The PCs kick in a dungeon door.

Description #1:

With the sharp crack of splintering wood, the door smashes open, revealing a room about forty feet across. The high, curved walls are lined with built-in shelves of cherry wood filled with books and warmly lit by a crystal chandelier that hangs from the middle of the domed ceiling. Five goblins are ripping books off the shelves, but their heads whip in your direction.

Description #2:

With the sharp crack of splintering wood, the door smashes open, revealing five goblins who whip their heads in your direction. The room is about forty feet across. The high, curved walls are lined with built-in shelves of cherry wood filled with books and warmly lit by a crystal chandelier that hangs from the middle of the domed ceiling. The goblins have been ripping books off the shelves.

Which description is more effective?

What we’re broadly looking at is whether it’s better to describe the monsters in a room FIRST or LAST.

(Disclaimer: Descriptions are an artistic expression and the given circumstances of any particular moment at the game table are limitless. So there will be a bajillion-and-one hypothetical exceptions to any general principles we might discuss. Think of anything I advocate here in the same way you’d interpret “don’t cross the line when shooting reverse angles” in film or “sentence fragments are bad” when writing fiction. Know the rules so you can break the rules.)

The argument for Monsters First is that it mirrors the crisis perception of the characters: If you opened a door and saw a slavering beast, all of your attention would be immediately focused on the monster. You wouldn’t take your time inspecting the rest of the environment and only THEN look at the monster!

It seems like a logical argument. The problem is that it ignores the actual experience of the characters: If you opened a door and saw a slavering beast, you would immediately want to REACT to that slavering beast. That’s the adrenaline-pumping crisis response (fight or flight!), and it’s why Monster Last is the correct technique. You want the player to be able to immediately react to the monster just like their character would. You don’t want to blunt that reaction by forcing them to wait until you’ve finished the rest of the description.

Note that this isn’t just a matter of associating the experience of character and player. It’s also about effective dramatic presentation: A director of a horror film, for example, wouldn’t follow up on a jump scare with an establishing shot that slowly pans across the scenery before showing the main character’s reaction to the monster!

Okay, but can’t we resolve this dilemma by just not describing the room? The character’s focus would be entirely on the slavering monster. If they’re not focused on the rest of the room, we just won’t describe it to them!

Description #3:

With the sharp crack of splintering wood, the door smashes open, revealing five goblins! Their heads whip in your direction.

Unfortunately, this approach ignores the limited bandwidth by which information about the game world is transmitted to the players (i.e., the GM’s voice).

Although the character may be fixated on the monster, their peripheral vision is immediately processing the environment: Where are the exits? Where can they hide? What are the defensible position? How can they attack? Not only can they take in the totality of their sensorium, they’re also capable of taking action while simultaneously continuing to observe their environment.

The player can’t do that: When they communicate their intended action to the GM, they’re monopolizing the same channel that would be used to give them a description of their character’s environment.

Two outcomes become likely:

First, the player will recognize the problem and ask clarifying questions to obtain the understanding of setting they’re lacking. (“Are there any obstacles that would stop me from charging them? Do I see anything I can dive behind?”)

Second, without understanding the environment, the players will take nonsensical actions. (You didn’t mention the giant chasm that runs across the room between them and the rabid mammoth, so now they’re charging straight into it even though that would be a ridiculous thing for their character to do? Whoops.) This, of course, will force you to stop and correct them, explaining the important context they didn’t know (even though their characters would have).

In either case, you’ve reverted to interjecting an environmental description between the revelation of the monster and the reaction (Monster First). Only it’s actually gotten worse because the presentation is now awkward and frustrating.

WHAT ABOUT A BATTLEMAP?

If you’re using a detailed battle map couldn’t you just reveal it to the players to provide essential environmental information? And then just verbally announce the five goblins in the room?

Sure thing! You could also use other visual references. Pictures are worth a thousand words. In terms of technique, though, this is still Monster Last: You’re use using the visual presentation to handle the room description.

