RPGing and imagination: a fundamental point

[Lanefan]

Assuming high-myth

If it's drama resolution it's set up and performance. What's dramatically appropriate? Resolution of performance confirms the safe is cracked, but stage notes imply a cut to the supervillain tossing the dirt into the wastebasket. This is an instance of the "puzzle" other posters spoke of.​

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If it's conflict resolution, success means that as the player character is turning away from the empty safe, they spot a bunch of crumpled documents in the wastebasket.​

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An alternative in both cases is simply, say yes - describe how characters find the dirt in the wastebasket. That does not take us to resolution. Choosing this would depend on the game's intended focus.​

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Is that what you mean to query? It's honour goals or honour fiction. Or don't go to resolution, say yes.

What I don't see anywhere here is reference to a hard-coded prep model of an in-game reality, where the location of the papers is pre-set by the GM and the PCs will eventually either find them or they won't. This would seem to suggest a fourth type of resolution, whether called "task resolution" or "puzzle solving" or whatever.

On a broader scale, in the various scenarios you're proposing is there the possibility of an outcome where the PCs outright fail to find the papers at all, thus either shutting off that line of drama/story either temporarily or permanently or greatly diverting it?

Example (I hope!):

Player: "I crack open the safe in hopes of finding the demonic papers the mayor told us about. Jory, keep watch at the door."
GM: "Ok." [invoke system's resolution method, to a 'fail' result] "Result: you open the safe but find nothing in it...and Jory, you hear footsteps rapidly approaching the door!"
Player: "Maybe that mayor ain't so honest as we thought he was - this is a trap!" (etc. etc. as the PCs try to escape)

So here the players never find the papers they wanted and worse, are driven away from further searching the place they'd been told to look. The story has to take another direction. Can this happen, in the sort of system you're talking about; and if it can't, how can that be justified?

 

[FrogReaver]

What I don't see anywhere here is reference to a hard-coded prep model of an in-game reality, where the location of the papers is pre-set by the GM and the PCs will eventually either find them or they won't. This would seem to suggest a fourth type of resolution, whether called "task resolution" or "puzzle solving" or whatever.

On a broader scale, in the various scenarios you're proposing is there the possibility of an outcome where the PCs outright fail to find the papers at all, thus either shutting off that line of drama/story either temporarily or permanently or greatly diverting it?

Example (I hope!):

Player: "I crack open the safe in hopes of finding the demonic papers the mayor told us about. Jory, keep watch at the door."
GM: "Ok." [invoke system's resolution method, to a 'fail' result] "Result: you open the safe but find nothing in it...and Jory, you hear footsteps rapidly approaching the door!"
Player: "Maybe that mayor ain't so honest as we thought he was - this is a trap!" (etc. etc. as the PCs try to escape)

So here the players never find the papers they wanted and worse, are driven away from further searching the place they'd been told to look. The story has to take another direction. Can this happen, in the sort of system you're talking about; and if it can't, how can that be justified?

I might be wrong, but pretty sure high myth encompasses map play. Myth as is used here is about binding predetermined fiction. So IMO, it’s in the first line!

 

[FrogReaver]

Given I'm dismissing or radically revising a construct dear to some, it's reasonable to ask if anything of value is lost? Is the baby being thrown out with the bathwater!? I've characterised "task resolution" as absurd. That's harsh: a generous characterisation would be - lacking in explanatory power.

I aim to robustly uphold conflict resolution, which not only continues to have explanatory power but becomes less blurry (to use the characterisation a poster in another thread gave the lines between it and "task resolution"). I say that new lenses - particularly that of drama resolution - better explain alternatives to conflict resolution with genuine utility to play. That the alternative to conflict resolution is indeed drama resolution, and not resolving tasks for their own sake!

A few thoughts.

1. I appreciate the alternative model and especially your thoughts on the lack of explanatory power of task resolution. Reflecting back, one of my most common complaints is that the descriptions of my d&d 5e play under the prior model was inadequate and I think you partially explain why - the model itself makes task resolution not descriptive of any rpg play - and thus my pushback against it describing my 5e play and my preoccupation with how to accurately describe my 5e play under that model - and thus also why I kept on probing the minutia of task vs conflict resolution.

