Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 7607876" data-attributes="member: 4937">You'd think that would be easy to explain and without controversy.It's a bizarre form of 'mother may I'.   I don't doubt you are right that it's not unusual, but it can't be logically supported IMO by any tortured path.   There are plenty of GMs and even some players that seem frustrated by and even offended by the undeniable fact that the player's mind extends into the game universe and interacts with it.   GMs and players with an aesthetic of simulation feel this somehow invalidates the game in some fashion.  The player is supposed to be pretending that he's whatever character he created, and if the player brings any of his own mental skills to the table then that's "metagaming" or whatever.   And I agree that at some level it is metagaming, I just find it absolutely bizarre that anyone would think that this is bad.  Yes, I prefer to have players mostly play their character in "actor stance", but even in "actor stance" the player's mind still extends into the game universe and animates the choices of the character.   So "metagaming" is what happens every single time that a player decides to do something, because he can't ever be pure and not exist in this universe as well as the game universe.  It only however is "wrong" with the GM doesn't get their way.  A GM that tries to force a player to pass some sort of mental check in order to decide what the player's character does, is a GM that really wants to be playing the game by themselves with only their own mind making any choices in the game, or (to be more generous) wants no minds at the table extending into the game.But consider the consequences of that if you aren't going to be a hypocrite about it and apply this idea evenly to the game.  If what a PC or NPC chooses to do is to be left to a dice roll, why aren't all choices first tested against a dice roll.  Choose to be bad or good?  Pass an alignment check and then play that way.  Choose to be smart or dumb?  Pass an intelligence check.  Choose to be greedy or generous, merciful or vengeful?  Pass the associated personality tests to find out how the PC acts?  Will you attack the orc on the left or the right?   Don't metagame, flip a coin!   The result of taking the player's mind out of the game is that the player becomes part of the audience of the game, and not a participant in it.   If the player's intelligence, knowledge, intuition, or charisma is not to be trusted within the game, then the player obviously can't be allowed to make choices about how his character acts.What it turns out is actually going on when a GM accuses the player of metagaming, is the GM is frustrated by their lack of control over the game and decides to start playing both sides of the table so that the player - who is getting it "wrong" - is forced to get it "right".   The players are loading up with spells that thwart "Earth Elementals"?  Well, the GM decides that is not how that wanted or planned the encounter to go, so by golly we are going to make it happen the way it "should".   The biggest flaw common to new GMs is that spend a lot of time fanaticizing about how cool some planned encounter is going to be, reimagining the details as the player's are surprised or awed or a afraid again and again in their mind, and excited to spring some difficulty on the players.   Such daydreaming may seem harmless, but is the mother of all sorts of GMing sins.What are the stakes of these checks really?  What meaningful consequence is calling for this Arcana check really adjudicating?  Nothing less than who gets to play the player's character.  If the player loses the roll, then the GM gets to play the character.   And the GM is calling the checks, so presumably he can keep calling the checks until the player bows to his wishes.Fundamentally, the problem I've had since the "Francis the Guard" issue was introduced to derail this thread and get us off the original topic, is that the side involved in declaring one ought to validate that the guard is Francis have claimed that they are doing so to empower the player and increase their agency.  They have sneered against the idea of GMs that refuse to share their hat.  Yet time and time again, when you scratch the surface, the actual stake being argued over is that the GM gets to play the player's character.   The GM is allowing "Francis the Guard" only because by yielding on this point about the setting, he's gaining even greater leverage over the PC.   For example, the same poster that introduced "Francis the Guard" claimed that his response to "Francis the Guard" was a "Yes, but..." response where he literally got to tell the player how his character had behaved.  There is nothing wrong with fielding ideas from the players, but don't tell me how empowering that is, if you are going to repeatedly bring up how small concessions by the GM involve big concessions by the player.  All the denial that the player is absolutely in control of their character, seems in point of fact geared to proving the GM is in control of the PC by rights.  The real issue in the twisted claim that for a player to be in control of the characters thoughts, the setting and the thoughts had to be in agreement, seems to actually be that in blurring the line, the GM wants control over the player character's thoughts.  After all, once that wall separation goes down, it's a two way street but one which, if unregulated, is not equal in power.</blockquote>

Verification