1 minute ago, RickInVA said:

And while I agree that the social skills have a target that is the primary recipient of the result, as they are generally opposed checks, so I don't think it is reasonable that the Active Party is immune to also being convinced. This is not like climbing a rope, there is another being opposing you, which, to me, allows for the possibility that if the Active Party fails, that the Target Party succeeds. To use an example from Tramp Graphics, if the Character is attempting Coercion on, say, a bouncer at a club, failure could mean that, in addition to not being let in, the Character is now afraid of the bouncer, and when told to "Beat it!' immediately does! I think that has to be a possible outcome, which is, to me, the equivalent of the Character paying/selling for more/less than they wanted to.

Here's another point where we differ:
To me, that would either be a Threat/Despair result or (more likely) a separate Coercion check.

For me, I draw an important distinction between PC Failure and NPC Success. The acting character's Threat isn't the target's Advantage, and the action character's Failure isn't the target's Success.

In that example, I'd say "The bouncer refuses to budge, and just glares at you. 'Beat it, pal.' " He rolls his Coercion against the PC with Boost/Setback from the PC's Advantage/Threat, and succeeds. The PC decides now would be a good time to take a stroll down the street and enjoy the night air.

43 minutes ago, RickInVA said:

You make a good point. However, I still feel that the non-binding method is far to much in the Player's favor, and is too much allowing Player knowledge to influence the result.

What exactly is wrong with this and how is it different from pretty much the entire game favouring the acting party, which will usually be the PCs.

Plus, as has been repeated rather a lot, if the PCs walk away the PCs do not get what they want. They fail.

23 hours ago, micheldebruyn said:

But I'm confused about what you are trying to say.

It's in bold up there: there have to be consequences. I spelled it out in an example too, I'm not sure what's confusing about it.

22 hours ago, P-47 Thunderbolt said:

You have not been listening to anything I've been saying.

I have, but your examples of "consequences" just aren't significant, they don't scale with the dice results.

16 hours ago, Rimsen said:

Why is not considered consequence if you can't buy something?

If you need a Dewback to pass the Jundland Wastes and you roll ridiculous bad, why is it not a consequence that you chose to walk instead and get a handful of punishment going on foot as opposed to riding smoothly.

Well now *that's* finally a good example. No argument from me. But that kind of context has been entirely missing from the other "non-binders".

1 minute ago, whafrog said:

I have, but your examples of "consequences" just aren't significant, they don't scale with the dice results.

They don't have to be significant, they have to make sense. And some of the "significance" depends on stuff that happens further down the line. Not having X might prove to be a serious consequence in and of itself.

And what're you talking about "not scaling to the dice results"? Threat/Despair still apply.

1 minute ago, whafrog said:

Well now *that's* finally a good example. No argument from me. But that kind of context has been entirely missing from the other "non-binders".

Well now I know you haven't been paying attention. I've been saying (for a while) that part of the consequence is not having X.

1 hour ago, RickInVA said:

You make a good point. However, I still feel that the non-binding method is far to much in the Player's favor, and is too much allowing Player knowledge to influence the result.

And while I agree that the social skills have a target that is the primary recipient of the result, as they are generally opposed checks, so I don't think it is reasonable that the Active Party is immune to also being convinced. This is not like climbing a rope, there is another being opposing you, which, to me, allows for the possibility that if the Active Party fails, that the Target Party succeeds. To use an example from Tramp Graphics, if the Character is attempting Coercion on, say, a bouncer at a club, failure could mean that, in addition to not being let in, the Character is now afraid of the bouncer, and when told to "Beat it!' immediately does! I think that has to be a possible outcome, which is, to me, the equivalent of the Character paying/selling for more/less than they wanted to.

As @P-47 Thunderbolt said, a failed Coercion roll, in and of itself does not make the acting character afraid of his target, not even with Threat or Despair. The only way an acting character is going to fear the target is if the target rolls a subsequent Coercion roll of his own the following round, or the PC’s Coercion roll was opposed by the target’s Coercion skill not his Discipline skill.

32 minutes ago, whafrog said:

It's in bold up there: there have to be consequences. I spelled it out in an example too, I'm not sure what's confusing about it.

Literally nobody has been argueing in favour of no consequences.

1 hour ago, P-47 Thunderbolt said:

I've been saying (for a while) that part of the consequence is not having X.

Yeah, but your examples of consequences have been rather milque toast so...only a small difference between your examples and zero.

2 minutes ago, whafrog said:

Yeah, but your examples of consequences have been rather milque toast so...only a small difference between your examples and zero.

Because most of the time, choosing to not pick up a particular item isn't going to be that big a deal, nor is the consequence of walking out on the deal, and nor would Threat be a big deal. In the circumstances where it would be, it is.

Examples are not supposed to prove every single individual point down to the smallest detail and to the greatest degree. They are supposed to point you to point on a whole. It's not my fault you are too stubborn or whatever to see it. Just like how I said "the roll wouldn't be without consequences" about seventeen thousand times, and you still said "but it'd have to have consequences! You're not allowing for that."

