All Characters Should be Good at Talking to NPCs

[Voadam]

1. We are playing out a game not your script.
2...So what are some ways you encourage players to fully participate in the game even if they're not social butterflies?..... Brass knuckles, booze, cattle prods, and tossing them from bridges when the creek is dry.

Have an NPC interact with them directly with open ended questions or similar interactions.

"You are a druid, what do you think?"

Give them prompts.

"So they are asking around about the missing art, what are you doing?"

Be mindful of spotlight and inclusion.

 

[pemerton]

It's quite possible to imagine my PC making a sword thrust at a NPC, the GM to imagine how that NPC might deflect that thrust with a shield, etc. If the GM has notes that say this person is really good at deflecting thrusts with her shield then in order to kill the NPC with my sword I'd have to persuade the GM that, on this occasion, I've performed a manoeuvre with my sword that even some who's really handy with a shield can't deflect.

I've never tried that, so I'm not quite sure what it would look like, but in principle it doesn't seem impossible.

Resolving social interaction by talking seems to me just the same. I mean, if my PC is trying to persuade the guard to let me pass, I'm not actually trying to persuade a person to let me pass. What I'm trying to do is to persuade the GM that s/he should consider the guard persuaded. And that's no different from persuading the GM that s/he should consider the guard stabbed!

 

[CubicsRube]

A simple thing I do in all RPGs is I consider the character's class or role and what aspects of society they would have access to. A Bard might be best to speak to nobility, but most guard captains wouldn't give them the time of day. A Fighter adventurer they might listen to. Wilderness types would be more receptive to their own than city type of roles etc.

 

[Composer99]

Main topic:

I think the goal should be that all players should be able, if they wish, to meaningfully contribute to social interaction with NPCs. Not necessarily every single instance of social interaction, but rather when taken as a whole.

I think reducing it to being good at talking to NPCs is probably going too far. It strengthens the idea that social interaction writ large is a niche that the party face fills completely and that the turnip-personality character (let's call them Gruff Turnip) is not meant or allowed to take part.

With that in mind, having different niches for social interaction, and making sure as a DM/GM/what-have-you to encourage different player characters to fill those niches, is a good way (at least IMO) to broaden the scope of social interaction. Others have already touched on this idea: the introverted nerd who opens up when discussing a topic about which they are knowledgeable and enthusiastic, the gregarious charmer, the hulking bad-cop muscle, the empathetic listener, the charlatan, that sort of thing.

So, you want to have different ways that characters can contribute to social interaction, not necessarily always in equal measure. You want to encourage the players to choose social niches that fit their characters. (Gruff Turnip could almost certainly be menacing, for instance. Or if you need someone in an interaction to be abrasive, offensive, or annoying, then Gruff is the right tool for the job.) And then you want to make a point of having situations come up in the game that reward characters from different niches contributing in social interaction.

The other thing you can do - again, as others have already touched on - is have different NPCs react differently to different player characters. The simple townsfolk are going to find the loquacious wizard boring and hard to understand, preferring perhaps the plain-spoken fighter (or maybe even Gruff Turnip, who at least has the decency to look you in the eyes and give you a firm handshake before insulting you), while of course Sage McSmartypants will have the opposite reaction.

Now, the character who has invested in social skills is a good all-round social generalist, and absolutely shines in the niches that their character best fits, but everyone else still has ways to contribute meaningfully to social interaction - if they wish. Even Gruff Turnip.

---

Tangent (spoilered because tangential):

Spoiler: Magic!

Pick a magic spell that isn't mentally oriented, and I can do something towards that without magic -- perhaps not at the same scale or effect, but I can try. Fireball? I can use oil and fire, or alchemist's fire. Weaker, less effective, but I can do this. Fly? I can climb to high buildings and construct wings, or ride a griffon. Invisibility? I can try to hide or camouflaged myself. Magic in other areas does do magical things, usually by expanding the scope of the effect. But, I cannot convince an NPC or PC of a thing if they don't want to be convinced outside of Charm Person. Flatly, if the GM says, "this guard will not let anyone unauthorized past," I cannot talk my way past him, no matter what, with freeform RP but I can Charm or Dominate him and do it. My only option is to try a different approach. Thus, "it's magic" doesn't even hold water compared to other magic when it comes to Charm. It's a totally weak argument that sums up to "because."

This whole line of complaint about charm/domination magic makes no sense. In fact, it makes so little sense it is nonsense. It is just as much "because"-style circular reasoning as what you are complaining about.

