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Author Topic: GMing Tip: Give your Players Minions.  (Read 1977 times)

robertliguori

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GMing Tip: Give your Players Minions.
« on: May 18, 2021, 10:59:04 AM »
One consistent point I've consciously tried to stress in the campaigns I run is to give the PCs underlings, or minions.

What do I mean by minions? Well, basically the same thing that's meant when used by the various adversaries of the campaign; low-level characters in their employ or otherwise bound to their will, and if not always perfectly competent, with sufficient loyalty to be left alone to do their best to accomplish their leader's goals. 

Why minions? A bunch of reasons.

First, PCs are exceptional.  Even in systems where PCs start at low level and don't have cosmic power, having a few people who are meant to stand in as baseline individuals lets you emphasize how, even if the PCs aren't superhuman (yet!), they are still a cut above, by giving them a man-at-arms who does his best, but lacks the infinite drive and indifference to hardships that PCs effortlessly display.

Secondly, it lets you handle the small stuff.  At the level where PCs can be assumed to handle a particular kind of challenge without risk, they should be able to have their people handle the challenge for them.  It explains why the PCs are not wasting screen-time with whatever the challenge is most of the time while still bringing in a reason to deal with the challenge if things so suddenly wrong, and in so doing, you make that kind of encounter interesting.

It also lets you introduce needed capacity in terms of allies more gracefully.  If the campaign really expects that you have a cleric as healer and condition-remover and no one is interested in playing that role, then it's a lot simpler to introduce an NPC cleric ally as buffered by the PC's entourage than just dropping them into the party proper.  Also, having an entourage of NPCs with defined histories and skillsets makes it a lot easier to drop a needed clue or direction on the party when needed, and always lets you provide a bunch of different perspectives on a creature or event in the game world to let the PCs come to their own conclusions.

While minions should always be a net benefit to the party, you can also use them tactically in specific situations to help drive the plot in certain directions.  A small group of PCs can probably live off the land in the deep wilderness indefinitely; if the party have a druid and are willing to say "Sure, let's just not stop off in any towns at all as we cross Occupied Kingdom.  Showers and beds are overrated!", then they can avoid a lot of plot hooks.  And it gets worse when the party wizard gets Teleport in a few levels.  But by giving the PCs a group of allies they don't want to just leave in the lurch, then you can limit them to two kinds of travel; normal travel with their allies, or short bursts of stealthy or rapid travel that lets them use all of their PC abilities, but will still need to take them back to their allies sooner or later.

Minions are also a great way to softly nudge the campaign along a particular moral path as well.  Having otherwise ruthless and loyal NPC allies balk at a suggested course of action is a great way to suggest, without judgement, that the party might want to find another option, even if looting the village, burning it, and scattering their stolen dragon-scales to start a war between the kingdom and their nearby draconic enemy would be a really great plan.  It also provides a much stronger justification for ruthless PCs who want a good reason not to take the horrible, optimal path; if the long-term hobgoblin bodyguard of the wizard would be really sad if the wizard started leaning into necromancy, then the wizard would lose a friend and ally even if the party is fine with it, so the player has a built-in excuse for their PC, who has every other in-character reason to start their undead army, to hold off.  And, of course, using NPCs as morality pets means that when you as GM have another villain threaten the beloved allies of the party, you're giving them permission to take all the breaks off.

And finally, to that point, minions present a great soft spot for villains to target.  PCs often don't have strong or significant relationships with their families, simply because families rarely come up in play a lot, but going after the party's beloved manager, who has been canvassing taverns and work-boards from the beginning of their journey and got them their very first assignment to exterminate the dire rat in a grandmother's cellar, can produce a similar effect, and one that every PC can partake in equally.  NPC allies also offer a way for the adventuring group to get in over their head without it being any PC's fault; if the PCs do have an NPC whose loyalty is unquestioned and whose service is of great value most of the time, then having them screw up and need the PCs to bail them out by going along with the adventure lets you have your hook without having to trick a PC into taking it, and makes it a better hook, because the PCs are choosing to go along with it until they can solve the problem for their ally, and not just stringing the adventure along until they can bail.

The one real downside is that NPC minions create more work for the GM.  Not only do you need to juggle a bunch more sheets (even if they are abbreviated), you need to be able to drop into one of a bunch of roles on no notice, if the PCs turn to one of their entourage and ask questions you had never considered them asking.  But if you do that prep work, and get in the habit of thinking through things in the world from how the core NPCs and the PCs are likely to see them, then you'll end up with a more detailed, more lived-in world.

