Quote from: Sommerjon;861185It's either "because that's the way I learned to play" or it's hyperbole.
Which hasn't surprised me in the slightest.

I'd imagine it's pretty easy not to be surprised when you actively ignore or willfully misinterpret anything that conflicts with your expectation.

I mostly GM these days, but I enjoy it when players want to collaborate with me as they get invested into the setting, offering suggestions on world-building to tap into their characters' backgrounds.

For example, I recently changed a sinister future dungeon from being a Babylonian Ziggurat into an Egyptian pyramid after a player requested it so that she could tie it in her (Egyptian PC's) background and character development. You know, so as to make it not just another dungeon, but also a trigger for character growth. I LOVE that kind of player buy-in as long as it is, as I said earlier, collaborative and not demanded.

When I DO play on the rare occasion, I might do the same sort of thing as long as the GM is cool with it. Other than that, I try to interact with the other characters as much as possible, making a real effort to react to their in-game actions*. Acknowledging what their characters do and their effects on the world kind of increases immersion for everyone (responding to the team's efforts). In other words, I want everyone to have fun and make it feel like their characters MATTER as part of the world.

I know that I'll probably get a lot of flak for this but whatever, the OP asked.

* not necessarily in a confrontational way: we're a party or team and even though we may not LIKE each other we work together and cover each other's asses. At least, that's how I usually play my characters: if others at the table give no fucks then good for them.

Quote from: Justin Alexander;861189There's something incredibly satisfying about predicting that somebody is going to give a bullshit answer, pointing out exactly why it's a bullshit answer, and then watching them go ahead and give the bullshit answer anyway.

It's as if they've just rebutted themselves.

I'd predict that the next thing he'll do is start telling people that they're lying about how they actually play and what they prefer, but I see he's already done that.

Never bothered to respond to your asshattery.  Now you feel the need to inject yourself again.  Whatevs.

Quote from: Justin Alexander;860987GM: You walk into a kitchen.
Player: I grab the atom bomb.

The GM never "bothered to determine" whether or not there were atom bombs in the kitchen, so there should be no objection when a player assumes that there is, right?

You'll argue that no "mature adult" would assert the existence of an atom bomb in a kitchen. But that's just a "no true Scotsman" fallacy, implying that you and your players are never out-of-sync with your expectations. Even if that were true 100% of the time in the general case (which is unlikely), it's essentially impossible in the specific case.

1. Exploderwizard loves using the "I game with mature adults" line.  I'ts enjoyable to use it back on him.
2. Your supposed love of GM dictating everything, doesn't stop the "no true Scotsman" fallacy.
3. Why is the player not letting the GM finish describing the scene?
4. Why would the group be out-of-sync?

Perhaps you would understand it better if Bren explains it to you;

Quote from: Bren;860679[strike]I assume know that[/strike] I'm not playing with idiots or assholes - since I won't. That drastically decreases the number of other assumptions that need to be stated before play.

Quote from: Justin Alexander;860987For example, the assumption that one would find a knife in a kitchen is a reasonable one. But what if the GM knows that there are no knives in this particular kitchen because the NPC has a phobia of knives? And that this is, in fact, a crucial clue in figuring out what happened the night before?

But, funny how that word is used in this thread, lets take the exception and make more out of it than what it is.

Playing in a game, don't know about you, where there were no knives present in a kitchen and the GM never says anything about it until I am in need of a knife.  I'd have serious doubts about their ability to describe a scene effectively.  Furthermore if that only happens when I am assuming something about the setting, Railroad Dick DM is exposed.

Quote from: Justin Alexander;860987Someone has the ultimate authority for determining truth in the game world. And, barring some sort of narrative control mechanic, that authority is going to rest with the GM.

Notice how I never said they didn't.

Quote from: Bren;861211I'd imagine it's pretty easy not to be surprised when you actively ignore or willfully misinterpret anything that conflicts with your expectation.

When this goes from assuming there is a shotgun behind the bar to I grab the atom bomb....yet I am the one willfully misinterpreting?

Most likely all you can picture is
nDervish: I look out the window. What do I see?
GM: Good question. Why don't you tell me what you see?

GM: You see a group of dwarves approaching. Roll Discern Realities.
nDervish: I rolled a 10.
GM: You recognize their leader. Who is he and how do you know him?