(Or, at least, to make that presentation more efficient: I’ve found that even the best visual aids usually benefit from additional verbal details. The great thing is that you can multitask, usually delivering the additional details at the same time that you’re drawing or revealing the visual reference. The usual single channel of information at the game table briefly becomes multi-channel, which is great!)

WHAT ABOUT INITIATIVE?

Wait a minute. What about initiative?

We’ve been talking about that moment of instantaneous response as if it looked like this:

GM: Five goblins are ripping books off the shelves, but their heads whip in your direction. What do you do?!

Player: I yell, “Fire in the hole!” and throw a fireball in the room.

But doesn’t it actually look like this?

GM: Five goblins are ripping books off the shelves, but their heads whip in your direction. Roll initiative.

(rolling dice)

Player: 14.

Player: 8

Player: 21!

Player: 15.

Player: 16.

GM: (also rolls dice and does math) … okay. Looks like Bob is first. What are you doing, Bob?

This is actually something I addressed in the very first Random GM Tip I posted to the Alexandrian:

Have your players roll their initiatives at the end of combat. Use this initiative for the next combat. (Initiative modifiers essentially never change, so it doesn’t really matter when you roll the check.) When it looks like the PCs are about to encounter something, roll for its initiative and slot it into the order. If they don’t encounter it for some reason, no big deal.

Using this method, by the time combat starts, initiative is already completely resolved. As a result, there’s no delay while you ask for initiative, the dice are rolled, your players tell you their results, and then you sort the results into order. This allows you to start combat off with a bang and keep the ball rolling with that same high intensity. It means that when the players are ambushed, you can maintain that adrenaline rush of surprise instead of immediately undermining it with the mundane task of collecting initiative.

This method also means that initiative results are generally being collected at a time when other bookkeeping chores are being done anyway: After the heat of battle, wounds are being healed; corpses are being looted; equipment lists are being updated; and options are being discussed. Juggling a few extra numbers does not detract from that moment.

And you’ll notice that the reason for moving the resolution of initiative is the same reason for using Monster Last scene description: To capitalize on the moment of reaction to drive the players’ excitement into launching the new scene.

THE REACTION POINT

I’ve been talking about the initiation of combat, but there’s a general principle here:

1. Identify the reaction point (the point at which your players WANT to react);
2. Focus your description to that point; and
3. Clear away any detritus that gets in the way of the players immediately reacting.

The stronger the players’ desire to react, the more important this becomes.

You can also think of the reaction point as being literally the point where you’re asking the players for a response: You want that point to be as interesting as possible because you want to provoke a strong response from the players. Because that’s what will drive the action forward in interesting ways, which will let you easily frame the next reaction point to be as interesting as possible.

Examples outside of combat might include:

• Even though you just rolled the random wilderness encounter, make sure to set up the terrain first before describing the merchant’s wagon coming over the hill.
• Noticing that the eyes of the painting in the haunted house are following you should probably be the last thing described in the room.
• A beautiful, blue-haired man blows you a kiss from across the tavern’s common room.
• They notice someone following them.
• The Federales warchief demands the ship’s instant surrender.

Now, here’s the dirty secret that sort of inverts the idea of putting the most interesting thing at the reaction point: If you instead want the players to preferentially react to something in an otherwise undifferentiated list, put it at the reaction point. Psychologically this is due to recency effect. (The other strong position is to mention something first due to primacy effect. But for immediate choices – i.e., a direct response to a described scene – Miller & Campbell, 1959 identifies the last position as the stronger preference.)

For example, if there’s a pit trap under the fancy tabaxi rug in the middle room, drop the description of the rug in the middle of the room’s description and mention the shelves covered in knick-knacks on the far side of the room last: You increase the odds that a curious PC will cross the room (and the rug) to check out the shelves first.

Running a successful horror scenario in a roleplaying game can be a unique challenge, but it’s not the impossibility that some feel it to be.

There is one baseline requirement, though: The players have to be invested in the game world. They have to CARE about something. Their own PCs at a minimum. The whole group is better. Other stuff in the game world is ideal.

