What did the OP say happened.
What she did instead was basically tell him "F*$§ off or I kill you", pretty much in those words, and shove her way past him.
She rolled good on her Intimidate too.For me that meant however he was now convinced that they really did it, he's drunk and he feels honor-bound now to his threat before to declare a blood-feud (which apparently is a big thing to Ulfen), so while he was shaken from the Intimidate he'd still rage and attack.
He actually crit the face with his Battleaxe and nearly send her into a coma with a single hit.
The PC told the NPOc to f'uff or I'll kill you. The PC shoved past him. The PC rolled well on their intimidate score.
The PC successfully intimidated them.Later the player told the DM they felt cheated because they wanted to make the guy friendly. Except they didn't tell the DM that. (until 4'ish months after the fact.)
I think we all agree- 4 months is a long itme to go between taking an action and telling the DM what version of a skill you are using.
Note the spoiler in the OP.
immediately rages and attacks (note that he is not so drunk
as to take any penalties in combat).
The write-up in the adventure has said what happens if the PC's don't use some method to change the person from pissed to friendly. He. Attacks.
What else did the OP say?
He said from what they saw in that region chest-thumping would be a better result than sweet-talking and the guy should have backed down.
The player in question was trying to chest thump, not sweet talk the guy. He was trying to demoralize him. It just didn't work. Which ultimiately is the player's beef. I rolled high so what I wanted to happen is what should have happened.
And if the PC had told the DM that he wanted to use intimidate to make the guy friendly it might have worked. It could have at least sparked a conversation that would lead to a resolution.
Instead though the PC threatened the guy which by the text in the AP write up the OP posted meant the guy attacked.
And he did.
Know what your skills do. If a skill (or feat or spell or class ability or trait or magical item or non-magical item or whatever) has a list of options then yuo NEED to tell the DM which you are using. While they have the option of asking you directly they also have the option of going with what you say to determine which option you chose.
"F'off or I'll kill you" while you brush past the guy is NOT a method to tell the DM you are taking a minute to intimidate the guy into friendlyness. Its a way to tell the DM you are trying to demoralize him. Which in this particular case was a recipe to get his axe in your face.
-S
So, at your table, if one prefers the GM to follow some semblance of the rules for skill checks, rather than "calling it like they see it", the solution is to never roleplay at all?That sounds really... bad.
I literally do not understand what you are trying to say.
This thread makes me want to rename the Skills Bulff and Intimidate into Feint and Demoralize and say the other uses are now simply RP, that way no one can argue over this dumb crap anymore.
Later the player told the DM they felt cheated because they wanted to make the guy friendly. Except they didn't tell the DM that. (until 4'ish months after the fact.)Except it should have anyway for 1d6 × 10 minutes.
The write-up in the adventure has said what happens if the PC's don't use some method to change the person from pissed to friendly. He. Attacks.Then why bother giving the player the roll if he was going to autofail him regardless what he rolled? That's why it's pretty unfair. If the GM is going to be that inflexible with the material he should be up front about it and probably not have allowed the attempt.
Know what your skills do.
Again, wasn't an issue. GM knew. Player knew. It just comes down to the GM didn't want the Barbarian to be intimidated.
The write-up in the adventure has said what happens if the PC's don't use some method to change the person from pissed to friendly. He. Attacks.Then why bother giving the player the roll if he was going to autofail him regardless what he rolled? That's why it's pretty unfair. If the GM is going to be that inflexible with the material he should be up front about it and probably not have allowed the attempt.
Ummm....I don't think thats quite how it happened. They way I read it the player picked up his dice and said "I tell him to frack off and brush by him, I rolled eleventy billion intimidate."
That's all fine and dandy, but the GM didn't ask for an intimidate role, the player just rolled one. And the player didn't say he was trying to convince him to be his friend, he told him to frack off. I mean, I always do that to people who I want to be my friend but it can't work for everybody right?
Also, everybody is just arguing circles around one another. I don't even know why I bothered to post this. We can't have an argument because it's clear no one's opinion or position on the subject will be changed by any argument the opposing side can provide.
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Except it wasn't an ambiguous situation. The player clearly stated what he was doing, and it wasn't taking a minute to do a scare away check. We're back to the GM having to stop every time the player says something to say 'You said you are going to attack the guy, are you using any of your feats?' every time. That's no way to run the game.
Yet the PC made an Intimidate check. So it's clear that they thought using Intimidate was appropriate in this situation.
Rounds occur outside of combat, sure. Is there any impact of the Shaken condition outside of combat? Is there a point of "demoralizing" somebody outside of combat? Plus, rolling initiative allows you to track who goes in what order. You're using Intimidate to place an effect on somebody which only plays a role in combat. What's the point of demoralizing outside of combat (or at the very least, when initiative is tracking actions)?
And Intimidated people need not run away. It can work just as well to explain it as them simply having "lost the nerve" to carry on with the plan, at that time. There's nothing to say the NPC doesn't come back some short time later even madder and more sure of himself, instigating a combat at that point. In fact, that seems precisely how this could have played out, considering what happened.
It simply seems dismissive to me to have it play out:
NPC: "Hey! We need to talk!"
PC: I want to intimidate him. "F-off! *pushes past* *rolls high on skill check*"
NPC: *hits PC in the face axe*
And where did the PC say, "I'm intending to demoralize him"? The rules of the encounter said that if the attitude is changed to friendly, he goes away. The purpose of making an intimidate check can be to temporarily change attitudes to friendly. So it's actually a really legitimate question to ask the PC if they're intending to demoralize or influence the NPC. Just because they inartfully roleplay to say "F off or I'll kill you!" doesn't mean the intent isn't to influence. That's the point. As a GM, your job is to clarify this very type of thing. Does it need to happen every time a person does any kind of check? No. But when the results could be this disparate, it is incumbent upon you to figure it out.
And again, it's a temporary change, after which the NPC has even more reason to hate the PCs. So the encounter is going to happen anyway.
Again though, we are back to either granting the person the best way to do something every time, or we are back to stopping the game every time someone says something. Because the OP's player wasn't ambiguous. It was very clear they were not using a minute to do anything.
So instead, we are back to requiring the PCs to specifically roleplay a minute long conversation to use Intimidate when what the PC is wanting to do fits right inside what Intimidate can do? The OP's actions weren't particularly ambiguous. "I want to do [this]." What those actions actually mean is a separate matter. Demoralizing? Influencing? It's not clear. It's certainly possible that the PC still wanted to Demoralize the NPC. I'm not going to assume that from what was presented.
If you want to stop the game every time, that's fine, but you are absolutely wrong on the combat part. There is nothing in the rules saying you can only demoralize in combat. Nothing in there about 'in combat'. Only how long it lasts, rounds. Rounds exist outside combat. If you don't think so, then you can't cast any spell that lasts in rounds outside combat, which is not true. So, again, no combat required for this. It just makes them shaken for a few rounds.
But again, what impact does demoralizing have outside of combat? What exactly does Shaken do? They suffer penalties to attack rolls, saving throws, skill checks, and ability checks. Necessarily combat? No, but there's a pretty strong indication for that, particularly since it lasts a few seconds only. Not to mention that demoralizing is a standard action, which is a concept that really only exists within combat. You can do things that take a standard action outside of combat, certainly, but how often does one need to precisely track time outside of it? It seems pretty clear to me that the intent behind Intimidate (Demoralize) is to be used in combat because you can't spend 10 rounds telling someone to kiss off.
Why did the NPC get to attack first? Were the PCs given a Perception check to notice the drawing of the weapon? Did the NPC take the shaken penalty on the Initiative check as well as the attack and confirmation rolls?
The GM's job is to adjudicate the rules, and the player's job is to specify what they are doing. If the player specifies something that is perfectly legal within the rules, get's a result that wasn't what they wanted, that is there fault. The GM is not supposed to second guess the players at every step. You truly want to play in a game where the GM makes you stop and point to the rule and verse on every thing you do? Have you actually ever played in a game like that? Do you run your own games like that, where you stop every time someone does something? Because, again, the OP's player wasn't 'imprecise' they explained EXACTLY what they did. They told the guy to F-Off and pushed him out of the way. That's not the description of any thing other than a Demoralize check per the Rules. Again, you advocate that every GM should stop every player in every game and confirm which rule they are using.
