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Drache64
2019-10-11, 11:30 AM
Does the Party need a Face/Leader? The guy who talks to the king, the guy who breaks the tie/chooses when no one wants/cares what path to take?

In most of my groups as a DM I have seen players rise to the top of the face of the group/the leader. I then have run new campaigns with the same players and watched the previous face play a new character who is supposed to be a background character, but the group ends up floundering, not knowing what to do or where to go, and then the previous leader becomes the leader once more despite trying not to.

I have run groups with multiple faces/leaders who end up kind of being captain and co-captain of the group. They decide what the group is going to do and how they are going to do it and set the tone for the group BUT they do it in a good nonforceful thanks-for-taking-the-lead type of way.

I have seen DMs try to force people who aren't the face/leader make decisions in an attempt to force fairness "Santos! you haven't said anything, what do you want to do? where do you want to go?"
Santos: "Uh.... I don't know.... Uh..... I really don't...." *looks at the leader* "what should I do?"

this has been my experience, but now I want to broaden my perspective. What do you guys think? What is your experience? Is this a necessary role or is it a luxury? or is it a problem in your group?

Satinavian
2019-10-11, 11:47 AM
At least face and leader are different roles.

Whether you have a leader heavily depends on personal interactions between the players. Sometimes one will emerge, often not. Some groups need one, some groups don't.
But you might also have a captain or someone who has the command IT, where other players play subordinates. It is difficult if someone else is OT leader in the group, but with a bit of discipline it can be done and can be fun. It is not necessary either.

A face is a character who speeks with NPCs. It is not necessarily a decisionmaker, it can as well be the mouthpiece, the herold or the informant of the group so to speak. Often this role gets divided further depending on what kind of NPCs you are speaking too, with high-class/low-class being the most common distinction.


Yes, sometimes players can be in over their head if they are meant to be the decisionmaker of the group but are not strategically minded/have little understanding of the world. Players can also be in over their head if they are the designated speaker of the group and suddenly get stage fright.

But the GM should not meddle too much with what players get what role. That is for the players to decide and with some experience everyone knows what his boundaries are and what he enjoys to play.

Mastikator
2019-10-11, 11:49 AM
I'd say about half of the players I've played with have been bystanders. That's fine, I've been a bystander many times. Sometimes I don't have the energy or knowledge or someone else REALLY wants to be the face of the party and I don't want it enough to challenge them.

Ideally everyone will share the spot light evenly, a more likely problem is that nobody wants to be the face than someone is being it too much

weckar
2019-10-11, 01:37 PM
Yeah, lumping face and leader together like that isn't cool.

Like, it's cool. Be Nick Fury. Have Stark do the talking, though.

Psyren
2019-10-11, 02:19 PM
Avengers are a bad example because Steve is both (face and leader). Stark is almost as likely as Starlord to just piss off whoever you're talking to, he would definitely not be my choice of face.

Anonymouswizard
2019-10-11, 02:56 PM
Avengers are a bad example because Steve is both (face and leader). Stark is almost as likely as Starlord to just piss off whoever you're talking to, he would definitely not be my choice of face.

I'm trying to think of good examples, because in fiction they go together a lot in smaller groups (Aragorn, :roy:, Stevie McFlagpants...), and there's more likely to be no dedicated face (e.g. Mustang's men in FMA) then there is to be a seperate face and leader.

I'd also say we can split the Leader into two archetypes, the Tactician (good at coming up with plans and solving problems), and the Motivator (good at getting over players to actually engage with the plan). Just like with Faces/Leaders in general the Tactician and the Motivator can be the same person, but they don't have to be. I've seen self-motivated groups push somebody who could never lead into the 'leader' role because they're the only one able to come up with a half decent plan, or are able to take our half-baked ideas and turn them into something that might have a chance of success (even if those ideas sometimes involve the words 'and then we summon a demon and hope it's under our control').

Tawmis
2019-10-11, 02:58 PM
Does a party NEED a leader? No.

Because it is a social game, so it's nice when everyone gets to weigh in.

In game wise (as characters) it's nice if there is a Tanis Half-Elven type; but that's certainly not required. Depends on player and character personalities.

False God
2019-10-11, 03:23 PM
Does the Party need a Face/Leader? The guy who talks to the king, the guy who breaks the tie/chooses when no one wants/cares what path to take?
As always, each group is their own little microcosm, some groups like highly specified roles and thus benefit from a dedicated "face", "tank", "healer", and so on. Some groups just do whatever, if they have a role, great, if not, whatever. Some groups overlap, with everyone having similar skills.

