Judgement calls vs "railroading"

[Tony Vargas]

Well this is pretty much the crux of it, isn't it?

In the context of this, the 5e D&D forum, I think so, yes.

If the only two ways to do RPGing were sandbox or railroad, then what you say would be correct. But they're not.

I offered two other alternatives besides sandbox or railroad (though I do think they're a fair dichotomy to impose on 5e D&D campaigns, in general, not the only one, of course, there's 'tailored' vs 'status quo' as well, for instance - and with similar sorts of results). To wit: an actual story with an author (OK, not an RPG), or "some kind of collective storytelling exercise" (which, I think, describes, however flippantly and dismissively, quite a lot of RPG and RPG-like activities).

... Consider the dramatic pacing inherent in a game like MHRP or 4e, ...

Two examples.

Again, this seems to assume that all systems are, more-or-less, process sim, modelling the ingame causal processes ("truth") and hence that to get story (ie "fiction") we need the GM to use force at various points to suspend or override the mechanics.

Not all systems, but at least the one this forum is about.

It's now 25 years since the first publication of Over the Edge, and nearly 35 years since the James Bond game was published.

More examples of RPGs that I premptively dismissed from consideration as "collective storytelling."



Not that there's anything wrong with that.

 

[pemerton]

If you kill him off and they are not emotionally invested, then what's the point?

Just to give a couple of possibilities - they might care about the organisation the NPC leads, or some family member who will be left grieving or impoverished by the death. Or it might simply be a device for managing the unfolding of the fiction - an unexpected assassination can be a useful tool for making the emergence of some other conflict, which the players are invested in, seem plausible within the fiction.

Sometimes a death has to hit home, and actually feel sad. You can't do it often, but if you do it at least once, it gives the story a bit of emotional weight. It's like killing off Gandalf at the end of Fellowship of the ring, but then not bringing him back.

[MENTION=16586]Campbell[/MENTION] is not saying that there shouldn't be deaths of NPCs which make the players feel the force of it. He's saying (or at least, I'll paraphrase him as saying) that if the players are invested, then he would have the death be a consequence of the action in which they participate (presumably a consequence of failure in most cases, but not necessarily always).

For instance, let's try to imagine how the Moria scene might emerge from resolution in a RPG in which Gandalf is an ally or resource that Frodo's player brought into play (Gandalf the White would then be an instance of Aragorn's player "reactivating" that resource). In that case, Gandalf dying to the Balrog would be a consequence of failed action resolution, probably on Frodo's part but perhaps on Aragorn's (eg maybe Aragorn's player fails a check, and Frodo's player activates some mechanic that lets him/her give Aragorn some retrospective bonus, but at a cost - and so Frodo's player sacrifices Gandalf to pay that cost).

Or if you envisage a more traditional set-up, where Gandalf is a self-standing NPC ally, then Gandalf's death will be the result of combat resolution in which the players took part, and failed to adequately ensure the survival of their ally.

In these sorts of scenarios the players feel the NPC's death - it's far from nothing - but it's not the sort of "cheap shot" that Campbell referred to. It's a tangible outcome of the players' failed action resolution.

 

[pemerton]

this seems to assume that all systems are, more-or-less, process sim

Not all systems, but at least the one this forum is about.

5e has a non-sim Inspiration mechanic, which enables players (and their PCs) to try harder in a context where stuff they are committed or connected to in some fashion is on the line.

It has a non-sim damag mechanic (hp), plus non-sim action economy which allows some characters (eg fighters, via action surge) to try harder.

I think the main obstacle to using 5e to play a non-sandbox game that generates story without railroading/illusion would be non-combat resolution system. I see three issues, which I'll address from easiest to hardest to sort out:

(1) The guidance on DC setting and when to call for checks is a bit vague. But the latter can easily be resolved by treating "uncertain" as going to dramatic uncertainty rather than causal uncertainty, and so running the game in a more-or-less "say 'yes" or roll the dice" style.

(2) The rules around re-tries are even vaguer. But it would be very straightforward to use "let it ride", in just the same way as Stephee Radley-MacFarland advocated for 4e in a "Save My Game" column.

(3) Bounded accuracy makes non-combat resolution very dependent on the swing of the d20 rather than the investment of the player (via the play of his/her PC). This is an issue for "say 'yes' or roll the dice". Liberal use of the inspiration rules might help with this, however - advantage is a strong buff to try to take the focus off the d20 alone and back onto the PC's connection to the action.​

At higher levels there is the perennial risk of spell-casting drowining out all other considerations, and so "(mostly) vanilla narrativist" 5e might work best from (say) 3rd level to (say) 10th or so, but the bulk of play seems to happen in that level range in any event.

