Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Imaculata" data-source="post: 7743269" data-attributes="member: 6801286">It just so happens that in the last session of my 3.5 pirate campaign (just this weekend), an interesting situation came up regarding player agency.The players were about to start a boss fight with an evil cult leader, whom they had no reason to trust. However, he was accompanied by a Frost Wind Virago. An evil frost fey, although all they could tell about her at first glance, was that she was a stunningly beautiful fey. The Frost Wind Virago is like a siren. She has a supernatural ability to draw her enemies towards her with her captivating voice (if they fail their will save), and then they just stand there taking a beating and offering no resistance.But during the opening of the fight, I actually had her not use this ability. Instead I had her do as the flavor text describes: She tries to get close to her enemies, using deception and misdirection, only to activate her special powers to freeze and stun her enemies.She approached the players, begging them to see reason, and to have a cease fire. She manipulated the elves in the party, by pretending to be an ally to the elves, knowing they might be more prone to trusting a fey. She even got them to willingly hand over her magic bow (which they had looted from her room), by lying that it was a gift from the elves to her. It was a parley situation, as is of course fitting in a pirate campaign. But I rolled no skill checks for her at all. She told them that her lover (the evil cult leader) was not the man they believed him to be. She also praised one of the PC's for being 'a reasonable man, willing to see reason'. I just used lies and manipulation to get the players to trust her, so that she could get the first shot in.I was surprised it worked so well, since the fight initially started with the players having the advantage over their enemies. I think one or two of the players knew that they might be walking into a trap, but they decided their characters would not think the same.</blockquote>

Verification