# All Aboard the Invisible Railroad!



## NotAYakk (Jul 15, 2022)

Choices only matter when the PCs have actionable information between the choices.

"There are 3 doors, which one do you open" isn't a choice, it is a random number generator.  If the same encounter is behind all 3 doors regardless of what scouting work the PCs do, it is a fixed random number generator.

I don't know about your players, but when I'm playing and my choices are blind and the information I try to gain is unconnected to what happens when I act on it, I don't feel I have agency.


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## Paul Farquhar (Jul 15, 2022)

Even if the players don't realise their choices don't matter, the DM knows. I find a large portion of the fun of being a DM is seeing how the choices the players make affect the direction of the game.


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## RuinousPowers (Jul 15, 2022)

NotAYakk said:


> Choices only matter when the PCs have actionable information between the choices.
> 
> "There are 3 doors, which one do you open" isn't a choice, it is a random number generator.  If the same encounter is behind all 3 doors regardless of what scouting work the PCs do, it is a fixed random number generator.
> 
> I don't know about your players, but when I'm playing and my choices are blind and the information I try to gain is unconnected to what happens when I act on it, I don't feel I have agency.



Exactly this. "I go left/I go right" is meaningless unless its based on information or knowledge. Coin flipping decisions isn't player agency.


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## jgsugden (Jul 15, 2022)

In my experience, these approaches tend* to result in games that feel like slow paced video games rather than an RPG. 

Why?  The text works, but the subtext is often* nonexistent.  It usually* has that feel of randomly inserted challenges because the way

Players start to ask questions about why the dungeon is laid out in such a random manner.  They ask why the group has to go through the kitchen to reach the chief's bedroom.  The group asks why they always choose the right door.  They ask, and ask, and ask ... the same way we ask questions about video games, especially older ones, where the pieces only kinda fit together.

D&D is an RPG.  A role playing game.  Characters play a role in a story.  In a good story, the world around thew characters makes sense.  It feels like the players are entering someplace that has existed long before they arrived, not something that was thrown together to give them a challenge.  A well prepared session is going to be a better experience for players most of the time. 

Usually*, it isn't hard for players to see through a collage approach of improvised railroads and note that it feels far less immersive than a dungeon setting where you built the dungeon with a plan and a thought about how it is laid out.  When you can smell the cinnamon a few rooms away from the kitchen, when the escape passage is laid out in a way that makes sense, when all the puzzle pieces fit ...

* All that being said, there are times when this is the best path.  For example, when PCs reach higher levels, they get the capability to teleport across the world - or even between planes - in an instant.  My setting's primary world is roughly 23 times the size of the Earth.  My Astral Sea is literally infinite, as are my Elemental Planes - as is my version of Space surrounding the Prime Planet.  I can't plan everything.  I have a few 'in reserve' dungeons/cities/bnuildings/wilderness settings that I can pull out and populate on the fly, but there are times when none of them work for the strange place the PCs decide to go.  In those instances, I have to improvise the entire encounter/scenario and follow many of the rules recommended above to do so.  However, when I do so, I try to make sure I do the following:

1.) Put a story first,  There has to be something there for the PCs to discover.  That story should unfold, and it is often best if it is not 'linear' so that the PCs are walked through the story as they find the elements.  It has to unfold as they go. 

2.) There should be a greater story element wherever they go.  It may play into the current storylines that the PCs know, or it may drop seeds for a future storyline, but the adventure they are undertaking should have a purpose.  Sometimes that lore drop isn't even going to come to fruition during the current campaign ... but may result in seeds the players can plant that will impact the next campaign.  In the end, they can't just feel like this choice they made went nowhere.  You can get away with the occasional entirely self contained one shot ... but I really try not to have that be the case.

3.) I try to drop a seed that will get them back to parts of the world that have prepared materials.  It won't be a direct connect, usually, as that feels out of place, but instead it will be something that reminds them of what they might be neglecting, or that would benefit them in doing what they are trying to do elsewhere.  A simple example would be finding a skeleton key that can open any lock once when they've been stymied by a lock that was not intended to be such a challenge, but they just couldn't get past and they left behind many sessions ago.


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## Krachek (Jul 15, 2022)

It’s a nice OP.
I feel as DM that I deliver a story influenced by players.
I can’t have infinite rooms, encounters and npcs prepared.
I use floating plot and encounters that can be place on need.
The overall need to be coherent, feel real, and a Dm should be a good story teller and have a good poker face.


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 15, 2022)

Corone said:


> What if I told you it was possible to lock your players on a tight railroad, but make them think every decision they made mattered?



Then I would think you have rather a high opinion of your ability to consistently and faultlessly outwit 4-5 other people for a sustained period. I find most players are highly intelligent, and can pretty quickly figure out that they're being deceived. A clever and chary DM can keep up the charade for a while, but it never lasts forever.



Corone said:


> While this may sound like the evil GM speaking, I have my reasons. Firstly, not every GM has time to craft a massive campaign. There are also plenty of GMs who are daunted at the prospect of having to figure out every eventuality. So, this advice is offered to help people scale down the pressure of being a GM and give them options to reuse and recycle their ideas and channel players through an exciting adventure that just doesn’t have as many options as they thought it did. All I’m suggesting here is a way to make sure every choice the players make takes them to an awesome encounter, which is surly no bad thing.



It is a bad thing if it is presented deceptively. It's not the rails that are the problem--it is their (alleged) invisibility. Putting someone in a cage when they think they're completely free is questionable at best.



Corone said:


> A Caveat​I should add that used too often this system can have the opposite effect. The important thing here is not to take away their feeling of agency. If players realise nothing they do changes the story, then the adventure will quickly lose its allure. But as long as they don’t realise what is happening they will think every choice matters and the story is entirely in their hands. However, I should add that some players are used to being led around by the nose, or even prefer it, so as long as no one points out the “emperor has no clothes” everyone will have a great game.



Yeah...this is exactly the problem I have. If their joy depends on never, _ever_ realizing that they've been deceived, then the game is eternally on the edge of collapse when it doesn't need to be. It's really not _that_ hard to actually let players have agency either--nor to recycle old ideas into new things if you didn't have the time or opportunity to use them when you originally intended. Recycling doesn't have to take the form of "it's literally exactly what I was originally planning to do, but I've just quantum-superposition'd it from being south of the Dark Marsh to being west of the Fire Cliffs."



Corone said:


> You See Three Doors…



This isn't even agency in the first place, so we're not exactly off to a good start.



Corone said:


> This variant on the idea above works with any dungeon, although it might also apply to a village or any place with separate encounters. Essentially, you create ten encounters/rooms and whichever door the player character’s open leads to the next one on your list. You can create as complex a dungeon map as you like, and the player characters can try any door in any order. But whatever door they open after room four will always lead to room five.



At one point, I actually did something like this....sort of. It's from the _Gardens of Ynn_ supplement, which (other than this one small flaw) is actually quite excellent. When I solicited feedback from players after the journey to Ynn, one of them spoke up about how when he realized that I would roll to find out what the next area was _after they chose which way to go_, it bled away all tension and impact. He knew that, whatever would happen, it was random, so there was no strategy or preparation involved. Just some new thing the party hadn't seen before. (Technically that was me _very slightly_ tweaking it because I didn't want to have to keep completely re-drawing my map every time they hit a new room.)

Should I do something like this again in the future, I will try to generate a set of labyrinths _in advance_, and then select between them when the adventure starts, so that it's still random and I'm still surprised by what specifically happens, but there _is_ an actual set of rooms and choosing to go in direction A actually truly is _different_ from choosing to go in direction B (unless, contextually, it isn't because of magic BS or whatever.)

So while this has some potential, I have actually gotten direct player feedback about how this is not great, and if I were actually _hiding_ it from the players, that would have gone over like a lead balloon.



Corone said:


> What Path Do You Take in the Wilderness?



Frankly this is so much worse than the three doors. At least there, you're making it clear that they're picking even if the "choice" is really not a choice at all, just a random selection. With this method, you're literally just straight up lying to them about whether or not they're making choices. There is no direction except "forward," you're just letting them believe there is.



Corone said:


> Before You Leave the Village…



....why not just _talk to them_? This isn't even doing anything that just saying, "Alright guys, time for final preparations before you head out. Is there any remaining business you'd like to cover, anything you might have forgotten?" wouldn't. Like...at least with the others you're trying to be efficient with resources. This is literally just "they'll pick up on the hints! There's no need to _communicate_ with them!" What possible advantage does this provide?


Corone said:


> Following the Clues​Finally we come to the most common invisible railroad that isn’t ever considered railroading (ironically). Investigative adventures usually live and breathe by allowing the player characters to uncover clues that lead to other clues. Such adventures are actually openly railroading as each clue leads to another on a proscribed path. The players aren’t forced to follow the clues, but what else are they going to do? The players are making a point of following the railroad in the knowledge it will take them to the denouement of the adventure. What makes this type of railroading entertaining is that the players feel clever for having found the clues that lead them along the path. So if they start to divert too much the GM can put another clue on their path or let them find the next one a little easier and you are back on track.



Here I must outright disagree with you. Yes, it is _one possible option_ that this is done in a railroading fashion. It is ABSOLUTELY NOT going to ALWAYS be railroading. The problem is, you have presumed a _linear sequence_ of clues...meaning, you have _presumed_ the rails. You can have clues that are just...present. They don't specifically point to subsequent clues. They're just single pieces of information. I know this because _that's how I did a murder mystery_. There were clues in the kitchens, clues on the body (some real, some faked), clues in the victim's bedroom, clues that could be gleaned from talking to the servants. No clue directly led to any other clue; it was on the players to choose where to look and who to talk to. There were intentionally-placed false leads, and there were dead ends. (The players tried to resurrect the victim, for example; it only partially worked, however, so the victim wasn't going to revive _fast enough_ to prevent the diplomatic incident the players wanted to prevent.) 

The players had to reason, had to use IRL information I knew they had (e.g. that _livor mortis_ takes at least 2 hours to be noticeable, so the victim couldn't possibly have been killed by the person who found his body), contradictions between statements made by the suspects, and weird differences in the reports between different people who had no reason to lie. I had prepared for as many possible results of this mystery as I could: failure to identify any culprit at all, positively identifying the wrong person, having two or more plausible suspects without a clear identification, identifying the right culprit but not the reason for the murder, or truly finding everything. The players were persistent and clever and worked out _almost_ everything, including the secret motive. There was no railroad here, because I was willing to accept essentially every possible result from the investigation. The one mystery they didn't solve was who was keeping one of the tertiary suspects under control via addictive drugs. (I think it just got lost in the shuffle, to be honest, but it _is_ the one component of the mystery that never got solved.)

There was no "track" to get back onto, because the players were fully in control of whether the mystery was actually solved, or not. And they very, _very_ much appreciated that their success was _theirs_, not something I ensured would happen.



Corone said:


> Now, all this may all seem a little manipulative,



Because it is. Blatantly so. There is no "seem" about it.



Corone said:


> but modifying events in reaction to what the players do is a part of many GM’s tools. Any trick you use is usually okay as long as you do it to serve the story and the player’s enjoyment.



I strongly disagree with this sentiment. Tricking people is rarely wise, and never necessary.



Corone said:


> That said, never take away player agency so you can ensure the story plays out the way you want it to.



This order is impossible to obey while implementing the other things you have described here. Either you actually do respect player agency, and thus do not force the story to end up in the shape or location you want it to be, or you do ensure that things end up going where you wanted them to go anyway, and thus do not respect player agency. (Note that, if you have a frank conversation with your players, that's rather a different story; you are still respecting their agency, by giving them the opportunity as players to choose whether or not to participate. It's not _ideal_ to say "please just do X thing, even if you might not normally, because it's important for this to happen." But at least you're respecting them and their agency.)



Corone said:


> This sort of railroading should only be used just to make the game more manageable and free up the GM to concentrate on running a good game instead of desperately trying to create contingencies. So, remember that you must never restrict the choices and agency of the players, at least knowingly. But it is fine to make sure every road goes where you want it to, as long as that is to somewhere amazing.



Again, your instructions are directly contradictory. You advocate knowingly making it so whatever direction the players choose to go in the wilderness, it will always lead to the haunted house (or whatever other location you have in mind.) That is directly and specifically restricting the choices and negating the agency of the players. They do not actually have a choice of where to go. They can have any color they want, as long as the color they want is black.



Corone said:


> Your Turn: How do you use railroading in your games?



I don't. Ever. Full stop. I have never needed to, and I see no reason to start. I have always been honest with my players. The _characters I play_ are not always honest with them. But I, as DM, have never lied to my players. And doing so has enriched my game in ways too numerous to count.


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## Paul Farquhar (Jul 15, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> I know this because _that's how I did a murder mystery_. There were clues in the kitchens, clues on the body (some real, some faked), clues in the victim's bedroom, clues that could be gleaned from talking to the servants. No clue directly led to any other clue; it was on the players to choose where to look and who to talk to. There were intentionally-placed false leads, and there were dead ends.



You publish? I would love to have this adventure!


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 15, 2022)

Paul Farquhar said:


> You publish? I would love to have this adventure!



I do not, but I would be happy to draft up something for you. Probably not tonight, but over the weekend.


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## Bayushi_seikuro (Jul 15, 2022)

To me, the way I want to 'railroad' came up during a stream with the three Critical Role GMs - Matt, Aabria and Brennan.

Brennan said that any railroad comes from session zero.  The plot hooks you laid out during that 'get to know your character and build the party' will be used against you.

(Side note: the video is full of good advice for gaming, but another point Brennan brought up: most people in real life don't HAVE forty pages of back story.)


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## Paul Farquhar (Jul 15, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> I do not, but I would be happy to draft up something for you. Probably not tonight, but over the weekend.



No hurry, but I would love to see it. Some of my players (and my wife) are big murder mystery fans, but I have never been able to write one.


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## Mort (Jul 15, 2022)

I have no problem with linear sessions - in fact I often prefer them, as long as they are honestly presented as linear. It irritates me when a session is presented as open ended yet turns out to be anything but.

I've found VERY few players who don't share in that view, the linear adventures are not the problem, the deception is. 

So why deceive?


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 15, 2022)

Paul Farquhar said:


> No hurry, but I would love to see it. Some of my players (and my wife) are big murder mystery fans, but I have never been able to write one.



As an overview, the structure of the adventure was as follows:



Spoiler: Adventure components



1. Players arrive in the Jinnistani city of Mt. Matahat, which is located inside the mountain. (It's lit up during the day because the side of the mountain is made of transparent crystal--probably the work of an ancient noble genie.) For my group, they needed a favor that only a foreign dignitary could provide; your group would likely have its own reasons.
2. They secured an audience with one of the four sultans of the city. (It rotates who's Padishah Sultan(a) every couple of centuries, as the original Padishah Sultana of Mt. Matahat had four noble genie children and didn't want them resorting to violence over the throne.) He, being a subtle manipulator type, had the party seek out an audience with his brother, in order to retain plausible deniability.
3. The party did favors for the younger brother, and for their boon from him, asked to attend an upcoming masquerade ball (timed to match a every-other-year lunar eclipse). Younger brother got them nice costumes to wear. (You can use whatever one-session adventure you like as the favor for the younger brother.)
4. The eldest sister is the current ruler, but she's been paranoid someone is trying to overthrow her, and thus becoming draconian. The elder brother (2nd oldest sibling) wants the PCs to investigate, looking for any evidence that his sister has gone truly overboard; if they can find anything, he can use it to pressure the royal court into a vote of no confidence, which will allow him to ascend the throne a century early. Even if they turn up nothing, he'll grant their request--just having them as an asset at the party is worth the paltry thing they're looking for. (Again, this might need adjustment for your group.)
5. Before the party begins, the players have the chance to talk to the staff/servants. This is their first opportunity to gather clues, though they don't know that it's going to be for a murder mystery yet. (I sprung the murder on the players--they thought this was going to be pure courtly intrigue at first!) My group chose to be friendly with the servants, particularly in the kitchen; others could choose the guards, footmen, groundskeepers, or various other workers.
6. At the party, set in a manor estate with various magical protections to prevent invasion or untoward behavior, things go well at first. They meet some foreign dignitaries, greet the Padishah Sultana, and generally have fun. Then, there's a row between one of the guests (the young Baron of Cinders) and the Secretary of Agriculture for Mt. Matahat. The secretary said something disparaging (seemingly by accident) and the Baron took offense; the secretary departs to another part of the manor.
7. An hour later, just after the lunar eclipse has reached its height, a woman's scream is heard from the top floor, and the body is found with an obviously efreet-wought (that is, fire-genie) dagger in his back. The body is currently in livor mortis (blood settling) and his clothes are disheveled. (Successful examination reveals he's been re-dressed, and there is no blood on his clothes around the wound--meaning, the dagger was planted _after_ death, once the blood no longer had pressure to push it out of the wound.)
8. Conversations with the servants revealed a key clue: one of the other visiting dignitaries, who had been at the manor for diplomatic deals prior to the party, had received a dress delivered to her so she could attend the party. The servant who received it explicitly said the dress was _blue_. The dress the woman wore during the party was explicitly _red_.
9. Kitchen servants identified that the victim had requested coffee be sent to his room a little while before the party began, but it was left outside his room rather than brought in. (Checking the coffee reveals it was poisoned with a narcotic drug--in small doses it produces euphoria, in large doses it is quite fatal.) [Aside: this was one of the _multiple_ levels of misdirection: another possible suspect was someone who, the party learned, had been hooked on this drug and his supply was missing. It had been stolen by the perpetrator in order to commit the murder, and acting as another possible fail-safe should the true method of death be discovered.)
10. Examining the papers in the man's room, they discovered who he'd been working with. A successful analysis proved that some of the documents had been forged, and that the authentic documents pointed to the woman who'd been with him--the one who had the strange dress of apparently changing color! They also found suspicious connections among the woman's stuff to accounts they knew connected back to a merchant in their home city, whom the party has quarrelled with in the past, a man named Jafar el-Aly.
11. The Baron of Cinders--along with the Prince of the South Wind, Sahl--were effectively under temporary house arrest as possible suspects for assaulting the Padishah Sultana's court. Interviewing them, the party realized that _the victim had to have been dead *before* his quarrel with the Baron_. Meaning whoever had had that quarrel, they were using illusions or shapeshifting to pretend to be the victim after he was already dead.
12. Examining the room and the outside of the house, they realized that the windows of the victim's room had been left unlocked, and the plants growing on the exterior of the building had been damaged. Someone had climbed on the outside of the building, while people were busy paying attention to the party.
13. An interview with one of the other suspects--the woman who had found him--revealed that the victim had been carrying on a secret affair with her, despite their outward appearance of antagonism. The two had been subtly funneling money into private accounts, so they could retire and live out the rest of their lives together in some other court. She confessed to having stabbed him (which the party already knew wasn't what killed him) because she thought he had betrayed her.
14. Finally they put it all together: the aforementioned diplomat woman had stolen the drugs from that other dignitary, whom she had gotten addicted to that drug in the first place. She requested a meeting with the man, because she was already there to conduct diplomatic discussions, and killed him by poisoning his coffee. She then pretended to be him at the party, intentionally riling up the Baron of Cinders to make him look guilty of murder. She then returned to the body in his room (where _livor mortis_ had set in), used magic (probably a bag of holding) to carry him up to the top floor by _climing on the outside of the house_. She then deposited him in the room where he was found, left the knife in easy reach of his location, and venomously directed the man's lover to him.
15. With the correct perpetrator caught, it would _seem_ like everything is good. However, this whole fiasco played perfectly into the elder brother sultan's hands: even though the victim had been resurrected and the killer caught, his elder sister's _incredibly poor_ handling of the diplomatic situation was ample evidence for a vote of no confidence, meaning he was essentially guaranteed to become Padishah Sultan; he gladly fulfilled their request and, in effect, now has warm feelings specifically toward the party and the city they come from, a major diplomatic boon for their own city's ruler (a Sultana herself.)



I used a neat mansion map I found online, I'll have to get you a link. But yeah that's pretty much the overall journey. As I said, a lot of distinct clues, few of which were smoking guns and none of which were a breadcrumb trail per se. Some of the clues do relate (e.g. the coffee, the poison, the drug addict it was stolen from, etc.; or the state of the body, the lack of blood around the wound, the body's clothes, etc.) but I did my best to create as many totally distinct clue locus points as I could so that the players could _easily_ miss half the clues and still potentially solve the mystery.


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## mykesfree (Jul 15, 2022)

What the OP has stated is the basic principle of many "magic tricks" it is call the the "One Ahead Principle".  It is extremely effective in the appearance of choice.


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## TheSword (Jul 15, 2022)

Even if there is no agency in which door the players go through, there can be plenty of agency in how they act when the do.

To me egregious railroading is when players want to effect an outcome and common sense/plausibility gets bent trying to prevent that happening… the enemy always gets away or can’t be killed. The guard can’t be persuaded or bribed. The door can’t be broken down.

I couldn’t care less as a player which door I go through as long there is something interesting on the other side that I get to interact with. Locational/geographical railroading always happens to some extent and is really just a question of degrees. There is always some form of railroading based on the structure design of the place. It really doesn’t matter to me.


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## sevenbastard (Jul 15, 2022)

Corone said:


> What if I told you it was possible to lock your players on a tight railroad, but make them think every decision they made mattered?




What if I told you I could run a game where you had actual choices that matter with consequences and a good chance of the whole party dying?

I get the idea you are going for but why teach people a short cut when you can work to teach them the actual process.

It's scary but start small, practice, and don't be afraid to fail.

In fact I would sat you to take steps to show your player the transparency.

For example I roll all my dice on the table. So when I roll a wandering monster and it comes up a trolls I might hand them the paper with the list that shows a troll is a 13 on the table. Then let them roll the 2d4 to see how many. If there are no spoilers on the list why not show them the dangers they face, the ranger should know anyway. 

When a player is fleeing randomly down hallways with one hit point and they chose left instead of right. And left hits a dead end and get killed. I would show them the map that shows right lead to the exit. Not to rub it in but to show them how close they were and build trust. Trust that I don't fudge for them so they know that victories achieved are true victories.


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## MrZeddaPiras (Jul 15, 2022)

This is the way me and the people I knew used to DM all the time when I was a kid. Turns out players like it, and even kind of expect you to do it, as long as you make their characters look cool and incorporate pay-offs to their backstories in the game. Incidentally it's a style I came to dislike profoundly, because it's all manipulation and keeping the players happy so they'll like you.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 15, 2022)

Well, its not too often you see an honest and robust defense of illusionism.  Props for that at least.


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## FrozenNorth (Jul 15, 2022)

NotAYakk said:


> Choices only matter when the PCs have actionable information between the choices.
> 
> "There are 3 doors, which one do you open" isn't a choice, it is a random number generator.  If the same encounter is behind all 3 doors regardless of what scouting work the PCs do, it is a fixed random number generator.
> 
> I don't know about your players, but when I'm playing and my choices are blind and the information I try to gain is unconnected to what happens when I act on it, I don't feel I have agency.



Agree and disagree.  I agree that choices only matter when the PCs have actionable information.  So, a PC who says “We go north” without a specific reason is mot really exercising their agency.

To me, the corollary is that if a PC is not exercising their agency, a DM isn’t taking it away by throwing in a disconnected encounter.  If the PCs go north and encounter a troll, their agency is not impacted if, had they chosen to go west, they would have encountered a western troll (maybe with a hat and cowboy boots).

Of the other hand, if a PC is exercising agency (“Yon peasant, prithee tell what is to the north of this hamlet”), then the DM ignoring this is denying the PC their agency.


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## Stalker0 (Jul 15, 2022)

When these types of threads come up, people inevitably turning into the notion that "The Dm lying is inherently bad".

And that is simply not true. As a DM, your job is to craft an experience for your players. And you have many tools at your disposal to choose from, manipulation is simply one of them. And all DMs do it to some extent or another. For example, do you describe in detail every single person that exists in a city?....probably not. So when you decide to describe in detail an NPC....you are manipulating the players, you are focusing their attention on something specific. Maybe because the NPC is important, or because you want them to be a red herring, but you are directing their focus and their decision making.

There are definately times when the PCs throw you a curve ball, and go somewhere you had never thought of, and have no plans for. So maybe you throw together a super quick dungeon in your head, using a few of the tricks above. This isn't meant to be a major dungeon, its just meant to cover an XYZ quick thing and then the party moves on. And sometimes....DMs get busy. Maybe they didn't have as much time to prep as they wanted, and so their choices are throw something together real quick with maybe a little manipulative glue in the middle....or cancel the session. I know my players would always rather play than me going, "sorry guys I got busy, no game". Now like all tools, overuse of one is not a good idea. And if your doing this is a crutch because you haven't learned how to make adventurer's with player agency....than yes that's a problem. But as one more tool in the box, these tactics are fine when used in moderation.


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## iserith (Jul 15, 2022)

Please don't purposefully offer me choices that don't actually matter. It's not much to ask as a player in my view.

Or at least let me know that's what you're doing so we can dispense with the deception.


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## Charlaquin (Jul 15, 2022)

MrZeddaPiras said:


> This is the way me and the people I knew used to DM all the time when I was a kid. Turns out players like it, and even kind of expect you to do it, as long as you make their characters look cool and incorporate pay-offs to their backstories in the game.



Well… Some players do. Others will be very upset if they learn the DM is doing this. And that, to me, is why it’s a problem. If the players are aware and onboard, great, have fun! But this strategy is fundamentally built around hiding it from the players. That’s disrespectful of any player who might not want to play this way.


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## Stalker0 (Jul 15, 2022)

As for other railroad options, another classic one is the "Mission based adventure".

Players get the mission from their "boss" and go to work. That immediately focuses the adventure, and I find it works extremely well in many campaigns.


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## Charlaquin (Jul 15, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> When these types of threads come up, people inevitably turning into the notion that "The Dm lying is inherently bad".
> 
> And that is simply not true.



It is absolutely true. Some players are vehemently opposed to this sort of quantum DMing, and by hiding it from the players, you prevent yourself from knowing if any of your players feel that way. You’re just doing something to the players that they might hate, without their knowledge or consent. And that is wrong.


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## overgeeked (Jul 15, 2022)

Railroading is the worst kind of play. What you’re talking about is the illusion of choice. It’s as old as dirt and always bad. If the players’ choices don’t matter there’s no reason for them to be at the table. You might as well read them the story instead of pretend they or their characters matter. The result is the same. Only you don’t have the pressure of lying to them for hours on end session after session.


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## Krachek (Jul 15, 2022)

Players are smart, they know the DM have a finite preparation, they can help to keep the story on track.


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## NotAYakk (Jul 15, 2022)

FrozenNorth said:


> Agree and disagree.  I agree that choices only matter when the PCs have actionable information.  So, a PC who says “We go north” without a specific reason is mot really exercising their agency.
> 
> To me, the corollary is that if a PC is not exercising their agency, a DM isn’t taking it away by throwing in a disconnected encounter.  If the PCs go north and encounter a troll, their agency is not impacted if, had they chosen to go west, they would have encountered a western troll (maybe with a hat and cowboy boots).
> 
> Of the other hand, if a PC is exercising agency (“Yon peasant, prithee tell what is to the north of this hamlet”), then the DM ignoring this is deny the PC their agency.



Sure.  Which is why I consider it part of the "describe the world" problem that DMs have.

1. DM describes the world
2. Players make choices

One choice is "I don't look at the clues and pick something random".  But the DM should be providing some kind of clues asto what choices have what results.

This is the game of dropping bread crumbs and hints, and the rule of 3 (if something clue isn't mentioned 3 times, it isn't a real clue).

Once the rule of 3 is in play -- that the DM is responsible to hide 3 clues about meaningful choices, and let the players pick them up or not -- then this kind of invisible railroad won't work.

Like the 10 room dungeon.  The meaningful choices in the dungeon should have 3 clues describing what the choice means.  Then when the players run into a choice, the DM is no longer "allowed" to nullify the choice, because the previous clues _told the players_ information about the results of the choice.

Even if the players don't work out the clues before making the choice, they could work it out afterwards.  And those threads of clues to payoff in the world change what the world acts like in ways fundamentally incompatible with "invisible railroads".

...

On the other hand, the clues as yet ungiven can be changed based on player choices!  For example, the DM might want there to be a Kobold dragon-cult, and might even have given clues it exists!  But before giving a clue *where *it is, the location of the cult doesn't have to be determined.

If the PCs follow a trail of clues to the tropics, or the arctic, maybe the cult retroactively follows them; in one case, it is a black dragon cult, in the other a white dragon cult.  Or maybe it avoids them, and is in the other spot!

This doesn't have to fully nullify the choice of arctic or tropics, so long as those choices where meaningful *in another way*, and the clues about them let the player make an informed decision.

With no clues given where the cult is prior to the choice, the choice isn't about "did I find the cult", but rather about the other clues.  Still a bit dirty, because the players might honestly think they have a 50% chance to find the cult between the two choices, and in reality it is 0% or 100% (depending on DM's decision).


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## Remathilis (Jul 15, 2022)

I'm just here to see all the badwrongfun replies and wasn't disappointed.


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## Stalker0 (Jul 15, 2022)

overgeeked said:


> Railroading is the worst kind of play. What you’re talking about is the illusion of choice. It’s as old as dirt and always bad. If the players’ choices don’t matter there’s no reason for them to be at the table. You might as well read them the story instead of pretend they or their characters matter. The result is the same. Only you don’t have the pressure of lying to them for hours on end session after session.



1) Just because you railroad a portion of the game doesn't mean the character is entirely railroaded. I might say that you will always meet NPC X in the next room (no matter which room you choose), but your character still determines how they interact with that character.

2) Some people like stories. Not everyone plays an RPG to make an endless series of character chocies. Its a combination of choices, and then seeing where it goes. People like hearing the villain's monologue, the NPCs quirky dialogue, and their fellow PCs epic moment just as much as making their own character decisions. Its a balance.


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## MatthewJHanson (Jul 15, 2022)

Corone said:


> The Ten Room Dungeon​This variant on the idea above works with any dungeon, although it might also apply to a village or any place with separate encounters. Essentially, you create ten encounters/rooms and whichever door the player character’s open leads to the next one on your list. You can create as complex a dungeon map as you like, and the player characters can try any door in any order. But whatever door they open after room four will always lead to room five.



This seems super weird to me. It seems to me that it would make much more sense to either:

A) Lay out the dungeons with the same ten rooms, but in a way that makes most sense for the dungeons.
B) Literally just put all the rooms in one big line. If room 4 always leads to room 5, why have more than one door? Nothing wrong with an actual linear dungeon.


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## Ovinomancer (Jul 15, 2022)

I'll leave this here, as it's extremely relevant to this discussion:

The Impossible Thing Before Breakfast

This brief essay talks directly to the issue in the OP and discusses the ways that it works.  In short, there's a conflict between the idea that the GM controls the story but the players control the main characters.  This is the Impossible Thing.  It then talks about how this isn't usually a large point of discussion because every table has found some way to resolve it for themselves.  The OP is such a way, discussed in the article as a combination of illusionism -- the presentation of illusion of choice -- and participationism -- willingly agreeing to follow the GM's story.  The article also discusses trailblazing, which is very much in line with the 3 clues approaches.  It wraps up with a discussion of a different approach entirely, that centers more on the main character side instead of the GM story side.  It's a good read, worth considering.


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## CleverNickName (Jul 15, 2022)

I've used all of these, particularly the "Ten Room Dungeon" example.  I find it's the most efficient use of my writing time.  I'm also a fan of "Before You Leave the Village" and the "What Path Do You Take" options as well...they're more seamless.  I try to avoid the "Three Doors" device, though.

However, I've learned that it is very important to not use ANY railroad devices during the first 3-5 gaming sessions with my players, though.  I know that during these first few gaming sessions, the players are going to be testing me.  They will deliberately try to break whatever I put in front of them, to test the limits of my game world and find out how good I am at improv and adaptation.

I show them three doors?  They will spend an hour searching for a hidden fourth door, then hack all three doors apart with axes, then use familiars to scout through each doorway.  Once they are satisfied that each door leads to a different location, they will start digging up the floor just to see what they find.  If I don't give them something interesting to find, they will decide to leave the dungeon and go home.  Eventually they will they concede that they need to pick a doorway to move forward...so they will divide the party into three groups and explore them all three separately and simultaneously.

_Why on earth are they doing this?! _you might ask yourself.  Well, their previous DM was a railroad engineer, and the players were made to feel like their choices won't matter.  The players really do want their choices to matter, so they are going to do everything they can to discover whether or not I'm using a railroad plot device, and then escape it by any means necessary.  It takes a handful of gaming sessions for this attitude to wear off...and once it does, I can gently start adding these tactics back in.


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## TheSword (Jul 15, 2022)

sevenbastard said:


> What if I told you I could run a game where you had actual choices that matter with consequences and a good chance of the whole party dying?
> 
> I get the idea you are going for but why teach people a short cut when you can work to teach them the actual process.
> 
> ...



Procedurally generated dungeons are not more virtuous than crafted dungeons because they include random elements.


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## overgeeked (Jul 15, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> 1) Just because you railroad a portion of the game doesn't mean the character is entirely railroaded. I might say that you will always meet NPC X in the next room (no matter which room you choose), but your character still determines how they interact with that character.



Just because you rob the players of agency a little bit doesn't mean you'll rob them of all their agency. Sure. But the fact that you're willing to rob them of any agency is the problem.


Stalker0 said:


> 2) Some people like stories. Not everyone plays an RPG to make an endless series of character chocies. Its a combination of choices, and then seeing where it goes. People like hearing the villain's monologue, the NPCs quirky dialogue, and their fellow PCs epic moment just as much as making their own character decisions. Its a balance.



If they want a story they can read a book or watch someone else's live play. They will have exactly the same level of agency as in a railroaded game.


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## DEFCON 1 (Jul 15, 2022)

Railroading being a useful tool is overrated.  Just like player agency is overrated.  Being completely honest with your players is overrated, and lying to your players is overrated.  Rolling out in the open is overrated and rolling behind a screen so you can fudge if necessary is overrated.  In all these cases... the YES! YES! YES! and NO! NO! NO! from a lot of the opinions here on the boards about this topic comes off to me as amusing more than anything else.

Every single one of those things has a place in the game for someone.  Obviously not at every table... but there's not a single one of them that is a universal Always Yes or Always No for the entire gaming populace across the board.


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## Blue (Jul 15, 2022)

Sounds like pure Illusionism.

At that point, if the GM isn't willing to put in the effort to run that includes the choices of the players, isn't it better just to run a module and let your players know it, so they have expectations about how much their character or agency matters (very little) but the journey is still fun.


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## DEFCON 1 (Jul 15, 2022)

Blue said:


> Sounds like pure Illusionism.
> 
> At that point, if the GM isn't willing to put in the effort to run that includes the choices of the players, isn't it better just to run a module and let your players know it, so they have expectations about how much their character or agency matters (very little) but the journey is still fun.



Probably dependant on how well you know the players and whether or not it's something they do or don't care about.


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## Scott Christian (Jul 15, 2022)

I think most experienced DMs run in a grey area, between railroading and openness. 

I find the ones that insist they don't have never looked back and analyzed their DMing. 

I also find the way DMs lean toward one or the other is based on the stage they're in and/or the players they are playing with.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 15, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> It is absolutely true. Some players are vehemently opposed to this sort of quantum DMing, and by hiding it from the players, you prevent yourself from knowing if any of your players feel that way. You’re just doing something to the players that they might hate, without their knowledge or consent. And that is wrong.




Its also often matched up with people who think they'll be able to hide it indefinitely.


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## Remathilis (Jul 15, 2022)

overgeeked said:


> Just because you rob the players of agency a little bit doesn't mean you'll rob them of all their agency. Sure. But the fact that you're willing to rob them of any agency is the problem.




Let's take a quick hypothetical. 

Your players decide, unbeknownst to you until now, they want to find a portal/Spelljammer/whatever and go explore another setting in the game that isn't the one you are currently on. Go visit Sigil or Krynn or Eberron.

Do you let them go to a completely new world and continue the game? If not, why are you robbing them of their agency?


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 15, 2022)

Krachek said:


> Players are smart, they know the DM have a finite preparation, they can help to keep the story on track.




And this is the other side of this.  With most players you don't need to play this sort of silly game; unless they specifically signed on for a heavy-duty sandbox kind of experience, they'll work with you.  The only people who won't/can't are really hardcore deep-IC/immersionist players, and those aren't so common that everything needs to be structured with them in mind.


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## Celebrim (Jul 15, 2022)

Like I don't know if this is accidental or purposeful, but this essay appears to be cribbed from one I posted a long time ago at EnWorld.  Yeah, even some of the sentences look like paraphrases.


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## Reynard (Jul 15, 2022)

Agency is the point. It is paramount. It is the only reason to bother with the headaches RPGs produce. If you want to be on rails, play Gloomhaven. (Obviosuly, all "IMO" and a litle hyperbolic, but I wanted to get the point across.)


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## diceexmachina (Jul 15, 2022)

I am not going to weigh in on anything specific on the OP or the responses directly, but offer a third opinion on "railroading" from Brennan Lee Mulligan (from Critical Role's GM roundtable):


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 15, 2022)

overgeeked said:


> If they want a story they can read a book or watch someone else's live play. They will have exactly the same level of agency as in a railroaded game.




Not, however, with the same level of engagement.  If you don't think there are players who want to just find their chalk marks and proceed from there, let me disabuse you; there absolutely are and too many options makes the game worse, not better for them.


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## Cadence (Jul 15, 2022)

I'm curious how the various ways of having replacement players show up after a player death fit in.   Would the replacement player not have showed up if they turned right instead of left?  I mean, clearly the as-of-yet revealed character has a different place in the game than the as-of-yet revealed monster, but it seems quantumish in both cases.  Or is that one of those things the party will almost always agree to?  Does everyone on here always bring up how that works in session 0?


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 15, 2022)

I hate railroads... but I admit we all have to keep some semblance of control of our games... and as much as I have played the "What ever way they go they have a bandit encounter" once or twice over all I do not suggest it. 

in my current mindset I make a world, I put 3-5 hooks and 3-5 points of interest in each city... I make 3-4 dungeons, and a bunch of NPCs and bad guy groups then I start my campaign. Wha the PCs choose to focus on I flesh out more, and becomes the game


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## Arilyn (Jul 15, 2022)

Every GM develops their own tool box and every player has game preferences. What will work fine at one table will be despised at another. There is nothing wrong with the Invisible Railroad advice. It could be a tool that you'd never use, one you use rarely or even frequently.  

I think of it like art. Are you using a craft kit? Are you a purist avoiding mixed media like the plague? Do you only use oils or watercolours? No right answers. 

It gets said a lot but if you are having fun GMing and your players are eagerly coming back for more, game on. If you want to expand your horizons then give new games and techniques a try and hone your skills.


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## Cadence (Jul 15, 2022)

Thinking of dungeons.  Are modules where creatures are assigned to a room and assumed to be there -- instead of having some natural pattern of movement through the thing (excepting those that wouldn't) -- also a railroad?

I'm wondering in particular about 



Spoiler: Module Name






Spoiler: Module Name



Goodman version of B1 and B2





 and the other party of adventurers and the family of gnomes.  Should there only be a pretty darn low chance the party ever runs into the former, and a pretty high chance if the party dilly-dallies that the gnomes have cleaned the place out before the party even gets there?


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 15, 2022)

Remathilis said:


> Let's take a quick hypothetical.
> 
> Your players decide, unbeknownst to you until now, they want to find a portal/Spelljammer/whatever and go explore another setting in the game that isn't the one you are currently on. Go visit Sigil or Krynn or Eberron.
> 
> Do you let them go to a completely new world and continue the game? If not, why are you robbing them of their agency?



I would for sure let them look for the portal and/or spell jamming ship... but I get to decide if there is one to find. In my current world the place the players are is locked... you CAN'T planar travel to or from it but they don't know that... I would not stop them from trying though. 

Given time if they rreally put there effort and game time into it I would let the game unfold where they could unlock it and head to another world...


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## TheAlkaizer (Jul 15, 2022)

Corone said:


> There are also plenty of GMs who are daunted at the prospect of having to figure out every eventuality. So, this advice is offered to help people scale down the pressure of being a GM and give them options to reuse and recycle their ideas and channel players through an exciting adventure that just doesn’t have as many options as they thought it did




This is an argument that always leaves me pondering. Whenever I tried to have a traced road with plenty of prepared elements (for whatever reasons) it always ended up being much more work than just have some tools, lists, prompts, tables and a bit of improvisation. You don't have to prepare for most of what the players will do, you mostly have to prepare to be able to react to what they'll do.

It boils down to saying _"I can't overprepare every eventuality, so I'll overprepare only one at the cost of the players agency"._ Seems like a great price to pay when there's other simpler solutions.


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## Reynard (Jul 15, 2022)

Remathilis said:


> Let's take a quick hypothetical.
> 
> Your players decide, unbeknownst to you until now, they want to find a portal/Spelljammer/whatever and go explore another setting in the game that isn't the one you are currently on. Go visit Sigil or Krynn or Eberron.
> 
> Do you let them go to a completely new world and continue the game? If not, why are you robbing them of their agency?



One presumes that at the outset you all had a conversation about the campaign and everyone agreed to play THIS one. Now, that isn't necessarily a permanent choice but changing it definitely requires another conversation.

In actual practice, if the party decided they were going to go on a hunt for a Spelljammer or planar portal or whatever (and assuming we weren't explicitly doing a plotted campaign) I can't see why I wouldn't let them at least start their quest. Maybe they exist. Maybe they don't, but their wandering around aimlessly in search of clues would definitely give me a few weeks to work it out one way or the other.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 15, 2022)

Thomas Shey said:


> And this is the other side of this.  With most players you don't need to play this sort of silly game; unless they specifically signed on for a heavy-duty sandbox kind of experience, they'll work with you.  The only people who won't/can't are really hardcore deep-IC/immersionist players, and those aren't so common that everything needs to be structured with them in mind.



this is why I come clean. "Yeah... that dessert goes off the map, and I didn't plan for off the map, so if we want to wrap game now for the night and maybe depending on my time skip next week I will work on that, or do you want to pick some other way?"

THis also follows from when in 3.5 one player (thank the gods he moved) used to brag "In real life I have the 'avoid DM plot hook' feat" and would go out of his way to avoid joining the party, go to unmapped area's do dumb out of character things just to be diffrent... we finally instituted the rule that doesn't get used much 
-If your character doesn't fit the game/group you are going to have to retire them to NPC and create one that does-


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## Reynard (Jul 15, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> this is why I come clean. "Yeah... that dessert goes off the map, and I didn't plan for off the map, so if we want to wrap game now for the night and maybe depending on my time skip next week I will work on that, or do you want to pick some other way?"



Yeah, I have never understood the desire to stay so "in character" that some players and GMs won't talk about their preferences and concerns like adults. Instead, they insinuate things in play and then get frustrated  when the other party doesn't pick up on their cues or whatever. It's weird.


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## Jack Daniel (Jul 15, 2022)

If you offer three doors that all lead to the same quantum encounter, what happens when a PC peeks behind them with a divination? Well if there's nothing actually there, they cannot be permitted to do that — forcing any DM who didn't anticipate this to throw up a last-minute, BS anti-divination shield or the like. Even simpler, what if the players capture a wandering monster in this dungeon and _ask_ what's the behind the doors? Will _every single monster_ be ignorant or recalcitrant, 100% of the time?

There is no foolproof method for keeping the railroad invisible. To even attempt it is the height of folly.



Corone said:


> Firstly, not every GM has time to craft a massive campaign.




Just massive enough that the players have agency is all you need, and that takes no more work than writing a linear plot. Honestly, there's _no_ excuse not to.


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## TheAlkaizer (Jul 15, 2022)

Remathilis said:


> Let's take a quick hypothetical.
> 
> Your players decide, unbeknownst to you until now, they want to find a portal/Spelljammer/whatever and go explore another setting in the game that isn't the one you are currently on. Go visit Sigil or Krynn or Eberron.
> 
> Do you let them go to a completely new world and continue the game? If not, why are you robbing them of their agency?



Of course I let them.

If it's a very focused story that's being ran, let's say the hook of the campaign is to find who stole the jewels of the King, I'll let them know that leaving the region would equal dropping the current _"quest" or "plotline"_. Most of the time, they'll decide not to.

But in most of my games, I lean much more towards an buffet-like experience with plenty of hooks and the players are free to go wherever the want. It might take time (which is buffer for me to go read stuff before next session) and it will surely lead to something different. But they can. 

I had this exact challenge when we played Starfinder. They finished a little two of three session investigation, and I was sure they'd bite to one of the few hooks I had presented them. But they actually didn't find them that interesting and they told me _"we want to take one spaceship and fly on the other side of the system to Akiton, because Felix's character has family that disappeared a few years ago in his backstory and we want to try and find them."_ It's challenging for a DM, but this type of situation is *pure gold*. I didn't have to craft anything and the players right now are telling me what they're _intrinsycally_ interested in.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 15, 2022)

TheAlkaizer said:


> But they actually didn't find them that interesting and they told me _"we want to take one spaceship and fly on the other side of the system to Akiton, because Felix's character has family that disappeared a few years ago in his backstory and we want to try and find them."_ It's challenging for a DM, but this type of situation is *pure gold*. I didn't have to craft anything and the players right now are telling me what they're _intrinsycally_ interested in.



I live for player generated plot hooks


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## overgeeked (Jul 15, 2022)

Egon Spengler said:


> Just massive enough that the players have agency is all you need, and that takes no more work than writing a linear plot. Honestly, there's _no_ excuse not to.



The secret is it takes far, far less time. And it's dramatically less stressful. You don't have to constantly worry about what you'll do if they go left when they "need to" go right or try to peek behind the curtain. So much easier not to bother with that nonsense. I've played and run for decades and the easiest time I've ever had running a game was a West Marches open-world sandbox. I didn't have to prep the entire thing, only what was close to the PCs...about a day's travel. As long as I knew what was there, I could improvise based off that prep. Make some wandering monster tables, some locations, some factions, give them a few clocks, and let the PCs loose. Every time they bumped into something the world changed and reacted. They did most of the work for me. No rails and no pre-written story. All I had to do was have the established world react. So smooth and easy to run. The players had a blast and they had agency.


TheAlkaizer said:


> I had this exact challenge when we played Starfinder. They finished a little two of three session investigation, and I was sure they'd bite to one of the few hooks I had presented them. But they actually didn't find them that interesting and they told me _"we want to take one spaceship and fly on the other side of the system to Akiton, because Felix's character has family that disappeared a few years ago in his backstory and we want to try and find them."_ It's challenging for a DM, but this type of situation is *pure gold*. I didn't have to craft anything and the players right now are telling me what they're _intrinsycally_ interested in.



Exactly. You don't have to do that work because the players will do it for you. You just need to make it interesting. That's basically what the full context of that clip from Brennan Lee Mulligan is talking about. The character wants the quick and easy locating of their family but the player wants that to be an interesting and engaging gaming experience. The referee just has to put enough logical obstacles in their path to keep them both satisfied. His use of the word rails is unfortunate, because that's not what he's actually talking about. The fact that he put air quotes around the word rails is telling.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 15, 2022)

diceexmachina said:


> I am not going to weigh in on anything specific on the OP or the responses directly, but offer a third opinion on "railroading" from Brennan Lee Mulligan (from Critical Role's GM roundtable):



I have a love hate relationship with everyone in that video when it comes to DM style... but that didn't sound TOO bad


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## Charlaquin (Jul 15, 2022)

Remathilis said:


> I'm just here to see all the badwrongfun replies and wasn't disappointed.



It’s perfectly goodvalidfun. As long as everyone involved consents to it. Which they can’t do if they don’t know it’s happening.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 15, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> It’s perfectly goodvalidfun. As long as everyone involved consents to it. Which they can’t do if they don’t know it’s happening.



that is the thing... my group is open about everything (sometimes too much) and I can't imagine in the moment of needing to flub a bit of railroading saying I was... but in the wrap up or the pre game of the next session I would. Hiding things like this is BS and very much WRONG


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## Charlaquin (Jul 15, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> 1) Just because you railroad a portion of the game doesn't mean the character is entirely railroaded. I might say that you will always meet NPC X in the next room (no matter which room you choose), but your character still determines how they interact with that character.
> 
> 2) Some people like stories. Not everyone plays an RPG to make an endless series of character chocies. Its a combination of choices, and then seeing where it goes. People like hearing the villain's monologue, the NPCs quirky dialogue, and their fellow PCs epic moment just as much as making their own character decisions. Its a balance.



Yep, and some people feel the opposite way. It isn’t appropriate to secretly enforce one way of playing on the group without their knowledge or permission. If you asked, and everyone was like “yes, I would like you to manipulate things behind the scenes so that whatever we decide to do, it will always result in the story you have planned,” then great! Knock yourselves out. The issue here is that this strategy has been devised to deny the players the opportunity to say, “no, I would prefer you don’t do that, please.”


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## Charlaquin (Jul 15, 2022)

diceexmachina said:


> I am not going to weigh in on anything specific on the OP or the responses directly, but offer a third opinion on "railroading" from Brennan Lee Mulligan (from Critical Role's GM roundtable):



In-context, I think what he’s actually trying to say here is great. The problem is, the clip that’s going around leaves out important context, and communicates kind of the opposite of what I think he was actually saying.


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## Cadence (Jul 15, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> Yep, and some people feel the opposite way. It isn’t appropriate to secretly enforce one way of playing on the group without their knowledge or permission. If you asked, and everyone was like “yes, I would like you to manipulate things behind the scenes so that whatever we decide to do, it will always result in the story you have planned,” then great! Knock yourselves out. The issue here is that this strategy has been devised to deny the players the opportunity to say, “no, I would prefer you don’t do that, please.”




It feels like there is a lot of ground between "getting the story the DM wants no matter what" and having "a.non-zero chance the party never runs into anything interesting because they kept choosing places things weren't or dies because they run into something really dangerous by happenstance."

What's the best way to have a consistent game world where the later isn't a problem, but the DM doesn't do anything at all to tip the scales?


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 15, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> In-context, I think what he’s actually trying to say here is great. The problem is, the clip that’s going around leaves out important context, and communicates kind of the opposite of what I think he was actually saying.



I don't know the full context... but again I am not on board 100% with any of there styles... but what I heard doesn't sound too bad.   I want my character to say "Why don't we just call the eagles and fly this ring to Mt Doom" but I want the DM/NPCs to explain "That wont work and here is the ingame reason" (and I have plenty of tolken reasons), I also think sometimes when teh PCs keep trying to find a short cut "Why can't we give it to the elder god, why can't the egales fly us there, why can't I give it to the immortal elf queen of beuity and goodness, why can't I XXXX" the correct answer for the DM is to sometimes say "Okay, you give it to X and they handle it for you" then move on to another story beat.

Were I sometimes have to say "Out of game, I want you to say no" a great example is a Ranger I played in 2e. He just wanted to be a farmer... every thing he said or did was about wanting to 'go home and own a farm' and things kept coming up. I kept reassuring the DM out of game... Yes Grant the character wants to be a farmer, Rob the player wants you to keep making me be a hero instead"


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## overgeeked (Jul 15, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> It’s perfectly goodvalidfun. As long as everyone involved consents to it. Which they can’t do if they don’t know it’s happening.



That's the bit that always sticks out. If the referee's so invested in railroading their players thought it was actually okay, they'd tell the players it was happening. They typically say something about spoiling the illusion. What illusion? The illusion that the players' choices actually matter. And if the players' choices don't matter...why are you running a game?


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## Reynard (Jul 15, 2022)

overgeeked said:


> That's the bit that always sticks out. If the referee's so invested in railroading their players thought it was actually okay, they'd tell the players it was happening. They typically say something about spoiling the illusion. What illusion? The illusion that the players' choices actually matter. And if the players' choices don't matter...why are you running a game?



I think it is okay to get "blanket approval" at the beginning. I did that when I ran Avernus, which i chose to do as a railroad. I let the players know early on that was the style of game we were going for, they all agreed, and from that moment on CHOO CHOO MFER. But everyone was in and we had a great time and I had Doom Troopers descend from the kies with chainswords and beam rifles.


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## overgeeked (Jul 15, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> In-context, I think what he’s actually trying to say here is great. The problem is, the clip that’s going around leaves out important context, and communicates kind of the opposite of what I think he was actually saying.



I started a thread about it when the video first dropped. The fuller context is really, really important to that clip.

ETA: It would be helpful to actually include the link...need more coffee. 









						Critical Role - Story, rails, and running games
					

There was a round-table discussion last night between Matt Mercer, Aabria Iyengar, and Brennan Lee Mulligan. There was a lot of laughs and a lot of referee talk. One thing that stood out was this analogy by Brennan.    I'm not sure what to think about this, honestly. I know that's a common...




					www.enworld.org


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## overgeeked (Jul 15, 2022)

Reynard said:


> I think it is okay to get "blanket approval" at the beginning. I did that when I ran Avernus, which i chose to do as a railroad. I let the players know early on that was the style of game we were going for, they all agreed, and from that moment on CHOO CHOO MFER. But everyone was in and we had a great time and I had Doom Troopers descend from the kies with chainswords and beam rifles.



Exactly. Lack of consent is bad. Lying about consent is worse. 

But there's a difference between a linear adventure and a railroad. They're used interchangeably, but they're not the same thing.


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## Cadence (Jul 15, 2022)

overgeeked said:


> But there's a difference between a linear adventure and a railroad. They're used interchangeably, but they're not the same thing.



I could swear there have been people in various threads on here that would disagree with that.  And it's sometimes hard for me to parse what folks mean by the former so it isn't the later.

What are your favorite definitions?  (Links to some are just fine too, thanks!)


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 15, 2022)

Reynard said:


> I think it is okay to get "blanket approval" at the beginning. I did that when I ran Avernus, which i chose to do as a railroad. I let the players know early on that was the style of game we were going for, they all agreed, and from that moment on CHOO CHOO MFER. But everyone was in and we had a great time and I had Doom Troopers descend from the kies with chainswords and beam rifles.



yup... in the current try at Strahd we had to make some conssessions cause that book even with me doing a bunch of add on stuff (adventure league cities, old supplments, online suggestions for expansions) there is ONLY so much we can do.


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## Charlaquin (Jul 15, 2022)

Cadence said:


> It feels like there is a lot of ground between "getting the story the DM wants no matter what" and having "a.non-zero chance the party never runs into anything interesting because they kept choosing places things weren't or dies because they run into something really dangerous by happenstance."
> 
> What's the best way to have a consistent game world where the later isn't a problem, but the DM doesn't do anything at all to tip the scales?



Very true! And I think the best way will vary from group to group. Personally, my preference is to use a combination of design and procedural generation. Plan out adventure locations, designing interesting areas and encounters by hand, and putting together some solid random tables to lean on to generate content on the fly.


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## Cadence (Jul 15, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> Very true! And I think the best way will vary from group to group. Personally, my preference is to use a combination of design and procedural generation. Plan out adventure locations, designing interesting areas and encounters by hand, and putting together some solid random tables to lean on to generate content on the fly.



What's your favorite way to make sure they get to the interesting areas or encounters?  Are they usually ones that clues have been dropped to?

What ballpark size of a random table has worked best for you?  (The n=1 extreme is just a quantum ogre, right?  At the other extreme its not really saving any work).


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## Charlaquin (Jul 15, 2022)

Reynard said:


> I think it is okay to get "blanket approval" at the beginning. I did that when I ran Avernus, which i chose to do as a railroad. I let the players know early on that was the style of game we were going for, they all agreed, and from that moment on CHOO CHOO MFER. But everyone was in and we had a great time and I had Doom Troopers descend from the kies with chainswords and beam rifles.



Yes, agreed. This can easily be a quick conversation during session zero, like “hey, I want to run this adventure path, which will require some buy-in on all of your parts. Can we all agree we’re here to play through this story and we’re going to follow the plot where it leads us?” Or, alternatively, “I want to prepare some custom stuff, but I don’t want that hard work to go to waste because you all decided to zig when I thought you would zag. Is it ok with all of you if I shuffle things around behind the scenes to make sure you don’t miss the best bits?” Those are both perfectly reasonable requests, and if the players agree, I don’t see any issue with either approach. The problem is deciding you’re going to shuffle things around like that without checking in with your players first.


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## Yora (Jul 15, 2022)

This seems like an excessively big effort to convince players of a lie when it would be so much easier to tell the truth. Players are not that stupid. If their choices never matter, they will catch on to it quickly. I think the chance of this working is very low, and is it really worth to wreck several campaigns in the hope that one day you become good enough at lying to fool a group of players?


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## Mort (Jul 15, 2022)

Cadence said:


> I could swear there have been people in various threads on here that would disagree with that.  And it's sometimes hard for me to parse what folks mean by the former so it isn't the later.
> 
> What are your favorite definitions?  (Links to some are just fine too, thanks!)




Linear simply means the adventure moves in 1 direction, there is no choice where the players go. They go from point A-B-C etc. But they players are aware of the direction and choose to go along with it.

Railroad means the players go to the set destinations *no matter what choice they think they are making*, there is no actual choice, but the players don't know that.

That's the key difference - if the players know what they are in for and there's just always one direction to go - it's linear. If the players think they have multiple choices but in fact have none, it's a railroad.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 15, 2022)

Cadence said:


> I could swear there have been people in various threads on here that would disagree with that.  And it's sometimes hard for me to parse what folks mean by the former so it isn't the later.
> 
> What are your favorite definitions?  (Links to some are just fine too, thanks!)



first, we could fill an encyclopedia Britannica with the word definitions disagreed with on enworld

second I can run a linar adventrue a few ways...

1) the dungeon is just 1 path with maybe a side room here or there but all the side rooms are dead ends.

2) my events that (hopefully) my PCs can't stop or directly interact with start at A go to B then to C and teh story is how they react.

3) a mix there of 1 and 2...

example of 3) the campaign is pitched as exploring the new world. the first game starts at docs in the kingdom of X. You all either come togather or meet there at the docs... no matter what the PCs do a fight breaks out and the PCs have to react. (the fight is between a group of elves and a group of orcs both wanting into the expedition)
once on the boat that leaves the next morning they are locked into the boat for 3 months at sea... the orcs and elves not only are still at odds but they are recruiting others (do the PCs join 1 side or the other or do they try to defuse) No matter what the PCs do there is a storm.
after the storm has damaged the ship there is an enemy ship from anothe rcounty approching... the captian of this ship and head of teh expadition warns to prepare for a fight.  there is going to be boarders...

assuming the PCs and boat survive all this they find islands half way to the new world with a tribe of dragon born and a tribe of avarial elves on them. they can explore make friends and resupply if the PCs want they can sit it all out.

assuming everyone still is okay (so is the boat) there will be an attack by aquitic creatures that are undead. 

when the PCs finally get to the new world the boat is beaten up half the expadition is gone and they need to make a base camp... how do they respond. 

no matter what they do they are being spied on by the evil dark shaman that lives here, and also the aasimar tribe near by the landing site... how do they react?


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## Charlaquin (Jul 15, 2022)

Cadence said:


> What's your favorite way to make sure they get to the interesting areas or encounters?  Are they usually ones that clues have been dropped to?



Clues can work. I also am comfortable with the possibility that some hand-designed content will just get missed, and that’s ok. Especially because, in a location-based sandbox campaign, just because the players didn’t get to explore room 34b. today, doesn’t mean they won’t do so on another day.


Cadence said:


> What ballpark size of a random table has worked best for you?  (The n=1 extreme is just a quantum ogre, right?  At the other extreme its not really saving any work).



I’m a big fan of the old 1d12+1d8 table, so 19 possibilities, weighted in favor of the numbers in the middle of that range. Then I’ll make multiple such tables for different areas. You can assign each area a target level, and have 2-4 be trivial encounters or non-threatening events, 5-8 be easy encounters or simple hazards, 9-13 be medium encounters or moderate hazards, 14-17 be hard encounters or complex hazards, and 18-20 be deadly encounters or deathtraps. That creates a nice balance of challenge, which should be suitable for characters of the target level and one level above or below it.


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## Stalker0 (Jul 15, 2022)

Now though I have (and will continue) to defend the DMs right to use illusionism to augment their game, there are aspects of it that are more efficient than others.

The 3 doors scenario is one of those, which is effectively a "directly invalid choice". In such a case its better just to remove the choice entirely, the one door leads to one room, and we move on.

But if my group chooses path A (versus B and C), and they always meet a Nymph no matter what, that to me is a soft railroad. THeir choice of path might have still mattered for other reasons, might even affect some of the conditions of the Nymph. If the choice has impact, even if I remove some of the impact through a soft railroad, its still a valid scenario.

There is also an important aspect of believability that sells a notion. Finding a nymph in a forest (and all my paths were forest paths), sure that makes sense. Finding a sand crawler by going through a forest path.....ok that's weird, its going to need an explanation. Maybe the DM comes up with a cool explanation to sell it, but I do agree that the DM wants the world to make a certain amount of sense. If things are happening "just because", than that removes beliveability even if you aren't using illusionism.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 15, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> I’m a big fan of the old 1d12+1d8 table, so 19 possibilities, weighted in favor of the numbers in the middle of that range.



I love that... but I often play with the 2 and 20 bringing you to a separate chart... and/or some encounters can not be duplicated but when it happens it doesn't make that number a no encounter but it moves a new encounter in it's way...

a 5 is 2 hobgoblin archer 'scouts' but after you encounter them the next time it is rolled it is 3 hobgoblin legioniares, but after that encounter the next time it is rolled it is a hobgoblin warlord with 2 archers and 2 legioniares. woe to the low level party that chooses fight and beats the 1st two but some how keeps rolling 5s...


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 15, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> Now though I have (and will continue) to defend the DMs right to use illusionism to augment their game, there are aspects of it that are more efficient than others.
> 
> The 3 doors scenario is one of those, which is effectively a "directly invalid choice". In such a case its better just to remove the choice entirely, the one door leads to one room, and we move on.
> 
> ...



yeah this sounds more like what I think of..

in my above example about the boat if there was a dead PC that needed to bring in a new Aasimar tribe member on the mainland of the new world... I would 100% not feel bad that what ever way they went scouting they run into him/her


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## jgsugden (Jul 15, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> When these types of threads come up, people inevitably turning into the notion that "The Dm lying is inherently bad".
> 
> And that is simply not true. ...



That is a bit of an oversimplification of the breadth of statements against this approach.  

When a DM uses these approaches, the DM is slapping things together to follow his railroad and connecting the dots by convenience, rather than plan.  That is going to be messy. That will result in nonsensical elements being attached to each other.  It will not result in immersive world building that has cohesive senssibility for the functionality of the dungeons and spaces in which PCs are adventuring. 

This has nothing to do with the DM lying to players being 'bad'.  It has to do with the DM's design not having cohesion.

If you put together a murder mystery and want players to put together the puzzle pieces, they're discouraged from trusting the significance of clues when so much of the setting is nonsensical.  Is the lack of a privy in a manor house a sign that the residents are undead, or just that the DM didn't leave room for one?  If the PCs enter a room and find three doors, explore one and determine it is a dead end and then come backl to the next ... onlyto find out there is a roaringly loud sound on the other side of the door - why didn't they hear the sound when they first found the door?

There is a reason we plan.  There is a reason we tie things together.  It makes it easier to be immersive and suspend disbelief.  There are times when we have to either stop the game or 'wing it', but 'wining it' as a primary plan you use every game has limitations that players will feel.


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## Reynard (Jul 15, 2022)

jgsugden said:


> That is a bit of an oversimplification of the breadth of statements against this approach.
> 
> When a DM uses these approaches, the DM is slapping things together to follow his railroad and connecting the dots by convenience, rather than plan.  That is going to be messy. That will result in nonsensical elements being attached to each other.  It will not result in immersive world building that has cohesive senssibility for the functionality of the dungeons and spaces in which PCs are adventuring.
> 
> ...



"Immersion" is not a universal goal. Some people don't really care about it at all.

the reason the "GM lying" is bad is because it robs players of the most important aspect of playing an RPG: agency.


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## Stalker0 (Jul 15, 2022)

jgsugden said:


> That is a bit of an oversimplification of the breadth of statements against this approach.
> 
> When a DM uses these approaches, the DM is slapping things together to follow his railroad and connecting the dots by convenience, rather than plan.  That is going to be messy. That will result in nonsensical elements being attached to each other.  It will not result in immersive world building that has cohesive senssibility for the functionality of the dungeons and spaces in which PCs are adventuring.
> 
> ...



I think your expanding your scope too high.

There is a big difference between "winging" a random dungeon that is a side quest, and winging the major murder mystery plot. There are things where cohesion and immersion are quite important, and other places where its not that big a deal.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 15, 2022)

Reynard said:


> "Immersion" is not a universal goal. Some people don't really care about it at all.
> 
> the reason the "GM lying" is bad is because it robs players of the most important aspect of playing an RPG: agency.



Yeah... there are beer and pretzel gamers I have meet and what I would call 'war gammers' that would both 100% be down for the railroad.   I could even be convinced to play in such a game (and I bet about 1/3 of my group) if someone pitched it.  We would not make the same type of characters though.


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## Paul Farquhar (Jul 15, 2022)

Cadence said:


> I could swear there have been people in various threads on here that would disagree with that.  And it's sometimes hard for me to parse what folks mean by the former so it isn't the later.
> 
> What are your favorite definitions?  (Links to some are just fine too, thanks!)



I think I can tackle that one. A linear adventure is one like Call of the Netherdeep, that I am running at the moment (aside from a few either/or bits). It has a series of plot hooks, which players choose to take because their meta-knowledge tells them they are likely to lead to more interesting adventures. They don't have to take the hook; they have a choice. It's more like a signposted footpath "this way to the adventure" than a railroad.

A railroad gives players no choice. They are either forced into a certain course of action, or whatever choice they make leads to the same outcome.


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## Charlaquin (Jul 15, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> I love that... but I often play with the 2 and 20 bringing you to a separate chart... and/or some encounters can not be duplicated but when it happens it doesn't make that number a no encounter but it moves a new encounter in it's way...
> 
> a 5 is 2 hobgoblin archer 'scouts' but after you encounter them the next time it is rolled it is 3 hobgoblin legioniares, but after that encounter the next time it is rolled it is a hobgoblin warlord with 2 archers and 2 legioniares. woe to the low level party that chooses fight and beats the 1st two but some how keeps rolling 5s...



Oh yeah, you can do all kinds of fun stuff like that if you have the prep time. For my last Curse of Strahd campaign I made separate tables for day and night encounters that did a bit of environmental storytelling. So, for example if a 5 on the daytime encounter table was a swarm of ravens picking at a carcass, a 5 on the nighttime encounter table would be a skeleton. Or during the day you’d find an overgrown tombstone and during the night you’d find the same tombstone and a ghost. Or during the day you’d find a flameskull and at night you’d find a dullahan looking for its head.


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## Cadence (Jul 15, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> Clues can work. I also am comfortable with the possibility that some hand-designed content will just get missed, and that’s ok. Especially because, in a location-based sandbox campaign, just because the players didn’t get to explore room 34b. today, doesn’t mean they won’t do so on another day.
> 
> I’m a big fan of the old 1d12+1d8 table, so 19 possibilities, weighted in favor of the numbers in the middle of that range. Then I’ll make multiple such tables for different areas. You can assign each area a target level, and have 2-4 be trivial encounters or non-threatening events, 5-8 be easy encounters or simple hazards, 9-13 be medium encounters or moderate hazards, 14-17 be hard encounters or complex hazards, and 18-20 be deadly encounters or deathtraps. That creates a nice balance of challenge, which should be suitable for characters of the target level and one level above or below it.




Do you adjust frequency of rolling or how you use the chart based on party health or the like?


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 15, 2022)

Cadence said:


> Do you adjust frequency of rolling or how you use the chart based on party health or the like?



I know it wasn't me you asked, but I usually have a % chance of encounter THEN roll on the chart if you get one.  In the CoS game eveyr hour you roll 1d20 and depending on day or night and on road or off depends on where from 15+ to 19 or 20 only on a d20 roll is the encounter... but you roll every hour until you have 3 encounters in a day/night then I let it pass. 

In my last island hopping game it was D% and depending on day/night or in dangerous water or not could range from 50% chance to 20% chance


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 15, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> this is why I come clean. "Yeah... that dessert goes off the map, and I didn't plan for off the map, so if we want to wrap game now for the night and maybe depending on my time skip next week I will work on that, or do you want to pick some other way?"
> 
> THis also follows from when in 3.5 one player (thank the gods he moved) used to brag "In real life I have the 'avoid DM plot hook' feat" and would go out of his way to avoid joining the party, go to unmapped area's do dumb out of character things just to be diffrent... we finally instituted the rule that doesn't get used much
> -If your character doesn't fit the game/group you are going to have to retire them to NPC and create one that does-




Its absolutely legitimate to look at a player and go "Do you actually want to participate in this campaign with everyone else?  Then find a way to do so."


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 15, 2022)

Reynard said:


> Yeah, I have never understood the desire to stay so "in character" that some players and GMs won't talk about their preferences and concerns like adults. Instead, they insinuate things in play and then get frustrated  when the other party doesn't pick up on their cues or whatever. It's weird.




There's a lot of little quirks like this in the hobby.  The people who insist everything you say during the game be IC don't make any more sense to me; besides it feeling really artificial, it makes it hard to present things with clarity in many cases.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 15, 2022)

Cadence said:


> It feels like there is a lot of ground between "getting the story the DM wants no matter what" and having "a.non-zero chance the party never runs into anything interesting because they kept choosing places things weren't or dies because they run into something really dangerous by happenstance."
> 
> What's the best way to have a consistent game world where the later isn't a problem, but the DM doesn't do anything at all to tip the scales?




I think if you do even a little contingency planning, worrying about a consistent tendency to find the dullest spots and ignore all the more interesting is either an indication that you've got a player group who's actually resisting doing anything interesting (in which case its time for an out-of-character discussion about what you're all there for) or you're spending too much energy pre-planning for a low-incidence event.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 15, 2022)

Thomas Shey said:


> There's a lot of little quirks like this in the hobby.  The people who insist everything you say during the game be IC don't make any more sense to me; besides it feeling really artificial, it makes it hard to present things with clarity in many cases.



I had this whole argument here on enworld about 'declaring actions' that someone can't just say what they are trying for they have to say what in game action (in some cases in general but in some cases needing real specifics)   like it's not just a bunch of us being buddies talking around a table.

I have heard people at cons and on this site say they have kicked people from game for 'breaking character'

mean while at my games we all talk about 'how can we do this?' and interrupt because someone remembered they just saw a new trailer, and sometimes when a DM forgets a rule they ask the players "Wait how does X work again"  and we only ask someone to repeat/rephrase if for some reason we don't understand... if we get the gist that's enough.

I will say though I have stopped game to ask "What is it you are trying to find/do?" when a player starts going in a way I don't understand.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 15, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> , I also think sometimes when teh PCs keep trying to find a short cut "Why can't we give it to the elder god, why can't the egales fly us there, why can't I give it to the immortal elf queen of beuity and goodness, why can't I XXXX" the correct answer for the DM is to sometimes say "Okay, you give it to X and they handle it for you" then move on to another story beat.




The problem is, if you find them that persistent about it, there's no assurance the same thing won't happen with the next.  Sometimes players really act like they're not there to, well, play, at least not in any way that does anything interesting.



GMforPowergamers said:


> Were I sometimes have to say "Out of game, I want you to say no" a great example is a Ranger I played in 2e. He just wanted to be a farmer... every thing he said or did was about wanting to 'go home and own a farm' and things kept coming up. I kept reassuring the DM out of game... Yes Grant the character wants to be a farmer, Rob the player wants you to keep making me be a hero instead"




Though honestly, if he spends _too_ much time in-game doing that, there's always a question if he's offloading too much of the effort of keeping his character in play on the GM.


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## pukunui (Jul 15, 2022)

Paul Farquhar said:


> Even if the players don't realise their choices don't matter, the DM knows. I find a large portion of the fun of being a DM is seeing how the choices the players make affect the direction of the game.



This is why I tend not to pre-roll random elements of an adventure. I like not knowing _something_.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 15, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> I had this whole argument here on enworld about 'declaring actions' that someone can't just say what they are trying for they have to say what in game action (in some cases in general but in some cases needing real specifics)   like it's not just a bunch of us being buddies talking around a table.
> 
> I have heard people at cons and on this site say they have kicked people from game for 'breaking character'




Yeah.  To be clear, my reaction to that would be "No great loss."



GMforPowergamers said:


> mean while at my games we all talk about 'how can we do this?' and interrupt because someone remembered they just saw a new trailer, and sometimes when a DM forgets a rule they ask the players "Wait how does X work again"  and we only ask someone to repeat/rephrase if for some reason we don't understand... if we get the gist that's enough.
> 
> I will say though I have stopped game to ask "What is it you are trying to find/do?" when a player starts going in a way I don't understand.




I can understand a certain desire to avoid massive side-discussions and the like, but the only-IC speaking, at the most generous, absolutely favors certain approaches to gaming as though they were intrinsic virtues rather than matters of taste, and its worst, is a clear attempt to set someone up for a gotcha.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 15, 2022)

Thomas Shey said:


> The problem is, if you find them that persistent about it, there's no assurance the same thing won't happen with the next.  Sometimes players really act like they're not there to, well, play, at least not in any way that does anything interesting.



I have never found a full group that didn't latch onto something. I have had individual player thought that feel like that.


Thomas Shey said:


> Though honestly, if he spends _too_ much time in-game doing that, there's always a question if he's offloading too much of the effort of keeping his character in play on the GM.



I don't know I was willing to run with "Can't go home gotta help these villagers, but after that..." followed by "Can't go home my buddy needs help with the castle, but after that..." it even ended up with 3 diffrent high level adventures where I promised 'this is teh last time' just to have the DM rope me into the next plot. I wasn't being abusive about it... it was more a running joke that my (2e) 5th level ranger dueled into 12th level wizard just wanted to go home and be a farmer...

btw I did. The end of the campaign I went and bought the land I grew up on and built a farm and raised a family... while my advtureing buddies became kings, arch wizard advisors, the avatar of nature itself, and the necromancer rulling a city of the dead in the underdark... I lived on a 12 acer farm


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 15, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> I have never found a full group that didn't latch onto something. I have had individual player thought that feel like that.




I've seen it.  Its baffling.



GMforPowergamers said:


> I don't know I was willing to run with "Can't go home gotta help these villagers, but after that..."




That's a little different; all that does is exclude some motivations from his set to adventure, but it doesn't mean the GM has to go through backflips to keep him play.


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## Mort (Jul 15, 2022)

Remathilis said:


> I'm just here to see all the badwrongfun replies and wasn't disappointed.




I'm all for different experiences and that different groups have vastly different playstyles preferences, whatever.

But when an article actually has a BIG section essentially stating - don't get caught doing this - your players won't like it and will probably take it badly?

Then yeah, That IS an indicator that the proposal might be badwrongfun.


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## Dragonsbane (Jul 15, 2022)

Personally, I find this advice not what me or my players would want. Matt Coleville said in one of his videos that when he gives the players 3 choices of which way to go, sometimes they always lead to the same place. Wow. Talk about zero player agency. I told my players about it. One said "If I found out you were ever doing that, I would never play." The others nodded. I wonder what Matt's players thought about it. "Which way do you go?" Doesn't matter!  Seriously, DMs need to be trusted. I would never do this at my table, but if this makes your game fun, more power to you. I say this in the most polite and non-insulting way, stating this as intent on forums can be misunderstood. I am in no way telling people how to have fun, just disagree with the OP on that point and player agency.


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## iserith (Jul 15, 2022)

When I was regularly running pickup games for a Discord server of hundreds of people, there were some rules in place for what kind of treasure you could award per tier of character for the one-shot, since they could take that same character and play in someone else's one-shot.

In every single adventure, among the treasure, I would include one of the approved magic items: A skeleton key. This key basically had a 10% chance to open any lock and, if it did, it would disintegrate. I always awarded it because I figured, however remote, somewhere, someway, it would wreck someone's plot or railroad gated behind a door or chest or whatever. I know it happened at least once based on feedback from one of the players.

It's horrible, I know, but I won't deny getting some sense of satisfaction out of it.


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## Reynard (Jul 15, 2022)

pukunui said:


> This is why I tend not to pre-roll random elements of an adventure. I like not knowing _something_.



I like not knowing as much as possible.  I set up situations rather than plots and then just let the players loose. Between player shenanigans and swingy dice, I get to be as surprised as them.


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## CleverNickName (Jul 15, 2022)

Reynard said:


> I like not knowing as much as possible.  I set up situations rather than plots and then just let the players loose. Between player shenanigans and swingy dice, I get to be as surprised as them.



This is the way.


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## pemerton (Jul 15, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> I would for sure let them look for the portal and/or spell jamming ship... but I get to decide if there is one to find. In my current world the place the players are is locked... you CAN'T planar travel to or from it but they don't know that... I would not stop them from trying though.



So how is this not a "railroad" (or whatever you want to call it)? The GM has already decided that what the players are trying to have their PCs achieve can never succeed.


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## DND_Reborn (Jul 15, 2022)

Honestly, DMs railroad all the time--even if they don't realize they are doing it. I refuse to believe _anyone_ who claims they "never do it"... it just means they don't realize they are doing it. And frankly, railroading, in and of itself, is not a bad thing.


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## Mort (Jul 15, 2022)

DND_Reborn said:


> Honestly, DMs railroad all the time--even if they don't realize they are doing it. I refuse to believe _anyone_ who claims they "never do it"... it just means they don't realize they are doing it. And frankly, railroading, in and of itself, is not a bad thing.




Railroading has a negative connotation for a reason - it is MEANT to express a negative concept.

If you are using the term in such a way that it is "not a bad thing..." then the term itself loses its intended meaning.


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## South by Southwest (Jul 15, 2022)

CleverNickName said:


> This is the way.



That leaked Mando trailer has me pretty geeked.


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## Charlaquin (Jul 15, 2022)

Cadence said:


> Do you adjust frequency of rolling or how you use the chart based on party health or the like?



I use the Angry GM’s tension pool mechanic for random encounter rolls. Basically, every “turn” I add a d6 “tension die” to the tension pool. A “turn” is approximately one day during downtime, 4 hours during overland travel, or 10 minutes during dungeon exploration. Most time-consuming actions (e.g. spending a day on a downtime activity; traveling 6 miles at a slow pace, 12 at a medium pace, 18 at a fast pace; trying to pick a lock) take 1 turn; some take multiple turns (a short rest takes 6 turns at a 10-minute scale, a long rest takes 2 turns at a 4-hour scale, etc). Risky actions (e.g. spending downtime carousing, traveling at night or through dangerous territory; trying to break down a door in the dungeon), which may or may not also be time-consuming, trigger a roll of all the dice currently in the pool. When the sixth die is added to the pool, I roll them all and then remove them all from the pool. Any time a 1 is rolled on any of the tension dice, I roll for a complication, usually on one of those 1d12+1d8 tables. (I don’t roll multiple times if multiple dice turn up 1s; it’s just a binary if one or more dice turns up a 1, roll, if no dice turn up a 1, don’t roll).

Complications can include wandering monsters, hazards, events, etc, and obviously there are different tables for the different time scales; the sorts of complications that are likely to occur during downtime are different than the sort that are likely to occur while traveling, or in a dungeon. Importantly though, complications are never positive for the party. They should always involve some kind of risk or challenge, or consume PC resources, or at the very least just be ominous and put the PCs on-edge. The point of the pool is to create rising and falling dramatic tension, which means the players need to fear the roll of the tension dice, and positive random events, or too many neutral ones, undermines that.

So, in a sense, party health and the like can sort of affect the chances of complications, indirectly. If the party is low on health or other resources, they can try to avoid taking risky actions, especially when there are a lot of dice in the tension pool, to avoid triggering extra rolls. But crucially it’s their _decisions_ that affect it, not just my assessment of their condition. And they can only try to mitigate the risk of complications, not eliminate it completely.


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## MGibster (Jul 15, 2022)

NotAYakk said:


> I don't know about your players, but when I'm playing and my choices are blind and the information I try to gain is unconnected to what happens when I act on it, I don't feel I have agency.



As a player, I'm fine with exploring the uknown in this way.  But you're right, that it isn't a meaningful choice because I don't have enough information to pick one door over the other.  A meaningful choice would be something like, "If you go through the south door, you'll risk angering the Qwigibo and her many suitors.  But if you go through the east door, your journey will take longer but you will likely encounter no dangers.  Which way do you proceed?"


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## Magister Ludorum (Jul 15, 2022)

I will not play at a table where GMs use quantum encounters or meaningless choices. I have a lot ofgaming options.

And I will state that I never consciously railroad characters by taking their choices away, not in 45 years of GMing.


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## DND_Reborn (Jul 15, 2022)

Magister Ludorum said:


> And I will state that I never *consciously *railroad characters by taking their choices away, not in 45 years of GMing.



 That's the key word, "consciously". IME ever DM has done it, even if they didn't mean to.  Players often have limited choices. It isn't so much "taking them away" as there aren't any other realistic alternatives. 

I mean, consider this scenario:

_The PCs are captured and ordered to complete a task. If they don't agree to do it, they will be executed. They are under a Zone of Truth and have failed their saves, so cannot lie._

Is that railroading?


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## Mort (Jul 15, 2022)

DND_Reborn said:


> That's the key word, "consciously". IME ever DM has done it, even if they didn't mean to.  Players often have limited choices. It isn't so much "taking them away" as there aren't any other realistic alternatives.
> 
> I mean, consider this scenario:
> 
> ...




Did the PCs have options that could have avoided this scenario? If yes, Not railroading.

Did the PCs agree to whatever plot the DM was running and it had this scenario was part of the agreement? not railroading.

Did the PCs (per players) expressly take actions that SHOULD have avoided this scenario but the DM decided that the scenario was happening anywhay, player/character actions/choices be damned? Then yes, railroading.

Railroading isn't necessarily the characters choice being forced because of circumstance, this can easily happen in play.

It's when the DM plows forward with whatever he has going for plot despite any choices/actions or even desires of the players.


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## DND_Reborn (Jul 15, 2022)

Mort said:


> Did the PCs have options that could have avoided this scenario? Not railroading.



They were captured during a battle. I suppose they could have all just fought to the death... not a good option IMO.



Mort said:


> Did the PCs agree



That's the railroad: agree or die.

If a player wants to continue with that character, they have to agree.

I've seen such scenarios in one form or another _all the time_ for over 40 years. Others might just think of this as the "adventure hook", but it is really railroading. It isn't bad, as I've said, but it happens.


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## Cadence (Jul 15, 2022)

Mort said:


> Did the PCs have options that could have avoided this scenario? Not railroading.
> 
> Did the PCs agree




What if the options were before they were captured?


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## Mort (Jul 15, 2022)

Cadence said:


> What if the options were before they were captured?





Phone glitched and response posted before it was finished, I've fixed that


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## Mort (Jul 15, 2022)

Cadence said:


> What if the options were before they were captured?




An unfortunate, no choice scenario is not necessarily railroading. Characters OFTEN get into linear situations as a result of prior choices.

Getting caught and forced into doing something you don't want isn't necessarily railroading it can be a consequence of your choices - the very opposite of railroading.


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## Mort (Jul 16, 2022)

DND_Reborn said:


> They were captured during a battle. I suppose they could have all just fought to the death... not a good option IMO.
> 
> 
> That's the railroad: agree or die.
> ...




This is heavy handed and linear but not remotely a railroad. There is no illusion  as to what the choices are or aren't.

Heck the player can choose to die and roll up a new character.


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## DND_Reborn (Jul 16, 2022)

Mort said:


> An unfortunate, no choice scenario is not necessarily railroading. Characters OFTEN get into linear situations as a result of prior choices.
> 
> Getting caught and forced into doing something you don't want isn't necessarily railroading it can be a consequence of your choices - the very opposite of railroading.



By that logic, there is never railroading. If you (or others) feel that way, no wonder people can claim "I've never railroaded _my_ players!".


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## DND_Reborn (Jul 16, 2022)

Mort said:


> Heck the *player *can choose to die and roll up a new character.



If the _player _choose to die, I don't think they could play anymore.


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## Maxperson (Jul 16, 2022)

Mort said:


> I'm all for different experiences and that different groups have vastly different playstyles preferences, whatever.
> 
> But when an article actually has a BIG section essentially stating - don't get caught doing this - your players won't like it and will probably take it badly?
> 
> Then yeah, That IS an indicator that the proposal might be badwrongfun.



Yep.  There's only one time railroading is okay, and that's when you have player buy-in before the railroading starts.


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## Mort (Jul 16, 2022)

DND_Reborn said:


> By that logic, there is never railroading. If you (or others) feel that way, no wonder people can claim "I've never railroaded _my_ players!".




Railroading is the illusion of choice.

The scenario you provided contains no such illusion, as such, it is not railroading. The player is 100% aware of the non choice provided. 

Now if the player chooses for the character to die and the DM still saves him and continues with the plot - THAT'S railroading.


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## jgsugden (Jul 16, 2022)

Reynard said:


> "Immersion" is not a universal goal. Some people don't really care about it at all.
> 
> the reason the "GM lying" is bad is because it robs players of the most important aspect of playing an RPG: agency.



Immersion is for the most part universally superior to the alternatives.  It means you're so caught up in things that it steals your focus.  Being "caught up in the moment" ... being "into it" ... being "blown away" ... how often do people reference these things as bad things?

Well, blown away in another context is bad, but in the context of seeing something and being captivated by it ... always seen as good.

You can have fun without immersion.  True.  But you're more likely to have more fun when you're really into it - which is what immersion is all about.  



Stalker0 said:


> I think your expanding your scope too high.
> 
> There is a big difference between "winging" a random dungeon that is a side quest, and winging the major murder mystery plot. There are things where cohesion and immersion are quite important, and other places where its not that big a deal.



I disagree.  

In your example, the side quest is unimportant, and not worthy of being treated with the same respect and care that the main plot is.  Think about a movie, book, or tv series.  Think about the parts of it that are treated as unimportant.  The ones that don't really tie to the main story ... and don't make complete sense ... You don't find them in great movies.  You do find them in bad movies ... and they're (some of) the things that make the movie bad.  

If your 'side plot' isn't worth doing right, it isn't a good contribution to your campaign. 

I've acknowledged that this "wing it" approach is a necessary evil at times.  When PCs go unexpected places that you have not prepared, your two choices are improvise or stop (unless you have some trusty prepared gap fillers that are highly adaptable).  Sometimes you just don't have the time to finish preparing and have the same choices - no game or winging it.  However, if you're planning on using it for elements of your campaign as a "good enough for this thing" approach when you could do better, then I think you're doing a disservice to that area of your game, and I believe that any good DM will generate a better experience for their players by crafting, rather than hobbling together, an adventure.  

Use the OPs techniques in a pinch.  But you'll be better off not using them as a crutch.


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## Maxperson (Jul 16, 2022)

pemerton said:


> So how is this not a "railroad" (or whatever you want to call it)? The GM has already decided that what the players are trying to have their PCs achieve can never succeed.



Is the DM making them do those things? No. Can they leave and try anything else they want to do? Yes.  Not a railroad.  They aren't being forced down any line.


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## Maxperson (Jul 16, 2022)

DND_Reborn said:


> That's the key word, "consciously". IME ever DM has done it, even if they didn't mean to.  Players often have limited choices. It isn't so much "taking them away" as there aren't any other realistic alternatives.
> 
> I mean, consider this scenario:
> 
> ...



No. It's an in-fiction consequence of the situation.  The domination spell used on a PC is likewise not railroading, even though it does deprive that player of agency for a bit.  There can be linear portions of the game.  Linear and railroading are different things.


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## DND_Reborn (Jul 16, 2022)

Mort said:


> The scenario you provided contains no such illusion, as such, it is not railroading. The player is 100% aware of the non choice provided.



All player choice is illusion, as it is always up to the roll of a die or the DM the results of those choices.



Mort said:


> Now if the player chooses for the character to die and the DM still saves him and continues with the plot - THAT'S railroading.



Seen that, too.

Here's another:

The DM has the adventure prepared. The players can choose to go to city A or city B. Regardless of which they choose, the adventure hook will take place and set the PCs on their path to the adventure.

This is a classic example of the pick a door scenario. It _happens all the time_, even if the DM's doing it don't realize it.

Or another:

The DM has the adventure prepared, but the players get sidetracked. Later on, the DM still runs the adventure after the sidetrack is over, even though the "timeline" of the world might indicate other events made the adventure null.

I could go on and on.


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## DND_Reborn (Jul 16, 2022)

Anyway, I've said all I care to on the topic. I'll leave it to others to continue discussing. Later.


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## Maxperson (Jul 16, 2022)

DND_Reborn said:


> If the _player _choose to die, I don't think they could play anymore.



I have 2 players who wouldn't miss a game for anything.


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## Mort (Jul 16, 2022)

DND_Reborn said:


> All player choice is illusion, as it is always up to the roll of a die or the DM the results of those choices.
> 
> 
> Seen that, too.
> ...




Did the players agree to run the adventure (heck, I've done that kind of thing in a flashback), not railroading.

You said you're done with this discussion, but introduced a hypothetical.

Yet, so far none of these are railroading. None of them involve taking away the players choice WITHOUT THEIR KNOWLEDGE.


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## Olgar Shiverstone (Jul 16, 2022)

Part of the art of DMing is knowing when to offer real choice versus the illusion of choice.

Two plot hooks that lead to the same place: illusion of choice.
Two paths than offer different hazards that can be negotiated separately: choice.

There's a place for both. What I think DM's should try to avoid is when the rails are visible: not even the illusion of choice.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 16, 2022)

pemerton said:


> So how is this not a "railroad" (or whatever you want to call it)? The GM has already decided that what the players are trying to have their PCs achieve can never succeed.



um... you cut the part of my answer were I explained that I currently have a world that is locked from the planes... if they pushed trying I would let them find away... 

my other campaign is CoS and verymuch a railroad...but that is how WotC wrote it


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 16, 2022)

DND_Reborn said:


> All player choice is illusion, as it is always up to the roll of a die or the DM the results of those choices.
> 
> 
> Seen that, too.
> ...



how can you NOT relize you are doing it? like YOU KNOW there are not multi seeds and hooks and spread through the cities... YOU KNOW they are all the same...


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## pukunui (Jul 16, 2022)

Reynard said:


> I like not knowing as much as possible.  I set up situations rather than plots and then just let the players loose. Between player shenanigans and swingy dice, I get to be as surprised as them.



I mostly only run published adventures, so while I’d prefer to only set up situations and scenarios, generally there is a bit of plot. So I like to inject a bit of randomness where I can so that even I can be a bit surprised sometimes.

This is one of the reasons I’m enjoying running _Dungeon of the Mad Mage_. There is no plot, and I’ve removed the level restrictions on the magic gates, so the players are in complete control of where they go and what they do.


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## Maxperson (Jul 16, 2022)

pukunui said:


> This is one of the reasons I’m enjoying running _Dungeon of the Mad Mage_. There is no plot, and I’ve removed the level restrictions on the magic gates, so the players are in complete control of where they go and what they do.



I've been running it also, kinda sorta.  I know my players aren't going to be into doing that much Undermountain all at once, but they do like dungeons.  What I've done is stripped each level out as an individual dungeon and removed all mention of Halaster.  The players are currently seeking out a book that they need to deal with one of the plots going on in the world, and they found out that it's in a castle underground.  Insert a dungeon in a mountain that is levels 6 and 7.  During the session last night they finally found the tunnel down to the seventh level and are trying to negotiate with the stone giants.


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## pukunui (Jul 16, 2022)

Maxperson said:


> I've been running it also, kinda sorta.  I know my players aren't going to be into doing that much Undermountain all at once, but they do like dungeons.  What I've done is stripped each level out as an individual dungeon and removed all mention of Halaster.  The players are currently seeking out a book that they need to deal with one of the plots going on in the world, and they found out that it's in a castle underground.  Insert a dungeon in a mountain that is levels 6 and 7.  During the session last night they finally found the tunnel down to the seventh level and are trying to negotiate with the stone giants.



I’ve just been running it as is as much as possible. I tried the whole “multiplanar game show” conceit from the DMs Guild Companion but it just didn’t stick (mostly because I kept forgetting about it). After the first party wiped to the drow on level 3, I had the second party “hired” by Halaster to do the “clean house” quest (ostensibly to prepare the dungeon for the next season) with the promise of a wish each if they make it down to his lair on level 23.

