Making Diplomacy Work

[Zinegata]

Okay, the first thread just went "RAR!". The second thread was largely an unintelligible argument about "reaction vs disposition" or whatever. So maybe the third time's the charm - especially if we try to focus on making the bloody diplomatic system work instead of whining about parts of it we don't like.

There are two things to realize about all diplomacy systems however. First of all: Diplomacy in real life is complex. As in ridiculously complex. There are layers upon layers of relations and past history that could affect two people talking to each other that it would make even the interrelations in the later seasons of Buffy the Vampire Slayer seem straightforward and sane.

So any diplomatic system for an RPG - by necessity - will be abstracted to some degree. Unless you want to make something so murderously complicated that you'll spend six hours just calculating your bonuses and penalties before rolling dice, at which point you probably need to see a doctor for OCD.

Secondly, different players/groups deal with diplomacy in different ways. And it works for them with varying levels of success. Let's face it: If every gaming group followed the diplomacy rules for most systems religiously, there would be a lot more RPG players in mental institutions today. Let's be generous and assume there aren't that many.

So let's start by enumerating the different approaches (models) that people use with regards to diplomacy:

I. Magic Tea Party Diplomacy

In this model, the players literally take the role of their characters. There's no dice rolling. There's just the players pretending to be their character, and the DM pretending to be the witch/woodsman/giant wolf/whatever.

Cue some people in the Den frothing at the mouth in rage over this model.

The problem with this model are asshole players and DMs. The sort who can't be reasoned with and use this kind of system to bully people around. Or play them so out-of-character that you suspect the world is full of dopplegangers. All of which makes the game unfun.

But for some players, this is actually a pretty simple and effective way to get diplomacy done. And for them it IS fun. Some players do in fact play Rogar the Barbarian because they want to go "Rogar SMASH!" every time a goblin prisoner fails to answer their question honestly. Some DMs do in fact want to play as the goblin making cute "Please don't kill meee!!!" voices and do it well enough to be entertaining.

And fortunately, most people generally don't play with assholes if they can help it.

From an objective designer's perspective however, this approach is awfully lazy. There is actually NO system to resolve diplomacy in the first place with this kind of setup. What you have is each player's individual skill at (pretend) interpersonal relations, something which you can't exactly resolve with a die roll. Heck, it's not even something that you can reliably train people to do even if you put them through six weeks of drama school, or 40+ years of real life.

So for all you game designers out there, don't suggest Magic Tea Party Diplomacy unless you're incredibly lazy. Because people here will point that out and mercilessly use it as an excuse to burn down your house, rape your spouse, and hang your from a tree before shooting you.

II. Diplomacy by the Numbers

Okay, let's now talk about the second approach - which is to have an actual diplomacy system that involves some dice rolling.

The nice thing about this system is that it can actually make non-combat characters viable. All those points/XP/feats they spent on things like "Diplomacy Skill" aren't just flavoring and actually do something.

The problem with this system is that people might rely on it entirely too much. Sure, it should be common sense that a barkeep will welcome customers, but some players or DMs may suffer from fits of madness and insist that every character interaction be accompanied by a diplomacy roll. This is bad as it slows down play and can get really tedious when you just want to buy a can of tomatoe soup paying its marked price.

So, in reality, what most people actually do is...

III. Take the Third Option

The reality of a lot of RPG sessions is that they mix Magic Tea Party with a more structured system. For non-confrontational conversations like asking "where the town hall is", the DM generally won't make you roll the dice unless there's something seriously wrong with the town. Heck, making you roll the dice is often used by DMs to tip players off that something is incredibly wrong with a situation.

DMs and players like mixing their Magic Tea Party and By the Numbers models in particular encounters too. Let's say you have a negotiation encounter. A player says something particularly witty and relevant. DM awards +2 bonus to the diplomacy die. It's completely arbitrary. It will, by principle, drive some people into an uncontrollable rage. But by God, it works.

So if you're playing with relatively normal people, assume that while they like playing under a structured, by-the-numbers system, they expect occassional rewards and penalties for brillant or idiotic play too - even if it's completely arbitrary (albeit ideally, there should be guidelines - i.e. maximum of a +2 bonus on a D20 system, for instance).

Otherwise they'd be playing Mass Effect 2 and have the Gamefaqs guide handy on exactly how many Paragon or Renegade points they'd get for each and every NPC response.

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So, now, let's talk more in-depth about the by-the-numbers systems. There are generally two kinds of encounters that this systems resolve, namely:

1) One on one encounters

2) Group encounters

So let's go talk about these two types.

I. One on One Diplomacy

Most systems just stick with one-on-one diplomacy. You have Character A. You have Character B. You roll dice. You add their charm/diplomacy/fast talk/whatever modifier. Mix in some other bonuses or penalties. Higher total wins, albeit magntitude of win will depend on how much you beat the other guy's total.