Omega

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Re: GMing Tip: Give your Players Minions.
« Reply #1 on: May 18, 2021, 11:05:37 AM »
Retainers, Henchmen, Hirelings, Followers, and Mercenaries used to be an integral part of O, B, BX and AD&D. But were phased out by 2e in favour of the occasional NPC joining the group usually temporarily. They make a comeback in 5e with the Companion/Sidekick system from Essentials and Tasha.

Few other RPGs ever had any that I have ever seen.
« Last Edit: May 18, 2021, 11:08:59 AM by Omega »

Shrieking Banshee

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Re: GMing Tip: Give your Players Minions.
« Reply #2 on: May 18, 2021, 11:46:46 AM »
My players never care. They just don't care to micromanage.

robertliguori

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Re: GMing Tip: Give your Players Minions.
« Reply #3 on: May 18, 2021, 11:54:03 AM »
My players never care. They just don't care to micromanage.

That is why I am calling this distinct from the hireling and mercenary rules, and included the line about independent action there.  Making it into a subsystem means that it gets optimized.  You want the PCs to have a personal relationship with the hirelings.

And there are a lot of things you can include to make them want people around to do the work.  As mentioned above, a manager hireling who pre-screens adventure hooks for obvious traps and scams is, if nothing else, a great time savings.  If your players don't want to micromanage, then specify that they've got an allied NPC following them around who makes sure nothing gets left behind after they camp for the night, refills all of their consumables between adventures, hones and polishes the (nonmagical) weapons regularly, and so on.

If the players are just wholly uninterested in relationships with NPCs, then I suppose there's not a lot you can do, but there are loads of busywork tasks that someone should have to do that get glossed over in most campaigns.  Neglecting to ignore them, and instead saying "This adventure is not bogged down in minutia because of those NPCs over there (who take a small cut from your looted treasure which is deducted behind the scenes, so it's effectively free to you).", gets you NPCs which the players can interact with and keep as persistent characters across adventures, and lets you sometimes gamify things like running out of arrows without making the rule "Ammo tracking sucks." and then running into a case where you really need to do it.

Shrieking Banshee

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Re: GMing Tip: Give your Players Minions.
« Reply #4 on: May 18, 2021, 12:12:23 PM »
You want the PCs to have a personal relationship with the hirelings.
And I mean they just generally don't super care. Systems or no systems. They prefer to be as independent as possible.

Any NPCs given they will be protective and respectful of, because they play respectful and good characters. But it never really engages them.
I could bring up the minutia, but that's just more effort for me for a response of 'Thats nice' from them.
The thing is I love base building, and minions, but that's me as a player. Most groups I get involved in are more about 'Get to the adventure already'.
Its not that they are utterly NPC/ethics unmotivated or whatever. Some of my NPCs have been great hits with them. But as employers, or villains, or gags.
In addition, they are immensely self-reliant. Many have overlapping abilities because they don't want to be dependant.
If in game I gave them a loyal NPC to make them dinner, they would generally resort to their own rations instead (out of fear or poisoning or whatever).

I very much wish they were into the minutia, but sadly they are not. They have other virtues instead.

Edit: You brought up arrows. As a funny example one of the first things the archer PC sought out was an endless quiver.
« Last Edit: May 18, 2021, 12:19:05 PM by Shrieking Banshee »

oggsmash

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Re: GMing Tip: Give your Players Minions.
« Reply #5 on: May 18, 2021, 03:21:13 PM »
  I have a campaign where I do have a number of NPCs who have ended up working for the PCs.  They seem to really like it (its GURPS, and it also allows me to be a bit more creative with 'rewards' from adventures rather than just giving points alone I can add an advantage with regard to people to help, reputation, wealth holdings, or influence with important people) as they feel a good deal more "important" I guess.   It is a sword and sorcery setting where magic is rare, dangerous and almost inaccessible (so far) to the PCs.  So there are mundane concerns that come into play a bit more often then in a higher fantasy setting.

Ratman_tf

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Re: GMing Tip: Give your Players Minions.
« Reply #6 on: May 18, 2021, 03:53:19 PM »
For my Dark Sun campaign that never went into domain management  :- I planned to give each PC an advisor suited to their class. The advisor would be a way to give them adventure-bite-sized info bits about their realm, and possible solutions to problems. Like rumors in a tavern, but specified to their domain.
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Lunamancer

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Re: GMing Tip: Give your Players Minions.
« Reply #7 on: May 19, 2021, 12:10:50 AM »
1E is built for this. And I mean that very literally. An often overlooked and underappreciated facet of how the game is put together is that it assumes the 0th level human as the basis. A whole lot about the game makes a lot more sense once you recognize this.

