The Lost City & Missed Opportunities

I avoid "Monday morning quarterbacking" as much possible here on my blog. The actions of the PCs are their actions. They don't need me coming along and telling them the "right" way to play. I'll point out errors in character development or systemically poor approaches to a task, but otherwise, they can do what they like.

Still, I think it's worth noting how things could have gone a bit differently in the Lost City.

Sunday night, after the game ended, a few of us sat and talked for a few minutes about the self-described flailing of the PCs, trying to try something that turned out to be the right thing to do. The irony of doing the "right thing" and then not following up on that was painful; it all could have ended much earlier and with much less expenditure of resources. And had they just focused exclusively on the priestess instead of activating the jaguars by bothering the statue, they could have puzzled it out and experimentally tried options and defeated her. They did find her one weakness - she was a poor grappler and couldn't use her "deathtouch" ability without a free hand and couldn't cast spells while grappled. They just didn't really exploit it, and tried damage long after it was clear damage wasn't the way to do it. It was just hopeless action for a while - attempting to do the same thing again just to stay busy.

I will say the jaguar statues were a trap for typical delver behavior - smashing anything that could be a golem before it activates would spark an avoidable fight. Also, smashing everything in places they visit just in case they conceal treasure, or because they're "evil" (not a priority until combat is over and it's clear the "evil" thing isn't valuable and salable), or because they're bored. Had they showed some restraint, they wouldn't have needed to fight them. They didn't do a lot of harm, but they did enough, and 2200 worth of obsidian chunks sold for 880 and it cost probably that or more in paut and healing potions expended as a result of them. Net/net, it wasn't a good use of time or resources.

But the lost opportunities go way back, to the first series of delves in the Lost City. I won't enumerate all of them, just a couple that directly bear on the current session's results.

Back when they first attacked Rangol Grot (pre-emptively getting him back for trying to kill them, and for the high crime of possessing an item they also wanted), they managed to savage Rangol's companions and force him to flee. Angus was pursuing Rangol Grot, but couldn't run him down due to inferior Move. So he gave up and went back to the group. Actually, that's a whole post on its own - running away when you have less Move and pursuing when you have inferior Move.

The missed opportunity is that they gave Rangol Grot about 20-30 seconds time before the next group of pursuers came. That's not long, but it was long enough. He was able to gather up a couple of prized possessions, including the Right Bell of D'Abo, and flee. He only needed a brief respite to escape. The PCs gave it to him. Had they kept after him Rangol would have needed to flee without the bell, hoping it would stay hidden. The PCs having the Left Bell of D'Abo, they'd have been been able to triangulate its location and find it eventually. It wasn't safe from them in the house. It was safe out of range. He fled to an encampment, which the PCs never blundered into, and then from there into the jungle itself. There he got himself some new friends, and it was there they found him . . . years later.

The second missed opportunity was the message from the Princess. Multiple times, from the first few sessions in town to the Naga delve, the PCs saw that glow . . . and ignored it or actively avoided it. The message isn't that deep, but having had it, it would have made the task more clear. Instead, it grew in stature . . . eventually, it became "let's go get the Princess and bring her to the temple" and it's clear that this wasn't the way to do it. Instead of just pointing the way early, as intended, it was sought out when they hoped it was the how-to guide for clearing the temple.

Sometimes sitting on the GM's side of the screen it can be frustrating watching the players miss opportunities. It's like watching a comedy or a horror movie where the protagonists make some error, just narrowly miss some connection, or otherwise act "foolish" because of a lack of complete understanding of the situation.

But it's also fair to look at it from the side of the players, and see how they could make decisions based on limited information.

Still, some of the above was really odd - even with a party with multiple people in it across the delves with Curious, they'd rather self-control rolls than investigate a strange glow in a town they were searching for treasure, and that they were searching for a rumored ghostly Princess who appeared there. The lapse in not chasing a fleeing foe more than a few seconds because he was too quick meant another loss. Those seem more like mistakes than choices made in the absence of good information. Even so, the games were fun to play . . . just it was sad how often "we need the second bell!" came up and how often "If we could find the Princess . . ." was said. The bell was in their grasp at one point, and the Princess was at all points. They just needed to go and look for it.

It's sparked some discussion with the players about how to organize delves, combat and otherwise, and we'll see what comes to pass with that.