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View Full Version : Squishy games railroady and DM-dominated?



Dalebert
2015-12-02, 11:22 AM
EDIT: I changed the title of the thread because I feel like I made a mistake to call it "fate-based" when I really mean squishy, as opposed to crunchy. Squishy rules are meant to be easier than crunchier rules, but I have generally bad experiences with them so far.

"It's about the story."

That's what I keep hearing from one DM but I'm wondering if I'm seeing a correlation between DM styles and their preference for fate-based systems. I mean, I acknowledge the #1 rule that the DM is always right. You don't want to spend 10 minutes of game time arguing while people wait around to play. You make your case for something but ultimately accept the DM's call to keep the game moving. Maybe you bring it up later offline or at least out of game in a more casual setting like over lunch but he remains the ultimate arbiter because you need someone to be. It seems like fate-based systems are even more DM-centric because you really have so little structure.

In a somewhat crunchy game, I have something to go on. I have some idea of what my character can do. I have some idea of how big of a threat a particular encounter may be. The world around me feels more solid and real. What my character is capable of in a more fate-based game feels extremely heavily dependent on the DM's whim at that moment. Are my character's actions moving HIS story in the direction he wants it to go? Then he may be more lenient. Otherwise...

I've played in story-heavy games in crunchy systems. Often my creativity about my character's past and personality is stimulated by the mechanics. I once wanted a necromancer but I didn't want to be evil and I picked a race that gave me some mechanics I wanted. Both inspired me to come up with a story line for my character that the other players thoroughly enjoyed and that I got countless compliments on. The supposedly story-loving DM was provided with countless opportunities for role-playing and doing fun stuff in the context of the character I had created and he seemed disinterested. It wasn't HIS story.

It can also introduce a lot of tedium when there's so little structure. If you just hand me a blank page and say "Make a character", and I ask "What am I allowed to play?" and you say "Anything!" then I'm going to probably sit there for a while and eventually say something like "I want a character who can summon dragons to do his bidding." Then we will spend some time while the DM starts explaining exactly what he'll let me get away with and it will remain very vague. "Well, you won't actually be summoning this huge, powerful dragon that does whatever you say, but how about you call upon dragon spirits that can do something for you and then vanish after a turn or two, and you'll get better at it over time, and eventually you may be able to actually summon a real dragon... but probably just small ones like a wyvern and then... And of course I want some structure, so now we're making up rules from scratch.

It's like I sword-fighting a fart. What do I even aim for?

sktarq
2015-12-02, 11:40 AM
Depends on what you like to for fun in game.

No really.

You can generally figure out a basic power level that you start at and that will grow during the game. A burglar type starts by being able jimmy a poor lock in 10 minutes and has an eye for the shadows but will eventually grow to ninja/mission impossible type stunts. Consider that your matrix to measure ideas against.

And I wouldn't say Fate style systems are more DM dependent as more human dependent. Both DM and player have wider ranges of control. If your playstyle doesn't match the system well then of course the DM's boost will be far more obvious.

Eisenheim
2015-12-02, 12:24 PM
I definitely would not say fate drives things in a railroady direction. That certainly hasn't been my experience. Part of the confusion here seems like the difference between fate the system and a given game that uses that system. Fate isn't actually a game on its own. Unlike D&D it has no default setting, but every game you play using fate will have a setting, so the mechanics of fate are wide open, but if a GM just says "make a character, anything goes" that's useless, even in fate.

I'm running a fate gmae right now where the PCs are gods, and their enemies are other gods and primordial monsters.

I'm playing in one where the PCs are slightly larger than life heroes in 1870's america.

Those are both fate games, both clearly define what kinds of characters and powers are appropriate, play for both is narratively driven, and they are very different from each other.

As player and a GM, I would say that the GM in fate has as much or a little more power to direct the story than in a non-narrative RPG, such as D&D, the players have a lot more, and the dice have a lot less, since both player and GM have tools to work around the dice when they don't cooperate with a satisfying narrative.

Geddy2112
2015-12-02, 01:18 PM
Certainly railroading "storytime" GM's could prefer a fate based game, but it does not mean that fate based games are inherently railroaded. A railroad reading rainbow DM will be that way in any system.

Anonymouswizard
2015-12-02, 01:23 PM
In a somewhat crunchy game, I have something to go on. I have some idea of what my character can do. I have some idea of how big of a threat a particular encounter may be. The world around me feels more solid and real. What my character is capable of in a more fate-based game feels extremely heavily dependent on the DM's whim at that moment. Are my character's actions moving HIS story in the direction he wants it to go? Then he may be more lenient. Otherwise...

It's really the opposite. In most games I'm powerless to affect the GM's story if he's clever enough (and I have played with someone who is clever enough, never giving enough evidence to suspect the campaign villain, but also not giving us any reason to suspect him), or even just doesn't give me a chance to interact. In Fate, I can spend a Fate Point to interact (and if I can't effect the story I don't lose the Fate Point, I'd actually give an extra here as well).


I've played in story-heavy games in crunchy systems. Often my creativity about my character's past and personality is stimulated by the mechanics. I once wanted a necromancer but I didn't want to be evil and I picked a race that gave me some mechanics I wanted. Both inspired me to come up with a story line for my character that the other players thoroughly enjoyed and that I got countless compliments on. The supposedly story-loving DM was provided with countless opportunities for role-playing and doing fun stuff in the context of the character I had created and he seemed disinterested. It wasn't HIS story.

I won't disagree that mechanics can stimulate creativity, but in this case the system has no effect on SSLDM beyond allowing him to justify his railroading. When I GM Fate (or any game) I have the problem of players not roleplaying enough and so having to power through the plot faster than I'm ready and end up not having a satisfying conclusion (to the point where my planned Anima game is less like the 'climbing tower' I normally try and give my players and more like a one way road network).


It can also introduce a lot of tedium when there's so little structure. If you just hand me a blank page and say "Make a character", and I ask "What am I allowed to play?" and you say "Anything!" then I'm going to probably sit there for a while and eventually say something like "I want a character who can summon dragons to do his bidding." Then we will spend some time while the DM starts explaining exactly what he'll let me get away with and it will remain very vague. "Well, you won't actually be summoning this huge, powerful dragon that does whatever you say, but how about you call upon dragon spirits that can do something for you and then vanish after a turn or two, and you'll get better at it over time, and eventually you may be able to actually summon a real dragon... but probably just small ones like a wyvern and then... And of course I want some structure, so now we're making up rules from scratch.

It's like I sword-fighting a fart. What do I even aim for?

I'm someone who loves Fate, because it's the system where I can take a party consisting of a completely ordinary soldier, a dragon summoner (who summons, say, ancient red wyrms en mass), a highly intelligent cat, and the ruler of a small nation, and expect them to all have the same amount of influence on the plot (instead of the ancient red wyrm summoner being the most prominent). If you want more structure than aspects give yes you'll have to make up some rules, maybe the summoning takes a Fate Point or five and allows you to effectively use a character for a scene, maybe the dragons only allow you to overcome certain obstacles and use a weapon 4 attack (I would personally allow a weapon 6 attack, because I can just scale everybody's extras/Fate Points to compensate). You might end up with a Refresh of 1 and no Stunts, but you'll be able to pick them up fairly quickly.

Knaight
2015-12-02, 01:33 PM
I'm not a big fan of Fate, but I wouldn't characterize it as either railroady or GM-dominated by nature. That's entirely on the GM, and if anything they picked a system they have to fight against to implement a railroad.

AMFV
2015-12-02, 01:42 PM
I'm also not a huge fan of FATE, I'm much more into crunchy systems But I don't think that FATE itself is what makes the game likely to be railroady. I suspect that a DM who is likely to run a railroad, would be just a likely to do that in FATE as in other systems, that's more a matter of personality.

To be honest I don't think running a railroad is always bad, if you can do it with the players believing that they have agency, it is roughly the same as them having agency. There are of course degrees of railroading. There's forcing the players to walk down the exact hallway, and denying them any opportunities to feel creative, and then there's rearranging things so they wind up where you planned even if you hadn't actually originally planned on them being there, both are restrictions of agency, one is obvious and (in many cases) unfun, the other should never be something the players should know, and it should be fun for all involved (provided that the story is good).

Florian
2015-12-02, 01:44 PM
Well, the problem here is the "Anything" part.