This is of course based on taste, campaign need, group agreement and a number of other factors.

Some groups players enjoy having a leader. Not everyone likes or wants to lead. Not all characters are the leadership sort.


In most of my groups as a DM I have seen players rise to the top of the face of the group/the leader. I then have run new campaigns with the same players and watched the previous face play a new character who is supposed to be a background character, but the group ends up floundering, not knowing what to do or where to go, and then the previous leader becomes the leader once more despite trying not to.
Some people are just leaders. Force of personality, a natural talent for it, trained skill, whatever the case is, some people are just good at leading, good at making decisions and some people well, aren't. Some people enjoy, are comfortable, or just naturally default to a follower position.

The former is often me in most games. I'll make leaders and enjoy leading. I'll make support/background characters...and end up leading. Leading is just something that comes easy to me. Decision making is something I've trained in. It can be annoying though, leading takes time, takes work, takes more energy than not leading and sometimes it would be nice to just kick back. (I love railroads for this reason!)


I have seen DMs try to force people who aren't the face/leader make decisions in an attempt to force fairness "Santos! you haven't said anything, what do you want to do? where do you want to go?"
Santos: "Uh.... I don't know.... Uh..... I really don't...." *looks at the leader* "what should I do?"
IME, there are people who can make decisions but simply prefer to defer to someone else. There are also people who can't make decisions. The first type of people are fine, when they're put in a decision-making situation (attack the monster, which spell, do I retreat or not?) they can make a decision and it works fine. In lieu of a leader they can make their own choices just fine. The latter group of people I find are problematic for a group. They get trampled over easily. They follow because they are incapable of making a choice. They place a burden on the rest of the party because even simple decisions are difficult for them (do I attack the monster attacking us?), they force people to lead because they are completely incapable of doing so.

HappyDaze
2019-10-11, 06:53 PM
Does a party NEED a leader? No.

Because it is a social game, so it's nice when everyone gets to weigh in.

In game wise (as characters) it's nice if there is a Tanis Half-Elven type; but that's certainly not required. Depends on player and character personalities.

A leader still allows everyone to weigh in. A leader's role is to pull people together and motivate them towards a common cause, not to subjugate them to the will of the leader alone.

JakOfAllTirades
2019-10-11, 08:13 PM
Sometimes it's complicated. My current group's Barbarian is a good leader, when he isn't raging. So if we're not in combat, we have a leader. But when he rages, he's just focused on killing whatever's in front of him, and someone else has to provide leadership. Or maybe no one at all. We always muddle through.

We have one "face" character; the shifty half-drow warlock. (My character.) He's an excellent negotiator, but sometimes it's hard for the rest of the group to trust him because there's always some little thing he's conveniently forgotten to tell everyone. Oops.

At least we're both Chaotic Good. The Wizard and the Rogue round out our party, and they're Chaotic Neutral, besides being crazy on top of that. It's pointless having a leader when nobody can agree on anything or stick to a plan. Likewise, having a face to speak for the party is pointless when you can't figure out where everyone stands.

Slipperychicken
2019-10-12, 04:54 AM
A small group (i.e. 10 or less, which is basically almost all parties) doesn't need a designated leader. Whether you want it or not, everyone will get input and have opportunities to discuss what has happened and shape the party's direction.

If one player happens to have others' respect enough to have somewhat greater influence, that will happen without any special intervention or pressure. Also players may have authority in different areas; one might be great at talking with NPCs, another might be fantastic at puzzles, a third really good at tactics, and so on. It's entirely possible for most of the players to take turns "leading" depending on what they're good at.

weckar
2019-10-12, 04:56 AM
I am very unsure whether They mean IC or OOC leaders, by now.

tomandtish
2019-10-14, 11:28 AM
Does the Party need a Face/Leader? The guy who talks to the king, the guy who breaks the tie/chooses when no one wants/cares what path to take?


At least face and leader are different roles.

Whether you have a leader heavily depends on personal interactions between the players. Sometimes one will emerge, often not. Some groups need one, some groups don't.
But you might also have a captain or someone who has the command IT, where other players play subordinates. It is difficult if someone else is OT leader in the group, but with a bit of discipline it can be done and can be fun. It is not necessary either.

A face is a character who speeks with NPCs. It is not necessarily a decisionmaker, it can as well be the mouthpiece, the herold or the informant of the group so to speak. Often this role gets divided further depending on what kind of NPCs you are speaking too, with high-class/low-class being the most common distinction.


