How many times have you had to reset your Rifts game?

[Greyaxe]

I had a Rifts/Robotech mash up that eventually go so ridiculous I had to just say NO. Stop the game and start Rifts over from scratch.

Any other stories like that?

[Alrik Vas]

I have had to restart a game because all the players died. Though i've never restarted because they got too powerful. Though the campaigns have actually ended before. I don't count that as a reset, just finishing.

[Mech-Viper Prime]

I reset about three times, characters kept their levels, but it was a in game event that kept resetting time, they never figured out what was going on even with the clues I dropped.

[Sureshot]

If memory serves at least twice. Despite what they say not everything in the books has been play tested properly if at all. Certain Occs/RCC can do a real number on games.

[DhAkael]

Once, 18 years ago.
...and that was only a half re-set. Basicly the primary meta plot has not changed more than maybe 5% since first printing, first edition Rifts (CR, TM, PCP, etc) was published.

Top that suckers.

[rat_bastard]

One, it involved traveling back in time and and killing and replacing our past selves.

[Slight001]

One, it involved traveling back in time and and killing and replacing our past selves.

Now that is what I'd call a Temporal Paradox.

[rat_bastard]

One, it involved traveling back in time and and killing and replacing our past selves.

Now that is what I'd call a Temporal Paradox.

Whenever something like that happens its because a wizard changed things.

but-

Wizard did it!

Seriously the magic allowed us to replace our past selves despite the fact that that would obviously would not work.

[Alrik Vas]

In a different game altogether, i got the chance to reset the story via time travel. I found it funny that in the end, the same things happened anyway, just slightly later. Some of us are just on a collision course with doom.

[wyrmraker]

Our regular Palladium GM has a distressing tendency to suddenly switch game settings once our characters get skilled enough to take on most average opponents. I have a few dozen character sheets on permanent hiatus, because every time we swing back to a setting, he requires we make new characters, all level 1.

[Crow Splat]

Our regular Palladium GM has a distressing tendency to suddenly switch game settings once our characters get skilled enough to take on most average opponents. I have a few dozen character sheets on permanent hiatus, because every time we swing back to a setting, he requires we make new characters, all level 1.

I cringed a little when I read this. One of my favorite parts of being a GM is trying to find new ways to challenge powerful characters.

I have to say that I have never "reset" a game, but I have had a few end. Mostly when a party get pretty high level and then the individual power struggles between players end with most of the PCs killing each other. One game that ended like that actually had the group making new characters while goal was ti overthrow the last man standing from the first party.

[flatline]

As a matter of course, we "reset" the setting every time we started a new campaign with a new GM. The GM was free to do whatever they wanted with the setting without worrying about any baggage from previous campaigns.

--flatline

[MaxxSterling]

I've never reset a game.

The very thought of penalizing players for essentially winning would make me never play with that GM ever again. In Rifts, there is no ceiling.

I had 2 characters that became so powerful with such excellent bonuses, that they became God hunters. They would seek out lower-level godlings/deities/intelligences, like Chantico, Kirgi, Myrlynn, crap like that and stalk them, kill their way through the flock, guardians, cultists, whatever and then make an attempt to kill the deity/being. And were fairly successful, but ultimately bit off more then they could chew, but had an awesome time in doing so.

[Noon]

Our regular Palladium GM has a distressing tendency to suddenly switch game settings once our characters get skilled enough to take on most average opponents. I have a few dozen character sheets on permanent hiatus, because every time we swing back to a setting, he requires we make new characters, all level 1.

Did your characters have any goals in life?

If so, then if you can consistantly beat regular dudes, you've pretty much won the game. It's boring after that.

What are you gunna do, say the GM should force you into fighting bigger things?

[Hannibal]

One, it involved traveling back in time and and killing and replacing our past selves.

Now that is what I'd call a Temporal Paradox.

Whenever something like that happens its because a wizard changed things.

but-

Wizard did it!

Seriously the magic allowed us to replace our past selves despite the fact that that would obviously would not work.

Well, it didn't work quite like that. There was definitely a conundrum... they had to have existed to kill themselves in the past, but upon dying in the present, they couldn't exist in the future. So, solution... upon killing their old selves, they essentially they became unanchored in our current space-time continuum, and basically "phased-out". BUT... the liberty taken was that a temporal wizard knew how (and was properly motivated) to find their unanchored essences and re-anchor them in the existing space-time continuum (ie, reanchoring their future selves in the present to replace the versions of themselves they had just killed). Good thing rifts has temporal magic... ;p

[Incriptus]

Once. I was running a phase world game. The party took a shot at a fight they couldn't win. I ended it there and switched games. About 10 years later I tried to reset the game to the run just before that fateful trip ... but I didn't have much traction. The players had lost the characters motivation over that time frame. At the time, after all those adventures setting off on a mission to harass the splugorth made sense. After ten years it sort of sounded stupid.

[Noon]

Ten real life years??

[wyrmraker]

Our regular Palladium GM has a distressing tendency to suddenly switch game settings once our characters get skilled enough to take on most average opponents. I have a few dozen character sheets on permanent hiatus, because every time we swing back to a setting, he requires we make new characters, all level 1.

Did your characters have any goals in life?

If so, then if you can consistantly beat regular dudes, you've pretty much won the game. It's boring after that.

What are you gunna do, say the GM should force you into fighting bigger things?

Yes, our characters had goals. Almost all of which were either ignored or turned into 'plot hooks'. Like me having a Natural Genius in HU2 who I wanted to create the first equivalent of MD alloy. Never mind that the character had the skills and equipment to do it all from scratch, suddenly a, alien ship is found imbedded in a mountain, and a dragon's supernatural claws carve us out a chunk for 'research'. Never mind that my character had spent the last month in-game on computer modelling and research.

Even the most trivial of occurrences become blown out of proportion. For example, a run for an Operator to go and buy copper wire from a repair shop. Suddenly the wire is fake, the owner is a demonic mole, and the town is full of hostile CS agents. In Wyoming. And then suddenly there's a Deus Ex Machina when our characters get overrun and have to be saved by the level 10 merc group that 'just happened' to be coming to town to resupply. It happens a lot.

