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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Gothmog" data-source="post: 272538" data-attributes="member: 317">I am not, nor have I ever been a plot-nazi.  Although I do admit starting out as a hard-core dungeon-delver, hack-n-slasher.  I think that railroading is probably the worst thing a DM can do, because it makes the players feel like they have no control over their actions or the outcomes of their adventures.  I think everyone here could see how frustrating that would be.A few years ago I agree to play in the campaign of a friend I had known since high school.  He had DMed a lot before when he was in college, so I thought he should have a good grasp of how to do things, and it would be fun.  Turned out he was the biggest plot-nazi I had ever heard of.  Before every session, he would write a prologue he would read aloud to us about the adventure, and expect us not to use any info we learned there (which is good, but I and most of the other players would have rather learned the info during play, rather than have it scripted to us).  The plots of the adventure were set in stone, so that no matter what manner of travel we used, it always took the same amount of time to reach a destination.  If a player figured out an ingenious way to get at the heart of the problem, he would be told flatly that it didn't work, despite the fact the rules said otherwise (and often with this DM changing the rules during the session to that plans would no work).  Players who displeased the DM were subject to "grudge monsters"- critters who were unleashed on the party, but somehow all managed to attack the offending character.  In fact, there was a standing joke in the game that whenever an NPC would start a long speech, someone would say "Look out, here comes the plot wagon!".  The DM never understood that comment, mostly because he was busy flirting with one of the female players and missed the original reference.  Another time, he had scripted for the king of a country to land the killing blow on a badass invading evil general.  One of the PCs used a poisoned sword of sharpness and managed to land a critical hit potent enough to kill the guy.  Reeling, the DM said we had killed the guy's armor, and now his armor decayed into rust!!!  Regarless of player action, the adventures would end just as he had scripted them.Later we learned that he only ran the campaign so he could wirte books about the characters and adventures.  He even told us he loved the dialogue of our characters in his story!?!?  Because he was a a friend, none of us really wanted to tell him his campiagn was lame, but players missed sessions all the time due to boredom or lack of interest.That game just left a very bad taste in my mouth, and to this day I cannot abide a plot-nazi.  I know plot-nazis come in varying degrees, but I guess I have seen the worst there is.</blockquote>

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