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Darth Credence
2021-01-26, 12:40 PM
This isn't necessarily a bad thing, but I've noticed something from my players that is making me have to rethink how I prep stuff. They are, in video game terms, completionists.

Basically, I have one major plot line that is the main campaign. They started out working on this plot line, and have traveled across a decent chunk of the kingdom working on it. Meanwhile, I also have a lot of other things available for them to do, because I want them to be able to do anything they'd like. Basically, any given town they go to will have a couple of side quests, while a major city could pretty much keep them busy for a long time.

This was great in the small towns - they would find the side quests, and do them before moving on. Worked out just fine, because they were a long way from starting to run into time constraints on the larger plot beats, we all had a lot of fun, and the stuff I had made was all getting used. Now, however, they have come to a city that is the equivalent of medieval Paris. It's huge, and there are a lot of things that can be done there. Simple things like killing things in the sewers, to investigating nearby problems for various quest givers, to interacting with nobility, and finally a couple of major things that they really aren't high enough level to deal with right now (border skirmishes from a fairly powerful group and dealing with organized crime in the poorer district of the city). The major ones were pretty much there as part of a living world - the border skirmishes will grow in severity until they must be dealt with, and the organized crime group is a fact of life in the poor district that will need some major time to resolve. The main quest should be leading them out of town to a place about 150 miles away.

Currently, they are basically arguing whether they have time to squeeze in dealing with the crime lords before they head out to investigate what they can do about the border skirmishes. This is after systematically going through every side quest opportunity they can find, and if I have any other type of hook show up here, I'm sure they'll take it. I had the Duke of the city talk to them about the border skirmishes, and ask them if they are powerful enough to deal with them - I think they took it as a challenge because they said that they were quite powerful - they are level 7, which isn't nothing, but they just ran away from the leading edge of the attackers. They were exhausted from a day where they actually had a number of encounters in a day, but still.

At some point, I need them to move on from this city. But short of railroading them, I'm not sure how. I could stop creating other possibilities, but if there is only one thing to do, that sounds like railroading. I think they may have actually forgotten what they are supposed to be doing - it will matter later because they took on a quest to deal with one thing and return within a year, but in game it has only been like two months. Any ideas?

Anymage
2021-01-26, 01:00 PM
If they have a video game mindset of "we have to tackle all the sidequests before moving on with the main plot, because otherwise we'll lose access to the sidequests as the plot advances", lean into that. Let them clean up enough that an authoritative questgiver says something like "they're circling their wagons now, we need to wait a bit until they make their next move" or "things are still in flux after your last mission, maybe we should hold off so we don't destabilize things too badly". Let sidequests dry up as they get completed without letting any more pop up.

Players often expect some sort of structure to the plot, so treating it as such and giving them some guidance isn't "railroading" in any problematic sense.

Xervous
2021-01-26, 01:05 PM
These opportunities don’t exist in a vacuum. Make the offers expire after so many days. Someone else took the job or circumstances are changed.

If they want to ignore the main quest, shouldn’t bad things start happening? Not things that would necessarily spell out rocks fall you die, but you can still do drastic changes that reinforce the concept of a living world. Sure the main quest has a hard to change trajectory that they’d be riding along with, but if they don’t involve themselves they will miss key turning points, track changes they could have brought about.

Alcore
2021-01-26, 01:21 PM
Sounds like you made a video game; the only part of the world that is moving is the PCs and the things they interact with. I know it might seem like railroading, or even punishment, but have time pass. While they are doing quest X have another group complete Y. This might completely backfire as they try to speed up quest completion.

After a month, or a week, of game time remind them there is a villain out there. Reinforce any place the villain considereds home, add a level to him, perhaps even let him complete a major goal. Let the greater world suffer.

Darth Credence
2021-01-26, 01:39 PM
I do, indeed, have time constraints and things changing because time is passing. When I first created the world, I also created a calendar that had important dates and what will happen and where as those dates pass. They have blown through a number of dates, but because they haven't left the massive city, they don't know what is happening several hundred miles away. The next stage on the main quest originally would have been that they needed to go to a specific person and attempt to acquire some missing pages from a book. At this point, those pages have been sold, and they will have to track them down or come up with an alternate method of determining how a ritual will be performed. But they don't know that things have changed, and my problem is getting them to understand that things have changed without just telling them. The major methods I had been relying on was using the Aasimar paladin's deva giving him prophetic dreams or the divination wizard getting clues in divination spells. The divination wizard just doesn't cast divination spells - at this point it's clear he just wanted portent. The paladin listens to his deva, and gets the message that he has things to do, but he is much more interested in ignoring that for the organized crime subplot as it has a passing connection to his back story. He knows that the job he is currently on was given a one year timeline, and while they have calendars and see time passing, they don't seem to think there is any kind of rush for that.

Thanks for the thoughts. I think I will have to let the side quests dry up, but I just worry that it will make for a more dull world when they can be in a massive city and there is nothing for them to do.

KoDT69
2021-01-26, 03:15 PM
If they insist on that side plot, make a sub-plot off of it that drives them to the bigger plot. Need them to go stop that invading army but they are puttering around on something less relevant? Cool. There's a missing thing (key, map, magic item, etc) required but they find out quickly that the guy leading that enemy attack is the culprit! Better yet, he could have left a taunting confession if your group has skeptics. Give them incentive to drop that side story and get them to the action. Maybe even some misinformation that the invading army IS the side quest to something bigger. Let them see consequences for dilly-dallying about.