2. Can you elaborate on the differences between task resolution and your drama resolution. I want to make sure it’s really a new concept and not just a substitution of jargon.

3. Can you describe 5e play, say ability checks and attacks using your model? It will help me make sure I’m on the same page as you.

 

[FrogReaver]

Assuming high-myth

If it's drama resolution it's set up and performance. What's dramatically appropriate? Resolution of performance confirms the safe is cracked, but stage notes imply a cut to the supervillain tossing the dirt into the wastebasket. This is an instance of the "puzzle" other posters spoke of.​

​

If it's conflict resolution, success means that as the player character is turning away from the empty safe, they spot a bunch of crumpled documents in the wastebasket.​

​

An alternative in both cases is simply, say yes - describe how characters find the dirt in the wastebasket. That does not take us to resolution. Choosing this would depend on the game's intended focus.​

​

Is that what you mean to query? It's honour goals or honour fiction. Or don't go to resolution, say yes.

Not quite but those are interesting questions. I’m focused more on the conflict resolution case, with the addition of some binding predetermined fiction. Your explanation gives 1 method - you’ve changed the players stated goal, a subtle change but it’s still been changed!. This would be the case I mentioned earlier of the DM saying no to the players stated goal after resolution. In practice the player generally accepts this change for whatever reasons (would be interesting to explore), but for my interests at the moment I don’t see anything that hinges on whether the player accepts or rejects that subtle kind of change.

I’m a bit undecided about say yes. If yes is the resolution then it’s either in the safe as the player wanted for his goal - in which case you aren’t saying yes to his stated goal - so really the same analysis here as if it had went to resolution.

It also strikes me that the actual location of the dirt in conflict resolution wouldn’t be the kind of detail to be predetermined as the precise location just wouldn’t matter. In which case the whole discussion around that may be moot. However, if true it does still shed some light - one method of avoiding the issue may be to highly restrict what is bindingly predetermined. If this is done and the details given to players before they interact with those things then i think its possible to have binding predetermined fiction in a day yes or roll dice system - which probably comes as no surprise to many here. I guess that brings me to - what kind of fiction can be predetermined in such systems. Maybe people and any predetermined details relevant to them that you share the moment they are introduced in play? I suppose one could also do this with special objects so long as shared when the object was introduced in play.

 

[FrogReaver]

One other thing I’ve noticed, keeping the discussion in the abstract helps me much more than play examples from games I don’t know.

 

[pemerton]

@Crimson Longinus

Helping scale down stakes - from "She tells us everything" to "She trusts us on this one thing" - isn't saying no or even putting things off. It is scaling down.

It needs to be read concurrently with the other principles and the expositions of them - which I've quoted at some length.

The point of prep, in DitV, is not to create a basis for vetoing, or separating the relationship between task success and goal achievement; it's to provide material for confronting the players (via their PCs), for coordinating various elements of the fiction (eg who is connected to whom, who knows what about whom, etc).

In a CoC-type approach, the GM calls for checks to decide whether or not to reveal this information (be that information about what's in safes, where safes are located, who knows whom, etc). In general, information is "hoarded" or "gated". A significant aspect of play is for the players to identify the possibility of this information (eg that there might be a safe) and then to learn more about its details (eg the safe might have dirt in it) and then to find out if those suppositions, formed by a mix of guess and inference, are sound (eg "We crack the safe!").

In DitV, the GM is actively revealing the town in play, is following the players' lead about what's important and is driving play towards conflict by, at every moment of play, either saying 'yes' or framing a conflict (which will be either vs another person, or vs demonic influence).

