@hawkeyefan Thank you for the great examples! (I'm definitely going to look up Spire to steal some ideas from to hack and splice into stuff).
It's a great game, I'd recommend it. Definitely worth playing, but it's also just a book crammed with ideas on every page. And excellent GM advice (though a lot of it is lifted from other games).
A lot of the questions you've asked can be answered by looking at the GM advice offered in the book under "Running the Game". These are the kinds of clearly presented principles that, in my opinion, are absent from 5E. Here they are:
GENERAL GM ADVICE
- YOU NEVER ROLL DICE. Well – you roll dice to see how much stress you inflict on players, but that’s it. You never have to roll a dice to make something happen: you just say that it does, and it does. Players can resist, or fight back, if they want – that’s where the dice come in.
- DON’T MAKE PLAYERS ROLL DICE UNLESS THEY HAVE TO. The rules of the game are intended to sit in the background, and the majority of a session will be spent having a conversation in which you tell a story. If you feel the story moving a certain way, let it – you don’t need to roll dice.
- SOMETHING’S ALWAYS AT STAKE. Don’t ask the player to roll dice unless there’s something at stake – that is, unless you can envisage a way the task would mark stress against one of their resistances. If you can’t figure out what could go wrong, and if you can but it’s not interesting, don’t bother asking for a roll.
- MAKE NOTES, THEN REFER TO THEM. They don’t have to be exhaustive, but try to write down whatever you or your players say that you find interesting or that you think will come up again in play. You won’t use all of it, but it helps to have it there.
- SAY YES. When a player asks a question, it’s an indication they want the game to go in a certain way. Try to say yes to queries when you can, because it moves the story and play onwards rather than stopping it in its tracks.
- FAIL FORWARD. A failed roll isn’t a block in a storyline, it’s a different branch – something always happens. Whenever a player rolls the dice, change the world in some way as a response, or give them some information.
- RE-USE BEFORE YOU INVENT. Always try to use old material (characters, locations, etc) that the players have interacted with before rather than inventing new material, because re-using established facts is how improvised stories gain traction and weight. If the players establish a church as their home base in the first game, call back to it every time they have a meeting. If they go shopping and meet a particular trader, have that trader crop up again next time they go shopping. It’s easy, and it works.
- ASK QUESTIONS, AND LISTEN TO THE ANSWERS. If you don’t know precisely what’s what in a particular situation (i.e. if a player asks “Are there any dealers in the occult round here?”) then feel free to turn the question back on the players (“Tell me, are there any dealers round here? If there are, what are they like? If not, why not?”). Use their answers, everyone will feel more engaged with the story, and you didn’t have to do any work.
- DON’T BE AFRAID TO CHANGE STUFF. The players are going to change things – the city will not be the same at the start of the campaign as it is at the end if you all do your jobs right. To that end, if you want to rewrite part of the setting on the fly, go for it. Maybe all your Knights are hollow suits of armour animated by sentient wasps. Maybe your Carrion-Priests flooded New Heaven with vultures, not hyenas. Maybe the rivers are full of giant carp that people ride around. Maybe the gods descend to the streets and walk among their worshippers. It’s all up to you – whatever gets you and your players excited is the “right” way to play, not sticking slavishly to canon
Moved this one out of order to frame things
Who decides what is "available" and what is "pretty much anything"?
Who decides how much of a favor is appropriate? Is it an actual deal if the price is really high?
"I want them to get me the kings magic sword that he always has with him" feels bad?
When this came up in our game, it was the player who suggested what it was that he wanted. I took "available" to mean that if it's in the book in some way, then it's available. The item in question was the specific suit of armor of a Paladin that had been killed during play (a Paladin is like an elite law enforcer of the city, tasked with dealing with treason and insurrection). So in that sense, we knew the armor existed, so it must be available, right? Perhaps not for sale, but it exists and so it can be obtained.
One of the PCs had previously killed the Paladin in a public duel. So, I decided that the armor was on permanent display in the district of Amaranth (the seat of power of the ruling High Elves of the city). Basically, the player wanted this contact to steal the armor. I said that this would be a very risky proposition, and that this would require a roll, using the ability of the contact to determine the outcome. He agreed and rolled, and got a Success With Stress. He took the Stress damage to his Shadow Resistance (his anonymity, essentially). This was enough to result in Fallout and so I selected the one below, which seemed fitting and thematic and also interesting as hell:
- WRATH OF THE SUN GODS: [Shadow] Your operations are uncovered by the Solar Guard, the grand inquisitors of the aelfir church, and you are hunted. Many of your NPC bonds are dragged out into the street and shot. Your friends dare not speak your name.
So quite the cost, ultimately. Not decided by GM fiat, though. I don't want to get into all the mechanics of the game, but this was all determined following the rules of the game. I chose the specific consequence from a list based on the rolls and the severity.
It feels like there is a lot of room between really wanting a slice of chocolate cake and someone to talk to right now, and wanting not to be an orphan. Is there something constraining the GM to make it a desire useful to the player? (Is this supposed to just be insight into the NPC or something obviously actionable? What rules constraints are on the GM to make it useful?)
The principles of play. "Something's always at stake" and "say yes" seem most suited here. Having these principles, even when they don't correlate perfectly to a specific situation, really helps the GM understand the nature of his role in the game, and what he should be striving toward. In this case, embracing the ideas of the players, not trying to thwart them as "unearned" or anything like that.
When this came up in our game, the player asked this about Mother Moon, the matron of a gnoll crime family, during a meeting they were having to try and broker a truce among some of the warring crime factions of the city. Given the context of the situation, I told the player what Mother Moon was hoping to get out of the meeting; that she wanted to ally with the Church of the Gun in order to destroy their mutual enemy, Mr. Winter.
If I'd said something like "She's really in need of a nap" that's me as GM being a total weasel, and not honoring the play.
Who decides what's conceivable?
Can I get into the locked guarded vault in the heavily guarded high security government facility as easily as I get into the local sheriffs records room?
Conceivable is likely decided by consensus, if needed. But I think most often, conceivable is pretty clear.
You've compared two possible places, and while I would agree there would be a varying degree of difficulty involved, neither seems inconceivable for someone to make their way inside.
I should clarify that "situation" is an ctual game term, like a "scene" or "scenario". Many abilities are "once per situation". So in this case, the action will already be taking place in the location in question, and the character using the ability is able to turn up, as long as it's remotely conceivable.
Need to remind myself this game is all set in the one city!
Yes, it's the eponymous Spire, a miles-high city that once belonged to the Drow, but has been taken over by the Aelfir (high-elves). The PCs are all Drow revolutionaries, trying to covertly thwart/oppose Aelfir rule.
All set in the one city. Are there tourists/out-of-towners? It feels like there is a big difference from "they both come from poor families", "they both arrived in town five years ago", and "they both played on the championship youth soccer team under coach Smith back in '14". What in the rules constrains the GM to make it useful?
Again, the principles of play help guide the GM here to make things interesting. "Something's always at stake" does a lot of lifting... two NPCs being childhood friends could matter quite a bit. I don't think the GM must know exactly how useful this may be, but they have to offer something that could at least conceivably matter.
One of the times this came up in our game, the player linked a city watchman and a university professor. I decided that the two were both infatuated with the same student. I didn't know exactly how that would be interesting to the characters or how they'd use it, but it was something that offered leverage of some kind.
All in all, still plenty of input from the GM. But far less approval needed by the GM for basic abilities to work. It's more "player does this, then GM does that" and less "player does this, then GM decides if it works and how".