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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 7918503" data-attributes="member: 42582">I don't think I quite understand the example.You seem to be positing that the application of a social/emotion mechanic (such as sanity or morale or whatever) might prompt the player to change an aspect of the character (eg rewriting a Bond, Ideal or Flaw). That seems - at the basic structural level - similar to the Nightcrawler example I posted upthread (only driven by "failure" rather than "success"). I don't see how it illustrates a story having already been written by the GM: how did s/he know what the outcome would be of the SAN check? Or how the player would develop his/her PC in response?Or are you positing that the GM rewrites the PC via a fiat power? But how does s/he know what is going to happen as a result? In my Prince Valiant game one of the PCs - as a result of a GM-exercised Special Effect, fell in love with the Countess of Toulouse. But that didn't determine what would happen - eg that he would sneak her out of the castle they were sheltering in to keep her safe from her husband, the Count, which produced some difficulties for the other PCs when the Count demanded to them that they produce his wife. Nor that, after another PC killed her husband, that he would come up with a plan to make her the ruling Countess of Toulouse and thus separate himself from her so that he wouldn't act on his infatuation to the detriment of his marriage.And if the player has a device for controlling or restoring his/her PC (like spending a Fate point to refuse a compel) then the GM clearly can't author the story in advance because the player has this power to determine which way it goes at a crucial moment.So I'm clearly not seeing whatever it is that you are seeing in your example. And I'm also not seeing what "secret backstory" has to do with anything.  As you describe it the player knows that the mechanic is invoked (the change in the PC presumably isn't being kept secret from the player) and presumably the player knows what it is in the fiction that explains why it is invoked. (Ie I assume the GM is not just saying make a SAN check, or add such-and-such a trait to your sheet without any explanation as to why).There's also the bigger question as to how it is brought about that the PC is in the fictional circumstance that triggers the mechanic in the first place. That goes to bigger issues of framing which are highly relevant to character-driven play, but don't seem like they'll shed any further light on this particular example as they will only reinforce my failure to understand how the GM is authoring this and knowing what is going to happen.</blockquote>

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