Sandbox or Adventure Path?

[cailano]

In a Pure Sandbox campaign, the PCs are presented with a setting and given free reign to explore it. Any plot that develops is emergent and based on PC actions.

A Pure Adventure Path campaign has a strong central plot, and the PCs act as central characters in an epic story.

Some Sandbox Campaigns feature plotlines that the PCs can engage with (or not). Sometimes this takes the form of episodic adventures, other times the plotlines are more like "fronts" that affect the setting.

Conversely, some Adventure Paths have sections that involve open exploration, such as when the PCs visit a new city or region within the setting. Their actions usually move the central plot along, but they choose how to do it.

So here's the discussion: What style do you prefer? Why?

RULES

1. No bashing anyone else's choice. Be excellent to each other.

2. No choosing "all of the above." Even if it's true, it doesn't make for a very interesting discussion.

 

So, Sandbox or Adventure Path? Let's hear what you think. And don't forget to vote in the poll!

[Feirgon]

As a player, any of these options can be great, the dependency is on the GM. If the GM isn't feeling the game, no one will enjoy it and/or it will die an early death.

 

However, if I had to pick an option as a GM, I think I prefer Adventure Path with Sandbox elements.

I should state, that in almost every game I have ever run, I created a world and an overarching storyline, but let the players decide how they wanted to interact with said storyline. Ignoring the plot may not affect the player characters' immediate situation, but eventually there would be a breaking point where ignoring the plot would not be feasible.

This allows me to make the world feel lived in, as NPCs and locations have to deal with the fallout of the plot even if the players choose to go in another direction. As a GM this keeps me engaged with the world as much as I am engaged with the player characters.

Edited April 24 by Feirgon (see edit history)

[Basil_Bottletop]

I know that I'm a reactionary player by nature and it takes quite a bit to get me to impose the will of my PC onto a game knowing that suddenly the entire group is stuck doing what I want them to do or what I initially suggested. This comes from a history of being in large group games at the table and then years of being here no the Weave where collaborative story-telling requires the 'co' part to be strong and active.

I've also found myself gravitating towards making characters that just won't have those opinions more often now, which probably isn't the best method to avoiding it.

This thread is probably going to go through at least one conversation where someone needs to define what a sandbox game means in terms of 'floor' and 'ceiling' freedoms, but if we're talking at face value... give me a carrot on a stick and watch me struggle to get to it while also moving further down the road.

[Choomie]

I had spent about three months planning a campaign for the 'Weave that I ended up scrapping; I didn't have the skills to run it at the time. Realistically, I'm better off starting off with someone less ambitious, both to get my feet wet in the GMing world and to show the community what I can offer them. I'll include some details in a spoiler box since it'll be long and ramble-y.

Spoiler

The campaign was going to be based in the north of Golarion, the in-game setting for the Pathfinder RPG. I had an initial level one adventure planned, but that one was a 3rd party written adventure that gave the players a lot of room to grow and explore. It involved a corrupt castellan imprisoning them for various reasons (to be worked out in the session zero app phase), and the players would decide how and when they wished to escape. They could explore the keep—which was built on a cliff overlooking an icy sea—or they could communicate with their fellow prisoners, to find possible answers or rally support. There were a few different options for escape, like finding a secret smuggling network that could take them across the sea, or down the coastline, depending on what they wanted. There could also be a riot of sorts, and they might find freedom that way.

Then there were some things to do in the frozen countryside. There was a nearby town with robbers and bandits (the dashing, swashbuckling, heroic-ish type). There was a military presence that surrounded the town, trying to wait out the bandits. There was also a secret crypt with a cult that worshiped an ancient behemoth, and their powers were tied to the evil ambitions of the castellan. There was a lot of detail in this book. The goal was, once this was complete and the characters were somewhere between level 2-4, they would be off exploring the cold frontier. I had a map with bullets on it; depending on where the PCs went, and when, there would be a possible adventure module. I was going to keep track of time because multiple events were going on and the results of the PCs actions and the adventures they didn't do were going to affect the world. I wanted it to be living and breathing, and there was going to be a key survival element between adventures. I wanted to create room for players to sit around a campfire making food, where they could get to know each other, talk about their goals and their traumas, as they figure out where to go and what to do next. Likewise, I had adventures planned up through level 16, and I think it could have ended with them at level 20.