I think the pandemic kind of wreaked havoc on a number of the more plotted campaigns I tried to run (like _Odyssey of the Dragonlords_), so we’re all enjoying the simplicity of an old school dungeon crawl with no real plot. The guys don’t really have to remember stuff that happened months ago in real time. They can just kick in the door, kill the monsters, and take their stuff. Although sometimes they talk and negotiate with the monsters instead.

All that being said, I have told them that we’ll stop if/when we all get bored of it. I‘m not going to try and force them to grind all the way through. But several of them are keen to get to level 20, and this remains the only published adventure in which you can actually do that, so we may stick with it for a while yet.

(Next session is tomorrow. They’ve finished exploring level 6 and are about to start figuring out how to open all the portals and figure out where they all go. I’ve been using XP and somehow they’ve hit 10th level already, so they’re a bit ahead of the curve.)


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## Reynard (Jul 16, 2022)

DND_Reborn said:


> By that logic, there is never railroading. If you (or others) feel that way, no wonder people can claim "I've never railroaded _my_ players!".



I don't understand. The definition of "railroad" presented is "it happens because the GM decides it does, regardless of the actions of the PCs" not "as a consequence of those action." By your logic, literally EVERYTHING is railroading.


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## Reynard (Jul 16, 2022)

jgsugden said:


> Immersion is for the most part universally superior to the alternatives.  It means you're so caught up in things that it steals your focus.  Being "caught up in the moment" ... being "into it" ... being "blown away" ... how often do people reference these things as bad things?



No, that's engagement.  They aren't the same thing.


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## Reynard (Jul 16, 2022)

Olgar Shiverstone said:


> Part of the art of DMing is knowing when to offer real choice versus the illusion of choice.
> 
> Two plot hooks that lead to the same place: illusion of choice.
> Two paths than offer different hazards that can be negotiated separately: choice.
> ...



And people are telling you that illusion of choice is not good. If there is no choice, just present it honestly. Most players won't care if it happens on occasion. Telling your players they have options when they don't is a breach of trust. Uour job as GM is not to entertain the players or tell them a story. It's to facilitate fun at the table where everyone has input into the outcome.


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## overgeeked (Jul 16, 2022)

Reynard said:


> And people are telling you that illusion of choice is not good. If there is no choice, just present it honestly. Most players won't care if it happens on occasion. Telling your players they have options when they don't is a breach of trust. Your job as GM is not to entertain the players or tell them a story. It's to facilitate fun at the table where everyone has input into the outcome.



It’s really wild how “be open and honest with your players” is such a tough sell. Do these referees really think they have to control everything for the game to work? Lighten up the grip. It’ll be okay. 

Referees don’t have to lie to their players to run a successful game. You can actually play to find out what happens instead of pretending you are and lying to the players about it and their choices. If railroading is so awesome, why the need to lie to the players about it happening? It’s such a weirdly and pointlessly adversarial thing to do. The players can have fun without you controlling literally everything. The reason you have players at the table is to get their input, i.e. play off their choices. If they don’t get to make choices there’s no reason to have players.


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## pemerton (Jul 16, 2022)

DND_Reborn said:


> consider this scenario:
> 
> _The PCs are captured and ordered to complete a task. If they don't agree to do it, they will be executed. They are under a Zone of Truth and have failed their saves, so cannot lie._
> 
> Is that railroading?



If I knew nothing more than what you say here, I would think this is pretty railroad-y. There might be contexts where it's a consequence for failure that reflects chosen stakes, and is not a railroad.


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## pemerton (Jul 16, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> um... you cut the part of my answer were I explained that I currently have a world that is locked from the planes... if they pushed trying I would let them find away...



Because that part makes no difference to the question. Your "world" is just story that you've written. You've written a story in which the players can't have their PCs succeed at a thing that they want their PCs to achieve. As I asked, how is this not "railroading (or similar)? It's the GM deciding that the action declaration will fail in advance of play and regardless of how the players frame their attempt.


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## pemerton (Jul 16, 2022)

DND_Reborn said:


> Honestly, DMs railroad all the time--even if they don't realize they are doing it. I refuse to believe _anyone_ who claims they "never do it"... it just means they don't realize they are doing it. And frankly, railroading, in and of itself, is not a bad thing.



I've run D&D sessions, and campaigns, where there was no railroading.


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## Reynard (Jul 16, 2022)

overgeeked said:


> It’s really wild how “be open and honest with your players” is such a tough sell. Do these referees really think they have to control everything for the game to work? Lighten up the grip. It’ll be okay.
> 
> Referees don’t have to lie to their players to run a successful game. You can actually play to find out what happens instead of pretending you are and lying to the players about it and their choices. If railroading is so awesome, why the need to lie to the players about it happening? It’s such a weirdly and pointlessly adversarial thing to do. The players can have fun without you controlling literally everything. The reason you have players at the table is to get their input, i.e. play off their choices. If they don’t get to make choices there’s no reason to have players.



Right. There is nothing wrong with playing througha story. It can be really fun (see my comments above about Avernus) but you don't need to LIE about it. Just agree that's what you are going to do. It's also fun to not have the foggiest idea what is going to happen next, even as the GM. That's awesome. But you also need to agree that that's what you are going to do.

People: as play groups, talk.


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## bloodtide (Jul 16, 2022)

I love the Invisible Railroad!

A "railroad" game is simply one run by an unexperinced or bad DM that is clumsy.  A good and or experenced DM hides the rails naturally.  So the players will never know anyway.


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## Reynard (Jul 16, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> I love the Invisible Railroad!
> 
> A "railroad" game is simply one run by an unexperinced or bad DM that is clumsy.  A good and or experenced DM hides the rails naturally.  So the players will never know anyway.



Honest question, no snark: what is it about being railroaded that you like? Is it knowing you will get a coherent story? Is it something about your character's place in that story? Why do you prefer the "illusion of choice" over "actual choice." Again, I am not trying to snark or trap you. I am honestly curious.


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## Cadence (Jul 16, 2022)

pemerton said:


> Because that part makes no difference to the question. Your "world" is just story that you've written. You've written a story in which the players can't have their PCs succeed at a thing that they want their PCs to achieve. As I asked, how is this not "railroading (or similar)? It's the GM deciding that the action declaration will fail in advance of play and regardless of how the players frame their attempt.




Say you're running a modern crime game set in the US in 2022.   The players want to find an operational star destroyer or discover the cure for all cancers or locate the the lost city of Atlantis or true ESP.  Is it a railroad if they can't do those things in the story you're writing  the game you're running?


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## bloodtide (Jul 16, 2022)

Reynard said:


> Honest question, no snark: what is it about being railroaded that you like? Is it knowing you will get a coherent story? Is it something about your character's place in that story? Why do you prefer the "illusion of choice" over "actual choice." Again, I am not trying to snark or trap you. I am honestly curious.



Well, I'm a Forever DM that loves a fast, epic, engaging, deep, action adventure story.

Sadly, more then half of all gamers play the game as "present".  I know form long, long experience that there is no way to ask a player to play "more amazing".  Few will even consider it if asked.  But worse if few even know what to do.  

The players need to be railroaded to become the type of player I want in my game.  There is no other way to run them through the gauntlet.  The railroad is the only way to tear them down so they can be built back up.  Just teaching players to Do Something works great in the railroad.  

And it's even more true for personal things the player wants the character to be or do....but refuses to do.  That's where the railroad comes in: leading them right to it.


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## Reynard (Jul 16, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> Well, I'm a Forever DM that loves a fast, epic, engaging, deep, action adventure story.
> 
> Sadly, more then half of all gamers play the game as "present".  I know form long, long experience that there is no way to ask a player to play "more amazing".  Few will even consider it if asked.  But worse if few even know what to do.
> 
> ...



While I hope that works for you and you and your players enjoy the game you are running, I will be honest: I am very suspect of a GM that says that railroading is the best way to go for player enjoyment, since GMs aren't the ones that have to deal with it.


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## Remathilis (Jul 16, 2022)

Reynard said:


> Honest question, no snark: what is it about being railroaded that you like? Is it knowing you will get a coherent story? Is it something about your character's place in that story? Why do you prefer the "illusion of choice" over "actual choice." Again, I am not trying to snark or trap you. I am honestly curious.



I will answer with an example from what YouTuber Josh Strife Hayes has said about MMO design. 

MMO typically falls into two broad camps: narrative driven or open world. Narrative MMOs like WoW, ESO or the Old Republic have a general main story that is augmented with plenty of side quests, raids, dungeons and supplemental systems like crafting or housing to keep players interested. They can go and do other things but they always have a main focus of the story to fall back on. Even if they engage in none of the supplement stuff, there is an engaging story they can interact with. A structure. A sense of purpose.

Open world games like New World or many survival/full PvP MMOs give you a big world and tell you to make your own fun. Go craft. Go PvP. Go build houses and form guilds or go raid dungeons and grind for loot. The problem is there is rarely any reason to do any of that besides "you can". The story doesn't evolve because there is no story, except for what you did while crafting or raiding or hunting wolves for hours. You just wander around aimlessly trying to find something fun to do while trying not to die. You have lots of options but none of them matter.

Now let's take this back to D&D. When a DM says "in this campaign, you're all pirates" or "you're all on a holy quest for the Sun God" or "you're all working for the super secret branch of the King's spy order", you have set up a storyline that gives the PC focus. A long term goal and an expectation. The day to day stuff can vary; finding a rare spell component for the wizard, doing a quest for a priest who raised another PC, or saving a PCs brother from cultists, but eventually all roads lead back to the main plot. 

Conversely, if the DM says "here is the town of Townsville, explore it" I find that PCs often don't know where to begin. One will want to go fight orcs, one will want to go after the cultists from in his backstory, one will want to seduce the mayor's daughter and the last will want to burn the tavern down and steal every coin in the place before he does. There is no coherent direction to go, no long term goal beyond "do something" so PCs find their own fun, and it usually involves provoking bigger and bigger responses from the DM.

For me, the payoff of having that structure of a set of rails outweighs the boredom of aimless wandering of an open world. I know where the fun is, I don't have to wander around trying to find it.


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## Reynard (Jul 16, 2022)

Remathilis said:


> I will answer with an example from what YouTuber Josh Strife Hayes has said about MMO design.
> 
> MMO typically falls into two broad camps: narrative driven or open world. Narrative MMOs like WoW, ESO or the Old Republic have a general main story that is augmented with plenty of side quests, raids, dungeons and supplemental systems like crafting or housing to keep players interested. They can go and do other things but they always have a main focus of the story to fall back on. Even if they engage in none of the supplement stuff, there is an engaging story they can interact with. A structure. A sense of purpose.
> 
> ...



I don't think having a strong set of constraints regarding the campaign is the same thing as "railroading." You can all be members of the Church of the Silver Flame looking for heretics and still have a completely open world improv game.


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## Remathilis (Jul 16, 2022)

Reynard said:


> I don't think having a strong set of constraints regarding the campaign is the same thing as "railroading." You can all be members of the Church of the Silver Flame looking for heretics and still have a completely open world improv game.



True, but I feel that a theme is best paired with a narrative that serves it. If you're going to be a member of the Silver Inquisition, the DM should be tossing rumors of heretics, cells of hidden cultists in government, a council of demon worshipping high priests, and maybe a grand conspiracy against the Church to stop. Not just say "go find evil and smite it" and set me in Thrane, looking for something to do. Again, I don't want to have to wander around looking for the fun stuff. I want a main plot with occasional rest stops for side quests.


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## Reynard (Jul 16, 2022)

Remathilis said:


> True, but I feel that a theme is best paired with a narrative that serves it. If you're going to be a member of the Silver Inquisition, the DM should be tossing rumors of heretics, cells of hidden cultists in government, a council of demon worshipping high priests, and maybe a grand conspiracy against the Church to stop. Not just say "go find evil and smite it" and set me in Thrane, looking for something to do. Again, I don't want to have to wander around looking for the fun stuff. I want a main plot with occasional rest stops for side quests.



Even a "main plot" doesn't mean a railroad.  It just means that Something Is Happening that The Characters Care About. I think that confusing the language creates problems in discussing the game that are unnecessary and detrimental.


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## Ovinomancer (Jul 16, 2022)

Cadence said:


> Say you're running a modern crime game set in the US in 2022.   The players want to find an operational star destroyer or discover the cure for all cancers or locate the the lost city of Atlantis or true ESP.  Is it a railroad if they can't do those things in the story you're writing  the game you're running?



Nope, that's a failure to have a coherent group that adheres to the premise of play.  Not every constraint needs to boil down to railroading. 

Which is why I define railroading as the sustained use of Force.  Force is where the GM forces a specific outcome regardless of input.  One or two instances is not sufficient for railroading.  In many games, Force is a viable and useful tool.  It's overuse is where you get railroading.  How much is overuse?  That's going to depend on the individual and can vary based on how it's used.  People have different tolerances.


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## pemerton (Jul 16, 2022)

Cadence said:


> Say you're running a modern crime game set in the US in 2022.   The players want to find an operational star destroyer or discover the cure for all cancers or locate the the lost city of Atlantis or true ESP.  Is it a railroad if they can't do those things in the story you're writing  the game you're running?



The players know in advance that those things are outside the scope of play. This is not the same as what @GMforPowergamers posted:


GMforPowergamers said:


> I would for sure let them look for the portal and/or spell jamming ship... but I get to decide if there is one to find.



GMforPowergamers is posting that the players are permitted to think that their action declarations can make the difference they are hoping for - ie their PCs find their way to another world - but has actually decided that those action declarations cannot make any such difference. This seems to fit the definition of "railroad" most posters in this thread are using, that is, letting the players think their action declarations are meaningful when in fact they are not.

GM for Powergamers also goes on:


GMforPowergamers said:


> Given time if they rreally put there effort and game time into it I would let the game unfold where they could unlock it and head to another world...



The whole language of "I would let the game unfold" seems to me to the language of railroading. The GM is deciding what happens.

EDIT: The first sentence of this reply is broadly similar to @Ovinomancer's remark about _the premise of play_. I think that @Ovinomancer is taking it for granted that that premise of play is a shared thing and not a secret known only to the GM.


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## Stalker0 (Jul 16, 2022)

jgsugden said:


> I've acknowledged that this "wing it" approach is a necessary evil at times.  When PCs go unexpected places that you have not prepared, your two choices are improvise or stop (unless you have some trusty prepared gap fillers that are highly adaptable).  Sometimes you just don't have the time to finish preparing and have the same choices - no game or winging it.  However, if you're planning on using it for elements of your campaign as a "good enough for this thing" approach when you could do better, then I think you're doing a disservice to that area of your game, and I believe that any good DM will generate a better experience for their players by crafting, rather than hobbling together, an adventure.
> 
> Use the OPs techniques in a pinch.  But you'll be better off not using them as a crutch.



Sounds like you and I have found common ground. I declare that we have won the internets!!!!


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## Paul Farquhar (Jul 16, 2022)

Cadence said:


> Say you're running a modern crime game set in the US in 2022.   The players want to find an operational star destroyer or discover the cure for all cancers or locate the the lost city of Atlantis or true ESP.  Is it a railroad if they can't do those things in the story you're writing  the game you're running?



There is an awful lot of grey space between "you must stick to a script" and "you can do whatever you like irrespective of if it makes sense".


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## pemerton (Jul 16, 2022)

jgsugden said:


> When PCs go unexpected places that you have not prepared, your two choices are improvise or stop (unless you have some trusty prepared gap fillers that are highly adaptable).  Sometimes you just don't have the time to finish preparing and have the same choices - no game or winging it.  However, if you're planning on using it for elements of your campaign as a "good enough for this thing" approach when you could do better, then I think you're doing a disservice to that area of your game, and I believe that any good DM will generate a better experience for their players by crafting, rather than hobbling together, an adventure.



My best GMing of D&D has generally involved improvising events (though generally not improvising maps or stat blocks).


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 16, 2022)

Thomas Shey said:


> Well, its not too often you see an honest and robust defense of illusionism.  Props for that at least.



Not sure which forum you've been visiting these past couple of years, but there have been _several_ threads on this just in the last year alone.

People really like hardcore illusionism. Since I don't, I rather notice it when it gets defended.


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 16, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> When these types of threads come up, people inevitably turning into the notion that "The Dm lying is inherently bad".



The DM lying _to the players_ is bad. Characters portrayed by the DM lying to characters portrayed by the players? Perfectly reasonable.

And using your imagination and inventing fictional things _isn't lying_.



Stalker0 said:


> And that is simply not true. As a DM, your job is to craft an experience for your players. And you have many tools at your disposal to choose from, manipulation is simply one of them.



You can also just choose to, y'know, _not_ do that. No good DMing exists that can be achieved with manipulation but cannot be achieved without manipulation.



Stalker0 said:


> And all DMs do it to some extent or another. For example, do you describe in detail every single person that exists in a city?....probably not. So when you decide to describe in detail an NPC....you are manipulating the players, you are focusing their attention on something specific.



Abso-friggin-lutely not! That's....no. Your definition of "manipulation" is so skewed as to become meaningless. Unless you are willing to specify what you mean by "manipulation," it's going to be hard or even impossible to discuss this. Your use of the word is so alien to me I literally don't even know what you mean by it anymore.



Stalker0 said:


> Maybe because the NPC is important, or because you want them to be a red herring, but you are directing their focus and their decision making.



"Directing focus" is not manipulation. I am deeply confused about your reasoning here; what made you think such things were "manipulative"?



Stalker0 said:


> There are definately times when the PCs throw you a curve ball, and go somewhere you had never thought of, and have no plans for. So maybe you throw together a super quick dungeon in your head, using a few of the tricks above. This isn't meant to be a major dungeon, its just meant to cover an XYZ quick thing and then the party moves on. And sometimes....DMs get busy. Maybe they didn't have as much time to prep as they wanted, and so their choices are throw something together real quick with maybe a little manipulative glue in the middle....or cancel the session. I know my players would always rather play than me going, "sorry guys I got busy, no game".



I hesitate to think I am in any way _special_ when it comes to DMing, and I have never needed any "manipulative glue" as you put it to achieve these things. Learning to improvise is an incredibly important skill, doubly so for _me_ because I like to plan things to the Nth degree and thus I _knew_ I would need to force myself to improvise. I would further argue that being able to just straight-up say, "Hey guys, can I take 15 minutes to prepare something?" is the third-most-important DM skill one can acquire, after "always be ready to improvise" and "always be more fair to the players' characters than to yourself-as-DM." (The close 4th would be "say yes or roll the dice.")

Several times, things the _players_ wanted to do--that would have ended up being simple one-note dungeons under your scheme--have naturally evolved into some of the most important and interesting components of the story thus far. Things I would never have considered. That, perhaps more than anything else, cements my opposition to these tools. You cut yourself off from the absolute best possible source of awesome developments: the players.



Stalker0 said:


> Now like all tools, overuse of one is not a good idea. And if your doing this is a crutch because you haven't learned how to make adventurer's with player agency....than yes that's a problem. But as one more tool in the box, these tactics are fine when used in moderation.



Again, I disagree: there is no problem that can be solved with them that cannot be solved without them. Hence, they are risks without need.


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 16, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> As for other railroad options, another classic one is the "Mission based adventure".
> 
> Players get the mission from their "boss" and go to work. That immediately focuses the adventure, and I find it works extremely well in many campaigns.



Personally, I would not consider this a form of railroading--because it's something the players have bought into. They _understand_ that they are getting assignments, and that the completion of that assignment is what they're there to do. If they weren' interested in completing those assignments, they would voice their disagreement or (in extremity) depart the game.

If the players have already given informed consent to go to a chosen destination, it isn't railroading. You haven't _coerced_ them into going anywhere. And it sure as heck isn't _invisible_ railroading, because they literally know that there's a destination in mind!


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## Paul Farquhar (Jul 16, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> If they weren' interested in completing those assignments, they would voice their disagreement or (in extremity) depart the game.



Nah, they get sent to The Village.

Be seeing you.


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 16, 2022)

Remathilis said:


> Let's take a quick hypothetical.
> 
> Your players decide, unbeknownst to you until now, they want to find a portal/Spelljammer/whatever and go explore another setting in the game that isn't the one you are currently on. Go visit Sigil or Krynn or Eberron.
> 
> Do you let them go to a completely new world and continue the game? If not, why are you robbing them of their agency?



For my current game: This is not possible at present, and the players are currently working on finding out why.

Something I established as part of the cosmology known to academia in this setting is that there are _exactly_ three planes that are known to exist:

the *mortal world* (Al-Duniyyah, "that which is near" or "the place of examination"), which the Spirit World (Al-Barzakh, the "barrier" or "separation") is a subset of, where dead souls linger before passing on to whatever fate the dead go to meet;
the *elemental otherworld* (Al-Akirah, lit. "the other world," where the genies retreated many centuries ago), which is _much_ more magical than the mortal world but as a result also much more dangerous;
and *Hell/the Abyss* (Ja'hannam, "the place of sin and darkness," more or less), which is where demons and devils come from; according to Safiqi doctrine, they were banished there by the One after they waged a War in Heaven against Their will.
_Official_ Waziri cosmology* states that no other planes exist, period. The party has conclusively proven this false, as they have adventured in the artificial perpendicular plane of Zerzura, the Garden-City. While inside Zerzura, they came across a "Polyplanetarium," which contained powerful (and dangerous) objects that could display either the night skies or surfaces..._of other worlds_. The implication from this is that there isn't just _one_ other plane, but possibly an enormous number of other planes, but for some reason the wizards of Al-Duniyyah _cannot even observe them_, let alone travel to them. This is a weird mystery, and the party is slowly but surely discovering that that mystery may be a heck of a lot more important than they ever realized.

(*The Safiqi believe one other plane exists, _Jannah_, True Heaven, where the souls of the righteous dead go at death, but only the righteous may enter and none may leave once they do, so it is inaccessible to mortal prying eyes. This is their explanation for why certain dead people cannot be resurrected, even if the spell is cast immediately after death.)

In a different game that had had no pre-established reason why this couldn't happen: I would do my best to embrace the players' desire, but, depending on their level and the various commitments/connections they've made, would try to make clear exactly what the difficulty and consequences of such a choice would be. E.g. if the characters are literally level 1, fresh-faced adventurers with only a little experience, it's gonna take a while; travelling to a totally separate setting is a Big Deal for someone just starting their adventure. They'll have to build up to it, perhaps hunting down rumors of otherworldly travellers or researching the components necessary to conduct a ritual. Higher-level characters could get it done more quickly, but have many more entanglements and connections to deal with--leaving your entire _world_ behind is a lot for any character to do, so there will necessarily be consequences, and probably people who aren't entirely happy about the character doing that. (E.g. our party Bard has a loving family and is in a dedicated relationship with a single person; if he were to leave for a whole other world entirely, his girlfriend would _definitely_ be bothered by that, and his family would be concerned for his well-being.) Allies who have trusted them in the past would probably feel hurt that they're leaving them behind, and those with official duties (like our Battlemaster, who is still officially part of the Sultana's Army, just on special assignment from her as an adventurer) would likely see such an action as dereliction of those duties.

In a certain sense, I have already told my players that I would let them do something _like_ this; I expressly told them that if they decided one day that they just weren't interested in this story anymore, that they wanted to chart a ship off into the Sapphire Sea and never return to Al-Rakkah, that I would absolutely let them do that. I would feel very disappointed _in myself_, because it would mean that I had failed to make something that was sufficiently interesting to warrant their continued attention, but I would absolutely support their choice and do my best to respond to it.

There would be consequences for this choice, however; they would essentially be abandoning their friends and allies to whatever fate awaits them, so after a while (probably 2-3 months after the party left) they'd start hearing rumors about stuff that had happened in the Tarrakhuna. It would never be more than that--just the occasional rumor of some major event or other. A dead leader, a disease or disaster, upheaval, something like that. And such rumors only last for a relatively short while, sailors being who and what they are, so it wouldn't even be more than an occasional mention. I would strive to avoid making those rumors into guilt trips, but rumors of Bad Things happening "Back Home" is really the only major consequence that could befall the party if they chose to do this, should they choose to travel far enough away.

Fortunately, my players are troopers. They appreciate that they _do_ have the freedom to go wherever they want, if they should choose to do so, but freely choose to stay in the Tarrakhuna and adventure there, because (a) what I have offered them remains interesting enough to explore, and (b) they feel attached to the characters, organizations, locations, and mysteries of this place, even though they may also feel a desire to explore other places too.


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 16, 2022)

Cadence said:


> Thinking of dungeons.  Are modules where creatures are assigned to a room and assumed to be there -- instead of having some natural pattern of movement through the thing (excepting those that wouldn't) -- also a railroad?
> 
> I'm wondering in particular about
> 
> ...



Prewritten modules are understood to be inherently more railroad-y than things developed "live" (or, well, pseudo-live) by the DM. At least, I would certainly _hope_ that if the players have agreed to play a module or adventure path, they understand that certain events are expected to happen and thus certain things are "fixed points" even if they're allowed to color outside the lines etc.

Again, for me the issue is the _deception_, not the rails per se. If the players know and consent, awesome, more power to you, do what you like.

In this case, the coverup isn't just worse than the crime, it IS the crime.



overgeeked said:


> I started a thread about it when the video first dropped. The fuller context is really, really important to that clip.
> 
> ETA: It would be helpful to actually include the link...need more coffee.
> 
> ...



Yeah I was gonna say, I remember when that thread went up, and hearing the _full context_ of the quote was...revelatory, to say the least. They're speaking of "railroading" in a context that makes it....pretty much _not at all_ "railroading" in the usual sense. Like, it's "railroading" that...is literally based on the personal backstory and information _created by the player_. So...the player literally already put their buy-in and agency into it. They WANT to go where that train is headed, wherever that might be. That's so radically different from what most people refer to as "railroading"--and what _this thread_ refers to as "railroading"--that I don't really agree with the classification at all.

There's a difference between "having a plot" and "being on (invisible) rails." The former means you know the state of affairs and plausible dramatic moments/events/concepts/themes. The latter means you have a fixed sequence of events that will definitely occur no matter what (and, if invisible, that you'll _ensure_ they happen even if the players think they have control.) The two are not the same.



Stalker0 said:


> But if my group chooses path A (versus B and C), and they always meet a Nymph no matter what, that to me is a soft railroad. THeir choice of path might have still mattered for other reasons, might even affect some of the conditions of the Nymph. If the choice has impact, even if I remove some of the impact through a soft railroad, its still a valid scenario.



I mean...if you just make the one tiny step of actually (in-story) making sure that all three paths _actually do_ lead to the same place, then you've done no railroading at all. Sometimes, paths converge IRL. That's a perfectly natural event. It's even something you can foreshadow/telegraph/explicitly state, depending on context. (E.g. our party Druid, before the character's soft retirement, would _probably_ notice that the path they're on curved away at first before curving back, allowing the party to guess "hmm, maybe these three paths all converge at the same point!") This is one aspect of what I mean by saying that these techniques aren't necessary. You can have the choice still have consequences (as you say, changing the party's condition or the condition of other things as a result of the choice), even if all three result in reaching the same physical destination.

There's no need for an illusion here, if you're actually adding consequences. You literally just need to be _slightly_ more informative to the players, and suddenly it's not even illusionism anymore, it's not a soft railroad, it's just....exploring through a defined space.


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 16, 2022)

DND_Reborn said:


> Honestly, DMs railroad all the time--even if they don't realize they are doing it. I refuse to believe _anyone_ who claims they "never do it"... it just means they don't realize they are doing it. And frankly, railroading, in and of itself, is not a bad thing.



Give your definition of "railroading," then, and we can see. Because, at least by _my_ definition of "railroading," I never do it, and my players have explicitly stated that they appreciate that I do not use railroading.



DND_Reborn said:


> _The PCs are captured and ordered to complete a task. If they don't agree to do it, they will be executed. They are under a Zone of Truth and have failed their saves, so cannot lie._
> 
> Is that railroading?



No. It is choices having consequences--so long as their capture was the result of their choices (and, presumably, undesirable dice rolls).

Sometimes, logically, there just aren't other choices to be made. That's not railroading. _That is life_.

Unless you mean to say that, for example, _reality itself_ railroads you every time you must exit a room via the only door because you cannot physically destroy the wall to exit....



Maxperson said:


> Yep.  There's only one time railroading is okay, and that's when you have player buy-in before the railroading starts.



Which, IMO, means it isn't railroading anymore. The players' agency is respected, _because they want to go where you're leading_. You don't need a fence to hem them in. They go of their own volition.



Mort said:


> Railroading is the illusion of choice.
> 
> The scenario you provided contains no such illusion, as such, it is not railroading. The player is 100% aware of the non choice provided.
> 
> Now if the player chooses for the character to die and the DM still saves him and continues with the plot - THAT'S railroading.



Exactly this. Couldn't have said it better myself.



DND_Reborn said:


> All player choice is illusion, as it is always up to the roll of a die or the DM the results of those choices.



Then you are simply incorrect. There are player choices that are not illusions. So long as you continue to hold this incorrect belief, contradictions will result.



DND_Reborn said:


> The DM has the adventure prepared. The players can choose to go to city A or city B. Regardless of which they choose, the adventure hook will take place and set the PCs on their path to the adventure.
> 
> This is a classic example of the pick a door scenario. It _happens all the time_, even if the DM's doing it don't realize it.



I have never done this and would never do it. Period.



DND_Reborn said:


> Or another:
> 
> The DM has the adventure prepared, but the players get sidetracked. Later on, the DM still runs the adventure after the sidetrack is over, even though the "timeline" of the world might indicate other events made the adventure null.



I have never done this, and would never do it. Period.



DND_Reborn said:


> I could go on and on.



Thus far, you're 0/3 on examples of railroading; the first by not actually being railroading in the first place, the second and third by absolutely being railroading...and being things I would never do and have never done.

If time has passed, then the adventure not only can change, it _should_ change. That's literally how I respect my players' choices, by _having the world change_. Sometimes it changes because of what they do; sometimes it changes because of what they _didn't_ do. And sometimes it just changes regardless of their actions. That, again, is _life_. Things change.

And if the players choose to go to City B, it sure as heck won't have the same adventure hooks as City A would. The two are distinct cities; they should have distinct components. I will consider such elements as local (sub)culture (e.g. Al-Maralus, to the north, is more tropical and more directly influenced by Moroccan culture and names, while Al-Tusyoun, to the south, is much more arid and more influenced by the Levant), past events associated with those cities in-game (the party has been to both cities before, but has rarely been to Al-Tusyoun while Al-Maralus they've visited repeatedly), and both secret and non-secret information about the setting (e.g. the Cult of the Burning Eye is not particularly active around Al-Tusyoun while the Shadow-Druids are, something the PCs do not know; they do, however, know that Al-Tusyoun is more of a "crossroads" town, while Al-Maralus is more of a "gateway" town to another region.) Being further south, Al-Tusyoun will have more elves/half-elves and dragonborn (who are more common in the temperate, southern "elf forests," though the dragonborn are rare in general on this continent), while Al-Maralus is mostly humans and orcs/half-orcs, with many of them related to the indigenous peoples of the northern jungles. Etc. As a result, the names, races, and occupations of the people they meet will depend on where they go, and the dangers they face will differ. My commitment to maintaining a consistent, grounded, meaningful world is part of how I respect my players' choices.



pemerton said:


> Because that part makes no difference to the question. Your "world" is just story that you've written. You've written a story in which the players can't have their PCs succeed at a thing that they want their PCs to achieve. As I asked, how is this not "railroading (or similar)? It's the GM deciding that the action declaration will fail in advance of play and regardless of how the players frame their attempt.



For my part, I consider it non-railroading because, _for my world_, there is a reason why this fact is true, and the players can not only discover that fact, but attempt to _do_ something about it. (Indeed, I hope that they not only attempt to do something about it, but that they do so with gusto!) If they just petulantly said, "But we want to go to another world NOW!" then I would be rather annoyed with them (and extremely surprised that they became petulant all of a sudden!), and explain that while I am 99.9%* of the time willing to work with them on the things they wish to do, sometimes there will be barriers or difficulties that must be overcome before that can happen, and that if they wish to participate in my game, they will need to accept that _sometimes_ getting the thing they want to get will be an adventure, possibly a lengthy one, rather than instant gratification.

But, as I said in an earlier post, my players are troopers, and have never even once been petulant or demanding. In fact, they've been nothing but accommodating, which is part of why I do everything I can to support their choices and ensure that appropriate, grounded consequences result from those choices. I also do that because of my _ardent_ belief that it is my duty as DM to foster player enthusiasm whenever and wherever I can, but it certainly doesn't _hurt_ that my players are respectful and cooperative.

*There are a small number of areas where I am....reluctant to compromise. I made sure that as many such areas were explicitly identified as possible during Session 0, and work to be absolutely transparent and forthright about such things. E.g., I do not run games for evil PCs, not because I don't think evil PCs can be interesting, but because I do not trust my ability to produce an _enjoyable game_ for evil PCs. Players can choose to have their characters go full-on capital-E Evil if they want, but I consider that a form of retirement for the character. A _formerly_ evil character struggling to atone for past sins is awesome, however, so I'm quite willing to make stuff like that happen. Likewise, necromancy (as in raising the dead as profane things like _ghuls_ or zombies), alongside slavery, is one of the _very_ few EXTREME taboos of the culture of the land the game is set in; to practice necromancy in any way that could be discovered would be reputational suicide, so I have _strongly_ encouraged the players not to do that sort of thing. When any issues with these topics arise, I give players a fair hearing and work with them to try to find consensus, and I have only once had to do anything more than "have a quick, polite conversation."


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 16, 2022)

Remathilis said:


> True, but I feel that a theme is best paired with a narrative that serves it. If you're going to be a member of the Silver Inquisition, the DM should be tossing rumors of heretics, cells of hidden cultists in government, a council of demon worshipping high priests, and maybe a grand conspiracy against the Church to stop. Not just say "go find evil and smite it" and set me in Thrane, looking for something to do. Again, I don't want to have to wander around looking for the fun stuff. I want a main plot with occasional rest stops for side quests.



As was said by others above, I don't see "there are ongoing events, which your characters plausibly care about," as being the same thing as "railroading." And I'm also quite aware that Mr. Hayes (a lovely Youtuber, I've burned through almost all of his content already!) very specifically favors gaming where the main story _exists_, but the players _do not have to follow it_. They can choose to go off and do other things, and come back to the main story later _if_ they want to. That doesn't at all sound like railroading. Instead, it sounds like there's an adventure line _for those who want one_, and a world to explore for those who really _don't_ want an adventure line.

One of the (very) few exceptions to this preference is Final Fantasy XIV, which I know he enjoys mightily, where it does pretty heavily restrict your non-MSQ choices until you advance the MSQ. And he has specifically commented on how he doesn't really care for how restrictive FFXIV can be with its content outside of advancing the MSQ. He believes the adventure line is worthwhile enough to forgive this fault, but it is something that needs forgiveness, as it were. (I, personally, expect most video game stories to be fixed things, so it never really bothered me, but I get why it bothers him.)

For my own game, there are plots (plural, there's various things going on in the world.) These are events, which will happen, unless the players interpose themselves, at which point it becomes unclear exactly what will result--we must play to find out what happens. This is the essence of the Dungeon World "fronts" concept, as I understand it. The world is full of threats. Those threats will do bad things if allowed to operate unhindered. The players, as Heroic Adventurers, are naturally-gifted hinderers and meddlers. And you'd better One-damned believe their opponents would've gotten away with it if it weren't for those _meddling kids!_ 

More seriously: there's stuff going on. There's things to discover and track down. But the PCs also have their own stuff going on, and sometimes those personal matters carry more weight. Sometimes the party is hungry for a direction, and I'll throw them a bone. That's not railroading, that's greasing the wheels of play when they've gotten stuck and no one knows quite what to do. Much of the time, however, I'm quite happy to follow the players' lead. The current adventure blossomed out of a player wanting to speak to a particular person about information she'd uncovered regarding a lost ancient heirloom of his people. We've already gotten three sessions and at least one Perilous Journey out of that (completely personal) inquiry. I am quite excited to see what _else_ comes of it.


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## Mort (Jul 16, 2022)

Remathilis said:


> I will answer with an example from what YouTuber Josh Strife Hayes has said about MMO design.
> 
> MMO typically falls into two broad camps: narrative driven or open world. Narrative MMOs like WoW, ESO or the Old Republic have a general main story that is augmented with plenty of side quests, raids, dungeons and supplemental systems like crafting or housing to keep players interested. They can go and do other things but they always have a main focus of the story to fall back on. Even if they engage in none of the supplement stuff, there is an engaging story they can interact with. A structure. A sense of purpose.
> 
> ...




That's not railroading. It's merely an agreed upon structure and plot. The players are presented  with a choice at session 0 and have chosen to abide by this structure and plot. The fact that the rails are visible and agreed upon usually means it's not railroading.

Now let's say the players THOUGHT they were playing an open world game but the DM only had this pirate plot to run. He doesn't tell the players this, he hides the fact that there is nothing else for them to do. Every time they try to take a path different from this pirate adventure, he guides them back to the pirate adventure and only advances that plot. That would be railroading.


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## bloodtide (Jul 16, 2022)

I can help with the double meaning of "Railroad" being both good and bad.

Take Performance Magic.  Ok, perfomance magic is not real.  Sorry to shatter any illusions.

So ask someone would they like to be tricked, deceived or lied too and you will get a hard passionate NO.

Now this is exactly what performance magic does, and millions love it and have no problem with it.  You can break down the magic audience into three easy groups:

1.The Clueless.  They think the performance magic is real "magic".  They can't figure it out...and it looks impossible.  They have been told it's "not real", but it sure "looks real".  And try as they might, they can't figure out how that rabbit was pulled out of the empty hat.  Even when you might try to explain it, many don't want to know.....they want to "keep the magic alive" for them.  They can't (or don't wish to) figure it out means it's "real" magic to them.

2.The Knowers.  They are much more fascinated by "how" the stage magic was done then just watching it.  They get enjoyment from figuring out how the trick was done.  They like to know things.  Many of these people often do magic themselves.

3.The Fans.  They like magic.  They are fully aware it's a trick, but they don't care.  They are fine with being fooled, ticked, deceived and such for entertainment.  They will avoid learning much about magic, again to keep the wonder alive.


The same is true for novels/TV shows/Movies.  Some are clueless and just enjoy them.  Some know about story crafting and can spot and see things with no problem, and can enjoy that craft.  And many know the whole story is fake, set up and crafted...and ignore all that, so they can be entertained.

In both cases the trickery and deception is for a good outcome.

Railroading is exactly the same:  Some are clueless they are even "on a rail" or something.  Some know and see the railroad and enjoy watching the track being laid.  And some know fully well it is happening, but just sit back and relax and let it happen to have fun.


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## Mort (Jul 16, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> I can help with the double meaning of "Railroad" being both good and bad.




I much prefer to keep it at what it is: railroading as the illusion of choice.

Much less muddy that way.



bloodtide said:


> Take Performance Magic.  Ok, perfomance magic is not real.  Sorry to shatter any illusions.



But in a magic show, part of the fun is trying to figure out how the magician is doing it. We know it's not real, but the good magicians make it seem like it is.

This isn't the case with gaming. The fun isn't in trying to figure out how or what the DM is doing and that being part of the entertainment. The fun is in interacting with the game, the environment and each other. Usually to create a shared experience at the table.




bloodtide said:


> So ask someone would they like to be tricked, deceived or lied too and you will get a hard passionate NO.
> 
> Now this is exactly what performance magic does, and millions love it and have no problem with it.  You can break down the magic audience into three easy groups:
> 
> ...




If the people at the table agree to the parameters of the game, it's not railroading it's an agreed experience with agreed upon limitations. This is what most adventure modules are and they work because players agree to stay within the framework of the module.

It's when the DM doesn't tell the players the framework and the constraints but imposes them anyway that problems occur.


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## Shiroiken (Jul 16, 2022)

A certain level of railroading is normal, as is a certain level of illusionism. The amount varies for people, but IME most players are *not* fans of consistent illusionism. 

When I devise a campaign, the overall idea is pretty much set, so there's some railroading that will keep the players moving towards this goal. A lot of adventure hooks are set up this way too, especially published adventures and APs. Most players understand this, and will accept obvious railroading, so long as it makes a level of sense. For example, most of Descent into Avernus is a railroad once you get into Avernus, but because the rails lead you down the most logical choices, most players aren't going to object. The decision to _go_ to Avernus is a major railroad that many PCs likely aren't going to accept, however, so it comes off as rather forced. 

Illusionism can be a useful tool, but one that should only be used sparingly at best, because one the illusion is revealed, the players will doubt any future action as being relevant. IME it's best when the DM wants to narrate a specific scenario without having to make a crapload of extra stuff that probably won't come up anyway. The "choose a door" that's always correct is nonsense, since you're putting them in the situation to deliberately take away their agency anyway. If you want to have a linear dungeon, you just make a linear dungeon, rather than presenting it as somehow a choice.


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## overgeeked (Jul 16, 2022)

That's a terrible analogy. Something a bit closer would be buying tickets to a stand-up comedy show and when you get to the venue the house decides to strap you into a chair and force you to watch Warhol's Empire instead because they think they know better than you do.

When players sit down to play a game, they expect their decisions will matter. When their decisions don't matter and the players find out, they tend to throw things at the offending referee and walk out. As they should.


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## Stalker0 (Jul 16, 2022)

Reynard said:


> Honest question, no snark: what is it about being railroaded that you like? Is it knowing you will get a coherent story? Is it something about your character's place in that story? Why do you prefer the "illusion of choice" over "actual choice." Again, I am not trying to snark or trap you. I am honestly curious.



I can answer this for you as a longtime DM.

There are two main reasons:

1) Older players with Real Lives: So one of the things I have noticed in my games as the years have gone on, as my players have gotten older, gotten jobs and families.... they just don't have the mental energy they once did. I have done "open sandbox" games with them, and what I find is that giving them a bevy of choices tends to create decision paralysis, infighting, and slows down the game. What normally happens is one player just makes a choice and everyone goes along with it.

conversely my most successful campaigns have been my "mission focused" ones. Ie the players are a part of some organization, they have a boss that goes "alright team, your mission is....". Aka I put them on a railroad, here is where you are going and what you are doing. And they love it, it removes any infighting, any debating, they just get right into the roleplaying and the action.

2) Limited DM time: Likewise as I've gotten older, my time and mental energy are limited as well. Now I can spend that time crafting a dozen options to try and account for player choices....each of which only get a small portion of my time and creativity, or I can focus my energies on 2-3 encounters I know they will encounter (because of the railroad), each of which will be much more involved and interesting because I've put my full mind to their creation.


Now the key here is the matter of degrees. There is railroading and there is RAILROADING. I may be forcing some of the plot points, but that doesn't mean I don't have an NPC pivot due to my player's roleplaying, or change up a dungeon if my players take 3 days to do the job instead of 1. My players still have agency, they just don't have TOTAL agency. The covenant is effectively....I will be limiting some of your agency, and in return, we will get more time in for gaming (rather than debating), and the encounters you have will be more interesting.


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## overgeeked (Jul 16, 2022)

A lot of people in this thread seem to conflate linear adventures with railroading. They're not the same thing. 

Matt Colville has a video about it. The definitions at the top. Though he is using sandbox and open world as they are used in video game design.


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## Stalker0 (Jul 16, 2022)

I think we can also debate the notion of DMs offering a "false choice" vs players imposing a "choice outside the plot".

The 3 door scenario is an example of the former. The DM is directly implying to the players, "I am giving you a choice" but then is not.

In the latter example, the DM goes "alright you all are heading head back to Balwick city right?" The players nods and the DM gets his encounter ready, when one of the players goes, "hey all, maybe we shouldn't go the direct way back, maybe we should take that longer route Gurney told us about, could be safer" The players debate for 10 minutes, going through teh pros and cons. The DM honestly doesn't care, they didn't have any bandit encounters planned, they just wanted the players to meet NPC X to kick off the next plot. Whichever way the players decide to go, NPC X will show up.

So in the second example, the players have "imposed" a choice on the DM, its just not a choice that will have any impact on the plot. Another example of this is...a PC chat ups a given person in a tavern who is not important to the plot in the slightest. Maybe its a fun encounter, but ultimately the DM isn't going to do anything with it, the plot moves on. This is a form of railroading but I say its not a true evil, its just the DM focusing the story. Whereas the first scenario is a harsher one, as the DM is effectively "promising" the players a choice, but then not delivering.


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## Stalker0 (Jul 16, 2022)

The other thing I find about sandboxes, is that most players who want their choices to matter still want "interesting games".

What I mean by that is....if you play a sandbox to its fullest level, there are places in the world that are going to be flat out boring. If you get off the plot trail, the PCs could find themselves in a place that is wonderfully boring. Everyone is safe, no danger, no issues, no treasure, no monsters, just fine.

I find while players playing in sandbox games want to be able to go places and have that matter, they still want there to be interesting things to do when they get there, regardless of where it is. The DM therefore may have to "come up" with some problems on the fly, which technically is a form of railroading, but again its in service of creating an entertaining story.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 16, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> Not sure which forum you've been visiting these past couple of years, but there have been _several_ threads on this just in the last year alone.




Most of them are either pretty evasive about flat-out admitting to illusionism, or clearly don't have the courage of their own convinctions.



EzekielRaiden said:


> People really like hardcore illusionism. Since I don't, I rather notice it when it gets defended.




Like I said, go back and look at how rarely someone is this blunt about it.  It _does_ happen (you can usually tell because its some GM who has an excessive degree of faith in his ability to fool his players basically indefinitely), but its not the common case.


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## overgeeked (Jul 16, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> The other thing I find about sandboxes, is that most players who want their choices to matter still want "interesting games".
> 
> What I mean by that is....if you play a sandbox to its fullest level, there are places in the world that are going to be flat out boring. If you get off the plot trail, the PCs could find themselves in a place that is wonderfully boring. Everyone is safe, no danger, no issues, no treasure, no monsters, just fine.
> 
> I find while players playing in sandbox games want to be able to go places and have that matter, they still want there to be interesting things to do when they get there, regardless of where it is. The DM therefore may have to "come up" with some problems on the fly, which technically is a form of railroading, but again its in service of creating an entertaining story.



Yep. The starting town is the utterly boring safe place with no monsters, treasure, or dangers. Gets the PCs out the door and fast. There's also chunks of the landscape that are simply that, landscape. You'll only have an encounter there if a wandering monster is rolled.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 16, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> Personally, I would not consider this a form of railroading--because it's something the players have bought into. They _understand_ that they are getting assignments, and that the completion of that assignment is what they're there to do. If they weren' interested in completing those assignments, they would voice their disagreement or (in extremity) depart the game.




Where the line gets muddy is the narrowness or not of the rules of engagement of how they handle the assignment, and the GM's handling of that.  There are absolutely people who think any constraints on PC choices by the campaign situation approaches railroading, but this is usually from people who are completely determined that RPGs are only about open-ended sandboxes.

But there are other internal constraints that can flex this question considerably.



EzekielRaiden said:


> If the players have already given informed consent to go to a chosen destination, it isn't railroading. You haven't _coerced_ them into going anywhere. And it sure as heck isn't _invisible_ railroading, because they literally know that there's a destination in mind!




Yup.  And in my above case know there's some approaches they're not permitted to take by the conditions of their employment.

Where it can get a little--sticky--is when those are so extremely narrow that the only question is whether they can execute the task given their abilities under those constraints.


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## iserith (Jul 16, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> The other thing I find about sandboxes, is that most players who want their choices to matter still want "interesting games".
> 
> What I mean by that is....if you play a sandbox to its fullest level, there are places in the world that are going to be flat out boring. If you get off the plot trail, the PCs could find themselves in a place that is wonderfully boring. Everyone is safe, no danger, no issues, no treasure, no monsters, just fine.



Leaving aside the fact that there's no reason to believe any place in a fantasy setting must be "boring," as you say, what makes you think a party of adventurers is going to hang out there indefinitely? There's no XP. No treasure. It seems to me that they've found a good resting place in your example, but it's not going to help them achieve their goals otherwise. I wouldn't expect them to hang out. (And, again, if the place is boring, that's the DM's fault for putting it there in the first place.)



Stalker0 said:


> I find while players playing in sandbox games want to be able to go places and have that matter, they still want there to be interesting things to do when they get there, regardless of where it is. The DM therefore may have to "come up" with some problems on the fly, which technically is a form of railroading, but again its in service of creating an entertaining story.



The DM presenting problems on the fly is not railroading in and of itself.

The "story" is emergent during play. The DM describes the environment. The players describe what they want to do. The DM narrates the results of the adventurers' actions. When you look back on that taken as a whole, that is the "story."


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 16, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> The other thing I find about sandboxes, is that most players who want their choices to matter still want "interesting games".
> 
> What I mean by that is....if you play a sandbox to its fullest level, there are places in the world that are going to be flat out boring. If you get off the plot trail, the PCs could find themselves in a place that is wonderfully boring. Everyone is safe, no danger, no issues, no treasure, no monsters, just fine.
> 
> I find while players playing in sandbox games want to be able to go places and have that matter, they still want there to be interesting things to do when they get there, regardless of where it is. The DM therefore may have to "come up" with some problems on the fly, which technically is a form of railroading, but again its in service of creating an entertaining story.




This is only a problem if the GM is unwilling to tell the players something to the effect "The area you're in right now appears to be normal farmsteads and you have no reason to believe there's anything much interesting going on there."  If the players still insist on it, their boredom is a self-inflicted wound.  This ignores, of course, the fact that many traditional sandbox GMs insist on being coy about such things, and many players have been taught not to trust overt GM statements, but there's only so much you can do about gaming pathologies.


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## iserith (Jul 16, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> I think we can also debate the notion of DMs offering a "false choice" vs players imposing a "choice outside the plot".
> 
> The 3 door scenario is an example of the former. The DM is directly implying to the players, "I am giving you a choice" but then is not.



Except that it _is _giving the players a choice. If they have a sense of what lay behind each door, then it's an informed choice. If those choices are meaningfully different such that the players want to see what's behind one door and the DM gives them the content of _their _choosing regardless of which door they picked, then the DM is railroading. It's not railroading for all three doors to lead to one place, however, unless we're prepared to say that the great hall of the king with its many doors is somehow railroading in and of itself.



Stalker0 said:


> In the latter example, the DM goes "alright you all are heading head back to Balwick city right?" The players nods and the DM gets his encounter ready, when one of the players goes, "hey all, maybe we shouldn't go the direct way back, maybe we should take that longer route Gurney told us about, could be safer" The players debate for 10 minutes, going through teh pros and cons. The DM honestly doesn't care, they didn't have any bandit encounters planned, they just wanted the players to meet NPC X to kick off the next plot. Whichever way the players decide to go, NPC X will show up.
> 
> So in the second example, the players have "imposed" a choice on the DM, its just not a choice that will have any impact on the plot. Another example of this is...a PC chat ups a given person in a tavern who is not important to the plot in the slightest. Maybe its a fun encounter, but ultimately the DM isn't going to do anything with it, the plot moves on. This is a form of railroading but I say its not a true evil, its just the DM focusing the story. Whereas the first scenario is a harsher one, as the DM is effectively "promising" the players a choice, but then not delivering.



First, what a tedious player that is in the example. The party's already made a decision to go to Balwick and then Captain Waitaminute wants to open the floor for 10 minutes of further debate instead of getting the heck on with it. Yikes.

Second, there is still a choice here. It does not impact anything with regard to what happens next, but it does change the story - the PCs took the scenic route instead of the direct one. A minor detail in context probably, but again, it's not railroading in and of itself. The players want to go to Balwick. They get there with one route taking longer than the other.

Finally, it's not railroading to have NPCs hanging around for color but who otherwise have no connection to the events in play, even if the players taken interest in them. NPC X does and has motivation to seek out adventurers like the PCs who they need for a quest. This presents the players with another choice. Again, not railroading.

All in all, I think this is a great example of why it's not useful in my view to obfuscate what railroading actually _is _otherwise one will tend to see it everywhere (even when it's not there).


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## Stalker0 (Jul 16, 2022)

iserith said:


> Second, there is still a choice here. It does not impact anything with regard to what happens next, but it does change the story - the PCs took the scenic route instead of the direct one. A minor detail in context probably, but again, it's not railroading in and of itself. The players want to go to Balwick. They get there with one route taking longer than the other.



So what your saying is, the players are fine with certain choices not mattering (or mattering only as a minor story detail) as long as they get to where they ultimately want to go.

Could you say the same thing about the 3 door scenario? As long as the players ultimately get to the treasure and beat up the monster, do they really care if the monster wasn't behind door number 1 until they chose it?


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## Stalker0 (Jul 16, 2022)

iserith said:


> First, what a tedious player that is in the example. The party's already made a decision to go to Balwick and then Captain Waitaminute wants to open the floor for 10 minutes of further debate instead of getting the heck on with it. Yikes.



If you have never had a group of players get into a long debate about an absolutely pointless decision, than no wonder you don't see the value in a soft railroad


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## Reynard (Jul 16, 2022)

It's very strange how in this thread some folks seem to think the GM doing anything at all is "railroading" -- including,  bafflingly, presenting an adventure hook.


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## Cadence (Jul 16, 2022)

iserith said:


> The DM presenting problems on the fly is not railroading in and of itself.
> 
> The "story" is emergent during play. The DM describes the environment. The players describe what they want to do. The DM narrates the results of the adventurers' actions. When you look back on that taken as a whole, that is the "story."




I really appreciate this post of yours and the next one in regards to helping me navigate things in the thread.  I think for me it comes down to "how emergent on the fly" does the "problem" need to be and what counts as an "NPCs hanging around for color but who otherwise have no connection to the events in play".

Say, there are two roads and a bunch of woods.  The party knows the woods are rumored to be full of old monsters and  ruins and whatnot, and the DM has a bunch of index cards with things to draw from or a table to roll on if they get off the beaten path.  The players know the left road leads to Castle X and the players know the right road leads to Dungeon Y, and they are very different things and allow the party to accomplish different big exciting things and achieve some of their goals.  The roads are also safer known to be safer than the woods (and they are!), but there's a group of bandits that has recently moved into the area unknown to the players and denizens of the starting point.

Where does the limited number of things to randomly populate the woods come in.  Say one of the things in the stack of cards or table that can only happen once is a witches hovel.  Given that the table/deck of cards isn't too big, if they explore the woods long enough they're likely to run into most of the things on the cards.  Is it bad that they'll almost surely stumble on the "Witch's Hovel" by random chance if they go pretty much any direction in the woods long enough?  Does it change if when the party converses with or interrogates one of the things that pops up they get usually reliable information about the adjacent areas and if that's rolled/drawn to be the hovel, then it's locked in? 

How bad is it to have the bandits pretty much show up on whatever road the party goes down (like a random encounter table with 1 entry) if they are just designed to be a reasonable challenge, give some flavor, and maybe drop off a hook that can be picked up whenever?

I'm not really concerned what label those are given, but would the set-up be viewed as giving false choices or stealing player agency?  Or would it be viewed as not far from on the fly or color?


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## overgeeked (Jul 16, 2022)

Reynard said:


> It's very strange how in this thread some folks seem to think the GM doing anything at all is "railroading" -- including, bafflingly, presenting an adventure hook.



It's a rhetorical device. Present anything and everything as "railroading" to get people to agree that railroading is sometimes necessary. We're supposed to ignore that it's fundamentally redefining the word under discussion. It's the same problem with all those jargon threads. Different people are honestly using the word to mean different things while others are intentionally misusing the word to push agreement.


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## prabe (Jul 16, 2022)

@Cadence The extent to which the choices you describe are problems in the sense of being meaningless choices depend on whether the PCs are trying to find (or avoid) something. If the Witch's Hovel or the bandits are ... incidental to the PCs' actual goals and intents, they're probably fine..


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## iserith (Jul 16, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> So what your saying is, the players are fine with certain choices not mattering (or mattering only as a minor story detail) as long as they get to where they ultimately want to go.
> 
> Could you say the same thing about the 3 door scenario? As long as the players ultimately get to the treasure and beat up the monster, do they really care if the monster wasn't behind door number 1 until they chose it?



We'd have to define what "mattering" meant here. It matters to the emergent story certainly. For example, they took the scenic route instead of the the most direct one. Does the additional time spent matter? It might not. Did it matter to the possibilities of encounters? It seems like it didn't and the DM is perfectly free to say which stretch of terrain has a chance of an encounter or not. So it's a choice that doesn't have much impact and that's okay. As a DM,  I would have the choice actually have an impact, particularly as it seems like it was information gleaned from an NPC and therefore seemingly relevant in some way. Perhaps the longer route is freer of encounters, but runs the risk of exhaustion due to forced marching, whereas the direct route on the road has no risk of exhaustion, but a greater chance of being waylaid by bandits. But, ultimately, the DM still isn't railroading here if the choice doesn't have as much import. 

Certainly it may not matter to the players if they are happy with what they found in the 3 door scenario. The issue has never been, for me and clearly for others, that the group uses these techniques. The problem has been the DM who does this without the players buying into that kind of play. For players that didn't consent to that sort of play and who imagine that their choices matter, may not be too pleased. Honestly, the 3 door scenario just seems kind of stupid to me. It's not clear what purpose it would serve in game play and I can't see why a DM would even want to do that in the first place. It's setting up the possibility for dissatisfaction with absolutely no upside that I can see. Why do it at all?


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## iserith (Jul 16, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> If you have never had a group of players get into a long debate about an absolutely pointless decision, than no wonder you don't see the value in a soft railroad



I've certainly seen it, and it's almost always about a choice that has very little impact. But I have dealt with it at the source - by dealing with the players directly. By helping them understand the value of moving the game forward once consensus has been reached, you just don't get this sort of backtracking and reopening of debate. You even get faster consensus-making. I think that's more effective what whatever techniques you think are involved in a "soft railroad."

For me, this whole thing mostly boils down to prep fundamentally. It's easier to prep a plot than a location-based adventure. DMs only have so much time to devote to prep with everything else in their lives also demanding attention. A plot makes it easy to prep, but now the DM has created for themselves a new challenge: keeping the PCs on the plot because there is no other content prepared. So rather than just say they only have so much content ready (and published modules fall into this category) and get everyone's agreement that anything outside that prep is a no-go, they engage in railroading to keep the PCs on the prepared content.


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## iserith (Jul 16, 2022)

Cadence said:


> I really appreciate this post of yours and the next one in regards to helping me navigate things in the thread.  I think for me it comes down to "how emergent on the fly" does the "problem" need to be and what counts as an "NPCs hanging around for color but who otherwise have no connection to the events in play".
> 
> Say, there are two roads and a bunch of woods.  The party knows the woods are rumored to be full of old monsters and  ruins and whatnot, and the DM has a bunch of index cards with things to draw from or a table to roll on if they get off the beaten path.  The players know the left road leads to Castle X and the players know the right road leads to Dungeon Y, and they are very different things and allow the party to accomplish different big exciting things and achieve some of their goals.  The roads are also safer known to be safer than the woods (and they are!), but there's a group of bandits that has recently moved into the area unknown to the players and denizens of the starting point.
> 
> ...



I'm having a hard time following your example, but so far as I can glean from it, I would say that the number of different encounters on a random encounter table has no bearing on whether the DM is railroading or not. That DM could certainly be criticized for missing the point of random encounter tables though!


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## bloodtide (Jul 16, 2022)

Mort said:


> But in a magic show, part of the fun is trying to figure out how the magician is doing it. We know it's not real, but the good magicians make it seem like it is.
> 
> This isn't the case with gaming. The fun isn't in trying to figure out how or what the DM is doing and that being part of the entertainment. The fun is in interacting with the game, the environment and each other. Usually to create a shared experience at the table.




Like I said, few people can or more so want to figure out how the magic is being done: they just want to be amazed and entertained.  And just like magic, the game is not real, so players can have fun, interact or do whatever other words they want to do on the DMs railroad.  When they are having fun, they don't look for the rails.



Mort said:


> It's when the DM doesn't tell the players the framework and the constraints but imposes them anyway that problems occur.



I'm not sure what framework is, but as long as the DM uses their superior gaming skills to make sure the players don't find out, the game works out.


Like the poster that mentioned adult players not having much time and energy.  I agree.  But I also say that goes for all ages.  After all, I develpoed my game stlye quite young.  After just a couple games with players doing the "freedom of choice" to NOT play the game, I knew that way was not for me.  So enter the railroad of fun.  

Time is also a big factor.  I'm not a big fan of the players choosing to socialize, not play the game and waste my time.  Just take a default satertudar night game from 6pm to midnight(six hours).

The game won't likely even START at with players (and all too often the DM too) being unfocused chatting, watching Youtube videos, and whatever.  When the game finally starts the DM will do the "we left off at the last game" recap, and the game will continue.  Very slowly as the players somewhat half remember and try to get into the game mindset.  This can take some time, maybe an hour or two.  It's much worse when the players have to stop the game constantly to ask questions.  Then maybe a combat encounter happens, that takes often an hour or even a simple combat.(9pm)

Then the players will "want a break" and to "get something to eat", and often this can take an hour or more of wasted time.(10 pm)

Then...maybe...everyone might get focused for a couple minutes of game play(10:30pm).  But the same players will slow down the game by choosing not to play.  The good player might complain here that after five hours the game has gone nowhere, and they wish people could just play the game.(11 pm)

Then...maybe...the good players might drag the group to play.  The characters FINALLY make it to the Dark Tower and fight there way inside.  (11:30pm)  The Big Battle of the Dark Tower is ready to go......BUT....it's almost midnight.  So the game must be ended for the night.  Most go home a bit unhappy from not having as much fun as they liked....except the players that chose not to play and ruin the game for everyone.


So compare to my Cannonball Express game plan:  The characters (and players) will be moved along the plot and story...no matter what they "choose" to do.  There will be tons of build up and action and adventure(you hit the floor running in my game....or else).  Events and encounters go quick, and combat is even faster.  The group will make it to the Dark Tower before 8pm.  So the action at the tower, and the Big Battle all happen before 9pm.  

THEN everyone takes a food freak after the three hours of fast, intense, and focused gaming.(9:30pm)

Coming back after the break is a lot of afterwards stuff, and tiding up loose ends along with other actions and encounters.  By 11 pm or so we have shifted into downtime and wrap ups.


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## iserith (Jul 16, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> Like I said, few people can or more so want to figure out how the magic is being done: they just want to be amazed and entertained.  And just like magic, the game is not real, so players can have fun, interact or do whatever other words they want to do on the DMs railroad.  When they are having fun, they don't look for the rails.
> 
> 
> I'm not sure what framework is, but as long as the DM uses their superior gaming skills to make sure the players don't find out, the game works out.
> ...



You can _absolutely _have a focused and fast-paced game _without _railroading though.


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## Stalker0 (Jul 16, 2022)

overgeeked said:


> It's a rhetorical device. Present anything and everything as "railroading" to get people to agree that railroading is sometimes necessary. We're supposed to ignore that it's fundamentally redefining the word under discussion. It's the same problem with all those jargon threads. Different people are honestly using the word to mean different things while others are intentionally misusing the word to push agreement.



So if we want to go into the business of defining, than we should look back at the OP. The OP has defined by their article that the mechanics they present are "invisible railroading". As this is a thread to debate the article presented, that should become the common definition that we use for the debate.

So railroading at its strictest definition is "using the mechanics defined by the article". So now we can state that these mechanics are "good" or "bad", but than we don't debate anything outside of those specific mechanics.

If we do, than we have to start with a specific definition of Railroading, and since I think that would be a fun exercise, I'm going to make a thread to do just that.


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## jgsugden (Jul 16, 2022)

Reynard said:


> No, that's engagement.  They aren't the same thing.



The definition of immersion is deep mental involvement.  Engagement is a deep emotional investment. There is a nuance, but they're highly related and everything I described would be applicable to someone that is highly immersed in a game of D&D.


pemerton said:


> My best GMing of D&D has generally involved improvising events (though generally not improvising maps or stat blocks).



And you can happen to pull off a good event with entirely improvised moments.  Entirely possible.  All DMing involves some improvising, afterall.  We don't prepare every little feature.  However, you can also far more easily %$@! the pooch.

The question here is whether planning to improvise will tend to result in a better, or even equal, game than planning out a session in advance so that it ties together _better_.  And, as is the case pretty much everywhere in life, the actual truthful answer is that more preparation gives you a better product in the end.  There is a point of diminishing returns, but we're talking about the basic approach to a game preparation, and you're kidding yourself if you think that wandering into a session and wining it is going to work.  That is the same mentality that some C students in school have towards an exam ... "I don't need to study ... I can just figure it out."

Let's say we have three DMs.  One (DM 1) totally improvises on the spot.  One (DM 2) has a really rough idea for a dungeon delve and just improvises as the PCs go.  The last (DM 3) takes the time to figure out how much the PCs can do in the available time, designs a dungeon to fit the available time, uses an environment/map/terrain that was designed intelligently, and has ties between the events in the session that make sense.

DM 1: You can have fun in this type of game.  However, it can also blow up in your face far more easily than the other two styles.  When I see DMs _fail_, it is often because they are just pulling it off the cuff and have no overall idea on how to proceed.  Their NPCs are often flat because they lack motivation tied to the campaign/adventure.  When this approach is attempted for an entire campaign, it often flops and people lose interest after a few levels.  Why?  Because it is just a bunch of short bursts of gaming with nothing tying it together.  The greater picture isn't there.  

DM 2: A little preparation is better than no preparation, but it can still be improved upon.  There can be a greater picture there with a little preparation, but if it is out of focus it can step on itself.  In this scenario, where the DM only worries about the big beats and doesn't sweat the samll stuff, the small stuff can blur the image.  The PCs can get confused by dungeons that do not make sense ... confusing a bad design element with a clue that gos nowhere.  Further, every time they stop to consider something that feels out of place it takes them out of the game.  If you want to keep your players interested and off their phones/computers, taking this a step further can help.

DM 3: When well executed - which takes a lot more than just planning - a well planned game will give your players answers to all of their questions and pull them in deeper into the game.  Quality preparation can make sure that every moment at the table matters.  It can make sure that you don't end up with pointless side quests where the players end up confused why they're doing them.  It can give you a chance to develop storylines that engage players more than the encounters.  

I've played for over 40 years.  Consistently, when DMs put in the effort, it shows.  I have enjoyed games run by DMs that do not prepare much ... but I've seen some of those DMs really improve when they added the pregame effort.


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## Remathilis (Jul 16, 2022)

Mort said:


> That's not railroading. It's merely an agreed upon structure and plot. The players are presented  with a choice at session 0 and have chosen to abide by this structure and plot. The fact that the rails are visible and agreed upon usually means it's not railroading.
> 
> Now let's say the players THOUGHT they were playing an open world game but the DM only had this pirate plot to run. He doesn't tell the players this, he hides the fact that there is nothing else for them to do. Every time they try to take a path different from this pirate adventure, he guides them back to the pirate adventure and only advances that plot. That would be railroading.




So it really comes down to "do the players have the option to refuse the plot hook and if so, does that end the campaign.

I ran a pirate campaign and, at a certain point, had a long series of adventures where a magical storm shipwrecked them on the Isle of Dread*. At a certain point, the storm pops up and a ship gets wrecked. The PCs have zero say in this matter unless they opt to never go on their boat and instead stay in port for the rest of the campaign.

On the one hand, it's a railroad; no matter what the PCs would do, the storm was unavoidable. On the other hand, no player would willingly say "hey, let's go sail into that magic storm and lose our ship and be stuck on a dangerous dinosaur-covered island!" I guess I could say "If the players set sail for X location at Y time, they will run into the magical storm and crash." but then I'm designing an adventure on the off-chance the PCs end up fulfilling the conditions. And if they don't the whole adventure idea is wasted**. 

* It wasn't really, but that invokes the feel I was going for and is good enough for this scenario.
** Assuming, of course, the repeatedly reusing the same plot-hook over and over until the PCs opt to go on the adventure isn't a railroad of a sort itself. I mean, if the DM is gonna threaten every boat the PCs ever own from here to eternity, might as well get it over with.


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## Mort (Jul 16, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> Like I said, few people can or more so want to figure out how the magic is being done: they just want to be amazed and entertained.  And just like magic, the game is not real, so players can have fun, interact or do whatever other words they want to do on the DMs railroad.  When they are having fun, they don't look for the rails.




So why hide the rails?

It's a whole lot less work to be fully up front and let the players willingly follow along then to constantly have to be thinking about ways and techniques to obfuscate what your doing!



bloodtide said:


> I'm not sure what framework is, but as long as the DM uses their superior gaming skills to make sure the players don't find out, the game works out.




Why waste energy being so needlessly adversarial? If the group likes how you run, why hide how you run? The enjoyment of the game is the point, not the "magic show."

This whole concept of having to be ahead of the players and "superior" to them in gaming is baffling to me. It just seems to add an unnecessary layer and require even more (and different) skills to the already daunting task of running a good game.

I recognize that it's presented as a "short cut." But it seems to require even more effort than the alternative!




bloodtide said:


> Like the poster that mentioned adult players not having much time and energy.  I agree.  But I also say that goes for all ages.  After all, I develpoed my game stlye quite young.  After just a couple games with players doing the "freedom of choice" to NOT play the game, I knew that way was not for me.  So enter the railroad of fun.
> 
> Time is also a big factor.  I'm not a big fan of the players choosing to socialize, not play the game and waste my time.  Just take a default satertudar night game from 6pm to midnight(six hours).
> 
> ...




This problem seems to be with unfocused players not any need for illusionism. Having a focused linear adventure is not railroading and there are plenty of techniques to help players stay focused.

Any players that refuse to abide by the agreed upon parameters of the adventure need to be addressed and then hopefully the group moves on. Again not a railroading issue, a player issue. One that exists just as much if the DM railroads.


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## bloodtide (Jul 16, 2022)

iserith said:


> You can _absolutely _have a focused and fast-paced game _without _railroading though.



True.  But it is like saying a bunch of cooks can just create a great meal with whatever stuff they bring to the kitchen.  It COULD happen.  Though it would happen every time when the master chief tells the cooks what to bring and has a plan for the meal.   



Mort said:


> So why hide the rails?
> 
> It's a whole lot less work to be fully up front and let the players willingly follow along then to constantly have to be thinking about ways and techniques to obfuscate what your doing!




Same reason magic does it.  If the magician turned the table around, so you saw the box with the rabbit in the table, you would not be amazed when the magician set their hat on the table, reached down to the rabbit and held it up.  Then the magician is not making a rabbit "appear from nowhere", they are just picking up a rabbit.

Also the same way most people do not look plot synopsis, spoiler reviews or final game scores before they watch a movie or a "big game".  





Mort said:


> Why waste energy being so needlessly adversarial? If the group likes how you run, why hide how you run? The enjoyment of the game is the point, not the "magic show."
> 
> This whole concept of having to be ahead of the players and "superior" to them in gaming is baffling to me. It just seems to add an unnecessary layer and require even more (and different) skills to the already daunting task of running a good game.
> 
> I recognize that it's presented as a "short cut." But it seems to require even more effort than the alternative!




It's not hiding, it's trickery and deception and fooling them.  Again, many are clueless.  But even the ones that know it is happening might not always see it.

I don't say Superior in a bad adversarial way.  Many DMs do have Superior skill, story crafting, writing, planning, game mastery, rules mastery and other such things.  Really, this is one of the basics of being a DM.


Mort said:


> This problem seems to be with unfocused players



The Railroad is a near perfect fix, so why change it?


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## Reynard (Jul 16, 2022)

jgsugden said:


> The definition of immersion is deep mental involvement.  Engagement is a deep emotional investment. There is a nuance, but they're highly related and everything I described would be applicable to someone that is highly immersed in a game of D&D.
> And you can happen to pull off a good event with entirely improvised moments.  Entirely possible.  All DMing involves some improvising, afterall.  We don't prepare every little feature.  However, you can also far more easily %$@! the pooch.
> 
> The question here is whether planning to improvise will tend to result in a better, or even equal, game than planning out a session in advance so that it ties together _better_.  And, as is the case pretty much everywhere in life, the actual truthful answer is that more preparation gives you a better product in the end.  There is a point of diminishing returns, but we're talking about the basic approach to a game preparation, and you're kidding yourself if you think that wandering into a session and wining it is going to work.  That is the same mentality that some C students in school have towards an exam ... "I don't need to study ... I can just figure it out."
> ...



You completely missed, ignored, or aren't familiar with another style in which the GM defines the parameters of the situation, motivations of the NPCs and features of the environment to such a degree that they can improvise both coherently and confidently. You seem to be intimating that "preparation" is somehow limited to defining which monsters are in which rooms, and it's just not so. Moreover, your doubling down on the idea that immersion is somehow a necessary goal shows that you have a particular view of what a successful game looks like. Which is fine -- for you. But it isn't universal or a point from which to determine broadly applicable truths.


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## overgeeked (Jul 16, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> I'm not sure what framework is, but as long as the DM uses their superior gaming skills to make sure the players don't find out, the game works out.



I'm surprised it took that long. "I'm better at gaming than you, so you will sit down, shut up, and enjoy the ride...whether you like it or not."

Frustrated novelist referees are a thing. Maybe you should write a novel. You might get more enjoyment out of it than "running an RPG."


bloodtide said:


> The Railroad is a near perfect fix, so why change it?



Because it's not a fix and it isn't perfect. It's a self-defeating strategy that requires a lot more energy than simply being honest with your players.


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## Umbran (Jul 16, 2022)

overgeeked said:


> Frustrated novelist referees are a thing. Maybe you should write a novel.




*Mod Note:*
Please stop telling people why they do things.  

If you want to make discussions personal, you can do it on reddit or twitter or something. You should stop doing so here.


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## Remathilis (Jul 16, 2022)

overgeeked said:


> Frustrated novelist referees are a thing. Maybe you should write a novel. You might get more enjoyment out of it than "running an RPG."



That's rich considering how many DMs are absolute control freaks about PC backstories.


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## Reynard (Jul 16, 2022)

Remathilis said:


> That's rich considering how many DMs are absolute control freaks about PC backstories.



To be fair, back stories can get a little out of hand. While I don't think the GM should control them, I think it's important to make sure that backstory fits into the game presented.

Or, alternatively,  dispense with them entirely.


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## Mort (Jul 16, 2022)

Reynard said:


> To be fair, back stories can get a little out of hand. While I don't think the GM should control them, I think it's important to make sure that backstory fits into the game presented.
> 
> Or, alternatively,  dispense with them entirely.




I tend to allow no more than a short paragraph of backstory for any given PC.

IMO, the PCs are meant to be developed during play, not come fully formed before the first session even starts.

Usually though, the group will come up with some concept for themselves as a whole, such as Knights of the Silver Flame, employees of Morgrave University, members of the Greyhawk adventurer's guild - that sort of thing. Tends to bring the group together better and focus play much better/easier than a bunch of completely separate back stories.


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## Reynard (Jul 16, 2022)

Mort said:


> I tend to allow no more than a short paragraph of backstory for any given PC.
> 
> IMO, the PCs are meant to be developed during play, not come fully formed before the first session even starts.
> 
> Usually though, the group will come up with some concept for themselves as a whole, such as Knights of the Silver Flame, employees of Morgrave University, members of the Greyhawk adventurer's guild - that sort of thing. Tends to bring the group together better and focus play much better/easier than a bunch of completely separate back stories.



One useful thing about those overly long backstories is that they tell you a lot about what the player sees in their head when they think "fantasy."


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## overgeeked (Jul 16, 2022)

Mort said:


> I tend to allow no more than a short paragraph of backstory for any given PC.
> 
> IMO, the PCs are meant to be developed during play, not come fully formed before the first session even starts.
> 
> Usually though, the group will come up with some concept for themselves as a whole, such as Knights of the Silver Flame, employees of Morgrave University, members of the Greyhawk adventurer's guild - that sort of thing. Tends to bring the group together better and focus play much better/easier than a bunch of completely separate back stories.



I always start D&D PCs off at 1st level and limit backstories to 100 words. Even then the players tends to go nuts.


Reynard said:


> One useful thing about those overly long backstories is that they tell you a lot about what the player sees in their head when they think "fantasy."



In theory the PC's backstory will also tell you the kinds of adventure hooks the character will never pass up. But I've found that's not true. The players will often ignore their own backstory whenever it's convenient.


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## Mort (Jul 16, 2022)

Reynard said:


> One useful thing about those overly long backstories is that they tell you a lot about what the player sees in their head when they think "fantasy."




Possibly,

I prefer to just have a conversation with the player and ask their preferences, influences, likes and dislikes. Saves me having to guess.


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## jgsugden (Jul 17, 2022)

Reynard said:


> You completely missed, ignored, or aren't familiar with another style in which the GM defines the parameters of the situation, motivations of the NPCs and features of the environment to such a degree that they *can* improvise both coherently and confidently.



I'm going to play the veteran card and say I've seen 40 years of gaming in a huge variety of situations.  It is my broad experience that reinforces my perspective.  Further, I've said it is more than possible to have a good session with the improvised style ... your _can_ was accurate ... but overall you'll get a superior product more regularly through craft and preparation rather than relying upon the tactics of the OP as your primary methodology. 


> You seem to be intimating that "preparation" is somehow limited to defining which monsters are in which rooms, and it's just not so.



Think about what I said.  Think about how you interpreted it.  Really give it a try.  Then ask why your statement absolutely missed the point. Reducing what I described to "which monsters are in which rooms" ... I'm talking about what makes a story make sense which is a lot more than 'bugbears here, orcs there'. 







> Moreover, your doubling down on the idea that immersion is somehow a necessary goal shows that you have a particular view of what a successful game looks like. Which is fine -- for you. But it isn't universal or a point from which to determine broadly applicable truths.



Again, my 40 years of experience with a broad range of DMs playing with a broad range of players in a broad range of circumstances differs with your opinion.  


I can't recall ever seeing a table where a DM prepared an adventure for their player group with attention to detail and conducted the game skillfully (both from a rules and storytelling perspective) where the game was not highly successful.  There can be down moments (usually when they have to adapt to something unexpected), but the degree of success (as measured by the enjoyment of the players) is very high in these circumstances.  The games - and the campaigns overall - work.  

I have seen _a lot_ of games where an overconfident DM sat down at a table, 'winged it' while relying upon their charm and rules knowledge, and left their players either bored, frustrated, confused or dismissive.  Not every session of a 'winged' game fails, but the approach results in failed sessions too often, and no DM that comes unprepared escapes the fruits of their lack of labor.  These are the tables at Cons where the players leave mid-session.  These are the games at home where players don't know it is their turn because they're not paying attention.  These are the games where the players start to have their PCs do stupid things to entertain themselves because they're bored.  These are the games where you see players sharing sideways glances with each other as the DM describes something.  These are the campaigns that peter out at level 5 to 9 with people looking for something new because there is nothing holding their interest.  

Clearly, you don't want to hear this from me.  That is cool.  Think about all the other people in your life, and across the globe, that have said essentially the same dang thing:  Put in the work.  Be prepared.  You get out what you put in.  By failing to prepare, you prepare to fail.  H.  Thorough preparation makes its own luck.  Not that hole.  Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity.  Preparation precedes power.  OK, maybe that hole, but only because you came prepared.  The minute you get away from fundamentals – whether its proper technique, work ethic, or mental preparation – the bottom can fall out of your game, your schoolwork, your job, whatever you’re doing.  

The importance of preparation gets repeated over and over ... and not because some people find it to be true sometimes, but because it is, essentially, universally true that in the long term you get a better result through preparation and planning than through winging it.

Not all preparation is going to look the same.  There are many different ways to prepare.  There are too many variables to prepare for them all.  However, the DMs that have learned how to prepare efficiently and stylistically are the ones that people remember.  I promise.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 17, 2022)

pemerton said:


> Because that part makes no difference to the question. Your "world" is just story that you've written. You've written a story in which the players can't have their PCs succeed at a thing that they want their PCs to achieve. As I asked, how is this not "railroading (or similar)? It's the GM deciding that the action declaration will fail in advance of play and regardless of how the players frame their attempt.



again... my world was made _and pitcched with other worlds_ and players signed on but if players put resources into something unexpected or against type i will CHANGE THE WORLD....


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## Reynard (Jul 17, 2022)

jgsugden said:


> I can't recall ever seeing a table where a DM prepared an adventure for their player group with attention to detail and conducted the game skillfully (both from a rules and storytelling perspective) where the game was not highly successful.



Without getting into GM screen measuring contests -- it is a weird flex btw -- I am going to suggest that the latter half of your statement there was the deciding factor. I have seen GMs over prepare themselves into bad games as often as you have seen them under prepare into bad games, I am sure, because the preparation isn't the sole defining factor. Each individual GM, especially a skilled one, will find the level of prep that works best for them and it will vary from GM to.GM, sometimes significantly. Hell, it will vary for a single GM from game to game or even from campaign to campaign of the same game. All I am.saying is there isn't a hard and fast rule and you can't just decree prep is the key to success.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 17, 2022)

pemerton said:


> The players know in advance that those things are outside the scope of play. This is not the same as what @GMforPowergamers posted:
> GMforPowergamers is posting that the players are permitted to think that their action declarations can make the difference they are hoping for - ie their PCs find their way to another world - but has actually decided that those action declarations cannot make any such difference. This seems to fit the definition of "railroad" most posters in this thread are using, that is, letting the players think their action declarations are meaningful when in fact they are not.



no that is not what I said at all... there choices DO matter. THey choose to look for X and find Y instead is very diffrent then 'no matter what they look for they find Y"

IF my players ask to find a blacksmith in town but I know if they go looking they will find out that there used to be one that died in a mysterious fire.
If my player instead ask for a church of pelor and they find out the two churches in town are to bane and shar I am not railroading them.
If my player instead asked "is there a mage guild" and I just answeers "no, but there is a lone crookied towr that looks like it might be or have been a mage tower once... that is not railroading.

the fact that what they asked mattered and they wouldn't find out about the fire if they don't look for a blacksmith, and might not notice the churches if no one looks is what makes choice matteer.


pemerton said:


> GM for Powergamers also goes on:
> The whole language of "I would let the game unfold" seems to me to the language of railroading. The GM is deciding what happens.



the DM ALWAYs unfolds the game... how is the DM reacting tto the PCs chopice railroading?


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## beaumontsebos (Jul 17, 2022)

I’ve had to resort to invisible railroading on occasion and it’s never been a problem for me or my players. If you’re having fun in a game and realize during the game that your on an invisible railroad and become crappy about it, that’s on you. You are ruining the fun you were having by holding onto your idealized version of D&D. How about just enjoy the fun while your having it?


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## TheAlkaizer (Jul 17, 2022)

beaumontsebos said:


> I’ve had to resort to invisible railroading on occasion and it’s never been a problem for me or my players. If you’re having fun in a game and realize during the game that your on an invisible railroad and become crappy about it, that’s on you. You are ruining the fun you were having by holding onto your idealized version of D&D. How about just enjoy the fun while your having it?



If you were having fun in my game and then I start spraying you with water and you become crappy about it, that's on you. You are ruining the fun you were having by holding on to your idealized and dry version of D&D.

Obviously, I'm being dishonest with an hyperbole. But I don't think saying to anyone it's their fault that they're not having fun a good approach. Fun is a ridiculously complex topic and last time I read papers on the topic of play, it was impossible to force someone (or yourself) to have fun.

I think if a player was enjoying himself thinking most of his choices mattered, and when he realized they don't it ruins the fun and he's not enjoying himself; then shouldn't be considered as a very obvious clue that you shouldn't mettle too much with your players' agency as opposed to holding it out against them that they're not having fun?


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## beaumontsebos (Jul 17, 2022)

TheAlkaizer said:


> If you were having fun in my game and then I start spraying you with water and you become crappy about it, that's on you. You are ruining the fun you were having by holding on to your idealized and dry version of D&D.



This is bad analogy. I was spraying water on you the whole time and you enjoyed it.


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## Cadence (Jul 17, 2022)

beaumontsebos said:


> This is bad analogy. I was spraying water on you the whole time and you enjoyed it.



Well they thought it was water...


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## beaumontsebos (Jul 17, 2022)

Cadence said:


> We'll they thought it was water...



Haaaahaaaaaaa!


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## Reynard (Jul 17, 2022)

beaumontsebos said:


> This is bad analogy. I was spraying water on you the whole time and you enjoyed it.



You're right. A better analogy would be that I was feeding you beef stew you were really enjoying. When I tell you that it was actually rat, it's on you for being upset.


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## beaumontsebos (Jul 17, 2022)

Reynard said:


> You're right. A better analogy would be that I was feeding you beef stew you were really enjoying. When I tell you that it was actually rat, it's on you for being upset.



Ha! A better analogy.


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## overgeeked (Jul 17, 2022)

Reynard said:


> You're right. A better analogy would be that I was feeding you beef stew you were really enjoying. When I tell you that it was actually rat, it's on you for being upset.



That's a great analogy. Now a further question: who's actually the jerk here? The one objecting to eating rat or the person covertly feeding people rat? At a guess, it's the person lying about what's really in the meal.


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## beaumontsebos (Jul 17, 2022)

overgeeked said:


> That's a great analogy. Now a further question: who's actually the jerk here? The one objecting to eating rat or the person covertly feeding people rat? At a guess, it's the person lying about what's really in the meal.



I don’t think secretly feeding people rats is really equivalent to invisible railroading.


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## Cadence (Jul 17, 2022)

beaumontsebos said:


> I don’t think secretly feeding people rats is really equivalent to invisible railroading.



Very true. Unlike railroading, you might be forgiven for the rats.


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## overgeeked (Jul 17, 2022)

beaumontsebos said:


> I don’t think secretly feeding people rats is really equivalent to invisible railroading.



I do. If you tell your players you're running an RPG then the players expect and should have agency. If they don't have agency, i.e. the referee is railroading, the referee is lying to them about what's on the table. Telling them a story instead of running an RPG. Feeding them rat instead of beef stew.


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## bloodtide (Jul 17, 2022)

overgeeked said:


> That's a great analogy. Now a further question: who's actually the jerk here? The one objecting to eating rat or the person covertly feeding people rat? At a guess, it's the person lying about what's really in the meal.



Well, to add in the railroad bit.

Lets say I made a meal, but did not tell you what it is, and you can't figure out what it is...but you know it's not Official Store Bought Meat.  You eat it and find the meal great.

Then I tell you it's rat, or possum or squirrel or crawfish.  You knew it was unknown meat to you, but still it tasted great.  If I handed you a breaded crawfish nugget you would act out on how grouse it was and how you would never, ever eat it.  But when you eat it unknowingly, it tastes just fine.  So the over reaction to how bad it was, before you even tried it, was just silly.


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## overgeeked (Jul 17, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> Well, to add in the railroad bit.
> 
> Lets say I made a meal, but did not tell you what it is, and you can't figure out what it is...but you know it's not Official Store Bought Meat.  You eat it and find the meal great.
> 
> Then I tell you it's rat, or possum or squirrel or crawfish.  You knew it was unknown meat to you, but still it tasted great.  If I handed you a breaded crawfish nugget you would act out on how grouse it was and how you would never, ever eat it.  But when you eat it unknowingly, it tastes just fine.  So the over reaction to how bad it was, before you even tried it, was just silly.



Or, you know, if it's so awesome you wouldn't feel the need to lie about what it is in the first place.


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## beaumontsebos (Jul 17, 2022)

overgeeked said:


> I do. If you tell your players you're running an RPG then the players expect and should have agency. If they don't have agency, i.e. the referee is railroading, the referee is lying to them about what's on the table. Telling them a story instead of running an RPG. Feeding them rat instead of beef stew.



I’d much rather enjoy a game with occasional invisible railroading than eat rat stew. But you know, to each their own.


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 17, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> So what your saying is, the players are fine with certain choices not mattering (or mattering only as a minor story detail) as long as they get to where they ultimately want to go.



It is, in general, impossible to make literally absolutely every single choice be world-shatteringly important. As has been discussed to death in other threads, sometimes the player chooses to wear white instead of black and...that choice has no impact. Some choices are color and flavor, some are made equivalent by accident or dramatic irony (e.g. "We can't trust Bruce Wayne with this information...but we can totally trust _ Batman_ with it!" A _seeming_ choice due to dramatic irony can be very good for future drama), some are initially superficial but can grow into being more important. The only way to know the difference for sure in ALL cases is sound judgment, and your judgment will never be perfect. That's okay. Making a mistake now and then is fine, I don't demand perfection. Usually it's pretty clear though.



Stalker0 said:


> Could you say the same thing about the 3 door scenario? As long as the players ultimately get to the treasure and beat up the monster, do they really care if the monster wasn't behind door number 1 until they chose it?



There are three reasons why this "choice" runs afoul, at least according to my own best judgement:

It is presented as though the doors do in fact lead to _truly different_ rooms, with different contents and (if applicable) different opponents.
It's honestly just not a very interesting choice without any further information, because the players have no way of making an informed decision. It's effectively random, so it's fundamentally just not very interesting, and yet it's being presented as though it's worthy of making a choice about it (even though it isn't.)
Unlike the above "should we take the safer scenic route," there is no possibility of unexpected (by the DM, to be clear) follow-on consequences. The only results of playing Illusionist Pick-A-Door are that you get to see the only room the DM will let you see. The consequences of taking the scenic safe route, however, could be much more interesting and wholly unplanned by the DM. Having such consequences shows respect for players making a decision, even if that decision did not initially have any impact, so long as the consequences do in fact follow reasonably from thr choice.
But really, the biggest and simplest issue is the first point. The scenic route vs quick route choice, the players know for sure (indeed, they specifically desire) that the two routes take them to the same place, that's their goal, it just so happens that the risk of danger they're presuming is not actually present (or is much lower, or is unaffected by which road they take, etc.)

Worth noting: in a context like this, I am very likely to just tell my players that it wouldn't make a difference which route they take. The hypothetical clearly indicates they've been paying attention to the roads and doing stuff to help keep things safer. If things are safe enough that it's not going to matter which road is taken, then there's a good chance I would just straight-up tell them, "You don't need to worry about bandits, your efforts have helped make most roads safer for the time being, so there's no need to take extra time unless you have some other reason to do so." This skips a lengthy and unnecessary debate and respects the players' agency by keeping them informed of things they should reasonably know about, eliminating (some) false choices.

As noted above though, dramatic irony can be a great thing in context. It should be used with care and only occasionally, a tasty spice rather than a main course, but it can be fun. A critical component though is that dramatic irony only works when the truth is eventually revealed to the players. If the gap between expectation and reality is kept eternally hidden, there is no benefit. For a tabletop game, if you as DM prevent the players from ever discovering that their choice was ironically not a choice at all, then functionally there might as well not be any irony in the first place, since your author fiat powers are preventing it from ever mattering.



Stalker0 said:


> If you have never had a group of players get into a long debate about an absolutely pointless decision, than no wonder you don't see the value in a soft railroad



I just don't see the point of encouraging pointless debate when the characters themselves should know better. And I don't, at all, see that as a "soft railroad." It follows from their referenced prior decisions (they did stuff to make an area safer.) Having safer roads is in fact respecting their decisions by having real, durable consequences for those decisions.



Cadence said:


> I'm not really concerned what label those are given, but would the set-up be viewed as giving false choices or stealing player agency? Or would it be viewed as not far from on the fly or color?



Since the woods are only finite in size, if the players continue investigating indefinitely, the only reasonable assumption is that they do not move in a single straight line, so the fact that they might find the witch's hovel eventually is not too weird. I might include a reference to something if they have been super insistent about only travelling one direction (e.g. "you come to what you assume is the edge of the forest, as the trees begin to thin and aren't as tall as before, so you veer a little west, back into the thicker parts of the wood...") Or they just get a little lost! Nothing weird about that. People get turned around all the time even when they know where they're going.

