What ever happened to "role playing?"

[milotha]

Side note: I just realized what was really bugging me here.

There's no differentiation being made, in many of the "D&D is just rollplaying" arguments, between "roleplay" and "success". Most of the complaints I'm hearing boil down to "my character couldn't win without having the scores to do that social stuff, and that's not fair". And that's what really grates on me.

1) As soon as you make roleplaying about winning, about gaining levels and furthering the plot and getting more stuff, you're cheapening it -- and the people in the group who would roleplay will find their voices drowned out by every mediocre roleplayer in the group shouting, "I'm feeling angst right now!" in hellish unison, often while wearing a black T-shirt with an ankh prominently displayed.

2) I haven't heard anything about people roleplaying a low-charisma character and running into any trouble with it. I mean, you guys want roleplaying to matter more, right? C'mon, I'm sure somebody made Charisma their dump-stat once or twice. My group currently has two Cha10 and one Cha8 person, and they just love saying the wrong thing at the wrong time. The Cha10 guys are clueless and direct, respectively, and the Cha8 guy is just incredibly abrasive. We play point-buy. Everyone chose these ability scores for themselves. They're having a great time. They don't expect to win by social skill rolls, because they didn't put the points there -- and they give each other grief in-character, set each other up for hilariously socially inept one-liners, and enjoy themselves a ton. The face-man in the group is the one who wins with social skill rolls, but that certainly doesn't mean that nobody else is roleplaying. If that's not happening in your group, then, well... your group has gotten into the habit of doing nothing except that which leads as quickly as possible to victory, with no side-trips for roleplaying along the way. Your group would, by that definition, be a bunch of rollplayers. Sucks etre vous.

3) Social skills should be required in order to win, even with roleplaying. Just like you wouldn't let a 3rd-level wizard cast Meteor Swarm because he roleplayed it really well, you shouldn't automatically give somebody the keys to the castle just because their Cha10, no-social-skills character made a good point with the royal seneschal. To do otherwise is essentially to cheat. To confuse roleplaying with victory is to completely misunderstand what roleplaying is, and to pervert one of the most important parts of the game.

1) Roleplaying doesn't have anything necessarily to do with success. It does have to do with the character's actions affecting the game. If the game is reduced to die rolls without any consideration of the actualy actions, or intent of the players, then whey are the players even sitting at the table?! If you roleplay out a social situation, it doesn't mean that you succeeded anymore. It means you had an impact on it. I never find that just rolling a d20 is a good substitute for this.

2) Perhaps because low charisma players don't expect to effect the situation. If I play one, I will role play out sabotaging the situation before we even get to a die roll. The GM seems quite willing to raise the DC based on my statements. Consider playing the high charisma player. If you say something effective, is this going to lower the DC? If roleplaying isn't rewarded, then it doesn't.

 

[IceBear]

But it's not about rules for role-playing; it's about encouragement to role-play.

I'll give you a specific example: Compare the flavor-text on your average Kit in a 2E product to the flavor-text on your average Prestige Class for a 3E product. Not the rules, here; just the fluff. Consider how the Kits describe their probable role within a campaign and compare it to how Prestige Classes barely even try (some don't try at all!). Compare how 2E describes the kind of personality that would likely be attracted to the Kit (and why) to how a Prestige Class is rarely more than a set of neat-o abilities. Sure, the DMG does touch on Prestige Classes being used/applied in this fashion (at least, the 3.0 one did...), but then this concept is burried beneath the presentation of Prestige Classes as nothing but sets of new abilities with just enough flavor to serve as an excuse for their existance.

To me, it's the difference between "here's a piece of world-flavoring for you to consider for your game world" and "here's a short blurb for you to sell your GM on so he'll let you have these powers..."

To which I'll add that I tend to reject Prestige Classes if the introduction to that Prestige Class doesn't grab my interest (i.e., if the flavor is lacking, I don't even pause to review the mechanics). As it is now, I use less than 10 published Prestige Classes, ignoring most others for that very reason. In comparison, I found myself considering Kits quite often; even if the mechanics weren't right for my game, they usually inspired me to work-up something similar but more suitable.

