Hostage situations and other ways of introducing Stakes.

[sirogit]

Here's a problem I reached in DitV:

A dog has just told the owner of burlesque house, Cyrus, to close up shop and move along. He doesn't want to, on account that its allowing him to support his brother who was thrown out by his brutalized wife, Phidelia. A conflict is on, with the Stakes of "Whether or not Cyrus closes down the Burlesque house."

The dog has dwindled Cyrus's dice. Cyrus concedes, and turns his back to start walking out of town, when suddenly he pulls out a pistol and levels it at Phidelia.

At this point, I was really unsure of how to treat the conflict.

A) Keep the current conflict, and say that Cyrus has escalated to gun-violence, and that he's pointed the gun at Phidelia instead of the Dog is just color? If the Dog takes the blow, he either got in the way of the bullet or convinced Cyrus to shoot him.

B) Keep the current conflict, and say that Cyrus is still talking, he's just using a paticular method of persuasion. The Dog Sees by sticking to the conflict. Reversing the Blow would be becoming immune to his threats, and Taking the blow would be to be badly effected by them. Either way, the hostage is alive and the conflict presses on.

C) Same as B, except that treat the woman's life as a sort of meta-Stake decided by how the Dog sees: If he takes the blow, she's killed, if he reverses she's free and the egg is on Cyrus's face.

D) Keep the curent conflict, Cyrus has escalated to gun violence, Phidelia is a new side, and now has to see to Cyrus's Raise. The Dog's gonna have to See to keep in the conflict.

E) Disallow the hostage situation, or any situation where someone can pull up an important Stake before the current conflict is finished, and try to work out Cyrus's actions so that there's two distinct Stakes: Whether the burlesque house stays open -and- whether Phidelia lives.

[Trevis Martin]

Um, well I don't know if I'm reading this right but you seem to have said that Cyrus (you as GM) conceeded the conflict  Which means the stakes go to the player.  You can't, I think, conceed the conflict and then re-open it like that.

Now if Cyrus walking away is a 'Take the Blow' kinda see and then he raises with taking a hostage that's another thing all together.

Otherwise I guess its a follow up conflict but instead of "Does Phidelia get killed" I think the stake would center around WHY Cyrus is taking a hostage.  Is it so he can force the dogs to go?  Is it so he can get away without pursuit?

I'd say wether Phileda lives though is incidental to the original stake.  And Cyrus would be well within the rules to kill her as a raise.  Or try to anyway.

my take anyway.

Trevis

[sirogit]

Err, what I meant was, Cyrus -pretended- to concede(I, the GM, was giving the illusion of coneding without actually saying anything out of character.). In actuality, he (and I) was still fighting over whether the burlesque house stays open, and then started shooting Phidela as a way to get the Dog to give up, as both a See(Dodge) and a Raise(Which what I believe was a 15)

His intentions were a bit clearer in the game, because his whole arguement consisted of "I won't give up the burlesque house until Phidelia's gone. Do that and we have a deal."(I treated that as a normal Raise, under the belief that if the Dog agreed, it'd be surrendering the Stakes to Cyrus; The house is still open until the Dog plays by Cyrus's rules. Now I see that agreeing could've been a Raise, by making Phidelia leave, The Dog is forcing Cyrus to hold true(Give up the Stakes), find a way around his deal while keeping face(Reverse the Blow) or just plain welch and look bad in front of the town(Take the Blow))

[lumpley]

If Cyrus shoots Phidelia as a raise, the Dog has to see.

If the Dog reverses, blocks or dodges, Phidelia isn't shot; the Dog says how she isn't.

If the Dog takes the blow, it's up to the Dog: Phidelia's shot and the Dog takes d4 fallout, or the Dog dives in the way and takes d10 fallout.

If your group is super-duper strict about taking the blow, you might not allow the latter, but I would.

If Phedelia's shot, is she killed? It depends on the exact intent of the raise plus the Dog's description of taking the blow. If Cyrus wants her dead, he should raise with something like "I splatter her brains all over your pretty coat," so that taking the blow the Dog can't say something like "she steps back gasping and clutching her arm where you shot her." When you take the blow, you have to follow the raiser's intent; how closely will vary pretty widely group to group.

-Vincent