What is the point of GM's notes?

[Aldarc]

I usually use terms like 'developments', 'events', 'in-game events', to describe what happens in a game.

These terms are clearly above “highly equivocal” or “ambiguous” misunderstandings in a TTRPG conversation.

 

[Imaro]

I'm confused by the question. I didn't frame anything that wasn't prompted by the players, and then constrained by them. I don't think you can call this unilaterally me doing it at all -- I'm not telling them my conception of the fiction, I'm creating fiction for them in accordance with their inputs and constrained by those inputs. If your point is that the GM exercises creative license, then sure, both games are the same in that the GM exercises creative license. This misses much.

Have you actually played Blades in the Dark? What crew was in play? What was one of the themes/stories that emerged?

I didn't say you did it all. I said the fiction was still created by the GM in the majority of cases. My point is that even under constraints you created the majority of the fiction, not them. They guided it and directed it but you created it, not them. If I constrain an artist to work in a certain medium, with a certain color palette... did I then create the work of art?

It's been quite a while but yeah I have played it. I'm cloudy on the exact details since it's been a long time but if I remember correctly the crew were hawkers (drug dealers) and one of the stories that emerged was them attending a rave-like party to pass off laced drugs as belonging to their competitors in order to weaken their competitors hold on the neighborhood. I remember they had a Whisper who, because of a roll ended up causing an entity to invade the party. And I also remember them running into members of their competitors gang who realized they were passing of drugs with their marking on it... again because of a roll. The main thing though is that I was still the one generating most, though not all of the fiction.

 

[Campbell]

I usually use terms like 'developments', 'events', 'in-game events', to describe what happens in a game.

Is there any term you would accept that reflects that there are real world causes to these things? That they do not just spring from the ether fully formed.

 

[Aldarc]

What I mean is a term that carries lots of connotations so that it is easy to equivocate on. Both story and fiction are easily equivocated on.

From what I can tell, the only person who is equivocating on what they mean by "fiction" in this thread is you and I think that you are intentionally trying to do so. Again, I think that this is mostly a you problem and not an inherent problem with the term "fiction."

Take story, it can mean 'hey what's the story man'. as in 'what happened. But it can also mean a formal story, with structure, themes, etc. This regularly crops up in RPG discussions where someone takes the former meaning then shifts to the latter to assert that all RPGs are about story (I have been in countless threads where this has been the case) in order to build an argument that RPGs ought to have strong story telling tools, or that the GM ought to be trying to weave a story, etc. Fiction is a very similar kind of term, and I have seen it produce similar problems in previous discussions. It is a lot less prevalent of a term though, so I am mostly anticipating the problems it will produce if it gets more mainstream currency.

I think that your chief problem is not so much with "fiction," but, rather, with the term "story." And I have stated before that the people who should be opposed to having story imposed on them are also people who are putting forth "fiction" as a term. I also think, as I have said before, that your argument is mostly an unfounded slippery slope fallacy.

Still it is very murky, I know in previous discussions with posters here it has routinely produced all kinds of difficulties for me when contrasting my style with pemerton's for example (and I suspect this is because of the elasticity of the term due to all its connotations, and how it kind of glues the events in the campaign with the setting in a way, so that the fiction is both setting and what the characters do-----at least that was my reading of some uses of it in prior discussions).

Again, I don't see how or why this is a problem.

 

[Bedrockgames]

I think that your chief problem is not so much with "fiction," but, rather, with the term "story." And I have stated before that the people who should be opposed to having story imposed on them are also people who are putting forth "fiction" as a term. I also think, as I have said before, that your argument is mostly an unfounded slippery slope fallacy.

Slippery slope is an acceptable argument if the stated outcome is likely (which I would maintain it is)

 

[Aldarc]

Slippery slope is an acceptable argument if the stated outcome is likely (which I would maintain it is)

Which I maintain isn’t especially since you are prone to fear-mongering arguments.

 

[uzirath]

Any of these details might be able to be revealed to players by them asking questions, like "I observe the square from the shadows and see if the guards leave any gaps in their patrol routes," which prompts the GM to provide their answer to this question. Or investigate guards to see if they're bribable, which prompts the GM to tell the players what they think about this.

I'm curious about whether players can engage in observation like this in Blades? What would happen? I'm very fuzzy on these non-traditional games, but here's what I imagine based on following some of these conversations. The player can't just fish for information with no outcome in mind. So instead of saying, "I observe the guards to see if I notice anything useful," they could say, "I secretly observe the guards and discover a gap in their patrol route which I then exploit." Something like that?

When I've been a player in a traditional game, a significant amount of the fun has been in gathering information. Which seems to be an effort to transferring as much of the GM's conception to the players as possible before declaring a high-stakes action.

 

[Bedrockgames]

Which I maintain isn’t.

Fair enough

 

[Bedrockgames]

Is there any term you would accept that reflects that there are real world causes to these things? That they do not just spring from the ether fully formed.

I don't think developments does that. But if you must, Imaginary Developments could work. I think in-game developments or in-game events makes clear these are things happening in a game, not something we are believing really occur. Not sure it is needed to prevent the kind of misunderstanding from arising.

 

[hawkeyefan]

I usually use terms like 'developments', 'events', 'in-game events', to describe what happens in a game.

Oh no, both of those words have multiple definitions, too!