How to reach Dresden level health status

[BumblingBear]

If you want RAW (though I'm really less than fond of RAW arguments), check out YS315.  "Whenever a PC is attempting an action where time is important, choose a reasonable increment on the ladder as the starting point...  Reasonable is, of course, extremely group dependent.  If your group decides instant social damage is reasonable, go for it.   

Does it take more than an instant for an "Oh shit" moment to sink in?
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You get into a fight with a guy at a bar, you hit him hard, and he says, "You a-hole.  I'm a cop!"

Instant social consequence with a good social attack.
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You're a bad guy duking it out with a group in a park they lured you to.  You toss magic around, and one member of the group suddenly says, "This is accorded nuetral ground, and a pixie just watched you try to kill us!  Nah nah nah nah nah!"

Social attack.  Probable social consequence.
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Mental and physical consequences are a very real tool in combat, which is why there is a Psyops corp in the military.

It's why you can say, "I've got AIDs!" during a fight as an attack.

[Khalis231]

Implications are not RAW.

If characters can take mental stress from something disturbing they see in combat (and they can), then I see no reason why social stress cannot be taken as well.

Additionally, it makes sense to socially take out a character during combat.

Like, oh, "Luke, I am your father!". 

Point for Bumblingbear.

Well, I was hoping not to jump into the whole RAW thing, but here we go:

"Social conflicts occur when the opposing agendas of two or more characters are resolved without physical violence, calling upon a different set of skills and trappings to resolve them. The damage done by these conflicts can be highly variable, ranging from simply instilling a false sense of security in the loser to ruining his public reputation and hurting his relationships."

Emphasis mine. If physical violence is involved, it's not a social conflict, and the application of social skills is best resolved via maneuver.

But, as you say, characters can take mental stress during combat, which seems to imply the same for social stress. However:

"Being able to attack the mental stress track is no small feat. The kind of abuse necessary to inflict this kind of damage on another person usually takes a great deal of time and energy .... Between mortals, some sort of prior connection or justification must exist to inflict mental stress and consequences."

Basically, to deal mental stress in a combat situation (well, to deal mental stress period), you need some sort of justification, aka a power that lets you do so. Incite Emotion, Dominate, spirit evocation (arguably) etc. deal mental stress because their descriptions explicitly allow them to. An Outsider that deals mental stress simply due to its frightening appearance should have the specifics of that ability statted out as a power, and that capability should be reflected in its refresh cost.

There are no analogous powers for dealing social stress at a moment's notice. I would argue that the RAW supports keeping social stress out of physical conflicts, although at the end of the day I think it's mainly about personal preference. Handle it however works best for your group.


As far as the climax of ESB is concerned, Vader didn't take Luke out in that fight - Luke's player totally went for the concession after taking the extreme consequence of "Severed Hand." If Vader had taken Luke out, he would have either captured Luke or killed him.

[BumblingBear]

I want an official (at least as official as we can get) word from Fred on this.

As I said, saying, "I've got AIDs!" in a fight fight is very likely to take the opponent out or cause a concession.

To me, that is a social or mental attack.

I think that it was just misworded in the book.

Such as, "A social attack takes place when no bodily harm is being done" or something like that.

[UmbraLux]

Does it take more than an instant for an "Oh shit" moment to sink in?
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You get into a fight with a guy at a bar, you hit him hard, and he says, "You a-hole.  I'm a cop!"

Instant social consequence with a good social attack.
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You're a bad guy duking it out with a group in a park they lured you to.  You toss magic around, and one member of the group suddenly says, "This is accorded nuetral ground, and a pixie just watched you try to kill us!  Nah nah nah nah nah!"

Social attack.  Probable social consequence.
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Mental and physical consequences are a very real tool in combat, which is why there is a Psyops corp in the military.

It's why you can say, "I've got AIDs!" during a fight as an attack.

To me, every one of these would be better as a maneuver subsequently invoked for effect.  That will end the fight faster than going for a take out...whatever track you're targeting.

I want an official (at least as official as we can get) word from Fred on this.

Honestly, play it however your group is comfortable.  No matter what anyone says. 

[Set Abominae]

our group was facing the Dullahand, sort of the Fae version of the Grim Reaper, the inspiration for the Headless Horseman stories

As the group caster, I decided to cast a spell to set up the Fae in the center of an intense magnetic field as a definition for a weapon 8 Earth attack.