And, as a horror GM, you want to be aware of what your players actually care about: If they don’t care about something, then they cannot fear its loss. Target what the players care about, which may not be the same thing as what their characters care about.

The thin line of distinction here can often be found in joking around the table: It’s okay if the players are using jokes to try to distract themselves from the danger. That’s part of horror! It actually shows that they’re invested in the world.

But if the players are using jokes to distance themselves from the game world, that’s a problem: Those jokes de-invest the players’ engagement in the game world. It’s the difference between Buffy cracking wise with Willow and the MST3k crew mocking a movie.

The distinction between these two forms of humor at a gaming table – where roleplaying, meta-game discussion, and meta-commentary often flow around each other seamlessly – can be very subtle, but it’s important.

Long story short: If you’re trying to run a horror game and you’re having problems with disruptive behavior (i.e., players disrupting the table’s investment in the scenario), then it’s useful to step back and have a group discussion about expectations. However, it’s easy for this conversation to misdirect towards things like “no laughing” or “horror is serious business, so everyone put on their frowny faces.” In my experience, this is often ineffective and it can be more useful to drive to the heart of the matter: Why don’t you care?

Fixing that issue may be a much more complicated issue (and beyond the scope of this essay), but the frank discussion is usually a good place to start.

In any case, let’s lay this digression aside and assume that you have a group invested in their characters and the game world.

What next?

THE CORE OF HORROR

Regardless of medium, achieving true horror is a vague and unspecific art. But you’re generally looking for some combination of danger, anxiety, helplessness, and enigma.

These qualities are often associated with the lack of power, and this can lead to the assumption that horror becomes impossible if characters have a certain amount of power: You can’t do horror with superheroes. Or D&D characters. Or colonial marines in a warship armed with nuclear weapons.

In general, however, the objective amount of power you have is only relevant because it influences your RELATIVE power. And even relative power is only meaningful insofar as it affects PERCEIVED power.

If you perceive yourself to be overpowered by something that wants harm you (or, often more effectively, those things and people you care about), then you are in DANGER.

If you see no way to escape or redress the imbalance of power, you are HELPLESS.

If you are concerned that such danger or helplessness could happen, you are ANXIOUS.

Finally, when confronted with an ENIGMA, players will perform an act of closure. With proper circumstance and priming, their closure will create the threat of danger or helplessness, either heightening the sense of anxiety or creating anxiety even in situations where it isn’t necessary.

Scott Mccloud – Understanding Comics

SHORTCUTS & MULTIPLIERS

There are a number of shortcuts and multipliers you can use to create or enhance horror.

PHOBIAS have various sources, but they are all pre-trained fear responses. They bypass rational threat assessment and immediately trigger a sense of overwhelming danger.

Making the players fear for something other than their PCs (i.e., themselves) allows you to place the endangered thing or person at a distance. This DANGER AT A DISTANCE reduces the perceived ability to do anything about the danger, thus reducing perceived power and enhancing helplessness.

Conversely you can endanger PCs from a distance or in a way they don’t understand. If they can’t figure out how to apply their power to MYSTERIOUS DANGER, they also lose perceived power. (I used this technique in The Complex of Zombies with the bloodsheen ability to create a terrifying mystery.)

You can achieve similar effects via DILEMMAS. If multiple things the PCs care about are simultaneously put in danger (preferably in different locations), being forced to choose which one to help or save can create helplessness. (Or it can force the party to split up, which is also great for horror: It reduces the perceived power of the characters and it lets you put isolated characters at risk, presenting danger at a distance for the rest of the group.)

You can use PRIMING to direct how players perform closure on the enigmas you present. (There are a lot of ways to do this. Horror movies actually do it with their soundtracks: Specific music cues or types of music or the lack of music prime the audience to literally imagine the worst possible outcomes from otherwise innocuous interactions – like opening a door – a thousand times over.)

You can use the UNEXPECTED to create quick enigma, disrupt the perception of relative power, or maximize the effectiveness of a phobia. (Jump scares are a simple example, but so are xenomorphs climbing through the ceiling when you expected them to come through the doors.)

