Hello all,

I have been working myself over to post an advanced interest check in the forums for quite some time now, and have balked at every opportunity. I have tried to put my finger on exactly what was bothering me and I think I have found it.

Conflict Resolution in a non tabletop setting.

How can it be done where everyone is happy? How does one know when to lose? When to win? How does a GM accurately and decisively act on the knowledge that their creations may die? Or that a specific player's character may not live?

I am not talking about dice rolling in a D&D game. A good, old fashioned roleplay in the general freeform, casual, and advanced forum is my focus here. I would like to hear opinions from GMs as well as players who have had this sort of experience in their travels on this site. Please, open discussion.

Thank you.

In the roleplay that I'm currently in we use a non-dice combat system to 'resolve' conflicts. In a nutshell, the GM rewards what we do in combat with ambiguous points that count towards defeating an enemy. When we have reached the target amount, that enemy can be defeated. The system is very non-intrusive and the players don't even have to acknowledge that it is there, it's purely for the GM.

@Prisk:
So the way a player writes out their creativity onto their post is then quantified in a set number of points? Perhaps I was too naive to think that there could be any other way to decide how a conflict is resolved without a hard number system. In your example it seems that the GM is subjective in the distribution of these points unless there are specific rules that govern the output of these points.

I myself GM'ed a game a long time ago that was very harsh in consequences but relied on creativity (and a great deal of collaboration) to resolve scenarios either between players or between the players and the GM. It felt like I was forcing the story down their throats, and I do not want to do that.

I don't usually use numbers outside of Bleach(keeps things easier there), so I resolve conflicts by listening to both sides and going with the better option. You are the GM, so ultimately, you can decide th best course for the RP.

Mostly, you won't make everyone happy, but from what or seen, unless the resolution is completely out there or unfair, most will go along with it.

You can decide when to lose when it's bear for the story. Or, prior to it taking place deciding whether losing or winnin is better for the continuation. For Allaria, I have set points where losing is the option, but I let them get there how they like. For instance, there was a war at the beginning that wasn't meant to be won and wasn't.

Just know they can and will die. If you don't want them too, then they won't. You can have them survive if they are pertinent to the story later. But if their ultimate purpose has been served, then killing them off can be a good point and morale booster for the players. Make them think they are doing well in the story.

Tell them their characters have a chance to die. People usually accept that line. But don't kill them just because Lols, that'll turn people off.

In other words, you can definitely have conflict resolution without numbers. It's mostly based on what you think will be the best course of action. People have been doing it on Guild for a while now.

When you meet conflict resolution, do you mean between the players, or between characters within the IC?

IC wise, I generally trust my players to know what's reasonable and right for what their characters should do. When players first join my rp I emphasise how players should and must be prepared for their characters to be injured or lose - afterall, characters that can always win aren't particularly interesting. Characters who lose, and then rise up to overcome their opponents are simply more interesting. I first established this within the first mission where their enemy was simply that powerful that defeating them wasn't an plausible option, and that retreating was the safer, sane option. Not everything needs to result in a victory. Fortunately, all of my players understand this and not only accept it, but support it. They're all quite ready and willing to have their characters injured or lose because it helps make the story more dramatic and interesting. It's something which has to really come down to trust. I dislike stats and dice systems, they're not my thing at all, afterall I prefer the flexibility of having my characters lose in the way I want without having to have that be decided by a dice roll or stat.

Now, what happens if a player doesn't understand this? Then it becomes a GM call, and something they should communicate over the OOC. If a player is writing a character to be too powerful then what they should, the GM should inform them, explain what is wrong, suggest ways to improve and ask the player to edit their post. If the player disagrees or continues to suffer the same problem where they don't understand the 'power level' within the rp, then the GM needs to deliberate on whether or not the player is suited for the rp.

Player conflict is the same thing really if it continues and escalates - final say is with the GM, but then again I think your topic means character conflict?

As far as conflict goes, it takes a lot of ingenuity to create a situation in which everyone is happy, especially in the case of a negative consequence like death. Naturally, no one wants their own hand-crafted character to die as a result of having flaws, or making mistakes. Still, it is your job as a GM to ensure that an outcome is decided and that the story continues smoothly, enjoyably, and fairly.

I heard of plenty of ways to avoid displeasing multiple persons with the outcome of a conflict. Some involve "beginner's luck" or some other form of reduced consequences, and some require a lot of out-of-the-box thinking. I have no experience leading a roleplay as a GM, considering my free time is spontaneous and scattered, however these are ideas I have heard from friends of mine who have done so in the past.

1: The simplest way to resolve a situation in which a character could die is to reduce consequences and end the conflict prematurely. My friend claimed that this was the simplest way to resolve conflict only because the conflict immediately ends, and everyone has a reason to continue afterwards. This may be the simplest way to resolve conflict, but it is also the most cliche, as you'll see in my example. I suppose you should use this strategy for a situation in which the roleplay would otherwise end.


