Judgement calls vs "railroading"

[lowkey13]

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[pemerton]

it's a player reacting in character (Robilar) to the fiction that's already in place (there's 12 deities down there and I'm bustin' 'em out).

That what it means for a player to impose his/her will on the fiction. Rob Kuntz wants to change the fiction: to have the gods be freed. And it happens, because he declares actions for his PC, and Gygax (as GM) resolves them.

The relevant feature for current purposes is that there is no secret backstory, no NPC with a character arc, that restores the status quo, or blocks Robilar's action, or otherwise prevents the action declaration from having the consequences its player intended it to have. The fate of the 12 gods is not "in motion" in some metaplot-driven fashion wherein Robilar's action just become a small cog in the big wheel of Gygax's authoring of the unfolding history of his campaign world.

It's player-driven. (In terms of [MENTION=16586]Campbell[/MENTION]'s classification upthread, around post 70-something, it's a version of "free kriegspiel".)

I've had a look over your play example from post 328 (where the party's trying to get into the underdark) and in all honesty I'm not sure what I'm supposed to be looking for.

It shows the PCs returning to people they'd dealt with before - the duergar, some of the drow - and how developments can be handled without the GM just extrapolating behind the scenes by reference to his/her conception of how things would "naturally" unfold.

So eg you can see the player of the paladin making the duergar's diabolic connection salient; then the framing of a check, to see whether or not they've learned their lesson; and how this unfolded into them switching allegiance to Levistus instead.

It illustrates the workings of a "living, breathing" world without the need for the GM to do anything besides frame situations and resolve checks by reference to that framing. (Ie no secret backstory)

there's a roll in there that fails by 1 (needs 41, roll adds to 40 after all's said and done). A PC then lets his imp speak (but why does this need an action point - isn't speech a free action at all times?) and the imp makes his case. This is a new development, which makes the old roll history: shouldn't the imp's speech provoke a whole new roll, rather than simply modifying one whose outcome has already been determined?

The imp doesn't have its own action economy - in mechanical terms its a feature of the PC. Mechanically, the player is spending an AP to add +2 to a failed check (thereby making it a success). In the fiction, this takes the form of the imp speaking.

 

[pemerton]

The mystery is neither better nor worse, but some people might state that the "fiction" or the "game" is better for their preferences based on the different styles.

Sure. But [MENTION=29398]Lanefan[/MENTION] is making claims about what has to be the case, or what is required, for a mystery to take place in a RPG. Sure, there's one way to do it - the classic CoC way.

It's not the only way, though.

A setting doesn't have to be constantly changing, but some people do enjoy that.

For the players, though, if the change is never narrated by the GM then they never know of it. So I think narration is still the key. Which means the (other?) key is, "What triggers that narration and how does it interact with action resolution?"

There's a different table dynamic if narration of this sort of stuff is treated not only as an input into but also as an output off action resolution. I think everyone in this thread agrees with that.

But what I'm disputing is that only if one confines backstory narration to input can one get a rich, changing, "living, breathing" gameworld.

 

[lowkey13]

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[Manbearcat]

Yet we/they have repeatedly been told that in fact our/their place is the corner, or better yet somewhere else entirely.

And to add, it's also a gray-scale rather than black-and-white. I mean, there's times both as player and DM I've seen or let things get too railroady even for me; yet I still see lots of value in laying the occasional bit of track in order to produce a better game.

It helps if you know your table, of course, and know what they expect and-or are looking for in the game.

Minor bits of what's being called GM Force are pretty much a part of the game, I'd say.

Careful...they'll run you out on a rail if you keep saying things like that!

Lanefan

Don’t have much time, so just a quick comment on this (I’ll get to your play analysis response tonight).

My interest in these threads is to (a) be able to effectively distinguish between various play priorities and the techniques/systems that perpetuate them and (b) be able to do an effective post-mortem on play events (my own and others) to understand and convey precisely what is going on.

Not recognizing the nature of, and impact on play of, singular instances of applied GM Force, and delegitimizing Railroading/Illusionism as “not RPGing” or something to be tarred and feathered (rather than have its play priorities and techniques both illuminated and understood), is anathema to the point of my participation in these threads.

If people want to/do apply GM Force, they should understand its techniques and its implications. If people don’t, they should understand the same (to ensure they avoid it). The same thing goes for things like dungeon stocking/table creation, dynamic decision-point creation, presenting choices with costs, “Fail Forward”, “Playing to Find Out What Happens”, “Say Yes or Roll the Dice”, “Let It Ride”, or “Go to the Action.”

