Does Anyone Take the Diplomacy Rules Seriously?

[Iaimeki]

The skill system, as a whole, is not that well balanced, because the utility of skills varies so drastically. However, of the skills, Diplomacy seems to be the least-balanced, because a literal interpretation of the rules makes it trivial to build characters who can turn anyone into their friend. Meanwhile, WotC's added many noncore abilities that allow character to bypass most of the explicit or implicit limitations on the skill.

So, does anyone actually play with these rules? I just don't see how it's possible to have anything resembling an interesting game if you do, since everyone just plays a Diplomacy build and asks all of their new friends to do whatever it is the PCs feel needs to be accomplished—and everyone does, without fail.

[power_word_wedgie]

I'll start by saying that they are a little unbalancing in my opinion. However, running roughshod over the kingdom is a little extreme. In ancient times, yes you can bluff a king out of his robe, and in fact was done quite often. However, kings are surrounded by these people called "advisors" with Sense Motive and Diplomacy themselves, and they don't like giving up their golden goose. In fact, if they notice that you are trying to bluff the king, they might try to convince the king to get rid of you. After all, people don't like competition, and the advisors are no exception.

Now, am I saying that bluff should be handled that way for every instance. Heck no. If a guy is investing resources into a skill, they should be able to convince a bartender, guard, and maybe an advisor or two. All I'm saying is to keep in mind the social environment in which your characters are set.

[User3]

1173151967[/unixtime]]I'll start by saying that they are a little unbalancing in my opinion. However, running roughshod over the kingdom is a little extreme. In ancient times, yes you can bluff a king out of his robe, and in fact was done quite often. However, kings are surrounded by these people called "advisors" with Sense Motive and Diplomacy themselves, and they don't like giving up their golden goose. In fact, if they notice that you are trying to bluff the king, they might try to convince the king to get rid of you. After all, people don't like competition, and the advisors are no exception.

Now, am I saying that bluff should be handled that way for every instance. Heck no. If a guy is investing resources into a skill, they should be able to convince a bartender, guard, and maybe an advisor or two. All I'm saying is to keep in mind the social environment in which your characters are set.

No offense, but what does this have to do with the OP's question?

Iaimeki: Nope, I use a diplomacy roll to gauge how effective a presentation was, not how far you improved its opinion of you. Of course, I don't use the hostile->helpful table at all.

[power_word_wedgie]

1173156365[/unixtime]]No offense, but what does this have to do with the OP's question?

The point is that on face value Diplomacy rules seem horrendously broken to the point that you can take over a kingdom with Diplomacy, but in an actual campaign (social) situation they really may not be. (Not many kings run around without advisors, etc.)

It's like saying, "Gee, orcs are easy to kill - the DM always starts encounters with them with their backs facing toward us" or "Gee, dragons are easy to kill - every time we encounter them they are in 10' tall rectangular rooms." If you play in a campaign where the PCs walk straight up to the king without advisors listening, it's somewhat similar.

[User3]

1173156924[/unixtime]]

1173156365[/unixtime]]No offense, but what does this have to do with the OP's question?

The point is that on face value Diplomacy rules seem horrendously broken to the point that you can take over a kingdom with Diplomacy, but in an actual campaign (social) situation they really may not be. (Not many kings run around without advisors, etc.)

It's like saying, "Gee, orcs are easy to kill - the DM always starts encounters with them with their backs facing toward us" or "Gee, dragons are easy to kill - every time we encounter them they are in 10' tall rectangular rooms." If you play in a campaign where the PCs walk straight up to the king without advisors listening, it's somewhat similar.

You spent the entire time talking about Bluff. Diplomacy doesn't allow a sense motive check. As written, its a sliding DC that determines how far you shift the audiences reactions to you, from hostile to fanatic. There is *no counter*.

[erik]

And what is to stop the PCs from owning all the advisors via diplomacy as well, as written?

Diplomacy as written is garbage.

