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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 6817942" data-attributes="member: 42582">Well, here are some extracts from the statement of the GM's and players' roles in BW (revised rulebook, pp 55-56, 268-69 - I think it's the same in BW Gold):Beliefs are not arbitrarily chosen. Each one must relate to the situation at hand when the character joins your world. These tie him [sic] to events and thereby create drama as Beliefs cross and conflict with other Beliefs. . . . By openly and honestly setting down their top three priorities, players are helping the GM and the other players get the most out of the game. Now they all know what you're after, and they can help you get it. . . Beliefs are meant to be conflicted, challenged, betrayed and broken. Such emotional drama makes for a good game. . . . [M]y priorites when I set down to GM Burning Wheel . . . * To get across my point/vision/idea (also known as the theme of the game). * To challenge and engage the players. . . . t is the GM's job to interpret all of the various intents of the players' actions and mesh them into a coherent whole that fits within the context of the game. . . . He [sic] can see the big picture - what the players are doing, as well as what the opposition is up to and plans to do. His perspective grants the power to hold off one action, while another player moves forward so that the two pieces intersect dramatically at the table. . . . Most important, the GM is responsible for introducing complications to the story and consequences to the players' choices. . . . Players in Burning Wheel must use their characters to drive the story forward - to resolve conflicts and create new ones. Players are supposed to push and risk the characters, as they grow and change in unforeseen ways.In the case of my upthread examples, the cures on the angel feather, and the pyramid in the Bright Desert, all relate to the war between angels and devils which is part of Ancient History (one of the mage PC's skills) and may herald the coming Apocalypse (and Apocalypse-wise is another of the mage PC's skills). The Dark Elf, as I think I already mentioned upthread, engages the elven ronin PC's Belief that I will always keep the elven ways - and the geography of the dark elf engages the backstory of the mage PC (with his ruined tower in the foothills) as well as the newly-introduced shaman PC, who (among other abilities) summons spirits of the foothills.If the GM is pushing play towards the Misty Lake, s/he must believe that doing so will somehow engage the players via their PCs' Beliefs - which, in turn, given the way that Beliefs are meant to be authored by the players, must mean that the Misty Lake somehow speaks to or relates to the current ingame situation.And that ingame situation hasn't been shaped just by the GM - it's an outgrowth of the players action declarations and adjudication. Hence it's not about GM railroading - but is about GM contribution and creativity.To me, this seems to be a description of a game that involves less pre-authorship and more authorship in response to player flags and even (perhaps) action declarations. (For the latter - depending a bit on how big a time is a later time.)I've never thought that it effects the agency that you desire as a player. I've been trying to explain the outlook of those designers (and the RPGers who play their game) who deliberately promoted "fail forward" as a technique. And this is related to a certain conception of what player agency amounts to. (Which is different from yours.)As to why it matters - [MENTION=27570]sheadunne[/MENTION] gives a good explanation in a post not far upthread, to which you replied in the post above this one.Part of the explanation is that simply raising a barbarian horde isn't likely to be the focus of play in the sort of game that I prefer. The horde will have some more intimate, dramatic/emotional connection to the PC. (A bit like how, in my BW game, it's not just that the world is threatened by a balrog, but that the balrog is possessing the brother of one PC who was also the evil master of another, who (it seems) made the black arrows that killed the beloved master of a third PC.)If that sort of emotional drama is less important, and if the focus is more on the action/adventure and "external" aspects of events, then the difference between Ed Greenwood's NPCs and NPCs authored by the GM as part of the adjudication of play won't be such a big deal.</blockquote>

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