The need for social skills in D&D

[replicant2]

I've seen it espoused, time and time again on this board and others: People who disregard "social" skills such as diplomacy, sense motive, intimidate, in some cases even gather information. Their reasoning is typically as follows: Why should I let a player roll to resolve an action that should be addressed by good role-playing?

Hogwash.

Let's face it, not all players are created equal. I've seen my share of shy players during games. I've seen games where amateur actors dominate the role-playing, causing others who don't possess the same thespian ability to fade into the background. Other people just have different playing styles: They love the tactical side of D&D, but don't feel the need to get into character.

Should these types of players be prevented from playing bards, or information-gathering rogues? Should they be prevented from playing fighters who can inspire a group of townspeople to defend their town from invading orcs? Of course not. But DMs who handwaive away skills such as diplomacy or intimiate do just that.

Put another way: Why don't DMs who prefer to resolve diplomacy through role-play do the same for other skills? The player who has an uber-powerful fighter doesn't have to describe the feint and series of crafty parries and counterthrusts that result in a critical strike; the rogue who disarms a highly complex trap can do so with a die-roll, not by a player who thinks like McGyver and can describe how a complex spring mechanism works.

Now, I'm not espousing the elimination of good role-play. Being in character is what separates D&D from other board games. Encourage role-play, but in the end, let the dice decide. If you want to tack on a modifier for a great speech by the player, feel free. But don't penalize the shy player.

Anyways, just some food for thought.

 

[delericho]

I agree, somewhat. I wouldn't want to see those things ever resolved solely through the use of the dice roll, but neither do I feel the dice should be made irrelevant. What I've seen several times, though, is players using Charisma as a dump stat, not investing in any social skills, and then expecting the DM to let this weakness slide through role-playing since the alternative will really cause the game to drag.

It's a vexing problem, and one that I don't think 3e fully fixes. But 3e is a distinct improvement over previous editions in this regard, and I would like to think 4e would be an improvement again. Alas, looking at some of the trends in D&D supplements over the last year or so, that doesn't appear to be the case (they seem leaning far more towards 'nothing but combat'), but that's another rant.

 

[|)ar|{]

The same can be said for knowledge skills. I tend to let my players roleplay if they can keep it within the skills of their character. If they start to stray one way or the other I ask for rolls which I may adjust one way or the other based on the roleplaying. Roleplaying is fine and good but when the 6 int orc starts coming up with all the battle plans, the 7 chr dwarf ranger faces the party and the fighter just happens to know that you need obsure alchemical weapon X to hard the BBEG, well than you call in the dice.

 

[atomn]

I think that a social skills should have a large basis on the actual roleplaying instead of the die roll. But I find it should be mostly a penalty due to poor roleplaying instead of a bonus for a good speech. I've been in games before where the social aspects have relied entirely on the die roll, which results in situations like:

DM: "The rogue searches the pockets of an injured companion and pulls out her change purse and puts it in his pocket and walks away. Anyone nearby make a DC X Spot check and if you make it, you see this happen."

Ranger: "OOC: I made it." "Rogue, I saw you steal from her. Put her coin purse back."

Rogue: "What? I don't know what you're talking about. I didn't take anything."

GM: "Roll a Bluff check against a Sense Motive check."

Rogue with a high Charisma and a maxed Bluff beats Ranger's Sense Motive and the Ranger is brainwashed into thinking that the Rogue never took anything and doesn't know what the Ranger is talking about.

Relying too heavily on the die roll makes for a sort of Jedi mind trick.

Additionally, while I can appreciate that some people are more shy than others, I think relying heavily on social die rolls stifles the player as a roleplayer. If you're a shy player who doesn't do much in character roleplaying and can get away with a die roll while saying "I Bluff them", you're going to have a tough time developing as a roleplayer because there's little need to try to roleplay.

Although I do agree that fantastic roleplayers shouldn't be able to get away with great in-character dialogue when their Diplomacy modifier is -2.

 

[Darth Shoju]

I find they can also speed things up at times. A lot of the time it bogs a session down when a GM spends too much time with one player role-playing something that the other characters aren't involved in. I find that skills like Gather Information are great for this; often when a party hits town the characters go off to take care of different things. While the other characters are re-supplying or casting divination magics or talking to a specific NPC, the party rogue can say "I'm using my Gather Info to spend the day finding out about (whatever)". That way the DM can roll, take care of what the other players are doing and then get back to the rogue about what he found out. It works really smoothly in my experience.

