Are things like Intimidate/Bluff/Diplomacy too easy?

[Stalker0]

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.

Just to reemphasize my argument from above.

In this context, the DM can set up which "button" allows the players to determine the pylactery is fake, but its important to be upfront about it with players.

For example, lets say the DM does not believe knowledge arcana (no matter how high) can tell the phylatctery is fake (same argument as saying a bluff check can't convince a guard to let you in). In this context the DM is free to say so...but he should tell the players that when they ask for the check. He could then say "however, a forgery check could tell".

That way the party could try a forgery check....or perhaps find an npc with forgery to help them.

The players have pressed the required button....but still did it in a reasonable, roleplaying context....which in the long run leads to a good gaming experience.

 

[JamesonCourage]

Just to reemphasize my argument from above.

In this context, the DM can set up which "button" allows the players to determine the pylactery is fake, but its important to be upfront about it with players.

For example, lets say the DM does not believe knowledge arcana (no matter how high) can tell the phylatctery is fake (same argument as saying a bluff check can't convince a guard to let you in). In this context the DM is free to say so...but he should tell the players that when they ask for the check. He could then say "however, a forgery check could tell".

That way the party could try a forgery check....or perhaps find an npc with forgery to help them.

The players have pressed the required button....but still did it in a reasonable, roleplaying context....which in the long run leads to a good gaming experience.

Well, in my (unstated) example, the players wanted to know "could this be the phylactery?" The Knowledge (arcana) check would indicate that "yes, this could be the phylactery."

Separately, they could see if it's fake. And yes, I have no problem giving clues to players, if it's reasonable. And on top of that, I'll give them information, if it's something their character would know. And if it's iffy, I'll allow an appropriate roll.

But you make some good points. If they said "is this the real phylactery" and I said "roll a Knowledge (arcana) check," and they "succeeded" then I would say "this could be it, it does fit the description of what a phylactery might look like."

If, from there, they inquired about it further... "is there a way to see if it's real?" or "do I know for sure that this is it?" or "is there any way to check if the phylactery is connected to the lich, and not just some other phylactery?" then I'd help them, as appropriate, such as by mentioning Forgery, known experts on the matter, ways of testing it (if they know ways of testing it, such as on a skill check), etc.

I probably won't give out that information unprovoked, though. If they don't ask any of those questions, I won't bring it up unless I suspect that their characters would know information that would make them question it. Or, if I think that they should have thought of it, I'll often give a Wisdom check on it.

At any rate, though, this is all personal play style, and I don't want to tangent away from things now that we've gotten back towards the OP.

As always, play what you like

 

[pemerton]

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

There's a sense in which this is not true of D&D combat - the players roll their attack dice, and their damage dice, and when the enemy reaches zero hp the PCs have won the fight. The GM's interpretations and adjudications can alter the difficulty of the attack numbers (who is flanking, who has the higher ground, etc etc) and even the outcome of the damage numbers (who has DR, who has regen, etc). But it can't change the fact that rolling high attack rolls and higher damage rolls is taking the players towards the goal, of victory by their PCs in the combat. (Whether a monster like the nilbog is a refutation of my claim here, or rather just a very badly designed monster, I'll leave for someone else to work out!)

In 3.5, there is no skill challenge rule, where successes indicate that something happens, and then you narrate how it happened. That's a fine rule. I spent about a day looking into how I could apply something similar in my game (with no real success), because I really like how it could speed up play, and it reminded me of the extended rolls from WoD.

However, in 3.5, if you follow RAW, or even RAI, in my opinion, then there's just no way to reconcile your interpretation of the rules.

I think Hussar's point is that, to the extent that this is true of 3.5, it's a flaw in 3.5's design.

For what it's worth, if I was GMing 3E I would treat Bluff as a persuasion skill. So you'd have three persuasion skills, as in 4e - one for persuasion by deception and fast-talking, one for persuasion by being scary, one for persuasion by being reasonable.

If this was happening in my game I would know if the guards were unbluffable before it ever came to it. It would be in my notes and write up for the castle.

Making the Bluff check means you have lied convincingly enough for the target to believe you. What happens then depends. What are the guards orders? What kind of day is he having? What exactly was the lie? Are the PCs impersonating someone the guard knows? Whether or not I have answers to these written down before hand depends on the context of the encounter. I may know this because I created the world. I may know it because the module tells me. I may not know it and pick something that's reasonable. I may not know it and make a roll on the Mythic Fate Chart.