So even confined to consideration of 5e I don't see that your implicit assumptions hold good.

 

[Jester David]

stuff

Are you *actually* interested in people responding to the question in your first post, or is that just bait so you can argue with them about how they're wrong? Because it really feels like the latter. It feels like you have a pretty firm idea of what *you* think plot and railroading is already in mind.

 

[Emerikol]

Interesting thread. Same old characters for the most part making the same arguments. Still it's good to see how different folks pass time.

To me it comes down to the fact that roleplaying conceptually has fractured. Some nice terms to help us communicate would be helpful. I'm sure if I attempted to describe the various styles someone would argue with me. The key of course is having fun and if your group is having fun then the rest of the world can bug off you are doing it right.

I prefer a rules light, DM empowered, moderate to heavy options game that is ran in a decent sized sandbox where the world is either designed up front or The DM understands it well enough to make judgments or call for probabilistic die rolls. I want the players to be able to change the world and arrive at different outcomes. I want them to do so by defeating their enemies and overcoming the challenges of the game. I generally do not like styles that involve players inventing the world and/or it's contents themselves. Perhaps with some minor leeway on backstory at character creation.

But that is just what I like. I'm sure those who traditionally love to oppose me will point out how much more fun I or my friends would enjoy their style more. I wouldn't. But I'm glad there are styles to suit all tastes. My love of pizza does not burden me with the need to force it on any of you.

 

[robus]

For instance, we're told that "An adventure is a series of scenes and encounters that comprise a single, complete story." But what marks a story as complete? Who gets to decide that nothing more is at stake? If it's the GM, then we're right back in the realm of GM force - so the idea of an adventure as a meaningful unit of play brings railroading with it per se; if it's the players, then when they decide that there's nothing more at stake for their PCs presumably the campaign is done.

Well one hopes that the party has some objective that want to accomplish: rescue the dragon from the prince, find the lost treasure of Pemerton, whatever, and when they accomplish that (or fail in some obvious manner - there's nothing worse that an aimless session!) then that adventure is complete.

Of course if you prefer games without objectives that's cool but, for me, when I was playing in a PotA game we soon became completely unrooted from any objective. At the beginning of each session I would find myself asking, what are we trying to do and why? It was quite unsatisfying

 

[FrogReaver]

Are you *actually* interested in people responding to the question in your first post, or is that just bait so you can argue with them about how they're wrong? Because it really feels like the latter. It feels like you have a pretty firm idea of what *you* think plot and railroading is already in mind.

There is nothing wrong with having an opinion and starting a thread to get other opinions and see how others respond to your opinion. Why do you always accuse others of starting a thread to tell others they are wrong?

 

[pemerton]

Well one hopes that the party has some objective that want to accomplish: rescue the dragon from the prince, find the lost treasure of Pemerton, whatever, and when they accomplish that (or fail in some obvious manner - there's nothing worse that an aimless session!) then that adventure is complete.

But will all their objectives be satisfied simultaneously? If so, then presumably the campaign is at an end. If not, then what marks out the adventures in any strong way?

Of course if you prefer games without objectives that's cool

The issue is not a lack of objectives. It's the proliferation of them!

 

[pemerton]

Are you *actually* interested in people responding to the question in your first post

Yes. But if there response is to say that, for a campaign to have a story there must be a plot that is created by the GM, then I'm going to explain why I disagree. Because I play in campaigns with stories, and they do not have a plot that was created by me as GM.

 

[pemerton]

I prefer a rules light, DM empowered, moderate to heavy options game that is ran in a decent sized sandbox where the world is either designed up front or The DM understands it well enough to make judgments or call for probabilistic die rolls.

That is the first style that [MENTION=16586]Campbell[/MENTION] called out in post 73 upthread, using "Free Kriegsspiel" as a label but pointing beyond it's literal meaning to the sort of game you describe. I associate this style especially with B/X, Classic Traveller, and Gygaxian AD&D.

I want the players to be able to change the world and arrive at different outcomes. I want them to do so by defeating their enemies and overcoming the challenges of the game.

I assume you think it is up to the players, rather than the GM, to decide who the PCs will try and ally with, and who they will oppose?

I would also guess that you tend to think of "story" as something comes out after the game has been played, as a retrospective reflection on the events of play.