Social "Combat' and "Duels"

[Michael Hopcroft]

There are many campaign types where there wil be many social situations that, while not played out as a conbat, would have as serious repurcussions as any combat. go to any royal court, govenrment agency, or business and you will find numerous situations in which social interactions can have ahrmful or even deadly consequences if mis=handled.

 

If the conseuqnces of an action taken by another character can lead to social limitations for YOU that you don;t get points for, such as "unemplyed", "perosna non grata", or having secrets you were keeping exposed, what is the most effective way to play it out 9aside from obviously roleplaying your handling of the situation).

 

Likewise one can imagine numerous social situations which act like duels, such as a game of Chess or Go being played for extreemly high stakes. rememebr how many times James Bond has played games of skill against people who turned out to be master villains to guage their strength of will?

[caris]

Re: Social "Combat' and "Duels"

 

Can you give some criteria for "best"? Do you want it done strictly within the structure of existing rules? Are you OK with House Rules that adapt rules from other parts of Hero System? Are you OK with House Rules that are more independent of the current rules?

[arcady]

Re: Social "Combat' and "Duels"

 

You can work it out with presence attacks affected by skill checks.

[dyjoots]

Re: Social "Combat' and "Duels"

 

You can work it out with presence attacks affected by skill checks.

 

 

Those were my thoughts. It seems easy enough to apply concepts from Physical/Martial combat to Social "combat". Use skills and skill levels to attack and defend, and use Presence rolls (or the equivalent... relevant CHAR/5) to determine the effect.

 

It would take some major adjustments to make social conflict have the depth of options that fights do in Hero System, but the core rolling systems (i.e. 9 + CHAR/5 for actions; CHAR/5 dice pools for effect) make it easier than in some games.

[Frenchman]

Re: Social "Combat' and "Duels"

 

I can see 'social combat' working with many of the same 'maneuvers' that are used in real combat.

 

You can pause for dramatic effect, allowing people to focus on your next words, but possible giving a quick-witted foe an opportunity to interrupt you or disarm your coming comment (haymaker)

 

You can make insult or insinuation one after another, barely giving your opponent a chance to gain his bearings in your verbal barrage, but increasing the chances of stumbling over your words and sounding like an idiot (sweep)

 

You can deflect or twist the meaning of an incoming comment with a few simple words, turning it benign or even favorable (block)

 

These are just a few examples, and a creative GM could come up with many more, such as attacking your opponents credibility (possibly represented as a drain pre), or a phrase so well-turned that your opponent is literally stunned into silence (if your presence attack more than doubles his presence, perhaps).

[Sean Waters]

Re: Social "Combat' and "Duels"

 

Social STUN would be PRE + EGO/2 +INT/2 + COM/3, with PRE acting as social BODY.

 

You could use (points in relevant skill) x 2 (or INT/2 if you don't have a relevant skill) as DEX and STR and EGO as CON.

 

Social and psych lims would provide either vulnerability or damage resistance.

 

...maybe...

[SleepyDrug]

Re: Social "Combat' and "Duels"

 

Isn't this what role-playing is for? No combat, just social skills and intrigue?

[Sean Waters]

Re: Social "Combat' and "Duels"

 

Isn't this what role-playing is for? No combat' date=' just social skills and intrigue?[/quote']

 

Not sure I entirely agree. I mean what about the social inadequate who wants to play a suave sophisticated lady killer. Not likely to be good at role playing the situation, so we have rules so that they can roll dice to be James Bond.

 

Role playing is more fun but relying on it too much gives an unfair advantage to certain types of player.

[KA.]

Re: Social "Combat' and "Duels"

 

Not sure I entirely agree. I mean what about the social inadequate who wants to play a suave sophisticated lady killer. Not likely to be good at role playing the situation, so we have rules so that they can roll dice to be James Bond.

 

Role playing is more fun but relying on it too much gives an unfair advantage to certain types of player.

 

I do understand SleepyDrug's concern, however.

I have always thought of RPG's as an advancement of "Cowboys and Indians".

