Greetings all,

I haven't posted in forever and lurked very seldom because being in a Ph. D. program has really kept me from having much time for the hobby.  That said, I had a thought that I felt might lead to some interesting possibilities.  I've been noticing rules for social conflict as well as the more traditional physical conflict in a lot of games, but there is another category that I don't think has gotten the attention it deserves, mental conflict.

I'll try to clarify what I mean.  I'm not talking about winning an intellectual argument to convince someone of something.  I consider it reasonable for that kind of thing to fall under social conflict resolution.  I'm talking a full blown battle of wits between two masterminds.  For example, Sherlock Holmes vs Prof. Moriarty or L. vs Light Yagami (Death Note).  Alternatively, it could be an individual vs an organization, such as Frank Abagnale vs various authorities (Catch Me If You Can / real history), Lelouch vs Britannia (Code Geass), etc.  These kinds of battles involve long term interactions of deduction vs. misdirection.  Social skills may be involved, but reasoning ability and manipulation of other people through misinformation are at the forefront.

I'd like to provide a way for mental stats and/or mental skills to mean more than "I know about stuff" or "I can invent stuff" or "I can find out stuff" like they so often do.  I'd like this kind of battle of wits to be a plausible choice for players' characters.

As a brainstorming exercise, how might a game support these kinds of mental conflicts?  Are there any games that do (not to my admittedly limited knowledge)?

One possibility I've thought of is to give players with high mental stats or skills some kind of retroactive scene creation/editing power to demonstrate how they were previously manipulating events for use during a climax.  This might allow their covert manipulations to remain secret until the results of their plans come to fruition.  I'm not sure how this would work, I'm just trying to get people thinking.  Other approaches may work just as well or better.

As a possible starting point, how might you go about this in Universalis (which gives you more power then most games I know of regarding what's going on in the background)?

Looking forward to hearing your thoughts.

I think that would be hard to use except in games that deal with conflcits on a larger than player level, such as the way Burning Empires handles larger conflicts. That said, i think it is also more widely applicable, because it deals with knowledge of your foes tools and methods, and how to counter act them. In that light it can also apply for con artist vs con artist, stage magician vs stage magician (think The Prestige, or Carmen San Diego, or this one manga I forget where the main characters were stage magicians), AND similar measures and counter measures apply to spy masters, and to tactical conflicts (SWAT vs experienced bank robbers eg Heat, most special forces operations eg Ghost in the Shell). In a way this is also related to martial artists understanding the strengths and weaknesses of an opponants styles and technique range.

One challange to me is including enough detail in habits and techniques to allow for use of counter techniques. I suspect it would mostly have to be flavor, with the core contest being a trait vs trait contest.

Two things I would want to include would be that many tricks come from investing in one tactic, but distracting the opposition as to where you are investing that effort. Another factor I would love to see is some means of producing a land mine of a sort, a trap that you leave for the other to waste time, effort, resources, or again misdirect, distract, or waste time.
I suppose part of it all is the question of what is the real conflict here? Showdown or escape? Get revenge, or get the money? Make a stand, or make them look bad? And so on.

Thanks c.13.  Its fine with me if this works only higher than "player level," though I would appreciate a little clarification on exactly what constitutes "player level" conflicts.  I agree that this kind of conflict would be a applicable to a large variety of characters and situations, and many of the ones you mentioned I had thought of, such as Special Forces vs Terrorists, con vs con etc.  I just didn't want to go too broad initially to help focus discussion.  That said, pick whatever type of mental conflict you like for examples if you have any ideas of how to actually pull this off.

Regarding level of detail, could Flaws, Traits, or Aspects (such as in FATE) be used as a source of detail for manipulation?  Such things certainly add flavor, but they might serve other purposes as well.  Perhaps a smart character could tag other people's vulnerabilities in order to manipulate them somehow.  I'm still thinking that some kind of retroactive editing power might work best, so long as it did not contradict any previously established facts by removing them (but altering them might be ok).  For example, you use your mental ability to claim that the MacGuffin the antagonist has just gloatingly stolen from the heroes is really a fake with a built in tracking device placed by yours truly.  That's probably not the best example, but something along those lines might be made to work.  You might make such a claim only after beating the antagonist in a skill roll against strategy or whatever (fortune in the middle).

  I'm fine with the actual mechanics boiling down to some kind of trait vs trait contest, I just want the result of said contest to mean something in terms of the scene/situation/setting rather than the typically passive use of mental skills to see if you know something or are smart enough to solve a puzzle.  I would like for mental capability to have its own niche of usefulness, just as physical and social capabilities do in many other games, rather than the bonus or support role that mental ability is often relegated to.

I'm not really sure how to approach misdirection, but I have definitely liked the idea of setting "mines" of some sort as a way to draw attention away from what you are really up to.

Regarding the nature of the conflict, it depends in part on the nature of the intelligent character.  Heroic or antiheroic types will often be going for a confrontation in order to apprehend the villain, but this need not be the case if you are, for example, trying to escape to safety or infiltrating enemy lines.  I was originally thinking more along the lines of a showdown or making a stand, but confrontation avoidance can be just as dramatic and relevant to a story.

Cool! I know I'd definitelly want to play a game where I get to (try an') outwit my opponents. But, there's a question... What are you trying to achieve? The sort of narrative where characters get into the sort of situations that you described in the initial post? Or a game where the players (including the GM, assuming he's there to begin with, maybe?) get to actually try and trick each other? Personally, I'd find a game most interesting if it combined the two in some way, as that would pro'lly help with immersion.

