Voice impersonation : Acting or Mimicry?

[Anaraxes]

Originally Posted by Pursuivant

Sounds like a job for the Dabbler perk

That was my thought. Though I'm not sure all agents were put through the entire syllabus. There was customization by different sections (destination regions) and often mission.

I've got PS variants called Fire Fighter and Tradecraft

I did wind up with a few points that I couldn't easily slot into an existing skill -- for example, "setting up meetings", "arranging fallback positions", "use dead letter box" (better, the knowledge of that and similar techniques, including cutouts; literally just "using" the box would be Holdout, Pickpocket, etc), cell organization and recruiting to spawn off new cells (as distinguished from recruiting for any normal job or military organization, with which there's overlap). There are enough little bits that don't fit that I was also thinking of a PS: Tradecraft just to make sure they were covered. But the bits are little enough that it might be better to try to stuff them into other skills, just as the spy-oriented applications -- or just skip them, since I'm also not sure there'd be a lot of call to roll against a skill for the leftover bits.

[Anaraxes]

Originally Posted by whswhs

If you're not attempting to deceive the audience into believing you really are the person you're impersonating, it's not Acting; it's Performance.

That's a good rule for initially placing the distinction, but it does get blurry in practice, and so perhaps not so good for a bright-line objective determination of which skill always to call for. Good actors do temporarily deceive their audience, though we usually call it "suspension of disbelief" in this case. If you're watching Cate Blanchett, and you're thinking of past good Germans, Queen Elizabeth, how her relationship with Andrew Upton is going, and what her next project is going to be while she's portraying Galadriel in LOTR, then she would be doing something wrong. The audience is supposed to stop seeing her as anything but that character she's currently portraying, in part because she's successfully counterfeiting the moods, emotions, and voice that the character should have. On the reverse, con men and fast-talkers are also getting you to suspend your disbelief in their proposition long enough for them to get away with their schemes, long con or short.

Really good "performances", on the other hand, are sometimes found to be so iconic and definitive that they dominate other interpretations of a character; viewers (or critics) have been fooled into not seeing those other performances at all, even if the other actor is skilled. The iconic deception is so strong that it takes on a bit of reality of its own, and to be convincing, subsequent actors wind up having to counterfeit their predecessor, rather than their own independent vision of the character.

I wouldn't blame anyone for being confused as to which skill is which in many cases. I'd probably just rename Acting to "Deception" to make the "Acting is deception" intent more clear. But there's still a blurry line between that and Performance; people are impressed and entertained (Performance) by the very ability to counterfeit moods and emotions (Acting). This might be a case where the skills were split too finely. Or, it might just be that a better answer is to move the boundary, so that "Performance" covers just the Professional Skill: Actor knowledge and keeps at most the ability to form a rapport with the audience, suitable for musicians as well as actors, while actors are either relying on their Performance-2 default to do their job of Acting, or just have both skills, removing the default between them.

Luckily, GURPS has GMs, so they can each make their own calls as their situation needs.

[pawsplay]

Originally Posted by whswhs

If you're not attempting to deceive the audience into believing you really are the person you're impersonating, it's not Acting; it's Performance.

But acting covers moods as well as impersonation. And surely there is such a thing as acting with sincerity; acting in congruence with your intentions is surely not always entertainment.

[Anaraxes]

Originally Posted by pawsplay

But acting covers moods as well as impersonation

Also voices, hence the titular question of the thread. Bill's comment puts a lot of weight on the "believe you really are". (I'm reminded of the 1978 Christopher Reeve "Superman", with the famous tagline "You'll believe a man can fly".) My own earlier comment pointed out that I would say I was supposed to believe Cate Blanchett "was Galadriel" -- in the context of the film.

The difference with the deceitful Mission: Impossible type of impersonation is the context. The target of the impersonation thinks the situation is "real". And I pick M:I as the example, because their modus operandi is famously elaborately gaslighting their target -- dates, locations, surrounding events -- so that what they think is real is often enough all faked, as much as is a movie. (There were a couple of M:I eps that were based on filming a movie or TV show. Philip K. Dick did a treatment of a plot that involved a rogue M:I agent that was on to all their tricks, and so involved many layers of I-know-that-you-know-that-I-know deception, putting Total Recall to shame, and at least matching Inception. But, it was never produced.)

So, you "know" that a movie is just a movie, but the actors aren't doing their job if you're not "drawn into the movie" -- which is to say, believing that it's real just deeply enough and long enough for the act to serve its purpose. In the case of Hollywood, that's entertainment -- and taking a bit of of your money. In the case of a long con, they might be after a bit more of your money, and much less concerned as to whether you're happy when the deception ends. (And speaking of "Inception", there's of course "The Sting", a movie about a con... Or "The Stuntman", where the titular character has some trouble figuring out when the movie ends.)

That context of "reality" is a little blurry, and in both cases, is of limited scope and duration. That's why I argued earlier that most actors do in fact usually have a good Acting skill, not just Performance. Whether or not they put that skill toward other ends is a matter of the actor's own ethics, not built into the skill itself. There are actors that just play themselves in every role, but those are relatively uncommon. And there are those that are typecast, always playing the same sort of character even though those characters are nominally different people". But that's an absence of information about their range, not a positive signal that those actors have no Acting skill.

