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Just wondering.  D&D's model is quite lackluster for this sort of thing.

Conversation and roleplaying?

I mean mechanically.

Quote from: B.T.;465532I mean mechanically.

I know you did.

I come up with a personality and a motivation for the characters and let them respond however seems fair. If someone thinks they will die if they step a red line, a natural 20 on a diplomacy check won't talk them into crossing it.

If there is a question, I have players roll right at the start of the RP and let the die roll influence how I have the character act, but usually the die roll picks between a minimum number of possible responses which are similar. Its never fall in love or call the guards, but it might be call the guards in a minute or call them now.

Well considering there is no universal "How best to run an RPG", it depends on the game at hand.  

It also depends on the circumstances of the encounter.

Many games use a kind of combat system. I usually had a problem, when such a system would be used with diplomatic acts, making people your friends and the like. Intimidating isn't really a problem for me. Give people Resolve Points or whatever and beat them down with Intimidation. But beating down I-don't-care-about-you Points with Diplomacy didn't suit me.


I came up with the following for a game of mine.

Everybody has a Philosophy a.k.a. alignment. Everybody has a Reputation score a.k.a. character level, as well.

There is no diplomacy skill. I had one at first, but found that everybody should be able to make friends, just not as easily with everyone. Therefore philosophies are figured in.

The mechanism works like that: When a PC interacts with an NPC the player can roll 1d6 through 5d6 as he likes. Every die coming up 4+ is a success. If a single die shows a 1, all successes from this roll are lost.

So there's a gamble. It's easier to collect successes in several small attempts than rushing things. I like that, as I think that building up relations takes time.

To gain Influcence for an NPC you first need a number of successes equal to their Reputation (important people don't care about your petty advances) plus one for each step your philosophies differ.

Further succeses are considered Influence and can be used to buy favors from the NPC.


I always tell the players that they do not need Influence to get something. If they have good arguments or strike a deal that's perfectly fine. Spending influence means that the NPC gives you stuff, just because they like you.


My experiences with this little system have been quite good. It's a bit more like building connections than encountering problems but it suits me just fine.


Edit: Tried to make that legible.

Nice trolling attempt, as usual, B.T.

It depends how important they are to the resolution of the game.

In Tough Justice and Courtesans a form of social dice play was essential as the Character's social skills needed to be mechanically quantified.

QuoteIn Tough Justice and Courtesans a form of social dice play was essential as the Character's social skills needed to be mechanically quantified.

Can you explain how this worked?

Well Tough Justice needed a way of determining who had won the Case beyond GM Fiat. Courtesans needed a way of determining how well each lady manipulated her Admirers emotions.

Both use modified d6 roll offs as the core mechanic. In Tough Justice success either offensively or defensively in a Team v Team context adds Case Points which build to the total result.

Courtesans is similar but the Margin of Success can be taken in Resources of the Player's choice. These are Legend (public image) Reputation (standing in the prostitution scene) Wealth (money) and Influence (Political clout)

Quote from: B.T.;465530Just wondering.  D&D's model is quite lackluster for this sort of thing.

If you ignore 95% of their implementation, 4E skill challenges work on occasion quite well, = 'do complex skill checks operating on target numbers the GM cooks up while ignoring 100% of the official material to that effect'.

On the whole though I mostly ignore any rules implementation whatsoever. And that's not based on my folders being on, but on having slouched through several Burning Wheel "duel of wits" scenarios. It's literally Rock, papers, scissors with social interaction names tagged on the individual social combat maneuvers, and arbitrarily so.

Just look at 1of3's d6 roll mechanic. You could paste that onto any other risk influenced resource management subsystem, and you wouldn't know the difference.

Huh, I found DoW fun.

Also, Diaspora has a nifty social conflict system that can be used to model many non-combat situations (or even fleet battles).

Then again, I'm not interested in simulation, but rather resolving conflict and introducing uncertainty, so a system being arbitrary doesn't matter to me so long as it makes play interesting/fun.

If they are playing their character usually roleplay.

If they are playing themselves I use dice and the stat or skill they have or lack there of...Same if the player has a lack of social skills himself I wont force him to do what he is uncomfortable with.

I generally narrate and roleplay social encounters but if a PC has a social skill and wants a different outcome I let them roll it and I let the result stand.  Of my own game designs, Bare Bones, Incandescent, and among the beautiful creatures have almost no social rules excepting leadership and morale of course.  Galaxies in Shadow and In The Shadow of Dragons have fairly elaborate social rules but the later has a much broader range of social skills and the former goes into greater detail when dealing with relationships.

In both there is a default modifier that represents the initial relationship, it's easier to wheedle your old granny than the dark lord, well, most of the time at least.  The default modifier can be adjusted by circumstances and can be permanently altered by social actions.  If you try intimidating your old granny she may be as intractable as the dark lord the next time you come around begging favors.

But it basically is a modifier that also serves as hit points.  It's a way of pushing past player disputes and accusations of unfairness with a dice roll or two and gives the DM some tools for defining who NPCs are in relationship to the PCs.

Quote from: J Arcane;465531Conversation and roleplaying?

That plus Dice Rolling! IMO, there's always a Random chance that needs to be thrown in there. Of course Conversation and Roleplaying factor into bonuses/penalties to the die roll.

Personally, lately, I'm in favor of competing die rolls, i.e. d20 or d100 plus whatever social skill of the characters involved(and NPCs), plus a modifier for the Player depending on Roleplay/What was said...

Quote from: greylond;465652That plus Dice Rolling! IMO, there's always a Random chance that needs to be thrown in there. Of course Conversation and Roleplaying factor into bonuses/penalties to the die roll.

Personally, lately, I'm in favor of competing die rolls, i.e. d20 or d100 plus whatever social skill of the characters involved(and NPCs), plus a modifier for the Player depending on Roleplay/What was said...

I like to try to make my social rules strengthening roleplaying.  

I also admit that I very rarely have my NPCs start the use of social skills, except in areas I have predesigned this way or if it is completely obvious.  I think we spoke about this in one of Pundit's threads.  

But we have a ton of social skills
4-6 acting skills,
a ton of ustoms skills,
leadership skills
relationship skills.
persuasion skills

Hell, we have a parent skill called, "Basic Carnal"

And generally, the better players try to pick and choose the one that helps.
Then we use the 'declare-roleplay-roll-recover' system.  

Makes for a good time.  Not saying it is better or worse, just that is has worked for my games for decades.

I follow the rules of the game if they're fun, but sometimes they're not, like all other rules.

We use a combination of roleplaying and dice-rolling.

Not everyone is very good at putting things into words - a shy roleplayer won't necessarily make a good Don Juan, for example, but his character might have very high seduction and people skills. Also, some people are very good at talking and can be very persuasive even though their PC doesn't have the same skills. So, we don;t rely on either roleplaying or dice rolling on their own.

So, we play out the encounter and see how it goes. Where a decision is needed then we roll dice to find out how well an attempt worked out. Sometimes the PC will get a bonus for a clever or passionate piece of roleplaying, depending on the encounter.

Normally, I play RuneQuest, Basic Roleplaying or HeroQuest, each of which has fairly good mechanisms for handling social encounters as they have social skills.

As to how to do it in D&D, I haven't played it for a very long time and, unfortunately, wouldn't have a clue, I'm afraid.

Role-playing and, if necessary, reaction rolls.  IF necessary.

Depends on the game.

My preference is always to give the players room to show some ingenuity, without necessarily punishing the stutterers, the timid and other folks who have every right to play a silver-tongued devil of a character.

More often than not I use dice rolls, but always modified by the player's actual roleplayed discourse (weighing both delivery and content) and by the circumstances (e.g. it's easy to fool the Imperial Navy when you're wearing an officers' uniform and barking authoritatively; harder when you look, and dress, and talk, like a space hobo with no documents).

I do require players to think up of something to say. "I try to fast-talk the guard" by itself is not a valid declaration of action; I wish to know exactly what their characters have in mind. More timid players are free to forgo roleplay and flatly state what they intend to say (e.g. "I tell the soldier these are not the droids he's looking for"), but this deprives them of the useful roleplaying bonus.

I like to think that, while this penalizes less articulate players playing glib characters, it does not entirely gimp them, while still rewarding players who come up with clever speeches and deliver good performances.  The way I see it, it's no different from allowing ad-hoc modifiers for clever tactics in combat.

Quote from: Windjammer;465632On the whole though I mostly ignore any rules implementation whatsoever. And that's not based on my folders being on, but on having slouched through several Burning Wheel "duel of wits" scenarios. It's literally Rock, papers, scissors with social interaction names tagged on the individual social combat maneuvers, and arbitrarily so.

Here's a quick summary of the problems social conflict systems have--

(1) If you allow the PCs to be affected by the social conflict mechanics, then you're removing the player's ability to make choices as their character (since those choices are being artificially overridden by the system). But since the entire heart of a roleplaying system is making choices as your character, this is heavily problematic. It's like a game of Chess where every so often the mechanics step in and prevent you from making otherwise legal moves.

The solution? Don't let PCs be affected by the social conflict mechanics.

(2) But if you don't allow the PCs to be affected by the social conflict mechanics, then the system becomes incredibly difficult to balance. It gives the PCs access to a whole range of tactical options which basically cannot be responded to by the NPCs.

As a result, you typically you either end up with a system which is a completely broken "win button" (by-the-book 3E Diplomacy skill) or you end up with a system which makes any successful social interaction virtually impossible.

(3) Realistic personality simulation is ridiculously difficult. Advanced supercomputers don't do a very good job of it. Expecting simplistic mechanics that can be executed using paper, pencil, and maybe some dice at a dining room table is completely ridiculous.

This problem is partially alleviated because you have human players at the table who can attempt to smooth over the absurdities of the system. But there's a pretty thin line between "smoothing over the absurdities of the system" and "we're just ignoring the rules anyway". These sorts of fixes also generally require people to enter into a very dissociated relationship with the mechanics -- to stop making decisions as their characters and to start making decisions as improv storytellers trying to explain the decisions the mechanics are making for their characters.

Which basically means, to sum up, that social conflict mechanics tend to work well in storytelling games. They tend to be shitty for roleplaying games.

With that being said, I have had success using social-based skills to resolve the outcome of very specific social interactions in RPGs. (Does he believe that lie? Does he have a favorable first impression of the PC? Et cetera.) I don't let the mechanics interfere with the actual roleplaying of the players (i.e., making decisions as their characters), but I am less precious with my NPCs (since GMing already requires a fairly dissociated mindset, this is not particularly disruptive).

In storytelling games? Sure. Whatever. Most storytelling games work better with a conflict-based resolution mechanic anyway, and social interactions just become another tactic within the conflict-resolution toolbag at that point.

Duel of Wits affects the situation, not the character, though.

Quote from: Justin Alexander;465724Here's a quick summary of the problems social conflict systems have--

(1) If you allow the PCs to be affected by the social conflict mechanics, then you're removing the player's ability to make choices as their character (since those choices are being artificially overridden by the system). But since the entire heart of a roleplaying system is making choices as your character, this is heavily problematic. It's like a game of Chess where every so often the mechanics step in and prevent you from making otherwise legal moves.

The solution? Don't let PCs be affected by the social conflict mechanics.

(2) But if you don't allow the PCs to be affected by the social conflict mechanics, then the system becomes incredibly difficult to balance. It gives the PCs access to a whole range of tactical options which basically cannot be responded to by the NPCs.

As a result, you typically you either end up with a system which is a completely broken "win button" (by-the-book 3E Diplomacy skill) or you end up with a system which makes any successful social interaction virtually impossible.

(3) Realistic personality simulation is ridiculously difficult. Advanced supercomputers don't do a very good job of it. Expecting simplistic mechanics that can be executed using paper, pencil, and maybe some dice at a dining room table is completely ridiculous.

This problem is partially alleviated because you have human players at the table who can attempt to smooth over the absurdities of the system. But there's a pretty thin line between "smoothing over the absurdities of the system" and "we're just ignoring the rules anyway". These sorts of fixes also generally require people to enter into a very dissociated relationship with the mechanics -- to stop making decisions as their characters and to start making decisions as improv storytellers trying to explain the decisions the mechanics are making for their characters.

Which basically means, to sum up, that social conflict mechanics tend to work well in storytelling games. They tend to be shitty for roleplaying games.

With that being said, I have had success using social-based skills to resolve the outcome of very specific social interactions in RPGs. (Does he believe that lie? Does he have a favorable first impression of the PC? Et cetera.) I don't let the mechanics interfere with the actual roleplaying of the players (i.e., making decisions as their characters), but I am less precious with my NPCs (since GMing already requires a fairly dissociated mindset, this is not particularly disruptive).

In storytelling games? Sure. Whatever. Most storytelling games work better with a conflict-based resolution mechanic anyway, and social interactions just become another tactic within the conflict-resolution toolbag at that point.

I am normally on the same side of the fence with Justin, But I think your basic premise is false; or at best very incomplete.  NPCs using social skills on the player, at least in the hands of a good GM, is merely an enviromental descriptor that the players add into their Roleplay.  
The GM does not need to be heavy-handed.  Describing the effects of most social mechanics used by NPCs should be done 'in-game'.  One does not tell the players that they have to trust everything the Gate Captain says; One informs the players that, "The Gate Captain is perfectly relaxed as he speaks, and to your experienced ears, his words have the ring of truth."

However, I am in agreement that I allow the PCS to have more effect on the NPCs.

Q: How do you resolve social encounters?

A: Ultimately? With a knife.

RPGPundit

Quote from: LordVreeg;465756I am normally on the same side of the fence with Justin, But I think your basic premise is false; or at best very incomplete.  NPCs using social skills on the player, at least in the hands of a good GM, is merely an enviromental descriptor that the players add into their Roleplay.  
The GM does not need to be heavy-handed.  Describing the effects of most social mechanics used by NPCs should be done 'in-game'.  One does not tell the players that they have to trust everything the Gate Captain says; One informs the players that, "The Gate Captain is perfectly relaxed as he speaks, and to your experienced ears, his words have the ring of truth."

I think you missed me second-to-last paragraph. That's exactly the sort of specific social action which I said does work because it doesn't make a decision for the character.

Quote from: Justin Alexander;465891I think you missed me second-to-last paragraph. That's exactly the sort of specific social action which I said does work because it doesn't make a decision for the character.

Yeah, but I use them for nearly every social encounter, and my games are VERY social heavy by nature.  Over 40 skills that can be used easily in social situations, and we average compabt every other session.  So since you used the term, 'Very-specific' in that paragraph for something I use dozens of times per session, there is still a disconnect.

Come to the dark side.  We have cookies.

 (and basic cooking, basic hospitality, create recipe, mass cooking, camp cooking, baking, chef as cooking skills...)

Negotiation, occasionally followed by a Charisma check if the results have a large degree of uncertainty.

Social skills and player interaction both have appropriate places in making the game fun. Imo, if you are discarding one or the other, you are discarding opportunities for enjoyable play.

But it's possible to do both very wrong.

A few points/principles I live by:
1) some discussion is boring and don't deserve a lot of table talk; abstract these away with a roll if important.
2) pcs may be immune to diplomacy results, but you can use the skill roll to describe and impression to the players.
3) like jump rolls depend on the chasm, social rolls depend on the npc. You can't expect a high impress* to give you the world on a silver platter.
3a) ...but it should give you something

*- that's the Spycraft/Fantasy craft equivalent of diplomacy, for you d&d/pathfinder players.

It's often in the set-up. Writing up or prepping the social encounter is no different than writing up a combat encounter/dungeon room. The NPCs have their starting positions, there may be a couple of traps set, and the GM knows/has a note of what the NPC's walkaway position is in a negotiation - as well as any specific personal prejudices or weaknesses.

If that stuff is in place, then there are skill checks required to navigate through the various obstacles - and if the players says something really clever or comes up with a winning tactic, they may get a bonus (and vice versa in the more frequent occasions when they say something dumb and offensive). Just like in a combat encounter, there should not be a single way, or a single dice roll, to get through it and achieve what you want, and the GM should have a good idea of what the various win/lose/draw outcomes are.

If on the fly it comes down to judgement, ie "OK, if you want to get away with that you better make a decent Fast Talk roll, otherwise this guy is going to either brain you himself or call for the cops".

But then I quite recently spent rather a lot of time fleshing out RuneQuest/Legend social interaction rules for my Age of Treason book so it covers bribery, corruption, oratory and courtroom battles...so I am biased to a rules solution to social interaction.

For D&D yeah, the standard 'make my PC's role play it out' or 'roll on the Reaction Table.'

Really it does depend on what kind of game you're playing.

Some days you only socially interact with the +2 Battle Axe the character is holding.
All good fun.

As of my current majestic wilderlands campaign, I'm really loving playing fast and loose with the reaction table.

RPGPundit

Forgive the thread necromancy, especially one that was apparently started by a now banned user. But I found this doing some research on social skills in RPGs, and this is what got me to register instead of just lurk. Anyway...

To understand where I'm coming from on this topic, it's important for me to mention two things. One, I've been GMing for a long, long time. There are a lot of situations that just arise regardless of which game you're playing. Over time you find really effective procedures for doing things. The procedures themselves are not specific to any one game. For example, regardless of whether I'm playing D&D or GURPS, I can choose to end each session on a cliff hanger if I find that keeps players coming back week after week and showing up on time. (I don't. It's just an example.)

The second thing is, I actually "persuade" for a living and have been successful enough at it to have time to waste on RPG message boards. So I am familiar with the popular notion of how it works, how it really works, myths that don't work at all, et cetera. So I have a pretty clear picture of how a persuasion attempt would go, and I've boiled it down to a procedure that will work for virtually any RPG. ("Virtually any RPG" here means any RPG that doesn't already dictate a specific procedure and would be greatly unbalanced by ignoring said procedure.)

The procedure I put in place, since it does follow a real conversation, can be 100% role-played out, with it calling for skill checks in a few key points. I hesitate to liken social encounters to combat encounters, because the whole point of social skills is to gain consent and cooperation, which is the complete opposite of conflict and domination. But, much like combat, it doesn't cram everything into one die roll. There is interaction and the opportunity for choice between dice rolls.

True, combat in D&D doesn't require that the player know how to swing the sword. But it does require that the player choose a weapon and decide which enemy to strike. I feel the same should hold for social encounters. You don't need to know how to best deliver an argument because that should come down to your character skill. But you do need to choose or formulate your argument and decide who to pitch it to.

And just like in combat, where a blessed crossbow bolt will automatically slay the Rakshasa, and a non-magical, non-silver weapon will never harm the werewolf, and the player and character alike may have no way of knowing their opponent is one of those creatures, sometimes choice alone, not dice, will determine the outcome. Similarly, certain arguments in social encounters will guarantee success, or guarantee failure, and the player and character alike may have no way of knowing that about the person they are pitching.

^Can you spell out how you do it?

Interesting stuff, I'd like to read a more detailed description as well.

Much like combat* I prefer to have some differentiation between player persuasive ability and character persuasive ability.

Quote from: Lunamancer;866395The procedure I put in place, since it does follow a real conversation, can be 100% role-played out, with it calling for skill checks in a few key points.

This sounds interesting. Tell us more.


* Actually almost exactly like how combat works in a lot of systems.

• In most (if not all) RPGs a player with good tactical ability will do better in combat than a player with poor tactical ability. That is almost unavoidable and not really a bad thing. (Similarly, it is almost unavoidable that a player with good persuasive ability in real life will be able to be more persuasive than a player with poor persuasive ability in real life.)

• In most RPGs a player whose PC has good in-game combat ability will (all things being equal) do better in combat than a player whose PC has poor in-game combat abilities. Again this is almost unavoidable and is not a bad thing. (Similarly, a player whose PC has good in-game persuasive ability should (all else being equal) do better at persuasion in game than a player whose PC has poor in-game persuasive ability.

As a DM and designer I lean to a mix. I have the players talk out the interaction and then make a check based on charisma and possible modifiers to see how well it went over since the player may not have the force of personality the character has.

But I also like having some framework to automate interactions for those times when you just want to breeze through and move on. Or want a surprise. Or even solo play. BX D&D has that system and it works great.

I'd like to hear more too.

(although you might want to start a new thread for it so it gets more traffic)

Well, thanks for the interest. I appreciate the opportunity to discuss this. Every time I have to explain it, I get a little bit better at explaining it.

So in its basic form, I break persuasion down into 5 phases. Introduction, discovery, presentation, elaboration, and the close. The introduction is about getting the other person's attention and willingness to listen. Discovery is about finding out what they want, their motivations. Presentation is framing your proposal in a way likely to appeal to your prospect. Elaboration is when the prospect still has doubts--objections or questions--and you clarify to ease their concerns. The close is like the handshake that seals the deal.

I think the way most people approach it (especially bad salesmen in real life) is they skip discovery and treat elaboration as a battle of wits. So it's like, "Hi, this is what I think you should do," followed by several rounds of verbal jujitsu until someone finally admits they're wrong. Being that this is an internet message forum, I think we all know how unrealistic that is.

And certainly players can try to do that within the confines of my persuasion system. They're welcome to try anything they like. But doing so leaves everything entirely up to luck. And I'm not talking about luck of the dice. I'm talking about the player just happens on the one argument (or one of several arguments) that will successfully convince the NPC. And even then I may still call for a skill check--just because you say the right thing doesn't mean the NPC trusts what you say.


So usually I would begin by calling for a skill check on the introduction. Which skill, of course, depends on whatever's most appropriate for the situation and the game system. But the idea is you're just trying to get an NPC to listen. Players can decide for themselves whether or not to listen. They almost always do, suckers that they are! But if a PC or NPC succeeds in a skill check to get a reluctant player to listen, the GM can nudge the player with something like, "You sense that the person standing before you has some very important information."

In lieu of a skill check, it is possible to capture someone's attention by other means. Telemarketers, who are generally extremely low-skill persuaders, offer some freebie for listening. In a fantasy RPG, there are limitless other ways to bypass the need for a social skill, perhaps even calling on other adventuring skills--a Hold Person ought to get someone's attention!

The wise player will move onto the discovery phase. In the classic case, it's literally asking questions of the prospect. However, the conversation could also be more subtle, calling on social skills to try to get a "read" on the prospect. Whichever, some sort of lie detection skill can help to make sure you're getting accurate information. However, if the Introduction went exceedingly well, the prospect will be truthful at this stage. Again, it's also possible to bypass social skills by using other means of discovery. It might involve consulting the Harlot table in the 1st Ed DMG to get the dirt on your prospect.

Once you know what the other person wants, then you can begin to argue (or offer a proposal) about how in helping you, that person will actually be helping themself. While it should be placed entirely on the player--not the character or game system--to decide exactly what direction to take this, effective presentation can be determined by a skill check. If the player needs to say things that are untrue to make the proposal appeal to the prospect, then some sort of deception check is also in order.

The elaboration phase will be initiated by the prospect. Sometimes no further elaboration is required. If the proposal truly matches the prospect's motivations, and it was communicated clearly in a way deemed trustworthy, it can move straight to the close. However, if the "pitch" included anything that was vague or any deal-breakers, those will be addressed here. If a skilled persuader was way off in presentation (perhaps the character had high persuasion skills but the player foolishly skipped discovery), a skill check can keep the prospects attention, giving the persuader the opportunity to fall back to discovery and make a new presentation based on new information.

If everything has gone well in the prior stages, the close won't even require a skill check. Success just follows. On the other hand, if the persuader gave a poor presentation and fumbled through the elaboration, it is likely the close will fail without a skill check as well. (Again, here a skilled persuader can, with a skill check, continue to hold the prospect's attention, fall back to discovery, and try to present a new case.) In between the extremes of automatic success (which should really be the most common case if all the steps were followed well) and automatic failure, the persuader can go for a hard close.

A hard close can go simply as a skill check. But there might also be actions the persuader can take outside the scope of social skills that can win the day. Think of playing poker. You think the other guy is bluffing. He goes all in. You still think he's bluffing, but the fact is you can't afford to be wrong about it, so you fold anyway. A hard close can be like that.


That's the basics of it. There are other little details. Like using an "up-front contract" in the introduction--because in reality, the biggest pitfall isn't a "No" but a non-committal answer. The up-front contract is designed to head that off. Or, the discovery phase should end with a question that sums up all information discovered, like, "So, if you could get x and y, will you be willing to do z?" Because the prospect admitting to what they want keeps them from lying about it just to frustrate your attempts at persuasion.

I hope this has been clear and helpful.

Quote from: Bren;866443Much like combat* I prefer to have some differentiation between player persuasive ability and character persuasive ability.


This sounds interesting. Tell us more.


* Actually almost exactly like how combat works in a lot of systems.

• In most (if not all) RPGs a player with good tactical ability will do better in combat than a player with poor tactical ability. That is almost unavoidable and not really a bad thing. (Similarly, it is almost unavoidable that a player with good persuasive ability in real life will be able to be more persuasive than a player with poor persuasive ability in real life.)

• In most RPGs a player whose PC has good in-game combat ability will (all things being equal) do better in combat than a player whose PC has poor in-game combat abilities. Again this is almost unavoidable and is not a bad thing. (Similarly, a player whose PC has good in-game persuasive ability should (all else being equal) do better at persuasion in game than a player whose PC has poor in-game persuasive ability.

I wanted to address these great points specifically, and how that looks following my procedure.

Case 1. Player is a terrible persuader. But the character is highly skilled.

Say the player pulls the bad salesman tactic, skipping discovery. Thanks to the character's high social skills, the introduction goes well. Maybe all the player said was "I have a proposition for you," but the character said it with such genuine conviction that the prospect is willing to listen. Maybe he even likes you.

So you go into the pitch. Since you skipped discovery, you only assume you know what the NPC wants. Maybe you get lucky and your guess just happens to match the NPCs hidden motives quite well. Between that and your skill, the presentation goes off without a hitch. Maybe there will be a question or two on the elaboration phase (since odds are it's not going to be a perfect match since you were guessing), and as long as you can handle them, you move into the close with the blessing of an automatic success.

However, if you aren't so lucky, and what you think the NPC wants isn't what he really wants, you meet with a lot of resistance in the elaboration phase. The player doesn't have to be the most socially adept person in the world, but as long as he's got a brain, I think at some point it's going to become clear that his pitch was way off the mark. If he's smart enough to start questioning why the NPC doesn't want something that will obviously benefit him, or start asking questions that get at what he DOES want, the character's high social skill will allow that player a second chance at forming a proposal the NPC will go for.

One point (a detail I didn't mention in the last post), usually if you try to propose something someone doesn't truly want, that person might get to thinking you really don't care about what they want and you're only out for yourself. This might undo the good will generated by a good introduction. The prospect might become dishonest, or just play his cards close to his chest. It may take skills like cold reading and lie detection to save the deal at this point. Again, if the character has high social skills that cover the bases, this is possible, but the difficulty of the situation has just gone up.


Case 2. A player who knows what I know about persuasion but his character has no skill at it.

