Strategy or role-playing game?

[Storm Raven]

There is a physical distinction in the types of actions. Note the "can" and "can't".

In a roleplaying tabletop game you are not physically playing Conan and your physicality does not impact Conan's physicality. A paraplegic can play Conan and have him jump over a pit.

In a NERO style LARP the person playing Conan does use their physicality to play Conan. A paraplegic playing a Conan character will fail at jumping over a pit because they cannot physically do so.

The paraplegic playing Conan can talk as Conan in either situation.

No, he can't. Because he's not Conan. He's playing Conan. Why is it that you have no problem with a character relying on his game attributes to do physical stuff, but do have a problem with relying upon the character's game attributes to have the character do social stuff? Why do the character's attributes in one instance count but the character's attributes in the other don't? Why even have Charisma scores and social skills? Why not min-max your physical attributes at the cost of your social skills/attributes?

 

[Storm Raven]

No. What I am saying to the players in my games are "You are playing a character. How you play them is up to you. If you want to play them as talkative or quiet, bullying, narrowminded, courageous, foolish, diplomatic, scared, insulting, friendly, conniving, analytical, rash, or whatever, that is up to you. There are rules that handle the physicality of things for the character but you play the character and decide what your character tries to physically do. I run everything else."

There are also rules that handle the sociability of things for the character you play. Why do you ignore those, but use the physical ones? Why does the player's skill become important in one venue, but in the other, the character's skill is the only thing that matters? You have yet to explain why this distinction makes any sense other than to say "just because", which isn't an answer, but rather a dodge.

If I'm a glib person, who is good at social interaction, why should I not design my character as a Charisma 6 half-orc with maximized physical stats? According to you, I can "role-play" him as a glib orator, skilled at negotiations and diplomacy and that's my choice. I get the social skills for free since I, the player, am good at them. I can use Charisma as a dump stat for no cost. Basically, I get something in game "for free" so to speak.

 

[Voadam]

False dichotomy. And now you're hiding behind the rules that you very clearly disdain in favor of 'real roleplay'?

Previously, you've as much said that if the player cannot perform certain actions, they can't in character, or are penalized for the attempt, since they're using the dice to aid in the play of said character. So, which is it? While I might not entirely agree with The Shaman's statements (nor do I entirely disagree), there wasn't any attempt to cloud the issue there.

I'm not following you.

How are you suggesting I'm hiding behind rules?

In my games yes, there are things characters can not do if the players can not do them. Players trump characters in certain things. If a player can't figure out a riddle, his character can not figure out a riddle. There is no intelligence check or skill roll involved (under the core rules no explicit checks for these types of things).

I could choose to make up a DC int check and apply mechanics and dice rolls to the challenge and make riddles for high int characters or lucky lower int characters and build off the games mechanics and some vague definitions to stick close to core rules.

However I choose not to have mental conclusions or social interactions resolved by mechanics. Either the players figure out the riddles or they don't. It is a deliberate choice to run a game a certain way.

 

[jdrakeh]

Any thoughts?

Strategy and roleplay are not mutually exclusive, despite what some would have you think - after all, D&D began life as a set of supplementary rules for an existing wargame. That sais, I think it is fair to say that D&D 3x focuses more on tabletop tactics than many previous editions of the same game have, but unfair to say that it does so at the expense of roleplay elements.

 

[Voadam]

Your opinion's your own, but it doesn't change the facts, Voadam.

You've got your preferred style of play, one which penalizes other styles. To enforce it, you exclude a sizeable portion of the rules in favor of what you think the game should be like, core books be damned. Of course, what you do at your table is your affair...but personally, I'm very glad that your table isn't anywhere near mine.

The social rules are what, one or two pages in the skill sections? Out of how many hundreds of pages of core books?

When I as DM want my game to be run differently than RAW yes, core books be damned. I believe the DMG even has a rule supporting that type of choice. As long as I tell my players up front so they know what they are getting into it is not a problem.

I've never denied it is a style preference. Note above my posts saying whether to include these rules for social mechanics is a design choice for style of play. Since the players can handle the interactions and mechanics can handle them you can run them purely on player interaction, purely on mechanics, or a combination. It is a choice among possibilities.

Some people like NERO LARPing.

Some people like MET LARPing.

Some people like D&D with social mechanics.

Some people like D&D without social mechanics.