What? You mean have I ever stopped a game to ask a player what they were trying to do when the said, "I'm going to do 'X'"? Yes. Absolutely. And no, I'm not advocating stopping players all the time to point to the rule they're using. Nothing I said amounts to that.
But what I did say is when a situation like this crops up where I can pretty well figure out what the players are intending to do (get this NPC to leave them alone), but how they're going about doing it doesn't necessarily fit under the rules (or fits under the rules but in potentially a couple of different ways), I'd like to figure out what they actually mean.
GM: Hold on, are you trying to demoralize or influence this guy?
PC: Demoralize!
GM: Ok, let's roll initiative so I can track who goes when.
*everybody rolls initiative*
GM: Ok, what'd you roll on Intimidate? Well, you see it shocks him. A little doubt creeps into his eyes. But, apparently what you said really pissed him off. He draws his axe and swings at your head.
PC: Um ... sh-
[If you want that to happen outside of combat, fine. Then *PC Demoralizes* followed by "Ok, everybody give me a Perception check" followed by "What you said had an impact, because he really gets mad. Unfortunately, you didn't see him draw his axe until it was too late. Roll for initiative!"]
or
GM: Hold on, are you trying to demoralize or influence this guy?
PC: Intimidate!
GM: Influencing takes longer than that. You could probably try to demoralize that way, but influencing takes something else.
PC: Oh. Well, in that case ... Demoralize! [See above]
or
PC: Oh, well, in that case ... I do [whatever] to Intimidate him.
At worst, the Player says, "What's the difference?" In which case you give them a quick explanation. And that's a good thing, because it's then clear that what you thought they intended to do and what they were trying to do based on their understanding of the rules didn't mesh up. Unless the PC said, "I'm going to demoralize him," I'm not necessarily going to assume that's the intended use of Intimidate outside of combat (and especially when the results would be this disparate).
It's not like something like this crops up all the time. Asking a question about it takes a grand total of what, like 10 seconds? At most maybe a minute if there's something you're unsure about or need to explain? Seems like a trivial cost to pay to avoid making a player feel like you pulled the rug out from under them. In the games I've GMed, this has happened at most maybe once a session, if that.
The write-up in the adventure has said what happens if the PC's don't use some method to change the person from pissed to friendly. He. Attacks.Then why bother giving the player the roll if he was going to autofail him regardless what he rolled? That's why it's pretty unfair. If the GM is going to be that inflexible with the material he should be up front about it and probably not have allowed the attempt.Ummm....I don't think thats quite how it happened. They way I read it the player picked up his dice and said "I tell him to frack off and brush by him, I rolled eleventy billion intimidate."
That's all fine and dandy, but the GM didn't ask for an intimidate role, the player just rolled one. And the player didn't say he was trying to convince him to be his friend, he told him to frack off. I mean, I always do that to people who I want to be my friend but it can't work for everybody right?
Also, everybody is just arguing circles around one another. I don't even know why I bothered to post this. We can't have an argument because it's clear no one's opinion or position on the subject will be changed by any argument the opposing side can provide.
And I actually don't have any problem with "You demoralized him and it torked him off, so he attacks you." I just think it's in everybody's best interest for the GM to say, "What are you trying to accomplish?" Doing that takes like 5 seconds and can avoid this whole problem.
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"I Craft a catapult, fire it at the Viking" (rattle rattle) "and brush past him."
Later the player told the DM they felt cheated because they wanted to make the guy friendly. Except they didn't tell the DM that. (until 4'ish months after the fact.)Except it should have anyway for 1d6 × 10 minutes.The write-up in the adventure has said what happens if the PC's don't use some method to change the person from pissed to friendly. He. Attacks.Then why bother giving the player the roll if he was going to autofail him regardless what he rolled? That's why it's pretty unfair. If the GM is going to be that inflexible with the material he should be up front about it and probably not have allowed the attempt.Know what your skills do.Again, wasn't an issue. GM knew. Player knew. It just comes down to the GM didn't want the Barbarian to be intimidated.
Intimidate doesn't make him friendly (for any length of time) unless you spend 1 minute doing it.
If you spend 1 standard action then /instead/ of making them friendly it Demoralizes them.
Action: Using Intimidate to change an opponent's attitude requires 1 minute of conversation. Demoralizing an opponent is a standard action.
If you don't spend 1 minute then you are, by the definition of the skill, not going to make them friendly. One for one second not for 1d6x10 minutes. Not if you roll a 1 or a natural 20 or the final tally is an 11 billion Intimidate roll. It doesn't happen anymnore than rolling an 11 billion climb check means your character can fly away.
Intimidate can not make someone friendly without spending 1 full minute. "F'off or I'll kill you" as you brush past the guy isn't 1 full minute of anything. If ALL you do is that, and never tell the DM "hey, i want this to make him friendly" (so that the Dm knows you are doing what you said, plus alot of other stuff you didn't say) then he's not going to assume you did a bunch of stuff you didn't say,.
he's going to assume you did what you *said* and consult the rules accordingly and then make the NPC react accordingly.
In this case, the PC said what she did, rolled the die, demoralized the opponent, who tried to crater her face with an axe.
She failed to make the NPC friendly because she decided NOT TO DO ANY ACTION that would make the NPC friendly. If she had, then maybe she wouldn't have gotten an axe to her face. But she didn't. She had optins at her disposal. She chose one option instead of another. That turned out to be an ineffective option.
The DM acted appropriately.
It comes down to the DM knowing that the demoralize option would either pass or fail (and give the NPC an appropriate penalty if successful) but that by the NPC's write-up a demoralize would be unsuccessful in terminating the encounter.
However, using Intimidate to modify the attitude of the NPC could have succeeded. The PC didn't try that though. She tried to demoralize the guy. Pass or fail- axe to the face.
1 full minute, or 1 standard action. The PC chose their course and didn't like that the outcome *they wanted* didn't happen just because they got a high number on the die.
I can understand that. It sucks to get a high number *and still fail* at what you wanted to do.
But when you have *options* and *choices* then you live with the option or choice that you made. This PC choose to demoralize. *that was the wrong choice*. They rolled high. They were successful in demoralizing the NPC. The NPC was demoralized. The demoralized NPC planted an axe into the PC's skull.
If the PC wanted to use the "make him friendly for 1d6x10 minutes" version of Intimidate then they should have 1) told the DM that. 2) Acted in a manner consistent with that desire or (preferably) BOTH.
But you can't act like A and then get mad when the DM assumes you want A when you really want B. You have to communicate.
You can roll as high as you want on that climb check but its never, ever going to let you fly. Or swim. Or make a pair of Boots of Elvenkind.
Why? Because the rules for the climb check dictate how the skill works.
Intimidate also has rules for how it works. It has an election of two choices in it. This PC chose X and wasn't happy that they didn't achieve the result Y. A high roll doesn't suddenly change the action that was taken. Being unhappy with the result, or the result not doing what you wanted also doesn't change the choice you made.
If you want to give a 3 second verbatim sentence followed by an Action and you want that to be a 1 minute skill check instead of the standard action skill check then the appropriate thing to do is open ye olde mouth and tell the DM.
I, myself, would not Rp out a minute long intimidate check. (or diplomacy check. or any other check actually.) But I WOULD tell the DM i intended for it to be that version and would maybe RP out a line or two and then tell him the gist of what I wanted to say. I certainly wouldn't threaten someone with death and walk off and expect that to count as a " 1 minute of conversation." that the skill requires for that effect.
The Player chose. They chose unwisely. They ate an axe for it. The DM did the right thing.
-S
And I actually don't have any problem with "You demoralized him and it torked him off, so he attacks you." I just think it's in everybody's best interest for the GM to say, "What are you trying to accomplish?" Doing that takes like 5 seconds and can avoid this whole problem.The write-up in the adventure has said what happens if the PC's don't use some method to change the person from pissed to friendly. He. Attacks.Then why bother giving the player the roll if he was going to autofail him regardless what he rolled? That's why it's pretty unfair. If the GM is going to be that inflexible with the material he should be up front about it and probably not have allowed the attempt.Ummm....I don't think thats quite how it happened. They way I read it the player picked up his dice and said "I tell him to frack off and brush by him, I rolled eleventy billion intimidate."
