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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Manbearcat" data-source="post: 9229114" data-attributes="member: 6696971">Ok, good.  I'm glad we agree on that first paragraph.I'm not going to answer for anyone else on here.  I'm pretty sure I'm the only person on here to have run Dogs in the Vineyard so I'm going to answer as someone who has run an S-ton of it.  Please don't ask me to square it with whatever anyone else has written in this thread.  I'm not reading all the posts or what everyone is saying.In Dogs in the Vineyard it works like this:* You've got a Town with Sin and a handful of codified NPCs making problems or with problems or with pleas for help.  You then have some proto-NPCs to fill-in-blanks as needed (because there are more people in Town than just your handfulish). * Your job is to use all of this stuff to aggressively provoke the PCs (who are young, barely prepared, gun-toting priests with authority vested by The King of Life and their roles in the hierarchy of stewardship within The Faith); their condemnation, their ceremony, their wrath, or their mercy.  You're prepping situation that demands action and reflection.* Everything except the fundamental components of setting is mutable until it enters play.  The point of your prep is not tell a story...its the inverse...its to demand of the players, through their PCs, to tackle these situations so you can collectively find out about these young priests, this flock, this Faith.* If someone has a secret that is shot-through with Sin (Violence, Sex, Deceit, Disunity, Blasphemy, Apostasy, Worldliness, Faithlessness) then you either just straight-up reveal it as a component of framing to provoke the PCs right now (the bulk of the secrets in Dogs) or it gets uncovered when talking to NPCs who aren't apt to escalate to physical/fighting if/when they lose a "just talking" conflict.  Alternatively, represent it as Demonic Influence in a conflict where there is no NPC involved and the goal of the players are to (say) "uncover the Steward's terrible secret in his diary within the Faith-house" and the goal of the secret is maybe "to be found and exact a terrible price" or "not be found until its too late."  Fallout in that conflict would only be the equivalent of "just talking" so only d4s but could represent whatever pending PC choices.  The thing about Demonic Influence-exclusive conflicts is they're basically impossible to win as the GM...but they virtually always extract a toll from the PCs because your dice are sufficient to force the PCs to take Fallout.  So, someone (or multiple) is going to change adversely (take Short-Term Fallout) after that conflict whether it be their Relationship to Stewardship or a Trait the reflects their orientation to/past with the Sin in question or an Attribute is subtracted or a Belonging is lost or whatever...but they might gain Fallout Experience and advance their character simultaneously.Regardless, the Demonic Influence (which wants to isolate the community, endanger the community’s survival, exacerbate the community’sinjustices, prosper the community’s sinners, oppress the community’s faithful, undermine the fabric of their faith, and to have sin become habitual) will reveal itself and the PC (or PCs) will change as the situation escalates.That is the beating heart of Dogs in the Vineyard.* If some crazy circumstance occurs (I've run probably 50 or so Demonic Influence conflicts...I think I've actually won...one?...and that conflict had nothing to do with concealing Sin/conspiracy), and Demonic Influence loses and the antagonist/obstacle is "not be found until its too late", its just treated akin to "show signs of an approaching threat" (which you would have already showns signs so you're just perpeatuating/building on that) in PBtA games.  The terrible secret gets revealed soon thereafter in a worse situation.+++++++++++++Net:  Secrets aren't in Dogs in the Vineyard to serve as mystery/puzzle-solving apparatus where PCs poke and prod the setting like a D&D dungeon.  They're there for (a) situation-framing and to (b) extract a terrible price (on the PCs, on the community, on the Faith) and to (b) provoke judgement.</blockquote>

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