I have no clue if this had been remotely successful. Of course, it was intense and required a lot of memory and organization, and it's probably too big for me to handle. I wanted a world that was alive, and I wanted the players to have room to go wherever they wanted and do whatever they wanted, with adventure hooks popping up in their travels.

As a player, I love the narrative goods over the strictly crunchy. I like battles and that sort of thing, but in PbP they tend to go for a long, long, long, long time. I appreciate the moments when characters can just talk to each other like real people in an unreal, fantastical world.

From my experience, there have been some adventure path games where the characters aren't integrated in the story by the player or GM, and for me that ruins some of the immersion. Any kind of story, whether it's a game or a novel, should have the characters be central. They're what we remember most of all. Starting with the story first could get in the way of that. Of course, a skilled GM or a player with a great spark of creativity can make it work well.

[Faeryl_]

As a player, I think straight APs or APs with sandbox elements sound the best. I prefer my games to have some structure else I'll risk losing interest.

[bwatford]

Based on my experience, maintaining a full sandbox game in play-by-post (pbp) is challenging due to decision paralysis. When presented with numerous options, players often engage less and take more time to act.

A pseudo-sandbox approach, offering limited choices such as A, B, or C, tends to be more effective than an open-world format. In many cases, the mere illusion of choice is just as effective. For instance, whether players choose option X or Y, both lead to event 2. This approach also simplifies game planning.

I tend to prefer AP's with DM modifications to suit the party build or to incorporate character elements.

[Feirgon]

10 minutes ago, bwatford said:

Based on my experience, maintaining a full sandbox game in play-by-post (pbp) is challenging due to decision paralysis. When presented with numerous options, players often engage less and take more time to act.

I have successfully GM'ed two fully sandbox games. One was a God Game and the other was a Shop Management On The Frontier. The key aspect that made these games manageable was a concise list of mechanically relevant actions.

I can see an argument against saying that this approach constitutes as full sandbox, but there was no major plot (from the GM's perspective).

[Michael Silverbane]

The choice between sandbox vs adventure path or some combination thereof for me depends on the specific campaign and its goals.

I've got two games in the planning stages right now, one being more on the sandbox end of the spectrum and the other being almost a pure adventure path.

 

For the sandboxier game, the player characters will be able to travel pretty freely between points of interest (planets), and each point of interest will have a few extant plots going on for them to choose to engage with. Alternatively, the player characters can probably start up their own plots at a point of interest. If they choose to do so, that will push the game even more into the sandbox realm.

For the adventure pathier game, player characters will be presented with an episodic series of mysteries to solve, which will push them toward a more or less predetermined end-game conflict with an insidious cabal of bad criminals. Or whatever.

[Phntm888]

My personal preference as a player is for an Adventure Path with Sandbox elements. I really enjoy playing in games where you're told, "You have to accomplish X" but leave open the option of how and maybe when you accomplish "X". It gives players a certain amount of freedom to do their own thing, while also making sure everyone is focused on a cohesive goal. I also sometimes struggle to stay engaged with a more sandboxy campaigns.

As a GM my preference largely depends on what kind of game I want to run and how much prep I want to do. I've only done a pure sandbox once back in college. We had a large D&D group (something on the order of a dozen of us), and we had a standing game night in the lobby of the one dorm, but the one time it was only me and 3 other people who showed up. We were playing 3.5 and wanted to play, so I just said, "Okay, everyone roll up a Rogue," and then ran a Thieves Guild sandbox for a session. I had no stats for any NPCs, don't even remember what I called the city, and all 3 players did their own thing. One went robbing houses, another decided to start a protection racket, and the third decided to go find blackmail on city officials. It was a lot of jumping back and forth between three different storylines as I tried to make sure everyone had fun. It was fun, but I don't think I could do it for a whole campaign. Eventually I was gonna need to flesh out the Thieves Guild, the local government, create some notable NPCs and locations in the city to make the world feel alive and not just like a painted canvas background. Doing that kind of prep was beyond my abilities at the time, and now I don't have the time to do it - especially if every single PC needs their own separate storylines.

These days, most of my time for GM'ing is either Adventure Paths, or Adventure Paths with Sandboxy elements, like Kingmaker, which I'm running 2 games of the PF2 conversion here on MW. A lot of the prep work is already done for me - I just need to make sure I know where the stat blocks I need for any given enemy/random encounter are, and I'm good to go. It means I don't need to spend as much time prepping for each game session, when I have a limited amount of time available to do so.

