How to political intrigue

>>49527631

First, whatever you come up with, explain how it works to the players. This is an area that varies wildly from game to game, even among games that have intrigue as a system at all.

Second, go read a book like Shogun, where there's considerable intrigue. It'll give you a good feel for the shape that political maneuvering takes.

OK, now let's talk systems. The core, by far most important element of intrigue is a source or sources of intelligence. Without it, a character is a pawn, not a player, regardless of who or what he is. These aren't just sources that you tap and are done-- your PCs should be assumed to be regularly checking their sources and then you give them Wisdom checks to catch if some tidbit is of enough importance that you highlight it to them.

Some intelligence sources:

Agent intelligence (Americans call it HUMINT) is by far the most valuable. Agents are people who provide you with information in exchange for threats, promises, flattery, or commands. Some may not even recognize that they're your agents; either you use a cut-out or they don't realize you're using them for information at all.

Surveillance means having someone surreptitiously watching a person or place of interest. They might be hiding, but more likely they're someone hiding in plain sight like a servant.

The fantasy equivalent of SIGINT is penetrating enemy communications. Intercepting notes and catching and decoding their hidden signals. There's a whole science to this that dovetails with clandestine communications.

Then there's magic. Not much to be said here.

>>49528017

The next step is intelligence analysis. That means figuring out how reliable your information is, and how to assemble all the pieces into a coherent picture. There are whole books about how this is done, but for your purposes it's basically the job of the players. In pre-modern times, that's how it was done: by a courtier himself with perhaps a mentor/advisor/wife helping make sense of it.

Along the way, the players should have formed a coherent picture of what they're objectives are. In real life, this is murky. People's goals can be varied and contradictory, they may not really know what their goals really are, or may be lying to themselves about what they want. This is all incredibly common and once you start looking at people and asking "What does he/she want?" you'll see what I mean. Hell, you probably don't know what YOU want, not really, deep down where it matters.

So then you formulate plots (or ideas for how to counter others' plots). Which is to say, ways to use the intelligence you've gathered to decide what to do (above board or sneaky) to turn what you know into how to get what you want.

Then you execute on the plan. This is usually obvious for a DM to run and obvious for a player as to how the mechanics will work. In many games it's the only real part that the game covers. IMO the least interesting part.

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>>49527631
>>49527631
>Then there's magic. Not much to be said here.
Yes and a very important part of most Magical settings. Don't shy completely away from it, because if players have access to anything like that, they will want to use it. Most groups if you bar them from it will want to use it MORE, or come up with other clever uses of spells. Players are inventive.

Intrigue settings are finally the time to shine for those Scrying and anti scrying spells, instead of be relegated to mapping out dungeons ahead of time.

It's important to know how to thwart such spells and even non-magical nobles worth their salt know how to throw off scrying effects.

- First off when speaking to agents don't use their real name- or names at all if they can help it.
- Preferably people send proxies in the first place.
- Important objects should always be stored in lead lined boxes.

A good trick when doing social campaigns and having to deal with scry effects, make sure your intriguers are smart enough to never speak their plans out loud. Whispering, encoded notes, hey time to crack out that ol` Drow Sign Language. A cheaty DM trick I like is: unless the PCs are using the likes of Arcane Eye, all Scrying effects unless specifically mentioned never quite end up in a good angle to read that Ciphered note before being burned.
Sometimes this adds the bonus mini-hook for players that if they want to know what's going on they have to break into somewhere and retrieve the documents. Hopefully subtly.

Animal Messager/Message
Arcane Lock
Modify Memory
Pass Without Trace
Sequester

The time for all of these spells to shine and be first picks over Fireball and Fly.

Just remember anything the players use, you can use to. If the PCs are not careful themselves they can just as easily be spied on.

>>49528097

OK so then there's the "how you do it" phase. This means you ought to be tracking your player's resources in a more granular way than D&D will provide by default.

There's a sociology paper by french and raven that might give you ideas, but here's some things to try:

Allies: people of equal or greater power with whom you negotiate to get them to do something you want, usually in exchange for you doing something they want. Won via Diplomacy or, if you're lying, Bluff.

Subordinates (legitimate power): you have some position or rank that entitles you to the loyalty of the group or some of its members, You can command them, usually within limits defined by the organization's rules.

Agents: just like intelligence agents, and often the same people. People who do your bidding for whatever reason, but are not your subordinates. They're usually someone else's subordinates that you've, well, suborned.

Remember, even if you're planting physical evidence or doing something like sabotage, ideally you don't want to be doing those things yourself. You go through someone else to put distance between you and your acts. Even better, you use a cut-out, where the person doing the deed either doesn't know who they're doing it for, or thinks they know and are mistaken.

Finally, remember that every NPC of note will be doing the same thing, though they probably won't be systematic about it and may not even recognize the steps the way I'm presenting them here. They should vary in skill. Some clumsy, some elegant. Different styles and approaches. Different goals, and mostly the NPCs are targeting one another. It's a dangerous trap to make everything fall into PCs vs NPCs, and too often that's how it falls out because the DM doesn't concentrate on the internecine fighting as much as on the stuff that directly affects the PCs.