I ended up having to take a few consequences and spending some fate points to make to go off right, but the result was several cars, rebar, a hummer full of WWII era grenades and other assorted area debris slamming into him...

only to discover that he wasn't that easily killed

so, immediately afterward they decide we want to seal him away at least temporarily so we can book, so now I'm helping craft an iron ring and rushing through a binding ritual as the guy is coming back together, with help from the rest of the party (they volunteered to take some consequences for the ritual...adding their blood to the binding)

then I had to use earth magic to bury it deep enough that someone simply walking through the area wasn't going to break the circle.

finally, we learn that one of our number had been infected with balefire in the fight and thus the binding was going to last about half the time we thought it would since while binding him, it was also supercharging his healing

meanwhile, we had to cleanse the party member of balefire before it killed him

at the end of that, I had 8 consequences (I have a lot of mental resilience) and lots of dots filled up and the GM gave us all fate points for how many consequences we had, so I ended with 11 fate points, healing from the NPCs in the area get rid of some of the mild consequences...

and then we decided to contact the Archive about our Denarian related apocalypse situation and someone got the bright idea to open a portal directly to her, for which we needed a heavy load of power....

but first they want me to look at something in a museum with my sight and I find that a Winter veil has covered a Denarian curse around a display case that's supposed to hold the Papal ring coming soon, that cost some fate points to escape more consequences

queue the Dullahand I had sealed earlier and who was getting ready to escape...so we return to where he was bound and wait for just the moment that he escapes before he's free, but after his power is accessible....and drain him dry of power (at least temporarily) to open rifts in space through which the Archive and Kinkaid come

also at this time, I had to have the Sight up to time the spell correctly, so when the extra unintended rifts open up I get a nice eyeview right into some Nevernever underworld....on top of what was going on staring at the Dullahand

more rifts than we wanted open up and a horde of little gremlin thingies come swarming out and we cover for the archive as she cleans up our(my) sloppy spellcasting (at this point I'm operating with "gaping wounds" and "bleeding eyes and ears" physical consequences as well as a small handful of not yet recovered mental milds) I do a couple of simple spells including a "cloud of iron dust" to test to see if the enemy were fae (they weren't...I should probably apologize to the team half-orc at this point) and then the gremlin things smell the blood from my wounds and tons of them come swarming toward me...

At this point, I take a concession to electrocute everything within 10ft of me.

And I'm taken out...

I wake up later when my injuries are mostly gone somehow...something about the supernatural recovering Pharoah Reborn and a blood transfusion....which is how my character's idiot brother became said PCs vassal, so hoping the Pharoah character doesn't think about that....

And then I learn that my character's yakuza assassin family has decided to send a group inbound to "rescue" me from the Wardens....

who are vaguely suspicious (probably convinced) that I'm a warlock and only the greater issue of Denarians, Loki and Maeve plotting some sort of Doomsday thing is keeping them from running a full trial on me....

Err...how did your GM make that determination if you didn't get taken out or take a concession (cashing out page 206)?

[Thrythlind]

random house-ruled decision as I understand it...he wanted us to put aspects of our personality at risk, and at least one person had a forced aspect change brought on by how we handled the cure

[InFerrumVeritas]

I see how everyone sees it as one of each consequence period, but honestly I think RAI is that it is one of each consequence per stress track.  It does seem odd that socially curb-stomping a troll makes it easier to kill.  "You've insulted me, so instead of a bruise I've got a broken rib!"  My group saw it as different for each stress track too. 

[ways and means]

I believe social stress can be done in combat there are examples in the novel where people are talked down in the midst of violence and the concept of combat banter is standard for a heroic game. If you can talk, gesture, emote etc then in my opinion you can take part in some form of social combat and it makes sense especially in the case of intimidation which is part of battle.     

[toturi]

As I said, saying, "I've got AIDs!" in a fight fight is very likely to take the opponent out or cause a concession.

Or your opponent could well reply, "Is that a proposition?" And the person that said he had AIDS is very likely to be taken out or offer a concession with that.

[finnmckool]

I'm with Bear. If you can't perform social and mental attacks during a fist fight then what's the point of having damage tracks for them? Or consequences? Or anything? It reduces my character to only being useful in the ball room scene BEFORE the big fight? Which means my actions are less consequential because the GM is going to have that big fight coming regardless. Now I'm not saying there aren't a thousand ways to work around that, but my point is why work around it? Why have all the rules and trappings for social attacks if they're only for the snipping and repartee' during the pre-brawl? If you can't mix it all up, if they have to stay exactly separate fights, then what's the point? My social character in a group of thugs is just gonna end up sitting around, twiddling his thumbs, waiting for that ONE scene in the arc when I get to shine, like most other RPGs. One of the cool things about this game is exactly this mechanic that makes a social character a serious threat. You can clever your way out of any fight in a pinch. But if you can't mix the three then what's the point? All those social attacks become the bone you throw. "Here. Go diplomacy it up. Then we're having our rocket launcher fight."

[InFerrumVeritas]

As much as I disagree with it, I did just get clarification via email from Fred:

Four, period, as imolied by the character sheet -- but you can gain
additional typed consequence slots through stunts and their ilk.

Well crap on a stick.

