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Message: <blockquote data-quote="bloodtide" data-source="post: 9766375" data-attributes="member: 6684958">XI. I have a cool adventure prepared. There is a cave of goblins north of Fantasyville. I will try to get the players to talk to Mr. Wizard who will inform them of the caves existence and give then the hook. But the players decide to not meet Mr. Wizard. Nobody in the world will interact with them anymore until they meet Mr. Wizard. They still dont want to, so I have angels descend from the Heavens to tell them to go to Mr.Wizard or die. They do so. We follow my original outline from there on.This is the classic.  The DM has the adventure ready to go, all the players have to do is start the adventure.Disclaimer-Our example players here have agreed to just go on "any adventure" and don't really care about the details. Of course, the players don't know the wizard is the key to starting the adventure.  And a lot of players will just aimless wander around a game world if they are given the freedom to do so.  There is a reason such "video games" are popular.  Some players can have fun for endless hours just doing almost nothing.Though a lot of players don't like playing an action adventure type RPG, and then just doing effectively nothing for hours.  The players might have some semblance of fun chasing a stray cat for an hour, but will really feel that hour is just wasted.  Not only does the DM get frustrated, but the worse to come is the players will unfairly blame it all on the DM.  The players that outright refused to leave town or take the DMs adventure hook, will 100% point all the blame on the DM.  Very few players will take any sort of responsibility for their actions.  The players refused to play the game, and everyone had a boring, waste of time.  And it will all be put on the DM, as the DMs faultAny idea of "corporation" or "group storytelling" or anything "shared", will go right out the window and the players will just say the person is a "bad DM".  Not wanting this label, and wanting to have a fun game, many DMs turn to Railroading to get it done.----The first flaw in the above is : Don't do the Open Sandbox.  It is typical for DMs to let the players "play in the samdbox", that is aimlessly wander around and do basically nothing.  The PCs might drink at a bar, or go shopping or other such mundane, non adventure worthy things.  Don't do it.  Unless you want to DM in the sandbox, don't open it.  Even for a few minutes.  If you want to let the PCs do something like prepare, like going shopping, do it as a Downtime Activity.  Player to DM, with no character role playing.Second, if you do want to do a bit of pre adventure gaming:  Never make the start of the adventure in any way depend on the players doing something.  After all, there is always a chance they won't.  In the above example, simply having the wizard come and find the PCs works.  Good bait also works wonders, give the PCs a good or great reason to go visit the wizard.Third, is just like clues, you should always have at least three hooks.  You want The Wizard, The Mayor and The Goblin...at a minimum.  So, no matter what the PCs do, they will encounter at least one of them and get the hook.  And each hook can make a bit of a different adventure.Fourth, in a general sense, it is better to have the PCs be part of the world.  Have them join groups, organizations, religions or secret societies.  A living world should be full of them.  And the best thing as the PC can always meet a contact or be given the adventure as a mission for the group.All, of the above are better then the Bad Railroading.....</blockquote>

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