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Old 10-17-2023, 11:23 PM   #1
Michael Thayne
 
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Default How do you use influence skills in your game?

I've tended to run games that aren't exactly very social-heavy—Supers, Monster Hunters, Dungeon Fantasy. I've been thinking about running a more social-heavy game recently, which made me look more closely at the rules for influence skills, which made me realize I've never really used them as written. As written, they seem kind of odd. Since most influence skills (except Diplomacy) completely replace the results of a reaction roll, it seems as-written you need to ask players what influence skill they're using before you roll a reaction roll (or at least before you give the players any hint of the result). Does anyone actually do that? If not, what do you do instead?

There are other oddities of rules-as-written influence skills. There's no downside to using Diplomacy over a straight reaction roll, and as long as you avoid straight reaction rolls there's no way to get a Disastrous or Very Bad reaction. This is fixed somewhat by the alternate rules in Mysteries (reprinted in Social Engineering), though I worry those introduce too much variance, making it too easy to get Disastrous or Excellent reactions.

I suspect that in practice a lot of people use alternate approaches. The Dungeon Fantasy series suggests one—using a reaction roll to determine if the monsters are willing to negotiate at all, then using skill rolls to handle the actual negotiation. What else do people do?
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Old 10-18-2023, 12:19 AM   #2
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Default Re: How do you use influence skills in your game?

Quote:
Originally Posted by Michael Thayne View Post
I've tended to run games that aren't exactly very social-heavy—Supers, Monster Hunters, Dungeon Fantasy. I've been thinking about running a more social-heavy game recently, which made me look more closely at the rules for influence skills, which made me realize I've never really used them as written. As written, they seem kind of odd. Since most influence skills (except Diplomacy) completely replace the results of a reaction roll, it seems as-written you need to ask players what influence skill they're using before you roll a reaction roll (or at least before you give the players any hint of the result). Does anyone actually do that? If not, what do you do instead?

There are other oddities of rules-as-written influence skills. There's no downside to using Diplomacy over a straight reaction roll, and as long as you avoid straight reaction rolls there's no way to get a Disastrous or Very Bad reaction. This is fixed somewhat by the alternate rules in Mysteries (reprinted in Social Engineering), though I worry those introduce too much variance, making it too easy to get Disastrous or Excellent reactions.

I suspect that in practice a lot of people use alternate approaches. The Dungeon Fantasy series suggests one—using a reaction roll to determine if the monsters are willing to negotiate at all, then using skill rolls to handle the actual negotiation. What else do people do?
I use the Mysteries/SE appeoach, also if you play larger than life characters, Mysteries has also a couple of rules to limit high skill characters.

My approach is that when you try to influence someone you are tying to get something, so it is you (the character) that must choose one approach based on which buttons you are tying to press. There is also some neat stuff on manipulation that a social character might use. If, as a GM, I roll a generic reaction just to gauge an initial behavior of the npc on my own for no reason, I let the character roll aninfluence or reaction for the specific request, based on his or her approach, perhaps with a modifier. I think that rolling multiple times to change the approach is allowed in SE, with a cumulative penalty, especially when you can bring new facts on the table.

Imho the players should be aware that if their characters just blink their eyes and smile making a request in plain language this is not a diplomacy attempt, and this is why bringing any argument that favor a mutual agreement, or mentioning that you always remember good friends, is always better. Anything else can backfire.

Also you might want to consult SE about skills that can be used in place of an influence roll when dealing with particular subjects.

The approach that you mention in dungeon fantasy doesn't seem so alternative to me - it is like when (iirc) you get a disastrous reaction on "confrontation with authority table" and you need to make a second reaction roll for "potential combat". I think the GM is free to create complex social situations also, using influence and modifiers as building blocks.

In a high tl social/investigative game I had the character was hosted by her contact group (high society and hobby skill) to introduce herself. She had to make a public speaking roll to introduce herself, beat an insult contest from one of her hosts (see SE), show her own hobby handcraft creations (hobby skill rolled), and created episodes based on the mental disads of each host. during the day. Instead of using a single influence, I tracked the outcomes as positive and negative reaction modifiers accumulated with each of her hosts, and I rolled a final reaction with each of them, when a valuable was stolen and she was framed, to see who of the hosts believed her story snd supported the investigation. This is an example of a structured social encounters, exploiting "temporary reputation" on top of the base mechanics.
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Old 10-18-2023, 02:33 AM   #3
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Default Re: How do you use influence skills in your game?

Quote:
Originally Posted by Michael Thayne View Post
I've tended to run games that aren't exactly very social-heavy—Supers, Monster Hunters, Dungeon Fantasy. I've been thinking about running a more social-heavy game recently, which made me look more closely at the rules for influence skills, which made me realize I've never really used them as written. As written, they seem kind of odd. Since most influence skills (except Diplomacy) completely replace the results of a reaction roll, it seems as-written you need to ask players what influence skill they're using before you roll a reaction roll (or at least before you give the players any hint of the result). Does anyone actually do that? If not, what do you do instead?
Aside from Diplomacy, while social skills avoid the risk of 'Very Bad' or worse result (barring a bluff with Intimidation), in return you never get better than 'Good' (excepting with Sex Appeal). Also, if you're not very familiar with your target using influence skills is not without risk - they may have very high Will or be Indomitable.

I personally think Diplomacy is a little too good. It's always usable, and is much safer, and being at an effective -1 because it's a Hard skill only somewhat compensates for that, and only for relatively low point-value PCs.

