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<blockquote data-quote="Mark" data-source="post: 1799830" data-attributes="member: 5">If the players don't create characters that have buttons to push (essentially allowing themselves to be prone to hooks by portraying themselves as heroic), then find out what buttons the actual players have and subtly lace them into your game.For instance, find out what the favorite food is for one player and create an in-game equivalent to tempt his character.&nbsp; If one of the other players is particularly close to a relative, such as an uncle, create an uncle, in-game, for his character.&nbsp; Find out what motivates them in real life and utilize these tendancies within the game, analogously.Alternately, for the one that will only work for money, use it.&nbsp; Find a way to draw him into a gambling contest of some kind and rig it so he loses.&nbsp; He will then, not only want to work for gold, but HAVE to work for gold...and soon...lest his creditors come looking for him (and they can always be just a step behind when he needs motivating).I'm not suggesting that you pile this on all at once and exploit it continually (unless that works <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f61b.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":p" title="Stick out tongue&nbsp; &nbsp; :p"&nbsp; data-smilie="7"data-shortname=":p" /> ).&nbsp; Pick your moments.&nbsp; Even as you are exploiting one or another of these, you should be sowing the seeds of another so it is available to you down the road.IMO, it is important, as a DM, to be able to manipulate the players, if that is what it takes, so the stakes of the game feel high.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Mark, post: 1799830, member: 5"] If the players don't create characters that have buttons to push (essentially allowing themselves to be prone to hooks by portraying themselves as heroic), then find out what buttons the actual players have and subtly lace them into your game. For instance, find out what the favorite food is for one player and create an in-game equivalent to tempt his character. If one of the other players is particularly close to a relative, such as an uncle, create an uncle, in-game, for his character. Find out what motivates them in real life and utilize these tendancies within the game, analogously. Alternately, for the one that will only work for money, use it. Find a way to draw him into a gambling contest of some kind and rig it so he loses. He will then, not only want to work for gold, but HAVE to work for gold...and soon...lest his creditors come looking for him (and they can [i]always[/i] be just a step behind when he needs motivating). I'm not suggesting that you pile this on all at once and exploit it continually (unless that works :p ). Pick your moments. Even as you are exploiting one or another of these, you should be sowing the seeds of another so it is available to you down the road. IMO, it is important, as a DM, to be able to manipulate the players, if that is what it takes, so the stakes of the game feel high. [/QUOTE]

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