Site Based or Event Based?

[silentspace]

Which do you prefer and why?

As a player I prefer Site-Based. You don't feel like you're being led around by the nose and you feel like you actually have choices. I especially hate running across dying NPCs who give long rambling speeches but you're unable to heal them because they're 'beyond healing'

As a DM I prefer Event-Based. Because you can have an actual storyline, and set up things to happen for future things to happen that have 'meaning'.

 

[alsih2o]

mine is the bad answer, it takes both.

a good event at a good site beats an awesome event or awesome site alone

 

[Kichwas]

Probably a mix here as well. Have a good location, like a city, but put events in it as well as seeing what 'events' the players create on their own.

I think this is the wrong line upon which to divde styles.

 

[Henry]

It takes two to make a game go right,
It takes two to make it outta sight.

If your players are self-starters, then make it site-based, but those site-based are also linked to event-based happenings. There's nothing like a sharp timetable in a campaign to make the gameworld feel dynamic and alive.

Contrary to belief, you can have an event-driven plot without being railroaded; just plan for what happens without the PC's there, and then retrofit those plans plausibly based on what the PC's did (or didn't do).

 

[DaveStebbins]

Absolutely agree with the others. Most of my adventures are site-based, but I always have a schedule of events which will happen if the PCs do nothing. The site is never static. As the PCs act, events may or may not happen, or may be changed, and NPCs and monsters certainly react to events created by the PCs. A static site-based adventure (to me) is just a series of doors waiting to be kicked down.

 

[Altalazar]

Both. It is just too artificial one way or the other. And to avoid the feeling of those darn railway tracks beneath your players feet, you need to make sure that the event based stories are flexible enough to change and have alternate possibilities - both planned and made up on the fly - to cover the inevitable "straying" from one's envisioned course.

 

[DaveMage]

Pretty much same here - both.

However, in my games it's much more "site-based" with only a couple of "events", which are usually to get the players going - not railroading.

 

[Arnwyn]

I prefer site-based (both as DM and player).

However, a bit of variety never hurt anyone, so I have a good mix.

 

[diaglo]

the world is not static. every humanoid poos.

 

[Rel]

I'll agree with the concensus and say it takes a mix. But I'd say that, in general, my campaign is more event based but my adventures are more site based.