[power_word_wedgie]

1173158178[/unixtime]]
You spent the entire time talking about Bluff. Diplomacy doesn't allow a sense motive check. As written, its a sliding DC that determines how far you shift the audiences reactions to you, from hostile to fanatic. There is *no counter*.

Yep. However, Diplomacy allows "counter-diplomacy" to resolve an action. If you're trying to get too friendly with the king, someone else (an advisor) can argue their case as well. Figuring that they have been spending all of their resources on social skills, unless the king is surrounded by 1st level advisors, then it's not as broken.

Now, I agree, if you're going to try to get the advisors and kings to think of you in friendly terms, then that's great. Diplomacy helps, and it should since it would be useless otherwise. However, if an advisor's whole goal (to keep his influence with the king) is counter to your action, and your whole action is to convince him to do something he would normally not do, then there is a Sense Motive check in there. However, if you're trying to convince him that's "you're cool" or to perform an action they would do, then Diplomacy is fine as is.

Thus, my answer is: Yes, it's broken to a degree, but in the context of everyone in a world arguing their case via their ranks of Diplomacy, it's not so broken.

[Interested2]

To answer the original question: Aside from WotC, no.

[Modesitt]

I've never met anyone that actually plays with Diplomacy as-written. When I suggest a Diplomancer to a GM, they usually just stare at me for a moment and say "Uh. Ok. We're not playing with the rules as written on Diplomacy anymore. Uh. Opposed tests!" And then we move on.

Quantifying diplomacy and relationships was a nice idea, but the implementation left much to be desired.

[NineInchNall]

1173187805[/unixtime]]

1173158178[/unixtime]]
You spent the entire time talking about Bluff. Diplomacy doesn't allow a sense motive check. As written, its a sliding DC that determines how far you shift the audiences reactions to you, from hostile to fanatic. There is *no counter*.

Yep. However, Diplomacy allows "counter-diplomacy" to resolve an action. If you're trying to get too friendly with the king, someone else (an advisor) can argue their case as well. Figuring that they have been spending all of their resources on social skills, unless the king is surrounded by 1st level advisors, then it's not as broken.

Yeah, and what's to stop the PC from sweet talking the advisors?

[RandomCasualty]

Yeah I pretty much ignore all the social skills (especially diplomacy), and just do them based on a DM fiat non-system system.

Bluff works basically as an opposition skill to sense motive, so it prevents people from detecting that you're lying, but a successful bluff doesn't mean they believe it's the truth either. After that, it's up to the NPC or PC to decide if he thinks it's in his best interest to believe it.

Diplomacy is basically something I do entirely ad hoc. There are no rules to it. Sometimes I'll roll diplomacy in secret and it makes the conversation slightly slant to the PCs, but nothing truly major. The less important the NPC, generally the easier he is to influence by diplomacy and the more he can be influenced. Diplomacy uses are entirely arbitrary.

[Judging__Eagle]

The problem with cobbeling a Diplmacy system out of arbitrarium is that if you have a PC, who can do nothing except peacfully talk the group out of encounters that they don't necessarily have to fight.

That player, and their PC gets boned, more. As it stands a diplomancer gets boned by his or her onw party more than enemies, since the other party members eventually get sick and just start killing crap that has or is about to surrender.

The rest of the time the DM is stuck figuring out that everyone said PC intimidates either runs in terror or wets themselves.

Which gets boring.

I want Diplomatic PCs to be able to literally be as awesome at Diplomacy as a Fighter is at smashing rocks with his pinkie finger or how a cleric or Druid can bring dead stuff back to life or how any number of things like that can occur.

Plus, it would be totally realistic for the Diplomancer to you know, duplicate real life people who can convince people that what they say is true.

In fact, there's an actual method to convincing someone that what you say is what you need to say to get them to do what you want them to.

Whether it's for them to think that a pick-up line is exactly the line that they'd go for, to telling a racetrack attendant that your 'losing' ticket is really a winning ticket.

