anyway.

Any given group will consider some of these outcomes to be appropriate and some to be inappropriate. Like, in one group, "the GM should either run with it or rein it in, but shouldn't throw a fit about it." In another group, "the players broke the rules when they made their secret pact, and if the game busts up over it, well, they should have thought of that before."

Please don't chime in just to say which outcomes you think are bad and which you prefer! That's not the question.

It seems as though it became true in the fiction the moment was introduced. I mean, if the GM runs with it later, then it was always true.

In real life it seems like it became true when the GM accepted it.

If the GM doesn't accept it that's another bowl of beans. Everyone's fiction isn't in agreement. I don't know if you can say it's true.

If he doesn't get in on the joke, then I have no idea. That's too deep for my brains.

(a) Uhm, never? The chamberlain NPC isn't a real person? Is this a trick question?

(b)I'd say we're dealing with two different facts:
1) The chamberlain's odor is generally considered offensive,
and
2) The PCs all perceive the chamberlain as offensively odored.

Fact #2 is established in the fiction shared by the -players- by the secret meeting to the players and forms a cause for their behavior in game, but isn't communicated to the GM until much later. Fact #2 very strongly implies the existence of Fact #1, but because it goes across a strongly agreed GM/player split, the GM is given control over how that fact would govern non-PC stuff (I think in this play style it would be somewhat absurd for the players to ask for others to be grossed out by the chamberlains smell)

In some of the examples, the GM picks up on the clue and retroactively adds Fact #1 to the fiction. (In the first two examples, somewhere in "session 5") In others, he holds that fact #1 isn't true, and makes the players retroactively amend fact #2 to give some other explanation of their behavior.

Bret: That's my take too. In the real world, it becomes true when the GM says "okay, but it's a still, muggy day. It doesn't help a bit," because that's when everyone at the table has finally understood and assented to it. At that moment it becomes retroactively true in the fiction, back to the first time Player 1's character edged over and opened the window. (Like how Darth Vader became retroactively Luke's father, back to Luke's birth. And later on he bacame retroactively Leia's father too, back to her birth, which she retroactively shared with Luke.)

Outcome 3, the GM fights it and the players relent, reconciles the shared fiction in the other direction: now everybody agrees that the Chamberlain retroactively never smelled bad. When player 1's character edged over and opened the window, retroactively he did it for some other reason.

And then if the group doesn't reconcile their shared fiction, it never becomes conclusively true or not true. Player 1's character really did edge over and open the window, nobody disputes that, but why? It's contentious.

True in RL: Never. I'm with Sean that this feels like a trick question, since the damned NPC doesn't exist in RL. Am I just not getting your meaning?

True in the fiction: When the players assented to it together. It wasn't true in the fiction for the GM yet.

True for some isn't true for the group. Until the players and GM can fix the conflict in the fiction, play breaks down. You cannot have role-play without agreement about what happens in the fiction. As soon as there is a disagreement at the table about what is true in the fiction, the group must resolve it before they can continue play.

Note that I didn't use the word "secrets" anywhere. This has nothing to do with secrets. It's just about agreement about the fiction. Like you say, secrets are just unshared plans for what you want to put into the fiction.

The example you give is interesting because the players have assumed that the GM must go along with them for some reason. Perhaps they feel that majority rules, or that the GM has accepted their input into the fiction about opening windows and stuff so she's validated their contribution.

In any case, there is significant social pressure for the GM to accept that the chamberlain smells bad. The GM's best recourse seems to be going back to the original social contract: either a) "we agreed that you owned your PCs and I owned the NPCs" or b) "I'm the GM, dammit." Meanwhile the three or four players are saying, we outvote you (more social contract stuff).

Er.

I said, "True in the fiction: When the players assented to it together. It wasn't true in the fiction for the GM yet."

I didn't mean that, as the rest of my post clarifies.

It's true for the players when they assent to it together but not for the GM. They are accepting it into the fiction together with the fond hope that the one person on the outs (the GM) will get on board when she catches on.

But it's not really true in the fiction till everyone assents.

> (a) When did it become true in real life that the
> Chamberlain NPC smells bad, if ever?

I suppose if the chamberlain's smell causes some mechanical change (-2 for stinky feet!) that's how his fact becomes true "in real life".

> (b) When did it become true inside the game's fiction that
> the Chamberlain NPC smells bad, if ever?

As soon as the GM is aware that the PCs consider him smelly and agrees it's so.  If he doesn't agree that it's so, it becomes true in the game fiction that the PCs believe him to be smelly, but that's the extent of it.  If he never catches on, the PCs behave oddly around the Chamberlain for some reason and the GM is like "whatever" or worse "why are they so skeeved around him?  maybe I'll give them a *reason* to be skeeved!".

Why is the GM's agreement required?  Because the Chamberlain is part of the GM's job.  He presents NPCs to challenge and entertain the PCs.  He might have a good reason for an NPC to be not smelly.  If PCs just declare facts about an NPC and the GM can't veto those declarations (or even know about them) then there's nothing to stop the PCs from declaring anything to be true at any time.  The PCs have a GM to help create/manage their shared fiction and if they don't want to let him do his job, then they don't need a GM.

Sean and everybody: no trick questions!

For "true in the fiction," you might say something like "the day the Chamberlain started to stink was the day he consummated his scandalous love with the untalented apprentice perfumer; by coincidence, he met with the adventurers in the inn that very afternoon," for instance.

On what day in the Chamberlain's fictional life did he start to smell?

For "true in real life," it's like, okay, at some point it became true in the fiction that the Chamberlain smells. At that moment, player 1 looks at his watch. What's the time and date? Which session of play were the real people in, when it became true in the fiction that the Chamberlain smells? (Or was it outside of play, at the players' secret meeting?)

If it never became true in the fiction, then of course there was never a real-life moment when it became true in the fiction.

Adam: "The example you give is interesting because the players have assumed that the GM must go along with them for some reason. Perhaps they feel that majority rules, or that the GM has accepted their input into the fiction about opening windows and stuff so she's validated their contribution." [my emphasis]

I've been calling it "setting up." The players are setting the GM up to go along with it when it finally comes out. The better they set the GM up, the more likely the GM will be to go along.

(I chose this example, yes, because it's counter to the systemic authority in play. I can say more about that later if anybody's interested.)

Ooh! Here's another important possible outcome.

