Game Mechanics And Player Agency

pemerton · Apr 18, 2018

There are a few different ways to think about resolving the situation where the king asks the PC to rescue his daughter, and - in the ensuing social resolution process - the GM (for the king) succeeds over the player (for the PC).

(1) The PC receives a buff/augment if carrying out the quest. (This is adapted from how The Riddle of Steel handles its "spiritual attributes'.)

(2) The PC receives a penalty if doing things other than the quest. (This is sort-of how MHRP/Cortex+ Heroic handles it.)

(3) The PC changes his/her ideal to be something like I will rescue the king's daughter. (This is a variant on one way Burning Wheel can handle this sort of thing.)

(4) The PC sincerely agrees to help rescue the king's daughter (this is the default outcome of a Duel of Wits in Burning Wheel).

Notice that, consistent with any of these, is

(5) The king, in return, agrees to some request made by the PC (this is typical in a BW DoW).

A lot of posts in this thread seem to assume that the GM makes a single roll, which, if high enough, means

(6) The PC heads off on the quest.

But I think that would be a fairly poor mechanic.

Imaculata · Apr 18, 2018

Jhaelen said:
?!!?!
So, if I buy a gadget that's been advertised as something everyone requires and find out later that it serves absolutely no useful purpose and is actually detrimental in certain circumstances, it's a not a problem with the gadget?

What I mean is that the alignment system is not designed to be a replacement personality for your characters. So if players create their characters this way, that is a problem with the player's imagination, not with the rules.

As for being totally useless, I couldn't disagree more. I think the alignments help get a basic idea of where your character stands in regards to morals and values. For example, whether your character is good, neutral or evil, is already a pretty clear step to defining what kind of character you are going to play. If your character is lawful, then this poses the question in what way your character is lawful? Do they obey the law, even if they think the law is wrong? Or do they follow a personal code? I wouldn't call that useless, but it is just a basis from which to further expand on your character's moral compass.

Lanefan · Apr 18, 2018

pemerton said:
There are a few different ways to think about resolving the situation where the king asks the PC to rescue his daughter, and - in the ensuing social resolution process - the GM (for the king) succeeds over the player (for the PC).

(1) The PC receives a buff/augment if carrying out the quest. (This is adapted from how The Riddle of Steel handles its "spiritual attributes'.)

(2) The PC receives a penalty if doing things other than the quest. (This is sort-of how MHRP/Cortex+ Heroic handles it.)

(3) The PC changes his/her ideal to be something like I will rescue the king's daughter. (This is a variant on one way Burning Wheel can handle this sort of thing.)

(4) The PC sincerely agrees to help rescue the king's daughter (this is the default outcome of a Duel of Wits in Burning Wheel).

Both 1 and 4 above can also result from a typical D&D-style game using ordinary persuasion without forced mechanics. In the case of (1) above the "buff/augment" might not be so much mechanical as either social (this letter will get you access to aid and information in any town or city in my realm) or strategic (I'll send 6 of my own guards to accompany you; they can guard your horses and camp if required, and their presence may open doors that would otherwise remain closed to you). (4) can result from straight-up roleplaying.

Notice that, consistent with any of these, is

(5) The king, in return, agrees to some request made by the PC (this is typical in a BW DoW).

There's also:

(6) On meeting resistance or objection from the PCs the king ups the ante by proactively offering a special reward or boon on his daughter's safe return. The PCs might accept this, or might present a counter-offer, which if accepted takes us back up to (5) above. This again doesn't need to use any hard-coded mechanics.

A lot of posts in this thread seem to assume that the GM makes a single roll, which, if high enough, means

(6) The PC heads off on the quest.

But I think that would be a fairly poor mechanic.

It would be, but that's how some would see it working in, say, 3e D&D.

The thing is, mechanics - good or poor - aren't needed for this at all; just in-character negotiation.

Most reasonable players/PCs would take the mission on, in the fiction either out of altruism or loyalty to the crown or for whatever reward may be in the offing; and at the table because the players want to bite the hook being offered. That said, the DM still has to be prepared for the party to say "no" for whatever reason, and have a plan B ready if the players/PCs don't suggest a different mission.

