Encounters - who speaks first?

[Michebugio]

When handling Encounters, I often notice an aspect seemingly not covered by the rules: who, among the characters, gets to speak first?

This is not a trivial question as it may seem. Let’s say that everybody is introduced, then everybody can make interaction skill rolls. Let’s also say that appropriate skills for this encounter are Awe, Inspire and Song. Let's say also that each character has the same skill rating in one of those skills (so one has Awe 3, another Inspire 3 and the last Song 3, for example).

The three players presumably want to say something different each, and the three rolls will get different answers and reactions. Moreover, it's obvious that the players each want the Advancement points associated with those rolls.

The problem is that, many times, players find difficult to adjudicate who will roll first among them. If one or two fail and surpass the Tolerance, the third won’t get any roll because the Encounter will be over. Maybe some players think that the information or effects they’ll obtain with their rolls are more important than the others, and must be obtained first before the Tolerance drops below 0.

In general, players don’t always agree on how to conduct an Encounter, on what must be said first, and on who should say that first. The rules seem to not consider this, as everybody can make rolls, but sometimes there isn’t room for everybody to speak: very often it's just a matter on who thinks faster about what to say, and the others may argue with him until they come up with something better. So, order matters.

To get things streamlined, I adopted a kind of “initiative system” for Encounters, so there is an established sequence (like combat) where everybody gets one roll when their turn comes, like it was a combat action.

To determine initiative, I sum the Valour, Wisdom and Standing rating (this last one where applicable) together for each player: the character with the highest sum gets to speak first, then the others exactly like in an initiative system. In case of draws, compare Wits (basic, then Favoured score if basic is still a draw), or roll a dice in case of perfect parity. Everybody rolls just one skill when their turn comes, and they can even pass their turn if they have nothing to say.

(Example: Varbrand the Barding (Valour 3, Wisdom 4, Standing 2), Aeranthor the Elf (Valour 3, Wisdom 5, Standing 2) and Carl the Hobbit (Valour 2, Wisdom 4, Standing 3) are speaking with King Bard. Aeranthor would normally get to speak first (Valour + Widsom = 8, the highest sum among his companions), but since his Standing doesn’t apply to Barding culture, it’s Varbrand who takes the word first (Valour + Wisdom + Standing = 9), then Aeranthor, and last Carl. If they were in the Shire though, speaking to the Mayor, it would have been Carl the Hobbit the one with the right to speak first!)

How do you handle this in your campaigns? Am I missing something in the RAW, or a system like this would be actually useful?

[Mytholder]

I'd be strongly tempted to declare that they all fail. If a group of people came up to me, introduced themselves, and the one broke into song, one started boasting, and the last one declaimed an inspiring speech, I'd assume they were crazy.

Another option would be to have the NPC in the encounter take charge and decide who speaks first - and if the players still argue over who's talking, then that's a definite insult to their host.

[Michebugio]

I'd be strongly tempted to declare that they all fail. If a group of people came up to me, introduced themselves, and the one broke into song, one started boasting, and the last one declaimed an inspiring speech, I'd assume they were crazy.

Well, it's all about roleplaying. I wouldn't be so tyrannical to declare that they all fail just because of the rolls they choose. Think about a situation where they must convince a warlord to send some of his best warriors in aid of the fellowship: one character boasts their prowess in battle to demonstrate that they'll have good chances (Awe), another rallies the warriors in the room with an inspirational speech (Inspire), and the last sings a song about an old battle won by an ancestor of the chieftain (Song). They wouldn't seem crazy at all to me, that could be a powerful and moving moment instead.

Another option would be to have the NPC in the encounter take charge and decide who speaks first - and if the players still argue over who's talking, then that's a definite insult to their host.

That definitetly makes sense, but it doesn't take into account that the NPC is ME (the Loremaster). For what I've said above, it would be difficult for me (the NPC) to decide who should speak first, without wronging one player over the other. That's why I think we need an objective criterion for that.

[Majestic]

I recognize the issue, and dealt with this myself awhile back. At the time I had a really large Fellowship (7-8 players, I think?), and to make things easier and to keep things flowing I started with the player to my left and just went around the table clockwise.

I recognized that one of the players was frustrated and disappointed, and when I asked him about it he pointed out that the particular Encounter we were dealing with was the perfect opportunity for his Dwarf to shine; the necessary skill was finally in his 'wheelhouse' and - based on the position of where he was sitting at the table - it meant that it was possible he wouldn't even get to roll a single time. This was also because a few players were deciding to "take a shot" when it came to their turn, gambling that they could get an Advancement Point if they rolled well (rather than really considering failures and how it could affect the Encounter).

I ended up having a talk with my players about how they approached Encounters. I let them know that, with the approach they were taking, there was a good chance they would ruin or wreck an important Encounter, unless they used more strategy and intention.