Fate relies on a very specific unwritten rule, namely all players (that includes the gm) knowing the same background and being "on the same page" and an understanding that using such things as skills are not based on simulating imdividual avtions but the ability to influence the ongoing narrative.
So it is possible to play Tin Tin as well as Metabatons with the same rulesets and no changes, as lomg as all participants agree on the same boundaries.

CharonsHelper
2015-12-02, 01:50 PM
I would say that Fate isn't inherently railroad centric - but GMs who want to railroad their players would gravitate towards Fate based games.

In part this is because the type of GMs who want to railroad do so to 'tell their story' to a captive audience, and too much crunch can get in the way of said story. And more importantly - less crunch for players to call them on when they change world to fit their story.

But generally - bad GMs will be bad no matter what they're running. But - I would agree that they gravitate towards games like Fate in the same way that FPS jerks may gravitate towards games that let them spawn-camp more easily.

Doesn't make those games or other people that play them inherently bad - just that it makes the game more appealing to those players.

Disclaimer: I tried not to be, but I may be a bit biased as I prefer crunchier systems.

CharonsHelper
2015-12-02, 01:53 PM
To be honest I don't think running a railroad is always bad, if you can do it with the players believing that they have agency, it is roughly the same as them having agency.

It's also possible that such things would be more noticeable in a more 'story' based game like FATE. If you're playing Pathfinder, a lot of your choices have to do with mechanics, so when the occasional story choice is really a magician's choice - it'd be less noticeable.

Knaight
2015-12-02, 01:58 PM
I would say that Fate isn't inherently railroad centric - but GMs who want to railroad their players would gravitate towards Fate based games.

In part this is because the type of GMs who want to railroad do so to 'tell their story' to a captive audience, and too much crunch can get in the way of said story. And more importantly - less crunch for players to call them on when they change world to fit their story.

The thing about Fate is that it has a built in fate point economy, and while that generally ends up being used to subtly influence a number of smaller things, it's also the sort of thing where you can just blow fate points in huge numbers to just about completely seize the reins for a while. That's not conducive to railroading at all.

AMFV
2015-12-02, 02:02 PM
It's also possible that such things would be more noticeable in a more 'story' based game like FATE. If you're playing Pathfinder, a lot of your choices have to do with mechanics, so when the occasional story choice is really a magician's choice - it'd be less noticeable.

I think that the key aspects would involve using different techniques to hide the railroad. After all twists in fiction are often difficult to predict, and that's a medium that typically has no crunch at all. The difference is that in DnD (or similar crunch systems) The DM has an easy out: "You didn't make the check" whereas in FATE he would have to think on his feet more quickly for why a course of action wouldn't work.

Florian
2015-12-02, 02:08 PM
Certainly railroading "storytime" GM's could prefer a fate based game, but it does not mean that fate based games are inherently railroaded. A railroad reading rainbow DM will be that way in any system.

How so? A Fate based game can turn in any direction, any time, because the players have the means to access the story itself via fate points. It borders on being stupid/wanting to have a fist in the face to prepare and enforce a whole story arc the way railroading would need to.

kyoryu
2015-12-02, 02:09 PM
Any game can be railroaded, but Fate isn't really geared for railroad play.

As others have pointed out, the Fate Point economy really gives players the ability to get the result they want, at least some of the time. And "play things out, even if it's not what you had planned" is advice explicitly given in the Fate Core book on multiple occasions.

Fate really works best when neither the GM nor players really know what is going to happen.

AMFV
2015-12-02, 02:13 PM
Any game can be railroaded, but Fate isn't really geared for railroad play.

As others have pointed out, the Fate Point economy really gives players the ability to get the result they want, at least some of the time. And "play things out, even if it's not what you had planned" is advice explicitly given in the Fate Core book on multiple occasions.

Fate really works best when neither the GM nor players really know what is going to happen.

To be fair, I imagine that if a DM wanted to railroad in FATE and had that sort of personality. He would simply twist the results of the FATE points, or respond vindictively to discourage that sort of usurpation of authority. Bad railroading DM's tend to make it all about authority. It isn't so much about "wanting their story told" as it is about exerting authority, and that can be done as easily in any system where people are present. You don't need to exert authority on the rules, when you can exert it directly on people.

Florian
2015-12-02, 02:22 PM
To be fair, I imagine that if a DM wanted to railroad in FATE and had that sort of personality. He would simply twist the results of the FATE points, or respond vindictively to discourage that sort of usurpation of authority. Bad railroading DM's tend to make it all about authority. It isn't so much about "wanting their story told" as it is about exerting authority, and that can be done as easily in any system where people are present. You don't need to exert authority on the rules, when you can exert it directly on people.

How should he do this? The basic Fate premisse is the veto right for all participants.

AMFV
2015-12-02, 02:33 PM
How should he do this? The basic Fate premisse is the veto right for all participants.

Talking loudly, shouting, whining, leaning on other players to interfere, refusing to move forward with the things that happened with the FATE points, refusing to acknowledge those happened later, preventing any meaningful things from happening.

There is no system that is going to offer you protection against a bully, particularly a bully who also has partial right to arbitrate rules. I suspect that this sort of DM would start out by setting up a system of houserules designed to prohibit this from happening, but they may or may not.

As a note, I'm not saying that FATE is a bad game, I'm only arguing that the manipulation happens on a non-rules related level, but on a level of personal interaction, the rules are secondary to the people involved in this case.

Lord Raziere
2015-12-02, 02:37 PM
Talking loudly, shouting, whining, leaning on other players to interfere, refusing to move forward with the things that happened with the FATE points, refusing to acknowledge those happened later, preventing any meaningful things from happening.

There is no system that is going to offer you protection against a bully, particularly a bully who also has partial right to arbitrate rules. I suspect that this sort of DM would start out by setting up a system of houserules designed to prohibit this from happening, but they may or may not.

As a note, I'm not saying that FATE is a bad game, I'm only arguing that the manipulation happens on a non-rules related level, but on a level of personal interaction, the rules are secondary to the people involved in this case.

Thats not a Fate problem, thats a "GM is refusing to play the game with us" problem, and thus should be kicked out of the game.

if Fate makes the person all the more obvious to spot, all the better, they get kicked out faster. I don't see the problem with this.

Florian
2015-12-02, 02:40 PM
Talking loudly, shouting, whining, leaning on other players to interfere, refusing to move forward with the things that happened with the FATE points, refusing to acknowledge those happened later, preventing any meaningful things from happening.

There is no system that is going to offer you protection against a bully, particularly a bully who also has partial right to arbitrate rules. I suspect that this sort of DM would start out by setting up a system of houserules designed to prohibit this from happening, but they may or may not.

As a note, I'm not saying that FATE is a bad game, I'm only arguing that the manipulation happens on a non-rules related level, but on a level of personal interaction, the rules are secondary to the people involved in this case.

I echo what has just been said: That is not a Fate problem and Fate makes spotting railroady gms very very easy.

AMFV
2015-12-02, 02:42 PM
Thats not a Fate problem, thats a "GM is refusing to play the game with us" problem, and thus should be kicked out of the game.

EXACTLY! Most jerk DM issues are not caused or facilitated by rules and systems, they are caused by bad character, and facilitated by the people around the bad DM. Like I said it doesn't happen on the game level, rather on a personal level.



if Fate makes the person all the more obvious to spot, all the better, they get kicked out faster. I don't see the problem with this.

And here is where I break with you. Bad DMs of that type are easy enough to spot in ANY system, and they rarely get kicked out, people who are prone to that type of misbehavior also tend to be good at assessing who will put up with their bad behavior and who will not.

Edit:


I echo what has just been said: That is not a Fate problem and Fate makes spotting railroady gms very very easy.


I will echo what I said in all my earlier posts. I wasn't calling it a FATE problem, but a system independent one. As it's a problem of personal interaction, I don't think that any rules system would stop it, or cause it to be less of a problem. It's not happening on the level of the game, but rather on the level of the people involved. As such, the game rules aren't really a factor. I mean I've had one GM like this, and this generally resulted in large numbers of houserules to adjust things that weren't in their favor.

CharonsHelper
2015-12-02, 02:43 PM
Thats not a Fate problem, thats a "GM is refusing to play the game with us" problem, and thus should be kicked out of the game.

I don't think he said that it was a Fate problem - I certainly didn't. I merely opined that that sort of GM will tend to gravitate to a system such as Fate.

Lord Raziere
2015-12-02, 02:44 PM
EXACTLY! Most jerk DM issues are not caused or facilitated by rules and systems, they are caused by bad character, and facilitated by the people around the bad DM. Like I said it doesn't happen on the game level, rather on a personal level.



