TSR How Did I Survive AD&D? Fudging and Railroads, Apparently

[pemerton]

I don't know the game, I'm talking about what everyone is posting about how the play the game.

But none posts about how they play RPGs in a way that fits the description you posted:

In the second one, whatever random thing the players decide to do they will find the treasure or the murderer or whatever else?

To reiterate: no one has ever posted that they play the game in this way.

 

[pemerton]

Yes, 2e's Magic Item Creation rules suck. They suck much more than 3e's creation rules. This feels like cherry picking.

Yes, I deliberately chose it to illustrate a point.

You give another illustration of the same point in your post:

If the DM is unfamiliar with the rules, or just inclined to playing a different way, they could say "Well, you'll need to consult someone whose been here before." Does it work? Sure.

If the GM is going to use this way - ie have the players play through a whole different adventure, about the sage etc, in order to learn what is down passage A vs passage B - then why does it matter that the GM has or hasn't made their own decision one way or the other about this. They could wait for the whole sage episode to play out, and then make a decision - one that they are reasonably confident will be interesting at that point of play - at the last possible moment.

 

[guachi]

I read Masks back in the day. It's basically a breadcumb trail of clues that take the party from one location to the next. As @Quickleaf says, linear, rather than a railroad. There is nothing to prevent the PCs giving up and going home, apart from the world will end some time later (and they don't know this).

Have you looked at the current version? It's absolutely massive and includes bizarre but completely true things like the fact that Peru's national drink was created, in its modern form, by a Mormon who moved to Peru from Utah. And you can have that very drink, the pisco sour, in his bar. The amount of strange-but-true things in the adventure make me realize most D&D adventures aren't bizarre enough.

 

[pemerton]

I read Masks back in the day. It's basically a breadcumb trail of clues that take the party from one location to the next. As @Quickleaf says, linear, rather than a railroad. There is nothing to prevent the PCs giving up and going home, apart from the world will end some time later (and they don't know this).

I thought I'd come back to this, as it is prompt to the rest of this post.

There can be a tendency to discuss RPGing as if what matters is the abstract text of the books we use. But the actual event of RPGing is a concrete that happens among human beings.

So the fact that a rulebook or a module doesn't contain express instructions to the GM who is running it to do railroad-y things (like, eg, blocking or twisting players' action declarations that might undo the railroad) doesn't really tell us whether or not it's a railroad.

What is more important, in my view, is to look at what sort of play is likely to result if a group tries to use the rulebook or module, following its instructions in good faith. Because assuming that someone in the group has forked out good money for the module, and that someone in the group has spent their time prepping to run the module, then that is what we can expect the group to do.

And if what the module presents is a sequence or bundle of events that the players are expected to work their way through, with certain outcomes being precursors to subsequent events (otherwise they wouldn't be playing the module), then I think its reasonable to characterise the module as a railroad, by which is meant that it has a structure that will tend to produce a pre-scripted experience in play.

Whether this is a good or bad feature of the module is obviously a matter of taste (see eg @Retreater's post 120 upthread). But I think from the analytical perspective, as opposed to the perspective of preferences, it is a pretty key feature.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

So the fact that a rulebook or a module doesn't contain express instructions to the GM who is running it to do railroad-y things (like, eg, blocking or twisting players' action declarations that might undo the railroad) doesn't really tell us whether or not it's a railroad.

Yes it does. If it has nothing to keep the players on any rails it is not a railroad. The simple absence of anything that isn't part of a central plotline does not indicate the players cannot do anything else. It's just a fact that no amount of planning can cover all eventualities. But a human GM can. That's why you have one, and not a computer. The human GM can create any additional material as and when it is required. This is fundamental to the nature of RPGs, it doesn't need to be written into the adventure, and declining to do so is an abjuration of responsibility.

 

[pemerton]

The human GM can create any additional material as and when it is required.

What does "can" mean here? And how does it relate to "will"?

If it has nothing to keep the players on any rails it is not a railroad.

It is not rules text that keeps players on rails. It is decisions made by actual people at the table.