Oh, I forgot to mention that this GM has made a patternable habit (as in 95%) of not planning out games properly. "The best games are always run by the seat of the pants." So he literally meakes all this up as he goes. And then once our characters get above average (about 3-4 levels) he switches games on us, making us all start over with new characters at level one.

[Incriptus]

Ten real life years??

I exaggerated, turns out it was only 4 years in real life. Felt like 10 years ... 10 years is probably more accurate for the Rifts game that I want to reset (ie ignore a non-complete run started by a different GM)

[Razzinold]

I have never reset a game, but I have altered parts of it that were done in haste.
Like someone asked me who their contact was and I just through a random name because I knew they were not going to meet them yet.

Later on when I worked on my game before the next scheduled game I would flesh out the character more, I have even changed their names and occupations before.

I just did that recently. I told them their Black Market contact was named Slippery Pete and was an Expediter so they wrote that in their notes. Next game I will have to change that because their contact is now a Black Market Merchant and an Expediter who is now named "Gentleman" Johnny Calabrese and now I've worked some plot hooks into him as well. I gave him Street Rep: Honest and Street Rep: Hero.

He's going to ride around this one neighbourhood in a GAW car that was made to look like a 1950's Cadillac and he's going to behave like an old time Italian-American wiseguy.

[say652]

As a GM never as a player on umm..... lets call him GMDT sent a wild vampire horde at four level three characters....we died. My bad reset. Then thinking that was a fluke, ok no prob bro. Then came the Temporal Raider. ... and we died. Ok homie you killed us all again. My bad yo give me one more chance. Grrr but again I sit down. Then came the Splugorth Slaver.......... I think this is whst began the attack of the BRICK stage. Skills? Ten years later I still run into similiar GMDT's.

[Noon]

Our regular Palladium GM has a distressing tendency to suddenly switch game settings once our characters get skilled enough to take on most average opponents. I have a few dozen character sheets on permanent hiatus, because every time we swing back to a setting, he requires we make new characters, all level 1.

Did your characters have any goals in life?

If so, then if you can consistantly beat regular dudes, you've pretty much won the game. It's boring after that.

What are you gunna do, say the GM should force you into fighting bigger things?

Yes, our characters had goals. Almost all of which were either ignored or turned into 'plot hooks'. Like me having a Natural Genius in HU2 who I wanted to create the first equivalent of MD alloy. Never mind that the character had the skills and equipment to do it all from scratch, suddenly a, alien ship is found imbedded in a mountain, and a dragon's supernatural claws carve us out a chunk for 'research'. Never mind that my character had spent the last month in-game on computer modelling and research.

So he kind of had a GMPC solve your characters quest for you?

Thing is though it doesn't sound like you'd need to fight anything more than regular dudes (if fight at all!) to achieve it (assuming it's achievable). Once you're skilled enough to consistantly beat regular dudes, it's an auto win.

Even the most trivial of occurrences become blown out of proportion. For example, a run for an Operator to go and buy copper wire from a repair shop. Suddenly the wire is fake, the owner is a demonic mole, and the town is full of hostile CS agents. In Wyoming. And then suddenly there's a Deus Ex Machina when our characters get overrun and have to be saved by the level 10 merc group that 'just happened' to be coming to town to resupply. It happens a lot.

Only problem I had there was with the Dues Ex.

I mean, the alternative is that you have sessions full of...getting copper wire.

Given a choice, I'd prefer demons out of nowhere.

I've heard of some people who spend whole sessions shopping in the game - maybe you and the GM just don't match. He certainly doesn't sound like he'd suit the shoppers.

Oh, I forgot to mention that this GM has made a patternable habit (as in 95%) of not planning out games properly. "The best games are always run by the seat of the pants." So he literally meakes all this up as he goes. And then once our characters get above average (about 3-4 levels) he switches games on us, making us all start over with new characters at level one.

Personally I don't enjoy forcing a plot upon the game world and in regards to most of the game world there is no point prepping - most of what I'd write down would be the same thing I could think up on the spot in game.

[wyrmraker]

Our regular Palladium GM has a distressing tendency to suddenly switch game settings once our characters get skilled enough to take on most average opponents. I have a few dozen character sheets on permanent hiatus, because every time we swing back to a setting, he requires we make new characters, all level 1.

Did your characters have any goals in life?

If so, then if you can consistantly beat regular dudes, you've pretty much won the game. It's boring after that.

What are you gunna do, say the GM should force you into fighting bigger things?

Yes, our characters had goals. Almost all of which were either ignored or turned into 'plot hooks'. Like me having a Natural Genius in HU2 who I wanted to create the first equivalent of MD alloy. Never mind that the character had the skills and equipment to do it all from scratch, suddenly a, alien ship is found imbedded in a mountain, and a dragon's supernatural claws carve us out a chunk for 'research'. Never mind that my character had spent the last month in-game on computer modelling and research.

So he kind of had a GMPC solve your characters quest for you?

Thing is though it doesn't sound like you'd need to fight anything more than regular dudes (if fight at all!) to achieve it (assuming it's achievable). Once you're skilled enough to consistantly beat regular dudes, it's an auto win.

Even the most trivial of occurrences become blown out of proportion. For example, a run for an Operator to go and buy copper wire from a repair shop. Suddenly the wire is fake, the owner is a demonic mole, and the town is full of hostile CS agents. In Wyoming. And then suddenly there's a Deus Ex Machina when our characters get overrun and have to be saved by the level 10 merc group that 'just happened' to be coming to town to resupply. It happens a lot.

Only problem I had there was with the Dues Ex.

I mean, the alternative is that you have sessions full of...getting copper wire.

Given a choice, I'd prefer demons out of nowhere.

I've heard of some people who spend whole sessions shopping in the game - maybe you and the GM just don't match. He certainly doesn't sound like he'd suit the shoppers.

Oh, I forgot to mention that this GM has made a patternable habit (as in 95%) of not planning out games properly. "The best games are always run by the seat of the pants." So he literally meakes all this up as he goes. And then once our characters get above average (about 3-4 levels) he switches games on us, making us all start over with new characters at level one.