2: When multiple players are in a situation where one or more character must die according to all rules and logic, it is impossible to reduce the consequences of the situation. This is not the end of the line, however, there are two things you can do to keep everyone happy: you can change or add to the rules, or you can alter the situation. Either way, be careful how you do so, because you should neither alter the rules nor the situation enough that the players lose their ability to make decisions - you want to alter the players' decisions.



3: Talk. It is rather simple, just talk to the players and ask them what they think should happen. If an attacking player does not actually want his/her character to use a lethal move, then you just resolved the issue by telling the player the situation, because the player will probably edit his/her post. Sometimes, you can form compromises between two characters, such as in the example below. Roleplaying is heavily based on socializing, so I did not think much of this when my friend told it to me, but if I was leading a story along, I suppose I would forget that fairly quickly.


That is all I can bring to the table. I, personally, found these three ideas fairly good. There are more, but some of them did not sound quite right, and I have not encountered any situations in which they would work, so I'll leave them out. The whole point is that you do not want to just kick someone out of your roleplay, you want to use your creative thinking to keep everyone involved and interested. Thoughts? Did I misinterpret what my friends said?

Sarcor said
@Prisk:So the way a player writes out their creativity onto their post is then quantified in a set number of points? Perhaps I was too naive to think that there could be any other way to decide how a conflict is resolved without a hard number system. In your example it seems that the GM is subjective in the distribution of these points unless there are specific rules that govern the output of these points.I myself GM'ed a game a long time ago that was very harsh in consequences but relied on creativity (and a great deal of collaboration) to resolve scenarios either between players or between the players and the GM. It felt like I was forcing the story down their throats, and I do not want to do that.

There are predetermined rules for point distribution with base amounts for basic actions and bonuses to various combinations of actions. Then there are ambiguous rewards—however, also confined to predetermined amounts—that the GM can distribute for creativity and/or unforeseen actions and events. I suppose it's unfair to call it conflict resolution, it's more like anti-godmodding if anything (casual mini-game, perhaps).

Sarcor said I have been working myself over to post an advanced interest check in the forums for quite some time now, and have balked at every opportunity. I have tried to put my finger on exactly what was bothering me and I think I have found it.

Conflict Resolution in a non tabletop setting.

How can it be done where everyone is happy? How does one know when to lose? When to win? How does a GM accurately and decisively act on the knowledge that their creations may die? Or that a specific player's character may not live?

I am not talking about dice rolling in a D&D game. A good, old fashioned roleplay in the general freeform, casual, and advanced forum is my focus here. I would like to hear opinions from GMs as well as players who have had this sort of experience in their travels on this site. Please, open discussion.

Conflict resolution? Several manners, usually intermixed of the following though.
A. Players agree in advance what the results will be, usually in a duel setting. (ex: Player A and Player B agree in private that X will lose, but not before he manages to hurt Y.)
B. GM's word is law. If the GM says you got hit, you got hit. Nobody else but the GM can enforce this.
C. Story-based wounding. Like the above, but wounds are judged based on what would be appropriate for character expy, rather than what they would probably get. (ex: Getting a harmless enough scar across the cheek, as opposed to, say, having half your jaw cut off.)
D. GM rolls dice, either keeping the results private or displaying them publicly. Often supported by B, but not always.
E. Everyone rolls dice. Typically supported by at least a light system of some sort, with a site that records the rolls of registered users used to ensure nobody can lie about results.

Combine with proper battle etiquette (ex: Instead of saying "I hit your character", you say "I attempted to strike your character") and everything usually works out, so long as your fellow role players are not dimwitted power mongers.

It seems the only reasonable way to do it would be to just discuss this extensively in the OOC, and resolve it that way. Granted none of the rolelplays I have participated in have gotten to the point of bickering, it still remains a concern for me.

Communication is often key, and a lot easier than one would assume. A lot of conflicts I've been around in RPs have been solved by a GM putting their foot down, or communicating with the players and coming to a final decision.

Sarcor said How can it be done where everyone is happy?

Players are not their characters, and I'd hope that people posting in Advanced would be aware of this. What would make the player happy would be a satisfyingly dramatic consequence of whatever the conflict was for their character. Their character, however, may not be so fond of the results.

In a section dedicated to detail, development and general thought-through-ness, my best solution would be to have the players debate the most interesting results of the conflict for their characters' arcs beforehand. If they disagree on what would be more interesting, then there's the good old-fashioned compromise / GM steps in tactic.

Simple fact:



Plenty of solutions have been presented, and most of them are effective in minimizing collateral damage.