Why PCs should be competent, or "I got a lot of past in my past"

[Wolfpack48]

I am playing other games than D&D, though the current campaigns aren't really scratching my itch for competence either.

It's not the fragility I have a problem with (well, not much). It's the incompetence. 50% chance of success is a horribly low chance for anything you're doing at more than a hobby level. I want success chances of at least 2/3 on things I'm supposed to be OK at, and 90% or above on things I'm supposed to be good at.

A "medium" DC in 5e is 15. A 1st level character built using the standard array and using their best stat and a skill in which they're proficient will have a +5 bonus, which means they need a 10+ to succeed. That's not "pretty competent". That's really bad.

Is there some way to tweak DC for skill level? Experienced "medium" DC becomes a 10, or "proficient" becomes a +10 instead of 5?

 

[Maxperson]

Or just start at 3rd level. The fragile newb period in 5E is amazingly short.

That's what I've been doing for decades and it works just fine. Still playing D&D!

 

[GrimCo]

I am playing other games than D&D, though the current campaigns aren't really scratching my itch for competence either.

And what level of competence would be ok with you so you can say that character is competent?

It's not the fragility I have a problem with (well, not much). It's the incompetence. 50% chance of success is a horribly low chance for anything you're doing at more than a hobby level. I want success chances of at least 2/3 on things I'm supposed to be OK at, and 90% or above on things I'm supposed to be good at.

A "medium" DC in 5e is 15. A 1st level character built using the standard array and using their best stat and a skill in which they're proficient will have a +5 bonus, which means they need a 10+ to succeed. That's not "pretty competent". That's really bad.

DC are there for tasks that you do under stress or duress and there is repercussions if you fail. Not for tasks that you do under normal circumstances. For that you don't even need to roll. You do just succeed. If you character is a smith and wants to forge a blade, you don't need a roll. If you have enough time, access to tools, forge and good materials, you just forge a blade, some days you do more, some less, sometimes you fudge something so you need to rework it, but in the end, you are successful. But if your smith has to make it on the short order for local noble or you are getting evicted, then you are under stress and you roll.

Thats how it works in real life. I'm sure you also seen people fudge tasks that they done hundreds of times and can almost do it in their sleep, because they are stresed out, they are facing very tight deadlines or something like that.

 

[uzirath]

As has been mentioned a few times upthread, the issue around the odds of failure depends on the particular game's baseline assumptions about what calls for a skill check and how the rules define expertise. I know that GURPS hasn't gotten a lot of love in this thread, but it's the game I'm most experienced with, so I'll use it as an example.

In GURPS, your base skill level "measures your odds of success at an 'average' task under adventuring conditions – in other words, in a stressful situation where the consequences of failure are significant" (GURPS Basic Set, p. 171). Under normal, non-adventuring circumstances, you roll with a +4 or higher bonus. (They include an airline pilot as an example on the same page.) As a result, even at relatively low point values, characters usually succeed at routine job tasks.

A recent character of mine, for example, is a security officer on a space navy vessel. She was built on 125 points and her base skill levels range from 10 to 14. Thus she's quite competent at her job. For routine tasks, she would roll with a bonus against a minimum of 14 (91% chance of success) for her weakest trained skills. For her core competencies, she has above a 98% chance of success. At that level, the GM—following the guidelines in the rules—assumes success unless there are high dramatic stakes for a critical success or failure. When we were in the setup phase for the adventure, she used a number of routine skills. The GM narrated the results, except for my edge skills. Even with those, she succeeded on nearly every check.

Later, however, we were in a battle with space pirates and there was a lot of time pressure (i.e., "adventuring conditions"). Under those circumstances, her skills were more modest, and had higher chances of failure. Still, though, she seemed quite dependable, especially at her best skills.

During a battle situation, she tried to use her blaster to hit a small control panel by a door from some distance. Her base skill is 14... generally considered to be at "expert" level. But, the smoke caused a -2 vision penalty. The size of the target and range led to another -3, meaning that her effective skill was a 9 (~38% chance of success). Now, she could have stopped to aim, which would have increased her chances significantly, but we were racing to get to another area, so she took the unaimed shot and missed. The chase was on. This was dramatically satisfying and fit with our sense of the fictional situation. She felt like a mid-range action hero.

If we wanted to make things even more cinematic, we would build the characters on higher point totals, leading to higher skill levels. Again, routine use would be a non-issue, but the characters would have better odds in more extreme circumstances: thicker smoke, longer range, smaller target, from a moving vehicle, etc.

While the D&D rules don't preclude any of this (I've played extensively in every edition since BECMI), in my experience it's easier to fine-tune character competency in a skill-based system.

 

[Reynard]

The biggest mistake people make in running TTRPGs, broadly speaking, is calling for unnecessary rolls.