>>49528333

Very well said. And I agree. Too often DMs ban spells like these, but IMO this is the time to haul those spells and counterspells out

If you are just starting out. I highly suggest some of the PCs start as "something."

Not just lowly murder hobo with goodish intentions #37

More like A minor duke/baron on the edge of his liege lords land. small time, has a few handmaids, a steward, and maybe two guards. These are the people that just tend to the home. Often the lord does his own leg work and deliver his own messages.

But as any political setting, get pulled into something bigger.

>>49528520
We're in the 3rd session, they already ran a few small "rats in the basement" style quests for the mages guild. In doing so they accidentally discovered that the mages guild is being eroded by a large terrorist-esque deadric cult and there is a conspiracy to keep it quiet within the guild in order to stop mass panic spreading. As they now know too much the mages guild has now added them as members of the team of agents that are dedicated both to maintaining the conspiracy and ending the cult.
>>49528017
>>49528097
>>49528333
>>49528440
This is great stuff guys. Capping these to refer to.

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>>49528017
>>49528097
>>49528333
>>49528440

Different anon, but these are great tips. Thanks. Got any more?

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>>49528017

>HUMINT

>Most valuable

>disdain for plebs

I hope you are only talking about in fantasy. Because then sure, I SUPPOSE.

SIGINT would be mainly magical in nature. Tracking elemental magic flows, discharges, flare ups, unnaturally high magical expenditure, etc

>>49528579
mind sharin' the cap with a lurkin' anon for his own later usage?

Great tips /tg/ thanks. I'm not OP, but I'm a raw fucking GM so here's some super basic newbie questions.

How do I prep this so it's not a railroad?

How do I actually run this at the table so it's interesting? My preference is combat but my player seems to prefer a talky campaign. I dunno how to run that.

>>49529411
Have several forces in your World (2-3) that have opposing goals, know what those goals are, and how these forces want to achive them.
Once you know that, you can more easily come up with what they will say or do at any given time, or as a response.

To give an example:
>A high standing dude wants to get his hands on 4 magic stones.
>He will do anything to get them, but won't do it himself, since he has a reputation to uphold, instead sending out mercenaries and assasins to get them.
>He needs them to bring back his master, some ancient evil into this world.

>On the opposite side, there are the priests who need those stones to activate an ancient weapon to defeat this evil.
>They need help anywhere they can get, but have to keep low to not get detected.

If you haven't noticed this is the plot from the fifth element. So just rip out from whatever movie or book you want if it helps.

>>49527631

Last time my players were sent to infiltrate a cult (razmir i think), they identified, kidnapped, and executed the ranking cultist before they even knew what was up and who was behind it.

>>49528969

Agent intelligence is by far the most valuable. Surveillance, documents, intercepting communications, open records, all are important and useful, but as the saying goes, recruiting agents is 1 and everything else is 0.

Americans love signals intelligence and are clumsy about agent recruitment because they have political constraints. It's valuable, but limited. Agents provide penetration, they can probe for clarification, they provide context and meaning. And once in a while, they can be employed for other purposes. A man is a fool to discount the value of agent intelligence.

>>49529411

Let the plot write itself. Do thorough prep work before every session, and carefully plan after a game is over. Remember every "faction" is made up of individuals with their own agendas. Don't try to write a plot. Just have a general ideal of where you're going. Don't forget the most important rule of intrigue: Shit Happens. It always happens and Fate causes the damnedest things. Big things can come from small details, and seemingly important details can be made irrelevant by factors that pop up seemingly out of nowhere.

Since you as DM are the hand of fate, remember that gentle intermittent nudges will keep your game on track far better than strong shoves. Often you can draw your players' attention just by mentioning a detail and seeming to try to downplay it.

Make a list of the significant NPCs, both friendly and antagonistic. Then for each of them decide what they want the PCs to do. Interactions with said NPC should always involve them trying to push the PCs towards that.

> Be me
> Players are fighting against a scheming nobleman, they're actually doing really well at uncovering his plots
> They manage to meet him in the middle of the woods, alone, unarmed and absolutely defenseless.
> "It's all over, count Schemington! We can easily kill you right now!"
> Count Schemington nearly shits his pants, but manages to not drop spaghetti.
> Starts telling them how he's got very powerful friends, and they're all perfectly informed about who's to blame, if he's suddenly to disappear
> It's all a bluff, of course, he's nowhere near that level of influence
> Players, who know perfectly well that he's a lying, scheming cunt, take his bluff at the face value
> Instead of finishing it right there and right then, they begin trying to make deals with him, because they don't want to get in trouble.
> They're now actually working for his ass
> All because they didn't realize that this liar might be, gasp, lying.

What the fuck went wrong?

>>49534827
>Be me
found it

>>49534827

Did you give them a roll to detect the lie?

Hey, shit happens. Many a kingdom has been won by a clever bluff.