I'm trying to think of good examples, because in fiction they go together a lot in smaller groups (Aragorn, :roy:, Stevie McFlagpants...), and there's more likely to be no dedicated face (e.g. Mustang's men in FMA) then there is to be a seperate face and leader.

One of the best examples would be Hannibal Smith and Templeton Peck from the A-Team. Hannibal was definitively the leader, and Templeton was the face (in fact, it was his nickname).

LordCdrMilitant
2019-10-14, 03:14 PM
Does the Party need a Face/Leader? The guy who talks to the king, the guy who breaks the tie/chooses when no one wants/cares what path to take?

In most of my groups as a DM I have seen players rise to the top of the face of the group/the leader. I then have run new campaigns with the same players and watched the previous face play a new character who is supposed to be a background character, but the group ends up floundering, not knowing what to do or where to go, and then the previous leader becomes the leader once more despite trying not to.

I have run groups with multiple faces/leaders who end up kind of being captain and co-captain of the group. They decide what the group is going to do and how they are going to do it and set the tone for the group BUT they do it in a good nonforceful thanks-for-taking-the-lead type of way.

I have seen DMs try to force people who aren't the face/leader make decisions in an attempt to force fairness "Santos! you haven't said anything, what do you want to do? where do you want to go?"
Santos: "Uh.... I don't know.... Uh..... I really don't...." *looks at the leader* "what should I do?"

this has been my experience, but now I want to broaden my perspective. What do you guys think? What is your experience? Is this a necessary role or is it a luxury? or is it a problem in your group?


I consider this a negative effect, actually, and try to involve all the players and give them time to be in front, if they so choose.

I also try to at least put a little kibosh on times where one player is commanding the others.

Jay R
2019-10-14, 04:03 PM
In general, no, all parties don't need to be built the same.

Decades of D&D games, or RPG in general, have demonstrated many characteristics that are either:

very useful for playing a party, or
a very common result of playing a party.
[Note that being useful, and being a likely result, are not synonyms.]

But nobody has ever shown -- indeed, nobody could ever show -- that these are necessary.

So the only useful question is this: would this role be valuable for the group I'm playing with now?

If it comes up a lot, then that indicates that it is either useful or a naturally occurring result. Bt the difference is crucial.

Do lots of people fall into the Face roll become it's better for the party, or because some people talk more than others?

Did George become the Leader because he's good, or because we wanted him, or just because he's pushy?

But the general question is not helpful, The helpful question is the specific one about your group.

ErdrickOfAliaha
2019-10-14, 05:50 PM
So, full disclosure, I only read the first couple replies. BUT I have a valid and on topic question.

I keep getting defaulted to Leader because I'm a Tactitian and I am Tired of IT. Advice on how to get my group to turn to someone else? Aside from skipping weeks, I have tried being the grease monkey, I have rolled several characters incapable of both tactical leadership and face, but still in those moments, my group keeps looking to me. How do I get someone else to step up? How? I just want a couple adventure arcs off, man.

Duff
2019-10-14, 05:53 PM
At least face and leader are different roles.
Agreed.

The leader is usually based on the *players* and the dynamics in the lounge room (or wherever you play). Also note that in some groups there'll be different leaders in combat and out of combat. But it can also flow from character dynamics. My current character was a servant to another character in the party, so I usually looked to the player for leadership (which worked for him and me.)
The face is more often an attribute of the *character* - charisma and social skills. Though a more assertive player is more likely to enjoy playing the face. Whether the role of face is something the party needs depends on the adventure/campaign and the system. In D&D, you're likely to struggle with social challenges unless you have a charismatic character with at least a bit of investment in social skills. But if your party tends to blow up social challenges, you are using a system that deals with social interactions without using the character sheet or the difficulty of them is pitched lower to take account of the lack of specialized skills, you can get by quite nicely without a face



But the GM should not meddle too much with what players get what role. That is for the players to decide and with some experience everyone knows what his boundaries are and what he enjoys to play.

I'm going to add YMMV on this.
A recent game I was in had our party coming from an embattled community. The kids of a particular year are raised from birth to function as a fighting group. The elders assigned the role of leader to the party.
ie the GM chose the character based on the actions of the characters. And the "winner" was the player who has least (interest in+talent for) leadership. Hilarity ensued as we frequently all looked to the "Leader" for decisions. My 2nd character was a consummate professional adventurer. He worked hard at slotting into the party. and he always looked to the "Party Leader" for direction
So the player was well out of his comfort zone, but helped by the fact that we've been playing together for many years and have all been roleplaying for over 30 years

Edit to add

So, full disclosure, I only read the first couple replies. BUT I have a valid and on topic question.