Magic in most TTRPGs isn't just extending nonmagical things. Or, put another way, you just aren't "do[ing] something towards" a magical effect "without magic". Magic, more often than not, breaks fundamental rules of reality. You just aren't replicating fireball when you use alchemist's fire. Alchemist's fire is a fueled chemical reaction. Fireball is "manipulat[ing] thermodynamic differentials with your fingers". Constructing a glider/artificial wings is manipulating known forces to stay airborne. The fly spell is telling those forces to shut up and sit in the corner. Hiding or using camouflage is about staying out of other creatures' line of sight or being mistaken for something else. Becoming invisible magically entails letting light just... pass through you unobstructed (despite your own eyes still receiving light in sufficient quantity to see by).

Why do werewolves or vampires have only particular weaknesses (varying from system to system)? There's no sensible reason for these phenomena that you can extend logically or reasonably from nonmagical principles. If you transform, say, a human into a toad, where does all their extra body mass go? There's no sensible nonmagical phenomenon that you can work from. How do dragons exhale fire, much less lightning or sleep gas? There's no good reason - it's just magic. (Although that one faux documentary tried its best, bless it.)

Many (most?) varieties of magic in TTRPGS require overlooking physical or biological impossibilities. They are by nature inherently unreasonable. You can't sensibly justify them through any means other than "it's magic" because there is no other justification.

Suffice to say, there is no sense in complaining about the circular nature of magic, because its very impossibility precludes any other nature.

 

[billd91]

For example if you have skills of intimidate, convince, charm, incite, inspire and command - you could have up to 6 characters filling a social niche.

Other games have had multiple interaction skills, but I'm not honestly convinced they're that great a solution. Adding skills certainly won't help in a game in which some characters are just going to dump their stats anyway so they have more build points/ options to spend on their core competencies.

Which of course gets to the natural question:
If players feel they can't contribute in certain kinds of scenes, maybe they shouldn't dump their ability to do so by focusing their character development elsewhere?

 

[CubicsRube]

Other games have had multiple interaction skills, but I'm not honestly convinced they're that great a solution. Adding skills certainly won't help in a game in which some characters are just going to dump their stats anyway so they have more build points/ options to spend on their core competencies.

Which of course gets to the natural question:
If players feel they can't contribute in certain kinds of scenes, maybe they shouldn't dump their ability to do so by focusing their character development elsewhere?

Player playstyle is always going to trump mechanics and if players don'flt want to engage in the social pillar of the game, theu certainly won't.

But for me i think there needs to be at least a few social skills to allow those that want to engage with NPCs a choice of niche.

 

[pemerton]

Player playstyle is always going to trump mechanics

That sounds a bit simplistic. I mean, we wouldn't say this about playing poker or football. Or about playing Australian rules football compared to American football.

 

[CubicsRube]

That sounds a bit simplistic. I mean, we wouldn't say this about playing poker or football. Or about playing Australian rules football compared to American football.

Those aren't comparable. A better comparison would be to a board game where you can't make up rules or judgements as you go along.

However what I mean to say is that you can have all sorts of rules around social interactions in an rpg if you want, but if the player doesn't want to speak to NPCs or engage in that part of the game, they won't.

 

[pemerton]

what I mean to say is that you can have all sorts of rules around social interactions in an rpg if you want, but if the player doesn't want to speak to NPCs or engage in that part of the game, they won't.

Well sure, that's true of rules for combat as well; or rules for climbing walls. I don't see that it's special about social interaction.

 

[Voadam]

Which of course gets to the natural question:
If players feel they can't contribute in certain kinds of scenes, maybe they shouldn't dump their ability to do so by focusing their character development elsewhere?

Or alternatively, the game system could be designed to not make those trade offs part of the system.

Take GURPS/Man-to-Man, a point buy system for generating combat abilities. Characters can trade off toughness versus strength versus accuracy to have different styles of combat that are roughly balanced for different 100 point buy builds. In Man-to-Man it is just the combat point buy options, In GURPS you expand the things you can spend points on to social skills and abilities or skills for other things like exploration or other non-combat and non-social activities such as knowledges and professional skills and other miscellaneous advantages.

You can go the GURPS route of spend your standard 100 points among the three pillars or focus on being good in one. This leads to lots of opportunities for mediocrity in spreading yourself thin around lots of areas to participate OK in lots of places, or being a good specialist (combatant, face, etc.) who is poor in other areas.

Alternatively you could set it up where you have three separate pools of points so everyone is good at combat in their own style (the D&D 3e on model and the Man-to-Man model) and competent in other areas/pillars too.