Markdoc

Re: Social System

Re: Social System

Re: Social System You are mistaking situational bonuses - which I've already mentioned - for base mechanics. This is pretty simple, and it seems really obvious to me, but let's try again. Situation: Two characters, fully rested and uninjured, face each other in a clean/well-lit street. Physical combat: Their base OCV and DCV is always going to be the same, no matter how often they do this, unless you actually spend points to change them. They can change the chance of hitting each other by situational bonuses (dodge, block, using different attacks) but the base chance of success is always going to be the same, regardless of how the characters feel about each other. An AoE attack is always going to go againt DCV3, A 12d6 EB is going to do 12d6 damage, etc. Social combat: The base chance of success is (or should be) different every time the characters meet, since it should be modified by their state of mind and past history. A 12d6 PRE attack is only going to be a base of 12d6 the first time it is used, etc. The two situations are not analogous. Even more starkly take Character 1 away and replace it with a totally different charcater with the exact same powerset. Physical combat plays exactly the same. Social combat should not. That because social combat is predicated on who you are, not just what you are. Why? A character heartbroken over his DNPC Girlfriend having an affair is not necessarily going to be easier to say, persuade - or necessarily harder to persuade - on an unrelated topic. It'll certainly affect his interaction with that DNPC, but it may or may not have an effect on other social interactions. In contrast, if he has a broken arm, his combat efficiency will be impaired, regardless of who broke it. Again, in the physical universe, there's a direct linkage that doesn't necessarily exist in a non-physical interaction. You are welcome to your opinion, but that's simply not how physical combat works in Hero system. Reputation does not affect your OCV. I don't gain bonuses to my HKA or STUN, simply because I don't like the guy I am trying to stab. Personal history doesn't feature in the mechanics at all. I understand you like the concept, and that's fine, but simply stating that "they are the same" doesn't change the fact that they are not. Situational modifiers are "instant", if you like. They can change from phase to phase and don't carry over. If I gain +3 DCV from hiding behind a wall, I gain no DCV bonus the next time I fight the same opponent somewhere else - or even the next phase, if I move away from cover. Prior history doesn't change how our powers interact in physical combat. The STUN you inflicted on an opponent a day ago has no effect on his STUN total right now. However, in a proposed "social system" if I gained "+3 social DCV vs X" because "last time I went along with what X suggested, he betrayed my trust" that should carry over. Social modifiers are not situational. If you want to persuade someone to carry a package to the captain, it's easier if the captain is in the next room and it's aregular workday, than if he's huddled in a foxhole with bullets pinging all around. That's a social situational modifier - it's environment dependant. However if the last time you gave your messenger a package it exploded in his hands, he's going likely be reluctant to take another package from you, regardless of your local environment. That's not a situational modifier: it's a personal/historical one. There really is no equivalent for lasting bonuses in physical combat and the closest we come to lasting penalties is BOD or ability damage - and they are not history-specific. If you are at 2 BOD, you're at 2 BOD, regardless of who inflicted that injury.

Re: Social System Sigh. I thought I was being clear, but just to make it stone obvious: mechanistically the attacks used will still be as effective as they were in the previous fight. Your energy blast does not normally get weaker because you shot the same guy with it last week. Even if your opponent Found Weaknes on you last week, your defences don't start lower in this week's fight, nor does he get a bonus or penalty to try again. And yes, if one of the characters involved were injured, that would make a difference - but then if one of the characters was injured in a totally seperate indcident, before they'd ever met, that would affect the fight too ... all of which is irrelevant to the discussion at hand. Unlike the physical combat example, in social combat, the relative effectiveness of attacks must be directly affected by previous interactions and social reputation. Otherwise the entire idea becomes unrealistic and essentially pointless. If a character suggests "Let's take a walk through the park" the chance of success is going to differ wildly depending on whether the character asking is the other character's trusted companion, arch-enemy, or a random contact, if it's 12:00 pm or am, if the character asking is known to be holding the other character's DNPC hostage at a secret location, etc. If on the other hand, in the identical situation, one of those two characters responds by physically attacking the other, the chance of success is determined by their relative CV and attacks/defences ... not their relative history. Totally different situation. It's why, on reflection, a purely "combat simulation" form of social combat wouldn't work - a character would need a "social DCV" that was different for every PC/NPC, or alternatively would need to track "social CV modifiers" for every PC/NPC they had ever interacted with. cheers, Mark

