To a point, everyone has to rely on allies- having friends and other people you can trust to do what's needed when you can't do everything yourself. But just how far can you really trust them?
It's a fact of life that everyone is going to have their own motivations and agenda. For the most part, NPCs' agendas won't be important- whether a city guard wants to retire next week or get home to marry their sweetheart will usually just be background information. But in some cases, they may take advantage of what happens in order to advance their own goals. Some examples of how you can use Allies' goals in your game: - While hunting down a cult, a Noble family lends a cohort of guards to help round up the cultists, confronting them all at once rather than letting them escape to hunt down the Player Characters. But when they go off-script and slaughter the scions of another noble family, disguising the battle as part of the fight against the cult, this might cause unintended results for your PCs. - A loyal armsman's motivation for being loyal may not be as straightforward as possible- he's saved a PC's life many times, cared for them when they were sick and polished their armour- but if the truth about their criminal past comes to light, their cushy and protected position might be in danger. - A reclusive wizard lives alone in her tower in the woods, refusing to intervene in local matters. At first, this seems to be an infuriating statement of neutrality even when innocents are threatened- but a prophecy stating that her power will burn the town to ash if it is unleashed, puts a different spin on this choice. Also posted on Game Masters Stash on 15 November 2019. Comments are closed.
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AuthorI'm Luke. He/him pronouns. Archives
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