Since then they've been more careful, often picking a member of the party to make an Introduction, and using the appropriate member of the company that is good at what they feel is necessary (Awe, Courtesy, Song, Inspire, etc.) after that. Doing this has made it so that we don't have to have any kind of 'initiative order' or the like (not that such a thing wouldn't be a good idea), and has worked rather smoothly.

I don't think my players have failed an Encounter. They may have on their first one in the game (King Thranduil in "Words of the Wise"), but since then they've done very well, often only getting one or two failures. They now work much more as a team and work in concert with one another when they approach an Encounter.

[Michebugio]

I recognized that one of the players was frustrated and disappointed, and when I asked him about it he pointed out that the particular Encounter we were dealing with was the perfect opportunity for his Dwarf to shine; the necessary skill was finally in his 'wheelhouse' and - based on the position of where he was sitting at the table - it meant that it was possible he wouldn't even get to roll a single time. This was also because a few players were deciding to "take a shot" when it came to their turn, gambling that they could get an Advancement Point if they rolled well (rather than really considering failures and how it could affect the Encounter).

I'm very familiar with this. The problem is that, by now, my players have very experienced characters with a skill rating of 4 in a couple of interaction skills each, and at least 3 in the others. They never fail an encounter, and most of the times they just keep rolling to collect Advancement Points after they already got 7 successes

I talked to them too, but I feel that the problem is elsewhere: encounters have started to be uninteresting. They never fail, they're always safe. It's not like battles where you can get Weary and suddenly even skilled fighters start getting low rolls: during Encounters, characters are almost never Weary and so almost always roll at full power. And they have plenty of Tolerance too, since Wisdom, Valour and Standing are getting very high.

So everything usually goes down to "let's make as many rolls as possible to get Advancement points", which is a bit awkward sometimes

Besides the initiative to rule this, I would really need something to make Encounters more interesting. Just raising the TNs simply doesn't work, because really: why should be a TN 18 or 20 to convince a guy that you're the best man to do the job? That's why I developed an ultra-short adventure (The Lonely Giant Encounter, check it out in the forum) to finally have a challenging and interesting Encounter that can have a real impact on the characters.

Other mechanics, like for example considering the characters Weary when rolling social skills in some circumstances, would be interesting too (maybe when the Tolerance drops below a certain point, like Endurance dropping below Fatigue?). I don't know.

[Majestic]

Yeah, it sounds to me like your players are somewhat gaming the system. My players haven't tried to do that at all, but if they did I'd probably just encourage them to move on, letting them know they've gotten what they're after and warn them that they're likely to overstay their welcome.

When I first read your Lonely Giant encounter I thought the Tolerance was awfully low. But considering the meta choices your players are making, it might be a good one to drop on them. I wouldn't tell them the Tolerance, up front, either.

[Woodclaw]

I'm interested in this issue too, recently I've started writing a new adventure for a mid-tier group (say that they have 3-4 adventures under their belts) and the first thing I noticed is that encounters are pretty damn hard to handle now.

Another option would be to have the NPC in the encounter take charge and decide who speaks first - and if the players still argue over who's talking, then that's a definite insult to their host.

That definitetly makes sense, but it doesn't take into account that the NPC is ME (the Loremaster). For what I've said above, it would be difficult for me (the NPC) to decide who should speak first, without wronging one player over the other. That's why I think we need an objective criterion for that.

This is a pretty interesting idea and a good stopagap for the time being.

As for providing a more precise system, I might have to dig out the "A Song of Ice and Fire" from Green Ronin, which has a pretty extensive Intrigue system.

[zedturtle]

Alright, so to "fix" the system with doing minimal damage to the rules as written, how about this?

Encounter Length:
"He can be appalling when he is angry, though he is kind enough if humoured. Still I warn you he gets angry easily."

Not every personage the heroes have a chance to speak with has an unlimited amount of patience or time. For situations where time is limited, the Tolerance of the Encounter may be reduced as the heroes overstay their welcome. At a set timeframe (no earlier than the second Interaction), each further Interaction will reduce the Tolerance by one. This is to represent the impatience of some for those who are long-winded, or otherwise waste the time or goodwill of important people.

- - - - - -

As for figuring out who should speak next, how about something like this? Whoever rolled highest for initial Insight makes the first choice, then they must select another player to perform the next action. The Loremaster responses and then the player who took the action selects the next player.

[Majestic]

I like it. Perhaps another player could 'interrupt', if they decided to, but at a -2 penalty?

[zedturtle]

I like it. Perhaps another player could 'interrupt', if they decided to, but at a -2 penalty?

Yeah,

I would just hope that your players are nice enough to call on the person holding up their hand and saying "Me! Me!"