Social Encounters: Does it Matter What and How PCs Speak to NPCs?

[Jd Smith1]

By rendering what/how PCs speak meaningless you invalidate a player's social acumen and force them to rely on their mechanical acumen, which completely changes what the game is about and which skillset gives you the edge. This is why we have different games which meet different needs, and why I wish RPGs were clearer on which needs they meet, but the hobby seems violently allergic to any effort at categorizing playstyles.

I see it as defeating bad accents, improving time use, and supporting the fact that I don't want to do it Putting a category on the book wouldn't change anything, because I am inclined to change anything I want, and regard admonishments & advice from writer as (like setting fiction) as wasted space I ignore.

 

[MGibster]

And there is no particular reason why a social engagement can't involve some combination of both player and character skill. What the players speak doesn't have to be meaningless, nor does it have to be everything. There is a broad area in the middle between pure mechanical resolution and pure fiat.

And this is where I am, stuck in the middle with you. I realize not every player has my silver tongue and I don't want to punish them for not being as awesome as I am. And humble, like way more humble than anyone else. But I digress. I just want to see them put in some effort, you know? Just show me a little hustle on the field and I'm a happy GM.

 

[Celebrim]

And this is where I am, stuck in the middle with you. I realize not every player has my silver tongue and I don't want to punish them for not being as awesome as I am. And humble, like way more humble than anyone else. But I digress. I just want to see them put in some effort, you know? Just show me a little hustle on the field and I'm a happy GM.

It's not just that as a GM improvisational theater is one of the things that I find most fulfilling. I mean one of the best things that can happen as a GM is for the players to start theatrically playing together and you don't even really need to supervise but can just enjoy the show. I'm a happy GM then, because for once it gets 50% of the spotlight off me and let's me feel like my work has not been in vain.

But for me adjudicating a social interaction is just hard, and it matters to me how the player has approached it for determining what the NPC says or does. The biggest thing for me is not how suave the player is or how well they say things, but how well they've judged the motives of the NPC - something that they could cleverly tease out in conversation. Is this NPC susceptible to bribery, or would they be offended by it? Are they the sort that if you threatened their family they'd back down, or would that make them implacable enemies? Is this person secretly a coward, or strong-willed and courageous? Are they proud or humble? What is it that you could offer them that they really want? Do you have some leverage on this NPC? Just how believable is the lie based on what the NPC actually knows? If the player makes their "sales pitch" based on a correct understanding of the NPC and not an incorrect one, it really has little to do with how charismatic the player is in real life.

It's that sort of thing that determines for me how much the PC's can sway the NPC, and not so much whether the player stutters, or is shy, or has a voice not meant for radio, or sounds lame when they are acting. Good social tactics make more of an impact on how I adjudicate the scene than charismatic pitches with good acting. I want to reward charismatic pitches with good acting, but if I do its generally by a small amount.

And players may end up adopting strategies in their rhetoric that don't reflect the thing that they were going for. It's not uncommon for attempts to persuade to veer off into attempts to intimidate. Those are very different things.

Of course, to me at least, if the player has chosen a character that is just bad at social interaction all the skilled play in the world doesn't mean that they will be successful, the same way that skilled tactics might not let a low-level character kill a dragon because they just don't as a character have the combat skill to implement the plan. And conversely, if the player has created a high charisma diplomacy, then NPCs may just be swayed regardless of how badly the player has misjudged the NPC.

All of this is really subtle and complex and hard to quantify in a set of universal rules. Past interactions, the PC's race or ethnic group, the PC's reputation or social standing, and just how big of a demand the PC is making on the NPC all may influence the DC I offer to succeed. I may have guidelines I've written up ahead of time for common gambits the players might attempt for a particular NPC, and I might have some general guidelines that help me pick DCs, but often I am just trying to ad hoc the closest thing I can to fair rulings while keeping the game going.

 

[MichaelSomething]

I suspect it is because you and I are world-class GMs.

Only natural for Enworlders.

 

[Anon Adderlan]

It's all about the core activity of play, and whether that's the one players want to or are able to engage.

Consider that in combat it matters greatly what your character's attack bonus is and what your hit points are but that isn't ever all that matters. Whether you choose to engage in ranged combat, or close to melee matters. Whether your party fights defensively or presses the attack, whether you split up to address different threats or focus attacks on a single foe, whether you choose to position yourself between the enemy and another player, and what abilities you choose to use and when all are some of the many things that go into determining how successful you will be in combat.

Here the core activity is thinking tactically. Social acumen is irrelevant.

So typically combat involves some combination of both player and character skill.

And there is no particular reason why a social engagement can't involve some combination of both player and character skill.

There's no such thing as character skill, just assets and procedures a player has access to, the utility of which depend entirely on their ability to implement the ones which lead to the results they desire.

What the players speak doesn't have to be meaningless, nor does it have to be everything. There is a broad area in the middle between pure mechanical resolution and pure fiat.

So what's the core activity here?

If the player makes their "sales pitch" based on a correct understanding of the NPC and not an incorrect one, it really has little to do with how charismatic the player is in real life.

It's that sort of thing that determines for me how much the PC's can sway the NPC, and not so much whether the player stutters, or is shy, or has a voice not meant for radio, or sounds lame when they are acting. Good social tactics make more of an impact on how I adjudicate the scene than charismatic pitches with good acting.

