Players characters evading direct questions

[gbaji]

[ASIDE: I picked cops because it was the closest good guys/bad guys option. So yes, we're geese and ganderers]

Lol! Yeah. I get that.

Talakael says if they had suggested they had mommy and daddy and were beating them that would have advanced the conversation. But they just went with "They are bad guys and you are good guys, so fight!".

To be fair. I'm assuming that this quote: "they are evil and in the city and are up to no good" is being run through a filter a bit here, and that this was likely not literally the only words they spoke at all in response to the NPCs asking them what was going on and why they were asking for help.

I'm admittedly going out on a crazy limb and assuming they did mention that there were fomori and evil werewolves in their building abducting people and doing <whtever evil things they do> to them. I thought I read at some point that they were kidnapping people and turning them, to build up forces for the attack, but maybe I'm misremembering. In any case, I'm assuming the bad guys were doing "something" in the building, otherwise the PCs would not have been there in the first place.

I find it telling that the question he kept asking the players wasn't "what are the <bad guys> doing?", but "what are the <bad guys> planning?". Again, I may be reading a bit into linguistic clues here, but that suggests that the players did tell them about what the bad guys were doing in their building and in the city (which they likely thought was sufficient to get assistance), but Talakeal had already decided that the only thing that would get help was if they told them about the plan to attack the woods, so that's what he kept asking them about.

To which, I could totally see a group of players who have maybe discounted the attack they learned about as irrelevant to the Fae folks, being really confused. Like "why do you care what they are planning? We're telling you what they are doing in our building and to our neighbors right now". And I could see them stumbling around trying to think of things and not coming up with anything other than very vague "um... they're planning to do bad things to more people?".

It does come off heavily as a mental map difference. The players were in a completely different headspace and just didn't grok what Talakael was after. Maybe? Dunno. Obviously none of us where in the room at the time. But my general rule of thumb when diagnosing things like this is to assume that the players aren't actually intentionally trying to fail to achieve what they went there to do. And my experience in gaming is that while accidents happen in terms of physical actions (which is what we often use dice to determine in game), when the problem is a social disconnect, it's because someone didn't realize something, or failed to make the same mental connection in relation to something that someone else expected them to. That's almost always a player/GM perception disconnect.

I have, in fact, very very very rarely seen players receive information and just utterly fail to arrive at the actual obvious meaning of that information. What usually happens is that there is a disconnect between what the GM thinks is "obvious" and what the players do. And, also as a general rule, if you think some bit of information should "obviously" result in a given conclusion, but none of the players at your table arrive at that conclusion? You are the one who is wrong. Not always. But... well... most of the time. And even if you are not wrong, it really doesn't matter. If you've provided the players with information that you consider to have an "obvious" conclusion, you've already decided that "this is a conclusion they should arrive at if they do <in game action> to get the information". Heck. It's probably written right in your adventure ("If the PCs get the werewolf to talk about their plans to attack the woods, then they'll know to tell the Fae about it, and this will convince the Fae to help them"). If it's literally so obvious, and they went through the required step to get the information, then... give them the conclusion as well. They already "earned" the outcome in terms of in-game actions, so give them the "reward" for that.

If they "get the obvious conclusion" then that's great. If they dont, then you need to make sure they do, even if that comes to the point of just flat out telling them. I mean, if it's really obvious, then your not telling them anything they should not already know (cause it's "obvious", right?). But... on the off chance that it's not really as obvious as you think it is, you're covering for that as well.

The requirement for flow of information is based on which side is asking which side for help. The PCs had no leverage, so it is on them to convince the Fae to help...and it seems the bar for convincing was low.

Oh absolutely. They're the ones showing up hat in hand and asking for help. I'm just pointing out that the GM can use the other direction to help them out when they are stuck.

100% agree...certainly was an opportunity to have two background Fae discussing having just come from the House in the Woods to ring the bell. Of course, the PCs could have just answered the question as reasonably posed.

Yup. That falls into the category of "give the players multiple (three) clues". One clue is the werewolf telling them about the planned attack. A second one could absolutely have been the party overhearing a conversation in which a Fae presence in the Muir woods is mentioned (which may jog their memories about the first clue). A third clue might be more of a "clue by four", where you literally have one of the Fae tell them about this new freehold in Muir woods, and it's somewhat precarious, and they're still negotiating with the werewolves there, and anything going on the the area would be a real problem for us, and boy if someone knew about something that might be a threat to that freehold in Muir woods, Baron whathisname would be really interested in knowing all about it, and would be willing to do a huge favor in return for the information. (hint hint hint).

Provide more clues than just the one. If they get it on the first one, you're golden and the players feel great about being clever. But you should provide increasingly more "obivous" clues until they "get it".