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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Josiah Stoll" data-source="post: 7432288" data-attributes="member: 6881836">(Long post, ye have been warned)I was going to write something like this. I play a lot of Pathfinder and D&D, which normally don’t lend themselves well to “stealth-based” games, but I was thinking a couple of weeks ago: what do spies do in Golarion and the Forgotten Realms? I mean, secrets are still important, so there should be people that sell them... right? Here’s what I worked up for a 5e game:1. Ignore the “Fighter-Mage-Thief-Cleric setup. It was bad, anyways (Druids are gods, after all). Plus, that setup assumes you are going to be fighting most of your enemies. Instead, you need something like:       Someone who can “scout ahead” with a familiar/scrying/ridiculous perception/talk to plants/whatever other crazy crap they can whip up.       Someone to deal with guards via Diplomacy, dealing lots of damage, grappling, or spells.       Someone to counter magic users (more on this later).       Someone that can nullify booby traps/alarms.This way, everyone is important at a different point in the game without feeling patronized. 2. Tell the players they’re doing a stealth game before they start. Then you don’t have to worry about the Wild Magic Sorcerer ruining everything.3. The “planning phase” is the best part, so it deserves the most screen time. When the Scouty Guy cases the area, tell the party tons of information. Draw floorplan maps, and show them to the party. Reveal enemy types, strengths, and weaknesses. This isn’t “The Great Evil that is Metagaming,” this is a legitimate feature of the game. This is one of the iconic moments in basically every heist or SpecOps movie ever, and it deserves to be treated that way. Plus, it’s fun.3. Magic is technology. Give the players access to a city where they can get spells/potions/magic items ordered. I made my “magic mart” an underground “black market” kind of place, but that is by no means the only answer. Use Divination spells in place of security cameras, and Alarm spells for well...This is where the “anti mage” comes in. Their job is to foil the security system much like the “hacker” in a movie. This is a surprisingly difficult job, because of the sheer number of ways that the players could be spied on and the various ways to counteract them. Bonus points if you can show the guards’ obvious surprise. That makes the hacker feel great.4. Make fights short and brutal. Usually only have one or two opponents at a time, lower their HP, and increase their damage. Make it clear to the players that the entire op is a bust if the majority of the guards get alerted.5. Never, ever let the party betray eachother. It’s a staple of espionage films, but it doesn’t usually work great. Since the party is so dependent on their planning, having a member betray the others will immediately make the entire op go bust. A player of mine tried it, and it felt terrible for everyone involved.TL;DR: You can do “espionage” with any system, but you might have to throw out your preconceptions.</blockquote>

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