[Vocab] Task versus Conflict

[Andrew Morris]

I think we might be agreeing, but maybe not. Let me check:

For Conflict resolution, only player "resistance" matters.  As I tried to show in the Trollbabe example, the resistance of fictional elements need have no effect unless a player is invested in it.

Right. It doesn't have to have an effect. It might, though. This is a feature of System (in Lumpley Principle usage). Resolution mechanics are also part of System. But they are different components. They might work together, or not.

In contrast, but strict application of task resolution rules, the opposition of fictional elements can be important whether the player cares about them or not.

Right again. It might or might not be imporant.

These aren't defining concerns, though. They are related. They might even correlate, but they certainly don't define.

In any game, you don't roll (or whatever) for everything. Some things are assumed to happen without reference to the resolution mechanic -- walking across a room, say. This could happen in a game with task resolution or conflict resolution.

Likewise, resolution might have great or little importance to the player. I might really care about winning a task or conflict, or my mind might be wandering to something else entirely, and I'm just going along to keep things moving. This is just a matter of player preference, and it's certainly not the defining quality of resolution.

So, are we actually on the same page, or are we reading different books?

[M. J. Young]

I have skimmed many of the posts on this thread from the past week, so can only hope I'm not duplicating something that's been said; but I think I can put some clarity to this task versus conflict distinction. I'm going to offer an example which is on the same scale either way, and I'm going to use the "warning the village" example.

"Bob, the raiders are heading for the village. What are you going to do?"

"There's a mesa nearby on top of which is an old signal tower. I'm going to climb the mesa and light the signal fire, and hope that they see it in time to prepare the defenses."

"O.K., the climb is a difficulty six, and lighting the long-neglected pyre will be a difficulty three, so altogether you have to roll at least a 16 to do this. Roll the dice."

(Dice roll; 18 is rolled.)

"That's a success. You climbed the mesa and got the fire lit in plenty of time.

"Bob, the raiders are heading for the village. What are you going to do?"

"I'm going to find a way to warn the village."

"You're in conflict with the general of the army, whose determination is 14; yours is 9. You need at least a 16 to succeed. Roll the dice."

(Dice roll; 18 is rolled.)

"You succeeded in warning the village; how did you do it?"

"I remembered that there was an old signal fire atop this mesa, so I climbed the cliff face and got it burning. They saw the fire, and prepared themselves for battle."

These examples are on the same scale, have the same probability of success, and are resolved by the same roll. The first is task resolution, and the second is conflict resolution.

The task resolution system focuses entirely on the difficulty of doing specific tasks which cumulatively bring about desired outcomes. We determined what to roll by considering what the character had to do to succeed, and deriving the chance that he would succeed at those specific undertakings.

The conflict resolution system focuses on the significance of the events at hand and the degree to which the outcome matters to the adversaries. In this case, what we are comparing really is the determination of the general to reach the village before it is warned versus the determination of the character to warn them. Each is trying to beat the other (even if unaware of the other's efforts specifically). We roll to see which of them beats the other. Once we know that, we retroactively determine how that could possibly have happened.

In a standard duel, it is certainly arguable that each fighter is trying to beat the other. We can settle it as a single roll. If that roll is fundamentally about who hits whom, how much damage is done, the abstraction of the mechanics of the fight, it is task resolution. If the roll is fundamentally about who wins, the details being incidental both to the probabilities and the story, it is conflict resolution. You build task resolution probabilities from the question of whether the character can perform these tasks successfully (leading to the outcome of the conflict). You build conflict resolution based on why one side or the other ought to win (retroactively creating the explanatory tasks).

I hope this helps.

--M. J. Young

[GB Steve]

I think part of the problem with sorting out tasks and conflicts is that sometimes the same roll resolves both.

If an orc blocks your path and you want to get past him, you have a conflict.

There are many ways you can resolve this conflict, including retreat (which requires no rolls, although you might want to test courage or somesuch in HQ), talking (which in AD&D required no rolls but would do in HQ) or fighting (in AD&D would require several rolls, in HQ 1 roll in the conflict were deemed minor or several if deemed major).

It's rather difficult to disentangle which of these rolls relate to task and conflict, but it seems to me that the task is the chosen method of conflict resolution. It might take more than one roll to resolve the task. In AD&D, the combat might last several rounds, or you could do it in one if the dice are good. Once the task is resolved, the combat in this case, you can see what this means in terms of resolving the conflict. AD&D has no explicit conflict resolution mechanism.