Without skill, you're likely to fail at the introduction. No matter how persuasive you are as a player, you CAN effectively be shut out at the get-go if the character has no skill. One thing you can try to do to compensate is offer some consideration, a gift perhaps. This can open the door for you, but this is already a cost that a more skilled character could have avoided.

Next, you go onto the discovery phase. Because you as a player are such a great persuader, you ask all the right questions, you avoid any words that might trigger hostility, and you find out exactly what the NPC wants. Now all you have to do is present your proposal.

Since your character has no skill, you may say all the right words, but that doesn't mean a difficult NPC will believe them. Like in the introduction, you could offer some consideration. Part of the proposal could be some automatic penalty that would befall you if you have been untruthful. If you were trying to convince an NPC to go through a certain door, but he's suspicious it's a trap, you might offer to be the first to go through. You might also sweeten the deal. The NPC may still not trust you, but the reward is so great, it's worth a small gamble. Again, it CAN be done without skill, but you are incurring costs that you would not have if your character had the skills.

If you've done everything as best as possible, there may not be an elaboration phase. It would be kind of pointless if the NPC doesn't trust you. Although if your offer is so interesting, the NPC may be forward enough to tell you what they need to overcome the trust issue. It might be the NPC that insists you walk through the door first.

In any case, you better make sure you have it wrapped up. Without skill, don't expect to succeed at a hard close. Like my poker example from the previous post, you could up the odds and go all-in. This puts you in a very perilous place, however, if the NPC still doesn't bite. It's a risk you wouldn't had to have taken if you had invested some skill points in your character's social skills.



I'm also going to add a Case 3. This is an example of trying to be as persuasive as possible using zero social skills. You might also try to call it a quick sell.

In this case, I imagine you've done your homework on your prospect. You've used your other character skills to investigate and dig up all the dirt. It might have been a full blown adventure in itself to get all the information, but you now know your prospect's motives.

You have no skill to win the introduction. So you just blurt out the ideal question I referred to in the previous post for ending the discovery phase, "My lord, if I can deliver to you your grandmother's lost signet ring, will you grant me and my companions safe passage?"

If that truly is one of the most important things to the NPC, that question itself is sufficient to grab the attention without an introduction. You can shoot straight into your proposal. If the motive was powerful enough to get you this far, this can be entirely roleplayed out without skill checks. The NPC may have some questions in the elaboration phase, but if you're sufficiently prepared with all the information before hand, you can knock those out of the park and move onto a clean, successful close.

How would you guys handle two PCs trying to convince an NPC to agree with one of them?

In our game each PC wanted the town mayor to accept their idea, each of which was mutually exclusive. So they took turns arguing with him and each other, and I had them rolling Persuasion checks and having the NPC respond logically. But I'd be interested how you'd break it down on a mechanical level if you were going to do that here.

Or would it all just be roleplaying?

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;866522How would you guys handle two PCs trying to convince an NPC to agree with one of them?

In our game each PC wanted the town mayor to accept their idea, each of which was mutually exclusive. So they took turns arguing with him and each other, and I had them rolling Persuasion checks and having the NPC respond logically. But I'd be interested how you'd break it down on a mechanical level if you were going to do that here.

Or would it all just be roleplaying?

Could you provide more details about the situation? What are the ideas each of the PCs have? What makes them mutually exclusive? How do their ideas benefit the mayor? And what are the mayor's priorities?

I'm so glad you posted this and shared your approach! (Might've been best to start a new thread and just link to the old thread, for clarity.)

We had a thread recently about whether the best GM's seem to be well-read, or not. I would say another determination (at least for the social interactions in a campaign) is how well the GM understands human behavior, whether through psychology, literature, experience, or whatever. The best GM's I know were all quite sharp and broad in their understanding of how many different people might behave in different circumstances. The GM's who didn't have so much of that, or who were a bit unbalanced themselves, naturally ran worlds where everyone in them, and the social interactions, were a bit like the GM and the GM's slant or lack of social perception/skills/etc. Almost goes without saying.

The whole thing about using some mix of dice, rules, and/or just roleplaying, seems like something good GM's just develop their own way of handling that works for them.

I really like the system you've shared! It makes a lot of sense, especially for attempts to convince someone of something. I wonder if you have other systems for other types of social interactions?

It has me think of various other forms of real-world communications training I've done, and how they compare and contrast. They would all seem to agree that your “discovery” is vital, as there is another person there, and without relating to them, you would just be guessing, so your results in convincing about something would be fairly random (or as good as your guess), as you wrote.

I would add that there's also another layer of practical effect about “discovery”, which is that other people will have some things in mind that they will want to communicate to you, and if you don't at least listen to those things (including reactions to what you say), then they may not listen to you. If their ideas are irrelevant to what the game wants to resolve, then that might just be something the game can abstract into the skills of the convincer, however.

It could be interesting to try to develop this sort of system for other models of communication, and/or other types of conversation.

As with a lot of game design, I like to try to model what I know about the situation in detail first, with little or no weight given to playability, and then later see how rules based on a full modelling can be abstracted into something playable. I think GMs who have strong understanding of human interactions end up doing this automatically when handling social interactions in RPGs: they combine roleplaying with some mechanical thoughts and improvised die rolls to fill in where they don't know the details and to take into account the differences between PC skills and player performance, but it's very interesting and useful to try to break it down with the benefit of a good formal explanation of a real-word model of communication like you've done.

My preferred way of dealing with social encounters is that you make dice-rolls or stat-comparisons before the encounter begins, and those:-

* do not point to specific outcomes of the dialogue
* instead merely bias the GM's roleplay of NPCs, and choice of hints to give players

What then happens is that conversation flows naturally, but the GM treats high-skilled PCs or high-rolling players' characters more favourably than he would probably have treated them without that element of bias, and treats low-skilled PCs or low-rolling players' characters less favourably than he would probably have treated them without that element of bias. A player skilled at persuasion can mitigate the effects of poor dice and stats, and a player hopeless at persuasion can use good rolls and good stats to mitigate their poor conversational skills, but crucially the natural ebb, flow and twists of conversation are preserved.

Quote from: Lunamancer;866524Could you provide more details about the situation? What are the ideas each of the PCs have? What makes them mutually exclusive? How do their ideas benefit the mayor? And what are the mayor's priorities?

We were playing Lost Mines of Phandelver with Sildar as the mayor. He's the mayor of a backwater town called Phandalin that he wants to build up and bring prosperity to.

After the party helped save the town several times, he appointed one of the PCs as the vice-mayor, who gets to speak for the mayor when the mayor is busy / not around / etc. We'll call him PC A.

The other PC is one who's rich and helped fund a lot of the repairs the town was going through, responsible for a lot of the buildup they've had lately. We'll call him PC B.

So PC B decides that he wants to help build up the town's guard forces. Right now it's just a handful of guards who can handle cat burglars and drunks but that's about it. He wants to fund them and buy them equipment and train more recruits and organize them.

PC A intervenes and says that he can't let someone divide the town's loyalties, as PC B would effectively be building a private militia. PC A says that if PC B wants to help the town he should donate to the town treasury and then PC A can distribute the goods through proper government channels. PC B doesn't want the town turned into a bureaucratic morass and enjoys the free wheeling nature frontier nature it had until now.

So they both go to the mayor and argue their case between them and him.

Quote from: Omnifray;866530My preferred way of dealing with social encounters is that you make dice-rolls or stat-comparisons before the encounter begins, and those:-

* do not point to specific outcomes of the dialogue
* instead merely bias the GM's roleplay of NPCs, and choice of hints to give players

This is precisely how it works in ZWEIHÄNDER (http://warhammerfantasyroleplay.com). The players first discuss above board what they intend to achieve and what is at risk. Next, they each pick a social tactic (based on their strongest social skill). Finally, each makes a single skill test. The result of the skill tests determine a number of personality traits/reaction temperaments the NPC will adopt during play (such as aggressiveness, untrusting, forgiving, afraid, indifference, etc...).

The "success" of the social encounter is therefore based on the role-play. However, personality traits/reaction temperaments - for good or ill - shape how the NPC reacts to such requests and how they acquiesce to their demands.

Quote from: Omnifray;866530* do not point to specific outcomes of the dialogue
* instead merely bias the GM's roleplay of NPCs, and choice of hints to give players

Exactly.  Something I've seen in a number of threads over the years (and especially where D&D players are concerned) is the premise that social skills are magical powers that compel both PCs and NPCs alike to do your bidding.  "Hey, I made my Bluff roll by a lot, so the NPC should just swallow it, right?"

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;866522How would you guys handle two PCs trying to convince an NPC to agree with one of them?

In our game each PC wanted the town mayor to accept their idea, each of which was mutually exclusive. So they took turns arguing with him and each other, and I had them rolling Persuasion checks and having the NPC respond logically. But I'd be interested how you'd break it down on a mechanical level if you were going to do that here.

Or would it all just be roleplaying?

Depends on how much random you or the players want in their session?

Combining the oration and the persuasion rolls sounds like the best mix since as noted above the PCs may be better at this stuff than the player.

5e DMG though does have the NPC interaction system for connecting to their interests and quirks as layers to peel away. Not a bad system really. Especially when drawing a blank for an NPC or just not up for, or no need to,  orating them.

Quote from: Lunamancer;866520I wanted to address these great points specifically, and how that looks following my procedure.

I was going to ask for examples, but you anticipated my need. Well done. ;)

The five step method you outlined reminds me of the seduction rules in James Bond 007, which also used five steps, each step of increasing difficulty.

QuoteFive Steps for Seduction
Five Steps
1.   The Look (Ease Factor 10)
2.   Opening Line (Ease Factor 9)
3.   Witty Conversation (Ease Factor 8)
4.   Beginning Intimacies (Ease Factor 5)
5.   When and Where? (Ease Factor 4)

I'll have to look at your five step method to see how to adapt it for use in my Honor+Intrigue campaign. Your five steps clearly lay out a method that the players/PCs should be using to interact with NPCs.

Quote from: Ravenswing;866561Exactly.  Something I've seen in a number of threads over the years (and especially where D&D players are concerned) is the premise that social skills are magical powers that compel both PCs and NPCs alike to do your bidding.  "Hey, I made my Bluff roll by a lot, so the NPC should just swallow it, right?"

I've usually seen this from player who are some combination of immature, unsophisticated, or very unworldly. Since the players don't at all understand how persuasion works in the real world, a magical black box approach in the game world makes as much sense to them as any other model of persuasion.

For D&D, I think that way of looking at persuasion started with WotC. I don't recall anyone in OD&D or AD&D thinking that CHA was all powerful though it tended to make NPCs like or trust the PC and was great for boosting morale or NPC loyalty, But magical mind control tended to actually be magical, e.g. Charm Person.

I have the players play out the scenario, then either auto succeed/fail or set a DC based on how it went and they roll to see if the outcome was in their favor or they made some obscure faux pas.

For example, if they get some great banter going they either succeed automatically or get a low DC to beat. Success means they get what they want or at least something in their favor. Maybe a discount, or the NPC will spread some helpful rumors about the group.

Failure means accidental offense like talking about a forbidden subject or the NPC was too difficult to persuade. The NPCs may talk shit about the characters to other NPCs, introduce some complications later on, or something similar.

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;866531We were playing Lost Mines of Phandelver with Sildar as the mayor. He's the mayor of a backwater town called Phandalin that he wants to build up and bring prosperity to.

After the party helped save the town several times, he appointed one of the PCs as the vice-mayor, who gets to speak for the mayor when the mayor is busy / not around / etc. We'll call him PC A.

The other PC is one who's rich and helped fund a lot of the repairs the town was going through, responsible for a lot of the buildup they've had lately. We'll call him PC B.

So PC B decides that he wants to help build up the town's guard forces. Right now it's just a handful of guards who can handle cat burglars and drunks but that's about it. He wants to fund them and buy them equipment and train more recruits and organize them.

PC A intervenes and says that he can't let someone divide the town's loyalties, as PC B would effectively be building a private militia. PC A says that if PC B wants to help the town he should donate to the town treasury and then PC A can distribute the goods through proper government channels. PC B doesn't want the town turned into a bureaucratic morass and enjoys the free wheeling nature frontier nature it had until now.

So they both go to the mayor and argue their case between them and him.

I could ask a lot more questions, but I'm going to make a few simplifying assumptions. I'm going to assume the mayor actually does care about the town, not his own power. Because it might be that he cares about the town only insofar as when things go well for the town, the people support him, and he has power. But even if PC B improved the town vastly with his plan, it would undermine the power of the mayor. So the mayor must truly care about the town for this to even be in question. Otherwise, he definitely would not like PC B's proposal.

Here's a wrinkle I'd put in it, though. If this is even a tough choice for the mayor, it's clear he likes parts of each proposal. So I would say the mayor's priority would be to try to find a "compromise" that would allow him to have his cake and eat it, too. I'm assuming what he likes about A's proposal is it avoids the dangers of a strong, private militia. And what he likes about B's proposal is that B is footing the bill.

I assume the mayor, because of his position, has really great social skills. So here's how I'd see this playing out. The mayor indeed agrees to hear both sides. According to my procedure, each side has thus succeeded in their introduction--the mayor is willing to listen. The mayor is very agreeable to this. No check is needed on the part of the PCs.

Each side indeed presents their case (perhaps foolishly skipping the discovery phase). Any particular piece of either case that acts as a safeguard against a private militia, or that pledges private funding, will be received favorably by the mayor. (Though if PC B proposes a safeguard or PC A pledges funding as part of the overall plan, skill checks may be required for those parts of the plan because the mayor may be rightly skeptical.)

Then we continue onto the elaboration phase. At least that's how it looks from PC A and PC B's perspective. From the mayor's perspective, everything so far has been the mayor listening to discover the precise motives of the two PCs. It will seem as though he's asking important questions to more clearly understand the proposals when he's really pushing, testing how much each PC will back-peddle, how much ground they'll give in order to win the mayor's favor.

Once the mayor knows this, and the PCs are expecting his decision at, what is from their perspective the close, the mayor will present his own plan that will secure funding from B while agreeing with A that there needs some oversight. Depending on how the skill checks went for A and B earlier, this may influence the degree of oversight. But ultimately the mayor will be making a pitch to have his cake and eat it too under the guise of offering a fair and judicious compromise to satisfy both PC's.

Roll 2d6 for base attitude of the NPC, higher is better.

Then the players fucking ROLEPLAY.  If they aren't "glib talkers," tough goddam shit.  Nobody's born a master tactician either.

Learn.

You want to persuade me, be persuasive.  If you aren't persuasive, learn.

Quote from: Skarg;866527I'm so glad you posted this and shared your approach! (Might've been best to start a new thread and just link to the old thread, for clarity.)

You're not the first to suggest it, I was thinking of doing it, but it looks like we've got a bit of activity here. If it starts to go in a lot of different directions, I'll dedicate a threat to my procedure specifically. There is a lot I could write on it. After all, I've literally read dozens of books on the subject, been to over a hundred training meetings, and have years of experience. It's hard to boil all that down into a message board post while also incorporating game mechanics to boot!

QuoteWe had a thread recently about whether the best GM's seem to be well-read, or not. I would say another determination (at least for the social interactions in a campaign) is how well the GM understands human behavior, whether through psychology, literature, experience, or whatever.

Funny you should mention that. Part of the reason I signed up here and decided to chime in on this thread is to get my momentum going again for this stuff. Of the hundreds of books I've read on topics outside of persuasion, there are a few that strike me as translating well to RPGs. One of my favorites is Essai Sur La Nature Du Commerce En General by Richard Cantillon.

The opening chapters almost read like a world builders guide, where it details how human civilizations form, and the differences between villages, towns, and cities. The book itself is the world's first full-fledged economic treatise, written circa 1730, before the industrial revolution. The theory is solid and still holds in modern times. But the fact that it references pre-modern observations gives it a lot of credibility as to translating to a fantasy game world economy.

Another one that's got me lately is "A Short History of Man" by Hans-Hermann Hoppe. Something about it reminded me of the old World of Greyhawk box set booklet that describes the migration of the ancient (human) races, Suloise, Oerideans, etc. What's great about Hoppe's book is it doesn't just spew facts of history and science. It provides reasoning and mechanisms. If the first thing you do is draw up a world map, the second thing you should do is populate the world according to what's laid out in A Short History of Man.

QuoteThe best GM's I know were all quite sharp and broad in their understanding of how many different people might behave in different circumstances. The GM's who didn't have so much of that, or who were a bit unbalanced themselves, naturally ran worlds where everyone in them, and the social interactions, were a bit like the GM and the GM's slant or lack of social perception/skills/etc. Almost goes without saying.

Just as an aside, RPGs are basically getting together with real live people and sitting around playing a game where you put yourself into the perspective of various fictional characters. If it weren't for the nerdom attached to the hobby, I'd have to question how anyone can game for any appreciable amount of time and not become good at social situations and understanding human behavior.

QuoteThe whole thing about using some mix of dice, rules, and/or just roleplaying, seems like something good GM's just develop their own way of handling that works for them.

There are any number of ways of mixing rules, dice, and roleplay (ruleplay, rollplay, and roleplay). Not all of them appeal to me. For me, interaction is the thing. Some people are happy to roleplay it out and end it all with a single deciding skill roll, with modifiers according to how good the roleplay was. That's not much interaction there. My procedure allows for, if you, the player, make a mistake, maybe your character's skill can save your ass. Or if you botch a skill roll, maybe clever decisions as a player can compensate. The system calls on you to act and react like that.

QuoteI really like the system you've shared! It makes a lot of sense, especially for attempts to convince someone of something. I wonder if you have other systems for other types of social interactions?

Speaking of books that translate well to gaming, my procedure is very similar to the selling system found in "The Secret of Selling Anything" by Harry Browne. I've added to it the benefit of my experience and a few really great pointers from other selling systems (the "upfront contract", which I didn't get into too much but is highly potent is out of Sandler Sales training).

Now the whole way I came to hear about this book is because it was on a best seller list for a financial blog because one of the blog's followers read the book and, using its advice, went out looking for a job as a financial analyst and landed two offers from Wall Street firms within one hour. The point being, this system, has applications in other kinds of social situations.

Take education for instance. I used to take guitar lessons. I went through a few different teachers. All were graduates of the Berkeley School of Music. All of them tried to hammer home the importance of me learning to read music. But I didn't want to do that. I was a teenager, I wanted to be like Slash. He's the best. Three teachers all failed to get me to read music. They just kept telling me if I'm serious about music, I have to learn to read.

Then a fourth teacher came along. She got me to read music. She "sold" me on reading music. See, up 'til then, when the teacher told me I had to learn to read music, what I was hearing is "Slash, that's something different from what I teach, boy. I'm not going to teach you to be Slash." Which of course is what I wanted. No wonder it fell on deaf ears! But she said, "So many musicians can't read music. This would really set you apart." And you know what I heard? "Not only can I teach you to be Slash, I can teach you to be even better." No wonder I was suddenly motivated to read music!

QuoteI would add that there's also another layer of practical effect about "discovery", which is that other people will have some things in mind that they will want to communicate to you, and if you don't at least listen to those things (including reactions to what you say), then they may not listen to you.

That is absolutely 1000% correct. The whole point of asking questions in discovery is to get the ball rolling in a productive direction. It's really about listening. That's where you learn how to frame your proposition in a way that will close. And as an added psychological benefit, most people really like someone who is truly willing to listen to them talk about their problems.

Quote from: Lunamancer;866590I could ask a lot more questions, but I'm going to make a few simplifying assumptions. I'm going to assume the mayor actually does care about the town, not his own power. Because it might be that he cares about the town only insofar as when things go well for the town, the people support him, and he has power. But even if PC B improved the town vastly with his plan, it would undermine the power of the mayor. So the mayor must truly care about the town for this to even be in question. Otherwise, he definitely would not like PC B's proposal.

Here's a wrinkle I'd put in it, though. If this is even a tough choice for the mayor, it's clear he likes parts of each proposal. So I would say the mayor's priority would be to try to find a "compromise" that would allow him to have his cake and eat it, too. I'm assuming what he likes about A's proposal is it avoids the dangers of a strong, private militia. And what he likes about B's proposal is that B is footing the bill.

I assume the mayor, because of his position, has really great social skills. So here's how I'd see this playing out. The mayor indeed agrees to hear both sides. According to my procedure, each side has thus succeeded in their introduction--the mayor is willing to listen. The mayor is very agreeable to this. No check is needed on the part of the PCs.

Each side indeed presents their case (perhaps foolishly skipping the discovery phase). Any particular piece of either case that acts as a safeguard against a private militia, or that pledges private funding, will be received favorably by the mayor. (Though if PC B proposes a safeguard or PC A pledges funding as part of the overall plan, skill checks may be required for those parts of the plan because the mayor may be rightly skeptical.)

Then we continue onto the elaboration phase. At least that's how it looks from PC A and PC B's perspective. From the mayor's perspective, everything so far has been the mayor listening to discover the precise motives of the two PCs. It will seem as though he's asking important questions to more clearly understand the proposals when he's really pushing, testing how much each PC will back-peddle, how much ground they'll give in order to win the mayor's favor.

Once the mayor knows this, and the PCs are expecting his decision at, what is from their perspective the close, the mayor will present his own plan that will secure funding from B while agreeing with A that there needs some oversight. Depending on how the skill checks went for A and B earlier, this may influence the degree of oversight. But ultimately the mayor will be making a pitch to have his cake and eat it too under the guise of offering a fair and judicious compromise to satisfy both PC's.

Yeah, the mayor does care about the town, and he was the kind of mercenary adventurer type that wasn't all about strict government procedures so he doesn't really have a problem with PC B's plan.

It's more that he put PC A in charge of these things, but PC B is one of his friends and a big supporter so when they came to him with this problem he's trying to find a middle ground to make them both happy. It's like when a politician has his VP support a policy that makes a big donor get mad and dial him up asking wtf is going on.

In the end it was pretty much exactly what you said: the compromise was to have PC B buy the stuff but have PC A provide oversight. But that was achieved pretty much solely through roleplaying, not mechanical checks. I had them roll Persuasion to see if there'd be a clear winner but they each rolled high and extremely close to each other.

Charisma isn't a dump stat.

In-character roleplaying isn't rocket science.

And if the chattering takes too much time, roll for initiative. This ain't Downton Abbey.

Quote from: B.T.;465532I mean mechanically.

In my experience this doesn't work.  Because the moment you set it up with mechanics past a couple of skill checks at most, you've defined a conflict in which there needs to be a 'winner'.  And most conversations aren't a conflict.  Even negotiations are more about compromising in a way that at least benefits both parties equally, or your side better than the other, without them realizing it.

You don't 'resolve' a social situation, you let it play it out.

Again, You Mileage May Vary.

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;866597In the end it was pretty much exactly what you said: the compromise was to have PC B buy the stuff but have PC A provide oversight. But that was achieved pretty much solely through roleplaying, not mechanical checks. I had them roll Persuasion to see if there'd be a clear winner but they each rolled high and extremely close to each other.

Yeah, a lot of cases are analogous to the non-magical, non-silver weapon vs a werewolf, or the blessed crossbow bolt vs the rakshasa. We know the outcome without rolling the dice. But we roll anyway because the player doesn't always know it when they're fighting a werewolf or a rakshasa. So it preserves the mystery.

I think in the procedure I outlined, if we were playing it out step by step and calling for dice rolls at key points, even if we know the outcome, when the mayor starts pushing back a little to test just how important each piece of the proposal is to the PC in question, if that player's skill check turned out badly, that might actually shake the player's confidence and make the player more willing to give a little more so as to walk away with at least SOMETHING he wanted.

In your case, though, they both rolled well, so it sounds like it was an even and fair compromise. Even though the solution was ultimately arrived at strictly through roleplay, not dice, just consider that what one player asked for--the very content of the roleplay--might have been different if that player were staring down at the die in front of them showing a '1.'

If you want to know how my procedure can influence PCs without mandating they play a certain way, there you have it.

Quote from: ZWEIHÄNDER;866539This is precisely how it works in ZWEIHÄNDER (http://warhammerfantasyroleplay.com).

How come the website for Zweihaender is warhammerfantasyroleplay dot com? Or is that just one of those questions where I should just not go there??

Quote from: ZWEIHÄNDER;866539The players first discuss above board what they intend to achieve and what is at risk.

There is a difference there:- in my system, whilst the ref will sometimes ask the players what they are intending to achieve from the social interaction, and whether they are intending to be dishonest, etc., primarily it's the ref who privately evaluates what people are likely to be trying to achieve and decides on the appropriate dice-rolls accordingly. That said, it is a relatively subtle difference - sometimes the ref will need to ask the players directly about these things. I don't like to slow the game down unnecessarily sorting these things out, but sometimes the players' input is indispensable.

Quote from: ZWEIHÄNDER;866539Next, they each pick a social tactic (based on their strongest social skill).

My system uses two stats for this:- Persuasion and Empathy. Different rolls may be needed depending on how the ref evaluates the different parties' objectives and tactics. If you haven't made a roll that you later think you need, you substitute a stat-comparison (which gives you the median outcome of the dice-roll), so that you're not interrupting the conversation to roll dice tediously.

Quote from: ZWEIHÄNDER;866539The result of the skill tests determine a number of personality traits/reaction temperaments the NPC will adopt during play (such as aggressiveness, untrusting, forgiving, afraid, indifference, etc...).

In my system the dimensions are basically gullibility versus cynicism and everything else flows from that. But it would be interesting to try Zweihaender's system some time. I don't have time right now!

Quote from: ZWEIHÄNDER;866539The "success" of the social encounter is therefore based on the role-play. However, personality traits/reaction temperaments - for good or ill - shape how the NPC reacts to such requests and how they acquiesce to their demands.

Yes, that's the same basic design goal.

Quote from: Bren;866576I was going to ask for examples, but you anticipated my need. Well done. ;)

Good examples can get really wordy because, hey, if it's combat, we have detailed stat blocks. I can just say "ogre" though and you can go look up the stats. I would argue if you want to have truly great social interaction in your games, you need to give just as much detail to what matters to the NPCs. I suppose one great project would be to come up with some generic, stock NPC "social stats" that can be plugged in.

QuoteThe five step method you outlined reminds me of the seduction rules in James Bond 007, which also used five steps, each step of increasing difficulty.

This list, sorry to say, reminds me more of what I call the "bad salesman" approach. No discovery phase. I should point out that the "bad salesman" approach is exactly what about 95% of sales books and 99% of sales offices teach. So these seduction rules aren't really "wrong" per se.

It's like this. If someone trained in average sales technique saw someone using my system (credit where credit is due, I borrowed almost entirely from Harry Browne's system), to the average salesman, my discovery phase would look like a rapport building stage, where I'm bonding with the prospect before I go to present and ultimately close the deal.

Relating it to the James Bond system, the witty conversation is where I'd actually be doing discovery. To make it fit a James Bond seduction flavor, there might be a few direct questions, but a lot of the discovery and information gathering would be done from reading body language and innuendo.

Now I'm not fully familiar with the James Bond system. I assume the falling Ease Factor means it's getting more difficult at each stage, correct? This is also a feature of the bad salesman technique. Because if discovery were in the place of witty conversation, you would move forward armed with everything you need to know to make it something SHE wants.

