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Message: <blockquote data-quote="EzekielRaiden" data-source="post: 9723051" data-attributes="member: 6790260">Well, I think what Hawkeyefan is aiming for (no pun intended) is that they don't really think "done with the best of intentions" vs "not done with the best of intentions" is a particularly meaningful division to draw. Especially because most of the people who do "railroad" are doing it genuinely believing that it is, in context, a good and right thing to do--perhaps even the good and right thing to do.Instead, I think a much more relevant distinction to draw is threefold: explicit agreement, lack of discussion, or active deception.Explicit agreement is, as some have mentioned in the thread, the folks who truly want a linear, low-choice experience. They aren't interested in having their personal expression influence the experience, any more than they would want their personal expression to influence a good book or a good movie. When a GM tells the group, "Hey, I'm thinking about running Zeitgeist, you in?" that gives the players a clear notion of specifically what they're signing up for, and it's on them to evaluate and decide. And if they agree, they've conceded at least some ground in the "player choices should matter a lot" department because...that's always going to be much more limited when running a whole-game-spanning adventure path.Unfortunately, what I find is much more common with this stuff is lack of discussion. The GM does things because they feel like it and...doesn't really specify to the players. Whether that's because they think they shouldn't specify, or just don't think it's worth mentioning, I dunno. But they sort of...glide past the stuff without ever really saying. One of those "if we never have to talk about it, it's never a problem...right?" kind of things, which naturally I think are misplaced but I mean it does work some meaningful proportion of the time, so...whatever, I guess. Just seems to me like it's leaving a land mine tucked in a corner in the hopes that it'll never actually explode.And then of course there's active deception, which I've referred to as illusionism. Folks know I think that's a bad thing, so I'm just gonna leave it there and move on.So, linear adventures are, or at least should be, something you do with explicit agreement. Do we need a specific name for that? I dunno. Maybe? Maybe not. I guess if folks feel the need it doesn't hurt.But if we do in fact need such a label, I think it's also important to call out the difference between "railroading by just trying to never broach the subject" and "railroading by deceiving people into thinking they aren't on rails." The two have some tactics in common, but aren't the same.</blockquote>

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