Story based actions that you wont even allow a roll for - too railroady?

[cold_breaker]

With Cassandra's Tears, if a player makes a declaration, the power ensures that the whole world is actively working against him taking advantage of it.

I think this is more my problem with the system then - the scope of which players have control of the story is a bit much for my tastes. I like to keep players declarations within reason - 1 fate point is enough to make small declarations (an object that makes sense being in a location is explicitly there, someone forgot to lock a door, etc.) not huge changes such as might rule out any obstacles I may have planned out for the PCs, such as the item no longer being in the possession of the bad guy, or X character knowing where and what the PCs are after.

[Wordmaker]

Cassandra's Tears is difficult to work with as a GM. I have a player with it in my game and it's challenging coming up with visions that the psychic will believe, but that could be misinterpreted badly enough that the other players don't have to work too hard to ignore it.

In any event, the real difficulty is that the players know the vision is true, even if the characters don't believe it. You need your players to be totally on board with handicapping themselves by RPing against what they know to be true.

[ReaderAt2046]

I think this is more my problem with the system then - the scope of which players have control of the story is a bit much for my tastes. I like to keep players declarations within reason - 1 fate point is enough to make small declarations (an object that makes sense being in a location is explicitly there, someone forgot to lock a door, etc.) not huge changes such as might rule out any obstacles I may have planned out for the PCs, such as the item no longer being in the possession of the bad guy, or X character knowing where and what the PCs are after.

Well, that's easy to handle. There's no rule that you have to accept a declaration, even a FP one. In fact, the rules on the subject say

This gives you the ability
to create things in a story that would usually be
under the GM’s purview. Typically, these things
can’t be used to drastically change the plot or
win a scene.Declaring “Doctor Keiser drops dead of
a heart attack” is not only likely to be rejected
by the GM, it wouldn’t even be that much fun
to begin with. Declarations are better suited
to creating convenient coincidences. Does your
character need a lighter (but doesn’t smoke)?
Spend a fate point and you’ve got one! Is there
an interesting scene happening over there that
your character might miss? Spend a fate point to
declare you arrive at a dramatically appropriate
moment!
Your GM has veto power over this use, but
it has one dirty little secret. If you use it to do
something to make the game cooler for everyone,
the GM will usually grant far more leeway than
she will for something boring or, worse, selfish.
As a general rule, you’ll get a lot more lenience
from the GM if you make a declaration that is in
keeping with one or more of your aspects. For
example, the GM will usually balk at letting a
character spend a fate point to have a weapon
after he’s been searched for them. However, if
you can point out that you’re Always Armed
or describe how your Distracting Beauty
kept the guard’s attention on inappropriate
areas, the GM is more likely to give you some
leeway. (This is much like invoking an aspect,
but without a die roll.)

[cold_breaker]

I guess that puts me back at where I started - that declared visions, while not specifically against the rules - would probably by and large be vetoed unless they were extremely clever ways of making the story more interesting then I originally planned.

Actually, on another note: it occurs to me that if you don't like the meta of pretending to not believe a prophecy then there's another way you could play the downside - perhaps sometimes the prophecies are randomly symbolic? For instance, if you see a city in flames, that could mean that the city is going to literally burn, or it could mean that the important relic is at a shop in the city called 'in flames' - or that the hot chick you met at the bar last week is in the city. I'd need to think up some ways to keep it so the vision is still somehow useful - but it's a zero refresh power - it's not like the visions always HAVE to be useful after all.

[Tedronai]

If the GM can't trust their players, then they should be using a different system.  Attempting to deceive your players runs directly contrary to the foundations of the DFrpg ruleset.

[cold_breaker]

If the GM can't trust their players, then they should be using a different system.  Attempting to deceive your players runs directly contrary to the foundations of the DFrpg ruleset.

And yet, telling all of the details of a story runs directly contradictory to the whole idea of the Dresden Files.

I think you're taking the idea to its bitter extremes unnecessarily. Part of telling a story is leaving out enough details until the end. Even the one shots have red herrings suggested in them. In this case, it's not that I can't trust my players per say, it's more that trusting them would turn a role playing game into a session of improv leading to a foregone conclusion - possibly fun, but not really in the spirit of a RPG. It's more fun if I can add in twists that completely change the players endings: and so far my players seem to agree with me on that front to be honest. During the one shot I ran before running my own game, I had complaints that the players knew the ending about half way through.

I'm not saying the players shouldn't have some control, or even a lot of control of the story, but their is a limit to their power at some point, or else it's just dungeons in dragons in god mode, isn't it?

[Tedronai]

I think you are seriously misunderstanding me.

You don't have to give your players complete control over, or even complete foreknowledge of your plans.  Just don't lie to them.

If you want to have visions that are difficult to interpret, have the character roll Lore to interpret the information.  Success reveals one or more Aspects related to the subject matter of the vision.  Failure indicates that the character cannot make sense of the vision and no Aspects are revealed.  Alternatively, allow the player to boost the roll, gaining access to one of the above-mentioned Aspects by also having an Aspect placed on their character representing an inaccurate or incomplete understanding of the vision that will cause problems later (those problems being represented by Compels against that Aspect).
If you actually want the character to come to a mistaken conclusion regarding the vision, simply Compel them from the start, skip the roll, and deceive the character rather than the player.


It's really difficult to maintain a mystery for long in the DFrpg without ignoring the rules, twisting them into knots, or breaking them outright.  The system simply isn't suited to it.  If that's what you and your players are after, you'd be better off in a different system.

