Does Conflict Res = No Roleplaying?

[Darcy Burgess]

Last night marked our group's first kick at the Conflict Res can.  We're playing an established Star Wars campaign under the Pool.

The evening was *FUN* but (unsurprisingly) it wasn't what we're used to.  We've been pretty "tradiional" in our choice of games thus far (CoC BRP, Unknown Armies, Godlike, MSHAG to name a few), but all are systems that at their heart engage in task resolution.

We found that because you need to fram your stakes before rolling that the actual ROLE playing tends to get curtailed -- the how (where roleplaying typically happens) is now narrated as opposed to played out.

Is this a product of Con Res?

The Pool?

Us doing it wrong?

[TonyLB]

Can you give a specific example from your actual play?

[Michael S. Miller]

Jumping the gun on seeing specifics, I'd speculate that it's a product of The Pool specifically. InSpectres doesn't have this problem, nor does Universalis, or Otherkind, or lots of other conflict-res games. Likely because they break down the conflict resolution into smaller, more manageable chunks.

InSpectres has its skills, Universalis has its individual traits and dice, Otherkind has its categories of narration. The Pool just has "the winner gets to narrate." That seems to imply that "I won, so the rest of you just shut up and listen." Did you play it that way? I'd suggest letting the winner of the roll have final authority over what actually happens, but encourage everyone at the table to contribute ideas. IIRC, PrimeTime Adventures does this. With Great Power... will, also.

[Ian Charvill]

If you're doing scene resolution then roleplaying after the point of resolution can feel a lot like going through the motions.

So, you set up the scene, lay out the stakes, roll then everything feels like it deflates and the rp feels like everyone is phoning it in?

So, magic 8 ball says: Scene Resolution plus Unfamiliarity equals Loss of Dramatic Tension.

I suspect conflict resolution with lots of intermediate rolls might feel more familiar (HeroQuest is probably canonical here).

Of course, my intuition could be way off.  In which case, as Tony says, concrete examples are the key.

[jburneko]

I'm with Tony in that I'd like to see some specific examples.  But I also have some general notes specific to the pool.

Things depend heavily on how you were treating the narration "rights" element of The Pool.  It has been stated around here for a while that any game that awards narration rights to a specific player usually means, "the buck stops with that player" and not "only that player speaks."

So let's say the player is in a heavy argument with an NPC.  The way it usually flows for me is like this:

Step 1) A bit of "classic" roleplaying.  In character, real-time, improv banter between the player and the GM.

Step 2) Realization by either the player or the GM that there's a conflict here.  Followed by OOC discussion (fairly brief) of exactly what's at stake.

Step 3) System imployed to determine outcome of conflict.

Step 4) "Narration"

Now I'll elaborate on Step 4.  Let's say the player decides to take a Monologue of Victory and let's say that the stakes were that he wanted to break down the NPC's resolve.  The player might say that the NPC visibly slumps and develops a quiver in his voice.  So, the GM starts delivering the NPC's dialogue in a weak manner.

So what ends up happening is that they still roleplay out the end of the argument but that roleplay is deliberately informed by two factors.  First the actual outcome of the conflict and the player's narrative rights.  So if the GM has the NPC do something and the player doesn't think iss right, the player just says, "No wait, do this first."  And the GM says, "Oh, okay..." and so on.

However, when using conflict resolution regardless of narration rights, the amount of real-time, improv, dialogue (i.e. "free roleplaying") goes way down.  Espcially if you employ the conflict resolution system for ALL conflicts including PC vs. PC (i.e. No long, drown out in-character arguments).  The general conflict resolution pattern is:

GM or player  frames scene -> brief free roleplay to establish scene -> OOC discussion of conflicts and stakes -> employ resolution system to determine outcome -> brief free roleplay informed by conflict outcome to establish resolution -> GM or player frames next scene.

The above also assumes there's only one conflict per scene and if you employ the "break it down" technique I described previously (Note: Capes is an example of a game that REQUIRES this) then it becomes more involved but it still involes units of roleplay to establish conflict, employ system to determine outcome, roleplay to establish resolution.

It makes for tighter, snappier games.  So, in my opinion, you get MORE meaningful role-play not less.  But you do get less of the improv, real-time, stuff that tends to dominate other forms of play.

Jesse

[Valamir]

I wouldn't say you were playing wrong Eggo, but you were probably playing pretty deliberately.

Its new to you...you're not sure how to proceed...you want to make sure to get it write...it feels different.  All of those things can take you out of your roleplaying stride.

If you play games like this long enough to where seeing things in terms of conflict rather than task becomes instinctive and you no longer have to dedicate brain cells to thinking about it, you'll find yourself getting into the role playing of a character without any trouble.

Probably the biggest adjustment you'll wind up making to gettin into character is that alot of your roleplaying will occur AFTER the dice are rolled rather than before.

