Take 20

[Eothe_Master]

Can you "take 20" on a Craft skill check. If I wanted to, for example, craft a masterwork weapon.

--EM

 

[whatisitgoodfor]

No, the situations where you can take 20 are as follows:

* You have no time or pressure constraints. (ie. There isn't a goblin trying to brain you with a club)

* There is no penalty for failure. This one pretty much eliminates everything. Craft skills included. If you fail the craft check by 5 or more you lose 1/2 of the raw materials, which counts as a penalty for failing.

 

[Staffan]

You can never take 20 on any roll that has a negative consequence except time for failure. Since you have a chance of losing your raw materials with Craft rolls, you can't take 20 on those. I guess if your skill level was high enough that you couldn't roll so low as to lose materials, you could take 20. However, in that case you're good enough that you might as well take 10 instead.

 

[Crothian]

Take 20 assumes that you roll a 1, then a 2, then a 3....all the way to a 20. So, if you have the time and resources to waste. THen I guess you could in theory.


But the short anser is no, you can, however take ten. Get some magical +10 tools, and you'll be fine.

 

[CRGreathouse]

Take 20 assumes that you roll a 1, then a 2, then a 3....all the way to a 20.

No, it doesn't.

 

[dvvega]

IMC I house rule a take 20 as it comes up.

An artisan who devotes all his time to create a masterpiece can take 20 but the time take and cost is doubled IMC. I think that someone who takes the time to do something well can do it.

On the other hand, a rogue will never be able to take 20 on disarming or setting a trap.

 

[Crothian]

No, it doesn't.

From the SRD:

Taking 20: When the character has plenty of time (generally 2 minutes for a skill that can normally be checked in 1 round, one full-round action, or one standard action), and when the skill being attempted carries no penalties for failure, the character can take 20.
Instead of rolling 1d20 for the skill check, calculate the character's result as if the character had rolled a 20. Taking 20 means the character is trying until the character gets it right. Taking 20 takes about twenty times as long as making a single check would take.

Okay, it doesn't speciffically say you roll a n1 then a 2. But you do do it till you get it right (like rolling until you geta 20) nad it typically takes 2 minutes which happens to be 20 rounds which would be 20 rolls.

 

[Mal Malenkirk]

Why would you want to take 20 on a craft check anyway?

To craft an item you need to put forward 1/3 of its market value.

Say you could take 20... It would cost you 20 time the raw material cost.

You would then end up with an item that has a production value that is 20/3 of its market value! That is completely ridiculous.

Let me present you Dhumbarsse, the master weaponsmith that takes 20 on his craft skill check! His masterwork longswords cost him 2100 GP to produce but he is willing to sell them for only 3,000 GP. That is quite a bargain my friend!

 

[gnfnrf]

Okay, it doesn't speciffically say you roll a n1 then a 2. But you do do it till you get it right (like rolling until you geta 20) nad it typically takes 2 minutes which happens to be 20 rounds which would be 20 rolls.

Except you don't do it until you get it right. You do it once, very slowly and carefully. The result is more or less the same, but the specifics of application are somewhat different.

For example, you can't use Take 20 on a test with a penalty for failure. There is no argument to this, as it is expressly stated in the rules. This is a place where taking 20 is NOT like rolling successive numbers.

If you want to produce a very good item with Craft, just start rolling. The odds are better than 2 in 3 that you'll get a 20 before you've rolled 20 times.

--
gnfnrf

 

[CRGreathouse]

If you want to produce a very good item with Craft, just start rolling. The odds are better than 2 in 3 that you'll get a 20 before you've rolled 20 times.

No, they're not - 62.3%.