Railroading - Forcing PCs to take certain actions

[Curufea]

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[teh bunneh]

Re: Railroading - Forcing PCs to take certain actions

 

You might consider having the Duchess call her dear friend the Baron in for a consultation, and ask him and his people to perform a special mission for her -- whatever that might be (sabotage, infiltration, recon, spy-work, assassination, whatever). That way, the whole team "joins the war" without "joining the army."

 

[Curufea]

Re: Railroading - Forcing PCs to take certain actions

 

That IS a good idea. But maybe I'll have the secret order of Mages ask the Baron "I am not a mage, I am merely chanting hymns and waving hands for effect" Alden to do it...

He's had hints about them and was unfortunately not present in the session where he got to meet them - so this gives me a reason to have him meet them, while his player is present.

[Vondy]

Re: Railroading - Forcing PCs to take certain actions

 

Have the duchess recruit the Baron and his non-violent outlaw heretics to perform some sort of service for her that will aid in the war effort. It doesn't have to be outright combat (some sort of diplomatic/clandestine sort of thingt), but should be dangerous enough / involve constantine nemesis enough for this bodyguard wannabe soldier to stick close enough to his boss. And then you can steer them back on course more subtely, or not.

 

Or, if the player doesn't get subtle, you could always say: leave the party and I'll kill you. Kill you for real.

[Curufea]

Re: Railroading - Forcing PCs to take certain actions

 

The other question is - how often and under what circumstances is it necessary to force PCs to do things? Is High Fantasy more or less prone to it than Low Fantasy, Steampunk or Alternate History genres?

[OddHat]

Re: Railroading - Forcing PCs to take certain actions

 

The other question is - how often and under what circumstances is it necessary to force PCs to do things? Is High Fantasy more or less prone to it than Low Fantasy' date=' Steampunk or Alternate History genres?[/quote']

 

I sometimes need to semi-railroad the players.

 

In my home campaign I've had to straight out say to the players "Look, I need you to stay together. If you don't, I can't run multiple solo games."

 

In convention games I need to have the adventure begun and ended in a satisfying way in a given window of time. I throw together X number of scenes that don't necesarily need to be played out in order, and keep an eye on my watch. 30 minutes before the end of the game, no matter what the characters decide short of group suicide, they are going to end up in that final scene.

 

As with so many things, good communication and a group that's willing to collaborate are key.

[Killer Shrike]

Re: Railroading - Forcing PCs to take certain actions

 

The other question is - how often and under what circumstances is it necessary to force PCs to do things? Is High Fantasy more or less prone to it than Low Fantasy' date=' Steampunk or Alternate History genres?[/quote']

This has little to do with genre or subgenre and more to do with GM style and ability to move the story where they want it without forcing players to do things they don't want to do.

[Erkenfresh]

Re: Railroading - Forcing PCs to take certain actions

 

Let the guy leave the party and give him a blank character sheet to make a new guy the party picks up. Hopefully, he's not too attached to Thodric and can move on. Thodric could go on to become an important hero in the war and you could have NPCs mention him to the party so they can chuckle.

[Manic Typist]

Re: Railroading - Forcing PCs to take certain actions

 

I think everyone railroads at the start of all campaigns. After all, you have to get characters to meet, and give them a reason to START hanging out.

 

Most of the time, they are too diverse to make this easy without a pinch of railties involved.

[Fitz]

Re: Railroading - Forcing PCs to take certain actions

 

I note you said "leave and join the army" -- I take it Thodric isn't trying to get everyone else to join up too? Is Thodric so important to the campaign that you have to force everyone else to follow his lead?

 

I find it best just to lay it on the line in my campaigns; I'm not interested in running a bunch of solo campaigns, so if someone wants to leave the party -- fine, but either they start another character who wants to *stay* with the party, or they stop playing in my campaign.

 

I need players who are prepared to cooperate in a group activity. That doesn't mean that they always have to go along with what everyone else is doing, but it does mean that they have to make some kind of effort to facilitate the game.

[Vondy]

Re: Railroading - Forcing PCs to take certain actions

 

The other question is - how often and under what circumstances is it necessary to force PCs to do things? Is High Fantasy more or less prone to it than Low Fantasy' date=' Steampunk or Alternate History genres?[/quote']

I prefer to think of it as a giant pinball game - and the players are the ball. Its more of an exercise in redirection than railroading. You try to richochet them back on course. Of course, you have to be careful not to tilt the machine... and Fitz is right, unless your running a solo game its a group activity, and that requires players to consider, well, the group. And the GM. You shouldn't have to play pinball with more than one ball...

[Thia Halmades]

Re: Railroading - Forcing PCs to take certain actions

 

In my home campaign I've had to straight out say to the players "Look' date=' I need you to stay together. If you don't, I can't run multiple solo games."[/quote']

 

This really sums up what I do, but my foundation rules are fairly strict because I've had too many campaigns irreparably derailed by PCs who were behaving 'in character.' keyes bill makes an excellent suggestion as well, in that by giving them an in-character assignment, you've got a new plot hook, a satisfied PC, and a ready-to-rock squad of players who now have purpose and a mission.

