I was wondering here recently how other GMs make the investigation part of their adventures interesting and have all of the dots connect?

Salcor

Listen to your players conspiracy theories and pick the best one?

Our GM is great at the sucker punch... he puts all the cards on the table, and then a lot more cards, and lets us figure out which ones are important... generally we pick the wrong ones, so then he invariably smashes us with something so we sit there and constantly are smacking our heads with our palms.

Course we've come to suspect that he doesn't have a clue what is going on until we decide, then he always picks a different direction. So now we're plotting against him, misdirecting him into thinking we're going towards A while really we're plotting for B.

An easy trick is to make sure that there are several different ways to get a given clue or piece of information, so that sooner or later, whatever the group attempts, they still find that info... just in a manner of their choosing. It gives them the freedom to wander around aimlessly as players are inclined to do, while still keeping them involved in the investigation.

It's easy to overdo this, though. In any given investigation, about half of the clues will crop up in some way or another, whichever way the group turns. Of the half that remain, 50% should be useful, but not vital information (things that'll give them an edge during the final confrontation, but which isn't essential to them reaching that point), and what's left should be independant of player choice (the next murder, for example - that'll happen and become known to the players regardless of whatever the player's are doing, so they don't have to actively search for it)

A good way to plot an investigation is to draw a flowchart showing the major clues, where each one one leads and what leads to it. This makes it easy to keep track of what the players need to get to the next chapter of your game.

Also back in the the days before the Light of the Emperor was cast on RPGs there was a game, James Bond 007, with some of the best scenarios ever written - they were clear and had plenty of good advice for the GM; the best bit was that after each major chapter there was a troubleshooting page to help you get things back on track if the players missed the vital crew or killed the villain too early etc. A little thought about these things in writing a game can save a lot of trouble when running it.

DW

Santiago said:

This. Investigations aren't fun unless your players are right at least some of the time. What better way to ensure they're right then let them unknowingly create the truth as they do the investigation and inevitably jump to conclusions. Just be sure to keep some cool twists up your sleeve. Even though they're right, doesn't mean they have to be 100% correct, which also helps make your investigations seem more elaborate and fun.

Mark It Zero said:

In the end you want your Investigators to be right, but leading up to that you want enough twists and turns that they can't just predict the ending at the beginning. The CSI tv shows and the shows like Bones do this well. The clues are all there usually in the beginning, but for the first 30 minutes or so all their theories are generally wrong. Its only after closely examining all the clues, discarding the irrelevant ones, retrieving the ones you thought were irrevelant in the first place, and finally putting the puzzle together does it all work out.

Also, with a little twisting, shows like CSI and Bones and Law and Order can give you a plethora of ideas.

Xathess Wolfe said:

What I meant is if players come up with a better plot than you originally thought of, go with it...

The two seperate players (or groups of players) are exploring different avenues of investigation, give each half a clue, or a throwaway line that only makes sense when the two meet back up and discuss their findings. Recently I did this with my players and they got a great sense of acheivementy from bring the clue together.

Eg: two players went to the bloodsworn office and got a list of current bounties, while another slummed it with the hab workers. When the same name cropped up in both avenues of investigation, the knew they were on to something.

I tend to do things a bit differently.

Since I have grown accustomed to the concept of endless play, meaning we play the same characters and the story of their lives as long as its fun and suits us (or as long as they manage to stay alive, reasonably sane and somewhat on the good side of things), I usually have at least one, if not more overarcing plotlines and arcs, as well as often a personal storyline for one of my players (I try to have about half of our scenarios/adventures/missions have something to do with one of the player characters).

For these reasons, I cannot usually stray far from the original layout of the storyline, and certainly not always adapt to player ideas as if it was my storyline all along.

Thus, I usually handle investigations, puzzles and whodunits like this:

I write down and create in my head what actually happened. I usually outline a rough timeline what the people involved will do over the days, weeks or months that our little story happens. Its usually not very detailed, but its stuff like:

Trader X who saw the murderer will leave the planet 10 days after the killing happened. He will be in the system and reachable via vox for another day, then hes gone.

Noble Y is only around every Sunday, since he continuosly moves around between houses and palaces. If you dont catch him on a Sunday out in the bar, you have to arrange an audience.