 

[lowkey13]

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[Ovinomancer]

I'm trying to summarise two hours (or more?) of play into a few sentences of description, to make a couple of general points: (1) "fail forward" is not, in general, the same thing as "success with complication"; (2) that a player-driven game is consistent with surprise, revelations, rich backstory, etc.

I don't think anything about those points changes by eliding two checks into one in the narration. And I took it as given that, if the basic principles of play and GMing are things like "say 'yes' or roll the dice", "no failure offscreen", etc, then the evolution of the game's backstory is subject to further play.

If you're curious about more details of the game I'm happy to post them, but it might be more productive if you ask it in the spirit of curiosity rather than in the context of arguing that I don't know how to manage stakes and consequences in a game about which you know nothing other than the handful of fragments I've posted in this thread.

But even based on those fragments, I would have thought there would be enough to get a sense of what is going on with the mace: it is a nickel-silver mace that the PC was (before play actually commenced) crafting in the tower when the orcs attacked. The player had established, as one of his Beliefs (a BW PC has 3 Beliefs), that he would recover the mace. That goal was, as I have explained, enmeshed in a larger context of the PC's backstory in relation to his brother, plus the backstory of the assassin (who at that time was a PC) who had suffered terribly at the hands of the brother and had as her one unchanging Belief that she would flay him and send his soul to . . . [a bad place].

As the GM it's my job to push the players on their Beliefs, to frame situations where they can be put to the test, and - when checks are failed - to narrate consequences that are failures, and that will force the players to make hard decisions. Because I'm GMing a party game, it's also my job to interweave the players' Beliefs - hence the discovery of the black arrows not only forces the player to reconsider his Belief about redeeming his brother, and not only escalates the situation between the PCs one of whom has sworn to save him while the other has sworn to kill him, but also brings in the elven ronin who wears, around his neck, the broken black arrow that slew his master (thus, in his backstory, precipitating his travels to human lands where he nevertheless is determined (as his most constant Belief) to always keep the elven ways.

For all anyone at the table knows, the brother made the arrows under the coercion of some other power - perhaps the Balrog was threatening to possess the brother PC, and the only way for his older brother to keep him safe was to buy the Balrog off by supplying cursed arrows to his orc archers. Who knows? That's what "playing to find out" means.

And as far as the mace is concerned, it's not just a "non magical mace". That's your description. That's not the conception of it at the table. If someone was playing a LotR-based game, in which recovery of the Red Book of Westmarch by some 4th Age hobbit was at stake, one might easily fail to capture the full scope of what is going on by referring to it as a "non-magical lorebook".

Had you identified finding the mace as a Belief earlier, much grief could have been skipped on this issue. I generally find this to be the case with longstanding arguments with you - that some key piece of information was omitted that resolves the issue nicely. Accomplishing a Belief is a fraught situation, so the failure assigned is on par. This was really the bit that you needed to provide to clear this up.

 

[Ovinomancer]

This is well put. Thanks for managing to clearly convey in a few sentences what's a I failed to convey over several posts.




You're kidding with the names I think, but this is an excellent point.

My issue with the term railroading is that I think it's fairly clear what it's meant to be...a line with set points in a certain order. You cannot vary the order or add any points in or skip any points or make any other changes.

In RPG terms, an adventure has a chapter 1, then a chapter 2, and so on until the end. There is no changing the story or going about the different parts in a different order. If this is the case, then it's a railroad. If it's not the case, then it is not a railroad.

Now, that's perhaps too strictly defined....but I think others are using the term far too broadly.

I also think that the term term is meant to refer to the story (if not a whole campaign, then at least an adventure) as a whole, rather than at one small decision point within the story. I don't know if one instance of DM judgment by fiat deserves the term railroad to be broken out.

You have to have a thing least several such points for the metaphor to even apply.

RE: the naming convention

Yes, a bit tongue in cheek, but only because I began thinking in terms of transportation. I'm an engineer by trade, and work with communications, and often end up using highway analogies to explain various types of shared bandwidth usages because everyone immediately understands and gets a general understanding.