Some people like other games.

Lots of ways for RPGs to be run to fit different play styles.

 

[Voadam]

There are also rules that handle the sociability of things for the character you play. Why do you ignore those, but use the physical ones?

Choice. Play style. Unnecessary mechanics bogging down play and social interactions or causing wierd results I don't want to run. Disdain for the actual mechanics used (static diplomacy targets, certain skills as non-class skills for many classes, etc.). Qualitative difference between physical and social skills.

 

[Storm Raven]

Choice. Play style. Unnecessary mechanics bogging down play and social interactions or causing wierd results I don't want to run. Disdain for the actual mechanics used (static diplomacy targets, certain skills as non-class skills for many classes, etc.).

So, does anyone but a bard, sorcerer, or paladin ever use Charisma as anything other than a dump stat? Do any of your players ever take ranks in social skills? Is there any reason not to min/max your character into a combat monster? How do you feel knowing that your "role-play" ideas work to the effect of encouraging min/maxing combat monsters?

Qualitative difference between physical and social skills.

This doesn't actually exist.

 

[Voadam]

If I'm a glib person, who is good at social interaction, why should I not design my character as a Charisma 6 half-orc with maximized physical stats? According to you, I can "role-play" him as a glib orator, skilled at negotiations and diplomacy and that's my choice. I get the social skills for free since I, the player, am good at them. I can use Charisma as a dump stat for no cost. Basically, I get something in game "for free" so to speak.

Depends how I'm running the game.

Option 1: Mechanics matter. I could run a game so that Charisma and skill totals are used to influence how interactions go without using the given charts. Modifiers would be ad hoc so the low charisma no skill character could have everything taken in the wrong context etc. but nothing he could point at to a chart and say "I expect my failure on this roll to be a two category shift of attitude."

Option 2: Game mechanics are for game effects only. A low cha character with no bluff skill is poor at feinting and would make a poor bard, sorcerer, or paladin. However he can play the character as an orc negotiator and it is not a problem.

3e is pretty balanced around combat, removing the social skills as social adjudication does not shift the balance that much.

 

[IcyCool]

Well, there's some truth to that charge. Disallowing social characters from using their social skills is not much fun for the social character's player. And depriving the players of their rightful fun is characteristic of a bad DM.

I have yet to disallow a player's concept. I have watched as non-social players attempted to play social characters, and resorted to "I roll bluff" (without even an attempt to roleplay). And I watched as said players and characters were absolutely no fun for anyone else at the table. IMO, allowing such a person to play such a character was a bad DMing move.

So I disagree with your assertion. And I sort of agree as well.

Now, I personally think it's a lot of fun to make my Bluff/Diplomacy/Whatever roll, see how well or poorly my character did, and then role-play that result. What I don't care for at all, though, is having a DM claim the right to decide whether my character succeeds or fails based on that DM's evaluation of my "performance" as a player...which sounds to me like what you're proposing. I say good riddance to that school of gaming thought!

I'm not proposing anything. This discussion isn't about fact. It's about opinion. And for the most part, I still require a roll of some sort. But as this is a role-playing game, I feel no guilt in telling players that they should be roleplaying.

Still are. It's just that there are a lot fewer things uncovered by the rules (and that's a good thing).

Perhaps it is just the players I've met recently, but I disagree. It seems like the players see a rule, and then feel cheated if the GM doesn't use it. I think for a GM, the rules are nice to have, but for some reason, players seem to have more of a feeling of entitlement. And that's bad.

If the DM isn't playing by the rules, I'd say they have every right to be upset. And if the DM doesn't know the rules well enough to run the game without breaking them, maybe he shouldn't be DMing.

Ahh, but that arguement is easily defeated. The GM is playing by Rule 0.

The bad old days of players having to suck the DM's $&%#@! to get a favorable ruling are gone. Power--in the form of clear and consistent rules--has been stripped from the tyrannical DMs and redistributed to the players. Huzzah!

While I'm sure you weren't serious with this comment, if you were doing that to your DM, you weren't role-playing. You weren't playing a strategy game either, for that matter.

 

[Storm Raven]

3e is pretty balanced around combat, removing the social skills as social adjudication does not shift the balance that much.

Umm, yeah. Maybe that is because you never bother to use the social interaction rules, so you don't actually know what the balance is when those rules are being used?