Skill checks against enemies

[cronuss]

I'm new to DMing and have only held 3 sessions so far, all improvised. I'm playing with friends whom are learning the game as well, so this hasn't been too much of an issue.

The other day I had the PCs encounter 2 human mages (level 4 human mage from MM1). Part of my story is that these two were dominated or controlled by a higher being (a lich, mind-flayer, something yet to be decided... tips?) and were doing it's bidding. The male mage was giving away hints at this, and the PCs were trying to get information out of him.

They kept trying to use insight, diplomacy, etc, on this guy, which I liked, but I didn't know how to set the DCs for it. The human mage "monster" doesn't have any perception, insight, or other skills listed in the monster manual... so am I to assume they have zero skill in those or should I make up my own DC?

The PCs kept trying to bluff him and talk to him but I didn't really know how to handle it, so I think I went with a 15 or 20 DC, which they failed repeatedly and ended up trying to kill the mage cause they grew tired of it. So I had him run away and perhaps reappear later in the story.

Also, while I'm here asking questions... can someone explain exactly how grabbing works? The PHB isn't very clear. Is it STR + d20 VS STR? Someone explain the grabbing system in terms of how to achieve and hold a grab? Thanks... (they wanted to grab him and keep him still while they talked to him).

I also struggled with how to handle the encounter in general on this scene. They started talking to the mage without rolling initiative, so they were freely talking and attempting skill checks. Then the female mage stepped in and got aggressive so I had them roll init. When they wanted to try and run diplomacy with the male again, I was making them use a standard action... another frustrating thing for them. I was unsure how to handle this whole situation

Sorry for making this long-winded... I'm learning.

:\

 

[DragonXNIK]

I'll take a stab at this.
First of all, glad you're learning and enjoying the game so far, I know I do. Being a DM is definitely challenging but you can find a lot of answers if you're willing to peruse the Player's Handbook and the Dungeon Master's Handbook.

Starting off: Skill check to discover Mage is being mind controlled
This is probably a good place to try and introduce a skill challenge, but without getting into the flaws in the mechanics for that type of encounter, I'd have to say that Insight would probably be the most fitting skill check here.
Setting a DC is often plagued by a desire to stick to nice round numbers, like 15 or 20. A DC 20 is not something you want to have to beat at level one, it's just not likely to happen if you're trained, and nearly impossible if you're untrained in a skill.
Monsters don't need to have skills because they can't use them against the PCs in most settings. Your monster shouldn't roll insight to see if a player's bluff check fails, they should have a DC to be fooled. There's no need to have opposed rolls anywhere in this type of encounter. The players are competing against a DC of how hard it is to tell that something is amiss with an NPC's behavior, not against your D20 skill rolls.
Setting this DC can be done with math and preparation, but that's not something that will likely come in handy for an Improvisational style of DMing like you've stated. Just be aware that for every 1 you increase the DC, the player's chance of success goes down by 5% (this is really bad math, but it's close enough to estimate with).
I'd say a DC 13 would allow the PCs to note that his actions don't seem to be his own, followed up by perhaps an Arcana check to detect mind control magic, or if you have no Arcane trained, a diplomacy to try and coax him to reveal his controller. The second DC should be higher, and you should encourage your PCs to aid another to get a good chance of success.

Grab is listed in the PHB page 290, but I'll summarize it here. STR mod+level mod+Misc bonuses to grab attacks (from items or feats) vs. Reflex defense of monster (or PC). If that hits, the target is immobilized (unable to move any squares but otherwise able to defend). Escaping a grab is listed on Page 288.
If billy the 2nd level fighter wants to grab a fleeing mage, he takes his str mod of +4 (from his 18 str), and adds his level mod of +1, then attacks the Mage's reflex defense. He rolls a 15, resulting in 20 vs. the wizard's 18 reflex defense, so the wizard is unable to move until he uses actions to escape or is otherwise forced out of the grab.

To sum up, once you hit the reflex defense, the monster is immobilized until an escape attempt succeeds. There should be nothing preventing your players from having multiple grabs attempted against one target, making escape impossible in one turn.

Once combat started, your players always have the option of choosing to 'knock out' rather then kill any defeated enemy. This is described on page 295 of the player's handbook. So they should have fought the two wizards until they defeated them, then tied them up and continued the skill encounter.


