I see soliloquies somewhat differently than Warren and Eris do. Allow me to
demonstrate. This is what the GM I learned GMing from does, and he seldom
has problems with it:
Soliloquies take no time, regardless of who is speaking them, but PCs *can*
interrupt a villain's soliloqy in the middle if they choose to, which
grants no extra bonuses since villains tend to look at people when they
speak to them, and notice their audience winding up to slug them. However,
if the villain doesn't get to finish his soliloqy, then the party doesn't
get the information in the rest of the speech, and if that means we didn't
know something important... (for example, that our missing party member is
being held hostage back at the Lab of Iniquity ) so be it. Basically,
players lose nothing by listening (He generally limits each NPC monologue
to a paragraph or two, so we don't age appreciably. Persuasion attempts by
a PC sometimes get longer, but happen less often. ), and players
gain information that enhances the storyline and sometimes a chance to talk
foes out of fighting.
So what I want, personally, are not rules that package such monologues as
attacks to be purchased as abilities or defended against, ("Doctor Horrid's
going to explain the point behind his whole evil scheme. Everyone make Will
Saves." "I've got the 'Nya Nya, Can't Hear You' Feat--- do I get that
bonus here?" ) but rather rules that will make my players say things
like,"Yay! A Soliloqy! About smegging time!". ....Anybody got any of
those?
ps. Someday, I'd like to try out Jonathan Wells' suggestion of requiring a
speech of some sort before a Fudge Point is spent... but I suspect it would
work better with some players than others, so I'll wait until I have a
[somewhat uniformly] speech-happy group playing. (Ah, what a good day
Someday will be... )
Your Mileage, Play-Style, and Players Will Almost Certainly Vary. but have
a nice day, at least.
Steven M. Graham, not looking for trouble (but trying telling that
to Alien Taffy Monsters. ).
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