The way I imagine it... Lets say this is a game that's parceled out into different scenes. Lets say that, depending on who/what your character is, you get a number of tokens of varying colours. The colours, dunno what number of them would be best, have a rock-paper-scissors-like relation to each other. The starting number of tokens may or may not be known to the opposing players, but their actual number during play should not be (put them in a bag or pocket, or something).

Now, when a scene comes, it's narrated in one way in another, establishing what's happenining... Or assumed to be happening, at least! At the end of a scene, or maybe at any point of it, a player can take a paper cup, put a token in, and place it on something representative of that scene (a sheet of paper with a number on it?). Another player can then do the same. You could also put in an emtpy cup, trying to lure out tokens from your opponents. Maybe you could also throw in a way to call on an opponent's bluff... Spend a token to reveal the contents of a cup - if it's empty, you get your token back and some sort of token from your opponent (or knock some health or stamina or whatever from your opponent? or stop the opponent from bidding on the next scene? Maybe any one of these things, at your choice). If it's not empty, it's owner gets the token used for revelation, and his own back (and/or something else?).

At some point, you uncover the cups, showing what was underneath. Some tokens beat other tokens, empty cups beat everything - representative of a stone-cold bluff, with no resources involved. The loser of the conflict begins the narration, showing what tricks he tried to pull, and then the winner tells his story on how he saw through those tricks and used them to his advantage. (It's the winner whousually  get first dibs on narration rights, but I think it'd be more thematically appropriate to reverse this... Not too sure, though.)

Um... Just thought that this could easily get difficult with more than one person at the table. Maybe, instead of tokens, dice? White dice beat red dice, red dice beat black dice, black dice beat white dice (d6+6 versus d6, mechanically). The question of which bonus gets involved is solved by, I dunno... Total (of the dice on the table) most prevalent colour versus least prevalent colour? Could mean a crushing victory (i.e., prevalent whites vs. minor reds).

...well, this is getting wordy and contrived, so I'll stop here. Haven't yet learned how to pitch an idea in a concise manner. Hope this was of some help.

Thanks for the suggestion.  I think any number of resolution mechanics could probably be made to work.  Keeping tokens/points secret from other players certainly has merit for creating misdirection.  I guess I'm more concerned with "what does it mean when you win/lose?"  I want players to be able to use some kind of secret planning to bring things into a situation to throw off the opponent's plans (upon winning a mental contest), and a Thirty Xanatos Pileup could be a lot of fun if multiple protagonists and antagonists are doing this to each other.  Basically that means everybody has secret plans that start messing with everyone else's secret plans, resulting in a chaotic mess.  That kind of thing is usually comedic, but I'm fine with allowing it as a possibility.

One way to make this work in terms of misdirection is to allow diversions.  Upon winning a mental contest, you have the ability to introduce some kind of external threat (e.g. a series of explosions at the front gate gets the attention of all the guards, while you sneak in from another place).  The system I'm designing already accounts for this sort of thing.  If you win a skill contest, this does not necessarily mean you actually do some kind damage (perhaps their armor is too strong for your attack to penetrate), but you success does mean that you opponent is forced to deal with the threat you pose, as opposed to other threats.  This allows a character to keep the attention of an enemy through witty banter, fast but largely ineffective attacks, or other diversionary tactics, allowing other characters to sneak up and do real damage or sneak away to safety.  Stealth is much more effective when something loud and annoying is drawing the attention of everyone you are trying to avoid.

I could see this working even with mastermind vs mastermind scenarios, in which case it becomes more like a chess match.  For example, your bishop may not pose much of a threat, but by putting the opponent's king in check with it, you force your opponent to respond to the threat posed by the bishop, which then allows your queen to do some real damage.  However, on the next turn, your opponent may beat you in a mental contest, allowing them to introduce something that you and/or other players must respond to, allowing the opponent to escape or strengthen their position.  This kind of exchange might continue until one of the competing geniuses runs out of mental HP or something.

I'm just brainstorming here.  If anybody has other suggestions or sees potential problems with this approach, please share them.

Honestly, I don't see any big problem doing what you're proposing when only a single genius is in play. Make a roll, win, you get your explosion, poison, unforseen backstabbing, whatever. What's giving you trouble in that area, specifically?

As for the "mastermind chess" aspect of it...

Well...  Perhaps you could "anchor" the results of a mindgame check to a thing/person/place? Make a mental check, you get to infuse, say, a NPC henchman with a single "plot point". "Ah hah! But that henchman is actually my brother, and he will undo you readily and well, good sir!". The opponent then gets to counter this, at increased difficulty - "Why yes! But you see, I control his mind! *Obligatory evil laughter* Now, dare you kill your own BROTHER?" And this can go on, with "I have the anti-ray-thingy right here in my back pocket!", until someone fails a counter(?) or runs out of "mental HP" or whatever.

Basically, whenever an element is used in a "master scheme", it gains value for whatever effect you're trying to use it for. So you have an incentive to try and twist your opponent's plans to suit your own - as per the tradition - rather than just letting completelly random things fly. The higher it's value, the more difficult it'd be to jack it.

I'd also suggest the "mental HP" to be some sort of meta-currency, seeing how usually a scheme isn't hatched on the spot, but is rather thought out well before it comes into play. Refresh it each session, make the players work for every bit they get, I dunno.

