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"Railroading" is just a pejorative term for...
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<blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 5427458" data-attributes="member: 42582"><p>What I find strange in some of these discussions is an insistence that a game must either be linear or sandbox, or at least somewhere on a spectrum between the two.</p><p></p><p>Because the sort of game I described, and - if we're understanding one another properly - the sort of game you also run, is one in which there is no sandbox in the classic sense (because you'll move the stuff from Chicago to New York, or make it up in response to what's gone before, or whatever) and yet it's not linear, because no one knows where it's going until it happens.</p><p></p><p>There also seems to be a lot of reluctance on the part of some GMs who post on ENworld to try and run this sort of non-linear, non-sandbox game. For example, I'm posting a bit on the moment on the "3.5E exalted-monk-paladin trainwreck" thread (I can't remember it's exact name). And the GM who started the thread has set up some interesting situations, by introducing a whole lot of cool stuff into a moduel s/he was running. But then s/he keeps talking about the way in which the players were <em>supposed</em> to respond to it - even though this sort of expectation seems to have been a major cause of the very trainwreck in respect of which his/her OP was seeking advice.</p><p></p><p>I personally think it would be good for the game if DMGs and the like gave more advice on how a GM can run this sort of game, because it's a game style that I think tends to be satisfying for players - their choices shape the game - while also being comparatively light on the load it imposes on the GM - unlike at least the classic sandbox (look at the work The Shaman does to prep his game, for instance).</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="pemerton, post: 5427458, member: 42582"] What I find strange in some of these discussions is an insistence that a game must either be linear or sandbox, or at least somewhere on a spectrum between the two. Because the sort of game I described, and - if we're understanding one another properly - the sort of game you also run, is one in which there is no sandbox in the classic sense (because you'll move the stuff from Chicago to New York, or make it up in response to what's gone before, or whatever) and yet it's not linear, because no one knows where it's going until it happens. There also seems to be a lot of reluctance on the part of some GMs who post on ENworld to try and run this sort of non-linear, non-sandbox game. For example, I'm posting a bit on the moment on the "3.5E exalted-monk-paladin trainwreck" thread (I can't remember it's exact name). And the GM who started the thread has set up some interesting situations, by introducing a whole lot of cool stuff into a moduel s/he was running. But then s/he keeps talking about the way in which the players were [I]supposed[/I] to respond to it - even though this sort of expectation seems to have been a major cause of the very trainwreck in respect of which his/her OP was seeking advice. I personally think it would be good for the game if DMGs and the like gave more advice on how a GM can run this sort of game, because it's a game style that I think tends to be satisfying for players - their choices shape the game - while also being comparatively light on the load it imposes on the GM - unlike at least the classic sandbox (look at the work The Shaman does to prep his game, for instance). [/QUOTE]
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