What complicates the matter further, is in practical terms, good guards call their supervisor. So success or not, there's a logical complication to the request that might not have been obvious to player or dm.

What counters that, is since the dm controls the nature and severity of all reactions,the dm does have influence on plausibility in ways that avariety of responses are viable. Just like inreal life, some people get away with murder. The dm does NOT have to throw the book at the PC.

I'm in agreement with Hussar on this. If the PCs make an amazing Diplomacy check, then maybe the guard isn't loyal after all. Maybe he's corrupt and that's why the check succeeds.

it occurs to me that reversing the order of arrivals might actually be a more interesting choice.

I think these five quotes capture the main issue here.

Janx makes clearly what I also take to be Hussar's key point - that the GM, in setting up the backstory and determining complications, is having a big influence on the scope of PC action, and in a different sort of way from giving a monster DR or regeneration - it's not just tweaking a dial in some otherwise transparent action resolution mechanic.

Krensky mentions resolving the factual question by rolling on the Mythic Fate table. But GSHamster's response to that makes sense to me - the player, by investing PC build resources in the Bluff skill, has declared that s/he want to play a game in which his/her PC wins by (among other things) bluffinf. So instead of rolling on the Mythic Fate chart, why not let the PC's high bluff check settle the issue?

[MENTION=386]LostSoul[/MENTION]'s concern - that this is, in effect, the player setting the challenge for his/her PC - I think is obviated if the DC is still set by the GM, and any complications that attend the success are also set by the GM. This also answers [MENTION=5889]Stalker0[/MENTION]'s concern about social skills being too strong.

(On this approach, [MENTION=22779]Hussar[/MENTION]'s idea that the whole table's sense of reasonableness is relevant would come into play only as a threshold test for a Bluff check being permissible at all, rather than as an element in the resolution of the check once it is agreed that the check can be made.)

GSHamster also flags the GM being flexible with the timing of events in order to produce an interesting story, rather than the GM holding the events constant and making the players work around that conception of the gameworld. Ron Edwards discusses this sort of case as one relevant piece of data for distinguishing narrativist from simulationist (ie exploration-heavy) play.

Which means that JamesonCourage's concern about making the game too narrativist would apply to both of GSHamster's suggestions. The game would no longer be strictly exploration, because significant elements of the gameworld would be settled as part of the actual adjudication of the situation, by a combination of GM decisions in order to introduce complications, and GM decisions as part of the adjudication of player skill checks.

I think this is a very deep difference in playstyles.

The players want to be beaten, battered, bruised, and bloody at the end. They also want to win. Part of my job as a GM is to push them as hard and far as I can with plot twists, conflicts, reveals, etc while still positioning them for a triumphant victory.

This is true, but how is it to be achieved? And what are the points at which the beating will take place? In particular, who has primary say over what will be the nature of the key challenging situations - the players, or the GM?

Different answers to this experience produce very different play experiences, in my view.

 

[Hussar]

First off, I think I should just become GSHamster's sock puppet from now on because he's explaining my points much better than I am.

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.

But, that intention is entirely your own interpretation. As you said, the ONLY thing the bluff skill does is cause someone to believe you. Ok, fair enough. The DM then proceeds to have the NPC act on that belief in a manner that the DM feels is consistent.

Ok, I'm still on board.

The DM has a fair number of possible actions he could choose to take, all of which are consistent (or at least reasonably consistent).

Again, I'm still on board.

The DM chooses the course of actions that is the most disadvantageous to the PC's, not because it's obviously the only sane course of action, but because ... well, I honestly don't understand why. It's not like it's the only plausible course of action.

And, this is where I get bogged down.

Because I see it time and time again. The DM chooses the most disadvantageous result every single time in the assumption that it's more interesting to constantly throw roadblocks in front of the PC's.

THAT'S what I don't like. Granted, doing it from time to time is perfectly fine. All things in moderation. But, don't pretend that this is something that it's not. You're choosing this interpretation specifically to throw more challenges at the party, not because it's somehow more believable. Because, as this thread has shown, there are any number of other courses you could take that are equally as believable.

This is the thing that I really dislike. As GSHamster so rightly points out, if the players succeed at a challenge, then they should be in a better position than they started from.

And, looking at the phylactery example above, that's what I mean by pixel bitching. "You successfully KN Arcana'd the pretty rock. Yup, it could function as a phylactery" and then jumping out with the "AHA GOTCHA!" later on because they didn't go down the list of skills, trying each and every one to make sure that they got all the information.

