Adventures The Opposite of Rail-roading

[Stormborn]

Yeah. I have had this problem. For me it was trying to run a campaign that was a sandbox world with people who just weren't comfortable playing in one. They were used to a DM giving them direction, or to having me as a player run the party leader who said "here is what we are going to do next."
So I changed the campaign and play style. It was their favorite campaign ever once I spurred them into a direction. Sandbox games aren't for every group. Not saying thats the case with yours, but if I was getting frustrated with their play style I would set up an arc of adventures that had them going in a direction and then would see what happened once I gave them more freedom after that.

[roguerouge]

They're fifth level? Sounds like you need a Big Bad to motivate them. Get a villain that's very powerful to start messing with the PC's lives. Maybe some of it's intentional and maybe some of it is that a PC loved one happened to live in the city he decided to splatter with an asteroid. What matters is that the PCs start to take this BBEG personally. Once they are unified in their hatred of this villain, they'll start having plans to take him down. They'll have a goal to keep them occupied.

Nothing promotes focus, party unity, and long-term planning like a Big Bad.

[Cadfan]

Sounds like a good time to pimp my Opt In Gaming theory!

Before the campaign begins, get everyone's consent for the plotline you want the game to have. Then, run the game as normal. The players will pursue the plotline that they collectively agreed to pursue. You can even railroad once you've gotten their agreement, because railroading only counts as railroading if its nonconsensual- and you got their consent up front.

What you're doing is similar to what I'm suggesting, except that your group of players appears to be constantly renegotiating their consent to the game's plotlines. Of course its stalling out, you've turned the sort of decision that should be made once into a rolling committee meeting.

What you get them to agree to doesn't have to be very specific. It can be, but it doesn't have to. Personally, I like to go very specific- "Do you want to play in a military themed campaign where all the PCs are soldiers in a human army doing battle with an army of hobgoblins?" That was a recent one. But then, I tend to only run my games for a year at most. You might want a more broad charter if you intend to run a multi year campaign.

Its all about making the social contract work for you. If the group's expectations are clearly stated in advance, the players will do half the work for you in keeping everyone else in line.

[el-remmen]

Thanks for all the comments and suggests (some of which were impressively long!*)

Let's see how much I can address from memory. . .

1) Big Bad: It is on its way, but there have been clues to its source. They should get more on this when they get the big "info dump" in a session or three.

2) Trimming the Threads: I hope that the events that are in the cards will lead to their ability to leave at least one thread in the hands of another adventuring party and combine another two into one goal they can handle simultaneously.

3) Personality Conflict: There is certain some of that, as there is in most groups to one degree or another.

4) Time Limits/Deadlines: As I have said, I have done some of that - too much is cheesy.

5) Be a little more meta: I have been trying this, though a player or two of mine can get a little "Darkon" about this sometimes. Though to be honest, the less we have to do this the better for my own enjoyment. (We don't even give each other tactical advice out of character during combats).

6) Railroading: I think my players would probably be more forgiving of so-called "railroading" than I am. . .

7) Use NPCs to comment on their behavior: I do this all the time. I also try to reinforce what total dipwads they come off as when they start arguing and contradicting each other in public, or when addressing someone of authority.

For more background: While my "Out of the Frying Pan" campaign was theoretically as open as any other campaign I run - it took place within a small section of the world and was thematically unified throughout. While fun was had by all, I often got the feeling that the players would have liked to break out of that area and have more room to explore and do other things along with the main "plot line" - so I designed this campaign to start more open and then narrow down as they make choices and go places. I guess I should have been forcing the narrow-down sooner, OR - gone backwards - started narrow and then get "open".

[el-remmen]

Originally Posted by Cadfan

What you get them to agree to doesn't have to be very specific. It can be, but it doesn't have to. Personally, I like to go very specific- "Do you want to play in a military themed campaign where all the PCs are soldiers in a human army doing battle with an army of hobgoblins?" That was a recent one. But then, I tend to only run my games for a year at most. You might want a more broad charter if you intend to run a multi year campaign.

This is exactly how I do my campaigns, except I dictate the terms to the group within a certain frame and then let them create characters within that frame.

For example in this campaign, all the PCs are young nobles of low birth signed to an "adventuring charter" to gather wealth and prestige for their families while doing some exploring saving their nation. I even gave incentives for characters to have previous bonds and connections (two sets of cousins, one character's older sister is the widow of another's decease older brother, two are from related churches, one is from a rival noble house from two of the cousins, but they have the same liege, etc. . .)

