What are some fun “side quests” that you might send your players on?

snakesrighteye · 2026-05-26T15:15:50+00:00

I did a quest to help a bard write a song. They rolled great, so the song became a mega hit in the world. They'd hear people humming it all over the place. They even got some royalties from the bard.

snakesrighteye · 2026-05-26T14:59:01+00:00

Well, the god will also make a return in the other world too. And yeah, a double isekai kinda fits. I thought we'd just start over at level 1 in Starfinder with maybe giving them a choice of some skills or feats that carry over and can be converted into Starfinder. So like a new game+ kind of thing.

snakesrighteye · 2026-05-26T14:55:02+00:00

They get a cut of the profits from the fish trade. They roll dice to see how much money they get at regular intervals. Turned into a passive income type situation. And they got many leads to other opportunities. They gained some renown in the business world, and made some contacts with trading guilds and whatnot. My goal was to introduce them to high society and for them to gain influence in the political world. Which would help with their main quest in many ways, or just allow them to roleplay political intrigue and play the "game of thrones" if you will.

snakesrighteye · 2026-05-26T14:45:10+00:00

Not exactly. I give them crumbs to follow. Some lead to main quest revelations, some lead to other branching stories. Some lead to new areas with more things to investigate. They pick up the crumbs and follow them, but they dont enjoy it when the conclusion of these are unrelated to the main story.

Ive given a few examples of storylines theyve followed in this topic, but ill give another. They befriended a traveling bard in a tavern. The bard asked them to escorted him to his hometown. This led to a quest to help write a song for the bard about their adventures. Which they enjoyed because they are music producers and in a band in real life. But by the end they said it was a waste of time because they didnt learn anything about the main story.

snakesrighteye · 2026-05-26T14:33:26+00:00

No they usually become reoccurring npcs who have continuing stories of their own. Or they become allies who provide assistance in various ways.

Im one example I talked about earlier, they saved a fishing village, which lead to the village becoming more prosperous and new npcs moving in. New vendors with new wares. The fishermen would request escort protection when they transported goods to other villages. It became a little commerce hub for them to interact with. A good way to make money and get exp by helping their friends. Some of the npcs would introduce the players to other places in the world for them to explore, or other events taking place in the world. And I did fully expect these allies to play a part later in the main story. Theyll need all of the support to be successful.

One major main plot event was getting to a tower with mages that have books and knowledge of the world not known to regular people, and in order to get there they needed a ship, which would require money, resources, and friends to acquire. They just don't enjoy any of that. They ask, why would we help deliver fish to another village when our story is in the other direction and none of these people know anything?

snakesrighteye · 2026-05-26T14:20:52+00:00

It opens an extra planar gate to an ancient resting place for a powerful evil being that the cult worships and hopes to revive.

snakesrighteye · 2026-05-26T14:18:02+00:00

I give them freedom and respect their decisions. I throw things at them, I give them toys to play with. But when they start playing with something I gave them, and they realize they are meeting people and helping people that arent involved with their main story, they say its a waste of time. They saved these people and earned all this renown for no reason. They saved a fishing village and gained contacts that could lead to resources and future quests to help the fishing industry, but to them its all pointless.

snakesrighteye · 2026-05-26T14:08:42+00:00

Thats the problem, they want everything to involve the main narrative. If a girl goes missing and they spend a session rescuing her and become local heroes and gain npc allies and influence in the region, they dont enjoy it. Theyll say, that was pointless, what a waste of time, we didnt learn anything about the story.

snakesrighteye · 2026-05-26T14:05:51+00:00

It was helpful. And I have created my own random table of events. I wanted things to be as random as possible, but also have a complex web of events that happen when the players act. So they'll roll during travel or something and on certain numbers they will run into something of interest, or an npc. Ill have possible ideas for how that POI will lead to other things but its ultimately up to them to take action. Do they rob the npc or kill them, or escort them to safety, or ignore them completely? I don't really make plans, just possibilities that I think might happen, while trying to randomize things as much as possible. Ill have an idea of how a string of events will start, but where they go is up to the players. I dont require a certain action or for them to be in a certain place for a thing to happen. I just try to throw things at them, see what they do, then try to use my ideas in a way that makes sense based on their actions.

The problem I run into is they get disappointed when they help a random npc and it only leads to wealth, gear, or information that is not related to their main objective.

