Social 'Combat': the hill I will die on (because I took 0 things for physical combat)

[Thenomain]

@thatguythere

@bored sums it up. Most of the time it's Aspects, which is also Fate's strongest or second-strongest mechanic. (I can't decide if I like the skill pyramid more. I think I do. Though how Dresden Files handled fate points and stunts still enamors me for its elegance.)

And saying "Fate is Fudge with bells and whistles" is like saying "a car is just four wheels with bells and whistles". Fudge is a system upon which you might be able to build a game. Fate is a game system.

I have more hills to die on than Rome.

[ThatGuyThere]

@thenomain
To me Fudge is a game system as well. I have both played in and ran games using FUDGE the same as I have any other game system.
the main differences I see between the two are the Aspects and the Fate Point economy. Which to me both qualify at bells and whistles, (One I like the Aspects, and one I have never cared for, fate points) but to me playing FATE is basically playing FUDGE with a few wrinkles.

[faraday]

@thatguythere said in Social 'Combat': the hill I will die on (because I took 0 things for physical combat):

I have both played in and ran games using FUDGE the same as I have any other game system.

I have too so I don't quite understand the distinction.

[surreality]

I am also unfamiliar with FUDGE, so. Uhm. I do appreciate the attempt at help, though?

[Bobotron]

Social health tracks have the same problem as 'roll dice ot influence' depending on how written. Taking 'social damage' still is going to trigger some people's agency complaints, because they will have to RP in some what that they don't want to. As well, there are Social and Mental stress/health tracks in Cortex as well. Mostly those end up 'putting you out of the fight' somehow.

[Ganymede]

@bobotron said in Social 'Combat': the hill I will die on (because I took 0 things for physical combat):

Social health tracks have the same problem as 'roll dice ot influence' depending on how written. Taking 'social damage' still is going to trigger some people's agency complaints, because they will have to RP in some what that they don't want to. As well, there are Social and Mental stress/health tracks in Cortex as well. Mostly those end up 'putting you out of the fight' somehow.

I have no problem, personally, with social skills taking someone "out of the fight." Again, my concern is ensuring there is a mechanism to pull out of something that will cause another player to feel very uncomfortable.

[JinShei]

I'm a self acknowledge fate fan so... I've found it works beautifully on a mush, but that the mindset of the players has to be such that they use the aspects as a live part of their sheet. That gives nuance to the numbers. I.e. my nun was amazing in social combat, but her aspects gave situations where she would not use her skills or could not be forced to do...

[Lithium]

People who die on the 'Player Agency' hill will not be happy with any sort of social combat system.

That's not to say anyone here is doing that, but there comes a point when: You are playing a game, the game is going to take you out of your comfort zone eventually (Sooner in some game systems), and if it's so far out of your comfort zone, that you have to try and make rules not apply then... maybe it's you, not the system.

(Note: The you is a general nebulous you, not directed at anyone specific)

[faraday]

@lithium said in Social 'Combat': the hill I will die on (because I took 0 things for physical combat):

That's not to say anyone here is doing that, but there comes a point when: You are playing a game, the game is going to take you out of your comfort zone eventually (Sooner in some game systems), and if it's so far out of your comfort zone, that you have to try and make rules not apply then... maybe it's you, not the system.

As someone who will die on the social combat hill... I 100% agree with you there. If I choose to play on a game with social combat, then I'm honorbound to follow the rules, whatever my preferences may be.

Where I find value in this thread is seeing where potential compromises can be found. For instance - after this thread @Seraphim73 and I went off and worked on social conflict systems independently. His was obviously more non-consent oriented and mine more consent-oriented, but it was hilarious how similar they were otherwise. If I was going to venture onto a game with social combat, I would be far more comfortable on a system like his that with the traditional "roll Persuasion vs Willpower and do what they say". There IS room for compromise here.

[The Sands]

@lithium said in Social 'Combat': the hill I will die on (because I took 0 things for physical combat):

People who die on the 'Player Agency' hill will not be happy with any sort of social combat system.

Not true. You want a social combat system where I am 'intimidated' and the rules say 'this is how it is handled' then I'm all for it (assuming I feel the rules for how it is handled are reasonable. After all, I would certainly object if the rules say I keel over from a heart attack because you got 1 success on your Presence + Intimidate roll and I have no chance to resist).

But it has to be a system that I feel takes into account the complexity of a character. Suzie Social fluttering her eyelids might be able to make Billy Badboy knock over a coffee shop for her but she should have no hope in Hell of making Gary Gayguy (and I hope no one takes offense at that name) kill his partner because Suzie Social isn't offering anything Gary is interested in.

[Lithium]

@the-sands Oh for fucks sake, here goes the circular nonsense again. Several systems have been pointed out as having /something/ similar to that, and everyone says 'aspects suck' and then there are people who are demanding a characters whole entire personality and mindset be mapped out on the game, on a sheet, so that they can point and go: No. I am immune to your stuff that you paid points for even though it cost more than all my combined punch you in the face skills.