The reason why this is bad technique, especially in sales, is because it means you spend more time with people you ultimately can't or are unlikely to close. Part of the purpose of the discovery phase is also to find out if there's something that would prevent you from closing the deal so you don't waste your time and can move on to the next prospect. In the case of a skilled seducer, it keeps you from getting a drink thrown in your face.

The ultimate test: Would this work if it's an NPC trying to seduce a PC? See my most recent reply to mAcular Chaotic for one example of how my procedure can effectively sway PCs.

QuoteI'll have to look at your five step method to see how to adapt it for use in my Honor+Intrigue campaign. Your five steps clearly lay out a method that the players/PCs should be using to interact with NPCs.

I would say it's just a matter of plugging in the appropriate skill checks for your system. But I think it's important--and maybe you're already doing this given the focus on intrigue--to make sure you detail NPCs motives, preferences, and priorities, just as we always are sure to detail combat stats for monsters. And remember. There are werewolves and rakshasas out there. And they may be actually fairly common in social situations.

Quote from: Omnifray;866622How come the website for Zweihaender is warhammerfantasyroleplay dot com? Or is that just one of those questions where I should just not go there??

SEO rankings. They let this domain lapse a long time ago, and I claimed it for my own.

Quote from: Omnifray;866622There is a difference there:- in my system, whilst the ref will sometimes ask the players what they are intending to achieve from the social interaction, and whether they are intending to be dishonest, etc., primarily it's the ref who privately evaluates what people are likely to be trying to achieve and decides on the appropriate dice-rolls accordingly. That said, it is a relatively subtle difference - sometimes the ref will need to ask the players directly about these things. I don't like to slow the game down unnecessarily sorting these things out, but sometimes the players' input is indispensable.

My system uses two stats for this:- Persuasion and Empathy. Different rolls may be needed depending on how the ref evaluates the different parties' objectives and tactics. If you haven't made a roll that you later think you need, you substitute a stat-comparison (which gives you the median outcome of the dice-roll), so that you're not interrupting the conversation to roll dice tediously.

In my system the dimensions are basically gullibility versus cynicism and everything else flows from that. But it would be interesting to try Zweihaender's system some time. I don't have time right now!

Yes, that's the same basic design goal.

It sounds like you have a pretty robust, yet simple, social system. I'd love to take a look at it sometime. Can you link me?

Quote from: Bren;866576I was going to ask for examples, but you anticipated my need. Well done. ;)

Good examples can get really wordy because, hey, if it's combat, we have detailed stat blocks. I can just say "ogre" though and you can go look up the stats. I would argue if you want to have truly great social interaction in your games, you need to give just as much detail to what matters to the NPCs. I suppose one great project would be to come up with some generic, stock NPC "social stats" that can be plugged in.

QuoteThe five step method you outlined reminds me of the seduction rules in James Bond 007, which also used five steps, each step of increasing difficulty.

This list, sorry to say, reminds me more of what I call the "bad salesman" approach. No discovery phase. I should point out that the "bad salesman" approach is exactly what about 95% of sales books and 99% of sales offices teach. So these seduction rules aren't really "wrong" per se.

It's like this. If someone trained in average sales technique saw someone using my system (credit where credit is due, I borrowed almost entirely from Harry Browne's system), to the average salesman, my discovery phase would look like a rapport building stage, where I'm bonding with the prospect before I go to present and ultimately close the deal.

Relating it to the James Bond system, the witty conversation is where I'd actually be doing discovery. To make it fit a James Bond seduction flavor, there might be a few direct questions, but a lot of the discovery and information gathering would be done from reading body language and innuendo.

Now I'm not fully familiar with the James Bond system. I assume the falling Ease Factor means it's getting more difficult at each stage, correct? This is also a feature of the bad salesman technique. Because if discovery were in the place of witty conversation, you would move forward armed with everything you need to know to make it something SHE wants.

The reason why this is bad technique, especially in sales, is because it means you spend more time with people you ultimately can't or are unlikely to close. Part of the purpose of the discovery phase is also to find out if there's something that would prevent you from closing the deal so you don't waste your time and can move on to the next prospect. In the case of a skilled seducer, it keeps you from getting a drink thrown in your face.

QuoteI'll have to look at your five step method to see how to adapt it for use in my Honor+Intrigue campaign. Your five steps clearly lay out a method that the players/PCs should be using to interact with NPCs.

I would say it's just a matter of plugging in the appropriate skill checks for your system. But I think it's important--and maybe you're already doing this given the focus on intrigue--to make sure you detail NPCs motives, preferences, and priorities, just as we always are sure to detail combat stats for monsters. And remember. There are werewolves and rakshasas out there. And they may be actually fairly common in social situations.

Quote from: Lunamancer;866621Yeah, a lot of cases are analogous to the non-magical, non-silver weapon vs a werewolf, or the blessed crossbow bolt vs the rakshasa. We know the outcome without rolling the dice. But we roll anyway because the player doesn't always know it when they're fighting a werewolf or a rakshasa. So it preserves the mystery.

I think in the procedure I outlined, if we were playing it out step by step and calling for dice rolls at key points, even if we know the outcome, when the mayor starts pushing back a little to test just how important each piece of the proposal is to the PC in question, if that player's skill check turned out badly, that might actually shake the player's confidence and make the player more willing to give a little more so as to walk away with at least SOMETHING he wanted.

In your case, though, they both rolled well, so it sounds like it was an even and fair compromise. Even though the solution was ultimately arrived at strictly through roleplay, not dice, just consider that what one player asked for--the very content of the roleplay--might have been different if that player were staring down at the die in front of them showing a '1.'

If you want to know how my procedure can influence PCs without mandating they play a certain way, there you have it.

I was just thinking "wouldn't this force the PCs to act against their will" as I was reading this. Then I realized you were talking about shaking the PLAYER's confidence and not the player character.

What if they just ignore the 1 and ask for the moon anyway?

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;866634I was just thinking "wouldn't this force the PCs to act against their will" as I was reading this. Then I realized you were talking about shaking the PLAYER's confidence and not the player character.

What if they just ignore the 1 and ask for the moon anyway?

That's their choice. Maybe the 1 means nothing, and maybe it does. I guess you have to ask yourself, do you feel lucky? LOL

But seriously, in some situations, the player is simply not willing to give an inch. If I were PC B, my attitude as a player might be that I wasn't willing to foot the bill if I wasn't going to have it my way. It might be that I preferred to see no town guard built up at all rather than see it run by a political system. And if that's the case, then I'm kind of like a werewolf in that situation. No matter how good your skill roll was (or how bad mine was), no matter how good your skill is (or how bad mine is), you just don't have the right weapon to harm me.

Now the ultimate outcome--the compromise to allow B to build it but to give oversight to A (being that they're both PCs, I'm assuming B trusts A quite a bit), that just might be something I can live with. Maybe that's silver dagger that gets me to give up my money.

That's a key point to my procedure. You DO need to have the right weapon in order to succeed. The function of the skills is to help you get the right weapon, and to use it effectively.

Let me just add to my last post for the sake of being clear.

Let's say my attitude as a player is not what I described in the previous post. Let's say instead my preferences were as follows:

1 - Built up town guard under my control
2 - Built up town guard under the government's control
3 - No built up town guard at all.

(Of course there are possibilities in between 1 and 2. Like option 1.5, they're under PC A's control.)

When I'm in that meeting trying to make my case and I, as player, sees the 1 come up on my die roll, I know I'm probably going to "lose" this. So I can take the safe route and give in, knowing option 2 is at least better than option 3. Or I can press my luck and stand my ground. I may end up getting option 1 after all if I'm stubborn enough. But the risk is that we end up with option 3.

Isn't making choices and taking risks for your character is what RPGs are all about?

So I did write a reply to Bren's post about the James Bond seduction system. I kept getting a message that it was invisible pending moderator approval. I'm still really new here and really have no idea why it would have been flagged. Maybe referring to "bad salesmen" was considered a personal attack? LOL Or maybe the topic of seduction was just too risque!

Quote from: Lunamancer;866641But seriously, in some situations, the player is simply not willing to give an inch. If I were PC B, my attitude as a player might be that I wasn't willing to foot the bill if I wasn't going to have it my way. It might be that I preferred to see no town guard built up at all rather than see it run by a political system. And if that's the case, then I'm kind of like a werewolf in that situation. No matter how good your skill roll was (or how bad mine was), no matter how good your skill is (or how bad mine is), you just don't have the right weapon to harm me.

Nice example.

This is the sort of situation where people who think a good Bluff roll (or whatever) should always get what they want just fail to consider.

Unless the king really doesn't want the throne, it is unlikely to matter how well you roll when asking the king to give you (an unknown wanderer) his crown for free. As you say, there are situations where if you don't have the silver dagger or know the magic word you just aren't going to succeed.

Bren, I did try to write a reply to your James Bond example, but I must be using some key word that gets my post flagged. Maybe it will eventually be approved.

Quote from: Lunamancer;866595Funny you should mention that. Part of the reason I signed up here and decided to chime in on this thread is to get my momentum going again for this stuff. Of the hundreds of books I've read on topics outside of persuasion, there are a few that strike me as translating well to RPGs. One of my favorites is Essai Sur La Nature Du Commerce En General by Richard Cantillon. The opening chapters almost read like a world builders guide, where it details how human civilizations form, and the differences between villages, towns, and cities. The book itself is the world's first full-fledged economic treatise, written circa 1730, before the industrial revolution. The theory is solid and still holds in modern times. But the fact that it references pre-modern observations gives it a lot of credibility as to translating to a fantasy game world economy.

As chance would have it, I've been working on game designs that include pre-industrial economies, with the intention of contrasting to industrial thinking, so: sold! Would you recommend a particular English translation?

QuoteAnother one that's got me lately is "A Short History of Man" by Hans-Hermann Hoppe. Something about it reminded me of the old World of Greyhawk box set booklet that describes the migration of the ancient (human) races, Suloise, Oerideans, etc. What's great about Hoppe's book is it doesn't just spew facts of history and science. It provides reasoning and mechanisms. If the first thing you do is draw up a world map, the second thing you should do is populate the world according to what's laid out in A Short History of Man.

I'm doing that too... sold. Man, you're good. ;-)

Quote from: Lunamancer;866647Bren, I did try to write a reply to your James Bond example, but I must be using some key word that gets my post flagged. Maybe it will eventually be approved.

Impressive! I wonder what it takes to get flagged on this site! :hatsoff:

Quote from: Bren;866646Nice example.

This is the sort of situation where people who think a good Bluff roll (or whatever) should always get what they want just fail to consider.

Unless the king really doesn't want the throne, it is unlikely to matter how well you roll when asking the king to give you (an unknown wanderer) his crown for free. As you say, there are situations where if you don't have the silver dagger or know the magic word you just aren't going to succeed.

I think this is a teachable moment that's probably worth expanding on. One thing I left out that is ultra important, almost like the keystone of why the system works in real life sales situations, is to understand the nature of exchange.

Suppose I to the favorite local burger joint and buy a hamburger for $5. Is the hamburger worth $5?

I suppose a lot of people would say, "Yes, that's why it's priced at $5."

But think about it. Would you get up off your couch, put on your shoes, drive downtown in traffic, just to exchange a 5-dollar bill for five 1's?

No. I'm going to buy that burger because to me it's worth more than $5. Maybe to me it's worth even $8. In a sense, I'm profiting to the tune of $3 worth of happiness units by buying that burger.

What about the burger joint? Is the burger worth $5 to them? Of course not. How could a business stay profitable unless the $5 it was receiving on each burger was worth more than the burgers they were giving away? Maybe to the burger joint, they were only worth $2 each.

The point is, there is a spread, a whole range of negotiable terms that are mutually beneficial to all parties involved in the trade that everyone could agree to voluntarily (voluntarily means without the GM taking control of your PC because someone made a good skill roll against that PC). Now skill can help you come to an agreement within that range. It's not going to get you outside of it.

And what I didn't really mention (except briefly in the lost James Bond post) is that skill also helps you determine early on when the range between you and the other person is so narrow or non-existent as to make persuasion fruitless. We become so obsessed over our definition of "success" we often forget there are always implicit costs to the very attempt, even if the only cost is time. And so sometimes success means minimizing those costs.

Quote from: Skarg;866650As chance would have it, I've been working on game designs that include pre-industrial economies, with the intention of contrasting to industrial thinking, so: sold! Would you recommend a particular English translation?

The more recent one, edited by Mark Thornton (he's an economist) is aimed at preserving Cantillon's ideas, whereas the translation from the 30's was more history-minded, so opted to try to accurately translate out-dated French into out-dated English, so it's less readable and probably less accurate in terms of translating the economic ideas.

QuoteI'm doing that too... sold. Man, you're good. ;-)

Heh, I actually got that one free on .pdf before it was released. My brother had contacted the publisher in hopes of obtaining permission to do an audiobook. He was kind enough to forward me a copy.

QuoteImpressive! I wonder what it takes to get flagged on this site! :hatsoff:

I have a couple of guesses as to what it might have been, but I can't say what they are without getting this post flagged as well, lol!

Quote from: ZWEIHÄNDER;866627SEO rankings. They let this domain lapse a long time ago, and I claimed it for my own.

Well, fortune favours the brave...

Quote from: ZWEIHÄNDER;866627It sounds like you have a pretty robust, yet simple, social system. I'd love to take a look at it sometime. Can you link me?

It's not that simple, and unfortunately it's not available online at the moment. I'm currently going through the painful tedium of incorporating a few hundred edits from playtesting etc. When it's done I'll certainly be making a song and dance about it as much as I can. That may take some time.

There is an ashcan version that you could buy in hard copy from Lulu if you wanted (Soul's Calling Core Guide) but to be honest it's not as polished as I want it to be ("several hundred edits" speaks for itself) and it doesn't entirely represent my latest thinking. If you are interested though, there's a cheap paperback "value" edition whereas the hardback copy is quite expensive.

Quote from: Dr Rotwang!;465701Role-playing and, if necessary, reaction rolls.  IF necessary.

Same here. I find adding more of a board-game kind of element just a distraction from the reasons I'm playing an RPG instead of a board game.

"IF necessary" is a key point. What someone is going to do -- or at least a big domain of things he or she is NOT going to do -- can be close enough to certain given the incentives presented.

There are lots of low-probability possibilities for which we don't test in an RPG because either that's more bother than it's worth or the random events themselves would detract from our fun. ("You're eating? Roll for salmonella poisoning!")

"Where is the game?" is I think an important question to which different people may have different answers. I find it in the choices I make while engaging the imagined world from the perspective of my role. Others prefer to downplay that in favor of a statistical walk testing their "character build" choices.

I find the latter boring, just as I find casino games such as Roulette boring. Obviously, plenty of other people get a kick out of those. Again, though, it seems a bit odd to me to choose an RPG for that; and odder still when the expectation is brought to the aspect least like such abstract contests.

Quote from: Omnifray;866530My preferred way of dealing with social encounters is that you make dice-rolls or stat-comparisons before the encounter begins,

I do such things if and when I have a question calling for such an answer. Sometimes those arise before (or just when) someone comes along: "In what mood is Arevik Darbinyan, given the imponderables of how his day has been so far?" At other times they arise in the course of conversation.

Quoteand those:-

* do not point to specific outcomes of the dialogue
* instead merely bias the GM's roleplay of NPCs, and choice of hints to give players

Since the nature of the answers being sorted depends on the particular questions being asked, I make no such blanket limitation on their scope.

QuoteWhat then happens is that conversation flows naturally...

but I let the posing of questions to 'mechanics' flow along with it, rather than being forced at the outset.

Quote from: Phillip;866664but I let the posing of questions to 'mechanics' flow along with it, rather than being forced at the outset.

As I say, in my system there are always stat-comparisons to fall back on, to avoid interrupting the conversation for dice-rolls.

Quote from: Bren;866578For D&D, I think that way of looking at persuasion started with WotC. I don't recall anyone in OD&D or AD&D thinking that CHA was all powerful though it tended to make NPCs like or trust the PC and was great for boosting morale or NPC loyalty, But magical mind control tended to actually be magical, e.g. Charm Person.

I'd humbly suggest that OD&D/AD&D didn't foster such notions because there weren't explicit mechanics for the use of CHA in social situations.  The Bluff skill had to exist before people abused it, after all!  ;)

Quote from: Ravenswing;866685I'd humbly suggest that OD&D/AD&D didn't foster such notions because there weren't explicit mechanics for the use of CHA in social situations.  The Bluff skill had to exist before people abused it, after all!  ;)

There wasn't AS MUCH. There was darned plenty in 1E AD&D, though, a whole page of factors. In OD&D, there wasn't that long list of factors to modify rolls -- which many DMs ignored anyway -- but the rolls were there. If you used the CHA modifier given for Loyalty rolls with the Reaction spread of results, it could be very powerful. The raw score gave range for control of troops in combat.

Things like Bluff skill tend to limit capabilities rather than enlarge them.

Anybody who says that OD&D didn't have explicit mechanics for CHA in social situations need to read the fucking rules!

KNOWING WHAT YOU'RE TALKING ABOUT, MOTHERFUCKER!  DO YOU DO IT?

BTW, using the Reaction table in OD&D radically changes the game.

Seriously.

If the GM begins each encounter by rolling Reaction instead of just rolling Initiative, the amount of combat decreases and the amount of RP increases rather remarkably.

Quote from: ZWEIHÄNDER;866627SEO rankings. They let this domain lapse a long time ago, and I claimed it for my own.

Clever bastard! Kudos! That was a sharp move.

That was a good one Zweihander!

Quote from: Spinachcat;866762BTW, using the Reaction table in OD&D radically changes the game.

Seriously.

If the GM begins each encounter by rolling Reaction instead of just rolling Initiative, the amount of combat decreases and the amount of RP increases rather remarkably.



Clever bastard! Kudos! That was a sharp move.

What's the reaction table?

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;866737Anybody who says that OD&D didn't have explicit mechanics for CHA in social situations need to read the fucking rules!

Have.  Many times.  IMHO, anyone who claims that a "loyalty" table to see if hirelings stick with you and the "In addition the charisma score is usable to decide such things as whether or not a witch capturing a player will turn him into a swine or keep him enchanted as a lover" blurb on p.11 of Vol I constitute explicit CHA mechanics for social situations is unclear on the concept.

Hmm, 5e has that whole Honor stat. Maybe it could be useful for social encounters.

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;866783What's the reaction table?

IIRC, roll 2D6 +/- CHA modifier when you encounter a person/creature, the higher the total the better the reaction from the person/creature you encounter.

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;866783What's the reaction table?

About the same function to the reaction table in BX.

Essentially on first contact you could try to hire monsters, be it NPCs, adventurers, or actual monsters if their alignment was the same as the negotiators.

In BX it was more potent as it could swing monsters to your side reguardless.

What's the reaction table in BX. I assume the NPC's disposition?

I've only played 5E. (Though I read up on the rest.)

Actually I played PF once too but I hated it.

Quote from: Lunamancer;866647Bren, I did try to write a reply to your James Bond example, but I must be using some key word that gets my post flagged. Maybe it will eventually be approved.

Curious. I wasn't aware that posts got flagged.

What the fuck?

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;866875

Quote from: Spinachcat;866762BTW, using the Reaction table in OD&D radically changes the game.

Seriously.

If the GM begins each encounter by rolling Reaction instead of just rolling Initiative, the amount of combat decreases and the amount of RP increases rather remarkably
.[/QUOTED]


Fancy that!!

You can

QuoteSpinachcat or you can tell us you Quoted Spinachcat. Trying to do both at the same time doesn't work. :p

Quote from: Spinachcat;866762BTW, using the Reaction table in OD&D radically changes the game.

Seriously.

If the GM begins each encounter by rolling Reaction instead of just rolling Initiative, the amount of combat decreases and the amount of RP increases rather remarkably.

.

Even if one doesn't use reaction tables, it makes little sense for everything under the sun to want a fight. Even a group of bandits that come up on an encounter table probably want the players money, they don't necessarily want to have a battle right off the bat.

Quote from: Bren;866864Curious. I wasn't aware that posts got flagged.

All I can think is there must have been a word or a phrase there that triggered something that made the post require moderator approval. Which is kind of puzzling because it's not like there was a lot of explicit language in it. I will try my best to paraphrase it, careful to avoid anything that may trigger.

The James Bond system you posted varies from mine in a significant way. Actually, the James Bond system follows what I call the "typical" persuaders model. There's no discovery phase. It's not really wrong per se. It's consistent with the majority of books about sales and probably 99% of sales managers would give it the thumbs up (with perhaps a minor tweak or two).

The system I use is heavily borrowed from Harry Browne. If Harry Browne had been a James Bond type character, to a typical observer, he'd be doing the exact same thing. Only he inexplicably somehow ends up having more success. Must be luck, right?

The key difference is, when Harry Browne appears to be engaging in witty conversation, he's actually doing the discovery step. Granted, "discovery" in this situation may have a different feel to it. It may still have a few direct questions, but it's going to consist more of reading body language and innuendo. And when he proceeds, it's not just that he knows exactly what gets the woman going. It's that she feels listened to, understood, and not judged. That frees her inhibitions so getting her going is even in the realm of possibilities.

Now it might be an average pick-up artist does seem to have a good bit of success. That may be due to other attractive qualities like good looks or confidence. It may also be due to luck--he just stumbles upon the right set of words and attitudes that break down inhibitions and he just happens to like the exact same kink or lack thereof. (Or maybe he just buys her stronger drinks.) Then again, some women are just uninhibited by nature. I'm sure a large part of being a great pick-up artist is being able to spot the uninhibited ones.

I'm not really familiar with the James Bond system, but I'm assuming the falling Ease factors means the encounter is getting more challenging as it progresses. Do I have that right? Because this is another feature of the typical approach to persuasion. It starts out going for easy wins, then pushing for more and more as the conversation moves on.

The reason this is less effective, especially in sales, is because it allows you to waste a whole lot of time with people when, for whatever reason, you just don't have the ability to close the deal. A key part to success is to realize there are werewolves out there. So if you don't have the silver dagger, cut your losses and move on. When you use the discovery step, everything gets easier after that. Not harder. In the case of a smooth seducer, doing it right ultimately means is never getting a drink thrown in your face.

Quote from: Spinachcat;866762BTW, using the Reaction table in OD&D radically changes the game.

Seriously.

If the GM begins each encounter by rolling Reaction instead of just rolling Initiative, the amount of combat decreases and the amount of RP increases rather remarkably.

Fancy that!

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;866895Even if one doesn't use reaction tables, it makes little sense for everything under the sun to want a fight. Even a group of bandits that come up on an encounter table probably want the players money, they don't necessarily want to have a battle right off the bat.

Bandits almost NEVER want a fight.  Fights mean that some of your guys can get hurt or killed, property gets smashed, and the well-dressed fop who's coughing out his life with a sword through his guts is the duke's grandson, and you just lost a shot at a huge ransom.

Quote from: Ravenswing;866996Bandits almost NEVER want a fight.  Fights mean that some of your guys can get hurt or killed, property gets smashed, and the well-dressed fop who's coughing out his life with a sword through his guts is the duke's grandson, and you just lost a shot at a huge ransom.

At one point, I was working out a decision-making matrix for NPCs. Highwaymen vs Caravan was the first scenario I worked on.

The way I figured it, yes, the bandits would prefer to avoid fighting because fighting is costly for all the reasons you mention. However, asking for surrender has its own costs, namely you lose the element of surprise.

The flip side would be for the caravan. Do you fight, or do you surrender? And that would come down to a few things. Whether the highwaymen would try to kill you anyway once you hand over the valuables. Whether or not it was possible to defeat the highwaymen in combat. And, of course, whether the anticipated cost in lives would be greater or less than the cost in goods.

So the highwaymen would have to assess whether they could take out the caravan's fighters using the element of surprise, and whether or not they thought the caravan would accept surrender. Only then would they decide whether to ask for surrender, or just attack without warning. Or even just remain hidden and let the caravan go, because it may be too well guarded. Or it may seem that the wealth of the travelers just isn't worth the risk of trying to rob.

Quote from: Lunamancer;866956I'm not really familiar with the James Bond system, but I'm assuming the falling Ease factors means the encounter is getting more challenging as it progresses. Do I have that right?

You are correct.

QuoteThe reason this is less effective, especially in sales, is because it allows you to waste a whole lot of time with people when, for whatever reason, you just don't have the ability to close the deal. A key part to success is to realize there are werewolves out there. So if you don't have the silver dagger, cut your losses and move on. When you use the discovery step, everything gets easier after that. Not harder. In the case of a smooth seducer, doing it right ultimately means is never getting a drink thrown in your face.

Yes I can see the difference and understand the advantage of figuring out if a deal is possible/likely.

One of the reasons I like the five steps you outlined is that as a model it clearly lays out to the players that there is an advantage to taking several steps, including discovery or information gathering, in the process of making an attempt to persuade or make a deal.

One disadvantage to an involved or detailed discovery phase in game is it presumes the GM knows that level of detail about the wants and needs of any relevant NPCs. Often I don't. Randomly or otherwise generating answers to discovery questions can be time consuming. What James Bond and other systems do is abstract the discovery as part of the various difficulties. As you noted, an unfortunate side effect is it limits how much tactical choice a player can make vs. how much is left up to die rolls and PC skills.

Regarding getting drinks tossed in your face, when you are James Bond, that is also just part of the seduction process. ;)

Quote from: Lunamancer;867024Or it may seem that the wealth of the travelers just isn't worth the risk of trying to rob.

Heavily armed, but shabbily dressed travelers do tend to have a low short term risk to reward ratio.

Quote from: Bren;867047Regarding getting drinks tossed in your face, when you are James Bond, that is also just part of the seduction process. ;)

I was just thinking that a drink to the face was a pretty good sign that Bond was on track!

Quote from: Natty Bodak;867064I was just thinking that a drink to the face was a pretty good sign that Bond was on track!

Well its a game (and genre) where getting captured by the bad guy is the default strategy for winning, so the assumptions in Bond-world are a little different than in the real world. :D

Quote from: Bren;867047One disadvantage to an involved or detailed discovery phase in game is it presumes the GM knows that level of detail about the wants and needs of any relevant NPCs. Often I don't. Randomly or otherwise generating answers to discovery questions can be time consuming. What James Bond and other systems do is abstract the discovery as part of the various difficulties. As you noted, an unfortunate side effect is it limits how much tactical choice a player can make vs. how much is left up to die rolls and PC skills.

Right. So I would address this in three different ways.

First, I think GMs have to make an adjustment if they really want more social interaction in the game. Characters typically are given plenty of combat stats. And look at just AC alone. In most cases, it's one number. If your shield has defended the maximum number of times that round (I'm still in 1st Ed mode), you have a different AC. If you're taken by surprise, you don't get your Dex bonus. The point is, we have a lot of combat stats, and we have a logical framework for customizing them to a specific situation. We need to give this kind of consideration to NPCs we expect there to be social interactions with.

