Letting the Players Run the Campaign -- Without Them Knowing It?

[airwalkrr]

I have often encountered situations where players take in a bunch of clues and draw some conclusion from it. Sometimes, I sit back in my DM chair and chuckle knowing I've successfully led them astray. But sometimes they pick up on things that I hadn't noticed and their conclusion actually seems more dramatic or simply more logical (not that D&D needs to be logical mind you) than the one I had come up with. Occassionally, I have gone home after a session and cogitated my plan based on the conclusions the PCs made. And more occassionally I have actually incorporated some of the PCs' speculation into my campaign; and they never discovered what I was up to. They thought that was my plan all along and they had simply figured my plan out.

What if this kind of situation was the paradigm for an entire campaign? A DM could make things up on the fly and let the players draw their own conclusions. The DM would simply pick and choose the conclusions that seem most reasonable and let the players discover it. It would probably make for quite an empowering campaign as at least some of the PCs would always be right. It would also take a little heat off the DM. Why is there a necromancer hunting around in this dungeon? Is it related to the tome the PCs found in the city? He doesn't have to answer these questions. He can just design cool and challenging encounters and let the PCs figure it out. If the players knew the DM was doing this, then the campaign might not seem as fun. But I've gotten pretty good at keeping my "DM face" and making the players believed I am prepared even when I am not over the years. I think this kind of campaign might be kind of fun to run. What do you think?

 

[theredrobedwizard]

This is exactly what I've been doing since I started DMing all those years ago.

Quite a lot of fun.

-TRRW

 

[shilsen]

I don't think that works as the paradigm for the entire campaign. It's fine to have such elements in the game, and personally I think it's a very good thing, for precisely the reasons you mention. But there should also be things in the game that have a rationale which the players/PCs have to discover, rather than it necessarily fitting one of the conclusions they come up with.

To expand a little on the above, the kind of campaign you describe would make it difficult to have some of the moments I really adore as a DM, which is a moment when the PCs and players get to go, "OMFG! We're so screwed! I never saw that coming! And now that it's arrived, it all makes complete sense."

In short, there needs to be some material in the campaign which falls beyond the reach of the PCs' speculations, IMNSHO. But, that being said, making substantial use of the approach you describe above is just fine with me.

 

[I'm A Banana]

What if this kind of situation was the paradigm for an entire campaign? A DM could make things up on the fly and let the players draw their own conclusions. The DM would simply pick and choose the conclusions that seem most reasonable and let the players discover it. It would probably make for quite an empowering campaign as at least some of the PCs would always be right. It would also take a little heat off the DM. Why is there a necromancer hunting around in this dungeon? Is it related to the tome the PCs found in the city? He doesn't have to answer these questions. He can just design cool and challenging encounters and let the PCs figure it out. If the players knew the DM was doing this, then the campaign might not seem as fun. But I've gotten pretty good at keeping my "DM face" and making the players believed I am prepared even when I am not over the years. I think this kind of campaign might be kind of fun to run. What do you think?

Ever since I went into "minimal adventure design mode," this has been my preferred method. It's collaborative storytelling at it's finest, really, and takes a bit of a load off of the DM.

It does require the right set of players, though. Not every group will speculate, some want to just be lead into the next thing...

 

[Lost-Johnny]

I have incorporated this element into my games as long as I have been running, but I tend to do the reverse even more. My players have always been so danged clever that somebody always figured every next step ahead of time. So I started reverse engineering my plots to shock and suprise even the bored intellects. Of course sometimes they have to get it right.

 

[EricNoah]

I fear I would not have the requisite with-it-ness to pull this off successfully.

 

[Greg K]

Like others, I have been utilizing the technique for a while. I don't use it exclusively, but it does see its fair share of use.

 

[Wraith Form]

I fear I would not have the requisite with-it-ness to pull this off successfully.

I'm feelin' you, EN.

 

[Olgar Shiverstone]

Yeah, this technique works really well and talkes a load of planning off of the DM.

Just throw out a collection of random facts, rumors, characters, and hooks. The players will then come up with a theory to connect it all that will likely be more entertaining than anything I could have thought of ... and the campaign goes off in that direction.

It's even better when they come up with a great idea, then reject it ... 'cause you can select that theory to be true, and later they smack themselves 'cause they thought of the solution and threw it out!

 

[Wik]

Count me in as one of those who have done this.

One thing I like but hate at the same time is when I have a nice little plan come up, and I've figured out the obvious course of action the PCs will take. When the players come to that little part of my game, they start debating what should they do. One of the players will bring up the idea of doing what I had figured they would do, until one (or more!) of the other players will say something - entirely relevant to the campaign world - that would make my plan illogical.

For example, the players had a lot of money in an old Dark Sun game, and since most of them were warrior types, I had figured they would head to the city-state of Tyr to get iron weapons. I had a bunch of plans for when they got there involving renegade templars (this was right after Tyr became independant), unscrupulous traders, elven rogues, and (of course) the Veiled Alliance. All was going to plan... the PCs knew they wanted iron weapons, but the question was, where to go?

"Hey! Let's go to Tyr! They have iron weapons!" I nod sagely, doing my best to look uninterested.

"That's stupid." What!? "Remember that Tyr's in a civil war right now, and they're afraid of Urik. Any iron weapons they'd have would have been requisitioned by the army - if they even had the manpower to work the mines."

And then I'm thinking "oh, crap, he's right."

They're both good and moments, you know? Bad because they've completely ruined your plans, but good because it shows that your Players are paying attention to more than just the monster of the week that they just killed.