<<< Return to the Campaign Workbook Collection

Your party seeks adventure in remote, poorly explored wilderness or distant lands with alien cultures, and surviving the journey requires more than just a map. Providing your players with a guide helps ensure that they end up where you want them and gives you a voice to prepare them for the adventure ahead.

Guides also provide an opportunity to introduce your PCs to interesting and possibly recurring NPCs. Whether the guide is a hardened elven explorer, а young kuo-toa that speaks only a little common, or a reclusive gnome cleric directing the party with helping hand spells, giving a guide personality and goals of her own can add a lot to your adventure.

TYPES OF GUIDES

A guide is an NPC who can lead the PCs to their destination or provide knowledge that helps them survive along the way. The behavior and abilities of different guides vary greatly, but they can be classified based on how they’ve gained their knowledge of the area.

Explorer: The explorer has been there before. He knows the paths, has faced the perils along the way, and may have some useful notes in a journal, Explorers are often treasure hunters, sifting through old ruins to find valuables ог lost magic items for themselves or their employers. Though they are valuable to the PCs because they know the way, explorers are only interested in specific discoveries; they typically care little about any flora, fauna, or NPCs encountered along the way unless they are a threat or a source of supplies.

Scholar: The scholar knows the ancient legends, has read the explorers journals, and can translate inscriptions. He may never have been to the destination, but he has the resources to find the way, perhaps after a few misinterpretations and wrong turns. Scholars may want to pause along the journey to examine new types of plants, animals, ог unusual terrain. Often, they carry a cumbersome collection of books and scrolls with them and have no experience traveling and surviving in the wilderness.

Native: The native has lived in or near the party’s destination and is perhaps the most valuable of guides, She knows the local paths and how to avoid common dangers. She understands local languages, including idioms and the meanings of local folktales. She can train the PCs in the local culture and act as an ambassador. Local guides can be difficult to find and even more difficult to communicate with, If forced into a choice of loyalties, they are likely to choose their own people over the PCs.

Monster: The only creatures familiar with the paths through the cavern maze may be a tribe of troglodytes, and the location of the hidden glade may be known only to an ancient treant. A desperate young locathah may emerge from the waves to ask for help rescuing his relatives from a remote island fortress. A wounded young copper dragon may lead the PCs deep into a hillside cavern to reclaim his mazelike lair and treasure hoard from an evil ogre mage.

WHY GUIDES GUIDE

Showing a party the way to their next adventure is a dangerous task, so a guide always has a reason for helping.

Protection: A guide may lead the PCs to their destination simply because he wants to get there too and doesn’t want to go alone. The guide could be a chef looking for a rare ingredient for his lord’s Growfest meal, or a bard who secretly holds a treasure map of the area. An NPC may offer himself as a guide because he’s in trouble with a powerful guild, and he thinks the PCs can deter their attacks.

Help: When someone seeks out the party and begs for help eliminating some terrible evil, that NPC may also act as a guide back to the adventure location. А young lady who accompanied her love to the dark keep but lost sight of him during a battle may seek the party’s aid in rescuing him. А desperate dryad may risk using her tree Stride to travel into town to seek help driving off a sorcerer who is destroying her woods.

Money: With no other motivation, many guides work for payment. The typical cost of a guide is 3 sp per day. Some guides demand half of the total estimated fee in advance and half when the party reaches their destination. Others just accept their daily pay. Guides for hire may be found at inns and roadhouses, and sometimes at roadside temples. They are not the most trustworthy guides and are likely to demand more money or slip away to safety if they encounter unexpected danger.

Nothing: Occasionally someone may guide the party with no expectation of receiving anything in return. This may be a grateful resident of a town the PCs saved from destruction, or a mermaid they rescued and returned safely to the ocean. This type of guide serves out of gratitude and respect, so the PCs must be careful to remain deserving of those affections.

Deception: Some guides should not be trusted. They offer to show the PCs the way to their destination, but instead lead them into an ambush or to their master’s lair. NPCs that offer or beg for help and then lead the PCs into trouble can make your campaign more interesting but using them too often may leave your players discouraged and distrustful o fall NPCs.

Freedom: NPCs and monsters can also be unwilling guides, serving the PCs because of threats or blackmail. A pretty street urchin caught in the act of stealing may act as a guide in the city if the PCs don’t turn her over to the watch, or the party may promise a subdued goblin his freedom if he leads them safely around the goblin army.

Enchantment: If no better option is available, the PCs may obtain a guide by using spells such as charm person, ог charm monster. Such guides might prove unreliable, but for short journeys they сап be useful. The PCs may charm a guard to guide them through the castle, or cast charm monster on a harpy and have her fly overhead and show them the way across a dangerous swamp,

GUIDES ARE NOT LEADERS

You don’t want your party turning to the guide to make all of their decisions. Because a guide knows more about an area and its inhabitants, the PCs may ask him to suggest where they should camp, how many guards they should set, or how best to deal with obstacles along the way. The risk of a guide who knows too much is that the PCs end up feeling like they’re just along for the ride.

Before you introduce a guide, decide exactly what he knows and doesn’t know. Is he sure of the entire route, or is he still trying to solve one of the riddles in the ancient poem? If he took this trail before, how did he get past the harpy-filled tower in the mountain pass and what did he see there? If he’s a local resident, why is he off wandering the world? Is he still accepted in his own community?

Another way to prevent guides from stealing the show is to limit their contact with the party. A satyr guide might disappear before dusk and reappear at dawn to get the party started in the right direction. A weathered old scholar might stay at home and guide the party using messages delivered by trained hawks, A lizardfolk guide might speak nо Common, reducing communication to pointing and grunting.

Understanding the motivations and abilities of your guide also helps. A scholar’s military advice is likely to be bad. A foolhardy explorer may give advice that gets the party to their destination quickly, but with no thought to safety. And a monster helping under duress may not be the most trustworthy source of tactical advice.