In MLwM for example, you roll directly to resolve the conflict. You can do this before, during or after some narration and you can interpret the roll in anyway that reflects the result. There is no direct task resolution. You might chose to interpret things so that you are resolving a conflict by rolling for the outcome of a task but that's not what the rules ask you to do (but you can if you like).

[Andrew Morris]

If that roll is fundamentally about who hits whom, how much damage is done, the abstraction of the mechanics of the fight, it is task resolution. If the roll is fundamentally about who wins, the details being incidental both to the probabilities and the story, it is conflict resolution.

Right. That's what I'm saying. Task resolves cause, conflict resolves effect. Thanks for coming up with a very clear set of examples. I'm not so good at creating examples.

I think part of the problem with sorting out tasks and conflicts is that sometimes the same roll resolves both.
 
If an orc blocks your path and you want to get past him, you have a conflict.  
 
There are many ways you can resolve this conflict, including retreat (which requires no rolls, although you might want to test courage or somesuch in HQ), talking (which in AD&D required no rolls but would do in HQ) or fighting (in AD&D would require several rolls, in HQ 1 roll in the conflict were deemed minor or several if deemed major).

Okay, but the point is that the resolution mechanics adjudicate either cause or effect. This is why it's not difficult to determine what is a task and what is conflict. If an orc blocks your path and you want to get past him, you might have a conflict, or you might have a task. It depends on what's being resolved. If the resolution mechanics determines the success or failure of your attempts to get past the orc (cause), then it's task resolution. If the resolution mechanics determine whether or not you get past the orc (effect), it's conflict. In the former, success would imply that you get past, just as in the latter, success would imply that your efforts (retreating, talking, fighting, whatever) were successful.

Steve, you say that "somtimes the same roll resolves both." I can't picture this system in my mind. Can you provide an example of this? A practical example from an existing system where the resolution mechanic specifically resolves both cause and effect in a contest would be ideal.

[John Kim]

The task resolution system focuses entirely on the difficulty of doing specific tasks which cumulatively bring about desired outcomes. We determined what to roll by considering what the character had to do to succeed, and deriving the chance that he would succeed at those specific undertakings.

The conflict resolution system focuses on the significance of the events at hand and the degree to which the outcome matters to the adversaries. In this case, what we are comparing really is the determination of the general to reach the village before it is warned versus the determination of the character to warn them. Each is trying to beat the other (even if unaware of the other's efforts specifically). We roll to see which of them beats the other. Once we know that, we retroactively determine how that could possibly have happened.

I agree with this thoroughly.  This is what I meant when I said much earlier in the thread:

The key distinction that I see is that in your description, resolution depends on the stated reason why the character is doing the action. So depending on how I answer why my character is climbing the cliff, the results will vary. So, for example, suppose my PC is a callous showoff. He doesn't care about the villagers, but another PC bets him that he can't make it to the village before the enemy horsemen. Now the conflict might be against the other PC, to try to win the bet. Right?

This distinction is in what the resolution depends on.  So if the roll depends on the reason (or motivation, as someone else suggested) for the action, then it is Conflict Resolution.  

If an orc blocks your path and you want to get past him, you might have a conflict, or you might have a task. It depends on what's being resolved. If the resolution mechanics determines the success or failure of your attempts to get past the orc (cause), then it's task resolution. If the resolution mechanics determine whether or not you get past the orc (effect), it's conflict. In the former, success would imply that you get past, just as in the latter, success would imply that your efforts (retreating, talking, fighting, whatever) were successful.

Steve, you say that "somtimes the same roll resolves both." I can't picture this system in my mind. Can you provide an example of this?

I'm not sure why you can't picture it.  In my experience with traditional games, a roll resolves the effect.  For example, I want to damage a monster.  I roll the dice.  If I hit, I roll damage -- it's hit points are reduced below zero.  The monster dies.  That has resolved both cause (I hit) and effect (the monster dies).  To take your example above: I want to get past the orc.  I use the Tumble skill, which calls for a roll at DC 25 to succeed.  I roll and succeed.  The rules for the skill say that I get past the orc.  Again this has resolved both the cause (I tumbled successfully) and the effect (I got past the orc).

