A DM who spends a session or two or three or six or whatever getting to know the players and the characters should have a pretty good idea of his audience -- he should know what is likely to be a climactic situation, and can steer the game in that direction with the understanding that the players want to come along for the ride.
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Gameplay drives a basic narrative conflict toward resolution almost automatically. To "tell a good story" without limiting player freedom isn't that difficult to do.
I agree with this, but I think that the way you have expressed it is potentially ambiguous, which has exposed you to (what I think are unjust) accusations of railroading.
In particular, I think your reference to "steering the game in a particular direction" is what is causing (what I take to be a) misunderstanding.
Storytelling focus or an act structure don't necessarily lead to one-option-only railroads.
Who is taking away the ability of players to make up their own minds? All you are doing with the structure is making an agreement of sorts. Burin's player telling you he's the last of his clan is asking you as a DM to include that somehow, and telling you as a DM that he is going to jump into a situation that involves that, willingly.
If the player doesn't want to do that, then it will be an interesting choice.
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Either way, we have conflict and resolution. I see it as my job as DM to introduce the former, and move on from the latter.
The same problem comes up without a narrative focus, though.
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The narrative focus at least sticks the hooks right in the character, so that, choose fight or choose flight, something is at least revealed about that character's goals and ideas.
This is all good stuff, and describes how I GM my game. This is what The Forge calls
narrativism. (More exactly, it's one pretty straightforward way to run a narrativist game using a mainstream system.)
The key, as you note, is that the GM's job is to
introduce conflict - this is scene framing. The GM determines what the ingame situation is. The fact that you, as GM, know what the players care about and want to do via the medium of their PCs - because they've told you, both via their character build and by express communication - means that in setting up the situation, you've tried to make sure it succeeds at the metagame level, ie, that the players care about it.
As
Ron Edwards puts it, you need to make sure "that your situations in the S[hared] I[maginary] S[pace] are worth anyone's time." If they're not, then your game will fizzle, not because it's a railroad, but because it's boring.
Players make up their own minds and draw their own conclusions, figure out their own climaxes, and control their own characters, but the DM works with their personal hopes and dreams as unique individuals to do something that they want to do, rather than making a trap that closes in on them regardless of their choices.
Story structure isn't about removing choice, it's about telegraphing that choice well in advance (the Introduction) so that the DM can then plan with confidence, knowing that Burin, somehow, will get involved with these giants, since it connects to his goals as a character.
The idea that "story" automagically creates a choiceless railroad where the DM basically tells his own story at the players is wildly inaccurate.
This is a good summary. The player builds a hook into his/her PC. The GM picks up on that hook by framing an appropriate scene (this is where the bit about it "being worth anyone's time" becomes relevant - as you say, communication between players and GM helps the GM do this with confidence). Assuming that the scene
is worth anyone's time, the player engages that scene via his/her PC. The GM then adjudicates that play, via the action resolution mechanics. The PC choices, as mediated via mechanics and GM's adjudication of those mechanics, produces a climax. The climax has not been chosen or predetermined by the GM.
You can't plan for every contingency, so you direct the action by motivating the characters.
Once the characters are driving the action themselves, you can predict where they will tend toward with a startling degree of accuracy, without worrying in the slightest about the chance that they won't take the bait.
I think that these passages - and especially "directing the action" or "predicting where they will tend toward" - are ambiguous in the same way as "steering the game in a particular direction". By framing a scene that engages the PCs and the players, you have established the conflict. By your own account, however, it is now up to the players to decide (via their play of their PCs, plus the vagaries of the game's action resolution mechanics) how the conflict is resolved.
In a mainstream game like D&D, I think there is one particularly big challenge in running the sort of game you're describing (or that I think you're describing - you're one of the few other GMs I've seen on these boards actually talk about running a game in a way that I can recognise as fitting with my own approach, and I hope I haven't too readily assimilated your approach to my approach!)
The challenge is - How does one transition between scenes? Or, to put it another way, When the climax of one scene has resolved, how does the GM set up the next scene? The 4e DMG alludes to this issue with its reference to glossing over the small stuff, but this (i) draws the derision of a whole lot of people who are more interested in an exploratory style of play, and (ii) doesn't really tell those who want to play narrativist how to achieve that glossing without just disregarding the game's mechanics, and (iii) reopens the door to railroading - because, of course, in practice it will be the GM who decides what is glossed and what isn't.
There are particular, identifiable, elements of the action resolution mechanics of mainstream RPGs, like D&D, that I believe can make scene transition tricky. Here are three, and I imagine there are probably others.