Anyway. All of this can be pretty much useless to you (I'm just pretty excited about the idea, so I'm blurting stuff out at near random...). If you're looking to give your current system an ability to do this sort of thing, it'd probably be of benefit to find out something about what you already have, so we could know how to fit all this scheming and brooding with what you have already.

I'm actually thinking of the anime Spiral, here - the first half thereof. Of particular note is a three-episode plot arc on the premise "groups A and B are competing to try and get across the city to meet up with each other, defuse a bomb strapped to one of them, and generally look like they have more 'power' than the other".

(The climax is roughly "Actually, the entire fake detonator setup was a triple-bluff; the point was to have a confrontation here, in order that we would be underneath the train-line, and the key to this bomb could be thrown out of the window by someone you thought couldn't be here yet, since the train doesn't arrive until two minutes after it is supposed to explode.")

So, you have a series of 'reveals' - each person in turn saying "Actually, I anticipated that, and did the following."

"Ha! I have you at gunpoint."
"I swapped the ammunition in your gun with blanks half an hour ago!"
"Oh, this is my spare gun."
"Good thing there's a giant invisible perspex wall across this room."
"Yes, shame about the hole I had cut in it."
"I knew you'd do that, so I arranged that it would cause an optimal acetalene-oxygen mixture if the airtight wall was breached; fire that gun, and we both blow up, along with the entire airship."
"Hmmm... Seems you get away with it this time, drat you!"

System to taste. Drama (with resources), Karma and Fortune all work.

What you miss out on, of course, is the opportunity to genuinely anticipate things, and throw in 'teasers' for your solutions. Might be possible to work that in, if you like it.

(As a GM, I love anticipating the PCs reactions to situations, having appropriate NPCs anticipate likewise, and prepare - and then drop hints to the PCs about said preparations. The moments of "Oh, damnit, I should have known they would do that!" are great fun, with the hints there to keep me honest. Not appropriate to every game by any means, but...)

@DWeird: As far as the single genius situation is concerned, I don't think there is any particular problem with that.  Several Pulp and Superhero games have had a similar ability for their mega-geniuses that seems to work.  I just wanted to make sure there wasn't anything I was obviously overlooking.  I know from experience (I'm an engineer) that its easy for a designer to be blind to flaws in his own design.

What I'd really like though is to capture the terrific thrill of the duel of wits as evidenced in the media I referenced in my first post.  The example you gave leans toward a comedic angle as measures and counter-measures continue to escalate until things threaten to get ridiculous.  I'd like to allow for limitations on what is possible to prevent absurd counter-measures without overly limiting creativity.

I agree that mental HP should be some kind of meta currency given that schemes are planned ahead of time.  Concerning that, I had a thought.  If a genius is going to introduce something they have prepared in advance, I think whatever they're introducing should be introduced regardless of whether they fail or succeed against their opponent mastermind.  Instead, success means that your opponent didn't see this coming and has to draw on existing resources to deal with it.  Failure means your opponent did see it coming and gets to turn it against you or otherwise twist it to their own advantage.  In other words, spending a plot point introduces something to the scene, but narration rights on that something are determined by the role result.  I think this fits with how intelligence often works in fiction, where it is often used to predict the actions of another person.

I think that might avoid the constant escalation of counter measures.  I also think that powerful effects should be so expensive to produce that the mastermind can only pull a huge effect maybe once per session (typically), but smaller things (like happening to have a useful gadget) aren't as expensive and can be bought with fewer plot points (as if they were planned).  I think this kind of thing would allow for Batman-like crazy-preparedness without allowing the smart characters to dominate.

I haven't talked about my current system much because it's still in the works, but had planned on having this kind of capability from the get-go.  I can say this much.  I'm using a unified set of resolution mechanics for simplicity.  So social, mental, and physical conflict should be resolved with the same mechanic.  The way my system currently works, one d6 determines success/failure and another degree of success/failure (there is more to this, but I don't think its relevant).  Players have plot points with which to affect/create things, and a GM is optional.  This is why I brought up Universalis in my original post, as I was curious if anyone knew if it could handle something like a duel of wits with its plot points (coins).

So basically, I want to know what kind of limitations might be necessary to create the effect found in fiction.  I want over the top comedic countermeasures to be optional, not inherently available in the system.  I would like feedback from the community to try to come up with good ways to approach this, as I'm not sure I will think of everything by myself.  If I'm not being clear about something, please let me know.

@Tom: I would love to incorporate teasers of what someone is planning.  The problem I think is that RPGs, being interactive, are created on the fly.  Thus, no one can truly anticipate much.  Of course you could still drop teasers in the hope that things would work out the way you anticipate, and if they don't, you just forget about them and move on.  I remember (I only remember the beginning), and I'm already planning to rent it for insight into this kind of battle (even though I know it doesn't exactly end).  I just don't want the counter-counter-counter-measures to get out of hand, as I stated above, because I think it can break the tension of a dramatic confrontation.  I welcome your thoughts.

Jay wrote:
I remember (I only remember the beginning), and I'm already planning to rent it for insight into this kind of battle (even though I know it doesn't exactly end).

Jay,
  I would suggest using rules based on the bidding process from ditv. The ability to inject clever ploys/ruses in a sub-element of the conflict without having to resolve a task/sub-conflict seems key to making this kind of struggle work.
  Does that make sense? Is that where you are going with this?

dndenver, would you mind giving me an example?  I haven't played DitV, though I've read reviews of it, and I'm roughly acquainted with the resolution mechanic, but an example of injecting a clever ploy or ruse in a sub-element would definitely help me.  Otherwise I'm not sure I can answer your question confidently.

