Anyone who gets to know me quickly discovers that Dungeons & Dragons is my special interest and that I sometimes speak in terms of real life as that game. At this time I want to discuss the significance of having a low "Charisma" attribute and the penalties it incurs.
As a player in D&D you have six different attributes that define your abilities. Three are physical attributes and three are mental.
Physical attributes: Strength, Constitution (toughness), Dexterity.
Mental attributes: Intelligence, Wisdom, Charisma.
Charisma is defined as your personal charm, presence, leadership ability, ability to sway opinions, influence people, and the general impression people have of you. A player's attribute scores range from a low of 3 to a high of 18. Low scores are associated with increasingly severe penalties and high scores are associated with increasingly powerful bonuses.
In D&D, other peoples' reactions to you are not just based on how you behave with them, but are heavily influenced by your Charisma score.
For example:
Jesse the player attempts to enter a bar and to chat with people drinking there in order to gather information about local job opportunities. Jesse has a low Charisma score of 5, as compared to an average score of 10 - 12 out of a possible 18. This incurs a penalty to his every attempt to interact with people, a large penalty of -3.
Here is the matrix of possible reactions to players approaching strangers in a bar, shown as numbers rolled on 12-sided game dice:
Die Roll.........Reaction
1 - 2...........Openly hostile, may start a fight with player
3 - 4...........Unfriendly, will refuse to give any information
5 - 8...........Neutral, will give a little information in exchange for a bribe or a round of drinks
9 - 10..........Friendly, will give some helpful information for nothing in return
11 - 12.........Impressed with player, may hire the player on the spot or introduce them to an employer personally
Jesse, because of his Charisma penalty of -3, must subract 3 from whatever number he rolls on the 12-sided die in order to determine what reaction his attempts to socialize cause. So if he had an ordinary, average Charisma and he rolled the number 5 and had no bonuses or penalties, the Reaction matrix shows that the people Jesse approached in the bar would feel neutral towards him and would give him a little information if he bought them drinks.
BUT since Jesse has a -3 penalty, he has to subract 3 from his original roll of 5, giving him a result of 2 on the Reaction matrix. With this result, the people he approaches are openly hostile and threaten to beat him up just for asking about jobs. Furthermore, there is zero chance of him impressing anyone enough to hire him on the spot or introduce him to an employer personally. And it will be the same problem no matter who he speaks to or what about. He always carries that large penalty around with him and peoples' reactions are shifted towards him, and only to him, in a negative way.
It's obvious by this system that a person with higher Charisma will always have a more favorable reaction despite doing the exact same things as a person with a lower Charisma.
And this is how I find that this applies to real life in a way I find appalling:
1. At a previous job we had "casual-dress Fridays". There were still rules about what you could wear, but they included sweatshirts and jeans. Seeing that other people were wearing hooded sweatshirts, I also wore one on Friday. Immediately I was severely told that hoods were not allowed, and was given the option of either returning home to dress differently or taking off my hooded shirt to remain all day in my t-shirt underneath. I mentioned the other people who were currently dressed in identical hooded sweatshirts and was told that "they have been spoken to as well." But THEY were not sent home or forced to undress, THEY continued to wear their hooded shirts not only all that day but on every subsequent Friday. Due to a higher Charisma, they were not penalized for the exact same actions that I was penalized for.
2. At a different previous job, a co-worker had taken to habitually scolding me loudly in front of everyone in the middle of the office. One day I got up the courage to tell him in an equally loud tone that we couldn't discuss things by yelling in public and had to step into a private area nearby to have that conversation. Immediately, everyone around us who had heard the altercations but who had always remained silent themselves stopped what they were doing to come over and began to criticize ME for raising my voice, in loud voices of their own. Due to my lower Charisma, I received reaction penalties for doing the same thing as others were doing, while they got away with doing the exact same thing.
The pattern of being penalized for actions that are exactly the same as what other people are not being penalized for is pervasive, but it sounds like you're whining or playing the perpetual victim if you point it out. But it's really a severe penalty that applies to almost every situation in life. I am literally screwed (penalized) before I even do anything because peoples' reactions are pre-disposed to be much more negative to me than to other people doing the same things.
16 Nov 2010, 9:49 am
