D&D General What's wrong with Perception?

[jasper]

When sometime around late 2016 early 2017 the idea that passive perception was always on, and writers did not start bumping the DC to account for this. As Hriston states perception by the creators became radar.

 

[DEFCON 1]

When sometime around late 2016 early 2017 the idea that passive perception was always on, and writers did not start bumping the DC to account for this. As Hriston states perception by the creators became radar.

Heh... I've had "passive perception" as being always on since it was introduced to the game back in 4E.

As far as writers not accounting for it... if/when I found an issue in one of the adventures I just changed the DC myself in whatever method I felt appropriate at the time. Didn't need anyone to account for it in the writing.

 

[jasper]

Heh... I've had "passive perception" as being always on since it was introduced to the game back in 4E.

As far as writers not accounting for it... if/when I found an issue in one of the adventures I just changed the DC myself in whatever method I felt appropriate at the time. Didn't need anyone to account for it in the writing.

My point is. Once it was change, writers and errata should have taken it into account. Everyone knows you can change stuff. Writers Do your job.

 

[Jefe Bergenstein]

I always run into people wanting to use Acrobatics for climbing. Climbing stuff is like half the point of the Athletics skill.

Acrobats climb stuff pretty fast too. Springing off some walls up an alley seems a fair acrobat use. Athletics still governs lifting/breaking/swimming if we want to keep it's niche protection.

I don't see any reason more than one skill can't be used for certain rolls. I tend to allow that, and offer two rolls if you're training in both, like using religion or history for knowledge on a religious crusade, or even athletics/history for who won the Dungeonball championship of 3472.

 

[Ogre Mage]

This complaint is hardly unique to Dungeons and Dragons. On the Savage Worlds boards I've seen similar complaints about the over-importance of the Notice skill. In the World of Darkness it's the Awareness skill.

 

[Vaalingrade]

Never got the issue between perception and investigation.

Investigation is noticing and inferring things people do such as figuring out where something has actively been hidden while perception is noticing things using available sensory information.

For example, I pride myself on being able to decipher 'idiot logic', such as what led someone to do something stupid or where grocery stores stock things. This is investigation and would lead me to going to the correct aisle.

If I was wandering the aisles and just looking for the item without any idea where to start, it would be perception and would only come up once I Magoo'd my way to that aisle.

Someone with Investigation knows to check for a false bottom to a desk drawer. Someone with perception only gets to check for that if they are actively interacting with the drawer.

 

[rooneg]

Acrobats climb stuff pretty fast too. Springing off some walls up an alley seems a fair acrobat use. Athletics still governs lifting/breaking/swimming if we want to keep it's niche protection.

Acrobats climb quickly because they’re Athletic and Strong ;-)

Seriously, Strength is already one of the worst attributes, it doesn’t need its lunch money being stolen by Dexterity any more than it already has been.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Something I noticed in the "what don't you like about 5e?" thread was a few people griping about players going out of their way to take Perception. I'd run into this a few years back when I played Pathfinder 1e as well. I'm not really sure what the problem is with players wanting to be good at noticing things, so I was wondering if maybe people would help me understand their point of view on the topic.

D&D especially is a game where not noticing something can end up with your character getting in serious trouble, so it seems to me that everyone would want the ability to not blunder into traps or be snuck up on by Bugbears.

It's wildly overused.

D&D 5E is completely wildly over-reliant on it. People often name it as a "god-tier skill" or the like, and that's not a sign of good design, that's a sign of bad design.

Fewer things should require Perception tests, including passive Perception.

It's weird that you don't see a problem from your own description. It's not really optional. At least one, preferably multiple party members need a high Perception, for 5E to function correctly. If you don't, your party is basically Sideshow Bob in the field full of rakes. That's not interesting. That's not engaging. That's not fun. It's not even active - it's literally 90% passive. It's just a dumb must-have thing, that someone in the party either has as a matter of course, or has to sacrifice some stuff to get.

It's much like healing in 2E. It wasn't that people wanted to be "COOL HEALER DUDE", almost no-one did. But someone had to bloody be the Cleric or no-one was getting any healing and you were all going to die. Likewise Perception. Very few people want to be "COOL PERCEPTION DUDE", but unless you have 1+ party members who have high Perception, the game turns into a total farce.

BORING!!!

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Acrobats climb quickly because they’re Athletic and Strong ;-)

Seriously, Strength is already one of the worst attributes, it doesn’t need its lunch money being stolen by Dexterity any more than it already has been.

On the contrary it absolutely does.

Acrobatics needs to basically do everything Athletics does when it comes to movement or escaping from stuff, otherwise you're getting into a moronic situation where super-agile characters are terrible at climbing and jumping and so on, because they don't have a ton of STR.

You're totally missing the point re: "lunch money". You're like a nerdy kid bullying another nerdy kid out of his lunch money, when the fat INT/WIS/CHA trio will come around the corner and take both of your lunch monies. The real issue is that either fewer skills should roll off INT/WIS/CHA, or characters who primary STR or DEX need stuff to make up the difference - Expertise, Reliable Talent, extra skill proficiencies and so on.

 

[Vaalingrade]

How do we propose to have characters interact without their environment without determining if they notice things?