That's all fine and dandy, but the GM didn't ask for an intimidate role, the player just rolled one. And the player didn't say he was trying to convince him to be his friend, he told him to frack off. I mean, I always do that to people who I want to be my friend but it can't work for everybody right?
Also, everybody is just arguing circles around one another. I don't even know why I bothered to post this. We can't have an argument because it's clear no one's opinion or position on the subject will be changed by any argument the opposing side can provide.
The DM can certainly do that. And if I was playing a game and the Dm asked me that, I'd have no problem with it. I might even thank him if he stopped me from making a mistake.
Its not his responsibility to do so, however. It is Mine. I control my character. It is my responsibility to tell the DM what I am doing. If I do not do so, then he has every right to look at what I did say and follow the rules regarding it.
This isn't some absurd, obscure ruling. This isn't someone miscounting a square on the board and the DM forces them to throw a polearm. This is a case of someone choosing to use a standard action instead of a 1 minute action and then getting annoyed that the choice they made didn't work.
To their credit- they didn't gripe about it, or stop the game or have a fit- they just were discussing things several months later and it came up.
The DM however did the right thing. He made the right call.
-S
Ummm....I don't think thats quite how it happened. They way I read it the player picked up his dice and said "I tell him to frack off and brush by him, I rolled eleventy billion intimidate."
That's all fine and dandy, but the GM didn't ask for an intimidate role, the player just rolled one.
You're reading stuff into the OP that isn't there.
GM knew it was intended as an intimidate check, didn't have a problem with the length/content of the check, didn't disallow the check, and had no objection to the way in which the check was made. The player didn't do anything wrong.
It's just that the player chose intimidate over the options explicitly listed in the adventure and that the GM felt the Barbarian shouldn't be dismissed despite the successful intimidation check. I don't think any adventure has a comprehensive list of all ways to approach each situation that may arise. If the text in the adventure is assumed comprehensive and trumps the rules then there really ought to have been some warning.
Also, everybody is just arguing circles around one another. I don't even know why I bothered to post this. We can't have an argument because it's clear no one's opinion or position on the subject will be changed by any argument the opposing side can provide.
I'd settle for a consensus on the facts. The circles are being made by those circumventing the point.
Intimidate doesn't make him friendly (for any length of time) unless you spend 1 minute doing it.
GM did not have an issue with the length of the threat. The GM understood it, the player understood it. That was never the issue.
And I actually don't have any problem with "You demoralized him and it torked him off, so he attacks you." I just think it's in everybody's best interest for the GM to say, "What are you trying to accomplish?" Doing that takes like 5 seconds and can avoid this whole problem.The write-up in the adventure has said what happens if the PC's don't use some method to change the person from pissed to friendly. He. Attacks.Then why bother giving the player the roll if he was going to autofail him regardless what he rolled? That's why it's pretty unfair. If the GM is going to be that inflexible with the material he should be up front about it and probably not have allowed the attempt.Ummm....I don't think thats quite how it happened. They way I read it the player picked up his dice and said "I tell him to frack off and brush by him, I rolled eleventy billion intimidate."
That's all fine and dandy, but the GM didn't ask for an intimidate role, the player just rolled one. And the player didn't say he was trying to convince him to be his friend, he told him to frack off. I mean, I always do that to people who I want to be my friend but it can't work for everybody right?
Also, everybody is just arguing circles around one another. I don't even know why I bothered to post this. We can't have an argument because it's clear no one's opinion or position on the subject will be changed by any argument the opposing side can provide.
I don't like that level of hand holding. Especially for experienced players, even more so in role playing portions of the game. You may not know if you're intimidating to demoralize or scare him into being your friend, but when you say you're doing something you're lucky if I give you more than a, "Are you sure?". Players should be allowed to fail. Sometimes characters should get an axe upside their skull. There is a huge difference between frak off and "If you don't leave us alone we will kill you, your wife, your child, your parents, and everyone else in this damned city as we burn the whole city to the ground. We have incomprehensible power that your feeble mind cannot begin to comprehend. We control the eldritch forces of the universe and we will bring down our righteous fury and lay you low if you do not relinquish your ground. Your little dog will be the least of your concern if you do not yield now. We did not kill your dog because we did not will it so, but gods help you if we see you again or you bother us on this matter just once more. By the time we are finished with you, you shall crave the release of death." That's an appropriate intimidate. Maybe not to make someone your friend necessarily, but to make the act friendly until they can GTFO? Yeah, I think so.
Yet the PC made an Intimidate check. So it's clear that they thought using Intimidate was appropriate in this situation.
As someone posted above, saying "I build a catapult using Craft(Seige Weapon) and blast him with a ballista" <rolls dice> "Oh, Cool, I rolled a 43, I then brush past him." doesn't work, and I hope you would agree it doesn't. It takes time to build a ballista, and you need materials. This is exactly the same situation, only needing 10 turns instead of 10 days. But again, the player cannot circumvent the rules by rolling and getting high and claiming to win the game. There are rules, he didn't follow the rules. He just did whatever he wanted, ignoring how the skill works, and assumed his interpretation was valid.
Rounds occur outside of combat, sure. Is there any impact of the Shaken condition outside of combat? Is there a point of "demoralizing" somebody outside of combat? Plus, rolling initiative allows you to track who goes in what order. You're using Intimidate to place an effect on somebody which only plays a role in combat. What's the point of demoralizing outside of combat (or at the very least, when initiative is tracking actions)?
Wrong. Shaken imposes the following :
A shaken character takes a –2 penalty on attack rolls, saving throws, skill checks, and ability checks. Shaken is a less severe state of fear than frightened or panicked.Only one of those four things is strictly combat. So no, demoralize doesn't only work in combat. Someone could indeed demoralize someone out of combat and initiate combat to penalize that person. Or they could do so to make them have a harder time with a skill check (psyching out an opponent during a dart throwing contest for example, which again is out of combat). I am sure there are dozens and dozens of reasons to use it outside of combat. Your insistence that it is only in combat shows a complete and total lack of knowledge about the rules.
In fact, that seems precisely how this could have played out, considering what happened.It simply seems dismissive to me to have it play out:
NPC: "Hey! We need to talk!"
PC: I want to intimidate him. "F-off! *pushes past* *rolls high on skill check*"
NPC: *hits PC in the face axe*And where did the PC say, "I'm intending to demoralize him"? The rules of the encounter said that if the attitude is changed to friendly, he goes away. The purpose of making an intimidate check can be to temporarily change attitudes to friendly. So it's actually a really legitimate question to ask the PC if they're intending to demoralize or influence the NPC. Just because they inartfully roleplay to say "F off or I'll kill you!" doesn't mean the intent isn't to influence. That's the point.
They didn't inartfully roleplay a 1 minute intimidate check. They said "I tell him to F off and push past him." Rolls dice. That's it. That's not inarticulate roleplaying, that is very very good roleplaying, it's saying what their character does, and then rolling to intimidate the guy and hoping he doesn't attack. He did, again, oh too bad so sad.
So instead, we are back to requiring the PCs to specifically roleplay a minute long conversation to use Intimidate when what the PC is wanting to do fits right inside what Intimidate can do? The OP's actions weren't particularly ambiguous. "I want to do [this]." What those actions actually mean is a separate matter. Demoralizing? Influencing? It's not clear. It's certainly possible that the PC still wanted to Demoralize the NPC. I'm not going to assume that from what was presented.
No, again, you seem to completely ignore other people's statements. The statement was 'If you want to do something other than what you indicate you need to tell the GM that'. If he wanted to scare him off, all he had to do was say 'I scare the guy off with an intimidate'. He didn't say that. He said, and I feel like a broken record repeating what should be easily read the first 500 times, he said 'I tell the guy to f off and push past him'. So again, either follow what the player says they do, or don't, but if you don't, you're stopping the game every time they say something.
But again, what impact does demoralizing have outside of combat? What exactly does Shaken do? They suffer penalties to attack rolls, saving throws, skill checks, and ability checks. Necessarily combat? No, but there's a pretty strong indication for that, particularly since it lasts a few seconds only. Not to mention that demoralizing is a standard action, which is a concept that really only exists within combat. You can do things that take a standard action outside of combat, certainly, but how often does one need to precisely track time outside of it? It seems pretty clear to me that the intent behind Intimidate (Demoralize) is to be used in combat because you can't spend 10 rounds telling someone to kiss off.
