"Why won't you listen!?" - Talking with your fists.

[Ratskinner]

None of which has any effect on whether or not, for example, one party convinces the other that the princess needs to be rescued.

A wins, A rescues the princess. B wins, B subdues A. There's no mechanic for A to get B to go with them and rescue the princess short of the GM going, "Okay, he gives in, he'll do what you say."

In Legends of the Wulin, no matter what the outcome of the actual fight is, A gets a chance post-combat to give B the impression that the princess does indeed need saving, and B gets a chance to give A the idea that this is all a fool's errand. And all without rolling the equivalent of a Persuasion check. The difficulty is determined by the likelihood that such a thing would happen, but it's still possible.

If such a thing can be done in FATE, that's awesome, but I really doubt 5e has anything along those lines built into it.

If I understand the scene you're describing, Fate can definitely handle it. In several ways, in fact: First, if no one is supposed to actually get hurt, just run it as a Contest with the fighting as flavor. Second, just agree ahead of time that for this "Persuasion Fight" its allowable to take non-physical consequences related to the point in contention and run it as a regular Physical Conflict. Third (a bit unorthodox) run it as a Conflict and Contest together, if the Contest ends before someone is taken out or concedes...so be it. Fourth, run it as a Social/Mental Conflict, and just use the physical fight as flavor. Fifth, its a regular Physical Conflict, but neither side will accept a concession from the other without the appropriate admission.

Although, I'm not sure I understand what you've written about how Wulin handles it. (Or maybe I don't understand the scenes you're referencing.) I say this because Fate (and myself for that matter) would need to know the dramatic purpose of the scene to judge it. That is, if the purpose is to convince the opponent, then we'd use one set of mechanics (and the fight might only be flavor), but if the fight is a real honest-injun "I'll kill you" fight, then we'd use another. I mean, how does it matter if A convinces B if B is dead? How does Wulin determine how likely such a thing is? Why is the lack of Persuasion check important? Is this effectively some kind of "dominance" fight?

I'm not aware of any such mechanic in 5e. However, it is still the "modular edition" so who knows what will show up in the DMG.

 

[Cronocke]

If I understand the scene you're describing, Fate can definitely handle it. In several ways, in fact: First, if no one is supposed to actually get hurt, just run it as a Contest with the fighting as flavor. Second, just agree ahead of time that for this "Persuasion Fight" its allowable to take non-physical consequences related to the point in contention and run it as a regular Physical Conflict. Third (a bit unorthodox) run it as a Conflict and Contest together, if the Contest ends before someone is taken out or concedes...so be it. Fourth, run it as a Social/Mental Conflict, and just use the physical fight as flavor. Fifth, its a regular Physical Conflict, but neither side will accept a concession from the other without the appropriate admission.

See, this is why I want to play a couple games of FATE before I ever try to run it. This sounds like great stuff.

Although, I'm not sure I understand what you've written about how Wulin handles it. (Or maybe I don't understand the scenes you're referencing.) I say this because Fate (and myself for that matter) would need to know the dramatic purpose of the scene to judge it. That is, if the purpose is to convince the opponent, then we'd use one set of mechanics (and the fight might only be flavor), but if the fight is a real honest-injun "I'll kill you" fight, then we'd use another. I mean, how does it matter if A convinces B if B is dead? How does Wulin determine how likely such a thing is? Why is the lack of Persuasion check important? Is this effectively some kind of "dominance" fight?

Let me break it down further, then.

The way fights (and indeed, any contest of wills) work in Wulin is that there is no such thing as HP. Instead, a successful hit inflicts something called a "Ripple". Ripples represent a minor bruise, a slight doubt, or a minor hesitation. In and of themselves, they mean very little. However, particularly well-aimed hits will force you to make a roll of all the Ripples you've accumulated so far - and the attack that triggers this adds its Damage bonus to this roll. Depending on how this roll goes, a character could take an injury, which provides action penalties, or even be Taken Out of the fight entirely - which doesn't necessarily mean dying, but could instead mean no longer being able to stand unaided, or passing out from a concussion, or anything else believable.

