Re: When does the contest begin?

From: Roderick and Ellen Robertson <rjremr_at_...>
Date: Wed, 10 Apr 2002 12:35:31 -0700

> So that one side bids on it's perception ability, while the other uses
> it's actions for augments. Nice, but what about a meeting which ISN'T
> an ambush? One where, normally, one side is not using any ability
> against the other before the contest proper, but where there is ample
> time for preparation. What about, say, a court case. Augment law with
> Orate, Heortling Custom, all the Feats you can find. Or a straight
> battle, time is set for it to begin, but you have the full night to
> augment. What then limits the number of augments?
>
> I really like this basic idea, that some action or condition ends the
> augmentation period, rather than any arbitrary numeric limit. But I
> can't think how it works in terms of a time, rather than action,
> limited situation.

You can have however many augments as you can cram in before one side says: "And now I present my case to the the jury and lawspeakers" or "I order the Phalanxes forward" and roll a non-augment action. Brian's idea is that the whole Augmentation process can be handled as an Extended Contest, so all those augments are not "free", but are Unrelated Actions in an on-going contest. So the contest might be:

Players: "We find out what Orlanth did in this situation" (Roll 'Heortling Myths' for an augment to 'Heortling Customs') Narrator: "Oddi Silvertongue gets his whole clan behind him" (Roll 'Relationship: Clan' for augment to 'Orate').

P: "We appeal to our chief (Roll 'Relationship: Chief' for augment)
N: "Oddi's cousin the lawspeaker uses the the 'Locate Evidence' feat"
P: "Bother, if he's got a lawspeaker we better do something - I know, we

recruit Heorry the Humakti and his Truth magics (roll "Relationship: Heorry")

N: "Oddi's cousin steps before the moot and presents his case"
P: "Aggh, we're not ready!"
N: "Too bad, he's going to trounce you if you piddle around with more

augments..."

Note that the AP in the contest are set 'way back before Oddi's cousin steps forward, probably by the "Heortling Custom", "Orate", or whatever you figure you'll be using to convince the jury.

Game Time is fluid, and under the final control of the players (narrator included). You can use the narrative device of "Time Passes" to shorten the night, or the cinematic one where you see the timer on the bomb counting down, then cut to another part of the action, cut back to the bomb, cut to action... A 30-second timer can take ten minutes or more of screen time to reach Zero (or 007, in some certain spy movies...).

If it's not a player-vrs player battle, the narrator can impose a "augment limit" simply by cutting to the chase and declaring "Oddi steps forward and submits his plea to the Lawspeakers" - If you haven't managed to get all the augments you were hoping for, that's too bad. Of course, the players can also pre-emptively start the action, hoping to cut their opponent's augments short.

RR