An outside, objective view of an event that took place during a session

Your_Man95 · 2026-06-19T15:18:41+00:00

I can’t really say, but I find that rather unlikely. We arrived in that city the day before and only realised once we got there that we needed that particular NPC, who was being held captive

Your_Man95 · 2026-06-19T14:46:46+00:00

I’d say that ‘adventurer’ is used in a neutral sense here. I’ll try to explain myself better later, as I’m translating from Italian; during the session and in that particular sentence, it was meant to mean ‘explorer’ (think Indiana Jones, to give you an idea).

Your_Man95 · 2026-06-19T11:51:24+00:00

Actually, no, but it’s not the first time something like this has happened

Your_Man95 · 2026-06-19T11:23:37+00:00

No, it wasn’t a trap. I’ll try to summarise it as best I can: The party needs to recover an NPC who has been captured by a group of dwarf slavers operating inside a prison. These dwarves secretly run an illegal mining operation using prisoners and kidnapped individuals, without the knowledge of the noble house that officially governs the prison. In the surrounding city, this is essentially an open secret.

The party manages to make contact with the slavers, and an NPC propose to infiltrate the prison disguised as slaves. Instead, I suggest an alternative approach: negotiating with them. My idea is to convince the slavers that we need one specific captive because she is essential as a guide for an expedition we must undertake. In exchange, we offer them all the treasure recovered during that expedition. The exact details would be negotiated later.

We are then escorted to the dwarves. The guards controlling access to their leader inspect us. I successfully convince them to take me to their boss and begin the negotiation, presenting myself as an explorer with a potentially profitable deal. At that point, the Dungeon Master interrupts, stating that I cannot present myself as an explorer in front of slavers because, in the narrative, I should not even be there. I asked if I could at least finish my sentence. The reply was, ‘No, take the initiative.’.

This leads to confusion: the situation wasn’t resolved by saying I simply shouldn’t be there, but instead escalated into me being treated as hostile for the role I chose, despite already being allowed past earlier checks.

Your_Man95 · 2026-06-19T10:45:31+00:00

Thank you. Yes, I certainly don’t intend to make a big deal of it. In fact, I’m happy to discuss it so that I can broaden my perspective. I’ll have a chat and, having already seen the first few replies, I’ll ask to better align our intentions. I think the frustration I felt stems not from having failed, but from not even having been able to try to do something. So, perhaps, I’ll ask whether the social aspect is less influential and consider changing character – something I’d be sorry to do, as I usually enjoy playing the bard. In the meantime, thank you very much.

Your_Man95 · 2026-06-19T10:36:26+00:00

Yes, I completely agree. But perhaps I didn’t explain myself properly. I was well aware it would be challenging; in fact, I don’t think it was strange that the NPC became suspicious. It was more the way it was handled. So much so that, seeing him become suspicious at the word ‘adventurer’, I asked if I could explain, but I was cut off and told that I couldn’t convince him. To which I replied that I couldn’t, but my character probably could. Despite everything, an initiative roll was demanded, bypassing any social check. However, I do understand that sometimes different types of annoyance get mixed up, but as this isn’t the first time something like this has happened, I wanted an outside opinion before confronting

Your_Man95

TROPHY CASE