Lastly, if you want to make a bad guy that can be defeated at the end of the player's Heroic adventuring career (levels 1-10), Mind Flayers are too tough, Liches are WAY too tough, and no specific monster type is coming to mind for me, so I'd suggest you add in an evil Cult of a dark god or devil, and have the Devil/God's cult leader/avatar be a psychic wizard who has connections to the Mage guild and appears to be an upstanding denizen. Just stat up a solo Human Mage level 11 with an emphasis on psychic damage and a domination power.

Oh, after looking around on the monster's manual, a Grell might be a good candidate for the Big bad here. They look like giant floating brains with beaks and tenticles, and they're scoped out with psychic attacks. No idea what would motivate them to control mages to do their bidding though.

 

[MrMyth]

Monster Skills
For skills checks of monsters that aren't listed, you need to look at the bottom of their stat block where it lists their ability scores and their modifiers. Those modifiers (which includes the bonus for 1/2 level) are what you use for unlisted skill checks. So insight for the human mage would be a wisdom check. Only the skills a monster is particularly good at are listed in its skill section.

Skill DCS
If you are in a situation where opposed skill checks are not relevant, and PCs are attempting a creative solution and you are looking for level-appropriate DCs, page 42 of the DMG has a table that can be very useful for this. There is some errata for it with lower DCs that some use - whether you do or not, it can give a good starting point for figuring out how challenging to make a skill check that your PCs suddenly spring on you.

Skill Challenges
If you are feeling particularly ambitious, this would be a good opportunity to use a Skill Challenge (detailed on pages 72-76 of the DMG). Essentially, it gives a framework to figure out how many skill checks the PCs might need to succeed at a task. In this case, a simple skill challenge (requiring 4 successes before 3 failures) would probably be appropriate. Let the PCs use Diplomacy, Bluff, Insight, and any other reasonable skills (such as Arcana to 'talk shop' or the like) as is appropriate for their words and actions. Let each success get them a little closer to winning the mage over, and if they get 4 successes, he gives in. 3 failures, and he is convinced he can't trust them and tries to get away or outright attacks.

Note that Skill Challenges are a bit more of an advanced system, but can be a useful device if you can master them.

Grabbing
Grabbing is an attack any player can attempt. It is a strength-based attack against the targets Reflex. It doesn't prevent the enemy from fighting back, but does keep them from getting away unless they escape the grab. The PHB, on page 288 and 290, has all the details.

Encounter Management
For how to handle the encounter overall... that is actually a tough question. It depends on how intense things have really gotten - is the mage actually fighting them while they try and calm him down? Or just trying to get away?

I don't think it would be unreasonable to let them make Diplomacy checks and the like as minor actions - that prevents them from feeling like the more peaceful approach will deprive them of their other options.

But in the end, this area will end up needing to be a judgement call - the best approach can simply be to try one choice out, and see how well it works, and either stick with it or try something new next time.

 

[Amaroq]

Welcome to DM'ing!!

I do try to imagine the courses of action my party might take and work out the DC's for skill checks in advance; it helps (a lot) to give yourself a day or two to think of various modifiers, or to look up, for example, the Jump rules, and pre-calculate all of the conditions that apply at a point the PC's might be trying to jump over. You can do this both to make a formal "skill challenge" or simply to set a single skill check DC.

The "general rule" for an opposed skill check is generally "aggressor makes a d20 skill check against a static DC from the 'defender' .." So, for example, Stealth: if I'm trying to sneak past a sleeping dog, we use my d20 + my stealth versus the dog's "Passive Perception" (minus the penalty for sleeping, if any).

Now, the key bit is, we remember my Stealth result. If somebody else tries to use an Active Perception check to spot me before my next turn, then we use their d20 + their Perception versus my (now-passive) Stealth result.

That said, Insight, Diplomacy, etc, all sound like very good approaches with this particular encounter, and they don't quite work the same way.

The most common Insight usage is against somebody's Bluff check, which does work much the same way as Stealth/Perception.

However, in the case you describe, I'd set a DC for "Insight to detect the control/dominate effect" as part of my NPC work-up for the NPC in question. I'd probably set a couple of different DC's, probably using the DMG's "DC per character level" chart (ah, right, page 42, thanks MrMyth) .. I might set it as follows:

DC 12 (Easy) Insight: "There's something a bit .. off .. about him."

DC 17 (Moderate) Insight: "The more you talk to him, the more it strikes you that, there's just something not-right about his diction and turn-of-phrase .. maybe he's just not a native Common speaker, but he doesn't have an accent at all."

DC 22 (Hard) Insight: "You think you recognize the signs of some form of magical compulsion on him; you'd really need some time with an Arcane ritual of some sort to get a better read on what's going on, but .. he's not himself, exactly."

