D&D 5E Is Intimidate the worse skill in the game?

[Paul Farquhar]

Not according to the book. I just checked and it gives an example of basing it on character level.

Example: Shiera the 8th-level rogue wants to try the classic swashbuckling move of swinging on a chandelier and kicking an ogre in the chest on her way down to the ground, hoping to push the ogre into the brazier of burning coals behind it. An Acrobatics check seems reasonable.
This sort of action is exactly the kind of thinking you want to encourage, so you pick a moderate DC: The table says DC 14."

That has zero to do with the encounter level and everything to do with character level. Had a 1st level PC tried the exact same thing, the DC would have been 12.

That's not the way I do it. I would always assess the difficulty without respect to the PCs at all. If the chandelier was already within reach because it was tied up for cleaning it's DC 10. If it requires a jump to reach it's DC 15.

This means that low level characters are prone to pratfalls. Only medium-high level characters can do this sort of thing reliably. I assume movie swashbucklers are at least tier 2.

As in the session I mentioned earlier, talking your way past the palace guards is hard (DC 20) the player was only able to do it because they were level 11 and heavily invested in Charisma, Persuasion and Deception (and happened to roll well).

 

[UngeheuerLich]

No. The spirit was "if you don't know what DC would make sense, this table will give you a reasonable difficulty for a typical character." Exactly what it says on the page itself, that it is for, and I have already said this several times, improvised actions for which the books do not already have specific guidance.

Still constantly redifines easy, medium hard.

Did you ever actually read page 42? Or did you exclusively look at the table?

Yes of course.

Because I don't see how you could have read the following text and somehow gotten the idea that the DCs are being set in lockstep with the PC's level--except for things where there couldn't possibly be a pre-set DC to begin with, and thus inventing a reasonably-challenging DC is the whole point!

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So if the DM choses an equal level medium, a level 20 character might have a lower chance to succeed than a level 1 character... even if medium at level 1 looks different than medium at level 20, the feeling of being in a never ending treadmill is there as the player never knows, a certain score is good.

In 5e, you just pick easy, medium or hard and don't consult a table that depends on level.
You just chose 10, 15 or 20. So a player has numbers to compare with. They know that +9 allows them to overcome any easy challenge.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

I spoke of 3e and 5e where you tell me DCs scale.

Yes. They do. Checks are harder when you are dealing with Asmodeus.

Which is total bollocks and you made it up.

That's what you literally just said!

You said there are, only and exactly, three DCs. Easy (10), Medium (15), Hard (20). If an action requires a "Medium" check, then that action ALWAYS requires a medium check, no matter what circumstance it occurs in. That's literally what you said.

Why would you make such examples then?

Because it's what you said!

Difference:

3e and 5e define what easy and hard is. And if you face a DC 20 door at any level, it is a hard challenge. Because even at level 20 anyone not learning the skill are still as good as they were at level 1.

NNnnnnnnnope! What is "hard" at level 1 is not hard at level 20--and thus DCs go up as you gain levels. Figuring out that Asmodeus is lying is harder than figuring out that a village child is lying, and this goes up in steps, not simply "okay, and now this check is 20 when before it was 15." Perception DCs depend on monster stealth, which goes up. Hitting an enemy depends on its AC, which goes up with its CR....exactly the way things go up with monster level in 4e.

In 4e easy and hard are constantly redefined, because even the wizad who never did anything to learn how to pick locks at higher levels is suddenly an expert who can break any easy lock and has a good chance to just laugh at the hard one woth DC 20 at level 20.

They're constantly redefined in 3e and 5e too! That's what I'm telling you! It's YOUR HOUSERULE which makes "hard" this bizarre fixed number, and thus actually easier at level 20 than it is at level 1 (if and only if you have a good stat and/or proficiency/expertise).

So comically you are somehow trying to swap it around and define scaling new.

I'm not. This is what "scaling" has always meant. Stronger encounters require bigger numbers. YOU are trying to fix the world at flat, unchanging DCs that never account for any details of the situation, no matter what. That's literally what you said from the very beginning, DCs that never, ever change no matter what!

 

[EzekielRaiden]

In 5e, you just pick easy, medium or hard and don't consult a table that depends on level. You just chose 10, 15 or 20.

NO YOU DO NOT!

For God's sake, what do I have to do to prove this to you? Do I need to dig out the difficulty classes from the most recent 5e adventure I've played? Because I guarantee you they absolutely the hell are not universally fixed at 10, 15, or 20. They are ALL OVER THE PLACE. And they go UP as you face more dangerous threats. That is literally how the actual game is written.

Your fantasy of a world where there are only and exactly three difficulty classes and they remain perfectly fixed no matter what is completely invented. That's not how 3e worked, and it's not how 5e works as the book is written nor as its adventures are written.

You created this, as a house rule, because you knew that with 5e's system, allowing DCs to keep scaling up ensured that either only experts succeeded, or experts exclusively succeed and never fail.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

NO YOU DO NOT!

