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What is a Social challenge, anyways?
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<blockquote data-quote="AbdulAlhazred" data-source="post: 8950907" data-attributes="member: 82106"><p>OK, so NOW we do get to some of what I would call fertile ground. I basically don't get much from pregenerated adventure content. I mean, now and then there are some exceptions. I think products like the 4e Gloomwrought & Beyond can be pretty useful, but it doesn't really present ADVENTURES, its a city gazetteer with loads and loads of situations and potential scenarios that PCs could get involved with. When you go from there to something like a module, now you have actual encounter design, and frankly now you're expected to engage in some form of trad play. So, many of those encounters could be pretty useful and work out fine. Typically the combat ones (usually a bit tame for my tastes, but some are fun) but NOT typically the more social ones, which are attempting to move things along certain specific 'paths'. When I am running a social encounter type of scenario, I don't envisage ANY specific outcomes. I will consider the fictional position, pure and simple. This character is X, he might potentially accept Y, he wants Z, etc. I think in fact this thread has pretty well-covered anything technical there I can say at this point! </p><p></p><p>So, the nut of my proposition here is that social scenarios need to provide constraints, very similar to combat ones. You can go here, you can't go over there, this guy has this ploy he can use against you, this other guy might help if you approach correctly, etc. But you can't easily dictate what all the moves are going to be ahead, and its VERY VERY HARD to write these things at the detail level of 'module play' ahead of time and in a generic fashion. I've seen people do PRETTY well, there's a 4e module called Courts of the Shadow Fey that was put out by Kobold that I was a collaborator on (Bauer is an awesome guy) that did really well. It, again, avoided really nailing things down to specific encounters. It presented the various factions, the 'rules of court', the various ploys that would be used, individuals and their motives, and an overall scenario. There wasn't any specific set way that things would work out, AT ALL. In fact the whole module was basically one giant social situation. It didn't use any specific existing rules, but a sort of mini-game was laid out where the PCs could become accepted by certain fey, or make them enemies, or whatever, and that would open new doors. The party also has a very specific agenda of their own, so there's an overall kind of a bargain that can potentially happen. It wasn't perfect, a party of dwarves would be completely hosed, for instance, but it worked.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="AbdulAlhazred, post: 8950907, member: 82106"] OK, so NOW we do get to some of what I would call fertile ground. I basically don't get much from pregenerated adventure content. I mean, now and then there are some exceptions. I think products like the 4e Gloomwrought & Beyond can be pretty useful, but it doesn't really present ADVENTURES, its a city gazetteer with loads and loads of situations and potential scenarios that PCs could get involved with. When you go from there to something like a module, now you have actual encounter design, and frankly now you're expected to engage in some form of trad play. So, many of those encounters could be pretty useful and work out fine. Typically the combat ones (usually a bit tame for my tastes, but some are fun) but NOT typically the more social ones, which are attempting to move things along certain specific 'paths'. When I am running a social encounter type of scenario, I don't envisage ANY specific outcomes. I will consider the fictional position, pure and simple. This character is X, he might potentially accept Y, he wants Z, etc. I think in fact this thread has pretty well-covered anything technical there I can say at this point! So, the nut of my proposition here is that social scenarios need to provide constraints, very similar to combat ones. You can go here, you can't go over there, this guy has this ploy he can use against you, this other guy might help if you approach correctly, etc. But you can't easily dictate what all the moves are going to be ahead, and its VERY VERY HARD to write these things at the detail level of 'module play' ahead of time and in a generic fashion. I've seen people do PRETTY well, there's a 4e module called Courts of the Shadow Fey that was put out by Kobold that I was a collaborator on (Bauer is an awesome guy) that did really well. It, again, avoided really nailing things down to specific encounters. It presented the various factions, the 'rules of court', the various ploys that would be used, individuals and their motives, and an overall scenario. There wasn't any specific set way that things would work out, AT ALL. In fact the whole module was basically one giant social situation. It didn't use any specific existing rules, but a sort of mini-game was laid out where the PCs could become accepted by certain fey, or make them enemies, or whatever, and that would open new doors. The party also has a very specific agenda of their own, so there's an overall kind of a bargain that can potentially happen. It wasn't perfect, a party of dwarves would be completely hosed, for instance, but it worked. [/QUOTE]
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What is a Social challenge, anyways?
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