Adventure Scale

[Victim]

So I was chatting to a friend about the new playtest packet, and he made a really good point (I think). I'm just going to quote him here

"Having 'pick Dwarf Locks' as one of the hardest things you can do in the game is great, too - it's not 'outwit an abyssal lord' or 'run up a length of thread' or 'push over acolossus.' It speaks of a smaller world which players might be able to make an impact in and stay close to believability... although this is only up to fifth level. But this sort of street-level stuff, 'Holy he's got DWARVEN LOCKS on his back door how are we going to get in' affair is right up my alley."

I agree with this by the way. But what do you think? Do you think their claims of flatter math is a sign they're thinking of toning it back overall? Do you like that idea?

Nope. Because "OMG DWARVEN LOCKS!" is the same DC as swim out of a whirlpool or fly out of a tornado.

And the DC for the feats of demigods is only 3 higher, and well within the reach of a lucky first level character.

 

[Sunseeker]

still easy for a rogue given enough time.

This has always been something that bothered me about locks, traps, and anything that requires serious skill to undo. It's basically "roll until you win", it NEVER made sense to me because nowhere else in the game does this logic apply. Somehow a rogue can just keep trying forever until they win, why not just story-RP it that they unlocked it right away and save a dozen rolls?

Personally every trap, every lock, every object upon which one can try their skills to open or undo, should have a limit of how many times it can be attempted.

Perhaps a puzzle lock can be tried innumerable times, or perhaps a very delicate lock made with super-thin wires can only be attempted twice, or that arcane sigil can only take 3 attempts before it explodes. Maybe that dwarven lock latches itsself shut after only one failed attempt. Maybe that magic lock rearranges itsself after every attempt, becoming progressively harder and harder to open until it is beyond humanoid comprehension, spreading it's key-holes into the 8th dimension!

Things that are "roll to win" should be few and players should always feel like everything they attempt requires concentration and skill, not just innumerable attempts until they roll a 20.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

This has always been something that bothered me about locks, traps, and anything that requires serious skill to undo. It's basically "roll until you win", it NEVER made sense to me because nowhere else in the game does this logic apply. Somehow a rogue can just keep trying forever until they win, why not just story-RP it that they unlocked it right away and save a dozen rolls?

Personally every trap, every lock, every object upon which one can try their skills to open or undo, should have a limit of how many times it can be attempted.

Perhaps a puzzle lock can be tried innumerable times, or perhaps a very delicate lock made with super-thin wires can only be attempted twice, or that arcane sigil can only take 3 attempts before it explodes. Maybe that dwarven lock latches itsself shut after only one failed attempt. Maybe that magic lock rearranges itsself after every attempt, becoming progressively harder and harder to open until it is beyond humanoid comprehension, spreading it's key-holes into the 8th dimension!

Things that are "roll to win" should be few and players should always feel like everything they attempt requires concentration and skill, not just innumerable attempts until they roll a 20.

No, I especially like the idea, that given enough time you can open the door. Take 20 was one of my favourite rules. A rogue, who is trained in opening a lock should just be able to do so. It is when you are in a hurry, when you should not be able to open the lock easily.

When you look at 3.x DCs, you notice, that everything makes sense, if you use take 20 as a default.

Open locks, break a door, find magical traps. All those DCs are so high, that you basically need a 20 to achieve success. (Or a quite high level or skill fokus or a high stat).
So a rogue who s well trained, should just be able to open a lock, given time. Just don´t roll, if time is not limited and assume a rolled 20.

 

[Sunseeker]

No, I especially like the idea, that given enough time you can open the door. Take 20 was one of my favourite rules. A rogue, who is trained in opening a lock should just be able to do so. It is when you are in a hurry, when you should not be able to open the lock easily.

When you look at 3.x DCs, you notice, that everything makes sense, if you use take 20 as a default.

Open locks, break a door, find magical traps. All those DCs are so high, that you basically need a 20 to achieve success. (Or a quite high level or skill fokus or a high stat).
So a rogue who s well trained, should just be able to open a lock, given time. Just don´t roll, if time is not limited and assume a rolled 20.

I hate "take a X" rules. If you're going to just let them open the door, there's really no point in having the door locked now is there? They didn't really achieve anything, they didn't work for anything, they just set their die with the "20" facing up and we all moved on with the game. I could have just DM hand-waived and said "Upon close inspection, the lock is open, but has been carefully set to appear closed." There'd be some dramatic tension, we wouldn't need to bother with dice rolls, and we'd all move on. It'd be far more interesting than just having the rogue roll until they win or set their die to 20.

If there is a locked door, there is a reason it is locked, if it ever becomes unlocked, there's a reason why it becomes unlocked. If a door is locked and there's never going to be an owner unlock it or a guard come by and check on it, then why is the door locked?(yes I suppose it could be an ancient locked door deep in a forgotten tomb or something, but aren't those things usually filled with monsters and dangerous traps that trigger when you attempt to break open a lock?)

 

[B.T.]

Great. So the high level wizard can teleport to other planes, and the high level theif can actually pick dwarven locks!

Am I bad for wanting feats of skill that are as impressive in their own way as the feats of magic that high level wizards and clerics can perform?

Or even DCs low enough that high level non-casters can reliably do the things they're supposed to be good at. If bounded accuracy means my 20th level theif can't pick that dwarven lock by rolling a three on the die, I'll be pretty upset.

There are so many presuppositions in this post that I don't know where to begin except by listing them.

