Roll for Effect or Intent?

[GMMichael]

Yes, the issue of scale is separate from task versus conflict. As Vincent Baker said in his essay "Conflict Resolution vs. Task Resolution" which you can find here:

actually you can conflict-resolve a single blow, or task-resolve the whole fight in one roll:​

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"I slash at his face, like ha!" "Why?" "To force him off-balance!"​

Conflict Resolution: do you force him off-balance?​

Roll: Loss!​

"He ducks side to side, like fwip fwip! He keeps his feet and grins."​

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"I fight him!" "Why?" "To get past him to the ship before it sails!"​

Task Resolution: do you win the fight (that is, do you fight him successfully)?​

Roll: Success!​

"You beat him! You disarm him and kick his butt!"​

(Unresolved, left up to the GM: do you get to the ship before it sails?)​

These are both questions of scale, illustrating how much progress the GM wants to award for the roll result. It seems that Baker uses "conflict" for simpler activities, and "task" for more complex ones.

 

[Umbran]

The alternative is:

"I want to hunt down who did this."

"Okay, roll X."

"I got a 21."

"That succeeds. What does that look like?"

There's nothing about conflict / intent resolution that requires the referee remove the player's agency.

The conversation has probably gone well past this, but this is why a typical good declaration includes both the goal and approach.

Indeed, as a broad generalization, if you don't know the approach, you cannot tell what roll the player has to make!

"I want to get the orc to tell me where the pie is hidden," does not include enough information to tell me whether this is a Persuasion or Intimidation check, for example.

This basic issue remains whether we are talking about a task-level, or a conflict-level resolution.

 

[Umbran]

I think this generally comes to the point that there is no time in which the GM can cleanly assume that Effect is the only thing that matters.

That would be like assuming that any time a player chooses to do something, it is followed by the phrase, "...at ANY cost."