First, there are mechanical carryovers from scene to scene
which the players have the mechanical resources to deal with outside the framework of the scenes themselves - eg healing, equipment collection/repair/purchase, resting to regain spells, etc. (Games more explicitly designed for narrativist play will tend to abstract more of this stuff away, and/or make it harder to engage in outside the context of the story-driving scenes.)
Second, there are overland travel rules which tend to emphasise travel speeds, maps, "getting lost" checks, etc, all of which encourage the players to engage in the minutiae of travel as part of play, although not itself a source of drama, rather than treating non-dramatic travel as something to be handled via scene-transition. (4e is confused about this - it suggests using skill challenges to handle a lot of this stuff, which is better suited to a scene-framing/climax driven style of play, but at the same time hands out race options (eg the elf feat in the PHB) or class options (eg the cavalier ability in Essentials) that are mechanically designed for map-style travel rather than skill challenge-style travel).
Third, classic D&D play handles finding threat (eg traps, ambushes etc) and gaining rewards (eg treasure in a dungeon) in a fashion that encourages players to treat it as a part of play more-or-less independent of engaging a climactic scene. This is where play can get bogged down in Perception checks, 10'-poles etc. (Again, in 4e the logical way to handle this sort of stuff is to make ambushes consequences of failed checks in travel skill challenges, but as with travel in general the game is ambivalent in the way it presents this stuff.)
I think a lot of accusations of railroading in relation to situation-driven narrativist play using a mainstream ruleset like D&D come from concerns about how the GM is handling these elements of play, and whether or not the GM, by using various workarounds to keep the game moving from scene to scene and not bogged down in the minutiae of inventory management and square-by-square searches, is in fact exercising control over the plot.
In practice, the technique I use is (mostly informal or implicit) consensus between players and GM. For example, when the players start having their PCs search, and I know there is nothing of interest for them to find, I will tell them as much and forestall more and more exacting searching. Or, remembering the maxim of "framing scenes that are worth anyone's time", if I hadn't planned for there to be anything interesting but the players seem quite invested in finding something interesting, then I will introduce something interesting, thereby framing a new (investigation-focused) scene. (Here is an
actual play example of this from a session I GMed earlier this year.)
I also use skill challenges to handle travel and the availability of extended rest opportunities, in effect making these elements of little "mini-scenes" rather than leaving them to non-dramatically-governed bit-by-bit action resolution.
And sometimes I just use somewhat hard scene-framing - for example, in the only "shopping expedition" in my campaign to date, I just asked all the players "OK, have you got all your stuff you wanted to get" and when they all had, I cut to the meeting with the town Baron, which was the next scene that I was ready to run that I thought had a chance of being worth anyone's time.
If I know Bill's dwarf is the last surviving member of his clan after a giant war because Bill told me so, how is adding an element of narrative to the game by saying something like "The giants that eliminated your clan are rampaging in the mountains to the north!" at all repetitive? It guides the player, it guides the character, and it provides an instant narrative arc
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I don't understand how your example is dramatically different from the ones above, except that in your example, the temple was part of the world and it didn't matter who the characters were, and in my example, I use character motivations to drive character arcs.
I don't really see how one is objectively better or worse than the other.
I would go further than your last sentence - if you want to run a game in which actual play produces something like a story in the traditional sense, the sort of approach you describe is probably objectively better. (I observe disinterestedly!)
I don't often find much reason to refer to Ron Spencer's opinions, but in this case, he made a useful observation I have to agree with entirely. This is the "impossible thing before breakfast." Either the player's control is illusory, or the outcome of the situation cannot be what you have stated based on the starting conditions.
But Ron Edwards doesn't think that player control is incompatible with running a game that will produce a story. The tag-line for narrativist play, after all, is "story now".
The key is to separate situational from plot authority, which I think KM is doing in his posts in this thread. The GM sets up the situation. The player engages it, via his/her PC. The situation is then resolved via the action resolution mechanics, as deployed by the player (and the GM, for NPCs) and adjudicated by the GM. The GM then sets up the next scene that follows in an interesting fashion from that resolution (as per KM's example of the Grand Illusionist situation resulting in some fashion or other from the Rampaging Giants situation).
The player's control here isn't illusory. But it's not total. The nature of playing a game with a GM is that some elements of the gameworld that the player has to engage with via his/her PC will not be chosen by the player.
But I don't see any significant functional difference between setting up the Grand Illusionist in a way that follows from, riffs on or alludes to the climax with the Rampaging Giants (whatever that climax happened to be) and the GM of an exploration-oriented sandbox deciding that various game elements will interact with the PCs in various ways. In both approaches, the GM is controlling the backstory (except for local parts of the backstory that the players set up as part of building their PCs) and exercising situational authority.
