Intrigue by letter

[Jon Snow]

I just wanted to share how I've been handling Intrigues over long distances.

I've been using the Language ability with bonus dice from the appropriate persuasion or deception specialty.

The roll is against the opponents intrigue defense (situational modifiers may apply). Depending upon the nature of the goal, it may require multiple degrees of success. A critical failure may make future intrigues more difficult or worsen the situation.

It has worked very well and it has caused some characters to increase their Language above 3 which they would not think of doing before

[Polynikes27]

This is a wonderful idea that allows for games that play in a much larger sphere. Language is a worthless skill that becomes much more important and allows for a "power behind the throne" type character.
The only idea I have for improvement is to perhaps have a straight bonus to the language roll based on the influence style. For example if you wanted to charm the person in a letter and you have 4D in persuasion you would get a +4 on the roll. This would allow you to use cunning, will, etc. to greater effect as well.[/quote]

[Trystane]

I agree, this is an excellent idea. It promotes a rather minor attribute, and helps keep the flavor of the setting alive. Think of how much intriguing is done by letter in the series.

- Lysa's letter to the Starks that starts the whole ball rolling
- Tywin Lannister's letters to Roose Bolton, the Westerlings, Lord Frey, etc etc.
- Cersei's letter to Jaime that he promptly ignores.

It's a subtle part of the setting, but an important one.

[Lord Mormont]

Yes as previous posters have said an excellent idea!:D

One suggestion I would make is that certain qualities and flaws should be not effective over intrigue by letter - attractive, marked, ugly, etc. Of course there are always exceptions - love letters, marriage proposals to people who've actually met you....

[Jon Snow]

Thanks folks, it has worked out well. I hadn't really considered letting some of the physical benefits and drawbacks having much input but I see your point about how it might come into to play if someone has already met you. I'm going to use that

If someone uses the flat bonuses mentioned let me know how it turns out - I kinda like using the using cross ability bonus dice myself, though.

[kckolbe]

Well done. I'd actually been considering taking it one step further than that and making all persuasion rolls based on Language. After all, I think it unfair that you make your "attack" roll based on persuasion AND, if you are using charm or seduce, base your damage off of it as well.

[Jon Snow]

Since there's a lot of new faces here, I wanted to repost some of the stuff we've used. Intrigue by letter has been really good for my campaign.

[aprewett]

First time I have seen this post.
I would add, you might have to do a knowledge or somesuch test to first see how much you know about a new long distance contact. It would make sense to be harder to 'charm' a person if you know little about what makes that person.

Do you have a courier service opperating in your game or how do you handle the movement of the correspondance?

Allan

[Carriker]

Love this post. Correspondence plays a part in my own chronicle, too, if for no other purpose than to highlight the fact that the Narrator Characters are also reacting to what the PCs are doing.

http://oakthorne.net/wiki/index.php?title=House_Wisent_Correspondence

[Jon Snow]

Joseph, I love those letters! The wax seals are a great touch. How did you go about doing those? Very impressive.

[Jon Snow]

First time I have seen this post.
I would add, you might have to do a knowledge or somesuch test to first see how much you know about a new long distance contact. It would make sense to be harder to 'charm' a person if you know little about what makes that person.

Do you have a courier service opperating in your game or how do you handle the movement of the correspondance?

Allan

Primarily, the correspondence takes place by raven. Though I have made use of couriers as well.

[Flagg]

Joseph, I love those letters! The wax seals are a great touch. How did you go about doing those? Very impressive.

I was impressed by that too, and since you got no answer, I started fiddling around using the GIMP, and here's what I came up with:



I used a combination of the blur, oilify, and emboss filters, along with some brushes.

[Saturno]

I like this. I really do.

I tried something similar, but the results were lame. Basically three of my PC's sent one letter (each one) for a NPC Lord describing one event (one assassination) in 3 different ways. In the heat of the game I really didnt knew how the Lord would react with these 3 letters, so I decided to roll a small intrigue between the 3 PCs and the NPC Lord. The players rolled Persuasion (Convince) or Deception (Bluff) and the best score was the one the Lord believed most. But your idea of using Language with the assist of the apropriate intrigue-ability is magnificent! I will surely use this in my game!

Thank you very much!

[Carriker]

Joseph, I love those letters! The wax seals are a great touch. How did you go about doing those? Very impressive.

Sorry; didn't see this until now. It was done in Photoshop.

[Kajani]

I had used this option of intrigues by letter sometimes and decided to handle it in a similar way. But I made Language not SO important. A roll must made in Language against 9 (if the result is higher it may bring benefits), and this roll decided how well the following persuasion/ deception roll works. I am planing to use it similar with official declaration which could be read or spread by people who read them out loudly