As a player, I like a campaign that...

[Haltherrion]

There's always lots of threads on railroading versus sandbox (or less pejoratively, prep'd versus ad hoc games). Which do you honestly like as a player and why?

Myself, as a ref, I tend more to the sandbox on the spectruum although I still prep a lot. Maybe I'm really more in the middle but I like to think I create elements I can use wherever the players choose to go. As a player, I would state I like the same sort of setting yet when I'm not ref'ing in my group, the other most common ref tends to do a lot less flexible settings and honestly, I really enjoy his campaigns even though it often means I have little say in where the campaign goes.

I guess in some ways this isn't too odd. In computer RPGs, I love Bethesda's open worlds like Morrowind and love Fallout but also love Dragon Age, both are fairly opposite on the player-freedom spectruum.

Thoughts?

 

[Haltherrion]

I'm honestly not trying to pass judgement on any response. In the hands of the right referee, all could make for a fun campaign.

 

[Rune]

Choice 3 is best, but, really, a combination of all is even better. I prefer lots of hooks in a sandbox style, but even railroading isn't necessarily bad, if the DM can do it without letting the players know that s/he is doing it.

But, mostly, the hooks. As the campaign builds momentum, the DM doesn't even have to make them up--the PCs will start to make their own through their own (mis)adventures.

 

[Derren]

For me 3+4, although setting and story elements are imo the same.

The Ref should provide the world which includes several events big and small which will happen.
The players are free to interact and alter the outcome of those events (which leads to new events based on how they were resolved) or are free to strike out on their own.

A pecific example: The old king is very ill and will die soon and a lot of adventurers are seeking a miracle cure from old ruins and dungeons.
The players are free to make this their main quest, a side quest, just interact with the miracle seekers in any way they want or ignore it completely. Whats important is that the players have complete control over how to approach this event and are not forced to choose between several plotlines the Ref made up. Want to help the king? Great. Want to make is seem like you helphim while actually replace him with an doppelganger? Fine. Convince him to become a lich to escape death? Go on. Whatever the PCs come up with goes as long as it is possible in the predefined power level of the setting.
And depending on what they do the king will die, survive or anything in between, each outcome altering the setting and creating more events.

 

[Gilladian]

I chose 3, but really any variation on 1-3 is fine with me as long as I know going in what the likely option is.

I've been railroaded, and while I CAN do it for a while, it isn't usually fun, so 1 is my least preferred style of the 3.

But 4, wherein nothing is planned, and everything is left to the devices of the players, rapidly devolves into a whole lot of nothing. I've never had a DM, in 30+ years of playing, who could pull it off.

 

[Derren]

But 4, wherein nothing is planned, and everything is left to the devices of the players, rapidly devolves into a whole lot of nothing. I've never had a DM, in 30+ years of playing, who could pull it off.

For 4, its not the DM wo needs to pull it off, it are the players. When they just sit there passively and wait till the DM throws them a plot hook (what from my experience is the most common type of player by far) this style simply will not work no matter how goor the DM is.

 

[havard]

As a player, I prefer some sense of direction, especially early on in the campaign. I have played in some campaigns where I have felt really lost and not really felt able to take the game in any direction either.

I do love it when the players gradually gain more and more control of the game however. Usually I find it easier to do so once I've gotten a bit of familiarity with the framework provided by the DM.

-Havard

 

[Umbran]

All those variations can work. I've had fun with all of them over time, so I cannot say I really prefer one over another.

 

[Oni]

3 & 4, for exactly the reasons Derren stated above. I'm all for events in the game world as long as they're there for the players to latch on to, ignore, bend, spindle, mutilate, and/or manipulate their hearts content. But if the choice is freedom within the confines of a specific storyline provided by the GM, meh. And the more strongly the story asserts itself over player freedom the less enjoyable it is to me. Ultimately it's the players that should be deciding what they are doing in the game world not the GM, IMHO.

A game where the DM has to spend hours prepping feels limiting to me, because I don't want to be a jerk and waste all the GM's prep time by ignoring what he's planned, but at the same time it's less enjoyable for me if I feel obligated to do the adventure because it's the one that's there. More and more I'm coming to prefer games that require little prep and are very easy to run on the fly, even as a player, because then I don't have to choose between feeling pressured into a particular course of action or like a jerk for blazing my own path and causing the GM undue work.

 

[Thasmodious]

Myself, as a ref, I tend more to the sandbox on the spectruum although I still prep a lot. Maybe I'm really more in the middle but I like to think I create elements I can use wherever the players choose to go. As a player, I would state I like the same sort of setting yet when I'm not ref'ing in my group, the other most common ref tends to do a lot less flexible settings and honestly, I really enjoy his campaigns even though it often means I have little say in where the campaign goes.

Strangely, that perfectly sums up my position and situation as well.