Social Status in AFF

Okay, you've assigned points to SKILL, STAMINA, and LUCK (and MAGIC)[1]. You've assigned your Special Skill points and selected your Talent. If you are that way inclined you have selected your Spells or Miracles[2]. You've thought up a name, a description, and you've done the most boring bit of any character creation process - you've gone shopping. Your Advanced Fighting Fantasy 2e Hero has the expertise and equipment and is ready to Dungeoneer!

But wait. What's this? Social Status?

Heroes start with a Social Status of between 0-6 (chosen as per character concept), with 7 and 8 available to starting Heroes who take the appropriate Talents.

What's this for? Do the GOBLINS in the Forest of Doom care whether or not my Adventurer is a dirt farmer from Hick Town or the son of King Salamon himself? Well, actually, they just might. But yes, I'll concede, as far as the rules go, Social Status isn't of any great importance.  In fact, the only place I can find a mention of using it is on p51, in the Social Actions - Reactions[3] section, which reads:

"Social class should also be taken into account if the difference between the two parties is more than 3 or so. A beggar talking to a Lord may well get an unfavourable reaction, but a Lord talking to a beggar will be very different!"

So all a bit loose and freeform. And "3 or so" seems like a rather large gap to begin with; the difference in social rank between a 'senior priest' and a 'master craftsman' ought have some effect in most pseudo-Medieval settings, even if the difference in Social Status is only 2.

But it *could* be used by enterprising Directors to add an impression of depth to their campaigns. First, and most obviously, Social Status could be used as a modifier in social situations. So you're asking your Heroes to test their Leadership, their Etiquette, their Bargain, their Con[4] Special Skill? Surely all of these could be influenced by a PCs Social Status? I wouldn't recommend rolling against Social Status, unless you want failure to be the norm - and perhaps that's right, that leveraging your Social Status is something that can only be reliably done by people of the knightly classes and above. But as the rules suggest, the power of social rank to affect a situation is relative: a Sir Therfax can reliably browbeat a peasant, but a king can impress his will upon the Sir Therfax. It is also not simply one directional. Horgun the dockworker has a much better chance of making useful contacts in the Block & Tackle Inn than does Sir Therfax.

So the rules are right, difference in Social Status matters, and should be applied on a case-by-case basis to 'social' Special Skill tests. Sometimes the Heroes Social Status will be being measured against that of an NPC[5]. Sometimes the bar will be set by the setting - a Director can assign different 'Social Status' scores to different parts of a city (or even different parts of a Castle, a Palace, or a Temple). So a knightly hero (Social Status 7) might have +3 modifier when attempting to impress their will upon a the town clerk (Social Status 4). But such a character roleplayed as leaning on the little people might also might suffer a -4 modifier when attempting to make friends with a sergeant of the town watch. A few points on the dice can be a way to reinforce the colour of the setting. There is no reason why Social Status cannot be used to add more fun (yes, fun!) to the Hireling, Mass Combat, and Holdings rules in the Heroes Companion. It is up to the Players, through their choices, statements of intent, and description of their Heroes' actions[6] to determine quite how their Social Status would effect the game world, and for the Director to make a judgement. 


[1] I've written before (and I'm not the first to say so), that AFF, being such a simple, robust system, is well suited to the addition of extra 'stats', or the replacement of the existing stats (usually MAGIC, but I could imagine replacing LUCK too). Stellar Adventures does this, adding TECH for Robot characters (which interestingly replaces LUCK) and PSIONICS for Space Monks and other Psychics (replacing MAGIC). Other examples from the solo gamebooks would be FEAR (House of Hell), HONOUR (Sword of the Samurai), WILLPOWER (Beneath Nightmare Castle), EVIL (Dead of Night), though I'm pretty sure that there's others scattered through the books. Add whatever is thematically appropriate for your setting and campaign. CORRUPTION? Go ahead. SANITY? Sure, and get all 1920s pulp hero investigating what needs be done by renaming SKILL 'COMPETENCE' and STAMINA 'GRIT' too.

[2] Actually, the magical abilities granted through worship of the gods of Titan are described as 'powers' in a section entitled 'Priestly Abilities', but I like 'Miracles' so that's what they are in my game!

[3] AFF2e has no set mechanism for 'Reactions'. I use something very like the 2d6 Reaction Roll of Classic D&D, adjusted by whether the NPC/Monster disposition is Friendly, Neutral, Unfriendly, or Hostile - the categories given to us in Out of the Pit. I tacked it onto the end of my Viscera! supplement.

