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Message: <blockquote data-quote="clearstream" data-source="post: 9249977" data-attributes="member: 71699">Given the fiction invokes the rule, how can they be in conflict?This is a good example of what I've called a broken chain of justification. There are two ways to understand this.Character in a soaring skyship justifies taking a lethal plunge <s>justifies</s> a rule for plunges that aren't lethal <s>justifies</s> further fictionOne way to understand this is that our fictional action is "lethal plunge" which our rule does not handle. Therefore do not invoke that rule. Say something else instead. "You die", could feel appropriate.Another way to understand this is that we helped ourselves to a resolution - "lethal" - that wasn't justified by facts about our game world. Plunges aren't lethal for high-level characters. Corrected, we should haveCharacter in a soaring skyship justifies taking a plunge justifies a rule for plunges that aren't lethal for high level characters justifies character sticks the landingBuilding the result we think should happen into our action - i.e. "lethal" - was jumping the gun. To see this, picture that the character was not quite so high-level, so had a 50% probability of dying. We ought not jump the gun and pronounce them dead at the point of the action declaration.But how should we decide which to choose? In both cases, fiction takes priority.Either our world is one in which high-level characters don't die from falls, in which case we're not entitled to help ourselves to the result "dies from the fall"... and certainly not at the point of action declaration without running it through the mechanic. Or our world is one in which falls from a sufficient height are always lethal for characters, in which case, we ought not to invoke a rule that doesn't deal with that. Given we're now in my third category - it's not covered by a rule - it's turned over to GM. (This is similar to the case I raised up thread, where the action very nearly but does not exactly fit the Assess a Situation rule. The same principle applies.)AW manages it with rigourous rules. Some other games manage it with adroit GMing.</blockquote>

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