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Message: <blockquote data-quote="SteelDraco" data-source="post: 3528356" data-attributes="member: 359">Expect that they're going to move from place to place. Unlike in a dungeon, there are significant areas between encounters that aren't significant, and will tend to be glossed over. You don't have to map everywhere they go; just have a good idea of the layout of the city. They say they want to go somewhere, they usually can, just provide some interesting details along the way to showcase your city. It's a hard balance to find, between 'generic city' and too much detail. That's something that depends on your group and how they expect things to play. Maybe toss a few descriptions in that they can choose to get involved in or not, just to see how they react to things. The majority of encounters in a city shouldn't be combat. Expect to roleplay more.Multiple avenues of investigation. Never depend on a single clue; have at least a couple, that point to different ways of finding the same information, or different avenues that end at the right place. When I'm designing urban adventures, I usually have a couple of tracks in my head about how they could find out different things. As long as you have a solid picture in your mind about what's going on, you should be all right. PCs will surprise you; as long as you can think on your feet, you'll do all right. In the setting you've described so well? All kinds of things. Rampaging kobolds, looters, doomsday cultists, elemental byproducts of the magical storm, angry mobs of half-orcs or other residents... you have a lot of material to play with. Think about the different forces playing around, and how they'd interact. Do the half-orcs who just want to get paid team up with the kobolds to rob and kill? Who else is being displaced by the floods? Natural forces can be encounters (a flash flood ripping through the streets, or PCs having the opportunity to save a noble or guard patrol, earning a valuable ally). I generally assume random people just run away from combat after the first round or two. It prevents massive AOE spells for a little bit, and I'll usually start the board with a scattering of random pedestrians when a fight breaks out in the street. But guess what? Most of those people just run away when swords get drawn and balls of fire start shooting across the street. How would you expect modern people to react to a sudden gunfight? They're not going to stick around.They have to pick sides at some point. If they're skilled adventurers, people are going to try to get them to help, and that will usually mean going up against someone else. As long as you know the agenda and capabilities of all the different groups, you can figure out what they're going to do pretty quickly. Probably they'll want to find out about the half-orcs. Who hired them? How can they find that out? Are they carrying something that would lead them to a certain person? Ancient coins that are only going to be found down in the kobold tunnels? Were they paid in famous wine vintages found only in a rich noble's wine cellar? Working for a particular half-orc boss, who could be pounded on for additional information?One thing I've noticed about your plot - the PCs aren't involved in the real quest, which is figuring out why it's raining so much. I wouldn't generally include an element like that in a game without involving the PCs in the real deal. They're the stars of the show, after all. If they feel like they're just running damage control while the real heroes fix the problem, that might not jive with them too well.</blockquote>

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