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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Janx" data-source="post: 5721819" data-attributes="member: 8835">I agree.Let's discard these gamist terms like Narrative Control.  Nobody agrees on their scope anyway.Since the dawn of the first RPG, players have asked if something exists, and at many times with the hope that the answer is Yes so they can use it.If I say the PCs enter what appears to be the Dining Room of the Mansion.  That paints a picture.  But if the player has an idea, he's going to ask questions that both clarify that picture and lead the DM to what the player wants.  If he asks "are there any candlesticks?"  he might be hoping to steal them, or use them as a light source, or an improvised weapon.  It's entirely logical that a dining room could have them, but they might also have been plundered or not-applicable as the room uses wall sconces.Whatever this form of behavior is called, it's been happening for 40 years.Now the player asking if there's a Teleport pad nearby so he can skip walking 20 miles.  That's a bit stronger.  He's gone beyond the realm of creating content that is probably there to getting very specific and very special (assuming teleport pads are not a common occurance in this world).Nextly to all this, is the ironic assumption that saying yes = railroading.  I would find that to be quite the opposite.Players who ask if things exist that the DM didn't explicitly define are going off the rails.  RailRoading is more related to when the DM tries to keep them in the bounds of his defined content.  Saying "No" is the tool a RR GM would use to keep them constrained to the path the GM has planned.Not saying a GM who says "No" is railroading.  But a true RRGM is more likely to say "No" than "Yes" to any question regarding undefined content in order to constrain player choices to the valid path he has planned.  Saying Yes would unlock new paths that could bypasss his RR content or worse.As to the concept of asking these kinds of questions being unsatisfying to the players?  They're the MotherFrakkers who asked!  Players wouldn't ask if there's a shortcut if they didn't want to hear "Yes"To sum up, for me, it is standard game play to ask if something is present that logically does tend to exist in the typical environment(candlesticks in Dining Rooms, shortcuts on maps, rocks on roads, applecarts in markets, deer in forests) and that the GM is free to resolve the answer by their own method.It is therefore accepted that the player is trying to lead or manipulate the GM into saying Yes so as to gain an advantage, but that is no more or less what a player and PC would try to do regardless of the GM's resolution mechanic.It is a different thing to ask for unusual things (like a Teleport Pad in the woods) which are atypical for that kind of environment.  If the rules don't allow for stronger content suggestions (points to spend on Content) than the GM is within his right to say "No" outright as the player may be abusing the "clarifying question" principle.</blockquote>

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