Sorry for the flood of posts everyone, I'm playing v3 for the first time in a couple of days and I must admit I'm a bit neverous, even though I've been GMing for decades ..!

I'm starting off with 'A Day Late, A Shilling Short' so the players can get used to the mechanics; I'll be having Vern Hendrick hire the players to find the coach, and the parcel will be Aschaffenberg's deeds and paperwork for Grunewald Manor.

I'm a bit nervous about the Klaus von Rothstein episode however. All the social encounter/progress tracker stuff sounds all very well, but I really can't see any reason whatsoever why my players won't just immediately say "I grab him and push him out of the way". I know I would, and knowing my players, I'm sure they will too ...

Any good tips for playing this scene from those who have already done it? Cheers.

Two things come to mind:

1) He's safely inside the coach, while everyone else is locked outside. If Klaus is liable to think the PCs are just going to brutalize him into giving up the parcel, he can always just shut himself inside until they agree to talk things out.

2) Presuming he's still alive, the roadwarden Rutger Abend, as an officer of Imperial law for better or worse, should naturally be adverse to the idea of the PCs just ****** 'n grabbing the parcel in question. That's not to say the PCs can't just do it anyway, but trying to cross the Empire is hard enough as it is without the Roadwardens chasing after you.

Just some ideas off the top of my head.

To be honest, the Rothstein bit was awkward for me too. However, I'd made it a bigger problem by only having one PC know about the package - he didn't tell the others so the social combat felt awkward. If you make sure that everybody knows about the package then it will feel less silly when you break into the first social combat.

You could also make the point that the first adventure is a demo exercise, and encourage the players to do this bit properly so they can get used to the system. It's not the best written encounter, so it needs all the help it can get.

I have read about that "A day late" several times, but where do I find the scenario?

Gallows said:

Check the support section of WFRP on this site for it.

And Uni-head, this is what I did.

My players are not very experienced and they wanted to do the grab and bash technique, but I explained to them that this is obviously a high tier noble (due to what he is wearing) and is delivering more then just the "1 important package" on there. Should they try and push him around without killing him he will eventually make it to town and have a warrant for their arrest.

Also look at the type of party card they have chosen, are they a gang of thugs? glory hounds? What would the "party card" do if that makes any sense.

Cheers!

Thank for the suggestions folks, they really help. Unfortunately, using the party card to dictate what the players should be doing is really not going to work in my group - I certainly don't want them feeling like the mechanics of the new system are dictating their actions in any way, or it'll be back to V2 faster than you can say "it's just like a boardgame!".

I like the idea of using the coachman/roadwarden to remind them of the consequences of their actions. They'll probably just push von Rothstein around anyway, but at least I'll be able to have a character who isn't immediately unlikable tell them they're handling things wrongly.

This has given me a good new perspective, because if things turn out the way I think they will, I can make von Rothstein a reappearing character who can really make trouble for the PCs in social circles later on. The players may think they have gotten away with their strong-arm tactics, but then a few sessions on I can have something really annoying happen that is obviously due to his influence - and make it obvious that he has made it 'his business' to make like difficult for the PCs in revenge for how he was treated. Great stuff!

I am firmly in the camp of allowing my PCs to do whatever they **** well please, with the understanding that there are implications. In this case, you better believe that Klaus will marshal some resources against the aggressive PCs (if he is able). Of course, maybe you play him as one who backs down when truly physically confronted, and that triggers a vindictive streak. With his amount of money, he can certainly hire some protagonists to pursue the PCs and make life hard for them. Or more likely he will turn fellow merchants against them. Perhaps using some influence to deny them any coach services in the surrounding area. etc. etc.

In my most recent campaign, the PCs were confronted by a young noble (the equivalent of the duke's son); they didn't quite know his rank during the encounter, but knew he was somebody important. They allowed a discussion to escalated to the point where they attacked and killed him. If they had helped him out, his house/family would have become their patrons. Instead, by a turn of events, they were subsequently hired to discover his murderers. And it soon will be discovered it was they who committed the act... it's going to hurt when they all become outlaws very shortly...

I always have this problem in my games - it's tricky to convince players that they would be impressed by someone of higher rank, and even trickier to get them to act with any sort of deference towards them. They always end up being confrontational or rude or violent - which is fair enough, but doesn't really take into account the fact that in the 'game world' they would be brought up to take the class system very seriously. In this new campaign I must get across the serious consequences of pissing off people with a lot more money and influence than you.

I think, in part, this is sort of a "PC knowledge" vs. "Player knowledge" sort of thing. I mean, I'm more than happy to let my players take stupid courses of action and suffer the consequences, but at a point like this I would at least tell them ahead of time that, if anything, their characters would know that messing with a noble is generally not a good idea, even if the player themselves don't.

If they choose to pursue that course of action afterwards, well then, that's just part of the fun. :3 They'll be surprised to learn the differences in how the authorities respond to a peasant being murdered compared to a noble being beaten up...

As mentioned before, in this specific scenario, I was able to use Rutger as my mouthpiece to basically say as such. In my case, he even so far as to load his blunderbuss as a none-too-subtle sign of his disapproval of roughing up Klaus, even though he'd also prior expressed a severe dislike of the man already. Granted, he was still sorely wounded from the beastmen, but his point came across: while my PCs were still tempted to try the "quick and dirty" approach, they eventually relented and tried to talk things out, and even managed to get Rutger to vouch on their behalf in the end.

It sometimes helps to have those below the PC's station defer up to the PC's in turn. Adventurers are often times one of the following: independent, wealthy brave, free from the normal ties to a job or place. Any combination of these traits might garner the PC's attention, respect and admiration from the right kinds of people.

If all the PC's ever see are NPC's of a higher station then it becomes a little annoying. It becomes unbearable if they are also expected to always bow down to these NPC's. Bringing the PC's into the class system but not as the lowest rung on the ladder has helped me in these kinds of situations.

It also helps if one the characters benefit from the class system, due to connections with people in higher places or personal status.

Another thing is that they might just be more interested in breaking the status quo.I know some people who just can't stand authority figures of any kind and react negatively to them, no matter what the circumstances. Especially if it's required of them to conform to some norm they don't agree with.

Lexicanum said:

I don't know. I think you can use that for delightful narrative tension. I had a great GM who spent a whole bunch of sessions 'teaching' us to fear and respect nobles, and then made one of them a major opponent. It made everything that came after just that more terrifying, because not only was he a badass, but we also constantly worried about what kind of legal and cultural rules we were breaking.