And so on. I then make a list of clues and bits of info, and assign them as it fits to my NPCs.... I usually differentiate clues between vital (cant solve the thing without, such as the primary suspect etc.), important (helps a lot to know and/or leads onward, but not absolutely vital, such as the murder weapon, or the personal relationship of victim to killer) and optional (such as health condition of people involved, special tricks they may have like digital weapons, bodyguards, generally stuff that makes the way easier and the final confrontation, if combat, less lethal)

Vital clues will never leave the scene. I always make sure these are around, and will improvise and swap them with other clues so my players get them one way or the other.... always making sure they dont suspect I fudge a bit here. But these things show up early, and reliably.

Important clues CAN leave the scene, like with the trader above, and I usually have some sort of secondary way to acquire them. If they miss the trader, because they think of him too late, he may have stuff written down in a diary he forgot somewhere. Basically, important clues are never gone completely, but if you missed the logical and correct way of getting them, it will be a pain in the ass to still get hold of this information.

Optional Clues are hard to get, and I have no problems with making them only available under special circumstances, within a small timeframe or whatever. Some of these optional clues are wrong anyway, some are added hints to point at the way the other clues link together, most of them are helpful in avoiding trouble, pitfalls, possibly ambushes and nasty surprises from the bad guy.

After this process, I dont change around much during gameplay, cause frankly I dont need to. Once the vital clues are given out in the first hour or two of investigative work, the players catch on, and its then just a matter of handling your clues right.

I usually combine the creation of the Optional Clues with the creation of the enemy. Basically, most stuff that differentiates the main enemy or enemies from a normal citizen can be found out ahead of time. Is he a good shot? Does he have backup? Is he a mutant? Under most circumstances, its pretty realistic to say that almost all of this, barring extreme secrecy, is somewhere out there. If my players come up with an innovative or unforseen idea, ask a guy I havent prepared, I usually throw them such an optional clue as reward.

Just one last hint: Avoid having absolutely vital, important, BIG clues on random NPCs that really shouldnt know them. Yes, even if your players are dumb, blind and manage to evade all the important ones. You set a precedent by that which players will quickly realize, and start methodically asking every single patron of the next bar they go into, every soldier, everyone they meet, which bogs down the game alot... and all that because they may have realized that the information is NOT tied to the subject of their investigations.

I know, sometimes its annoying to see them walk by the right guy a dozen times without asking, but dont ruin the suspense of disbelief by obviously getting the info to them no matter what they do.

Bartenders do NOT know the secret entrance to the nobles palace. No matter how important that info is.

Generally I just have an outline and wing it from there. Good idea + good roll = clue. I also generally try to ensure that the investigators have mutliple chances to figure out what they need to know, but each delay ups the ante. For example, if chasing a series of cult killings, each ritual site gives the investigators a number of chances to figure something out. If they fail to get enough info, the next site will have a whole new set of opportunities, but the cultists will have progressed their plan one more step. So the longer they take the easier it is to figure out what's up, but the nastier the threat they are chasing becomes.

Though yes, if a player comes up with a theory way cooler than mine, I'll award them a small immediate xp bonus for "figuring things out ahead of schedule", so they think that it was my plan all along.

Aureus said:

Cool solution, but idd, players sometimes come up with far more horrible things than us humble GM's...

Santiago said:

Why do you think I use them?

Mix it up. One time they are on a clue hunt, trying to piece things together; the next is more of a noir style investigation where most of the work is strong arm tactics and fast thinking; another time they begin knowing who the killer is, but need to find proof do to his political clout; etc. Don't make the experience repetitive.

Have an ideal outline of what you want to happen, but let the players come up with original ways to gain clues - doubtless they'll surprise you.

Keep track of npcs likely to pop up again - even waitresses or reporters - and have them do just that, it gives the players a sense of belonging to the setting.

Get yourself a Jenga tower - every time the pcs look for a clue make them pull from the tower - if the tower falls before they figure it out, the villain gets away.

Take an table top timer and set it for 4 hours (assuming you play at least six) every time they get a clue and make a right or clever connection add ten minutes to the timer ... when the timer runs out the bad guy occomplishes his task.

Do cut scenes for each clue, demonstrating some aspect of how the clue got where it is, thus you are telling the story of this mystery to the players one piece at a time.

