What to do if my players become enemies of Sandpoint?

[Faceless Mann]

I'm something of a newcomer to the GM scene, and at the risk of sounding too inept, I wanted some advice on how to best handle this situation. We are on Chapter 2 of Runelords, the Skinsaw Murders, and as a way to increase tension, I had the mayor treat the players with a bit of hostility after learning of the party face's connection with the Skinsaw Man.

One of the players, a Witch, responded by hitting Sheriff Hemlock with a slumber hex and then locking himself in the mayor's office with a grenade and interrogating her for information regarding The Misgivings.

I took this chance to have Farmer Grump appear, wailing about the scarecrows, to get the players out before too much damage could be done. With that said, half of the party seems uninterested in returning to Sandpoint but if they do, they'll face some challenges since I can't imagine the Mayor putting this incident behind her.

[Drakkiel]

with this I would probably just give them negatives in the town itself

people being curt or rude to them...certain shops not allowing them to buy things from then on...increased prices openly made higher only for their characters

it doesn't always have to come down to physical violence to punish PC for bad choices

(first thing one of my players did during the festival was try to steal a longbow from one of my festival games)

[Peet]

It's a little weird since the kinds of information people could get from interrogating the mayor the mayor would probably have provided for free.

I would treat this as the result of an intimidate attempt. Afterwards the mayor will be more hostile than before.

However, you should make sure there are opportunities for the players to redeem themselves. It will be important later on that they are able to return. If nothing else, their intervention against the stone giant raid ought to do it.

Peet

[Faceless]

Peet wrote:

However, you should make sure there are opportunities for the players to redeem themselves. It will be important later on that they are able to return. If nothing else, their intervention against the stone giant raid ought to do it.

This is partly my concern since the players are making it clear that, save for Ameiko, they have little love for Sandpoint and they might just abandon the town. The party leader wants to help out where she can, but she didn't take the accusation of being connected to the murders very well, the Witch wants to get the Mayor kicked out of office, the Magus flat-out hates *everyone*, and the Warpriest is neutral to the whole thing.

[captain yesterday]

you need to start making Sandpoint a more friendly place to live, otherwise the campaign might be over:)

[S'mon]

You could have someone apologise for the mayor's bad behaviour, and ask the PCs to stick around. Ameiko seems the obvious one as they like her, maybe Brodert Quink too.

[Kobold Catgirl]

Perhaps the Mayor could excuse her behavior by having some personal connection to this (sister killed in Unpleasantness, for instance). Overall, the town is supposed to like and trust the PCs after Burnt Offerings.

That being said, it sounds like the PC took the Mayor hostage. That's...kind of overkill for "Mayor was kinda rude".

[Faceless]

Given that the Mayor's brother and fiance were killed by a serial killer, she had every reason to be upset about any possible connection the PCs might have with a new serial killer running amok, which I did have her mention.

And it's not like I haven't shown that they have friends in town, they just...choose to focus on the few a!~**#%s they've met.

[Latrecis]

Your players appeared to have missed the memo: when people are suspicious of you, it's not good to be arrogant, obnoxious or behave even more suspiciously. Unless your goal is to convince those doing the suspecting that they were right in the first place.

However, you might be able to proceed with Sandpoint and the PC's being hostile toward one another...

Spoiler:

The pc's appear to be well into Skinsaw Murders. When they finish with the Ghouls (assuming they do) have Hemlock or Ameiko meet them before they get back to town and tell them the Mayor has issued warrants for their arrest. Their only choice is to clear their name or they will be wanted in every city, town and village in Western Varisia. That should get them to Misgivings. Dealing with that should get the Mayor off their backs and they can write Sandpoint off. But they'll need a new base - suggest Magnimar and use the clues in Foxglove Manor to get them there. Assuming they can be bothered to deal with the Skinsaw cult and "save the mayor" that can get them to Book 3. If they really don't care about Sandpoint, they can ignore the raid to start Book 4 - you can substitute some of the adventures suggested about restoring Fort Rannick to keep them on pace with XP. They can follow clues available in Book 3 to find Jorgenfist or even be approached by Sandpoint survivors to hire them to rescue prisoners. At Jorgenfist, they can rescue prisoners and have an apology or humiliation party (as they desire) and head back to Sandpoint for Book 5. They don't really even need to rescue anyone for Book 5 to work. They will find clues that send them after the Scribbler and that alone will motivate them to head to Sandpoint. Even if they are unwelcome there, no one in Sandpoint is going to give them any guff at this point (considering their level at the time.) In a twisted way, Sandpoint has way more to lose by annoying the pc's, than the other way around.

[Right0us_Man]

I agree with Latrecis, however following his advice, i cannot possibly see how any of your pcs have good alignments. They don't need to be evil to be arrogant and brash and completely pig headed, but that doesn't fall in line with good alignments either. I'd suggest, having them REREAD their alignment descriptions, make the pcs ask themselves if this really fits with their alignment.

If at that point they still continue to act this way towards npcs in general, then they should constantly be having rp issues in every town and rest stop they go to. It should be a MAJOR hurtle for them to overcome, because it seems to me they have no trouble killing things and trying to force their way around, but against npcs like the Lord Mayor of Magnimar and others, this is a horrible idea. There are NPC in Magnimar who are of a higher level than the pcs, and the Mayor most definitely would call in whatever favor he has to, to get aid that can effectively fight the pcs.

Magnimar isn't a very friendly place honestly. Most of the guards there are almost entirely corrupt and would gladly sell the Pc's out to a local gang of thugs or one of the many cults hidden within its borders. There are lots of ways to handle a group of players who act arrogant and brash.