Are things like Intimidate/Bluff/Diplomacy too easy?

[JamesonCourage]

The problem is Stalker0 - and I totally agree with how you have posted things - is that apparently, bluffing the guard isn't enough, nor is diplomacy.

Correct.

After all, there is no open the gate skill.

Again, correct.

According to JamesonCourage, no skill can get that gate to open. The only thing that gets that gate to open is if I press the correct series of buttons in the DM's head and he lets me get in the gate. If I fail to press any of the buttons, then I cannot enter. If I do not press ALL of the buttons, I still cannot enter. In fact, pressing the buttons doesn't actually do anything because it all comes down to the DM making an adjudication that I have apparently convinced him that I should be let in.

This is no more true than rolling a Survival check to determine north, rolling a Knowledge (geography) check to determine where a city is in relation to yourself, and then telling the GM that you're heading there.

The checks mechanically represent success in a limited area, and GM adjudication resolves the rest. This is true in nearly every aspect of the game. That you prefer an exception to social skills, or just Bluff, or anything else is fine. But it is not arbitrary GM fiat to follow that just like the rest of the game.

At no point does any of my successes actually let me in the gate. It's all up to DM Fiat.

Again, no more than "you rolled a success on your Bluff, so you get in. Here's how it went down" is. Your method is just as much GM fiat as mine is.

I would say that the basic difference here is, how do you award success. After all, we all agree that the PC's succeeded. They bluffed the guard. The guard believes their lie. Maybe the DM requires a further diplomacy check, that's fine. But, in the example, even if I do that, the guard still calls down the king and I'm screwed.

You're not necessarily screwed.

This is not a universal situation, it's a specific situation that I gave Lost Soul to demonstrate differing levels of success and failure.

You can still succeed in your social checks.

You could have succeeded in your investigation checks better than you did.

Circumstances can favor you, rather than be against you.

I'm not sure how many times it needs to be said, but maybe eventually you'll see what I'm trying to say.

Now, if any of the following is the result:

For example:
You make your bluff. The guard believes your lie. So he calls for someone to escort you where you need to go in the castle. You're in, but you need to shake the escort in a way that seems natural and accidental.

-or-

You made your Bluff. The guard believes your lie. So he lets you and the turnip cart containing the rest of the party in and points you towards the kitchens.

Then the PC's success ACTUALLY is a success. They get in the door and they are not subject to an endless string of subsequent challenges until they fail. See, both of these examples actually reward success instead of punishing it.

Where did I say there's an endless stream of challenges? In fact, did I give a number of challenges that they'll need to make? If so, what number?

It all comes down to how do you reward success.

Not really. My point, and the thing that everyone seems to agree on, is that the PC's have already succeeded. They bluffed the guard, they jumped through the hoops, they got their 12 successes before 3 failures, whatever floats your boat. They succeeded. But, that success is then turned into a failure because the DM decides that their success just isn't quite good enough.

That's where I part company.

That's not what happened. You can only succeed mechanically at lying with the Bluff skill. In this case, that means a success is measured by whether or not someone believes your bluff, but not by whether or not or achieve your goal.

Please, explain to me where it did, using the definition of success that I am familiar with:

suc·cess
1. The achievement of something desired, planned, or attempted

They were indeed successful at lying. Nothing beyond that. You can play it that way, and that's cool, and I know you have fun, and it's not wrong.

But saying "you succeeded on your Bluff, so the guard reacts this way, so you get let in" is actually a little more GM fiat than "you succeeded on your Bluff, so the guard believes you, and here's how he reacts" because your method doesn't follow the rules.

Bluffing the guard is jumping through one hoop. Hitting a dragon is jumping through one hoop. If you use the GitP Diplomacy rules (and adjust Intimidate appropriately), then all of a sudden Bluff, Diplomacy, and Intimidate seem much less binary than people make them out to be. There's a back and forth, there are multiple checks, there is a lot less "I made the check, so I win" going on. I don't use the rules from GitP directly as written, but I definitely modified my old Diplomacy skill to reflect it as a base.

Hussar, I really don't understand your issue. I mean, I understand it, but it's an issue with a play style with people who aren't in this thread. And, if your point is "I don't like it when people use X play style" then I understand. But attributing it to me, Krensky, or anyone else is simply false, especially when we tell you that is simply isn't the case.

