Is Railroading ever a good tactic?

[Storminator]

We've found one situation always requires railroading: having the PCs get captured. It's come up in two different games under two very different and normally very good DMs. It seems the PCs will always rather die trying to fight their way out than allow themselves to be captured.

I think this may be because the players feel that if the DM presents them with that situation, they must also have intended for them to either fight or clever their way out of it before they get captured.

So in our games at least, the only way to have the PCs get captured is to start the session off in the prison cell, assuming they were captured between last session and the current one.

That's what non-lethal damage is all about. Hit your PCs for a dozen points of non-lethal, then let them fight to the death. Once they're unconcious, they're in the cell.

PS

 

[Professor Phobos]

I guess since the name is professor I will just have to agree that your defintion is somehow superior to mine and that I must be wrong in believing that many of us have many different definitions of Railroading. The Professor has the gospel from on high so his opinion must be correct.

It is good to also note that there is no such thing as good railroading. Here many of us have played in games or run games that were good because we were railroaded. All of those stupid Slave Lords modules suck. The whole silly issue of them being classics and us enjoying them.....yep. It is all a lie. No one really like those modules. Railroading all the way and we know that there is no good railroading.

Nice to know we have such an authority figure as yourself Professor. I might have believed my own personal experiences had you not come along and shown me how wrong I have been all of these years. Thanks.

:\

Glad you understand!

More seriously, it just strikes me as deeply useless to say there are different kinds of railroading. If it isn't a problem- it really isn't railroading, now is it?
If the players are accepting of a GM's prodding in a certain linear direction as in much of Beyond the Mountains of Madness, then they aren't being *forced* anywhere. Railroading implies imposition- it implies an arbitrary decision forced on the players against their will.

If they're cool with it, then they aren't being railroaded. Because they choose to accept whatever limited range of options they're given; explore the arctic, be slaves, whatever.

Calling normal GM jobs (starting adventures, creating storylines, etc) "railroading" seems to make the term completely meaningless.

 

[Eosin the Red]

But by your defintion a module can never railroad, only the DM can and we know that is not true or all those reviewers who say that module X has too much railroading are all wrong.

I look at it as a continuum (I learned something in nursing school) of restrictions from what is not just acceptible but necessary at the good end to the point where you are the DMs favorite characters sword caddy. ----->

Player: "I will try to foil the spell casting of the lich with my net since I cannot hurt him."

DM: "Don't worry about it. Daegoth the Great kills him with a power attacked charge this round, right before you were to be slain."

There is also bad and OMG bad kind of railroading so we can make distinctions within the class. Slave Lords is bad. Vecna Lives is very bad. The Witchfire Trilogy is only minorly annoying in its railroading.

 

[pawsplay]

My Star Wars group has gone from level 1 to 5... sitting in my notes are some stats for an evil Force-user, who has yet to make an appearance. Originally, the encounter was supposed to spark one character's future as a Jedi, but the characters have strenuously resisted rumors in order to further their strict orders, so that PC is well on his way to becoming an ace pilot and officer instead. I suppose I could have inserted the character as an obstacle in one of their missions, but why force the fit? He'll be around when I need him.

 

[Professor Phobos]

But by your defintion a module can never railroad, only the DM can and we know that is not true or all those reviewers who say that module X has too much railroading are all wrong.

To a certain degree, yes, they are- no module can really railroad, since railroading is something that can only happen in-play.

But some adventures are written in such a poor way to perhaps *require* it.

 

[Chimera]

Geez, I feel like pulling out the Vizzini speach regarding what some of you consider railroading.

I once played with a GM who was nothing but railroad.

We had a special boat that could go 60mph. But he would "intercept" us with normal galleys. I tried to explain the physics of that one, how we could avoid any normal boat if we chose to, but he insisted that we had to have these encounters. Got nothing special out of them, so we were never sure why we HAD to have those encounters.

We got sick of his railroading us into a plot we had no interest in, so we decided to leave the town, which was a port on the edge of a desert. We try to hire a ship. No one will take us. We offer many times the going rate. No takers. We try to buy a ship, even for much more than it is worth. No takers. We try to gear up to cross the desert, but are warned off doing that.

So we resolve to steal a ship. We attack at night with a really good plan. Every last crew member on the ship is on the deck, fully armed, on round 2. Longboats full of town guards are crossing the harbor and boarding the ship in a single round.

Ah, but we soon discover that he will NOT kill us! We're all at low single-digit hitpoints and suddenly no one can hit us.

Then the ship somehow catches fire. Over about 5-6 rounds, it burns to the waterline, mysteriously doing so without injury to any of us or the people we're fighting.

"The ship is going to sink. What do you do?"

"WE DROWN!!!" (wads of character sheets rain down on GM)

This same guy once argued with a player during a combat, insisting that the player's dwarf "must" (somehow) be up on a ledge that he couldn't have climbed, fighting the wizard there. They were screaming at each other, moving the character's mini back and forth between where the GM wanted him to be, and where the character walked into the cavern and attacked the closest enemies.

You just ain't never been railroaded until your GM insists that your character is doing something that neither you nor your character would ever even remotely consider doing. Or refuses to allow you to do the simplest of tasks because they would interfere with the story he has created.

 

[The_Gneech]

Chimera: Ouch. I've been there.

-The Gneech

 

[Eosin the Red]

You just ain't never been railroaded until your GM insists that your character is doing something that neither you nor your character would ever even remotely consider doing. Or refuses to allow you to do the simplest of tasks because they would interfere with the story he has created.

I had a DM (I refuse to play when he runs now days) but I think he and this DM went to the same school of DMing. You are 4th level fighting a 12 levels uber tweaked character and suddenly he can't hit you anymore.

I got into the habit of refusing to tell him how many hit points I had so that he could see by my parade of characters just how overpowered his encounter were.

He once killed my Paladin 5th level paladin in a single round because I gave a speach and demanded an opposed diplomacy roll. His 18th level Paladin attacked me from the rear and did enough to bring me to -42 HP with one hit.

 

[MerricB]

I just killed a plotline of my non-railroading DM.

We were meant to capture an NPC. She was meant to escape and lead us into a dungeon.

I walked up to her and hit her. Hmm - critical hit. Hmm... maximum damage. Crumpled up unconscious NPC.

Goodbye rest of adventure. My DM is currently thinking up other ways of getting us into the dungeon.

Cheers!

 

[milotha]

I once played with a GM who was nothing but railroad.

You just ain't never been railroaded until your GM insists that your character is doing something that neither you nor your character would ever even remotely consider doing. Or refuses to allow you to do the simplest of tasks because they would interfere with the story he has created.

Been there. Done that. Moved on from that. I know how frustratring that can get. I was very happy the day the campaign dissolved, and I found a better GM to play under.

At least your 10th character wasn't arrested, imprisoned, and executed for a crime you didn't commit without you or any of the other PCs getting to do anything. Not even a dice roll. Now that's fun- NOT!