But being Taken Out isn't quite the end of the fight.

Both characters now roll their Ripples. The other party declares what they want the resulting effect to be - it could be just an injury that hadn't been noticed until now, or it could be something like a burgeoning respect for their foe. Any sort of effect works - in the case of an emotional one, it's an impulse to act a certain way or face a temporary penalty for resisting the urge. The less likely the character is to suddenly suffer from that malady, or feel that curse, or have those doubts, the higher the GM may make the penalty to the Rippling roll - which may cause the effect to fail after the roll is already made.

The end result is that two people could have a fist (or sword or staff) fight until one person passes out, at which point his opponent realizes the truth in his words, nurses him back to health, and agrees - reluctantly - to join in his quest.

The fun part is that these rules also govern how persuading an enemy works, and indeed, with the right investment in abilities you can use verbal put-downs in place of physical attacks (or alongside them in the narrative, but mechanically only the words matter), or paper talismans and mystical hand gestures, or acupuncture needles laced with poisons and biles. These also inflict Ripples, but instead of standard injuries, they cause passions, curses, and illnesses. And, just like with combat, the end-of-battle roll can lead to any sort of effect. If you want to be Zhuge Liang and berate someone until they have a heart attack and die, Legends of the Wulin allows for it.

 

[Celebrim]

If I understand the scene you're describing, Fate can definitely handle it. In several ways, in fact: First, if no one is supposed to actually get hurt, just run it as a Contest with the fighting as flavor. Second, just agree ahead of time that for this "Persuasion Fight" its allowable to take non-physical consequences related to the point in contention and run it as a regular Physical Conflict. Third (a bit unorthodox) run it as a Conflict and Contest together, if the Contest ends before someone is taken out or concedes...so be it. Fourth, run it as a Social/Mental Conflict, and just use the physical fight as flavor. Fifth, its a regular Physical Conflict, but neither side will accept a concession from the other without the appropriate admission.

The problem with that sort of 'FATE can definitely handle it', is you've pretty much said, "FATE just gives the GM some tools and lets him decide how to handle it." There is nothing wrong with that, but from that perspective every system can handle the seen provided that the GM is in the mindset that he has a toolbag that can be applied to particular problems. Remember that even 1e AD&D introduced a subsystem for subduing dragons that treated combat as a narrative toolbag. So long as the GM is of the opinion that the rules are suggested solutions and he's free to adapt them to the situation, and as long as the players agree to this approach, all of the above different ways of handling the situation can be applied in every system. I can run a D&D fight where no one actually gets hurt (see subdual rules, for an instance) and by fiat declare no damage is inflicted after the combat is resolved (on in 3e you could run it as all damage is non-lethal, which for that matter had a counterpart in 1e). I can run it as skill contest of some sort. I can run it as a contest where the side whose morale fails concedes the point. I can run it as a skill contest and use a physical fight as flavor. I can run it as a skill contest with results that are weighted or influenced by the simultaneous results in the combat.

If FATE can handle it in all those different ways then there is actually no rule on how to handle the situation. But that puts FATE on par with virtually every other system. The only difference is how FATE encourages you to think about resolving situations.

I should note that as early as 1990, I was doing pretty much all of that in some form in 1e AD&D. For example, a social conflict whose outcome depended on the result of an arm wrestling match which was run as a skill challenge (first side with 4 more successes than the other wins). All you need is the willingness of the DM to see the rules as tools that are applicable to certain situations. Why did I run it that way? Because the DMG didn't specifically tell me how to run it, but I had seen in published works mechanics like ability checks (roll under ability score) and ad hoc skill challenge subsystems created for a special purpose in a custom encounter. So I just applied those tools in the absence of any official decree as to what to do in this situation in a way that I felt captured the action of arm wrestling semi-realistically.