As for how I use these skills and rules, I ask the players what approach they're using and what skill, if any. If it seems a bit off, I'll ask them to explain how their chosen skill applies in the situation (usually this gets skipped - they almost always use Diplomacy). Then we do the quick contest of skill vs Will, and/or a reaction roll, and roleplay from there.
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Old 10-18-2023, 06:17 AM   #4
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Default Re: How do you use influence skills in your game?

My approach is sort of like Rupert's. I sometimes ask, "Are you trying to use an Influence skill, or are you just asking for what you want and seeing how they react?"

Though I think there's a third case. If you're trying to find, say, a provisioner, and you make a search roll (based on city size and IQ or Area Knowledge, for example) and succeed—then the provisioner you find is going to be willing to sell you provisions. No reaction roll needed, and certainly no Influence roll. Oh, there are cases where one might be called for—if you belong to a disliked minority group, or have a good or bad Reputation, or want a specially favorable deal—but a lot of the time, rolling for either reactions or Influence counts as "nuisance rolls."
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Old 10-18-2023, 06:49 AM   #5
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Default Re: How do you use influence skills in your game?

Maybe I'm running it wrong, but we run the reaction first, and then any influence skills... And you don't get to choose to not have a reaction roll. Also, there's some pretty hard limits on what people will do, and the situation they're talking in is at least as important as the roll.

We also tend to roleplay the conversation first and then roll to see if they accept the offer. In a pinch my players occasionally say "I have no idea what to say, but I want to accomplish this..." Then the question is "what skill did that sound like?"
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Old 10-18-2023, 07:56 AM   #6
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Default Re: How do you use influence skills in your game?

One thing I don't particularly care for is the rule that player characters (PCs) can't be affected by influence rolls directed at them by other PCs. So far it hasn't been a problem in most games that I've run. However, something I'm considering implementing for my next campaign, during or just after character creation, is looking at each character's influence skills and either taking the best skill, or what that player thinks will be his PC's most commonly used skill, and comparing it against each of the other players' characters to see what reactions would usually be ruled out and have each player then record the likely range of reactions to each of the other PCs as a baseline for how his character feels about each of the other PCs initially. They can alter that reaction range during play, as long as they can justify it by their interactions in play, but unless two PCs are consistently rubbing each other the wrong way, the initial reaction range should return with time as an untoward incident's effect recedes over time.

I'm not sure it's worth implementing, or even if it will work, but for a heavily social campaign, it might be something to consider. So far, I haven't had the occasional D&D 'murder hobo' problem of PCs trying to off each other, but it irks me that influence rolls have no effect on other PCs, so anything that would prevent other players from reacting as if a character with say high-skill Diplomacy was a rude, ignorant lout (especially if the player isn't particularly good at role-playing a very diplomatic character) is something I would welcome.
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Old 10-18-2023, 09:06 AM   #7
Michael Thayne
 
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Default Re: How do you use influence skills in your game?

Quote:
Originally Posted by Kaslak View Post
I use the Mysteries/SE appeoach, also if you play larger than life characters, Mysteries has also a couple of rules to limit high skill characters.
I see where it suggests using the Rule of 16 to influence rolls, also limiting bonuses, are those the rules you're thinking of or something else?

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Originally Posted by Rupert View Post
I personally think Diplomacy is a little too good. It's always usable, and is much safer, and being at an effective -1 because it's a Hard skill only somewhat compensates for that, and only for relatively low point-value PCs.
I thought about this though I'm not sure it's an issue with RAW. By RAW Diplomacy is "the skill of negotiating, compromising, and getting along with others." Also, RAW includes penalties for using inappropriate influence skills. It seems like if a PC claims to be using Diplomacy without offering any sort of deal or compromise, in a situation where the challenge goes beyond just "getting along" with people, the GM would be justified in imposing a heavy penalty for use of an inappropriate influence skill. (Or just saying "no, that's not Diplomacy, that's a straight reaction roll.")
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Old 10-18-2023, 09:09 AM   #8
Michael Thayne
 
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Default Re: How do you use influence skills in your game?

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Originally Posted by ericthered View Post
Maybe I'm running it wrong, but we run the reaction first, and then any influence skills... And you don't get to choose to not have a reaction roll. Also, there's some pretty hard limits on what people will do, and the situation they're talking in is at least as important as the roll.

We also tend to roleplay the conversation first and then roll to see if they accept the offer. In a pinch my players occasionally say "I have no idea what to say, but I want to accomplish this..." Then the question is "what skill did that sound like?"
This seems way more intuitive than RAW. Do you still have influence skills mean failure = Bad reaction and success = Good reaction or something else?
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Old 10-18-2023, 09:16 AM   #9
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Default Re: How do you use influence skills in your game?

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Originally Posted by ericthered View Post
Maybe I'm running it wrong, but we run the reaction first, and then any influence skills...
Reaction rolls are always appropriate when NPCs might judge a character or a party based on their looks. That's where traits like Appearance, Fashion Sense or fancy clothing, etc. come in handy. A bad Reaction roll, or just Intolerance or Shyness, might mean that an NPC avoids contact with the PCs before they can get within speaking range.
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Old 10-18-2023, 09:46 AM   #10
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Default Re: How do you use influence skills in your game?

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Originally Posted by ericthered View Post
Maybe I'm running it wrong, but we run the reaction first, and then any influence skills... And you don't get to choose to not have a reaction roll. Also, there's some pretty hard limits on what people will do, and the situation they're talking in is at least as important as the roll.
That was the way that my players preferred to do it in Infinite Cabal. There was a period when they had to visit loads of temples and establish at least a relationship of acceptance with each one.

They had some pretty good reaction modifiers, although they did take care to chose an appropriate PC for each approach. If the reactions were poor, they'd try to salvage them with Diplomacy. It worked out quite well.
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