Charisma and Attractiveness, Difference?

[8BitNinja]

One thing I have always wondered was how to differ a character's attractiveness from charisma. Sure they are the same stat, but there are plenty of people who are unattractive but have a magnetic personality.

How do I chart that for an NPC or even a PC in D&D?

[Airk]

One thing I have always wondered was how to differ a character's attractiveness from charisma. Sure they are the same stat, but there are plenty of people who are unattractive but have a magnetic personality.

How do I chart that for an NPC or even a PC in D&D?

I don't get it. Why do you need to "chart that"? Do you "chart" "blonde" or "red head"? How about "really big muscles" vs "Lean and wiry" vs "Going to fat"?

If a character is really hot, write it down in the appearance section of their character sheet. If they have a face like a bulldog, write THAT down in there instead. Neither one has anything to do with their 18 charisma.

[Khedrac]

Easy - play 2nd1st Ed - Comeliness was a stat.

That said, it's usually a mistake to make it a stat on the same level as the others. It is too easy for it to become a dump stat for most characters. Also more than any other stat it limits how a player can describe their character - what's worse is that different people have different ideas of what is attractive (and let's not start of different races...)

[Red Fel]

I don't get it. Why do you need to "chart that"? Do you "chart" "blonde" or "red head"? How about "really big muscles" vs "Lean and wiry" vs "Going to fat"?

If a character is really hot, write it down in the appearance section of their character sheet. If they have a face like a bulldog, write THAT down in there instead. Neither one has anything to do with their 18 charisma.

This. Off the top of my head, I can't imagine a context where "physical attractiveness" - which, let's be honest, should vary based on the viewer - would require a mechanic that did not employ the Charisma stat. Trying to seduce a person? Sometimes, manipulation or personality can be what gets someone to bed. Posing for a painting or sculpture? The artist may be so taken with the force of your presence that it would be that, and not your aesthetics, that dictates the final product.

I can't think of a context in which "Comeliness," as the original was statted, would require any mechanical application separate and apart from Charisma. And if it doesn't impact mechanics, I can't see the point to "chart" it as anything more than mere aesthetics.

[Thrudd]

Easy - play 2nd Ed - Comeliness was a stat.

That said, it's usually a mistake to make it a stat on the same level as the others. It is too easy for it to become a dump stat for most characters. Also more than any other stat it limits how a player can describe their character - what's worse is that different people have different ideas of what is attractive (and let's not start of different races...)

Not in 2ed, comeliness is an optional rule from 1e uneathed arcana. It was rolled like the other stats and then modified by charisma.

[Mr.Moron]

Charisma is force of personality, among other things it governs your ability to change people's ideas and perceptions both about you and other things. Fitting a certain expectation or preference of person in terms of appearance, manner or social standing is what determines their ideas and perceptions about you are, before you change them.

At times when you should account for personal appearance it should be rolled up into initial attitudes, and by extension the DCs of the action you're trying to take. At least in the D&D framework. You certainly could make a system with it as a separate stat but it's hardly required.

[Tarlek Flamehai]

Welcome to the BoEF....

[daremetoidareyo]

I say there is no difference. You can be a weasel faced pastor of good. A highly effective hawknosed politician. A mediocre faced tour de force of sexual energy. A fat slob of a hilarious comic. A beautiful but socially inert person.

When you split physical attractiveness from charisma you start making decisions on how bangable monsters are. Don't go down that road.

Further, it sort of messes with the whole theatre of mind to have to believe that your character is unattractive if you don't want them to be.

If you want, make a flaw called "ugly" which can be used to get a lame pre-req feat like dodge or combat expertise in exchange for randomly assigned charisma penalties.

[dude123nice]

Welcome to the BoEF....

There is no such thing. That never happened.

