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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 9331133" data-attributes="member: 42582">Not remotely.The player declares an action: I stab the Orc. Dice are rolled to find out what happens next. (The earliest RPG I know to use this rule is 1974 D&D, via its combat system.)The player declares an action: I look around for a sympathiser. Dice are roll to find out what happens next. (The earliest RPG I know to use this rule is 1977 Traveller, via its Streetwise skill.)Neither is "meta level acausal". Both involve the player declaring an action, and dice being rolled to see what happens next and whether the action succeeds.Now, at some tables the GM is allowed to decide that the Orc is invulnerable, or lucky, or whatever, and hence can't be killed by the attempt at stabbing. (I believe the DL modules use a version of this for some NPCs.)And similarly, at some tables the GM is allowed to decided that there are no sympathisers, and that everyone is fanatically loyal to the NPC, and hence the attempt to find sympathisers is doomed to failure. (I believe, from your posts, that your table uses a version of this rule.)Those are GM-driven approaches to play. They are very popular, but obviously not the only approaches, given that RPGs from 1974 and 1977 canvassed other possibilities.If the GM has decided, unilaterally and in advance, that every attempt to find sympathisers will fail, or that any attempt to overthrow the Mad Tyrant in his throne room will fail, then the players can't control the nature of play via the actions of their PCs (to try and find sympathisers; to try and overthrow the Mad Tyrant in his throne room).That's the whole point of what I'm saying!Narrativist play doesn't depend upon "meta level acausal", but it does depend upon the players being able to establish stakes, and upon the fact that - when they do so - the GM doesn't just get to decide the consequences by unilaterally deciding what happens next. 1974 D&D and 1977 Traveller won't yield narrativist RPGing without a bit of addition to what the rulebooks say (both games have rulebooks that are silent on some crucial processes of play), but they have mechanical systems that at least point us in its general direction.</blockquote>

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