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Enchanted Trinkets Complete--a hardcover book containing over 500 magic items for your D&D games!

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="barsoomcore" data-source="post: 2753368" data-attributes="member: 812"><img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f600.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":D" title="Big grin    :D"  data-smilie="8"data-shortname=":D" />This especially makes me laugh:I'm happy to have contributed to your sense of self-worth, sir. If you need any further pointless intellectual gratification, just ask.Um, what? If what you're saying is that PC's should be able to influence what NPCs do, then, duh. I think (and I'm sure you're going to smack me down with your mighty wit for this) that influencing NPC action is THE WHOLE FRICKING POINT of role-playing games. Wether it's kill the orcs and acquire their stuff, or convince the third daughter of the Duke that her father is not a murdering tyrant, PCs attempt to have an impact on NPCs. That's the basic mechanic of all RPGs.HOW NPCs are influenced of course varies from one campaign to another, but even the most hack-and-slash game can be considered to revolve around influencing NPCs (just in a very basic, black and white sort of way).I think all gamers want that to a greater or lesser degree. Again, you seem to want to make qualitative distinctions where the difference is purely one of degree.You seem to conflate DM plots with NPC plots (not to mention campaign plots) so I'm not always sure what you're getting at here. I would find it surprising if you felt that NPCs plotting and scheming were a bad thing -- all your examples have been of DMs plotting how the campaign should go, rather than NPCs.In the games I like to run, there are numerous NPCs, all up to their tricks in the background. The players may NEVER run across these plots -- that's not the point. THOSE plots aren't the story of the campaign -- the story of the campaign is the actions of the PCs. Those plots exist in order to provide obstacles, allies, and excitement for the PCs, should they happen to run afoul of them.For example, again in Barsoom, one of the key trade families had been trying to get control of the lands of one of the PC's families. They launched a court action to have the lands transferred to their control, and it bounced around the courts for some time. I WAS thinking that at some point it would come to a head, the PC would discover what was going on, and want to put a stop to it.Instead, the party got interested in other stuff, and in the process, inadverdently caused the death of the trade family member most responsible for pushing the court deals through. They never even knew it was going on. I knew, though, and because I knew, I was able to play the NPCs involved in a very specific way, and decide how they would react to given actions by the PCs.That to me is VERY different from most of the examples you've been giving, where the DM expects the party to behave in a certain way. To me, this is just making sure that the setting is a living, breathing thing that the PCs can explore and interact with as they see fit.</blockquote>

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