You work out all the "plot" and "dialog" yourself, but when someone says:

"I shot you!"

"No you didn't, you missed me!"

there is a mathmatical way to resolve what happened.

 

But, if you build a numerical model for the dialog part of the story, then I think a lot of the roleplaying will disappear.

 

Many Hero players seem to get too caught up in the math and the mechanics already. Not that I have anything against either, I have no problem with the math involved, and I am very glad to have it, so that combat can be resolved fairly. But, it seems like the rich level of detail possible sometimes causes roleplaying to be left by the wayside in favor of efficiency.

 

I don't think grafting the same sort of thing onto the non-combat aspect of the game would really be a good thing to do.

 

That does not mean that it would be "wrong" for any particular person's campaign, it is just not a direction I would want to see the system go in.

 

Please don't think that I am one of the "drama majors" that thinks all the silly rules get in the way of my "emoting".

 

Quite the opposite, I have to push myself to do much actual roleplaying, and I don't think people like me need another crutch to keep us from needing to.

 

Just my opinion,

 

KA.

 

Oh, I also have no problem with the existing Skills that cover things like Seduction or Oratory. But I see them as covering how well your character can deliver what you have them say.

In other words, two politicians could give the exact same speech, or two guys in a bar could use the exact same pick-up line, but based on their level of skill, the result could be either attractive or offensive to the intended audience.

[JMcL63]

Re: Social "Combat' and "Duels"

 

Isn't this what role-playing is for? No combat' date=' just social skills and intrigue?[/quote']I agree with TheRealLemming that you seem to be missing the point here SleepyDrug. Not only is TRL on the button with his comments about dice enabling players to do things with their characters that they couldn't do themselves (of which combat is only the best-known example), but there is also the aspect of non-combat contests Michael Hopcroft referred to in his original post. I mean, however useful it might be to roleplay some of what is at issue here, is there really any way to roleplay a game of chess, or of cards? I think not, because these are skills which your character would be exercising, and as such, the character's success or failure in their use of said skill will be resolved through the use of dice, as is typically the case.

 

The real issue here, IMO, is that there is serious need, in rpg rules, for simple mechanics to create a series of dice rolls, with scope for players' roleplaying and tactical input, that dramatises the kind of situation under discussion. I mean to say, it's easy enough to have a HERO pc with the appropriate KS and PS to make them a good poker player, say. But, if the use of those skills in gameplay simply comes down to a single, all-or-nothing dice roll, then you have a mechanic that certainly does something, but what it won't do, IMO, is dramatise the sorts of situation so often seen in the genres HERO is supposed to handle. This requires a series of dice rolls IMO, in which sense we are indeed talking of some kind of analogue of combat.

 

That said, I do think that some of the suggestions made in this thread (eg. TRL's idea about social STUN) are just far too complicated for what is at issue here. I don't think that a confrontation between a PC and a villain across the gaming table should be turned into a full-blown alternative combat. This would be too time-consuming IMO. What I think is needed is a way to create the ebbs and flows of the game (thus giving opportunities for wit and repartee- ie. for roleplaying), whilst also generating the uncertainty that creates tension amongst the players. This could be as simple as setting a target value (eg. 10), and having the PC(s)/NPC(s) involved accumulate points towards that required total based on the degree of success of their various skill rolls.

 

And that's it really.

[Sean Waters]

Re: Social "Combat' and "Duels"

 

I think there is often more role playing involved with a player who IS socially adept and intelligent playing a character who is not. It is easy to just make hilarious* social gaffs and do incredibly amusing* stupid things, but actually playing a character who is not bright or witty is a real challenge. Seeing the key to the plot and finding some way to bring it to the groups attention without either telling them out of character or having the character just come up with it (albeit in a slow, slurred voice with lots of 'duuurrr's in) is a real challenge.

 

We don't insist that players of combat specialists characters actually be good at ju-jitsu, players of world renowned mathematicians have the calculus, so I'm always a little unsure as to why we think players of superspies ought to be able to do debonair.

