Post/Author/DateTime	Post
21st_Gunslinger 11-09-04, 11:50 PM	Hi there, Well I am Dm'ing and well there is a darn PC in my game who manages to foil the story line or my plan, quite often by accident. To provide a backround.... there are only 3 pc's and me Elven Enchanter Lvl 4 Tiefling Druid Lvl 4 Air Genasi Ranger/Rogue Lvl 3/1 interesting mix, and they all have a nice story backround to how they came to where they are blah blah. We roleplayed the meeting of the group, they shared what they were doing in the area---- Im in FR btw if u hadn't figured Mistledale to be exact-- Yes investigatin the drow incursion. The problem is, though its not a problem for them, is that I like my campagin to be seamless, i have the math for travel worked out, and i 'pre-empt' the characters choices so i am not caught unawares, but they manage to- unawares foil my plots for the story development. Anyway, to keep it short, they foiled my story, got more loot than their level would normally allow (as they were meant to return at a later date), (IM a stickler for realistic details) ADmittadly the player of the Elf is smart, in the sense he ALWAYS solves murder mysteries with minimal clues, manages to 'lucky roll' to escape bad things etc etc. I dont want to say, STOP SOLVING because thats not the name of the game, they got lucky, but I can see it fast becoming a trend and i fear railroading the story could prove nasty and detract from the fun of it, I mean who DOESNT love foiling the bady guys plans. Im not an EVIL DM and if they play well, think things through and even take risks, I reward them, because I like it and I believe it means they are enjoying the game......... suggestions to make it harder for foilment, please
Thomar_of_Uointer 11-09-04, 11:56 PM	If every important NPC has potions of invisibility, expeditious retreat, and cure blah wounds, they should be able to handle getting away from the PCs. Remember, one-shot loot is much easier to give away than powerful magic.
Fixxxer 11-09-04, 11:58 PM	To be honest, it doesn't sound like you should be making things harder at all. It sounds like you need to learn to adapt to the situation. Don't take this the wrong way, because I'm not trying to insult you or anything. It's just that part of the DM's job is to adapt to any situation and be able to pull something out of his butt at the right moment to keep the story going seamlessly. If you try to micromanage everything, you're just gonna wind up getting screwed when the game goes in a direction you didn't plan for. To put it simply, if you plan for the PCs to turn left, they'll turn right. There's nothing you can do about this except to wing it until you can get the PCs to get back on the left path.
Board_Rider 11-10-04, 12:02 AM	Well you could first start at making it more difficult or totally impossible to get to a certain area, meaning that the characters must find something (like a key, or whatever) to get into that area. Alternatively you could lead "obvious" clues for the PC's to find which become dead ends. While I don' care for railroading, sometimes it might be a useful, short lived tool for a DM to use in situations like this.
Dispeyr 11-10-04, 12:15 AM	To put it simply, if you plan for the PCs to turn left, they'll turn right. There's nothing you can do about this except to wing it until you can get the PCs to get back on the left path. This is precisely why, after struggling for well over half my 1.8 decades of DMing to try and keep storylines moving how I intended without resorting to heavy-handed railroading, I at last simply threw up my hands and began organizing my stories a bit differently. Instead of having an intended path, I just create the necessary details for each group/organization/"side"/etc. involved in the plot I've concocted, plan out each important NPC's motivations, determine what will happen if there is no other outside intervention, and dump the PCs into the mix. They choose what to do, who to work with, where to go, etc., and I just figure out how everyone reacts to their choices. NPCs still try to convince, coerce, threaten, cajole, trick, manipulate, strongarm, and/or seduce the party to aid them directly or indirectly, events that seem to have nothing to do with the central conflict have ramifications that loop back into the mix, and so forth, but all of that isn't even remotely railroading, just having the world live around the PCs. The only way I get majorly disrupted in any way is if the players perversely decide to have their characters go haring off across half the world for absolutely no reason whatsoever, and I'm lucky enough to have players that don't do things like that when there's no logic to it. :P
Nova_blade 11-10-04, 12:32 AM	I use a similar method to the above, except that at the start of the campaign/module I often will use some railroading in order to get the PC's to work together to get the first major central area (i.e. all are imprisoned, or all find themselves exploring the same dungeon, or all of them happen to be on the same ship that is shipwrecked). From there, it pretty much is open ended. I also include specific "Plot Points", which I may or may not use - usually, these are wide scale events that affect the PC's, whether directly or indirectly. Alternately, it sometimes is an encounter/event the PCs will have to experience. Some examples might be a dragon attack, the discovery of an ancient city, a meeting with a strange, slightly demented old man, etc. Another idea is to keep locations, etc. purposely ambiguous, and change as needed. So if your Dark Lord has an ancient artifact of power, but the PC's defeat him before the said artifact of power is discovered, simply reuse the same artifact for Dark Lord #2.
Roxlimn 11-10-04, 01:00 AM	I would suggest not to create a storyline or plotline but rather to create plots and story-settings. You have to realize that you need to give your players the illusion of free choice, as that's what players like to do in D&D. Without this element, they'll just play Neverwinter Nights on the PC. You can give them a choice of 3 or 4 methods in which to tackle a quest without being too heavy handed about it but the moment you start telling them what to do most of the time, you'll get complaints. Obviously, the way to not let them foil your plans is to plan everything they can possibly do! Leading them along 3 or 4 choice paths, I've found, is much easier than covering an infinity of possibilities.
21st_Gunslinger 11-10-04, 01:46 AM	thanks..... I will have to try the moduled part........ its just with Mr. lucky roll and resident brain genius, I will have to DM fudge a few things I am sure. Thanks
TommyBlack 11-10-04, 01:11 PM	Another way to deal with this is keep your attention to detail but abandon the concern for realism. For instance, the party is at a fork, and they can go right or left. You want them to enter a certain room next. So what you do is let them decide which is the best way to go, and either way it ends up leading to the next place they need to be. For instance, say you have a story where town A is being attacked by raiders from town B, and you want the party to get to town A and find out about the raids and go attack town B. Now, the party is on a road and they get to a fork where one way leads to oakvale and the other to moopville. If they decide to go to oakvale, it becomes town A. If they decide to go to moopville, that instead becomes town A. As another example, say you design a dungeon the party should go through. Now they hear about three different quests they can take up, one to save the daughter of a noble in the caves up north, another to examine the ruins of an ancient city to find a magic book down south, another to kill the minotaur in the labyrinth to the east. You can let the party decide which to go to, and then use your dungeon for whichever one they go to, just changing what's in the "boss room".
DeLoungeville 11-10-04, 02:45 PM	I just wanted to second TommyBlack's Suggestion. That is the way i've been doing it for several years (can't believe i've been playing that long) and it has worked out wonderfully. Just make sure that the PCs have the illusion that they had the "choice" and don't ever let them know that if they had went to moopville instead of oakvale then moopville would have been under attack instead. If you are really good at winging it then fixer is right (As he usually seems to be around here) about that aproach being the best. One of the best DMs i've ever had didn't even think about things 1/2 the time just showed up and ran the session, and they were great. I on the otherhand can't wing anything so i plan then simply adapt the plan to fit the PC choices. Good Luck -DeLoungeville