Do you like plots?

[The Shaman]

The DM is there to provide the setting. To provide the basic starting scenario for the players. It's up to the players to run with it. The story is what happens to the pc's in the setting.

This might be a finer distinction than it seems, and some of us might be talking past each other. An orc-invasion scenario has been mentioned. I've used similar. What I would object to is a game in which the pc's are taken from scene to scene in a pre-planned sequence ultimately discovering the invasion, defeating the minions, and conquering the BBEG at the end. This is the kind of game involving railroading to keep the characters on track, miraculous escapes by the BBEG because he isn't supposed to die yet, and fudging to make sure the players don't fail and ruin the DM's story. In other words, it doesn't matter what the players do, good or bad, because the DM has his story to tell.

What I don't object to is a dynamic setting in which things are happening independent of the player characters and the pc's can choose how and when they involve themselves in the setting. The players find out about the orc invasion. Do they try to stop it? Try to join it? Get the f outta Dodge? If they do try to stop it, do they roust the local militia and meet it head to head? Do they engage in spying and sabotage? Do they kick the orcs' door down, kill them, and take their stuff? All those answers are provided by the players and not the DM. The DM, of course assigns consequences to the players' actions. If the players say screw it, and get out of town. Well, that orc army takes over. Or maybe some other heroes take care of it and get the kudos the pc's should have gotten.

In the end, the "story" is reflective, post hoc, what the pc's did, not what the DM decided would happen ahead of time.

Well-said, and spoken like a true grognard.

Some gamers like to pretend 2e never happened, for reasons relating to sourcebooks or players options - I like to pretend 2e never happened because of the idea that a GM is a "storyteller." The GM is not the writer, or the director - s/he's the stage manager. Set up the scenery, place the props, get the extras on their marks, and get the hell out of the actors'/players' way.

 

[EricNoah]

I like some plot in my game; I like it when NPCs occasionally trick us or lead us astray; or when they show up unexpectedly later. But I prefer it to be somewhat simple -- not too many twists, not too many characters to remember. Particularly if we're only playing once a month.

 

[Mouseferatu]

Maybe we are talking around each other. I don't see what I said as exclusive of the two posts that followed.

One of the best experiences for me, as a DM, is to see the look of dawning comprehension of the players' faces when they suddenly put the last clue in place, and realize what's truly been happening "behind the scenes" for the past 8 games. Or when they realize that the "throwaway" encounter and conversation they had with the old woman in game 1 actually provided the vital clue for successfully defeating the main villains in game 26.

Believe me, when I say I like to provide story, I don't mean leading the PCs around by the nose, scene to scene. I've accidentally done that, and had it done to me, and it sucks in both directions. What I mean is, I know the overall events that are taking place, and I always design next week's adventure with that story in mind. But it's also designed to account for what the PCs did last week, where they want to go, and what they want to accomplish.

Again, I can only reiterated, complex story and character-driven campaigns are not mutually exclusive.

 

[Ourph]

I've noticed that a lot of people--not necessarily referring only to people in this thread--seem to equate "The campaign involves a long-running story" with "DM railroading and the inability for the characters to make any choices or have an impact."

I submit from personal experience, on both sides of the screen, that this is only true with a poor DM. (Or at least one who's not good at the balancing act.) It is, however, entirely possible to have a long, complex, intricate story that runs the entire length of a campaign, in which the PCs are very much the driving force, and player choice is meaningful.

You just have to have a DM willing to adapt the story accordingly, and players who are willing to create characters that fit within certain parameters. It only works if everyone involved wants it to work.

Maybe "railroading" isn't the correct term for what others are trying to say. I think the overall statement is simply that 100% player autonomy is mutually exclusive with a DM defined metaplot. You can certainly have varying degrees of player autonomy which are less than 100% in such a campaign, but the players are always giving up some options (i.e. - metagaming some choices) in order to cooperate with the DM's vision of the campaign. If they're not, then the DM isn't running a "pre-determined" plot, he's winging his way through his own "scenery" which has been set up in advance, which isn't the same as "plot".

Personally, I have seen only one campaign run where there was 100% player autonomy. The DM was highly experienced and very very comfortable winging encounters, description and adventures. I really enjoyed that game. I've seen LOTS of campaigns where player autonomy was significantly less than 100% and quite a few (amongst them, my own) where player autonomy approaches 100% (let's call it 90%+). I find that as the amount of player autonomy drops, so does my enjoyment as both a player and a DM.

So yes, it is possible to have a DM conceived plot that is driven by player choices, but that doesn't necessarily mean there's no railroading or that the players have significant amounts of autonomy. It is actually more likely that in those situations the players and DM have either an acknowledged or unspoken agreement to cooperate in certain ways to make the game move forward. If the players are voluntarily choosing only the options which support the DM's predetermined plot then they are still giving up autonomy; it's just covert rather than overt (sometimes referred to as "illusionism" in RPG theory-speak).

