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Message: <blockquote data-quote="The Shaman" data-source="post: 2744887" data-attributes="member: 26473">Gather Information, Diplomacy, Intimidate, and Bluff do not inhibit roleplay, nor can they be used to the exclusion of roleplay.Gather Information reveals "a feel for the major news items in a neighborhood," or put another way, local gossip. It is not a Google search. If there is no reason for local gossip to include a reference to the BBEG, for example, then no result will produce useable information. It also carries with it a time restriction - if the adventurers don't have the time to invest to make the rounds of the local watering holes, then the skill an't be used, but this in no way prevents them from attempting to walk into a bar and have a conversation with the bartender.That brings us to Diplomacy, which is used to change a character's attitude toward the diplomat - it is not charm person or dominate, nor is it a means of getting a character to say yes to anything and everything that the adventurers want. According to the skill description in the MSRD, a  Helpful character will take risks on behalf of the diplomatic character, providing protection, back up, healing, or aid. Exactly how that assistance is offered is not specified, but there's no reason to assume based on the description that a character would perform an act that is against its allegiances or alignment, for example, which may prescribe exactly what sort of aid or protection is available. There are also significant limits on how the skill can be used, such as a minimum of full round action up to whatever the GM deems reasonable.So now we come to Intimidate, which like Diplomacy is subject to a number of significant constraints: "Circumstances dramatically affect the effectiveness of an Intimidate check. There are limits to what a successful Intimidate check can do. The character can't force someone to obey his or her every command or do something that endangers that person's life." Bluff is similarly constrained.Here's the crux of how these skills work in game: they are not used to replace roleplaying, but to guide it. As GM, I don't tell the player making the Diplomacy check, "Okay, the mayor is now friendly to you. What do you want him to do?" - I roleplay the mayor's reactions, listen to the character's requests, weigh them in light of the mayor's convictions and abilities, and determine what aid, protection, or whatever he is able to provide. A Gather Information check leads to an encounter in a smoky backroom where a pool hustler is holding court, dispensing tidbits on the local scene - the players have the opportunity to ask additional question, or may have to decipher details about the information gathered.The point is, the so-called social skills of d20 games do not preclude roleplaying - under a set of limited circumstances, they provide a source of guidance on how to roleplay a character in light of an adventurer's skills. This is hardly mere dice-rolling.Where you see "power and control," I see a social contract that says, "This is a game. Play fair."I grew up with those same games as well - the ninety-odd pages of Top Secret, the sixty-some pages of Boot Hill, the dozen or so pages of Melee. All great games, no question.Whether a game has a lot of rules or only a few, the rules exist to do one thing: resolve the element of chance. They create a set of probabilities, to guide the description of the action based on the roll of the dice. My approach to this as GM is to assign those probabilities at the beginning of the adventure, and to stand by them when the dice hit the tabletop. And this means accepting a simple rule: Improbability Happens.I would ask one thing of GMs who fudge in order to maintain the story, the characters' place in the game-world, to blunt improbable outcomes, or whatever: tell your players up front that this may occur. Don't lie to your players and cheat them out of the satisfaction of their successes by allowing them to think that the events of the game broke their way on the roll of the dice, that their improbable success was really the result of the GM tipping the scales.</blockquote>

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