[4] And why are there no Persuade or Orate Special Skills? Want your Hero to have one - write it in! There is, please note, a Silvertongued Talent which adds a whopping +3 (on a 2d6 curve, that's a LOT) to these kind of social skill tests. 

[5] Note that I advise that Directors do not listen to the AFF2e rulebook here. Way back in 2015 I wrote:

"AFF is meant to be a simple game. The master merchant should have SKILL 4 STAMINA 5, which adequately represents him as a combatant, and on the same index card you scrawl 'PCs attempting to bargain with Marco Columbo suffer a -4 penalty to their effective SKILL'. Instead of opposed tests - which require NPCs to be statted out as if they were PCs - non-combat 'contests' are then conducted as unopposed tests based only on the PC's SKILL and Special Skills, plus or minus modifiers, with the capability of the NPC to frustrate the aims of the PC being expressed as a simple modifier. The NPCs are treated just like any other feature of the world of Titan that might affect the PC's chances of achieving their goals." 

[6] i.e. Roleplaying, but so many take that to mean more speaking in a funny voice than making choices on behalf of your character. You don't have to put on a posh voice to have your adventuring prince bully the town guard, you just need to say that that is what he intends to do and describe how he will do so. And then we might roll the dice.  

How To Resolve Everything That Comes Up

The older I get, the less tolerance I have for crunch, even if I do sometimes have flashbacks to teenage fantasies of having a table at which a game in which weapon length, height, weight, incremental fatigue, etc. were all incorporated into a smooth running game. I want quick systems that arbitrate the move from player choice to consequences - which for me is the crux of the gaminess of role-playing games.

Anyway, I recently came across a post (from last November) on The Borderlands entitled How To Resolve Everything That Comes Up, and basically, "yes". In fact, I've said it before, I think, somewhere, in different words, that the 2d6 Reaction Roll system is THE lost universal D&D arbitration system. I wasn't the first, of course. 

So: the players have made a choice and it is not clear what the outcome must be? Let the dice decide. Decide what would be the worst possible outcome, the best possible outcome, roll 2d6, add or subtract 1, 2 or in extreme circumstances 3 for all the factors reckoning into the disposition of the situation, do the same for PC actions (default to Ability Score modifiers) and interpret the result. 

One of the great joys of returning to Classic D&D and its variants a few years ago was using tools such as the reaction roll, random encounter tables, and morale rules and feeling much more like I was also playing the game, not simply running a game for other people. Creative interpretation of the results of simple dice rolls is one of the key skills, and prime pleasures, of Old School games mastering. 

Oh. I've kind of spoiled Steve's post. Head there anyway, he has it laid out in a well presented table!

More on the Reaction Roll

I've been clear that the Reaction Roll is one of most valuable bits of Classic D&D. I'm not that fussed about how you resolve combat, tasks, character advancement etc., but I do think that having a simple means of freeing the DM from determining NPC reactions is something that every game could benefit from.

While browsing the other day I found this post, from late last year, by Alex Chalk of To Distant Lands, in which he breaks down the procedure for determining reactions into the Reaction Roll, a consideration of Interests, and modifiers for Disposition.

I need to get myself my own header. Well, in fact, my blogs need a total design overhaul.

Rather than repeat his work, you should check it out HERE. It is very likely to make it onto my GM summary sheets.

My Reaction to Petty Gods

I rolled a 6 and a... 5. A overwhelmingly positive reaction. Depending on whether you are playing Basic D&D or Labyrinth Lord, which inverts the table.

+2 to Reaction Rolls based on the pretty sweet 'AD&D' cover...

I liked the 'original' release of Petty Gods that Greg Gorgonmilk put together. And the new one, which is Revised and Expanded (given the extra input of Richard LeBlanc of New Big Dragon Games) is simply fantastic. But my favourite part of the book - the bit that makes it immediately and inspiringly gameable - is the use of and commentary on the use of Reaction Tables. The Reaction Roll (and its 2d6 cousin, the Morale Roll) is an underused mechanic in D&D - most RPGs either take it further (too far?) and comprehensively mechanise social interactions, or leave everything to the GM. Since returning to old school D&D gaming I have used Reaction Rolls in order to generate NPC attitudes in a variety of situations, with the range not - as per the book - from 'Immediately Friendly' to 'Immediately Attack' but from 'As Hostile as Possible (Given the Circumstances)' to 'As Positive as Possible (Given the Circumstances)'. So, is that trader going to try to cheat the PCs, or will he be impressed by their bearing and be especially helpful? Roll 2d6 (apply modifiers) and consult the bones, just as you would when the party bumble into a raiding party of Goblins. The dice roll is the same, it is the interpretation of the results that is different.

