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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Lackhand" data-source="post: 4104708" data-attributes="member: 36160">Railroading: When the DM forces you to play your character "right". This can be the plot forcing itself forward without actual player interaction necessary; being beset on all sides by failure with one, ridiculously forced, avenue towards success, or similar bits of DM wankery. It's usually bad; sparingly, it's not intolerable, but it usually ends up with the players feeling useless. That's bad.Basically, you get to plot out the NPCs and their situations, and the initial hook. You get to dictate to the players "Come up with a reason to stick together, or I will come up with one for you, and you will resent it."Everything after that is in their hands, and you need to react to it. And since you have an unlimited number of unlimited-potency NPCs and situations, you need to not be a dick while reacting to their actions.Separately, if you throw gods and artifacts at them at level 1, you not only have nowhere to scale up to, but you risk god-fatigue, where the whole thing becomes hard to sustain and farcical.You might be able to pull it off, but it's really hard to do enjoyably, so you might want to reconsider.Sure! Level every 3 sessions. No, seriously. DM Fiat all the way, and never look back. It's what I use <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" />Indeed. But "Here is the secret at level one BWAH HAH HAH DOOM!" is a bit straining for players. The problem isn't structure, the problem is rails -- and since your players know about them and have said "okay", that's not too bad a problem. But communication is key, and if people look like they're not having fun, a softer touch may be necessary.4 is a surprisingly big number, and depending on how bitter the pill is to swallow, may cause player resentment.It's very possible, but the only way to do it is to be responsive. You can do some work by planning your campaign as a tree of possibilities -- you know your friends, and you know which junction points are likely to have the biggest swings and which way they're likely to choose, so you can design for that to be the case.As soon as you find the need to get the plot "back on track" (which isn't the same as getting the players back on track!), you've removed their actual agency.Consequence is easy, and when the players actually choose consequences, every rat bastard DM everywhere lights up like a christmas tree.Yeah, but you're throwing artifacts at them to force the plot that you want them to follow, and you're starting the campaign with this. It's not bad in and of itself, but it correlates strongly with badness. JRR Tolkien was a nifty writer, but a lousy DM.</blockquote>

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