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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 7956342" data-attributes="member: 42582">I think that 5e D&D  (i) doesn't have a clear system for extended PC vs PC social contest, and (ii) is ambigous over whether the outcome of a successful skill check is you did that well or you got what you wanted (roughtly task vs conflict resolution, without wanting to hang too much on tha parituclar terminology), and (iii) doesn't have a system for incorporating emotional/relationship components into a check.I'm sure these things could be sorted out at a particular table, but I don't think they're there in the basic presentation of the rules. I think that makes it harder to get things going, or make some things obvious.To elaborate on those thoughts a bit more: in D&D, if - during the course of the PC vs PC rivalry - one of the PCs suddenly escalates to violence, the whole arena of conflict is changed and there's no straightforward way to have the social conflict feed through into the new situation. Eg there's no obvious mechanic for the other PC to cow/shame the escalating PC into stepping down. I would generalise this point by saying - outside of some magical effects, and 4e skill challenges - D&D doesn't make it easy to establish finality in a scene simply via social interaction.I also think that Prince Valiant "has everything named and described in a way that promotes a certain type of play" but I don't think that that is a separate thing bur rather is related to the features I've been describing above in this post.All of this is before we get to the default XP-and-gp reward framework of D&D. Because, by default, social interactions tend not to yield either of these that also tends to make the seem secondary in play. 4e again is an exception, and you could easily drift 5e away from the default (though I don't think "milestone levelling" would necessarily help in this respect), but it is another feature of the game that differs from those systems that (as I've experienced them) tend to give the OP more fo what he's looking for out of the box.,To finish, none of this is meant as a critique of D&D. It's meant as an attempt to reflect on how one might want to tweak/drift to get what one wants. If you - [USER=6704184]@doctorbadwolf[/USER] - already have it then my thoughts are unncessary. But [USER=467]@Reynard[/USER] did seem to be looking for some thoughts. (I hesitate to call it advice because I don't know 5e well enough. Maybe goal-oriented musings?)</blockquote>

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