Mike Mearls on Social Encounters

[FourthBear]

I'm always teetering back and forth as to my feelings on social challenge mechanics. I do feel that it would be nice to be able to mechanically represent a character's social ability divorced from the player's. But I've never really found a social game system that would fit well into D&D and not become tiresome after a few iterations. I don't expect much from the social encounter system, but perhaps they'll help organize social challenges in a way that helps engage the entire group. It would be nice if I could get the players who tend to drift off during "talky bits" involved without having to sacrifice too much in the way of free form roleplaying.

 

[Gundark]

Total Speculation:If you want a preview of the social encounter rules, get out your copy of Heroes of Battle. Read the rules on designing a flowchart to manage battlefield encounters. Cross out "battlefield" and write "talky."

Hmmm Heroes of Talk

Just not the same ring to it.

That said, something like a dramatic conflict from spycraft might be good

 

[Irda Ranger]

So, in effect, the mechanics are "the DM decides"?

Yes and no.

Your tone suggests that this is somehow bad, or different from any other rule in the game. It's not. It's like any other Skill check: The PCs state what they want they want to accomplish, and the DM decides what the DC is for that. If they make the DC, they succeed; if they fail, they don't.

The only wrinkle that mearls is adding to that is that there are degrees of failure and success; so that "perfect success" means you get what you want, no strings attached, but a "partial success" might get you your desired intent (talking with the prisoner), but with added complications (like the crime lord asking for a bribe).

I'd actually prefer an even slightly more robust sub-system. You could have "Argument Points", like "Hit Points", but you "score hits" with a Diplomacy roll instead of an Attack roll (or something else entirely, I'm not married to an implementation). It wouldn't have to be as convoluted as the Combat Chapter, but something just a few pages long could add real depth and new adventure opportunities to D&D. I imagine they considered this though and though "Crap, we don't want another way to balance classes against each other (and need "Social Roles" as well as "Combat Roles"), so we won't do this."

But I think it would be pretty cool.

 

[Nork]

Roughly speaking, all of D&D is that. I'd be happy with some interesting, flexible systems that give me some ideas on how to make the leadup to the decision fun.

This.

I'd also be happy if by having a system that the players and the DM know what their options are, and thereby serve as an aid to help folks with the RPing.

Don't know what the DM is hinting at with his dialog? Sense motive on the NPC. If you make it, the DM knows he can spell it out. If you fail, the DM knows not drop any hints. Is the orc chief being influenced by one of his hot-head sub-chiefs? A PC can attempt to intimidate him. The DM and the players know what direction to take the dialog depending on the roll.

Hopefully it will help everyone to be on the same page and have their imaginations synced up via a common framework.

 

[Cadfan]

I'm interested in seeing if the mechanics they have for 4e are richer than "Roll a LOT of Diplomacy checks".

I'll bet you a nickel that 4e social encounter rules means flowcharts. See Heroes of Battle for reference.

 

[apoptosis]

I guess the question then becomes, will the players have any way of influencing what is at stake? For example, can the players cause the GM to up the ante, by upping the ante themselvesn (eg in the Crime Lord example, they promise the Crime Lord their services in response for a better outcome from him).

Strangely we are on the same page

I think many times the social mechanic has been a risk-free system (i can try and do anything I want to the NPC and they cannot use the same system for retribution; instead the DM has to decide what the NPC do in this case and we are back to DM-fiat).

Diplomacy becomes something to a skill-based version of a charm spell.

A way to increase the stakes would help that a lot and still empower the players as they get to decide to raise the ante.

I think this would work well with bluff and deception challenges as well.

 

[Kraydak]

Bleh for flowcharts, and *if* (big if) Mearls' post is indicative of stuff in the DMG, bleh there as well. Not because it is bad advice for an experienced DM (it isn't), but because it can lead to bad DMing by new DMs. Social situations, like combat, are quite fluid. If you go in detailing 2 outcomes, it will rapidly cause problems as the players deviate from the script. If the DMG suggests that you make a flowchart, and doesn't explicitly say that you should never expect a flowchart to survive contact with the players, it'll lead to bad DMing. Of course, saying "make a flowchart, don't expect it to get followed" isn't very productive advice... which is part of why social encounter mechanics aren't a common aspect of RPGs. Combat is much easier to write rules for.

 

[LEHaskell]

The mechanic Mearles described sounded awfully similar to the alternative "extra difficult" skill checks (PHBII? DMGII? Can't remember where I saw them). Essentially, you make repeated skill checks with the goal of getting X number of successes before you got Y failures. The intent was to add some drama and "press your luck" story elements to rather bland skill encounters. As I recall, the rules included a table of probabilities for various DC's and relative number of successes/failures.

 

[LostSoul]

Yes and no.

Your tone suggests that this is somehow bad, or different from any other rule in the game. It's not. It's like any other Skill check: The PCs state what they want they want to accomplish, and the DM decides what the DC is for that. If they make the DC, they succeed; if they fail, they don't.

Yeah, I'm a little disappointed, but I'll get over it.

If it does work the way you say it does, that would be cool. But it's not quite the same: the DM decides what happens on a successful check. That's not quite the same as what happens after a successful attack roll or climb check.

I'd actually prefer an even slightly more robust sub-system. You could have "Argument Points", like "Hit Points", but you "score hits" with a Diplomacy roll instead of an Attack roll (or something else entirely, I'm not married to an implementation). It wouldn't have to be as convoluted as the Combat Chapter, but something just a few pages long could add real depth and new adventure opportunities to D&D. I imagine they considered this though and though "Crap, we don't want another way to balance classes against each other (and need "Social Roles" as well as "Combat Roles"), so we won't do this."

But I think it would be pretty cool.

You mean like Duel of Wits?

 

[Zaruthustran]

I think it'd be fun to break a social encounter into three phases, each earlier phase influencing successive phases.

1. Prep. This could be as simple as a Spot or Sense Motive as you walk into a merchant's shop, or as complex as an entire investigatory adventure.

2. Debate. Engaging the target in verbal combat could be a simple opposed roll for an argument (haggling over a price) or a static DC for simple objective (befriend the guard). Or it could be a series of rolls, like a static DC to "break the ice" and then an opposed DC to successfully engage in stimulating conversation.

3. Resolution. This could be simply the DM telling you the results of phase 2, or one more roll for when you actually seal the deal.

So for example, a sales call. In phase 1 you research the customer (Gather Information roll vs. static DC) and determine that he enjoys boating. So you read up on boats, with the intent to learn enough so that you can make conversation. In phase 2 you make a diplomacy roll against a static DC just to get him to spare you a few minutes of his time; you use boats as an icebreaker and get +2 to the roll. Success! Now that you're in a conversation, you outline the features of your product and the benefits the customer will enjoy, paying attention to what the customer says so you can adjust your pitch. Static Sense Motive check, with a +2 for the rapport successfully established in phase 1. Success! Phase three, and it's time to ask for the sale. The DC is determined by how much the customer actually wants this product. If you're selling ice to Eskimos the DC is very high; if you're selling water to a man crawling out of the desert you don't need to roll. Your good listening skills give you a +2 on this diplomacy roll, and you get a further +2 for the success in phase 1 (total of +4 for both bonuses).

Success! Congrats, you've established the want to buy. Now repeat phases 1 to 3 as you talk about price.

Very simple or inconsequential encounters could just do phase 3. But debates with the King? Bargaining with Jabba? That'd justify the use of all three.