The Train Conductor, or How I Learned To Stop Fearing The Rails: Introduction

Railroading is a justifiably dirty word in RPGs, but an over used one.

The main problem that people have with it, is that true railroading means that the player’s choices have no effect on what is going to happen. Most video games, and most bad RPGs operate this way. No matter how cagey the players are, they have to be fooled by the traitor so that they can go through the mission where they break out. No matter how much you dislike that clown, you can’t finish him off because without him the entire second half of the plot doesn’t occur, etc.

As typically occurs, this justifiable fault has been expanded to encompass any forms of plot or the like in adventures. The OSR folks eschew plot altogether, which has its own certain appeal, but doesn’t necessarily work for everyone.

Whether for good or ill, the idea of story, plot, and the ‘frustrated novelist’ approach to adventure design is now firmly ensconced.  The emergence of things like Paizo’s Adventure Paths have also pushed the idea of ‘course correcting’ adventurers into the mix further.

Now, I sympathize with things. As a kid I remember saving up to purchase the old 2e boxed set for Undermountain, and then having my players promptly launch off on a tangent that rendered the entire thing irrelevant.

Hurts, man. Hurts in the freaking wallet. I rolled with it, because rolling with it is what a DM does. But I can understand why someone would want to not lose out on the outrageous amounts of cash people shell out for pre-planned adventures.

As I said earlier though, people tend to interpret any attempt by the DM to salvage his preparation (precious, precious, prep) to be ‘railroading,’ when its not. Again, definitions are important. Railroading, to me, anyway, has always been defined as when the DM has a set course and no event of player choice or interaction will modify it.

Now, when I say disaster prep, I don’t mean crap like Schrodinger’s corridor (where no matter what path is taken, it leads the place the DM wanted it to), I mean actual planning. If you’re a DM who wants to railroad, you obviously did prep. That’s presumably WHY you’re sodding considering railroading in the first place. You want to avoid having your plans or story be thrown askew. Actual planning can help to avoid railroading, while simultaneously getting your players more invested, let them feel like they have an actual impact on the world (what most of them want) and not feel like they’re actors you’re forcing to play for you without actually giving them the script.

There are a few tricks I’ve learned for accomplishing this, and I think I’ll expand on them in other blog posts. I’m not very pithy, so don’t expect clever titles for these.