Well, considering I never used kits and I don't use Prestige Classes I'll take your world for it. Sorry - I don't use the OFFICAL kits and Prestige Classes

I make my own campaign world. In my world "prestige classes" tend to be some sort of organization, and you'll have to join that organization first (which tends to be all about roleplay).

I guess I understand what you mean about the missing "fluff", but "fluff" doesn't equal roleplaying to me. I look at the missing "fluff" being gone due to economics rather than a move to get away from roleplaying. And the DMG gives a talk about how to use prestige classes in it, so I think that's why they get rid of the specific fluff for each class - they gave the general in the DMG.

Edit: Also, someone mentioned earlier about 3E being more of a toolkit for a "generic" campagin more than the other editions. I think that's some of the problem. It's easy to add fluff text for a campaign specific prestige class, but word it wrong in a generic one and it may not "fit". The DMG advices using prestige classes to satisfy a "role" in a campaign. That's more of a DM call than a rulebooks.

 

[IceBear]

I think the view that the rules to 3e are complete or are a complete skeleton is the problem. If you want to do something, then the GM will attempt to find some rule in the book that applies to your action and make you roll on it.

That's just great, except that there actually aren't all that many social skills. They aren't all inclusive, they are all based off of one stat, which isn't necessarily representative of the entire skill.

Is Bluff just based off of your charisma? Doesn't the intelligence of the bluffer also play into how believeable the bluff is? Doesn't the strength of the person play into how believeable an intimidate can be?

Do you really believe that there is a modifier in the book for every conceivable combination of social interactions. Can social interaction be so codified, that a single die roll is appropriate? How can the DCs be so codified in advance of the player's actions.

If you boil the game directly down to the rules in the book and making everything a roll based on the rules in the book, then do the player's actions at all effect the roll? Since the DCs are set by the GM, how is making the players roll any less arbitrary then having the GM just say that you failed or succeeded?

I guess that I really view that reducing the game down to rolls against preset DCs strips the players social interactions of any relevance.

It goes without saying that no rules are complete and without flaw - otherwise there wouldn't be errata or a FAQ I'm sorry if you take my general statements so literally. All I meant was in the past you might have one DM that completely roleplayed social encounters, another that had you make Charisma checks, another that had some house rule, etc. That might make things harder for newer players to even start to feel comfortable with the rules to roleplay. With 3E there is this consistent base. THAT's what I meant.

Here's how I play social skills in my game. I am CERTAIN you'll find some flaw or problem with it, so please keep it to yourself - it works fine for my group of ROLEPLAYERS!!! and it's much the same as we did it in 2nd Edition too (minus the clear cut skills). A player is interacting with an NPC. Depending on the interaction we might not roll dice at all (routine interaction). However, if there is any doubt about how it would go (convincing a guard to let you past when he's under orders not to let anyone past) then the player will roleplay out how he attempts to get past the guard. After this is done, he will roll the appropriate skill (Bluff/Diplomancy/Initimidate, whatever) and I will adjust the DC depending on the roleplaying (maybe he said just the right thing to make the guard trust him).

I also used Complex skill checks (which I stole from Alternity). Perhaps in order to negotiate the trade deal will take three successful Diplomacy checks over the course of the meeting.

I think you're overstating your attitude with this "one die roll thing". Why don't we all just have the PCs roll one die and if they succeed they complete the mission?

Anyone that used to roleplay still will. Those that rollplayed still will. New groups will probably rollplay too (and that's no different than before), but eventually they'll learn to roleplay. You strike me as an elitist who is looking down his nose at the "young whipper snappers" and forgetting when you were one too.

It's not the rules. It's the experience of the players and the group. And yes, even if attracts more rollplayers than roleplayers, it's good. We're getting older and the hobby is losing to video games. Any new blood is good. With experience they might learn to roleplay. Why not help them along?

