Quote from: BedrockBrendan;627853Yes it does, if you understand what "Midnight is BASICALLY a setting where Sauron wins" means. Even without the qualifier, I think it is obvious you are not creating the expectation of an exact match to lord of the rings.

We're not going to agree. No matter how many times the two of us restate our opinions.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;627857Your reaction is just as extreme as the one you are accusing therpgsite of.

Really, saying that a mix of Sandbox and Railroading is cool is more extreme than Sandbox NOW!

What an odd world you live in. Are you certain that it isn't just a case of you thinking anything that disagrees with you must be extreme? Or is this part of the illusion of even-handedness that you try so hard to project?

Quote from: estar;627859What you are missing is the fact they are fully aware that a war is going on.

I didn't miss that, indeed it makes up the entire question.

Quote from: estar;627859Our definitions of freedom are different. In my campaigns players are as free as we are in real life to make their fate.

So not at all then basically. This makes me ask why do you make unfounded claims as to their freedoms?

Basically the only difference between your Sandbox and a Railroad at this point is that the Railroad GM is at least being honest- "no you can't build an inn, it's stupid and not the point of the campaign", while you'll let them do it- and then burn it to ground wasting all their effort and play time.

So Railroads say no. Sandboxes grinds your face in your failure to live up to the GM's adventure.

Quote from: estar;627859What happen to the inn building Frodo is the exact same situation as my inn-building merchants.

What I find interesting is that earlier in this thread before I entered it (I believe it was this thread) you bragged about how much freedom players had in your sandbox, why after all they just decided to build an inn and that was not only unexpected by you- you were overjoyed by it! You held it up as an example of a Sandbox, and showed it to the world and did a little dance.

After forcing me to ask twice, you finally admit that it's going to be burned to the ground because that's what happens when you ignore a war.

Yes, your inn-building merchants are in the same situation as my inn building Frodo. The difference is that I didn't say Frodo was in a Sandbox, I didn't imply that he could get away with building that inn in a public post, and I didn't hold it up as a model of something special when in fact it was nothing of the sort.

Quote from: gleichman;627875What an odd world you live in. Are you certain that it isn't just a case of you thinking anything that disagrees with you must be extreme? Or is this part of the illusion of even-handedness that you try so hard to project?

I had a whole response to this, but it is honestly not even worth the effort of typing it.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;627894I had a whole response to this, but it is honestly not even worth the effort of typing it.

+ 1 Wisdom.

Quote from: gleichman;627881Yes, your inn-building merchants are in the same situation as my inn building Frodo. The difference is that I didn't say Frodo was in a Sandbox, I didn't imply that he could get away with building that inn in a public post, and I didn't hold it up as a model of something special when in fact it was nothing of the sort.

The mistake you are making is that it will progress like this

Step 1) The Players build the Inn
Step 2) The big bad comes in and destroys it.

How it plays out is that the players are well aware that there is a war on. They are not going to build the inn in one session and the war resolved in the next. The techniques in World in Motion gives the players ample warning to do something about it. That something being whatever they think will resolve the situation. It could be a return to being mercenaries for a while. It could be some other creative solution. I don't know what they will do. Although given how my players reacted to similar circumstances in past campaigns they usually manage to figure it out.  

The same with the Frodo example. I used Crickhollow for a reason. Frodo's player deciding to build an inn in Crickhollow has already heard Gandalf's exposition, already talked to the Elves in Woody End, already aware of the Black riders. So if Frodo's player and the rest of the party (Sam, Merry, Pippin, and Freddy Bolgor) decided to build an inn and have half a brain they already have a plan to deal with the Black Riders, the immediate threat at that point in the book. The Nazgul are not invincible as shown as they when they fled Buckland when the alarm was raised.

Assuming that plan worked, now they will have to deal with Gandalf returning from Rivendell to urging them to take the Ring to Elrond's Council. If they continue to refuse to do that . Hopefully they become aware of Saurman's plots in the Shire. Certainly Sauron will send the Nazgul in again or some other agent. Likely at some point Frodo's player will seek a resolution to the ring as he continues to lose sanity point or whatever mechanic being used to represent the corrupting influence of the One Ring.