[xenopulse]

[quote:"M.J."]The task resolution system focuses entirely on the difficulty of doing specific tasks which cumulatively bring about desired outcomes. We determined what to roll by considering what the character had to do to succeed, and deriving the chance that he would succeed at those specific undertakings. [/quote]

The problem with the application of task resolution, however, is that this part--determined what to roll by considering what the character had to do to succeed--is often absent. My GM will not tell me what I have to do to address a particular conflict. He asks me, "What does your character do?" I have to think of a task. He doesn't tell me whether that will, if successful, bring me in any way closer to resolving a conflict I have in mind. It could be a waste of time, even if I succeed. I crack the safe--but there's nothing of value in it. My task succeeded, but the action was a waste with regards to the conflict.

Now, that's a way of play that many old school people think is the right way to go. I think it stinks and wastes my time. But if we had a conflict resolution system in place, that just would not happen.

I'm not saying that CR is superior; just that it doesn't have that particular pitfall. Therefore, TR *can* address conflicts step by step, but it often also just handles tasks that are not conducive to resolving conflicts at all.

[Andrew Morris]

John, I don't believe either of these example show a resolution mechanic that resolves both cause and effect. Let's break them down:

For example, I want to damage a monster.  I roll the dice.  If I hit, I roll damage -- it's hit points are reduced below zero.  The monster dies.  That has resolved both cause (I hit) and effect (the monster dies).

In this example, we'll take your stated cause (hitting the monster) and effect (the monster dies). What is resolved by rolling the dice? Whether or not the monster is hit. Now, the fact that the monster's HP are reduced below zero is a different concern. The GM could state that the monster has a magic item or ability that reduces the damage, or increases the monster's HP, and the monster would still be alive. So this is task. If it were conflict, the roll would determine whether or not the monster died or not, and the cause is the element that would be assumed  or inferred.

I want to get past the orc.  I use the Tumble skill, which calls for a roll at DC 25 to succeed.  I roll and succeed.  The rules for the skill say that I get past the orc. Again this has resolved both the cause (I tumbled successfully) and the effect (I got past the orc).

Now, I'm making a bit of an assumption here, but I'm betting the rules don't say that a Tumble skill roll at DC25 means that you get past an orc. They say that you successfully perform a Tumbling maneuver. In this example, the cause is "performing a Tumbling maneuver" and the effect is "getting past the orc." All that the Tumbling roll resolved was whether the Tumbling maneuver was successful or not. Since it was successful, players and the GM agree that the result of the maneuver was that you get past the orc. The GM could have instead said that you roll past the orc in a brilliant display of acrobatic prowess, but you land right in the snare the orc has set, trapping you at his feet. So this is another example of task resolution.

Do you follow my logic here? I admit, I might be putting too much emphasis on the semantics of it, but, on the other hand, a precise definition is more useful.

He doesn't tell me whether that will, if successful, bring me in any way closer to resolving a conflict I have in mind. It could be a waste of time, even if I succeed.

Right -- dead on.

[John Kim]

For example, I want to damage a monster.  I roll the dice.  If I hit, I roll damage -- it's hit points are reduced below zero.  The monster dies.  That has resolved both cause (I hit) and effect (the monster dies).

In this example, we'll take your stated cause (hitting the monster) and effect (the monster dies). What is resolved by rolling the dice? Whether or not the monster is hit. Now, the fact that the monster's HP are reduced below zero is a different concern. The GM could state that the monster has a magic item or ability that reduces the damage, or increases the monster's HP, and the monster would still be alive.

I don't see how that's relevant.  Yes, it's generally possible for a GM to secretly cheat.  For that matter, a GM can stomp his foot and say "I'm not playing unless the monster lives." and thus it lives.  But that's irrelevant to how the rules work.  The rules are that when a monster runs out of hit points, it dies.  If my damage roll is sufficient to reduce it's hit points below zero, then the rules say that it dies.  

I want to get past the orc.  I use the Tumble skill, which calls for a roll at DC 25 to succeed.  I roll and succeed.  The rules for the skill say that I get past the orc. Again this has resolved both the cause (I tumbled successfully) and the effect (I got past the orc).

Now, I'm making a bit of an assumption here, but I'm betting the rules don't say that a Tumble skill roll at DC25 means that you get past an orc. They say that you successfully perform a Tumbling maneuver.