That doesn't mean we have to agree on which is the 'right' way to run every situation, and who we as GMs decide based on our table goals what the right way to run a situation is determines the flavor of our game. How we decide that is influenced by how the system is presented, but it's not actually set by the system.

I say this because Fate (and myself for that matter) would need to know the dramatic purpose of the scene to judge it.

This is an example of a DM setting a flavor to the table using his preferences. I'd tend to look less at the dramatic purpose of the scene and instead guess what the likely outcomes of the player proposition are to be and try to improvise a system that produced a range of results that matched the likely outcomes. The better the available tools the system has, the easier that is to do.

 

[Ratskinner]

The problem with that sort of 'FATE can definitely handle it', is you've pretty much said, "FATE just gives the GM some tools and lets him decide how to handle it." There is nothing wrong with that, but from that perspective every system can handle the seen provided that the GM is in the mindset that he has a toolbag that can be applied to particular problems. Remember that even 1e AD&D introduced a subsystem for subduing dragons that treated combat as a narrative toolbag. So long as the GM is of the opinion that the rules are suggested solutions and he's free to adapt them to the situation, and as long as the players agree to this approach, all of the above different ways of handling the situation can be applied in every system. I can run a D&D fight where no one actually gets hurt (see subdual rules, for an instance) and by fiat declare no damage is inflicted after the combat is resolved (on in 3e you could run it as all damage is non-lethal, which for that matter had a counterpart in 1e). I can run it as skill contest of some sort. I can run it as a contest where the side whose morale fails concedes the point. I can run it as a skill contest and use a physical fight as flavor. I can run it as a skill contest with results that are weighted or influenced by the simultaneous results in the combat.

If FATE can handle it in all those different ways then there is actually no rule on how to handle the situation. But that puts FATE on par with virtually every other system. The only difference is how FATE encourages you to think about resolving situations.

Hang on...a single subsystem specifically for subduing Dragons means that suddenly AD&D has social conflict rules? No, I don't buy it. Your point here sounds like some kind of contraposition of the Oberoni Fallacy. There is a vast difference between "the GM (or adventure author) can make up some way of handling X (even if its a clever extension of other subsystems)" and "the system provides multiple tools/avenues for handling X". The current Fate Core rules actually provide (as I tried, but apparently failed to get across) guidance on which of those possibilities are best suited to the table intent (advice which is extensive and which I am loathe to get into here.) All but one of examples I gave are RAW for Fate Core, they don't involve the GM inventing anything and they don't risk de-protagonizing PCs or taking away player agency.

I should note that as early as 1990, I was doing pretty much all of that in some form in 1e AD&D. For example, a social conflict whose outcome depended on the result of an arm wrestling match which was run as a skill challenge (first side with 4 more successes than the other wins). All you need is the willingness of the DM to see the rules as tools that are applicable to certain situations. Why did I run it that way? Because the DMG didn't specifically tell me how to run it, but I had seen in published works mechanics like ability checks (roll under ability score) and ad hoc skill challenge subsystems created for a special purpose in a custom encounter. So I just applied those tools in the absence of any official decree as to what to do in this situation in a way that I felt captured the action of arm wrestling semi-realistically.

That doesn't mean we have to agree on which is the 'right' way to run every situation, and who we as GMs decide based on our table goals what the right way to run a situation is determines the flavor of our game. How we decide that is influenced by how the system is presented, but it's not actually set by the system.

This is, IMO, illustrative of one of the great problems we (as a community) have when discussing 1e (or any of the older editions, really). People all seem to have done so much customization and invention that we were all playing different games. It has created, IMO, a false nostalgia for the system which, really, RAW, wasn't all that good. (...And I say that as someone playing ACK right now.)

This is an example of a DM setting a flavor to the table using his preferences. I'd tend to look less at the dramatic purpose of the scene and instead guess what the likely outcomes of the player proposition are to be and try to improvise a system that produced a range of results that matched the likely outcomes. The better the available tools the system has, the easier that is to do.

