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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Bacon Bits" data-source="post: 8087502" data-attributes="member: 6777737">For your incidental climbs, by-the-book (I only do this in combat):<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">PCs make a successful Strength (Athletics) check to climb up to half their movement speed in one round.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">A PC that fails the check makes no progress.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">A PC that fails the check by 5 or more falls from where they started their turn. At the bottom, this means they take no damage.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">A PC that takes damage while climbing must make an immediate Strength (Athletics) check. Realistically, this should be a Strength save, but the rules say it's an Athletics check.</li> </ul>The average PC with 30' of movement will climb 15' each round, so a 20' pit will require 2 rounds to scale.How I actually run incidental climbs out-of-combat:<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">PCs make a single successful Strength (Athletics) check to climb the entire distance (here, 20' but it could be 300' and it'd still be one check).</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">A PC that fails by less than 5 takes two or three times as long to reach the top. Sometimes this matters.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">A PC that fails by 5 or more falls. They take damage as though they fell halfway (here, 10' for 1d6 damage for a 20' climb, or 150' for 15d6 for a 300' climb). Usually then I skip to the part where the party reaches the top or bottom, about five times longer than it normally takes to climb (if it's the top). I'm almost never going to make characters fall 2 or more times on the same climb. That's a boring story. You took your lumps, let's move on.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Average climb DC is 8. Climbing with a rope is DC 5. This means that unless you have someone with negative strength and no athletics proficiency, you won't ever fall if you have a rope. That way you can handwave the whole thing as taking a few minutes.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">If the PCs tie themselves together or otherwise explain how they're working together to assist each other, they can make a group check. One character (probably the one with the highest Strength (Athletics) bonus) can roll one check with advantage.</li> </ul>I loathe rolling dice multiple times to determine the result of an event. One die is more than enough uncertainty to resolve most things out of combat. The last thing I'm interested in doing is making every PC roll every 15' of a 300' climb. Especially if someone falls. I have no interest in watching 5 people roll 20d20 one at a time hoping they don't roll below a 3 or whatever. I intend climbing to be an obstacle that the PCs can overcome by thinking, planning, and cooperation, not an individual skill challenge. The PCs usually aren't getting XP for it, so I'm not going to make it that difficult.There have been exceptions, such as when the PCs had to cross a partially collapsed rope bridge in the middle of a heavy storm. In that instance, I am instituting a skill challenge, and the PCs do get XP for completing it, and they do have to roll every round. The DC is also closer to 13, so you need an 8 or better not to fall.</blockquote>

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