Remember this?
This is why I dislike "If the GM never bothered to determine, then there's nothing wrong with the player's implicit suggestion. GM's call. Always."
I don't believe that anymore. Hanging around here helped me reach that conclusion.
Add to that Krueger's Ol' Clem Johnson and Justin's knifeless kitchen.  Know the issue with both?  Exceptional based design.
Ol' Clem Johnson who owns the place is one of those rare Christians who walks the walk.
Does he?  He owns a saloon.
Granted Justin's knifeless kitchen goes no where
"For example, the assumption that one would find a knife in a kitchen is a reasonable one. But what if the GM knows that there are no knives in this particular kitchen because the NPC has a phobia of knives? And that this is, in fact, a crucial clue in figuring out what happened the night before?"
Both have what should be very obvious details, but for some reason are not.

Quote from: Bren;861161...
It's faster for me to invent a name than to look up one I already invented. ...

I'm actually OK with players being able to figure out that some NPCs just aren't that important. And on the other hand, I've had NPCs who started out as just another "Bob" and ended up being interesting or important. But I agree there is a line of metagaming in there somewhere that I'd rather the player just didn't cross.

Yeah, as I said, I've gotten quite good at making up names and even GURPS stats immediately. And yes I'm also often fine with player figuring out who's interesting or not from clues which may or may not be intentional. Unlike my newbie-GM concerns, I also usually now like it when previously-generic characters get attention and become involved in interesting ways.

I wrote about that example not because naming NPCs still concerns me, but as an early example of that "line of metagaming in there somewhere" that you mentioned. What I still try to avoid (and have much more subtle skills for doing so) is when players try to use meta-game tricks for out-of-character goals that aren't an agreed conceit of the play mode. Even my games may include some such agreed conceits, especially if it's a limited scope adventure or the focus is on only one aspect of play. However, for play modes where my intent is to provide a consistent role-playing experience, there's a class of out-of-character meta-gaming I would avoid.

QuoteWhile your motives weren't the best, I thought that sounded kind of fun in an unrealistic over-the-top pulp action kind of way. Not appropriate for a sandbox or naturalistic setting, but probably just right for something more emulative of the 1930s pulp fiction, Comic Books, a lot of action movies and TV shows, and Leverage.

Yeah, and that campaign ended up being similar to those genres in many ways. Wild excessive action, abundant goon fodder, paranoid plotting, crazy people, funky abuse of magic. I still enjoy the genre a lot. When/if we still play in it, it's still got elements like that, though now I don't just have stuff appear out of thin air, and I don't have those control-based motives. It's still wild and crazy but it also makes a lot more sense than it originally did. I came up with some funny retcon social parody elements to explain or at least be consistent about how there are so many adventurers and thugs wandering about ready for mayhem.

Again, I posted about it in this thread because of the meta-game elements I want to avoid as player and as GM. I don't want to run or play in a game where going for a crystal ball reading summons a siege weapon assassin team... Unless it's a horror nightmare game. ;-) (Or maybe if I was trying for a "holographic universe" theme, where what you were obsessed with would be what would show up in the world... which if intentional and well done could maybe be interesting.)

And yes, now I will have already thought about the availability of divination, its limits and its implications. Many meta-issues I ran into as a new GM were caused, and solved, by whether the GM had read and considered the available magic and other aspects in the setting or not. And now I'll tend to want to establish that a character has learned about any specific details of magic before I accept a player having their PC go looking to use it. No "My guy wants to find a [specific peculiar strong magic]" because the player read about it in a game book. That example was mainly about the GM (me) being unprepared and insecure and responding to it in a weird unfair unspoken "don't do that or you might get killed off" way, even if it did turn also out to be a classic memory feeding the action paranoia style of the game.

But what remains is the class of meta-game problem, which can easily be caused by not considering the possible uses of things the GM suddenly feels are not what he wants or knows how to deal with, but can happen any time the GM for whatever reason chooses to force things to happen in ways that break the play contract. In my case, I like the play contract to keep things that exist and that happen to be fairly consistent and realistic and based on in-game-world factors and not by the GM forcing things that matter "too much" for reasons of style or cool-seeming-ness or genre conventions or to avoid player upsets or whatever (ya there are grey areas).

Other players and game styles of course have different ideas about their play contracts, but I'd say the same general rule applies. That is, the difference between me not wanting the GM to teleport in assassins to prevent PC actions he dislikes, and the fellow who wants the GM to provide a shotgun behind the ol' West bar, is the (oft un-detailed) play contract. But the basic violation is the same, or opposite - the GM is forcing or not forcing things to work a certain way or not - whether it's to be rational/consistent/realistic/simulationist (me), or imaginitive/flexible/cool/genre-compliant, or whatever.

Quote from: Nexus;861163Ha! That sounds kind of fun for the right sort of game.