[Lord Foul]

As a player I prefer the sandbox with plots option, as it provides the greatest flexibility and feels most like a real world that my character is living in and can become involved in. I like to have the agency to decide the path my character will take and what kinds of things I will become interested in and play a part in. It works because I am a highly pro-active player and will drive the game whatever anybody else does around me.

As a GM I prefer the adventure path with some scope for a bit of sandboxing, because, in general, players do not tend to be sufficiently driven and self-motivating to find their own way through an adventure without a lot of signposting along the way.

 

[cybersavant]

sandbox is hard to do on a forum - too slow, fast rate of growing boredom, too much prep for too little reward

adventure path - too long for forum, too much attrition throughout

 

==

 

the last 'campaign' i started to prep was tbis

 

- i went through my scenarios and picked the ones i liked - noted their locations/features, then created a 'borderlands area' of a generic world

i plopped in villages and sites from many varied sources that fit with the scenarios - and populated the region

i designated the largest town/city as the closest point to 'civilization' and decided that all the PCs would come from somewhere in or near it

they would also have a list of the other communities in the borderlands in order to tie their characters in to the area

i have a 5" binder with location and modules printouts that needs to be updated/ completed

 

this way, the PCs have a grounding, don't have to learn a whole game worlds history, and have freedom to explore/ reach out

 

that was the plan - need to get back to it at some point

 

[Actana]

I'm unsure where I stand on this, and as a result I have to reject the prescriptive nature of "sandbox vs adventure path". I'm going to assume that AP in this context isn't just a published module or like, but just a more linear adventure, homemade or published.

To me, I suppose what I like most is having a focused idea on what the game is about, a situation in the setting, and then having the players just... do whatever in it. The plotlines are there and are also tied to the PC goals, so the players have the incentive to pursue those plotlines, but can do so in whatever way they want to. The prep I do is not about what will happen, but what has happened, who the major players are and what they want, which then allows me to react to whatever the players do. The plotlines are open, can be pursued, or can be left alone, in which case consequences may or may not happen.

Sometimes I give the players choices of premade character concepts that then further shape the form of the game. There are times when I don't even plan for much in a game before I have the characters because they are the defining factor for how the structure of the game

Then of course there are degrees of games and the needs for each, but I do tend to shy away from too much linearity regardless. I can do it, and have in the past, but it's not necessarily what I like or want best.

Ultimately, the game is about the PCs and what the PCs do, but the PCs are also tied to the setting and the adventures in them. There's no overarching plotline they must follow, but the game, the world and their characters will incentivize them to deal with their problems and issues that are tied to the various types of adventures out there.

 

The examples I'd use for the kind of games or premade modules that support this are Masks: A New Generation, Avatar: Legends, the Neverwinter Campaign Guide for D&D 4e, and the two modules of Kings of Silver and Eidolon Sky for Spire: The City Must Fall.

[AberrantForm]

Whether as a player or DM, Sandbox with Plot is *mhmm* just right!

[OzzyKP]

In theory I very much prefer an open Sandbox. Players choices and actions have real consequences and shape the course of the game. Otherwise you are basically just playing a video game. Kill some mooks, kill the boss, proceed to level 2.

That said, being able to pull off a sandbox game, especially in Play by Post, is rather hard. Decision paralysis, as bwatford mentioned, is the biggest slow down I see in games. I am working on prepping a game to run that will be a fairly open sandbox, and whew, I'm a bit overwhelmed with all the work involved to anticipate different possibilities. My initial plan was to be completely open, but I've started to narrow down the scope of the game and add at least an initial plot/direction to make things easier for me to prepare for.

[Roughtrade]

Even when I was younger and had time and energy to devote to complete world building, my games had a story arc/plotline.

These days, I prefer APs because the fun for me is in voicing NPCs and APs let me dispense with most of the plotting. PCs go off book sometimes, and it can be fun to deal with the eddies and make some stuff up. I also like modifying the APs, since most of them are half a decade old or more, depending on system. Subverting some encounters or building up others to surprise the jaded is always fun.

In Play by Post format, I believe that having a structure is helpful. PbP games have enough issues with dragging. Adding the complication of five Players with their own agendas, or more often, everyone waits for someone else to do something because they don't want to be thought of as pushy - It can make things even slower.

 

54 minutes ago, OzzyKP said:

Decision paralysis, as bwatford mentioned, is the biggest slow down

Even in an AP, this can be an issue. As a GM, the only thing I can do is describe the ten foot wide corridor going into the distance with two doors. Someone's gotta walk down the lane and pick a door.