-Some have complained about Fighters being weak, not keeping pace with the mage power curve. Or that they're simply boring. No special widgets or buttons to press. But really fighters are the ultimate bad-asses. At hero level (4th) you get 4 attack routines when in melee with 0th level minions. You're built to be wading into enemy minions.
-Seems weird how you have to have attributes extremely high or extremely low for them to give you bonuses or penalties to certain activities. At the same time, the DM is instructed to generate ordinary NPCs using 3d6, counting 1's as 3's and 6's as 4's. This virtually eliminates any chance for their being attribute-related adjustments. This saves the DM the trouble of having to track attributes for 0th level minions.
-Descending armor class also seems weird and counter-intuitive to a lot of people. But it works out that Your AC is your chance (in 20) of being hit by a 0th level human. This saves the DM the trouble of having to keep the 0th level minions hit tables or THAC0.
-A lot of people have complained about how lethal the game is at low levels. But it seems as if it was deliberately calibrated so that 0th level NPCs are almost always one-hit kills. That saves the DM the trouble of having to track their hit points.
-Save or Die effects, and level drains, have been called buzz-kills. But 0th level minions are perfect for absorbing these attacks. The poison or energy drain that is so dreadful to PCs, against 0th level minions will largely be wasted since the normal attack damage itself is likely to kill the 0th level minion, drawing down the potency of these attacks substantially if minions are employed.
That's my two cents anyway. Carry on, crawler.

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Kyle Aaron

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Re: GMing Tip: Give your Players Minions.
« Reply #8 on: May 19, 2021, 12:33:56 AM »
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Omega

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Re: GMing Tip: Give your Players Minions.
« Reply #9 on: May 19, 2021, 01:10:41 AM »
My players never care. They just don't care to micromanage.

That is why I am calling this distinct from the hireling and mercenary rules, and included the line about independent action there.  Making it into a subsystem means that it gets optimized.  You want the PCs to have a personal relationship with the hirelings.

Except that aside from the new interaction and sidekick/companion system for 5e... The rules for hirelings, henchmen, etc were...

You talk to them and pay them as needed. Maybe make a reaction check, maybe not. Or just pay them and thats that in some cases.

Thats it.

If that is too complex for players then they should not be playing RPGs.

Bren

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Re: GMing Tip: Give your Players Minions.
« Reply #10 on: May 19, 2021, 01:24:20 AM »
-Save or Die effects, and level drains, have been called buzz-kills. But 0th level minions are perfect for absorbing these attacks. The poison or energy drain that is so dreadful to PCs, against 0th level minions will largely be wasted since the normal attack damage itself is likely to kill the 0th level minion, drawing down the potency of these attacks substantially if minions are employed.
Well that's an angle I had not considered.   8)

Though you'd want really loyal minions so they don't fail the morale check for facing mini-Nazgul Wraiths.
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Lunamancer

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Re: GMing Tip: Give your Players Minions.
« Reply #11 on: May 19, 2021, 09:02:42 AM »
Except that aside from the new interaction and sidekick/companion system for 5e... The rules for hirelings, henchmen, etc were...

You talk to them and pay them as needed. Maybe make a reaction check, maybe not. Or just pay them and thats that in some cases.

Thats it.

If that is too complex for players then they should not be playing RPGs.

I believe you are correct. But to play devil's advocate, look at what Bren posted immediately following this post of yours. It's what I consider a very "2nd edition" attitude.

Let me explain that a bit. 1E had some detailed rules for loyalty, and big bad monster jumping out and swallowing a couple of your minions up were not marks against loyalty. In fact, if you jump into the fray trying to save your minions, that could actually increase loyalty. 2E scrapped the loyalty rules in the interest of streamlining, and so presumably to avoid abuse of NPCs in the absence of loyalty rules, it opted for some vague finger wagging about if too many of your NPC companions get killed, no one will want to be your friend. And it seems to me the 2E approach is more widely adopted than the 1E one, probably because it takes less effort and only requires remembering a fairly intuitive general principle.

