the goblins, but maybe they could have a veteran sergeant (soldier-3) accompany them if he's not too busy elsewhere.

 

[S'mon]

H
The PCs were working with a group of scholars and researchers at a university library in a major city (this is in D&D 4e). One of the researchers and an important document were abducted by villains. This is kind of a big deal to the university people, who are hiring the PCs to help them out.

So the question from the players is: This is a major university full of sages - someone must be able to cast some kind of scrying ritual.

On this specific point, I don't know where you get this from. In 4e NPC ritual casting ability is entirely up to the DM (says so in the DMG, in its brief discussion of NPC demographics) - and the Scry ritual is 18th level, AIR! If it were my campaign I might give the University researchers some low-level rituals, maybe in the 1-6 or 1-8 range, but I doubt I'd give them high-Paragon stuff unless it was a Planar metropolis.

 

[Jan van Leyden]

If your adventure would be compromised by a successful ritual just try to cook up a story reason for it's failure.

May be the expert for this ritual has no success with it. And this may be because he has something to hide himself or is in league with the abductors, or is blackmailed by them.

 

[Starfox]

The Simulationist Approach:

The university has measured X resources to combat this problem. These resources can then be spent in different ways. Some resources -like rituals- ought to be easier for the university to acquire because of their special talents. But if they are willing to shell out 10,000 gp on an expensive ritual, they should be paying the party at least as much to get the best help they can. If the party is working for a 1,000 gp reward, it does not make sense to spend 10,000 gp on a ritual.

Maybe the problem is that the party is too low level for the problem the university has? Perhaps they should have gotten some more expensive heroes? Or perhaps the issue really wasn't so important, or they would have mustered more resources. Or perhaps there are political/practical reasons, such as that these heroes are on retainer or the only ones available?



The Storytelling Approach:

It makes a cool story, and allows the heroes to experience first-hand some very cool magics, far out of their daily experience, teasingthem about cool things to come when they themselves reach such lofty levels. So what if it short-cuts the crux of THIS game, there is always room for more problems next session.



The Gamist Approach:

The party is level 3. They should not have access to resources far above their level, or the integrity of the game is threatened and the obstacle becomes trivialized.

 

[Kzach]

Firstly, you need to convey to the players that the world is full of mooks, not heroes. Sure, the library MIGHT have access to the ritual, but who would cast it? Nobody knows how! It's well beyond the capabilities of any of the staff because they're all 1st-level minions (or whatever equivalent there is in your system of choice). Are the PC's going to cast it? They can't either as it's too high a level for them as well.

But let's say, for argument's sake, that the library is mysteriously staffed by powerful NPC's. Although, why you'd do that I don't know since it bears no relevance to the fact that it's a library or the story. But let's say it has them anyway. The ritual you're looking for is actually 24th-level (observe creature), not 10th. And it costs 31,000gp to cast. Which is cheaper? Hiring a bunch of wannabe 3rd-level heroes for a few hundred gold, or blowing a 31,000gp ritual? Hell, does the library even HAVE that kind of cash? I doubt it has more than enough resources to keep it's staff fed and the books dry. Whatever money it may have, is probably going to the PC's to get them to find their lost item.

Lastly, if it serves the plot, then why the hell not give them access to the scrying ritual? Forget all of what I said above and say, "We have already determined the location of the object. Retrieving, however, is what you're here for... if you don't want the money, don't take the job."

 

[amerigoV]

The PCs were working with a group of scholars and researchers at a university library in a major city (this is in D&D 4e). One of the researchers and an important document were abducted by villains. This is kind of a big deal to the university people, who are hiring the PCs to help them out.

...

How do you deal with this kind of thing? "The sages are busy with more pressing matters"? (Even though one of their own was just kidnapped?)

Did the researcher have tenure? If not, they certainly are not going to waste big money on the guy

"We like Bob, but we do not 'like-like' Bob."

 

[Alaxk Knight of Galt]

Our GM quit DnD. Seriously.

This GM was extremely rules savvy. He remains the single best DM I've played with for rule proficiency. His mastery of the 3.5 rule set was simply staggering.

That said, when our 9th cleric decided he'd start selling 1st level cures for 100gp a pop (14+ spells per day) the GM suffered a gaming breakdown. Nothing in the rules prevented this, though logic suggested, even in a large city, you aren't going to have an overwhelming demand for cure light wounds. Even if there was such a demand, you'd think at some point the cleric's deity might get pissed off at this money making scheme at his expense (unless the vast, vast majority was being donated back to the church).

Sadly, the DM in question saw no logical reason why this wasn't a valid money making scheme as set forth by the rules. So he stopped running the game. While he remained with the group for a couple of years, though he swore he'd never run a 3rd edition game again.

The rules can be anchor if you let them.