Personally I don't enjoy forcing a plot upon the game world and in regards to most of the game world there is no point prepping - most of what I'd write down would be the same thing I could think up on the spot in game.

While I understand what your responses, I don't think I can properly convey just how often this happens. While in-game shopping trips are dull and boring, I will generally run that session as "Okay, it'll run you X amount to restock your supplies." Just enough not to slow down the play. If the players want something more complicated than general supplies, then haggling can commence. But this GM does this for every little thing. I have seen this scenario for haggling over the purchase of flour, e-clip charging, buying ammunition at a Naruni Enterprises outlet, all sorts of meaningless throw-away stuff.

As for not planning anything, it becomes difficult when we are writing down who/when our characters deal with stuff, and then he says "That never happened!" And then we pull out our notebooks to show our gaming notes as players, and he gets confused because he really *doesn't* remember doing that.

It becomes especially problematic when one of us has a character from a town in an area, and when our character goes back home he pulls some of this other stuff about the local laws and such "Because I wanted to mix it up a little", and we get a little hostile when we have to say, "And why didn't my character who was born and raised here know that? He should've known that." And he wonders why I take matters into my own hands when it comes to where my characters are from, if they're not from a canon settlement. If he makes it up, it starts off as decent, but is subject to massive changes at any time. If I write it out, it's all written down in a clear, concise manner that makes sense. He may compl,ain that town creation is his job, but he really can't argue when I say, "I understand, but if you make it, you'll never remember a fourth of it, and then to fill in the gaps you'll just make a bunch of stuff up that'll tick me off because my character would've known this stuff."

[Braden Campbell]

I had a Rifts/Robotech mash up that eventually go so ridiculous I had to just say NO. Stop the game and start Rifts over from scratch.

lol Good times....

[say652]

Tonight actually.

[Svartalf]

I once dumped a Rifts/HU games because the players were so effing munchkin the only way to challenge them was all to close to killing them outright and it was no fun seeing them roll over the threats that should have balked characters their level, a shame that was before the Carella books and CWC

[Alrik Vas]

That's rough, Svartalf. However, you said HU was involved, so I don't have THAT much sympathy.

[Svartalf]

Yeah, I was too liberal

[Colt47]

A lot. I've had to restart games in a lot of different RPG settings and systems due to some stupid moves players make in critical moments of a campaign, though I'll admit sometimes it was due to my own negligence . Some things I'd like people to consider very carefully when playing a game involving any kind of danger to personal wellbeing...

1. Do not split up the party! Why would you do this? It's like the worst horror movie trope of all time.
2. If someone is playing a stealthy scout character, keep a leash on the little fellow in case his amazing plan for assassinating someone falls through the floor.
3. Women + bars are evil. Why would any woman in a bar be interested in your unkempt woodland lice infested CK who probably is dieing to get a good shower after traveling for days on end? For that matter, please check to make sure they aren't a succubus. They like to frequent those joints.
4. Always use the buddy system and always have some weird pass code. I've yet to see a setting that doesn't have some kind of doppelganger monster or a spell that controls minds.

Also, this is all stuff from before Spoony ever made his episode on the subject in case anyone sees a similarity with what was stated here and what he says in his show.

[kh_hawkes]

Last group I was in for four years. About eight times there was a reset in that four years. Have a nice stack of level five PC's from that run.

[flatline]

A lot. I've had to restart games in a lot of different RPG settings and systems due to some stupid moves players make in critical moments of a campaign, though I'll admit sometimes it was due to my own negligence . Some things I'd like people to consider very carefully when playing a game involving any kind of danger to personal wellbeing...

1. Do not split up the party! Why would you do this? It's like the worst horror movie trope of all time.
2. If someone is playing a stealthy scout character, keep a leash on the little fellow in case his amazing plan for assassinating someone falls through the floor.
3. Women + bars are evil. Why would any woman in a bar be interested in your unkempt woodland lice infested CK who probably is dieing to get a good shower after traveling for days on end? For that matter, please check to make sure they aren't a succubus. They like to frequent those joints.
4. Always use the buddy system and always have some weird pass code. I've yet to see a setting that doesn't have some kind of doppelganger monster or a spell that controls minds.

Also, this is all stuff from before Spoony ever made his episode on the subject in case anyone sees a similarity with what was stated here and what he says in his show.

I'd like to comment on #1. Most of my non-support characters were specifically designed to operate away from the rest of the party. Splitting the party is only a horror movie trope if you're the victims. If you're the aggressors, then it's more like the A-Team where everyone has a part to play to get the plan rolling and the group doesn't get back together until each individual has already played their part in the plan. If you have limited time to get the plan rolling, then you have no choice but to work on different aspects of the plan in parallel which means splitting up.

Plus it guarantees each character has a chance to be the focus for a while.

--flatline

[Tor]

One, it involved traveling back in time and and killing and replacing our past selves.

Now that is what I'd call a Temporal Paradox.

Gotta love how shows like Continuum conveniently ignore this type of thing.

Between the Shadows offered an easy explanation about how what seems like time-travel is just travelling to different dimensions that appear like the past. Totally avoids paradoxes.

This meshes with with TTMNT's dimensions explanation, although TTMNT's time travel stuff seems to suffer from similar 'you can kill your grandfather' problems.

I once dumped a Rifts/HU games because the players were so effing munchkin the only way to challenge them was all to close to killing them outright

I heavily doubt this.

[Colt47]

A lot. I've had to restart games in a lot of different RPG settings and systems due to some stupid moves players make in critical moments of a campaign, though I'll admit sometimes it was due to my own negligence . Some things I'd like people to consider very carefully when playing a game involving any kind of danger to personal wellbeing...

1. Do not split up the party! Why would you do this? It's like the worst horror movie trope of all time.
2. If someone is playing a stealthy scout character, keep a leash on the little fellow in case his amazing plan for assassinating someone falls through the floor.
3. Women + bars are evil. Why would any woman in a bar be interested in your unkempt woodland lice infested CK who probably is dieing to get a good shower after traveling for days on end? For that matter, please check to make sure they aren't a succubus. They like to frequent those joints.
4. Always use the buddy system and always have some weird pass code. I've yet to see a setting that doesn't have some kind of doppelganger monster or a spell that controls minds.