 

The trouble with rewarding someone who comes up with good lines as against someone who doesn't is thatyou might as well just average IQ and EQ of the player and set their character social skills based on that. I'm not saying that you should ignore good approaches to social skills any more than I am suggesting that you should ignore a well thought out tactical approach to combat. I just think that there isn't anything wrong with just rolling the dice if that is the way you want to play it, and that a character with 15- conversation should almost always get more information out of a mark than a character with 11- conversation, no matter the relative abilities of the players.

 

There. That's how I'm approaching this. Let's roll the dice and see who wins...

 

 

* NOT!

[caris]

Re: Social "Combat' and "Duels"

 

I’ve got mixed feelings about the issue of how much to abstract social interaction as well as where and when to apply those abstractions.

 

I really think this rule is best to handle interactions with NPCs, and the rules however they are created are very clear that they do not apply to PC/PC interactions. I’ve been in situations where players have tried to rely on abstracted social interaction rules to do things to other players that ranged anywhere from rude to down right nasty.

 

With that caveat in mind I’d like to point out a few more situations where such abstractions are very useful. First there are some types of campaigns where a full blown set of “social combat†rules would be useful, any type of high court intrigue game would be an example. Alternatively, having a way to resolve a situation where two or more characters (PC or NPC) are trying to influence another NPC in different ways. Having a way for the GM to measure relative effectiveness could be a useful tool, and take some of the role play burden off the GM.

[Sean Waters]

Re: Social "Combat' and "Duels"

 

I’ve got mixed feelings about the issue of how much to abstract social interaction as well as where and when to apply those abstractions.

 

I really think this rule is best to handle interactions with NPCs, and the rules however they are created are very clear that they do not apply to PC/PC interactions. I’ve been in situations where players have tried to rely on abstracted social interaction rules to do things to other players that ranged anywhere from rude to down right nasty.

 

With that caveat in mind I’d like to point out a few more situations where such abstractions are very useful. First there are some types of campaigns where a full blown set of “social combat†rules would be useful, any type of high court intrigue game would be an example. Alternatively, having a way to resolve a situation where two or more characters (PC or NPC) are trying to influence another NPC in different ways. Having a way for the GM to measure relative effectiveness could be a useful tool, and take some of the role play burden off the GM.

 

 

Strongly agree with your comments.

 

Mind you, NPCs can't really influence PCs either...no matter how good their persuasion roll, the PC can always say. 'No, I'm not going to let you have a look at my gun'. (You might be able to do it with a skill like conversation, where the NPC is trying to subtly obtain information...maybe).

 

This means that NPCs are at a massive disadvantage against PCs, short of using PRE attacks or powers. Whilst I appreciate that the average game is going to involve the PCs getting info from NPCs much more than the other way around, there are situations where it would be nice to have a workable mechanic for NPCs (or in some situations, PCs) influencing PCs, without some deus ex 'OK...good roll...hand the gun over'

 

'No, but...'

 

'No buts, he's got the gun'

 

'Hang on I'd never...'

 

'While you are flapping your jaw he shoots you...take 6 Body and 24 Stun...'

 

The other problem with social interaction is the very simplicity of it...it is usually resolved with one roll, or a skill and complementary skill at best, which makes things far more uncertain. Whilst uncertainly is essential, it does have a bit of a lottery feel to it, in many cases, and a more developed system would ideally allow a bit more structure in social interaction, whilst leaving room for role playing.

 

Any stunning ideas?

 

One possibilty that springs to mind is making continuing opposed rolls, and counting the amount you succeed or fail by as 'damage'. You need to get your target's EGO to make them do something in a social situation. If you get (minus) EGO it has the opposite effect that you were trying for - you turned them against you. Continuing rolls will suffer penalties for repeat attempts unless you leave time between them...say at least a 5 hours. EGO 'damage' for a particular attempt 'heals' at 5 points per day....so against a strong willed or socially skilled opponent you will need to really take your time to make them do anything.