Outcome 7: it never happened

Maybe it starts out like outcome 3, the GM fights it and the players relent, but there's no retroactive in-character justification that everyone can agree to. Finally:

GM: Oh forget it. This business about opening windows and fleeing the room and so on? It never happened.
Players: Oh all right.

The GM withdraws his assent to all those past character actions, the players assent to that, and with an imperceptible ripple in the fabric of its imaginary reality, the fiction reshapes itself. None of that stuff ever happened, after all. If anybody refers to it, somebody else says "that didn't really happen, remember?" and it's "oh yeah, that's right, it didn't."

Kind of like how now Greedo shot first.

It became true in the fiction for the group at the same time it became true IRL for the group: at the moment the GM assents to including it in the fiction.

I can talk about how it was true in the fiction for a subset of the groups (the players but not the GM), I suppose, but that's not "the fiction" (the shared imagined space).

The trick to talking about "true" in the fiction is that truth is negotiable, at all times. That means what might be true now might not be true later, when we renegotiate it.

So let's suppose we say it was true that the chamberlain smelled as soon as the players secretly decided so. The GM didn't know it, so it wasn't true to her, but it didn't matter to her either. Then the GM catches on and there's renegotiation. If the GM accepts the new "truth," then it suddenly RL becomes true.

But it doesn't have to stay true. Maybe the GM plays along for one session, then has second thoughts. The next time the group meets, the GM says, "You know, I have decided that the chamberlain thing is dumb. Can we say that never happened? Because it's really messing with my head and I won't be able to play this character right anymore, and I think that will make the game suck for me." And maybe the players agree, and now it's false that the chamberlain smells until the next RL renegotiation, which probably never comes.

Oh. Now I get why you split "in the fiction" and "RL." I was conflating them. You got to watch me talk it out.

The in-the-fiction truth timeline is always negotiable, just like the truth itself. That's what "retconning" is.

Sorry for the gymnastics. I'm on board now.

Cool! Anybody still having trouble with it?

When in the fiction did it become true in the fiction?
- versus -
When in the real world did it become true in the fiction?

Vincent, this is funny cause I was thinking about a situation in which something like this happened in a game I ran a long time ago, which got brought up at a party not long ago. I'm going to replace the actual character with "chamberlain" and the actual problem with "stinks" because it amuses me to run with it.

Player 1 one day decides that the Chamberlain stinks. He acts out making a face, and then says his character goes and opens the window. Most of the group doesn't notice, but player 2 does.

Player 2 then asks Player 1, at the table but while everyone else is involved in a fight scene and not paying attention, if he was saying that the Chamberlain stinks. Player 1 says, yes, he stinks. Player 2 laughs and the next time he meets the Chamberlain he makes the stink face to, and asks player 1 to open a window. No one really catches on.

Later in the game Player 3 wants to kill the Chamberlain but knows he can't do it alone. At first Player 1 and Player 2 have no real reason to do it. However, they decided together that they'll go along with it because he stinks, and they're tired of it. They never tell Player 3 or 4 about this—but its part of an explicit scene that they bluebook together.

So the Chamberlain is killed by the three together, and the game goes on. Player 4 (the GM) and Player 3 never know that Player 1 and 2 killed the Chamberlain because he stank, just that they did go along with the kill plot. The games goes on and eventually ends.

A year later, the group is back together and talking about the game. Player 3 says something about when they killed the Chamberlain and Player 1 laughs and says, "Player 2 and I only did that because he stank." Player 3 asks what, and Player 2 goes and digs out the bluebook in which they recorded the scene of their characters getting together and deciding to kill the Chamberlain because he stank. Player 4 says, "But he didn't stink, did he?" And Player 2 says, "Well if he didn't we wouldn't have killed him." Player 4 makes a face.

Player 4 then says:

1) "He didn't stink, you must have killed him for some other reason"
2) "I didn't know that he stank, but I guess he must have"
3) "I guess we had different visions of the character"
4) "I need more Vodka."

So if half of the group took action that changed the game based on information that was only real to them, when does it become "real" in any sense at all to everyone else? Especially if the reasoning only becomes obvious (if ever) long after the game is done and the fiction is now just memories and occasional bluebooks?

(In real life Player 4 said he needed more Vodka, because no one needed to make the different stories into one story. They could both be "true" or not, it didn't really matter as play was over. Of course, at that moment, rather like Schr??dinger's Cat, the Chamberlain both stank and didn't.)

So this is about authority over the fiction.

I'm going to go right into Spirit of the Century, because these systemless examples (or maybe it's parlor narration or something) feel a bit too loose.

GM:  As you search through the Chamberlain's desk, he leaps from his hiding spot behind the curtain and attacks!  I'm rolling his Stealth versus your Alertness to see how much of an ambush bonus he gets.
Players:  Okay, but we're totally spending a Fate Point and tagging his 'Stinky' Aspect to get a +2 to our rolls.
GM:  HE DOESN'T STINK.
(et cetera, et cetera)

So what's going on with this example?  The mechanics of the system are not letting each player have his own personal unsynchronized fiction.  The system is demanding they get synched up and on the same page.

(Furthermore, SotC has explicit mechanisms by which they can cause the "Chamberlain is stinky" concept to become a fact within the fiction.)

It's not really important here what the answers to A and B are, but that everyone involved agrees on the same answers.  The fiction doesn't fork.  The system won't allow it.

Brand's post is excellent. There really is no "sharing" of "Shared Imaginary Space"—I mean, that's a fine name for the idea of "What we all imagine together" but as his example points out it is not actually shared.

There is ample room for paradox and meta-game decisions informing in-game behavior creates a paradox in the context of the imaginary events of the game.

-Marco

If a piece of fiction isn't shared, then no, it's not part of the Shared Imagined Space.

If a piece of fiction is shared, it is part of the Shared Imagined Space.

It's not a matter of what we're imagining together.  (I don't think that's possible, right?)

But we can lay out a bit of fiction—like a writer typing a sentence that a person can read, or a storyteller describing how the wolf enters the house, or a crew on a film creates an image of a character reacting to news—and now it's shared.

And what is shared among everyone at the table is the Shared Imagined Space.  Until then, its story-stuff-flotsam floating around in the heads of one or more people.

Right?

Questions first. Would it make a difference if the players decided the Chamberlain had one leg, instead of that he smelled? Is this the same question?

The problem (for me) with the question as its phrased is because of the subjective nature of whether something smells or not (I can't believe I'm writing this).

