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<blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 8167466" data-attributes="member: 42582">I'm not sure what you mean when you say &quot;players are more aware than one would think that the referee just happened to create a forest in front of them&quot;. What do you think I think? Do you think I'm lying to my players?My players knew that I narrated a storm and the landing of their ships on the Dalmation coast. They knew that we collectively agreed they were travelling overland to Constantinople. They knew that I narrated that they came to a forest. They knew that we were working from a generic map of Europe that gives one a general sense of what is between the Dalmation coast and Istanbul/Constantinople.I don't think the concepts of fairness or challenge have much applicability in my RPGing, at least as you use them. I am not challenging the players in their ability to plan an overland trek. Or to avoid meeting the Bone Laird. The &quot;challenge&quot;, such as it is, is to decide how to respond to an ancient ghost who lingers on for some reason.If &quot;sandboxing&quot; means play that prioritises geographical matters, then I am not running sandbox games.Though that would still leave it a bit unclear to me why it is OK for the GM to establish, say, a challenging bit of topography (without random rolling) but not a challenging bit of weather (without random rolling).In my case, I narrated a forest because that was what I had in front of me in the scenario I wanted to use. It was colour, easily incorporated - surely there were forests in Dacia/Romania in the 8th century CE? - but not the principle focus of play. The focus of play was the NPCs and their ongoing status as ghosts. Celtic ghosts, as it turned out.I would think that sometimes, even in a geography/architecture-focused sandbox, the GM must have to come up with details on the fly: colours of drapes, shapes of columns, manufacture of roofing materials, etc. Presumably most of the times these aren't very significant to what is at stake.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="pemerton, post: 8167466, member: 42582"] I'm not sure what you mean when you say "players are more aware than one would think that the referee just happened to create a forest in front of them". What do you think I think? Do you think I'm lying to my players? My players knew that I narrated a storm and the landing of their ships on the Dalmation coast. They knew that we collectively agreed they were travelling overland to Constantinople. They knew that I narrated that they came to a forest. They knew that we were working from a generic map of Europe that gives one a general sense of what is between the Dalmation coast and Istanbul/Constantinople. I don't think the concepts of [I]fairness [/I]or [I]challenge[/I] have much applicability in my RPGing, at least as you use them. I am not challenging the players in their ability to plan an overland trek. Or to avoid meeting the Bone Laird. The "challenge", such as it is, is to decide how to respond to an ancient ghost who lingers on for some reason. If "sandboxing" means [I]play that prioritises geographical matters[/I], then I am not running sandbox games. Though that would still leave it a bit unclear to me why it is OK for the GM to establish, say, a challenging bit of topography (without random rolling) but not a challenging bit of weather (without random rolling). In my case, I narrated a forest because that was what I had in front of me in the scenario I wanted to use. It was colour, easily incorporated - surely there were forests in Dacia/Romania in the 8th century CE? - but not the principle focus of play. The focus of play was the NPCs and their ongoing status as ghosts. [I]Celtic ghosts[/I], as it turned out. I would think that sometimes, even in a geography/architecture-focused sandbox, the GM must have to come up with details on the fly: colours of drapes, shapes of columns, manufacture of roofing materials, etc. Presumably most of the times these aren't very significant to what is at stake. [/QUOTE]

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