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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ovinomancer" data-source="post: 8224726" data-attributes="member: 16814">I don't really agree that you can do this and still have a game.  It's a theoretical position that says that the GM has authority over everything, including player action declarations, albeit in a retroactive sense.  I mean, if this is the position you're staking, then the game is really Mother May I with a side of "pray I don't alter the deal further."There's a pretty notable difference between changing what's in the GM's notes, which requires only the GM, and changing what happened at the table, in the shared fiction, which requires checking with everyone.  I mean, if you don't, then you're one of those stories.I strive to always assume good faith gaming.  Don't make your argument contingent on bad faith just to make a point.Yup, and you don't really know, do you?  What's a dissociative mechanic if not hitpoints and character levels?  These seem fine.  Every complaint I've seen that throws mechanics under the bus because they're "dissociative" is usually ignoring massive "dissociative" mechanics all around, just because they're used to those mechanics, so of course they're not a problem. I don't doubt your experience.  There are plenty of GMs not good a improv.  I've played in prepped campaigns that were a mess, too.  Does that mean I can dismiss prep?  Nope, it's a great way to do things.  I'd appreciate some reciprocity (<-- favorite word) on this.Shrug, I guess a position where no one can actually say anything is something?  It certainly insulates everyone from actually looking at their play in any critical way.Thanks for this, but you're in error if you think I'm not extremely aware of your approach -- I just got done responding to you that I've used it, recently.  So, try to reconcile that I 1) know your approach, 2) think it's a good approach to use for at least some of my own gaming, and 3) am still saying what I am saying.What you seem to be missing in my posts is that I'm not arguing that prep isn't an excellent framework from which to provide consistent fiction, even across years, but rather that it is not at the same level of "real" as what's entered into the game.  This is because you can change it without repercussions, permission, or issue at any time.  You can add to it.  You can subtract from it.  I mean, your story about the traitor, it's possible that you wrote yourself a nice bit of fiction in the intervening years and changed what you conceived for that character during that time, so maybe it was prepped he was a traitor, but you've changed it.  The player reads your fictional piece, and that's the truth now.Until someone else knows it, it's not fixed.Is it a fictional story?Ovi, thanks.  No d. The only "truth" is what's shared.  Prior to this, it is, at best, a framework to present the shared fiction, and can be changed.  You've locked in on "but I don't change it" and that's cool, but it doesn't change the fact that it can be easily changed.  If things are true because I choose them to be true, then this is not a useful definition of true.  Your argument here suggests that a thing is true if it isn't changed, and somehow not true if it is changed, when it's occupying the same space.  I mean, I might make some notes for a game a year in advance, and then, a week before a game, drag those out, review them, and decided I don't like how they work out and make some changes.  Accordingly, I've now rendered them not true?  Yeah, I can't get behind this at all.  Instead, I present a clean, clear boundary -- it becomes true in the shared fiction only when it's shared.  Prior to that, it's only the GM's notes.And, again, I ask when it is created full?  At what point does the draft become the not-draft and thus truth?  I mean, you pointed out an inn above, with no map.  Then you add a map, and perhaps, because you like the map, made a change to prior prep to accommodate the map.  Is this not possible?  How can this truth change?You look and realize you wrote down 80 goblins live in this cave, but the map you added later can only hold 20, if you pack them in.  What gives here? If it's shared to the players, and it's changed without discussing it with them, then you'll likely have some problems at your table because you're negating the one thing they can control -- what their characters do.  This is the only thing that the GM has no control over, but your assertion that you can just changed the shared fiction does exactly this -- the players made choices and actions based on situation A, and now you've retconned that to situation B.  You've violated the only thing that Rule 0 doesn't actually cover.And Rule 0, IMNSHO, is a terrible rule.  It's talking about how the rules can be changed to suit the game (ie, they're not locked and inviolable), it's not establishing the GM as dictator, empowered to change anything anytime.</blockquote>

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