Also, this is all stuff from before Spoony ever made his episode on the subject in case anyone sees a similarity with what was stated here and what he says in his show.

I'd like to comment on #1. Most of my non-support characters were specifically designed to operate away from the rest of the party. Splitting the party is only a horror movie trope if you're the victims. If you're the aggressors, then it's more like the A-Team where everyone has a part to play to get the plan rolling and the group doesn't get back together until each individual has already played their part in the plan. If you have limited time to get the plan rolling, then you have no choice but to work on different aspects of the plan in parallel which means splitting up.

Plus it guarantees each character has a chance to be the focus for a while.

--flatline

There's nothing wrong with having a character that works best away from the party. It's when the said character / player runs into a dangerous situation and doesn't take into account what to do when they fail that critical check to knock out a guard: The party is there to help your character out of those kinds of messes, and if they aren't they aren't a really good party.

[Alrik Vas]

Little topic drifting...but I'll jump in on that...

As to the PC's being the aggressors, I love to do it. It's easiest when you have a discernable target, though. Sometimes you really don't have one (like, the badguys don't advertise their location and you're racing them to some finish line or another). When that happens, you get stuck in a bad spot and have to either charge ahead with a plan and hope it works, or think defensively.

In regards to splitting the party in general, sometimes it fouls up, sure, but I wouldn't call a party bad if they couldn't possibly know what the missing character is doing.

[Akashic Soldier]

About five times

Each one of those bars is its own game, set within the same continuity. Some characters from different games have met one another. I made sure to "finish" each game as best I could. Each game has its own "themes" and elements that made it "feel" different to the others.

[Blue_Lion]

Never, as a GM you never have to do anything you choose to.

I have never done a campaign reset games may die off, but generally I employ stuff from an old campaign in new ones. Unless it is a different world.

[Shorty Lickens]

Never.
But we also learn to go with the flow.

PC's screw up and cant save Maryland from the Mechanoids?
No big deal, ARCHIE and Hagen will finish the job. We just miss out on the glory and the rewards.
Or maybe Hagen forces a set back of some kind, and the characters get a chance to regroup and start over.

Maybe their side actually loses the war against Splynn, and they have to deal with the fallout from that. Maybe they gotta run and rebuild their shattered army or lose contact with allies and friends. It stinks but life goes on. Maybe they get new team mates or allies and start the war again, later on. Its all good. In an epic story theres no such thing as failing.

Bilbo Baggins had setbacks but eventually worked through them and won.
Later on the Ring was passed to Frodo for another quest. And he had setbacks. But eventually won.
Stuff went real bad for the Old Republic, but after 2 thousand years righted itself again.

[Khord - Lizard Mage]

Once as a GM but four times as a player. Oddly enough, All five campaigns were in the same setting but run by four different GM's. The older characters ended up either dying or becoming too powerful and/or practical to run. The survivors became semi-legendary characters in the scenarios as NPC's.

[Zer0 Kay]

I always run the same campaign when I get a new group, so I always restart in that manner, the only time I've restarted with the same group was because of the "door in the middle of nowhere" item in the randomer item list. But all I did was tell everyone if they choose to make the same decisions they end up back at the door and we don't have to replay anything. So I asked if anyone wanted to change any of their decisions. They all said no, I had them roll perception and they found a note that had fallen off the door. It said "do not open. I forget why." They didnt go through again.

[Balabanto]

I've been running Rifts for close to 20 years now. I have had NO resets. There are so many different characters doing so many different things, that it boggles my mind.

[Razzinold]

I always run the same campaign when I get a new group, so I always restart in that manner, the only time I've restarted with the same group was because of the "door in the middle of nowhere" item in the randomer item list. But all I did was tell everyone if they choose to make the same decisions they end up back at the door and we don't have to replay anything. So I asked if anyone wanted to change any of their decisions. They all said no, I had them roll perception and they found a note that had fallen off the door. It said "do not open. I forget why." They didnt go through again.

We had a GM do that once or twice and we still have the imprint from the railroad tracks on our bodies.
We figured that he didn't want to have to come up with anything on the spot, and had nothing written down, that he was forcing us to play the same path his group did before he joined ours.

Every time we tried to do something we were turned the other way. Even times when we went through elaborate planning there was no point in doing it.

I remember one time we were looking for some intel and had a tip on a few places we could look, we happened to pick this big star studded party, because we felt safer around people (we were being hunted). So we took the time to steal some clothes from a fancy stores (tuxedos and stuff), managed to hack the computers to get our names on the list and we either forged invitations or stole real ones (can't remember). So we do all that work to get in for him to turn around and say "none of these people are real, they are all demons impersonating celebrities and they are now attacking you". So out of game he was like "I have no idea why you would even bother going there" and we were like "we picked one of your 3 options".

So we survive that and move onto option 2, pretty much a repeat of option 1. It was like that with everything, manage to discretely kill someone in a completely abandoned part of town where half of it didn't even have electricity, but the random building we dragged the guy into had a state of the art security system that recorded it all, contacted the police and sent a copy to the news agency before we even left the building. This is what caused us to be on the run in the first place.

Now I know the point of his game was for us to end up being on the run, but talk about forcing our hands. He didn't even bother waiting for something realistic to happen like pulling a bank job, or killing someone in public.

[Zer0 Kay]

I always run the same campaign when I get a new group, so I always restart in that manner, the only time I've restarted with the same group was because of the "door in the middle of nowhere" item in the randomer item list. But all I did was tell everyone if they choose to make the same decisions they end up back at the door and we don't have to replay anything. So I asked if anyone wanted to change any of their decisions. They all said no, I had them roll perception and they found a note that had fallen off the door. It said "do not open. I forget why." They didnt go through again.

We had a GM do that once or twice and we still have the imprint from the railroad tracks on our bodies.
We figured that he didn't want to have to come up with anything on the spot, and had nothing written down, that he was forcing us to play the same path his group did before he joined ours.

Every time we tried to do something we were turned the other way. Even times when we went through elaborate planning there was no point in doing it.