I suspect that you're used to thinking in terms of being "done" when the dice hit the table.  You roleplay first to set the stage and determine what to roll and what modifiers you get.  Then you roll the task.  Then you apply the results and move on.

In conflict resolution its not unusual (and pretty much built into the way the Pool is structured) that you first roll to determine the overall outcome of the conflict...THEN you roleplay the events out that led to that known result.  Then you move on.

It tends to be a little more like "Whose Line is it Anyway" where the audience throws out a topic and then the Improv guys act it out.  In this case the topic is the result of the Conflict..."You just failed to stop the villain from escaping and now the city is in flames...go" and then, like the Improv guys, you act that out.

[TonyLB]

Ralph:  Technically wouldn't it often be "You're about to fail to stop the villain, and the city will burst into flames... go"?

[Valamir]

It could be.  Depends on how the conflict was framed and where in the process you rolled the dice.

If you framed the conflict around the villain escaping and the city bursting into flames, then rolled to resolve and failed.  Then you'd know that you failed and could move into roleplaying based on that outcome.

Most often, of course, players truly comfortable with conflict res will be roleplaying all along during the before, during, and after parts.

[Mike Holmes]

Terminology police here. What we're talking about is not good to call Role Playing for several reasons. It's more accurate, I'm guessing, to say in this case that the players didn't do much "first person" portrayal? Instead using a lot of third person?

First Person: "Hey, barkeep, get me a drink!"
Third Person: Ragnar asks the barkeep for a drink.

So play was more the latter than the former is the "problem?" Keep in mind that this isn't really a problem, it's just a different style of play. And, second, as others are pointing out, you can "correct" this problem if you want.

But I would agree that Conflict Resolution and other techniques do seem to support the use of the third person more. That is, it's easier to think of the result as the "storyteller" when you have a story result than it is to then come up with the first person description of what's going on.

Mike

[Andrew Morris]

We found that because you need to fram your stakes before rolling that the actual ROLE playing tends to get curtailed -- the how (where roleplaying typically happens) is now narrated as opposed to played out.
 
Is this a product of Con Res?

But I would agree that Conflict Resolution and other techniques do seem to support the use of the third person more.

Yeah, I'd agree with that, assuming the use of third person is what you're referring to, Eggo.

[Warren]

I'm still new to this myself, and after just starting out with conflict resolution myself, (DitV, if it matters) after years of task-based gaming it does feel odd, as you do use the third person more.

I guess this appears as less "Role-Playing" is going on, as less immediate characterisation is going on -- I think the proper term is Actor stance -- and I think a lot of "old-school" (what would be the correct term?) roleplayers consider that as a fundamental part of roleplaying, i.e.

First Person:
Bob the barbarian: "Hey, barkeep, get me a drink!" is different in tone from:
Eric the cleric: "Excuse me, kind sir, but could I trouble you for some wine?"

Whereas Third Person could be seen as just saying:
"Bob asks the barkeep for a drink." isn't very different from:
"Eric asks the barkeep for a drink."

Which I think 'removes' the roleplaying to a lot of the Task-oriented roleplayers. I certainly found it odd. But, that being said, I have found the way that Jesse describes working very well. I found that your character is shown by what they do and what decisions they make, in a very focused, productive way, rather than silly voices and (usually bad) acting the minor points of sitting in the bar.

Warren

[Frank T]

Now, maybe we should wait for a reaction from Eggo before we speculate any further. Reading Eggos post carefully, I would guess that he is not just about first person versus third person.

the how (where roleplaying typically happens) is now narrated as opposed to played out.

This might just hint at dialogues in direct speech, but it might as well mean the whole process of back and forth between player and GM that occurs in "classic" play, like:

"I head for the door and look outside, do I still see anything?"
"Yes, the guy is just rushing down the street trying to make for the corner."
"I give a warning shot and yell at him: Stop!"
"He drops to the ground and rolls over, wielding a gun himself."
And so on.

That would be a result of the person winning narration having control over everything, as opposed to the player describing his character's actions and the GM describing the reaction.

[Valamir]

Yeah, Frank.  I suspect that's exactly what he's referring to.

Which makes Jesse's response above pretty much the key entry in this thread at this point.

[Brand_Robins]

I'd like to note, for the record, that I just used Jesse's post on the subject to convince a player whose been scared off of conflict resolution for as long as I've known him to give a game with it a try.

Thanks Jesse.

[timfire]

I think Conflict Res does cut down on a *little* bit of "role-playing." For example, let's say you want to convince a guard to let you through a locked door. With stock Task Res, the players essentially have to convince the GM (or whoever) to let them do what they want. If the GM isn't going for it, the players can just keep going for as long as they want, or until the GM gives in.  

With Conflict Res, players can just call for a roll and be done with it. On the down side, this means conflicts will occasionally be played out in a "meta-game" sort of way. But on the up side, it prevents a certain amount of unproductive play.