And here is where I break with you. Bad DMs of that type are easy enough to spot in ANY system, and they rarely get kicked out, people who are prone to that type of misbehavior also tend to be good at assessing who will put up with their bad behavior and who will not.

1. Yes, this is what Fate player would know?

2. really? oh well, I leave and find another group, no gaming is better than bad gaming, this is basic stuff dude. its the other guys poison if they decide to stay.

AMFV
2015-12-02, 02:48 PM
1. Yes, this is what Fate player would know?

2. really? oh well, I leave and find another group, no gaming is better than bad gaming, this is basic stuff dude. its the other guys poison if they decide to stay.

Well the general problem is what we see here. "Well the players could beat the bad DM with 'FATE points'", people tend to default to trying to beat people by working within the rules, even when the problem is not contained by the rules. I once had a GM in Shadowrun, who was continually weakening characters, lowering our starting points, over and over, every time we had successfully produced a character who could be even the least bit competent. We never complained against this directly (though we should have), instead we wound up trying to munchkin our characters more and more.

Trying to argue for a rules solution to a not-rules problem is never going to end well, and that's the same thing as saying FATE is better or worse at dealing with DM railroading and bullying, FATE is as good as any system, as it's not the interaction with the rules that's the issue, but the interaction between people.

Edit:

I don't think he said that it was a Fate problem - I certainly didn't. I merely opined that that sort of GM will tend to gravitate to a system such as Fate.

I don't think so, again this is a people problem, not a rules problem. A DM like that could just as easily twist a rules heavy system in his favor as he could bend FATE that way. It has more to do with people than actual rules.

Florian
2015-12-02, 02:49 PM
Sorry, but what exactly does that have to do with Fate?

AMFV
2015-12-02, 02:51 PM
Sorry, but what exactly does that have to do with Fate?

Nothing, which is my argument.

I was arguing that FATE doesn't have any bearing at all on whether a DM behaves like a jerk. It's system independent.

Dalebert
2015-12-02, 03:07 PM
Good points made. I made a mistake to use the term "fate-based". My concern is really about squishy rules versus more crunchy rules. I'm happy with a reasonable balance, of course. I feel like rules should be crunchy "enough" to have some structure to them. Otherwise, when it's left wide open to interpretation, you have a game that's even more DM-focused than games already are. In fact, I think fate as part of a crunchy enough (but not too much) system can actually be pretty cool. I apologize for expressing myself poorly.

Anonymouswizard
2015-12-02, 03:16 PM
Have we realised that we're all arguing similar things, ON THE FIRST PAGE?

@AMFV: I agree that some of us like to try and solve everything within the rules. For me this comes from two tendencies: normally knowing the rules better than the GM (in one case when I'd had access to the book for about 20 minutes and had one a quick google search, whereas he had had access for over two months), and being a stubborn idiot with a good grasp of decently complex maths. If given a chance I can create a character that will ride roughshod over GMs (not that I always do so on purpose, how was I supposed to know that nobody else had an array!?*), but I'll offer to redesign the character if asked to tone it down (I was told that I shouldn't try to beat everyone else at their own game, whereas I was just concentrating on my concept, which was an air mage [I flew as fast as the lightning powered speedster could run, was able to turn into air, and could control air, and had Intellect reaching the human maximum in a party with a psychic {a telekinetic!? I could understand if a telepath was smarter than me, but she didn't use her TK anywhere near the 8 INT on her sheet}]), but I've had things like a GM first ignoring what my character could do because researching the zombie plague isn't a decent idea in a zombie apocalypse apparently (how was I suppose to know we had to punch it into oblivion instead of find a cure!?***) and complained because only one player had given him a backstory when he hadn't asked for one (I responded to these by pointing out not only how he was using the system wrong, but his claims of 'this is in every sytem' [i.e. a 5% chance of a crit fail, standard target number of 10 if it's non d%] isn't even in half the systems I'd played and might not be in this one, have you even read the rules). I know my tendency to fight within the rules is wrong, but considering that I've only ever had to do it with bad GMs, I haven't had the chance to grow out of it.

Looking back on it though, my rather weird ideas of how games aren't all about beating the bad guy or following the yellow brick railroad (although that was at least a pretty enough railroad to make me forget about the train) being the root cause of it all.

I now have an idea of running a sandbox campaign set entirely on a really large train. Like 100 carriages the size of manor houses.

* I concentrated my powers in a, IIRC, barely legal array and then tacked flight and insubstantial on, whereas the GM advised another player to spend a lot of PP on Summon and Equipment when that didn't even work by the rules**, and he should have just bought two arrays: one for weapons and one for armour (which would have given him some points to increase his defences).
** The GM assumed M&M worked on a descriptive system rather than an effects system.
*** Oh, I've had several people tell me that my expectation of the game sounds far more interesting than what it was, makes me want to run my own zombie game using Fate.

icefractal
2015-12-02, 03:17 PM
The players can use FP to declare stuff, but IIRC, the GM has the ability to reject that. It's only supposed to be used when someone's making a declaration that screws up the premise of the game, or that the whole group dislikes, but a railroading GM could easily twist that as "going against my story is breaking the premise of the game". Or they could use the 'evil genie' method - "Yep, you call in your police contacts and a SWAT team is sent to deal with the cultists. Too bad the police have already been infiltrated by the cult - you just provided them more weaponry!"

That said, it's no worse than other games in that respect. However, I do think that railroading is more obvious and more annoying in a rules-light system, because you don't have much mechanical gameplay to fall back on. It also might be somewhat easier for GMs to slide into railroad territory when they don't need to override any rules to do so.

Florian
2015-12-02, 03:24 PM
Good points made. I made a mistake to use the term "fate-based". My concern is really about squishy rules versus more crunchy rules. I'm happy with a reasonable balance, of course. I feel like rules should be crunchy "enough" to have some structure to them. Otherwise, when it's left wide open to interpretation, you have a game that's even more DM-focused than games already are. In fact, I think fate as part of a crunchy enough (but not too much) system can actually be pretty cool. I apologize for expressing myself poorly.

Ok, see, the problem I do have here is that Fate is not, by any means, squishy.
It has a different focus and it is very very crunshy in regards to that focus.

Stuff like the skill pyramid, aspects and stunts are geared towards a "scene", not an individual action and in this regard, they work and they provide the necessary crunch.

As a Fate gm, I would never, ever, ask my players to check a skill for one simple task if that task is not part of a larger ongoing narrative. That would make no sense with this particular system and the accompanying style of play.

If you make the transition to this kind of thinking, then the hard crunch is there and nobody will fiddle around to circumvent this.

sktarq
2015-12-02, 03:30 PM
Actually I would FATE as a system is less forgiving of railroady DM's than many chrunch heavy systems because players can try to use the system to support themselves in a more flexible manner. This will either cause problematic DM's to act less problematically or to be problematic in a more obvious fashion. Do note this a relative effect - both will eventually show their true colours but in FATE there are more opportunities to force the issue clearly.


On the other hand a player who does not engage with system (by choice, unfamiliarity, whatever) will be almost entirely carried along by the DM- possibly to their annoyance possibly by design.

Geddy2112
2015-12-02, 03:40 PM
How so? A Fate based game can turn in any direction, any time, because the players have the means to access the story itself via fate points. It borders on being stupid/wanting to have a fist in the face to prepare and enforce a whole story arc the way railroading would need to.

I was saying that some GM's might prefer a Fate based system in the same way some people prefer the color red to blue. A railroading GM will railroad in any system-while some systems may cater to this more than others, the problem is the GM, not the system.

As we all pretty much agree, bad GM is bad.

Florian
2015-12-02, 03:49 PM
I was saying that some GM's might prefer a Fate based system in the same way some people prefer the color red to blue. A railroading GM will railroad in any system-while some systems may cater to this more than others, the problem is the GM, not the system.

As we all pretty much agree, bad GM is bad.

Think of me as being a bit of dumb, but I actually can't wrap my head around this.
Note that I don't agree that railroading equals bad gm, stuff like Adventure Paths run on that and they are great, but I do think there are systems, and Fate is one of them, where trying to roalroad is simply futile.

AMFV
2015-12-02, 03:55 PM
Think of me as being a bit of dumb, but I actually can't wrap my head around this.
Note that I don't agree that railroading equals bad gm, stuff like Adventure Paths run on that and they are great, but I do think there are systems, and Fate is one of them, where trying to roalroad is simply futile.

