D&D 5E At Your 5E Table, How Is It Agreed upon That the PCs Do Stuff Other than Attack?

[Micah Sweet]

It seems like a very passive-aggressive confrontational relationship of player and DM to me. It's one thing to optimize a PC, it's another to try to game the DM and exploit loopholes.

In my experience, that's just what players do.

 

[Micah Sweet]

If I'm making an insight check in the middle of a conversation with an npc, there's really only one thing I could be doing.

If we're trying to cross a rope and the last two pc's made acrobatics checks to try to balance across, I would assume you know what I mean when I say I want to make an acrobatics check as well.

If I'd like to get to the window, and you tell me there's a guard at the door, "I'll make a stealth check" seems pretty clear to me.

"I'd like to cast invisibility" is usually accepted - aside form stating what spell I am casting how will I communicate that?

I'd really prefer that players don't describe their actions in mechanical terms at all, at least not until I tell them how to adjudicate what they want to do.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I guess I've never really considered an Insight check as "a described action." It's something that happens in the background at my table.

Like, for the "searching out a lie" part of the rule. Let's say that there's a conversation between one of the characters in the group and an NPC fisherman, and they are talking about the fish that got away. I might ask someone at the table to roll an Insight check to see if the NPC is being sincere, exaggerating a bit, or outright lying to them. It doesn't cost the character an action, and they don't have to declare it, I just use it as a way to shape the tone of the scene. My response is always something like "the fisherman really believes what he's saying," and never "the fisherman is telling the truth."

And for the "predicting someone's next move" part, I ask a player to roll for Insight in combat to help the party understand their opponent's behavior and to build tension. For example, if their enemy readies an action, or a dragon's breath weapon recharges, I'll ask someone to make an Insight check for free to see if they notice. It doesn't cost the character an action, it's just a way to measure intuition. It's something I do to build tension.

Players that ask for an Insight check are usually doing so because they don't know what questions to ask, or they don't know who to trust, or they just want to resolve a complicated social situation with a single dice roll. And that's...not really what the Insight skill is for. So I consider it to be a request for more information...they are saying "um, could you give us a hint here?" I'll let them roll, but I'll ignore the result and give them more hints about questions they should ask, or which NPCs might be more trustworthy, or what they should expect, etc., to help them move forward.

I'm really not a big fan of the Insight check as a blanket lie detector, but the rules are usually read that way and its hard to convince players otherwise.

 

[Oofta]

...
Players that ask for an Insight check are usually doing so because they don't know what questions to ask, or they don't know who to trust, or they just want to resolve a complicated social situation with a single dice roll. And that's...not really what the Insight skill is for. So I consider it to be a request for more information...they are saying "um, could you give us a hint here?" I'll let them roll, but I'll ignore the result and give them more hints about questions they should ask, or which NPCs might be more trustworthy, or what they should expect, etc., to help them move forward.

Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. Asking for an insight check means that you, as a player, may not believe the NPC but aren't sure if your PC picks it up. Sometimes it's just something just doesn't seem to fit in the story, perhaps there's missing information, something the PC isn't saying. There are many, many reasons to ask for insight. Fishing for information? Not really one of them.

But even if, heaven forefend, someone is just fishing. So what? If you're trying to solve a mystery there are going to be times when you just have to ask the dumb question, review the situation, think on what is happening and what you've seen. I don't have an adversarial relationship with my players (although the NPC might) so of course I'm going to help them out. I'll do it by giving them clues to the target's emotional state, which is what insight is designed to infer. There's no reason to withhold that.

 

[Oofta]

In my experience, that's just what players do.

If you don't want players exploiting loopholes, tell them to not exploit loopholes. Treat them like reasonable people who understand that everyone is just there to have fun playing a game. Radical concept, I know.