Or you could just tell them, hey guys you're time is running out. Figure out your priorities. There's not always a way to do everything within time constraints. Part of building the story. They should be able to figure out if a quest is an immediate priority or if that basement will still be flooded with kobolds when they get back :smallwink:

Alcore
2021-01-26, 04:45 PM
I suppose then my next questions would be...

What happens if the villain achieves total victory?

Can the PCs revert the changes?


I don't really want an answer myself; but the idea of running a post apocalypse game might appeal to them.

Yora
2021-01-27, 04:55 AM
Or the players just could keep doing small stuff in the city if that's what they really want to play.

Necroanswer
2021-01-27, 05:24 AM
This might sound like a silly question, but do you think its possible that your players think that you expect them to do every sub-quest? Could they grabbing every plot hook because they feel like you used your own time to develop something for them and they don't want to skip something you worked on?

Kardwill
2021-01-27, 05:39 AM
They have blown through a number of dates, but because they haven't left the massive city, they don't know what is happening several hundred miles away.

Ingame, events that happen offscreen without any information trickling back to the players may as well not exist. You need to make them aware that stuff is happening.

For example, this document they had to buy from a merchant? If they were aware of that merchant's identity, have some news come to the players about that merchant's murder and the fact that the thieves "only seemed interested in some old papers". Have nasty rumors trickle back from the place where "stuff happens". Urgent messages from people they know. News from other people that tried to tackle the problem while they were busy.

Alternatively, if your players love your side-content so much (which is a good thing. Having your paladin feel involved in the "mafia" sidequest is cool) lean into it. Maybe link those activities to your main plot? Like, for the "take down the mafia" sidequest, the mafia is involved in the sinister plot in some way (they abduct and sell sacrifice victims, or deal with forbidden artefact from the sinister cult, or lost men to the cult, etc...), and the players will discover important informations (with a deadline) during their adventure?

Don't be too enamored with the plot you set up. Having stuff happen completely offscreen may be realistic, but it's not very interesting. Adjust it to the players, by putting clues in the places/subplots/characters they interact with.

Aliess
2021-01-27, 07:42 AM
If they go after the crime syndicate then can you use that to push then back into the plot?
- the mob bosses have better connections and find out the players are out to get them. They drive the players or of town with not so subtle threats that they'll kill them if they come back. (Might just make the players come back and waste more time trying to fight them though)
-They try to recruit the players. You want to keep everyone in the city safe, we want to keep everyone in the city safe. How about you stop annoying us and go chase up this real threat that we've got a lead on?
One of the mob bosses works for the chief villain and has some papers that the players conveniently find with the time and place of something big going down on a couple of days (the main plot).

Darth Credence
2021-01-27, 10:15 AM
Ooh, this has given me some ideas. I can see a way that I can link the crime syndicate to the main plot, by having the rise of the syndicate be due to the increasing power of the main villain. That would also allow me to bring in the changes to the world that is happening in other places. They know enough about the main villain that they would get the connection simply by requiring a specific combination of coins to be allowed entrance somewhere, so that will be pretty easy.

As to whether the players think I want them to do every side quest, that is actually pretty possible, and I know how they would get that idea. When a player has to miss a couple of sessions, we have one shot adventures where the other players create characters in the same world, just a different area, and go on a mission that will impact how the world changes. We've done two - one of them should have shown them how things were changing out in the world, because they actually participated in the mission that allowed for the big bad to enter the world. They will absolutely see the results of that if they ever move on with the main quest, as that was tied in to the person who had the missing pages and they know that. The other one was to establish where a few magic items ended up, but it happened to take place near an area that they had passed through. There was no way for the regular party to do that adventure, but they may have taken it as I had something there that I wanted to use so I did it as a fill in adventure to not waste it. I told them at the time that it was not, but I can see them getting that idea. I'll have to figure out how to correct that, if possible.

I hope I'm not falling into a trap where I'm trying to force a plot that they don't want to do. I have an endgame for the entire campaign, but I don't really care how we get there, so I suppose I can just attempt to change things around now to make what they want to do be the main plot. But I've kind of tried that, thinking that if they want to be in the city, I should get them more involved in the city, maybe get them some land. They pretty much ignored that bit, and just wanted cash for doing jobs. Lots of things to consider here.

FrogInATopHat
2021-01-27, 02:18 PM
Ingame, events that happen offscreen without any information trickling back to the players may as well not exist. You need to make them aware that stuff is happening.

This is the only advice that you realistically need.

If the players don't know about a deadline it effectively doesn't exist.

It seems your suggestion that you tie the crime syndicate into the main plot will only reinforce the notion that they need to do everything. Communicate in advance, out of character if need be, that their focus on side-quests is having a real impact on the main quest and make it clear what is and isn't a side quest.

If you retcon a side quest into the main quest, why would they not keep doing what they're doing?

Jay R
2021-01-28, 09:57 PM
Yes, let the main quest start intruding on them.

But also, make a side quest that connects immediately to something that is connected to the main quest. There will be too many distractions in Paris. [There always are.]

So when they are away from the city rescuing a trade caravan, have them hear about a nearby village under attack from gnolls. As they defeat the gnolls, have two other adventures appear (you want them to have choices), but neither of them leads back to Paris. They lead to more adventures, closer to the main quest.

Dorothy kept getting side quests and missions-- help a Scarecrow get down from a post, unrust a Tin Woodman*, deal with an attacking Lion -- but each one led *to* the main quest, not away from it.

*Yes, I know -- Tin doesn't rust. Work with me here.