As always, play what you like

 

[GSHamster]

I think it's an issue with the word "success". To me, if the players are successful at a check, they should end up in a better place than they started. Maybe not all the way to the finish line, but certainly closer than they were before the check.

In this example, they succeed with their Bluff check, and end up in a worse position than they started. That is what strikes me as unfair on the DM's part.

Personally, I think the mistake was allowing the check. If the DM was determined to forestall that route, then she should have shut it down in conversation with the guard before the check, "Eh? the ambassador has already come through here. The king himself welcomed him into the hall before dinner."

In my view, once you proceed to the dice, the DM has an obligation to move the PCs closer to the goal if the check is successful. Moving them backwards after a successful check is just not cricket.

 

[Krensky]

At no point does any of my successes actually let me in the gate. It's all up to DM Fiat.

Your position is as much GM fiat as JC's, Hussar.

Now, if any of the following is the result:
Originally Posted by JC
For example:
You make your bluff. The guard believes your lie. So he calls for someone to escort you where you need to go in the castle. You're in, but you need to shake the escort in a way that seems natural and accidental.

-or-

You made your Bluff. The guard believes your lie. So he lets you and the turnip cart containing the rest of the party in and points you towards the kitchens.


Then the PC's success ACTUALLY is a success. They get in the door and they are not subject to an endless string of subsequent challenges until they fail. See, both of these examples actually reward success instead of punishing it.

Those are my examples. Let me give you some others.

You made your Bluff. The guard believes your lie. So he follows his standing orders regarding refugees from the Orclands and sics the dogs on you.

-or-

You made your Bluff. The guard believes your lie. He knows the king hates mimes so he tells you to get lost.

Those are success at the test too.

The thing is though, the challenge isn't to bluff their way past the guard. It's to enter the castle. Any way of doing that gets the PCs the XP for that objective. The Bluff check isn't a challenge, it's a tactic.

They chose the wrong lie. That's it.

Now, in both of those cases, when the players are cooking up the scheme, I'll make some Knowledge checks or suggest a player use a free hint ability, or give me an action die for a hint. So I can inform them that it's a bad plan and why. Same might have happened in the Merry Prankster example, but I may have let them step in it there since their being really dumb, the result will be hilarious, and it'll give me months of material.

Not really. My point, and the thing that everyone seems to agree on, is that the PC's have already succeeded. They bluffed the guard, they jumped through the hoops, they got their 12 successes before 3 failures, whatever floats your boat. They succeeded. But, that success is then turned into a failure because the DM decides that their success just isn't quite good enough.

See, this is the issue.

You keep repeating this. It's not true.

The PCs succeeded at their Bluff. The guard believes them. We all agree here.

Now, you say that unless the guard lets them in, regardless of the circumstances in the castle, his orders, his temperament, the nature of the lie, etc, the GM is being a jerk and abusing his players by turning their 'success' into a 'failure'. That the GM should change to world so the player's succeeding at telling a lie to a guard grants them access to the castle no matter what. That succeeding at a check grants the player broad agency to define the world and NPCs actions.

I, and others disagree. That's not what I or the people I play with want out of a traditional RPG. For me, part of it is that the players get to dictate their character's actions. They don't get to dictate mine as well. Part of it is my view that the only thing the Bluff vs Sense Motive check does is determine if the guard believes you. How the guard responds depends on the guard, his orders, the lie, the conditions in the castle, etc. In fact this is explicitly RAW and RAI in my ruleset.

Now I need to go back to rereading Wick's Play Dirty. I have a game tomorrow night.

 

[Stalker0]

The only thing that gets that gate to open is if I press the correct series of buttons in the DM's head and he lets me get in the gate.

At its core, bypassing all challenges in roleplaying game requires you to "press the correct series of buttons". However, the trick to being a good DM is the following:

1) Making sure the players have some clue as to which buttons to press.
2) Show some flexibility when the situation calls for it, especially for good ideas.

In the example I mentioned, if the guard had simply said "I can't let you in"....then that's just frustrating.

But when the guard says "The BBEG said to let no one but himself in"....then that gives the player a clue...something to work with.

Perhaps he could come back disguised as the BBEG, or forge orders from him allowing you to let him in....or perhaps intimidating the guard. All of these might be paths that work....but that doesn't mean all of them should work in all cases.


However, the problem that sometimes arrises with skills like bluff....which I would say is the origin of this whole thread....is when that skill becomes the "master key" that unlocks any challenge.

