Who dipped me?
I didn't see it but I know they robbed me!

There are a lot of situations where players and characters can (and will) have different information and make different decisions, and where the line between the two is is often not clear and remains up to players to decide. Certainly players can do whatever they like in these situations since there is no policing of identification, players can be entirely metagaming or entirely playing to their character and it's up to them.

Should they though? Well, possibly not.

In this very specific scenario there is actually an additional bit of meta information for a player to consider when transposing what they think they know, onto what their character knows, which is that in this situation (and a few other types with similar 'do I know' checks) the player themselves knows their character has just failed a skill check to be aware of what happened.

Say for a moment that the game worked differently and there was no hidden skill checks, that the game was explicit to the player what their character had failed at and they see 'X stole Y from you, but your character didn't notice it'. In that scenario it would be much more obvious when a player decides to override what their character knows in favour of what they know and says instead 'well actually I am choosing to notice it' and plays based on that.

I think it is more clear in that context how sometimes players can push the boundaries of what their character should really be aware of, despite what the game is telling them. This is likewise often true of players complaints about characters being able to stealth into locked rooms alongside them, which are usually presented as 'but I would know if someone was coming through a doorway with me, or someone was in a small room with me'... but of course their characters didn't know, because they didn't have the stats or skills to know, but the player nonetheless feels they the player should not be constrained by those limitations.

It is not easy to learn to limit playing abilities, especially ones we feel we've earned through hard work and dedication and experience, to play to stat limitations that constrict those abilities, especially when those abilities involve meta understanding or meta knowledge of the game and its players. At one time identifying someone for a plot purpose was a major triumph to me as a player, now it is often trivial. A one time identification of a character whose player I could recognize in my sleep is pretty much the worst thing I ever did as a player and I've regretted it ever afterwards. I am almost always trying to ignore now what I know as a player, because what does it really do but mess up someone's earned success?

Eventually it's no real win to deduce something that happened, and who was responsible. And there are plenty of scenarios where there is no skill check about what you can and can't know about players to act as guidance so it's really entirely up to player discretion about what they should do, but I think it's best practice to at least make the attempt to limit themselves to the constraints of their characters and not rationalize exceptions.

It is certainly an elegant skill of the very best and most experienced players to be able to veil their intentions and actions even from other players, to create disguises that no one can even suspect might be a disguise, to do something invisibly even under the microscope of a tiny world that is constantly watching.

Should that be the minimum standard for someone to succeed? I don't think so myself, and I think many players would be surprised to know how many times their successes relied on someone else deciding they didn't know something.

In so many words: being reasonably suspicious of disguised people isn't meta, assuming their real identity is meta. Killing every shroud you see isn't reasonable, but considering them as suspects for the Bad Things happening certainly is.

Scenario One: You are a local crime boss. You have way too many enemies to count. People want to kill you just about every time you show your face outside. You notice there's a shrouded individual standing outside your apartment/office/wherever, and that they've stayed there for quite some time. Is it smallworlding to be understandably paranoid that they're waiting to kill you? Nine times out of ten, that's an NPC memento, but I've seen plenty of players roleplay their paranoia (knowingly or unknowingly) and hire a solo to evict the loitering individual (with words, first, and then wrestling or beatings later, not just a cold-blooded bushwhack and necksnap). Maybe they really were just standing there because they wanted to, maybe they were waiting for a friend, but they were just in the wrong place at the wrong time, and that's just how life is in Red sometimes.

Scenario Two: This is what started the argument in the previous thread. You are in a bar chatting with your friends. You notice a shroud come in. No big deal. Shroud says nothing, doesn't seem to interact with anyone, and then suddenly disappears. You didn't even see them leave. Considering you were aware enough to notice them enter, is it not suspicious that you couldn't even notice that they were leaving? Is it not suspicious that they didn't even seem to interact with anyone or order a drink? Even if you explain it away as something completely thematic, such as a solo swinging by to silently scan the crowd for a mark (which does happen as well) it is still suspicious behavior compared to the baseline of coming to social places for social interactions and drinks

For the Mixer Math to follow, you have Bad Things plus Suspicious People equals Assumptions. You might have just swung by to check out the crowd for a mark as a solo, but if someone notices that their shit is missing, they could very well assume your shady ass is the pickpocket and try to follow you. Or, maybe you did steal their shit, and instead of acting cool, you acted shady, and now they're wondering who that shrouded hulking femboy was. In my opinon, that's on you for being shady.

I think this is very interesting. I've never considered it but maybe it would be easier for players to know what things they can assume their characters do and don't notice if the game explicitly stated it instead of just not mentioning it. I've never considered this angle before!

I understand that can be difficult to wrap your head around when thinking about it from a text standpoint, but if you've ever been talking to someone in real life, not looking directly at them, just to turn around and see that they're gone, you could likely understand what I mean. You can notice you didn't notice something, by realizing something has changed without your direct observation of it. Depending on the situation, it can be quite startling. Just as you can notice someone was standing there without you having seen them move into that position, you can notice they've left that position without you having seen them leave.

If I was talking to them and poof, they're gone, for sure I get noticing that. But If I say them come in, looked at them chatted with two other people then eventually noticed they were gone, I'd personally be tempted to have my PC not take any special notice of it.

Now that I think of it, I kind of want to examine the room descriptions to see if places like bars/clubs mention people coming and going regularly. If it's assumed that there is a flow coming and going then I would once again be more inclined not to notice not noticing them depart or hide. Was probably one of the many in the flow and my PC just didn't take note.

I think that, for me, a few takeaways so far are:

1. It's almost always very situational to me. Sometimes it makes sense to notice and assume, sometimes less so.

2. I'm not ever going to be comfortable telling someone that their character should not notice something the game says they see. Or force them to see/hear things the game doesn't say is happening.

3. Assumptions are a character's prerogative but they can do as much harm as good. As they should.

A shroud by itself isn't suspicious. A shroud behaving suspiciously is suspicious.

And suspicious behavior in a shroud is amplified or lessened depending on sector. What's suspicious on Green (walking around an apartment area with a shroud on, seemingly following someone specific for a length with some other factors thrown in), isn't all that suspicious on Gold and is going to be even less suspicious on Red. Because you increase the ambient number of ponchos and hoods there as well as decrease the sector security each level you go down, while the overall population rises.

Also I think we need to step away from the overall thought of 'disguises are used because they don't want their face recognized and that's inherently suspicious' (I didn't pull the direct quote, sorry if it's different, I had this reply copied to paste and didn't want to lose it and I'm in a rush). Wigs and contacts exist to hide faces and are part of the disguise system, and for a long time we had to go through a whole period of people across all sectors trying to use wigs and contacts as a reason to say someone is up to no good. Wigs and contacts are disguise items, yes, we know that on an OOC level that they help bump the disguise score. But in a world built on looks and aesthetic, millions of people are going to be wearing contacts or wigs at one point just for the look. I'd really like us not to go back to people thinking someone wearing contacts (how would you even know if you don't know them???) means someone needs questioned or is a problem.

If an IC source told my character something wasn't suspicious, should be a certain way or is a certain way, my character would strongly question the motivations of that source. I personally find IC sources the lest reliable regarding how the in game world is!