D&D General "I make a perception check."

[Jfdlsjfd]

You can just move behind the door & hope for the best. Alternately if you were really stumped on what your PC might do you could make some kind of knowledge check (ie wis:stealth or wis:insight) to intuit what would be a good place to hide then say "yea I want to hide in [specific one]" after coming up with options. Of couirse how long you want to spend trying to intuit that will impact the DC & possible results but you would need to decide that not expect me the gm to decide it

(just a general opinion about something you said and not a direct criticism of the good idea of using mental stats to assess things when you have the time to do some assessing beforehand).

I would expect deciding where to hide is a part, maybe a central part when in a hurry and needing to hide now!, of the Stealth skill. My real-life Stealth let me know that one can't hide by just running behind the back of a person and mimicking his moves, and that closing your eyes doesn't make you more stealthy. At the table, I'd be unhappy if my skilled rogue mastering the art of not being seen was having to roll (and potentially fail) because the untrained barbarian's player identified that hiding behind the curtain was the ideal place (automatic success) while I chose to have my rogue hide under the table.

Same if I were to use Stealth to get past a guard. It might very well be extremely stupid in real life to throw a rock at an armour to make a noise and use the time he's looking toward the noise to speed toward the next room, because it warns the guard that something is odd and he probably won't leave his post to look at the armour scratching his head but just glance quickly toward the armour and put his hand on his sword, warily (or it could be a tried and true tactics of infiltrators, for all I know, but let's assume it's bad). So basically, doing that is both a flourish in description and a bad idea that should warrant disadvantage, compared to Bobby Barbarian whose player just said "I roll Stealth to get in the next room, err, stealthily?". I'd say my skilled rogue would know if the stone trick is a valid one or not. Especially since, irrespective of the validity of the trick in real life, it works in fiction (Plague's Tale, Thief...) and might work in the genre-emulating gameworld.

I am not pleading for not describing rolls, but that part of the skill is knowing how to do things without player adjudication. One wouldn't ask "do you chant the song of revealing first or do you do the magic-detecting gesture first when using Arcana to assess if the sword is magical?"

 

[iserith]

I want to change perspective and come at this as a player for a minute, since I GM a lot more than I play. It might help me better understand that needs and intents of those players that declare "I roll perception! ::clatter::"

If I am a player and in a circumstance that feel precarious, my first instinct is to declare something like, "I draw my weapons and prepare for anything." If I am being honest, that's pretty vague (except the weapons part).

I want to ask @Charlaquin and @GMforPowergamers and anyone else how you would respond to that declaration.

Absent an additional context about this precarious circumstance, I would just say "Okay, great, sounds like you're keeping watch..." or, if I'm a couple drinks in, "The rasp of cold steel! Shounds like you're keeping wash..." Then ask what the next character is doing, if I need to.

From a rules perspective, whatever task they were doing before stops and they are alert to threats. If I decide to have monsters attack the party from hiding, this character's passive Perception applies when determining surprise. They also don't have to use any actions or object interactions to have their weapons at the ready in the first round, should a combat break out.

Edit: YIKES, this post is eerily similar to @Charlaquin's!

 

[Charlaquin]

Except, unless your description is perfect (and who's is?) you will know the layout better than the player. Further, this is another way of saying, my character is better at this than I (the player) am, can I get some help.
Sure,

But some people are WAY better at that then others. In a D&D game there would be some (even possibly in the party) who are practically supernatural at it (even without magic). The skill exists and there is plenty of fiction (heck a while genre of ninja movies) to support it. If a player what's his character to be good at that, I'll let him

My description should be enough for the players to understand the options available to them. As for being better at hiding, again, I don’t really see what there is to be better or worse at when it comes to hiding. Maybe the keeping still and quiet part? That should only come up if there’s uncertainty in whether or not they will be found, in which case they will get to add their character’s stealth-related bonuses to the check they will have to make.

There are lots and lots of tables some which works be MUCH easier to hide behind or under.

Ok. I wouldn’t describe that as stats, but I see what you mean.

 

[Charlaquin]

Right so if comes to a check a character with high stealth is likely to get a great number and beat the passive perception of any guards. The player’s choice, of course, might make it so that no check is needed, but if it is, the character build is going to have a big impact.

Exactly. In my view, having to make a check is the worst case scenario because checks can fail and have consequences for failing. Your character’s stats help insulate you against the risk of failing and having to suffer those consequences in the unfortunate case where you have no other option but to place your fate in the hands of a fickle d20.