There comes a point wher epeople HAVE to be able to separate their 'player agency' from the god forsaken character and let the character /live/ in a virtual world that is not this world, where they can change and adapt and have foibles, successes, failures, and not all be bound by some ineffable way some nebulous person see's the character.

There is NO SYSTEM that accurately represents reality!

Not one!

Quit trying to make social combat like /reality/ and play by the rules.

[faraday]

@lithium And here we go again, with "my way is the only possible way for anyone to play and if they dare to suggest that maybe different rules would be better they're rules-breaking lunatics who shouldn't be playing in a virtual world" nonsense.

Yeah. This is productive.

[The Sands]

@lithium I'm quite willing to play by the rules. I'm simply suggesting that if you want these rules you come up with a system that makes some sense.

It's too complex? Well then, maybe you shouldn't try and force people to use something even you admit is broken.

The real thing, however, is you said 'People who die on the 'Player Agency' hill will not be happy with any sort of social combat system' and I'm saying 'Nope. Try again'. I think 'Player Agency' is quite important, yet I just demonstrated that I could be happy with a good social combat system. Such a system might not currently exist but your statement implies that I will never be happy with a system and that is simply untrue.

And WTF is up with you telling me to play by the rules? I have said 'this is what you need to do' or 'that is a problem'. I have never said 'I will just ignore that rule if you try and make me follow it'. Hell no. If I'm see a game with rules like this that I don't like I'm just going to walk away. You don't get to accuse me of 'not following the rules' because I won't play your broken system.

[Nemesis]

@the-sands said in Social 'Combat': the hill I will die on (because I took 0 things for physical combat):

Not true. You want a social combat system where I am 'intimidated' and the rules say 'this is how it is handled' then I'm all for it (assuming I feel the rules for how it is handled are reasonable. After all, I would certainly object if the rules say I keel over from a heart attack because you got 1 success on your Presence + Intimidate roll and I have no chance to resist).

But it has to be a system that I feel takes into account the complexity of a character. Suzie Social fluttering her eyelids might be able to make Billy Badboy knock over a coffee shop for her but she should have no hope in Hell of making Gary Gayguy (and I hope no one takes offense at that name) kill his partner because Suzie Social isn't offering anything Gary is interested in.

OK so, yeah, common sense is actually neither of those things because Seduction isn't necessarily sexual in nature and getting Billy Badboy to knock over a coffee shop is something he's likely to do anyway, so good job identifying that as a good and reasonable use of social skills, but there's absolutely no reason that a female with high seduction can't charm a gay guy by some means toward any goal at all unless he actually literally has a stat that allows him to ignore Seduction.

If the Seductor scores high rolls across several meetings, drawing the Seductee into a close personal relationship or making them lust after money or power or sex or whatever, it's perfectly reasonable for a priest who's never killed anyone and truly believes he'd go to hell if he did to promise the Seductor that he will do anything they ask and then simply not follow through when they aren't standing there goading him into it later on.

That's the big problem I see in this whole conversation: Everyone who's pro-social wants social successes to affect a person like a bullet or a knife wound that needs treatment and active reversal to be undone. I say again: Unless it's a power, it's not meant to work that way. I don't even need to look into the Fate system to know from the jump that it's not meant to work that way by the developers of Fate who aren't delusional - although it could certainly work that way if someone wanted to make their own custom RPG using Fate and say so.

Can social successes accumulated across a dozen or a hundred scenes amount to cult-level "indoctrination" that needs treatment and active reversal? Absolutely, yes. Fluttering eyelashes? Flash of cleavage? That might get you out of a speeding ticket if you weren't doing something like weaving in and out of traffic or doubling the speed limit (which may be treated as attempted vehicular manslaughter whether the speed limit is 10 or 60 m/kph), or to make it clearer: If the cop you're flashing your tits at isn't so pissed off at your irresponsible behavior in the first place that he'd rather shoot you than cite you.

Thinking that a 1-off social win should be as psychologically damaging as a bullet is physically, or that anyone should be completely immune to someone else based on gender or social tactic type, is completely insane.

[The Sands]

@nemesis said in Social 'Combat': the hill I will die on (because I took 0 things for physical combat):

OK so, yeah, common sense is actually neither of those things because Seduction isn't necessarily sexual in nature and getting Billy Badboy to knock over a coffee shop is something he's likely to do anyway, so good job identifying that as a good and reasonable use of social skills, but there's absolutely no reason that a female with high seduction can't charm a gay guy by some means toward any goal at all unless he actually literally has a stat that allows him to ignore Seduction.

