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<blockquote data-quote="rounser" data-source="post: 2960040" data-attributes="member: 1106">From point A, they have a choice of proceeding to points B, C, D, or E.&nbsp; That's quite a clear branch in the railroad tracks.&nbsp; After choosing point E of these options, they have indeed proceeded in a line of their own choosing.Alright.&nbsp; Meaningful choice of what they can do next probably matters more.It was an answer to your assumption that after the PCs have done E, then B, C and D are still back there waiting for them.&nbsp; That example was to show that your assumption isn't necessarily correct.&nbsp; &quot;Not railroading&quot; doesn't mean &quot;no cause and effect.&quot;Well, he doesn't have to.&nbsp; Instead, we could use your model of all the other adventures still being available afterwards.&nbsp; Or only one of them, or whatever.&nbsp; Yes, the DM gets to choose which of these is the case, but he's still offering the players a meaningful choice within that framework.I think the disconnect we're having is that you're saying that any DM restriction = railroading, whereas I'm saying that having even one meaningful choice at the &quot;direction of the campaign&quot; level is enough for it not to be considered railroading.&nbsp; Even a choice of the order in which adventures are played is enough to prevent it falling into my definition of railroading.I find your definition a bit of a furphy, because any arbitrary decision on the nature of the game such as &quot;goblins live in the Skull Plains and not flumphs&quot; could be considered a restriction on the PCs (&quot;But....we want to fight flumphs!&quot;), and therefore &quot;railroading&quot;.&nbsp; <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f615.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":confused:" title="Confused&nbsp; &nbsp; :confused:"&nbsp; data-smilie="5"data-shortname=":confused:" />I'm content to leave my take on railroading at the level of &quot;next adventure is...&quot;, because I think that's the classical definition of a railroad, in the Dragonlance Classics sense (although DL Classics also commits other &quot;sins&quot; that could be considered railroading, such as NPCs who cannot die).&nbsp; Railroading within an adventure is another issue, and also being discussed in this thread (I think).&nbsp; I'm not discussing that.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="rounser, post: 2960040, member: 1106"] From point A, they have a choice of proceeding to points B, C, D, or E. That's quite a clear branch in the railroad tracks. After choosing point E of these options, they have indeed proceeded in a line of their own choosing. Alright. Meaningful choice of what they can do next probably matters more. It was an answer to your assumption that after the PCs have done E, then B, C and D are still back there waiting for them. That example was to show that your assumption isn't necessarily correct. "Not railroading" doesn't mean "no cause and effect." Well, he doesn't have to. Instead, we could use your model of all the other adventures still being available afterwards. Or only one of them, or whatever. Yes, the DM gets to choose which of these is the case, but he's still offering the players a meaningful choice within that framework. I think the disconnect we're having is that you're saying that [i]any[/i] DM restriction = railroading, whereas I'm saying that having even one meaningful choice at the "direction of the campaign" level is enough for it not to be considered railroading. Even a choice of the order in which adventures are played is enough to prevent it falling into my definition of railroading. I find your definition a bit of a furphy, because any arbitrary decision on the nature of the game such as "goblins live in the Skull Plains and not flumphs" could be considered a restriction on the PCs ("But....we want to fight flumphs!"), and therefore "railroading". :confused: I'm content to leave my take on railroading at the level of "next adventure is...", because I think that's the classical definition of a railroad, in the Dragonlance Classics sense (although DL Classics also commits other "sins" that could be considered railroading, such as NPCs who cannot die). Railroading [i]within[/i] an adventure is another issue, and also being discussed in this thread (I think). I'm not discussing that. [/QUOTE]

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