The Windkey and the Lamplighter

My weekly [Burning Empires][] group has been having difficulty with some
of the mechanics. Some are not well-written as technical
specifications. No matter how much fun they are to read, they’re
difficult to apply. Some just take a very long time—we’re
considering ways to shorten the application of these. But one has
caused problems all on its own: the Duel of Wits, Burning Empire’s
social conflict mechanic. The Duel of Wits was inherited from Burning
Wheel with minimal changes, so you might understand it as well from
there.

This has led me to comparison between several games mechanics for
resolving social conflicts. They can be classified on several
principles:

• Why is the mechanic here? Is it to force an end to player
  conflicts, or to simulate convincing characters?

• What is the conclusion? Does it let one player edit another’s
  character sheet? Let one character influence another? Provide
  incentives and influence? Commit players to binding deals?

• By what means does it operate, combining randomness, character
  skill, player skill, and player desire?

• How broadly are they available? Is this just something for
  dedicated preachers and diplomats, or a common mechanic?

Burning Empires and Burning Wheel

The Duel of Wits is a core mechanic of the game: the easiest way to
extend a conflict beyond a single roll. It appears to be there
because the author, Luke Crane, had problems with on-running arguments
in his group. Now one player can demand another engage in the Duel of
Wits or drop the argument. At the beginning, players name forfeits
from the other side. At the end, they agree on a compromise between
those forfeits based on the result of the die rolls. To cut down on
randomness and provide some room for player skill, there’s a
RPS-derived mechanic for integrating die
rolls to produce a final score. Variance in this score influences the
balance of the compromise.

This is a player-level commitment. Once, I thought this was a great
idea. Having now seen that some players don’t like being bound in
this way, I’m not certain that it’s right for all groups or for
long-term commitments. It’s fine for getting one player to shut up
about how he hates the group’s shadowrunning plan—for that night.
It’s not going to work to get the Elf and the Dwarf to stop bickering
over racial supremacy issues.

Weapons of the Gods

An extensive social conflict system, tied to the medicine and sorcery
mechanics. All of these work by imposing Chi Conditions: incentive
pairs. For example, a Courtier might impose the condition "In Love,"
specifying that the target receives a bonus to certain other
die-rolls, or a resource useful for the broader game, in every scene
in which he makes eyes at his beloved. A less pleasant Courtier might
make this a negative condition, so that the target receives a penalty
in any scene in which he does not moon around.

These are slow to set up—it’s typical for players to show up for a
session with the Chi Conditions they intend to use in mind. These
don’t show up in high-action conflict. Pre-existing Chi Conditions
can have great impact there.

Because this is an incentive system, players never have the chance to
complain about others abuse of the system—you’re not bound to
behave in a particular way, you merely have set costs.

Exalted, Second Edition

There’s a very complicated tactical mini-game for social conflict.
It’s built parallel to the basic physical combat system, without
concepts of Soak (armor). Just as a Mass Combat system exists as a
modifier to the base combat system, a Mass Social Combat system exists
to model religious conversions and the like.

The game is heavily focused on player skill: the vast quantity of
rolls smooth out most randomness. At the end, a target character has
been convinced of something, but his player may spend a scarce
resource to have his character act in contravention of this belief.
It’s not clear what this represents in the imagined space: is the
character stubborn? strong-willed? Used to mind-control and so
willing to act against his own beliefs from time to time? This escape
clause is there to make it harder to change a player’s character
without his agreement, so it doesn’t have an easy translation to the
imagined world.

Over time, repeated losses of this Social Combat system can edit a
character’s sheet, contradicting a player’s original intent for his
character.

Dungeons and Dragons v3.5

This game has a Diplomacy skill, not often rolled. Most GMs drift
this to require player roleplay, use this to judge "plausible
reactions," and let dice adjust a bit within that.

There’s an entirely different mechanic around the Bluff and Sense
Motive skills. A contest of skill rolls lets one character lie to
another. There’s not a lot of opportunity given for a player to let
his character fail one of these tests, or insist that one particular
test is important.