The technique works something along these lines:

1. Ask the person to think of a time that X happened (X being a situation that you want to have emulated right now)

2. Ask them to think about that situation and how they felt and what they were thinking (this helps get them mentally prepped).

3. Ask them to think of what was said that got them to do what they did in the situation (of course, you have to pre-text this by initially stating that situation is one where they did what you want them to do now).

4. Mumble a bit

5. Their brain supplies the rest; and they think that you said exactly the right thing.

It's pretty wierd to watch someone do exactly that, but it does work.

I'm pretty sure that a diplomat could 'pick up' a trick like that pretty easily by the time they hit, oh, level 5-10?

[RandomCasualty]

1173210801[/unixtime]]The problem with cobbeling a Diplmacy system out of arbitrarium is that if you have a PC, who can do nothing except peacfully talk the group out of encounters that they don't necessarily have to fight.

Well honestly, I don't consider the diplomancer a very valid character concept I guess. I mean having a negotiator is okay, but that should be a secondary thing you do, not your main battle schtick. It sucks as a schtick because it takes away the fun from the other PCs who are presumably built for battle. It amounts to, "you guys sit on your ass while I make a skill check and solve the entire adventure."

A character whose only skill is to detract fun from the other PCs probably shouldn't be allowed at all.

Not to mention having the diplomancer concept can be really destructive to storylines. I mean I'm alright with people being good at negotiations. Sure you get someone who comes to the bargaining table and people tend to listen to him if he makes remotely reasonable sounding offers. Maybe he can put a positive spin on something negative and get you to reluctantly agree to something. But he shouldn't be able to just walk into any castle and instantly get the king to sign over his kingdom just for the hell of it, no matter how good he is.

I don't want someone who gets infinite wealth and rules the world after level 5 with a good build.

Plus, it would be totally realistic for the Diplomancer to you know, duplicate real life people who can convince people that what they say is true.

Real life people have a limit. It's one thing to sell a guy a crappy used car or get him to misunderstand a contract wording in your favor. It's another thing entirely to get a king to sign over his whole kingdom to you.

If diplomacy was as easy as you seem to think it is, there wouldn't be all kinds of conflict in the Middle East. There wouldn't be all sorts of problems in international relations that lead to wars. But great diplomats can't even convince religions that believe in the same God to get along. So I mean... if you want to talk realistic, then diplomacy has a lot of limits.

[User3]

I really think that the D&D design decisions would be much more understandable if all players and characters were just fighting waves of monsters in a flat, infinitely open field.

For one, making rules for social interaction in a role-playing is just intellectually numb. Why do we need these confusingly arbitrary rules for convincing people of things when we can already do that with the DM by just talking to them? Creating rules for the way an entire conversation will turn out between the character and some local yahoo detracts from both the on-screen time of that NPC, and their relative impact on the players. With the way things are now, you don't even have to talk with the person you're "diplomacizing." You could just stand there for 1 minute, make the check, and *bam*. They're friendly.

I know that the Diplomacy rules are supposed to be justified like "it's the character who is suave and agreeable, not the player," but that just seems like needless coddling. I agree that there should be at least some way of altering the way conversations turn out even if the player happens to be mute, but as it stands, Diplomacy as a concept sucks noodles. So no, I do not take the Diplomacy rules seriously.

-Artless

[NineInchNall]

1173219035[/unixtime]]For one, making rules for social interaction in a role-playing is just intellectually numb. Why do we need these confusingly arbitrary rules for convincing people of things when we can already do that with the DM by just talking to them? ...

I know that the Diplomacy rules are supposed to be justified like "it's the character who is suave and agreeable, not the player," but that just seems like needless coddling.

Needless coddling? Then to be consistent you must have your melee players describe or act out a fully realized plan of line and blade dominance dependent upon the line and guard taken by their oppoents. No, that would be ludicrous.

