D&D 5E Using social skills on other PCs

[HammerMan]

Hang on, I thought you said the player decides how their character reacts to the intimidation in your games. Now you’re saying the roll has a binary result - the NPC succeeds at intimidating the PC or fails to do so. How do you square that with the player getting to decide how their character reacts?

the same way I do when my NPCs under my control are intimidated, or any other player/dm...

I remember the exchange you’re referring to, but @iserith didn’t quote 3e in that exchange. Someone else quoted the 3e PHB to demonstrate that, in 3e, it was explicitly the case that social skill checks couldn’t cause PCs to do something the player doesn’t want their character to do. That doesn’t mean that source is where @iserith is getting the idea that actions made to force a character to decide something out of the player’s control don’t have an uncertain outcome in 5e. In fact, I would wager @iserith wasn’t even aware of the 3e quote in question, since they haven’t played or run 3e in a long time.

and yet the ONLY place we can find it is... an older edition (something he swears he magically whiped from his mind to read the one true way of 5e)

Furthermore, the 3e quote in question wouldn’t even make sense in the context of 5e, where ability checks are part of the action resolution process rather than actions in and of themselves. It made sense in 3e, where skill checks were things you could just do.

and yet it is the only carve out we can find.

And no one is arguing that there is.

so the skill works, the stat check works the same for players and npcs... so you agree with me?

It also isn’t even close to our reading, which again, doesn’t treat ability checks as discrete actions, but as a part of the process of resolving actions.

and even by your reading (declair action, decide if it is possible or not auto fail auto success or not , pick dc, roll) we can show how it can be an NPC making the check

 

[Swarmkeeper]

I believe that when we have an in game skill test of any type the DM can call for an ability check or contest. I believe that it doesn't take control of the PC/NPC and give it to the winner of the skill, the owner of the character still decides what they do and how they react.

Agreed

the same as any other ability check to test for the ______ of the PC/NPC

In your game, though, right? You had just said ability checks were binary. The degree was your house rule.

Orc is guarding pie. PC keeps bugging orc, but orc doesn't want to fight, so he is going to try to intimidate them to go away (after telling them just go away a few times) I say he growls. this is not (DOn't just please don't go back to this) an auto matic sucess or fail, and we need to know if the orc is actually scary or not... so I set a DC (no I can't give you a DC, look up how to set them) roll and pass/fail
fail: Player is told orc failed to intimidate them and they react
pass: Player is told orc succeed to intimdate them and they react.

React how? By RAW, how should they react?

 

[Lanefan]

I don't quite agree with that. The encounter creation rules. The entirety of them......................guidelines. Every last rule in the DM's workshop...............................guidelines. All the rules on creating NPCs.......................guidelines. All the magic item and treasure rules........................guidelines.

5e has created a situation where guidelines and rules are completely interchangeable.

Which is why each DM has to decide where the line between guidelines and rules falls, and it'll fall in a different place for each one. I suspect you and I are at different ends of this: you seem to treat a lot of things as being rules that I would treat as mere guidelines.

And arguing about guidelines as if they were rules is likely to get nowhere fast.

 

[Bill Zebub]

Seriously - you support cheating in the game??? That doesn't sound like you, somehow.

It's only "cheating" by the expectations/restrictions you put on the game. For those who don't adopt your house rules, it's not cheating.

Personally I think it's "cheating" for the DM to force their own storyline by telling the players how they are supposed to roleplay.

 

[HammerMan]

React how? By RAW, how should they react?

By RAW there is no reaction dictated. Not for NPCs not for PCs.

Just like way back my whole "The farmer falls backwards in fear and the dogs move up growling"
or "The orc punches you in the face" or "the orc now sees you as the strongest and is following your lead..." or "the orc runs away"
or "the kobold pees his pants and faints" or "The kobold tells you everything you want to know
or "the guard calls for help" or "the guard lets you by"

all based on the DMs view of how this monster/npc reacts.

I would expect the player to take the information given and figure out how there character would respond...

 

[Maxperson]

Which is why each DM has to decide where the line between guidelines and rules falls, and it'll fall in a different place for each one. I suspect you and I are at different ends of this: you seem to treat a lot of things as being rules that I would treat as mere guidelines.

And arguing about guidelines as if they were rules is likely to get nowhere fast.

5e set rules and guidelines up as one and the same, though. Not me.

 

[Swarmkeeper]

Claiming it themselves would open up a whole other can o' worms, in that some players would constantly be claiming it while others - the more reticent ones, or those less confident in their roleplaying - rarely if ever would.

End result: arguments; and all of them preventable by simply not using such a system.

Then how come, after using this method for the last 6 months, there have been zero arguments at our table? I mean, this is in a West Marches campaign with 3 different DMs and 14 additional players? Is my table an outlier? Or is the 5e DMG variant on "Player's Award Inspiration" ok after all?

 

[HammerMan]

Which is why each DM has to decide where the line between guidelines and rules falls, and it'll fall in a different place for each one. I suspect you and I are at different ends of this: you seem to treat a lot of things as being rules that I would treat as mere guidelines.

And arguing about guidelines as if they were rules is likely to get nowhere fast.

and I do believe that is the RAI by the writers and WotC as a whole... they WANT us all interpreting the rules our own ways.

 

[Charlaquin]

and I do believe that is the RAI by the writers and WotC as a whole... they WANT us all interpreting the rules our own ways.

Funny, Jeremy Crawford said RAI is that you can’t make a PC do something with an ability check

 

[Lanefan]

Quite literally nobody in this thread has argued that he or she has the one true way to play. Nobody.

That might be because we're all long-timers here and know that putting forward this argument would be a fast-track to red text and getting booted...