The Opposite of Railroading...

[Pbartender]

I prefer the freewheeling side more: one man wandering around into things.

Be aware that I'm using "Freewheeling" is a negative connotation, much like "Railroading" is normally used. To put a finer point on Ourph's analogy...

"Railroading" is plot direction without player freedom.
Whereas "Freewheeling" is player freedom without plot direction.

Taken to their utmost, neither is enjoyable.

 

[Raven Crowking]

Again, it depends how we define "railroading" (obviously ). For example, if I design a dungeon for an adventure, and place it just outside the village where the PCs start, it's hardly railroading if I expect the PCs to explore the friggin' dungeon.

No...but if the game is either "explore the dungeon or go home" they're on rails.

EDIT: The trick is, of course, to give the players sufficient motive to want to explore the dungeon. IOW, "Why should I care?" is the question all DMs should be keeping in mind, whether they are making an adventure or making a world.

 

[The Thayan Menace]

True Dat!

Taken to their utmost, neither is enjoyable.

Agreed.

-Samir

 

[ShinHakkaider]

EDIT: The trick is, of course, to give the players sufficient motive to want to explore the dungeon. IOW, "Why should I care?" is the question all DMs should be keeping in mind, whether they are making an adventure or making a world.

Finally we agree on something! In prepping the adventure path I'm running now I found this is where I put most of my efforts. After getting input from the PC's about their characters I tried to make the specific adventures relevant to them and in some cases I didnt have to, some of the PC's came up with their own motivations as to why they were doing what they were doing. I even started reading up to 3 - 4 adventures ahead so that I could start laying seeds down for the PC's early on.

 

[der_kluge]

Railroad campaign:

The opposite of a railroad campaign:

 

[Pbartender]

The trick is, of course, to give the players sufficient motive to want to explore the dungeon.

Or, make sure the players know that they need to build characters with sufficient motive to want to explore the dungeon.

 

[Odhanan]

I'm having a bit of a problem with the term railroading being thrown around in a negative connotation here. So instead of defining railroading which obviously means
different things to different people, define how the opposite of railroading works in your game. This means that if youre a DM who doesnt like railroads you must be running a railroad free game. For me that usually means youre running a plot free game that allows the PC's to do anything that they want to, but I could be wrong about that which is why I'm asking for examples.

Give details not some vauge outline. specific details. Thanks.

Well first, I think it's a pretty smart way of presenting the issue Shin, so thanks for that.

Now, to answer your question, I do not like railroading no, and I actually am proud of saying that my games are minimal in terms of railroad. My definition of a railroad-free environment is when the PCs walk down the street and want to open the door of the Potion-maker I just mentioned without having anything more than a few lines about him in my notes and the PCs knock at it, try to sell stuff, kill him, and a whole trail of game sessions (which can count in more than a dozen) spring out of it despite the fact that I never intended to have the killing of the potion-maker happen.

That's anti-railroad to me.

Doesn't mean that once the event happened I can't modify the frame of the campaign and prepare for following events, but in essence ANY event can occur when triggered by the PCs in the game. That's an ever-adapting process to me, whether in-game (improv) or between the games (prep after the event). That's the anti-railroad to me, and that's actually the essence of the interest the user has towards RPGs as opposed to reading novels.

 

[Raven Crowking]

Or, make sure the players know that they need to build characters with sufficient motive to want to explore the dungeon.

Sure. But I am talking about motivating the players, not just the player characters. The number one, most important thing for a fun campaign is that the players and DM are both motivated to play. That sounds obvious, but it is something we sometimes forget. The DM has to be operating an an enviroment that's fun to DM. The players have to be operating in an environment that's fun to play in.

Look at your players, look at their PCs, look at your potential plot hooks, and ask yourself: How can I make this personal?

The best campaigns, IMHO, have more material than the players can ever follow up on. When the players are torn between their choices, because they have a great desire to do more than one mutually exclusive thing, the DM has succeeded in a big way.

RC

 

[EricNoah]

It is really tough to be fully prepped to run 2-3 adventures at any given time. I can totally see why a DM steers groups to the one adventure that's ready to go.

I have been pitching my group about 10 rumors at a time, they vote on one or two they are really interested in and then I prep for those one or two adventures. Sometimes multiple rumors lead to the same adventure.

What other tools and techniques do DMs use to have interesting/fun material ready "on the fly"?

 

[Mark CMG]

What other tools and techniques do DMs use to have interesting/fun material ready "on the fly"?

It can help to be ready for the group based on their level, primarily, and their likely environments, secondarily. So, too, when it is as much about NPC adversaries as it is creatures you can make figurative and increasingly difficult circles around the group, each sectioned by as many options as you can devise or have prepped (this also depends on how prepped you feel you need to be), and then see which direction the group goes and where they cross the lines. Plus, keep an open mind for ways to correlate the PC actions with whatever NPCs are at hand, e.g. rescuing a merchant thwarts a ring of thieves. And just because they mess with the mayor does not mean he can't hire that band of thieves you have prepped already. They just come at the PCs with different motivations and, perhaps, different information to spill if they get caught. Just keep the stat blocks for creatures and NPCs of appropriate levels handy and, for their motivations, play off of what the PCs do, in contrast with conflict.