 

In my epic campaign, I started out with all the PCs being opted into the Special Forces program, with the assumption they already received their requisite training. The SpecOps unit they joined is both non-traditional and very quiet about their true objective to the outside world. This gave me some automatic hooks, and a strong compulsion for the PCs to stay together. In HERO terms, the 'rules' I set were really pre-assigned disads:

 

- Loyalty to the Empire, (Common, Total)

- Loyalty to the Unit (Common, Total)

 

This prevented a great many inconvenient things from happening early on, including, but not limited too, one of players constantly agonizing over 'going home' to the Glittering Ice where she came from, which, obviously, she can't do. But she's just as vested in the plot (gasp! What will happen next?!) as she is in her character RP drama (gasp! I wanna go home!) The further the game has continued the more NPCs they've met and the more involved they are in the politics and the "real" events that are taking place.

 

A few well placed disads do wonders.

[Curufea]

Re: Railroading - Forcing PCs to take certain actions

 

This has been the main failing of the Vampire RPG, I've always felt - nearly every character is a loner and if they roleplay, there is very little reason to stay together...

 

But all these are good ideas to keep PCs together, other than attaching Wedlocks to their necks and threatening death with separation

[Thia Halmades]

Re: Railroading - Forcing PCs to take certain actions

 

OH, you mean Curse of the Azure Bonds? The single most blatant plot hook ever built. Good heavens. "You all wake up. You're all stuck. Good luck!" Talk about your railroads.

 

This is why I hated book 6 of Harry Potter - 95% Teen Drama, 5% Railroad. Glorph.

[Eosin]

Re: Railroading - Forcing PCs to take certain actions

 

There are a couple of issues getting entertangled. First, I'd take a crack at answering the direct question.

 

Let the character join the other army and tell him he needs to make a character who can hang with the party since this is a shared game and not a solo spotlight on his character.

 

 

Now, on with the deeper issues.

 

First, when you are designing a game there is a set of shared assumptions that have nothing to do with railroading. If I say build a chacter for a campaign set in a Conanish-Hyborean world and you pull out Capt America and offer to run him as the team leader there are obvious issues. The player and the GM have an unspoken social contract that equates to "We will endevor adhere to campaign themes to the best of our ability." Chief to the smooth operations of a game is adherance to that rule by everyone involved and communications of DM expectations.

 

Here is where we get into campaign ground rules which have nothing to do with Railroading. The example above is ludicrous rather than the subtle undermining that occassionally occurs when a player does not like a setting or genre. This kind of insidious game kill on the part of a player needs to be detected early and dealt with bluntly lest it destroy the work of the DM and the other players. It most often expresses itself as seemingly legitimate "But that is what my character would do" moments but infact the character was designed to cause disruption. It sounds like what you have going on in your game.

 

It might also be possible that the DM failed to communicate specific expectations at the time of character creation. Running a campaign of "All the Kings Men" needs to be understood by the players before they build their characters or they just might make characters who really wouldn't get involved in such plans. This is the point where the DM needs to examine his or her own failings and either scrap the current campaign for the one that they want to run or they must accept that the campaign they envisioned is not going to be run and go with the flow of what they do have. WIth each DM and each game the correct answer is going to vary.

 

Railroading, IMO, involves forcing specific actions after a game has begun. These actions impinge on player and character freedom as well as suspension of disbelief in order to allow the GAME/PLOT rather than the CHARACTERS take central focus. Moving a dungeon to a new location or a NPC to a different city so that players can pick up or continue a plot isn't railroading, it is improv but insisting that characters explore a specifc plot-campaign arch by refusing to allow the characters freedom to do anything but the DM mandated story is railroading most assuredly. This kind of forced audiance to your grand plan and cool campaign is pretty universally condemed as un-fun for those involved. Pre-canned adventures by thier generic design must include some motivational set-up but this is usually limitied to a strong hook to get the characters involved ~ this flirts very close to railroading which you will frequently find with very tight stories that don't allow for much latitude.

 

Anyway...

Campaign Expectations = Good

Story Set-Up = Good

Railroad = Bad

[Thia Halmades]

Re: Railroading - Forcing PCs to take certain actions

 

Eh, it's a matter of interpretation, really.

 

If you cheat, and don't get caught, did you cheat?

 

Said another way:

 

I've written PLOT ALPHA. Plot Alpha occurs in City Delta on the River Yadda. You, the PCs, (all of you, yes) are in an adventuring military unit. A few of you break off (the party du jour) and make your way towards Plot Alpha, when you suddenly say "Hey, you know what? Eff this. Let's burn the town the ground, shoot the horses and ride off on the women."

 

And I blink a few times, edit out City Delta as being a wasted effort, change the names of any NPCs you've heard of, and promptly make CITY EPSILON your new destination.

 

Which has the exact same plot as City Delta, i.e., Plot Alpha.

 

Were you railroaded?

[Eosin]

Re: Railroading - Forcing PCs to take certain actions

 

Were you railroaded?

