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Message: <blockquote data-quote="kenada" data-source="post: 9287383" data-attributes="member: 70468">I would call a plot a series of events that the GM wants to happen. There can be different (or even unplanned) paths between them, but the key element is that the events are planned out by the GM. An example of this is the scenario I described in <a href="https://www.enworld.org/threads/the-alexandrian%E2%80%99s-insights-in-a-nutshell.703060/post-9286164" target="_blank">post #135</a> and outlined in <a href="https://www.enworld.org/threads/the-alexandrian%E2%80%99s-insights-in-a-nutshell.703060/post-9286362" target="_blank">post #160</a>.When I ran it, we used a map of <a href="https://pathfinderwiki.com/wiki/Pitax" target="_blank">Pitax</a> and the surrounding region. The PCs were free proceed with their investigation as they pleased, but the clues they discovered were set up to lead them to the eventual conclusion (that the tigers had been taken out of the city, located in a particular cave, and the PCs would need to fight a boss to free them).I find this distinction important because I am not planning things out that way in my current campaign (as discussed in <a href="https://www.enworld.org/threads/the-alexandrian%E2%80%99s-insights-in-a-nutshell.703060/post-9285951" target="_blank">post #86</a> with some recaps posted <a href="https://www.enworld.org/search/2749019/?t=post&c%5Bthread%5D=682741&c%5Busers%5D=kenada&o=date" target="_blank">here</a>). I do not want that the raiders or bandits or dragon situations should play out a particular way. I do not have any particular plans for how the meeting with the fake-Maria (as mentioned in <a href="https://www.enworld.org/threads/the-alexandrian%E2%80%99s-insights-in-a-nutshell.703060/post-9286276" target="_blank">post #154</a>) should go.When I am playing GM-as-opposition, there are mechanics to avoid imposing my wants on play. The dragon situation is put to a tracker. When it completes, the dragon is arrived. Should fake-Maria want to make a move against the PCs (e.g., coerce them), she would make a skill check (per the system’s procedure), and the result would be binding on both her and her target (a PC, likely).I tried for years to use Justin’s <a href="https://thealexandrian.net/wordpress/17308/roleplaying-games/hexcrawl" target="_blank">hexcrawl procedure</a>, but I could not make it work. It requires too many rolls every day of play, which slowed down exploration at the table, and the amount of prep (every hex!) was oppressive. I want to run a sandbox exploration game, but I don’t want to have to do a lot of prep. If I am just making things up, there is a risk of bias (as discussed in post #86). My use of narrativist techniques is meant to be a solution to that bias, though I would not describe it as that kind of game.(The fact that my homebrew system does not fit neatly in a taxonomical bucket is one of several reasons why I dislike their use in RPG discourse, but digging into that is way outside the scope of this thread.)</blockquote>

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