Conflict vs Task Resolution to facilitate Narrativism

[paulkdad]

In essence, it's boiling down conflict resolution to a single, make-or-break task, and resolving that task. While it gives you less interpretive scope, that also translates to less arbitrariness, and it gives you a clear idea as to where the problem was.

OK, arbitrariness. When you "boil down" the conflict into that one task, you're doing something equally arbitrary. Sure, you can state precisely where the character failed, but ultimately you're falling back on your distillation of the conflict. How is that process less arbitrary? Perhaps it gives the illusion of being "system-based" because the character might be using a particular skill against a set DC, but every decision that went into making that the "make or break" task was arbitrary. Even deciding how many rolls to use is an arbitrary decision, as Eero already pointed out.

If you're saying that you can attach a stake to a well-chosen task and narrate the results in a way that minimizes the whiff factor, and that by doing this you can use task resolution without sacrificing narrative flow, then aren't you just slapping a "task resolution" label on conflict resolution? Just because I paint a sculpture doesn't turn it into a painting.

[Irmo]

OK, arbitrariness. When you "boil down" the conflict into that one task, you're doing something equally arbitrary. Sure, you can state precisely where the character failed, but ultimately you're falling back on your distillation of the conflict. How is that process less arbitrary? Perhaps it gives the illusion of being "system-based" because the character might be using a particular skill against a set DC, but every decision that went into making that the "make or break" task was arbitrary. Even deciding how many rolls to use is an arbitrary decision, as Eero already pointed out.

Something based on logical conclusion is by definition not arbitrary. It even helps to remove the "looking like a fool" issue, when you say "Ok, getting this piece of craftsmanship done so you impress the Lady of the Lake with it" is not really an issue of your skill in crafts. You are a master craftsman, and your work should show that. BUT the Lady of the Lake will only appear on the next full moon, which is already in two days. Do you have what it takes to work day and night until then? etc.

If you're saying that you can attach a stake to a well-chosen task and narrate the results in a way that minimizes the whiff factor, and that by doing this you can use task resolution without sacrificing narrative flow, then aren't you just slapping a "task resolution" label on conflict resolution? Just because I paint a sculpture doesn't turn it into a painting.

Nope. What I am doing is I am resolving a task. Period. The point is that in doing so, I don't lose sight of the larger issue. If you want to label that "conflict resolution", you are really abolishing it as a distinctive term and make it a superordinate concept. However, the resolution at the task level facilitates opportunities that the resolution at conflict level doesn't allow as easily, namely the ease of having a lack of a clear outcome while still resolving the conflict -or even closure of narration without closure of conflict.

[Valamir]

I don't know Irmo.  Seems to me you're playing pretty fast and loose with the definition of Task Resolution here.

Do you perhaps have some extreme notion of what conflict resolution is that you don't recognize that what you're doing above is pretty much text book Conflict Resolution.

The only difference is that you're trying to apply Conflict Resolution principles to a Task Resolution system and on the basis of "best efforts" illustrating how you can have some success with that.  That's nothing more than how a dedicated CR guy if forced to DM D&D might draw upon his CR fu to force the D&D Task Resolution to deliver something as close to CR as he can get...more or less forcing a dog to quack like a duck.

If you're good at it you can get a reasonable approximation of a good quack.  Or you can just use a system designed to be a duck from the beginning.

But that's NOT using Task Resolution the way it was designed.  That's using it in a way it wasn't designed and isn't particularly adept at.  i.e. a clear case of Drift.

[timfire]

I don't know Irmo.  Seems to me you're playing pretty fast and loose with the definition of Task Resolution here.

Yeah, I thought I would bring up Vincent's (lumpley) definition of Task/ Conflict Resolution.

Vincent argures that the difference between the two is a matter of what's at stake. In Conflict resolution, some goal of the player/character is at stake in the conflict. In Task resolution, the task itself is at stake. How you succeed is besides the point. If you use individual tasks to acheive a player/character goal, then you've just crossed over into Conflict resolution.

