Intimidate with STR

[Kae'Yoss]

Although I agree with you about not being able to intimidate people with Strength, I hate it when people say "the fine art of intimidation isn't for brutes". It IS for brutes. That's why Fighters and Barbarians have it as a class skill. Fighters and Barbarians take a much more direct course to intimidate (they don't try to blackmail or anything like that) but Charisma is STILL important.

So they take a "direct course" to the "fine art" of Intimidation? They may intimidate (and proper intimidate), but a brute (read: low charisma) won't elevate it to an artform (charismatic fighters, rogues and bards do).

 

[Mathew_Freeman]

I'd personally give someone who used a strength check to back up an intimidate roll a circumstance bonus (or better yet, an unnamed bonus so that it stacks with everything ) to their intimidate check.

For anyone that watches WWE, I'd say the Big Show is a classic example of a high strength, not-so-high Cha character. Sure, he can chokeslam a guy in each hand, but I've never bought him as a genuinely scary guy. Now Eddie Guerro (apologies for the spelling), who is much smaller, has the charisma to pull off being a bad guy (or good guy, whatever).

My point is that no matter how much work Big Show does on being more intimidating, Eddie can always up his game as well. Why? Better Cha score.

 

[Kae'Yoss]

Strength-Intimidate should be as valid, but for the less subtle, more threatening approach. You can still intimidate someone by a display of strength. If you don't think so, surely the guy with the huge muscles pounding his fist into the palm of his other hand and asking for your money isn't trying to sweet-talk you?

As for barbarians with a Cha of 6 who are dumb-looking, it is true that their screaming madly won't be that intimidating, however if this same barbarian had a 22 Str and managed to bend the guy's sword in half... that's a different story.

Lastly, the idea that this kind of intimidation won't work because it will just make the person scream and run away or faint or whatever, well that's what would happen if the character -failed- their Str based intimidate, just like if they failed their cha based one and the target wasn't fooled or scared by their threats, blackmail, etc.

Let's follow Johnny Adventurer into peril and see how he thinks about all this.

Here, we see Johnny on the road, and the gentleman with the wardrobe-like build next to him is a professional highwayman, as are the guys who stand around them both with smiles on their faces that suggest that they don't think the words that come out your mouth are funny, but the entrails that will soon come out of the huge, gaping hole in your stomage will be.

Now, the gentleman tells Johnny to hand over his valuables or he'll go hard on him. Johnny thinks: "S***, they got me. This guy is huge, and he has friends with him, some with bows and crossbows, and I'm all alone. I might beat him with room to maneuver, but those guys don't look like think much of fair play. I think I'll hand over my stuff, cause I have no friends here.


Now, was Johny frightened? Hell yes! But why was that? Because the highwayman had a nice high value noted beside Str? Sure. Was it because he has made a really good Intimidate check? Sure not. He may have been intimidated, but he wasn't Intimidated (with the capital I, meaning it has something to do with the D&D Skill and Idea about intimidation). He saw no other way out than to do so. If we wait to see what's happened, we'll see that a dozen armed men on horseback - guards from the nearby city - will join the conversation, and as soon as the highwaymen look at their direction, Johnny will grab his valuables, shove one of the highwaymen aside and run for safety - he'll know the criminals will have better things to do than to deal with a single, harmless man. Not when they have a dozen far from harmless men, on horseback, with swords and lances, to deal with.


Now let us leave Johnny for a while, for he'll do some dungeoneering, and monsters don't intimidate, but try to bite your head of first chance they get. After a week of wating through the blood of aberrations, magical beats, and the occasional outsider (and other fluids of vermin and oozes), Johnny is back in the big city, where he sits in a bar (with a name like "the Rusty Anchor" or something with "Wench" in it) and quaffs his ale. After overhearing and unnecessarily loud (and unnecessarily stupid) remark by a half-ogre one table down the row, he makes a snide remark, not counting on the half-ogre's levels as ranger and ranks in Listen. And of course the bigjob takes offense.
He storms over to Johnny's table and shouts at him. They engage in some verbal sparring, and the half-ogre takes a sword and bends it in half and tells Johnny that he'll be next if he won't shut up this minute

This is what Johnny's thinking:
"Damn, that bastard is strong. If he gets me, I'm done for, I have my doubts he'll bend me in half - he'll probably break me - but he has to get me for that. He doesn't look fast, I'm sure I'm faster, and I only have to get out of the tavern - and the exit is right behind me - and run past that guard post. They'll see me followed by a big bloke screaming death threats at me, think he's an invader, and shoot so many arrow into him that he looks like a big, ugly hedgehog. Let's see if his muscles will avail him of anything then!"