I mean, after all the points you've raised JC about following the rules, you pretty much abandoned the rules for Forgery. They don't allow you to detect forged objects. Forgery only allows you to produce documents, not objects and detect forged documents, again, not objects.

Since we're being absolutist with RAW and all that.

 

[Janx]

In the Lich example (a case of NPC deception): the creator of it mentioned the PCs doing a Knowledge check to identify the phylactery.

JS goes on about how that skill wouldn't reveal the answer.

In all of these discussions, is each of us NOT taking the time to verify the intent of the writer, and instead sticking to an interpretation of what they said?

The author could have meant "made appropriate checks to find the phylactery". But because he said a skill name, JC seems to have taken him literally. Which then shapes his response.

the premise that each success should move me forward should still be valid. Each hit on an enemy reduces his HP, making him closer to dead (my apparent goal). Obviously, when my goal is misguided (wrong person to be killing), I've got a different problem. But in the microcosm of 'killing this NPC", the sucess is still valid. That I've got the wrong man is a different problem, which will reveal itself an encounter or two down the road.

What the phylactery and gate house pose is, how does a GM fairly hide the information and fairly reveal the information. Note, I have no specific meaning on "fair" in terms of GMing. I suppose it means that there is a way of truly succeeding that is discernable via reasonable methods in game.

Since the social skills tend to be about PCs manipulating and decieving NPCs, and the phylactery example are about an NPC manipulating and decieving PCs, they are relevant in arbitration similarities.

With the gatehouse, the PCs make some gather info checks to inform them of the security conditions, opportunities and vulnerabilities. Apparently they rolled low. they also dickered around, so the GM made the situation more complicated. The net effect was, they never should have gone for the guard.

With the phylactery, the lich made a fake. That's a forgery. Phylactery's are known to be a hidden item because of their vulnerability. So the PCs are going to be inspecting EVERY item they find. So once the correct skills/spellss to use are identified, they roll. Their might find no phylactery, find the fake and fall for it or not, find the real one.

JC's counter to the scenario seemed to imply they find the fake, and don't realize they are carrying the real one. It assumes a certain search order through the loot and that they STOP when they misidentify the fake. And that they don't do further tests (because the example didn't say).

Do you make your party roll these skill checks per item, or for the entire pile?

If you make them roll for the entire pile (as in searching the entire pile for the 1 expected phylactery), then failure means they find NO phylactery, or they fall for the fake phylactery. Success means they identify the fake as fake, and MIGHT find the real one (if the roll is high enough).

Its possible, just using 1 die roll can arbitrate the whole mess. Or the GM could make the party roll per item (despite that for 10 items, 8 rolls are meaningless).

Another way to look at the gatehouse, was that if it was combat, and combats take an average of 6 rounds per. There would be a whole lot of dice rolling to kill your way into the castle. It takes a few checks for Climb to go over the wall. A few checks for stealth to sneak in.

I suspect then, that requiring a few checks to social your way in would count as fair play. Though it is fair to assume the Gather Info and Disguise checks to assist in this con count towards that # of die rolls required expectation.

 

[Krensky]

There's a sense in which this is not true of D&D combat - the players roll their attack dice, and their damage dice, and when the enemy reaches zero hp the PCs have won the fight. The GM's interpretations and adjudications can alter the difficulty of the attack numbers (who is flanking, who has the higher ground, etc etc) and even the outcome of the damage numbers (who has DR, who has regen, etc). But it can't change the fact that rolling high attack rolls and higher damage rolls is taking the players towards the goal, of victory by their PCs in the combat. (Whether a monster like the nilbog is a refutation of my claim here, or rather just a very badly designed monster, I'll leave for someone else to work out!)

No. It doesn't push them further to victory. It pushes them further towards killing their opponent with is not a necessary requirment of victory. If fact it can often be a detriment to achieving said victory. What if their opponent knows where the McGuffin is? What is he's the Dark Lord's kid brother, the whole reason the Dark Lord hasn't just said F-it and destroyed creation? What if killing this person lands them in jail and after a trial on the block for murder? Etc.

The whole argument Hussar, and to some degree, you are making is that succeeding at a test inexorably leads the players closer to victory.

I say that's poppycock.

Succeeding at a test means you succeeded at whatever that test was determining. You Bluff the guard, he believes the lie. You Investigate or Appraise the phylactery, you learn it's a fake. You Attack the NPC with your sword, it takes damage.

