D&D General Social Pillar Mechanics: Where do you stand?

[Umbran]

That's...not how anyone I've ever spoken to about the term has used it. I am genuinely kind of baffled here. It's always been used in a game balance context to my knowledge.

Oh, goodness no. I agree with Reynard here.

I won't say they aren't sometimes related - game balance makes spotlight balance a lot easier to achieve, yes. But they aren't the same thing.

At this point so car it seems to me that most people who want social mechanics don't have trust in their DM or very bad experiences with their DMs.

So, let's turn this around to illustrate a point:

Do you want combat mechanics? Why do you want combat mechanics - you could just trust your GM to narrate the combat. Don't you trust your GM to tell you who wins?!?

 

[M_Natas]

Situation

House Harkonnen has moved on House Atreides and the party is at the Landsraad council of Houses trying to get sanctions against House Harkonnen.

Take 5e.

Could be handled free form, the party interacts with NPCs and makes their proposals and the DM roleplays the NPCs and adjudicates results. Could be in-depth, could be light, could be first person roleplaying or second person approaches, could focus on one character or the party as a whole or multiple characters sequentially.

Could be handled using the standard 5e skill system with the DM deciding to call for a roll against a DC to determine success, persuasion to get what they want, the party describes their approach or roleplays stuff out and then a die roll is used engaging the mechanics for a skill check, character stats, possible advantage and disadvantage, bardic inspiration, etc. This engages some of the character aspects, build choices, possibly approaches taken for advantage and disadvantage, and includes an element of chance and uncertainty in the result and is based on roughly how difficult the DM assesses the challenge of the task.

Additional rules could be a 4e style skill challenge, multiple characters doing different things to accumulate progress towards the desired end result. Multiple characters involved and engaged sequentially, multiple approaches, not a binary yes no on a single die result but multiple checks with impacts so there can be successes and setbacks and complications, possibly over multiple rounds of party actions, different aspects of the situation can come in, approaches impact difficulty and there is an element of chance involved at multiple stages.

But that is just an extension of the 5e System. Instead of one skill check you make several. That is still RAW and I would think most experienced DM would not reduce such important discussions to on skill check.

Treating it like a set piece combat with table focus and everybody being involved. Mechanics, build, choices, and luck of the die all matter.

There are more in-depth rules sets for handling such situations as well to make it more like combat with multiple options and relevant considerations and ways to determine results.

But social combat ... like ... Speaking to each other is the most natural thing for us humans that we can do in an RPG. Putting that in a corset of formaloty and squeezing it into rounds with limited actions feels strange to me. It would kill any spontaneity that makes a conversation a conversation.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

At this point so car it seems to me that most people who want social mechanics don't have trust in their DM or very bad experiences with their DMs.

I want mechanics because absolute freeform "describe an action and roll" is not very interesting gameplay to me. I can do roleplay regardless of whether I am engaging with a meaningful gameplay experience--I have never seen a single rule which could ever take away my ability to roleplay--so for me it's as simple as wanting more engaging gameplay. Rules that actually require tactical consideration, not just "be really persuasive toward your DM."

There are analogies I could make, but I won't. It really is just that simple: I want gameplay that is fun in and of itself. "Convince a person that your argument is sound" is not really fun gameplay for me. (Oftentimes, I would barely even call it "gameplay" at all.) The ideal situation, of course, is one where the roleplay-fun is driven by and inseparable from the gameplay-fun, and the gameplay-fun is driven by and inseparable from the roleplay-fun. But as long as both parts are actually fun individually, I can tolerate them not actually directly driving one another.

If I wanted "negotiate a result, perhaps with a random roll for spice," I'd play a semi-freeform roleplay, as those invite a broader spectrum of interests. If I wanted just heavily social gameplay without much roleplaying, I'd boot up Vicky3 or CK3. The special, unique thing TTRPGs offer, and in particular that D&D-like games offer, is having gameplay that really matters as gameplay, and roleplay that really matters as roleplay.

That's why having actually good gameplay, with balance and interesting rules and effective design etc., is so important to me. If I'm not getting any solid gameplay, I just don't really have a reason to play D&D when I could be getting more of the other stuff instead.

 

[Voadam]

The players play out or describe an approach of their character ("I want a lower price" or "My character tries to ask for a discount by being nice"), the DM decides if there is a chance of failure or success, if there is, he let's the player make a Charisma (Persuasion)-check against an appropriate DC based on the disposition of the NPC towards the Characters and the approach taken and then narrates the results based on the Dice Roll (if that was needed).

I see the 5e RAW as more discretionary for DM procedure and approach.

Page 236:

"Dice are neutral arbiters. They can determine the outcome of an action without assigning any motivation to the DM and without playing favorites. The extent to which you use them is entirely up to you."

"One approach is to use dice as rarely as possible. Some DMs use them only during combat, and determine success or failure as they like in other situations. With this approach, the DM decides whether an action or a plan succeeds or fails based on how well the players make their case, how thorough or creative they are, or other factors."

Page 244:

"Some DMs prefer to run a social interaction as a free-form roleplaying exercise, where dice rarely come into play. Other DMs prefer to resolve the outcome of an interaction by having characters make Charisma checks. Either approach works, and most games fall somewhere in between, balancing player skill (roleplaying and persuading) with character skill (reflected by ability checks)."

 

[M_Natas]

Oh, goodness no. I agree with Reynard here.

