SRD Talk:Charisma

How Should I Play a Low Charisma Character?

I currently have a PC in my campaign who has 6 charisma.. How exactly should he be playing his character? As of now, he's just been pretending that he's extremely ugly. Someone with low intelligence is stupid, someone with low wisdom doesn't often know what's going on.. what's the key for low charisma (other than physical looks? (August 24, 2008 1:21AM PST ~VgWizard14) —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 67.182.88.155 (talk • contribs) 02:22, 24 August 2008 (MDT). Please sign your posts.

Charisma is about influencing others and displaying your creativity. Think of it as force of personality.

The easiest way to portray poor charisma is just being socially BAD in some way. Examples include 1) saying exactly the wrong thing, 2) continuously insulting people when not necessary, 3) missing basic social cues, 4) mumbling, have a thick accent, or otherwise being hard to understand, 5) being a phenomenally bad dresser.

In play, for example, I can have a poorly kept dwarf who speaks in a very thick Scottish accent. He is hard to understand, and he looks like a lowlife. Those all indicate negative charisma.--Dmilewski 06:49, 24 August 2008 (MDT)

The point of Charisma measuring attractiveness is that your influence can be heightened by your looks. All sorcerers need not be attractive, though they may be more likely to be attractive (I like to think of them as the extreme sports kind of people). A barbarian with a low charisma could look like Conan: shaped muscle, broad shoulders, square jaw. He might be very clever, but his speech might be slow since he does not speak common all that well. He might have no tact with dealing with social situations since he finds them dull and slow. He also probably dresses in dead animal furs. --Aarnott 09:07, 24 August 2008 (MDT)

Charisma is multi-facetted; Looks are one part, the better looking the easier it can be to overcome other factors, but smell, voice, cleanliness, etiquette, and personality, all are a part of Charisma. Just as when a Cahrisma score goes up, the character is liked more and those around them want to please them, as the score goes down they are liked less, disliked, avoided, event hated. Have you ever approached someone you were drawn to from a distance and turned and walked away as soon as you heard their voice? Or met that lady who was not necessarily good looking, but from her actions and speaking you became almost instantly fond of her? That is all charisma.(Honorlord (talk) 14:52, 3 February 2014 (MST))

What does a Charisma Score of 40 means?

A PC in our campaign inherited from another PC who died an artifact that doubles the owner Charisma score. She had 20 before, and now...(even though she is a Ranger, she likes feeling pretty and Charisma is always her highest score, compensating for her real-life awkwardness - I'm being mean, but I can: she's my sister)

Well we are having a hard time imagining what would such high Charisma score mean. It's beyond a god's score. What should the general reaction to her character be? We've been assuming everyone and everything is constantly under the effect of a Charm spell once they lay eyes on her Ranger, but that serves only for rules purposes. We'd like ideas of what it means to have Cha 40 and maybe comparisons to something that would possess a similar Cha score. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by NaykidNinja (talk • contribs) 15:30, 20 September 2013 (MDT). Please sign your posts.

It means that the character should have been a Sorcerer or Bard. No, it just means that the character is very charismatic. If a character has a high Strength score, it does not mean that they will stand out for their Strength in a city necessarily, and it is the same with any ability score. They will, however, perform very well on Charisma-based skill checks. --Green Dragon (talk) 12:27, 20 September 2013 (MDT)

But with Strength we can make easy comparisons. For example, a score of 30 means the person is as strong as an elefant or a triceratops. If you're familiar with World of Warcraft lore, I'm thinking maybe Queen Azshara had a near 40 Cha score. Even Manoroth the Pit Lord would not harm her, the demons that were put at her side to watch her moves became completely loyal to her, would gladly give their lives for her and forgot all about their demonic hierarchic superiors. Also, pretty much the entire population of her kingdom loved her unconditionally. You think that's a good definition for a "real life" Cha 40 score? If so, her character is broken and cannot be played anymore, unless we turn her charisma into just a number as you suggested, or maybe we could get her to be somehow stripped off the artifact... —The preceding unsigned comment was added by NaykidNinja (talk • contribs) 21:36, 20 September 2013 (MDT). Please sign your posts.