So suppose the GM has prepared a town, and part of the prep is that the sinners meet in a particular hall, and some virtuous young person has title to that hall in virtue of inheritance from their aunt, but the sinners have hidden the title and testamentary instruments in a safe, so they can keep their meeting place which has become imbued with their sinful essence. The players start poking around, and as per Baker's examples (pp 137, 139)

Present the PCs with choices — by which I mean, have your NPCs come to them and ask them to do things, fix things, take care of things, make it right, make it better, tell them it’s not their fault, tell them they’re in the right, tell them not to worry - then back waaay off. “Sister Abigail comes to you and asks you to marry her to her lover, Brother Ezekiel. Yes, they’ve been having an illicit affair and he’s already married. What do you do?”

Provoke the players to have their characters take action, then: react! Whatever the PCs do, your NPCs have to adjust to it. Figure out what they want now - it should be easy, they want what they always wanted _ and have ’em work toward it. . . .

I have the NPC launch into his or her tirade. “Things are awful! This person’s sleeping with this other person not with me, they murdered the schoolteacher, blood pours down the meeting house walls every night!”​

So the players learn there's a meeting hall. And something or someone - as portrayed by the GM, engaging in active revelation and provocation - brings the issue of uncertain or disputed titles to the players' attention. And so the GM follows that lead, and the safe becomes a component of the action.

This is different from CoC. It doesn't involve "saying 'no'" to action declarations, or breaking the relationship between success at the task and achieving the goal, based on secret backstory. Nor does it require no myth. It requires application of the relevant principles - saying 'yes', driving play towards conflict, actively revealing the town in play.

Of course the DitV version depends on the overall framing of the game - the PCs are religious authority figures. Different RPGs use different technical methods, different framings, etc.

 

[pemerton]

Suppose that someone decided to try and run CoC more like DitV. How would it go?

I think the most obvious things, that would come up fairly quickly, are that (i) there are no rules for resolving most of the relevant conflicts, and (ii) there are no rules for establishing and imposing most of the relevant consequences.

Conflict resolution isn't just a matter of choosing to narrate some thing rather than some other thing, after the dice are rolled. It's about having actual processes of play, expectations and allocations of authority pertaining to who gets to say what, etc, that mean that (a) stakes can be framed, and (b) the conflict can be resolved other than via someone just choosing the outcome, and (c) the stakes-relevant consequences can be established.

Torchbearer or Burning Wheel are a bit closer, in the basic of PC building and resolution mechanics, to CoC, but CoC can't emulate them either. It has no system for player-side flags (Belief, Instincts etc); no system for identifying and incorporating PCs' relationships; no system for the PCs trying harder; no system at all for a good chunk of conflict that doesn't involve physical violence.

Principles, procedures, mechanical details, what the fiction is about, etc - these are all interconnected elements of RPG design, which then yield the RPG experience.

 

[Old Fezziwig]

Conflict resolution isn't just a matter of choosing to narrate some thing rather than some other thing, after the dice are rolled. It's about having actual processes of play, expectations and allocations of authority pertaining to who gets to say what, etc, that mean that (a) stakes can be framed, and (b) the conflict can be resolved other than via someone just choosing the outcome, and (c) the stakes-relevant consequences can be established.

I'm not sure it'd be satisfying because the system's not really backing it up, which tends to invite problems, but you could do it on an ad hoc basis, right? I'm thinking specifically of the suggestions that Baker makes here under Practical Conflict Resolution Advice. There's an effort to frame stakes and reduction in GM authority as far as strict choice of outcome. There'd have to be some sort of negotiation around consequences, but it should be possible to play CoC using these principles.

 

[pemerton]

I'm not sure it'd be satisfying because the system's not really backing it up, which tends to invite problems, but you could do it on an ad hoc basis, right? I'm thinking specifically of the suggestions that Baker makes here under Practical Conflict Resolution Advice. There's an effort to frame stakes and reduction in GM authority as far as strict choice of outcome. There'd have to be some sort of negotiation around consequences, but it should be possible to play CoC using these principles.

Maybe?

I mentioned CoC because it has some superficial resemblances to DitV: strange cults who risk social order, that need to be uncovered and de-fanged; characters who exercise some sort of authority (often intellectual, in CoC) to try and investigate those cults; a lot of the action need not be D&D-ish physical adventure and combat - a lot of it is people-oriented stuff.