[UmbraLux]

I believe social stress can be done in combat there are examples in the novel where people are talked down in the midst of violence and the concept of combat banter is standard for a heroic game. If you can talk, gesture, emote etc then in my opinion you can take part in some form of social combat and it makes sense especially in the case of intimidation which is part of battle. 

I still haven't seen any examples of a social attack during physical combat which can't be modeled (usually better) by a maneuver followed by invoking for effect. 

Invoking for effect is powerful.  Give someone reason to fear and they may run...without having to go through their stress and consequence tracks.  Of course it needs to fit the situation and opponent's personality, but that's why we role play!

I'm with Bear. If you can't perform social and mental attacks during a fist fight then what's the point of having damage tracks for them? Or consequences? Or anything?

Stress isn't damage.  Consequences are damage.  Stress is simply how tough and resilient you are against some class of attacks.

It reduces my character to only being useful in the ball room scene BEFORE the big fight? Which means my actions are less consequential because the GM is going to have that big fight coming regardless. Now I'm not saying there aren't a thousand ways to work around that, but my point is why work around it? Why have all the rules and trappings for social attacks if they're only for the snipping and repartee' during the pre-brawl? If you can't mix it all up, if they have to stay exactly separate fights, then what's the point? My social character in a group of thugs is just gonna end up sitting around, twiddling his thumbs, waiting for that ONE scene in the arc when I get to shine, like most other RPGs. One of the cool things about this game is exactly this mechanic that makes a social character a serious threat. You can clever your way out of any fight in a pinch. But if you can't mix the three then what's the point? All those social attacks become the bone you throw. "Here. Go diplomacy it up. Then we're having our rocket launcher fight."

Maneuver, maneuver, maneuver! 

Seriously.  Distractions, sowing seeds of doubt, perhaps even giving cause for fear...all those and more are maneuvers.  In some situations you might invoke one for effect to cause an end to combat.  In others you'll hand a bunch of aspects off to your friend the combat monster who is going to gain massive bonuses because you've confused, distracted, and frightened your opponent. 

Maneuvers are awesome!

[InFerrumVeritas]

I still haven't seen any examples of a social attack during physical combat which can't be modeled (usually better) by a maneuver followed by invoking for effect. 

Invoking for effect is powerful.  Give someone reason to fear and they may run...without having to go through their stress and consequence tracks.  Of course it needs to fit the situation and opponent's personality, but that's why we role play!
Stress isn't damage.  Consequences are damage.  Stress is simply how tough and resilient you are against some class of attacks.
Maneuver, maneuver, maneuver! 

Seriously.  Distractions, sowing seeds of doubt, perhaps even giving cause for fear...all those and more are maneuvers.  In some situations you might invoke one for effect to cause an end to combat.  In others you'll hand a bunch of aspects off to your friend the combat monster who is going to gain massive bonuses because you've confused, distracted, and frightened your opponent. 

Maneuvers are awesome!

Sure, Maneuvering is probably a better option in most instances.  However, if you can do a social maneuver, you can also do a social attack.  It's still a type of conflict action and if you're saying that you can only perform social attacks in social conflicts, I think it's absurd to then allow social maneuvers.

Also, given the information that you only get so many consequences, I think it's entirely reasonable to want to use the social or mental stress track as a quick way to fill those up.  Which is why I think the ruling is silly.

[UmbraLux]

However, if you can do a social maneuver, you can also do a social attack. 

Not true if you're trying to maintain something close to lifelike verisimilitude.  And only true mechanically if your group agrees both reasonably fit the same time frame.

Consider just what social damage / consequences are - long term loss of reputation, shame, perhaps depression (though that may be mental), lost respect, etc.  Those things don't happen on the same time scale as bullets. 

However, a momentary (as in not going to cause long term consequences) doubt, fear, confusion, distraction, and more can and do occur in a physical combat's time scale.  They're simply not going to be something the character is still dealing with a week or a month later. 

[InFerrumVeritas]

Not true if you're trying to maintain something close to lifelike verisimilitude.  And only true mechanically if your group agrees both reasonably fit the same time frame.

Consider just what social damage / consequences are - long term loss of reputation, shame, perhaps depression (though that may be mental), lost respect, etc.  Those things don't happen on the same time scale as bullets. 

However, a momentary (as in not going to cause long term consequences) doubt, fear, confusion, distraction, and more can and do occur in a physical combat's time scale.  They're simply not going to be something the character is still dealing with a week or a month later. 

I can see it happening though.  In a fight, people's egos are particularly exposed.  A high deceit roll like "I killed your father," would be a wonderful attack.  Sure, it can be a maneuver to place an aspect.  But you could also be socially damaging a character and forcing a consequence like "Enraged" (which, while it can be an aspect is also a rather potent social consequence).

Yes, bullets work very fast.  Much faster than swords.  Much faster than fists.  Much faster than feet.  They're a poor time reference.  Combat exchanges aren't a set time.  They're fluid.