 

[Mouseferatu]

Ourph,

Fair points. I agree; for a story-based campaign to work, the players have to want a story-based campaign. They are, indeed, giving up some options.

Then again, I remove some options in most of my campaigns whether or not they're story-based. I don't tend to allow evil PCs, I insist that the PCs have at least roughly compatible goals, and that sort of thing. Once you've one that far, there's actually not much further to go to have a group perfectly suited for a particular tale.

Frankly--and here's where I'm sure I'm going to run into further disagreement --I don't like 100% player autonomy, as a DM or a player. Don't get me wrong, I hate railroading with a bloody passion. At the same time, however, I've found that in most games where the DM doesn't have at least some small sense of where things are going, play tends to bog down very quickly.

I guess I'm most comfortable with, say, roughly 80% player autonomy. Free will and meaningful choices, but not completely aimless.

 

[rogueattorney]

Personally, I have seen only one campaign run where there was 100% player autonomy. The DM was highly experienced and very very comfortable winging encounters, description and adventures. I really enjoyed that game. I've seen LOTS of campaigns where player autonomy was significantly less than 100% and quite a few (amongst them, my own) where player autonomy approaches 100% (let's call it 90%+). I find that as the amount of player autonomy drops, so does my enjoyment as both a player and a DM

I personally think that player autonomy should begin quite low and then exapand as the campaign progresses. At the very beginning, the player won't have much control over anything other than his own character (class, race, alignment, etc. - and even some of these will be restricted for setting purposes). Where he is and what he's doing at the very start of the adventure will be DM determined. From there, player autonomy expands and expands at an exponential rate. In my ideal campaign, one that I've only really reached once in 20+ years of gaming, as players gain more and more power and influence in the campaign world, they will essentially end up being co-DM, with control over large swaths of the campaign. (How else would you describe it when the characters control armies and kingdoms, cast spells like Wish and Alter Reality, and have essentially become demi-gods?)

Someone over at Dragonsfoot (and I apologize for not remember who, if you're reading) analogized it to the DM being the taxi driver instead of the railroad conductor. Everyone starts at the train station, but the players in the taxi at least get to determine where they want to go.

R.A.

 

[Mouseferatu]

Something else worth mentioning, though I'm giving away some Deep Dark DMing Secrets here...

*braces for impact*

Free will isn't as important as the illusion of free will.

The reason most people hate railroading, IME, is that they hate feeling like they can't control their own character. So long as they get to make their choices, and feel those choices are meaningful, they're happy.

It doesn't matter if those choices are actually meaningful. After all, if the DM presents the players with a situation where the options are A, B, and C, and the players choose B, they're never going to see A and C. It doesn't matter, then, if A and C ultimately lead to the same place as B. Nobody but the DM's ever going to know.

Don't get me wrong. This doesn't work all the time. Done too frequently, or too ham-handedly, it becomes obvious. When exercised subtly and infrequently, however, it's a really good way of keeping things going in a certain general direction without being ugly about it.

 

[Harmon]

We have a GM that likes the deep plots, but he lacks the Players that are capable of figuring them out.

Our GM likes the deep plots that lasts for years, back ground characters that you meet once in a while and discover that they are the reason everything has happened.

I keep notes, lots of notes, but I can't keep pace, the story gets lost because it started three years ago, while we are playing three other campaigns and I am GM for my own.

Right now our campaign is I fear spinning out of control with lots of very powerful villians that I want to handle but the plots just keep coming and I can't keep pace.

Am I lost? Ya. Am I enjoying his campaign? A thousand times true. Why? Because in the end he will tie it all together and we will see it. He's a great GM. He likes plots, we suck at figuring them out, he knows that and we keep coming back to the table.

 

[TerraDave]

Are we talking plot, metaplot (to ref another thread) or backstory...

PCs make the plot, the DM the metaplot* and each side contributes to backstory, though the DM probably adds more.

Free Will: read what the Mouse said. But tactical choice and visible consequances are good things, and I have had more then a few cases where I enjoyed it when the PCs went against the grain of what I had thought they should do

Complexity: Psion is right, to much and a lot will be lost. That may be ok, but don't expect everyone to appreciate it or get it.

Arc: long running connections are nice, but it is also good to have things that are resolved . Leave everything open, and then someone moves to take a new job and the campaign stops...

All this aside, ya, in practice I come up with some pretty convaluted stuff. But I have learned to tolerate my players not getting all of it, and--as I just noted in the other thread--they have learned to take notes.

(edit)*by this deffinition of metaplot

 

[WayneLigon]

As a Player (not a DM), how much plot do you like in a D&D game?

Are you satisfied with raiding dungeons without thought as to any behind-the-scenes reasons for going in?

Are you excited by deep, convoluted plots for everything and everyone?

I don't think everything needs to be tied up into one huge metaplot, but there has to be some plot for there to be a RPG at all instead of a minis skirmish. That might be what your players want and find to be fun, though.