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Message: <blockquote data-quote="5ekyu" data-source="post: 7427536" data-attributes="member: 6919838">I think random encounters ger a bad rap, to some extent, but also deserve it. Of course, they are encounters not combats so thats a wide open pallet to paint.I use the term to represent more unexpected off kilter events but **still** give them meaning. A random predator attack against a large armed group can be extremely informative about the area and things going on. Is it starved to desperation by loss of the usual game? Is it terrified and fleeing out of its tertitory due to mystery? Is it showing bald blistered spots causing it pain and driving it to attack tough prey?Other conflicts can also serve to introduce a lot of other tags - with ties to the area, the events or even tie-ins to character backgrounds.Are a couple of the bandits/raiders (former) members of the soldier PC's unit or company, even before or after he served? Or are they of the cleric's religion? Are some of them wearing **that** armor even though they are not the ones who should be? Does one of them carry a brand that means something to a PC.Or maybe the encounter is the site of a raided group of travellers, looted and left. How much story and choices can you seed into that to make it have a lot of meaning? Even if its just proper burials and services it sets the stage to learn about them and later on seed in the raiders with instant heat as soon as some item tells the PCs who they are.***Heat delayed burns longest and hotest.***I think too many people take the position that random encounters are meaningless, are "waste of time" instead of seeing them as encounters to be used to add depth that can add personal elements and tangential hooks that a more direct "theme and plot" can sometimes not portray as well alone.So, when running a game, one of the first things i do, and keep doing, is write down "stray hooks". Can be as easy as a sentence or a paragraph. Early on in development, they each serve to illuminate setting elements and groups. Once i have PCs more (min 5) are written for each pc - race, class, sub-class, background and history. As specific plots stories and locations are developed, do some specific to those.Then, when its timing and situationally appropriate for a "stray" encounter pull in one of those hooks, posdibly randomly. I use playing cards for flavor (suit) and magnitude (face value)</blockquote>

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