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

[billd91]

The reason we have the combat mini-game is because we do not have any combat or fight "narration" or "roleplaying" to speak of--

When it comes to this line of reasoning, I think we have to figure out whether the dog is wagging the tail or the tail is wagging the dog. I don't think we have the combat mini-game because we don't have fight "narration". It's more accurately we don't have or require fight narration because we have the combat mini-game.

And that's probably true for the lack of social mini-game. We have to narrate it because we don't have the social interaction mini-game. And I think, ultimately, that's fine. I don't really want a detailed social mini-game that is as involved as combat. But I think we have to be careful where we're implying causation.

 

[Tonguez]

That would make things interesting. Unfortunately it would also bog down the RPG session as the DM (who is role-playing the foes) and the players 'combat' one another with opposing skill checks. Ex. Deception vs. Insight.

Social interaction should be about role-playing and getting into character.

Its not something I'd do all the time but for one whimsical character I did a old tough Granny NPC and gave her a Scathing rebuke ability - Old Granny can make a scathing critique of a person within 30 feets actions, undermining their confidence and resolve. The target of Grannys ire must make a Wisdom saving throw or suffer disadvantage on all ability checks and attack rolls for 1 minute as they second-guess their decisions and actions...

ie using spells as a model it would be p;ossible to give the DM a set of pre-made social actions that work like Spells and which have the players make all the rolls to overcome.

 

[Vaalingrade]

But how is this not replacing the actual verbalization players are making? As I mentioned above, one can't have it both ways. If you want to make things fair to people who don't want to talk... then you can't have any rules wherein actually talking or making cogent argument has an effect on the success or failure of social combat (via bonuses, modifiers or whatever). It has to be entirely about just rolling dice. That's the only fair way to make the quiet players be on equal ground to the talkative ones.

Which means that yes, one would need to replace the standard part of the roleplaying question-- "What does your character do/say?" "My character does/says X..." with a series of "verbal attacks" and " verbal defenses" and "resolve hit points" and so forth-- first one to knock their opponent to 0 has made them lose the argument.

And that's fine, if that's what someone out there wants to design. But I seriously doubt it will ever be designed by anyone at WotC because it goes against what I think they think the entire premise of roleplaying is-- telling the DM what you want to do, and the DM telling you what happens.

What's stopping you from explaining what you're saying alongside your roll in the same way you can describe your attack roll or spell cast?

And what's stopping you from saying what your character says outside of those situations where success of failure matters?

All it's really preventing is me getting away with succeeding on a social encounter by using my personal experience writing speeches and public speaking while playing a Barbarian who has zero skills to actually match my mouth.

It's the death of the last bastion of skilled play and I'm here for it.

 

[Vaalingrade]

Also, this removes the DM's personal biases and perceptive from the MPC's reaction, which is awesome.

 

[Umbran]

That's fine in theory. In practice, the first thing that'll happen is PCs trying this social combat against other PCs;

The table should already have an agreement on PvP play. The existence of a system of any kind does not change that.

or players getting upset when NPCs legitimately try it on the PCs, and so forth.

What?

Do players get upset when dragons try to eat them? Why should they get upset when the Evil Viceroy tries to get them thrown in jail, and gives them the benefit of a trial they might actually win?

There are already games that have social conflict resolution systems, or that have systems that don't significantly differentiate between physical and social conflict in their mechanics. These games do not implode from having such systems in them.

Indeed, the inclusion of a social conflict resolution system can resolve one of the larger awkward bits of D&D - leaders of all sorts, from mayors to kings, have this weird need to be high-level members of combat-focused classes. A social conflict resolution system opens up an avenue for those who can't cleave you in half, or throw a fireball at you, to exert power in the world regardless, and do it in a systematic way that the players can still engage with.

 

[DEFCON 1]

That's nonsense.

Just like in combat, players are engaged in the conversation that is play, and then utilize the game mechanics to make that happen in the fiction. Sometimes what they want to do is solely a function of what's on their character sheet, but usually there is interplay with the terrain,the other participants and the GM. Why would "social combat" be any different.

"I want to chop the goblin boss's head off!"
"Okay, roll to hit."

"I want make the vizier back off so I can talk directly to the king."
"Okay, make a intimidate check."

You can expand those conversations in either case, and of course how the dice rolls interact with the statblocks says a lot about what happens.

I get that some folks might not want a social combat system, and that's fine, but it is ridiculous to keep saying it would be fundamentally different than the rest of play. You could make exploration work like combat, too,if you wanted to.

Maybe I've been misunderstanding you. If you are considering making simple Skill checks of Persuasion, Intimidation, and Deception as being "social combat"... then I'm fine with that. Because what you describe here is exactly what I've been saying... a player has to say what they want to do and the DM makes a determination of what results. "I want make the vizier back off so I can talk directly to the king" is exactly the sort of thing that the game expects of players. But I've been getting the impression from folks n the thread here that expecting "quiet" or "shy" players to think of and say a statement such as this is precisely the sort of thing the game needs to avoid by installing a "social combat" system. That it's not fair to ask those players to actually state what they want their characters to do or say.

Now whether or not the vizier does or does not back off is being determined by DM Fiat, or a Skill check, or a "social combat" system as intricate as Physical Combat (with "attack" rolls, "social armor classes", "damage", "hit points" etc. etc.)... any DM can go with whatever system they think is most compelling and interesting. But in all cases, we still expect the player to tell us just what it is they want to do. They have to tell us that they want the vizier to back off, just like they have to tell us they want to attack the goblin.

So if this is what all of you also believe, then indeed I may have misunderstood and the "social combat" mechanics you advocate for are just a matter of degrees.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

It's the death of the last bastion of skilled play and I'm here for it.

No it isn't. You need also remove the player ability to decide where to move, what power to use and generally what to do. As long as players can make decisions that matter there is certain amount of skilled play involved.

 

[Umbran]

If they're at the same table I'm at and their lack of engagement is dragging things down, then yes they do; not just to me but to the rest of us as well.

Were you of the thought that this entire thread of discussion was about your personal table?

 

[DEFCON 1]

What's stopping you from explaining what you're saying alongside your roll in the same way you can describe your attack roll or spell cast?

Nothing. Except what you say to describe your attack roll or spell has no impact on how the attack or spell does. That's what the dice do. You cannot make your attack or spell better by "describing it well".

So by the same token... if we are installing a social combat system in order to avoid giving preferential treatment to the players who "speak well"... then you can't modify your "social attack rolls" by what you say. Because once you do that... you again are giving the "talkers" of the table bonuses for talking well that the use of social combat itself was supposed to avoid.

 

[payn]

Do the foes get their own skill challenge to see if they can beat the PCs?

A good question! I run what I call social events, or perhaps you could think of it like a social dungeon. Instead of the PCs talking to a single NPC, they are entering an event with numerous NPCs. For example, a noble is throwing a ball to commemorate something or other. The PCs are tasked with attending and finding out which nobles support their benefactor in their pursuit of the throne. There are 6 nobles (with perhaps agents with their own agendas). The PCs have to work out who they support, if they are pliable, and to avoid unnecessary detection and/or faux pas.

So, discovering an NPCs position, their influences, and attitude is like the exploration. Avoiding faux pas, enemy agents, or annoying a noble are the traps. Finally, the discovery, gaining the support, and outing the enemy agents is the combat. In typical dungeon terms roughly of course.