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AD&D: The No Choice Campaign
We were a bunch of players used to playing Call of Cthulhu, and then one of our number decide to run AD&D. Most of the players hadn't played AD&D for years, and maybe some had never played it.

In the first scenario we were all starting characters, 1st level. A patron approached us with a job to do and we took it. We approached the site of action with the utmost caution. Eventually we met the our opponents and fought them. Once we were getting low on Hit Points we decided to run away. (I recall that I decided it was time to run away when my Hit Points had dropped below half their full value. Some seasoned AD&Ders might say that merely losing half one's HP is nothing and I should not have even considered running at that point, but I was trying to play my character like some kind of normal person and I thought that someone who was that badly injured in reality would probably run). As a result we failed to get our hands on the treasure.

After the first scenario, the GM complained that we were playing the game like Call of Cthulhu players, being cautious about approaching the ememy. He said we should have just gone in there and hacked them until they died. He pointed out how weak they were and how we should have been able to beat them.

In the second scenario we were sent to sort out another lair of evil bad men. We scouted the area and found a back way by which we could sneak into the lair of our enemies. This involved wading thorough a small underground river.

There were three of us. The first PC crossed the river with no problem. The second PC crossed the river with no problem. The last PC crossed, and the GM said that something was moving in the water. The last PC ran to finish crossing and get out of the water, and then a giant squid emerged from a cave. The GM didn't roll any dice; he just said that that was happening at that time. All three PCs had crossed the river and then a giant squid blocked the river to stop us going back.

It was obvious that the GM had predicted that we would look for an indirect route of attack with a safe path of withdrawal, had contrived this back entrance to fit that purpose, and then had put this giant squid there to block our retreat so that we would have to fight all the enemies which he had lined up for us to fight. There was no feeling that these were the realistic risks which people in that situation might face: the GM was just forcing us into his linear plot. We had deliberately planned to use intelligent tactics (allowing ouselves a path of retreat if things went against us) and the GM took this from us by a sneaky, underhand plot. This really pissed me off.

If there were a giant squid in the water which could be roused, then there should have been a certain chance every time someone crossed that it would emerge. The fact that the GM didn't roll for this showed that this was not so: instead, he had arranged that it would emerge when the last PC crossed, to get us all on the same side of the river with no possibility of going back. This was a really unsubtle 'Hand of God' manoeuvre: the Hand of God simply came down and said 'Thou shalt not go back!'. I felt like realistic choices hand been taken from me and I was just left as a puppet on the GM's string.