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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Bedrockgames" data-source="post: 8239021" data-attributes="member: 85555">Sure and these tools exist in a variety of forms (I mentioned my tables for having world events for example). But I think the issue is: this is not the purpose of play. All that stuff you do in the background (and mind you not all GMs tend to that in the same way in a sandbox) is just to create a sense on the large scale that they live in a world (because that is how our world works: things change). But the purpose is more about the small scale. More what that Feast of Goblyns entry was talking about: the change that occurs immediately around the players when they are contending with enemies and allies who are treated as active players----where the GM is running them intelligently, emotionally, etc; making decision about what the NPCs try to do in response to what the players do. That is really the focus here. I do care that the empire in the background is believable, and so through tables or fiat I may occasionally introduce changes (I like having them marked on my calendar in advance if I can---and I find tables are helpful of breaking me out of the same mental patterns, as well as more fair). This is also why I still very much like to use encounter tables on the local level. Sometimes I know enough about the immediate situation that I don't need a table (in the Feast of Goblyns example the players are already embroiled in a plot with Harkon Lukas, so I can simply decide if he tries to meet them on the road or not---in my game probably giving him a survival roll to meet them and asking the players to make one to see if they are able to see him first and avoid him if they choose). Or maybe, instead of going to the PCs, he tries to get to where they are going first and plant false clues or information. It all depends on the situation. So if setting solitaire describes that the setting can be managed by the GM alone. That is fair, except the isn't the point of play. I can manage a setting in a vacuum I suppose. But what purpose would that serve? I can't really have this situation with Harkon Lukas come to life unless I have active players with wills of their own pushing against it. It just isn't the same. For me the fun is my own discovery as GM of what this whole situation leads to. Again, I would invoke here the character driven-situational GMing I spoke of earlier as a part of this process.</blockquote>

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