Avoiding Railroading - Forked Thread: Do you play more for the story or the combat?

[Cadfan]

In the game, the PCs hear some rumours about undead. They re-spec their PCs in order to be effective against undead. They go and fight the undead. The fights are tough, but because they optimized vs. undead they are successful.

They pat each other on the back for their smart choices. They're happy.

The DM knows that the original encounters only featured a sprinkling of undead. When the players changed their PCs he altered the encounters. The choice to re-spec, which the players were feeling so good about making, was actually meaningless; the encounters would have been just as difficult no matter what they had done.

It brought the players joy and a feeling of accomplishment to choose powers, use them well, and win tough victories because of that choice.

Its only meaningless if you view D&D as a sort of metagame duel between players and dungeon masters.

Which is a bad way to look at things, because that makes the entire game essentially meaningless, since the DM could win any time he wants to.

 

[LostSoul]

It brought the players joy and a feeling of accomplishment to choose powers, use them well, and win tough victories because of that choice.

Maybe I wasn't clear. The build choices the players made had no effect on the difficulty of the encounters. That was just the DM's choice. The players wanted their choices to matter, but they did not.

 

[CharlesRyan]

WORD. No preparation means no emotional attachment to stuff you've already written up, which means no temptation to railroad.

Awesome.

Except that some people want to enjoy a game with a coherent story. And the OP asked for tips on making that happen well. Not to be told that he's wrong for having that interest.

 

[CharlesRyan]

There's nothing wrong with planning what the baddies will do in an encounter. But if you spend countless hours planning on having Hank the Barbarian carry the enchanted Halberd of Pabst Blueribbin to the sky kingdom of the winged elves, and Hank's player is more interested in bedding wenches and killing goblins in the forests of Daventry, there's a dilemma.

It seems we're in complete agreement.

1. Plot loosely. Don't spend countless hours planning.

2. Be reactive with your implementation of the plot (just like you are as an encounter unfolds). Accept that the players are their own creatures with their own outlooks and ideas. When they do the unexpected, roll with it, give it the chance to morph into something even cooler than you originally envisioned (easy, since your original vision was pretty loose), and/or find new ways to gently nudge things back in the direction you had in mind.

Like I said, a lot like prepping and GMing an encounter.

 

[S'mon]

Its only meaningless if you view D&D as a sort of metagame duel between players and dungeon masters.

No, traditional D&D is an in-game duel between the PCs and the Dungeon. Dungeon construction with increasing threat by level is designed to facilitate this and reward smart play.

 

[S'mon]

The question is how do the really great DMs out there manage to keep intricate campaigns with great story elements without making the players feel like they've been railroaded?

To get back to this; intricate campaigns with great story elements are not the same as a coherent pre-plotted story. The best approach is to have detailed NPCs with their own motivations and dynamic behaviour, who will act independently of the PCs. There is no story dependent on particular PC actions. There may be an indicative timeline of how things will progress if the PCs do nothing, but no story dependent on particular PC actions. It can resemble a game of Diplomacy, with at least 2 NPC factions and the PCs representing 1 or more factions themselves.

The secret is character-based play, not story-based play. And the best source for NPC realistic motivations is The Prince by Niccolo Machiavelli.

 

[Phaezen]

It seems we're in complete agreement.

1. Plot loosely. Don't spend countless hours planning.

2. Be reactive with your implementation of the plot (just like you are as an encounter unfolds). Accept that the players are their own creatures with their own outlooks and ideas. When they do the unexpected, roll with it, give it the chance to morph into something even cooler than you originally envisioned (easy, since your original vision was pretty loose), and/or find new ways to gently nudge things back in the direction you had in mind.

Like I said, a lot like prepping and GMing an encounter.

I am going to be trying this for my next campaign. I have an super-plot (involving scheming demonlords) but intead of having it in the players faces, it will start off as rumors, chance encounters and the like, at least well into the paragon tier. Until that point, i will be dangling many small plot hooks infromt of the players to see what direction they decide to head in, I have asked each player to provide some plot hooks for thier character as well.

Hopefully this will keep the players interested in the campaign as thier characters will have a lot of freedom to explore the world while at the same time keep me happy as the superplot will be advancing, mainly due to what should appear to be chance encounters and off stage link ins to the various plots that the characters follow.

Phaezen

 

[Webby140]

In terms of general plot I have a clear idea of what groups and evil individuals are going to do, and I set up the circumstances of that. Depending on what happens in my game session one week, I prepare for the next 'leg' the next week. This involves writing dungeons, setting loot, getting a bit of background down and some interesting items explaining what was there and why a group was there.
I think I tend to have one of those multi-path ludonarratives you see in games where there's always a couple of endings, and a few different strands of "choices" the PCs could take... but I always try to anticipate what they might choose.

There's no railroad though, I don't think. It's my players choice whether to follow up a quest or not.

 

[Ktulu]

I do a combination of things:

1. Begin with a general idea of what the game will be about. This is based on what I want to run as a DM, and what the players (and by extention, the characters) want.

2. Each week, I have the players give a follow-up of what they enjoyed, didn't enjoy and what they're planning on doing. I combine this with the over-all plan I have and, it usually plays out well.

3. This is a harder thing, but I try to pay close attention to what's engaging the players. If Gaelen's player isn't interested in the politics behind the war, but the rest of the players are, I'll make sure the next session has something special set aside for him. If Garr's barbarian is having trouble with the primal aspect of his character, then next week they'll encounter a Nereid and her minions.

4. The hardest part, in my opinion, is getting the characters invested. They won't care about railroading if you get them sold on the world. If you spend enough time making sure they care about the story, they'll already be doing what you want. For instance, in my current game, I've got them seeing red whenever the enemy is mentioned. I know they'll defy logic in going after their enemies, so I can easily plan for that. I can literally throw out three possible hooks and right now they'll take the one causing pain, as they're wanting as much revenge as possible. However, if even one of their NPC's is in destress, they'll come running to the rescue. They've suffered enough losses and don't want a pyrrhic victory.

 

[Mallus]

The DM advice I often give myself is "Design problems, not solutions".

I also advise myself to avoid creating set-pieces for my adventures, unless they are in response to the player's stated plans, ie I'll craft an encounter called "Showdown at the Midwinter's Ball!" only if the players tell me they intend to confront the evil Duke at the Midwinter's Ball.