Your 'feeling' of what was intended isn't RAW. RAW, the skill can be used as it is, not in the way you feel it should be. If you want to houserule, go for it.
Why did the NPC get to attack first? Were the PCs given a Perception check to notice the drawing of the weapon? Did the NPC take the shaken penalty on the Initiative check as well as the attack and confirmation rolls?
A) The AP said he attacks if not convinced to be friendly, indicating the NPC was ready to attack. We don't know why he got to attack first, he may have won initative, the PCs could have failed sense motive checks, he could have had a readied action to attack if the player did anything hostile (a perfectly valid interpretation of the AP). Since we don't know, your question is immaterial.
B) It doesn't matter if he took the penalty on the attack roll or not, the OP stated he rolled a 20. That's a hit no matter what in attack rolls, so it's moot. It doesn't matter for this discussion if the GM goofed up on the crit confirmation or not, it doesn't negate the fact the NPC was perfectly valid to attack with the penalty. Whether it was assessed or not is immaterial to the current discussion.
Other stuff about better ways to GM.
Styles of GMing are as varied as there are GMs. I'll often stop and clarify something if I'm confused. What I object to is the idea, and you keep pushing it, that there was anything confusing in this situation. There wasn't. Nor did the player object at the game. He waited four months. I object to the idea that the GM was somehow wrong for taking the player at his word for what his character did, and then someone on the interweb passing judgement that he was bad for taking the player at his word when the player never even hinted he wanted to do something else before or after the stupid axe to the face. If you wanted to do A, and the GM thought you meant B, you darn well say something at the game, you don't complain about it four months later. I either tell my GM then, or after the game, or I accept that I was less than clear and screwed up.
Ruling aside, I want some of this magic alcohol for all my PCs. It's so potent that it provides a +5 bonus to your DC against all social skills (and apparently can even negate them at will) but at the same time doesn't impose any penalty to attack rolls. If it works like that for this guy, why isn't the rest of humanity hopped to the gills on this stuff, too?
Kirth, you're usually much better at reading before commenting.
1) OP stated the Viking rolled a nat 20 crit, so any penalties to the attack roll were irrelevant.
2) It didn't make him immune to a social skill. The PC used the wrong skill invocation.
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I think it was fairly handled. PCs should realize that all of their actions have consequences and that sometimes, those consequences may include combat or making an enemy of a potential ally. At my table, unless it is painfully obvious to me that you are joking, what you say or do is "in character."
I have had players who thought they were all that and threw the wizard's drink into his face, and they paid the penalty. Not every person they run afoul of is a level 1 commoner (though not all should be retired 20th-level adventurers, either), and sometimes, torquing off someone who is capable of kicking your tail leads to exactly that.
OP stated the Viking rolled a nat 20 crit, so any penalties to the attack roll were irrelevant.
No; the crit still needs to be confirmed, so it's entirely relevant.
"Being drunk" gives an NPC +5 vs. mind-affecting and -0 to attacks.
I presume from the tenor of many of the responses that it gives a PC -5 vs. mind-affecting and -5 to attacks.
P.S. "too bad! so sad!" (and "Hahahahahah he killed the stupid PC and it was totally legal!") sounds to me not like justifying a good call, but rather like gloating. YMMV.
OP stated the Viking rolled a nat 20 crit, so any penalties to the attack roll were irrelevant.No; the crit still needs to be confirmed, so it's entirely relevant.
Not for the purposes of the discussion of whether he should have run away like a little girl it isn't.
"Being drunk" gives an NPC +5 vs. mind-affecting and -0 to attacks.
I presume from the tenor of many of the responses that it gives a PC -5 vs. mind-affecting and -5 to attacks.
Not sure where you are pulling any of this from, haven't seen any rules on that for drunk. I can't find anything in the CRB about the actual penalties or bonuses (if any) for being drunk.
P.S. "too bad! so sad!" (and "Hahahahahah he killed the stupid PC and it was totally legal!") sounds to me not like justifying a good call, but rather like gloating. YMMV.
Not gloating to me. When I say it, I deliver it in a deadpan voice. Oh well, too bad, so sad. It indicates a complete and utter lack of sympathy, not gloating. If you want to make a character who is the face, and has a huge intimidate bonus, you should know the rules for intimidate.
Nobody expects you to know the intimidate rules if you aren't building a character who intimidates. But if that's the shtick you are going for, you should darn well know them. If you don't, too bad, so sad you didn't read how your powers work. That's not my fault, nor is it the GMs responsibility to tell you the best way to play your character. If you ask me, I'll be happy to go over it with you. If I build a character, I read how my powers work. And if I make a mistake on how they work, I tell the GM I made a mistake (even if it's bad for me), and then I move on wiser for the learning experience.
The only time I don't expect someone to know how their character's abilities work is when it's a new player, in which case I am more than happy to tell them how their character works, and even point things out to them if they want me to. But if you've been playing for 5 or 10 years, you should know how your character works by now. If you don't, too bad, so sad.
If I build a character, I read how my powers work. And if I make a mistake on how they work, I tell the GM I made a mistake (even if it's bad for me), and then I move on wiser for the learning experience.This wasn't a misunderstanding of the rules. OP explained why the Intimidation check was reduced to a shaked condition instead.
For me that meant however he was now convinced that they really did it, he's drunk and he feels honor-bound now to his threat before to declare a blood-feud (which apparently is a big thing to Ulfen), so while he was shaken from the Intimidate he'd still rage and attack.
Had nothing to do with the one minute rule, miscommunication between GM & player, the content of the threat, or the way it was RPed.
Not sure where you are pulling any of this from, haven't seen any rules on that for drunk.
From the OP. He goes on about how the viking was just exactly drunk enough to get a big boost vs. social skills, but no penalty at all to attacks. That seemed to me to be an awful convenient state to be in, and wondered if it applied evenly (I suspect it doesn't).
If you don't, too bad, so sad you didn't read how your powers work. That's not my fault, nor is it the GMs responsibility to tell you the best way to play your character.
That depends -- yeah, if it's a relatively new player, or even one new to playing a character with that skill, and who purchased it as an afterthought -- I'd be a lot more sympathetic. After all, this is presumably a friend of yours, hopefully not someone you despise whom you see as inappropriately asking you for a favor. (On the other hand, if it's someone who said, "Yeah! I'm'a make an initimidate MASTER!!!" then, yeah, I'd throw him to the dogs.)
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I never said it can't be used outside of combat. I said it's pretty clearly intended to be used primarily in combat. That's the default. "You can intimidate someone and then initiate combat!" Yeah, that's still combat.
And please feel free to imply I don't understand the rules. That does well for you. Demoralize is clearly intended to be primarily combat oriented. Exclusively? No. Primarily? Yeah, I don't see how you can argue otherwise. And I'm not going to make a base assumption that somebody is using something outside of combat that pretty clearly appears to be intended for use primarily (not exclusively) within combat.
Penalties to attack rolls are still relevant to confirmation rolls. So, again, still applicable. Initiative checks for determining who goes first. Still applicable. I recognize we don't know whether any of these things happened. That's why I asked. It's relevant to the discussion. If the PCs didn't have an opportunity to notice him getting aggressive, beat him in initiative, etc., then I have a problem with it because I believe that would have been adjudicated incorrectly. The way the write up sounded, it was *PC Intimidates* *NPC Rages and attacks*. There was a lot of other detail given. I feel like a detail like "I even gave them a [___] check to notice that he was preparing to attack" would have been mentioned.
I don't have an issue with a particular aspect (though I think more could have been done to simply avoid the problem), I simply think it's the confluence of all factors that turned out unfairly for the player. Perhaps I made that part unclear, so that's on me. But please, mdt, don't act like I'm not capable of understanding the rules. You and I see this differently. Fine. I'm not claiming you don't get anything.
And again, I don't see what the harm is in taking 5 seconds to clarify. Despite your protestations, I don't think it's necessarily clear that the player was intending to demoralize, rather than simply cow. You'd prefer not to, that's fine. I think asking a simple question for the sake of everybody being on the same page is preferable to the minor interruption of gameplay.