(Text for flavor, the idea is, my PC's are making one die roll against several DC's at a single time; I'll usually structure the text so that I can read both at once, e.g., if a PC rolled a 19, I'd just read the DC 12 and DC 17 back-to-back.)

Diplomacy is a different kettle of fish entirely; its been left fairly undefined, so you can use it as you like.

A lot of DM's use it to express "protocol", e.g., if you're going to the Duke's ball, do you address the Duchess with the proper honorific, do you use the right fork for the right course of the meal .. for that, you want to set up some "failure" DC's as well as some "success" DC's. For example, you might opt for a "terrible insult" down below DC 5, a "minor gaffe" at DC 5, escaping notice at DC 10, getting noticed positively at DC 15, and really standing out (flirtatious, charming, etc) at DC 20 or 25.

When it comes to negotiation, you typically want to peg results similarly: my Diplomacy stand-off situations usually include a DC below which things degenerate into a fight, insult DC's, a no-deal DC, a "counter-offer" DC (larger block of results than the others), an "acceptable" DC, and a "Hey, we'll even throw in ..." DC.

Then I modify the ROLL based on what the party are offering.

For example, my party come upon a trapped-in-magic-circle demon; they've also encountered a magical defense that they can't get past. Negotiations ensue. I might set my "he hates you" DC down at <= 4; my "he's insulted and breaks off communication" DC at 5; my "no, no deal" DC at, say, 9; my "he makes a counter-offer" at DC 13, my "acceptable" DC at 21, and my "he throws in a boon of some sort" at DC 25.

Then I modify their roll as follows:

If they're offering:
- nothing: -5
- banishment back to his original plane: +0
- freedom, full stop: +5
- a chance to kill the mage who bound him here: +5

If this happens after:
- a failed intimidate check: -5
- a failed bluff check: -2
- a successful intimidate check: +2
- a successful bluff check: +0 to +5, depending on the "bluff"

If they want things in addition to simply "take care of our problem", each additional thing they want lowers the DC. So, somebody wanted a magic sword, that might lower the DC by 8 to 10 - our demon doesn't have a magic sword, can't conjure one, and doesn't have much political capital to convert into a sword.

As it turned out, my players wound up getting the "counter-offer" deal; the demon's counter-offer was "You give me your worst sin."

They have no idea why he wants their sins; he gave them a Bluff answer about why, which nobody was able to penetrate via Insight, and they finally agreed.

Not exactly appropriate to your situation, I'm thinking - Diplomacy, while a perfectly good option for getting a normal NPC to change his course of oction, is rarely going to get you anywhere with a dominated/controlled NPC!

I also struggled with how to handle the encounter in general on this scene. They started talking to the mage without rolling initiative, so they were freely talking and attempting skill checks. Then the female mage stepped in and got aggressive so I had them roll init. When they wanted to try and run diplomacy with the male again, I was making them use a standard action... another frustrating thing for them. I was unsure how to handle this whole situation

That sounds about right, to me.

I try to keep a decent lid on "free form" scenes, at very least going around the table - one of my players describes it as, "you always seem to ask whoever is least engaged a question, at just the right time to re-engage them."

Sometimes, that means squashing somebody a little - while the party were stuck in a trap, the bard kept having ideas that might get them out, and wanting to roll skill checks ... all well and good, but when she tried the third in succession, I told her "Okay, we'll come back to you in a minute. Sophie, what are you doing while the bard's been doing all this?" ... (generalized, its, "don't let the most talkative player dominate the session", though you do have to recognize that some players are perfectly happy in an almost "watching" role.)

As for initiative, yeah, I think you handled that spot on. My party, shortly before coming to the demon, encountered a thinking undead creature, and a good dozen minion-y unthinking undead.

"Roll Initiative", I told them, then asked what they were doing. They (cleverly) didn't just charge straight into combat. Instead, they began negotiating with the thinking-undead creature - while the minions attacked them. So, some used Standard actions for Diplomacy checks, while others used Standards on minion-slaying.

It worked out for them, they got the thinking-undead to agree to let them past without fighting them, which made the encounter much easier than it "should" have been had they just fought straight through it.

Since I *do* like doing that sort of thing, I've settled on a non-RAW interpretation, of letting people make the "try to perceive something" rolls as a Minor action - e.g., Arcana, Dungeoneering, History, Insight, Nature, Perception, Religion - which winds up working out fairly well in play.

Hope that helps!