First of all, I am not a real world pilot nor do I have ANY training. I play around with FSX for the learning experience and to have a bit of fun.

 

Anyway, just for the fun of it, I made a flight plan from Reno, NV to the Tahoe airport on the north end of Lake Tahoe with a bit of sight seeing on the way and flying a Bombardier CRJ700. The straight line path is very short but the 3 sightseeing legs of the trip add time as well as allowing for a fairly easy approach to the destination.

First thing I noticed was the ATC directing me off of the path in the flight plan. In fact, ATC has kept me off of the path I had intended though it did direct me to the destination airport in a more straight path.

I did miss an approach and the ATC seemed to be directing me back onto the flight plan I had filed for the next attempt but I had to quit the game as other things happened before I could finish it up.

So, is it normal for ATC to direct someone off of a flight plan that has been accepted?

FSX ATC vectors you for an instrument approach starting 60 to 100 miles away.  If your on a short flight they will vector you right after takeoff and the flight plan doesn't matter to the controllers anymore.  There is no way around this.  Follow the instructions.  They vector you quite a far way out of the airport all the time too.  I don't use the FSX ATC.  I use an ATC addon called Radar Contact (RC).  You should consider either that or Pro Flight Emulator (PFE) another ATC addon if you want more realism.  PFE can take a while to set up while RC doesn't require much setup.  Just load an FSX flight plan and you should be good to go.  Hope this helps somewhat.

Sounds like "it is what it is". That's OK too. I ay get an ATC addon as suggested. For now, I think I'll make my flight plans VFR for the short hops and sight seeing tours...I might also drop using larger jets to fly those with

Glad I could help.  If you get RC, be sure to check out the RC forum here on AVSIM.  Also, be sure to read the manual.