No in that case the thing compelling the characters to act comes from player motivation. Players, in my experience, tend to enjoy this more, as opposed to having characters compelled to act because of something an NPC has done.
I agree. I said earlier that you can have a road from town a to town b infested with high level monsters, with the only safe point being the road, i.e. almost any MMO out there.
The difference is that players can change the world. Heck, if they get to be high enough level they can even move rivers and lakes and flatten the land. Or they can travel to other worlds and find a better home; the choice is up to them.
Eh, maybe you have better players than I, because if I ran a game without some semblance of narrative, my PCs would be the ones going about creating doomsday plans, overthrowing kings, and setting themselves in position of power.
Idle hands, and all...
I say it's coming from the GM for not having a plot.
That's not what I said. The players are just doing good. The Overlord hears about it, and not liking do-gooders and being a proactive sort of guy who read the evil overlord list and knows that it's best to nip these things in the bud sends someone out to shank them before they start messing with him.
So we come back to the "Only the players deserve to have fun." bit. If the players don't engage with the hooks for the cult at all its best to shuffle them off for use later or for re-skinning or whatever. If they do and then choose to wander off, well, at that point why should the cult just stop until they reenter the PC's range again?
The DM having a plot outline and notes on the things that go on in the world independent of the PCs are not twisted machinations. As for it being an extreme, its perfectly consistent with your descriptions of GMing.
GM: The villiage ahead of you seems to be beseiged by goblins.
If the GM is not bullying you into taking the one true path, it's not a railroad. If you can say no and the game goes on without the universe conspiring to make you do what the GM wants, it's not a railroad.
I don't see the distinction. I'm not sure there is one. Why on earth would a plot hook based purely on a static environmental factor be any more inoffensive than one based upon a living, breathing person? And in what way is the mine example a matter of player motivation, whilst a sick villager is a matter of character motivation?
No, you can't do that. Putting an infestation of monsters off the road is a constraint against leaving the road, and by your definitions that's pure railroad.
No, it sounds boring either way.If the DM is making some crazy, fast moving dynamic world, why not play an eccentric character who builds his own impenetrable tower and watches the DM tell us how his setting unfolds? It only sounds boring if the world is more stagnant, in which case the player might be motivated to go out and have his own turn at changing the world.
Yeah, see, responses like that make it unlikely that good discussion will ensue. You know that your play style is idiosynchraitc and unusual, and yet anyone who expresses a desire to do something different is met with incoherent value judgements and arguments.takasi said:I can think of a million reasons why a character would want to adventure and change the world. If you can't, then I guess maybe you should just let the DM do it for you after all.
Sure, why not. They don't exist at all. That'll dovetail nicely with your concept of everything being a railroad.takasi said:Can you define it again? You said it's just one track right? How about if there are only two? Or five? Or ten? How many options have to be on the table to prevent something from being a railroad?
Because as you said earlier there are always at least two tracks: do or do not. So I guess railroads don't exist?
So basically, if this setting is too characterful, the players will either modify it to something less interesting, or move to a suitably boring alternative.
Whoops, sorry.Hey, guys, please don't make accusations of trolling - especially when people are clearly trying to discuss the topic. It distracts people and derails the conversation.
1) redefine commonly used jargon
Sure, why not. They don't exist at all. That'll dovetail nicely with your concept of everything being a railroad.