Like most DMs, I'm always searching for ways to run better adventures - trying to find out what's fun, what's interesting, what bores the players so I know what to avoid. My current players are big fans of having a lot of freedom and hate feeling railroaded.
When writing adventures in advance, however - lets say for Dungeon - is it possible to write it without some degree of railroading? Is it not a given that when you plan the encounters and plan the outcome, it's inevitable that the adventure will path the players into those encounters and into that outcome?
In other words, how can an adventure be written without the players feeling either railroaded into the ending, or bewildered by the lack of usual structure?
Creative Director
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Like most DMs, I'm always searching for ways to run better adventures - trying to find out what's fun, what's interesting, what bores the players so I know what to avoid. My current players are big fans of having a lot of freedom and hate feeling railroaded.
When writing adventures in advance, however - lets say for Dungeon - is it possible to write it without some degree of railroading? Is it not a given that when you plan the encounters and plan the outcome, it's inevitable that the adventure will path the players into those encounters and into that outcome?
In other words, how can an adventure be written without the players feeling either railroaded into the ending, or bewildered by the lack of usual structure?
An adventure written without "railroading" would look like a backdrop article, since it'd have to detail everything in a certain region. Make the region too huge and presto; you have a campaign setting. We don't really have the room in Dungeon to do adventures like these.
In other words, without some sort of railroading, it's not an adventure. The trick is to present an adventure that the PCs want to go on, and to set up the adventure in a way that it's the PCs that start the ball rolling. An adventure hook that starts with a merchant or guard stopping the PCs in the street and telling them that his boss will give the PCs 1000 gp to go on an adventure isn't as good as a hook that has the PCs hearing about the boss's problems from a drunk guard or bitter merchant while they're passing by or doing something else, at which point the PCs take it upon themselves to visit the guard to offer their services. If you keep the problem vague, you can reuse the adventure if the PCs don't take the bait by using the adventure for the next time they decide to do something.
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In other words, how can an adventure be written without the players feeling either railroaded into the ending, or bewildered by the lack of usual structure?An adventure written without "railroading" would look like a backdrop article, since it'd have to detail everything in a certain region. In other words, without some sort of railroading, it's not an adventure. The trick is to present an adventure that the PCs want to go on, and to set up the adventure in a way that it's the PCs that start the ball rolling.
Agreed.I think you have to assume a DM running an adventure from a mag has the basic wit to modify those parts that do not fit his campaign world, and the motivations of his PCs, and/or players.
If he chooses to run a setting that has wierd world-specific rules, with awkward players of freakish PCs, then he shouldn't blame the scenario's author if it goes belly-up or fails to spark.
Another way is to give the players the illusion of choice, typically through multiple adventure hooks.
Toss out a couple of different hooks at the PCs, all of which lead to the same adventure. Try to have the hooks appeal to different character motivations, so that they don't appear to be the same hook. (ie. Having both Guard A and Guard B tell the PCs that their boss needs some adventurers isn't two distinct hooks, it is just repeating the first hook.) Focus on whichever hook the PCs seem most taken with, and then progress into the adventure from there. The PCs have the illusion of choice (ie. "we didn't have to take this job, we could of done X instead..."), because they don't know that all the hooks led to the same adventure.
In other words, without some sort of railroading, it's not an adventure. The trick is to present an adventure that the PCs want to go on, and to set up the adventure in a way that it's the PCs that start the ball rolling.
Ah. So in other words, it is inevitable that a prewritten adventure will have a limited number of paths, but the players won't mind if you set them paths they like?
I'd rather play the well-planned, thought out scenario, even if my character's reason for doing so is a bit shaky, rather than spending an afternoon on the wandering damage table.
Sometimes, the best reason for your character is, "Gee, my friend Bob the Fighter really wants to do this. He's saved my ass more than once; guess I'll help him out this time. Besides, I'm likely to make money doing this."
I've never really accepted, "but my character wouldn't do that" as a very good excuse from a player. It's really not difficult to find a viable reason - my friends wanna do this, I'll get paid some phat loot, it'll help make me famous, whatever.
I agree with you, Brent. We also play every other week - and only for about 4 1/2 hours. I try really hard to offer up plot hooks that appeal to at least two players; sometimes, though, other players need to suck it up and use a generic excuse to go on an adventure.
I e-mail the players between sessions to make sure I know what their choices for a direction to the next session are. If they still turn "left" then I have to make it up as I go along, but I usually have a subplot or three on reserve that I can spring on them if they don't follow the pre-destined path.
