If you don't know what the scene is going to be in advance, then how do you prepare for it? Anyway, the questions that you ask when setting the scene are not esoteric. They are imminently practical.
Example:
One of my PCs decided to infiltrate Yolanella's court with the
intention of gaining influence over her. The PC attended a banquet and
used his Seduction ability to make an impression on her." (A true, if
distasteful episode from my game) What was the purpose of Yolanella in
this scene? She has power (Satrap of Spol) and the player wanted to
use that power for his own purposes. How hard should this be to do? I
set the difficulty based on what I thought my players would enjoy.
Easy victories over notable opponents are not fun, but then again the
PC's victory in this contest didn't diminish Yolanela in the eyes of
the players. Instead, it was just one step forward in a plot line that
was interesting, funny, and more than a bit disturbing. I therefore
made the contest difficult, but not too difficult.
Note: I had no idea that the player was going to try this before he brought up the idea in that night's game. I couldn't have prepared for it if I had wanted to. Using HQ2 this wasn't a problem at all. In most other games, it would have given me a migraine.
-Kevin McD
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