What do you consider a "railroading" module?

[T. Foster]

Railroading to me is when decision-making authority is taken out of the players' hands in a way that they find objectionable. Many players don't mind being told what to do, and even prefer it -- they're playing the game to hear a good story and participate in some cool scenes (be they combat or role-playing). They don't want a lot of freedom and decision-making authority and when they're given it they tend to "freeze" and stand around bored "waiting for something to happen." Often these players don't have enough grounding in the genre/setting (or just haven't been paying close enough attention) to be able to make effective decisions even if they wanted to. So, faced with these kinds of players, it's much easier as GM to just tell them "the Duke of X orders you to go to this place and do this thing" -- as long as where they're going and what they're doing is interesting and "cool" the players won't mind, and won't feel railroaded.

The problem with these types of players only arises when they don't like the adventure -- when they're being told to do something that they don't find interesting or cool -- then, suddenly, they'll complain about being railroaded and not having enough freedom. But what they really want isn't freedom, it's just to be told to do things that are more in line with their expectations. Communication and knowing your players is key here -- find out what they like and want in adventures, and run those kinds of adventures. And, perhaps most importantly, if you're running an adventure (either of your own design or a store-bought module) and the players aren't enjoying it, ditch it! Yeah you might have thought it was the best thing ever when you wrote/read it, but if your players aren't engaged it's your obligation as GM to move on to something else (or at very least change things around to match the players' expectations) -- if you force the players to "play through" an adventure they're not enjoying (especially a long one or series) nobody's going to have any fun.

 

[Ranger REG]

In a game featuring magic, there are extremely few situations which will only have one possible solution.

If, for example, the module as written prevents the party from, say, cutting down the trees lining the paths of the module and no amount of magic can affect those trees, then that is railroading. If the module then stipulates limitations on flight and teleportation, then it is locking the rails even tighter.

Then you better think of a reason as to why the trees are protected by magic, if the PCs wish to investigate.

Granted, a single situation might have only a very small number of solutions, but, an entire adventure is a whole 'nother beast.

Is that why gamers prefer dungeon-crawl over story-based adventures? Despite the limited environment, the dungeon still offers many paths and doors or portal for the PCs to choose. For a story-based adventure, it's important for the PCs to stay on the plot track, even though one could offer alternative endings.

 

[howandwhy99]

You know, I've been doing this for about 26 years now. I'm not a kid. I might not be God's gift to players, but I don't think I need basic lessons in DMing. And back when I was a player, the play group that I was in was among the better tactical groups in the nation with the tournament records to prove it. I don't think I need lessons on how to dungeoneer either. You want to disagree with me fine, there's probably good reasons for doing so although I get the impression that alot of your disagreement was based on a misreading of what I wrote (which is as much my fault for not being clear as anything), but if you start with the premise that I'm stupid then either I'm just going to start ignoring you or very quickly pirate cat is going to be asking me to leave another thread.

I'm glad you wrote back after I wrote that entire response. My intention was not to talk down to you and I apologize for the way I came off. I've just seen far to many folks who are willing to live with another's story or style of play because an enjoyable freeform game is believed impossible. I may be misreading what you originally stated. It's sounds like you are saying railroading is inevitable. With that I disagree.

Here are a couple of responses, which I hope will clear up some other points:

I love it when people state thier full agreement with me and then go on to disagree completely in practically the very next sentence. What you said is completely contridictory. Either you can't believe that I'm absolutely right, or you can't believe that 'one door with just one key and no other way in' is bad. But you can't believe both.

I could have been clearer here. I was agreeing that an adventure where only one action (like a special key to open a special door) is not railroading. However, if a DM runs only one adventure at at time (the "or else we don't play") and that adventure has a plot requiring said door to open, then it is a railroading adventure design.

Wait a minute, didn't you just say that you used 'force' too? Surely you don't think you are excluding yourself from those that railroad if you also admit that you are using 'force' to obtain the outcome you desire (namely that the PC's have a good chance of succeeding, that the story keeps moving despite the players getting 'stuck' etc.)?

Yep. I admitted I have needed to fudge NPC reactions so I don't overwhelm my players. I believe that is a problem with the system I am running. I run it for the players who enjoy it. To say I don't railroad and other DMs don't either isn't to say I have never done so or would never do so. Certainly almost anyone who's ever run a convention game has done so.


Now on to the good stuff:

Who said that I did? What I said is that I made the decision that the PC's were not red shirts. I do things like have the evil overlord send his weaker minions to deal with the PC's when they first gain noterity for spoiling his plans, rather than coming himself and dealing with them right away before they become too dangerous to thwart so easily. That is railroading. It's a story convention that the evil overlord is always incompotant in this way, allowing things to get out of control before he actually takes the situation seriously despite his 23 INT.

It's odd to me that you call this railroading. I can understand the old James Bond cliches of not killing Bond when one has a chance. But what you describe above seems more like a Simulationist method. Kings and Queens don't know pesky adventurers will later topple the crown. They deal with each problem in kind in a way they believe will effectivly deal with the situation. If the PCs prove very capable, well, they should watch out. Gaining too much notoriety can be as much a bad thing as a good one. (of course then they can use their fame to their advantage, if they're smart)

Who said that I did? What I said is that I always have a way for the PC's to succeed or save the day. The real world is under no such obligation to provide you with a way out.

