Station Squatting (Player Railroading)

[Wootz]

I don't understand this. Is this the player's unwilling to go on a quest the DM wrote up? How is that such a bad thing? If the party doesn't want to do it, why does the DM have to force the players into it? Isn't THAT railroading?

 

[Dausuul]

My players seem to have an odd habit, not unlike Station Squatting. If I'm not actively dangling a carrot in front of them, they do squat, as in nothing. They'll stare at me and and each other until I throw the hook at them. It's like they need railroading. I'll come up with a million different adventure hooks, but all I need is one. I almost wish my players would do at least some station squatting, that way I can wrap an adventure hook around them, instead of just saying "You'll find some gold in them hills" and that kick-starting everything. Mind you with 8 people in the group, it's hard for them to agree on anything, so the easily picked fruit gets them going.

Some groups are like that. It has advantages and disadvantages. It can be frustrating because your players don't give you anything to build off of; on the other hand, it makes it easy to lay out a campaign and move things along.

(Except when you get the players who neither do anything of their own accord nor bite on any of the hooks you toss them... those are just evil.)

 

[avin]

Can't read the story at work, but what's wrong if players decide to create a bakery? How I wish my kill + loot players had that idea... I could even think about all the plots... Ogres acting like mobs, poisoned supplies, the river which waters were used to make the bread just got dry, a ghost wandering inside the bakery at midnight, some strange paying an obscene quantity of money for a special cake with rare ingredients...

 

[avin]

My players seem to have an odd habit, not unlike Station Squatting. If I'm not actively dangling a carrot in front of them, they do squat, as in nothing. They'll stare at me and and each other until I throw the hook at them. It's like they need railroading.

My actual group is like that.

Descriptions:

An Eladrin Wizard that acts like a bard, talk too much and spend a night in jail with some orc... (he cried on another game when players killed his chicken companion...)

A human cleric of Bahamut that kill hostages and impale an elf's head before enter Baldur's Gate (he isn't cleric of Bahamut anymore, for sure - in real like he takes some really weird tea and his uncle was killed after burn 10 horses...)

A (now) Genasi Spellsword. He never talk. Seriously... he like capes... oh hell...

A human rogue that is a pirate and never shower. He was convinced by some spriggan that the mud under a log would make his penis get bigger... (this is the good player, and show up good hooks all the time)

So I would welcome any player with creative ideas I could get...

--------------------

My games are never railroads. Things happen. If the players don't rescue the princess she dies. If the players kill innocent they will be hunted. If they do nothing and wait... well, then plots go to them.

 

[Mallus]

I've said it before, I'll say it again: the more I play D&D, the more I come to realize it's just group therapy with dice.

I think I first realized that back in high school.

 

[Desdichado]

I think it's kinda funny that the example of running a bakery is being tossed around. Wasn't the first adventure of the current Paizo AP something about the PC's being asked to run a tavern or an inn or gambling hall or something like that?

Clearly, the idea that running a business is a dead-end when it comes to adventure isn't an idea that everyone shares.

 

[el-remmen]

I thought some folks in this thread might be interested in a related thread: The Opposite of Railroading

 

[Maggan]

Clearly, the idea that running a business is a dead-end when it comes to adventure isn't an idea that everyone shares.

The way I read it no-one is opposed to the idea of letting players run a business in-game, neither are they for example opposed to them playing pirates and running their own pirate ship, or creating a bakery, or what have you.

That is not, as far as I read it, the gist of the problem.

From my reading of the thread, and my own experiences, the whole thing boils to whether you as a player have a responsibility to help the DM move things along.

If the DM has prepared a business-running adventure and the players engage in that, then all is fine. But it the DM has prepared a dungeon crawl, then problems might occur if the players engage in station squatting.

So I don't think that what the OP or anyone else is saying is that every instance of players who run a business in-game is "station squatting". It's when they start running a business when the DM is saying more or less directly "hey, I don't have that prepared, and I don't do business simulations good enough for us to have fun, so please could you please take the hook" but then the players just arse around doing their business thing anyhow, that it becomes station squatting.

/M

 

[Desdichado]

That is not, as far as I read it, the gist of the problem.

I'm not talking about the gist of the problem, I'm talking about that specific example and the context in which it was delivered. You can rationalize and make the thing seem reasonable all you want, and I won't argue that you make some compelling points, but the thread originator clearly has said that he not only hasn't prepared a bakery running scenario, but that he wouldn't, and he doesn't believe D&D should ever feature running a bakery as part of a scenario. That's right here in the thread. I'm not making it up.

All in all, "station squatting" sounds like stubborn pouting on the part of either the players, the GM, or more likely both.

 

[Maggan]

All in all, "station squatting" sounds like stubborn pouting on the part of either the players, the GM, or more likely both.

That I agree with.

And I would also be very surprised if those who have said "running a bakery has no place in D&D" didn't mean "... for me" instead of "... for anyone". Each has their own idea of what they want to play using the D&D rules, and each can only speak for their own preferences.

/M