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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 5517923" data-attributes="member: 42582">I have nothing against metagaming - for the sort of game I like to play it's pretty important - but it depends a bit on what it is the players metagame. For example, if one player who (for whatever reason) doesn't know a piece of campaign lore is running a PC engaged in a complex negotiation where that information would be useful, but it also makes sense that the PC in question would be as ignorant as the player, then I think the whole table would regard it as a little unsporting for someone to blurt out the information just to help the player get out of a tricky spot!On the other hand, I expect my players to play their PCs, and to contribute to the game more generally, keeping in mind not only what is going on in the fiction but what is happening at the table, and what would make for a fun time. So (for example) if one PC has scouted ahead and been attacked and knocked out, and if the other players then come onto the scene and see that there are two doors through which the scouting PC might have gone, I would never object if a player, knowing which door the scouting PC went through, said "My PC has a feeling that this is the one to go through" even though there is no ingame basis for such an intuition. What does it add to the game for the unconcious PC to lie there any longer than necessary, with his/her player missing out on the game and pointlessly running the risk of losing the PC altogether?As for puzzles/riddles - I had one in my last session, a password needed to open a door. The players had their PCs try lots of forms of words, with various Intimidate and Diplomacy checks used to deliver them in a range of tones, and History checks to try and get extra relevant information. In the end the players realised that there was one salient name that they hadn't tried - and when they tried it, the door opened. (There was another way around the puzzle - the PCs had the magical ability to discover a question hidden on the door asking, in effect "What was my creator's name?" - to which they knew the answer. But despite mooting the use of this magical ability a couple of times they didn't try it, because the player in question was worried that it might cause a very dangerous magical backlash to his PC.)I regard this sort of "challenging of the players" a permissible variant on all the other challenges I pose to them, like how to deploy their resources and use the mechanics to manipulate the fiction so as to succeed at skill challenges and combats. I wouldn't do it all the time, though, just because it is a bit more divorced from those resources and mechanics.</blockquote>

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