Social Combat: House Rules and Random Thoughts

[Taran]

After having a long conversation about the intricacies/problems/hurdles of Social combat, I was wondering how other people run their conflicts and/or if they have any house-rules they've put in.

Also, if you could revamp it any way you wanted, how would you do it? 
(removing it from the game doesn't count as a solution!)

***

I'll start a train of thought:

Presence as a passive skill.  It's weird and, its usefulness is dependent on how much your GM uses it.   How do you use the Charisma Trapping, for example?

I feel like First Impressions Trapping should be in presence instead of Rapport.

In fact passive skills are silly.  Alertness seems to work ok ...but 'The Tip Off' for Contacts?  or 'Info Dump' for scholarship?  They're great if you have a GM that actually considers them...do people even take stunts that boost those trappings?

[blackstaff67]

Never really comes up unless a player reminds me of his Presence.  Most folks I know take the Presence skill at one point just to have a better social track--and that's it.   

Come to think of it, don't know that many people who bother buying Contacts all that often, either, outside of NPCs. 

What the rules needs is a way to showcase how someone might have a single trapping of the skill at a decent level while being substandard at the other trappings that doesn't require the player to spend Refresh to purchase a Stunt.  Honestly, if the game could've done that, I'd be happier with the rules.  The whole Aspect thing doesn't necessarily do it all for me, because it mandates the expenditure of a Fate Point...and while there may be generous GMs out there, I think I can safely presume FPs are not easily come by.

[Taran]

Never really comes up unless a player reminds me of his Presence.  Most folks I know take the Presence skill at one point just to have a better social track--and that's it.   

Come to think of it, don't know that many people who bother buying Contacts all that often, either, outside of NPCs. 

What the rules needs is a way to showcase how someone might have a single trapping of the skill at a decent level while being substandard at the other trappings that doesn't require the player to spend Refresh to purchase a Stunt.  Honestly, if the game could've done that, I'd be happier with the rules.  The whole Aspect thing doesn't necessarily do it all for me, because it mandates the expenditure of a Fate Point...and while there may be generous GMs out there, I think I can safely presume FPs are not easily come by.

I love contacts.  It can be super useful. 

The Showcasing trappings isn't necessarily a social combat problem...I suppose you could separate all the trappings from their skills but break them into their grander parts: social, physical, mental.  Then dole out more points.  X social points, X mental, X physical points.

It would take a lot of balancing.  Maybe each category has its own pyramid.

[Haru]

As a lot of the things in the DFRPG, I think trappings are a relic of the past. I like to just look at the skills and use them to do whatever makes sense. I don't really look at the trappings at all, if they are not special rules, like the ambush trapping.

Presence, for example, would be the skill to lead people, to make them listen to you, etc. If that matches a trapping, great, if not, as long as it fits that theme, it can be rolled with that skill.

Best example of using a passive skill actively would be one of Arcane's latest actions with Jeffrey. He used contacts to declare that he knows the guy he is fighting, because he sparred with him.
http://www.jimbutcheronline.com/bb/index.php/topic,39379.msg2225160.html#msg2225160

There's not really a trapping for this kind of thing, but it makes sense in the theme of the skill.

[RonLugge]

I have a group that's merged 'Presence' and "Rapport" into the 'Charisma' skill.  Frankly, I think that's the right way to go with those.  Presence just isn't strong enough as an independent skill at most tables.  Similar to how might is just a skill drain that should probably be merged into physique.

[Taran]

Physique feels a like a balanced skill...mostly because Might isn't used for much.

Putting the stress track trapping of presence together with the broad sweeping attack/defense of rapport feels too powerful, IMO.    There's no reason to take another skill. 

It's like taking endurance, weapons, guns and athletics and putting them into the same skill.

Actually, I'd say my biggest complaint is that rapport is too powerful.  I feel it should be limited to an attack skill and empathy should be a defense skill.

Deceit can be used to attack and defend on specific occasions but not always.  Which I find balances it.

Presence needs a broader application.  Right now it can 'sometimes' be used as a defence.  Its only real active trapping is Command.

[Mr. Death]

The way I look at it, Presence is your passive, established impression on people. Your reputation, etc. Basically how people see you who haven't actually spoken to you personally.

Rapport is how well you actually interact with people -- how friendly and personable you are, how well you can talk to others, etc.

Basically, Presence is a restaurant giving Robert Downey Jr. a discount because he's a famous celebrity.

Rapport is a restaurant giving Robert Downey Jr. a discount because he was friendly to the wait staff, posed for photos with them and everyone had a great time.

Not all the skills are or should be active -- some are just to establish things.

That said, I never do social conflicts because my groups tend to be primarily roleplayers anyway, and they'd rather just act it out as seems natural.

[Haru]

You could take the Core skills for this. You've got provoke and rapport. Provoke is anything that is intended to provoke a feeling in someone else. Doesn't really matter which, angering someone would be done with this just as much as flirting. It's the social attack skill. On the other hand you've got rapport that's more like the social defense skill. It distinguishes mainly between how you actively make people feel towards you and how your general behavior makes them feel towards you. Empathy still exists as well, I think, but it's more of a social notice.