I don't like that level of hand holding. Especially for experienced players, even more so in role playing portions of the game. You may not know if you're intimidating to demoralize or scare him into being your friend, but when you say you're doing something you're lucky if I give you more than a, "Are you sure?". Players should be allowed to fail. Sometimes characters should get an axe upside their skull. There is a huge difference between frak off and "If you don't leave us alone we will kill you, your wife, your child, your parents, and everyone else in this damned city as we burn the whole city to the ground. We have incomprehensible power that your feeble mind cannot begin to comprehend. We control the eldritch forces of the universe and we will bring down our righteous fury and lay you low if you do not relinquish your ground. Your little dog will be the least of your concern if you do not yield now. We did not kill your dog because we did not will it so, but gods help you if we see you again or you bother us on this matter just once more. By the time we are finished with you, you shall crave the release of death." That's an appropriate intimidate. Maybe not to make someone your friend necessarily, but to make the act friendly until they can GTFO? Yeah, I think so.
Right, I don't really disagree with any of that. I just don't see how "What do you mean by 'Intimidate'" is doing very much hand-holding.
Once again, I ask to all people saying he needed to verify the type of Intimidate check this:
If you go up to a stranger and he says, "F*** off or I'll kill you!" and pushes past you, is he . . .
a) Trying to scare you (Demoralize)
b) Trying to get you to treat him as a friend for a short time (Influence Attitude)
c) Not sure, need to ask him
Option a is a very reasonable assumption. I can't find any fault with a DM who is told that a character does this, with no further explanation of intent from the PC, and comes to the conclusion that they meant for a Demoralize.
As for the "was there any way to know the NPC would attack?", well, that is mostly on the PC in my mind. The viking dude already said he plans to declare a blood feud, that is pretty much establishing that he is ready to fight about it. I don't think a Sense Motive is required to ascertain that the NPC might attack if mishandled, just Common Sense.
The DM can ask.
The issue is: Is it the DM's job to ask or the player's job to make it clear what they are doing?
If the player says they are doing X and RP's out X and rolls the dice and says X and tells you the result- do you ask them if they are doing Y?
I don't think anyone would slap a DM for asking. I wouldn't. I'd just give an answer and go on without a second thought. Asking might even make me ponder if I was doing the right thing.
Is it his job though? No. It isn't. Its the player's job to know how his skills work, what his skills do, what actions are required to do what and to communicate effectively his intentions if they vary beyond what he's gonna do. And by golly if you are going to stand up and RP something when you actually intend it to come across entirely differently (turning a less than 6 second statement into a minute long converation) then the player had dang well better tell the DM about it.
Its not the DM's job to say "I'm sorry did you mean that to take 1 full minute to make him friendly or was that a standard action to piss him off?"
"F'off or I'll kill you" is pretty clear which one was meant. And it worked. And the player had sour grapes that it didn't function as the other way to use Intimidate.
The player could have misunderstood the skill. The player could have just chosen poorly.
Either way- You make your choice and you deal with it. In this case they had to deal with severe HP loss as result from an axe to the forehead. The situatin not turning out how you wanted it to doesn't mean the DM did something wrong.
-S
Right, I don't really disagree with any of that. I just don't see how "What do you mean by 'Intimidate'" is doing very much hand-holding.
Just a difference of opinion I guess. I was typing something to provide a more clear explanation, but I got lazy.
Its not the DM's job to say "I'm sorry did you mean that to take 1 full minute to make him friendly or was that a standard action to piss him off?"
It's also not his job to say "I'll take it as meaning whatever thing will get him killed, because you know, my job is to punish the players for their presumption!"
"F'off or I'll kill you" is pretty clear which one was meant.
Uh, that he wanted him to f--- off?
And it worked.
No, it didn't, or we wouldn't be having this discussion.
The DM can ask.
The issue is: Is it the DM's job to ask or the player's job to make it clear what they are doing?If the player says they are doing X and RP's out X and rolls the dice and says X and tells you the result- do you ask them if they are doing Y?
I would say that it's the GM's job to facilitate fun times for all.
Let me ask you this?
If the player says they are doing X and RP's out X and rolls the dice and says X and tells you the result - but the GM hears the player say Y - what happens then?
It's certainly not more fun for the player for the GM to say "You should have been clearer. Too bad, So sad." Is it more fun for the GM? Who benefits?
Its not the DM's job to say "I'm sorry did you mean that to take 1 full minute to make him friendly or was that a standard action to piss him off?"It's also not his job to say "I'll take it as meaning whatever thing will get him killed, because you know, my job is to punish the players for their presumption!"
"F'off or I'll kill you" is pretty clear which one was meant.Uh, that he wanted him to f--- off?
And it worked.No, it didn't, or we wouldn't be having this discussion.
Its not the DM's job to punish anyone. It is the DM's job to adjudicate actions and describe the world and act as the NPC's as they go about their lives and especially as they interact with the PC's.
I disagree that the DM just willy nilly interpreted it as being whatever he wanted. The player did an action. The DM responed to that action as the AP write-up told him to.
Yeah, he wanted the guy to F'Off. That isn't friendly. That isn't cooperation. Unless of course you are actually advocating that the player meant and that the DM should have had the NPC go and f' himself off.
Even if that is what he wanted though he didn't do so by the rules. "F'off or I'll kill you" still doesn't rise to the level of a 1 minute long conversation. It does however rise to the level of 1 standard action demoralize.
*could* the DM have asked? Yep. *should* the Player have been specific? Absoutely.
Did the DM bork the player?
Not in my opinion.
And I counter that it did work. The player got exactly what he rolled for and exactly what he RP'd for. He just didn't get what he *wanted*. He Wanted something entirely different. I do grant you that. Unfortunately, the actions he took in character didn't correspond to what he wanted anymore than flapping your arms and rolling a climb check correspond to your character being able to fly.
-S
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And I counter that it did work. The player got exactly what he rolled for and exactly what he RP'd for. He just didn't get what he *wanted*. He Wanted something entirely different. I do grant you that. Unfortunately, the actions he took in character didn't correspond to what he wanted anymore than flapping your arms and rolling a climb check correspond to your character being able to fly.-S
He made an intimidate check with the obvious intent to influence attitude rather than demoralize.
You even admit to recognizing what he wanted.
If we all recognize what the player is trying to have the character attempt, then nitpicking a way to change that to attempting a different action that reinterprets what he was obviously trying to attempt is not a good call.
The DM can ask.
The issue is: Is it the DM's job to ask or the player's job to make it clear what they are doing?If the player says they are doing X and RP's out X and rolls the dice and says X and tells you the result- do you ask them if they are doing Y?
I would say that it's the GM's job to facilitate fun times for all.
Let me ask you this?
If the player says they are doing X and RP's out X and rolls the dice and says X and tells you the result - but the GM hears the player say Y - what happens then?
It's certainly not more fun for the player for the GM to say "You should have been clearer. Too bad, So sad." Is it more fun for the GM? Who benefits?
If the player says A but the DM hears B and then says what happened then presumably the player has the table's backing when he says "I said A." At this point the DM should say "Oh crap I misheard you" and things get re-told accordingly.
We all make mistakes and I do agree that the DM shouldn't arbitrarily hose you for them.
But I also am extremely leery of "mistakes" that always happen to save the PC from a greasy death or costly issue- especially if its something that mirrors what happened in the OP's case.
(thinking "F'off or die" is a 1 minute long convo is awefully convenient after getting your skull split by that axe.)
To be clear- I am not accusing that player. Neither wa the DM that I saw. But it would be a pattern I would look for, if it started happening with any regularity.
What should happen:
Player:
"I really want this guy to leave me alone. I'm going to use Intimidate to make him shut up and go away."
DM: "Alright, it takes one minute and you have to converse with him to do it- or if you just want to demoralize him abit it'll take a standard action."
Player: *responds however he wants it to go down.*
Players and DM's conversing is a good thing.
Players just rolling die and saying "F'off or die" and getting mad when they get axes to the face.. well, they're getting what you get for telling someone to f'off or die. The DM's job is to RP the NPC's. You can't expect him to realistically RP that without getting an axe to the face from the drunk and already-pissed off viking.
He failed to make the guy friendly and cooperative and succeeded admirably and further pissing the guy off.
-S
And I counter that it did work. The player got exactly what he rolled for and exactly what he RP'd for. He just didn't get what he *wanted*. He Wanted something entirely different. I do grant you that. Unfortunately, the actions he took in character didn't correspond to what he wanted anymore than flapping your arms and rolling a climb check correspond to your character being able to fly.-S
He made an intimidate check with the obvious intent to influence attitude rather than demoralize.