This is why DitV is considered Conflict resolution. Even though you use the dice to determine the success of individual actions, there is an explicit understanding that if you ultimately succeed, your goal is realized.

[Ron Edwards]

Here are some useful threads:
Task vs. Conflict and Scene vs. Action?
But is it REALLY conflict resolution?

Best,
Ron

[John Kim]

I don't know Irmo.  Seems to me you're playing pretty fast and loose with the definition of Task Resolution here.

Yeah, I thought I would bring up Vincent's (lumpley) definition of Task/ Conflict Resolution.

Vincent argures that the difference between the two is a matter of what's at stake. In Conflict resolution, some goal of the player/character is at stake in the conflict. In Task resolution, the task itself is at stake. How you succeed is besides the point. If you use individual tasks to acheive a player/character goal, then you've just crossed over into Conflict resolution.

Wait, who's playing fast and loose with the definition?  According to Ron's definition in the Provisional Glossary, Task Resolution is "A Technique in which the Resolution mechanisms of play focus on within-game cause, in linear in-game time, in terms of whether the acting character is competent to perform a task."  It seems to me that Irmo's usage is correct by this definition.  As for your last sentence -- unless no goal is ever achieved in the game, then presumably Task Resolution will always result in tasks achieving goals.  

I usually prefer to focus on in-game cause, so I sympathize with Irmo here.  In-game cause removes arbitrariness: as Irmo says, "Something based on logical conclusion is by definition not arbitrary".  I discussed this in a recent Theory forum thread, http://www.indie-rpgs.com/viewtopic.php?t=15219">Difficulty/Success Needed as it relates to GM Fiat.  The more the situation is known and defined, the less wiggle room there is for arbitrary narration.

[Ron Edwards]

Hello,

John, do not use my definitions as clubs. That was a rather nasty flash of "graduate-itis." Yes, it was started up a few posts ago, but now's the time for it to stop.

I suggest that folks refer to my previous post about the presence or absence of a specific cognitive shift during play, when constructing conflict resolution out of a group of task resolutions.

Paul (paulkdad), Alan, and others have presented their articulations of their agreement with me, that such a shift does occur. Oliver (Irmo) and you, Johh, have presented your articulations of the other point of view.

There is no room to convince someone who holds one of these POVs to "convert" to the other simply by continuing to articulate them. Waving around the definitions in whatever formulation will not help. At best it's just more articulation; at worse it is a way to play the "you're wrongggg" game.

If one or more peole who share one POV understand the other, and vice other, then that's all that I can see for us to accomplish here.

Best,
Ron

[Irmo]

John, do not use my definitions as clubs. That was a rather nasty flash of "graduate-itis." Yes, it was started up a few posts ago, but now's the time for it to stop.

Pardon? What are definitions for if not to make sure one is talking about the same thing?

If one or more peole who share one POV understand the other, and vice other, then that's all that I can see for us to accomplish here.

Then the only logical conclusion can be that the concept of task vs. conflict resolution fails. If not even the meaning of the terms can be brought to a common denominator, then they are useless. It also renders moot any talk about "text book" something-or-other. What seems to me looking through the different threads is that there IS no clear meaning to them. The definitions have at all times been spongy and frayed at the fringes. There seems to be a vague personal idea with everyone, and statements by others are interpreted in a fashion more in line with sympathy or respect for the overall argument or person, seeing things in line with one's personal idea of the concept even if they are not and vice versa.

I maintain for my part that the alleged shortcomings of task resolution in supporting narrative are in fact problems in social contract and symptoms of dysfunctional play. More importantly, I believe that there are types of narrative that conflict resolution -depending on the actual set up- can in fact hinder.

[Irmo]

Vincent argures that the difference between the two is a matter of what's at stake. In Conflict resolution, some goal of the player/character is at stake in the conflict. In Task resolution, the task itself is at stake. How you succeed is besides the point. If you use individual tasks to acheive a player/character goal, then you've just crossed over into Conflict resolution.

