Split from the thread about Agenda & GNS, as this is totally tangental to the main topic of discussion in that (and that thread's basically closed). So...

Also, I've been thinking about where the mythology of shows like Lost and Battlestar Galactica meet GNS. I've seen situations where a lot of the player drive is centered on "figuring things out", but not necessarily on a mystery level of investigation a la Call of Cthuhlu. It's weird. It's more of an expectation of being fed backstory revelations every few sessions or so, but I don't actually have a set up backstory. So it turns into a Czege Principle thing where the players who are interested in discovering this weird backstory are also making it up, which is unsatisfying.

In AW, this is a drive not really to see passionate characters in untenable situations, but to figure out the Apocalypse and the Psychic Maelstrom on a metalevel. Anyone else seen that?

I haven't seen this in AW, but I've definitely seen this drive in games.  I'm somewhat susceptible to it myself - I like that complex backstory and revelations, and am inclined towards putting that sort of thing into games I run where it's applicable.  (I hadn't thought about even trying that in AW, but I can see where it might occur to me, "Hrmm. Fleece is doing this, and Joe's Girl is doing this - It would totally make sense, and complicate things in an interesting way if it was revealed that Fleece was Joe's daughter…"  And I'm not sure if doing something like that works with MCing AW the way you're expected to in the text.

So that's one question.

But for me, the bigger question is where this 'drive to figure stuff out' falls into the conception of RPG theory, and how it might be usefully applied in design.  (I have some stuff I'm working on that it's somewhat applicable to, but it's also just interesting stuff.)

[Not sure if this is the appropriate place in the forums for this, but whatever, if it belongs somewhere else, someone please move it.]

Just an observation from using the 'Ask questions' technique last night in the game I'm MCing.  (Not AW, incidentally. It's applicable to a wide array of games.) (Also, I don't know that this is going to be some huge revelation to anyone else, but it was definitely a 'eureka' moment for me.)

Asking questions like this inverts a kind of exchange that's common in games. 

Normal version goes something like this: Player asks GM a question. GM, having never considered the question before, makes something up on the fly; not letting on that he just pulled this 'fact' out of thin air, GM answers with conviction and authority.  In many games, a HUGE number of 'things' in play get generated this way.

Now, in in AW, when the MC asks provocative questions, it's the player who answers, usually coming up with something on the spot.  What this means is that the impetus of filling in the world becomes a group thing, rather than being channeled through a single individual.

Also interesting to me was that noone seemed to notice the 'flip', or that they were directly contributing to the creation of setting, story, situation, etc... Maybe because there's already a precedent for the GM to query players - it it's what you're asking that makes a difference in this case.