[cold_breaker]

I'm not trying to imply I will lie to the characters - just that I will make it that I'm not giving the players metagame knowledge and then trust them to pretend they don't know it. Essentially you're right - the vision I describe will be weird, symbolic, and ultimately fluff so that the person with the vision - if they fail to interpret it - can start claiming rediculous things if they roll low. If they roll high, then they can interpret it correctly and start claiming ridiculous things that are actually true.

The best part of this is it works well with the idea of sliding difficulties - they're never quite sure how well they did. If they roll terribly they might just get a nightmare vision and simply know something important is gonna happen. If they roll badly, they can get a bit of facts that may or may not be misleading. If they roll adequate, they can get the correct meaning, and if they roll excellently they can be absolutely sure of the vision and possibly even place an aspect on the vision for use later - such as knowing just where to stand to avoid getting shot, or getting even more, unnecessary info.

I should mention again, so I don't mislead you. In this situation, I'm not lying to my players, just not telling them exactly how well they succeeded. You'd give vague answers at this point unless they rolled extremely well or extremely badly.

[Mr. Death]

You don't have to give your players complete control over, or even complete foreknowledge of your plans.  Just don't lie to them.

I kinda have to disagree with this. Partly, admittedly, because one of my players (who will normally throttle me if I so much as allude to a spoiler about anything else), has an infuriating habit of turning to me while we're playing and asking things like, "Oh, is this vampire my long-lost relative?"

I agree with cold_breaker--a big part of the appeal and fun of the Dresden verse is mystery, solving the mystery, and finding out twists toward the end. So I tend to give my players the information that their characters are given. Usually they come to the right conclusion anyway, or close enough--one player tends to come to a conclusion that's a little left of center from what I've intended, but his ideas are usually better than what I've come up with so I just roll with it and incorporate it into the game.

[Tedronai]

I should mention again, so I don't mislead you. In this situation, I'm not lying to my players, just not telling them exactly how well they succeeded. You'd give vague answers at this point unless they rolled extremely well or extremely badly.

Without having at least a decent idea of how well your character succeeded (or how badly they failed) it becomes difficult, at times impossible, to make the necessary metagame decisions upon which this system is based, such as whether or not to invoke an Aspect to boost your roll.

[Wordmaker]

Generally I find it's best to let players know what difficulty they need to match to succeed at a dice roll. It keeps the game moving fast and means that agency remains with the players and they can steer the narrative for their characters.

For the same reason, when I invoke or compel an NPC's aspects, I let the players know what those aspects are.

[cold_breaker]

Without having at least a decent idea of how well your character succeeded (or how badly they failed) it becomes difficult, at times impossible, to make the necessary metagame decisions upon which this system is based, such as whether or not to invoke an Aspect to boost your roll.

Ah, now you're getting into a whole different can of worms - should you tell your players how well they need to roll for a success! This is something that the designers of the FATE system have implied strongly, but never actually given a definitive answer.

My answer to this is usually yes - within reason. If a player is trying for an outcome they explicitly know - such as lifting an object, shooting a target, or overcoming an enemies armor - I will gladly tell them. Heck, I'll volunteer the info. If a target is a little hazier - those rolls where the player is fishing for info from the GM (like looking up info at the library, or searching the scene of a crime) then the goals are a little more vague. Again, this is a discretion call - if they want a particular fact from a research roll - say a famous figures birth date, I may give a set target, but not if they cant tell me exactly what they want to know. I'm not going to tell them that there is a reward for hitting a 3, two rewards for hitting a 7, and a ton of stuff for hitting a 10 - they might have a vague idea how thorough they were (e.g. they know what the dice roll was) but that's it.

Many people want to hear that the answer to this is clearly yes, but in the fate system, just like in real life, the answer is not always as clear cut as yes or no.

[Wolfhound]

Just an aside, it's always helpful to see other GMs asking and dealing with questions/issues that I myself have with/because of my players from time to time. 

[Tedronai]

If a player is trying for an outcome they explicitly know - such as lifting an object, shooting a target, or overcoming an enemies armor

That's not the player trying for an outcome, that's the character.  Except that the character doesn't know what Aspects or Fate Points, or 'Tags' are in the first place, and so doesn't need to know how many would need to be involved in order for them to succeed at their task.

If a target is a little hazier - those rolls where the player is fishing for info from the GM (like looking up info at the library, or searching the scene of a crime) then the goals are a little more vague. Again, this is a discretion call - if they want a particular fact from a research roll - say a famous figures birth date, I may give a set target, but not if they cant tell me exactly what they want to know. I'm not going to tell them that there is a reward for hitting a 3, two rewards for hitting a 7, and a ton of stuff for hitting a 10 - they might have a vague idea how thorough they were (e.g. they know what the dice roll was) but that's it.

In doing so, you deny the players the ability to play their characters effectively, evocatively, and often, satisfyingly.
Without such information, they cannot make the necessary decisions as to whether or not they should spend resources that do not exist in the game-world, but nevertheless affect it.
The character is doing research.  The player is spending FPs (or not, depending on whether or not the they deem it worth their while).

[Haru]

I've found that this is really hard to do right. Fate sort of encourages you to share a lot more than other games do. You get a vision, you know what it is about, but your character interprets it the wrong way and goes on a wild goose chase. All fun and games.

Though sadly, most players are not wired that way. They know what the vision is saying, they are going to pursue it if their character knows it or not. Even if they are compelled to follow the wrong interpretation, they will find the shortest way out of it. It's one shape of Player Paranoia, I believe.

Now I'm not propagating telling players everything. There is value in secrecy. But when there are dice involved, a player should know the stakes. If you don't want to let them know, call it a plot device and leave the dice out of it.