Admittedly, Fate can require (or at least work much better with) awareness the dramatic purpose or intent of the scene, if you're not interested in that...then Fate won't be the system for you. Personally, I consider it an advantage of the Fate system (and a few similar systems) in that working at what I often refer to as the "story" level, Fate avoids the necessity of inventing a new system to handle every situation. But that only works for the playstyle(s) and agendas to which it was intended (for all those systems.)

 

[Ratskinner]

See, this is why I want to play a couple games of FATE before I ever try to run it. This sounds like great stuff.
<snippage of Wulin description>

Honestly, the system itself is pretty simple, but it requires a different headspace than D&D. The Fate Core book does a good job going over a lot of stuff, and the pdf is available PWYW on rpgnow. From your description, conflicts work somewhat similarly to Wulin (not identical, but there are some similar bits). It sounds like a big fight in either system involves building up some kind of fictional positioning ("ripples" vs. "aspects" & "consequences"). Fate doesn't have an inherent climactic roll like it sounds like Wulin does, although they often happen. (I mean, what else are you gonna use all those aspects and consequences for?)

 

[Celebrim]

Hang on...a single subsystem specifically for subduing Dragons means that suddenly AD&D has social conflict rules?

Wait, what?

No, I don't buy it.

I didn't ask you to buy anything. I was making conversation. Apparently I did a bad job of explaining what I was saying, because I haven't a clue where you got what you responded with.

Your point here sounds like some kind of contraposition of the Oberoni Fallacy.

I'm getting really sick of seeing that phrase broadly applied to anything people say. The Oberoni Fallacy is very simple, and it refers to people excusing real failures of the design by saying that the GM can produce house rules.

So for example,

Person #1 "1e Thieves suck"
Person #2 "Yeah, but you can house rule that."

That's the Oberoni Fallacy. There is nothing remotely involved in the Oberoni Fallacy in pointing out that 1e AD&D had a variety of subsystems in official sources that you could rely on to handle novel situations.

In the case of:

Person #1: "AD&D lacked a social conflict system"
Person #2: "I guess. If you mean that AD&D lacked a skill system, then I agree, but if there was a social conflict where you needed to have a fortune mechanic to resolve the outcome, it was pretty easy to apply the standard of 'roll below Charisma' which was used in published TSR modules, or to do some sort of NPC reaction/response test based on the character's charisma score which was also part of the official rules."

That's not the Oberoni Fallacy.

In your case, I was calling out that for each of your 'several ways of handling it', there existed precedent for handling a combat in a similar way in a published source. I choose 1e AD&D precisely because I thought it would be surprising that such an old system had all the different general approaches suggested by FATE in its tool bag. The example of subduing a dragon corresponded not at all to resolving the situation as a social challenge, but rather to your suggestion of "if no one is supposed to actually get hurt, just run it as a Contest with the fighting as flavor." Nothing in the AD&D rules forbids the DM from running a scenario as a combat in which no one gets hurt, and the example of the dragon shows that there is precedent and reason to think that a DM would think that is in his toolbag. While the AD&D rules may not have specifically called out the DM's ability to use subdual rules in a situation not involving a dragon, the overall approach of the 1e DMG and TSR modules was to treat the DM as privileged to adopt the rules to the situation. Now, this creates a real design problem, in that there was not a unified approach to any particular problem - something proven by the diversity of ways that were published to determine if someone had drowned - and this meant that often an answer to 'how to run' this was not at a DM's finger tips leading to rules of dubious utility. But that's not the issue we are trying to resolve. We are trying to resolve the question of, "Can AD&D allow you to talk with your fists?" And the answer to that is, "Yes. Yes it can."

There is a vast difference between "the GM (or adventure author) can make up some way of handling X (even if its a clever extension of other subsystems)" and "the system provides multiple tools/avenues for handling X".

