Cohesion vs Railroading

[DongShenYin]

This will be my first time GMing a "real campaign", and the attitudes of roleplaying has changed so much since my college days. Back then there was no talk of "railroading" or "storylines" it was just "defeat the problem the DM set up and get cool stuff"... so while I'm still at the stage of worldbuilding, I'm thinking of how to craft adventures that would make the world interesting and not have the campaign die a slow boring death.

--Dora

 

[Quickleaf]

Great advice so far!
Dora, I suggest you decide on the setting/theme/villain or some other central element of the story you'd like to explore. Now take this idea to your players, ask them what they think about it, would they be interested in playing, and also ask them about what kind of characters they want to make. This input stage is crucial to a long life (and can be repeated as often as you like)

Don't work about it being your first time running a campaign! Just go for it! Having a story to tell is a great idea --it keeps the PCs from ending up doing "something at the tavern." Just be cognizant when you are planning the adventure not to make assumptions about PC actions. Whenever you are unsure what your PCs would do, simply provide options and consequences. Anyhow, hope this helps! What kind of game are you running?

If you really want to try something different..(and I think I'll start a post on this!) ...bring some colored pencils/markers to the first game session and have everyone sketch out the character they'd like to play.

 

[shilsen]

Except here we run into practical matters - Not every GM is good at winging it such that everything the PCs do winds up dramatic or interesting. Many folks need prep time to make a game work, and if the PCs go off in pursuit of goals that haven't seen prep-time, the GM is stuck. Similarly, not every player is good at choosing interesting goals or pursuits.

No argument here. The point I was making is definitely more valid with a DM who's fairly comfortable with the players going off in a random direction and with players who are proactive in picking and working towards their own goals.

Nor is a world driven and centered upon player action particularly believeable. Sometimes, things unrelated to your goals impinge upon your life, no?

True. That's what I was referring to when I said that "Obviously, since I want them to have the sense of a living, breathing world around them, others will interact with them, and the party can choose to follow up on some of these interactions, but the choice will ultimately be theirs, not mine."

As for things unrelated to my goals impinging on my life, luckily that doesn't happen much on a personal level. It's a gift - or I'm living a solo campaign without knowing it

IMHO, the game is best not when the PCs are always reacting, nor when the world is always reacting. A mixture of both makes the most rich story.

What you said.

 

[nopantsyet]

I've been redefining this line for myself recently. I've always been firmly in the cohesion camp, but doing this in a homebrew world is a lot of work. So I've found myself drifting to focus on cohesion over other elements of the game because that's the most fun to work on.

Plan for everything so you're prepared for everything.

Not a very practical appropach. It takes a lot of work to prepare on this level, and the time I can put into it has dropped significantly. So I'm trying to find a new balance, keeping the positive elements of the thorough, cohesive game, butfocusing more on plot and pacing than on thoroughness.

My approach is to come up with mini encounters and events that relate to the various plot arcs; I focus my background development around these. These can range from the conveyance of minor information to a complete side adventure.

Plan for nothing so you are prepared for everything.

Many of these will tie back to the broader plot in some way. It may just remind them it's happening, or advance the plot significantly; and they don't even have to follow up on it. But it keeps them thinking about it, and keeps it alive in the campaign world. And that results in better cohesion than my previous brute force methods.

It allows the session events to go in whatever direction the players choose, while still allowing programmed aspects of the plot and world to continue to unfold.

 

[DongShenYin]

I think I get it. One of my worst experiences of being railroaded was this game where we played for SIX HOURS and got NOWHERE because there was only ONE door to the dungeon and only ONE WAY through the door. We couldn't figure it out and the GM let us run around in circles without helping. Needless to say, we haven't played in one of his games since.

On the other hand, I've been hearing a lot about catering to the players' goals and the players' ideas and the players' interest... which leads me to wonder, what's the point of being a GM? Am I just here to manipulate the environment so that every choice the players make is a legitimate one? That no matter where they go and what they do, it's always the "right thing"?

