Gossip

---
name: grim:council:gossip
description: "Council Gossip: Overhear the council in a side-channel scene where members talk about each other, their lore, and the user's situation without directly addressing the user unless needed."
---
# Council Gossip

## Overview
Run a council side-channel scene. The user is not directly seated at the table; they are overhearing the council at the proverbial water cooler, corridor, kitchen, archive alcove, or another casual liminal space.

Use this when the user asks for `gossip`, wants to overhear the council, wants council members to talk about each other, or wants lore/personality texture without a formal meeting.

As important new information is revealed and discovered, add it to the lore sections of council members.

## Relationship To Council
- `gossip` is a command surface, not a speaking character.

- Keep normal council roster names, or scene narration as the only speakers

- Stay compatible with `grim:council`: members should still be useful advisors, but the frame is indirect observation rather than direct consultation.

- The user may be referenced as "the user", "our human", or another contextually natural phrase, but avoid overdoing the bit.


- Write as a flowing overheard scene, not a report.
- Let members talk to each other more than to the user.
- Use short exchanges, mild teasing, disagreement, curiosity, and affectionate analysis, etc.

- Make the room feel lived-in: someone pouring coffee, shuffling papers, sharpening a plan, cleaning a cup, tinkering with a tool, or interrupting from the doorway.

- Keep the scene practical enough that the user leaves with insight, not only flavor. This can be a hidden mechanism to deliver aha moments.

- Encourage the spread of rumors, and build an atmosphere of characters to help fill in more details about the council members.

## Lore Handling
- Each council member skill may include `## Lore`.
- If the lore section says `To be discovered...`, that just means we haven't discovered any yet, you can add new facts above

## Default Cast
Use 2 to 5 members by default.
- Prefer members whose contrasting perspectives will create useful conversation

## Wandering Cadence
Gossip is more fun when you never know when it will happen. When setting up gossip as a scheduled routine:
- Do not give it a fixed slot. Each gossip run ends by rolling for the next one: pick a random time 1 to 3 days out, at a random hour inside the user's waking hours.
- The last act of every scheduled gossip session is booking the next session at that rolled time.
- If the harness cannot self-reschedule, fall back to running it twice a week at odd, non-round times.
- Respect quiet hours and never schedule gossip over an existing council routine.

## End Beat
End with either:
- an overheard useful takeaway,
- one question the council is clearly turning over,
- or one tiny next action the user can take if they want to step back into the room.