A social combat is a multi-character engagement where NPCs and PCs posture in a conceptual map. When the engagement is over, the NPCs will act according to their location in the tactical map.

Definitions

Let there be a tactical engagement map made of states connected by transitions.

A state is a box representing a course of action. Each character is located in one state. NPCs are bound to follow the course of action corresponding to the state it occupies at the end of an engagement.
The plane of a state is a key skill upon which the position relies on the most. Any attempt to manipulate within this state with other skills incurs a penalty. For example, if a position relies on political considerations, it will be more difficult to weaken this position with an economic argument.
A transition is a weight expressing the distance between two adjacent states. This quantity represents the minimum margin of success (MoS) required to move a character between two states. The minimum weight of a transition is 0.
The distance between two states is the sum of all transition weight of the least expensive path between two states.
The composure of a character is a penalty that applies to all skill resolution of this character for the duration of the social engagement.

Occupying a state

The state that a character occupies is the position of this character in the social engagement map. For PCs, this may not be the PC’s true position. However, NPCs should be bound to their position on the map as the objective of a social combat is to manipulate NPCs to make certain decisions. Given sufficient reasons, it is possible for a NPC to misrepresent himself/herself.

Because it is a matter of perception, once a PC states a position, moving about to other states must be done such as to convince all other than the change in state is real and not just some trick. Likewise, PCs can be forced to shift under the weight of a winning argument by another character. Treat PCs finishing in boxes that do not match their underlying player’s true color as if they were under the effect of a delusion disadvantage that must be overcomes.

Playing an Engagement

The order of play for the character is contextual and determined by the GM. This order may be set and changed to fit the situation. Some moves are opposed and call for a skill contest, some are not opposed and call for a skill check. The GM may adjust any check to reflect how great or tenuous the skill relates to the desired effect.

Possible moves

For this section, let’s assume an active character A and an optional target character T or target state S.

Move Self (Free Action)

Character A can shift to another state before taking any action. This shift must be announced and incur a temporary loss of composure equal to the transition cost of the path to go from its original to final states.^[1] This loss of composure vanishes once character A concludes his/her move.

Strenghten/Weaken state action

Character A select a target state S and make an argument in favour, or against this position. The objective of this action is to increase or lower the transition in and out of this state.

Procedure

Character A selects a state S
A sets that scope of the action by declaring a skill to be used, and whether it will strenghten or weaken the state.

The skill in the state’s plane is unmodified, others are used at -2

Anyone interested may resist the action: resisting with another skill than the skill in scope is done at -2, if the alternative skill used to resist isn’t in the state's plane, there is an additional -2 penalty.^[2]
One round of skill contest is performed: if A succeeds and has a positive MoS, A can apply its MoS to alter one or more weights of transitions that are incident to S. A MoS larger than 4 allows A to reset the plane of the target S to a skill of his/her choice. If A fails, and the counter check succeeded with a given MoS. The resisting party may distribute its MoS on incident transition weights and A’s composure. A single transition weight may not be changed by more than 2 units in one distribution event.

Personal Attack action

Character A selects a target character T to perform a personal attack. The goal of a personal attack is to degrade the target’s composure.

Procedure

Character A selects a target character T
A sets that scope of the action by declaring a skill to be used
Adjust the attacker’s skill by its distance to T: friends are more dangerous than sworn enemies.^[3]
The target T select a skill to resist the attack. Using a different skill is done at -2 penalty.
One round of skill contest is performed: If one party succeeds, the winner may apply the MoS as lost composure for the rest of the turn. Only one point of lost composure will remain in the next turn.

Sway action

Swaying is an action that aims to force a party to adopt the position of a contiguous state.

Procedure

Character A selects a target character T
A sets that scope of the action by declaring a skill to be used

The skill in the state’s plane is unmodified, others are used at -2

Adjust the attacker’s skill by its distance to T: friends are more dangerous than sworn enemies.
The target T select a skill to resist the attack. Using a different skill is done at -2 penalty.
One round of skill contest is performed: If A succeeds, A may move T along a path toward itself up to a weight equal to its MoS. If A fails, T’s MoS is deduced to A’s composure for the coming turn. Only one point of lost composure persists beyond the current turn.

Pass

A character may elect not to do anything for a given turn.

