I just started dming for the first time this past weekend with a group of all pretty novice players. To start off I decided on using the dragon of icespire peak prewritten campaign. During the first quest at the dwarven excavation area, if anybody is not familiar with it, it's a very straight forward dungeon where two dwarves offer some sending stones and half of the loot from the dungeon if the party agrees to clear the dungeon of enemies. Everything went according to plan just fine, they killed the enemies, explored the entire dungeon, and one of them even fell for the incredibly obvious trap at the end. The issue is what happened after, upon returning to the quest givers the party almost simultaneously decided that they were going to screw over the quest givers. They bullied and intimidated, with stupidity good rolls I might add, the quest givers into keeping all of the loot that they previously agreed to split. I guess I should be happy they didnt outright kill them. I'm worried that this is going to be their go to solution going forward but I also dont want to ruin their fun if that's the type of party they want to be. I think some sort of consequences wouldn't be outlandish but I dont want to come off as a vindictive dm. I also dont want to need to rewrite a prewritten campaign because my players feel like being ***** to every npc. Honestly my first thought was to let them continue being ***** until they screw over a few too many npc then have the dwarves come back as over leveled heroes and tpk them. The campaign takes place around one town so I figure they could only mess with so many people before the town just wouldn't want them there anymore. Is that too much? I'd appreciate any advice from some more experienced dms. Anyway thanks for reading and I look forward to hearing back.
If they decided to not share the loot, they shouldn't have gotten the sending stones. Simple as that.
Track their reputation and have NPCs be unfriendly when it gets low. Have the town guard approach them citing complaints and tell them they are under investigation which may lead to fines. Have quest NPCs give them less or even wrong information in an attempt to sabotage them. Raise item and lifestyle prices. Etc.
This actually sets up a pair of antagonists for the party when they travel beyond the confines of the box adventure if you continue it. If they don't deal with the dwarves, they could hire a rival group of adventurers to hunt them down and take back what is theirs as an immediate response, long term they could set the players up, getting them involved in schemes that ruin their reputation and put them on the wrong side of a powerful organization or individual.
If the players end up killing those two dwarves, remember dwarves are clannish, a "mess with me, mess with my family" vibe, those two could easily have dozens of family members that take offense to their untimely deaths and make it their life goal to end the party in a painful manner.
Stupidly good rolls are never validation for the other side to completely give up on an agreement. When players try to pull this garbage I will sometimes allow them to change the percent of exchange (maybe 60-40 or so) but not completely turn on a deal. Have the 10 guards show up and reinforce the deal or have their clan vow revenge. Once you allow players to just dictate/trash negotiations fully cause of a die roll you are basically opening up Pandora's Box which you may not ever be able to close.
Yes, they could kill the quest giver or whatever and take it but unless you are running a completely "sure do whatever you like" story then set the parameters you are comfortable with and make the players play within them. You define the rules as the DM. They determine the story direction within the constraints of those rules.
Disclaimer: This is my view of DMing. I may be wrong in your view. We can agree to disagree. I just feel DMs need to realize that rolls are not the end all be all of success or failure.
Thanks for the reply I'll definitely take that into consideration in the future, I guess I'm just worried about steamrolling my players. I've had a couple of shitty dms in the past that left a bad taste in my mouth. I want my players to feel like they can really do anything but I agree there needs to be some limits. Since I've made the post I've talked to a couple of my players and they've agreed to cool it down a bit. On another note I've been trying my hand at writing my own campaign as we work our way through this box adventure and I can definitely say I'm learning alot. I cant say I was really prepared for how different being a dm is to just being a player.
I just started dming for the first time this past weekend with a group of all pretty novice players. To start off I decided on using the dragon of icespire peak prewritten campaign. During the first quest at the dwarven excavation area, if anybody is not familiar with it, it's a very straight forward dungeon where two dwarves offer some sending stones and half of the loot from the dungeon if the party agrees to clear the dungeon of enemies. Everything went according to plan just fine, they killed the enemies, explored the entire dungeon, and one of them even fell for the incredibly obvious trap at the end. The issue is what happened after, upon returning to the quest givers the party almost simultaneously decided that they were going to screw over the quest givers. They bullied and intimidated, with stupidity good rolls I might add, the quest givers into keeping all of the loot that they previously agreed to split. I guess I should be happy they didnt outright kill them. I'm worried that this is going to be their go to solution going forward but I also dont want to ruin their fun if that's the type of party they want to be. I think some sort of consequences wouldn't be outlandish but I dont want to come off as a vindictive dm. I also dont want to need to rewrite a prewritten campaign because my players feel like being ***** to every npc. Honestly my first thought was to let them continue being ***** until they screw over a few too many npc then have the dwarves come back as over leveled heroes and tpk them. The campaign takes place around one town so I figure they could only mess with so many people before the town just wouldn't want them there anymore. Is that too much? I'd appreciate any advice from some more experienced dms. Anyway thanks for reading and I look forward to hearing back.
If they decided to not share the loot, they shouldn't have gotten the sending stones. Simple as that.
Track their reputation and have NPCs be unfriendly when it gets low. Have the town guard approach them citing complaints and tell them they are under investigation which may lead to fines. Have quest NPCs give them less or even wrong information in an attempt to sabotage them. Raise item and lifestyle prices. Etc.
This actually sets up a pair of antagonists for the party when they travel beyond the confines of the box adventure if you continue it. If they don't deal with the dwarves, they could hire a rival group of adventurers to hunt them down and take back what is theirs as an immediate response, long term they could set the players up, getting them involved in schemes that ruin their reputation and put them on the wrong side of a powerful organization or individual.
If the players end up killing those two dwarves, remember dwarves are clannish, a "mess with me, mess with my family" vibe, those two could easily have dozens of family members that take offense to their untimely deaths and make it their life goal to end the party in a painful manner.
Stupidly good rolls are never validation for the other side to completely give up on an agreement. When players try to pull this garbage I will sometimes allow them to change the percent of exchange (maybe 60-40 or so) but not completely turn on a deal. Have the 10 guards show up and reinforce the deal or have their clan vow revenge. Once you allow players to just dictate/trash negotiations fully cause of a die roll you are basically opening up Pandora's Box which you may not ever be able to close.
Yes, they could kill the quest giver or whatever and take it but unless you are running a completely "sure do whatever you like" story then set the parameters you are comfortable with and make the players play within them. You define the rules as the DM. They determine the story direction within the constraints of those rules.
Disclaimer: This is my view of DMing. I may be wrong in your view. We can agree to disagree. I just feel DMs need to realize that rolls are not the end all be all of success or failure.
Thanks for the reply I'll definitely take that into consideration in the future, I guess I'm just worried about steamrolling my players. I've had a couple of shitty dms in the past that left a bad taste in my mouth. I want my players to feel like they can really do anything but I agree there needs to be some limits. Since I've made the post I've talked to a couple of my players and they've agreed to cool it down a bit. On another note I've been trying my hand at writing my own campaign as we work our way through this box adventure and I can definitely say I'm learning alot. I cant say I was really prepared for how different being a dm is to just being a player.
Thanks for the posting, I'm really into the idea of having their choices spin off into a lasting consequence.