When your bluff is so good you can bypass even very hard DCS (doable in 4e, actually very easy in 3e), then the tendency is to let a player talk his way through any situation (the master button). At that point, the context of the situation becomes meaningless. It doesn't matter what the guard's orders are, or what his loyalty is, or the penalty for letting someone in....if he can be hammered down with bluff it simply doesn't matter. That is the legitimate danger of giving social skills too much power...and I think its something to be aware of when determining how social skills will work in a particular game.

 

[JamesonCourage]

I think it's an issue with the word "success". To me, if the players are successful at a check, they should end up in a better place than they started. Maybe not all the way to the finish line, but certainly closer than they were before the check.

And I think success should be defined by how the rules define them, rather than based on PC goals.

If the PCs are fighting a lich, and they kill him and destroy his phylactery (they got a tip off as to what it is from an anonymous source), then they think they've succeeded in their goal. However, I know that the lich orchestrated the information, gave them false information on his phylactery, and prepared a fake phylactery because he knew the party would go after him (they were past friends, and he had become Evil). Then, they take his stuff (it is D&D, after all), and he pops up 1d10 days later at his phylactery (which they have), and ambushes and kills one of the PCs (before taking his stuff back). This cannot happen with your preferred method, as far as I can tell, as killing the lich and destroying his phylactery seems reasonable, and "negating" that outcome would be wrong. But please, correct me if I'm wrong, as I might very well be.

But, had the PCs looked into things (they did literally no research, and took the source at his word), they may have found out that this wasn't the case. Sometimes things aren't always successful, even if you roll high (like kicking some lich butt).

It's a play style difference. Your style isn't wrong. And I'm not playing a game where it's run by "... GM fiat, railroady, inferior game where I arbitrarily make things disadvantageous to the players and always rule against them and don't trust them". That's just not the case, and the fact that Hussar has repeatedly attributed those things to me, as well as other things (endless checks that they players can't succeed, taking away player success or twisting player success into failure, etc.) is something I find a little baffling.

In this example, they succeed with their Bluff check, and end up in a worse position than they started. That is what strikes me as unfair on the DM's part.

It's following the rules of the game. If the GM is to be a neutral arbiter, I'd rather him follow the rules as they were intended.

Personally, I think the mistake was allowing the check. If the DM was determined to forestall that route, then she should have shut it down in conversation with the guard before the check, "Eh? the ambassador has already come through here. The king himself welcomed him into the hall before dinner."

There's nothing wrong with that style of play, but using the rules isn't wrong, either.

In my view, once you proceed to the dice, the DM has an obligation to move the PCs closer to the goal if the check is successful. Moving them backwards after a successful check is just not cricket.

If that's the way you and your players like, I have no beef with that

As always, play what you like

 

[JamesonCourage]

At its core, bypassing all challenges in roleplaying game requires you to "press the correct series of buttons".

Yep.

However, the trick to being a good DM is the following:

1) Making sure the players have some clue as to which buttons to press.
2) Show some flexibility when the situation calls for it, especially for good ideas.

I agree with both of these

In the example I mentioned, if the guard had simply said "I can't let you in"....then that's just frustrating.

But when the guard says "The BBEG said to let no one but himself in"....then that gives the player a clue...something to work with.

Perhaps he could come back disguised as the BBEG, or forge orders from him allowing you to let him in....or perhaps intimidating the guard. All of these might be paths that work....but that doesn't mean all of them should work in all cases.

Yep, all of this sounds reasonable. I mean, you'd have to be more intimidating than the BBEG, but if you can do it, and the Risk vs. Reward is tilted in your favor, then you can convince him. No issues with this at all.

However, the problem that sometimes arrises with skills like bluff....which I would say is the origin of this whole thread....is when that skill becomes the "master key" that unlocks any challenge.

Yeah, I'd like to touch on this again too, as you bring us back to the original topic. This was the original objection by NewJeffCT, and I agree that social skills can be abused in 3.5.

When your bluff is so good you can bypass even very hard DCS (doable in 4e, actually very easy in 3e), then the tendency is to let a player talk his way through any situation (the master button). At that point, the context of the situation becomes meaningless. It doesn't matter what the guard's orders are, or what his loyalty is, or the penalty for letting someone in....if he can be hammered down with bluff it simply doesn't matter. That is the legitimate danger of giving social skills too much power...and I think its something to be aware of when determining how social skills will work in a particular game.