It actually was fun and exciting (in a terrifying way) for the player. It was my first big long-term campaign using a game system I hadn't invented myself, so we were all learning and it had many hilarious  wild elements to it which were fun.

But while the play ended up being wild and fun, as GM I was learning a lot about control - both how to keep the game from devolving into something that stopped being fun or interesting or we couldn't believe/care about because it became too inconsistent - and even more interestingly, about my own reactions out of fear of losing control to clever or depraved player schemes, and learning I don't need to control, and what interesting ways I can respond instead (and without needing to warp or abuse the reality of the game world).

Quote from: Sommerjon;861268Notice how I never said they didn't.
When this goes from assuming there is a shotgun behind the bar to I grab the atom bomb....yet I am the one willfully misinterpreting?

No you are not the only one. That doesn't make you correct though. Nor does it make everyone who disagrees with you or has a different point of view wrong.

I agree there is a huge difference between finding a shotgun behind the bar and finding a nuclear weapon.

But there is also a huge difference between finding a dishrag, clean glasses, or a bottle of whiskey behind the bar and finding a shotgun. Dishrags, glasses, and whiskey (or their equivalents) are necessary components of a bar. Shotguns (and atom bombs) are not necessary components for a bar. A shotgun is a component of a particular kind of bar.  

Anon Adderlan said his belief in the world was impaired if the bar was not the equipped with a shotgun because that's the particular kind of bar that he imagined in his own head. And if he can't have what he imagined in his own head, that ruins the fun for him. Now a lot of people found that to be a really odd and possibly selfish belief* and one that was contrary with the way a lot of people play RPGs.

Now I guess you are in the same bandwagon with Anon Adderlan since you keep wailing about that only reason people don't play games like you and AA are because they fear change, or they are mired in tradition, or some such bullshit.

QuoteRemember this?
This is why I dislike "If the GM never bothered to determine, then there's nothing wrong with the player's implicit suggestion. GM's call. Always."
I don't believe that anymore. Hanging around here helped me reach that conclusion.

Yeah. I remember. It sounded incoherent the first time. It still does the second time.

I don't care how you play let's pretend in your own time, but it is rather annoying to hear you whine over and over that the only reason other people don't agree with you is tradition or something.

Some of us just don't want to play let's pretend the same way that you play. You might try doing us the courtesy of accepting that we actually do know what we like when we play.


* Anon Adderlan didn't seem at all concerned about what kind of bar the other people at the table imagined nor whether a shotgun being behind the bar was ruining their fun. Now maybe he really is concerned about other people and just forgot to mention it, or maybe he sees RPGs as the players all together against the GM, or something. But if he did, he didn't say so. So some people thought he sounded overly entitled.

Quote from: Skarg;861276In my case, I like the play contract to keep things that exist and that happen to be fairly consistent and realistic and based on in-game-world factors and not by the GM forcing things that matter "too much" for reasons of style or cool-seeming-ness or genre conventions or to avoid player upsets or whatever (ya there are grey areas).

We are in agreement. Thanks for clarifying. If I sounded like I was picky on younger you or was too critically nitpicky, I apologize.

 

QuoteBut while the play ended up being wild and fun, as GM I was learning a lot about control - both how to keep the game from devolving into something that stopped being fun or interesting or we couldn't believe/care about because it became too inconsistent - and even more interestingly, about my own reactions out of fear of losing control to clever or depraved player schemes, and learning I don't need to control, and what interesting ways I can respond instead (and without needing to warp or abuse the reality of the game world).

Good point about fear of losing control as a reason GMs end up warping or abusing the reality of the game world.

Along similar lines, I think one thing that can lead to inelegant or ham-handed GM 'solutions' to problems that occur due to some unanticipated effect is the reluctance of some GMs to admit fault and work to get agreement on a solution. Rather than figure out some (possibly) clever way to nullify some previous error, it almost always works better to just be upfront and say something like, "Hey people, when I put that ring of 3 wishes in the treasure of that one troll, I wasn't thinking about all the ways that wishes might make the game weird, or less fun for you, or hard for me to run. Also when I let you wish for three more wishes as one of your wishes, I don't know what I was thinking. But that was a mistake and I need you to work with me to fix it."