Second, we can always opt to scale back to abstracting social interactions with NPCs when the NPCs aren't important enough to detail. Players without requisite social skills will have trouble getting past hello. If the NPC is truly that unimportant, the cost of a sufficient gift to get their attention would be beyond the value the NPC provides. Think of it as a mook rule for persuasion.

Third, and this is something that I see perhaps as a worthwhile project, we could take the time to start creating some stock NPC motivation templates. If the players decide to try to persuade, intimidate, or con a random NPC that you, as GM, couldn't possibly have anticipated, a quick roll on a table, and you have ready-made motives to plug into the NPC.

This third option, especially when used for each and every unimportant NPC, can actually add a lot to the game. In an ideal world, if the party encountered a gang of bandits, I want each one to be outfitted individually, each with their own name, personality, and possibly special advantages/disadvantages rather than a platoon of identical, interchangeable bad guys. It goes a long way towards really captivating the players imaginations. I guarantee you, they'll think at least one of those bandits was just a totally awesome character, even though he's nothing but a stock, straight-out-of-the-book schmo.

QuoteRegarding getting drinks tossed in your face, when you are James Bond, that is also just part of the seduction process. ;)

Well, that's because James Bond is such a charmer, he doesn't need to seduce women. He gets them to seduce him. The drink in the face? That's just the gal using a take-away close.

Quote from: Lunamancer;867098Right. So I would address this in three different ways.

Not sure how you are envisioning #1.

Two things I have done at times in H+I that seem kind of like #1 are the following.

{1} Assigning NPCs a degree of tractability i.e. openness or resistance to new ideas and to changing their mind. Historically, some bad rulers were easily swayed and ended up vacillating from one course of action to another depending on what courtier had most recently gotten the king's ear while others would stick firmly to a course despite evidence that a change was desirable.

Tractability and modifier to persuasion:
Mercurial      (+2)
Impulsive      (+1)
Flexible      (0)
Reserved      (-1)
Unwavering      (-2)
Intractable      (-4)
Inuman           (Impossible)

{2} Assigning Keys based on interests or specific approaches that would make an NPC more open to being influenced. So approaching a NPC using that key or offering that key would have a beneficial influence to persuading the NPC to agree to a deal or course of action. Keys included:

Approaches

• Bribe (Artwork, Books, Fine Clothing, Horses, Jewelry, Weapons)
• Entertain
• Flatter
• Intimidate
• Offer Aid
• Pray
• Question
• Seduce
• Seek Aid
• Trade

Interests

• Club (shared membership)
• Drinking
• Gambling
• Gossip
• Party
• Sports (Chess, Fencing, Hunting, Riding, Shooting, Tennis)

#2 makes sense and the analogy to Mook rules is apt.

#3 sounds the most interesting approach though I'm not sure how one would go about creating a set of templates for motivation.

QuoteThis third option, especially when used for each and every unimportant NPC, can actually add a lot to the game.

The cost/benefit of having to track individual and different motivations for each NPC will have to be looked at. I suspect it will be too high a tracking cost to do that for all NPCs. One reason that Runequest 3 moved to templates like Fair Viking Warrior or Average Merchant is because the cost of generating, recording, and tracking individual combat and skills stats for each NPC exceeded the value provided by having all those things individualized. In RQ, individualized stats (like the very old Militia book) preceded templates like the RQ3 Vikings Sourcebook.

Wow, this is getting very, very interesting. I especially appreciate the reference to "mook social rules". :D I'll have to come back to this thread and really dig in and reply. Thanks for the contributions, Lunamancer!

Quote from: Lunamancer;867098In an ideal world, if the party encountered a gang of bandits, I want each one to be outfitted individually, each with their own name, personality, and possibly special advantages/disadvantages rather than a platoon of identical, interchangeable bad guys. It goes a long way towards really captivating the players imaginations. I guarantee you, they'll think at least one of those bandits was just a totally awesome character, even though he's nothing but a stock, straight-out-of-the-book schmo.

Back in the day, when RuneQuest stat blocks were remarkably big by then-usual standards (to the point that Chaosium sold booklets of pregenerated ones), I realized that most of the details were lost on players. There really wasn't much point in a lot more mechanical paperwork than for monsters in AD&D, unless a figure was interacted with over an extended period.

What players noticed was what they saw, which was appearance and personality that could be quite different even if stat-wise I was re-using Rhino Rider #3 for however many figures.



Well, that's because James Bond is such a charmer, he doesn't need to seduce women. He gets them to seduce him. The drink in the face? That's just the gal using a take-away close.[/QUOTE]

The players roleplay the scene.  When it seems appropriate, one of the players rolls whichever skill they are using with a possible bonus for good roleplaying or good use of IC information.  I resolve the scene based on what they wanted to do and how well they did on the check.  Some NPCs can be convinced or made friendly and some can't.  Of the ones that can, some are easy to convince and some are very difficult.    

PCs are really susceptible to social skills in the way NPCs are.  If an NPC is siccessfully bluffed, I have them act as if they believe what is being said.  The specifics depend on the NPC.  A shifty, untrustworthy NPC will be prepared for the PC to also be shifty and untrustworthy even if he does believe them.  For PCs, I just say something like, "He seems to be telling the truth."  What the PC does with that is up to the player.

Quote from: Bren;867107Not sure how you are envisioning #1.

Generally, I go with just a brief verbal description. I do like your tractability modifier. It's almost like a "social armor class." It's perfect to apply to the introduction phase. From there, use the discovery phase to feel out the interests. With that in mind, decide on an approach for the presentation.

Quote#3 sounds the most interesting approach though I'm not sure how one would go about creating a set of templates for motivation.

The cost/benefit of having to track individual and different motivations for each NPC will have to be looked at. I suspect it will be too high a tracking cost to do that for all NPCs.

What I've done in the past is to track exact stats for individual members of large groups, say like a bandit gang. Each of them had names, one or two features noted about their physical descriptions. Some of them had a special advantage and/or disadvantage. Each of them had different weapon (or weapons), armor, and monetary treasure. If magical items were to be among the treasures of the group, they would be assigned to individuals in the group and uses in the encounter.

Now to generate this the old fashioned way, whether having to imagine it up, or roll it from a table, that would take too long to be worth while. Using a computer-aided generator, however, it's quick and easy and the end result is great.

Gary Gygax was once asked why he included so many polearms in AD&D. His response was because he imagined an army of orcs, each with a different weapon, rather than there being any uniformity. He thought it was a cool visual. I definitely agree. It's more life-like. Less sterile. That's been my inspiration.

This was all long before I developed my procedure for handling social interaction. It was before I knew much of anything about the art of persuasion. So I never got around to creating new automated tables to generate personalities as well. But I imagine it would add just as much impact. There are certainly tables in the 1st Ed DMG that could provide a jumping off point.

What I have done, however, is when starting a new campaign, at the starting locale, I would generate 20 NPCs at the locale, giving them all names and stats, even if they were just "0th level humans." They had jobs, desires, and so forth. The idea was to add another 5 NPCs in between each game session to fully flesh out the town. I found that when NPCs had clear motives, the plots began to write themselves. And my campaigns have always been 100% sandbox. Yet plots made sense because NPCs were putting events in motion which would effect the PCs.

This begins to stray onto another topic, another of my pet projects, something I call the Perpetual Campaign. It's equal parts NPC motivations, Adventure Ecology, and randomness. Anytime the PCs "complete an adventure" a new one is always popping up. And there's always a list of interesting things to choose from the party can do that never runs out.

Quote from: Phillip;867112What players noticed was what they saw, which was appearance and personality that could be quite different even if stat-wise I was re-using Rhino Rider #3 for however many figures.

I kept my stat-blocks manageable. Lejendary Adventure is usually my go-to game, though I play a lot of old-school D&D. In LA stat blocks for "monsters" really just comes down to 5 items: Health, Precision, Speed, Attacks, Defense. So when I'm varying attacks and defense, that means detailing weapons and armor individual bandits would use. Not just formed part of their physical description--players know full well that has a mechanical effect on play.

When I was using D&D, I wouldn't generate STR, INT, etc, I'd treat them with monster stats. They'd have individual damage and AC according to weapons and armor (MM in many cases gave the percentages of which gear they would have) and their own hit points according to the hit dice roll. So what? 3 stats really are all that would vary. If I wanted to include bonuses for one or two exceptional stats, that would bring it up to 5 figures, just like LA.

You combine that with a name and one or two physical features--it's not a full-fledged description. If you detailed your own character with so few details, you'd be laughed at by snobby roleplayers. But when it's a bit NPC, who isn't supposed to have that detail, it's just enough to make a lasting impression.

Quote from: Lunamancer;867130Generally, I go with just a brief verbal description. I do like your tractability modifier.

I got the idea from Black Vulmea's blog. It helps differentiate otherwise similar contacts. If known, those behavioral traits also allow for tactical choices.

Vicomte “Chancie” de Chambre
Tractability: Mercurial; +2 to persuasion; changes beliefs (and hats) like other men change their hats.
Factions: Avant-garde fashionisté; Bassompierre's party.

• Because Chancie is mercurial he is easy to persuade. On the other hand, he is quickly bored and moves on to the next new thing so he doesn’t stay interested or persuaded for very long. He makes a good contact for current gossip or fashion or immediate, short-term help.

Seigneur de Toiras
Tractability: Reserved; -1 penalty to attempts to persuade. Tends towards firm opinions or to stay the course.
Factions: King Louis XIII (Toiras is a Huguenot, but loyal to the King)

• Toiras is difficult to persuade, but he tends to hold firmly to his opinions once he holds them. Toiras would make a good long term ally or friend.

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;866829What's the reaction table in BX. I assume the NPC's disposition?

I've only played 5E. (Though I read up on the rest.)

Actually I played PF once too but I hated it.

On OD&D it allowed you to try and recruit monsters encountered in the dungeon. You could only try to recruit monsters of the same alignment as the recruiter.
2d6 roll +/- any CHA mods +/- any DM determined mods from orations and offers. On a bad roll the creature was hostile or even attacks. On a good roll the creature accepted or even got a bonus to loyalty.

In BX the table was the same. But the effect was more profound as it was a system to determine monster attitude on contact. Rather than recruitment. And for reactions after talking to them.

Most of the games I have seen already have some way to slant the odds of success based on who you are talking to.  In Pathfinder (which I run a lot these days), the DC is based on the NPC's initial attitude.  The DC is a lot lower for a friendly NPC than for a hostile one.

Quote from: Lunamancer;867130Now to generate this the old fashioned way, whether having to imagine it up, or roll it from a table, that would take too long to be worth while. Using a computer-aided generator, however, it's quick and easy and the end result is great.

Indeed it is.  I don't know how I ever GMed without a computer to handle that sort of procedural work for me.

Quote from: Lunamancer;867130This begins to stray onto another topic, another of my pet projects, something I call the Perpetual Campaign. It's equal parts NPC motivations, Adventure Ecology, and randomness. Anytime the PCs "complete an adventure" a new one is always popping up. And there's always a list of interesting things to choose from the party can do that never runs out.

I would be very interested to hear more about this if you don't mind.  Particularly how you manage it.  I've done a lot with faction-level metagames to provide the same kind of end result, but have never considered it feasible to carry it out on the level of individuals.

How do you resolve social encounters?

Stop thinking of them as encounters...

Social interaction should not be its own minigame... These are roleplaying games after all... Play it, dont game it.

Quote from: nDervish;867230I would be very interested to hear more about this if you don't mind.  Particularly how you manage it.  I've done a lot with faction-level metagames to provide the same kind of end result, but have never considered it feasible to carry it out on the level of individuals.

It's a lot to explain all at once. And I think if I did explain it, it would be off-putting to most. It does involve a lot of record-keeping. But to the extent that a GM does spend more than an hour between sessions preparing next week's adventure, this can be a time-saver. And, of course, provides an endless source of ideas.

There are a lot of different components to it. I detail important NPCs, definitely the ambitious schemers. I play sandbox, so this is the source of the "plots." These NPCs are typically ones PCs will not encounter early in the campaign. Then I detail a bunch of low-level, ordinary NPCs that PCs are likely to encounter just by going place-to-place around town. These are a lot of work with little individual pay-off individually. Collectively, it makes the campaign seem more living and breathing.

I also have random tables, a good number of them, for producing events in response to things the PCs do. These aren't always big, noticeable, earth-shattering events. After a successful dungeon crawl when the party brings back a good amount of loot, word of this could attract NPC adventurers to the town (and yes, I generate stats for these and track them in the background). An NPC adventurer already in town might seek to join up with the party. If there are enough adventurers in town, especially if the PCs aren't accepting new members, they may form a rival adventuring party.

Another example, always seems to come back to bandits. If the bandits try to rob a caravan guarded by the PCs who are far more powerful than the bandits anticipate might lead to the death and capture of bandits, the remaining gang is smaller and weaker. Maybe they'll demand new leadership. Suddenly the pattern of how bandits strike and the tactics they use changes. Or if the entire band is somehow killed or captured, this leaves a vacuum for another gang to come in to fill. Maybe two gangs attempt to jump on the opportunity. This would mean both a spike in robberies as well as occasional violent outbreaks of gang rivalry.

To link it back to NPC adventurers, after spending time in town without getting in on adventure, there is a chance that NPC adventurer will join a gang (also a chance of them leaving town or giving up adventuring and finding work as soldiers or guards, etc).

All of this requires record-keeping, and the majority of it will be in the background, players completely unaware of it, so it initially seems a lot of work with little payoff. But the natural progression sets up backstories for future events that become major story arcs.

Quote from: YourSwordisMine;867231How do you resolve social encounters?

Stop thinking of them as encounters...

Social interaction should not be its own minigame... These are roleplaying games after all... Play it, dont game it.

Unfortunately some people really do want a rule and detail for everything.

I like 5e D&D's approach to this with the Traits-Ideals-Flaws-Bonds system. In 4 rolls you have a good basis for the NPCs interaction factors.

example: arrogant, believes strongly in balance, is infatuated with another NPC, and knows something forbidden.

Combine that with the rest of the NPC gen and the interaction rules starting on page 244 and on the fly you can glean a fair variety of people and as little or as much rolling to deal with them as you want.

Quote from: nDervish;867230Indeed it is.  I don't know how I ever GMed without a computer to handle that sort of procedural work for me.



I would be very interested to hear more about this if you don't mind.  Particularly how you manage it.  I've done a lot with faction-level metagames to provide the same kind of end result, but have never considered it feasible to carry it out on the level of individuals.

Tony Bath's "Setting Up a Wargames Campaign," which is part of this volume.

http://www.lulu.com/shop/society-of-ancients-and-tony-bath-and-john-curry/tony-baths-ancient-wargaming/paperback/product-15463540.html

Honest, folks, a LOT of this stuff was written up in a very useable form by Tony back in the early 70s.

Quote from: Omega;867160On OD&D it allowed you to try and recruit monsters encountered in the dungeon. You could only try to recruit monsters of the same alignment as the recruiter.
2d6 roll +/- any CHA mods +/- any DM determined mods from orations and offers. On a bad roll the creature was hostile or even attacks. On a good roll the creature accepted or even got a bonus to loyalty.

In BX the table was the same. But the effect was more profound as it was a system to determine monster attitude on contact. Rather than recruitment. And for reactions after talking to them.

It was used that way by Gary and Dave before publication, too, even though it wasn't explicitly spelled out.

Quote from: Lunamancer;866395The procedure I put in place, since it does follow a real conversation, can be 100% role-played out, with it calling for skill checks in a few key points. I hesitate to liken social encounters to combat encounters, because the whole point of social skills is to gain consent and cooperation, which is the complete opposite of conflict and domination. But, much like combat, it doesn't cram everything into one die roll. There is interaction and the opportunity for choice between dice rolls.

Ahem, the goal of a con isn't consent, it's making someone believe erroneous information.
Similarly, the goal of a lot, and probably of most violence, is to gain (grudging) consent and cooperation;).
Just saying:). I must add that I like your system a whole lot, but I find trying to point out the similarities to fighting to be more useful.

Quote from: Lunamancer;866466Well, thanks for the interest. I appreciate the opportunity to discuss this. Every time I have to explain it, I get a little bit better at explaining it.

So in its basic form, I break persuasion down into 5 phases. Introduction, discovery, presentation, elaboration, and the close. The introduction is about getting the other person's attention and willingness to listen. Discovery is about finding out what they want, their motivations. Presentation is framing your proposal in a way likely to appeal to your prospect. Elaboration is when the prospect still has doubts--objections or questions--and you clarify to ease their concerns. The close is like the handshake that seals the deal.

I think the way most people approach it (especially bad salesmen in real life) is they skip discovery and treat elaboration as a battle of wits. So it's like, "Hi, this is what I think you should do," followed by several rounds of verbal jujitsu until someone finally admits they're wrong. Being that this is an internet message forum, I think we all know how unrealistic that is.

Actually, I'd say that this is exactly realistic. The unrealistic part would be hoping for high-percentage success.
Then again, I think this is also the tactic used when the persuader is lacking time. Well, if you're good at "cold reading", you could make it work a lot of the time - but then you're just shifting the discovery phase before the intro, and relying on non-verbal clues.

Still, it works often enough for many people. I'd point out a probably less popular examples: people that do cons on the phone. Some of them just call people, and manage to make them believe a wild story about a relative or friend needing cash.
I've been targeted by those people, myself (and it was funny how fast they hung the phone after I asked whether they mind me recording the conversation). They are good, and usually rely on information they obtained beforehand.

Is such a scenario possible under your system, though? Often enough to make it worthwhile?

QuoteA hard close can go simply as a skill check. But there might also be actions the persuader can take outside the scope of social skills that can win the day. Think of playing poker. You think the other guy is bluffing. He goes all in. You still think he's bluffing, but the fact is you can't afford to be wrong about it, so you fold anyway. A hard close can be like that.

Well, how would you make a "poker close" if you need someone to become your ally in order for you to avoid being murdered by your enemies? Presume whatever argument you like worked, but not perfectly, and give me an example, please.

Quote from: Omnifray;866530My preferred way of dealing with social encounters is that you make dice-rolls or stat-comparisons before the encounter begins, and those:-

* do not point to specific outcomes of the dialogue
* instead merely bias the GM's roleplay of NPCs, and choice of hints to give players

This one tends to fail miserably if the player is better at persuasion than the GM, IME;).

Quote from: Bren;866578I've usually seen this from player who are some combination of immature, unsophisticated, or very unworldly. Since the players don't at all understand how persuasion works in the real world, a magical black box approach in the game world makes as much sense to them as any other model of persuasion.

I was going to say "MMO fans", because that's my experience with said players.

Quote from: Lunamancer;866956All I can think is there must have been a word or a phrase there that triggered something that made the post require moderator approval. Which is kind of puzzling because it's not like there was a lot of explicit language in it. I will try my best to paraphrase it, careful to avoid anything that may trigger.

The James Bond system you posted varies from mine in a significant way. Actually, the James Bond system follows what I call the "typical" persuaders model. There's no discovery phase. It's not really wrong per se. It's consistent with the majority of books about sales and probably 99% of sales managers would give it the thumbs up (with perhaps a minor tweak or two).

The system I use is heavily borrowed from Harry Browne. If Harry Browne had been a James Bond type character, to a typical observer, he'd be doing the exact same thing. Only he inexplicably somehow ends up having more success. Must be luck, right?

The key difference is, when Harry Browne appears to be engaging in witty conversation, he's actually doing the discovery step. Granted, "discovery" in this situation may have a different feel to it. It may still have a few direct questions, but it's going to consist more of reading body language and innuendo. And when he proceeds, it's not just that he knows exactly what gets the woman going. It's that she feels listened to, understood, and not judged. That frees her inhibitions so getting her going is even in the realm of possibilities.

Now it might be an average pick-up artist does seem to have a good bit of success. That may be due to other attractive qualities like good looks or confidence. It may also be due to luck--he just stumbles upon the right set of words and attitudes that break down inhibitions and he just happens to like the exact same kink or lack thereof. (Or maybe he just buys her stronger drinks.) Then again, some women are just uninhibited by nature. I'm sure a large part of being a great pick-up artist is being able to spot the uninhibited ones.

I'm not really familiar with the James Bond system, but I'm assuming the falling Ease factors means the encounter is getting more challenging as it progresses. Do I have that right? Because this is another feature of the typical approach to persuasion. It starts out going for easy wins, then pushing for more and more as the conversation moves on.

The reason this is less effective, especially in sales, is because it allows you to waste a whole lot of time with people when, for whatever reason, you just don't have the ability to close the deal. A key part to success is to realize there are werewolves out there. So if you don't have the silver dagger, cut your losses and move on. When you use the discovery step, everything gets easier after that. Not harder. In the case of a smooth seducer, doing it right ultimately means is never getting a drink thrown in your face.

Seducing or persuading, how would players recognise it's time to cut the losses under your system?

And since you're answering about other systems, how would your system map to Exalted 3e's system? In it, you need to know something the NPC believes or values in order to have a chance to make him or her act according to what you want.
Like, you want a satrap to reduce some taxes, you need to know if he or she actually believes stuff like "people need to be kept happy in order to minimise unrest", or "I shouldn't be too hard on them". Then you use that to argue it supports your case.
Thing is, you can still fail, if he also has beliefs that contradict this. Like "my superiors wouldn't be happy with reduced tax revenue" can be good enough for him to spend Willpower and resist your influence.
You want to block this in advance, find out and sooth his fears of his superiors, or make him fear unrest more than his superiors.
So, how does it map to your system?

Quote from: Lunamancer;867098Right. So I would address this in three different ways.

First, I think GMs have to make an adjustment if they really want more social interaction in the game. Characters typically are given plenty of combat stats. And look at just AC alone. In most cases, it's one number. If your shield has defended the maximum number of times that round (I'm still in 1st Ed mode), you have a different AC. If you're taken by surprise, you don't get your Dex bonus. The point is, we have a lot of combat stats, and we have a logical framework for customizing them to a specific situation. We need to give this kind of consideration to NPCs we expect there to be social interactions with.

Here's where I totally agree... I often say that my NPCs are just one line of stats. Sometimes, I add that the reason I like it this way is "so I'd have more time for their personality".

QuoteSecond, we can always opt to scale back to abstracting social interactions with NPCs when the NPCs aren't important enough to detail. Players without requisite social skills will have trouble getting past hello. If the NPC is truly that unimportant, the cost of a sufficient gift to get their attention would be beyond the value the NPC provides. Think of it as a mook rule for persuasion.

Isn't that the inverse of a mook rule? Players without requisite social skills shouldn't bother with unimportant persuasion. So, they don't deal with mooks.

QuoteThird, and this is something that I see perhaps as a worthwhile project, we could take the time to start creating some stock NPC motivation templates. If the players decide to try to persuade, intimidate, or con a random NPC that you, as GM, couldn't possibly have anticipated, a quick roll on a table, and you have ready-made motives to plug into the NPC.

This third option, especially when used for each and every unimportant NPC, can actually add a lot to the game. In an ideal world, if the party encountered a gang of bandits, I want each one to be outfitted individually, each with their own name, personality, and possibly special advantages/disadvantages rather than a platoon of identical, interchangeable bad guys. It goes a long way towards really captivating the players imaginations. I guarantee you, they'll think at least one of those bandits was just a totally awesome character, even though he's nothing but a stock, straight-out-of-the-book schmo.

Well, that's a book of stat blocks I'd actually buy.
Like, my current Exalted campaign has only about 10 well-developed NPCs, and 8 of them have got one line of combat stats... Which is awfully hard in Exalted, BTW.
But all of them have names and a full set of Personality Keys, as above, and Relationship Keys (or Intimacies and Backgrounds, in the system).

I guess I really liked the "Name your NPCs" advice in Apocalypse World.

Quote from: Lunamancer;867130Gary Gygax was once asked why he included so many polearms in AD&D. His response was because he imagined an army of orcs, each with a different weapon, rather than there being any uniformity. He thought it was a cool visual. I definitely agree. It's more life-like. Less sterile. That's been my inspiration.


This begins to stray onto another topic, another of my pet projects, something I call the Perpetual Campaign. It's equal parts NPC motivations, Adventure Ecology, and randomness. Anytime the PCs "complete an adventure" a new one is always popping up. And there's always a list of interesting things to choose from the party can do that never runs out.

This makes me remember a local LotR comic. The amount of polearms for the orcs was really staggering...:D

And do you mean the state where you're just playing the NPCs, and new stuff to do constantly pops up? It's sweat when things reach that moment:p!

Quote from: Lunamancer;867131You combine that with a name and one or two physical features--it's not a full-fledged description. If you detailed your own character with so few details, you'd be laughed at by snobby roleplayers. But when it's a bit NPC, who isn't supposed to have that detail, it's just enough to make a lasting impression.

What's a snobby roleplayer? Because the people that are usually referred to in this way on this forum would know I'm playing Over The Edge, or Sorcerer, and actually envy me;).

Quote from: Lunamancer;867235It's a lot to explain all at once. And I think if I did explain it, it would be off-putting to most. It does involve a lot of record-keeping. But to the extent that a GM does spend more than an hour between sessions preparing next week's adventure, this can be a time-saver. And, of course, provides an endless source of ideas.

There are a lot of different components to it. I detail important NPCs, definitely the ambitious schemers. I play sandbox, so this is the source of the "plots." These NPCs are typically ones PCs will not encounter early in the campaign. Then I detail a bunch of low-level, ordinary NPCs that PCs are likely to encounter just by going place-to-place around town. These are a lot of work with little individual pay-off individually. Collectively, it makes the campaign seem more living and breathing.

I also have random tables, a good number of them, for producing events in response to things the PCs do. These aren't always big, noticeable, earth-shattering events. After a successful dungeon crawl when the party brings back a good amount of loot, word of this could attract NPC adventurers to the town (and yes, I generate stats for these and track them in the background). An NPC adventurer already in town might seek to join up with the party. If there are enough adventurers in town, especially if the PCs aren't accepting new members, they may form a rival adventuring party.

Another example, always seems to come back to bandits. If the bandits try to rob a caravan guarded by the PCs who are far more powerful than the bandits anticipate might lead to the death and capture of bandits, the remaining gang is smaller and weaker. Maybe they'll demand new leadership. Suddenly the pattern of how bandits strike and the tactics they use changes. Or if the entire band is somehow killed or captured, this leaves a vacuum for another gang to come in to fill. Maybe two gangs attempt to jump on the opportunity. This would mean both a spike in robberies as well as occasional violent outbreaks of gang rivalry.

To link it back to NPC adventurers, after spending time in town without getting in on adventure, there is a chance that NPC adventurer will join a gang (also a chance of them leaving town or giving up adventuring and finding work as soldiers or guards, etc).

All of this requires record-keeping, and the majority of it will be in the background, players completely unaware of it, so it initially seems a lot of work with little payoff. But the natural progression sets up backstories for future events that become major story arcs.

