[SE] Selling fish to a fisherman

[weby]

Originally Posted by Gigermann

This is actually the origin of my issue, from the last time someone decided to play a Face Man in one of my games. As I started working on the campaign, I realized that even with a Skill 14 versus a "normal" guy (Will 10), unless some penalties are racked up, the Face Man will be able to short-circuit every fight.

Note that someone who starts as negatively inclined towards you will likely get a bonus to any will rolls from just that without any special other things.


But overall, yes I have found the influence rules to be kind of not working when the skill gets too high and my current campaign is now at the level where the faceman! is skill 25 and the Bard! is at skill 27. So I basically threw the influence rules out and made my own, they are influenced by the idea of friendliness levels in D&D, but the actual implementation is quite different. You can see them in: https://hups.kivinen.iki.fi/k2011:reactions

[whswhs]

Originally Posted by Andreas

I can certainly see how that could be a problem in many genres, but would not the natural solution to that problem be to not allow too high social skills and advantages (or make them more expensive)?

It seems to me that it would be better to just not allow certain powerful traits if they are problematic, than to have immunity to those traits come up with implausible frequency.

What's "implausible"?

If we are talking, say, about guards at a bank, or at a high-security prison, I would expect them to be people who could not be talked into violating their duties. After all, doing so would cost them their jobs, and might send them to prison; both their interests and their principals would go against their susceptibility.

I would allow a guard's being susceptible if that were the premise of a scenario, or if there were a way for the PCs to do research and find the specific guard who had some sort of vulnerable point. But I wouldn't allow a good roll to get the guard to go blatantly against his duties.

[Kalzazz]

Offenders can be very good at manipulating staff

http://www.amazon.com/Games-Criminal.../dp/0960522603 is a very good book on the topic (and recommended reading at TDCJ CO Academy)

El Chapo once escaped from a max security prison by bribing guards (and the police, and the prison administrator and who knows who else)

The Bureau of Prisons actually as part of their vetting process for employees does a credit check on them, to avoid hiring people who need money and thus might be susceptible to bribery


Trying to suborn people into getting you out of prison is usually a fairly long involved process, so if someone wanted to do it instantly I would possibly impose the -10 for instant use

[vicky_molokh]

Originally Posted by whswhs

What's "implausible"?

If we are talking, say, about guards at a bank, or at a high-security prison, I would expect them to be people who could not be talked into violating their duties. After all, doing so would cost them their jobs, and might send them to prison; both their interests and their principals would go against their susceptibility.

I would allow a guard's being susceptible if that were the premise of a scenario, or if there were a way for the PCs to do research and find the specific guard who had some sort of vulnerable point. But I wouldn't allow a good roll to get the guard to go blatantly against his duties.

Given the current situation in one of the campaigns I play, I would like to gather more such examples, and will be thankful for similar contributions from others.
The one that comes to my mind is from Hero (2002). Spoilered for those who prefer to watch it themselves:

Spoiler:  

One of the protagonists (Nameless) is planning to assassinate the emperor. This has largely been his life's goal, and he's ready to die for it. Broken Sword tries to convince him to reconsider. In his ultimate Influence attempt, he writes two words on the sand and shows them to Nameless. The attempt succeeds, and when Nameless arrives at the emperor's palace, he spares the emperor, giving up his life in the process.

I consider that example to be something that in-world characters would tend to call impossible until they witness it, but what the game system should consider merely improbable, or at least improbable without epic skill levels.

[Andreas]

Originally Posted by whswhs

What's "implausible"?

If we are talking, say, about guards at a bank, or at a high-security prison, I would expect them to be people who could not be talked into violating their duties. After all, doing so would cost them their jobs, and might send them to prison; both their interests and their principals would go against their susceptibility.

I would allow a guard's being susceptible if that were the premise of a scenario, or if there were a way for the PCs to do research and find the specific guard who had some sort of vulnerable point. But I wouldn't allow a good roll to get the guard to go blatantly against his duties.

