Encounter Idea 19 – The Mob

In most role-playing environments the heroes come home, tell their tales, spend their money and then they are off again onto the next adventure.

The question then has to be asked, what repercussions are there on the community? In a lot of cases they may not be good – higher costs as more money flows in along with higher taxes. Parents concerned about their children wanting to take up the ‘adventuring life’ instead of staying home to help on the farm or in the family store. The increased crime rate as thieves move in and bandits attack townsfolk on their way in or out looking for the riches to be had.

Take all that and sprinkle in a little presuasion and you have a mob on your hands and that’s something that every party should be wary of.

When confronted with a mob like this the party has to deal with things with a bit more tact. They can just open fire on all those people (unless they’re playing from the evil slant) that wouldn’t be right. How could they be heroes and protectors of the weak when they gun down (fireball, charge, etc.) the very people they are trying to help? An interesting situation to have to role-play out of.

You should also keep this in mind from the other side of the coin as well. I played a character once, a wizard/thief, who was acutally responsible for creating a mob. There were strange things going on and wanting to bring down the local mages’ guild he built on those fears and with a little prodding turned the whole town on the guild who then proceeded to burn the guildhall to the ground – a very memorable experience and enjoyable session.

I would like to thank the members of the gmmastery Yahoo group for inspiring this post.

May your dice roll well.

Be sure to check out these additional encounter ideas