 

[milotha]

It goes without saying that no rules are complete and without flaw - otherwise there wouldn't be errata or a FAQ I'm sorry if you take my general statements so literally. All I meant was in the past you might have one DM that completely roleplayed social encounters, another that had you make Charisma checks, another that had some house rule, etc. That might make things harder for newer players to even start to feel comfortable with the rules to roleplay. With 3E there is this consistent base. THAT's what I meant.

Here's how I play social skills in my game. I am CERTAIN you'll find some flaw or problem with it, so please keep it to yourself - it works fine for my group of ROLEPLAYERS!!! and it's much the same as we did it in 2nd Edition too (minus the clear cut skills). A player is interacting with an NPC. Depending on the interaction we might not roll dice at all (routine interaction). However, if there is any doubt about how it would go (convincing a guard to let you past when he's under orders not to let anyone past) then the player will roleplay out how he attempts to get past the guard. After this is done, he will roll the appropriate skill (Bluff/Diplomancy/Initimidate, whatever) and I will adjust the DC depending on the roleplaying (maybe he said just the right thing to make the guard trust him).

I also used Complex skill checks (which I stole from Alternity). Perhaps in order to negotiate the trade deal will take three successful Diplomacy checks over the course of the meeting.

I think you're overstating your attitude with this "one die roll thing". Why don't we all just have the PCs roll one die and if they succeed they complete the mission?

Anyone that used to roleplay still will. Those that rollplayed still will. New groups will probably rollplay too (and that's no different than before), but eventually they'll learn to roleplay. You strike me as an elitist who is looking down his nose at the "young whipper snappers" and forgetting when you were one too.

It's not the rules. It's the experience of the players and the group. And yes, even if attracts more rollplayers than roleplayers, it's good. We're getting older and the hobby is losing to video games. Any new blood is good. With experience they might learn to roleplay. Why not help them along?

Sounds great to me. That's very similar to the method that I've found to work and still allow the players to role-play and impact the situation.

As for being elitist, I've seen experienced role-players players fall prey to just saying in the new system "I bluff the guard." It's these people that I'm concerned about, and I think that somehow the rules of the game or how they are written have encouraged GMs and players to think this way. They won't do this in some other systems, but there is something about d20 that makes them think this is OK.

 

[Zappo]

That game was my baby.

Dude, for being a part of something that royally irks the WoD elitists, you have just gained ten cool points in my eyes.

Kinda like visiting a 2E forum and mentioning 3E?

Probably; I don't visit 2E forums much. The irony of self-appointed masters of rhetoric and intrigue getting involved in a pointless flame war which features no real arguments but lots of swearwords somehow escapes them.

Everyone is contending that the new players will learn from the older players. That somehow role playing will be its own reward. This is great dreaming, but many people are just plain 1) scared of trying 2) intimidated by the other players 3) to unmotivated to bother 4) repressed by GMs that actually don't bother to listen to the players anyway.

The idea that roleplaying doesn't need a reward isn't dreaming; it works for me and my friends, here and now, in the real world. Anyway, these all sound like classical Problems With The Players Not With The System to me. Making you less shy, or making your friends stop being jerks, isn't D&D's job. If you are a newbie in a group that doesn't do roleplay, you will not learn to roleplay, and there's nothing the rules can do about this.

D&D has a fairly tactical combat system that has seen some fairly extensive play testing over the years. As for the social skills, IMHO they seem to be less well thought out, less well play tested, less complete, and less comprehensive than everyone is making them to seem.

True. I don't contend that these rules are perfect, but only that their existance is justified, and that the lack of modifiers based on the quality of the player's roleplaying is a wise choice.

However, do you want to compare them with those of the previous editions?

 

[takyris]

I think the view that the rules to 3e are complete or are a complete skeleton is the problem. If you want to do something, then the GM will attempt to find some rule in the book that applies to your action and make you roll on it.

Yup.