It can also be effective to ESTABLISH RUTHLESSNESS. In order for horror to exist, the threat of loss cannot simply be performative: The audience (i.e., the players) must believe the threat to be real. And the easiest way to make that happen is if the threat is real, which can be demonstrated by actually pulling the trigger (or swinging the axe, as the case may be).

This can be very effective when dealing with the problems created by genre expectations: There are all kinds of genres in which the main characters are placed in jeopardy, but are never in actual danger of being killed. This is particularly true of the pulp genres and TV procedurals that many RPGs are based on.

Modern design ethos, for example, has ingrained the belief in many groups that game play is supposed to be a predictable series of “fair” encounters. The expectation is thus that the PCs will constantly be placed in the perception of “danger,” but will never actually be at risk. You’re obviously never going to feel helpless if you know every encounter has been designed for you to triumph, nor are you going to feel anxious about the possibility of facing the next “dangerous” encounter. Horror, of course, is completely impossible under these conditions, and often the only way to break that long-held belief is to bluntly demonstrate that, no, you and/or the things you care about are NOT safe.

CONCLUDING THOUGHTS

Let’s wrap up with a couple things you should NOT do.

First, don’t tell the players that their characters are scared. While it’s true that we have an empathetic model of mind (i.e., if we see someone smiling we often reflect that emotion and become happy ourselves because we have circuitry in our brains specifically designed to recreate the emotions seen in others) and that horror fiction – particularly film – leverages that to create fear in an audience by showing a character in fear, instructing players what their characters are feeling can often psychologically distance them from those characters and have the opposite effect.

(What you CAN do is vividly describe the emotional reaction of NPCs. Particularly NPCs that you know the players care about. The bandwidth is still limited compared to a film, but the technique can be effective.)

You should also not allow this imprecation to discourage you from using tools like sanity mechanics, assuming you’re using them correctly, of course. (Note that, when used correctly, sanity mechanics create enigma and use priming to frame player closure through foreshadowing without disrupting their emotional engagement with both their character and the moment. This is obviously not a coincidence.)

Second, never railroad the players into danger.

As the Railroading Manifesto tells us, railroading is never a good idea. But it sure can be tempting in a horror scenario! After all, if helplessness is one way of creating horror, what could make the players feel more helpless than forcing them into a preconceived outcome?

The problem is that this helplessness is not diegetic; instead of being focused on the game world (and the things that the players care about in that game world) it’s focused on you. This emotional redirection can disconnect the players from the game world, causing them to lose the investment that is foundational to the horror experience. In other words they stop caring. And often the fear you want them to be feeling is replaced with anger.

Conversely, true autonomy often heightens the horror: It’s only when choices matter that enigmas are fully engaged with (because they know the outcome of those enigmas are not predetermined; in the most simplistic form, if they could solve this puzzle faster then they might be able to save Lisa’s life). Furthermore, when players feel true responsibility for what happens (because it’s the result of the choices they made), the guilt they feel for those outcomes – and, importantly, the fear of experiencing that guilt if things go wrong – will enrich their emotional response to danger and helplessness.

That kind of emotional engagement, of course, will heighten the players’ investment in the game world, expanding the depth and breadth of the horror itself.

Say that you want to randomly pick one of the PCs:

2 = coin flip, even/odds
3 = d6/2
4 = d4
5 = d10/2 or d6 + reroll 6’s
6 = d6
7 = (sure, I guess) d8 + reroll 8’s
8 = d8
9 = (seriously?) d10 + reroll 10’s
10 = d10
11 = stahp, u hav tu mny playrs

Obviously you can use this sort of technique for any random number you need to generate.

This is a sequel to Random GM Tip: Calling in the Big Guns. That article dealt with strategies for dealing with PCs who go to powerful patrons for help; NPCs that logically should want to help them with their current situation, but whose involvement would effectively sideline the PCs and possibly remove them from the scenario entirely.