Somehow all this stuff did not work out the way I expected. . .

In my last campaign ("Out of the Frying Pan") the characters all had the requirement of wanting (for whatever reason) to get out of being conscripted in a major war going on in the setting. . . I used this to get them all going in the same direction and driven together by consequences.

[el-remmen]

Originally Posted by LostSoul

Do you have an example of this from a game?

I'd like to hear what the fictional situation was as well as how the players were acting at the table.

Well, I was going to repost it here, but it is long, but this is a link to an episode of the story hour that involves a long and debate. It was actually the last big one before I had the talk with them OOC about spending so much time arguing.

It has gotten better since then, but it still flares up too often for my tastes.

Euleria, who is mentioned a few times in the post, is the party's steward who takes care of their logistical stuff while they adventure and during downtime like sending messages, determining tax on booty, arranging travel and accommodations, interviewing potential hirlings, etc. . . I can only imagine how bogged down the game would get without her.

[Raven Crowking]

Just one more thought.....

It could be that your players don't feel capable of making decisions that are rewarded in-game. If enough of their decisions do more "biting them on the ass" than "forwarding their career", they are bound to think and rethink every decision point.

In addition to the "tough" parts of a sandbox, there have to be very real and obvious rewards for their decision-making. Even where they go wrong, common folks should be lauding them for trying, for example.

Remember, whatever behaviour you want your players to perform is a behaviour that you must reward consistently and often. If you want PCs to talk to NPCs, doing so must offer an immediate benefit to the PCs at first. Then you can slowly delay rewards, and include ringers, as the players learn that talking is often (but not always) worthwhile.

Likewise, try kick-starting them with some basic decisions where the rewards of making a decision -- no matter what decision they make -- are immediate and obvious. Once they realize that decision-making is okay, and that they drive the campaign, you can throw in the occasional ringer again. The more they feel rewarded for the decisions they do make, the more difficult you can make those decisions.


RC

[Azgulor]

The sandbox campaign is my favorite. However, like you, I can find it to be frustrating at times when players don't engage. At the risk of all of this falling into the category of "Things you already do", here's my two cents:

1. Coinciding with your "PCs aren't special (necessarily)", let their indecision have consequences. You've already stated you have timelines/deadlines etc. Rather than focus on the personal consequences of letting indecision rule, have it impact the setting. This can vary from the minor consequence where a NPC ally is incovenienced to major consequences such as inaction resulting in war, plague, etc.

2. Allegiances/Affiliations - DM-suggestions and borderline railroading seem less like spoon-fed "go here/do this" if conveyed by a superior of their order, commanded by a noble, etc. It doesn't even have to be a "do it b/c they said so". If the PCs revert to their indecisive ways, the assignment is given to another, the PC(s) loses status/favor, has a previously routine request denied them, etc. NPCs can have long memories also.

3. Kickers. The adventure seeks the PCs out, forcing action. This one can be overplayed as much as any other, but it's damn hard to have a debate when people are burning down your house, killing your dog, or trying to kill you. Variation on the theme is important here, of course and it doesn't always have to be life or death. Many of the greatest instances of NPC hatred came from encounters I considered to be throwaways. And for me, nothing reinforces the beauty of the sandbox more than the unexpected transition of a minor NPC into a major one. I've had entire adventure arcs come out of the players' interest in a "minor" NPC once I had to decide what that minor NPC was trying to achieve.

4. NPC timelines. Whether it's an ally, rival, or villain give key NPCs goals and at least a broad plan for how, and especially when, they plan to obtain their objective. If indecision means the enemies are better prepared, greater in number, or higher in level, thems the breaks.

5. In Media Res launchpoints. If none of the above are working or you fear you've used them too frequently, this one can be jarring if your players have never encountered it before. Throw them into a situation/encounter and only after it plays out fill in the backstory of how they arrived at that situation. Maybe their idle lifestyle burned through their loot and they needed work. Maybe after months have passed with little activity they are caught unawares by an old foe. Or a flood wiped out the village or town or fire ravaged the city and now they're homeless.

