NOW LIVE! Today's the day you meet your new best friend. You don’t have to leave Wolfy behind... In 'Pets & Sidekicks' your companions level up with you!

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Swarmkeeper" data-source="post: 7796711" data-attributes="member: 6921763">This thread has been enlightening so far.  Thanks for starting it, [USER=6801328]@Elfcrusher[/USER]At our table last week, a player asked if his character recognized the leathery winged bird-like reptilian beasts that were attacking their ship in the fog.  I simply said “no, these creatures appear to be from a land that time forgot.”  After the game, I second guessed myself.  Was I telling the player what his character thought?  Should I have asked him in return “tell me about what in your PC’s life experience might inform him about such creatures.”? In this case, I don’t think a roll was appropriate since there is no special ability to be gleaned for said creature.  It was a Yes or No call on my part, but I still felt critical of myself that I may have botched it.After reading some responses here, I now feel confident I can choose to say No since I had already established that the creatures were not known in the civilized world at all.  But, with a good backstory reason (which I should have encouraged) I might have said Yes in the moment.Now, what if PC’s backstory somehow included possible pertinent knowledge of said creatures AND said creatures had a special trait, like their bones could be ground up to brew a Heroism potion.  Meaningful cost of failure = miss out on some treats.  I guess I would set a reasonably difficult DC and ask for an INT roll letting the player know if they fail, they only get partial info since these creatures are so obscure.  Whaddaya think?</blockquote>

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