For example, combining some scenarios above maybe it all comes down to the PCs saying "Look, Y'r 'Eyeness, those guards you want to send with us - why not send them to rescue Princess Jasmine while we do some investigating and try to find out if the kidnappers are acting on their own or are agents of something bigger. With luck, what your guards do might draw what we seek out into the open."

Lanefan

pemerton · Apr 18, 2018

Lanefan said:
pemerton said:

I think that would be a fairly poor mechanic.

Click to expand...

It would be, but that's how some would see it working in, say, 3e D&D.

Part of my point is that the discussion in this thread is somewhat distort by excessive focus on 3E's poor social rules.

Lanefan said:
mechanics - good or poor - aren't needed for this at all; just in-character negotiation.

There are all sorts of things for which mechanics aren't needed. The question is whether they might, by some, for some purposes, be wanted.

Lanefan said:
Most reasonable players/PCs would take the mission on, in the fiction either out of altruism or loyalty to the crown or for whatever reward may be in the offing; and at the table because the players want to bite the hook being offered.

This I don't agree with at all. (When [MENTION=22779]Hussar[/MENTION] said something similar, he described it as an empirical prediction but didn't use the normative language of reasonable.) The whole "hook" model of RPGing is something I don't care for.

Aldarc · Apr 18, 2018

Ovinomancer said:
Why would you assume there's no consequences? Let's assume you do spot in the King's face; sure, maybe you avoid being forced to agree with the DMNPC, but surely you aren't saying that there'd be no consequence for this?

Your focusing on the mechanical resolution as if ous the crux when is just a tool, and one that shouldn't be used to force player choices.

Please "note," to borrow your own imperative, Ovinomancer, that I have not advocated for forcing player choice. The pressing issue when players argue that their characters should be absolved from mechanical consequences of successful NPC rolls in what we may call "social combat" scenarios. Narrative consequences in any scenario are a given. And this becomes clear in the example that you raise below.

And note choices. Being hit in combat isn't a choice -- the PC is never offered the choice to be hit or not. But it has a consequence. So should a NPC pushing and agenda at the player. If the player chooses to not accept it, there may be consequences for this, even very bad ones, but one shouldn't be "I, as DM who built this NPC, have him overwhelming social souls, picked his agenda, framed this scene, and then forced this check, get to tell you what your character does." The DM already had lots of Asbury to bring pressure on players, they shouldnt also be able to abuse mechanics you take the one thing player have complete power over -- what choices they make in response.

If you're going to remove choice, have the decency to just narrate at your players instead of pretending that they actually have options.

So, yes, let us note choices. Your examples here point not to the crux of the problem but cruxes, namely that there are narrative and mechanical consequences at play. The choice, the agency, for both the NPC and PC lies in the decision to engage in combat and how they go about it. They choose their target and how they fight (e.g., weapons, spells, maneuvers, etc.). The PC and NPCs can react and adjust what they do. These are narrative choices. They do not choose to hit. They do not choose to avoid being hit. These things are resolved in dice resolution mechanics. They "hit" and they are "hit" throughout the course of combat. But do note as well that players, particularly in at least 3-5e D&D, do not always have absolute authority over the combat narration of their characters, such that if they say that they are aiming for the eyes, and they hit their target, the eyes themselves are not necessarily what is "hit." The details of combat narration are often abstracted or left open for both GM and player input depending upon table preferences.

Many social scenarios, IMHO, are a form of combat. And as with combat, there should be mechanical consequences for PCs from a "hit" or a skill success made by NPCs. A successful social "hit" of a PC from an NPC's skill check would not necessarily take the form of "[getting] to tell you what your character does," and this appears to be an absurd extreme case rather than one that would be seen in actual play. As has been acknowledged by others in this thread, those pressing this argument are leaving out a tremendously large healthy middle range of alternative solutions. But a success and a fail for making a mechanical roll should have mechanical consequences and not just narrative ones. Hence my comparison with the invisible impenetrable force field that removes the player from consequences, which I hope you now understand is meant to refer to mechanical consequences, much as being "hit" in the context of combat.

