I'll be adding more of this later on.

Veteran GURPS. In RPGs you Grow and your tastes change. Me and Henry are into Social Characters. Its basically understanding the REAL world kinda thing for me. There are guns and there are smooth talkers. Everyone has explored the combat character, now its time to explore the talker.

Its easy to make a challenging combat encounter. Its hard making a social encounter that is challenging and able to draw the attention of even the most devouted hack and slasher. IT is a fantasy game playing RPGs, reality need not apply, BUT its interesting when we experiment in various strengths other than Force or Tactics.

Negotiation and Social Skills are my weak points. Its nice to figure them out in the safety of the gaming table.



Psychology. B216 A successful skill roll will allow you to predict the general behavior.


The Collins GEM English Dictionary Definition of Behavior is Manner of Behaving. It defines Behave as acting a particular or functioning in a particular way.
General Behavior is a pretty broad term, its up to your GM to draw the line.
A few Examples of a General Behavior that I could think of: Favor, Like, Dislike, Repulsed, Disgusted, Honor, Praise, imitate, Deny, Deceive, desire, Pleases, Takes/Draws Pleasure, Satisfies, Depend and Abuse.

Here are some useful questions you can ask to predict a certain kinds of behavior that would be relevant in an adventure.

"Will he favor Flattery?". Ask which influence approach can best be used. Flattery would likely be Savoir-Faire or Fast Talk.
"Will he favor a Bribe?". A very useful question in tight situations where you try to predict if this person be averse, insulted, or react negatively or positively to a bribe. I think Streetwise would be the best skill to Haggle over the price, if it is the best course of action.
Will this person likely betray us in our deal?. Deviant behavior is still behavior, and the possibility of an NPC breaking an agreement can give the PCs a chance to void an agreement or to count on that betrayal.
How far will he go to honor our deal?. This is a good follow up question to any negotiation. They might honor the deal but will come back on the first sign of trouble. Depending on the context you can already tell this person is Honest or with a Strong Code of Honor.
"Will he try to screw me over?". If you are negotiating and you should ask this to determine if the person is the type to make unfair demands. This really helps when you are not as skilled as a merchant as your opponent. If your a skilled merchant then you may already know what kind of person you're dealing with before agreeing to anything.
"Are they open to negotiations?" Instead of guns blazing, you may want to talk it through. this is helpful for GMs to give a clear "OK" sign to start shooting.
"Isn't he trying to get something out of this deal?" If something is too good to be true, it probably is. When negotiations should be challenging and faces odd or no resistance, this should be a question the player should ask the GM asap.
Will he try to Hide it?. Asking a question you already know the answer to can reveal more information depending on how the person behaves when answering. If the person shies away from the topic, vehemently denies, feigns ignorance, tells parts or the whole truth may give possible motives, connections, relations, unusual circumstances that may give the PCs a clearer direction where to go.

Using Psychology with Body Language, Detect Lies, Observation, Interrogation, Merchant, and Social Skills.

Interrogation is useful if your not as skilled in phrasing questions as a professional investigator, psychologist, or lawyers. You might just tell the GM what you want to ask, and he may tell you how you should phrase it or to speed up things just allow you to get away with role-playing.

Psychology, Body Language and Detect Lies.
"Your words are saying one thing, your Body another, and from what I know about you there is one more thing your not telling me."

I'll add some more next time.