I have yet to run my first mission with my 4-mouse group (it’s coming up in a couple of weeks - Mail Run). But I had one of those ‘moments’ when an idea came to me that I thought would make a great mission. It has elements from movies and stories and real life all mixed together but, strangely, when it is scaled down to MG, it takes on a whole new life, at least for me.
Gwendolyn calls the Mouse Guard together for an urgent meeting. She explains, excitedly and nervously that in a remote town, a little too close to the weasels, an albino mouse has been born. Similar to the Native American Indians, a white version of an animal is held in high regard. Whether or not it truly is, is up to the GM. But in my mind, this would be an ongoing mission that gets interwoven between other missions, and as this albino mouse grows, he/she actually does have some seer-type abilities (think, “The One” from The Matrix or something similar). In any case, missions could center around the Mouse Guard needing to transport him/her from place to place, guarding him/her when he/she gets old enough to address many mice, or when he/she is laying paws on the sick or diseased, etc. Basically the Mouse Guard become his/her bodyguards going forward.
A traitor mouse, working for the weasels, informs them of the mouses’ morale booster prodigy mouse. Taking it out would be a major blow to the mice and, frankly, demoralize them. The weasels begin to devise ways to find and capture/kill the albino prodigy mouse.
In my mind, this prodigy mouse is a male and they call him Malcolm.
Obviously, this is very general and high level. Details need to be worked out to properly insert into an MG campaign, but nevertheless, I wanted to at least float it out there.
i would be concerned with players that don’t feel interest in the NPC becoming a key story character and mission surrounding the life of an NPC over other matters. It is a neat idea, but wouldn’t grasp all groups.
I don’t know. The special mouse certainly doesn’t have to be the only thing the PCs deal with throughout the campaign, but having a consistent focal point for events can provide quite a bit of continuity for a long series of adventures. I think most groups will recognize a ‘McGuffin’ regardless of what it looks like, and see the prodigy mouse as exactly that. (Just like the batch of medicine they have to deliver one game, or the trade caravan they have to guide and protect through dangerous areas in another.)
Just be sure not to let the prodigy overshadow the group. If he ends up rescuing them more than once or twice over the course of a few years of play the PCs are going to feel like their characters a lot less special. On the other hand, if your party has a weak spot (healing, for example), it might be perfectly reasonable to let the prodigy mouse fill that role when it’s necessary. Just remember to make your players spend the appropriate checks when it happens.
That can be awesome though. Some of the mice will be all “superstitious mumbo jumbo” but others might be true believers. From such things are good arguments crafted. Of course, the mission is the mission even if the mice think its a waste of resources.
One note, I think I would leave the question of whether Malcolm is a seer open to interpretation. What’s important is that folks believe he is, and losing him to the weasels would be a blow.