You even admit to recognizing what he wanted.
If we all recognize what the player is trying to have the character attempt, then nitpicking a way to change that to attempting a different action that reinterprets what he was obviously trying to attempt is not a good call.
I recognize knowing what he wanted with the hind sight of this post telling us the player told the DM what he wanted.
He made an intimidate check without the requisite *minute long conversation* needed to make the guy cooperative. He made an off the cuff half-sentence response and brushed past the guy.I fail to see how that is anything but a demoralize WITHOUT the player instructing the DM that he wanted to stretch it out to a minute by using the other aspect of that skill.
What he was "obviously doing" was starting a fight with an axe wielding Viking.
I know that because "F'off or die" is a sure fire method to start a fight with a guy carrying an axe who is already pissed off at you. They are known as "fighting words".
She used fighting words. She rolled. She succeeded. The guy was demoralized. And the fight started.
The player might have wanted the minute long version. They might have thought they were getting it. But its Is Not what they RP'd for and it isn't how they acted and it certainly isn't what they communicated to the DM.
I totally agree that if the DM somehow knew that the PC meant the 1 minute versin and just arbitrarily said "screw that, an axe to the face is much more interesting (for me) than for her to succeed!" then the DM is absolutely 100% pure WRONG and should be chastised repeatedly.
But that isn't the situation we've been presented with.
DM's shouldn't change what the players do. They shouldn't screw the players over with DM only knowledge and they shouldn't metagame for their villains. There's lots of things the DM shouldn't do.
The DM should have NPC's react according to how PC's act towards them. They totally should respond appropriately to how they are treated, especially if you are following an AP and it lays out their motivations, reasons, and actions.
She told the already pissed off Viking to f'off or die. He clearly chose to die. (or to kill her- which he apparently almost succeeded at.)
I totally concede that the DM could have asked the question. But I don't fault him for not. I fault the player for not making their wishes known, *especially* in light of the fact that they RP'd their character doing the exact opposite of what they wanted them to do. (by saying something stupid, and by doing it quickly and walking off when the skill in question required a minute of conversation).
-S
As noted by other, a demoralize would have made no sense in that situation.
You state that he was trying to brush by, not fight.
If GM required that the 1-minute conversation be displayed rather than assumed, the correct reaction would have been "you need to spend a minute to do that" rather than "instead of your character trying what you wanted, he tries this other thing."
eta:Sure, if the GM couldn't tell that's what the player was intending, that's another story, but it seems beyond obvious that if you aren't trying to start a combat, and call for an intimidate check, one use of which will avoid combat and the other will be functionally useless unless in a combat, he doesn't mean the second one.
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I would contend that "F'off or die" is in fact an attempt to start a fight.
Maybe thats just a reflection on where I'm from and what I've seen though. I will accept that it may not be a universal truth.
I would however cautiously advise people not to walk up to someone who is mad at you and has an axe in hand and say to them "F'OFF OR DIE" unless they are in fact wanting a fight.
-S
GM: The NPC approaches you asking why you killed his dog.
PC: I tell him to "F- off, get out of my way" and intimidate.
GM: Demoralize?
PC: Yeah.
That's it. Doesn't seem like I'm coddling or hand-holding or anything. *shrug*
To each his or her own.
If you don't, too bad, so sad you didn't read how your powers work. That's not my fault, nor is it the GMs responsibility to tell you the best way to play your character.That depends -- yeah, if it's a relatively new player, or even one new to playing a character with that skill, and who purchased it as an afterthought -- I'd be a lot more sympathetic. After all, this is presumably a friend of yours, hopefully not someone you despise whom you see as inappropriately asking you for a favor. (On the other hand, if it's someone who said, "Yeah! I'm'a make an initimidate MASTER!!!" then, yeah, I'd throw him to the dogs.)
When I run new people, or old players in new systems they haven't played before with me, I give them a 'hand of god'. That HoG is for them to rewrite history. Once. And if you read back, I've said probably a dozen times in this thread, if a newbie is doing stuff, I will take extra time and make sure they know what they are doing. If it's an experienced player, then they should know what they are doing.
or
PC: "I tell him to F'off or I'll kill him as I brush past and around and just kinda look menacing to get him to calm down. The skill says it takes about 1 minute to do, and should work for 1d6x10 rounds if successful. *rolls intimidate check* i got a 32."
Tell the DM what you are doing.
-S
I never said it can't be used outside of combat. I said it's pretty clearly intended to be used primarily in combat. That's the default. "You can intimidate someone and then initiate combat!" Yeah, that's still combat.
I note you ignored the other examples I gave of outside combat?
And please feel free to imply I don't understand the rules.
I didn't imply it, I flat out stated it. If you think a specific statement of 'I say 3 words and push by him' is intimidate to scare off, then you do not know the rules of Intimidate. Full stop. You have argued that previously.
That does well for you. Demoralize is clearly intended to be primarily combat oriented. Exclusively? No. Primarily? Yeah, I don't see how you can argue otherwise.
Besides, if you're going to use the Demoralize version of Intimidate, you probably ought to have been set up for an encounter, anyway (since it's set up to be used within combat).
Because if the player here was using the demoralize option, initiative ought to have been rolled first. It's an in-combat use of Intimidate. If it's unclear what the player is trying to do, ask.
Rounds occur outside of combat, sure. Is there any impact of the Shaken condition outside of combat? Is there a point of "demoralizing" somebody outside of combat? Plus, rolling initiative allows you to track who goes in what order. You're using Intimidate to place an effect on somebody which only plays a role in combat. What's the point of demoralizing outside of combat (or at the very least, when initiative is tracking actions)?
But again, what impact does demoralizing have outside of combat? What exactly does Shaken do? They suffer penalties to attack rolls, saving throws, skill checks, and ability checks. Necessarily combat? No, but there's a pretty strong indication for that, particularly since it lasts a few seconds only. Not to mention that demoralizing is a standard action, which is a concept that really only exists within combat. You can do things that take a standard action outside of combat, certainly, but how often does one need to precisely track time outside of it? It seems pretty clear to me that the intent behind Intimidate (Demoralize) is to be used in combat because you can't spend 10 rounds telling someone to kiss off.
You seem to be going back and forth on this from your quotes above. First it was there's no non-combat usage, then there is maybe nothing in the rules but the rules clearly imply it's combat only, and now back to grudgingly admitting it has non-combat uses. So.. yeah, I never said it had the same level of utility in and out of combat. I only objected to the comments that it was purely combat only (which if you go back to my first post about how that was bunk, it was addressed to Uncertainty Lich, not you, as he stated flat out that it was combat only, full stop).
Penalties to attack rolls are still relevant to confirmation rolls. So, again, still applicable. Initiative checks for determining who goes first. Still applicable. I recognize we don't know whether any of these things happened. That's why I asked.
Yes, but why are you asking me instead of asking the OP? Demanding I answer those questions is about like my demanding you prove they didn't occur. It's utterly pointless to whether the rules support the GM's decision on how the player's choice was adjudicated. Everything after the viking attacking is irrelevant. It doesn't matter if the viking actually face axed the PC or not. The point is, was the attempt to face axe valid given the stated actions of the PC and the RAW. It was. How it played out after the attack declaration by the viking is utterly irrelevant to the rules discussion of was the intimidate ruling valid.
It's relevant to the discussion.
No it isn't, see above.
If the PCs didn't have an opportunity to notice him getting aggressive, beat him in initiative, etc., then I have a problem with it because I believe that would have been adjudicated incorrectly. The way the write up sounded, it was *PC Intimidates* *NPC Rages and attacks*. There was a lot of other detail given. I feel like a detail like "I even gave them a [___] check to notice that he was preparing to attack" would have been mentioned.
Irrelevant, and unknowable. Again, please provide proof you are not still beating your wife. If you want details, ask the OP, but demanding them from me and stating they are vital to your argument is ludicrous.
I don't have an issue with a particular aspect (though I think more could have been done to simply avoid the problem), I simply think it's the confluence of all factors that turned out unfairly for the player. Perhaps I made that part unclear, so that's on me. But please, mdt, don't act like I'm not capable of understanding the rules. You and I see this differently. Fine. I'm not claiming you don't get anything.