Actually, sounds a pretty normal amount of bookkeeping. Although I tend to keep it in my head.
If I forget something, it obviously wasn't important;).

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;867285Tony Bath's "Setting Up a Wargames Campaign," which is part of this volume.

http://www.lulu.com/shop/society-of-ancients-and-tony-bath-and-john-curry/tony-baths-ancient-wargaming/paperback/product-15463540.html

Honest, folks, a LOT of this stuff was written up in a very useable form by Tony back in the early 70s.

Since I've been reading this thing for a couple days now, I can only confirm what Gronan said:D!

Quote from: AsenRG;867610Ahem, the goal of a con isn't consent, it's making someone believe erroneous information.
Similarly, the goal of a lot, and probably of most violence, is to gain (grudging) consent and cooperation;).
Just saying:). I must add that I like your system a whole lot, but I find trying to point out the similarities to fighting to be more useful.

I still stand by my original claim. I channel Taleb when I say beliefs are meaningless. It's choice that matters. The goal of the con isn't to change what someone believes, it's merely a means to an end. The goal of the con is to get them, of their own free will, to act on erroneous beliefs.

Here's the ultimate litmus test: How does it work on a PC? The player will ultimately decide whether or not to believe the lie. If the player's character has the ability to detect lies, then that would certainly diminish the chance of a con working, and it would take a highly skilled con man to sneak something by.

QuoteActually, I'd say that this is exactly realistic. The unrealistic part would be hoping for high-percentage success.

Right. And I'll touch on this again when I address your question about exalted. It's always possible that someone just stumbles upon the right motivation by dumb luck.

QuoteThen again, I think this is also the tactic used when the persuader is lacking time. Well, if you're good at "cold reading", you could make it work a lot of the time - but then you're just shifting the discovery phase before the intro, and relying on non-verbal clues.

Yes, the discovery phase doesn't even have to take place in the other person's presence. However, you always increase the odds if you summarize what you know in the form of a question before going into your pitch. "If I can help you get x and y while avoiding z, would that be worth doing abc?" Because it shows the person you're trying to persuade that you understand them. If they say yes, now they're admitting to their needs. No matter how much evidence and proof you have, whatever you know about the prospect's needs is just your opinion. When the prospect says it, however, it's fact.

QuoteIs such a scenario possible under your system, though? Often enough to make it worthwhile?

The vast majority of sales organizations don't use a discovery phase, yet they manage to stay in business. They do a weak form of pre-qualifying. And they (hopefully) have the right marketing campaign to generate lists of people predisposed to being more open to the company's offer. Still, it's groping in the dark. The person on that other end of the phone is either interested in your idea or they're not. And if they are, they might still not do business with you because they don't trust you.

QuoteWell, how would you make a "poker close" if you need someone to become your ally in order for you to avoid being murdered by your enemies? Presume whatever argument you like worked, but not perfectly, and give me an example, please.

Just to be clear, my "poker close" example was for a character who lacked the skill to hard-close. So the player has to take on larger risk to even have a chance.

The underlying "mechanics" of it are as follows. The player in this situation is looking at three possible outcomes, ranked from favorite to least favorite.

1) Stay alive, deliver a "secret" of importance to the right people.
2) Before dying, tell someone the secret to pass on to the right people
3) Killed by enemies. Take the secret to your grave.

This other person you're trying to persuade to help protect you from the wrath of your enemies also has an interest in getting your secret to the right people. He's looking at the following three outcomes, also ranked from favorite to least favorite:

1) Deliver secret without getting involved in someone else's battle.
2) Deliver secret, even if it means getting involved in someone else's battle.
3) Avoid getting involved, even if it means the secret is lost.

So if the player goes for the "poker close" she raises the stakes and swears to take the secret to hers grave unless she gets help fighting off her enemies. The player is taking a risk because she COULD opt for her #2 for certain. Instead she takes that off the table for a shot at #1, even though it means risking #3.

As to the prospect, #1 has been taken off the table. Maybe. Maybe the prospect doesn't believe the player. If he does believe the player, that means his best choice is option 2. If he does not believe the player, he could stand his ground and shoot for #1. But if it turns out she was telling the truth all along, he's risking #3.

The "poker close" works if and only if the prospect is unwilling to risk #3 for a shot at #1. It's solely determined by choice, not dice. If the prospect is an NPC, the GM of course may choose to delegate his choice do a dice roll anyway.

QuoteSeducing or persuading, how would players recognise it's time to cut the losses under your system?

Cutting losses is about ruling out early someone who cannot be closed for one reason or another. This will be found during the discovery phase in one of two ways. First, the player may discover that the prospect's motives are just not compatible with what you want and what you have to offer. Second, the character may discover through some sort of lie detection skills that he's not getting honest answers during discovery. This would indicate the intro failed to gain openness and willingness to listen.

QuoteAnd since you're answering about other systems, how would your system map to Exalted 3e's system? In it, you need to know something the NPC believes or values in order to have a chance to make him or her act according to what you want.

I have to make clear, I've been calling it a "procedure" not a "system" because I have no intention of re-writing rules. I use a combination of the existing mechanics (typically skill checks) of whatever game I'm playing and good old fashioned roleplaying. It's more like a GMing trick. An outline for handling a common situation no matter what RPG you're playing.

From what you describe, Exalted seems pretty good match for what I do. Just one nitpick (and I think we are actually on the same page about this, I just want to be clear), it's not 100% necessary to know what the NPC values or believes. You could get it right just out of dumb luck. And in my opinion, this is how much of the sales profession works in real life. Contact enough people, and sooner or later you're bound to get lucky. And you can increase your odds of getting lucky by accurate stereotyping.

QuoteLike, you want a satrap to reduce some taxes, you need to know if he or she actually believes stuff like "people need to be kept happy in order to minimise unrest", or "I shouldn't be too hard on them". Then you use that to argue it supports your case.
Thing is, you can still fail, if he also has beliefs that contradict this. Like "my superiors wouldn't be happy with reduced tax revenue" can be good enough for him to spend Willpower and resist your influence.
You want to block this in advance, find out and sooth his fears of his superiors, or make him fear unrest more than his superiors.
So, how does it map to your system?

Exactly how you describe. The idea behind my procedure is that though it has a structure and periodic skill checks to give "crunch" to people who want that, it is simultaneously 100% roleplayed out. It's limited only by whatever plausible argument you can think of.

So suppose we had a great intro, the satrap is open and willing to listen to what you have to say. You do a thorough discovery, so you know his motives, beliefs, and fears fully, then (ideally) you go to the summary question, "If I could show you a way to keep your superiors happy while minimizing unrest, would you be open to modifying your tax policy?"

Right away, he might say, "Well reducing taxes would make my superiors unhappy, so I don't know if you can help." This tells you that what you really need to focus on soothing his fear of his superiors.

If, on the other hand, he just answers with a plain "Yes," you can go into the terrible cost unrest has on the coffers and how that in turn will make his superiors unhappy. Either way, you've fished out what the dominant motive is and focus on addressing it.

QuoteIsn't that the inverse of a mook rule? Players without requisite social skills shouldn't bother with unimportant persuasion. So, they don't deal with mooks.

I'll be honest, I'm not a big fan of mook rules, so I may be using the term wrong. The way I'd envision this working is, if you have skill, and these are just regular Joes, just make a skill roll and be done with it. There's not much to be gained or lost. So just fast forward the tape.

QuoteI guess I really liked the "Name your NPCs" advice in Apocalypse World.

Absolutely. Those little details make a huge difference. I mean the cost (in time) to benefit (of it mattering in the game) for an individual minor NPC may make it not worth it. But encountering a large number of them that are individuals rather than carbon copies kicks up the immersion to say the least. It carries a larger macro benefit in addition to the individual smaller benefits.

QuoteAnd do you mean the state where you're just playing the NPCs, and new stuff to do constantly pops up? It's sweat when things reach that moment:p!

First time I did something like that, it really didn't even take that many NPCs. It was the local ruler, the guy seeking his position of power, his lieutenant, the ruler's oldest son, the ruler's long-lost daughter, an orc chieftain, and a half-orc hermit. The guy seeking power, naturally, was really the one setting a lot of the stuff to do in motion. And he wasn't even someone the PCs would encounter any time soon.

QuoteWhat's a snobby roleplayer?

Maybe it was just the gamer circles I was in, but having 3-pages of non-game stat character notes (personality, history, motives, etc) seemed to be all the rage back in the 90's.

Quote from: Lunamancer;867662I still stand by my original claim. I channel Taleb when I say beliefs are meaningless. It's choice that matters. The goal of the con isn't to change what someone believes, it's merely a means to an end. The goal of the con is to get them, of their own free will, to act on erroneous beliefs.

Yes, but the mechanism is different. Say, you know someone is going to spend money and is looking for the best investment. By slipping him or her misinformation about the other options, shortly before making your own offer, you indirectly raise the value of your own offer.
You're not using persuasion to get him or her to act in his or her interests, not trying to show how a particular action is in his or her interests, nor even what the action should be. You're merely shaping his or her perceptions, and letting him or her come to the sub-optimal conclusion by his or her own wits.

QuoteHere's the ultimate litmus test: How does it work on a PC? The player will ultimately decide whether or not to believe the lie. If the player's character has the ability to detect lies, then that would certainly diminish the chance of a con working, and it would take a highly skilled con man to sneak something by.

Oh yes, definitely. Characters in my games have been known to get all the available lie detection skills...:D

QuoteRight. And I'll touch on this again when I address your question about exalted. It's always possible that someone just stumbles upon the right motivation by dumb luck.

Are educated guesses ("the person of a given age has kids and is worried about their well-being above all") character or player skill?

QuoteYes, the discovery phase doesn't even have to take place in the other person's presence. However, you always increase the odds if you summarize what you know in the form of a question before going into your pitch. "If I can help you get x and y while avoiding z, would that be worth doing abc?" Because it shows the person you're trying to persuade that you understand them. If they say yes, now they're admitting to their needs. No matter how much evidence and proof you have, whatever you know about the prospect's needs is just your opinion. When the prospect says it, however, it's fact.

Actually, sometimes even being wrong is appreciated, IME:). As you no doubt know, but I felt it needs to be noted.

QuoteThe vast majority of sales organizations don't use a discovery phase, yet they manage to stay in business. They do a weak form of pre-qualifying. And they (hopefully) have the right marketing campaign to generate lists of people predisposed to being more open to the company's offer. Still, it's groping in the dark. The person on that other end of the phone is either interested in your idea or they're not. And if they are, they might still not do business with you because they don't trust you.

Reminds me of the last time I got a phone call from my bank with an exclusive offer:). At least the guy on the other end got cut off fast, so we didn't waste time.
But I get what you mean.

QuoteJust to be clear, my "poker close" example was for a character who lacked the skill to hard-close. So the player has to take on larger risk to even have a chance.

Yeah, that's exactly the kind of example I was asking about!

QuoteThe underlying "mechanics" of it are as follows. The player in this situation is looking at three possible outcomes, ranked from favorite to least favorite.

1) Stay alive, deliver a "secret" of importance to the right people.
2) Before dying, tell someone the secret to pass on to the right people
3) Killed by enemies. Take the secret to your grave.

This other person you're trying to persuade to help protect you from the wrath of your enemies also has an interest in getting your secret to the right people. He's looking at the following three outcomes, also ranked from favorite to least favorite:

1) Deliver secret without getting involved in someone else's battle.
2) Deliver secret, even if it means getting involved in someone else's battle.
3) Avoid getting involved, even if it means the secret is lost.

So if the player goes for the "poker close" she raises the stakes and swears to take the secret to hers grave unless she gets help fighting off her enemies. The player is taking a risk because she COULD opt for her #2 for certain. Instead she takes that off the table for a shot at #1, even though it means risking #3.

As to the prospect, #1 has been taken off the table. Maybe. Maybe the prospect doesn't believe the player. If he does believe the player, that means his best choice is option 2. If he does not believe the player, he could stand his ground and shoot for #1. But if it turns out she was telling the truth all along, he's risking #3.

The "poker close" works if and only if the prospect is unwilling to risk #3 for a shot at #1. It's solely determined by choice, not dice. If the prospect is an NPC, the GM of course may choose to delegate his choice do a dice roll anyway.

Got it. Thanks, that was the example I was asking for!

Now, in the exact same situation, how would higher skill allow you to avoid the poker close?

QuoteCutting losses is about ruling out early someone who cannot be closed for one reason or another. This will be found during the discovery phase in one of two ways. First, the player may discover that the prospect's motives are just not compatible with what you want and what you have to offer. Second, the character may discover through some sort of lie detection skills that he's not getting honest answers during discovery. This would indicate the intro failed to gain openness and willingness to listen.

Sounds reasonable.

QuoteI have to make clear, I've been calling it a "procedure" not a "system" because I have no intention of re-writing rules. I use a combination of the existing mechanics (typically skill checks) of whatever game I'm playing and good old fashioned roleplaying. It's more like a GMing trick. An outline for handling a common situation no matter what RPG you're playing.

Well, many sub-systems are just skill checks with procedure, so the distinction is kinda murky.

QuoteFrom what you describe, Exalted seems pretty good match for what I do. Just one nitpick (and I think we are actually on the same page about this, I just want to be clear), it's not 100% necessary to know what the NPC values or believes. You could get it right just out of dumb luck. And in my opinion, this is how much of the sales profession works in real life. Contact enough people, and sooner or later you're bound to get lucky. And you can increase your odds of getting lucky by accurate stereotyping.

Yeah, that's explicitly allowed in Exalted 3e, too.
But unless you're good, high Socialize helps. Of course, you have to somehow evoke the subject you want to read the prospective NPC's reaction on, or you just can't roll Socialize...;)

QuoteExactly how you describe.

To be honest, it's not my example, it's an example from the book...I think. Or it's an example I read on Internet, but the developers approved, doesn't matter!

QuoteThe idea behind my procedure is that though it has a structure and periodic skill checks to give "crunch" to people who want that, it is simultaneously 100% roleplayed out. It's limited only by whatever plausible argument you can think of.

Yeah, that's how a lot of modern systems work, too.

QuoteSo suppose we had a great intro, the satrap is open and willing to listen to what you have to say. You do a thorough discovery, so you know his motives, beliefs, and fears fully, then (ideally) you go to the summary question, "If I could show you a way to keep your superiors happy while minimizing unrest, would you be open to modifying your tax policy?"

Right away, he might say, "Well reducing taxes would make my superiors unhappy, so I don't know if you can help." This tells you that what you really need to focus on soothing his fear of his superiors.

If, on the other hand, he just answers with a plain "Yes," you can go into the terrible cost unrest has on the coffers and how that in turn will make his superiors unhappy. Either way, you've fished out what the dominant motive is and focus on addressing it.

Right. That's how I'd expect it to go, myself.
Luckily, it's also how it already goes in some systems (Exalted and Pendragon, or RQ6 if Passions rules are used).

QuoteI'll be honest, I'm not a big fan of mook rules, so I may be using the term wrong. The way I'd envision this working is, if you have skill, and these are just regular Joes, just make a skill roll and be done with it. There's not much to be gained or lost. So just fast forward the tape.

Yeah, mook fights usually mean you can still be hurt, but you can take them so easily you're actually taking them out in numbers.
The biggest difference is that in your procedural system, players with skills should deal with the mooks, while usually mooks are the domain of the characters with lower skill. The analoguous example would be the GM deciding not much can be gained, so it can just be roleplayed out and even skipping some details, I think.
Either way, that's besides the point.

QuoteAbsolutely. Those little details make a huge difference. I mean the cost (in time) to benefit (of it mattering in the game) for an individual minor NPC may make it not worth it. But encountering a large number of them that are individuals rather than carbon copies kicks up the immersion to say the least. It carries a larger macro benefit in addition to the individual smaller benefits.

Obviously I agree.

QuoteFirst time I did something like that, it really didn't even take that many NPCs. It was the local ruler, the guy seeking his position of power, his lieutenant, the ruler's oldest son, the ruler's long-lost daughter, an orc chieftain, and a half-orc hermit. The guy seeking power, naturally, was really the one setting a lot of the stuff to do in motion. And he wasn't even someone the PCs would encounter any time soon.

Sounds about right for what I do as well.

QuoteMaybe it was just the gamer circles I was in, but having 3-pages of non-game stat character notes (personality, history, motives, etc) seemed to be all the rage back in the 90's.

It still is, in some circles. Less so, or quite the opposite, in others.
But wouldn't those same people commend you for having lots of non-game stat character notes and limited stats? The ones I know, would be most likely to do exactly that. (Now, players of some well-known system, would be most likely to require more crunch. But they usually aren't considered snobby, from what I know - I admit I don't play it, as a general rule;)).

Quote from: AsenRG;867704Yes, but the mechanism is different. Say, you know someone is going to spend money and is looking for the best investment. By slipping him or her misinformation about the other options, shortly before making your own offer, you indirectly raise the value of your own offer.
You're not using persuasion to get him or her to act in his or her interests, not trying to show how a particular action is in his or her interests, nor even what the action should be. You're merely shaping his or her perceptions, and letting him or her come to the sub-optimal conclusion by his or her own wits.

Perception is the thing. It's like I said about the summary question. Regardless of whether what your pitching is true or false in an absolute sense, in the context of persuasion, it's nothing more or nothing less than the persuader's opinion. When the prospect says it, it becomes fact. If the prospect accepts the false information as fact, evaluation of what's in his best interests is filtered through that lens.

Cons are most effectively used the same way as a regular persuasion attempt. The difference is, if when you frame your proposal (or during elaboration) you have to misrepresent the facts, I call for a "con" roll to tell the lie convincingly.

Part of what's happening in discovery is we're zeroing in on what's of interest to the prospect. If you start talking about investment options before finding out what's important to the prospect, even if it's to spread negative false information about the ones you're NOT selling, it's going to be less effective. You begin to lose the prospects attention whenever you talk about something they're not interested in.

Again, it's entirely possible for your misinformation to just happen upon your prospect's fears. In the financial industry, probably mostly any industry, there are some well-known "pain points" that apply to a large number of people. But it's not universal.

I've actually had people come up to me saying they want to get into something high-risk. Nobody wants high-risk. What they really mean to say is they're willing to tolerate high risk if they can get a higher long-run yield. But because they equate that to wanting high risk, if a con man were to go up to one of these people and start telling them about all of these (false) risks involved in what they're currently invested in, the prospect might be thinking, "Yeah, that's exactly what I wanted."

A more effective way to run the same con is to first fish out in the discovery phase that the person wants high risk. A follow-up question or two will actually reveal the person is interested in very high yield. So the misinformation you want to give regarding his current investment is NOT going on and on about the risks. That might work for most people, but with this person, misinformation about how the yield on his current investment is capped would be more effective.

The point is, whether it's a con, intimidation, seduction or anything else, it's always going to work best when using this procedure. Without discovery, you're only ever guessing at what will work. (How many times have we seen a hero in a movie threatened or tortured without ever giving up anything, then the bad guy puts a gun to a loved one's head, and that changes everything?)

QuoteOh yes, definitely. Characters in my games have been known to get all the available lie detection skills...:D

I consider the elemental social skills to be detecting lies, lying convincingly, reading between the lines, and effective communication. Whatever the actual skill is in the game, it's going to have one or more of those four applications.

QuoteAre educated guesses ("the person of a given age has kids and is worried about their well-being above all") character or player skill?

The player is ultimately going to pitch an idea and it will either be a good match for the NPC's hidden motive or not. If there is an applicable skill and means for obtaining the information necessary to make a guess educated then I suppose it could from the character as well.

QuoteActually, sometimes even being wrong is appreciated, IME:). As you no doubt know, but I felt it needs to be noted.

Yes, the most important thing to communicate is that you realize the prospect is only going to do something that is in his best interest, and you wouldn't expect him to do otherwise. Getting a "no" and doing more discovery adds to your credibility that you care about what this person wants.

I work with some people whose sales script is a typical one, not much discovery aside from a weak pre-qualification, and so instead of having a summary question going into the pitch, they have a line "Maybe this could help you out." I teach them to sound as uncertain as possible when saying that line. At least that's what I teach when I'm not being a wise-ass saying, "Take everything you know about sales and do just the opposite."

QuoteReminds me of the last time I got a phone call from my bank with an exclusive offer:). At least the guy on the other end got cut off fast, so we didn't waste time.
But I get what you mean.

Yes, the biggest pitfall in persuasion is not getting a "no" but getting a non-committal answer. You call back again and again and again wasting a lot of time when there never was a chance of closing the deal. A good intro heads this off with an "up-front contract." An example of that, "If at any point you feel that this is not something that's of interest to you, do you feel comfortable telling me that?"

QuoteNow, in the exact same situation, how would higher skill allow you to avoid the poker close?

Hard closes ought to be rare. And they rarely work. In most cases, going into the close, success or failure has already been determined. This basically gives a character who has skill a last-ditch effort. A character with skill actually has two options here. One of them could be to fall back and revisit discovery to come up with a better proposal. The other option would be go for the hard close.

Going for the hard close obviously saves time. But it's also helpful because in actual play, it might be the PC already went around in circles a few times and is out of "ammunition." It's either go for the hard close or nothing. It should be an extremely difficult roll, about one-tenth normal probability for success, so it should only be used when there's nothing left to lose.

QuoteIt still is, in some circles. Less so, or quite the opposite, in others.
But wouldn't those same people commend you for having lots of non-game stat character notes and limited stats?

Maybe, maybe not. One unfortunate mindset I see a lot of gamers follow is, recognizing that so much of what we do is entirely subjective, they hang all their judgments on facts that are objective, no matter how insignificant. And then try to argue their significance.

So, who's to say who has a better quality character background or personality or what have you? But we can point to a page count or word count.

I've read plenty of game reviews (not all of them are like this but there are a lot of them) that focus on things like page count, font size, and margins but don't seem to say anything that would help me determine whether or not the game is fun. Or they might harp on the "production value" and "quality of artwork" without ever mentioning whether or not it fits the game or enhances the mood. Some of the cheesy ink sketches from the 1st Ed DMG do more for the product than a full color glossy of some "really serious RPG scene" would have. Of course, that's just a matter of opinion.

Quote from: AsenRG;867610This one tends to fail miserably if the player is better at persuasion than the GM, IME;)

Fail in what sense?

In the sense simply that it produces the same results as pure conversational roleplay?

Or in the sense that both that method and pure conversational roleplay fail to give effect to players' social stats if the player is more persuasive than the GM?

I'm not convinced that any of my players have been significantly more persuasive than me, but whether they have or haven't, I've never noticed significant problems with this approach. However, if (which I doubt) you're right, then perhaps that helps to explain why the Pundit thinks that the GM has to be the Alpha Male of the Group, shoes I easily fill of course ;) * chest-beating + roar *

Quote from: Lunamancer;867745Perception is the thing. It's like I said about the summary question. Regardless of whether what your pitching is true or false in an absolute sense, in the context of persuasion, it's nothing more or nothing less than the persuader's opinion. When the prospect says it, it becomes fact. If the prospect accepts the false information as fact, evaluation of what's in his best interests is filtered through that lens.

Cons are most effectively used the same way as a regular persuasion attempt. The difference is, if when you frame your proposal (or during elaboration) you have to misrepresent the facts, I call for a "con" roll to tell the lie convincingly.

Part of what's happening in discovery is we're zeroing in on what's of interest to the prospect. If you start talking about investment options before finding out what's important to the prospect, even if it's to spread negative false information about the ones you're NOT selling, it's going to be less effective. You begin to lose the prospects attention whenever you talk about something they're not interested in.

Again, it's entirely possible for your misinformation to just happen upon your prospect's fears. In the financial industry, probably mostly any industry, there are some well-known "pain points" that apply to a large number of people. But it's not universal.

I've actually had people come up to me saying they want to get into something high-risk. Nobody wants high-risk. What they really mean to say is they're willing to tolerate high risk if they can get a higher long-run yield. But because they equate that to wanting high risk, if a con man were to go up to one of these people and start telling them about all of these (false) risks involved in what they're currently invested in, the prospect might be thinking, "Yeah, that's exactly what I wanted."

A more effective way to run the same con is to first fish out in the discovery phase that the person wants high risk. A follow-up question or two will actually reveal the person is interested in very high yield. So the misinformation you want to give regarding his current investment is NOT going on and on about the risks. That might work for most people, but with this person, misinformation about how the yield on his current investment is capped would be more effective.

The point is, whether it's a con, intimidation, seduction or anything else, it's always going to work best when using this procedure. Without discovery, you're only ever guessing at what will work. (How many times have we seen a hero in a movie threatened or tortured without ever giving up anything, then the bad guy puts a gun to a loved one's head, and that changes everything?)

I can see your point here. But my con example assumes that what's important for the target is already known, so the discovery happened.
There's just no "close". Once he or she accepts the facts, the target gets the wrong conclusion without our help.

QuoteI consider the elemental social skills to be detecting lies, lying convincingly, reading between the lines, and effective communication. Whatever the actual skill is in the game, it's going to have one or more of those four applications.

I'd call "reading between the lines" to be more of a bureaucratic skill, but other than that, I agree:).

QuoteThe player is ultimately going to pitch an idea and it will either be a good match for the NPC's hidden motive or not. If there is an applicable skill and means for obtaining the information necessary to make a guess educated then I suppose it could from the character as well.

OK, variable works for me.

QuoteYes, the most important thing to communicate is that you realize the prospect is only going to do something that is in his best interest, and you wouldn't expect him to do otherwise. Getting a "no" and doing more discovery adds to your credibility that you care about what this person wants.

I work with some people whose sales script is a typical one, not much discovery aside from a weak pre-qualification, and so instead of having a summary question going into the pitch, they have a line "Maybe this could help you out." I teach them to sound as uncertain as possible when saying that line. At least that's what I teach when I'm not being a wise-ass saying, "Take everything you know about sales and do just the opposite."

Great, glad I was getting you right, then.

QuoteYes, the biggest pitfall in persuasion is not getting a "no" but getting a non-committal answer. You call back again and again and again wasting a lot of time when there never was a chance of closing the deal. A good intro heads this off with an "up-front contract." An example of that, "If at any point you feel that this is not something that's of interest to you, do you feel comfortable telling me that?"

Yeah, one difference between sales and persuasion of the kind PCs are doing is that you have to persuade a specific person. A lack of interest isn't acceptable, except as a means to signal you to change the proposal.
So I saved the guy from Sales some time by cutting him off after less than 2 minutes. But if he was a PC and had to sell me on a given plan, that wouldn't be to his advantage.

QuoteHard closes ought to be rare. And they rarely work. In most cases, going into the close, success or failure has already been determined. This basically gives a character who has skill a last-ditch effort. A character with skill actually has two options here. One of them could be to fall back and revisit discovery to come up with a better proposal. The other option would be go for the hard close.

Going for the hard close obviously saves time. But it's also helpful because in actual play, it might be the PC already went around in circles a few times and is out of "ammunition." It's either go for the hard close or nothing. It should be an extremely difficult roll, about one-tenth normal probability for success, so it should only be used when there's nothing left to lose.

