Last week we explored how Realm of Runes handles lies and lie detection. This week we'll take a step back and dive into the evolution of social skills in the system from an overall perspective. This area of the rules has become more robust during the playtest process, but also has been greatly simplified at the same time.
When the first version of Realm of Runes was put together, social skills were more of a colloquial concept than a true system. While used during discussion to reference the big three Charisma-based skills, Deception, Diplomacy and Intimidation (and sometimes Performance), it had virtually no imprint on the rulebook itself. Where it did show up was with regard to a few Ancestry Perks, such as Deep Dwarf. In its first iteration that perk (among its other benefits) gave a bonus to Athletics and Intimidation, but gave a penalty to Deception, Diplomacy and Performance.
As the skills system became more robust, however, such clear statements became more muddy. There are many instances in Realm of Runes where one skill can be expanded to overlap with, or even replace, the functions of another skill. Performance and Religion, in particular, can each be used to perform the functions of all of the big three with enough investment. In the case of Religion, as well, this not only changes the skills being used, but also changes the Key Ability being referenced from Charisma to Wisdom, and possibly even Intelligence with perk investment. So, clearly, the initial wording proved insufficient to encompass the scope of what the Deep Dwarf perk was meant to influence.
For a while, it seemed that the next step was to simply expand upon the scope of the wording. As the Backstory Traits were added into the system, many of these traits have a positive or negative impact on a character's social interactions with others. The Bookworm trait, for example, gives a bonus to Recall Knowledge and Recall General Knowledge, but its drawback is a penalty to basically all social interactions. Because the possibility of these interactions had become so broad, the initial wording of the trait said that it imposed a penalty to Deception, Diplomacy, Intimidation, Performance, Religion and Society checks against creatures. That last clause was the most important, as it was meant to clarify the scope of the penalty. Creating a disguise uses the Deception skill, but it isn't a check against a creature. Similarly, learning a divine spell uses Religion, but is not a check against a creature either.
This seemed fine, but it began to fall apart under some probing. If you are at least trained in Religion or Society, not only can you use those skills as a Knowledge Specialty, but you can also use the associated skill for the check instead of the Knowledge skill itself. If you are trying to identify a creature using Religion or Society, is that a check against a creature? Similarly, the DC to cast a spell while threatened without triggering an Attack of Opportunity is based on the Reflex DC of the foes that threaten you. If you are a divine caster this check uses Religion, but is it a check against a creature? Going by just the intent of the rules interaction, the answer to both questions should be no, but it's not clear enough for comfort.
The best course was to stop putting it on the situations that interacted with social skills to define the rules elements to which they apply. Realm of Runes already makes use of a wide array of traits, keywords which can be referenced by other rules elements and which also provide quick identification when reading through options. Three new traits were added: Social, Civil and Rude. With these new traits, the corner cases and odd interactions entirely disappeared, and the intent and execution of social skills finally overlapped with both accuracy and precision. Let's take a closer look at these traits.
The Social trait is more of an umbrella trait. Any activity that involved social interaction with another creature gains this trait. The Bookworm Backstory Trait we discussed earlier now simply says it imposes a penalty on social checks and DCs. Since Combat Casting and Recall Knowledge lack this social trait, it is clear that the Bookworm penalty applies to neither, even though Religion can sometimes be used as a social skill. The social trait is useful, but it's not yet complete. While it works for Bookworm, it fails to account for the scope of something like Deep Dwarf, which gives a bonus to some social interactions but imposes a penalty to others.
This is where the other two traits come in. The Civil trait is added to social activities where the intent is generally positive and the experience is typically pleasant for everyone involved. The Rude trait is just the opposite, and is added to social activities where the intent is generally hostile and the experience is typically unpleasant for the recipient. All activities with the Civil and Rude trait also have the Social trait, though not all activities with the Social trait have either Civil or Rude added. For example, Make Impression (Diplomacy) is a civil social check, Demoralize (Intimidation) is a rude social check, while Lie (Deception) is social, but neither civil nor rude. Since the traits apply at the activity level, they still apply even if you change the skill you use for that activity from the default. To reflect this new paradigm, the Deep Dwarf perk instead applies a bonus to rude social checks and DCs, while imposing a penalty to civil social checks and DCs. If the check or DC is neither civil nor rude, Deep Dwarf has no effect on it one way or the other.
Another fringe benefit of this change is the ability to further increase its scope. Where previously social benefits or impediments were limited to specific skills, simply referencing a trait really opens up the opportunities to apply elsewhere. The Stage Magician skill perk (Legerdemain) lets you use the skill to Perform or Stage Performance which are typically Performance skill uses. Whereas before it would have never made sense to include Legerdemain in the suite of skills that are affected by effects like Deep Dwarf or Bookworm, it can be surgically given the civil and social traits to include this obviously social interaction in the umbrella.
We can even go a step further to include more than just skills. Several enchantment spells, like charm, suggestion and many Bardic Composition Powers, use magic to modify social interactions and it's not a stretch to give them the social trait, too. It also goes a long way to ensure that the rules remain future-proof. Since there already exist spells and a Legerdemain use that should fall under the social umbrella, it isn't a stretch to imagine that future supplements might add other social skill uses or options that fall outside the typical expectations for what constitutes a character's "social skills." In such cases, adding some combination of these traits at that time ensures that they successfully and retroactively work with the rules that came before.
Social skills in Realm of Runes have become more effective and precise, while also reducing the complexity of their interactions with the rules at large. Rather than actually referring to any skills in particular, a character's social skills instead applies to social interactions, regardless of which skill they end up falling under, if it even falls under a skill at all. Next week we'll take a closer exploration of perhaps the strangest skill in a character's potential arsenal: Occultism.
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