D&D 5E Are players always entitled to see their own rolls?

[iserith]

I believe secrets rolls do sometimes make the game better, and I use them.

Example: PC is using insight against an NPC who is lying to them. PC is highly skilled, say +9, and rolls a 17 (26) in the open. DM rolls behind the screen and gets a 18 and the NPC is secretly a master spy, adds +9 (27). Result is "you cant read him".

Just by seeing his own roll of 17, and knowing he is good at insight, and getting the "cant read him" result, this player has now been tipped off that there is something special about this NPC.

If the DM made the roll for the PC however, this situation is avoided. The PC just gets the "cant read him" result without knowing his roll was 17.

Is there a better way to avoid this kind of tip off whilst still letting the player roll in the open?

There's a lot of missing context that had led up to the player being able to declare a goal and approach and the DM finding it to be uncertain. So I think it's fair to say that at the point the player describes wanting to discern the NPC's truthfulness, both the player and the character have reason to believe something is up. (My point being, you don't just get to roll every time you declare you're trying to discern truthfulness. At my table, you just fail outright without time spent in the interaction plus evidence of some kind, however tenuous.)

Further, the character is quite skilled in Insight given that bonus, so it's also reasonable in my view to narrate the character as doing a very good job of observing the NPC's body language and mannerisms and coming up with nothing, which reveals to the character that this guy is either telling the truth as he understands it or is just as good at telling lies as the PC is at picking up on them. That is what a character this skilled might also think which means the player's thoughts and character's thoughts are reasonably in line.

The long and short of it is, if you're concerned with that kind of "metagaming," you want to narrate in a way that lines up the player's perception of the situation with the character's, given the context of the scene. In this case, the character can't discern a lie, but knows something is up. This is just "progress combined with a setback," essentially, which is often my go-to tool in these kinds of situations.

 

[Psikerlord#]

There's a lot of missing context that had led up to the player being able to declare a goal and approach and the DM finding it to be uncertain. So I think it's fair to say that at the point the player describes wanting to discern the NPC's truthfulness, both the player and the character have reason to believe something is up. (My point being, you don't just get to roll every time you declare you're trying to discern truthfulness. At my table, you just fail outright without time spent in the interaction plus evidence of some kind, however tenuous.)

Further, the character is quite skilled in Insight given that bonus, so it's also reasonable in my view to narrate the character as doing a very good job of observing the NPC's body language and mannerisms and coming up with nothing, which reveals to the character that this guy is either telling the truth as he understands it or is just as good at telling lies as the PC is at picking up on them. That is what a character this skilled might also think which means the player's thoughts and character's thoughts are reasonably in line.

The long and short of it is, if you're concerned with that kind of "metagaming," you want to narrate in a way that lines up the player's perception of the situation with the character's, given the context of the scene. In this case, the character can't discern a lie, but knows something is up. This is just "progress combined with a setback," essentially, which is often my go-to tool in these kinds of situations.

I hear what you're saying, but I prefer the simplicity of the secret roll (then it can just be a failure, no requirement for a fail forward).

 

[the Jester]

But you're not doing that, you're playing a game. Say your character does search a ruin for secret doors (telegraphed or otherwise) and without me asking you to roll, I inform you of your failure to find any.

Can you still be sure, via metagaming, there are none? Perhaps you're searching the wrong place or wrong time. Perhaps the doors are visible to those with dark vision only. I mean, there's a number of reasons you could conceivably fail to find any, apart from "there are none."

So what does the no-roll failure really say? That your attempt to find secret doors didn't succeed. That's all.

It depends on whether you ever ask me to roll if there's no secret door there, or if you always give it away.

Which is fine. Playstyle difference. But yours sounds like it would lower my level of immersion for metagame reasons.

 

[the Jester]

I think the prime directive of the DM is to get everyone to participate in the story, and whether you have secret rolls or not plays second fiddle to allowing the broadest application of skills as possible.

There is a notion in here that may explain some degree of the disparity between the two sides here- the notion of story.

So don't get stuck as a DM on only one type of skill being able to unlock a portion of the story (secret door or otherwise). Eventually you end of with everyone falling asleep while the bard, rogue or wizard tries. You can still make something hard to find, but with more skills on the table, as least the chances are better they will eventually figure it out.

