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These rules are designed by CrownedSun. This system is designed to add a low-impact and easy system for the resolution of social situations. It replaces the extremely freeform guidelines from the corebook whenever the storyteller or players wants to allow more detailed resolution of social situations and conflict without having to add huge chunks of new mechanics to his system.
Look at some of the System Complications, or Charm Notes.
The key aspects of this social resolution system are both simple and already a part of the game as it exists in print. A serious effort to change anothers view is called an appeal, and is a dice action. Unrolled Appeals are simply flavor, and while quite important for roleplaying have no involuntary effects on other characters. An appeal should generally be roleplayed out to apply stunt bonuses to each side, but there are also several important mechanical decision to be made. The first is to decide what Trait you are targeting with your appeal, called it's Correspondence. The most effective appeals target the Virtues of your mark (the person being targeted by your appeal), urging him to action by calling upon these essential parts of his heroic personality. The Virtue Correspondence that you choose depends on how you state your arguement, and more guidelines will follow later. As a quick example, a Compassion appeal is a cry made to the marks sense of deceny and fellowship.
The character making the appeal then makes a social roll, using a combination of a Social Attribute and a Social Ability, such as Charisma + Presence or Manipulation + Performance. The most common Social Abilities are Presence, Socialize, Bureaucracy and Performance but sometimes other abilities such as Linguistics or Lore might be used. The exact combination will depend on the characters arguement and his capabilities. The character will probably also add stunt dice, and possibly channeled virtue dice or charm bonuses to this roll. The difficulty of this roll is usually 1, but can be raised due to charms, strange circumstances, or a poor choice of Virtue Correspondence. Lastly, rushing an arguement tends to make it more difficult!
In order to successfully make the appeal, the character has to overcome a threshold of success based on both what he is asking of his mark and their relationship with each other. This is measured in two separate factors, called the Magnitude of the appeal and the level of Opposition between you and your mark. The Magnitude reflects how much you as asking of your mark, and is the prime arbiter of the threshold. It ranges from 1 to 6, with a Magnitude of 1 reflecting small polite concessions, 3 representing serious and meaningful requests, and 6 for the truly legendary feats of persuasion. The Opposition of the mark is of lesser importance, ranging from 0 to 5. Someone who actively opposes you and whose goals conflict with yours has an Opposition of 3, while Oppositions of 0 and 5 run from disinterested neutrality to irreconcilable differences of worldview. You obtain your basic threshold by adding Opposition to Magnitude, but in most circumstances you cannot more than double the basic Magnitude of the request. I.e., Magnitude 2, Opposition 3 results in a threshold of 4. However, a mark who particularly hates you might choose to oppose your arguement based entirely on that hate.
Against an extra or other unimportant NPC, this basic threshold suffices. However, important characters usually gain stunt bonuses which further raise their threshold. Though the character still gains any motes or willpower as necessary, the actual bonus instead moves into the characters threshold. This results in a final range of 1 to 14. If, after subtracting any applicable difficulty modifiers, the character achieves a number of successes equal to the Threshold then he is said to have made his appeal.
Though the appeal has been made, it has not yet affected the mark! The mark rolls his targeted virtue, and if he gets even a single success then he is swayed and is now inclined to do whatever you wished him to do. If he gains a number of successes equal to or over his targeted virtue rating he is convinced. A swayed or convinced target can spend a single willpower point to ignore your appeal. Though your words had an effect on your mark and you've made an overall impact on him, he's not yet commited to this action and your appeal need do no more than color his roleplaying.
However, there is an additional game effect! Every time a target ignores an appeal that swayed him, his threshold on that matter is reduced by one, while ignoring an appeal that convinced him reduces the threshold by two. Once the threshold of an appeal is lowered to 0, the character can simply make the appeal as often as he wishes and eventually the mark will run out of willpower. How long it takes for your threshold to go back to normal is a matter between you and your Storyteller, and depends on events in the story.
Low Magnitude Appeals
It can be a lot easier to convince someone to perform minor favors for you. Any appeal with an Opposition of 2 adds +1 die to the virtue roll if you successfully made the appeal, while an appeal with a magnitude of 1 adds +3 dice to the virtue roll and requires an extra willpower point to ignore if the character is convinced.
Additional Rules and Clarification
Many many social charms do NOT affect the above system, having their own systems that they use exclusively. The following charms are somehow relevant to the above situation, and should be taken into account.
General Charm Use
Solar Charms
Abyssal Charms
Sidereal Charms
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