I'm going to be running a session in a couple weeks where the party is essentially wanted and going to be searched for by the city guards. I'm looking for encounter ideas that can fill the gap. They don't have to be super detailed or anything, for example, one of the ideas I have is a woman has found a piece of cloth that belonged to one of the character's outfits. She's found by the guards and they believe her to know the location of the characters and interrogate her, even going as far as going to kill her over getting information out. The characters can either intervene or not, doesn't really matter. But I'm looking for other kinds of encounters in this set up. I would use some from the first episode of Hoard of the Dragon Queen in a similar fashion, but most of my group has already played that campaign, so I need new ideas. Anything indoors, outdoors, underground is fair game! Combat encounters, moral dilemmas, anything else!
First thing that jumps to mind is a skill challenge! Matt Colville outlines them in his video here. Maybe they have their current location reported to the city guard, and get notice that they're coming just minutes before the guards bust down the door. Run a skill challenge for them to hide or escape without confrontation. If done right, it can be really cinematic, and super memorable!
Edit: See another forum post here on dndbeyond about skill challenges here.
A noble pretends to believe the players' innocence and takes them in, offering them room and board. The food is drugged, and the players gets dragged off to a torture chamber that the noble uses for entertainment (only on people who won't be missed, like criminals or slum rats), or the players may get taken to an illegal underground fighting arena for nobles' entertainment, or they may be used as offerings in some dark rituals that the noble is conducting.
The party runs into and spill the drink of a drunk off-duty city guard, and have to go through an social encounter to avoid being recognized.
Your party's rogue might get some time to shine, and sees some signs written in the thieves' cant about safe havens in the city, or other places that leads to interactions with the city's thieves' guild.
The party gets a bounty on their heads, and bounty hunters starts showing up!
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I'm going to be running a session in a couple weeks where the party is essentially wanted and going to be searched for by the city guards. I'm looking for encounter ideas that can fill the gap. They don't have to be super detailed or anything, for example, one of the ideas I have is a woman has found a piece of cloth that belonged to one of the character's outfits. She's found by the guards and they believe her to know the location of the characters and interrogate her, even going as far as going to kill her over getting information out. The characters can either intervene or not, doesn't really matter. But I'm looking for other kinds of encounters in this set up. I would use some from the first episode of Hoard of the Dragon Queen in a similar fashion, but most of my group has already played that campaign, so I need new ideas. Anything indoors, outdoors, underground is fair game! Combat encounters, moral dilemmas, anything else!
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First thing that jumps to mind is a skill challenge! Matt Colville outlines them in his video here. Maybe they have their current location reported to the city guard, and get notice that they're coming just minutes before the guards bust down the door. Run a skill challenge for them to hide or escape without confrontation. If done right, it can be really cinematic, and super memorable!
Edit: See another forum post here on dndbeyond about skill challenges here.
Here are a few quick ideas:
A noble pretends to believe the players' innocence and takes them in, offering them room and board. The food is drugged, and the players gets dragged off to a torture chamber that the noble uses for entertainment (only on people who won't be missed, like criminals or slum rats), or the players may get taken to an illegal underground fighting arena for nobles' entertainment, or they may be used as offerings in some dark rituals that the noble is conducting.
The party runs into and spill the drink of a drunk off-duty city guard, and have to go through an social encounter to avoid being recognized.
Your party's rogue might get some time to shine, and sees some signs written in the thieves' cant about safe havens in the city, or other places that leads to interactions with the city's thieves' guild.
The party gets a bounty on their heads, and bounty hunters starts showing up!