It's threads like those in which I thank the High Powers, if any, that they did not make me a mathematician at heart. It took me 5 frigging minutes, as I read 3e, to figure out that diplomacy guidelines are broken. It took me 5 more minutes to explain to my players, that I'm setting the DC for that stuff.

Actually, this is the problem with systems that are too complex, without focusing on narration conflict resolution. Sooner or later, you will make mistakes. And to me, 3e is indeed more complex. Is it a broken system though?

Not really more then Warhammer's "Toughness as DMG reduction" broken.

The problem i found with diplomacy is the rule should have given the GM much more leeway to determine what success actually meant (and this how we used it). The player can say "i am going to try to talk sauron into letting us go", but the GM should ultimately decide what smooth talk can actually achieve against sauron (or any character). There are some people who simply wont budge on certain things. To use a modern example, should a player playing a cia agent be able to talk Osama Bin laden into loving america? Probably not. As a gm i would interpret a successful diplomacy roll against bin laden as the pc earning his respect as an adversary or something to that effect. It wouldn't really change things much but might lead to a "you and I aren't so different agent Smith afterall" kind of dialogue.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;513715The problem i found with diplomacy is the rule should have given the GM much more leeway to determine what success actually meant (and this how we used it). The player can say "i am going to try to talk sauron into letting us go", but the GM should ultimately decide what smooth talk can actually achieve against sauron (or any character). There are some people who simply wont budge on certain things. To use a modern example, should a player playing a cia agent be able to talk Osama Bin laden into loving america? Probably not. As a gm i would interpret a successful diplomacy roll against bin laden as the pc earning his respect as an adversary or something to that effect. It wouldn't really change things much but might lead to a "you and I aren't so different agent Smith afterall" kind of dialogue.

Exactly. The mistake they made there was giving some clear rules for "how to make NPCs your bitch", rather then give a few examples of various DCs you need to, for example, persuade the bandits to let you go, persuade the guards not to arrest you, persuade the judge to not sentence you for hanging. You can have just as absurd situations, if in AD&D you rule that "Roll under or equal to Charisma to change people's attitude to you in positive way", then you see your players chugging Potions of Charisma like Coke.

Also, this is another reason why I think an idea of "Social combat" should spread from narrative RPGs towards classic RPGs. Of course, bribing a guard to let you past the gate, if the guard is lazy, is just a diplo check. If you are however trying to wriggle your way out of a murder, it's social conflict, which should be as complex as combat. This is perhaps why Diplomacy in 3e is more dumb then broken - because it treats complexity of human interaction in a same manner as jumping a far ledge.

Then again, if you write just guidelines, you will end up with people complaining that there are no real rules. It's Sophie's Choice, except nobody dies.

Generally i avoid social skills and let people deal with stuff in character. But because some of my players like having social skill mehanics, i use them as a back up device. If a player has lots of ranks in persuade tries to put together a sales pitch to an npc but but keeps bungling, i. May cal for a persuade roll after all the rp and factor in the result. Or if a character has no ranks keeps making sweet pitches, i may ask for a check to reign him in a bit. But these days i find the game is more fun for me when social skills are removed or ignored. I ran a game last year with no social skill rolls and found it really put us into character, cranked up the rp, and made the characters decisions matter a lot more. We also didn't use stuff like perception. So everyone really had to interact with the setting and npcs, like we did when we played in the 80s/90s.

Playing without these things is jarring at first if you havent done so for a while, but after a couple of sessions it really makes a difference (at least it did for me). I even had people in my group who were adament that social skills don't dampen rp adit it made a huge difference.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;513719Generally i avoid social skills and let people deal with stuff in character. But because some of my players like having social skill mehanics, i use them as a back up device. If a player has lots of ranks in persuade tries to put together a sales pitch to an npc but but keeps bungling, i. May cal for a persuade roll after all the rp and factor in the result. Or if a character has no ranks keeps making sweet pitches, i may ask for a check to reign him in a bit. But these days i find the game is more fun for me when social skills are removed or ignored. I ran a game last year with no social skill rolls and found it really put us into character, cranked up the rp, and made the characters decisions matter a lot more. We also didn't use stuff like perception. So everyone really had to interact with the setting and npcs, like we did when we played in the 80s/90s.

