Our sorcerer got some officers to confront the person who stole his identity and we turned the human trafficking ring over to the guard who pulled everyone out relatively safely.
But to even things out the sorcerer killed someone for his cloak and my rogue stole stuff from a person we later found out leaves the thieves’ guild the next session. Karmic balance.
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You should have the same guard come back at the end to arrest the party, like the end of the Holy Grail.
There’s always the option of them unknowingly bringing their problem to a corrupt official, and realizing that it’s much deeper rooted than just common criminality.
That’s when you pull out the ACAB writing and have them proceed to do everything they can to not have to help you, just like real life.
More realistically the rank and file town guards will actually try as hard as they can to be helpful, because the medieval hue and cry system means every single one of them is a volunteer, meaning no millitary dropouts who want a paycheck and to feel like a badass.
Also in a city state set-up, they’re more often than not also the millitary, so double on the no bootcamp dropouts point.
Where you’ll run into trouble is more hierarchicalized cities where there’s neighborhood and regional levels of overseership that can fall into the hands of corrupt officials who actively benefit from some criminal activities, more often than not in the form of bribes to look the other way, because again, all volunteer force, doesn’t take a lot to be able to make participation worth more than the honor of the badge.
Hypothetically you could avoid this by making your police force all paladins and just constantly be checking for oathbreakers, but that’s operating dangerously close to the “literally nobody would willingly subject themselves to this without pay” event horizon.
I mean we can basically justify the law keeping faction to act and respond in whatever way suits the story.
Perhaps the police are a mercenary company paid to guard the local clergy, so reporting their misdeeds is moot.
Perhaps as you said it’s that the law keepers are an order of paladin’s who must uphold their oath of enforcing the law or lose their magical connection.
Perhaps the closest to a guard force up to that point has been the ruling warlord’s loyal warriors, and to your party, they’re the enemy.
If the party become too over reliant or too wary of the police, have them reform in plot, for better or for worse.
It doesn’t really matter how you frame it, the existence of a police force is always going to necessitate power dynamics. Every form of policing exists to subjugate the public, from medieval guards who protect the crown to the modern day police force which is run by fascist gangs. There is zero context where you can go to an authority and not have to deal with those dynamics.
I mean maybe in real life. I had a game where one state was basically a commune. They had “guards” but they were volunteers from the community that were willing and able to do stuff like keep watch at night, make note of visitors, deescalate situations, and so on.
It worked well. The players helped stop counter revolutionaries from restoring the (now undead) despotic king to the throne.
Edit: there’s power dynamics in any situation. This one didn’t have authorities that were subjugating their people.
I really like this take. I wish more people would do that instead of just ignoring the elephant in the room.
Every form of policing exists to subjugate the public
I mean when it’s to subjugate them to the law of “don’t kill people” then I suppose that’s a good thing
That one’s quite good, but that;s not the majority of what they do, is it?
I think it’s just to make sure people follow laws in general
More realistically the rank and file town guards will actually try as hard as they can to be helpful, because the medieval hue and cry system means every single one of them is a volunteer, meaning no millitary dropouts who want a paycheck and to feel like a badass.
That’s gotta depend a lot on the specific setting
“The town guard arrive, but they are startled by an acorn falling and shoot you 27 times.”
Shoot you and your dog
I played a Drow aberrant mind sorcerer where we came across a cult operating in the back room of a tavern and it was guarded by two thugs.
Half our party went in unarmed under the guise of being townsfolk, myself and one other party member entered the tavern shortly after and sat at a table within sight of the thugs.
After a few moments my character looked at the rogue in front of me and said go get the guards. He was like “uhhhhh” I was like tell them there’s been a murder. He was like “what are you doing I don’t understand” I’m like just go. So he leaves. I wait a few more minutes then I telepathically implanted one of the thugs with Enemies abound. It causes the target to perceive everyone as enemies. The person directly in front of of him was the other thug.
He pulled out his sword the other thug was like “Billy? (Or some other name I can’t remember) and he proceeded to gank his buddy, and as the body was sliding off his blade my party member and the town guards burst through the door, and the guards screamed stop! The thug’s attention was drawn to them and he charged them and was subsequently cut down.
The rogue only then realizing what the game plan was screamed out “there’s more of them behind that door killing our friends!” The guards and the rogue burst through the doors and a massive brawl ensued between enthralled townsfolk, cultists and our party where we managed to defeat a significantly higher level encounter than what we should have been able to if we went at it alone and the cultists were forced to flee.
I think using the law to your own ends can be a good thing if it is something your character would do. My Drow Sorc would not have engaged the law unless it was to his benefit. And that’s exactly what he did.
After the session our DM was like wow that was unexpected but also the outcome was really fun. Unfortunately a few sessions later the campaign fell apart, so I never got to find out if the actions would catch up to me or not but it was fun as hell.
That’s awesome, reminds me of one of my favorite scenes from the Bourne movies. Bourne knows some agents are coming after him to the building he’s in, so he picks up a phone, calls the police and says “I heard gunshots, I think they’re Americans” and then throws the phone against the wall, fires a few random shots, and leaves. The police then catch the agents sneaking up to the building and arrest them.
I did see that movie but at the time I wasn’t thinking of that. This cult had jumped us on the road incapped a few party members and took off with our loot. I was truly focused on not only winning a combat against them but turning as many people as I could in the process against them. My plan did work out much better than expected. I had assumed we would still be overwhelmed but our Druid used spike growth and was hidden as a spider in the room with them so combat became very difficult for them with the guards plus our party and the spike growth causing them damage.
This is about to happen in the next session we play. They are 100% gonna have a run in with the authorities when they sail into port, and it’s gonna be up to them on how to deal with it. I would love for them to befriend the knights, but I know at best they’ll spend a night in jail, and at worst they’ll be hunted down like stray dogs by every Knight in the city. They’re learning, though. A month ago I wouldn’t even bother brainstorming alternatives, because they’d just fight everyone without thinking and wind up sleeping outside the city, again.
Might be worth checking in with the players about what kind of game and setting they want. A game where the players investigate and call in the cavalry could be fun. A refreshing change from the common freelance murder moron mode of play.
Lean into it if you want. Have the PCs make friends with a guard NPC. Maybe do some quests for the guards. Then have the captain of the guards get killed (maybe while responding to a call from the NPCs) and then the NPC guard friend asks for the PCs help making sure that the next captain isn’t the obviously corrupt asshole/failson nepobaby/stooge of the big bad.
Alternatively, the captain of the guards dies and the replacement is one of the above people and now the guards are suddenly much more hostile to the party, demanding bribes, refusing to act against nobles breaking the law, or trying to arrest the party to help the big bad’s plans.
no more cops in dnd