So to bring back my earlier point, my issue is when an NPC succeeds at "hitting" a PC within the mechanical context of a social scenario but then the PC attempts to render themselves immune from mechanical consequences of that "hit." What that "hit" entails may vary depending upon the system. In Fate Core, for example, players can take Mental Stress (and Consequences) in social combat. And enough stress of any sort, whether physical or mental, can take characters out of play.

Guest 6801328 · Apr 18, 2018

Aldarc said:
So to bring back my earlier point, my issue is when an NPC succeeds at "hitting" a PC within the mechanical context of a social scenario but then the PC attempts to render themselves immune from mechanical consequences of that "hit." What that "hit" entails may vary depending upon the system. In Fate Core, for example, players can take Mental Stress (and Consequences) in social combat. And enough stress of any sort, whether physical or mental, can take characters out of play.

I'll note that at least in some systems the mechanics you are describing are not there. In 5e, for example, there is a combat mechanic that says that if you roll above a specific DC you reduce your targets HP by a deterministic amount.

But there's no corollary for social "hitting". The rule for "Persuasion" does not say specify the result for a success (with exceptions being very clearly defined); really the only conclusion we can draw from a success is that you are persuasive. Whatever that means.

It would be like having a combat mechanic for attack rolls that didn't specify the damage. In such a (strange) circumstance I would conclude that the results are meant to be narrated. But that's exactly the case for social skills in 5e, and other systems.

Now, other systems may have the mechanics you describe, treating social encounters more like combat, and I think it's fair to say that if those mechanics do exist, then a player who wants to render themselves immune are not really following the rules of that game. As you claim.

I don't think anybody here disagrees with you that it's defying the rules; they/we are just saying that we don't like those mechanics and either wouldn't choose those games or would house-rule the mechanics.

I think the conversation would be most productive if, instead of arguing whether or not it's breaking rules, we discuss the pros and cons of having those rules.

Hriston · Apr 18, 2018

Elfcrusher said:
I'll note that at least in some systems the mechanics you are describing are not there. In 5e, for example, there is a combat mechanic that says that if you roll above a specific DC you reduce your targets HP by a deterministic amount.

But there's no corollary for social "hitting". The rule for "Persuasion" does not say specify the result for a success (with exceptions being very clearly defined); really the only conclusion we can draw from a success is that you are persuasive. Whatever that means.

It would be like having a combat mechanic for attack rolls that didn't specify the damage. In such a (strange) circumstance I would conclude that the results are meant to be narrated. But that's exactly the case for social skills in 5e, and other systems.

Now, other systems may have the mechanics you describe, treating social encounters more like combat, and I think it's fair to say that if those mechanics do exist, then a player who wants to render themselves immune are not really following the rules of that game. As you claim.

I don't think anybody here disagrees with you that it's defying the rules; they/we are just saying that we don't like those mechanics and either wouldn't choose those games or would house-rule the mechanics.

I think the conversation would be most productive if, instead of arguing whether or not it's breaking rules, we discuss the pros and cons of having those rules.

I think, in 5e, CHA (skill) checks are the wrong place to look for the equivalent of social "hitting" of PCs. The real action is in the Inspiration mechanic. When an NPC makes an argument that touches on the personality traits, ideal, bond, or flaw of a PC, Inspiration incentivizes the PC's player to make a decision that "portrays" the PC's personal characteristics. For example, if my PC's background is Noble with the bond "I will face any challenge to win the approval of my family," and the king makes the argument that rescuing his daughter will show that my PC is worthy of his family's approval, the mechanical benefit to me, as a player, aligns with my PC pursuing his own interests in the situation, and to disagree would be to leave Inspiration for my PC on the table. If, on the other hand, the king's argument doesn't speak to any of my PC's personal characteristics, then what reason would my PC have for agreeing to go along?

