I started a thread a while back on GM Fiat and freeform management of the gaming environment (ie. railroading to some) and it got pretty heated. The vast majority of the members here were on the side of railroading being evil or at the very least the practice of an inept GM, while a few counted it merely as a an option of approach and with some uses. I don't want to descend into that same argument here...

However something  came up during that conversation that generated quite a bit of discussion amid my gaming friends and was touched on but not really settled in the former thread.

There could be (read 'could' as an obvious opinion and in no way a declaration of fact) a comparison between the popular 'Zero Prep- Improvisational' GM style to the afore mentioned and well-ridiculed Railroader. (I use this term because of its universal acceptance, I disagree totally however that it applies to many of the GM strategies I have mentioned here. But I digress...)

If a GM has no previous knowledge of an element of the setting or the reaction of an NPC, and therefore generates what is lacking on the spur of the moment, based on the player's actions, his perception of the situation and lastly his desire to present a fun and rewarding experience for all...he is heralded as a great GM! Someone who can think on their feet, exact detail from nothing on the fly, and weave in depth storylines without forethought!  

I wont disagree. Ive seen some guys play that way and have tried it myself with varying degrees of success. It is a challenge but can be incredibly liberating and effective.

Now, another GM does the exact same thing...BUT...BUT...BUT - he originally had something else in mind and based on the players actions and his own perceptions etc.... decided something else would be more fun, cool, entertaining, fair or whatever. So he changed it.

To the players there is absolutely no difference in the experience. Some will say the latter GM acted unfairly towards the players, by changing reality around them, and yet in the case of the former there was no reality. How fair is that?

To use a cliché from the former thread...

Why is ok to generate a Wizard's Tower from one's imagination on the fly, to plop it right down in front of the players when they inquire what is on the road north of town...

And Yet is isn't ok to take the tower from its originally planned location south of town and move it north when the unaware players ask the same question?

We've bounced this around our group in almost comical fashion for a couple months, it comes up during play now (which is really annoying... did you make that up just now or alter it?)

Im curious to hear some of your opinions.

OK, I'm going to lay out what I believe what a railroad versus improvisational GM'ing.  And the key element is choice.

A railroad adventure you have no choice, it will happen no matter what the input of the players.  There's also usually pre-made NPCs that will do the heavy lifting.


In an improv style, it's nothing but choice.  Some times, yes, the Wizard's Tower is there, no matter what the players choose, BUT the players will be affecting change, and even then, if the players don't want to go into the tower, then the tower sits there, probably forlornly, but the choice to go in or not, was made.

The element of choice is what makes the difference.

To me.

YMMV.

sigh... again?

We allready touched on this two or three threads now? Sometimes this borders on trolling.

It doesn't matter, if the group is enjoying itself.

Quote from: rgrove0172;934923Why is ok to generate a Wizard's Tower from one's imagination on the fly, to plop it right down in front of the players when they inquire what is on the road north of town...

And Yet is isn't ok to take the tower from its originally planned location south of town and move it north when the unaware players ask the same question?

I'm not sure "OK" is the right term, and I think it's all subjective such that there's no "correct" answer. It's mostly about how the GM perceives what is fair game or not in his game world. In my own games, if I had already placed the tower, then I would almost always consider its location fixed and part of the game world reality, so I normally wouldn't move it. I wouldn't say that a GM who decides to move it is "wrong," but in my game the tower's position and location is part of the game, and part of "let the game play out as it will" just like "let the dice fall as they may." The players would need to discover it (or not) based on the game world reality that I've already decided on.

I'd also feel completely free to improvise an encounter I had not previously placed/fixed in the game world's reality. I also sometimes create such encounters or small sites in advance, specifically for such circumstances. In my mind, those aren't "fixed" in the same way. They're not game world reality (yet), just potential.

Hope that makes sense. And just to re-emphasize: I'm not saying the way I do it is the "correct" way, it's just the way I do it.

Quote from: rgrove0172;934923We've bounced this around our group in almost comical fashion for a couple months, it comes up during play now (which is really annoying... did you make that up just now or alter it?)

Im curious to hear some of your opinions.

I think for a lot of groups, it is important. Note that your group can't "unsee" the issue now.

So, I think a few posters have got good replies, but I'll chuck my two cents in as well.

The reason I think GMs and players think it's important is that part of an RPG is player decisions affecting outcomes. If an outcome is predetermined "You will encounter the Wizard's Tower no matter where you go." then player decisions are irrelevant. The players don't even have to be there. Replace them with monkeys or wind up toys.
But if the players don't realize that their decisions are irrelevant, then you have the illusion of choice. Or, on the other hand, it's just that making a choice in some situations is not important. This often happens when the players buy into a scenario setup in the first place. "Go find the Wizard's Tower."

The simple solution to the Wizard's Tower example is to tell the players that the Wizard's Tower exists. If you want them to find it, then tell them where it is. Easy. Give them a map or a guard tells them. Whatever.
If the tower is a random encounter type thing, then plop it down in front of them, just as you'd do with any random encounter.

The setup "Go find the Wizard's Tower, there are three roads to follow." and then putting the Tower in the middle of whatever road the party chooses is disingenuous. That's where the players are given a decision point, and the decision is irrelevant. If I could sum up the problem, I'd put it that way. "Don't give players irrelevant decisions to make."

Good stuff guys, and I appreciate the thoughtful tone. It's a fine line it seems, heavily swayed by the group expectations and the way the information is presented.

In my game I don't want to do it because I don't like it and it makes my own world feel like it doesn't have "verisimilitude;" I'm breaking my own suspension of disbelief.

