It’s time to bring in the Mentor.

Everybody needs a reason to go on a dangerous Quest.  Your players will have more buy-in to the storyline if they feel like something is in it for them.  Of course, some players don’t engage much with the role-playing part of the story, and others are very reluctant heroes who need a good push out the door.

That’s where the Mentor comes in.  The classic mentor figures are guys like Obi-Wan Kenobi and Gandalf; wise old Wizards who can tell the young hero what he needs to do – and maybe train him a little bit, or give her the special item that’ll give a much-needed edge later on.

They don’t always have to be old wizards.  The Mentor could be the King, or a parent, or anybody with wisdom to share about the coming trial.  (The Ranger who last went to the Mountain of Shadows to get the Pearl Orchid.)  Even a bard with a good story could help out – give the heroes that last bit of advice and a shove of motivation to get them moving along.

The Mentor is your device to give the heroes a compelling reason to take up the dangerous quest; to change their minds if they refused the adventure, to give them advice and make sure they’re properly equipped for the trial to come.  The Campaign worlds we’ve created over the years have usually had plenty of Mentor figures built in; often the same Mentor would appear in different campaigns, giving a new band of heroes that extra nudge out the door.

Now, if all else fails, you can simply use an authority figure for the mentor – the aforementioned monarch, or a military leader, or one of the gods.  That’s your last resort to get the heroes moving – but it’ll work.

Now that they’ve accepted the quest, they’ll need to cross over into the adventure proper – I’ll cover that in Part Five.

Check out the upgradable Sword, below.

A Fighter in one of my campaigns developed a detailed family history.  She belonged to an ancient royal line long thought dead.  To reward this extra work on the character, I added an item to an early treasure find – an Admantium Greatsword +1.  This sword was once part of the ‘Crown Jewels’ of a fallen Kingdom – a hugely powerful relic with a long history and personal value to the character.  Now, for a low-level Fighter this was an excellent find!  However, I knew that within a few levels a +1 Greatsword would start to pale compared to new treasures that would come available.

So, I added something not in the rules, but I liked it rather a lot.  The sword had once contained five jewels of great value – rubies I think.  When the Kingdom had fallen the sword had lost, the jewels removed from their mountings, and sold off seperately.  The sword itself had fallen into the heroine’s hands, but the gems were all missing.  From time to time, she would find a hint or clue for another gem.  As she recovered them, and mounted them back to the sword, it began to gain more abilities.  Flaming Blade, upgrade to +2, etc.  By the time she’d become a high level Fighter and recovered all the gems, she had a powerful, ancient sword with great history and abilities to match hers.

That worked, and the player was quite pleased with her specialized loot.  Something similar could easily be done with armor, or spellbooks, or what have you.