Aldarc · Apr 18, 2018

Elfcrusher said:
I think the conversation would be most productive if, instead of arguing whether or not it's breaking rules, we discuss the pros and cons of having those rules.

This has been my impression of what we were doing. However, as this is a forum dedicated primarily to D&D (and its prevailing current system), 5e (and D&D more broadly) tends to dominate that conversation and the core assumptions of many discussions.

I don't think anybody here disagrees with you that it's defying the rules; they/we are just saying that we don't like those mechanics and either wouldn't choose those games or would house-rule the mechanics.

I would think that someone with your own preferences would actually like how Fate handles this. It is up to the player to select how they take the mental stress or consequences. If they choose, for example, to take a Mild Consequence (-2) rather than the equivalent of a 2 stress box for a social contest, then they can name an Aspect that represents what happened with their character and the narrative: e.g., Royally Shamed, Riled to Anger, Dericisively Mocked, Scorned into Silence, etc. This is all player-facing.

I'll note that at least in some systems the mechanics you are describing are not there. In 5e, for example, there is a combat mechanic that says that if you roll above a specific DC you reduce your targets HP by a deterministic amount.

But there's no corollary for social "hitting". The rule for "Persuasion" does not say specify the result for a success (with exceptions being very clearly defined); really the only conclusion we can draw from a success is that you are persuasive. Whatever that means.

Of course, but my point here is that rolls should also have some measure of mechanical consequences. And that opinion is obviously my own sense of should rather than is, largely because the "is" is incohesive.

For example, in 5e or PF we may ask here what does a successful Persuasion/Diplomacy check communicate or achieve? This answer should ideally be the same for both a Player Character and a Non-Player Character, as their respective Player Agents can both roll skills in the capacity of those characters. If it achieves nothing, then why roll? If there is no point rolling because the roll has no mechano-narratival weight, then why does this skill exist? And there is, IMHO, a compelling reason why the skill exists: gaps exist between player ability and player character ability. A player is not obligated to sucessfully convince a GM that they hit, nor the GM that their NPC hit the PC. There are mechanics to resolve that issue. Likewise, the inhabited character may have a higher degree of diplomatic profiency than the player-who-inhabits-the-character. That gap can create a frustrating dissonance between player and character. Social skills exist, to some degree, as a mechanical means to empower and reinforce unpersuasive players roleplaying persuasive characters to inhabit their character without relying strictly on GM fiat. But this again takes us back to an earlier question: what then does a successful Persuasion check achieve mechanically? And why can't this apply to PCs just as it does to NPCs?

Likewise, for some people, players who exceed the DC of a Persuasion/Deception check will automatically successfully persuade/deceive the subject in question. Or there are people who will refuse the results of a Deception/Bluff check made by one PC against another because "my character wouldn't believe that" despite the success of the one player and the failure of the other in this contest of rolls. But without mechanical rules to govern this, these sort of things can devolve into a childhood brawl of "you didn't hit me with your laser, because I had my impentrable force field on that blocks lasers" scenarios that I mentioned earlier. It can turn players into sore losers who reject a reality that applies to them what they apply to others in the fictive space. No character wants to be deceived, and if a player knows that another player is lying, they will go out of their way to rationalize why their character could not possibly believe the Deception/Bluff.

This is, in part, the benefit of having rules apply equally to NPCs and PCs, because the same mechanics that could resolve NPC on PC skill check issues are often the same that help resolve PC on PC issues.

It would be like having a combat mechanic for attack rolls that didn't specify the damage. In such a (strange) circumstance I would conclude that the results are meant to be narrated. But that's exactly the case for social skills in 5e, and other systems.