Calling this a railroad is the equivalent of bitching about why wandering monsters and other dungeon deizens from the lower levels are bothering them the players when they decided to setup an inn on the first levels after clearing it out.

It not a railroad if is a consequence of the premise of the setting. Rather is part of the challenges that the players have to overcome if they want a successful inn.

In my own particular case, they will have to come to a decision about how to deal with the war because that part of what happening.

Quote from: gleichman;627881Basically the only difference between your Sandbox and a Railroad at this point is that the Railroad GM is at least being honest- "no you can't build an inn, it's stupid and not the point of the campaign", while you'll let them do it- and then burn it to ground wasting all their effort and play time.

The railroad is using GM fait to deny the players any opportunity of success. Yes for now the way events will unfold Nomar will fall. But that like step 50 and we are only still at step 20. There are plenty of opportunities for the player to change the fate of Nomar, preserve their inn, and even prosper beyond what they thought possible.

Quote from: gleichman;627881So Railroads say no. Sandboxes grinds your face in your failure to live up to the GM's adventure.

In a good sandbox campaign for every possibility of failure there is a possibility of success. How it plays out it up to the players.

Quote from: gleichman;627881After forcing me to ask twice, you finally admit that it's going to be burned to the ground because that's what happens when you ignore a war.

And you ignore the my explanation of how it plays out. It not inevitable that the players will lose their inn. They may come up with something that causes to Nomar to be victorious without going back to be mercenaries or fighting in mass battles.

Right now with the events that already played out in about two game years, both Nomar and the Skandians will fall to City-State. At the pace the players are going that is like 300 sessions. Likely something the players will do will resolve it in their favor. But there are campaigns that resulted in the player failing to achieve their goals and even in their deaths. But by and large the players that I referee are a pretty smart bunch of folks and they nearly always figure something out.

And they enjoy my games because they know that I won't pull the punches. Failure is a real possibility which makes their victories all the sweeter.

It no different then what you describe for your tactical encounters. You don't script the outcome of combat. In my campaigns I do the same thing both for both combat and the roleplaying side of the game.

Quote from: gleichman;627881Yes, your inn-building merchants are in the same situation as my inn building Frodo. The difference is that I didn't say Frodo was in a Sandbox, I didn't imply that he could get away with building that inn in a public post, and I didn't hold it up as a model of something special when in fact it was nothing of the sort.

Paizo sells a lot of Adventure Paths and design them well so that the logical choice is the natural one to make. The railroad can be made to work and work well. You write it up and hope your players find it fun and interesting.

Running a sandbox campaign isn't special, but it is different. In short your game is like the old King's Quest computer game that were popular. You start at the beginning and move to the end. And the path you take are limited and failing a challenge is the same as death as that where the game ended and the only way to move on is to play that encounter until you succeed.

Sandbox campaigns are like the Ultima Series. You make a character, you are in a big world, there is stuff going on, but you have total freedom to go whereever and do whatever. If you don't day but you don't succeed it not the end of the game. You go try again or you do something else until you figure it out.

You play King's Quest, I play Ultima. Both games are fun and both work equally well.

Quote from: gleichman;627846I have no issue with a spectum, what I have issue with is the way the term is used online- which admits no spectum and condemns campaigns such as my own as railroads. I think the term Sandbox is this site's version of the term Story-Game, a knee-jerk overused term that even the people claiming it don't fully understand the implications of.

Myself, Lord Vreeg and other who write about sandbox campaign don't write what you describe. But if you don't read people's full posts I guess you can't help it.

Quote from: LordVreeg;627855I will respond to this, as I said earlier that these concepts as absolutes don't really exist, they exist as ends of a continuum.  

I view it as little more absolute than that. To me it about how much does a referee get bent out of shape when the players trash his setting or plot. Does he go with the flow or does he meta-game to force the game back onto the right track.

