[Solar System] Knocked out of Extended Conflict and Intents
Eero Tuovinen:
Yeah, you need to have definite arch to the system in something like this. It's like D&D combat: that system would go nowhere if there were no ablative hit point totals. The only thing that tells you how near the end is is your ablating hit point total, after all.
As for the practical dialogue: let's say Adam's player is A, Beatrice's B and Charlie's C. Beatrice is a cop, Adam is a fugitive and Charlie is a corrupt NSA agent. An extended conflict is ongoing.
SG: The elevator doors close between Adam and Charlie just as the latter draws his gun. There's no doubt that he's going for a kill. Beatrice succeeded in second-guessing Adam, so she'll be waiting for him on the third floor when he gets out of the elevator. The round ends, a new round begins.
A: For the next round, I'm going to jump out of the elevator and Wrestle her down - perhaps I can talk her out of this foolish chase before Charlie gets up the stairs.
C: I guess I'll run up the stairs and surprise Adam in the act of assaulting an officer - Endure for bonus dice.
B: Come now, A - shouldn't we negotiate? Charlie's clearly off the handle here. <This is "out of character", note.>
A: What do you have in mind?
B: I'll help you disarm Charlie if you'll go with me to the precinct peacefully.
A: OK, works for me. You'll shout something like that as the elevator doors open and I stumble out, ready for anything?
B: Actually, I'll shout "Adam, stop running! I love you, but you've got to trust me!" <Note how what the characters know and think has only occasional touchpoints with the stakes of the conflict.>
A: Cool. I'm going to go along with that.
C: Damn. Sounds like I'm screwed.
SG: So we have Beatrice and Adam changing intents, which means defensive actions. Everybody would make a defensive action here, so C - want to skip ahead and do something proactive against their defenses? <C's defensive action was not mandated by the rules, but inspired by the fiction, so he can swap to something else with a tiny bit of flex in the fiction.>
C: OK, let's say that I get up top, kick open the door and Shoot the first thing that moves, murder in my eyes.
A: That'd be me, as I run towards Beatrice - I'll React to throw both of us out of the way.
B: React, likewise - my check supports A here.
SG: So we're finally ready for the dice, then. Let's roll.
The above example is somewhat elaborate as a depiction of a typical extended conflict negotiation phase, but that's how it goes when you change intents - it's pretty typical for some players to declare actions, then somebody changes intents, then others correct their actions to match. In this case we see both Adam and Beatrice changing their intents to remove the conflict between them, allowing them both to focus on fighting against Charlie. The characters do not need to engage in elaborate negotiations, that part is done by the players, out of character. Note that we could technically say that Beatrice won her conflict against Adam here, in that Adam's player accepted the idea that Adam would go with Beatrice after the climatic fight against Charlie was concluded. Rules-wise, however, such a victory looks just like a change of intent - Beatrice changed her intent because she is now more concerned about saving Adam from Charlie than just taking Adam into custody, and Adam changed his intent because he is now more concerned with kicking Charlie's ass than escaping from Beatrice and Charlie.
If Beatrice had to hunt Adam to exhaustion and force him out of the conflict, then Adam would indeed be helpless against Charlie, unless Beatrice decided to defend him. This makes eminent sense to me. Note that if Charlie weren't participating in the conflict before Adam succumbed, it wouldn't be unreasonable for Adam to get a new conflict against Charlie when he arrives with gun in hand. A tapped-out Adam with a full Harm track might not be much of an opposition for Charlie, but that's just how it goes in this sort of game - you don't get your hit points back after a battle in D&D, either.
It's not very difficult to replace the Harm tracks with some other sort of conflict arc if you feel that characters should get to resist each contrary force separately instead of being forced to ablate their strength against all of them at once. You could have separate "progress tracks" for Adam's freedom vs. Adam's life, for example. I like the personal nature of the Harm track well enough (I think it's cool that a character can get weakened by one struggle and then be brought down by another), but I could see benefits in different set-ups, too.
Paul T:
Great, thanks, Eero!
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