Avoid Those Railroads, Even Where They Start
written by Donat P. Fevre
July 18th, 2007 · 5 Comments
Railroading your players throughout a campaign is a sure recipe for disaster. While some players may let it fly, there are many who just won’t stand for it, and will even leave your D&D group if you do it too much.
However, it seems like railroading players at the very beginning of a campaign is still a very common thing. And it seems most players generally buy into it easily, just to get the game rolling along. Generally, the common theme seems to be “You all meet in a tavern, and are approached by this guy…”
Just recently, I did use a method similar to this, though in the form of an old, indistinct man directing them to a certain place and time. The first three players I did this on bought into it quite well, for the most part. The fourth player I tried to do this on (my girlfriend, conveniently or inconveniently enough) didn’t buy into this at all. Her character simply had no interest in what the old man had to offer.
So what do you do to get your players’ characters to gather and meet?
- They run into each other out of shear coincidence. This is a method I used for my main campaign. I began with one player, asking her what her character was doing. And I helped flavor it up a little, describing the environment and whatnot. Then I asked the second player what his character was doing. I did much the same thing as with the first player, flavoring it up a little. Then the first player’s character spotted the second player’s character trying to hide (very poorly at that) in a tree.
You can use this method for all the characters that everyone is playing. Eventually, through sheer coincidental circumstances, the characters will all meet up, and inadvertently end up being the adventuring party. - Events occur that capture the player character’s attention. Take a look at your campaign and figure out what events occur where. Perhaps something strange occurs that can spurn a particular character into action. Maybe an explosion in the middle of a village, and the player character happens to be interested enough to go investigate. Or perhaps there’s something making the animals of a forest freak out, which could prompt a ranger or druid into action. Or perhaps some odd arcane event is occurring, and a wizard is sent out with a few other to go investigate the occurrences.
You can also combine this with the first method to try to get all the player characters together. - Bribe the characters. Some player characters are only interested in money. Or power. Or knowledge. Entice those characters with a reward if they do whatever your NPC is asking them to do. They just might take the bait.
The less you can make it seem that you’re trying to get all the characters to a common spot, the easier it will be to keep the attention of all your players. No one likes being forced to do something, so why should you make their characters be forced as well? Instead of using DM intervention to shove all the characters to where you want them, let the players make the decision instead.
Then, just use a little bit of social engineering to get the players to make the choice to do what you want them to do! 
Topics: D&D General
While “Bride the characters” seems rather funny, that was entirely a typo. Big thanks to the friend who pointed that out for me.
Anyhow, my bad.
There is another way that I found after dealing with uncooperative platers or those who expected a bribe to cooperate.
At character creation time, tell them:
Your characters have been companions for a few years now and are just getting out into the big bad world. Figure out how you how you met and why you are together now.
I actually completely forgotten about that one!
That can work very well too. I think I did that for a Winter one-shot that I ran about a year ago. It ended up with the entire group starting out two groups. One group were people who were already residents of a town, while the other group were basically mercenaries who wanted cash.
Oh, and then there was the one character who was a missionary. She went to that town to try to convert the populace to her religion. Unfortunately for her, she had to contend with the already entrenched religion.
I am a big fan of this technique. The players decide how they know each other when they create their characters. That way there is no way I’ll deal with a group of characters that hang out together just because we’re playing a game. I might even ask them to tweak their characters if I’m not satisfied with the result.
That doesn’t mean there is no conflict between the characters. There’s usually a lot of conflict and tension between old friends that have to be together all the time.
It’s always hard, especially when you start DMing and want to get the show on the road. First, there are two factors on the player’s side: 1. player personality, 2. character alignment.
Player personality is obvious: the player is happy to go along with the DM, especially at the beginning of the adventure where the way you introduce the world indicates what the player should do, and they want to get the show on the road as much as you do.
2. Character alignment seems most important in the good-evil spectrum: For example, in the latest campaign, my character did not resist an old man begging for help trying to save the world because he is good. Good characters aren’t hard to motivate, usually. Neutral and Evil characters are better with bribes: Ocelot basically offered you anything because he figured you’d all be dead, but he was rich enough to plausibly promise it. Attention-capturing is a double-bladed sword: at the beginning of the aquatic session there was an explosion and the sounds of battle to draw the characters to the scene. Everybody decided to ignore it for the sake of their own hides. It wasn’t a problem - if anything, it was easier to use NPCs to convey the information - but only the good guys rushed to help.
Lawful is easier for the DM, especially for Paladin or Samurai (or monk, or cleric, or fighter…) characters who obey some kind of master’s orders. Chaotic…is once again probably better with bribes.
PS: Ahh, the winter campaign…we weren’t just mercenaries; we were mercilessly evil murderers, two soldiers taking orders from Loki.