My Solution to the "Attractiveness" Issue with Charisma


Homebrew and House Rules

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DIO has charisma, ZA BOWAURLDO!!!


Bandw2 wrote:

So if i were to rename the stats I would name them after measurable things and not nebulous mental things that can shape personality.

Intelligence would become Memory (covering your ability to process information as well, not just retaining it, as in putting 2 and 2 together to make 4)

Wisdom would become Mental reflexes, or some other word I could use to accurately describe it, but it would record how quickly you can think about the world around you. Your reaction time and ability to counter mental attacks before they can effect you, this slides off into covering your perception and sense skills by making sure you're less likely to not be paying attention, etc.

Charisma would become your force of will, which is actually palpable in pathfinder worlds. People are often drawn to people with strong wills, they can also be easily manipulated by them and they also are less likely to be manipulated in return.

It covers everything very easily and...

Actually... remembering things is a wisdom check, I believe, while solving a puzzle would be an intelligence check.

People talk of charisma being a physical stat... think about wisdom, then! All the senses are tied to wisdom! Perception is your eyes, your nose, your ears, your skin... being able to discern fine details at a distance seems like a physical trait to me! ;)

Dark Archive

When it comes the initial subject of measuring attractiveness, I have learned that it is simply not worth arguing about when it comes to Charisma.

Pathfinder has actually offered an alternative that I'd be more than willing to use for one of my characters, that being the social trait "Charming" which is as follows:
----------------------

Charming
Blessed with good looks, you've come to depend on the fact that others find you attractive.

Benefit: You gain a +1 trait bonus when you use Bluff or Diplomacy on a character that is (or could be) sexually attracted to you, and a +1 trait bonus to the save DC of any language-dependent spell you cast on such characters or creatures.

There are also a few racial options and feats here or there that can be used to measure attractive without having to waste time debating Charisma and whether or not attractiveness plays any part into the ability stat.


Charisma is the culmination of all factors that influence others - be them physical appearance, vocabulary, social whit, body language, force of personality, perceptive presence, even the sound of their voice, etc. - quantified as a single number. Until Paizo breaks this number into several narrower factors (which won't happen), Charisma will continue to be a problem for anyone trying to describe it to anyone else, because everyone's perception of these factors varies from each others'.

As for your house rule, I think it's unbalanced. Most creatures immune to mind-affecting effects (including Charm and Intimidate), are in the category that would grant your DC/check a -1 penalty, making it irrelevant that you got the -1 penalty in the first place, meaning that in most cases, you're pretty much getting a free +2 bonus to your Charms and Cha-based checks to the only creatures you were gonna use them on in the first place. If you made it a feat instead of an automatic mechanic, I would say it's balanced.


I really do groan when I see another "Add your CHA modifier to......" option


The original poster wrote:
The Actual Houserule: If you have 14 or more Charisma, you can choose to add the "Attractive" modifier. If you do, you gain a +2 bonus on Charisma ability checks and Charisma-based skills against anyone who is attracted to your race and sex (which is most player races and possibly some monster races), as well as +2 to the DC of your charm spells against these individuals. You gain a -1 penalty on charm DCs and checks against anyone else. If you do not choose this modifier, your Charisma score is unchanged. At the DM's discretion, you may want to make the modifiers more extreme for very high Charisma scores.

Since you asked for opinions, I'm not really a fan.

I am of the opinion that Charisma is a purely mental ability score: It represents your ability to impose your will upon others by nonphysical means; such as persuasion, deception, intimidation, obstinance, etc.

In my 35 years of gaming, every attempt I've seen to add a stat for physical appearance has pretty much fallen flat... starting with the "Comeliness (COM)" stat introduced to AD&D 1st Edition in TSR's 1985 rulebook Unearthed Arcana. (I think it's notable that COM didn't get included in any subsequent AD&D 1e material, and did not appear in 2e.) In 2005, the 3.5 third-party supplement The Book of Erotic Fantasy by Valar Press (republished by White Wolf) tried adding this stat back, and met with a similar level of success.

When I GM, the way I play PC appearance is simple: You can describe your character's physical appearance in any way you want. If you want your character to be ruggedly handsome or alluringly beautiful, you just define your character that way. If you want your character to have a particularly memorable or striking appearance, that could help or hinder you in certain circumstances, as the plot of the game dictates; I might give an ad hoc circumstance bonus or penalty to particular skill rolls if that aspect of the character comes into play.

If a player wants her PC's physical appearance to grant some kind of game mechanic modifier, then she'll need to take a trait or feat that grants it, such as the Charming trait or a feat like Persuasive or Skill Focus: Bluff.


