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Message: <blockquote data-quote="hawkeyefan" data-source="post: 9454151" data-attributes="member: 6785785">So my last session of Stonetop, we were getting ready for the Festival of the Dawn, which takes place on the Vernal Equinox and includes marriage celebrations and betrothals for the next year. The PCs had just defeated a Swyn, a babboon-headed snake creature that has plagued the town since our very first session. It had mesmerized a young girl and used her to lure another child… the NPC nephew of the Ranger… into danger. The boy has the “forest eyes” that hint at fey-blood, and so he was a target of the swyn for some unknown reason. So they were all looking forward to a celebration. One of the PCs… the Lightbearer, a priestess of the sun… betrothed herself to a rival of the town, the mercenary leader Brennan, who had effectively taken over the town of Marshedge to the south. Another PC (the Ranger) has a sister who is due to marry another NPC, the town’s Marshall. There are some simmering social issues that have been bubbling up in town. So my prep for the last session just involved giving those situations some thought. The town’s midwife is the mother of the marshal and has been antagonistic toward the PCs. She’s on the verge of making a move to cause trouble for them. Also, a wandering priest of Tor has arrived in town and is kind of disrupting services involving other deities. This has the Blessed PC on guard. Finally, Brennan the Mercenary has some men, the Claws, and they’re a rowdy and dangerous bunch that doesn’t really mix well with the simple folk of Stonetop. So the session begins and I have all of that on my mind… so what happens? The players decide to make sure the young girl was no longer under the influence of the Swyn. They bring her to the NPC Judge’s vault to make sure she was free of the creature’s influence. After confirming she was safe, one of the PCs decided to do the same for another. The Would Be Hero PC had in a previous session failed a Death’s Door roll. When that happens, the PC either dies or else makes some kind of pact with a dark power, gaining the Thrall insert. So Would Be Hero had started behaving very strangely, and so the Blessed and the Ranger took this opportunity to try and see what was going on with him, too. The Judge was able to determine that he was being influenced by one of the Things Below. Hlal, the Eternal Maw. So the session became about trying to exorcise Hlal from the Would Be Hero, while also jeeping everyone else safe. That all turned out to take up the entire session, so we never got to the Festival. That’s what I expect will happen next session now… but who knows? Ultimately, you just keep track of situations. Use NPCs frequently… lots of NPCs and in a lot of ways. Tie the PCs to them. Make the world seem lived in. The PCs are connected to it and to its people. Then you just let the players kind of tell you what they want to do, and you respond in kind. Take notes, track situations, have ideas about what NPCs want, and react to the players.</blockquote>

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