This is from D&D3.5.  According to the online reference for them, they say that for a DC of 25, the follow is accomplished (incidentally, the table is labelled "Tumble DC" and "Task"):

"Tumble at one-half speed through an area occupied by an enemy (over, under, or around the opponent) as part of normal movement, provoking no attacks of opportunity while doing so. Failure means you stop before entering the enemy-occupied area and provoke an attack of opportunity from that enemy. Check separately for each opponent. Each additional enemy after the first adds +2 to the Tumble DC."

That seems pretty explicit to me.  If I succeed at my roll, I can move through the enemy at one-half my character's speed stat.  Now, again, sure -- a given GM can say that it doesn't succeed even if I make my roll.  But he's not following the rules.

[Andrew Morris]

John, it doesn't have to be a matter of the GM "cheating." There might simply be other factors the player does not know about which mean that winning the task does not result in the expected outcome. Also, the fact that the "rules" state that a monster dies when reduced below zero HP does not make that part of the resolution mechanic, any more than the fact that vampires in V:tM lose 1 blood point per night is part of the combat system, even though it might inter-relate or affect it.

As to the orc example -- ahh, well, my lack of experience with d20 and D&D is showing. You make a good point that the rules pertaining to the Tumbling Skill specifically mention moving through enemy-occupied territory. That's probably the strongest case I've seen for task overlapping with conflict. But (and please check my understanding of D&D rules), there could be another orc hiding in the bushes who tosses a net over the character, not as an "attack of opportunity," but as their regular attack. Again, other factors can prevent the expected outcome, which would not be the case in conflict resolution.

[John Kim]

John, it doesn't have to be a matter of the GM "cheating." There might simply be other factors the player does not know about which mean that winning the task does not result in the expected outcome. Also, the fact that the "rules" state that a monster dies when reduced below zero HP does not make that part of the resolution mechanic, any more than the fact that vampires in V:tM lose 1 blood point per night is part of the combat system, even though it might inter-relate or affect it.

Offhand, I don't see how the player knowledge factors into what the resolution mechanic is.  I see the case you're thinking about -- i.e. the player expects one thing, rolls and succeeds, but then doesn't get the expected outcome.  But it seems to me that this depends on player expectations, not on the process used to resolve what happens.  

Suppose the monster is really an illusion created by an enemy mage.  So the character swings and hits.  Instead of killing the monster, the character discovers that the monster is an illusion.  Does it matter if the player knows that the monster is an illusion or not?  Suppose the player knows out-of-character that the monster is an illusion.  Does that change the nature of the mechanic?  

As to the orc example -- ahh, well, my lack of experience with d20 and D&D is showing. You make a good point that the rules pertaining to the Tumbling Skill specifically mention moving through enemy-occupied territory. That's probably the strongest case I've seen for task overlapping with conflict. But (and please check my understanding of D&D rules), there could be another orc hiding in the bushes who tosses a net over the character, not as an "attack of opportunity," but as their regular attack. Again, other factors can prevent the expected outcome, which would not be the case in conflict resolution.

This seems to hint more at player knowledge as an issue.  If you're not talking about GM cheating, I don't see what being in the bushes has to do with it.  Is an orc with a net in the bushes any different than an orc with a net standing beside his fellow orc?  

Also, I don't actually recall the D&D rules on this.  But let's suppose that there is an orc with a net standing there with a held action, and by the rules he gets a chance to entangle the PC when he tries to tumble past.  The player knows he has to both make his Tumble and the net-wielding orc has to miss.  So we make the Tumble roll and the net to-hit roll to resolve this.  How is this different?  We have to make two different rolls, but the combination of the two still resolves the desired effect -- i.e. does the character make it past the orc?

[Andrew Morris]

Right, I agree that player knowledge doesn't change the resolution mechanic. I'm not arguing that. However, these cases serve to highlight the fact that task resolution might not result in the expected outcome. In turn, that goes to show that task resolution is about the cause, not the effect. The effect can be expected, and it might come to pass nine times out of ten, but that doesn't change the fact that cause is what is being adjudicated by the resolution mechanic itself. Sure, the system might or might not have rules that relate to this, but that doesn't change the resolution mechanic any more than player expectation does.

This seems to hint more at player knowledge as an issue.  If you're not talking about GM cheating, I don't see what being in the bushes has to do with it.  Is an orc with a net in the bushes any different than an orc with a net standing beside his fellow orc?

No, it's just the first counter-example that came to mind.