(And yes, this doesn't actually work exactly like 3.X. But let's be honest. Most diplomacy systems are actually this simple and just have minor variations - i.e. it goes on over multiple rounds, more modifiers, etc)

That being said, there are ways to spice up the system, as long as you remember that a negotiation isn't just about the action/reaction of the two parties trying to get the other to do something. You could get a -5 modifier to your diplomacy roll if you say something like "Communism rules!" to Glenn Beck, but you also have to remember factors like:

1) Past history between the two characters. If you're talking to a goblin who lost his entire family to one of your "adventures", he's probably not going to be very receptive to what you say. But if you're talking to your character's dad and your relationship is actually normal instead of full of wangst, then you can probably convince him to lend you a sword or two without even having to roll.

Other modifiers exist, but I think this is really the most important to take into consideration as part of diplo rolls on top of what you actually do or say. Besides, having NPCs that actually remember what you did with them (or against them) leads to a more complete and believable world. So be like the dwarves in RoW: Write down every good thing that the players have done for them. And write down in excruciating detail every bad thing that the players have done against them.

2) Outside/Environmental pressures. Sure, your dad loves you. But if times are tough and you're already 21 years old, chances are he's gonna say that he needs that sword for himself. Especially since you have that +5 Vorpal sword as your "spare". Tough luck son.

Of the two, environmental pressures should come into play less often if you're interacting with long-term NPCs. But if you're interacting with a throwaway character, then these factors come into play much more prominently. A starving town is a bad place to diplo for food, for instance.

II. Team Diplomacy

Team diplomacy is a tricky thing. You can't just have everyone talking. If you do, it will be a comedy of errors like 4E's skill check system, where the party keeps failing because ALL team members MUST roll for diplomacy even if they're likely to fail - thus accumulating more failures and successes and screwing over the whole team.

It's like having a choir with both good and bad singers going at it at the same time. The bad singers will ruin the singing of the good ones.

To make team diplomacy work, you need to have multiple types of actions in your diplomacy system. So that while not everyone is a great fast-talker, even the big hulking Barbarian can contribute if he rolls his high Intimidate skill instead of his crappy Diplomacy skill - thus contributing to the party's overall success.

You could also take it a step further and do something like Mouse Guard. I've detailed it in another thread, but on top of simply rolling for skills players choose an action from a menu of four choices. Certain actions counter others in a rock-paper-scissors style resolution, while the actual dice-rolling just determines the margin of success.

This lets even the complete social clutzes contribute to a diplomacy challenge - as long as they're canny about picking the right actions at the right time. Sure, the NPC may be the world's greatest Deceiver, but if an "Attack" conversation totally negates deception then even a character with a relatively weak "Attack" skill can contribute positively to the overall team success.

Anyway, that's already a fuckton of stuff from me: Anybody else with their own notes on how to make Diplomacy work?

[mean_liar]

Magic Tea Party and a limit on how many Attitude shifts a single check can garner you.

Honestly Diplomacy hasn't been troublesome enough for me at my table in order to bother to come up with anything other than a cursory fix.

[Zinegata]

Good point on attitude shifts. I should probably write something on that too.

[Nebuchadnezzar]

I never cared for 3e's use of the word diplomacy. It doesn't handle negotiations at all. It's speed friendship, and I don't know if that's something that needs to be addressed outside of charm effects.

As far as comparing Mouse Guard social mechanics to d20, one could argue that Bluff maps to Feint and Maneuver, Sense Motive to Defend, and Intimidate to Attack. Depending on the specific interaction, Knowledge checks could supplement or supplant the skills for Maneuver or Attack, possibly modified by Cha instead of Int for this case. I do think a four to six action model is the best way to simulate negotiations or arguments, but am unsure if it should be 1:1 on skills or just an ad hoc allocation depending on the situation.

[tussock]

Anybody else with their own notes on how to make Diplomacy work?

Set a goal, achieve that goal. Want the king to give you an army for an adventure? So there's a reason for that, you organise a meeting with the king's secretary and explain it. You get a list of people to go annoy, and maybe figure out how accurate that is and invent some shortcuts. But you go annoy some people and they have problems you might be able to solve, which you get around or take time over, whatever.

After some social adventuring like that, with the dice and the skills and the combat as appropriate to each bit, you go pledge some shit to the king, where some people are on your side, others against you, and someone who probably isn't the king makes a decision about the army. Then you have an army, and maybe a whole lot of social debts, or a geas, or whatever, and you go do you adventure, and hope you can pay your debts later. Social debts are handy because the NPCs can send you on more adventures.


If you just want these Orcs to not attack right now, you promise to leave, and maybe that's a bluff, and you roll diplomacy to see if they let you. Only maybe they escort you the fuck out of Orctown, and want tribute, and the women, because their morale check said they're all cocky today and they're Chaotic Evil.

And if you're diplomancing a dragon, it wants to know what the fuck you're doing it it's lair, and what's with all the dead Kobolds, and you need an answer to that or you're not really diplomancing at all, are you.

