Social Skills, starting to bug me.

[Janx]

A series of tangentially related thoughts...

Well said, but can't give you XP at this time

speaking in character and stuff is worth XP in my game.

But the actual resolution of the attempt, I prefer cold hard mechanics.

 

[Mallus]

That's a rather circular assumption- and one in which I haven't seen much direct evidence for.

Here's some direct evidence...

It is necessary to simulate in-game magic because out-of-game magic does not exist.

It is necessary to simulate in-game melee combat because staging lethal sword fights in your living room is impractical. Also, illegal in most non-failed states.

It is necessary to simulate things like horse riding, iron portcullis-lifting, and armor-crafting, et cetera because D&D is usually played in homes, apartments, and clubs, not in fields, actual dungeons, and forges.

However, it is not absolutely necessary to simulate speech acts. Those can be performed --safely and at negligible cost-- in the common places D&D is played.

You should note I was simply being literal in the bit you quoted.

There's an assumption there that all speech is the same, and therefore no skill is involved.

That's your assumption, not mine. That's nowhere near what I wrote.

I certainly never said there is no skill involved in speech -- that's pretty much the opposite of my position. I think speech/in-character negotiations represents as strategic and intellectual a challenge as anything in the game, which is why I'm hesitant to handle it too abstractly.

The version before or after thieves?

I was thinking 'before', but either would do.

And in the latter, would you allow a fighter to be better at opening locks than a thief...

Locks and traps are an odd case in old-school D&D. They're often presented both as puzzles the players are meant to solve and as more abstract obstacles a specific PC class is meant to solve.

So my answer is: in certain cases, yes.

... our a mage to be better at bending bars based on his ability to describe the action?

Again it depends. Feat of raw physical strength aren't analogous to puzzles. There's nothing for the players to 'solve'. There's no game there. So no, describing a pure feat of strength is meaningless.

However, any player is free to come up with some smart way of bending the bars, a la McGyver.

Nonsense! I've been to any number of live-action events where sword-fighting has been done. Likewise magic has been performed by people accruing it out.

Are you really suggesting LARPers aren't also simulating combat and magic use. If so, tell me where these people meet. I gotta check this out!

So are you saying there should be no skills for such?

No. I was merely saying there is no absolute requirement to simulate things like trap-finding/disarming mechanics. This is not the equivalent of saying they shouldn't exist.

Or are you proofing that people who spend skill points on those skills can be trumped by people who simply talk a better game?

Note how dismissive 'talk a better game' is. As if players who enjoy solving in-game challenges more directly are kinda like BS artists. Oy...

So you don't believe things such as oratory, debate, negotiation or social skills are trainable abilities. That explains a lot.

Less reading into, more reading out of, please.

Yes, communication skills can be learned. I didn't suggest otherwise.

If the game has a unified skill system, that player would probably be having problems with the system as a whole.

A reasonable assumption that does nothing to contradict what I wrote. Some people are good with mechanics, some are good a talking pretty, some sly devils are good both!

Do you allow such in a "just talking"?

Yes.

Which brings up a different problem; just taking is completely left to the whim of the referee as to whether the attempt works.

Yes. Just talking relies on DM adjudication.

I prefer rules-based backing on social tasks...

The DM still needs to translate the skill check results into the appropriate NPC behavior, ie, the King won't give the PCs his entire army just because someone rolled a 32 for Diplomacy.

Which means a great deal of the social encounter is still being decided by the DM.

... to hoping that the referee liked the pizza I fed him before my attempt.

My group likes, trusts, and respects one another. We don't need to rely on bribes (though I wouldn't turn down the occasional bottle of bourbon, if any of my players are reading this...).

 

[Mallus]

It isn't, but it IS wrong to assume that everyone can talk well enough to play Sir Rakehell the Glib convincingly.

I wasn't making that assumption. I'd let a tongue-tied player simulate Sir Rakehall interpersonal's skills.

However, I'd also, hypothetically-speaking, judge my friend Mike on his own formidable verbal skills in the same campaign, and ask Sir Rakehill's player not to get his codpiece in a twist over Mike's PCs CHA score.

And I firmly believe that a modern RPG should not discourage anyone from playing Sir Rakehell the Glib merely because their personal social abilities are somehow lacking.

I'm a firm believer in the same thing, Danny.

But the question remains: how much does in-game success depends on character ability, and how much comes from player ability?

(this is complicated further by the way complex systems make 'character ability' just another kind of player ability ie, skill at chargen)

For social encounters in D&D, I like a mix of both, but I'll use either/or when appropriate.

 

[BryonD]

I'd let a tongue-tied player simulate Sir Rakehall interpersonal skills.

