Question on rewards for PC's actions

[Unseenmal]

Hello all, my question is depending the choice made by the players here. I like to throw some pop culture stuff into games from time to time to have a little levity in the game.

That being said, in the campaign now, the PC's will be entering a dungeon as PC's are known to do. However, along their travels in said dungeon, they will hear the sounds of a battle going on. When they find it, they will see 2 figures locked in combat. A large, dark figure wearing black full plate fighting a small goblin wearing robes. The PC's will know nothing of these beings other than what they see.

But for your information...here we go. The large black armored figure is known as Dark Raider and he would scream EVIL, if the PC's could detect that stuff (none can...no clerics or scrolls of detect evil or know alignment, etc). The little goblin is Yotta and he's not evil but in the PC's eyes "Hey it's a goblin....kill it". Not terribly original pop culture thievery but hey, I'm still new to DMing.

There are 2 things playing against the PC's here. First, I have been known to have the REALLY GOOD NPC show up wearing black full plate. They know it hence this little bit o trickery. Second, so far in the campaign, goblins have been the major pain in the ass leading up to the big baddy. Dilemma for them.

I want them to choose to help the little goblin obviously and I have rewards for them for that plus the subtle hints to do so that hopefully someone paid attention to. But I am drawing a complete blank on what to give them (do to them) if they choose to help the Dark Raider. The PC's will be about 3-4th level at this point. They themselves could not defeat either NPC on their own but with the help of the other NPC they can defeat one or the other. Sorry for the longness...

Ideas?

[HalfDragonCube]

Maybe a niche magical item that will come up later in the adventure as very useful. Just file the encounter under 'Easy if done correctly'. The doing just happens earlier on in the campaign.

[myancey]

Is there going to be any hint as to which one is the baddie?

If not, I'd just give them the same treasure value in choosing the baddie as choosing the good guy.

If they choose to help the good guy, maybe award them with extra XP? That's always a nice gift.

Maybe the bad guy rewards them with one of the cursed items from D&D, like the -2 Sword, Cursed...

Here's the SRD stats:

-2 Sword, Cursed

This longsword performs well against targets in practice, but when used against an opponent in combat, it causes its wielder to take a -2 penalty on attack rolls.

All damage dealt is also reduced by 2 points, but never below a minimum of 1 point of damage on any successful hit. After one week in a character’s possession, the sword always forces that character to employ it rather than another weapon. The sword’s owner automatically draws it and fights with it even when she meant to draw or ready some other weapon. The sword can be gotten rid of only by means of limited wish, wish, or miracle.

Strong evocation; CL 15th; Craft Magic Arms and Armor, bestow curse, and limited wish or miracle; Price 1,500 gp.

Just be sure that the bad guy names the sword...like "Something's Folly". Cursed swords that are named tend to be pretty funny.

[HalfDragonCube]

Is there going to be any hint as to which one is the baddie?

If not, I'd just give them the same treasure value in choosing the baddie as choosing the good guy.

If they choose to help the good guy, maybe award them with extra XP? That's always a nice gift.

Maybe the bad guy rewards them with one of the cursed items from D&D, like the -2 Sword, Cursed...

Here's the SRD stats:

-2 Sword, Cursed

This longsword performs well against targets in practice, but when used against an opponent in combat, it causes its wielder to take a -2 penalty on attack rolls.

All damage dealt is also reduced by 2 points, but never below a minimum of 1 point of damage on any successful hit. After one week in a character’s possession, the sword always forces that character to employ it rather than another weapon. The sword’s owner automatically draws it and fights with it even when she meant to draw or ready some other weapon. The sword can be gotten rid of only by means of limited wish, wish, or miracle.

Strong evocation; CL 15th; Craft Magic Arms and Armor, bestow curse, and limited wish or miracle; Price 1,500 gp.

Just be sure that the bad guy names the sword...like "Something's Folly". Cursed swords that are named tend to be pretty funny.

What, the 'I gain a meagre penalty and I can't be disarmed' sword?

Make it adamantine and you have a fighter/burrowing machine.

[Unseenmal]

Is there going to be any hint as to which one is the baddie?

Yes they have been given hints here and there about which one is the baddie. But that also depends on if they paid attention and/or remember those hints when the time comes. My idea for choosing correctly was to rewards them with templates. It won't break the game I planned and they have been asking me let them try them out. So I was thinking of doing the same either way just giving them bad templates like instead of 1/2 celestial give that PC the 1/2 fiendish and let that play out naturally.

[myancey]

What, the 'I that a meagre penalty and I can't be disarmed' sword?

Make it adamantine and you have a fighter/burrowing machine.

So make it a dagger...like a punching dagger. Those are fun. Just saying, cursed items make great rewards from evil dudes. Nothing says, "You just helped the baddie kill the good guy" like being rewarded with a cursed item.