Marco,

I should add that I think most of this is paradigm stuff. Like, its all matters of interpretation and stance, and most fact claims about the SIS or lack thereof are off base because it isn't a matter of fact.

Which is why I'm always happy when Vincent talks about this stuff, despite the fact that he's all positivist about it. Even if his paradigm isn't mine, his paradigm is one that leads him to make good deductions and push his craft forward, and that's more valuable than whether or not its "factually" true.

(Where as under my paradigm this issue normally doesn't matter, unless and until the derivations in individual stories leave us in irreconcilable fictions. I've lots of ways to deal with that, so that's something I've learned. But I wouldn't have gotten some other techniques without folks like Vincent coming at it from a different angle.)

Weird - I start thinking that if the players agreed the GM decides this stuff, why are they going behind his back then acting on their own call? Sure the GM might decide to run with it, but he might not and then what - the players are acting outside of what they agreed they could do?

Yes, awful responce to the original questions. Just can't actually see myself being able to answer them with this issue coming before those questions.

Hey, Vincent:

What if you replace "the first session after" with "when the Chamberlain shows up, the GM says 'he's a big, gross, smelly guy.'" And then forgets about it, and contests it as above.

Does that change anything? Does it become retroactively not part of the SIS? Why?

yrs—
—Ben

Tom R. wrote:
If PCs just declare facts about an NPC and the GM can't veto those declarations (or even know about them) then there's nothing to stop the PCs from declaring anything to be true at any time. The PCs have a GM to help create/manage their shared fiction and if they don't want to let him do his job, then they don't need a GM.
This is an interesting point. The whole question is about how we get on the same page, and there are good reasons why we try and avoid this kind of situation. Or at least, the more problematic resolutions of it.

Think about this situation, though, if it had been the gm introducing things in similar fashion. The fact that it is players here means that they are assuming power to assert this about the GM's character, and are staging a coup in order to do it. GMs do this all the time and are given that power as part of their job. The GMs job includes making secrets that were plans all the time.  Though, as Vincent's next post shows, it doesn't always make for coherent story.

Emily,

Did you mean to say that the GM has the power to assert things about a Player's Character—to stage a coup upon the reality of the character?  Can you give some examples of this, if this is what you meant?

I agree that the GM's job includes making secrets that are revelations (and reversals of fact) to the Players.  ("Luke.  I am your father.")  But is that the same thing as deciding a Player's Character is stinky?

My own assumption is no.  I, as GM, can make revelations and reversals of the fiction (as a GM, I consider it my job).  But I can't alter a PC or determine a new fact about the PC.  I can't say, "We never spoke of your guy having an affairs or involvement with any women while he was serving in Iraq, but I'm declaring that you have an Iraqi son."  That would be staging a coup, I think, I that would rub me the wrong way.  However, if the Player made a point of saying his character had an affair with Iraqi women while serving in Iraq, I could see, if it added to the narrative, that there's a secret of an Iraqi child that might surface during play.

Is there any difference for these things for you?

Hi Vincent

Awesome post! I hope I'm not drifting off topic here but I'm finding people's interpretation of "inside the game's fiction" really interesting.

As Marco wrote:
There really is no "sharing" of "Shared Imaginary Space"—I mean, that's a fine name for the idea of "What we all imagine together" but as his (Brand's) example points out it is not actually shared.

And yet the debate about when/whether something becomes "true inside the game's fiction" seems to hinge on people's perception of when that something became "shared"

In reality it became true in Player 1's fiction as soon as he decided it was true. It became part of player 2's fiction a bit later on. And it was never part of player 3 or 4's fiction. So what is "the fiction" we're all talking about? Where does it exist? And what if "the fiction"/shared consensus which we think we've agreed upon actually turns out to be inconsistent?

For example, what if all the players entirely agree on the fact that the Chamberlain smells, but then it subsequently comes to light that Player 1 had been imagining the Chamberlain reeked of rotting flesh, while Player 2 imagined that the Chamberlain smelled strongly of vanilla? The Chamberlain still smells (unless this fact gets retconned out) but the perception of what that means and how it impacts on the players' individual imaginings is suddenly thrown into doubt; perhaps changing the complexion of the "fact" entirely.

@ Bruce (and Marco)
But what happen when, for some reason, in the fiction it become NECESSARY to define the Chamberlain's smell?

Who decide it?

And what if the GM decide that the Chamberlain smells of rotting flesh, but player 2 simply forget about it and go on imagining, after a couple of sessions, that the chamberlain smells of Vanilla?

What if the Chamberlain is a potent Archmage, able to push planets with a mere gesture, but player 2 during the game think about a movie he had seen the week before, mix and match the characters, and begins to imagine the Chamberlain as a buffoon without any power?

What if player 2 forget an entire continent on the other face of the game planet? The Continent is still there for the game, or it appear and disappear when player 2 speak?

There is difference between the things that Player 2 imagine THAT HE DON'T SHARE WITH ANYONE AND NOBODY OTHER IMAGINR, that contradict what other people said during the game, and what he imagine will catch the following day when he will go fishing?

What he imagine (or remember) influence his actions in the game, but what he did eat at lunch influence the game, too (too much food—-> lethargic players). If "influencing the game" is enough, the beer he did drink ten minutes before is part of the SIS?

I think that all this talk about "imagination of the players" is myddying the waters. The SIS has nothing to do with what the players are IMAGINING. The SIS (Shared ImaginED Space) is what the players IMAGINED some time ago, and the SHARED. After they shared it, what they imagine or remember about it don't change it. The act of sharing, of telling, "fix" it in that state.

(a) Uhm, never? The chamberlain NPC isn't a real person? Is this a trick question?

(b)I'd say we're dealing with two different facts:
1) The chamberlain's odor is generally considered offensive,
and
2) The PCs all perceive the chamberlain as offensively odored.

Fact #2 is established in the fiction shared by the -players- by the secret meeting to the players and forms a cause for their behavior in game, but isn't communicated to the GM until much later. Fact #2 very strongly implies the existence of Fact #1, but because it goes across a strongly agreed GM/player split, the GM is given control over how that fact would govern non-PC stuff (I think in this play style it would be somewhat absurd for the players to ask for others to be grossed out by the chamberlains smell)

In some of the examples, the GM picks up on the clue and retroactively adds Fact #1 to the fiction. (In the first two examples, somewhere in "session 5") In others, he holds that fact #1 isn't true, and makes the players retroactively amend fact #2 to give some other explanation of their behavior.