Re: Cool Guns for your Games Yeah, but note the intended use: it would cause you some grief if someone stuck the muzzle directly into your ear and then pulled the trigger ... which is what purse guns like that were for. If you had to use it, your assailant was probably already in close physical contact. cheers, Mark

Re: My Bodyguard Another option, which I am little surprised has not been suggested is to look at giving him complementary combat skills to the Knight's. By that I mean (for example) missile deflection. The first time someone tries to put an arbalest bolt into the armoured knight, he'll appreciate that. Likewise, give him skills to augment the knight's attacks This would mean that the bodyguard player would need to be prepared to be a team player, but it sounds like he is already there. This approach could make the Knight/bodyguard combo more effective than the knight alone. In that case, I'd suggest things like: "Shieldman" Missile deflection (non-gunpowder weapons at range, adjacent hex, requires OIF Shield of opportunity. 15 active, 10 real) "Trip Foe" +3 CSL, all HTH Combat, usable by other (+1/4), requires successful to hit roll (-1/2) 19 active, 12 real "Distracting blow" 2d6 Flash - sight group (20 real). etc. Since these minor powers are all "combat tricks" I'd be inclined to drop them in a multipower. Buy some levels in Block and you get the Knight/bodyguard combo, where the bodyguard does not so much focus in doing damage as setting up the knight to do more damage and blocking attacks in return. A 2d6 Flash, for example isn't much use ... until you land it just before your buddy, who then gets to headshot a blinded foe. Likewise, you can trip an enemy - and your buddy can hit him at half DCV while he's lying down (potentially allowing your buddy to dump CSLs into extra damage and still have a good chance to hit) ... and of course Danger sense, out of combat, immediate vicinity. It'd take some training to get right - but done right, it could be deadly. cheers, Mark

Re: Magic system wanted -- historical magic Yeah, I have "Authentic Thaumaturgy" and it's really not useful. Pedantic, poorly written - you'd be better off with some history texts, and a few novels like The Phoenix and The Mirror or the Dragon Waiting for flavour. As for using "traditional" european magic in a game setting, I've done just that, in my Immortals game, and it worked really, really well. Several players specifically commented on how much they liked the flavour of the magic system. The basic idea - not hard to convey to players - is that magic is not the D&D style approach with the mage as mobile artillery platform, but more ... well, traditional. Mages are scholars as much as anything and if you want someone dead, it's usually easier to stab them (or hire someone else to stab them) than to go through all the magic rigmarole. On the other hand, if you want immortality, unlimited wealth, to control the weather or to learn the secrets of dead kings ... for those things, you need a mage. I have the magic system I used posted here. I'm using a slightly more caster-friendly version in my current campaign. cheers, Mark

Re: Magic system wanted -- historical magic

Re: Social System Correct. But given that PRE by itself is a pretty blunt weapon, can easily be nerfed by circumstances and PRE attacks degrade rapidly with use, I haven't found it to be overpowering. It tends to be an approach that is only useful if judiciously used. In addition, note that I "cap" the effectiveness of social skills by not allowing "mind control" like effects - which means that a very high PRE allows you to overcome difficulties more easily, but rarely allows you to dictate the effect. I view it as analogous to OCV, in this regard. In the majority of games, it doesn't matter if you have OCV20 or OCV30 - under most circumstances, you will always score a hit - but hitting by 10 more than you need, doesn't make your attack more effective. It merely guarantees that you successfully hit. The combo of PRE attacks and social skills makes high-PRE characters viable in a variety of situations, without making them overwhelming, in my experience.

Re: What books should I buy??? As an aside - this campaign can be easily converted to a more European setting by swapping Samurai for Knights or Huscarls and Ninja for Assassins and Rogues - in fact the first dozen adventures were written for my own fantasy setting with a vaguely Scandinavian feel and simply converted over to give me a Japanese setting cheers, Mark

Re: Byronic Hero That was the same thing I thought of, with the addendum that The Stress of Her Regard would be even more apposite, since it includes Byron, Keats and the Shellys as major characters. Both great books. I had planned to swipe whole swathes from The Stress of Her Regard (and blend it with Declare, REH's Shahrazar stories, Hope Hodgson's House on the Borderlands and Clive Barker's Weaveworld) and use it as the background for my victorian "pulp" game, but that never got off the ground. cheers, Mark