But CoC has very limited resolution machinery to bring to bear on a lot of this stuff.

I also think a typical CoC scenario is liable to be vulnerable to introducing stakes that fit the fiction. Like, if you go to the library looking for the occult volumes, what's at stake is that a cultist notices you . . . or that you accidentally draw the attention of some mi-go . . . or . . . This has a real potential to disrupt the pre-planned mystery/investigation, I think.

I think it's not a coincidence that Baker's examples are action-adventure ones. I think these sorts of ad hoc consequences are more easily incorporated into trad-ish play, because they don't tend to affect the overall trajectory of events and opposition.

This post is probably a bit more sceptical than is warranted. On the other hand, when I've run Cthulhu Dark using simple conflict resolution, it's been no myth, so that I can do the consequences and so on without having any prior fiction and plot that I'm potentially mucking up. And that experience is probably contributing to my scepticism.

 

[clearstream]

What I don't see anywhere here is reference to a hard-coded prep model of an in-game reality, where the location of the papers is pre-set by the GM and the PCs will eventually either find them or they won't. This would seem to suggest a fourth type of resolution, whether called "task resolution" or "puzzle solving" or whatever.

As noted, "high-myth" implies both high-prep and low-mutability in play. If there is a gorge, it's there because GM drew it on their map when they prepped their campaign.

On a broader scale, in the various scenarios you're proposing is there the possibility of an outcome where the PCs outright fail to find the papers at all, thus either shutting off that line of drama/story either temporarily or permanently or greatly diverting it?

So this is the problem that Baker's thoughts on high-myth and conventional approaches to resolution, and Harper's bottom diagram point to. If the goal of a scene is X, but resolution of the scene doesn't concretely resolve for X/not-X, then you get open-ended scenes. Where's the endpoint? Who is that up to and what are their compelling/constraining rules or rubrics for deciding?

I've mentioned that you get the same thing with "unlucky or error-prone players" in conflict-resolution. A string of misses leaves the scene open unless - like 4e skill challenges - the game procedure also tracks misses to close the scene (not all do.) Strings of poorly chosen and contradictory goals can close a scene without that scene contributing anything to resolving the overall situation. At least, not in any satisfactory way. You can see the virtue of a system that takes heed of interstitial resolutions while advancing inexorably toward closure, and thus are born skill challenges (4e), clocks (BitD), journeys (ToR), momentum (L5R), progress tracks (Ironsworn), and etc.

Example (I hope!):

Player: "I crack open the safe in hopes of finding the demonic papers the mayor told us about. Jory, keep watch at the door."
GM: "Ok." [invoke system's resolution method, to a 'fail' result] "Result: you open the safe but find nothing in it...and Jory, you hear footsteps rapidly approaching the door!"
Player: "Maybe that mayor ain't so honest as we thought he was - this is a trap!" (etc. etc. as the PCs try to escape)

So here the players never find the papers they wanted and worse, are driven away from further searching the place they'd been told to look. The story has to take another direction. Can this happen, in the sort of system you're talking about; and if it can't, how can that be justified?

Under conflict resolution, that can happen on a fail, as a hard move. It's a trap! Under so-called task resolution, it can happen on both fail and success, given high-myth. We can't crack the safe / we crack the safe but the papers are not inside. When I look at things folk do that I can't see the sense of, or that I disagree with, one question I ask myself is - from what angle does this make good sense? Where's the payoff for doing it this way?

To use an analogy (and I'm famously terrible at analogies) think of task resolution as the chisel in the hands of a sculptor addressing a block of marble. Each good stroke of the chisel (successful performance) brings the sculpture further into definition. At some point, the sculptor sees that their creative purpose is achieved, and they put down the chisel.

