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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Spatzimaus" data-source="post: 1199859" data-attributes="member: 3051">You need to be more specific: when you say Monty Haul, do you mean the "8th level characters having +3-equivalent weapons" variety or the "we roll d30s for hit points and item plusses" variety?  I'm assuming it's the first variety.Railroading is the worst way to run adventures.  If you arbitrarily remove a large fraction of the PC's equipment through no fault of their own, it'll never turn out well.I had a DM once who decided that as a plot point, my character (a Diviner) was going to fall off a cliff; it was the way he had decided we'd find the secret illusion-covered cave.  Whenever I'd do a divination, he'd find some way to work that in there.Well, the time comes and I'm walking along the mountain trail.  He tells me to make a Balance check.  I make it easily.  He tells me to make another.  (Of course, no one else in the group was asked to do so...).  I make it again.  At this point he just gives up and has the mountainside crumble under me, so I fall no matter what.But, this whole railroading issue can be bypassed.  If you're talking short-term solutions, then the ooze-n-Sunder method works.  If you're looking long-term, just pick your next few adventures carefully.  Here are some possibilities:> Put them in a combat-light situation, like something involving local politics in a corrupt city.  These sorts of adventures are entertaining in their own right, and if this group has done nothing but dungeon crawls, it'll be a nice change of pace for them.  Plus, it's a transition to the high-level adventuring style.  But more importantly, no loot!  The most dangerous enemy my players have is a mid-level Aristocrat.  Sure, they could crush him in a fight, but why would he bother fighting them?> If you do have a combat-oriented adventure, make them fight oozes, undead, constructs, or animals/beasts/magical beasts.  If you put humanoids in there, make them be mostly Monks, Druids, and Sorcerers, or give templates.  None of these will be expected to have large amounts of loot.  If you DO have weapon-bearing enemies, have enchantments like Unholy that prevent players from using them afterwards.> Remember, you can get people to doing things because they need to be done, not because of any guaranteed reward.  For example, maybe the Cleric's church is having problems with the local authorities, and they picked him to resolve the situation.  He has no choice; if he refuses, there go all of his spells, so the party will do the job even if there's no compensation.  While in a sense this is railroading, it's IN-GAME railroading that leads to other plot points; it's something their players would choose to do anyway given their personalities.You can combine all of these into one package.  A small town is being secretly menaced by a Weretiger (with Druid levels), who managed to curse a large number of townsfolk last month; at the last full moon, they killed a good number of people.  The Cleric's church asks him to escort a group of healers to the town to break the curses on the next full moon, since they missed the 3-day window for Remove Disease.  The party is supplied with masterwork silver weapons, and is told that if anything goes wrong to try to take the townsfolk alive for the healers to deal with (curing requires the afflicted to make a Will save, DC 20, each time Remove Curse is cast on them, so it might take several attempts.)The ten people who were thought to be cursed are caged, and when the full moon comes they revert; but, so do about 20 other people, including the senior priest (Clr 5) and several town guards (War 2); after some fighting, all of them run off into the woods to join their "father".There.  Adventure with very little loot, that the players would want to take part in anyway.  Any weapons they already have are nearly useless (DR 5/silver on the afflicted, 10/silver on the natural lycanthrope).  And, it's a challenge to take the people alive, so you're justified in giving good XP out; a few adventures like this, and their equipment will be average for their level, without anything actually being taken away from them.</blockquote>

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