I keep getting defaulted to Leader because I'm a Tactitian and I am Tired of IT. Advice on how to get my group to turn to someone else? Aside from skipping weeks, I have tried being the grease monkey, I have rolled several characters incapable of both tactical leadership and face, but still in those moments, my group keeps looking to me. How do I get someone else to step up? How? I just want a couple adventure arcs off, man.

The easiest* option is to talk to the players about what you want. See if anyone else offers to step up and if they do, support them as much as you can. When other players look to you, you look to the leader. If they are struggling, don't tell them what to do, ask them if your suggestion is a good one. If you have the skills for it, don't even offer a solution, ask a question which is a hint. Don't say, "Lets ask the Baron", ask "Would the Baron know that?". Don't set watches, offer to take first watch (or call "Dibs" on the last watch based on how your character does things).

If players want tactical advice and you're the player with the best tactical understanding, you would have to be willing to let the quality of tactics used slide. Let mistakes happen. It may help if a less tactical game is played. But again, if you want to share your skill/knowledge without being the leader, ask leading questions. "Would [the rogue] be better off flanking for me or sniping from that shadow over their?". "[Mage], do you want us to cluster them for a fireball?"

*Easy only if the personalities work for it. Some people get touchy about this sort of thing.
Be Nice!

Jay R
2019-10-14, 06:46 PM
So, full disclosure, I only read the first couple replies. BUT I have a valid and on topic question.

I keep getting defaulted to Leader because I'm a Tactitian and I am Tired of IT. Advice on how to get my group to turn to someone else? Aside from skipping weeks, I have tried being the grease monkey, I have rolled several characters incapable of both tactical leadership and face, but still in those moments, my group keeps looking to me. How do I get someone else to step up? How? I just want a couple adventure arcs off, man.

The solution — the ONLY solution — is to play with somebody who is good at tactics and willing to do it. Otherwise, anybody else put in the role of team’s tactician will make the tactically correct decision to turn to you.

False God
2019-10-14, 10:40 PM
So, full disclosure, I only read the first couple replies. BUT I have a valid and on topic question.

I keep getting defaulted to Leader because I'm a Tactitian and I am Tired of IT. Advice on how to get my group to turn to someone else? Aside from skipping weeks, I have tried being the grease monkey, I have rolled several characters incapable of both tactical leadership and face, but still in those moments, my group keeps looking to me. How do I get someone else to step up? How? I just want a couple adventure arcs off, man.

Just say NO. When they look at you, ignore them. When they ask you to make a decision, refuse. Pull your phone out if it helps you ignore them. Keep doing it until they either kick you from the group or they start making their own decisions.

Personally? I tried this approach with people I knew wouldn't kick me. They started making their own decisions and I'll tell you the terrible reality: THEIR DECISIONS SUCK! *headdesk* literally the first session I refused to be leader they walked us straight into a TPK because the ranger decided getting a different animal companion was more important than completing the quests we were on. ONE SESSION! That's how long it took them to kill the entire party. Because none of them were capable of staying focused and on task. They all knew what the quest was. But they just went: nah we're gonna go over here and try to capture a bird 'cause *reasons*!

We all rolled up new characters and started anew the next week. I stood my ground. I refused to lead. Hey remember that thing that happened last session? They did it almost again! I finally hit fudge it and took the lead, pulled the party out of a near-TPK and got us all back on track and completed the quest we were on from the previous session. All in one session.

Letting people who can't make decisions try to lead is one of my most infuriating experiences in tabletop gaming.

Leading is a lot of work. It can make games more work than fun. But letting them lead? I have never wanted to beat my head against a wall so hard and been so tempted to quit a group of people I've played with for years the stupidity was so great.

/rant over

Anyway, just fair warning that the alternative to leading is not always an improvement.

Koo Rehtorb
2019-10-15, 12:12 AM
Just say NO. When they look at you, ignore them. When they ask you to make a decision, refuse. Pull your phone out if it helps you ignore them. Keep doing it until they either kick you from the group or they start making their own decisions.

