Unsatisfied with the D&D 5e skill system

Saelorn said:

Maybe it works at your table, due to your own social contract, but it is very clearly against the process of play, which states that players declare their actions rather than their goals.

There's no way I could possibly play the way you run it, for the exact reason I don't play any of those other games which are designed to facilitate that sort of thing. It violates causality too much, which breaks immersion for me, and gives me a headache. It's great if you can run your game in such a way that everyone has fun, but you're fighting against the tide.

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Alright, but it doesn’t clearly state that players declare their actions. It states, “the players describe what they want to do.” That’s PH 181.

I don’t feel a semantics argument is worthwhile, but if the argument is “it doesn’t say GOALS” anywhere, you have to concede it also doesn’t say DECLARE ACTIONS anywhere either.

That leaves us with “what they want to do.” I think you’d agree with me that the players should mentally put themselves in their characters’ shoes/perspective and decide on a course of action that seems best to that character.

Whether that course of action is straightforward (kill a goblin) or broad (get into the guarded tower), the player must necessarily say out loud what they want to do. We can’t really play unless they do.

Now if what they want to do IS straightforward, I think we all agree that’s sufficient. DM can set a DC if they feel that’s warranted for the situation, or rely on the goblin’s AC or whatever. The player rolls, and we determine the outcome of the action.

But the sticky tricky bit is that “what the player wants to do” is not always one action. “Get into the guarded tower” is not a declared action. And it’s not sufficient for play. It’s great that you want to get it in, but a piece is missing.

Take the opposite approach. “I want to sneak.” Well, cool, more power to you. But that’s also not quite sufficient. Where do you want to go? Who do you sneak past? Even if you do creep up the main road that the guards are watching, you’ll be spotted. I think a fair DM here might pause and ask for some clarification.

Now “I want to sneak into the guarded tower” is essentially as good as “I want to kill the goblin.” It’s light on details but at least we have some idea what the player wants to do, and the action by which that player makes “what they want to do” happen. That’s something we can adjudicate. We can go further, and clarify “by spell or by weapon?” “Sneak up the wall or through the back?” And that may affect how hard the action is.

Anyway, for my games, I ask that the players tell me “what they want to do” and add “how they want to do it” which almost always includes an action.

Leaving the semantics bit aside, “intent and approach” is functionally the same as “goal and action” or “what and how” or “plan and execution.” And I believe it’s a best practice to make sure DM and player are on the same page before dice get rolled.

“Players describe what they want to do” is helpfully broad enough to glide over straightforward stuff, but also leaves plenty of room for the DM to say “hang on a sec, how’s that work?” where what they want isn’t reasonably clear or straightforward at all.

“I’ll just tell the guard we have business here.” Plainly the goal is to bypass the guard. But is this a deception? Persuasion? An intimidation? Or a distraction for something else? Knowing that helps me know what ability score applies, what skill might apply, and what DC to set. Not knowing that, I may not have sufficient info to set a fair DC. I want to be fair to my players.

So the HOW matters as much as the WHAT. Or, the goal matters as much as the action.

5ekyu said:

From last to first...

DND 5e rules in the PHB state
"Sometimes an attacker wants to incapacitate a foe, rather than deal a killing blow. When an attacker reduces a creature to 0 hit points with a melee attack, the attacker can knock the creature out. The attacker can make this choice the instant the damage is dealt. The creature falls unconscious and is stable."

That makes it clear that when a creature is dropped to zero by melee attacks the attack can choose to Ko instead of kill.

yes, the Gms job is to narrate the results but that does not mean skipping past choices the player can make that alter the outcome.

point is, it was the Gm choice to skip over the stage where the player can choose (by RAW) that led to your allegedly "awkward" case of the Gm jumping to the wrong conclusion. This is not a case of a player not stating his goal when he should, but of the Gm not asking when the choice was there for the player.

OBVIOUSLY if the table has agreed to a house rule which says these have to be pre-declared before each attack - the player cannot know it will be a drop-to-zero before the attack and so must declare every time - things change but thats the house rule issue.

But for 5e - the minimum extent of "how do you want to do this" is - "Are you going to KO?" when the zero hit occurs.