While waiting for my answer I'll add this. Imagine each players image of the game's fiction in a circle. Now imagine them overlapping - a Venn diagram. (Someone with better topographic knowledge can probably come up with a better analogy). In places, a couple of them overlap - what you call the SIS, I imagine the small region where all the regions overlap, and there is agreement. Some people's circles are bigger than others. If you zoom out, it all looks like shared fiction, but it's not quite as simple as that.

In a long term sandbox game, that small area in the middle will grow and the game will become esaier to play, though it might be harder to introduce new players.

Remember the setup, everyone!

Imagine that the players get together behind the GM's back and say "hey you know the NPC Chamberlain, our contact with the king? Let's all, no matter what the GM says about him, let's all react to him as though he smells bad. We can't insult him to his face, we need him, but let's be subtle and see what the GM does with it."

So they do.

The players know that they can't simply choose to make the Chamberlain smell bad. They know that if they said "hey GM, we've decided that the Chamberlain smells bad," the GM would say "huh? No."

I don't think that it became true in the fiction for them then, at their secret meeting. They're all like "let's act as though he smells bad and see what happens," they aren't like "from now on it's true that he smells bad."

So Simon!

Your answer: I chose an example that the players can act on without reaching outside of their characters' actions. They're just saying what their characters do, which is their job. It's to parallel the "shh, Betty's character's paranoid" example.

So stick with smelliness for now. You can put forward another outcome if you want (GM: "how about your characters really do find him stinky, but only they do in the world, so that's weird." Players: "yeah, okay").

But really my point isn't "what should happen?" at all. A bunch of different things CAN happen, I don't care which does.

My point is, is it a secret from the GM that the Chamberlain smells bad? Is it true that the Chamberlain smells bad, but the GM doesn't know it?

My point is, is it a secret from the GM that the Chamberlain smells bad? Is it true that the Chamberlain smells bad, but the GM doesn't know it?

Right. My problem with this is that it's against the rules of the sort of game I think you are talking about, where the GM gets to decide (by the rules) whether an NPC smells or not. It's a bit like everyone agreeing to steal money from the banker in monopoly.

So, I would say, not it is not true until the GM agrees it. The players have appropriated a piece of fiction which is not in their remit. The shared fiction has broken down altogether.

In every case I am talking about the shared fiction generated within the rules by the game system. The circle HAS to intersect the GM for it to be true, if that truth is in the GM's remit in the game system.

There is another problem with the idea of shared fiction, which is the shared fiction of moment-to-moment play, and the retrospective view of the fiction to date.

So Outcome 1. It's true in "real life" when the GM agrees with the players that it was true.

Outcome 2: It was never true.

Outcome 3: It was never true.

Outcome 4: True when the GM agrees it.

Outcome 5: The game breaks down before any meaningful truth can be established. There is no shared fiction, because the negotation breaks down.

Outcome 6: Never true. Just a rather peculiar practical joke.

As to when it's true in the fiction-to-date, that can change from moment to moment, based on the current shared fiction.

In games which don't privilege GM authority over an NPC's smelliness, I'd give a different answer.

Simon, my take is that those rules you're talking about, who has authority over what, they serve to push the group toward one outcome or another. The more systemic authority the GM has over the NPC's qualities, the more strongly the GM can object, the more systemic weight his simple objection carries.

In the "Betty's character is paranoid, shh, don't tell Betty" example, the group presumes that Betty will respond well and give the group outcome 1, but nevertheless she might respond badly and give the group one of the other outcomes. If she does, that'll be socially expensive, because they've set her up well and because systemic authority is on their side.

In other words, outcome 1 - Betty runs with it - is most likely, because of the thorough setup and the systemic authority. If Betty fights it, though, outcome 5 - Betty fights it and the game busts up - is far more likely that outcome 3 - Betty fights it and the rest of the group relents.

I don't think that rules about who has authority over what can change when things become true. I think that they can change which outcomes happen.

Sorry for the digression, but it makes me think of a paradox in physics. Extract of the page I was reading this very morning.

Erwin Schr??dinger in

What is life ?

[The theory of realativity revealed] that no physical cause could spread more rapidly than the speed of light[...]

Suppose a friend of mine should board a space ship traveling at half the speed of light and reach the nearest fixed star in eight or ten years. Suppose he settled down there. At a certain moment I might wonder whether he were still alive, and I should have to realize that perhaps there is no objective answer to such a question. If he 'has died', but only recently, so that a radio message carrying the news cannot yet have reached me, or if he is only 'seriously ill' and 'going to die' before my next radiogram can reach him - in both cases, it is, from the standpoint of a physicist, a question of interpretation where my friend is alive or not.

Does this ring a bell ?

Ben: I've called that "dropping out of currency." If somebody says that the Chamberlain stinks, and everybody agrees to it, but nobody acts on it, and everybody forgets it, does it become retroactively false? I don't think so. It just drops out of currency and nobody thinks of it one way or the other.

Oh, I had forgotten that part of the setup. The "let's all react to him as though" part. It's a very strange setup, actually.

At the time of the secret player meeting, the players don't believe the chamberlain is actually smelly in the fiction. It's likely, given one interpretation, that they don't even intend to make the chamberlain smelly in the fiction. They just want to "see what the GM does."

The weirdness is that there's no in-fiction justification for this behavior. It's some bizarre meta thing going on. The characters, having no reason to act as if the chamberlain smells, but doing so anyways, are essentially acting insane.

So it isn't true in the fiction that the chamberlain smells until at least one person offers up that fact. In your example, Vincent, that person is the GM.

In all the outcomes, it only becomes true in RL that the chamberlain smells if everyone at the table assents. At the time they negotiate the truth of the fiction, they also decide to what time period in the fiction that truth applies: i.e., when did the chamberlain smell?

There's an outcome that I don't think you mentioned.

Outcome 8: The GM assents but the players don't

Player 1: When my guy sees the chamberlain coming he opens all the windows in the inn. He's opening the last one when he comes in.
GM: Okay, but it's a still, muggy day. It doesn't help a bit.
Player 1: I don't know what you mean.
GM: The chamberlain. He smells, right?
Player 1: No, why would you think such a thing? That's dumb.
GM: He's my NPC. He smells.
Player 2: We don't want him to smell. We just want to act like he smells. If you make him actually smell, that will ruin our fun.
GM: You guys are crazy.

