Missing Rules

[5ekyu]

DC 40. Hope your fall is a short one.

Veryclear.

 

[Reynard]

.There is also nothing in D&D 5e rules that leads me to believe the player can or should ask to make ability checks.

There's a whole paragraph on it in the same section that talks about DMs determining whether an ability check should happen and if so what skill proficiency might imply.

I have played literally every edition of D&D and 5e ia not some FATE like paradigm shift. In basic playstyle ig not mechanics, they all play essentially the same way once PCs enter the dungeon.

 

[iserith]

As far as determining whether something is uncertain, I don't know what the 5e designers had in mind and don't have much sense of how the typical 5e GM does this. But to me, saying that the outcome of the attempt to jump further than normal is not uncertain because the rules for jumping without need of a check say you can't do it seems like an overly narrow call. It seems to me that the jump rules make it certain that you can jump X feet, thus leaving it uncertain whether you can jump further than that - and the check is used to determine whether the further jump is possible (subject to some caveat that certain attempts at superhuman distances might just fail - presumably at most 5e tables an attempt to jump 50 feet without magical assistance is going to be declared an auto-failure by the GM).

And to combine some of the above thoughts: to require a description of what is being done to jump further than normal to be a description of different mechanical means - like springboards or ramps - seems needlessly complex and at odds with the general spirit of the jumping rules, because if I do use a ramp to get a height advantage then why don't I get an automatic increase in the distance I can jump (or to put it another way, why does being trained in Athletics make it easier for me to take advantage of a height difference when jumping?). And to me it also seems to encourage the fiction to focus on external elements of the characters, like what sort of equipment they can find and exploit, rather than internal elements, like how committed they are and what they are willing to risk to achieve their goals.

An ability check must necessarily be tied to a fictional action since the function of an ability check is to resolve uncertainty as to the outcome of the task. A player can always try to have the character jump further, but he or she is obligated to offer the reason why that's even possible. Your ramp example may well indeed allow for an automatic increase in the distance the character can jump, no roll. That is up to the DM who is charged with determining if the proposed approach to the goal is so easy and free of conflict and stress that there is no chance of failure or if the task is so inappropriate or impossible that it can't work. If the answer to both of these questions is "no," then a check is appropriate. People will differ on whether the proposal of "take a deep breath and give it the ol' college try" is sufficient to boost the character's normal jumping distance.

Are you playing D&D 5e yet? In past discussions, you had not. I recall you mostly played D&D 4e (which is quite different from D&D 5e in many ways) or Burning Wheel.

 

[iserith]

There's a whole paragraph on it in the same section that talks about DMs determining whether an ability check should happen and if so what skill proficiency might imply.

I have played literally every edition of D&D and 5e ia not some FATE like paradigm shift. In basic playstyle ig not mechanics, they all play essentially the same way once PCs enter the dungeon.

If you're referring to the section you quoted previously on DMG page 239, that is very clearly referring to the player asking if a proficiency applies to an ability check the DM already called for. That is mirrored in the Basic Rules on page 58 and 59. I even provided you with an example of play from the Basic Rules (page 2) that underscored what that section meant. The DM called for an Intelligence check and the player asked if he could apply Investigation. This is very different than asking to make an ability check, which is entirely the DM's role in this game.

I know these sections very well. It's the basis for a specific approach I use at the table: I try to only ask for ability checks and the players apply the proficiency they feel is appropriate based on their understanding of the action they are attempting. "Often, players ask whether they can apply a skill proficiency to an ability check." (DMG, page 239.) Since I like to minimize the amount of questions at the table (questions aren't actions), my answer is a default "Yes," on the assumption of good faith, and the players don't need to ask.

 

[Reynard]

A player can always try to have the character jump further,

Yes.

but he or she is obligated to offer the reason why that's even possible.

No. This is not true. I don't know where you are getting this, except possibly a very strange interpretation of the description of play.

 

[iserith]

No. This is not true. I don't know where you are getting this, except possibly a very strange interpretation of the description of play.

The description of a fictional action necessarily includes a goal (what you hope to achieve) and an approach (how you try to achieve it) e.g. "I try to clear the 10'-wide pit by jumping over it." This allows the DM determine if the task is possible or impossible and, if possible, whether there's a need for an ability check which may or may not include a skill proficiency.

 

[pemerton]

An ability check must necessarily be tied to a fictional action since the function of an ability check is to resolve uncertainty as to the outcome of the task. A player can always try to have the character jump further, but he or she is obligated to offer the reason why that's even possible.

Sure, but the reason might simply be "I know I can't clear this comfortably - it's further than the gap I jump across every morning when I'm training! - but if I give it my all I might just make it!"

The idea that, by default, the distances a hero can try and jump either fall into the will automatically make it category and the can't possibly make it category isn't that appealing to me, and on my reading of the 5e rules is not mandated by them.

People will differ on whether the proposal of "take a deep breath and give it the ol' college try" is sufficient to boost the character's normal jumping distance.

Is it sufficient or not? That seems like something uncertain - and hence that might aptly be determined by a check.

Are you playing D&D 5e yet? In past discussions, you had not. I recall you mostly played D&D 4e (which is quite different from D&D 5e in many ways) or Burning Wheel.