In my experience, usually 1-4 are enough. When they're not #5 almost always does the trick. It seems to work b/c the amount of unknown information jars them out of their indecision or they're annoyed that the rug was pulled out from under them (even if just a little). Either scenario is a good intro to force a candid conversation. Sandboxes only work if the PCs interact with it. I've found the key is to make the amount of time between "when last we saw our heroes" and "right now" a long enough span that it shocks them a little. My players sometimes get mired in the hour-by-hour, day-by-day play that it's hard to advance the timeline. It drives them nuts when they ask "during the break could I have been planning x". Sadly, no it's a missed opportunity - but you can start doing that now.

Also, to steal an idea from my favorite RPG, Conan, in the 2nd edition they put in a great idea for gaining fate points (or action points, extra XP, goodie of choice). Have the players write down 3 foreshadowed events such as "my character is robbed", "caught with another man's wife", and "duel my hated foe". This gives you insight into what they want from the game. If the situation arises and they take the bait, they earn the cookie. If they don't take the bait, no cookie. Aside from letting them have creative input over the direction of the campaign (in a limited way), it also gives you tangible examples of how indecision resulted in missed opportunities.

Anyway, sorry for the long post. Hope at least some of the ideas are helpful.

And, if you're already doing these things, then I guess great minds think alike!

[LostSoul]

Originally Posted by el-remmen

Well, I was going to repost it here, but it is long, but this is a link to an episode of the story hour that involves a long and debate. It was actually the last big one before I had the talk with them OOC about spending so much time arguing.

Interesting.

Have you thought about having rolls for conflicts like that?

[Delta]

Some quick comments: When I've had degenerate playing groups, I would *not* want to ratchet up "Timeline/ Villain Plans", because that just turns into players-vs-DM playing chicken as to who can mess up the campaign more. PCs flee from the region. Or basically dare the DM to see if he has balls to one day run a session where the villain's completed master army rolls in and automatically massacres them. Or, heck, they join it and now they're on the winning side via inaction.

Idea #1 -- Start with fewer choices. You can go to (a) Castle of Doom or (b) Ruined Abbey of Set. Pick one. Ratchet up choices as they get better. Or go old-school and make the whole campaign one major labyrinth with multiple passages.

Idea #2 -- Require them to *Pick a Leader*. Again, old-school, but when I trotted that out earlier this year for a 1E Tomb of Horrors game, I was delighted by how well it worked. I said, "This isn't meant to be lorded over anyone, but if the party becomes totally indecisive I'll assume that everyone follows the leader's direction." It worked great. Feel free to switch leader per adventure or session, but establish that as an opt-in to sitting down to the game.

Idea #3 -- Don't bother scheduling a game session until the players agree on an adventuring destination/ target/ goal (outside of session). If someone really refuses to do that for character-acting reasons, then they don't play that session. If there is disagreement, schedule a session for the majority party. Or pro-rate your time according to number of players in a party. On your web-board have people propose adventuring sessions and get sign-ups before scheduling a play date.

Consider reading the essay at the back of the 1E PHB to back in the mood. The heavy character-acting stuff has got to be sacrificed a bit for the sake of the game. Where to adventure should be chosen before the game session starts. It also sounds like you may have a disruptive player in the mix, consider booting him.

[chriton227]

Originally Posted by Raven Crowking

It could be that your players don't feel capable of making decisions that are rewarded in-game. If enough of their decisions do more "biting them on the ass" than "forwarding their career", they are bound to think and rethink every decision point.

Agreed. The times I've been in sandbox style games that started to fall into analysis paralysis, it was because we were beginning to feel that every decision was a wrong decision, or because the consequences of failure were completely out of scale.

Accept a commission to retrieve the Chalice of Anduria? The patron turns out to be a secret cultist who needs the Chalice to free his lich master. Rescue a little girl in the woods? She turns out to be a disguised demon planning on devouring the party in their sleep. Let the press gang down by the docks escape after they try to "recruit" a member of the party? Their next target ends up being the benevolent king (in disguise to better observe the status of his kingdom), and with him out of the picture, his evil half brother usurps the throne. Don't manage to catch the bandits that robbed a supply caravan going to a nearby mine? The bandit use the supplies to breach a lake causing the mine to flood, killing everyone inside because the mine owner wouldn't pay protection money, and in the process destabilize the land all around the mine, causing sinkholes to open randomly under the town, eventually leading to the resident having to abandon the town lest they get swallowed up by the earth.