[Lvl 2 Expert]

If the players are interested in that aspect of roleplaying just wing it a bit. A character who has high charisma and the fluff behind it that they're attractive is going to catch someones eye regularly. Seduction checks are charisma based, but you can give a bonus for the character being someones "type". A character who's fluff says they're generally attractive might get that bonus more often. And for balance and giggles, ones in a while have an opposite gendered NPC who they need to work with professionally either completely fall apart into a nervous wreck around such an attractive person or cling to them, hopelessly in love.

Okay, maybe don't do that last bit, it's horribly annoying. But if you want to make this sort of distinction, try to give players some elbow room. That also means letting the huge barbarian with the fluff "good at intimidating people" have a bonus to intimidation a little more often, for instance. The other workable solution is not making any mechanical distinctions. A character interested in seducing people is going to try it a lot more than the other characters, and will therefor end up with more conquests. Reality emulated without any bonuses. The only problem will be annoying players who want to play a really attractive character who totally hates all the attention they get, but those were already a problem to begin with.

Note: I'm reading attractiveness as not just physical beauty here. Being nice to people is attractive, being successful is attractive, being smart and hard working is attractive. Whatever the reason, these characters make NPC's think "wow" rather than "I like that fellow", "this is a competent expert" or "I'm not going to mess with her".

[Anonymouswizard]

Welcome to the BoEF....

I have fewer problems than I probably should with that book. Mainly due to the funny passage for how Lawful Neutral people approach sex. I'd never use it, but I was worried it would be like TGTMNBN, having to integrate every time I visit the brothel.

To answer the question of the thread, traits/feats. They're normally the best way to model it, with them applying a bonus to Charisma skills in applicable situations (did I ever tell you how I got these scars?). It may lack the separation between attractive/very attractive/model/drop dead gorgeous/that friend of yours, but it works.

[Khedrac]

Not in 2ed, comeliness is an optional rule from 1e uneathed arcana. It was rolled like the other stats and then modified by charisma.

Oops - my bad - been too many years.

[Hunter Noventa]

I remember a campaign where we had Comeliness stat, we derived it by averaging Charisma and the highest Physical stat the person had, as we kind of figured that would be the most defining part of their physicality. We didn't actually USE it outside of a few silly bits, but it's an option of sorts.

[Honest Tiefling]

I don't tend to chart things, but important NPCs usually have 2 'types', one physical, one mental. You (Or more appropriately for my games, the person hired to distract someone or a potential political match) fit or you don't fit. In my opinion, it tends to work better in the two examples it tends to come up as a plot point, where they don't need to just find a pretty lady/guy, but the correct one to achieve what they want.

I really don't care if people want their PCs to be attractive. You're probably still going to fail as a wizard with 8 strength in Proud Warrior Culture Land however.

There's some people who aren't attractive, but I'll listen to. And then there's people that I'd admit are attractive, but only when their mouth is shut.

[LudicSavant]

I don't get it. Why do you need to "chart that"? Do you "chart" "blonde" or "red head"? How about "really big muscles" vs "Lean and wiry" vs "Going to fat"?

Hit the nail on the head.

[Psyren]

Ahh, this topic again.

I'll just quote myself to save my fingers some typing:

They're almost uncorrelated. I say "almost" because examples of conventionally attractive creatures with low Cha are rare - artists tend to, consciously or unconsciously, add "ugly" to creatures if the style guide tells them they'll have low Cha, or be a typically low-Cha type, like a monstrous humanoid.

Having said that, there are examples in both directions where Cha does not correspond to attractiveness. The "ugly with high Cha" examples abound (just look at the Atropal, with its 42 Charisma) but the low-Cha yet conventionally attractive examples are a bit harder to find. They are there though:

9 Charisma
10 Charisma
11 Charisma
13 Charisma

Actually, that last one raises an interesting point - in addition to "beauty" we have other forms of physical endearment, like "cuteness." A lot of animals fall into that category (particularly babies), but they have notoriously low Charisma. Are they physically unappealing?

[Talion]

The issue of including physical attractiveness as a defining feature of charisma is two fold:

1. Physical Attractiveness is subjective. Some traits may be more universally popular than others, but nothing is guaranteed.