Achieving goals (ie, victory) often requires succeeding in the correct tests, sometimes even in the correct order in the correct timing. This isn't pixel bitching. There's no magic dot to click on. It's a bit of common sense, knowing when to ask for GM hints, and the GM not being a douche and actually planing instead of getting liquored up and going down to the local dungeon to stomp some lowly NPCs.

I think Hussar's point is that, to the extent that this is true of 3.5, it's a flaw in 3.5's design.

For what it's worth, if I was GMing 3E I would treat Bluff as a persuasion skill. So you'd have three persuasion skills, as in 4e - one for persuasion by deception and fast-talking, one for persuasion by being scary, one for persuasion by being reasonable.

Which makes it much more powerful.

Krensky mentions resolving the factual question by rolling on the Mythic Fate table. But GSHamster's response to that makes sense to me - the player, by investing PC build resources in the Bluff skill, has declared that s/he want to play a game in which his/her PC wins by (among other things) bluffinf. So instead of rolling on the Mythic Fate chart, why not let the PC's high bluff check settle the issue?

No, I didn't. Go reread that quote.

The factual question, did they lie convincingly, was settled by the Bluff versus Sense Motive opposed check and the associated modifiers.

What I was using the Fate Chart for was to decide the guard's response if I was drawing a blank. Normally this wouldn't occur, but it might if the players did something really odd. Why use the chart instead of just letting them in? Because it give me options and guidance when the well runs dry. It helps generate beats and threads while answering my question.

By taking ranks in Bluff, the player says he want's his character to be able to lie successfully. The more things he piles onto that, the more often he wants it to happen and the more often it should happen. Bluff doesn't let you control the thoughts and actions of the target though. It let's you lie convincingly. Impress and Intimidate don't let you control the actions of other, just adjust their Disposition, making them more likely to do what they ask. Heck, in my game the only thing Charm Person does is raise the target's Disposition towards you. (Which is all it should do in 3e, if the developers hadn't been afraid of changing the text. The spell says it makes someone like you, not makes them your loyal henchslave.)

I think this is a very deep difference in playstyles.

Other then you bringing up Forge wankery, I agree.

This is true, but how is it to be achieved? And what are the points at which the beating will take place? In particular, who has primary say over what will be the nature of the key challenging situations - the players, or the GM?This is true, but how is it to be achieved? And what are the points at which the beating will take place? In particular, who has primary say over what will be the nature of the key challenging situations - the players, or the GM?

Both. The players define how they wish to overcome challenges by how the build and play their characters. The players influence the challenges they encounter by choosing what hooks they bite, which ones they ignore, which the run from, and what Sub-Plots they engage in. The GM influences the challenges encountered by what hooks he presents and how he responds to the player's choices and actions. He also influences it by setting up and maintaining the world.

Final responsibility is the GMs though. If he misreads the players and ignores the signs (which should include them outright telling him they want less talky-talky and more smashy-smashy, or whatever), then it's his fault that people aren't having fun at the table.

Sometimes the solution to that is more smashy-smashy. Sometimes its "I'm sorry Bob, but we all agreed to play a game of political maneuvering and conspiracy. I told you guys there would be very little combat. Do you want to make a new character who isn't so focused on something that the game isn't focused on?" Sometimes it's a middle-ground.

It's still the GMs job to determine the challenges, arbiter the results, make sure everyone is having fun, and move the game along.

Why?

Because that's what the GM does.

 

[LostSoul]

LostSoul's concern - that this is, in effect, the player setting the challenge for his/her PC - I think is obviated if the DC is still set by the GM, and any complications that attend the success are also set by the GM.

That could be true. A big question is how does the DM determine what the DC is? Another question is what is the nature of the challenge - that is, how do players overcome it?

 

[JiffyPopTart]

RE: The bushwhacking lich plot

When I am running a game I make a conscious effort to remember that the characters will be doing things "off camera" that the players don't specifically say they are doing.

One of those things would be the whole "Examining the phylactery with magic" thing.

In the proposed scenario I would assume that even if the players simply gathered up all the loot in a big bag and never mentioned looking at it at all, at some point in their downtime they would eventually go back through everything inspecting it at greater length.

