As soon as the GM mentions the desert, the players can become proactive - asking questions about it (do they have relevant knowledge skills? Ranger favoured territory? character background?), casting scrying spells (if they have them), sending scouts (if they have them), making plans for their PCs'.
Sure, but these don't bear on the players' goal of engaging the city.
But they can somehow force a besieging army to do their bidding. Again, we are back to you being willing to allow the PC's to exercise their creativity to leverage the siege
Huh? To leverage the siege (i) doesn't require getting the army to the the PCs' bidding - the players can sneak in under cover of bombardment, for instance, regardless of the will of the besiegers, and (ii) doesn't require the GM's permission except via general mechanisms of adjudication.
Does it really kill all the fun of the game for a player to be bored once in a while?
I certainly do my best to avoid it!
It negates player choice. If one or more of the players likes this type of struggle and has chosen appropriately for those desires, the application of GM force negates their choice to engage the game this way.
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It skews choice value. If the players know that X can and will be hand waved away then there is (almost) no reason for the player to choose resources that handle that situation rather than taking the wave.
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It rewards poor planning.
Poor planning I'll put to one side, as that is a hallmark of procedural or skilled play which, for some tables at least, is not such a big deal.
A related consideration to this is the way a system can make planning matter. For instance, in my 4e game planning is often relevant for establishing the ability to get bonuses during tactical resolution (eg when hunting a purple worm, carrying lime (? a sack of some basic substance) to reduce acid damage if swallowed) but is less often relevant to stratgegic/operational matters, which are far more likely to be handwaved (eg one of the first items I placed in the game was a Basket of Everlasting Provisions, to create a veneer of plausibility around handwaving food and drink).
But on the skewing of choice value and invalidation of choices, these won't matter if no players make the relevant choices and this is clear at the table. For instance, at my table players don't make mny choices (in PC build etc) that are related to strategic travel because they know that I, as GM, won't bring those choices into play. Conversely, my love of undead and demons is well known and they often make choices that will help them confront undead and demons.
That sort of skewing of choices isn't a problem. It helps the table make sure that the PC builds and player resources are focused on mutual matters of interest.
But in this specific instance of play - the bit where the wizard and GM collude to keep everyone in this place - what input in this 'collaborative effort' did the Rogue, Cleric and Fighter players have?
When this example reaches the crunch, there's no sharing in sight.
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Rogue, Cleric and Fighter just get to say meekly what their characters want. None of them, as written, are empowered to change what's happening. All the indications are that to do so would require the GMs permission. Then the GM is faced with the question you put to the reader. Who do I side with here?
Nice analysis.
My 4e game is certainly more traditional than what you've described in your post, but when it comes to major game-framing decisions (like where do we go to, what sorts of adventures are we about to have?) they do collaborate. Even on much more modest things, we go for open rather than secret so that everyone can join in the joke.
And on that particular point, [MENTION=6681948]N'raac[/MENTION], either the players can enjoy the mystery of the the wizard player exerting scene-framing authority,
or that authority can be shared, but (contra to what I took you to imply) they can't have both at the same time.
The wizard's wants, the cleric wants, the fighter wants... this is just 'huh?'. Are you saying this is this due to:
a) a fundamental playstyle difference?
b) player-authored goals for the characters?
If it's (b) why would I need to be involved?
In my game, if the players are playing out some debate that is grounded in conflicting player-authored PC goals then that discussion will involve a mixture of in-character and out-of-character discussion. In-character stuff will appeal to considerations like what is at stake in the fiction. Out-of-character stuff will appeal to considerations like how much play time something will take, or how different things might interact with the levelling dynamic of 4e D&D.
I will get involved, not in trying to adjudicate but by kibitzing, and reminding players of infiction matters that are relevant to their particular PC - basically trying to keep fictional stakes in their minds to discourage too much easy or expedient compromise. The role of agent-provocateur.
That was one session. A "mini-adventure". I'm pretty sure a lot of this applies to Hussar's and pemerton's thoughts but I'll let them comment on that
My main comment is that I enjoyed seeing the notorious gorge episode finally written up in its full glory.
Otherwise, that looks similar to something I could imagine running. It wasn't clear to me how much of the geographical/backstory knowledge that the players had (i) was narrated by them (perhaps BW-Wise style) as opposed to (ii) narrated to them by the GM in response to successful knowledge checks, or perhaps free narration.
