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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Rystil Arden" data-source="post: 3144152" data-attributes="member: 29014">And I do realise this.  It is human nature to hallucinate things into a situation based on the way we perceive a scene--heck, I do a lot of my research on that (I just came back from running an experiment on a similar topic--ironically I was posting while subjects were doing the experiment).  And I've made the same mistakes as a GM myself on numerous occasions.  What ruined it for me (and this is why I tried not to say anything until after I saw your answer) is when you wouldn't let us go back and resolve this misunderstanding.  It's just a different perspective, I guess.  When a player first pointed out to me that I'd done this in a PbP game, my response was immediately "Oh crap!  This is all my fault!" and I bent over backwards with editing a huge amount of posts (over 100) to make things right.  As the GM in our games, we each have a god's eye view of everything that has happened, and we are the players' window to our world.  As such, in a case of dual misunderstanding in a fairly ambiguous case, I believe as a GM and a player that the player is entitled to the benefit of the doubt, especially when it's the difference of making the game more/less fun, unless it's going to make the game less fun for the other players.  In this particular case, it would have required nothing more from you than saying back when we mentioned that we thought we had him that when Eternity/Michael/Almayce was there standing right next to the guy, they did indeed grab him, and the rest of the game would have been unchanged--it's more-or-less the most unobstrusive retcon possible. (For an example of a much more obtrusive retcon--if we had already wound up fighting Fallonese who recognised us on sight as the 'Attackers' because of the left-behind guy and only then after questioning one of the fallen and being forced to kill half of them, we discovered that we left one guy behind--that's a really obtrusive retcon)As I said all the way at the beginning, I guess it's a different playstyle.  You may in fact lie less extreme on the continuum than the "You didn't look up" GM, but you're over there on that side--when a disagreement occurs due to misunderstanding on everyone's part, you side with the status quo (which implictly sides with the GM).  I can see why someone might do that.  The GM is, after all, in control of the game and making the final decision, so it could seem reasonable to always err on the GM's side.  For me, however, it isn't that simple.  As I said before, I believe in verisimilitude too, and thus the GM is the window to the world he or she creates.  As such, any time there is a double-misunderstanding, I believe that it is the GM's burden that this occurred, in a sense, a failure of the window to convey the full scene to make everything clear, and the GM, unlike the players, can act with perfect knowledge, since the GM is in control and makes the scenarios.  Thus, I err with the players.</blockquote>

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