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Message: <blockquote data-quote="clearstream" data-source="post: 8607296" data-attributes="member: 71699">For me it depends on whether you are grasping the fictional position referenced as that which existed at a past time, or grasping that it can only exist in the present and accepting that you're doing some glossing over that is useful even while not being always correct.To attempt to diagram my argument out a bit, let's suppose we are in an RPG session and it's 8pm. For convenience, I'll step time in 5 minute increments. I will assume that player cognitive states include beliefs, emotions and inclinations.[20.00][20:05][20:10][20.15][20:20][20:25] Clock time[....1....][....2....][....3....][....4....][....5....][....6....] Real world statesPLAYER COGNITIVE STATES[....A....][....B....][....C....][....D....][....E....][....F....]  Fictional positionsAt 20:05 the player establishes they are waiting to ambush a gnoll in a cave. Everyone agrees, so the group might be assumed to have some information about the fictional position at B.At 20:10 GM narrates a gnoll scout emerging and the player character fires. Dice pools are assembled and rolled, establishing that the world state at 3 contains a tie.At 20:15 the player announces using a trait against themselves to break the tie...One way to describe the above is to say that world state 3 produces no fiction, and when we come to 20:15 we retroactively assess or gain knowledge of a pristine B that has remained exactly as it was at 20:05.For many purposes that is adequate, but it will sometimes misguide intuitions because at 20:15 it is only physically possible for players to use what exists at 4 and D. That is because cognitive states change continuously and imperfectly. It is even possible for imperfections to creep into the world state (a dropped die, an incorrectly marked fail on a sheet and so on). Unless we have the benefit of a perfect-stenographer with access to our cognitive states, it will only be with reference to our beliefs, emotions and inclinations now that the fictional position now can be determined. My cognitive state cannot return to a previous moment to say what was in that moment: it can only say what I believe now about what I believed then.Sometimes we are dealing with simple matters of recollection, such as did you show me a card with the letter A on it at 20:00? The facts of the matter in such cases can be abstract. Establishing reaching is a complex matter. It is not a simple test of world state. For example, what does our group feel it is to be cunning? What are they inclined to deem meet in light of what they remember and believe? Reaching isn't enacting a system step incorrectly, it's misapprehending or missapplying something quite fundamental in our fiction.What I observe in play is no discounting of FitM events from feelings about our fiction. I don't believe folk are easily capable of discounting them. Rather I see folk weave system events into updates of what they think is in the fiction. I'd possibly say that the very best rules are those that do that job effectively (update the fiction effectively). What we decide is acceptable due to fictional positioning references everything in our cognitive states at the time it's queried... and the tie is in that state colouring our fiction.I am referring to characters, both PC and NPC. A gnoll that had sense ambush would be just as capable of sensing the PC ambush. Were such a gnoll included in the example, then it would amount to the GM grasping Dro's intent and (based on that intent) giving said gnoll additional options.</blockquote>

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