[MGuy]

NPCs all have dispositions. This sets a bonus/negative toward convincing someone of something. PCs can adjust this by somehow associating themselves (from a glance) with something significantly positive to the target (a group, an ideal, etc)

Situational modifiers are applied (highest bonus vs largest penalty) based on the situation. Player's can "create" positive circumstances by setting up a situation that would have the target in a more positive mood to negotiate (The meeting is set on a holiday, they take the target out to dinner, etc)

When making a diplomatic roll players must state an aim. Diplomacy is more like a negotiate skill for me so when you "Intimidate" or "Negotiate" you have to set something you're trying to convince the target to do/agree with. Based on the apparent riskiness (another penalty) and apparent profitability (another bonus) are added together based on abstract levels (low, moderate, high, extreme) and added to 10 to st the DC of your aim a DC is decided upon. Player's roll on it other can aid (though my aiding rules are a bit different so the aid another action works out a little better for me) the speaker.

Now if another character or the target itself is actively opposing what the characters are proposing then it becomes an opposed Diplomacy/Intimidate roll (depending on the nature of what's being spoken about). If both diplomancing parties are trying to convince a third party of something they must both beat the DC that would be set up for the third party and then the results are compared.

The issues I see with this are:
the equation is a bit lengthy. DC wise it looks like:
10+ Disposition + Situation Mod + Apparent Risk + Apparent Gain

There is a quite a bit of MTP and leaning on MC judgment in it. The MC has to decide on a disposition, specific reactions, what bonuses/penalties are fit and fair, and whether or not the PCs will be opposed. I don't mind this. Socializing is extremely complicated and I'd hope the MC is fair minded enough to pick up on what is and isn't acceptable to the players.

There is also nothing to simulate the likely compromises that one usually makes in negotiations. I believe there should be something to represent the give and take thing because I've found an effective way to haggle with someone in reality over anything is to start out over the top to make later, more agreeable, offers seem much more reasonable by comparison. However I have not come up with anything to mimic that that isn't needlessly complex.

This system has worked and has only rarely been called into question when a player has generally been unreasonable.

[shadzar]

diplomacy needs something badly missing in 3.x and that is the ability to worsen the situation. Sure it doesnt seem fun, but WTF if you can never do anything to piss off the other person only make them more appealed to you?

for diplomacy to even be used the other party cannot be hostile to you, as in wanting to kill you on sight, because they already arent wanting to hear anything you have to say, they want to kill you. they have to be willing to hear what you have to say.

[hogarth]

Magic Tea Party and a limit on how many Attitude shifts a single check can garner you.

Honestly Diplomacy hasn't been troublesome enough for me at my table in order to bother to come up with anything other than a cursory fix.

+1, although I'd probably rephrase it as a limit on how big a favour you can ask for rather than in terms of attitude shifts. I don't like the "speed friendship" aspect of Diplomacy (as Nebuchadnezzar so eloquently put it).

[Dean]

I agree. Diplomacy is, in effect, not a skill it is an attribute. Charisma sucks in every imagineable way and Diplomacy can rock your face off. If you wanted to "fix" diplomacy you would have to identify whether or not you wanted some sort of actual political diplomacy skill or a skill that is called...like "Persona" or something like that which can make people like you and be a smooth talker who people respond to well.

If it's the first then the answer is probably don't make that skill, because it's incredibly lame and specific. The second is reasonable. It'd be cool to have a skill that decides if you can make your gaoler let you leave the cell to pee or if you can get a drink on the house by flirting with the bartender. It's honestly a skill I'd invest in. It's not tumble or concentration I know so it's not life or death but I'd take one skill if there was a legitimate and functional chart that could tell me just how much of a Han Solo I could be

[MGuy]

The thing is I don't want to wholly MTP it because Charisma "is" there and there are credible things you can do with the skill. If I can intimidate and bluff someone I can certainly negotiate with them. Its not a huge leap from these two to this one.

[TarkisFlux]

As far as comparing Mouse Guard social mechanics to d20, one could argue that Bluff maps to Feint and Maneuver, Sense Motive to Defend, and Intimidate to Attack. Depending on the specific interaction, Knowledge checks could supplement or supplant the skills for Maneuver or Attack, possibly modified by Cha instead of Int for this case. I do think a four to six action model is the best way to simulate negotiations or arguments, but am unsure if it should be 1:1 on skills or just an ad hoc allocation depending on the situation.

I attempted to port the mouse guard / burning wheel diplomacy mechanics over to d20 a while ago. Here's a link even. I was never particularly happy with how it turned out, and it never gathered sufficient attention here to be torn down and rebuilt into something better, but maybe you can find something worthwhile there.

[TheWorid]

The third option of the OP is still a pretty lazy way of doing it. It still makes things come down to a dice roll, which can be very frustrating for players, just adding a layer of MC interpretation on top over what constitutes cleverness or wit. It allows for favorite-playing, while still making success feel somewhat out of the player's hands.

My favored solution is to work out one set of aspects of social interaction that can be mechanically influenced, and another that cannot be influenced. For example, playing on the emotions of an audience is tricky for the MC to adjudicate, because no one at the table is actually being affected by the issues that are being discussed. This makes it a prime target for being part of a character ability, and doing so allows, say, someone who is meek in real life to play a charismatic character.

On the other hand, the actual content of argument doesn't work well with a dice roll. You get illogical situations like convincing enemies to throw themselves into lava when you do that. Consequently, this is an aspect that should not be part of a roll, at least without a the PC possibly having a special ability specifically granting that power.