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Old 10-03-2018, 08:39 AM   #21
JohnPaulB
 
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Default Re: Wishes

(5) A wish will grant its user one true answer to any yes-or no question, from the GM.
  • This states that you must give an answer that is true.
  • That there is only one answer. (Not more than one answer.)
  • And that it is an answer from a yes or no question.
[Then again, it could be stating “the one true answer” as in all other answers are false. Heh.]


It does not state that the answer has to be YES or NO. Only that it fits the above parameters.

If the GM feels that the players are trying to subvert the gameplay with overuse of this, then they might try the following:
  • The GM might be able to give a riddle answer,
  • give a speech about the wonders of Cidri economics (and somewhere in there obtusely answer the question),
  • answer in a foreign language (I like Klingon)
  • or with a logic problem.
As long as it truly answers their question.

---------------------------------

If you don’t like the fact that getting One True Answers is now too easy via experience points, but are stuck with it in the Rules As Written, add some homeworld fluff to it.
  • Have the Wizard’s Guild outlaw One True Answers. It is now a Wizard criminal act to use a Wish for One True Answer (or to make one) and if detected, you will be hunted down by Wizard Guild Marshals and prosecuted under their law.
  • Or have it legal, but there is a 50% chance of a Lesser Demon gang coming after and roughing up users of One True Answers because it exploits them.
  • Or have users of One True Answer become social pariahs if it was found out. It becomes a secret they must keep.
These could also be reasons that its not widespread to use One True Answers on Cidri.
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Old 10-03-2018, 09:17 AM   #22
The Wyzard
 
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Default Re: Wishes

(Source: I'm an attorney in real life. Figuring out how to ask the right question and interpret the answer is something I do in my job on a daily basis.)

A single yes-or-no question can be quite useful, but it's not game-breaking.

Some of you may be old enough to remember a political fuss about a high-ranking figure in the US military giving a speech where he talked about "known unknowns" and "unknown unknowns," and how the latter were more dangerous than the former. A lot of people made fun of him and liked to pretend that the whole concept was ludicrous.

Without getting into my feelings on the situation or the man (which aren't pertinent), I definitely want to come out in a strong defense of the distinction he was creating, which is useful and sound from an epistemological perspective, in my opinion.

Short form: It's the stuff you don't even know you need to ask that is going to get you. A lesser wish requires meaningful investment. I don't think you can just spam it and ask 20 questions. As an adjunct to other investigative efforts, it's useful and not imbalanced. If the PCs don't prepare for it with other research to figure out what questions to ask in the first place, it's not going to help them much.

That means it's just another part of playing the game.
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Old 10-03-2018, 10:07 AM   #23
Skarg
 
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Default Re: Wishes

Thankfully, Steve recently posted that the GM can choose to answer the question or not - if the GM declines, the wish isn't consumed.

Whether wishes can/will be cranked out in large numbers or not depends a lot on how risky it actually is (currently a bit of a matter of detailed rules interpretation and/or GM rulings), and whether you've got a semi-suicidal wizard who can & will cast it or not. Probably there will always be at least a few such wizards, but how many and how long they last depends a lot on the chances of death and/or demon rampages.

Of course, I imagine Steve didn't think to also re-word the Trance spell, which is a safe way to get up to two two Y/N questions answered per day... unless the GM alters it.

Wyzard, your point about unknown unknowns makes complete sense (it helps if you're not being cross-examined and say something like "the things you know you know" versus "the things you don't even know that you don't know, but that are still true and important".

However, I would also make a distinction that the bar (or my bar, anyway) for knowledge magic is not even close to being about PCs being able to know everything so that nothing can get them. It's more about:

* Many things should take normal means to learn, and remain subjective or incompletely known. Having a way to snap fingers for binary truth bypasses all sorts of world situations that are otherwise interesting, and prevents quite a bit of natural scheming and secrets and changes the whole nature of who can logically know what, or what you can safely assume remains unknown. (Consider espionage, loyalty tests, murder cases, all sorts of research questions, cosmological questions... the list of questions people would love Y/N answers to but normally really cannot get, or that takes something significant to get, is as long as the imagination... and to me, that seems like an infinite list of interesting game situations that can get undermined by allowing this sort of ability without limits on what can be asked and how clear and reliable the answers are.
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Old 10-03-2018, 10:28 AM   #24
Shadekeep
 
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Default Re: Wishes

I think it could be more interesting if a wish granted a ONE WORD answer, rather than a YES/NO answer. That would give the GM latitude for creativity and ambiguity, while also giving the wisher something to think about. I see that a narratively more inventive and satisfying.
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Old 10-03-2018, 02:31 PM   #25
JLV
 
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Default Re: Wishes

Quote:
Originally Posted by Shadekeep View Post
I think it could be more interesting if a wish granted a ONE WORD answer, rather than a YES/NO answer. That would give the GM latitude for creativity and ambiguity, while also giving the wisher something to think about. I see that a narratively more inventive and satisfying.
That's good, but I still wouldn't want to limit the GM's creativity too much. I always liked the answers the Magic Mirror Persillian gave in Jack Vance's Lyonesse series, for example; everything from poetry to speeches about fairness, to one-word answers -- all of which were highly apt, but most of which were fairly opaque to their recipients. Of course that requires the GM to either have very quick wits or to have planned a wide variety of potential answers to a lot of obvious and not-so-obvious questions well in advance!
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Old 10-03-2018, 04:11 PM   #26
Skarg
 
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Default Re: Wishes

You can also summon a demon and just ask it questions with one-word answers (but it's appropriately limited to what the demon knows about the question, whatever that is), or tell it go teleport someplace to get some info and come back and tell you what it found out, without even having to win a mortal contest of wills to get a wish.

Last edited by Skarg; 10-03-2018 at 04:17 PM.
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