Friendship is Dragons
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Page 536 - The Crowd Came Back
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I'm hoping 2015 is also the year of rent being paid on time. :x
That's something that PCs seem to rarely worry about in my circles-- rent and bills. Adventurers travel a great deal so they just need to scrounge up coin for an INN, but have you actually had a group that owned homes (or tented apartments) where they needed to hold down a job for support.
One unconventional story I have is from D&D: The PCs had purchased a run down building in a bustling town and created their own tavern. Even better was that they refurbished some meeting rooms in the back for inexperienced adventurers to network and join groups. That's right, the PCs perpetuated the "You all meet in a tavern" cliche. :D
Owning a tavern meant regular mortgage payments, as well as expenses to keep the booze flowing. Being adventurers made finding money trivial, but the fun part of it all was all the NPCs their hired to run things when they went on adventurers.
Two of their employees were former minions of BBEGs who repented and worked loyally at the taven (one was an orc cook with a really great recipe for pulled pork).
My favorite part was how the players decorated their tavern with trophies and stuff they brought back from their dungeon diving. Kinda looked like a TGI Fridays. And yeah, they even had cursed magical items hanging off the walls. That was gutsy!
That's something that PCs seem to rarely worry about in my circles-- rent and bills. Adventurers travel a great deal so they just need to scrounge up coin for an INN, but have you actually had a group that owned homes (or tented apartments) where they needed to hold down a job for support.
One unconventional story I have is from D&D: The PCs had purchased a run down building in a bustling town and created their own tavern. Even better was that they refurbished some meeting rooms in the back for inexperienced adventurers to network and join groups. That's right, the PCs perpetuated the "You all meet in a tavern" cliche. :D
Owning a tavern meant regular mortgage payments, as well as expenses to keep the booze flowing. Being adventurers made finding money trivial, but the fun part of it all was all the NPCs their hired to run things when they went on adventurers.
Two of their employees were former minions of BBEGs who repented and worked loyally at the taven (one was an orc cook with a really great recipe for pulled pork).
My favorite part was how the players decorated their tavern with trophies and stuff they brought back from their dungeon diving. Kinda looked like a TGI Fridays. And yeah, they even had cursed magical items hanging off the walls. That was gutsy!
Eeyup, though when you meet a rogue Gutsy that is trying to flamethrower you to death, it's not so 'cool' anymore. Darn things are fairly armored too, so carry EMP grenades or find cover quickly.
I prefer that over the whole "You guys are in different parts of town/farm/castle/amusement park and now must meet each other before you can actually go on adventuring!" thing that I keep getting thrown into from time to time. This almost always seems to happen with the groups that have a lot of "loner" characters in them and so someone ends up having to bribe them with money or stuff or what not so they can actually start playing the actual game they all got together to play in the first place. Heck, when our sorcerer fled for parts unknown, we had a dragonborn fighter/sorcerer that our barbarian had to pay 100 gold just to get him to join our party because he had no reason to come with us otherwise. But now I'm getting side tracked.
I tend to not have a problem with rogue Gutsy as a gauss rifle tends to go through them rather easily. Then again, a gauss rifle tends to go through everything easily so *shrug*.
After the incident at the Sierra Madre I got a holorifle and not only did I have a lot of ammo for it I was pretty good with it too. I still have in my quick select after reaching level 50 beating all the DLC and winning the dam with help of Yes Bot... So yeah Gustys are no prob. Plus in melee I have a Chainsaw! HERES BLUEBLADE!
In one of my campaigns our party overthrew a VERY corrupt paladin who was using his brand of justice to get whatever he believed he needed to pursue evil. We exposed his corruption by letting our hexblade (who was the D&D equivalent of Lad Russo from Baccano) just walk in front of the guy on the street and letting him deal the first blow. After that the hexblade acted like an innocent for a few swings before fighting back, but by then the paladin's reputation was already in the hole.
A few days later he attacked the whole party in public just outside town, and when we beat him we made sure he was dead. The whole town thanked us and gave us his mansion in gratitude, along with the butler who took care of the place.
