D&D General Why defend railroading?

[Crimson Longinus]

But I don't see the point in making something up on the spot and then pretending it was all part of your extensive world building.

I see value in it. It makes the world seem more real. It gives the illusion that the world exist independently of the characters and is far larger and deeper than just the bits seen on the game. I think creating this sort of illusion of reality is part of good storytelling. After all, the whole point is to pretend that the world is real.

 

[Cadence]

For me, it's about having decisions that are relevant. Meaningful, consequential decisions. I don't want a DM to pretend I have a choice when I don't. If I don't have a meaningful, consequential choice, don't present me with a choice. Tell me what happens.

The quantum ogre is just an abstract situation of illusion of player choice. If it was a literal random ogre encounter in the woods then maybe it's not a big deal (unless the players knew there was an ogre lurking and chose the path based on avoiding the ogre). But illusionism comes up in a lot of other ways, and imo requires a suspension of disbelief from the players, who might be happy to do that.

A party gathers information and knows about the existence of a settlement on road A that has a bridge, a road B with a bridge, bandits roam the area, and there's a ford at point C. The DM has a village planned out on road A, bandits planned by the bridge on road B, stream ford C between them has an old hermit planned, and the deep water D has planned giant leeches. Choosing one of A-D would count as a meaningful decision, right?

Does it stop being meaningful if there will also be an Ogre appearing along the way no matter which way you picked? (Does that cancel out all of the things from having chosen A-D and all of the choices made within that encounters).

If that means the game is a long series of the DM narrating to the players what happens and the only choices we really get are at character creation, then it's quite clearly not an RPG. Likewise, it's not really an RPG if the only time the DM stops narrating at the players is when they get to combat. It becomes a miniatures skirmish game, not an RPG.


And none of that is onetruewayism or badwrongfun, it's pointing out that there are categories of games. Games are fun. Yay games. But chess isn't an RPG. Warhammer Fantasy Battles isn't an RPG, but Warhammer Fantasy Role-Play is. Jenga isn't an RPG in and of itself...but it can be the random mechanic for Dread (or some other game that uses the tower for the random element). Certain elements must be present for it to be an RPG, take away enough of them and it's no longer an RPG.

I think I want to hear your answer to my question above in this post to see if it feels like you're onetruewaying or not.

 

[overgeeked]

Something we also must consider is how many consequences must a choice have to be defined as “meaningful”.

For me, unless my choice matters, it's not meaningful. If I choose A but that choice is irrelevant, i.e. no consequence, then it's not meaningful. So one. My answer is at least one consequence.

going back to my earlier example. Let’s say tunnel 1 has the McMuffin and tunnel 2 has a magic pool. Water from the pool will aid in releasing the mcguffin from its guardian, so the “optimal path” is going there first before engaging the guardian.

now by using a quantum ogre I am removing one choice from the players (when they encounter said ogre) but I’m still offering impact on their choice.

If you're using Quantum Ogre, you are, by definition, removing their choice. So there's no choice and therefore no impact of or on their choice. Tunnel A has the McGuffin. Tunnel B has the magic pool. The players choose A. Unless you let the players freely decide A and follow through with that choice (presenting them with the McGuffin), it's railroading.

 

[Steampunkette]

Yes, they have. And the responses have mostly been "I like it therefore it's good" the second best is "it's easier therefore it's good" and "how dare you not like the thing I like".

That's what happens when you disagree with someone on a discussion forum. You tell them that you disagree and why.

Automatically agreeing with whatever you're told isn't understanding either.

It'll be no surprise when I inform you you're not telepathic. I didn't even start the thread with a working definition of railroading. I got that about 8-10 pages into the thread.

If you're interested in understanding then you have to set aside your own personal biases and try to understand. You have to try and see from their perspective. That's how you come to -understand-.

Not tell people "You're wrong and here's why". Because that's not trying to understand. That's just trying to have a debate. And you certainly don't throw out random strawman arguments or try and characterize everyone else's positions as infantile in your debate disguised as an attempt to understand.

This is not a good faith attempt.

And while you may not have Defined it until page 8 you had decided that it was Wrong/Bad/Ignorant to do in the OP. And there's literally no position, no argument, no direction that anyone can give you that you're going to stop and understand and go "Oh. I see. Well that makes sense, even if I disagree with you."

'Cause there've been some GREAT and well reasoned attempts.

No. Because if done at all railroading zeros out table enjoyment.

See?

You're not showing an attempt to understand. You're showing an attempt to declare everyone else wrong. And all debate is just a circular series of people trying to get you to understand even the most BASIC aspect of -their- perspective... and you refusing it.

I'm done. And I highly recommend everyone else in this thread disengage, too.

