"No adventure ever survives contact with the players," a gamer friend of mine recently said. It is a fact of gaming that players will do unexpected things. The beauty of tabletop role-playing games is the way they allow for creative solutions to problems. The other edge of that sword is the possibility that players will come up with a solution the GM is totally unprepared for. And in some cases, that solution unravels all the GM's nefarious and deadly plans.

In such a situation, the last thing you want to do is end the session in frustration or appeal to your players to choose a different solution for the sake of the game. Players should be rewarded for highly ingenious thinking, not punished.

Here are some common 'break down' moments and how I've dealt with them in the past:

Players Sneak in the Wrong Way:
Sometimes it can be as simple as rearranging the order in which things will happen so that the players still encounter things in an appropriate order. If, for example, they need a certain item on the ground floor to defeat the main evil foe in the dungeons, but they figure out a way to enter through the basement, you can simply change the location of the item for the enemy so the players don't die needlessly in a hopeless battle.

Players With Superior Numbers of Allies: Sometimes players contrive ways to bring a ton of other NPC allies with them to what was to be a final duel. Strategic-thinking players, especially, have a tendency to play it cautious in order to preserve as many resources and assets for the final confrontation as they can. They see beating an enemy with overwhelming force as the smart solution, if the less classically heroic. To ensure that the players and their mini army don't bulldoze your entire set up, you can either beef up the smaller enemies in order to pick off more of their forces early or increase their numbers to compensate for the players' superior numbers. If you are a GM who appreciates brilliant strategy for its own sake, perhaps you could instead consider rewarding the players for their tactical thinking by allowing them to plaster minor enemies in record time. However, if you do so, consider one of the following for the final challenge: 1) If they are to face some final, powerful enemy, make the enemy that much stronger and scarier. 2) Rule that, because the players decided to sweep in with a large, obvious force, their ultimate foe had enough warning to plot an escape. Such a ruling is a fair trade-off that makes strategic sense: by bringing huge numbers to bear, the players sacrifice stealth, mobility, and the element of surprise.

Players Figure Out Things Too Soon: Sometimes a shrewd player will guess, deduce, or research and discover what was to be your entire strategy. They know everything before they ever enter a dangerous area. To keep things interesting, feel free to throw in a couple of unexpected, minor red herrings. After all, no intelligence is 100% accurate to the smallest detail. Even minor obstacles can keep things exciting and keep players on their toes, and it doesn't feel like they wasted all that effort to get information you're just going to make useless.

Players End Up With a Super Item They Weren't Supposed To: Remember that actions have consequences, and that it's impossible to keep huge discoveries totally secret for long. Once word gets out of what the players have at their disposal, they may find themselves being tracked, watched, or even hunted for possessing it. Perhaps the item in question is evil and that evil starts to curse them. Perhaps the players begin to have disputes with NPCs who covet the item or followers and hangers-on who start to slow them down or embarrass them. Since such items are usually stolen, perhaps people related to its former owner come looking to recover it...by any means necessary. This can be tricky if players feel you're punishing them for having something they feel they deserve to keep. If it's clear they love having the item, then just alter future game challenges to account for its presence. Perhaps even provide a few challenges that can ONLY be solved by use of their super-item.

Players Kill Someone They Weren't Supposed To: Again, actions have consequences. If the victim was supposed to be a main ally, such allies most likely have friends and family who will seek restitution and can then become other potential allies who fulfill the same role. If the victim was a main source of information, perhaps the players find clues that yield the same information on the victim's body, among the victim's possessions, from a helpful assistant, or simply scattered in a timely matter throughout the ensuing storyline.

Finally, I have one simple rule when it comes to unexpected actions by the players: if what they did or did not do doesn't strictly matter to the larger objective of the story or campaign, let them do what they like. Chances are, they'll find their own way back to the pre-planned paths to that objective eventually.

Decision Matrix for Games With Many Players

At a recent Pathfinder session, a friend introduced me to a mechanic to aid players in making difficult or complex plans. If your players run across a situation that requires them to chose one among a handful of options and there is differing opinion as to which is the best, you may find this "decision matrix" works well for you.

Advantages include being impartial and democratic, revealing the group's general consensus out of individual responses to simple questions, uninfluenced by input from others. In groups of more than four players, this decision matrix can be especially helpful in streamlining decision making.

The main disadvantage is speed. The decision matrix does take a bit of time to get through, and the more players, the slower it works.

Step 1: Determine the choices at hand. The players know what their goals are, and the dispute should be over the route to achieve those goals. This step takes two parts: identify important factors and identify main choices. Important factors are things like party safety vs. party speed, factors that have to be juggled. Main choices are things like which route to take toward an objective or which approach to use when striking down an unknown foe just over the next hill.

Step 2: List both factors and choices. Write them down on a piece of paper such that they form a grid, which factors down one side and choices along the top.

Step 3: Interview the players. Go around the circle of players and ask each to individually answer. Forbid other players from interfering. Ask each player for their vote on the best course of action for each given factor, and on the second best.

Step 4: Tally the results. The majority decision should be visible. If there is a tie, repeat the process with only those choices that were tied, and ask only for the top choice from each player.