This is true and probably the strongest argument I can think of against a pure simulationist roleplaying style. To define railroading as anything that isn't pure simulation of the real world is tough to counter. I don't think this is why the term came about in the first place, but here's an answer: In the case of "sometimes there is no way out", it's time to roll up a new character. PCs die and or get stuck and can't get out. The key is: don't give up hope. As a player I'm hoping there is a way out of any situation I get my character into. As a DM I'm looking for those ways out too (albeit with wider vision). If no one can determine one, than I can always opt out. In my original response above my 2 players could have lost their characters, if the other new characters had not successfully found them.

Not it doesn't. You can have a dangerous, fantastic, adventure-filled world and the majority of people in it never find the adventure and never have the adventure come to them. Our own world is dangerous and fantastic, but if you gained super-strength and super-speed and instinctive martial arts prowess today, you couldn't go out tommorrow night and stop a mugging, prevent a burglery, and bring a murderer to justice because you'd find it a very hard thing to be in the right place at the right time. Dangerous and fantastic or not, oppurtunities to be heroic aren't happening on every corner like this was 'City of Heroes' or something. And the problem with conventions like 'City of Heroes' is that they don't stand up to scrutiny. As someone else said, they are like the plots of professional wrestling. They fall apart if you look too close, and that's means that you the world designer are STILL designing events to happen to the PCs. If you want to have a heroic game, its pretty much inescapable that you do so.

A world full of adventure that never has the adventure affect the people in that world isn't fulfulling the definition for me. I agree our own world is dangerous and fantastic. I don't agree that if I was a hero I couldn't go out and stop muggings though. Real life heroes already do that all the time. Being a hear in a RPG is just safer.

I don't know City of Heroes, but it sounds like a poor design. You don't need to have implausible "hero tasks" on every street corner. Just have plausible NPCs. The players will involve themselves in their plots, they will create their own, or they will remain farmers. Plots are not for the DM to create for the PCs. They are for the NPCs. The players plot their own PCs course. Story is just the end result you can tell your buddy afterwards.

In case this sounds potentially dull (I know I'm explaining RPGs again), I'd like to say our own real fantastic world affects us all everyday. We just don't take up the adventure. Of course, neither are we all endowed with hero-like abilities.

Show me a campaign setting without designed encounters and I'll show you the worlds largest wandering monster table. I had one that was 50 pages once. Believe me, I know about freeform.

Well... not exactly. A lot of the older modules had no synopsis or storyline. They were simply modules where adventure was ripe. It isn't just randomness all the time, but that randomness could easily be tied to adventures going on in the vicinity... just like the real world.

Let us return to the definition you provided: "I called it "force", for lack of a better word, for when a DM manipulates events to an outcome they desire rather than one of consequence."

You claim that fudging isn't railroading, and I agree that it isn't generally recognized as railroading but I think that you'll find that any good definition of railroading encompasses fudging. Take your definition just provided. Wouldn't you agree that when you fudge the results, or the NPC's actions, or anything else, you are manipulating events to an outcome you desire rather than strictly one of consequence? You want to argue I think that this is different than having the NPC (whether a villain or not) critical to a latter point in the plot be effectively unkillable, but I don't think it is. They both can be achieved by fudging and they both are the DM manipulating events to some end other than one of consequence.

So you railroad too. We all do. Some of us just do it more gracefully than others.

You seem quite determined to label me a railroading DM no matter what I think. Well, not just me, everyone. I agreed with you above that my fudging is a form of forcing players, but I'm trying hard to determine a way out of it. The system can be changed. And no, I'm not arguing this is different than other forms of railroading. The key is when I wasn't fudging the system was screwing up. Until I get a handle on the rules I'll fudge a little. It's the least I can do.

Absolutely. I didn't say that it wasn't. What I said is that if interesting and profitable things are in every direction, then the world wasn't strictly one of consequence.

This last point (I put your last one at the start) is sort of strange. How is a world ripe for the taking not one of consequence? (By the way, I think it's consequential now I think about it.) Is it not simulationist enough? Is the real world more mundane? I just want to clarify.

 

[howandwhy99]

Railroading to me is when decision-making authority is taken out of the players' hands in a way that they find objectionable. Many players don't mind being told what to do, and even prefer it -- they're playing the game to hear a good story and participate in some cool scenes (be they combat or role-playing). They don't want a lot of freedom and decision-making authority and when they're given it they tend to "freeze" and stand around bored "waiting for something to happen." Often these players don't have enough grounding in the genre/setting (or just haven't been paying close enough attention) to be able to make effective decisions even if they wanted to. So, faced with these kinds of players, it's much easier as GM to just tell them "the Duke of X orders you to go to this place and do this thing" -- as long as where they're going and what they're doing is interesting and "cool" the players won't mind, and won't feel railroaded.

I agree and I have played with many players who like this style. In my experience these same players can learn and enjoy making their own decisions in freeform games. It depends on how the game is begun. Placing the group in an easily understood situation with a beginning goal. As they learn and explore the world via that goal they work together to choose different paths. I think placing the PCs in charge of others is an excellent way of putting them in a decision making role at start (check out the storyhour in my sig. Once the ball gets rolling, the PCs know what the players know via exploration. With a few consequences and intriguing information they'll start making their own plans outside the initial goal. I'm not saying everyone will always do this, but every one of our totally new to roleplaying players has.