Dragon Warriors

The way this would work in my game is that I generally wouldn't expect the player to explicitly say which skill they were using. This would be based on how they chose to roleplay the situation.

"Come on, Corporal? Let me in. Do I look like a criminal to you?"

"OK - make a Looks check."

versus

How dare you block my path, Corporal? Do you have any idea who you are dealing with? I'll have your stripes for this!"

"I want a Presence check."

In the former case, the character is relying on simply presenting themselves in the best fashion they can. In the second, they are trying to seem more than they actually are but without having to actually make the guard disbelieve what they can actually see.

I would probably want the player to explicitly say that they were using Hypnotic Suggestion, but I might also ask them to roll against it if their roleplaying made me believe they were trying to get the guard to do something that the guard would not be inclined to do based on the evidence in front of them.

So - Looks check when the character is simply putting their best face forward. Presence when they are trying to seem more than they are but without actually needing their target to ignore the evidence in front of them. Hypnotic Suggestion when the target actually needs to ignore something they can see ("These are not the droids you are looking for") or go against what they would generally want to do.

Is there overlap in some cases? Sure - sometimes a situation is simple.

Looking at it another way - and this one is based on information the GM has, but the player may not.

Corporal Jenks really doesn't care about the gate rule. He thinks it's stupid to keep people locked out of the city just because they get there a little late, so he has no problem letting somebody in if they look respectable - Looks check.

Corporal Burgon generally enforces the law but he doesn't like the idea of getting in trouble with his Sergeant if he doesn't let somebody important in and they make a complaint, so he can be persuaded to let somebody in, if he thinks they might be important - Presence check.

Corporal Graves is a stickler for the rules, who virtually never breaks them - or maybe never breaks them at all, he doesn't care who you are - Hypnotic Suggestion check.

In this type of case, Corporal Jenks would probably open the gate if any of the three checks were made - but Corporal Graves is basically immune to a Looks check or a Presence check because he doesn't let people through the gates just because he likes them or is intimidated by them. He still does his duty even in both those cases.

Thanks for this discussion - I like seeing things being analysed like this.

_________________
Life and Death Are Only a Dice Roll Away!

Shaun Hately
co-author A Weak Pleasure
co-author Friends or Foes
co-author Dragon Warriors Players Guide

Hm... too many stages. I'm of the thought that if someone wants to roleplay a smart guy, they need to try to be smart. I'm was hoping that a whole new 'adventuring' section on bribes and npc interaction would come about. Basically, what motivates a guy to do what you want depends on what they get out of it. A bribe would work. I'd say, whether it is with the shiny stuff or a 'service' you could convince a farmer to loan you his cart and horses or burn his house.

I don't know, just watched the A team recently. 'Face' could get what he wanted by lies and charm. Not just looks but a great intellect in coming up with cover stories and acting. I think the Assassin should get some 'Knave' powers since it is their role to fit in and infiltrate households and whatnot.

I would prefer an adventuring section dedicated to npc player interaction. I suppose it has to be sanitized despite how the historical real world works. Monetary bribes won't necessarily bring a kingdom to its knees compared to some intangible things.

Because its all about player interaction, of course a charming barbarian could somehow convince people to do stuff like open gates or procure food. A section on tips might be nice too. Also an expansion on the hirelings section would be nice, a sorcerer might not want to rely on members of his own party for protection.

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The problem with using Looks as a mechanic is that it doesn't increase over time, whereas as any character that adventures, survives adversity, explores other cultures, etc., is likely to become more confident and charismatic. Knaves may add their rank to their Looks for the purposes of making such checks, but other characters don't. We don't for example, expect a character to use their Psychic Talent score to cast spells for their entire professional career, or use Reflexes to Evade. Instead, characters have such secondary abilities that develop over time, albeit at different rates for different professions.

In my own Dragon Warriors games, I've introduced Guile and Conviction scores, which work exactly the same way as Attack and Defence or Perception and Stealth. I find it's a much more consistent mechanic than using a primary ability score check for opposed social checks.

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Cobwebbed Dragon (Lee)

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Yes, you are correct, and this is intentional.

The different Knave Talents are all methods of achieving the same end goal; they reflect the diverse range of primary methods by which any "conman" can manipulate others. The Talents form a "toolbox" that covers the wide array of social and physchological tricks that a Player can select from in order to achieve a desired outcome. The Knave Talents are intended to form a coherent and complete whole, regardless of the Looks rules.

If playing with the Looks rules, then Looks can be used in addition to any of the applicable Talents. It is up to the player to select whichever method/rule that they prefer.

All of the tactics that you suggest (see quotation) are legitimate ways in which to achieve the objective.

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I must agree. I confess to finding the different rules for social interaction in the Player's Book to be a bit hard to digest. I had attributed that to my own mental shortcomings but I can see others had similar reactions to some degree.