Supporting another character

Once that a skill has been declared and all modifiers determined, any number of additional characters may intervene to assist. The assisted check is only possible if the character that declared the skill succeeds a Leadership check, adjusted by lost composure.^[4] A failure of leadership indicates that the attempt to cooperate are neither useful nor deleterious to the upcoming skill contest. Supporting characters may use the same declared skill, or any properly narrated skill with the same modifier as the declared roll. This modifier is further adjusted by the distance from the supporting character to the leader. Any positive MoS from supporting characters may be used to cancel the effect of lost composure for this skill check. ^[5]

Roleplaying through Social Combat

Further to lost composure and distance there are other possible modifiers that apply:

If a character uses the same skill in the same turn, he/she incurs a cumulative -2 penalty on the skill check.
In all cases, the GM may apply an additional modifier to any skill check based on appropriateness. A GM should be satisfied by the narration of the action in order to allow the check to go unpenalized. On the other hand, a very good argument that fits the skill declared may be worth a bonus.
If an argument is at odd with a disadvantage of either A or T, adjust the target number by -1 instead of asking either party to roll separately vs self control. Make the check at -2 for tipsy and -3 against drunk characters. For example, making a call for caution to an overconfident target would be penalized by -1.

End of engagement

An engagement may be of a fixed length. Alternatively, it will terminate if all characters in play take a pass action.

Effect of Social Engagements

Lasting effect on the narrative

Once that an engagement ends, NPCs will act according to the state in which they are located. PCs are not bound to their end states the same way. Instead, a PCs will get a temporary disadvantage compelling him/her to act according to the social engagement’s outcome. The GM may remove this temporary disadvantage at any time, or even decide not to apply the outcome at all.

Lasting effect of lost composure

In some settings, losing composure may persist and have lasting effects. This composure penalty would apply only if the character engages the same social circle. A minor loss of composure can lead to a loss of influence by 1, a larger loss of composure leads to a loss of influence by 2. This loss of influence applies to the base composure in the next social combat involving the same group of people.

Other than by actual roleplaying, there is a way to regain influence. The GM may ask a player how his character intends to recover from this face-losing situation. A skill is invoked, adjusted by the lost composure and any other applicable modifiers. If the check is successful, the lost influence is negated.

Experience and the skill system

Achievement : If a character has contributed to achieving its goal with at least one dice roll. This is worth one point. Narrating well how the skills are used is also worth an additional point. These points can be used to negate lost influence.

Acknowledgements

Thanks to Jason Woolard, Arne Jamtgaard, Alex Safatli and Justin Aquino for discussion and playtesting. Thanks to Grouchy Chris for discussion.

Changelog

Version 2.0

In this version the action move self is converted to a free action to be done before any other action. It causes a temporary composure penalty for this turn only as others are trying to adjust to the player’s new stance on the engagement map.
Strenghten/weaken is now made state-dentric rather than transition centric. The action can also be opposed from now on.
States are associated with planes, or most relevant skill to a given state. Penalty are incured when an argument is made with peripheral states.
Composure penalties are now split into immediate and transient penalty without caps, and a small residual long term composure loss -1. This should address the issue of plummeting composure.
Skill contests are now penalizing resisting with different skills: the attackers gets to decide the nature of an exchange and should play to its best advantage.
Swaying is now bound to the plane of the original state: the argument to beat to shoo someone off the box.
Attackers are affected by distance while defender never are. This makes it harder to attack.
Supported check are now possible. Leadership is required from the main actor on an action, and the benefit of support is limited in mitigating lost composure. Composure is still a non-renewable resource: but its loss is mainly temporary and can be negated by teamwork.
Disadvantages are integrated to the skill contest instead of being rolled separately.
PCs are tagged with temporary disads if they end an engagement in an awkward position.

[1] Shifting position will not be denied. But the change in advocated position incur a penalty proportional to the distance in the shift. Frequent turncoats will have a lower average composure.

[2] There is no distance penalty for Strenghten/Weaken: Extreme opponents are equally capable to argue as close peers.

[3] Sworn enemies’ attacks are more likely to be dismissed. It is easier to be hurt by the action of a peer.

[4] It takes leadership to get people to coherently act together. And this leader must still have some credibility on the “floor”.

[5] Support can prop up a tired actor, but will not negate the penalty due to distance or skill mismatch. The argument, not the lease of credit to the actor is ultimately the challenge in a skill contest.