The freedom of railroading, part 2

(click here for the first part of this series)

I used to believe that one of the ways to inspire drama and characterization in my players was through giving them choices combined with mysteries to unravel. The arrogant, magically cloaked man will not disclose his allegiances. Will the players approach a member of the “StingerZ” or the “Snakes” for inside info? Will they have the man followed? Or will they basically beat it out of him? Or what of the four factions warring over the powers of a little girl the players protect. Are the players loyal to their own organization? Maybe one of the rival factions actually has a better offer? Do they hide her from all of them, friend or foe?

As it turned out, what I inspired in my players was determination, investigation and frustration. It became a game of gathering information, checking every angle, and then make the choice that seemed correct. The characterization suffered greatly. Determined to untangle every mystery and get to the bottom of things, there was not much room left for actual role-playing. Not because it couldn’t be done. Just because everyone was too focused on the task at hand.

When I started a fresh campaign in Dungeons & Dragons 4th Edition, using nothing but four encounters woven together in a dungeon crawl, strange stuff started to happen. My players established quirks and battlecries for their characters. They tried to negotiate with the kobolds, even though all of them knew they had to fight after all. They made jokes and one-liners, and willingly created inner turbulence in the group (although never enough to make real problems). The level 1 Cleric of Avandra ended up having a helluva lot more personality than the abused Mastigos mage of the Mysteries.

There are of course other elements at play here, but in the end the silly stereotypical and railroaded dungeon crawl inspired a lot more interesting characters than my grand urban open-ended fantasy epic.

Advertisement

~ by moredice on April 7, 2009.