But since you need it spelled out for you, let's take the example from earlier of Beskar:
Let's say they chose not to pick it up. Lo and behold if later that session, a dark Jedi shows up to do battle! Now their Beskad-wielding combatant doesn't have Parry or Cortosis Weave, and is in a lot of danger if he decides to do what he's good at.

1 hour ago, Tramp Graphics said:

As @P-47 Thunderbolt said, a failed Coercion roll, in and of itself does not make the acting character afraid of his target, not even with Threat or Despair. The only way an acting character is going to fear the target is if the target rolls a subsequent Coercion roll of his own the following round, or the PC’s Coercion roll was opposed by the target’s Coercion skill not his Discipline skill.

So you will agree that if the target did oppose with Coercion that a level of Threat/despair could make the Character fear the NPC as a result of the Coercion attempt? 4 Failures, 2 Threats, 2 Despairs?

I will also say that I agree with you, that if opposed by Discipline the Character would not suffer the effects of Coercion themselves. Likewise I would clarify that I would not expect a Negotiation roll opposed by Cool to force the Character to complete the transaction. I have rarely encountered a situation where a buy/sell Negotiation was not opposed by Negotiation, so all my prior writings have presumed a Negotiation vs. Negotiation check.

2 hours ago, micheldebruyn said:

What exactly is wrong with this and how is it different from pretty much the entire game favouring the acting party, which will usually be the PCs.

Plus, as has been repeated rather a lot, if the PCs walk away the PCs do not get what they want. They fail.

The exact wrongness is that it, IMHO, creates too easy a system for the Characters to under pay to buy and over earn to sell. The Players already have advantages, no need to give them the keys to the store as well.

I think you misunderstand the discussion if you feel that way. In all the examples of Buy/Sell the characters have the opportunity to get what they want, i.e. to buy or sell. They just don't have the opportunity at that moment to buy or sell at the price they want.

If the Players want to buy an item that is normally (book value) 500 credits, but they only are willing to pay 250, then just have them say that and let the GM adjudicate if they can, don't roll a Negotiation hoping to get a fantastic roll, and walk away the 98 times in a 100 that they don't get that result. To me that is abusing the system.

9 minutes ago, RickInVA said:

If the Players want to buy an item that is normally (book value) 500 credits, but they only are willing to pay 250, then just have them say that and let the GM adjudicate if they can, don't roll a Negotiation hoping to get a fantastic roll, and walk away the 98 times in a 100 that they don't get that result. To me that is abusing the system.

If the PC's goal is to buy at 250 to then sell at 500, and they can consistently buy at 400 to sell at 450, let's say they can make one transaction per session.

Over one hundred sessions, they make 2,500 credits.

Now, if they only take two out of a hundred rolls, but they get the 250 and 500, they just made 250 credits. That's it.

This is where the opportunity cost becomes a big deal.

33 minutes ago, RickInVA said:

So you will agree that if the target did oppose with Coercion that a level of Threat/despair could make the Character fear the NPC as a result of the Coercion attempt? 4 Failures, 2 Threats, 2 Despairs?

I will also say that I agree with you, that if opposed by Discipline the Character would not suffer the effects of Coercion themselves. Likewise I would clarify that I would not expect a Negotiation roll opposed by Cool to force the Character to complete the transaction. I have rarely encountered a situation where a buy/sell Negotiation was not opposed by Negotiation, so all my prior writings have presumed a Negotiation vs. Negotiation check.

When you have a Coercion vs Coercion opposed check, what you’re talking about is a Staredown . The ultimate result of that does not necessarily mean that the loser will slink away, though, that is an option. It could cause him to act rashly. This is the likely outcome if the victor of the opposed roll had Success with multiple Threats or a Despair.

This is not the case with Negotiation. A negotiation is not simply about determining the price of an item, but if the item is even sold at all . In the example of the Mandalorian Armorer, which I was a part of, the negotiation for the other party members to buy Beskar for their armor was not only to determine a price, but if he would even sell to the other party members (those not members of Clan Buurenaar, or even House Ordo), even though the head of the clan authorized it.

Not only that, but it is completely unrealistic for every negotiation for a purchase to result in a sale anyway. I used to work in direct sales, and most of the time I didn’t get the sale at all. Not only that, but if you watch shows such as Pawn Stars, we see multiple times when no deal is reached even after several minutes of haggling . Thus, no sale is made. Your ruling makes that outcome impossible. Your ruling makes a sale inevitable with just the price being in flux. The way we look at it, the sale itself is in doubt. That is how it should be.

See the thing is a negotiation check is a white market check. It is not like the Ralph's store is going to shoot you because you decided against selling them a widget. Streetwise check for a black market sale is going to have a different result.

1 hour ago, RickInVA said:

If the Players want to buy an item that is normally (book value) 500 credits, but they only are willing to pay 250, then just have them say that and let the GM adjudicate if they can, don't roll a Negotiation hoping to get a fantastic roll, and walk away the 98 times in a 100 that they don't get that result. To me that is abusing the system.

PC: I wanna buy that item that costs 500 creds, and I want to give you 250 for it.

NPC: Get out of my store before I call security.