So we make the Tumble roll and the net to-hit roll to resolve this.  How is this different?  We have to make two different rolls, but the combination of the two still resolves the desired effect -- i.e. does the character make it past the orc?

Damn good question. I'll have to think about it before I answer. I think this goes back to the "task summing to conflict" issue discussed earlier. I originally disagreed with this idea, but you might be right that they can overlap. Again, I'll have to consider this.

[xenopulse]

John,

Would you agree that with task resolution, there's the possiblity for tasks that are not conducive to resolving any conflicts?

Let's look at the "get dirt on this guy" example. That's the conflict right there--do I or don't I get dirt on this guy? In a TR system, I have to try and find something that addresses the conflict via trial and error, by first cracking the safe (which is empty), then searching the desk (which doesn't have anything in it), then hacking into his computer (which doesn't contain any useful information), then maybe finally deciphering the encrypted document in the filing cabinet. Or maybe there never was any dirt in the GM's plans, and so no matter how many things I come up with, I'm screwed.

Now, you could make a slim case of saying that each of these tasks eliminates the options, thereby contributing to resolving the conflict--if there's a right task to find. The problem is that here, the player has to come up with the right answer. If s/he doesn't, they lose the conflict. Not because of their player skills or their bad luck with dice, but because they did not pick the right task to address the conflict.

This is *exactly* how the majority of my RP experiences with TR systems have played out. Trial and error, often leading to frustration. Even resulting in some adventures that were never solved because we players never found just the right things to do.

Some TR systems try to mitigate this with soft rules, such as "roll only when it's important." But that still doesn't take the weight off me to find the right thing where I am allowed to roll.

Now, with a CR system, you approach it the other way. First, you state what conflict you are addressing. "I want to find dirt on this guy." Then you either quickly agree on a way to do that and roll, or you roll and simply narrate how you did it ("You win--you found useful files in his drawer and now have dirt on him"). You *can* do this with a TR system, but then you've really drifted it into CR territory.

[Walt Freitag]

Okay, here's an important point that's been missing from this discussion.

In all kinds of typical functional play, conflicts get resolved.

So every "system" in the all-inclusive Lumpley-Principle sense of "system" must be, in some sense, a conflict resolution "system."

Hence, examples of play using task resolution in which we see conflicts get resolved are easy to come by. "It can't be task resolution if we see players using it to resolve a conflict" is a false conclusion.

A task resolution system can resolve conflicts, but with one or both of two drawbacks: the conflicts are limited to certain specific types, and/or it can never be guaranteed that a conflict will reach resolution unless additional (usually informal) measures beyond the resolution system itself are taken to link tasks with conflicts.

A resolution system that's designed to resolve tasks related to inflicting damage on orcs will, therefore, be just fine at resolving conflicts that are conceived and framed so as to be resolvable by inflicting damage on orcs. And scenario designers will put a great deal of effort into inventing conflicts that fit that description.

However, such a system won't work as well for other kinds of conflicts. If a player decides his character wants revenge on the evil orc lord who killed his father, no amount of orc-bashing task resolution is guaranteed to lead to any progress toward resolving that conflict. If a player successfully uses his interrogate-orc skill a hundred times to find out where the orc lord is, the result can be, a hundred times, that the orc being interrogated doesn't know. The GM doesn't have to be cheating to bring this about, just uninterested. If the GM has decided only that the orc lord is far away out of the picture somewhere, then naturally none of the local NPC orcs would have any reason to know where he is. Or perhaps the GM has seeded information about the orc lord all over the place, but due to bad luck the player-character keeps interrogating just the wrong NPCs or rolling failures on the interrogate-orc skill at just the wrong times, so no progress is made. If that GM were less scrupulously impartial and wanted to see the conflict advanced toward resolution, he might be tempted to do a little clue-moving or No-Myth Technique.

Which reveals clue-moving and No Myth as some of those "additional (usually informal) methods for linking tasks to conflicts" I mentioned above.

Another one is stakes-setting. Which is the technique of making a predictive "if-then" statement an established fact in the SIS. Such as, "If you can capture an orc of Colonel rank or higher, he'll know where the orc lord is." Or, "If you manage to light the signal fire, the village will be warned." Or, "If you drop the One Ring into the Crack of Doom, Sauron will be destroyed forever." Such statements usually come under the guise of reasonable advance prediction of cause and effect in the SIS. Often, they're revealed "in-character" by NPCs, but sometimes a GM will just state them outright, as in, "Okay, I'll let X happen if your character can accomplish Y successfully." They have equal authority either way, at the social level, because they're really metagame contracts that link tasks to conflicts. (Can you imagine: "Oops, Gandalf was wrong. Dropping the One Ring into the Crack of Doom didn't have any effect. Must have been some misinformation that Sauron spread for self-preservation. Sorry, Frodo.")