As referenced above though, having gotten feedback from players on this overall topic, I have decided to actually pre-roll multiple possible maps and only determine which map is the actual thing just before the players enter the space, that way it's still a surprise even to me but the consequences of choosing to go west vs. north are real and not fictive. A player specifically pointed out that such "it's not really there until we choose to go that way" stuff was not to his liking and, although he had fun, he would prefer not to have that sort of thing again. (To be clear, I specifically request feedback after any major adventure and the player discussed it with me privately, never making any kind of issue about it during play. So I very specifically asked for feedback and was given it in a specifically positive and non-judgemental way.)




jgsugden said:


> DM 3: When well executed - which takes a lot more than just planning - a well planned game will give your players answers to all of their questions and pull them in deeper into the game. Quality preparation can make sure that every moment at the table matters. It can make sure that you don't end up with pointless side quests where the players end up confused why they're doing them. It can give you a chance to develop storylines that engage players more than the encounters.
> 
> I've played for over 40 years. Consistently, when DMs put in the effort, it shows. I have enjoyed games run by DMs that do not prepare much ... but I've seen some of those DMs really improve when they added the pregame effort.



It seems to me that there is a HUGE HUGE HUGE gap between your Type II Demon DM 2 and DM 3. That is, the first and second DMs are very similar, one does no planning at all ever for any reason, the other does a small bit of planning and nothing more, and the third does HARDCORE TOLKIENESQUE EVERYTHING IS PLANNED FROM MINUTE ONE stuff. One of these things is not like the others.

I have plot elements in my game. I have a world with rules, with secrets waiting to be revealed, with forces dark and light clashing. Some things I prepare for a lot, like that murder mystery I mentioned. However, as noted, I have a tendency to plan....a lot. Every little detail. That is not good for the game because it will make me inflexible and unable to respond to situations where my beautiful plan ceases to apply. Hence, I have forced myself to improvise. Usually, I'll do the planning but keep it restricted to events and participants, leaving the exact process or layout of places open and flexible. I do prepare maps some of the time, but try to do so only as necessary.

I have thought quite a lot about the cosmology and contents of the world, and continually work to improve it, factoring in player contributions and on-the-fly improvisation. And yet, despite all that, I certainly don't think I meet the bar you've set for your DM 3 here. It seems incredibly and, frankly, unrealistically high.



Remathilis said:


> So it really comes down to "do the players have the option to refuse the plot hook and if so, does that end the campaign.
> 
> I ran a pirate campaign and, at a certain point, had a long series of adventures where a magical storm shipwrecked them on the Isle of Dread*. At a certain point, the storm pops up and a ship gets wrecked. The PCs have zero say in this matter unless they opt to never go on their boat and instead stay in port for the rest of the campaign.
> 
> ...



There will always be SOME amount of having to agree to accept story events. The players cannot possibly be the only active, dynamic participants in the world, and if they aren't the only ones, there will be events they didn't cause that will affect them and the possible choices they can make. That doesn't make this move a railroad, because (again...) the players have consented to playing a pirate adventure and "a storm at sea" is an event that is extremely plausible from both a naturalistic-reasoning standpoint (sailing is dangerous and shipwrecks are a common result from dangerous storms) and from a genre-conventions standpoint (many great stories begin with a shipwreck, e.g. every voyage of Sinbad the Sailor, _20000 Leagues Under the Sea, Robinson Crusoe, The Tempest, Tarzan_, etc.)

Now, did they directly and explicitly consent to this specific event in advance? No. But that isn't required to avoid railroading.

Let me turn this example around. If a player had become legitimately upset, as in "why are you doing this, this isn't what I signed up for," how would you respond to that? Because it seems to me that you would respectfully have a conversation about it with them. I suspect you would even invoke much of the reasoning I used above, that the game being offered is consistent with these events.

Now, part of the problem here is that you're inserting a module (the Isle of Dread) into an otherwise (AIUI) non-module game. That's always going to be tricky because modules are inherently a bit railroad-y, but that's usually not a problem because the game is presented as being module-based. Unfortunately, in order to insert the module, you have to properly "trigger" it, and you are choosing to use a method that requires a fairly strong degree of DM force in order to guarantee it. Personally, I would have approached it differently, as follows:

1. Next time the players are looking for information or exposed to appropriate sources of gossip (essentially guaranteed in most games), they overhear rumors about the Isle of Dread or something relating to it (rumors of treasure, for instance). Make mention of the stormy seas of late as well.
2. If the players follow up on those rumors, awesome, the plot is on and you can have a nasty storm hit them. If they don't, then perhaps a wealthy client seeks them out to ask for help finding this island, or some other adventure hook finds its way to them.
3. At this point, if the players still avoid or ignore the hook, they clearly don't _want_ to go to the Isle right now. Keep it in your back pocket, perhaps as a negative consequence of a bad sequence of rolls or the like, but allow the issue to rest. It's okay for the players to decide that they aren't interested in something you think would be cool.
4. If the conditions become right for the Isle story to happen, awesome, you have a fun thing to do, and you will have respected the players' agency. If it doesn't happen, oh well. That's life. The road not taken, as Frost put it.



bloodtide said:


> True.  But it is like saying a bunch of cooks can just create a great meal with whatever stuff they bring to the kitchen.  It COULD happen.  Though it would happen every time when the master chief tells the cooks what to bring and has a plan for the meal.



This is a false dichotomy. There are more options than "literally thrown together from whatever is on hand" and "deceiving the guests into thinking they freely ordered the only dish you were ever going to serve."



bloodtide said:


> Same reason magic does it.  If the magician turned the table around, so you saw the box with the rabbit in the table, you would not be amazed when the magician set their hat on the table, reached down to the rabbit and held it up.  Then the magician is not making a rabbit "appear from nowhere", they are just picking up a rabbit.



Except there is, again, a key difference here.

The magician MUST do these things in order to perform the so-called "magic." Because magic doesn't exist in our world (as far as we know, anyway, and I'm 100% sure if it did Facebook or some other soulless corporate machine would be exploiting it for profit!)

The DM, on the other hand, does NOT have to do this. The "trick" is completely unnecessary. You can achieve the exact same end with some careful, improv-supporting preparation, forethought, communication with your players, and keeping good notes. The "trick," far from being required, is in fact a huge and unnecessary risk.



bloodtide said:


> Also the same way most people do not look plot synopsis, spoiler reviews or final game scores before they watch a movie or a "big game".



Except those things are fundamentally different because they _already exist._ There is no decision to be made, just the information. People choose not to look those things up because they want suspense, not because they want to make meaningful choices. There is no deception involved, and the audience already knows that the events are fixed and cannot even in principle respond to the choices they make.



bloodtide said:


> It's not hiding, it's trickery and deception and fooling them.  Again, many are clueless.  But even the ones that know it is happening might not always see it.



.... I'm sorry, what? How is that NOT hiding???



bloodtide said:


> I don't say Superior in a bad adversarial way.  Many DMs do have Superior skill, story crafting, writing, planning, game mastery, rules mastery and other such things.  Really, this is one of the basics of being a DM.



I don't see how it is possible for this to not be adversarial (it's literally deceiving people!), and referring to it as being "superior" would honestly sound like a parody if I didn't know you were totally serious. Being perfectly frank, if you see yourself as Simply Better than your players, that belief is a significantly greater problem than railroading. That belief, that one is _simply better_ than other people, is a serious problem in human society.



bloodtide said:


> The Railroad is a near perfect fix, so why change it?



Because it isn't. It is in fact an incredibly risky fix that requires eternal and flawless vigilance to maintain. The moment the players realize they've actually been on rails when they believed they had not, the trust between them and the DM disappears, and all their decisions are revealed to have been false and hollow. That will sour not only the past, but the future as well, leaving that eternal seed of doubt: "Is the DM deceiving me again?" I hate even the thought of having that Sword if Damocles hanging over my head. And I can 100% say that it would upset me greatly if I found out that a DM used these techniques on me.

Further, it only takes _one_ slip up. One mistake. Oh and in top of that, the players outnumber you. Even if you are "superior" (good Lord, what a smug way to put it!) to them _individually_, they are essentially guaranteed to be "superior" to you _collectively_. They can, as a group, remember more, observe more, and reason both more and faster; they are literally more capable than you alone can be.

Let's say you only have a 1 in 10000 chance, any given session, of slipping up and revealing your railroading to a single player. If that were your chance per session in general, you could in fact be pretty confident it would never happen (as in, even with perfect weekly sessions every week for 60 years, the odds of anyone, at all, ever discovering it are only ~26.8%.) But you must deceive five people (or whatever, I'm going with five.) Suddenly, the odds go from being low to being very high; you have a (very nearly) 79% chance of being discovered. And that's with some very favorable unrealistic assumptions, namely that past sessions can never be reevaluated and discovered, and that the chance is always fixed super low, rather than varying from one session to the next.

Again: why not just play with your cards face up? It really isn't difficult. I've been doing it for years and, as I said earlier, I am not nearly so prideful as to think that I am somehow special or gifted as a DM. It would be more work to cover up the railroad than to just run an honest game!


beaumontsebos said:


> I’ve had to resort to invisible railroading on occasion and it’s never been a problem for me or my players. If you’re having fun in a game and realize during the game that your on an invisible railroad and become crappy about it, that’s on you. You are ruining the fun you were having by holding onto your idealized version of D&D. How about just enjoy the fun while your having it?



How about just don't deceive people? That seems like a pretty good rule to live by.



bloodtide said:


> Well, to add in the railroad bit.
> 
> Lets say I made a meal, but did not tell you what it is, and you can't figure out what it is...but you know it's not Official Store Bought Meat.  You eat it and find the meal great.
> 
> Then I tell you it's rat, or possum or squirrel or crawfish.  You knew it was unknown meat to you, but still it tasted great.  If I handed you a breaded crawfish nugget you would act out on how grouse it was and how you would never, ever eat it.  But when you eat it unknowingly, it tastes just fine.  So the over reaction to how bad it was, before you even tried it, was just silly.



My parents drilled into me not to judge food I have never tried before unless I have extremely good evidence for doing so. E.g., I won't eat fugu fish sashimi, despite having no idea what it tastes like. This has nothing to do with its flavor, and everything to do with the fact that fugu, if prepared incorrectly, is lethally toxic. If someone offered me "sushi" that was in fact fugu sashimi and then told me what it was after I ate it, I would feel fully justified in being very upset; even if that person were absolutely certain the food is safe, it's not acceptable to conceal the potential risk from me until after I've eaten it.

More pertinently, yes, I would still feel deceived if someone fed me rat or possum or squirrel without saying what it was, even if they said it was meat that wasn't bought at a store. I would not be happy with them, even if I legitimately actually liked the meat, because that kind of omission is a breach of trust in my book. I would recognize that the flavor was good, but I would still be angry at the person gave it to me because I want to make informed decisions. (I've personally, knowingly eaten crayfish, they're okay but not really my preference, so that example doesn't really apply to me.)

Realistically, if they refused to identify the meat, I would refuse to eat it unless I was starving, so the example is already flawed from the outset. And yes, I DO actually ask what is in my food before I eat it. I read the nutrition information panels and do my research. I don't have a health or philosophical reason, I just want to know what I'm eating, and give others the same courtesy when I cook for them. I see DMing in exactly the same way. I would never serve someone food if I wasn't willing to tell someone what was in it. Even if I believed that might make them not want to eat it. It is a matter of respect and honesty.


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## Reynard (Jul 17, 2022)

beaumontsebos said:


> I’d much rather enjoy a game with occasional invisible railroading than eat rat stew. But you know, to each their own.



I don't actually think occasional invisible railroading is unforgivable. As with all things in real world play at the table, lines get fuzzy in the heat of the moment and the "never fudge" GM lets the last monster die at 1 HP because why extend it for another inevitable round, or time is running short and the "never railroad" GM eliminates a side passage in the dungeon to get to a certain place at session break.

 I just take issue with the idea that "it's their fault for getting upset."


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## overgeeked (Jul 17, 2022)

Reynard said:


> I don't actually think occasional invisible railroading is unforgivable. As with all things in real world play at the table, lines get fuzzy in the heat of the moment and the "never fudge" GM lets the last monster die at 1 HP because why extend it for another inevitable round, or time is running short and the "never railroad" GM eliminates a side passage in the dungeon to get to a certain place at session break.



I 100% disagree with this.


Reynard said:


> I just take issue with the idea that "it's their fault for getting upset."



I 100% agree with this.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 17, 2022)

Reynard said:


> You're right. A better analogy would be that I was feeding you beef stew you were really enjoying. When I tell you that it was actually rat, it's on you for being upset.



I will say time and again that "Here eat this thing you say you don't like" as a trick is a BIG pet peeve... especially since my niece has food allergies and just says she doesn't want or like things that will give her hives (she is embaraced by it) its a good thing it isn't a worse reaction


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 17, 2022)

Reynard said:


> I don't actually think occasional invisible railroading is unforgivable. As with all things in real world play at the table, lines get fuzzy in the heat of the moment and the "never fudge" GM lets the last monster die at 1 HP because why extend it for another inevitable round, or time is running short and the "never railroad" GM eliminates a side passage in the dungeon to get to a certain place at session break.
> 
> I just take issue with the idea that "it's their fault for getting upset."



I don't want to play with or run a 100% never fudge DM... but I also wont be and would need to be convinced pretty hard to play under a DM that fudged alot. Same with invisible railroading.

As I said up thread in my example, if a PC died, and I needed to introduce the new party member then what ever direction the PCs go they run into him/her... that is the quantum ogre right there but one I think we can all agree is needed


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 17, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> I don't want to play with or run a 100% never fudge DM... but I also wont be and would need to be convinced pretty hard to play under a DM that fudged alot. Same with invisible railroading.
> 
> As I said up thread in my example, if a PC died, and I needed to introduce the new party member then what ever direction the PCs go they run into him/her... that is the quantum ogre right there but one I think we can all agree is needed



If the players agree to the contrived scenario and enthusiastically support its inclusion, knowing that it is something worth doing and understanding what the consequences are...

How is that railroading? It sure as heck isn't fudging.

Like at this point people have basically started saying that DMs who do literally anything AT ALL are railroading. The term has been watered down to meaninglessness.

Edit: And I myself never fudge. Ever. I will do things like have a near-dead enemy get finished off without a roll....by TELLING my players "it's almost dead, tell me how you kill it/knock it out." I will do things like, as stated above, skipping unnecessary debates if the PCs have even the slightest chance of knowing that the debate is unnecessary. Etc. Absolutely none of that involves pretending that I am using the dice when I am secretly (and with intentional effort to keep players from knowing) ignoring the dice and just doing whatever I feel like doing.


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 17, 2022)

Reynard said:


> I don't actually think occasional invisible railroading is unforgivable. As with all things in real world play at the table, lines get fuzzy in the heat of the moment and the "never fudge" GM lets the last monster die at 1 HP because why extend it for another inevitable round,



That's not fudging, or at least if the DM just makes the tiny, tiny change of letting the players know what's going on, it doesn't have to be. I find my players are quite enthusiastic about getting that "glory kill" opportunity when a monster is near-dead and they get to just succeed on the final blow. Gives them an opportunity to strut a bit, you know?



Reynard said:


> or time is running short and the "never railroad" GM eliminates a side passage in the dungeon to get to a certain place at session break.



How would you handle this if you had already made a map that the players could see?

More seriously, this is so far from what "railroading" means to me that I struggle to understand why you call it such.



Reynard said:


> I just take issue with the idea that "it's their fault for getting upset."



On this at least we are in full agreement.


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## Reynard (Jul 17, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> Edit: And I myself never fudge. Ever. I will do things like have a near-dead enemy get finished off without a roll....by TELLING my players "it's almost dead, tell me how you kill it/knock it out."



Just on the subject of definitions, i absolutely consider that fudging in the same way that just deciding the hit that left 1 HP just took them out. If you as GM decide it's dead and don't require another full round to let the players and dice decide if it dies or kills a PC or whatever, you fudged. If eel like we all shift definitions to make sure we are innocent of whatever unforgivable crime we accused others of, and that's just silly. better, I think. to admit imperfection and just do our best.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 17, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> If the players agree to the contrived scenario and enthusiastically support its inclusion, knowing that it is something worth doing and understanding what the consequences are...
> 
> How is that railroading? It sure as heck isn't fudging.
> 
> Like at this point people have basically started saying that DMs who do literally anything AT ALL are railroading. The term has been watered down to meaninglessness.



1st everything I do I am open about so it is hard for me to really get into the mindset... the surprises I spring on my players are little bits of lore, hidden passages ect but if I have to fudge odds are the players will know about it within a month if not right then and there "Okay, that orc has 7hp left...but dead, lets just move on" has been said more then once.

However the "pick a door," and no matter what door is the door X is behind is something I may do from time to time... but only because it is needed to move the story forward and it wouldn't be 'doors' but more likely "where are you going now" when they can go anywhere on the map and no matter where they go... there is the new NPC or PC..."


EzekielRaiden said:


> Edit: And I myself never fudge. Ever. I will do things like have a near-dead enemy get finished off without a roll....by TELLING my players "it's almost dead, tell me how you kill it/knock it out." I will do things like, as stated above, skipping unnecessary debate s if the PCs have even the slightest chance of knowing that the debate is unnecessary. Etc. Absolutely none of that involves pretending that I am using the dice when I am secretly (and with intentional effort to keep players from knowing) ignoring the dice and just doing whatever I feel like doing.



I have also let a nat 1 get "Yea that is just a fail not a crit fail" on death saves when I know that the player would be REAL pissed if his character died... the most resent example I can think of is the time Steph's paladin/sorcerer died, then she brought in a new armor artificer, and 1st encounter she got double crit in the 1st round dropping her to 0... her turn came and she failed her first save, and the druid couldn't heal her that round (wild shapped) but was going to switch back on the next... and she rolled a 1 (2 death saves so dead...) she went red both ashamed and mad... I was like "No that's just 1 fail we can say that wasn't a 1" and she went on to finish out that campaign many levels later with that character...

Oh another 'fudge' was when I had rumors of a 'powerful healer' in a town near by but they were a divine soul sorcerer and only had low level spells but high level slots... and that was a 'hidden gotcha' until a PC got hit by a thing (maybe turned to stone...it was something) that only greater restoration could undo... so they went there. I could have played it straight and they would be SOL becuse that sorcerer couldn't do that spell... I just wrote in that spell and now he had it.


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 17, 2022)

Reynard said:


> Just on the subject of definitions, i absolutely consider that fudging in the same way that just deciding the hit that left 1 HP just took them out. If you as GM decide it's dead and don't require another full round to let the players and dice decide if it dies or kills a PC or whatever, you fudged. If eel like we all shift definitions to make sure we are innocent of whatever unforgivable crime we accused others of, and that's just silly. better, I think. to admit imperfection and just do our best.



Fudging requires deception. It cannot be fudging if there is no deception. This is the standard I have always used, I have used it in every thread discussing fudging, and no one has ever thought this was a weirdo stance that was just excusing myself.

How is "I don't fudge" inconsistent with this? I don't deceive my players about whether I'm using the rules or not. If I deviate from the rules, I make damn sure my players know that I am doing so.


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 17, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> 1st everything I do I am open about so it is hard for me to really get into the mindset... the surprises I spring on my players are little bits of lore, hidden passages ect but if I have to fudge odds are the players will know about it within a month if not right then and there "Okay, that orc has 7hp left...but dead, lets just move on" has been said more then once.



Which I am fine with. That's not fudging, because the players know what you are doing. I usually don't specify the exact amount of HP. But I have ended fights early in various ways _but only by telling the players that the fight was ending early_.



GMforPowergamers said:


> However the "pick a door," and no matter what door is the door X is behind is something I may do from time to time... but only because it is needed to move the story forward and it wouldn't be 'doors' but more likely "where are you going now" when they can go anywhere on the map and no matter where they go... there is the new NPC or PC..."



Why ask them where they are going then? Legit. If they are just going to run into the Quantum NPC, why not just say they run into them and dispense with the pretense?



GMforPowergamers said:


> I have also let a nat 1 get "Yea that is just a fail not a crit fail" on death saves when I know that the player would be REAL pissed if his character died... the most resent example I can think of is the time Steph's paladin/sorcerer died, then she brought in a new armor artificer, and 1st encounter she got double crit in the 1st round dropping her to 0... her turn came and she failed her first save, and the druid couldn't heal her that round (wild shapped) but was going to switch back on the next... and she rolled a 1 (2 death saves so dead...) she went red both ashamed and mad... I was like "No that's just 1 fail we can say that wasn't a 1" and she went on to finish out that campaign many levels later with that character...



Again: you specifically told her, coming to an agreement with rhe player in public, open discourse. I have never seen a definition of "fudging" that would count something like that. I would do this (indeed, I have done things like it.) I would never, ever fudge.



GMforPowergamers said:


> Oh another 'fudge' was when I had rumors of a 'powerful healer' in a town near by but they were a divine soul sorcerer and only had low level spells but high level slots... and that was a 'hidden gotcha' until a PC got hit by a thing (maybe turned to stone...it was something) that only greater restoration could undo... so they went there. I could have played it straight and they would be SOL becuse that sorcerer couldn't do that spell... I just wrote in that spell and now he had it.



Had the players actually met the NPC and learned of their limited Sorcerer spell list? If not, I see no problem with this. Things that have not yet been fixed in play may be altered, if necessary. I certainly don't think of this as any form of railroading.


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## Mort (Jul 17, 2022)

Reynard said:


> Just on the subject of definitions, i absolutely consider that fudging in the same way that just deciding the hit that left 1 HP just took them out. If you as GM decide it's dead and don't require another full round to let the players and dice decide if it dies or kills a PC or whatever, you fudged. If eel like we all shift definitions to make sure we are innocent of whatever unforgivable crime we accused others of, and that's just silly. better, I think. to admit imperfection and just do our best.




If you actually tell your players what you're doing, it's not fudging it's merely a shortcut.

Fudging, major or minor, requires some level of deception. Telling the players "alright the monster doesn't have a lot left, but the way this combat is going it's going to take 30 minutes to resolve. What say we just get to the end and call the monster vanquished - everyone good with that?" Isn't fudging it's a request to do a cut scene.

In the same way, railroading requires the players are blind to the manipulation. If it's out in the open, it's not railroading.


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## overgeeked (Jul 17, 2022)

Reynard said:


> Just on the subject of definitions, i absolutely consider that fudging in the same way that just deciding the hit that left 1 HP just took them out. If you as GM decide it's dead and don't require another full round to let the players and dice decide if it dies or kills a PC or whatever, you fudged. I feel like we all shift definitions to make sure we are innocent of whatever unforgivable crime we accused others of, and that's just silly. better, I think. to admit imperfection and just do our best.



I don't think that's the case. I don't fudge either. I roll where everyone can see. Monsters have whatever hit points they have. I use things like morale checks to have fights of variable lengths. I also have monsters with objectives that generally don't involve simply slaughtering the PCs, though on occasion that's exactly what they want. So once the objective is completed...or impossible...the monsters flee. If the PCs want to investigate some side passage and it's getting late, I'll call the game there. Not scrub it from the map to eliminate it as a possibility. Some toxic things are so common that a lot of people don't see them as toxic. Absolutely admit imperfections. No one's perfect.


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## Reynard (Jul 17, 2022)

Mort said:


> If you actually tell your players what you're doing, it's not fudging it's merely a shortcut.
> 
> Fudging, major or minor, requires some level of deception.



I have never understood fudging to require deception but rather be simply asking for a die roll then ignoring or altering the results to your whim as GM. But, again, definitions.


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## Reynard (Jul 17, 2022)

overgeeked said:


> I don't think that's the case. I don't fudge either. I roll where everyone can see. Monsters have whatever hit points they have. I use things like morale checks to have fights of variable lengths. I also have monsters with objectives that generally don't involve simply slaughtering the PCs, though on occasion that's exactly what they want. So once the objective is completed...or impossible...the monsters flee.



But flight isn't automatic.  If the monster has 1 hit point and you say it runs off down the corridor without consideration of initiative and movement rates (or chase rules or whatever) you're fudging.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 17, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> Which I am fine with. That's not fudging, because the players know what you are doing. I usually don't specify the exact amount of HP. But I have ended fights early in various ways _but only by telling the players that the fight was ending early_.



I always think of fudging as not obeying the die roll...


EzekielRaiden said:


> Why ask them where they are going then? Legit. If they are just going to run into the Quantum NPC, why not just say they run into them and dispense with the pretense?



normally because there are OTHER things that it matters for they wont ONLY meet the PC NPC, they will then be on different plot hooks.

So up north is the orc tribes that are preping for war, and down south is the kingdom having an issue with a succession issue were twins are both claiming the thrown of there dead mom, and to the east is the elven wood, and to the west is the port city where they find out about the illithid pirates.  

no matter what way they go the new party member is in that direction... and/or the NPC with the story hook about the teifling lord from the city of brass that has a job they may want the PCs for. 



EzekielRaiden said:


> Had the players actually met the NPC and learned of their limited Sorcerer spell list? If not, I see no problem with this. Things that have not yet been fixed in play may be altered, if necessary. I certainly don't think of this as any form of railroading.



yeah had an earlier conversation said that he could NOT do it I wouldn't change that,


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## Mort (Jul 17, 2022)

Reynard said:


> I have never understood fudging to require deception but rather be simply asking for a die roll then ignoring or altering the results to your whim as GM. But, again, definitions.




If you ask for a roll, ignore the result in favor of whatever result you actually want (presumably because the roll did not conform to the desired result) but tell the player the roll succeeded/failed when it was actually the opposite, how is that not a deception?


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## Charlaquin (Jul 17, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> I can help with the double meaning of "Railroad" being both good and bad.
> 
> Take Performance Magic.  Ok, perfomance magic is not real.  Sorry to shatter any illusions.
> 
> ...



Right, but see, the Clueless, when they find out that the magic wasn’t real, sometimes feel deeply betrayed by the deception. See: any child when they learn Santa Claus isn’t real. This doesn’t always happen, but it can. The “invisible railroad” is a problem because it attempts to preserve the cluelessness of the players, at the risk of creating this feeling of betrayal. The problem isn’t the illusionism itself, it’s the lack of disclosure that it’s indeed an illusion that’s being performed.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 17, 2022)

beaumontsebos said:


> I’ve had to resort to invisible railroading on occasion and it’s never been a problem for me or my players. If you’re having fun in a game and realize during the game that your on an invisible railroad and become crappy about it, that’s on you. You are ruining the fun you were having by holding onto your idealized version of D&D. How about just enjoy the fun while your having it?





Frankly, this is a cheap excuse to write off people who don't like being lied to about what's going on.  Don't want people to respond negatively?  Tell them you'll do it upfront.  If you're unwilling to do that, you have no right to complain when they don't like it and tell you so--you asked for it.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 17, 2022)

beaumontsebos said:


> I don’t think secretly feeding people rats is really equivalent to invisible railroading.




You're not the one who has a right to the judgment.


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## Oncewasbenji (Jul 17, 2022)

If all doors lead to the same place, why have three doors? If you had one, the story would.move quicker and be more honest. The three doors aren't about creating a meaningful choice there. They are about covering something up. And why are you covering it up? Becuase you know that this is a disingenuous way to design and run. You can run a game any way you like but I personally have decided not to be in future games run by dms who espouse this method when talking to me as a 'dm equal'.


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 17, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> I always think of fudging as not obeying the die roll...



In that case, if it's "I didn't use what the die said" in _literally any situation ever_, then yes, I do """fudge."""

I just never, ever "fudge" in a way that is all three of (a) secret, (b) not learnable by the players, and (c) actually affecting the results of play. So if I do it openly, I don't consider that fudging...because there's nothing untoward going on, players know what's up. Or, if I do it "secretly," but in such a way that the players can tell SOMETHING is going on, and by digging deeper they can learn exactly what is going on and how to counter it, that's also fine. Or, finally, if the die roll doesn't actually interface with the _rules_ or the _consequences_ in any meaningful way (e.g. rolling up a random NPC's eye color, if for some reason I was doing that, has no impact on anything, so there's no reason why I couldn't decide after the roll "actually, purple sounds more interesting than brown, I'll go with that.")

The vast, vast, vast, VAST majority of the time, when people speak of "fudging," they mean _secretly_ ignoring die rolls and/or rewriting monster stats (same thing mathematically), almost always while specifically making it so players THINK you're using those things fully legitimately, and doing everything in your power to make it so your players never, ever discover that you deceived them.



GMforPowergamers said:


> normally because there are OTHER things that it matters for they wont ONLY meet the PC NPC, they will then be on different plot hooks.



Okay, so...I don't understand quite what's going on here. If the NPC shows up in either place, why not just flavor it as "the NPC was following you and only just now caught up to you here." That way, there's no need for quantum superposition--the NPC ends up where they do for fully natural, understandable reasons. Or perhaps multiple NPCs were sent out, going to multiple locations, so that the person who sent them would be quite sure ONE of their messengers would meet the PCs. That's another perfectly cromulent explanation.

I'm sure I could come up with more if I needed to. Point being, there are tons of ways to have fully legitimate, non-railroad reasons why an NPC will be there regardless of where the party goes. You don't need to resort to railroading.



GMforPowergamers said:


> yeah had an earlier conversation said that he could NOT do it I wouldn't change that,



Then it seems to me you and I don't really disagree very much here.

I do not do things that deceive my players. I rely on a mixture of planning (but not too much, because I know that that's a huge temptation for me), dynamic improvisation, and scrupulous self-consistency.

I will choose not to use dice, or choose to disregard the rules, should that be a useful thing to do--but I will either do so in a way that is fully explicit and open with the players, or which is not _fully_ explicit and open, but which is clearly hinted at, turning my choice to ignore the rules into an adventure hook for the players to dig into. (I very, _very_ rarely need to do this.) My prep-work plus my improvisation is enough to handle essentially everything I run into. I've literally only once had to even _bend_ things a bit, and even then, it was more "I can fix this diegetically by exploiting an already-established fact that just hasn't yet been applied to _this specific fight_." Sooo....yeah.


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 17, 2022)

Re: performance magic and other such things, again, I am incredibly confused as to how people can think this is the same as illusionism at the gaming table.

Magic--at least, of the type performed as "magic tricks"--isn't real. Anyone who _believes_ magic is real is simply mistaken. The illusion of performance magic being real, rather than being cleverness, cold reading, sleight of hand, and other such techniques, is _necessary_ for the "tricks" to appear impressive. You cannot _even in principle_ impress people with sleight-of-hand where from the very start they can see exactly what you're doing and how you're doing it. It's like (in fact, essentially identical to) explaining a joke: if you explain the trick, you kill the trick. The trick doesn't _work_ without the illusion.

But DMing is completely different. In fact, _diametrically opposite_. The illusion IS NOT necessary. It is completely, 100% optional. You can (as I have) completely avoid all illusionism, of any form whatsoever, and run a game your players consistently love. (I hesitate to say I run a great game, but my players have liked it four four years running and almost never have negative feedback, so...) You DO NOT have any need, whatsoever, to trick anyone about anything in order to run a successful and enjoyable game.

The fact that the one thing _critically depends_ on the illusion--that, without the illusion, the _there is no magic_--while the other has no dependence on the illusion whatsoever--that the game may be good, bad, or indifferent regardless of whether there is the illusion of choice or not--is a vital difference which demonstrates the failure of the analogy.

And that's before we even get into the fact that adults should absolutely know, in advance, that a magic trick--_given it's literally called a "trick"_--should be understood as an illusion right out the gate. The magician is putting on a show, and the audience knows, in advance, that they will be presented with something that is not what it appears to be. That is emphatically the opposite of railroading. With railroading, as @Charlaquin said, the goal is to _prevent the players from ever finding out that there was an illusion_. It is to _enforce upon all players_ that they be, as @bloodtide put it, "the clueless."

Thing is? People don't like being _made_ to be "the clueless." In fact, a lot of people really, really _hate_ being _made_ to be "the clueless." It makes them feel hurt and angry. It makes them feel like their goodwill has been exploited, and like the trust they placed in the person who made them "the clueless" has been pissed on. If the person _happens to be_ "the clueless" just because, e.g. they just never thought about the issue before, it wasn't something hidden from them they just literally never realized it, they will usually feel embarrassed and self-conscious. Those may not be as bad as feeling angry and betrayed, but they're still negative feelings that I wouldn't want my players to feel as a result of my actions at my gaming table.

A magician does her tricks with a wink and a nod, and people willingly play along. A railroading/fudging DM does his deception totally silently, actively trying to deny even the _possibility_ that someone could find out, actively working to lock all participants into "the clueless" role and ONLY that role. The two are not the same, and the fact that someone likes the former and HATES the latter should not be surprising to anyone.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 17, 2022)

Yeah, railroading generally is bad and player choices should matter, but I also don't see a reason to be fundamentalist about it.

Running a game is full of illusions, illusions of  making the world seem real, making it seem bigger and more full of interesting things than it actually is. Whilst those literal three doors are silly, in broader sense similar things are common. The world is infinite, the GM prep time is not. So interesting things "just happen to happen" in the time and place the characters happen to be. That is extremely common. And yeah, sometimes choices that might seem to matter don't, and sometimes choices that seem not to matter do.

It's all make believe, GM makes stuff up. Everyone knows this, no one is being deceived. Also, I don't get this desire to police people's GMing techniques. If I have good time, I don't care how the GM achieved it (except perhaps in a sense that I could copy their techniques for my own GMing.) I want them to run the game the way they feel comfortable with.


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## Reynard (Jul 17, 2022)

Mort said:


> If you ask for a roll, ignore the result in favor of whatever result you actually want (presumably because the roll did not conform to the desired result) but tell the player the roll succeeded/failed when it was actually the opposite, how is that not a deception?



It is, but the actual fudging part is complete once you change the result. You could tell the players and it would still be fudging is what am saying.


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## DEFCON 1 (Jul 17, 2022)

Personally, you know what I think is much, much, much worse than knowing my DM is lying to me on occasion during the game?  The DM naming their NPCs like 'Fredd Dirst' or 'Yngelina Jolee'.

That shows you right there what I truly find important when I play D&D.


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## Charlaquin (Jul 17, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> Yeah, railroading generally is bad and player choices should matter, but I also don't see a reason to be fundamentalist about it.
> 
> Running a game is full of illusions, illusions of  making the world seem real, making it seem bigger and more full of interesting things than it actually is. Whilst those literal three doors are silly, in broader sense similar things are common. The world is infinite, the GM prep time is not. So interesting things "just happen to happen" in the time and place the characters happen to be. That is extremely common. And yeah, sometimes choices that might seem to matter don't, and sometimes choices that seem not to matter do.
> 
> It's all make believe, GM makes stuff up. Everyone knows this, no one is being deceived. Also, I don't get this desire to police people's GMing techniques. If I have good time, I don't care how the GM achieved it (except perhaps in a sense that I could copy their techniques for my own GMing.) I want them to run the game the way they feel comfortable with.



Again, the techniques themselves aren’t necessarily a problem. The problem is using controversial techniques _without the players’ knowledge or consent_, which illusionism is specifically designed to do.


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## pemerton (Jul 17, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> I think we can also debate the notion of DMs offering a "false choice" vs players imposing a "choice outside the plot".
> 
> The 3 door scenario is an example of the former. The DM is directly implying to the players, "I am giving you a choice" but then is not.
> 
> ...



In your second case, why is the GM not just telling the players that it doesn't matter which way they go back to the city? Why let the players waste time thinking they're making a meaningful decision if it's not?



Stalker0 said:


> If you have never had a group of players get into a long debate about an absolutely pointless decision, than no wonder you don't see the value in a soft railroad



Again, why is the GM not making it clear that nothing is at stake?


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 17, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> Again, the techniques themselves aren’t necessarily a problem. The problem is using controversial techniques _without the players’ knowledge or consent_, which illusionism is specifically designed to do.



On the internet people have seven thousand different definitions of railroading, illusionism and fudging and they loudly exclaim they have a problem with these things. In real life I have never encountered this. The practice is that the GM runs the game the way they see fit, and as long as the end result is enjoyable, everyone is good with it. 

And at least in D&D the rules clearly state that in the end the GM is basically an arbiter of what goes, so at least implicitly the players have agreed to this when they agreed to play, unless otherwise noted

I don't think I use most of the stuff people find controversial, at least not much. But then again, I'm not going to make promises, especially considering the myriad definitions floating around. To be blunt, as a player it is not your business how I manage the things behind the curtains, and if you're not fine with that then we shouldn't play together.


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## pemerton (Jul 17, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> IF my players ask to find a blacksmith in town but I know if they go looking they will find out that there used to be one that died in a mysterious fire.
> If my player instead ask for a church of pelor and they find out the two churches in town are to bane and shar I am not railroading them.
> If my player instead asked "is there a mage guild" and I just answeers "no, but there is a lone crookied towr that looks like it might be or have been a mage tower once... that is not railroading.



These don't seem to me the same as what you described upthread, of permitting the players to declare actions to try and travel to another world although you've already decided that that isn't possible and hence that those actions will fail.

But I tend to see much of what you describe here as railroading also. You are deciding in advance that certain actions fail, on the basis of your own authorial inclinations.



GMforPowergamers said:


> the fact that what they asked mattered and they wouldn't find out about the fire if they don't look for a blacksmith, and might not notice the churches if no one looks is what makes choice matteer.



This is all you, as GM, making decisions. There's no _objective_ reason why, to learn about the fire, the players have to have their PCs ask about a blacksmith. This is a contrivance that you as GM have set up. Likewise for the churches.

Setting up hoops for the players to jump through, while making the nature of those hoops obscure, again seems to me to fall within the general conception of railroading: the GM is deciding what happens in the fiction, perhaps using the actions that the players declare as cues, but the meaning (if any) of those actions is completely obscure to the players.



GMforPowergamers said:


> the DM ALWAYs unfolds the game



This claim isn't true.


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 17, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> So interesting things "just happen to happen" in the time and place the characters happen to be.



Of course they do. We only pay attention to people who have actually interesting experiences. This isn't a matter of "illusionism." We don't read histories about nameless 15th-century porters who died at age 36 from cholera, having done nothing particularly interesting. We read histories about Shakespeare and Queen Elizabeth because they have the opportunity to _do_ things in their time and context. Adventurers in a fantasy setting are just us paying attention to _fictional_ people whose lives are Particularly Interesting, because there's no real point in paying attention to the (very large number of) people whose fantasy lives aren't actually interesting or noteworthy.

Slice-of-life _is_ a valid genre. It's just not one that has much appeal in this context.



Crimson Longinus said:


> It's all make believe, GM makes stuff up. Everyone knows this, no one is being deceived.



_Imagination is not the same as telling lies_.

Anyone who says otherwise is not only wrong, they are advocating a position corrosive to _doing_ imaginative work or play.

There is a very, VERY big difference between, "I know that I am here because I want to imagine cool things that are not physically real" and "I am here to make choices, except that they won't actually be choices at all most of the time, and you'll do everything you possibly can to prevent me from ever finding this out. Oh, and you won't tell me this, but instead present it as though I really am making choices."

The former is imagination. The latter is being sold a bill of goods. The difference is obvious.


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## pemerton (Jul 17, 2022)

jgsugden said:


> The definition of immersion is deep mental involvement.  Engagement is a deep emotional investment. There is a nuance, but they're highly related and everything I described would be applicable to someone that is highly immersed in a game of D&D.
> And you can happen to pull off a good event with entirely improvised moments.  Entirely possible.  All DMing involves some improvising, afterall.  We don't prepare every little feature.  However, you can also far more easily %$@! the pooch.
> 
> The question here is whether planning to improvise will tend to result in a better, or even equal, game than planning out a session in advance so that it ties together _better_.  And, as is the case pretty much everywhere in life, the actual truthful answer is that more preparation gives you a better product in the end.
> ...



I've also played, and GMed, PRGs for about 40 years. And I find that games in which the GM prepares a story and railroads the players through it is less fun than one in which the players contribute to the shared fiction.

And the reason is not mysterious. RPGing is essentially conversation, albeit stylised conversation: different participants talk about different things, and there are rules that tell us who can say what when. The topic and upshot of the conversation is a shared fiction.

Conversations are best when they are spontaneous and responsive. A script isn't a conversation - at best it might be a simulacrum of one. In my view, the same is true in RPGing.


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 17, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> And at least in D&D the rules clearly state that in the end the GM is basically an arbiter of what goes, so at least implicitly the players have agreed to this when they agreed to play, unless otherwise noted



If the law tells you that an immoral or inappropriate behavior is legal, does that make that behavior acceptable?

Just because the rulebook says something doesn't mean it's the correct thing to do. In fact, the rulebook may even directly tell you to do things that are _not_ correct, whether by accident (consider various typos across every edition of D&D, but _particularly_ 3e) or on purpose (e.g. the advice to 3e monks that they should be mobile, when that prevents them from using a full attack and thus massively hurts their damage output.)


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## Charlaquin (Jul 17, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> To be blunt, as a player it is not your business how I manage the things behind the curtains, and if you're not fine with that then we shouldn't play together.



I absolutely agree! The problem with the technique described in the opening post is that it denies the players the opportunity to make that decision, because it is specifically designed to prevent the players from knowing the DM is doing it.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 17, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> Of course they do. We only pay attention to people who have actually interesting experiences. This isn't a matter of "illusionism." We don't read histories about nameless 15th-century porters who died at age 36 from cholera, having done nothing particularly interesting. We read histories about Shakespeare and Queen Elizabeth because they have the opportunity to _do_ things in their time and context. Adventurers in a fantasy setting are just us paying attention to _fictional_ people whose lives are Particularly Interesting, because there's no real point in paying attention to the (very large number of) people whose fantasy lives aren't actually interesting or noteworthy.
> 
> Slice-of-life _is_ a valid genre. It's just not one that has much appeal in this context.



But consider how the GM makes it so that interesting stuff happens to the characters.

Characters wake up in a tavern. The GM asks what they want to do. So they say they go to library to do some research and after that, on afternoon, they go to the market to do some shopping. When they arrive to the market, there is commotion. An exotic wild beast that had been transported for the sale has broken loose and is wreaking havoc! The characters try to stop the beast and prvent it from killing poor townspeople!

Except this was terrible deceitful illusionism! The GM had preplanned the encounter, and it didn't matter when the PCs went to the market. Had they decided on the morning to go to the market first, the encounter would have happened then. Had they decided to spent a longer time in the library and go to the market next day, the encounter would have happened then. This is basically the same thing than all those false choice doors and roads and whatnot. But I bet GMs do this all the time. 




EzekielRaiden said:


> _Imagination is not the same as telling lies_.
> 
> Anyone who says otherwise is not only wrong, they are advocating a position corrosive to _doing_ imaginative work or play.
> 
> ...



Far from obvious. Different people consider different ways of making stuff up "deceitful". I don't know if you consider my above example to be such, I'm sure some people would. I wouldn't.

It's all made up, stop worrying about it.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 17, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> If the law tells you that an immoral or inappropriate behavior is legal, does that make that behavior acceptable?
> 
> Just because the rulebook says something doesn't mean it's the correct thing to do. In fact, the rulebook may even directly tell you to do things that are _not_ correct, whether by accident (consider various typos across every edition of D&D, but _particularly_ 3e) or on purpose (e.g. the advice to 3e monks that they should be mobile, when that prevents them from using a full attack and thus massively hurts their damage output.)



Oh please! Playing an elfgame in a way you don't like is not immoral! If you don't like the way an elfgame arranges the authority, you don't have to play that elfgame.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 17, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> I absolutely agree! The problem with the technique described in the opening post is that it denies the players the opportunity to make that decision, because it is specifically designed to prevent the players from knowing the DM is doing it.



Presumably they're making the decision when they decide to play a game that gives the GM authority to run the game the way they want.


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 17, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> Except this was terrible deceitful illusionism! The GM had preplanned the encounter, and it didn't matter when the PCs went to the market. Had they decided on the morning to go to the market first, the encounter would have happened then. Had they decided to spent a longer time in the library ang go to the market next day, the encounter would have happened then. This is basically the same thing than all those false choice doors and roads and whatnot. But I bet GMs do this all the time.



I would not do this. If they chose to go to the library before going to the market, the encounter would happen without them. If they delayed going off to an important location, _the world goes on without them_. I won't be a HUGE stickler over time things because I don't want to be a dick. But if they intentionally delay on something they know is important, e.g. repeatedly putting off addressing a known threat (as my group did with the black dragon gang), that threat becomes more dangerous.



Crimson Longinus said:


> Far from obvious. Different people consider different ways of making stuff up "deceitful". I don't know if you consider my above example to be such, I'm sure some people would. I wouldn't.
> 
> It's all made up, stop worrying about it.



It's really very simple. Are you telling me my choices actually matter? This is a yes or no question. Either you are, or you aren't. _Do_ my choices actually matter when they _seem_ to matter? This is again a yes or no question. Either they do, or they don't. If you're telling me that seemingly-meaningful choices matter, but in fact they do not matter, then that is deceptive. It literally could not possibly get any simpler.

Are (at least some) player choices presented as being actually meaningful? Yes/No
Are those choices that are presented as meaningful _actually_ meaningful? Yes/No
Extra credit: Do you conceal the evidence that would reveal that the seemingly-meaningful choices aren't? Yes/No

If the answer is "yes" to the first question and "no" to the second, it is deceptive, period, end of discussion. If the answer to the extra credit question is _also_ yes, then it's not only deceptive, it's actively covering up that deception, continuously. Few people like being deceived. Even fewer like finding out that someone has worked to deny them even the possibility of discovering the deception.

If the answer is "no" to the first question then while it might not be deception anymore, you're not very likely to attract a lot of players. Telling people straight-up, "It doesn't matter what choices you make, the events will play out as I want them to," is...well, you CAN do that, but I don't think you'll be very successful. There's a reason so many people who advocate for fudging and/or railroading out there explicitly say that you should never allow your players to find out that you do it. Likewise, if you don't conceal the fact that you're offering choices that _appear_ to be meaningful but are in fact meaningless, I strongly suspect you're going to have at least one upset player sooner rather than later, and the results area not likely to be pretty--so if your answers are Yes/No/No, I don't expect you to have much success as a DM.

Yes/No/Yes is deceptive, and thus unstable--if you slip up, you're likely to have upset players--but it is at least an unstable equilibrium. Yes/Yes/(N/A) is not deceptive, and thus stable. You aren't telling your players that a given choice is meaningful when it isn't, and thus there is nothing to "slip up" on, no hidden truth to be revealed because the surface appearance _is the truth_.



Crimson Longinus said:


> Oh please! Playing an elfgame in a way you don't like is not immoral! If you don't like the way an elfgame arranges the authority, you don't have to play that elfgame.



I used the phrase "immoral *or inappropriate*" for a reason. I would appreciate not being selectively quoted.


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 17, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> Presumably they're making the decision when they decide to play a game that gives the GM authority to run the game the way they want.



That's a pretty flimsy excuse. "There's a line of text buried in a book you're never going to read which justifies my behavior!" Nah, sorry, that's not cutting it.

You have to actually say it. _You_, the human being, have to _communicate_ with the people you're working with. Come to a consensus. If you do that, awesome, there is no deception, nobody's being sold anything other than what they asked for. I support that 100%, even though I don't personally grok what the players get out of playing a game where their choices (frequently) don't matter.

I do not, at all, whatsoever, support someone claiming, "Because there's a line of text buried in a whole other rulebook you've almost certainly never read, I never need to get consent from my players." That's absolute hogwash, and deeply disrespectful to those players.


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## Charlaquin (Jul 17, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> Presumably they're making the decision when they decide to play a game that gives the GM authority to run the game the way they want.



Can’t consent without knowledge. It’s perfectly fine to run games this way, as long as you notify your players you’re doing so. Some of them might decide not to participate, but that’s why you tell them first. So they have the opportunity to make that informed decision.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 17, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> I would not do this. If they chose to go to the library before going to the market, the encounter would happen without them. If they delayed going off to an important location, _the world goes on without them_. I won't be a HUGE stickler over time things because I don't want to be a dick. But if they intentionally delay on something they know is important, e.g. repeatedly putting off addressing a known threat (as my group did with the black dragon gang), that threat becomes more dangerous.



So when does the clock start? How many clocks for things the players are likely to miss you have running simultaneously?

I'm not even saying that one couldn't do that. I do it for a bunch of stuff, usually big stuff. But I also use flexible time line and sometimes location too. 



EzekielRaiden said:


> It's really very simple. Are you telling me my choices actually matter? This is a yes or no question. Either you are, or you aren't. _Do_ my choices actually matter when they _seem_ to matter? This is again a yes or no question. Either they do, or they don't. If you're telling me that seemingly-meaningful choices matter, but in fact they do not matter, then that is deceptive. It literally could not possibly get any simpler.
> 
> Are (at least some) player choices presented as being actually meaningful? Yes/No
> Are those choices that are presented as meaningful _actually_ meaningful? Yes/No
> ...



This assumes the sort of clarity that simply generally is not present. In the earlier example is the question "what you do on the morning" presented as meaningful? And is it meaningful? It certainly is in sense that the players say they want to do research in the library, so they get to do that. But it is not meaningful in the sense that the market encounter happens eventually anyway. So was someone deceived?



EzekielRaiden said:


> I used the phrase "immoral *or inappropriate*" for a reason. I would appreciate not being selectively quoted.



Doesn't make it any better.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 17, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> Can’t consent without knowledge. It’s perfectly fine to run games this way, as long as you notify your players you’re doing so. Some of them might decide not to participate, but that’s why you tell them first. So they have the opportunity to make that informed decision.



Notify about what? That the GM is in charge? It says so in the rules!


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## Charlaquin (Jul 17, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> Notify about what? That the GM is in charge? It says so in the rules!



Notify them that you are going to change things around behind the scenes so the players don’t miss out on prepared content.


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 17, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> Notify about what? That the GM is in charge? It says so in the rules!



Notify that choices _which clearly are supposed to matter, won't._ Or rather...



Charlaquin said:


> Notify them that you are going to change things around behind the scenes so the players don’t miss out on prepared content.



...this. This is correct.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 17, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> Notify them that you are going to change things around behind the scenes so the players don’t miss out on prepared content.



What does this mean? What is a change? Why is this something that is not already covered by the GM being in charge?


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## Charlaquin (Jul 17, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> What does this mean?



It’s pretty well-described in the opening post.


Crimson Longinus said:


> What is a change?



For example? Say you have a cool setpiece encounter planned. But, you don’t want to risk the possibility that the players will miss it, so rather than keying it to a specific part of the dungeon or whatever, you decide it will occur wherever the players happen to go.


Crimson Longinus said:


> Why is this something that is not already covered by the GM being in charge?



Because it’s a technique that requires the players’ ignorance of its use in order to function. It is specifically designed to be kept secret. Now, if you tell your players you plan to do this, and they agree they are fine with you doing it without notice, no problem. If you don’t inform them, you are deceiving them, which is disrespectful.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 17, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> It’s pretty well-described in the opening post.



Sure. And some of that, at least in smaller scale, is pretty normal GMing.



Charlaquin said:


> For example? Say you have a cool setpiece encounter planned. But, you don’t want to risk the possibility that the players will miss it, so rather than keying it to a specific part of the dungeon or whatever, you decide it will occur wherever the players happen to go.



So the GM must beforehand declare that location and timing of everything is not fixed and preplanned? Why? That is practically always the case! 



Charlaquin said:


> Because it’s a technique that requires the players’ ignorance of its use in order to function. It is specifically designed to be kept secret. Now, if you tell your players you plan to do this, and they agree they are fine with you doing it without notice, no problem. If you don’t inform them, you are deceiving them, which is disrespectful.



A lot of GMing relies on players not knowing stuff. How is not implicitly obvious that in D&D GM is allowed to keep stuff secret from the players?


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## Charlaquin (Jul 17, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> Sure. And some of that, at least in smaller scale, is pretty normal GMing.
> 
> So the GM must beforehand declare that location and timing of everything is not fixed and preplanned? Why? That is practically always the case!



It may be “normal GMing” and “practically always the case” to you, because of who you have played with. There is, however, a significant contingent of D&D players and DMs for whom this is very much not the norm, and in fact, considered very poor form. That’s why it’s important to discuss ahead of time. These unspoken assumptions can and do lead to dysfunction and hurt feelings when they come to light. 


Crimson Longinus said:


> A lot of GMing relies on players not knowing stuff. How is not implicitly obvious that in D&D GM is allowed to keep stuff secret from the players?



It’s not _just_ that the DM is keeping something secret, it’s that the technique is premised around deceiving the players.


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## Reynard (Jul 17, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> Can’t consent without knowledge. It’s perfectly fine to run games this way, as long as you notify your players you’re doing so. Some of them might decide not to participate, but that’s why you tell them first. So they have the opportunity to make that informed decision.



yeah, this is mostly a table agreement issue. Just open up Session 0 with: "I am interested in running a tightly plotted game and will occasionally manipulate things behind the screen to make that happen, all with the goal of creating an awesome experience for everyone at the table. Is that cool?" Ta da.


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## Charlaquin (Jul 17, 2022)

Reynard said:


> yeah, this is mostly a table agreement issue. Just open up Session 0 with: "I am interested in running a tightly plotted game and will occasionally manipulate things behind the screen to make that happen, all with the goal of creating an awesome experience for everyone at the table. Is that cool?" Ta da.



Exactly. Easy peasy, most players will probably be fine with it, and those that won’t have the opportunity to decide not to play. Everyone wins.


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## Stalker0 (Jul 17, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> Are* (at least some)* player choices presented as being actually meaningful? Yes/No
> Are those choices that are presented as meaningful _actually_ meaningful? Yes/No



This is the sticking point right here. Again its all a matter of degrees.

If you are railroading so hard in your game that your players NEVER have a meaningful choice, than I agree, that's a pretty crappy game most of the time. But that is really not what a lot of us are talking here.

We are talking a tool in the box, something to be sprinkled in, to be used when it makes sense to do so. Not a club that is constantly waved endlessly at all points of the game.

So no its not binary at all. Its a spectrum. One dm might throw in a tool once in a blue moon. Another dm might do it every few sessions. And a third dm might do it at every opportunity. They are not the same.


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## jgsugden (Jul 17, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> ...It seems to me that there is a HUGE HUGE HUGE gap between your Type II Demon DM 2 and DM 3. That is, the first and second DMs are very similar, one does no planning at all ever for any reason, the other does a small bit of planning and nothing more, and the third does HARDCORE TOLKIENESQUE EVERYTHING IS PLANNED FROM MINUTE ONE stuff. One of these things is not like the others...



Please read my response(s) again and think about it.  I do not say that every little element is planned in fine detail. I go out of my way to say that you can't prepare for everything and you have to find the way to strike the good balance.  Having a sensible plan is what that third DM does.  The floor to get into that third tier is to think things through as you build rather than build on the fly.

This is about telling stories that make sense across the board, where you have enough preparation to make sure that the stuff you're throwing at the party makes sense.  That does not require you to plan out every thread on a carpet in a Robert Jordan-esque tome for each session.  It requires you to make a plan, execute on a plan, and make sure that as you build your dungeon/adventure, in advance, you take the time to make sure it makes sense.  Look through the examples I've listed.  Look at the comments I've made about the differences in what preparation might be.  

A 'DM 3' might spend 6 hours preparing for a 4 hour session, or they might spend 1.  They might have all the stats printed out for the monsters or look them up as they go.  They might write everything down or have it in their head.  The key is that they're thinking it through.

The PCs are hunting for a bandit leader and the DM has decided the bandits are in a cave complex 2 days outside town.  Why?  What made that location appeal to the bandits?  Is it a natural cave?  Did they take it from other creatures? Is it in the mountains, a valley, a forest or somewhere else?  Can they cart supplies there?  If not, how do they get supplies? What is the story about how they arrived there?  

How long does it take to think that through?  Maybe a few minutes.  However, if you do, then you have ideas on what to do and how to build the dungeon in a way that supports that story and makes the location make sense to a group of players.  That results in a far superior product than deciding the bandit leader's chamber in the cave will be the last one the PCs find and letting them randomly explore a Nethack-esque complex of caves that you place as they encounter them.  

Folks - there is a reason they give you maps and story around the dungeons you find in good prepublished adventures.  They're doing this work for you.  It is a fairly universal good thing.


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## jgsugden (Jul 17, 2022)

pemerton said:


> I've also played, and GMed, PRGs for about 40 years. And I find that games in which the GM prepares a story and railroads the players through it is less fun than one in which the players contribute to the shared fiction.



NOTE: I objected to the INVISIBLE RAILROAD (the title of this thread) and encouraged people to plan to create a world that makes sense.  When the world makes sense, it opens options, not closes them.  Real choice is created in a world that is prepared.  When the DM just shoves whatever they want in front of you regardless of the choices you make, as the OP suggests, that is the railroad.  Preparation is necessary ofr players to actually have choices to make.  Choice is between options, and options have to exist before you can choose between them.







> And the reason is not mysterious. RPGing is essentially conversation, albeit stylised conversation: different participants talk about different things, and there are rules that tell us who can say what when. The topic and upshot of the conversation is a shared fiction.
> 
> Conversations are best when they are spontaneous and responsive. A script isn't a conversation - at best it might be a simulacrum of one. In my view, the same is true in RPGing.



And this has NOTHING to do with the type of preparation I describe.  You're setting the stage.  You're not limiting what the players do with/on the stage.  You're preparing better for the NPCs to contriburte to that world meaningfully by giving them the background they need.  If you wing the NPCs as you go, they'll come off as random and nonsensical too often.  If they have goals, if they have a reason to be where they are, if they have a spark of life... then they're far more likely to be engaging.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 17, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> It may be “normal GMing” and “practically always the case” to you, because of who you have played with. There is, however, a significant contingent of D&D players and DMs for whom this is very much not the norm, and in fact, considered very poor form. That’s why it’s important to discuss ahead of time. These unspoken assumptions can and do lead to dysfunction and hurt feelings when they come to light.



Everything is never preplanned. I don't rally understand where these red lines lie.  



Charlaquin said:


> It’s not _just_ that the DM is keeping something secret, it’s that the technique is premised around deceiving the players.



It is not a secret that the GM is in charge and makes stuff up.


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 17, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> This is the sticking point right here. Again its all a matter of degrees.



I don't see how there can be a degree here, or anything other than a binary. If you present choices that are _supposed to matter_, but they specifically _do not_ matter, how is there any degree to that?

Are you really saying that travelling due west and travelling due north are choices that aren't supposed to have ANY physical significance or consequences on the people making the journey, that they will have _literally exactly_ the same experience, travel to EXACTLY the same places, etc., etc.?

If I'm allowed to choose a destination between distinct options, those options should, y'know, _actually be distinct_. This isn't hard, this isn't some weird narrow specific thing. This is an example people have repeatedly used in both this thread and previous threads.



jgsugden said:


> A 'DM 3' might spend 6 hours preparing for a 4 hour session, or they might spend 1. They might have all the stats printed out for the monsters or look them up as they go. They might write everything down or have it in their head. The key is that they're thinking it through.



Then you really over-sold how much preparation was required. MASSIVELY over-sold it. Your statements about "you don't have to prepare everything" very much came across as "you don't have to truly prepare _everything_...but you should always get _as close as possible_ to preparing everything." This came from statements like: "Quality preparation can make sure that every moment at the table matters."

If what you _meant_ was, "Every DM does a mix of heavy impromptu improvisation, and heavy planning, and the exact balance point will vary from person to person and even from session to session," that....was not at all what I got from it. Particularly because your presentation offered zero-prep and _very nearly_ zero-prep, and seemed to be making a very clear "more prep is _essentially_ always better." You gave a fig leaf that "there is a point of diminishing returns" and basically never otherwise touched the possibility that one can over-prepare. Which is a serious issue for a lot of DMs..._particularly those who feel they need to railroad_.


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 17, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> It is not a secret that the GM is in charge and makes stuff up.



Again, you conflate _using imagination to dream stuff up_ and _pretending that something you told the players were distinct never was_.

It is the DM's job to be inventive and imaginative, yes.

It is not the DM's job to tell players that a particular thing matters when it very much doesn't.


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## Stalker0 (Jul 17, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> Are you really saying that travelling due west and travelling due north are choices that aren't supposed to have ANY physical significance or consequences on the people making the journey, that they will have _literally exactly_ the same experience, travel to EXACTLY the same places, etc., etc.?



Because again, you are looking at it way too rigidly.

Lets say the party travels west. If they do so, they will likely meet the King of Arkenor, and PC 1 will be reuninted with his lost love. If they go north, they will find a people suffering a plague, and will have to decide how they want to intervene. But either way they go, the DM plans a bandit encounter.

Does this identical bandit encounter suddenly mean their choices don't matter? Of course not! Player choice can matter, without mattering in every single possible way. Maybe the DM pulls out a few of the tricks mentioned in the article, but at the end of the dungeon the players find a hostage situation in which their actions and words might be the difference of life and death for the young woman held hostage. Does that mean for that dungeon the player choices didn't matter? Of course not....it mattered a great deal....just not in every single possible way.

Its a spectrum. Just like a DM creates combat encounters that sometimes lets PC 1 shine, and sometimes lets PC 2 shine.... they craft adventurers and dungeons that are a combination of important player choices and just bits that move things along without being very impactful. and as long as you ensure that enough of the player choices are impactful and meaningful, then you have done your job. If you are railroading so much that the players feel like they are in a movie instead of an interactive story....than you have gone to far. It is a spectrum.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 17, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> Again, you conflate _using imagination to dream stuff up_ and _pretending that something you told the players were distinct never was_.
> 
> It is the DM's job to be inventive and imaginative, yes.



But you seem to have weirdly specific rules about how GM is allowed to make stuff up. Why it is allowed to make up "a wild beast will break loose at the market 09:00 AM, Thursday" and not allowed make up "a wild beast will break loose at the market the next time the PCs go there"?



EzekielRaiden said:


> It is not the DM's job to tell players that a particular thing matters when it very much doesn't.



GM is not telling the players the choice either matters or doesn't matter.


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 17, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> Because again, you are looking at it way too rigidly.
> 
> Lets say the party travels west. If they do so, they will likely meet the King of Arkenor, and PC 1 will be reuninted with his lost love. If they go north, they will find a people suffering a plague, and will have to decide how they want to intervene. But either way they go, the DM plans a bandit encounter.
> 
> ...



Why are the same bandits residing on two totally different roads? That's just bizarre to me. That makes no sense.

That there are _other_ things which will matter _further down the road_ does not mean that you haven't invalidated the meaning of the choice _here and now_.

It's not like this is hard! Just shelve the bandit encounter and do _something else_. Maybe there are basilisks to the west. I dunno! You have the freedom to do whatever you like. Why not just take the handful of minutes required to put together something else?


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## jgsugden (Jul 17, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> ...Then you really over-sold how much preparation was required. MASSIVELY over-sold it. Your statements about "you don't have to prepare everything" very much came across as "you don't have to truly prepare _everything_...but you should always get _as close as possible_ to preparing everything." This came from statements like: "Quality preparation can make sure that every moment at the table matters."



Go back and read again.  I am not responsible for your reading comprehension issues.







> If what you _meant_ was, "Every DM does a mix of heavy impromptu improvisation, and heavy planning, and the exact balance point will vary from person to person and even from session to session," that....was not at all what I got from it. Particularly because your presentation offered zero-prep and _very nearly_ zero-prep, and seemed to be making a very clear "more prep is _essentially_ always better." You gave a fig leaf that "there is a point of diminishing returns" and basically never otherwise touched the possibility that one can over-prepare. Which is a serious issue for a lot of DMs..._particularly those who feel they need to railroad_.



I ... just ... can't ... 

This discussion is about whether you're better off preparing it or winging it.  Yes, if you prepare by lighting yourself on fire, putting your body parts in a meat grinder, and drinking rat poision you're going to be worse off than if you wing it.  There are ways to prepare poorly.  BUT I CONSISENTLY INCLUDED REFERENCES TO PREPARING SENSIBLY.  That is the type of preparation I discuss.  I mention the craft of preparation, and I mention tailoring to your players.  Accordingly, overpreparing, self immolation, and all the other flawed ways of preparing are inherently irrelevant to the discussion in which I am participating.  They're out of scope.  

The comments I am making are that if you prepare sensibly, you are going to deliver a superior product over time to your players than if you wing it consistently by throwing things at them that are not planned out so that they make sense.  It is as simple as that.  It should not be controversial.  It is the same advice we get in most areas of our life.


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## Stalker0 (Jul 17, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> Why are the same bandits residing on two totally different roads? That's just bizarre to me. That makes no sense.



Well from the players perspective, there aren't bandits on both roads. There are bandits on the road west where they went, they have no idea what was on the north road because they didn't go that way.

And the reason for using the same encounter, not every DM is great at just whipping up encounters. Or maybe the DM puts in some real oomph into this encounter, really puts in the work....creates some interesting terrain, maybe a cool bandit captain to taunt the players, really tries to make the encounter interesting and cool. Or....they could just throw a few random monsters that will be a speed bump.

DM encounter design takes time and effort, and not every DM has time to spare. So why not use the same encounter on either road (that the players will never know about) and make it a really cool encounter that the players will probably greatly enjoy, versus just ad hocing some basic encounter because you couldn't bare to invalidate one piece of the player's choice that isn't even that important to the story, when you have plenty of fun impactful choices just waiting for them when they get to town.


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## bloodtide (Jul 17, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> Right, but see, the Clueless, when they find out that the magic wasn’t real, sometimes feel deeply betrayed by the deception. See: any child when they learn Santa Claus isn’t real. This doesn’t always happen, but it can. The “invisible railroad” is a problem because it attempts to preserve the cluelessness of the players, at the risk of creating this feeling of betrayal. The problem isn’t the illusionism itself, it’s the lack of disclosure that it’s indeed an illusion that’s being performed.



I guess some kids are upset to learn Santa or the Easter Bunny is not real.  But they are kids.  I think you'd be hard pressed to find a clueless adult that thinks magic is "real", show them that it's all fake and they have been tricked, and have them get upset.  

The railroad does not preserve anything, half of all clueless are stuck there, and the other half want to be there.  The railroad is invisible as the player can't, or won't see it.



EzekielRaiden said:


> But DMing is completely different. In fact, _diametrically opposite_. The illusion IS NOT necessary. It is completely, 100% optional.




This compares the non-railroad game to a cheese sandwich, and the railroad game to a massive stacked sandwich with many meats, cheeses and vegetables.  Sure there are people that eat cheese sandwiches and love them, but a lot more people like sandwiches with more.


EzekielRaiden said:


> With railroading, as @Charlaquin said, the goal is to _prevent the players from ever finding out that there was an illusion_. It is to _enforce upon all players_ that they be, as @bloodtide put it, "the clueless."



You might have missed a post, but the DM does not make players clueless.  People make themselves clueless.  They either can't understand or don't want to understand.  




EzekielRaiden said:


> Thing is? People don't like being _made_ to be "the clueless." In fact, a lot of people really, really _hate_ being _made_ to be "the clueless." It makes them feel hurt and angry.



I lot of things in life rely on trickery and deception, even other games.  Poker is a great example of such a game: players attempt to deceive and trick.  Yet one one walks away from a poker game made at the player that bluffed: they get mad at themselves for not seeing it.  Same with a lot of sports: the quarterback "looks to you" like he will be throwing to the right, so you move to the right to block and.....woah, he threw the ball to the left.  Does that player go home all mad at the quarterback?

The same way a player that had a good fun time in the game does not complain about the railroading.




pemerton said:


> And I find that games in which the GM prepares a story and railroads the players through it is less fun than one in which the players contribute to the shared fiction.



So, and any one can answer here, how do players contribute to the shared fiction?

Lets take a simple adventure: small town has some bandits nearby.  The players and characters both agree to help the town and stop the bandits.  So the DM has a simple railroad flow chart for the characters to find the bandit camp.  Very simple.  So what can't the players do to "contribute to the shared fiction" on the railroad.  Keep in mind both the players and characters agreed to do this adventure, so doing anything else except this adventure is disrupting the game.


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## Remathilis (Jul 17, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> Now, part of the problem here is that you're inserting a module (the Isle of Dread) into an otherwise (AIUI) non-module game. That's always going to be tricky because modules are inherently a bit railroad-y, but that's usually not a problem because the game is presented as being module-based. Unfortunately, in order to insert the module, you have to properly "trigger" it, and you are choosing to use a method that requires a fairly strong degree of DM force in order to guarantee it. Personally, I would have approached it differently, as follows:
> 
> 1. Next time the players are looking for information or exposed to appropriate sources of gossip (essentially guaranteed in most games), they overhear rumors about the Isle of Dread or something relating to it (rumors of treasure, for instance). Make mention of the stormy seas of late as well.
> 2. If the players follow up on those rumors, awesome, the plot is on and you can have a nasty storm hit them. If they don't, then perhaps a wealthy client seeks them out to ask for help finding this island, or some other adventure hook finds its way to them.
> ...




I want to address this specific part.

I used Isle of Dread (and clearly the footnote didn't help) to express a scenario style, not the actual module. But to be fair, it doesn't really matter if it's the actual module of a lovingly created scenario made from scratch. (Actually, I think it's WORSE if it's not the module, since then I've wasted time creating an adventure locale that the PCs will never see.) Yes, it's a scenario that requires a lot of force by the DM, but fiction is full of events outside the decision process of the protagonist. Odysseus didn't want to stop at half the islands he ended up on, and I'm pretty sure if he heard rumors of a powerful sea witch that turned people into swine, he'd probably give that island as wide a berth as possible. 

As for the numbered list: I believe 1 and 2 are fine plot hooks. However, if the PCs are opting to avoid the hook, they are forfeiting the privilege of any meaningful adventure that session and have accepted either a series of random encounters or a premature end while the DM stops to start prepping for the next session. My prep time as a DM is limited by other factors in my life, so preparing multiple scenarios which may never see the light of play is a colossal waste of time. My players know this, so they are generally good at biting on the presented plot. Is this a railroad? Maybe not, but there is a whole lot of nothing between plot depots, so take that for what you will.


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 17, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> But you seem to have weirdly specific rules about how GM is allowed to make stuff up. Why it is allowed to make up "a wild beast will break loose at the market 09:00 AM, Thursday" and not allowed make up "a wild beast will break loose at the market next time the PCs go there"?



Because the former reflects an imagined world that exists independently of the players' choices, and in which the consequences of those choices are durable and meaningful.

The latter is exactly equivalent to Skyrim, where the monsters level up to match you whenever you enter a dungeon and the market-stall assassination (or at least the attempt thereof) of an NPC only occurs the second you arrive because it's a scripted event.

You make a great deal out of the fact that it's a live DM there doing the thing.



Crimson Longinus said:


> GM is not telling the players the choice either matters or doesn't matter.



Sure they are. You've repeatedly said they are: that they put forward an illusion, not merely an imagined world that doesn't exist but a _false description_ of that world, ensuring that the players' beliefs about what occurred are in fact _false_, not merely _imaginary_. You've _agreed_ when people have described it that way, as an illusion disguising the true state of affairs (namely, that the choice involved wasn't a choice at all). Why is it suddenly not that now? What changed?



Stalker0 said:


> Well from the players perspective, there aren't bandits on both roads. There are bandits on the road west where they went, they have no idea what was on the north road because they didn't go that way.
> 
> And the reason for using the same encounter, not every DM is great and just whipping up encounters. Maybe the DM puts in some real oomph into this encounter, really puts in the work....creates some interesting terrain, maybe a cool bandit captain to taunt the players, really tries to make the encounter interesting and cool. Or....they could just throw a few random monsters that will be a speed bump.
> 
> DM encounter design takes time and effort, and not every DM has time to spare. So why not use the same encounter on either road (that the players will never know about) and make it a really cool encounter that the players will probably greatly enjoy, versus just ad hocing some basic encounter because you couldn't bare to invalidate one piece of the player's choice that isn't even that important to the story.



DMs should be brave enough to accept that the things they create will not always come up in play. Like...if a DM literally can't accept that the thing he thought was super duper ultra cool just didn't interest the party, or (by pure coincidence) didn't end up being what the players wanted to investigate even if they were ignorant of that specific part, _the problem is that DM_, not the players.

DMs, like artists, must learn how to let go of their art at least _some_ of the time. Learn that sometimes, even the things you think are masterpieces...aren't. Using trickery and deception to _ensure_ that your masterpieces always end up in front of the players means intentionally ignoring this extremely important lesson. That's both unwise and counterproductive.

I get, very much, the disappointment of seeing something you prepared go up in smoke because the players (coincidentally, totally by accident) didn't happen to play ball. That's a learning experience....assuming you don't slap the lesson away and _force_ it to happen the way you want. And yes, this has happened to me. Two or three times now, at least. Probably more I'm forgetting. I've mentioned one in various places before (the molten obsidian golem my players cleverly shut down with no fighting at all, despite me having geared it up to be a huge epic battle.) I've had at least one dungeon and at least one NPC, totally separately, which I put a lot of work into making. They never came up, and the game moved on. I can accept that that happens sometimes. It seems to me that the pro-railroad crowd is saying, in effect, "But this thing that was important to _me_ is more important than being respectful to my players."



bloodtide said:


> I guess some kids are upset to learn Santa or the Easter Bunny is not real.  But they are kids.  I think you'd be hard pressed to find a clueless adult that thinks magic is "real", show them that it's all fake and they have been tricked, and have them get upset.



I have met such people. I don't really think they're all that relevant here.



bloodtide said:


> The railroad does not preserve anything, half of all clueless are stuck there, and the other half want to be there.  The railroad is invisible as the player can't, or won't see it.



No. It's invisible because the DM _hides away all the evidence that might reveal it_. That's the point. That's my WHOLE point here. You keep acting like every player is some dumb rube, too stupid to figure out when they're being hoodwinked. That's both an incredibly disrespectful view of players, and in my experience _completely, dead wrong_.

My players are sharp. Being perfectly honest, none of them is as intelligent as I am, but that doesn't mean they are anything less than highly intelligent. They have more than once made me sweat bullets because I was worried they would feel disappointed by "seeing through" some events or secrets or the like. Collectively, they are _absolutely_ smarter than I am.



bloodtide said:


> This compares the non-railroad game to a cheese sandwich, and the railroad game to a massive stacked sandwich with many meats, cheeses and vegetables.  Sure there are people that eat cheese sandwiches and love them, but a lot more people like sandwiches with more.



If you're going to claim it's a dissimile, it is beholden on you to actually show _why_ it's a dissimile, not just use some _other_ dissimile to...argue by analogy that the analogy is bad. So please, tell me why what I actually said was incorrect, don't just tell me the comparison is _like_ some other bad comparison. Otherwise, this whole paragraph was just a non-sequitur that said nothing more than "I don't like your argument, it reminds me of a bad argument."

In fact, in general, you keep using arguments by analogy, and those arguments by analogy end up having problems. I don't think that tactic is serving you very well, and it certainly didn't serve you well here.



bloodtide said:


> You might have missed a post, but the DM does not make players clueless.  People make themselves clueless.  They either can't understand or don't want to understand.



The DM sure as heck does. Why else are they _concealing things from the players?_

With a magic trick, anyone with even a modicum of education knows it's not real. The illusionism-using DM is specifically ensuring that  their players believe it IS real, and moreover, actively hiding any information which could have suggested otherwise. Since you seem to like these arguments by analogy: It would be like a magician trying to "prove" that their magic is in fact completely legitimate, by providing edited and manipulated video tapes that _appear_ to show the magic being physically real, and destroying all other records that could contradict those manipulated tapes.



bloodtide said:


> I lot of things in life rely on trickery and deception, even other games.  Poker is a great example of such a game: players attempt to deceive and trick.  Yet one one walks away from a poker game made at the player that bluffed: they get mad at themselves for not seeing it.  Same with a lot of sports: the quarterback "looks to you" like he will be throwing to the right, so you move to the right to block and.....woah, he threw the ball to the left.  Does that player go home all mad at the quarterback?




This is the repeated problem your analogies keep having: _the deception is explicitly part of play here_. In poker, bluffing is explicitly a component of the experience. You choose to play, knowing that other players will try to play mind games with you in order to get an advantage. Likewise, in sports, you are explicitly competing against the other team. You are aware that you need to accurately predict the opponent's actions and obfuscate your own actions. (As with most competitive sports and games, this is what makes it similar to warfare, and is a major component of why strategic games are an important part of military education.)

Again: with the illusionism DM, _they do not want the player to ever think that sleight of hand is happening_. They want the player to genuinely believe that the superficial situation--choices that actually do matter--is in fact the true situation, when it isn't. And they will actively hide away any evidence that this isn't the case. Go looking just about anywhere and you'll see that nearly everyone who advocates for fudging, for example (which isn't railroading _per se_, but absolutely is a form of illusionism) will expressly say that you SHOULD fudge, but IF you do, NEVER EVER let the players find out. The deception is NOT explicitly part of play, and is in fact kept very hush-hush, hidden away, denying the players even the opportunity to discover that a deception might occur at all while specifically leading them on so they'll believe what they're told.

In other words..._make your players be "the clueless_." Make them _think_ the rolls are real, when they aren't, in the case of fudging. Matt Colville even explicitly said that in his games, he will _pre-roll dice_ and hide them behind his screen, so that if players challenge him over whether he actually rolled a certain value or not, he can lift the screen and "show" them that that's what the die really said.

This is what I mean by making the players be "the clueless." This is _actively deceiving_.



bloodtide said:


> So, and any one can answer here, how do players contribute to the shared fiction?
> 
> Lets take a simple adventure: small town has some bandits nearby.  The players and characters both agree to help the town and stop the bandits.  So the DM has a simple railroad flow chart for the characters to find the bandit camp.  Very simple.  So what can't the players do to "contribute to the shared fiction" on the railroad.  Keep in mind both the players and characters agreed to do this adventure, so doing anything else except this adventure is disrupting the game.



My players have contributed to the shared fiction in the following ways, all of which either came because I prompted it, or they volunteered it and I enthusiastically embraced it (because I LOVE it when they do so):
1. Inventing an organization or society that is active in the world. For example, the of Robin Hood-esque Silver Thread thieves/pickpockets/etc., who work to keep the shadows safe for the common man and fight against the oppression of the poor by high society. This included Rahim, the dashing prince of thieves who leads them. Lovely character. I always enjoy portraying him, all suave and good-humored.
2. Establishing historical characters of significance, such as long-dead saints, former rulers, particular ancient genies, etc.
3. Mythopoeia, telling us the nursery rhyme or Nomad Tribe story-ritual or bawdy tavern song where the character heard about something.
4. Personal connections, e.g. loved ones, rivals, former friends, etc. One character, for example, has a vast extended family, who are willing to provide help, so long as it reflects well on them within the clan.
5. Requests, such as wanting to find a teacher of the Dance of the Wizard's Blade (a magical martial art) or wanting to find lost or apocryphal books of strategic theory and practice.
6. On-the-spot NPCs invented to explain how or why the character knows a particular fact or has been to a particular place etc.

I'm sure there are other ways. As I said, I LOVE it when my players do this, because it means they're engaged and enthusiastic enough to want to contribute their own things, make their own mark on the world. Several organizations and concepts in this world wouldn't exist without player input, and I strive to keep them as close to the player's original concept as possible, out of respect for them and their ideas. In return, my players know not to abuse this, contributing things they're sincerely enthusiastic about, not just memelord crap or silly pop-culture references. (Though we _do_ occasionally do silly things in game, to maintain a certain sense of levity.)


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## DEFCON 1 (Jul 17, 2022)

Meh.  Player choice is overrated.


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## Stalker0 (Jul 17, 2022)

So I do want to codify something, as the "Railroad is always bad" camp has used the common argument that "there is no benefit to railroading, you could always just not do it".

The fundamental benefit of Railroad is.... DM time savings. If I make one combat encounter that the party will encounter if they go down any of 3 paths, versus crafting a different encounter for each of those paths....I have saved a good amount of my time. Maybe that's time I spend enhancing another part of the game, maybe its time I spend working on the garage at home. But that is a benefit.

Now you can argue that you would rather spend more time on your game and not railroad, and that is your choice. But it doesn't invalidate that there is an inherent benefit to railroading for the DM, and not railroading has a cost.


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 17, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> So I do want to codify something, as the "Railroad is always bad" camp has used the common argument that "there is no benefit to railroading, you could always just not do it".
> 
> The fundamental benefit of Railroad is.... DM time savings. If I make one combat encounter that the party will encounter if they go down any of 3 paths, versus crafting a different encounter for each of those paths....I have saved a good amount of my time. Maybe that's time I spend enhancing another part of the game, maybe its time I spend working on the garage at home. But that is a benefit.
> 
> Now you can argue that you would rather spend more time on your game and not railroad, and that is your choice. But it doesn't invalidate that there is an inherent benefit to railroading for the DM, and not railroading has a cost.



Except that you have to put so much effort into _hiding_ the railroading. Preventing the players from finding out. Covering it up when it happens. Etc.

And with your three paths thing...again,_ why not just have one path?_ That's the solution that _doesn't_ give any false impression of multiple distinct paths. It by definition cannot take any _more_ time than preparing three paths would, and should essentially always take less.

Between the added (and at least for me _extremely_ significant) burden of constantly having to cover up, and just...the whole technique of skipping over fake choices entirely (or just, y'know, being honest with your players; my players appreciate that I am very forthright with them), you may actually spend _more_ time railroading than you would avoiding it!


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## Stalker0 (Jul 17, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> DMs should be brave enough to accept that the things they create will not always come up in play. Like...if a DM literally can't accept that the thing he thought was super duper ultra cool just didn't interest the party, or (by pure coincidence) didn't end up being what the players wanted to investigate even if they were ignorant of that specific part, _the problem is that DM_, not the players.



And once again your absolutism is your downfall. You are correct, that DMs should on occasion be willing to let things they created go in the interest of player choice. We share that belief.

The issue is that you believe it MUST be true all the time, and this is why you are incorrect. There are cases where a DM should let the thing go, and there are times where the DM knows he's players are itching for some combat and so intends to make it happen for them. Both are useful tools. You are denying tools in your DM toolbox with the absolute position, and so it weakens you, not strengthens you.


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 17, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> And once again your absolutism is your downfall. You are correct, that DMs should on occasion be willing to let things they created go in the interest of player choice. We share that belief.
> 
> The issue is that you believe it MUST be true all the time, and this is why you are incorrect. There are cases where a DM should let the thing go, and there are times where the DM knows he's players are itching for some combat and so intends to make it happen for them. Both are useful tools. You are denying tools in your DM toolbox with the absolute position, and so it weakens you, not strengthens you.



Except, again, it's not.

Because you can always recycle your exciting old content into something new that actually fits the situation. Sure, it might be a little bit of work. _You're the DM. Doing that work is what YOU signed up for_.

If you don't have the time to run a game like this, that's what modules and APs are for. And in those cases, the players _know_ they're on rails, so it's not a problem. As I've said.


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## Stalker0 (Jul 17, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> Except that you have to put so much effort into _hiding_ the railroading.



My lord, really?

You think that my that my quantum bandit scenario is super hard to cover up?

DM: Ok you all encounter a group of bandits on the western road!!
Player: Oh man, what would we have found if we went north?
DM: You don't know, you didn't go north.

Congrats, you've done it.


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## Stalker0 (Jul 17, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> _You're the DM. Doing that work is what YOU signed up for_.



Ah, can you point me in the DMG the page where it tells me how many hours of DMing I am supposed to do a week? I seemed to have missed that section


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 17, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> The vast, vast, vast, VAST majority of the time, when people speak of "fudging," they mean _secretly_ ignoring die rolls and/or rewriting monster stats (same thing mathematically), almost always while specifically making it so players THINK you're using those things fully legitimately, and doing everything in your power to make it so your players never, ever discover that you deceived them.




I'm not sure that's really true, ER.  I've seen it used a pretty fair bit the way the prior poster said, as not respecting die rolls once made whether acknowledged or not.  It wouldn't be the first time a term is used variously by different people and if you happen to mostly run across one usage, you might not realize it.


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 17, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> My lord, really?
> 
> You think that my that my quantum bandit scenario is super hard to cover up?
> 
> ...



Sure. That's one instance.

Now repeat that _every single time you do this_.

Over and over and over and over and over and over.

And it just takes _one_ mistake. One time where the players see through it, for the house of cards to fall down. _That's_ why I don't do it. I don't believe for a second I can keep up a facade like that forever. I can _barely_ keep up a facade of evil NPCs who aren't the person they appear to be!


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## Stalker0 (Jul 17, 2022)

Also, I love how you keep telling me how difficult Illusionism is....when apparently you never engage in it. Could it be that you are just not an expert of that subject due to your own inexperience? Or perhaps....your just bad at it, and that's why you never use it? And nothing wrong wtih that, we all have our strengths and weaknesses, but perhaps your weakness in one area of DMing does not mean that its wrong for other DMs to use it when it is a strength of theirs.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 17, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> Because the former reflects an imagined world that exists independently of the players' choices, and in which the consequences of those choices are durable and meaningful.
> 
> The latter is exactly equivalent to Skyrim, where the monsters level up to match you whenever you enter a dungeon and the market-stall assassination (or at least the attempt thereof) of an NPC only occurs the second you arrive because it's a scripted event.
> 
> You make a great deal out of the fact that it's a live DM there doing the thing.



So what? Why is the latter bad? I actually prefer the former for big stuff, but I see no reason to be fundamentalist about it, as it is practically impossible to have everything preplanned so that the world actually seems full of interesting things regardless of wherever and whenever the PCs go. 

And that GMs do this is not "deception." There are no people outside internet debates who think that GMs never ever do anything like this.

Also, I'm flabbergasted that you run Story Now games which literally are based on concept of no myth and the GM just making stuff up as response to player actions. 



EzekielRaiden said:


> Sure they are. You've repeatedly said they are: that they put forward an illusion, not merely an imagined world that doesn't exist but a _false description_ of that world, ensuring that the players' beliefs about what occurred are in fact _false_, not merely _imaginary_. You've _agreed_ when people have described it that way, as an illusion disguising the true state of affairs (namely, that the choice involved wasn't a choice at all). Why is it suddenly not that now? What changed?



It is always an illusion to a degree! There is no "real version" of the world so how could there be a false one?


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## Stalker0 (Jul 17, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> Now repeat that _every single time you do this_.
> 
> Over and over and over and over and over and over.



Because I don't do it every single time, that's the whole darn point. I mix it in with other fully immersive stories that adjust to player choices. Your right if I slam the illusion card everytime I dm, yeah its probably not going to go well. As a tool I use on occasion, nope I have no problems maintaining it for entire campaigns.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 17, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> Except that you have to put so much effort into _hiding_ the railroading. Preventing the players from finding out. Covering it up when it happens. Etc.



That's super easy, barely an inconvenience.



EzekielRaiden said:


> And with your three paths thing...again,_ why not just have one path?_ That's the solution that _doesn't_ give any false impression of multiple distinct paths. It by definition cannot take any _more_ time than preparing three paths would, and should essentially always take less.



Because it would be weird world if it had just one path. The illusion is to make the world seem bigger.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 17, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> Because you can always recycle your exciting old content into something new that actually fits the situation.



How is that not exactly the similar sort of illusionism? It is the same content, perhaps slightly reskinned. This is literally what the quantum bandits are, except the recycling happens now instead of later.


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## iserith (Jul 17, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> So I do want to codify something, as the "Railroad is always bad" camp has used the common argument that "there is no benefit to railroading, you could always just not do it".
> 
> The fundamental benefit of Railroad is.... DM time savings. If I make one combat encounter that the party will encounter if they go down any of 3 paths, versus crafting a different encounter for each of those paths....I have saved a good amount of my time. Maybe that's time I spend enhancing another part of the game, maybe its time I spend working on the garage at home. But that is a benefit.
> 
> Now you can argue that you would rather spend more time on your game and not railroad, and that is your choice. But it doesn't invalidate that there is an inherent benefit to railroading for the DM, and not railroading has a cost.



Correct, railroading allows for the preservation of prep. Prep takes time, so the more you keep your players on your prep by railroading, you don't have to create a lot of extra stuff that might not get used. Accordingly, you save yourself prep time. Ultimately this is a matter of time management on the part of a DM who has chosen to railroad over other approaches that might be workable for their schedule. I, for example, plan my next campaign right when I start my current one. I outline what I'll need for prep, break that down into little pieces, then work on those pieces bit by bit while the current campaign is playing out. When done, I'm ready to start this new campaign and I repeat that process. No fuss, no muss, and no railroading needed.

But ultimately here's the thing: All you have to do is explain to your players and ask them for their agreement to stick to the prep as much as they can while understanding sometimes you'll move stuff around to keep things on track, and you're no longer railroading. Railroading is by definition doing something against someone else's wishes. If they're cool with going along with your plot, finding reasons for their characters to stick with it, and good with you moving that ogre to their current path, then you're not railroading anymore. What's revealing is the objection to just saying what you're doing up front. Everyone understands that time is a limited commodity. They'll understand some adjustments need to be made. And if they don't, then they don't have to play.


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 17, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> Ah, can you point me in the DMG the page where it tells me how many hours of DMing I am supposed to do a week? I seemed to have missed that section



Did I specify a number of hours? Hmm, doesn't seem like I did. _How odd._ Perhaps, instead of a snarky comment, it would be more constructive to engage in actual conversation.



Thomas Shey said:


> I'm not sure that's really true, ER.  I've seen it used a pretty fair bit the way the prior poster said, as not respecting die rolls once made whether acknowledged or not.  It wouldn't be the first time a term is used variously by different people and if you happen to mostly run across one usage, you might not realize it.



Okay. It's pretty clear from every Youtube video, every forum post, and every live-person conversation I've ever had that "fudging" means being secretive. That's rather a weird bubble to have somehow maintained.



Crimson Longinus said:


> So what? Why is the latter bad?



Because it's clearly not a world that has any durability or weight to it? There are no consequences. Nothing _matters_. Things "change" only so they can stay perfectly the same. The world continuously rearranges itself in order that exactly the same curve is drawn, no matter what order you pass through its parts.



Crimson Longinus said:


> I actually prefer the former for big stuff, but I see no reason to be fundamentalist about it, as it is practically impossible to have everything preplanned so that the world actually seems full of interesting things regardless of wherever and whenever the PCs go.



I don't have everything preplanned, as I said. I have forced myself not to, because I know that's much too much of a temptation for someone like me. But if they choose to go west instead of north, I will improvise _different things_ if I haven't prepared anything. (And, in general, I've done at least a LITTLE prep, so I have _something_ to go off of. That's why I have a map that _is_ drawn...and yet full of blanks.)



Crimson Longinus said:


> And that GMs do this is not "deception." There are no people outside internet debates who think that GMs never ever do anything like this.



There absolutely are. I was one, before I got involved in debates like this. It's part of why I find the practice so problematic and shocking. It has made me second-guess some of my past DMs.

People having problems with absolutism? Here's a flawed absolutist stance for you.



Crimson Longinus said:


> Also, I'm flabbergasted that you run Story Now games which literally are based on concept of no myth and the GM just making stuff up as response to player actions.



People have (in effect) told me I play DW wrong. My players are happy and I enjoy running the game, so...I dunno what to say. I've always found it incredibly weird that people harp so hard on DMs having absolutely nothing pre-existing when two of the Principles ("draw maps, leave blanks" and "think offscreen, too") and one of the explicit instructions for How To DM ("exploit your prep") require that you have, y'know, things prepared and stuff that definitely exists without prior player input. You cannot have "no myth" and also have, and I quote, "They don’t know that the attention that just fell on them was the ominous gaze of a demon waiting two levels below, but you do."



Crimson Longinus said:


> It is always an illusion to a degree! There is no "real version" of the world so how could there be a false one?



Nnnnnnnnnope.

There is a "real version." Just because it's fictional doesn't mean there is absolutely no weight to it whatsoever...unless you've _decided_ there should be no weight to it.

My fictional worlds do, in fact, have weight to them. Things exist, in a fictional, narrative sense. Choices matter, in a fictional sense. Just as they do in, say, books or movies or TV shows. Continuity is vital, for instance. Rational relationships between things are important. "Babylon 5" and "Star Trek" don't exist in the sense that you or I exist, but they _do_ exist in a narrative sense, and that narrative existence is extremely important. The fictional world I share with my players exists in a narrative sense. Doesn't your fictional world exist in that sense? It has a history, for example, that shouldn't be changed for light or transient causes.



Stalker0 said:


> Because I don't do it every single time, that's the whole darn point. I mix it in with other fully immersive stories that adjust to player choices. Your right if I slam the illusion card everytime I dm, yeah its probably not going to go well. As a tool I use on occasion, nope I have no problems maintaining it for entire campaigns.



Yeah, sorry, I don't buy it. I've seen through DM illusions before, and my players are WAY too sharp to not see through any of mine (hell, they've already pretty much seen through 3/4 of everything I've done thus far, they just don't _know_ they have, it's intuition rather than evidence.) It's not a matter of skill. It's a matter of numbers. Four or five brains vs one. That's not a winnable game. It's just not.