I remember one time we were looking for some intel and had a tip on a few places we could look, we happened to pick this big star studded party, because we felt safer around people (we were being hunted). So we took the time to steal some clothes from a fancy stores (tuxedoes and stuff), managed to hack the computers to get our names on the list and we either forged invitations or stole real ones (can't remember). So we do all that work to get in for him to turn around and say "none of these people are real, they are all demons impersonating celebrities and they are now attacking you". So out of game he was like "I have no idea why you would even bother going there" and we were like "we picked one of your 3 options".

So we survive that and move onto option 2, pretty much a repeat of option 1. It was like that with everything, manage to discretely kill someone in a completely abandoned part of town where half of it didn't even have electricity, but the random building we dragged the guy into had a state of the art security system that recorded it all, contacted the police and sent a copy to the news agency before we even left the building. This is what caused us to be on the run in the first place.

Now I know the point of his game was for us to end up being on the run, but talk about forcing our hands. He didn't even bother waiting for something realistic to happen like pulling a bank job, or killing someone in public.

Nope, each time it's different. I don't like being on the rails so I always run mine as a sandbox with only general notes. One game I ran was supposed to go to Oregon, they ended up in Mexico. If they go my way, there is reward and glory and fun, if they don't... I still try to make it fun.

[Eclipse]

Problem with railroading is, since it's all in the GM's head, if he doesn't (care to?) track these things carefully, the PCs trying to avoid a big baddie can be pointless, since he could contrive an excuse for the big baddie to turn up at this other location. Or at least for the big baddie's minions to notify him because they happen to be around.

Reminds me of this old tale:

"A merchant in Baghdad sends his servant to the marketplace for provisions. Shortly, the servant comes home white and trembling and tells him that in the marketplace he was jostled by a woman, whom he recognized as Death, and she made a threatening gesture. Borrowing the merchant's horse, he flees at top speed to Samarra, a distance of about 75 miles (125 km), where he believes Death will not find him. The merchant then goes to the marketplace and finds Death, and asks why she made the threatening gesture. She replies, "That was not a threatening gesture, it was only a start of surprise. I was astonished to see him in Baghdad, for I had an appointment with him tonight in Samarra.""

Basically, to correct this, he has to decide on a plan for the villain that is fixed, until he has a reason to change it, e.g. based on the actions of the PCs that he can reasonably have become aware of, and only then.

[Zer0 Kay]

Problem with railroading is, since it's all in the GM's head, if he doesn't (care to?) track these things carefully, the PCs trying to avoid a big baddie can be pointless, since he could contrive an excuse for the big baddie to turn up at this other location. Or at least for the big baddie's minions to notify him because they happen to be around.

Reminds me of this old tale:

"A merchant in Baghdad sends his servant to the marketplace for provisions. Shortly, the servant comes home white and trembling and tells him that in the marketplace he was jostled by a woman, whom he recognized as Death, and she made a threatening gesture. Borrowing the merchant's horse, he flees at top speed to Samarra, a distance of about 75 miles (125 km), where he believes Death will not find him. The merchant then goes to the marketplace and finds Death, and asks why she made the threatening gesture. She replies, "That was not a threatening gesture, it was only a start of surprise. I was astonished to see him in Baghdad, for I had an appointment with him tonight in Samarra.""

Basically, to correct this, he has to decide on a plan for the villain that is fixed, until he has a reason to change it, e.g. based on the actions of the PCs that he can reasonably have become aware of, and only then.

That is a story of fate not railroading. Just because a foe is in the GMs head and not on paper and just because he doesn't carefully track everything on paper doesn't mean its railroading. Almost every single console or PC game is railroading. Having a linear path of either location or events is railroading.

So I hope your not implying that my game is a railroad simply because I have no detailed notes and tracking records.

If a GM isn't attached to a given series of events occurring there shouldn't be a problem. I guess it may also be a difference in definition of campaign. For me a campaign is an ongoing game with a common theme.

My groups don't even start in the same dimension. They frequently won't even face the same foes, unless they happen to go to the same places. The only constant is an allied NPC that shows up, a tool I use to provide information and rescues when needed.

[Razzinold]

Problem with railroading is, since it's all in the GM's head, if he doesn't (care to?) track these things carefully, the PCs trying to avoid a big baddie can be pointless, since he could contrive an excuse for the big baddie to turn up at this other location. Or at least for the big baddie's minions to notify him because they happen to be around.

Reminds me of this old tale:

"A merchant in Baghdad sends his servant to the marketplace for provisions. Shortly, the servant comes home white and trembling and tells him that in the marketplace he was jostled by a woman, whom he recognized as Death, and she made a threatening gesture. Borrowing the merchant's horse, he flees at top speed to Samarra, a distance of about 75 miles (125 km), where he believes Death will not find him. The merchant then goes to the marketplace and finds Death, and asks why she made the threatening gesture. She replies, "That was not a threatening gesture, it was only a start of surprise. I was astonished to see him in Baghdad, for I had an appointment with him tonight in Samarra.""

Basically, to correct this, he has to decide on a plan for the villain that is fixed, until he has a reason to change it, e.g. based on the actions of the PCs that he can reasonably have become aware of, and only then.

No, it was straight up railroading. We were not trying to avoid any confrontation, in fact it was the opposite, we were actively trying to go out and find information. I illustrated above how much detail we went into planning our method to infiltrate for him to simply go "nope it's all demons nothing for you here" and then out of game say "I don't know why you even bothered going there". He always said that about 2 of the 3 options. What he did was give the illusion of choice but what he really wanted was for us to pick his choice.

Another example, we were provided a vehicle by someone who kind of forcibly employed us. We tried to deviate from the set plan, i.e. steal the vehicle, can't do that because it's rigged and he shuts down life support, corrects the course and threatens to do it again if we deviate.

See railroading, our character should be able to chose if we want to go to some other planet or take off somewhere else. He did other things as well, the FTL drive was triggered remotely to send us into the quadrant of space he wanted us to be. So I decided to hack the ship, I find the stuff and remove it, once again the ship is hijacked. "Back up remote" is his answer.
So we were like "wow, that transmitter has awesome range considering he is back on earth and we are in a entirely different solar system".

