Pointless quests

[pemerton]

I like [MENTION=386]LostSoul[/MENTION]'s suggestion, or something like it. The players need to be able to make real choices for their PCs, and besides being fun to roll dice it also means that the resolution of things is taken a bit more out of the GM's hands.

 

[Omegaxicor]

@LostSoul I love that idea, it's great

@MetaVoid I like that because it seems intelligent to keep a guy off, watching the watchers, in case the patrol is ambushed/attacked but I think a 'passive' perception check or an auto-success active check because it does seem mean for the players to look for another Goblin and not see it due to poor dice roll, but if they don't look then they might not see

 

[MetaVoid]

I didn't mean it as some hidden controller/watcher of patrol, but as normal part of the patrol, but either forward scout that is a bit off or somebody who had to ...erm... answer the call of nature ... and is just now catching up.

 

[Omegaxicor]

ah, I see, I thought you meant there would be several patrols each with an off member. I suppose it would be strained for the party because they might get the first guy but always get the rest because they would be actively looking to avoid falling into the same trap.

 

[MetaVoid]

Even if you do it like there are some enforcers that "spy" on their own patrols, PCs could avoid it by ambushing the hidden one first (as its role implies other goblins don't know it's there) - as long as the ambush is two stealth strikers hitting in surprise round or some clever silencing tactics, single monster shouldn't be too hard to put down in surprise round.

You can't give goblins too much credit for intelligence or (in case of the spy) dillingence in their duties...if you do it that way, that spy should be some other, more lawful race...

 

[Omegaxicor]

there are plenty of possible choices, the reason the mission requires spying is to find out why so many savage humanoids are drawn to one place to serve..."loyally" (the still wouldn't be very intelligent or diligent) but I would probably say the spy was a Goblin from another tribe or something...

 

[delericho]

Would you run a quest as a DM where if everything goes to plan there will be no combat or puzzle solving.

Sure. Especially since...

The mission would only have combat if the party fail their sneak checks and since the party, at the moment, lacks a stealth character that seems likely...

Besides, it should probably be noted that "puzzle solving" has a very broad definition in D&D. It's not just a matter of navigating the chessboard trap, or putting together the five key items hidden around the place, or finding the fiendishly-hidden secret door.

In short, planning how to approach the enemy army without being seen, deciding which areas to observe more closely, and extricating themselves without bringing the entire army down on their heads are all likely instances of "puzzle solving".

 

[Hussar]

Something else to be careful of, possibly, is pass/fail situations. If the party fails a single skill check, what does that mean? It's going to happen that they fail checks, that's a given. So, perhaps and escalating scale of responses is better than, "Well, you failed so the entire army mobilizes to crush you!"

Maybe its a sliding scale of how badly the roll is failed, or perhaps a sliding scale of number of failures.

And, if the party takes prisoners, overload them with information. At least, that's my advice. Don't have prisoners clam up. Sing like a canary. It's better to give the players too much information and then let them run with it, than not give them enough and watch them stumble around randomly.

 

[Omegaxicor]

Goblins being stoic and fearless...

I assume each failure makes the next skill checks harder and the responses will increase with each failure