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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ovinomancer" data-source="post: 8139074" data-attributes="member: 16814">Well, it doesn't happen at all, assuming good faith play, so I'm not sure how much less of it happening could be to your satisfaction.The GM in the first example could use a randomizer as well -- this isn't the issue, and I may have occluded things by mentioning mechanics.  The difference is that in the first example the player's agency is entirely limited to finding out what the GM thinks.  Don't get me wrong, this can be hella fun -- there's a few GMs out there I love to be entertained by.  But, if the only thing that can happen revolves entirely around what the GM thinks, then there's a limit on agency here.  Again, this is fine.In the second example, the player has the ability to see that it's their intent that's at stake -- we find out if what the player wants is true, not the GM.  This is a major shift in what your choices can actually affect in the game, and comes with a concatenate increase in agency.  Now the player's choices are not constrained entirely by what the GM thinks! Mechanics aren't the issue (although they are part of the system that avoid the Czege Principle).  We haven't put anything off to the dice, we've agreed that we're playing around what the players choose to do instead of around what the GM thinks.This is, as I say, does NOT make one game better than the other.  It's a differentiator that goes into an individual's evaluation.  Why would I not want to play a high agency game?  For one, they make increasingly weighty demands on the player.  If we've agreed that we're playing around what the player thinks, then the player has to do that and takes on a larger share of the burden for the game.  People might not like this, or, they think that it's more fun to explore the GM's thinking than their own contributions.  That's awesome!  Again, looking at games and evaluating agency isn't a final metric of better or worse, it's a data point that goes into your consideration of what you want out of the game (hopefully fun!).  Knowing more data points improves your decision making and understanding.  That's it.Finally, I've bolded a statement above.  Can you show me where, in objective reality, I can find the listing of the contents of the chest in the example?  Heck, can you tell me where, in objective reality, the chest is?  We're talking about a game of make-believe.  What you're calling "objective reality" is really just whatever the GM imagined.  I think we can agree that the first example works entirely if the GM is running from a published module, or has extensive home-brew notes, or is winging it but maintaining authorial control.  Regardless, it's still what one person imagines.  GMs are not privileged to create "objective reality" over anyone else.  If the GM can imagine it, why can't the player do it instead?</blockquote>

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