But if that's the mindset, if every low level schmuck that dies just because something bad happened outside the PC's control results in a bad mark on the PC's permanent record, I wouldn't want to deal with having NPC minions either. At that point, they become a huge liability. So I think the real burden is not the rules or the record-keeping but rather the quasi-ethical one imposed by the "2nd edition" attitude towards NPC companions. I think that's the part most players find off-putting about having hirelings. And I think that's the thing the OP was trying to fix by imagining minions as perfectly loyal.
That's my two cents anyway. Carry on, crawler.

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robertliguori

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Re: GMing Tip: Give your Players Minions.
« Reply #12 on: May 19, 2021, 11:44:44 AM »
Except that aside from the new interaction and sidekick/companion system for 5e... The rules for hirelings, henchmen, etc were...

You talk to them and pay them as needed. Maybe make a reaction check, maybe not. Or just pay them and thats that in some cases.

Thats it.

If that is too complex for players then they should not be playing RPGs.

I believe you are correct. But to play devil's advocate, look at what Bren posted immediately following this post of yours. It's what I consider a very "2nd edition" attitude.

Let me explain that a bit. 1E had some detailed rules for loyalty, and big bad monster jumping out and swallowing a couple of your minions up were not marks against loyalty. In fact, if you jump into the fray trying to save your minions, that could actually increase loyalty. 2E scrapped the loyalty rules in the interest of streamlining, and so presumably to avoid abuse of NPCs in the absence of loyalty rules, it opted for some vague finger wagging about if too many of your NPC companions get killed, no one will want to be your friend. And it seems to me the 2E approach is more widely adopted than the 1E one, probably because it takes less effort and only requires remembering a fairly intuitive general principle.

But if that's the mindset, if every low level schmuck that dies just because something bad happened outside the PC's control results in a bad mark on the PC's permanent record, I wouldn't want to deal with having NPC minions either. At that point, they become a huge liability. So I think the real burden is not the rules or the record-keeping but rather the quasi-ethical one imposed by the "2nd edition" attitude towards NPC companions. I think that's the part most players find off-putting about having hirelings. And I think that's the thing the OP was trying to fix by imagining minions as perfectly loyal.

Yeah, that's it exactly.  Also, another point is that most of the support staff of adventurers should not be accompanying them into hot zones.  The gnomish scribe and historian who's main job is to check all maps offered by suspicious robed men in taverns for signs of fraud or forgery, provides historical context on what exact kind of horrible traps the party can expect to be most likely in each historical era of ruins, and also can trade historical curious recovered from said ruins to museums and collectors for a good price (on which he takes his commission) should not be brought into the dungeon unless the party is specifically up for an escort mission, or after they've cleared a ruin and want his expertise on translating the poem on the door they couldn't force open.

But I think that there's also a mindset shift here.  Minions should be, like that guy, specific individuals, with specific skillsets that make the party want them to be around at least some of the time.  The idea of a morale penalty for a generic pool of hirelings in the future is thinking of things wrongly; the penalty for getting your historian contact killed is that you don't have that contact any more, and that can lock the party out of treasure, opportunities, and quests just as surely as feeding the magic jeweled key they found to a rust monster.

---

To be honest, I hadn't considered that some players would be so allergic to having NPC allies.  On the other hand, I also recognize that there is a reason "Curse your sudden-but-inevitable-betrayal!" is a joke.  And on reflection, I feel like the right way to get at that kind of player paranoia would be to encourage it.  Part of the problem of modern storytelling inherited from monster-of-the-week serial shows is that it's very often that the party's friendly new ally is connected to or perhaps just actually the monster, so when a 5th-wheel friendly ally shows up, a lot of people are waiting for the other shoe to drop.  That mercenary who respects the PCs for saving the starting town from a goblin warband six sessions ago could indeed be an agent of the Dark Wizard.

But so could the tavernkeeper who sold them their provisions.  So could the random guard who let them into town.  So could the quest-giver who directed them towards a death-trap-filled tomb.  So could every merchant who buys and sells with them.  And unless the PCs want to start their own economy, they're going to have to deal with a lot of people, and trust in the generalized abstraction that a random merchant picked out of a crowd of merchants hasn't been marked by the GM as a special NPC, and so can be trusted to fill their role as a money-into-service vendor.

But if you break that assumption a few times, by having random NPC vendors be cheats or incompetent or secretly allies of the party's enemies, then you can make NPC allies that the PCs have who have demonstrated value and worth mean more.  Of course, you can also turn the PCs into full-on murderhobos who decide to just start going full criminal, so you need to be careful with this method.