My preferred D&D playstyle is best described as linked mini-sandboxes. There's a plot thread that the players move along, and this tends to jump players between encounter areas. That's a loose term, as it fits both an area to be explored and a political situation that needs to be resolved. The basics are that the encounter area is a sandbox where the party has a goal - decided by them or offered by the plot - but no defined pathway to the plot. For exploration, I build out an area using terrain types, features, NPCs, and critters. I then come up with a few sets of motivations for the groups in the area. Some are tied to the goal, for or against. Some are entirely separate and deal only with local concerns. Some have nothing to do with the local, but are passing through and might be interacted with (these I use to augment campaign themes, frex, if there's a war going on, there may be a group of deserters or a unit moving through or a conscription party). Then the party is turned loose to accomplish (or not) their goal. They decide how/when/where to strive and the obstacles and NPCs come into play. Not everything is used, and some things are used often, depending on how I think they best fit what the party is trying to accomplish.

Example: The party is looking for more information on the main plotline, which involves manifestations of a strange rocklike substance that warps and perverts the surrounding area/creatures. They're looking for any mention or story that fits this description. At this point, we're at an exit, and I provide a few choices to the party -- they hear a story about something that may fit the bill (odd happenings nearby), a previous research effort returns a new tidbit not related to the plot but of interest to a character (a magic item, for instance); and the party is approached by a friendly NPC they have history with with a request to help a friend. All of these choices are valid, and each gives up something offered by the others. In this specific case, the story of odd happenings isn't related to the plot, but could gain a powerful ally for later, the magic item is a magic item, and the request from a friend is directly related to the plot. The party opts to aid their friend and travels to a distant land to provide assistance. The information provided there from their questions immediately tells them this is main plot related, and the agree to assist wholeheartedly.

So, this is an example of interstating. There are only a few choices, and each will move the party down the plot in a big jump, and once they pick their exit, that's their exit. Now, if they really wanted to not go that way, I allow it, but the style of play follows this convention. Now we enter the mini-sandbox, though.

The encounter area is an elemental confluence deep in the desert. They're guided there but the guides refuse to enter. In the confluence, I've set up five distinct terrains, and 2 special features for each: the high plain, which is neutral ground and features a massive set of ruins and a smaller set of ruins, the water domain, which features a mineral spring and a bitter, poisonous lake, the fire domain, which features a burning lake of oil and a massive flame jet, the earth domain which is a trackless sea of dunes that features a dome of stone somewhere deep inside, and the wind domain which is a barren, windswept rock hills with large stone spires (heavily wind etched) and a permanent cyclone that wanders the area. Some of these features are crossovers (the hot springs, the sandstorm cyclone, the sea of burn oil, the poisonous lake). The idea here is that they cement this as an area of elemental confluence. The ruins tie in the ancient dwarven empire that's a campaign theme. The main NPCs are four elemental genies, one each, in charge of their domains. Each is vying for power in different ways. Earth has become corrupted by the strange stone and is attempting to corrupt Air. Fire is worried, but not much. Water is very concerned and will ally with outsiders that offer help. In addition, there is a group of cultists in the area that venerate the strange stone and it's corrupting effects. They're camped in the Air domain and are working to destablize Water so Water can't prevent the turning of Air. There's also a pack of gnolls that have moved into the smaller ruins and are currently starving but can't escape because of the pair of mated blue adult dragons that have moved into the area, sensing that they can steal the power here away from the distracted elemental lords. Finally, there's a dungeon under the large ruins that still holds knowledge of the ancient dwarves that would be useful to the party if they discover it. And a smattering of elemental themed critters fills the rest of the area for encounters while exploring.

The party's goal is to identify a possible corruption by the strange stone and eradicate it while learning more about the corruption to better combat future updates. They also have a ongoing goal of gathering more information from dwarven ruins, because the last time the strange stone appears was just prior to the falling of the dwarven empire in a great cataclysm (which is popularly blamed on the dwarves themselves). At this point, I don't script anything. I know the area, the motivations of the groups, and what will happen absent player involvement. I have a rough timetable of what will happen (which is usually set to 'players screw around doing nothing for too long'). After this, it's what the players do and how they interact with the surroundings that determines the game. They are now Baha-ing.