Needless coddling, my ass. If the player isn't any good at fencing, his character can be. If the player isn't any good at picking locks, his character can be. If the player isn't any good at making things blow up with his mind, his character can be. You want to say, however, that if the player isn't any good at sweet talking people, his character cannot be. I call bull shit.

[User3]

1173223086[/unixtime]]

1173219035[/unixtime]]For one, making rules for social interaction in a role-playing is just intellectually numb. Why do we need these confusingly arbitrary rules for convincing people of things when we can already do that with the DM by just talking to them? ...

I know that the Diplomacy rules are supposed to be justified like "it's the character who is suave and agreeable, not the player," but that just seems like needless coddling.

Needless coddling? Then to be consistent you must have your melee players describe or act out a fully realized plan of line and blade dominance dependent upon the line and guard taken by their oppoents. No, that would be ludicrous.

Needless coddling, my ass. If the player isn't any good at fencing, his character can be. If the player isn't any good at picking locks, his character can be. If the player isn't any good at making things blow up with his mind, his character can be. You want to say, however, that if the player isn't any good at sweet talking people, his character cannot be. I call bull shit.

I can see your point with that. But what I meant was there shouldn't be these rules that, in some ways, force as little interaction as possible between the player and the NPCs. If there's no reason for the players to even be talking a scene through with these NPCs when they can just toss down some dice with a moderate Diplomacy check, why even have them in the game? I don't want my players to be forced to play themselves in the game, but I do want them to play.

-Artless

[NineInchNall]

Well, here's the thing: how are rolling Bluff, Diplomacy, Gather Information, or Sense Motive checks and interacting with NPCs mutually exclusive activities?

Normally, I run it such that the Diplomacy check is rolled and then played out with the NPC.

Now, there's also the issue of your rhetorical question: "If the players do not speak (as in actually act out their conversations) with NPCs, what is the point of having those NPCs there in the first place?"

If the players do not physically act out or describe their precise attacks and defenses against monsters, what is the point of having those monsters there in the first place? The monsters represent challenges that the characters overcome, and regardless of whether the player says, "I take a stance with my sword arm extended and my hip angled back in order to maximize distance, then I engage my opponent's blade in quarte, which should get him to attempt to retake that line; when he does I'll disengage and thrust by seizure in the same line," or simply says, "I attack him," the player is playing the game and his role.

Basically, I don't think that playacting is really the heart of the game. Oh, it can be fun, I suppose, but ...

[RandomCasualty]

1173223086[/unixtime]]
Needless coddling, my ass. If the player isn't any good at fencing, his character can be. If the player isn't any good at picking locks, his character can be. If the player isn't any good at making things blow up with his mind, his character can be. You want to say, however, that if the player isn't any good at sweet talking people, his character cannot be. I call bull shit.

But any such rules are unfairly one sided and that's where the arguments fall apart.

What about the DM? Say the DM isn't great at bluffing, but wants to have a slick tongued liar NPC. PCs want to be able to override the effects of a skill roll by personal choice, while they want NPCs to have to obey the skill roll like it's the word of God.

Can't have it both ways.

If PCs want to be able to convince the BBEG with their awesome skills, then the BBEG has to be able to convince their paladin to turn against his god with a good diplomacy check. The king has to be able to trick them with a good bluff check and so on.

If the DM's acting skill is put on the spot, then it's fine for me if the same standard is held up to the PCs as well.

I consider part of the skill to a roleplaying game to be, well... roleplaying.

At some point you have to draw the line and say it's a game played by players, not a simulation. You don't allow PC wizards int checks to re-choose their spell list because: "My wizard is smarter than that, he would have prepared protection from fire, even though I, the player, forgot to."

Yeah, in fantasy reality, it wouldn't be the PCs who make any decision, but rather their character, but then if their characters did everything, they wouldn't need players to play them. The diplomacy rules are a specific area where that line really needs to be drawn, because any rules that are created for it are unfair, treating PCs and NPCs differently.