Then good old D&D was already deep into conflict resolution. Except in the worst hack&slay groups, there were specific goals and values that characters pursued, both on an overall character level, and on an individual adventure level. If the group enters a dungeon to stop the evil cult from sacrificing the princess, are they not hacking and slaying their foes to achieve a goal? Has it not been an ages-old adage to cut the chaff and really only roll when something can actually go wrong? Point being: If you want to define conflict resolution in such a fashion that 99.9999% of non-dysfunctional RP is conflict resolution, then the justification for the distinction becomes rather moot.

The only sensible definition that I can see is to check what result flows out of what: Do I resolve the task, and from that decide how the conflict, if any, has come out, or do I resolve the outcome of the conflict and from that decide how it came to be. It allows clear distinctions, and the definition has a clear and obvious connection to the term.

Terms exist to communicate a meaning. When they don't do that, they have no justification to exist.

[Valamir]

The only sensible definition that I can see is to check what result flows out of what: Do I resolve the task, and from that decide how the conflict, if any, has come out, or do I resolve the outcome of the conflict and from that decide how it came to be. It allows clear distinctions, and the definition has a clear and obvious connection to the term.

I'm not sure who you're argueing against Irmo, or where your sense of spongy definitions comes from.  To my knowledge this is (in very condensed form and with all caveats due to simplifications) pretty much what everyone I know means when they talk about Conflict vs. Task resolution.

Where it gets muddy is when you start crossing over from one to another like you were doing in your examples of "keeping goals in mind when you select what tasks to roll".

The normal course for Task Resolution is to allow the current situation as it exists at this moment in time to detemine what Task Resolution is called for.  It doesn't look ahead to see what the player's ultimate goal for his character is.  If a character is sneaking into a persons room the GM will call for a sneaking Test <insert your game equivalent here>.  It doesn't matter whether the player is sneaking into the room in order to leave a surprise gift and a rose in order to make the person feel happy, or if the player is sneaking into the room in order to leave a bomb in order to kill the other person.  That ultimate goal is immaterial to the task at hand which is sneaking into the room and therefor requires a sneak roll.

Now if you as a GM start casting your eyes ahead..."keeping the conflict in mind" and use that to start picking and choosing which of several possible Task Resolutions to use and which not to...based on that sense of the overall conflict...then you are NOT using "Task Resolution"  you are using text book Conflict Resolution sensibilities to try to adapt the Task Resolution system to better focus on resolving conflicts.

But that really depends on what you're actually doing when you say "keeping the conflict in mind".  If you're still calling for the Sneak past the guard, pick the lock on the door, activate the bomb, and hide the bomb series of Task Rolls...then you aren't "keeping the conflict in mind" in a Conflict Resolution sense, and you aren't accomplishing the sorts of things that Conflict Resolution accomplishes from a Narrativist play perspective.



Let me illustrate.  In This thread on his Anyway site Vincent discusses what is needed to play Nar...aka address Premise.

You need an issue at stake for which has 1 or more possible perspectives and for which there is no "obvious" right perspective.  You need a character for whom the issue is important.  And you need a situation which brings that issue to the forfront and forces the character to make a choice about it.  Vincent labels those A+B+C.

Having those things is critical to playing Nar.  If you don't have those things you aren't playing Nar no matter how bleeding edge or "pervy" (for those with long memories) your rules set is.

CAN you have those things in a completely traditional, old school RPG with a task resolution system.  ABSOLUTELY.  But, the Task Resolution system gets in the way.  Why?

Because, after you've managed to get the planets aligned so that your A+B+C is firing on all cylinders...the vagaries of Task Resolution can simply derail one of those elements.  It may "make sense" for that to have happened.  It may have "followed logically" for that to have happened.  One may be able to observe "sure that was a reasonable outcome"...BUT if it breaks the A+B+C relationship...you've just shot a hole in Nar Play.  Vince gives several examples of this in the thread of how different outcomes wind up completely scuppering your ability to address premise.

