Tailing somebody, all gumshoe-like

[Supaida]

I was skimming through Google, trying to find some mention of this issue, when I realized--hey, I'm registered at ENWorld now! So I come to ask you wonderfully smart people.

In my game that's just beginning (the third session is coming up on Tuesday), one of the PCs has been mistakenly given a stolen treasure that should have gone to an NPC. So now the NPC wants to follow the party through town, find out who these people are, where they're going to be staying, if they're rich or poor, etc. My only problem is, I don't know how to give the PCs the opportunity to notice this. I'll probably just use opposed Spot and Hide rolls at the end of every hour or so, but has this been covered anywhere in the official rules? Thanks.

 

[Patryn of Elvenshae]

Actually, it has!

You can find it in Complete Adventurer.

If you are tailing at 60' or more, you must succeed at one Hide check per 10 minutes. Within 60', you must succeed at aone Hide check per round. You still need cover or concealment - and a moderately crowded street provides enough of either to Hide.

If you fail the Hide check, you can make a Bluff check to appear innocuous, opposed by Sense Motive. Success means you are seen, but don't appear to be following. Failure means you've been spotted.

The target gets a bonus on Sense Motive depending on how worried they are (ranging from -5 for cocky to +20 for paranoid and is able to recognize you).

CV has a greatly expanded list of uses for the PHB skills - I highly recommend it.

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

I think using Disguise is a good skill rather than Bluff, too. (Still opposed by Sense Motive, not Spot.)

But I think the skill is hard to use due to time management. I rarely know how long, exactly, my PCs are going to be walking about. Furthermore, even if you see the person tailing you, what if you only see them once? Then you won't realize you're being followed, unless you see them again tomorrow.

And finally, the rule gets cumbersome if they're being tailed by sixteen secret police officers

 

[Rassilon]

How good is your Excell-fu ?

The rules recommended by Patryn (in CAdv) are actually pretty good, and in case being oficial floats your boat, well, they're official.

But you're right, executing them will take alot of time with the setup that you want to run.

Another But: Excell can do some crazy stuff, like producing a random die roller, that you could map 16 vs 16 times, modify by the relevant PC / NPC modifiers, and have it highlight the occurrences where the PC sees the NPC. You could have it do 60 iterations, telling you exactly in what 10 minute period over a ten hour tail who gets spotted by whom

Or you could just average the party's total spot, vs. the npc's total hide, and roll 6 times for every hour of tailing.

Edit: Ooops. Two people with two different problems. Ignore the Excell stuff.

Rassilon.

 

[Supaida]

Hey, I can't access the site for a day, and when I can again, my question's already answered! Thanks, guys. This site is great. I'll have them roll a few Spot and Sense Motive checks at the start of the session and not tell them why. It'll get them curious.