---

Also, I am reminded of one aborted campaign I ran which had major problems with this.  The original plan was for it to be an urban campaign, moderately heavy on intrigue and politics and factions within the cities.  One player suggested bringing a changeling to the party, as their natural shapeshifting and impersonation abilities would be a natural fit for an intrigue campaign.  Then every other player agreed, everyone was playing a changeling, and the party essentially never got into the campaign because they did everything under aliases, and the minute a rival faction started trying to pressure them, they'd just drop their identities and re-introduce themselves to the city as another group of new adventurers.  Among other things, it was a lesson to me as GM for how bonds to allied NPCs are important, and need to be cultivated and baked into the campaign from the start; because with the resources available to most adventurers, you need a carrot as well as a stick to get the PCs to engage with the world socially, or else they can just opt out of reputation, name, and identity if they want to.

Bren

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Re: GMing Tip: Give your Players Minions.
« Reply #13 on: May 19, 2021, 04:43:13 PM »
I believe you are correct. But to play devil's advocate, look at what Bren posted immediately following this post of yours. It's what I consider a very "2nd edition" attitude.
Technically it's my OD&D attitude. I never used 2nd Edition.

My point though was that it isn't very reasonable for a 0 level character armed with a normal spear/halberd/sword/axe that can't even damage the wight or wraith to calmly stand, fight, and die. That fighter is going to need to be really, really motivated to fight (especially in the front rank) rather than turning tail and running while hoping the life-draining undead monster stops to drain someone else...like that dwarf in plate armor. NPCs shouldn't be a counter on a board game that the player can just push around regardless of circumstance and absent some strong rationale very, very few people are going to act like Kamikaze pilots.

Now if that high charisma fighter or paladin who has been a reliable and fair (maybe even generous) employer is standing right next to the 0 level fighter and the fighter's been equipped with a silvered spear (silver used to hit wights, can't recall if it also worked against wraiths, but assume it does for the sake of this example) that's going to be a different situation with a morale check that the NPC may well pass.
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robertliguori

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Re: GMing Tip: Give your Players Minions.
« Reply #14 on: May 19, 2021, 06:15:58 PM »
I believe you are correct. But to play devil's advocate, look at what Bren posted immediately following this post of yours. It's what I consider a very "2nd edition" attitude.
Technically it's my OD&D attitude. I never used 2nd Edition.

My point though was that it isn't very reasonable for a 0 level character armed with a normal spear/halberd/sword/axe that can't even damage the wight or wraith to calmly stand, fight, and die. That fighter is going to need to be really, really motivated to fight (especially in the front rank) rather than turning tail and running while hoping the life-draining undead monster stops to drain someone else...like that dwarf in plate armor. NPCs shouldn't be a counter on a board game that the player can just push around regardless of circumstance and absent some strong rationale very, very few people are going to act like Kamikaze pilots.

Now if that high charisma fighter or paladin who has been a reliable and fair (maybe even generous) employer is standing right next to the 0 level fighter and the fighter's been equipped with a silvered spear (silver used to hit wights, can't recall if it also worked against wraiths, but assume it does for the sake of this example) that's going to be a different situation with a morale check that the NPC may well pass.

Yeah, standing and trading blows with a monster with supernatural fear or DR is not something that should be in the minion wheelhouse.

On the other hand, useful minions might withdraw and start lighting and hurling torches everywhere, to make sure there are no more undead hiding in the shadows (and maybe inconveniencing a wight if another minion thinks to start pelting it with flasks of lamp oil).

And, of course, if you the player are willing to spend thousands of gold on holy water on your minions, then you can make any kind of singular undead target very much regret its choice in all-you-can-eat humanoid buffet line.  But again, heroes are special, and part of that specialness is being able to stand against threats the merely brave quail against.

But again, my point is the party should not be adventuring with a level 0 character defined entirely by their gear.  They should have names and relationships to the PCs, and if they can't help at whatever challenge presents itself, then (barring cunning misinformation from a villain or the party choosing to bring them along for their own reasons) they shouldn't be there in the first place.

And, as GM, since I want to foster those kind of relationships since PCs having strong ties to NPCs makes for a better game, than I can ensure that, e.g., the hirelings do a controlled retreat from the fight with the wight, and instead manage to counter a flanking maneuver from a pack of skeletons that were alerted by the noise and would have made the fight that much harder had they finished sneaking in.

But that's because I go for a very narrative-heavy and character-driven game myself, and specifically find that (and have players that find that) more interesting than doing some quick math to find the most efficient way to get to the next 10' room and beat up the orc there for his pie.