hawkeyefan
Legend
wasn't Exalted brought up as a bad example not a good one...
It was brought up as an example of how social mechanics work poorly, and I think @Campbell ’s point is that it’s an example of poorly designed social mechanics, not an example that proves social mechanics cannot work.
If my character can be persuaded against my desires..."because that is realistic"...then shouldn't my character also flee screaming from just about every single monster encountered? Or perhaps just freeze up and soil his trousers? And then suffer horrible PTSD afterwards? Because that's what we humans would undoubtedly do in those situations?
Or maybe, just maybe, the point of D&D is not to realistically model human psychology, but to have fun killing monsters and taking their stuff.
So, yeah, social combat subsystem. Great idea. But it should be based on what would be fun, not what's realistic.
Or how about this: at least as realistic as the physical combat system.
Yeah, it’s all a matter of implementation toward the goals of play.
In a game like D&D, where the characters are routinely faced with violence and horror, it doesn't make a lot of sense to have mechanics for fear or trauma and the like, not unless you want to shift the tone significantly. But for other games, those kinds of things may make sense.
Overall, I think 5E works fairly well on the PC to NPC vector. This can also be expanded pretty easily along the lines of Skill Challenge, which I think add the kind of dynamic scene called for in the OP.
I would say that I wish there was a little more at risk for the PCs in the social/emotional/mental area, but such rules would be potentially difficult to implement without significant changes to the core rules.