Are Traits Weaksauce? (Social Favored Terrain)

[billd91]

First is that most of them are very DM/adventure dependent on how useful they are. I played the knight through Caves of Chaos, and never really got a chance to use Knight's station.

I think, in general, this is fine but should be discussed when setting the ground assumptions for the game. If the game is expected to just be the Caves of Chaos, plenty of character concepts won't fit well. This should be made clear at the outset. But for a sandbox campaign that is expected to have the players driving a lot of the impulse for adventure, including where or why to explore, then traits and backgrounds that are no help for any one segment may pay off in other segments. I would just encourage a DM in those circumstances to provide ways for all backgrounds to shine or risk running an unbalance game.

 

[KidSnide]

I think backgrounds should include some type of “favored social terrain” bonus (but maybe not with that term). In other words, commoners should have a significant advantage with “ordinary people”, knights and soldiers should have a significant advantage with guards and other military types, and sages and priests should have a significant advantage with knowledgeable scholarly types. This type of bonus shouldn’t dominate skills and ability scores, but it should be enough to allow a socially mediocre character to significantly contribute when their character is in a situation that matches his or her background. The mechanics should back up that character's familiarity with that part of the game world.

Now that's definitely reasonable. It's a good idea BUT it has one risk: that of actually codifying a benefit that you should already have!

Let's go back to the barbarian persuading the savage tribe. Do we really need a Trait to tell us "you have +X bonus skill on social interactions with other savage people" when this could have been just a circumstance bonus that the DM grants if you ask her? A particularly stubborn and rules-lawyer DM would refuse the bonus, but IMHO a reasonable DM should immediately recognize that this is a circumstance that should be valid for everyone interacting with someone else with which they share strong cultural basis.

Turn this into a Trait, and what you get is that actually you now have to pick the Trait to have something you could have been entitled to anyway, and now you can't pick another less obvious Trait.

I think this is a great argument for adding "social favored terrain" to Backgrounds. Essentially you're saying that a good DM already gives this kind of bonus. That's exactly the type of sign that suggests the bonus should be baked into the system. The DM guide isn't for good DMs. It's for average DMs and new DMs, and those folks should be given the strong guidance that players should get a powerful familiarity bonus in the appropriate social contexts.

Yes, a good or great DM will provide a more nuanced social familiarity bonus (e.g. to handle social status of a bounty hunter who is really the son of a duke), but the existence of a better and more game-specific method of handling this type of rule is not an argument to leave out the basic rule for the benefit of DMs and players who are just learning how to play.

Also, lets remember that this isn't an issue if you're ignoring dice. This is an issue when social interactions are a mixture of dice rolling and role playing. This is to solve the problem where the background of one PC makes that person the right candidate to conduct a social interaction, but where another PC has better bluff/diplomacy/insight skills.

I think it sucks when it's super appropriate for one PC to interact with an NPC it's connected to his background, but yet the rules make it tactically superior for a PC with superior Charisma skills to handle it instead. Usually, this is a "face" PC who already does the lion share of social interaction.

Backgrounds should let PCs have the "moment in the spotlight" during interactions. If they don't help that happen, I don't think they are fulfilling their function.

-KS

 

[nomotog]

I don't think traits are made to have a big rules footprint. I like the idea of social terrain and things, but you can just make a skill for that.

 

[Sunseeker]

I personally prefer traits to be "weaksauce" as you put it. They should be flavor, providing minor bonuses AND penalties in certain situations, entirely dependent upon the will of the DM and the campaign setting.

I remember playing Deadlands, which has various types of negative and beneficial traits and weaknesses. While taking weaknesses allowed your character to gain a few extra points to build with, it wasn't really significant enough to make or break the game, and I liked that.

IMO: traits should be restricted to exactly what "traits" are in real life, snooty, alcoholic, needy, afraid of the dark, cowardly, bold, ect... And provide very minor, very situational bonuses or penalties. Perhaps your character is an arrogant, racist human noble who has a tendency to get drunk and go off on elves. In tavern-type situations, your character might have to make a will save in order to decide not to buy a drink, as they struggle with their alcoholism. If they fail, they inevitably drink too much, and assuming they don't flat-out pass out, may go on a drunken rant about how they hate those tree-loving, pointy-eared hippies.


And of course, you would have complete control on if you chose these traits, and perhaps you could balance it out with "Temple Acolyte" showing that your character has joined a religious order's 12-step program to hopefully overcome their faults, thus giving them a minor bonus to saves against their weakness.


That's how I like traits, fluffy. A character should be able to have a few of them(say, 3-4) that amount to very prominent, defining elements of your character that add primarily role-play value and a touch of roll-play effects.

Perhaps you are a poor(-1 diplomacy when dealing with nobles, +1 when dealing with townfolk), honest(+10% prices when buying from merchants), farmer(+1 nature checks when dealing with farming, -1 dungeoneering) who was orphaned(-1 insight when dealing with families, +1 sense motive when dealing with criminals) at a young age.

These are solid roleplaying points that many people often use to define their characters. Many DMs often give similar bonuses based on "good roleplay" for following your character's personality. By adding some basic bonuses or penalties to some basic traits, it helps both the player and the DM understand when and where your character's background should come into play in the course of the game.

 

[the Jester]

No, traits (as presented) aren't weaksauce- they are part of a background, and they are the part that gives the strongest tie to the campaign.

I'm happy with them as presented in the playtest doc.

 

[KidSnide]

IMO: traits should be restricted to exactly what "traits" are in real life, snooty, alcoholic, needy, afraid of the dark, cowardly, bold, ect... And provide very minor, very situational bonuses or penalties. Perhaps your character is an arrogant, racist human noble who has a tendency to get drunk and go off on elves.

....