Personally? I tried this approach with people I knew wouldn't kick me. They started making their own decisions and I'll tell you the terrible reality: THEIR DECISIONS SUCK! *headdesk* literally the first session I refused to be leader they walked us straight into a TPK because the ranger decided getting a different animal companion was more important than completing the quests we were on. ONE SESSION! That's how long it took them to kill the entire party. Because none of them were capable of staying focused and on task. They all knew what the quest was. But they just went: nah we're gonna go over here and try to capture a bird 'cause *reasons*!

We all rolled up new characters and started anew the next week. I stood my ground. I refused to lead. Hey remember that thing that happened last session? They did it almost again! I finally hit fudge it and took the lead, pulled the party out of a near-TPK and got us all back on track and completed the quest we were on from the previous session. All in one session.

Letting people who can't make decisions try to lead is one of my most infuriating experiences in tabletop gaming.

Leading is a lot of work. It can make games more work than fun. But letting them lead? I have never wanted to beat my head against a wall so hard and been so tempted to quit a group of people I've played with for years the stupidity was so great.

/rant over

Anyway, just fair warning that the alternative to leading is not always an improvement.

This is a hilarious story and thank you for telling it.

Laserlight
2019-10-15, 01:33 AM
I wrote a long response but I'll boil it down to: some people can't make decisions; it's good to ask for their input, but don't try to force them to be a leader.

Droid Tony
2019-10-15, 02:43 AM
Yes.

Any social group needs a leader and a face, but they are not always the same person. Can you have a game without them? Sure: but it's like watching Avengers Endgame on a four inch black and white pitcure tube TV.

The Leader in a RPg has the dual roles of being the leader in the game and being the leader in real life. The game just runs so much smoother with a leader.

The Face also has an out side the game part. It's not just having a character with a good ability: it's about how you use that ability, when you use the ability and when not to use it.

Glorthindel
2019-10-15, 03:38 AM
I once had a bit of fun with the idea in a Dark Heresy campaign. The party were a cell working for the Inquisition, and unknown to the players, their Inquisitor was a traitor, who was keeping that bit of information from his subordinates, and was structuring his cells specifically to keep as much information that might incriminate him compartmentalised (if anyone remembers the series Alias, I had very loosely structured the cell like in the early series).

So, the first few missions were carried out under the supervision of a NPC commander, and once they were "trained", and ready to be sent off on their own missions, I gave each player an in-character psychological evaluation to determine the characters willingness to follow orders (the unquestioning the better), loyalty to their Inquisitor (good), loyalty to the Emperor (bad, given their boss was a secret traitor), trust in their squad mates (to determine who had the most loyalty from the team as a whole), etc.

Based on these results, I had the Inquisitor appoint the most loyal unquestioning drone to the role of squad leader. To avoid any table-issues with having a DM-appointed leader, I gave every other party member jurisdiction over a particular speciality, allowing them to assume command if a mission veered into their particular area of speciality (the Psyker was in charge of Warp-schenanigens, the Tech-Preist in charge of xenos tech, the Gunslinger in charge of underworld contacts, etc), so although there was one general leader, everyone got moments in charge.

Now, ultimately the idea was the party would discover their Inquisitors heresy. I started every mission by giving a squad breifing (heavily redacted), then gave the team leader an special eyes-only breifing detailing more specific information, and if any specialism were expected to be involved, each specialist his own eyes-only breifing regarding those issues. I then littered these eyes-only breifings with clues that things weren't entirely as they seem, expecting the players to share the secrets in their personal breifings and start making connections that weren't immediately visible. Hilariously, the plan went rather better than expected, and the campaign went for two years before the illusion cracked and the party realised exactly how much very bad stuff they had been doing :smalleek:. The players assure me it was the most fun campaign I have ever run, so it seemed to work, but I can't imagine it would work for every type of player.

Morty
2019-10-15, 03:44 AM
A party doesn't need anything, strictly speaking. Particularly when you consider all the potential systems and playstyles. Leaders and social-specialised characters are simply two roles that naturally emerge and have a fair amount of overlap.

Anonymouswizard
2019-10-15, 03:56 AM
The Face also has an out side the game part. It's not just having a character with a good ability: it's about how you use that ability, when you use the ability and when not to use it.

Over played on games without dedicated faces (if there was one it tended to be me), but that's because the group considered the in-game social aspect so important that at least half the group had dedicated a bunch of punts towards social skills (one player never did, and occasionally characer concepts caused us to neglect them). When the GM realised that we actually weren't playing for the combat (around the time our default strategy became 'call the police') enemies became much more willing to talk and strike deals, and misty encounters began to allow us to run away from the first turn. The only restriction was that the final session would always end worth a final boss fight, but as we tended towards rocket tag systems we hurray tended to stockpile big guns for then.

