Strength Check DCs

[Nyarlathotep]

Is it just me or does it seem like Strength check DCs are way too high? I'm not sure if I'm handling things correctly, but a lot of adventures call for Strength checks that are impossible to make. As an example, something like a stone door that is stuck has a Strength DC of 28 to open. By my calculations, a character with a 26 strength is going to open that door only 5% of the time*. And this hardly seems to be the worst example of this. There are more than a few adventures where Strength 30+ checks are called for. Am I crazy or do Strength check DCs need to be lowered across the board?

As a secondary question, when the PCs are trying to lift something heavy that requires a Strength check to complete, how do you do it in your campaigns? Allow assisting characters to make a STR 10 check, success providing a +2 bonus to the primary "lifter" or allow the characters to combine the results of their Strength checks to get a final total?

As a final question, do you allow multiple checks to open objects if the first result fails (essentially allowing a Take 20 on strength checks)?

Thanks!


*Add a crowbar and they'll open it 15% of the time.

 

[el-remmen]

As a secondary question, when the PCs are trying to lift something heavy that requires a Strength check to complete, how do you do it in your campaigns? Allow assisting characters to make a STR 10 check, success providing a +2 bonus to the primary "lifter" or allow the characters to combine the results of their Strength checks to get a final total?

Personally, I use the former. Though I am not sure what is technically correct or what the reasoning is.

BTW, I am shifting this over to the "Rules" forum.

 

[Victim]

Yeah, I think that rerolls are allowed. Characters might have a low chance to break things initially, but with sustained effort they can force their way through.

STR checks to lift things seem to interact oddly with the set limits in the encumberance system.

 

[Seravin]

Answering your third question first, yes characters can take multiple tries when opening an object. Page 65 of the PHB "the normal take 10 and take 20 rules appy to ability checks"

So, a person with a 26 strength will open the door 100% of the time - if they spend two minutes trying it. They have a 5% chance of popping it on any single try though.
The crowbar means that someone with a 22 strength can also open that stone door inside of two minutes.

I generally use the make a DC10 to add a +2 assist method. I've seen the other method used a few times, but I'm not sure why I'd use it unless i wanted a certain number of characters invloved in the task or if the STR DC would normally be too high for any chance of success and I wanted the players to suceed anyway.

 

[James McMurray]

Is it just me or does it seem like Strength check DCs are way too high? I'm not sure if I'm handling things correctly, but a lot of adventures call for Strength checks that are impossible to make. As an example, something like a stone door that is stuck has a Strength DC of 28 to open. By my calculations, a character with a 26 strength is going to open that door only 5% of the time*. And this hardly seems to be the worst example of this. There are more than a few adventures where Strength 30+ checks are called for. Am I crazy or do Strength check DCs need to be lowered across the board?

Take 20, aid another, and a crowbar can incraese the chances drastically.

As a secondary question, when the PCs are trying to lift something heavy that requires a Strength check to complete, how do you do it in your campaigns? Allow assisting characters to make a STR 10 check, success providing a +2 bonus to the primary "lifter" or allow the characters to combine the results of their Strength checks to get a final total?

I figure out what the object ways and use the encumbrance charts to determing if they can lift it, allowing them to fully combine their capacities if there is room for them all to apply leverage.

As a final question, do you allow multiple checks to open objects if the first result fails (essentially allowing a Take 20 on strength checks)?

Since the rules allow it, I allow it.

I think the strength DCs are fine. A locked or stuck door made of solid stone should be hard to budge.

 

[Arkhandus]

A few things to remember:
1) Never forget the Aid Another action. Any really high Strength check is best done by the entire party Aiding Another for the beefy fighter-type's check. I forget off the top of my head whether or not you can Take 20 on a Strength check, but I think you can for most things ('lest there's an ogre chasing you and no time to keep hammering/tugging at the obstruction for a few minutes).

2) If it opens inward, there's always the battering ram option. Or if downward, the heavy block or log dropping option. Even if you have to carve yourself a battering ram from a tree outside the dungeon right then and there.
...........My old PC in For More Than Glory, Magnus Krieghelm, did this when we apparently missed finding whatever clue or NPC or whatever would've lead to the magic key to open the seal on the dungeon. After struggling with the lock and the sealed stone door, Magnus put his noggin to the task, turning right around and starting to chop down a tree with his hatchet (handaxe). Then started to carve off the branches and chop off a large enough log from it to make a battering ram for him and the rest of the party to carry and ram the door together (Strength check by Magnus the fighter, aided by each of the other PCs plus whatever circumstance modifier applied for using a battering ram at least as big and heavy as Magnus' burly self, but wielded by the whole party). At some point the rest of the party realized what I was doing beyond just hacking away at a tree with my hatchet, and they started helping a bit, though Magnus was the only fellow who carried an axe.

3) Some stuff is only meant to be bustable by raging barbarians, magically-beefed-up fighters, and big angry monsters.

4) Tools of course help.

.....I dunno what my 3rd and 4th points were originally going to be. Reminiscing about Magnus made me forget, heh. Dude was fun to play, until he died. No problem cannot be solved by Magnus with sufficiently well-applied brute force and smarts! We didn't need no steeenking rogue!

 

[Legildur]

It's exactlty for these scenarios that our party finds it difficult to get away from having a half-orc barbarian in the party. Throw on Enlarge Person, Bull's Strength, Rage and a crowbar and all's well.

 

[starwed]

A portable ram is useful regardless of which way the door opens. You're trying to break the door to pieces.

Ram, Portable: This iron-shod wooden beam gives you a +2 circumstance bonus on Strength checks made to break open a door and it allows a second person to help you without having to roll, increasing your bonus by 2.

It's only 10lbs, too, so most parties should have one.

 

[Stalker0]

Yeah, as long as 20 + your str mod meets or beats the door DC all is well. Your not meant to be able to rip open a stone door in 6 seconds unless you have a really really high strength. Your supposed to bash on it many times until it finally gives.

What I found sometimes problematic are teh object breaking rules. There are many times a character can break a door to pieces with damage faster than they can make the strength DC

 

[Ravilah]

I'd just have my adamantine hammer-wielding cleric of Kord smash the heck out of the thing, boosted with Bull's Strength and the Strength Domain special ability.