[darksolitaire]

But that also depends on if they paid attention and/or remember those hints when the time comes.

Seems like a lost cause :smallbiggrin:

[Unseenmal]

Seems like a lost cause :smallbiggrin:

No no...so far they seem to be good in that area. I'd say about 75-80% of the time the get the hints and apply them where needed, correctly. I'm just planning for that other 20-25% where they miss it. But they are fairly newer players to go along with my fairly new DMing. So I'd like to try to cover the 2 main bases here.

[ffone]

My players usually ask for Sense Motive rolls when they are curious about good- or ill- intentions of NPCs. IMO a slight reward for helping the 'right' side is fair since it rewards investment in Sense Motive, Detect Evil (I know they don't have it but it means they invested elsewhere), asking clever questions (my understanding is that failed Sense Motive doesn't mean you auto-believe the other guy, it means you can't 'read' tells like facial and voice cues; you might still guess they are lying if for example what they say contradicts a fact you already know), etc.

btw Dark Raider - lol. I like the pivoting of Darth into a 'description' name. I wonder if you could do the same for Yoda? Maybe he's a bard known in taverns across the realm as the Yodeler? IIRC goblins like hill and mountain terrain, and like orcs their bards probably use 'rougher' types of music like chants and percussion, so yodeling actually fits for a goblin bard.

If you wanted him to be a class that doesn't have Perform - just give him a few ranks cross-class; no point trying to optimize every NPC. Maybe he's not a GOOD yodeler and people in taverns pay him to SHUT UP. The singing might even be a ploy to obscure his real abilities (Yoda was a walk-softly / big-stick type).

Yoda as a goblin is also funny b/c it could explain his weird grammar. (Common as a 2nd language. Maybe in Goblin, at the end of the sentence the subject and verb always go, mmm?)

[Slipperychicken]

Item of Detect Evil, kept on the goblin's corpse. You were complaining that they can't, also makes them realize what they've done.

The Dark Raider's social support, maybe he has connections with grateful but evil associates who can give them plot hooks and assistance?

Also:
What happens if the PCs don't immediately try to murder one of them? What if they (using free action speech) try to divine the intentions of the combatants, or attempt to stop the fighting to decide who's Good and who's Bad?

[ffone]

Item of Detect Evil, kept on the goblin's corpse. You were complaining that they can't, also makes them realize what they've done.

The Dark Raider's social support, maybe he has connections with grateful but evil associates who can give them plot hooks and assistance?

Also:
What happens if the PCs don't immediately try to murder one of them? What if they (using free action speech) try to divine the intentions of the combatants, or attempt to stop the fighting to decide who's Good and who's Bad?

+1. IMO PCs should pretty much always do this - (unless they would rather leave the two alone and be on their way) lead with a "What transpires here?" type shoutout and get a Sense Motive (even if no one's good at it, every PC gets one, so you might get lucky; and many characters have no Bluff ranks) rather than attacking first and then asking questions (unless maybe that ruins a surprise round ambush, but that doesn't sound like the case here).

It's important IMO not to incentivize PCS in a way that will encourage them to NOT want to find out the truth - for example if they get punished for knowingly killing a good buy, but not for ignorantly doing so, then the incentive structure is to never find out (so that they can always attack the guy with the more valuable-looking gear to loot).

[Unseenmal]

ffone, I like the Yodeler idea. I will have to steal that...maybe instead of battle sounds they hear that first.

Slipperychicken, I do have contingency plans for if they decide to talk first to try to deduce who is good and who needs the stabbing. I have some dialogue to go from that each NPC will use to convince the PC's to help them. Basically all I really need here is something to "reward" them if they choose wrong. Again, I don't think they will but you never know what PC's will do in a given situation. I do like your idea of the items of detect evil....

Also I should note that this encounter doesn't really hinge too much on the final outcome of the campaign. Only that if the Yodeler dies then they will have to find out the info he has about the goblin attacks some other way. But they don't know he has this info yet....and if they kill him, if will make their jobs that much harder.

[Unseenmal]

+1. IMO PCs should pretty much always do this - (unless they would rather leave the two alone and be on their way) lead with a "What transpires here?" type shoutout and get a Sense Motive (even if no one's good at it, every PC gets one, so you might get lucky; and many characters have no Bluff ranks) rather than attacking first and then asking questions (unless maybe that ruins a surprise round ambush, but that doesn't sound like the case here).


Yeah this is what I was planning....there is a rogue in the party so this should be fairly easy.

[PirateLizard]

If you're going to be doing stuff like this, no matter the outcome, the PCs will likely (barring they're not braindead chimps) be more wary of more of the same in the future. That said, you have a couple of options.