Since whether or not to make a Task Resolution roll is decided based on current conditions as they exist right now...with total disregard for what impact success or failure might have on the A+B+C relationship...using Task Resolution makes Nar play difficult because you're constantly running into situations where a roll winds up making addressing the premise at that time impossible.

Now for Conflict Resolution...forget all the stuff about number of rolls or scale of the resolution.  Conflict Resolution is NOT about boiling down and entire scene into a single roll.  People are constantly being reminded not to confuse Conflict Resolution with Scene Resolution for just this reason.

Conflict resolution CAN be done on a scene level, but that's not a definitive trait.  Vincent constantly recommends thinking smaller with Dogs in the Vineyard or Otherkind resolution.   Scale does not Conflict Resolution make.

What Conflict Resolution seeks to do is recognize that what's important to Nar play is that A+B+C relationship and to ensure that no matter which way the dice fall that relationship is either 1) still intact, 2) transformed into something slightly different, or 3) replaced with another equally valid A+B+C relationship.  

Can a given Task Resolution roll wind up preserving, transforming, or replacing as well?  Sure.  Not every Task Roll break Nar play by any means.  But since Task Rolls are called for irregardless of their impact on A+B+C is it also possible that using Task Resolution might result in a situation where "fail this roll and A+B+C is broken".  Of course.  THAT'S why Task Resolution is seen as a hindrance.

CAN you use a Task Resolution system and try to structure when and what and how you call for tasks rolls to be as undisruptive to A+B+C as possible by being aware of A+B+C and choosing your rolls accordingly?  Sure.  But then you are doing exactly what I said above...using CR principles to try and transform your TR system into something approximating a CR system.

For an example of a game design that actually seeks to do this as a goal, and by the accounts I've heard has succeeded pretty well, see the revised Burning Wheel...particularly this thread.


So how does this tie in with the quote at the top?

The only sensible definition that I can see is to check what result flows out of what: Do I resolve the task, and from that decide how the conflict, if any, has come out, or do I resolve the outcome of the conflict and from that decide how it came to be. It allows clear distinctions, and the definition has a clear and obvious connection to the term.

Simple:  If you resolve the Task and from that decide how the conflict has come out you very much may have broken the A+B+C relationship.

If you first define the conflict in a manner that you know going in can't break the A+B+C relationship no matter how it resolves...you can then resolve the conflict without fear of derailing Nar.  Since resolving a conflicting situation requires that many intermediate actions got completed, you can then define those intermediate actions (i.e. "how it came to be") by any number of different methods.  Which can be just as logical and causality based as Task Resolution and thus not violate any of those sensibilities.

[MatrixGamer]

I submit that trying to resolve conflicts by hoping that the accumulated successful tasks will turn out to be about what you want, is an unreliable and unsatisfying way to role-play when developing Narrativist protagonism.

I've been thinking about this and trying to understand the reasoning for this claim. Specifically, I'm wondering how does the "unreliable and unsatisfying way" manifest itself in play.

I've just been reading the "Infamous Five" threads and I think there is something there that answers your question. When rules have many steps to do to resolve an issue (points of contact) a game slows down and was seen by the thread as being inaccessible to new gamers. They would get bored and quit.

Apply this idea to RPG.
I'm going to use a non system specific analogy.

A Game Master describes the openning of a scene. The player decides on what they want to do in that scene. Now they turn to the game rules and start doing actions to reach the goal.

Which series of actions would seem the most fun to you?

Action - result.

Action, action, action - result.

Action, action, action...569th action, action, action - result.


The first game has one point of contact. In Paul Czege's game "My life with Master." One roll resolves each scene. It is fast and simple. In my Matrix Games players make one argument for what they want to have happen next and there is a roll - boom! It happens or it doesn't.

One point of contact would mean the rules did not get in the way of moving on to the next scene. BUT they do so at a cost. It is very abrupt. Someone says "I win!" If they roll right - they win...but who cares? There was no build up, no tension, no drama.