Pathfinder Lost Omens Subscriber
Goblin_Priest wrote:
Bandw2 wrote:
stuff

Actually... remembering things is a wisdom check, I believe, while solving a puzzle would be an intelligence check.

People talk of charisma being a physical stat... think about wisdom, then! All the senses are tied to wisdom! Perception is your eyes, your nose, your ears, your skin... being able to discern fine details at a distance seems like a physical trait to me! ;)

I don't believe wisdom is for remembering things.

here's the first lines of intelligence and wisdom, since I wasn't able to find anything specific on wisdom checks.

Intelligence wrote:
Intelligence determines how well your character learns and reasons.
Wisdom wrote:
Wisdom describes a character's willpower, common sense, awareness, and intuition.

I'd prefer these be simply described as your memory and mental reflexes, so that way you don't have these traits affecting your character's personality.


Pathfinder Lost Omens Subscriber
Haladir wrote:
The original poster wrote:
The Actual Houserule: If you have 14 or more Charisma, you can choose to add the "Attractive" modifier. If you do, you gain a +2 bonus on Charisma ability checks and Charisma-based skills against anyone who is attracted to your race and sex (which is most player races and possibly some monster races), as well as +2 to the DC of your charm spells against these individuals. You gain a -1 penalty on charm DCs and checks against anyone else. If you do not choose this modifier, your Charisma score is unchanged. At the DM's discretion, you may want to make the modifiers more extreme for very high Charisma scores.

Since you asked for opinions, I'm not really a fan.

I am of the opinion that Charisma is a purely mental ability score: It represents your ability to impose your will upon others by nonphysical means; such as persuasion, deception, intimidation, obstinance, etc.

In my 35 years of gaming, every attempt I've seen to add a stat for physical appearance has pretty much fallen flat... starting with the "Comeliness (COM)" stat introduced to AD&D 1st Edition in TSR's 1985 rulebook Unearthed Arcana. (I think it's notable that COM didn't get included in any subsequent AD&D 1e material, and did not appear in 2e.) In 2005, the 3.5 third-party supplement The Book of Erotic Fantasy by Valar Press (republished by White Wolf) tried adding this stat back, and met with a similar level of success.

When I GM, the way I play PC appearance is simple: You can describe your character's physical appearance in any way you want. If you want your character to be ruggedly handsome or alluringly beautiful, you just define your character that way. If you want your character to have a particularly memorable or striking appearance, that could help or hinder you in certain circumstances, as the plot of the game dictates; I might give an ad hoc circumstance bonus or penalty to particular skill...

I feel like mentioning they fell flat, because for the most part all it affects is like starting attitude modifiers, and no one really pays any attention to those anyway. There simply isn't a way to make physical appearance an interesting stat on it's own.


For us, one of several homebrew traits was the Social trait Attractive. It granted a Trait bonus of +1 to all Charisma-based checks when dealing with someone who might consider you physically appealing and a -1 penalty to all Charisma-based checks when dealing with someone who might consider you a rival. We also have the feat Sex Appeal which did the same thing except with Racial bonuses of +2 and penalties of -2. The feats were deliberately left so that they could stack, in case a character wanted to double-down and really play up their attractiveness. Of course, ultimately its the GM's call as to who might find them attractive and who might consider them a rival, though presumably more NPC's would fall in the former category than the latter.


A feat for +2 or -2 to three skills when the DM wants seems like kind of a crummy deal.

I mean, persuasive is +2 to diplo and intimidate, +4 at level 10.

Adding bluff to that list doesn't seem worth keeping it +2 forever and then making it only work when the DM wants and having it actually penalize you if they feel like it seems kind of crummy.


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I'd just use the physical attributes to define physical attractiveness.

Some possible interpretations would be:

High Str + Con -> Arnold Schwarzenegger.
High Str + Dex -> "muscles like whipcord."
High Str alone -> Muscles covered by a bit of fat.
High Con + Dex -> Not imposing looking, but nothing puts him down.
High Con alone -> Santa Clause. But from the cover of a metal album.
High Dex alone -> Acrobat


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This reminds me of this old thing I made sometime back: the derivative ability scores.

You choose two things to represent your physical appearance, how powerful you seem, and your apparent luck. These scores have no real mechanical effect, but can be used to determine others' perspectives without utilizing the actual ability scores directly.

Dark Archive

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Tacticslion wrote:

This reminds me of this old thing I made sometime back: the derivative ability scores.

You choose two things to represent your physical appearance, how powerful you seem, and your apparent luck. These scores have no real mechanical effect, but can be used to determine others' perspectives without utilizing the actual ability scores directly.