 

That would mean that weak willed NPCs with little social skill would be easy marks, and even PC v. PC would work - one PC doesn't have to remain engaged in the situation if they don't like how it is going, but if they do, they should have to role play out the consequences (treat it as a temporary psychological limitation). In effect you would be treating social interaction as a power - a small cumulative NND (skill v skill test) mental transform.

[Hugh Neilson]

Re: Social "Combat' and "Duels"

 

The real issue here' date=' IMO, is that there is serious need, in rpg rules, for simple mechanics to create a series of dice rolls, with scope for players' roleplaying and tactical input, that dramatises the kind of situation under discussion. I mean to say, it's easy enough to have a HERO pc with the appropriate KS and PS to make them a good poker player, say. But, if the use of those skills in gameplay simply comes down to a single, all-or-nothing dice roll, then you have a mechanic that certainly does something, but what it won't do, IMO, is [i']dramatise[/i] the sorts of situation so often seen in the genres HERO is supposed to handle. This requires a series of dice rolls IMO, in which sense we are indeed talking of some kind of analogue of combat.

 

I think this is the crux of the matter. In the source material, we see the SuperScientist hard at work with the latest problem. Assume his skills are medical and he is trying to discover a cure for a disease before his comrades, and he, succumb to it. Very dramnatic reading or TV. RPG? Make a skill roll; either you succeed or you fail.

 

We could extrapolate this out to make all combat powers modifiers to the "Combat" skill roll. Make an opposed roll - the winner wins the combat.

 

If scientific research, social "duels" or what have you will be a major part of the game, fleshing out the rules related to these makes sense - it will add to the drama. For a typical Champiopns game (say), we probably have what we need. For a game centering aorund byzantine politics, rather than KO the Bad Guy, combat rules could be simplified and social interaction rules beefed up.

 

Oh yes - and with this beefing up, they WOULD apply to player characters, just as combat rules do now. If it's a key factor in the game, no one should be immune.

[Frenchman]

Re: Social "Combat' and "Duels"

 

I don't think that most games need such complicated rules but every once in a while. That said, they do need them once in a while, meaning that maybe there should be something there. Oh, wait. There is.

 

Presence Attacks. Thats one thing you can do with them, is use them in social combat. I was simply suggesting that some 'normal' combat maneuvers be allowed to apply to them, making for more intricate and unpredictable social interaction. If it ain't broke, don't fix it. There are allready rules for this, they just might need to be expanded upon a little bit.

 

Also, in response to SleepyDrug's comment that we should roleplay our roleplaying...Don't you roleplay combat? Or is it, "I rolled a 7, I hit it for 4 Body and 12 Stun." How boring. Even when we are totally out of our game and ready to pack up for the day, our combats never go below, "I swing my sword at him, okay I got 'im in the arm for 4 Body and 12 Stun."

 

As for TRL's comment on roleplaying qualities which we lack, I totally agree. In my younger years one of my best friends and roleplaying buddies was The Brian, as he was known. He wasn't dumb, in fact he could think up better solutions to problems than many of us could. He just needed time to do it. A lot of time. He had slightly above average intelligence with the limitation Extra Time (5 hours), so in the short run, he was pretty dumb. Most of his characters were big dumb bricks, which he roleplayed really well and had a lot of fun doing it. But once in a while he would create the uber-mage with globs of Int. Being that we were 12 and 13 at the time, we mostly made fun of the poor guy for not being able to even come close to thinking of 'the intelligent' thing to do.

Years later, our games started shifting from hacknslash to epic world-saving with lots of political intrigue, and I created a few characters who were supposed to be suave debonair types. Lets just say I am not an eloquent speaker. I have good conversation skills, but when it comes to saying something dramatic and meaningful, I reach for the Big Book o' Quotes. This made me think of The Brian again, and realize that a roleplaying game limited players, in some ways, by their intellectual and social capacities.

Just this saturday, it happened again, and I (who had been helping a hero newbie create a character instead of paying attention to what was going on) suddenly had my character thrust into a spot where I was expected to come up with an inspiring soliloqy (sp) on the spot. I was totally blank. Crap. I think my exact words were, "He says something cool. Lemme roll my presence attack." He didn't say anything cool, because even though I got 12 dice of presence attack, I rolled 14. Ouch.