Knaight
2019-10-15, 05:47 AM
No - but it's a general no, and one that only works because of a combination of fringes and some real pedantry. Leaders are the easy one here; some sort of decision making process needs to happen, that doesn't require a leader. Still, they can easily emerge, especially if you're running a game with a party that stays glued together thoroughly.

Faces are more complicated. Essentially the face roll emerges when there is a character that handles the bulk of the social side challenges/obstacles. This is often pretty relevant, but there's two cases which tend to remove the dynamic. The first is when there is no face, because there's no social side (or at least no social side in the challenge/obstacle part of the game). Games that lean really heavily on environmental opposition or just on all fighting all the time can end up here. The other is where there is no face, because there's so much social side that aspects of it get partitioned out on the whole party - much the way that in D&D it's pretty conventional for there not to be a single character that handles the bulk of the fighting, where in other games that's a lot more common.

All of those dynamics are entirely functional, but in practice the middle ground where there is a defined face role is probably the most common, especially if expanded to cases where there are multiple face roles but the bulk of the party still aren't included. Of course, once you expand past the dynamic of a party the face role tends to disappear in a way that a lot of other roles don't.

Ornithologist
2019-10-16, 11:48 AM
I have been running as the leader and sometimes face for my current group, but for a very important reason... Aside from the GM and myself, this game is the first time any of the players have done any kind of tabletop RPGs.

Luckily for me, the group is gaining lots of xp in real life so I have been able to step back on the leader portion. We are actually running a ocean's eleven styled cyberpunk game, so it forces each of us to be the face at different times. Of course, my real goal in this adventure is to get the rest of the party hooked on RPGs. A good group is a hard thing to replace after all.

Lorsa
2019-10-17, 04:43 AM
So, full disclosure, I only read the first couple replies. BUT I have a valid and on topic question.

I keep getting defaulted to Leader because I'm a Tactitian and I am Tired of IT. Advice on how to get my group to turn to someone else? Aside from skipping weeks, I have tried being the grease monkey, I have rolled several characters incapable of both tactical leadership and face, but still in those moments, my group keeps looking to me. How do I get someone else to step up? How? I just want a couple adventure arcs off, man.

If your character does not have any tactical skill or social suave-ness, have you tried to simply mess up completely by purpose? If you know what the tactically correct thing to do is, have your character suggest the complete opposite. If they have you talk to [insert NPC here], do a poor job it (being insulting, or dimwitted or whatever). Simply play your non-tacical, non-social character as it should be played.

After a couple of sessions, I promise you that someone else will step up.

Jay R
2019-10-18, 04:22 PM
1. Each decision point that the party reaches needs to be decided. It can be done by one player, or it can be done by a number of players who reach a consensus or decide by some other method, but the decision cannot be made by no player. So there needs to be at least one decision-maker. If there is only one, that decision maker is called the Leader.

2. Each negotiation that the party reaches needs to be negotiated. It can be done by one player, or it can be done by a number of players who reach a consensus or decide by some other method (negotiation?), but the situation cannot be negotiated by no player. So there needs to be at least one negotiator. If there is only one, that negotiator is called the Face.

FabulousFizban
2019-10-19, 02:07 AM
yes and it is usually the best RPer

Duff
2019-10-23, 08:51 PM
1. Each decision point that the party reaches needs to be decided. It can be done by one player, or it can be done by a number of players who reach a consensus or decide by some other method, but the decision cannot be made by no player. So there needs to be at least one decision-maker. If there is only one, that decision maker is called the Leader.

Also, an effective *player* leader can act a bit like a chairperson in these decision making conversations, inviting others to speak, making sure quieter players are listened to, summarising the plan to make sure everyone agrees etc. So even when decisions are more group based there can be a role for a leader amongst the players

Mordaedil
2019-10-24, 02:23 AM
In my experience, players will always pipe up in situations where they feel their character has some semblance of authority. A role like face might be relegated to a single person in a game like Shadowrun, but for a game like D&D, our experience is very different.

Our "face" or the guy that invested into diplomacy heavily sat on his hands the whole game and never made a diplomacy roll. Never really talked during discussions with various NPC's either.

Instead, the ones doing the talking would either be the priest (favored soul) or me (sorcerer). Neither of us had very strong social skills, but we spoke a lot on things we had authority on, matters arcane or moral, and it saw far more play time than the guy who put the most points into a skill.