Making the Thief Talk

[Rechan]

I find myself in an interesting situation.

The PCs are going to need to get information from a burglar. Basically "Who hired you; we need to find them, where did you meet them to negotiate/drop off the item/get paid?" But, the burglar isn't going to want to talk. The PCs intimidating/bribing the thief isn't going to get the information they want.

So I'm not sure how they could get the information from the thief in a reasonable way, given the thief's motivation.

The problem comes from this: the thief is a very skilled one - he managed to break into the vault/lab of a noble house who makes magical spy tech/super weapons, so he's clearly got the skills. However, if he talks, the thief is afraid that it will either 1) get back to the people he stole from, or 2) word will get out that he talked, and he'll gain the reputation of a squealer. If that happens, then the door is open for anyone to harass him over crimes he might have committed, and no buyer will ever trust him because he might roll over on them.

Anything the party threatens to do to him, or offers to pay him, is not worth the risk of his livelihood/his life at the hands of others down the road.

So what can my PCs do to get him to talk?

It's easy to say "His motivation is getting in the way, so don't have the NPC worry about that". That is easy, but I also want to challenge the party to come up with a solution that isn't "We'll break your face if you don't, we'll give you money if you do."

I want it to be a hint challenging, but I can't think of a solution ahead of time.

 

[Crothian]

It all depends on what the PCs are willing to do to him. Maybe they will kill him if he doesn't talk. If it is not common knowledge yet he got caught maybe the PCs can promise to keep the secret of who told them and then let him go.

The guy has options. He can always talk and just say that it wasn't him. Even if there is ruumors it was people will never know the truth. If he is that good then people who need his services might not be able to find someone else to do. Wiorse case scenerio he could always go elsewhere or reinvent himself as someone else. I personlly don't see his reasoning for not talking all that convincing. But there could be more to it then you've said.

 

[cignus_pfaccari]

I personlly don't see his reasoning for not talking all that convincing. But there could be more to it then you've said.

Agreed. Skill Challenge with bonuses from Diplomacy, Bluff, Intimidate, and Heal* should resolve it. People have their breaking points, and he can be convinced to squeal like a pig, and maybe it won't have to involve losing his ability to walk right.

* - For anatomy knowledge. You know, for when they start to carve out his spleen.

Brad

 

[Hereticus]

The PCs are going to need to get information from a burglar. Basically "Who hired you; we need to find them, where did you meet them to negotiate/drop off the item/get paid?" But, the burglar isn't going to want to talk. The PCs intimidating/bribing the thief isn't going to get the information they want.

Perhaps if the party were to lead the Thief into believing they were going to sell his body and brain to an Aboleth, in exchange for the information it contained...

What level is the party?

 

[fba827]

Yeah, Skill Challenge. And use high end DCs to represent the thief's resistance.
Primary Skills: Diplomacy (good cop), Intimidate (bad cop), Insight (to know why he might not be talking)
Secondary skills (that one PC could use to give a +2 to another PC's chec): Bluff (add to a good cop/bad cop), Heal (add to an intimidate), Streetwise ("look, we heard from so and so that you might be in trouble with so and so")

Basically, somewhere in that diplomacy check, the PCs are giving reason/incentive to talk despite the threat to himself (maybe they offer protection, maybe the convince him that they are about to elliminate that person so he wouldn't be a threat for long, etc)
Or in an intimidate, that is is when the PCs are saying that they are a bigger threat than this other person could ever be. etc.

OR if you're not doing 4e or skill challenges, then use the same gist (but without the skill challenge reference) -- so maybe the PCs are able to get him some local "witness protection" type thing. Maybe the PCs know of a friend/ally/priest who will let the theif hide out in the basement until it all blows over. That sort of thing.

 

[Rechan]

I don't think my PCs have any of those skills.

Seriously.

 

[Crothian]

There is nothing wrong with you as DM setting up a solution and then having the PCs fail. Maybe they'll have to just find the information some other way. Or maybe they will come to a dead end.

 

[Rechan]

There is nothing wrong with you as DM setting up a solution and then having the PCs fail. Maybe they'll have to just find the information some other way. Or maybe they will come to a dead end.

In general I don't like giving people the runaround. 'Sorry, that's just a dead end and an hour of realtime you wasted not accomplishing the obvious hook I put in your path'.

My time with this group is limited, so I don't want to waste time. But I do want to actually put some roleplaying in the game.

 

[Crothian]

In general I don't like giving people the runaround. 'Sorry, that's just a dead end and an hour of realtime you wasted not accomplishing the obvious hook I put in your path'.

My time with this group is limited, so I don't want to waste time. But I do want to actually put some roleplaying in the game.

It's not that type of dead end but that might be a bad word for this. What I am talking about is just failure. The players have a chance to get the information, they just were not able to.


If they spent the hour trying to get the info and when they got it the information was worthless to them and didn't lead anywhere; that's the type of dead end that you seem to be talking about.

 

[Kid Charlemagne]

Perhaps if they fail, they get led into a trap rather than just fail to get information... The thief could figure out some way to lie to them that would result in his getting a chance at a rescue.