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<blockquote data-quote="Lanefan" data-source="post: 9044607" data-attributes="member: 29398">If the players, in-character, proactively seek out these adventures then sure, having them find adventures isn't particularly jarring.But when either of the following occurs, it is jarring:--- the adventures found just coincidentally happen to be tailored to a specific character, every time (not necessarily always the same character)--- the players in-character do not look for adventures but adventures always seem to find them anyway.The first one is key: coincidence is fine if it happens once in a blue moon.&nbsp; When it happens at a frequency far beyond what random chance would reasonably allow, it's gone from coincidence to (the bad type of) contrivance.players' perspective.Yes. Why?&nbsp; Because while &quot;something ... established in the game [is] simply true&quot; is - I think - agreed by all of us, many players want to know (or at least be able to then or later learn in-character) the setting-based causal path explaining why it is true and how it is true, so they can a) determine whether they can rely on it still being true if-when the same thing happens again in play and b) extrapolate from that how-and-why to better inform themselves of other truths in the setting before they arise in play.&nbsp; In short: precedent.And because players often want to learn those hows and whys (and IMO they have a right to try), and further because this is the sort of thing where a GM could really seriously mess up their whole game by trying to wing these answers in the moment and getting it wrong, the GM IMO needs to have at least the kernel of that rationale nailed down well ahead of time.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Lanefan, post: 9044607, member: 29398"] If the players, in-character, proactively seek out these adventures then sure, having them find adventures isn't particularly jarring. But when either of the following occurs, it is jarring: --- the adventures found just coincidentally happen to be tailored to a specific character, every time (not necessarily always the same character) --- the players in-character do not look for adventures but adventures always seem to find them anyway. The first one is key: coincidence is fine if it happens once in a blue moon. When it happens at a frequency far beyond what random chance would reasonably allow, it's gone from coincidence to (the bad type of) contrivance. players' perspective. Yes. Why? Because while "something ... established in the game [is] simply true" is - I think - agreed by all of us, many players want to know (or at least be able to then or later learn in-character) the setting-based causal path explaining [I]why[/I] it is true and [I]how[/I] it is true, so they can a) determine whether they can rely on it still being true if-when the same thing happens again in play and b) extrapolate from that how-and-why to better inform themselves of other truths in the setting before they arise in play. In short: precedent. And because players often want to learn those hows and whys (and IMO they have a right to try), and further because this is the sort of thing where a GM could really seriously mess up their whole game by trying to wing these answers in the moment and getting it wrong, the GM IMO needs to have at least the kernel of that rationale nailed down well ahead of time. [/QUOTE]

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