Why A Party Face Is A Bad Idea

[scc]

Some thoughts of mine crystallized recently, and well the thread title came to me. Let me explain.

Party face, for those of you unaware, is a term from D&D, dating back to at least the 3rd ed era, where due to the fact that all talky skills keyed off a single attribute, CHA, that most classes didn't get much use out of, along with the way skill points where handed out, most parties would a single member, most likely a rouge, bard, or sorcerer, to be the party face and invest in the needed skills. What this means is that anytime the party needs to do talky stuff, this one party member gets the spotlight.

Now this is a single point of failure, which is bad enough, but I've realized that in DF, which copies D&D pretty much to a T, follows an cycle of start in town for talky stuff, move to dungeon for fighty stuff, then back to town for more talky, and I wouldn't be surprised if many other genre's are apt to follow a somewhat similar pattern. The problem with this is that the non-talky characters don't have much to do in town, meaning they'll want to leave town and get to the dungeon quickly, where everyone has stuff to do!

[Refplace]

The advantage in GURPS is Charisma and Talents can be pretty cheap and helpful. Also a few points in a skill and your likely to be competent and enough different attribute bases that its not had for everyone to be decent in town.

[Michele]

I'm not so sure.

First thing, in old-school dungeoning specialization was the main thrust of character classes. You have one brute-force frontline fighter, one magic user, one healer, one trap disarmer, one stealthy specialist, one archer etc. There is some overlap, in a way similar to a secondary MOS, but not much. All of that is not so different from having one social-skills specialist.

Secondly, who says that in dungeons you have no talk to do? That may be true for truly basic games. After those, you might always meet another party of adventurers, who are competitors but not necessarily evil or enemies. Or you might encounter a group of social monsters who also are, maybe for just for this once, willing to negotiate, etc.

Thirdly, this is GURPS. There's a long list of social Advantages beyond Charisma; there are several social skills. I can easily imagine that the thief has the best scores in Streewise and Fast-Talk. But the warrior, with his high HT, and notwithstanding his only average IQ, is the man to deal with the burly mercenaries drinking in the tavern - Carousing. Elves, with their good looks, are the best candidates to spend a couple of points in Sex Appeal. The priestly healer might have Savoir-Faire. While the rogue - the "party face" - will have a smattering of many of those, good levels in Fast-Talk and Acting, and above all an investment in the hardest skill, Diplomacy.

[Anthony]

In general any skill division that winds up with one PC doing most of the stuff for an extended scene while other people just sit around is poor game play (other notable offenders are stealth recon missions and netrunners), but it's rather tricky to fix.

[Say, it isn't that bad!]

Originally Posted by Anthony

In general any skill division that winds up with one PC doing most of the stuff for an extended scene while other people just sit around is poor game play (other notable offenders are stealth recon missions and netrunners), but it's rather tricky to fix.

If you can get one social skill (other than intimidation, interrogation, and the like) to 12-, you've got a 74% chance of at least making a decent impression; and failing by 1 or 2 covers 16% of the remainder, and is typically recoverable.

There's not a lot of difference between:

"That charming leader and their followers who offered to help discreetly retrieve Aunt Mildred's necklace from those horrible bandits."

And:

"That nice bunch of people who offered to help getting Aunt Mildred's necklace back from those horrible bandits. Wasn't their leader so charming?"

But there's still a definite and distinct difference.

[Michele]

Originally Posted by Anthony

In general any skill division that winds up with one PC doing most of the stuff for an extended scene while other people just sit around is poor game play (other notable offenders are stealth recon missions and netrunners), but it's rather tricky to fix.

I'd say it's mainly poor planning on the GM's part. Netrunning is decidedly hard to work around, yes, but the other two situations can be made better if the GM plans them well, providing sidekick roles for the other PCs. Maybe, while the social guy is buttering up the important NPC, somebody tries to interfere; so the other PCs have to stop that, etc.

[Anaraxes]

Originally Posted by Anthony

one PC doing most of the stuff for an extended scene while other people just sit around

In our games, the face characters may take the lead, but other players are generally involved with suggestions and conversation. Rolls that need to be made are usually against the face's skill, as long as they're actually participating as well. (Occasionally not, if other players take over the role. Or, when certain characters have particular advantages in some social situations despite a lower skill / stat.)

The stealth recon mission is harder to fix. This is a case of splitting the party. So, the usual advice about making sure to keep the spotlight rotating might help. But often, the other characters have literally nothing to do while waiting on the results of the mission. The other players might be thrashing out alternative strategies based on things the scout discovers. But it's harder to be engaged than when the characters are part of a conversation and injecting their own questions and comments.

It's certainly a good idea for parties to have some degree of backup for the various roles. Everybody has to sneak or talk at some point. Treating those skills and stats as pure dump stats and diversion of resources that could have been used to further pump up your one trick is an unwise build for many styles of play other than the set-piece tactical wargame that dungeon crawling can become. The GM can encourage breadth by making sure that characters get to do things outside of their core niche, giving the players some variety, and also by not being too harsh with the penalties in those sittuations. A challenge for the specialist is probably going to be much riskier or frustrating for the non-specialists, so just make their challenges appropriate to the character, not nailed to one global scale.

[Fred Brackin]

In 3.x/Pathfinder our "designated diplomat" tended to be a Cleric who used hsi Charisma for Chanelling. After he reached 3rd level he could self-buff his Cahrisma too.

It doesn't apply in Gurps because Social Skills are mostly IQ-based and only a few character concepts can afford to use IQ as a dump stat in Gurps.

[ericthered]

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

It doesn't apply in Gurps because Social Skills are mostly IQ-based and only a few character concepts can afford to use IQ as a dump stat in Gurps.

But an awful lot of disadvantages feature a reaction penalty. A face usually has both good influence skills and a good reaction penalty.

I've had "Faces" dominate a few games in the social arena. Nowadays I usually run games where the party is frequently trying to accomplish two tasks at once in two different places, and I emphasize social play more. That requires a bit more interaction with the game world and scene juggling, but I really like it, and it means everyone will actually be using their social skills.

[Donny Brook]

These kinds of issues are why I left that Other game behind decades ago, and why I don't understand the popularity of DF now.