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If the DM telegraphed that the enemy was on its last legs, then it completely makes sense for the player to declare the knock out if they hit the enemy with their attack. As you quote: "The attacker can make this choice" - they don't need the DM's permission to choose. Or are you saying for every potential killing blow in your game you, as DM, ask the player "Are you going to KO?" In a combat-heavy game, I stand by the claim that doing so over and over and over would be quite tedious.

5ekyu said:

First case - sorry but the point made was the player could just as well had declared the distance they travel up the wall, where they stop and *not* what they intended to do once they got their.

its was an incomplete ACTION declaration - "how far do you climb" - not a lack of statement of whats in the mind of the character.

Like i said, if a player tells me their character walks down the corridor towards the T intersection - i need to know "how far" to resolve that action, not "what is he thinking about doing once he gets there." I cannot imagine circumstances in which i as Gm would "gotcha" him by having his character just walk out into the corridor and get spotted without him having given me more info.

It seems like the term goal here is being used more in the manner of describing the action and that the assumption really being put forth is that without that stated the Gm *will* move straight to a means in which that bites the character. yet at the same time its oh so greatly protested as "not gotcha" and "not magic words".

Me, i just show them in play and by simply asking "how far?" a few times early on if i need to.

But, in fact, i find that when the players-to-Gm conversation *includes* game mechanical info like "move 25'" or "making stealth check or using stealth" these examples are practically eliminated.

So, in my experience, your climb 25' up a 30' wall is resolved the same whether or not your goal is to peek over the top or to ferret out a item from the cliff thats only 25' up. You as a player told me how far you wanted to climb - knowing you do need to define "where" when you say "i move".

Again i come back to that the more one forces the players away from the mechanics, it seems the more they are opened up to getting these "GM decides how to resolve" that go against them - based on the examples provided.

But thats just me, perhaps.

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You are absolutely right that the DM should ask for more clarity about the a player's choice of ambiguous action, regardless of playstyle: "I climb the tower" or "I walk down the hallway". That's exactly what my preferred playstyle encourages when a player is not clear. If the player states an approach and goal, then the DM can then easily do their job of adjudicating the action. A creative approach and/or goal can lead to a success without a roll and sometimes can shape the story in a way the DM had not previously envisioned.

Case-in-point:

PCs had just cleared out the basement lair of some nasty monsters. They were intent on finding some treasure in the crumbled remains of the base of an old tower that was in the basement. They worked together to succeed on some INT (Investigation) and STR (Athletics) checks to enter the tower without collapsing it further. They found the dusty skeletal remains of a long-dead humanoid with a note. The Storm Sorcerer was convinced this could not be everything and so said he was searching the floor for any cracks. After indicating "you bet", he then said he would cast create water to see if it drained through the cracks and then listen to what he heard. Now I did not have anything planned here, but after that creative approach and goal, I just improvised and said it sounded like the water was falling and splashing onto the floor of a hidden chamber below. Some more good roleplaying and successful rolls to not cave in the floor resulted in them finding a chest which I had not even planned. Good fun for all which would have been lost had the player simply said "I roll perception" or some other such short-hand that did not involve our approach and goal style.

iserith said:

Yeah, man, get them into a dungeon. There is no better place for players to gain confidence in decision-making. Plus, going into the underworld, facing your fears, and coming away with knowledge and gold to bring back to the community is part of the hero's journey. It will resonate and they may not even know why. Save the faction-based politicking for later, I say!

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Yeah, my group absolutely hates political stuff. The council meetings in ToD were just boring noise to them, so I quickly learned to make them into simple mission setters. "Well done on mission X, now we need people to Y and do Z. With that accomplished we should be in a position to make the final assault on the Well of Dragons!"

My players, at least, are very happy to have clear goals for their adventures.

robus said:

Yeah, my group absolutely hates political stuff. The council meetings in ToD were just boring noise to them, so I quickly learned to make them into simple mission setters. "Well done on mission X, now we need people to Y and do Z. With that accomplished we should be in a position to make the final assault on the Well of Dragons!"

My players, at least, are very happy to have clear goals for their adventures.

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They tell me not to change anything because they are enjoying the game so much. I just wish I could get more done.

