D&D 5E Social Challenges & Political Conflicts

[nomotog]

No. Reaching zero social HP would not mean you cannot talk anymore. The social HP relates to a loss of renown, or good-standing with another party.

And what dose that mean? What happens when you lose good standing?

 

[MechaPilot]

And what dose that mean? What happens when you lose good standing?

Do you have the DMG? Renown is described in the DMG, including the potential gaining of benefits for reaching certain levels of renown. Loss of renown interacts with the renown rules causing you to lose the benefits of having good social or political standing with a person or organization.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

And what dose that mean? What happens when you lose good standing?

I see (at least) three possible options:

1. You've been so thoroughly discredited, no one is willing to listen to you--even if you made a stellar point with full citations and an armor-piercing question, you've already lost the listeners. With this interpretation, "social HP" models something more like your relationship with the audience in question, rather than a specific, identifiable characteristic of your individual character. Which makes sense, because a social combat model requires a context in which it occurs. In theory, this would also mean that you regain all/most of your "social HP" the moment you enter a sufficiently distinct situation, which might not only be "give it a day to let cooler heads prevail." On the plus side, this can mean there are many ways to restore your "social HP" (up to its maximum--people can't like you infinitely!), but on the downside, it can also make it a bit of a head-scratcher, and kinda makes magical "social HP" restoration...well, mind-control-y, which is double plus ungood.

2. Your opponent/s has/have exhausted all of the defenses you have available to you. Your character cannot continue talking, because even if they haven't been won over, they no longer have any meaningful arguments/counters to put up. In this interpretation, "social HP" DOES reflect something about your individual character: how well she has withstood attacks on her opinion(s)/claim(s)/social position(s). Just as with real people, a single debate rarely changes a person's mind, but it IS possible to reach a point of not knowing what else to say--you may still hold the opinions you held before, but you no longer have the "resilience" to keep defending them. (Hence my idea of calling "social HP" resilience points--it wasn't JUST for pun. ) This could mean that, *un*like HP, "social HP" can benefit from temporary boosts or "item" benefits--so, for instance, having photographic evidence that clearly and succinctly refutes an expected counter-argument might cash out, mechanically, as a layer of "temporary social HP"

3. Your opponent/s has/have gotten so far under your skin that you are no longer able to rationally participate in the social encounter--you're overwhelmed by something non-rational. In other words, maybe you ragequit; you throw up your hands in disgust and storm out; you blast your opponent/s with obscenities/expletives/ad hominems/etc. Or if you aren't angered, you're depressed, stoic, whatever--but regardless, you're emotionally unable to continue with social interaction. In this interpretation, "social HP" is not so much your ability to defend your arguments as it is your ability to stick to the participation. Using this emotional-stability definition also has its perks and flaws--some people remain cool under pressure, while others blow up easily while still thinking they can continue to participate. But, on the perk side, suddenly an idea of "social healing surges" (or hit dice, or w/e else) makes LOTS of sense; you're not magically coming up with better protections for your arguments, nor suddenly improving your standing with the crowd, but rather regaining your composure.

TL;DR: I see at least three interpretations: crowd-receptiveness; amount of defense you have for your position; emotional stability.

Ironically, I was originally thinking that I liked the second best, but having explained them out now, I think I like the third much better. It gives a place for BOTH magical AND inspirational "social healing," and leaves stuff like "how the crowd feels about you" or the like to other, perhaps better areas, like social "conditions" or social "wounds," or even whatever the negative equivalent would be of "boons" (perhaps "blunders"?)

 

[77IM]

I've been thinking that one fun thing to do would be track different qualities of reputation per PC, as tracks. For example:

- A dangerous/wimpy track: Every time you do something badass, you get a point towards dangerous. When you are a coward or loser, you get a point towards wimpy. These cancel out so if you are dangerous +3 you are also wimpy -3. When you try to intimidate someone or make claims based on your badassness ("Yes, your highness, I can slay that dragon for you"), add your dangerous modifier. When you are pretending to surrender or act meek, add your wimpy modifier.

- A trustworthy/deceptive track: When you fulfill a promise or duty despite difficulty, or when someone places trust in you, you get a point towards trustworthy; when your lies are exposed, you get a point towards deceptive. Get your trustworthy bonus when you are making a promise or asking someone to trust you; get your deceptive bonus when you are trying to convince someone how tricky you are or claim to know secret information.

Note that as reputation factors, events that affect your rating could be manufactured or faked. Like, if you manage to publicly intimidate someone known to be a badass, your dangerous rating could increase. So the main way players would interact with those mechanics is by actually doing things that affect reputation in an attempt to "game the system."

EDIT: NPCs would have these reputation tracks too. So if you challenge someone to a duel -- and you beat them or they back down -- you gain dangerous and they move towards wimpy. I'm not totally sure how such NPC tracks would be used during game play, but it would be a way of "defeating" someone in a social context, by driving their reputation tracks in a direction they don't want.