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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 7344728" data-attributes="member: 42582">I don't understand your question. In particular, I'm not sure what you're envisaging can't be done.I'll try again to explain how I see it, and perhaps that will answer your question.Scenario 1The established fiction - let's say - is that the PCs are hoping to find a map; that the map is lost/missing/somewhere unknown; and that one particular PC has just found him-/herself in a study.Then - let's suppose - the player of that PC, using his/her power to make moves in the game, declares "I search the study for that map we're looking for." The shared fiction now includes the PC searching the study.The question is: can, and if so does, the shared fiction change to include the PC finding the map in the study?Scenario 2The established fiction - let's say - is that the PCs are engaged in a raid of some orcs' stronghold (like, say, B2); that the orcs are very ready to fight back; and that one particular PC, armed with a sword, has just found him-/herself in a room with an orc.Then - let's suppose - the player of that PC, using his/he power to make moves in the game, declares "I draw my sword and attack the orc!" The shared fiction now includes the PC drawing his/her sword and engaging the orc in combat.The question is: can, and if so does, the shared fiction change to include the PC killing the orc?My contentionThe shared fiction changes by acts of authorship. In the RPGing scenarios I've described, there are two candidates to do that authoring: the player and the GM.It is very widely accepted among RPGers that, in scenario 2, the dice are used to mediate the authorship. Rougly speaking, if the dice come up in the player's favour, the player's desire as to the content of the shared fiction is realised: it includes the PC killing the orc. If the dice come up otherwise, then the player's desire is not realised: the shared fiction will include a still-livng orc, and possibly other consequences as well (such as a wounded or dead PC).There is no technical or metaphysical reason why scenario 1 has to be any different in the way the action declaration is resolved and hence the new ficiton is authored. That is, the dice can be used to mediate the authorship: if they come up in the player's favour, the content of the shared fiction includes the PC finding the map in the study; if not, then the shared fiction does not include discovery of a map, and possibly includes other consequences as well.If scenario 1 nevertheless is handled differently - eg the state of the shared fiction following the action declaration is determined by the GM reading from his/her notes - then the player does not have agency over that aspect of the shared fiction. Agency in respect of that aspect of the shared fiction has been reserved to the GM alone.Trying to explain that reservation of agency in metaphysical terms - the map is in <the kitchen, the cave, wherever> and not in the study, and so of course the PC can't find it in the study - is just reiterating that agency has been reserved to the GM. Because the map being in the kitchen (or wherever) is itself just an authored piece of fiction. It's not an independent, objective reality in the way that the actual location of some actual map in the real world would be.</blockquote>

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