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The Fine art of noncombat one-shots.
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<blockquote data-quote="Aristeas" data-source="post: 2916855" data-attributes="member: 41008"><p>Same here. I never plant red herrings, I just fill the world with potentially interesting people and places, and let the players interact with whatever they want. Sometimes they just walk by and get on with the adventure. Sometimes they play around with whatever it is for a little while, and then move on. Sometimes they get completely sidetracked by one interesting NPC or place which has nothing to do with the adventure...in which case you make sure it has something to do with the next adventure, because if they were that interested you did something right.</p><p></p><p>In a recent campaign I introduced an orphanage run by Mr. Leech, who embodied every horrible nineteenth century orphanage cliche I could think of. He believed that laughter encouraged poor moral development, and that too much food made children lazy and complacent. The PCs spend a good hour tormenting this man: telling jokes to the children, passing out bags of candy, accidentally having animal companions bite him, poisoning his tea, soaking and then magically freezing his bedsheets, and finally contacting the board of directors to buy the orphanage just so they could fire him. He had originally had nothing to do with the plot, he just lived next door to it. But after all that effort was put in, it couldn't very well come to nothing, so I decided that there was a secret passage in the basement leading to the building next door, where the plot was happening. And Mr. Leech got his revenge a couple adventures later...</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Aristeas, post: 2916855, member: 41008"] Same here. I never plant red herrings, I just fill the world with potentially interesting people and places, and let the players interact with whatever they want. Sometimes they just walk by and get on with the adventure. Sometimes they play around with whatever it is for a little while, and then move on. Sometimes they get completely sidetracked by one interesting NPC or place which has nothing to do with the adventure...in which case you make sure it has something to do with the next adventure, because if they were that interested you did something right. In a recent campaign I introduced an orphanage run by Mr. Leech, who embodied every horrible nineteenth century orphanage cliche I could think of. He believed that laughter encouraged poor moral development, and that too much food made children lazy and complacent. The PCs spend a good hour tormenting this man: telling jokes to the children, passing out bags of candy, accidentally having animal companions bite him, poisoning his tea, soaking and then magically freezing his bedsheets, and finally contacting the board of directors to buy the orphanage just so they could fire him. He had originally had nothing to do with the plot, he just lived next door to it. But after all that effort was put in, it couldn't very well come to nothing, so I decided that there was a secret passage in the basement leading to the building next door, where the plot was happening. And Mr. Leech got his revenge a couple adventures later... [/QUOTE]
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