DMing the first time

[Spore]

Greetings,

I will soon DM a sort of Spanish commonwealthish city campaign with sailing backstabbing and politics and I want some general advice onto how I can keep the group together and focussed. We're in Pathfinder. They're 3 guys playing following concepts: CN female melee bard starting the adventure as courtesan, CG female wind oracle starting as the daughter of a rich noble and her NE urban ranger bodyguard.

We will start out in the brothel/bar were the bard works and the bodyguard regularly is customer. The daughter is guest there as well without the knowing of her father (so she thinks). I want the adventure to start with some kind of ambigous thuggery for cash. I need a way to cut the fatherly funds from the noble daughter (probably assassination and a changed will to inherit someone else), release the bodyguard from her father's payroll (firing a NE hero is kind of suicide imho). Getting the courtesan away from her demeaning job is kind of easy actually.

Also are there common tricks to increase the unity in the group? If they'd play their characters to heart the backstabbing inside the group would be immense.

[Yora]

The one thing that makes people forget their hate for each other is their shared even greater hate for someone else.

Normally I would say, never let the players make up characters without them first agreeing why their characters are a group, but in this case it could actually get quite interesting.
Your idea looks quite promising. Have the father of the noble be assassinated and let the bodyguard save her from an attempt at her life. And then words get around that the bodyguard is framed for the murder and wanted for having kidnapped the noble daughter. If they are found, he gets executed for murder, and she falls in the hands of the actual conspirators who failed to kill her in their first attempt. So they need to work together to find out who wants her dead and framed her bodyguard.
The bard might witness the attack on the lady and could also provide an alibi for the bodyguard, so the conspirators want her out of the picture as well.

[Airk]

I'm not entirely clear what you're aiming for here. Are the players supposed to be backstabbing within the party or not? If they are, then there's not going to be a 'party' for long and you should be prepared for that.

If no, then give them good reasons not to - I suggest you have the PLAYERS create those reasons as part of chargen.

[Coidzor]

I suppose the easiest option for all of that would be framing them for the assassination of a bigwig, forcing them to flee and find who really is responsible, but that'd tend to risk them skipping town for a bit, I suppose.

[Spore]

Yes, because of you I am pretty much set on that version. Now just to fail an assassination on an d8 hero with Con 8... I think I need some incompetent thugs. :D

[Talos]

OR we could say rich dad sails a way on business venture for an undetermined amout of time, whilst away mother who is scorned by his relationship with his daughter. cuts her off in his absence. To further punish her she fires her body guard. Based on rich dad giving her lenacy to do more than she should(e.i hang out in a brothel) Rich mom has contacts and can pull strings too.

now while rich dad is away the mom puts her into a polically sticking situation which is bad for family business how ever untrue. Dad returns, devoted wife tells him of her transgressions. Dad knowing her wild side sees it in the realm of possiblity. Devoted wife supplies more evidence with help from out side sources. best case scenerio would be if the body gaurd could validate something without the knowledge of what really happened. then in a rage dad cuts her off to save everything he has build for the family. after that, he calms and decides to find her and ask him for himself. when devoted wife poisons him before he can find the truth.

[Spore]

Nice idea, Talos.

But if I introduce too many backstabbing characters, I fear that my players will get too paranoid to trust anyone ever again. It's my debut as an DM and as much as I love double crossing and betrayal in every form, I wouldn't want my players to check for traps every centimeter and kill every potential ally on sight.