Jay,
  No prob.
  Are you familiar with poker (like 5-card draw)?
  Basically, each side of the conflict rolls a pool of dice.
  Then the players take turns playing two dice at a time in the form of Bet, Call, Raise, Fold maneuvers.
  Each time you play two dice, you get to narrate actions that are consistent with the traits that generated the pool of dice and the other actions in the scene.
  Play continues until one side or the other folds (either voluntarily or because they ran out of dice).
  I can give a more detailed example if you need it.
  Let me know either way.

Ok.  So your not talking escalation (which I'm not sure would work well), but just the bidding process from a single roll.  That sounds interesting, but I would need to abstract it a bit, as I'm not using a dice pool mechanic and I would rather avoid fist-full-o-dice syndrome.  I'll give it some thought.  I've trick-or-treaters to deal with for the next few hours (its Halloween night now Stateside).  I could see a pool of points being spent in a similar manner.  Something like Hero Wars' Action Points perhaps?

Sure, I can see the counter-counter-countermeasures not fitting in with every genre at all - they're what I immediately thought of when the idea came up, though.

Something that might take the same idea (what's done is done, but anticipation still gives you occasional reversals) to less insane lengths, and therefore less inappropriate comedy, is to strictly limit the number of reversals. Arranging the system to put an absolute cap of two reversals on any given situation might well do the trick. (The Princess Bride, for example, did very well at that, I reckon - well, if you discount the Sicilian's speech).

And as for teasers... yes. They're the one genre staple you just can't do properly. Faking them might be worth it, though.

(Well, that or mechanising them - arranging that they be recorded when they happen, and are then required to be worked into the upcoming story. Not, of course, appropriate to every style of game).

Why would you resolve mental conflict in any way different from any other kind of conflict?
Actually, I would say that "mental vs. physical conflict" is a false dichotomy. Say my goal is to stop you from marrying my loved one. I might strike you down, I might outwit you, why should there be a rule difference?

I´m not saying there shouldn´t be one, I am asking for a reason.

Because they feel different. Sometimes you want to zoom in on a brawl, sometimes you want to zoom in on an argument, sometimes a chase or a mastermind battle of wits. Each of these has a different feel and it is possible to support such a feeling through rules. For example, in a brawl I'd want the feeling that everything is chaotic, whereas in a mastermind battle of wits I'd want the feeling that the only chaos anywhere comes from me not perfectly knowing my opponent's mind. So once the table agrees that you will try to stop me by striking me down, we may choose to zoom in with some kind of fighty rules, but if instead we agreed you'd try by outwitting me, if we zoom in on that, maybe a different set of rules can help support an outwitting scene than can help support a fighty scene.

@Tom: I think limiting the number of reversals to two is a great idea for serious/dramatic genres.  This would leave the instigator of the original attempt to outwit with the final say (if she wins) without it getting absurd.  I think this matches what often happens in fiction, with both parties confident they have outwitted each other until the final reveal and we see who really outwit who.

@soundmasterj: Guy hit the nail on the head, and articulated it better than I probably would have.

@Guy: Thanks!

Some time in the next few days I'll post a rough outline of how mechanics might match up with actual scenarios from fiction.  I want to review some fictional battles of wits I have at my disposal to try to make sure the mechanics are leading to believable results.  Then you can all try to outwit me ;-)

So what I´d look for is how do you think they feel different (to be honest, I don´t get it) and try creating the rules from there. Ie., a mental conflict feels like this, so the rules should capture exactly this; a physical conflict feels like this, so rules should capture it.

But as I said, I am not convinced. A fistfight might as well be a mental conflict. Say we throw punches and suddenly you see that I wasn´t actually trying to bash your nose in, I was trying to make you angry so you would embarass yourself. I get the girl again. Or I am trying to make you lose your cool so I cut you up when you are randomly thrashing around. You´re dead, I get the girl. Or maybe you only pretended I had you and actually, when I try to cut you up while you seem all mindless rage, suddenly, your left hits me from where I´d never expect it and there I go to the floor. You get the girl.
I distinctly remember the movie "Enemy at the gates" about two snipers duelling and while they aren´t doing much but shooting each other, it actually is a battle of the mind; and the sniper with the cooler temperament wins. (He shoots the other one dead, but the girl, sadly, eats it, too, so noone gets her.) I´d think the distinction lies elsewhere.

I had one more thought about this while driving yesterday: Start from a very sketchy description of the final confrontation, and work backwards, filling in the lead-up with flashbacks, and added details.

Establish that you are going to try and outwit both the cops, and the other drugs gang, starting with a deliver due to arrive at the docks at midnight.

Frame the final scene - a three-way standoff in a derelict warehouse, surrounded by crates.

Then go back and fill in more and more details, filling in the confrontation as you do so.

e.g. Your positioning another goon squad in ambush on one particularly large crate.

e.g. An earlier confrontation with the police, in which they were able to plant a bug on your lieutenant.

e.g. A sniper shot taken at the leader of the opposing gang, leading to a wound he is concealing, but which will affect him.

Again, maybe not what you want, but I can see it working somewhere.

@soundmasterj: I'll try to clarify what I mean by a mental conflict, and how it is distinct from what you are describing.

