Intimidate!

[Kae'Yoss]

Yes

You beat me there. I couldn't understand it myself (of course, I know what I wanted to say, but I didn't really).

I will clarify it here.

You make an initmidate check, the normal way: 1d20 + your intimidate modifier (ranks, cha, feats...). You get +2 on that check for every size category you are larger than the foe, or -2 for every sc you are smaller.
The DC isn't fixed anymore, but they make a "level check" which is d20 + their Character Level or HD. If they have bonuses to will saves against fear, they get to add it on their level check. If they are immune to fear, they cannot be intimidated.


I say that ruling goes in a good direction, but instead of the level check, you should be able to make an intimidate check of your own, if that bonus is higher than your "level check", or at least get your cha or wis mod to the check. Or you could even oppose it to a real will save.

As for Player Characters: I say you can use bluff against a PC: A NPC tells them a lie, and they get their sense motive check to see if they can tell that he lies.
It should, IMO, also be possible to intimidate a PC, but with another mechanic: Maybe if the NPC succeeds at his check, the players (on top of being told that the NPC is very menacing and a little frightening, too), get some morale penalty to their checks if they attack him, at least for a couple of rounds.

 

[Hypersmurf]

You make an initmidate check, the normal way: 1d20 + your intimidate modifier (ranks, cha, feats...). You get +2 on that check for every size category you are larger than the foe, or -2 for every sc you are smaller.

That makes a lot more sense than what you said before

-Hyp.

 

[Celebrim]

When a player uses a PC to intimidate a NPC, he has the reasonable expectation that if he succeeds I will modify the behavior of the NPC in some fashion that indicates that he really is intimidated to some degree. But, a player that intimidates an NPC with the expectation that the player can now dictating to the DM what the NPC does is likely to be disappointed. Intimidating my NPC properly may make them hestitant to openly challenge the PC, but it will also probably make them resentful, nervous, and passive. It is much harder to intimidate a NPC into doing something than it is to intimidate them into not doing something, and the average NPC given a chance to consider the consequences of being passive is likely to explode into a fury if the PC's don't give the NPC 'an escape' - some expectation that the consequences of assisting the PC's like getting fired, being arrested, being killed, being called a coward, and so forth won't in fact come to pass.

I make the same demand of my players behavior, no more or less, than they make of me.

I feel it is reasonable that if an NPC intimidates a PC, that the PC has some responsibility to act intimidated with the same expectations of behavior that the PC would have if he intimidated an NPC. This is a natural control on the skill, because a PC that wants to argue with me that an NPC will be 'dominated' by a mere intimidation check has to accept that a mere intimidation check will ammount to losing control of his PC as well. So, the player role plays. He understands his character is frightened and he acts frightened. That doesn't mean necessarily that he can't try something the minute the intimidating threat's attention is elsewhere, and it certainly doesn't mean that further demands can't and won't push a PC past the breaking point. It just means that for now, you are frightened. That's a whole heck of a lot less intrusive and temporary of an effect than me passing a note 'You've been charmed. You now must treat the Imp as one of your best friends.', and really they both are just game mechanics and both rely on player judgement and interpretation whether I call one a spell and another a skill.

This is the reason that Intimidation is based on Chr, not Str, and that half-orcs would make poor intimidaters. Threat of violence can frighten people, but without understand the pyschology of a social interaction, are just as likely to intimidate someone into hysterical screaming, catatonia, panic, defiance or rage as anything else. Anyone that has watched an older child try to intimidate a younger child ought to understand that fully.

If NPC's aren't meant to intimidate PC's, why bother giving NPC's an intimidate score at all? Surely a DM can decide when a NPC would successfully intimidate another NPC, especially if PC's are deciding when NPC's are successfully intimidating them. Heck, why bother with social skills at all? Surely a DM can decide when the PC's have intimidated the NPC.

 

[Pielorinho]

I think it'd be cool if intimidate could lead to morale bonuses or penalties. Something like this:

Intimidate: standard action, DC 15+opponent's level or hit dice. Success = -1 morale penalty to attack rolls until the character using the intimidate skill is successfully attacked by the intimidated opponents.
Success by 10 or more: the opponents are shaken, and may be tempted to surrender if they're NPCs.
Failure by 5 or more: opponents, cheered on by the ineffectiveness of the intimidation, gain a +1 morale bonus to attack rolls until one of them is successfully attacked by the intimidator's allies.

The roll would be modified by:
Relative size of intimidator to intimidatee (+/-4 for each difference in category)
Relative number of characters in each group (+/-4 for each factor of size one group is bigger than the other)
Number of characters downed in each group by enemies (+/-1 per character downed)

For example, my halfling rogue and his three friends face a group with two ogre warriors and twelve gnoll warriors. He unwisely tries to intimidate them.

The DC is 19, based on the ogre's HD, plus 8 because the ogre warriors are two size categories larger than the halfling, plus eight because their group is three times (or two size factors) larger than our group. Total DC of 35.
I try to intimidate them and roll a 25 -- good, but not nearly good enough. They laugh at my squeaky halfling voice and attack with refreshed vigor, gaining a +1 on each attack -- until I sneak-attack their ogre leader, felling him.

