What's a "collaborative story"? Story
A recital of events that have happened (past tense) or have alleged to have happened.
Are you running a PC in real time or are you sitting around with other players telling stories about what you played in the past?
The former is NOT a story, the latter IS.
You cannot create a story in real time? That's an interesting point of view. Not one I share, but interesting nonetheless. What does improv theater do if it doesn't create a story in real time?
We have already had this conversation. I do not wish to debate GNS again. Sufficient to say I think the model is a bad one, and do not find it at all helpful to label myself a simulationist. I want a setting gaff feels real, I also want lots of other things. I never said anything about 'exploring' the GM's concepts of alignment (pemerton did). I just want the setting to feel like a real thing outside my character. If you want to apply GNS labels to yourself, feel free. Find those categories reductive and artificial. GNS has a huge number of problems. One of its biggest issues is how it tries to define simulationist.
You want a setting that feels (I assume that's an autocorrect gaff in the quote
) real to you. You want it to feel like a real thing outside of your character. That's about as simulationist an approach as it gets AFAIK. Your goal is a functioning world that is independent of the characters. That might not be the only goal, but it is a goal.
If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck...
We're really back to the division of decisionmaking between player and GM. Why should we not let the player make other important decisions, any of which may lead to interesting play, like:
- whether the torture succeeds or the subject resists?
Irrelevant. Governed by the mechanics of the game which was agreed to before play began. There are systems where things work that way, but, D&D isn't one of them. The Intimidation rules are pretty clear on how this sort of thing is resolved in D&D.
- whether the subject had useful info at all?
Well, I'd say that if the paladin goes through with things, and the DM simply says, "Nope, he didn't know anything", that would violate the whole "interesting story" part. That's just a dick move by the DM. And, since the guy being tortured here (how did he become a bomber?) is an NPC, then he falls under the DM to run. No one has questioned that.
- the timing , including whether the info is extracted in time for the Paladin to stop the bomber?
Governed by the mechanics. Again, Intimidate rules apply. The players know that and would act appropriately
- whether having found the bomber, the Paladin succeeds in stopping him, or fails?
Because we all sat down to play a game and we agreed, in sitting down, that success and failure is governed by the mechanics and the dice. For the same reason you don't get to declare that your attack hit or miss.
However, no one agreed that you get to force your singular interpretations of alignment to the exclusion of all other interpretations, onto the players at my table. At your table, fine and dandy. But not at mine. Alignment is subject to multiple reasonable interpretations that are supportable by the phrasing of the mechanics. I do not want to play at a table where the DM has decided that his, and his alone, interpretation is the only valid one.
And why can't the second Paladin decide that he prays and receives a flash of insight, so he hurries off to find the bomber while the first is still busily torturing his prisoner?
What mechanics would allow for this? Is there any power that the paladin has that would do this? If not, then why does the paladin player feel that he is entitled to much up new rules on the fly?
For that matter, who decided there was a bomber, and that he is mad, and that there is someone who may now his whereabouts, and that we were able to successfully take him prisoner?
Umm, the DM? Again, no one has said that the DM cannot introduce or control NPC's? Nor has anyone claimed that the DM cannot introduce complications or setting elements. Everything would have had to have been played out and been the results of play.
Shared storytelling seems like it would share that around the table - which may mean another player's contribution to the story is that the act of Torture causes a reaction from the Forces of Good against the torturer
After all, that second Paladin has a right to his concept that the powers of a Holy Warrior require ongoing devotion to Good to be retained, doesn't he? Alternatively, if the issue is Player 2 being able to change Player 1's character, why can't Player 2 decide this greater devotion results in a reward for his Paladin? Meanwhile, Player 3 feels his Wizard has so perfectly exemplified the ideals of LG that he should have all the divine powers of Paladins added to his character sheet as well.
It seems like a lot of this "sanctity of character concept" discussion limits what aspects are actually in the player's control, on a basis I find pretty arbitrary.
How is it arbitrary? Or, rather, any more arbitrary than simply following the rules of the game? The game rules don't allow the player to force a reaction from the Forces of Good, nor do they allow Player 3 to add powers to his character sheet.
You are simply stuck in this idea that the rules are somehow the physics of the world. This is not a criteria that is shared here. The wizard cannot add paladin powers since that's not, in any way, conducive to the criteria of "an interesting narrative". Now, the wizard could start taking paladin levels or multiclass into paladin, or behave the way a paladin might sans the actual paladin powers, but, that's a separate issue.
But, of course there are limits on what the player controls. That's never been in contention. Players don't get to dictate NPC behaviors, for example. They generally don't get to dictate scenario elements. They certainly don't get to contradict previously established facts.
They don't do that because it would run counter to "creating an interesting narrative".