 

[Cadence]

The quantum ogre is just an abstract situation of illusion of player choice. If it was a literal random ogre encounter in the woods then maybe it's not a big deal (unless the players knew there was an ogre lurking and chose the path based on avoiding the ogre). But illusionism comes up in a lot of other ways, and imo requires a suspension of disbelief from the players, who might be happy to do that.

For example, do you dial down the difficulty of a combat mid way through? Some players want dms to do this, because they like the game aspects of combat but don't actually want to "lose." For others (me included), if there's nothing at stake then why roll dice at all?

If I DM'ed the way I'd like I would still dial things (rolls, hp, etc...) down or up if something turned out to be off about my planning (holy cow, I didn't realize effect X could do that!?! or holy cow, I didn't realize monster X and Y synergized that well).

I would not dial things down or up due to good or bad player choices or lucky or unlucky die rolls. (I put not doing that as the thing I wish I was better at in another thread that's going on right now).

I imagine that the amount of effort I put into the monster tactics in real time combat would be (at the least) subconsciously affected by how things were going.

I would agree that when you create something isn't a big deal, i.e. whether you have the tavern prepared or just make it up on the spot. I don't think it has to be the case that a non-linear adventure requires enormous prep. But I don't see the point in making something up on the spot and then pretending it was all part of your extensive world building.

I don't know what pretending would be needed. I guess if you usually have set pieces on a page coded to the map and are fake flipping to it to make it look like it was planned all along? Or if the players ask after the fact if it was random or planned or how they could have avoided it? (Do they do that).

 

[Hussar]

I'm 100% good with railroading being a degenerate play, but it degenerates from linear play; it's not some different animal.

I have to admit, I don't agree with the second part about railroading being degenerate linear play. One can railroad just as easily in a sandbox or open world scenario. "I do this - fail, I do that - fail, I do the other thing - fail, I do the thing that the DM has determined is the only possible way forward - success" is just as much of a railroad no matter what the type of scenario.

I think there is a danger here of fetishizing open world or sandbox play as somehow superior. "Oh, I play a sandbox so it's impossible for me to railroad" is an argument I've seen put forward many, many times. And it's not true. All I have to do is deny any plausible option until the right one is chosen and I've railroaded.

Again, it's all about plausible choices. A travel scenario from A to B is obviously linear. But, it's not any more or less likely to be a railroad than an open world scenario.

 

[overgeeked]

A party gathers information and knows about the existence of a settlement on road A that has a bridge, a road B with a bridge, bandits roam the area, and there's a ford at point C. The DM has a village planned out on road A, bandits planned by the bridge on road B, stream ford C between them has an old hermit planned, and the deep water D has planned giant leeches. Choosing one of A-D would count as a meaningful decision, right?

Does it stop being meaningful if there will also be an Ogre appearing along the way no matter which way you picked? (Does that cancel out all of the things from having chosen A-D and all of the choices made within that encounters).

Partially, yes. Partially, no. The decision is meaningful where it's meaningful and not meaningful where it's not. The decision matters in the sense of A-D but doesn't matter in the sense of the ogre.

 

[Cadence]

Partially, yes. Partially, no. The decision is meaningful where it's meaningful and not meaningful where it's not. The decision matters in the sense of A-D but doesn't matter in the sense of the ogre.

Is it still role-playing game with that kind of set-up?

 

[Malmuria]

A party gathers information and knows about the existence of a settlement on road A that has a bridge, a road B with a bridge, bandits roam the area, and there's a ford at point C. The DM has a village planned out on road A, bandits planned by the bridge on road B, stream ford C between them has an old hermit planned, and the deep water D has planned giant leeches. Choosing one of A-D would count as a meaningful decision, right?

Does it stop being meaningful if there will also be an Ogre appearing along the way no matter which way you picked? (Does that cancel out all of the things from having chosen A-D and all of the choices made within that encounters).

I think meaningful choices rely on player knowledge. If I were running a non-linear wildnerness scenario, the players should know that there always can be random encounters (and I would even check for them in the open), and their characters might know or have heard rumors of what specific creatures. And then as DM you just have to respect their choices. For example, if they've heard rumors of stone giants to the west, and because that they take precautions and go east, I don't think having the stone giants show up over there too (especially if it's just because you want a stone giant encounter) is very fair.

Ideally, the world would react to those choices. So in your example, maybe if they go meet the old hermit that means the bandits are able to make an escape or something, and the pcs hear about this. That's not a great example, but that's the way I would do it!

but tldr, the more information the players have, the better chance that they will be able to make choices that feel meaningful to them, and that might be a choice away from your pre-planned content.

 

[overgeeked]

'Cause there've been some GREAT and well reasoned attempts.

Really? I've read every response. What do you think are the great and well-reasoned attempts?