"How are the Players going to do that? Thats not my job. Thats their job. A lot of GamesMasters think of themselves as Story-Tellers but I prefer to consider myself a Conflict Designer. I create conflicts but I don't need to know how the Players figure their way out of the conflicts. That is where the story emerges and that is their department. My job as I see it is to provide an objective, location, antagonists and time-limit. Players drive the action with their decisions. I never know what my players are going to do. Maybe they'll kill the villain, maybe he escapes. Maybe they'll live, maybe they'll die. That's up to them and the dice. So why plan further than the next session? If I did I might be tempted to steer the game toward my preferred conclusion. But I don't want to do that. I want to be just as surprised as the Players."

Professor DungeonMaster,  Dungeon Craft, YouTube, The Reviled Society, Part 1 (Ep.291)

Ok. What was the purpose of this post? Are you interested in who agrees with this or not?

It certainly seems like good advice.  I have heard about people worrying about coming up with, or planning for different ways that players might try to solve problems presented to them, but it is the job of the players to "solve" the problems, complete the adventures, save the kidnapped people, slay the big evil monster, that sort of stuff, and then as the DM you just need to think about how things would play out, not pre-plan or railroad how stuff should work out.

More specifically, the subtlest of GM skills is incentivizing your players to do the things you want exemplified in your setting *without* removing player agency.

That's the balancing act - especially with players of different experience levels, adding to a third-dimension in terms of familiarity of the GM's modus operandi.

I have several noob players that truly believed they were roleplayers, but in reality they are just boardgamers that never really thought of their characters beyond a piece they moved around from encounter to encounter. So when I do my session-0, they're flabbergasted that we'd negotiate things they never experienced before in most of their RPG experiences.

Railroading is simply when GM's want to disregard player agency in order to force a very specific situation. This is reflexive from GM's that don't have the experience to make their worlds operate in a cohesive manner that goes beyond what most modules and AP's imply. They don't know how to fill in those gaps, and intially, they're *scared* to do so. But with experience, if they stick it out, they'll learn that's where the magic secret-sauce of great gaming is.

In regards to some of this, I have noticed that players get frustrated when their actions derail the plot, cause bad things to happen, etc. They then blame the DM/GM.

this is especially true with games that involve solving mysteries or problems (CoC, Top Secret, Necroscope, etc.) --if I play it straight as a GM, and the players totally miss clues, can't put the pieces together, or go off in a wrong direction, I can give them additional clues or hints, but the game is in their hands. It could go all wrong.

As a DM/GM you can be both storyteller and referee. You can be both judge and entertainer, but the agency is ultimately with the players.

The inverse is bottlenecking the adventure. I love coming up with a scenario and wondering how the players will contend with it. But I do like to have some idea of how they could solve it, or at least get around it. Just so I know it's not a dead end.

I actually disagree with that.  The DM should be open to however the players choose to solve the problem,  but he should never design a challenge that he doesn't see a way to overcome.  Otherwise he risks setting the players an impossible challenge.

Quote from: Mishihari on December 12, 2024, 01:48:11 AMI actually disagree with that.  The DM should be open to however the players choose to solve the problem,  but he should never design a challenge that he doesn't see a way to overcome.  Otherwise he risks setting the players an impossible challenge.

I'm very happy to have impossible challenges in my game, as long as the PCs are free to go do something else. I don't like the attitude of "It exists, therefore we can beat it". I love players who show some common sense and judiciousness in what they tackle. Of course they have probably picked up bad habits from railroad APs.

While it was not impossible, recently a PC group IMC came across a strong group of bandits waiting to ambush whoever came through a henge portal. The party was missing most of their Fighters, and most of the players are tactically weak. They could have eg left, or they could have waited until whoever it was appeared in the henge, then ambushed the bandits from behind. Instead they waited an hour, got bored, attacked the bandits. With little tactical skill the PCs split up, got surrounded, had the 2 Thieves in the thick of melee... it was a total mess. Complete lack of focus fire too. The hobbit thief's NPC goblin princess girlfriend was killed and they nearly lost several PCs. Luckily for them the enemy Fighter 2 leader only had 10 hp and eventually failed a morale check on 1 hp causing the enemy to flee. I'm fine with this being a "too hard" fight - and in fact it was the easier result, I could have rolled that the bandits arrived after the PCs at the henge and ambushed *them*.  >

Quote from: MerrillWeathermay on December 11, 2024, 07:30:18 PMIn regards to some of this, I have noticed that players get frustrated when their actions derail the plot, cause bad things to happen, etc. They then blame the DM/GM.

I've seen it occasionally where players blame the GM for the natural consequences of their own actions. Usually players love a "plot derailment" though. When I used to run APs I'd occasionally say "That wasn't supposed to happen" and their eyes would always light up at the thought that they'd "broken" the AP, eg they'd killed the main villain early, turned a bad guy good; anything the railroading AP writer didn't want to happen.

I've also seen DMs get completely wrongfooted by their players doing something they weren't prepared for. You shouldn't be married to a single course of action, but its a pretty good idea to be at least a little prepared for the range of likely actions your players might take.