Really, not from where I'm standing. Both involve relying on the GM to use his judgment as to how to handle something. The rest of what you said about 'deprotagonizing PCs' or 'taking away player agency' is in context just jargon BS. It sounds good but in practice it doesn't mean anything. I don't even want to know how you think you resolve the inherent contradiction in claiming that you don't risk deprotagonizing PC's but also that you are looking at the dramatic purpose and intent of the scene.

This is, IMO, illustrative of one of the great problems we (as a community) have when discussing 1e (or any of the older editions, really). People all seem to have done so much customization and invention that we were all playing different games. It has created, IMO, a false nostalgia for the system which, really, RAW, wasn't all that good. (...And I say that as someone playing ACK right now.)

I'm not going to get into a qualitative analysis of AD&D with you, because first it is a red herring, secondly it's crappy edition warring that will end up amounting to subjective preferences, and third you are really out of your freaking mind if you think I'm all full of nostalgia for 1e and think the system was great. You seem to be engaging in an inherent contradiction here in that you think I think 1e was great, but also that I felt the need to create lots of house rules. If I was really a 1e die hard I'd be playing some OSRIC system. I don't know where you got your chip on your shoulder about 1e, but when you go off on those sorts of rants you aren't responding to what I said.

The point is that at its core the scene of "talking with your fists" is pretty simple in both intent and resolution, and virtually any system can handle it in any number of ways provided the GM's approach to the system is to see the rules as a toolbox for solving problems. This doesn't involve house rules or customizations (except to the extent that every ruling is itself a house rule, which would not differentiate FATE from anything else)! Concepts like "Roll below your ability score to succeed." appear very early in TSR publications. Yes, it was most often in modules, but its not unheard of to introduce new rules in modules. To apply, "Roll below you ability score to succeed" in AD&D is not a house rule.

Player #1: "AD&D has no way of resolving a generic strength test."
Player #2: "Wrong, it has many. You could roll a bend bars/lift gates check. You could roll under the strength ability score. Or you could roll and open doors check."

That's NOT the Oberoni fallacy!

Player #1: "AD&D has no way of resolving a generic fortitude test."
Player #2: "Wrong, it has many. You could roll a system shock survival test. You could roll under the constitution score. You could ask for a save vs. petrification/polymorph...."

That's NOT the Oberoni fallacy!

Player #1: "AD&D has no way of resolving a generic social challenge."
Player #2: "Wrong, it has many...."

That's NOT the Oberoni fallacy.

Player #1: "AD&D has multiple ways of resolving any proposition, no official way to resolve any but the most generic dungeon bashing propositions, very little guidance to the DM how to pick from his many tools, and its made worse by a highly eclectic organization of its rules - some of which don't even work right."
Player #2: "Well, you can fix that with house rules."

Player #1: "AD&D's rules are so disorganized that often experienced players didn't even know it had rules to cover situations much less what those rules were."
Player #2: "Well, you can fix that with house rules."

THAT is the Oberoni fallacy.

Ratskinner: "FATE has an extensive tool bag for resolving combat as a social challenge, it's specifically called out as an intent of the rules, and there is tons of guidance to the DM on how and when he should adopt each particular strategy."
Celebrim: "Yes, all that is true and it's great. But if there is really six different ways to handle the same scene each with its own mechanical particulars and stakes and the GM has to carefully construct the right solution for each scenario, it's really not any better than any other game where you would have to carefully adapt the rules to the situation except that it specifically shines a spotlight on it as an intent of the system and privileges the GM to do so."
Ratskinner: "Oberoni! Oberoni!!!"

"There is more than one way to do things" is not necessarily good design. Ask anyone who has ever tried to debug someone else's Perl.

The big advantage to FATE's expressability is that it gets everyone on the same page, and highlights that there can be more goals and challenges of play than physical combat. I'm not going to get into it with you about why I consider FATE a self-defeating design that gets in the way of its own goals of play any more than I'm going to defend in detail what I think AD&D got right and what it got wrong.

 

[Ratskinner]

I didn't ask you to buy anything. I was making conversation. Apparently I did a bad job of explaining what I was saying, because I haven't a clue where you got what you responded with.