This is not to say that I think the "toolbox" approach is a bad one by any means, but it does seem to be working against the simplicity that characterises the better parts of the DW ruleset.

Cheers,

-Kyle

Fair comment. The three new Professions in the Players Guide were designed while the Paths material (now in Cadaver Draconis) was still part of the "Players Book". Talents in both the new Professions and the Paths were designed in order to bridge the mechanical gap between Assassin skills and those in the other non-magical Professions.

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Thanks Jiminy for the clarification on how the rules are meant to work.

I must say that I am very surprised that they work this way. Thirty years of reading and rereading the rules and playing this game where professions have unique rules to achieve unique outcomes meant it never occurred to me that a profession would have multiple rules to achieve the same outcome. It is a very different approach and in my mind goes against traditional DW logic. I think an author’s note would have helped avoid confusion here. Of course I may be the only one who had this problem…

So now I know the intent of the rules I will re-examine them with fresh eyes.

So going back to my first post I’m considering the feel of the rules (the fluff, the story, the role-play side of things) and the simplicity of the rules (the mechanics of the rules, how it fits in with other rules, the consistency, the roll-play side).

So looking once more at the scenario of a knave trying to get a guard to open the town gates after dark let’s consider Looks, Presence and Hypnotic suggestion (ignoring intimidate for now).

In terms of the feel and fluff there is not a great deal of difference here between the three. Looks allows you to use your physical appearance and strength of personality, Presence you use your enhanced Charisma (ie physical appearance and strength of personality) and Hypnotic Suggestion, the most different description of the three, allows subconscious influence of the target. All are ok on their own but combined with the fact they all achieve similar (or the same) outcomes they fall down for me. They don’t feel unique so they don’t feel as valuable.

So how about the rules side of things? Using the example of an 8th rank Knave versus a 1st rank knight guard at the gate. Note please: correct me if I have interpreted the application of these rules incorrectly.

Looks: The difficulty factor will depend on the modifiers used so in the best case for the knave (everything in their favour) the difficulty factor is 3 which will result in auto success given they add their rank 8 to their looks (min 9). If we have a difficult guard the difficulty factor increases to 16 but auto success is still achieved (again 9+8). Other modifiers can be applied for environment and role-play which may push the difficulty factor over 17 to require a roll. The roll being under looks plus rank, the modifiers don’t apply to the roll. Failure just means you don’t succeed.

Presence: Requires a roll under the looks score with a bonus of +1 for every 3 ranks. For our average 8th rank knave, that means rolling under 11. This skill does allow you to have others perceive your rank to be higher or lower than it is, however as determining rank is limited to certain skills and magic, this bonus has limited use. Failure means the mark becomes suspicious and may initiate combat. So in this situation the 6th rank skill is less effective than the standard rule. A higher looks value would have more value for this skill but that would also increase the chances of auto success for a standard looks roll which also adds rank.

Hypnotic Suggestion: Requires a roll under the looks score with no modifiers. For our average knave that means rolling under 9. Failure here also means the mark may become suspicious and initiate combat. So in this situation the 8th rank skill is less effective than the 6th rank rule and even less effective than the standard rule. As above, a higher looks value would have more value for this skill but that would also increase the chances of auto success for a standard looks roll.

So looking at the mechanics of the rules the “better” higher level skills (roll under looks) are less effective than the generic rule (roll under looks plus rank if you don’t meet the difficulty factor)and have greater impacts for failure, so why would you bother to pick them? You could take them for the different role-play aspect, but as noted above, there is little difference in the feel so again, why bother?

To use the “toolbox” analogy, if you can always pick any of the tools in your box and they all achieve the same outcome, then any smart tradesman will always pick the most effective tool in the box leaving the others untouched and unneeded. A real toolbox has different tools for different situations. That’s what is missing here and what I believe is needed. If each skill had a unique purpose or outcome, or upgraded the lower ranked skills to make them more effective, then you would consider adding them to your toolbox. As it is, I don’t see the value to them.

Again I may have a wrong interpretation of the rules so please correct me if this is the case.

I'll try and make the way I see this clearer.

The key here, as far as I am concerned, is that the three skills can achieve different results. Presence is able to overcome barriers that a Looks check alone could not get you past. Hypnotic Suggestion can get you past a situation that neither a Looks or Presence check would succeed in.

All a Looks check can do is make a person better disposed towards you - it can make them like you. It will not make that person do something that they would not do even for somebody they like. So the guard who is normally predisposed to let a friend through the gate might decide to let you through as they would a friend. But the guard who wouldn't even let their best friend through the gate, still isn't going to let you in just because he likes you.

Presence allows you to fool the guard into thinking you are more than you are, but again, it won't make him do something he wouldn't do for the type of person he now thinks you are. If you are dealing with a guard who is easily intimidated, or who respects the powerful, and would open the gate for an important person, when they wouldn't do it for just anybody, then this is the skill that works.