For God's sake, what do I have to do to prove this to you? Do I need to dig out the difficulty classes from the most recent 5e adventure I've played? Because I guarantee you they absolutely the hell are not universally fixed at 10, 15, or 20. They are ALL OVER THE PLACE. And they go UP as you face more dangerous threats. That is literally how the actual game is written.

Of course you do. An easy challenge in 5e is 10.
Of course the frequency of easy challenges gets lower.

Your fantasy of a world where there are only and exactly three difficulty classes and they remain perfectly fixed no matter what is completely invented. That's not how 3e worked, and it's not how 5e works as the book is written nor as its adventures are written.

You invent stuff I did not say.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Of course you do. An easy challenge in 5e is 10.
Of course the frequency of easy challenges gets lower.

Nope. That means it's actually pretty challenging at level 1 (only someone with at least proficiency or a good ability score has better than a 50/50 chance of succeeding), and utterly trivial at level 20 if the character has both of those things. It's NOT easy at every level. It's trivial at some levels and challenging at others.

You invent stuff I did not say.

It's literally what you said.

Containing skills in the 10 to 20 ramge was how I fixed 3e skill system myself. Once I noticed that that was probably the oroginal design intend all along, suddenly the system worked great.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

Yes. They do. Checks are harder when you are dealing with Asmodeus.


That's what you literally just said!

You said there are, only and exactly, three DCs. Easy (10), Medium (15), Hard (20). If an action requires a "Medium" check, then that action ALWAYS requires a medium check, no matter what circumstance it occurs in. That's literally what you said.


Because it's what you said!


NNnnnnnnnope! What is "hard" at level 1 is not hard at level 20--and thus DCs go up as you gain levels. Figuring out that Asmodeus is lying is harder than figuring out that a village child is lying, and this goes up in steps, not simply "okay, and now this check is 20 when before it was 15." Perception DCs depend on monster stealth, which goes up. Hitting an enemy depends on its AC, which goes up with its CR....exactly the way things go up with monster level in 4e.


They're constantly redefined in 3e and 5e too! That's what I'm telling you! It's YOUR HOUSERULE which makes "hard" this bizarre fixed number, and thus actually easier at level 20 than it is at level 1 (if and only if you have a good stat and/or proficiency/expertise).


I'm not. This is what "scaling" has always meant. Stronger encounters require bigger numbers. YOU are trying to fix the world at flat, unchanging DCs that never account for any details of the situation, no matter what. That's literally what you said from the very beginning, DCs that never, ever change no matter what!

Are you trolling me?

There is only one table in 5e. Chapter 2 of the DMG.
Very easy, easy 10, medium 15, hard 20, very hard 25, nearly impossible 30

Then those DCs are explained. You can read who can deal woth which challenge.

But the DCs for easy, medium and hard don't scale as the lack of 1/2 level bonus to eaverything, even if not proficient is not there in 5e (and it was not in 3e).

 

[Maxperson]

Yes, it has zero to do with the encounter level. Because the action is about whether that character can successfully swing. Which should--one would expect--have basically the same chances of happening regardless of character level. It's not like you're trying to swing on a rope that's on fire or something.

What's the point of getting better if the game isn't going to let you. They'd have been more honest if they just said there would be no bonuses, everyone roll an 11 or higher to do something.

The DC gets set based on level. It's poppycock for the DC to be different for the same task based only on the level of the PC.

Every example you gave before this specifically operated on the logic of something in the world somehow bending and flexing to adapt to the character's level. That doesn't happen in 4e. It never has, the books tell you NOT to do that, and they do so repeatedly across several different sections.

It literally adapts!! It's DC 12 for a 1st level PC and DC 14 for the 8th level PC. That's the DC adapting to level. It doesn't matter if the adaption it to keep things even. It's still DC adaption. If the DC is 12 at 1st level, it should be 12 at 8th.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

Nope. That means it's actually pretty challenging at level 1 (only someone with at least proficiency or a good ability score has better than a 50/50 chance of succeeding), and utterly trivial at level 20 if the character has both of those things. It's NOT easy at every level. It's trivial at some levels and challenging at others.


It's literally what you said.

Yes. I stopped scaling the world around my players. If somene had a +10 to hide, I stopped building NPCs with +10 perception.
I did not start using DC 30 challenges at level 10 so your Character feels as incomeptent as they were at level 1. I used 20 or max 25 usually.

And I also encouraged to use take 10 and take 20. So even if PCs face a DC 30 check at level 5, they can still do it if their bonus is +8 and circumstances are good given enough time.

Maybe I was simplifying it too much. But the genereal Idea that saved 3e for me was stopping to scale everything with the best in classs.

 

[Maxperson]

except the moderate DC for level 8 is...16. in fact, the only level where 14 is a moderate DC is level 4. that tells me that the level being considered isn't the character's.

I think you need to look again. The book clearly says, "7th–9th 8 14 19" Or maybe they changed it at some point