The difference in the sort of game that KM is describing (at least as I understand it) is (i) the considerations that the GM draws on in framing the scene, and (ii) the degree to which the players are expected to do the work of seeking out their own scenes. For every sandboxing cry of "Don't railroad me by framing scenes!" the narrativist can retort "Don't railroad me by making me engage with a gameworld that reflects your interests rather than my interests!" Which is to say, the issue here isn't about railroading, but about preferences for play - do the players prefer exploration (if so, have the GM build a world and let the players wander their PCs around it, finding their own scenes) or do the players prefer thematic engagement (if so, have the GM frame scenes that are worth anyone's time).
The telegraphy you are talking about is so strenuous on the story it will deform the entire campaign.
GM authority over scene-framing won't deform a campaign - I know that from experience. GM authority over
plot will deform a campaign in which the players want to choose for their PCs, but that's a different matter.
Frankly, if I want someone to tell me a tale, I'll pick up a book.
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Does the game you're running surprise you? If not, it's just work.
The game can be a surprise for all participants and yet be focused on "telling a tale" provided that the plot is not known in advance. This, in turn, is possible provided that the participants adhere to the action resolution mechanics.
This is why the "golden rule" that tells the GM to fudge dice in order to further the story is utterly inimical to narrativist play. If you can't get the desired sort of story without ignoring the action resolution mechanics, than either (i) abandon the desire for that sort of story or (ii) change your mechanics. (This is why I don't like 2nd ed much, which tries to use AD&D mechanics to produce a Tolkienesque or Dragonlance-ish experience - in my view, Gygax was correct in Appendix N to suggest that AD&D is closer to REH than Tolkien, although I feel AD&D is not even as close to REH as I personally would like).
Yeah, if the GM can't be surprised, at least in some small way, it's not really a RPG.
I would say that if I as GM can't be surprised, it's not an RPG I personally want to play. But I wouldn't go so far as to say it's not an RPG. Some people like illusionist play, for example, and I'm not going to say that they're not playing an RPG just because the GM already has predetermined, behind the curtain, exactly what will happen.
(I guess it also turns a bit on "at least in some small way". Even in the most illusionist game, presumably the players get to provide a bit of narrative colour to their PCs' actions, and some of this might give the GM a small surprise. But it's not going to influence the overall development of the story. This is at least my impression of the sort of play apparently envisaged by modules like Dead Gods or Expedition to the Demonweb Pits.)
I use the story approach of three acts when I prep too.
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I have never had a player complain of being railroaded or that they feel like they have no choices.
Because I know my players I can pretty much design encounters that will interest them.
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Just because I have a "story" in mind does not mean I know how it is going to end or how the journey is going to unfold. That part is up to the players. I don't try and force them to do it my way. Or try and force my vision on them on how I think it should unfold.
I also talk to the players about there hopes and wants for their characters so I can tailor the game to make it more personal for them.
This sounds to me like it could also be describing situation-driven narrativist play. The reference to "encounters that will interest them" is consistent with illusionism, but that seems to be contradicted by saying that it's up to the players how the story unfolds. (This seems to mean more than just that the players get to decide whether they use longswords or scimitars!)
So the DM's job is not to create the adventure?
I'm confused
everytime I've DMed I created a hook, a main bad guy (the climax) and encounters in between, what happens in between them and how they get there is not my job, but it is my job to make sure there is content for them to venture into, in all dircetions
On the other hand, this looks more like the GM is in charge of the story. It talks about the GM creating the hook - whereas KM very clearly, and I think Elf Witch also, are talking about the
player creating the hook by building it into his/her PC. This also seems to suggest that the GM decides who the bad guy is - whereas in KM's examples the players have decided this (both the Giants and the Illusionist become adversaries as a result of choices made by the players). And it also seems to suggest that the GM has framed all the scenes ("the encounters in between") in advance.
I think that in this sort of game the players have to be getting their payoff from something other than shaping the story. In D&D, the payoff is probably going to come from clever play in the way the players engage those encounters via their PCs. And if the GM is prepared to let the results of those choices stand (ie not override them via the golden rule) then the GM could be surprised eg by an unexpected TPK, or by an easy and/or clever victory over a difficult encounter. (White Plume Mountain would be a classic AD&D example of this; WotC modules like the Sunless Citadel or Forge of Fury are 3E examples that I think are meant to be played like this.) Alternatively, the payoff for the players might come from really enjoying the GM's story, in which case we're back at illusionism.
A lot of D&D players seem to like adventure paths, which as I understand them tend more-or-less to fit this model. Run in an illusionist fashion, the story for an adventure path had better be pretty good! Run in a gamist fashion (ie the payoff is clever play) then there is the obvious risk that not all - perhaps not much - of the path will actually be played.
