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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 6113682" data-attributes="member: 4937">- emphasis addedIn abstract, sure, I suppose I can agree with that.  But that is all irrelevant to the example from which the 'desert' and 'city' were drawn.   In point of fact, all the above elaboration consitutes no more than a red herring.   All the bolded assertions are false as they pertain to the scenario and so irrelevant, and thus all the ifs and suppositions about them are counter-factual.  In a different situation, maybe that's true, but then again no one has ever asserted otherwise.  For example, I asserted that if there was nothing interesting or relevant in the desert, then the best thing is to have the spell land them 5 miles from their destination within sight of 'the city' (but again there is no city, the whole scenario could be described as 'guided wilderness exploration').  So sure, for some irrelevant theoretical example, I can fully agree with you because since the example is irrelevant and abstract it doesn't change my opinions in the slightest.In point of fact, the players in the scenario were not led what to expect at all.  The scenario is intentionally vague.  This is because there is something about the setting which is false (I'm not going to spoil what it is) and so one of the ideas behind the scenario is that the players will because of their limited information develop their own theory of what is going on which will be wildly wrong, and then, at a later point there will be a surprise reveal - a twist - that causes them to radically reassess the setting in a dramatic way.   This sort of structure has been built into prior modules.  For example, the structure occurs in 'Saber River', which when it was ran for me as a young player provided for me then a paradigm shifting moment of awesomeness, and which made me as a DM go, "Wow!  There is so much more possible than I thought there could be!"  Granted, these particular sorts of twists are often overused and unsurprising now to the point of being cliche, but twists are still at the heart of telling good stories.Maybe, but this is again irrelevant.  There wasn't a random chance of a 5 mile or a 500 mile walk.  There was a fixed 110 mile walk and no expectation about the goals to achieve, and if anything an expectation set by the setting of, "We won't be exactly where we intend to be."I don't want to delve to much into the goal and point of the scenario, and I agree in this case that the 'desert' is just a distraction.  Of course, I can agree with that because the scenario also assumes that the desert is just a distraction or obstacle and assumes that the players will use every resource they can to truncate the journey as much as possible.  It even mentions using teleport in at least one place in the text.   And its worth noting that no one has argued that the players shouldn't use their resources to avoid the hazards of the 'desert' journey, so I'm not sure what you are really arguing here since on some level there is no disagreement.   The only thing I might quibble over is the fact that you seem to think the problem is that there isn't enough hand holding and leading players around by the nose ring, since you think everything would have been alright if Hussar had just been signaled more strongly what he was supposed to do.   Do you really think the problem here is the DM not explaining their will and desire to the players forcefully and clearly enough?</blockquote>

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