[Zherog]

1173223086[/unixtime]] Needless coddling, my ass.

You want Artless to coddle your ass?

[shau]

I have never played with a DM who uses WotC's rules. My current DM makes skills really good without being overpowering, but she pretty much makes up everything on the spot.

I know that the Diplomacy rules are supposed to be justified like "it's the character who is suave and agreeable, not the player," but that just seems like needless coddling. I agree that there should be at least some way of altering the way conversations turn out even if the player happens to be mute, but as it stands, Diplomacy as a concept sucks noodles. So no, I do not take the Diplomacy rules seriously.

I like to declare grappling attempts by tackling the DM.

Seriously, most people I know have the player do as best they can and then give modifiers according. In some cases it ends up being more fun than standard combat, because success and failure is dependent on how fast you can think on your feet.

[Brobdingnagian]

First, I'd like to point out the Diplomacy fix that works.

http://www.giantitp.com/articles/jFppYw ... br][br]Now, on to my other point. I think we're forgetting just what having 20 ranks in a skill translates to. That means you're level seventeen, and assuming you're a character who specialised in Diplomacy, it means your fighter buddy can kill an elephant with a mean look, your wizard pal can stop time, your cleric friend can bring back the dead at no cost or penalty whatsoever, and you... what?

Does it mean you can do nothing? Or that you can do everything with a word? Do you actually know what that many ranks in a skill actually means?

If you had that many ranks in jump, then when you screwed up royally, you clear twenty feet of ground without breaking a sweat, and that's based of only your ranks. The world's best poker players probably have a total Bluff skill modifier of 11, and Adolph Hitler probably had a total Diplomacy skill modifier of 15.

Point being, if my Rogue can alter the fabric of reality at fifteenth level because of his insane UMD check, and can convince people that they are dreaming and they only way to wake up is to kill themselves in their dream with his insane Bluff check, then he can damn well take all the kingdoms he wants if he can manage the insane Diplomacy check.

I have a Rogue who gets 49 regularly on his Diplomacy checks. At level 7. I went very far out of my to make him that awesome, and he's almost useless for anything else. But he can talk better than any human on Earth ever has. You'll have an easier time imagining the casting, effect, and after-effect of a Fireball than imagining what it would be like to hear this guy talk. He may as well be putting you under a mind-control spell. It's the whole hide vs. invisibility thing all over again.

A 17th level Ranger standing in an open field in the middle of the day (no impaired visibility/concealment, no cover) can disappear while you're staring right at him. And he does it without using magic of any kind. If I have twenty ranks in Diplomacy and have otherwise been focusing on that skill, I should rightfully be able to say "Give me your kingdom and I'll give you a job", and you'd probably do it without a single word against me.

I do agree that the core Diplomacy system is unusable. Fortunately, Rich Burlew has taken the Diplomacy rules seriously, and fixed them. Diplomancers should be valid characters. This is not AD&D. It's not all hack-and-slash anymore. Some of us want to play Diplomancers, just like some of us want to play as monsters. We should not be stopped from doing so.

I think that about covers it.

[AlphaNerd]

<i>First, I'd like to point out the Diplomacy fix that works.</i>

Do they actually work? I mean, they're at least not crazy. It looks pretty decent on paper, until you start stacking piles and piles of unnamed bonuses on things, at which point for a level-appropriate encounter, you can diplomize your way past anything even with the -20 net modifier. Of course, that's not really an indictment of the new rules, but rather the system, and the prevalence of money-generating splat books.

Part of the problem with Diplomacy and other social is that you *can't* really use it on the players without violating their free will. You don't get the option of choosing not to get charmed, choosing to be missed, or anything like that, but even if you fail your sense motive check by 50, you still can be suspicious, even if you shouldn't be. The only recourse is to have better roleplayers, or have the DM pre-roll bluff and sense motive checks or roll them behind a screen or whatnot.

Anywhichway, skill checks are inherently different than many of the other skills.