Re: Social System Dunno about the others, but work has been hectic lately, and I have been traveling a lot, so I haven't really been able to do more than check out the boards briefly the last 10 days or so. Things are slowing down a bit now, so I have a chance to write a more substantive response. First off, on the the "rules as written" question, maybe you guys are right: I've always interpreted what we are doing as pretty much going with the rules - however it's pretty plain that's not the consensus! As such, I have never "formalised" what I do. I can however sum up my general approach to things and then give some examples - perhaps we can formalise further from there. First off, I see social interaction as occurring through 2 mechanisms (from the gamist point of view). The first is PRE attacks. In my game those can have powerful effects, but are extremely limited in both duration and effect. The rules already allow for social effects "deeply consider what the attacker says" etc. In general, the rules I apply are: PRE attacks must be visible (they are attacks, after all) so you can't "PRE attack" someone subtly. It has to be some kind of "Look at me!" effect, that is going to draw attention - though precisely what that constitutes depends on setting. I usually require the player the define what the PC is doing to make a PRE attack - though it can be as simple as "I draw myself erect and bark "You men there! Follow me!"" You can use a PRE attack to try and get someone to do something, but as noted, effects are always going to be short-term (usually a phase or two at most) - PRE attacks are very blunt tools, but they are a way of getting people's attention. Generally, if used in conjunction with a social skill, you get a +1 for each step up on the PRE effect chart above the base - if appropriate. They normally would not be applicable to things like Conversation - though they could be - a loudly-spoken cutting remark, for example, to humiliate someone. Note that PRE attacks are highly context sensitive and lose effectiveness rapidly with repeated use against the same target/group. I have noticed some GM's will allow bonuses to PRE attacks (because players request them) but often don't apply the penalties (being outnumbered, repeated use, etc) which can make them overpowered. One thing I often do is PRE attack vs PRE attack. In some cases, this obvious - a Hero countering the scary effect of a demon on his colleagues, and nearby NPCs. Less obviously, it can be applied even when one antagonist is not there - for example, if the PCs are interrogating a thug, and try to use a PRE attack to frighten him, the thug may get a small bonus on his attempt to resist if his boss is really, really, scary (again, PRE attack vs PRE attack - with a penalty to the absent party for being, well, absent). The only actual change to the rules is that I substitute "appropriate action" for "violent action". They can be the same, of course - a Hero might be able to get frightened soldiers moving by leading the charge (appropriate action). A Commissar might get the same bonus by executing the nearest soldier (violent action) ... but even if both get the same PRE attack score, the overall effect on the soldiers is going to be different. The second is obviously social skills - here, we have mostly covered the ground. The base rules are as I have laid out above, namely: 1. Unless you have a captive audience somehow (and often even then) social skill use is an "opt-in" situation. You can't use Conversation or Persuasion on a target that has already pre-determined that they will not talk with you. On the other hand, if they have opted in - in other words, they do interact - then they must, to some extent suffer the consequences. 2. As noted, some situations lead themselves to breaking down skill rolls - other don't. This is very much on a case by case basis - using Seduction to establish a rapport and then using Persuasion to get the target to do something might be possible over several weeks. Using Persuasion on a suicidal person to stop them leaping off a bridge is likely to be minutes to seconds. All the standard skill rules for extra time, appropriate tools, etc apply. These are highly context dependant. For a seduction, wine and roses might work - or for an NPC with psych lims. like "Thrillseeker", a suggestion to go HALO skydiving might work better. I can't stress that last point enough - one reason that I resist a list of specific modifiers is because every interaction is highly context dependant. This is true of physical combat as well, but to a much, much lesser degree - social combat essentially comes with a history. If you are trying to punch an opponent in the face, the outcome depends on your relative combat skills and the environmental factors in play. It doesn't so much matter whether you fought last week. For social combat, however, relative skill and environment play a role - but so do your interactions (or lack of them) over preceding days, months and years. The same request, identically phrased and delivered in the same setting may have a totally different reception depending on whether it's coming from your old, trusted mentor, your lover of the last 3 weeks or the guy who's repeatedly tried to kill you and your family. That said, I tend to apply modifiers on a scale of ±1 to ±5 with 1 being "that sounds pretty reasonable/ a bit unreasonable" to "Hell, yeah/ Hell, no". Likewise, I score the degree of success from -5 to +5 on a scale of miserable failure to outstanding success (more or less than that has no particular effect: you can't gain mind control by having Persuasion 30-). Note, however, that even an outstanding success may not be enough to gain the result you want - there are cases where NPCs or PCs are simply not going to go along with a request. That doesn't mean they are immune to social interaction, as has been so often suggested - it merely means that particular approach is simply not going to work. Modifiers that I take into account include (but are not limited to) PRE attacks - as noted above Environmental modifiers - these can also run the gamut from -5 to +5 but are generally in the -2 to +2 range - defining these is hard (see below) Historical modifiers (again -5 to +5: what is the historical relationship to the characters to each other?) -5 is extreme hatred/distrust, +5 is extreme love/ implicit trust, etc. Note, this can be something heard about another character, it doesn't have to be personal. It can also "inherited" by being a member of a specific group. The disadvantage "reputation" can affect this, though I usually limit even a extreme reputation to +3/-3 unless the parties involved have personal knowledge of each other Pysch lim.s can give a bonus or penalty, but I tend to play them differently - if the social interaction triggers a psych lim., in a positive fashion I tend, instead of giving a bonus to the interaction, tell the player directly "You have a psych lim for X - make your EGO roll if you want to avoid going along with ...." The reason for this is that I regard Psych lims as a major foundation for the PC's mind and it is (or should be) something the player has deliberately indicated that they don't mind playing along with. Lastly, psych lim.s can be triggered by events, in which there is no social antagonist. If the psych lim is triggered in a negative fashion (ie: events or a social interaction point towards an course that would violate the psych lim) then the player has to either make an EGO roll to go along with it, or it acts as a penalty (-1, -3, -5, for moderate, strong or total) to the social interaction. To give an example of why I can't really give hard and fast modifiers, let's take an example: a bunch of adventurers turn up in a bar and ask for directions to the nearby castle. Simple situation, yes? Possible mod.s include: The bar itself. Small, with only regulars? A busy meeting place where strangers are common? Located in a area with distrust for foreigners? A rough place where brawls are frequent? An upper class establishment? The party. Known to the locals (for good or ill?) Bearing signs that indicate their affiliation or opposition to the local power structure? Are they polite? Are they scruffy? Do they look threatening? The destination. Is the castle the home of a hated vampire? A feared vampire? A beloved patron? Abandoned? Under siege? Is the local lord known to be recruiting mercenaries or adventurers? Has he demanded that all strangers be sent to him at once? The general location. Is the countryside at peace? At war? Under a dark curse? Over-run with violent "adventurers"? Is it broad daylight? Just before midnight on a stormy night? The NPCs. Do they hate "vagabond adventurers"? Are they faithful retainers? Are they obsequious to authority, craven or looking for a fight? Do they have any history with the PCs or the group they might represent? Any/all of these can give major modifiers before the PCs have even spoken a single word - and this is for a very simple interaction. I don't pretend to weigh all of these individually and add up any modifiers: I simply consider these aspects and then weigh any subsequent interactions against my "general atmosphere" and the NPCs involved. Lastly, I have indicated that I use complementary rolls extensively. A couple of general rules here - they apply to all skills, not just social skills. 1. I level penalties (-1 per 2 points the roll was failed by) on complementaries. This stops the players from all "having a go" (too many cooks spoil the broth!) They can try if they like, but soon learn it's better to let the best at a particular task tackle it - it's better to have no helpers than a bunch who don't really know what they are doing. 2. Group activities get a single roll, against which everyone measures their success. This is to stop everyone making a roll hoping to get a really low roll, which can slow things down and is likewise unrealistic. Hope that helps. cheers, Mark