2. It only matters if/when you see the person in question. If they're talking to you from, say, around a corner, or on a voice recording, or heck, even in a message on the internet, you can't see them. Which means, if they were banking solely on their good looks, their actual ability to use their charisma would be in the dumpster.

That isn't to say that there isn't a correlation. If someone considers the speaker to be physically attractive, sure, they're more likely to pay attention or even agree. But that in an of itself is as defining as presence, vocal control, and speech patterns in most instances. When it becomes important, my group includes 'relative attractiveness' as a circumstance modifier if the person in question can be physically seen by their audience. This includes any potential for backfire. Otherwise, what does it matter?

[Regitnui]

As others have said, physical beauty is a factor of Charisma, but by no means defining. To draw a comparison with a different stat, I have high Dexterity. Now does that mean I'm a contortionist? No, it just means I can spin my staff into a blur between my fingers, practice calligraphy, and beat most people in a game of knife-your-finger. Similarly, my high intelligence stat does not make me Stephen Hawking; I can tell you the etymology of the word eleven and remember and mix stories I read years ago. I'm not number-cruncher smart, I'm narratively smart.

So a high Charisma means you have a great presence. The beauty of a nymph that blinds anyone looking at her naked and the rakshasa who can convince you that rivers flow uphill and draw water out of the sea without using magic are both very charismatic. Neither can do the other; a nymph wouldn't care for manipulation, and a rakshasa needs a few Alter Self spells to look anything less than beastly. But they're both operating off Charisma. Does that make sense?

An appearance stat runs into the same problem, for those BoEF readers. A tiger or lion is a majestic creature, but only a few people will express any emotion regards the appearance except awe or fear.

Tl;Dr (lazy sods): Every stat covers different things. Charisma is both physical appearance and social skills.

[LudicSavant]

So a high Charisma means you have a great presence. The beauty of a nymph that blinds anyone looking at her naked and the rakshasa who can convince you that rivers flow uphill and draw water out of the sea without using magic are both very charismatic. Neither can do the other; a nymph wouldn't care for manipulation, and a rakshasa needs a few Alter Self spells to look anything less than beastly. But they're both operating off Charisma. Does that make sense?

I think what people need to understand is that Charisma isn't an output value. It's one abstract variable going into a variety of larger equations.

Whether it's "I can blind anyone who looks at me naked" or "I can convince you that rivers flow uphill" or "I can intimidate anyone and bend them to my will" or "I can inspire an army to be fearless" or "I can convince the king to make me his successor," it involves more mechanics than just a Charisma score. Often, the Charisma score isn't even one of the more influential mechanics (e.g. having an 18 Charisma doesn't matter half as much for your bluff check as having 15 ranks in Bluff).

[Regitnui]

I think what people need to understand is that Charisma isn't an output value. It's one abstract variable going into a variety of larger equations.

Whether it's "I can blind anyone who looks at me naked" or "I can convince you that rivers flow uphill" or "I can intimidate anyone and bend them to my will" or "I can convince the king to make me his successor," it involves more mechanics than just a Charisma score.

Precisely. The charisma score is what they mechanically work off, but doesn't define what or how they use it. Just that they're better at using it than someone else.

[valadil]

Game stats represent a bunch of different things. I have my own unofficial system for interpreting them. Basically each personal quality that could be represented should justify one of your attribute points. If you have a +1 charisma you could be beautiful, persuasive, a musician, or a pickup artist, etc. But only one of those things. If you have a +4, you have all those traits. Or combine some negatives - maybe your bard is a persuasive musician, but hideous. You have two positives and a negative, ending in a +1.

This isn't something I'd codify into game rules. It's just something I think about when I've got a concept for a character I'd like to stat out or for when I've rolled stats and want to understand the character behind them.

[Tarlek Flamehai]

And then there's people that I'd admit are attractive, but only when their mouth is shut.

Priceless, just priceless.