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Message: <blockquote data-quote="zarionofarabel" data-source="post: 9773836" data-attributes="member: 7026405">Well, yeah. That's the inherent advantage of an ad lib style. The entirety of the events of the campaign, both micro AND macro, can be drastically affected by choices the players make. I'm not saying that games with planned plotlines completely lack player agency, but ad lib games definitely offer a heck of a lot more agency. Plus, with an ad lib style a GM can tailor everything in the campaign for specific PCs/players. With a plotline game, the campaign is more about the story the GM wants to tell than the story the PCs make. Which, if all the YT vidoes I've watched in recent times, is what a lot of players want. It's the crux of the reason why I GM ad lib (plus laziness) style, because I don't want to make a story for the players to play a part in, I want the players to make their own story.So? It doesn't really matter if you make it up beforehand, or in the moment, it's all the same. You, as GM, are just making stuff up!So GMs who prep stuff are trying to make stuff that's less fun?!?Maybe in someone else's game. My games are usually overstocked with things the players can interact with as the contents of the setting are limited only by my imagination. I don't want to sound like a jerk, but imagining things for PCs to do in any setting is super easy, at least for me. Basically any story element that you can think of that would fit the theme and genre of the setting can exist. All a player has to do is express an interst in such a thing and voila! Said thing poofs into existence! As for telegraphing what PCs "should be" doing, well, I simply don't do that as there is never a time when the PCs "should be" doing anything specific. I also try to telegraph things PCs "could be" doing by imagining things that are "happening in the world" then somehow informing the players of said happenings. Again, easy as pie, as I simply tend to "think on things" in between sessions, so I have a smorgasbord of ideas rattling around in my brain at all times.I don't feel the need to tell players what they "should be" doing. It's up to the players what they want to do in the setting. Like I said above, providing content is super easy, just make something up! Plus, I don't need to bother creating content for anything the players are not actively engaging, allowing me to focus completely on the things they are engaging.Well that sucks! I've never found my ad lib content lacks in density or breadth of choice compared to things I "daydream" beforehand. In fact, my ad lib stuff, in retrospect, is consistently better than the crap I think about between sessions. Perhaps the urgency of improvising content kicks my thinking machine into overclock mode! So, yeah, I don't know about other improv GMs, but my ad lib content is far better than anything I would end up prepping. If I were to limit myself to stuff I prepped, my games would definitely suffer for it, and my players would probably be quite disappointed.Only if their choices aren't artificially, or subconsciously, limited to prepared content. If their choices are limited thusly, then an ad mib game would inherently offer far more variety of choice, simply because nothing is "set in stone" and anything is possible!No. At least not in my experience. In fact, I have found the opposite to be true. If players know that a GM prepares stuff ahead of time, they try to look for the "correct path" to follow, almost always latching on to the first "signpost" they are given. As the first "signpost" in most plotline games is, more often than not, the only "correct" one. If the players know that all paths are an option, because any event can possibly happen, they forge a path without considering anything other than what they want to do, free of restrictions.Yeah...no...just...no. Having prepared material definitely doesn't equate to more agency. Besides, in reality, nothing, prepared or not, exists until the players interact with it. If you have a hundred pages of prepped material the players never interact with, it effectively doesn't exist. Plus, if the GM is "staying true" to the material they have prepared, then that would probably limit agency as it would limit player choice to only those that conforms to the prepared material. Ad lib doesn't have anything to "stay true" to, so choices simply can't be limited, as there is nothing to limit them.See, and in a situation like this it wouldn't be my ad lib fiat that decides whether or not the criminal escapes. If it's a literal "chase" then it would be the system rules and applicable randomizers that would decide the outcome. At least, in the games I GM.I don't decide the outcome of questionable events by GM fiat. That's literally what the game system is for, to decide the outcome of events where the PCs have the ability to affect the outcome. I wouldn't set up a scenario where the PCs have the ability to stop a criminal from escaping, and then decide the result by GM fiat. The rules of the game, and the players choices and dice rolls, decide the outcome.Sorry mate, but much of what you claim are things that make a prepped game "better" than an ad lib game, are downright false. I do agree that an ad lib game can be railroaded, it's not something that's exclusive to linear adventure style games. In my experience however, linear games tend to suffer from the phenomenon far more often than ad lib games. Though, I will admit, ad lib games do suffer more often from being somewhat aimless at times. Both styles of play have their advantages and disadvantages, but to infern that one is inherently better than the other is disingenuous.All that being said, if it makes you feel any better, linear games seem to be the norm. I've only recently got back in to the "social media" aspect of the TTRPG hobby, and YT especially is chock full of videos by folks that are obvious proponents of linear play. Far more that those that espouse ad lib play, as far as I can tell anyway. Cheers!</blockquote>

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