This article deals with a similar problem: What happens when the PCs, when confronted with some horrible crime or circumstance, do the logical thing and report it to the proper authorities? For example, the police. Or the CIA. Or the army. The big, organized forces of Little Guys who enforce civilization.

Many of the techniques from the previous article will also work for this situation (and vice vera), but in practice they’re different enough to pose unique challenges. For example, while it’s relatively easy to explain why Elminster is busy and can’t help right now, it’s more difficult to explain why the entire police department would be so preoccupied that none of them can respond to a crisis.

(Realistically, of course, the difference between the Big Guns and the Little Guys is a spectrum with plenty of gray in the middle of it: The Chicago PD is definitely the “proper authorities.” A small town sheriff without backup looks a lot more like a solitary patron.)

In my experience, calling in the Little Guys also tends to be more disruptive than calling in a Big Gun. I think this is because most RPGs are structured around small bands of extraordinary heroes. Whereas Big Guns tend to work in the same paradigm, the inclusion of Big Brother seems to simply drown the PCs out. To mix my metaphors, the PCs end up being a fish out of water.

(This assumes that it’s the players who are deciding to reach out to the NPCs. Oddly, if the situation is reversed and it’s the GM who’s pushing the NPCs into the scenario I find that the exact opposite is true: Big Guns become far more disruptive and the Little Guys are manageable. I suspect this is for the exact same reason. The Big Gun operates in the same paradigm as the PCs, so when the GM tries to shove one of them down the players’ throats it feels as if the PCs are just being replaced by a newer, shinier model that they don’t get to play. Whereas when the Little Guys show up uninvited, they tend to be interpreted as simply another obstacle that our strong, independent heroes need to figure out a way to overcome. But I digress.)

So the PCs have picked up the phone and called the cops.

What happens next?

#1. THEY DON’T BELIEVE THEM

This solution can be basically a genre convention for any modern campaign featuring the paranormal. Think of shows like Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Supernatural: If you go to the cops babbling about werewolves, they aren’t going to believe you. They’ll probably just end up making the problem worse.

You can even use this paradigm in campaigns where the PCs are the authority. In fact, if you frame it correctly, it can let the PCs both simultaneously belong to a government agency AND be a small band of extraordinary heroes. Think The X-Files.

But this conceit doesn’t require the supernatural, either. Think about the beginning of Die Hard, where John McClane is continually trying to convince the LAPD that the terrorist threat is real, but they keep dismissing him as a kook or prank caller.

#2. LOST IN BUREAUCRACY

Alternatively, the PCs detect an oncoming crisis, warn the appropriate authorities, and… nothing. The authorities don’t do anything. Or they do something, but it’s misguided and doesn’t actually solve the problem. Or there’s a committee that’s going to figure out what the proper course of action is, but it’s clear by the time they’re done deliberating that the asteroid will have already obliterated Venice (or whatever).

Look no further than restraining orders that take three weeks to process when the guy bought a gun yesterday, the government response to the climate crisis, or the clusterfuck pandemic response in places like Brazil, England, and the United States. If anything, it becomes even easier to find malfeasance, mismanagement, and neglect at the local level.

You can send a strong signal early in a campaign that the Little Guys aren’t going to help the PCs by sending the bureaucracy looking for them first. Think about Walter Peck, the abusive EPA rep in the original Ghostbusters.

#3. THE BAD GUYS ARE CONNECTED

Coming back to Die Hard, do you remember that scene where McClane is celebrating because he can see the cop cars coming down the boulevard… but then the bad guys call it in as a false alarm and the cops flip off their sirens, turn around, and leave?

This scenario covers any number of possibilities for how the bad guys can counter the PCs notifying the authorities, like the horror and suspense movies where the heroes see something suspicious and call the cops, but by the time the cops show up, the bad guys have had a chance to make everything look normal.

It may be even more insidious than that, however, with the bad guys having already infiltrated the Little Guys: That might just be a few crooked cops so you don’t know who to trust, or it could be a conspiracy that secretly controls the entire local government. (Or an invasion of body-snatchers to the same effect.)