I came home that night, saw this thread, wrote my response, and kicked myself. I should have done a haymaker!

I'm going to stop typing now, because I ramble too much and this post is way to long and meaningless

[JMcL63]

Re: Social "Combat' and "Duels"

 

I don't think that most games need such complicated rules but every once in a while. That said, they do need them once in a while, meaning that maybe there should be something there. Oh, wait. There is.

 

Presence Attacks. Thats one thing you can do with them, is use them in social combat. I was simply suggesting that some 'normal' combat maneuvers be allowed to apply to them, making for more intricate and unpredictable social interaction. If it ain't broke, don't fix it. There are allready rules for this, they just might need to be expanded upon a little bit.

You might well be right on the matter of social combat Frenchman, but my point was more general than that. What I advocated was the need for a dramatic task resolution system, one that make skill use more dramatic, eg. to create the classic dramatic device of the deadline, as outlined by Hugh Neilson above. And the basic rules for this are dead simple: set a basic number of task points that have to be accumulated to complete the task; set the basic task period (eg. a medico striving to develop that antidote to save themself and their buddies won't usually be making rolls every phase; more likely every hour, or more); and the degree of success or failure adds or subtracts to/from the player's accumulating total. This can also be done competitively, in various ways. There is no need here for anything like combat manoeuvres. It is just a minor development of the existing skills system.

[JMcL63]

Re: Social "Combat' and "Duels"

 

Example of dramatic task resolution

 

Well, I just thought I'd flesh out my previous comments on this subject with an example. Imagine a palace intrigue game. The PC's are trying to organise some kind of expedition (a la Christopher Columbus, although this example could work in most any genre), and they are seeking support and sponsorship from the reigning monarch. Unfortunately for our PC's, they have enemies at court who are trying to foil their plans, and they are operating under time pressure to boot (they have to get everything ready in time for the right season maybe). This example has all the elements that are intrinsic to the kind of situation I am suggesting would benefit from a simple dramatic task resolution system: an objective the realisation of which will bring the players some benefit in the game (in this case cash and other resources, plus perhaps some kind of official status); a time limit (without this, the whole idea of dramatic task resolution is meaningless, because it's then just a matter of making skill rolls until success is achieved, and then the game moves on); and competition.

 

What we have then is a situation in which the players must use their skills to overcome the influence of their enemies in order to win the favour of the monarch. So, the GM decides that, apart from everyday court life, there are 4 big events upcoming at which the PC's will have the opportunity publicly to outdo their enemies so that their own influence and prestige proves decisive.

 

So, here is how I would work this: the players would have the opportunity to make 5 decisive dice rolls for the party as a whole- one for each of the big events, and a general one for the everyday court life. They would make them in that order too, because how they get on in the big events (eg. the annual ball held by the #1 heir to celebrate something or other) would contribute to the effectiveness of their everyday intrigues. I would pick appropriate time periods for the skill use for each event (typically a day or a week I would guess). The players could then define what their characters were doing: which of their contacts they were using, which favours they were calling in, which skills they were using as complementaries, and so on. The appropriate rolls would be made. I might play out some parts of the big events to give the players the opportunity to gain some schmuck bonuses for good roleplaying, then the final dice roll(s) would be made for that event. And so on.

 

At the end of this sequence (which could obviously include similar dice rolls by the GM on the part of the competition, or not, depending on how you chose to handle this), the decisive dice roll(s) would be made, and the monarch's attitude would be determined, leaving the players to embark on their expedition with or without the monarch's favour.

 

And that's about it really. The whole idea of this, as I said, is to develop a simple way of making skill use dramatic, both by escaping the 'all-or-nothing' nature of a single skill roll, and by giving the players the opportunity to think up interesting ways of using skills to complement each other as they cooperate towards completing some kind of task, not to mention some roleplaying opportunities along the way. The idea is also to make this process fairly quick, because it is intended to contribute to the development of the plot, to give the players new ways of determining the future of their characters. So I'm not talking about something that would take a couple of hours, but something that could be a prologue to the session's 'main event'.

