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Message: <blockquote data-quote="thefutilist" data-source="post: 9559876" data-attributes="member: 7044566">I 100% agree with you. When you switch sides due to a villain monologue you're making an artistic statement and if the dice are taking that away from you then you're just generating fiction together, which I find inane but each to their own. There are some nuances and caveats though.So you don't have to be consciously aware or identify that 'making a statement' is what you're doing. For me it would happen a bit like this:I'm hearing the monologue (as the character) and it's words hit me in such a way that I'm going to switch sides. In character I've been persuaded. If I was thinking about the character in a more third person view, it would be like they have a life of their own and they're making the choice.So the question is, are all value forcing mechanics equal?I find FATE a terrible game because the compels prevent me making a statement with no upside. It becomes a tedious fiction generator.What about the steel test in Burning Wheel? Well that's where I think things get interesting. Yes it does absolutely prevent certain types of statements being made because it's giving weight and 'bounce' to other statements. You play Burning Wheel with the expectation that this can happen because you desire that specific type of influence.What about stuff like Read A Person in Apocalypse World? zakael19 mentions why you'd use this and I fully agree. You're sacrificing pure IC conversation for something that has a little bit more mechanical elaboration. I tend to like these mechanics a lot but they're not at all in the same bucket as making choices for you, in fact they tend to highlight the choices and therefore push you to make them a bit harder.</blockquote>

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