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Message: <blockquote data-quote="EzekielRaiden" data-source="post: 8923084" data-attributes="member: 6790260">A distinction without a difference. You declare the power is absolute. The person I replied to said they'd never seen anyone do so. That you claim it, regardless of context, is the only relevant fact here.It sure as hell is when you present it as you did. It's very clear what you were saying.Yes, it absolutely would, because that's not absolute power if you actually include them. And if you don't actually include them, it's not equitable results and player inclusion.I tried. There wasn't much to read. Nice jab though, "trigger words" is another incredibly loaded phrase. Guess loaded language is only a problem when I use it?(Emphasis added.) Well then, you clearly don't actually believe in including the players. Because consensus IS how you include them. To call it a joke is to straight up deny that there is anything of worth other than you and your decision. That's why I push back so hard on this. Your derisive hostility to the very concept of actually including other people in adjudication is what I am so opposed to! (Well, that and the deception thing, but that's a different side of this discussion.)And you cannot do that unless you actually know what will do it. You cannot know what will do it without communicating and giving people the chance to make decisions for themselves, not merely meekly submitting to your word because you say it and you obviously know what's best for them and the game.It has to be a two-way street. Anything less is simply not capable of using this power "only to improve everyone's experience."Except it isn't. For a huge number of reasons. Just as how trusting a corporation—say, with a license they tell you is irrevocable and then turn around later and say it isn't—is nowhere near as easy to back out of. Or trusting a government, or any other sort of thing where one side has all the power and the other side has nothing but soft, social/reputation power to exert any influence at all. Pretending it is that easy is one of the ways abusers get away with their abuse, in all sorts of relationships.Because the players are not the ones claiming authority. That is where the asymmetry lies. I'm not at all saying that DMs are somehow inherently wicked (that would be hilariously self-incriminating, given I only DM these days); I'm saying that the way you demonstrate your "with great power comes great responsibility" reference is itself by showing deference to those who aren't claiming authority. In this context, players. Much as (for example) Superman could just kill people whenever he wanted, but he doesn't do so, because holding himself to a higher standard, a standard even ordinary citizens wouldn't hold themselves to, is all that stands between him and doing things because they are convenient to him, not because they are the right thing to do. (Notably, Clark Kent is much more willing to bend the rules than Superman: yet another proof that Kent is the actual person and Supes is a mask he wears to be able to help others.)I don't understand the relevance. I'm not talking about selfishness. I'm talking about elitism, deception, absolutism, the belief that "consensus is a joke," etc. One does not need to be selfish to be elitist. Indeed, some of the most selfless people are dangerously elitist as a direct consequence, and that is exactly the kind of dangerous sentiment that C.S. Lewis wrote about when he said that the most oppressive tyrannies are those exercised under the sincere belief that they are of benefit to their victims.I'm not apologizing for players at all, so I don't underarand what you are referring to. The only thing I have said even remotely in that direction is that "player entitlement" is largely a fiction, and doubly so for the alleged sudden rise thereof. Are there entitled players? Sure. But player entitlement, as some kind of philosophy or movement or pattern, is a pernicious myth used as a cudgel against anyone actually speaking up for player interests. As we have seen here.</blockquote>

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