I totally agree. Thanks for contributing more towards the point of the original post. I feel my discussion has been attached to it, but bringing us back there might make things a lot more productive.

As always, play what you like

 

[S'mon]

And yet, every interpretation here has the PC's failing to enter, despite succeeding on their skill checks.

I thought they were just hypothesising one theoretical example where success on a Bluff check would not equal success in getting into a castle; just to make the point that that is possible in particular circumstances. Not that PC failure is inevitable in every character-interaction situation, which is how you seem to be interpreting it.

 

[S'mon]

Yeah, so, basically, it's all up to DM fiat

Fiat = judgement. You obviously don't trust DM judgement. IMO without DM judgement there's no RPG.

 

[GSHamster]

If the PCs are fighting a lich, and they kill him and destroy his phylactery (they got a tip off as to what it is from an anonymous source), then they think they've succeeded in their goal. However, I know that the lich orchestrated the information, gave them false information on his phylactery, and prepared a fake phylactery because he knew the party would go after him (they were past friends, and he had become Evil). Then, they take his stuff (it is D&D, after all), and he pops up 1d10 days later at his phylactery (which they have), and ambushes and kills one of the PCs (before taking his stuff back). This cannot happen with your preferred method, as far as I can tell, as killing the lich and destroying his phylactery seems reasonable, and "negating" that outcome would be wrong. But please, correct me if I'm wrong, as I might very well be.

Well, in this example, there's no ability check involved after the fight. The PCs killed the lich in combat, and thus end up better than they started. The rest is normal plot.

But on the other hand, if the following sequence happened after the lich died:

1. The PCs ask if they can identify the phylactery through a skill like Knowledge: Arcane.
2. The DM agrees and sets a DC.
3. The PCs succeed on the check.
4. The DM has them destroy the fake phylactery.
5. Events proceed as above.

I would see that as unfair.

Admittedly, this example is a little more complicated because knowing your character failed the check tells the player enough information to be successful. Player knowledge and character knowledge differ now, and that always makes life complicated.

I would probably be okay with having a low-ish DC to be "fooled" by lich's deception, and a high (secret) DC to see through the deception to the truth.

But if the PCs "truly" succeed on the check, if they beat the secret DC, they should be able to identify the phylactery as a fake through the use of their skill.

 

[JamesonCourage]

I thought they were just hypothesising one theoretical example where success on a Bluff check would not equal success in getting into a castle; just to make the point that that is possible in particular circumstances. Not that PC failure is inevitable in every character-interaction situation, which is how you seem to be interpreting it.

Haha, exactly

Well, in this example, there's no ability check involved after the fight. The PCs killed the lich in combat, and thus end up better than they started. The rest is normal plot.

They end up worse. Had they not attacked, they would not have been ambushed, and their friend (the lich) would not have gone after them.

But on the other hand, if the following sequence happened after the lich died:

1. The PCs ask if they can identify the phylactery through a skill like Knowledge: Arcane.
2. The DM agrees and sets a DC.
3. The PCs succeed on the check.
4. The DM has them destroy the fake phylactery.
5. Events proceed as above.

I would see that as unfair.

Even if the phylactery was forged, and their didn't oppose it with a Forgery? What if they tried to identify it with Knowledge (arcana), and the check told them "yes, a phylactery could look exactly like this"? Now, that check has them believing that this is indeed the phylactery, even though it's been forged.

Admittedly, this example is a little more complicated because knowing your character failed the check tells the player enough information to be successful. Player knowledge and character knowledge differ now, and that always makes life complicated.

Well, now that they've succeeded on the Knowledge (arcana) check (and never rolled the Forgery check to recognize the fake phylactery), let me know what you think about it.

I would probably be okay with having a low-ish DC to be "fooled" by lich's deception, and a high (secret) DC to see through the deception to the truth.

I can see that

But if the PCs "truly" succeed on the check, if they beat the secret DC, they should be able to identify the phylactery as a fake through the use of their skill.

I can buy that, too. But, this means that a check can "succeed" at something, and still bring bad consequences on the player. They can "succeed" at Gather Information, but only gather enough to get themselves in some trouble (my ongoing example).

Now, I'm okay with this, and if you are too, then awesome! I just thought you were expressing something against this, and saying it was unfair to run things that way.

As always, play what you like