As you might remember, I tried to incorporate the Reaction Roll mechanics into my Goblin Encounters, as one of my bugbears with early D&D (and later D&D, of course) is the fact that adventure writers seemingly ignored the existence of the Reaction Roll and scripted monster and NPC reactions.

If only early D&D products had incorporated advice to the (novice?) DM on using the Reaction Roll, rather than scripting encounter reactions. If this had been the case I think that the idea that D&D was only a crude a 'kick in the door and kill everything' game would have been dispelled. As would avoiding pre-scripting the in-combat behaviour of opponents (or leaving it to the DM, who would often have monsters fight to the death, unless it serves the 'story' - or helps avoids a looming TPK - to have them flee) and allowing the Morale Roll to do its job (and more). The subtlety of D&D's simple mechanics would have been more widely seen. But that's another story.

Petty Gods: Revised and Expanded not only has Reaction Roll tables for each God[ling], whic transforms a stat block into an encounter, but also includes an article on different kinds of Reaction Roll tables - one each for Melancholic, Choleric, Sanguine, and Phlegmatic. The Hippocratic Humours are as good a system as any of producing differentiated Reaction Roll tables - for one they could easily fit on a GM screen (or reference sheet, if you don't like erecting barriers). Reading this impresses in your imagination the way that D&D's simple mechanics can produce a dynamic game experience for both the players, and, importantly, the DM.

Plus, you have to love Courtney Campbell's Petty God, the Quantum Ogre. (Note: Campbell's take on the use of Reaction Rolls has been influential on the way I've used the mechanic in games. His On the Non-Player Character really got me thinking about the way that D&D-ist games can do what games with more 'modern' takes on social interactions purport to do, and to arguably do it better. Simpler, for certain, which is a major virtue in an RPG.)

Extra: Talysman has been writing about using the Reaction Roll in a variety of circumstances, for example to to allow unclassed NPCs to call on divine intervention.

Petty Gods: Revised and Expanded is also available in print at Lulu.

Melange

Not something collected from Sand Worms, but a description of the patchwork of rules in play at my table during last week's session. The Party had found the Skin Mandala, were found by a little trouble in Salamonis (I should write up those session reports), and were then recruited by the King's spymaster to ensure that the trouble brewing between the local Goblin tribes (trouble likely caused by some unprovoked murder-hoboism by the Party) was turned to Salamonis' advantage. The reward was membership of the Order of the Brass Sceptre, a minor 'knightly' order populated by merchants and professors, but nevertheless a step into Salamonis society. 

The players were given some brief details on five local Goblin tribes, their customs and allegiances, and decided that the Party would begin by visiting the savage Moondance Goblins of the Forest of Spiders. The plan is still nebulous, but seems to be getting towards, 'unite the Goblins and sack Salamonis'. Indeed!

But in the sort term, that means a bit of a wilderness crawl. Out came the numbered hex paper and the index cards, and I started generating interesting encounters in and around the Forest of Spiders. Giant Spiders. Zharradan Marr's Rhino-Men and Soulless Ones. Mundane animals. Trees festooned with gory charms. Sinkholes of corruption. A village of Sprites. Etc. 

Now, on the table there were three d100 rule-books; Magic World (which we're using), RuneQuest 6, which is filled with interesting stuff, and OpenQuest 2, which has tended to be my go to d100 bestiary. Also on the table were Titan, Out of the Pit, and Advanced Fighting Fantasy 2e, to provide me with quick setting reference when I didn't just make it up. But that I resorted to using the next two books is something that I found quite surprising. In play, I referred both to Menzter Basic and Expert D&D. From the Basic D&D DM's book I took guidelines of 'monster' reactions and handling morale. From the Expert D&D book I took the procedures for wilderness exploration - getting lost, random encounters, and so on.

It made me realise just how much, as a DM, I value the D&D 'procedural game'. I've been meaning to write a proper blog post extolling the virtues of D&D's abstract, procedural (but simple) systems, so we can add that post to the list of things that I have promised to do. In the meantime, who else indulges in a cross-system melange?