Building Intrigue

[DragonBaneDM]

Hey guys!

So character creation for my upcoming game is practically done! There's one really cool detail that I think I need some help with. It's an urban game with a lot of different factions and leadership structures to interact with. My one player plain out told me "I want to be a Rogue of the most oppressed race." That's Dwarf! Not the optimal race, but they're a very plot centric race and I'm happy to have one. Gave him some other options, but he was pretty dedicated to the idea.

The guy's made the ultimate Spymaster. Expertise in Persuasion and Insight, and even took the Linguist feat for his Level 4 feat in lieu of an ability score increase. He's really excited to put his ciphers to use and thinks Thieves' Cant is a really cool feature. He's even used his Background as an in with his Cartographer's Guild, which is secretly working towards a more globalized world and freer trade. Lots of cool thoughts!

I want to make these decisions pay off. He's a good friend, it's a small group, and it's his first time playing D&D (he's had some Pathfinder experience from what I understand). Problem is, I'm a very "crunch over fluff" DM. Most of my games are combat oriented. I've got lots of mysteries, cool factions, and even one or two puzzles/ciphers built into the game. It's a good start, but I want this guy to have something in every story arc that lines up with his deal, even though it's not mine.

Without getting into specifics, what are some cool ways you've rewarded intrigue-focused roleplayers in your campaign?

[MarkVIIIMarc]

Most of the time it seems we come upon treasure after defeating a big bad guy.

Perhaps reward your Rogue and other players for role playing as well.

[JohanOfKitten]

Spice up your combat with intrigues elements : maybe the player can find the motive, the fear or the weakness of a big bad and can work on a way to use it to fight him more easily (With good intelligence on the henchmen, finding the weaker links and make him betrayed his master or flee just at the start of the big fight, creating an advantage for the players... A leverage on a dark mage could be use to curse a politician/noble linked to bad guys... )
Mostly, it comes from player's initiative and ideas. You can't really tell him to spy the henchmen to find a weakness. But you can stay open minded on the scenario to let those ideas bring things in the game, when the player comes with it.

Other things is creating scenarios where you can have great use of a spy at one point. It will make his character shines at a moment and bring strong memories of how he really helps the group to go foreward in this scenario.
For example, a game where an ally NPC is imprisonned for crimes he didn't (or did) do. An enemy faction is pulling strings in this story and they need to disculp him quickly or make him escape before execution.
Contacting the prisoner is tricky. An escape can be hard and push some conundrum about city guards that aren't necesserily evil wrongdoers. Finding who is behind it is complicated.
And in thoses 3 tasks, your player can do greats things with his spy (ciphered messages to talk with the NPCs, using thieves networks, listening to NPCs talking in different languages, bribing guards to see the prisoner or to "be away" when the escape is happening, finding if a guard is sold to the big bad guy etc...)



Oh, and yeah ! don't forget languages. A lot of tables put it aside or on trivial situations only, but it can be flavourful and great for the player to be able to understand NPCs that talk in a foreign language, thinking they can't be overheard and understood ((on an IRL example, the ONE thai shoper that could speak french and disrupt the french chat I had with my wife about the choice and the price of gifts and trinkets was able to sold us more and with less negociations than other shoper this day!! ))

[Quoxis]

With his expertises, there are always the usual party face options: haggle for more payment, ask people for information and help, talk the bad guy into giving up etc.

He'll likely make a good translator for the group, so you could tie that in, maybe have NPCs that don't speak common but can provide boni of some sort.

Thieve's cant counts as somewhat of a language, so he could teach the rest of the party a thing or two about it and have them communicate subtly without others noticing what it's about. Same goes for the cyphers. Being able to talk freely without others listening is great for all kinds of situations.

As for his background and ideals, try to implement wealthy merchants and politic figures of varying importance into quests, for better or worse, and let that play out on his guild's goals:
You accept the deal to mess up that smuggler's den? It belonged to the owner of the harbour, and as he's pissed off by you he won't permit you to do whatever you want.
You saved a random guy from bandits? His uncle is one of the town's officials regarding trade etc., and he might allow you a wish for saving his nephew.
Stuff like that.

[tieren]

His background is in a cartographer's guild?

Give him maps, not photocopies of your maps, but maybe crude renditions like could be gained from interrogating a henchman of the BBEG. even scraps of a few rooms here or there, a reliable rumor that there is a secret room in a particular area even if the informant doesn't know how to access it, etc...

[Unoriginal]

Why are the Dwarfs the most oppressed species, in you world?


His background is in a cartographer's guild?

Give him maps, not photocopies of your maps, but maybe crude renditions like could be gained from interrogating a henchman of the BBEG. even scraps of a few rooms here or there, a reliable rumor that there is a secret room in a particular area even if the informant doesn't know how to access it, etc...

Sounds fun.

[MBControl]

Smuggling routes.

Have your Dwarf collect contacts, and open smuggling routes. Have him communicate with new allies and contacts using thieves cant. Dwarves would be an ideal tunneling group, so that would tie in nicely, and it's an easy way to incorporate the side story into the main story, anywhere you go.

It would be easy to add simple intrigue to these plots, whether it be bribes, police raids, betrayal and the like. Your PC and party could start seeing financial benefit as the network grows and becomes more profitable. It could also provide an underground information pipeline for the players as well.

As the game progresses, your Dwarf could also be working behind the scenes to legalize the trade, and trade routes.

Pirates, thieves, smugglers and rogues will naturally add intrigue to any story line.

[Trekkin]

I suspect that trying to retrofit your game to support a plot you aren't used to running might be a bigger headache than you need to go through. You could consider letting his efforts at espionage influence the combat game instead.

Suppose you've set up your plot so that the PCs need to raid some guarded building or other. Let your spy work his contacts to find a mole in the guards, or perhaps visit the building on some pretext and pick some pockets, or some other convenient way to let him roll some dice without needing a lot of screen time and come away with the knowledge that they always put the rookie guards on shift from 6 to 12 on Friday nights so everyone else can go to the pub.

That's it. You're done. Now, no matter how the combat goes, it was easier than it might have been thanks to the diligent efforts of your rogue. If it was easy, hey, well done rogue; if it was almost a TPK, imagine what the seasoned guards would have done with them. The fact that you never modified a single one of their statistics is entirely incidental to the perception that the rogue did a rogue thing and everyone benefited.

If you feel like putting in more effort, you could let his efforts actually determine/"reveal" things about upcoming combats. Even something as simple as leaving notes in obscure languages on the bodies can give him something to do with his investment while helping the party; notes like "Hey, bro, good luck at your new posting. Say hi to the rust monsters for me!" That kind of thing.

Alternatively, this character seems like an excellent way to pick up dropped leads. If the PCs don't manage to pick up on where next they could go to advance the plot, or they chase a red herring and forget where the plot actually goes, this guy's criminal contacts can get the story rolling again.

I'd just shy away from trying to add "intrigue elements" unless you're cool with both the extra work and the extra spotlight time on this one character. It's easy enough to motivate him to steal extra things to help with his trade objectives, though.

[WickerNipple]

You didn't mention what rogue archetype he chose, but for this kind of character I would highly recommend Mastermind from the Sword Coast Adventurer's Guide. It gets overlooked frequently because it's not much of a combat class, but it does a ton of things this character would love -- including 2 free languages so he doesn't have to spend that precious feat on linguist.