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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Desdichado" data-source="post: 5216068" data-attributes="member: 2205">Well, why'd you say that, and how is it relevant?  The daughter left to go adventuring; who says the widowed mom has to sit at home knitting all that time?  She's a bitter, widowed empty-nester. I'm not aware of any version of D&D that reflects that idea in the rules.  In fact, most of them have you get better and more able at mental skills (like, say, spellcasting) as you enter middle and old age.Well, sure.  You're determined to roll your eyes at any explanation, because you're determined that this idea can't be made to work.:shrug:  Your call, I guess, but I think you're being particularly stubborn about refusing to see how it could work perfectly well if you were willing to run with it. No I'm not.  How ridiculous specific example might be is a completely 'nother question than whether or not the GM should be in there doing something this drastic with an NPC related to a PC.  Maybe you're conflating the two discussions, but I'm not.Frequently, yes.  Those ideas come from well established fairy tales played straight, however.The player doesn't know anything about the character.  Hadn't even thought about her once until the GM invited her to give him some background for him to work with.  False.And I think that's really bizarre.  "Before a GM can keep a secret about the setting, he has to check with his players to make sure they're OK with that secret."Well, that makes it not much of a secret at that point, doesn't it?  Kinda defeats the entire purpose of trying to spring a campaign secret on the players in the first place, doesn't it?  What you've essentially done is to radically expand the traditional turf of the players into what is traditionally the turf of the GM, and have players dictate what certain NPCs must be like and must do.  As well as curtail the opportunity for some really classic elements rife throughout the source material that informs the game like, "Surprise!  Mom or dad was secretly XXX instead of YYYY like you believed."I'd say you just described a classic example of how lack of trust between player and GM can create an impoverished gaming environment.</blockquote>

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