Crimson Longinus said:


> How is that not exactly the similar sort of illusionism? It is the same content, perhaps slightly reskinned. This is literally what the quantum bandits are, except the recycling happens now and not later.



Because "recycle" is not the same as "reuse." Remember those old commercials? Reduce, reuse, recycle. "Reuse" means to use the same thing again, like using a Ziploc baggie for more than one snack, or using paper plates more than once. "Recycle" means to take a thing, break it down into its materials so those materials can be used in something else, like taking milk jugs and turning them into planters.

I would not reuse a fight if it didn't fit--_period_. But, for example, one of the components of that aforementioned obsidian golem was some shadow-magic spider-bot things. Perhaps their makers discovered the golem later (the grotto in which the PCs found it was essentially deserted after they left), meaning those makers could try to create something intentional built off the same (accidental) principles of the golem. That would be recycling the old fight that never happened so I could build something _new_ and interesting as a result, anchored in plausible plot events, with the specific details necessarily altered because the situation is quite different.


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 17, 2022)

iserith said:


> But ultimately here's the thing: All you have to do is explain to your players and ask them for their agreement



Yes! This! Exactly this!

Why is, "Communicate with your players and get them on the same page" such a bad thing? Why does it make me an _evil absolutist_ that I want DMs to either communicate, or be scrupulous?

Why is this so hard?!


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 17, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> Because it's clearly not a world that has any durability or weight to it? There are no consequences. Nothing _matters_. Things "change" only so they can stay perfectly the same. The world continuously rearranges itself in order that exactly the same curve is drawn, no matter what order you pass through its parts.



Again you're being binary. That everything is not fixed doesn't mean that nothing is fixed! I can have an encyclopaedia of stuff defined about the world, and still some things can just happen when they would make the game more interesting. 



EzekielRaiden said:


> Nnnnnnnnnope.
> 
> There is a "real version." Just because it's fictional doesn't mean there is absolutely no weight to it whatsoever...unless you've _decided_ there should be no weight to it.
> 
> My fictional worlds do, in fact, have weight to them. Things exist, in a fictional, narrative sense. Choices matter, in a fictional sense. Just as they do in, say, books or movies or TV shows. Continuity is vital, for instance. Rational relationships between things are important. "Babylon 5" and "Star Trek" don't exist in the sense that you or I exist, but they _do_ exist in a narrative sense, and that narrative existence is extremely important. The fictional world I share with my players exists in a narrative sense. Doesn't your fictional world exist in that sense? It has a history, for example, that shouldn't be changed for light or transient causes.



Yes, mine have too. But that "reality" is by necessity just a broad stokes sketch, and it appearing as real world full of stuff is by necessity always an illusion to a degree. 

I believe I have similar desire to have an objective word than you (and lack of that is one of the things I don't like about Story Now games,) but I understand that this is always an approximation. And ultimately we are creating a fun experience to the players, not a realistic real-time world simulation. 



EzekielRaiden said:


> Because "recycle" is not the same as "reuse." Remember those old commercials? Reduce, reuse, recycle. "Reuse" means to use the same thing again, like using a Ziploc baggie for more than one snack, or using paper plates more than once. "Recycle" means to take a thing, break it down into its materials so those materials can be used in something else, like taking milk jugs and turning them into planters.
> 
> I would not reuse a fight if it didn't fit--_period_. But, for example, one of the components of that aforementioned obsidian golem was some shadow-magic spider-bot things. Perhaps their makers discovered the golem later (the grotto in which they found it was essentially deserted after they left), meaning they could try to create something intentional built off the same (accidental) principles of the golem. That would be recycling the old fight that never happened so I could build something _new_ and interesting as a result, anchored in plausible plot events, with the specific details necessarily altered because the situation is quite different.



Yeah, this is just quibbling about the details. It's the same thing. And of no one has suggested reusing things in places where they don't make fictional sense.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 17, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> What does this mean? What is a change? Why is this something that is not already covered by the GM being in charge?




Being in charge does not imply "I'll lie to you about what's going on _on a player level_ to keep the game running."  Those are in no way implied, and the fact parts of this hobby thinks so is, like the hyper-GM-authority view, a leftover artifact that does not serve it well.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 17, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> Okay. It's pretty clear from every Youtube video, every forum post, and every live-person conversation I've ever had that "fudging" means being secretive. That's rather a weird bubble to have somehow maintained.




And I've seen plenty of the other usage in both forums and live over 40 years in the hobby.  So is it, instead, that I somehow magically have found tiny amounts of this usage with great frequency?  Frankly, confirmation bias can be the answer in either direction.


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## Cadence (Jul 17, 2022)

I kind of wonder what % of D&D players at large wouldn't like each of the following - assuming they were told this is how the game would run in advance (but not each time they were happening):

Nothing ever prepped, and everything that wasn't revealed so far always determined on the spot.
Some prepped material, locations, and encounters dropped in where they seem appropriate so far as long as they don't contradict previously established facts or void character choices
Plot hooks dangled essentially regardless of where the party goes as long as it feels appropriate
Plot hooks missed if the party doesn't go to one of the few places they would naturally occur in a real world
Prepped things altered based on the the number of players present
Prepped things altered based on current character level when they encounter it
Everything prepped and never changed, regardless of characters levels, current status, or number of players present.
Planned encounters alterable up to the start of the session
Planned encounters alterable up to the encounter occurs
Planned encounters alterable while in progress if a miscalculation was done of the challenge level 
Planned encounters alterable while in progress if the luck is swinging abnormally against the players


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 17, 2022)

Thomas Shey said:


> Being in charge does not imply "I'll lie to you about what's going on _on a player level_ to keep the game running."  Those are in no way implied, and the fact parts of this hobby thinks so is, like the hyper-GM-authority view, a leftover artifact that does not serve it well.



But the thing is that outside these internet debates people do not consider stuff like "interesting thing happens when the PCs are around to see it" to be any sort of deception.

I am not opposed to discussing gaming practices, I'm doing that right now. But I think that in a DM centric game such as D&D it is the baseline assumption that the GM may choose and rearrange things behind the curtains in a manner they see fit, and if someone has a strong objection to that, it behoves them to bring it up.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 17, 2022)

Cadence said:


> I kind of wonder what % of D&D players at large wouldn't like each of the following - assuming they were told this is how the game would run in advance (but not each time they were happening):
> 
> Nothing ever prepped, and everything that wasn't revealed so far always determined on the spot.
> Some prepped material, locations, and encounters dropped in where they seem appropriate so far as long as they don't contradict previously established facts or void character choices
> ...



I can say that as a player, I don't care how the GM does any of that. As long as the world seems real and full of interesting stuff to do and it seems that my choices matter I'm good. I don't really care how the GM achieved it or whether some of my feelings are based on illusion. It doesn't really affect my subjective experience.


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## bloodtide (Jul 17, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> DMs should be brave enough to accept that the things they create will not always come up in play. Like...if a DM literally can't accept that the thing he thought was super duper ultra cool just didn't interest the party, or (by pure coincidence) didn't end up being what the players wanted to investigate even if they were ignorant of that specific part, _the problem is that DM_, not the players.
> 
> DMs, like artists, must learn how to let go of their art at least _some_ of the time. Learn that sometimes, even the things you think are masterpieces...aren't. Using trickery and deception to _ensure_ that your masterpieces always end up in front of the players means intentionally ignoring this extremely important lesson. That's both unwise and counterproductive.



Brave does not even fit here.  A DM makes up fun stuff for the game, this is even in the rules.  The whole point is the things will come up in the game.  

Players might randomly miss a thing or not go to a spot or whatever, so does the DM just toss that thing away?  Why?  What is even the point of the DM doing ANY game prep if it won't be used in the game?  

And what about improv?  If the DM has nothing made, everything is blank, and the characters go to a location....then the DM just improvs and encounter, that is fine right?  The encounter did not exist until the characters got there, so they could never have avoided it.  Or would you say the improv Dm must toss out that encounter too?

Or are you saying the Only Allowed Things are things the players are 100% fully aware and informed about and then choose to encounter?


EzekielRaiden said:


> No. It's invisible because the DM _hides away all the evidence that might reveal it_. That's the point. That's my WHOLE point here. You keep acting like every player is some dumb rube, too stupid to figure out when they're being hoodwinked. That's both an incredibly disrespectful view of players, and in my experience _completely, dead wrong_.



I never said all, I said a third.  They do exist.  


EzekielRaiden said:


> The DM sure as heck does. Why else are they _concealing things from the players?_
> 
> With a magic trick, anyone with even a modicum of education knows it's not real. The illusionism-using DM is specifically ensuring that  their players believe it IS real, and moreover, actively hiding any information which could have suggested otherwise. Since you seem to like these arguments by analogy: It would be like a magician trying to "prove" that their magic is in fact completely legitimate, by providing edited and manipulated video tapes that _appear_ to show the magic being physically real, and destroying all other records that could contradict those manipulated tapes.



Though for all of history all magicians have tried to hide how the tricks are done from most people.  Even today, most are reluctant at best to admit any tricks.  They keep up the illusion of magic at all costs.

I'd note that it's a bit confusing when you say a DM is creating such a good game illusion that players....think the game is real?


EzekielRaiden said:


> Again: with the illusionism DM, _they do not want the player to ever think that sleight of hand is happening_. They want the player to genuinely believe that the superficial situation--choices that actually do matter--is in fact the true situation, when it isn't. And they will actively hide away any evidence that this isn't the case. Go looking just about anywhere and you'll see that nearly everyone who advocates for fudging, for example (which isn't railroading _per se_, but absolutely is a form of illusionism) will expressly say that you SHOULD fudge, but IF you do, NEVER EVER let the players find out. The deception is NOT explicitly part of play, and is in fact kept very hush-hush, hidden away, denying the players even the opportunity to discover that a deception might occur at all while specifically leading them on so they'll believe what they're told.



Players are free to think whatever they want.  The rails are invisible as the players can't see them.   And for the record I never fudge: let the dice roll where they may.




EzekielRaiden said:


> 1. Inventing an organization or society that is active in the world. For example, the of Robin Hood-esque Silver Thread thieves/pickpockets/etc., who work to keep the shadows safe for the common man and fight against the oppression of the poor by high society. This included Rahim, the dashing prince of thieves who leads them. Lovely character. I always enjoy portraying him, all suave and good-humored.
> 2. Establishing historical characters of significance, such as long-dead saints, former rulers, particular ancient genies, etc.
> 3. Mythopoeia, telling us the nursery rhyme or Nomad Tribe story-ritual or bawdy tavern song where the character heard about something.
> 4. Personal connections, e.g. loved ones, rivals, former friends, etc. One character, for example, has a vast extended family, who are willing to provide help, so long as it reflects well on them within the clan.
> ...



So, other then the ones where you want the players to do your DM work for you(I don't agree with that, but if that is what you like it's fine), how does a Railroad stop a player from doing the other ones?

The players and characters are railroaded along the adventure The Bandits of Bunglewood.  A player can still make up character history, can still make up myths or make up NPCs they know.  The railroad keeping them on the adventure does nothing to stop the players from making that stuff up.


I'd have a big problem with the hostile player of number five though.  The player that like two hours into the game where the group is tracking down the bandits suddenly says "I want my character to abandon the adventure and the group and travel 100 miles to Footloose Port to learn how to dance".  Nope, never in my game.


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## Arilyn (Jul 17, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> I can say that as a player, I don't care how the GM does any of that. As long as the world seems real and full of interesting stuff to do and it seems that my choices matter I'm good. I don't really care how the GM achieved it or whether some of my feelings are based on illusion. It doesn't really affect my subjective experience.



Every GM will have preferences, varying amounts of time and different comfort levels when it comes to designing and prepping. I'd prefer they lean into what excites them while doing this, as to me, that will help make for a better game. I'm pretty flexible as a player and as long as the railroading isn't stomping all over my choices, I don't really care either. I don't feel that quantum ogres, encounters, etc. are railroading unless the players have knowledge and deliberately avoid the encounter but the GM forces it.


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## MichaelSomething (Jul 17, 2022)

Here's a relevant pic of a tweet cause I saw it on my phone


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## Maxperson (Jul 17, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> 1) Older players with Real Lives: So one of the things I have noticed in my games as the years have gone on, as my players have gotten older, gotten jobs and families.... they just don't have the mental energy they once did. I have done "open sandbox" games with them, and what I find is that giving them a bevy of choices tends to create decision paralysis, infighting, and slows down the game. What normally happens is one player just makes a choice and everyone goes along with it.
> 
> conversely my most successful campaigns have been my "mission focused" ones. Ie the players are a part of some organization, they have a boss that goes "alright team, your mission is....". Aka I put them on a railroad, here is where you are going and what you are doing. And they love it, it removes any infighting, any debating, they just get right into the roleplaying and the action.



Player type makes a huge difference here.  If you have proactive players,  you don't even have to come up with a zillion choices.  They will decide upon goals for their characters and then set about trying to achieve them.  All a DM with those sorts of players has to do is react and work on things relating what they are doing, and perhaps a bit of tangential stuff.  Improvisation also helps a lot.  

It's still a sandbox world, since they players can pick and choose what they want to do, and change along the way, but the DM has to work far less on it than a traditional sandbox.

Passive players on the other hand, need to be led to things.  They aren't going to come up with the idea to become the new sheriff in town, but if you present a problem in their town where the old sheriff is corrupt and there's no good replacement, a lot of passive players will happily decide to step into that role.


Stalker0 said:


> 2) Limited DM time: Likewise as I've gotten older, my time and mental energy are limited as well. Now I can spend that time crafting a dozen options to try and account for player choices....each of which only get a small portion of my time and creativity, or I can focus my energies on 2-3 encounters I know they will encounter (because of the railroad), each of which will be much more involved and interesting because I've put my full mind to their creation.



And here again improvisation is key.  I haven't crafted a dozen options, even a single option in decades.  What I do is come up with a puzzle, problem or encounter and let the players come up with ways.  They will almost always do so, and often in ways you wouldn't have crafted anyway. It's a waste of time coming up with options and trying to account for player choices when they're highly likely to come up with something you didn't think of anyway.

I'm not trying to say you are doing it wrong.  I'm just present a different take on those situations.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 17, 2022)

Cadence said:


> Planned encounters alterable up to the start of the session
> Planned encounters alterable up to the encounter occurs
> Planned encounters alterable while in progress if a miscalculation was done of the challenge level
> Planned encounters alterable while in progress if the luck is swinging abnormally against the players




This particular part has been a topic of controversy all the way back to near the beginning of the hobby.  Though the terms don't seem to have survived, back in the day in a couple of influential APAs and other places in the day there was discussion of the validity of "softkeying" (making up encounters as you got to them) or "flexkeying" (changes encounters on the fly after they'd started to adjust difficulty) in contrast to "hardkeying" (encounters that were pre-set and only used as-is).


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## Stalker0 (Jul 17, 2022)

Maxperson said:


> Player type makes a huge difference here.  If you have proactive players,  you don't even have to come up with a zillion choices.  They will decide upon goals for their characters and then set about trying to achieve them.  All a DM with those sorts of players has to do is react and work on things relating what they are doing, and perhaps a bit of tangential stuff.  Improvisation also helps a lot.
> 
> It's still a sandbox world, since they players can pick and choose what they want to do, and change along the way, but the DM has to work far less on it than a traditional sandbox.
> 
> ...



I'm very much in agreement with you, but I think that some people in the thread consider that "bad railroading". If your just coming up with something on the fly, than your not respecting player choice because you could have come up with that regardless of what the players do. The only "correct" way to do it (according to some) is to have everything laid out before the players choose, and then when they choose you just follow the path you already preplanned for without alteration. Anything less is railroading.


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## Maxperson (Jul 17, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> So what your saying is, the players are fine with certain choices not mattering (or mattering only as a minor story detail) as long as they get to where they ultimately want to go.



Choice is the key, not whether something matters or not.  The players had the choice to chat up the NPC or not. If the NPCs doesn't have any information for them to go on and it ends with nothing mattering, their choice was still honored.  They had agency.

Now, if while talking to the insignificant NPCs they discover that he's a farrier and one of the PCs has an aha! moment and says, "I need some horseshoes made of fairy steel for a magic item I'm going to have made, would you introduce me to the blacksmith?" and the DM says no in order to force the players back towards the plot that the DM wants them to engage with, THAT would be railroading.  He's shutting down agency in order to see his own agenda done.  If on the other hand he knows that the farrier really doesn't do favors for people and a diplomacy check fails and he says no, then it's not railroading for him to refuse that connection.


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## Stalker0 (Jul 17, 2022)

Maxperson said:


> Now, if while talking to the insignificant NPCs they discover that he's a farrier and one of the PCs has an aha! moment and says, "I need some horseshoes made of fairy steel for a magic item I'm going to have made, would you introduce me to the blacksmith?" and the DM says no in order to force the players back towards the plot that the DM wants them to engage with, THAT would be railroading.



However, what if while watching the scene, the DM sees the other players eyes start to roll, "oh here goes Bob again with one of his subplots". So the DM could let Bob go through this whole blacksmith scene, consuming the game time while the other players have to wait....or he could nudge Bob back on the main plot that all of his players are enjoying, and so now they get to participate. Remember that sometimes the DM has to step in when one player's agency can step on teh agency of others.

Again its never that black and white, which is my issue with this debate. I am willing to accept there are certain levels of railroading that are generally bad and excessive, but it seems like there are others that any amount of railroading is absolutely unacceptable. Those are incompatible viewpoints, with nothing in the middle to work towards agreement.


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## Maxperson (Jul 17, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> I'm very much in agreement with you, but I think that some people in the thread consider that "bad railroading". If your just coming up with something on the fly, than your not respecting player choice because you could have come up with that regardless of what the players do. The only "correct" way to do it (according to some) is to have everything laid out before the players choose, and then when they choose you just follow the path you already preplanned for without alteration. Anything less is railroading.



It's not railroading unless you enact it regardless of their choice.  

If I come up with, the baron is sending a legion to impose martial law on the next town the players come to and then do it no matter what town they go to, that's a railroad of illusionism.  Their choice of towns is not relevant.  If on the other hand I come up with the idea that the baron is going to impose martial law on the town of Weneedorder and the players who are heading there decide instead to turn north to Thistownhasorder, because it's close to something else they want to do, then it's not railroading for me to have the baron impose martial law on Weneedorder.  I have not invalidated their choice.

Similarly, if they decide to go into a town and no matter what they do or where the go I decide that they will be attacked by a street gang, that is railroading.  But if instead they go into a town and decide to go to the local adventurer's guild and find out if there are any problems and I have to come up with one and come up with a street gang problem in the dock district, that is not railroading.  I am honoring their choice and improvising a logical problem for the guild to be hired to take care of.  The players are then free to take the job and clean up the gang, not take the job and clean of the gang, take a different job, or take no job at all and go do something else.  They'll only be attacked by the gang if they go to the dock district.  That's not railroading.

Improvisation isn't railroading.  Forcing the players onto a path and denying them their agency is.


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## Maxperson (Jul 17, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> However, what if while watching the scene, the DM sees the other players eyes start to roll, "oh here goes Bob again with one of his subplots". So the DM could let Bob go through this whole blacksmith scene, consuming the game time while the other players have to wait....or he could nudge Bob back on the main plot that all of his players are enjoying, and so now they get to participate. Remember that sometimes the DM has to step in when one player's agency can step on teh agency of others.



Or I do what I do and pause the scene at the point that the farrier agrees to take Bob to the blacksmith and ask the other players what they would like to do.  Then I can bounce back and forth between them making Bob happy, and the other players happy.

One of four things will happen in that situation.

1. The entire group will decide to go with Bob.  If they choose to do this, I will honor their choice.
2. Bob will go alone and the group will do something else.  Either together or individually.  If they choose to do this I will honor their choice.
3. Bob will decide that he doesn't want to miss the main plot or whatever else the group decides to do and will put the blacksmith thing on the back burner.  If Bob decides to do this I will honor his choice.
4. Some of the other group members will go with Bob and the others will go do something else.  If they choose this I will honor their choice.

I don't need to force Bob towards the plot or the group towards Bob's side quest.  Everyone can have fun doing their own things for a bit.


Stalker0 said:


> Again its never that black and white, which is my issue with this debate. I am willing to accept there are certain levels of railroading that are generally bad and excessive, but it seems like there are others that any amount of railroading is absolutely unacceptable. Those are incompatible viewpoints, with nothing in the middle to work towards agreement.



I'm in the latter camp.  Any amount of removal of my agency by denying my character the ability to choose what he wants to do is bad.  Railroading is bad.  However, linear doesn't have to be.  If a PC gets arrested for a crime and the party can't break him out, he's going on trial no matter what the players choose to do.  That's a linear consequence of that PCs action, not a railroad. A leads to B.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 17, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> But the thing is that outside these internet debates people do not consider stuff like "interesting thing happens when the PCs are around to see it" to be any sort of deception.




That's not the whole issue, however.  Remember part of this discussion isn't just "should you do this?" but "should you do this while _hiding the fact you ever even do it_?"  I think it can absolutely be defensible to do this.  I'm a little less on board being coy about it when its spotted by people.  But I _absolutely_ think its bad practice to just go in assuming everyone will be okay with you do it without actually ever bringing it up.  The latter is a violation of trust in the social contract and I don't think I'm being hyperbolic to state so.

(Caveat: there's some muddy ground involving a GM who thinks he knows his players well enough to be able to use it with a technique without consulting with them about it. I play with people who I've gamed with anywhere from 10 years to more than 40 at this point, and I think they're all pretty clear that I'll occasionally do things like this at this point so I don't need to have this discussion (helped by the fact its not a technique I _like_ using (I usually consider it a failure state of set-up), so I use it rarely, and most of the ones who've known me for a time know _that_ too).  But I absolutely would not make that assumption with a new group of players or even a single player these days, and I don't really think anyone else should.  Talk to them about it.  If they're good, then its good.)




Crimson Longinus said:


> I am not opposed to discussing gaming practices, I'm doing that right now. But I think that in a DM centric game such as D&D it is the baseline assumption that the GM may choose and rearrange things behind the curtains in a manner they see fit, and if someone has a strong objection to that, it behoves them to bring it up.




This makes a _massive_ assumption about more consistency in gaming cultures than I think is warranted.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 17, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> Again its never that black and white, which is my issue with this debate. I am willing to accept there are certain levels of railroading that are generally bad and excessive, but it seems like there are others that any amount of railroading is absolutely unacceptable. Those are incompatible viewpoints, with nothing in the middle to work towards agreement.




Are you really that surprised that some people draw bright lines on things other people don't care about?  If so, why?


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## bloodtide (Jul 17, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> But the thing is that outside these internet debates people do not consider stuff like "interesting thing happens when the PCs are around to see it" to be any sort of deception.



In all fiction this is true:  no matter what the main characters do or where they go interesting things will happen.  



Maxperson said:


> ow, if while talking to the insignificant NPCs they discover that he's a farrier and one of the PCs has an aha! moment and says, "I need some horseshoes made of fairy steel for a magic item I'm going to have made, would you introduce me to the blacksmith?" and the DM says no in order to force the players back towards the plot that the DM wants them to engage with, THAT would be railroading.  He's shutting down agency in order to see his own agenda done.  If on the other hand he knows that the farrier really doesn't do favors for people and a diplomacy check fails and he says no, then it's not railroading for him to refuse that connection.



Not in my game.  I hate such sub plots and wastes of time during an adventure.  The idea that a player would lie and say they want to do an adventure, and then just look for ways to ruin the game for everyone else does not sit with me.  Your playing a social game with a group: no side things are allowed.  

Though the big problem with your answer is the Crystal Ball part.  If the DM has the NPC say "they don't know the smith" because they are railroading you say it's wrong.  But if the DM "just decides" the NPC does not know the smith, then it's perfectly all right.  

I disagree with the idea that the DM must do a tap dance all around a bunch of word play to keep the players happy.  It's a huge waste of time.  I'm a die hard railroad tycoon, but when asked "why did not NPC F know the smith" I'm going to give the dumb "oh I just decided that npc did not know that npc based on things and stuff".  And the clueless players will buy that has the "right answer" and we can keep playing the game.

But I also very much disagree with the idea that the players think they can just walk up to any random NPC and think that is whatever they want.  The idea that the player just has a character walk up to a random smith in Happywood and expect that random smith to say "fairy horseshoes?  Sure I"m the epic world know fairly horseshoe crafter....and lucky you came today, they are on sale for just one copper coin!"

In my game players need to put a lot more effort into finding the NPC they are looking for...


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 17, 2022)

Thomas Shey said:


> That's not the whole issue, however.  Remember part of this discussion isn't just "should you do this?" but "should you do this while _hiding the fact you ever even do it_?"  I think it can absolutely be defensible to do this.  I'm a little less on board being coy about it when its spotted by people.  But I _absolutely_ think its bad practice to just go in assuming everyone will be okay with you do it without actually ever bringing it up.  The latter is a violation of trust in the social contract and I don't think I'm being hyperbolic to state so.




The thing is, nothing is really being hidden. People post advice on message board on how to do it! DMG tells how to do it. It is not a secret. And I have nothing against discussing such things with the players, but in the real life most people literally don't care. They want to have good game and don't care how the GM does it. The handful of people here who have super rigid (IMHO, in some cases to the point of being in practice unachievable) standards for their GMs are the extreme outliers.


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## Maxperson (Jul 17, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> Not in my game.  I hate such sub plots and wastes of time during an adventure.  The idea that a player would lie and say they want to do an adventure, and then just look for ways to ruin the game for everyone else does not sit with me.  Your playing a social game with a group: no side things are allowed.



Different strokes for different folks.  Side things are fun for a lot of people.  If you don't like it, make sure none of your players do, either.  Everyone needs to be on the same page with a game.


bloodtide said:


> Though the big problem with your answer is the Crystal Ball part.  If the DM has the NPC say "they don't know the smith" because they are railroading you say it's wrong.  But if the DM "just decides" the NPC does not know the smith, then it's perfectly all right.



There's a reason why I chose the Farrier and the Blacksmith. There's no way they don't know each other as they rely on one another for business.


bloodtide said:


> I disagree with the idea that the DM must do a tap dance all around a bunch of word play to keep the players happy.  It's a huge waste of time.  I'm a die hard railroad tycoon, but when asked "why did not NPC F know the smith" I'm going to give the dumb "oh I just decided that npc did not know that npc based on things and stuff".  And the clueless players will buy that has the "right answer" and we can keep playing the game.



Then just get players who are on board with linear play.  If they agree to hop on the rails, it's not railroading. If you are not talking to them and forcing them on the rails, you're violating the social contract which is big, bad wrong fun.  Railroad = bad.  Linear = not bad.


bloodtide said:


> But I also very much disagree with the idea that the players think they can just walk up to any random NPC and think that is whatever they want.  The idea that the player just has a character walk up to a random smith in Happywood and expect that random smith to say "fairy horseshoes?  Sure I"m the epic world know fairly horseshoe crafter....and lucky you came today, they are on sale for just one copper coin!"



Who said anything about that? There's a very good chance that the smith can't work with fairy metal and will find that out when they go talk to him.  Nobody is saying to give the players everything they want.  We're saying it's bad to deprive the players of their agency.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 17, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> The thing is, nothing is really being hidden. People post advice on message board on how to do it! DMG tells how to do it. It is not a secret. And I have nothing against discussing such things with the players, but in the real life most people literally don't care. They want to have good game and don't care how the GM does it. The handful of people here who have super rigid (IMHO, in some cases to the point of being in practice unachievable) standards for their GMs are the extreme outliers.




But "most people" doesn't cut it.  Not when it only requires you to have the discussion once to make sure you don't have someone other than "most people".


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## bloodtide (Jul 17, 2022)

Maxperson said:


> Different strokes for different folks.  Side things are fun for a lot of people.  If you don't like it, make sure none of your players do, either.  Everyone needs to be on the same page with a game.



I wish players would not lie about such things, but they do.  Players that attempt to ruin the game are not invited back.




Maxperson said:


> There's a reason why I chose the Farrier and the Blacksmith. There's no way they don't know each other as they rely on one another for business.



The problem here is it is "what you think" and your going all MY way is the ONLY way.  You can't think of even ONE reason why two NPCs might not know each other?  Odd, I can think of some.  Maybe the two NPCs hate each other.  How about they only have second hand contact by their wives.  Or any of a dozen other ways.

The idea that you would just say "THIS MUST BE SO", is wrong.  




Maxperson said:


> Then just get players who are on board with linear play.  If they agree to hop on the rails, it's not railroading. If you are not talking to them and forcing them on the rails, you're violating the social contract which is big, bad wrong fun.  Railroad = bad.  Linear = not bad.
> 
> Who said anything about that? There's a very good chance that the smith can't work with fairy metal and will find that out when they go talk to him.  Nobody is saying to give the players everything they want.  We're saying it's bad to deprive the players of their agency.



No biggie, my game has no social contract: you play at your own risk.


But.....wait. If the DM has the smith say they can't work fairy metal that is 100% ok, as long as the DM says that they are "just saying it".  But if the DM just wants to get back to the adventure that is railroading and wrong, right?  

Any time the DM says anything the players don't like it "deprives them of agency".  


Your illusion is even worse: as long as you can toss some word salad at the players to convince them your "not railroading" you are free to trick, fool and deceave them and do whatever you want.  As long as you have the word salad defense, you can do anything.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 17, 2022)

Thomas Shey said:


> But "most people" doesn't cut it.  Not when it only requires you to have the discussion once to make sure you don't have someone other than "most people".



I'm fine with having session zero discussions and do have such. But you cannot cover everything and people who have extremely specific preferences probably should bring them up themselves. 

I don't fudge and I don't really railroad as I would define it. But I can also honestly say that certain people's requirements here seem to be so extreme that I could not promise to meet them even if I wanted to, and I don't want to. And ultimately I feel that how I run the things behind the curtains is my business, and if the player cannot accept that, then we just shouldn't play together.


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## Maxperson (Jul 17, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> I wish players would not lie about such things, but they do.  Players that attempt to ruin the game are not invited back.



You do realize that none of them, even the ones that lie, are attempting to "ruin" the game, right?  It may have that effect on you, but that's not their goal.


bloodtide said:


> The problem here is it is "what you think" and your going all MY way is the ONLY way.



You're the only one of the two of us talking in absolutes about playstyle here.  With you're, "They're lying to me and trying to ruin games!" by wanting to have fun trying to make a fun magic item for their character.  The bastards!  If there's any One True Wayism going on here, it's from you.


bloodtide said:


> You can't think of even ONE reason why two NPCs might not know each other?  Odd, I can think of some.  Maybe the two NPCs hate each other.  How about they only have second hand contact by their wives.  Or any of a dozen other ways.



The farrier whose only job is to put horseshoes on horses and the blacksmith whose job it is to make horseshoes? Man, if you have to jump through twisty swinging hoops to figure out a way for two people who rely on one another not to know one another, you might want to rethink your position.  Heck, not even your suggestion there shuts down what I said in that other post.  All it does is change, "I know the blacksmith and can introduce you," into "My wife knows him or his wife, we can see if she can get you an introduction."

But hey, by all means shut it down if you've told the players before the campaign started that side quests like that are not going to be allowed, but don't


bloodtide said:


> The idea that you would just say "THIS MUST BE SO", is wrong.



Cool. Cool.  Then it's wrong for you to declare that no side quests "Must be the way it is."  Fortunately, I don't run my games like that or force things on players.


bloodtide said:


> No biggie, my game has no social contract: you play at your own risk.



It's actually impossible for there to be no social contract in a social game.  It's present.  That you haven't consciously written one isn't relevant, nor does it mean that one doesn't exist.  Depending on what you've set up with the players before the campaign began it could be very different than the one that is present in my game, but it exists whether you want it to or not.


bloodtide said:


> But.....wait. If the DM has the smith say they can't work fairy metal that is 100% ok, as long as the DM says that they are "just saying it".  But if the DM just wants to get back to the adventure that is railroading and wrong, right?



If the DM has a valid in fiction reason for to happen and the goal isn't to shut down player agency, it's fine.  The vast majority of smiths have probably never worked with the metal and wouldn't know how.  Some might.  And some might be willing to learn.  Who knows. As long as you are not invalidating player agency, it's all good.


bloodtide said:


> Any time the DM says anything the players don't like it "deprives them of agency".



Where on earth did you get that ridiculous notion? It almost sounds as if you are deliberately trying to not understand what we are saying and just throw out absurdly contrary comments.


bloodtide said:


> Your illusion is even worse: as long as you can toss some word salad at the players to convince them your "not railroading" you are free to trick, fool and deceave them and do whatever you want.  As long as you have the word salad defense, you can do anything.


----------



## bloodtide (Jul 17, 2022)

Maxperson said:


> You do realize that none of them, even the ones that lie, are attempting to "ruin" the game, right?  It may have that effect on you, but that's not their goal.



I disagree.  I have met too many bad players.



Maxperson said:


> You're the only one of the two of us talking in absolutes about playstyle here.  With you're, "They're lying to me and trying to ruin games!" by wanting to have fun trying to make a fun magic item for their character.  The bastards!  If there's any One True Wayism going on here, it's from you.



I'm talking about a social game where four people want to go on an adventure to slay a dragon, and that lone fifth player wants to ruin the whole game for all of us with his horseshoes.  




Maxperson said:


> Cool. Cool.  Then it's wrong for you to declare that no side quests "Must be the way it is."  Fortunately, I don't run my games like that or force things on players.



I force a lot to get a good game.  It is just the way it is.



Maxperson said:


> If the DM has a valid in fiction reason for to happen and the goal isn't to shut down player agency, it's fine.  The vast majority of smiths have probably never worked with the metal and wouldn't know how.  Some might.  And some might be willing to learn.  Who knows. As long as you are not invalidating player agency, it's all good.
> 
> Where on earth did you get that ridiculous notion? It almost sounds as if you are deliberately trying to not understand what we are saying and just throw out absurdly contrary comments.



Well, if I, as the Railroading DM, do anything the players don't like it is automatically wrong according to you.

But you are free to do whatever you like, even things the players don't like, if you can toss out some word salad defense.  

Maybe examples:   The group passes through a town on the trail of someone.  Annoying player wants to ruin the game with the "hey can we stop at the tavern and pretend to drink for the rest of the night?"

My Railroad: No, tavern is closed for repairs, on with the adventure.       Badwrong fun, right?

Your Word Salad: No, the tavern is closed as they had a big bar fight last night.  Lots to clean up.  And when the player accepts your lie with a nod that is all good.


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## Maxperson (Jul 17, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> I disagree.  I have met too many bad players.



I haven't, but then I don't view, "Likes to do things on the side." as being a bad player.


bloodtide said:


> I'm talking about a social game where four people want to go on an adventure to slay a dragon, and that lone fifth player wants to ruin the whole game for all of us with his horseshoes.
> 
> I force a lot to get a good game.  It is just the way it is.



I doubt it.  I mean, I'm sure it's a good game for you, but I've never seen a good game that involved a DM forcing players via railroading.  If they agree to rails, then it's linear and not railroading.  Have your players agreed to what you force them into?


bloodtide said:


> Well, if I, as the Railroading DM, do anything the players don't like it is automatically wrong according to you.



No. That's just more of your intentional "misunderstanding" of what I'm saying. 


bloodtide said:


> Maybe examples:   The group passes through a town on the trail of someone.  Annoying player wants to ruin the game with the "hey can we stop at the tavern and pretend to drink for the rest of the night?"



I love how your game is entirely about you, and if the players want to do something they enjoy but you don't, they are "annoying, bad players who just want to ruin the game."  Have you ever tried to see and understand a viewpoint other than your own?


bloodtide said:


> My Railroad: No, tavern is closed for repairs, on with the adventure.       Badwrong fun, right?



Have they agreed to you forcing things?  If yes, it's all good.  If no, then yes it's bad wrong fun since you are forcing the players along so that YOU can get YOUR fun, and screw their fun.


bloodtide said:


> Your Word Salad: No, the tavern is closed as they had a big bar fight last night.  Lots to clean up.  And when the player accepts your lie with a nod that is all good.



No. That's just more of your intentional "misunderstanding" of what I'm saying.


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## Umbran (Jul 17, 2022)

*Mod Note:*
There's a lot of people making this discussion personal.  I already had to warn someone against doing that several pages back.



Maxperson said:


> No. That's just more of your intentional "misunderstanding" of what I'm saying.





Hey, @Maxperson you're basically accusing someone of lying now.  That is extremely uncool.  Learn to walk away from people you feel are being dishonest.


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## Medic (Jul 17, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> Maybe examples:   The group passes through a town on the trail of someone.  Annoying player wants to ruin the game with the "hey can we stop at the tavern and pretend to drink for the rest of the night?"



The sheer amount of acrimony with which this portrays the hypothetical player in question astounds me.


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## bloodtide (Jul 17, 2022)

Maxperson said:


> I love how your game is entirely about you, and if the players want to do something they enjoy but you don't, they are "annoying, bad players who just want to ruin the game."  Have you ever tried to see and understand a viewpoint other than your own?



I think I see the disconnect.

You view the game is open, whatever happens is fine and fun.  It's a fine way to run a game.

Nothing like my game, however.....

Players show up on time, no excuses.  If anything less then your house exploding happens, you are expected to be at the game.  If not, you won't be invited back.

Players show up ready to play.  They have everything they need to play, and they want to play the game.  When the game starts, players must focus only on the game.

Game play will be fast, focused and intense.  I want to get to intense scenes of drama, comedy, action, adventure and combat, all with in a detailed heavy story with a plot(s).  Players must pay attention and engage in game play.

Infamous Three Second Rule: Any time during the game when we switch from role playing to roll playing, such as an action, adventure or combat scene, the player has three seconds to state their action.  If they don't, their character stands in place confused for the round(and often a target in combat).

You must play the agreed upon adventure.  It's a vote, majority rules.  If you really don't like the vote: LEAVE.  No one, least of all me, wants you slogging along "just so you can play".

And, yea, no side stuff: you agreed to go on the adventure, remember?  There are times (often AFTER the main adventure segment of the night) that the DM will call for Free Time, and the players may vote for Free Time.  Otherwise you may NOT abandon the adventure and group to go off and do a solo thing like "pretend to drink in a tavern".  If you really feel that your character "must go", then just leave the game.



So, you see a slight difference in our two games.


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## Hriston (Jul 17, 2022)

I posted this in @Stalker0's thread about the definition of _railroading _where it didn't get too much attention:


Hriston said:


> The Provisional Glossary at the Forge (indie-rpgs.com) has this definition of _Railroading:_
> Control of a player-character's decisions, or opportunities for decisions, by another person (not the player of the character) in any way which breaks the Social Contract for that group, in the eyes of the character's player. The term describes an interpretation of a social and creative outcome rather than any specific Technique.​



I think it's a good definition because it states railroading isn't just GM Force. It's Force that breaks the Social Contract in the subjective opinion of the player whose character's decisions and opportunities for decisions are being controlled by someone else. If you, as a GM, want to use techniques of Illusionism, such as those described in the OP, but want to avoid railroading your players, you'd do well to make sure ahead of time the players' expectations of the game include the use of Illusionism.


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## Remathilis (Jul 17, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> Because the former reflects an imagined world that exists independently of the players' choices, and in which the consequences of those choices are durable and meaningful.
> 
> The latter is exactly equivalent to Skyrim, where the monsters level up to match you whenever you enter a dungeon and the market-stall assassination (or at least the attempt thereof) of an NPC only occurs the second you arrive because it's a scripted event.



There is an old rule of Dungeoncraft I live by: never create more than need. That is to say, I don't have two dozen potential plot hooks up in the air, existing in their own space in the vain hope that the PCs will stumble into them. If the campaign is going to center around an evil cult that is attempting to open a portal to the Hells in the King's bedchambers, I'm not ALSO going create a rampaging dragon, a schism between the elven royal heirs, a problem with kobolds in Rock Ridge, the turf war between two rival thief guilds and pirates ravaging the Southern Coast unless any of that is relevant to the Cult activity. Moreover, even if I did, the odds are too great the PCs, unable to be everywhere at once, will be too busy fighting pirates when the Blood Moon rises, and the center of the Kingdom becomes a one-way ticket to Hell. Congrats, the pirate problem is over because now the Kingdom is a demonic wasteland! 

Those things could exist, but they are not relevant to the campaign I am running, which involves rooting out cults and fighting fiendish foes. They might stumble into a small side quest (those kobolds have grown bolder since the cult started recruiting them) but at most, you're talking a 1-2 session side-trip to fix the problem at Rock Ridge. The focus is on the campaign I'm running.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 17, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> No biggie, my game has no social contract: you play at your own risk.




That_ is_ a social contract; just a particularly one-way one.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 17, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> I'm fine with having session zero discussions and do have such. But you cannot cover everything and people who have extremely specific preferences probably should bring them up themselves.




This requires them to know they're unusual.  People who enter the hobby often have no idea that the game culture they come from may be unusual.



Crimson Longinus said:


> I don't fudge and I don't really railroad as I would define it. But I can also honestly say that certain people's requirements here seem to be so extreme that I could not promise to meet them even if I wanted to, and I don't want to. And ultimately I feel that how I run the things behind the curtains is my business, and if the player cannot accept that, then we just shouldn't play together.




Which is fine, but the idea that the player is supposed to second guess to what degree the GM is going to be honest with them, and if they aren't its _their_ fault doesn't really cut it from where I sit.  I might miss something too, but if a player got upset about it, I wouldn't act like they were the unreasonable one the way some people in this thread apparently would.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 17, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> The thing is, nothing is really being hidden. People post advice on message board on how to do it!




And every player participates in message boards?



Crimson Longinus said:


> DMG tells how to do it. It is not a secret. And I have nothing against discussing such things with the players, but in the real life most people literally don't care. They want to have good game and don't care how the GM does it. The handful of people here who have super rigid (IMHO, in some cases to the point of being in practice unachievable) standards for their GMs are the extreme outliers.




I have to again note that the fact you haven't hit many in no way means they're necessary outliers (it doesn't mean they aren't, either, but overextending from person experience is not uncommon).


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 17, 2022)

@Thomas Shey I'm not sure what your point is. I've said that I'm not opposed to communicating, but everything can never be covered, and players can make their preferences known too.  And what is printed in the game books being used probably should have some connection to what the expected baseline is. 

But ultimately I don't get this need to thought police the GM, and I don't want to play with people who are going to do that, epically they throw around judgemental language like "lie" or "dishonesty." I think I've been perfectly open about how I feel about this, and I certainly would do the same in the RL too, if I had the slightest inclination that anyone would actually care.


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## pemerton (Jul 17, 2022)

jgsugden said:


> I objected to the INVISIBLE RAILROAD (the title of this thread) and encouraged people to plan to create a world that makes sense.  When the world makes sense, it opens options, not closes them.  Real choice is created in a world that is prepared.  When the DM just shoves whatever they want in front of you regardless of the choices you make, as the OP suggests, that is the railroad.  Preparation is necessary ofr players to actually have choices to make.  Choice is between options, and options have to exist before you can choose between them.And this has NOTHING to do with the type of preparation I describe.  You're setting the stage.  You're not limiting what the players do with/on the stage.  You're preparing better for the NPCs to contriburte to that world meaningfully by giving them the background they need.  If you wing the NPCs as you go, they'll come off as random and nonsensical too often.  If they have goals, if they have a reason to be where they are, if they have a spark of life... then they're far more likely to be engaging.



To me, this reads like a recipe for GM-authored and GM-dominated play.

The way to allow choices, in my experience, is to allow the players to decide what their PCs do, and why they do it, and what they hope to achieve by doing it.



bloodtide said:


> So, and any one can answer here, how do players contribute to the shared fiction?
> 
> Lets take a simple adventure: small town has some bandits nearby.  The players and characters both agree to help the town and stop the bandits.  So the DM has a simple railroad flow chart for the characters to find the bandit camp.  Very simple.  So what can't the players do to "contribute to the shared fiction" on the railroad.  Keep in mind both the players and characters agreed to do this adventure, so doing anything else except this adventure is disrupting the game.



Who decided this adventure? Who decided that bandits would be a focus of play? Why do the players have their characters agree to help the town? What counts as _helping the town_ and _stopping the bandits_? Until we have answers to those questions, how can we possibly tell whether or not we are talking about a railroad?

Probably the most important way the players contribute to the shared fiction is by deciding what is at stake. There are very many ways this can be done, more or less formal depending on the RPG being played. The most formal approach to this in D&D has been 4e's player-authored quests. But it can be done informally.


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## pemerton (Jul 17, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> But consider how the GM makes it so that interesting stuff happens to the characters.
> 
> Characters wake up in a tavern. The GM asks what they want to do. So they say they go to library to do some research and after that, on afternoon, they go to the market to do some shopping. When they arrive to the market, there is commotion. An exotic wild beast that had been transported for the sale has broken loose and is wreaking havoc! The characters try to stop the beast and prvent it from killing poor townspeople!
> 
> Except this was terrible deceitful illusionism! The GM had preplanned the encounter, and it didn't matter when the PCs went to the market. Had they decided on the morning to go to the market first, the encounter would have happened then. Had they decided to spent a longer time in the library and go to the market next day, the encounter would have happened then. This is basically the same thing than all those false choice doors and roads and whatnot





EzekielRaiden said:


> I would not do this. If they chose to go to the library before going to the market, the encounter would happen without them. If they delayed going off to an important location, _the world goes on without them_. I won't be a HUGE stickler over time things because I don't want to be a dick. But if they intentionally delay on something they know is important, e.g. repeatedly putting off addressing a known threat (as my group did with the black dragon gang), that threat becomes more dangerous



This one is a strange example to cause such a stark split.

@EzekielRaiden: in your treatment of this matter, who at the table decided that what was at stake _in choosing to go to the library, rather than go to the market_, was that the players wouldn't see and confront the escaped beast? As best I can tell, the answer is _the GM_. Did the GM tell this to the players? As best I can tell, the answer is _No_. So the players made a choice - to have their PCs go to the library rather than the market - which had a consequence that they didn't, and couldn't, have known about. That looks to me like straight-out GM control over the fiction, and the meaning of the players' choices. Which I thought was exactly the thing you've been complaining about in your posts!

The more general point, it seems to me, is this: If the GM frames a scene or encounter, and in that framing does not negate or override something that the players chose to make a focus or stakes of play, than no meaning that the players introduced into the game is being overridden or disregarded. So it can't be railroading.

There is an approach to play that slightly - but only slightly - complicates the preceding: the "hidden gameboard/secret notes" approach, where the players _know_ that the GM is referring to secret material to tell them what happens next, and a big part of the point of play is for the players to learn these secrets and exploit that knowledge to do well in the game. Gygaxian dungeon crawling is a paradigm of this; procedural hex crawls can be seen as a variant. In these games the players make choices that have stakes/consequences they are ignorant of - by design - but the skill of play is in overcoming that ignorance and gradually, as a player, taking control of the direction of play. These games also work best when the players have resources (like detection spells, or scouting abilities) that make it clear how they can acquire knowledge of the GM's secrets without just blundering around and risking losing the game (eg by having all their PCs swallowed by the devil mouth).

But the sort of thing that @CrimsonLonginus has described - where the PCs are doing research at libraries, shopping at market places, etc, and may or may not encounter escaped wild beasts - does not look to me like an example of hidden gameboard play. The very fact that the GM is not sticking rigidly to a prepared gameboard or set of notes reveals as much! So there seems to be no particular virtue in having secret consequences of the players' decision-making that only the GM knows, and can know, about. That would just be the GM telling a story to themself.



Charlaquin said:


> Say you have a cool setpiece encounter planned. But, you don’t want to risk the possibility that the players will miss it, so rather than keying it to a specific part of the dungeon or whatever, you decide it will occur wherever the players happen to go.



Are you assuming "hidden gameboard" play? Crimson Longinus, it seems to me, is not.

In non-hidden-gameboard play, why would the players assume that the stakes of going first to the library then to the market are different from those of going first to the market then to the library? And if the players have made no such assumption, then in what way is the meaning of their choice vitiated by the GM deciding to frame their trip to the market as an exciting encounter with a wild beast? How is that railroading? What choice which was presented as meaningful has been rendered meaningless?



EzekielRaiden said:


> If you present choices that are _supposed to matter_, but they specifically _do not_ matter, how is there any degree to that?
> 
> Are you really saying that travelling due west and travelling due north are choices that aren't supposed to have ANY physical significance or consequences on the people making the journey, that they will have _literally exactly_ the same experience, travel to EXACTLY the same places, etc., etc.?



Well, this is the crux, isn't it?

If it is the GM who is deciding what is west, north etc, and the only way the players learn any of that is by declaring their movement and having the GM tell them, there is no meaningful choice. It's just the GM telling a story, treating the players' action declarations as cues. The GM is presenting these as "supposed to matter" only in the sense that the players have some vague sense that what the GM tells them might differ depending on what actions they declare.

Again, if we're talking "hidden gameboard" play then things are slightly different, but nothing you have posted makes me think that that's the sort of RPGing you're doing.


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## Maxperson (Jul 18, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> I think I see the disconnect.
> 
> You view the game is open, whatever happens is fine and fun.  It's a fine way to run a game.
> 
> ...



Sure.  I could tell from the get go that our games are very different.  All I'm saying is that if you have the player buy-in before the campaign begins, it's all good.  They opted into those rules and have accepted them.  If they then break those rules, shame on them.  If on the other hand you are springing that sort of stuff on players after the campaign starts, then it's shame on you.

There's nothing wrong with playing that way if everyone is on board with it.


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## Remathilis (Jul 18, 2022)




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## Mort (Jul 18, 2022)

Remathilis said:


> View attachment 254132




If the players have no idea what's in any of the towns - there's no actual (meaningful) choice because essentially, they're just picking at random. So all three towns are not "the same" as they don't all exist yet (you've only filled out one, the first one they go to). Now if/when the go to town 2 and town 3 they will NOT be the same.

If the players do know what's in the various towns (at least some details) then they can't be the same. The players know the great sage they seek is in town 1 but the great warrior they seek is in town 2. The towns are not "the same" from that fact alone, there is a meaningful choice in picking one of them. As for the stats of the town? Again, town 2 won't be the same because the DM will probably not even fill them out until town one is done (unless he does, which works too).


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## Man in the Funny Hat (Jul 18, 2022)

I have never really had problems with railroading as a player or as DM - except when it was being done by published adventures.  First time I can _remember_ it becoming an issue is with A3-4 in the Slaver's series.  PC's are all ko'd and captured.  No saves.  No other possible outcome.  No alternative means even suggested to get them from the end of A3 to the start of A4.  But that was excusable because those were tournament adventures and while it's uncreative as hell and obnoxious, it's still kind of a necessary evil (until you sell it unchanged as a general adventure series to drop into otherwise unmodified campaigns).  The ones I recall that really set the gold standard and started the whole, "The DM is a *storyteller* and the PC's are just the little puppets dancing to a predetermined tune, and the players are just there to enjoy the part prepared for them - not to actually CHANGE it," were the Dragonlance adventures.  Was not sad to see the end of those and have not cared to revisit them even a little bit.

Since then I've seen it now and again, but it's become easy enough to spot ahead of time and I've learned to ignore or get around the practice. A few times I think it's even been a good DMing exercise or betterment challenge to fix such things.  Really I just learned to skip most published adventures and just let plots and adventures emerge more naturally from other ongoing play.


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## FrozenNorth (Jul 18, 2022)

DEFCON 1 said:


> Meh.  Player choice is overrated.



Maybe you aren’t choosing players sufficiently carefully?


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## Lord Rasputin (Jul 18, 2022)

Remathilis said:


> I'm just here to see all the badwrongfun replies and wasn't disappointed.



Depends on whether or not you define what is described in the essay as "fun." A lot of us don't.


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## Stalker0 (Jul 18, 2022)

Maxperson said:


> Similarly, if they decide to go into a town and no matter what they do or where the go I decide that they will be attacked by a street gang, that is railroading.



Again I consider this a matter of degrees.

A player of mine goes into a town, and does the following:

1) Decides to put on their extra special shoes. Nothing magical of course, they just think they look cool.
2) Wears some loose summer clothing, because its quite hot in the city.
3) Puts their money pouch tight around their leg, because they have heard of bandits around.
4) Prepares the absorb elements spell today.
5) Decides to go the west part of town to talk to the blacksmith.

I as a DM, do the following:

1) I make no adjustment to any of my encounters due to the shoes.
2) I do not make any checks for the hot weather, and would not have done so even if they wore "normal clothing"
3) The PC was not pickpocketed at any point in the day, so the choice of money pouch location has no meaning.
4) The PC is not hit with any elemental damage spells, and so this spell preparation choice was meaningless.

Have I railroaded so far? A lot of player choices have had 0 impact on the adventure so far, so am I a bad DM? Should I have improvised some pickpockets or had them get struck by lightning to ensure a few of these choices were impactful?

5) Now we get to the blacksmith. I as the DM decide to do an assassin encounter, and yes would have done that regardless of which direction the PC goes. However, because they choose to go to the blacksmith before the end of the day, the blacksmith is there, and they have a long talk and get some key info about the bad guy they are pursuing. And with a great persuasion check, gets 5% discount off some wares.


So for 5, the players choice absolutely mattered. Their decision to go to the blacksmith did not have any impact on their combat encounter, but it did absolutely have impact on what information the player was able to obtain, which now impacts the plot.

So does a player choice have to impact every single element of my story in order for it be impactful, or can we agree that as long as the player choice had some key impact, that's its not required for it to have ABSOLUTE impact over everything?


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## Stalker0 (Jul 18, 2022)

This gets me to my ultimate point.

Players absolutely want agency in the game, but I don't think they expect ABSOLUTE agency. I don't think most players expect that every little decision they make will have plot altering consequences. Sometimes their decisions are life and death, and sometimes you just pick a door and walk through it, and it doesn't really matter.

Its all about the experience in total. If the player is given enough interesting choices of impact that they feel like they are a key piece of the story, than congrats you've done it. And if they feel that you have denied them too many choices and that they are a character in a tv show....than you have created a true railroad and failed. But in between, there's time for a bit of A and a bit of B.


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## Maxperson (Jul 18, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> Again I consider this a matter of degrees.
> 
> A player of mine goes into a town, and does the following:
> 
> ...



No.

1. The player had full agency to put on the shoes or not.  You have no obligation to go out of your way to make what the player did meaningful beyond what the player did.  However, had you rolled or decided prior to the player's declaration that it was going to rain, those shoes might get muddy.  
2. You are under no obligation to alter the weather for the player, either. I would assume that you informed the player before hand that it was hot out, which is why the player said that he put on loose summer clothing.  This is just RP on the part of the player and the player had full agency to make that decision or not.
3. You don't have an obligation to make the player's choices matter. Railroading would have been if a pickpocket was determined by you to be successful no matter what the player did.  THAT would deprive the player of agency.
4. You don't have an obligation to make the player's choices matter. The player made a decision with full agency just in case something happened.


Stalker0 said:


> 5) Now we get to the blacksmith. I as the DM decide to do an assassin encounter, and yes would have done that regardless of which direction the PC goes. However, because they choose to go to the blacksmith before the end of the day, the blacksmith is there, and they have a long talk and get some key info about the bad guy they are pursuing. And with a great persuasion check, gets 5% discount off some wares.
> 
> 
> So for 5, the players choice absolutely mattered. Their decision to go to the blacksmith did not have any impact on their combat encounter, but it did absolutely have impact on what information the player was able to obtain, which now impacts the plot.
> ...



It's about agency, not mattering or impact.  Above the players have no agency to avoid the assassin. It's going to encounter them no matter what.  That's railroading and without player buy-in, is bad. The assassin should be avoidable.  Not that you can't have an assassination or attempted assassination no matter what, but the players shouldn't be forced to be there.

What I would do is if they learned information at the blacksmith(and he had that info prior to the players deciding to show up), then it's all cool if that leads them to the assassin.  They had agency to go to him or not.  They had agency with their questioning. And they had agency to decide to go confront the assassin or not. If they fail to learn in advance, then they will presumably hear about the assassination later.


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## Hriston (Jul 18, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> Again I consider this a matter of degrees.
> 
> A player of mine goes into a town, and does the following:
> 
> ...



Yes, it sounds like you forced an assassin encounter the PC had no opportunity to avoid. Whether it was railroading or not depends on the player’s expectations of gameplay.


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## Maxperson (Jul 18, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> Players absolutely want agency in the game, but I don't think they expect ABSOLUTE agency. *I don't think most players expect that every little decision they make will have plot altering consequences.*



That's not agency. Agency is not invalidating their choices by forcing them down paths or to encounters. Their choices have to be their own and not be invalidated, but do not have to be enhanced.

If the player of a wizard chooses to memorize protection from energy, it's not railroading if no encounters that you had set up have energy attacks, or maybe there are no encounters set up at all.  It *IS* railroading if you go through all your prepared encounters and change all of the energy attacks and spells into something else.  That invalidates the player's choice and agency.


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## Stalker0 (Jul 18, 2022)

Maxperson said:


> It's about agency, not mattering or impact.  Above the players have no agency to avoid the assassin. It's going to encounter them no matter what.



So your saying that all combat encounters the players have to be alerted to before hand, and they must be given a chance to avoid them...or its railroading?


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## Mort (Jul 18, 2022)

Maxperson said:


> It's about agency, not mattering or impact.  Above the players have no agency to avoid the assassin. It's going to encounter them no matter what.  That's railroading and without player buy-in, is bad. The assassin should be avoidable.  Not that you can't have an assassination or attempted assassination no matter what, but the players shouldn't be forced to be there.




But if the assassin is there because of the player's actions - it may well be an unavoidable encounter (or at least VERY difficult to avoid) precisely BECAUSE of player agency. If the PCs did something to piss of someone with access to assassins, an assassin tracking them down wherever they are is not railroading, it's a consequence.


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## Charlaquin (Jul 18, 2022)

pemerton said:


> Are you assuming "hidden gameboard" play? Crimson Longinus, it seems to me, is not.
> 
> In non-hidden-gameboard play, why would the players assume that the stakes of going first to the library then to the market are different from those of going first to the market then to the library? And if the players have made no such assumption, then in what way is the meaning of their choice vitiated by the GM deciding to frame their trip to the market as an exciting encounter with a wild beast? How is that railroading? What choice which was presented as meaningful has been rendered meaningless?



I wouldn’t have thought of it like that, but its quite possible I was assuming “hidden gameboard play.” I don’t see any problem with the encounter at the market example, and it wouldn’t have even occurred to me to consider it an example of the same thing as moving the _location_ where a setpiece encounter was planned to occur. Though I wouldn’t have been able to put into words why they felt different to me; I just intuitively registered them differently. But, yeah, as you demonstrated, that wouldn’t impact player agency at all, and so wouldn’t be an example of railroading, in my eyes.


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## Maxperson (Jul 18, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> So your saying that all combat encounters the players have to be alerted to before hand, and they must be given a chance to avoid them...or its railroading?



No.


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## Maxperson (Jul 18, 2022)

Mort said:


> But if the assassin is there because of the player's actions - it may well be an unavoidable encounter (or at least VERY difficult to avoid) precisely BECAUSE of player agency. If the PCs did something to piss of someone with access to assassins, an assassin tracking them down wherever they are is not railroading, it's a consequence.



There are always going to be exceptions, but even then it should still be avoidable, even if avoidance is extremely unlikely.  Let's say the players pissed off an assassins guild by killing an assassin who was on a job.  Now they want the one who landed the killing blow, the fighter, dead.  You have set it up so that it takes a month for the assassins to learn where the PCs are, where they live, and a rough schedule.  They will strike tonight!!!  Except that unbeknownst to you, the players have discussed travelling to a nearby city with a large library to research something and leave that afternoon via a teleportation circle.  Ooops! Encounter avoided! Agency mattered. It was very, very unlikely that would avoid the encounter, but it could still potentially happen.

Now if the assassin struck them the night after they teleported, that would be railroading.  There was truly no chance to avoid the encounter and nothing they did could matter.  You were going to force them down that path right then no matter what.  

To complicate things a bit more, let's assume that the assassins have a wizard with them that is capable of scrying. They've been watching the PCs and know where they live.  The assassin goes into their home and grabs something belonging to the fighter and scries the location of the party, then they too teleport.  Maybe the attack does happen, but it's not because of railroading. It's because of valid in fiction reasons and consequences.  That would not be railroading, since the attack isn't simply happening no matter what just because the DM desires a certain outcome.  

It may be that one day they do get attacked by the assassins.  Or maybe they grow too powerful before the encounter for the assassins to risk attack, and they back off.

The players' choice mattered and the encounter may or may not happen because of that choice and perhaps other choices.


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## Stalker0 (Jul 18, 2022)

Maxperson said:


> No.



Ok well then I'm having trouble reconciling why having an assassin attack a PC is railroading.

The PC had no knowledge of the assassin, and so their choices and action were never about the assassin, it was about acquiring information. And their choice did exactly that, their choice was rewarded with the impact of information provided from the blacksmith.

So why is this extra part, the part where they had a combat encounter....now railroading? At no point was their choice invalidated, the player got a reasonable impact from their choice.... so why if I throw in some extra is that railroading?


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## Maxperson (Jul 18, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> Ok well then I'm having trouble reconciling why having an assassin attack a PC is railroading.
> 
> The PC had no knowledge of the assassin, and so their choices and action were never about the assassin, it was about acquiring information. And their choice did exactly that, their choice was rewarded with the impact of information provided from the blacksmith.
> 
> So why is this extra part, the part where they had a combat encounter....now railroading? At no point was their choice invalidated, the player got a reasonable impact from their choice.... so why if I throw in some extra is that railroading?



Let's say the assassin was set to kill the duke's eldest son in 8 hours.  The party is unaware.  You know that the blacksmith, the head livery boy and a priest of the god of secrets either know about it or have clues that something bad is going to happen. 

If the party is allowed to find or not find these NPCs according to their choices, that's fine.  If the party just happens via their choices to be at the spot where the assassination attempt is going to happen, that's fine. If they learn about the assassination attempt and decide not to go, that's fine. If they never learn about the attempt, then they won't be there and will hear about it some time in the future.  Their choices determine if they know and if they will be there.

Now let's assume you just want them there no matter what and their choices are irrelevant.  They will learn the information whether they talk to the blacksmith, the hermit 2 miles outside of town or a sailor from a ship that just arrived in port.  If they decide not to go there, you will have the assassin come to them for some reason you contrive.  At that point nothing they do can matter, you've completely deprived them of agency and you are railroading them big time.  That's bad.


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## Stalker0 (Jul 18, 2022)

Maxperson said:


> Let's say the assassin was set to kill the duke's eldest son in 8 hours.  The party is unaware.  You know that the blacksmith, the head livery boy and a priest of the god of secrets either know about it or have clues that something bad is going to happen.
> 
> If the party is allowed to find or not find these NPCs according to their choices, that's fine.  If the party just happens via their choices to be at the spot where the assassination attempt is going to happen, that's fine. If they learn about the assassination attempt and decide not to go, that's fine. If they never learn about the attempt, then they won't be there and will hear about it some time in the future.  Their choices determine if they know and if they will be there.
> 
> Now let's assume you just want them there no matter what and their choices are irrelevant.  They will learn the information whether they talk to the blacksmith, the hermit 2 miles outside of town or a sailor from a ship that just arrived in port.  If they decide not to go there, you will have the assassin come to them for some reason you contrive.  At that point nothing they do can matter, you've completely deprived them of agency and you are railroading them big time.  That's bad.



But that's not the scenario I outlined. The assasin is just a random encounter, or maybe its a subplot I'm setting up for later. The player just knew they were going to get information about a villain they are pursuing....they choose the blacksmith, and got specific information. If I didn't have the random encounter would it be a railroad? Of course not...the player's choice was validated with the blacksmith's info.

So why does adding in a random encounter the player had no knowledge of suddenly make it a railroad?


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## Maxperson (Jul 18, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> But that's not the scenario I outlined. The assasin is just a random encounter, or maybe its a subplot I'm setting up for later.* The player just knew they were going to get information about a villain they are pursuing....they choose the blacksmith, and got specific information*. If I didn't have the random encounter would it be a railroad? Of course not...the player's choice was validated with the blacksmith's info.



No it wasn't.  Under that scenario they were going to get the information no matter who they talked with.  Total railroad and complete invalidation of the player's choice.  The choice literally didn't matter.  

Whether the encounter is random or not, if there's no possible chance to avoid, it's a railroad.  It's you forcing something on them.  I mean, random encounters are fine, but if they hear something approaching with a roll and decide to get the hell out of dodge, they have avoided the encounter.  If running or however else they choose to avoid can't make a difference, you're just forcing your agenda on them.  They have no agency.


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## Stalker0 (Jul 18, 2022)

Maxperson said:


> No it wasn't.  Under that scenario they were going to get the information no matter who they talked with.  Total railroad and complete invalidation of the player's choice.  The choice literally didn't matter.
> 
> Whether the encounter is random or not, if there's no possible chance to avoid, it's a railroad.



I in fact said that the fact they went to blacksmith gave them specific info for the plot. I guess I wasn't specific enough, I meant that if they had talked to someone else they would not have gotten that specific information.

Onto your second statement, this is where you and I fundamentally disagree. I can respect if the players were given a choice on how to avoid the assassin, and the DM just ignored that...then I could see that being considered a railroad. But in this case, at no point was a player's decision invalidated, because they were not making any decisions about the assassin. 

And going down that rabbit hole to me leads to madness. I mean if we are at that point, then your saying the only acceptable world in dnd is a hugely rich constructed world where hundreds of npcs have to have their schedules completely laid out, because I can't just drop a random encounter or an NPC on my party without it being fully immersed in the world and completely logical to the world's schedule or else its a railroad. Oh you decided to go to the blacksmith on tuesday? Well let me consult my npc chart to see if Mary the jester would be near by that day.... oh no that's her poker night. Oh but what about marigold the flower lady, wait did you go at 4:30 or going at 4:35? she only walks that area exactly at 4:30 so I need to time that roleplay encounter to check if whether you missed or not.

The notion of "plot convenience" happens in dnd all the time. The party "just happens" to meet an npc that could be helpful to them on their mission...even though the chance of that happening in real life could be less than 1 in 10,000. The party rescuses a woman who happens to be the old flame of one of the pcs....because its cool and dramatic (even though the odds are astronomical) Dms do this all the time, because tracking every minute of every day is just ludicrous, and we want our players to be heroes and to have interesting and dramatic things happen to them.


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## Maxperson (Jul 18, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> I in fact said that the fact they went to blacksmith gave them specific info for the plot. I guess I wasn't specific enough, I meant that if they had talked to someone else they would not have gotten that specific information.
> 
> Onto your second statement, this is where you and I fundamentally disagree. I can respect if the players were given a choice on how to avoid the assassin, and the DM just ignored that...then I could see that being considered a railroad. But in this case, at no point was a player's decision invalidated, because they were not making any decisions about the assassin.
> 
> ...



That's not what I'm saying.  Let me ask you a question. If you had a random encounter or non-random encounter set up in town that they had no idea about and they decided a few hours before it was set to happen to leave town to go find the magic mushrooms that they read about a few sessions back, would that encounter still happen?


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 18, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> @Thomas Shey I'm not sure what your point is. I've said that I'm not opposed to communicating, but everything can never be covered, and players can make their preferences known too.  And what is printed in the game books being used probably should have some connection to what the expected baseline is.




My point is that people coming into a game aren't even going to know what a DMG says in many cases (and that's assuming the characterization of it telling GMs to lie to their players is correct, that if true is a pretty retrograde thing for a modern incarnation to be doing, but I'm not a 5e person so I wouldn't know--its certainly not something I've often seen other games do).  So, really, I do consider this part of kind of a basic checklist of things (along with certain common trigger topics) that should be gone over in session zero.  



Crimson Longinus said:


> But ultimately I don't get this need to thought police the GM, and I don't want to play with people who are going to do that, epically they throw around judgemental language like "lie" or "dishonesty." I think I've been perfectly open about how I feel about this, and I certainly would do the same in the RL too, if I had the slightest inclination that anyone would actually care.




Whereas I think a lot of GMs are still carrying over baggage from the beginning of the hobby that I don't think were great ideas even then and have less excuse now, and I absolutely won't hesitate to tell people so.  Especially when it carries the odor of the usual top-down-GM-is-right-no-matter-what-the-players-think view about it.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 18, 2022)

Lord Rasputin said:


> Depends on whether or not you define what is described in the essay as "fun." A lot of us don't.




He's got a point though; the issue as I see it isn't that the "invisible railroad" isn't fun for some people.  It absolutely is.  My objection in this thread is the assumption that it will be for everybody, or that you can take it as a default it will be and then get self-righteous when it isn't for someone and the object to it.  You don't get to have it both ways; if you won't go to the trouble to make sure your players are on board that sort of thing, then when you find out the hard way, that's on you.

But to the degree some posters seem to imply its bad even_ with_ voluntary cooperation, yeah, that's dumb badwrongfun reactions because its deciding other people are required to feel as you are.  I don't recall seeing too much of that, but I could have missed some.


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 18, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> However, what if while watching the scene, the DM sees the other players eyes start to roll, "oh here goes Bob again with one of his subplots". So the DM could let Bob go through this whole blacksmith scene, consuming the game time while the other players have to wait....or he could nudge Bob back on the main plot that all of his players are enjoying, and so now they get to participate. Remember that sometimes the DM has to step in when one player's agency can step on teh agency of others.



Why do these people play together if they (a) hate one another's preferences so much and (b) cannot actually communicate enough to have an adult conversation about the problems they have with one another? The (much bigger) problem here is the railroad being used as a kludgy bandaid over the group being dysfunctional and not actually respecting one another. (Bob doesn't respect the others' time and preferences, the others don't respect Bob's interests.)

Don't railroad this. Have a conversation with the players, preferably a set of one-on-one chats before meeting up as a group and trying to address the issues with forthrightness and respect. The railroad is just glossing over a very serious group dynamic problem.



Stalker0 said:


> Again its never that black and white, which is my issue with this debate. I am willing to accept there are certain levels of railroading that are generally bad and excessive, but it seems like there are others that any amount of railroading is absolutely unacceptable. Those are incompatible viewpoints, with nothing in the middle to work towards agreement.



Evidently, some people consider certain actions "railroading" when I absolutely do not, just as some people apparently have such a casual definition of "fudging" as to, in my opinion, water the term down until it's nearly meaningless.

So, in the interest of hopefully clearer communication, I'm going to use the terms "fakeoutism," "forgery," and "enthrallment." All of these are clearly distinct from the usual terms, so I'll have to define them.

Fakeoutism is a style of DMing where the DM is, metaphorically, "selling a bill of goods," that is, intentionally presenting a situation that is misleading _to the players_, not just their characters. A rather obviously unkind example of fakeoutism is when a DM dislikes a particular option (such as a class or race) but, instead of banning it, instead chooses to make the game unpleasant and/or unfairly ultra-difficult for any player who chooses that option, rather than just banning it or having a conversation and trying to reach consensus. That is, the "fake-out" is that the DM is not actually allowing that option to play, they simply want to give the (false) impression that they allow such things while instead actually banning them in practice. This was rather unfortunately displayed in some of Gygax's early DMG text on how to get players to only play humans, "allowing" them to play powerful non-human options only to constantly kill off or unfairly target those characters until the player either leaves in frustration or wises up and starts choosing the right option (namely, humans.)

Many other forms of fakeoutism exist, however. It's any form of hollow pretense designed to fool players into thinking something matters or is respected by the DM when it is not. Note, again, the utterly critical difference between fooling the _characters_ and fooling the _players_. The characters may have incomplete or incorrect understanding of the world, that is perfectly fine (in moderation of course) and can lead to a great deal of fun gaming. Characters, despite being played by humans, are not _actual people_ and do not have agency or thoughts of their own, being personae worn by the players. Even though a character being fooled is usually a surprise or even a shock to the person playing them, this reaction is (in general) desirable and consented to by the player in advance. If everything we're perfectly predictable all the time, it would likely get dull, that's part of why we use dice.

The players, on the other hand, ARE actual people and thus should be equipped with full information about what kinds of things they are playing: theme, tone, rules, DM style/methods, etc., the stuff that should always be covered in detail during Session 0 and pre-game discussion. Much as, for example, if you're watching a movie, revealing the plot details ahead of time is usually considered a bad move (not always, but usually), while giving a trigger warning if there are deeply unpleasant or graphic scenes is generally wise. The former is in the realm of "fooling the character," as referenced above, while intentionally hiding any unpleasant scenes so that they will shock and apall someone would be "fooling the audience(/players, for games)." I hope we can agree that intentionally trying to upset someone more by having them watch something that contains (frex) a graphic dismemberment _without telling them_ is a disrespectful, possibly even cruel, deception.

This leads to "forgery." Forgery is a DM technique in the fakeoutism toolbox that fools the players by explicitly appearing to use the rules consistently and fairly, while secretly not actually doing that. Hence the name: the results are a forgery, a fake document or account passed off as though it were true. Many DMs recommend the use of forgery (by other names), but absolutely all who do so will explicitly tell you to never, EVER let the players find out that you forge the results of the rules. The "fake-out" here is that players in general (NOT everyone, but certainly a large plurality) want to play a game where the rules are understood and can be learned, reasoned about, and applied reliably and consistently, but they are only given the superfical appearance of rules that meet this standard, when in truth they do not. Forgery prevents the possibility of having rules that can do these three things. Firstly, because forgery is almost always covered up, the players cannot actually learn how the game really works; they can only learn the false pretense that is presented to them. Secondly, because forgery is necessarily unknown to the players due to being hidden from them, they cannot actually reason about it, meaning the conclusions they draw will necessarily be faulty. Finally, because the true rules are unknown to them (and likely, though not guaranteed, to be inconsistent), the players cannot actually apply the rules, they can only apply the false pretense they have been given.

This is why forgery is so easily eliminated simply by having an honest conversation (so there is no pretense) or by establishing ways in which the true rules can me discovered and potentially exploited/defeated. If you tell people what is going on, then they have been informed and can see what the "real" rules are. E.g., to use the extremely common example, it is *emphatically not *forgery to end a combat earlier than "when every enemy has 0 HP," even though that is the official rule, IF you let your players know that you are doing so. "This fight is over, there's no way the ogre can defeat you now. Fighter, tell me how gruesomely you kill this bandit filth." Yes, the official rules are set aside, but they are set aside openly, allowing the players to know what's going on. Likewise, telling the player, "I just rolled a crit, but frankly that's not interesting, so I'm going to say that you just got protected by Athena from that blow. A golden nimbus of light surrounds you, looking almost like a hoplite's shield, and the blow is deflected away harmlessly. The goddess is apparently watching over you today and has decided this is not your time to die...which may come with strings attached. You know how the Olympians are." This is not forgery, even though it is blatantly disregarding the text of the rules, because the player knows what is going on.

A third, more subtle case would be extending the life of an interesting "boss" creature that died "too quickly." Doing so by simply upping the creature's HP secretly would be forgery, plain and simple. However, if you make the change diegetic and support the players trying to find out what the hell that was and how it happened, it is no longer forgery: you are making that transformation a real part of the world, and more importantly making it learnable, which ensures that it can, at least in theory, be reasoned about and applied to future plans (whether to exploit it or to prevent it.)* The players may fail to learn all there is to know or may bungle their attempts or the like, what matters is that they had the genuine, no-fakeout opportunity to try. And, as I've mentioned before, for things where there is no intersection with player agency at all, then there's no pretense in the first place and thus no false pretenses.

Now we come to "enthrallment." And yes, I chose this word very intentionally. When a DM engages in enthrallment, they are practicing a form of fakeoutism on the level of semantic content (the meaning, purpose, or value of the game) rather than on the syntactic content (the rules and structures of play.) Consider the first sentence of the OP: "What if I told you it was possible to lock your players on a tight [predefined pathway], but make them think every decision they made mattered?" Notice the terms involved here: "lock," "tight," "make them think every decision they made mattered." This is very clearly the language of _control_, controlling the players' beliefs and, consequently, their actions; the OP even recognizes this in the very next sentence, saying, "While this may sound like the evil GM speaking, I have my reasons." It sounds like that for the very excellent reason that that's exactly what it is, manipulative and coercive DMing. That it is manipulative or coercive with good intentions (or, in some unfortunate cases, _allegedly_ good intentions) does not erase the manipulative or coercive nature--just because you want to make an _enthralling_ (as in exciting, fully-engaging, indeed _spellbinding_) experience does not mean you are not _putting the players in thrall to you_.

Enthrallment manifests in a variety of ways, some benevolent, some less so. As noted above, I consider the "but I worked _so hard_ on this" response highly unconvincing, because (a) I think it's important for creators to not be so precious about their work, and (b) there are _plenty_ of things you can do with that prep that don't involve a whiff of _forcing_ that prep to happen exactly the way you originally envisioned. Again, though, even with that situation, there is specifically an ingrained element of _control_: "If players realise nothing they do changes the story, then the adventure will quickly lose its allure. But as long as they don’t realise what is happening they will think every choice matters and the story is entirely in their hands." Explicitly, it's recognized that this technique is risky--if you're caught, it's not just bad, but _very_ bad--and that it requires deception, _specifically_ so "they will think every choice matters" (a phrase the OP has now used twice, so it's no accident.) Fooling your players into believing they have freedom and control when they actually don't is _clearly the point_, particularly in that the players are never supposed to "realize" that they don't. That's quite clear from the OP: the invisible rails must _stay_ invisible at all costs, and the players should never be told that they will be on invisible rails, that fact should be kept completely secret from them.

That bit I mentioned earlier about methods that don't involve any DM force at all is particularly important because, if you actually run a game where player choice matters, you should be running into a LOT of so-called "wasted" prep work. Answers to questions players never thought to ask, locations players never visited, treasures players unknowingly missed, NPCs they forgot to speak to, etc. Instead of treating these as a stumbling block that must be obliterated with fakeoutism, it's much better to treat them as learning opportunities. So the players missed a treasure--surely other people will come through the lair later, looking for whatever pickings they can find, and will discover that treasure instead. That creates an opportunity: perhaps the treasure is powerful and was found(/bought/stolen/etc.) by a rival of the players, leading to a more powerful and dangerous opponent down the line; or perhaps this powerful treasure sets the adventurer who found it on a dangerous path because they're able to take on threats they aren't _experienced_ enough to deal with but which the are now _powerful_ enough to deal with, making them dangerous to themselves and others. As above with my example molten-obsidian-golem fight, perhaps a "missed" fight gets filed away to be recycled into something new, as with my Raven-Shadows doing a "how did we screw up" analysis on the place, finding the solidified ex-golem, and trying to replicate its accidental creation in a more controlled manner.**

But--again, this is the _critical component_--if you DO actually make it clear that you do this, if you actually have a real, sincere conversation with your players and _inform_ them, then you're golden. They get a chance to push back. They get the opportunity to express their concerns or talk about their preferences with you. There is no deception, because _no false pretense is presented to begin with_. The OP explicitly and repeatedly refers (in different terms) to creating, and maintaining, a false pretense, knowing that if its falsehood is revealed, the players will be upset and their pleasure in the game will be damaged. (Well, knowing that that's true for _some_ players. Obviously not _all_ players feel that way...but a large enough group does to warrant the warning to never let it slip!)

That's all that is required to avoid fakeoutism: either communicate, or have the game be what it actually appears to be. Don't rely on _implications_ and _conventions_ and "well they should just know" etc. Those things are exactly what support the worst, most problematic false pretenses in the world. Be respectful and forthright with your players. That doesn't mean giving away every single little secret or exhaustively detailing every single statistic or feature. It just means....playing fairly, letting the players know exactly what they're signing up for, and making sure you have affirmative consent, not _presumed implicit acceptance_.

*I once did the reverse of this: diegetically _reducing_ a fight. Long story short, the players had chosen to burst down the most dangerous threat, and nearly killed it, but the tide of little nasties would probably have done them in. So the big shadow tried to save itself by vamping most of the small shadows and then bolting. That didn't end well for the big shadow! This power had not been absolutely explicitly described in advance, but shadow-spirits like this had stolen health from living things before, so it wasn't a stretch.

**This idea came to me as a result of participating in this thread, and I'm excited to see where it leads. My players will, hopefully, also be excited, as it kinda lets them have their cake and eat it too (they got to outsmart me, and yet will also--YEARS later IRL--get a taste of what they "missed" before.)


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## Charlaquin (Jul 18, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> (…) if we are at that point, then your saying the only acceptable world in dnd is a hugely rich constructed world where hundreds of npcs have to have their schedules completely laid out, because I can't just drop a random encounter or an NPC on my party without it being fully immersed in the world and completely logical to the world's schedule or else its a railroad. Oh you decided to go to the blacksmith on tuesday? Well let me consult my npc chart to see if Mary the jester would be near by that day.... oh no that's her poker night. Oh but what about marigold the flower lady, wait did you go at 4:30 or going at 4:35? she only walks that area exactly at 4:30 so I need to time that roleplay encounter to check if whether you missed or not.



I’ll note that DMs who are so strongly opposed to “illusionism” are usually fine with random generation. So, given that it just isn’t possible to plan everything to such a degree of detail, I think the more realistic logical extreme of this position (that is to say, the one you’re arguing against) is a world that is entirely procedurally generated.


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## pemerton (Jul 18, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> I’ll note that DMs who are so strongly opposed to “illusionism” are usually fine with random generation. So, given that it just isn’t possible to plan everything to such a degree of detail, I think the more realistic logical extreme of this position (that is to say, the one you’re arguing against) is a world that is entirely procedurally generated.



I have no interest in illusionistic techniques. Nor am I into procedural generation. Nor the sort of planning/prep/notes that @Stalker0 describes in the post you quoted.

Those are not the only alternatives to illusionism. Open scene-framing, and "say 'yes' or roll the dice", based around player-stipulated stakes - basically, what the 4e rulebooks advocate - is an alternative. And as the 4e books illustrate, entirely compatible with D&D.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 18, 2022)

pemerton said:


> These don't seem to me the same as what you described upthread, of permitting the players to declare actions to try and travel to another world although you've already decided that that isn't possible and hence that those actions will fail.




I don't see how players making a choice, that choice changing the flow of the game, and weather they succssed or fail (by die roll or just cause something isn't possible (but they then learn why it isn't, and even THAT changes cause they can do things to MAKE it possible) is in any definition railroad...

if tomorrow night (witch I doubt the game is new and I doubt they would think of it yet) they declaired they wanted to find a way to plane shift to the city of brass (just an example it could be spell jame to kryn or what ever) they would have to reserch and quest for the ability to do so... that adventure, that research and quest would look VERY diffrent thenif they instead said "I want to research vampires... are there any to hunt in your game world?" and that too would require reserch that would lead to a quest (and as I sit here typing I don't know the answer cause I don't have any vampires stated as anything important yet) but that again would not be what I expect...


pemerton said:


> This is all you, as GM, making decisions. There's no _objective_ reason why, to learn about the fire, the players have to have their PCs ask about a blacksmith. This is a contrivance that you as GM have set up. Likewise for the churches.



well they don't have to use the words "I am going to look for a blacksmith" they might do 100 things that bring up the fire... but there are also 100 things that wont.  I know the fire is a plot hook (I always have 3-5 but sometimes I have WAY more) but I also know my game doesn't depend on them finding the plot hook or demand they take it... maybe they just see it as a fun cool story about why there isn't a blacksmith... or maybe they investigate.

MY entire current style (except for pre written adventures) is what ever the players put effort or time into is what i run with.


pemerton said:


> Setting up hoops for the players to jump through,



you mean make them play there role as a character... and tell them what happens as they play the role and make decisions?


pemerton said:


> while making the nature of those hoops obscure, again seems to me to fall within the general conception of railroading: the GM is deciding what happens in the fiction, perhaps using the actions that the players declare as cues, but the meaning (if any) of those actions is completely obscure to the players.



um... how would a DM EVER tell a player the results of what they are looking for by your way?


pemerton said:


> This claim isn't true.



no it isn't


edit: my group is pretty liberal with control... we are all DMs at some point or another (although with varying levels of success) and we all know the rules well, and we all have experience with our group house rules and my individual house rules...PCs often in my games add things to the world.. but it is still the DM that unfolds what happens, I can't understand how else it would work?

WOuld a player say "I go to the blacksmith, spend 7gp and buy a shield and he tells me that the villian is weak to cold iron"? what if the DM already had set up and even hinted (if the PCs got it or not) that the villian was weak to adamantine does that then change it to cold iron?


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 18, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> Well from the players perspective, there aren't bandits on both roads. There are bandits on the road west where they went, they have no idea what was on the north road because they didn't go that way..



if I were going to pull this I would just say that 'randy the bandit' is in the north and 'sam the bandit' is in the west... and warn the players of alot of bandit activity.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 18, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> And going down that rabbit hole to me leads to madness. I mean if we are at that point, then your saying the only acceptable world in dnd is a hugely rich constructed world where hundreds of npcs have to have their schedules completely laid out, because I can't just drop a random encounter or an NPC on my party without it being fully immersed in the world and completely logical to the world's schedule or else its a railroad. Oh you decided to go to the blacksmith on tuesday? Well let me consult my npc chart to see if Mary the jester would be near by that day.... oh no that's her poker night. Oh but what about marigold the flower lady, wait did you go at 4:30 or going at 4:35? she only walks that area exactly at 4:30 so I need to time that roleplay encounter to check if whether you missed or not.



Right. This to me also seems to be the logical outcome of the stance some people are espousing, yet I doubt they actually do it like this.



Stalker0 said:


> The notion of "plot convenience" happens in dnd all the time. The party "just happens" to meet an npc that could be helpful to them on their mission...even though the chance of that happening in real life could be less than 1 in 10,000. The party rescuses a woman who happens to be the old flame of one of the pcs....because its cool and dramatic (even though the odds are astronomical) Dms do this all the time, because tracking every minute of every day is just ludicrous, and we want our players to be heroes and to have interesting and dramatic things happen to them.



Right. At least in small scale this is utterly basic stuff.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 18, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> So I do want to codify something, as the "Railroad is always bad" camp has used the common argument that "there is no benefit to railroading, you could always just not do it".
> 
> The fundamental benefit of Railroad is.... DM time savings. If I make one combat encounter that the party will encounter if they go down any of 3 paths, versus crafting a different encounter for each of those paths....I have saved a good amount of my time. Maybe that's time I spend enhancing another part of the game, maybe its time I spend working on the garage at home. But that is a benefit.
> 
> Now you can argue that you would rather spend more time on your game and not railroad, and that is your choice. But it doesn't invalidate that there is an inherent benefit to railroading for the DM, and not railroading has a cost.



i just want to say I have hammers and screw drivers in my tool box... but sometimes i need a hex wrench or a monkey wrench. very rarely I need a hack saw or a heat gun.   Railroad is a tool in the DM tool box, if used carefully and not that often it is great. But it shouldn't be your go to tool


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 18, 2022)

Thomas Shey said:


> My point is that people coming into a game aren't even going to know what a DMG says in many cases (and that's assuming the characterization of it telling GMs to lie to their players is correct, that if true is a pretty retrograde thing for a modern incarnation to be doing, but I'm not a 5e person so I wouldn't know--its certainly not something I've often seen other games do).  So, really, I do consider this part of kind of a basic checklist of things (along with certain common trigger topics) that should be gone over in session zero.



One certainly could and should discuss the GMing style. The issue really is with the extreme interpretation some people have with the "lie." 
I would never in million years consider "Can GM make interesting stuff happen when the PCs happen to around" to be part of the basic checklist for D&D. 



Thomas Shey said:


> Whereas I think a lot of GMs are still carrying over baggage from the beginning of the hobby that I don't think were great ideas even then and have less excuse now, and I absolutely won't hesitate to tell people so.  Especially when it carries the odor of the usual top-down-GM-is-right-no-matter-what-the-players-think view about it.



I'm really not talking about Viking-hat-GM-style, merely about the division of labour. As a GM, I am open to discuss thing, take suggestions and listen criticism. But I also don't think that I need to explain every detail of my invisible decision making process. But if the end result is not for the players liking, then complaining about that is absolutely fair. But ultimately I want to have the freedom to attempt to achieve satisfactory results in manner that seems most natural to me. And as player I extent that same courtesy to any GM I'm playing with.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 18, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> Yes! This! Exactly this!
> 
> Why is, "Communicate with your players and get them on the same page" such a bad thing? Why does it make me an _evil absolutist_ that I want DMs to either communicate, or be scrupulous?
> 
> Why is this so hard?!



because people here on enworld are bearly speaking the same language...  just look there are people that say railroading only counts if you lie to your players and others that say anytime you create a world and narrate the consequences of the success or fail THAT is railroading.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 18, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> I’ll note that DMs who are so strongly opposed to “illusionism” are usually fine with random generation. So, given that it just isn’t possible to plan everything to such a degree of detail, I think the more realistic logical extreme of this position (that is to say, the one you’re arguing against) is a world that is entirely procedurally generated.




And there are various other tools at hand, too.  I've absolutely used random encounter mechanics a fair bit in some kinds of campaigns (mostly fantasy or post-apocalypse) over the years, but its somewhat dependent on having enough enemy samples (or being able to pull them out very easily on the fly) to work.  In games where almost every encounter is likely to be a custom set of opponents (as is the case in the Fragged Empire game I'm running) this sort of thing is far less practical, though I'll still use some random material for system generation and the like.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 18, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> One certainly could and should discuss the GMing style. The issue really is with the extreme interpretation some people have with the "lie."
> I would never in million years consider "Can GM make interesting stuff happen when the PCs happen to around" to be part of the basic checklist for D&D.




That isn't the issue from my point of view.  The issue is, should the GM act like its something he had preplanned for days?  I've never been coy about the degree of making-things-up-on-the-fly I do, and when asked about it, I've freely admitted when a given encounter (in some cases a pretty complex one) was made up on the fly.  Some people may not want to know, but then, they don't have to ask, but I won't play games implying I did things two days before or that false choice are real choices (if I present something as a choice, there will be at least _some _difference in outcome depending on how they make it).

Its not the improvisation I'm objecting to; its the illusionism, and even worse, the assumption that everyone is supposed to be okay with the illusionism.



Crimson Longinus said:


> I'm really not talking about Viking-hat-GM-style, merely about the division of labour. As a GM, I am open to discuss thing, take suggestions and listen criticism. But I also don't think that I need to explain every detail of my invisible decision making process. But if the end result is not for the players liking, then complaining about that is absolutely fair. But ultimately I want to have the freedom to attempt to achieve satisfactory results in manner that seems most natural to me. And as player I extent that same courtesy to any GM I'm playing with.




Note there have absolutely been people in this thread that indicated it would be outrageous if someone found out and was soggy about it, though.  Like I said, different people are going to find different things its worth discussing in session 0, but if you miss an important one to someone, then I don't think you get to get put upon that they don't like it and make that pretty clear.

I mean, as a vague parallel, let's say I don't think to ask a new player about their triggers, and accidentally drop one in the game because I'm old and don't always think about such things.  If they react strongly, my reaction is going to be "Oh.  Should have thought to ask about problems here.  Let's see if I can minimize use of that in the future, and lets kind of elide around it here."  Not get annoyed at them for feeling that way and expressing it.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 18, 2022)

Thomas Shey said:


> That isn't the issue from my point of view.  The issue is, should the GM act like its something he had preplanned for days?  I've never been coy about the degree of making-things-up-on-the-fly I do, and when asked about it, I've freely admitted when a given encounter (in some cases a pretty complex one) was made up on the fly.  Some people may not want to know, but then, they don't have to ask, but I won't play games implying I did things two days before or that false choice are real choices (if I present something as a choice, there will be at least _some _difference in outcome depending on how they make it).



I mean I see no particular reason to not answer if asked, though I don't understand why anyone would ask or care. But ultimately I don't think it is the players business how the content is generated, so if the GM doesn't want to reveal that information, that seems fine to me. 

As for choices, I agree in the context where the stakes are clearly presented, but games are full of choices that are not like that. 



Thomas Shey said:


> Its not the improvisation I'm objecting to; its the illusionism, and even worse, the assumption that everyone is supposed to be okay with the illusionism.



No one can even agree what it means. Thus I could no promise to not to do it even if I wanted to.