If they continue to do things you don't want them to do? Give them a warning. They continue? Tell them you'd be willing to play with them, but not as their DM. It's never gotten to that point for me (it got close once, then we moved) but I'd rather just have open and frank discussions with people. As long as you're clear on the ground rules, which is something I do when inviting people to my game and I reiterate in a session 0, I don't see what the problem is. If someone is being a total jerk they're likely ruining the fun for everyone at the table.

In other words: if someone is doing something you don't want, remember the power of the word "no". Explain why once and then repeat as often as necessary. If they can't handle "no" they need to find a different group or a different shared activity.

 

[overgeeked]

If you don't want players exploiting loopholes, tell them to not exploit loopholes. Treat them like reasonable people who understand that everyone is just there to have fun playing a game. Radical concept, I know.

They respond much like people on the internet do when you tell someone your preference differ from theirs. You get a flood of responses telling you you’re wrong and it should be done like this or that the rules say that. I wonder where all these reasonable adults are you seem to think are out there. They don’t seem to post much anywhere on the internet. Either that or the internet is representative of what a reasonable adult is like nowadays. We’re 60 some responses in to an argument about differing preferences on how to handle ability checks. This is about how it goes at the table. Endless arguments…at least with most modern players.

 

[Oofta]

They respond much like people on the internet do when you tell someone your preference differ from theirs. You get a flood of responses telling you you’re wrong and it should be done like this or that the rules say that. I wonder where all these reasonable adults are you seem to think are out there. They don’t seem to post much anywhere on the internet. Either that or the internet is representative of what a reasonable adult is like nowadays. We’re 60 some responses in to an argument about differing preferences on how to handle ability checks. This is about how it goes at the table. Endless arguments…at least with most modern players.

If someone disagrees I explain that when I DM I set the rules. I listen to input, try to find compromise but the buck stops with me. Arguments stop because I just explain my decision and then say "no". If they continue to argue I'd show them the door, although that has never happened.

If they can't handle it then they can DM themselves or find a different DM. I'm not the right DM for everyone and I'm not going to be the right player for every DM. But if I sit at a DM's table, they set the rules. I agree with some of the things my current DM does, some I don't. But I'm enjoying the game so I keep going.

If it's a group of preexisting friends perhaps a different game or social activity would work better. All I can say is this is the pattern I've followed for decades and it's always worked. Occasionally a player isn't a good fit and we part ways amicably. Occasionally a DM or group doesn't work for me and I'll walk away, something I've done twice. Technically I walked away a third time from a group I didn't join where the height of hilarity was a story about Bobtown where everyone was named Bob, but that's a bit different.

I just see no upside to trying to forcing people to play "my way" in order to fix behavior that I don't want to see instead of just discussing it.

 

[Hriston]

If I'm making an insight check in the middle of a conversation with an npc, there's really only one thing I could be doing.

If we're trying to cross a rope and the last two pc's made acrobatics checks to try to balance across, I would assume you know what I mean when I say I want to make an acrobatics check as well.

If I'd like to get to the window, and you tell me there's a guard at the door, "I'll make a stealth check" seems pretty clear to me.

I might "know what [you] mean" in any of the above instances of play, but what you're actually saying is that you, the player, intend to roll a d20, add applicable modifiers, and compare the result to a DC. This is in contrast to someone who is describing fiction using words, which is the distinction on which the poll and thread are meant to focus. If your point is words don't matter and that people are only ever saying what they and their interlocutors understand them to mean, then I think that sort of notion is going to hinder discussion of the different kinds of things people can say.

"I'd like to cast invisibility" is usually accepted - aside form stating what spell I am casting how will I communicate that?

This one is different. Casting a spell is something a character does in the fiction. See the difference?

 

[Oofta]

.

...
This one is different. Casting a spell is something a character does in the fiction. See the difference?

The character is also doing the search in fiction. So no ... there's not really a difference.

 

[Swarmkeeper]

Asking for an insight check means that you, as a player, may not believe the NPC but aren't sure if your PC picks it up.

Can you, as a player at your table, just say that your PC doesn't believe the NPC?