I actually encourage them to not always follow the hints I drop and make their own choices about what they "really" want to do in my campaign, but I ask that I get between-session notice when possible.
It's worked out pretty well, but there's over a 120 years of combined gaming experience sitting at my table of seven regulars.
Dungeon can also be a great resource if you want to give players a degree of "freedom of choice"--you just have to have two or three different level-appropriate adventures in mind, and some idea how to adapt them to the present situation with appropriate hooks.
I do agree with F2K, though, that some between session notice is useful--ideally, you present forks in the road at the end of a session, then either have them choose one fork then and there, or think about it and decide by e-mail within a few days.
Read F2K's CY 576 Greyhawk campaign log to get an idea of how to adapt diverse published adventures to an ongoing campaign and tie them into characters' motives, shift the original plot to something new, and even re-set them in new geographic locales. I was very impressed with this when I read the log and figured out what he was doing.
I also think, though, that some of the onus is on the players to be creative--to think of reasons why they should take the bait, and not to be endlessly perverse and ornery, just because they think it's cool and antiheroic. I think it also helps if one of the players is willing to step forward and be a bit of a leader, persuading his fellow adventurers to come along, for the sake of the team, or for monetary gain, or whatever. Four chaotic selfish PCs generally won't accomplish heroic things unless one of them is willing to exercise a little persuasion.
Also keep in mind that typical group dynamics dictate that it takes some time for a new group to gel, so if you have a large number of new people, or are starting a brand new group, you might have to plan for them to spin their wheels for a while before a natural leader or a cohesive team emerges. This might be the stage to have lots of small sidequests handy while they figure this stuff out. (This is where the "backdrop article" comes in, with a few good stat blocs and some generic site maps to fill in the details on short notice.)
Another way is to give the players the illusion of choice, typically through multiple adventure hooks.
Toss out a couple of different hooks at the PCs, all of which lead to the same adventure. Try to have the hooks appeal to different character motivations, so that they don't appear to be the same hook. (ie. Having both Guard A and Guard B tell the PCs that their boss needs some adventurers isn't two distinct hooks, it is just repeating the first hook.) Focus on whichever hook the PCs seem most taken with, and then progress into the adventure from there. The PCs have the illusion of choice (ie. "we didn't have to take this job, we could of done X instead..."), because they don't know that all the hooks led to the same adventure.
As a DM I'd be more inclined to toss out three hooks that all lead to different adventures unless its really important to me, for some reason, that the PCs take this specific adventure - and then I might as well get the plot wagon out and run them over with it instead of beating around the bush.
I'm trying to write something along these lines at the very moment and I'm ashamed to say its become so hard I had to consult that shaby fraudster Nic Logue for help with plot twists and a second opinion on if it would work. Naturally his answer was typically annoyingly clever...
Rich
Another way to prevent railroading and adventuring ennui is to keep a realistic control of your game's ECONOMY. Nothing ruins game mechanics more than gold pieces coming out of everyone's ears. After that, what's the realistic sounding character motiviation for adventuring? Fun? Most people don't walk into chaotic, life threatening situations for fun. Knowledge? Maybe, if you've crafted a campaign where your characters are truly depended upon for exploration. Mostly, the motivation is money. So, make sure your players are charged for things they buy, deduct a fee of some sort for living costs for inbetween game times, and make sure your rewards are within reason for economies. I assure the DM that a well-maintained game economy pays for itself in the long run. I keep the PCs net worth totals myself in my computer so I know what everyone spends. It's not something I do in game a lot, I review it in prep., and one or two judicious raised eyebrows when someone mentions they're buying something (expensive) keeps everyone pretty honest. Players are eager to be railroaded when they want the cash. Plus, it makes them inquire about interesting things: the value of these candlesticks? Can we hawk and of these dragon scales? All those kinds of things can either be done quickly and cleanly by the DM (again, in prep, giving the pcs a total for their loot at the beginning of the next session) or you can let those things develop into role playing with merchants, fences, etc., for clues or other adventure threads. It also ties the PCs into their actions -- if someone sees their guild candlesticks show up in a pawn shop they're going to inquire who sold them to the dealer!
Most of the replies seem to have focused on the hook as "railroading" or not, but I've found players complain about "railroading" if the adventure is too linear as well.
Monte Cook had a good web article on this topic which I recommend reading (if I could only find the URL).
