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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Manbearcat" data-source="post: 6202498" data-attributes="member: 6696971">1 - This is going to take a few days to finish up due to conflicting schedules with my players.  We will probably be doing it via email.  At this point I know: - Level 14, complexity 2 social skill challenge - Dragonborn Paladin Bahamut's Templar which means the PC will more than likely be manifesting, divine platinum wings to make a point and channeling Bahamut's voice in Supernal to improve Diplomacy and Intimidate. - Dwarven Ranger Wyrmslayer (Thorin Oakenshield hat tip) who will bring knowledge bonus with respect to dragons - Halfing Scoundrel (Bilbo hat tip) who will bring Resourceful Action (Action point bonus to various rolls, including skill checks) and Problem-Solver (Immediate Interrupt for ally to reroll a skill roll with a + 2 bonus) - The entirety of the Skill Challenge will be to get to and convince the king to act or sponsor/deputize them, or grant them resources/assets/hirelings in their effort to hunt and defeat the dragon that is threatening to usurp his kingdom.  The obstinate chamberlain will be merely a complication as the stakes aren't high enough with a challenge itself being to "get past him to the king."  The recount of the scene, and analysis, will follow in the coming days.2 - I haven't parsed the entirety of your exchanges with @<a href="http://www.enworld.org/forum/member.php?u=42582" target="_blank">pemerton</a>but I would be surprised indeed to find that we aren't on the same page here.  I think you might be using "rules" for tier play for "default genre logic."  This may be another area where "rules" and "guidance"/"perspective"/"designer's notes" are used interchangably when they probably shouldn't.  Consider 13th Age whereby the designers each have clearly different takes throughout the course of the rulebook.  These are transparently meant to be conveyed as different takes/thoughts/guidance on specific techniques/mechanics/genre logic in play.  But they are not rules.  I think the same thing manifests with Gygax, Arneson, and Pulsipher, each having variance in their D&D ethos.Whenever pemerton and I have discussed this issue in the past, and I'm sure in this very thread, its been pretty uniform that "genre logic" and "fiction first" rules the day in 4e.  The tier system is just guidance for default genre logic.  As he mentioned upthread, and as I did in my own post, you can certainly drift the genre logic up or down tiers as you like and Neverwinter Campaign Setting advocates and provides guidance/means to do just this; eg move parlays with Gods from Epic tier to Paragon and parlays with Kings from Paragon to Heroic...ditto for combat threats as NCS does - lich antagonist to heroic tier.  4e is "outcome based design".  The math is transparent, the descriptors are as open as allowed.  Therefore, "genre control" is a product of table agenda and social contract.  However, that doesn't mean that the game doesn't presuppose a "default genre logic by tier".  But at the same time, it openly canvasses guidance for genre drift by tier.I would be shocked to find pemerton disagreeing that there are default thematic expectations and genre logic built into the tier system of 4e.  But I'll let him clarify.Unfortunately this isn't GM-force.  It probably requires some further breaking-down as there still appears to be confusion.1 - "Say yes or roll the dice" presupposes: a.  1st principles:  (i) The GM is driving the play towards relevant thematic conflict at all times.  Always addressing established premise.  Always pressuring the PCs.  Letting up only in Transition Scenes where they are regrouping or establishing assets/resources.  (ii) The players are the protagonists and the world is there to express that protagonism. b.  If there is no thematic conflict (nothing relevant to theme nor nothing at risk), saying yes to a player proposition should be the default GM move/action/play.  The motive isn't "what the GM wants" and the action isn't "the GM imposes upon the fiction by proxy of acquiescence to player proposition".  The motive goes back to 1st principles; "always drive play toward thematic conflct" and "the players are the protagonists."  Saying yes is coherent with respect to your principles.  If there is nothing at risk and the proposition is player-driven, saying yes allows the game to move on, back toward conflict, and allows the players to impose their vision (not yours...your motive here is 1st principles) upon the fiction.  Unfortunately the 4e PHB meant exactly this (always drive play toward conflict) but instead said "get to the fun" and basically made my gaming life a lot worse than it needed to be for the last 5 years (as edition warriors gathered their banners around that unbelievably poor, ham-handed phraseology of a 1st principle of Indie gaming). c.  Rolling dice to resolve mundane (not charged with conflict) moments of play is anathema to 1st principles.  Action Resolution is resolved solely for conflict where thematic premise is challenged and something relevant is at risk.  Therefore there is no "suspension of action resolution to say yes."  This is because "yes" means there is no conflict where thematic premise is challenged nor something relevant is at risk.  If you are framing Action Scenes that you expect players to engage with that don't inhabit the above, you're "doing it wrong."  Its illustrative of poor GMing with Story Now (Indie) gaming...not GM-force. I think what we keep coming back to is that some concepts are just so remote, so foreign that its difficult to digest without exposure.  Just something as simple as "genre logic" at the expense of "causal logic" is jarring to folks whose entire gaming paradigm is predicated open simulation of process and coupled cause and effect.</blockquote>

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