Fun fact, 1/10th normal skill is exactly the difficulty before "you don't get to roll" in RQ6. Then again, it's also your odds of rolling a critical, so maybe "you need a critical" is better:D.
Back to serious, would you make every player roll with these odds? If he hasn't got the character resource skills and is using a hard close instead of the roll, as in your previous example, that would be something like 3% chance for those guys.

QuoteMaybe, maybe not. One unfortunate mindset I see a lot of gamers follow is, recognizing that so much of what we do is entirely subjective, they hang all their judgments on facts that are objective, no matter how insignificant. And then try to argue their significance.

:D
I think you might be up to something here.

QuoteSo, who's to say who has a better quality character background or personality or what have you? But we can point to a page count or word count.

The rules for making a good piece of fiction aren't exactly unknown. It's usually simple to apply them.
Now, many people have unlearned doing that in order to avoid offending the literary challenged (others avoid doing this because they don't care about backstory and only want to see the character in play). But if you care about backstory and don't care who gets offended, it's usually simple.

QuoteI've read plenty of game reviews (not all of them are like this but there are a lot of them) that focus on things like page count, font size, and margins but don't seem to say anything that would help me determine whether or not the game is fun. Or they might harp on the "production value" and "quality of artwork" without ever mentioning whether or not it fits the game or enhances the mood. Some of the cheesy ink sketches from the 1st Ed DMG do more for the product than a full color glossy of some "really serious RPG scene" would have. Of course, that's just a matter of opinion.

Yeah, I admit I tend to skip those parts of the reviews as well;).

Quote from: Omnifray;867752Fail in what sense?

In the sense simply that it produces the same results as pure conversational roleplay?

Or in the sense that both that method and pure conversational roleplay fail to give effect to players' social stats if the player is more persuasive than the GM?

Fail in the sense that the people with high actual skill get disproportionately higher returns on even moderate investment in the social arena. Like, "someone with only a moderate investment in social skills overpowering all the social encounters without breaking a sweat" disproportionate.

QuoteI'm not convinced that any of my players have been significantly more persuasive than me, but whether they have or haven't, I've never noticed significant problems with this approach.

If none of them were significantly better, you simply haven't encountered it.
If any of them has been significantly better, you might have been prevented from noticing it;). No, I'm not kidding.

QuoteHowever, if (which I doubt) you're right, then perhaps that helps to explain why the Pundit thinks that the GM has to be the Alpha Male of the Group, shoes I easily fill of course ;) * chest-beating + roar *

The example I'm thinking of is my wife's characters, and frankly, I'm sure she wouldn't care that you're the Alpha Male of the group:p. I can guarantee she's not going to participate in the manliness competition, so as far as she cares, you can assume you won the chest-beating and are to be considered forever manlier than her:D!
So yeah, that's my experience with this approach. Again, it works for most other cases, and only really great disparity makes it break.

Quote from: Ravenswing;866996Bandits almost NEVER want a fight.  Fights mean that some of your guys can get hurt or killed, property gets smashed, and the well-dressed fop who's coughing out his life with a sword through his guts is the duke's grandson, and you just lost a shot at a huge ransom.

The issue with the last bit of this scenario is the assumption that the Lord Duke will not give up his heir as lost and simply get his entourage to wipe out the bandits anyway, instead of ransoming.

Most Dukes have multiple heirs anyway, what's losing one really cost?

Quote from: Christopher Brady;867835The issue with the last bit of this scenario is the assumption that the Lord Duke will not give up his heir as lost and simply get his entourage to wipe out the bandits anyway, instead of ransoming.

Most Dukes have multiple heirs anyway, what's losing one really cost?

That kind of misunderstanding how medieval society actually works is almost starting to get on my nerves lately...:)

Quote from: AsenRG;867762I can see your point here. But my con example assumes that what's important for the target is already known, so the discovery happened.
There's just no "close". Once he or she accepts the facts, the target gets the wrong conclusion without our help.

That's fine. It still fits the form. I don't anticipate people will do things the way I say is most effective. I wouldn't expect most players to know the system. I anticipate most PCs hopped up on social skills will skip discovery altogether and instead engage in verbal jujitsu.

Though I should point out that in my procedure, it is okay for discovery to happen outside of the prospects presence. The elaboration phase is not always present as it is initiated entirely by the prospect. And the close, in most cases, doesn't require any sort of skill check. Indeed, if the introduction, discovery, and presentation are all on point, the prospect will close themselves with a statement like, "I think I'd like to try it."

QuoteI'd call "reading between the lines" to be more of a bureaucratic skill, but other than that, I agree:).

I'm not sure what the best terms are. I can usually hear a lot of things just in someone's voice inflections. I don't jump to conclusions or try to come off like the Amazing Kreskin, but it's something that should be addressed. In game, this would be largely dependent on the character's skill, not what the player can hear. After all, who's to say the GM is a flawless character actor? The GM may not be accurately portraying inflection.

QuoteYeah, one difference between sales and persuasion of the kind PCs are doing is that you have to persuade a specific person. A lack of interest isn't acceptable, except as a means to signal you to change the proposal.
So I saved the guy from Sales some time by cutting him off after less than 2 minutes. But if he was a PC and had to sell me on a given plan, that wouldn't be to his advantage.

You are correct that it in the context of RPGs it is framed this way. However, persuasion is persuasion is persuasion. There are ways it works and ways it doesn't. And the simple fact is not everyone can be closed. This is actually why the roleplay element is so irreplaceable. It puts it onto the player to think up an argument that could plausibly work. A player may come up with something I never thought of and find a way to close someone I thought would be impossible. And that's fine. In fact, I consider it great.

Now it doesn't take someone of extraordinary skill to just give up  when a prospect doesn't play along nicely. It takes someone of skill to know the difference between someone who is a waste of time and someone who is just playing hard to get.

For those who are playing hard to get, the procedure I use allows characters of high skill to use their skill to keep the prospect engaged so you can go back to discovery take another run at it. And when all else fails, you have the hard close with a few percent probability of working. Because that really is about the percentage difference in rate of success when you just don't give up. Not really much.

QuoteFun fact, 1/10th normal skill is exactly the difficulty before "you don't get to roll" in RQ6. Then again, it's also your odds of rolling a critical, so maybe "you need a critical" is better:D.

Yeah, that's also how "criticals" work in LA, too, and that was one of the things I had in mind when I came out with that figure. But it's also realistic.

Back to serious, would you make every player roll with these odds? If he hasn't got the character resource skills and is using a hard close instead of the roll, as in your previous example, that would be something like 3% chance for those guys. One-in-Three, or 33% is a very common expected closing ratio over the long run. Someone at that caliber can bump that close to 40% by bringing the A game. A high-end superstar performs at about 50%, but can often perform just above 50% up to just shy of 60%.

So 10-20% of the base chance is about what it amounts to. I figure make it 10% and then have instances where a bonus could apply.

QuoteI think you might be up to something here.

Well, it doesn't just apply to gamers. There's a joke about an economist who loses his watch, so he's looking for it. A stranger comes up and offers to help him find the watch and asks, "Now just where abouts did you lose it?" and the economist points down to the other end of the street, "Down there somewhere."

So the stranger asks, "Then why are you looking over here?" to which the economist replies, "Because the light here is better."

Free will makes people intractable. Anything that takes human action as an input, whether it's an economy, a roleplaying game, or a social encounter.

QuoteThe rules for making a good piece of fiction aren't exactly unknown. It's usually simple to apply them.

I found the right 3 lines did more than 3 pages. I don't expect the backstory to tell a story. I expect to get just enough information that the character has a compelling reason to "adventure."

Quote from: Lunamancer;866395Forgive the thread necromancy, especially one that was apparently started by a now banned user.

We don't have a problem with thread necromancy here.

Damn though, this was from a while back! It was just before I started running the Dark Albion campaign that became the inspiration for the book.

Quote from: RPGPundit;868100We don't have a problem with thread necromancy here.

Damn though, this was from a while back! It was just before I started running the Dark Albion campaign that became the inspiration for the book.

Frankly, I was surprised how few hits I got on my search terms through google. I tried setting my filters to items just from the past year, but I wasn't happy with the results.

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;866829What's the reaction table in BX. I assume the NPC's disposition?

I've only played 5E. (Though I read up on the rest.)

I had tried very hard to push for the resurrection of the Reaction table in 5e.  Unfortunately it was not one of the suggestions that ended up in the final product.

Quote from: RPGPundit;868258I had tried very hard to push for the resurrection of the Reaction table in 5e.  Unfortunately it was not one of the suggestions that ended up in the final product.

Were they opposed to it for some reason?

Quote from: Christopher Brady;867835Most Dukes have multiple heirs anyway, what's losing one really cost?

The premise that the Duke gives a damn about his heirs.  Odd though it might have seemed, some folks -- even in medieval times -- did value their family members.

In any event, ransom of captives was so endemic in period that a number of scholars credit it as an influence on the spread of heraldry.

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;868291Were they opposed to it for some reason?

I just think that it was too long since it had been a part of things, and didn't fit the priorities for them. It was a step too far into Old School.

Quote from: RPGPundit;868258I had tried very hard to push for the resurrection of the Reaction table in 5e.  Unfortunately it was not one of the suggestions that ended up in the final product.

Its kinda sorta not really in there.

Page 244-245 social interactions and charisma checks. It folds into the rest of the NPC interaction system.

Problem is its spread out between two chapters and can end up forgotten or overlooked.

Quote from: Omega;868506Problem is its spread out between two chapters and can end up forgotten or overlooked.

Which would make it a lot like the morale rules in OD&D/AD&D...at least if one goes by the number of times fighting-to-the-death comes up in Internet discussions.

Quote from: Bren;868593Which would make it a lot like the morale rules in OD&D/AD&D...at least if one goes by the number of times fighting-to-the-death comes up in Internet discussions.

OD&Ds interaction rules are fairly prominent so would be hard to miss. But they are in the book used just for bribing monsters to join you. I believe it was Gronan who mentioned that they also used it for random demeanor and negotiation like it is used in BX.

Id have to dig out the DMG to see where it is in AD&D.

Quote from: Omega;868595OD&Ds interaction rules are fairly prominent so would be hard to miss.

And yet people who appear not to have had the wargaming context appear to have missed it. A lot. That's all I meant.

If you are suggesting that morale and reaction mechanics ought to have sufficient prominence in a rule set so that people who lack a wargaming context and any real-world knowledge of the effect of morale would still have a good chance of noticing and possibly using morale rules, then I agree. I get the sense that the frame of reference for WotC is card games far more than it is wargames.

Quote from: Bren;868600And yet people who appear not to have had the wargaming context appear to have missed it. A lot. That's all I meant.

If you are suggesting that morale and reaction mechanics ought to have sufficient prominence in a rule set so that people who lack a wargaming context and any real-world knowledge of the effect of morale would still have a good chance of noticing and possibly using morale rules, then I agree. I get the sense that the frame of reference for WotC is card games far more than it is wargames.

Actually, a lot of people have said "Oh, we just ignored that."

Take away gold for XP, don't raise monster XP, have all fights be to the death, then complain that low level D&D is a bloodbath.  Crom's hairy nutsack.

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;868617Actually, a lot of people have said "Oh, we just ignored that."

I submit that most of those people don't have a wargaming background or any relevant real world experience. I'd imagine that a few do and just don't care. But only a few.

Quote from: Bren;868628I submit that most of those people don't have a wargaming background or any relevant real world experience. I'd imagine that a few do and just don't care. But only a few.

I think I would use a narrower term than "wargaming" here.  Back in junior high and high school, we played AD&D the way Gronan describes - don't bother with morale, XP-for-GP is stupid and unrealistic, etc.  But I did have a wargaming background.

It's just that it was an Avalon Hill wargaming background, centered mostly on Tactics 2, Blitzkrieg, Panzer Blitz/Panzer Leader, etc., none of which explicitly modeled morale.  I'm sure morale was a factor in their combat results tables, but they didn't distinguish between units being eliminated because everyone died and units being eliminated because their morale failed.  Being a teenage boy with no outside experience to suggest otherwise, I just assumed that the units were literally "destroyed", so fights to the death in D&D fit perfectly with that.

I never really had that view challenged until I was 17 or 18 and got introduced to Squad Leader, which is very heavily invested in modeling the effects of morale and leadership.

Quote from: nDervish;868707I think I would use a narrower term than "wargaming" here.  Back in junior high and high school, we played AD&D the way Gronan describes - don't bother with morale, XP-for-GP is stupid and unrealistic, etc.  But I did have a wargaming background.

It's just that it was an Avalon Hill wargaming background, centered mostly on Tactics 2, Blitzkrieg, Panzer Blitz/Panzer Leader, etc., none of which explicitly modeled morale.  I'm sure morale was a factor in their combat results tables, but they didn't distinguish between units being eliminated because everyone died and units being eliminated because their morale failed.  Being a teenage boy with no outside experience to suggest otherwise, I just assumed that the units were literally "destroyed", so fights to the death in D&D fit perfectly with that.

I never really had that view challenged until I was 17 or 18 and got introduced to Squad Leader, which is very heavily invested in modeling the effects of morale and leadership.

Interesting. Squad Leader and its design notes gave me a great enthusiasm for morale in games, but I was first playing Squad Leader about the same time I was first playing RPGs, when I was 10-11 years old. Our 5th grade teacher had the class playing an "explore the Louisiana Purchase" game, and I remember trying to tell him he should add morale rules, hehe. Squad Leader makes morale an explicit thing with several relevant and very important mechanics (morale and leadership can be more important than firepower, equipment, or numbers of men). However even Tactics II (a game where the units are entire divisions rather than squads, crews and leaders) and pretty much every operational wargame has morale effects in the forms of the rules for forced retreats and cutting off retreats (many combat results are retreats not eliminations, and if the unit can't retreat due to terrain/enemies, it surrenders), but yeah before you've thought about morale, that can be semi-imagined as all tactical necessity without thinking much about morale per se.

What also helps is to read accounts of what battle is really like. I was also reading All Quiet On The Western Front and The Red Badge Of Courage about that time, so it made sense.

And yet, I still didn't use explicit morale rules in RPGs. I would however consider the mindset of the people involved, and have people run away sometimes, though not nearly as much as would be realistic - there was a lot of bloodthirsty RPG action for years at our tables.

Quote from: nDervish;868707I think I would use a narrower term than "wargaming" here.

Fair point.

Squad Leader hit the scene around the same time D&D was really taking off. My impression was that the prior Big Thing was Diplomacy, which resolved "social encounters" simply by having players conduct conversations and make decisions based on their own assessments of their interests.

SPI's Sniper came out the year before D&D, Patrol the same year as D&D. "Panic" checks were a notable feature! It also had a "miniatures" touch with fold-up vehicle models. If memory serves, the way the grid was used made for oddly shaped buildings, but some guys adapted the board game rules for ROCO Minitanks or larger scale models.

Quote from: Omega;868595OD&Ds interaction rules are fairly prominent so would be hard to miss. But they are in the book used just for bribing monsters to join you. I believe it was Gronan who mentioned that they also used it for random demeanor and negotiation like it is used in BX.

As for "fights to death", morale checks are among the first things mentioned in the OD&D books (in the section on charisma and Loyalty). There just is not a set system, though the one in Chainmail -- I presume the BX-ish one, not the complex Post Melee Morale calculation -- is suggested as fitting.

The Reaction table from Vol. 1 appears again, slightly modified, in Vol. 3, specifically for general demeanor and negotiation. However, I think Gary just assumed folks would draw inferences for themselves rather than imagining that they could use the table only for the kind of case given as example!

The brief notes regarding Intelligence and Wisdom clearly invite wide open application.

Also, there are the Control rules for commanders and troops in the shipboard combat section.

One could use the will/ego test rule from the section on magic swords for other purposes.

Quote from: Bren;868628I submit that most of those people don't have a wargaming background or any relevant real world experience. I'd imagine that a few do and just don't care. But only a few.

I think the point is that they knew full well that it was there, and decided not to use it. Tactical-wargame experience or not seems to me little to the point, as this looks like people picking up Monopoly and immediately changing things.

If they then complain that the game design is unbalanced or whatever, the complaint is illegitimate because they are not actually playing the game design in the first place!

Quote from: Phillip;868800I think the point is that they knew full well that it was there, and decided not to use it.

I disagree with that point.

In part, I suppose, because it's hard for me to imagine reasons why a lot of people who understand moral would choose to eliminate it. It seems equivalent to ditching attack rolls. What you get either isn't a game or it is a game set in bizarro world.

Well, PanzerBlitz was not exactly a great simulation either -- but it was fun enough in its wacky way! I'm thinking it was probably more fun than the more sensible descendant Arab-Israeli Wars, though I haven't played either in a long time.

My bad, when I say "wargaming" I mean "miniatures wargaming" and I call SPI/AH and similar games "hex and chit wargames."

Because I got introduced to miniatures first.

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;868828My bad, when I say "wargaming" I mean "miniatures wargaming" and I call SPI/AH and similar games "hex and chit wargames."

Because I got introduced to miniatures first.

Order of introduction was reversed for me.

Quote from: AsenRG;867842That kind of misunderstanding how medieval society actually works is almost starting to get on my nerves lately...:)

The aforementioned 'Duke' is the opposite extreme.  The issue is that everyone assume ransoming was the only way those types of situations, like some sort of genteel fantasy land and anyone who thinks otherwise is a delusional wannabe murder hobo.

People are stupid, and crooks are stupider.  That's pretty much been the only constant in all of history.  First off, the Bandits would be morons for wanting to negotiate a price for the Ducal whelp, simply because they could get tracked back to their hideout, or worse, the guy(s) they sent to collect the ransom took it, split it and took off never to be seen again.  And unlike in modern times, tracking someone is more difficult, cuz they don't have GPS or able to track a cellphone.  Criminals are not known for their sense of honour after all.

So that nixes that plan.  More than likely, the Duke WILL assume his child is dead, rightly or wrongly, and send a retaliatory force, simply because we still do it now.  If they rescue the kid?  Sweet!  If not, then sympathies on their loss, but at least the bandits are dead and scattered.

This, of course, is assuming they found the bandit camp in the first place, which may be a trick in itself.

Ransoming was a thing that Nobles did among each other, due to social rules.  No one else got to 'benefit' from that.

Quote from: Phillip;868800I think the point is that they knew full well that it was there, and decided not to use it. Tactical-wargame experience or not seems to me little to the point, as this looks like people picking up Monopoly and immediately changing things.

This actually matches my experience exactly. When I was younger, first into playing, the fun was mainly in combat. And besides, outside of combat, there really wasn't as much structure to the game. So if we rolled a wandering monster and it was regular people or good-aligned monsters, we ignored it and rolled again. Reaction table was only for human-like NPCs that we were "supposed" to parley with. And because it always botched, we always ruined the DM's storyline.

And morale? Well, when we were dungeon crawling, a lot of rooms didn't have second exits. And players rarely took prisoners. It seemed a pointless rule to us. Of course, as we matured, our tastes changed. But we had already learned to play D&D a certain way. We already had certain expectations of what it meant to sit down and play D&D.

QuoteIf they then complain that the game design is unbalanced or whatever, the complaint is illegitimate because they are not actually playing the game design in the first place!

I think I first made that argument 20 years ago, almost to the day, on usenet. This led to my introduction of gamers circular logic.

I'm not having fun when I'm playing D&D.
You can't tell me I'm playing wrong.
The only wrong way to play is not having fun.
So we house-ruled it to make it better.
But I'm not having fun playing D&D.

If you watch very closely, you'll still see it today. People invoke subjectivity as a defense against being told they're playing wrong while clearly expressing dissatisfaction with their gaming experience.

Quote from: Lunamancer;868850I think I first made that argument 20 years ago, almost to the day, on usenet. This led to my introduction of gamers circular logic.

I'm not having fun when I'm playing D&D.
You can't tell me I'm playing wrong.
The only wrong way to play is not having fun.
So we house-ruled it to make it better.
But I'm not having fun playing D&D.

If you watch very closely, you'll still see it today. People invoke subjectivity as a defense against being told they're playing wrong while clearly expressing dissatisfaction with their gaming experience.

Sadly, that's a fallacy.  Because if you don't understand the subsystem, or don't think it'd fit, there's no evidence using would make the game more fun.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;868890Sadly, that's a fallacy.  Because if you don't understand the subsystem, or don't think it'd fit, there's no evidence using would make the game more fun.

D&D is pretty irrelevant. You can't state you're not having fun playing such-and-such, and then deflect criticism of how you're playing by citing subjectivity.

If you're not having fun, then you ARE playing wrong. And if you're playing wrong, then criticisms are valid because you do need to change at least some of what you're doing.

And if what you're doing is different from the rules as written, well playing by the rules as written is the most ready made solution available to you. There's no guarantee that's going to work for you. But you haven't given the RPG itself a fair or honest try if you're not open to at least trying to use rules you've been ignoring to make your experience more fun. It's at least worth a try.

This becomes especially when there is a clear relationship between the complaint and the rules being ignored. For example, in the case of 1e, when people gripe that it's all murdergrind while ignoring, 1) A roll at the beginning of an encounter that vastly cuts down the amount of combat, 2) A roll during combat that vastly cuts down on the amount of fighting to the death, 3) The xp for gold rule which provides an incentive to avoid combat when possible.

That doesn't mean implementing those rules will automatically make the whole thing fun. But if it's still not fun, odds are it will be for a different reason than murdergrind. Maybe too much roleplay, frustration with enemies that flee before you get to kill them, and everything becomes a big lootfest.

Quote from: Lunamancer;868920D&D is pretty irrelevant. You can't state you're not having fun playing such-and-such, and then deflect criticism of how you're playing by citing subjectivity. ...

D&D - Making the impossible possible for 30 years... :teehee:

Quote from: Lunamancer;868920D&D is pretty irrelevant. You can't state you're not having fun playing such-and-such, and then deflect criticism of how you're playing by citing subjectivity.

I remember you.  You're the Bad Wrong Fun guy.  Right.  Moving on.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;868927I remember you.  You're the Bad Wrong Fun guy.  Right.  Moving on.

I don't remember you. But this will be the last time I recap this since I'm detecting a buttload of dishonesty emanating from your posts.

What I wrote is that if you're not having fun, you're playing it wrong. Yes, that very controversial statement found on WEG GM screens.

Contrast this with bad wrong fun, defined as illegitimate enjoyment.

See. The key to bad wrong fun is it has to be fun. If you're not having fun, you're not having bad wrong fun. Bad wrong fun does not apply to people criticizing those who are NOT having fun.

Playing D&D without reaction and morale checks, like I did when I was a kid and had tons of fun doing it, hey, that's bad wrong fun. It is foolish to criticize that given that we were all having a good time.

Playing D&D without reaction and morale checks, and then complaining that the game isn't fun because it's all combat and lacks role-play, that is NOT bad wrong fun because no fun is being had. It is legitimate to criticize that because the people playing it are not having a good time.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;868927I remember you.  You're the Bad Wrong Fun guy.  Right.  Moving on.

I don't remember you. But this will be the last time I recap this. If you can't comprehend it, that's your problem

What I wrote is that if you're not having fun, you're playing it wrong. Yes, that very controversial statement found on WEG GM screens.

Contrast this with bad wrong fun, defined as illegitimate enjoyment.

See. The key to bad wrong fun is it has to be fun. If you're not having fun, you're not having bad wrong fun. Bad wrong fun does not apply to people criticizing those who are NOT having fun.

Playing D&D without reaction and morale checks, like I did when I was a kid and had tons of fun doing it, hey, that's bad wrong fun. It is foolish to criticize that given that we were all having a good time.

Playing D&D without reaction and morale checks, and then complaining that the game isn't fun because it's all combat and lacks role-play, that is NOT bad wrong fun because no fun is being had. It is legitimate to criticize that because the people playing it are not having a good time.

Quote from: Lunamancer;868950Playing D&D without reaction and morale checks, and then complaining that the game isn't fun because it's all combat and lacks role-play, that is NOT bad wrong fun because no fun is being had. It is legitimate to criticize that because the people playing it are not having a good time.

MY comment was that if you went back and tried to use the Morale System, it MAY not actually improve on the lack of fun.

It might, but assuming it will is a fallacy.

And the game being all combat is the GM's fault for not reading his friends as to what they want.  This is why you TALK it out first.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;869008MY comment was that if you went back and tried to use the Morale System, it MAY not actually improve on the lack of fun.

It might, but assuming it will is a fallacy.

Good thing I didn't assume that. Shitty thing that you did assume that I assumed it.

QuoteAnd the game being all combat is the GM's fault

No. That would be the players fault for attacking everything.

Quotefor not reading his friends as to what they want.  This is why you TALK it out first.

No. You talk it out.

I only have a little bit of free time to dedicate to gaming once a week. I don't want to spend it talking about playing. Talk is cheap. I want to play. Or is that bad wrong fun?

Quote from: Lunamancer;869054I only have a little bit of free time to dedicate to gaming once a week. I don't want to spend it talking about playing. Talk is cheap. I want to play. Or is that bad wrong fun?

Communication is WRONG?  To blindly assume is RIGHT?  Really?  Cuz that's what I'm reading here.

This ENTIRE medium of entertainment is based on communication.  Making sure all sides can relate what they are meant to imagine (at least to a certain degree, everyone sees things differently after all) and how to react to it.

But if you have so little time to dedicate to actually playing, maybe you should find a less intensive hobby?  Otherwise, you'll just stress out instead of relaxing...

As for me, I'll keep talking to my players via phone or E-Mail, should they have questions, wants or needs in my game, outside of game time, if they can make the time.  Five minutes here, five minutes there, they add up for me.

Quote from: Lunamancer;869054No. That would be the players fault for attacking everything.

Could go either way, really.  It could be the players' fault for mindlessly attacking everything, but it could also be the GM's fault for creating a world/adventure where combat is the only effective (or even allowed) way to interact with anything.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;869075Communication is WRONG?  To blindly assume is RIGHT?  Really?  Cuz that's what I'm reading here.

Of course that's what you're reading. You're the same guy who equates "If you aren't having fun, you're playing wrong" to "bad wrong fun."  The key to effective communication is listening. You don't seem to be very good at it. Maybe that's why YOU need a talk session before you game.

Many of us don't.

Quote from: nDervish;869076Could go either way, really.  It could be the players' fault for mindlessly attacking everything, but it could also be the GM's fault for creating a world/adventure where combat is the only effective (or even allowed) way to interact with anything.

Which circles back to the point of all this. If the GM is using reaction and morale checks, then combat is not the only effective or allowable way to interact with anything.

But in all honesty, I have never seen what you describe actually done. Where the players go out of their way to find non-combat solutions and the GM railroads them into combat. I've seen GMs railroad according to a pre-determined story, and that story may include unavoidable combats, but the story itself is never all combat.

We played a module a few years back where the party was pressed into service by the local lord who commanded us to clear the monsters out of a cave. It turned out to be a lot more combat than we anticipated. It was becoming bothersome. So we turned to creating a plan to fake our deaths to get out of it.

