The Gaming Den

Wow. Thats um, not particularly relevant. Or addressing any of the points I raised.
Good job.

And the developers of the MMORPG Warcraft probably would argue with you. I may call it crap, but there are quite a lot of people who happily think of Warcraft as an RPG.

So, care to try again?

Voss at [unixtime wrote:1197001026[/unixtime]]Wow. Thats um, not particularly relevant. Or addressing any of the points I raised.
Good job.

And the developers of the MMORPG Warcraft probably would argue with you. I may call it crap, but there are quite a lot of people who happily think of Warcraft as an RPG.

So, care to try again?

Who cares what you call your game, as long as you have fun with it? I could call D&D a "Masterful parody of the Sword & Sorcery genre," regardless of whether it was intended to be or not.

Look, you can call it an MMORPG, but that doesn't mean there are any roleplaying tools there. There are Roleplaying Realms, but no more than I can count on my hands. Since there are thousands of servers otherwise, I suppose you could take that as evidence as well.

I'm sorry to differ with you, but such is true.

And do you really want me to whip out which one of us actually has talked to developers?

-Crissa

Crissa at [unixtime wrote:1197022250[/unixtime]]

And do you really want me to whip out which one of us actually has talked to developers?

-Crissa

Anyone can claim they've talked to the developers.

For example:

I talked to the developers this morning. And they told me how awesome I am.

Yeah, I was actually speaking with Andy Collins at the hospital today, and he told me that the entire PHB was a simple typo.

[edit] Deleted. decided it was too off-topic.

Voss at [unixtime wrote:1196978327[/unixtime]]Its a valid play-style, but quite often I don't want to sit through two fat guys playing out both sides of 'seduce the barmaid'.

Then don't. Tell them you're uncomfortable with it. Groups are always going have to decide what aspects of the game they're going to emphasize or suppress.

I think most people don't enjoy someone describing in detail about how their character takes a shit, or masturbates, or something. By your logic, we should put in rules to cover those activities and thereby prevent really unnerving descriptions of them.

It's been done, and it doesn't work. I've been in 3e games (with diplomacy) where your scenario has happened anyway. The only way to stop that stuff is to come to a consensus about what kind of game you want to play as a group.

Voss at [unixtime wrote:1196978327[/unixtime]]
Light or minimal role-playing isn't wrongbadfun.

I really don't think light or minimal role-playing requires having a randomized system for social encounters. If you want to have a game like that, you can just make your points abstractly, and the DM can resolve the situation based on what he knows of the NPCs.

Crissa at [unixtime wrote:1196975928[/unixtime]]What happens when you cast Charm Monster on it?

How does it communicate with its bosses?

This is a roleplaying game, and how are we supposed to make stories when all the story parts have been torn out of the figures?

Charm? Obviously it becomes some sort of friend for the duration of the magical effect, like everything else.

And about other stuff...

The spined devil stats were for the miniatures game. So obviously they'll leave out the flavor text for just the stat block. We can expect a monster is going to have some flavor text in the MM, but telling you what it's overall demeanor is shouldn't be in the stat block anyway. I'm not saying there shouldn't be a block of flavor text, I'm just saying that having social DCs in the stat block just isn't going to work.

Daiba at [unixtime wrote:1197044435[/unixtime]]

I think most people don't enjoy someone describing in detail about how their character takes a shit, or masturbates, or something. By your logic, we should put in rules to cover those activities and thereby prevent really unnerving descriptions of them.

Actually, my point is exactly the opposite. A lack of social rules doesn't prevent role-playing, any more than a lack of shitting rules prevents characters from ever taking a shit.

I really don't think light or minimal role-playing requires having a randomized system for social encounters. If you want to have a game like that, you can just make your points abstractly, and the DM can resolve the situation based on what he knows of the NPCs.

Neither do I. Its just that some people find a quick randomization mechanic for bullshit diplomacy situations to be useful. Its presence doesn't stop or hinder role-playing at all.


As for Crissa's off-topic babble, role-playing doesn't need tools or rules, any more than two people sitting in a coffee shop need dice to interact. As long as the players can communicate in some fashion, they can role-play.

I’ve been thinking about this for a while because somewhere there was something in the arguments that was not making sense. There are two arguments here, from what I can see. The first argument is based on an assumption that “role play” is social interaction. I think it is a false one. Role play is getting “into character.” This involves social interaction but it also involves combat to an equal extent. In the extent that some MMORPG systems encourage a war game mentality that abstracts the player from the character it can be seen as discouraging role play.

