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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Chaosmancer" data-source="post: 7604602" data-attributes="member: 6801228">Thinking through that scenario happening, I'd end up asking at least two questions. 1) Why is the barbarian buying scrolls that they cannot use? There are many answers, from buying them so other party members can use them to them not knowing that their barbarian can't use scrolls. Then, 2) I'd ask them why they think their character would believe the Earth Elementals to be weak to thunder damage? Now, maybe the party wizard is going to jump in and say they told the barbarian, so the barbarian could buy the scrolls, and they have studied the arcane including elementals so they should know. And I would respond, okay, maybe, let's roll Arcana since you're backstory was a conman who stole a spellbook. And so on and so forth. The idea is a consistent fiction, as consistent as we can make it. Which includes every character suddenly being a walking encyclopedia in spite of their backgrounds. You know, it is amusing to me that you keep repeating that line. "The smart play is to verify". It isn't that I don't agree with you, that is the smart play, but people don't always do the smart play. In fact, especially when it comes to verification, they rarely do. For an IRL example, it might be smart to check that your car has gas before you try and start it. After all, someone might have siphoned it off in the night. But, I doubt almost anyone does that. Because the vast majority of the time, your car is the exact same as it was when you stopped driving it the last time. The chances your verification will turn up anything new is low, so you are likely to skip verifying. This is why I said that unless you are changing things with some regularity, often enough that players realize anything could be different any time they sit down, then I doubt they really go out and verify much of anything. Of course there was more going on here than a single issue. There is always more going on than a single issue. But the usage of player knowledge under the assumption that anything they brought from the books was true, was part of the problem. No matter how many other things you can point to as contributing to escalating the problem, that was an aspect of it that ties directly into what we are discussing. I wonder why I keep getting accused of not arguing in good faith. I read what people post. I try and see where their arguments do not align with what is either being said or what is trying to be expressed. I point it out and try and put forth my position. I make no attacks. I make no appeals to authority. I try and avoid every logical fallacy I can. And the longer the conversation drags on, the more likely it is people say that I am trolling and not arguing in good faith. It might be that it occurs because these forums drag conversations on for days and weeks at a time and people get lost down rabbit holes of their own arguments. Because I never agreed that Francis the Guard should be at the gate. I did call people out who claim players have "absolute authority" over their characters thoughts and actions, yet decried Francis the Guard as a step too far. But, interestingly, I have never gotten an answer to the follow up of Francis not being at the gate. Does Francis exist within the city? My entire goal in this thread is to figure out the consistency, if there is "Absolute Authority" of a player over their character, then there are things that should not be true. Like, for example, you pointing out that a DM could tell a player they cannot play a LG Cleric. I think you are right. A DM can tell a player that, hopefully with good reasons and not just "I hate the gods" since a DM should try and work with players whenever possible. However, the player can also tell the DM, that this is the hometown they grew up in. Now, a DM could again, deny them that and tell them it doesn't fit, and I agree with that. If the player is setting up something that doesn't fit with the setting, then DM is perfectly within their rights to tell them to come up with something else, maybe work with them to find a way to fit it. And we can come up with examples of players declaring things, choosing things, or trying to create things within the shared universe of the table, and the DM could deny any and all of those, especially those that do not fit within the shared vision of the table. Now, why are a PCs thoughts and actions different? If a player declares a character's belief or action that is too far out of alignment with the tone and setting at the table, why can the DM not exercise the same authority they have been exercising every step of the way and say "No, that doesn't make any sense"? I'm not saying they should, I'm not saying it will be common, I'll even say that the list of things a DM might say no to in this case is microscopic while the list of things they'd say yes to is macroscopic in the extreme. This ties back into your "playground cops and robbers" problem. While I will say I think that sharing many things and being respectful of staying within the fiction means that it will appear as though no one has the authority, and that is the ideal situation. Ideally, the DM and the player work together. But the DM has the final say on everything. Why then have I been arguing about Francis the Guard? Because the people I have been arguing with have claimed both that Player's have absolute authority over their characters and that those players do not have the authority to create Francis somewhere within the town. But, if the player has absolute authority over the character, then they have absolute authority over the character's background, and therefore they have absolute authority over the creation of NPCs that tie to that background. Because absolute authority is absolute. So, if a player does not have absolute authority over their background, then they do not have absolute authority over their character. Without absolute authority over their character, then it is possible for the DM to exercise their authority over that character. Because absolute authority is absolute.</blockquote>

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