So, I find mixing up some styles works best for me. The interstating works to keep a game moving (I had full buy in from the players for a Big Plot game) towards the plot points (which overall were tightly scripted in the first few levels to establish themes but towards the end are written as 'here the players fight the BBEG' because I'm not entirely sure what form the BBEG will take -- it'll be fluid based on where the game leads and because I want the player choices to have big impacts at the end). But I prefer allowing a lot of leeway to interact with an area, to give the players agency to make meaningful choices in how they accomplish their goal (which they had less agency in picking, yes). I carry those choices forward. If the players destroy Earth, for instance, that's a way to solve the problem, but that's a closed end. If they, instead, find a way to cleanse him (which I didn't pick a method ahead of time, preferring to see how things work out), then they gain a powerful ally for later. Which will be useful.

This works for me, as a DM. As a player, though, I'm much more open to styles. I'll play in just about anything, so long as the dynamic is good and not toxic, and have enjoyed a bunch of different games and game styles over the years. One of my all time favorite games was a much more improv style game, as a matter of fact.

 

[hawkeyefan]

[MENTION=16814]Ovinomancer[/MENTION]

Good stuff, thanks for sharing. The term interstating does seem to fit. I like the idea of small linked sandboxes. My style is likely close to yours as I tend to mix lots of playstyles and material into it.

For instance, in my prep for this coming Friday, I kind of loosely plotted out 3 distinct paths that the players are likely to take. They certainly could surprise me and force me to adapt, but I'm not very concerned about the possibility as they are pretty invested in the ongoing stories that form our campaign.

They're currently in Sigil, which is kind of their home base. They recently learned of some information that may lead them to the prime material world of Golarion, or they may return to their home world of Toril, where the bustling town of Phandalin is being threatened by the spread of elemental cults from the Dessarin Valley. Or, they may hold off on leaving Sigil and may instead investigate some connections between various plot threads that they recently learned about, involving the disappearance and possible death of a group of a powerful group of allies.

So I have material planned for any of those options...remaining in Sigil, heading to Golarion, or returning to Toril. Each is pretty sandboxy in its own way....although the trip to Golarion does require a set encounter at the portal they will need to use. However, once they reach the location in Golarion, they're free to go about things however they like.

I suppose I'm always a bit surprised when folks try to advocate player agency in such a broad sense as the players literally determining every step of the campaign. I've never had a situation where the players and I didn't try to work together to make sure that their characters were invested in the world. The players deciding to go radically "off script" isn't a concern for me because they've contributed to and enjoy the "script". There's plenty of flexibility for them to pursue their goals however they like, but enough of a framework where I can at least partially see how they may do so.

 

[Xetheral]

I think some of the disagreement related to "consistency" is related to the concept of Dissociated Mechanics. The comparison isn't perfectly apt, but I think it's close:

When Pemerton decides, as a consequence of a player failure, that the brother was Evil all-along, it's effectively creating a dissociated mechanic for the player on-the-spot (instead of in the game's rules, where the label is usually applied). OOC, the player's decision to search for the mace has causally resulted in the brother's retroactive classification. But IC, the charcter's decision has causally resulted in a failure to find the mace (and finding the arrows instead). I think it's that OOC/IC inconsistency, analogous to a dissociated mechanic, that's causing some posters, like me, who react badly to dissociated mechanics, to feel that Pemerton's approach itself will necessarily lead to an inconsistant game world.

I came to this conclusion trying to reconcile my visceral agreement with the posters claiming that Pemerton's style would create inconsistencies with my intellectual awareness that I've run interally-consistant games while making on-the-fly changes nearly as big as Pemerton. So I know from experience that it can be done consistantly, but it still felt like it shouldn't be possible. Hence my conclusion that the inconsistency I felt was based in the mechanic itself, rather than in the game world.

For reference, my style is a hybrid of Saelorn and Pemerton's approaches. Like Saelorn, I approach playing D&D as analogous to a (casual) modeling exercise, with the current state of the model (the game world), the rules (part of the modeling engine), the GM's judgment/discretion (the other part), and player decisions (external input) used to determine how the model evolves. Unlike Saelorn, however, I don't view the model as sacrosanct; I will liberally tinker with it on-the-fly as a tool to achieve my ultimate goal of maximizing player enjoyment. (This includes being careful to make sure that the players are all on board with my style.) Consistency tends to be important to my players, so I'm careful to keep the game world internally consistent as interacted with by the PCs, even as I'm freely making changes behind the scenes based on OOC considerations. So my game worlds are in many ways as fluid as Pemerton's, despite my overall approach having more in common with Saelorn. (Ironically, earlier in this thread I considered my approach to be antithetical to Saelorn's: the conversation has certainly been an eye-opener.)