Though I am sure that some are tired of me discussing Fate, I find the system to be a useful counterexample to D&D, much as [MENTION=42582]pemerton[/MENTION] is want to use Burning Wheel or Cortex Plus as alternative examples of how they resolve similar issues. In this matter, I will say that Fate technically does not have "damage." Neither mental nor physical stress in Fate reflect "damage" or even being "hit." Stress instead is a pacing mechanic. Though here I will post an excerpt from collected Fate musings of The Book of Hanz:

But Stress isn't damage - it's a pacing measure, a way of determining how close someone is to being Taken Out. And succeeding on an Attack doesn't mean you
hit, and tying, or even losing, on the Attack doesn't mean you don't hit (though that's usually a good bet). Again, Fate doesn't tell you what happens, it just places constraints on the narration.

Though this primarily is talking about physical stress, this can also apply to mental/social stress. The point being expressed here (and expounded more elucidly) that "hitting" and "damage" are less important in Fate than the character's ability to withstand narrative stress in a scene.

hawkeyefan · Apr 18, 2018

Tony Vargas said:
Maybe 'backsliding' is an unfairly easy thing to hang on a game that set out, explicitly, and continually re-affirmed throughout it's playtest, the goal if evoking the classic game.

But, it is certainly going back to the 9-alignment system, and some mechanical impact, from a simpler/more intuitive (CG, LE, CN, LN, & TN having each thrown some folks) one with less mechanical impact.

Backsliding has a negative connotation and that is what I was disagreeing with.

Whether or not it's more intuitive or simpler will vary by person.

Tony Vargas said:
9 alignments is the middle ground between 9 alignments and no alignments? Wouldn't 4.5 be the mid-point. ;P

Seriously, though, it's fine to note that alignment has not been returned to nearly the invasive mechanical bugaboo it was in the classic game. Just don't kid anyone 5e 'reduced' that impact, anymore than it nerfed casters relative to the preceding edition.

5e is very much a compromise edition, so for any given horrendous D&Dism it's typically better than the worst offender, but that doesn't mean 5e, itself fixed the issue, just that it didn't restore it fully relative to the version that did.

I'm not attempting to kid anyone. I don't really care about what went on in the preceding edition.

Tony Vargas said:
My observation, from when the mechanical impact of alignment was removed, 6 years before 5e hit the shelves, was that it made players more inclined to play 'unaligned' characters, as they were more open to a range of personality & motivation, since there was no benefit to playing the more prescriptive alignments. It also helped that the alignments were fewer and more intuituve, there was no confusion over seemingly (to brand-new players) 'contradictory' alignments like CG or LE, nor temptation to use CN as an excuse for disruptive behavior...

Meh. Unaligned is simply Neutral with a different name.

hawkeyefan · Apr 18, 2018

Hussar said:
That’s just it, no he isn’t.

He’s telling you that x is true. You believe the lie, you don’t see the ninja, you find the argument very compelling to the point where you agree with it, you are grumpy because you are tired.

Now, given that information, what do you do?

This massive pile of straw you folks are building doesn’t carry any water. The dm is no more portraying your character for you than hitting you for five damage negates your ability to act.

There is a huge excluded middle between the dm not being able to say anything about your character and the dm turning you into a puppet.

I think that the DM telling you not that an argument is compelling, but that your character is swayed by the argument, leans more toward the puppet end of that spectrum. I'd be annoyed with it, and I don't do that to players when I DM. I just feel there are too many holes in this approach.

I will make the argument compelling if that's what I hope for. I'll let the players make Insight or whatever relevant skill check to see if they think the NPC is lying or anything like that. I'll give the player some information and then let them decide how their character feels.

Again, I think this is because no matter how compelling an argument can be made, people can still hear it and say "I don't care". Look at how many people smoke or eat McDonald's or do any other self destructive behavior. They have heard compelling arguments which they know to be true and they've chosen to ignore them.

Under your view of the rules, how do you allow for this phenomenon?

Also, how do you allow for different people to respond differently to the same compelling speech? if the result is based entirely on the roll for the NPC's speech, then if it's high, is everyone persuaded? Do you allow for different DCs for each listener? Seems needlessly cumbersome.

Game Mechanics And Player Agency

pemerton

Legend

Imaculata

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Lanefan

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pemerton

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Aldarc

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Guest 6801328

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Hriston

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Aldarc

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hawkeyefan

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hawkeyefan

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