#4. THEY DEFER TO THE PCs

At the opposite end of the spectrum, let the Little Guys recognize that the PCs are the most qualified, the most skilled, and/or have the most insight into what’s happening. They’ll either partner up with the PCs or simply put resources (and manpower) at their disposal.

One variant of this that can work particularly well is for each PC to be put in command of a squad of NPCs. You can let the players run the whole squad or, if the squads split up to pursue multiple objectives simultaneously, you can use troupe-style play (in which all the other players take an NPC in the current PC’s squad).

But what really makes this technique work is to actually put the players in charge: Give them access to the resources, but let them figure out how they want to utilize them.

This can be a fine line to walk if you want to make sure that it doesn’t permanently transform the campaign, but it’s usually not too difficult to justify why this is a temporary circumstance that only applies to the immediate situation. (Although maybe permanently shifting the campaign is exactly the right way to go!)

This post contains SPOILERS for Waterdeep: Dragon Heist.

A unique challenge to running urban campaigns is figuring out what happens if the PCs, confronted with some horrible crime or circumstance, do the logical thing and seek help from powerful allies. And the scope of this problem tends to grow as technology (or its magical equivalent) improves communication, travel speeds, or both. (Low level D&D characters in the middle of the woods tend not to have any recourse; modern teenagers with cellphones are a completely different story.)

In my experience, the problem also intensifies in what I’ll call mythological settings, where single individuals (powerful wizards, Sith lords, starship captains) can be possessed of immense power. This is because it can be both easier for the PCs to get access to these characters and often harder to explain why they don’t want to get involved.

Let’s take a step back for a moment: Why is this a problem?

First, it really mucks up the challenge level of the scenario when Batman calls in Superman to deal with the Joker. Second, it’s dramatically unsatisfying to go through all the preamble of a conflict only to be sidelined while Elminster heads off to experience the end of the story.

Now, let’s address the elephant in the room: There’s often an unspoken genre convention and/or table agreement that calling in the Big Guns is generally poor form and shouldn’t be done because it’s disruptive to the desired experience. If you want to make that a spoken agreement more power to you, but there are a couple things to be aware of:

First, this can actually create a different sort of problem for some players because it creates a tension between what their characters should be doing (based on their understanding of who that character is) and what that character is allowed to do. For some players, making this an explicit, spoken agreement can resolve this problem (because with the option definitively off the table the tension disappears). But for other players, it will actually make the problem worse because either acknowledging the tension or explicitly prohibiting the choice is even more disruptive to their roleplaying.

Second, calling in the Big Guns is not exclusively a problem. It’s also an opportunity. And there’s a lot of really cool experiences that you’re taking off the table if you just flat out ban these interactions. Superman shouldn’t just swoop into every Batman story, but World’s Finest crossovers can be really awesome.

On the flip side, this also means that sometimes players call in the Big Guns because it’s what makes sense for their characters to do… but that doesn’t necessarily mean that they want to do it as players! They don’t want to be sidelined while the Big Guns take care of everything, and they’re actually hoping that you’ll reject the offer so that they can have done the right thing in roleplaying their character truthfully AND get what they want by continuing to be in the starring roles in the rest of the adventure.

All of which means that, at some point, you’re going to run into a situation where the PCs decide that it’s time to call in the Big Guns.

What happens next?

#1. IT WORKS

They call in the Big Guns, the Big Guns have a good reason to be involved, and they come in and deal with the situation. Problem solved!

The trick here is to frame getting the help of the Big Guns as being the major accomplishment and then just letting loose and really enjoying the curb-stomping done by the Big Guns as the reward for a job well done.

If you want an example of this from another medium, look at The Lord of the Rings. Most of The Two Towers consists of the heroes trying to convince one major ally or another to put some skin in the game: Theoden, Treebeard, etc. Or take this scene from the movies:

Pippin literally summons an entire army to help solve his problems.

