[arg_discuss] Topic of the Week Aug. 17: Ghost Players

[Brian Clark]

> We used "ghost players" in Art of the Heist


Naw, those weren't "ghost players" -- everyone knew they were fictional
characters.

The specific presentation that spurred this conversation at ARGfest was from
a group that had some of their people participating in live groups, but with
instructions to push the group along in a particular direction. The "real
players" would have thought those were other "real players" up until the
moment they had the party at the end (when they did reveal that those "ghost
players" were cast members.) They did this because they had rather
aggressive timelines of interdependencies, so the "ghost players" were a way
of controlling pacing.

For me, the big issue this introduces is actually the potential mistrust
among players.