More precision in figuring out compromise contents.

[themadviolinist]

After a DoW, in which both parties have done damage to the opponent's BoA, it is necessary to negotiate a compromise. I have some questions relating to the specific working out of that compromise.

1. It is suggested that we take the margin of victory into account, that a DoW in which one party loses only a small amount of BoA, the winning party gets most of what he wants, while in the situation where the winner has still lost half or more, that the compromise is much more equal. I understand this as a guideline, but in practice, how do GMs deal with this guideline which is not terribly precise? Would you for instance have the winner make statements and allow the loser to edit as many as points lost by the winner during the duel?

2. Example: The Countess Elisa and the Black Baron are squaring off in front of the Prince. Each wants to make the Prince believe that the other is a traitor. Elisa's statement of intent is to have the Prince decide that the Black Baron is a traitor and should be parted from his head immediately. The Baron's intent is that, convicted of treason, Elisa will be given into his hands so that he may have his unspeakable way with her. Using the big deal rules, Elisa has a BoA of 9, while the Baron has 10. The PRince is somewhat infatuated with the Countess, something of which she is aware and until now has wished to head off. (Belief: I know the Prince is falling in love with me, but his wife is my girlhood friend, and I will not betray her.) She has decided to play against this belief, looking for the mold-breaker artha award and signalling that when her life is on the line, all bets are off. I award her an advantage die in any roll during the DoW for this fact and make notes to have things go pear-shaped for her if she wins the duel.

After all is said and done, the DoW goes to the countess. If she wins, but is down to 1 BoA herself, I understand that some nearly equal compromise should be made. As the GM playing the Baron, I'd suggest that the Countess has indeed sewn the seeds of suspicion in the Prince's mind, but that he wouldn't act against the Baron openly at this time, and that in fact, he would dismiss both complaints publicly to allow him to investigate more subtly. I would also steer the story towards complications that stem from Elisa abandoning her belief about her girlhood friend.

If on the other hand, Elisa sweeps to victory without losing any BoA herself, (Unlikely as that seems), she gets her intent, the Baron is beheaded immediately.

The problem for me is that gray area between. If she loses half her BoA, or 2 or 6, I don't feel confident about the amount of forcing of the compromise I should do?

3. What happens if, after a DoW, the players involved are unable to find a mutually satisfactory compromise position, but the loser does not wish to escalate to violence for whatever reason? The Baron doesn't want Elisa's death to be quick and public, he has much more fun in mind, fun that shouldn't see the light of day, and he'd rather bide his time then end things too quickly, not to mention that in the Prince's court is hardly the place for this cold master of his passions to explode into violence. If Elisa's player and I are unable to reach a compromise that works for us, what recourse does each of us have, keeping in mind the "don't be a dick" rule.

The heart of my questions I suppose is that there are a lot of quantitative mechanics for results in BW, but for this compromise rule, or if one wished to use the margin of failure to determine the extent of complications that stem from a failed roll, I don't have a lot of help from the rules. I realize that there's a need for wiggle room, but I'm open to suggestions to protect everyone from feeling that a result is arbitrary, but that reflects the actual margin of victory in a DoW, or perhaps in any extended challenge.

[jchokey]

This may or may not answer your question, but there was another thread recently (started by yours truly) that specifically addresses the question of compromises:

Duel of Wits - Compromises (http://www.burningwheel.org/forum/showthread.php?t=5424)

If you haven't already read it, it may be worth looking at.

[themadviolinist]

[QUOTE=jchokey;54219]This may or may not answer your question, but there was another thread recently (started by yours truly) that specifically addresses the question of compromises:

Duel of Wits - Compromises (http://www.burningwheel.org/forum/showthread.php?t=5424)

Thanks for the pointer, I don't know how I missed it. I am struck with a question that follows from the thread.

Under task resolution rules, the winner of a DoW has succeeded in a series of versus tests, so the winner should get his intent. This makes compromising more difficult, since it degrades the clarity of that winner gets intent. The compromise rule, unless you interpret compromise as a complication seems to fly in the face of hub and spoke considerations.

Also, I still feel that the process leads to a negotiation that, while not arbitrary, since everyone involved gets to decide whether to approve or veto the compromise, the process of negotiation is only loosely grounded in the result of the DoW. What I'm looking for are specific guide lines that can be applied across multiple DoWs to make this process feel less arbitrary to the players.