Thomas Shey said:


> Note there have absolutely been people in this thread that indicated it would be outrageous if someone found out and was soggy about it, though.  Like I said, different people are going to find different things its worth discussing in session 0, but if you miss an important one to someone, then I don't think you get to get put upon that they don't like it and make that pretty clear.
> 
> I mean, as a vague parallel, let's say I don't think to ask a new player about their triggers, and accidentally drop one in the game because I'm old and don't always think about such things.  If they react strongly, my reaction is going to be "Oh.  Should have thought to ask about problems here.  Let's see if I can minimize use of that in the future, and lets kind of elide around it here."  Not get annoyed at them for feeling that way and expressing it.




I don't see need to be a jerk about it, but also I don't think comparing someone's gaming preferences to trauma triggers is perhaps the best idea. These are not a similar thing and comparing them seems to me dismissive of actual psychological harm.


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## Remathilis (Jul 18, 2022)

Lord Rasputin said:


> Depends on whether or not you define what is described in the essay as "fun." A lot of us don't.



Yup. I don't consider rolling up characters (ability scores, HP, gold, spells) fun either, but when I suggest the people who do so are bad and wrong, I'm the bad guy. 

Funny what works for one group doesn't always from another.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 18, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> I mean I see no particular reason to not answer if asked, though I don't understand why anyone would ask or care. But ultimately I don't think it is the players business how the content is generated, so if the GM doesn't want to reveal that information, that seems fine to me.




let me tell you both why I might ask but why I have been asked...learning.

As a group FULL of DMs my normal group talks about "what gave you that idea?" or "How hard was it to plan that?" all the time. It helps all of us run better games. Now does everything get asked... no, and I would not want to waste my time by asking "Was that bandit REALLY always in the north" or "How did we just happen to be in town in the market when the sabretooth tiger got free?"

some things I have resently beens asked:
"wait was the vampire lord really based on the god emperor of dune all the time... back game 3 or 4 when we found out about his foresight did you have all this planned"
my answer "Yeah, game 0 I had this twist coming... but the way I had him always be 1 step ahead of everyone did change a few times to keep up... but he saw it coming even if I couldn't"

"Um, what class was she, that was an awesome combo you pulled off"
"Well she wasn't, I took the knight and gave it both the rogue cunning action and the fighter action surge, changed out dex for str and changed the equipment and gave her mage hand as a bonus action as part of her cunning action.  So you could say she was a fighter/rogue but she didn't have either as a full suit of abilities"

and one I asked just this week.
"Dude, where did you pull a monster that has perm hp damage, str damage, fatigue as damage AND a bane ability as a legendary from? did you make it yourself?"
the answer was mixing a third party undead with a shadow...




Crimson Longinus said:


> As for choices, I agree in the context where the stakes are clearly presented, but games are full of choices that are not like that.



yeah just like real life. Sometimes you get to make a clear choice with the consequences weighed out... and sometimes those unforeseen consequences kick your but.

I had a second editon game (actually one I ran in 2,3,and a retro clone and may still in 5) where there is a good killer (long before Gor from the THor story) and I had 0 intention of making a movie quote nor did I think that anyone else would.  The PCs were collecting 5 magic items, and they knew a legendary 'monster' may awaken... there were also clues (some they missed some they got) that the 'monster' was just a man so strong and smart he could and did fight and kill gods before he was locked away. 
When they got to the 3rd item they saw a giant gem prison that was cracked and a tall thin man with a thin long sword and peicemail broken armor... they instantly put togather THAT was the monster... they then assumed that they could take this 3rd one and it would not break (nope) they took the 3rd item the crystal shattered and Praxton the God killer stood before them... they KNEW that it took an army and high level characters just to weaken him and all 5 artifacts to lock him away so they stood no chance... what they didn't know was this was just (in my mind) flavor for later issues... so I had him fall out tired and weak and look up and ask "Are you gods?"
and 2 of my 5 players said 'No' 2 of them just looked at me in shock, and 1 said "Yes," and when one of the 'no' players said "WTF" he said "Ray if someone asks you if you are a god you say YES" 
I told him that was a funny ghost buster reference but I would let him take it back if he wanted... he didn't so we rolled initiative.  I killed him in the 2nd round of combat, and then walked off ignoring the others complaining "Liar... you were not worthy of my time"

If Ross had paid attention he could have pieced together this guy wanted to kill all the gods. (although everyone put that together then and said in retrospect it made sense) but in the moment he had a choice... say yes, say no, say nothing... 2 of those choices had a threat made to face level 25+ PCs and be a hard fight walk away, one had him throw down with 5th-7th level PCs... he made his choice. It wasn't really an informed choice because he not only didn't put it together in game what the guy's goals were, but when warned with the DM "are you sure you say that?" doubled down... and he lost his character


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## Charlaquin (Jul 18, 2022)

pemerton said:


> I have no interest in illusionistic techniques. Nor am I into procedural generation. Nor the sort of planning/prep/notes that @Stalker0 describes in the post you quoted.
> 
> Those are not the only alternatives to illusionism. Open scene-framing, and "say 'yes' or roll the dice", based around player-stipulated stakes - basically, what the 4e rulebooks advocate - is an alternative. And as the 4e books illustrate, entirely compatible with D&D.



No, I don’t think those are the only options either, I was saying the heavy use of procedural generation is the alternative to the heavy use of prep that the extreme anti-illusionism folks find acceptable.


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## Stalker0 (Jul 18, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> No, I don’t think those are the only options either, I was saying the heavy use of procedural generation is the alternative to the heavy use of prep that the extreme anti-illusionism folks find acceptable.



My issue is the notion this is more acceptable because it’s “fairer” and not railroady as opposed to the DM doing it. And that is a trust issue.

The dm really holds all the cards, they create the entire world. At a whim they could rip apart the PCs plans and characters, and there is nothing the PCs could do to stop him. But the reason the game works is there is trust the dm won’t do this, that they will craft a story with the PCs and will arbitrate fairly (though not perfectly)

If the players want to see procedural generation because they don’t believe the DM will keep things fair…then the game is already lost.


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## Charlaquin (Jul 18, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> My issue is the notion this is more acceptable because it’s “fairer” and not railroady as opposed to the DM doing it. And that is a trust issue.
> 
> The dm really holds all the cards, they create the entire world. At a whim they could rip apart the PCs plans and characters, and there is nothing the PCs could do to stop him. But the reason the game works is there is trust the dm won’t do this, that they will craft a story with the PCs and will arbitrate fairly (though not perfectly)
> 
> If the players want to see procedural generation because they don’t believe the DM will keep things fair…then the game is already lost.



Yeah, I don’t disagree. To be clear, I’m not part of the extreme anti-illusionism crowd I’m describing here. I don’t care for the DM changing things behind the scenes in a way that steps on player agency, but I don’t believe all behind the scenes changes do that. I also don’t think improvising is the same thing as illusionism. I’m just saying, the folks who take such an extreme stance that the only recourse seems to be an absurd degree of prep… are also usually fine with random content generation.


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## Maxperson (Jul 18, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> Yeah, I don’t disagree. To be clear, I’m not part of the extreme anti-illusionism crowd I’m describing here. I don’t care for the DM changing things behind the scenes in a way that steps on player agency, but I don’t believe all behind the scenes changes do that. I also don’t think improvising is the same thing as illusionism. I’m just saying, the folks who take such an extreme stance that the only recourse seems to be an absurd degree of prep… are also usually fine with random content generation.



I don't mind random generation, though it does sometimes leave something to be desired, because random.  That said, it also doesn't take anywhere near an absurd amount of prep to not deprive players of agency.  It takes next to none, really.  You just don't force them down some preconceived rail that you want them on for whatever reason.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 18, 2022)

I don't think random generation is any better to the player agency (at least if they don't know the odds) than the GM deciding. In either case the thing is determined independently of the player choices. It of course reduces the GM's agency, but that's another matter.


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## FrozenNorth (Jul 18, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> I mean I see no particular reason to not answer if asked, though I don't understand why anyone would ask or care. But ultimately I don't think it is the players business how the content is generated, so if the GM doesn't want to reveal that information, that seems fine to me.



As a raging egomaniac, I am more than happy to discuss GM-stuff and adventure generation (with the obvious caveat that sometimes, I cannot talk about things that haven’t been resolved).

In practice, in my three regular groups, such questions are extremely rare, to the point that I am more likely to bring up GMing than my players are.


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## Charlaquin (Jul 18, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> I don't think random generation is any better to the player agency (at least if they don't know the odds) than the GM deciding. In either case the thing is determined independently of the player choices. It of course reduces the GM's agency, but that's another matter.



Well, they _should_ know the odds


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 18, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> Well, they _should_ know the odds



How could they? What are the odds of a wild beast breaking loose at the market at the moment the PCs are there and how could they know that?


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 18, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> I mean I see no particular reason to not answer if asked, though I don't understand why anyone would ask or care. But ultimately I don't think it is the players business how the content is generated, so if the GM doesn't want to reveal that information, that seems fine to me.




And it doesn't to me.  Like I said before, that coyness on the part of GMs comes across to me these days as a possible sign of power-tripping on the GM's part; I don't see any real valid reason to hide it if asked.



Crimson Longinus said:


> As for choices, I agree in the context where the stakes are clearly presented, but games are full of choices that are not like that.




I just don't see much point in even presenting something as a choice if the choice has no meaning at all.




Crimson Longinus said:


> No one can even agree what it means. Thus I could no promise to not to do it even if I wanted to.




You can promise not to lie to people about what you're doing at least.  I'll be honest here and say if you think you can't get people at your table to even agree on what _that_ means, you've got a problem at your table with one or more people, one of which could be you.



Crimson Longinus said:


> I don't see need to be a jerk about it, but also I don't think comparing someone's gaming preferences to trauma triggers is perhaps the best idea. These are not a similar thing and comparing them seems to me dismissive of actual psychological harm.




Its not intended that way, but I also don't get to tell someone they have to react more positively to deception than they do to spiders.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 18, 2022)

And yeah, in my experience it is the people who are also GMs who are interested discussing gamemastering minutiae, those who are usually just players tend not to care.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 18, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> let me tell you both why I might ask but why I have been asked...learning.




A lot of this is often the case.  And of course, sometimes its just curiosity about a player whether you were actually up to making up something fairly complex on the fly.  Not everyone is, and it can be interesting to them that someone else can pull it off.
( I might not be able to keep all the balls in the air with some of done in the past these days, but then, I did them when I was 35 not 65).


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 18, 2022)

Maxperson said:


> I don't mind random generation, though it does sometimes leave something to be desired, because random.  That said, it also doesn't take anywhere near an absurd amount of prep to not deprive players of agency.  It takes next to none, really.  You just don't force them down some preconceived rail that you want them on for whatever reason.





Crimson Longinus said:


> I don't think random generation is any better to the player agency (at least if they don't know the odds) than the GM deciding. In either case the thing is determined independently of the player choices. It of course reduces the GM's agency, but that's another matter.



here is a qustion, one I am not putting my 2 cents into at all just asking... if you made (or have an adventure with) a encounter table and instead of rolling on it just pick  the encounter you as teh DM want to run (weather that be easiest for you most fun for table or just most sense)  is that better or worse then random?


I will again add a personal story... Curse of Strahd has random encounters... and over the course of 2 days I rolled 2 that made me chuckle (but they were random) day 1 they came across a hidden stash of cloths and the adventure suggests they might be a were creature having hidden them to  come back for... so I made up some drab farmer cloths and thought nothing of it... then the next day I rolled a werewolf encounter... so I had a werewolf come out of the woods, growl, howl and point to the character with the cloths... since I described it that way no one started a fight and we had a two or three minute point and make noise moment of role playe... before they relized they had the were wolfs cloths...


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 18, 2022)

FrozenNorth said:


> As a raging egomaniac, I am more than happy to discuss GM-stuff and adventure generation (with the obvious caveat that sometimes, I cannot talk about things that haven’t been resolved).
> 
> In practice, in my three regular groups, such questions are extremely rare, to the point that I am more likely to bring up GMing than my players are.



yeah in general our group has a soft rule about the DM sometimes just smiles and says "Spoilers" if asking about 1 thing would lead to another big reveal...


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 18, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> I don't think random generation is any better to the player agency (at least if they don't know the odds) than the GM deciding. In either case the thing is determined independently of the player choices. It of course reduces the GM's agency, but that's another matter.




Eh.  On one hand you're not wrong, but I think it does reduce the GM's active ability to reduce player agency.  As you aver, he's less able to decide they're encountering X no matter what they do.  And depending on how the random tables are set up, their decisions can still have some impact (back in the day, there was a significant difference in what you'd probably run into going into the mountains rather than the swamp in D&D (hint: chose the mountains).


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 18, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> And yeah, in my experience it is the people who are also GMs who are interested discussing gamemastering minutiae, those who are usually just players tend not to care.




There can be other reasons.  In my Fragged Empire game, whether something is an  NPC-only trait, a PC availabe trait, or something I completely cooked up myself (and what category I'd put it in) and how its mechaniced is interesting to a number of people in my group.  A number of them are also GMs, but that's not why.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 18, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> Well, they _should_ know the odds



to what level of granility?  Do I tell them (I often do but that is me) "on a roll of 15+ on a d20 you get an encounter" or do I just say "I don't someone about 20 to 25%" or do I just say "often enough that unescorted merchants don't often make it"

up thread when someone said the bandit encounter happens no matter if they go east or north I said I would jsut say "There is a lot of bandit activity latlye and say it's bandit Rob in the north and bandit keith in the east"  but does 
alot of bandit activity cover it for you?

Often when I introduce new players I will have the first adventure start with the players already hired to escort someone something from one place to another and warn them about 2 threats (so maybe kobolds and goblins, maybe were rabbits and bandits, or maybe orcs and undead) and plan 3 different encounter that would all fall between easy and medium difficulty 2 of 1 threat and 1 of the other. is the warning "Kobolds and goblins have been active" enough?


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## Maxperson (Jul 18, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> I don't think random generation is any better to the player agency (at least if they don't know the odds) than the GM deciding. In either case the thing is determined independently of the player choices. It of course reduces the GM's agency, but that's another matter.



I prefer DM deciding to random, if the DM is doing his best to be fair and impartial.  If he's doing that, then his rulings whether they are for you, against you, or require a roll, will be honoring your agency.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 18, 2022)

Maxperson said:


> I prefer DM deciding to random, if the DM is doing his best to be fair and impartial.  If he's doing that, then his rulings whether they are for you, against you, or require a roll, will be honoring your agency.



tbh I'm NOT fair or impartial 75% of the time... I am almost always on team "PCs should win this" random is MORE likely to TPK my party then anything i throw together


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## Maxperson (Jul 18, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> here is a qustion, one I am not putting my 2 cents into at all just asking... if you made (or have an adventure with) a encounter table and instead of rolling on it just pick  the encounter you as teh DM want to run (weather that be easiest for you most fun for table or just most sense)  is that better or worse then random?



I pick as often as not.  When I roll on random tables, half the time the result doesn't match the specific area the group is walking in, since the game makes it very generic with regard to terrain and doesn't take location into consideration at all.  As a result one of three things happens.

1. I roll and after I get three results that don't work, just get frustrated and pick the first thing I see that does work. I hate wasting time and if I have to keep rolling until I get something that works, I'm essentially picking anyway.
2. I roll and get lucky, so that's the monster.
3. I know from experience that #1 has happened a few times and just don't bother to roll, instead selecting from the chart.

The other thing is that selection isn't what makes something railroading or not. Railroading is explicitly denial of player agency somehow.  What encounter I pick doesn't do that.  Their choices will affect if they encounter whatever is rolled/selected, and whether it's even a fight.  I give them full agency.


GMforPowergamers said:


> I will again add a personal story... Curse of Strahd has random encounters... and over the course of 2 days I rolled 2 that made me chuckle (but they were random) day 1 they came across a hidden stash of cloths and the adventure suggests they might be a were creature having hidden them to  come back for... so I made up some drab farmer cloths and thought nothing of it... then the next day I rolled a werewolf encounter... so I had a werewolf come out of the woods, growl, howl and point to the character with the cloths... since I described it that way no one started a fight and we had a two or three minute point and make noise moment of role playe... before they relized they had the were wolfs cloths...



And that's cool.  Nothing there is denying the players any agency.  They found cloths.  Could have left them behind, but didn't.  When the werewolf showed up they could have fought it, run away or do the point and noise stuff.  That's a cool encounter in my book. Well done!


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 18, 2022)

Thomas Shey said:


> I just don't see much point in even presenting something as a choice if the choice has no meaning at all.



What does it mean to "present something as a choice?" and what sort of meaning should it have? People say things like that like it was unambiguous, and I don't think it is at all.

Let's get back to my example of a day in the town and wild beast at the market. Was "what you are going to do today" a clear choice, and was the characters getting to do research in the library a sufficiently meaningful even if they couldn't avoid the rampaging beast at the market?

What about "What sort of clothes you wear?" "What spells you prepare?" "What you say to the bartender?" The game is full of choices that may or may not matter. 



Thomas Shey said:


> You can promise not to lie to people about what you're doing at least.  I'll be honest here and say if you think you can't get people at your table to even agree on what _that_ means, you've got a problem at your table with one or more people, one of which could be you.



Oh, I'm sure I could have people at my table agree about it just fine. But not people here. And I am not lying about what I am doing. But when I say that it is ultimately my call as GM what techniques to use, then that is me being honest. 



Thomas Shey said:


> Its not intended that way, but I also don't get to tell someone they have to react more positively to deception than they do to spiders.



And I say that even using words like 'lie' or 'deception' is an overreaction and ultimately insulting.


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## Maxperson (Jul 18, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> tbh I'm NOT fair or impartial 75% of the time... I am almost always on team "PCs should win this" random is MORE likely to TPK my party then anything i throw together



I'm not team PC in my decision making, but am very much team PC as a person. I create challenges and interesting things and then let them figure out what they are going to do or not do. If they get into a fight with something really hard, I love it when they do some awesome stuff and win anyway, but I'm not going to make it easy on them.

I agree that random is more likely to TPK, though.  Random for me is for wandering monsters.  When I make a dungeon, castle or whatnot, I select the encounters.  Those random tables can with an unlucky roll, produce a dragon that will wipe the group.  When I select encounters, I mix it up between easy, moderate, hard and very hard.  I know the party capabilities, so I can match things up much better than the random table can.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 18, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> What does it mean to "present something as a choice?" and what sort of meaning should it have? People say things like that like it was unambiguous, and I don't think it is at all.




CL, I think we've had enough positive interactions to know I'm not going to just bust you for no reason or because I consider you some kind of enemy, but I've got to tell you that at some point this starts to come across as deliberate lack of engagement.

Yes, sometimes it can be ambiguous.  Many things in life are not clear-cut, but we still talk about them because ambiguity does not mean you cannot make effort to look at something and go "Does this look like it matters?  Would it matter to me?  Have I seen signs it matters to most players?"

You've described a situation.  Whether you deliberately emphasize it or not, there's going to be things that that look like they might make a difference.  People start to debate which of those they should do.

Is it that difficult when this happens to tell them "Whether you go up into the hills, down through the valley, or boat up the river isn't likely to effect much."  Then they can decide if they want to spend time on it or just tell you that you're going to the other side of the hills and not worry about it and spend mental energy on something that is (at best, and maybe not even this) just about color.

Its not just about not being actively going "You have these four options, which one do you take?" when none of them matter, but not letting players assume there are decisions there which, in terms of anything in game play, really aren't.



Crimson Longinus said:


> Let's get back to my example of a day in the town and wild beast at the market. Was "what you are going to do today" a clear choice, and was the characters getting to do research in the library a sufficiently meaningful even if they couldn't avoid the rampaging beast at the market?




Was the research likely to be useful?  Basically, would anything play out differently if they'd all stayed home and had lunch?




Crimson Longinus said:


> What about "What sort of clothes you wear?" "What spells you prepare?" "What you say to the bartender?" The game is full of choices that may or may not matter.




And you can tell people if that's true (if the mechanics don't already tell you that, which it does in the second case).



Crimson Longinus said:


> Oh, I'm sure I could have people at my table agree about it just fine. But not people here. And I am not lying about what I am doing. But when I say that it is ultimately my call as GM what techniques to use, then that is me being honest.




Of course it is.  But is that a reason for someone else not to say "I think Technique X is a bad idea?"  Or "I'd object strenuously to someone using this technique in a game I'm in?"  If so, why?



Crimson Longinus said:


> And I say that even using words like 'lie' or 'deception' is an overreaction and ultimately insulting.




Again, honestly, the fact there are words that describe doing something (and if "deception" is not an accurate description of someone acting like a decision that doesn't really make a difference does, I'd like to know why) that seem insulting seems like a case of "If you find that word insulting, why are you doing it?"  I mean, I get there's semantic loading being a thing, but its hard for me to think of a term to describe that process that isn't insulting if "deception".  People pay to have stage mages decieve them.  Their skill at doing sleight-of-hand (which is deception) is part of what people are there for.

So what word that actually describes the process would you find acceptable?  And why does your feelings here matter more than those who dislike it?


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 18, 2022)

I mean, I get that it can come across as unpleasant for people to repeatedly remind you that they consider some of your GMing choices actively offputting, and the terms they use are going to likely be in some cases overinflammatory, but at some point its unlikely that someone is going to describe a process they dislike in complimentary terms, and often there's a limited number of words to work with that seem to actually describe a process.

But I think its kind of unreasonable not to expect that when someone presents a technique for actively deceiving people (which is pretty clearly what the "invisible railroad" of the title is) and have people not call it that.  The question in the end, is if people _want to be deceived_.  And as the stage magic analogy has tried to show, sometimes people _very much do_.  But for people who don't, knowing whether its going to be on their plate is not trivial, and if folks who use these techniques can't accept that's true for at least some people, I really kind of don't know what to say here.


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## iserith (Jul 18, 2022)

Thomas Shey said:


> I mean, I get that it can come across as unpleasant for people to repeatedly remind you that they consider some of your GMing choices actively offputting, and the terms they use are going to likely be in some cases overinflammatory, but at some point its unlikely that someone is going to describe a process they dislike in complimentary terms, and often there's a limited number of words to work with that seem to actually describe a process.
> 
> But I think its kind of unreasonable not to expect that when someone presents a technique for actively deceiving people (which is pretty clearly what the "invisible railroad" of the title is) and have people not call it that.  The question in the end, is if people _want to be deceived_.  And as the stage magic analogy has tried to show, sometimes people _very much do_.  But for people who don't, knowing whether its going to be on their plate is not trivial, and if folks who use these techniques can't accept that's true for at least some people, I really kind of don't know what to say here.



Right, I can absolutely make the case for using techniques commonly associated with railroading. It's pretty easy to see why DMs use them and how they benefit the play experience and reduce the DM's prep time.

The deceit, however, is where it all breaks down for me. I'm not going to do that. It's not justifiable when I have other options.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 18, 2022)

iserith said:


> Right, I can absolutely make the case for using techniques commonly associated with railroading. It's pretty easy to see why DMs use them and how they benefit the play experience and reduce the DM's prep time.
> 
> The deceit, however, is where it all breaks down for me. I'm not going to do that. It's not justifiable when I have other options.




And that's a fine choice, but as I noted, some people don't want to see how the trick is done.

The gig is knowing whether all your players are on one side of that divide.  And the only real way to know, is to ask (like I said, I make an educated guess because I've been playing with the same people so long, but that's what it is--a guess.  Since I rarely feel a need to use illusionism, its not a big risk).


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## Charlaquin (Jul 18, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> How could they? What are the odds of a wild beast breaking loose at the market at the moment the PCs are there and how could they know that?



For the record, I didn’t think your beast at the market example was railroading. But, to answer your question, the players should know under what conditions the DM rolls for random encounter, how likely one is to occur when they do, and if/how they can affect those things.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 18, 2022)

Thomas Shey said:


> CL, I think we've had enough positive interactions to know I'm not going to just bust you for no reason or because I consider you some kind of enemy, but I've got to tell you that at some point this starts to come across as deliberate lack of engagement.



I know that you're arguing in good faith and I feel it is unfortunate that we are seeming to fail to communicate here. But I assure you that I am not being intentionally dismissive.



Thomas Shey said:


> Yes, sometimes it can be ambiguous.  Many things in life are not clear-cut, but we still talk about them because ambiguity does not mean you cannot make effort to look at something and go "Does this look like it matters?  Would it matter to me?  Have I seen signs it matters to most players?"




The thing is, that it is the ambiguous stuff that the disagreement almost always is about. Like basically everyone agrees that it is generally a bad practice to present a choice with clear(ish) stakes and then have it not to mater. But when get to discussion of what it actually means in practice, the disagreements emerge. I assure you that I honour the player choices great deal, and bigger the stakes are more important I feel it is to honour them. I have let players to blow up entire worlds. But still in discussions here sometimes I find out that some people get hung up on stuff I'd consider trivial. Things that I would consider to be just part of perfectly normal GM framing powers are seen as deceitful illusionism. And the logic behind such complains often eludes me. There probably is one, and in fact several, as these people don't seem to even agree with each other. 

Also, one other area where disagreement often arises is the level of fundamentalism regarding good practices. And some people are far more black and white about this than me. There are things that I consider to be good practices, (but aside Wheaton's rule type matters) I don't practically ever consider them to be absolutely binding. I'm wary of "a good GM always" or "thou shat never" type of proclamations. For every GMing principle I can think of there will be some rare edge cases when breaking it actually is the right choice. 



Thomas Shey said:


> You've described a situation.  Whether you deliberately emphasize it or not, there's going to be things that that look like they might make a difference.  People start to debate which of those they should do.
> 
> Is it that difficult when this happens to tell them "Whether you go up into the hills, down through the valley, or boat up the river isn't likely to effect much."  Then they can decide if they want to spend time on it or just tell you that you're going to the other side of the hills and not worry about it and spend mental energy on something that is (at best, and maybe not even this) just about color.



One of course can say that, and if the players get stuck for a long time debating something trivial it indeed might be a good call. Then again, it also is calling attention to the artificiality of the game world and addressing the situation at the metal level, which is something I'm not a huge fan of.



Thomas Shey said:


> Its not just about not being actively going "You have these four options, which one do you take?" when none of them matter, but not letting players assume there are decisions there which, in terms of anything in game play, really aren't.



Again, I swear I'm not trying to be difficult, but I'm not exactly sure what "letting layers to assume it matters" means. Like I just describe the situation, and the players make their assumptions and choices. It is not necessarily even that GM clearly outlines some choices, they just frame the surroundings and the players decide to make some choices on their own initiative.



Thomas Shey said:


> Was the research likely to be useful?  Basically, would anything play out differently if they'd all stayed home and had lunch?



Presumably the players had some reason to assume that I would be useful, so yeah, it probably would be, or at least could be. I mean of course they might have been mistaken about something or fail their library research rolls miserably or something, so it is not guaranteed to matter.



Thomas Shey said:


> And you can tell people if that's true (if the mechanics don't already tell you that, which it does in the second case).



Again, that is meta knowledge. Characters wouldn't know whether it will be relevant later, and the GM necessarily wouldn't know either. A situation may emergently lead to a place where choices that seemed to be pretty trivial turn out to matter. 



Thomas Shey said:


> Of course it is.  But is that a reason for someone else not to say "I think Technique X is a bad idea?"  Or "I'd object strenuously to someone using this technique in a game I'm in?"  If so, why?



I've been saying that this is exactly what they should say if they feel that way! The we figure out whether we can align our preferences or not. And for example based on this tread I can see that there are some people with whom I couldn't come to an understanding.



Thomas Shey said:


> Again, honestly, the fact there are words that describe doing something (and if "deception" is not an accurate description of someone acting like a decision that doesn't really make a difference does, I'd like to know why) that seem insulting seems like a case of "If you find that word insulting, why are you doing it?"  I mean, I get there's semantic loading being a thing, but its hard for me to think of a term to describe that process that isn't insulting if "deception".  People pay to have stage mages decieve them.  Their skill at doing sleight-of-hand (which is deception) is part of what people are there for.
> 
> So what word that actually describes the process would you find acceptable?  And why does your feelings here matter more than those who dislike it?



Illusionism is badly defined, but I don't think it as a term is insulting. Even railroading that tends to have rather negative connotations is less of a value judgement than "lie."

I understand that some people don't like these techniques, and communication is good idea. But also absolutely nothing suggested in the OP is something that the GM under the rules of D&D wouldn't be allowed to do, which of course is not the same than this being the only proper way to play. And sometimes gaming presence mismatches happen. What I don't like is turning such into a matter of morals rather than of taste.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 18, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> For the record, I didn’t think your beast at the market example was railroading. But, to answer your question, the players should know under what conditions the DM rolls for random encounter, how likely one is to occur when they do, and if/how they can affect those things.



This indeed makes the system gameable, which gives the players agency. Though such knowledge might sometimes be hard to justify from in character perspective. I know you're not that fussed about such things, but many people are. I definitely am.


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## G R (grizzyGR) (Jul 18, 2022)

This is a great article and I'm surprised how many are commenting that they don't like this idea. I mean, what's next? Will you be upset when you learn your DM just made up everything?


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## Charlaquin (Jul 18, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> This indeed makes the system gameable, which gives the players agency. Though such knowledge might sometimes be hard to justify from in character perspective. I know you're not that fussed about such things, but many people are. I definitely am.



It’s almost like you should talk about these sorts of things with your players beforehand, so you’re on the same page regarding what everyone is and isn’t ok with.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 18, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> It’s almost like you should talk about these sorts of things with your players beforehand, so you’re on the same page regarding what everyone is and isn’t ok with.



Sure. We are.


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## Charlaquin (Jul 18, 2022)

G R (grizzyGR) said:


> This is a great article and I'm surprised how many are commenting that they don't like this idea. I mean, what's next? Will you be upset when you learn your DM just made up everything?



It’s literally premised on doing one thing while making your players think you’re doing another. That’s why it’s called “the _invisible_ railroad.” It’s _hidden_, and hiding your actions is _deceptive_. If the players know you’ll be shuffling things around so they don’t miss the cool stuff you had planned and are ok with that, great. Have fun. If you actively hide the fact that you’re doing it though, that’s were there’s a problem.


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## Charlaquin (Jul 18, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> Sure. We are.



Cool.


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## pemerton (Jul 18, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> The dm really holds all the cards, they create the entire world. At a whim they could rip apart the PCs plans and characters, and there is nothing the PCs could do to stop him. But the reason the game works is there is trust the dm won’t do this, that they will craft a story with the PCs and will arbitrate fairly (though not perfectly)



How would the PCs stop the GM? The PCs are imaginary characters in a shared fiction; the GM is an actual person who is one of those who author the shared fiction.

And this point isn't just pedantic: the GM doesn't unilaterally "create the entire world". Like anyone else at the table, the GM makes suggestions about what is or isn't part of the shared fiction, and other participants do or don't accept those suggestions. Illusionist and railroading techniques are all about _what informs the GM's suggestions_ and _under what circumstances other participants accept them_. Within the scope of D&D play there are many possible approaches to both those things. Railroading and illusionism are not inevitable, and are not avoided only by the GM being "trusted".


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 19, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> I know that you're arguing in good faith and I feel it is unfortunate that we are seeming to fail to communicate here. But I assure you that I am not being intentionally dismissive.




I don't think you're being dismissive, but it kind of comes across that since the other side is hostile to your preference here, you're not working to understand the lines they're drawing



Crimson Longinus said:


> The thing is, that it is the ambiguous stuff that the disagreement almost always is about. Like basically everyone agrees that it is generally a bad practice to present a choice with clear(ish) stakes and then have it not to mater. But when get to discussion of what it actually means in practice, the disagreements emerge. I assure you that I honour the player choices great deal, and bigger the stakes are more important I feel it is to honour them. I have let players to blow up entire worlds. But still in discussions here sometimes I find out that some people get hung up on stuff I'd consider trivial. Things that I would consider to be just part of perfectly normal GM framing powers are seen as deceitful illusionism. And the logic behind such complains often eludes me. There probably is one, and in fact several, as these people don't seem to even agree with each other.




Of course they don't.  There are subjective elements in people's preference, so they aren't going to draw lines in exactly the same places and to quite the same degree of bright-line.

But again, since this sort of thing doesn't bother you much, you're not going to see the lines they draw as make sense.  One person's trivial issue is extremely bothersome to another.




Crimson Longinus said:


> Also, one other area where disagreement often arises is the level of fundamentalism regarding good practices. And some people are far more black and white about this than me. There are things that I consider to be good practices, (but aside Wheaton's rule type matters) I don't practically ever consider them to be absolutely binding. I'm wary of "a good GM always" or "thou shat never" type of proclamations. For every GMing principle I can think of there will be some rare edge cases when breaking it actually is the right choice.




But again, and I know I'm harping on this but its important, if your own tolerances are loose you're not going to draw many lines hard.  But other people's tolerances aren't so loose.  Now "always" language is usually problematic, but that's often because people overproject their own needs on others (or alternatively, don't but are sloppy about making it clear that they're only talking about games where they're involved).  That doesn't make the latter group isn't legitimate (the first group needs to get their act together a group) but just that they're not always as good at communicating it as they could be--but people who feel strongly about an approach and technique aren't always as motivated to make people who think they're a good idea understand them, because they're used to being blown off anyway.  This is all the more common if they're used to being in a minority in the hobby (I'm old enough that I just take it as a given that big parts of the hobby, especially the more you get toward the heavy Trad and specifically D&D (and super-specifically Old School) parts of the hobby are still tainted by the Divine Right of GMs, so the amount I bother to engage with them about is limited and I'm not always motivated to not get snarky there).



Crimson Longinus said:


> One of course can say that, and if the players get stuck for a long time debating something trivial it indeed might be a good call. Then again, it also is calling attention to the artificiality of the game world and addressing the situation at the metal level, which is something I'm not a huge fan of.




I'm aware of that, and I don't necessarily disagree--but again, its not all about us.  At the very least its easy for it to get frustrating to people when they spend effort discussing a path and the path seems to not be relevant at all.  Sometimes it can matter in terms of descriptive issues, and sometimes that's enough, but it doesn't take too many repeats of that before someone can wonder why they're bothering to take time on something that's forgotten ten minutes later.



Crimson Longinus said:


> Again, I swear I'm not trying to be difficult, but I'm not exactly sure what "letting layers to assume it matters" means. Like I just describe the situation, and the players make their assumptions and choices. It is not necessarily even that GM clearly outlines some choices, they just frame the surroundings and the players decide to make some choices on their own initiative.




The problem is players don't know what's significant or not most of the time.  Unless everyone's trained to know when you should give something attention and when its trivial by cues from the GM (and I'd suspect from your reaction above that you kind of avoid that) its very easy to fix a lot of attention on things that seem like they _could_ be important, but really aren't.  I doubt you do this kind of gotcha, but there was a reason at one time you'd get people spend really tedious amounts of care searching dungeons, because no one knew what detail they needed to pay attention to, and what not (its one of the reason so many people say to avoid red herrings at all cost, because people often have a tendency to be afraid they're missing something important).

This is kind of the issue with spending much time on choices that are, in the end, meaningless; people don't know the difference after a while and either just go with the first obvious choice, or whatever choice their buddy does.  It ends up destroying agency because there's too much noise in your decision making.



Crimson Longinus said:


> Presumably the players had some reason to assume that I would be useful, so yeah, it probably would be, or at least could be. I mean of course they might have been mistaken about something or fail their library research rolls miserably or something, so it is not guaranteed to matter.




Then its not a meaningless decision (or at least it doesn't have to be; research can be another thing that ends up just being one path in All Roads Lead to Rome but its at least not intrinsic to it).



Crimson Longinus said:


> Again, that is meta knowledge. Characters wouldn't know whether it will be relevant later, and the GM necessarily wouldn't know either. A situation may emergently lead to a place where choices that seemed to be pretty trivial turn out to matter.




I don't think its meta-knowledge to know that your spell choices can very well matter.  As to the others--I'll tell you the truth, if the GM started asking me a lot of questions about my clothing because it "might" matter latter, I'd start to consider it pretty picayune and a waste of both our times.  There really are some things you can just make some assumptions about when the matter comes up.



Crimson Longinus said:


> I've been saying that this is exactly what they should say if they feel that way! The we figure out whether we can align our preferences or not. And for example based on this tread I can see that there are some people with whom I couldn't come to an understanding.




But that's effectively what most of them are doing.  Like I said, yeah, there's some hyperbole, and even more people overgeneralizing but the great truth is most of the time when you see "A GM should never do X" there's almost always an unstated "when anyone like me is involved".  (Sometimes the person, as I mention, is overgeneralizing and assumes there will always or usually be someone like them around, but, well, if you don't expect people to make assumptions about how common things are that may or may not be warranted, any RPG discussion outside of a very small and specific pool is always gonna be kind of frustrating, man.  I mean you've done it yourself "I've never seen this outside forum discussions".  So?  Maybe that's significant, maybe its selection bias.  In this case I suspect the number of people bothered by this sort of thing aren't huge, but that can't be but an assumption.  As I referred to earlier, this hobby had horrifically top-down GMing as the default for a number of years, with the assumption "That was how it was done" and I know good and well there were plenty of people who were bothered by that, just not enough to stop playing).




Crimson Longinus said:


> Illusionism is badly defined, but I don't think it as a term is insulting. Even railroading that tends to have rather negative connotations is less of a value judgement than "lie."
> 
> I understand that some people don't like these techniques, and communication is good idea. But also absolutely nothing suggested in the OP is something that the GM under the rules of D&D wouldn't be allowed to do, which of course is not the same than this being the only proper way to play. And sometimes gaming presence mismatches happen. What I don't like is turning such into a matter of morals rather than of taste.




I'm going to hit this again because I think you kind of stepped around it.  Please don't take that as an insult.
In what way is the initial suggestion in this thread not "deception".  You didn't seem to like that term either, and honestly, it seems as close to a neutral term for it as is possible.

(And again, lots of games are, at best, vague about what is "permitted" by GMs, and in some cases suggest things that are a social meltdown looking for a place to happen.  If 5e actively suggests deception as a default, that's disappointing, but it just demonstrates that game designers aren't immune to the issues we've talked about in our exchange when it comes to overgeneralizing).


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 19, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> This indeed makes the system gameable, which gives the players agency. Though such knowledge might sometimes be hard to justify from in character perspective. I know you're not that fussed about such things, but many people are. I definitely am.




Are you at all surprised that some of your desires here are incompatible with other people's?  As I've noted, my interest in RPGs as a game being part of what I want there (I'm very much a person here for having my chocolate with my peanut butter with this) is pretty anathema to some people.  That just means we shouldn't be gaming together.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 19, 2022)

G R (grizzyGR) said:


> This is a great article and I'm surprised how many are commenting that they don't like this idea. I mean, what's next? Will you be upset when you learn your DM just made up everything?




I suspect they would if he claimed he didn't.


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## Stalker0 (Jul 19, 2022)

Thomas Shey said:


> I don't think you're being dismissive, but it kind of comes across that since the other side is hostile to your preference here, you're not working to understand the lines they're drawing



So its never good to have the "us vs them" argument, but my problem is I feel the "railroading is bad" crowd here is drawing a line in the sand that says, "there is no such thing as acceptable railroading....ever".

Whereas I have said several times that too much railroading, or railroading in certain cases, is absolutely bad, completely agree. But...there are exceptions.

Ultimately I don't know how to move the lines at this point. I've given an inch, and gotten no shift in return. So what do you do from there? heheh probably what we all should have done 10 pages ago and just let this go.... its not like one side is forcing the other to play under their "horrendous" DM style.


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## pemerton (Jul 19, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> I don't see how players making a choice, that choice changing the flow of the game, and weather they succssed or fail (by die roll or just cause something isn't possible (but they then learn why it isn't, and even THAT changes cause they can do things to MAKE it possible) is in any definition railroad...
> 
> if tomorrow night (witch I doubt the game is new and I doubt they would think of it yet) they declaired they wanted to find a way to plane shift to the city of brass (just an example it could be spell jame to kryn or what ever) they would have to reserch and quest for the ability to do so... that adventure, that research and quest would look VERY diffrent thenif they instead said "I want to research vampires... are there any to hunt in your game world?" and that too would require reserch that would lead to a quest (and as I sit here typing I don't know the answer cause I don't have any vampires stated as anything important yet) but that again would not be what I expect...



I don't see how the sort of decision-making you are talking about changes the game from _railroad_ to _not a railroad_.

Here are two reasonably well-known modules which are both railroads: Dead Gods, and Expedition to the Demonweb Pits. Suppose a GM asks their players to choose which of these modules to play: that doesn't make the ensuing game not a railroad.

Suppose the GM introduces two different hooks, one which leads to Dead Gods and on which leads to Expedition: that doesn't make the ensuing game not a railroad.

In your example, the _adventure, research and quest_ all seem to be things that the GM has decided, or will decide (eg you refer to _your_, the GM's, lack of having made up anything about vampires). The players are making a contribution about topic, but that seems to be it.



GMforPowergamers said:


> they don't have to use the words "I am going to look for a blacksmith" they might do 100 things that bring up the fire... but there are also 100 things that wont.  I know the fire is a plot hook (I always have 3-5 but sometimes I have WAY more) but I also know my game doesn't depend on them finding the plot hook or demand they take it... maybe they just see it as a fun cool story about why there isn't a blacksmith... or maybe they investigate.



Again, everything here seems to be authored by you the GM. As you describe it, the players are "lucky dipping" into your box of stories and seeing which one they pull out. Maybe they can throw aside one they don't like and have another draw. Is that what you mean by _meaningful choice_?



GMforPowergamers said:


> how would a DM EVER tell a player the results of what they are looking for by your way?
> 
> <snip>
> 
> ...



I've already mentioned other ways of approaching play. There is the approach set out in the 4e rulebooks, where the setting backstory is shared (it's presented in the PHB, mostly under the entries for races and for gods), and players are encouraged to author quests for their PCs, and the system for resolving actions (both combat and non-combat) is transparent and player-facing.

Of the RPGs I know, the one that has the most robust and unrelenting implementation of the 4e approach is Burning Wheel. While 4e is not quite as robust nor as unrelenting, it still works fine.

Another well-known approach is that found in Apocalypse World and well-known spin-offs like Dungeon World, Blades in the Dark, etc.

One thing these approaches have in common, which is directly relevant to "railroading", is that the GM is not permitted to rule that a player's declared action fails _just because_, in the GM's imagination, the fiction makes success impossible. Or to put it another way: these approaches do not treat the GM's unilateral, secret ideas about the shared fiction as authoritative.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 19, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> So its never good to have the "us vs them" argument, but my problem is I feel the "railroading is bad" crowd here is drawing a line in the sand that says, "there is no such thing as acceptable railroading....ever".




I'd say some of them absolutely are.  I mean, getting real, when there's something people respond to in different ways, there's going to be some point on the line where the acceptable amount is "None at all."  I won't eat pickles.  No, not even a little, not in any form.



Stalker0 said:


> Whereas I have said several times that too much railroading, or railroading in certain cases, is absolutely bad, completely agree. But...there are exceptions.
> 
> Ultimately I don't know how to move the lines at this point. I've given an inch, and gotten no shift in return. So what do you do from there? heheh probably what we all should have done 10 pages ago and just let this go.... its not like one side is forcing the other to play under their "horrendous" DM style.




Yup.  I think honestly the biggest problem in this sort of thread is that people who expect certain techniques or approaches just can't wrap their heads around the fact to some people it really is unacceptable.  They end up seeing the other side as just being contrarian rather than being able to accept that they sincerely don't want to deal with it.  I see this on a variety of topics when they come up.

At some point you really need to accept that when other people tell you some things are just flat out unacceptable to them, you take them at their word; maybe its useful to find out why they feel that way, but arguing their reasons doesn't lead to their conclusions is going to rarely be useful


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 19, 2022)

Thomas Shey said:


> But again, and I know I'm harping on this but its important, if your own tolerances are loose you're not going to draw many lines hard.  But other people's tolerances aren't so loose.



And that's fine. Perfectly legitimate. But if they're unable to articulate what those tolerances actually are, I wouldn't even in theory be unable to meet them. And like I have probably made pretty clear, I'm not terribly interested in trying in the first place. Granted, it probably doesn't help my attitude if the preference is expressed in a manner that implies that a failure to meet it to be a moral flaw.



Thomas Shey said:


> The problem is players don't know what's significant or not most of the time.  Unless everyone's trained to know when you should give something attention and when its trivial by cues from the GM (and I'd suspect from your reaction above that you kind of avoid that) its very easy to fix a lot of attention on things that seem like they _could_ be important, but really aren't.  I doubt you do this kind of gotcha, but there was a reason at one time you'd get people spend really tedious amounts of care searching dungeons, because no one knew what detail they needed to pay attention to, and what not (its one of the reason so many people say to avoid red herrings at all cost, because people often have a tendency to be afraid they're missing something important).
> 
> This is kind of the issue with spending much time on choices that are, in the end, meaningless; people don't know the difference after a while and either just go with the first obvious choice, or whatever choice their buddy does.  It ends up destroying agency because there's too much noise in your decision making.



Perhaps this is the pixel hunting problem? The GM has designed 'the correct solution' or the 'the specific interesting thing' but the players keep poking 'wrong things' so nothing interesting happens? As a player I hate this, and I make sure it doesn't happen in my games. I think it is pretty easy to avoid by just having a world full of interesting stuff and no 'correct solutions' but certainly some low-key illusionism can help making sure that the interesting stuff is where and when the PCs are. Like if the players really fixate on something that I hadn't meant to be in anyway relevant, then I probably just make it relevant, at least in a small way. But I'm sure some people would consider that changing the prep, thus deception, or something.. 



Thomas Shey said:


> I don't think its meta-knowledge to know that your spell choices can very well matter.  As to the others--I'll tell you the truth, if the GM started asking me a lot of questions about my clothing because it "might" matter latter, I'd start to consider it pretty picayune and a waste of both our times.  There really are some things you can just make some assumptions about when the matter comes up.



Sure, and GM probably wouldn't ask about clothing unless there was some special occasion for which they might expect the PCs to dress differently than usual. Though that totally could be just for flavour. But like I said, a lot of 'choices' are not actually the GM asking questions, they're choices the players spontaneously make in response to the situation. Like the GM describes how the weather is chilly, and a player in response describes how their PC dresses in a fur cloak. But perhaps the weather was intended just for flavour and GM was not planning for freezing checks... except then later due unforeseen circumstances the character gets trapped in an ice cave for a long time and whether they have warm clothes suddenly becomes relevant.



Thomas Shey said:


> I'm going to hit this again because I think you kind of stepped around it.  Please don't take that as an insult.
> In what way is the initial suggestion in this thread not "deception".  You didn't seem to like that term either, and honestly, it seems as close to a neutral term for it as is possible.
> 
> (And again, lots of games are, at best, vague about what is "permitted" by GMs, and in some cases suggest things that are a social meltdown looking for a place to happen.  If 5e actively suggests deception as a default, that's disappointing, but it just demonstrates that game designers aren't immune to the issues we've talked about in our exchange when it comes to overgeneralizing).




Ok. Let's try to unpack this. I wouldn't mind 'deception' if were it used as a technical term, but it really isn't. It comes along with 'lies' and 'dishonesty.' It is not just used to refer artistic technique of misdirection, it is used as a value judgment.

And for the record, I don't think DMG gives advice on illusionism, I don't think it gives much useful GMing advice at all, good or bad. It however gives advice on fudging, as thing GM might do, so I don't think such trickery is in any way considered out of bounds. 

But let's look what is actually happening in the examples in the OP. They're GM making up stuff, and then describing that stuff to the players. That's it. And that is what GM is supposed to do. The 'deception' that is happening is having the players to think that the world is independently and objectively existing, and not mutable and altered on the spot. But certainly that would be true if the GM would be just improvising this on the spot too? And certainly in broad sense the players are aware that at least some of the world actually is not predetermined (as everything never can be) and is just decided by the GM when relevant. So I really don't think that there is any significantly more nefarious deception going on here than in the general process of making some haphazard notes and stray thoughts coming across as real and existing world the PCs can interact with.


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## Mort (Jul 19, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> So its never good to have the "us vs them" argument, but my problem is I feel the "railroading is bad" crowd here is drawing a line in the sand that says, "there is no such thing as acceptable railroading....ever".
> 
> Whereas I have said several times that too much railroading, or railroading in certain cases, is absolutely bad, completely agree. But...there are exceptions.
> 
> Ultimately I don't know how to move the lines at this point. I've given an inch, and gotten no shift in return. So what do you do from there? heheh probably what we all should have done 10 pages ago and just let this go.... its not like one side is forcing the other to play under their "horrendous" DM style.




People's opinions tend to drift to extremes when arguing on message boards. If nothing else, most (not all of course) people aren't going to spend 20 pages on a middle of the road position, they'd drift from the thread.

Also, I think it's still a definitional issue - even after all these pages. I simply prefer railroading keep its negative connotation as a definition. Otherwise, the waters are just that much muddier as people argue "good" vs. "bad" railroading as opposed to the good vs. bad techniques involved themselves - and WHY some people have such a big issue (not that it's all THAT complicated - some people just place a very high value on player agency and consider any infringement verboten.)

Me? I'm fine just having a good time, and I don't get to play (vs. DM) nearly enough - so just about ANY style is fine as long as it's entertaining. But I do prefer knowing what style I'm actually playing. 

And, despite a lot of naysaying in this thread, most of the various techniques used to railroad actually work fine when used out in the open and often actually work better since, out in the open, you are working WITH your players instead of against them (where against means trying to keep the techniques etc. hidden).


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 19, 2022)

Thomas Shey said:


> I'd say some of them absolutely are.  I mean, getting real, when there's something people respond to in different ways, there's going to be some point on the line where the acceptable amount is "None at all."



Yeah, that's fair. It just is that with vague terms like "railroading" and "illusionism" that people cannot agree on, demanding "none at all" becomes rather tricky position. Like I said, I literally couldn't promise that even if I wanted to, because there is a good chance that they might consider something to fall into those categories that I wouldn't. 



Thomas Shey said:


> I won't eat pickles.  No, not even a little, not in any form.



Perfectly understandable.


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 19, 2022)

Thomas Shey said:


> And that's a fine choice, but as I noted, some people don't want to see how the trick is done.
> 
> The gig is knowing whether all your players are on one side of that divide.  And the only real way to know, is to ask (like I said, I make an educated guess because I've been playing with the same people so long, but that's what it is--a guess.  Since I rarely feel a need to use illusionism, its not a big risk).



This is, as I have repeatedly said, the main problem.

If you (generic) as DM choose to use these techniques _and get explicit affirmative consent to do so in advance_ (e.g. during session zero), then awesome. That gives folks like me a chance to ask you to please not, and if no understanding can be reached, we can break amicably.

But the OP, and pretty much every single person I've ever seen advocate for railroading (and fudging etc.), will either explicitly say "tell your players you don't do this even though you do," or will say "well players should just know that this is how stuff is done, I don't have to talk about it, everyone knows, there's no need to get consent." Even Crimson Longinus, who has become more clear that communication is actually involved in his stuff (as noted below), has spoken of how there's a one-liner reference buried deep in the DMG as justifying a presumption of player buy-in so actual communication can be skipped.



Crimson Longinus said:


> The thing is, that it is the ambiguous stuff that the disagreement almost always is about. Like basically everyone agrees that it is generally a bad practice to present a choice with clear(ish) stakes and then have it not to mater. But when get to discussion of what it actually means in practice, the disagreements emerge. I assure you that I honour the player choices great deal, and bigger the stakes are more important I feel it is to honour them. I have let players to blow up entire worlds. But still in discussions here sometimes I find out that some people get hung up on stuff I'd consider trivial. Things that I would consider to be just part of perfectly normal GM framing powers are seen as deceitful illusionism. And the logic behind such complains often eludes me. There probably is one, and in fact several, as these people don't seem to even agree with each other.



There is a different lesson to take from this, one that doesn't dismiss the entire other side you don't grok as though it were a pointless waste of time: other people have (a) very strong feelings about things you don't, and (b) it can be difficult to predict, so (c) you should be extremely careful and do your best good-faith effort to actively discover what the players value and how important to them certain things are. IOW, learning from this that communication is not only important, but that one of the great responsibilities that come with the great power of the DM's seat. That it is incumbent on DMs to be highly proactive. Nobody's perfect and nothing is guaranteed, so there may still be issues. That doesn't mean the effort isn't important.



Crimson Longinus said:


> I've been saying that this is exactly what they should say if they feel that way! The we figure out whether we can align our preferences or not. And for example based on this tread I can see that there are some people with whom I couldn't come to an understanding



How am I supposed to say something--to even know there is something to speak about--if, as the OP repeatedly says, I am being TOLD that things are a certain way when they aren't? Or if I am not told such, but the DM is constantly concealing any evidence which might suggest the other way?

How can someone who has only ever heard propaganda ask hard, important questions about their government? How, for example, were the American people supposed to speak out against PRISM when the program was secret?



Crimson Longinus said:


> Illusionism is badly defined, but I don't think it as a term is insulting. Even railroading that tends to have rather negative connotations is less of a value judgement than "lie."
> 
> I understand that some people don't like these techniques, and communication is good idea. But also absolutely nothing suggested in the OP is something that the GM under the rules of D&D wouldn't be allowed to do, which of course is not the same than this being the only proper way to play. And sometimes gaming presence mismatches happen. What I don't like is turning such into a matter of morals rather than of taste.



Given the OP explicitly and repeatedly warns against such communication, I'm not sure how one can get this reading.  And as I and @Charlaquin have repeatedly said, it is the false impression that is the problem, not the technique itself. The OP clearly, explicitly, and repeatedly refers to not only NOT communicating, but outright saying things which are not true and actively cultivating a false pretense for the players, actively avoiding any possible form of consent. That's where the moral issue arises.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 19, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> Given the OP explicitly and repeatedly warns against such communication, I'm not sure how one can get this reading.



It does not. The guy literally published an article about it under his own name on a public message board. It is not a secret.


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 19, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> It does not. The guy literally published an article about it under his own name on a public message board. It is not a secret.



Except all the places he does. Such as (all bolding added for emphasis)...



Corone said:


> What if I told you it was possible to lock your players on a tight railroad, but *make them think every decision they made mattered*?
> 
> While *this may sound like the evil GM speaking*, I have my reasons.





Corone said:


> channel players through an exciting adventure that just *doesn’t have as many options as they thought it did*.





Corone said:


> If players realise nothing they do changes the story, then the adventure will quickly lose its allure. But *as long as they don’t realise what is happening* they will think every choice matters and the story is entirely in their hands.





Corone said:


> If you use this too often *the players will start to realise what is going on*. To a degree *you are limiting their agency* by making them unable to backtrack.





Corone said:


> Now, *all this may all seem a little manipulative*, but modifying events in reaction to what the players do is a part of many GM’s tools. *Any trick you use is usually okay* as long as you do it to serve the story and the player’s enjoyment.




None of these statements make sense without the presumption of not only NOT telling the players that you do this sort of thing, but actively forestalling any possibility that they _might realize_ (a term used repeatedly in the essay) that you're doing it. Explicit instructions to avoid certain actions or patterns, not because doing so makes the game better, but because if you don't avoid them, people will discover the false pretense, and likely become upset.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 19, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> None of these statements make sense without the presumption of not only NOT telling the players that you do this sort of thing, but actively forestalling any possibility that they _might realize_ (a term used repeatedly in the essay) that you're doing it. Explicit instructions to avoid certain actions or patterns, not because doing so makes the game better, but because if you don't avoid them, people will discover the false pretense, and likely become upset.




The advice is to not overdo it so it feels they have no agency. Yes, it relies on the players not in the moment thinking in terms of this happening, but this doesn't mean that it is a secret in a broad sense that in the game everything may not always be what it seems. Like I said earlier, all that is happening is the GM making stuff up and describing that stuff to the players. But OP can of course answer himself what his actual communication with his players is, I can't know that.

I certainly wouldn't advice actively lying to the players. If you asked me to not use illusionism, I wouldn't say "Okay, I won't" and then do it anyway.
I would say "Can't promise that, mate."


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## pemerton (Jul 19, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> But let's look what is actually happening in the examples in the OP. They're GM making up stuff, and then describing that stuff to the players. That's it. And that is what GM is supposed to do.



That's not it.

In most RPGing, there are rules, including mechanical systems, and also principles, that govern what the GM makes up. Some of those are express; in many cases some are implicit.

The OP is advocating a particular framework of principles. They are not the only possible principles, not the only desirable principles, and for those who wish not to follow them are easily avoided.



Crimson Longinus said:


> The 'deception' that is happening is having the players to think that the world is independently and objectively existing, and not mutable and altered on the spot. But certainly that would be true if the GM would be just improvising this on the spot too? And certainly in broad sense the players are aware that at least some of the world actually is not predetermined (as everything never can be) and is just decided by the GM when relevant. So I really don't think that there is any significantly more nefarious deception going on here than in the general process of making some haphazard notes and stray thoughts coming across as real and existing world the PCs can interact with.



There are RPGs that involve the "world" not being predetermined, and that involve the GM deciding things when relevant - eg AW, DW, BW, 4e D&D - which do not require, and indeed eschew, the principles set out in the OP.


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## Maxperson (Jul 19, 2022)

G R (grizzyGR) said:


> This is a great article and I'm surprised how many are commenting that they don't like this idea. I mean, what's next? Will you be upset when you learn your DM just made up everything?



It's.... It's all real, isn't it?


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## Stalker0 (Jul 19, 2022)

Thomas Shey said:


> Yup.  I think honestly the biggest problem in this sort of thread is that people who expect certain techniques or approaches just can't wrap their heads around the fact to some people it really is unacceptable.  They end up seeing the other side as just being contrarian rather than being able to accept that they sincerely don't want to deal with it.  I see this on a variety of topics when they come up.



Well that stems from the fact that this is a forum....designed for discourse. And discourse is not possible when two sides have intransigent positions.

Doesn't mean I can't understand the other side, but it just means there is nothing left to talk about.


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## Maxperson (Jul 19, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> So its never good to have the "us vs them" argument, but my problem is I feel the "railroading is bad" crowd here is drawing a line in the sand that says, "there is no such thing as acceptable railroading....ever".



That's because railroading is universally negative. It's literally forcing someone to do something against their will or tricking them into it through lies. If the players agree to it, it is okay, but then it's no longer a railroad and is simply linear.


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## Corone (Jul 19, 2022)

Ok, I promised myself not to comment on threads like this but as I've just read a page of people talking about how I do or do not either run games or intend the article to be read, I clearly have to post something.

The intent of the article is to offer another tool for the GM, not a map for how to always run every game.
As far as I'm concerned, the contract you have with your players is to work with them to deliver a great story, and a certain amount of manipulation can sometimes help to do that. Novels and magicians misdirect on several occasions and no one has a problem with it.
If you disagree, or think its unspeakable to even consider it, that fine, no one said you have to.
If you found a useful way to reduce your GM prep and take some pressure off, great, glad to help.
Run, or play the games you want to.

As previous posters have said, if you've had a chat about it and don't agree, its time to walk away (as I'm sure we'd all rather be gaming).


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## Maxperson (Jul 19, 2022)

Corone said:


> Ok, I promised myself not to comment on threads like this but as I've just read a page of people talking about how I do or do not either run games or intend the article to be read, I clearly have to post something.
> 
> The intent of the article is to offer another tool for the GM, not a map for how to always run every game.
> As far as I'm concerned, the contract you have with your players is to work with them to deliver a great story, and a certain amount of manipulation can sometimes help to do that. Novels and magicians misdirect on several occasions and no one has a problem with it.
> ...



Speaking for myself, despite my strong opinion on the subject, how you just described the intent of your article is exactly how I took it.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 19, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> And that's fine. Perfectly legitimate. But if they're unable to articulate what those tolerances actually are, I wouldn't even in theory be unable to meet them. And like I have probably made pretty clear, I'm not terribly interested in trying in the first place. Granted, it probably doesn't help my attitude if the preference is expressed in a manner that implies that a failure to meet it to be a moral flaw.




I suspect most of the people in this thread (I'm very carefully not saying "all"--I know better) would be able to do that face to face.  Regarding the latter, see my response at the end of this.



Crimson Longinus said:


> Perhaps this is the pixel hunting problem?




Its absolutely related.




Crimson Longinus said:


> The GM has designed 'the correct solution' or the 'the specific interesting thing' but the players keep poking 'wrong things' so nothing interesting happens? As a player I hate this, and I make sure it doesn't happen in my games. I think it is pretty easy to avoid by just having a world full of interesting stuff and no 'correct solutions' but certainly some low-key illusionism can help making sure that the interesting stuff is where and when the PCs are. Like if the players really fixate on something that I hadn't meant to be in anyway relevant, then I probably just make it relevant, at least in a small way. But I'm sure some people would consider that changing the prep, thus deception, or something..




Well, again, some of the people objecting in this thread would have no problem with that as long as they knew you were doing it.



Crimson Longinus said:


> Sure, and GM probably wouldn't ask about clothing unless there was some special occasion for which they might expect the PCs to dress differently than usual. Though that totally could be just for flavour. But like I said, a lot of 'choices' are not actually the GM asking questions, they're choices the players spontaneously make in response to the situation. Like the GM describes how the weather is chilly, and a player in response describes how their PC dresses in a fur cloak. But perhaps the weather was intended just for flavour and GM was not planning for freezing checks... except then later due unforeseen circumstances the character gets trapped in an ice cave for a long time and whether they have warm clothes suddenly becomes relevant.




And most of the time most people aren't going to care about that.  Its all about framing in most cases.



Crimson Longinus said:


> Ok. Let's try to unpack this. I wouldn't mind 'deception' if were it used as a technical term, but it really isn't. It comes along with 'lies' and 'dishonesty.' It is not just used to refer artistic technique of misdirection, it is used as a value judgment.




Okay, now let me do my brief spiel about "scar tissue".

This is a term I picked up from my wife.  She refers to it as the baggage everybody--and I mean everybody--carries forward from prior experiences in their life.  Sometimes its minor, sometimes its not, and sometimes its, from lack of a better term, "localized".

Gamers are  _very_ prone to having scar tissue.  Gamers who participate in lots of gaming discussions even more so.  And gamers with apparently minor populace tastes, more yet.

This is because the topic at hand is not the only thing being responded to.  The last four, 20 or 100 times they've been in a related discussion is also right here, right now.  That's just how people work.  So when you see hyperbole, its in response to all the arguments they've ever had on this subject; its only about you to the degree that you're in the general category of people who've acted in the past like Illusionism is the Only Right Way to Play, and anyone who doesn't like it is a giant killjoy, and are perfectly happy to throw their own hyperbole around on it.  I've seen at least 2-3 examples in this thread of it, and its far from the most extreme I've seen on this.

[I occasionally think a general thread about the effect of "scar tissue" on problems in RPG groups would be worth starting, but I'm never sold it'd not turn into a trainwreck, and I participate in enough of those I don't need to start my own.]


Crimson Longinus said:


> And for the record, I don't think DMG gives advice on illusionism, I don't think it gives much useful GMing advice at all, good or bad. It however gives advice on fudging, as thing GM might do, so I don't think such trickery is in any way considered out of bounds.




Well, its defensible that at least some fudging is illusionism, when you do it acting like the actual result of the die roll is being honored.  Its just on a very limited scale.  I just try to limit my comments about what is or isn't in 5e because I'm neither a 5e player nor GM, I just read it enough to figure out its not my cuppa.



Crimson Longinus said:


> But let's look what is actually happening in the examples in the OP. They're GM making up stuff, and then describing that stuff to the players. That's it.




Uhm, no.  Consider why he, himself, calls it an_ invisible_ railroad.  Its the deliberate concealment that is as much or more an issue than the railroad.
 (though there are absolutely people who don't like that too.)



Crimson Longinus said:


> And that is what GM is supposed to do. The 'deception' that is happening is having the players to think that the world is independently and objectively existing, and not mutable and altered on the spot. But certainly that would be true if the GM would be just improvising this on the spot too?




It--depends.  Is he making things up to steer things in a certain direction?  Or is he just improving off what's currently happening?  I think in terms of railroading at least, they're pretty different.



Crimson Longinus said:


> And certainly in broad sense the players are aware that at least some of the world actually is not predetermined (as everything never can be) and is just decided by the GM when relevant. So I really don't think that there is any significantly more nefarious deception going on here than in the general process of making some haphazard notes and stray thoughts coming across as real and existing world the PCs can interact with.




Again, I think the "nefariousness" is the idea you can steer people where you want and they won't know.  If they do know, then the "invisible" part doesn't apply.  Some people still aren't going to like it because they're going to question if their decisions actually mean anything (and that turns very much on what the GM is doing with that improvisation), but at the very least there's no bones about what's going on.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 19, 2022)

Mort said:


> Also, I think it's still a definitional issue - even after all these pages. I simply prefer railroading keep its negative connotation as a definition. Otherwise, the waters are just that much muddier as people argue "good" vs. "bad" railroading as opposed to the good vs. bad techniques involved themselves - and WHY some people have such a big issue (not that it's all THAT complicated - some people just place a very high value on player agency and consider any infringement verboten.)




I don't think its so much of an issue whether there's "good" or "bad" railroading so much as whether people on the ground prefer it one way or another.  Make it definitionally bad tells people who'd rather just follow their chalk lines that they're "playing wrong" and I have as much an issue with that as people who think everyone should just accept illusionism and be happy with it.




Mort said:


> Me? I'm fine just having a good time, and I don't get to play (vs. DM) nearly enough - so just about ANY style is fine as long as it's entertaining. But I do prefer knowing what style I'm actually playing.
> 
> And, despite a lot of naysaying in this thread, most of the various techniques used to railroad actually work fine when used out in the open and often actually work better since, out in the open, you are working WITH your players instead of against them (where against means trying to keep the techniques etc. hidden).




And hear you seem to get that.  But as long as "railroading" is only viewed as negative, it privileges some play styles over others, which I think is a problem.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 19, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> Yeah, that's fair. It just is that with vague terms like "railroading" and "illusionism" that people cannot agree on, demanding "none at all" becomes rather tricky position. Like I said, I literally couldn't promise that even if I wanted to, because there is a good chance that they might consider something to fall into those categories that I wouldn't.




Yeah, but as I said, at the table you can unpack the matter more with them, and if everyone assumes each other is behaving in good faith, missteps can be adjusted after the fact--or someone can decide that its fundamentally hard for you to give them what they want and walk away in a no-fault kind of way.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 19, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> This is, as I have repeatedly said, the main problem.
> 
> If you (generic) as DM choose to use these techniques _and get explicit affirmative consent to do so in advance_ (e.g. during session zero), then awesome. That gives folks like me a chance to ask you to please not, and if no understanding can be reached, we can break amicably.




Sure.  But the great truth is, communication is hard and some people really don't like doing it for various reasons.  As such, a lot of things get done by assumption and guess that really probably shouldn't.  Like I said, I've never had the discussion, but the majority of people I game with I've played with for 20 years or more.  If the small amount of this I do was bothersome, I think I'd at least have gotten a hint by now.

I'd be _far_ less blase about this with someone new to my game.  Even less so if they didn't play with other people who's game culture I was familiar with.


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## MichaelSomething (Jul 19, 2022)

Time for my regularly scheduled," I trust the DM will use their judgement to run the game well. They're empowered for a reason."


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## bloodtide (Jul 19, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> It’s literally premised on doing one thing while making your players think you’re doing another. That’s why it’s called “the _invisible_ railroad.” It’s _hidden_, and hiding your actions is _deceptive_. If the players know you’ll be shuffling things around so they don’t miss the cool stuff you had planned and are ok with that, great. Have fun. If you actively hide the fact that you’re doing it though, that’s were there’s a problem.



But why?  Beyond some vague "it's generically wrong".  

For example, in order to surprise the players you have to hide things, be deceptive and such.  They can only be surprised for real.  You can't tell the players the supprie and then have it happen: it will fall flat.  Real emotions are always better then fake emotions. 


Maxperson said:


> That's because railroading is universally negative. It's literally forcing someone to do something against their will or tricking them into it through lies. If the players agree to it, it is okay, but then it's no longer a railroad and is simply linear.



Except it's not.  Even if I was the only pro Railroad poster, I alone would make it not universal.  And I'm not alone.


So I'll ask "what is wrong with railroading?"  Other then you don't like it.  And other then some moral high ground to say "all lies, deception and such are always wrong", because that is not true.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 19, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> Well that stems from the fact that this is a forum....designed for discourse. And discourse is not possible when two sides have intransigent positions.
> 
> Doesn't mean I can't understand the other side, but it just means there is nothing left to talk about.




Well, there's nothing left to talk about if you assume the only relevant question is how to use that technique.  It seems to me that "how to get these kind of results without doing that" is a valid topic that doesn't require the other side to accept the legitimacy from where they sit of your approach.  It may not be a discussion you're interested, but its not "nothing left to talk about".


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 19, 2022)

MichaelSomething said:


> Time for my regularly scheduled," I trust the DM will use their judgement to run the game well. They're empowered for a reason."




And for my "I trust a GM's intentions explicity or I won't play with them, but I don't trust any GM's judgment unlimitedly, and don't see any necessity to do so."


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## Mort (Jul 19, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> So I'll ask "what is wrong with railroading?"  Other then you don't like it.  And other then some moral high ground to say "all lies, deception and such are always wrong", because that is not true.




Railroading is the elimination of player choice. Generally added to the definition is that it is the unwilling or unknowing elimination of that choice (though not everyone, even in this thread, is adding the second bit).

It's bad because players like their choices, to the extent available, to matter. If their choices don't matter, why are they pretending to make them? They may as well sit back and allow the DM to narrate the story to them from beginning to end.

Now, pretty much all players accept SOME level of choice limitation. If you're playing a module/or published adventure the players generally agree to stay within the confines of the module. If the players are playing a pirate game/adventure they generally agree to stay within that genre.

Given that, many players expect that the choices they ARE given are real choices and that they can affect the outcome of the game in some meaningful way. Railroading means the players are not actually doing that. That, however it may appear, the DM has the story pre-planned and the player's choice doesn't factor in. The most extreme being, the DM has essentially written the entire story and the PCs are just being pushed through it with no agency whatever.

For many people, the point of gaming is to have the story EMERGE (be created) during play. The extreme end of railroading is that the story is set/fixed and the DM is merely REVEALING the story during play.

The later is anathema to players who want to shape the story, doubly so when they think they are helping shape it only to discover that it was, in fact, fixed.


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## Maxperson (Jul 19, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> But why?  Beyond some vague "it's generically wrong".



Why is deceiving someone wrong? Do we really have to explain that?


bloodtide said:


> For example, in order to surprise the players you have to hide things, be deceptive and such.  They can only be surprised for real.  You can't tell the players the supprie and then have it happen: it will fall flat.  Real emotions are always better then fake emotions.



Hiding a fact until it is discovered is not the same as actively lying to the players by telling them their choices matter when they don't.


bloodtide said:


> Except it's not.  Even if I was the only pro Railroad poster, I alone would make it not universal.  And I'm not alone.



Cool. There are a lot of people in the world who think that they have the right to steal from stores because they are evil corporations.  That doesn't make them correct that theft is okay.


bloodtide said:


> So I'll ask "what is wrong with railroading?"  Other then you don't like it.  And other then some moral high ground to say "all lies, deception and such are always wrong", because that is not true.



I've answered this literally a dozen+ times in specificity in this thread.  You are taking away their agency and denying them any choice that matters. When you do it, they are not playing the game.  Only you are.


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## pemerton (Jul 19, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> in order to surprise the players you have to hide things, be deceptive and such.



This isn't true at all.

When I GM, I surprise my players all the time. It doesn't require any hiding or deceiving. When I play, I find myself being surprised by my GM. Again, this doesn't require him hiding or deceiving.

For instance, the last time that I ran a session of my group's Traveller campaign, there was a surprise: one of the NPCs who travels with the PCs on their starship had been performing experiments, implanting Alien (TM) material into a NPC in the sick bay. The player of the relevant PC knew that this NPC was a medical scientist with an interest in bioweapons research; and knew that the other NPC was in the sick bay; and knew that the PCs had been encountering Aliens. Nevertheless, when an Alien started running amok in the starship, the player was caught by surprise!

No deception, no hiding, just framing.

Another example, this one from Burning Wheel: a PC's backstory included that he had trained as a sorcerer with his brother, in their tower in the Abor-Alz, before the tower had been sacked by Orcs and his brother possessed by a Balrog. In play, the PC returned to the tower for the first time since then. The player declared that his PC searched the ruins looking for a half-completed magic item his PC had been working on as an apprentice. The Scavenging check failed, and so the PC didn't find what he was looking for; rather, in the ruins of what had been his brother's private workroom, he found a stand of elf-slaying Black Arrows. This was a surprise to the player - and it hinted that perhaps his brother had succumbed to evil _before_ he was possessed by the Balrog. But maybe someone else - perhaps an Orc - had created the arrows? So the player declared an Aura Reading check, to determine who created the arrows. The check failed, and so the PC didn't learn what he had hoped to - rather, the Aura Reading confirmed that it was indeed his brother who had crafted the arrows.

In this example of play, as in the first one, there is no deception and no hiding. There's just the narration of consequences of failed checks, where the stakes are transparent, being implicit in the situation as informed by the PC's backstory and goals.

D&D can be run in the same sort of fashion as I've described in this post: clear framing, clear stakes, clear consequences. And surprise is amply possible.


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## bloodtide (Jul 19, 2022)

Mort said:


> Railroading is the elimination of player choice.



Well, I see a lot pre made adventure always badwrongfun and an improv adventure is super cool.  It also seems like the player "choice" seems to be all about the random "like real life" type games popular on line  where a character just does normal stuff like shopping and laundry.

Why do players think that any of their choices are altering the game reality?  At least 75% of them, like what road to take or door to open are way to mundane to matter.  And even the "big choices" don't matter too much, as they again don't really alter the game reality. 

I get there are other games that let players alter the game reality on a whim....but D&D is not one of those games.

It's hard to reply to all your jargon word salad though




Maxperson said:


> I've answered this literally a dozen+ times in specificity in this thread.  You are taking away their agency and denying them any choice that matters. When you do it, they are not playing the game.  Only you are.



Taking away jargon word salad is never wrong.

I wonder how I can trick and lie to so many players and still they have fun and a good game and never even notice.  They make dozes of choices during game play...none alter the game reality....but somehow they don't notice.



pemerton said:


> This isn't true at all.
> 
> When I GM, I surprise my players all the time. It doesn't require any hiding or deceiving. When I play, I find myself being surprised by my GM. Again, this doesn't require him hiding or deceiving.
> 
> For instance, the last time that I ran a session of my group's Traveller campaign, there was a surprise: one of the NPCs who travels with the PCs on their starship had been performing experiments, implanting Alien (TM) material into a NPC in the sick bay. The player of the relevant PC knew that this NPC was a medical scientist with an interest in bioweapons research; and knew that the other NPC was in the sick bay; and knew that the PCs had been encountering Aliens. Nevertheless, when an Alien started running amok in the starship, the player was caught by surprise!



Odd, I see a lie and lots of deception there.  So a PC knew some vague information you carefully sculpted to hide what was going on?  Notice how you BLATANTLY hit the part about the NPC doing experiments with the Alien(TM).  Just let that part out?  Just "randomly decided" that "somehow" the PCs did not know about it?  And why did you not tell the PC?  Was it to not ruin the surprise?  DM:  "oh the NPC in sick bay is doing dangerous reckless Alien(tm) experiments with no security protections."  

I think for forgot the "surprise" part in the second story.  Unless your saying the the "surprise" was the brother was evil?  But that is only a surprise if the brother was never mentioned before and the player had no chance to learn anything about them.


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## pemerton (Jul 19, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> Odd, I see a lie and lots of deception there.  So a PC knew some vague information you carefully sculpted to hide what was going on?  Notice how you BLATANTLY hit the part about the NPC doing experiments with the Alien(TM).  Just let that part out?  Just "randomly decided" that "somehow" the PCs did not know about it?  And why did you not tell the PC?  Was it to not ruin the surprise?  DM:  "oh the NPC in sick bay is doing dangerous reckless Alien(tm) experiments with no security protections."



Huh?

We were all sitting around the table. The player of the starship owner had decided that the starship, with some of the PCs and some of their NPC entourage on board, was going to travel from Zinion to Novus. We resolve the checks for entering jump space etc.

Then I frame the scene: Buzz is walking past the sick bay door, and out bursts an Alien. Mayhem ensues. After the Alien has been dealt with, the medical scientist NPC explains to the ship owning PC that her experimentation had got out of control.

There's no _hiding_ of anything! There's _revelation_, which is basically the opposite of hiding. (In Agon, John Harper sets out the cycle of play as _reveal_ the situation, _ask_ questions and build on the answers to drive the game forward towards conflict, and then _judge_ those contests and resolve their outcomes into new situations. That's basically what has happened here: _revelation_ of the Alien, _asking_ questions that established who was where on the ship and what they did to respond to the threat, and then _judging_ the results and resolving things into a new situation, namely, the revelation that the medical scientist NPC is still engaged in risky bioweapons research.)

If I had wanted to, I could have framed a different scene, such as the NPC mentioning to the PC the progress she is making on her research with Aliens. But I thought the one I framed was more exciting - in part that's because Traveller has more robust mechanics for resolving a fight with an Alien on a spaceship than for resolving an argument between friends. (That's not to say that Traveller doesn't have social mechanics - it does - but it has "thicker" combat mechanics.)



bloodtide said:


> That wouldn't have involved hiding anything either.
> 
> I think for forgot the "surprise" part in the second story.  Unless your saying the the "surprise" was the brother was evil?  But that is only a surprise if the brother was never mentioned before and the player had no chance to learn anything about them.



I think you are not understanding how the resolution works.

The brother had been mentioned before. As I posted, the player had introduced the brother, possessed by a Balrog, as part of his PC's backstory. Freeing his brother from that possession was a key motivation for the PC. The possession as an explanation for his brother's evil was a key part of the PC's conception of his brother.

The player chose to put those things at stake, first by searching the ruined tower, and then by Aura Reading the arrows. And the checks failed, and so the player loses the stakes. And so I narrate that he confirms that his brother made the Black Arrows.

I can assure you that that was a surprise, and an unwelcome one.

Had the player succeeded on his Aura Reading and learned that the Arrows had been made by an Orc, that would have been interesting (because of how it would have connected to other elements of the established fiction) but not very surprising.


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## Mistwell (Jul 19, 2022)

I expected invisible railroad trains in this thread and instead all I found was a bunch of discussion about how to run a plot in an RPG.


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## Mort (Jul 19, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> Well, I see a lot pre made adventure always badwrongfun and an improv adventure is super cool.



Nope. Interesting how you completely ignored the part of my post where I say the exact opposite of that.



bloodtide said:


> It also seems like the player "choice" seems to be all about the random "like real life" type games popular on line  where a character just does normal stuff like shopping and laundry.



Again, nope. Most of the time, shopping and laundry is just fluff kind of a fun riffing exercise for some groups though not my thing (though I would like to see @iserith 's shopping adventure. That looks like a blast).

No, Player choice is exactly what it sounds like. Do we go eliminate the goblins or go rat catching. Do we stop the hermit building the world ending machine or the vampire in his castle. If we pick one over the other, hopefully that makes the story different. And it wasn't just preplanned where there was actually only one choice.



bloodtide said:


> Why do players think that any of their choices are altering the game reality?  At least 75% of them, like what road to take or door to open are way to mundane to matter.  And even the "big choices" don't matter too much, as they again don't really alter the game reality.
> 
> I get there are other games that let players alter the game reality on a whim....but D&D is not one of those games.



Why not?

If you're playing a module then sure, the story is mostly written. But the players know that, have accepted it and are following along. Hopefully having fun because the module is good/being run well. Is that railroading, technically yes (though again I wouldn't say so because it's voluntary), but since it's accepted it's really just a linear, hopefully fun, path.

But not all D&D is run like that. It's not exactly hard to have a campaign where player choice drives the story along. It just means the DM doesn't have a fully pre owned path in mind




bloodtide said:


> It's hard to reply to all your jargon word salad though




Jargon word salad?

 Unwilling elimination of player choice. Please point out the jargon there. Or in the rest of the post for that matter, I really tried to be clear with no jargon other than, possibly, common  gaming terms.

Edit: @bloodtide, what jargon did I use in the post you are referring to? The ONLY jargon I see is the term Railroading, and this is a thread about Railroading.

And word salad generally means impenetrable or incomprehensible nonsense. What part of my post qualifies as that?


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 19, 2022)

Thomas Shey said:


> Sure.  But the great truth is, communication is hard and some people really don't like doing it for various reasons.



If you aren't willing to communicate, you shouldn't be DMing. Full stop. Communication is _absolutely essential_ to be a DM. It does not matter what style you favor, whether you like lots of DM force or no force at all or anything in-between. In order to do the task of DMing, you have to communicate what is going on to your players. It is not possible to DM in a way that does not involve communication to _some_ extent.

This is like saying a person wants to perform Shakespeare, but doesn't want to memorize. You cannot do the former without doing the latter. It's not physically possible.



Thomas Shey said:


> As such, a lot of things get done by assumption and guess that really probably shouldn't.  Like I said, I've never had the discussion, but the majority of people I game with I've played with for 20 years or more.  If the small amount of this I do was bothersome, I think I'd at least have gotten a hint by now.



Well, now that the topic has been broached, don't you think it is generally better to have a conversation about it, rather than to coast on presumptions, _hoping_ that those presumptions are correct?



Thomas Shey said:


> I'd be _far_ less blase about this with someone new to my game.  Even less so if they didn't play with other people who's game culture I was familiar with.



That's very good to hear. But, being perfectly honest, I still think it behooves you to communicate clearly and effectively with people you're very familiar with. Many, many, _many, *many, many*_ problems in human relationships arise because people think that familiarity and/or past history (e.g. "it was never a problem _before_") obviate the need for communication.



MichaelSomething said:


> Time for my regularly scheduled," I trust the DM will use their judgement to run the game well. They're empowered for a reason."



Thomas Shey already covered this, but here's my two bits: "Anyone who responds to concerns about presentation of false pretenses with 'just trust me!' is making things _worse_, not better."



bloodtide said:


> But why?  Beyond some vague "it's generically wrong".



I may not agree with Max about much, but he has the right of it. Deception is generically wrong. This is not an _argument_. This is a moral _axiom_.



bloodtide said:


> For example, in order to surprise the players you have to hide things, be deceptive and such.  They can only be surprised for real.  You can't tell the players the supprie and then have it happen: it will fall flat.  Real emotions are always better then fake emotions.



You do not need to be _deceptive_ to create surprise. Others, like @pemerton, have shown examples. Further, as I have repeatedly said, there is a difference between fooling the _characters_ (which results in players being surprised due to incongruity in _their understanding_ of the fictional context) and fooling the _players_ (which results in players believing things about the _kind of game they're playing_ which are not true.)

I am 110% in favor of reasonable situations where you fool the _characters_. I am fully opposed to situations where you fool the _players_.



bloodtide said:


> Except it's not.  Even if I was the only pro Railroad poster, I alone would make it not universal.  And I'm not alone.



Coercing someone into believing something false, so that they will be happier than they would be if they knew the true state of affairs. That is what is universally negative. Again, all that is required to avoid this is to tell people, at the outset, that you do this stuff. Something like:

"Hey, some of the time, I may fudge rolls or present you with choices that seem to make a difference and seem to put you in control of the story, even though they won't or don't. I won't tell you when I'm doing this, but it's going to happen now and then, and you should basically never be able to tell that I've done it. I genuinely believe that doing this is going to produce a better, fuller, more enjoyable experience than if I chose not to do this. I won't do it very often, because I understand that people value consistent rules and the feeling that the story responds to them. As long as you're okay with me doing that with the purpose of improving the overall experience, we should all have a good time."

And no, "Just _trust_ me, I'm the DM!" does not cut it for covering the above.



bloodtide said:


> So I'll ask "what is wrong with railroading?"  Other then you don't like it.  And other then some moral high ground to say "all lies, deception and such are always wrong", because that is not true.



Because, in order for it to be "railroading," you must have intentionally NOT said the paragraph above. You must intentionally be using _invisible rails_. It's not railroading if you tell your players you're running a premade module or AP, because _they know the rails are there_. It's not railroading if you tell your players in advance that you may, sometimes, give them situations that LOOK like choices that really matter and really give them control, but in practice don't at all, merely giving the illusion of agency and control. There, they can't see the rails directly, but they know there _are_ rails and they _will_ be kept to those rails without comment.

Passing off a pre-written module as though it were an organic campaign, on the other hand, is railroading--and quite clearly wrong (particularly because you add in a lovely dash of _plagiarism_, passing off the module author's work as your own.)



Thomas Shey said:


> And for my "I trust a GM's intentions explicity or I won't play with them, but I don't trust any GM's judgment unlimitedly, and don't see any necessity to do so."



For my part, it's the "explicitly" that's at issue. I can't trust someone _explicitly_ unless they've been explicit _with me_. They need to get me on board with what they're doing. That requires telling me that they will tacitly ignore the rules (which, for me, is an instant disqualifier for a serious game) or that they will tacitly subvert player choice (which is not _quite_ an instant disqualifier, but it's pretty close.) A DM that is honest enough to tell me they do this will absolutely have my respect, but I either definitely (for tacit rule-breaking) or probably (for tacit DM force) will not actually play with them unless it's a completely casual, usually humorous game. I won't raise a stink, I'll just depart, because the game being offered isn't one I'm interested in playing, no different from connecting up with a group to play a "sci-fi" game and finding out that that means "xenomorph body horror"--I'm not interested in playing that, so I won't stick around.



Mort said:


> Given that, many players expect that the choices they ARE given are real choices and that they can affect the outcome of the game in some meaningful way. Railroading means the players are not actually doing that. That, however it may appear, the DM has the story pre-planned and the player's choice doesn't factor in. The most extreme being, the DM has essentially written the entire story and the PCs are just being pushed through it with no agency whatever.



This is an _excellent_ way of phrasing it, thank you! Exactly on point: with all the myriad choices we already know to be irrelevant most of the time (such as the color of one's clothes or the town in which you were born etc.), when a choice is specifically _called out_ for us to make, that automatically elevates it. If it didn't matter, it would either be handwaved or wouldn't be brought up in the first place, because game time is precious and wasting it on irrelevancies is...well, wasteful. Hence why a blanket statement in advance is so important; it allows the DM to preserve the in-the-moment tension (by not calling attention to their sleight-of-hand) while still respecting the players' agency because they have already consented to such situations.


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## Maxperson (Jul 19, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> It's hard to reply to all your jargon word salad though
> 
> Taking away jargon word salad is never wrong.



This is the umpteenth time you've said this.  Hate to break it to you, but if you have resort to blatant evasions instead of responding to the argument, you have no position worth defending.  You've lost.

There is no "jargon salad" there.  Either respond to my argument or admit that you have no valid response.


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## Maxperson (Jul 19, 2022)

Mort said:


> Jargon word salad?
> 
> Unwilling elimination of player choice. Please point out the jargon there. Or in the rest of the post for that matter, I really tried to be clear with no jargon other than, possibly, common  gaming terms.



He likely has no counter argument worth bringing up, so he evades by insulting the arguments we put forth.


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## Medic (Jul 19, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> So I'll ask "what is wrong with railroading?"  Other then you don't like it.  And other then some moral high ground to say "all lies, deception and such are always wrong", because that is not true.



Y'know, I've seen a lot of wacky things in my lifetime, but this has got to be the first time I've seen someone use a discussion about tabletop role-playing as a venue to endorse the Noble Lie™.



bloodtide said:


> Odd, I see a lie and lots of deception there.  So a PC knew some vague information you carefully sculpted to hide what was going on?  Notice how you BLATANTLY hit the part about the NPC doing experiments with the Alien(TM).  Just let that part out?  Just "randomly decided" that "somehow" the PCs did not know about it?  And why did you not tell the PC?  Was it to not ruin the surprise?  DM:  "oh the NPC in sick bay is doing dangerous reckless Alien(tm) experiments with no security protections."
> 
> I think for forgot the "surprise" part in the second story.  Unless your saying the the "surprise" was the brother was evil?  But that is only a surprise if the brother was never mentioned before and the player had no chance to learn anything about them.



In the first example, the player in question possessed all of the knowledge they needed to determine the truth of the event ex ante; if we get pedantic, it's not even a lie by omission, because none of the requisite information was concealed such that it could never be found by a sufficiently curious player.

The second is not an example of a GM denying the player information, but the character's own failure to come to the correct conclusion as adjudicated by the GM. So no, this isn't a lie either.


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## pemerton (Jul 19, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> I see a lot pre made adventure always badwrongfun and an improv adventure is super cool.  It also seems like the player "choice" seems to be all about the random "like real life" type games popular on line  where a character just does normal stuff like shopping and laundry.



Prepared material doesn't have to be railroading. Is it used for framing? Or it used to dictate/negate consequences?

If the prepared material can only be used by deciding what happens next _independently of what the players have their PCs do_, then it starts to look pretty railroad-y.


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## pemerton (Jul 19, 2022)

Medic said:


> In the first example, the player in question possessed all of the knowledge they needed to determine the truth of the event ex ante; if we get pedantic, it's not even a lie by omission, because none of the requisite information was concealed such that it could never be found by a sufficiently curious player.



As a point of logic, _Person X conceals information Q_ entails _Person X knows information Q_.

In other words, and putting to one side weird, deviant cases, you can't conceal what you don't know.

If it's not established, in the shared fiction, what the medical scientist NPC is doing in the sickbay - because no one has made it a focus of play - then there is nothing I (or any other participant) knows about that, and hence nothing to be concealed.



Medic said:


> The second is not an example of a GM denying the player information, but the character's own failure to come to the correct conclusion as adjudicated by the GM. So no, this isn't a lie either.



In this case, the resolution system is clear: there is no established fiction about who made the arrows until someone authors it in accordance with the game procedures, and because it is a high stakes question - the PC wants his brother to be innocent! - the procedures don't permit unilateral GM authorship. The player puts the stakes into play by declaring the Aura Reading check, and again the procedure is clear: if the Aura Reading check succeeds, the player's intent is realised (so, in this case, the character confirms that someone other than the brother made the Black Arrows); if it fails, then the GM is obliged to narrate an adverse consequence (in this case, the PC reads the aura and confirms that his brother made the Black Arrows).

And as a point of logic, _Person X lies about information Q_ entails _Person X has acquired information Q_. In this case, the player and the GM acquire the relevant information at the same time, and neither lies to the other about it.


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## Charlaquin (Jul 19, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> But why?  Beyond some vague "it's generically wrong".



Quite simply, because some players - a lot of players - wouldn’t like it if they knew you were doing it. Do I really have to explain what’s wrong with doing something someone doesn’t like, while pretending not to?


bloodtide said:


> For example, in order to surprise the players you have to hide things, be deceptive and such.  They can only be surprised for real.  You can't tell the players the supprie and then have it happen: it will fall flat.  Real emotions are always better then fake emotions.



This is a non-sequitur. You can tell the players “hey, I’m going to change things around behind the scenes so you don’t miss the cool stuff I prepped” without ruining any surprises at all. And there’s really no negative impact to doing so, so I don’t understand where all the pushback is coming from.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 19, 2022)

I still remain puzzled by where people draw the lines.

GM framing stuff based on their prep. Cool!

GM improvises stuff on spot. Still cool.

GM has some prep, but decides on the spot where and when that prep is used. Deception!!!

I don't get it.   


Like why it is cool for GM to improvise on the spot that there is an ogre behind the door, but not cool to decide beforehand that behind the first door the PCs open there is an ogre?


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## Cadence (Jul 19, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> I still remain puzzled by where people draw the lines.
> 
> GM framing stuff based on their prep. Cool!
> 
> ...




It feels like for some it comes down to whether or not anything Ogre-y has transpired yet.  If the party is trying to avoid big monsters, does an augury, is cautious looking for signs or sounds, etc... and nothing matters then it feels a bit bad. 