This, I can totally get behind. It was a bad confluence of things. From a player not understanding how his abilities work, to failure to stop and correct his action at the time, to holding things in for four months, to a relatively new GM lacking enough experience to have that sixth sense of 'Ok, player said he was doing A, roleplayed A, and rolled A, but probably meant B'. Again though, that is not the GMs fault, and it doesn't make him a bad GM (as has been stated in this thread). It means he's a new GM, he made a valid ruling (maybe not the best ruling in the world, but a perfectly valid ruling that was consistent within RAW), and flaming him helps nobody.
And again, I don't see what the harm is in taking 5 seconds to clarify. Despite your protestations, I don't think it's necessarily clear that the player was intending to demoralize, rather than simply cow.
I'm basing my protestations on the information as given. I wasn't there, I don't have any other information other than what was given. That seems to be a problem here, people are projecting way more into this than what was posted. Based on what was posted by the OP, the decision was valid and the player was very obviously doing a simple threaten and move on, not a scare into being friendly maneuver.
So given the OP's statements, he made a valid decision. I can't base my decision off might have beens, or could have beens, or woulda coulda shoulda. Based of the post, it was a valid call. If the post is wrong, I can't know that or put it into my decision making.
I think asking a simple question for the sake of everybody being on the same page is preferable to the minor interruption of gameplay.
And it would be, for something ambiguous. But again, based on the OP's statements, and not anything thrown on it or projected on it, or added as what ifs, there was nothing ambiguous about what the player did. It's as unambiguous as stating 'I run the guy through' and then stopping to ask the player if he wanted to run the guy through with his rapier, or with his battle axe.
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What you mean like a competition of throwing darts? Yeah, the one where you're going to use attack rolls against an inanimate object dartboard? Yeah, that's not analogous to combat at all.
I understand the rules. Get off your high horse. We simply adjudicate things differently.
You think, based on the information given, it was the right choice. Good story. You've earned yourself a cookie. I don't think it was adjudicated wrong, I simply think the problem can be avoided by asking a single question.
And I've never once said he was a bad GM. I said I would have done it differently. So let's stop projecting, shall we?
Regarding the rest of the encounter and how it played out, it's relevant to how I view the purpose of this thread. "Did I treat my player fairly?" That's the whole point. I apologize for dragging the rest of the relevant situation into view when discussing whether I think the entire situation was resolved fairly. So, still relevant. If the GM is going to treat the act like a demoralization, then I'd like to know if that was consistent throughout the rest of the encounter. After all, the player complaint was that the GM discounted the intimidate check, but we weren't provided with much of any information about the rest of the encounter. Still relevant to the encounter as a whole. Which is what I was discussing. Which is the point of the thread.
And please reread my quotes. "Primarily intended to be used in combat" acknowledges uses outside of combat. Primarily does not mean solely. It's primarily intended to be used within combat, or situations quite similar to it. That you can concoct other situations where one might conceivably use the skill does not mean that the text doesn't pretty clearly imply in-combat use is the primary intent. All the penalties have quite a lot to do with combat, it's a standard action to use it, and the two examples you've through out there were both directly related to combat. I'm such an idiot. Herp derp.
And again, in the end, it matters to me what you think as little as it matters to you what I think. In my opinion, the situation was ambiguous. In my opinion, it's better as a GM to take three seconds and say, "Demoralize, right?" All problems solved. No questions asked. No chance for PCs feeling like you've pulled a fast one on them. And that was literally the only thing I chimed it to say. If you don't like how I handle that sort of stuff with my players, I honestly couldn't care less. It's probably a good thing we're not ever going to play together then.
But what do I know? Clearly I have a complete and total lack of understanding about the rules.
I suggest you read the OP again. The result of the roll was calculated, and the DM did compare it against the Barbarian's resist DC, since the DM did determine that it did beat it by enough (in his mind) to produce the "shaken" condition.
The roll was not explicitly struck by the GM, so the player was given no reason from anything described in the OP to think that his attempt was inherently invalid at all (as opposed to just not having succeeded at it).
If you want to say "you start trying to Intimidate him into backing down, but the already high-strung Barbarian attacks you before you can finish", that's fine. What's not fine is the player rolling Intimidate, the DM checking it against the Barbarian's stats as though the check went through, and then just saying "the Barbarian attacks you" without explaining to the player that what they were explicitly trying to get him to do (getting him to "F*** off") was actually flat-out invalidated, and was never even an option for the check (even though he calculated the check anyway).
Hence: quiet auto-fail.
You contradict yourself. The DM determined it produced the "shaken" condition, as you stated. So it was a successful Intimidate check with under the "demoralize" rules. So . . . the player's attempt was not invalid at all, it worked and was accounted for. How was the PC's attempt inherently invalid, as you claim? It was accounted for, as you yourself state.
There is no "quiet auto-fail" here. There is the player thinking "intimidate will get this guy to back off", doing something that seemed more like a "demoralize" than an "influence attitude", and the DM found that the "demoralize" succeeded. The fact that the viking attacked despite being Shaken (and in response to having his very serious grievance dismissed out of hand) is just a repercussion of the fact that the NPC was angry enough about his dog to not be dissuaded because of fear.
When a PC tries to use Acrobatics to move through a threatened space, and the roll succeeds, I would totally rule that the PC actually did a standing high jump instead, because that's also a function of Acrobatics, and it's far more realistic than moving through a threatened area when someone is clearly looking to kill you. So the PC jumps in the air, lands, and takes an axe to the face.
What?
You're missing the point that once the words "**** off" are out of his mouth, the attempt is over.
OK, one last parry.
The player may have said "**** off", but the character didn't.
Riposte:
What she did instead was basically tell him "F*$§ off or I kill you", pretty much in those words, and shove her way past him.
Unless you are trying to say that the player was physically present in the game, that sounds like a character action to me.
The PC told the NPOc to f'uff or I'll kill you. The PC shoved past him. The PC rolled well on their intimidate score.
The PC successfully intimidated them.
The player "rolled good" is not the same as success. The DM is perfectly within rights to say that "**** off" does not represent a full attempt to Intimidate, and/or that it constitutes an invitation to an axe to the face before the full intimidate action is taken. In this case, the DM felt that the "**** off" was nasty enough to demoralize the NPC, but not enough to make him back down, and certainly didn't constitute an attempt to change his attitude.
Ummm....I don't think thats quite how it happened. They way I read it the player picked up his dice and said "I tell him to frack off and brush by him, I rolled eleventy billion intimidate."
That's all fine and dandy, but the GM didn't ask for an intimidate role, the player just rolled one. And the player didn't say he was trying to convince him to be his friend, he told him to frack off. I mean, I always do that to people who I want to be my friend but it can't work for everybody right?
Pretty much how I read it too. I think people's interpretation depends on their experience. I am used to dealing with over-eager players who's character's are not shy about throwing their weight around. Others are used to encountering devious DMs who use the player's lack of knowledge of the rules to trip them.
And I actually don't have any problem with "You demoralized him and it torked him off, so he attacks you." I just think it's in everybody's best interest for the GM to say, "What are you trying to accomplish?" Doing that takes like 5 seconds and can avoid this whole problem.
I think the player made very clear what actions their character was taking, but I do see your point: If there is any doubt, by all means stop and ask. However, when you open with a line that is an invitation to start a fight from someone already threatening one...it's hard to see it go any other way.
Once again, I ask to all people saying he needed to verify the type of Intimidate check this:
If you go up to a stranger and he says, "F*** off or I'll kill you!" and pushes past you, is he . . .
a) Trying to scare you (Demoralize)
b) Trying to get you to treat him as a friend for a short time (Influence Attitude)
c) Not sure, need to ask him
99% of the time it means:
d) Trying to start a fight.{stuff}
I get where you are coming from, but if the Demoralize succeeded and had an effect, it was emphatically NOT a "quiet autofail" as you desperately wish to believe.
We're back to whether:
What she did instead was basically tell him "F*$§ off or I kill you", pretty much in those words, and shove her way past him.
...is anything but an invitation to a fight combined with a Demoralize attempt. I don't think the DM was wrong in assuming that it was, the meaning is pretty clear.
If you were cornered in a rough bar by a drunk hairy biker swearing at you that you killed his dog, what do you think would happen if you told him to "**** off" and tried to shove past him, in front of his gang? Your only reason to do that is either trying to start a fight, or trying to get him to back down by threatening too (not going to happen, BTW).
