Here's a story about talking to your players. A few years ago I was running Shadow of the Demon Lord, a great dark fantasy game. One of the players was playing a robot (they're called Clockworks) and he was a criminal, and he was trying to work his way up in the mob.

I wrote up how the mob was run and mentioned that it had a historic prejudice against clockworks. They were seen as untrustworthy. The boss liked to do secret meetings in saunas to keep things you know, for fleshies. I thought this was a cool hook because

the PC was waterproof, he was built to hold beer. Anyway, a bit later, the PC told me he wanted to slow poison and assassinate everyone in the mob until he was in charge. Now it's tough to do morality in a collaborative story. Shadows of the Demon Lord is a dark game.

Specifically, it is a game where moral corruption has a physical presence. It eats you out inside with disease and mutation and sickness. This is a horror universe where bad people are full of ichor. So I started down this arc where the character was slowly gaining Corruption

I figured the narrative map here was "what is the cost of attaining your dreams" kinda thing where he was wiping out Bad Guys but becoming a monster. My player however was aghast and affronted. He was like WTF YOU DOING TO MY CHARACTER MAN??? See, in his head, the

In his head, the mafia were Very Bad Dudes because of their racism (I'm Gen X, see, so I kinda just threw it in. Younger folks are much more black and white there. Good for them). So he was like, this is not the story of me turning evil. This is the story of the noble thief.

The noble thief who takes out the sickness in the thieves guild and brings it back to being Thieves of Honour. We were in the same game, we were similar people, we had a game contract, X cards, the same RPG in our hands. Totally different mind views.

And here's the REALLY IMPORTANT KICKER: THIS PROBLEM COULD NOT HAVE BEEN SOLVED WITH PLAY.
The only way we could realise we were on different pages was by stopping and explaining what we were thinking and resetting.
Can't do it in play. Not possible.

And honestly as a GM I was a bit cranky. I'd set up my version of morality in my head. How dare someone say my universe didn't work that way? How dare someone try to murder folks and "get away with it"??? It's a cruel universe! Doesn't he get that???

I mention that because you need to be aware of your emotions, so you can process them properly.
Got to use "I statements". Got to be open. Got to be giving.
This shit is hard. Gird thy loins if ye play games because shit gets real in there.

And HERE IS THE BIG ONE: The Magic Circle is not a crutch so you don't have to get real. That's not how games work. In fact, the Magic Circle is a GUN that makes it MUCH MORE DANGEROUS.
Don't pick up a game and be careless. Take shit seriously. Because it deserves it. Steve out.