1. It presupposes high level wizard/cleric spells will work like they did in 3e.

2. It presupposes that the only way to deal with "dwarven locks" is by having a high skill modifier.

3. It presupposes that having a high skill modifier is the only way to be good at doing things.

4. It presupposes that high-level martial characters won't get to do things that are impressive in their own right.

 

[Starbuck_II]

I hate "take a X" rules. If you're going to just let them open the door, there's really no point in having the door locked now is there?
They didn't really achieve anything, they didn't work for anything, they just set their die with the "20" facing up and we all moved on with the game. I could have just DM hand-waived and said "Upon close inspection, the lock is open, but has been carefully set to appear closed." There'd be some dramatic tension, we wouldn't need to bother with dice rolls, and we'd all move on. It'd be far more interesting than just having the rogue roll until they win or set their die to 20.

Actually, it may have been a reference to 1E when you avoided monsters as they gave too little XP for the trouble and took the loot. Taking 20 means 20 turns meaning 2 minutes, that means a lot if there are monsters coming.
But if there is no monsters then yeah, take 20 like 3E.

 

[tlantl]

Actually, it may have been a reference to 1E when you avoided monsters as they gave too little XP for the trouble and took the loot. Taking 20 means 20 turns meaning 2 minutes, that means a lot if there are monsters coming.
But if there is no monsters then yeah, take 20 like 3E.

You know I played AD&D for 20 years and never did we avoid monsters just to loot their lairs. Honestly the amount of xp you got wasn't that much. Most creatures only had small piddling treasures any way. You needed every experience point you could get. In AD&D you were only going to be somewhere near 9th level if you had the same 190,000 xp that gives you 20th level in 3e.

I always put the best treasures on the monsters, the DMG said that these things were useful and used by the monsters who had them, not hidden in some pile of refuse or a locked chest. If you didn't fight the monsters then you didn't get the goodies. A lot of the time I'd roll treasure types only to come up with nothing of value. Seldom did the dice produce an abundance of valuables. They didn't have to. Treasure was a reward that happened to give a little more xp to the party.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

I hate "take a X" rules. If you're going to just let them open the door, there's really no point in having the door locked now is there? They didn't really achieve anything, they didn't work for anything, they just set their die with the "20" facing up and we all moved on with the game. I could have just DM hand-waived and said "Upon close inspection, the lock is open, but has been carefully set to appear closed." There'd be some dramatic tension, we wouldn't need to bother with dice rolls, and we'd all move on. It'd be far more interesting than just having the rogue roll until they win or set their die to 20.

If there is a locked door, there is a reason it is locked, if it ever becomes unlocked, there's a reason why it becomes unlocked. If a door is locked and there's never going to be an owner unlock it or a guard come by and check on it, then why is the door locked?(yes I suppose it could be an ancient locked door deep in a forgotten tomb or something, but aren't those things usually filled with monsters and dangerous traps that trigger when you attempt to break open a lock?)

Or it could be a door to a storage room, that is locked with a dwarven lock. Most people can´t open such a lock.
You need thiefs tools. You need at least dexterity 14. Or you need training in opening locks and at least a dexterity of 8.

Maybe, and just maybe i would rather see a 1d10+10 rule instead of a take 20 rule. And if you fail with that roll, you can´t open it. Dunno. I am not sure a take 20 would fit into the current rules. As it is maybe a bit too easy to achieve impossible results.

So lets see how it plays out in the end.

 

[Sunseeker]

Or it could be a door to a storage room, that is locked with a dwarven lock. Most people can´t open such a lock.
You need thiefs tools. You need at least dexterity 14. Or you need training in opening locks and at least a dexterity of 8.

Even storage rooms get opened once in a while. I don't include a whole lot of mundane storage rooms locked with dwarven locks(unless I suppose, we're in a dwarven lock-makers home).

Maybe, and just maybe i would rather see a 1d10+10 rule instead of a take 20 rule. And if you fail with that roll, you can´t open it. Dunno. I am not sure a take 20 would fit into the current rules. As it is maybe a bit too easy to achieve impossible results.

So lets see how it plays out in the end.

I'm tentativly OK with take 10 rules, since it's the average. Take 20 is just too much though, especially for a skillmonkey rogue who's raised up their "open lock" skill in all sorts of silly ways.


At the end of the day, I still say this:
If it's worth being locked, it's worth your player's efforts to try and open it. If it's not worth being locked, just skip the rolls and move along.

Actually, it may have been a reference to 1E when you avoided monsters as they gave too little XP for the trouble and took the loot. Taking 20 means 20 turns meaning 2 minutes, that means a lot if there are monsters coming.
But if there is no monsters then yeah, take 20 like 3E.

Off the top of my head, the times when you would be deep within a dungeon and have no worries whatsoever about monsters(small or large) are few. The few small monsters at the entrance were often the minions of more powerful monsters deeper within, those monsters were often guards or gatekeepers of darker things within the bowels of the dungeon. Those darker things are often the spawn of malevolent extra-planar creatures from ages past.

At least, that's my logic on dungeon crawls, the deeper you go, the greater the terrors, but also the greater the rewards. And dungeons are never safe.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

Even storage rooms get opened once in a while. I don't include a whole lot of mundane storage rooms locked with dwarven locks(unless I suppose, we're in a dwarven lock-makers home).

That is genrally what keys are made for...

I'm tentativly OK with take 10 rules, since it's the average. Take 20 is just too much though, especially for a skillmonkey rogue who's raised up their "open lock" skill in all sorts of silly ways.

At the end of the day, I still say this:
If it's worth being locked, it's worth your player's efforts to try and open it. If it's not worth being locked, just skip the rolls and move along.

take 20 is just move along. And i think someone who invest everything he has in opening a lock should be able to open a lock. Just as a pilot should be able to safely steer his aeroplane. It is only when he flys in some kind of storm or something, that he could get troubles.