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Message: <blockquote data-quote="EzekielRaiden" data-source="post: 9006504" data-attributes="member: 6790260">Exactly. Absolute power that is never used because doing so would have deleterious consequences is not absolute power. It is conditional power--by definition.If the power is going to be conditional either way, why not make those conditions knowable? Why not test those conditions, so we can shape them so that they work for us, rather than against us?As I said much, much earlier in the thread: much, perhaps most of what is permitted by truly absolute GM latitude is merely the latitude to do things that are deleterious to the game. Things everyone, even stridently pro-Rule Zero folks, agree are deleterious to the game. Things everyone agrees the GM should not do, even though they could, because it just...wouldn't make a good game. If we all agree that such things are a problem, what is the point? Why bother with absolute GM latitude, when you could instead accept prodigious (but not absolute) GM latitude, cutting out the parts we agree are Seriously Bad Don't Do That? Because you totally can. You can design rules and limitations that don't prevent all possible bad GM behavior, but which, if followed, do prevent rather a lot of it. Hence my examples of things like needing to give honest answers in Dungeon World, or the emphasis on "be a fan of the characters" etc.Absolute latitude isn't needed. The only things it definitely enables that aren't enabled by prudently (and slightly) limited GM latitude are bad for the game. So why insist on it, when one will then instantly turn around and apply those very limits to oneself? Again: isn't it better for these limits to be known, public, testable, questionable, rather than hidden away, unspoken, unchanging, unquestionable?Then I don't understand why it's such a horrible problem to have a system which clearly and consistently answers such questions. Nothing about "you can use this to make balanced encounters" requires that players be incapable of running, heedless, headlong into danger. Far from it! You'll know (as DM, I mean) exactly the kind of danger they're running toward. The Fourthcore movement (which, IIRC, is sadly defunct now) was built around the idea of never having the kid gloves on, of a world that is genuinely dangerous and the players better bring their A game because the system sure as hell won't coddle them--they'll lose and they'll deserve it, because they did "rush in blindly," because they failed to plan or to "bravely run away," because they didn't have a good plan nor the ability to adapt and improvise.</blockquote>

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