I believe your getting at the fact that all conflicts are in some way mental, in that you are trying in some sense to surprise or outmaneuver your opponent.  However, your examples are what I would call physical and social conflicts.  A fist fight is a physical conflict.  Trying to make someone angry is a social conflict.  Both of these have mental aspects to them that rules can support.  I've seen "Enemy at the Gates", and I'd call it a physical conflict, with a lot of tactics and patience involved.  So you are right that these examples are in some sense mental conflicts, but the nature of the fight itself is resolved through physical or social actions and reactions.  The character is using their mental abilities along with their physical/social ones to create a desired physical/social result.  The mental abilities are basically augmenting the result.  You succeed in your social or physical effort by using your head, thus you get the girl.

What I'm trying to get at is somewhat different.  We are not necessarily talking about a face-to-face confrontation here.  Those are easy to resolve through physical or social interaction.  How do you represent larger scale planning?  Lets say there is a mastermind behind the final showdown of "Enemy at the Gates."  He is a third party in the war, and he wants to smuggle his goods through another location without worrying about either of these top snipers posing a threat.  He uses his brilliant mind to manipulate events such that both parties are going to be in the same place posing a threat to each other.  He reasons that their battle will take a while because they're both skilled and cautious, buying him the time he needs to meet his own objective.  However, one of the snipers (our protagonist) is very smart as well, and he realizes he is being manipulated from outside the usual channels based on snatches of overheard conversation.  After the showdown with his enemy sniper, which he cannot avoid due to present orders/circumstances, he tracks down his manipulator, locates him, and snipes him.

In that kind of scenario, there is a mental conflict between two people that is wholly separate from any social or physical engagement of the moment.  The idea behind a mental conflict of this nature is that by the time a face-to-face confrontation occurs, everything has already been previously set in motion by the mastermind(s).  They are trying to out anticipate each other, not wait for a good shot or look for an opportunity to make someone lose their cool.  Does that make sense to you?

@Tom: I'll think about your suggestion and get back to you.

I'm going to adjust the scenario I described above.  I realized its not as clear as it could be.  Instead of tracking down the mastermind and sniping him, our protagonist instead arranges for a friend of his to place land mines along the mastermind(s) smuggling route.  The mastermind does not anticipate this, and his smuggling operation gets blown to high heaven.

Ok, now I get it. I´d propose different terminology: short-scale, tactical, nondeterministic conflic vs. long-scale, strategical, deterministic conflict. Obviously, short-scale tactical conflict could be mental, too (playing speed chess).

First idea of how to model this coming to my mind is, how about you have a row of seperate opposed rolls of some kind. Whoever wins one of these, he gains 1 "Point" and has to narrate how some act of planning in the past of his plays out. First player to get X Points gets to narrate how a final reversal, a final plot, puts the last final in is opponents coffin.
How about the first roll won gives 1 Point, second roll 2 Points, third roll 3 or 4 Points etc (doubling or increasing by each roll)1? In this way, one could succed by only winning one of these conflicts (the one that gives 16 points), revealing that actually HE HIMSELF was Kayser Soze.
I kind of like this, Jay. I need to know how your finished game looks like :)

One nitpick: my exampls only became this and this kind of conflict as soon as it was decided how it was won. All examples were "physical conflicts" until it is learned that actually, one of the combatants was playing a second game, too, beating his opponent in a battle of wits the other one didn´t neccesarily even know about. They become mental/physical/social conflicts only a posteriori: after you´ve been beaten, you learn which game the other one was playing. Rules-wise, I think, FitM is the only way to succesfully integrate this fact into rules (suck it FatE).

Please tell me you like that Idea, Jay, because if you don´t, I am going to use it and I don´t have the time for it :(

To further flesh it out, two ideas of how the "point system" might work:
1. Points of first roll: 1, 2nd.: 1d2, 3rd.: 1d3, 4th: 1d4, 5th: 1d6, 6th: 1d8, 7: 1d10, 8: 1d12, 9: 1d20, 10: 1d100. Players win as soon as one player owns twice as many Points as his opponent, but only if he has more points than the other ones "mental hitpoints". Or: as soon as he owns more Points than his opponent has "mental hitpoints".
2. Before each roll, both players decide how much this one will be worth. Say, both start with a ressource pool of 100 Points. Each roll, each player offers X of his Points, thereby forcing his opponent to take the same amount from his pool. When one players pool is empty, the player with the most points won (not in his pool, points won) wins. So you may go all in if you are 50 points behind and still win.
3. Both ideas, combined: in the ressource pool are not points, but dice. So round 3, player A offers 3d6 from his pool, player B offers 2d6. Both put 5d6 (2+3) from their respective pool onto the table. Now, both roll their "mental combat/strategic conflict" skill. The winner earns 10d6 points.

Winner has to narrate how his final plot etc.

I am in love with this idea.

@soundmasterj:  I can't talk long this morning, but I'll say this.  If you come up with a workable mechanic to do this, I can't stop you from using it even if I wanted to.  Mechanics cannot be copyrighted (just don't try to patent it please).  The only constraint if we both end up using the same mechanic is that we can't use the same names for things (as these are copyrighted) unless we have permission to do so.  This is true in the US, and I believe it is true in many other places as well.

Option #2 sounds a lot like Hero Wars' Action Points.  This is the kind of approach I will probably use.  I want to avoid lots of dice and many different kinds of dice for my game, so if you want to avoid copycatting me, use #1 or #3.  Regarding terminology, I like using strategy vs tactics, as I think it highlights the distinction between the two levels of conflict.