This approach works if the players see the Big Guns as a manifestation of their will; no different than a fireball or a powerful magical artifact. THEY were the ones who called on the Big Guns. This can be a tricky balancing act to pull off, but it can be immensely satisfying when you do.

#2. THEY’RE BUSY

The Big Guns are busy doing something else and therefore cannot help.

This can be used preemptively if there’s a time crunch (“Sorry, Harry, Dumbledore isn’t in his office right now”), but it can be equally effective if the conflict comes up at the last possible second: “Great. Glad we’re all gathered here to go down into the Vault together. Now that we’re fully committed to this course of action, let’s— Wait! There’s a tarrasaque attacking the harbor! I’ve got to go!”

This works better, of course, when it emerges naturally out of the narrative. For example, in my Dragon Heist campaign the group had recruited Renaer and the Black Tears to assist in raiding the Cassalanters. That gig resulted in them “arresting” (i.e., kidnapping) Lord Cassalanter and taking him to the Blackstaff. At this point, I could clearly see the risk of the PCs’ contributions for the rest of the campaign getting washed out by a confluence of powerful NPCs: The stakes had gotten high enough that it would be hard to justify the Blackstaff and the Open Lord of Waterdeep not getting directly involved. So I framed the Blackstaff’s response accordingly: She called up Renaer and the Black Tears to help her perform a rapid-fire investigation of the Cassalanters to accumulate the evidence necessary to “make the arrest legal after the fact.”

The Blackstaff and Renaer were still helping the PCs, but only off-screen and tangentially.

You can also bake larger priorities into the setting. For example, in my Ptolus campaign there’s an invading army that’s marching towards the city. No matter how dire the stakes are in whatever scenario the PCs have gotten themselves involved in, it’s not hard to argue that preparations for a literal war are more important, giving me an easy trump card that I can play any time I need it.

On the other hand, you don’t actually need to go into a lot of detail as long as you’ve firmly established that the NPC in question is tied up in more important affairs; that they’re operating at a higher tier than the PCs. For example, when the Dragon Heist PCs later sent word to the Blackstaff that they’d located the Vault, the Blackstaff simply replied, “Good luck! Let me know how it goes!” The implication was that she was busy doing something else and trusted the PCs to take care of it.

On that note: You usually want the NPC, even though they don’t have the time or resources to deal with the problem, to acknowledge how clearly important the information the PCs are bringing them is, rather than belittling it. (Unless, of course, the PCs really are just wasting their time with trivialities.) This validates the players’ actions AND ratchets up the stakes.

The quickest way to achieve this effect is for the NPC to say, “This is clearly very important… which is why I’m deputizing you to deal with it.” In my Ptolus campaign, for example, I had the Commissar specifically deputize the PCs to deal with the local activities of the chaos cults. Ergo, any time they discovered some new, horrible thing that the chaos cults were involved with, the official response could neatly default to, “Keep up the good work!”

Another effective way of handling this brush off is for the Big Gun to give the PCs’ some form of assistance, even if they can’t get directly involved: A suitcase full of cash. A platoon of elven archers. The phone number of an old friend in Cairo they should talk to. Et cetera.

This idea of rewarding the PCs for going to the Big Guns is a common theme here: Even if the Big Guns turn the PCs down flat and refuse to help, if there’s still some sort of reward for having gone to them in the first place, then the players will feel validated in their choice. (It also tends to just make sense, unless the PCs were completely off-base in their belief that the NPC would care about what’s happening.)

#3. THERE’S A REASON THEY CAN’T HELP

Later in my Dragon Heist campaign, when Lady Cassalanter kidnapped one of the PCs’ adopted kids, the PCs sent a message to the Blackstaff.

Since we’d already established that the Blackstaff was investigating the Cassalanters, there was no good reason for her not to drop everything and come to help. But I knew that a fight with Lady Cassalanter would become trivial if the Blackstaff was involved, so Lady Cassalanter erected some wards around her location that would have specifically detected the Blackstaff’s approach (since she knew that the Blackstaff was now involved and had been investigating her family). The Blackstaff detected the wards, warned the PCs, and veered off. She’d be nearby, but with Lady Cassalanter holding a hostage it was just too risky for her to come barreling in with the PCs.

