Deciding scope for conflict-based resolution.

[Ben Miller]

Hi there.

For a while now I've been struggling to marry these two ideas:

1. Characters defined by a list number of skills (that have various levels of aptitude).
2. Conflict-based resolution.

I've just finished digesting this topic on Task Vs Conflict resolution..

http://www.indie-rpgs.com/viewtopic.php?t=9609

...but I'm still having problems getting my head around how this could work.  

The examples I've seen of conflict resolution always make the game sound very fluid (the story seems to flow well and the mechanics get in the way less) so I'm wanting to use that in my game.  However, I'm having problems seeing how it would really work in a wide variety of in-game situations.

Taking the example of the hero climbing a cliff and then having a fight (taken from the cited topic above and more specifically from The Princess' Bride movie) how can I provide some solid rules that the GM can use to decide whether this should be played as one conflict or, say, two conflicts (climbing, then fighting).  My particular problem I think stems from my game having characters that have skills and a rank in them: if we treat the scene as a single conflict, how much relevance should be put on the character's Climb skill and how much on his Fight skill when making a roll to determine the winner?  It seems that if the GM just makes a judgement call, the players are effectively dancing to the GM's tune too much.   The GM might as well just say roll a die and get a 4 or more.  I want to avoid that - the resolution mechanics (a die roll in my case) need to be clear and not require too much GM fiat.

If the character 'loses', does that mean he didn't climb the cliff or that he didn't win the fight?  Does the player or GM just make this up, and if so aren't we getting Narritive here?  What if I didn't want to make a Narritive-style game - does conflict-based resolution (as opposed to task-based) require a Narritivist treatment of the results of the conflict?  I'm guessing not, but I can't seem to get it clear in my head.

I suspect I'm re-hashing stuff that has been covered before, but I'd be interested to hear thoughts or see links to other discussions that cover this.

Ben

[Shreyas Sampat]

At first blush, here is what I'm thinking:

Skills are a natural outgrowth of a task-based system. They are appendages on a conflict system, in many cases. Conflict systems are about reaching goals, not overcoming obstacles.

Many of the questions you're asking can be answered in many different ways. I'm sure other folks will helpfully provide links; it's too early yet for me to think of a good spread of conflict systems to compare.

[lumpley]

Ben, you might find this helpful, on my site: Practical Conflict Resolution Advice.  A friend of mine asked me how he might introduce conflict resolution to his more old-fashioned players.

-Vincent

[Ron Edwards]

Hello,

One of the features of my game Trollbabe permits the group to arrive at "how much" a given conflict-resolution roll covers, each time. It's called "Pace," and ranges from whole-conflict, to exchange-by-exchange, to blow-by-bow (or nearly so). The person who poses the conflict gets to propose the Pace, and another person gets to modify that proposal - so the decision is reached on the emotional commitment to that conflict (and the effect of Pace on variables concerning risk to the character), but not on in-game causal justifications.

You should also check out HeroQuest in detail, in which conflicts are either Simple (one roll) vs. Complex (rather protracted series of bidding points and rolling dice). The interesting thing about this, though, is that Simple vs. Complex does not correspond to amounts of in-game time or to the in-game complexity of the conflict from the point of view of the characters.

Best,
Ron

[coxcomb]

IMHO, the GM should not make a determination of the scope of conflicts by himself. There will be some conflicts that the players want to breeze through. There will be others that they want to relish.

As Ron said, Trollbabe has a mechanic built in that takes this into account.

The point (well, one point) of conflict resolution is to get away from GM force. Let the players tell you how important a scene is, and how detailed thay want to be in resolving it.

[Jasper]

Hi,

My game ABSQVE ROMA has a system similar to Tollbabe's, though I call it Scale and it's decided by one player at a given time.  There are five discrete scales to operate at (minute, small, medium, large, great).  Which you use is dictated by how muhc focus you want to put on the situation, with the understanding that a task of each given scale would be about equivalent to about four tasks of the next smallest scale -- so four minute tasks could be used to handle a brawl:

1. Character swings at the thug
2. grapples with thug
3. pins thug to the ground
4. ties thug up

...or it could be handled with just one small task:

1. defeat and capture the thug

[RDU Neil]

IMHO, the GM should not make a determination of the scope of conflicts by himself. There will be some conflicts that the players want to breeze through. There will be others that they want to relish.

As Ron said, Trollbabe has a mechanic built in that takes this into account.