Understand that I don't consider it a railroad if the characters are taking orders from a NPC officer when they are members of the city guard. That is a consequence of their situation, no different than say moving into a square and activating a pit trap.

Of course resolving a pit trap is straightforward. When giving orders through a NPC, I have to be careful that I am following the motivations  I written for that NPC and not my own whims as to what I think the PCs ought to be doing.

Quote from: estar;627914Myself, Lord Vreeg and other who write about sandbox campaign don't write what you describe. But if you don't read people's full posts I guess you can't help it.

Just for fun I went back and read the last few walls of text you tossed out to confuse things. It didn't change my opinion of you, your campaign, or of the Sandbox concept. It made things worse actually.

I make the following suggestions, do with it as you will.

What you write might have meaning only to those have already drank the Kool-Aid. A very Forge like mindset I might add. For others, there is but cause and effect, player action and GM reaction- and you and Lord Vreeg have spent a lot of time hiding it and bragging about how clever it makes you.

Quote from: gleichman;627917What you write might have meaning only to those have already drank the Kool-Aid. A very Forge like mindset I might add. For others, there is but cause and effect, player action and GM reaction- and you and Lord Vreeg have spent a lot of time hiding it and bragging about how clever it makes you.

I will make it simple you run King's Quest, I run Ultima III.

Quote from: gleichman;627917What you write might have meaning only to those have already drank the Kool-Aid. A very Forge like mindset I might add. For others, there is but cause and effect, player action and GM reaction- and you and Lord Vreeg have spent a lot of time hiding it and bragging about how clever it makes you.

You are making up an issue that doesn't exist.

I have stated numerous times that sandbox campaign are just one of several ways of running a tabletop roleplaying campaign. I do not write a lot about the alternatives because I don't use them often. Since the bulk of my time refereeing is spending running sandbox campaigns, I have some things to contribute. People seem to find it fun and useful. I refereed over a hundred players since the early 80s. Not all of them had fun but a large majority seems to. At least they kept coming back to my games.

I ran some sessions for Beniost and thedungeondelver you can ask them if they had any fun. Granted I didn't run a campaign but I referee the roleplaying the same way regardless of the scope of the game.

I sold a couple of hundred copies of my books. Got good responses for the most part. People seem to like my hexcrawl setting Blackmarsh. I  have 3,000 downloads on RPGNow and 1,000 downloads from my website.

Lord Vreeg has a similar attitude which is why I like reading his stuff.

Accusing me and Lord Vreeg of making Forge mindset is so far off base that it looks like you are just trying to make something up.

Quote from: estar;627921I will make it simple you run King's Quest, I run Ultima III.

Never played Utima III.

I reject your description of mine as King's Quest I, but I know you don't care what it really is so I'll leave it at that.

Can we please stop feeding the fucking trolls?

I mean, how much more clear does Gleichbot have to make it that he has absolutely no intentions of holding an honest conversation with anyone here? He's decided that sandboxes are Teh Badwrong and like a retarded elf-pretending Terminator he will not stop at minor obstacles like entirely missing the point of the hobby and the workings of human nature and imagination.

He makes Frank Trollman sound like a human being for fuck's sake.

Quote from: gleichman;627917Just for fun I went back and read the last few walls of text you tossed out to confuse things. It didn't change my opinion of you, your campaign, or of the Sandbox concept. It made things worse actually.

I make the following suggestions, do with it as you will.

What you write might have meaning only to those have already drank the Kool-Aid. A very Forge like mindset I might add. For others, there is but cause and effect, player action and GM reaction- and you and Lord Vreeg have spent a lot of time hiding it and bragging about how clever it makes you.

You keep on pointing at everyone else for not understanding and drinking the cool-aid and seeing everything they don't agree with as extreme.

Hmm.

Quote from: estar;627925You are making up an issue that doesn't exist.

I think we've reached a stopping point, you're repeating yourself and it's either flat denials or examples that from where I set confirm my original opinions.

Do you have anything new?