Here's today's D&D opinion:
When you attack the bandit captain with your longsword, you can just say "I attack the bandit captain." You can add flourishes, but no one quizzes you on your stance, makes you show them how you'd hold a sword, or act it out.
And this is good, right?
— Alexandra Erin (@AlexandraErin) June 6, 2019
I agree! My only reservation on this point is that D&D has never codified its social mechanics in a sufficiently predictable and game-ish way to make this style of play enjoyable, IMO. There's no "social AC" or "argument hit points" to make the number-counting game fun here.
— James 🔥 Haeck (@jamesjhaeck) June 7, 2019
Isn’t it just contested by an insight/charisma/etc Roll? The Player's Handbook never explicitly codifies this. Some adventures do this. But even if this were an explicit rule, it's tremendously shallow compared to the D&D's combat system. Contested rolls can be part of a fun system, but IMO they aren't a fun system on their own.
— James 🔥 Haeck (@jamesjhaeck) June 8, 2019
Social Interaction in the DMG gives the breakdown of using Charisma checks to influence people.
Joey is absolutely right that it's a drop in the bucket compared to combat mechanics and options.
— Dan Dillon (@Dan_Dillon_1) June 8, 2019
But, the Social Interaction bits have a lot of potential to go as simple or complex as you like with interim roleplay, various ways to influence an NPCs attitude (which affects Cha check DCs) which can interact with the NPC's personality traits, ideal, bond, and flaw.
— Dan Dillon (@Dan_Dillon_1) June 8, 2019
And despite all my naysaying about contested rolls etc. not being fun on its own, I really like the way D&D handles social interaction. I enjoy it being straight-up roleplay, but it doesn’t work for everyone. IMO, having a more robust social variant wouldn’t be a bad thing. It isn’t straight-up roleplay, though.
— Dan Dillon (@Dan_Dillon_1) June 8, 2019
I think it’s really interesting that the Friendly/Indifferent/Hostile structure in the DMG never appears in any adventures. At least, as far as I’ve noticed! We see lots of mentions of hostile creatures, but I can’t recall any instance of indifferent creatures. Direct references to the social interaction rules would definitely go a long way
— Dan Dillon (@Dan_Dillon_1) June 8, 2019