Optional Objectives, live captures, and collateral damage

[WaterAndWindSpirit]

Hello everyone!

So I love to run Black Ops games, but sometimes I run regular fantasy games. And I've been on a Chimera Squad rush lately.

Anyways, this got me thinking...

In Chimera Squad, live captures to interrogate give you extra Intel. I was wondering what kind of In-Game benefits could live captures give. The obvious answer would be that live captures could give some intel on the area or the opposition so the PCs could prepare better.

Then there are optional objectives. Sometimes, the bad guys will try to destroy evidence in a fireball. Securing it before it happens (which can be risky mid-firefight) gives salvage. Rescuing hostages (which is risky as you have to kill an enemy who is guaranteed not to hit your squad on his turn) not only prevents collateral damage (see below) gives you extra resources.

And civilian fatalities increases Unrest, which results in riots down the line. I've got a similar mechanism in a campaign I've been trying to run, but what problems could befall a group of murderhobos not concerned with collateral damage?

So I've been looking at potential complications as optional objectives.

There is the obvious, hostages.
Capturing a hard target alive could also be a complication. Maybe for later study if you're using some research system.
Maybe civilians being hit by a plague/bio-weapon. Their deaths won't be blamed on you, but proper quarantine and treatment could deplete your medical supplies (not to mention expose you to the sickness), but you'd have grateful civvies down the line.
Civvies hit by chemical weapons. A rescue would again be great PR.
Plain wounded civvies slowly bleeding out. But they're bait of course. Do you take it?
Some volatile tech. You run the risk of going kaboom, but great salvage awaits.
Explosives about to detonate a structure. The structure itself may be expendable as far as your objective is concerned, but the locals may disagree. Especially if the structure is a culturally important monument.

Anyone else has additional ideas to contribute?

[Varyon]

A lot of this is going to depend on game system, play style, what sort of assets the characters have access to back "in town," etc, but here are some options.

Making Friends: I've been playing a lot of Conan: Exiles recently, and one of the mechanics there is that you can capture human enemies and make them work the Wheel of Pain (that giant thing Arnold was pushing in a circle in the first movie); after working it for a while, their spirit is sufficiently broken that they're willing to serve you as a thrall, so you can have them stand guard back at base, dance for your amusement, come with you and help out, or help craft items. Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain had a similar mechanic, where you can send knocked-out enemies back to base to augment your troops; fluff-wise, they're basically willing to join you once they find out who you are (they're pretty much all mercenaries already anyway).

This can be a good reward for Live Capture, provided you have some means to "convert" the enemy to your side. It can also be rather useful as a reward for Hostage Rescue (indeed, in MGSV, there are some areas with optional hostage rescue, and a successful rescue makes that character available to augment your troops). Note if you're emphasizing tactical play this is probably best as an option if your new friends typically don't need to tag along to be useful - they may be craftsmen, healers who reduce your needed downtime between missions, or even fellow adventurers who can form their own party and share the loot from a successful delve with you. Having one or two accompany the players is probably workable, however.

More Currency: If your murder-hobos are quest-takers, there can easily be an additional monetary reward for completing the various optional objectives. Failing that, depending on the game system (and/or houserules), there could be other forms of "currency" that can be acquired in this way. You've mentioned Intel and Salvage already, and there could also be things like Reputation (which can get you better jobs and/or better pay, make hirelings easier to find/cheaper, etc) or Favors owed you by various organizations (which can probably be spent in place of any other form of currency, albeit only with that organization or perhaps at a lesser rate with an allied one).

This probably works best for various optional objectives that don't really fit into the Live Capture and Hostage Rescue (or preventing Collateral Damage) bits, but could be a reward those as well.

Phatter Loot: Taking out the orcs before they down a strengthening draught means you can steal the potion for yourself, solving the puzzle-lock gets you access to the weapons stored in the boss' private armory, etc. As above, this probably works best for the miscellaneous other optional objectives. Certainly you can have special items as the reward for the others, of course.


What all optional objectives there are is going to depend heavily on just what type of setting you're in, what your murder-hobos are up to, and what sorts of encounters you want to run. If you're delving dungeons, secret passageways can work well; if you're fighting bandits, figuring out who's head(s) to bring back for maximum reward may be a good idea (and maybe you need to be stealthy at first to set things up so they can't get away once you attack).

[Black Leviathan]

An unfortunate accident: A mage's circle are working on a dangerous combat spell that could be unbalancing in warfare. For political reasons the reasonable mages can't appear to directly confront their college. Your team needs to go in and secure their research. There can't be any witnesses and your mage has to activate a series of three delayed spells designed to fail catastrophically when they are cast together making it look like the lab was destroyed by the magic they were working on.
Cloudstrike: A magical criminal is being sheltered by a highly secure floating city. They're extraction is simple, a featherfall potion that will allow them to reach the ground safely that isn't questioned in a flying city. However they'll need to find a way into the highly secure city and a way to smuggle any arms and enchanted items forbidden there and find a way to isolate the mage and get them to a drop point.
Dragon Drop: Your team is going into an enemy state to recover a noble POW along with any other soldiers you can free. You will be given a portal scroll that will return you outside of the city gates where home forces can defend you from pursuers, but the region is unscryable so there's no magical way to insert you. You're going to have to be brought into the town by one of our allies, a young dragon who will be carrying you men in his claws and releasing you as he dives under the line-of-sight of their archers.
Seals: The emerald coast has long been a source of trade for the Kingdom. Recently we've seen suspicious activity just beyond the coastal waters that makes us suspect the sea elves who we believed were neutral in the war may be preparing to make moves against our naval forces. Your team needs to investigate the area around the Black Key Isles. There will be no way for us to support you in their domain but we believe the are not watching this location closely but if you are caught in their domain it could trigger the very war we are hoping to avoid. No witnesses.