[Taran]

The way I look at it, Presence is your passive, established impression on people. Your reputation, etc. Basically how people see you who haven't actually spoken to you personally.

Rapport is how well you actually interact with people -- how friendly and personable you are, how well you can talk to others, etc.

Basically, Presence is a restaurant giving Robert Downey Jr. a discount because he's a famous celebrity.

Rapport is a restaurant giving Robert Downey Jr. a discount because he was friendly to the wait staff, posed for photos with them and everyone had a great time.

Not all the skills are or should be active -- some are just to establish things.

I remember this example and love it. I was trying to remember where I'd read it before.   It illustrates it well.

The problem is Presence relies on the GM lowering the resource roll for buying Lunch at the restaurant because he has a high Presence.
Rapport relies on the player saying, "I want to do a rapport maneuver and tag it to boost my resource roll"

the former usually gets overlooked because it's passive. 

[Theogony_IX]

I think Presence is a great modifying skill.  Rather than have the GM change the difficulty of the roll based on Presence, ask to have Presence compliment your Resources roll.

But yeah, keeping track of passive skills is difficult as a GM, at least it is for me.  I like to hope my players will call it out and make up for my failing in that area.

I tend to agree that exchange based rolls make social conflict feel unnatural and unwieldy.  You've suggested a few time in our game the idea of using opposed rolls and consequential contests to decide the outcome and then just roleplay it in that direction.  I like this idea, and used it a bit in the scene with Kai Bei and Yan Shi.  I also like the purchase based rules that wyvern found, used when you are trying to get someone to do something.  See this link for the details of that method.  I actually think that would have fit perfectly with the scene you are currently in with Fuling and Kai Bei.

You could probably break social conflicts down into two types, each covered by one of the two methods.

Opposed roles, extended contests, and consequential contests:  You are trying to discover something (an interrogation, an interview, a few questions).  You are trying to make someone react a certain way (become attracted to you, become angry).  You are trying to make someone do something immediately (leave in embarrassment, come back to your place, hand over the keys to a vault).  If you're doing an extended contest, consequential or otherwise, spacing the deciding rolls out allows players to make declarations and maneuvers to swing the conflict back and forth.  This gives low social skills players at least a chance to succeed even if they are outmatched.

Purchase-based conflict:  You want someone to behave in a particular way for a long period of time or to pursue a goal (back you politically, go and find an person/place/thing, guard a location while you are elsewhere).

I think these give a great deal of flexibility to players allowing them to roleplay their characters to the best of their ability and simply guide the scene to the decided result however fits the character.  The more social skills you invest in, the more effective you'll be at approaching a wide variety of social conflicts.  This also opens up justification for passive skills to become more active skills.

[RonLugge]

But yeah, keeping track of passive skills is difficult as a GM, at least it is for me.  I like to hope my players will call it out and make up for my failing in that area.

Which is one reason I'm starting to encourage players to argue with me over what skills are applicable to a given situation.  And, by extension, to mention when a passive might apply.  Some things, like 'tip off' from contacts is hard to remember, but...

[Dougansf]

You could take the Core skills for this. You've got provoke and rapport. Provoke is anything that is intended to provoke a feeling in someone else. Doesn't really matter which, angering someone would be done with this just as much as flirting. It's the social attack skill. On the other hand you've got rapport that's more like the social defense skill. It distinguishes mainly between how you actively make people feel towards you and how your general behavior makes them feel towards you. Empathy still exists as well, I think, but it's more of a social notice.

Agreed.  Fate Core got rid of the trappings, and merged a lot of the skills from DFRPG.  This made it much clearer (to me) about what skill does what, and it became easier to match it to physical combat mechanics.

Empathy is defense skill against Deceive, and also the Social Initiative skill, like Notice.

[InFerrumVeritas]

We haven't played DFRPG in a while, but when Fate Core (and the Toolkit came out) we used the idea of a stress track for chase scenes for social conflicts.  So there would be two group stress tracks that were x-boxes long (set somewhat arbitrarily, but aspects could be invoked to lengthen it at the start of the challenge).  Group would then try and push theirs faster.  No consequences, but aspects placed could last the whole session if relevant.

[Taran]

We haven't played DFRPG in a while, but when Fate Core (and the Toolkit came out) we used the idea of a stress track for chase scenes for social conflicts.  So there would be two group stress tracks that were x-boxes long (set somewhat arbitrarily, but aspects could be invoked to lengthen it at the start of the challenge).  Group would then try and push theirs faster.  No consequences, but aspects placed could last the whole session if relevant.

Chase scenes.  So a set number of rolls and whoever has the most shifts wins...

Sorry, I don't understand.  You are trying to fill your own track?  Since you want to lengthen your track, I suppose you mean you are trying to fill the other group's track?

So, there's a difficulty that you roll against and shifts you gain go against your track.  Whoever fills their track fastest wins?

It's a very intriguing method but I don't think I get what you're saying.  could you elaborate?