That's just great, except that there actually aren't all that many social skills. They aren't all inclusive, they are all based off of one stat, which isn't necessarily representative of the entire skill.

Never used Sense Motive or Spot in a conversation, or Knowledge to figure out something that might apply well to the situation? That's Wisdom and Intelligence right there.

Is Bluff just based off of your charisma? Doesn't the intelligence of the bluffer also play into how believeable the bluff is? Doesn't the strength of the person play into how believeable an intimidate can be?

Nope and nope. I have several very intelligent friends who can't lie to save their lives. If you've built a high-Int character with no ranks in bluff, you've just built them. Thank you for asking.

High Intelligence lets you put more ranks into Bluff, however, and Strength can be used to either get a circumstance bonus (like you'd get from picking someone up by the lapels) or instead of Charisma on a per-time basis as the GM feels appropriate. I believe that's listed as an official option somewhere.

Do you really believe that there is a modifier in the book for every conceivable combination of social interactions. Can social interaction be so codified, that a single die roll is appropriate?

See "Complex checks" in Unearthed Arcana if you want to get really involved in complex rolling systems. Failing that, the modifier in the book for every conceivable situation is right in there. +2, as a general rule of thumb, or more or less as the GM feels appropriate, up to and including the +20 bonus to Sense Motive checks a target gets if your bluff is completely ludicrous. It's in the book.

How can the DCs be so codified in advance of the player's actions.

That's a bit like asking how a wall's climb DC can be known before the player decides to try to climb it. The DM says "Hey, this guy's unfriendly, but he's also afraid of the law, so if you bluff or intimidate and use the town guards in some way, you'll get a +4 to your check. Otherwise, you get a -2, because this guy dislikes you." The stage is set for the players.

If you boil the game directly down to the rules in the book and making everything a roll based on the rules in the book, then do the player's actions at all effect the roll?

What is this, the eighth time we've brought this up? Yes, Mil, they do. Please stop with the false rhetoric. If I want to bluff my way past the guard, I can roleplay out that bluff to the best of my ability. If my bluff is very believable ("The king's attendant told me to come by to pay some tax or something, said I was late in my payments, so I really have to get in"), you get a bonus on your Bluff check. If it's somewhat more difficult ("Look, I won't lie to you, I've got to get in there to see a girl; let me in, and I'll tell you all about her later, eh?"), you get a penalty. If it's ludicrous ("I am Fildo the Leprechain, let me in and I'll grant you wishes!"), you get a huge penalty. It's in the book.

Since the DCs are set by the GM, how is making the players roll any less arbitrary then having the GM just say that you failed or succeeded?

You can do the same thing in combat, if you use that logic. The DM can always say that you hit or miss or kill the bad guy or take 100 points of damage. Your big problems boil down to "The DM can screw me" and "I can't automatically win regardless of the rules by giving a speech that somebody with my character's charisma and skill ranks has no business giving."

I guess that I really view that reducing the game down to rolls against preset DCs strips the players social interactions of any relevance.

Except that it's not reducing, they're only preset in the same sense that every DC in the game is preset, and they don't do any such thing.

If you have an entire set of people sitting there and going "I bluff the guard, I rolled a 12, do I succeed." Then how does the 3e system discourage this? Where is it in the system that this isn't how the social skills should be played? According to many of the posts this is a valid way to let the social encounters go.

1) The system doesn't discourage you from stripping naked and running around the room shouting "Look, guys, I'm invisible!" either. That's what the GM is for. In this case, the GM would need to know what kind of bluff you were making, anyway, so even by the basic rules, he needs to ask you for more information.

2) It's a valid way to let it go if that's the way you want your games to run. If you don't want your games to run that way, then it's not valid. Ta-dah.

What if the players just aren't bothering to stretch their wings beyond this? What if they aren't motivated by the rules to bother to role-play? What if they would really enjoy it, but they just aren't being encouraged to do this? If you contend that the rules allow both types of play. That's fine. They do. But how do they encourage new players who aren't familiar with role playing to add this into their character?

