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Message: <blockquote data-quote="hawkeyefan" data-source="post: 7336323" data-attributes="member: 6785785">I think the reason this keeps coming up is due to the example itself. I admit to not recalling if there were more details when this example was first put forth, but whenever it has been brought up since, it’s boiled down to “the PCs need a map, a player searches the stoudy for the needed map, the presence of the map is determined by the success or failure of the relevant check.”So finding the map had been positioned as a goal, and the player’s skill check determines whether the goal is achieved.To me, the example seems too simple to really tell us much. What’s the point of making the map hidden unless a search for it can result? And should a search for the map, if intended to be a goal involving any kind f challenge, be resolved with one check? If finding the map is a goal of the party, then allowing a skill check to determine its presence does imply that the player can control obstacle resolution through action declaration. If the character’s stated goal is to find the presence of alien life, then does he simply ask to search for signs of alien life every time he enters a room? Or are there other parameters at play not addressed in the map example? I’d like to offer another example that perhaps will help.A character has fallen from a cliff. This may be diring the course of battle, or it may be due to some mishap while exploring. At this point, the character’s goal is to not die.So the player indicates that they’d like to make a check or a saving throw or whatever relevant roll the game mechanics call for the PC to avoid falling to his doom. Would a classic GM driven game simply say “the cliff face is sheer and there is nothing to grab....you die”? Meaning the GM had determined this prior and consults his notes and that’s that? I would not expect most games to play out that way. Only the most extreme version of such a style. I would expect that the result of the check would determine the fiction, so that a successful check indicates the presence of a root that the character manages to grab. I’d kind of expect this approach in either tyle of game. Or at least in most games using eother style. To me, this seems a better example of a player attempting to introduce an element to the fiction through action declaration.</blockquote>

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