NPC Deception/Persuasion and player agency

[pemerton]

You test the beliefs of characters by putting them in situations where they have to make hard choices without obvious "correct" answers. Randomising the character's reaction and denying the player the agency of making the choice would defeat the whole point.

Is there a system that actually does this? I don't think I know of one.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Is there a system that actually does this? I don't think I know of one.

It seems to be what several people in this tread want. Also, to me it seems you play games like this. I remember your old example from your knight game where two sexist knights were courting the same lady, and they argued over it and the decision of who would get her and who would give up was outsourced to the dice.

 

[Maxperson]

And my response is, obviously you have every right to do this. However, I find this sort of characterization shallow and unconvincing in general, to me. I want the character concept tested and explored fully. Instead of a predetermined absolute inviolable idea that can't be challenged Narrativist styles of play generally don't take who you think you are as ground truth. You want to show your loyalty? Prove it, withstand temptation, and not just by fiat. You have to do it, or fail, and it's all on the table. For me, that's truly inhabiting the character.

You are making unfounded assumptions. Just because I know 100% would never do x, doesn't I know the same for you and z and his character cannot be tested in those situations.

I also fail to see how "you succeeded at a roll" or "you made a roll" shows loyalty or the lack of it at all. A roll(or whatever resolution process is used) means nothing for the character of my character.

That's like saying that just because I succeeded or failed a save against a fear spell that my character is brave or a coward.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

The sort of things you mention limit what the character can do. But if the thing affects character's emotions or volition, it will affect what they want to do. I think this is big difference. The former is an obstacle on the way to your goal, whilst the latter will affect what sort of goal you will pursue. If goblins block you from getting their treasure, you can come up with ways to circumvent, trick or even defeat those goblins. But if goblins compel you to believe that you actually don't want their treasure because materialism is not the true path to the happiness, then you will no longer pursue their treasure.

So, this is why communication, as well as a very explicit premise, are vital to narrativist play. Additionally the setting of stakes in a given situation and player agreement on stakes is important. If the game's premise is built around materialistic treasure acquisition, then "if you debate the goblin and fail the test, then you adopt a non-materealistic philosophy" is effectively a life and death struggle in terms of playing the character. First of all; any game worth it's salt as a game will not simply throw this at you, it will be part of some kind of game state. You already became demoralized, your ally perished due to greed, etc. These games are very big on things flowing out of the fiction. You don't take your first step into some dungeon and suddenly radically alter your character.

 

[Maxperson]

Whereas I think the opposing opinion is of "If you just get to pick what your character does, where was the test?"

In my knowledge of my character's character. I know if he is fanatically loyal and won't bend, or if he's loyal, but also has a self-serving flaw that might make him betray someone he is loyal to.

For the latter PC, if you put me in a situation where I can come out way ahead with a betrayal of that loyalty, I will struggle with that decision and it could go either way.

Using dice to make that decision is to me the easy and meaningless way out. I would rather feel the struggle with that decsion within myself as I embody my character.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Using dice to make that decision is to me the easy and meaningless way out. I would rather feel the struggle with that decsion within myself as I embody my character.

Yes! Very well said!

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Agreed, but the GM also "fudged out".

It's the GM's responsibility to tell a good story and make events that happen within it believable. If it's not remotely believable for the PC to fall for the NPC just because the GM rolled or otherwise compelled that result, why should the play not play the same game the GM is playing?

A roll for a social challenge can never create in itself a transcript of play. Rolling seduction for the NPC and then saying, "You are now madly in love with the NPC" never creates the circumstances or conversation which if written down in a novel or otherwise turned into a different form of story-telling media causes the audiences to understand why it happened and believe it.

At least in this case the player tried to provide that transcript to justify the story moment. If anything, they "fudged out" less hard than the GM did.

As a GM, if I want the player character to fall for an NPC, I try my darndest to make a character that could be someone's literary crush and try my best to suggest a relationship which an audience would "ship". And if my player isn't interested in that, well then they aren't interested for whatever reason.

If you want players to hold NPCs as having value, or provoke hate or love toward NPCs, make good NPCs.

Imagine how this might work in different systems. FitD would probably situate the NPC as an ally, or maybe a potential enemy. You can spurn them, but the fiction coming out of that will be consequences. Or maybe accepting her advances is a devil's bargain, or doing so is burning stress to resist, etc. Nobody is telling the player how the character MUST react. Additionally this has to be fictionally coherent and the situation will have been described and chosen through one of several mechanics.

 

[Thomas Shey]

I see both in fiction, so I don't think it's that.

I was very specific in saying adventure fiction, where one is much more common than the other.

Also, I think people at the table acting out something like flirting is only a tiny part of interpersonal social interaction of this sort.

I don't disagree, but its still one of the parts a lot of people are uncomfortable with.

D&D focused originally on violence and a sort of basic skilled play within a very narrow set of situations.

In a game of, say Apocalypse World, all sorts of interactions are assumed to be possibly in scope. I've yet to see this lead to problems.

Largely because people who preselect for PbtA games are less likely to think its a problem. This is the system that spawned Monsterhearts after all. PbtA games work well for a number of people, but this isn't the only area you'd probably lose people right up front (probably not even the most likely one).

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Yeah, that's cool, that can be done. By putting the character in actually difficult situations, forcing them to make hard choices.
But "can I roll high enough on the dice" is not an interesting or evocative way to test the character's beliefs.
That to me is incredibly shallow.

I don't think the dice generally just drop in and dictate out of the blue. Instead you develop situations/threats/consequences in the context of a coherent fiction. Dice might tell us that you pissed off the woman who made a pass at you and she's got it in for you now. Yep, you could have just gone along with the situation, but your darn loyalty had to get in way!

 

[Thomas Shey]

That doesn't answer the question of why combat challenges need to use a far different and more mechanical method of resolution than literally all other challenges though.

Well, I'd argue that part of that is that they're the subsystem most likely to interact with the opportunity to completely lose your character (I emphasize the "most" because obviously some athletic tests land there too, and I've argued before that at least some of those could use more love than they usually get, too). Given that anything but really light combat systems take up a fair bit of space, expanding other area one might want to get similar coverage is probably impractical (but occasionally does happen if its central enough to the genre being reflected).