Why I Hate Skills

[Bill Zebub]

Well, I don't tend to use prewritten adventures, so that wouldn't even occur to me.

I will freely admit that creating (for example) a trap that cleverly telegraphs its presence in a way that is novel to players and finds the right balance between too obvious and too obscure is a lot of work. Which is why I'm always hoping to find published adventures that do a good job of it.

I was thinking more in terms of what impact just deleting skills would have on things like the 3e rogue or bard..

I maybe wouldn't delete them outright. But I might make it less fiddly. I.e., "Thievery", "Silver-Tongued"

 

[Thomas Shey]

The stealth roll or whatever can also be done behind the GM screen when you attempt it and revealed if/when the consequences become available.

And for knowledge checks the GM can tell you what you think you know without telling you what the number was that decided what you know. If what you know doesn't answer your questions, you then start carousing or researching.

But the problem is, some failures won't reveal that. You'll find out you've got it wrong--when you find it out. Missing information is sometimes anything but obvious.

 

[Thomas Shey]

I maybe wouldn't delete them outright. But I might make it less fiddly. I.e., "Thievery", "Silver-Tongued"

Well, that's just skill lumping/splitting questions which is, I think, a bit of a different discussion than not using them at all.

 

[VHawkwinter]

But the problem is, some failures won't reveal that. You'll find out you've got it wrong--when you find it out. Missing information is sometimes anything but obvious.

Absolutely. But if you show them they rolled a 2, they'll know there's a very good chance they're missing important information.

 

[Bill Zebub]

Well, that's just skill lumping/splitting questions which is, I think, a bit of a different discussion than not using them at all.

Sure...and, in my opinion/experience, that sort of "lumping" tends to shift skills from being "buttons to press" or, worse, "buttons that need excuses to be pressed", into something that lends itself more to players devising plans.

 

[Bill Zebub]

But the problem is, some failures won't reveal that. You'll find out you've got it wrong--when you find it out. Missing information is sometimes anything but obvious.

In my opinion that's great in theory but really hard in practice. The GM secretly rolling and telling the player what they think they know doesn't really replicate the feeling of "thinking you know" something: the players themselves don't have any sense of certainty; they know it's just the result of a random roll.

Maybe that works for some, but the times I've tried it the results have been pretty unsatisfying for everybody.

 

[Andvari]

Can you give an example of when that would apply?

In Pathfinder 2E, for example, if you use Recall Knowledge in a combat to learn something about a monster and critically fail. You learn something incorrect. But if you as a player see that you rolled low, you now possess meta-game knowledge you should not have. And if you roll high, you know the information the GM gives you is probably accurate.

The same applies if you search an area and roll low on a Perception check. If you as a player rolled low, you now know there might still be something hidden. Or if you roll high, that you probably did not find anything because nothing was there.

Or trying to sneak by an area where there are hidden enemies unbeknown to the player, who will not attack, but do things behind the scenes that changes the players' experience moving forwards if they spot the players. If you normally postpone them rolling until they encounter a guard, they now know they've passed something when you make them roll.

In these cases, having the GM roll removes the meta-game knowledge from the player. This is also why the GM rolls the 1d6 when players search for secret doors in old-school D&D.

 

[Bill Zebub]

In Pathfinder 2E, for example, if you use Recall Knowledge in a combat to learn something about a monster and critically fail. You learn something incorrect. But if you as a player see that you rolled low, you now possess meta-game knowledge you should not have. And if you roll high, you know the information the GM gives you is probably accurate.

The same applies if you search an area and roll low on a Perception check. If you as a player rolled low, you now know there might still be something hidden. Or if you roll high, that you probably did not find anything because nothing was there.

Or trying to sneak by an area where there are hidden enemies unbeknown to the player, who will not attack, but do things behind the scenes that changes the players' experience moving forwards if they spot the players. If you normally postpone them rolling until they encounter a guard, they now know they've passed something when you make them roll.

In these cases, having the GM roll removes the meta-game knowledge from the player. This is also why the GM rolls the 1d6 when players search for secret doors in old-school D&D.

Ah, right. I had to go back to see what Micah had written, and realize I must have somehow mis-read it the first time. That all makes sense, of course.

 

[CreamCloud0]

Can you give an example of when that would apply?

OotS always comes through

 

[Micah Sweet]

In Pathfinder 2E, for example, if you use Recall Knowledge in a combat to learn something about a monster and critically fail. You learn something incorrect. But if you as a player see that you rolled low, you now possess meta-game knowledge you should not have. And if you roll high, you know the information the GM gives you is probably accurate.

The same applies if you search an area and roll low on a Perception check. If you as a player rolled low, you now know there might still be something hidden. Or if you roll high, that you probably did not find anything because nothing was there.

Or trying to sneak by an area where there are hidden enemies unbeknown to the player, who will not attack, but do things behind the scenes that changes the players' experience moving forwards if they spot the players. If you normally postpone them rolling until they encounter a guard, they now know they've passed something when you make them roll.

In these cases, having the GM roll removes the meta-game knowledge from the player. This is also why the GM rolls the 1d6 when players search for secret doors in old-school D&D.

That is exactly what I had in mind.