That "bad job" thing might be working in two directions here.

I'm getting really sick of seeing that phrase broadly applied to anything people say.

Apologies, that's why I used the phrase "contrapositive of" as I was intending it conversationally.

Person #1: "AD&D lacked a social conflict system"
Person #2: "I guess. If you mean that AD&D lacked a skill system, then I agree, but if there was a social conflict where you needed to have a fortune mechanic to resolve the outcome, it was pretty easy to apply the standard of 'roll below Charisma' which was used in published TSR modules, or to do some sort of NPC reaction/response test based on the character's charisma score which was also part of the official rules."

That's not the Oberoni Fallacy.

I mean a lot more than a lack of skill system, and personally I can't see "roll below Charisma" as social conflict system any more than "roll below Strength" would suffice for a physical conflict system. (Not that an ability check has no utility, mind you.)

In your case, I was calling out that for each of your 'several ways of handling it', there existed precedent for handling a combat in a similar way in a published source. I choose 1e AD&D precisely because I thought it would be surprising that such an old system had all the different general approaches suggested by FATE in its tool bag.

I would agree that 1e-era D&D tables (I'm unfamiliar with OD&D) developed "first drafts" of a lot of later rpg tech. I mean, in some ways they had too. I think a decent portion of the rest of our miscommunication revolves around drawing a line around AD&D as a system and what it can be given credit for. For example, I usually don't consider a rule or mechanic presented in a module to be part of the system when discussing it, mostly because there's no guarantee of which materials a group might have access. Similarly, something that a DM invented as a system doesn't count as a part of the AD&D system for me. (At least for the purpose of giving the system credit for it.)

Analagously, I draw a similar tight line around Fate to be within the Fate Core book...except that the publisher considers Fate Accelerated to be a part of Fate Core. So, even though the Fate Core book has a chapter about developing and adding "Extras"* to your game, I wouldn't give the Fate system credit for a particular Extras system that someone developed.

*Extras would be specialized subsystems for things like magic, psionics, cybernetics, giant robots, etc. Generally speaking, such Extras are unnecessary for using Fate in a given genre, but can be useful for re-inforcing or exploring exotic genre facets. That is, you can play fantasy using Fate Core out of the box, magic included. However, if you want part of your game to be "What if magic worked like this...?" or "I want magic to work just like it does in X". You might want to develop an Extra to account for that.

The example of subduing a dragon corresponded not at all to resolving the situation as a social challenge, but rather to your suggestion of "if no one is supposed to actually get hurt, just run it as a Contest with the fighting as flavor." Nothing in the AD&D rules forbids the DM from running a scenario as a combat in which no one gets hurt, and the example of the dragon shows that there is precedent and reason to think that a DM would think that is in his toolbag. While the AD&D rules may not have specifically called out the DM's ability to use subdual rules in a situation not involving a dragon, the overall approach of the 1e DMG and TSR modules was to treat the DM as privileged to adopt the rules to the situation. Now, this creates a real design problem, in that there was not a unified approach to any particular problem - something proven by the diversity of ways that were published to determine if someone had drowned - and this meant that often an answer to 'how to run' this was not at a DM's finger tips leading to rules of dubious utility. But that's not the issue we are trying to resolve. We are trying to resolve the question of, "Can AD&D allow you to talk with your fists?" And the answer to that is, "Yes. Yes it can."

Please note that I originally said, "Fate can definitely handle it". That is, Fate has such a scene/mechanics right there playable out of the box. No stretching of the rules, no "toolbox" or inventiveness, or special mindset required for the table to figure out how to do it. The same rules would work between PCs and between PC and NPC. Both players and GMs would have access to it and know how to do it.

I actually disagree with you about your answer to "Can AD&D allow you to talk with your fists?" Not so much in that such a scene can't happen in an AD&D game, but in that it was AD&D itself, rather than the DM that let you do it. Just because a GM might have a trick in his toolbag, doesn't mean that the system he's running has it, too.