Christopher wrote:
Did you mean to say that the GM has the power to assert things about a Player's Character—to stage a coup upon the reality of the character? Can you give some examples of this, if this is what you meant?
Oh! You're right of course. And I like the example of the affair with an Iraqi woman while on tour. Yes, the GMs job is not to stage coups, but to listen and collaborate with the players to perhaps follow up with new info/secrets that support and play into what has been established.

What I was thinking of when I said that it is the GMs job to come up with things new to the players and introduce them in play is more about the world. That is a huge part of what the GM is responsible for: telling the players what their characters see around them, without asking for the players permission (well, no—they all agree that this is what the GM does).  I can think of moments when GMs introduced things that happen based on a character's back story, but those seem more like your Iraqi love child example now that I think about it.

The difference there is that in many games—certainly not all—the GM giving your soldier a child isn't a coup, it would be a good play, whereas the player wouldn't necessarily have the right to do even that about about a GMs character.

Re: dropping out of currency.

I think that's an astute observation. It's an important concept because it's very different than changing in the fiction. Here's a contrived example.

Two sessions ago, the players meet a violet-eyed man named Hrabi. Violet happens to be an auspicious color to the temple of Grob, and Rob plays his priest accordingly, giving the man his trust.

This session, the GM forgets that Hrabi's eyes were violet, and describes them as red. He remembers he had creepy eyes of some kind. The players have forgotten the meeting, too, and Rob decides that a red-eyed man can't be trusted.

Later, they remember, but just let it go. It is true that Hrabi's eyes were violet (and always will be violet) for the first encounter. It is true that his eyes were red (and always were red) for the second encounter. They take no steps to fix the discontinuity. There is no in-fiction justification for an eye-color change or anything. Play continues, because it just doesn't matter that much.

Excellent dodge!

I was actually asking about how if one person forgets it, it's a remarkable approximation of the same case. Which makes me think ... whether or not something happened in a game isn't a big deal. It's all negotiated, on-going. So the difference between secrets and shared agreed upon history is ... not a lot. It doesn't become magically potent when everyone agrees on it.

yrs—
—Ben

It doesn't become magically potent when everyone agrees on it.

Huh. I'm surprised to hear you say that, Ben. It strikes me that Polaris in particular is calibrated precisely on the principle that things become magically potent when we all agree on (and imagine) them. It's certainly the closest to a shared-dream state that I've ever experienced in roleplaying. The use of the ritual phrases, the special roles of the players, the lighting and snuffing the candle. . .they all serve to focus attention on the contributed details, to help us weave the dream together. I've been playing it using Willem Larsen's Pedagogy of Play techniques, which serve to even more potently put everyone on the same wavelength for collaboration.

Same with Bliss Stage: "Create a horrible, traumatic apocalypse. Now set it just outside your window. Now name everyone after high school sweethearts." Do that in a group, with shared history and shared sense of place, and that shit is potent. Even, shall we say, Magical.

(I am being absolutely unironic when I say that.)

I guess my point is, all these things serve to put everyone's mind in the same place and same groove, so that we can avoid or minimize the "one person forgets" phenomenon. Willem's even expanded the Pedagogy in the course of our play to include a review ritual for when we've been away from the game for too long and such. If you focus on all remembering our content together, then it becomes even more vital to get everything out in the open and shared,, thus more clear how important the secret/plan distinction is.

You've got a point though, about the focus on "whether it happened." It IS all "negotiated, on-going." past input only becomes important inasmuch as we want to (and actually DO) build on it.

Peace,
-Joel

PS Ben, I hope you're cool with this line of discussion. I'm not trying to play "gotcha!" with your own texts or anything, i just wish to USE those texts to explore this issue and a perhaps a shared point of understanding.

Here is how it works for me:

"The Chamberlain is smelly"

O1) It becomes true in rl when the GM rolls with it and everyone basically proceeds with the smelliness of the chamberlain being true.

Once this happens, the truth extends backwards into the fiction, making it true for the previous sessions, with some wiggle room for players and GM to negotiate.

O2) Basically the same as O1.

O3) It becomes not-true in rl when the players relent, the not-truth rolling backward in the fiction much like O1, O2.

O4) This is hard.  I'd parse it: it's just bad, inconsistent fiction, and both the Chamberlain being smelly and not smelly are rl-true when both sides refuse to relent, with the same rollback as the other outcomes so far.

Crap fiction happens.

O5) Same as O4, loathing generated doesn't change the relationship.

O6) Never true.  We never see in the fiction what is going on with the behavior and rival explanations abound.  The players only posited acting as-if, not conspiring to author the Chamberlain as smelly.

O7) Basically the same as O3, just more dramatic.

O8) It depends if the GM relents to the player's demands that it not be acknowledged.  If he relents, the Chamberlain isn't smelly at that point, with rollback fictional truth.  If he doesn't, it's just O4 again.

"The players know that they can't simply choose to make the Chamberlain smell bad. They know that if they said "hey GM, we've decided that the Chamberlain smells bad," the GM would say "huh? No."

I don't think that it became true in the fiction for them then, at their secret meeting. They're all like "let's act as though he smells bad and see what happens," they aren't like "from now on it's true that he smells bad.""

Well, the set up isn't to see what happens, it's
"Let's all, no matter what the GM says about him, let's all react to him as though he smells bad."

So they decide to ignore what the GM says about him. It's the same as deciding to treat it as true, if you ignore anyone who might call it false. This is the same as treating it as true, because you've tuned out anyone who could say it's false - thus it ends up 'true' simply by mentally tuning out all nay sayers. Even the ones the group agreed to listen to listen to. It's not seeing what happens, as it's deliberately ignoring the only person they agreed could counter them.

Really it's a group who are either confused about the ramifications of their actions in RL and are unaware they are breaking their agreement, or a group who are outright cheating the agreement they supposedly agreed to.

Vincent, you say
I don't think that rules about who has authority over what can change when things become true. I think that they can change which outcomes happen.

as if "the rules and their outcome" are not the centrally important determinant of what happens in a non-fucked-up group. If you are following the rules, then then they almost always determine whether an outcome is true. The first thing in any game is the central contract to play by the system unless everyone disagrees (or sometimes if the GM disagrees). So where the system (including authority) impacts the fiction, it determines the truth in most cases.

The big difference between the Smelly Chamberlain and Betty is that her paranoia is induced as part of the system. It's like this:

GM to Betty: In Fear Itself, the standard rules are that your character's mental illness is simulated by all the other players. Are you OK with this? If not, you can just act something out yourself [rules option].