The point (well, one point) of conflict resolution is to get away from GM force. Let the players tell you how important a scene is, and how detailed thay want to be in resolving it.

Based on this concept, letting players determine importance of the scene, what about the "surprise" conflict.  The PCs going in thinking they know how it will all play out, and then get surprised by what they find, or how tough the opponenet is, etc.

Example:  Supers campaign... most supers can take out muggers and thugs with little problem.  Even Champions games with every die roll and random failure of an armor activation that could change things a bit, the heroes will usually have little trouble taking out the mooks.

But... what if you have one of the mooks really a supervillain without a costume.  Someone tougher and more threatening and unexpected.  Now, if you normally allow players to "breeze through" conflict resolution against mooks, instead of rolling every punch and kick... but this one time you say "No... it doesn't just happen, I want you to roll to hit" then the players immediately know that "something is up."  And start trying to figure out "what's the GM up to?"  

Instead, if you have them ALWAYS roll out the hits and damage, even vs. mooks where the outcome is all but foretold, they will not see it coming until that third "mook" catches their punch in his hand and throws them bodily in to the wall.  Then the players are just as surprised as the characters and you get that juicy "Holy Crap!  Who is that guy?" moment.

Basically, how do you keep the drama of the unexpected in a game where the players call all the shots?

[Shreyas Sampat]

I'm under the impression that one popular solution, Neil, is to allow the results of the conflict to deliver these surprises.

For instance, suppose that you have a system where if you lose the conflict, you may call for a reroll by spending some resource. This resource-spending will also trigger some kind of complication, which may or may not be related to the conflict at hand. When one of the players loses and calls for a reroll/complication, then the mook starts acting suspiciously competent.

Alternatively, you could have a mechanic where successive linked conflicts could vary in scale - you tried to deal with the mooks with one medium conflict, but when one grabs your gand and throws you into a wall, he forces a zoom to the small scale.

[Ben Miller]

Some good food for thought here.  Thanks guys.

I can see I'm going to have to bite the bullet and buy HeroQuest even though I'm not really into playing in Glorantha anymore...

It's interesting that the issue about what to do in conflicts when the players don't know what will happen next came up.  I was going to ask about this next!

I can't quite seem to grasp the logic of how conflict-based resolution works when you want to keep surprising the players as a GM.  

Conflicts seem to work well when the players have a clear idea what they want their characters to do.  So say the players come across a bunch of mooks and they state "We want engage them and push them back towards the dangerous-looking farm machinery."  To resolve this, we'd then figure out which of the players' abilities are relevant.  However, if I as the GM plan something to happen before the mooks get anywhere near that machinery (such as another bunch of mooks appearing behind the players) then I can't see how to maintain the suspense since I think I'd need to chop the conflict up somehow.

I mean, perhaps this is one not-so-obvious reason why task-based resolution is so popular.  You can maintain that air of "what will happen next" quite easily - it's built into the system effectively.

If I convince players to get their their head around conflict instead of task based resolution and then find that they often screw up my plans by choosing to clump loads of action together that I would rather have played out as several scenes.  I just think this might make the play 'stutter' a bit.

I always seem to post questions - not so good at the answers! :)

Anyhoo - if people agree that HeroQuest would be a good read for seeing how this can work then I'll go ahead and get it...

Ben

[Ben Miller]

Also...

How do you solve the "what's at stake" when the players don't actually know what's at stake?

To take an example from Mr Lumpley:
"What you're risking is being overheard by the goblins on the rooftop."

I like this - sounds good - but I may have just given away the fact that there are goblins on the roof.  Perhaps there is nothing at all in the tower, but I still want my players to think there might be!

(I know that some games like to get the players to set the stakes since they are creating the plot as they go along: that's not what I'm going for in my game.)

Ben

[Ron Edwards]

Hiya,

This is a great discussion, but I do think you're tying yourself into an unnecessary knot about something:

I can't quite seem to grasp the logic of how conflict-based resolution works when you want to keep surprising the players as a GM.

To take an example from Mr Lumpley:
"What you're risking is being overheard by the goblins on the rooftop."

I like this - sounds good - but I may have just given away the fact that there are goblins on the roof. Perhaps there is nothing at all in the tower, but I still want my players to think there might be!

I'll start with a basic concept first (the one that always drives people crazy when they first read The Pool) and then extend it to your specific question.