You don't get to negotiate every last thing you buy. You don't get to negotiate most things you buy.

1 hour ago, whafrog said:

Yeah, but your examples of consequences have been rather milque toast so...only a small difference between your examples and zero.

How bad do you want the consequences of a relatively mundane shopping trip to be?

57 minutes ago, micheldebruyn said:

How bad do you want the consequences of a relatively mundane shopping trip to be?

"You don't want to buy these novelty socks for 600 credits? Then witness the power of this fully operational battlestation."

2 hours ago, micheldebruyn said:

How bad do you want the consequences of a relatively mundane shopping trip to be?

I don't do mundane shopping trips. I can't think of anything more boring in a game. But I've also said many times that negotiating for the best deal on, say, nerf-jerky, is not going to generate grave (or even interesting) consequences.

43 minutes ago, whafrog said:

I don't do mundane shopping trips. I can't think of anything more boring in a game. But I've also said many times that negotiating for the best deal on, say, nerf-jerky, is not going to generate grave (or even interesting) consequences.

Maybe you don’t, but some of us do, particularly if there are attachments or mundane gear we want to buy for our characters during game time with any money they earn ( or otherwise acquire).

52 minutes ago, whafrog said:

I don't do mundane shopping trips. I can't think of anything more boring in a game. But I've also said many times that negotiating for the best deal on, say, nerf-jerky, is not going to generate grave (or even interesting) consequences.

You can't judge our "mundane shopping" by your "non-mundane" standards, whatever those are. You have to speak in the same terms as the people you're debating. If I say "yeah, they should be able to walk away from high-priced novelty socks" and you say "but it must have grave consequences! " I assume you are saying that there must be grave consequences for walking away from an attempt to purchase novelty socks, which is insane.

Our way of handling "mundane shopping" is pretty fast, straightforward, reasonable, and RAW. You roll a check to find it, interpret the results, and choose whether to buy the item at that price or wait for later. All in all, it takes a couple seconds. Then if we're feeling jaunty, someone might describe the shopping trip in lurid detail, taking all of about one minute.
The consequence of choosing not to purchase an item that is available is that you don't know when you're going to get another chance to purchase it, you don't know if you're going to get a better price, and you don't know what you're going to need it for and then regret not having purchased it.
Then sometimes Threat or Despair will add problems.

Most of the time, the consequences are going to come from not purchasing them item. If working with high-priced items and/or deals and with illegal items, you are much more likely to encounter consequences for not following through on the Negotiation.

4 hours ago, whafrog said:

I don't do mundane shopping trips. I can't think of anything more boring in a game. But I've also said many times that negotiating for the best deal on, say, nerf-jerky, is not going to generate grave (or even interesting) consequences.

Neither do I, but it does seem to be something a lot of people like in their games.

I guess it depends on your players and game master.

Some might haggle for everything, whilst others only when the GM makes it an issue of it!

6 hours ago, P-47 Thunderbolt said:

I assume you are saying that there must be grave consequences for walking away from an attempt to purchase novelty socks, which is insane.

I've clarified several times that is NOT my argument, using an examples even more mundane than socks. You appear to be intentionally distorting my argument...just to keep on arguing I guess, which is insane.

37 minutes ago, whafrog said:

I've clarified several times that is NOT my argument, using an examples even more mundane than socks. You appear to be intentionally distorting my argument...just to keep on arguing I guess, which is insane.

7 hours ago, P-47 Thunderbolt said:

If I say "yeah, they should be able to walk away from high-priced novelty socks" and you say "but it must have grave consequences! " I assume you are saying that there must be grave consequences for walking away from an attempt to purchase novelty socks, which is insane.

You are missing some key context there. That's an "if-then" statement.

I'm afraid I'm going to be rather blunt here, but my patience has run out (something pretty rare).

You can take your high-and-mighty attitude and shove it where the sun don't shine. You aren't the be-all-and-end-all, and this "you're distorting my argument" routine is pretty rich coming from someone who has been either stupid or just willfully blind as to what I've said throughout the thread. I should take a count of how many times I have had to repeat "yes, it still has consequences" and you have still gone "BuT iT sHuOlD hAvE cOnSeQuEnCeS." Maybe take a reading comprehension course or something.

If you're going to tell people they are doing it wrong and that your way is soo much better than theirs, you have to be talking about the same thing. If you don't think there should be " Grave Consequences! " for not purchasing that blaster pistol, and your only concern is walking away from a black-market sale with the E-WEBs you heisted, then say so. I don't think anyone here disagrees with that. In fact, that's kinda been our point. I don't know what your problem is, because I'm pretty sure you aren't stupid, but you've certainly been acting it.

And before you sniff and go "Oh, you're the one who's all high-and-mighty and arrogant, I'm just a humble frog." I'm really not. I'm confident in my position, and have gotten moreso as I've had to make, clarify, and defend my arguments, all while seeing the opposing arguments. As a result, I have become further convinced of the correctness of my position. I haven't been acting like I'm better than anyone else, or pretending that those who disagree with me are just lowly peons and that I know better. And I've been discussing the topic on the same terms as pretty much everyone else, unlike you.