That's how I like traits, fluffy. A character should be able to have a few of them(say, 3-4) that amount to very prominent, defining elements of your character that add primarily role-play value and a touch of roll-play effects.

That's a pretty cool idea, but quite a divergence from how traits are currently conceived. Right now, traits aren't really "traits" in the sense that you (or normal English) use the term. The current playtest traits are more about the character's pre-adventuring occupation than the character's personality.

Personally, I think some rules-light personality traits sound like a cool idea. Frankly, I could see just about any personality trait act like a self-balancing bonus/penalty. A character could get a +1 to +3 bonus to resisting persuasion or charm effects that contradict that character's personality and a -1 to -3 penalty to resisting persuasion or charm effects that fit it with a character's personality.

I'm not sure the average D&D player spends that much time thinking about their character's personality, but it sounds like a great optional rules module to me.

-KS

 

[Sunseeker]

That's a pretty cool idea, but quite a divergence from how traits are currently conceived. Right now, traits aren't really "traits" in the sense that you (or normal English) use the term. The current playtest traits are more about the character's pre-adventuring occupation than the character's personality.

Personally, I think some rules-light personality traits sound like a cool idea. Frankly, I could see just about any personality trait act like a self-balancing bonus/penalty. A character could get a +1 to +3 bonus to resisting persuasion or charm effects that contradict that character's personality and a -1 to -3 penalty to resisting persuasion or charm effects that fit it with a character's personality.

I gave up keeping up with the playtest largely to avoid Beta Burnout. So if they're talking more about professions, it'd be nice if they called them "professions" instead of "traits". It makes me think of the tiefling traits from Pathfinder's Blood of Fiends., such as

You enjoy being cut. The first time each day you take slashing damage, you gain a +1 bonus on attack and damage rolls for the following round.

or

You can alter your shadow to make it appear as that of any creature or object of your size or smaller.

or

You can manipulate any armor, gauntlets, or shield you wield, causing them to grow spikes. These spikes last only as long as you wear your armor.

Flavorful, useful, creative and overall: not game unbalancing.

I'm not sure the average D&D player spends that much time thinking about their character's personality, but it sounds like a great optional rules module to me.

-KS

I've got a pretty diverse group I'm running with right now. I'd say that at least 3 of them could probably write me a novella on their character. One of my power builders has said at a couple points that he's definitely come to care for his character.

But that's what's nice about a few pre-made "traits", people may not think of those things for their character, but when they see them in the rules, even the power builders may be willing to pick up a little role in exchange for a little roll.

 

[DEFCON 1]

I don't even know if you need to create individual "social terrain" modifiers for every single background... you might easily just have a rule in the front of the Backgrounds chapter (or within the DMG) that says that interacting with others of a similar background automatically grants a +1 circumstance bonus to social skill checks, or that you tend to default to Neutral (if not) Good reaction to NPCs of a similar background. It could just be a more universal rule.

 

[KidSnide]

I gave up keeping up with the playtest largely to avoid Beta Burnout. So if they're talking more about professions, it'd be nice if they called them "professions" instead of "traits".

Traits are the term they used to describe abilities for the "interaction" pillar. Every player gets to choose a background that (right now) appears to include three skills and a trait. So far, the backgrounds we've seen are knight, priest,
soldier, commoner and sage. Those five backgrounds each come with a trait: Knight’s Station, Temple Services, Endurance, Trade or Researcher. They provide a minor ability that's appropriate to the background.

I like that the traits are flavorful and not unbalancing. However, I don't think they do enough to differentiate the characters as they interact with the game world. The "Knight's Station" ability just allows you free food and lodging where people recognize your status. In the games I've played (at least the good ones), that is a pale shadow of the social benefits of knighthood.

I don't claim to have the full answers. Obviously, many background benefits will be highly campaign specific. If you give a noble the full benefits of nobility (status, wealth, contacts), it's hard to balance that against any reasonable benefits you could provide a blacksmith or a local criminal. I'm not sure if WotC should punch up the benefits or just provide guidance to DMs who want to.

The Social Favored Terrain idea is more focused on a specific problem: if you just rely on attribute and skill bonuses, a small number of PCs totally dominate the "face" aspect of interactions. If that's supposed to be a "pillar", then you want the mechanics to support characters taking advantage of the social connections of their background.

I don't even know if you need to create individual "social terrain" modifiers for every single background... you might easily just have a rule in the front of the Backgrounds chapter (or within the DMG) that says that interacting with others of a similar background automatically grants a +1 circumstance bonus to social skill checks, or that you tend to default to Neutral (if not) Good reaction to NPCs of a similar background. It could just be a more universal rule.

Yeah, definitely. But it would be useful to provide some guidance to how broadly the bonus should apply. Do knights get the benefit in the high status context and the military context? Also, some backgrounds (Charlatan?) might have a special version of the ability that, to pick that example, could provide a lower bonus to a wider range of situations.

-KS

 

[pemerton]

Traits are the “new” part of backgrounds.

<snip>

I want to see traits have a real impact in the interaction phase of the game. If a character’s background is appropriate to a situation, then that character should have a significant mechanical advantage in that situation.

I agree with this. A few weeks ago I suggested one way they might do this without simply being numerical bonuses: a PC having a certain trait can be deemed to have acquired, outside play, a certain relevant asset or oppportunity that another PC can only obtain though play.

So, for example, a PC with the Research trait can (X times per session, perhaps, or in some fashion regulated more informally between player and GM) be deemed to have read ceratin books, and on that basis be entitled to make certain skill checks, that another PC simply cannot make until, in play, s/he finds and reads those books.

Temple Services and Knight's Station would give access to friendships and other relationships with NPCs, rather than books: you already have friends in various places (and so can make checks eg to borrow things, or learn things, from them) whereas other PCs have to actually make those friends in play.

And so on.