--Dora

 

[shilsen]

On the other hand, I've been hearing a lot about catering to the players' goals and the players' ideas and the players' interest... which leads me to wonder, what's the point of being a GM? Am I just here to manipulate the environment so that every choice the players make is a legitimate one? That no matter where they go and what they do, it's always the "right thing"?

--Dora

There's a big difference between catering to the players' goals/interests and every choice they make being a legitimate one. All I'm saying is that if your PCs don't want to "chase the macguffin" (as you hoped they would) but decide to "beat up the whatzisnehm" instead, let them. Depending on the importance of the macguffin and the method they choose to go after the whatzisnehm, they might get themselves in a whole heap of trouble, which might spawn further adventures. And then again, it may not. Give the PCs the freedom to do what they want, whether it's the right thing or not. Unless you have the most unique group of players in existence, I seriously doubt that every choice they make will be the "right thing"

 

[Ranes]

At which point the macguffin can become a wampeter.

 

[deltadave]

Just remember that the only way the story moves forward is thru conflict. If there is some kind of conflict for each character that draws them in the same direction, the story evolves on it's own and party cohesion isn't a problem. Conflict is also where character is revealed, by the choices a character makes during the game.

Railroading is only a problem if the DM has a specific story they would like to tell. When the players and DM collaborate on the story it is much richer, and more rewarding for everyone involved.

 

[barsoomcore]

Wow, there's been some great advice in this thread. I think we're getting better at this, gang!

Just to chime in on my favourite little tidbit that I haven't seen posted yet:

Active NPCs

You don't need a "plot" per se, if your NPCs (good guys, bad guys and those in between) are always running around and causing trouble. I have a entire folder of little text files, one for each of my key NPCs or NPC groups, and every time I have an idea as to what one of them might be up to, I note it down. I run through those files once a week or so (before doing much planning for any given session) and make sure that all my NPCs are off pursuing whatever their goals might be, and looking for ways to tie that into what the party is doing. So if the expert spy has just gotten double-crossed by her employers (who happen to be the party's key nemesis), perhaps she'll seek out the party and offer to help them out. Or maybe she'll go digging for dirt on the party that she can use to get back into her former employer's good graces. And once that dirt comes up, you know it's not getting put back anytime soon...

The point is, if you've got a fair number of NPCs who are actively pursuing their own goals, and said goals intersect with the party, you don't need a "plot" for your campaign. Your players will have to either start taking action, or action will start being taken against them!

My players have learned to pay attention to what's going on in the background, because they realise that it's going to affect them somehow.

In the very very very very very excellent chapter on running adventures in the d20 Call of Cthulhu book, Monte Cook says that good adventures aren't stories in and of themselves -- they're the PROMISE of a story. The story is what happens when the players storm into the DM's encounters. The description of the encounters, what the DM has in his notes beforehand, is just the promise of the story.

No guarantees that the story you promise is the story you get, though.

 

[barsoomcore]

I've been hearing a lot about catering to the players' goals and the players' ideas and the players' interest... which leads me to wonder, what's the point of being a GM? Am I just here to manipulate the environment so that every choice the players make is a legitimate one? That no matter where they go and what they do, it's always the "right thing"?

Heh. I tend to make it my mission to ensure that no matter what my players do, it's always the "wrong thing". Pretty much every decision my players makes ends up with them gritting their teeth and snarling "WHY did we do that?"



Of course, every choice they make IS a legitimate one, from some point of views. I wonder what you mean by "right" in that sentence above. Do you mean "right" in the sense that they WIN every time, no matter what their decision they make? Or do you mean "right" in the sense that they do what you expect them to do?

Because as to the former -- I say heck, if you screw up, you're going to pay. My players know that -- that's called PC death. But as to the latter, I say it's MY problem if I didn't anticipate that decision and now I have to scramble to figure out what the heck happens next.

I kind of like that, though. It's a big part of the fun of DMing for me -- reacting to what my players do and keeping the game moving and making things fun and fitting it all into what I think is going on.

If you can already imagine the whole story of your campaign, my advice is -- write it down and spare your friends the annoyance of having to play the characters in your imagination. Cause why would it be fun to just figure out what you THINK is the "right" thing to do?