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Message: <blockquote data-quote="CuRoi" data-source="post: 5443757" data-attributes="member: 98032">Forgive the abuse of the railroad analogy... There is a big difference between railroading and conducting a story. When you are railroading, you are forcing the players along a pre-determined path regardless what they attempt to do to change it. When conducting, you're making sure the train(s) all stay on track and get to the various stops chosen by the passengers. If the party wants to switch tracks, you let it happen at the earliest conveinence.  If they want to hop off the train at the next stop and catch the 1:15 to Santa Fe, you should let that happen too. However, maybe there's an unavoidable delay; maybe the resltess natives have laid siege to the station, maybe there's a drought and you're out of steam until the players can fix the situation; maybe the train just never shows up and the party is curious enough to investigate. Make sense? This is your sandbox too. Without some sort of "direction" from the DM - if you don't have enough available engineers to drive the train, if the passengers aren't given a schedule of all the stops, and if nobody checked to see you have enough fuel on board, your'e on a trip to nowhere. Without the abused analogy: If you think they may finish the most recent story arc and are unsure what they will pursue next, you aren't railroading if you devise a side-plot or even if you draw their attention back to a storyline they didn't take the bait on earlier. The story isn't just "theirs" enitrely. Yes, they are the stars of the show for sure, however the story also belongs to the group as a whole. So it's perfectly ok for you to plan something they did not anticpate ahead of time.  For instance, if you just want to buy time and you have a really cool band of astral ninjas that wants to pop in and smack them around, then do it. Don't feel just because you have made the very wise decision to not railroad your players, that you can't sometimes provide them with things they have to react to or did not expect.  If you stop providing at least some sort of story direction you'll make your current predicament worse - your players will have no clue where to go and will wander aimlessly while you are paralyzed and unable to create something for fear of "forcing them" to play. I've seen plenty a "sandbox" game (and run some) that ran into that dreadful snag. These "between quests" times are also perfect for unfinished business. The guy the put in jail seeking revenge, the local law enforcement finally catches up to the party rogue, the mage stumbles across a key arcane element in soem elaborate item or puzzle he has been working on. While players should be free to "sandbox" it almost always takes the DM nudging people to get creative juices flowing. Also remember that this world you created is a vibrant living thing not just for the players to manipulate but for you to reveal to them. What has happened while they went on the last quest? What could have developed in that time which will change the landscape and maybe force them to recognize an old threat or re-evaluate their current position? Answers to any of these questions can quickly provide an idea of where the next train out of the station is headed...</blockquote>

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