Playing without these things is jarring at first if you havent done so for a while, but after a couple of sessions it really makes a difference (at least it did for me). I even had people in my group who were adament that social skills don't dampen rp adit it made a huge difference.

I think that there is a place for social skills. On the NWN servers I played, they were treated as RP guidelines - you did not roll a Bluff check when you tried to lie to your fellow player. But it was expected of you, that if you had a low Bluff skill, your character would not know to lie, so you'd rp accordingly, for example by emotiong "Of course, erm, that, uh *he shifts his eyes uncomfortably* I killed the guard, as you asked, boss." While if your bluff was high, you'd just go "Killed the bastard just as you asked, boss". At first I was not too cool with that, as metagaming was a possibility, but it's all about trust - people stuck with it. And in pen and paper stuff, it'd be even easier to enforce/be honest about. And that's where social skills become cool stuff rather then mechanical balance - because if you want to RP a master of lies, invest 20 points into Bluff, and RP likewise. Lie all you want, and the GM will accept most of the stuff, because you have 20 Bluff, you are a cold blooded liar.

Part of the problem is, that if the player is less talky, he'd be unable to play a very diplomatic character by your and partially mine method. On the OTHER hand, if such a player does try, it turns into "I try to persuade the guard to let us through, rolled 20, I succeeded, right?"

Again, this might be part of RPG experience and personality. For example - Scion has this whole "Values of Character" mechanic, that I find a good idea (it's sorta like alignment in DnD), but the actual MECHANIC execution of it ("If the character has Brave, he needs to fail the check or he charges into combat") is bizarre as fuck for me.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;513715To use a modern example, should a player playing a cia agent be able to talk Osama Bin laden into loving america? Probably not. As a gm i would interpret a successful diplomacy roll against bin laden as the pc earning his respect as an adversary or something to that effect. It wouldn't really change things much but might lead to a "you and I aren't so different agent Smith afterall" kind of dialogue.

That seems like a valid interpretation of changing hostile to friendly to me. Do the rules explicitly block this sort of interpretation?

Quote from: StormBringer;513643I pretty much agree with the rest of what you said, but this is the part that rather stands out for me.  It is a very odd stance for the 'linear Fighter quadratic Wizard' folks to take.  Giving everyone more magic would seem to include the Magic User, so they would be even more quadratic.

Well, that is MY interpretation of their attitude. I don't think they've bothered to sum it up so pithily.

Of course, from how I understand their point of view you really can't give the wizard and/or cleric moar magik because, well, they are already godlike. Its really giving everyone else the chance to catch up.



Which, yes, does tend to ignore the occasional calls to break up spell casters to allow more thematic casters (rather than, you know, just letting players decide to limit themselves to necromancy spells and call themselves a necromancer... gotta build in the limit, you see...) or the calls for wizards to actually create world destroying armies of minions like the bad guys always seem to do in cheesy swords and sorcery movies...

That's the problem with pithy summaries, I'm afraid...

Quote from: Justin Alexander;513699The pertinent question, however, is: What standard?

To start with, does anyone actually use the rule as written? Because if it's overruled in every game, odds are it's actually probably a bad rule. Easy standard right there.

Content is less predictable/adjustable, so I would just say that if the typical response to its use is regret or disappointment (toughness, the monk) it's probably time to fix something.

And I was arguing against Ben because rules are for play. People finding problems with the rules usually find them in play, but it doesn't matter because there's no special context that makes toughness a feat worth having. Pretty much ever. Nor is there any context that makes the diplomacy rules (as written) good. Pretty much ever. For the reasons I described (scaling capability vs fixed DC, doesn't take RP into account, etc.).