[Paul B]

It's a good question.

The winner gets what he asked for, no matter what. No matter what compromise you seek, it can't reduce or degrade what you asked for. So you have to be careful to ask for what you really want!

I think this probably has to get felt out by each specific group. I'm not sure there's a suitable mechanical answer because you're talking about non-mathy imaginary victories.

I can't remember if BW has the same guidelines for compromise as BE, but in BE there's a breakdown of Minor Compromise (I get a small part of what I asked for), Compromise (I get a major consession, or you only get half of what you were going for), and Major Compromise (I pretty much won but failed in some minor way).

Is your table unable to agree on what "minor" and "major" entails in the game? Mine can't, sometimes, especially if both parties really wanted their characters to win the DOW.

Maybe a change in procedure is in order? I could see this working (assume the reader is the one receiving the compromise):

Minor compromise: You get almost everything but I get to choose one way in which you fail.

Major compromise: I get almost everything but you get to choose one way in which I fail.

That middle zone -- straight-up compromise -- is sticky. Maybe a combination of both results? You get everything + my description of minor failure, and I get everything + your description of minor failure.

Obviously this won't work when both sides are mutually incompatible.

p.

[luke]

BE has more clearly expressed delineations for compromises.

[themadviolinist]

At the risk of seeming greedy, would you be willing to summarize a bit, since I'm not going to purchase BE until after I have run a successful game of BW, and I foresee this issue of compromises being somewhat thorny for my players.

[luke]

The whole concept of Burning Wheel compromises involves your group's attitudes. There are no hard mechanics for a reason. You use the DoW to produce a result with two values -- win/loss and degree of success. The meaning of the degree of success is dependent on the situation in the game and the ideas that were thrown around in the Duel of Wits.

So what you say in the DoW means something. It's one of the main things you have to rely on when seeking terms. You gotta go with what feels right based on the situation and the DoW result and degree of success.

[Azral]

In our group, we start with the premise that the winners get their intent. Period.

If there's a concession in order, then the losers get some portion of their intent, too.

We've never had truly mutually exclusive intents. Even when the intents directly oppose each other, there's usually a clever way to get both in play at the same time.

(Example: we both want to eat the cake. I win! I get to eat the cake! But as a concession, I'll help you convince the chef to share the recipe.)

And sometimes concessions can also include a significant bonus perk to sweeten it, if major portions of the intents are truly mutually exclusive.

Of course, half of our DoWs have ended in ties, which is when the horse-trading really gets going!

[stormsweeper]

The guideline is for compromises either the loser gets a bit of what he wants, the winner gets less of what he wants, or a little of both. The degree of compromise guides just how much concession there is. This is made easier by people just stating clear and unequivocal intents. Leave out any qualifying statements, and save those for the compromise.

[Z-Dog]

I like how it's vague.

Groups could negotiate how much comprising they'll do before they start the campaign: this one is high stakes, very little comprimising...this one's going to be a bit nebulous, we'll hug it out.

[jchokey]

In our last session (#14 in our campaign!), we tried using a method proposed in the Duel of Wits - Compromises (http://www.burningwheel.org/forum/showthread.php?t=5424) I mentioned before: We had the loser offer a compromise, which the winner was free to accept or reject. If the winner rejected it, then he got to propose a different compromise to to the loser. If the loser rejected that, then the other players would decide upon a compromise for them-- and if they couldn't agree, the GM would decide the compromise.

In this case, the loser's compromise was accepted and all worked well.

[jchokey]

In case anyone's curious about the DOW and the compromise that I alluded to, the terms of DOW stakes (roughly paraphrased) were as follows:

Judyn: We will go to the temple of the Octagonal Pit and purchase from their priests a condemned prisoner, whom we will kill and feed as a sacrifice to the Elder Brood Ivashu. (FYI: The Elder Brood Ivashu is a semi-divine monster, the spawn the god Ilvir, from whom the PCs wanted a favor.)

Jaroud: We will not go to the Octagonal Pit and we will not purchase a prisoner. We will not use a live sacrifice at all, but will instead find an already-dead corpse to feed to the Elder Brood.


