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<blockquote data-quote="CharlesRyan" data-source="post: 5010738" data-attributes="member: 5265">You've traced a logical circle right back to my original point, in my first comment in this thread, lo those many posts ago.That point: Using story structure is not the same thing as railroading.Yes, some adventure writers have written railroady adventures. And I agree with you that that's bad (in the sense that most players don't find them satisfying).Yes, some GMs, through lack of experience or skill, run railroady games. And I agree with you that that's bad (in the sense that most players don't find them satisfying).But those are issues of poor execution. And adventures and GMs can suck for all sorts of reasons, regardless of the underlying philosophy or toolbox they draw from. The world is full of poorly written and run &quot;sandbox&quot; games as well.To hold up an example of bad and declare &quot;this proves that the underlying philosophy is a failure&quot; is bogus.You might be confusing my use of the word &quot;fiction&quot; with &quot;story.&quot; My apologies. What I mean by fiction is &quot;made up.&quot;My point is that a &quot;made up&quot; environment (your campaign setting), combined with a series of &quot;made up&quot; events (encounters played through by the players), is suggestive of a story, if only on a subconscious level. As a result, most people are going to react, if only on a subconscious level, the way they do to a story. For example, they will (if only on a subconscious level) expect something that seems like it might be significant (that spooky castle) to be significant.This isn't metagaming. It isn't playing out of character. It is the natural reaction people have, based on a lifetime of experience with fiction.I don't want to put words in your mouth, but it sounds to me like you prefer a style of game that is very literally a game. To put it in terms that make sense to me, you're using D&amp;D to create a more sophisticated version of the Descent experience. Fair enough; nothing wrong with that. But I don't think it's what most people are frankly looking for in an RPG (which is why most people don't view Descent as an RPG); and it certainly doesn't invalidate an entire toolbox of GMing tools that lead others to very satisfying game experiences.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="CharlesRyan, post: 5010738, member: 5265"] You've traced a logical circle right back to my original point, in my first comment in this thread, lo those many posts ago. That point: Using story structure is not the same thing as railroading. [I]Yes[/I], some adventure writers have written railroady adventures. And I agree with you that that's [B]bad[/B] (in the sense that most players don't find them satisfying). [I]Yes[/I], some GMs, through lack of experience or skill, run railroady games. And I agree with you that that's [B]bad[/B] (in the sense that most players don't find them satisfying). But those are issues of poor execution. And adventures and GMs can suck for all sorts of reasons, regardless of the underlying philosophy or toolbox they draw from. The world is full of poorly written and run "sandbox" games as well. To hold up an example of [B]bad[/B] and declare "this proves that the underlying philosophy is a failure" is bogus. You might be confusing my use of the word "fiction" with "story." My apologies. What I mean by fiction is "made up." My point is that a "made up" environment (your campaign setting), combined with a series of "made up" events (encounters played through by the players), is suggestive of a story, if only on a subconscious level. As a result, most people are going to react, if only on a subconscious level, the way they do to a story. For example, they will (if only on a subconscious level) expect something that seems like it might be significant (that spooky castle) to [I]be[/I] significant. This isn't metagaming. It isn't playing out of character. It is the natural reaction people have, based on a lifetime of experience with fiction. I don't want to put words in your mouth, but it sounds to me like you prefer a style of game that is very literally a game. To put it in terms that make sense to me, you're using D&D to create a more sophisticated version of the Descent experience. Fair enough; nothing wrong with that. But I don't think it's what most people are frankly looking for in an RPG (which is why most people don't view Descent as an RPG); and it certainly doesn't invalidate an entire toolbox of GMing tools that lead others to very satisfying game experiences. [/QUOTE]

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