Quote from: MerrillWeathermay on December 11, 2024, 07:30:18 PMIn regards to some of this, I have noticed that players get frustrated when their actions derail the plot, cause bad things to happen, etc. They then blame the DM/GM.

this is especially true with games that involve solving mysteries or problems (CoC, Top Secret, Necroscope, etc.) --if I play it straight as a GM, and the players totally miss clues, can't put the pieces together, or go off in a wrong direction, I can give them additional clues or hints, but the game is in their hands. It could go all wrong.

As a DM/GM you can be both storyteller and referee. You can be both judge and entertainer, but the agency is ultimately with the players.

We have a different mindset in terms of scope of game. For my campaigns - there are a bazillion plots my NPC's are doing. But the only one that matters is the plot my PC's are engaging in on their own. Player Agency is King in my games. The Queen is Context. If my players have their PC's go off on a weird tangent in an investigation - so be it. It doesn't change anything, it doesn't mean that other clues to the original investigation might/might not be uncovered, it simply IS and the world moves on, and the game unfurls organically. Even if it means they fail catastrophically.

With the World In Motion mindset, I'm never "unprepared". The reacts to the PC's, and its inhabitants act on their own. The "story" is what the players DO after the facts.

Taken to the extreme, of course it's bad advice. Coming up with problems that you, yourself as the DM have no idea how to solve, and then expecting your players to do it, is a quick way to end up with frustrated players.

That being said, I believe he's referring to the more conventional plot problems and ideas like... Okay let's say a group of villagers were kidnapped and taken to the local Dungeon by a tribe of Orcs. The Orcs kidnapped these people because they want the Village to hand over their grain harvest as tribute.

This *does* have an obvious answer... The Villagers give over their grain harvest and many of them starve over the coming winter.

But you can allow your Players to come up with a variety of different solutions for how *THEY* would solve the issue while saving the lives of the Villagers.

As DM you can throw some "Levers" that the PC's can pull to help them with this. Maybe the Orc Chief's number 2 wants to usurp him and take his place. Maybe the Orc Chief's daughter is also dying from a rare disease. Maybe the Dungeon they're inhabiting used to belong to a forgotten God and the right rituals can wake up the defenses.

You can come up with a couple of brief, plot threads that can "aid" different solutions to the PCs but ultimately leaves everything in their hands. They can still ignore all three of those elements I just named and come up with their own solution... Whether that be just going in and killing everyone, trying to enact some kind of negotiations between the two groups, or some other unforseen alternative.

As DMs we just have to make sure the world is immersive enough, outside of the Box thinking doesn't stimy our ability to run the game, while also not spelling everything out for the PCs. I think most of us here are Veteran DMs and are aware of this kind of stuff.

Now I do think it's good, mysteries have been brought up, because there is and should be only 1 correct solution for the mystery. If you know who the killer is, you don't let your players randomly decide it's someone else.

All that being said though, you have to make sure there are plenty of clues... MORE than you think is necessary to point out who the killer is. Players don't get to see the whole plot like we do, so in a mystery scenario you have to make sure there are ample opportunities to find clues (And you should never hide essential clues behind a skill check. Skill checks should only give Bonus clues)

It might sound good initially until you examine it further. And sure, if might work for basic games but if you are trying to craft a deeper experience, like a political Vampire game, or even a more complex fantasy campaign, one that has consequences from certain actions, then that simplistic advice just won't cut it.

I mean, I love it when players try and throw me, but at the same time, there are some things in certain games and scenarios that are immutable. Of course, there is probably several ways of accomplishing the preferred outcome. And that can be left up to the players.

Its excellent advice. I think alarms should sound when DMs talk about "story-telling" or "plot".

DON'T confuse this with "setting the scene/situation"

The DM should craft a situation that is occurring, the whys & hows & wheres, & have that play out.
The Players should then deal with that situation as they see fit.

Its fine for the DM to imagine how the players might deal with it, but never push or lead them towards the 'story' you imagined.

Thinking about this is essential actually because you might have missed an obvious flaw in the situation.
"why would the cult leave the escape cave completely unguarded, anyone could walk in!"

If the players rush in & fireball the tent containing the clues, & the actual excavation into the tomb, burying it all in flaming timbers - deal with it! (This happened to me btw)
Let the chaos happen, then place another clue that give the minimum to set them back on track.
They burned all the other stuff, tough.

None of us are perfect, we do make mistakes & oversights, players can completely go off on tangents, so dont worry if you do have to add some on-the-fly fix to get the game back on track.

But I do think its important for DMs to always be mindful they are the arbiter of the situation, not the story-teller.

Quote from: Riquez on December 13, 2024, 06:13:50 AMThinking about this is essential actually because you might have missed an obvious flaw in the situation.
"why would the cult leave the escape cave completely unguarded, anyone could walk in!"

I find this happens a lot when I'm running published material. Recently I started running Castle Whiterock megadungeon from Goodman Games. The suggested hook is "Lyssa the Apprentice has been kidnapped by slavers", and the slavers occupy the surface & the only known route into the megadungeon.

The PCs just went to the slavers, bought her back for 200gp (the highest sum I could reasonably come up with) and went home.

Luckily I'm running a sandbox with a ton of other dungeons, and after a quick recalibration the PCs were delving the Endless Tunnels of Enlandin. But I felt sorry for all the poor schmuck GMs who must have been blindsided by that over the years.