Quote from: Catelf;790573The situation was indeed when the tester asked if he may borrow the other one's mobile phone.
If he wore costume, he was ok'd, but if he wore a hoodie, he was not.

Keep in mind, if someone comes up to you and asks to borrow your phone, your first concern is they might be intending to rob you. I think in that rather specific situation where the stakes are quite high and you have to make a snap judgment, you will be making it based largely on how they are dressed. Hoodies have different associations in different places though and not sure what kind of costume people were wearing (for example if someone is dressed like a police officer, you are probably pretty likely to give them the phone). I don't think this proves charisma doesn't matter or doesn't exist, it just shows that you have to account for the specific scenario when factoring in something like charisma.

so there are are two questions here,

i) is charisma a useful stat?
ii) is the reaction roll modified by charisma a useful mechanic?

the answer to part one is a depends. If you want to simulate a living being in a well realised fantasy world such that the entity exists apart from it's controller then yes charisma is useful but I know a lot of people prefer the player to inject their charisma and see that as part of the game where your skill at teh game relies on your charisma.

Now a lot of old school folks say Charisma just controls a loyalty bonus lets you control henchmen and affects reactions. This example probably puts lie to the last of these. Your charisma, is supposed to cover personal magnatism, ego, attractiveness, charm etc. Very little of this is apparent in a first meeting and even less so if you are wearing field plate with a full helm....
You have to guess that initial reactions ought to be governed by a host of other variables. It might be worth saying you get disadvantage on reaction rolls if you encounter someone where you are fully armoured at all points with a drawn weapon....

Overall. Charisma is useful as part of a well defined social module in the game. It is too broad, few aftershave models go on to lead vast armies or even have great public speaking careers, and it is hasn't been very well applied in old D&D but its  certainly useful and its minimal effort to put it to some use.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;790627You can do what you wish, but charisma and beauty are not the same thing. Certainly beauty can be part of it but ugly charismatic people exist and beautiful un-charismatic people exist.

e.g., Abraham Lincoln.

Yeah, I'd say it's a useful stat. There was a guy I grew up with, RL. He had the good looks, the charm, the wit everyone wishes they had. He could convince just about anyone to do whatever he wanted. He could bed any girl in the high school, he could con the teachers into giving him a better grade. After college RL became a salesman at a car dealership. He quickly became the top seller in his store and one of the top 3 in the state. He always denied he had something special, but it was obvious to everyone that he did.

On the other hand there is me. I can't convince anyone of anything. I'm an ugly dude with a bad voice and awkward manner. My charisma is so low I get penalties to just about any social situation I'm in. I've learned to live with it and adjusted my dreams downward.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;790627You can do what you wish, but charisma and beauty are not the same thing. Certainly beauty can be part of it but ugly charismatic people exist and beautiful un-charismatic people exist.

That was exactly my intention.
It would not replace the regular charisma, but it would affect the visual impression.

Is 'Fireball' a realistic magic user spell?
Is 'Raise Dead' a realistic cleric spell?
Is a 'Mirror of Life Trapping' a realistic magic item?
Is a 'Neo-Otyugh' a realistic monster?

Quote from: Old Geezer;790671Is 'Fireball' a realistic magic user spell?
Is 'Raise Dead' a realistic cleric spell?
Is a 'Mirror of Life Trapping' a realistic magic item?
Is a 'Neo-Otyugh' a realistic monster?

Those examples are all spurious though and in no way related to the actual OP.

Fireball is a very common magical effect in the source fiction.
Raise dead is seen as fairly common divine power
Mirror of Life trapping is exactly the sort of thing you expect to read about in a fairy tale
The Neo-Otyugh is a pretty stupid monster that is way too large to occupy the environmental niche applied to it. Typically creatures that feed on waste material are very very small not 6 feet tall and weighing 500 lbs cos there is by definition a lack of nourishment in shit.
So 3 out or 4 of them are "realistic" in terms of the D&D setting.

Perhaps the question could have been phrased as "what does the Charisma attribute provide in D&D and is a single stat to cover its myriad uses really sufficient?" but I think we all got the general idea.

Charisma is a legitimate trait that happens to get confused with or co-mingled with appearance.

I prefer the GURPS treatment of charisma- it is an advantage, you either have it or you don't.

Good looks can combine with real charisma to make a very powerful influential force OR mitigate an average (or worse) charisma. This is the old cliche of putting up with a real bitch or bastard just because of their good looks. The looks usually win in the short term fascination competition but real charisma trumps that over the longer term assuming the parties involved aren't extremely shallow.

So yeah, real charisma has value in gaming even completely separated from appearance.

Quote from: Catelf;790530I just listened at a documentary on the radio.
Someone checked out how others reacted towards him depending on how he was dressed.
Dressed, just that.

People reacted very different depending on if he were a costume or a hoddie.

This made me wonder if "Charisma" really is important for rpgs, as it easily may be trumped by clothing.

What you seem to miss is that (1) there are two variables here, and (2) that experiment was measuring only one of them.

Education in a given field being equal, is there something else - something called "intelligence" - that contributes to varying success rates? Costume being the same, is there something else that contributes to success at getting a positive reaction?

Look, various things are bound or lumped together. This is not a revelation to anyone who read the 1st ed. AD&D books, or RuneQuest (in which Charisma can change in response to the success or failure of adventures).

The question is what in particular the name corresponds to in a given game - and that's how it is with every attribute.

There is a messy interplay of natural talent, skills learned in a lot of different ways, and so on.

Ultimately, what most games call 'stats' are often at least in part a bunch of nested skills or adjusted characteristics (like Strength). And stats are often not highly correlated -- it's possible to be strong in very specific ways that don't interact with other elements of physical strength.

So, in the end... Charisma is as realistic as Intelligence or Wisdom. There are innate talents at interacting and affecting people, there are early proto-skills in reading people, and there are life skills developed over time to do those things.

I'd just roll with it. Clothes and such provide situational benefits, like swords, high ground, or having a research library on hand.

Comparing how realistic features are in a generally fantasy-dominated genre feels a little unreasonable.

That said: IF "stats" are viewed as expressions of character advancement across various traits then I don't see charisma as being a particularly unsuitable option.

Quote from: Catelf;790530I just listened at a documentary on the radio.
Someone checked out how others reacted towards him depending on how he was dressed.
Dressed, just that.

People reacted very different depending on if he were a costume or a hoddie.

This made me wonder if "Charisma" really is important for rpgs, as it easily may be trumped by clothing.

Charisma can be a real thing beyond just external trappings. Like mega church preachers, etc.

http://people.howstuffworks.com/10-charismatic-leaders.htm#page=0

Or the Pied Piper of Saipan...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guy_Gabaldon

(Seriously, read the story. It's amazeballs)

Hm, i'm kind of convinced ...

But it is also clear that clothes should be far more important in what impression one gives.

It makes me think of what I think was a an ancient Swedish king, who used to dress up as a regular man, to visit the regular people, to see how they acted normally, and afterward reward or punish them after how he had been met.
He was nicknamed "Greycoat" for that.

Quote from: Will;792240Or the Pied Piper of Saipan...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guy_Gabaldon

(Seriously, read the story. It's amazeballs)

Um, Interesting.
Language goes a long way too, clearly.