Sounds like the GM's job, not the book's job. The book gives the player a list of racial archetype personalities to use as a template, a list of class behavioral tendencies to use as a template, and a list of nine possible alignments to use as a template. That's a whole lot of "here's how you can roleplay your character" right there.

Everyone is contending that the new players will learn from the older players. That somehow role playing will be its own reward. This is great dreaming, but many people are just plain 1) scared of trying 2) intimidated by the other players 3) to unmotivated to bother 4) repressed by GMs that actually don't bother to listen to the players anyway.

1) Bull. 2) Bull. 3) Bull. 4) You're pulling out the "I could have a bad GM" argument again. Can we all as a group agree that "Yes, but what if I had a bad GM?" is not a valid argument by anyone? A GM who lets you level every time you roleplay is not good. A GM who ignores every attempt of yours to roleplay and doesn't let circumstances affect dice rolls is not good. Please. If a White Wolf Storyteller puts sugar in my gas tank, kicks me in the shins, and then steals my girlfriend and takes her into the back room for a "personal roleplaying session", does this prove that the Storyteller system is bad? No. So stop using "My GM was bad" and "But what if GMs do this?" as powerful argumentative proof of your position. They don't work. Every time you've said this, the people here have said, "Wow, sounds like you had a bummer of a DM." Nobody is defending that behavior. But it's not relevant to this conversation.

1) Roleplaying doesn't have anything necessarily to do with success. It does have to do with the character's actions affecting the game. If the game is reduced to die rolls without any consideration of the actualy actions, or intent of the players, then whey are the players even sitting at the table?! If you roleplay out a social situation, it doesn't mean that you succeeded anymore. It means you had an impact on it. I never find that just rolling a d20 is a good substitute for this.

For the sweet love of fey-touched halflings, why, sweet merciful eight-sided-dice, why do you keep turning "Not let you do something your character couldn't do, based on your ability scores and skill ranks" into "Not letting your actions affect the game"? Your Cha8, no-social-skills character can certainly affect the situation. He's just not likely to improve it much on his own. If he uses the right information (like using the fact that he knows the dude is afraid of the town guard in his intimidate check), he could get a circumstance modifier, even. That's in the book. If you wanted more, then you should have played a more charismatic character, or someone with more ranks in social skills.

Consider playing the high charisma player. If you say something effective, is this going to lower the DC? If roleplaying isn't rewarded, then it doesn't

You're mashing cause and effect together. The low-charisma character (played by a high-charisma player) is saying the rude stuff because his character isn't charismatic. He knows that his roll isn't going to be very high. He's anticipating that.

Feh. Should have left awhile ago. This is a silly discussion.

 

[Zappo]

I also used Complex skill checks (which I stole from Alternity). Perhaps in order to negotiate the trade deal will take three successful Diplomacy checks over the course of the meeting.

Actually, that's how the Diplomacy skill works in 3E D&D.

 

[Phosphoros]

Greetings Lokishadow,
I'm new here as well (second post) but I am also not new to RPGing. I've been doing it since '81.
I'm a little late to this conversation (15 pages late lol) but I wanted to share some of my experiences and comments on this, IMHO, very important topic.