I won't say they aren't sometimes related - game balance makes spotlight balance a lot easier to achieve, yes. But they aren't the same thing.

So, let's turn this around to illustrate a point:

Do you want combat mechanics? Why do you want combat mechanics - you could just trust your GM to narrate the combat. Don't you trust your GM to tell you who wins?!?

Combat mechanics in 5e help organise a Chaotic, fast paced, abstracted situation so that players and the DM can makr informed decisions.
Having an initiative round and a reduced set of actions (action, bonus action, reaction, movement, free action) turns a Chaotic system into order and makes it possible to play combat like chess. It makes combat more feasible and easily understandabl, especially for the DM, because of the set of rules he just needs to concentrate on running the Monsters.

Opposite to that is the social pillar. Speaking in character at the table is the most natural thing to do. Human brains are usually wired to be able to.follow conservations. The speech is not abstract, the interactions between NPCs and PCs can flow naturally and normally without overwhelming anybody, because we are usually used to that kind of interaction.
The social pillar of the game is the least abstract part of the game and that's why it needs the least set of rules and mechanics ...

Like, if you had a Star Trek Holodeck, that creates the Monsters and the Players could fight them, you also wouldn't need rounds, actions and bonus actions ect.pp.
But because of the abstract nature of combat in D&D, you need rules to make it playable and strategic.
But social interaction is way less abstract and that's why it doesn't need so many rules because people usually know how to behave in social situations, even pretended ones.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Oh, goodness no. I agree with Reynard here.

I won't say they aren't sometimes related - game balance makes spotlight balance a lot easier to achieve, yes. But they aren't the same thing.

Well. That's good to know. And deeply infuriating, since I had been very clear in every prior conversation (with other people, I don't think anyone in this convo?) that I was talking about game balance, which spotlight balance doesn't achieve...and they either never bothered to correct me or were using the term incorrectly as though it did provide gameplay balance (and was, in fact, the best form thereof.)

Will definitely keep this in mind.

So, let's turn this around to illustrate a point:

Do you want combat mechanics? Why do you want combat mechanics - you could just trust your GM to narrate the combat. Don't you trust your GM to tell you who wins?!?

A pithy and perhaps brusque way of putting it, but yeah, this.

But social combat ... like ... Speaking to each other is the most natural thing for us humans that we can do in an RPG. Putting that in a corset of formaloty and squeezing it into rounds with limited actions feels strange to me. It would kill any spontaneity that makes a conversation a conversation.

"But physical combat...like...fighting each other is the most natural thing for us humans that we can do in an RPG. Putting that in a corset of formality and squeezing it into rounds with limited actions feels strange to me. It would kill any spontaneity that makes a fight a fight."

The structure remains symmetrical: IRL fights are absolutely incredibly spontaneous, constantly-evolving things, where you absolutely do NOT have this artificial structure of "initiative" to put actions in a sequence, nor any limit other than the time it takes to do something on what actions you can perform moment to moment. Real brawls are messy and unstructured, with no rhyme or reason, every man for himself kind of thing.

We accept the heavy and harsh abstractions placed on combat because we're used to those abstractions. Doing that to social stuff feels weird only because it's new, with much less testing and different sets and kinds of variables.

Combat mechanics in 5e help organise a Chaotic, fast paced, abstracted situation so that players and the DM can makr informed decisions.

Why can't conversations be chaotic, fast-paced, abstracted situations where players and DMs want to make informed decisions on the plane of meaning?

 

[Shardstone]

Social Encounters aren't conversations, usually. Instead, they're usually things like Court, Balls, Intrigues, Dinners, Councils, Interrogations, and so on. The Encoutner rules that people like, such as for Influence, are to make these things a bit more gamey. The Encounter systems, such as Influence, are always lose enough though to allow for conversations, hence allowing a round of variable length.

Maybe this is just a situation of, you don't get it until you play it? It sounds like the people against these rule ideas are talking about something completely different then what proponents for this system are talking about.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

These Pathfinder 2E Influence rules are a good example. I think they improve things by giving the GM a solid foundation on how to adjudicate what the PCs do, with DCs and concrete targets and outcomes. This reduces the mental load on the GM and makes it more fair for the players.

I think one might still be able to interlace this with natural conversation somewhat, but it seems too crunchy to me and would get in the way. It is also telling that nothing in these rules actually tell us how this is roleplayed. Based on these rules one could imagine that people just each declare "I make an influence action on the Duke" etc.

 

[M_Natas]

That's why having actually good gameplay, with balance and interesting rules and effective design etc., is so important to me. If I'm not getting any solid gameplay, I just don't really have a reason to play D&D when I could be getting more of the other stuff instead.

But how do they look like? So far the 2e Pathfinder rules posted here I find quite overwhelming.
But I would love to see mechanics that improve the social pillar.

 

[Leatherhead]

I really think that the development of social mechanics is being held back by stigmas and an insistence against the concept based upon the idea that adept communication skills are an inherent property of all humans (instead of a learned behavior) and a general resistance to any kind of gamification of them, which is a shame.

I'm currently playing in an E20 campaign which has a mechanic called hangups, which mechanically inflicts negative consequences on some targets when a condition is met. Meaning you can actually tactically insult someone's mother and have tangible benefits in both combat and social play for it. It's by no means a new idea, integrating social play and combat play, but it's absolutely refreshing to see in action.