I've never seen players who weren't having fun fail to ruin the GMs plan. The reality is the GM controls shit.

It's funny I was just about to post on this.

Regardless of system, in combat, in games I run, everyone seems to feel useful because there's something they can do. I RP or investigation, if there is any rolling it's usually 1 roll by 1 person (roll to search, roll to convince X of something), which means the rest of the group doesn't feel as useful.

Quote from: Lunamancer;869088Of course that's what you're reading. You're the same guy who equates "If you aren't having fun, you're playing wrong" to "bad wrong fun."  The key to effective communication is listening. You don't seem to be very good at it. Maybe that's why YOU need a talk session before you game.

Many of us don't.

I don't even...

Really?  I chat with my players and hear their complaints and try to change my game for the better by explaining and compromising my 'vision' (which is never set in stone anyway) and you're accusing me of not listening?

Really?  Wow.

I once played the board game RISK by the rules, and four hours in, I realized, I wasn't having fun.  Sometimes using all the rules doesn't always equate fun.

In the last 30 years of gaming and GMing, I've had several groups and I've had more people return to my games than leave them.  I think I do OK, at least.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;869160I don't even...

:rotfl:

QuoteReally?  I chat with my players and hear their complaints and try to change my game for the better by explaining and compromising my 'vision' (which is never set in stone anyway) and you're accusing me of not listening?

:teehee: You did it again. I didn't accuse you of not listening. I was saying you're bad at listening. :teehee:

QuoteReally?  Wow.

:rotfl:

QuoteI once played the board game RISK by the rules, and four hours in, I realized, I wasn't having fun.  Sometimes using all the rules doesn't always equate fun.

Why, do you think anyone's arguing that using all the rules always equates to fun? Please say yes. One more example of poor listening skills is just what this thread needs.

Quote from: PencilBoy99;869140It's funny I was just about to post on this.

Regardless of system, in combat, in games I run, everyone seems to feel useful because there's something they can do. I RP or investigation, if there is any rolling it's usually 1 roll by 1 person (roll to search, roll to convince X of something), which means the rest of the group doesn't feel as useful.

I'd say that calls for a look at why you're rolling and to what effect. How is it that a number attached to this or that character and compared to a die toss is all that matters? Why are players' decisions so much irrelevant?

That has not been my experience, going all the way back to early "skill list" oriented games such as Traveller,  RuneQuest and The Fantasy Trip. It's not the presence of such factors that created the situation; it's some weird (to my mind) notion of how an RPG ought to be played.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;868846The aforementioned 'Duke' is the opposite extreme.  The issue is that everyone assume ransoming was the only way those types of situations, like some sort of genteel fantasy land and anyone who thinks otherwise is a delusional wannabe murder hobo.

People are stupid, and crooks are stupider.  That's pretty much been the only constant in all of history.  First off, the Bandits would be morons for wanting to negotiate a price for the Ducal whelp, simply because they could get tracked back to their hideout, or worse, the guy(s) they sent to collect the ransom took it, split it and took off never to be seen again.  And unlike in modern times, tracking someone is more difficult, cuz they don't have GPS or able to track a cellphone.  Criminals are not known for their sense of honour after all.

So that nixes that plan.  More than likely, the Duke WILL assume his child is dead, rightly or wrongly, and send a retaliatory force, simply because we still do it now.  If they rescue the kid?  Sweet!  If not, then sympathies on their loss, but at least the bandits are dead and scattered.

This, of course, is assuming they found the bandit camp in the first place, which may be a trick in itself.

Ransoming was a thing that Nobles did among each other, due to social rules.  No one else got to 'benefit' from that.

You know what?
That kind of thinking is exactly what I mean by "out of touch with reality due to not knowing history".
Yes, some people might do exactly that. Those are going to be the kind of rulers known for their ruthlessness.
Most people aren't going to do that.

Quote from: Lunamancer;867856That's fine. It still fits the form. I don't anticipate people will do things the way I say is most effective. I wouldn't expect most players to know the system. I anticipate most PCs hopped up on social skills will skip discovery altogether and instead engage in verbal jujitsu.

A nice approach I've taken in the past is "your roll tells you what the NPC might be susceptible to". Seems like a decent compromise.
And yes, some players suss it out before even making an argument. They just roll to confirm the delivery was right, or in your terms, to close - or in my terms, rolling to see whether the NPC would have second thoughts in the last moment:D.

QuoteThough I should point out that in my procedure, it is okay for discovery to happen outside of the prospects presence. The elaboration phase is not always present as it is initiated entirely by the prospect. And the close, in most cases, doesn't require any sort of skill check. Indeed, if the introduction, discovery, and presentation are all on point, the prospect will close themselves with a statement like, "I think I'd like to try it."

Well, that works then:).

QuoteI'm not sure what the best terms are. I can usually hear a lot of things just in someone's voice inflections. I don't jump to conclusions or try to come off like the Amazing Kreskin, but it's something that should be addressed. In game, this would be largely dependent on the character's skill, not what the player can hear. After all, who's to say the GM is a flawless character actor? The GM may not be accurately portraying inflection.

Agreed. Though if the player gets some info from the portrayal, it's only for the better.

QuoteYou are correct that it in the context of RPGs it is framed this way. However, persuasion is persuasion is persuasion. There are ways it works and ways it doesn't. And the simple fact is not everyone can be closed. This is actually why the roleplay element is so irreplaceable. It puts it onto the player to think up an argument that could plausibly work. A player may come up with something I never thought of and find a way to close someone I thought would be impossible. And that's fine. In fact, I consider it great.

Right. Admittedly,that's the moment we tend to see players resort to illegal means of persuasion...though not always.

QuoteNow it doesn't take someone of extraordinary skill to just give up  when a prospect doesn't play along nicely. It takes someone of skill to know the difference between someone who is a waste of time and someone who is just playing hard to get.

In the same vein, though, you might as well try the hard close on everyone you have doubts about, then...whether it works or not, there's at least a chance it would work.
I suspect some players would do exactly that.

QuoteFor those who are playing hard to get, the procedure I use allows characters of high skill to use their skill to keep the prospect engaged so you can go back to discovery take another run at it. And when all else fails, you have the hard close with a few percent probability of working. Because that really is about the percentage difference in rate of success when you just don't give up. Not really much.

Yeah, I think that's the greatest advantage of your method.

QuoteYeah, that's also how "criticals" work in LA, too, and that was one of the things I had in mind when I came out with that figure. But it's also realistic.

Well, never played LA, but glad this mechanic is representing it well.

QuoteBack to serious, would you make every player roll with these odds? If he hasn't got the character resource skills and is using a hard close instead of the roll, as in your previous example, that would be something like 3% chance for those guys. One-in-Three, or 33% is a very common expected closing ratio over the long run. Someone at that caliber can bump that close to 40% by bringing the A game. A high-end superstar performs at about 50%, but can often perform just above 50% up to just shy of 60%.

So 10-20% of the base chance is about what it amounts to. I figure make it 10% and then have instances where a bonus could apply.

I'm not sure what this means in game terms for you.
Do you mean you're fine with people without skills having 3% chance, while some investment would allow it to get to 33-60%? Or do you mean someone without skill investment would have the 33% with good roleplaying, and with it could get to nearly 60%?

QuoteWell, it doesn't just apply to gamers. There's a joke about an economist who loses his watch, so he's looking for it. A stranger comes up and offers to help him find the watch and asks, "Now just where abouts did you lose it?" and the economist points down to the other end of the street, "Down there somewhere."

So the stranger asks, "Then why are you looking over here?" to which the economist replies, "Because the light here is better."

:)
Well, if the odds of finding your watch are getting a heavier penalty for bad lightening than the penalty for looking in the wrong place...
Damn. I think there are systems that probably work this way:)!

QuoteFree will makes people intractable. Anything that takes human action as an input, whether it's an economy, a roleplaying game, or a social encounter.

OTOH, free will also makes people tractable. Try negotiating with a slave that's going to be punished for agreeing with you, and I suspect you might be meeting someone unswayed by almost any arguments. Will can be influenced by many things - peer pressure and perceived expertise, for one;).

QuoteI found the right 3 lines did more than 3 pages. I don't expect the backstory to tell a story. I expect to get just enough information that the character has a compelling reason to "adventure."

Agreed, but we were talking about what people that like being snobbish about games would approve of. And my point was, they'd probably approve of a long bio and a small amount of system input.
In fact, freeform roleplayers can be among the most snobbish of roleplayers, IME.

Quote from: Lunamancer;869088Of course that's what you're reading. You're the same guy who equates "If you aren't having fun, you're playing wrong" to "bad wrong fun."  The key to effective communication is listening. You don't seem to be very good at it. Maybe that's why YOU need a talk session before you game.

Many of us don't.

Hey, a talk session takes about an hour at most. It's good because some players actually suck at telling you what they like unless you ask them.
BTW, does anyone really devote a whole session to it?

Quote from: Lunamancer;869204:rotfl:



:teehee: You did it again. I didn't accuse you of not listening. I was saying you're bad at listening. :teehee:



:rotfl:



Why, do you think anyone's arguing that using all the rules always equates to fun? Please say yes. One more example of poor listening skills is just what this thread needs.

While I appreciate the verbal jujutsu skills you're showing... are you done already?
Just add CBrady to your IL and move on. The thread is interesting even without popcorn-munching, and it's not a fun show due to skill mismatch.

Quote from: AsenRG;869275You know what?
That kind of thinking is exactly what I mean by "out of touch with reality due to not knowing history".
Yes, some people might do exactly that. Those are going to be the kind of rulers known for their ruthlessness.
Most people aren't going to do that.

Just chiming in to agree with you. I'd say history is besides the point. Each Duke is entitled to have their own values, and moreover there might be something special with that particular child. You don't need to establish some general fact of history to use it as an example.

QuoteA nice approach I've taken in the past is "your roll tells you what the NPC might be susceptible to". Seems like a decent compromise.
And yes, some players suss it out before even making an argument. They just roll to confirm the delivery was right, or in your terms, to close - or in my terms, rolling to see whether the NPC would have second thoughts in the last moment:D.

Maybe it's just my personal experience, but I think gamers do tend to want more information about a situation to see if there's a way they can gain some kind of edge. I see this a lot in combat, especially. (The phenomenon of boring hit, miss, hit, hit combat that has led some to creating more "interesting" combat systems is just something I don't see a lot of.)

So I think you'll find even if you require players to take an active role in discovery, they'll catch on real quick.

QuoteWell, that works then:).

Discovery outside of the prospects presence has another side-benefit. Since the information can be discovered by many possible means, it gives PCs who aren't skilled in the art of persuasion the opportunity to contribute in a big way if the central point or goal in an adventure is to convince an NPC of something or another.

A common drawback to heavy emphasis on social interaction is that persuasion has a higher likelihood of being one-on-one than is combat one-on-one. But discovery can be the purpose of an entire side-adventure. So even if your character doesn't have the skills to be in that final social encounter, at least you can take credit for an assist.

QuoteAgreed. Though if the player gets some info from the portrayal, it's only for the better.

That is the best-case scenario, yes. And I think for that reason, GMs tend to ham up and over-emphasize the subtext. That's great in some cases. Players don't pursue a really boring, unintentional red-herring. In other cases, though, it could be tantamount to telegraphing the twist and kill the mystery. NPCs with eccentric personalities work as great camouflage for bad acting.

QuoteIn the same vein, though, you might as well try the hard close on everyone you have doubts about, then...whether it works or not, there's at least a chance it would work.
I suspect some players would do exactly that.

The thing is, once you go for a hard close, it can be hard to keep a good working relationship. Let's say you get a phone call from a salesman one day. He hooks you right from the beginning, seems like a nice enough guy, he's selling something you're actually interested in. Then at the end, you want time to think things over, so he hard closes you. You're weak, so you cave to his awesome verbal jujitsu. Now what do you do the next time he calls? Basically, if what he sold you didn't straight up save your life, you are not taking that call.

If you're a player and your character is a social skill ninja, you get to the end, and the close doesn't work, which do you do? Go for the hard close at 10% of your skill? Or do you fall back to discovery thinking maybe you missed something? Because you can always try the hard close after your second pitch, or third pitch. But if you go for the hard close the first time out and it doesn't work, falling back to discovery is virtually never an option at that point.

Maybe in the interest of full disclosure I should say, in real life, I almost never use a hard close. I think I hard-closed once in the past year. And even that, I just asked for the close then shut up. First one to speak loses. I hate that. But in that case, I felt it was appropriate, and it did work. It was a long-ass silence. It's the kind of thing sales people brag about. For me, if I'd done my job better, it would have never come down to that.

On the other hand, I do love the take-away close. If I know I've done everything I could to listen to the prospect, find out what they need, find just the right product for them, and frame the pitch in a way that's tailor-suited to them and they're still not giving me a yes, I'll take it off the table. It usually doesn't work. But sometimes, maybe 20% of the time, it does. And in either case, I haven't shoved anything down anyone's throat. So deal or no deal, the next time the phone rings, this person will still take my calls.

QuoteI'm not sure what this means in game terms for you.
Do you mean you're fine with people without skills having 3% chance, while some investment would allow it to get to 33-60%? Or do you mean someone without skill investment would have the 33% with good roleplaying, and with it could get to nearly 60%?

I assume a character with no skill points has a base chance of zero. They rely entirely on player skill in the discovery phase (or other character skills in cases where discovery is a side-adventure) to get just the perfect offer, and apart from that, either a very open-minded NPC (some people are just like that) or else you're running on sit mods. I've mentioned way up thread about PCs with no skills having to offer a gift or something on the intro to gain willingness to listen.

I also gave an example way, way, way up-thread of a "quick-sell", where the unskilled PC does discovery as some side quest, he knows exactly what the NPC wants, so his "introduction" is just the summary question that would usually come at the end of discovery. Just blurting it out like that to get attention. Now it has to be spot on if it's going to work. And blurting something out like that may also be perceived as rude, so there's some risk there as well. But if it is spot on and the player presents it in a way--in particular a way in which the PC has skin in the game to ward off trust-based objections--that could legitimately work without ever calling for a skill check.

QuoteWell, if the odds of finding your watch are getting a heavier penalty for bad lightening than the penalty for looking in the wrong place...
Damn. I think there are systems that probably work this way

I can just imagine the argument from abstraction. The player has his character search where it's light to get a light bonus (or avoid the darkness penalty). But hey, separation of player knowledge from character knowledge. The CHARACTER knows he lost the watch on the other side of the street, and that's abstractly figured into the die roll.

And the light bonus still counts, because of (take your pick):
a) respecting the player's choice,
b) because the player made a smart decision,
c) because the player was role playing not just roll playing,
d) because the player referenced the scenery in his description

QuoteOTOH, free will also makes people tractable. Try negotiating with a slave that's going to be punished for agreeing with you, and I suspect you might be meeting someone unswayed by almost any arguments. Will can be influenced by many things - peer pressure and perceived expertise, for one;).

I agree with your example, only I would use the word "intractable" to describe it. Why? Because suppose I pointed to a counter-example. A slave who, despite being beaten for agreeing with you, ends up doing so anyway. What makes free will intractable is my counter-example does not disprove your point one bit. The slave does still respond to incentives. Same external stimuli. But maybe he just evaluates those incentives differently.

Put another way. Suppose I offer to pay you $100 to cut off your arm. If you decline my offer, does that prove you ignore incentives? No. It just proves that your arm is worth more to you than $100. So you have greater incentive to turn down my offer than you do to accept it.

QuoteIn fact, freeform roleplayers can be among the most snobbish of roleplayers, IME.

Great thing about being in highschool when Amber was popular is we had tons of time to game, and so we were able to experiment with a lot of different games and just different approaches to games we were already playing. We had a few adventures that were simple, straight forward stories. Devoid of nuance, unless you count goofy quirkiness as nuance. When we spent 2 hours talking about what our characters were having for breakfast, I thought it was time to shut down the free form experiment.

QuoteHey, a talk session takes about an hour at most. It's good because some players actually suck at telling you what they like unless you ask them.

Yeah, asking the right questions is really key. Because even when players are talking, they still suck at telling you what they want (like that guy who came up to me and said he wants to invest in something high risk). I had this one player back during my college days, who after session 4 of a 5-session dungeon adventure was complaining about the lack of encounters with humans. Well, the next multi-session mini-saga was a mainly urban-based adventure that involved a secret society. Wouldn't you know it, he soon wanted to go back to orcs and goblins.

"Just talk it out, man" is a weird kind of advice. It doesn't really give you any hint as to how to accomplish the goals but at the same time sounds so reasonable, who could argue with it. That's why people who are clueless love invoking it. It keeps you from having to actually say anything while putting you in a critique-free zone.

Take the last campaign I ran in college. By then I had come to grips with reality. I wasn't going to have my perfect campaign. People had home work and projects and term papers and exams. Things that made their schedules irregular. So I said fuck it. No more story bullshit. Just dungeon crawls. We begin in town, we end in town. Whoever shows up, shows up.

The way that campaign grew in popularity was absolutely staggering to me. I booked huge tables in conference rooms on campus and we still got to the point of standing room only. We had to continue one session in a laundry mat, because the campus center building was closing and everyone was having too much fun to stop playing. The emotional highs some of the encounters brought players too was unbelievable. All those years of trying hard, trying to make sure there was a little of something for every type of player never measured up.

Stupid me. I saw we had a core group that kept showing up reliably, week after week. And they all wanted to do something more. More story. Some kind of epic quest. Bigger adventure. I said fine. That fell apart after 3 weeks. After 3 months of these 6 players never missing one game, making 2 games back-to-back proved too much of a burden.

Let me be clear, the moral here is not that we should all play dungeon crawls and nothing else. Notice, things never went right when I "listened to my players." They only went right when I was responsive to the reality of actual play. I only switched to dungeon crawls to alleviate the pressure of being expected to show up to the weekly game. It wasn't the dungeon crawl itself so much as saying, "Hey, fuck all your tight-ass aesthetics. This is supposed to be fun. Not work." And when things fell apart is when I decided to change gears from something that was already working perfectly.

Listen to the players. But listen to their actions more than their words. I don't care how much they bitch. If they show up every week, they're having fun. For some people, bitching IS fun. And if they tell you how awesome your game is and how sorry they are they have to miss it this month, they might not be telling you the whole story.

QuoteWhile I appreciate the verbal jujutsu skills you're showing... are you done already?
Just add CBrady to your IL and move on. The thread is interesting even without popcorn-munching, and it's not a fun show due to skill mismatch.

There are some lessons in there to learn.

First, don't under-estimate the CBrady. I think one great way of being a really successful forum bully is to take the weak/pathetic stance. It makes it easier to make everyone else out to be the asshole that way. Second, I would classify his posts as being verbal jujitsu of the purest form. Notice none of them deliver any actual substance. They only twist the words of the person he's arguing with while he himself hides in safe zones like, "Talk it out, man" "Communication" "Don't assume." "Bad wrong fun."

Aaaaand you can see how well the verbal jujitsu approach to persuasion works.

What I was doing, I haven't really given it a name or specified it in my persuasion procedure. But it's part of my real life job. Some people you talk to are just unreasonable, or are liars, or have nothing of value to offer in return, or are just otherwise wastes of time. Others are just playing with their cards close to their chests. And still with others there is a genuine misunderstanding.

First, I assume it's a misunderstanding. I make the appropriate corrections/clarifications, or repeat or recap what I said. If misunderstandings continue, I assume the other person is of value, for whatever reason they're just being difficult. Go back up-thread to see my PC vs PC example of persuasion, namely the ordered preferences of outcomes. Someone playing their cards close to them may be angling for a poker close. By calling them out, you're saying, "Hey, I'm not going for this bullshit, let's put the cards out on the table." Calling them on it is usually the best course of action at that point. Failure to do so almost certainly guarantees they won't respect you.

If that still doesn't work, you're dealing with someone who is a waste of time. At that point, you're right, it's time to ignore him. I gave it second and third thoughts before posting that final response. I don't care if his opinion is different than mine. It happens. I don't care if I can't convince him to do things differently. Not everyone can be closed. But I figure I have a right to raise an objection to him putting words in my mouth.

Quote from: Lunamancer;869317The thing is, once you go for a hard close, it can be hard to keep a good working relationship. Let's say you get a phone call from a salesman one day. He hooks you right from the beginning, seems like a nice enough guy, he's selling something you're actually interested in. Then at the end, you want time to think things over, so he hard closes you. You're weak, so you cave to his awesome verbal jujitsu. Now what do you do the next time he calls? Basically, if what he sold you didn't straight up save your life, you are not taking that call.

Is the "hard close" what is sometimes called "hard sell'?  Because that is the instant at which I leave/hang up.  And yes, I have.  Somebody starts to pressure me, it's over.

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;869318Is the "hard close" what is sometimes called "hard sell'?  Because that is the instant at which I leave/hang up.  And yes, I have.  Somebody starts to pressure me, it's over.

Yes, exactly. That's why it doesn't really work. A small number of people do cave to it, but if you try to hard sell everyone, you'll lose more people than you gain. Used as a last resort, yes, it can give you a small boost.

But I think if you look at the really successful career salesmen, they build a client list that they can tap into for future sales. Since there is already trust, those are always easy and lucrative sales. You can't build a client list like that if you go around hard selling everyone.

That's an example of how having a longer term context of social relationships than just a one-time random meeting adds to the game. You can get to know characters, and use real strategies for influencing them according to their personalities and interests.

The more things change...

Quote from: Lunamancer;868850I think I first made that argument 20 years ago, almost to the day, on usenet. This led to my introduction of gamers circular logic.

I'm not having fun when I'm playing D&D.
You can't tell me I'm playing wrong.
The only wrong way to play is not having fun.
So we house-ruled it to make it better.
But I'm not having fun playing D&D.

If you watch very closely, you'll still see it today. People invoke subjectivity as a defense against being told they're playing wrong while clearly expressing dissatisfaction with their gaming experience.

But fun is nothing but subjective. You can convince people that painting picket fences is fun. People can convince themselves that D&D, no matter how it's run, is unfun, just because it's D&D.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;869008MY comment was that if you went back and tried to use the Morale System, it MAY not actually improve on the lack of fun.

It might, but assuming it will is a fallacy.

Quote from: Lunamancer;869054Good thing I didn't assume that. Shitty thing that you did assume that I assumed it.

He said assuming it will is a fallacy, not that you made that assumption.

Subtle difference.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;869008And the game being all combat is the GM's fault for not reading his friends as to what they want.  This is why you TALK it out first.

Quote from: Lunamancer;869054No. That would be the players fault for attacking everything.

I've been in games where the only effective course of action was combat, and any attempts at persuasion were ignored if not outright condemned for wasting everybody's time. Where what the NPCs thought and did had been decided by the GM ahead of time and nothing the PCs said during the game would change that. There's a reason Charisma is notorious for being a dump stat.

If the PCs attack everything, then everything will revolve around combat. But if the GM only provides opportunities for combat, then everything will also revolve around combat.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;869008This is why you TALK it out first.

Quote from: Lunamancer;869054No. You talk it out.

I only have a little bit of free time to dedicate to gaming once a week. I don't want to spend it talking about playing. Talk is cheap. I want to play. Or is that bad wrong fun?

...

So much for the 'discovery' phase.

Quote from: Lunamancer;869088The key to effective communication is listening. You don't seem to be very good at it. Maybe that's why YOU need a talk session before you game.

Many of us don't.

Actually, the key to effective communication is motivating others to want to communicate openly, authentically and safely (http://www.frontlinelearning.com/Article_Communication_Ultimate_Key.html), which you don't seem to be very good at. Then again, perhaps communication is too complex to have something as simple as a single key.

Anyway, going straight into a game without establishing expectations is a recipe for disaster, and if you can avoid that without any discussion, more power to you. I've found that most long running tabletop groups actually consist of members who shared the same set of cultural values and expectations before engaging play, so explicitly establishing them beforehand was less necessary. Yet even in groups like that I still find expectation clash to be the #1 cause of player conflict.

I highly suspect you've had many such clashes, and that the reason you can avoid discussion before play is not because of your listening skills, but because your group shares enough of the same cultural values and expectations already. I could of course be wrong, so I'm honestly curious as to what your current and previous players might have to say on the matter.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;869160I chat with my players and hear their complaints and try to change my game for the better by explaining and compromising my 'vision' (which is never set in stone anyway) and you're accusing me of not listening?

Quote from: Lunamancer;869204:teehee: You did it again. I didn't accuse you of not listening. I was saying you're bad at listening. :teehee:

*snerk* You think there's a difference in this context.

Quote from: Lunamancer;869317You don't need to establish some general fact of history to use it as an example.

Well, certainly not on the internet at least.

Quote from: Lunamancer;869317The thing is, once you go for a hard close, it can be hard to keep a good working relationship.

That depends. Even after a hard close, if someone spends enough money on an ongoing contract, they'll often convince themselves that it's delivering value even when it's not. In fact, not delivering value can actually make it more likely for someone to convince themselves otherwise, to the point that they may even spend more money in the process.

Quote from: Lunamancer;869317When we spent 2 hours talking about what our characters were having for breakfast, I thought it was time to shut down the free form experiment.

Why? Weren't the players having fun?

Quote from: Lunamancer;869317Yeah, asking the right questions is really key. Because even when players are talking, they still suck at telling you what they want (like that guy who came up to me and said he wants to invest in something high risk).

So you do realize there's a difference between what people say, and what they mean.

Good to know. Shame it's not being effectively applied here.

Quote from: Lunamancer;869317"Just talk it out, man" is a weird kind of advice. It doesn't really give you any hint as to how to accomplish the goals but at the same time sounds so reasonable, who could argue with it. That's why people who are clueless love invoking it. It keeps you from having to actually say anything while putting you in a critique-free zone.

Sorta like "The key to communication is listening" :D

Quote from: Lunamancer;869317I don't care how much they bitch. If they show up every week, they're having fun. For some people, bitching IS fun.

Yeah, I'm sure that's exactly why people stay in actively destructive relationships, and why their complaints should be ignored because they obviously don't know what they're talking about.

Quote from: Lunamancer;869317First, don't under-estimate the CBrady. I think one great way of being a really successful forum bully is to take the weak/pathetic stance. It makes it easier to make everyone else out to be the asshole that way.

Not only did you misuse the term 'bully (https://www.google.com/search?q=bully+definition)', but you did so in the process of being a bully. Seriously, the weak are bullies because they make you look like an asshole? Are you fucking kidding me? That's not even SJW level bullshit.

Honestly though this whole thread makes you sound like a narcissistic sociopath. From the analysis of human interaction, to how you speak about your players and customers, which makes me reeealy curious to hear from them now.

Quote from: Lunamancer;869317Aaaaand you can see how well the verbal jujitsu approach to persuasion works.

Well, he did persuade you into acting like a 12 year old (with apologies to actual 12 year olds) :rotfl:

Quote from: AsenRG;869275Just add CBrady to your IL and move on. The thread is interesting even without popcorn-munching, and it's not a fun show due to skill mismatch.