Betty: I'm OK with it.

GM with group (no Betty) [negotiation over which mental illness - GM has final authority]

Betty continues playing, wondering when she might find out what her PCs mental issue is.

What would your answers be to the Smelly Chamberlain?

Vincent: I don't agree with what you said about the system mostly causing a tendency in which way the question resolves. I don't see that at all. It seems pretty possible to me for it go any which way, depending on the players and personalities involved. And the motivations for playing this sort of trick.

You could get #5 easily enough with Inspectres, if the same group would do that in D&D. It might even be easier with Inspectres, since all the systems for player input would make it more of a direct challenge if the conspirators didn't bother with any of that.

Or to extend the experiment a little...

Let's say that the GM went with either 1 or 2. Purely based on thinking it was funny and being agreeable to this player input. And then suppose that a little later the GM schemes up that the chamberlain has been taken over by some sort of evil parasite. Which, as a side effect, makes him smell.

So, the players get wind of this, and they start to question everything the chamberlain has told them and every mission he has sent them on. And it's pretty important which exact missions were tainted by the ones from beyond and which (early) ones were possibly untainted. Straight from the king.

And to make it a little tougher, the GM just turns around any questions and says, "Hard to say. Something was definitely smelly that hot day in July. Maybe a little before that. Couldn't really say."

So, where does the players' suspicion fall? The muggy day? The first day they met him? Sometime in between?

My guess is that most players would immediately assume that he was possessed at least back to the first place they noticed the other players acting on it, or alternately right back to the beginning.

My further guess is that the players in the conspiracy would assume it went back to the beginning, the players out of the conspiracy would assume it went back to the first time they noticed the conspirators at work, and the GM would likely have it sometime in between. (changing it a little to account for Brand's comment).

Joel: Thanks for the compliments about my games. I'm missing the connection to what I'm saying, though.

yrs—
—Ben

Callan, Simon: I don't think my example group is necessarily fucked up. Personally I think that spoofing on authority, especially in such a harmless way, is funny. Probably the GM showed some minor self-importance recently and this is how the group restores social equilibrium - in other words, he has it coming, but everybody knows he'll take his licks with good humor and no harm done.

In that case, Outcomes 2 (the GM reins it in), 3 (the GM fights, the players relent), or 4 (they never reconcile it, but so what) seem most likely to me.

Simon:
GM to Betty: In Fear Itself, the standard rules are that your character's mental illness is simulated by all the other players. Are you OK with this? If not, you can just act something out yourself [rules option].

Betty continues playing, wondering when she might find out what her PCs mental issue is.

This is a striking, perfect example of "the game rules bias the group toward outcome 1 (Betty runs with it)."

If despite her up-front agreement Betty fights the conclusion, she will feel like she let everybody down, went back on her word, and broke the rules. Correctly!

Outcome 2 isn't getting the love it deserves! In outcome 2, the GM momentarily admits that the Chamberlain smells, gracious to the players' input, but then immediately reasserts his authority over the Chamberlain's person. That's the GM I'd want for this kind of game.

Yes. For me, outcome 2 is probably the most socially healthy. The most functional in terms of the game fiction aligning and developing. And the most functional in terms of openly reminding the rules/authorities which (apparently) they were using and agreeing previously.

Of course, it depends on the fictional impact of the fictional details that the players were building. For this example it seems perfectly OK.

In that case, Outcomes 2 (the GM reins it in), 3 (the GM fights, the players relent), or 4 (they never reconcile it, but so what) seem most likely to me

I'd prefer and expect outcome 2.  I can't believe outcome 4 would happen - that's the really fucked-up one. I think I lack experience in this kind of roleplaying group, though, so this is just anecdotal. I just this example is like moving someone's counter in Monopoly as a joke. It could all end in tears if someone takes it seriously.

My old group go through an ostensibly anti-authority ritual at the beginning of games. "Hands up who likes the GM?", everyone starts to raise them, then sticks them right under the table. If anyone introduces the to indie games it will be like introducing the Yanomami to a Western lifestyle.

Wee, I'm enjoying this!

Ben: I was just seeing you saying something ("It doesn't become magically potent when everyone agrees on it") that those game designs seem to contradict. And that split seems to be CENTRAL, actually, to this whole discussion of Secrets/Plans. I guess this is just me agreeing wholeheartedly with Vincent, that collaborative creation is the fundamental act of roleplaying, and not really getting the people who appear to be resisting that claim.

If you've no further thoughts on this little detour, that's fine, I suppose I've said my piece and we can move on. i do think you're spot-on with your observation that agreement is "negotiated, ongoing," which prompted me to think about WHY "what happened" is important, as above.

Joel: Oh, that's simple. I'm not resisting that claim. I never really understood the "individual imagined space" stuff. But, then again, Vincent's stinky Chamberlain is collaboratively created, it's just that one player is excluded from the collaboration.

So what we're dealing with is the way that collaborative creations interact w/ each other in a dynamic, changing environment. In that context, there's nothing magically privileged about stuff the group all agreed to last time we played vs. creation with one or more players excluded.

yrs—
—Ben

It's true! I agree with Ben. The only thing that really holds is what we're agreeing to right this minute, whether we're the whole group or a subgroup, and it holds only for this minute.

What we agreed to before can influence what we're agreeing to right this minute, but it's the same kind of influence as what the rest of us agreed to while you were out of the room, what the dice say we should agree to, and what I promised I'd agree to, before.

That is, an influence, sometimes a powerful one, but no iron guarantee.

O-o-oh, OK! Gotcha, Ben. I guess your statement looked kinda similar to others' comments here recently that WERE about the primacy of "Individual Imagined Space" or whatever. I'm good now, I think.

Vincent—influence, gotcha. Makes absolute sense to me. Like I said, it strikes me that "what happened before" is important precisely because we (may) want to build on it, not because it's "objectively true" or "real" or any such thing.

Which, illuminates a lot of the bitter disputes in my roleplaying history in a new way. I thought they were about one thing, but they were really about another thing. interesting. . .

Peace,
-Joel

Vincent, it's just plain cheating to me, not spoofery. If the GM's shown some self importance, you don't play with him if it's such an issue, or you accept him for who he is and play exactly by the rules. And it's not harmless - if you agreed to do something, then you agreed to do it. It damages trust not to fulfil it, regardless of how small it was. For myself, I can't reconcile the foundations of this idea, let alone any further ramifications.

