GM fiat - an illustration

[bloodtide]

I didn’t say there’s not a difference. But I do think it is all about feeling. That for you (or a given group) it feels more like solving a mystery if you know the facts have been predetermined by the GM.

Well, people do feel like they are really solving a real mystery for real when they solve a real mystery for real.

Right. But mysteries don’t have creators that oversee their creation and how all the details fit together. More importantly, they don’t do so with a sense of how to present those details in such a way as to function as a game of some sort.

Maybe you don't follow the news and things like True Crime.....but.....this very much happens in real life.

This is why I’m making a distinction between what the characters are doing (solving a mystery) and what the players are doing (working out a logic puzzle).

Though in the classic tradition game the players are (solving the mystery), as the characters are (solving a mystery).

The players aren’t solving anything in either game. They are pretending to solve a mystery in both games.

Just note there are real game styles were the players do solve real mysteries for real.

But for others, the fact that they know there’s one participant who knows all the answers and has constructed this mystery and is running the game will make it feel somehow lesser. Especially the more the game shifts away from the what might entail skilled play of the game and more toward a test of the players’ skill at figuring out the GM’s puzzle. That they know it’s the GM’s puzzle makes it lesser in some way for them.

I mentioned this many pages ago: This is just the anti-DM feelings. Some players hate the idea that "one of the other players" is more powerful then them...in the game. This is after all why all the games that limit the DMs power even exist.

And it's not just mysteries....it is everything. And it's really the point of the whole thread.

My game: The player has their character cast alarm....and as DM, I on a whim say "eh, the Alarm becomes a Living Alarm Spellshark and bites your character!" and the player has to play with that happening in the game......or leave my game.

The Other Games: Well, scroll back to the OP. The game rules limit a what can happen to a small amount. And is very positive towards the player(s), of course....

This is before we even get into the quality of the mystery that has been constructed by the GM. Make it too easy, and it won’t seem very satisfying. Make it too hard, and play may stall out.

I find Scooby-Do mysteries work well for most players. Move up to Nancy Drew/Hardy Boys for slightly more intelligent players.

 

[hawkeyefan]

Well, people do feel like they are really solving a real mystery for real when they solve a real mystery for real.

For real?

 

[zakael19]

We're finding out the mystery of a) "What is the evil beneath the Chita Desert?" and b) "What exactly does the Grasp of Heaven want with the orbital satellite platforms?" and c) "How are they linked?" right now in my Tuesday game.

I have no idea. The player's information gathering rolls + questions + the missions they've picked + the character themes at play + backgrounds and drives + interactions with NPCs have all filtered stuff forward.

As far as I can tell, based on the end of session discussions; feedback in discord; and general excitement to dig back into the threads - nobody seems to care (or notice?) that it wasn't a defined thing when we started play. And not once have we stalled out or have I had to like, drop clues.

 

[hawkeyefan]

We're finding out the mystery of a) "What is the evil beneath the Chita Desert?" and b) "What exactly does the Grasp of Heaven want with the orbital satellite platforms?" and c) "How are they linked?" right now in my Tuesday game.

I have no idea. The player's information gathering rolls + questions + the missions they've picked + the character themes at play + backgrounds and drives + interactions with NPCs have all filtered stuff forward.

As far as I can tell, based on the end of session discussions; feedback in discord; and general excitement to dig back into the threads - nobody seems to care (or notice?) that it wasn't a defined thing when we started play. And not once have we stalled out or have I had to like, drop clues.

Sounds awesome. What game is this?

 

[pemerton]

For some of us ‘discovery’ necessarily implies pre-existence before the moment of discovery for the thing being discovered.

That’s the issue we are pointing to. We all agree fictional details even those with no pre-existence can be binding once created, but that’s not discovery, at least by our definition. I’d be curious to hear your reasoning for why such pre-existence isn’t required for discovery.

*note - I think it’s important to keep a clear line between discovering for the players and discovering for the characters. I think we all agree the characters discover. It’s the players that are in dispute.

By "discover" do you mean learn?

As in, are you talking about the players learning what the GM pre-authored?

