NOW LIVE! Today's the day you meet your new best friend. You don’t have to leave Wolfy behind... In 'Pets & Sidekicks' your companions level up with you!

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 5181581" data-attributes="member: 4937">There is a whiff of 'they are doing it wrong' in that statement that borders on suggesting that players like that must have something wrong with there heads.  I don't think you are being charitable enough to the position here, and I think perhaps it would be useful to ask where the conventions of AD&D came from rather than assuming that they are badwrongfun or obselete technology.  The early AD&D players largely came from a wargaming background.  They were used to competitive play with the rewards of victory.  They were used to 'keeping score' and playing games with the goal of getting more skillful at playing them.  Moreover, they were used to playing games were there was a simulation going on which they liked to imagine in some way modeled or reflected the reality that intrigued them, whether it was the 100 Years War, clashes between the Hittites and the Egyptians, or the wars of medevial Poland.  They created a game which was intended to do all those things to some degree.  It was intended to keep score.  The level of the character was to some extent intended to reflect the skill of the player.  The game was meant to encourage increased skill at playing it, and the game world was intended to model a reality.  The description of the game world was a description of this reality as it actually was, and this was required so that the DM could be said to be 'playing fair' in his role of referee/antogonist.Now, my silly description of the lurking ambush inn, while intended to be humorous is a description of your world as it actually is.  The inn has no fixed abode.  It wanders around looking for PC's to ambush, and then settles down when actually interacted with.  That's the game world you are describing.  The gameworld that the original players/designers of D&D wanted to describe was one that was consistant between groups of players.  Everyone knows where the Sign of the Prancing Phony is.Maybe it doesn't matter.  I already said that in general I approve of wandering inns.  But I find it odd that I'm the one accused of sophistry here.  You are the one who describes an inn that is always where ever the players are going, and yet seems to want to insist that it doesn't move about.  That your players can't see that it moves about is the trick, but the trick is real and anyone privy to 'behind the screen' will see it.Well, yes, I said that too.Well, yes, but, I suspect that if they don't step inside and engage w/the NPC's, the inn will put on a new coat of paint and follow them around until they do.Ok, so this moves the hard illusionism well beyond where I'm comfortable.  An NPC that is inescapable is railroad, and he better darn well be a near omniscient diety if he can just pop in like that.  And generally speaking, being hounded by a diety/Elmenster figure is a pretty straight forward railroad technique.Let me explain then.  Remember what I said about 'rowboat settings'.  Most adventure path settings, and many so called 'sandbox settings' are really just sparcely populated rowboat settings.  What happens is that you get dumped into the setting in your rowboat near something interesting.  You can choose to investigate the thing that is interesting, or you can choose to row around looking at nothing and doing nothing.  Quite soon you realize that the DM intends you to do this, and that if you don't, no fun is going to be provided, so if you want to have fun you better do what the DM intends you to do.  After you go investigate the one interesting thing in the setting, the DM tells you were in the vast ocean to find the next interesting thing, and so on and so forth.You are a talking about an unavoidable NPC, that can chase me down no matter what I do, and he's going to make me an offer.  And chances are, its going to be an offer I can't really refuse because otherwise, I can just diddle around in my rowboat.  And you wonder why some people don't like illusionism?</blockquote>

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