Over the next three rounds, we kill both ogres and six of the gnolls. I then try to intimidate them again.

Now the check is 17 (based on the highest HD left), +4 because they're one size category bigger than us. There are 7 of them left, not quite double our numbers, so there's no increased difficulty based on numbers. And we've knocked down eight of them, reducing the DC by 8.

Having killed their biggest members and over half their group, the DC is now 9. I roll a 24 on my check; the gnolls are shaken, and most of them either panic and run or drop their weapons and surrender.

Would something like this work?
Daniel

 

[Celebrim]

Pielorinho: Yes, I think something like that would be a very reasonable way to handle intimidate.

 

[smetzger]

Intimidate can never be used against PCs. Neither can Bluff. Players always decide how their PCs will react to a given NPC or situation.

Not that intimidation can't be used against the PCs, but specifically the Intimidate skill cannot be used by NPCs on PCs, or by PCs on other PCs.

Sure it can, if the NPC makes his Initimidate roll then the DM describes the NPC to the PCs as bigger, badder, and tougher than he really is. The PCs still have a choice, but their 'facts' have been clouded by the Intimidate check.

 

[Kae'Yoss]

That makes a lot more sense than what you said before

-Hyp.

Well, it didn't make a lot of sense before. Must have been tired. Or drunk. Or both...



Back to the show: Intimidate is there to influence the behavior of the target. Not more, not less: you won't get to dominate him as the spell, but neither will he just run away. He'll bahave roughly like the NPC attitude "friendly" suggests: he will chat, he will help a little, he'll offer advice and information. But he will take no risks (at least no big ones) to help the other, and the moment he's gone he may sound the alarm. Also, the magic will only last for about 10 minutes; you don't get a new lifetime friend with that.

 

[Pielorinho]

Back to the show: Intimidate is there to influence the behavior of the target. Not more, not less: you won't get to dominate him as the spell, but neither will he just run away. He'll bahave roughly like the NPC attitude "friendly" suggests: he will chat, he will help a little, he'll offer advice and information. But he will take no risks (at least no big ones) to help the other, and the moment he's gone he may sound the alarm. Also, the magic will only last for about 10 minutes; you don't get a new lifetime friend with that.

I dunno: I figure it works a little bit differently. Intimidate provides a stick that you can use to herd NPCs in the appropriate direction. But they've got to have a direction they can go in.

I can shout at my enemies, "Surrender, you scurvy mutts, or I'll slit your throats and feast on your entrails!" I've given them a suggested course of action (surrender), and the consequences they'll suffer if they don't (throat slit, entrails turned into halfling-chow). I want them to believe that if they surrender, they've got a better chance of surviving than if they keep fighting. That's an easy sell, if I've killed half their companions in two rounds and don't show signs of injury myself.

Some of them might run away: they've seen me stab, but they haven't seen me run, and I've got short stubby legs. Though I've successfully waved a stick at them, they haven't been herded in the direction I hoped. But if I pull out a bow and shoot one of them dead, the others might decide to stop running: I've closed off one direction for them.

If two of them drop their weapons and my raging barbarian buddy lops off their heads, the others are suddenly not going to believe my offer of surrender. They'll start running away again, or else they'll fight back.

If I capture them and say, "Tell us everything you know about your half-dragon master, and then I'll kill you," I've waved a stick at them, but I haven't given them any direction to go in. They're likely to clam up: if I'm going to kill them anyway, why should they cooperate?

If I say, "Tell us everything you know about your half-dragon master, and then I'll take away your weapons and set you free, and if I ever see you again I'll spit your eyes on my dagger and eat them like olives," then I've waved a stick, and I've given them a direction to go in: if they cooperate, they live, and if they don't cooperate, they'll probably die.

I think that's what intimidation is all about: you put two stark choices in front of someone, and make the consequences of choosing the wrong way look too horrible to contemplate.

Daniel

 

[Lord Pendragon]

Sure it can, if the NPC makes his Initimidate roll then the DM describes the NPC to the PCs as bigger, badder, and tougher than he really is. The PCs still have a choice, but their 'facts' have been clouded by the Intimidate check.

I agree with this 100%. What I object to is the interpretation that an NPC can use Intimidate to dictate a PCs actions. i.e. the check is made, and the DM tells the player that he's too intimidated to attack the NPC.

I also agree that Bluff can be used to color the information a PC gets from an NPC. However, if you look under the Bluff description in the PHB, it states that with a high check the PC could state incredibly crazy things, and get the NPC to believe them. I object to the NPC making a crazy claim ("the red dragon is only an illusion! The same wizard created the illusion of the dead bodies and horrible stench of burning flesh!") then rolling a high Bluff check, and the player being forced to play his PC as believing it.

 

[Celebrim]

"I object to the NPC making a crazy claim ("the red dragon is only an illusion! The same wizard created the illusion of the dead bodies and horrible stench of burning flesh!") then rolling a high Bluff check, and the player being forced to play his PC as believing it."

Fine with me. Just so you understand that the NPC isn't going to buy the same line even when you do roll a 40 for your bluff check either.