So with task resolution, if the player character performance - succeed or fail - doesn't end the scene, then what will? 4e's approach is just to count successes and failures, and end the scene at the stipulated count. You can see why folk played it differently - some conflict resolution, some task resolution. It works either way. But the scene ends whether or not the fictional position at that point feels dramatically appropriate. Referring back to my analogy, we've given Michelangelo fifty chisel strokes - no more, no less - to create David....

Thus, another way is to care about setting and situation prep, and dramatic appropriateness. The right performances culminating in the right fictional-position. We talk about GM as author, sometimes without giving that characterisation any real meaning beyond "they get to decide things". But authors don't just decide things, they pursue a creative ideal. So with the sculptor, and so with the player character performances that together culminate in the right fictional-position.

In the end, it's more important to rehabilitate the construct than change the language. Resolving tasks for their own sake is absurd. Either they're resolved for the intents they express, or for the sake of their effect in shaping - sculpting - the fictional-position. Task resolution must be understood in a way that has explanatory power and utility to play.

Examples

High-myth + task-resolution (demonic papers are concealed in a Bible on the bookshelf)​

Player: "I crack open the safe in hopes of finding the demonic papers the mayor told us about. Jory, keep watch at the door."​

GM: "Ok." [invoke system's resolution method, to a either result] "Result: the safe's too tough to crack / you open the safe but find nothing in it... and [complication] Jory, you hear footsteps rapidly approaching the door!"​

Player: "Maybe that mayor ain't so honest as we thought he was - this is a trap!" (etc. etc. as the PCs try to escape)​

GM has a dramatically appropriate fictional-position in mind up-front, and character performances haven't reached it. It might be wondered, why should we care so much about what we had in mind up-front if something better emerges during play? On the other hand, what really is the motive for compromising if we don't find it satisfying? Play for enjoyment.

High-myth + conflict-resolution (demonic papers are concealed in a Bible on the bookshelf)​

Player: "I crack open the safe in hopes of finding the demonic papers the mayor told us about. Jory, keep watch at the door."​

GM: "Ok." [invoke system's resolution method, to a fail result] "Result: You crack open the safe [apparently successful performance] but find nothing in it [failed conflict]... and [complication] Jory, you hear footsteps rapidly approaching the door!"​

Player: "Maybe that mayor ain't so honest as we thought he was - this is a trap!" (etc. etc. as the PCs try to escape)​

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The risks of conflict resolution are irrelevance of performance to result, and reaching. See Baker's comments on players wanting to go large with their goals, and talking them down. But what if a player says nope, it's sins absolved or nothing!?

High-myth + conflict-resolution (demonic papers are concealed in a Bible on the bookshelf)​

Player: "I crack open the safe in hopes of finding the demonic papers the mayor told us about. Jory, keep watch at the door."​

GM: "Ok." [invoke system's resolution method, to a success result] "Result: the safe's too tough to crack but as you are turning away you notice the spine of a bible sticking out a little further than other books on the shelf... the papers are tucked inside... and [complication] Jory, you hear footsteps rapidly approaching the door!"​

Player: "Maybe that mayor ain't so honest as we thought he was - this is a trap!" (etc. etc. as the PCs try to escape)​

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Makes you wonder what the point of all that prep was, right? for conflict resolution. Would it really have mattered if GM had just narrated the papers being in the safe players were focusing on?

Low-no-myth + task-resolution (players are hunting for demonic papers but GM hasn't prepped their location)​

Player: "I crack open the safe in hopes of finding the demonic papers the mayor told us about. Jory, keep watch at the door."​

GM: "Ok." [invoke system's resolution method, to a success result] "Result: You open the safe and the demonic papers are there, rustling and crackling even though there's no air movement... and [complication] Jory, you hear footsteps rapidly approaching the door!"​

Player: "Maybe that mayor ain't so honest as we thought he was - this is a trap!" (etc. etc. as the PCs try to escape)​

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Low myth gives GM greater freedom because they haven't decided in advance that one perfect shape they care about. Maybe it'd be like carving sympathetically in knotted wood. A shape emerges, but rather than being the exact figure you had in mind in advance, it's the figure that was contained in the wood itself.