Did I forgot to mention that he and his minions were magically "everything proof" when we unloaded every weapon on the ship at him at point blank range?

I have tons of examples. We all start out in jail, none of us can break out but there happens to be a girl in our group (played by a real life girl). The only way we could get out of jail was for her to seduce the guards and he had her play it on in detail. Nothing else we tried work, we tried supernatural strength, mutant abilities, magic, psionics, bribing the guards, psionic on the guards. The prison cells and guards were everything proof as well.
Someone with a high supernatural strength managed to grab one of the guards through the bars, can you guess what happened next?

Yup, you guessed correctly the human guard was even stronger and I'm not talking his roll vs the guard roll to see who wins either. No, no, no this guard was sooo strong that he broke the guys grip instantly.

Needless to say after all this, and more, happening in the same campaign some of us made plans to purposefully torpedo his campaign. He caught wind of it from another player and when we all get together next week he was like "let's put this game on hold and start another one."

[Zer0 Kay]

Problem with railroading is, since it's all in the GM's head, if he doesn't (care to?) track these things carefully, the PCs trying to avoid a big baddie can be pointless, since he could contrive an excuse for the big baddie to turn up at this other location. Or at least for the big baddie's minions to notify him because they happen to be around.

Reminds me of this old tale:

"A merchant in Baghdad sends his servant to the marketplace for provisions. Shortly, the servant comes home white and trembling and tells him that in the marketplace he was jostled by a woman, whom he recognized as Death, and she made a threatening gesture. Borrowing the merchant's horse, he flees at top speed to Samarra, a distance of about 75 miles (125 km), where he believes Death will not find him. The merchant then goes to the marketplace and finds Death, and asks why she made the threatening gesture. She replies, "That was not a threatening gesture, it was only a start of surprise. I was astonished to see him in Baghdad, for I had an appointment with him tonight in Samarra.""

Basically, to correct this, he has to decide on a plan for the villain that is fixed, until he has a reason to change it, e.g. based on the actions of the PCs that he can reasonably have become aware of, and only then.

No, it was straight up railroading. We were not trying to avoid any confrontation, in fact it was the opposite, we were actively trying to go out and find information. I illustrated above how much detail we went into planning our method to infiltrate for him to simply go "nope it's all demons nothing for you here" and then out of game say "I don't know why you even bothered going there". He always said that about 2 of the 3 options. What he did was give the illusion of choice but what he really wanted was for us to pick his choice.

Another example, we were provided a vehicle by someone who kind of forcibly employed us. We tried to deviate from the set plan, i.e. steal the vehicle, can't do that because it's rigged and he shuts down life support, corrects the course and threatens to do it again if we deviate.

See railroading, our character should be able to chose if we want to go to some other planet or take off somewhere else. He did other things as well, the FTL drive was triggered remotely to send us into the quadrant of space he wanted us to be. So I decided to hack the ship, I find the stuff and remove it, once again the ship is hijacked. "Back up remote" is his answer.
So we were like "wow, that transmitter has awesome range considering he is back on earth and we are in a entirely different solar system".

Did I forgot to mention that he and his minions were magically "everything proof" when we unloaded every weapon on the ship at him at point blank range?

I have tons of examples. We all start out in jail, none of us can break out but there happens to be a girl in our group (played by a real life girl). The only way we could get out of jail was for her to seduce the guards and he had her play it on in detail. Nothing else we tried work, we tried supernatural strength, mutant abilities, magic, psionics, bribing the guards, psionic on the guards. The prison cells and guards were everything proof as well.
Someone with a high supernatural strength managed to grab one of the guards through the bars, can you guess what happened next?

Yup, you guessed correctly the human guard was even stronger and I'm not talking his roll vs the guard roll to see who wins either. No, no, no this guard was sooo strong that he broke the guys grip instantly.

Needless to say after all this, and more, happening in the same campaign some of us made plans to purposefully torpedo his campaign. He caught wind of it from another player and when we all get together next week he was like "let's put this game on hold and start another one."

If your responding to my comment on it not being railroading but fate... That was directed at the story about Death and the rich Arab. That GM of yours is an unimaginative micromanager.

[Eclipse]

Problem with railroading is, since it's all in the GM's head, if he doesn't (care to?) track these things carefully, the PCs trying to avoid a big baddie can be pointless, since he could contrive an excuse for the big baddie to turn up at this other location. Or at least for the big baddie's minions to notify him because they happen to be around.

Reminds me of this old tale:

"A merchant in Baghdad sends his servant to the marketplace for provisions. Shortly, the servant comes home white and trembling and tells him that in the marketplace he was jostled by a woman, whom he recognized as Death, and she made a threatening gesture. Borrowing the merchant's horse, he flees at top speed to Samarra, a distance of about 75 miles (125 km), where he believes Death will not find him. The merchant then goes to the marketplace and finds Death, and asks why she made the threatening gesture. She replies, "That was not a threatening gesture, it was only a start of surprise. I was astonished to see him in Baghdad, for I had an appointment with him tonight in Samarra.""

Basically, to correct this, he has to decide on a plan for the villain that is fixed, until he has a reason to change it, e.g. based on the actions of the PCs that he can reasonably have become aware of, and only then.

That is a story of fate not railroading. Just because a foe is in the GMs head and not on paper and just because he doesn't carefully track everything on paper doesn't mean its railroading. Almost every single console or PC game is railroading. Having a linear path of either location or events is railroading.

So I hope your not implying that my game is a railroad simply because I have no detailed notes and tracking records.

If a GM isn't attached to a given series of events occurring there shouldn't be a problem. I guess it may also be a difference in definition of campaign. For me a campaign is an ongoing game with a common theme.

My groups don't even start in the same dimension. They frequently won't even face the same foes, unless they happen to go to the same places. The only constant is an allied NPC that shows up, a tool I use to provide information and rescues when needed.

I imply nothing about your game, since I know nothing about it. My point is from the pov of players, the actions of a GM might as well be similar to the story about Fate that I listed. And a railroading GM can take advantage of that - in his case, basically, the players have no free will, except perhaps an illusion of it, their fate is sealed, it's a train coming down the track and they're tied to it. If you're not one, then my observation doesn't apply to you.

