D&D 5E L&L: Mike Lays It All Out
- Thread starter GX.Sigma
- Start date
Li Shenron
Legend
I thought so too, but don't be deceived by the number.
Knowledge skills really work differently from other skills. All that matters, is the difference between someone trained in e.g. Knowledge Arcana and the others who are untrained.
The Intelligence bonus actually gets in the way a bit, because it makes it just as easy for an Int 18 genius to know something about Arcana without having read a single book, compared to someone with +4 skill bonus.
It's not the same as jumping or climbing... If I've never climbed a tree, I can still try. Physical skills are natural.
But Knowledge/Lore skills represent already knowing something. Here there is room for a lot of debate, how did you get that lore? Did you read books, did someone tell you, did you listen to bards in tavers, is this lore just part of folklore? You can have a fantasy setting where libraries abound in every city like today's real world, or another fantasy setting where books are as rare as in historical middle ages.
Maybe we shouldn't assume or think too much, but I want to point out once again that the danger is in allowing everybody to roll for Lore checks. This issue has been acknowledged since 3.0: "An untrained Knowledge check is simply an Intelligence check. Without actual training, a character only knows common knowledge." This allowed the DM to occasionally allow some PC to try a Kn:Arcana check especially if no one else in the party had that skill trained, but it generally was meant so that the DM would only let the trained PC do the check... otherwise every single time every PC would try their chances. And if you have 1 trained PC and 4 untrained PCs all of them rolling, but the difference in bonus is small, it easily ends up with the "rest of the group" (together) succeeding more often than the specialist.
To me this +10 idea seems to be meant for the same purpose, i.e. to tell untrained PCs to not bother rolling, and just let the specialist take the spotlight.
If it was for me, I'd just go straight to the point and simply make all Knowledge checks "trained only", but apparently they want to keep an open door.
Li Shenron
Legend
It was important when we all thought that feats were optional, in the sense that the whole group would choose whether to use feats or not, in which case each class needed to get the same amount otherwise ignoring feats would have been unfair to some classes.
It's not important anymore, now that feats are made optional on an individual PC's basis.
In fact, I thought that now this could also be easily used to fill dead levels. Instead, they seem to be making it worse by purposefully giving feats at the same levels as something else, just because the rare min-maxer has decided to use all his feats to bump the same primary stat but still wants another bump at the same level when the stat happens to be even
Dwimmerlied
First Post
Unless feats are used as a mechanic to add character concept flexibility. It doesn't necessarily have to be about power.
But casters already have this via their spells.
Mishihari Lord
First Post
The idea for making a basic game with extensibility seems well thought out and cool. For the rest, I'd need to play it to see how it went but for the moment I'm dubious. Feats, skills, benefits, proficiencies - how many different systems do we need to define how a player does things? IMO the answer should be "one."
Dwimmerlied
First Post
I agree that spell selection is a good way to implement many character concepts, but I can easily imagine lots of concepts that wouldn't be covered by this.
Sage Genesis
First Post
Thanks.
Yeah, I thought it was too high at first too until I thought about it.
Imagine if someone asked you which die was the monk's HD in 3rd edition. That's like a DC 15 check. So a person with no D&D experience would probably pick a die at random with a ~30% success rate, probably picking a higher die as they might think monks need bigger HD as their are monks in some forms of fantasy. An intelligence person might be able to guess not to pick the d12 as it might be too big. But a D&D fan would have a low chance of failure, failing only from porr memory, not playing 3rd edition, or a simple brainfart. So +10 is about right for the large hop in knowledge difference.
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Glad to see more proficiencies though.
Chris_Nightwing
First Post
Ok so a very simple skill system, or VSS:
For any given 'skill' or broad collection of conceptually related tasks you are either non-proficient (novice), proficient (apprentice), expert (adept) or masterful (master).
The DM will ask you to roll an ability check to see if you succeed at a task that is simple, average, difficult or impossible.
If your level of proficiency matches the difficulty of the task, you roll 1d20 and add your ability modifier.
If you are two or more steps below the required proficiency, you cannot attempt such a task.
If you are two or more steps above the required proficiency, you automatically succeed at such a task.
You have advantage, and roll 2d20, keeping the best, if you are one step above the difficulty.
You have disadvantage and roll 2d20, keeping the worst, if you are one step below the difficulty.
The DM never has to pick a DC: this is fixed at, say, 10.
So, an example 'skill' might be blacksmithing. A simple task might be fashioning a nail, an average task repairing a weapon, a difficult task could be fashioning a masterwork weapon, an impossible task would be making dragonscale armour. Novices can make nails and attempt to repair weapons, but they won't be making dragonscale. Your average village blacksmith could only make you fine armour, not dragonscale, and nails are easy. A reknowned blacksmith can attempt that, and can churn out nails by the dozen without breaking a sweat.
Pro: Simple, bounded, customisable and ability-independent
Con: Not sure on the math with different ability modifiers, not sure if auto-success or fail are to everyone's taste
For any given 'skill' or broad collection of conceptually related tasks you are either non-proficient (novice), proficient (apprentice), expert (adept) or masterful (master).
The DM will ask you to roll an ability check to see if you succeed at a task that is simple, average, difficult or impossible.
If your level of proficiency matches the difficulty of the task, you roll 1d20 and add your ability modifier.
If you are two or more steps below the required proficiency, you cannot attempt such a task.
If you are two or more steps above the required proficiency, you automatically succeed at such a task.
You have advantage, and roll 2d20, keeping the best, if you are one step above the difficulty.
You have disadvantage and roll 2d20, keeping the worst, if you are one step below the difficulty.
The DM never has to pick a DC: this is fixed at, say, 10.
So, an example 'skill' might be blacksmithing. A simple task might be fashioning a nail, an average task repairing a weapon, a difficult task could be fashioning a masterwork weapon, an impossible task would be making dragonscale armour. Novices can make nails and attempt to repair weapons, but they won't be making dragonscale. Your average village blacksmith could only make you fine armour, not dragonscale, and nails are easy. A reknowned blacksmith can attempt that, and can churn out nails by the dozen without breaking a sweat.
Pro: Simple, bounded, customisable and ability-independent
Con: Not sure on the math with different ability modifiers, not sure if auto-success or fail are to everyone's taste
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