Question on transitioning from social into physical conflict

[luminos]

There should always be some justification for switching from one sphere of conflict to another.  If the social conflict is about the vampire trying to intimidate the players, and the players resisting that intimidation, a concession should involve the players backing off and maybe trying to get the prisoner through stealth or subterfuge.  Or maybe the concession would be that when they switch to physical combat, they all have sticky aspects of being scared of the bad guys.  But conceding to direct intimidation shouldn't result in the heroes becoming really brave and going all out on the attack (unless, perhaps, a player aspect was invoked to justify doing so).  

There is not a static guideline for how to handle these situations, but if you try to make what can happen appropriate to the situation, it should work out okay.

Edit:  Partial solution:  Have you considered having one of the vampires using intimidation as a block on the players entering physical conflict?

[Papa Gruff]

You are right, it is a pretty complicated thing. And as a GM i try to decide what's good at the given moment. I mean hey, in the end it all turned out more or less the way I had expected it to. So everything is cool. I was just a tiny bit disappointed that the very cool social conflict came to such a crushing end. I would have liked to see the banter between the factions carry on a bit more. The repercussions will come out of the plot now. No problem.  

The players did good in the scene. They snatched what they came out of the claws of the RC, which are probably not glad about that. All together a bolt move that payed out at the moment but will come around to haunt the players some more. What more can a GM ask for? Just was curious on the take you forum guys would go for...

EDIT: @luminos EDIT ... Can i do that?!

[ahunting]

Ok we also did this in our game, and just went with, Concession to end the social combat, the agreed upon concession from both sides was something like "I'm really just here to just kick your a$$ anyway".  I don't think you can use an intimidate block vs entering physical Combat.

[luminos]

I don't think you can use an intimidate block vs entering physical Combat.

I don't see why not.  If it's a problem, though, just make a stunt that lets a character able to do that.

[TheMouse]

The following is general FATE stuff. I haven't memorized the intricacies of how Dresden is different than what I'm used to. So, please feel free to point out any rules that I'm breaking. (:

The way I see it, things are as complex as someone at the table is willing to make them.

If no one wants to do something tricksy, there's nothing stopping you from tossing punches at someone while they continue to try to frighten you off. Running a mixed social/physical conflict isn't an issue at all. Those who want to use physical violence use Alertness for initiative, while those who are using their social muscles use Empathy. Determine tie breakers normally between those using the same type of conflict, and use the opposing skill to break ties among those using differing types (so someone using physical conflict against a social conflict person uses Alertness, then breaks ties with the social dude with Empathy).

Someone being beaten on in social conflict can offer a Concession. They'll behave as though afraid and will back off, but they won't resort to physical violence. This way, you can avoid being Taken Out by giving some ground, and you can even be frightened away from physical violence, but you get to keep some Consequences unused.

Or you can use Maneuvers of a social nature during a physical fight. Keep using social skills to toss Aspects on the  terrified victim, then pass off the free tags to your buddies. The narrative "looks" like you're cowering in fear, even if no actual social conflict is going on.

Or you can use intimidation as a Block. Stop someone from coming any closer to you with your big aura of fear. Or keep someone from leaving. Or whatever.

There are like a hundred ways to do something with this.

[ahunting]

The following is general FATE stuff. I haven't memorized the intricacies of how Dresden is different than what I'm used to. So, please feel free to point out any rules that I'm breaking. (:

The way I see it, things are as complex as someone at the table is willing to make them.

If no one wants to do something tricksy, there's nothing stopping you from tossing punches at someone while they continue to try to frighten you off. Running a mixed social/physical conflict isn't an issue at all. Those who want to use physical violence use Alertness for initiative, while those who are using their social muscles use Empathy. Determine tie breakers normally between those using the same type of conflict, and use the opposing skill to break ties among those using differing types (so someone using physical conflict against a social conflict person uses Alertness, then breaks ties with the social dude with Empathy).

Someone being beaten on in social conflict can offer a Concession. They'll behave as though afraid and will back off, but they won't resort to physical violence. This way, you can avoid being Taken Out by giving some ground, and you can even be frightened away from physical violence, but you get to keep some Consequences unused.

Or you can use Maneuvers of a social nature during a physical fight. Keep using social skills to toss Aspects on the  terrified victim, then pass off the free tags to your buddies. The narrative "looks" like you're cowering in fear, even if no actual social conflict is going on.

Or you can use intimidation as a Block. Stop someone from coming any closer to you with your big aura of fear. Or keep someone from leaving. Or whatever.

There are like a hundred ways to do something with this.

That is an interesting solution.

[Sabrel]

Why should it be the other way? Just because you're good at Physical, if someone starts a social conflict, you can just punch them in the face and describe a Taken Out result where they don't have to talk to them?

That's a perfectly allowed course of action in reality. Why not in the game? It is a choice that can carry heavy consequences, but it is an allowed choice.

Violence is the ultimate negotiation. To quote Robert Heinlein, "Violence, naked force, has settled more issues in history than has any
other factor, and the contrary opinion is wishful thinking at its worst." With violence as the final potential arbitrator of any situation, what then makes social conflict a plausible option to begin with? There are no arbitrary rules of reality (the game) to force people into social conflict over physical ones so, generally, it is the conventions adopted by society as a whole.