1. Conflict resolution, and the necessary dialogue that accompanies it, does not necessarily entail Director Stance. Which is a jargon-ridden way of saying, "I take his ass down!" is a conflict resolution statement - and note that it contains no vestige of inventing stuff into the game-world. If you and your group set limits on the scope of Director Stance, then you can Conflict Resolve to your hearts' content with no worries.

Such a limit is best understood as a Buck Stops Here privilege for a given member of the group at any given moment. In playing HeroQuest or The Riddle of Steel, that buck usually always stops with the same person, the guy who plays the NPCs. In playing Trollbabe, Dust Devils, or The Pool, the buck-stop shifts around formally. In Sorcerer, it's a matter of customizing the buck-stop as the group sees fit.

2. Now for the specific techniques when it comes to surprise. Baseline concept A is that "surprise" is terribly over-rated in role-playing. Players like it when their characters are surprised, but that doesn't necessarily correlate to whether they need to be surprised at the same time.

For example, you say, "Roll! It's time to see whether the goblins nail your unsuspecting asses!" (first mention of goblins) Wow, say the players, goblins? Ack, goblins! They're surprised and enjoying it, given that goblins are interesting/relevant in some way, and not just a speed bump.

They roll. The characters Elfawannalaya and Bosco are surprised, but Nimblenitz is not. At this point, all the players are "over" their surprise, which they enjoyed thoroughly, and now they get the fun of playing their characters according to whether they are surprised.

I'm now going to say something very harsh - traditionally, the focus on "must ... surprise ... players!" is trying to solve the basic problem that the encounter with, e.g., the goblins, is fundamentally a stupid and irrelevant event in the game. Gotta have a fight. Goblins. Must make it exciting. Um, well, I guess the only way is to "get into character" and "be surprised," so I gotta figure out how. OK, tell them to immerse, surprise the characters with GM-rolls-it Perception checks, and thus the players will be surprised, right?

Wrong. The perception check is a big fat meaningless waste - the encounter only takes on player-relevance if, in fact, the goblins are relevant to the Creative Agenda of this group.

Does that mean the players must already know about the goblins? No. But the very mention of the word "goblin" must be a shocker - we're in the elf citadel! How can there be goblins here? Or, we're in the dragon cave - hope no one else is beating us to the treasure - shit! goblins toting dragon-traps, unexpectedly! That sort of thing.

That's the source of player surprise: pleased appreciation that Situation has landed at last, and that the Situation is feeding the CA; when the Situation contains new (but immediately obviously relevant) stuff, then it's surprising. There is no other "player surprise."

Let character surprise take care of itself through whatever mechanics of the system provide it. Sorcerer and Dust Devils do a fine job in this regard.

Best,
Ron

[Storn]

Wrong. The perception check is a big fat meaningless waste - the encounter only takes on player-relevance if, in fact, the goblins are relevant to the Creative Agenda of this group.

Does that mean the players must already know about the goblins? No. But the very mention of the word "goblin" must be a shocker - we're in the elf citadel! How can there be goblins here? Or, we're in the dragon cave - hope no one else is beating us to the treasure - shit! goblins toting dragon-traps, unexpectedly! That sort of thing.

I agree with this statement as "one" way of doing it.  A way that I prefer.  I find myself using Perception/Notice checks less and less.  I often turn to the player with the PC who has the most points/skill  in Perception/ Notice/ Danger Sense... and say "you notice..." OR turn to the player that is the most funny or relevant or surprising and say "you notice.."

Also, the drama of Players KNOWING of the goblins on the roof...and the PCs NOT KNOWING is a classic, classic movie, novel, comic book trick.  That is what the cut scene to the villain going "bwhahahah, Those meddlesome good-doers will never suspect that *I* found the Pool of Teleport and as we speak, my highly trained Goblin commandoes are hunting them down...bhwqahahhahaha!"... is all about.  

The viewers of the drama NEED to be on the implied threat... so we get to see the protagonists walk down the "empty corridor with long shadows"... we ALL know what is going to happen, goblin ambush... just the protagonists don't (the PCs).

You're right, no surprise... but engaging, interesting drama?  If sold right, sure!

[Valamir]

Conflicts seem to work well when the players have a clear idea what they want their characters to do. So say the players come across a bunch of mooks and they state "We want engage them and push them back towards the dangerous-looking farm machinery." To resolve this, we'd then figure out which of the players' abilities are relevant. However, if I as the GM plan something to happen before the mooks get anywhere near that machinery (such as another bunch of mooks appearing behind the players) then I can't see how to maintain the suspense since I think I'd need to chop the conflict up somehow.