Really, not from where I'm standing. Both involve relying on the GM to use his judgment as to how to handle something. The rest of what you said about 'deprotagonizing PCs' or 'taking away player agency' is in context just jargon BS. It sounds good but in practice it doesn't mean anything. I don't even want to know how you think you resolve the inherent contradiction in claiming that you don't risk deprotagonizing PC's but also that you are looking at the dramatic purpose and intent of the scene.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, I disagree. You, Celebrim, might have been the kind of DM that would work with his players and extend or improvise his rules to acommodate a player wishing to engage in such a scene. However, that doesn't mean that the AD&D system supported that implicitly or explicitly, it just meant you were an accomodating DM (or would have been, presumably.) It would be just as acceptable for the DM to say "no". No, it doesn't matter that you're playing a bard. No, it doesn't matter if you saw a scene like that and want it to happen. It doesn't matter that your only score above a 12 is charisma. Just "No, we're not doing it." That, in this case, is precisely what I mean by "deprotagonizing" or "taking away player agency." Maybe that makes him bad/uncreative DM, but its not like TSR issued licenses, and I witnessed plenty of that kind of thing.

I know you said you don't even want to know this, but for others who may be reading. The only thing necessary to resolve the dramatic purpose and intent of the scene for the Fate GM is some familiarity with the genre/scene/trope and to ask "What are you trying to accomplish?". Which hardly contradicts player agency or PC protagonization. (Notably, I lack the familiarity part for the scene in question.)

The point is that at its core the scene of "talking with your fists" is pretty simple in both intent and resolution, and virtually any system can handle it in any number of ways provided the GM's approach to the system is to see the rules as a toolbox for solving problems. This doesn't involve house rules or customizations (except to the extent that every ruling is itself a house rule, which would not differentiate FATE from anything else)!

Except that a Fate table doesn't need to make either a ruling or a rule for this case (beyond the usual discernment for using Fate).

Player #1: "AD&D has no way of resolving a generic social challenge."
Player #2: "Wrong, it has many...."

That's NOT the Oberoni fallacy.

I agree, but AD&D doesn't, to my eyes have very much of anything in the way of broadly applicable rules for a social challenge. So, to my eyes the exchange is more like:

Player #1: "AD&D has no way of resolving a generic social challenge."
Player #2: "Maybe not, but if the DM is inventive and re-purposes some of the other mechanics he could houserule one in."

Which is, if not the Oberoni fallacy explicitly,...Oberon-ish. However, I can certainly understand if you've experienced over-use of that term, and again, apologize.

Ratskinner: "FATE has an extensive tool bag for resolving combat as a social challenge, it's specifically called out as an intent of the rules, and there is tons of guidance to the DM on how and when he should adopt each particular strategy."
Celebrim: "Yes, all that is true and it's great. But if there is really six different ways to handle the same scene each with its own mechanical particulars and stakes and the GM has to carefully construct the right solution for each scenario, it's really not any better than any other game where you would have to carefully adapt the rules to the situation except that it specifically shines a spotlight on it as an intent of the system and privileges the GM to do so."

I don't think that's an accurate portrayal of the situation the GM faces in Fate, which I confess my original presentation would not dissuade one from understanding. I would like to differentiate between my position as a poster on a message board who doesn't quite grok the scene in question and that of a GM who would be running this in a game. Regarding this scene, all I'm really sure of is that (a) there's a physical confrontation, (b) its generally an extended scene/resolution, and (c) at least part of the result is a mental/social resolution/change for the loser. With only that to go on, I quickly conceived of 6 possible ways to proceed as a Fate GM.* I presume that a GM familiar with the scenes or genres in question would likely quickly or perhaps even immediately know which of those would be appropriate. The critical difference from the GM seat (and I've been in that seat for both systems) is that with Fate, there is no "carefully construct" or notable adaptation necessary.

*Additionally, those 6 methods only involve two mechanical processes: Conflicts and Contests.