Building a social encounter

[agoak]

I'm trying to create a social encounter, but figuring out the non=combat/social level of the NPC is rather vague (at least by the guidelines in the GM's core) I think I have some kind of handle on it, but every time I try and double check my number's I become less certain.

[NorrKnekten]

Honestly setting the level is all about what makes sense for the encounter and how challenging you think it should be.

You could have a look at the influence system but that typically says to just use the will-save modifier and then adjust for each skill.

Some of the NPC core entries might also help. as they do show what level they are outside of combat
The Smith for example is a level 3 creature in combat. and as such has modifiers between +5-9

But for anything related to crafting, like if you were trying to convince them about what an item is or challenged them to see who is the better crafter then they are a 6th level challenge and has modifiers closer to +15 which is reflected in their crafting skill and smithy lore.

[Tridus]

It works basically the same way as a combat encounter does. If this NPC is intended to be really good at the thing and it's intended to be a hard encounter, then their level for that social thing will be relatively high.

eg: The Mayor might be a level 2 character for combat purposes as they're really not good at it and have no real practice. But in a large town, they're probably really good at politics and things related to the office in order to keep that job. So their level for social encounters might be 7, with the stats in the appropriate skills to match.

[Finoan]

Yeah, I would run it as a VP system.

Quick summary and comparison: Combat is run in rounds that are 6 seconds long and each round each character gets three actions to use to do their combat things. Win condition is when the party exhausts the HP of the other side. Lose condition is when the party runs out of their own HP. VP systems run in rounds that are an unspecified amount of time long and each character gets one action each round to do a skill thing. Win condition is when the party gains, or doesn't lose, the needed number of points. Lose condition is when time runs out and the party hasn't won.

VP systems can be tweaked to have a lot of flexibility. There are some published variants such as Chases (which is pretty standard VP rules) and Influence (which has additional actions to do in a round that don't gain points). I have even run combat as a VP system where characters are allowed to use their attack bonus or spell attack bonus in place of a skill.

In any case, the point is that with a VP system, the challenge has a level that determines the DCs of the skills being used. The characters the party is interacting with are just set pieces to provide a narrative framework for the story and their level doesn't matter to the challenge.

[agoak]

I get how the VP's work, but I am also trying to scale fo experience awarded, and this will be an ongoing character, not just a single encounter, so I am trying to get more than "slap a DC on it and call it good", I'm looking for how to actually calculate the effective social level.

[NorrKnekten]

agoak wrote:

I get how the VP's work, but I am also trying to scale fo experience awarded, and this will be an ongoing character, not just a single encounter, so I am trying to get more than "slap a DC on it and call it good", I'm looking for how to actually calculate the effective social level.

the effective social level is dependent on the DC. or rather they follows the tables for creature modifiers.

if you want a creature who has a social level higher than its combat level then you as the gm need to set it and scale modifers and dcs accordingly.

same for experience. an influence encounter of the PCs level would typically be a moderate encounter unless its especially long or short

[Tridus]

agoak wrote:

I get how the VP's work, but I am also trying to scale fo experience awarded, and this will be an ongoing character, not just a single encounter, so I am trying to get more than "slap a DC on it and call it good", I'm looking for how to actually calculate the effective social level.

It's the same way you do it for anything else:

- Set the level of the creature for the encounter.
- Use the creature building rules to set skill bonuses and DCs appropriately based on that level.

If you want this to be a hard social encounter for a level 7 party, the creature in question should have a social level of around 9. You then set the DCs and bonuses as if it was a level 9 creature.

You can also do it in reverse if you have a set DC in mind: find that DC in the chart and it'll show the effective level.

Like, if you want it to have a Deception of +23 and they're a grifter so its their best skill, that gives you level 9 at extreme proficiency. Set other skills and DCs for a level 9 creature (but don't use extreme again).

[Finoan]

Effectively, the character will have two 'level' values. Or only one if the character is never going to be in combat. One will be their combat level and the other will be their social encounter level.

So:
'Ydris' is a level 2 combatant, and a level 6 court prosecuting attorney.
'Naoman' is a level 1 combatant, and a level 4 assistant paralegal.
'Dormas' is a level 1 combatant, and a level 4 records researcher.

If the party is level 5 and encounters them on the highway and needs to fight them for some reason, that would be a 15xp trivial threat combat encounter.

But if that same level 5 party is facing them in court after doing something stupid and getting arrested, that is going to be a 120xp severe threat social encounter.

And you would set their combat stats according to their combat level, and set their skill stats according to their social encounter level.