Hypnotic suggestion is the only one of the three skills that has a chance of getting a person to do something that they would not choose to do. Here you are able to make a person do something out of character.

Let's go back to Corporal Graves in my previous example - "Corporal Graves is a stickler for the rules, who virtually never breaks them - or maybe never breaks them at all, he doesn't care who you are."

You approach Corporal Graves at the gate. You decide to try and use a Looks check on him, to get you through the gate. Your check succeeds.

"Sorry, friend, you seem like a nice fellow and I really wish I could let you in, but orders are orders."

You approach Corporal Graves at the gate. You decide to try and use Presence on him, to get through the gate. Your check succeeds.

"I am dreadfully sorry, My Lord. I mean no disrespect to your august personage but I would not even let the Duke himself through these gates after dark."

You approach Corporal Graves at the gate. You decide to try and use Hypnotic Suggestion on him. Your check succeeds.

"Nobody is allowed in... I am not allowed to open the gate for anybody... my keys... yes, you can look at my keys..."

I think where there may be an issue is people thinking a successful roll on Looks or Presence means the character succeeds in the final goal. It doesn't. It just makes a person react to them differently, which might lead to a different outcome. Even Hypnotic Presence doesn't necessarily lead to the final goal, but it can cause a person to act out of character.

Yes, in some cases, for a Knave with a high enough Looks score, 'success' may be automatic, but all that success means is everybody seems to like you, or everybody seems to respect you. It doesn't mean that everybody will do what you want.

_________________
Life and Death Are Only a Dice Roll Away!

Shaun Hately
co-author A Weak Pleasure
co-author Friends or Foes
co-author Dragon Warriors Players Guide

Yes, as regards Presence versus Hypnotic Suggestion, the difference is as Shaun suggests. Hypnotic Suggestion provides a temporary amount of invasive control over a victim's mind against their conscious wishes, whereas Presence is all about charismatic persuasion. The weakness of Hypnotic Suggestion was actually deliberate, with a rationale that hypnotism is simply more difficult to employ than charm, and that it should also be weaker than magical spells.

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Show me the mythic legends, mighty heroes and mysterious faerie creatures!

But if we go back to my original post, the lines between them are not clearly defined within the published rules. Comment has already been made they the lines are deliberately blurred. So where exactly does one succeed where the other doesn’t? It is not clear where one can and can’t be used.



That is not what the players guide says. Optional Rules Looks says “can be applied… 2) talking ones way past a sentry” it does not say success depends on the moral code of the mark and that you may not get past the sentry even if you pass the test. If that’s how you want to use them that’s cool and sounds like a good idea to me. My comments however reflect the rules as written.



Again this is a nice interpretation of the rules but this is not what comes across in the guide. The example under the optional looks rules of Hendrik the Half-hand trying to bluff the hellspawn sounds like he is trying to make himself appear to be more than he is but he is but he is using looks rules, not presence. Under the example for presence the young girl clearly knew there was an intruder in the house. She did not think he was more than what he was, she simply succumbed to his charm ie looks. The published examples are the reverse of what you have said.



I agree here that the rules do talk about getting somebody to do something they may not normally do but within their moral code. The wording here is a little clearer than, and not quite as blurred as the previous two. However looking again at the example under presence where the knave gets a kiss into the bargain, would Abigail the shrewd niece of an Earl normally kiss an intruder? Presence has been used in a way that matches the Hypnotic suggestion description.



Again I like the way you interpret the rules but this is not how the rules are written. They talk about success and failure and nothing in-between. At most under the looks rules it says the GM may require a series of rolls, it still doesn’t say you may not succeed even at the end of all your rolls. This means others may interpret them very differently to what you have described.



Yes I can see that the difference in the “fluff” of the two rules but the application remains the same. I don’t need to invade the marks mind as I have already persuaded them with my charisma. I agree Hypnotism should be weaker than magic but within any given profession it is not normal to make an 8th rank skill of the mighty weaker than a 1st rank ability. So again, if I can get the job done with the cheaper tool, why buy the more expensive one, especially when it is less likely to work.

I thank you guys for taking the time to describe the intent behind the rules. My issues are not with the intent of what was trying to be done but the way it was done. The lines are blurred, the descriptions are similar, the examples given for one ability match the descriptions of other abilities, the mechanics make lower ranked abilities more useful than skills of the mighty, and the rules can be interpreted by different people in vastly different ways. Clearer, unique descriptions and examples with clear defined boundaries between the different abilities in the published guide would have helped here.

I like the knave, but in this area it still needs a lot of work to get everyone on the same page. Remember we may all role-play in our own ways and interpret things differently. Clearer rules will help reduce the amount of confusion. Sorry guys, but what was published doesn’t really match what you have described here in the forum. I say this in good faith as someone who genuinely cares about the Dragon Warriors game system.