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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 6209137" data-attributes="member: 42582">[MENTION=6696971]Manbearcat[/MENTION] ran a one-off scenario to illustrate how an audience with an obstinate chamberlain might be resolved in 4e. You encouraged him to do so.And now you're complaining that the scenario in question does not have the same backstory depth as a long-running campaign that has actually been played?And you really can't see any way of filling in those blanks in a reasonable and coherent fashion?What do you mean "How does that align with . . ."? If the players say that, then we can back up and resolve the attempt. As I said in reply to  [MENTION=205]TwoSix[/MENTION], though, part of the goal of this approach is to favour action over prep.Actually, the passages I quoted included replies of yours to Manbearcat where you insisted that he was misinterpreting the stakes set in his own game. I do not know how you think you can have better knowledge of what the player of the rogue intended than  [MENTION=6696971]Manbearcat[/MENTION] does. If his words led you to a mistaken belief as to the stakes, the worst that can be said against him is that he wrote poorly. It doesn't change the fact that he knows what was at stake in that moment of resolution, and that you have no access to that information except via his reports of his own knowledge!Both are true. They are not in contradiction, and not even in tension.Here is the description of the relevant process (already posted upthread, but repeated for reference puropses; it's by <a href="http://isabout.wordpress.com/2010/02/16/the-pitfalls-of-narrative-technique-in-rpg-play/" target="_blank">Eero Tuovinen</a>):[O]nce the players have established concrete characters, situations and backstory in whatever manner a given game ascribes, the GM starts framing scenes for the player characters. Each scene is an interesting situation in relation to the premise of the setting or the character . . . The GM describes a situation that provokes choices on the part of the character. The player is ready for this, as he knows his character and the character’s needs, so he makes choices on the part of the character. This in turn leads to consequences as determined by the game’s rules. Story is an outcome of the process as choices lead to consequences which lead to further choices, until all outstanding issues have been resolved and the story naturally reaches an end.If success does not lead to complicatoins than the game has come to an end.In the discussion of Manbearcat's example, there is also the difference between a check that is a sub-component in an overall challenge, and the challenge itself. The stakes and consequences of an individual check typically cannot be as significant as for the challenge overall. For instance, if the challenge is framed in relation to the king and his chamberlain, but not in relation to protecting the city from the drakes, then success at an individual check establsihes success in relatoin to the king/chamberlain goal, but is naturally going to have fewer large-scale and long-lasting consequences in relation to the drakes' depradations upon the city.I don't think of the die roll as a property of the PC. It is a separate integer in action resolution.As I said upthread, I prefer the personality of my PC to be expressed via mechanics. You telling me what your conception of mechanical differences is not relevant to my preference, which - naturally enough - is grounded in my conception of mechanical differences.It is hard to answer these questions, because you seem to be working with a concept of "scene" in which what would count as a successful outcome is known prior to the player engaging it; and you also seem to be assuming that scenes will be framed without regard to the significance, within the fiction, of the PCs who are to engage in them; and you are not assuming "fail forward" as the alternative to success.I posted a link to an actual play post upthread in which a "paladin" (mechaincally, a fighter/cleric) in my game had to choose between honour and expedience. <a href="http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?312367-Actual-play-another-combat-free-session-with-intra-party-dyanmics" target="_blank">Here is the link again</a>.What is important to me is that the player's choice is not between honour and mechanical effectiveness. Rather, it is between two desired fictional outcomes - that the prisoner by duly punished; and that his PC's word be kept. There is no trading off of value against effectiveness and ability to impact the fiction.I don't know what the analogue might be in the dragon scenario, because parameters have not been spelled out - but if the paladin player, having decided against offering the dragon sacrifices, now has no reasonably available way to mechanically impact the fiction, that is for me poor GMing and poor scene-framing.The notion of "sub-optimality for success" I also find hard to apply. I have mentioned, several times already, <a href="http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?309950-Actual-play-my-first-quot-social-only-quot-session" target="_blank">this episode</a> in which the PCs dined with the baron. As far as the NPCs were concerned, the fighter/cleric was the party leader. Mechanically, that character has 10 CHA and no trained social skills. Therefore one important element of resolution involved the other players taking steps such that the character was not tricked into giving over information to, or being goaded into premature action by, the baron's evil advisor. But as the post shows, the character was far from unimportant in determining the way the scene unfolded, and the player was definitely able to mechanically impact the fiction. Part of what was involved was changing the scene so that he could make an impact.My comments to N'raac also apply to this. Where did the notion of "winning" come from? Who set the goal?As to why I wouldn't sneak attack everything I meet - because perhaps there are NPCs in the game whom I don't want to kill.You appear to be telling me that my game is incoherent and shallow. I point you to actual play posts that will show you what is happening in my game. You then don't read them - because heaven knows you are too busy posting in this thread to read "extensive texts" - but you continue to assert that my game is inocherent and shalllow.You seem to me to be more interested in dismissing other posters than in actually trying to understand how they play the game.You're also welcome to read and comment on my actual play posts. There are a couple of links earlier in this post.</blockquote>

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