If the module tells the GM that they should do a certain thing, and the GM doesn't follow that instruction, then that is that. I have used modules that had instructions to me as GM to do a certain sort of railroad-y thing (eg that a certain NPC can't be negotiated with, or will always attack) and I've just ignored it (I'm thinking particularly of the 3E module Bastion of Broken Souls). And the module worked fine with me ignoring that stuff.

Conversely, if the module only works on the premise that the events are played through in a certain fashion, then even if it doesn't have instructions to the GM about making sure the events are played through, the GM - if they have any ingenuity or any social pull within their group - will, assuming that they want to run the module, take appropriate steps to make sure that that happens.

The railroad-y character of a module is not about what instructions it gives. It's about what sort of play is required to make the module work more-or-less as it is presented.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

What does "can" mean here? And how does it relate to "will"?

"can" means "is able to" - the usual meaning of the word, and "will" means "is obliged to as part of the social contract of running an RPG".

It is not rules text that keeps players on rails. It is decisions made by actual people at the table.

If the rules do not require the players to stay on the rails, it is not a railroad. It's a track through the wilderness.

If the module tells the GM that they should do a certain thing, and the GM doesn't follow that instruction, then that is that.

Sure, and then it is a railroad. Masks does not fall into that category.

 

[S'mon]

I thought I'd come back to this, as it is prompt to the rest of this post.

There can be a tendency to discuss RPGing as if what matters is the abstract text of the books we use. But the actual event of RPGing is a concrete that happens among human beings.

So the fact that a rulebook or a module doesn't contain express instructions to the GM who is running it to do railroad-y things (like, eg, blocking or twisting players' action declarations that might undo the railroad) doesn't really tell us whether or not it's a railroad.

What is more important, in my view, is to look at what sort of play is likely to result if a group tries to use the rulebook or module, following its instructions in good faith. Because assuming that someone in the group has forked out good money for the module, and that someone in the group has spent their time prepping to run the module, then that is what we can expect the group to do.

And if what the module presents is a sequence or bundle of events that the players are expected to work their way through, with certain outcomes being precursors to subsequent events (otherwise they wouldn't be playing the module), then I think its reasonable to characterise the module as a railroad, by which is meant that it has a structure that will tend to produce a pre-scripted experience in play.

Whether this is a good or bad feature of the module is obviously a matter of taste (see eg @Retreater's post 120 upthread). But I think from the analytical perspective, as opposed to the perspective of preferences, it is a pretty key feature.

I would rather call these Linear adventures, since Railroad comes from Railroading, the use of GM force to keep players on track, as advocated in eg Dragonlance and many 2e adventures. In a Railroad players can be acting in good faith to keep to the adventure and still find themselves subject to Railroading when they accidentally get off track, by eg killing a necessary NPC or making a sensible decision like going off track to avoid enemies. In a Linear adventure such as most Paizo APs, players who stick to the Path shouldn't find themselves hit by GM force like that.

 

[GrimCo]

Why is railroading always talked about in negative context? Some groups enjoy railroads. Good DM can turn railroad into roller coaster. It twists, turns, goes up and down, but it always stays on track and doesn't allow for deviations.

You can also enforce those rails by social contract. I'm familiar enough with before mentioned Masks, but decent amount of CoC adventures are linear and railroady. If i say i'll run CoC adventure Horror on Orient express and player say they want to play it, then we are playing that adventure. If they decide to exit train at one of the stops and never to return to train, then they are breaching that deal. Can DM wing it? Sure, if he is experienced enough and has talent for improvisation. Personally, i would just end game then and there. We had agreed to play Orient Express, not my home brew game. For whatever reason, you decided to exit from planned adventure, which is totally players right. Maybe they got bored of it. Again, cool. Let's end it and play something else.

 

[TiQuinn]

Yes, I deliberately chose it to illustrate a point.

What point is that? Not all rulesets are strong in all areas? My group never crafted items in 2e for a reason.

You give another illustration of the same point in your post:
If the GM is going to use this way - ie have the players play through a whole different adventure, about the sage etc, in order to learn what is down passage A vs passage B - then why does it matter that the GM has or hasn't made their own decision one way or the other about this. They could wait for the whole sage episode to play out, and then make a decision - one that they are reasonably confident will be interesting at that point of play - at the last possible moment.

You’re asking a hypothetical about a scenario in which I believe the DM is making a mistake in the way they’re running the game.