After that we always made sure to return home and add to our trophies and wealth, plus the town was huge and had tons of magical equipment available so we had plenty of incentive to make sure bills were paid. And with the butler being a Master of the Unseen Hand, we had no issues with security.
(side note: we did accidentally destroy the mansion near the end of the campaign, but that's what happens when you take an Astral Plane pirate ship out of its native plane and into the Material.)
A few days later he attacked the whole party in public just outside town, and when we beat him we made sure he was dead. The whole town thanked us and gave us his mansion in gratitude, along with the butler who took care of the place.
After that we always made sure to return home and add to our trophies and wealth, plus the town was huge and had tons of magical equipment available so we had plenty of incentive to make sure bills were paid. And with the butler being a Master of the Unseen Hand, we had no issues with security.
(side note: we did accidentally destroy the mansion near the end of the campaign, but that's what happens when you take an Astral Plane pirate ship out of its native plane and into the Material.)
I had a wizard who was graduating from college and looking for a place to call his own, but he used adventurer real estate - find an abandoned tower, clear out the monsters, and call it your own.
Heh, I am currently running a PF game where the PCs started out as home-owners in a frontier town and the theme of the game is to save the town from unknown evil. In that game, though, money isn't the cost of ownership...doing what the mayor of the town says is. The Mayor and her family literally owns more than half the homes and businesses in the little town, so the PCs are pretty beholden to her (even though they are aware of how corrupt she and her family are.) Amusingly, rather than expose or oppose the mayor's corruption, they mostly accept it as the cost of doing business, and the gunslinger is actually the mayor's constable who enforces the mayor's control over the town.
In another campaign that I was a player in, our group was starting a thieves' guild in a town to compete with the existing guild there. We were doing pretty well at getting control of territory in one district when we ran into the most frightening NPC that a PC group trying to appear legitimate can run across...the tax collector. I still suspect our rivals bribed that tax collector to come after us. It completely blew our attempt to stay under the legal radar since either the tax collector was honest or the original bribe/blackmail was so effective that we could neither afford the bribe nor the taxes. >.<
In another campaign that I was a player in, our group was starting a thieves' guild in a town to compete with the existing guild there. We were doing pretty well at getting control of territory in one district when we ran into the most frightening NPC that a PC group trying to appear legitimate can run across...the tax collector. I still suspect our rivals bribed that tax collector to come after us. It completely blew our attempt to stay under the legal radar since either the tax collector was honest or the original bribe/blackmail was so effective that we could neither afford the bribe nor the taxes. >.<
The great part about the party being invested in a home is that they aren't murderhobos.
People tend to be less certain about that point if they're all settled into a retirement centre, however. All it takes is a couple of retired detectives hearing about a few articles of allegedly stolen clothing and suddenly the body count no one would blink at in a goblin's lair starts to look awfully embarrassing. You'll never quite understand anything about half the complex burning down either. Not the why of it, nor the how, and you may even wind up uncertain about the who.
Hey, if a tavern is good enough for John Dortmunder, it's good enough for any adventuring party.
Sure, "You all meet on the Titanic," sounded like a good idea at the time...
Sure, "You all meet on the Titanic," sounded like a good idea at the time...
Expense/envander job... Well I had a group run around trying to run a fortress once. It went up as they bought a small island near this country full of islands. Not that big of an island, but big enough to have a fortress and some running room.
After buying the materials and workers to finally have their shining fortress... came the bills. Turns out the island fortress cost a bit of money putting a huge blow in their cash flow. So they tried getting some extra revenue.
First was the old merc option except anyone useful they found would (or captured if enemy that didn't tick them off) be given a job offer. Then they would work as ag roup with the others. Then they took all the weapons and armors looted from the bodies and started selling them at stalls near their merc fort.
That of course led to getting more people which lead to someone hiring a cook which of course lead to hiring NPCS who didn't fight to work. Then somewhere along the way one of them asked where did the town surrounding their fort come from and were they collecting taxes?
Funny part that came out of this. The town was making more money than they were and it also made them realize they were a tiny island nation. That of course lead to the idea of trying to join with the island nations and try to become rulers.