Occasional plot twists can add a lot of flavor and entertainment, but if they are overused the players will begin to feel that either nothing they do will turn out well, or that the DM is out to get them. If too many times the consequence for failure is huge, but the players have no way know that in advance, the players will become terrified of failing any task they attempt no matter how small, and will spend hours analyzing it looking for any indicator that the task in question is actually vitally important. In both cases, the players may decide that the only safe choice is to make no choice, and either let things go wrong naturally (reinforcing the idea that the DM is out to get them), or trying to get someone else to deal with the messes so it isn't on them if it goes wrong.

[Janx]

chriton227 and RC have hit upon the wrinkle, that el-remmen was concerned that "having too many timelimits would be cheesy" (not an exact quote).

To el-remmen's cheezy point, consider these 2 axioms:
1) in RPGs it is cheesy when there isn't a timeline, time limit to finish a quest (take oblivion for example). Other than the "if you find any more of these wierd things, I'll buy them" quests, most quests are problems, with some urgency
2) spend 80% of your time working on the top 20% of your task items. Your boss won't notice the items you didn't get done, because they weren't actually as important.

The 2 statements above are sort of contradictory. But they're both true. It turns out not everything is urgent, or important, in the sense that somebody else will do it, or work around it because its not done. But in the same vein, which is why #1 is true, if the quest isn't finished, SOMETHING happens. Either the monster gets stronger, another hero kills it, the monster got what he cam for an wanders off, people learn to live with the risk of monster attack (perhaps curtailing travel, or arming themselves into a paramilitary militia).

It's cheezy when something doesn't happen as a result of the PCs actions. Let's say your PCs have 3 choices when they see a mission: Do it, join the bad guys, ignore it. As GM's we tend to assume the first, they do the mission. And the expected result is "they succeed, and everything went back to normal, or things got better." But key factor, they do the mission, and things changed.

As Chriton and RC point out, IF we recklessly apply changes for the other 2 choices, we can damage our game world, take it where we didn't want to go. Ironically, that's the whole point of simulationist or sandbox play, the PLAYERS choices take the game to new directions, not the GM.

So I say that yes, every mission should have Changes, based on the 3 "big picture" choices the party could make. I also say, that giving them more work to do than they can handle, sets them up to not complete some missions. Unless you want that, don't do that.

Nextly, as Chriton excellently points out, "screwed ya" missions should be rare. You get a dog to be head shy by whacking it on the head everytime it comes near you to get petted. From then on, you got a dog that won't let you pet it. Which defeats the point of having a pet dog.

Early on (the first few adventures), quests should be straightforward. Go save the princess, go kill those orcs. Later, the PCs know people, have a good reputation, things get more complex. The first "twisted" plot should be that the party gets hired by "bad guy" to do something, and partway through, the party learns they've been duped. Which means the real quest is thwarting the bad guy. If the bad guy dupes the partly fully, then you're just teaching them that they can't trust anybody, because they'll never know who's good or bad. If you do it the way I suggest, you teach the party that they will figure it out in time, to prevent a bad guy from winning. All of this reinforces the good parties doing good with good intent will win most of the time. Only later, when things are their shiniest, do you add layers of division, betrayal, and lies to break from the pattern.

That's the second step, don't make every quest a lie to trick the players into making things worst.

From there, the consequences of "failure to do good" should vary in how far you want to take it. At the safest, another NPC party saving the day, puts things back to right, and can have the least damage.
At the darkest, having the villain get stronger, and sucessfully making the game world harsher is usually not where the GM actually thought the game was going. But none of this means the party can't turn the tide, and restore order.

I suggest the OP have some other NPCs save the day on some quests. SInce he's made a point that the PCs aren't special, than that means ANYBODY can do it. It's not like the world only has 5 special heroes (because the DM said it doesn't). It'll clean up the mess, and take some stress of the party.

[Pbartender]

Hey, Nemm, I used to have a lot of problems with this -- I still do to a small degree, but...

Originally Posted by el-remmen

For example in this campaign, all the PCs are young nobles of low birth signed to an "adventuring charter" to gather wealth and prestige for their families while doing some exploring saving their nation.

...this is similar to how I solved the problem.