And then when it comes to Bluff and Diplomacy, you still have to give the DM some idea of what you are saying to the NPC. In our group, the less verbose members usually paraphrase what their characters say "I tell the guard captain that we are a traveling band of performers." The DM rolls to see what kind of reaction we get. At this point even the non-actors often get into first-person role-playing. For those of us who are amateur thespians and start off in-character with some grand explanation, the DM usually reflects that in the roll in some way.

I dunno, I guess you can put me in the camp of people who has never believed that social skills hurts role-playing. The people who tend to lean on them weren't doing a lot of role-playing to begin with; at least this way they get to do something outside of combat.

 

[Shroomy]

I think that a social skills should have a large basis on the actual roleplaying instead of the die roll. But I find it should be mostly a penalty due to poor roleplaying instead of a bonus for a good speech. I've been in games before where the social aspects have relied entirely on the die roll, which results in situations like:

DM: "The rogue searches the pockets of an injured companion and pulls out her change purse and puts it in his pocket and walks away. Anyone nearby make a DC X Spot check and if you make it, you see this happen."

Ranger: "OOC: I made it." "Rogue, I saw you steal from her. Put her coin purse back."

Rogue: "What? I don't know what you're talking about. I didn't take anything."

GM: "Roll a Bluff check against a Sense Motive check."

Rogue with a high Charisma and a maxed Bluff beats Ranger's Sense Motive and the Ranger is brainwashed into thinking that the Rogue never took anything and doesn't know what the Ranger is talking about.

Relying too heavily on the die roll makes for a sort of Jedi mind trick.

I think that is a gross misinterpretation of the rules. The Bluff skill description says that the effect is not a suggestion, that such an outlandish lie would require a high modifier (at least +20 if not higher), and that any successful Bluff would have an effect of one round. At best, the rogue would induce 6 seconds of hesitation on the part of the ranger.

While taking role-playing consideration into account (or eliminating social skills altogether) is cool if everyone around the table agrees to it, I find arguments stating that the social skills lead to such abusive situations are based on a faulty interpretation of the rules.

 

[Ringan]

I agree that letting roleplaying having too much of a say for the outcomes of social situations can lead to certain people dominating. I think one's skill ranks/other stats should determine the quantitative aspects and roleplaying the qualitative ones.

I do agree that just saying, "I bluff them" is bad gaming, but I thought it was generally agreed that doing that gives you circumstance penalties? If not, I think it should be.

 

[replicant2]

Additionally, while I can appreciate that some people are more shy than others, I think relying heavily on social die rolls stifles the player as a roleplayer. If you're a shy player who doesn't do much in character roleplaying and can get away with a die roll while saying "I Bluff them", you're going to have a tough time developing as a roleplayer because there's little need to try to roleplay.

I agree with this, and were I the DM I would encourage the player to at least state the intent of his or her bluff. They don't have to act it out, but they should at least say something to the effect of, "I attempt to bluff the hobgoblin chief into believing that the neighboring orc tribe was responsible for the attack on his raiding party, not us." But then you should resolve it with a die roll.

 

[Mallus]

I agree that letting roleplaying having too much of a say for the outcomes of social situations can lead to certain people dominating.

Let me ask you this...

How is that any different from combat being 'dominated' by certain people, ie, the ones with good tactics?

Consider that tactical skill is not abstractly represented in the rules and comes solely from the player. Is that another problem that needs fixing?

 

[shadow]

I really agree with replicant. As, a shyer player, I often felt like I was being penalized when I wanted to play a diplomat or rogue type character. One of the worst games that I was ever in was a campaign where the DM forced every player to be in character all the time. If you (the player) weren't charismatic enough you could never play a fast-talking, glib rogue. I was playing a supposedly charismatic bard, but I was unable to do anything because as a player, I could never out talk the DM.

In another game I was in, the party was put on trial. Then, the DM put me under the spotlight to make a defense. Everything that I said, my character was assumed to say (with the same inflections and tone of voice). Unable to come up with an eloquent defense at the spur of the moment, the DM snickered and said sarcastically, "I hope you never have to give a defense in real life!"

If players want to play a wizard, do we expect them to research medieval alchemy and real-life occultic beliefs? Do we expect players who play a fighter to learn actual combat maneuvers? Why then, should we expect players who play roguish characters to be naturally charismatic and gifted at fast talking?