pwykersotz
2012-02-16, 11:24 AM
This is a question for all you DM's out there. What methods do you use to choose NPC reactions or plot developments that could honestly go in multiple directions?
I personally favor what my friend dubbed "luck rolls" for the players and d100 rolls that I keep secret. The luck rolls came about when I realized that my players just really like to roll dice. A situation came up where the odds were moderate for an encounter (30% chance a monster wanders by while they are on the road, 5% chance it's two monsters). I had the player roll a d20, and he rolled high and was unaccosted. He felt a sense of satisfaction at his "defeat" of the encounter without even drawing his sword, so I kept this kind of roll in the game.
The d100 is just a throwback to classic random events tables that I pull out when an event gets particularly chaotic and it's just too much to keep track of cause and effect in my head. Something to the effect of "How much of the room is destroyed after two groups of NPC's clash" or "You've walked into a factory where Rods of Wonder are made".
Anyway, secret or public, die rolling is pretty standard for deciding arbitrary events, does anyone do it differently?
I personally favor what my friend dubbed "luck rolls" for the players and d100 rolls that I keep secret. The luck rolls came about when I realized that my players just really like to roll dice. A situation came up where the odds were moderate for an encounter (30% chance a monster wanders by while they are on the road, 5% chance it's two monsters). I had the player roll a d20, and he rolled high and was unaccosted. He felt a sense of satisfaction at his "defeat" of the encounter without even drawing his sword, so I kept this kind of roll in the game.
The d100 is just a throwback to classic random events tables that I pull out when an event gets particularly chaotic and it's just too much to keep track of cause and effect in my head. Something to the effect of "How much of the room is destroyed after two groups of NPC's clash" or "You've walked into a factory where Rods of Wonder are made".
Anyway, secret or public, die rolling is pretty standard for deciding arbitrary events, does anyone do it differently?