Second Time DM Help? (One-Shot PC and Aarakocra questions)

[recyclops]

On Monday I've had my first session with some friends as a DM (I used to run Shadowrun before) and it was pretty awesome. For most of us it was the first session of D&D at all and I've got them all hooked up.

As this community used to help me as a reader with some open questions before, I'd like to ask you about some further advice.

Right now, the 5 PCs (2 Dwarves, 1 Human, 1 Lizardguy, 1 Aarakocra) are standing in front of an ancient temple in the middle of nowhere in which some nasty goblins are hiding. They've already succeeded in crushing down the goblins' patrol. Now my questions are:

1) A friend of us will spontaneously join us tomorrow, only for that one session. As he will stay at my place, we will have enough time to prepare his PC. Do you have any suggestions on how to integrate him into the action? The most obvious solution would be a pilgrim who just happens to come by or who shows himself to the PCs after having been worried about the goblins having taken over the temple. However, at least when playing Shadowrun this friend hasn't ever really been into playing religious or magical characters.

2) The first session ended with a discussion between the Lizard and the Birdperson. Birdperson argued that he won't enter the temple as it's underground and that it would make him panic. Lizard succesfully intimidated Birdperson to go down there nonetheless, with the Birdperson's player stating that by being able to just fly away, his PC couldn't get intimidated by physical threats (ignoring that the Lizard is the party's only well-trained fighting machine carrying around a longbow).
Right after the session I told the Lizard's player that I didn't want to interrupt their roleplay, but that I don't want the PCs to force actions on each other. She agreed and will think about a solution to come to terms with Birdperson.
However, Birdperson still doesn't want to go into the temple. It does sounds logical when he'd rather not go down there and offer to stay outside in order to watch out for any goblin reinforcements. That can't be a long-term solution, though, as he's also going to miss the EXP. The name of Dungeons and Dragons kind of shaped my own expectations towards the game and I wouldn't have offered my friends to play an Aarakocra if they'd panick everytime they see a dungeon entrance. Has anyone of you made similar experiences before and got some advice how to handle that?

3) The last question is also concerning Birdperson who's also the party's scout, for obvious reasons. In order to keep his flying ability balanced, I think it's okay to say "well, today's a heavy storm / hail" from time to time (as long as I say that before he's going to fly). But it shouldn't become a repetitive restriction, though I'd like to surprise the party with some surprising foes now and then, even in open terrain and even with a Birdperson flying around. What are some other possibilites to keep the element of surprise on the DM's side?
And how can I keep an Aarakocra PC from skipping some dungeons by just saying "have fun down there in the tunnel, we'll meet on the mountain's other side" without being too restrictive?


I'm not very good at keeping things short, but maybe a little bit more of information can help you with helping me. Thanks to anybody who'll read that wall of text anyway!

[Puh Laden]

1) You can go by the old standby of "you find a prisoner who is a capable combatant."

2) Incorporate this into a character arc for the birdman. For starters, why are they here? To clear out goblins? Well those goblins are a threat to the local town, a good or even a neutral character could be persuaded by an appeal to compassion. If he's greedy the other characters can remind him that he won't be rewarded if he leaves. Whatever the reason why, the birdman's experience leads to him conquering his fear.

3) Even if he did have the endurance to fly over a mountain without stopping and putting himself in danger when landing, that doesn't mean he'd abandon his friends. He can act as a messenger if things go wrong for them, but he would need to stay with them to do that. Really though, you just need to let the player know that for purposes of fun and playing the game the PCs all need to stick together.

[Sir cryosin]

1. The person win and thinking he could handle it all by himself but as he ventured for their in here realize he was going to need help he got into a situation that he wasn't able to handle himself. So the party just find him and they're surrounded by a couple of dead bodies.
2. It's the player's character you as a DM set up a adventure a dungeon a social situation whatever you set up a encounter it's up to the players to come up with the reason why they're PC should go in there. If the reason is well my PC's not going to go in there because they're a bird person they don't like the land on the ground well then you're just going to have to suck it up and be the tough DM and say well then I guess you can have to sit out for the session because this is what I have have have prepared for you guys you guys know this is where it was going.

If you really want to be the nice DM you could be like alright mr. Birdman while you're standing outside watching the front entrance you are attacked by some kind of flying monster. When the party Rose initiative to fight goblins you have the Birdman and the flying creature that are outside roll initiative as well so when it comes to their turn in the initiative you do a little flash over to the outside and have those to Duke it out on their turn why the party is duking it out with the goblins inside the cave. So why the rest of the party is exploring the dungeon you could have little hide-and-seek Chase scenes between the Birdman and the other flying creature describe as they're flying through trees or hiding behind huge hills are flying up into the clouds losing line of sight and stuff like that. But it's always dangerous to be split up from the party. That's why it's safer and numbers.

[Vorpalchicken]

1 Yes. A prisoner preferably tied to a post, about to be eaten by a monster kept as a pet in the temple. He knows where his equipment is being kept nearby and also has a healing potion among his belongings.

2 Have the goblin reinforcements show up. 20 of them (or maybe less but enough to make it an unfair fight). Armed with bows, with available cover behind which to hide (for advantage or to cancel disadvantage). The Aarakocra will have to retreat into the temple or die fighting the goblins.