A bank or high-security prison guard being persuaded to violate their duty by a normal human should certainly be extremely unlikely. I would give significantly better odds to exceptionally skilled people, but I would find it very unlikely that even they would succeed without some holding some advantage.

However, even very skilled humans most likely won't come anywhere close to a theroretically perfect approach. Such a negotiation is after all a very complicated activity with a near infinite number of possible approaches. Just because any real life human might be unlikely to succeed at such a senario, does not at all mean that any level of skill would be insufficent.

A guard could very well be pusuaded that he is better of with a changing jobs and that he would definately get away with violating his duty. Every guard might not be susseptible to this specific approach, but tailoring your approach to your specific target is part of having a high skill. Others might be possible to persuade that letting the prissoner go would be the right thing to do, that the friends of the prissoner are holding the family of the guard hostage or that they will get a bribe if they let them go etc.

[Gigermann]

Originally Posted by Kalzazz

Trying to suborn people into getting you out of prison is usually a fairly long involved process, so if someone wanted to do it instantly I would possibly impose the -10 for instant use

This is a good point, and reminds me of a minor complaint I have about social engineering in GURPS, in that time requirements are mostly vague or unspecified—granted, it's difficult to nail down, but if you're going to be able to "take your time" or "rush," you need a base to work from.

I played in a game a while back where we started a whisper-campaign to take over leadership of an organization. There's no indication at all of how long that should take. I'm not sure how you set a standard for that, exactly, but we really needed to know at the time.

[Gigermann]

Originally Posted by Andreas

A bank or high-security prison guard being persuaded to violate their duty by a normal human should certainly be extremely unlikely. I would give significantly better odds to exceptionally skilled people, but I would find it very unlikely that even they would succeed without some holding some advantage.

However, even very skilled humans most likely won't come anywhere close to a theroretically perfect approach. Such a negotiation is after all a very complicated activity with a near infinite number of possible approaches. Just because any real life human might be unlikely to succeed at such a senario, does not at all mean that any level of skill would be insufficent.

A guard could very well be pusuaded that he is better of with a changing jobs and that he would definately get away with violating his duty. Every guard might not be susseptible to this specific approach, but tailoring your approach to your specific target is part of having a high skill. Others might be possible to persuade that letting the prissoner go would be the right thing to do, that the friends of the prissoner are holding the family of the guard hostage or that they will get a bribe if they let them go etc.

It's in SE already (maybe Basic also?) that the guard could roll against his Loyalty instead—which, if he'd risk injury in the course of his job, would be 13-15. I was also thinking of using a Will-based Professional Skill roll for someone who's used to dealing with slippery types in the course of his job (a bounty hunter, in my instance). Risking one's employment is listed as a -2 (to the Manipulator), and personal danger is -3. Even so, that doesn't reduce the Vixen's chances against the Headsman quite enough to make it seem "right."

[Kalzazz]

A CO might well perceive an Offender as having Social Stigma (Criminal) and such also

[Whyte]

Milady de Winter pulls off some very good scams in the Three Musketeers.

There is also Snow White and the Huntsman.

A big point to me would be:
Does the executioner think that he could get away with it? "Let me escape and stay behind to be hung, drawn and quartered." sounds a lot different from "Lets escape together, I have some rich friends who will help us to get to the Caribbean, where we will live out the rest of our lives in wealth and debauchery." Is the execution to be supervised by people who would recognize her and point it out if he tried to pull a switcheroo? Also, some of the executioners might be quite callous and have high Will to go through their brutal job. Some might be downright sadistic.

But yeah, I'd probably allow for a chance.

[Not]

To elaborate: Milady de Winter is in prison and is interrogated by her prosecutor, a young zealot. Over the course of many weeks and many interviews, she gradually corrupts him and somehow convinces him to allow her to escape, with the promise that they will run away together. Of course, the rendezvous never happens. Dumas writes the encounters so very convincingly, I'm not certain whether they are fact or fiction. (He blunders in having her threatened with exile to Australia about 200 years too early.)