Except not every secret needs to be uncovered. The pcs don't need to find everything out. There's nothing wrong with some secrets remaining hidden and undiscovered.

 

[aramis erak]

Building off that, I feel there's a bit too much concern over the number on the die as opposed to the result of the action.

D&D had a binary fail/succeed setup. So if the DC is 10, an 11 and a 17 are equally successful. As 1 and 9 equally failures.

A number of the exemplar tasks in the adventures (and in the MM) have dual DC's, and thus at least 3 results...
Made it
Failed by 1-4
Failed by 5+

For example, one poison has a Con Save DC 9/14. On a 14+, no poison effect; 9-13, acquire the poisoned condition. ≤8, poisoned and incapacitated.

Many challenges are suitable to this mechanic.

And combat also has 3:
Nat 20/Crit
≥AC is hit
<AC or Nat 1 is miss.

 

[AaronOfBarbaria]

I believe secrets rolls do sometimes make the game better, and I use them.

Example: PC is using insight against an NPC who is lying to them. PC is highly skilled, say +9, and rolls a 17 (26) in the open. DM rolls behind the screen and gets a 18 and the NPC is secretly a master spy, adds +9 (27). Result is "you cant read him".

Just by seeing his own roll of 17, and knowing he is good at insight, and getting the "cant read him" result, this player has now been tipped off that there is something special about this NPC.

If the DM made the roll for the PC however, this situation is avoided. The PC just gets the "cant read him" result without knowing his roll was 17.

Is there a better way to avoid this kind of tip off whilst still letting the player roll in the open?

I find a better way is to always have the goal of a roll be something more specific than would allow for me to phrase failure as "can't read him."

To try and use this example of yours about a lying NPC that is, unbeknownst to the player and their character, a master spy. An example of potential failure descriptions that prevent the player seeing a high roll on their die from being tipped off to this master of deception:

"You see a solid amount of eye contact, but not too much, no twitches or tells, no micro expressions of stress, and he even looked in the direction you expect when someone is recalling information rather than inventing it on the spot." Or any other description that sounds like "you see evidence that what is being said is true." because that evidence doesn't mean it actually is true, just that any evidence of the fact that it isn't was hidden by the skill of the liar.

Here is an example from my own campaign recently: The party was investigating a strange fort that had recently been built, looking to find a renegade cleric that had stolen a religious relic, and as they were walking down one hall they noticed a young dragon chained to the wall at the corner, laying on the ground apparently sleeping. They quietly discussed strategy, and after a few moments one of the players said "Wait... I try to observe the dragon carefully to look for signs that it is only pretending to be asleep," and made a roll (and I rolled an opposed roll for the dragon).

The description following the roll was this: "You can see it's eyes are closed, no signs of eyelid fluttering, and it's breathing is slow and steady... but you're not familiar enough with dragons to know if those indicators of a humanoid genuinely sleeping apply."

Can you tell whether the PC or the dragon won that opposed roll? If I didn't know from seeing the results at the table, I don't think I could - it sounds both like a failure to find evidence of actual deceit, and like a success to notice evidence of genuine sleep but being unsure because of unfamiliarity since this is the first dragon you've ever seen.

 

[Psikerlord#]

I find a better way is to always have the goal of a roll be something more specific than would allow for me to phrase failure as "can't read him."

To try and use this example of yours about a lying NPC that is, unbeknownst to the player and their character, a master spy. An example of potential failure descriptions that prevent the player seeing a high roll on their die from being tipped off to this master of deception:

"You see a solid amount of eye contact, but not too much, no twitches or tells, no micro expressions of stress, and he even looked in the direction you expect when someone is recalling information rather than inventing it on the spot." Or any other description that sounds like "you see evidence that what is being said is true." because that evidence doesn't mean it actually is true, just that any evidence of the fact that it isn't was hidden by the skill of the liar.

