Secrets of the Halmae: My Players Keep Out

[Fajitas]

Heya, folks. Welcome to the Thread That Must Not Be Named for my home-brew campaign, Welcome to the Halmae. As the title says, my players shouldn't read this, as I expect it to be full of spoilery goodness.

Anyone not one of my players, read on. This is the place where I'll answer (some) questions about what's going on in my game, and I'll be asking for creative help from one of the best sources I can think of for problems that I can't solve on my own (that source would be you folks, by the way. Harnassing the power of the internet...)

If any of our regular readers want to bow out, now's the time. There will be spoilers in this thread, and I won't bother to mark them 'cause the whole dang thread's a spoiler. Some of these things won't happen in the Story Hour for quite a while. Others will give you enhanced insight into things that have already happened in the Story Hour. So, consider yourself warned.

Let the games begin.

 

[Fajitas]

So, Creative Problem the First:

Here's the situation. The PCs have recently returned to their home city of Dar Pykos, after having sought out the most powerful archmages in the world. Each archmage has been invited to come to the city to "interview" for the position of Chancellor of the Mages' Academy. This has been an epic quest, consuming six months of game time and about five times that long in real time.

All of the archmages in question will be coming to the city, where the current acting Chancellor, as well as the heads of the four Churches and the King of Dar Pykos will interview them and, together, decide which of them will be Chancellor.

All well and good, right?

The question is... how do I get the PCs involved in this? Fundamentally, this is a scene in which powerful NPCs sit around talking to other powerful NPCs, until the first batch of powerful NPCs decide who it is.

Booo-oooring.

It is, and has always been, my intent that the PCs would play a crucial part in the choosing of the Chancellor. So far, the PCs are the only people in the world (except one of the archmages herself) that have met all the archmages. They've gotten an initial feel for each of them, having spoken with, interacted with, and, in some cases, fought alongside them. Additionally, pretty much every PC is acting in an official capacity on behalf of one of the higher ups: either the Churches or the acting Chancellor. Thus, as their agents, each of the PCs' votes will be listened to by someone involved in the final decision.

Now, I suppose I could simply collect the votes from the PCs, let their higher-ups agree with them, and whoever the PCs vote in becomes the Chancellor.

But, after two and a half years of this, that feels so... anti-climactic. This whole mission has been about finding a new Chancellor. To have it decided behind closed doors, even through PC agency, just seems wrong.

I've been thinking about this one for, oh, much of the last year or so, and I just haven't come up with an answer I love. Here, however, are some of the best ones I've got:

1) The PCs sit in on the interviews.
Pros: Ummm, few.
Cons: The PCs are listening to NPCs talk to each other. Plus, since the PCs have already met these guys, it's basically just replaying scene we've already played.

2) Let the players play the higher ups interviewing the archmages. I'd write up character sheets with strong backgrounds and agendas for each higher up.
Pros: Gives things a new twist. Lets players play someone new and different. Really lets the players affect the outcome.
Cons: Still basically replaying scenes we've played before, just with new characters. Players have to pretend not to know things that their PCs have learned. May also require revealing to players secrets their PCs don't know about motivations among the higher ups.

3) Have the higher ups ask the PCs to "test" the archmages. That is, as part of the interview process, the higher ups would ask the PCs to establish challenges for the archmages, to see how they deal with problems (how do they handle difficult negotiations, physical attacks, interactions with the community, etc). The higher ups would roughly outline what kind of things they want, and then leave it to the PCs to determine the precise nature of the challenges.
Pros: Lets the PCs, in character, design "gameplay" for very powerful NPCs, which is fun gameplay in and of itself. Requires PCs to "role-play" in character, which should be fairly entertaining.
Cons: Puts a lot of the design burden on the players. If they don't embrace the concept, it could crash hard. Parameters of each challenge need to be sufficiently intricate so that they can't just be solved with a wave of a hand and a single high level spell (adding to the burden of the players).

4) Let the higher ups interview the archmages off screen. Then reveal that the various higher ups are unable to come to an agreement on who should be chosen. The PCs then must broker an agreement that all groups can live with.
Pros: High role-playing. PC will, essentially, become entirely responsible for the outcome.
Cons: Gives the PCs closer relationships with the higher ups than I might want. May essentially devolve into arguing back and forth with various stubborn, seemingly unreasonable individuals (something that has happened before and tends not to make my players happy).

Anyway, those are the best ideas I've come up with yet. Anyone else got any thoughts on the above ideas? Any new ideas? I'm dyin' here...

(By the way, for those unfamiliar with my game world, the most relevant thing to know is how arcane magic is treated. And the rest of the Story Hour ain't such a bad read either... )

 

[arwink]

The easy answer would be to make one of the archmagi not-what-they-appear. This is, traditionally, the kind of plot that calls for a doppleganger buy you could get around it by using one of the other shapeshifting races, a psion using mindseed (should you use or want to introduce psionics), or even an arcane variant on that power (which essentially replaces the targets personality with your own).

The PC's, as the only people who have met all of the cantidates, are the perfect choice to investigate the archmagi and try to work out who is different and why. In doing so, you can give them access to all the powerful people making decisions in order to answer questions and make suggestions. The situation will, of course, require them to keep things low key - even six months after the trouble with the academy, you don't want news that one of the potential replacment chancellors is an imposter to leak to the public.