What you're missing, though, is a patron. I styled their charter more on the charters of colonial exploration companies and privateers' letters of marque from the late, late Renaissance. The idea being, first the characters are hired as professional adventurers (giving them an excuse to act as such), they were specifically hired for their talents (giving them an excuse to power-game just a little), and they were hired to work together as a team. Also, the contract specifies the cut that the adventurers get to keep from any loot they bring back to their patron (giving an excuse for the 20% sale prices). Finally, in return the patron provides them with basic supplies, transportation (my guys have use of a sailing ship and crew), and contacts across the known world. Plus, that allows me to give the PCs tasks via the patron.

In essence, some NPC bankrolls the expedition and gives it direction in exchange for taking a (large) cut of the loot.

I try to keep the goal relatively general, "Go explore this newly discovered island. Bring back any treasure you might find. Also, make contact with the natives, and see if its worth opening trade relations with them." If gives them a goal to work toward, but leaves it open for them to go about it however they see fit.

They still tend to over-think decisions (last Sunday they spent half an hour trying to decide on the best way to cross an old rope bridge - they were all paranoid about it collapsing), but it doesn't completely paralyze the game.


Is it too late for some sort of authority figure or organization to latch onto your PCs and give them a little guidance?

[Kid Charlemagne]

Another thing that they might need is guidance on context. I'll occasionally chime into PC discussions when they start talking about thigns that are outside the normal parameters of how things normally work - noting that something one player mentions would probably be looked on by a particular social group, reminding them of the social dynamics of the world - a particular church hates wizards and is unlikely to want their aid, for example.

Raven Crowking may have a point about the players being concerned with a decision biting them on the butt - I've seen that happen a lot in games where there are real consequences to the PC's decisions.

[jgbrowning]

Originally Posted by el-remmen

So what do you all think? Suggestions? Commiseration? Questions?

Be a bit more easier on them so that every decision isn't viewed as important for survival or success. Make the failures enjoyable.

Easier said than done, of course.

joe b.

[el-remmen]

Just to clear up a point. . . the arguing has had little in-game effect. They have never been slow to act because of it, and so far there have been no bad in-game consequences - because basically they use the downtime between thing to argue - or like if the ship for place X leaves the next morning they'll say - well we have half the night - so we aren't taking up any time.

I have been basically making those wait time shorter, because for a long time if I said something like, "And so the evening passes. . ." They will interrupt and want to talk or do things in that time that keep the game from progressing.

Not always - but the proper positioning within that "dead time" means that only real time is being wasted not in-game time.

[BradfordFerguson]

Responding to the OP, I understand that your PCs have "a reason to be together" but they don't have a "stated purpose".

For example, I'm running a 4E game set in the Nentir Vale & Fallcrest (back of the 4e DMG), once the players finished Keep on the Shadowfell, I got them to agree to a group purpose that their characters' goal was to restore/spread civilization throughout the Nentir Vale by (1) strengthening each "point of light" (2) connecting the "points of light" (hooray, connect the dots!) (3) founding a kingdom/duchy (4) defending the kingdom from an external threat (5) expanding the kingdom into an empire (6) defending the empire against an external threat. They are currently in stage #2. Most simply put, their purpose is to "Civilize the Nentir Vale."


I think another failure (a strong word, but go with it) is that the PCs are "no one special". Not sure how you have set up your game, but perhaps the lands are too peaceful (?). Perhaps the players think that there will be political blowback if they decide to be proactive and "carve out their own niche"? I can see "the powers that be" wanting to keep tabs on a mercenary band, but if they lord over them too firmly then they may be reluctant to "put down roots".

Around 5th level or so, the PCs cleared a tower inhabited by undead in an abandoned town. The old town had the most powerful mage be its leader. The two arcanists in the group have laid claim to the tower and the town is in the process of being settled. That's fine. They are in the process of clearing a lord's manor in the main town they operate out of, they are already talking about claiming the manor (or at least asking to claim it). That's fine. I won't let them gain a great benefit from it in that they can just sit back and earn gold, so there isn't much harm in it.

Since they have cleared a good number of the obvious threats in the Nentir Vale, I discussed OOC with them about doing a 10-year "time skip" where there is a period of relative peace while the area is settled and trade is restored. The two arcanists are already talking about jockeying for becoming THE Lord Mage of Fastormel, and I've asked players to let me know what their characters will be up to during the time period. So I will let them shape what form the region takes as a result of and during the time skip. Then we will resume play and new threats will emerge and they will see the fruits of their actions in the development of the region (before I attempt to destroy them). muhahaha