But it feels like that should be true of the random table too.  Now I'm wondering if party actions should change results on those.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 19, 2022)

pemerton said:


> I don't see how the sort of decision-making you are talking about changes the game from _railroad_ to _not a railroad_.



by giving them choice and the ability to choose is the opposite of railroading... the game isn't 'my game' it's 'our game' now the players have lesser control, I would say somewhere between 50/50 with the DM having 50% and the players entirely control 50%. 

a real life example would be a 3e game. It started in the sunless citadel and a 'major' subplot is the goblins and the kobolds were at war. When the PCs decided that they would pick a side (kobold) and help them I quickly made a kobold queen. She was a half dragon (this was new i wanted to play with templates) and I figured this would be a 1 off for this low level adventure.  However the ranger/sorcerer PC decided he fell in love with her (he was a human so icky). this then meant that not only did the PCs continue to come back to the citadel after the adventure... but they now how a vested interest in the kobold 'kingdom'. 
I can't remember the name of the town near the citadel but the PCs negotiated an alliance between the kobolds and the city... now I had to scramble no more could I just wing 'have sword will travel' the PCs were building a kingdom I didn't see coming. So I inserted a legend of an old mine where a great king long ago mines some super metal...

My plan at that point was to have the mine be mostly empty but have some hard to get diamonds and adamantine in it (thinking in my head hard things grow together) but when the PCs got there and saw crystals one said "Hey, how do you forge weapon and armors out of crystals" and I would have written it off as a joke and explained they were diamonds but another player said "You alloy it... take steel work the crystals in while it is liquids and hot like you add carbon to iron." well there went my notes since that sounded way better. So I had to scap the adamantine and diamond and instead the mystic crystals could be added to a metal when forgeing and make them better... so i decided (mostly pulling from my backside) that the process would be master work (again as per those 3e rules) but would also have 'other' abilities that I didn't fill out and I was going to make the metal look white... but as I went to describe it yet another player asked "Wait like see through" and I decided sure... like a milky glass. 
Now I 100% expected they would move some allies to the mine, and get some crystals and make some new cool equipment... of course the ranger/sorcerer decided the first thing to make would be a ring... to propose to his 'beloved queen'
Now because of the fact that the kobolds in the mod that started this had a white dragon, I decided that she would request scale armor made for some of her 'elite kobold guards' (spoiler not very élite) and the PCs thought it was cool and said they should all get clear/white scale and work in some of the discarded scales of the dragon and become like an adder... but the rogue pointed out that he wasn't going to get much benfit from scale armor. That is when I decided what the 'other' property of this new metal would be... making it allow armor and weapons to be lighter. 

At no point did I direct any of this game on rails... game 1 I did not imagine the Adder Knights forming a kingdom of Kobolds, Humans and Gnomes... if anything I WAS THE WATER not the PCs...


pemerton said:


> Here are two reasonably well-known modules which are both railroads: Dead Gods, and Expedition to the Demonweb Pits. Suppose a GM asks their players to choose which of these modules to play: that doesn't make the ensuing game not a railroad.



correct... in order to not be a railroad you have to be willing to throw an adventure away. (hence why I said I DO railroad if we all agree to play an adventure like curse of strahd)  the choices in game have to matter. if the PCs go a way the DM didn't plan the DM has to let them, and modify there world to adjust (and a lot of time this means not using things you preped and making stuff up on the fly)


pemerton said:


> Suppose the GM introduces two different hooks, one which leads to Dead Gods and on which leads to Expedition: that doesn't make the ensuing game not a railroad.



no but it doesn't mean they WILL be a railroad just that you have not shown how much the DM is willing to work... if that 1 choice is it... railroad if on the other hand (as I keep showing) the PCs make 100s of choices and most of them directly shape the plot the game and the world... that isn't railroading.


pemerton said:


> In your example, the _adventure, research and quest_ all seem to be things that the GM has decided,



I mean It is more an assumption. how would you as a PC choose to do something if not to research it then go do it? that seems the most straight forward to me. 


pemerton said:


> or will decide (eg you refer to _your_, the GM's, lack of having made up anything about vampires). The players are making a contribution about topic, but that seems to be it.



they have 100% control of what they do, they have limited control in the form of asking and suggesting (sometimes not even on purpose) things that are not under there control.


pemerton said:


> Again, everything here seems to be authored by you the GM.



nope... I just authored the basic back drop... what happens is based on what the players do. 


pemerton said:


> As you describe it, the players are "lucky dipping" into your box of stories and seeing which one they pull out. Maybe they can throw aside one they don't like and have another draw. Is that what you mean by _meaningful choice_?



not luck choice.  The PCs CHOOSE to do something and then I narrate the results... the things they care about get worked on more and things they don't care about get dropped. Not every choice is meaningful, but alot are. 


pemerton said:


> I've already mentioned other ways of approaching play. There is the approach set out in the 4e rulebooks, where the setting backstory is shared (it's presented in the PHB, mostly under the entries for races and for gods), and players are encouraged to author quests for their PCs, and the system for resolving actions (both combat and non-combat) is transparent and player-facing.



and all of that is exactly what I described... go back and reread (or check out my I've always been playing 4e thread) please show me where you think anything I said contradicts this? Even to the point where my players can make up there own quest for a vampire that 5 minutes before they said it didn't exist. 


pemerton said:


> Of the RPGs I know, the one that has the most robust and unrelenting implementation of the 4e approach is Burning Wheel. While 4e is not quite as robust nor as unrelenting, it still works fine.
> 
> Another well-known approach is that found in Apocalypse World and well-known spin-offs like Dungeon World, Blades in the Dark, etc.



I do not play nor have I read any of those so I can not comment


pemerton said:


> One thing these approaches have in common, which is directly relevant to "railroading", is that the GM is not permitted to rule that a player's declared action fails _just because_, in the GM's imagination, the fiction makes success impossible.



now we are back to the skill thing... look if a Player tells me they climb the tree to look for a clue, and I know there is no clue up there they can climb all they want that doesn't make a clue appear. A Player who searches for a hidden door in a wall that is solid with no hidden door is not going to make one appear most times (I say most cause if a player makes a suggestion I like I may make changes but I am under no obligation to) 
that is not railroading... now you can have a style where that IS true, that there is no hidden passage but the Player authors it into exsistence... I just don't think saying anything short of that is railroading is helpful at all.  


pemerton said:


> Or to put it another way: these approaches do not treat the GM's unilateral, secret ideas about the shared fiction as authoritative.



that is still not rail roading...  by your defenition every defualt game of D&D 5e is a railroad.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 19, 2022)

Thomas Shey said:


> I'd say some of them absolutely are.  I mean, getting real, when there's something people respond to in different ways, there's going to be some point on the line where the acceptable amount is "None at all."  I won't eat pickles.  No, not even a little, not in any form.



You can not eat pickles.
You can order your burger hold the pickles.
I can eat pickles
I can order extra pickles on the side 
I can ask when you take the pickles off your burger that the kid put on cause 'special orders are hard' if I can have them...

we can eat together, we can eat on different sides of the world.

You should NEVER have the option to tell me I can't have pickles...
You probably shouldn't be insulting or demeaning to people just cause they choose to eat pickles.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 19, 2022)

pemerton said:


> Prepared material doesn't have to be railroading. Is it used for framing? Or it used to dictate/negate consequences?
> 
> If the prepared material can only be used by deciding what happens next _independently of what the players have their PCs do_, then it starts to look pretty railroad-y.



how is this any diffrent then every example I gave you called railroading?


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## Mort (Jul 19, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> I still remain puzzled by where people draw the lines.
> 
> GM framing stuff based on their prep. Cool!
> 
> ...




For some it's simply this:

Was the DM honest with the choices (or lack of choices) presented? If yes, cool. If no, not cool.

(Hopefully) easy example:

1. PCs are going from point A to point B. They encounter a door. They open the door and there's an ogre behind it, they encounter the ogre. There was NO choice here to be impacted. Just an obstacle to be overcome. For me, this is fine.

2. PCs are going from point A to point B. They encounter 2 doors they could go through. They pick one at random - and encounter an ogre. For me, it makes no difference if the DM had decided that they would encounter an ogre either way ,(or that there was a 50% chance of ogre or whatever), because there was no real choice present. Heck there could have been 2 ogres.

3. PCs are going from point A to point B and encounter 2 doors. But these PCs decide to do some research, through tracking, augury, interviewing locals, whatever. They discover taking the door on the right leads to a shorter, but more dangerous route, while the path on the left is longer but less dangerous. The group feeling rushed for time, takes the supposedly shorter route. They encounter an ogre vanquish it and move on. Would some in the group feel cheated if they found out that had they taken the other route they would have faced the same ogre under the same circumstances? I can see how they would!

How would someone find out? Well maybe they wouldn't, but things have a way of getting out. I remember back in college (when everyone had way too much time) I had a roommate who was in a different group with the same DM I had. I don't remember anything like this coming up, but we did talk and sometimes even compare. If I had found out we had the same scenario, picked different options but had the exact same scene play out? Wouldn't I be justified in being a bit annoyed?


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 19, 2022)

this also reminds me of the player that my style REALLY rubbed the wrong way.

He played like 1 game in 2e with us but then didn't really play D&D (did do board and video games) with us until 4e. His first character was a super stealthy super perceptive investigator that had things that played off it... so I kept putting the pcs in postions where stealth and investigation skills helped. He made a comment once or twice but nothing really jarring, but that party had a single warlord as a healer and even then they mostly were the buffing warlord so they didn't have a lot of healing.

the 2nd 4e game he made a clerics with like every healing power you can imagine... and in that game he found not only did we get less healing potions then the campaign before but I also included lots of NPCs that needed healing. He also thought I had upped the damage of some monsters but that was more trying to balance out the grind and that I explained... but about level 13 he blew up out of game and yelled "We went from never needing healing and always needing stealth to almost no need for stealth and every game I am healing everyone... why are you punishing us for my character being good at my job?!?!"

I was taken aback. But worse still others said they saw where he was coming from and that just becuse he could heal 'as if you spend a surge' 5ish times a day and could help you spend surges with bonuses a dozen times per combat he should never run out of healing... but in the last 3 sessions he used all his daily heals every day.

"Um... I made the encounters, especially the towns folk needing healing so you COULD use your healing powers and feel like they were a worth while investment?"

but then he drilled in about his last character and stealth and I told him that was a PC choice... although an understandable one since we went for 5 light armor high dex characters to 2 light armor 3 heavy armor characters... stealth wasn't a good choice, but they could TRY to sneak past things.

but he then pointed out that we had adventures that we had side objectives that embraced stealth and that gave bonuses if we did stealth and were set up to make stealth the better choice.

Okay, so I took this to heart and set up a stealth style adventure for the next week... and everyone (including that player) were missrable. they couldn't make a stealth check even in the easy catagory, in general they were more str int and less dex... so anything dex related they just kept failing... I also didn't have a single plot point for a month have to do with healing or townsfolk/npc needing healing... but he still used his healing like crazy and by 15th level I had a little list I had made of how many times someone was 'down less then a surge' but got healed and how many times he used (I think it was called healing strike) and didn't have anyone that needed healing... it was a long list. I then reminded him that gale the genasi warlord would never heal anyone until they were bloodied, cause she DIDN"T have a lot of healing resources.   I also pointed out that PC choices of useing healing was out of my hands...

that player remained friends but by the time 5e came around he wasn't playing D&D anymore.


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## Mort (Jul 19, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> this also reminds me of the player that my style REALLY rubbed the wrong way.
> 
> He played like 1 game in 2e with us but then didn't really play D&D (did do board and video games) with us until 4e. His first character was a super stealthy super perceptive investigator that had things that played off it... so I kept putting the pcs in postions where stealth and investigation skills helped. He made a comment once or twice but nothing really jarring, but that party had a single warlord as a healer and even then they mostly were the buffing warlord so they didn't have a lot of healing.
> 
> ...





Yeah, I mean players gravitate towards what their PCs are best at. If the party is stealthy,  they're going to solve many more problems via stealth than a non stealthy party. If the party has huge charm, there will likely be more talking, negotiating, that sort of interaction. And if the party has huge amounts of healing they will, likely, be less risk averse in their problem solving and not shy away from confrontations and other dangerous situations - especially in D&D. 

This will be as it even more true if the DM isn't designing specific challenges for the party as the party will almost certainly gravitate to solutions that utilize their strengths.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 19, 2022)

Mort said:


> PCs are going from point A to point B and encounter 2 doors. But these PCs decide to do some research, through tracking, augury, interviewing locals, whatever. They discover taking the door on the right leads to a shorter, but more dangerous route, while the path on the left is longer but less dangerous. The group feeling rushed for time, takes the supposedly shorter route. They encounter an ogre vanquish it and move on. Would some in the group feel cheated if they found out that had they taken the other route they would have faced the same ogre under the same circumstances? I can see how they would!



yeah this reminds me of another arguement... this one me trying to set up a con game and running it as a playtest before the con.

the players had to get from A to B. there were 3 routes they could take. They could go up and over the mountain, that was the longest it would take almost 3 weeks. They could go through the pass this was the quickest less then a week. They could go through the woods avoiding the path entirely but it would take anywhere from 1-2 weeks depending on skill checks. 

the PCs had the choice to try to get more into in point A, but by default they knew the pass was the most dangerous and the mountain was the least dangerous.  SO they got to pick speed or safety.  I then designed level appropriate challenges for each path.  And again they had resources they could choose to use (but would take time) to get more info on any/all paths. BUT there was a timer of sorts. the thing they needed to get from A to B was a magic elixir that would heal a disease that was plaguing the town. One of the pregens was also a paladin that could help when he got there. 

the argument was that I wasted too much time and energy making 3 paths. Since I would only be running this twice at most it would have 2 paths used and my home group bet anything that both would take the more dangerous faster route. At the very least just have over the mountain or threw the pass no one would be dumb enough (especially since no pregen was a ranger or druid) to try to trail blaze through the woods.

now we play tested all 3 paths anyway (even though they thought it a waste) and of the 2 times I ran it both in 4 hour slots... 1 time they never left point A. They spent the entire aloted time trying to decide. the other time they took the fast dangeus path, and TPKed.

so what do you think, was I wasting my time giving those choices?


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## Mort (Jul 19, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> yeah this reminds me of another arguement... this one me trying to set up a con game and running it as a playtest before the con.
> 
> the players had to get from A to B. there were 3 routes they could take. They could go up and over the mountain, that was the longest it would take almost 3 weeks. They could go through the pass this was the quickest less then a week. They could go through the woods avoiding the path entirely but it would take anywhere from 1-2 weeks depending on skill checks.
> 
> ...




If nothing else, your group learned decision paralysis Is a real thing!


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## Cadence (Jul 19, 2022)

Three things...

I'm envisioning a show where the omniscient narrator knows how important every seemingly meaningless choice is.  ("Ooh, should have gone to the lounge instead of your room in the dorm, now you'll never meet, fall in love with, and marry her."   ::: hits erase button on a bunch of possible futures ::: )

Even if two doors have a stochastic ogre the first time, does having two doors sometimes make a building seem more realistic, and give options later (split the party or not, for example)?

It hit me that I don't think about building layout enough as a player or DM. Which door would go to rooms more likely to have windows, closer to the surface of the mountainside, to the sacred direction, etc...   Feels like that should change things.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 19, 2022)

Mort said:


> If nothing else, your group learned decision paralysis Is a real thing!



yeah... that group was 2 brand new players (they had only done 1 or 2 D&D sessions before this) 1 kinda new (like a year into D&D or so) and 2 Vet long term players... but they did 4 hours of nothing. I have had my share of go nowhere games, but normally it is 'too many options' or 'not enough options/want to find option C' but most common is the party is split on what to do. This blew everyone of those out of the water.  They researched they debated, then they went back to double check, then one player wanted to see if he could get more help from the church (since it was an alchemist sending them) then another player asking if they went south (A to B was a northern trip) were there any cities that had teleport capable wizards so they could be safe and fast?


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 19, 2022)

Cadence said:


> It feels like for some it comes down to whether or not anything Ogre-y has transpired yet.  If the party is trying to avoid big monsters, does an augury, is cautious looking for signs or sounds, etc... and nothing matters then it feels a bit bad.
> 
> But it feels like that should be true of the random table too.  Now I'm wondering if party actions should change results on those.



Yeah, I totally get that using illusionism to frustrate the players' attempts to gain information might seem pretty questionable, but no one has suggested that, none of the examples in the OP are that.


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## FrozenNorth (Jul 19, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> a real life example would be a 3e game. It started in the sunless citadel and a 'major' subplot is the goblins and the kobolds were at war. When the PCs decided that they would pick a side (kobold) and help them I quickly made a kobold queen. She was a half dragon (this was new i wanted to play with templates) and I figured this would be a 1 off for this low level adventure.  However the ranger/sorcerer PC decided he fell in love with her (he was a human so icky). this then meant that not only did the PCs continue to come back to the citadel after the adventure... but they now how a vested interest in the kobold 'kingdom'.
> I can't remember the name of the town near the citadel but the PCs negotiated an alliance between the kobolds and the city... now I had to scramble no more could I just wing 'have sword will travel' the PCs were building a kingdom I didn't see coming. So I inserted a legend of an old mine where a great king long ago mines some super metal...
> 
> My plan at that point was to have the mine be mostly empty but have some hard to get diamonds and adamantine in it (thinking in my head hard things grow together) but when the PCs got there and saw crystals one said "Hey, how do you forge weapon and armors out of crystals" and I would have written it off as a joke and explained they were diamonds but another player said "You alloy it... take steel work the crystals in while it is liquids and hot like you add carbon to iron." well there went my notes since that sounded way better. So I had to scap the adamantine and diamond and instead the mystic crystals could be added to a metal when forgeing and make them better... so i decided (mostly pulling from my backside) that the process would be master work (again as per those 3e rules) but would also have 'other' abilities that I didn't fill out and I was going to make the metal look white... but as I went to describe it yet another player asked "Wait like see through" and I decided sure... like a milky glass.
> ...



I think this a very good example to riff off of to better understand the distinctions that some posters are making.

Nothing in the above write-up precludes some of the techniques that have been described as an “invisible railroad”.  So, for the sake of argument, suppose a campaign played out as described above BUT:

the GM made heavy use of “quantum ogres” to simplify their game prep; and
occasional use of some other “invisible railroad techniques”.

To me, the game is not a railroad.  The characters have a high level of agency and their choices are meaningful.


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## FrozenNorth (Jul 19, 2022)

Mort said:


> 3. PCs are going from point A to point B and encounter 2 doors. But these PCs decide to do some research, through tracking, augury, interviewing locals, whatever. They discover taking the door on the right leads to a shorter, but more dangerous route, while the path on the left is longer but less dangerous. The group feeling rushed for time, takes the supposedly shorter route. They encounter an ogre vanquish it and move on. Would some in the group feel cheated if they found out that had they taken the other route they would have faced the same ogre under the same circumstances? I can see how they would!



Let’s modify Scenario 3 a bit.

Scenario 3a.  Same set-up, but if they take the dangerous route, they would have faced an ogre champion (ogre with max hp, increased AC, and higher Str, Wis and Int than a normal ogre), rather than the normal ogre.

Scenario 3b. Same set-up, but if they take the path on the right, there is a 80% chance that the ogre shows up and on the left, the chance is 20%.  Players choose left, GM rolls a 15% on the die.

To me, neither of the scenarios are “invisible railroads” (though 3a is somewhat lazy GMing).  There was a meaningful choice, and the players agency was preserved.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 19, 2022)

FrozenNorth said:


> I think this a very good example to riff off of to better understand the distinctions that some posters are making.
> 
> Nothing in the above write-up precludes some of the techniques that have been described as an “invisible railroad”.



except the part where i describe that out of game I did not have tracks anywhere... in fact I was as supprised as my players on where the game went (and that is often the case with my style)


FrozenNorth said:


> So, for the sake of argument, suppose a campaign played out as described above BUT:
> 
> the GM made heavy use of “quantum ogres” to simplify their game prep; and



except I didn't (not that I never do, it is a tool in my tool box jsut a rare one for me to use)


FrozenNorth said:


> occasional use of some other “invisible railroad techniques”.



except for the parts where I showed you 'behind the screen' that I didn't.


I could have written a campagin about the Knights of the Adder forming and how they created there milky white light armor. I could have carefully channeled my players into making alliances and marrying my kobold queen, and bringing togather the land under there freaky half kobold offspring... but I didn't. 

if you asked me game 1 what was going to happen I would have said "Well I am running this adventure first, so kill some goblins and some kobolds and these new tree things... then fight a big bad druid, then move on. Each city they come to I will just pre plan an adventure as I see how each game goes they will wander until they hit a level where they tire of that then find a place to settle down and either change the way the game runs or retire this world" at NO point would I have even GUESSED that campaign would end as it did.


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## Maxperson (Jul 19, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> You probably shouldn't be insulting or demeaning to people just cause they choose to eat pickles.



There are of course exceptions, such as people who like pineapple on pizza.


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## Maxperson (Jul 19, 2022)

Mort said:


> 2. PCs are going from point A to point B. They encounter 2 doors they could go through. They pick one at random - and encounter an ogre. For me, it makes no difference if the DM had decided that they would encounter an ogre either way ,(or that there was a 50% chance of ogre or whatever), because there was no real choice present. Heck there could have been 2 ogres.



So this is where we differ. If there's no difference and the ogre will pop up behind whichever door I choose, then why even ask me?  My decision doesn't matter so the DM should just continue to play his solo game and pick the door, too. 

Even though I'm making an informed choice, my choice should still matter and no be invalidated by illusionism.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 19, 2022)

Cadence said:


> But it feels like that should be true of the random table too.  Now I'm wondering if party actions should change results on those.




Back in games where I've used random encounters, if the PCs actively sent out scouts and/or used magical techniques to determine what came ahead, I'd certainly generate the possible "random" encounters right then for the path options they had and report what they should see (of course random encounters outdoors could cover a world of things including "I just don't know what's in this area so I'll generate it when you get there" and "things actually do move around in this rough area so let's see if anything is wandering through as you are", and precautions are more useful with the first than the second, but it should matter to some degree with both.


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## Cadence (Jul 19, 2022)

Maxperson said:


> So this is where we differ. If there's no difference and the ogre will pop up behind whichever door I choose, then why even ask me?  My decision doesn't matter so the DM should just continue to play his solo game and pick the door, too.
> 
> Even though I'm making an informed choice, my choice should still matter and no be invalidated by illusionism.




Door choice could affect a lot of other things later?  (Maybe your choice is informative about a the main things in each direction, but not some of the little ones?)

Should random encounter tables need to be different depending on the door too?  (Why let me pick if all the random stuff is just the same?)


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## Mort (Jul 19, 2022)

Maxperson said:


> So this is where we differ. If there's no difference and the ogre will pop up behind whichever door I choose, then why even ask me?  My decision doesn't matter so the DM should just continue to play his solo game and pick the door, too.
> 
> Even though I'm making an informed choice, my choice should still matter and no be invalidated by illusionism.




Well sure, if I'm DMing there will either be 1 door or 2 doors with 2 (at least somewhat) different possibilities.

But, If I'm playing, I'm certainly not going to sweat a situation where there's no choice and something just happens.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 19, 2022)

Thomas Shey said:


> Back in games where I've used random encounters, if the PCs actively sent out scouts and/or used magical techniques to determine what came ahead, I'd certainly generate the possible "random" encounters right then for the path options they had and report what they should see (of course random encounters outdoors could cover a world of things including "I just don't know what's in this area so I'll generate it when you get there" and "things actually do move around in this rough area so let's see if anything is wandering through as you are", and precautions are more useful with the first than the second, but it should matter to some degree with both.



Right. Observation causes the wave function to collapse. Observation can be done in many ways. And this applies to "GM decides" just like it does to random tables.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 19, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> You can not eat pickles.
> You can order your burger hold the pickles.
> I can eat pickles
> I can order extra pickles on the side
> ...




Well, the parallels aren't exact here though, because the gaming equivalent has us sharing a burger.  



GMforPowergamers said:


> You should NEVER have the option to tell me I can't have pickles...
> You probably shouldn't be insulting or demeaning to people just cause they choose to eat pickles.




I don't think I ever have.  I don't even think other people in this thread have, though some have approached it closely because they can't understand why _anyone_ would want pickles.  I do agree the latter gets to be a bit much.


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## Maxperson (Jul 19, 2022)

Cadence said:


> Door choice could affect a lot of other things later?  (Maybe your choice is informative about a the main things in each direction, but not some of the little ones?)
> 
> Should random encounter tables need to be different depending on the door too?  (Why let me pick if all the random stuff is just the same?)



Rails don't have to be long in order for it to be railroading.  Even if there are different things down each passage way, being unable to avoid the ogre no matter what we choose is still railroading.  In this situation my agency in the short term(which door do I choose) is completely negated. 

Pick a side that has an ogre and let me have a choice that matters.


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## Maxperson (Jul 19, 2022)

Mort said:


> Well sure, if I'm DMing there will either be 1 door or 2 doors with 2 (at least somewhat) different possibilities.
> 
> But, If I'm playing, I'm certainly not going to sweat a situation where there's no choice and something just happens.



If you're playing you probably aren't going to be aware that you were railroaded.  That's how illusionism works.  Which in my opinion is what makes it worse than overt railroading.  At least with the overt method I can see it and opt to leave the game, rather than continuing to play a game where my choices don't matter at least some of the time.


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## iserith (Jul 19, 2022)

Thomas Shey said:


> Back in games where I've used random encounters, if the PCs actively sent out scouts and/or used magical techniques to determine what came ahead, I'd certainly generate the possible "random" encounters right then for the path options they had and report what they should see (of course random encounters outdoors could cover a world of things including "I just don't know what's in this area so I'll generate it when you get there" and "things actually do move around in this rough area so let's see if anything is wandering through as you are", and precautions are more useful with the first than the second, but it should matter to some degree with both.



Yep, in my current game, if you successfully Track while traveling, the DM rolls twice on the random encounter check and you can choose the result. Random encounters are indicated if the DM rolls an 18 or better. The benefit is that you can now choose - do you want to take the lower number and avoid the encounter or the higher number because you're looking for trouble? I'll then describe the tracks after rolling on the table to determine what it is and the players can draw their own conclusions about the threat, possibly recalling lore to figure out what they're looking at. (A ranger in favored terrain of course gets some additional info.)

Same deal with druidcraft. If the players want to know what the weather will be tomorrow, no problem - I'll roll it right now. It can seriously matter to their planning if tomorrow has heavy rain, strong wind, or both, so this is a good option to have on hand.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 19, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> this also reminds me of the player that my style REALLY rubbed the wrong way.




This gets into the other, complex issue of designing difficulties with the players in mind.

On one hand, you have the virtue that the players never are liable to be absolutely out to sea on a problem, but on the other, it also means that the players probably never feel like they have any slack; they have to use their core ability effectively every time, or to one degree or another or its a failure state.

I suspect in many groups they'd rather have a more middle-of-the-road case where they occasionally struggle (because they're not perfectly set up to deal with a problems) but also sometimes relax (because sometimes they have more ability to deal with a problem than is needed).


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 19, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> yeah this reminds me of another arguement... this one me trying to set up a con game and running it as a playtest before the con.
> 
> the players had to get from A to B. there were 3 routes they could take. They could go up and over the mountain, that was the longest it would take almost 3 weeks. They could go through the pass this was the quickest less then a week. They could go through the woods avoiding the path entirely but it would take anywhere from 1-2 weeks depending on skill checks.
> 
> ...




To a point.  I'm not sure I'd put that much effort into a con game, honestly, if for no other reason your first situation (everyone spends too much time arguing about which way to go) seems too likely.  The last thing you want on a convention game is anything liable to bog things down.


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## Cadence (Jul 19, 2022)

Maxperson said:


> Rails don't have to be long in order for it to be railroading.  Even if there are different things down each passage way, being unable to avoid the ogre no matter what we choose is still railroading.  In this situation my agency in the short term(which door do I choose) is completely negated.Pick a side that has an ogre and let me have a choice that matters.




What about...

If there's a 50/50 chance it's on either side and I roll?

If both sides have an ogre until they hear the other door open, and then it tries to run around and join it's compatriot the long way?

If I hadn't had plans for anything until you opened the door and thought and Ogre would be appropriate?


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## Mort (Jul 19, 2022)

Maxperson said:


> If you're playing you probably aren't going to be aware that you were railroaded.  That's how illusionism works.  Which in my opinion is what makes it worse than overt railroading.  At least with the overt method I can see it and opt to leave the game, rather than continuing to play a game where my choices don't matter at least some of the time.




Well yeah, Illusionism works great - right up until it doesn't.

I remember a Werewolf game from a long time ago. Things were moving along; we were doing the typical Werewolf campaign. Then the DM stepped out to take a phone call. He left his notebook in plain view and one of the players decided to take a look at it (yes, that's a big no-no).

He looked and frowned then bade us to take a look. He was so insistent, that everyone did. Turns out the railroading was BLATANT. stuff like - spot x, PC gets maimed etc. Just obvious no player agency plot.

Game collapsed from that. Should the guy have looked at the notes? No, that's terrible form. but it exposed the game and that was that.


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## Cadence (Jul 19, 2022)

Maxperson said:


> I can see it and opt to leave the game, rather than continuing to play a game where my choices don't matter at least some of the time.



If I were stupidly rich and had given a ton of my money to good causes, I'd love to take a few grand and commission a study of what choices matter and don't matter in different GM's games. (As in what things down the road change or not if the party dilly dallies, what plot points they miss or don't miss, etc ..). Just because I'm curious how many stationary points there are (like one of the MCU show episodes) and what variety of techniques there are for missing them.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 19, 2022)

I literally don't get why people would care about effectively blind choices, especially if they would be fine with improvising or randomising the outcome. It doesn't make any sense to me.


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## Cadence (Jul 19, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> I literally don't get why people would care about effectively blind choices, especially if they would be fine with improvising or randomising the outcome. It doesn't make any sense to me.



How many choices are?  And how many aren't?


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 19, 2022)

Cadence said:


> Three things...
> 
> I'm envisioning a show where the omniscient narrator knows how important every seemingly meaningless choice is.  ("Ooh, should have gone to the lounge instead of your room in the dorm, now you'll never meet, fall in love with, and marry her."   ::: hits erase button on a bunch of possible futures ::: )
> 
> Even if two doors have a stochastic ogre the first time, does having two doors sometimes make a building seem more realistic, and give options later (split the party or not, for example)?




The stochastic ogre honestly opens a lot of cans of worms about the situation as to whether there's any meaningful decision making involved.  Is it possible for them to avoid it at all?  If not, why not (and I don't even mean in-world, but whether the ogre encounter is actually serving some game purpose its lack would harm)?

I tend to agree with a poster above that if there's no way to determine that there's a difference between the two doors, there could be an ogre behind each one for all that it really matters (though I think when you head in that direction you can run into questions about player completism and whether it would make them end up fighting two ogres, which depending on the answer to my question can be unattractive for metagame reasons (over consumption of resources, use of time, experience assignment).



Cadence said:


> It hit me that I don't think about building layout enough as a player or DM. Which door would go to rooms more likely to have windows, closer to the surface of the mountainside, to the sacred direction, etc...   Feels like that should change things.




Yeah, but as you note, very few "dungeons" (even ones that are avowedly functional buildings or were at one time) think that through.  Even people who sell maps professionally for RPG use are hit or miss about this.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 19, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> Yeah, I totally get that using illusionism to frustrate the players' attempts to gain information might seem pretty questionable, but no one has suggested that, none of the examples in the OP are that.




Of course, he also doesn't address what to do about it, either.  If you don't, your "invisible railroad" pretty quickly stops being either invisible or stops being a railroad.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 19, 2022)

Cadence said:


> Should random encounter tables need to be different depending on the door too?  (Why let me pick if all the random stuff is just the same?)




Sometimes.  Ideally when generating random encounters there should be some differences depending on what parts of buildings and/or other  locations you're using.  Sometimes that falls on the sword of "too much work" (and it almost always will on some level, sooner or later).  Usually that's worked around by the GM simply ignoring results that don't make sense in context, but the more you do that, the more it approaches just deciding the encounter yourself.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 19, 2022)

Thomas Shey said:


> Of course, he also doesn't address what to do about it, either.  If you don't, your "invisible railroad" pretty quickly stops being either invisible or stops being a railroad.



And I feel the latter is the way to go in such a situation. I think certain subtle guiding techniques are pretty fine as long as they're just used to herd the meandering PCs towards the interesting stuff, but I feel trying to fight against the players' clear wishes is usually a bad call. That's what leads to frustration and complaints about railroading.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 19, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> Right. Observation causes the wave function to collapse. Observation can be done in many ways. And this applies to "GM decides" just like it does to random tables.




While I agree it applies, I don't think they're quite the same.  The difference is that a random encounter system (at least if there's any real variety and/or an actual check to see if its is applied) keeps a GM who uses it rigorously honest; that isn't as much the case if you're just deciding because to one extent or another what the GM _wants_ to happen is always in the background.  He's not really going to entirely know himself in many cases why he decided an encounter now, and particularly _that_ encounter (except of course when he does, but that makes it even less like a random encounter).

Honestly, scouting and scrying in these kind of situations can function as a sort of "saving throw against encounter" which is something that gives the players more meaningful choice, and is also often why GMs don't really want them to work unless the encounter is viewed as not really necessary in the first place.


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## Maxperson (Jul 19, 2022)

Cadence said:


> What about...
> 
> If there's a 50/50 chance it's on either side and I roll?



I still don't like it.  Choice still doesn't matter.  It's just 50/50 whether the illusion is an ogre there or nothing there on both sides.  It's different if you have a patrolling ogre and there's a 50% chance he's at the door on the left, a 25% chance he's at room #13 taking a nap and a 25% chance that he's at the mess hall getting a snack.  You've pre-established 100% that there is an ogre and pre-established the route.  I


Cadence said:


> If both sides have an ogre until they hear the other door open, and then it tries to run around and join it's compatriot the long way?



If it's pre-established this is not illusionism.  There's nothing wrong with ogre guards on both doors.  I'm not sure why the other one runs around the long way instead of just opening the door and walking around a corner, though. 


Cadence said:


> If I hadn't had plans for anything until you opened the door and thought and Ogre would be appropriate?



That's still a railroad.  It's still an unavoidable encounter and would happen no matter which door was picked.  Choice doesn't matter.


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## Cadence (Jul 19, 2022)

Tangentially, I'm now wondering about choose your own adventure books and the early 80s text based computer adventure games and how to classify different choices in them...


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 19, 2022)

Cadence said:


> If I hadn't had plans for anything until you opened the door and thought and Ogre would be appropriate?




Though that gets back to "Why is them avoiding the ogre completely a problem?"

(With the caveat that I don't think it matters much either way if they can't make the door choice in some sort of informed fashion).


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## Cadence (Jul 19, 2022)

Maxperson said:


> That's still a railroad.  It's still an unavoidable encounter and would happen no matter which door was picked.  Choice doesn't matter.




But I didn't decide Ogre until you picked a door.  Still bad?  (If so, that feels like it means anything just made up in the spot is bad, doesn't it?)


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 19, 2022)

Thomas Shey said:


> While I agree it applies, I don't think they're quite the same.  The difference is that a random encounter system (at least if there's any real variety and/or an actual check to see if its is applied) keeps a GM who uses it rigorously honest; that isn't as much the case if you're just deciding because to one extent or another what the GM _wants_ to happen is always in the background.  He's not really going to entirely know himself in many cases why he decided an encounter now, and particularly _that_ encounter (except of course when he does, but that makes it even less like a random encounter).



Sure, of course in the "GM decides" method the GM has more control than in randomisation method. But the _players _have same amount of control in each case! I feel this is a common hidden, and perhaps unrecognised motive in these discussions. Some people say they want the players to have more control, when what they actually mean is that they want the GM to have less! But system's say is a thing, so it is possible to offload some of the control to the mechanics, so that it is off the hands of _both _the GM and the players. 



Thomas Shey said:


> Honestly, scouting and scrying in these kind of situations can function as a sort of "saving throw against encounter" which is something that gives the players more meaningful choice, and is also often why GMs don't really want them to work unless the encounter is viewed as not really necessary in the first place.



Then again, I think it is also rather cool mode of play when the PCs know what they're facing and get to make decisions about how to prepare.


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## Maxperson (Jul 19, 2022)

Cadence said:


> But I didn't decide Ogre until you picked a door.  Still bad?  (If so, that feels like it means anything just made up in the spot is bad, doesn't it?)



There's no possible way to avoid that encounter.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 19, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> I literally don't get why people would care about effectively blind choices, especially if they would be fine with improvising or randomising the outcome. It doesn't make any sense to me.




I suspect in cases where they genuinely do (and note there have been several anti-roader types in this thread who've said they don't--there's no meaning to those choices anyway), its because they don't necessarily expect a GM who's going to present illusory blind choices isn't going to endeavor to make less blind ones just as illusory.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 19, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> And I feel the latter is the way to go in such a situation. I think certain subtle guiding techniques are pretty fine as long as they're just used to herd the meandering PCs towards the interesting stuff, but I feel trying to fight against the players' clear wishes is usually a bad call. That's what leads to frustration and complaints about railroading.




But again, a pointer toward where things might be interesting is a pretty mild railroad at best.  I doubt in many cases there's any need to be coy ("invisible") about it at all.


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## Cadence (Jul 19, 2022)

Maxperson said:


> There's no possible way to avoid that encounter.



If you'd picked the other door I might have thought of something else being there.

Edit: or if you augured or something else I wouldn't have put something contradictory there


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## Mort (Jul 19, 2022)

Maxperson said:


> There's no possible way to avoid that encounter.




I will say, this changes with D&D above a certain level.

The D&D group just tends to have LOTS of scouting options. Druids, familiars, scrying (of a bunch of forms). If they choose to be careful they can EASILY find out what's behind any given door, in any given place - well before they actually encounter it and avoid or otherwise plan for the encounter.

There really are only two ways to deal with this. 1. Nerf the spells/abilities - sadly the choice of WAY too many published modules, which, to me, feels silly and artificial or 2. Roll with it, accept that the PCs are going to be approaching the encounters differently and plan accordingly .


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 19, 2022)

Thomas Shey said:


> But again, a pointer toward where things might be interesting is a pretty mild railroad at best.  I doubt in many cases there's any need to be coy ("invisible") about it at all.



I mean I think basically all the examples in the OP are just that. Guiding meandering players toward the interesting stuff, whilst creating an illusion of a bigger world. 

Like sure, when the players say that they go to the forest the GM could just directly frame them at the witch's cottage. But it probably creates a feeling that the forest is large and full of stuff and they just happen to stumble on one of the many mysterious things in it, if it is done like in the wilderness example.

It seems pretty innocent to me.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 19, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> Sure, of course in the "GM decides" method the GM has more control than in randomisation method. But the _players _have same amount of control in each case!




I'm not convinced.  It'd be true if all possible encounters were equally easy to detect and equally significant, but they're not.  What's easy to spot in advance, the orc patrol marching cross country or the hidden basilisk in its lair?  This is particularly an issue of advanced detection methods are a limited resource (like scrying) or are likely to be used more often in some circumstances (a general outdoor travel situation where sending a scout ahead is less likely to be perilous than doing the same thing in specifically enemy territory).  In particular, when the detection isn't deterministic, with the GM its easy to parry success with trivial encounters and save the significant ones for failure.



Crimson Longinus said:


> I feel this is a common hidden, and perhaps unrecognised motive in these discussions. Some people say they want the players to have more control, when what they actually mean is that they want the GM to have less! But system's say is a thing, so it is possible to offload some of the control to the mechanics, so that it is off the hands of _both _the GM and the players.




Well, in practice, the more control the GM has, the less the players do that isn't, effectively, just granted them by the GM when he feels like it.  Its hard to argue that isn't true.




Crimson Longinus said:


> Then again, I think it is also rather cool mode of play when the PCs know what they're facing and get to make decisions about how to prepare.




It is, but it also changes the difficulty of the encounter, often non-trivially, so often GMs want to know one way or another in advance (if you set up the encounter and assume they'll know about it in advance and they don't, it can be a slaughter; have the opposite occur and its a cakewalk.  Barring really hardcore let-the-chips-lay-where-they-land GMs and games, these are non-trivial concerns).


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## Maxperson (Jul 19, 2022)

Mort said:


> I will say, this changes with D&D above a certain level.
> 
> The D&D group just tends to have LOTS of scouting options. Druids, familiars, scrying (of a bunch of forms). If they choose to be careful they can EASILY find out what's behind any given door, in any given place - well before they actually encounter it and avoid or otherwise plan for the encounter.
> 
> There really are only two ways to deal with this. 1. Nerf the spells/abilities - sadly the choice of WAY too many published modules, which, to me, feels silly and artificial or 2. Roll with it, accept that the PCs are going to be approaching the encounters differently and plan accordingly .



The premise is "Which door do you open?" The post was, "But I didn't decide Ogre until you picked a door. Still bad? (If so, that feels like it means anything just made up in the spot is bad, doesn't it?)"

The door has been opened and suddenly there's an ogre behind it picked by the DM as the party selected the door.  It's too late for those scouting options under that scenario.  If the DM selected an ogre to be behind door #1 while the players were discussing which door to open, then those scouting options would have the chance to reveal the encounter and make it avoidable.


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## Cadence (Jul 19, 2022)

Maxperson said:


> The premise is "Which door do you open?" The post was, "But I didn't decide Ogre until you picked a door. Still bad? (If so, that feels like it means anything just made up in the spot is bad, doesn't it?)"
> 
> The door has been opened and suddenly there's an ogre behind it picked by the DM as the party selected the door.  It's too late for those scouting options under that scenario.  If the DM selected an ogre to be behind door #1 while the players were discussing which door to open, then those scouting options would have the chance to reveal the encounter and make it avoidable.



If they were scouting, I would have had to decide during the scouting what was there (Well, I would have personally, anyway).

I was assuming they opened the door without doing anything to reveal what was behind it yet (thick door, no magic scrying used, say).


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 19, 2022)

Mort said:


> I will say, this changes with D&D above a certain level.
> 
> The D&D group just tends to have LOTS of scouting options. Druids, familiars, scrying (of a bunch of forms). If they choose to be careful they can EASILY find out what's behind any given door, in any given place - well before they actually encounter it and avoid or otherwise plan for the encounter.
> 
> There really are only two ways to deal with this. 1. Nerf the spells/abilities - sadly the choice of WAY too many published modules, which, to me, feels silly and artificial or 2. Roll with it, accept that the PCs are going to be approaching the encounters differently and plan accordingly .




Well, I have conflicted feelings here.  While I do agree its kind of perverse to play a game that gives you all these tools and then have the GM try and make them useless, I'd argue that often the GM is really just not that comfortable with the ability of information-gathering abilities to make most of the game moot.  To be honest, a group with two varied spellcasters and maybe a couple of characters with mundane scouting abilities has more information gathering baked in than you usually see with superhero teams of comparable size, and vastly more than in many fantasy games (which often either have far more limited access to such things, or make accessing them a solid and semi-permanent trade-off over having other useful magical abilities).


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 19, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> I mean I think basically all the examples in the OP are just that. Guiding meandering players toward the interesting stuff, whilst creating an illusion of a bigger world.




The problem is he doesn't address what to do if the players wander off the path anyway.



Crimson Longinus said:


> Like sure, when the players say that they go to the forest the GM could just directly frame them at the witch's cottage. But it probably creates a feeling that the forest is large and full of stuff and they just happen to stumble on one of the many mysterious things in it, if it is done like in the wilderness example.
> 
> It seems pretty innocent to me.




If that's where it ends, it probably is.  I just think that's a massive if.


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## FrozenNorth (Jul 19, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> except the part where i describe that out of game I did not have tracks anywhere... in fact I was as supprised as my players on where the game went (and that is often the case with my style)



I recognize that in your game you didn’t use “invisible railroad” techniques.  For the sake of argument, a DM could have a game that turned out like yours but did use quantum ogres snd certain other “invisible railroad” techniques.

I’m curious whether each poster, in the hypothetical situation, would consider whether the players had meaningful choices and whether their agency was respected.


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## Maxperson (Jul 19, 2022)

Cadence said:


> If they were scouting, I would have had to decide during the scouting what was there (Well, I would have personally, anyway).



I don't have a problem with that. I improvise all the time. So long as I improv things in advance of when they get there, I can set up signs of a trap or encounter if appropriate, respond to types of scouting, etc. and the party has agency. The encounter has the potential to be discovered in advance and avoided or not, at the party's choice.  If they fail through their actions or rolls and hit the encounter, that's not railroading since their agency was preserved prior to the encounter.


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## G R (grizzyGR) (Jul 19, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> It’s literally premised on doing one thing while making your players think you’re doing another. That’s why it’s called “the _invisible_ railroad.” It’s _hidden_, and hiding your actions is _deceptive_. If the players know you’ll be shuffling things around so they don’t miss the cool stuff you had planned and are ok with that, great. Have fun. If you actively hide the fact that you’re doing it though, that’s were there’s a problem.



Why are player's entitled to know everything? Player's being told what was and was not modified in their adventure is such a meta thing to do. There are a lot of things that need to be hidden from the players, and if an invisible railroad is used the way the author intends then player's will not know they're being deceived. This is simply another tactic that can be used in response to player actions. So many of these comments seem to be written by entitled player's.


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## Maxperson (Jul 19, 2022)

FrozenNorth said:


> I recognize that in your game you didn’t use “invisible railroad” techniques.  For the sake of argument, a DM could have a game that turned out like yours but did use quantum ogres snd certain other “invisible railroad” techniques.



But not without removing the players' agency.  Quantum ogres and invisible railroad techniques can give the appearance of the same outcome, but it wouldn't be the same.  In the game with quantum ogres and invisible railroading, which are really the same thing, the DM is the only one truly playing the game and the players are just going through the DM's motions, even if they don't know it.  The DM is basically an invisible puppet master pulling their strings.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 19, 2022)

G R (grizzyGR) said:


> Why are player's entitled to know everything?



um why wouldn't they?  back before I got sick we used to play basketball (almost the same group that played D&D) I can't imagine someone hiding something during that game...


G R (grizzyGR) said:


> Player's being told what was and was not modified in their adventure is such a meta thing to do.



okay... so what it's meta? 


G R (grizzyGR) said:


> There are a lot of things that need to be hidden from the players, and if an invisible railroad is used the way the author intends then player's will not know they're being deceived.



yet they are... being deceived. 


G R (grizzyGR) said:


> This is simply another tactic that can be used in response to player actions. So many of these comments seem to be written by entitled player's.



yeah... players that are entitled to respect and honesty when talking to friends about a game... I think that is a good entitlement. I would say it boarders on the bare min of respect


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 19, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> yeah... players that are entitled to respect and honesty when talking to friends about a game... I think that is a good entitlement. I would say it boarders on the bare min of respect




"Only players would say this" is also a cheap out, since I know a number of people in this thread who GM far more than they play (certainly I do).


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 19, 2022)

Maxperson said:


> But not without removing the players' agency.  Quantum ogres and invisible railroad techniques can give the appearance of the same outcome, but it wouldn't be the same.  In the game with quantum ogres and invisible railroading, which are really the same thing, the DM is the only one truly playing the game and the players are just going through the DM's motions, even if they don't know it.  The DM is basically an invisible puppet master pulling their strings.



exactly and it drives me nuts that people think what I do is deceptive and railroading (and I;m not claiming to never do it...but if I do I talk to my players about it and even still it's rare)


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 19, 2022)

Thomas Shey said:


> "Only players would say this" is also a cheap out, since I know a number of people in this thread who GM far more than they play (certainly I do).



yup... I am about 50/50 over all but right now actually get to play just a bit more often then run...


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## Mort (Jul 19, 2022)

G R (grizzyGR) said:


> Why are player's entitled to know everything? Player's being told what was and was not modified in their adventure is such a meta thing to do. There are a lot of things that need to be hidden from the players, and if an invisible railroad is used the way the author intends then player's will not know they're being deceived. This is simply another tactic that can be used in response to player actions. So many of these comments seem to be written by entitled player's.




Actually, from what I can tell, most of the posters on here talking negatively about railroading are the same ones I see talking about their games and being DMs. I DM something like 90% of the time (though I wouldn't mind it being less!)


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## Maxperson (Jul 19, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> yup... I am about 50/50 over all but right now actually get to play just a bit more often then run...



I run about 75% of the time.  It used to be 100% and then a few years before the pandemic hit I started to burn out a bit, so my game started to suffer. A few of my other players started stepping in once in a while to DM short 3-6 month campaigns to give me breaks.

One of them had never DM'd before and for his first time he picked an adventure path for 3.5(since that's what we played at the time) and then approached and said, "Hey guys, this is my first time and while X(me) is really good at rolling with things when we decide to just pick up and go to go somewhere way outside of where we are at to do things, I don't think I can handle those sorts of things well yet, so I'd like it if you guys would stay inside what the adventure provides."  We of course immediately understood what he was going through and didn't want to make things tougher on him than it needed to be for a first time and agreed to go through things that path in a linear fashion.  It wasn't a railroad because he came to us before hand and got our buy-in.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 19, 2022)

G R (grizzyGR) said:


> Why are player's entitled to know everything? Player's being told what was and was not modified in their adventure is such a meta thing to do. There are a lot of things that need to be hidden from the players, and if an invisible railroad is used the way the author intends then player's will not know they're being deceived. This is simply another tactic that can be used in response to player actions. So many of these comments seem to be written by entitled player's.





Mort said:


> Actually, from what I can tell, most of the posters on here talking negatively about railroading are the same ones I see talking about their games and being DMs. I DM something like 90% of the time (though I wouldn't mind it being less!)



I do believe i have given at least 5 examples from games i ran

I must be quite the entitled player... running dozens of campaigns from 95-2022


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## Charlaquin (Jul 19, 2022)

G R (grizzyGR) said:


> Why are player's entitled to know everything? Player's being told what was and was not modified in their adventure is such a meta thing to do.



I never said you need to tell the players what was and wasn’t modified. Just tell them, from the beginning of the campaign, that you plan to modify things, so that if they have a problem with that, they can voice it.


G R (grizzyGR) said:


> There are a lot of things that need to be hidden from the players, and if an invisible railroad is used the way the author intends then player's will not know they're being deceived.



So, it’s ok to lie to your players as long as you don’t get caught? Sorry, I disagree.


G R (grizzyGR) said:


> This is simply another tactic that can be used in response to player actions. So many of these comments seem to be written by entitled player's.



I would be surprised to learn if anyone who posts here regularly isn’t a DM. Regardless, it is indeed another tactic that can be used. But doing so without the players’ consent is deceptive and disrespectful. Seriously, what’s so hard about just giving your players a heads-up and saying “I plan to move things around to make sure you don’t miss the cool stuff I prepared. Everyone cool with that?”


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## Umbran (Jul 19, 2022)

jgsugden said:


> Go back and read again.  I am not responsible for your reading comprehension issues.I ... just ... can't ...




*Mod Note:*

If you can't, then take some time for yourself until you can, rather than be rude about it.


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## Ovinomancer (Jul 19, 2022)

I'm seeing a lot of "lie" going on, but from the player's perspective, what's the effective difference between making a choice blind and making a choice the GM is going to do what they want anyway?  There's an argument floating that it's fine to have players choose a path if you then randomly determine what's there (some kind of procedural generation) but I don't follow how this affords any difference in agency or meaning to the choice.  The only way that agency is increased is if there is some information about the difference between the paths that holds true.  But, even here, there's some issues to be considered.

Let's go with the example from above (paraphrased) where going down path A there's an 80% chance of ogre and 20% chance of bandit and on path B there's 80% chance of bandit and 20% chance of ogre.  Let's say that this information is even provided in a less mechanical way of "path A has way more ogres than bandits, and path B has way more bandits than ogres."  This is a true statement.  The players make a choice based on this, deciding they want less ogre and so pick path B.  The dice are rolled and turn up ogre.  Was there agency here?  I mean, sure, risks and all that, so yes to that hypothetical, but here's the real question -- does it matter that there was agency from the player's perspective?  They made a choice and the outcome was what they wanted to avoid anyway.  How does that appear?  Walk this through various iterations of play from where everything is 100% open and transparent to the players such that they see the %'s and the rolls and know exactly how it happened all they way through the vaguer statement and a roll behind the screen.  Let's assume the GM is 100% honest in all efforts here -- no lying.  In the 'behind the screen' version, does it matter if the GM is being honest?  The appearance from the players is one where they can easily leap to the conclusion the GM Forced the ogre.  And if the defense to this is "but you should trust the GM" then we need to go back and talk about occasional moments when the GM isn't honest and does Force the ogre and evaluate if there's actually anything different on the player side of the screen here.

I don't have preferred answers here (I have my preferences, but nothing says those are controlling).  I'm not fishing for a gotcha.  Legit thinking exercise.  Approach with curiosity.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 19, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> Regardless, it is indeed another tactic that can be used. But doing so without the players’ consent is deceptive and disrespectful. Seriously, what’s so hard about just giving your players a heads-up and saying “I plan to move things around to make sure you don’t miss the cool stuff I prepared. Everyone cool with that?”



I mean sure, you could ask that. But should you also ask "I'm planning to stick to the prep, so you might sometimes miss the interesting stuff, is everyone cool with that" or "I'm going to sometimes improvise, so who knows what's going to happen, is everyone cool with that?"

Like you can break things down like this if people for some reason have vey specific preferences, but in broad sense all this is covered under the GM makings stuff up and presenting it to the players, which in D&D is normally understood to be the GM's role, so if nothing further is specified, I don't think there is much reason to be shocked if any of the methods or their combinations are being used.


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## Charlaquin (Jul 19, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> I mean sure, you could ask that. But should you also ask "I'm planning to stick to the prep, so you might sometimes miss the interesting stuff, is everyone cool with that" or "I'm going to sometimes improvise, so who knows what's going to happen, is everyone cool with that?"



If you’re concerned some of your players
might take issue with those things, sure. But sticking to the prep and improvising do not involve deceiving the players. Again, the entire premise of this thread is about railroading while making it seem like you aren’t railroading. Saying one thing and doing another. Unless you get confirmation ahead of time that the players are ok with you doing so, it is inherently deceptive. That’s not the case with strict adherence to prep or improvisation.


Crimson Longinus said:


> Like you can break things down like this if people for some reason have vey specific preferences, but in broad sense all this is covered under the GM makings stuff up and presenting it to the players, which in D&D is normally understood to be the GM's role, so if nothing further is specified, I don't think there is much reason to be shocked if any of the methods or their combinations are being used.



But this isn’t just a matter of making things up and presenting it to the players. This is a matter of presenting something to the players that is false. It’s literally trying to trick them into thinking they have agency when in fact they do not. This isn’t me reading malicious intent into an innocuous statement, this is precisely the behavior the opening post describes.


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## Mort (Jul 19, 2022)

Ovinomancer said:


> I'm seeing a lot of "lie" going on, but from the player's perspective, what's the effective difference between making a choice blind and making a choice the GM is going to do what they want anyway?  There's an argument floating that it's fine to have players choose a path if you then randomly determine what's there (some kind of procedural generation) but I don't follow how this affords any difference in agency or meaning to the choice.  The only way that agency is increased is if there is some information about the difference between the paths that holds true.  But, even here, there's some issues to be considered.



For me, a blind choice isn't a meaningful choice. It's just pick a random number. In that sense, I don't care if it's 1 door 2 doors or 3 doors. If the players have no information as to the doors, there's little point in quibbling what's behind them or how it got there.

As more information is revealed, then it begins to matter. If the players are making an informed choice, the choice they make should matter in some meaningful way.

Now, if the Players TRY to make it a meaningful choice (they listen to the doors, they look at tracks leading to the doors, they do an augury, they try to scry on the other sides) and the DM foils them (say nothing works) because he doesn't want it to be an informed choice (which I have seen way too many times!) then that's a real problem.



Ovinomancer said:


> Let's go with the example from above (paraphrased) where going down path A there's an 80% chance of ogre and 20% chance of bandit and on path B there's 80% chance of bandit and 20% chance of ogre.  Let's say that this information is even provided in a less mechanical way of "path A has way more ogres than bandits, and path B has way more bandits than ogres."  This is a true statement.  The players make a choice based on this, deciding they want less ogre and so pick path B.  The dice are rolled and turn up ogre.  Was there agency here?  I mean, sure, risks and all that, so yes to that hypothetical, but here's the real question -- does it matter that there was agency from the player's perspective?  They made a choice and the outcome was what they wanted to avoid anyway.  How does that appear?  Walk this through various iterations of play from where everything is 100% open and transparent to the players such that they see the %'s and the rolls and know exactly how it happened all they way through the vaguer statement and a roll behind the screen.  Let's assume the GM is 100% honest in all efforts here -- no lying.  In the 'behind the screen' version, does it matter if the GM is being honest?  The appearance from the players is one where they can easily leap to the conclusion the GM Forced the ogre.  And if the defense to this is "but you should trust the GM" then we need to go back and talk about occasional moments when the GM isn't honest and does Force the ogre and evaluate if there's actually anything different on the player side of the screen here.
> 
> I don't have preferred answers here (I have my preferences, but nothing says those are controlling).  I'm not fishing for a gotcha.  Legit thinking exercise.  Approach with curiosity.




This is an interesting question. 

For me, I think I'm fine (If I'm a player, as A DM I'm not a fan of this method, I'd rather just draft a few extra scenarios). The PCs gambled on the 80% and if they lose the gamble, they lose the gamble.  The problem though, as you say, is that from their perspective there's no difference between the doors and the 20% chance (especially if the players don't know the DM rolled). But As with just about anything, I think this can be resolved with a bit of discussion in session 0 or whenever. The players that don't care, don't care, and the ones that do get to know what's going on.


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## FrozenNorth (Jul 19, 2022)

Ovinomancer said:


> Let's go with the example from above (paraphrased) where going down path A there's an 80% chance of ogre and 20% chance of bandit and on path B there's 80% chance of bandit and 20% chance of ogre.  Let's say that this information is even provided in a less mechanical way of "path A has way more ogres than bandits, and path B has way more bandits than ogres."  This is a true statement.  The players make a choice based on this, deciding they want less ogre and so pick path B.  The dice are rolled and turn up ogre.  Was there agency here?  I mean, sure, risks and all that, so yes to that hypothetical, but here's the real question -- does it matter that there was agency from the player's perspective?  They made a choice and the outcome was what they wanted to avoid anyway.



If the GM rolls in front of the players version, I don’t see any issues.  Part of the game is characters and players make decisions with less than perfect knowledge, so this is an expected outcome.



Ovinomancer said:


> How does that appear?  Walk this through various iterations of play from where everything is 100% open and transparent to the players such that they see the %'s and the rolls and know exactly how it happened all they way through the vaguer statement and a roll behind the screen.  Let's assume the GM is 100% honest in all efforts here -- no lying.  In the 'behind the screen' version, does it matter if the GM is being honest?  The appearance from the players is one where they can easily leap to the conclusion the GM Forced the ogre.  And if the defense to this is "but you should trust the GM" then we need to go back and talk about occasional moments when the GM isn't honest and does Force the ogre and evaluate if there's actually anything different on the player side of the screen here.



We are assuming a 100% honest GM here. So to me, to the extent that the players care (not an assumption in the hypothetical), they could simply ask the DM.
Player 1: “What gives? This was supposed to be the safer path and we fight a frigging ogre?”
DM: “Yes, safer path meant that you were less likely to fight an ogre, but the probability was non-zero.  You were unlucky.”
Outside the scope of the hypothetical, but if this mattered to the player, the DM could volunteer to roll such dice openly in the future.


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## FrozenNorth (Jul 19, 2022)

Ovinomancer said:


> conclusion the GM Forced the ogre.  And if the defense to this is "but you should trust the GM" then we need to go back and talk about occasional moments when the GM isn't honest and does Force the ogre and evaluate if there's actually anything different on the player side of the screen here.



Side note: I agree with you that “trust the GM” is not an answer.  It is a prompt: “What have you done as GM to create trust?”

That can have many answers, but one that I use is that I make most of my rolls openly.

Likewise, answering plainly to questions about GM choices also fosters trust.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 19, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> If you’re concerned some of your players
> might take issue with those things, sure. But sticking to the prep and improvising do not involve deceiving the players. Again, the entire premise of this thread is about railroading while making it seem like you aren’t railroading. Saying one thing and doing another. Unless you get confirmation ahead of times that the players are ok with you doing so, it is inherently deceptive. That’s not the case with strict adherence to prep or improvisation.
> 
> But this isn’t just a matter of making things up and presenting it to the players. This is a matter of presenting something to the players that is false. It’s literally trying to trick them into thinking they have agency when in fact they do not. This isn’t me reading malicious intent into an innocuous statement, this is precisely the behavior the opening post describes.




What is the deception? This idea seems to presuppose an acceptable way for the GM to generate the content and deviation from that without announcing it to be a deception. But where does this assumption come from? Cannot I equally as player have and assumption that the GM will fiddle with the things so that I meet interesting stuff and when that doesn't happen because the GM stuck to the prep and I failed to click the right pixels, can I claim I was deceived?

Yes, an illusion is created, but I don't think it is fundamentally different than many other ways of creating an illusion of real world full of stuff. And in a broad sense everyone knows this. Everyone knows that that ogre is behind that door because at some point the GM for some reason decided that it is there. We are basically just quibbling about when and why the GM decided it, and I see no particular reason to assume that there is some obvious default for that.


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## Ovinomancer (Jul 19, 2022)

FrozenNorth said:


> If the GM rolls in front of the players version, I don’t see any issues.  Part of the game is characters and players make decisions with less than perfect knowledge, so this is an expected outcome.
> 
> 
> We are assuming a 100% honest GM here. So to me, to the extent that the players care (not an assumption in the hypothetical), they could simply ask the DM.
> ...



Cool, but you kinda sidestep the last part, here, which acknowledges this and then asks "ok, take that and consider that the GM is lying.  What looks different on the player side?"  The answer, I think, is nothing.  So, then, what does that mean for the discussion at large?

The only thing I can see is some assumed principle that the GM should be 100% truthful at all times and not ever engage in any deception.  Otherwise, if we allow that a GM can sometimes be deceptive to any degree, we're really down to haggling about price and not principle.  I'm curious how hard a line people are holding here.

My answers to the above are pretty simple -- if I'm playing a game like 5e where so much is put upon the GM's shoulders, then I accept that there's some amount of Force that will be deployed.  We can talk about when it's too much, but that's a different discussion in my mind.  If I do not want to play where Force will be deployed, then I'm really looking at a different game or a very constrained premise in 5e.  As I don't think 5e is well suited to this (due to the, erm, openness of it's design to GM says) the effective result is that I don't expect 5e to be without Force ever.  When I play or run it, this is a default acceptance.  I'm only concerned about degree -- when I run I aim to minimize to the maximum amount such Force, but I don't believe I can expunge it fully.  System just doesn't support that, and I'm not doing that level of work for the game.


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## Ovinomancer (Jul 19, 2022)

FrozenNorth said:


> Side note: I agree with you that “trust the GM” is not an answer.  It is a prompt: “What have you done as GM to create trust?”
> 
> That can have many answers, but one that I use is that I make most of my rolls openly.
> 
> Likewise, answering plainly to questions about GM choices also fosters trust.



I can lie to you easily and do both of those things in 5e.  Stakes are often unclear, so die results don't provide the insight you might think, and me answering questions -- I can say a lot of things.  Unless you're looking for receipts, and I'm not sure that survives at the social contract level.


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## Ovinomancer (Jul 19, 2022)

Mort said:


> For me, a blind choice isn't a meaningful choice. It's just pick a random number. In that sense, I don't care if it's 1 door 2 doors or 3 doors. If the players have no information as to the doors, there's little point in quibbling what's behind them or how it got there.
> 
> As more information is revealed, then it begins to matter. If the players are making an informed choice, the choice they make should matter in some meaningful way.
> 
> ...



As I posted to @FrozenNorth, the next step of the thought experiment is to take this answer about how you'd set it up in session 0 and now apply a GM willing to lie about it.  What looks different?


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## Charlaquin (Jul 19, 2022)

Ovinomancer said:


> I'm seeing a lot of "lie" going on, but from the player's perspective, what's the effective difference between making a choice blind and making a choice the GM is going to do what they want anyway?  There's an argument floating that it's fine to have players choose a path if you then randomly determine what's there (some kind of procedural generation) but I don't follow how this affords any difference in agency or meaning to the choice.  The only way that agency is increased is if there is some information about the difference between the paths that holds true.  But, even here, there's some issues to be considered.
> 
> Let's go with the example from above (paraphrased) where going down path A there's an 80% chance of ogre and 20% chance of bandit and on path B there's 80% chance of bandit and 20% chance of ogre.  Let's say that this information is even provided in a less mechanical way of "path A has way more ogres than bandits, and path B has way more bandits than ogres."  This is a true statement.  The players make a choice based on this, deciding they want less ogre and so pick path B.  The dice are rolled and turn up ogre.  Was there agency here?  I mean, sure, risks and all that, so yes to that hypothetical, but here's the real question -- does it matter that there was agency from the player's perspective?  They made a choice and the outcome was what they wanted to avoid anyway.  How does that appear?  Walk this through various iterations of play from where everything is 100% open and transparent to the players such that they see the %'s and the rolls and know exactly how it happened all they way through the vaguer statement and a roll behind the screen.  Let's assume the GM is 100% honest in all efforts here -- no lying.  In the 'behind the screen' version, does it matter if the GM is being honest?  The appearance from the players is one where they can easily leap to the conclusion the GM Forced the ogre.  And if the defense to this is "but you should trust the GM" then we need to go back and talk about occasional moments when the GM isn't honest and does Force the ogre and evaluate if there's actually anything different on the player side of the screen here.
> 
> I don't have preferred answers here (I have my preferences, but nothing says those are controlling).  I'm not fishing for a gotcha.  Legit thinking exercise.  Approach with curiosity.



If the DM actually rolled and got that 20% chance of ogres, then that’s not invisible railroading. The players took an informed risk, and it didn’t pay off. If the DM just said path B had a lower chance of ogres but didn’t actually roll and just decided there was going to be an ogre encounter anyway, that’s invisible railroading. The players thought they were taking an informed risk, but the information they were given was false. And, yes, from the players’ perspective, there’s no real way to tell the difference. That’s the problem I have with invisible railroading. The only way it works is by taking advantage of the players’ trust that you will do what you say.

Now, if the players were made aware ahead of time that the DM might sometimes do things like this - setting up what seems to be a meaningful choice, but manipulating things behind the scenes in a way that makes the decision irrelevant, and they’ve agreed that they’re ok with it, that’s a different story. Now, they’re not trusting the DM to do what they say they’re doing, they’re trusting the DM to manipulate things in a way that will be fun/make for a good story/etc.


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## Charlaquin (Jul 19, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> What is the deception? This idea seems to presuppose an acceptable way for the GM to generate the content and deviation from that without announcing it to be a deception. But where does this assumption come from? Cannot I equally as player have and assumption that the GM will fiddle with the things so that I meet interesting stuff and when that doesn't happen because the GM stuck to the prep and I failed to click the right pixels, can I claim I was deceived?
> 
> Yes, an illusion is created, but I don't think it is fundamentally different than many other ways of creating an illusion of real world full of stuff. And in a broad sense everyone knows this. Everyone knows that that ogre is behind that door because at some point the GM for some reason decided that it is there. We are basically just quibbling about when and why the GM decided it, and I see no particular reason to assume that there is some obvious default for that.



Did you not read the opening post? It literally describes how to put the players on rails while thinking they aren’t on rails. That’s so self-evidently a deception, I don’t even know how to explain it more plainly than that. The DM has created an expectation of agency and then secretly undermines that agency to insure things play out the way they want. In what way could that be anything _but_ a deception?


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## Ovinomancer (Jul 19, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> If the DM actually rolled and got that 20% chance of ogres, then that’s not invisible railroading. The players took an informed risk, and it didn’t pay off. If the DM just said path B had a lower chance of ogres but didn’t actually roll and just decided there was going to be an ogre encounter anyway, that’s invisible railroading. The players thought they were taking an informed risk, but the information they were given was false. And, yes, from the players’ perspective, there’s no real way to tell the difference. That’s the problem I have with invisible railroading. The only way it works is by taking advantage of the players’ trust that you will do what you say.
> 
> Now, if the players were made aware ahead of time that the DM might sometimes do things like this - setting up what seems to be a meaningful choice, but manipulating things behind the scenes in a way that makes the decision irrelevant, and they’ve agreed that they’re ok with it, that’s a different story. Now, they’re not trusting the DM to do what they say they’re doing, they’re trusting the DM to manipulate things in a way that will be fun/make for a good story/etc.



From the player side of the screen, how can you tell the difference.  This is a principle argument, but one that can only be seen/detected/enforced by the GM on the GM.  That's not a great system, as it relies on the same "trust me" that the Illusionism deploying GM is relying on.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 19, 2022)

Ovinomancer said:


> From the player side of the screen, how can you tell the difference.  This is a principle argument, but one that can only be seen/detected/enforced by the GM on the GM.  That's not a great system, as it relies on the same "trust me" that the Illusionism deploying GM is relying on.



some of the times we caught DMs cheating were when they messed up and let slip something.  1 example was in 4e when someone realized we had only done about 70ish damage to bloodie a target...BUT then after doing well over 100 more it was still up. 

in general though nobody questions when they are having fun though. So if you me and 3 others are sitting at a table having a great time it most likely doesn't matter at all what the DM is doing... we only notice issues when we are board or unhappy.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 19, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> Did you not read the opening post? It literally describes how to put the players on rails while thinking they aren’t on rails. That’s so self-evidently a deception, I don’t even know how to explain it more plainly than that. The DM has created an expectation of agency and then secretly undermines that agency to insure things play out the way they want. In what way could that be anything _but_ a deception?



Yes, I did read it. Did you read it and consider what actually happens in the examples? They most rely on the player intuition to treat the fictional space like actual real physical space. But of course everyone actually knows that it isn't like that. GM made that up. 

Consider the ten room dungeon example. Then consider that instead of the GM having prepanned order of rooms like in the example, they're just improvising the whole thing. The end result is exactly the same, the stuff that the PCs encounter next is what the GM wants them to encounter next, and indeed the players probably would still think in terms of real space and their intuition would be that "it was there all along." Yet everyone actually knows that sometimes GMs improvise and I doubt many people would consider GM doing so deceitful. 

It is part of the GMs job to get the layer believe that made up things are real and have them treat them as such.


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## Charlaquin (Jul 19, 2022)

Ovinomancer said:


> From the player side of the screen, how can you tell the difference.  This is a principle argument, but one that can only be seen/detected/enforced by the GM on the GM.  That's not a great system, as it relies on the same "trust me" that the Illusionism deploying GM is relying on.



Did you not read my post? I already said, it looks no different from the player’s side, and that’s why it’s deceptive. It works by exploiting the players’ trust in the DM, which is a disrespectful and dishonest thing to do.


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## Ovinomancer (Jul 19, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> Did you not read my post? I already said, it looks no different from the player’s side, and that’s why it’s deceptive. It works by exploiting the players’ trust in the DM, which is a disrespectful and dishonest thing to do.



You don't appear to have taken my point.  I'm not saying you didn't say that, I'm saying that if this is so, then the argument is one from the principle that the GM should be honest.  But, since there is not way to tell from the player perspective (barring GM error or overuse) then we have a principle that is only visible and enforceable by the GM on the GM.  Is that really a useful principle -- one who's only watcher is the watchee?  That's what I'm getting at -- it's a toothless statement of principle, one that can be made forcefully but is actually without any force.


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## Charlaquin (Jul 19, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> Yes, I did read it. Did you read it and consider what actually happens in the examples? They most rely on the player intuition to treat the fictional space like actual real physical space. But of course everyone actually knows that it isn't like that. GM made that up.
> 
> Consider the ten room dungeon example. Then consider that instead of the GM having prepanned order of rooms like in the example, they're just improvising the whole thing. The end result is exactly the same, the stuff that the PCs encounter next is what the GM wants them to encounter next, and indeed the players probably would still think in terms of real space and their intuition would be that "it was there all along." Yet everyone actually knows that sometimes GMs improvise and I doubt many people would consider GM doing so deceitful.
> 
> It is part of the GMs job to get the layer believe that made up things are real and have them treat them as such.



Improvising is just planning and executing simultaneously. There is nothing deceptive about it, the dungeon layout doesn’t change to enforce a predetermined outcome.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 19, 2022)

Frankly, I don't even get why people care how the things were procedurally generated. If it indeed looks just the same from the player's seat, what does it matter? Stop worrying about whether we live in a simulation, if it feels real, it is good enough.


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## Charlaquin (Jul 19, 2022)

Ovinomancer said:


> You don't appear to have taken my point.  I'm not saying you didn't say that, I'm saying that if this is so, then the argument is one from the principle that the GM should be honest.



Of course the GM should be honest. Everyone should be honest. Honesty is pretty universally regarded as an important virtue.


Ovinomancer said:


> But, since there is not way to tell from the player perspective (barring GM error or overuse) then we have a principle that is only visible and enforceable by the GM on the GM.  Is that really a useful principle -- one who's only watcher is the watchee?  That's what I'm getting at -- it's a toothless statement of principle, one that can be made forcefully but is actually without any force.



This is exactly why I am so vehemently opposed to DMs using these deceptive tactics. The DM is the only one who can police their own honesty. That is a tremendous amount of power, and thus requires a tremendous amount of responsibility. D&D _requires_ trust between the players and the DM to function, so breaking that trust is an egregious abuse of power and act of disrespect towards the players.


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## Charlaquin (Jul 19, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> Frankly, I don't even get why people care how the things were procedurally generated. If it indeed looks just the same from the player's seat, what does it matter? Stop worrying about whether we live in a simulation, if it feels real, it is good enough.



So it does matter if I lie as long as I don’t get caught? Sorry, that’s not something I can agree with.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 19, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> Consider the ten room dungeon example. Then consider that instead of the GM having prepanned order of rooms like in the example, they're just improvising the whole thing. The end result is exactly the same,



I want to know this too.

I also want to know how well that DM is thinking through if they ARE planning.

I don't want to waste time thinking through "Oh there are only 17 orc warriors and we killed 14 so only 3 left" if I know the DM is just rolling random and doesn't care about number of orc warriors in a tribe.

I don't want to say "Hey, how is this mind flayer eating if he is 3 levels down" if the DM isn't the kind to think about it

I REALLY don't want to doe either if I know the DM is just pulling everything out of his butt.


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## Medic (Jul 19, 2022)

Ovinomancer said:


> I'm seeing a lot of "lie" going on, but from the player's perspective, what's the effective difference between making a choice blind and making a choice the GM is going to do what they want anyway?  There's an argument floating that it's fine to have players choose a path if you then randomly determine what's there (some kind of procedural generation) but I don't follow how this affords any difference in agency or meaning to the choice.  The only way that agency is increased is if there is some information about the difference between the paths that holds true.  But, even here, there's some issues to be considered.
> 
> Let's go with the example from above (paraphrased) where going down path A there's an 80% chance of ogre and 20% chance of bandit and on path B there's 80% chance of bandit and 20% chance of ogre.  Let's say that this information is even provided in a less mechanical way of "path A has way more ogres than bandits, and path B has way more bandits than ogres."  This is a true statement.  The players make a choice based on this, deciding they want less ogre and so pick path B.  The dice are rolled and turn up ogre.  Was there agency here?  I mean, sure, risks and all that, so yes to that hypothetical, but here's the real question -- does it matter that there was agency from the player's perspective?  They made a choice and the outcome was what they wanted to avoid anyway.  How does that appear?  Walk this through various iterations of play from where everything is 100% open and transparent to the players such that they see the %'s and the rolls and know exactly how it happened all they way through the vaguer statement and a roll behind the screen.  Let's assume the GM is 100% honest in all efforts here -- no lying.  In the 'behind the screen' version, does it matter if the GM is being honest?  The appearance from the players is one where they can easily leap to the conclusion the GM Forced the ogre.  And if the defense to this is "but you should trust the GM" then we need to go back and talk about occasional moments when the GM isn't honest and does Force the ogre and evaluate if there's actually anything different on the player side of the screen here.
> 
> I don't have preferred answers here (I have my preferences, but nothing says those are controlling).  I'm not fishing for a gotcha.  Legit thinking exercise.  Approach with curiosity.



I don't really have a stake in this ongoing discussion, since my GM style is totally different than the one which seems to be the subject of this thread, but I'll try to offer some perspective on this by taking the scenario and moving the furniture around such that the stakes are actually meaningful.

The player characters finish clearing out a dungeon and enter a room full of treasure, wherein they find a magic lever. The party's wizard casts identify on said lever, and relays to the rest of the group that it is a magic device that has an 80% chance of conjuring a legendary magic item, and a 20% chance of flat-out killing the rube that decided to pull it. Boldly, the rogue makes the attempt, dice are rolled, and seconds later she's a pile of gore because the DM rolled a 19 on the percentile in front of everybody; pure bad luck. All of the information they needed to make an informed decision was present, the unbiased truth was right there where everyone could see, and it will probably be remembered as a funny moment going forward.

Compare this against a similar scenario, where the wizard's spell only reveals "there is a chance of conjuring a legendary magic item, but a small chance of being killed." The rogue, plucky woman that she is, still makes the attempt - but the DM has already decided beforehand that no matter what he rolls, pulling the lever blows someone up. The chance of success was merely an illusion! The only way to avoid the DM's ploy was to not engage with it at all. It's incredibly spiteful to do this, and will likely lead to several weeks of polite discussion on EN World.

Ultimately, it's a matter of trust. The players trust that the GM will be a fair judicator that impartially interprets the outcomes of what their characters do instead of a despot that subjects the group to their will regardless of what actions they take.


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## Mort (Jul 19, 2022)

Ovinomancer said:


> As I posted to @FrozenNorth, the next step of the thought experiment is to take this answer about how you'd set it up in session 0 and now apply a GM willing to lie about it.  What looks different?




There might not be a difference from the player side UNLESS the DM gets caught railroading (especially if it's egregious), which I have seen happen a few times. And it has not done wonders for the group!

As for set up in session 0 if you plan to use a lot of illusionism etc? 1. Ask the players if they care how the sausage is made. If they all say "no, not at all we just want to be entertained..." you're basically done. if some say yes then 2. explain that you might not always be upfront with how their choices ACTUALLY impact the story and go over what that means how comfortable are they with agency limitations (and to what degree). 

If you're running published material, the talk might be a bit different. 1. Ensure everyone is comfortable staying within the confines of any given module and that's mostly it. You might also want to let them know if you plan to make significant changes (in case the player later wants to run the module or whatever), some players want the "authentic" experience and actually get miffed at too many changes (I've only ever encountered 1, but they do exist).


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 19, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> Improvising is just planning and executing simultaneously. There is nothing deceptive about it, the dungeon layout doesn’t change to enforce a predetermined outcome.



How does this make sense? Now we are in purely in invisible though crime territory. If I haven't decided what's on the left path and I improvise an ogre that's fine, but if I have beforehand decided that whichever path the PCs take there is an ogre there then it is deception? Even though I could have improvised an ogre on the right path too... How firmly I need to decide this for it to move from improvisation to deceit? Like if I have browsed level appropriate foes and noted that ogres might be good or watched Shrek on previous night, but not made any clear decisions, is that OK?


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 19, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> So it does matter if I lie as long as I don’t get caught? Sorry, that’s not something I can agree with.



If everyone has agreed that the GM runs the game in the manner they feel most comfortable with, then no one is being lied to.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 19, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> Frankly, I don't even get why people care how the things were procedurally generated. If it indeed looks just the same from the player's seat, what does it matter? Stop worrying about whether we live in a simulation, if it feels real, it is good enough.



it changes how I see the world, and my character interacts with the world...

back in 3e we had a guy DM who was not the best at it... but he was a friend and we tried to work with it. When one day he told us the size of the city we were in was more miles across then the state we live in (over 100 miles)  we went bonkers... especially when it had a population of a normal D&D town... later we went into a dungeon and we had just traveled north from this kingdom size city but had not gotten to the mountains... when we came out the mountains were to our east... we came out the same door we went in, and there was no magic... so the guy trying to map (since the DM didn't map the world) started going a bit nuts with 'moving mountains'.  It got worse yet a bit later when we took a boat from the eastern side of the super city less then a day west and somehow managed to make it to another city... when we pointed out we were still WELL inside the size of the city he labeled it he didn't know what to say.  
Then came the dinosour... that ran through the gate to the center of town and to the ocean... remember this city was over 100 miles, so how long did it take the dino to do it... 3 rounds. 18 seconds to go 100 miles that is 6ish miles per second...someone figuted that to be about 22,000 miles per hour.  when asked if there was a sonic boom he got mad. 

now I have had 'nonsense' worlds... I had one with root beer geysers chocolaty trees and oxygen producing elves (they breath in carbon dyoxid and out oxygen the oppisit of humans) and I also casually dropped kryptonians invading into a 3.5 game, so lord know I am not going to falt someone for some bat poop crazy things... but you need to know what your character understands...

in ross's game he was making up as he went where cities changed sizes and mountains moved and rivers dried up into desserts over night it wasn't some 'oh this is a clue' there was nothing to figure out... he just had a poop memomry and was making it up. The poor guy trying to map that world I swear aged 5 years in the 3ish months we played


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 19, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> So it does matter if I lie as long as I don’t get caught? Sorry, that’s not something I can agree with.



I mean if I rob 10 banks and don't get caught I just get lots of money... and no consequences.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 19, 2022)

Medic said:


> he party's wizard casts identify on said lever, and relays to the rest of the group that it is a magic device that has an 80% chance of conjuring a legendary magic item, and a 20% chance of flat-out killing the rube that decided to pull it. Boldly, the rogue makes the attempt, dice are rolled, and seconds later she's a pile of gore because the DM rolled a 19 on the percentile in front of everybody; pure bad luck. All of the information they needed to make an informed decision was present, the unbiased truth was right there where everyone could see, and it will probably be remembered as a funny moment going forward.



can I just say I feel like that rogue is every PC i have ever had in my games... or at least 7 out of 10.


Medic said:


> Compare this against a similar scenario, where the wizard's spell only reveals "there is a chance of conjuring a legendary magic item, but a small chance of being killed." The rogue, plucky woman that she is, still makes the attempt - but the DM has already decided beforehand that no matter what he rolls, pulling the lever blows someone up. The chance of success was merely an illusion! The only way to avoid the DM's ploy was to not engage with it at all. It's incredibly spiteful to do this, and will likely lead to several weeks of polite discussion on EN World.



hey look at that it's a classic gary SOD that removes the save... another reason I would NOT want to play under such a dm


Medic said:


> Ultimately, it's a matter of trust. The players trust that the GM will be a fair judicator that impartially interprets the outcomes of what their characters do instead of a despot that subjects the group to their will regardless of what actions they take.



this is also why if a DM does a lot of great things and is clear and upfront and honest I may even take the occassioanl 'or die' and just walk off the anger.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 19, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> How does this make sense? Now we are in purely in invisible though crime territory. If I haven't decided what's on the left path and I improvise an ogre that's fine, but if I have beforehand decided that whichever path the PCs take there is an ogre there then it is deception? Even though I could have improvised an ogre on the right path too... How firmly I need to decide this for it to move from improvisation to deceit? Like if I have browsed level appropriate foes and noted that ogres might be good or watched Shrek on previous night, but not made any clear decisions, is that OK?



again just be honest... "Yeah no matter what door oger" or "I am making this up as we go" or "I have this dungeon and 4 more mapped out in detail" or "I am useing random encounters"   but don't say "Im useing random" then really both paths have ogers or don't say "I had this mapped out fully" when you are making it up as you go...

and some groups wont care, they wont ask and they don't need to know... if no one asks and you never say that isn't a lie. But if you say or even emply you are one and the truth is the other you are a liar.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 19, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> If everyone has agreed that the GM runs the game in the manner they feel most comfortable with, then no one is being lied to.



if everyone agrees there is no issue... the OP is all about not letting them agree but lieing and pretending you are a different style of DM.

I put 100s of hours into each world, and I have dozens of possible plot hooks... and I STILL need to make things up on the fly sometimes. I still change my plans/reality when a player puts forward an idea that is better... I just don't hide it when I do.


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## FrozenNorth (Jul 19, 2022)

Ovinomancer said:


> Cool, but you kinda sidestep the last part, here, which acknowledges this and then asks "ok, take that and consider that the GM is lying.  What looks different on the player side?"  The answer, I think, is nothing.  So, then, what does that mean for the discussion at large?



To me, it depends.

Case 1: GM actually is lying (ie the players asked about the die roll and the GM misrepresented the results). Don’t do that.  Seriously.  I recognize that some proponents of invisible rails (such as Matt Colville) have supported this.  My understanding is that none of the posters in this thread would support that, though I may be mistaken.  I certainly would not.

Case 2: the GM is not lying, but the player does not know that.  This goes back to taking steps to build trust, including being upfront with GM decisions and volunteering to roll in the open.  That said, there are absolutely players that have great difficulty trusting the GM regardless of the GM’s actions.


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## FrozenNorth (Jul 19, 2022)

Ovinomancer said:


> I can lie to you easily and do both of those things in 5e.  Stakes are often unclear, so die results don't provide the insight you might think, and me answering questions -- I can say a lot of things.  Unless you're looking for receipts, and I'm not sure that survives at the social contract level.



The starting point with people I play with, either as a player or a GM, is a certain level of trust.  There are certain steps you can take to maintain or improve that level of trust, and I am always curious to hear more.

If that level of trust isn’t present, I’m not going to play with you in the first place.


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## Ovinomancer (Jul 19, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> Of course the GM should be honest. Everyone should be honest. Honesty is pretty universally regarded as an important virtue.
> 
> This is exactly why I am so vehemently opposed to DMs using these deceptive tactics. The DM is the only one who can police their own honesty. That is a tremendous amount of power, and thus requires a tremendous amount of responsibility. D&D _requires_ trust between the players and the DM to function, so breaking that trust is an egregious abuse of power and act of disrespect towards the players.



I suppose that you have similarly strong viewpoints about other media that may use unreliable narration techniques?  That's certainly a thing you can like, but calling it universal seems a bit presumptuous.


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## Charlaquin (Jul 19, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> How does this make sense? Now we are in purely in invisible though crime territory. If I haven't decided what's on the left path and I improvise an ogre that's fine, but if I have beforehand decided that whichever path the PCs take there is an ogre there then it is deception? Even though I could have improvised an ogre on the right path too... How firmly I need to decide this for it to move from improvisation to deceit? Like if I have browsed level appropriate foes and noted that ogres might be good or watched Shrek on previous night, but not made any clear decisions, is that OK?



Again, improvising is planning and executing simultaneously, so whether or not improvising is invisible railroading depends on what you planned, same as with pre-planned content. Invisible railroading involves presenting a choice that is ostensibly meaningful but manipulating things so the results are the same no matter what the players choose. So, if you improvise a decision and plan for the result to be the same either way, that’s invisible railroading. If you improvise a decision and plan for different results (or plan to improvise different results) depending on what the players choose, that is not invisible railroading.


Crimson Longinus said:


> If everyone has agreed that the GM runs the game in the manner they feel most comfortable with, then no one is being lied to.



But, again, invisible railroading is presenting a choice as meaningful that isn’t actually meaningful. That is lying, unless you have _explicit_ consent ahead of time. A general “sure the DM can do whatever they want” is not explicit.


----------



## Ovinomancer (Jul 19, 2022)

FrozenNorth said:


> The starting point with people I play with, either as a player or a GM, is a certain level of trust.  There are certain steps you can take to maintain or improve that level of trust, and I am always curious to hear more.
> 
> If that level of trust isn’t present, I’m not going to play with you in the first place.



Ok.  My point is that this 'trust' is entirely based on faith, can be abused easily, and there's often no way to tell -- you cannot tell if it's truth or deception in most of how 5e plays out.  So it's an article of faith, then.  Do you play with strangers often, or just with a home group?  How do you work with this trust when playing with strangers?

These are things being asked to generate thought, not to prove a point.  I'm finding a lot of the hardline stances taken in this thread to be odd, in that they only rely on faith for their operation.  Maybe that's not a bad thing, but it would be nice to see it acknowledged.


----------



## Ovinomancer (Jul 19, 2022)

FrozenNorth said:


> To me, it depends.
> 
> Case 1: GM actually is lying (ie the players asked about the die roll and the GM misrepresented the results). Don’t do that.  Seriously.  I recognize that some proponents of invisible rails (such as Matt Colville) have supported this.  My understanding is that none of the posters in this thread would support that, though I may be mistaken.  I certainly would not.
> 
> Case 2: the GM is not lying, but the player does not know that.  This goes back to taking steps to build trust, including being upfront with GM decisions and volunteering to roll in the open.  That said, there are absolutely players that have great difficulty trusting the GM regardless of the GM’s actions.



How do you feel about fudging?


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## Charlaquin (Jul 19, 2022)

Ovinomancer said:


> I suppose that you have similarly strong viewpoints about other media that may use unreliable narration techniques?  That's certainly a thing you can like, but calling it universal seems a bit presumptuous.



Huh? No, unreliable narration is a literary technique. That’s a totally different form of media that audiences engage with in a completely different way than they do with D&D.


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## Ovinomancer (Jul 19, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> Huh? No, unreliable narration is a literary technique. That’s a totally different form of media that audiences engage with in a completely different way than they do with D&D.



You'll need to make that clarification clear for me.  How is a GM presenting information that is false to drive an outcome different from an author presenting false information to drive to an outcome different?  Just pointing out that it exists in different media is not sufficient to support your claim.  Fundamentally, we're talking about false presentation of information with a different future outcome in mind.


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## HammerMan (Jul 19, 2022)

This argument is strange but I will say the article is boarderline bad advice. It is one of those things that if you do it right and not that frequently you can make some good games… but the very first time you get caught you lost all credibility with the party. 

I am much more into honesty but not . I have lied to players. But I normally warn them.  In session 0 in my last 4e campaign I told everyone to think of my pitch as 2 truths and a lie but with more of both.  

My pitch was lost.  The TV show but since this is D&D the smoke monster will make more sense.  I am drawing from old campaign settings and some “other” sources.  We will start from a boat going from point a to point b and we can all work togather on fleshing out both but BIG SPOILERS for a 20 year old show… you are not making it to pt B.  You will be trapped with a list of NPCs I want you to help me make and have to survive on an island.  You will NOT have most common equipment but there will be a skill challange to find things that washed up from the boat.  


So they all laughed and said “so ravenloft isle we got it” and we made PCs and NPCs.  We played game 1 loading the boat and game 2 at sea and game 3 a storm hit and they got gilligan’s ilanded.  We started with a skill challange and then a giant monkey man came and kidnapped some NPCs.  

They were in ravenloft that guess was right but the island came from third earth and the domain lord was Mum Ra.


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## Ovinomancer (Jul 19, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> So it does matter if I lie as long as I don’t get caught? Sorry, that’s not something I can agree with.



Rather, it doesn't matter to the player unless you get caught.  From the player perspective, they cannot tell if you're operating with integrity or not.  In fact, as I've tried to drive at with my example, acting with integrity can look like acting without it to the player, especially if there's an uncommon run of luck on the dice.  Too much of the system is hidden behind the GM for the player to be able to tell.  So a successful game where the player didn't catch you out on anything could mean that you did railroad and did it well or that you didn't.  They can't tell.  If the players cannot tell, what is the value of the GM's principled approach to the player?


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## FrozenNorth (Jul 19, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> I want to know this too.
> 
> I also want to know how well that DM is thinking through if they ARE planning.
> 
> ...



True, but I think this is independent from the railroad/non-railroad question.

I played through PF2 Fall of Plaguestone.  The villain wanted to destroy the town of Plaguestone, a town so small and miserable that our level 3 party was BMOC.

After defeating an entire orc tribe and various monsters affiliated with them, we learn that the villain’s plan is to poison the town.  We rush to prevent that.

Despite the fact that the orc tribe by itself would have been sufficient to level the town (not to mention the affiliated monsters), we almost TPK due to the fact that the villain was still being supported by 6 elementals, a small army of constructs, and the villain and their creation were a match for the now level 4 party.

That case was a linear scenario, but it could have just as easily happened with an improvisational DM.


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## HammerMan (Jul 19, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> Huh? No, unreliable narration is a literary technique. That’s a totally different form of media that audiences engage with in a completely different way than they do with D&D.



That is closer to an NPC lying to the the PC. That isn’t the DM lying.


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## Ovinomancer (Jul 19, 2022)

HammerMan said:


> That is closer to an NPC lying to the the PC. That isn’t the DM lying.