DM Dave1 said:

If the DM telegraphed that the enemy was on its last legs, then it completely makes sense for the player to declare the knock out if they hit the enemy with their attack. As you quote: "The attacker can make this choice" - they don't need the DM's permission to choose. Or are you saying for every potential killing blow in your game you, as DM, ask the player "Are you going to KO?" In a combat-heavy game, I stand by the claim that doing so over and over and over would be quite tedious.




You are absolutely right that the DM should ask for more clarity about the a player's choice of ambiguous action, regardless of playstyle: "I climb the tower" or "I walk down the hallway". That's exactly what my preferred playstyle encourages when a player is not clear. If the player states an approach and goal, then the DM can then easily do their job of adjudicating the action. A creative approach and/or goal can lead to a success without a roll and sometimes can shape the story in a way the DM had not previously envisioned.

Case-in-point:

PCs had just cleared out the basement lair of some nasty monsters. They were intent on finding some treasure in the crumbled remains of the base of an old tower that was in the basement. They worked together to succeed on some INT (Investigation) and STR (Athletics) checks to enter the tower without collapsing it further. They found the dusty skeletal remains of a long-dead humanoid with a note. The Storm Sorcerer was convinced this could not be everything and so said he was searching the floor for any cracks. After indicating "you bet", he then said he would cast create water to see if it drained through the cracks and then listen to what he heard. Now I did not have anything planned here, but after that creative approach and goal, I just improvised and said it sounded like the water was falling and splashing onto the floor of a hidden chamber below. Some more good roleplaying and successful rolls to not cave in the floor resulted in them finding a chest which I had not even planned. Good fun for all which would have been lost had the player simply said "I roll perception" or some other such short-hand that did not involve our approach and goal style.

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Do i ask a player at every Ko moment are they gonna Ko or do i stop a player from telling in advance they want to Ko? nope not at all. but then for me a player getting the "zero hit" and the player then interjecting "but i want to Ko" is not "awkward" if i started to skip past that step.

Remember the claim about how awkward and problematic the KO thing was was made by someone about how not having goal stated before would lead to resolutions that were not the intent - but so far those "examples" have been either unclear and incomplete action declarations (where Gm went toe worst way with it) or cases where the Gm skipped their decision step and then chose to describe that result as "awkward" in their use of it as an example of the problem.

To me, in my games, i do the actual "how do you want to do this" for dropping non-minions specifically in part because it allows the player to choose "KO or dramatic kill" making that decision step a part of the player involvement. For minion drops, we do not do it but we all know they can choose to KO and so the "wait, hang on i want to KO" is not awkward if it happens at all, its just a normal part of play that happens relatively rarely. i honestly cannot think of a time when the players wanted to Ko and it wasn't already obvious or on the table discussion-wise before the event happened. But, if it ever did, it would be just another character choice that adjusts the narrative and resolution, which in my games is more the goal of those, not something awkward.

***

As for your chest thingy, i myself house ruled Search checks to work like Foraging checks. So, by default, i do not have to have something "planned" for a character to gain benefit from their skills at searching. Just like with the great outdoors, i do not bother to assume that i have placed every item of any value or interest before a game session begins in precise places on the map. So, what you describe would have come out of a character having a very good result on a search check in my games.

As for the "creative approach" bit, well, i guess we each have our own thresholds for what constitutes "creative" as liquid on floor to find cracks has been used countless times in the various lore and fiction so... we wouldn't call that "creative", especially not say the tenth, twentieth or fiftieth time.

What we would call it is "effective" or to put a tighter bow on it "advantageous" and it would likely lead to advantage on the skill check unless there was some reason it wouldn't. After all, the guidelines for advantage specifically call out other actions that increase your chances.

But for all that, if you did the water pouring trick and were not good at searching and rolled a poor result anyway, thats not gonna result in you finding some secret stuff that matters (at least not without setbacks.)

But again, i did not need to know their goal, just their actions. it really did not matter whether in their heart of hearts they were hoping to find a secret chamber or mysterious runes under the dust. i needed their actions - not their goals.

have a player who takes plenty of time during play describing his character's goals. he goes on about what his character is thinking and why he is doing stuff, when i ask him "what are you doing?"

