> On May 22, 2015, at 10:01 AM, Kelly St. Clair <xxxxxx@efn.org> wrote:
>
> My gut feeling is that stories designed to deliver a Moral Lesson unto the players are, by their nature, rather fixed and railroady - not good adventures.  There's also the risk that one's players will not appreciate/agree with the intended moral, or with being preached at in general.  (Some have a particular antipathy to such lessons being embedded in their entertainment, something that is supposed to be for /them/ - it is an unwelcome imposition, like commercials.)

Kelly just said what I was thinking, only more clearly.

Remember: an RPG adventure is NOT a story; it’a a framework wherein stories are created collaboratively. If you, as the GM wish to impose a Moral on them, it’s got to be done much more subtly, and in response to the players actions, not the path the GM has ordained.

On a broader scale, you can always use standard tropes <http://tvtropes.org> but you cannot really force the issue.

--
Bruce Johnson
University of Arizona
College of Pharmacy
Information Technology Group

Institutions do not have opinions, merely customs