Treasure Tables is on hiatus as of December 13th, 2007 -- after two years of daily posts, I needed a break. If you're looking for GMing material, I have two recommendations: the hundreds of posts in TT's archives, and my new project, the multi-author GMing blog Gnome Stew. Happy GMing! -- Martin

Drifting Task Resolution into Conflict Resolution

Fri. December 9, 2005 

Steven Jarvis (of sjarvis.com) has a great post about “drifting” a task resolution system — D&D, in this case — into a conflict resolution-based system. The theory is very accessible, and he provides a solid example.

More posts about: Approaches and Techniques

Comments

8 Responses to “Drifting Task Resolution into Conflict Resolution”

  1. Steven on December 9th, 2005 7:07 am

    Thanks for the mention, Martin. It’s funny. I spent most of the last year learning and playing a number of indie, narrativist, Forge-y (or whatever) games (esp. Burning Wheel), and I thought I had sorta burned out on them. So, I returned to D&D this fall as a sort of palate-cleanser, eager to “let D&D be D&D.” Ironically, I now spend most of my time trying to figure out how to drift D&D closer to those other games/styles!

  2. Martin on December 9th, 2005 7:18 am

    Coming off of two Burning Wheel events at this year’s GenCon, drifting D&D was on my mind as well. Some of the earliest posts here reflect that. ;)

  3. ScottM on December 9th, 2005 11:12 am

    The whole “101 Days of D&D” series is also worth checking out.

  4. Martin on December 9th, 2005 11:35 am

    Scott: Agreed — it was the subject of a minipost last month. ;) Steven’s project has been shaping up well, and it’s an interesting read.

  5. Drew on December 9th, 2005 1:18 pm

    Having never experienced any Forge type games, the whole “What is your intent?” idea really took me. I really like how the whole resolution thing almost builds itself under those kinds of conditions. One of my campaigns I’m currently running would really benefit from this sort of dialoging.

    Thanks for the post!

  6. Martin on December 9th, 2005 8:38 pm

    Drew: Steven’s a sharp guy, and I wouldn’t be surprised if this topic came up again in his “101 days” project.

  7. Steven on December 9th, 2005 11:14 pm

    And to think: I blew off my D&D game tonight and we played Munchkin instead. :) Seriously. It was a blast. I’ve never played it before.

    I think all the theorizing this past week got to me and I freaked out a little. I’ll have a post later this weekend about “thinking too much.” I imagine I’m not the only GM who has this particular problem.

  8. Martin on December 10th, 2005 7:25 am

    (Steven) I imagine I’m not the only GM who has this particular problem.

    Guilty as charged — if I’m not careful, I tend to overthink things too (in gaming and in life).