Here is an example from my own campaign recently: The party was investigating a strange fort that had recently been built, looking to find a renegade cleric that had stolen a religious relic, and as they were walking down one hall they noticed a young dragon chained to the wall at the corner, laying on the ground apparently sleeping. They quietly discussed strategy, and after a few moments one of the players said "Wait... I try to observe the dragon carefully to look for signs that it is only pretending to be asleep," and made a roll (and I rolled an opposed roll for the dragon).

The description following the roll was this: "You can see it's eyes are closed, no signs of eyelid fluttering, and it's breathing is slow and steady... but you're not familiar enough with dragons to know if those indicators of a humanoid genuinely sleeping apply."

Can you tell whether the PC or the dragon won that opposed roll? If I didn't know from seeing the results at the table, I don't think I could - it sounds both like a failure to find evidence of actual deceit, and like a success to notice evidence of genuine sleep but being unsure because of unfamiliarity since this is the first dragon you've ever seen.

No I cant tell... but the trouble with adjudicating it in this way is that the skill is not useful - even when you succeed, you don't know if you did.

In this scenario I would prefer the rolls be hidden, and for the DM to tell me either - you're confident it's asleep (indicating success) or "you cant tell" (indicating failure).... (but also knowing that, if the roll was a 1, the DM might tell me the opposite of what it true!).

 

[AaronOfBarbaria]

No I cant tell... but the trouble with adjudicating it in this way is that the skill is not useful - even when you succeed, you don't know if you did.

That's not an assessment than any of the players at my table have ever shared... so I'm going to say you aren't correct, but are potentially getting a different assessment because you are reading a recap of the situation online, rather than experiencing it first hand.

In the example I gave, the player found the information gained by the check useful enough to base his course of action upon it - and the act of trying to see through the deception, despite lack of confidence in the result, was enough to ensure that the party wasn't surprised when the dragon revealed that it was actually faking and attacked them (the result of failing to notice the deception being that the party chose to try and sneak past the dragon, thus starting the encounter much closer to it than if they had noticed the deception and decided to attack from a distance).

 

[Psikerlord#]

That's not an assessment than any of the players at my table have ever shared... so I'm going to say you aren't correct, but are potentially getting a different assessment because you are reading a recap of the situation online, rather than experiencing it first hand.

In the example I gave, the player found the information gained by the check useful enough to base his course of action upon it - and the act of trying to see through the deception, despite lack of confidence in the result, was enough to ensure that the party wasn't surprised when the dragon revealed that it was actually faking and attacked them (the result of failing to notice the deception being that the party chose to try and sneak past the dragon, thus starting the encounter much closer to it than if they had noticed the deception and decided to attack from a distance).

So... was it a success or failure? I can see this info being useful for a fail, it essentially boils down to a "you cant tell" result. If this was a success however, we shall have to agree to disagree!

edit: sorry - I can see it was a fail, so fair enough, I think that description was spot on.

 

[iserith]

It depends on whether you ever ask me to roll if there's no secret door there, or if you always give it away.

My process of adjudication for this kind of situation is as follows. Player describes his or her character as searching for a secret door...

...and there is no door - PC fails to find a door, no roll.
...and there is a door, but the PC isn't looking in the right place - PC fails to find a door, no roll.
...and there is a door and the PC is looking in the general area of the door - PC may or or may not find it, roll.
...and there is a door and the PC is searching exactly where it is - PC finds it, no roll.

How much time is spent on the task also plays into the level of uncertainty. The more time is spent in the general area of the door may the provide the check with advantage or push the outcome to certain success (per DMG page 237). The less time is spent in the general area of the door may provide the check with disadvantage or push the outcome to certain failure.

If failure occurs after a roll, I generally narrate "progress combined with a setback." You find it, but a cost or complication is introduced. While it's not why I choose to use this rule option, it has the effect of making sure a player doesn't look at his or her low die roll and the DM's description that there is no door and assuming there must be a door there because there was a roll.

Would you explain where you start "metagaming" here?

There is a notion in here that may explain some degree of the disparity between the two sides here- the notion of story.

I believe "story" is emergent and is created during play. How do you see it?

Except not every secret needs to be uncovered. The pcs don't need to find everything out. There's nothing wrong with some secrets remaining hidden and undiscovered.

I completely agree.