I can accept that the player may not have intended this, but communication between DM and player is the responsibility of BOTH parties, and the DM interpreting this as an axe-to-the-face response seems perfectly reasonable to me.
Sounds like what the DM did was correct by the letter of the rules.
In addition it further complicated the story...making it more interesting.
Win and win.
I don't see why the player wouldn't have used Diplomacy. Intimidate just makes no sense in this situation. It just delays the inevitable and make the situation worse. This seem more of case of player not understanding the two skills by your description of events.
Both skills can be used to change an NPCs attitude. In both cases it required 1 minute of interaction with the NPC. So Telling the NPC F-Off or Die is not a use of the Intimate skill to shift attitudes. It can be Demoralize and if successful the target is shaken for round or more. Being shaken doesn't prevent the Barbarian from raging it just applies a -2 penalty to hit.
So what you did was correct. The player used Intimidate and didn't engage in 1 minutes of interaction. So it would be safe to assume they were demoralizing which is standard action. The Ulfen then would be free to declare a blood feud and attack the player taking the -2 penalty to hit due to being shaken.
By RAW you are 100% correct in what you did.
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There is no "quiet auto-fail" here. There is the player thinking "intimidate will get this guy to back off", doing something that seemed more like a "demoralize" than an "influence attitude", and the DM found that the "demoralize" succeeded.
Supporters of the GM's decision have gone off on this tangent with demoralize and the length of the threat. The reason it was reduced from a successful intimidation check to a demoralize had NOTHING to do with the one minute rule. It entirely had to do with the GM wanting to have the adventure go as written over how the intimidate check normally works.
For me that meant however he was now convinced that they really did it, he's drunk and he feels honor-bound now to his threat before to declare a blood-feud (which apparently is a big thing to Ulfen), so while he was shaken from the Intimidate he'd still rage and attack.
While I think Diplomacy and Intimidate are powerful tools, sometimes enemies just have so compelling reasons to fight the PCs that they can't just be convinced or scared into surrendering or walking away.
GM had no problem with the length of the threat meeting one minute and didn't confuse the check with demoralize. He wanted to play an angry Barbarian who couldn't be intimidated despite the successful check.
I don't see why the player wouldn't have used Diplomacy. Intimidate just makes no sense in this situation. It just delays the inevitable and make the situation worse.
RP reasons probably. You could politely explain to someone threatening to kill you if you don't hand over your lunch money that you don't owe them anything or you could bark back at them to make them retreat. Seems valid. One could spam Diplomacy in every situation Intimidate would work and it'd probably produce better results, but what fun is that?
Your description of the situation may have influence things. Obviously it was a long time ago so you can't quite remember, but I think, because the NPC "succeeded" anyway, the player never saw that the Intimidate was a success. Describing things to clue the player in to the fact that the attempt was successful, but not enough, could make them feel better. Example:
"The drunkard screams 'You killed my dog!' and swings his battleaxe at you."
^This gives no indication that the Intimidate worked.
"The drunkard screams [in a wobbly voice] 'You killed my dog!', and visibly trembling, he swings his battleaxe at you."
^That shows that he is shaken and gets the debuff, even if he still decides to attack.
The problem with that, Lich, is that it directly contradicts what the OP said happened.
So what happened was this:
The NPC comes up to the group and yells at them drunkenly that he finally found them, and they better pay up the weregild for the dog they killed or he'll be forced to declare the blood feud.
I was fully prepared for the face of the party to say "Nope wasn't us", and make the diplomacy check and most likely succeeding easily. Or just pay the 50 gp. I ruled the chance for a fight at this encounter at maybe 5% or so.Just to make this clear, the PCs were innocent of the crime, and got framed for it.
What she did instead was basically tell him "F*$§ off or I kill you", pretty much in those words, and shove her way past him.
She rolled good on her Intimidate too.For me that meant however he was now convinced that they really did it, he's drunk and he feels honor-bound now to his threat before to declare a blood-feud (which apparently is a big thing to Ulfen), so while he was shaken from the Intimidate he'd still rage and attack.
He actually crit the face with his Battleaxe and nearly send her into a coma with a single hit.
The DM, unless he was just lying to us, was perfectly prepared for the PC's to bypass the combat entirely through skill checks.
The PC in question however failed to do so because he used the wrong method. (demoralize vs make friendly).
Ascribing a dishonest motive to the DM though just to make him wrong and the player correct isn't something I can get behind. Is there some post made by the OP (or the player) that I missed which is leading you to that conclusion?
-S
The PC in question however failed to do so because he used the wrong method. (demoralize vs make friendly).It isn't the "wrong" method, just one not provided for explicitly in the adventure. The PC had every reason to expect intimidate to work as written. The GM chose to rule the NPC was too angry to be intimidated, which isn't how intimidate ordinarily works. It autofailed after a successful roll because the GM chose not to stray from how the adventure is written. The result of this?
Of course then they enter the dungeon where they got told by the Good spirit guarding it that "spider people had entered before, to kill the Oni". And what do they do? Murder everything that looks remotely like a spider, and don't even try to negotiate or even find out if they can talk.
Ascribing a dishonest motive to the DM though just to make him wrong and the player correct isn't something I can get behind. Is there some post made by the OP (or the player) that I missed which is leading you to that conclusion?The GM has been anything but dishonest. GM explains exactly why he chose to apply a shaken condition instead of have the Barbarian leave.
Adn yes the utter disregard of the man's actual situation was what made me decide to attack instead of the other options.
GM didn't want the Barbarian to be intimidated as the intimidate check typically works. The Barbarian was too angry to be intimidated, but not too angry to be presuaded? Either way the Barbarian was committed for the minute long check, the check was allowed and succeeded, GM just chose not to apply RAW. The GM can do that, but that's why the player felt it was unfair... it kinda was unfair.
The PC DID have every reason to expect it to work as written.
And it did. Intimidate did exactly what it said it did. The PC just failed to communicate which part of the skill they wanted to use.
It has two parts. They acted out the part for Intimidate type A but wanted to use Intimidate Type B.
Now the player did NOT get the result they may have wanted. But they did get the result of how they acted given the limitations of the rules for the Intimidate skill.
The DM didn't autofail the roll. The DM simply ruled that a "F'off or I'll kill you" as the PC brushed past the NPC was a demoralize not a 1 minute long conversation. The PC rolled the die, did the math, announced the result to the DM who calculated that the intimidate succeeded, the NPC was demoralized, he planted an axe in the PC's face.
The DM was prepared for skill use to bypass the NPC in question. He was even expecting it. Sadly for the group, the PC who took charge did a very poor job of explaining to the DM what she wanted to do.
Could the PC have explained it better? (yo DM I want the 1 minute version)
Absolutely.
Could the DM have asked for a clarification? (yo, you want the demoralize version or the 1 minute make 'em friendly version?)
Absolutely.
Is it the DM's responsibility to stop play and ask the player what they want to do everytime? Not in my opinion.
"F'Off or I'll Kill you" as you brush past the pissed off drunk viking with an axe isn't a 1 minute conversation no matter how you rearrage the letters. Unless the PC is taking extremely slowly it just doesn't pass the muster for that aspect of the skill. In this circumstance, absent the PC explicitly telling the DM that they are using the other part of the skill then they have instead explicitly told the DM that they are using the demoralize version.
The fact that the players didn't use social skills from then on really just means they need to work on communication more. When you do X and expect Y then get frustrated and think Y will never work.. then that isn't the DM's fault.
Just to be clear though: The barbarian is never committed to a minute long check just because the PC is attempting to do a skill that takes 1 minute to accomplish. Never.
The pissed off barbarian doesn't suddenly freeze in time and have a meaningful conversation over 1 minute because the player announces they want to use diplomacy or intimidate- unless they are also using some magic that forces the issue.
Deciaring a minute long intimidate when someone is coming at you with an axe is a relatively sure way to guarantee that you aren't alive at the end of the minute. Especially if your first, last, and only words to them are "F'off or I'll kill you".
(contrasted by "Now hold it right there, I've never seen this so called dog of yours, blah blah whatever so on and so forth").
The DM applied RAW. The player didn't like it because the player failed to inform the DM that they wanted to use the skill in a manner contrary to how they actually used the skill.
-S