The other question is I think a hidden matter of scale. Some object to a single diplomacy roll solving a social interaction problem. I agree not because it is a social interaction problem but because it is a single roll. Imagine if combat were reduced to a single roll? “You encounter an orc; roll a d20; you kill it.” Combat is somewhere between complete free form resolution and the single roll to resolve it all. Social interaction should be at the same level of detail.

It is difficult to compare apples and oranges. Combat and social interaction is like the apple and the orange. The first thing we need to do is make sure they are the same size. I don’t think 4E is going to do this, but then again, the journey to perfection requires a lot of steps in the land of the imperfect.

tzor at [unixtime wrote:1197055140[/unixtime]]The other question is I think a hidden matter of scale. Some object to a single diplomacy roll solving a social interaction problem. I agree not because it is a social interaction problem but because it is a single roll. Imagine if combat were reduced to a single roll? “You encounter an orc; roll a d20; you kill it.” Combat is somewhere between complete free form resolution and the single roll to resolve it all. Social interaction should be at the same level of detail.

I've had this discussion before, so I'm going to quote myself.

angelfromanotherpin wrote:There's a reason that in D&D a social interaction tends to be one roll and a physical combat tends to be many rolls: the game's focus is fighting. Fighting is where the risk and the reward are. Every so often you make a Bluff (or Intimidate or Diplomacy) roll and look really smooth, but that's the spice, not the meat.

It's totally possible to have social challenges mean more, but it's a lot easier to set up a fight than it is to come up with a situation where pulling a weapon is essentially the same thing as losing; and people don't play D&D to be in those situations anyway. At least, not often.

(follow-up) I didn't say it should stay that way. But if you want it to change, you need to understand why it is marginalized. D&D is a game which rewards risking death. If you want social interaction to give reward commensurate with combat, it has to risk death. Which means it should give a character as many options and choice points as combat as well. When people want that, they play a different game.

... because D&D doesn't even do D&D very well, let alone anything else.

tzor at [unixtime wrote:1197055140[/unixtime]]
The other question is I think a hidden matter of scale. Some object to a single diplomacy roll solving a social interaction problem. I agree not because it is a social interaction problem but because it is a single roll. Imagine if combat were reduced to a single roll? “You encounter an orc; roll a d20; you kill it.” Combat is somewhere between complete free form resolution and the single roll to resolve it all. Social interaction should be at the same level of detail.

Yeah, it's just rather difficult to put it on the same level of detail, because measuring social reactions isn't necessarily easy to do. Sure, you can have some basic social mechanics that are fairly consistent, like seduction, or spotting people lying, but everything else is entirely situational and unlike most things in D&D, it's something that's divorced largely from level. It's dependent on their own personality, goals, etc.

One guard may be loyal and would never take bribes ever, another guard might be corrupt and open to bribery. A gullible person may be easy to convince of something, a zealot would likely not believe anything that contradicts his own beliefs. Even if you were the best liar in the world, the zealot is going to believe that you are convinced you are speaking the truth, but that you are mistaken anyway.

Really I'm not sure of any great way to do a social system and effectively handle all the personality types you'd want in your campaign.

Sadly I think the best way to do it is was the way they did it in Neverwinter nights. Sometimes there's be a dialogue option and a skill check that would allow you to convince a character of something and get him to do something he normally wouldn't have done if you succeeded. And some NPCs you could do that to, and others you couldn't. That's actually something DMs can prepare for in modules. It's real easy for the notes to list "A DC 25 diplomacy check can convince the king to increase the quest reward to 2000 gp." or "an intimidate DC 20 will convince the hobgoblin to reveal the location of his master's lair."

This creates possible plot branches or extra opportunities based on skill use, without having such skills dominate the game.

As I said I don't know how to do it. I do know that it is possible and that once you realize what it is it will be intitutively obvious to the casual observer. You have to come up with social defense equivalents; I'm sort of thinking that alignment might have a role here, only you might have to chunk it up a few more notches, VG, G, MG, N, ME, E, VE and VL, L, ML, N, MC, C, VC. Then you have to consider the "level" of the social interaction; you need a social level of hit points. Finally you need to determine if you can grand unify the system and that's not intitutively obvious to the casual observer.