Ir-reprehensibly failing to solve a puzzle with me is usually anywhere from 0-1/2 the exp for the ECL of the puzzle, and perhaps loss of an item that would really be useful, as well as perhaps being barred from a deities temple until they atone in the case of say, causing the death of a pertinent follower (coughplothook). If you want to be "good adventurers," you really ought to be trying and finding ways to do the right thing. Once the party gets used to getting it right, it's a good reason to toss fun and useful things their way.

Like I said however, this being the first time and them not perhaps being on the lookout for things like this...not to mention the fun you can have with them coming under the sway of the dark side for a while, you may want to avoid slamming them too hard, or even at all. I don't do the above -all the time-, just when it suits me. If they think they got it right, Dark Raider or whatever BBEG you're using can manipulate them even easier, and to make matters even worse, the BBEG -knows- they're easier to manipulate if they think they're doing the right thing ^^.

You may need to be careful with this though, once they trust the guy you might want to avoid it turning into a very long term "save or die" situation where they already failed. It is, however, hilarious to have a party go from level 4-15 under the influence of some BBEG they botched the plotline with, then get run out of Waterdeep with every paladin and bounty hunter in the sword coast hunting them when they find out the "dark cult" the city has been paying them to find is actually them. Watching them stare at you or spit out their MtDew going, "what? he was the bad guy? WE'RE THE BAD GUYS??!?!" while you're explaining to them all of their alignments are now neutral at best and the Paladin just fell as her god got tired of trying to throw her hints is, I gotta say, FREAKING HILARIOUS. Then again I'm a rather Evil DM. It's a great way to go from Waterdeep to say, the Shining South or Unapproachable East as well, knock the party out of their comfort zone by forcing them to relocate. Many times my party doesn't even want to be in the same campaign setting. They're like, "uh, can we run through Sigil to Dragonlance?" Again...soooo freaking funny. Anyway...

Long story short, a party that forgets to roll sense motive is -pretty easy- to lead around by the nose, just as a party that isn't detecting traps is likely to trip over a string and have a cube drop out of the ceiling onto their heads in a heavily fortified dungeon. :smallwink:

[Unseenmal]

If you're going to be doing stuff like this, no matter the outcome, the PCs will likely (barring they're not braindead chimps) be more wary of more of the same in the future. That said, you have a couple of options.

Ir-reprehensibly failing to solve a puzzle with me is usually anywhere from 0-1/2 the exp for the ECL of the puzzle, and perhaps loss of an item that would really be useful, as well as perhaps being barred from a deities temple until they atone in the case of say, causing the death of a pertinent follower (coughplothook). If you want to be "good adventurers," you really ought to be trying and finding ways to do the right thing. Once the party gets used to getting it right, it's a good reason to toss fun and useful things their way.

Like I said however, this being the first time and them not perhaps being on the lookout for things like this...not to mention the fun you can have with them coming under the sway of the dark side for a while, you may want to avoid slamming them too hard, or even at all. I don't do the above -all the time-, just when it suits me. If they think they got it right, Dark Raider or whatever BBEG you're using can manipulate them even easier, and to make matters even worse, the BBEG -knows- they're easier to manipulate if they think they're doing the right thing ^^.

You may need to be careful with this though, once they trust the guy you might want to avoid it turning into a very long term "save or die" situation where they already failed. It is, however, hilarious to have a party go from level 4-15 under the influence of some BBEG they botched the plotline with, then get run out of Waterdeep with every paladin and bounty hunter in the sword coast hunting them when they find out the "dark cult" the city has been paying them to find is actually them. Watching them stare at you or spit out their MtDew going, "what? he was the bad guy? WE'RE THE BAD GUYS??!?!" while you're explaining to them all of their alignments are now neutral at best and the Paladin just fell as her god got tired of trying to throw her hints is, I gotta say, FREAKING HILARIOUS. Then again I'm a rather Evil DM. It's a great way to go from Waterdeep to say, the Shining South or Unapproachable East as well, knock the party out of their comfort zone by forcing them to relocate. Many times my party doesn't even want to be in the same campaign setting. They're like, "uh, can we run through Sigil to Dragonlance?" Again...soooo freaking funny. Anyway...

Long story short, a party that forgets to roll sense motive is -pretty easy- to lead around by the nose, just as a party that isn't detecting traps is likely to trip over a string and have a cube drop out of the ceiling onto their heads in a heavily fortified dungeon. :smallwink:

Good points and ideas. Gives me something to think about. I don't plan to hurt them by chossing wrong since they are relatively new players. Only a few gaming sessions under their belts. Unfortunately, our DM moved away and I was the only person with experience in the game (played D&D since 2nd edition but no DMing XP to speak of) But I don't really want to reward them obviously. I like your idea of making BBEG influence them into doing what he wants instead. I may run with that instead of outright punishing them. Makes for a much more fun and interesting time for me and them.

I love this forum. Insights from you guys plus the knowledge I picked up reading old threads will be most useful in my foray into DMing.