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<blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 8652580" data-attributes="member: 42582">[USER=16586]@Campbell[/USER] has frequently posted about player-side railroading.Also, the language of &quot;accusation&quot; seems misplaced. There is no crime at issue here.No one disputes that decisions have to be made. The discussion, insofar as it pertains to Vincent Baker on conflict vs task resolution, and John Harper's diagrams, is around a very particular decision: who decides when a conflict, or a situation, is resolved?Saying that the GM decides this isn't accusing anyone of anything. It may or may not be railroading, depending on a whole lot of extra consideration at work. It needn't typically be Force - mostly it will just be the GM exercising authority over scene-framing and content/backstory.I also think the contrast of &quot;principled&quot; with &quot;railroading&quot; is not always apt: I've played CoC scenarios which were extremely principled in the way they were GMed, but were clearly railroads in the sense that the players supplied a bit of colour and narration but little else. (The Forge calls this &quot;participationism&quot; because it is not at all illusionistic.)Can you give an actual example of the second, in which these tasks is not a set of tasks that is decided by the GM as the resolution of the game unfolds? I'm thinking of a certain sort of approach to a skill challenge, but is that what you have in mind?A fair bit of the action here seems to be in the social interaction ability checks. These will or won't reveal that the accountant knows the dirt to be in the safe. How are those to be resolved? I assume the accountant is a NPC. Is the GM allowed to have the accountant lie if they fail their save vs intimidation?Also, who decides what it is that the accountant actually knows? Is the GM allowed to decide that the dirt isn't in the safe but is in the secret underwater hideout? If the players, sitting around discussing possibilities but never thinking of the hideout, what happens in play?</blockquote>

[QUOTE="pemerton, post: 8652580, member: 42582"] [USER=16586]@Campbell[/USER] has frequently posted about player-side railroading. Also, the language of "accusation" seems misplaced. There is no crime at issue here. No one disputes that decisions have to be made. The discussion, insofar as it pertains to Vincent Baker on conflict vs task resolution, and John Harper's diagrams, is around a very particular decision: who decides when a conflict, or a situation, is resolved? Saying that the GM decides this isn't accusing anyone of anything. It may or may not be railroading, depending on a whole lot of extra consideration at work. It needn't typically be Force - mostly it will just be the GM exercising authority over scene-framing and content/backstory. I also think the contrast of "principled" with "railroading" is not always apt: I've played CoC scenarios which were extremely principled in the way they were GMed, but were clearly railroads in the sense that the players supplied a bit of colour and narration but little else. (The Forge calls this "participationism" because it is not at all illusionistic.) Can you give an actual example of the second, in which [i]these tasks[/i] is not a set of tasks that is decided by the GM as the resolution of the game unfolds? I'm thinking of a certain sort of approach to a skill challenge, but is that what you have in mind? A fair bit of the action here seems to be in the social interaction ability checks. These will or won't reveal that the accountant knows the dirt to be in the safe. How are those to be resolved? I assume the accountant is a NPC. Is the GM allowed to have the accountant lie if they fail their save vs intimidation? Also, who decides what it is that the accountant actually knows? Is the GM allowed to decide that the dirt isn't in the safe but is in the secret underwater hideout? If the players, sitting around discussing possibilities but never thinking of the hideout, what happens in play? [/QUOTE]

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