I literally just had a chat about it at lunch. he said "but i like roleplaying my character!" That led me to say "You telling the other players out of character why your character is doing what he is doing is not "roleplayin" your character. You telling us what your character is doing, what your character is saying and other things about WHAT is happening is roleplaying your character. You making decisions in-character is roleplaying."

It wasn't a discussion i started BTW it was two players having a discussion that i got brought into.

5ekyu said:

As for your chest thingy, i myself house ruled Search checks to work like Foraging checks. So, by default, i do not have to have something "planned" for a character to gain benefit from their skills at searching. Just like with the great outdoors, i do not bother to assume that i have placed every item of any value or interest before a game session begins in precise places on the map. So, what you describe would have come out of a character having a very good result on a search check in my games.

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Are you saying that your players know that treasure found is generated by their search tests, that it exists or doesn't exist based on what they roll? Is this really how you play? It's one thing for this to be a true yet hidden aspect of the game, but another thing to be an open fact. I want to think I'm misunderstanding you because if this is how you run these things, then why do your players bother coming to game? If adventure treasures are simply generated by their own dice rolls, then were is the sense of a real world existing behind their adventuring? It would be like playing games of Bethesda's Daggerfalls where all dungeons and awards are randomly generated. I must be misunderstanding you.

Edit: Unless, perhaps, these little rewards are so ancillary and unimportant to your players that it's just not that big a deal. That would be an unusual circumstance, but within the realm of possibility I suppose.

2nd edit: I actually found the liquid on the floor idea to be very creative, and I also would have rewarded it. Just because something has been thought of before, doesn't mean that everyone has been informed of that thought. There is nothing new under the sun, as King Solomon writes in Ecclesiastes. It doesn't follow then, that there is no creativity under the sun.

DM Dave1 said:

With all due respect, you are misunderstanding the plastyle. The statement of goals is a perfectly natural extension of declaring actions and simply allows the players to have greater agency over their PCs - with the added benefit of lessening the workload of the DM and perhaps even allowing a scene to go in a direction the DM never imagined. It's that last one which is very enjoyable to me.

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I'll take your word for it, that I'm misinterpreting in this case. It just sounds a lot like the classic example from non-causal games, where failing to open a door will lead the GM to narrate that guards to show up - not because you made too much noise in your attempt, and they were nearby, so they came to investigate - but because your stated goal was to get through the door, and the guards being present will prevent you from reaching your goal, so the GM decides that it's a plausible coincidence. You take an action, and what happens next depends on the GM's meta-game knowledge of your motive, rather than having anything to do with the action itself.

5ekyu said:

Do i ask a player at every Ko moment are they gonna Ko or do i stop a player from telling in advance they want to Ko? nope not at all. but then for me a player getting the "zero hit" and the player then interjecting "but i want to Ko" is not "awkward" if i started to skip past that step.

Remember the claim about how awkward and problematic the KO thing was was made by someone about how not having goal stated before would lead to resolutions that were not the intent - but so far those "examples" have been either unclear and incomplete action declarations (where Gm went toe worst way with it) or cases where the Gm skipped their decision step and then chose to describe that result as "awkward" in their use of it as an example of the problem.

To me, in my games, i do the actual "how do you want to do this" for dropping non-minions specifically in part because it allows the player to choose "KO or dramatic kill" making that decision step a part of the player involvement. For minion drops, we do not do it but we all know they can choose to KO and so the "wait, hang on i want to KO" is not awkward if it happens at all, its just a normal part of play that happens relatively rarely. i honestly cannot think of a time when the players wanted to Ko and it wasn't already obvious or on the table discussion-wise before the event happened. But, if it ever did, it would be just another character choice that adjusts the narrative and resolution, which in my games is more the goal of those, not something awkward.

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I only said it would be awkward if the DM described the killing blow of the axe cleaving the orc in twain, only to have the player say "whoa I meant to KO!" You know, awkward in that we now rewind a gory scene into one that didn't happen. If the player said they were swinging the axe in an attempt to knock out the orc well that solves the issue now, doesn't it?
I also said it was fine (though not ideal) if the DM said the "orc drops" and then the player said "I just wanted to KO." No harm, no foul.

