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<blockquote data-quote="Nevvur" data-source="post: 7417133" data-attributes="member: 6783882">It's not railroading, at least not yet. I'm not sure how much or what kind of preparation you've put into the pursuit, but there are clearly going to be several steps between discovering the item is missing and catching the culprit. It's not a railroad if the players have to go from point A to B to C. It's a railroad if the only way to get there is on your train.For example, one of the first things they'll need to determine is where the thief went. If there's only one source in the entire world that has this information, and there's only one method of extracting the information from said source, you're probably building a railroad. Advice I commonly see shared on this topic is some &quot;rule of 3&quot; thing. Create three viable ways to move the plot forward at each plot point. So maybe a local fence knows where the thief went, maybe a witness saw his face, and maybe there's a way to track the item or the thief through magic. I don't always follow this principle myself. Usually I'll come up with one, maybe two methods, but I also try to keep an open mind about the viability of player ideas I never considered, even if they aren't as sensible or straightforward as the solutions I imagined they would readily arrive at.edit: most importantly, if the players come up with a solution that blows my well laid plans to smithereens, but is perfectly clever and reasonable, I need to be prepared to throw all my preparation out the door. Refusal to do so is the biggest and baddest manifestation of railroading IMO.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Nevvur, post: 7417133, member: 6783882"] It's not railroading, at least not yet. I'm not sure how much or what kind of preparation you've put into the pursuit, but there are clearly going to be several steps between discovering the item is missing and catching the culprit. It's not a railroad if the players have to go from point A to B to C. It's a railroad if the only way to get there is on your train. For example, one of the first things they'll need to determine is where the thief went. If there's only one source in the entire world that has this information, and there's only one method of extracting the information from said source, you're probably building a railroad. Advice I commonly see shared on this topic is some "rule of 3" thing. Create three viable ways to move the plot forward at each plot point. So maybe a local fence knows where the thief went, maybe a witness saw his face, and maybe there's a way to track the item or the thief through magic. I don't always follow this principle myself. Usually I'll come up with one, maybe two methods, but I also try to keep an open mind about the viability of player ideas I never considered, even if they aren't as sensible or straightforward as the solutions I imagined they would readily arrive at. edit: most importantly, if the players come up with a solution that blows my well laid plans to smithereens, but is perfectly clever and reasonable, I need to be prepared to throw all my preparation out the door. Refusal to do so is the biggest and baddest manifestation of railroading IMO. [/QUOTE]

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