I have had players get confused when NPCs don’t want to drop everything and help them. Like, the NPC is just living life. They’re not going to risk their safety and livelihood because you asked nicely a few minutes after meeting them.

One player had her mind blown when she learned NPCs can lie. She’d sort of pissed off this one faction with mild misbehavior. She gets pissy with one guy and demands he tell her where the macguffin is. He lies. She says okay, goes to that place. Gets in some trouble, and has no macguffin. She’s looking at me like “where is it?”. After several increasingly overt hints I just tell her “maybe he lied to you, because you broke into his house, pissed off his friends, and demanded he help you. Maybe he just lied to you”.

“But… He said the thing is here”