A friend of mine of quite a few years is a DM. He mainly does AD&D 2ed and Alternity. He'll play any game though except for super hero games and I've even gotten him to try that. He's not a bad player and is a pretty decent person but he can't roleplay to save his life. By this I mean develop a character, play the character and effect the changes that would happen to a person during such adventures/horrors/battles/etc... It's always the same character. Shallow, whiny, total Chicken sh*t. Unfortunately, this wouldn't be that bad if the player himself wasn't that exact character.
The real problem starts when he DMs.
He is the pinnacle of Killer Dungeon Master. A real Marque de sade type of DM. His characters are center stage and they are uber powerful. They have all the goodies and they want to use each one on your character.
I remember the last I played a AD&D campaign with him.
Me and my "team" where scouting a forested area Unexplored for Millenia (even though the village that was being attacked was only 200 feet from the edge of the forest and all the house where wood and mud types) when we where jumped by a "creation of his own mind". It was called a Kur. I know he didin't make this up and I remember that exact creature from a book, just don't remember what book. Anyhow, we get attacked by 6 of these intelligent, magic using, phase shifting, 8th level creatures. We are a party of 3rd and 4th levels. Me being the highest at 4th.
Of course these things rape the party. I'm in single digit HPs and I land a perfect 20. No mods, nothing. Guess what? It dodged. It's base dodge he informs me +18 so it only needs to roll a 2 or higher to dodge. Of course it did.
After the adventure if you could call it that, I hung around until everyone had left (I didn't want to nail him infront of the other players) I informed him that while I value his friendship it would be a cold day in hell when I let him DM me again. This was not an isolated incident. It was jsut the last straw.
The roleplaying part of his games and many others I've played in has gone by the wayside in favor of Munchkining your character to death and hack and slash.
I love hack and slash just as much as the next person but I don't want it all the time.
As a DM I try to make compelling storylines, interesting plot twists, and well devloped characters. I always make an effort to make it a challenge without trying to kill them.
One thing I always say to my players before a new game, especially if they are new, is I will never put you in a situation you can not get out of. There is always a way to get out of a situation.
I also reward role playing with something that fits the mecanics of the given game. Is my Fantasy campaign (AU) I reward with a hero point or extra experience. I let people know it too. They see others getting rewards for bringing the character to life they will more than likely do the same.
In my Babylon 5 Campaign (before I gave up since all anyone wanted to be was a Psi-cop or Ranger) I gave creds.

The last example (I know this is long, apologies if you're completely bored) is a modern day horror game I ran. It was heavily modded. I had basically taken the original rule book (Kult RPG) and spent several months redeveloping it.
I had two player. I'm the most proud of this game as it was heavily based in role playing. The players learned to trust me for basics as they brought their characters to life. And I must say, it was better than any game I've ever played.... ever.
The role playing was intense and fun. At one point a main character that the PCs had dealings with and was a main DM (me) character died. The role playing was done so well that there was tears and it was acted out to it's conclusion. The great thing is that about 10 minutes after the session was over. We where cracking up and ordering another pizza.
I ended up getting a friend to make me two fake Oscars and giving to them the last night of gameplay after 8 years of play.

So anyhow, Lokishadow. I know how you feel. it's really to bad all of us Role players can't get together and have a game together. I bet it would be great.
Hopefully if the thread drifted I didn't pull it off to far.

If you got this far, congratulations!

Phosphoros

 

[Bendris Noulg]

Y'know, I know you were replying to Milotha, but to this...

You strike me as an elitist who is looking down his nose at the "young whipper snappers" and forgetting when you were one too.

I gotta say, I love it when someone resorts to name calling. I'd also like to take this time to say that being called an "elitist" bugs me about as much as being called "greedy" bothers Donald Trump.

In other words, I've earned it.

Beyond that, I think this conversation has just about burned itself out, especially since the name-calling is starting and I can smell the smoke already. I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree about whether or not people that don't role-play are role-playing.

How it is possible to disagree about whether or not people that don't role-play are role-playing, but we obviously are disagreeing about whether or not people that don't role-play are role-playing.

So, I guess we should all just go back to play our role-playing games...

Whether or not we're role-playing, of course.

 

[Phosphoros]

I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree about whether or not people that don't role-play are role-playing.

I've finally read through much of the thread and I must say that it's kind of sad that it's turned out so harsh in the end.

I think an important point here is that everyone has their own idea of what role-playing is. To argue it seems a little futile.
I have to agree with Bendris that the only real course of action is to agree to disagree.
I remember a flame war a long time ago on the EverQuest forums about what role-playing was. Granted, EQ is just a semi-original rip-off of old school D&D but the agrument went on forever.
Kind of like this one. Which makes me glad I made a long post just a couple posts up.

Phosphoros