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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Janx" data-source="post: 5413925" data-attributes="member: 8835">Hmm.. I don't think that's a JITP issue.  I can write an adventure on paper that way.What you've designed is certainly a projected linear path to a goal of meet the BBEG at Location 4.It doesn't mean that's how it'll play out, given possibilities of defeat, retreat, abandoning the the quest.  It also isn't much different than a travel to ThereVille session.  Where in the Gm rolled up 4 encounters on the road to ThereVille, the player's stated destination from the end of the last session.In both scenarios, the players are very likely to hit each encounter, barring an unexpected change.  That would definitely be a linear plan.  Though not necessarily a railroad by my definition of FORCING them to go to location 4, or to go to ThereVille.  They are welcome to use divinitation, information gathering, teleport spells to find alternatives.  In addition, there may be a number of possible choices to get from each location to the next (or clue to clue).After the fact, what HAS transpired is obviously linear.  Before the fact, there's a lot of activities that have probable trajectories, therefore naturally being linear.The PCs are going to look for clues to who the BBEG isThe PCs are going to then find the BBEGthe PCs are going to confront the BBEGPretty linear.  Assuming the players goal is "confront BBEGs" that's pretty much how it will play out, until the party fails, aborts, or succeeds.But I think I have defined Linear at the Macro level, in that the path to any player goal tends to be linear, and BotE is defining the Micro level, where within the chain of encounters to pursue that goal, a tightly linear assumption is undesirable.I suspect then, that a discussion of "Linear" in terms of GMing approach and adoptance of generally accepted best practices is to minimize the amount of Linear game expectation at the micro level.</blockquote>

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