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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Xetheral" data-source="post: 7063845" data-attributes="member: 6802765">I see a difference between an abstract model simulating an in-game concept (e.g. HP as an abstract model of resiliency) and a mechanic where the IC and OOC consequences of a player's decisions diverge (e.g. failure searching IC leads to not finding the mace/discovering that the brother has always been evil, but OOC visibly causes brother to have always been evil).But if you don't like the analogy because you don't like the underlying terminology, that's fine. To rephrase my point without the analogy: the difference between the IC and OOC consequences of player actions in your style of play seems inconsistent to me. That inconsistency makes me viscerally expect your campaign itself to be inconsistent, even though intellectually I know it's often possible to change things on the fly to that degree and still keep the campaign consistent, because I do it too.I agree with your conclusion. I just had a hard time reconciling that agreement with my visceral dislike to making that kind of change be a visible consequence of action resolution. I shared my theory as to why I felt one thing and thought another as a possible explanation for where the "inconsistency" complaints against your style might be coming from.The player and the PC learn at the same time that the brother was always evil, but the player also knows that the brother was always evil because of a failed die roll. That's the disconnect.For reference, I might have decided at the same point in the game you did to make the brother have always been evil. At my table usually the players won't be aware of when such decisions are made, and so the player knowledge matches the PC knowledge, and there's no disconnect. But even if the players are aware (or become aware) they'll know that the cause of the change was that I realized it would make for a better story and a more enjoyable game, not the PC's failure.Happy to. Here are some examples:<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">If my players think to search a very clever hiding spot that I hadn't thought to hide anything in, I might add a reward or something special to that location on the fly.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">If my players come up with a solution to a mystery that makes for a better, more exciting story than what I'd had in mind, I might change the solution to match.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">If my players make a logical (but incorrect) deduction about the game world from exisiting evidence, I might change the game world to match their deduction.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">If the players make a good plan that would fail due to factors they happened not to learn, I might modify those factors.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">If the players make a good plan that depends on obtaining a particular resource, I might make that resource obtainable (although not necessarily easily), even if it arguably shouldn't have been available were I ruling "impartially".</li> </ul>Of course, in all of these situations I also might not make a change (and usually don't). My goal isn't to make everything the PCs do succeed--that would be boring. But when I do make on-the-fly changes my goal is to facillitate the PC's attempts to interact with the game world, not to shut down those attempts.</blockquote>

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