I don't agree, railroading (in the negative sense) is mostly the action of forcing the players to interact with the story exclusively on your terms, and as you desire them to. There's no way to prohibit this in ANY system that has a story teller or DM at all. Essentially wherever there is any kind of power, there is a way to abuse it. Yes, there may be less authority spelled out, but even notional authority can quickly become real authority in the hands of somebody gifted at manipulation.

I think that it's important to make a distinction between linear storytelling (where the story will proceed in one direction and alter itself around the player choices) and railroading (where the player's are forced to make the decisions the DM wants). Now this line may not be in the same place for every group, and it may change depending on circumstances, but it's certainly a starting point.

Red Fel
2015-12-02, 03:59 PM
Think of me as being a bit of dumb, but I actually can't wrap my head around this.
Note that I don't agree that railroading equals bad gm, stuff like Adventure Paths run on that and they are great, but I do think there are systems, and Fate is one of them, where trying to roalroad is simply futile.

The point is that, whether you're in a fluff-based or crunch-based system, a railroading GM will find ways to railroad.

If the game is fluff-based, it becomes a lot easier for the GM to simply "nope" a player's actions. That doesn't mean that such a game is railroad-y inherently, but rather that a railroad-oriented GM will find it very convenient. By the same token, however, a GM focused on player agency will be able to give his players greater freedom to go nuts. If the game is crunch-based, it means setting arbitrarily high difficulties, or presenting situations that would prevent the use of abilities.

In either event, the metric of railroading, as AMFV points out, is whether the DM plants a sign that says, "Plot this way, all aboard," and what ability (if any) the players have to go in another direction or pursue an alternative course of action. And that exists irrespective of whether dice are being rolled with any frequency.

Anonymouswizard
2015-12-02, 04:08 PM
I think that it's important to make a distinction between linear storytelling (where the story will proceed in one direction and alter itself around the player choices) and railroading (where the player's are forced to make the decisions the DM wants). Now this line may not be in the same place for every group, and it may change depending on circumstances, but it's certainly a starting point.

Or lack of player choices *grumble grumble*. I've had players tell me off for not having provided plot.

You mean there are zombies and a vampire in London*, and you aren't going to investigate? Apparently I have to spoonfeed people.

* As a member of this forum said 'no plot? There should not be zombies and a vampire in London!'

Florian
2015-12-02, 04:11 PM
I don't agree, railroading (in the negative sense) is mostly the action of forcing the players to interact with the story exclusively on your terms, and as you desire them to. There's no way to prohibit this in ANY system that has a story teller or DM at all. Essentially wherever there is any kind of power, there is a way to abuse it. Yes, there may be less authority spelled out, but even notional authority can quickly become real authority in the hands of somebody gifted at manipulation.

I think that it's important to make a distinction between linear storytelling (where the story will proceed in one direction and alter itself around the player choices) and railroading (where the player's are forced to make the decisions the DM wants). Now this line may not be in the same place for every group, and it may change depending on circumstances, but it's certainly a starting point.

You know, I'm not too much a fan of roleplaying theory, but actually, here it helps.
A true narrativistic playstyle does not need a gm at all, it only needs imput. Fate supports exactly that. The gm, when you fully realize this mode, is just a player amongst players and nothing else.
Sure, you're right, this doesn't stop jerks, but their jerkdom is nowhere as obvious as here.

@Red Fel:
The same answer goes out to you. In a sense, the power changes here, if you fully engage that kind of game. The basic situation is, that anyone at the table is equal and all have the same veto rights, so a simple "nope" is not for the gm to do, if not all agree on this.

We can debate on how that changes if someone, in this case a "bad" gm overrides the basic rules, bit that will lead us to a bery different situation.

BRC
2015-12-02, 04:12 PM
F.A.T.E, or any Rules-Light system, is not especially prone to being railroaded. However, I think that you DO notice it more when a GM is railroading in such a system.

For a game like D&D, there is a certain heft to the rules, and an enjoyment factor that comes from working within the system. There is a level of fun to casting spells, rolling dice, and adding up damage. Obviously, a good or bad DM influences how much fun you are having, but even something as simple as "Here is a room full of goblins, kill them" can be fun.


The downside of such a system is a lack of flexibility. There is not much support in the rules themselves for playing anything BUT a group of well-armed, experienced killers. Sure you can do it, especially with a good GM, but there is not a lot of mechanical support for, say, Courtly Intrigue.

FATE, on the other hand, is much more of a Storytelling system than a Game. The upside is flexibility, you can tell just about any type of story using FATE. The downside is that your game can only ever be as good as the story being told.

A DM in D&D can railroad the players all day long, but if they're good at running and inventing Combat encounters, and the group is of the right mindset, then everybody can have fun, and the Players may not even notice that they are being railroaded. The story could be as bland as "Go to the spooky tower and rescue the princess from the evil skeleton pirate ghost wizard", but the players could still have fun through mechanics alone.


F.A.T.E does not have that luxury. There is just not enough heft to the mechanics to let them carry the game. This means that, while a great GM can take a FATE Game wonderful places, a poor, or even Mediocre GM can't lean on the system to provide fun.

This is especially true because FATE handles Railroading WORSE than D&D does. In D&D, regardless of how you build your character, if you're taking PC levels, chances are you're going to be good at fighting. Just about every PC class gets better at combat as they level up, and you have to be trying pretty hard to make a character with no combat aptitude whatsoever.
So, a Railroading GM can throw Combat at the players, and everybody will be able to contribute.

FATE, not so much. Combat, Diplomacy, investigation, research, ect, are all equally supported, and function using very similar, if not identical, mechanics. This means that Railroading becomes far more noticeable, as your diplomat with no combat skills suddenly finds themselves up against people or things with no interest in negotiation. As the story stubbornly resists all attempts to deviate from the GM's plan, you realize that you're on the rail.


A good GM can get away with some railroading by making it so that their intended path is the one that the Players would have decided to take anyway. This is easier in D&D, where everybody is at least somewhat capable of fighting, as well as an understanding that the game is going to be about fighting Monsters. In FATE, that understanding does not necessarily exist. So, something that might be acceptable in D&D (The Macguffin is in a place full of mindless monsters, you're going to have to fight your way through), becomes railroading in FATE (Oh, yeah, the monsters are mindless so we can't talk our way through, and we can't sneak our way through, and there is nothing to investigate. ALL ABOARD THE PLOT TRAIN! CHUGGA CHUGGA CHUGGA!).


So yeah: I don't think Railroading GMs are drawn to FATE, I think you just notice it a lot more.

AMFV
2015-12-02, 04:14 PM
Or lack of player choices *grumble grumble*. I've had players tell me off for not having provided plot.

You mean there are zombies and a vampire in London*, and you aren't going to investigate? Apparently I have to spoonfeed people.

* As a member of this forum said 'no plot? There should not be zombies and a vampire in London!'

Typically what I aim for is to have a series of plot hooks of increasing obviousness. If the players aren't interested in one hook, I usually either try to make it more obvious, or I prod them for a different hook. It also helps to ask them about what kind of game they're looking for, and what their out of character goals are for their character, then you can get a sense for what they want.

If there aren't responding to really obvious hooks (like having them get attacked by zombies, or the vampire), then maybe you should move them in a different direction.

So in your example my plot hook hint progression would be something like this:

A.) Vague rumors (a la AD&D adventures), I may even include more than one set, so that players can kind of set what they're actually chasing.

B.) Offering the players a job investigating said phenomena, or alternatively having some evidence of it right in front of them. Like finding a person who's been bitten by a vampire, seeing a person infected with zombism escape from the hospital. At this point you should ask the players if the plot is just not interesting to them, get a feel for why they aren't pursuing it.

C.) The big guns, this is if they aren't following the others. Have the players get attacked by one of the supernaturals. If they are still not engaging the plot at this point, try a different plot. Definitely engage the players in direct discussion, if they aren't into it, then they will need something completely different.

Edit:


You know, I'm not too much a fan of roleplaying theory, but actually, here it helps.
A true narrativistic playstyle does not need a gm at all, it only needs imput. Fate supports exactly that. The gm, when you fully realize this mode, is just a player amongst players and nothing else.
Sure, you're right, this doesn't stop jerks, but their jerkdom is nowhere as obvious as here.