I really don't care what others do in their games unless they tell me I'm doing it wrong, in which case you all know the lyrics.

Quote from: Ratman_tf;934954The reason I think GMs and players think it's important is that part of an RPG is player decisions affecting outcomes..."Don't give players irrelevant decisions to make."

That's definitely a major factor in the way I run things. The players don't always know what's behind the curtain, but I think that presenting them with decisions that matter  makes the game world seem more real to them. It gives them a sense of agency. In my games, I think they mostly sense this through decisions that don't work out. For example, if the Wizard's tower is in one of three mountain vales, and they spend time and resources searching the wrong one before exploring the correct/true location, they have a sense that the game world is a real thing with fixed properties. It's solid, and they can interact with it in a meaningful way that isn't mere smoke and mirrors. I guess it's possible that a talented improvisational GM could do without the fixed reality of the game world and still maintain the illusion, but I personally find it easier to supply that "game reality" by have some elements of the game world fixed and static.

FUCK THE CALM!!  TIME TO MOSH BITCHES!!

The Living Campaign adventures are almost always the choo choo train. And they are extremely popular between the RPGA, Adventurers' League and Pathfinder Society and a smattering of other games who have Living Campaigns happening at home or FLGS for their games.

So while its easy to drop a dookie on the Railroaders, let's acknowledge that for many RPGers, its their absolutely preferred method of play. In fact, it may be the only style of play they ever encountered.

I may have said all this before in previous thread.

For me, I am looking for maximum awesome in my games. So when I have a 4 hour slot at a convention or FLGS game day, I do what it takes to make sure the adventure energy is rocking. I have to get a beginning, middle and end into those 4 hours and I've spent decades getting good at hiding the train tracks.

But at home, the awesome is the PCs wandering about discovering all the stuff I created.

Also, I don't make hexcrawls full of boring shit. In my campaigns, pick any direction and you will find trouble that will be fun for me to GM. For me, great fun is seeing which trouble the PCs decide to investigate and watching how that ripples through the setting.

BTW, I also cheat. I don't make worlds doing okay. I only run worlds on the brink, even if the "world" for that campaign is just a city, a nation, an island, whatever.  Wherever the locale, its not some hunky dorky place full of meh.

Wanna skip the Wizard's Tower and wander up the road to the Olde Inn? Great! The Olde Inn is being devoured by Ankheg's tonight, but the bandits attacking the place at midnight don't know that yet.

If the players have no knowledge of the Tower one way or the other, and thus no plan whether to find it or ignore it, and you decide to move it from South Road to North Road because you think they'd enjoy it more - then that's really no different then just deciding out of the blue that there is a Tower on the North Road.  It's Fiat.  You decide they see a Tower on the North Road.  But, it's Fiat that does not nullify player action or choice for the sake of your narrative.  Whether the Tower was created 2 minutes in advance or 2 months in advance, it's still just in your bag of tricks, ready to be used until you actually use it.

If the players have heard there is a Tower, but want to avoid it, and correctly choose the North path, but they reach it anyway, then you're imposing your will and using your powers as GM to override their choice for your own reasons, even if you think it's for their own good.

Personally, I tend to think the Tower's not going anywhere, leave it on the South Road and they'll get it later.  Or if I really think they will like it, and want to engineer something, I will engineer them finding out about it, so at least it's now a choice they can make, but if they don't choose it, they don't.

Any GM is going to have "What If" and "Man they're going to love this" scenarios in their head that never get realized.  It's just one missed opportunity, but it probably was replaced by one that may have even been better.  Even if it wasn't better, it was their choice, so it was theirs in the way that an engineered option would not be.

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;934968In my game I don't want to do it because I don't like it and it makes my own world feel like it doesn't have "verisimilitude;" I'm breaking my own suspension of disbelief.

I really don't care what others do in their games unless they tell me I'm doing it wrong, in which case you all know the lyrics.

The bolded half is the same.

The unbolded half is the opposite for me and my players. They understand I like to run PDF/print adventures, and they like the stories in the ones I choose, so they willfully, gleefully embrace the adventure. Sometimes, part of the adventure is convincing one character (character, not player) that they should actually join the rest, but that's actually a non-annoying in-character thing for this group. For us, the suspension of disbelief and verisimilitude (good word, difficult to spell before coffee) come from the characters and how they interact, not from the choice to or of adventure. (Not 100% sure how to word the last, but I think it communicates my thoughts.) :cool:

Or, to sum up what three of my players said after I discussed alternate game systems, "we don't really care ... as long as it doesn't get in the way of us role playing", the latter of which for them is being able to have fun with things like accurately playing their characters (needing to be convinced to participate) or, in character, slightly gonzo things, like cannonballing into the bathtub full of water, in the keep abandoned for decades, that happens to contain a water elemental, and live to tell about it.

My last D&D campaign went very well because I ended each session with a full discussion about what the PCs/Players wanted to do next. What was their next move? Where did they want to explore?

Once a unanimous decision had been made, the understand at the table was that I would prepare the next session based on the players' intentions.

Other than that, I typically just used random tables when I had to make something up on the spot or fed off the players' expectations and imaginations. Sometimes it is hard to dodge a few curve balls (I'm looking at you, Flight spell guy or the dude who routinely murdered key NPCs out of nowhere).

I think it is about the reasons why you put it there (basically unrelated to the time you put it there, but "on-the-fly" is too often too convenient a way to push things in a certain direction to keep your (storytelling smeared) fingers off) and how that fits to the actually or implicitly agreed on gaming style.

Quote from: Omega;934946Sometimes this borders on trolling.

"Borders on trolling?" Dude, the border is thirty miles behind this post and receding fast.