Why I Dislike the term Railroading

[BenBrown]

That's just it, though - when I see a "linear" adventure it's almost always the former. (For example, the 4e adventure P3 is insanely linear in structure.) I'm having a hard time thinking of pre-scripted and immutable adventures, though.

The aforementioned Barrow of the Forgotten King is pretty darned close. Of course, it's just a big linear dungeon crawl, with a minimum of branches, all of which shortly dead-end. There's no real plot to railroad, but it's pretty much linear.

 

[pukunui]

Wrong. It is your determination that they must arrive at C that makes it a railroad.

All the rest is just details of laying rails.

If you were running a game instead of a railroad, then you would not be concerned with choosing the players' moves for them. You would not be rigging the outcome.

You would let the players play the game, and so discover the outcome.

You misunderstand me. I wasn't implying that the GM was forcing the players to go to C. I was assuming that the players wanted to go there. That is, the GM has presented them with an adventure hook that requires their PCs to make their way to a particular destination (C) and the players have accepted the hook and their PCs have set off on the journey.

I can accept that if the GM only gives them a linear path with which to go from A to C, this does not automatically mean they're on a railroad. Even if the players aren't given the option to take multiple routes to their destination, as long as they can still affect the outcome (and not just of each individual encounter but also the overall plot), then there's no railroad. If the PCs' actions at B make the encounter at C easier or harder, then it's not a railroad. If the encounter at B makes it apparent to the players that it isn't worth their PCs' time to go to C and the GM is happy to let them go to D instead, then it isn't a railroad. But if the GM is determined that the PCs go to C no matter what, and even if he has given them several paths to get there, then it is a railroad.


Going back to NWN2, I think perhaps my problem with that game is not that it's linear and therefore also a railroad. It's just that it happens to be both linear and a railroad. On a small level, the game gives you choices and allows you to affect the outcome of particular encounters. For instance, depending on your Diplomacy skills and the dialogue choices you make, you might be able to circumvent a potential combat encounter. Or if you're very sneaky, you might be able to bypass it entirely. If you fail, you have to fight. But how you tackle each individual encounter has no bearing on the overall plot. Successfully talking your way out of encounter A has no effect on encounter B. Winning or losing the trial makes no difference because either way you're fighting the frenzied berserker, and if you fail there, it's game over (or reset to your last saved game, as the case may be, since this is a video game). Even if you beat the guy, winning or losing the trial has no real effect on the environment. Sure, you get either a good title or a bad one, but that title carries very little meaning within the game. You can also insult your companions all you want, and they won't leave you (except at prescripted moments). And even if you don't bother to follow the various romantic subplots, the cut scenes assume you do (playing a female, you can ignore the paladin all you want and choose never to engage him in the romantic dialogue, but his actions in the cut scenes are all scripted as though you have).

Anyway, I realize this is a CRPG and not a tabletop game, so a certain amount of scripting is necessary. But like I mentioned in my original post, NWN1 gave you a lot more freedom than NWN2 does. And I think NWN2 can still be used as a good example of what a real tabletop RPG railroad looks like.

 

[Ariosto]

An interesting example that tests the "linear=railroad" hypothesis is the "(Super)Natural Disaster" adventure. You know the kind: some wizard's experiment goes awry and for a night the town is plagued by zombies, frozen in ice, whathaveyou. there's no agency and no way to stop it, just a schedule of inevitable events (whether its x zombies per hour squared, or the ice zone doubling in diameter every hour), the Stuff (people, places and things around the PCs), and the PCs themselves.

It's certainly immutable and linear, which suggests its a railroad. But at the same time, there's no presupposed endpoint or requirement set upon the PCs, which suggests a freeform (or "sandbox") adventure. So which is it?

Reynard, if I show up to be a 'player' in this affair, then what is my role?

If it is simply to go as scripted from scene to scene, having no decisive decisions to make, then I expect at least Guild rates.

That's what that kind of 'player' is for.

As a player of a game, I want an interesting game to play. That means my choices make a difference -- the difference between victory and defeat.

 

[Ariosto]

If the DM actively shuts down alternative paths and alternative solutions, and only allows the adventure to move in the direction that he wants - that's the railroad.

