NOW LIVE! Today's the day you meet your new best friend. You don’t have to leave Wolfy behind... In 'Pets & Sidekicks' your companions level up with you!

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Aldarc" data-source="post: 7695282" data-attributes="member: 5142">As a GM, do you tell your players everything about their environment and every piece of equipment that the orcs wear or have on their persons? Do you say tell them that the orc is wearing a healing potion at his belt when the orcs arrive at the scene or do you only bother to provide that piece of information when the orc simply decides to pull one out? <img src="http://www.enworld.org/forum/images/smilies/erm.png"  class="smilie" loading="lazy" alt=":erm:" title="Erm    :erm:" data-shortname=":erm:" /> The idea that players would ever be able to know the entire environment is implausible and unrealistic, whether as a player or as a GM. If an orc did pull out a horn in an attempt to summon reinforcements, it would not strike me as odd or "out of thin air" as a player. It would just be a part of the narrative. It's the GM's job to provide and maintain a plausible narrative for the game, and that would include narrating the GM Intrusion. And perhaps the complication introduced by the GM Intrusion is not at once. If the orc blew the horn, then perhaps the complication is not that orc reinforcements jump out of thin air but, instead, that other orcs in the area are alerted to the presence of the PCs. Let's keep in mind, for example, that a GM could decide - at their leisure - that an orc pulls out a horn that she blows for more reinforcements without the need of a Natural 1. The only difference is that the player himself that triggers the complication through the dice roll. In itself, it says nothing about whether the 1 is an automatic failure. It says nothing about whether its the result of character incompetence or a bumbling/major fumble. It simply says that the player's dice roll triggers a narrative complication of some sort. It could be as simple as, the orc finds an opportunity to knock the character prone. You can say that the character feels incompetent because "they created the opening" or "they fell prone" but one could also say that this Intrusion allows the orc to feel more menacing or more than just a mook. I think that this is particularly important given the nature of the Cypher System: i.e. the GM never rolls. When the GM does roll, those mooks can fumble, crit, disarm, and such, particularly if they are playing with a more simulationist rules set. This is less so in a number of more narrativist-leaning rules sets, like the Cypher System. I presume, so please correct me if I am wrong, that you prefer simulationism over narrativism. You take all of this as examples of "out of thin air" or "incompetence" whereas I and others do not. What you seem to be repeatedly and blatantly missing is the key idea that the GM Intrusion should be internally consistent and appropriate for the narrative. If orc reinforcements are within the realm of possibility and realism for the narrative context at a given time, then they are not out of thin air. Your fear may be exaggerated given how the GM Intrusion more often than not plays out in practice.</blockquote>

Verification