What of those attractive folk who are neither very strong or tough, without a lot of muscle or bulk, but simply very pretty or attractive? Those who perhaps live lives without need to ever really work physically hard, yet being very beautiful to look at.


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Tacticslion wrote that Tacticslion wrote:
Still, those who are truly charismatic do at least care for their physical cleanliness and a moderate amount of their appearance. To derive appearance, choose one of Strength (for well built muscular structure) or Dexterity (for swift, graceful movements) and one of Intelligence (for well-used lexicon, fashion knowledge, and a clever ‘look’) or Charisma (for all-around personality manifested in the flesh). When you have chosen one physical ability score and one mental ability score, add them together plus ten and any other bonuses, and you have your appearance. Alternatively strictly use charisma along with strength or dexterity to show physical beauty characterized by muscular development or toning.

Seems like it could accommodate that alright.


Seems unnecessary if the game is DMed correctly. Appearance is really a non-issue and it should not affect the game in any way. Can you give any examples of how it has affected your game? Charisma is about personal magnetism and that's it. Very little to do with Appearance. Some of the most beautiful people in the world are so boring and nauseating that after an hour you'd rather be hanging out with the Elephant Man. Charm spells are magical, it makes Zero difference if you are good looking or not.

Dark Archive

Except for Sorcerers, then it is the exception then.


Bandw2 wrote:
I feel like mentioning they fell flat, because for the most part all it affects is like starting attitude modifiers, and no one really pays any attention to those anyway. There simply isn't a way to make physical appearance an interesting stat on it's own.

It's not generally a big issue in wargames like D+D and Pathfinder, but it comes into it's own in rules light games such as Storyteller, which has Appearance as one of the three Social attributes.

Dark Archive

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I refuse to view or treat D&D or Pathfinder as a war game. It may have rules for combat, and it may generally be assumed that combat is fairly important to the roleplay, but I will not agree it is a war game.


JonathonWilder wrote:
I refuse to view or treat D&D or Pathfinder as a war game. It may have rules for combat, and it may generally be assumed that combat is fairly important to the roleplay, but I will not agree it is a war game.

Put on blinders if you like, but Minature Wargaming is at the heart of D+D's roots. 3.5 even put out a supplement called "Minature Handbook" which had character classes such as Healer and Warmage and Marshal that were all but reduced to minature pieces.

The game originated by bolting roleplaying on to wargaming and the entire history has been trying to complete the fitting together of the two. Back in the days of First Edition, movement was not described in feet, but in inches on a battlemap. The 30 and 20 foot movement rate of today were the 12 and 9 inches of yore. And lot of maneuvers and combats still pretty much depend on how the minatures are arranged on a battlemap.

The big difference with story-based games is that they generally don't get anywhere near the minutiae of war games. You don't generally have Werewolf, Vampire, or Dr. Who and Buffy, or Amber Diceless played with tactical battlemaps.

Silver Crusade

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Drahliana Moonrunner wrote:
JonathonWilder wrote:
I refuse to view or treat D&D or Pathfinder as a war game. It may have rules for combat, and it may generally be assumed that combat is fairly important to the roleplay, but I will not agree it is a war game.

Put on blinders if you like, but Minature Wargaming is at the heart of D+D's roots. 3.5 even put out a supplement called "Minature Handbook" which had character classes such as Healer and Warmage and Marshal that were all but reduced to minature pieces.

The game originated by bolting roleplaying on to wargaming and the entire history has been trying to complete the fitting together of the two. Back in the days of First Edition, movement was not described in feet, but in inches on a battlemap. The 30 and 20 foot movement rate of today were the 12 and 9 inches of yore. And lot of maneuvers and combats still pretty much depend on how the minatures are arranged on a battlemap.

The big difference with story-based games is that they generally don't get anywhere near the minutiae of war games. You don't generally have Werewolf, Vampire, or Dr. Who and Buffy, or Amber Diceless played with tactical battlemaps.

... none of that makes Pathfinder or DnD a wargame though.

Fresh corn off the cob =/= Popcorn


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Sure it does. Popcorn is a type of corn, it simply isn't harvested fresh on the cob until it dries out.


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I'm inclined to think Pathfinder is closer to a story game than a wargame, mainly because of how players are encouraged to run it by APs and such. But not by much.


The 007 game replaced Wisdom and Charisma with Perception and Willpower, respectively. It eliminated an awful lot of ambiguity. I really wish D&D had done the same.

As it is, Wis and Cha are random mish-mashes of stuff that in some cases overlap, and in others have almost nothing to do with one another, in a kind of two-stat soup that no one can sort out.


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I think the distinction is pretty clear, personally. There's way more confusing overlap with Wisdom and Intelligence than Wisdom and Charisma.