If the bad DM stories on this forum have taught us anything, is that jerk behavior on the part of a DM is easy enough to spot in any system. I don't think rules light systems have any real advantage in that point. Again because it's a person that's creating the problem, the social cues will be obvious even in a system that completely backs their railroading.

Florian
2015-12-02, 04:22 PM
@AMFV:

Fate is anything, but it is not "rules light". It has way more strikt rules on how you play than D&D and it is way more concerned on how you interact with the actual story than anything else.

It is a common mistake from "veteran" roleplayers who switch to that system to consider it rules light because it doesn't focus on individual tasks.

Anonymouswizard
2015-12-02, 04:22 PM
Typically what I aim for is to have a series of plot hooks of increasing obviousness. If the players aren't interested in one hook, I usually either try to make it more obvious, or I prod them for a different hook. It also helps to ask them about what kind of game they're looking for, and what their out of character goals are for their character, then you can get a sense for what they want.

If there aren't responding to really obvious hooks (like having them get attacked by zombies, or the vampire), then maybe you should move them in a different direction.

So in your example my plot hook hint progression would be something like this:

A.) Vague rumors (a la AD&D adventures), I may even include more than one set, so that players can kind of set what they're actually chasing.

B.) Offering the players a job investigating said phenomena, or alternatively having some evidence of it right in front of them. Like finding a person who's been bitten by a vampire, seeing a person infected with zombism escape from the hospital. At this point you should ask the players if the plot is just not interesting to them, get a feel for why they aren't pursuing it.

C.) The big guns, this is if they aren't following the others. Have the players get attacked by one of the supernaturals. If they are still not engaging the plot at this point, try a different plot. Definitely engage the players in direct discussion, if they aren't into it, then they will need something completely different.

I think part of the problem is that in my last game I had started each session with a 'plot over here' sign (because the one time I turned up ready to run a session based on a scenario a player had got the group into, the player dropped out of the campaign and I had to fall back on advancing the campaign plot, nobody gave me hooks again). I tried a sign saying 'plot over here' (being attacked by zombies, the vampire saying ominous things, a literal alien god saying 'you should do something about this' and giving them a book that had hints), and the closest the game got to dealing with the plot is a side thing intended to make recovering from the vampire attack more difficult. They complained there was no plot after all of this.

AMFV
2015-12-02, 04:25 PM
@AMFV:

Fate is anything, but it is not "rules light". It has way more strikt rules on how you play than D&D and it is way more concerned on how you interact with the actual story than anything else.

It is a common mistake from "veteran" roleplayers who switch to that system to consider it rules light because it doesn't focus on individual tasks.

Well the reason I was making the distinction between rules light and crunchy, is that is what the OP intended and why he changed the title of the thread. I believe you that FATE isn't rules-light. My point still stands, the issue is an issue of interaction not dependent on the rules, so the rules aren't really the most significant thing. One system is as susceptible as another.

Florian
2015-12-02, 04:35 PM
Well the reason I was making the distinction between rules light and crunchy, is that is what the OP intended and why he changed the title of the thread. I believe you that FATE isn't rules-light. My point still stands, the issue is an issue of interaction not dependent on the rules, so the rules aren't really the most significant thing. One system is as susceptible as another.

The OP simply is wrong.
What we do talk about here is "Player Empowerment" and a system that supports that.
Regular D&D players confuse that with "Rules Empowerment", but that is not the thing with Fate, not is it the same.
Crunch in the D&D sense means being able to chose one action that is covered by the rules and see it through to the bitter end.
Crunch in the Fate sense means chosing a course of action and declaring it "right", thereby seeing it thru to the bitter end.

AMFV
2015-12-02, 04:36 PM
The OP simply is wrong.
What we do talk about here is "Player Empowerment" and a system that supports that.
Regular D&D players confuse that with "Rules Empowerment", but that is not the thing with Fate, not is it the same.
Crunch in the D&D sense means being able to chose one action that is covered by the rules and see it through to the bitter end.
Crunch in the Fate sense means chosing a course of action and declaring it "right", thereby seeing it thru to the bitter end.

Well the OP noted that, and changed the thread title, and documented that in the first post. He intended it to mean Rules-Lite vs. Crunchy, Not really FATE vs. D&D, I suspect as a non-veteran player, he may have made the same mistake that veterans often do. And we should probably move the discussion towards what he intended, if at all possible.

Florian
2015-12-02, 04:54 PM
Well the OP noted that, and changed the thread title, and documented that in the first post. He intended it to mean Rules-Lite vs. Crunchy, Not really FATE vs. D&D, I suspect as a non-veteran player, he may have made the same mistake that veterans often do. And we should probably move the discussion towards what he intended, if at all possible.

See, this is the point where we have very divergent views.
I see any game that needs a gm to function, especially if it has the need to empower said gm, as a "squishy" game system.

Lord Raziere
2015-12-02, 05:00 PM
I don't agree, railroading (in the negative sense) is mostly the action of forcing the players to interact with the story exclusively on your terms, and as you desire them to. There's no way to prohibit this in ANY system that has a story teller or DM at all. Essentially wherever there is any kind of power, there is a way to abuse it. Yes, there may be less authority spelled out, but even notional authority can quickly become real authority in the hands of somebody gifted at manipulation.


so we should listen to you because of a hypothetical jerk who is really good at socially manipulating people?

where are you gaming that is so bad that its filled with complete sociopaths who always try to outright abuse their power? :smallconfused: because Fate is founded on the assumption that we're all trusting each other here and cooperating with one another. not that the GM is TEH MASTEH. as you seem to believe.

AMFV
2015-12-02, 05:15 PM
See, this is the point where we have very divergent views.
I see any game that needs a gm to function, especially if it has the need to empower said gm, as a "squishy" game system.

Well then you are using an extremely non-standard definition. Typically here, Squishy means that there aren't a lot of rules, and many things tend to be made up on the spot. Crunchy means more rules and guidelines. Like the difference between freeform roleplaying and Palladium.


so we should listen to you because of a hypothetical jerk who is really good at socially manipulating people?

where are you gaming that is so bad that its filled with complete sociopaths who always try to outright abuse their power? :smallconfused: because Fate is founded on the assumption that we're all trusting each other here and cooperating with one another. not that the GM is TEH MASTEH. as you seem to believe.

Here's the thing. D&D is founded on THAT VERY SAME ASSUMPTION, As really is every single group activity. And all group activities contain people that can become jerks. There are even people who are not jerks in other environments that will become jerks in particular activities. Try organizing a game of flag football. It is very possible that you will find out that one of your friends is a total jerk, when competitive sports are involved.

I don't see what you're disagreeing with here.

Do you submit that people can't be manipulative bullies? Or that a particular set of rules IN A GAME would stop somebody who is probably bullying OUTSIDE THE GAME? What is it that you're arguing.

Heck, even specific rules against things don't prevent them from happening in real games, that's why referees and enforcement is so important. And in most roleplaying systems either the DM, or the group majority is charged with that. So if the DM is abusing that, either the whole group needs to complain about it (which is less likely as per the bystander principle and a few others that keep people from objecting to people in authority), or the DM himself needs to police himself (thoroughly unlikely if he really is a jerk).

Look I have nothing against FATE, or against any squishy system, nothing at all. I'm just saying that if there's a group where one person is a bullying jerk, then he's going to be a bullying jerk in any system, FATE or D&D, or what-have-you.

Lord Raziere
2015-12-02, 05:22 PM
because you seem to think that once the jerk is there, its hopeless and the game is ruined forever....when you can just y'know.....kick him out.....leave.....call him out on it....so you moved the goalposts and now say the jerk, is not just ANY jerk, they are a jerk who is really good at social manipulation. which sounds to me like the hypothetical jerk your talking about is sounding more and more like an improbable sociopath that is at the very least unlikely. you just seem to be so insistent on being unhappy and negative about this.

Florian
2015-12-02, 05:38 PM
Well then you are using an extremely non-standard definition. Typically here, Squishy means that there aren't a lot of rules, and many things tend to be made up on the spot. Crunchy means more rules and guidelines. Like the difference between freeform roleplaying and Palladium.

You know that there are cultural differences and D&D-style games are not considered to be mainstream everywhere?

AMFV
2015-12-02, 05:39 PM
because you seem to think that once the jerk is there, its hopeless and the game is ruined forever....when you can just y'know.....kick him out.....leave.....call him out on it....so you moved the goalposts and now say the jerk, is not just ANY jerk, they are a jerk who is really good at social manipulation. which sounds to me like the hypothetical jerk your talking about is sounding more and more like an improbable sociopath that is at the very least unlikely. you just seem to be so insistent on being unhappy and negative about this.