Regarding your nitpick, I think this comes down to how a conflict is defined.  Correct me if I'm wrong, but you are defining the type of conflict based on the result of the roll, where as I am defining the type of conflict based on the intended result prior to the roll.  This may be hard to see, but I believe both can use Fortune in the Middle.  In my system, one roll covers more than one type of conflict.  The initial intent is stated up front (I'm trying to punch you and I'm trying to make you angry).  You roll to see if you succeeded.  Depending on your roll and your Physical and Social traits, your physical attempt may succeed or fail, and you social attempt may separately succeed or fail.  You describe what actually happens based on the level of success or failure after the roll.  Thus its possible that your punch connects but doesn't make your opponent angry, or that your punch misses but that fact that you tried to hit your opponent made him angry anyway.

The problem I can see with waiting 'til the success or failure to reveal the hidden agenda (I'm trying to make you angry) is that you can pile on the hidden agendas whenever you get a good roll.  For example, initially you just want to hit your opponent.  However, you get a really good roll, so you decide as a player that you were actually trying to make him angry too, and effectively get extra effect for your roll that doesn't necessarily make sense in the story (there may not be a plausible reason for a social aspect of your attack).  It is more obviously a problem when the initial attack is social.  You just insulted your enemy, but because you got a good roll, you decide that you also used the insult to distract him so you could clobber him with a knockout punch.  There is nothing inherently wrong with this approach, I just think it opens up some potential for abuse that the other approach of stating what your trying to do up front helps to mitigate.  Note that there is a difference between what you are intending to do vs what you actually end up doing, so this can still be FitM.

I wasn´t talking about legal problems, it was more that I don´t have the time to write a game about strategical conflicts. Thankfully, it seems it´s already witten (HeroWarrrrrs! Why, oh why must you spoil my evil plans!)

I would say conflict is not defined by rolls, but by results. I would base my reasoning on the simple fact that the winners write the historic books; ie., what kind of conflict was the dominant one is determined by whoever lives to tell the tale about the conflict. So, apriori, you enter conflict thinking about how you want to hit him, but when you leave combat and you outsmarted him, it WAS (as in, what is told) aposteriori a battle of wits.
One important thing is not to talk about actions, but about results. Not - I punch you, roll dice; but, I want to make you hurt (/angry) by punching you, roll dice. Otherwise, you get: ok, you hit him. He isn´t hurt nor angered. What do you do now? So- conflict resolution, not task resolution.

I would think that piling on hidden agendas was exactly what a battle of two masterminds would be about? I´m thinking of Batman vs Joker in The Dark Knight (contrasting to enemy at the gates, a good movie): Gordon is dead! No, Gordon just pretends to be dead so he may take the Joker prisoner! No, the Joker WANTED to be taken prisoner so his evil plan etc etc.
Again, whoever dealt the last blow determines what kind of conflict the conflict was (the Jokers plan was to get taken prisoner and execute his kidnapping, Gordons plan was to take the Joker prisoner. Because the Jokers plan embraces Gordons plan, the Joker determined what actually went on.).

Obivously, one would have to state ones first action and that actions direct goal (I hit him, if I connect, he hurts), but 5 turns later, well, lets see. I don´t see where abuse would be a problem? The examples you gave were examples of tactical (at best) conflict, where results were immediate (punch or insult). But what you want is conflict were preplanned actions later reveal their effects, right? So you have to put aposterioric results above aprioric intents.

Well... What you want in conflict on such a large scale is exactly piling on of hidden agendas, right?

By the way, I´m in Germany so your evening is my midnight. Not exactly the best foundation for communication, i fear.

I don´t know. Should you NOT want to center your game about "big reversals", but want to integrate it in another game, just have "preplanning" as a skill/trait/whatever.
So we battle (whats at stake is, who gets the girl). I roll my X dice for skill: punching. You roll your Z dice for skill: preplanning. You roll higher. We narrate how I go at you, but what I didn´t know is that you are prepared for this situation and secretly tied my shoelaces together. I fall down, you marry her. Or: I roll higher. We narrate how you preplanningly brought a gun to our knife fight, but I punch it out of your hands and marry her. My punching beats your preplanning, your preplanning beats my punching, whatever, that´s what dice are for.
But here I am, lying on the floor, boots tied together, and spend a Metagame Point to escalate. I roll my own preplanning skill! You roll your punching skill! You win. I narrate how actually, I KNEW how you had tied my shoelaces together and untangeled them. I only pretend to fall down. You come to check out if I´m hurt. I kick at you with my non-tied legs, but you karate me KO (your punching beats my preplanning). Damn, seems like I´ll have to attend to your wedding with a black eye.
Seems simple.

Thanks for your input.  I agree that conflict resolution fits very well with the larger scale mental conflicts I have in mind, and task resolution does not fit so well.  Your point is well taken.  However, I think that the scale of a conflict is very relevant.

Because they feel different. Sometimes you want to zoom in on a brawl, sometimes you want to zoom in on an argument, sometimes a chase or a mastermind battle of wits. Each of these has a different feel and it is possible to support such a feeling through rules. For example, in a brawl I'd want the feeling that everything is chaotic, whereas in a mastermind battle of wits I'd want the feeling that the only chaos anywhere comes from me not perfectly knowing my opponent's mind. So once the table agrees that you will try to stop me by striking me down, we may choose to zoom in with some kind of fighty rules, but if instead we agreed you'd try by outwitting me, if we zoom in on that, maybe a different set of rules can help support an outwitting scene than can help support a fighty scene.

I´d propose different terminology: short-scale, tactical, nondeterministic conflict vs. long-scale, strategical, deterministic conflict.