Similarly, Penn Gillette (a magician) bluntly describes his job as "lying to you". They just use their skills, which aren't solely Sleight of Hand, to entertain, and thus also have Performance, though criminals could use the same skills in other ways.

"Trying to make you really think" some particular thing is common in entertainment.

All that said, I do agree with the core distinction Bill points out. Acting is deception; Performance is the degree of entertainment, along with the Professional Skill part of the skill set of an actor. Rather than try to push impersonation into Performance so that actors can pile points into Just One Skill, I'd just insist that those characters have both skills.

And surely there is such a thing as acting with sincerity; acting in congruence with your intentions is surely not always entertainment.

That's a different sense of the word. You don't roll against GURPS Acting skill whenever you try to do anything ("act"), or when you substitute for another official in your organization ("acting President" -- you're not deceiving people), or when your anger takes on physical expression ("act out"), or, oppositely, when you behave in an appropriate manner ("act your age"). You can imagine a little brat that you scold into behaving appropriately. But while a truly bad kid might even indeed be trying to use Acting to pretend they're a good kid when they're not, and that Acting President is taking the place of the real President, those are just small similarities to the actor-con man-deceptive sense of the word that gives the Acting skill its name that makes English use the same word for similar meanings in many cases.

We go through life every day without hard, bright lines neatly delineating the exact, objectively determinable meaning of every nuance. The GURPS skill list is just another case where some judgement is called for.

[whswhs]

Originally Posted by pawsplay

But acting covers moods as well as impersonation. And surely there is such a thing as acting with sincerity; acting in congruence with your intentions is surely not always entertainment.

Are you talking about acting (the real world profession and practice) or about Acting (the GURPS skill)? The two are not the same thing, not at all. This is one of the places where GURPS terminology causes a lot of confusion.

For acting with sincerity, see the passage about cultivating a persona on p. 61 of GURPS Social Engineering.

Bill Stoddard

[pawsplay]

Originally Posted by Anaraxes

That's a different sense of the word. You don't roll against GURPS Acting skill whenever you try to do anything ("act"), or when you substitute for another official in your organization ("acting President" -- you're not deceiving people), or when your anger takes on physical expression ("act out"), or, oppositely, when you behave in an appropriate manner ("act your age"). You can imagine a little brat that you scold into behaving appropriately. But while a truly bad kid might even indeed be trying to use Acting to pretend they're a good kid when they're not, and that Acting President is taking the place of the real President, those are just small similarities to the actor-con man-deceptive sense of the word that gives the Acting skill its name that makes English use the same word for similar meanings in many cases.

So do you think the Honest Face Perk is always used in a deceitful manner? That is, is it a Perk possessed only by those who are actually dishonest?

[whswhs]

Originally Posted by pawsplay

So do you think the Honest Face Perk is always used in a deceitful manner? That is, is it a Perk possessed only by those who are actually dishonest?

Honest Face is not about not seeming to be deceitful, but about not seeming to be a criminal or troublemaker. That is, it's about seeming to have Honesty, which in GURPS means obeying the law; telling the truth is Truthfulness. Honest Face does give a bonus to Acting skill IF you are pretending to be innocent, but not for any other deceptions.

Honest Face can also help you get through customs, for example, without being singled out for close inspection, and more generally can prevent your being suspected of lawbreaking. Since a law-abiding person CAN be suspected of lawbreaking, it can be useful to such a person.

[pawsplay]

Originally Posted by whswhs

Honest Face is not about not seeming to be deceitful, but about not seeming to be a criminal or troublemaker. That is, it's about seeming to have Honesty, which in GURPS means obeying the law; telling the truth is Truthfulness. Honest Face does give a bonus to Acting skill IF you are pretending to be innocent, but not for any other deceptions.

Honest Face can also help you get through customs, for example, without being singled out for close inspection, and more generally can prevent your being suspected of lawbreaking. Since a law-abiding person CAN be suspected of lawbreaking, it can be useful to such a person.

If you are smuggling things through customs, presumably there's some Acting there if you need to play it cool.

What skill would it be, to convince them, hey, I'm not smuggling, when you're really not?

[Curmudgeon]

Originally Posted by pawsplay

If you are smuggling things through customs, presumably there's some Acting there if you need to play it cool.

What skill would it be, to convince them, hey, I'm not smuggling, when you're really not?

Neither Acting nor Performance. Law, possibly with a specialty in Customs and Tariffs, seems the likeliest as the backing for "Hey, I'm not smuggling[,]" comes down to "See here, this is the definition of smuggling and these are the elements that comprise the offence. Note that the second element, here, the fifth element here, as well as the sixth element here, have not been met. Consequently as those are essential elements 9f the offence and they are not present, no offence has occurred."

Public speaking (Bard) might be useful and if you're in a hurry, you might try to bamboozle them with Fast-Talk. Note that Fast-Talk essentially operates to get a snap decision in your favour so it is not necessary that you be trying to get a decision that you're not entitled to, even though that is a common use to put the skill to.

[Refplace]

Originally Posted by pawsplay

If you are smuggling things through customs, presumably there's some Acting there if you need to play it cool.

What skill would it be, to convince them, hey, I'm not smuggling, when you're really not?

I would say Acting to try and look relaxed and calm and am influence skill such as Fast Talk if you get caught to try and talk your way out of it.