Example:
The players are investigating a mysterious island. They know from earlier reconnissance that there is a supposedly abandoned town on the island's far side that is now active with people, and that the woods between their current location and the town are filled with hostile creatures. They do not know if the people in the town are friends or foes, but they do know that there is a large and dangerous disturbance in a crater southeast of the town. The players cannot reach a group decision after several minutes of decision, so the GM decides to try using the decision matrix method.

She talks with the players and determines that they all agree that all of the following factors are important:
1. The safety of the group.
2. The speed with which they can reach the town in order to warn potentially innocent people of their danger.

There are three possible routes to take to the town:
1. Using the road that leads over the island to the town.
2. Using the most direct overland route through the woods.
3. Sailing the characters' ship around the island to a reef-free bay within sight of the town.

She begins asking each player the following questions:
"Which of the three routes do you think is the safest? Which is the next safest?"
"Which of the three routes do you think is the fastest? Which is the next fastest?"

She begins to tally the answers, asking each player in turn. In the end, she adds up the tallies and determines that the group's general consensus lies with taking the ship around the island. This will sacrifice a good deal of speed, but is much safer than the danger of the woods or the lack of cover on the road.

I hope this helps you to resolve disputes about the next course of action the next time you have a game with a lot of players.

Realism in Role-Playing Games

If you know too much about how something really works, chances are you won't enjoy a simplified layman's version. There are a lot of elements to any role-playing game that are written with the assumption that players know little or nothing about them. For example, military operations, or piloting a space craft, or Medieval sword fighting techniques. In general, role-playing game systems are designed to simulate the flavor of such things, to make it just real enough to satisfy the imagination, to make one feel as if one really were a military general or space marine or noble knight.

Ironically, it seems the same type of person who deeply enjoys RPGs is also the same type of person who tends to have a deep working knowledge of some element that RPGs are commonly built around. There are military and tactical nerds, history buffs, Medieval warfare enthusiasts, and of course the religious fans of a given fictional setting who can quote the smallest minutiae of trivia. These are the people who, in my experience, become the most dissatisfied with RPGs meant to simulate their beloved interest. Games simply leave too much out for the sake of ease-of-play. It can be doubly frustrating for such a player when they know more about a topic than the Game Master.

What both GMs and topic-enthusiast players have to realize is that, in general, the more "realistic" a game attempts to portray something, generally the less fun that game becomes for everyone else not interested in such things. Things become too frustrating for the unenlightened player because, without any knowledge about how a given element really works, the only reference the player usually has comes from literature and especially movies. And role-playing games have more in common with both of these than with any real-world simulator. The "weight," if you will, of any role-playing game tends to fall against the side of greater realism, for favor of allowing players the freedom to act in-character and engage the game's story.  

Now, there is nothing wrong with a game that attempts to be as realistic as possible. Every game has it's own style, a reflection of the gaming philosophy of the designers and of the target audience the game is trying to reach. Obviously, every role-playing game has to have some level of realism in order to give everyone a common metaphysical grounding. But every role-playing game must also simplify reality to some extent. It's the difference between a game where "bullet proof vests stop bullets" and "bullet proof vests provide a degree of cushioning against ballistic impact so that it is less likely a bullet will cause fatal injury." At the end of the day, I must say as a GM and a game designer that fun has to trump realism. Games must cater to the widest possible audience, and to do that, they have to make sacrifices to make themselves accessible.

Part of the reason that Dungeons and Dragons was the introduction to role-playing games for an entire generation was that it was relatively easy to learn. Even the title tells you exactly what sort of game you're getting into. This is not the sort of game where, for example, a paladin without a screwdriver will be unable to don his armor. It is not the sort of game where every person is either a peasent or a lord, and where females have little to look forward to in life besides marrying well. That's part of the game's appeal: a fantasy game of high adventure and grand deeds, where players can feel like heroes, or at least like bad-asses. Realistic details that would make the game more historically accurate to Medieval Europe would also become a barrier to the main point of the game, especially to new players.

So if you are someone who enjoys role-playing games but is often frustrated by their lack of realism, my humble suggestion is that you find a genre of game that lies outside your field of expertise (if that's possible). That way, you can become swept up in the make believe of it without having the fun derailed when something happens that you know should happen differently. Also, be as forgiving as you can of ignorant GMs. They're doing the best they can to give you a compelling story that you can interact with and make your own, to some extent. They may not know a short sword from a bastard sword, but they just might know how to put a new twist on the damsel in distress that makes that time-worn cliche fresh and interesting again. And that is a talent.

If, on the other hand, you are someone who likes to run role-playing games but is often frustrated when your players are ignorant of setting details or real-world accurate facts, there are two things I would suggest:
1. Become an instructor. If your real passion lies in the accuracy of your game to the real world, then use the game as a medium to teach others about what you find interesting. Games were originally invented as teaching tools, not story-telling devices. If you tell people up front that you want to run a game that accuratley portrays, for example, 17th century France, then those who would be interested in learning about 17th century France are more likely to sign up to play.

2. The same suggestion as given above. Change games to find one where you are as equally ignorant of real-world details as your players. That way, everyone is operating out of the same refrence points, with all their inaccurate flaws and well-known fictional tropes. Yes, the setting may make you yawn or roll your eyes, but think of it as an opportunity to focus on telling a compelling story out of what the game gives you to work with. After all, that's what RPGs are all about: telling stories.