GM fiat - an illustration

[Bedrockgames]

I'm asking you how you would explain it.

I've posted how I would explain it. At some length. And you think my explanation is no good. So what does a good explanation look like?

You gave an overview of how you think trad play unfolds. I think that is reductive and a very rigid way to look at play. But like I said before, I wouldn't break down play in that manner. I think it is an organic process that is intuitive and varies from table to table and person to person. You are much more concerned about that aspect of play than I am.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

In AW there is no player-side move when you go to a place to meet a person. So if that's what the player says, the GM makes a move - typically a soft one, unless the player is handing the GM an opportunity on a plate.

In making their move, the GM will always say what prep demands.

In this case, it's not clear how Krumptown and Sludge are elements of play; or what you have in mind as bringing it about that (i) the player knows about Krumptown but (ii) doesn't know that it has bee burned down, and (iii) knows about Sludge but (iv) doesn't know that Sludge is dead. So I can't really say more than the above with any clarity.

Those stipulations are correct. But it is part of the prep that Krumptown and Sludge are gone. They're not moves.

 

[Bedrockgames]

I'm asking you how you would explain it.

I've posted how I would explain it. At some length. And you think my explanation is no good. So what does a good explanation look like?

Now I can tell you how a mystery might be planned, and what steps the GM might want to keep in mind when running the game. But like I said, I don't think there is a prescriptive way here. The only thing that matters is the facts of the mystery be pinned down and remain so, that they may be explored (and how different groups and tables explore is going to vary: they will model it to their satisfaction). But I do think ti is possible if you have these concrete details, a concrete sense of place, a concrete set of characters involved and to give players the freedom to investigate it as they will, for them to explore, find clues, put clues together and work to solve the mystery. I also don't think this is something one needs to prove because people do it all the time and know the results from experience. Even if we kept it as stilted and static as possible: i.e. a rigid map, with clues rigidly placed, and characters who rigidly give a list of clues when prompted by the right questions (minding you this isn't how I would do it). Even in that very dry approach you are going to have an objective mystery the players are solving. At least for the purposes of a game. Like I said before, no one is saying this a simulation of a real life mystery

 

[Crimson Longinus]

'I go to Krumptown and meet Sludge and he's fine and we have a beer' is quite the action declaration, no? It seems to skip over quite a few steps.

Wouldn't you normally just start with 'I go to Krumptown?'

Doesn't seem particularly outlandish to me. In any case, I think we can imagine all sort of things the player can declare their character to do that could contradict established prep.

Like I totally buy that the move structure with it's flexible outcomes is such, that it is relatively easy to avoid such contradictions. But the claim was not about the moves, it was about action declarations altogether, which can be basically anything. Now if @pemerton wants to amend their statement to mean only moves, then I have no issue with it.

 

[pemerton]

You gave an overview of how you think trad play unfolds. I think that is reductive and a very rigid way to look at play. But like I said before, I wouldn't break down play in that manner. I think it is an organic process that is intuitive and varies from table to table and person to person. You are much more concerned about that aspect of play than I am.

So I infer from this that you can't explain your play to a new player. All you can tell them is that "it's an organic process"! But when they go outside and start planting flowers, you have to tell them they're doing it wrong.

 

[pemerton]

Those stipulations are correct. But it is part of the prep that Krumptown and Sludge are gone. They're not moves.

There's no prep in AW that says that Krumptown and Sludge are gone. I've given you a couple of examples of how it could play out. Obviously there are indefinitely many other possibilities.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

There's no prep in AW that says that Krumptown and Sludge are gone.

Why?

 

[pemerton]

Now if @pemerton wants to amend their statement to mean only moves, then I have no issue with it.

As I said, I don't even know what this means.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

As I said, I don't even know what this means.

You don't know what moves are?

 

[pemerton]

Why?

What do you mean, why? Because it's not what the rules tell the GM to do. Prep in AW is of threats and fronts. (In the revised edition I think the terminology is thinned down to threats only, but my copy is the original.)