D&D 5E Using social skills on other PCs

[HammerMan]

But.................................it's not an exception or contradiction, so it fails the Specific Beats General taste test. I can't be an example of something that it fails to do.

it tells the player how they think...like the caster is a close known associate even if they just met

But never as any sort of specific exception or contradiction.

I read several.

 

[Ovinomancer]

I don’t recall the page number off the top of my head, but it’s the quote we’ve been discussing that says the player decides what their character thinks, feels, and does. Since a player decides what their character thinks, feels, and does, the outcome of any action taken with the goal of forcing a player’s character to make a specific decision is not uncertain.

Some game actions, such as the effects of certain spells, maneuvers, and actions in combat, explicitly state exceptions to this general principle. Ability checks, as far as I can tell, do not.

It's pg 174 in the PHB -- the only mention of this and in a context of describing roleplaying and not as a generally applicable rule to the rest of the game. I find it a stretch to insist that this is a general rule, and even if so it falls to specific/general.

It's worth noting, I suppose, that Crawford agrees with your interpretation even though the rules as written are terrible support for this. Heck, I agree with your conclusion on play, I just cannot agree with the argument you're putting forward to get there. Can't agree with Crawford, either. If this was intended play, burying the critical rule in a section on roleplaying no one is going to reference when looking up rules to adjudicate play seems a really, really poor choice. Then couching the rule is terms of a general description of how you roleplay that's applicable to just about any RPG even those that have explicit ways to direct PC thinking? Weird.

 

[Maxperson]

it tells the player how they think

I guess in respect to the, "You regard the caster as friendly acquaintance" it does, but it fails as a rule to stop the player from deciding success or failure.

I read several.

Then show one that contradicts the player rule. Just one. I've asked you a half-dozen times and you keep evading.

 

[iserith]

so how does someone who can not in real life tell how trust worthy someone is play someoone with a high insight in your games?
How does a moderately to low intelligent player play a high int character?

Same as playing any character - say what you want to do and hope to accomplish in a reasonably specific, but succinct way. If there's uncertainty as to the outcome and a meaningful consequence for failure, I'll call for an ability check.

that is just a diffrent way of wording it, and since we have gone to Roll20, all the dice are on the view for anyone to see and we all agree on DCs, so that just seems like a waste of time...

Saying that an NPC is trustworthy - effectively that the PC who is not under your control believes the NPC is trustworthy - and saying the NPC displays no tells that they are lying are not the same thing at all.

 

[HammerMan]

I get how you see it. It's just not supported by the rules.

not everyone aggrees with you. so since it is how we read vs how you read how can either be right/wrong

You've dismantled nothing but your own argument that your approach is supported by the rules. They aren't. But that's okay, right? Play how you want.

man, would it hurt you to say that someone read the rules and INTERPRETED them other then how you did without breaking going around or some other house rule...
You keep ending arguments with "But your approach is not supported by the rules" when we have shown page after page of where we see those differently then you.

 

[Bill Zebub]

yes, I expect that if I describe a huge rain storm my players will RP being in a storm.
If I describe a icy chill in the air I do NOT expect my players to all of a sudden pretend they are in a sunny beach
if you describe with word or numbers an intimidating orc i do not expect them to treat it like a rat.

Yes, this is fine.

If you are rolling dice to describe the Orc's behavior in the same way that you would roll dice to determine the day's weather, then I think we agree on the purpose of the dice.

I guess the question is, if you expected the player to say, "Brrr....I stay inside by the fire" and instead they said, "I love a good storm! I stand in the downpour and scream my defiance to the weather gods!" are you ok with that?

Likewise, if you roll a nat 20 on the Orc's intimidate and the player doesn't respond in the way you are expecting, are you ok with that?

 

[HammerMan]

I guess in respect to the, "You regard the caster as friendly acquaintance" it does, but it fails as a rule to stop the player from deciding success or failure.

Then show one that contradicts the player rule. Just one. I've asked you a half-dozen times and you keep evading.

not evading.... we have been over it. You don't see it and refuse to give the benefit of the doubt that anyone reads the rules different then you do. I refuse to do the work of retyping or searching and copy pasteing again.

 

[Ovinomancer]

Sure, but the DM always has the authority to decide to resolve an action in other ways. The key difference here is support. The rules provide specific instructions (i.e. support) for how to resolve a shove attempt, or casting Charm Person, or whatever. They do not, as far as I can tell, contain such instructions for resolving an attempt to force a player’s character to make a certain decision. The DM has only the general rules for ability checks to fall back on, unless they want to resolve the action in a way the rules don’t support them in (which they have the authority to do and is perfectly valid). Said general rules for ability checks say that the DM calls for them to be made to resolve actions that have an uncertain outcome. However, since there is also a general rule/principle/whatever you want to call it stating that the player decides what their character does, and the general rules for using ability checks to resolve improvised actions don’t contain a specific exception to this rule/principle, the rules do not seem to support the DM in calling for an ability check to resolve such an action.

This is the same argument I addressed with @Bill Zebub -- the existence of one rule that codified some action does not imply anything about the intent to not allow a different action that doesn't have a more codified rule. There are very good reasons why a designer may choose to leave a type of action uncodified and open rather than provide codification for it and those don't involve wanting to minimize or restrict actions of that kind.

As for explicit exceptions, these don't exist all over the place but are assumed. Charm person doesn't call itself out any more explicitly than do the options for use of CHA ability checks. This is an argument where there's some level of explicitness that's present in one place but not another yet cannot be qualified in any real way.

 

[Swarmkeeper]

I don't understand how this argument withstands the specific/general rule, though.

Not sure I follow. I indicated how a player roleplaying fits into the play loop. Then I describe something that is a major pet peeve of mine. Do I need the disclaimer "unless a specific rule - such as a spell or NPC ability - says otherwise"?

 

[Charlaquin]

It's pg 174 in the PHB -- the only mention of this and in a context of describing roleplaying and not as a generally applicable rule to the rest of the game. I find it a stretch to insist that this is a general rule, and even if so it falls to specific/general.

It's worth noting, I suppose, that Crawford agrees with your interpretation even though the rules as written are terrible support for this. Heck, I agree with your conclusion on play, I just cannot agree with the argument you're putting forward to get there. Can't agree with Crawford, either. If this was intended play, burying the critical rule in a section on roleplaying no one is going to reference when looking up rules to adjudicate play seems a really, really poor choice. Then couching the rule is terms of a general description of how you roleplay that's applicable to just about any RPG even those that have explicit ways to direct PC thinking? Weird.

Hey, I never claimed the D&D 5e rules were well organized or presented. If your opinion is that these rules should have been written better, I agree with you. And it’s odd because I actually think they were written much better in the open playtest packets.

And yes, I know what people are likely to say to this: I’m carrying over assumptions based on my experience with a previous “edition” by running D&D 5th edition like it’s D&D Next. I actually think that’s a perfectly fair critique of my position, D&D Next does heavily color my interpretation of the 5e rules. However, I think based on the fact that Jeremy Crawford agrees with my interpretation, it’s clear that I’ve at least arrived at the RAI through that lens, which I think is most often not the case when someone carries over assumptions from previous editions.