"scripting" contests

From: contracycle <gamartin_at_...>
Date: Tue, 29 Jan 2002 13:21:19 -0000

Iu was just wonderign what folks might think of a GM being VERY proactive and aggressive in framing extended contests. The kind of thing I am thinking of is the climactic meeting with the primary villain. For this kind of scene, the GM might wish to, say, have the villain driven backwards up a sprial staircase so that they can deliver some last words in a dramatic scene at the top of the tower in a driving gale - or whatever.

It seems to me that the extended contest mechanic makes this sort of thing possible. Becuase the GM has a final result in mind, they can use this to deliberately frame their narration of exchange results to give this effect. For example, even if the villain where to win an exchange, this does not mean they have to stop retreating up the stairwell; the victory can be narrated as a wound (by AP conversion) or some other event which does no interrupt the theme. As the characters win - which we have every reason to expect - the GM pushes the result closer and closer to the envisioned outcome.

The concern I see with this is that players might object to such aggressive framing. It implies, or at least you could argue, that the GM is being less than totally honest as far as the contest goes; although the contest mechanic is there, at least to an extent, to determine the outcome, the GM has to some degree superceded this by limiting the mechanic to framing the detailed experience rather than the ACTUAL outcome of the fight. So, what do people think of that idea?