Is it not?  Let's say that the GM has the NPC lie, and we pretend it's a different person.  The GM is determining if and how the lie is detectable, and on whatever counts for failure to detect the lie, presents the information as truth.  The players then make a choice based on this information, which was imagined by, instantiated by, and presented by the GM.  Is there something magical about a fictional person that makes this different in some way?  How does that work?


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## FrozenNorth (Jul 19, 2022)

Ovinomancer said:


> Ok.  My point is that this 'trust' is entirely based on faith, can be abused easily, and there's often no way to tell -- you cannot tell if it's truth or deception in most of how 5e plays out.  So it's an article of faith, then.  Do you play with strangers often, or just with a home group?  How do you work with this trust when playing with strangers?



Easy, I’m always the DM. 

More seriously, it depends.  I probably wouldn’t commit to a long term campaign with someone I didn’t know.  For a one-shot or two-shot, I give the benefit of the doubt.  If wrong, well, I know that I will probably not want to play with them again.  



Ovinomancer said:


> These are things being asked to generate thought, not to prove a point.  I'm finding a lot of the hardline stances taken in this thread to be odd, in that they only rely on faith for their operation.  Maybe that's not a bad thing, but it would be nice to see it acknowledged.



It’s a social game.  Of course you are going to rely on the social contract.  I don’t think this is relying on faith more than any other game.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 19, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> Again, improvising is planning and executing simultaneously, so whether or not improvising is invisible railroading depends on what you planned, same as with pre-planned content. Invisible railroading involves presenting a choice that is ostensibly meaningful but manipulating things so the results are the same no matter what the players choose. So, if you improvise a decision and plan for the result to be the same either way, that’s invisible railroading. If you improvise a decision and plan for different results (or plan to improvise different results) depending on what the players choose, that is not invisible railroading.



This doesn't make sense to me, I don't understand what this means in practice. Please respond to the actual examples or make your own. 

GM describes that there is a room with a red and a green door. Please tell me what according to you are acceptable methods for the GM to decide what is behind the green door when a PC decides to open it. 



Charlaquin said:


> But, again, invisible railroading is presenting a choice as meaningful that isn’t actually meaningful. That is lying, unless you have _explicit_ consent ahead of time.



It is framing a situation, then deciding what happens once the players declare an action. The only 'lie' here is the pretence that the world is objective and real even though the GM is making it up. But everyone knows this to be true, even though they might not always be sure when and why the GM is making the stuff up. 



Charlaquin said:


> A general “sure the DM can do whatever they want” is not explicit.



It absolutely covers it. How would it not?

Is according to the rules of D&D the GM allowed to describe that there is a red and green door? Is according to the rules of D&D the GM allowed to decide what is behind the red and green doors? Answer to both is clearly "yes." That's all that is happening here.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 19, 2022)

Ovinomancer said:


> Rather, it doesn't matter to the player unless you get caught.  From the player perspective, they cannot tell if you're operating with integrity or not.  In fact, as I've tried to drive at with my example, acting with integrity can look like acting without it to the player, especially if there's an uncommon run of luck on the dice.  Too much of the system is hidden behind the GM for the player to be able to tell.  So a successful game where the player didn't catch you out on anything could mean that you did railroad and did it well or that you didn't.  They can't tell.  If the players cannot tell, what is the value of the GM's principled approach to the player?



They cannot tell on specific instance, but it is likely that over a longer period of time differing principles would lead to a different subjective player experience. Like for example if the GM consistently fudges and illusionises so that the most dramatically appropriate thing happens, then it will in the long run produce a rather different player experience than if the GM sticks to the prep and lets the dice fall where they may, even though occasionally the latter will produce dramatically appropriate thigs too.

But basically if the GM would sparingly do such manipulations, I don't think it would noticeably affect the player experience. I have my of principles regarding such things when I GM, but they're really just for my own enjoyment. Like it is more exiting for me as GM if I don't fudge, so I don't.


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## Mort (Jul 19, 2022)

Ovinomancer said:


> Rather, it doesn't matter to the player unless you get caught.  From the player perspective, they cannot tell if you're operating with integrity or not.  In fact, as I've tried to drive at with my example, acting with integrity can look like acting without it to the player, especially if there's an uncommon run of luck on the dice.  Too much of the system is hidden behind the GM for the player to be able to tell.  So a successful game where the player didn't catch you out on anything could mean that you did railroad and did it well or that you didn't.  They can't tell.  If the players cannot tell, what is the value of the GM's principled approach to the player?




If the GM adopts a principled approach from the getgo then there is no chance they overuse the technique (or are sloppy, even with small/limited use) and end up harming the players' experience at some point.


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## Ovinomancer (Jul 19, 2022)

Mort said:


> If the GM adopts a principled approach from the getgo then there is no chance they overuse the technique (or are sloppy, even with small/limited use) and end up harming the players' experience at some point.



Hmm.  So there's no way that 100% honesty can have a negative player experience?  I think this is a core divide on the fudging debates, so I'm not inclined to take it on faith, so to speak.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 19, 2022)

Ovinomancer said:


> Rather, it doesn't matter to the player unless you get caught.



when you do slip up and get caught how do you think the players will feel?


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 19, 2022)

FrozenNorth said:


> True, but I think this is independent from the railroad/non-railroad question.



more side or parralell.. it's about being open and honest.   IT's about not telling someone you have a map when you don't (and driving them nuts as they try to map something that is out of an mc escher painting...


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 20, 2022)

Ovinomancer said:


> Hmm.  So there's no way that 100% honesty can have a negative player experience?  I think this is a core divide on the fudging debates, so I'm not inclined to take it on faith, so to speak.



that is intresting... I have a 100% honesty style and I will tell you it does have drawbacks.

the biggest one is some surprises don't work. another one is sometimes I have to admit to things that are embracing. 

However I do ALSO try to branch out. Right now I am both playing in and running a curse of strahd and for that adventure I am not as honest as I have been with my own worlds.   Although I did out right tell them when they hit the hook to the Amber temple that "Look you need to be this tall to ride that ride... and on your tip toes you aint hitting it yet"


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## Mort (Jul 20, 2022)

Ovinomancer said:


> Hmm.  So there's no way that 100% honesty can have a negative player experience?  I think this is a core divide on the fudging debates, so I'm not inclined to take it on faith, so to speak.




I suppose it can, the question becomes does it have LESS drawbacks and does it fit more with what the DM and the players want from the group.

Though, let's be clear, we are talking with honesty in either telling the players up front that railroading will/might happen and/or an attempt at a lack of railroading (which are actually two very different approaches). Not honesty from the DM promising to NEVER deceive the players (and in particular their PCs) within the context of the game itself.

Further, I think the "best" play experience comes from the DM and players being fully on the same page as to the expectations of the game. I think problems arise when the DM expects/provides one kind of play experience and the players expect/play toward something different. So, yes, I do think honesty as to what kind of play experience is being provided will enhance the game much more than any chance it might harm it.

Now in most cases with D&D the DM is MUCH more in control of the play experience and certainly can deceive the players as to what kind of play is actually being done (the DM holds almost all the cards, as it were) but I do think this will, if not immediately then eventually detract more than it helps the play experience.


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## Charlaquin (Jul 20, 2022)

Ovinomancer said:


> You'll need to make that clarification clear for me.  How is a GM presenting information that is false to drive an outcome different from an author presenting false information to drive to an outcome different?  Just pointing out that it exists in different media is not sufficient to support your claim.  Fundamentally, we're talking about false presentation of information with a different future outcome in mind.



Because in a book or movie or whatever, the media is consumed passively. There is no expectation that the reader or viewer can make decisions that will affect the narrative. If there was such an expectation, like, I don’t know, a choose your own adventure book, but all the “choices” lead to the same outcome, _then_ we would have an accurate analogy. And I think anyone who bought that book would be rightly annoyed, as they really had no ability to choose their own adventure at all. Might as well have just been a regular book at that point.

It’s not the narration being unreliable that’s the problem, it’s creating an expectation of audience agency, but not actually delivering that agency, all the while trying to maintain the facade of that agency.


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## Charlaquin (Jul 20, 2022)

Ovinomancer said:


> Rather, it doesn't matter to the player unless you get caught.  From the player perspective, they cannot tell if you're operating with integrity or not.  In fact, as I've tried to drive at with my example, acting with integrity can look like acting without it to the player, especially if there's an uncommon run of luck on the dice.  Too much of the system is hidden behind the GM for the player to be able to tell.



Right, which is exactly why it’s such an egregious violation of trust not to act with integrity.


Ovinomancer said:


> So a successful game where the player didn't catch you out on anything could mean that you did railroad and did it well or that you didn't.  They can't tell.  If the players cannot tell, what is the value of the GM's principled approach to the player?



Being able to make choices that matter… which is the entire point of RPGs. Also like, not being lied to, which is a basic matter of respect.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 20, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> Being able to make choices that matter… which is the entire point of RPGs. Also like, not being lied to, which is a basic matter of respect.



100% this

if you sleep with my fiancé and I never find out... you still cheated on me


wait flip this around... if as a player I say "crit" when I really rolled a 3 and the DM doesn't catch me that is all good right?!?!?


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## Charlaquin (Jul 20, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> This doesn't make sense to me, I don't understand what this means in practice. Please respond to the actual examples or make your own.
> 
> GM describes that there is a room with a red and a green door. Please tell me what according to you are acceptable methods for the GM to decide what is behind the green door when a PC decides to open it.



It doesn’t particularly matter what’s behind either door, because that’s not an informed decision. No agency is being violated if there’s an ogre behind both doors. Now, if the players have some information that might influence their decision - for example some door guardian has given them a riddle that indicates one door leads to safety and the other leads to certain death, it is violating their agency if both doors actually lead to safety. 


Crimson Longinus said:


> It is framing a situation, then deciding what happens once the players declare an action.



Yes, but if that framing contains information that the players rely on to make a decision, and that decision has no actual impact on the outcome, then they have been deceived. The “lie” there is that their decision matters, that they’ve been given information they can leverage to affect a desired outcome, when in fact, the outcome is the same regardless.


Crimson Longinus said:


> It absolutely covers it. How would it not?
> 
> Is according to the rules of D&D the GM allowed to describe that there is a red and green door? Is according to the rules of D&D the GM allowed to decide what is behind the red and green doors? Answer to both is clearly "yes." That's all that is happening here.



The red and green door example illuminates nothing because the players aren’t really making a decision there; at least not a meaningful one.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 20, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> It doesn’t particularly matter what’s behind either door, because that’s not an informed decision. No agency is being violated if there’s an ogre behind both doors. Now, if the players have some information that might influence their decision - for example some door guardian has given them a riddle that indicates one door leads to safety and the other leads to certain death, it is violating their agency if both doors actually lead to safety.
> 
> Yes, but if that framing contains information that the players rely on to make a decision, and that decision has no actual impact on the outcome, then they have been deceived. The “lie” there is that their decision matters, that they’ve been given information they can leverage to affect a desired outcome, when in fact, the outcome is the same regardless.
> 
> The red and green door example illuminates nothing because the players aren’t really making a decision there; at least not a meaningful one.



But the example in the OP are basically like that. They're not about informed choices, they're just about random 'doors' that create an illusion of a larger objectively existing space. (The clue one isn't like that, but it also doesn't actually contain illusionism, so I'm not sure what it is doing on the list.)

I agree with you that messing with informed choices is generally a bad call. But that's not what's happening here. So it seems that we might not actually disagree, at least significantly.


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## Mort (Jul 20, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> 100% this
> 
> if you sleep with my fiancé and I never find out... you still cheated on me
> 
> ...



Though keep in mind, D&D (all iterations, as far as I'm aware) makes it VERY clear that the DM cannot be guilty of cheating while the players 100% can.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 20, 2022)

Mort said:


> Though keep in mind, D&D (all iterations, as far as I'm aware) makes it VERY clear that the DM cannot be guilty of cheating while the players 100% can.



Yep, like it or not, by the rules the GM is allowed to overrule the rules. The social contract is another matter.


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## Charlaquin (Jul 20, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> But the example in the OP are basically like that. They're not about informed choices, they're just about random 'doors' that create an illusion of a larger objectively existing space. (The clue one isn't like that, but it also doesn't actually contain illusionism, so I'm not sure what it is doing on the list.)
> 
> I agree with you that messing with informed choices is generally a bad call. But that's not what's happening here. So it seems that we might not actually disagree, at least significantly.



The 10-room dungeon example contains plenty of informed decisions. Or at least it should, if the dungeon doesn’t suck.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 20, 2022)

Mort said:


> Though keep in mind, D&D (all iterations, as far as I'm aware) makes it VERY clear that the DM cannot be guilty of cheating while the players 100% can.



but is it cheating if you don't get caught?


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 20, 2022)

FrozenNorth said:


> Case 2: the GM is not lying, but the player does not know that.  This goes back to taking steps to build trust, including being upfront with GM decisions and volunteering to roll in the open.  That said, there are absolutely players that have great difficulty trusting the GM regardless of the GM’s actions.




See my comments re "scar tissue".


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 20, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> The 10-room dungeon example contains plenty of informed decisions. Or at least it should, if the dungeon doesn’t suck.



It is quite possible that by your standards it would suck*. But it doesn't contain informed choices regarding direction selection, which is the part that is being illusionised. From player perspective it would be similar like if the GM randomly drew a new room from some deck of cards when the PCs decide to move to the next area. It's just that in this instance the GM has arranged the order of the cards. But even if they hadn't, the player choices wouldn't be any more informed.

(* And mine too. This would probably produce rather nonsensical space. But official D&D dungeons often are completely nonsensical, so that really isn't super relevant criticism. I suppose one could carefully craft the sort of rooms and the sort of framing for the whole thing which would make it seem sensible.)


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 20, 2022)

Mort said:


> Though keep in mind, D&D (all iterations, as far as I'm aware) makes it VERY clear that the DM cannot be guilty of cheating while the players 100% can.




To be really blunt, at least without qualification, that position is not exactly the game's advice's finest hour.


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## Mort (Jul 20, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> but is it cheating if you don't get caught?




For players, yes, of course. "Successful" cheating is still cheating.


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## Mort (Jul 20, 2022)

Thomas Shey said:


> To be really blunt, at least without qualification, that position is not exactly the game's advice's finest hour.



And yet it is one of the few pieces of advice that is 100% consistent through ALL editions of D&D.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 20, 2022)

Mort said:


> And yet it is one of the few pieces of advice that is 100% consistent through ALL editions of D&D.




At the risk of being wry, "And?"


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## Ovinomancer (Jul 20, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> when you do slip up and get caught how do you think the players will feel?



About the same as when they think I've slipped up but I haven't.  Like when they get ogres anyway because that's what the dice say just one time too many.

The argument that one way always fails and causes grief is unfounded.  We can tell this because we have WotC APs, which have many moments that align to the OP, where the module tells you to engage in this kind of behavior.  Heck, there's DMG advice about fudging that aligns here.  So, if we assume that merely a large plurality run the game according to this advice, then there's a lot of games out there doing this.  And they seem to be doing just fine.  WotC, at least, continues to sell APs.  So the idea that this approach always fails into acrimony is false on this account.  Secondly, it doesn't even acknowledge that since the behavior is largely opaque to the players, that a run of bad dice behind the screen looks exactly like the kind of failure you're discussing here.  Finally, discounting an approach because the overdone failure state has unfortunate characteristics is exactly like throwing stone whilst living in a glass house -- all game approaches fail at some level of degeneracy.


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## Mort (Jul 20, 2022)

Thomas Shey said:


> At the risk of being wry, "And?"




And obviously it endures - that's all.


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## Ovinomancer (Jul 20, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> Because in a book or movie or whatever, the media is consumed passively. There is no expectation that the reader or viewer can make decisions that will affect the narrative. If there was such an expectation, like, I don’t know, a choose your own adventure book, but all the “choices” lead to the same outcome, _then_ we would have an accurate analogy. And I think anyone who bought that book would be rightly annoyed, as they really had no ability to choose their own adventure at all. Might as well have just been a regular book at that point.
> 
> It’s not the narration being unreliable that’s the problem, it’s creating an expectation of audience agency, but not actually delivering that agency, all the while trying to maintain the facade of that agency.



So, then, your argument is that an unreliable narrator in other media can never engender hostile or hurt feelings in a reader because they have no expectation of agency?  That the belief in the correctness of the narration holds no relationship whatsoever to the belief in the expectation that any given choice mattered?  

Your argument hinges on the idea that agency in creating fiction is somehow special.  That GM dishonesty impacts that special agency in ways that are always negative.  The problem here is that the GM is restricting agency in lots of ways that are not available to the players to know until they thwart action declarations.  So you're calling out some subset of the restriction of agency as especially bad, but it only hinges on an honest argument, and one that doesn't apply if the GM is being dishonest through a NPC agent.


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## Charlaquin (Jul 20, 2022)

Ovinomancer said:


> So, then, your argument is that an unreliable narrator in other media can never engender hostile or hurt feelings in a reader because they have no expectation of agency?  That the belief in the correctness of the narration holds no relationship whatsoever to the belief in the expectation that any given choice mattered?



My argument is that an unreliable narrator in passively-consumed media is a categorically different thing that a DM in D&D presenting false choices that don’t really matter. Like, it’s apples to streaming series. The issue is one of false agency, not one of… narratives… containing… falsehoods? I don’t know, it’s bizarre to me to even make the comparison.


Ovinomancer said:


> Your argument hinges on the idea that agency in creating fiction is somehow special.  That GM dishonesty impacts that special agency in ways that are always negative.



It’s not always negative. If the players are informed and consenting, it’s perfectly fine, even potentially positive. I don’t know how many times or in how many different ways I have to say that the problem is in the deception - in presenting a decision as though it will have an impact on what will happen next, when in fact it doesn’t.


Ovinomancer said:


> The problem here is that the GM is restricting agency in lots of ways that are not available to the players to know until they thwart action declarations.  So you're calling out some subset of the restriction of agency as especially bad, but it only hinges on an honest argument, and one that doesn't apply if the GM is being dishonest through a NPC agent.



Again, restricting player agency isn’t necessary bad in and of itself. What’s bad is trying to trick the players into thinking they have agency, when in fact they don’t.


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## Maxperson (Jul 20, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> it changes how I see the world, and my character interacts with the world...
> 
> back in 3e we had a guy DM who was not the best at it... but he was a friend and we tried to work with it. When one day he told us the size of the city we were in was more miles across then the state we live in (over 100 miles)  we went bonkers... especially when it had a population of a normal D&D town... later we went into a dungeon and we had just traveled north from this kingdom size city but had not gotten to the mountains... when we came out the mountains were to our east... we came out the same door we went in, and there was no magic... so the guy trying to map (since the DM didn't map the world) started going a bit nuts with 'moving mountains'.  It got worse yet a bit later when we took a boat from the eastern side of the super city less then a day west and somehow managed to make it to another city... when we pointed out we were still WELL inside the size of the city he labeled it he didn't know what to say.
> Then came the dinosour... that ran through the gate to the center of town and to the ocean... remember this city was over 100 miles, so how long did it take the dino to do it... 3 rounds. 18 seconds to go 100 miles that is 6ish miles per second...someone figuted that to be about 22,000 miles per hour.  when asked if there was a sonic boom he got mad.



Heh.  When I was in Jr. High and High school, one DM I played with had a different distance issue.  He was okay with where mountains were in relation to the city.   His issue was that every single dangerous place, village, or dungeon was within 3 days of town.  All of them.  These poor cities must have been on the edge of extinction with all the nearby danger.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 20, 2022)

Mort said:


> And obviously it endures - that's all.




Wouldn't exactly be the first time bad ideas lasted a long time.


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## Charlaquin (Jul 20, 2022)

Maxperson said:


> Heh.  When I was in Jr. High and High school, one DM I played with had a different distance issue.  He was okay with where mountains were in relation to the city.   His issue was that every single dangerous place, village, or dungeon was within 3 days of town.  All of them.  These poor cities must have been on the edge of extinction with all the nearby danger.


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## Remathilis (Jul 20, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> Of course the GM should be honest. Everyone should be honest. Honesty is pretty universally regarded as an important virtue.
> 
> This is exactly why I am so vehemently opposed to DMs using these deceptive tactics. The DM is the only one who can police their own honesty. That is a tremendous amount of power, and thus requires a tremendous amount of responsibility. D&D _requires_ trust between the players and the DM to function, so breaking that trust is an egregious abuse of power and act of disrespect towards the players.



As a side effect: are you also against DMs fudging rolls or modifying encounters in the PCs favor? For example, calling a nat 20 a regular hit rather than a crit to avoid killing a PC outright, or secretly lowering a monster's HP because you overestimated the CR of a creature? Or are you 100% play the die as rolled and if it's a tpk, so be it?


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## bloodtide (Jul 20, 2022)

Mort said:


> No, Player choice is exactly what it sounds like. Do we go eliminate the goblins or go rat catching. Do we stop the hermit building the world ending machine or the vampire in his castle. If we pick one over the other, hopefully that makes the story different. And it wasn't just preplanned where there was actually only one choice.



Right, the big player choice in the game is the metagame "what will we do today".  Ok, but after that there are no "big" choices.



EzekielRaiden said:


> I may not agree with Max about much, but he has the right of it. Deception is generically wrong. This is not an _argument_. This is a moral _axiom_.




Right.  But then think of all the things in life where deception is OK.  Performance Magic is pure deception, but no one says it's wrong.  The vast majority of fiction used deception to shock and awe the audience,  no one says it's wrong.  Surprise Parties are common, and you often have to deceive the person it's for, and no one thinks it's wrong.  A vast majority of games  involve deception, and no one says that is wrong.  The vast majority of team sports involve deception, and no one thinks that is wrong.  


EzekielRaiden said:


> You do not need to be _deceptive_ to create surprise. Others, like @pemerton, have shown examples. Further, as I have repeatedly said, there is a difference between fooling the _characters_ (which results in players being surprised due to incongruity in _their understanding_ of the fictional context) and fooling the _players_ (which results in players believing things about the _kind of game they're playing_ which are not true.)



It is impossible to fool, surprise or anything else "the character", as the character is not real.  


Charlaquin said:


> This is a non-sequitur. You can tell the players “hey, I’m going to change things around behind the scenes so you don’t miss the cool stuff I prepped” without ruining any surprises at all. And there’s really no negative impact to doing so, so I don’t understand where all the pushback is coming from.



I don't get this at all.  So the DM just says some random stuff and can get away with it because the players "agree" to it?




GMforPowergamers said:


> a real life example would be a 3e game.



So, I use all this as a non example.  ONE player decided to do a silly "love" plot and the other players choose to join with the kobolds.  Ok, so this has nothing to do with the Sunless Citadel adventure:  the DM can run the game through a hard railroad and the players choices have nothing to do with that.  


GMforPowergamers said:


> I can't remember the name of the town near the citadel but the PCs negotiated an alliance between the kobolds and the city... now I had to scramble no more could I just wing 'have sword will travel' the PCs were building a kingdom I didn't see coming. So I inserted a legend of an old mine where a great king long ago mines some super metal...



So, just to check that "suddenly improving" that the mine just happened to have some super metal is no Railroading as the players CHOSE to go there.  



GMforPowergamers said:


> My plan at that point was to have the mine be mostly empty but have some hard to get diamonds and adamantine in it



So you had a plan and changed it based on some random stuff the players said.  So, because the players randomly said something this is not a railroad.  That makes no sense. 


GMforPowergamers said:


> At no point did I direct any of this game on rails... game 1 I did not imagine the Adder Knights forming a kingdom of Kobolds, Humans and Gnomes... if anything I WAS THE WATER not the PCs...



Right, you just sat back and let the players DM the game and made everything in the game that they liked.  The players want X, and you rolled out the red carpet and said "ok".  But I also notice there is no adventure here, it's just free form role playing.  Your just sitting back and making the game reality whatever the players want.




GMforPowergamers said:


> correct... in order to not be a railroad you have to be willing to throw an adventure away. (hence why I said I DO railroad if we all agree to play an adventure like curse of strahd)  the choices in game have to matter. if the PCs go a way the DM didn't plan the DM has to let them, and modify there world to adjust (and a lot of time this means not using things you preped and making stuff up on the fly)



I disagree.  If the players are going to just toss the adventure away on a whim, then they can find another DM.  This is not about player choice, this is about not being a jerk.  



Mort said:


> 3. PCs are going from point A to point B and encounter 2 doors. But these PCs decide to do some research, through tracking, augury, interviewing locals, whatever. They discover taking the door on the right leads to a shorter, but more dangerous route, while the path on the left is longer but less dangerous. The group feeling rushed for time, takes the supposedly shorter route. They encounter an ogre vanquish it and move on. Would some in the group feel cheated if they found out that had they taken the other route they would have faced the same ogre under the same circumstances? I can see how they would!



Well, I can agree with this.  IF the players take TIME and RESOURCES to look and plan ahead knowledgeably, then they can make an informed decision.  



Maxperson said:


> If you're playing you probably aren't going to be aware that you were railroaded.  That's how illusionism works.  Which in my opinion is what makes it worse than overt railroading.  At least with the overt method I can see it and opt to leave the game, rather than continuing to play a game where my choices don't matter at least some of the time.




So if your having fun and enjoying the game, do such things matter?



Maxperson said:


> There's no possible way to avoid that encounter.




The big question here is how and why did avoiding encounters become this big badge of honor player thing?  How is choosing not to play the game such a big victory?  A great many players would say encounters are a big part of the fun of the game.  A lot of platers would much rather have an encounter then a "well nothing happens" for hours.  So why is avoiding one a good thing?  

The only way it makes sense is if the players are just hostile and are trying to ruin the game for the DM.


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## Charlaquin (Jul 20, 2022)

Remathilis said:


> As a side effect: are you also against DMs fudging rolls or modifying encounters in the PCs favor? For example, calling a nat 20 a regular hit rather than a crit to avoid killing a PC outright, or secretly lowering a monster's HP because you overestimated the CR of a creature? Or are you 100% play the die as rolled and if it's a tpk, so be it?



Yes, I’m against fudging, either in the PCs favor or against them.


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## Charlaquin (Jul 20, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> I don't get this at all.  So the DM just says some random stuff and can get away with it because the players "agree" to it?



What are you talking about?


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## bloodtide (Jul 20, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> I mean I think basically all the examples in the OP are just that. Guiding meandering players toward the interesting stuff, whilst creating an illusion of a bigger world.
> 
> Like sure, when the players say that they go to the forest the GM could just directly frame them at the witch's cottage. But it probably creates a feeling that the forest is large and full of stuff and they just happen to stumble on one of the many mysterious things in it, if it is done like in the wilderness example.
> 
> It seems pretty innocent to me.



I agree.



Charlaquin said:


> I never said you need to tell the players what was and wasn’t modified. Just tell them, from the beginning of the campaign, that you plan to modify things, so that if they have a problem with that, they can voice it.



So the first not so big problem is the irrational crazy player reaction.  Even mention a railroad, and some players will refuse to play and run away from the game screaming.    And, fine, let them run away and find some other game.   Though the problem comes where player A is the ride or brother or best pal of player B.  So if player A runs away from the game screaming "railroad bad....aaaaaahhh!", then they take player B with them.  So, to keep players you need to deceive crazy player A.

Also, you can tell all the players Railroad all the live long day.  But, as you can see in the thread, everyone has a different word salad definition.  So the player thinks 'railroading' is X, but they can't see it or even know it's happening....other then the DM said so.  But when the player makes 100 choices and "feels on rails" then are fine thinking there really is no railroad.


Charlaquin said:


> What are you talking about?



A couple of pages ago, someone said that a DM can just say something like "attention players I am changing things behind the scenes" and when the players nod yes and say "ok", then the DM is allowed to do anything as they now have player permision.  

So if a DM, by themselves, moves an ogre, it's always wrong.  DM asks players to "move things around" and the players say "ok", then the DM can do whatever they want.


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## Charlaquin (Jul 20, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> So the first not so big problem is the irrational crazy player reaction.  Even mention a railroad, and some players will refuse to play and run away from the game screaming.



Which should be a sign that they don’t want you to do it. When people don’t want you to do something, the appropriate response is to _not do it_, not to do it anyway and try to hide it.


bloodtide said:


> And, fine, let them run away and find some other game.   Though the problem comes where player A is the ride or brother or best pal of player B.  So if player A runs away from the game screaming "railroad bad....aaaaaahhh!", then they take player B with them.  So, to keep players you need to deceive crazy player A.



Or, get this: you could not railroad and keep both players. Wild, I know.


bloodtide said:


> Also, you can tell all the players Railroad all the live long day.  But, as you can see in the thread, everyone has a different word salad definition.  So the player thinks 'railroading' is X, but they can't see it or even know it's happening....other then the DM said so.  But when the player makes 100 choices and "feels on rails" then are fine thinking there really is no railroad.



Which is why it’s important to discuss the matter openly and honestly with your group, so everyone is on the same page regarding what is or isn’t acceptable to them in the game.


bloodtide said:


> A couple of pages ago, someone said that a DM can just say something like "attention players I am changing things behind the scenes" and when the players nod yes and say "ok", then the DM is allowed to do anything as they now have player permision.



Yes, that was me. 


bloodtide said:


> So if a DM, by themselves, moves an ogre, it's always wrong.  DM asks players to "move things around" and the players say "ok", then the DM can do whatever they want.



Yes, because moving things around behind the scenes isn’t _inherently_ wrong, what’s wrong is doing it without the players’ knowledge or consent. If you talk to them about it and they agree they don’t have a problem with it, then go right ahead, have fun.


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 20, 2022)

I've probably missed some posts I would normally respond to, but this is already on the order of a dozen quotes and my posts run long as it is.


Crimson Longinus said:


> Yes, I did read it. Did you read it and consider what actually happens in the examples? They most rely on the player intuition to treat the fictional space like actual real physical space. But of course everyone actually knows that it isn't like that. GM made that up. <snip> It is part of the GMs job to get the layer believe that made up things are real and have them treat them as such.



This explains some of the logic behind your past comments, which were opaque to me before.

Yes, I agree it is the DM's job to make a thing which is not real, _in the sense that a table is real,_ seem to be real _in the sense that a table is real_. That is NOT the same as "It is the DM's job to make the player think _the game is actually what they claim the game is_, when in fact the game is NOT that." This is a gulf so large it is very difficult for me to believe you truly think the two are absolutely identical. They are not. At all. This is what I keep referring to when I say "fooling the characters" (diegetic, in-universe, "Watsonian" misapprehension of what the "real" contents of the fictional world are) versus "fooling the players" (_in the real world_ deceptions about the kind of experience being offered to the player.)

If I do everything in my power to get you to believe that you are, in fact, buying a plot of land on the Moon, even though you _are not actually_ buying a plot of land on the Moon, that is deceptive. Even if I am extremely careful to never _legally_ say or imply that you are buying a plot of land on the Moon, it is still deception. (Whether or not it is _fraud_ remains for a court to decide.)

Further, you know what the best technique--literally foolproof, in fact, so long as you do it consistently--for getting a player to treat the contents of the fictional world as though they were real? _Actually have them behave like real things do_. Which is (part of) what I'm asking for. The deception is not foolproof; even if you uphold the deception indefinitely, it's always possible to see the man behind the curtain. If you _aren't_ deceiving, if you _actually do_ model the world honestly and fairly and consistently, there's nothing to see behind. The world is exactly what the players think it is.



Charlaquin said:


> Of course the GM should be honest. Everyone should be honest. Honesty is pretty universally regarded as an important virtue.
> 
> This is exactly why I am so vehemently opposed to DMs using these deceptive tactics. The DM is the only one who can police their own honesty. That is a tremendous amount of power, and thus requires a tremendous amount of responsibility. D&D _requires_ trust between the players and the DM to function, so breaking that trust is an egregious abuse of power and act of disrespect towards the players.



Well-said.



Crimson Longinus said:


> If everyone has agreed that the GM runs the game in the manner they feel most comfortable with, then no one is being lied to.



Absolutely not. "In the manner they feel most comfortable with" IS NOT affirmative consent. Affirmative consent is what is needed here. As I have explicitly said, several times.

Why is it so friggin' hard to just SAY, "Hey guys. I see the rules as suggestions, and I believe my role as DM is to push things in the right direction if they get off track. So, some of the time, I'm going to invisibly bend or break the rules, or make it seem like you're in control when you aren't. I promise not to do this for any reason other than to make the game more enjoyable for you guys. As long as you're okay with that, we should all have a great time." That's all that's required! Just a couple sentences! _*Why is this so hard?!*_



Ovinomancer said:


> You'll need to make that clarification clear for me.  How is a GM presenting information that is false to drive an outcome different from an author presenting false information to drive to an outcome different?  Just pointing out that it exists in different media is not sufficient to support your claim.  Fundamentally, we're talking about false presentation of information with a different future outcome in mind.



Several reasons, and I'm honestly confused why you would think they're the same. (For simplicitly, I will generally assume the work is a _book_, and thus the audience is one or more _readers_, but this applies to most forms of media.)

1. Audiences do not have agency. They are passive observers. By engaging with a work (book, film, TV show, etc.) they are necessarily accepting that they have no control whatsoever over the process of the narrative. A reader cannot change what words are written in the book without, in essence, writing a new book that plagiarizes some portion of the old one.
2. By contrast, TTRPG players in a railroaded game are being _told_ they have agency when, in fact, they do not--whatever agency they have is at best provisional and at worst completely illusory, as the OP put in the very first sentence: "What if I told you it was possible to *lock your players on a tight railroad*, but *make them think every decision...mattered*?" (Emphasis added.)
3. Video games actually present us with a useful point of comparison here. By definition, a video game can only have a fixed set of ending options, purely because video games are _finite things_. Only an irrational player could expect a video game to have all possible endings accounted for. However, many RPGs feature multiple _different_ endings, depending on player choices. And we see a very similar argument to the one we're having here about railroading whenever a video game offers endings which either (a) do not make sense within the context of the story, or (b) are essentially identical despite the players making very different choices and being _told_ that those choices would matter. Mass Effect 3 is probably the poster child of this problem, where they had built up choices and history across three games, with some of those choices being pretty major, like whether to spare the last queen of an alien hive-mind race or whether to hold onto data acquired from _utterly deplorable_ medical experiments but which could potentially save a species. By the end, despite all the build-up and even having major, story-ending choices come up even in ME3 itself, the game boiled down to _your choice of what color the explosion would be_, and how _damaging_ that explosion would be. People were rightly _pissed_ about the ending of Mass Effect, because it boiled down literally ALL of the decisions you'd made before into a singular boring number.....which you could increase regardless by just _doing the PVP mode_. So they essentially made all the choices from all three games meaningless, and then left you with a final A/B/C ending _despite having explicitly said they would not do that_. So, even though some amount of "railroading" (really authorial force, but whatever) was accepted, even _expected_, the players pretty clearly expected that SOME consequences would still come up and matter, when in fact essentially nothing did. The illusion was revealed, and the players HATED it. The "extended cut" ending was a band-aid on a bullet-wound as far as I'm concerned, but at least it showed they were trying.

Sooo...yeah. Even in contexts where railroading is _logically required_ because, y'know, there's only finitely many things a computer program can _do_, there's still often expectations that choices will matter enough to truly affect endings and consequences. Video games are a sort of midway-point between a pure passive audience experience (books, movies, etc.) and a pure audience-driven experience (like a TTRPG where, as the OP wrote, "every decision they [the players] made mattered.") And wouldn't you know it, video games have people respond rather badly to railroading! You can see a similar, but perhaps more useful, example with the controversial "white phosphorus scene" in _Spec Ops: The Line_, where the player is _forced_ to use white phosphorus (a _horrifically damaging_ chemical weapon) on a target they believe to be an enemy camp. Turns out, it was _exclusively_ civilians, meaning if the player went ahead with dropping the white phosphorus, they've just committed a blatant war crime. Prior to that point, the game was much better about recognizing player choice, giving situations which LOOKED like they could only be solved with violence, but which were totally resolvable peacefully if the player so chose. For example, you need to disperse a crowd of civilians at one point, and are given a prompt to shoot your gun. If you shoot into the crowd, you'll kill someone innocent. But if you shoot _into the air_, the crowd will still disperse, and you won't hurt anyone doing it. 

People (again, IMO rightly) criticized _SO:TL_ for this blatant use of force in the "white phosphorus" scene. To be very clear: If you try not to shoot the white phosphorus, the game will send infinitely-respawning waves of enemies at you, so you will eventually run out of ammunition and die. You _absolutely must_ use the white phosphorus to proceed. You are _not allowed_ to not do so. And then the game will repeatedly criticize you for thinking you're a hero when you just "willingly" committed a war crime. One of the lead developers even gave the god-awful excuse that the players DID have a choice: they could choose to turn off the console and stop playing!

So yeah. In interactive media, where player decisions are _supposed_ to matter to some extent, people really dislike railroading. Even when it's obvious! This isn't new or weird or illogical. It's something that arises from the interactivity of the medium.



bloodtide said:


> Right, the big player choice in the game is the metagame "what will we do today".  Ok, but after that there are no "big" choices.



That's an incredibly impoverished view of player choice. You're basically saying all choices ever made in every campaign ever in the history of humanity were completely without meaning. That's...a stance, I guess, but I can't say I expect anyone to agree with it.

More importantly for this conversation, however, *IF* that "metagame" choice of what to play today IS in fact presented honestly and fairly--so the players are _explicitly_ informed in advance that the game may involve the illusion of choice and/or a pretense of obeying the rules while actually breaking them--then, _as I have repeatedly said_, THAT IS PERFECTLY FINE. Because you have, in fact, respected player agency. They get the chance to decide for themselves whether that's a game they want to participate in or not. You have not deceived them.

But that's not what people actually DO, is it? Because in that case, the rails aren't _invisible_. Oh, the DM doesn't _call attention_ to them, sure. But they're still there. The problem isn't, and never was, _whether or not there are rails_. The problem is, and has always been, _whether any present rails are invisible._

It is the invisibility that is the problem. And it is the invisibility that is the deception. This is why the "magic trick" analogy and the "reading a book" analogy and indeed pretty much every other possible analogy you could come up with always fall down. With a magic trick, it's right in the name: it's _trickery_. You know it isn't real, it will merely have the illusion of being real. (Well, it will be physically real in the sense that you will see physical phenomena, but it won't be "real" in the sense that the _apparent_ physical processes observed will not be what is actually happening. This is the problem with the word "real"--it has _several_ different senses and it's very easy to get them jumbled up.)



bloodtide said:


> Performance Magic is pure deception, but no one says it's wrong.  The vast majority of fiction used deception to shock and awe the audience,  no one says it's wrong.  Surprise Parties are common, and you often have to deceive the person it's for, and no one thinks it's wrong.  A vast majority of games  involve deception, and no one says that is wrong.  The vast majority of team sports involve deception, and no one thinks that is wrong.



Again, with _literally every single one of these_, the problem is that any so-called "deception" _is part of the initial buy-in_. When you watch a magic _trick_, you know it's an illusion, that the trick COULD be explained with mundane stuff. There is no "deception" of this kind at all in fiction, since...the book is literally right there and doesn't contain anything other than what it contains, so I have no idea what you mean by that. (There _is_ deception in the sense of _fooling characters_, but you cannot lead a reader to believe that reading the book is somehow not actually reading a book...) A surprise party is not a deception, it's just unexpected; unexpected things are not deceptions. I would actually call it wrong to intentionally deceive someone about the party though, so that's...not a great example.

Games and sports, again, _you are buying into the idea that you are competing against someone_. When you compete, _that person_ will try to deceive you about _what strategies they are using_. That is "fooling the character" deception.

Now, imagine if you wanted to play rugby, but your group of friends think you won't actually enjoy playing rugby. (Let's say you happen to live in the US, so you have no idea what "rugby" actually entails, other than being a contact sport similar to gridiron.) So they invent a careful deception to make you _think_ you're playing rugby. They never, _technically_, SAY that you're playing rugby, but they never contradict you when you say you are doing so, and because you have no reason to look deeper, you believe you are playing rugby. Then something breaks the illusion--maybe you become a real enthusiast for the sport and make a new friend on an online forum, and you suddenly realize that all the things you thought were true about rugby are in fact false, because your friends made you believe you were learning and playing rugby when you were _not_ learning nor playing rugby.

Do you not see how there is a difference between "I want to make my opponent think I'm going to dodge left when I will actually dodge right" and "I want to make my friend think he's playing rugby when he's actually playing some sport we invented on the fly"? The difference seems perfectly clear to me. And that's what I have been expressing when I contrast "fooling the character" (diegetic deception within the fictional or strategic space) and "fooling the player" (non-diegetic deception about the game itself and what the IRL human participants are actually doing.)



bloodtide said:


> It is impossible to fool, surprise or anything else "the character", as the character is not real.



If you believe that, then it is impossible for us to discuss further.

The character is a persona worn by the player. The character, as instantiated by the player, has certain beliefs about the in-fiction universe. Those beliefs may be correct, or incorrect. If those beliefs are incorrect, and were engendered by one or more NPCs, then it seems perfectly valid to say that the character has been deceived. Yes, that deception only has any value so long as the player is playing the character, but the idea is that the deception is solely confined to the actions, events, and entities that "exist" within the fictional world.

Contrast this with fooling the player. The player, who is a real living human being, has certain beliefs about what kind of game they are playing and what kind of actions they are taking _as a real human being playing a game_. Those beliefs may be correct, or incorrect. If those beliefs are incorrect, and were engendered by the DM, then it seems perfectly valid to say that the player has been deceived. More importantly, it seems perfectly valid to say that this deception is of a very different nature from the deception in the previous paragraph. Instead of being one about beliefs regarding the interaction of fictional entities within the fictional space, it is a deception about the interaction of _real-world_ entities with one another, namely, the interaction of the players with the rules and with the DM.



bloodtide said:


> I don't get this at all.  So the DM just says some random stuff and can get away with it because the players "agree" to it?



What's not to get? I mean, you're incorrect to say that the DM "just says some random stuff." The statement needs to be fairly specific, actually, though it can obviously take a variety of forms because there's a zillion ways to say the same thing. Ultimately, the DM needs to do one of two things. Either they need to state _well in advance_, "hey guys, sometimes I'm going to make it seem like you have a choice when you don't." Or, they need to state _at the moment they do it_, "hey guys, I had some stuff prepared for this, but you would miss it by taking this path, so I'm gonna shuffle some things around so that you don't miss anything cool, alright?" The first one gets affirmative consent as a blanket: the DM has been pre-approved for using a large amount of DM "force" (directly _making_ stuff happen, regardless of what the players are doing) without needing to provide notice to the players. The latter gets affirmative consent for the given moment: the DM secures buy-in for a deviation from the norm _in this case_ to use a large amount of DM force.



bloodtide said:


> So, just to check that "suddenly improving" that the mine just happened to have some super metal is no Railroading as the players CHOSE to go there.



Seems correct to me? I would personally be at least somewhat cautious with this, as it _could_ drift into railroading if one isn't careful. But this doesn't seem problematic to me: the players have chosen something which made a hard swerve in the campaign, and now the DM is responding to that. New discoveries are made, which would not have been made if the players had chosen differently. Their agency is respected, because instead of _forcing_ the players to do any particular thing, the DM is _supporting_ the direction the players chose for themselves.



bloodtide said:


> So you had a plan and changed it based on some random stuff the players said.  So, because the players randomly said something this is not a railroad.  That makes no sense.



You keep using this word "randomly." It's not "randomly" at all, neither the previous example nor this one. These are very clearly purposeful things; the players are _purposefully_ working toward creating a new political body (perhaps a city-state), and the previous stuff was about the DM _purposefully, specifically_ seeking player consent for taking a particular action. These are ABSOLUTELY NOT random. They are done with purpose and the form of the action is pretty specific. That's not random _at all_.



bloodtide said:


> Right, you just sat back and let the players DM the game and made everything in the game that they liked.  The players want X, and you rolled out the red carpet and said "ok".  But I also notice there is no adventure here, it's just free form role playing.  Your just sitting back and making the game reality whatever the players want.



Firstly? You're being incredibly rude and mocking here. Is that productive? I don't really think it is.

Second, I think your reading is completely wrong. Supporting what the players do is absolutely not the same as any of the scathing descriptions you've given here. Just because you lean into what interests the players does not mean you "let the players DM the game" or any of that stuff. It means that you recognize the stuff that excites them, gets them enthusiastic, and you work to ensure that that stuff will be supported going forward. They could quite easily _fail_ to make their desired nation. They could make it, but it might be full of problems they didn't anticipate. Or trying to make it could push them toward taking actions they find reprehensible, causing them to re-evaluate their priorities and maybe abandon the new nation idea. Or they could find that it's just a really hard, long, _tedious_ task to put together a new nation, and thus freely choose to focus on other things instead. There are probably more directions that could go that I'm not thinking of--because I wasn't present for that game and haven't the foggiest what the players' goals were.

Supporting your players' goals does not mean making a trivially-easy game where every single thing they ever ask for is instantly delivered to them on a silver platter. The fact that you assumed so, and then went full-bore for put-downs on that assumption, does not reflect well on your argument.



bloodtide said:


> I disagree.  If the players are going to just toss the adventure away on a whim, then they can find another DM.  This is not about player choice, this is about not being a jerk.



I'm sorry....you're literally going to say that the players choosing to do something which doesn't comport with an adventure _they literally don't know is coming and could not possibly predict_ makes them jerks? Really? Come on man. You're not a jerk if you tell someone you can't make it to their party when you don't realize your SO intends to propose to you at that party. That's not how this works.



bloodtide said:


> So if your having fun and enjoying the game, do such things matter?



To me? Absolutely. Because a _very large_ portion of the fun I derive from roleplaying is knowing that when I make a decision with consequences, those consequences are _because of my decision_. Likewise, when I'm playing a game, I expect the game's rules to be enforced both fairly and consistently, so that I can actually _learn to play better_. If either of these principles is violated--if my actions are irrelevant to the consequences I face, or if the rules are not fairly and consistently enforced--then nearly all joy I derive from the roleplaying experience is gone. (I say "nearly all" because if it's an entirely non-serious game, where we're just screwing around, then I can handle some fudging because I'm not there to learn to play, I'm there to goof off--the enjoyment becomes restricted mostly to "spend time with friends" and "say or do something funny," the roleplaying game being reduced to just a tool to have that happen, rather than the core of the experience.)



bloodtide said:


> The big question here is how and why did avoiding encounters become this big badge of honor player thing?  How is choosing not to play the game such a big victory?  A great many players would say encounters are a big part of the fun of the game.  A lot of platers would much rather have an encounter then a "well nothing happens" for hours.  So why is avoiding one a good thing?



You need only read Sun Tzu to get your answer: "Hence to fight and conquer in all your battles is not supreme excellence; supreme excellence consists in breaking the enemy's resistance without fighting." To fight and conquer once battle is joined is certainly excellence, but to forestall even the need to fight in the first place is _true_ excellence, because you spend no resources and take no risks, and yet still achieve your goals.



bloodtide said:


> The only way it makes sense is if the players are just hostile and are trying to ruin the game for the DM.



Not at all, and again you insert this hostility and peevishness into the players that is simply _not present_. It is rational (as Sun Tzu said above) to wish to avoid putting yourself at risk in order to achieve your ends, so long as those ends can still be achieved. (It is, of course, _cowardice_ to shy away from dangers that actually do _have_ to be endured in order to do things you truly _need_ to do, but it is _foolhardiness_ to rush into dangers you DON'T have to endure.)

There is no need to presume hostility. The players are being rational agents trying to reduce their exposure to _unnecessary_ danger.


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## Charlaquin (Jul 20, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> Why is it so friggin' hard to just SAY, "Hey guys. I see the rules as suggestions, and I believe my role as DM is to push things in the right direction if they get off track. So, some of the time, I'm going to invisibly bend or break the rules, or make it seem like you're in control when you aren't. I promise not to do this for any reason other than to make the game more enjoyable for you guys. As long as you're okay with that, we should all have a great time." That's all that's required! Just a couple sentences! _*Why is this so hard?!*_



So, I wasn’t going to say it, because I don’t want to put words into people’s mouths. But, since Bloodtide said the quiet part out loud, I’ll quote them.


bloodtide said:


> So the first not so big problem is the irrational crazy player reaction.  Even mention a railroad, and some players will refuse to play and run away from the game screaming.    And, fine, let them run away and find some other game.   Though the problem comes where player A is the ride or brother or best pal of player B.  So if player A runs away from the game screaming "railroad bad....aaaaaahhh!", then they take player B with them.  So, to keep players you need to deceive crazy player A.



^ This? This is why it’s so hard. People recognize, maybe consciously, maybe unconsciously, that some of their players probably wouldn’t like it if they knew their DM was doing this, and might not want to play in that game any more.


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 20, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> So, I wasn’t going to say it, because I don’t want to put words into people’s mouths. But, since Bloodtide said the quiet part out loud, I’ll quote them.
> 
> ^ This? This is why it’s so hard. People recognize, maybe consciously, maybe unconsciously, that some of their players probably wouldn’t like it if they knew their DM was doing this, and might not want to play in that game any more.



Which is why we (you and I and others) keep saying that this isn't JUST a matter of passively not revealing something. It's an active deception, because many DMs recognize that the thing they're doing is something that would upset their players.

Incidentally, @bloodtide , this is exactly what I meant by not being respectful to your players. You are absolutely not showing any respect whatsoever to a player that doesn't want to participate in this kind of gaming. You are, in fact, actively putting down such players and painting them as nasty, mean, and petty. Is there any wonder, then, why I have said so many times that this is a matter of being respectful, and that there's a deficiency of respect going on here?


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## Maxperson (Jul 20, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> Performance Magic is pure deception, but no one says it's wrong.



People go see magic knowing that sleight of hand is going on.  No one is being deceived.


bloodtide said:


> The vast majority of fiction used deception to shock and awe the audience,  no one says it's wrong.



Are you talking TV and movies?  Because, yeah, no one thinks the special effects are real.


bloodtide said:


> Surprise Parties are common, and you often have to deceive the person it's for, and no one thinks it's wrong.



 People know that they are having birthdays and will get a party.


bloodtide said:


> A vast majority of games  involve deception, and no one says that is wrong.  The vast majority of team sports involve deception, and no one thinks that is wrong.



You really think that the opposing teams don't know that the other side is up to trickery?


bloodtide said:


> So if your having fun and enjoying the game, do such things matter?



When my fun is based on a lie and I'm not really playing the game because of it, yes it matters.


bloodtide said:


> The big question here is how and why did avoiding encounters become this big badge of honor player thing?



Avoiding encounters started in Basic and 1e.  But I never claimed it's some sort of badge of honor, big or otherwise.  This is purely about agency, so why don't you address that instead? 


bloodtide said:


> How is choosing not to play the game such a big victory?



I'm not choosing not to play the game.  The DM railroading me is preventing me from playing the game.  Only through agency can players actually play the game. Illusionism fools the players into thinking that they are playing the game when they are not.


bloodtide said:


> The only way it makes sense is if the players are just hostile and are trying to ruin the game for the DM.



Ahh, and now back to the evasion and attacks.  Players who don't like to be railroaded and lied to "are just hostile and trying to ruin the game for the DM."  Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiight.

Address the arguments.


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 20, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> I mean I think basically all the examples in the OP are just that. Guiding meandering players toward the interesting stuff, whilst creating an illusion of a bigger world.
> 
> Like sure, when the players say that they go to the forest the GM could just directly frame them at the witch's cottage. But it probably creates a feeling that the forest is large and full of stuff and they just happen to stumble on one of the many mysterious things in it, if it is done like in the wilderness example.
> 
> It seems pretty innocent to me.



Meant to include this in my quotes, must have missed it.

Firstly: it absolutely does not come across, AT ALL, WHATSOEVER, as merely "guiding meandering players toward the interesting stuff." It certainly does involve creating the illusion of a bigger world, that I'll grant you. But we have sentences like _the very first one_, but several others too:
"What if I told you it was possible to lock your players on a tight railroad, but make them think every decision they made mattered? While this may sound like the evil GM speaking, I have my reasons."
"So, this advice is offered to help people scale down the pressure of being a GM and give them options to reuse and recycle their ideas and channel players through an exciting adventure that just doesn’t have as many options as they thought it did."
"If players realise nothing they do changes the story, then the adventure will quickly lose its allure. But as long as they don’t realise what is happening they will think every choice matters and the story is entirely in their hands."
"...as long as no one points out the “emperor has no clothes” everyone will have a great game."
"If you use this too often the players will start to realise what is going on. To a degree you are limiting their agency by making them unable to backtrack."
"Sometimes the easiest choice is no choice at all."
"Now, all this may all seem a little manipulative..."
"But it is fine to make sure every road goes where you want it to, as long as that is to somewhere amazing."

This advice is about how "to lock your players on a tight railroad." It "may sound like the evil GM speaking." It makes players think the adventure has many options, while it "just doesn't have as many options as they thought it did." Hell, the OP even explicitly says, "nothing they do changes the story"!

It's worth noting, there are statements meant to pull back a bit from this. Things like:
"All I’m suggesting here is a way to make sure every choice the players make takes them to an awesome encounter, which is surly [sic] no bad thing."
"I should add that used too often this system can have the opposite effect. The important thing here is not to take away their feeling of agency."
"That said, never take away player agency so you can ensure the story plays out the way you want it to."
"So, remember that you must never restrict the choices and agency of the players, at least knowingly."

But do you see the disconnect between these two sets of quotes? The admonishments tell you not to take away the feeling of player agency, nor even to take away player agency at all...and yet the actual advice, the "what to do," _explicitly does do that_, by the author's own admission. E.g., "To a degree you are limiting their agency..." etc. These statements contradict one another, telling you to do a thing and then telling you you absolutely shouldn't do that thing. Only one of those two positions can be correct--and it's pretty clear, _from the title alone_, which of the two positions is the one actually being advocated.

And  yes, I _know_ the author is a poster here who posted something intending to clarify his intent. I frankly don't really care. Death of the author and all that. The content of the post is the content of the post, and that's what I'm critiquing. I don't really care if it was _meant_ to only ever be a suggestion to make preparation easier. What it _actually says_, as in the words actually written and the connections between them, is what matters, not whether the author approves of what people see in those words.

Secondly: your "framing" example is fine, _in the limited presentation of this post_, because there are no meaningful choices to be had along the path. As Thomas Shey said, this doesn't even register as "railroading" to me, and I see no reason whatsoever why the DM would need to be coy about it. It would seem to be easier (and more honest) to just say, "Moving along, you reach the heart of the forest where the old cottage awaits..."

But that's not what people are talking about when they talk about the "invisible railroad" or the like. They aren't talking about scene-framing things so the action arrives more quickly or smoothly. They're talking about quantum ogres and haunted houses which show up no matter which direction the players go. They're talking about dungeons that are a linear sequence of rooms dressed up as though they were a sprawling complex. They're talking about mysteries where it is a foregone conclusion that the players _will_ solve it, and any time they look like they might _not_ solve it a new clue will miraculously drop into their lap so they "stay on track" (a bit more literally than is usual for that phrase.)


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 20, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> I've probably missed some posts I would normally respond to, but this is already on the order of a dozen quotes and my posts run long as it is.
> 
> This explains some of the logic behind your past comments, which were opaque to me before.
> 
> ...



It is not possible to do that! It is always an illusion to some degree. And everyone knows that! 

Like your bizarre objection to my market example. You don't actually track timetable of literally everything happening in the world in the off-chance the PC happen to be around when the timer for an interesting thing comes up. No one does that. Players perfectly understand that sometimes the GM just has interesting stuff happen in place and time of their choosing because they want to put that content in the game.

These sort of 'deceptions' are merely about immersion, getting the contrivances of a game to seem like a real world and get the payers to buy into that. 



EzekielRaiden said:


> Absolutely not. "In the manner they feel most comfortable with" IS NOT affirmative consent. Affirmative consent is what is needed here. As I have explicitly said, several times.
> 
> Why is it so friggin' hard to just SAY, "Hey guys. I see the rules as suggestions, and I believe my role as DM is to push things in the right direction if they get off track. So, some of the time, I'm going to invisibly bend or break the rules, or make it seem like you're in control when you aren't. I promise not to do this for any reason other than to make the game more enjoyable for you guys. As long as you're okay with that, we should all have a great time." That's all that's required! Just a couple sentences! _*Why is this so hard?!*_




Look mate. It is not hard, but it also is not hard for the GM to ask "I sometimes roll some dice and let them decide the result, is that cool?" but the fact remains that by the rules they're already empowered to do this. I will honestly tell you that you have a have unusually strong personal hang-up about this; this is no common. People generally don't care about incidental low-key illusionism. There are million things the GM is allowed to do that might still bother someone, and discussing things is good idea, but frankly, you're being both entitled and judgemental by elevating your personal preferences on some special pedestal.


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## pemerton (Jul 20, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> how would you as a PC choose to do something if not to research it then go do it? that seems the most straight forward to me.



Well I am not a PC, I'm a real person in the real world.

If I was playing a character in a RPG, then one thing I might do is declare that my PC undertakes research. Whether or not the game is a railroad depends on a range of things: _where is my reason for undertaking the research coming from?_; and _how is the outcome of my research resolved?_.



GMforPowergamers said:


> if a Player tells me they climb the tree to look for a clue, and I know there is no clue up there they can climb all they want that doesn't make a clue appear. A Player who searches for a hidden door in a wall that is solid with no hidden door is not going to make one appear most times (I say most cause if a player makes a suggestion I like I may make changes but I am under no obligation to)



When you say "I know", what you mean is _I have decided_. Because the shared fiction has no independent existence as an object of knowledge.

So what is happening here is that a player is declaring an action; the GM has already decided the outcome (ie nothing useful happens); and the GM is not telling the player that straight-up, but rather is allowing the player to proceed as if the search for the clue, door, etc is meaningful. That seems to fit the definition of "railroading" and "illusionism" being used in this thread. 



GMforPowergamers said:


> that is not railroading... now you can have a style where that IS true, that there is no hidden passage but the Player authors it into exsistence... I just don't think saying anything short of that is railroading is helpful at all.
> 
> that is still not rail roading...  by your defenition every defualt game of D&D 5e is a railroad.



I'm responding to what you (and others) are posting. As I posted, the default presentation of 4e D&D is not railroading (eg in the rules for resolving a skill challenge, there is no provision for a check to find a clue to fail _just because the GM has decided that there is no clue to be found_).

If the default approach to 5e _is_ to run it as a railroad, that would of course be an interesting state of affairs.


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## wedgeski (Jul 20, 2022)

The only certain railroad in D&D is the one travelled by threads like this.


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## pemerton (Jul 20, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> I still remain puzzled by where people draw the lines.
> 
> GM framing stuff based on their prep. Cool!
> 
> ...





Cadence said:


> It feels like for some it comes down to whether or not anything Ogre-y has transpired yet.  If the party is trying to avoid big monsters, does an augury, is cautious looking for signs or sounds, etc... and nothing matters then it feels a bit bad.
> 
> But it feels like that should be true of the random table too.  Now I'm wondering if party actions should change results on those.



If the GM's improv, or random rolls, negate prior player choices and outcomes, then that would be a problem too.


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## pemerton (Jul 20, 2022)

FrozenNorth said:


> To me, the game is not a railroad.  The characters have a high level of agency and their choices are meaningful.



Do you mean _players_?


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 20, 2022)

Mort said:


> For players, yes, of course. "Successful" cheating is still cheating.



but but but were we just told lying doens't count if you get away with it.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 20, 2022)

Ovinomancer said:


> The argument that one way always fails and causes grief is unfounded.



i never siad it ALWAYS fails...i didn't even say you never can ever do it... I just suggest being honest with your players when you do and that when it fails and they find you have lied it hurts teh game


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## FrozenNorth (Jul 20, 2022)

Thomas Shey said:


> See my comments re "scar tissue".



Sure, but if a player consistently acts like I am not trustworthy despite my best efforts, I am definitely within my rights to stop playing with the person.  All players, including the GM, need to be having fun.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 20, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> So, I use all this as a non example.  ONE player decided to do a silly "love" plot and the other players choose to join with the kobolds.  Ok, so this has nothing to do with the Sunless Citadel adventure:  the DM can run the game through a hard railroad and the players choices have nothing to do with that.



first what makes the plot silly?
second your right you CAN run the game on hard rails or the soft rails suggested by the OP. I just think you need to be honest about it.


bloodtide said:


> So you had a plan and changed it based on some random stuff the players said.  So, because the players randomly said something this is not a railroad.  That makes no sense.



I didn't force the players into my way of doing things... int that case I didn't even make the world only me... we all made this world, this story.  I'm not saying you have to do what I did, I'm not even saying that you should... heck I don't always do it this way. but I was defending myself cause I was told I still railroad. and again... I didn't even say I never railroad, I said I do sometimes it's just rare, and when I do I don't lie about it.


bloodtide said:


> Right, you just sat back and let the players DM the game and made everything in the game that they liked.



um I'm not sure what you mean... I played the NPCs so I at least did SOME of the DM work.


bloodtide said:


> The players want X, and you rolled out the red carpet and said "ok".



yeah... cause we were all friends, and so I didn't see a reason not to... I still don't


bloodtide said:


> But I also notice there is no adventure here, it's just free form role playing.



I mean they adventured into many places, Im not sure where you get the idea of it there being no adventures.  


bloodtide said:


> Your just sitting back and making the game reality whatever the players want.



You do realize that is what every DM does right?


bloodtide said:


> I disagree.  If the players are going to just toss the adventure away on a whim, then they can find another DM.  This is not about player choice, this is about not being a jerk.



I covered this before... we don't allow jerks to do that. We often just have the soft rule being "If your  character doesn't want to play in this campaign, they can go out on there own and you can make one that will" 

I have 0 intrest in fighting with jerk players anymore. I am too old for that.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 20, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> So, I wasn’t going to say it, because I don’t want to put words into people’s mouths. But, since Bloodtide said the quiet part out loud, I’ll quote them.
> 
> ^ This? This is why it’s so hard. People recognize, maybe consciously, maybe unconsciously, that some of their players probably wouldn’t like it if they knew their DM was doing this, and might not want to play in that game any more.



that is why the op needs the rails to be invisable... cause they would have players stop trusting them if they saw it.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 20, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> that is why the op needs the rails to be invisable... cause they would have players stop trusting them if they saw it.



I don't think it is that.

It's just that if you want to craft an illusion of a vast mysterious forest the characters can wander in, with countless strange things the they can meet and discover, it kinda works better if you don't outright tell them that there are actually just three mysterious things and the characters are guaranteed to stumble upon them all, as that's all you had the time to prep...


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 20, 2022)

pemerton said:


> Well I am not a PC, I'm a real person in the real world.



but I assume you control PCs in the past and will again in the future.


pemerton said:


> If I was playing a character in a RPG, then one thing I might do is declare that my PC undertakes research. Whether or not the game is a railroad depends on a range of things: _where is my reason for undertaking the research coming from?_; and _how is the outcome of my research resolved?_.



and again... why do you assume it ISN'T the players choice?!?!  I can't list 500 different actions that the player COULD declare. This post would just take 6 days to read and longer to write.


pemerton said:


> When you say "I know", what you mean is _I have decided_. Because the shared fiction has no independent existence as an object of knowledge.



correct I dexided... cause I know that what really happened didn't have to do with that tree. 

Lets take a game I have pitched before but not actually run yet (it's in my to be played pile) where there is a mostly human kingdom that flourished until a king married and elven woman as his second wife after his first died in child birth... since then it has been hundreds of years of her rule as queen as both the pure human royal line (from that kings siblings and his children with first wife) and his half elf descendants with her all grew up had families and grew old... so now as she is sick there are A LOT of claimants to the throne and being a human kingdom this has never happened before. 
That is the general idea. The specifics will change based on who is playing and what they are playing (and adding to the world) but one of the plots I have in my head is the question of if the 500 year old elf is really just getting sick or if she is being MADE to be sick.  Since this is only a rough idea I can't admit to having the answers now... but I will by the time game 1 or 2 kicks off. If I decide she was poisoned by coronial mustard then there is no clue to be found in any trees.... because neither mustard or elf would have been in the tree. BUT if a PC chooses to climb a tree I wont tell them not to or that they can't, I will just tell them there is noting up there and move on...


pemerton said:


> So what is happening here is that a player is declaring an action; the GM has already decided the outcome (ie nothing useful happens); and the GM is not telling the player that straight-up, but rather is allowing the player to proceed as if the search for the clue, door, etc is meaningful.



because the search IS meaningful... I don't understand why "you find nothing" isn't an  answer!!?  I have people on these boards tell me all the time that if a 8 str no training no equipment character declares they climb a deadly cliff but there is nothing on top I am supposed to let them auto succeed instead of roll... but then (and mostly different but sometimes same people) claim that once they get to the top something MUST be there...  


pemerton said:


> That seems to fit the definition of "railroading" and "illusionism" being used in this thread.



not even close. letting a player do what they want is never railroading... telling them what to do (either by trickery or just out right) is. And the illusionism here is nothing like the hidden rails... I am not directing there choices I am infact letting them go anywhere they want no rails. I have even said that if they go far enough afield (And trust me players will) I will gently but honestly tell them they are on a dead end... BUT they ALWAYS have the choice to stay on the dead end... the best part is when they go chaseing a dead end and find a whole different plot.  
THis is why I very rarely make it a dozen games into the campaign without at least a few major surprises TO ME THE DM.


pemerton said:


> I'm responding to what you (and others) are posting. As I posted, the default presentation of 4e D&D is not railroading (eg in the rules for resolving a skill challenge, there is no provision for a check to find a clue to fail _just because the GM has decided that there is no clue to be found_).



there actually is... reread the skill challenge, the DM decides if an action or skill is appropriate (and again the going joke from the time Tony 'did a push up for insight') in fact one of the very examples was that during a negotiation you can declare all intimidate checks to count as fails without a roll if you decide that intimidating isn't what is needed. 


pemerton said:


> If the default approach to 5e _is_ to run it as a railroad, that would of course be an interesting state of affairs.



I don't think it is. I think the defualt of many published adventures for every edition is though.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 20, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> I don't think it is that.
> 
> It's just that if you want to craft an illusion of a vast mysterious forest the characters can wander in, with countless strange things the they can meet and discover, it kinda works better if you don't outright tell them that there are actually just three mysterious things and the characters are guaranteed to stumble upon them all, as that's all you had the time to prep...



well I don't know the players that think that you or I as a DM sat down and planned out 5,000 possible things in the woods... so I don't see why you would lie and pretend you did.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 20, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> well I don't know the players that think that you or I as a DM sat down and planned out 5,000 possible things in the woods... so I don't see why you would lie and pretend you did.



Yeah, probably not 500. But it could be ten or twelve or something. Who knows? In any case, the stuff in the OP is mostly just about making the world seem bigger than it actually is and saving prep time.


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## jgsugden (Jul 20, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> Frankly, I don't even get why people care how the things were procedurally generated. If it indeed looks just the same from the player's seat, what does it matter? Stop worrying about whether we live in a simulation, if it feels real, it is good enough.



Some of us have been making the point that, over the long haul, players will definitely be able to tell that you slap things together rather than plan them out.  We all have to improvise some as players are unpredictable, but the more you do it - and the more you _decide_ to do it, the more obvious it will be.  

If you think, "I do this all the time and players do not know" - you may be wrong.  And even when you're right - even when players lack the experience with prepared DMs and only know DMs that use this 'invisible railroad' - most will find themselves enjoying a well designed experience far more when exposed to it, all else equal.  

This is not rocket science.  This is not controversial.  Everywhere you go in life, the people that put in the effort and prepare better generally do better at the things they try to do.  The people that 'fake it' and 'make it up as they go along' generally do worse.  

And I'll reiterate it once again: We all _have_ to improvise at times.  We must put things together on the spot, and sometimes that requires us to use techniques like the OP suggests ... the debate at hand is not whether these tools should exist: It is whether you should plan to use them as your primary option or if you're going to provide a better experience by providing a well thought out, internally cohesive, and systemically complementary story, adventure and setting.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 20, 2022)

jgsugden said:


> If you think, "I do this all the time and players do not know" - you may be wrong.  And even when you're right - even when players lack the experience with prepared DMs and only know DMs that use this 'invisible railroad' - most will find themselves enjoying a well designed experience far more when exposed to it, all else equal.



I'm not sure this is 100% true for all. 
I think some beer and pretzel gamers, I think all new players, and I think some portion of what's left would do fine and enjoy those invisible rails more...


jgsugden said:


> And I'll reiterate it once again: We all _have_ to improvise at times.  We must put things together on the spot, and sometimes that requires us to use techniques like the OP suggests ...



yup and being upfront about it sometimes my rails are WAY more forcefull then the OP... "Look, just go in the damn dungeon" is not exactly a quote from me... but it is kinda close. 
IN curse of strahd I had to have my players promise when we made characters that tthey would play up the setting a bit and NOT refuse strahds dinner invite, BUT also not just try to kill him on sight even if he is a jerk.


jgsugden said:


> the debate at hand is not whether these tools should exist: It is whether you should plan to use them as your primary option or if you're going to provide a better experience by providing a well thought out, internally cohesive, and systemically complementary story, adventure and setting.



very good summery


----------



## Crimson Longinus (Jul 20, 2022)

jgsugden said:


> Some of us have been making the point that, over the long haul, players will definitely be able to tell that you slap things together rather than plan them out.  We all have to improvise some as players are unpredictable, but the more you do it - and the more you _decide_ to do it, the more obvious it will be.




Yes, _I_ made that point:



Crimson Longinus said:


> They cannot tell on specific instance, but it is likely that over a longer period of time differing principles would lead to a different subjective player experience. Like for example if the GM consistently fudges and illusionises so that the most dramatically appropriate thing happens, then it will in the long run produce a rather different player experience than if the GM sticks to the prep and lets the dice fall where they may, even though occasionally the latter will produce dramatically appropriate thigs too.
> 
> But basically if the GM would sparingly do such manipulations, I don't think it would noticeably affect the player experience. I have my of principles regarding such things when I GM, but they're really just for my own enjoyment. Like it is more exiting for me as GM if I don't fudge, so I don't.




But, yes, extensive use is likely to be noticeable. Agreed.



jgsugden said:


> This is not rocket science.  This is not controversial.  Everywhere you go in life, the people that put in the effort and prepare better generally do better at the things they try to do.  The people that 'fake it' and 'make it up as they go along' generally do worse.




Sure, but there also is such thing as overprepping. I know, I do it a lot!  



jgsugden said:


> And I'll reiterate it once again: We all _have_ to improvise at times.  We must put things together on the spot, and sometimes that requires us to use techniques like the OP suggests ... the debate at hand is not whether these tools should exist: It is whether you should plan to use them as your primary option or if you're going to provide a better experience by providing a well thought out, internally cohesive, and systemically complementary story, adventure and setting.




No, that's not the debate. I don't remember anyone suggesting that these should be used extensively and as your primary methods. 
The sides are _"fine occasionally to smooth things over"_ (like you suggest) and _"NEVER!!!"_


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## jgsugden (Jul 20, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> ...Sure, but there also is such thing as overprepping. I know, I do it a lot!



As discussed repeatedly in this thread, the capability over-prepare is not an argument against preparing, just as the possibility of getting in a car accident doesn't mean nobody should drive.[/quote]No, that's not the debate. I don't remember anyone suggesting that these should be used extensively and as your primary methods. The sides are _"fine occasionally to smooth things over"_ (like you suggest) and _"NEVER!!!"_[/QUOTE]Except that the OP themself, while half heartedly saying that this technique can be overused as a hedge, suggests that some players prefer it.  Further, they go on to say, "it is fine to make sure every road goes where you want it to, as long as that is to somewhere amazing."

Then three posts later we start to see the DMs that post about using this as their primary approach, and indicating they think it works to make a good game for the players with small criticisms on the edge of the approach:


Krachek said:


> It’s a nice OP.
> I feel as DM that I deliver a story influenced by players.
> I can’t have infinite rooms, encounters and npcs prepared.
> I use floating plot and encounters that can be place on need.
> The overall need to be coherent, feel real, and a Dm should be a good story teller and have a good poker face.





Mort said:


> I have no problem with linear sessions - in fact I often prefer them, as long as they are honestly presented as linear. It irritates me when a session is presented as open ended yet turns out to be anything but.
> 
> I've found VERY few players who don't share in that view, the linear adventures are not the problem, the deception is.
> 
> So why deceive?





MrZeddaPiras said:


> This is the way me and the people I knew used to DM all the time when I was a kid. Turns out players like it, and even kind of expect you to do it, as long as you make their characters look cool and incorporate pay-offs to their backstories in the game. Incidentally it's a style I came to dislike profoundly, because it's all manipulation and keeping the players happy so they'll like you.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 20, 2022)

pemerton said:


> If the GM's improv, or random rolls, negate prior player choices and outcomes, then that would be a problem too.




I think that's a muddy spot; except within narrow contexts, its possible for a decision to have potential meaning but because of later events a player (and his character) has no control over, that doesn't end up being true.  The only way it can't be a thing at least some of the time is if consequences are a very quick follow-up to the decision.

As an example, a set of players can decide they're going to going to choose the road that has less reports of bandits on it, on the hope that they'll manage to avoid them on their way to an objective.  That doesn't mean that avoiding bandits is a given from doing that.  If the GM has a table that puts lots of bandits on the first, and few on the second, but they still come up, I don't see an intrinsic reason that's inappropriate; the situations was never described as doing more than them putting their thumb on the scale.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 20, 2022)

FrozenNorth said:


> Sure, but if a player consistently acts like I am not trustworthy despite my best efforts, I am definitely within my rights to stop playing with the person.  All players, including the GM, need to be having fun.




Absolutely, but its simply reality that players that have been taught by prior experience that GMs will lie to you at their convenience are not going to stop making that assumption just because they hit one that doesn't.  And it can take a long time to win that trust, and the fact its not fair does not change that.  Like it or not, as a GM (or far as that goes, player) you're carrying the baggage of ever other GM/player the other person has dealt with for at least a while.  It would be nice if that wasn't true, but that's not how people work.


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## Krachek (Jul 20, 2022)

There is an interview with Crawford on the Challenge in DnD, release near the launch of monter of the multiverse.
He clearly say that the DM can make vanish or add hit points to a monster during a fight.
Not before, during a fight. 
That is my new reference to railroad issue.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 20, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> I don't think it is. I think the defualt of many published adventures for every edition is though.




I'll go as far as to suggest this is the case for the vast majority of published adventures for most game systems, far as it goes.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 20, 2022)

Krachek said:


> There is an interview with Crawford on the Challenge in DnD, release near the launch of monter of the multiverse.
> He clearly say that the DM can make vanish or add hit points to a monster during a fight.
> Not before, during a fight.
> That is my new reference to railroad issue.




This still requires that you don't think designers are entirely capable of having feet of clay.  I've known a few too many over the years to consider their opinions on the matter of procedural (rather than mechanical) decisions to have any special weight.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 20, 2022)

Krachek said:


> There is an interview with Crawford on the Challenge in DnD, release near the launch of monter of the multiverse.
> He clearly say that the DM can make vanish or add hit points to a monster during a fight.
> Not before, during a fight.
> That is my new reference to railroad issue.



I mean, yes, the GM absolutely can do that. Whether that is a good idea is another matter entirely. But I can certainly imagine situations and playstyles in which it would be beneficial on occasion. A newbie GM underestimating how dangerous a monster they chose was and didn't want a TPK comes to mind. Routinely doing this, as well as other fudging, probably indicates that the system is not suited for your needs though.


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## Maxperson (Jul 20, 2022)

pemerton said:


> So what is happening here is that a player is declaring an action; the GM has already decided the outcome (ie nothing useful happens); and the GM is not telling the player that straight-up, but rather is allowing the player to proceed as if the search for the clue, door, etc is meaningful. That seems to fit the definition of "railroading" and "illusionism" being used in this thread.



Not necessarily.  If the DM knows that nothing is up there because he already knows where the useful information is, he is not forcing the PC down his path and invalidating agency.  The player has full agency to climb the tree and look or not, the DM simply knows the answer to the what the player is seeking in advance and can tell him.  There's no illusionism involved. There's no railroading involved.

If on the other hand there was a clue up the tree, but the DM felt that the PCs were going to find it too soon and moved it in response to the declaration to go search, THAT would be railroading.  The DM would be invalidating the choice to search and forcing the story in the direction he wants it to go.

That's the big difference.


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## Charlaquin (Jul 20, 2022)

Krachek said:


> There is an interview with Crawford on the Challenge in DnD, release near the launch of monter of the multiverse.
> He clearly say that the DM can make vanish or add hit points to a monster during a fight.
> Not before, during a fight.
> That is my new reference to railroad issue.



It’s not what I would call “railroading,” but it’s definitely a technique I would take serious issue with, for similar reasons.


----------



## GMforPowergamers (Jul 20, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> I mean, yes, the GM absolutely can do that. Whether that is a good idea is another matter entirely. But I can certainly imagine situations and playstyles in which it would be beneficial on occasion. A newbie GM underestimating how dangerous a monster they chose was and didn't want a TPK comes to mind. Routinely doing this, as well as other fudging, probably indicates that the system is not suited for your needs though.



forget newbie... I can imagine someone dropping 5 shadows (CR2) on a 8th level party just to find that with bounded accuracy the shadows can still hit, and when they hit the 8 str rouge with a crit for 5 str dropping him to a 3, then on the next round hit him again for dead even though he still had 40hp might have to decide the shadow 'miss' no matter what they roll after that.


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## Charlaquin (Jul 20, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> forget newbie... I can imagine someone dropping 5 shadows (CR2) on a 8th level party just to find that with bounded accuracy the shadows can still hit, and when they hit the 8 str rouge with a crit for 5 str dropping him to a 3, then on the next round hit him again for dead even though he still had 40hp might have to decide the shadow 'miss' no matter what they roll after that.



DMs should be taught encounter planning like gun safety: Never point a monster at a character unless you’re willing to pull the trigger.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 20, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> DMs should be taught encounter planning like gun safety: Never point a monster at a character unless you’re willing to pull the trigger.



yeah but lets be honest at CR 2 the shadows would be powerful... but I miss typed they are CR 1/2 Hobgoblins can already hit above that weight class but shadows blow them out of the water...


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 20, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> forget newbie... I can imagine someone dropping 5 shadows (CR2) on a 8th level party just to find that with bounded accuracy the shadows can still hit, and when they hit the 8 str rouge with a crit for 5 str dropping him to a 3, then on the next round hit him again for dead even though he still had 40hp might have to decide the shadow 'miss' no matter what they roll after that.




Though honestly, these days I still think saying "Guys, I misjudged this something horrible, lets do a rewind here" is the better choice and disrupting the flow be damned.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 20, 2022)

Thomas Shey said:


> Though honestly, these days I still think saying "Guys, I misjudged this something horrible, lets do a rewind here" is the better choice and disrupting the flow be damned.



yeah I actually agree with this. "opps" happen.

BUT it depends on the game and the group really... I would not mind if the DM said "Yeah, that didn't happen"


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 20, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> DMs should be taught encounter planning like gun safety: Never point a monster at a character unless you’re willing to pull the trigger.




The problem is when you think you have a pellet gun and discover its a .357 Magnum.  At some point in getting used to a given game system that can happen to anyone.  Its why I tend to be extremely cautious when applying opponents with unusual abilities or tricks until I'm really, really experienced with a system, but not everyone has been GMing for 40 years.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 20, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> yeah but lets be honest at CR 2 the shadows would be powerful... but I miss typed they are CR 1/2 Hobgoblins can already hit above that weight class but shadows blow them out of the water...




Everything I've heard tells me that 5e CR material is pretty much a joke.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 20, 2022)

Thomas Shey said:


> Though honestly, these days I still think saying "Guys, I misjudged this something horrible, lets do a rewind here" is the better choice and disrupting the flow be damned.



Personally I don't agree. That would bug me hella lot more than the GM just fudging behind the curtains to fix the situation or even deus exing us out of the trouble.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 20, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> yeah I actually agree with this. "opps" happen.
> 
> BUT it depends on the game and the group really... I would not mind if the DM said "Yeah, that didn't happen"




Well, and I'm not super-hostile to someone fudging to paper over a mistake; I did it for enough of my early gaming career to not consider it intrinsically malign.  But I do think its kind of a moral hazard and better to avoid in general.  Different people have different priorities, though.


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## Mort (Jul 20, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> yeah but lets be honest at CR 2 the shadows would be powerful... but I miss typed they are CR 1/2 Hobgoblins can already hit above that weight class but shadows blow them out of the water...




Sure, Shadows can surprise a party (any stat draining monster can - Intelect Devourers are even worse!).

And I certainly see not wanting a TPK because you (the DM) misjudged the threat.

But giving the shadows a case of Stormtrooperitis? The problem with that is the players are almost sure to catch what you're doing and then what? it's just awkward.

I much prefer clueing the party in on something they're likely missing (If the party has a round, an 8th level party should be able to annihilate the shadows, especially if the have a cleric). Or even, as a last resort do what @Thomas Shey just suggested.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 20, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> Personally I don't agree. That would bug me hella lot more than the GM just fudging behind the curtains to fix the situation or even deus exing us out of the trouble.




See my comment above.  But like I said, I don't need to be dancing around with the temptations these days, and my priorities are such I'd really rather not go there even if the players prefer it.  I just think its bad practice.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 20, 2022)

Thomas Shey said:


> Everything I've heard tells me that 5e CR material is pretty much a joke.



it pretty much is... I have complained a few threads about it. THe shadow the wraith the intellect devourer all hit harder then they look, and things like the Mind Flayer that feel like they SHOULD be the BBEG end boss often have glass jaws and are let downs.

in general 5e has a monster problem, one I am hopeing the MotM is fixing... but I still don't have a copy yet


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 20, 2022)

Mort said:


> Sure, Shadows can surprise a party (any stat draining monster can - Intelect Devourers are even worse!).



yup


Mort said:


> And I certainly see not wanting a TPK because you (the DM) misjudged the threat.
> 
> But giving the shadows a case of Stormtrooperitis? The problem with that is the players are almost sure to catch what you're doing and then what? it's just awkward.



I mean it depends... I am useing Roll20 so they would all see the fudge, but back when we gamed at my house they would not see the dice and there have been plenty of real (both at table and on roll20) times the luck of dice took a swerve and someone went from hit, crit hit to miss...misss...gee does a 8 hit...miss... wait I got a 14, oh your a 15...miss.


Mort said:


> I much prefer clueing the party in on something they're likely missing (If the party has a round, an 8th level party should be able to annihilate the shadows, especially if the have a cleric). Or even, as a last resort do what @Thomas Shey just suggested.



see the whole "The party should annihialte them" is the problem... that is what SHOULD happen, and even unlucky shouldn't start killing off characters, but 1 or 2 lucky shots can ruine a campagin.


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## Doctor Futurity (Jul 20, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> I live for player generated plot hooks



I am envious. My current group is so old and jaded that I feel like they are constantly playing the metagame of: wait for GM to bait the hook, then obediently bite and follow. But my preferred GMing style is to provide lots of options then wait for the players to surprise me, challenge me, with the unexpected. Unfortunately the groups I used to game with that did this are long gone, and my current gang of players, while decent folk, are a lot more interested in waiting for me to "show them" what to do which is deeply frustrating to me. Improv is intrinsically part of what I like most about gaming.


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## Maxperson (Jul 20, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> yeah I actually agree with this. "opps" happen.
> 
> BUT it depends on the game and the group really... I would not mind if the DM said "Yeah, that didn't happen"



I will correct my mistake.  Not by saying, "You wake up from a dream!", but rather by fudging a little behind the screen to even things up and make it the encounter difficulty it was supposed to be. It's my job as the DM to fix my mistakes.  Fixing an error is neither railroading, nor illusionism.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 20, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> it pretty much is... I have complained a few threads about it. THe shadow the wraith the intellect devourer all hit harder then they look, and things like the Mind Flayer that feel like they SHOULD be the BBEG end boss often have glass jaws and are let downs.
> 
> in general 5e has a monster problem, one I am hopeing the MotM is fixing... but I still don't have a copy yet




Its not an easy problem to address; 3e had it, 5e had it, and the guy doing Sabre struggles with his own variation on it.  Heck, even 4e muddled it sometimes early on, and it had a lot of advantages here.  Its not impossible to do right (I'm of the opinion Pathfinder 2e has done a credible job here) but it helps a lot if the rest of the system supports it, and you still need to do care when setting up monsters and applying the rating to them (the former because there are potential builds that are almost impossible to rate properly; horrific glass cannons (monsters that do massive damage but can't take it) are almost impossible to properly assess as opponents, and honestly, probably just should be avoided in design).


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 20, 2022)

Doctor Futurity said:


> I am envious. My current group is so old and jaded that I feel like they are constantly playing the metagame of: wait for GM to bait the hook, then obediently bite and follow. But my preferred GMing style is to provide lots of options then wait for the players to surprise me, challenge me, with the unexpected. Unfortunately the groups I used to game with that did this are long gone, and my current gang of players, while decent folk, are a lot more interested in waiting for me to "show them" what to do which is deeply frustrating to me. Improv is intrinsically part of what I like most about gaming.




Its absolutely a difference in style that you need to account for.  As I put it, some people want to go out and forge their destiny, and some just want to find their chalk marks (and with some, it depends how they're feeling this weekend).


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## Mort (Jul 20, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> see the whole "The party should annihialte them" is the problem... that is what SHOULD happen, and even unlucky shouldn't start killing off characters, but 1 or 2 lucky shots can ruine a campagin.




I can see that if you overclock your CRs (meaning you keep throwing "deadly+" threats at the party), but as wonky as the CR system is "hard" and lower encounters very rarely go sideways that badly. And even if they do (say the shadows take the rogue down) an 8th level party should have a revivify or similar handy - so it's a resource loss not a dead PC.

That said, one thing I tend to do, wherever possible I try to make escape or evasion a possibility. Not a big fan of the fight to move forward or die model that's often presented.


----------



## GMforPowergamers (Jul 20, 2022)

Doctor Futurity said:


> I am envious. My current group is so old and jaded that I feel like they are constantly playing the metagame of: wait for GM to bait the hook, then obediently bite and follow.



oh we fall into that too alot... but I love some Player plot and I live for it becuse I don't always get it.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 20, 2022)

Mort said:


> That said, one thing I tend to do, wherever possible I try to make escape or evasion a possibility. Not a big fan of the fight to move forward or die model that's often presented.




This is a problem that, as I've noted, is reinforced by people who are used to the fact most systems are pretty much pants at providing a viable method to flee if things go wrong; barring games with an explicit separate escape mechanic set, it usually adds up to using the extent movement system to try and disengage, and there are enough things that are faster and better at handling terrain than at least some PCs that can be a loser.  And of course people who have run into that even once in a serious problem imprint on the lesson that its better to fight until you die than get cut down as you run.


----------



## Charlaquin (Jul 20, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> yeah but lets be honest at CR 2 the shadows would be powerful... but I miss typed they are CR 1/2 Hobgoblins can already hit above that weight class but shadows blow them out of the water...





Thomas Shey said:


> The problem is when you think you have a pellet gun and discover its a .357 Magnum.  At some point in getting used to a given game system that can happen to anyone.  Its why I tend to be extremely cautious when applying opponents with unusual abilities or tricks until I'm really, really experienced with a system, but not everyone has been GMing for 40 years.



Oh, absolutely. Shadows’ CR is severely lowballed, and they remain a significant threat at any level thanks to their strength drain. And misjudging the difficulty of an encounter is an easy mistake to make, even for experienced DMs. That’s exactly why I think it’s important to impress upon new DMs that _any_ encounter can result in character death, even one you meant to be easy. Even when you judge the difficulty correctly, sometimes the dice just fall in such a way that a character dies anyway. In that way, it’s much like with guns - even if you know what you’re doing, an accidental discharge can still happen, so don’t point it at anything you aren’t ok with shooting. Don’t put PCs into life or death situations if you aren’t ok with them dying to unlucky rolls. There’s no shame in ruling that PCs only get injured or something instead of dying, and in my opinion, better that than to fudge rolls or change monster HP mid-combat.


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## Charlaquin (Jul 20, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> Personally I don't agree. That would bug me hella lot more than the GM just fudging behind the curtains to fix the situation or even deus exing us out of the trouble.



This is a rather polarizing matter, as it seems everyone feels strongly about this one way or the other. As such, I think this is a matter well worth discussing beforehand with any new group, or newcomers to an established group.


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## Arilyn (Jul 20, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> Personally I don't agree. That would bug me hella lot more than the GM just fudging behind the curtains to fix the situation or even deus exing us out of the trouble.



Me too. Rewinding or making the whole thing not happen feels a lot worse than the GM adjusting a few things on the fly. A "redo" would feel incredibly jarring to me personally.


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## Remathilis (Jul 20, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> Yes, I’m against fudging, either in the PCs favor or against them.



Ah yes. The unshakable neutral arbiter DM, who exists only to provide context for the world, never giving or expecting any quarter.

player: hey DM, think one day I can get a holy avenger?
DM: if I randomly generate one on the loot table, yes.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 20, 2022)

Remathilis said:


> Ah yes. The unshakable neutral arbiter DM, who exists only to provide context for the world, never giving or expecting any quarter.
> 
> player: hey DM, think one day I can get a holy avenger?
> DM: if I randomly generate one on the loot table, yes.



the only thing worse is the one that claims they do that then stack the deck... "97, thats a Holy Avenger I'm not giving that... reroll"


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## Charlaquin (Jul 20, 2022)

Remathilis said:


> Ah yes. The unshakable neutral arbiter DM, who exists only to provide context for the world, never giving or expecting any quarter.
> 
> player: hey DM, think one day I can get a holy avenger?
> DM: if I randomly generate one on the loot table, yes.



I mean, I enjoy random loot tables, but I also have no problem with hand-placing loot. That’s no different in my view than hand-crafting a dungeon layout or hand-placing monsters. All three are significantly different than dice fudging, and I fail to see any meaningful connection between them.


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## Remathilis (Jul 20, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> I mean, I enjoy random loot tables, but I also have no problem with hand-placing loot. That’s no different in my view than hand-crafting a dungeon layout or hand-placing monsters. All three are significantly different than dice fudging, and I fail to see any meaningful connection between them.



For me, placing a magic item just because a player has requested it is a type of fudging. If it makes sense the villain would have a holy avenger then place it, but if you're placing it because your paladin player wants one, that's not being a neutral arbiter. 

But that's a wild tangent and I don't want to take the topic further off the invisible rails.


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## Maxperson (Jul 20, 2022)

Remathilis said:


> For me, placing a magic item just because a player has requested it is a type of fudging. If it makes sense the villain would have a holy avenger then place it, but if you're placing it because your paladin player wants one, that's not being a neutral arbiter.
> 
> But that's a wild tangent and I don't want to take the topic further off the invisible rails.



I hand place about half the items and roll the other half.  I NEVER hand place an item that was requested. The world doesn't work that way unless they are actively searching out the item in fiction, and then there will be a chance they might eventually find it.


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## Charlaquin (Jul 20, 2022)

Remathilis said:


> For me, placing a magic item just because a player has requested it is a type of fudging. If it makes sense the villain would have a holy avenger then place it, but if you're placing it because your paladin player wants one, that's not being a neutral arbiter.



Ok, I see where you’re coming from. For me, my opposition to fudging isn’t that it isn’t neutral, but that it’s deceptive.


Remathilis said:


> But that's a wild tangent and I don't want to take the topic further off the invisible rails.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 20, 2022)

Remathilis said:


> For me, placing a magic item just because a player has requested it is a type of fudging. If it makes sense the villain would have a holy avenger then place it, but if you're placing it because your paladin player wants one, that's not being a neutral arbiter.
> 
> But that's a wild tangent and I don't want to take the topic further off the invisible rails.



that seems weird... I mean I would feel that way if I gave random bear #17 a holy avenger to drop, but any place I put it, it will make sense.


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## iserith (Jul 20, 2022)

Remathilis said:


> For me, placing a magic item just because a player has requested it is a type of fudging. If it makes sense the villain would have a holy avenger then place it, but if you're placing it because your paladin player wants one, that's not being a neutral arbiter.
> 
> But that's a wild tangent and I don't want to take the topic further off the invisible rails.