Another way to link tasks and conflicts, more formal but more limited in scope, is with rules that extend the resolution system by specifying precise effects of successes at various tasks. The rule John cites concerning use of acrobatics skill to get past an enemy is a good example. For my hunting-the-orc-lord example, a relevant rule might be "Any time an orc is captured, there's a 2% chance that the orc is secretly a member of Orc Intelligence. Such orcs have a great deal of knowledge about all orc affairs. If a successful interrogate roll is made on such an orc -- that roll being made at -6, due to the resistance training Orc Intelligence members receive -- then the interrogator can get true answers to any questions that are at all related to orc affairs. But only five such questions may be asked and answered before the orc dies from the stress."

The inclusion of such rules doesn't turn a task resolution system into a conflict resolution system, because the range of conflicts they can cover must still remain limited, even if the number of rules becomes very large. By contrast, a true conflict resolution system can address any conflict that a player can describe, subject to limitation only by the scope of the conflict and not by its nature.

- Walt

[Valamir]

Excellent post, Walt.

I think alot of the round and round on this stems from experienced Task Resolution GMs who are so used to using some of the techniques you indicate (in particular the If-Then technique) that they don't even realize that this is an extra layer they themselves are bringing to the system that has the effect of making it function somewhat more like a Conflict Resolution system.

[John Kim]

Would you agree that with task resolution, there's the possiblity for tasks that are not conducive to resolving any conflicts?

Let's look at the "get dirt on this guy" example. That's the conflict right there--do I or don't I get dirt on this guy? In a TR system, I have to try and find something that addresses the conflict via trial and error, by first cracking the safe (which is empty), then searching the desk (which doesn't have anything in it), then hacking into his computer (which doesn't contain any useful information), then maybe finally deciphering the encrypted document in the filing cabinet. Or maybe there never was any dirt in the GM's plans, and so no matter how many things I come up with, I'm screwed.

I see this as an issue of scale.  Yes, it is possible to do a large series of small-scale tasks, and for them not to add up to the large-scale task.  On the other hand, you could also resolve getting the dirt on someone as a single Task Roll at a large scale.  For example, in D&D3, the "Gather Information" skill folds an entire evening's worth of questioning into a single roll.  This is the same thing as doing round-by-round combat vs. a mass combat system which resolves a complete battle in a single set of rolls.  

But the same thing is true of conflicts.  You accomplish your larger goals by a series of smaller-scale conflicts.  Unless the entire adventure is resolved in a single application of the resolution mechanic, you can still be screwed by the GM requiring more conflicts to accomplish your overall goal.  To take your example.  Suppose you resolve in a single roll whether you get the dirt on someone.  OK, so why were you trying to get the dirt on him?  So you could blackmail him for money?  Well, the GM could say that someone has just robbed him of all his money.  Now you've got to beat those thieves.  She can then say that the police come, and you have to beat them in a conflict.  In short, she can keep throwing conflicts at you until you lose.  

The same applies to Walt's example of getting revenge on the orc lord who killed your PC's father.  Even under conflict resolution, there are an indeterminate number of rolls to successfully enact the revenge.  So the exact same issue comes up.  

The problem is that here, the player has to come up with the right answer. If s/he doesn't, they lose the conflict. Not because of their player skills or their bad luck with dice, but because they did not pick the right task to address the conflict.

This is *exactly* how the majority of my RP experiences with TR systems have played out. Trial and error, often leading to frustration. Even resulting in some adventures that were never solved because we players never found just the right things to do.

I'm familiar with the syndrome.  I just think that it is not a problem directly with Task Resolution.  I think it's a matter of picking the right scale for your resolution relative to the goals.  For example, I think that D&D3 very deliberately addressed this problem for how it decided on the scale for its "Gather Information" skill.  In there, you just say what information you're looking for and roll once for an evening of poking around.  

Now, it could be that some people think of larger-scale as "Conflict Resolution" -- but I think that M.J.'s definition is more appropriate to what is most often discussed as this.