Hiho,
I need some good ideas how to handle the following situation. My group ended the Catacombs of Wrath and now just arrived at Thistletop. Tsuto managed to escape and the party - after a rest - followed him.
Now the ranger of the group scouted the area and stumbled over the goblin druid and the ranger was alone and his best idea was to pretend being a friend of Tsuto. The druid believed him and guided him to the entrance. The rest of the group arrived in time to see the ranger and the goblin druid crossing the bridge and hided behind some trees.
I know, it was not the best idea to leave the group and enter Thistletop alone, but the most of the players are very experienced. However the player of the ranger is an absolute beginner and from the roleplaying perspective it was a great moment to be in a lone situation and doing his first important decision. And the idea was not so bad as to outgame stopping him doing so. I don't want to punish him now for his not so clever idea.
So Tsuto escaped to Thistletop and reported to Nualia. The goblins may know that he is being chased. (Or maybe not?)
The ranger just entered Thistletop an the party is hiding across the bridge. What can I do now other than arrest him? It's a good situation for the player to do his own roleplay without looking for the experienced players how they handle a situation.
Thx in advance
Sheharan
I love the new PC's clever decision and as a GM I like to encourage creative problem solving in my players. That being said, this can be a sticky situation. Played straight, unless the player has high diplomacy and/or bluff skills, the player has a high chance of being killed and the other players having no idea what happened.
Personally, I would want to reward, not punish, the new player for thinking outside the box. So as GM I would make sure that the player can actually succeed in this situation rather than immediately being found out and ganged up on and killed. That would be a good way to convince this player to never try diplomacy or espionage again.
So this is how I'd personally handle it, foregoing realism in favor of good story-telling. This is all with the assumption that the player has no way of communicating with the rest of the group now that they are separated.
- Gogmurt is disgruntled, and I'd play him as kind of mouthy. Make it clear that Gogmurt isn't happy with these new longshanks, though remember that he'd be smart enough to not spill everything immediately to one of Tsuto's allies. It shouldn't take much encouragement to talk him into a straight up rant about how unhappy he is with Nualia's control, though - he could provide some valuable intel about Nualia's plans and her allies. If the player has some high diplomacy skills, the player could even convince Gogmurt to defect!
- Gogmurt can escort the PC through thistletop to the second level. He takes the PC to Tsuto's room, knocks, and he isn't there. Nualia and her closest advisors are in the cathedral discussing Tsuto's (failed) attempt to meet with Erylium at the Glassworks.
-Gogmurt doesn't really want to intrude on the meeting - he doesn't like that freaky Lamashtu stuff they get up to in there. He'll mention how Nualia's demonic dogs give him the creeps! He'll ask the PC to wait in Tsuto's room for their meeting to be over, although he will say that this might take awhile, as him and Nualia "go at it like donkey rats" (AP's words not mine!) in the forest regularly. Gogmurt will then leave and head back to his place in the brambles - pretty bumbling on his part, but goblins aren't that smart. This gives the player a chance to stealthily escape. If you want to make it harder to escape, have Gogmurt post Tangletooth to guard the PC, or one or two goblin chumps. A fight would probably catch the attention of Nualia and her cronies, though.
-The player could have the option of listening through the door on their meeting. I would reward this if the player thinks of it with intel on Nualia's progress with finding Malfeshnekor.
-I'd probably put some small windows in the hallways near the stairs on the upper floor. The player could sneak out that way and come to the back of the island. I'd also put a rowboat and rope pulley (I put that in for Nualia and her goons to have an escape plan in case of the bridge getting burned down in my game) towards the back of the island, maybe hidden in some bushes so its not immediately obvious from afar. Otherwise the player stands a slim chance of crossing the bridge without being seen - it is pretty well fortified.
-By the time the PCs come to Thistletop as a group, Nualia and her henchmen will have returned to their normal posts. Fighting all of them at once would probably end in a TPK unless your group is min/maxing.
The goal here is to reward the group with some good intel and roleplay, without killing the player for making a clever decision, while keeping the player's decisions autonomous. This route would hopefully give the player a few good options of what to do without railroading them too much. You also want to keep the whole thing relatively brief - your other players won't be doing much while this going on, so you want the group reunited ASAP.
If I follow correctly, now seems like a good time for the other players to attack. It was not exactly clear - where is everyone at the point you stopped? Are the other players watching from the mainland and the ranger and Gogmurt are about to open the door or is the ranger already inside and the door is closed? Either way an immediate attack by the players should help. If they attack as the door is opened, the ranger can hold the door until they cross the bridge (carefully of course!) If the door is already closed, the ranger can try to open it for them perhaps fighting goblins to do so or he can flee toward one of the towers in an effort to rejoin his allies (granted he doesn't know where to go) or he could "volunteer to help" and follow other goblins as they run to the towers to fight off the intruders.
There's some room to think Gogmurt, given his distant relationship with Tsuto wouldn't know he doesn't have any friends. But Ripnugget is not nearly so ignorant. It seems unlikely to me that Gogmurt would bypass Ripnugget and take a "friend" directly to the people he mistrusts most (Nualia and her crew.) I think he would take the ranger to Ripnugget (the druid still supports Ripnugget and wants to influence him against the longshanks) and the goblin chief would never buy the friend story and would take the ranger prisoner while sending a message to Nualia looking to earn favor. Keep in mind Tsuto just returned from Sandpoint without his sister who he went to get and without the squad of goblins who went with him. The half-elf most likely got his butt kicked and ran back to Nualia. The goblins should be hyper suspicious of any player that appears in their midst shortly thereafter.
Sad to say but the DM created some of this problem - I'm generally in favor of giving a player some rope and seeing what they do with it but not taking the rope, tying a noose with it and draping over the player's head. Given that a follow-up atack from Sandpoint after Nualia and her cronies stir up trouble is Gogmurt's #1 fear he should view the ranger as his worst nightmare come true. He should never willingly take the ranger anywhere other than to the nearby goblin dogs (just outside his lair) where he and his animal companion try to abush him. If the other players do not think to attack or do so too slowly, I would suggest once the ranger is inside and the door is closed, Gogmurt says "What?! Do you think I'm stupid?" and immedialy attacks the ranger while calling for help fron nearby goblins. This could also be clear call for help to the other players and a signal the ranger should flee.
Thx for the answers.
As I said I don't want to punish the player/character for his chosen path. Of course in the last consequence it's my fault as his GM that he is in such a situation.
I like Karolinas idea. I think the PC will be escorted to one of the guest rooms. Maybe he meets there with Orik. (The party knows him - not as an enemy - from an introductory session, so it will be interesting how the PC reacts.) The stealthy intel part and listening to the meeting can be funny.
After that I can imagine that the PC will sneak to the towers to take out the guards and give a sign to his friends. But more likely he will do something totally unexpected, as players always do :-)