Threatening with strength might people make frightened, but frightened people don't behave the way you want them to. Actually, in D&D terms they'll drop what they hold and run away. Intimidate with charisma, on the other hand, won't only make people frightened, but also make them sure that they can't run away from that. They won't get away as soon as some armed guards appear, they won't bolt and run past the guardpost. Because they *know* that such behavior won't save them.

 

[Bauglir]

A show of strength may certainly frighten an opponent, but so would a display of magical power, or a display of skill, or even a show of hardiness. (I remember once a tough goon in a movie (might have been Bond) intimidated people by chewing on a glass, or stubbing out a cigarette on his arm.)

I can stomach a high strength, or other visible display of power applying a circumstance modifier to an intimidate check, but not having it replace charisma as the applied stat.

 

[Shader]

This is all very helpful chaps, thanks. I stand by my original observation that Intimidate should be optionally useable by STR, and I think my reasoning is as justified FOR as some of yours are as justified AGAINST. Everyone will have an opinion, of course, and they're all valid.

I'm just glad I got the references to said material

 

[DreamChaser]

Charisma-Intimidate should be the subtle, the persuasion, the manipulation. Grima Wormtongue. The threat of surprises or nastiness if you don't do what is asked of you.

Strength-Intimidate should be as valid, but for the less subtle, more threatening approach. You can still intimidate someone by a display of strength. If you don't think so, surely the guy with the huge muscles pounding his fist into the palm of his other hand and asking for your money isn't trying to sweet-talk you?

Why stop there? Since making a strength based intimidate serves no purpose other than to allow fighters, rangers, and barbarians to avoid putting a decent score in Charisma, we should make sure to do the same thing for all the other classes.

Dexterity Intimidate: I move around so much that you get frightened that I won't stop.

Constitution Intimidate: I resist disease and poison frighteningly well.

Intelligence Intimidate: I use endless sophestry (which will be stuttered and uninspired) to make you afraid that I will never shut up (like now, perhaps).

Wisdom Intimidate: My perceptiveness and piety terrify you, you infidel.



None of these are any more intimidation than strength intimidation is. They might offer circumstance penalties or bonus but not a replacement for the ability.

It is important to remember that Charisma is not simply VERBAL presence. It applies to your sense of self and ability to express yourself in all ways. It is the reason that ALL perform skills (even mime and instrumentation) are Charisma based. A powerful fighter with a low charisma would always look unimpressive (compared to a high charisma fighter) when he attempted to use a feat of strength to intimidate. He wouldn't convey his intent well enough.

Of course, you have already made up your mind (based on a pre-revision justification) but hopefully we the dissenters can keep others from falling into the same decision.

DC

 

[Shader]

Despite the fact that we all have our own opinions, I wouldn't dream of forcing mine on anyone else. The posts I have made on this subject are simply that, my own opinions. You have yours, I have mine. However to suggest that mine are wrong is a little barking, and the way in which you mock by completely taking the pee, well that's just childish. Mildly amusing though

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying my way is right. Far from it. I'm simply saying that WOTC obviously thought it could be used as an alternative, which I agree with. You don't. That's great.

For the record, I personally believe that any attempt to intimidate or threaten someone through a "non-standard" method (ie using Intimidate skill), such as using a dazzling display of magic or bending an iron bar, should be permitted a check against the relevant stat; not just Charisma.

I believe Charisma has it's place, I really do. I'm not someone who thinks that Charisma is only useful for poncy Elves or Sorcerers. I just think that there needs to be a little flexibility. Being too narrowminded about stuff like this never got anyone anywhere.

 

[Bauglir]

As well as all the points brought up so far, I think this sets a bad precedent.

I mean, if you have str based intimidation, why stop there? Why not have str based perform (a weight lifting act), str based Knowledge: Arcana (think of all the books you could carry!), str based Search (how else can you look under all those big rocks?)

These are very silly examples of course; the idea is to show that you could wedge just about any skill under any stat if you think hard enough. (It reminds me of an old 'your gun is your skill' joke I read once where someone went through the skills one by one and showed how you could replace all of them with a gun - Open Lock: Shoot out the lock, etc - that sort of thing)

Intimidation is about force of personality. While being large and muscular is certainly a tool the intimidator could use (much like they could use a gun) and could certainly apply a circumstance modifier, it should never be able to replace charisma outright as the basis of intimidation.

IMO of course

 

[Darklone]

Right. Give Dex bonus to damage in ranged combat. And dex to hit in melee. People say it's logical. Wait and see what happens to the game

 

[Shader]

Clearly you and I will never change our opinions, as great as they are

I think you really are getting silly though... A STR based Knowledge: Arcana? Barking mad.

An Int based Gather Information for research? Makes perfect sense to me.

And besides, we've already established that WOTC suggested the Intimidate thing as an option.