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I hope this is not too late but my main advice would be to try try to walk the fine line of advocating for your position to the best of your abilities while also avoiding to seem unresponsive to the points the partners make to challenge you. You should be aware that the arguments the partners will make are not always ones which they actually believe would refute your view. One of the main purposes of the article discussion is to test whether you are able to hold your ground when challenged by someone in a position of authority - a skill that every good lawyer needs to develop. As such, if you think a point they made is flawed, or valid but insufficient to persuade you to change your view, you should not back down.

At the same time, you want to avoid looking like you're irrational and that you cannot learn during the conversation. Some of the points the partners make will be quite relevant for the debate, and the debate topics are specifically chosen to be ones involving a nuanced cost-benefit analysis and allowing for reasonable disagreement. As such, you should aim to acknowledge and address their points. A move I would often make would be to say something of the sort 'I definitely understand where you are coming from, and I agree this is certainly a drawback of my view/an upshot of yours. However, I do not think the drawback is quite as impactful as you said/I do not think the point should be weighed so heavily because...'. Another option is to accept the relevance of their points and then address them by integrating them into your view: ie 'I agree this might be a problem, but I think under my approach we might hedge against the risk in this way'.