(Their point was that if they did succeed than their next characters could be one of the hired mercs from their own origination. with them trying to pay off a bill to their old characters)
It was kind of funny to watch even though it was a fast campaign. Never saw the group more concerned with economics and political situations than killing monsters before and spending gold to make them even more powerful.
After buying the materials and workers to finally have their shining fortress... came the bills. Turns out the island fortress cost a bit of money putting a huge blow in their cash flow. So they tried getting some extra revenue.
First was the old merc option except anyone useful they found would (or captured if enemy that didn't tick them off) be given a job offer. Then they would work as ag roup with the others. Then they took all the weapons and armors looted from the bodies and started selling them at stalls near their merc fort.
That of course led to getting more people which lead to someone hiring a cook which of course lead to hiring NPCS who didn't fight to work. Then somewhere along the way one of them asked where did the town surrounding their fort come from and were they collecting taxes?
Funny part that came out of this. The town was making more money than they were and it also made them realize they were a tiny island nation. That of course lead to the idea of trying to join with the island nations and try to become rulers.
(Their point was that if they did succeed than their next characters could be one of the hired mercs from their own origination. with them trying to pay off a bill to their old characters)
It was kind of funny to watch even though it was a fast campaign. Never saw the group more concerned with economics and political situations than killing monsters before and spending gold to make them even more powerful.
Hee hee, but seeing PCs get invested in a game like that means you're doing something right as the GM. :D
Indeed... <scribble scribble>
*Blueblade reads note*
"It just says... that I put in 4 periods after 'I see' instead of 3?"
*Blueblade reads note*
"It just says... that I put in 4 periods after 'I see' instead of 3?"
Because 4 periods are more suspicious than 3 because 3 can be used to make this emote :3
*reads note from DM*
Hmmmmmmm.... *scribble scribble*
*reads note from DM*
Hmmmmmmm.... *scribble scribble*
Here's hoping 2015 is even better! Hopefully I'll have better stories to tell this time around. :P
It is a glorious and tragic thing when a DM and player team up to thwart the party. Not gonna lie, but I see RD's lightning bolt stunt coming imminently and some serious backlash from the party.
I don't know if it matters to you, but you know you just gave the internet enough information to track you down to your hometown and your age, right?
It's surprising how well Applejack's expression fits her final comment. It's surprising because I'd never have imagined that expression matching what she said until I read her saying it and, suddenly, it's perfect.
Who am I kidding, of course she is. I just hope the end result doesn't end up like our groups own.
That and the fact that its been pointed out that a stallion's voice was heard instead of a mare's voice makes me want to think that it isn't one of the party that is doing this. But I have been wrong before so I guess we'll just have to wait and find out.
The three of us were jailed for "assaulting" a guard who was about to kill a old peasant man (if the topic comes up, I'll tell the story), and before I continue, it was I who assaulted him... with a teammate. Anyway, the magistrate was telling us our crimes and our soon to be punishment when I (an orc brawler, it may not be a barbarian, but I could have passed for one), who had been staring at a wall the entire time, turned around and charged the cell door. I broke it down and knocked the magistrate prone and essentially helpless. The two guards at the end of the hall decided that was a good time to try and help their boss.
The ensuing fight was I smacking everyone around with my fists and our cleric performing random spells that could aid us, and our ranger trying to figure a way out of her cell. The battle ended with us winning and getting a one way ticket out of the village.
Barbarian's (or those of similar kin) are loose cannons with the most efficient (if completed) plans.
Also, Mykin, I pray you're right about what Rainbow is doing, it would probably end really hilariously if she does.
Anyone have stories about celebrations in your d&d game that DIDN'T go wrong?
I'm surprised nobody made the connection between note-passing shenanigans and the game Paranoia with AJ's commentary yet.
Happy New Years. Some of us are still around despite our best interests.
Here's to more tabletop ponies in the year to come. 2014 was a year of experimentation, breakdown, and renewal. Let's hope 2015 is a year of continued success through diligence.