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Kirth Gersen wrote:

The 007 game replaced Wisdom and Charisma with Perception and Willpower, respectively. It eliminated an awful lot of ambiguity. I really wish D&D had done the same.

As it is, Wis and Cha are random mish-mashes of stuff that in some cases overlap, and in others have almost nothing to do with one another, in a kind of two-stat soup that no one can sort out.

Do you think that's a problem with the ambiguity between Wis and Cha, or with mating skills to specific ability scores? In early D&D Wisdom was Cleric's prime requisite (Which I'm fine with; strong fighters, dexterous thieves, intelligent wizards, ahem, magic-users and wise clerics, it works) but Wisdom had nothing to do with avoiding surprise. In 3e/PF the ability score that makes a cleric oh-so-clerical makes joe average NPC good at a ton of other stuff which is not at all divine in nature, just as a fact of the game mechanics.


I've cut Ability Scores out of skills [and attacks and saves(including save DCs)] and IMO my game is better for it.


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D&D/Pathfinder is neither a narrative game nor a wargame. It is a combination of the two, and is both, without truly being either one. A narrative game is generally not going to have a battlemap (though they can still be useful for showing approximate positions and such during combats). A true wargame lacks any narrative at all.

In games with presence instead of charisma as an attribute, it's the force of personality that's emphasized, and, especially since there are several spontaneous spellcasting classes that get their spellcasting ability from such a force, it seems to me that that is what should be emphasized with charisma as well.

Something I would like to point out as well is that I've noticed, as a GM, in Paizo adventures there are female characters are specifically referred to as beautiful but yet have low charisma scores (like 8).

Lastly I would like to agree with those who have said that appearance is not necessarily attractiveness (though it can be) and with those who recommend letting players say how attractive they are and applying ad hoc bonuses and penalties as appropriate. If they want something more concrete, take a trait.


JonathonWilder wrote:
Tacticslion wrote:

This reminds me of this old thing I made sometime back: the derivative ability scores.

You choose two things to represent your physical appearance, how powerful you seem, and your apparent luck. These scores have no real mechanical effect, but can be used to determine others' perspectives without utilizing the actual ability scores directly.

What of those attractive folk who are neither very strong or tough, without a lot of muscle or bulk, but simply very pretty or attractive? Those who perhaps live lives without need to ever really work physically hard, yet being very beautiful to look at.

You misread it.

Strength or dexterity, not strength or constitution.

That said, first important note "old thing" (i.e. not necessarily up to current standards) and second important note "optional" (i.e. feel free to adjust it for your own purposes).

:)


bearinjapan wrote:
Seems unnecessary if the game is DMed correctly. Appearance is really a non-issue and it should not affect the game in any way. Can you give any examples of how it has affected your game? Charisma is about personal magnetism and that's it. Very little to do with Appearance. Some of the most beautiful people in the world are so boring and nauseating that after an hour you'd rather be hanging out with the Elephant Man. Charm spells are magical, it makes Zero difference if you are good looking or not.

For us? "It made people feel good to have a number."

There you go! :D


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Goblin_Priest wrote:
Bandw2 wrote:

So if i were to rename the stats I would name them after measurable things and not nebulous mental things that can shape personality.

Intelligence would become Memory (covering your ability to process information as well, not just retaining it, as in putting 2 and 2 together to make 4)

Wisdom would become Mental reflexes, or some other word I could use to accurately describe it, but it would record how quickly you can think about the world around you. Your reaction time and ability to counter mental attacks before they can effect you, this slides off into covering your perception and sense skills by making sure you're less likely to not be paying attention, etc.

Charisma would become your force of will, which is actually palpable in pathfinder worlds. People are often drawn to people with strong wills, they can also be easily manipulated by them and they also are less likely to be manipulated in return.

It covers everything very easily and...

Actually... remembering things is a wisdom check, I believe, while solving a puzzle would be an intelligence check.

People talk of charisma being a physical stat... think about wisdom, then! All the senses are tied to wisdom! Perception is your eyes, your nose, your ears, your skin... being able to discern fine details at a distance seems like a physical trait to me! ;)

That's why every holy training program includes an eye exam, you know.


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Kobold Cleaver wrote:
I think the distinction is pretty clear, personally. There's way more confusing overlap with Wisdom and Intelligence than Wisdom and Charisma.

Dunno. I've always found it kind of weird that Charisma is your force of personality and ability to exert your will but doesn't actually do anything to help you resist those same effects. Instead that's intrinsically linked to... your ability to find those keys you lost the other day.


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Look at it this way: Wisdom is Constitution, Charisma is Strength. ;P

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