(This was also a hybrid because the Blackstaff actually gave them valuable intel on where Lady Cassalanter might be holding their son, so she’d already helped them to a certain extent and the PCs had been rewarded for calling her in. You can read about what happened next in this campaign journal.)

In my Ptolus campaign, another major element of Act II is the exploration of the Banewarrens. These, once again, pose a potentially existential threat in the middle of the city, and there once again needs to be some explanation for why the city authorities and other major players don’t come barging in to resolve the crisis. In this case, I simple turned the Banewarrens into a point of religious dispute. The two halves of the schismed Church effectively checkmated each other, and the civil authorities in the form of the Commissar refused to get involved because of the tangle of Church politics.

#4. SPLIT THEM UP

“We have not come here by chance. I do not believe in chance. When I see three objectives, three captains, three ships, I do not see coincidence. I see providence. I see purpose.” – Morpheus, The Matrix Reloaded

Now that the Big Guns have been called in for the actual op, split the group up: While the Big Guns do one thing, the PCs need to do another.

For example, we could imagine a Dragon Heist campaign where the PCs have successfully recruited the Blackstaff or Manshoon or Laeral Silverhand to come into the Vault with them and retrieve Neverember’s stolen hoard. But as the Vault cracks open, the bad guys suddenly arrive with something so incredibly dangerous — the Cassalanters summon a pit fiend, or Xanathar himself shows up with a bevy of gazers and mind flayers, or Jarlaxle teleports in with a platoon of elite drow mercenaries — that the Big Gun has to deal with it. They turn to the PCs and shout, “This could all be a distraction! Get into the Vault! Make sure the gold is secure!”

This is also a good example of how, as the GM, you want to pay attention to why the players want to call in the Big Guns. For example, they may have concocted some incredibly convoluted scheme that requires them to be in nine places at the same time and they have no idea how they can pull it off by themselves. That’s a perfect opportunity to just lean back, let them bring in the Big Guns without fuss, and then peel them off into separate action groups.

#5. FLIP IT AROUND

Now that the Big Guns are involved and putting themselves in charge, they send the PCs to do something crucial for their success.

Returning to our example of the Dragon Heist Vault, when Jarlaxle shows up with his force of drow mercenaries, the Blackstaff turns to the PCs and says, “Hold them off here! I’m heading into the Vault!” Once the drow goons are defeated, the PCs follow and discover the Blackstaff standing over the dragon she’s just slain. A dragon?! Phew! Good thing they called her in!

If you’re more dramatically inclined, you can also frame this so that the PCs show up just in time to take the shot that finishes off the dragon. “Thank you!” says the Blackstaff. “It was a more difficult foe than I had expected!” Or whatever.

You can also reverse expectations here by making it LOOK like the crucial part of the mission (i.e., the thing that the Big Guns are going to go do) is one thing and the ancillary goal is some other thing, while in reality it’s actually the exact OPPOSITE. So the PCs get sent to pursue the ancillary goal in a supporting capacity, but then it turns out they’re actually doing the absolutely vital thing that’s going to save the day! (“I thought Griznak was going to be at the fort?!” “Yeah, well, he’s here, and we’re out of time. Let’s go!”)

#6. THEY ARE THE BIG GUNS!

The zero-to-hero dynamic of D&D tends to get ingrained to the point where we sometimes forget that it’s fully possible to have a campaign dynamic where there AREN’T any Big Guns to appeal to because the PCs are the biggest guns around.

This can be particularly true within a specific set of parameters.

Even in D&D, it’s quite possible to run a campaign where, once the PCs hit mid-level play, they’re the most powerful people in town (and possibly for hundreds or thousands of miles around).

On that note, even if they aren’t the biggest guns in town, this is nevertheless a great time to have low-level adventuring parties come knocking on the door with problems that they need a Big Gun to solve for them.

FURTHER READING
Random GM Tip: Calling in the Little Guys