Outcome 5 it is, then, for you! That's okay.

Outcome 5 seems to attribute the whole thing to 'the GM fought it'. So not really that outcome.

Okay!

Outcome 9: the GM calls them on their crap and the game busts up.

We join session 4 in progress:
Player 2: ...Anyway my guy sits at the window and tries to breath mostly outside air.
GM: WHY?
Player 2: It's just what he'd do.
GM: No come on. What's he thinking when he decides to do that?
Player 2: He's thinking "dang the Chamberlain smells."
GM: BUT THE CHAMBERLAIN DOESN'T SMELL.
Player 2: Are you telling me what my guy's thinking? Who's mind controlling him? Don't I get a Will Resist Roll?
GM: Nobody's mind controlling him. I'm just telling you, he wouldn't be thinking that, because the Chamberlain doesn't smell.
Player 2: You get to tell me what my guy's thinking now? That's the new rule?
GM: Well you sure don't get to tell me that my guy smells. I'M THE GM. You're not playing by the rules.
Player 3: We're just saying what our characters do...
GM: Oh please. You're saying the Chamberlain smells bad and you have been for 4 sessions now. He does not either.
Player 2: You say my guy doesn't think he smells, but I say he DOES smell and my guy smells him plain as day.
GM: But you guys made me the GM for a reason. You agreed when we started this game that I'd be in charge of things like whether the Chamberlain smells. Were you lying? Did you change your mind without telling me? What?
Player 2: Whatever. Quit if you don't like it.
GM: Fantastic. You got it. See you all around.
Player 3: This sucks. I just thought it would be funny.
GM: Not really, no.

They never play again. They don't even try another session. Eventually they all have happy lives and some of them are still good friends, but the GM and player 2 never quite reconcile.

More like that, Callan?

Oh and one more while I'm here:

"Outcome" 10: the players never do it in the first place
Nobody ever does anything to suggest that the Chamberlain smells. The players don't because that would be the GM's job; the GM doesn't because he doesn't think that the Chamberlain smells. Play proceeds without.

Now ... which of the possible outcomes is the one that should happen, doesn't interest me in the least. Different groups, different times, different relationships, any possible outcome might happen.

I'd love it if you could take on the question at hand, instead: in each of the given outcomes (now including 2 new ones just for you), IS IT true that the Chamberlain smells, WHEN is it true that the Chamberlain smells, and WHAT MAKES it true that the Chamberlain smells?

OK. Direct question, Vincent. This is my current view of it.

Players are authors and also audience. But when different parts of the audience are watching different movies, there is no unique fiction were things are happening or not. In one fiction something happens, in other not.

When players arrive at the point of aligning the different fictions, a detail like if the Chamberlain smells, it only becomes true if everybody agrees that is was true. All character actions and world events need the (implicit) approval of the other players to be really true in the shared fiction. Even when someone is using an authority/responsibility given by the rules, she may still say something so strange that some other players may object to let it be stated as true in the fiction. You need your fellow players to reassure that the things you are saying are reasonable and true in the fiction, no matter the authorities.

In outcomes 1 and 2, the GM accepts and confirms that the Chamberlain was smelling. This makes it retroactively true in the fiction. From now on, everybody may play with that detail safely, because at that point, everybody was accepting it was a real thing in the fiction. Previously it was not clear, and it was not safe to try to use it. Indeed, the reactions of the GM in other outcomes show what could happen when someone uses a detail in play which has not yet been agreed to be true by everyone.

In outcome 3, the fiction is blending, at the end, the Chamberlain does not smell bad, and the players retroactively build an explanation for their behavior that becomes true, as it is agreed by everyone (you may discuss if they only agree due to coercive means, but it is another question).

In outcome 4, they don't manage to create a shared fiction. Thus, the chamberlain may smell bad or not, depends on whose fiction you consider. Using anyone of the different views to justify actions or events in the shared fiction is not safe, as other players may have another view. It may create troubles.

Troubles like in outcome 5. They don't manage to create a coherent shared fiction and they fight for it. They spoil the game doing it. It does not matter who had the right or authority to decide if that small detail was true or not in the shared fiction. Everyone should (implicitly) agree on it to make it true and safe to use.

In outcome 6, they are not creating a coherent shared fiction. Thus, for some players it is true, for the GM it is not. But nobody uses it in a relevant way to build on the shared fiction. Thus, it becomes irrelevant and it does not bring trouble.

Outcome 7. Interesting example. The fiction may be blended in people minds. In this case, they retroactively decide that they were never even opening the windows. At this point, everybody erases the possibility that the Chamberlain was smelling bad. They agree that nobody can use that detail (or even the opening of the windows) in the shared fiction. At this point, the Chamberlain definitively does not smell bad. They were playing with the possibility. But at this exact moment, the whole audience knows it was not.

Outcome 8. They decide that the Chamberlain does not smell, but their characters are acting like he was, for whatever reason. The GM think it is a silly thing, but it seems he accepts. Thus, at this moment everyone has a clear idea. In the shared fiction the Chamberlain was never smelling bad.

Outcome 9. As outcome 5.

Outcome 10. Nobody ever thought about it. Nobody knows or cares if he smelled. Thus, it was an irrelevant detail that was never used. It was never stated in the fiction if it was true of false.

Final thought: Even things that are true in the shared fiction, may be retroactively changed to be false. You only need that everyone agree on it. You can discuss if things are true/false only in a given moment, in a given fiction. All the people sharing a given fiction need to agree on any detail to make it really true on that fiction. Something that is stated to be true, may be used (safely) by any player to build more fiction based on that fact. Until the group change their minds and they agree it is not true, or it was never true. If this destroys or not the coherence of the fiction, is again another question.

Arturo: you've layed out my own take on it exactly. Your current view matches mine to the last detail.

Here's my take:

The Chamberlain's stinkiness gets reified in the fiction at the moment that the players agree on it.

If the GM later argues them out of it, it retroactively was never reified at all.

yrs—
—Ben

I agree with Arturo:

it only becomes true if everybody agrees that is was true.

BUT there are rules to determine who gets to decide what's true. When you agree to play the game, you are expected to follow these rules, if you do not what occurs is an argument, not a game. So, of course, it depends on everyone's agreement, in the same way it depends on everyone's agreement that a bishop moves on a diagonal.

See, I argue that the social contract trumps the rules at all times. The rules are just social lubricant to make agreeing on stuff easier.

