DitV2: New Rules!

[lumpley]

I don't follow.

If you're losing, you can decide to salvage your best remaining (that's what "showing" means) die and give the stakes, instead of staying in a conflict that's just going to keep sucking. It's to encourage you to ditch out of conflicts you can't win.

Maybe restate your "supposed to be played against..." question for me?

-Vincent

[mataglap]

Well, being able to salvage a showing "1" or "2" isn't much incentive to give in a conflict.  Being able to preserve a "5" or higher is. 

[lumpley]

So cut your losses early. That's the point.

-Vincent

[Mayuran]

Hey, folks-

We played for the first time last night using the new rules and ran into confusion about the following:

Follow-up Conflicts
A follow-up conflict is simply a new conflict that follows on the one just ended. In general you treat it exactly as you would any other, but it does have a few special considerations:

- It counts as a follow-up conflict only if its stakes follow directly from the previous conflict's resolution.

- Its stakes can be the same as the previous conflict's stakes only if all three of its participants, its stage as set, and its opening arena are different. That is, if your character tries to talk my character into admitting her sin, but fails, you can't just try again. That conflict's done. What you have to do if you want a follow-up with the same stakes is come back another time or catch her at some other place, with your friends to back you up — and this time it can't be just talking.

The situation was 2 Dogs - Br. Zachary and Br. Elias - vs. an NPC, Running Fox.  He was coming into town to kill a man who had murdered his brother.  The stakes were "Do we convince Running Fox to leave peacefully and let us deal with the murderer?"

Both Running Fox and Br. Zachary had escalated to physical, and eventually Running Fox escalated to fighting.  However, when it came down to it, the Dogs continued talking and had a powerful enough argument that the GM decided that Running Fox would give (the winning raise was Br. Elias saying "okay, we'll give you the murderer... but tomorrow, outside of town.").

He then immediately wanted to attempt a follow up - "Running Fox comes back, this time with his gang, at night, to get this guy by force."

We said "hey, we won the conflict..." and so we were trying to figure out how that rule about follow up conflicts fits with what had happened.

The example given is from the perspective of a player who keeps wanting to continue the same conflict, but I assume the GM has the same power. When we objected, the GM didn't push it - but we were all still confused about the rule.

I think we set the initial stakes higher than the GM wanted (from his perspective "Do we get Running Fox to leave peacefully, this time?" might have been more appropriate), but having a follow up with the same stakes, after spending so much time on the initial conflict seemed like a cop-out.

Like explicitly said in the rules for Burning Wheel, there is something to be said about "letting it ride."

Any insights?

[lumpley]

In general, the GM should abide by both the spirit and the letter of every conflict's resolution. The other players should too, but the GM's under special obligation.

As GM, the time to leave open the possibility that Running Fox will come back in the night is when you [collective] set the first conflict's stakes, not after you've resolved them.

However, "when we objected, the GM didn't push it" - that's exactly the right way to handle the situation, on both sides' parts.

Does that answer your question?

-Vincent

[Mayuran]

Thanks for the answer, Vincent.

Now we're clear on how a follow up conflict with the same stakes is dependent on the original terms.

Seems like our problem is more about reaching concensus on stakes, and thinking carefully about what the stakes mean. 

I remember it being written somewhere that the players want to set high stakes, the GM wants to set low stakes, and the ideal is always somewhere in the middle.

peace

mmt