I mostly agree with the OP: to me, "the world" should be completely under the GM's control and I really don't like the idea of Fate Points, or Narrative Points or whatever you want to call them.  I would say a kind of game where everybody gets a turn in shaping the narrative sounds to me more like a fun party game for a weekend than the kind of thing you can build into a campaign lasting for years.  You should get some degree of shaping the world in when you create your character---"I'm from a famous family of Paladins," "my dad is the best wizard in Elftown," "I'm from the Barony of Sandvichia on the Sourpuss River," whatever.  To me the idea is the GM controls the world and all the NPCs in it, including where they put their shit, and if I say there's no shotgun behind the bar then there was never a shotgun behind the bar.

Where I have to disagree is in the 'immersion' thing.  I don't think I've ever really experienced 'immersion' to the degree some people claim to, nor do I really wish to.  When I play a character, I'm doing it for the mental exercise of testing my creativity against obstacles, or even just the thrill of chance-taking.  That's not to say I don't roleplay.  Just like you wouldn't metagame "well, my last PC got roasted when he opened a door with that rune on it so I sure as hell won't do it now," part of creating a character to me is knowing their persona, figuring out what actions are reasonable to them, and then doing that.  I never confuse myself for my character or think of them as my imaginary friend or whatever the hell, tho.

Quote from: Sommerjon;861268Never bothered to respond to your asshattery.

To sum up:

1. You directly quote me.
2. I reply.
3. You claim that you never "bothered to respond" to me.

That sort of blatant lie really bodes well for the intellectual content of your post.

Quote1. Exploderwizard loves using the "I game with mature adults" line.  I'ts enjoyable to use it back on him.
2. Your supposed love of GM dictating everything, doesn't stop the "no true Scotsman" fallacy.
3. Why is the player not letting the GM finish describing the scene?
4. Why would the group be out-of-sync?

So, to sum up:

1. You said something you apparently don't actually agree with.
2. You admit that you're using a no true Scotsman fallacy, but couple that admission to a non sequitur.
3. This is a non sequitur.
4. You know that this question has already been answered, because you then reply to it with another non sequitur.

QuotePlaying in a game, don't know about you, where there were no knives present in a kitchen and the GM never says anything about it until I am in need of a knife. I'd have serious doubts about their ability to describe a scene effectively.

Unless your character has X-Ray vision, I don't see how they could possibly reach the conclusion that "there are no knives in this room" without searching the kitchen drawers.

But nice attempt at dodging the issue.

QuoteFurthermore if that only happens when I am assuming something about the setting,

No one is advocating that the GM should only know things about the setting when the player makes an assumption. This is yet another non sequitur.

Quote

QuoteSomeone has the ultimate authority for determining truth in the game world. And, barring some sort of narrative control mechanic, that authority is going to rest with the GM.

Notice how I never said they didn't.

Multiple personality disorder? Someone hacked your account? You're just conceding that you were wrong all along in the most back-assed way possible?

QuoteWhen this goes from assuming there is a shotgun behind the bar to I grab the atom bomb....yet I am the one willfully misinterpreting?

There's something incredibly satisfying about predicting that somebody is going to give a bullshit answer, pointing out exactly why it's a bullshit answer, and then watching them go ahead and give the bullshit answer anyway.

It's as if they've just rebutted themselves.

When they just try to repeat the same bullshit answer again in the hopes that nobody will notice the Emperor Still Has No Clothes?

Priceless.

Quote from: Bren;861161It's faster for me to invent a name than to look up one I already invented. And one nice thing about the Honor+Intrigue game I'm running is that it's set mostly in 1620s France and none of us are French nor fluent in French, so names like Jean, Jacques, and Francois still sound less mundane than John or Bob, but are easy to invent on the spur of the moment. I also have name lists organized by nationality that I can quickly access.

Athos may be the name of a mountain, but Athos is also the name of a man.

Quote from: Bren;861278Now I guess you are in the same bandwagon with Anon Adderlan since you keep wailing about that only reason people don't play games like you and AA are because they fear change, or they are mired in tradition, or some such bullshit.

If I can get "nostalgia!" my Bingo card will be full.

Just popping in to say: isn't the original Traveller character generation system pretty close to 100% associated?

Possibly Harnmaster if played BTB, maybe Warhammer...basically any game where, even if you have options, they're options the character would have.

Quote from: Sommerjon;861268Playing in a game, don't know about you, where there were no knives present in a kitchen and the GM never says anything about it until I am in need of a knife.  I'd have serious doubts about their ability to describe a scene effectively.

I happen to have a knife block sitting on the counter in my kitchen.  Most people I know, however, do not, instead keeping all their knives in drawers.  Thus, it is not immediately obvious when you enter their kitchens whether any knives are present or not.

Unless you mean to say that the first thing you do on entering someone's kitchen is to open all the drawers and inspect their contents?