Judyn won the duel, but her BOA was reduced from 6 (we were using "not a big deal rules" to 1. The player of Jaroud proposed the following compromise (again, roughly paraphrased):

"We will go to the Octagonal Pit and we will buy a condemned prisoner to sacrifice, but the prisoner has to be an actual murderer/killer-- not just a petty thief or other poor wretch. Also, when the time comes to sacrifice him. you Judyn will take his life yourself."

Judyn's player agreed to this so this is what was done.

I thought this was a pretty cool result because:

(1) Judyn still got her full intent (i.e. going to get a prisoner to sacrifice to the monster).

(2) She had to agree to some limitations on *how* she got her intent (i.e. has to be a killer, she has to sacrifice it herself).

(3) Created a more interesting situtation, since they now had to get a prisoner who was a dangerous killer/murderer and take him to where the monster was.

(4) Set up a neat moral/physical conflict for Judyn to be played out later.)

[Fourth Horseman]

The winner gets what he asked for, no matter what. No matter what compromise you seek, it can't reduce or degrade what you asked for. So you have to be careful to ask for what you really want!



Well, that's only a good strategy if you are 100 percent certain you will win the DoW. Otherwise you run the risk of being permanently foreclosed from achieving your goal. Where DoWers are pretty evenly matched its best to obliquely reference what you want so you can compromise into it ...

[Paul B]

Well, that's only a good strategy if you are 100 percent certain you will win the DoW. Otherwise you run the risk of being permanently foreclosed from achieving your goal. Where DoWers are pretty evenly matched its best to obliquely reference what you want so you can compromise into it ...

Aaaah, yes. But then you're trying to game the system in a way it wasn't intended (IMO). I have a couple players here who do the same thing in my games. It's like pulling fucking teeth to get them to commit to anything.

Another thought on structuring compromises: think of them as appending a "yes, and..." or a "yes, but..." to the end of the other side's intent.

p.

[Fourth Horseman]

Aaaah, yes. But then you're trying to game the system in a way it wasn't intended (IMO). I have a couple players here who do the same thing in my games. It's like pulling fucking teeth to get them to commit to anything.

Another thought on structuring compromises: think of them as appending a "yes, and..." or a "yes, but..." to the end of the other side's intent.

p.

Gaming the system? Why certainly. In a way it wasn't intended? Well maybe Luke should chyme in, since I only started taking this tack in my own DoWs upon his advice ...

[Paul B]

Gaming the system? Why certainly. In a way it wasn't intended? Well maybe Luke should chyme in, since I only started taking this tack in my own DoWs upon his advice ...

Well...now I'm interested, too.

p.

[zabieru]

When Rich says "obliquely reference what you really want" I'm hearing "use as your Statement of Purpose something concrete which leads towards your goal, but which, if lost, doesn't block you totally.*" When Paul says "pulling teeth to get them to commit" I'm hearing that he has a hard time getting concrete, enforceable Statements of Purpose from certain players.

I'm not sure that what Rich is saying is actually related to the problem you're having, Paul. Can either of you guys comment on that?

*So maybe given the "loot the tomb" example from that other thread, you might write a statement of purpose like "the sacred relics of this tomb would be better cared-for in our clan's hold" for the pro-looting faction. That would allow you to loot the whole place on a win, claim "we'll strip all the secular treasure but leave the religious stuff in place" as a major compromise, and maybe talk about some specifics on a minor (say, the disposition of the jewels outside the tomb proper). Am I on the right track here, Rich?

[Fourth Horseman]

*So maybe given the "loot the tomb" example from that other thread, you might write a statement of purpose like "the sacred relics of this tomb would be better cared-for in our clan's hold" for the pro-looting faction. That would allow you to loot the whole place on a win, claim "we'll strip all the secular treasure but leave the religious stuff in place" as a major compromise, and maybe talk about some specifics on a minor (say, the disposition of the jewels outside the tomb proper). Am I on the right track here, Rich?

I think you hit the nail on the head, at least with respect to what I was getting at ...

[luke]

Basically, my advice for a Duel of Wits boils down to "aim high" and "always think of a possible compromise before you agree to a DoW." Follow those two guidelines and you'll always get something out of every DoW (and FF if you're playing BE).