If a dungeon is a linear series of rooms, then it truly is linear, and "railroads" the players. I've seen complaints about the adventure being linear in such literal cases, but not "railroading". If however, there are a series of settings or events and the adventure is designed so they can only occur in one order, then then I've heard complaints of "railroading".
To rephrase the original question, I think it is possible to write a FINITE adventure without railroading. The trick is to come up with a series of encounters that can occur in roughly any order. The PCs do have a choice, but they have a finite number of choices.
SPOILER for Into Wormcrawl Fissure ...
The first half of James' adventure in the latest Dungeon is a perfect example of this technique. Before heading into Earthcancer Gorge, the PCs have three locales to visit. They PCs do have choice, as they can make their visits in any order they choose, and they might even partially explore one, retreat, tackle a different one, etc. On the other hand, the number of choices is finite (basically 3, with some subtleties to each choice resulting from the order of the choice), so it's possible to write the adventure.
The second half of James' adventure also illustrates this technique. The Tabernacle is not a linear dungeon; there are multiple viable paths. Again the PCs have choice. However, the dungeon is finite, and there are basically two viable paths through the dungeon.
More importantly, James uses a third trick to keep the adventure contained. Rather than right one "big" adventure, he's really written two smaller adventures, connected by a single bottleneck (passage down Earthcancer Gorge). This has the curious effect of giving the PCs more choice points but reducing the number of possibilities that actually have to be defined.
--Eric
Sounds to me like your players would enjoy a campaign rather than just getting together some character to do a dungeon crawl or some such. A campaign gives a world of choices and the intent of the campaign may be intense or benign; ie your campaign world could have some overall prophesy or gods at war using people as pawns; or your characters could just ignore all that and try to carve out their own niche in the world. In a campaign many of the adventures offered in dungeon could still be usefull; just collect a lot of them and put the various lures for them in various places the pcs might encounter them. There used to be a book called the Book of Lairs; think there were several volumes; I would put lures for these lairs and the problems these creatures caused in various places with npcs offering various rewards and the pcs could pick and choose; of course; you could always expand the ones they ignore to show how their actions and choices affect the world. The major problem I have seen with the type situation like what you describe is when the party has no real reason to stay together; they inevitably separate to stay home and make scrolls and potions; or some such while others seek other stuff. The last thing you want to do is have your gaming group separated by perhaps weeks of travel. You could always limit travel by cutting down availability of stuff like horses or have bandits or war cut off routes of travel making them very hazardous or have a nation close its borders or have plague sweep through land; all good campaign hooks in additon to controlling movement. The big thing is to ask your players; do you want to get together to run through a stand alone adventure; whereas they are committed to that adventure; or play a campaign; find a setting most will agree on; ie, terrain; level of technology; and just let them explore. When I started out I bought all the Judges Guild maps which gave my players a very different setting than my other friends who would run Greyhawk; that everybody knew just about everything about; as well as other campaign worlds. My judges guild maps have booklets of nearly each hex and what is there; players run around and I roll a spot check (in 3.5) to see if they notice or are near the colossal arm that is sticking out of the ground in hex 3255; it also gives advice about what pcs might find if they dig it up and such; could lead to another adventure hook; personally, the various modules that d&d put out that I decided to purchase; I just read them and decided a place to put them in my world; sometimes the pc encounter them. Maybe this sort of thing would work for your players; personally, my gamers love campaigns and do not care to much about getting together for a dungeon crawl. The big thing here is to make certain that the pcs do affect the world, I have found that this above all things is most important to gaming and can be a bonus to any gm; let your pcs develop things like rogues guilds and such over the years you can expand them and then that guild has a very real history in your mind which adds depth to your game. All you have to do in the start of a campaign if you pcs decide to see what is any direction; is familiarize yourself with your map and run whatever adventure they wander into or run away from. Piece of cake.
I would say, yes, it is possible. You do, however, need to look at your players, and their characters, in a critical light. What would JimmyJoe the Barbarian do in this instance? Why would he do X instead of Y? Know your players, know their characters and all shall be good. Why would Alice the wizard want to go after the Big Bad Evil Guy? Add a plot thread that connects Alice & BBEG.
My GM mentor told me that no matter what adventure you run, whether it comes out of Dungeon or anywhere else, be prepared to have the following handy:
1.) A beginning
2.) Multiple mid-points
3.) A multitude of endings
4.) Totally throw the adventure out the window
Improvisation is your friend.