 

And that really is it. I hope this makes sense, and that some people find these vague notions useful.

[zornwil]

Re: Social "Combat' and "Duels"

 

Perhaps I'm over-simplifying, but isn't this was Conversation, Persuasion, and similar skills are for? And the PC's employment of whichever skill as appropriate along with role-playing being the determinants of likelihood for dice roll, when those rolls are necessary? (back to KA's point, "I convinced him!", "No you didn't!")

[JMcL63]

Re: Social "Combat' and "Duels"

 

Perhaps I'm over-simplifying' date=' but isn't this was Conversation, Persuasion, and similar skills are for? And the PC's employment of whichever skill as appropriate along with role-playing being the determinants of likelihood for dice roll, when those rolls are necessary? (back to KA's point, "I convinced him!", "No you didn't!")[/quote']Not so much over-simplifying zornwil as missing the point I feel. The skills you mention are indeed some of those that would be useful in the situation I outlined above, and there are equally situations in which a bit of roleplaying and a straightforward single skill roll would be an appropriate way of dealing with the situation (eg. using Conversation to get info out of a nark in a bar). What I am on about is the idea that there are also situations- typified by the race against time- which aren't handled well by single dice rolls because, as Hugh Neilson also pointed out, in these situations, a single dice roll simply fails to generate the requisite tension among the players. Hence my ideas about using a series of dice rolls to generate that tension, because that's the only way to get round the problems associated with just using one dice roll in situations of the sort I'm referring to. That's the gist of it really.

[zornwil]

Re: Social "Combat' and "Duels"

 

Not so much over-simplifying zornwil as missing the point I feel. The skills you mention are indeed some of those that would be useful in the situation I outlined above' date=' and there are equally situations in which a bit of roleplaying and a straightforward single skill roll would be an appropriate way of dealing with the situation (eg. using Conversation to get info out of a nark in a bar). What I am on about is the idea that there are also situations- typified by the race against time- which aren't handled well by single dice rolls because, as Hugh Neilson also pointed out, in these situations, a single dice roll simply fails to generate the requisite tension among the players. Hence my ideas about using a series of dice rolls to generate that tension, because that's the only way to get round the problems associated with just using one dice roll in situations of the sort I'm referring to. That's the gist of it really. [/quote']

But wouldn't these skills be the basis of multiple rolls in any tense situation, particularly with role-playing and back-and-forth conversation? I have had that happen.

[JMcL63]

Re: Social "Combat' and "Duels"

 

But wouldn't these skills be the basis of multiple rolls in any tense situation' date=' particularly with role-playing and back-and-forth conversation? I have had that happen.[/quote']I don't see why not, but this isn't really what I'm talking about zorn. My theme is less social 'combat' than dramatic task resolution, which could involve social skills, but is more likely to involve other skills, eg. the medical skills appropriate to Hugh Neilson's example above. I say 'more likely' for the simple reason that there are far more skills than just the social skills, and because, by and large, I think you are right that the social interactions you describe probably don't need this task resolution system I keep banging on about. Maybe my example was poorly chosen.

[zornwil]

Re: Social "Combat' and "Duels"

 

I don't see why not' date=' but this isn't really what I'm talking about zorn. My theme is less social 'combat' than [i']dramatic task resolution[/i], which could involve social skills, but is more likely to involve other skills, eg. the medical skills appropriate to Hugh Neilson's example above. I say 'more likely' for the simple reason that there are far more skills than just the social skills, and because, by and large, I think you are right that the social interactions you describe probably don't need this task resolution system I keep banging on about. Maybe my example was poorly chosen.

I still don't think I really understand what you're getting at, sorry. Probably not worth trying to explain this far into it, unless you have the patience.

[megaplayboy]

Re: Social "Combat' and "Duels"

 

There are some good films to represent some forms of social "combat":

"Ridicule" and "Dangerous Liaisons/Valmont/(that remake with SMG and Reese Witherspoon and Ryan Phillippe)" come to mind.