This way you get the fun of having a strong reason for the PC's to be involved, as well as the fun of watching them try to negotiate dealing with powerful figures without letting on that they're inestigating them. Kettenek knows if that will work with Anvil around, but it'd be interesting to watch him try

 

[Len]

Test the archmages by setting them several challenges. Have the players play the archmages so they're competing against each other to solve the challenges. A left-over player can be the fair-minded judge who referees the competition. (Hmm, who would that be?)

One of the challenges should be to put out a fire. That is obviously a necessary skill for the Chancellor.

Wizardru did this and it seemed to work out well:
http://www.enworld.org/showpost.php?p=1496699&postcount=337
http://www.enworld.org/showpost.php?p=1548346&postcount=340

 

[dpdx]

Oh, you know I'm all over this thread like Anvil on a maritime delivery contract.

Two ideas:

PCs are interviewed by the higherups in front of the archmages.

Each archmage makes it clear that should they be selected, *good things* will happen to the PC(s) that help them attain the job. PCs get grilled by higherups, and it tests their ability to influence the higherups without incurring their wrath. Which leads to...

Each archmage has one or two champions from among the PCs.

Like "seconds" in a duel, the PCs stand in for challenges when the archmage deems it appropriate. In addition to the influencing, PCs want to make an impression on behalf of their favored archmage during the challenges. Except these challenges are for archmages, and PCs may be biting off more than they can chew.

 

[Zog]

Start killing the Archmages. First, a failed assassination attempt. Then a successful one. Always seeming to target the AM who is 'in the lead' for the job.

But, of course, things are not as they seem. IS anyone actually dead? Or simply being captured? Or is one of the Archmages running their own game? Trying to stir up trouble and have a good reason to depart angrily?

Is the church (some faction of one of them) acting against the mages? Or does someone want it to appear that way?


A simpler option would be to have them run security - protect the meetings from above such problems, as well as archmages spying on other archmage interviews perhaps? Am vs AM sabotage? Nothing violent, just propoganda, deception, etc. So, the party can sit back and someone who cheats will get the post, or they can take action and influence who gets the post by discovering who is willing to bend / break/ redefine the rules to get what they want. (and hey, maybe they end up wanting that person as Chancellor!)

 

[jerichothebard]

Also, don't forget that (just to add to the complexity), it's unlikely that the archmages are going to arrive alone. I would imagine that they will all have an entourage of some sort, some retainers, 53 purple peacocks, 95 white Persian monkeys, 75 golden camels, 60 elephants...

Do the players have an archmage they favor?

 

[orsal]

A couple of the job candidates are jockeying really hard for the position. Since the PCs were the original intermediaries between them and the search committee, it is only natural that they canvas the PCs for help. What form of help? That's something we have to figure out, but some requests are made that pose ethical dilemmas. Choices that the characters have to make! Especially since bribes incentives are offered, by two different archmages.

 

[Spatzimaus]

Well, I think the biggest hurdle you face is the knowledge part. The players have spent years getting to know these mages, so you can't really ask them to play the committee without leading to a lot of uncomfortable information gaps. You could have them play the archmages themselves, but I'm sure you don't WANT to let the players know the hidden agendas of these characters; plus, there are only four of them.

I think the better solution is to have the characters attached to the archmages as go-fers, local guides, translators, or even adjutants. Jericho's right that each might show up with an entourage, but how many would be familiar with Dar Pykos? Even if it's not an official requirement, the players are the only ones who fully understand both the culture of Dar Pykos and the cultures of the archmages' homelands. Plus, the PCs don't have a lot of hidden agendas, since they were under contract to the university in the first place, and are low enough in level that it's not a problem to use magic to verify their intentions. So, the PCs would summon the archmages when the committee needs them, show them around town, run errands, help clear up cultural confusions, that sort of thing.

This will force the PCs to split up, unfortunately. But, it provides a decent reason for them to be involved, lets them give information without any issues, and leads to the next step: if something unexpected were to happen to one of the archmages, the PCs would be directly in the middle of things, even if they normally wouldn't be involved in events that high-level. They'd help the university people and the archmages figure out what happened. I don't think this should be part of the plan; university bureaucracies are pretty stuffy, and things like an orchestrated "test" are just a bit too erratic for them. I'm sure they WANT a nice, long, drawn-out academic review of the four candidates, followed by a lengthy debate.

But you don't have to let that happen; ideally, this event would result in a clear "winner", even though it wasn't orchestrated by the university. For instance, let's call the archmages A, B, C, and D in descending order of competence. D does something nefarious to B, removing B from the competition. In the resulting investigation, D is found to be guilty, A clearly shows he's the best candidate for the job while C looks a bit ineffective, and it becomes a no-brainer when the committee picks A over C. There, you've picked a new Chancellor, the PCs were involved every step of the way, and no one had to sit through hours of recitations of events.

 

[Trahnesi]

Have two anti-arcane activists bust down the door with swords swinging.

Ok, maybe not that - they'd get splattered by the archmages. But this is a great time for the anti-magic forces to attack - the biggest archmages are all in one spot! If you can get them, you're set! I'd have those folks be plotting something. And, if they're smart, they're plotting multiple different things to make things hard. Possibly doing things to get the citizenry all riled up, possibly arranging an assassination, maybe even arranging a riot. The characters get back and they quickly start hearing rumors about what's going down. They need to protect the confrence.

This does make the characters less involved in the actual decision of who to make Chancelor. Possibly the events will give them insight as to who is the better choice, but that isn't certain. (You could have the best choice be the one who comes and helps them ... but because he's helping with the problems, he isn't doing the politicing that needed to actually get the job and someone else is about to get it. The players can try to pull strings to get the right person in, if they want...)