Of course, it's unreasonable to expect a good, non-railroading GM to be burdened by having to take copious notes like a robot so they can prove they're not a railroader and that their plans are independent of the players' plans.

[Zer0 Kay]

Problem with railroading is, since it's all in the GM's head, if he doesn't (care to?) track these things carefully, the PCs trying to avoid a big baddie can be pointless, since he could contrive an excuse for the big baddie to turn up at this other location. Or at least for the big baddie's minions to notify him because they happen to be around.

Reminds me of this old tale:

"A merchant in Baghdad sends his servant to the marketplace for provisions. Shortly, the servant comes home white and trembling and tells him that in the marketplace he was jostled by a woman, whom he recognized as Death, and she made a threatening gesture. Borrowing the merchant's horse, he flees at top speed to Samarra, a distance of about 75 miles (125 km), where he believes Death will not find him. The merchant then goes to the marketplace and finds Death, and asks why she made the threatening gesture. She replies, "That was not a threatening gesture, it was only a start of surprise. I was astonished to see him in Baghdad, for I had an appointment with him tonight in Samarra.""

Basically, to correct this, he has to decide on a plan for the villain that is fixed, until he has a reason to change it, e.g. based on the actions of the PCs that he can reasonably have become aware of, and only then.

That is a story of fate not railroading. Just because a foe is in the GMs head and not on paper and just because he doesn't carefully track everything on paper doesn't mean its railroading. Almost every single console or PC game is railroading. Having a linear path of either location or events is railroading.

So I hope your not implying that my game is a railroad simply because I have no detailed notes and tracking records.

If a GM isn't attached to a given series of events occurring there shouldn't be a problem. I guess it may also be a difference in definition of campaign. For me a campaign is an ongoing game with a common theme.

My groups don't even start in the same dimension. They frequently won't even face the same foes, unless they happen to go to the same places. The only constant is an allied NPC that shows up, a tool I use to provide information and rescues when needed.

I imply nothing about your game, since I know nothing about it. My point is from the pov of players, the actions of a GM might as well be similar to the story about Fate that I listed. And a railroading GM can take advantage of that - in his case, basically, the players have no free will, except perhaps an illusion of it, their fate is sealed, it's a train coming down the track and they're tied to it. If you're not one, then my observation doesn't apply to you.

Of course, it's unreasonable to expect a good, non-railroading GM to be burdened by having to take copious notes like a robot so they can prove they're not a railroader and that their plans are independent of the players' plans.

Cool 'nuff. Sorry you had to deal with that GM. Some people do like that kind of gaming though, don't know why.

[Razzinold]

Problem with railroading is, since it's all in the GM's head, if he doesn't (care to?) track these things carefully, the PCs trying to avoid a big baddie can be pointless, since he could contrive an excuse for the big baddie to turn up at this other location. Or at least for the big baddie's minions to notify him because they happen to be around.

Reminds me of this old tale:

"A merchant in Baghdad sends his servant to the marketplace for provisions. Shortly, the servant comes home white and trembling and tells him that in the marketplace he was jostled by a woman, whom he recognized as Death, and she made a threatening gesture. Borrowing the merchant's horse, he flees at top speed to Samarra, a distance of about 75 miles (125 km), where he believes Death will not find him. The merchant then goes to the marketplace and finds Death, and asks why she made the threatening gesture. She replies, "That was not a threatening gesture, it was only a start of surprise. I was astonished to see him in Baghdad, for I had an appointment with him tonight in Samarra.""

Basically, to correct this, he has to decide on a plan for the villain that is fixed, until he has a reason to change it, e.g. based on the actions of the PCs that he can reasonably have become aware of, and only then.

No, it was straight up railroading. We were not trying to avoid any confrontation, in fact it was the opposite, we were actively trying to go out and find information. I illustrated above how much detail we went into planning our method to infiltrate for him to simply go "nope it's all demons nothing for you here" and then out of game say "I don't know why you even bothered going there". He always said that about 2 of the 3 options. What he did was give the illusion of choice but what he really wanted was for us to pick his choice.

Another example, we were provided a vehicle by someone who kind of forcibly employed us. We tried to deviate from the set plan, i.e. steal the vehicle, can't do that because it's rigged and he shuts down life support, corrects the course and threatens to do it again if we deviate.

See railroading, our character should be able to chose if we want to go to some other planet or take off somewhere else. He did other things as well, the FTL drive was triggered remotely to send us into the quadrant of space he wanted us to be. So I decided to hack the ship, I find the stuff and remove it, once again the ship is hijacked. "Back up remote" is his answer.
So we were like "wow, that transmitter has awesome range considering he is back on earth and we are in a entirely different solar system".

Did I forgot to mention that he and his minions were magically "everything proof" when we unloaded every weapon on the ship at him at point blank range?

I have tons of examples. We all start out in jail, none of us can break out but there happens to be a girl in our group (played by a real life girl). The only way we could get out of jail was for her to seduce the guards and he had her play it on in detail. Nothing else we tried work, we tried supernatural strength, mutant abilities, magic, psionics, bribing the guards, psionic on the guards. The prison cells and guards were everything proof as well.
Someone with a high supernatural strength managed to grab one of the guards through the bars, can you guess what happened next?

Yup, you guessed correctly the human guard was even stronger and I'm not talking his roll vs the guard roll to see who wins either. No, no, no this guard was sooo strong that he broke the guys grip instantly.

Needless to say after all this, and more, happening in the same campaign some of us made plans to purposefully torpedo his campaign. He caught wind of it from another player and when we all get together next week he was like "let's put this game on hold and start another one."

If your responding to my comment on it not being railroading but fate... That was directed at the story about Death and the rich Arab. That GM of yours is an unimaginative micromanager.

I was responding to Eclipse, sorry for any confusion.
I agree very unimaginative. I don't think a GM has to have the story written out like a screenplay or novel to be a good GM or not to be considered a railroader but I know railroading when I see it.

