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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 5513938" data-attributes="member: 42582">The short answer: for much the same reason that the players can't start play as emperors or gods.Now I'm not saying that an RPG can't be run in which the PCs are emperors (or gods). Nor am I saying that this couldn't be done in D&D (maybe there is a reason why the emperor has to pretend to be a commoner, and doesn't and can't access his wealth, armies, courtiers etc). But I don't think one can just casually permit a PC to start the game as an emperor (or god) and not expect it to have a pretty big effect on the way the game plays.Whereas NPC emperors, gods, and speakers-with-the-dead are quite OK. They are various sorts of plot device that I (as GM) can introduce into a situation as I do or don't see fit. The players can also introduce these elements into a situation - by successfully deploying the resources at their disposal (mostly their PCs and those PCs' relationships) - but the adjudication of these situations is ultimately under my control as GM. (So, for example, the benefits of successfully dealing with the emperor to gain access to magic items can't be any greater than the standard treasure parcels for the level of the PCs in question. The benefits of using Religion skill in a skill challenge to commune with one's god can't be greater than the benefits of using History instead - although they might be different, sending the scene in a different direction from wher it might othewise have gone.)Ultimately, if the speaker-with-dead NPC becomes a liability to the game, I can kill him off. This is not so with a PC.I'm not a big fan of hauling around GM plot devices either. If the PCs want to talk to the speaker-with-dead they will have to go and find him again. Unless something changes radically in the game, there is zero chance of him accompanying them anywhere.As for demons wanting to kidnap PCs - that may or may not happen (it happened in my last game, in which one of the PCs - a fox spirit - was violating the terms of his banishment from heaven, and so constables of hell came to arrest him; in my current game, one of the PCs is a demonskin adept and enemy of Lolth's cult, and so is certainly in danger of attracting hostile demonic attention). But I can introduce that sort of situation into the game without needing to introduce the "game-breaking" magic as well. Whereas I would only tend to mention such larger events to the players if those events were of some significance in helping establish the situation in which the PCs are engaged, or in enriching the context for the players to make choices for their PCs. An analogy, not exactly perfect but near enough - if it only deserves mention in the Appendix B timelines in LotR, and not in the actual text itself - like, say, the battles fought by the dwarves of the Iron Hills - then it's probably not going to get mentioned by me to my players. Or, to put it another way - I engage my players in the world by using myth and history - which gives shape and context to the events they are actually engaging with via their PCs - rather than current affairs, unless those current affairs also contribute comparable shape and context.This does have consequences that some don't like - for example, if an NPC or an event is mentioned in any detail then the players know that adventure lies this way - but I'm from the school of "no need to search for the fun". Again, others differ (in part by rejecting that description of sandbox play).</blockquote>

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