D&D General [rant]The conservatism of D&D fans is exhausting.

[KYRON45]

I’ve never played in or run a game where players couldn’t make choices.

Reading everyone’s take on what’s what is fascinating to me.

 

[Hussar]

The point is there really aren't roads in a sandbox. You might have some to start to help players get used to taking initiative, and it is totally fine if you want a sandbox with roads (there is no problem with using structures within a sandbox you are more comfortable with) but the ideal is to not have roads

I disagree. There really are roads. The DM provides hooks, the DM makes the NPC's, the DM creates any conflict within the setting between those NPC's and groups, the power groups in the setting are created by the DM, every single element, outside of the PC's is 100% authored by the DM and the DM has stories and ideas focused around every single one of those elements.

The only freedom the players have, effectively, is choosing which DM authored story do they want to play through tonight. If there are cultists in the hills over there, then there are cultists in the hill over there and the story of the players meeting those cultists will play out in a fairly predictable manner most of the time. If there aren't cultists in the hill over there, then the story of "The party meets the cultists" doesn't happen.

Reacting to whatever the DM creates isn't, in my opinion, taking initiative at all. It's simply choosing from the curated list of adventures that the DM has pre-authored.

 

[Hussar]

That isn't a linear adventure. That is the players choosing to go to a sage, then to Nexus, then to the spell jammer. Unless the GM prepped those as the paths he wanted the players to go down, that isn't what linear adventure means at all

In what way is this not linear? The players have zero choice here if they want to progress. They must progress in a proscibed order dictated by the DM.

If you don't see this as linear, no wonder we don't agree what sandbox is.

 

[Hussar]

But does that assume they stay the course, and don't opt to do something else once find out where portal is or once get to Nexus? They may opt to never go on the Spell jammer?

Yes, this gets brought up all the time, but, honestly? How often do the players get half way through achieving a goal then completely abandon it? They've already reached Nexus, they've got the next step, but, suddenly they jump ship and do something else? I really don't think a lot of groups do this and even if a group does do this, doesn't do it very often.

By and large, a group will choose a course of action (possibly multiple courses of action) and then see that through to the end. If they are abandoning stuff in the middle to go do something else, I'd be seriously questioning whether or not I completely failed to engage the players with an adventure.

 

[Bedrockgames]

In what way is this not linear? The players have zero choice here if they want to progress. They must progress in a proscibed order dictated by the DM.

There isn’t enough information in this example to know that. We don’t know if the GM planned on a sage being the avenue for learning the location. As long as the players are free to engage this question how they want, I think it isn’t linear. I mean they could probably find the answer to this question with a spell of their own

If you don't see this as linear, no wonder we don't agree what sandbox is.

What you are describing does not seem to be a linear adventure. It appears to be the players choosing to go to a sage, then choosing to go somewhere based on the information the sage gives

EDITED FOR CLARITY TO FIX AUTOCORRECT FAILURE

 

[mamba]

As a player it would never occur to me to not want to do what the DM presented. If I don’t want to do what the DM is offering; that’s it…the game is over.

what if the DM gave you four options to choose from rather than a single one you have to take?

 

[Bedrockgames]

I disagree. There really are roads. The DM provides hooks, the DM makes the NPC's, the DM creates any conflict within the setting between those NPC's and groups, the power groups in the setting are created by the DM, every single element, outside of the PC's is 100% authored by the DM and the DM has stories and ideas focused around every single one of those elements.

The only freedom the players have, effectively, is choosing which DM authored story do they want to play through tonight. If there are cultists in the hills over there, then there are cultists in the hill over there and the story of the players meeting those cultists will play out in a fairly predictable manner most of the time. If there aren't cultists in the hill over there, then the story of "The party meets the cultists" doesn't happen.

Reacting to whatever the DM creates isn't, in my opinion, taking initiative at all. It's simply choosing from the curated list of adventures that the DM has pre-authored.

i think you are wrong about freedom and authoring but that honestly doesn’t even matter because sandbox is about freedom to choose and even if the GM is authoring everything and these are just gm authored stories to choose from (which again I think is just not true): the players still have all these stories to choose from. The point is if the Gm has 20 ‘stories’ to pick from (which would be low for most sandboxes that is a much greater level of choice than if the GM has one adventure that the players must buy into for the game to happen

 

[KYRON45]

what if the DM gave you four options to choose from rather than a single one you have to take?

Any Dm that I would play with would present options that have some connection to the party in some way. So picking one would be no problem.
Even if this weren’t the case; I agreed to join this DMs game and as such I’ll role with what he’s got in mind.

I’ve never played in a game where the party wasn’t built around a core premise of some kind.
It’s not uncommon for that premise to change or be discarded eventually; but I just wouldn’t play in a game where there was no central reason for us all being t in the beginning.

 

[AlViking]

I totally agree with this. And that's generally my point. When people claim "My game is a sandbox", I tend to read it as more of a "feeling" than an actual fact. Mostly because IME, it's mostly likely that a sandbox is more "You have more options for doing stuff" than in a linear game. It's a question of degree, not kind. I mean, the Curse of Strahd is a pretty open sandbox campaign module. But, like you said, you're going to face Strahd in the end. You start at A, proceed through B-F in order of choice and then arrive at the G spot at the end.


Again, totally agree with this. D&D isn't particularly well suited to pure sandboxing because the players simply don't have any ability to change the setting. It's too reactive to be what I would call an actual, non-linear sandbox. That was certainly my experience with Ironsworn where I literally had no idea what would happen by the end of each session, even though I was running the game.

To me it's a spectrum. Most games aren't true sanboxes, not even Minecraft by some people's definition. But we can still have games that are very close to sandboxes, it just won't fit the "purest" of definitions.

 

[gban007]

Yes, this gets brought up all the time, but, honestly? How often do the players get half way through achieving a goal then completely abandon it? They've already reached Nexus, they've got the next step, but, suddenly they jump ship and do something else? I really don't think a lot of groups do this and even if a group does do this, doesn't do it very often.

By and large, a group will choose a course of action (possibly multiple courses of action) and then see that through to the end. If they are abandoning stuff in the middle to go do something else, I'd be seriously questioning whether or not I completely failed to engage the players with an adventure.

Depends on the players, I've had ones that are quite easily distracted, and will pivot to next thing that takes their interest. Like doing a sci fi game, where pretended to be in a band to get to something, but then really enjoyed band experience so shortly afterwards looked at whether could do some sort of tour. Then one player likes seeing an NPC using a rocket launcher so then focus goes on to sourcing a rocket launcher, and once those two sorted, have decided want to do something else than what original plan was.
Could be the group gets to the Nexus, and the DM provides nice colorful description of the place, and part of the description grabs the players' interest and they want to investigate that now aware of it.
Yes, could be as DM that not quite capturing their interest in current path, but sometimes it is something else grabbing more interest unexpectedly than then pivot to. Like I've said elsewhere, I don't DM sandbox anymore, but used to, and in our gaming industry sometimes am a player in sandbox campaigns.