Social Skills: Role versus Roll Play

[Belen]

I saw a discussions on the WOTC boards regarding a GM railroading a PC who wanted to use her social skills. I ended up writing my thoughts on the matter and I wanted to see what the EnWorld crowd thought.

Social skills can be very hard to use in game, especially for those GMs who started running games under 2e. Before the skills ever became fully realized, social skills revolved around the players most likely to role play situations well. The GM made a judgement (without any die rolls) on gut instinct and the game progressed.

3e skills make it much harder (and easier) on GMs. They take a very role play oriented decision and base it on numbers. No GM wants a game where social situations depend on die rolls. A PC who just says "I roll diplomacy," is a nightmare. The entire flavor of the game is lost and the GM becomes the ultimate number cruncher. This happens to lead to zero fun for the GM. Heck, most GMs run games because they like to ROLEplay.

Hence, the social skills become very difficult to use, and social skills have an added element that skills such as climb never have. A PC with diplomacy cannot just roll and succeed. They have to try to roleplay the skill. In my game, I do not judge NPC reaction based on the real life diplomacy skills of the character and I let the die roll help or hinder the character.

However, I think this really hinders growth as a roleplayer as well. You just do not try as hard if you know that you have high ranks in the skill. Therefore, we have the dilemma.

Thoughts? How do others use the social skills? How do we improve this area of our games? etc?

Dave

 

[Desdichado]

3e skills make it much harder (and easier) on GMs. They take a very role play oriented decision and base it on numbers. No GM wants a game where social situations depend on die rolls. A PC who just says "I roll diplomacy," is a nightmare. The entire flavor of the game is lost and the GM becomes the ultimate number cruncher. This happens to lead to zero fun for the GM. Heck, most GMs run games because they like to ROLEplay.

I think a bigger problem is the players who take CHA and social skills and treat them like dump stats, but then because they are charismatic people in real life, they play their characters like Don Juan. I'd rather roll diplomacy then reduce social interactions to the players rather than the characters interacting.

That said, I typically do both, and haven't had a problem with it. Most of my players will roleplay out what they say and how they act, and when they're done, I roll (or have them roll) appropriate checks to see how effective they were. Skipping the RP and going straight for the roll is only used in the very rare case where I've got a very shy and retiring player, or when we're in a hurry and don't want to spend a lot of game time on a given social interaction.

 

[Psion]

Thoughts? How do others use the social skills? How do we improve this area of our games? etc?

If it's something off screen I don't want to waste table time on, I won't hesitate to say "make a diplomacy/bluff/gather information" roll.

If it is pertinent to the story, I make the player role-play out the situation, and then set the DC (or assign DC modifiers) based on the role-playing. The way I see it, the player only really announces intention. How many times have you thought out a social interaction in your head and it turned out totally different in reality? Yeah, I thought so.

So it goes with PCs. If a PC fails what seemed like an easy task when announced, it was because the character failed to pull it off for some reason... they came off as arrogant, they stammered or hesitated, or whatever.

Occasionally, I'll give players a roll to have a second chance to rethink their speech if they are about to do something socially stupid.

Sure, roleplaying is important, but part of the purpose of the system is to bridge the gap between the player and the character.

 

[Belphanior]

I also have a big problem with players who act real charismatic, but whose PCs don't have the stats to back it up.

I do it like this:
I ask the player what his character is trying to get across. What arguments does he use, what kind of examples does he use? Then, I ask him for a Diplomacy/Bluff/Whatever roll, and adjust the DC upon what he said.

I also automatically assume in my mind that if the Cha 18 paladin enters a room and the player says "yo folks", the paladin actually walks up to each person in the room, shakes their hand, and asks them "how are you?" in a way that makes you know that this guy genuinely cares.


My 2 cents

 

[Belen]

Maybe the answer is to open up the charisma (or social skills) to all PCs. That could lead to a lot more character concepts and those people who enjoy role-playing may decide to add ranks to them no matter what class they want to play.

The real question, as I see it, is how do we promote Role play versus Roll play and still use the skill system. It is inherently unfair that fighters can just roll ALL their skills with no added component, yet RP skills have the extra RP component.

Personally, I do not want to have RP as die rolls, but I also do not want to penalize my players because they lack real life charisma....

Dave

 

[Voadam]

I like to have PCs act out their social interactions and if they start insulting and provoking people then that is fine, reactions and story consequences happen from the players' actions.

I try to have NPC reactions modified by the character's skills and attributes and character type so that some characters have easier times in certain situations than others. So the chaotic rogue gets along well with the shady sailors while his brother the antisocial no social skill assassin makes them feel feel creeped out.

I expect PCs to roleplay according to their character concept and have fun with the interactions.

That said, my harper mage loremaster has spent a ton of skill points on diplomacy and bluff for character concept in the game I play in.

 

[BiggusGeekus@Work]

I'd like to see more adventures that build in the need for social skill checks. Right now Diplomacy can change attitudes and at high levels it can change them by a lot. A "diplomat" character with high Diplomacy and Bluff can pretty much waltz through any module where the monsters are not instantly hostile. At the low end Diplomacy often doesn't do much.

