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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 4137073" data-attributes="member: 4937">This is not clear, and the way I read it, the rules don't take a strong stand on the issue either way but instead leave the matter up to individual DMs.  The skill rules, as is typical for D&D, don't address how the game should be played - merely provide tools for playing the game you decide you want to play  For example, page 58 of the 3.0 player's handbook concerning how skills are used in play contains several short examples, including the following: "Unsucessful at winning the cleric's favor with song, Devis tries to sway her with words.  He explains that he and his party are good people and that helping them would in turn help many others.  Devis is trying to use the Diplomacy skill, which he doesn't have (he has 0 ranks in diplomacy), so he doesn't get to add any ranks to his skill check, but he does get to add his +2 Charisma modifier.  The DM secretly sets the DC at 20, and Devis's player rolls 19 on the d20 for a result of 21.  The cleric smiles and agrees to help Devis and his party."This example of play is short, but certainly in line with my description of how skills work in play.  We could easily rewrite the above description such that Devis's player did not need to describe what Devis was doing (that is outline the argument), only describe what his intention was (to persuade the cleric to help).3e gives DM's wide latitude in setting the DC's for tasks and applying circumstantial modifiers to rolls.  It provides very little guidelines for why the DM should set particular DC, but the examples provide hint that it can be just about any reasoning that a particular DM finds reasonable.Certainly there is nothing in the RAW which suggests descriptive player propositions should not be taken into account, end of story.  And, "stop me if you've heard this", but what the rules don't forbid, they permit. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f609.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=";)" title="Wink    ;)"  data-smilie="2"data-shortname=";)" />First of all, I believe, "I search the room." is a valid player proposition and one that involves a high degree of difficulty in adjudicating only in some corner cases.  As a practical matter, the player should not have to describe his actions in great detail all the time.Secondly, the notion of either 'taking 20' on a search check and 'searching a 5'x5'x5' space' seems so opposed to everything that a skill challenge seems to represent, that I would imagine both are meaningless even if a skill challenge doesn't explicitly require player narration of thier actions to any degree beyond the most superficial.</blockquote>

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