That is precisely what I see right there. You are allowed only to go from A to C. An attempt to head in any other direction is an attempt to "jump the rails". Whether with the subtlety of a shell game or with very blatant rigging, you will be forced back into line.

 

[Reynard]

Reynard, if I show up to be a 'player' in this affair, then what is my role?

I don't know. What was your role before this scenario started. I imagine whatever else it was, it was also probably protagonist -- and still is. Except now, you're not a protagonist in a hero-versus-villain story, you're a protagonist in a man-versus-(super)nature story -- a story you are writing by playing.

Here's the thing -- that story can be a paragraph long, ending with, "...and they got the hell outta Dodge." and that's okay.

If it is simply to go as scripted from scene to scene, having no decisive decisions to make, then I expect at least Guild rates.

You're making lots of assumptions there, all of them wrong.

As a player of a game, I want an interesting game to play. That means my choices make a difference -- the difference between victory and defeat.

Victory over what?

See, now we're talking about something else entirely, that's related to neither railroads nor sandboxes. You want to Kick Ass and Take Names, to be a Big Damn Hero. That's fine. Whatever you like. But, when I run games, the PCs are not the only characters in the world and things happen regardless of them or their actions. And sometimes, 'Stuff Happens' when they are around and they just have to deal (even if dealing means running away or otherwise ignoring the situation).

The PCs are present for situations all the time. Sometimes those situations are created by antagonists in the setting; sometimes those situations are caused by the setting itself. You can't have any type of game, railroad or sandbox, without those situations. Of course this doesn't prohibit players or their characters from creating their own situations, but IME most players don't want that responsibility and the game is more fun for everyone when (again, most) players are reactive.

 

[Ariosto]

You're making lots of assumptions there, all of them wrong.

Dead false. In that statement, it is you making assumptions. Apply some common sense, please.

Why do you refuse to answer the question?

If you will answer it, then we shall have the answer to the question of whether your production is a 'railroad'.

 

[Ariosto]

Victory over what?

That's up to me.

Unless it's a railroad.

 

[Reynard]

That's up to me.

Unless it's a railroad.

If you read what I wrote you would know that the whole point of the argument is that in the situation I described you *do* have complete freedom. You can choose to deal with the situation at hand any way you desire, up to and including just bugging out.

But perhaps it isn't a lack of choices that you are concerned about, but rather a lack of control. Perhaps you classify the situation I described as a "railroad" because you use the term to mean any play situation where you are not in command of what is occurring at the table. If that is the case, you need to get yourself behind the screen, because presenting situations is exactly the GM's job in any rpg. It is the players' job to deal with said situations. It really can't be distilled much more than that.

But I'm likely wasting words. I believe we had this very same discussion a couple months ago and it turned out much the same as it is now.

 

[Ariosto]

If you read what I wrote ...

I read it. It was unclear. I requested answers to questions. Your response was evasive and disagreeable.

in the situation I described you *do* have complete freedom

Then just why do you imagine that it should be regarded as 'railroading'?

It is of no help at all for you to try to put words in my mouth, to make up insulting 'speculations' about my thoughts.

What would be helpful would be for you to turn that energy instead to coming up with other, potentially clearer, words in which to express your own thoughts.

 

[Obryn]

The aforementioned Barrow of the Forgotten King is pretty darned close. Of course, it's just a big linear dungeon crawl, with a minimum of branches, all of which shortly dead-end. There's no real plot to railroad, but it's pretty much linear.

Right - but if it's set up as a bunch of rooms in a line, there's still quite a bit of potential for PC efficacy, depending on how the game is run. I'm unfamiliar with the adventure, though, so I can't speak much more about it.

I'm personally taking the adventure I mentioned - P3 - and rearranging the heck out of it. While I don't think it's a big railroad, I also don't think there's enough emphasis on solving the scenario in ways other than hacking through it. For example - there's a huge dungeon with a lot of empty space and four little fiefdoms, all managed by sub-bosses, all of whom are subservient to another sub-boss. Sadly, none of these sub-bosses have personalities, and apart from some vague allusions, they are basically portrayed as static individuals who don't interact. Simply put, this sucks, and I'm making the situation much more dynamic.

-O