"How about, instead of arguing every time we want to do something, we agree to use Dogs in the Vineyard as our baseline for how to determine stuff?"

"Okay. But this time, I don't like the way the dice fell, and I'm asking y'all if we can just ignore the rules for a moment."

"This time, okay."

Vincent, I think the GM would say the following
GM: Not really, no. Also, I am having sex with your sister. She is an enthusiastic and sensual lover.

Also it depends on what you mean by true. Tommi (he reads here, but I'm not sure if he posts) once described a (nifty) comparitive idea to me, of a group of people with sheets of paper in front of them and though description and talking, they all try and draw roughly the same thing on each page. That's a way of visualising what's going on with an SIS? If you'd take it that 'its true' is to have a high level of sameness to each page, then in outcome 9 there is an low level of sameness as the GM's page does not contain the item. Either round down the fraction and call it not true or a low level of truth. In outcome 10, they are presumably very similar sheets, but none of them contain a smelly chamberlain. So it's not true at all - not even a fraction.

I can't honestly answer for the others, at a moral level. It's like telling me a guy swings a punch at someone, then asking me if his rollex is fake...I either want to address the punch, or nothing as I don't think the rollex's fakeness matters in light of the situation. Even when the GM rolls with it - the GM might think the players are just making a suggestion (and decides to roll with what he thinks is a suggestion), the players aren't suggesting. They are going to do it no matter what he says. Wham.

Well, if you can't you can't. But your moral response is off-topic, and I said so to open the thread.

Simon: Here's how I'd characterize our difference of opinion.

You: When the rules are set up just so, it really is a secret.

Me: When the rules are set up just so, it's practically a secret, you can treat it like a secret in every way, but it's technically a plan or vision.

We both agree that either way it's a thing that you can play with in your game designs, to very good effect, yeah? Really a secret, or practically a secret, who cares, the point is to design good rules that support mystery and fun revelations.

For instance, "psst, everyone act as though Betty's character is paranoid" is really cool, presumably a lot of fun to play with, theoretically illuminating, and not any kind of problematic whatsoever.

Vincent:

That sounds right. I am finding this helpful as a practical way of thinking about gaming with secrets, and designing for them. I remember one game we played where the GM gave one player an important secret, and he just absolutely wouldn't give it up, even though the rest of us needed it. A secret as a plan for gradual revelation would have been much, much better.

" IS IT true that the Chamberlain smells, WHEN is it true that the Chamberlain smells, and WHAT MAKES it true that the Chamberlain smells?"

It is only true if the duly constituted authority agrees or asserts that it is true.

It becomes true when the duly constituted authority does so.

It is that authority that makes it true.

—

I see nothing here that is not a basic authority issue.  The proposed players are staging a kinda coup against the GM.  That might be a good thing, maybe they would all be better off within a distributed authority framework.  But given the framework proposed, the issue is quite simple - everything the playersd said about the chamberlain was untrue until it gained GM consent.  The conspiratorial players assertion that the chamberlain was smelly never "enters the fiction" in any meanignful sense; any number of other scenes could have been played out, featuring other NPC's, none of whom acknowledged the smelliness of the chamberlain.  The only thing that did enter the fiction was their narrated actions, which were bizarre.

Basic authority issue.  Either the GM has that authority, or the players share it.  Partial assertions made without such authority don't mean anything, they are just propositions at best, and in this case, not even that (because the proposition is concealed).

I don't think it'd be technically difficult to mechanically set up true secrets.  Something like an oracle, consulted at the beginning of play, but the drawn cards are put face down into an envelope and sealed until a later time.

It's my understanding that that's neither a plan nor a secret. A face-down card isn't "true" at all, it's just a card. In any case, its effects don't become "true" until such a point as the card is revealed and said effects are figured out and accepted by the group.

At most, the face-down card, however, is an interesting example of a plan being formulated by nobody at all... stretching it, a bit, but in any case, still not a secret.

Right. The face-down card can't even effect play IRL until it's viewed. And the players might agree to ignore it when they do view it.

I gave my take on secret cards here.

I wanted to mention my cure for "this is just what my guy would do":
"where?"
"what?"
"in what outside situation would he do that?"
"this one"
"Ok fine, but we agreed that I get to tell you what the situation is like, and you get to tell me what your character does, in accordance with that situation"
"umm ok"
"so what part of the situation is causing him to act like that, or is it just coming from inside his head?"
"...."

This is based on an understanding that the GM gets to make the context for the characters. So by defining elements of the chamberlain, the players are breaking the rules by recontextualising the characters. Now that's fine, the GM doesn't need to get all "chain of command" on them if he is willing to flow with it, but the important feature of the structure is that it means that players can pull "rank" on a specific area, if someone is just being domineering. Just like the GM or other players can suggest stuff that the players might want to do, and players (like my brother) can go "no he does it this way instead, he's my character!!".

It's happened so often in our flexy woolly games that I've got an idea of how someone elses character should behave, they can't decide, and I've suggested stuff. People can feel defensive, or they can realise that they get the final say, and just say no politely. 'Course, sometimes the GM takes up my suggestion anyway via "rule of cool", and we have to fight to stop permanent change once we realise the owner of the character doesn't want that! So no wonder people can get defensive at my suggestions!

Now finally, what if the GM goes with what they players have said? Well you can either say that the GM has according to the rules photo-copyed everything that they did and made it real, or that the rules that people actually play by have shifted, so that players can introduce stuff if they think it strongly fits their character.

In other words, it's real if it is according to the rules, and is made real when the rules are applied, because tautologically, the rules define what is legit SIS and what is "could be".

That's roughly what I was thinking, Josh, and I almost interpreted the examples as being suggestions as well...but the idea is they go along with the plan regardless of what the GM says (when the GM has rank on this). If in a group this is considered making a suggestion, no wonder people can get defensive about suggestions. Just making a quick note about it.

Outcome 11: ambiguity continues

In the fourth session after:
Player 1:When my guy sees the chamberlain coming he opens all the windows in the inn. He's opening the last one when he comes in.
GM [in Chamberlain's voice]: Is something the matter?
Player 1 [in character's voice]:No your grace, not at all.
GM [in Chamberlain's voice]: "Blast you and your snide little insults, you dishonourable twit! I demand satisfaction! My second will call on you shortly." The Chamberlain storms out, fuming.
Players: Ooops!

Does the Chamberlain smell? Who knows? The PC's actions have generated a result in the SIS but was it a subtle insult or an odor that caused it?