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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 5402953" data-attributes="member: 42582">Who is saying this? In the actual play examples, and descriptions of approaches to play, give by me, by Chaochou, by The Shaman and Beginning of the End, the GM has also had control. But the GM's control is in framing the scene - whether that be by determining what is in the king's pocket and what the king's mood is, or by determining what the False Pope or chevalier are doing, or . . .But the players get to decide how to engage the scene that the GM has framed. And the GM and players together than resolve the scene, using whatever mechanics are relevant - I think I use more structure action resolution for social scenes than The Shaman (4e skill challenges vs reaction roll) but there is still a lot of overlap in our approaches, as far as I can tell. We both have to play out the NPCs' responses in light of the dice rolls, and in light of the responses of the PCs to those responses.I call it scene framing. Plus action resolution. It requires being sensitive to what the players care about.Contrary to what Celebrim said, if the thief player doesn't care one way or another about going to clear out the forest, but does care about whether or not his PC is the one who tried brazenly to rob the king in plain sight, then it is not a railroad to set up the encounter the way Beginning of the End described, provided that the actual robbery attempt is resolved, and its implications for the thief's reputation brought into play in the gameworld.Like Chaochou said upthread, using NPCs response to force hard choices on the players, or to direct them into events that are engaging for them, isn't railroading. It's GMing!</blockquote>

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