this post was submitted on 19 May 2025
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If you've railroaded your campaign that much you're a bad GM. It's not your story, it's your players story.
Rollercoaster are fun yet have rails.
Are you even a GM to allow yourself such snap judgment? But for you know, we GM/DMs are not your employees RPGs are a group collaboration.
I hate this take a lot, I'm gonna be honest. I don't care if his game is so on rails that it's set on the fucking orient express. As long as the players are having fun with the game, and the GM is having fun with the game.. that's a good GM.
So a player that told you from beginning what he wants to do, which doesnt fit into your story, should they be forbiden to participate?
Do you just assume the worst in everyone you meet? How exhausted are you with the way you think?
What you said does not follow from the post you responded to. In any way. Why would you assume that? That's like me randomly asking if you kicked a puppy before posting your comment.... wait, d-did you?
I never said anything even vaguely approaching that?
What do you even mean by "told me from the beginning what he wants to do"? If I'm prepping a fantasy campaign and one of my players tells me, "I'd kinda prefer we do something sci-fi" then I have no obligation to change my entire campaign because a player isn't happy with it. I might still do it, if I felt interested in running that and the rest of the table does too, but imo I'm well within my rights to tell him no.
If you mean that he wants a plotline of his own then I'd do my best to accommodate that, assuming it doesn't clash with the rest of the campaign horribly. If it does, then I'd just say that and offer alternatives if I can think of any. If I can't, then of course he can still play if he'd like.
How is this in any way railroading?
The DM determined that A) the players would find this crown, B) they would not clean it when they found it, and C) it would get cleaned at some point the DM decides later, whether the players wanted it to or not. Good for a book, bad for D&D.
....
A) this makes no sense to describe as railroading, apparently finding anything plot or backstory related is railroading?
B & C) Players not doing what a dm expects isn't railroading. If the dm then turned around and said "no you don't do that" or decides to make it impervious to prestidigitation, that might fit the definition.
Railroading is removing player agency and not giving players choices. Players just doing something unexpected that throws you for a loop? That's called DMing.
My main point is that the DM gave them a crown but then for some reason panicks when they do something very mundane with it. It implies the DM has a rigid story set, rather than a sandbox for the players to explore.