That wasn't at all what I was saying. We were not discussing any particular scenario. Rather the likelihood that somebody would be able to be a jerk in a particular scenario. If you'd like I'll present some, which may clear it up fro you.

Scenario A.)

I'm playing a D&D game with my wife and her friends. The DM is my wife's closest friend, and my wife is very insistent that I play. The DM goes on long rants about various political topics, and her games are always bent to those ends. When I try to act in a manner she doesn't approve of, I'm simply ignored. She frequently dictates my character's actions to me, and to the other members of the group.

I try to bring this up, but everybody seems to really enjoy it. I ask my wife if she'd mind if I'd leave, and she says that it would be something that would bother her, since D&D is such a big part of her life. So what should I do? I can't kick the player out, I can't leave, and the bullying is getting worse.

Scenario B.)

I'm invited to a group with one of my friends. As play goes on my friend starts to get more and more controlling. The story lines are getting more and more grandiose, NPCs are being given the spot light increasingly often. But my friend is a good storyteller, and it seems like everyone else is really enjoying the game, even though we are now reduced to the level of secondary characters.

When I bring this up with my friend, he apologizes, and then things change, for about one session, then they go back to normal. Other people have complained intermittently, but not at the same time, and they tend to be enjoying themselves for the most part. My friend is deeply sensitive, and has said he would likely stop DMing altogether if I left, and everyone else is having fun. What should I do?

There you go, two scenarios where things aren't nearly as black and white as you suggest, both are realistic, and definitely within the realm of possibility. And neither of them have an easy solution. Both those scenarios are also notably system independent (I did say D&D in one, but that isn't really pertinent), they could happen (and do happen) in all game systems.

Edit

You know that there are cultural differences and D&D-style games are not considered to be mainstream everywhere?

Yes, but DM and Players is a fairly common dichotomy. And on THIS forum, those words have the specific meanings I mentioned, which means that if you use other meanings or assume others are doing so, you're going to confuse everybody, as you did.

nedz
2015-12-02, 05:43 PM
Talking loudly, shouting, whining, leaning on other players to interfere, refusing to move forward with the things that happened with the FATE points, refusing to acknowledge those happened later, preventing any meaningful things from happening.

There is no system that is going to offer you protection against a bully, particularly a bully who also has partial right to arbitrate rules. I suspect that this sort of DM would start out by setting up a system of houserules designed to prohibit this from happening, but they may or may not.

There are other ways to railroad rather than relying on intimidation.
Examples:

The DM could be persuasive and subtly manipulate the players.
They could have some players who are very predictable, and then simply feed them the appropriate stimuli.
They could run an All roads lead to Rome type of world where the players choices all produce the same results.
They could run a narrative style game where things happen because:plot rather than for any mechanical reason.

Many of the above styles can be used to create the illusion of choice.

AMFV
2015-12-02, 05:46 PM
There are other ways to railroad rather than relying on intimidation.
Examples:

The DM could be persuasive and subtly manipulate the players.
They could have some players who are very predictable, and then simply feed them the appropriate stimuli.
They could run an All roads lead to Rome type of world where the players choices all produce the same results.
They could run a narrative style game where things happen because:plot rather than for any mechanical reason.

Many of the above styles can be used to create the illusion of choice.

True. And to be fair, my examples actually both focused on those sorts of things (at least in my most recent post). The intimidation was more because we were discussing particular kind of jerkish behavior (not all railroading is inherently that, to my thinking), that does rely on being able to influence people. It's only the things that popped into my head that were the manipulative things.

Regardless, I would argue that your examples are as system-independent as mine are, and would be equally possible in almost any system.

sktarq
2015-12-02, 06:29 PM
AMFV: I'd agree all the way up to the point of the word "equally" in your last line.

Present in all certainly but not necessarily with equal ease. Railroading requires time to spot most of the time and systems that are more player cooperative storytelling (be they Fate, or the optional players can declare a definition of an undefined aspect of world type rules in the back of the Trinity books) are far easier to force the DM to expose themselves as what they are early. I'd also say there is a correlation between squishy rule sets and such player-defines-world cooperative game effects. Thus squishy rule sets (on average) allow DM railroading to be more obvious, and thus to be dealt with faster than a crunch heavy system.

I would say that such squishy system may attract certain kinds of bad GM's (I want to tell MY story types in particular) but I think the flexibility given to the players is a greater tool for dealing with railroading as a specific problem than the DM gains.

AMFV
2015-12-02, 06:39 PM
AMFV: I'd agree all the way up to the point of the word "equally" in your last line.

Present in all certainly but not necessarily with equal ease. Railroading requires time to spot most of the time and systems that are more player cooperative storytelling (be they Fate, or the optional players can declare a definition of an undefined aspect of world type rules in the back of the Trinity books) are far easier to force the DM to expose themselves as what they are early. I'd also say there is a correlation between squishy rule sets and such player-defines-world cooperative game effects. Thus squishy rule sets (on average) allow DM railroading to be more obvious, and thus to be dealt with faster than a crunch heavy system.

I would say that such squishy system may attract certain kinds of bad GM's (I want to tell MY story types in particular) but I think the flexibility given to the players is a greater tool for dealing with railroading as a specific problem than the DM gains.

Again, the railroading is not a system problem. It's an out-of-game problem. As an out of game problem, there is not a set of rules in the universe that could not be circumvented to that purpose by somebody clever enough or manipulative enough, or aggreesive enough.

As far as "noticing" it, you're going to realize it's happening in ANY system fairly rapidly. Read through the "Bad DM" stories thread, I don't recall a single "I didn't realize he was railroading until..." almost all of those stories are "I ignored the red flags right at the beginning" railroading is absolutely not hard to spot. It isn't easy to cleverly hide with D&D, or with any stem.

Furthermore, I submit that if you don't realize that the railroading is there, it's mostly irrelevant. If it isn't affecting you enough for you to even realize it's happening, then who cares?

nedz
2015-12-02, 06:40 PM
Regardless, I would argue that your examples are as system-independent as mine are, and would be equally possible in almost any system.

Agreed, though some approaches may work better, for the rail-roader, in different systems.

AMFV
2015-12-02, 06:42 PM
Agreed, though some approaches may work better, for the rail-roader, in different systems.

I will certainly concede that point. I suspect that is why some people view certain systems as easier to abuse, because they notice certain issues more readily.

nedz
2015-12-02, 07:20 PM
I will certainly concede that point. I suspect that is why some people view certain systems as easier to abuse, because they notice certain issues more readily.

That could well be true because Rail-roading which isn't detected is just simulated agency.

sktarq
2015-12-03, 01:01 AM
Again, the railroading is not a system problem. It's an out-of-game problem. As an out of game problem, there is not a set of rules in the universe that could not be circumvented to that purpose by somebody clever enough or manipulative enough, or aggreesive enough

Not contesting that with sufficient aggression, manipulations, etc that any system can be DM railroaded but that does preclude a difference in difficulty based on the system. Any building can be destroyed but a shack is easier than a bunker. And while Railroading is an out of game problem at its core many of the strongest means of combating it are in game. Railroading can be foiled by in game actions-and such actions are easier to force and make stick in "squishier" rule set IMH. And as for noticing it-in many of the crunchier rule systems a good railroader will only have to push or manipulate the game a few times a session where in squishier games being able to anticipate those key points is more difficult and thus it shows up faster as more of a direct hand is needed more often and thus a DM's railroading starts to show and THUS it becomes problematic.

icefractal
2015-12-03, 01:24 AM
Since the subject has come up, I'm going to point out that "jerk GMs" are a red herring. Yes, they exist. No, they're not the most common cause of railroading. The most common cause is mediocre GMs, or GMs having an off day, or GMs that just aren't remotely on the same page as the players. When you focus on GMs that are actively trying to be an *******, the answer is "Don't play with them then." and the system is fairly irrelevant. But for the more common case, the system can very much have an impact.

Like for example - one GM I know. Not bad in general, but he doesn't improvise well and so he has a tendency to no-sell actions that would send things in an unexpected direction, or short-cut the plot too much. But - he's not viking-hat about this. When making rulings, he tends toward keeping things on the rails, but if you point out "Here's a rule, explicitly says I can do this" then he'll accept that and roll with it.