It was more then just having a boss fight show up in a different location, because all GM's do this, same thing with event triggers switching from one town to another, i.e. we skipped Town A (which the GM figured we would stop at because it was bigger/had more to offer) and instead stopped at Town B (which had nothing more than a small trading post).
By skipping Town A we altered his "plan" he switched his plan of us finding out "_____________" (about a job, bounty, treasure hunt) from the local bartender to the dude running the trading post and that is a logical thing for him to do.

I was talking about having complete control over all actions. Like say he lays out an awesome plot hook for us to go mine some caves for rare artifacts, gems, whatever but we (as players and our characters) would rather make money chasing down bounties sine it's a better fit for our characters because we all chose Man-at-Arms OCCS.

Now I realize his campaign could have been cool and there could have been a mystic doorway or something that we would find but as players, or characters, we don't know that so it isn't logical that we would suddenly become miners.
So off we go to try and chase some bounties and he would do stuff like the guy we were chasing was hiding out at the mines and if we track him there they capture us and now we work the mines like slaves. Scenario 2 is we don't take the bounty that leads to the mines we take a completely different one instead. We track this guy down and guess what he owns the mines, boom! sent as slaves to the mines.

That is railroading because no matter what we do, or attempt to do, we end up in those mines.

[Zer0 Kay]

Problem with railroading is, since it's all in the GM's head, if he doesn't (care to?) track these things carefully, the PCs trying to avoid a big baddie can be pointless, since he could contrive an excuse for the big baddie to turn up at this other location. Or at least for the big baddie's minions to notify him because they happen to be around.

Reminds me of this old tale:

"A merchant in Baghdad sends his servant to the marketplace for provisions. Shortly, the servant comes home white and trembling and tells him that in the marketplace he was jostled by a woman, whom he recognized as Death, and she made a threatening gesture. Borrowing the merchant's horse, he flees at top speed to Samarra, a distance of about 75 miles (125 km), where he believes Death will not find him. The merchant then goes to the marketplace and finds Death, and asks why she made the threatening gesture. She replies, "That was not a threatening gesture, it was only a start of surprise. I was astonished to see him in Baghdad, for I had an appointment with him tonight in Samarra.""

Basically, to correct this, he has to decide on a plan for the villain that is fixed, until he has a reason to change it, e.g. based on the actions of the PCs that he can reasonably have become aware of, and only then.

No, it was straight up railroading. We were not trying to avoid any confrontation, in fact it was the opposite, we were actively trying to go out and find information. I illustrated above how much detail we went into planning our method to infiltrate for him to simply go "nope it's all demons nothing for you here" and then out of game say "I don't know why you even bothered going there". He always said that about 2 of the 3 options. What he did was give the illusion of choice but what he really wanted was for us to pick his choice.

Another example, we were provided a vehicle by someone who kind of forcibly employed us. We tried to deviate from the set plan, i.e. steal the vehicle, can't do that because it's rigged and he shuts down life support, corrects the course and threatens to do it again if we deviate.

See railroading, our character should be able to chose if we want to go to some other planet or take off somewhere else. He did other things as well, the FTL drive was triggered remotely to send us into the quadrant of space he wanted us to be. So I decided to hack the ship, I find the stuff and remove it, once again the ship is hijacked. "Back up remote" is his answer.
So we were like "wow, that transmitter has awesome range considering he is back on earth and we are in a entirely different solar system".

Did I forgot to mention that he and his minions were magically "everything proof" when we unloaded every weapon on the ship at him at point blank range?

I have tons of examples. We all start out in jail, none of us can break out but there happens to be a girl in our group (played by a real life girl). The only way we could get out of jail was for her to seduce the guards and he had her play it on in detail. Nothing else we tried work, we tried supernatural strength, mutant abilities, magic, psionics, bribing the guards, psionic on the guards. The prison cells and guards were everything proof as well.
Someone with a high supernatural strength managed to grab one of the guards through the bars, can you guess what happened next?

Yup, you guessed correctly the human guard was even stronger and I'm not talking his roll vs the guard roll to see who wins either. No, no, no this guard was sooo strong that he broke the guys grip instantly.

Needless to say after all this, and more, happening in the same campaign some of us made plans to purposefully torpedo his campaign. He caught wind of it from another player and when we all get together next week he was like "let's put this game on hold and start another one."

If your responding to my comment on it not being railroading but fate... That was directed at the story about Death and the rich Arab. That GM of yours is an unimaginative micromanager.

I was responding to Eclipse, sorry for any confusion.
I agree very unimaginative. I don't think a GM has to have the story written out like a screenplay or novel to be a good GM or not to be considered a railroader but I know railroading when I see it.

It was more then just having a boss fight show up in a different location, because all GM's do this, same thing with event triggers switching from one town to another, i.e. we skipped Town A (which the GM figured we would stop at because it was bigger/had more to offer) and instead stopped at Town B (which had nothing more than a small trading post).
By skipping Town A we altered his "plan" he switched his plan of us finding out "_____________" (about a job, bounty, treasure hunt) from the local bartender to the dude running the trading post and that is a logical thing for him to do.

I was talking about having complete control over all actions. Like say he lays out an awesome plot hook for us to go mine some caves for rare artifacts, gems, whatever but we (as players and our characters) would rather make money chasing down bounties sine it's a better fit for our characters because we all chose Man-at-Arms OCCS.

Now I realize his campaign could have been cool and there could have been a mystic doorway or something that we would find but as players, or characters, we don't know that so it isn't logical that we would suddenly become miners.
So off we go to try and chase some bounties and he would do stuff like the guy we were chasing was hiding out at the mines and if we track him there they capture us and now we work the mines like slaves. Scenario 2 is we don't take the bounty that leads to the mines we take a completely different one instead. We track this guy down and guess what he owns the mines, boom! sent as slaves to the mines.

That is railroading because no matter what we do, or attempt to do, we end up in those mines.

the funny thing is if he hadn't tried so hard he still could have gotten you there. Is it still railroading if your finessed there? Drop hints that there is treasure in them caves... No bite, offer a bounties but don't tell details until you accept. So it sounds like he was trying to play Santa Claus without getting labeled as one by making you work some. The funny thing is he didn't play to your characters.

However it is every players responsibility to pick up the pick axe and dig for gold and you guys so failed.