That last bit implies they don't have a choice. They absolutely have a choice, it's just that they are allergic to good decisions.
this post was submitted on 02 Sep 2023
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The GM has the power to present a heist, but unless the GM is really railroady, the players have the power to make it a ransom, a demolition job or just ignore everything and join the circus.
One shots, like the few Mörk Borg ones I have recently played, have a higher chance of people doing what the scenario expects, but when a character is given a trait that they only eat named things, the player starts asking and collecting every NPCs name.
The GM has the power to present a heist, but unless the GM is really railroady, the players have the power to make it a ransom, a demolition job or just ignore everything and join the circus.
This doesn't sound contradictory to "planning a heist". I guess I just took it to mean that the setup was a heist and that the punchline was that they had little control over the tone during actual play. I feel like ransoms, a demolition job, or joining in the circus fall within the "heist" aesthetic and narrative.
My interpretation was that setting the soundtrack is a minor tone choise, you're still going through the movie the GM has made for you. But if the GM is willing, the players may ignore or demolish all the plot points turning the planned Ocean's 11 to Fast and Furious, or Taken, or Top Gun, or Armageddon except the PCs are the meteorite. Or skip the whole movie and make up their own stage play musical set on the next town over.
EDIT: Everything devolving to Benny Hill still applies, unless there is an actual agreement of the tone everyone should try and uphold.
I've never experienced the party going off the rails. I guess I've just joined relatively mature groups.
I think people have lots of definitions for what constitutes railroading. I personally don't think anything in the meme constitutes going off the rails.
In my view, if you build or plan the next session based on where you think they're gonna go next and what they seem like they want to do as players, and then someone goes "Well can I actually just make a 90-degree turn off the road to the city that we're talked about going to last week into these random woods instead of engaging with the hours of content you made for us," you aren't railroading them for going "sure, but I'll have to pause the session here so I can put the time and prep into this that you deserve as players, or we play Dnd today."
Matt Colville has a great vid on this, but I can't remember its title. I think he's done a few videos that talked about railroading.
We've had a few instances where the party decided we want to go do thing, but there was no way the DM had prepared. We let him know "this is a thing we'd like to pursue later" and get on with the planned events. We try to remember that his time is valuable!
This is the ideal. I think a problem also comes up because I think a lot of people (DMs included) feel like "peak Dnd" is when you could in theory, go anywhere and do anything your party wants, and you just need to review few quick notes and be ready to go.
Honestly in the campaign I've been playing in I've gotten kind of tired of the whole "the PCs are idiots" schtick
Do you feel that the PCs actually pretty smart, but the DM is still making jokes like they aren't? Or is it some of the PCs are using "oh I'm dumb" as an excuse to derail gameplay and ruin ingame plans?