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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Crazy Jerome" data-source="post: 5732918" data-attributes="member: 54877">I run a lot of mystery, even in games that are on the surface more action-hero fare. The players in our group all like a lot of mystery in the game. Heck, if we were playing a Conan knock-off, it would be Conan with a side of Nero Wolfe. <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" /> One thing I have noticed about rule-of-three thinking adapted to roleplaying is that the rule-of-three as usually discussed assumes a few things about the game. It assumes that there is going to be a correspondence in how the clues feel in the game compared to reading about the clues in a story. It assumes that one clue will be sufficient to "solve" the problem, and three are provided merely to make sure that the players get one without it being too hamhanded. And so forth. Mainly, it assumes that the characters will be engaging in a bit of a detective story, but the players will be "reading" about it. For standard D&D play, those are probably good assumptions. Conan isn't normally even a Mickey Spillane type, much less the more cerebral examples. <img src="http://www.enworld.org/forum/images/smilies/laugh.png"  class="smilie" loading="lazy" alt=":lol:" title="Laughing    :lol:" data-shortname=":lol:" /> This is often mystery color instead of mystery in fact. To include a lot of mystery, and give the players a sense of being in a mystery, you need a lot more than 3 clues. You need a lot of clues, many of them subtle, and none of them capable of providing the complete answer (short of amazing insight by a player). Among other things, this gives the players a sense of "hey, something strange is going on here," before they have any real idea what that something is. Mystery has to build.  When adapting to this style, however, you could do a lot worse than to start with rule-of-three. Simply come up with three big clues that satisfy the standard rule-of-three. Make sure all three are substantially different. Then take each clue and break it down into several parts, and scatter them out over the time and place of the rough expected story arc of the mystery. If the players get most of the parts of one of the big clues, they'll get the answer soon thereafter. (If you aren't careful, this will seem like a standard rule-of-three mystery with a lot of frustrating hoop jumping, however.) A better result is that they will get some of the parts of each clue, and guess the answer before they can prove it. This will naturally lead to a faster pace as they get near the answer, and will be very satisfying for players that like to do this kind of thing. The plethora of clues (clue parts) will give their characters plenty of time to use their abilities.</blockquote>

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