[RandomCasualty]

1173272566[/unixtime]]First, I'd like to point out the Diplomacy fix that works.

http://www.giantitp.com/articles/jFppYw ... NF.html[br]

I don't know why people point to giant's fix as something that actually works. It makes me wonder if they've ever actually used it in real play.

All giant's fix does is make DCs more level based, since it factors in the hit dice of the guy you're talking to. Which is kinda nice, but it isnt' anywhere near balanced, because the diplomancer is still getting way more bonuses than +1/level.

Also, the conventional rules only allow you to make things friendly (assuming you disregard the ELH, which is fine because it's 3.0), so you can't do the range of broken things that you can do under giant's system, which really does allow you to automatically get the king's castle.

So giant's system is also known as "never buy a magic item again" because you can walk around trading pieces of string for +10 swords and artifacts. And as far as I can tell it isn't any more fair than the original system, as it doesn't apply to PCs.

Point being, if my Rogue can alter the fabric of reality at fifteenth level because of his insane UMD check, and can convince people that they are dreaming and they only way to wake up is to kill themselves in their dream with his insane Bluff check, then he can damn well take all the kingdoms he wants if he can manage the insane Diplomacy check.

Then the game ends, and that's stupid.

It's effectively the same argument as asking for infinite wealth, and as soon as you get it, the game ends.

I do agree that the core Diplomacy system is unusable. Fortunately, Rich Burlew has taken the Diplomacy rules seriously, and fixed them. Diplomancers should be valid characters. This is not AD&D. It's not all hack-and-slash anymore. Some of us want to play Diplomancers, just like some of us want to play as monsters. We should not be stopped from doing so.

No, they're not valid characters. And I'm not talking rules at all, I'm just talking about concept.

Talking to people is secondary, not a primary schtick. It's why it's a skill and not a base class ability. It shouldn't be any more dominant to the plot than the ability to climb walls, pick locks, disarm traps or identify a spell with a spellcraft check.

These are all support abilities, not instant "I win, you lose" powers. You can be able to disarm every trap in the complex, but it's not like that's going to win you every adventure, you can be able to jump 500 ft up and nobody cares. You can have a +150 spellcraft and yet you're still not able to move mountains or anything.

But social skills effectively are an unbalanced magic bullet that lets you win any encounter, and not to mention that, but you've now got a squad of over CRed creatures following you that you don't even have to pay. You just walk around the countryside conscripting every single person you come across, who instantly becomes your friend for life. At that point, who needs a party?

The diplomancer as a concept just isn't feasable from a game standpoint. It isn't balanced, and it quickly overshadows the other PCs.

If you want a guy who controls minds and stuff, then by all means, make an enchanter or a beguiler. But someone who uses the broken skill system to irrevocably permanently control people without even being seen as an offensive action is not workable as a character concept. At all.

[User3]

1173289710[/unixtime]

Talking to people is secondary, not a primary schtick. It's why it's a skill and not a base class ability. It shouldn't be any more dominant to the plot than the ability to climb walls, pick locks, disarm traps or identify a spell with a spellcraft check.

So... what you're saying is you're just fine with it being broken-as-all-hell I Win ability but only if it's some arbituary ability tied to only a certin classes and with it's own new and completly seperate progression that will be fucked to all hell by muticlassing and that will eventuary require even more bandaid feats?

[RandomCasualty]

1173297245[/unixtime]]
So... what you're saying is you're just fine with it being broken-as-all-hell I Win ability but only if it's some arbituary ability tied to only a certin classes and with it's own new and completly seperate progression that will be fvcked to all hell by muticlassing and that will eventuary require even more bandaid feats?

Well no, obviously diplomacy as written is broken.

But you can have controlling people as a primary class schtick. It's called being a beguiler or a mindbender or an enchanter.

As a side note, I'm also saying that skills shouldn't be primary schticks anyway, because the skill system sucks. So it's relegated to handling secondary tasks you don't really care much about.