In the Dresdenverse,society, both mortal and supernatural, has adopted various constructs of rules and regulations on when the use of violence is acceptable. Conversely, there are also punishments for individuals who defy those conventions. If someone is giving you too much lip in a bar and you decide to get physical rather than just take the social loss, then bouncers and potentially even bystanders and/or the police are going to get involved. If a wizard is losing a social fight to a WCV and lights him up, unless the vamp gave one of the strictly worded reasons for violence under the Accords, that wizard just committed an act of war to avoid losing one Social conflict. Just for the privilege of switching the mode of the fight to one of his strengths, he's not only going to have a bunch of Whites wanting his head, but probably a fair part of the White Council too.

When you're dealing with potent fae, who's deaths can unbalance nature itself, and wizards that can level city blocks with their death curse, violence outside of tight constraints is something the vast majority of entities is going to find objectionable in the extreme, and they will certainly make that displeasure felt most potently on anarchs that  regularly violate the conventions on combat. So in addition to the hazards of misjudging the combat strength of your social opponent and getting dead rather than simply humiliated, there is also all of the other fallout that comes from talking with your fists all the time. There is no need for a kludge rule fix when in-game consequences already provide heavy deterrent to abuse.

If something is important enough to a character where they are willing to risk all of that to start a fight (or if the character is just dumb or stubborn enough to do it anyway), maybe you should let them, and then let them deal with the consequences of that choice.

Happens to Harry all the time.

[GoldenH]

GH to reality here, you guys are saying it's okay to deny access to social combat through use of physical combat, but it's awful deny access to physical combat through use of social combat?

Either both are okay, or neither are; there's no reason to make physical combat superior because it isn't. Making it possible to ignore social combat IS the kludge rule fix.

[Sabrel]

It's doesn't fit logical consistency, and it flies in the face of multiple situations in the very narrative that provide the basis for this game. The problem is, you're looking at the combat rules purely in a vacuum. The idea that "either both are okay, or neither are" completely ignores the situations surrounding and following combat, which are part of the balancing factors, and I have brought them up several times. A character that turns everything into a physical fight doesn't get off scott free. Very often, he ends up in a much worse situation than if he had just taken his social knocks gracefully.

Of course, a lot of this comes down to GMing style. I am a firm believer that everything within a game needs to maintain an internal logical consistency. It needs to "make sense" so that the players can just make use of common sense (possibly a slightly modified version, but common sense nevertheless) to determine what they can and can't do, and what is a "good idea" and what is a "bad idea" without needing a deep, "crunchy" knowledge of rules mechanics. As far as I am concerned, if a rule has to fall back on "because it's a rule," rather than having an easily plausible in-world explanation for why X can/can't be done, it's a bad rule. It is hard to find such explanations for social situations not being allowed to descend into violence, because it happens a fair amount in the stories, and players can point to that.

Honestly, I like TheMouse's solution of combining things the best, though. Life is rarely cut and dry, in either our universe or the Dresdenverse. Excluding social combat from a fight and versa because "that's not the kind of conflict we're having right now" seems a very artificial shackling. A warlock can throw a mental attack during a fight, why not a social one? It lets a socially strong character potentially hamstring a fighter by tying up consequences in absorbing Social hits when they could otherwise be absorbing Physical damage, and vice versa.

[Wordmaker]

Who says this game is about emulating reality?    The rules are there to reflect fiction and narrative.

I've run games that have drifted from social to physical conflict without any issues whatsoever. The beauty of FATE is that it can handle pretty much anything that can be thrown at it.

If you're in a gunfight, there's no problem using Rapport to try and negotiate a ceasefire (inflicting Stress) or using Intimidate to startle an opponent (a maneuver or block).

[neko128]

I think I'd probably have just inflicted the social consequences anyway, while letting him shift it over into physical combat.  The way you described it smacks of dodging the consequences with a poor excuse.  If the RCV was winning a social combat through intimidation, hell, the PCs're probably scared.  The consequences could be the equivalent, as someone mentioned, of "backed into a corner" or "terrified by fear".  I'm not convinced they should be *allowed* to attack if they've just lost being intimidated, without overcoming that consequence somehow.

The rules specifically say the easiest way to reflect those consequences is an Aspect - "terrified", "too scared to approach the big bad vampire", whatever.

The rules also provide alternate ways to reflect the consequences - in how the PCs are treated by other people.  Giving them a reputation as "yellow-bellied", or "not as tough as the vampires".

Seriously, if they lost the social conflict, they lost the social conflict.  They shouldn't get out of it for free.

If one of them made a physical attack "fairly", and before they actually took social consequences...  I see no reason to believe the vampire couldn't still make another social attack and inflict those consequences anyway, in the case of intimidation.  Logical discourse?  Maybe not so much in a firefight.  But "RAAR, I'M THE BIG BAD VAMPIIIIIIIRE!" *rips up lamp-post and smashes a car with it* makes just as much sense - if not more - when the bullets are flying. 

[GoldenH]

So, I'm curious, what exactly is the perceived difference between The Mouse's position, mine, and those others who are agreeing to allow mixing social/physical combat so long as everything is kept consistent?

[Wordmaker]

I don't see much of a difference. The only thing I'd add is that a character shouldn't be able to get out of taking Stress in one form by introducing another form of conflict to the scene.

So sure, I'd be more than happy to let someone punch a guy in the face for threatening him. But he's still taking any Stress or Consequences that come from that Social attack.

[TheMouse]

So, I'm curious, what exactly is the perceived difference between The Mouse's position, mine, and those others who are agreeing to allow mixing social/physical combat so long as everything is kept consistent?

Mostly that I'm cuter and more likable than you and thus easier to agree with.

[neko128]

Mostly that I'm cuter and more likable than you and thus easier to agree with.

 /facepalm