Sort of written myself into a corner...

[NOhara24]

Patches, Sinn (two N's because it's edgy), Aster and Shatonia Bon Qui-Qui Monroe-Jones; don't read this. Spoilers may follow.

Hey playground, I need some direction in the campaign that I'm running. Here's more or less what's happened in the form of bullet points:

Before the campaign started:

• War between the Drow and The Church (loosely organized group of good-aligned worshipers) left the Drow scattered and Lolth dead.

What the players have experienced at this point:

• The remaining Drow are seemingly starting to organize and strike back at the Church, attacking small cities and making key assassinations of low-level officials within the Church with the intent of causing discord and paranoia among citizens. It's working.
• Both major cities the players have been in have been attacked in some fashion. The first city, Drywind, was razed. Players managed to save the Cleric assigned to the town and most of the townsfolk, but the captain of the guard and a couple key NPCs died as well.
• The second city,Oasis, while not subject to an overt attack, did see their church-appointed Magistrate assassinated and impersonated by what the players think is the same individual that masqueraded as the Captain of the town guard in Drywind.

Where I'm running into trouble:

• In both major cities the players have been to, I've run the same gag twice. The antagonist(s) comes in, abducts a person of importance and while disguised as his victim he orders the players around to do his dirty work for awhile until he can either organize his forces and attack the city (Drywind) or kill his victim in private and display his corpse in a public place for all to see (Oasis).
• I haven't given my players many juicy clues just as to who they are opposing or what their next move should be.

Now, my knee-jerk reaction is to throw them a bone for their trouble. Give them some sort of key information that would get the wheels in their heads spinning and motivate them to move the campaign in the direction of their choice instead of me saying "Well, now you're going here." Basically give them the carrot instead of the stick to get them moving.

My other thought is to do what I've done before. Send them to a new city and see if they've caught onto the M.O. of their foe(s) and if they do, they'll thwart an attack on the city they're in and catch the enemy with their pants down. Dangling the carrot in front of them and threaten with the stick if they fail.

What say you?

[Lord Torath]

Well, if you don't "throw them a bone for their troubles" as you put it, I would certainly "Throw them Three Clues" at the very least.

Have they told you what they think is going on? That can give you a pretty good idea of what you need to let them discover.

[Erasmas]

Why not do both - give them a juicy clue that leads them to the next city where they may or may not be able to catch the Baddie in the act?

[Lord Torath]

But make it three clues.

[TheStranger]

But make it three clues.

This. You said you hadn't given your players a lot of juicy clues; give them some. Then give them some more. Give them enough clues that you feel foolish for leading them by the hand. Then, if you're lucky, you'll only have to spend an hour or two holding your tongue while they ignore the obvious answer and try to figure out how to prove that the priest from the first adventure who looked at them funny (because they didn't wipe their feet before entering the church) is actually hiring a doppleganger to pretend to be a drow to bring the church leadership down so that the priest (who is obviously a drow in disguise) can become an archbishop and resurrect Lloth.

And if that's really what's going on, may the gods have mercy on you.

[NOhara24]

Well, if you don't "throw them a bone for their troubles" as you put it, I would certainly "Throw them Three Clues" at the very least.

Have they told you what they think is going on? That can give you a pretty good idea of what you need to let them discover.

Good link, that really helped. I'm going to have to adhere to that rule from now on.

But make it three clues.

Oh you.

[KillianHawkeye]

IMO, if the drow's strategy keeps working, there's no reason for them to stop using it.

I suggest keeping to the literary tradition of repetition. That being that when something happens a second time, you play it straight, but when it happens a third time, you subvert it.

Thus, on the third time your players experience this scenario, something unexpected happens that causes the truth to be revealed. Maybe they meet someone else who's found out the truth. Maybe they catch the villian in the act this time. Maybe they get lucky and find wherever the villian is stashing his supplies or minions and lay a trap to catch him there. The point is that either something goes wrong with the villain's plans or some outside force acts as a catalyst to trigger the heroes' discovery of the villain's plans.

[tommhans]

you can always make an awesome threat agaist the whole country, and they get told that there are some certain important information about the enemy in another city they havent been in, and another city after that may have equipment to help you defeat this evildoing threat. Now they suddenly have choices to make on their own, and they lead themselves to the place of their choice.

Do they have background stories, maybe put some of their cities/town etc into the story, making them also a bigger part of the story, thus also making some other places for them to visit.

Just some thoughts ofc, im a new dm, but this is what my old dm did, and im just continuing this story, and its not stupid, they make every choice on their own, i do a little force here and there but that has to happen so that they can get on the "right" track. I also punish them secretly when they waste time, cities get destroyed because they rather joke around. ^^