3 Confronting his fear is a way to overcome it. See above.

[Sir cryosin]

I have had a party of 6 Adventures walk into a room that had three different entryways and they split up into into teams of two person so three teams of two people. And all picked a different direction to go in each Direction I had different monsters in each the directions so what I did was I went back and forth and I describe them to what they see as they go into their different hallways then they all happened upon the monsters that were in each area around the same time as each other so I had them all roll initiative and I had all the monsters roll initiative and I would just do little cutscenes so when it came to team one I've cut and I'll be like so team won this role role and describe what you do and I'll have the monsters role and describe what they do and then I'll cut the team too and have them do and describe and then I'll cut the team 3 and I'll do what they do and describe and stuff like that. It cut down on the time that it would have spent exploring the dungeon but it didn't cut down and didn't provide any challenges to combat stuff like that because you still had that initiative order that you followed. They were just lucky to where they had an even split between melee combatants and spellcasters so each team had a melee and a spell caster.

[Arial Black]

Players cannot force other PCs to do what they want by rolling skill checks. Players always get to choose what to do, unless magic compels them, and skills are not magic. None of this 'I rolled a 20 on my persuade check so you have to give me all your stuff and walk around naked LOL' bollocks.

You don't have to be a cleric/druid/paladin/priest to be religious or desire to visit a temple.

A flying PC may prevent the PCs from being surprised, but at the same time the enemies can easily spot him and so the PCs cannot surprise the enemy just as often. It's a two-edged sword.

Not wanting to go underground is the players choice. If they later regret that choice because they are choosing to miss the fun, that's on them. They may have their claustrophobic PC decide to hazard the danger anyway, because staying outside alone and ineffective is also a bad choice. They have to decide which choice is worse and choose the lesser of two evils.

Do not impose any artificial 'can I overcome my fears' roll; it should be a role-playing choice for the player.

[recyclops]

1. The person win and thinking he could handle it all by himself but as he ventured for their in here realize he was going to need help he got into a situation that he wasn't able to handle himself. So the party just find him and they're surrounded by a couple of dead bodies.
I really like that idea and I think my friend is going to think the same. Coincidentally, I underestimated Goblins and the party has followed the footsteps of more Goblins than they probably could handle. This scenario would explain why 2-3 Goblins are "missing" and of no danger anymore.

Thanks to everybody for the friendly responses. I'm surely not going to force any actions on Birdperson and I also don't want to punish his reasonable RP decisions by throwing unbeatable monsters at him (and thus punishing the rest of the party as well). I guess he'll has to decide between sitting outside and looking out for more Goblins or joining the fun and getting that loot and XP. He does like loot and XP.

[BabyCthulhu]

Birdperson could also hear from outside the cries for help of his party and decide to enter.
Or he could spot those goblin reinforcements he was looking for and either try to fight them alone, or fly away, in which case they could force him to enter the temple looking for help, or watch as the goblins enter the temple ready to attack the group from behind.

[jleonardwv]

You could let the bird scout from the air and find a alternate entrance which might embolden him to enter and explore thinking his special ability gave him an advantage.

[MrMcBobb]

1) I love the idea of it being an enterprising Goblin who comes out and tries to ingratiate him/herself with the party and joins up to give them information on how to kill the Gobo Chief (so that he can become Chief when they leave, hence one encounter) but the PC Gobo maybe has a different mind-set to the current chief. Is more interested in the lands to the West (or whichever direction the village you are protecting isn't in) so it's beneficial to take him on board.

2) Players with restrictive RP ( :smallfurious: ) always bug me as a player and a DM but that can't be changed. Maybe speak to him as a player before the session, there's no point playing D&D with your mates if you're just going to say "My character wouldn't go there, do that, or engage with this session" so give him a reason to go underground (money, magic items). Also what's his character's relationship like with the other PCs? Maybe have a sort of Gimli/Legolas style "An elf will go underground where a Dwarf dare not? I'd never hear the end of it" style thing. Sure he can stand outside while the others do all the legwork but he's never going to hear the end of it. "Hey, remember that time you were too scared to fight goblins?"

3) Allow him to fly but let him know that intelligent monsters/antagonists are going to be looking up and it's harder to be stealthy in the sky (not many shrubs to hide behind up there) than on the ground. Also if he's flying really high to get cloud cover then the perception checks to see what the enemy are doing are going to be wicked hard. Seeing a human encampment from 500 feet in the air through a canopy of trees is bordering on the impossible side of Perception checks. This allows your character to use the ability when he feels it will be most useful, it introduces choice to his process. Not simply "is it hailing? No. Then I fly"

[recyclops]

Hey there, thanks again for all the answers. Just a quick feedback to show that your responses really helped me:

1) My friend went for the adventurous Half-Orc Barbarian who entered the dungeon on his own just to realize that there are too many Goblins for him. So he gladly accepted the party's help and together they crushed the goblins, leveled up, solved their puzzle and got an end fight with some skeletons. I'm glad to tell that they enjoyed the second session as much as the first.

2) The Birdperson player explained to me that he really just wanted to stick to the Aarakocra's description in the book and not interrupt the game by restrictive RP. He accepted that in my setting, Birdpeople may not exactly enjoy being underground, but they can cope with it if necessary.
I also halted a few other PC maneuvers to force another PC to do something.

3) Concerning the height of his flights, the Birdperson is really reasonable and will only fly so high that he can still see the party. I will however thankfully resort to the risk of him being discovered by foes (as he already had been discovered by a Goblin patrol before).