After reading through Mark’s Silence article I thought about how many of the players in my group don’t like to fully disclose their plans to me. They feel they can get the maximum amount of surprise and realism out of me when they keep their plans from me. When it first happened I thought it was kind of strange to be the GM and kept in the dark, but after a while it seemed to make sense. I’ve actually found that it’s quite helpful in making encounters more realistic.



A realistic encounter, be it a fight or a conversation with an NPC, is the goal for most players and GMs. We want the NPCs and monsters to act and react realistically. Just because the goblins know the PCs are invading doesn’t mean they should have prepared the perfect counter to the player’s plan of attack. This means that the GM is forced to try and forget/disallow everything about the PCs’ plans because he knows all about them either because he asked what they were, or the players told him out of obligation/duty. It’s not easy for most people to pretend they don’t know something that plays such a prominent role in immediate events.



As I mentioned at the beginning I allow my players to plot their plots and plan their plans without involving me 100% of the time. They will normally call on me when it comes to rules clarifications (“I want to do X – what mechanics do I need to take into account?”), but for the most part they do their own thing. This way, when they spring out Stage 1 of The Big Plan I react based on only the actions that are happening at the time. I don’t know what Stage 2 looks like so I’m not able to thwart their plans based on precognition. While this does work, and helps create realistic encounters, there are times when the right amount of precognition is necessary for the GM.



When GMing an NPC or monster with supernatural intelligence I use my GM knowledge against the players. I figure that if I’m running a lich with near god-like smarts, he’s going to have thought of many, many different counters to many, many different plans of attack on his person. So, I ask the players what they are planning, just the basic details, not full disclosure as that level of detail isn’t necessary. I then take the information and use it as if the lich had already planned for such an inevitability. This allow the bad guy to seemingly out think and out plan the players, giving the appearance of supernatural or magical knowledge/foresight.



There are times however when the players and the bad guys are fairly evenly matched. Intelligence levels are nearly equal. This is when we get to see who’s plans are best. I once again adopt the “Don’t tell me about it” approach, but I set things up so that the PC’s are specifically the targets of the bad guys plans. No more implementing a general defensive plan in case the lair is attacked. The bad guys know the PCs, they have studied them at least to some degree so any obvious flaws and abilities are taken into account.



My D&D group has a character who is an archer type of fighter. He’s freaking incredible. Shooting arrows huge distances and laying waste to everything around him. The main bad guy and his lieutenants are going to know this. They’ve either seen it directly or had many minions die at the archer’s hands. Looks like some protection spells against missile weapons are called for. Oh! And how about something to deal with that obnoxious cleric who keeps healing the party when the bad guys almost has them beaten? Might want to take him out first and then the others will fall without any healing…



But what about the times when the PCs are actually smarter than the bad guys? While this doesn’t happen often, it’s been known to occur. If this happens, I make sure that I give the PCs a couple of hints as to what they could do, giving them the opportunity to take these hints and implement them in their planning. Nothing super obvious, more along the lines of “Now remember, last time you fought the goblins of the Bloody Eye they had rust monster pets and liked to use poison arrows.”



Sure the PCs can ignore your hints, but you’ve done your part by reminding them of the rust monsters and poison arrows. That information helps you swing the intelligence issue in favor of the players. If they do choose to ignore the hints, and things go badly for them, you can always remind them never to underestimate someone just because you think your smarter than they are.



The last thing that I feel is important for a GM to do regarding the PC’s planning is to allow yourself to be surprised. If the players have a plan they’ve kept from you and when they put it into action it stuns you let it stun the bad guy. Sure, some of the bad guys will recover quicker than others, but remember that the GM is the bad guy. If you’re stunned, he’s stunned. This gives the players a tremendous feeling of accomplishment. They pulled one over on you, they can see it in your eyes and they should see it in the way the bad guy reacts. Think of this as a token reward. Heck, if the plan is really good you should think about an XP bonus for good roleplaying.





Well, that’s enough out of me for now. Let me know what you think and I’ll see you in the forums!