Documentation on surface-manager and the associated settings service can be confusing.
One can change surface-manager's geometry with
luna-send -n 1 -f luna://com.webos.service.config/setConfigs '{ "configs": {"com.webos.surfacemanager.displayConfig.json": {"compositorGeometry": "1280x720+0+0r0s1"}}}'
On a Raspberry Pi3 with a multi-resolution display, this leaves me in a 1280x720 window, with the display still in 1920x1080 (max the display supports) resolution.
I'm still routing around to try and figure out if there's a way to adjust the display resolution, or if i'll need to invent something for that.
When running in a lower resolution than the display, the tap indicator is offset significantly, but taps themselves are handled correctly, which is.. strange.