1. Council of Elrond: I can't use this. The author has the rest of the story hinging on this one. If Elrond had not rolled nine Gandalfs to get this Outrageous decision through, this forum wouldn't exist.
That's true if you see the outcome as binary. But were there other possible outcomes that would have resulted in the story evolving in other ways?
2. Strider meeting the hobbits in Bree: His aim was to be their guide. Aragorn had a Success. 'Could this have 'gone wrong?' Could Aragorn have had a partial Success?
He did get a partial success: Frodo agreed to go with him, but wasn't 100% trusting. Sam even more so.
3. The Fellowship meet Galadriel & Celeborn: In this they wanted (needed) shelter. They got that. Yet they also had three major extras (a) their individual gifts (Really Useful Items!) (b) the advice of the elf lords, Celeborn and Galadriel - including the Mirror for Frodo & Sam and (c) the collective gifts of the boats and Lorien Cloaks.
Yes, that was extra successes. A normal success would have just been grudging shelter in a flet on the outskirts of Lorien.
4. Gandalf meets Theoden after escaping Isengard: A Failure as Gandalf did not persuade Theoden of his danger. But with this Failure, Gandalf had an excuse to take Shadowfax.
Partial success right there.
5. Gandalf returns to Edoras: A Success, because a defence against Saruman was raised. But More than a Success, because Theoden himself went to war. Gandalf could not have been expecting (or ASKING FOR) such a strong result.
Agreed.
6. Meeting with Saruman after Helm's Deep: A Failure. Saruman did not turn back to the path of Wisdom. His Lore and Skill was denied to the Powers of Light, and Isengard, though nullified, was of no use to Rohan or Gondor. Yet, not a total failure. His staff was broken, and a palantir was recovered.
I see that as a total failure, and hostilities commenced.
For the ones that may well be Councils - would RAW realise their narratives? Does the framing of the Council Rules suggest and encourage such narratives strongly enough that new players and a new LM would produce interactions like this? Is so, then the rules are explicit enough. If not then they may be too simple.
In my opinion, no.