One thing I forgot to mention.  Think for a moment about how much power a pre-planning skill gives you compared to a punch.  Pre-planning can do just about anything if it is not constrained in some way.  Instead of tying shoelaces, what about opening a trap door below your opponent that descends into a bead of lethal spikes?  I feel a zoomed-out use of a planning skill that uses conflict resolution restrained by point costs for what you are allowed to introduce makes a bit more sense.  Otherwise I fear someone with a high pre-planning skill could stop anyone from doing anything to them and singlehandedly wipe out the opposition by "seeing it coming".

Nah, task resolution just sucks :)
I don´t think it is usefull, ever, but that is another discussion. Likewise the want for "chaotic task resolution"; if I want a battle to be chaotic, I have the players roll dice to solve the conflict and narrate it chaotically. I want characters to be confused, not players, and I´d think a focused, not-distracted player makes a better narrator of a chaotic battle.

Why would a supposed "preplanning" skill be overpowered? I roll my five dice punching, you roll your four dice preplanning, I roll higher, my punching beats your preplanning! What´s the problem? Just don´t treat them any different mechanically.
If you want to treat them any different mechanically, that´d be a choice. Do you actually want to have a focus on large-scale strategical conflicts? If so, go HeroWars; what you described sounded like what you want. I´d love to go over some details with you as soon as I understand how strategic conflicts are positioned in your game, because while I don´t know much, I sure like to speculate.

In keeping with the tradition of double posts, here comes Vincent D. Baker on large-scale Task Resolution and small-scale Conflict Resolution: http://www.lumpley.com/hardcore.html , search for "task resolution" on the page and read the ~5 paragraphs, it´s great!

Nice timing soundmasterj, I was just about to post this when I saw your post linking to Vincent's article.  I've read the part you pointed out and a few of the following posts.  I have added to the end of my post to reflect this, but if there are any breaks in the flow of thought because of this, I apologize in advance, and also for the length.

We may have to agree to disagree regarding task resolution, but I want to be clear as to why it appeals to me for my game.  What you're describing sounds (to me at least) like it's trying to support a pure Narrativist Creative Agenda.  My game is more along the lines of a Nar/Sim hybrid, and I feel that task resolution fits the simulationist angle better than conflict resolution.  If you want an example of a successful Nar/Sim hybrid, check out The Riddle of Steel.  You may already know of it, but I thought I'd mention it for any other new people reading this.  Ron has a review of it in the reviews section.

So anyway, that's where I'm coming from.  I don't want pure storytelling/narration.

As to why preplanning could be overpowered, I think its a matter of scope, not just who wins the roll.  If the puncher wins, he gets to describe how and where he punches, and how that affects the other player.  If the preplanner wins, she gets to describe... what exacly?  As far as I can see, ANYTHING SHE WANTS so long as it affects her opponent.  In a high trust pure NAR game, this is probably not an issue, but I'm expecting a lower trust environment (e.g. chat rooms) as a potential audience for my game.  Simulationism can help to provide believable limits on what players can do so they don't start narrating things like "you fall through a trap door and die!" without death being both dramatically appropriate AND believable in the setting.  I can tell this isn't your position, but please try to see it from my perspective if you can.  Pure NAR games can be a lot of fun and many successful games are pure NAR, it's just not what I'm looking for regarding my own project.

Vincent is right that determining what is at stake is important to resolution, and that task resolution can give the GM unnecessary narrative power and kill collaboration.  He is also right that conflict resolution need not be large-scale and and task resolution need not be small scale.  I have realized that from the beginning.  However, I'm consciously choosing to use conflict resolution for large- and medium-scale conflict, and task resolution for small-scale conflict.  While task resolution can certainly create the possibility for GM abuse, I do not believe it follows that it must.  In my game, task resolution is only used for vary detailed aspects of a conflict.  "Does my sword strike hit, and where?"  "Does my offhand remark about his family bother my opponent?"  Note that this is not the same as "Do I kill him?" or "Do I ruin his reputation?"  I don't know what will be effective against my opponent at this smallest scale.  I do not have enough information to be able to narrate that "if I win this, then this will happen."  This is true chaos, not just uncertainty.  I do not know what my opponent is going to do this very instant or how they are feeling at this very time.  I'm fishing for a weakness.  Keep in mind that at this level, we are dealing with SIM underpinnings of the system, not the NAR guiding influences.

Remember that in my game, a GM is optional.  If you succeed at a task, you get to narrate what the result is, not the GM.  If you fail, your opponent gets to narrate what happens, not the GM, unless she is the opponent.  In my game, even the environment is a character, so there is no such thing as trying to open a safe, succeeding, and finding it empty, or failing, but it containing something critical that ruins the plot if you fail.  Vincent points out that task resolution creates uncertainty, and this is only one of many possible sources of suspense.  I want that particular source of suspense.  I believe that at the smallest end of the scale, task resolution reinforces a simulationist agenda because at a small scale, life is unpredictable.  When you are in the middle of a fierce sword fight, you don't have time to think about what your goal is for each individual sword swing (task res), but you can have a goal in mind for a particular maneuver (conflict res), such as "I want to throw him off balance."

Note that every example of task resolution I've given could be replaced with conflict resolution, but conflict resolution determines the stakes ahead of time.  I want the stakes at the very smallest end of the scale to be unknown, but small, in terms of import.  I WANT that effect.  That is the ONLY time I use task resolution.  The Riddle of Steel follows a similar pattern in that individual attack exchanges use task resolution, but your overall odds of winning are greatly improved by setting the stakes with your Spiritual Attributes.  Individual attack exchanges have unknown stakes, save in general (I hurt you), because you don't have time to determine your detailed intent.  You don't have time to think, if I hit him with this next attack, I'll knock him down and have him trapped.  You may want that, but who knows what will actually happen.  You just think "Swing, dodge, thrust, block!" etc.  This is starting to veer off topic somewhat.