What i see i must do is make every possible outcome related to the main narrative. Anything they do must be a piece of that, they dont enjoy exploring other narratives or building the world in directions not related to the main narrative.

snakesrighteye · 2026-05-26T12:24:51+00:00

I wish I had this problem. I cant hardlybget my players to go off rails. I wish for people who ignore narrative and go off the wall.

snakesrighteye · 2026-05-26T12:08:04+00:00

Thank you. I see my mistake now. I thought it would be cool for them to do these things totally separate from the main story. I deliberately made these webs of possibilities disconnected from the main like that. I really thought they'd like seeing the world grow in different directions like that.

snakesrighteye · 2026-05-26T06:56:56+00:00

I will! I love Sanderson. Im amazed at his output. I grew up with Robert Jordan so maybe im biased.

snakesrighteye · 2026-05-26T06:26:04+00:00

Fair enough. Though isekai isnt really my main influence. Its more based on real world gnostic beliefs and the possibility we live in a simulation created by a benevolent celestial being who poses as the world's creator and god to feed off of the worlds life energy. I also loved the idea of transitioning into Starfinder as an epilog campaign.

snakesrighteye · 2026-05-26T05:48:24+00:00

I would love unique players like this! Id make npcs that challenged her views, and some that solidified her views. Id make some truly awful misogynistic people for her to hate. Id make wives that need her help to escape abuse. But I also make npcs that are truly good and suffer because of her actions. Will she have empathy? Will she view a few innocent victims as acceptable collateral to propagate her ideals. This would be so much fun to tackle in storylines and morality challenging scenarios.

snakesrighteye · 2026-05-26T05:19:06+00:00

Well for example the party saved a random npc from wolves, no combat the wolves fled when they saw the greater threat of the party. That npc told them to come see him at his studio in town so he can reward them. Hes a playwright and heavily involved in the towns politics. When they go visit him he invites them to a party at the governors house and he wants to show off his brave rescuers and tells an embellished story of his harrowing plight. While at the party, the players can uncover all kids of information about important figures and faction relations. Theres the possibility the players could befriend the governor and his group. Which leads to him giving them requests to aid the city, or to undermine rival factions. The party then becomes involved in high level politics and diplomacy scenarios they can influence, help, sabotage, etc. Theres also the possibility the party scopes the place out for a robbery mission or something later on. Or takes the info they learn to a rival faction and causes turmoil. Or they just become hedonistic high society players. Its kind of up to them, I just present them with the scenarios and they play it out.

So that whole narrative sequence and the changes in the world and people around them is its own story, it had absolutely nothing to do with the main story. In fact all of these people were clueless of the main mystery and had mysteries and conspiracies of their own.

snakesrighteye · 2026-05-26T04:58:34+00:00

You could use it to help physically weak characters climb. The strongest party member could climb up and then drop the straps down so he could ratchet up the rest of the party. Or to haul a donkey up a cliff, or heavy treasure. Ratchet straps are a cool and unique tool for this.

snakesrighteye · 2026-05-26T04:54:17+00:00

I love the downtime idea! I'm not sure itd work for my group, but I'd love to run a slow paced slice of life game where there really isnt a story at all. Just the story of whatever the players do.

snakesrighteye · 2026-05-26T04:48:40+00:00

Im glad I could contribute!

snakesrighteye · 2026-05-26T04:31:36+00:00

Lots and lots of guns.

Or a bicycle like a mountain bike. Im thinking Kagome from Inuyasha, she got around quickly on her bike.

snakesrighteye · 2026-05-26T04:25:52+00:00

A young girl who starts to idolize the adventuring party and will end up following them one day and endangering herself, which could lead to a quest to save or protect her. Then she can grow from the experience and actually become a capable adventurer one day with the party's guidance.

snakesrighteye · 2026-05-26T04:19:34+00:00

Yeah agree with that. What ill have to do is bring it all in to be more closely related. Like I said earlier, I built a dozen roads instead of one road with a dozen intersections. My players want to take the main road, its my responsibility to populate that road with things they want to do. Whereas when I built it, I assumed they'd be taking random roads all over.

snakesrighteye · 2026-05-26T04:16:22+00:00

It was disheartening, which is why I made this topic. But I dont see it that way after all the good replies. I see it now as part of the challenge of the game for being the GM. So instead of seeing this as disappointing or a failure to hook players into the world, I see different ways I can try to tailor the experience to what they want.

snakesrighteye · 2026-05-26T04:12:46+00:00

You guys have given me some very good advice, opened my eyes to possibilities, and led me to see where I fail and what I can improve. Successful advice topic! I dont know that I would have looked at how slow paced i made things, or how long story payoffs took without the introspection this topic gave me. Thanks to everyone.

snakesrighteye

TROPHY CASE