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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Oofta" data-source="post: 7458825" data-attributes="member: 6801845">I'm just relaying what I and my group have done and enjoyed for several years now (I'm not always the DM).  Some people are motivated by adding to their character's journey and don't need direct PC rewards, the story is it's own reward.  In addition my campaigns are fairly open-ended and sometimes there are threads that one person would like to pursue that the rest of the group is not interested in, or not interested in enough to spend game time on.Let's say Bob has a PC Vinzu.  Vinzu grew up in the bad part of the city called Gutter Town.  At lower levels the group had encountered a wererat gang in Gutter Town but more pressing issues all came up that they decided to pursue.  Vinzu isn't particularly happy about this but understands.  There's a chance of a portal to a hell dimension opening and if it does the entire region will face dire consequences.  Derek the mage has already declared he's going to need to do several months of study and research, Brog the Barbarian wants to spend some time with his brother he thought was dead and so on.So that's where the session ends.  The group voted and they decided they're going to investigate the portal next session so I can prep.  A couple of the PCs have downtime activities unrelated to adventuring but Bob thinks Vinzu would want to clean out the wererats.  If Sheena (who has not declared downtime actions) wants to join Vinzu, great she's more than welcome.  So Bob proposes the story arc and as DM I agree that it's fairly trivial and let them handle it in downtime.If I had the time and inclination I could run a side-quest, but we don't so instead we handle it off-line with a story.  Maybe Bob works with Mary for Sheena's point of view or they both write the story from different perspectives.  Their reward is that they get to do some creative writing that hopefully they and the rest of the group enjoy.So no.  No milestones, no concrete rewards.  Perhaps because of this Vinzu sets himself up as head of the local gang to fill in the power vacuum, or whatever outcome makes sense.  Or maybe I had a note that the wererat gang was really a front for a Beholder and the next session becomes the rest of the group rescuing Vinzu with Bob running an NPC. With Bob's permission of course.  At the same time other people may write their own stories.  Derek's player may write up a diary about their findings, Brog's player may write a letter to the group telling him about visiting family. Sheena's really been doing a long-term secret side story she worked out with the DM that spans multiple down-time sessions but she's not ready to tell the group about it yet.I do make occasional exceptions for magic items.  It may make sense for Vinzu to get that cloak of invisibility that I was going to give him at some point soon anyway.  In addition, campaigns can pivot based in part on downtime activities although in most cases I want the entire group involved.TLDR: sometimes the story is a reward in and of itself.  I've enjoyed it over the years without the PC gaining anything from it other than a fun story.  That's enough.</blockquote>

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