Then the core activity is accounting for other's values and experiences. Knowing what to say is relevant, but how it's presented by the player is irrelevant.

Of course, to me at least, if the player has chosen a character that is just bad at social interaction all the skilled play in the world doesn't mean that they will be successful, the same way that skilled tactics might not let a low-level character kill a dragon because they just don't as a character have the combat skill to implement the plan. And conversely, if the player has created a high charisma diplomacy, then NPCs may just be swayed regardless of how badly the player has misjudged the NPC.

Then the core activity is rolling to win. All player abilities are irrelevant.

I may have guidelines I've written up ahead of time for common gambits the players might attempt for a particular NPC, and I might have some general guidelines that help me pick DCs, but often I am just trying to ad hoc the closest thing I can to fair rulings while keeping the game going.

Then the core activity is playing to the GM's tastes and expectations. Social acumen is the only thing relevant.

I see it as defeating bad accents, improving time use, and supporting the fact that I don't want to do it Putting a category on the book wouldn't change anything, because I am inclined to change anything I want, and regard admonishments & advice from writer as (like setting fiction) as wasted space I ignore.

The specifics are irrelevant. The only thing that matters is that all the players are on the same page. So how are you making sure that's the case?

 

[Celebrim]

It's all about the core activity of play,

I'm pretty sure I don't like that term because it is binary thinking. It suggests that there is one thing and one thing only going on, and as my argument tried to show that is almost never the case. I prefer terms like "core gameplay", "process of play" or "core gameplay loops" because they encompass the potential diversity of how the game is played and what goes into it.

There's no such thing as character skill, just assets and procedures a player has access to, the utility of which depend entirely on their ability to implement the ones which lead to the results they desire.

It's not so much just that I think "There is no such thing as character skill" is demonstrably false, as it is that I think you follow up your contradiction of my term by making a rough stab at defining it which is then self-contradictory. If there was no such thing as character skill then you couldn't define it. When I use the term I mean such things as the literal bonuses that are on a character sheet, and which encompasses such things as skill check or an attack roll or a saving throw or an amount of hit points or a proficiency bonus or a set of moves and abilities a character may employ in the fiction or to modify the meta-fiction. Yes, this is "just assets" a player has access to and if you want to call "character skill" something like "character assets" I don't mind, but the fact is that a character can have a +4 bonus to horseback riding that is independent of the player's skill at riding a horse. That is a meaningful thing and a meaningful distinction.

So what's the core activity here?

The question is inherently flawed. It's like asking, "What is 2+2?" and then being upset that the answer isn't "yes" or "no". Core gameplay isn't about one thing, but in an RPG almost always involves a minigame where both character skill and player skill are inputs. Heck, core gameplay rarely is actually a single loop of play, as RPGs are almost always inherently collections of minigames each with their own core loop of play. When an RPG doesn't have multiple minigames, it begins to have a very board game like feel to it, often with play where the roleplaying feels irrelevant.

Then the core activity is accounting for other's values and experiences. Knowing what to say is relevant, but how it's presented by the player is irrelevant.

Then the core activity is playing to the GM's tastes and expectations. Social acumen is the only thing relevant.

Then the core activity is rolling to win. All player abilities are irrelevant.

I mean, all of that is false and it's not obvious to me why it isn't obviously false aside from this flawed framework of "core activity" you are unnaturally imposing over play. As an obvious example, in a combat with many tactical options it matters how the player chooses to play the character. This is true in a tabletop RPG or whether we are playing something like World of Warcraft or Diablo or Bloodbowl or Settlers of Cataan or whatever. But at the same time, you can do everything right as a player and make all the right tactical and strategic decisions and still "roll a 1" and miss the attack. A lot of the skill of playing is managing the randomness, both in reducing the random factor and having a plan for recovering from or dealing with the inevitable runs of bad luck. The player skill doesn't become irrelevant just because there is a random factor, and to suggest that either we are playing something like Chess with no obvious fortune mechanic or else player skill doesn't matter is so bizarre I can't imagine where that idea comes from except lack of experience with gaming.

The specifics are irrelevant.

I don't see how that follows.

The only thing that matters is that all the players are on the same page. So how are you making sure that's the case?

By explaining and often writing down formally the process of play and how I will adjudicate their propositions, and by being consistent about it over time so that players gain trust in the process and see that it is fair and accomplishing its purpose. For example, by seeing that the charismatic player with a low charisma character isn't advantaged in social situations compared to a less charismatic player with a high charisma character, but by providing situations were skillful social play matters. I tend to think of this as "secret dialog options" where the player if they've picked up the right clues and figure out things to say that give them a massive advantage in a social encounter. This tends to cause conversations to have a literary verisimilitude quality because NPCs tend to behave in ways that would be explicable in the transcript of play such as changing their mind because plausible reasons have been presented to them or the PC has demonstrated plausible leverage.

But even then, you can still "roll a 1".

 

[Jd Smith1]

The specifics are irrelevant. The only thing that matters is that all the players are on the same page. So how are you making sure that's the case?

By ensuring that survival requires teamwork and input.

 

[Wolfpack48]

Even if the players don’t actually roleplay out directly what they say, I’d ask them to describe what they say and how they say it then add any character sheet modifiers and make the test. I don’t allow characters to push a button on their character sheet to get past the guard.