I am planning a set piece that involves some NPCs deceiving my players. The short version is that my players will meet some simple farmers trying to bring their crops to market, only to find that they’re actually smugglers in a Hatfields and McCoy’s type feud, which the party then gets messily swept up into. I generally don’t trick my players; I don’t think there’s anything wrong with it but I imagine some tables would take to it more than others. Do you trick your players? Are there some tricks you find acceptable and others that are unacceptable? For me, I have no qualm getting my players swept up into the seedy underworld of drug or artifacts smuggling, but I don’t think I would run a plotline on human trafficking. That I think would be difficult in an unpleasant way for everyone involved.
I wouldn’t say never, but it seems like the kind of story that would kill the buzz. I like playing silly campaigns and it’s hard to be silly about such things. I have run stories where the party finds captive people and busts them out, but it usually isn’t a core component of the campaign plot. I have a storyline in the backlog that I’ve never used about sentient stones. Basically, magical crystals in the rock form neural networks. Some of them can think, some of them can communicate, but they are immobile and defenseless. they are routinely harvested for their magic crystals, and sometimes trafficked great distances. One of the campaign hooks centers around a stone that was used to prop up a table right next to a mill, close enough that it could hear the rocks scream as they slowly grind down to dust, every day, for years. It gets grim. I might run that one with the right table.
Make it a rescue mission.
From a candy factory.
Manned with rock gnomes with green hair.
Oh my god. If the rocks are ground up and mixed into candy, because the magic makes the candy pleasantly tingly…
Blatantly call it rock candy. Make them roll perception to see if they notice the actual ground up rock.
I imagine whether or not you can taste the rock depends on how well the candy is made. Cheaper rock is coarser and contains more regular rock grit, the more expensive stuff is milled finer and is almost pure magic crystal.
I imagine it would be kind of a touristy thing, like there might be street vendors selling rock candy in a town market, and some fancier confectioners that all claim to have the finest rock candy in the whole region.
The final insult to the rocks is the the candy is mostly sold to travelers because most people agree that it’s not that good. kinda like licorice, or salt water taffy. Some people love it, and it’s a kind-of interesting feeling to have the crystals dissolve in your mouth, but most people would just as soon pass after they’ve had it once.