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<blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 5404953" data-attributes="member: 42582">Lanefan, that sounds like Celebrim's &quot;play set&quot;.But I'm curious as to what you mean by pre-designed story.In my game, I prepare encounters that, everything else being equal, I will present to the players. For example, currently the PCs are trying to move through the foothills from point A (where they've just destroyed a demonic temple) to point B (where they have to pay some duergar slavers to redeem some prisoners). I am doing this via a skill challenge, and at certain points in the challenge certain encounter will occur (with the PCs getting advantages or disadvantages depending on how the skill challenge is going). So unless the players decide to abandon the trip to point B, and thus to abandon the skill challenge, those encounters will occur. But how they play out is up for grabs - for example, one is with some hags, and I have that statted up as both a negotiation skill challenge and a combat, because I'm not at all sure how the players will handle it. (In the previous game the same players had their PCs befriend rather than kill a night hag who had useful info for them - they have a soft spot for helpful information-dispensing NPCs even when those NPCs are evil.) Indeed, I'm anticipating that this encounter could be what prompts the players not to keep going to point B, and instead to decide to try and enter the Feywild.Is this anything like what you have in mind when you talk about &quot;the DM's pre-designed story&quot;?</blockquote>

[QUOTE="pemerton, post: 5404953, member: 42582"] Lanefan, that sounds like Celebrim's "play set". But I'm curious as to what you mean by pre-designed story. In my game, I prepare encounters that, everything else being equal, I will present to the players. For example, currently the PCs are trying to move through the foothills from point A (where they've just destroyed a demonic temple) to point B (where they have to pay some duergar slavers to redeem some prisoners). I am doing this via a skill challenge, and at certain points in the challenge certain encounter will occur (with the PCs getting advantages or disadvantages depending on how the skill challenge is going). So unless the players decide to abandon the trip to point B, and thus to abandon the skill challenge, those encounters [I]will[/I] occur. But how they play out is up for grabs - for example, one is with some hags, and I have that statted up as both a negotiation skill challenge and a combat, because I'm not at all sure how the players will handle it. (In the previous game the same players had their PCs befriend rather than kill a night hag who had useful info for them - they have a soft spot for helpful information-dispensing NPCs even when those NPCs are evil.) Indeed, I'm anticipating that this encounter could be what prompts the players not to keep going to point B, and instead to decide to try and enter the Feywild. Is this anything like what you have in mind when you talk about "the DM's pre-designed story"? [/QUOTE]

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