So with that GM at least, a system that's more dependent on GM judgment does in fact lead to more railroading. It varies from case to case I'm sure - there are probably people out there who railroad more the crunchier the system is - but neither is it as simple as "Bad GMs are bad, system doesn't matter."

Dimers
2015-12-03, 03:07 AM
@OP: 13th Age is a pretty squishy system. Its rulebook keeps saying "Here's a rule ... though if it doesn't work for you, don't use it." The designers have sidebars noting times that they ignored parts of their own ruleset. The skill system and icon relationship structure rules are wide open, and they keep hinting to both DM and players that the players should have agency. Even some aspects of combat -- otherwise the crunchiest part of the game -- are squishy and approximate, like positioning.

As others have said already, that kind of game allows the DM to act less railroady and less central just as easily as it lets her act more controlling. I have a 13th Age DM right now who made sure all players had meaningful input on worldbuilding, asks "What piece of magical loot did you find in the monster's hoard?", inserts choices into modules where they didn't exist before, keeps checking in about what plot items we care about pursuing as players ... We helped create the plot; he's not railroading or dominating anything.

AMFV
2015-12-03, 05:04 AM
Not contesting that with sufficient aggression, manipulations, etc that any system can be DM railroaded but that does preclude a difference in difficulty based on the system. Any building can be destroyed but a shack is easier than a bunker. And while Railroading is an out of game problem at its core many of the strongest means of combating it are in game. Railroading can be foiled by in game actions-and such actions are easier to force and make stick in "squishier" rule set IMH. And as for noticing it-in many of the crunchier rule systems a good railroader will only have to push or manipulate the game a few times a session where in squishier games being able to anticipate those key points is more difficult and thus it shows up faster as more of a direct hand is needed more often and thus a DM's railroading starts to show and THUS it becomes problematic.

I disagree, any means of combatting a problem that is caused by out-of-game interactions, with in-game rules is inherently going to fail. Period.

We do not give precedence to game rules over social rules, as such social stuff is going to take precedence, and the problem will persist. A mediocre DM is not going to become less mediocre in one system or another.

Now, certain types of railroading may be more easily observed in one system or another, but I still hold that railroading itself is system independent.


Since the subject has come up, I'm going to point out that "jerk GMs" are a red herring. Yes, they exist. No, they're not the most common cause of railroading. The most common cause is mediocre GMs, or GMs having an off day, or GMs that just aren't remotely on the same page as the players. When you focus on GMs that are actively trying to be an *******, the answer is "Don't play with them then." and the system is fairly irrelevant. But for the more common case, the system can very much have an impact.

Like for example - one GM I know. Not bad in general, but he doesn't improvise well and so he has a tendency to no-sell actions that would send things in an unexpected direction, or short-cut the plot too much. But - he's not viking-hat about this. When making rulings, he tends toward keeping things on the rails, but if you point out "Here's a rule, explicitly says I can do this" then he'll accept that and roll with it.

So with that GM at least, a system that's more dependent on GM judgment does in fact lead to more railroading. It varies from case to case I'm sure - there are probably people out there who railroad more the crunchier the system is - but neither is it as simple as "Bad GMs are bad, system doesn't matter."

Systems DO matter, but not for this particular problem. In a crunchier system, inability to deal quickly with numbers becomes a problem. In a squishier system, inability to rapidly and effectively improvise becomes an issue. There are DM problems that will be made signifcantly worse in either case.

Railroading is not one of them. Railroading is a fundamental problem of storytelling, it will exist in ANY system where one of the players is designated as the primary storyteller. I don't feel that lack of crunch or presence of crunch has any significant bearing on it.

In terms of mediocrity, lack or presence of crunch won't cause the DM to be able to think more quickly on his feet, nor will it cause him to be able to fill more of the world in, which are the chief causes of mediocrity inspired railroading. So again, this particular problem is system independent. Not all problems of bad DMing are, but this one is.

Earthwalker
2015-12-03, 06:20 AM
Railroading is not one of them. Railroading is a fundamental problem of storytelling, it will exist in ANY system where one of the players is designated as the primary storyteller. I don't feel that lack of crunch or presence of crunch has any significant bearing on it.


I have been reaqding this thread and thinking why is Fate a system I really like being discussed as a rail-roady game that is not how I see it at all.

I was trying to think of why I feel it isnt and AMFV in the quote above pointed it out to me. The designated story telling. The process of creating campaigns and characters for those campaigns is a group activity in Fate. It is not shouldered onto one character.

Every step of the process as described in the book is handled as a group with suggestions taken from all players.

I think this is why it seems so weird to me to have Fate described as a railroady game. It is certainly not how I have pictured it, I certainly can't work out why someone wanting to make single primary story teller game in a system that has less support for it.

AMFV
2015-12-03, 06:33 AM
I have been reaqding this thread and thinking why is Fate a system I really like being discussed as a rail-roady game that is not how I see it at all.

I was trying to think of why I feel it isnt and AMFV in the quote above pointed it out to me. The designated story telling. The process of creating campaigns and characters for those campaigns is a group activity in Fate. It is not shouldered onto one character.

Every step of the process as described in the book is handled as a group with suggestions taken from all players.

I think this is why it seems so weird to me to have Fate described as a railroady game. It is certainly not how I have pictured it, I certainly can't work out why someone wanting to make single primary story teller game in a system that has less support for it.

Well you still have the GM equivalent in FATE, which is technically what I was referring to. Although I think there's only a couple people who described games like FATE as easier to railroad (and I was not among them). I think any system that has the GM role can wind up with that.

Dalebert
2015-12-03, 09:40 AM
I have been reading this thread and thinking why is Fate a system I really like being discussed as a rail-roady game that is not how I see it at all.

It's a long thread so I understand. You missed the thread title change, the all-caps "EDIT:" at the top of the OP where I clarified that it's not about fate. I made a post a page or two back where I explained that I should have said it's about squishy rules vs. crunchy and that it's not about fate.


The most common cause is mediocre GMs, or GMs having an off day, or GMs that just aren't remotely on the same page as the players.

Yes, THIS! I'm not reposting the whole quote but folks should click and go re-read it. I wish I'd communicated this in the OP.


There are other ways to railroad rather than relying on intimidation.
Examples:

They could run a narrative style game where things happen because:plot rather than for any mechanical reason.



I can relate to this one. Remember, the primary question asked in the OP was whether railroady DMs are attracted to more squishy systems. Can it be a sort of red flag in itself? I have a DM who keeps emphasizing the importance of "story" and I can't help but think he means HIS story and not whatever the players add to or change it. And I don't think he's a sociopath. I don't think he's even just enjoying a position of power like some DMs do, maybe because they were picked on a lot in high school or whatever. I think he's just not a spectacular DM.

So many of these posts in so many words say something like "The system doesn't matter, a good DM..." But we're not all spectacular DMs. I feel like this particular DM gets exasperated if things don't go how he planned and too much agency on the part of the players means he may have to go into the uncomfortable territory of winging it. There's another DM I haven't played under quite as much where I wonder similarly now. When he's in a crunchy system, I've seen him just chunk rules that don't fit for him despite them completely throwing off the balance of the game, like making short rests basically impossible. Then I see him getting excited about more squishy rule systems.

So I've seen a couple of cases where DMs who seem to already show signs of wanting to dominate the game for one reason or another getting excited about systems where they can just decree things and players have nothing to go on. We can't point out how a decision is unfair to our character or disruptive of game balance in some way on the basis of the system because the system is just so dang squishy.

ImNotTrevor
2015-12-03, 10:34 AM
I think it's weird how we assume that "not having lots of rules" means a game is just flippant and easy to manipulate.

Apocalypse World is my favorite "Rules Light" game, and it is really rock-solid. The core concept of Powered by the Apocalypse games is about as crunchy as it comes, but it comes from a stance of "the fiction tells you what mechanics will come into play."

So it's not, "I'm going to roll Intimidate and make her tell me where Shazza is." There is an explicit rule stating you can't do that stuff in AW. If you were to say, while playing AW, "I'm going to Go Aggro and make her get out of my way" the MC must, and I mean MUST, respond with a slight variant of "Cool, but what do you DO?"

The moves and rolls are activated by the actions of the characters. For instance how it should normally go in AW is:
"I tell Shazza to get the f*** outta my way before I knock her teeth in."
"Sounds like you're Going Aggro. Roll +Hard."

