The current social system offers only a binary choice: succeed at convincing someone, or fail completely. This does not represent the subtleties of influencing someone. The system also throws in Unnatural Mental Influence as the primary method for Charms to interact with social situations.

This page presents a different approach to social influencing.

Characters have 2 MDV scores. MDV is equal to (Wits + Integrity) / 2, UMDV is equal to (Wits + Integrity + Willpower) / 2. MDV is the value used against social attacks, while UMDV is used to resist Unnatural Mental Influence and other mental effects. Both MDV and UMDV are modified as follows when used to defend against social attacks.

Demeanor: When making social attacks, the attacker's Appearance is compared to the defender's Conviction. If one is higher than the other, a +1 or -1 modifier is applied to the defender's MDV. This modifier increases to +2 or -2 if the difference is at least 3 or higher.

Characters with an Appearance of at least 3 can change their demeanor to target a Virtue other than Conviction. Characters with an attractive Appearance may choose to target Temperance. Characters with an imposing Appearance may choose to target Valor. This change in demeanor is obvious to the defender and to bystanders.

Intimacy, Virtue or Motivation: Intimacies, virtues and motivation modify the MDV as per the original rules (p.172) with the exception that virtues modify MDV by -1 or +1 and intimacies by -2 or +2.

Not every argument is as easily made as another. There is a big difference in convincing a customer to buy a donut, or spend all his money as a donation to an obscure small religion. Tenacity represents the character's resistance against the argument being made. There are a lot of factors influencing tenacity, but the amount of commitment required and the amount of resistance against the proposal are the biggest factors. Tenacity starts at Essence and can be modified by factors that make the proposition favorable or unfavorable for the defender. Such factors include:

• Dedication: how much the character has to dedicate himself to the goal, usually expressed in time or effort. This factor can reduce tenacity if the defender expects to have more free time, or work done for him.
• Familiarity/Enmity: how much the character dislikes the attacker. People are more inclined to resist their enemies than their friends. This factor can reduce tenacity if the defender trusts the attacker or is close friends.
• Cost: the number of background dots that have to be used to reach the goal, double that amount if the background has to be sacrificed. If the character receives backgrounds dots, this factor reduces his tenacity.
• Intimacies, Virtues or Motivation: the same modifiers as on MDV, though they stack in the context of tenacity. As with the other factors, these can reduce tenacity if the proposal resonates with the character's virtues, intimacies or motivation.
• Circumstances: sometimes there are additional factors that come into play that give the character extra resistance or incentive. The storyteller is always the final arbiter on whether such a circumstance is allowed.

If tenacity is modified to zero or below the player should consider the notion that the character might simply be in favor of the proposal. Otherwise the minimum is 1.

The attacking player decides on a goal for his social interaction, to which the ST determines an interval. Small goals have short intervals such as scenes, while larger goals may have intervals of days or sometimes even weeks.

Characters can take one social attack per interval.

1. Declaration of Attack: The attacker's player states his attack and which Charms he applies (except reroll effects).
2. Defender declares response: The defender declares the use of MDV and any modifiers that apply to it. He also declares the use of Charms.
3. Attack Roll
4. Attack Reroll
5. Subtract External Penalties/Apply Special Defenses: MDV and any other penalties are subtracted from the successes on the attack roll. The remaining successes determine the degree of success of the attack.
   
6. Defense Reroll
7. Counterargument: The defending character has the opportunity to make a counterargument against the attack. In case of a Performance attack, one or more members of the audience may attempt to make a counterargument. Their players roll contested (Wits + Socialize) to determine whose counterargument is applied in this step. In other cases, the roles are simply reversed.
   Apply steps 1-6 of social attacks to determine the degree of success of his counterargument. The counterargument is made using the same ability as the social attack, but not necessarily the same attribute.
   Note that resolution of the counterargument step will most likely involve MDV modifiers different from the original attack. In case of a Performance attack the counterargument must be applied to the individual MDV's of the members of the audience.
8. Determine damage: The damage of the social attack is determined by subtracting the successes of the counterargument from the successes of step 5 (or 6 after a re-roll).
9. Spend Willpower: The defending character can resist some or all of the damage of a social attack by spending one willpower per point of damage remaining.
10. Apply Results: The final damage of the attack is applied to the tenacity track. Any non-damage effects also apply at this stage.

When attacking social units, the group's magnitude is applied as an external penalty in Step 5. The leader of the group or a special character may make a counterargument. If more than one person tries to make a counterargument, their players roll contested (Wits + Socialize) to determine whose counterargument is applied in this step

For written attacks, the social attack rules are slightly changed. The Appearance Modifier on MDV calculation uses Linguistics instead of Appearance. Using a different demeanor is possible, as long as the character has Linguistics of at least 3.

In step 1 of the social attack, when the written attack is penned, the attacker must also declare any defensive Charms to be used in the counterargument phase. Furthermore, step 7 is replaced by the following:

7) Counterargument: The defending character has the opportunity to make a counterargument against the attack. To do so, apply steps 1-6 with the roles reversed. The counterargument can only be made with ([Wits or Intelligence]+Linguistics) against the MDV of the writer at the moment of writing. During the counterargument Appearance Modifiers cannot be applied, but Intimacy, Virtue or Motivation modifiers are still applicable.

If the Tenacity track is filled, the target is convinced of the goal the attacker was trying to convince him of. The goal is now a belief, and when appropriate the social influence counts as a commitment towards a relevant intimacy, or a rejection against a relevant opposing intimacy. This natural result is not a form of compulsion though; the belief is installed in a natural way and the character himself can choose how to act upon it. In some cases, especially when the character's beliefs are particularly shaken by the result, he may want to think on things for a while first.

Characters loyal to the Solar may replace the lower of their own Wits or Integrity with the Solar's Integrity.

Replace “This Charm doubles the Solar's successes on the roll before comparing them to the target's MDV” with:

This Charm doubles the damage of the social attack at the end of step 8.

Replace the text of this Charm with the following:

The Solar burns with impossible glory. This Charm can supplement any attempt at natural mental influence. If the character's Appearance is higher than the targeted Virtue, the Appearance Modifier on the defender's MDV is equal to (the Solar's Appearance - the targeted Virtue), this modifier cannot exceed the Solar's permanent Essence.

Upon purchasing this Charm, select a single demeanor to which this Charm applies. Extra demeanors can be supplemented by this charm by buying support for them at 2xp per demeanor.