Okay, let me back up:
As long as you have any positive AP, you have free will *as to your actions and abilities in the contest*. You can switch abilities, decide to beat the crud out of the opponent, or surrender. Unless you choose surrender, you are pretty much locked into the AP mechanism. Until the contest is resolved, your free will about what happens *after* the contest is in doubt (after all, that *is* the contest).
Many contests are about your free will after the contest. A seduction attempt is attempting to co-opt your free will. So is bargaining. So is any debate. You want to do X; Suzie (or me, or Camo, or Alex) want you to do or think Y. If you lose the contest, you lose the choice of what you are going to do in the aftermath of the contest. You'll let your opponent cross the bridge first, you'll sleep with Suzie, you'll agree with me. Once that moment of defeat is over, however, you're free will is usually restored. Suzie may need to seduce you again (with a modifier - maybe positive, maybe negative...), you can change your mind about how the rules work. Some contests (like crossing a bridge) are kind of meaningless to revisit. You let him cross, that's the end of it.
> In the example we started with--people using brag and intimidate to see
> who's the first over the bridge--it strikes me as that kind of situation.
I went back to the original message (#16199) just to make sure what the actual contest was. Alexander wrote:
"I did an extended contest trial run with the gamers, doing a simple scenario of two people trying to cross a narrow bridge from opposite ends. After figuring out that the healer wouldn't stand up to the cavalry soldier, we switched sample characters and had the cavalry guy face the trooper. The contest to see who got across first started out as a swearing contest."
>From what I can tell, the contest is "Cross the bridge first". The initial
actions are a swearing contest. They could have started out with combat, or
bribery, or seduction, or almost anything. Later in the contest, one guy
switched to physical abilities in an attempt to bully or injure his
opponent. He still was within the goals of the contest - "Cross the bridge
first".
The free will question here is "Will I let this jerk cross the bridge first." Losing the contest means the answer is "Yes". The abilities used by the winner will indicate how we got to that answer. If the cavalry trooper had lost during the initial Swearing portion of the contest, then he would have lost his nerve, felt respect for such a proficient swearer, been humiliated, etc. If he had won by riding down the foot soldier, then the foot soldier would have lost his free will by sheer physical intimidation, physical injury or been pushed out of the way. (Sometimes we can't exercise our free will because we are physically unable to do it - there's not much a guy lying unconscious in a puddle of blood can do to stop a horseman from crossing the bridge)
RR
It is by my order and for the good of the state that the bearer of this has
done what he has done.
- Richelieu
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