What I particularly like about this statement is that it leaves some ambiguity with regards to who is being outmatched. Chapeau!  ;)

Quote from: Anon Adderlan;876225But fun is nothing but subjective.

That's not a "but." That's exactly what I was saying.

QuoteYou can convince people that painting picket fences is fun.

No. Not really. You either find it fun or you don't. If you can get children to make a game of painting the fence so they have more fun while doing it, it's still not painting the fence that's fun. It's the game they're playing that's fun.

QuotePeople can convince themselves that D&D, no matter how it's run, is unfun, just because it's D&D.

And just like it's not the painting of the fence that's fun, it's not D&D that some people find unfun. It's some people's experience of playing it that was unfun. Being an effective communicator means understanding and unraveling the difference.

Apply it to the fact pattern that the exchange of posts was referring to. If someone claims D&D is unfun, I ask why. If the answer is, "Because it's all combat," I ask, "Well what about the NPC reactions table? What about morale?"

If the answer is, "Well, we don't use those," I can safely say, "Sounds like you're playing wrong." I have two measures to back this up. First, you're not having fun. Second, you're not playing D&D. You're playing D&D minus a couple of rules you decided to skip.

What measures does the guy puking up the term "bad wrong fun" have to point to? Presumably that he's playing the way he likes. And yet he's also claiming he doesn't like it. That's a contradiction no matter how you wish to spin it.

QuoteI've been in games where the only effective course of action was combat,

Effective? Effective how? Effective at what? Towards what end? With what goal in mind? See, your goal is always yours. Never the GMs.

QuoteSo much for the 'discovery' phase.

How do you figure?

QuoteActually, the key to effective communication is motivating others to want to communicate openly, authentically and safely (http://www.frontlinelearning.com/Article_Communication_Ultimate_Key.html),

The secret to motivation is that it's impossible to motivate anyone. A line that claims the key to anything is motivating others is guaranteed to not be reaching the heart of the issue. In any case, I agree being someone reasonable people want to communicate openly and honestly with is extremely helpful. I do this on a daily basis and am extremely good at it. I owe it in large part to the fact that I'm not deluding myself into thinking I'm motivating people. One of the fastest ways to shut down open, honest communication for a large number of people is by trying to motivate them.

QuoteAnyway, going straight into a game without establishing expectations is a recipe for disaster,

When I follow a recipe for pancakes, I always get pancakes. If it's a recipe for disaster, then going straight into a game without establishing expectations should always produce disaster. That's what the word recipe means. In my experience, it never once has.

You do seem a little shy about stepping up and saying it produces disaster in your game. Is that because it doesn't and your so-called recipe doesn't even yield what you claim it does in your own experience? Or is it because you run train-wrecks and yet presume to tell others how they ought to run their game.

QuoteYet even in groups like that I still find expectation clash to be the #1 cause of player conflict.

The phrase "player conflict" is telling. Yes, every player may want something different. And everyone is free to go off and play solo the rest of their lives that way they can have everything exactly the way they want it. But most people see clear, without having to be told, that it's more fun to have others to game with. Even if that means you stifle some of the things you enjoy. It's a trade-off, and you're trading up. And the benefit is mutual among the players in the group. That is not player conflict. That's the exact opposite. It is player cooperation. Now if you insist on viewing it as conflict, I can see why that might cause problems in some instances. Sure.

QuoteI highly suspect you've had many such clashes, and that the reason you can avoid discussion before play is not because of your listening skills, but because your group shares enough of the same cultural values and expectations already.

No clashes. Lots of diversity. I'm grateful for the fact that everyone at the table wants something a little different and so brings something a little different to the table.

This is another bizarre idea. If anything, people wanting something different has the potential for less clashing. If everyone wants to play the hero who slays the dragon, and only one person can get in that killing blow, then I guess that's a sort of clash. But if one person wants to slay the dragon, another wants to rescue the princess, another just wants it to be a really dramatic struggle, and still another just wants to take its stuff, there's more than enough room for everyone to get exactly what they want.

QuoteWell, certainly not on the internet at least.

Not anywhere. Not even in hard science. You are at all times allowed to make arbitrary, even untrue assumptions if you are looking to prove something conditionally (that is, on condition that the assumption holds, all the rest follows) or if you are searching for a contradiction to establish the assumed premise as demonstrably false.  Furthermore, if you want to avoid selection bias, in some instances you have to consider not only what did happen but also what could have happened.

In any case, you are certainly allowed to suppose a fictional duke you made up for an example can have whatever motives or other characteristics you choose to ascribe.

QuoteThat depends. Even after a hard close, if someone spends enough money on an ongoing contract, they'll often convince themselves that it's delivering value even when it's not. In fact, not delivering value can actually make it more likely for someone to convince themselves otherwise, to the point that they may even spend more money in the process.

This is a fallacy. The Harvard Business review recently put out an article outlining 8 types of salespeople. The "closer" type, surprise surprise, does close at a slightly higher percentage than the "expert" type when given the opportunity to close. However, the expert is far more likely to get into a position to close in the first place. And the closer type has far worse retention and is thus not very effective when it comes to selling services.

Now I'm not even necessarily citing the Harvard Business Review as the end-all-be-all authority on this. But I do trust their data. If you play the expert but at the very end switch tactics to the closer, you are going to get a slight bump in your closing percentage. And it is slight. And it does hurt future customer relations.

The real edge the expert enjoys is the long-term repeat customers and referrals. Only 9% of all salesmen fit the "expert" type. Yes. A full 91% of the information, training material, "science" and ideas about the sales industry are complete bunk. And 63% is downright counter-productive. Including crazy fallacies about creating value by destroying value.

QuoteSo you do realize there's a difference between what people say, and what they mean.

And this is a surprise to you?

QuoteGood to know. Shame it's not being effectively applied here.

Where?

QuoteSorta like "The key to communication is listening" :D

No. Not sorta like that at all. Communication is a two-way street. Effective persuaders do more listening than talking. That's a non-trivial statement that you can put into practice immediately and goes against the common image of the smooth-talker.

QuoteYeah, I'm sure that's exactly why people stay in actively destructive relationships,

Destructive according to whom? A lot of us would agree that drug abuse is destructive. But it seems that the short-term high is more significant from the junkie's point of view than is the long-term damage. For all your preaching on the subjectivity of things, you seem to slip in the assumption of an objective view of "destructive", and earlier on up the post, "effective" as well.

Your so-called "recipe for disaster" might include a few ingredients that you neglected to list. Such as a belief that players are engaged in conflict rather than cooperation, and that players who enjoy complaining is somehow like being in a destructive relationship. Not to mention the heaping portion of negativity that you seem to be spewing here.

QuoteHonestly though this whole thread makes you sound like a narcissistic sociopath.

I'm pretty sure that's just something people with an inferiority complex accuse others of to make themselves feel better.

QuoteFrom the analysis of human interaction,

Such as?

Quoteto how you speak about your players

Such as?

Quoteand customers,

Such as?

For someone who spends a lot of time linking completely irrelevant internet sources, I would think relevant citations from this very thread would be easy.

QuoteWell, he did persuade you into acting like a 12 year old (with apologies to actual 12 year olds) :rotfl:

He did not. And I thought I had made this clear, but I'll say it again just in case. Part of the job of a skilled persuader is to recognize when someone is being unreasonable. He failed to persuade me that he had anything of value to add or that anything he said it worth taking seriously. And now you have, too. All I see is negativity.

Quote from: Lunamancer;876382Apply it to the fact pattern that the exchange of posts was referring to. If someone claims D&D is unfun, I ask why. If the answer is, "Because it's all combat," I ask, "Well what about the NPC reactions table? What about morale?"

If the answer is, "Well, we don't use those," I can safely say, "Sounds like you're playing wrong." I have two measures to back this up. First, you're not having fun. Second, you're not playing D&D. You're playing D&D minus a couple of rules you decided to skip.

And if the answer is "I don't like the artificial restrictions of class and level, plus the absurd increase in power between starting and highly-experienced characters destroys any sense of connection I may feel to the game world"?  Those are things which actually are a part of the D&D rules, not a result of ignoring those rules and, for some of us, they are unfun (i.e., when those elements are present, they directly reduce the level of fun).

I'll certainly agree that this is subjective and that those factors are benign for some people and that they directly increase the level of fun for still others.  But not everyone who says "D&D is unfun" is actually talking about a broken D&D-like game that they call "D&D".

Quote from: Lunamancer;876382The phrase "player conflict" is telling. Yes, every player may want something different. And everyone is free to go off and play solo the rest of their lives that way they can have everything exactly the way they want it. But most people see clear, without having to be told, that it's more fun to have others to game with. Even if that means you stifle some of the things you enjoy. It's a trade-off, and you're trading up. And the benefit is mutual among the players in the group. That is not player conflict. That's the exact opposite. It is player cooperation. Now if you insist on viewing it as conflict, I can see why that might cause problems in some instances. Sure.

I have no idea what you intend to be replying to here, but it's not anything that I saw in Anon Adderlan's post.  He did not say that player conflict is desirable, nor that it is inevitable.  But it does happen.  Even if you have never seen it in your games, all you have to do is follow any random gaming forum for a while and you're going to see someone asking for help with resolving a player conflict in their game.  Based on reading several such discussions (and, yes, some personal experience as well), when player conflicts arise, the #1 cause tends to be mismatched expectations, which is what Anon Adderlan actually said.

Social intrigue mechanics came up often during the development of ZWEIHÄNDER Grim & Perilous RPG (http://warhammerfantasyroleplay.com). We've used several different models, but eventually settled on this:

QuoteUniversally, players and Gamemasters alike tend to take umbrage at systems which focus solely on "skill rolls" over role-playing to determine success. A few even employ social combat, albeit intensely mechanical in nature (Honor and Intrigue, Song of Ice and Fire). Many tabletop role-playing games don't have social skills (early editions of D&D), instead leaning on player's ability to influence non-player Characters through role-play. Some games, like Pathfinder, distill social interaction down to a handful of dice rolls without giving players agency or allowing role-playing to augment their chance for success. Heck – some systems actively discourage third person role-playing all together!

While we certainly see a place for these approaches, here at ZWEIHÄNDER Grim & Perilous RPG (http://grimandperilous.com), we think we found a great middle ground. Role-playing determines success or failure, while Skills augment the conversation. Both first and third person role-playing is supported, and rewarded. In our optional Social Intrigue system, there are two approaches a Gamemaster can take:

SIMPLE EXCHANGE
This is whenever Social Intrigue warrants an expedient answer through use of a Skill. For example, either the player gets the lowest price possible for a piece of equipment using Bargain, manage to Charm a doorman to let them into an exclusive tavern or even Intimidate to scare off onlookers standing around a scene of a crime. These sort of Skill Tests are very easy for the Gamemaster to rule on, distilling everything down into a single, binary result. While role-playing is still considered to be a factor, Social Class and a Character's Order & Chaos Ranks influence the Difficulty Rating while the result of the Skill Test determines the outcome.

COMPLEX EXCHANGE
Complex exchanges are reserved for specific interactions, ones which require delicate wording, subtle threats and honeyed words to persuade others to consider and approve of something they'd normally not agree to do. Before complex exchanges occur, all participants discuss above board their objectives and what may be at risk. Once determined, each player selects a Skill to use – otherwise known as a Social Tactic – which will influence both the role-play and how it influences the emotions of the non-player Character they interact with. In this system, they make Social Tactics check before in depth role-playing begins. As before, Social Class, along with Order & Chaos Ranks, determine the Difficulty Rating. The results of these rolls determine emotions, otherwise called Temperaments, that the Gamemaster writes down to help guide them on how to role-play the non-player Character the players are interacting with. Success and failure matter; one can generate favorable Temperaments, whereas the other can generate unfavorable ones. After these Temperaments are generated, the Gamemaster references them throughout the interaction to determine how the non-player Characters interact with the players in return.

In the end, Skill Tests determined the general mood of the person the party interacted with, but the result of a complex exchange is resolved solely by role-playing.

http://grimandperilous.com/?p=817

As far as I am concerned, no mechanics can simulate human interaction. Even today with thousands of hours and millions of dollars the best that science been able to produce are a few clever simulations of human interact that work very well for specific circumstances. For example Siri on Apple iOS devices.

One of the strengths of tabletop RPGs is the having the human referee to handle this.

However you have to have some type of mechanics because we have players playing characters with skills and attributes better than their own personal skills.  In my experience it is easier to come up with mechanics to deal with attribute that deal with physical interactions like strength, dexterity, and constitution. And it is harder to deal with the mental/social ones like intelligence, wisdom, and charisma.

My techniques are based around the concept of while the player may not be as mentally/social adept as his character, I as the human referee have complete control over how the setting/NPCs respond to him. So in the absence of a compelling reason, I will act as if he was the smartest or most socially adept person in the room if his attribute/skill warrants it.

A compelling reason for me means that the players has totally misread the situation to be the point that is he not just way out in left field but not in the ballpark.

What I use to decide how my roleplaying playing out are the circumstances of the encounter, the result of a skill/attribute check, and my notes on the NPCs involved.

The downside of course these are all highly subjective criteria that benefit enormously from experience both from life and time spent refereeing campaigns.  Which can make it daunting for a young referee just starting out in tabletop.

In which case, I would tell the young or new referee is to rely heavily on the stereotypes you know already. Eventually as you grow older and gain more experience, you will develop a greater range in how your NPCs act.

I think most RPGs, even detailed ones like GURPS would benefit from more advice and less rules when it comes to social interactions.

On the flip side, when I hear that D&D is lacking in social mechanics I view it as bullshit. Because the one rule that ALL RPGs share is the fact that the game has human referees adjudicating the actions of the character as they interact with the setting.  Because all social mechanics are inadequate to simulating human behavior, the need for a human referee handle social interactions for D&D is no different than any other RPG.

Quote from: nDervish;876413And if the answer is "I don't like the artificial restrictions of class and level, plus the absurd increase in power between starting and highly-experienced characters destroys any sense of connection I may feel to the game world"?  Those are things which actually are a part of the D&D rules, not a result of ignoring those rules and, for some of us, they are unfun (i.e., when those elements are present, they directly reduce the level of fun).

Then you're speaking in irrelevancies here. This thread is not about whether or not you like D&D. It's about social encounters in RPGs. The comment I was initially responding to was Philip's where I chimed in to agree when he said this, where his use of "it" refers to use of social encounters in RPGs:

QuoteI think the point is that they knew full well that it was there, and decided not to use it. Tactical-wargame experience or not seems to me little to the point, as this looks like people picking up Monopoly and immediately changing things.

If they then complain that the game design is unbalanced or whatever, the complaint is illegitimate because they are not actually playing the game design in the first place!

QuoteI'll certainly agree that this is subjective and that those factors are benign for some people and that they directly increase the level of fun for still others.  But not everyone who says "D&D is unfun" is actually talking about a broken D&D-like game that they call "D&D".

And nobody EVER made that claim. Again. This thread is about social encounters in RPGs. You want to talk about the pros and cons of D&D? Start a new thread.

QuoteI have no idea what you intend to be replying to here, but it's not anything that I saw in Anon Adderlan's post.  He did not say that player conflict is desirable, nor that it is inevitable.

And I didn't say he said either of those things and there is nothing in my response that implies such. I understood perfectly what he said.

QuoteBut it does happen. Even if you have never seen it in your games, all you have to do is follow any random gaming forum for a while and you're going to see someone asking for help with resolving a player conflict in their game.

Just because people call it player conflict doesn't mean that it is player conflict. This is what my response addressed. If in your subjective opinion as evidenced by your choice, the benefit of playing in a group outweighs the cost of not getting exactly your way, then you're trading up. And if it doesn't, don't join. There's no conflict.

If you insist on seeing it as conflict, you're going to come up with some false diagnosis. And I guess you folks decided on "mismatched expectations."

Strangely, this is actually on-topic in a way. Persuasion only works because the perceived benefit of the proposition outweighs any cost incurred by going along with it. If you choose to view things as conflict that are really not, you're not going to understand the basis for effective persuasion.

Quote from: estar;876429As far as I am concerned, no mechanics can simulate human interaction. Even today with thousands of hours and millions of dollars the best that science been able to produce are a few clever simulations of human interact that work very well for specific circumstances. For example Siri on Apple iOS devices.

I'm not disagreeing with your general point. I definitely agree there is something special about human interaction. However, I would suggest that if it costs thousands of hours and millions of dollars, it is in fact not the best science for studying human behavior.

To use a classic example, imagine you're standing in grand central station during rush hour. If you merely track the observable, physical movements of people, you will see nothing but complete chaos. But the moment you take into account the insight that humans have goals, the chaos suddenly fades and it all makes perfect sense. People are just trying to get home.

No amount of hours or dollars of research will make sense of it. The insight that will make sense of it can be arrived at free of charge and instantaneously for some people.

Quote from: Lunamancer;876440However, I would suggest that if it costs thousands of hours and millions of dollars, it is in fact not the best science for studying human behavior.

The payoff is substantial which why people continued to investigate and try to make something of it. And there have been advances just not quite in the areas people were expecting.

Quote from: Lunamancer;876440To use a classic example, imagine you're standing in grand central station during rush hour. If you merely track the observable, physical movements of people, you will see nothing but complete chaos. But the moment you take into account the insight that humans have goals, the chaos suddenly fades and it all makes perfect sense. People are just trying to get home.

No amount of hours or dollars of research will make sense of it. The insight that will make sense of it can be arrived at free of charge and instantaneously for some people.

Actually that not true, there quite a bit of research into how how traffic flows pedestrian, vehicle, etc and a lot of practical techniques that come out of it.  But you are right in the sense that it is useless in picking out the motivation of any specific individual.

As far as it relates to RPGs, understanding the patterns of traffic for pedestrian at various level of technology can be useful to distill a few useful rules in describing the life of a place to the players. It all grist for the mill.

However when it to randomly selecting a person out of the crowd I would recommend a good random table. With multiple points of entry to allow for a random roll to answer something like "I look for somebody who is well dressed". Because for all intents and purpose it is random who is there at a given moment absence additional information.

One key element to roleplaying NPCs, is for their reactions to be plausible given the circumstances. And their reactions need to be random from the point of view of the players. Basically variation within a range. A good random table will help you from falling into a rut when it comes to roleplaying NPCs. It doesn't have to be elaborate to be useful.

Of course if you have prepared notes then there is need for a random table. Although I will say random tables are useful in coming up with various details. I general I find that when I prepare something that has a large list of details (like a village or city) I have about a two dozen or so specific ideas. I use random tables for the rest. I don't blindly use the results. It serves as an idea generator for the stuff I haven't thought of yet.

The same with roleplaying social interactions, in absence of notes, I will use a table to get some ideas. I will keep some and reject others and then wing it from there.

I use is a program from nBos call inspiration pad pro. I coded up a table that combined the NPC personality traits from the AD&D 1st edition DMG guide and from Paizo's Pathfinder Gamemastery Guide. The result is short stat block with enough traits that I always find one or two that allows me to come up with something interested to use as the basis for roleplaying an NPCs.

I combine that with the player is trying to do with his roleplaying. Using any rolls he makes as a guideline as to how his character presenting himself.  Sometimes making a NPC roll if it is situation involving a contest of wills or skills. The result is how the social encounter plays out.

Quote from: estar;876445The payoff is substantial which why people continued to investigate and try to make something of it. And there have been advances just not quite in the areas people were expecting.

There is no question that in some instances, data-driven studies have been profitable. For some types of problems, that is an effective way of looking at them. For others, however, I have two important questions.

1. How many of these studies eschew human motivations entirely?
2. And of those, how many are time-tested?

You have to be careful with large data sets. The number of spurious correlations grows exponentially the more variables you track. They do eventually deteriorate in the long run with time. But the technology to make economically viable some of the larger data sets doesn't go back far enough to allow this corrective effect to take place.

QuoteI use is a program from nBos call inspiration pad pro. I coded up a table that combined the NPC personality traits from the AD&D 1st edition DMG guide and from Paizo's Pathfinder Gamemastery Guide. The result is short stat block with enough traits that I always find one or two that allows me to come up with something interested to use as the basis for roleplaying an NPCs.

I do like the inspiration pad. What you've done was actually on my to-do list. I may have actually alluded to similar things in this thread, can't remember.

I once attended a workshop given by Gary Gygax where during the Q&A someone asked him why he included so many pole arms in AD&D. His answer always stuck with me. He had this vision of an orc army, each with a different type of ole arm.

I thought it was a powerful visual. And it inspired me to get away from the whole thing where, say, a gang of bandits all have the same weapons and armor, except perhaps distinguishing a leader. Instead, I want each member of even a large gang to be unique. Software like the inspiration pad really goes a long way in helping me generate 40 different gang members rather than a leader and 39 clones.

Social encounters can sometimes be resolved simply through talking and roleplaying.

When conflict occurs, Savage Worlds is quite robust. Its charisma system applies to Persuasion tests which can change an NPC's attitude. In combination with solid roleplaying this can get an NPC to do what you want them to do. With the right edges. charisma either positive or negative can be applied to Intimidation rolls which can also serve the same effect by getting an NPC to not do something like raise an alarm.

The social conflict rules are even more robust for a large debate or other social contest of wills. In 50 Fathoms, they came up when Kirk tried to depose Captain Kirel and later Captain Tellah and attempted to incite a mutiny among the pirate crew.

One of the reasons I like Savage Worlds is that these social skills follow the same rules as combat. They also have a clause which prevents them from being used against PCs leaving that strictly to roleplaying whereas social conflicts are NPC vs. PC.

Another great system was Earthdawn which had a large variety of social skills that all applied against a character's Social Defense (the higher the Charisma, the higher the Social Defense and the better they were at social skills from Etiquette to Seduction).

D&D doesn't handle this particularly well in the editions I played and even 3.x was limited to diplomacy/bluff checks in social situations.

Quote from: slayride35;876466Social encounters can sometimes be resolved simply through talking and roleplaying.

That's how I handle *all* social encounters, so as a consequence Explore doesn't have any social skills or attributes. If NPC reaction is ever in doubt I might resort to a roll, mostly that's restricted to checks such as "their leader is dead, do they flee". I've no rules for this, same as there's no rules for the "is there a gun behind the bar" situation, where I might reply "probably – there is unless I roll a 1".

Savage Worlds also has rules for initial NPC reaction, a roll of 2d6 determines the initial starting attitude of an NPC if the GM hasn't selected one already.

I generally handle morale checks in Savage Worlds with a spirit check. If a leaderless enemy fails the TN 4 check, they run away. Of course that harkens back to my days of D&D 1e Red Box and AD&D 2e with Morale checks.

I usually determine random scene items if asked by rolling a d6 die with + and - on its sides (3 + and 3 -, so its 50/50). Spending a Bennie after the roll adds it to the scene automatically if the roll indicated it was not present (and I have done that for GM characters too).

Quote from: Lunamancer;876460I once attended a workshop given by Gary Gygax where during the Q&A someone asked him why he included so many pole arms in AD&D. His answer always stuck with me. He had this vision of an orc army, each with a different type of ole arm.

Dude sure liked his pole arms.

Generally, if we're talking mechanics, I tend to prefer something like the aforementioned Earthdawn's Social Defence for genres where a quip can contribute to winning or losing a fight. If I want to deemphasize that, I prefer just having the skills and playing it out:).

Quote from: RPGPundit;877146Dude sure liked his pole arms.

It's because they're likable;).

It's because like most creative geniuses, he was a little nuts.

Quote from: RPGPundit;877623It's because like most creative geniuses, he was a little nuts.

Or maybe because he was a wargamer and history buff. He knew the importance and variety of pole arms in combat.

Quote from: RPGPundit;877623It's because like most creative geniuses, he was a little nuts.

If you intend to imply that polearms aren't likable, those would be fighting words and we should settle it with a polearms duel:D!

Quote from: Omega;877805Or maybe because he was a wargamer and history buff. He knew the importance and variety of pole arms in combat.

Part of the workshop was a debate between Gary and the museum curator about how the pole arms were used in combat. The curator's position was that the purpose of these polearms were for show. To look menacing, to intimidate the enemy. Most of the additional blades were useless, and they all basically had the same function.

Gary's view was largely informed by his childhood, where he and his friends created replicas of these weapons, and the additional features of these weapons actually could be used effectively if you had enough practice. So his position was that of course they were all used in combat.

Pole Arms are likeable. So are trains. But the guy who can't shut up about trains ever is still a bit batshit.

Quote from: Lunamancer;877903Part of the workshop was a debate between Gary and the museum curator about how the pole arms were used in combat. The curator's position was that the purpose of these polearms were for show. To look menacing, to intimidate the enemy. Most of the additional blades were useless, and they all basically had the same function.

Gary's view was largely informed by his childhood, where he and his friends created replicas of these weapons, and the additional features of these weapons actually could be used effectively if you had enough practice. So his position was that of course they were all used in combat.

That's a fun part I didn't know. Thanks:).

Quote from: RPGPundit;878457Pole Arms are likeable. So are trains. But the guy who can't shut up about trains ever is still a bit batshit.

Of course, but the guy who talks about trains in a book about pretending to be a train driver is in a wholly different category;).

I doubt if that book was the only time he discussed the subject.  Otaku never stfu about their interests.

Quote from: yosemitemike;879015I doubt if that book was the only time he discussed the subject.  Otaku never stfu about their interests.

Not sure whether you mean Gygax here under "otaku", so I'll answer in general.
Anyone is behaving appropriately when talking about his or her interests to other people that share those interests.
People earn the "distinction" of being Otaku when behaving inappropriately. (The word itself is derived by an old-fashioned greeting, and implies "you're so out of touch you'd use one of those"). You don't become an "otaku" by talking about football to football fans. You do if you try to talk about American football to people who are interested in the kind of football that is better known across the world, and assume they must mean they like your kind of football.
Of course, it is just as inappropriate to do vice versa. The point is, what is an appropriate topic changes with the people that are listening you:).

Now back to the assumption that you meant Gygax there...
If Gygax was talking about his interests to other people interested in history and/or reenactment, and for all I know that was the case, he wasn't acting like an "otaku". From what I know he was talking about it to a museum curator, to a reenactor like himself known as Gronan these days, and via his book, to other people interested in playing the role of someone who uses polearms. All D&D players can be assumed to have at least some interest in the above if they want to play fighting man classes. Many don't, but at least the people near him seem to have been into reenactment, and quite heavily at that.

If you have other examples, say, about him talking about polearms to an old lady who thought history is about constructing genealogy trees, I'd be interested to know those;).

Yup, I got one friend who is always talking about Magic the Gathering. Which is fine with most of us who have played the game (I quit about three years ago from physical collecting and two years ago from video games/online). But talking about Magic to members of our social group that have no interest in nerdy stuff just makes him seem weird at the bar for example. Gotta know your audience to have a conversation, otherwise you are just talking to yourself in the close proximity of another person.

Quote from: RPGPundit;878457Pole Arms are likeable. So are trains. But the guy who can't shut up about trains ever is still a bit batshit.

Yes, I am.