I would then make a secret D20 Arcana check for all the players who have that skill and give them the "fake" information for the lower DC (Yes, its a phylactery and arcane fingerprints seem to connect it to Steve the lich) and the "real" information for the higher DC (Yes, its a phylactery and arcane fingerprints seem to connect it to Steve the lich, but something about it seems off to you, etc)

I would never in a million years expect or require my players to ask if they can "Make a forgery roll" on a phylactery.

DS

 

[NewJeffCT]

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.

That was my original point 200+ posts ago, but you said it much more eloquently than me. A lot of times, bluffing your way past the guard is far easier than using a charm person spell or similar, where at least the guard would have a saving throw or a will defense. Plus, a lot of people think using Diplomacy or Bluff is essentially like a dominate person or charm person effect.

 

[Janx]

That was my original point 200+ posts ago, but you said it much more eloquently than me. A lot of times, bluffing your way past the guard is far easier than using a charm person spell or similar, where at least the guard would have a saving throw or a will defense. Plus, a lot of people think using Diplomacy or Bluff is essentially like a dominate person or charm person effect.

In the case of the gatehouse guard, the PCs chose the wrong time and target. Posing as diplomats had too many catches, higher DC and probably get you passed up the chain.

Posing as turnip delivery = lower DC and probably get you into the kitchen and ignored during the hustle and bustle.

In real life, it REALLY is that easy to get past the right guard with the right simple story.

I assume most folks don't want the rules to allow a ridiculous lie told to the wrong NPC to be allowed to work because the PC went all munchkin on his social skills.

There's a castle with 2 locked doors. One leads into the quiet kitchen, where nobody's at because supper is over. The other leads to the guard house before rest of the castle, which is chock full of guards. The kitchen lock is of poor quality and easy to pick.

If the PC goes for the kitchen door, it's easy to get in (roll a succes).
If the PC goes for the guard house door, it's a harder lock and IF he picks it, he just walked into a room full of guards.

Assuming the PC is a master lockpicker, one door leads to success, one door leads to more trouble (failure). Who's at fault? The GM or the PC?

This example is intened to be a parallel to the social attempt to Bluff the guard. If the PC goes to the harder door, I think the player has some culpability. If the GM negated any means of gaining intel (refusing any attempts and making both doors of equal nature), then it's the GM's fault.

As to should the Bluff not engender belief, but also action, it probably depends on the nature of the presented truth. Certainly, that's what the liar intends to happen. When I bluff in poker, I am trying to get you to react as though you KNOW I have the cards I am PRETENDING to have. When I lie to my parents, I am trying to NOT get punished for doing what i did.

A case could be argued, that if the guard's reaction to somebody showing up at the gate is to call his supervisor regardless, then he is in effect, unbluffable. If his reaction is identical to whether he believes or not, then the roll was a waste of time. If the difference is that when the boss shows up and he BELIEVES the lie, then how he presents them to his boss might affect the bluff to the supervisor. If I show up at the gate and my underling says "these guys CLAIM to be the diplomats" versus, "these diplomats showed up, their papers appear to be in order". That subtle difference acts as an influence on the supervisor who makes the final call.

and this is where more DM fiat comes in, the supervisor might believe the bluff, but be stuck with the 'no entry after 10pm" rule. He might say, "hey, I'm sorry but we're not permitting entry after 10PM. I know, it's late, you guys are tired. Here's a note to the innkeeper at the Weary Arms. He'll put you guys up for the night, and if you come back tomorrow and ask for me, I'll make sure your not hassled again."

Here's what happened:
I just denied immediate access to the castle, as that wouldn't make sense
I left an open for them to get in tomorrow with minimal fuss
I did not escalate this further up the chain to cause more skill checks (which one will inevitably fail).

The ball is still in the PCs court. the skill checks suceeded, so no alarms have been raised. The party has a chance to back out or move forward. If the party has an urgent need to get in TONIGHT, once they leave the gate, they are free to pursue a new strategy.

On the topic of DM Fiat, which gets thrown around like a swear word, I think its important for all GMs to realize that they are making this stuff up. every bit of it. Whether you wrote it down before the game, or made it up on the spot, it is made up. And while the consequences for any PC action might seem logical, and in a way they are, for each action, there are a multitude of logical and varying responses.

Personally, I believe responses that make things harder or more complicated should be used when the PCs make a mistake or choose poorly. it usually beats outright killing them, as well. I also use them as a plot device, when what I've designed was deliberately 'simple' and the complication is what makes it level appropriate. I'm a bit wary of making situations complicated for the sake of being complicated, as I find making it too hard is too easy.