So Sir Rakehill DOES have skills and those skills persist whether Sir Rakehill is played by a slick player or a tongue-tied player?

 

[Mallus]

So Sir Rakehill DOES have skills and those skills persist whether Sir Rakehill is played by a slick player or a tongue-tied player?

Please rephrase. I don't understand what you're asking.

 

[S'mon]

Now are you saying that you think ALL rolls should be out front? For example opposed checks like Bluff vs Sense Motive where the Sense Motive roll was hidden? I think I missed it if you had an opinion about this situation.

I've always done all rolls in the open, yes. I'd normally have PC roll vs a static DC, though.

 

[BryonD]

Please rephrase. I don't understand what you're asking.

You said "Sir Rakehall interpersonal skills".
Thus you were stating that these were skills which were tied to the character and not tied to the player.

You further reinforced this idea by pointedly stating that the character's skills would be preserved even if played by a "tongue-tied" player.


My question is: Did I understand this correctly?

 

[Hussar]

It's simple, really. Social encounters --ie, talking-- is the thing you need to simulate least.

Role-playing games are played by talking.

I disagree with the idea that talking is the thing you need to simulate least. But move on.

Isn't OD&D played more-or-less exactly like this?

Yup, and, believe it or not, we've learned a couple of things in the 40 years of game development since.

It's not a double standard. It's a question of whether the in-game act requires simulating or not.

Things like sword-fighting and spell casting require simulating.

Things like disarming complex mechanical traps/puzzles doesn't outright require simulating; the trap can be described using words and maybe visualization aids, as can the solution process . This is a bit cumbersome using speech, but it can, and has, been done (often). The biggest problem with this is the need for a steady supply of new brain-teasing puzzles to spring on the players. The biggest advantage of this method is the feeling of accomplishment the players get for solving the problem themselves.

And, you tangentially hit on the need for social mechanics here. One, it's cumbersome to try to just "talk it out" every single time. Two, it becomes a problem to constantly keep it fresh. And, the big one for me, the advantage here varies very largely from group to group. While one group enjoys puzzles, the next group finds it intensely boring and watching the game grind to a halt while we pixel bitch our way through the trap du jour is not why we sit at the table.

The same thing can (not necessarily does, but can) apply to social encounters as well. While talking it out can be great fun, it can also drag and be incredibly boring, particularly if it takes significant time and only engages one player. Watching someone role play talking it out with the gate guard for half an hour when the session is only three hours long isn't my idea of fun. And, BEING that guy who talks to the guard for half an hour because I can't find the right phrase to convince the DM to let me pass is also not my idea of fun.

Things like speech, negotiations with NPCs are a special case. They don't require simulating at all. Everyone can just talk. And again, if it's the players own words that "win" the social encounter, they greater the feeling of accomplishment.

Yup. I will agree with that. When it works, it's fine. But, again, that line between a feeling of accomplishment and that feeling of frustration is very, very narrow.

This may favor players who are better at talking. Then again, if you handle social encounters/negotiations with some sort of abstract system, then you favor players better with abstract systems/mechanics.

We're talking about D&D players. This is a game with THOUSANDS of pages of rules. Presuming that a D&D player has a basic grasp of math isn't exactly a stretch. In fact, I'd say its a safer assumption to think that a D&D gamer has some grasp on mechanical systems. It's not like social mechanics are all that complicated.

Heck, again, as I mentioned before, when the rules for initiative are more complicated than the rules for diplomacy, I'm thinking that the advantage isn't all that great.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

how much does in-game success depends on character ability, and how much comes from player ability?

I think most should come from the PC. He is, after all, the one with the stats, powers, skills and so forth; he is the one in the campaign world. As pointed out, it's probably 99% of his successes based on those powers and physical skills, for obvious reasons.

And while PCs have mental stats, it's OK for a player to sometimes overstep their boundaries because, as we all know, those are far more abstract, subjective, and variable...even in the RW. My IQ measures just over the qualifying mark for "Genius", but under pressure, I've forgotten my own name and Latin phrases I've known for decades. I'm a pretty unassuming guy, and only 5'7"' but I stopped a fistfight between two drunks at an open-air rock festival with a dirty look...and some people in an Irish pub thought I was a "legbreaker" hired to help someone collect on a debt.

So while there can variability, and the mental stats are more of an "average" in regards to the PC's reality, the PC stats-NOT the player's actual intelligence, wisdom or charisma- should (like the physical stats) be responsible for the bulk of PCs successes based on those stats.

To do otherwise, IMHO, is to start down the path of making those stats irrelevant.

 

[S'mon]

A roleplaying game should not be so focused on the acting side that it forgets that the real challenges should be to the PC's abilities, not the players.

There is NOTHING WRONG with challenging the players' abilities. That's what GAMES are about.