You call for a roll when the following 2 things are true:
1) The outcome is uncertain. That means you DON'T call for rols during routine activities.
2) The consequences of success or failure are interesting and further develop the current situation. That means thar even if the outcome is uncertain, if the actual results don't matter, don't call for a roll.

Relatedly, my personal philosophy includes: if you call for a roll as GM, you stick with the result and its consequences, no matter what.

 

[GrimCo]

I agree with that sentiment, that's how i treat skills as a DM and that's how both of DMs i play with treat them.

For mundane tasks under normal circumstances, no rolls are required. Tell what you want to do and how you do it. Thats it. You did it. You roll only when there is something at stake. Rogue opening lock for house owner who locked himself out of his own house, he doesn't need to roll, he will open the door. Rogue opening lock while trying to be quiet, under time constrain to do it quick while his pals are on the lookout for guards and passers by, then you roll.

 

[aramis erak]

While there is certainly nothing in D&D that forces players to make young characters, it is certainly implicit to the structure of D&D and the assumption that you start at 1st level that you make an inexperienced character. This assumption in my experience tends to be soft forcing on the idea of a young character, because otherwise you typically have to assume some character flaw to explain why an older character is inexperienced and most players aren't into that. It's not that you can't have a middle-aged rich dilletante like Bilbo Baggins finally getting out of the house for the first time in his life as a PC in D&D, it's just that that story doesn't typically resonate with players who are generally creating a player character as a playing piece to self-identify as. Whereas, if the inexperienced character is young, this doesn't present itself as a character flaw but the natural expectation.

Sure, you can probably think up a dozen or so original backgrounds to explain why an older character as very few useful life skills and now is suddenly going on an adventure as an exercise in creativity, but those explanations aren't as obvious as "my PC is young" and often carry unwanted baggage.

The only reason that it's really an issue in an old D&D format is that money earned generates XP. So shopkeepers, merchants, and farmers all earn XP...

If we make the assumption that the D&D GP is the Domesday shilling¹ (1086), a typical laborer makes 1-2 £ per year, or thus 20-40 gp... so a laborer takes 1200/40=30 years to make level 2 as a thief - or if we assume level 0-1 takes as much XP as level 1-2 (I can't get to GHA to check the AD&D rule on that) then to make level 1...
The major farmer would make a few dozen £ per year... 12£ is 240 XP, so 5 years to Thief 1 or 2. The wealthy merchant clearing 100£ per year was getting 2000 XP...

This is where the disconnect hits. Treasure from any source generates XP. Now, if the laborer works only for room, board, and clothing, they get none...

---

1: There's almost a 1:1 correspondence twixt a report of some prices in shillings from Domesday and the D&D OE GP prices, and I read it in a book I got in 1990 via ILL checked out of the Lake Geneva Public Library with it checked out in 1973 by EGGygax, per the checkout sleeve)... A couple items with mixed shillings and pence were rounded up. Also, a few pages before, mention was made of the gold shilling - 1dwt of gold as a shilling coin. Another reference in that same region notes a 12dwt (silver) shilling... which is, for reference, 1/20 of a troy pound....

 

[aramis erak]

You really need to do one of three things with D&D here:

1. Accept PCs are not typical.

2. Force downtime so that progression is not fast.

3. Accept there's a heck of a lot of high level characters out there.

I don't really see a fourth case.

4. Assume that XP cannot be earned by anything other than great risks.

It doesn't assume PCs are atypical in anything but willingness to take risks.

 

[aramis erak]

Which RPGs have it where the players aren't doing some kind of adventuring?

Ars Magica and Mechwarrior 2nd ed both have significant downtime activities that, in the right circumstances...

Wait, I know pushback is inevitable.
So... Explicating:
In Ars Magica, it's entirely possible, if uninspired, to play the character who takes his 1-2 pawns of Vis from the covenant's distribution, and whose biggest adventure is surviving the botched research rolls. Now, given that GMing is shared, it's quite possible for anyone in the group to hit the covenant grounds with some adventure, but that's not itself a given, either.

In Mechwarrior 2e with Mercenary's Handbook (MHB), it's entirely doable to RP the "Paper Colonel" (or in Brit-Speak, "Regimental Colonel") - the organizer of the merc unit who never themself take the field. All the fighting can be abstracted with the MHB's abstract combat system. The only adventure said Colonel is facing is negotiating the next contract and paying the bills. Both of which ALSO have abstraction mechanics. (I'm talking the 1980's MHB, for reference)

 

[aramis erak]

Its kind of weird in that you start ok at most stuff, but then get worse and worse at everything but one or two things which you get really good at.

There are many who will push back because they're not familiar with PF RAW...
The reason for that's because the difficulties climb as the character levels - the skilled skills remain the same odds for the same difficulty label, while the unskilled skills fall behind.

It's instantly solved by excising that one bit of (IMO, asinine) design.