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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Cadfan" data-source="post: 4780991" data-attributes="member: 40961">The point of a sandbox game is to increase the amount of choices the players get to make. (there are other points, but that's a big one) Its not the only method of accomplishing that goal. Consider getting the players to make major decisions near the end of game sessions, particularly in ways that will irrevocably commit them for the next session.  Then you can run the next session with preparation and direction as much as you like, and they still got to make the initial choice. For example, lets say there's a hook out there about a cult in the city sewers, and a hook about the town watch needing to hire outside consultants for a secret mission.  The players choose at the end of a game session which hook they're going to bite.  Then, either by plot involvement (they mug a cultist press ganger, earning an enemy) or by blatant metagame agreement, they commit to following this plot thread next session.  You get to plan things to the hilt, and they still got to make the initial choice.  Its close to sandboxing; really, its just sandboxing with a metagame agreement on when to make major plot branching decisions in order to facilitate the DM's ability to prepare effectively before session. Another option that's kind of a bad word around here is illusionism.  This is the idea that the players make decisions that seem to branch the plot, and do in a way, but that the branches lead back together behind the scenes.  Done poorly this can result in an obnoxious game environment.  Done well its seamless and can really enrich your ability to prepare for a game session. A poor example is something like, "You reach the end of the sewer tunnel.  Do you go left or right?"  And no matter what the PCs pick, they run into the same preplanned fight with a sewer crocodile. A better example might be the two hooks I mentioned above.  Suppose the secret mission the guard wanted to hire consultants for was to solve a kidnapping.  And it turns out that the kidnapping in some way involves the sewer cult.  Whichever path the players select, they get to discover the existence of the other path, and have new opportunities to engage with it.  It can actually be quite rewarding- the moment when the PCs figure out that the cult they heard about last session was responsible for the kidnapping can be a really great one, particularly if you only hint at it indirectly and they connect the dots themselves. Of course there's another possible problem that kind of gets in the way of either of these.  Is the problem that the players simply don't want to bite the hooks you offer?  It doesn't matter what neat DMing tricks you come up with if that's the case.  If that's the problem, just ask them why they're not biting.  Is there something else they'd rather be doing?  Are they tired of the game?  Was there something about the hooks that made them uninteresting?If you need to, flat out ask them what hooks they'd like to find.  Its ok if the players, in an entirely metagame act, tell you "we're tired of sewers and cults, we want to go fight... I dunno, in a war or a foreign country or something."  Great!  You've got a hook the players actually want!  Next session there's a recruitment poster on the wall for the foreign legion, and off everyone goes.</blockquote>

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