That doesn't make much sense to me. We have Disable Device skill checks that effectively say "make your roll or the trap goes off causing X damage". A party doesn't need a rogue as long as it has a barbarian with a high CON (ie the one scene from The Gamers where the Barbarian "disarms" the trap).

Social encounters should be somewhat similar. Make the roll or have a nasty encounter. Exp is rewarded if the skill roll is made. Hey, the character paid for the skill, he should get some use out of it.

 

[Cybern]

Aha! The 100 CAN$ Question!

We had that problem since we started playing something else than AD&D2e (thac0 WAS simple!), and we still can't deal with all theses cases.

I had a player in a VTM game who never gave some thoughts to his social skills/stats, but would almost make you do in your pants when he did his roleplay and tried to intimidate someone. The GM often felt bad when the player got angry when he was told that his crappy Intimidate roll (2, 4) wasn't good enough to scare the lone defenseless kid. When we asked him if, in his background, his character often intimidated people, he said all the time. So whenever this guy creates a character, we force him to put some ranks/skill points/etc in intimidate, or suffer the consequences.

We also have a player who roleplays exceptionnally well, but gets mad when we tell him that his 9 Cha dwarf can't "just roleplay" his diplomacy. He too, with time, bought social skills for all his characters so that he could use his natural social skills in game.

With 3.X, we let the character roleplay his social skill, and, based on what he said, assign a +2/-2 (per the PHB) conditionnal modifiers to his roll. When he rolls crap (or real good), the DM often retell what the character said in the way it sounded according to the roll (more/less scary/convincing/kind). Worked out well enough for us. Some players even roll before they RP, so they can adjust their RP accordingly.

The real problem with social skills IMC comes from PCs who wants to convince/intimidate/bluff other PCs. I think I saw in the PHB or DMG that a player can decide if he's convinced/intimidated/etc, while it makes social skills useless versus players. We often argue (in-game) about party decisions, and some players get mad at the social character who convinced their PC with a roll. The can't get it that leaders aren't always brain or muscle, but often social guys.

IMC, I really don't have patience for players who cry when their Sense Motive roll is too low, and they never got a rank in it. In your games, do people often put cc ranks in social skills (sense motive included) to reflect their roleplay, or adjust their roleplay to their stats ?

I even tend to penalized (rolplay award xp) players who don't RP remotely their Cha (en Int and Wis, to some extent). I can't take another 18 Cha Pal who "just looks good, but acts like Squall" (from FF 8). "Whatever" ain't a diplomacy sentence, in my book.

 

[Belen]

Actually, my fiance plays a bard in my game with a ton of social skills. She has close to 30 in Bluff, Diplomacy and Gather Info; however, she is a fairly new player. She roleplays great, but really does not know how to use her social skills.

It is easy in a dungeon delve to know what skills are needed, but the social skills seem to be a real problem. During roleplay, we hardly ever remember to use them. I know that I certainly forget about the checks when I am trying to RP and NPC.

And, on the flip side, I have some players who use lack of skills to get out of roleplaying. They will give me a line like, I such and such class, I do not have those skills, so therefore I cannot do it. This can be a copout sometimes for players who would rather just have a game of combat.

The lack of the social skills gives them the "out" they need.

<sigh>

"Sorry, I can't do that. I have no ranks in diplomacy."

 

[SnowDog]

Social skills are only half of the problem. What about the high-WIS cleric whose player is wishy-washy? The high-INT wizard whose player can't think his way out of a paper bag?

In my game, I try to be lenient about people playing one way or the other when it comes to their mental stats. When it comes down to it, though, it's not fair to have the skills and stick points in them if they aren't going to be as important, say, as Disable Device or Cleave. You can't just "describe how you fight" really well and not have to roll your to-hit .

So, I do what a lot of GMs do. We roleplay the situation, and I ask for rolls. I then retroactively adjust what is happening based on the rolls.

Player: insert wonderfully convincing spiel about why PCs should be allowed past guard
DM: "Roll your diplomacy."
Player: "Hrm, 6, including modifiers."
DM: "Ok, well, with that, basically you aren't getting anywhere. You have this great solution worked out, and while it sounds totally convincing when you start, you realize you must have said something wrong as the guard is completely not buying your story. You'll have to try something else."
DM: Insert guard acting all mean and stuff

(Extra credit to the Player if he says, "Yeah, maybe when I went to tell him how he would be seen as helpful in the eyes of his commander, I completely mess that up, and it makes it sound like I'm threatening to report him to his commander, and he gets all defensive." Now that, I like.)

As for PC-to-PCinteractions, I have yet to encounter a situation where a player is trying to be hostile with these skills. I've had to deal with bluff checks for white lies, with sense motive to determine if one character can pick up on another one's mood changes, etc. Basically these act as aids for RP within the party, because I never want to stifle RP within the party.

So far, I have yet to have a real complaint about how it works. I think we all just know it's an imperfect system and we deal with it the best we can.