Re: how do you like your fantasy games I usually run low points (50+50 is typical for starting, though we have gone as low as 25+25) with a "realistic" feel, but not necessarily grim. Occasionally, though I also run high fantasy (starting points 300+). cheers, Mark

Re: What Fantasy/Sci-Fi book have you just finished? Please rate it... From our last gaming session: "You said you had a plan!" "So I did. I never said it was a good plan." cheers, Mark

Re: What Fantasy/Sci-Fi book have you just finished? Please rate it... Both. Pretty much all of them are independant pieces, but many of them are set in the same science-fiction universe he has used in books like Dying of the Light, and there's a novella set in the world of A Song of Ice and Fire, prior to Robert Baratheon's seizing the throne (I wonder if the main character in that will pop up later in the series ...) cheers, Mark

Re: Social System

Re: How would you stat up gods in Hero System? The comic? I've never read it. I ran this back in medical school, in the '80's, so I dunno if it was out then. I actually swiped the idea from Van Vogt's "World of Null-A" and then mixed it with "Nine princes in Amber" - so the PCs were playas in a vast interdimensional political conflict. cheers, Mark

Re: Social effects

Re: How would you stat up gods in Hero System? That's pretty much my approach as well. I think it's because some GM's resist the idea of "Give the PCs the points to build what you want them to build" - they're more wedded to fixed point totals, so they build all heroes to the same levels and then try to scale the game world to match. Meh. It's doable, but it seems like a lot more work. cheers, Mark