The fiction caused mechanics to happen, not the other way around. It has been streamlined, not stripped down. Going Aggro means a lot of things. Intimidating, attacking someone who doesn't expect it, attacking someone with no means to retaliate effectively, etc.

Seize By Force is fighting someone on equal terms, or taking something by force (dur) or securing a position or storming a front gate or taking command of a gang by killing their current leader. All of those things are covered by Seize By Force.

Seduce/Manipulate is ANY form of manipulation that doesn't involve a genuine threat of violence. If you threaten to shoot someone, but you're bluffing, Seduce/Manipulate. If you want them to sleep with you or if you want them to betray Gumbo or if you want them to give you their car for the day, or want them to like you more than they like Joe's Girl, all the same move.


This is a lengthy preamble for:
In AW the rules are just as hard and fast as in d&d. There are just less superflous ones. It really doesn't matter how much damage specifically a blizzard does to a person per round. Apocalypse World isn't Weather Conditions Simulator. Having that rule is a waste of time. The GM is smart enough to figure out that (1-harm AP) is probably sufficient for extreme weather. And maybe having a coat eliminates that. That's a 2 second decision, not something that merits a whole paragraph and later a whole splatbook about how stuff works where it's really cold.

A lot of these systems realized that, actually, people are generally smart enough to build quick solutions out of the parts they have. As ak example: the existence of taco bell. Taco Bell does not feature a large amount of ingredients. Yet they'll make a lot of different things because those ingredients are easy to combine in new ways.

Yes, it relies on the GM. That's not a bad thing unless your GM is less smart than a lobotomized crab.

If your GM is an a-hole, guess what? They're just an a-hole. The only thing that has changed is in AW you can actually quote the rules for the MC and show that they're doing it wrong according to the system. (Yes, the MC in Apocalypse World has rules they must follow and it even tries to teach you how to GM in general. The only system I've ever read that tries to do so and/or does so competently.)

So yeah, Fiction-first systems are crunchy in their element. They just don't have a rule for absolutely everything because that's often a waste of time within those systems since it will come up nearly never and the tools to make the solution are already provided.

FATE is... meh. Being generic comes with risks. For Gurps, it means making a rule for LITERALLY EVERYTHING. For a fiction first system it means making rules for things in incredibly broad terms. It makes add-on creation super easy, but also lacks focus because it's trying to be everything.

I like Apocalypse World and its hacks. I find them to be the perfect middle ground. And reskinning or jacking Apocalypse World is ultra easy. Time consuming, but easy.

Just my 2cp.

goto124
2015-12-03, 10:37 AM
Is it against the rules to announce you're Go(ing) Aggro, instead of describing your actions to the GM?

Having been in a similar situation before, let's just say it was a horrible experience, and stop there.

icefractal
2015-12-03, 05:32 PM
In terms of mediocrity, lack or presence of crunch won't cause the DM to be able to think more quickly on his feet, nor will it cause him to be able to fill more of the world in, which are the chief causes of mediocrity inspired railroading. So again, this particular problem is system independent. Not all problems of bad DMing are, but this one is.No offense, but did you read the entire post you quoted? It's not precisely a "light / crunchy" thing, it's more of a "GM judgment / hard rules" thing, which merely happens to often correlate with light / crunchy. But this isn't some hypothetical effect I'm speculating on, I've seen it happen multiple times. The difference between "A PC might be able to do X, it's up to the GM" and "A PC can do X unless the GM overrides it" has been enough to make the game less railroaded. Again, YMMV.


If your GM is an a-hole, guess what? They're just an a-holeYes, fine - and that relates to the entirety of railroading how? Only in the same way that arsonists relate to things catching on fire - they are a cause, but preventing all arson would not eliminate the need for a fire department.

Florian
2015-12-03, 06:27 PM
I'm with ImNotTrevir there.
Games like AW and their ilk, the whole Storygaming branch, really, use way strikter rules (crunch) for the game itself than games like D&D or Gurps, which use strikt rules (crunch) for task resolution.

I think, as a rule of thumb, you actually can say that games that depend on a gm are more squishy then those that can be uses without a gm at all.

AMFV
2015-12-03, 07:33 PM
No offense, but did you read the entire post you quoted? It's not precisely a "light / crunchy" thing, it's more of a "GM judgment / hard rules" thing, which merely happens to often correlate with light / crunchy. But this isn't some hypothetical effect I'm speculating on, I've seen it happen multiple times. The difference between "A PC might be able to do X, it's up to the GM" and "A PC can do X unless the GM overrides it" has been enough to make the game less railroaded. Again, YMMV.

My argument is that somebody who is liable to railroad due to mediocrity will either misapply the rules, have a situation where they can't go further and panic (then change the game with houserules), or that sort of thing. With somebody who is deliberately forcing the railroad experience, that would be even easier. I don't think that game rules can fix a problem that is a social problem for a specific group, in a general case. Now you might be able to develop (or find) a set of rules that works for your group, but it would hardly be universally applicable.

Edit: The rules only can fix a problem if there is consensus, which in this scenario is unlikely to exist.

Fri
2015-12-03, 08:17 PM
No offense, but did you read the entire post you quoted? It's not precisely a "light / crunchy" thing, it's more of a "GM judgment / hard rules" thing, which merely happens to often correlate with light / crunchy. But this isn't some hypothetical effect I'm speculating on, I've seen it happen multiple times. The difference between "A PC might be able to do X, it's up to the GM" and "A PC can do X unless the GM overrides it" has been enough to make the game less railroaded. Again, YMMV.

Here's from my experience.

Who's setting the difficulty of the game or the skillcheck in "crunchy" game? Still the GM. Sure, there might be some guideline or whatever in the PHB, but setting everything is still up to the GM.

A bad GM in DnD who still really don't want a player to enter an inn room, still can make the DC of the lock astronomical. A bad GM who don't want his villain to be killed in an encounter, still can give it some magic armor with astronomical AC or DR or whatever.

kyoryu
2015-12-03, 09:25 PM
You can railroad any game. Some games are harder, and you railroad "squishy" (judgement-dependent) games different than "crunchy" games.

There's some belief by many that crunchy games act as a defense against railroading, because the rules assert you can do certain things. I don't find this to be true. GMs railroad those games just as much, by prohibiting actions or setting difficulties that must be beat.

The real way to avoid getting railroaded is to not play with GMs that railroad.

Fri
2015-12-03, 09:28 PM
Except if your group enjoy linear storytelling style of game that is. Then by all mean find a GM that railroad.

Seriously, after years of playing, I realized the best way to game is by first making sure everyone agree and understand the style of game and the system everyone want to play. I guess this depend on choice of people you can put in a group though.

AMFV
2015-12-03, 09:40 PM
Except if your group enjoy linear storytelling style of game that is. Then by all mean find a GM that railroad.

Seriously, after years of playing, I realized the best way to game is by first making sure everyone agree and understand the style of game and the system everyone want to play. I guess this depend on choice of people you can put in a group though.

I would argue that the term "railroad" and a linear story are not analogous terms. One can have a linear story that isn't a railroaded story. I feel strongly about this because I like linear stories, but not railroads, so there's a clear distinction there.

Although I agree with the rest of the sentiment.

Balmas
2015-12-04, 03:41 AM
I would argue that railroading depends more on the DM and the players than on the system. Generally, I have found story-driven games to actually be less railroady than systems full of crunch.

Part of this is, I suspect, the different focuses each system has. Look at D&D. It's an expansive system that will allow you to play pretty much any fantasy concept, so long as your fantasy concept involves combat. Maybe 80% of the system revolves around combat, on making bigger numbers to fight against bigger numbers. In systems that are rules and crunch heavy, which require you to plan and build a character in advance, it's easy to lose sight of the character and the roleplaying in the name of +2 to damage with greatswords. Character motivations are simple, and when the players don't know what to do, sometimes the DM needs to point them in the right direction.

Compare that to rules-light systems. Without the distraction of building a character, each character must develop full motivations and characterizations. Part of what I love about systems like Apocalypse World is that everything that happens is because the PCs did something, or because they want something. What they focus on is what the game becomes about, while what they don't focus on fades inoto the background.

kyoryu
2015-12-04, 04:39 PM
There's probably something to that. In many systems, combat is itself interesting enough that playing a game where the "plot" just exists to move you from combat to combat is a viable way of playing, while most "lighter" systems don't have enough mechanical crunch to hold interest, and so players of those seem to care about "what do we do/what happens" (not that all players of crunchier systems don't/can't).