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<blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 7341795" data-attributes="member: 42582">The conversations are not entirely different. They're not different at all.If the GM establishes elements of the shared fiction ahead of time, and does not reveal those elements to the players, then they act as constraints on action declaration. To reiterate an example that has been going on now for much of the thread, if (i) the GM has authored that the map is hidden in the kitchen rather than the study, and (ii) the players declare that their PC search the study for the map, then (iii) the players are not free to have that action declaration succeed, as the GM will (presumably) automatically declare, on the basis of his/her pre-established setting, that the map is not to be found in the study.To say that the players have the &quot;freedom to go wherever&quot; is just to say that they can trigger different episodes of narration from the GM. It doesn't show that they have significant agency over the actual content of the shared fiction.This is why I did not frame the OP in terms of &quot;improv&quot; vs &quot;prep&quot;, and have consistently explained why I don't see this as a very critical distinction for the purposes of this thread. The question I asked in the OP was about the GM establishing, in advance, the setting and backstory elements of the game.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="pemerton, post: 7341795, member: 42582"] The conversations are not entirely different. They're not different at all. If the GM establishes elements of the shared fiction ahead of time, and does not reveal those elements to the players, then they act as constraints on action declaration. To reiterate an example that has been going on now for much of the thread, if (i) the GM has authored that the map is hidden in the kitchen rather than the study, and (ii) the players declare that their PC search the study for the map, then (iii) the players are [i]not[/i] free to have that action declaration succeed, as the GM will (presumably) automatically declare, on the basis of his/her pre-established setting, that the map is not to be found in the study. To say that the players have the "freedom to go wherever" is just to say that they can trigger different episodes of narration from the GM. It doesn't show that they have significant agency over the actual content of the shared fiction. This is why I did not frame the OP in terms of "improv" vs "prep", and have consistently explained why I don't see this as a very critical distinction for the purposes of this thread. The question I asked in the OP was about the GM establishing, in advance, the setting and backstory elements of the game. [/QUOTE]

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