Remember the original AD&D? It had a table that cross referenced specific weapons to specific armors. Hey maces are better against chain mail (bashing) as opposed to swords (slashing). But we dropped that.

So let's say the lady (I'll use Ms Mignon for the moment) is at the city gate and the guard won't let her enter because it's past normal gate hours. Ms Mignon can use the following social attacks.

The Good Attack, "but I have to go and cast all sorts of enture elements to homeless people on this cold night."

The Classic Bribe, (Hands the guard several gold coins)

The Shock and Awe, (I drop my tunic in front of him)

Yea she might have to do a combination of attacks to get in. Come to think of it I've seen all these attempts in my games.

Voss at [unixtime wrote:1197052950[/unixtime]]Actually, my point is exactly the opposite. A lack of social rules doesn't prevent role-playing, any more than a lack of shitting rules prevents characters from ever taking a shit.

It looks like we pretty much agree with one another. Sorry if I misunderstood; this statement was probably responsible:

Voss wrote:Its fucking creepy. 'I try to seduce the barmaid and I rolled a 21 on the diplomacy check' 'Ok, she goes upstairs with you' is pretty much the limit of what I want to deal with.

With regard to the following:

Voss wrote:Its just that some people find a quick randomization mechanic for bullshit diplomacy situations to be useful. Its presence doesn't stop or hinder role-playing at all.

I'd prefer that such a mechanic be listed as optional, with a conditional stating that the intent is it be used for "bullshit situations", instead of presented as a primary means of resolving social encounters.

Edit: Typos.

tzor at [unixtime wrote:1197055140[/unixtime]]I’ve been thinking about this for a while because somewhere there was something in the arguments that was not making sense. There are two arguments here, from what I can see. The first argument is based on an assumption that “role play” is social interaction. I think it is a false one. Role play is getting “into character.” This involves social interaction but it also involves combat to an equal extent. In the extent that some MMORPG systems encourage a war game mentality that abstracts the player from the character it can be seen as discouraging role play.

Meh. I don't see why you can't 'get into character' during a fight as easily as social interactions. You still have the ability (as a player) to describe your actions in an 'in game' fashion. Even in an MMO situation you can fuck with emotes, speech and macros to do it.

I suspect I see the RP angle solely as a player skill. You can do it as much or as little as you like, but it isn't really a reflection of your characters abilities. Its setting and window dressing, largely. Someone may personally want more or less of it in a game, but it doesn't actually break the system either way.

When it comes to social skills, sure you can RP your way through without ever touching a die, but there are situations where they're useful. Say you're at an organized event of some sort, and Billy the Social Fucktard ends up with the bard character after characters are handed out (by whatever system, randomly or whatever). Now, is it good to screw the party just because things ended up this way? Not really. So you give them an out.

Voss, don't be a fucking asshole. Go play tea-party if you want. But as long as there are no rules for social wang-measuring, we'll never know if you can talk your way past the guard or not.

Of course you want rules for it, so Billy the fucktard can play the suave bard, else you're stuck listening to his inane attempts and the DM's random adjudication which may or may not be at all predictable. And without rules, that's all it is, pushing buttons randomly until you figure out the DM's choice of which character doesn't kill you when you bribe them.

You can fuck off too, Count. You can make fun of what I do, but that doesn't change the fact that for the last three years I've actually been working as an analyst in the computer games industry. What the fuck do you do, anyhow? I don't see you at industry conferences, taking notes or sampling wares. Learn something for once.

There's no reason to take the upper road here; none at all.

I'm not going to play fucking tea-party to turn axis and allies into a roleplaying game. I'm not twelve anymore.

-Crissa

Crissa, you should know by know that most people on this board, especially Voss, are very insulting in their writing style (which is basically an excuse to get away with being a dick on the Internet).

Crissa:

Wow, and I thought I needed to get laid.

Seriously though, you're being possibly unnecessarily rude and offended when people aren't actually aiming any offence at you.

At any rate, I totally want to make "Magical Tea Party d20". I am so close to sitting down and doing so.

Crissa at [unixtime wrote:1197077572[/unixtime]]Voss, don't be a fucking asshole. Go play tea-party if you want. But as long as there are no rules for social wang-measuring, we'll never know if you can talk your way past the guard or not.

I'm not going to play fucking tea-party to turn axis and allies into a roleplaying game. I'm not twelve anymore.

