D&D General Defining Story

[Hussar]

Story is the outcome once the play has completed. And yes, the GM may set up the starting conditions, and hopefully ones that are rife with conflict and interesting revelations. But what you seem to be missing that the GM doesn't control the PCs, and what the PCs do will greatly influence the outcome. Until the PCs have made their choices and influenced the course of events there is no story.

For this to work the best, there should be a lot of situations that have no obvious "correct" answer but ones that are more open ended.

See, I disagree. What the players do won'T actually "greatly" influence the possible outcomes. The possible outcomes will almost always be anticipated by the DM, and the DM will then move on to the next conflict.

 

[Hussar]

You can have the whole thing prepped down to the floorboards and still have no idea what's going to happen once the players get involved.

I mean, take a typical old-time adventure module. With a few exceptions (most of which have numbers starting with DL) all they present is a setting and a bunch of maybe-connected situations and-or obstacles and-or potential opponents. Even if I-as-DM know this material inside out, I still have no way of knowing how (or even if!) the players/PCs will approach it or what will happen if-when they do.

Or take another example: the common situation where the DM has a behind-the-scenes schedule of events that will happen at specific times unless the PCs somehow force that schedule or those events to change. For example, I could have predetermined that two armies are going to meet and do battle in the Vale of Flowers on Day 12, but I've no idea how or if that's going to affect the PCs nor do I know how or if the PCs will affect it. Maybe the PCs broker a peace on Day 10. Maybe they're in the Vale for other reasons on Day 12 and unexpectedly get caught in the fighting. Maybe they'll work with one of the armies, helping them plan for that battle. Maybe they don't get to the Vale until Day 14, when all they see is flocks of crows. Or maybe they go another way entirely and don't hear about the battle for months.

I'm kind of in that situation right now. The party I'm running is in a hilly area that's on its way to becoming a war zone. Going in, I thought I wouldn't have to worry about details of the war itself as it was months away and the PCs should be long finished in the area by then. Well, what I initially thought would take them several in-game days (or at most a few weeks) has now gone on for three in-game months, meaning that armies, scouts, and strike forces are now moving in the hills around them like chess pieces.

I'd initially thought that war would be an off-screen bit of news. Now it's looking like I'll have to run it in some detail, if only to determine how or if it directly affects the PCs and-or what opportunities they might have to get involved if they so desire. And though I've got ideas as to who will win the war and how this will happen if all else remains the same, I've no idea how it's going to play out as regards the PCs nor do I know whether the PCs will intervene somehow and make a difference.

And yet, nothing the players have done has influenced that this war is going to occur. That story element is fixed. It's going to happen.

You already know how the battle in the Vale of Flowers will resolve. It will resolve in one of four ways, depending on the player actions. That story is already written. All you're doing now is filling in the script and picking which ending. That's not emergent at all.

 

[Lanefan]

And yet, nothing the players have done has influenced that this war is going to occur. That story element is fixed. It's going to happen.

Correct; though they have already influenced elements of it, withor without realizing it.

And it would happen whether the PCs were here or 5000 miles away.

You already know how the battle in the Vale of Flowers will resolve. It will resolve in one of four ways, depending on the player actions. That story is already written. All you're doing now is filling in the script and picking which ending. That's not emergent at all.

The PCs' part in it is completely emergent, and that's the bit that matters, isn't it?

 

[Hussar]

And it would happen whether the PCs were here or 5000 miles away.

That's kinda my point. You already have a story. Whether or not the PC's interact with that story, that story is going to happen. Now, I'm pretty sure that you've got a number of ideas for what happens if the party does X or Y and whether or not they succeed on task A or B. So, basically, the story is already plotted out. The only thing that is revealed in play is which resolution you choose to use.

In other words, none of that is emergent, any more than a choose your own adventure book is an emergent story.

This is the point I keep trying to make. The second the DM decides that there are events in the campaign, that campaign is no longer emergent. It cannot be because the DM now has decided on the order of events and whether or not particular events will occur.

It's why the opposite of sandbox is not railroad. The opposite of sandbox is linear. But, in both a sandbox and a linear campaign, you have a pretty good idea of what's going to happen in that campaign, most of the time. Curse of Strahd is a pretty decent sandbox. Isle of Dread is also a pretty good sandbox.

Guess what? You can pretty accurately predict what will happen when you run those adventures. And if you can predict that, then story is no longer emergent.