Not really interested in picking nits with you, though, so that's enough of that.

5ekyu said:

As for your chest thingy, i myself house ruled Search checks to work like Foraging checks. So, by default, i do not have to have something "planned" for a character to gain benefit from their skills at searching. Just like with the great outdoors, i do not bother to assume that i have placed every item of any value or interest before a game session begins in precise places on the map. So, what you describe would have come out of a character having a very good result on a search check in my games.

As for the "creative approach" bit, well, i guess we each have our own thresholds for what constitutes "creative" as liquid on floor to find cracks has been used countless times in the various lore and fiction so... we wouldn't call that "creative", especially not say the tenth, twentieth or fiftieth time.

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My players enjoyed the moment, so it really doesn't matter if you think it overplayed.

Do you ever wonder why you've been called rude multiple times on these forums? Perhaps you simply don't care. Anyway, moving on...

5ekyu said:

What we would call it is "effective" or to put a tighter bow on it "advantageous" and it would likely lead to advantage on the skill check unless there was some reason it wouldn't. After all, the guidelines for advantage specifically call out other actions that increase your chances.

But for all that, if you did the water pouring trick and were not good at searching and rolled a poor result anyway, thats not gonna result in you finding some secret stuff that matters (at least not without setbacks.)

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I gave the player an auto-success because it was my prerogative to do so as DM and just narrate the result of their approach and goal. Yes, I also could also have given them Advantage on a roll, but I did not have any meaningful consequence of failure in mind that fit the scene at hand, so I did not bother. I could have invented a consequence, but again, it didn't fit the flow of the narrative so I skipped right to the reward.

5ekyu said:

But again, i did not need to know their goal, just their actions. it really did not matter whether in their heart of hearts they were hoping to find a secret chamber or mysterious runes under the dust. i needed their actions - not their goals.

have a player who takes plenty of time during play describing his character's goals. he goes on about what his character is thinking and why he is doing stuff, when i ask him "what are you doing?"

I literally just had a chat about it at lunch. he said "but i like roleplaying my character!" That led me to say "You telling the other players out of character why your character is doing what he is doing is not "roleplayin" your character. You telling us what your character is doing, what your character is saying and other things about WHAT is happening is roleplaying your character. You making decisions in-character is roleplaying."

It wasn't a discussion i started BTW it was two players having a discussion that i got brought into.

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I agree, a goal alone is not enough, which is why we ask for an approach. What is your action and what is it you're trying to accomplish? I will refer you back to [MENTION=6776133]Bawylie[/MENTION]'s post if you missed it. He sums it up nicely here, but you might read the whole of what he wrote to keep it all in context:

Bawylie said:

Leaving the semantics bit aside, “intent and approach” is functionally the same as “goal and action” or “what and how” or “plan and execution.” And I believe it’s a best practice to make sure DM and player are on the same page before dice get rolled.

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Saelorn said:

I'll take your word for it, that I'm misinterpreting in this case. It just sounds a lot like the classic example from non-causal games, where failing to open a door will lead the GM to narrate that guards to show up - not because you made too much noise in your attempt, and they were nearby, so they came to investigate - but because your stated goal was to get through the door, and the guards being present will prevent you from reaching your goal, so the GM decides that it's a plausible coincidence. You take an action, and what happens next depends on the GM's meta-game knowledge of your motive, rather than having anything to do with the action itself.

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Yeah, Jerk DMs will be jerk DMs no matter what the playstyle. They're playing to win, not to provide interesting challenges for the players and to help create a fun time for all. Those types eventually get weeded out when the players call them out on their consistently bogus rulings.

DM Dave1 said:

Yeah, Jerk DMs will be jerk DMs no matter what the playstyle. They're playing to win, not to provide interesting challenges for the players and to help create a fun time for all. Those types eventually get weeded out when the players call them out on their consistently bogus rulings.

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Yes, but there are also games where that is the legitimate and expected course of play, because the game is concerned more with creating an interesting narrative than in modeling causal processes. Those GMs aren't (necessarily) being jerks, when they play those games and make such rulings.

My comment was just that D&D, specifically, is not one of those games.