Greetings,
The short: players are about to be caught breaking and entering into a noble's house, how much trouble should I put them in?
I'm thinking hefty fine and pay to repair damages.
The long:
I'm running rise of the runelords for a group of mostly true neutral to chaotic good players. One ranger, one warrior, one magus, one druid.
We're on chapter 2, the skinsaw murders.
I may have laid it on too thick and they now believe that Titus Scarnetti is behind the murders at the mill.
The ranger takes 20 to lock pick and takes 20 to sneak. There's no rush, so I allow it. I rolled perception for Titus every 15 minutes he's in the house.
Well, the Magus likes to be in the spotlight and decides to try to sneak into the house, I tell him to roll move silently, bam, natural 1.
I explain he trips over the step into the front, the door slams open, Titus is aroused from his slumber and comes out to investigate.
The druid decides to summon creature and places a boar inside the front door.
At this point, I'm adlibbing the layout of the house, deciding there's a foyer that overlooks the entry way. The magus decides he's going to play it off like he was tracking the boar and it broke into Titus' house.
It's a new group of players, I'm very generous when it comes to meta-gaming and out of character talk. They convince the magus that's a bad idea. He decides to run, but not before Titus is able to catch a glimpse of someone.
The ranger, meanwhile, is remaining hidden in the deepest darkest corner her can find, basically afraid to move.
Advancing to the point, the boar dashes outside into the forest before the summon expires, Titus goes outside in a robe, sword, and shield searching for the intruder.
The magus reveals himself, tries to sell the 'I'm hunting at 3am and a boar managed to lock pick and trash your entryway'.
Titus escorts the magus to the sheriff. Sheriff is en route to the house to further investigate to try to decide who's story is less outlandish.
It was late, I ended the game there.
In an effort to add believability to the story, after Titus left, the ranger kicks in the front door to simulate the boar smashing his way in. What he failed to realize is that Mrs. Titus locked herself in the upstairs bedroom. Surely she heard the crash after Titus left for the sheriff.
I figure, as long as the players don't say anything stupid; the sheriff still needs these adventurers to help keep the town safe, he'll fine them a decent amount of gold, give them a good scolding, and make them pay for a new door.
Your thoughts?
Perhaps some reputation penalties and some intense grilling as to why they thought breaking in would be all that good an idea. Alternately, if any of this lot are any good at Diplomacy, now would be a REALLY good time to break it out. (Or even a discrete Charm Person?)
This might even help inspire one or two of them. 'OK, who has the best Diplomacy skill?' If the answer's the warrior at a total mod of -1 ... (and is he a Warrior as in Warrior class or just 'guy/gal who hits stuff mostly'?)
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Legal trouble: The magus is definitely (and the ranger, possibly, depending on just how much the magus runs his mouth in the clink) in trouble, and should both pay a fine and replace Titus's door. If the magus has the campaign trait "Favored Son (Sheriff)" from the Advanced Player's Guide, now would be a REALLY good time to use that "once per play session get out of jail free card."
Plot trouble: If Titus is indeed behind the murders, congrats. Now Titus knows the party's on to him. Does he flee? Does he gun for the PCs? Does he try to pin the murders on them? Does he know a couple buddies in jail who might make the magus "disappear?"
titus is just a snobby noble if i remember who owns the mill where the murders happened.
The Scarnetti family is potentially the mafia in the Sandpoint area, if you wanted to play them that way.
No reason Scarnetti would just go to the authorities if he had family go frame the PC'S for some other crimes, by maybe planting stolen goods in the character's rooms, then giving the PC'S a chance to "redeem" themselves by performing some service for Scarnetti instead of him calling in the sheriff.
You should always do your best to keep your players out of legal trouble.
That could potentially be achieved by allowing their characters to experience repercussions for the characters' illegal actions in the game.
A good dm rewards his players for making smart choices or succeeding at something they should have normally failed, but when a character does something very foolish or stupid and fails at it miserably, then by all means the dm should give out proper punishment to discourage such actions in the future. As another person pointed out in another thread I just read here recently, if the dm is not enforcing, he is enabling.
By the by, a natural 1 on a skill check is NOT a fumble or auto-failure - that happens only on attack rolls and saves.
You should still go by the total of the roll, so unless your magus has a low enough stealth skill that he could be detected by the NPC (including the -10 penalty for being asleep, plus whatever penalties for distance and intervening walls/floors) you ruled it incorrectly.
In that situation I'd say the penalties for being caught should be either extremely light, or something that can be entirely handwaved away.
I have played with players who would have killed Titus Scarnetti in an attempt to cover up their break-in, so your players' attempt to mislead Titus Scarnetti counts to me as good intentions badly implemented. In addition, given who the real murder is, you do not want to send them a message to stay away from influential people.
I would have Sheriff Hemlock scold them for clumsily acting like a bunch of common burglars, and then explain that thanks to the gratitude of the town for their help against the goblins and the intervention of their influential friend Ameiko Kaijitsu, they won't be thrown in jail.
Instead, he asks them to pay for the damages and to stay out of town for a few weeks until Titus forgets about the incident. Fortunately, they can continue their investigation out of town, because a man held in Habe's Sanatorium had witnessed three murders....