But this is one of the big issues right here. In the example Suzie is using a specific type of action to influence Billy and Gary and that action doesn't work against Gary. In essence Suzie is trying to shoot Gary with a gun that has no bullets (or more accurately, bullets Gary is immune to). I'm not saying that Suzie is never going to be able to influence Gary simply because she's a woman but she's going to need some other kind of ammunition to do so (cash, convincing Gary that his partner has been unfaithful, threats against Gary's well-being, etc.)

Now you could abstract the system so much that Suzie only has to say 'I want to try and use Persuasion on Gary' and then we roll dice but do we really want a system that abstract? It seems to me like you're in real danger of:

'I enter the bar'
(die roll)
'My clothes appeal to people'
(die roll)
'People enjoy my presence'
<OOC> Thanks for the scene guys.

Of course that's a gross exaggeration and I'm not completely sure my concern is great enough to say 'don't go that way'. I'm just positing the negatives.

The idea that Suzie says '<OOC> I want to use Persuasion on Gary' and then the two players work out a reasonable solution for how Suzie is able to persuade Gary is a definite possibility. The only problem is this solution works between two players who can come to an agreement. It doesn't solve the issue of the completely recalcitrant player which means you've now codified a system (and increased the complexity of the game by adding more rules) that still may not resolve the original problem.

[Ganymede]

@faraday said in Social 'Combat': the hill I will die on (because I took 0 things for physical combat):

If I was going to venture onto a game with social combat, I would be far more comfortable on a system like his that with the traditional "roll Persuasion vs Willpower and do what they say."

The good news is that this isn't how many, if not all of us, see a social combat system working either. And it's definitely not the way I'd like it, and it's definitely not the way that the good people at White Wolf or Dream Pod 9 see it.

But there is a certain trickiness to the compromising and the language that, unsurprisingly, a lot of people aren't really hitting on in a way that satisfies everyone, really.

[ThatGuyThere]

Since it is on topic and because I am somewhat curious what other people think about it I will share how i handle social rolls in table top, both against PCs and NPCs. (I am a big believer in the mechanics of anything effecting PCs and NPCs in the same manner.)
Not non-supernatural social skill instead of the roll controlling action modifies them.
For example intimidate, if one character is trying to intimidate another and succeeds then while the targets character still has autonomy of action acting against the character that intimidated him would incur a penalty.
Or for everyone's favorite seduction no roll should force sex but instead the seducers would apply a penalty to the targets actions because the targets is distracted by thinking desirous thoughts whether they are ever acted on or not.
Or if you want to use social combat to benefit someone use leadership to give an inspiring speech and those following your goals for the next scene get a bonus.
That why the social combat crowd does get some bang for their buck, while the agency crowd still has final say over the actions of the character even if those action become less likely to succeed.
As much as I dislike the world of NWoD 2.0 one good thing is the conditions, and this could be used to codify this a bit, for example a successful seduction gives the condition call Flustered and it is given a set effect and a set way to resolve it. Leadership could give an inspired Condition that gives a bonus until resolved, etc. It would involved more overhead in the initial set up but would be a middle ground.

[The Sands]

@thatguythere Overall I like that setup. It still preserves autonomy of action while allowing the social skills to have value. I'm not sure I would agree with everything in the setup (I might be tempted to require a Willpower roll before an Intimidated person can even initiate combat and I think the Seduction could still use work because it continues to have problems that people can just use it in completely inappropriate situations) but I think the concept is sound.

[Seraphim73]

Change "Seduce" to "Beguile" or "Entice." Then it's less likely (especially with Entice) that people try to use it to roll people into bed. Sure, some people will still do it, because there are assholes everywhere, but fewer people will do it.

[Lithium]

@faraday @The-Sands

Sorry. I snapped. I'd been up a long time and needed sleep and was just frustrated.

Why because I don't see eye to eye on this. I probably never will. There is no happy middle ground for me.

The whole idea of player agency is something I don't understand.

The whole point of an RPG for me, is to not be in control of everything, it is to play out a life different from my own. I don't want to rail road a character, I want to give the character a starting point and then let them go and be free to experience /their/ lives.

We're not writing a book here. We really aren't. We're playing a game in a medium that involves writing, not writing a book and using dice to determine the outcome.

/NOBODY/ on this planet is one hundred percent consistent, one hundred percent of the time. Hell not even software.

That is my problem with this whole 'Player Agency' bit.

Also, no, I am not asking for social rolls to be like bullets, and I am /tired/ of that bullshit that the 'player agency' people are putting forth.

I just want social characters to be able to influence people socially, because, that's the point.

I just want everyone to play by the same fucking rules and quit trying to cheat.

(ETA) Now if a game wanted to give social stats a price break, both in chargen and in xp, and say they only functioned as guidelines against PC's but functioned fully against NPC's I'd be fine with that. Because that's playing by the rules of that game. I'm a coder, I like rules being followed. Without rules we have Anarchy.