QuoteClaiming that a rule is completely worthless because it breaks under extreme hypothetical circumstances that 99% of the people playing the game will never see at their gaming table... well, ok. But does it really matter?

Except when rules break at low levels that many people will see at their table, as in the case of toughness, the monk, and the procedures behind diplomacy.

Also, I bought the rules for high level play with the rules for low level play. If I want to play a high level game (as many of us did in the 3x days) I don't want to have to rewrite more than half the system (as many of us did).

I mentioned earlier how if I complain about how magic is messing up my 1 fight per session mystery game, people will tell me to put a deadline or wandering monsters in it, and if I tell them those things don't fit the context of the adventure they'll tell me I'm being lazy. If I say high level play breaks down, the answer is not to use high level play. Why not? I payed for those rules same as any others in the book. Why should I not expect for the high level rules to just work?

QuoteTo return to an earlier point, however: Where, exactly, is the rule useful then?

The entire structure of Diplomacy in 3E is "make a skill check against a flat DC to permanently modify an NPC's relationship with you". Once you've said "well, that's stupid and the DM should never let that happen", what guidance or utility is the rule providing?

Zilch. That's why it's a craptacular rule.

This is what I'm getting at really.

Quote from: two_fishes;513735That seems like a valid interpretation of changing hostile to friendly to me. Do the rules explicitly block this sort of interpretation?

No they don't but I think a lot of people interpret them to mean you magically convince the target of your position. Looking at the SRD right. Nw, and it isn't as bad as I recall, but I do think some characterz simply wont budge on those categories. But bin laden having respect for you, isn't the same as wishing you well. Diplomacy can only do so much. If Obama sits down with Glenn beck, i dont think there is anything either side can say to get the other to "go out of his way to help". These sorts of rules are fine if people like them, i just would just like to see more respect in them for character personality and motives. Sometimes players shouldn't be able to shift thoses categories.

I probably should leave this topic alone, but for me it reminds me of when people complained about "balance" in In Nomine. The powers had no real "balance" between them at all if taken from a firepower perspective, or any perspective in its particular. However, since the game had various specialists operating under wholly different contexts, there was no real way to "balance" powers because there was no real equivalence. Games couldn't have PCs try to be powerful in all things or stay within the tight confines of their specialty. There was no way to take one part and from its lens judge the whole because you ran into competing parts that checked such usage.

The end result was "balance" between powers was a pipe dream in actual play. It just didn't make sense because setting context and its ensuing world logic threw any mechanical presuppositions out the window. Throw in player alterations to world conceits (adjusting the game's dials as it were) and even more power disparity expectations became irrelevant. And the most tragic part in me trying to relate this is you sorta have to see it to believe it.

Then again, In Nomine was shit because it slaughtered great iconoclastic original  rather then anything related to actual mechanics of the game .

I always viewed DCs in the rules as guidelines or examples, there for the DM to reference when determining thier OWN DCs for particular actions. I would never set a cap on DCs, and never have.

Also, not once in 10 years of playing 3e has anyone in my group EVER used the Diplomacy skill - that's what Role Playing is for.

Quote from: Werekoala;513745I always viewed DCs in the rules as guidelines or examples, there for the DM to reference when determining thier OWN DCs for particular actions. I would never set a cap on DCs, and never have.

Also, not once in 10 years of playing 3e has anyone in my group EVER used the Diplomacy skill - that's what Role Playing is for.

Rules as guidelines?  That's just CRAZY TALK!

Quote from: thedungeondelver;513746Rules as guidelines?  That's just CRAZY TALK!

Silly person - Difficulty Check mechanics are the RULE , how to set the number is a guideline.

*whap*

Quote from: Rincewind1;513741Then again, In Nomine was shit because it slaughtered great iconoclastic original  rather then anything related to actual mechanics of the game .

And yet I'm not all that interested in INS/MV's iconoclastic world as I am IN SJG's more muted world. I felt I had more atmosphere dial options for the types of games I wanted to play. Now there's a good example where buying a game is not explicitly for its rules! Tone mattered on both sides.