Re: Social effects How do you purchase those powers? Would you award two different points totals (one for social, one for physical?). That would mean everyone would be equally skilled, socially, though how they manifested that would differ. Or would you require people to buy social attacks out of their total point pool? The latter allows someone to be the suave con-man while the other is the incoherent thug, which seems more in tune with the source material. If you do this, how do you prevent socially skilled characters from hogging the limelight? By definition, social skills shine in social situations, while combat skills shine in combat. But if high social skills can also be used to define others actions, then they will likely shine in combat as well. Secondly, what kind of time frame do you envisage social combat working in? If it's combat time, most situations are going to be resolved really fast, and the problem of limelight time is exacerbated. If it's much slower than the sort of situation we talked about earlier, where people use social skills in combat is essentially impossible. In Exalted, for example, physical combat time is ten times slower (IIRC) than social combat time, meaning essentially, you either do one or the other. Thirdly, what are your opt-out options? Most games that feature social combat also allow PCs to opt out - the writers recognize that having your characters motivations dictated or altered doesn't make for a fun game, and they want to stay in business. To stick with Exalted as an example, you can ignore any social interaction by expending willpower (in some way the equivalent of BOD, in what you are suggesting, I guess, since you have a limited stock). Or you can state that a required action goes against your motivation (kind of like a Pysch lim) - in which case you can normally just blow it off. Thoughts? cheers, Mark

Re: Someone Please Explain This to Me? I'm not really an HKA partisan, so I don't really have a dog in this fight, but I've had many players buy KA's for exactly that reason, and heck, as a player, I've done it myself. For "hard targets" with high defences, a KA is actually a much more reliable way of getting STUN through (about 1 hit in three will generate STUN significantly above the mean for a normal attack of similar cost). One hit in 3 is pretty reliable. If the target has defences approaching the mean of the attacks used - as Hugh points out, around 2.5 to 3 per DC - then KA will, on average, significantly outperform a regular EB and if the DEF/DC ratio is higher than that, a KA will still be effective - if somewhat spottily - whereas regular attacks will be essentially useless. KA's are, in fact, very reliable: you can't predict their Stun Output from attack to attack, but over a single combat, where multiple attacks are thrown, that very rapidly averages out. As I said, I don't really care - my games tend to have low DEF/DC ratios and virtually everyone has KAs anyway. But the math cannot be denied. cheers, Mark

Re: What would your sidekick be named? For me it'd be "Target boy". Because let's face it, that's what he'd end up being anyway. cheers, Mark

Re: How would you stat up gods in Hero System? I ran a game a while back where all of the players were immortals (and in my game world, in many places, the immortals are worshipped as gods). They got their "immortality" via duplication: many multiples of copies with the limitation that only one copy could be active at a time, and all the other bodies were lifeless, waiting to be animated. Kill one body - be it never so thoroughly - and they'll just pop up in another. To really "kill" an immortal, you have to kill all of the bodies, all of them hidden in many different places, guarded by fanatic priesthoods, or in a cave whose entrance is under the sea, in a castle of brass surrounded by a lake of fire and guarded by a dragon - or simply sealed in a caisse below the floor of a peasant's hut. Cost a bit, but gave pretty close to guaranteed immortality. This is easy enough to deal with: you just need to make religion relevant. In the current game, religion is a major social factor: so the players spend a good deal of time interacting with priests, cults and temples. In fact, recently, two of them stumped up a fair amount of loot just to be allowed to join a cult. There's no reason of course that this couldn't give you some advantages like access to "divine damage" - in my case, the players did it because belonging to the city cult gives them access to cult secrets (like the city archives) and gives them social status. cheers, Mark

Re: What Fantasy/Sci-Fi book have you just finished? Please rate it... A George RR Martin RRetrospective: a collection of his short stories, novellas and TV scripts. Some I've read, some I hadn't, all good. Also interesting to know what he was doing during the "lost decade" when he apparently stopped writing (he was writing, just for TV) cheers, Mark

Re: Social effects Ah - OK. I misunderstood, my bad - I was looking at this as potential rules additions, which I hold to much more stringent "general acceptability/usability" criteria. For what it's worth, tho' I'm happy to share my own house rules, most of them don't meet that criteria! So I always identify them as "house rules", not rules change suggestions. That said, I'm happy to discuss possible ideas. So how do you envisage this combat working? With Stat.s as is, or with entirely new stat.s? cheers, Mark