 

That doesn't seem any different than my example of moving a Dungeon or an NPC to another location. Cannabilizing unused aspects of the game isn't railroading, I rather admire it for its conservation of effort.

 

[EDIT] To add to that statement.

 

Railroading would occur if the DM moved the nine hells to keep the players from destroying the city. In my game, railroading would be the characters walking away alive after attempting to destroy a city (5 versus 2,000 are impossible odds in my games but that is a whole different can of worms).

[Thia Halmades]

Re: Railroading - Forcing PCs to take certain actions

 

Than I'm not a big railroader. I've certainly moved plots to avoid them getting ruined, and flipped PC concepts from one point to another to avoid wasting the work, and other than the one time I had them all shoved off a boat (rather than die & end the game, which was a huge railroad but they had walked on the boat and were otherwise corpsed) they haven't been railroaded once in that campaign.

 

In Ravenloft, not at all. But that's what it's there for, much more open since there's no military telling them what to do.

[Curufea]

Re: Railroading - Forcing PCs to take certain actions

 

There are occasions, when PCs are just so darn contrary that you have to at least attempt a railroading. An example is a Cthulhu game I ran about 3 years ago:

 

The PCs knew the ritual was taking place, there were large amount of cultists taking part and the creature was gradually appearing.

The PC with the most mythos (and who had played CoC the most) rushed in, stared at the monster and went catatonic.

I repeatedly suggested that they either retreat, or attack the cultist as they attempted to complete the ritual. But instead, they drew guns and started shooting at the monster - until the ritual was completed, another PC was overwhelmed and the now unoccupied cultist overwhelmed them with numbers.

 

What I should have done, as the PCs ressisted thinking past heroic pointless violence - is railroaded them and had them flee from fear. The monster was after all so scary it drove one PC temporarily insane.

[Erkenfresh]

Re: Railroading - Forcing PCs to take certain actions

 

In situations where the entire party should die for doing something stupid, you gotta come up with some reason why they don't. Maybe after getting knocked unconcious, another party finds out what's going on and rescues them (this is especially good if the other party are rivals). Maybe they're taken prisoner, though this usually means the removal of their equipment, well at least somewhere safe until the party escapes and finds a cache full of their stuff (and their stuff only oddly enough).

 

In one campaign, the party was fighting the final big bad boss of the whole thing and lost. It was very close too. So, I decided that they could remake characters if they wanted to but the ones who didn't were resurrected 100 years later. And the quest to fight the big bad boss demon continues, except now they have to find him.

 

Anyhow, it's pretty easy to avoid railroading when you have a campaign setting book. When someone says "hey screw this, let's go find an inn, maybe if we take this road instead we'll find one" it's easy to go look on the map and figure out what's over there. For anyone who does world building on the fly, I respect you very much, it takes a good imagination.

[Curufea]

Re: Railroading - Forcing PCs to take certain actions

 

It's party members wanting to split up from the party that has me worried - not deviations from plot.

[Erkenfresh]

Re: Railroading - Forcing PCs to take certain actions

 

As others have mentioned, "that's what my character would do", isn't a very good excuse to leave the party. Either his character needs to have a reason to stay (fame, treasure, and women) or just have him create a new one and see if he backpedals on the decision.

[Eosin]

Re: Railroading - Forcing PCs to take certain actions

 

In situations where the entire party should die for doing something stupid' date=' you gotta come up with some reason why they don't. Maybe after getting knocked unconcious, another party finds out what's going on and rescues them (this is especially good if the other party are rivals). Maybe they're taken prisoner, though this usually means the removal of their equipment, well at least somewhere safe until the party escapes and finds a cache full of their stuff (and their stuff only oddly enough).[/quote']

 

I kill em?

 

We have a GM who will fudge to keep the party or party-members alive but people do outlandishly stupid crap in his game cause we know that he will railroad us into living. (Well, exept for the time that my 3rd level Paladin challanged the 17th level Eldrich knight). Natural outcomes, IMO, makes for a better game. I like knowing that if we all pull a bonehead maneuver in our Dark Champions game that there will be some blood. If Card Shark and his posse show up ~ we run. It is our only hope to survive.

 

Obviously, whatever promotes the "most fun" in your game is what works best for your group but if I want script immunity then I play a video game and reboot to the last saved game.

[Thia Halmades]

Re: Railroading - Forcing PCs to take certain actions

 

I'm with Eosin on this 100% - my PCs know that the fudging of the dice has gone away (considering how often they get critted) and that fear is a reasonable response to certain amounts of opposition (f'rinstance, any DEMON who's bigger than your HEAD).

 

If there is no threat of losing (i.e., dying) then there is no game. It becomes story hour about a bunch of people who aren't truly interacting with the world. Interacting with the world with sharp pointy objects (Don't Point That Thing At My Planet! - Thank you, TF2V) is a fast & sure way to get yourself into a large amount of immediate danger. Usually from other people's sharp pointy objects.

 

In HERO, all illusions of immortality (s'alright, I'll just jump on the grenade and let my HP soak it) go away. And that's an improvement for what I do.