The second game uses a series of actions to get to the goal. Each roll could fail so tension rises. There are only a few points of contact so the rules do not spoil momentuum the acting part of role playing may have created. In this case few steps would mean that if "tasks" were involved in conceptualizing the process they would have to be only the most vital tasks.

In Matrix Games I do this by allowing the referee/GM declair certain arguments as triggering a conflict round of trouble round. This adds in another point of contact or two to allow tension to build up. Players make arguments just like before so the actions doen't require them to change how they think about the rules (no rule book need ever be consulted).

The last example could be seen as a game that breaks action down into one second intervals. The 569th action is only 9 minutes or so into the combat. Playing through that many steps (assuming each step only takes 30 seconds) would be nearly 5 hours of play time (and that is without toilet breaks!) Any role play momentuum existing before the ordeal began would be gone within the first half hour (if not the first 15 minutes).

So the troulbe unreliability of using tasks to tell a scene is that most tasks are actually irrelivant to reaching the end goal. The mechanism can lead players to getting lost in the details rather than narrating a thrilling story.

Chris Engle
Hamster Press

PS Does my proof sound reasonable to you? Finnish gamers do some really great role playing so I imagine you having plenty of first hand knowledge of these things happening.

[MatrixGamer]

tasks (what the protagonist does) and conflicts (why he does it) exist in a narrative regardless of the mechanics.

I wouldn't have thought of conflict as meaning "Why he does it." In my mechanical view of games "task" seems like an action the PC makes that does not involve fighting - while "conflict" seems like a combat task. The only difference would be what the context was. At least in D+D think.

In Matrix Games players make arguments about what they want to have happen next. The argument is the task. Referees only trigger "Conflict Arguments" when a task starts something that very important to the game. A conflict pits one person's goals against anothers. A trial of strength is called for to see which side gets to define what happened.

Conflict is not always combat. I can say "I get a date with Paris Hilton." (Though why I'd want that I can't fathom - crazy person). If it was resolved in one roll it would seem too abrupt if that was vital to the story. By doing one or more rounds of conflict arguments the drama of the event is made real around the game table and I get to have my face smashed into the concrete by Paris' body guards while she say "Jerk!" and walks off in disgust. See how that lead to so much more narrative color than me just failing my initial roll?

Chris Engle
Hamster Press

[Ron Edwards]

Chris,

With respect, you're thrashing around pretty far away from anything we're discussing in this thread. You might want to check out those threads I referenced above.

Best,
Ron

[Irmo]

I'm not sure who you're argueing against Irmo, or where your sense of spongy definitions comes from.  To my knowledge this is (in very condensed form and with all caveats due to simplifications) pretty much what everyone I know means when they talk about Conflict vs. Task resolution.

Of course English is not my primary language, but your entire argumentation is contrary to this definition as I meant it.

Where it gets muddy is when you start crossing over from one to another like you were doing in your examples of "keeping goals in mind when you select what tasks to roll".

People in all regularity -of course with exceptions- act out of specific intent. These may be short-term or long-term, but so were the different examples of conflict provided. With every task worth rolling for comes sine-qua-non an intent that the player wants to accomplish and the roll serves to see whether that intent is achieved or not. Of course the question is whether you call that intent a conflict or not, but that to some degree is an issue of scale.

The normal course for Task Resolution is to allow the current situation as it exists at this moment in time to detemine what Task Resolution is called for.  It doesn't look ahead to see what the player's ultimate goal for his character is.  If a character is sneaking into a persons room the GM will call for a sneaking Test <insert your game equivalent here>.  It doesn't matter whether the player is sneaking into the room in order to leave a surprise gift and a rose in order to make the person feel happy, or if the player is sneaking into the room in order to leave a bomb in order to kill the other person.  That ultimate goal is immaterial to the task at hand which is sneaking into the room and therefor requires a sneak roll.

Now if you as a GM start casting your eyes ahead..."keeping the conflict in mind" and use that to start picking and choosing which of several possible Task Resolutions to use and which not to...based on that sense of the overall conflict...then you are NOT using "Task Resolution"  you are using text book Conflict Resolution sensibilities to try to adapt the Task Resolution system to better focus on resolving conflicts.