A common technique in conflict resolution system is grades of success.  Such as:
Success plus a bonus (critical, sometimes called "yes, and")
Success
Success plus a complication (partial success, sometimes called "yes, but")
Failure plus some success (partial failure, sometimes called "no, but")
Failure
Failure plus a penelty (fumble, sometimes called "no, and")

The GM can use these success grades to handle the above situation.

Consider:

Players: "we drive the mooks back into the farm machinery where they'll be chopped to pieces in a spray of gore".

Roll: Partial Success, aka Success plus a complication, aka "yes, but"

GM: "Yes, you drive the mooks back; but before they reach the farm machinery you hear a noise.  There are more mooks behind you!"


or:
same situation but the roll is a critical, aka Success plus a bonus, aka "yes, and"

GM: "Yes, you drive the mooks into the farm machinery.  The whiring blades slow just long enough to grind the mooks into a fine red mist which sprays out of the chute on top; and you hear a noise behind you.  There were more mooks ready to spring, but having witnessed the fate of their fellows they now take off down the road"

[Mike Holmes]

This is really a non-issue. All of these "problems" exist in equal quantity with either method of resolution:

1. How much is done in one roll? In GURPS if I decide that I want to use my smithing skills to make a sword, the GM can have one roll or many to get it done. How many makes sense is up to the GM. In fact, the only place in almost all task RPGs where you know how much to break things down is in combat. Since you have to be able to come up with appropriate breakdowns of action outside of combat in these games, use the exact same logic you do here for Conflict based resolutions.

2. Surprise. What if the player makes his perception roll too early? Then isn't the surprise blown? Do you just not allow the roll? Use this same logic in conflict based resolutions to achieve surprise. You don't have to reveal everything to the players, truth be told.

3. Maneuver. What if in the Mooks to the machine example, the PCs kill the mooks on the first round with good rolling? Out of luck, eh? With conflict resolution, you can avoid this, actually, by just having the conflict be more appropriate in scope, and by the fact that you have narrative control over the outcome. With conflict FITM, you can make it so that both success and failure result in some of the same conditions occuring while you make the success or failure about something else. Conflict resolution is better for this, not worse. Task resolution is only so popular because it was first and is encoded in 99% of all RPGs. I'm not saying that conflict is better (one can argue that you lose certain things), just that popularity has nothing to do with how effective a particular mechanic is if it's not something that everyone has been exposed to.

4. Setting stakes. Most of these games make the stakes mechanical. In HQ, if you loose with a Minor Failure, you get a -10% penalty to certain kinds of actions. In your goblin rooftop example, you just tell them what they see. When they roll their Minor Failure, then you narrate, "You manage to jump to the other roof, but land off balance. Which is too bad, considering the eleven goblins that are waiting there for you. You're -10% to fight them."


I don't mean to be condescending, but your fears here are based on not having seen it in play. When you do, you'll be struck by two things. First, by how much it looks just like what you normally do. Second, by how easy it is to do, and how natural. You won't notice the effects really until you see a lot of play, and note how the players and GM are using it to guide the game dramatically so that you don't get those dull moments that you get with task resolution.

If you think it might help, come and check out my IRC HQ game. You can find details on where to lurk at Indie Netgaming (see my sig).

Mike

[Ben Miller]

Thanks for the feedback and examples everyone.  I'm sure you're right that when I play it will feel quite natural. (I've been ummin and arring about running a game using The Pool for ages but never quite found the motivation/conquered my fears!)

I'm also interested though in how multiple skills can come to bear on one conflict 'roll'.  I can see situations where the GM breaks up a conflict into a series of mini-conflicts each using a particular skill.  This more a question of system mechanics I suppose in the sense "how do we deal with that mechanically".  Perhaps that's something that has confounded me when I've tried to develop a game using conflict-based resolution.  I don't want the game to decompose complex conflicts into lots of separate little conflicts - I think the temptation in this case would be for the players and GM to slip into treating it as task-based resolution (certainly for my group who are mostly born-and-bred Gamist task-resolvers!).

I can also see that if I allow players to employ multiple skills in one conflict there would be a danger of characters' most impressive skills never really standing out because they often get averaged in with their less impressive skills.  I want my game to promote the incredible abilities of characters (the supernatural perception of an elf, say).  Have I made sense there?

Anyway, I'll be checking out HQ very soon...

Ben