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@clearstream may have a different reply to make from this one. But as I read @clearstream's posts, the point is quite simple: players in RPGs are capable of (i) establishing immediate goals relating to the removal of afflictions, conditions etc, and (ii) declaring actions that, if successful...

The rune case has no "meta-decision". The player says "Maybe these runes will help us get unlost", and puts their dice pool together, and the declared action is resolved. Where is the alleged "meta"? I mean, of course the player knows that the result of the declared action will effect the...

It seems hard to understand, because posters - eg @AlViking - keep posting that the character determined what the runes mean.

I don't see the point of this. In a D&D combat, the player - through rolling dice etc - contributes to a fiction in which an Orc is dead. In the imaginary world of D&D, the player's character - by dint of deft footwork, skill with a blade, etc - kills an Orc in battle. The PC can't kill an...

I know. You have made this quite clear. In the game I was playing, the character had not control over the meaning of the runes either. The runes had been written by some unknown person long ago. The character doesn't roll dice. The player did. Suppose I told you that combat in your D&D game is...

I dunno - it's not that hard to find people posting about their dissatisfaction with their RPGing. But maybe they're not being sincere? In any event, if you accept my testimony as to my own play, than I don't know on what basis you are saying the design question I identified has not been answered.

Suppose that the game is one based on GM-authored backstory. The player knows that the runes their PC reads were not actually written 1000 years ago. They know that they were made up by the GM, either on the spot or perhaps in the course of preparation for play. In my MHRP/Fantasy Hack game...

I didn't say it is. But it is part of playing a RPG. There is not the least difficulty in saying how MHRP works: *The PC is subject to a Lost in the Dungeon complication, rated at d12. *The GM frames a scene, that includes a Strange Runes scene distinction. *The player, as their PC, has the...

On the contrary: you are ignoring the role of epistemic uncertainty, which makes the metaphysical aspect of the situation secondary. The character does not know what the runes say; but they have a conjecture and a hope. For them, epistemically, it is possible that the runes reveal a way out...

As I have posted, I understand your assertion. I disagree with it. The fact that the player's action establishes backstory elements that are, in the fiction, not caused by the PC, doesn't make the decision spaces different - beyond any general differences of the sort that I have been pointing to...

Really? The player doesn't (in 3E) pull out their Power Attack spreadsheet? Or (in any version of the game) check that the cleric has enough cure spells to keep their PC up? Or draw inferences from previous damage rolls made by the GM for the opponents, so as to inform decisions about which PC...

The player can't "dictate reality". They can contribute to a shared fiction. That's called playing a RPG. You seem to be thinking of the backstory (the "reality") as some sort of constraint that the players have to learn and navigate their way through. But that is not the only way to play a...

Performing mental arithmetic, and working out what fiction is dictated by feeding those numbers into the rules engine, is not the same thing as fighting an Orc. The player and character are doing different things. I'm not sure why this is supposed to be revelatory, or relevant. You posted that...

Yes. The player is playing a RPG. As part of that, the player authored some fiction. That's what happens when someone plays a RPG! The player calculates to hit bonuses, and estimates ratios of damage to hit points. Their PC, meanwhile, is fighting for their life and trying to read the Orc's...

The player authors a fiction. The character discovers a reality. How is that hard?

Yes they do.

From the post where I introduced the example: If you haven't read the example, or noted that the action declaration is about reducing or eliminating a complication - something reiterated by me in many posts in this thread, probably some in reply to you - why is that my fault? I've hardly kept...

You posted "The players is, if I successfully interpret these runes what do I want them to mean (given whatever constraints are in the game)." That's not accurate. As I've posted repeatedly, from when I first posted the example, and most recently in reply to you in post 20205, the player was...

Yet you have managed to say some sensible things about how it plays!

So, as I posted, this was a fantasy hack. In MHRP played literally as superheroes, something like Power-Dampening Collar might be more appropriate. Or Trapped in Arcade's Garbage Collector. But in something a bit more gritty, maybe Lost in the Tunnels of Nanda Parbat would make sense.