NOW LIVE! Today's the day you meet your new best friend. You don’t have to leave Wolfy behind... In 'Pets & Sidekicks' your companions level up with you!

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="jgsugden" data-source="post: 8952959" data-attributes="member: 2629">Social covers every interaction between beings, so it covers most of the game.  You have social interactions within combats.To me, the mechanics have to be light and non-intrusive.  Social conversations require timing and acting to convey a good story.  Stopping the action to roll dice really gets in the way of telling a good story.  To that end, I try to limit the situation to 1 or 2 rolls for a lengthy situation - and I usually have it take place early in the situation.In my campaigns, players tell me what they're attempting socially.  Then, I think about whether their ability scores support what they are attempting. If so, they passively achieve what they attempt.  If not, I may call for a roll or determine that they do not succeed based upon the impact to the game of their potential failure.Example, two 9th level PCs walk into a bar and locate an underground figure that sells information.  Thewy know that the figure has information about a quest they are working to resolve, and they want that information.  The two figures are an 8 charisma barbarian with no charisma or wisdom skills, and a warlock with a 20 charisma, 16 wisdom and proficiency in insight, persuasian and intimidation. I determine that unless the PCs have a good introduction, starting a conversation with this figure (who had some bad blood with the PCs in the past) would be a moderate challenge - DC 15.  If the barbarian player says they walk up and say, "We know you've got information on a Tortle named Grunk.  We want to know where to find him, and who might be with him.": I would either tell the barbarian that the figure brushes them off without a response (as it wasn't a partocularly great opening - not something that would give them help on the DC) or I'd ask them to make a charisma check with a DC of 15 to start the negotiations.If the warlock player said the same thing, I'd just go straight into the negotiation as the +8 persuasian bonus is enough to get past the DC to start negotiations with the fesity underground figure.  I've used these types of techniques for decades and have never really felt like there was a gap in my game caused by the approach.  It is fast and effective.  Most of the 40 years I've been playing didn't even have the roll element.  I just figured out success and failure based upon ability scores - I think it was late 2E when I really started to allow people to roll a die to improve their odds of success.  Prior to that, I listened to what people said and asked how charismatic you'd have to be to "pull it off" in the situation.</blockquote>

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