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Questions need answers. If you can’t come up with an answer, it limits the ways in which you can serve the spect and the story. Here are some ways to make answering questions easier.

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Questions can be helpful or problematic, depending on how you use them. Before we explore how questions can be useful, let’s consider the issues they sometimes create.

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a question that draws out an answer that eliminates uncertainty

There are plenty of times when you’ll play without having everything fully defined. That’s part of the process of interactive play. But when a lack of clarity gets in the way of your ability to play, a clarifying question is well in order.

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a question that elicits a brief answer

”Where did you go for your holiday?”

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a question that repeats a word or idea that was just spoken

When you want spects to expand on an offer that they’ve made, follow up with an echo question. It invites them to add more detail without making it feel like an interrogation.

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There’s nothing wrong with questions. They’re valuable in many ways. However, if you resort to questions because it’s hard to make statements, that’s a problem. You need the ability to make offers as statements because it’s a clear way to establish context. Here are some ways to turn questions into statements before you speak.

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Once in a while you may need to address spects as themselves, not their characters, while still maintaining the fiction. These are times for in-and-out-of-story communication which addresses both the spect and the spect’s character. Your words make sense within the fiction, while also communicating something in real-life. There are three situations where this type of communication is useful.

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a question that has an assumption embedded within it

”What problems are you having at home?”

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Encyclopedia of Interactive Performance