Lay out the entire scenario at the begining of the game and then let the players control the villain as well as their characters. Give them a time limit of X number days and have them decide what he is doing each day. Set a pair of rewards beyond xp, one reward if the bad buy wins, an equally tempting reward if they win. Let them try to trump themselves and see how it works out. (you, of course, still play the npcs and react to their decisions)

Have them arrested for the crime, when they protest and declair their innocense have the abitor in charge of their case present them with all the clues and have them try to figure the case out from their jail cells.

Give them a difficult riddle at the begining of the game. Each clue they find offers some hint to the answer ... if they guess correctly they catch the villain in time, if not he escapes/succeeds, etc.

Do random cutscenes throughout the adventure, showing the villains plan progress bit by bit, the pcs will feel the tension mount as they see his plans coming to fruition.

Two Major issues here: GM's and Players

On the GM side, planning a mystery can be difficult for multiple reasons:

1) It is very difficult to properly gauge how easy or hard the clues you come up with will be for the players to use to solve the story. The cause of this is simple, you have full information, so a series of clues that adds up 2+2+2=6 from your perspective may be mystifying to players who can't see the whole picture. It's kind of like when you get to the end/big reveal of a book or movie and suddenly realize there were all these clues that should have been obvious, but you didn't realize it when you saw them.

2) Also what makes sense to you based on the way you think about problems may be a completely different animal to those with another mindset, just because they think along different lines than you.

This two-fold difficulty can result in players agonizing and running into a wall with something you think should be easy, as well as seeing right through something you thought was subtle and complex.

3) Since your control over what avenues the players pursue when following their investigation, it is sometime hard to make sure they get all the clues they need w/o being overly heavy handed or rigging the outcome. (If you don't care about being obvious, rigging the sucess or failur of an investigation is easy based on consciously withholding or just handing out info.)

On the player side, players are the wild card, it all depends on the players you've got:

1) Effort - some players will have their characters chase down every glimmer of a lead, every idea that pops up. Others sit back and refuse to pay attention to anything not handed to them on a silver platter. While the lazy are generally more of a problem, sometimes the overeager can be distracting or add unnecessary confusion (which is sometimes a good thing, other times not)

2) You never can tell where they're going to go with a clue. - I used to run a Deadlands campaign that was almost all one mystery after another. It was an odd investigative dynamic.

One guy was the obstinant, lazy, give it to me on a platter type, but the rest really dug into the mysteries.

Among those who pursued solving things, several of the players were good at spotting clues and figuring out what the clues meant, but somehow even though they could figure out each piece could never quite put the puzzle together to get the answer. (Though when the answer was finally revealed, they'd alway be all "****, it was right there in front of us the whole time!")

Then the was one guy who, while equally adept at spotting clues (more adept actually as he would often find clues where there weren't any) always misinterpreted, misconstrued or misunderstood every clue, and yet somehow he would take his ball or wrong assumptions, roll it up, staple together three entirely unrelated red-herrings, and Bang! he'd have the right answer to the mystery. I never could figure out how he did it, but every mystery his character was involved in he solved, but he somehow did it by getting everything but the conclusion wrong.

The point being, mysteries are tricky on several layers, and the added complexity makes for increased challenges (but also often more rewarding gameplay) on both sides of the table.

@Khaunshar

Would you mind writing up one of your investigations in total with all the clues you planted and how they got found or missed? Your method sounds quite interesting and intuitive, but how do you make your important and optional clues important when the Vital ones are all that's needed to solve the mystery?

I ll try and do that, but may take me a bit as I am awfully busy this week.

Well, probably the best way of ensuring that all of the dots connect is to make things so that, even if they fail to connect the dots, they still have a chance - albeit reduced - to influence the outcome for the "good".

Illumination is a good example, because regardless of whether the PCs pick up the right trail or not, the Crow Father will manifest one way or another and the PCs will have to face him. The only question is whether they have to rush back to the Cathedral and find him manifest in his full power or whether they'll catch him early enough - from solving the clues - to take him down before he's in full flight.

As for red herrings, one useful thing is to make the red herrings clues for the next adventure, for the adventure after that or as part of a bigger metaplot for your players. For example, I want to introduce the Temple Tendency a couple of adventures from now, so I plan on introducing the idea in this adventure.

R.

I like all of the suggestions that have been made here. I especially think that the jenga idea was a little outside the box but good. I would like to see the Khansaur's document, I think that would be a great resource. Thanks for all the suggestions.

Salcor