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ShortQuests -- individual adventure modules! An all-new collection of digest-sized D&D adventures designed to plug in to your game.

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Bastoche" data-source="post: 2755165" data-attributes="member: 306">This is exactly NOT open gaming. The DM should not encourage PCs to "take the right path" in open gaming via in-game "clues". He should make everything the players choose to be (or become) the right path. If it seems logical to the PC (4 people on average) and not to the DM (1 person), I can't imagine it being SO off track as to be a dead end. What I understand here is that you are suggesting that "good" players should "find" the plot hook naturally. It just don't happen if you let them be totally "free". You either have to railroad them on the right path to a degree or be railroaded, as the DM, by their ideas.That's exactly the problem in our game. We miss clues and misinterpert information. It's not the player's fault. Neither is it entirely the DM's in fact it's both. The real problem is that the DM can't put himself in his players shoes. Clues that seems obvious to him may not seem obvious to the players. The DM has further insight on "the great scheme of things" and that's what makes him unable to judge what is "poor logic" and what is not. And that's because D&D feature no clear mechanics for such tasks resolution. That's the reason why true "open gaming" needs a completely different approach than "conventionnal" play. For an example, read my previous post in response to barsoomcore concerning the family feud.1) your opinion is biased by the fact that the DM has "a thing in mind" for the players. Making the players choices "void" by putting "your story" in their face no matter what they choose. You assume there has to be a very specific goal from the start (becoming king or acquiring treasure or finding long lost brother, etc). The other thing is that the "choice" I'm talking about is not "course of action" but rather choice of direction. I refer again to my family feud example.2) Yes and no. If the players  really do say what you suggest they will, then it implies such players do not want open gaming. But if they do want open gaming, such train of thought will never ever crosses their mind! The motivation is not the goal, it's making the choice itself. The fun doesn't emerge from accomplishment itself but by making the choices that leads to accomplishment.3) Is it any more believable than the fact that all bad guys they encounter in "convential" play "just" happen to be the same CR as the players? Everything they choose in such instance is not automatic success. There's still rolls to be made and strategy to make. It's just the all the non-roll mechanics are not an excuse to have combat of the right challenge rating to reach the goal but rather an end in itself. And it's certainly NOT a charmed life because there never is an "obvious" path. Every paths are equally dark and equally leads to crashing conscequences. My family or the right path? When you have to choose between two equally important goals, etc. Instead of "find the solution the DM has hidden in his game world".</blockquote>

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