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Idea for social encounters in RPGs
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<blockquote data-quote="GlaziusF" data-source="post: 4466042" data-attributes="member: 74166"><p>That risks being a little too arbitrary and unresponsive.</p><p></p><p>I mean, imagine your rogue's face when you just draw "indifferent" all through a giant bustling metropolis, and then drawing Rogue Trader when you're at some dirt farm in the sticks. </p><p></p><p>My initial instinct goes something like this, but unfortunately it's pretty 4E specific. I call it the BINDS system. Prep a pack of 21 cards for each player, with different qualities on each card. Duplicates are OK. Give them three to start with, and three more every time they train in a "social skill" at character creation, or take Skill Training or Skill Mastery in a social skill. </p><p></p><p>For purposes of the system, social skills are Bluff, Insight, iNtimidate, Diplomacy, and Streetwise. Every role card is marked by which of the skills are applicable to it. About 12 cards total should apply to Insight, Diplomacy, and Streetwise, with maybe 9 cards total for Bluff and iNtimidate, since they also have combat uses. </p><p></p><p>When you get into a large-scale social situation, everybody picks a skill, draws 4 cards, and makes an open-ended check. If they meet an easy DC (per page 42 DMG) they can keep 1 card, a medium keeps 2, and a hard keeps 3. The cards they keep have to have a matching skill on them - if there aren't enough, too bad. You can use the cards to drive open-ended interaction or as "negate 1 failure" in a social skill challenge. Yes, even if the skill autofails in the first place! You may not be able to iNtimidate the Duke, but if you have an Old War Buddy card you got with iNtimidate, you can frown meaningfully at the Duke's minister -- who used to be an aide-de-camp you saved -- and he can say "Duke Brogan, these people may seem rough but underneath their intentions are good" or somesuch.</p><p></p><p>Hmm, thinking about that a little more, if you use that for social skill challenges, take out the ability of 1 player to make a "doesn't count for failures" check to give someone else +2, and let anybody spend a card marked with Insight, even if they didn't get it that way, to get a picture of the "desired skills" for the encounter instead of getting them with an Insight check. </p><p></p><p>Any cards you don't keep go back in the deck, any cards you use go in a discard pile, which you shuffle back into the deck when you take an extended rest. Really big social encounters like a grand ball or a giant marketplace, or chained skill challenges like a series of meetings with the various ministers of a castle, can have multiple opportunities to draw from the deck, using (if you want) a different skill each time.</p><p></p><p>Maybe there can be a paragon-tier feat that lets you redraw one card that doesn't match the skill you're using, or somesuch, and a heroic tier feat that lets you spend an action point to make another draw in the middle of an encounter. Maybe an epic-tier one to let you spend an action point to shuffle the discards into the deck.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="GlaziusF, post: 4466042, member: 74166"] That risks being a little too arbitrary and unresponsive. I mean, imagine your rogue's face when you just draw "indifferent" all through a giant bustling metropolis, and then drawing Rogue Trader when you're at some dirt farm in the sticks. My initial instinct goes something like this, but unfortunately it's pretty 4E specific. I call it the BINDS system. Prep a pack of 21 cards for each player, with different qualities on each card. Duplicates are OK. Give them three to start with, and three more every time they train in a "social skill" at character creation, or take Skill Training or Skill Mastery in a social skill. For purposes of the system, social skills are Bluff, Insight, iNtimidate, Diplomacy, and Streetwise. Every role card is marked by which of the skills are applicable to it. About 12 cards total should apply to Insight, Diplomacy, and Streetwise, with maybe 9 cards total for Bluff and iNtimidate, since they also have combat uses. When you get into a large-scale social situation, everybody picks a skill, draws 4 cards, and makes an open-ended check. If they meet an easy DC (per page 42 DMG) they can keep 1 card, a medium keeps 2, and a hard keeps 3. The cards they keep have to have a matching skill on them - if there aren't enough, too bad. You can use the cards to drive open-ended interaction or as "negate 1 failure" in a social skill challenge. Yes, even if the skill autofails in the first place! You may not be able to iNtimidate the Duke, but if you have an Old War Buddy card you got with iNtimidate, you can frown meaningfully at the Duke's minister -- who used to be an aide-de-camp you saved -- and he can say "Duke Brogan, these people may seem rough but underneath their intentions are good" or somesuch. Hmm, thinking about that a little more, if you use that for social skill challenges, take out the ability of 1 player to make a "doesn't count for failures" check to give someone else +2, and let anybody spend a card marked with Insight, even if they didn't get it that way, to get a picture of the "desired skills" for the encounter instead of getting them with an Insight check. Any cards you don't keep go back in the deck, any cards you use go in a discard pile, which you shuffle back into the deck when you take an extended rest. Really big social encounters like a grand ball or a giant marketplace, or chained skill challenges like a series of meetings with the various ministers of a castle, can have multiple opportunities to draw from the deck, using (if you want) a different skill each time. Maybe there can be a paragon-tier feat that lets you redraw one card that doesn't match the skill you're using, or somesuch, and a heroic tier feat that lets you spend an action point to make another draw in the middle of an encounter. Maybe an epic-tier one to let you spend an action point to shuffle the discards into the deck. [/QUOTE]
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