Sorry, I am not. I have only installed the game once and played it for a few hours, that is it. I do not know anything about it really. If you make a historical comparison I would be much more apt to respond with a thoughtful comment. For a 40 Charisma I would potentially compare it to a Catholic saint of some sort, or even one of those who wrote the Bible. There may, though, be more accurate comparisons that I am not considering. --Green Dragon (talk) 15:05, 20 September 2013 (MDT)

It sounds like the artifact is badly designed. Ability scores can have linear bonuses, you don't apply a multiplier. Deities often have Cha 30 or more, but that's tied in with their epic levels. Marasmusine (talk) 01:38, 21 September 2013 (MDT)

Edit: This might help you understand why you don't mulitply. The zero-point (no I don't know the correct terminology) of an ability score is 10, not 0. An ability score of 12 has a modifier of +1. If you double to 24, your modifier becomes +7: You've actually multiplied by 7. In your example of Cha 20 to Cha 40, this is x3. Marasmusine (talk) 01:47, 21 September 2013 (MDT)

I agree. It was a bad and poorly thought idea. It didn't occurred to anyone at the time the implications in case the artifact would fall in the wrong hands, meaning someone who actually has a high Cha score, since in our group, Cha is always the lowest score of any character, except for my sister's. Nobody enjoys playing bards or sorcerers in our group (mages are prefered). There's often a paladin, but even then, the Cha score is 14, at most. Which would turn into an amazing 28, which is still acceptable. Dragons have that kind of Cha score. We're having trouble with the 40 though... We're not beying able to achieve suspession of disbelief during the game session because we cannot conceive Cha 40.

Well if you're still pre-epic, you meet a point of diminishing returns. Once you can succeed at every conceivable social skill check (and your Cha-based spells are irresistable), it doesn't matter if it's Cha 30, 40 or 1000, it's all functionally the same.

My advice is to retcon the artifact to be +6 Charisma. Marasmusine (talk) 14:52, 21 September 2013 (MDT)

So godly charismas run upwards from 25 and have the potential of being resisted. First to try and create an image of a 40 Charisma, the very vision causes you to feel as if you may be melting on the inside, the voice makes your sould dance, the aura draws you to willingly surrender to her will, her scent fills you with tears of joy and your mind tells you she can do no wrong. Perhaps if you allow the doubling to only effect the original unmodified charisma roll without stacking with other modifications, that would cap the score at 36 and you might more easily suspend disbelief. If the score of 40 is exceptional by comparison to the rest of the game, then perhaps you should scale the effectiveness so that it grows with the character maximizing at some point if your levels scale to a point where it is appropriate. (Honorlord (talk) 15:11, 3 February 2014 (MST))

An alternative way to handle this, and one I'd recommend for such a high score, is to say that she is having 'Godly' influence on the game-world. Does she like the color pink? Now EVERY person has a subconscious interest in that color - they all wear at least 1 or 2 items that are pink, often without realizing it. Does she hate spiders? Now everyone goes out of their way to kill spiders, and every story has a spider as the villain. Does she like pizza (or maybe stew mushrooms)? Now it is THE food, even royalty insist on having it for meals - it becomes a high artform of cuisine.

Gods, ideally, grow into their power gradually. They have learned to harness it to their own ends, to manage their portfolios and worshipers. When someone unprepared suddenly has that kind of influence....it can wreak havoc on the world and their own lives.

The desired metagame effect of all this is teaching her to be very wary of making use of that kind of power, or maybe having her dig into her character and that character's relationship to the gameworld.

I know its a long time since the issue was raised, but I guess someone else might find this useful. reddir (talk) 19:59, 3 February 2014 (MST)