Pretty much any David Mamet film, too.

[JMcL63]

Re: Social "Combat' and "Duels"

 

I still don't think I really understand what you're getting at' date=' sorry. Probably not worth trying to explain this far into it, unless you have the patience. [/quote']Patience, or bloodymindedness, but here goes.

 

Imagine you've got a wizard who's trying to create a spell. To define this as a task, you could simply take the active points cost as the target value. The GM could then set a task period (a week per dice roll say). The player marshalls the wizard's various KS and other appropriate skills to get a basic skill roll and its complementaries. Each time a roll is made, the degree of success or failure adds to or is subtracted from the required total, as defined by the spell's active cost. Once this cumulative total is greater than or equal to the spell's active cost, then the task is complete, and the wizard has their new spell.

 

That's the basic principle of the task resolution system I am talking about. It's not something I can take credit for. I first saw it back in the 80's IIRC.

 

The next thing is the idea of using a system of this sort to dramatise task resolution. The premise here is that there are many situations utterly typical in the genres which HERO seeks to represent that simply don't work if you handle them with a single skill roll, even with complementary skills in use.

 

Consider the race against time example, the wizard above only having 2 months to devise that new spell when 3 are really needed say. If you did this with a single dice roll to cover the success or failure of the wizard's research and so on, this would be deadly dull. It would completely fail to capture the essential tension of the race against time, because the players' experience of this dramatic device would be reduced to a single moment of dice-driven uncertainty; and we can agree surely that nothing quite gets players on the edge of their seats than those critical dice rolls. That's one of the virtues of dice in games in general, not to mention rpg's- the uncertainty they create generates tension and the drama of the unpredictable and the unexpected. What you need to create the sense of the race against time is the feeling of a dynamic, of something happening and moving forward, of the ups and downs of increasingly fraught attempts to get the thing done before it's too late. This is what you cannot do with a single dice roll, which is why I'm suggesting the idea of using the task resolution system outlined above, because it breaks a task down into a logically defined series of dice rolls, with the outcome of each contributing to the overall success of the task.

 

So, what I am on about then is a system that defines tasks as a target value that the player must reach by accumulating the degree of success of their skill rolls, and using that system to handle situations in which the element of time is important in some way (ie. the characters don't have all the time in the world at their disposal), and other situations too. This wouldn't have to be used all the time, because there are plenty of situations where a single skill roll is perfectly adequate.

 

For example, consider lockpicking and safecracking. Picking a basic lock is a task that it is reasonable to handle as a single roll in a single phase. Cracking a safe OTOH would take longer obviously, but it could still be done as a single dice roll if the safecracker had all the time they wanted. But what if the rest of the party have to hold off the forces of law and order while the safecracker gets to work? In that case it would make sense to define the task as I have outlined above, and open up the opportunity for the other players to be gnashing their teeth as the safecracker fluffs roll after roll, and takes much, much longer than everyone expected.

 

And that's it really zorn. I hope this has cast some light on what I've been banging on about so much in this thread.

[zornwil]

Re: Social "Combat' and "Duels"

 

Patience, or bloodymindedness, but here goes.

 

(snip)

 

Okay, thanks, and a couple things.

 

First, my original post in this thread was in response to the initial thread topic, not your posts in this. So when I got your response I got confused between Hopcroft's initial question and your position. My response is still how I feel re Hopcroft's original problem statement, as I understand it.

 

As to your ideas, yeah, good notions. I don't see this as too dissimilar from roleplaying where you ask people, "generally, what's your approach to this particular stage" (if it's something that requires that detail) and making incremental dice rolls along the way, though I appreciate it is not the same thing, just saying it's not too dissimilar is all.

 

The one thing I encourage one to be careful of is not setting up a series of dice rolls guaranteed to thwart the PCs for the number of rolls and increased probability (to the point of certitude) of failure. Just as the incremental task resolution should allow for drama and opportunity, it also should not be such that each step is all-or-nothing such that any failure ends the entire event.