-Crissa

Heh. I have to admit I find this funny. It used to be if you, playing your character, could talk your way past the DM, playing the guard, you talked your way past the fucking guard. Do it in character, and its roleplaying. This was the fucking basis for all RPGs. Yes, if you have a shitty DM, this can turn stupid. But so can blind dice rolling:

Base it solely on a dice roll, and it isn't role-playing anymore. Its just another dice roll, to get you past a challenge. Strip it down, and it isn't even about getting past a guard. Its *just* another dice roll to get you past arbitrary obstacle number 5. You could design a computer program to do that shit for you. IF RNDM + [diplo mod] < 20, go back and find a new route into city. Remaining choices- make sneak check, make attack roll.
SNEAK/ATTACK/FLEE?

You can dress it up and call it role-playing, but you can just it easily turn it into a game of craps. Or whatever the fucking things was by Wizards. Dragon dice.

Hey look, it comes back to my original point, doesn't it. Roleplaying is independent of the system. Whether you roll dice for every single decision or don't roll any dice at all, you can still be Bob the fucktarded elven bard.


And fucks sake, captain, you need a new name. Little miss manners or little miss self-righteous whiny bitchy pants.

Your new name is the March Hare, Voss.

I brought scones.

Let's have a tea party.

I have the tea. And wouldn't you know? It just so happens to be my Unbirthday today!

Voss at [unixtime wrote:1197068232[/unixtime]]Meh. I don't see why you can't 'get into character' during a fight as easily as social interactions. You still have the ability (as a player) to describe your actions in an 'in game' fashion. Even in an MMO situation you can fuck with emotes, speech and macros to do it.

But that's not my argument. My argument is an immersion one. The moment you abstract the combat to "hit the fucking button" or "roll the fucking die again" you have in effect insulated yourself from the role play and have gone into war gamer mode.

The MMORPG pulls you out of in character mode because the combat becomes mechanical and repetitive. This has more to do with the nature of MMORPG advancement than it has with the nature of the game itself.

I'm a firm believer in the Lieber notion of the powers of Necessity and Chance. This is then combined with the player's power of being the Hero. The dice is the impartial abritrator between the DM and the Player. It is in effect what keeps it from turning into a He said, she said argument. Is it perfect? Hell no, but it is impartial.

Voss at [unixtime wrote:1197080048[/unixtime]]
And fucks sake, captain, you need a new name. Little miss manners or little miss self-righteous whiny bitchy pants.

I'm not being serious about the "excuse." It's just my writing style.

Crissa at [unixtime wrote:1197077572[/unixtime]]
You can fuck off too, Count. You can make fun of what I do, but that doesn't change the fact that for the last three years I've actually been working as an analyst in the computer games industry. What the fuck do you do, anyhow? I don't see you at industry conferences, taking notes or sampling wares. Learn something for once.

I'm not making fun of what you do. I don't actually know who you are, what you look like, what foods you like, when the last time you saw a really good movie, or for that matter anything about you.

As far as I know, "Crissa" might be some sort of character that you are playing online. For all you know, "Count Arioch" might actually be a committee running experiments on the internet to gauge people's reactions to off-topic comments. As far as any of us knows, Voss might be a 400 pound guy who hasn't left his basement since 1993.

The truth of the matter is, none of us really knows anything about the other people on the boards. (With a few exceptions. I've met fbmf on several occasions, and talked to him on the phone a couple of times. I'm pretty sure what he represents on the boards is accurate.)

Crissa, you very well might know all these game designers. The thing is, unless you have documented proof that you have, saying "I know a game designer and they said blah blah blah" is hearsay. It might make for amusing anecdotes, but it fails in a debate.

And what do I know? I know lots of things. I hope to know a lot more in the future. What's the point of asking?

Sigh. It's a real shame though. The second fbmf or ramnza sees this, it'll be deleted, including my reply because it's quoting something you're saying where you basically piss all over the CoC to call me names. Ususally, they're pretty good about it. I haven't actually read one response of yours to something I've said, they're pretty good at protecting me from you. I honestly expected something a bit more intellectual, not "Fuck off asshole rar rar rar".

Koumei at [unixtime wrote:1197079068[/unixtime]]
Wow, and I thought I needed to get laid.

In Crissa's defense, I betcha there isn't one person on the boards right now who couldn't use a good lay.

Seriously, you there. Yes you, the one who's reading my post. If you had the chance to get a lay from someone you found sufficient to lay, and had enough time and energy to do such an act, would you turn them down?

I rest my case.