Quote from: Sommerjon;861268Ol' Clem Johnson who owns the place is one of those rare Christians who walks the walk.
Does he?  He owns a saloon.

The Church has not consistently condemned drink, though there probably have always been those within it who do.  And don't forget that, according to the gospels, Jesus' first miracle was to turn water into wine.

Quote from: Harime Nui;861289I would say a kind of game where everybody gets a turn in shaping the narrative sounds to me more like a fun party game for a weekend than the kind of thing you can build into a campaign lasting for years.

That's another interesting point.  One of the other things I tend to dislike about "Forgey" games is that they're often very highly-focused on playing one specific situation or story, then ending the game once that situation/story has been resolved.  Conversely, more "traditional" games tend to at least allude to the promise of campaigns which span years or even decades or real-world time (even if, in practice, that promise is only very rarely fulfilled).

Perhaps, then, there is some connection between narrativist/forgey/storygamey/whatever-you-want-to-call-them mechanics and short-term games?  Not necessarily that one causes or requires the other, but perhaps they work better together than trying to run a long-term campaign with forgey rules?

This discussion about what is role of GM is in my view same as a role of a art director (or just about everyone in any organized activity): Ultimately someone makes the final decision on what goes. She is usually someone who is responsible for the activity. This goes to stuff like R&D and artistic creation where group works on subject. If not one person making the call, then there is some other mechanism but there is always going to be some kind of mechanism or else the group will eventually fail due lack of unified direction.

GM is simply easiest and simplest way of organizing a group play where activities are so broad no set of rules can cover them. This same method is widely used in work as well.

Quote from: Bren;861285We are in agreement. Thanks for clarifying. If I sounded like I was picky on younger you or was too critically nitpicky, I apologize.
...

No it didn't sound that way to me. And those were good ideas for ways to deal with those problems. But I wanted to make explicit that there were multiple things going on in each example, and while having good GM techniques for them is good, I meant them as examples of types of metagame gameworld-warping that I like to avoid.

On RPG StackExchange are abundant other examples of gameworld-warping even as advice praised by the crowd there, most of which would have me leave a game right away. Or players who want to say they are playing an actual game with risks but seem to actually want the GM to make them automatically win and be the cool heroes and not ever have any setbacks. And the community there seems to encourage enabling this and to discourage suggesting a game with actual risks and consequences. e.g.

Question: "How do I handle offended players as GM?" Synopsis: My players said they wanted a "dark, rough and dangerous" game, but when they wiped out everything in my adventure (BTW I fudged some rolls that would have killed them so they wouldn't die) and started killing their way through other areas and took on more strong enemies despite my warnings, they started sulking when some of them took some temporary hitpoint loss. "Both players were really pissed that they got wounded and lost interest in the game. They were offended and upset and the game began to stall. How do I handle such players?"

Most popular answer: (Advice on perspective very diplomatically worded and then: ) "If you must make players fail and suffer harsh consequences, you should try to minimise both how hard the failure should hit and how powerless they are as a result." ... "If they're already frustrated, you should do what you can to give them back some power." ... "rush to a conclusion: say that most of the fight goes out of the enemy as soon as the players kill the next one, or say "okay, you kill the rest of them, we don't really need to bother rolling dice, you're going to win eventually""

Another answer saying basically that "coddling" the players by not letting them lose or even take temporary damage was neither dangerous nor much of a game, and made other good points without being diplomatically worded to shield the feelings of players who might identify with these immature players, got downvoted and actually deleted by moderators.

Similar for questions about what to do when a PC dies. "Have them make a new character of equivalent power and have it show up right away." or "Let them have the character's twin appear." or "Let them get ressurrected immediately." seem to be popular options, while suggestions about serious consequences for dying tend to get a "boo hiss" especially if one expresses that one doesn't like or see the point of pretending to be in a dangerous situation in an actually-consequence-free game.

Quote from: Arminius;861363Just popping in to say: isn't the original Traveller character generation system pretty close to 100% associated? ...

I thought about that when reading that article too. I'd say so but even more so if the player could make more decisions for the character during their pre-game career, as opposed to rolling dice and taking whatever came up. IIRC the player just chooses service and whether to take multiple terms or not. But it shows how a more elaborate character generation system that was essentially a high-speed roleplayed experience would be associative, and possibly quite cool.

The Roguelike ADOM has a character gen system a little bit like that, at least superficially. You pick a gender, race and class and then it describes a number of scenarios during your childhood/adolescence, giving you options where the choices determine tweaks to your character. However they turn out to map quite simply and mechanically to various +/- adjustments and so on.