So (to everyone reading), regarding the main topic, do any of the approaches we have already mentioned (or any new ones that you can think of) allow mastermind characters to do their thing?  Does restricting a mastermind's influence to big picture influences rather than small scale battles make sense?  Is this facilitated by separating where conflict resolution (using narration) comes into play and where task resolution (using more chaotic simulation) comes into play make sense?

re:, task/conflict resolution- and this again touches the main discussion- there is a lot of suspense in CR. What creates suspense in CR (and generally, I think) is not, do you succeed? But, what does it cost you?

I also think that a game with clearly distributed narrational rights should be optimal for a chatroom style game, but that, of course, is another discussion. One thing though: you want believable stories? Tell the players to make up believable stories. "Rules emulating physics" won´t do that, appealing to common understanding will. If someone wants to fuck things up, he will find a way, whatever agenda you are persuing.

I am pretty sure though that a succes earning you narration rights is more or less conflict resolution - noone will narrate "I manage to open the safe, but it appears to be empty!" if he doesn´t have to. So you earn narrative authority through your character succeeding in a physical task.

Well, back to "mental conflicts" :)

What do you want to "simulate"? If you actually want one focus of your game being on large-scale battles of wit, I´d say this nice metagame mechanic would be appropriate.

re:re task/conflict resolution: I never said there wasn't suspense in CR.  I plan on using the "What will it cost?" suspense in CR often.  I just want to also include the only kind of suspense that is not in CR, the kind where you are only vaguely sure what something will cost.  I like the bound unpredictability of small costs determined by the dice because the stakes are soft instead of hard for details.  From what I've read, CR doesn't do that; you set the stakes beforehand.  CR works great for the large-scale mental conflicts we've been talking about, but in terms of very fine detail, I like it when the players can be surprised by an event they would not have thought of that follows the structure of the world they are in.  This does not in the least mean that they must sacrifice control of bigger issues that affect the story more directly.

If success earning narration rights is CR, then forgive me for misunderstanding.  My thinking was that CR is when the result of a success is predetermined (at least in general), with detail filled in after, and TR is stating intent (but not the desired result) and narrating the results after.  Vincent's examples also seem to lean toward my understanding of CR when defining stakes.  The player is clearly saying what she wants to accomplish and what it will cost if she loses ahead of time.  Sorry for any confusion.  My attraction to TR is that you don't always know what you can or will accomplish upon success.  For small scale events, the dice replace the GM or player and tell you what happened.  The rules don't know about the conflict, only the task, so they tell you how you succeeded or failed at the task, and you interpret the effect on the conflict.  You may not like this, but I actually enjoy it, and I know I'm not the only one.  I'm pretty sure that fits with a SIM agenda.

Back to Mental Conflicts,

The focus of my game is individuals involved in a large scale conflict.  Thus, these individuals are able to direct or influence the large conflict (mastermind), and also participate in a small segment of it.  One example might be a general and his staff who influence the war but also fight in the field.  I want everything to be under the control of the players (who can also share the GM roles between them) except for fine details of moment by moment interactions.

Key, I think, is this bit:

The rules don't know about the conflict, only the task, so they tell you how you succeeded or failed at the task, and you interpret the effect on the conflict.

My apologies, I had an idea and haven't read everyone's contributions yet.

To me, key points of this conflict are discerning your oppositions traits (techniques, values, whatever), taking risks with a given approach, using your own traits to help your conflict, using your oppositions traits against them to best choose a tactic. Tension is over risks taken, and uncertainty if you really understand your foe.

Resolution comes like this:

Each player gets a chance to identify vulnerabilities and strengths in their opposition.

Each player gets a chance to put out false information about their vulnerabilities and strengths.

(It would be better if you could gain both false and real info about anyone, not just cancel out one another's identify and obscure ratings)

A player initiates an conflict, calling upon a weakness of their target. Using this weakness gives you a chance at better results (eg extra cards in a poker hand, more dice to roll to get a good result, but not a pure additio n of success, uncertainty of results is important). Success grants you progress. This round goes to you.

If the player uses a trait that is false, the targetted player can use that as additional bonus in a later round. They accept the setback, but get to add it to one of theor own efforts later.

Ideally, each round would have a real gain or loss in it, unless there effort totally fails, which probably should protect the given vulnerability for a while.

I would also suggest there be at least two tracks for measuring progress in the contest, so there is variation in flavor of techniques and results, but also to again add uncertainty as to what about you your opposition will attack. Changing the dimensions of the conflict is common. (3d manuevers vs 2d in Wrath of Khan, switching between attacks on determination to attacks on person or vice versa, making a sacrifice that results in a larger loss for the opposition).

I am trying to think of how to leave a booby trap, literal or otherwise. I could see it as a sepcial version of a false vulnerability, or perhaps as an action taken against the oppositions strength.

Narrating this would be tricky I think. Most examples have a flurry of actions that are countered, with just the final few being truly telling blows that resolve the conflict. I am thinking of Yojimbo, or the lies in Mousetrap, or the betrayals at the end of Four Dogs Playing Poker, or the shifting trusts and alliances in Shallow Grave.