I'm not playing 5e, but this thread came up on a forum front page and the question of how actions should be resolved in various systems is something I find interesting.

The last two sessions I've GMed have been Prince Valiant. (You can read about them here and here if you like!) The basic approach to resolution is not different from that which you advocate for 5e - player declares what his/her PC does, and GM stipulates check required (if any) and difficulty. (Unlike 4e there are not resources whose deployment is senstiive to the making of checks; and unlike BW there is no system of advancement contingent on making checks with a particular ability; so calling for checks isn't really a player-side thing.)

I'm running it much as I've been running Classic Traveller (another system I've been running a bit over the past year or so): say "yes" when nothing much is at stake and the fiction doesn't make success terribly improbable; otherwise set an "objective" difficulty (which contrasts with 4e or Cortex+ Heroic - the latter another system I've been running quite a bit recently) and see how the check plays out, with BW-style "fail forward" narration of failures.

Asking to make an ability check is asking for a chance to fail, and the d20 is famously fickle. The smarter play in my view is to describe what you want to do while making an effort to remove uncertainty as to the outcome and/or the meaningful consequence of failure.

I find this very reminiscent of classic D&D or OSR-style play. I feel that it tends to push play in the direction I mentioned upthread - very operationally focused, with a principal consideration being external factors that will allow the character to succeed.

I prefer using "say 'yes'" as a device to manage dramatic pacing rather than as a response to tactical planning, and to use "fail forward" to manage the outcomes of failure. It's also the case that it's a long time since I've run a system with a "notoriously fickle" d20 (4e has the illusion of being such a system, but there are so many player-side resources for generating post hoc boosts, retries, etc that it really isn't) - BW and Prince Valiant are dice pools, Classic Traveller is mostly 2d6, and Cortex+ Heroic is very complicated dice pools with a lot of player-side manipulation as well.

Because of the way 5e strongly demarcates "mundane" checks and "magical" spells and class abilities, I suspect it may be hard to play in the style I prefer, which is one reason why I don't play it. But on this particular issue of a character jumping further than s/he easily can, I think drifting it in that direction in the way that I've described (following [MENTION=467]Reynard[/MENTION]'s description) is not that hard at all. (And in lieu of any sophisticated "fail forward" in the event of failure, if the PC is 14th level as Reynard suggested then the hp mechanics will probably carry that load.)

 

[robus]

The description of a fictional action necessarily includes a goal (what you hope to achieve) and an approach (how you try to achieve it) e.g. "I try to clear the 10'-wide pit by jumping over it." This allows the DM determine if the task is possible or impossible and, if possible, whether there's a need for an ability check which may or may not include a skill proficiency.

I'm really not understanding this hard line you're drawing. The jumping rules determine what a character can do without possibility of failure. I.e. they automatically succeed, no check required. There then has to be a certain amount of reasonable distance beyond that the character can attempt with some risk of failure. And a further distance at which the character is guaranteed to fail.

The character stating that they realize they're attempting to jump beyond what they can do without fail (but not an unreasonable distance) puts them into this grey area surely?

I don't get why you're being so black and white about it?

 

[Charlaquin]

Failure's meaning is also M, though. And not an additional M, but the same M. You keep persisting with this unsubstantiated notion that failure has to have added meaning. It doesn't. You saying so isn't going to change the rule. The formula is M=M. So long as M is not 0, failure has meaning.

The failure’s value is a variable we are trying to find. If the failure’s value is equal to the situation’s value, then M+X should equal 2M. But it doesn’t. M+X=M, therefore X must equal 0. If the meaning is not altered by the failure, the failure is not where the meaning came from.

You flat up attribute to me the argument that all failure has meaning, and that's not anything I said from my first post on this subject to my latest. That's a gross distortion of my argument.

No, I do not. I attribute to you the argument that failure to achieve a goal can have meaning by itself, not it always does. It would take only one example of a failure to achieve a goal having meaning by itself to prove that failure can be meaningful by itself. And still you have not given one.

 

[iserith]

Sure, but the reason might simply be "I know I can't clear this comfortably - it's further than the gap I jump across every morning when I'm training! - but if I give it my all I might just make it!"

The idea that, by default, the distances a hero can try and jump either fall into the will automatically make it category and the can't possibly make it category isn't that appealing to me, and on my reading of the 5e rules is not mandated by them.

Is it sufficient or not? That seems like something uncertain - and hence that might aptly be determined by a check.

To be clear, my position is only on what the jumping rules specifically say in the context of how to play the game (again, according to the rules), especially as it relates to the need for the player to describe a goal and approach for the DM to judge and not just ask to make an ability check.

While I would likely not rule that a character can just "try harder" (or words to that effect) to jump than normal without some kind of circumstance giving him or her a boost, it is not for me to say whether another DM is wrong for accepting "I try harder" as a viable approach to the goal of jumping an unusually long distance. And it would be equally incorrect for anyone to say that I'm wrong for not accepting that approach as anything other than a normal jump. This is also my position with regard to judging something as having a meaningful consequence of failure as evidenced by my exchange upthread with @Maxperson and @Charlaquin.