I ask questions: "Where are you? What does this place look like? Who do you know here? Who here wants your head on a pole? Where's the nearest place to here? Who lives there? Why did they kill your brother? Why did the machine go wrong? What do you need to fix it?"
My friends will create crazy stuff based on their desire to make this fun and character goals, dream up new relationships to make this place interesting to them, talk through what would be fun for them as players (even if it means pain for their characters). I mediate as necessary in that discussion.
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But they don't need my permission to do anything, or to know anything. If something is not automatic they can engage the mechanics to do it or know it.
In my game I (as GM) have more control over backstory than what you describe here. Rather than the sort of strong collaboration you describe, player engagement (which is obviously not the same as player authority) is achieved via clear and strong reveals, so that the playes can see (in general terms at least - their may be more specific mysteries) how the situation in the fiction connects to their own goals and preferences (as revealed via PC build, preferences epxressly and impliedly revealed in play, etc).
But your bit about permission is interesting. In my game, I follow the HeroWars/Quest, MHRP-style "credibility test" approach for permissions - if it fits within the logic of the game and genre, then it can be attempted, and the mechanics tell you if you succeed or fail. (Often it may be automatic and thus established via free-roleplaying.)
Credibility testing is adjudicated by me as GM with input from other players. I would describe my (GM) role as first among equals.
I want to relate this back to the desert/siege issue in this way: without more, the players in my game can leverage the siege as a resource for engaging the city (eg by describing an action like sneaking into the city while a bombardment is underway). Whereas, in my game, the desert can't without more be leveraged to engage the city because (in the absence of super-powerful magic) there is no credible way that trudging the desert sands changes or links to anything in the city.
I'd like to ask you to expand on this.
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It seems like the rule is there to move the story along unless something is at stake. This seems like it could apply to a very basic, hot and sandy desert that saps your strength, if that threatens something you value.
But, regardless of that, I don't see where it says anything about breaking the rules outright (the centipede carrying them across the desert). If nothing is at stake, it does seem to say "they make it" without any problem, but not that the PCs can break the rules and summon powers they don't have
Here is Luke Crane's elucidation of "say yes" from the Adventure Burner (pp 248-49):
The Say Yes rule is difficult to adjudicate, yet it's one of the most vital elements of the system. It grants the GM authorial power to cut right to the important stuff and skip the extraneous or tiresome action.
In a recent campaign, our characters were crossing a narrow span over a chasm. . . One of the players, Rich, described his character hopping up onto the railing and capering along. Should Pete [the GM] have called for a [skill/stat check] for Rich's character to keep his balance? No. Never. Why? Certainly "in real life" there's a chance of falling, but in the story, it just didn't matter. Rich was roleplaying. He was embellishing, interacting with Pete's description. Rich made the scene better.
And what would the [check] have accomplished? He would have succeeded . . . [or] he would have fallen and we would have had to save him. It would have turned out like a false note in a bad action movie. . .
Thus, Pete could Say Yes to the action. Rich wanted his character to look cool crossing the briged. Great! Move on.
Later, those same characters needed to cross a narrow ledge to gain entry to a lost tomb. Pete described wind whipping along the cliff walls. We would have to make [checks] to cross and get in. This was a totally legit tes. The tomb was the goal of a long quest. Would we get in unscathed? Or would this cost us? . . . If we failed, we'd lose those precious resources!
In another recent game, our previous session ened with . . . a pact with a revanent to laed the group across endless plains. At the beginning of the next session, I had to resist every bad GM impulse. . . I wanted to dig right into that journey and make it real with dice rolls. But it would have been too much and unnecessary - and breaking the intent of the deal . . . made in the previous session. Thus I simply described the arduous journey and cut right to the good stuff - the group of travellers on the banks fo the river that borders the Land of the Dead. Though I did not explicitly Say Yes, the idea is the same.
Don't Be a Wet Blanket, Mr GM
Don't call for a test just to see a characer fail.
If a player . . . describes something simple and cool for his character, don't call for punitive [checks]. Ask yourself, "Is anything really at stake here?" A good measure . . . is whether or not they actively challenge or build into a challenge for a Belief or Instinct. If not, just roleplay through it.
This seems pretty on-point to me! [MENTION=22779]Hussar[/MENTION] and I are both advocating a "say yes" approach. The function of the huge centipede is to establish credibility (using the HW/Q language - MHRP has a similar idea too), or in Luke Crane's terms to permit the things to be treated in terms of embellishing roleplaying without any PC limits having to be violated.