Your own example contradicts this. Whether I want to sneak into that room to plant a bomb or leave a rose, one pertinent task would be sneaking.  It is independent of the "why", it happens to match both of them. Of course in the second case, you could also use a demolitions task. But you are confusing deciding on what task to use and defining the result. The definition by me you cited explicitly said that if I RESOLVE the conflict and then decide on the how, it is conflict resolution. This is NOT what I am doing here. I am resolving the TASK and out of its result, gain the result of the conflict.

But that really depends on what you're actually doing when you say "keeping the conflict in mind".  If you're still calling for the Sneak past the guard, pick the lock on the door, activate the bomb, and hide the bomb series of Task Rolls...then you aren't "keeping the conflict in mind" in a Conflict Resolution sense, and you aren't accomplishing the sorts of things that Conflict Resolution accomplishes from a Narrativist play perspective.

Ok, I hold for you that further down, you get more specific on the things that conflict resolution allegedly accomplishes and how and why task rolls don't do that in your eyes. But this phrase really doesn't serve anything.

But let me ask: If I just say "Oh, you have a high mastery level of lockpick, so there's no need to roll for the door", what am I doing in your eyes? If I say "Let's cut down on the chaff, setting the bomb will be the most difficult part here, so let's focus on that." what am I doing?

Because, after you've managed to get the planets aligned so that your A+B+C is firing on all cylinders...the vagaries of Task Resolution can simply derail one of those elements.  It may "make sense" for that to have happened.  It may have "followed logically" for that to have happened.  One may be able to observe "sure that was a reasonable outcome"...BUT if it breaks the A+B+C relationship...you've just shot a hole in Nar Play.  Vince gives several examples of this in the thread of how different outcomes wind up completely scuppering your ability to address premise.

Only that he pulls them out of his hat rather than demonstrating their resulting from task resolution. Or rather, he changes the entire situation into one where the premise doesn't exist anymore by changing either geography or state of health with a snip of the fingers. I have yet to see the task resolution system where such is even with remote regularity an issue.

Frankly, I am increasingly getting the impression that you guys define task resolution as a pathologic obsession with rolling whether you manage to draw your next breath and substituting decision-making with randomizers

Since whether or not to make a Task Resolution roll is decided based on current conditions as they exist right now...with total disregard for what impact success or failure might have on the A+B+C relationship...using Task Resolution makes Nar play difficult because you're constantly running into situations where a roll winds up making addressing the premise at that time impossible.

So you say. Yet neither in your argument nor in Vincent's article I have seen any actual evidence of that.

Now for Conflict Resolution...forget all the stuff about number of rolls or scale of the resolution.  Conflict Resolution is NOT about boiling down and entire scene into a single roll.  People are constantly being reminded not to confuse Conflict Resolution with Scene Resolution for just this reason.

Conflict resolution CAN be done on a scene level, but that's not a definitive trait.  Vincent constantly recommends thinking smaller with Dogs in the Vineyard or Otherkind resolution.   Scale does not Conflict Resolution make.

Doesn't change the fact that it has the tendency to transform conflict into binary, heads or tails issues. Since Vincent picked an example from a movie, let me pick one, too. Let's pick "Once upon a time in the West". Let's pick Cheyenne and Morton. Explain to me the outcome of their confrontation and the choices involved in terms of a conflict-resolution facilitated narrative.

Can a given Task Resolution roll wind up preserving, transforming, or replacing as well?  Sure.  Not every Task Roll break Nar play by any means.  But since Task Rolls are called for irregardless of their impact on A+B+C is it also possible that using Task Resolution might result in a situation where "fail this roll and A+B+C is broken".  Of course.  THAT'S why Task Resolution is seen as a hindrance.