And do you require a certain time to have elapsed? Eg suppose the GM decides something at time T1 during the session, which the players learn at time T2. Does that count as "discovery"?

if you are introducing facts during play, regardless of method, then you could still be kind of solving an objective mystery if you are pinning things down. But again it feels like it wouldn't be a mystery if two minutes in I make a guess and that guess is neither objectively right or wrong because that detail hasn't yet been determined.

What would the guess be about?

Are you imaging the player guessing the GM's entire plot? Or are you imagining them roleplaying their character as having guessed something which, in the fiction, they have some knowledge of?

 

[Bedrockgames]

What would the guess be about?

Are you imaging the player guessing the GM's entire plot? Or are you imagining them roleplaying their character as having guessed something which, in the fiction, they have some knowledge of?

Again this isn't about one style of play or even my style of play. So it could be any kind of guess. But a simple example might be they take action based on who they think did it, and they end up being wrong. For instance maybe they think Mr Green did it, and so they restrain him for the night in order to prevent further crime while they continue to investigate. Only for another murder to happen because the real killer was someone else. In that kind of situation, having an objective backstory makes a difference. Especially since this isn't meant to be a blind guess in a mystery but one based on the evidence they have gathered so far

 

[Bedrockgames]

Also @pemerton when you ask that many questions for a single post it raises people’s defenses because it feels like an interrogation

 

[Campbell]

@Bedrockgames

You are also challenging the integrity of the play experience of many people's games and doing so without regard to the experiential quality of those games (something you get your druthers up about on a regular basis).

You also are regularly (whether meaning to or not) associating games that share no conceptual underpinning whatsoever. Hillfolk is a game with fiat narrative currency and distributed scene framing authority meant model television drama series dynamics. It is explicitly a collaborative storytelling endeavor.

Apocalypse World is a game where GMs have scene framing authority and players are just expected to play their characters with integrity. It differs from a trad experience in that the GM is making moves to threaten their community and explicitly put pressure on the characters.

These play experiences could not be more different from one another. Trying to address them as part of the same phenomenon is irresponsible. Why continue to do so through multiple threads when this has been addressed multiple times to you directly is baffling.

 

[Bedrockgames]

@Bedrockgames

You are also challenging the integrity of the play experience of many people's games and doing so without regard to the experiential quality of those games (something you get your druthers up about on a regular basis).

I am not casting any quality judgement on the games, I merely used the phrase 'really solving the mystery' to denote a particular type of engagement. And to be especially clear, I made no judgment about whether this was possible or not in games like AW

You also are regularly (whether meaning to or not) associating games that share no conceptual underpinning whatsoever. Hillfolk is a game with fiat narrative currency and distributed scene framing authority meant model television drama series dynamics. It is explicitly a collaborative storytelling endeavor.

This is because I was responding to a particular point @hawkeyefan made and Hillfolk was a relevant example of how players having more information doesn't always mean more agency (because in a mystery, where you are really trying to solve things, more information can reduce your ability to make meaningful choices). We were talking about whether expansion of agency beyond the character to the player meant greater agency or not. We weren't talking about AW or specific types of games (perhaps Hawkeye can say what games and what procedures he had in mind when that was going on, but it was many many pages back)

Apocalypse World is a game where GMs have scene framing authority and players are just expected to play their characters with integrity. It differs from a trad experience in that the GM is making moves to threaten their community and explicitly put pressure on the characters.

Yes, and like I said before, I do not play AW, so I wasn't passing any judgement on it or games like it (and I asked Pemerton to clarify whether in such a game, it would be possible to have a pre-existing and objective mystery to investigate and solve).

These play experiences could not be more different from one another. Trying to address them as part of the same phenomenon is irresponsible. Why continue to do so through multiple threads when this has been addressed multiple times to you directly is baffling.

And I am not doing that. I've been making numerous qualifying statements in order to make clear I have no opinion on AW in this respect. I even said, this isn't a play style or system thing, because campaigns where the players are trying to solve an objective mystery exist across many kinds of systems and many play styles

 

[Umbran]

Just note there are real game styles were the players do solve real mysteries for real.

With respect, I think the real game styles are where players solve fictional mysteries for real.

I don't believe there are real game styles in which, for example, players have solved the very real Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum theft at the game table in their dining room, and turned the culprits over to the police.