 

[tetrasodium]

(just a general opinion about something you said and not a direct criticism of the good idea of using mental stats to assess things when you have the time to do some assessing beforehand).

I would expect deciding where to hide is a part, maybe a central part when in a hurry and needing to hide now!, of the Stealth skill. My real-life Stealth let me know that one can't hide by just running behind the back of a person and mimicking his moves, and that closing your eyes doesn't make you more stealthy. At the table, I'd be unhappy if my skilled rogue mastering the art of not being seen was having to roll (and potentially fail) because the untrained barbarian's player identified that hiding behind the curtain was the ideal place (automatic success) while I chose to have my rogue hide under the table.

Same if I were to use Stealth to get past a guard. It might very well be extremely stupid in real life to throw a rock at an armour to make a noise and use the time he's looking toward the noise to speed toward the next room, because it warns the guard that something is odd and he probably won't leave his post to look at the armour scratching his head but just glance quickly toward the armour and put his hand on his sword, warily (or it could be a tried and true tactics of infiltrators, for all I know, but let's assume it's bad). So basically, doing that is both a flourish in description and a bad idea that should warrant disadvantage, compared to Bobby Barbarian whose player just said "I roll Stealth to get in the next room, err, stealthily?". I'd say my skilled rogue would know if the stone trick is a valid one or not. Especially since, irrespective of the validity of the trick in real life, it works in fiction (Plague's Tale, Thief...) and might work in the genre-emulating gameworld.

I am not pleading for not describing rolls, but that part of the skill is knowing how to do things without player adjudication. One wouldn't ask "do you chant the song of revealing first or do you do the magic-detecting gesture first when using Arcana to assess if the sword is magical?"

I was unclear in that post. I wouldn't require a roll because it's just as useless as attempting to see inside the castle by peering at the streetside stone wall surrounding it, you just fail & never had a chance because it's closing your eyes to hide level bad. this post has a better example of using stealth with competence.

 

[Charlaquin]

Edit: YIKES, this post is eerily similar to @Charlaquin's!

We both run exploration and travel pretty similarly. I think the biggest difference is probably in the system I use for determining complications. Also, I treat foraging as a one travel turn action instead of an ongoing action while traveling.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

I kind of agree with the OP in that I prefer the players explain what their characters do in natural language rather than in game mechanics when possible.

I have a player who, when I mention something that seems suspicious about an area, will exclaim “I search for traps!” but also sometimes simply “Perception!”

As I am familiar with the player, I know that when they say “Perception!” they very likely mean they carefully investigate the area, hoping to avoid falling into any traps. So instead of having an argument, I just ask for confirmation. “Do you want to search the room?”

90% of the time, they say “yes”, I describe how the character is carefully moving through the room, investigating the flagstones and walls, and, assuming no objection, I secretly roll the d20. If one of the flagstones is trapped, they might trigger it if their roll is too low.

If there are no traps, but the southwest corner has some loose floorboards with treasure hidden, they will find it if their roll was high enough, even though it isn’t a trap.

If there is an alcove with treasure hidden behind a tapestry, they will find it if they roll high enough. However, if they say “I look behind the tapestry”, they will automatically find the alcove, assuming the tapestry is the only thing preventing them from seeing the alcove.

So while I would prefer the player says “I search the room” to “Perception!”, I can usually infer the former from the latter. I also don’t require as precise a description as “I look behind the tapestry,” but specificity can in some instances be advantageous to the players.

The reason why I prefer natural language to game mechanical lamguage is that it makes the experience more immersive to me and (as far as I can tell) my players.

Imagine if the DM was equally lazy in their narrative.

DM: “You are in a room.”
Players: “Perception.”
DM: rolls
DM: “You gain 187 gold pieces and a dagger.”

That would make for an immensely boring game, I think.

I could be wrong, but I think we ALL agree with your post.

 

[Swarmkeeper]

I think it’s things like a tablecloth etc. I might not describe a tablecloth in my description but if a player asked “is there a tablecloth that would decently obscure me?“ I might add one because it‘s fun and reasonable.

There's always a chandelier!

 

[Maxperson]

IMNSHO, the DM that clearly understands what his players want but demands they phrase it differently seems like they're picking a weird hill to die on.

The players clearly wants to create confusion for the DM and situations where the DM has their PCs do things differently than they would have done them?

 

[Maxperson]

There's always a chandelier!

Just ask Errol Flynn.