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<blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 5170465" data-attributes="member: 4937">This is an entirely different thing than the idea you introduce next.&nbsp; If I as a DM planned for the party to go right, but not left, I ought not say, &quot;No&quot; when they decide to go left.&nbsp; If I planned to have a door that could only be breached by answering a riddle, I shouldn't stop a clever idea to bypass the door in some other fasion just because it short cuts what I thought was a particularly clever riddle or puzzle.&nbsp; But what you are suggesting is that which ever way the player goes it ought to hold whatever the player expects.And frankly, that isn't what the player wants.&nbsp; What the player wants is to be surprised.&nbsp; What the player wants is to actually be clever and figure it out and have a real victory, not to have a victory handed to them based on the first wild idea that they threw out there.&nbsp; Where in the heck are we getting the idea that making the world morphic based on player conjecture is making it 'more real'?&nbsp; Isn't that by definition making it less real?&nbsp; I don't know, maybe most players are wildly different than I am, but I suspect most players will suss out your subterfuge in a hurry and be rather disappointed to find you've been practicing this degree of illusionism.&nbsp; Players hate to have their victories stolen from them, and one way or the other this destroys the believablility of the victory as well as the believability of the narrative.&nbsp; So?&nbsp; Maybe.&nbsp; I try hard to make the answers cooler than the players can imagine.&nbsp; If I don't succeed every time, well, that's the breaks.&nbsp; The alternative is for the players to not be surprised.&nbsp; The alternative is for every tired trope, every simplistic meme, every most obvious alternative to become the exact thing that is there.&nbsp; &quot;There are statues, ergo there must be a creature that turns things to stone around here.&quot;, is one of the most tired ideas in dungeon crawling.&nbsp; If some other player spoke up and said, &quot;Gee.. look at all these statues, there must be a medusa around here.&quot; and a 'turn to stone' creature came into being because of that, I'd want to brain the player, not because I was 'scared' of the medua, but because its so bloody trite.&nbsp; I have no desire to turn every scenario with statues into something that turns things to stone.&nbsp; I have no desire to be that predictable.&nbsp; Some times statues are just statues.&nbsp; Sometimes some else entirely is going on.&nbsp; I have no desire to reward players for jumping to really dumb conclusions based on the the most shallow of conjectures.I have no desire to play in that sort of game either.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Celebrim, post: 5170465, member: 4937"] This is an entirely different thing than the idea you introduce next. If I as a DM planned for the party to go right, but not left, I ought not say, "No" when they decide to go left. If I planned to have a door that could only be breached by answering a riddle, I shouldn't stop a clever idea to bypass the door in some other fasion just because it short cuts what I thought was a particularly clever riddle or puzzle. But what you are suggesting is that which ever way the player goes it ought to hold whatever the player expects. And frankly, that isn't what the player wants. What the player wants is to be surprised. What the player wants is to actually be clever and figure it out and have a real victory, not to have a victory handed to them based on the first wild idea that they threw out there. Where in the heck are we getting the idea that making the world morphic based on player conjecture is making it 'more real'? Isn't that by definition making it less real? I don't know, maybe most players are wildly different than I am, but I suspect most players will suss out your subterfuge in a hurry and be rather disappointed to find you've been practicing this degree of illusionism. Players hate to have their victories stolen from them, and one way or the other this destroys the believablility of the victory as well as the believability of the narrative. So? Maybe. I try hard to make the answers cooler than the players can imagine. If I don't succeed every time, well, that's the breaks. The alternative is for the players to not be surprised. The alternative is for every tired trope, every simplistic meme, every most obvious alternative to become the exact thing that is there. "There are statues, ergo there must be a creature that turns things to stone around here.", is one of the most tired ideas in dungeon crawling. If some other player spoke up and said, "Gee.. look at all these statues, there must be a medusa around here." and a 'turn to stone' creature came into being because of that, I'd want to brain the player, not because I was 'scared' of the medua, but because its so bloody trite. I have no desire to turn every scenario with statues into something that turns things to stone. I have no desire to be that predictable. Some times statues are just statues. Sometimes some else entirely is going on. I have no desire to reward players for jumping to really dumb conclusions based on the the most shallow of conjectures. I have no desire to play in that sort of game either. [/QUOTE]

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