I wouldn't agree with the claim that a 'railroad' is always a bad idea.
Hmm, okay I retract my statement in that case.
There is kind of this unspoken rule of D&D (well unspoken in the rulebooks at least) that if the DM spends a lot of time preparing for a session, its expected that you won't go running off for no good reason (as determined by the group dynamics). There are two good reason for this: 1) Your DM has put a lot of effort into it, and he's your friend, and you don't want to make your friend feel like he's wasted his time, and 2) Most DMs don't ad-hoc a game nearly as well as they can run a prepared one.
This isn't to say that PCs never go outside what DMs plan for. They do it all the freakin' time! It's one of the things that makes D&D worth playing, IMO. But, its a group game, and just as the DM makes concessions for the players, the players make concessions for the DM, usually, or at least without some kind of reason. And, that is a good thing. If that's something that you consider railroading, then I can definately see that point of view.
And clearly that's not what I'm talking about here. I'm talking about the fact that most adventures have a linear series of expected events, and the players are expected (and indeed often have to complete the adventure) go from A -> B -> C -> D in order. If you've got a better term than 'railroad' for that which will make you less uncomfortable, then by all means, I'll be happy to hear it and use it.
I like the term "linear design" taken from video games. The reason is that I think of the term "railroading" as something done in game. Two DMs could be using the same material to run a game, and it could play differently based on how strictly they preserve the A -> B -> C -> D structure in the presented module. So in this sense, I think its important to distinguish between how one prepares the game and how one runs the game.
At least, that's how I've been approaching this discussion. It's possible we aren't all quite on the same page as far as that is concerned. Would you say that the discussion is more about preparing for a session, running a session, or both? In other words, when does the distinction between "situation" and "adventure" become most important?
How about this for adventure:
A hazardous undertaking that the DM wants the players to explore in the game.
Question: If the players express an interest in exploring a "situation" and the DM prepares for it for the next session
in exactly the same way that he would have if he had under the "Adventure" definition, is it a situation or is it an adventure? This goes into my question above about preparation vs. running. If two sessions are prepared identically, but one as the result of DM intent and one as a result of player intent, what does that mean as far as the distinction between situation and adventure as per this discussion?
Situation: An in-world location or event that can be interacted with. No component of PC interaction is part of the situation, though PC interaction can change the situation and/or create new situations. For example, the Forest of Evil between two villages is a situation, with its related wandering encounter tables, subset locations, etc., etc. .
Adventure: A series of smaller-scale events that takes place during game time. I.e., the encounter design is a situation; the encounters as they play out constitute an adventure. Travelling through the Forest of Evil is an adventure.
...
In the strongest version of the other paradigm, the DM creates situations wherein he envisions the sequence of small-scale events that will occur. He is, in effect, predetermining to some extent not only the situation but also what will occur when the players interact with that situation (i.e., the adventure).
This I can understand, but doesn't it go against what people have been saying in the thread? By that I mean that it has sounded like people have been making the point that "situations" and "adventures" are some kind of opposites that don't interact with each other. And, that has been my main problem with the whole idea of situations. But, in this definition they play off of each other and, in fact, improve each other. But, isn't that going against what Celebrim said above?
Or are we just agreeing, but having a hard time realizing that we agree? It has happened before on these boards...
Hmm... All this discussion makes me wonder if a separate thread where each person describes:
1a) How is a session (adventure/situation) developed?
1b) How is a typical session played out?
2a) How is a campaign developed?
2b) How does the campaign play out?
This may be harder or easier to describe depending on someone's style. But perhaps seeing how each person actually does the game could give some perspective.
I think that would be a great idea.