It's as simple as the character taking proactive steps in the world to see if there are indeed holy weapons of that sort. Perhaps they attempt to recall lore, use divination spells, or consult a sage. If it makes sense for the setting, the DM can say they exist and the player can have the character quest for it. That's not fudging or railroading in the slightest in my view.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 20, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> that seems weird... I mean I would feel that way if I gave random bear #17 a holy avenger to drop, but any place I put it, it will make sense.




It goes back to the random treasure tables early in the hobby.  While treasure tables would slant what _kind_ of magic items might show up in a given treasure, and would slant how _frequently_ higher powered ones showed up, they didn't actually slant what _treasures_ high powered ones would show up in.  So you could find a basic +1 sword and a vorpal blade anywhere a magic sword showed up.


----------



## bloodtide (Jul 20, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> Which should be a sign that they don’t want you to do it. When people don’t want you to do something, the appropriate response is to _not do it_, not to do it anyway and try to hide it.



But, yet again this is not a universal truth. 


Charlaquin said:


> Yes, because moving things around behind the scenes isn’t _inherently_ wrong, what’s wrong is doing it without the players’ knowledge or consent. If you talk to them about it and they agree they don’t have a problem with it, then go right ahead, have fun.



But if the players don't know what your doing why does it matter?  And why do the players get all this power to control the DMs actions?  



EzekielRaiden said:


> cidentally, @bloodtide , this is exactly what I meant by not being respectful to your players. You are absolutely not showing any respect whatsoever to a player that doesn't want to participate in this kind of gaming. You are, in fact, actively putting down such players and painting them as nasty, mean, and petty. Is there any wonder, then, why I have said so many times that this is a matter of being respectful, and that there's a deficiency of respect going on here?



I don't see it the same way.  The word "respect" is not one that you and I would agree on a definition of, just like railroading.



Maxperson said:


> 't know that the other side is up to trickery?



As I said, a lot of people are clueless and don't know.  A lot of people.




Maxperson said:


> Avoiding encounters started in Basic and 1e.  But I never claimed it's some sort of badge of honor, big or otherwise.  This is purely about agency, so why don't you address that instead?



It did?  Can you tell me where?  

Unforfunetly I don't know what "agency" is in your definition.



Maxperson said:


> I'm not choosing not to play the game.  The DM railroading me is preventing me from playing the game.  Only through agency can players actually play the game. Illusionism fools the players into thinking that they are playing the game when they are not.



Well, I'm not sure your talking about playing the same game as I play.  I can railroad hard and every has a great time on the adventure and loves it...even when they were "deceived" in your words.  

Now the hostile "agency" group that avoids all encounters in the game and just sits around for hours is not playing the game.



GMforPowergamers said:


> first what makes the plot silly?
> second your right you CAN run the game on hard rails or the soft rails suggested by the OP. I just think you need to be honest about it.



Well, "love" is a silly thing to do in a D&D game: if you real want to play a love game try Hearts RPG or some other such game.  I wish there could be more honesty too, but too many players are so extreme to make it impossible.


GMforPowergamers said:


> um I'm not sure what you mean... I played the NPCs so I at least did SOME of the DM work.



From your posted story a couple of pages ago:  Any ideas you had about the game you just tossed away.  You did whatever the players told you to do.  You were not even making a game together:  they told you what to do and you did it.  



GMforPowergamers said:


> I mean they adventured into many places, Im not sure where you get the idea of it there being no adventures.



Because you did not mention any?  


GMforPowergamers said:


> You do realize that is what every DM does right?



No.  Not every DM.  Some DMs make the game for themselves and the players.  



Thomas Shey said:


> It goes back to the random treasure tables early in the hobby.  While treasure tables would slant what _kind_ of magic items might show up in a given treasure, and would slant how _frequently_ higher powered ones showed up, they didn't actually slant what _treasures_ high powered ones would show up in.  So you could find a basic +1 sword and a vorpal blade anywhere a magic sword showed up.



I love this myself, and as I run an Old School type game always, I make it a feature.  I embrace randomness.


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## pemerton (Jul 20, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> I literally don't get why people would care about effectively blind choices, especially if they would be fine with improvising or randomising the outcome. It doesn't make any sense to me.



Because they are assuming the tropes and procedures of "hidden board" gameplay, even when they are not using its underlying principles and imperatives.


----------



## pemerton (Jul 20, 2022)

Medic said:


> I don't really have a stake in this ongoing discussion, since my GM style is totally different than the one which seems to be the subject of this thread, but I'll try to offer some perspective on this by taking the scenario and moving the furniture around such that the stakes are actually meaningful.
> 
> The player characters finish clearing out a dungeon and enter a room full of treasure, wherein they find a magic lever. The party's wizard casts identify on said lever, and relays to the rest of the group that it is a magic device that has an 80% chance of conjuring a legendary magic item, and a 20% chance of flat-out killing the rube that decided to pull it. Boldly, the rogue makes the attempt, dice are rolled, and seconds later she's a pile of gore because the DM rolled a 19 on the percentile in front of everybody; pure bad luck. All of the information they needed to make an informed decision was present, the unbiased truth was right there where everyone could see, and it will probably be remembered as a funny moment going forward.
> 
> ...



I agree that the two examples you set out contrast strongly, but I don't think the contrast shows that the main issue is trust. I think the contrast shows that there is a difference between the GM playing by the rules - including the very local rules that have been established about a particular situation in the fiction - and a GM just making stuff up, especially stuff that is adverse to the players!

Classic D&D is replete with the sort of thing you describe - see eg the Appendices in Gygax's DMG, especially Appendix A and Appendices G and H. There are also the percentage chances of success on Augury and Divination spells. The game system these create, via their interactions, have a certain lottery flavour. And like a lottery, their fairness depends on the dice actually being rolled and the appropriate outcomes applied.


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## Maxperson (Jul 20, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> It did?  Can you tell me where?



It encouraged you to steal treasure and get away rather than fight monsters, since monsters killed you and gave a small fraction of the XP that treasure did.


bloodtide said:


> Unforfunetly I don't know what "agency" is in your definition.



You should try reading my posts sometime.  I've been very specific about it several times.


bloodtide said:


> Well, I'm not sure your talking about playing the same game as I play.  I can railroad hard and every has a great time on the adventure and loves it...even when they were "deceived" in your words.



And the same thing would have happened with no players.  It's only you playing the game when you railroad. Lying to your players and making them think they're playing is pretty bad.


bloodtide said:


> Now the hostile "agency" group that avoids all encounters in the game and just sits around for hours is not playing the game.



No idea what you are talking about.  You're creating yet more Strawmen, because that's not something I've ever said.

For all that you just said, you still evaded everything.  Do you have a real response for an argument that I've made?


----------



## pemerton (Jul 20, 2022)

Mort said:


> And yet it is one of the few pieces of advice that is 100% consistent through ALL editions of D&D.



This isn't right. Moldvay Basic doesn't tell the GM that they can't be guilty of cheating. Quite the opposite - there is a lot of advice on how to be fair and balanced. I believe that Mike Carr gives similar advice in the intro to module B1. And Gygax in his PHB and DMG absolutely assumes that the GM will stick to their prep, and gives detailed explanations of when a GM might depart from random rolls for content determination (wandering monsters and finding secret doors) - clearly a great deal of thought has been given to the relevant principles, and there is no suggestion that a GM is free to depart from those willy-nilly.


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## iserith (Jul 20, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> that seems weird... I mean I would feel that way if I gave random bear #17 a holy avenger to drop, but any place I put it, it will make sense.



Story emerges in an interesting way when we get weird results from tables and then have to come up with a reason for it to make sense in context. Perhaps this was a once great paladin of the order of the ancients who was cursed to become a ravenous bear and now, having been released from his curse by blessed death, they can pass along their holy avenger to someone worthy so long as they pledge to slay the hag that lay the hex and blights the forest to this day.


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## Maxperson (Jul 20, 2022)

pemerton said:


> This isn't right. Moldvay Basic doesn't tell the GM that they can't be guilty of cheating. Quite the opposite - there is a lot of advice on how to be fair and balanced. I believe that Mike Carr gives similar advice in the intro to module B1. And Gygax in his PHB and DMG absolutely assumes that the GM will stick to their prep, and gives detailed explanations of when a GM might depart from random rolls for content determination (wandering monsters and finding secret doors) - clearly a great deal of thought has been given to the relevant principles, and there is no suggestion that a GM is free to depart from those willy-nilly.



It's on page B3

"While the material in this booklet is referred to as rules, that is not really correct.  Anything in this booklet (and other D&D booklet) should be thought of as changeable - anything , that is, that the Dungeon Master or referee thinks should be changed."

If the DM can change anything, he literally cannot cheat, because there are no rules except that which he decides is a rule.


----------



## Mort (Jul 20, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> But if the players don't know what your doing why does it matter?




Because, if you're playing a campaign where the players think their choices matter (ie not a published module with a set beginning, middle and end) many actually want those choices to MATTER. if the DM presents 3 supposedly distinct plot hooks and the PCs bite on one, most players want that one to be pursued not for all 3 to actually be the same plot disguised as 3 separate choices.



bloodtide said:


> And why do the players get all this power to control the DMs actions?



The players, in D&D, have almost no power over the DMs actions at all. 

The point is, if the entire "story" is completely set by the DM, beginning, middle and end, the players ALSO have no real power over their own actions. That's the point of contention here.


----------



## pemerton (Jul 21, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> This doesn't make sense to me, I don't understand what this means in practice. Please respond to the actual examples or make your own.
> 
> GM describes that there is a room with a red and a green door. Please tell me what according to you are acceptable methods for the GM to decide what is behind the green door when a PC decides to open it.
> 
> ...



This whole discussion (of which your post is a part) rests on so many unstated assumptions that it's hard to unpack them all.

One of those assumptions is that _what situation a GM frames_ ought to be connected, or ought to appear to be connected, to _where the players have their PCs go_. This assumption comes right of out dungeon-crawling, "hidden gameboard" play. Why people who don't engage in that sort of play would still hang on to the assumption I don't know, but we can see that they are.

Another assumption is that _it is important that players have some control/influence, even if it is blind control/influence, over what scenes their PCs are framed into_. Hence the obsession with whether or not the players can make choices that will let their PCs "avoid" the ogre. Again, this assumption comes right out of dungeoneering play - where part of the skill of play is for the players to choose whether to enter a room and run the risk of its inhabitant in exchange for the chance of treasure, or to bypass a room because they're not ready to tackle it yet. (You can replace the word "room" with "level" and still have an accurate description of classic dungeoneering play.)

Suppose instead of an ogre who wants to kill the PCs, and who might drop treasure if they defeat it, we make it an encounter with a prophet. Or with a water-seller. Or with the PCs long-lost cousin. What if the logic of the encounter, in the fiction, is not to provide a wargame-style challenge or a chance of running a risk in exchange for loot, but rather to foreshadow, or to provide an opportunity, or to link present events to resonant backstory? There are good and bad ways for a GM to set up those sorts of encounters, but we won't get much insight into those by pontificating about the way random ogres are placed behind dungeon doors.

The previous paragraph has also brought to light a third assumption: that the meaningfulness of an encounter is nothing beyond its risk/reward profile in dungeon-crawling terms. As opposed to, say, what the player might decide their PC will part with for the chance to obtain water. Or how the player will have their PC respond to the return of their cousin.

And there is a closely-related fourth assumption: that meaning flows predominantly from the GM's control over the fiction. That is, that all the players are brining is a willingness to run risks of being bopped on the head by ogres in exchange for the chance of grabbing some loot, and that more-or-less everything else about the fiction will flow from the GM. But what if the player is the one who establishes that their PC has a long-lost cousin? Or that their PC is waiting for a particular sign? Or that their PC is trapped is lost, parched, in the desert? And so the meaning of the GM's decision making about who or what the PC meets isn't driven by the logic of dungeon-crawling, but by other sorts of logics - is the GM honouring or thwarting the way the player has introduced these stakes into the game? For instance (and borrowing, with slight alteration, an example from Luke Crane's Burning Wheel rulebooks), if the player establishes as their PC's raison d'etre that they are searching to find their long-lost cousin, then the GM who has the player meet the cousin in the first encounter of the first session has probably made a bad GMing decision. The decision doesn't become any better because the GM rolled percentile dice first ("There's a 20% chance the person behind the red door is the cousin") or because the GM decided in advance that the cousin lives in a hut to the north of the village (so if the PCs head north they meet the cousin, but if they head south they don't). In RPGing where the players are the primary source of meaning, the decisions that GM's have to make to honour that meaning and avoid running roughshod over it rarely have anything to do with these conventions of "hidden gameboard" play.


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## pemerton (Jul 21, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> letting a player do what they want is never railroading



In the OP, the player is allowed to choose which door their PC opens. The GM doesn't stop them doing that; they just decide what will happen next independently of which door the player chose for their PC. Yet many people think that can be railroading.

And in your example, what the player wants to do is not _climb a tree_. What they want to do is _find a clue_. And you've already decided that the are not going to succeed at that. Hence you've decided they can't do what they want to do. That's the railroading.



GMforPowergamers said:


> I dexided... cause I know that what really happened didn't have to do with that tree.



When you say "I know what really happened" all that means is _I wrote this story where things went this way and not that other way_. The game's fiction isn't some sort of independent object of knowledge. It's stuff that people make up - in this case, you've made it up, and on the basis of what you've made up you're telling the player that their declared action ("I search the tree for a clue") fails.



GMforPowergamers said:


> because the search IS meaningful... I don't understand why "you find nothing" isn't an  answer!!?



By this measure, opening the red door and having the GM tell you there is an ogre there; even though they would have said the same thing if you had your PC open the green door instead; is meaningful, because "You see an ogre" is an answer to "What's behind the door".



Maxperson said:


> If the DM knows that nothing is up there because he already knows where the useful information is, he is not forcing the PC down his path and invalidating agency.  The player has full agency to climb the tree and look or not, the DM simply knows the answer to the what the player is seeking in advance and can tell him.  There's no illusionism involved. There's no railroading involved.



Here is the illusion: the GM allows the player to declare the action, with the intention of finding a clue, while _already knowing that nothing will be found_.

Here is how the illusion could be avoided: the player says "I wonder if there is a clue in the tree" and the GM replies "No, there's not."



GMforPowergamers said:


> Lets take a game I have pitched before but not actually run yet (it's in my to be played pile) where there is a mostly human kingdom that flourished until a king married and elven woman as his second wife after his first died in child birth... since then it has been hundreds of years of her rule as queen as both the pure human royal line (from that kings siblings and his children with first wife) and his half elf descendants with her all grew up had families and grew old... so now as she is sick there are A LOT of claimants to the throne and being a human kingdom this has never happened before.
> That is the general idea. The specifics will change based on who is playing and what they are playing (and adding to the world) but one of the plots I have in my head is the question of if the 500 year old elf is really just getting sick or if she is being MADE to be sick.  Since this is only a rough idea I can't admit to having the answers now... but I will by the time game 1 or 2 kicks off. If I decide she was poisoned by coronial mustard then there is no clue to be found in any trees.... because neither mustard or elf would have been in the tree. BUT if a PC chooses to climb a tree I wont tell them not to or that they can't, I will just tell them there is noting up there and move on...



As per my reply just above to Maxperson, that last sentence is where the illusion is found.

More generally, what you have just described seems to me to be a railroad: you have decided in advance what play will be about (this sick elf, the claimants to the throne, the possibility of mustard poisoning, etc). As you present it, the players' role is to learn this stuff that you as GM have made up in advance.


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## Maxperson (Jul 21, 2022)

pemerton said:


> Here is the illusion: the GM allows the player to declare the action, with the intention of finding a clue, while _already knowing that nothing will be found_.



No such illusion exist. The intention is not to find a clue.  The intention is to see if one is there. The player doesn't create clues or not based on declarations.


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## Charlaquin (Jul 21, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> But, yet again this is not a universal truth.



Right, which is why you should _talk to your players about it_ to find out if they’re ok with it or not.


bloodtide said:


> But if the players don't know what your doing why does it matter?



If I sleep with your partner or spouse and you don’t know I’m doing it, why does it matter?


bloodtide said:


> And why do the players get all this power to control the DMs actions?



They don’t get to control the DM’s actions. The DM is under no obligation to run the game in any way they don’t want to, just like the players are under no obligation to play in a game they don’t want to. If you _talk to each other_ about these things ahead of time, you can make sure everyone who is participating is doing so because they want to, and the people who don’t want to can leave.


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## pemerton (Jul 21, 2022)

GMforPowergamers said:


> reread the skill challenge, the DM decides if an action or skill is appropriate (and again the going joke from the time Tony 'did a push up for insight') in fact one of the very examples was that during a negotiation you can declare all intimidate checks to count as fails without a roll if you decide that intimidating isn't what is needed.



I've read it many times.

The "appropriateness" is not about "does this fit the GM's preconceived plot?". It is about "does this make sense in the situation presented to the player?" The example given (4e DMG p 75) is of trying to use Diplomacy to help survive a desert crossing.

If the PCs are looking for clues in a wooded area, what is inappropriate about trying to find a clue by looking in the trees?

As for the Duke example, that is not a rule that the PCs can't find a clue. It is about methods that will or won't work, and can be learned by making a successful Insight check (4e DMG p 76). It's analogous to an immunity to a particular damage type. It doesn't involve the GM deciding, in advance, whether the players can get what they want out of the encounter.

Whereas your example of the clue is exactly that: you have decided, in advance, that the players can't get what they want out of their action declaration.



Maxperson said:


> It's on page B3
> 
> "While the material in this booklet is referred to as rules, that is not really correct.  Anything in this booklet (and other D&D booklet) should be thought of as changeable - anything , that is, that the Dungeon Master or referee thinks should be changed."
> 
> If the DM can change anything, he literally cannot cheat, because there are no rules except that which he decides is a rule.



Remind me not to play Moldvay Basic with you!

It's obvious that Moldvay is referring, on page B3, to things like XP required to gain a level, or to the treasure and encounter tables, to the ways spells work, to monster stats, etc. Roughly speaking, we could call these the mechanical/mathematical elements of the game.

He is not saying: you can change all the principles of play, so that the game no longer resembles what I told you to do at all, but you're still playing the game I wrote for you! (And even for what he does suggest might be changed, I don't think that he is saying a GM would do that all _in secret_, without telling the other players.)

Moldvay sets out, in detail - especially in chapters 4 and 8 - a set of play procedures for playing a hidden gameboard dungeon-crawler. If you ignore those procedures you are hardly playing his game anymore. And if a GM tells someone "I'll run some Moldvay Basic for you" and then ignores all the principles and procedures that Moldvay sets out, that would be tantamount to cheating.


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## pemerton (Jul 21, 2022)

Maxperson said:


> No such illusion exist. The intention is not to find a clue.  The intention is to see if one is there. The player doesn't create clues or not based on declarations.



This is sophistry.

If we use this approach to characterising players' action declarations, there is never any illusionism because the intention is never anything more than "find out what the GM says happens next". And that intention is always honoured.

Or to put it another way: a player can agree to be railroaded, allowing the GM to decide in advance whether or not attempts to find clues have any chance of success. And likewise a player can agree to be railroaded, allowing the GM to decide in advance whether or not attempts to find or avoid ogres or bandits have any chance of success.

There's no difference in the structure of play between the two cases, except that for some reason many people are happy with the first sort of railroad but not the second.


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## Maxperson (Jul 21, 2022)

pemerton said:


> Remind me not to play Moldvay Basic with you!



Hah!  I'm not saying I run my games that way, only that it's written that way. Spiderman comes to mind.  With great power comes great responsibility.  The DM can abuse his authority, but cannot cheat.  I prefer not to do either. 


pemerton said:


> It's obvious that Moldvay is referring, on page B3, to things like XP required to gain a level, or to the treasure and encounter tables, to the ways spells work, to monster stats, etc. Roughly speaking, we could call these the mechanical/mathematical elements of the game.



He was very clear that there are no rules in the book and that the DM can change any or all of them.  Like Gygax he then cautions the DM about changing things, but there are no limitations implied.


pemerton said:


> Moldvay sets out, in detail - especially in chapters 4 and 8 - a set of play procedures for playing a hidden gameboard dungeon-crawler. If you ignore those procedures you are hardly playing his game anymore. And if a GM tells someone "I'll run some Moldvay Basic for you" and then ignores all the principles and procedures that Moldvay sets out, that would be tantamount to cheating.



Sure, if you change enough the game changes.  That's not the point.  The point is that there isn't a single rule in the book that is not subject to DM change.  Further, since there are no rules and they are all guidelines, the DM is free to just create a rule stating that he cannot cheat.  But again, that's not to say that the DM can't abuse his authority.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 21, 2022)

pemerton said:


> I agree that the two examples you set out contrast strongly, but I don't think the contrast shows that the main issue is trust. I think the contrast shows that there is a difference between the GM playing by the rules - including the very local rules that have been established about a particular situation in the fiction - and a GM just making stuff up, especially stuff that is adverse to the players!
> 
> Classic D&D is replete with the sort of thing you describe - see eg the Appendices in Gygax's DMG, especially Appendix A and Appendices G and H. There are also the percentage chances of success on Augury and Divination spells. The game system these create, via their interactions, have a certain lottery flavour. And like a lottery, their fairness depends on the dice actually being rolled and the appropriate outcomes applied.




Yeah, one of the reasons I've made strong use of some randomization even in games where I'm doing a lot of improvisation is that, from lack of a better term, it keeps me honest.  I'm not completely immune to steering things away from anticlimax and the like, but its too easy when you're just coming up with things to start to let your own biases and other issues turn things into an exercise in manipulating the players to an end, and that's not really what I'm there for.  I may bake some assumptions into the tables when I make them, but if I'm doing things with tables in play, or even randomizing among, say, three things that could be happening that I come up with in a given situation, it tends to hose down any leans I have in that regard.


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## bloodtide (Jul 21, 2022)

Maxperson said:


> It encouraged you to steal treasure and get away rather than fight monsters, since monsters killed you and gave a small fraction of the XP that treasure did.



Ok, so classic D&D had a rule that had it make sense for characters to avoid combat and even gave them a reward for doing so.  Ok, that was YEARS ago.  Modern D&D has no treasure for XP rule.  In modern D&D the main way to get XP is by winning encounters.

So in the modern game, why do so many players have a near obsession with avoiding encounters and not playing the game?




Maxperson said:


> And the same thing would have happened with no players.  It's only you playing the game when you railroad. Lying to your players and making them think they're playing is pretty bad.



Well, there are players there playing the game with me and having fun.


Maxperson said:


> No idea what you are talking about.  You're creating yet more Strawmen, because that's not something I've ever said.



Well, not just you, but many are making the point that the whole point of "agency" is for the players to avoid encounters.  That example has been used dozens of times.  If the DM has unavoidable bandits outside of town: wrong.  If the players use "agency" to avoid an encounter, that is the beast game ever....though nothing happens.



Maxperson said:


> For all that you just said, you still evaded everything.  Do you have a real response for an argument that I've made?



I might have lost your argument in the pages and pages.  Maybe you can re post it?  Or summarize it?



Mort said:


> Because, if you're playing a campaign where the players think their choices matter (ie not a published module with a set beginning, middle and end) many actually want those choices to MATTER. if the DM presents 3 supposedly distinct plot hooks and the PCs bite on one, most players want that one to be pursued not for all 3 to actually be the same plot disguised as 3 separate choices.



I don't think most players pick apart the game as much as you do.  Most players are there to have fun.  They don't really care to much about all that stuff.  

Though three of the same plot hooks is not railroading


Mort said:


> The players, in D&D, have almost no power over the DMs actions at all.
> 
> The point is, if the entire "story" is completely set by the DM, beginning, middle and end, the players ALSO have no real power over their own actions. That's the point of contention here.



My question was about how the DM could only take action after they asked the players for permission first.



Charlaquin said:


> Right, which is why you should _talk to your players about it_ to find out if they’re ok with it or not.



They are not, that is why the railroad is invisible in the first place.



Charlaquin said:


> If I sleep with your partner or spouse and you don’t know I’m doing it, why does it matter?



Odd example.


----------



## Maxperson (Jul 21, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> In modern D&D the main way to get XP is by winning encounters.



Is it? 

The DMG says that the DM can award experience for noncombat challenges, or go with milestone XP or level advancement without XP.  You can gain levels in 5e just fine without ever getting into a fight.

Yes, the DM can go traditional and give out most or all XP through fights, but it doesn't have to be that way.


bloodtide said:


> So in the modern game, why do so many players have a near obsession with avoiding encounters and not playing the game?



You tell me, since you're the one stating it.  I never said anything like that.


bloodtide said:


> Well, there are players there playing the game with me and having fun.



I'm sure they are.  They aren't playing the game, though.  They're just along for your ride.  That can be fun, but it's not my thing.  Do they know that they are being railroaded?


bloodtide said:


> Well, not just you, but many are making the point that the whole point of "agency" is for the players to avoid encounters.



I've never said that, though.  It has to be possible to avoid them, which is very different than the point being to avoid them, which is your fabrication.


bloodtide said:


> I might have lost your argument in the pages and pages.  Maybe you can re post it?  Or summarize it?



Agency is being able to make a choice that matters.  If a player is on rails, overt or illusionary, that player has no choice and so can't be playing the game.  To play the game you have to be able to make choices that matter.  


bloodtide said:


> I don't think most players pick apart the game as much as you do.  Most players are there to have fun.  They don't really care to much about all that stuff.



Yes and no.  I have put terms to it and can discuss it.  Players in my experience don't like to be forced into things.  Players recognize when they are being forced into something against their will and generally hate it.  Unless you lie to them and use illusionism to fool them, which is a technique designed to avoid them knowing that you are doing something they will hate.


bloodtide said:


> Though three of the same plot hooks is not railroading



If you are presenting three false choices, because they are all the same choice, then yes that is railroading.  You are forcing them down a path.


bloodtide said:


> They are not, that is why the railroad is invisible in the first place.



So you know they aren't okay with being railroaded, so you hide it and do it anyway.  Classy.


----------



## Charlaquin (Jul 21, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> They are not, that is why the railroad is invisible in the first place.



So, you’re just straight up admitting you hide the railroad because you know your players wouldn’t like it if they knew you were doing it? Ok, that’s… bold of you…


bloodtide said:


> Odd example.



But an effective one, because it illustrates my point in a totally unambiguous way. Just because the wronged party isn’t aware they’ve been wronged, doesn’t mean the act wasn’t wrong.


----------



## bloodtide (Jul 21, 2022)

Maxperson said:


> Is it?
> 
> The DMG says that the DM can award experience for noncombat challenges, or go with milestone XP or level advancement without XP.  You can gain levels in 5e just fine without ever getting into a fight.
> 
> Yes, the DM can go traditional and give out most or all XP through fights, but it doesn't have to be that way.



You do know there are other encounters other then fights right?


Maxperson said:


> You tell me, since you're the one stating it.  I never said anything like that.



Your one of the people saying players must always be allowed to avoid all encounters.  The choice is: path/door A leads to encounter and path/door B leads to nothing.



Maxperson said:


> I've never said that, though.  It has to be possible to avoid them, which is very different than the point being to avoid them, which is your fabrication.



So your saying it just needs to be possible in some vague theoretical way, but then the players won't do it?



Maxperson said:


> Agency is being able to make a choice that matters.  If a player is on rails, overt or illusionary, that player has no choice and so can't be playing the game.  To play the game you have to be able to make choices that matter.



Well "choice" has nothing to do with playing many games, and RPGs are no diffrent.  Players can play the game, have no "meaningful choices".....not even know or notice....and have fun.  




Maxperson said:


> Yes and no.  I have put terms to it and can discuss it.  Players in my experience don't like to be forced into things.  Players recognize when they are being forced into something against their will and generally hate it.  Unless you lie to them and use illusionism to fool them, which is a technique designed to avoid them knowing that you are doing something they will hate.
> 
> If you are presenting three false choices, because they are all the same choice, then yes that is railroading.  You are forcing them down a path.
> 
> So you know they aren't okay with being railroaded, so you hide it and do it anyway.  Classy.



I find most players don't mind being "forced" to play an RPG, as long as they have fun.  

I'm too Old School to have class......I'm like school in summer time 




Charlaquin said:


> So, you’re just straight up admitting you hide the railroad because you know your players wouldn’t like it if they knew you were doing it? Ok, that’s… bold of you…



There are BOLD RPGers and OLD RPGers........but there are no Bold, Old RPGers.  


Charlaquin said:


> But an effective one, because it illustrates my point in a totally unambiguous way. Just because the wronged party isn’t aware they’ve been wronged, doesn’t mean the act wasn’t wrong.



Right, and this is where intention matters.  Were they "wronged" into a wild emotional rollercoaster of a crazy fun game that they loved?  Yes, they were.


----------



## Charlaquin (Jul 21, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> There are BOLD RPGers and OLD RPGers........but there are no Bold, Old RPGers.



What does that mean?


bloodtide said:


> Right, and this is where intention matters.  Were they "wronged" into a wild emotional rollercoaster of a crazy fun game that they loved?  Yes, they were.



Well, you admittedly did something you knew they wouldn’t like, and then lied about it so they wouldn’t find out. So, yes, they were absolutely wronged.


----------



## Maxperson (Jul 21, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> You do know there are other encounters other then fights right?



Yep.  So you can level without ever getting into one.  Thanks for agreeing with me.


bloodtide said:


> Your one of the people saying players must always be allowed to avoid all encounters.  The choice is: path/door A leads to encounter and path/door B leads to nothing.



Nope! Never said that!


bloodtide said:


> So your saying it just needs to be possible in some vague theoretical way, but then the players won't do it?



Who knows what they will do.  Would they avoid some if they have advanced knowledge? Yep! Would they go after some directly if they have advanced knowledge? Yep!  Will they hit some because they didn't check or failed their rolls?  Yep!

I've never met a group that would avoid all or even most of them, though.  The key is that they have agency, the choice to make those decisions.


bloodtide said:


> Well "choice" has nothing to do with playing many games, and RPGs are no diffrent.



Objectively False.  RPGs are very different from board, sports and card games.


bloodtide said:


> I find most players don't mind being "forced" to play an RPG, as long as they have fun.



My players would probably punch me if I tried to force them to play an RPG.  If players don't want to play, they don't play. Hell, I wouldn't want to force them to play in my game in the first place.  If they don't want to be there, then they shouldn't be there.


bloodtide said:


> Right, and this is where intention matters.  Were they "wronged" into a wild emotional rollercoaster of a crazy fun game that they loved?  Yes, they were.



So it's okay to steal as long as the person you steal from doesn't catch you and is still happy.  Got it.


----------



## EzekielRaiden (Jul 21, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> So, you’re just straight up admitting you hide the railroad because you know your players wouldn’t like it if they knew you were doing it? Ok, that’s… bold of you…



So much for the argument that the only thing anyone here is talking about is doing stuff everyone is implicitly supportive of...



Charlaquin said:


> But an effective one, because it illustrates my point in a totally unambiguous way. Just because the wronged party isn’t aware they’ve been wronged, doesn’t mean the act wasn’t wrong.



Other examples:

"If the teacher doesn't know we're all copying our homework from the nerd in the class, so long as we turn it in on time, why does it matter?"
"If the customers don't know the bank is actually insolvent, so long as we can meet daily withdrawals, why does it matter?"
"If the employees don't know we've been shorting their pay, why does it matter?"
"If our theoretical physics papers are absolute fictions but published because no one knows enough to contradict us, why does it matter?"

I could give some more, shall we say, _charged_ examples relevant to political events of the past few years, but I will instead leave those as an exercise for the reader.



bloodtide said:


> There are BOLD RPGers and OLD RPGers........but there are no Bold, Old RPGers.



Being flippant doesn't respond to the thing said. It is unusual, and not particularly great, that you do something you KNOW will upset someone, and cover it up specifically because you know it will upset them. You have yet to explain why doing so is a good thing. This _clearly_ differs from something like performance magic, where revealing the trick's inner workings is usually met either with mild disappointment or, more often, fascination at the actual process. (I'm thinking, for example, of how sleight-of-hand artists can achieve some genuinely shocking results with such minimal actions and the economy of attention.) The earlier example (I believe you gave it?) of a surprise party is also illustrative here: if someone told you "I do not want a surprise party, I don't like birthday parties, I just want a nice quiet birthday to spend with my family and maybe a close friend," and you threw them a surprise party _anyway_, don't you think that would be a problem?



bloodtide said:


> Right, and this is where intention matters. Were they "wronged" into a wild emotional rollercoaster of a crazy fun game that they loved? Yes, they were.



They were wronged because they THOUGHT they had forged a story of their own with the freedom to choose a different path. Instead, they were sold a bill of goods, and there was always and only one path they could have taken. The freedom was a straight-up lie. The _intention_ to make something cool and awesome does not excuse the _action_ of deceiving someone into thinking they have freedom when they do not _when it would upset them to know that that freedom wasn't real_.

In fact, let's examine that "intention matters" angle:

"If the patient doesn't know we're pumping them full of experimental drugs to keep them stable, what does it matter?"
"If my daughter _thinks_ she can do as she likes, but in actuality I have pre-approved every person she ever interacts with, what does it matter?"
"If my husband _thinks_ he's still vegan, but I've been secretly feeding him meat to treat his anemia and B-vitamin deficiency, what does it matter?"
"If my Jewish friend loves my cooking, but doesn't know I use pork fat because nothing else tastes as good, what does it matter?"

In every case, the intention is to do something the speaker thinks is good for the person in question. In every case, it is still wrong.

Or, to give you an adage in return: _The road to hell is paved with good intentions._


----------



## bloodtide (Jul 21, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> Well, you admittedly did something you knew they wouldn’t like, and then lied about it so they wouldn’t find out. So, yes, they were absolutely wronged.



Does not bother me at all.  And it's not like they will ever know.  The ends justify the means. 



Maxperson said:


> Yep.  So you can level without ever getting into one.  Thanks for agreeing with me.



I'm not the anti railroad agency players that run from all encounters are not even playing the game.




Maxperson said:


> Who knows what they will do.  Would they avoid some if they have advanced knowledge? Yep! Would they go after some directly if they have advanced knowledge? Yep!  Will they hit some because they didn't check or failed their rolls?  Yep!



Well, they will be railroaded right into all encounters in my game. 



Maxperson said:


> Objectively False.  RPGs are very different from board., sports and card games.



True.....but the more "different" things are, the more the "same" they are...but we don't really want to talk about such "choice".




Maxperson said:


> My players would probably punch me if I tried to force them to play an RPG.  If players don't want to play, they don't play. Hell, I wouldn't want to force them to play in my game in the first place.  If they don't want to be there, then they shouldn't be there.
> 
> So it's okay to steal as long as the person you steal from doesn't catch you and is still happy.  Got it.



Well. I don't play with such physically violent people.  

And...well....no comment.



EzekielRaiden said:


> You have yet to explain why doing so is a good thing.



I did pages ago.  Deception, to do a good thing is not in any way wrong.  It is so common and accepted nothing more needs to be said. 




EzekielRaiden said:


> This _clearly_ differs from something like performance magic, where revealing the trick's inner workings is usually met either with mild disappointment or, more often, fascination at the actual process.



Most players could care less, but many DMs are fascinated.  When another DM is a player in my game and they not only have fun, but they watch all the other players having fun.  They watch as all the other regular players get super focused and engaged when encountering the gnome Bix.  Watching all the players express real emotions and go all out in the game to catch that annoying reoccurring gnome npc.  And the DM playing asks how it's done:  Railroading. 




EzekielRaiden said:


> The earlier example (I believe you gave it?) of a surprise party is also illustrative here: if someone told you "I do not want a surprise party, I don't like birthday parties, I just want a nice quiet birthday to spend with my family and maybe a close friend," and you threw them a surprise party _anyway_, don't you think that would be a problem?



Uh, sure for that specific example.  But lets take another (non birthday related) surprise party.  So the person to be surprised DOES NOT say "I don't want it".  So you set up the party and guests and food and such, and have to deceive and lie to them so they don't find out.  When they are surprised with the party they love it and like being supprised.  



EzekielRaiden said:


> They were wronged because they THOUGHT they had forged a story of their own with the freedom to choose a different path. Instead, they were sold a bill of goods, and there was always and only one path they could have taken. The freedom was a straight-up lie. The _intention_ to make something cool and awesome does not excuse the _action_ of deceiving someone into thinking they have freedom when they do not.



Well, the players just thought wrong.  Don't know where they go such crazy idea from any way.




EzekielRaiden said:


> In fact, let's examine that "intention matters" angle:
> 
> "If the patient doesn't know we're pumping them full of experimental drugs to keep them stable, what does it matter?"
> "If my daughter _thinks_ she can do as she likes, but in actuality I have pre-approved every person she ever interacts with, what does it matter?"
> ...



Well the medical ones and religious one....no comment.
Meeting a child's friends is something a good parent does.  

Try some:
A guy hates sci fi, is tricked into watching a sci fi movie and finds he likes it.
A guy hates country music, is tricked into listening some and finds it's not so bad.
Some guy gamers think "women can't play RPGs, and are tricked into playing a game with women....and discover women can play RPGs.


----------



## Maxperson (Jul 21, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> Does not bother me at all.  And it's not like they will ever know. * The ends justify the means.*



Said every dictator ever.


bloodtide said:


> I'm not the anti railroad agency players *that run from all encounters* are not even playing the game.



At this point this is just a deliberate smear by you against the other side. I have corrected you numerous times on this and literally no one but you has been saying that.  That's all you heave.  Smears and evasions.


----------



## EzekielRaiden (Jul 21, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> Does not bother me at all. And it's not like they will ever know. The ends justify the means.



Seriously? You're literally actually going to say this.

Well, folks, I feel like that's case closed. "I don't care how bad the means might be, my noble ends are all the justification I need."



bloodtide said:


> I did pages ago.  Deception, to do a good thing is not in any way wrong.  It is so common and accepted nothing more needs to be said.



You absolutely did not. I have responded to those things, and have not seen you actually give an argument of weight. I have, in fact, explicitly said why your arguments by analogy _don't work_. You have continued to use them anyway.



bloodtide said:


> Most players could care less, but many DMs are fascinated.  When another DM is a player in my game and they not only have fun, but they watch all the other players having fun.  They watch as all the other regular players get super focused and engaged when encountering the gnome Bix.  Watching all the players express real emotions and go all out in the game to catch that annoying reoccurring gnome npc.  And the DM playing asks how it's done:  Railroading.



That your players are having fun does not mean this is the only way for it to be fun. That's a classic logical fallacy (namely, false dichotomy: you _have_ to railroad otherwise the players wouldn't have fun. This is false.)



bloodtide said:


> Uh, sure for that specific example.



Yes, that is my point. Your "specific examples" keep not working _because they aren't the same as the thing being discussed_. You keep bringing up non-sequitur examples, things that aren't relevant, and pretending that they are relevant. Performance magic and watching movies doesn't involve any agency on the part of the audience, that's a _vital difference_ between those things and playing a TTRPG, yet I have not seen a single statement addressing this fault.



bloodtide said:


> But lets take another (non birthday related) surprise party.  So the person to be surprised DOES NOT say "I don't want it".  So you set up the party and guests and food and such, and have to deceive and lie to them so they don't find out.  When they are surprised with the party they love it and like being supprised.



Except that, again, the whole point here is that the person DOES NOT LIKE SURPRISE PARTIES. That's the WHOLE POINT. By assuming the person DOES like surprise parties, you have literally just made the argument completely circular, you have _assumed_ the thing you were trying to _prove_.

Making a fallacious argument doesn't make you wrong. But it doesn't do you any favors, and making _repeated_ fallacious arguments casts doubt on your premise.



bloodtide said:


> Well, the players just thought wrong.  Don't know where they go such crazy idea from any way.



You explicitly said you WANT them to think it, and will do whatever it takes to ensure they never stop thinking it. You _literally just said that in the post I quoted_.



bloodtide said:


> Well the medical ones and religious one....no comment.



Why not? They are extremely relevant and demonstrate _exactly_ the problem here. A person who has a very strong reason to oppose a particular state of affairs, being deceived by people who genuinely think well of them. Why should these be passed over without comment? By ignoring them, you are tacitly admitting that there are examples which poke holes in your argument, but which you refuse to engage with.



bloodtide said:


> Meeting a child's friends is something a good parent does.



That's not what I said. I said _pre-approving_ every single person the child interacts with. That means the child is never _allowed_ to meet anyone the parent doesn't want them to meet. That's quite a bit different--and, I hope you'll agree, _dramatically_ more draconian.



bloodtide said:


> Try some:
> A guy hates sci fi, is tricked into watching a sci fi movie and finds he likes it.



Except that, again, _you are assuming the person starts liking sci-fi_. That's not what we're talking about. We're talking about someone who gets tricked into watching a sci-fi film and _doesn't like it when he realizes it's sci-fi_.



bloodtide said:


> A guy hates country music, is tricked into listening some and finds it's not so bad.



Again, you make this circular by presuming appreciation. Further: you cannot have someone listen to country music, or watch a sci-fi movie, etc. without them, y'know, _learning that it is country music or sci-fi_. That's a pretty clear fault in the analogy, because _as you literally just said_, you work to make sure your railroading will never be observed.

That's two problems with these examples. One, you _know_ that the players will not only not be happy, but will in fact be _angry_ if they learn that you tricked them into a railroad. Two, you actively work to ensure the railroad will never be discovered. That makes your examples both circular _and not actually analogies_. This isn't even an argument by analogy--it's a pure _non sequitur!_



bloodtide said:


> Some guy gamers think "women can't play RPGs, and are tricked into playing a game with women....and discover women can play RPGs.



See above. Both of the critical faults remain: in order to achieve this you have to _reveal that the person was playing with women_, and you have to _assume the person actually is happy after the reveal_. You have explicitly stated that both of these statements are false, that you specifically try to prevent such a reveal from occurring, and that if such a reveal _did_ occur, it would guaranteed cause at least some of your players to become upset.


----------



## Maxperson (Jul 21, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> You absolutely did not. I have responded to those things, and have not seen you actually give an argument of weight. I have, in fact, explicitly said why your arguments by analogy _don't work_. You have continued to use them anyway.



I also refuted his examples point by point, and he also did not respond to me on them.  Funny that.


----------



## bloodtide (Jul 21, 2022)

Maxperson said:


> At this point this is just a deliberate smear by you against the other side. I have corrected you numerous times on this and literally no one but you has been saying that.  That's all you heave.  Smears and evasions.



It's the example all ways given: the players avoid and run from any encounter.  Then they brag about it-"yea, the DM had an encounter planned, be we showed him...HA....we ;picked the south road and nothing happened!"




EzekielRaiden said:


> That your players are having fun does not mean this is the only way for it to be fun. That's a classic logical fallacy (namely, false dichotomy: you _have_ to railroad otherwise the players wouldn't have fun. This is false.)



Ok, for this vague statement, it's not the only way.



EzekielRaiden said:


> Yes, that is my point. Your "specific examples" keep not working _because they aren't the same as the thing being discussed_. You keep bringing up non-sequitur examples, things that aren't relevant, and pretending that they are relevant. Performance magic and watching movies doesn't involve any agency on the part of the audience, that's a _vital difference_ between those things and playing a TTRPG, yet I have not seen a single statement addressing this fault.



Well, because I'm not talking about agency, I'm talking about accepted deception.




EzekielRaiden said:


> Except that, again, the whole point here is that the person DOES NOT LIKE SURPRISE PARTIES. That's the WHOLE POINT. By assuming the person DOES like surprise parties, you have literally just made the argument completely circular, you have _assumed_ the thing you were trying to _prove_.



Right, I said that ONE person who hates surprise parties....well, just leave them alone.  Everyone else, surprise them.



EzekielRaiden said:


> You explicitly said you WANT them to think it, and will do whatever it takes to ensure they never stop thinking it. You _literally just said that in the post I quoted_.



If I said what I want the players "to think" it would be "not much" or "nothing much".



EzekielRaiden said:


> Why not? They are extremely relevant and demonstrate _exactly_ the problem here. A person who has a very strong reason to oppose a particular state of affairs, being deceived by people who genuinely think well of them. Why should these be passed over without comment? By ignoring them, you are tacitly admitting that there are examples which poke holes in your argument, but which you refuse to engage with.



I doubt the forum rules will allow this, so skip.


EzekielRaiden said:


> That's not what I said. I said _pre-approving_ every single person the child interacts with. That means the child is never _allowed_ to meet anyone the parent doesn't want them to meet. That's quite a bit different--and, I hope you'll agree, _dramatically_ more draconian.



No?  Are you a parent?  Good parents pre approve such things when possible.  




EzekielRaiden said:


> Except that, again, _you are assuming the person starts liking sci-fi_. That's not what we're talking about. We're talking about someone who gets tricked into watching a sci-fi film and _doesn't like it when he realizes it's sci-fi_.



Well, no, that is what your talking about.  I'm talking about a person tricked into a railroaded game....and they have fun.  And even if they found out, they could still accept they had fun.  



EzekielRaiden said:


> Again, you make this circular by presuming appreciation. Further: you cannot have someone listen to country music, or watch a sci-fi movie, etc. without them, y'know, _learning that it is country music or sci-fi_. That's a pretty clear fault in the analogy, because _as you literally just said_, you work to make sure your railroading will never be observed.



Not so.  There are plenty of "stealth" sci fi movies and country music that don't "look or sound" like "what people think".  



EzekielRaiden said:


> That's two problems with these examples. One, you _know_ that the players will not only not be happy, but will in fact be _angry_ if they learn that you tricked them into a railroad. Two, you actively work to ensure the railroad will never be discovered. That makes your examples both circular _and not actually analogies_. This isn't even an argument by analogy--it's a pure _non sequitur!_



Some will like it, some will hate forever.....I concentrate on the ones who liked it.

Story Time:  So a couple weeks ago a D&D group of young players wanted to play a spelljammer campagin after all the hype.  They posted an add at the libiary and got no responses.  This is a group that would agree with much that you have said.  But they really wanted to play spelljammer.  So......they come to me.  Needless to say we agree on nothing...except we all play D&D.  They ask me to DM.  I mention our play styles don't match, they say they want to play.  They want to know what kind of game it will be and do a whole "session 0" thing.  I refuse to tell them anything and have them make clueless berk groundling characters.  

That was in the recent past.  And the game is still going on.  The game is a pure railroad...and "worse" things(to them anyway).  And yet...they are all still in the game.  They have so much fun every week, and can't wait to come back for more.  It's too soon to say if any of them might learn the truth or if they will have to stay deceived forever.  They are down right amazed how fun the game is, as they have heard lots of "horror stories" (mostly true, but often told with word salad jargon that they like).  So the game rolls on, and they will likely never know.  I've even slyly mentioned they are riding The Great Space Coaster(though they are all WAY to young to know of that show), but as long as they don't hear the trigger jargon buzz word "railroad", they are clueless.


----------



## Charlaquin (Jul 21, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> Why not? They are extremely relevant and demonstrate _exactly_ the problem here. A person who has a very strong reason to oppose a particular state of affairs, being deceived by people who genuinely think well of them. Why should these be passed over without comment?



Because he doesn’t think they’re wrong.


----------



## Maxperson (Jul 21, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> It's the example all ways given: the players avoid and run from any encounter.  Then they brag about it-"yea, the DM had an encounter planned, be we showed him...HA....we ;picked the south road and nothing happened!"


----------



## EzekielRaiden (Jul 21, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> It's the example all ways given: the players avoid and run from any encounter.  Then they brag about it-"yea, the DM had an encounter planned, be we showed him...HA....we ;picked the south road and nothing happened!"



I've literally never seen or heard of this. Ever. You are the first person to ever speak of such a thing to me.



bloodtide said:


> Well, because I'm not talking about agency, I'm talking about accepted deception.



Then you aren't talking to anyone in this thread, because both the opening post and essentially everyone since then has been. Like, as much as I may hold the written text of the opening post to account for what read like fig-leaf excuses, it DOES actually explicitly say to not take away the players' agency. That's literally part of the topic.



bloodtide said:


> Right, I said that ONE person who hates surprise parties....well, just leave them alone.  Everyone else, surprise them.



Okay. Now...what if that one person (because it only takes one!) is expected to be involved in most activities because, say, they're your spouse and you really love to include them in the things you do? You'd be terribly disrespectful to throw those surprise parties knowing you'd be dragging your spouse into a party they would legitimately dislike attending.



bloodtide said:


> If I said what I want the players "to think" it would be "not much" or "nothing much".



That does not sound good to me. "I want my players to not think much of anything." That's...what? I want my players to be thinking constantly! I _yearn_ for their critique.



bloodtide said:


> I doubt the forum rules will allow this, so skip.



Then I will consider the point conceded; if you refuse to refute the examples, then your claim that there is no such thing as a well-meaning but still wrong deception has been given two counter-examples.



bloodtide said:


> No?  Are you a parent?  Good parents pre approve such things when possible.



Again, you are thinking of this as "I want to check in on the things my child likes." That is not what I am saying.

I am saying that this parent literally doesn't even allow their child the _possibility_ of meeting someone, AT ALL, EVER, that has not been pre-approved. The child is kept inside an enclosed bubble. The only people allowed into that bubble are EXCLUSIVELY those the parent has approved in advance. She cannot meet a friend and _ask for the parent's approval_. She will ONLY be allowed to even START meeting people _after_ those people have been reviewed and approved by the parent. And she is never told this. She thinks she meets people just because they're people she happens to have run into. This is false. Literally no person she has ever met, in her entire life, is someone that her parent has not, in advance, reviewed and deemed acceptable.

That is why I am calling it draconian. I absolutely agree with you that a good parent takes interest in the people their children meet, and works to ensure that their child forms healthy relationships with constructive people. This is not that. This is, "I will never even let you _realize_ that you only met people I chose for you to meet in advance." This is "Truman Show" type stuff.



bloodtide said:


> Well, no, that is what your talking about.  I'm talking about a person tricked into a railroaded game....and they have fun.  And even if they found out, they could still accept they had fun.



....so you're willfully only talking about circular examples. In that case, I'm just going to ignore every instance of examples like this in the future, because they are pointless.



bloodtide said:


> Not so.  There are plenty of "stealth" sci fi movies and country music that don't "look or sound" like "what people think".



Sorry, don't buy it. Both genres are quite obvious. There's a reason you chose them for the example.



bloodtide said:


> Some will like it, some will hate forever.....I concentrate on the ones who liked it.



Then you are concentrating on people _irrelevant to the thread_.



bloodtide said:


> Story Time:  So a couple weeks ago a D&D group of young players wanted to play a spelljammer campagin after all the hype.  They posted an add at the libiary and got no responses.  This is a group that would agree with much that you have said.  But they really wanted to play spelljammer.  So......they come to me.  Needless to say we agree on nothing...except we all play D&D.  They ask me to DM.  I mention our play styles don't match, they say they want to play.  They want to know what kind of game it will be and do a whole "session 0" thing.  I refuse to tell them anything and have them make clueless berk groundling characters.
> 
> That was in the recent past.  And the game is still going on.  The game is a pure railroad...and "worse" things(to them anyway).  And yet...they are all still in the game.  They have so much fun every week, and can't wait to come back for more.  It's too soon to say if any of them might learn the truth or if they will have to stay deceived forever.  They are down right amazed how fun the game is, as they have heard lots of "horror stories" (mostly true, but often told with word salad jargon that they like).  So the game rolls on, and they will likely never know.  I've even slyly mentioned they are riding The Great Space Coaster(though they are all WAY to young to know of that show), but as long as they don't hear the trigger jargon buzz word "railroad", they are clueless.



So...in contravention of what you said before, _you did in fact MAKE them clueless_. That was your goal. You specifically intended that. And you do these things, knowing that (a) you did NOT have to, you COULD have done something that wasn't railroading "and worse" (whatever that means), and (b) they WILL be upset should they ever find out.

To be honest, I'm done arguing here. You clearly know what you're doing has an enormous potential to hurt the people you do it to. You do it--"and worse"--anyway, without remorse, without even a second thought. I have nothing further to say to you. I hope the truth doesn't harm the people you run for so much that they decide never to play again, because that would be a tragedy.


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## pemerton (Jul 21, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> Don’t put PCs into life or death situations if you aren’t ok with them dying to unlucky rolls. There’s no shame in ruling that PCs only get injured or something instead of dying, and in my opinion, better that than to fudge rolls or change monster HP mid-combat.



Interestingly, Gygax expresses exactly the same opinion in his DMG.

There's no _illusion_ in telling a player that their PC, who has just lost all their hit points, suffers some consequence other than dying!


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 21, 2022)

pemerton said:


> Interestingly, Gygax expresses exactly the same opinion in his DMG.
> 
> There's no _illusion_ in telling a player that their PC, who has just lost all their hit points, suffers some consequence other than dying!



Which is part of why I keep saying illusionism is never necessary. There is no gameplay consequence that can be produced by illusionism which _cannot_ be produced without it.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 21, 2022)

So I just skimmed couple of last pages, but I just want to say that I don't really agree with @bloodtide's attitude, but it certainly helps me better understand why some people have so strong feelings about this...


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## pemerton (Jul 21, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> So I just skimmed couple of last pages, but I just want to say that I don't really agree with @bloodtide's attitude, but it certainly helps me better understand why some people have so strong feelings about this...



My feelings are motivated by what I enjoy in play as a GM and as a player. I enjoy being creative, and sometimes provocative; I don't want to be a storyteller.


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## AnotherGuy (Jul 21, 2022)

pemerton said:


> My feelings are motivated by what I enjoy in play as a GM and as a player. I enjoy being creative, and sometimes provocative; I don't want to be a storyteller.



And yet a storyteller can be creative, provocative and still enjoy play.


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## pemerton (Jul 21, 2022)

AnotherGuy said:


> And yet a storyteller can be creative, provocative and still enjoy play.



Sure. I posted about my reasons, not those of anyone else.


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## AnotherGuy (Jul 21, 2022)

So there are players that actually welcome the "railroad" like those at my table.
The option exists in-game for them to pursue their own agendas fulltime and yet they enjoy the semi-linear storyline provided by a railroad with me as DM having to find creative ways of inserting their diverging character-driven check points along their path and at times be provocative on which check point is more urgent (theirs' or the railroad?)

The only way to truly set their (as well as my) mind truly free, I believe, would be to remove the over-arching railroad storyline completely and see what the players do with that much freedom. i.e. when there is no impending doom/enemy or someone asking them to perform a fetch/find/save quest.
As long as the railroad storyline exists, they, trained as they are, are likely to get on board the train and follow the tracks.

Is the railroad really invisible to them? Do they care? How much agency in the game-world do they want?
These will be interesting questions to have with them one day. But as long as we are having fun in the heavily invested current years-long campaign, and given the RL time constraints we have I do not know when it will be possible to explore a pure player-driven adventure.


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 21, 2022)

AnotherGuy said:


> So there are players that actually welcome the "railroad" like those at my table.



Being perfectly frank, I don't really understand why you feel you need to say more then.

I and others--at the very least, @Charlaquin and @Maxperson--have said that if you have your players' consent, awesome. You've respected their agency. It wouldn't be _my cup of tea_, but who the hell cares whether _I_ would enjoy playing in your game? I'm not one of your players!

The problem is with the lack of consent, the invisibility, the hoodwinking, passing off a game (not a _fictional world_, not a _fantasy setting_, not a _place_, the actual, IRL game activity) as being something it isn't.


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## AnotherGuy (Jul 21, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> Being perfectly frank, I don't really understand why you feel you need to say more then.
> 
> I and others--at the very least, @Charlaquin and @Maxperson--have said that if you have your players' consent, awesome. You've respected their agency. It wouldn't be _my cup of tea_, but who the hell cares whether _I_ would enjoy playing in your game? I'm not one of your players!
> 
> The problem is with the lack of consent, the invisibility, the hoodwinking, passing off a game (not a _fictional world_, not a _fantasy setting_, not a _place_, the actual, IRL game activity) as being something it isn't.



Fair enough I haven't been closely following the thrust of the thread. I have been caught in a moment of rambling 
For me, if the DM is good, railroad or not I'm game. My bar for enjoyment is pretty simple. Good DM = good game.


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 21, 2022)

My stance is that generally everyone participating actually understands and has consented to the idea that the fictional world cannot have perfect objective existence, and required the GM (or at least someone, but in D&D it is mostly the GM) to make decisions of what exist and how it is presented. And that when doing so the GM is authorised to use their own judgement. Furthermore, it is understood that the GM may use that judgement to bring forth elements they think would be cool to include. The GM deciding that the third forest area the PCs explore will contain the witch's cottage, or that the next treasure parcel they find will contain the plot relevant magic ring or that the character's long lost brother will not be found until dramatically appropriately arduous amount of searching has been conducted is not 'deception.' It is just the GM using their framing powers to include interesting elements in appropriate moments. And may this sometimes mean that some choices do not have the weight that they perhaps could be imagined to have if we assumed objectively existing world? Like it actually didn't matter which treasure parcel you looted, you found the Ring of Power anyway, even though logically, in an objective world it would have mattered. Sure, that can happen. But also don't think this is shocking. No one expects that every minor decision will have a huge impact, and everyone is aware that the world actually isn't perfectly objective and the GM is making some decisions to direct things.

Now could people agree that they wanted to explicitly play an old school map and key game where basically everything is predetermined? Yes, of course they could. In such a game the GM wouldn't be doing much of such directing, though perhaps even there they might need to make calls on small thing. But in either case, I don't think there is any basis on assuming that this is the expected playmode of 5e D&D, and that any deviation from it requires an explicit announcement.


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## Mort (Jul 21, 2022)

AnotherGuy said:


> So there are players that actually welcome the "railroad" like those at my table.
> The option exists in-game for them to pursue their own agendas fulltime and yet they enjoy the semi-linear storyline provided by a railroad with me as DM having to find creative ways of inserting their diverging character-driven check points along their path and at times be provocative on which check point is more urgent (theirs' or the railroad?)
> 
> The only way to truly set their (as well as my) mind truly free, I believe, would be to remove the over-arching railroad storyline completely and see what the players do with that much freedom. i.e. when there is no impending doom/enemy or someone asking them to perform a fetch/find/save quest.
> ...




What you're describing isn't a railroad, especially if the players have the option to pursue their own agendas along the path.

It's a linear throughline, something that links many of the threads of the campaign together - and one the players are either fully aware of or become fully aware of.

Now, if the players utterly rejected this throughline, kept trying to pursue something else - but invariably ended up right back on track to do this particular plot - then it's a railroad (But that doesn't sound at all like what is happening.)


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## bloodtide (Jul 21, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> I've literally never seen or heard of this. Ever. You are the first person to ever speak of such a thing to me.



Scroll back in the thread, the "player agency choice" to avoid encounters is talked about a lot.





EzekielRaiden said:


> Okay. Now...what if that one person (because it only takes one!) is expected to be involved in most activities because, say, they're your spouse and you really love to include them in the things you do? You'd be terribly disrespectful to throw those surprise parties knowing you'd be dragging your spouse into a party they would legitimately dislike attending.



Well, sure, in your exterme example.  But not so much when your just talking about playing a game for a couple hours.



EzekielRaiden said:


> That does not sound good to me. "I want my players to not think much of anything." That's...what? I want my players to be thinking constantly! I _yearn_ for their critique.



I can take or leave critique, much of it is not really useful, even more so when the player will just toss around jargon word salad.


EzekielRaiden said:


> Then I will consider the point conceded; if you refuse to refute the examples, then your claim that there is no such thing as a well-meaning but still wrong deception has been given two counter-examples.



The problem is your changing things.  I give and example of one thing.  You ignore it and say oh what about this other thing.


EzekielRaiden said:


> Again, you are thinking of this as "I want to check in on the things my child likes." That is not what I am saying.
> 
> I am saying that this parent literally doesn't even allow their child the _possibility_ of meeting someone,



Yea, the problem is your example is a crazy extreme not possible in reality.  


EzekielRaiden said:


> So...in contravention of what you said before, _you did in fact MAKE them clueless_. That was your goal. You specifically intended that. And you do these things, knowing that (a) you did NOT have to, you COULD have done something that wasn't railroading "and worse" (whatever that means), and (b) they WILL be upset should they ever find out.



Again, I don't "make" people anything.  They are what they are.


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## pemerton (Jul 21, 2022)

Crimson Longinus said:


> My stance is that generally everyone participating actually understands and has consented to the idea that the fictional world cannot have perfect objective existence, and required the GM (or at least someone, but in D&D it is mostly the GM) to make decisions of what exist and how it is presented. And that when doing so the GM is authorised to use their own judgement. Furthermore, it is understood that the GM may use that judgement to bring forth elements they think would be cool to include. The GM deciding that the third forest area the PCs explore will contain the witch's cottage, or that the next treasure parcel they find will contain the plot relevant magic ring or that the character's long lost brother will not be found until dramatically appropriately arduous amount of searching has been conducted is not 'deception.' It is just the GM using their framing powers to include interesting elements in appropriate moments.



The first clause seems plausible, and the second clause also with the parenthetical qualification.

The second sentence, about the GM's judgment, is more contentious. Likewise the fourth sentence about a "dramatically appropriate" amount of effort. There are a variety of ways to handle these elements of framing and discovery, even within D&D: 4e, for instance, presents different techniques and different principle from 2nd ed AD&D. What you describe seems (to me, at least) much closer to the latter than the former. And 2nd ed AD&D is a version of the game I don't much care for, precisely because it basically advocates all railroad, all of the time.


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## Maxperson (Jul 22, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> Scroll back in the thread, the "player agency choice" to avoid encounters is talked about a lot.



No it isn't.  That's your pretty blatant misinterpretation of what was said.  Nobody has said that agency is avoiding encounters. Repeating something that you know to be false, because I've corrected you at least 4 times now, isn't going to suddenly make it true.


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## pemerton (Jul 22, 2022)

Maxperson said:


> Nobody has said that agency is avoiding encounters.



They've certainly implied it. Eg:







Maxperson said:


> There's no possible way to avoid that encounter.


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 22, 2022)

pemerton said:


> They've certainly implied it. Eg:



It's worth emphasizing the extremes being presented here.

The example that was being discussed at the time of your quote from Max, over ten pages ago, was a combat which is not _logically required_ to happen (e.g., not the same as "the campaign premise is you start with a prison break, SOME kind of fight is unavoidable"), but which the DM ensures _absolutely will_ happen no matter what the players choose (e.g. "it doesn't matter which direction you go, you will run into and have to fight Bandit Lord Al-Hazen.") That's fairly clearly not respecting player agency. That is not at all the same as saying player agency _is_ combat-avoidance. Whereas the claim made above was not only very specific, but went much further than just avoidance; it included mean-spirited celebration and active, gleeful efforts to destroy DM prep work. Explicitly it involved the players _bragging_ about preventing the DM from using prepared stuff.

Saying, "Agency means embracing things like the possibility that the players choose things which invalidate your prep work" does not, at all, whatsoever, mean saying, "Agency is very specifically players maliciously trying to waste the DM's time, and then bragging about their successful rejection of work the DM put into the game."


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## pemerton (Jul 22, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> It's worth emphasizing the extremes being presented here.



My view is that many posters seem to have an obsession with avoiding encounters (ogres, bandits etc) as if they can't separate a conception of player choice in RPGing from the sorts of choices that are central to hidden-gameboard dungeon- and hex-crawling, but completely irrelevant to a lot of contemporary RPGing.

The players in my Prince Valiant game have almost infinitely more agency then I see in most posts about 5e D&D play. The fact that, when we confirmed they were travelling from the Dalmatian coast through Dacia to Constantinople, I framed an encounter first with Huns and then with an undead lord and his entourage, doesn't change that. The outcomes of their agency are manifested in the fact that the survivors of the defeated Huns are now members of the PCs' warband (a religious military order), while the remains of the undead (whom they converted to Christianity) are now located in the reliquary of the martyrs of their order.


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## G R (grizzyGR) (Jul 22, 2022)

Oh my goodness, so many responses. Not going to bother responding to everyone. I said what I said and stand by it, a bunch of entitled opinions here that are upset about things that they would have no idea or clue about if done properly.


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## Maxperson (Jul 22, 2022)

pemerton said:


> They've certainly implied it. Eg:



That is no such implication. My statement implies that agency requires that it should be possible to avoid an encounter, not that agency = avoiding encounters. Nice try.


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 22, 2022)

pemerton said:


> My view is that many posters seem to have an obsession with avoiding encounters (ogres, bandits etc) as if they can't separate a conception of player choice in RPGing from the sorts of choices that are central to hidden-gameboard dungeon- and hex-crawling, but completely irrelevant to a lot of contemporary RPGing.



Well, encounters are just a very simple and straightforward example of something which might or might not happen. They clearly require some effort on the DM's part to set up, while being easy to negate/derail purely by happenstance via player choice. There have been other examples, though, like running into an important NPC no matter which town you travel to, or finding a certain treasure in the next dungeon regardless of what that dungeon is or who(/what) occupies it, or certain physical locations cropping up regardless of the direction the players travel (such as, from previous threads, the "haunted house" scenario that the DM plonks down on the path the players take, no matter which path that happens to be.)

Other examples of railroading appeared in the OP, like the dungeon which has 10 rooms that the DM will use _in the order the players enter rooms_, not as put onto any map or location, or the mystery-solving adventure where the DM just flings out a new clue if the players ever wander off in an unexpected direction. I think what you see as an "obsession" is just using the simplest, most ready-to-hand example that requires minimal faffing about with explaining or inventing context.

So, to cover other examples that have nothing to do with encounters (in the sense of _combats_ or at least the risk of such):

1. The players are presented with what seems to be a difficult choice: they are adventuring through a cave system, and they can either try to rappel down a rock face, or take some circuitous pathways that hug to the wall. This looks like a real choice, with risks and significance, but in actuality, there's no way for them to get down safely: the DM has prepared a fall into an underground lake as a prelude to a "Lost World" scenario in the style of Edgar Rice Burroughs (which she happens to know several players are fans of Burroughs.) If they try to take the slow but safe path, a rockfall will occur, throwing them off into the darkness below. If they try to rappel, the crumbly rock will fail, same result. It _seems_ to be a choice, but it isn't.

2. A war is brewing. The PCs know that the Duke and the Countess are both gearing up for civil war against the childless King who has been acting strange and draconian, but that in truth, they are each being deceived by the Abbess, actually a demon in disguise who has been manipulating the King. If the players support the Duke, the King will in turn show favor only to the Countess, and vice-versa. If the players try to reconcile the two sides, the DM will invent new problems to prolong the tension until the three-way meeting can occur. If the PCs try to heal the King, find an heir, or seduce any of the three, all attempts will either fail or "succeed" (that is, appear to work, but never actually accomplish anything.) There are many different things the party could potentially think to do, but the DM won't let anything that doesn't lead to this (literally) crowning moment of heartwarming happen. No choice--they _will_ get that awesome scene. Edit: Oops, trimmed out important info. First: Duke is King's sister's son. Second, at the fateful meeting, King will be freed of compulsion but will die, and Duke/Countess will fall in love and agree to rule jointly (since they both have a claim.) DM knows a player loves sappy romances, another finds inheritance law fascianting, and a third is an English historian who will catch the War of the Roses references. Hence, it's totally cool to block any player actions that would prevent this awesome, heartwarming scene!

3. There is no example 3, because the DM won't allow there to be one. Oh, you'll _think_ there's an option 3, there will be an option _labelled_ 3, but it's actually one of the other options rephrased.

4. It's early in the campaign, and the DM thinks the players would really love a story about cursed artifacts and ancient deals with eldritch beings and people, both wicked and well-meaning, making decisions for the whole world whether or not they are justified in doing so. But to get the ball rolling, the players have to get drawn into the curse. The players are presented with their choice of which magic item to take from a mysterious benefactor--but no matter whether they choose the ring, the sword, or the robe, it's a cursed item and the others will just be ordinary magic items. They won't be allowed to investigate which item might be cursed, nor even know _that_ they're cursed. The choice is illusory, but presented as though it could have gone differently--they WILL get this plotline, there is no other way.

5. Murder mystery. A victim was murdered, and there are clues that point to the real perpetrator. Let's say the Baron did the deed and the Duchess is the innocent person he's framing. The party has found clues and started to build a case. They fall for the Baron's ruse immediately, and interpret the deceptive clues as genuine. For a classical railroad (as described in the OP), the PCs will simply keep bumping into new clues until the resolution is a foregone conclusion; there will never be any doubt. Or for the quantum railroad, whoever the party decides is guilty is in fact guilty, no matter what fiction was established to begin with--which, to be clear, is _just as bad._ Either way, there is no choice: correct because of _enforcement_ or correct because of _transformation_, either way, the only world allowed to exist is one where the PCs correctly identify the killer. This shows more clearly the connection to _consequences_, which is why "agency" is more important than "choice" per se--sometimes, a choice either has no consequences, or the consequences of a particular choice just aren't relevant. But clearly there _should_ be consequences for pinning guilt on an innocent person, and that's not allowed to happen here.


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## Umbran (Jul 22, 2022)

G R (grizzyGR) said:


> a bunch of entitled opinions here that are upset about things that they would have no idea or clue about if done properly.




*Mod Note:*
Hint: you lose the moral high ground when you get insulting.

You also lose the ability to post in the thread.


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## Medic (Jul 22, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> Just because the wronged party isn’t aware they’ve been wronged, doesn’t mean the act wasn’t wrong.





bloodtide said:


> Does not bother me at all.  And it's not like they will ever know.  The ends justify the means.



I'd just like to juxtapose these two gold nuggets against one another.



EzekielRaiden said:


> If the PCs try to heal the King, find an heir, or seduce any of the three, all attempts will either fail or "succeed" (that is, appear to work, but never actually accomplish anything.)



I detest this one in particular so much, because it's basically a GM spiting me for getting invested in the NPCs. It's one thing if, say, the countess just totally rebuffs all of my advances, but if I manage to successfully heal the king only for it to inexplicably fail later, it feels like I wasted my time caring about these characters. Like, sorry I bothered to engage with the fiction instead of rolling dice during the fights and texting the rest of the time.


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 22, 2022)

Medic said:


> I'd just like to juxtapose these two gold nuggets against one another.



Yeah that's...yeah.



Medic said:


> I detest this one in particular so much, because it's basically a GM spiting me for getting invested in the NPCs. It's one thing if, say, the countess just totally rebuffs all of my advances, but if I manage to successfully heal the king only for it to inexplicably fail later, it feels like I wasted my time caring about these characters. Like, sorry I bothered to engage with the fiction instead of rolling dice during the fights and texting the rest of the time.



Worth noting, I fumbled my edits (tried to keep it short...or at least short*er*...) so I left out that the "awesome moment" the DM was plotting was the Duke and Countess having a whirlwind battlefield romance and agreeing to rule jointly after the King's untimely (but guaranteed) death. I doubt this will change your feelings about it, but the point was to emphasize that in all of these cases, the DM totally does have a planned scenario they genuinely believe their players will find cool...but they're _enforcing_ that event even if the players take actions that would, unknowingly, prevent it from occurring.


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## Charlaquin (Jul 22, 2022)

Medic said:


> I'd just like to juxtapose these two gold nuggets against one another.



Both quotes were from the two of us arguing about that very point, so…


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## Crimson Longinus (Jul 22, 2022)

@EzekielRaiden 

On you list #2 is the one that seems rather questionable to me, and that is the sort of problematic railroading that people often complain about. Most others seem to be just one-off low-key force to set up cool stuff for later (about which the players presumably can make a lot of interesting decisions once we get there,) whilst #2 is a whole predestined scenario. It is not the setup that is forced it is the conclusion, and that, I feel, is a rather significant difference. 

#5 is also a bit eh... but doing a proper classic murder mystery where it actually feels the PCs are genius investigators is super hard, and usually requires some sort of shenanigans.


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## Thomas Shey (Jul 22, 2022)

Edit: Just noticed Umbran stepped in wearing his red badge, so I'm going to remove this as counterproductive.


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## Medic (Jul 22, 2022)

Charlaquin said:


> Both quotes were from the two of us arguing about that very point, so…



Absolutely. I felt that those two excerpts were worth highlighting.


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## pemerton (Jul 23, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> Well, encounters are just a very simple and straightforward example of something which might or might not happen. They clearly require some effort on the DM's part to set up, while being easy to negate/derail purely by happenstance via player choice.



That last clause seems false to me, unless a whole lot of further assumptions are being made which aren't true of RPGing in general, and probably don't make a lot of sense outside the context of hidden gameboard, map-and-key play.



EzekielRaiden said:


> There have been other examples, though, like running into an important NPC no matter which town you travel to, or finding a certain treasure in the next dungeon regardless of what that dungeon is or who(/what) occupies it, or certain physical locations cropping up regardless of the direction the players travel (such as, from previous threads, the "haunted house" scenario that the DM plonks down on the path the players take, no matter which path that happens to be.)
> 
> Other examples of railroading appeared in the OP



You seem to be suggesting that all or any of _running into an important NPC_ or _finding a certain treasure_ or _finding a haunted house_, regardless of where the PCs go, is per se a railroad. To me that's obviously false, and once again rests on assumptions that there's no good reason to cling to.



EzekielRaiden said:


> I think what you see as an "obsession" is just using the simplest, most ready-to-hand example that requires minimal faffing about with explaining or inventing context.



Your other examples all have exactly the same structure - the PCs go to imaginary location X and find or encounter imaginary thing or person Y - and reflect the same obsession. It's as if the only meaningful choice posters can think of players making is the choice of where on the map to take their PCs, as if we were still all playing in the manner set out by Gygax and Moldvay 40+ years ago, when that hasn't been mainstream for decades.



EzekielRaiden said:


> So, to cover other examples that have nothing to do with encounters (in the sense of _combats_ or at least the risk of such):
> 
> 1. The players are presented with what seems to be a difficult choice: they are adventuring through a cave system, and they can either try to rappel down a rock face, or take some circuitous pathways that hug to the wall. This looks like a real choice, with risks and significance, but in actuality, there's no way for them to get down safely: the DM has prepared a fall into an underground lake as a prelude to a "Lost World" scenario in the style of Edgar Rice Burroughs (which she happens to know several players are fans of Burroughs.) If they try to take the slow but safe path, a rockfall will occur, throwing them off into the darkness below. If they try to rappel, the crumbly rock will fail, same result. It _seems_ to be a choice, but it isn't.



What's the way in which the choice is presented? Suppose that this is the first session, and we've all built our explorer-type PCs, and the GM asks "Would you guys be rappelling down the rock face, or going down via the narrow, circuitous path?" And we answer, and the GM incorporates that colour into the framing of the fall into the Lost World.

I don't think that's a railroad: it's just inviting the players to introduce some colour into the framing.

Or to put it another way: your example, on its own, doesn't reveal whether or not it's a railroad because doesn't reveal what, if anything, is at stake in the GM's invitation to the players to make a choice.



EzekielRaiden said:


> A war is brewing.



Who decided this? To my mind, this is where the incipient railroad is being laid.



EzekielRaiden said:


> The PCs know that the Duke and the Countess are both gearing up for civil war against the childless King who has been acting strange and draconian, but that in truth, they are each being deceived by the Abbess, actually a demon in disguise who has been manipulating the King.



The same question arises here. Who wrote all this backstory? How did the players come to know it? Of course there are non-railroad-y ways that something like this might come about (eg Burning Wheel play could lead to a situation like this) but when I see this example posted in this context the first thing it suggests to me is GM-dominated play in which the players' principle role is to provide a bit of colour.



EzekielRaiden said:


> If the players support the Duke, the King will in turn show favor only to the Countess, and vice-versa. If the players try to reconcile the two sides, the DM will invent new problems to prolong the tension until the three-way meeting can occur. If the PCs try to heal the King, find an heir, or seduce any of the three, all attempts will either fail or "succeed" (that is, appear to work, but never actually accomplish anything.) There are many different things the party could potentially think to do, but the DM won't let anything that doesn't lead to this (literally) crowning moment of heartwarming happen. No choice



Sure, a GM could keep writing more and more stuff. Personally I would be out of the game you're describing here well before it got to this point.



EzekielRaiden said:


> It's early in the campaign, and the DM thinks the players would really love a story about cursed artifacts and ancient deals with eldritch beings and people, both wicked and well-meaning, making decisions for the whole world whether or not they are justified in doing so. But to get the ball rolling, the players have to get drawn into the curse. The players are presented with their choice of which magic item to take from a mysterious benefactor--but no matter whether they choose the ring, the sword, or the robe, it's a cursed item and the others will just be ordinary magic items. They won't be allowed to investigate which item might be cursed, nor even know _that_ they're cursed. The choice is illusory, but presented as though it could have gone differently--they WILL get this plotline, there is no other way.



This sounds like it has the potential to involve clumsy GMing. But from the point of view of railroading, the real issue, again, is who decided to play a campaign about cursed artefacts? 

Also, how do "the others" turn out to be ordinary magic items? When do they come into play? If the PCs are obtaining them by killing and robbing the mysterious benefactor, it seems that the wheels have completely fallen off, and railroading is the least of this table's problems.



EzekielRaiden said:


> Murder mystery. A victim was murdered, and there are clues that point to the real perpetrator. Let's say the Baron did the deed and the Duchess is the innocent person he's framing. The party has found clues and started to build a case. They fall for the Baron's ruse immediately, and interpret the deceptive clues as genuine. For a classical railroad (as described in the OP), the PCs will simply keep bumping into new clues until the resolution is a foregone conclusion; there will never be any doubt. Or for the quantum railroad, whoever the party decides is guilty is in fact guilty, no matter what fiction was established to begin with--which, to be clear, is _just as bad._ Either way, there is no choice: correct because of _enforcement_ or correct because of _transformation_, either way, the only world allowed to exist is one where the PCs correctly identify the killer. This shows more clearly the connection to _consequences_, which is why "agency" is more important than "choice" per se--sometimes, a choice either has no consequences, or the consequences of a particular choice just aren't relevant. But clearly there _should_ be consequences for pinning guilt on an innocent person, and that's not allowed to happen here.



Your last sentence makes little sense to me - the guilt and innocence are all in the fiction, and if whoever authors the fiction decides that whomever the players have fastened on _is_ the killer, then no guilt is being pinned on any innocent person.

You seem to be assuming that a murder mystery must be set up and run as a game in which the players try and work out the content of the GM's notes. That's one way to run a murder mystery - I've done it - but it's not the only way - I've done others too. The first approach was closer to a railroad than the second.


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## bloodtide (Jul 23, 2022)

Maxperson said:


> No it isn't.  That's your pretty blatant misinterpretation of what was said.  Nobody has said that agency is avoiding encounters. Repeating something that you know to be false, because I've corrected you at least 4 times now, isn't going to suddenly make it true.



If I were to ask for an example of "player agency where players make a meaningful choice", I bet your example would be avoiding an encounter.  Again, that example has been used dozens of times.  



EzekielRaiden said:


> ISaying, "Agency means embracing things like the possibility that the players choose things which invalidate your prep work" does not, at all, whatsoever, mean saying, "Agency is very specifically players maliciously trying to waste the DM's time, and then bragging about their successful rejection of work the DM put into the game."



Guess it just looked that way to me as no one was giving any postive examples.

Railroad example: DM says(to themselves) "no matter the road they pick they will encounter the fire troll bandits.  It's a well balanced challenging fun encounter I made, I think everyone will like it, and we will use it.

Player Agency Example(players out loud)-"the DM has encouter set at the South Bridge, lets leave town by the North Road, so the DM can't use that encounter.  Ha, we will show that DM to come prepared to a game!"

Was there a postive example I missed?  Maybe repost it?





EzekielRaiden said:


> 1. The players are presented with what seems to be a difficult choice: they are adventuring through a cave system,



Ok, so what would you require here for a choice?  A safe boring path down where nothing happens?  Or a ladder up and out of the caves?  Or something else?  Why can't things happen in a game world without the players approval?  Would this example be better if there was a foe causing the rockfalls TO trap the characters?  


EzekielRaiden said:


> 2. A war is brewing.



I guess here the DM can't "just say" that is the way each NPC is?  And this is an example of "if a DM makes any plans, its always wrong".  Right?  Only pure random improv is the right way.  And why must the players have the ability to alter reality?  Unless the players are High Ups in the social group, why would anything they do effect the Big Npc?

 But ok, lets say the DM just improved the big NPCs.  Then when the players "do stuff" the DM has the big NPCs react to the players stuff.  So is this not illusionism?  Making the players feel special no matter what they do?



EzekielRaiden said:


> 4. It's early in the campaign, and the DM thinks the players would really love a story about cursed artifacts and ancient deals with eldritch beings and people, both wicked and well-meaning, making decisions for the whole world whether or not they are justified in doing so. But to get the ball rolling, the players have to get drawn into the curse. The players are presented with their choice of which magic item to take from a mysterious benefactor--but no matter whether they choose the ring, the sword, or the robe, it's a cursed item and the others will just be ordinary magic items. They won't be allowed to investigate which item might be cursed, nor even know _that_ they're cursed. The choice is illusory, but presented as though it could have gone differently--they WILL get this plotline, there is no other way.



Sounds fine to me.  Though really you can just drop the pointless choice.  Just have the mystery person offer one item.  Even better if it's a group item.  As many players are greedy, look before they leap and do zero research it is easy to curse characters a lot.  The set up is so easy: The Glade of Good is where some unicorns guard a vorpal sword.  A lot of players will murderhobo those unicorns in no time...and get a curse doing so, start plot.  

This is a perfect example of, yes SOMETIMES things just happen to characters that they can't avoid.  That is life, even game life.  Everything can't be only because of choices and concquences.  


EzekielRaiden said:


> 5. Murder mystery.



You lost me here.  When the PCs follow the false clues don't they figure out the Lady is innocent?  A railroad, by design, would offer real clues that did not fit the red herring clues.  And I'm not sure the "quantum" one is a railroad.  Your talking about a DM that does not make a "mystery" they just sit back and let the players "DM" the mystery, and whatever the players say, the DM is like "wow, you guys solved it!"  That is not railroading.  I'd call that side table buddy DMing.


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## Maxperson (Jul 23, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> If I were to ask for an example of "player agency where players make a meaningful choice", I bet your example would be avoiding an encounter.  Again, that example has been used dozens of times.



No it hasn't.  Not once has agency = evading an encounter. Keep trying to spin it that way, though.  Maybe you'll convince people if you make that claim enough. 

Agency = a player actually having a choice(or at least the capability of getting a choice), not the DM's choice forced on the player.


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## pemerton (Jul 23, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> If I were to ask for an example of "player agency where players make a meaningful choice", I bet your example would be avoiding an encounter.



Just using this as a springboard: for me, the core of "player agency" is the players deciding what their PCs goals and motivations are, what the campaign is about, and who the PCs' friends and enemies are; establishing what is at stake in situations presented to them and  deciding how to respond to those situations; and not having the GM dictate the outcomes of action declarations without reference to mechanics.


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## bloodtide (Jul 23, 2022)

Maxperson said:


> No it hasn't.



Ok, so several pages of this thread did not have the avoid encounter example, when say the players "used agency" to avoid bandits or an ogre.

Maybe you could help by giving a non encounter avoiding example?



pemerton said:


> Just using this as a springboard: for me, the core of "player agency" is the players deciding what their PCs goals and motivations are, what the campaign is about, and who the PCs' friends and enemies are; establishing what is at stake in situations presented to them and  deciding how to respond to those situations; and not having the GM dictate the outcomes of action declarations without reference to mechanics.



I have not seen anyone mention this "type" of agency.  After all goals and motivations don't really matter on a railroad.  A character can have a goal of X, and ride the railroad just fine.


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## Maxperson (Jul 23, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> Ok, so several pages of this thread did not have the avoid encounter example, when say the players "used agency" to avoid bandits or an ogre.
> 
> Maybe you could help by giving a non encounter avoiding example?



Pick any example where the DM is forcing his choice on the players.  No agency.  Now pick any example of player choice mattering(the DM not forcing his choice on the player).  Agency.  It's really simple.


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## pemerton (Jul 23, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> I have not seen anyone mention this "type" of agency.  After all goals and motivations don't really matter on a railroad.  A character can have a goal of X, and ride the railroad just fine.



I'm talking about the approach found in RPGs otherwise as varied as 4e D&D, Burning Wheel and Apocalypse World. Where players set the stakes, decide their PCs' goals, and this is what play is about.


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## bloodtide (Jul 23, 2022)

Maxperson said:


> Pick any example where the DM is forcing his choice on the players.  No agency.  Now pick any example of player choice mattering(the DM not forcing his choice on the player).  Agency.  It's really simple.



Well, I don't agree here.  Players, if they are lucky, get maybe 50% real choice....more often like 1%.  But then they won't know anyway.



pemerton said:


> I'm talking about the approach found in RPGs otherwise as varied as 4e D&D, Burning Wheel and Apocalypse World. Where players set the stakes, decide their PCs' goals, and this is what play is about.



If the players want this illusion it's fine.  The players pick X, and then the DM makes the X railroad.


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## Maxperson (Jul 23, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> Well, I don't agree here.  Players, if they are lucky, get maybe 50% real choice....more often like 1%.



If the DM is a dictator, yes. If he's a player in the game and wants the other players to actually be playing, it's at around 100%


bloodtide said:


> But then they won't know anyway.



Dictators use that philosophy as well. You're the only one playing in your game.  The other "players" are just there for the ride, even if they don't know it.


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## pemerton (Jul 23, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> If the players want this illusion it's fine.  The players pick X, and then the DM makes the X railroad.



I don't think you're quite getting what I have in mind. Here's a short illustration - a summary account of a skill challenge:



pemerton said:


> The current focus of my 4e game - which is now at 30th level, the top end of Epic tier - is the fate of the multiverse: will it be engulfed in an imminent Dusk War, or is there some way of averting such a thing?
> 
> <snip>
> 
> ...



There is no illusion in this play.


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## Charlaquin (Jul 23, 2022)

pemerton said:


> I don't think you're quite getting what I have in mind. Here's a short illustration - a summary account of a skill challenge:
> 
> There is no illusion in this play.



Dusk War is a great concept for an end of the world threat in a 4e game!!


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## HomegrownHydra (Jul 23, 2022)

bloodtide said:


> Ok, so several pages of this thread did not have the avoid encounter example, when say the players "used agency" to avoid bandits or an ogre.
> 
> Maybe you could help by giving a non encounter avoiding example?



An example from one of my games would be a time that a player learned that some NPCs who had ties to his PC had been captured by a band of hobgoblins and bugbears. I had planned for the entire party to respond, and so there were enough opponents for multiple battles involving the whole party, and I had planned to have three different fights. However, just two players actually attempted to tackle the problem, and they did so by trying to sneak into the encampment at night. When they failed a sneak check they tried to fight the whole camp straight up (they just assumed that I had balanced the battle so that they would be able to win). This was incredibly foolish and totally hopeless, but I decided that I wasn't going to go easy on them and instead would send every opponent at them which would surely steamroll them. Yet, when one of the players realized they were in over their heads, he tried a very smart tactic: he had his PC shout out a demand to challenge the leader 1-on-1. Since there was a NPC leader, I decided to go with it. Then, with some very lucky rolls and more smart roleplaying, the PC got the leader to give up and let them leave.

This scenario played out completely differently then I had planned. However, this wasn't because they avoided the encounter. On the contrary, they aggressively (and stupidly) sought out the fight. But at every point of the way I allowed their choices (and dice rolls) to matter, for both good and ill.


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## EzekielRaiden (Jul 23, 2022)

pemerton said:


> That last clause seems false to me, unless a whole lot of further assumptions are being made which aren't true of RPGing in general, and probably don't make a lot of sense outside the context of hidden gameboard, map-and-key play.



I had assumed we were talking about games where the DM takes a necessarily leading role. In a "no-myth" or "story now" game, if you actually stick to those principles, railroading is _impossible_, so I had assumed that was irrelevant to the conversation.

@bloodtide I have no further response to you, other than to say that you are, again, either assuming the absolute dirt-worst about the players involved, or actively inserting malice and hostility where none is present ("Ha, we will show that DM to come prepared to a game!") Unless and until you drop that presumption of players being actively hostile to their DM, I won't be responding. You aren't arguing in good faith, so there's no point in having a conversation.


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## Dannyalcatraz (Jul 23, 2022)

*Mod Note:*

I‘m seeing some posts in this thread that could be considered arguing in bad faith…or merely strong disagreement.  I haven’t seen anything that’s actionable, though.

Still, the result has been a rise in the general tension up in here.  Because of that, I would suggest that disengagement between certain posters is in order.  Perhaps even the use of ignore lists.  (Before lines get crossed, obviously.)


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## pemerton (Jul 23, 2022)

EzekielRaiden said:


> I had assumed we were talking about games where the DM takes a necessarily leading role. In a "no-myth" or "story now" game, if you actually stick to those principles, railroading is _impossible_, so I had assumed that was irrelevant to the conversation.



I took it we were talking about D&D. Some posts seem to be talking about RPGing in general.

Of course if play involves the GM taking a leading role in the sense you seem to mean, it will be a railroad - that's virtually tautological!


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## bloodtide (Jul 23, 2022)

HomegrownHydra said:


> An example from one of my games would be a time that a player learned that some NPCs who had ties to his PC had been captured by a band of hobgoblins and bugbears.



Guess I'd point out that right here is a railroad.  Sure the player could refuse to not only role play, but also not play the game, but really the player has "no choice" but to help right?




HomegrownHydra said:


> I had planned for the entire party to respond, and so there were enough opponents for multiple battles involving the whole party, and I had planned to have three different fights. However, just two players actually attempted to tackle the problem, and they did so by trying to sneak into the encampment at night



So you had a group of people, but only two took the adventure hook?  Did the rest just sit there and watch?  Go home?  Or did you try the ill advised two adventures at once?



HomegrownHydra said:


> . When they failed a sneak check they tried to fight the whole camp straight up (they just assumed that I had balanced the battle so that they would be able to win).



That sounds like "player agency" to me.



HomegrownHydra said:


> This was incredibly foolish and totally hopeless, but I decided that I wasn't going to go easy on them and instead would send every opponent at them which would surely steamroll them. Yet, when one of the players realized they were in over their heads, he tried a very smart tactic: he had his PC shout out a demand to challenge the leader 1-on-1. Since there was a NPC leader, I decided to go with it. Then, with some very lucky rolls and more smart roleplaying, the PC got the leader to give up and let them leave.



You said you were not going to go easy on them....and then you did.  


HomegrownHydra said:


> This scenario played out completely differently then I had planned. However, this wasn't because they avoided the encounter. On the contrary, they aggressively (and stupidly) sought out the fight. But at every point of the way I allowed their choices (and dice rolls) to matter, for both good and ill.



But this is no example of "player agency" though.  The players were always free to choose whatever they wanted to do, right?  You don't seem like a DM that would ever say 'no' to a player.  When you "decided to go with whatever the players want" you effectively gave them control of the game.  And not that that is a bad thing, but it only works as the players agree.  You don't describe the role playing or rolls, but if both were amazing, then sure the characters might get out of this jam the chose to get in.

Also you never mentioned your plan.  If your plan was just "encounter the npcs", ok, you did that.  

Also I note a bit of confusion when just two characters go up against a powerful group, you do nothing.  But then once the characters get in trouble you are suddenly willing to change everything.  I'd guess as you did not want to kill two characters.  And if your plan was to "not kill two characters", then you did that plan.


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## GMforPowergamers (Jul 25, 2022)

pemerton said:


> I've read it many times.



yet you are still not seeing that DMs determine if a skill is appropriate...


pemerton said:


> The "appropriateness" is not about "does this fit the GM's preconceived plot?". It is about "does this make sense in the situation presented to the player?" The example given (4e DMG p 75) is of trying to use Diplomacy to help survive a desert crossing.



and in what way does finding a clue about the military leader poisoning the queen in a random tree make???  it is just picking a skill and trying to force it into the story for no reason.


pemerton said:


> If the PCs are looking for clues in a wooded area, what is inappropriate about trying to find a clue by looking in the trees?



it depends on if there is a reason to suspect a clue up there or if the high str trained in athletics fighter just thinks he should get to use his best skill...


pemerton said:


> As for the Duke example, that is not a rule that the PCs can't find a clue. It is about methods that will or won't work,



and climbing a tree will not work.


pemerton said:


> Whereas your example of the clue is exactly that: you have decided, in advance, that the players can't get what they want out of their action declaration.



just as intimidate not working on the duke was decided in advance by the DM... that the player can't get what they want ouf of their action declaration.


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