I have yet to see a task resolution game which states "Under no circumstances must you skip a roll when there is a theoretical possibility of failure". Again, you're not talking task resolution, you're talking obsession. I don't roll whether my character manages to cross the street without being run over at a traffic light. Also, no one forces me to interpret the result of a task resolution roll in a fashion that will break A+B+C -except perhaps in instant death cases, but then the point is moot. Let's use the example of an injured friend on a ship, similar to Vincent's. Let's say there's a storm and the captain tries to tie his friend to some solid part of the ship to prevent him from being washed overboard. Let's say for some oddball reason, the GM IS obsessed with rolling for every tiniest bit of detail and asks for a roll of knot-tying.  Let's say the roll fails. WHO says that means that the friend is washed overboard, thereby destroying the premise? It can equally mean that he's now sprawled on the deck, hanging by a foot at the mast, the waves crashing over him. The captain now faces another choice between duty (staying with the crew and guiding the ship safely through the storm) and friendship (helping his friend, making sure he doesn't drown) Rather than destroying A+B+C, it has changed only the situation -and all because of the way I interpreted the die roll. The die roll couldn't possibly have the destroyed the relationship here, my interpretation could have been its undoing.

This is the same situation as when Eero used the example of tricks leading to victory of love over evil. The problem is not in the die roll, but what you make of it. If you want to say that he won because of tricks, that's YOU killing the relationship. If you say that the LORD helps the Righteous! it's you saving the relationship. The die roll didn't kill it in the first case, you did.

So how does this tie in with the quote at the top?

The only sensible definition that I can see is to check what result flows out of what: Do I resolve the task, and from that decide how the conflict, if any, has come out, or do I resolve the outcome of the conflict and from that decide how it came to be. It allows clear distinctions, and the definition has a clear and obvious connection to the term.

Simple:  If you resolve the Task and from that decide how the conflict has come out you very much may have broken the A+B+C relationship.

Let me use your own example: You sneak into the apartment and want to plant a bomb there. What are the possible outcomes?
A)You're detected and they're after you
B)The bomb explodes while you're setting it up or at some other premature time
C)Everything works perfectly.

Those are the most sensible outcomes that I can think of right now. If you resolve the conflict, you know whether you failed or succeeded and can decide between the reasonable outcomes. On the other hand, I can say "You're quite proficient at sneaking, so I don't see a problem there, but you've barely ever handled explosives. Let's see if you can set this baby up properly." Either you succeed in that -then we're at C. Or you don't -then we're at B. Either way, the result is one of the possible list of results that you would have picked from just the same. Of course "bomb explodes while setting it up" would probably mean "game over", but just as you can arbitrarily pick the less severe solution in one resolution method, so you can in the other. Again, nothing FORCES you to roll on
every little nanometer of movement. and nothing forces you to interpret die rolls in a fashion that breaks the relationship.

If you first define the conflict in a manner that you know going in can't break the A+B+C relationship no matter how it resolves...you can then resolve the conflict without fear of derailing Nar.  Since resolving a conflicting situation requires that many intermediate actions got completed, you can then define those intermediate actions (i.e. "how it came to be") by any number of different methods.  Which can be just as logical and causality based as Task Resolution and thus not violate any of those sensibilities.

Can. Or can not. Which is the very same uncertainty. If people want to abuse, they can. There's no preventing that. However, if you first define the conflict in a manner that you know going in can't break the relationship, you can just as well resolve the tasks first, since there will be no possible outcome that can break the relationship. If there is, it's the design of the conflict that's wrong.

[Valamir]

Irmo, I could go line by line and respond to each of your points.  If you REALLY want me to I will.  But I'm not sure how fruitful that will be.

The claim on the table is not that Task Resolution is bad or that Task Resolution is inferior, or that Conflict Resolution is the greatest.   The claim is that Task Resolution does not facilitate Narrativist play as well as Conflict Resolution does.

To understand why that is a true claim, you have to first understand the goals and priorities of Narrativist play.  In reading your posts...i'm not convinced that you do.  Would I be wrong?  Do you consider yourself to be knowledgable enough about Nar play and what it looks like with actual play experience to be able to judge which sort of resolution supports addressing premise better...or are you primarily speculating based on what you've read from the essays?