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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Rechan" data-source="post: 4960782" data-attributes="member: 54846">Naturally, my players should vamoose. THe DMG2 talks about letting PCs play NPCs to create a vignette, a lead-in for the story. I have an idea for one, but I need help ironing it out. Here's the nutshell: the game starts with PCs playing NPCs (in a tavern, of course), in an isolated mining town/walled fort in a mountainy, snowy region. The town is filled with fog, and the place is swarmed by zombies. I have a really good reason for the fog and zombies, but that's not important.What I have in mind is creating several NPCs, treating them all like minions (One hit kills), and giving each NPC a special skill/technique. One can actually competently use a weapon. One has HP enough to be hit twice. One has good acrobatics/athletics. One is fast. One can use his force of will to halt the undead. One can make fire (long story short, if anyone sparks a flame, they are burned to death, but because this NPC is a tiefling, he has enough fire resistance to avoid death, thus being the town's firelighter). The Goal of the game is: Survive the Night, or Reach the Town Gates alive (the zombies, I will make clear, are not OUTSIDE the town). As soon as one of the goals are reached, the survivor NPCs meet the actual PCs, who arrive on the scene. My problem:1) Time. Will this take too long? I definitely want to get the "Let's board up the windows/doors to avoid the zombies!" but I don't want the game to drag. 2) Participation. The NPCs are minions, so unless PCs play smart, they should die rather easily. How do I keep players occupied if their guy dies? I had thought of giving them a new NPC - the characters stumbling across another survivor - but that might lose suspension of disbelief, and take away the feeling of Needing to survive if there's a replacement right around the corner. If I don't do that, how do I occupy the players whose characters die? 3) Direction and pacing. Is it not clear enough? This goes back to #1. I want to get the PCs moving on their objectives. But, if the players choose to just wall themselves up in the top floor of the tavern and sit, then this portion of the session is going to be very boring ("You sit on your butt until daybreak.") 4) Is this a good idea, period?</blockquote>

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