Games with great social rules

[SkidAce]

@Celebrim sadly for my players, I am the IRL authority on small unit tactics and base defense.

 

[Celebrim]

@Celebrim sadly for my players, I am the IRL authority on small unit tactics and base defense.

I have the trait that though I actually don't know anything, I know enough about everything to be able to fake expertise on a lot of things successfully, to the extent that I took my infant to the emergency room and the intern they put on diagnosing my kids pneumonia asked me if I was a physician. The real answer is I'm a Game Master that has to learn a little bit about everything in order to run games, and I still get crazy questions from players that I don't know how to answer. It's insane what players will come up with and want to know sometimes.

I am not an IRL authority on small unit tactics and base defense, but I've played enough games that I can be a credible challenge to anyone tactically at most anything short of playing chess with an actual master.

 

[Eyes of Nine]

I have the trait that though I actually don't know anything, I know enough about everything to be able to fake expertise on a lot of things successfully, to the extent that I took my infant to the emergency room and the intern they put on diagnosing my kids pneumonia asked me if I was a physician. The real answer is I'm a Game Master that has to learn a little bit about everything in order to run games, and I still get crazy questions from players that I don't know how to answer. It's insane what players will come up with and want to know sometimes.

I am not an IRL authority on small unit tactics and base defense, but I've played enough games that I can be a credible challenge to anyone tactically at most anything short of playing chess with an actual master.

Hope your infant was ok.

 

[Celebrim]

Hope your infant was ok.

This was many years ago. She's in college now.

 

[Gorgon Zee]

I don't think anyone has mentioned The One Ring's council rules, which work roughly like this:

• One hero acts as spokesperson and makes the primary roll. Their degree of success determines how many supporting rolls the company can make before the other party's patience runs out.
• Other heroes make rolls using whatever skill fits how they contribute — awe, lore, courtesy, riddle. The GM always allows different skills, but the choice colors the result and may incur penalty or bonus dice.
• Total successes across all rolls — spokesperson and supporters combined — determine the degree to which the council goes the company's way.

 

[Committed Hero]

Gumshoe has a system that mirrors combat. In Bubblegumshoe, it's the main avenue of antagonism, but in Swords of the Serpentine, it's parallel to physical fighting.

 

[aramis erak]

I don't think anyone has mentioned The One Ring's council rules, which work roughly like this:

• One hero acts as spokesperson and makes the primary roll. Their degree of success determines how many supporting rolls the company can make before the other party's patience runs out.
• Other heroes make rolls using whatever skill fits how they contribute — awe, lore, courtesy, riddle. The GM always allows different skills, but the choice colors the result and may incur penalty or bonus dice.
• Total successes across all rolls — spokesperson and supporters combined — determine the degree to which the council goes the company's way.

That's 2nd's; i prefer first's.

Tolerance set by spokesman's culture and adjusted for cultures of others, rather than intro.
Tolerance is maximum fails before the other side stops listening.
To be able to apply success levels towards goals, you must be introduced, either by self or by the spokesman... one pc always used his smoking trait to auto-succeed with dwarf or hobbit as he shares his pouch. Later rolls are make statement, make roll to see if it worked.
After max failures or satisfaction with progress, evaluate success.

 

[Gorgon Zee]

That's 2nd's; i prefer first's.

Tolerance set by spokesman's culture and adjusted for cultures of others, rather than intro.
Tolerance is maximum fails before the other side stops listening.

The mathematician in me doesn't like the thought that in theory the council might never end, but I guess you call the council when you have achieved max number of successes. From a pacing POV, I prefer to know upfront the number of speeches, but I agree that 1st ed seems a more natural way to express tolerance.

I do like the 2E way that the spokesman chooses a presentation style though -- do you decide to present you team as powerful and impressive? Are you polite? Or are you trying to hide your plans?

On the other hand, I liked the built in cultural adjustments in 1E, even if they do mean it makes sense to exclude characters from scenes (if you are going to meet with dwarves, and you are playing the only elf character, might as well go off and make some tea -- if your character joins the scene it will only make things worse for your team)

To be able to apply success levels towards goals, you must be introduced, either by self or by the spokesman... one pc always used his smoking trait to auto-succeed with dwarf or hobbit as he shares his pouch. Later rolls are make statement, make roll to see if it worked.

Huh, I don't remember that from when I played 1E -- maybe my GMs skipped it. Not sure that I'm excited by making two rolls for one task. Each player making one roll for "Hi, I'm Dave" and another for "Why I want you to invade Moria" seems a bit pointless. Were there rules to skip the former if the person already knew you? It would get a bit tiresome to be rolling "Hi, Dave again" rolls when you come back to look for more help!

Overall, I've been mixed on my preference between the two versions. I'm coming down on preferring 2 because although the rules-loving part of my personality thinks the 1E rules a better expression of Tolkien's world, the part that runs multiple games and likes a cleaner, simpler system much prefers 2E. Plus the art and book layout is drop-dead gorgeous.

HOWEVER -- My personal preference is pretty irrelevant. Thanks for adding comments on the differences between editions; hopefully they will help the OP build their system

 

[zakael19]

One thing I like about games that provide a structure is that the entire table gets to a level playing field on what's expected of the interaction. IMO/IME this actually allows for structuring the role-play in a way that drives towards dramatic resolution (I have enough hours-long circular conversations trying to come to common ground with disagreeing parties IRL thank you!) that suits genre rather then any notional sense of "realism" (again, my life has enough "real" negotiations/sales/etc to know that this is generally bad gameplay).

This of course also helps when a) you can't see body language to riff off of and b) with folks who for a variety of reasons struggle with free-form role-play. The direct feedback I've received from players especially off the neurotypical range is that goals and objectives within the social conflict really help them feel that there's something to "grab on to" and center on. Draw Steel!'s structure had an especial highlight from them, although arguably that's a refined version of a Skill Challenge anyway.

 

[Eyes of Nine]

arguably that's a refined version of a Skill Challenge anyway.

No one had mentioned 4e until now. It's been a minute (well, 12 years) since I played 4e, and close to 16+ since I ran it. Skill challenges and utility powers; or other 4e mechanics - what do we think about those?