D&D 5E Crawford on Stealth

[robus]

While I understand in the context of this discussion, and based on the "varying views" on how stealth should work, I couldn't disagree more.

The word I use is elegant.

So an elegant chaos then?

 

[Maxperson]

That just says, to me, that the enemy rolled a higher stealth than both the Soldiers passive perception and their perception check. Same result on a different side of the equation I guess. I feel like it is more realistic to attribute a successful ambush to skill on the part of the attacker, rather than a failure on the player end. Unless the players declare something stupid like "I charge straight through the clearing", then they deserve the ambush.

That's why I said the methods were known. If they know how and in what types of terrain the ambushes happen, they couldn't be ambushed unless they were off their game. You don't even have to know an ambush is there. You just have to be ready for one if it happens. They weren't. People aren't perfect and flub things.

I suppose it's true that the enemy rolled higher, but it rolled higher than the rolled perception, not passive perception, because in real life there's no such thing. Nobody perceives everything under X passive level.

 

[Maxperson]

While I understand in the context of this discussion, and based on the "varying views" on how stealth should work, I couldn't disagree more.

The word I use is elegant.

It all depends on what you consider to be a "hot mess". 5e is designed with rulings over rules in mind, so it is very vaguely worded all over the place. That can be a "hot mess" to someone who prefers a game like 3e or 4e where the game tried to be precise and tell you exactly what to do.

 

[daviddalbec]

I thought this subject was resolved by page 3 of this thread. Wow

 

[Maxperson]

I thought this subject was resolved by page 3 of this thread. Wow

There's your mistake right there.

 

[schnee]

So an elegant chaos then?

Nah, it's a very good game with some flaws.

My group is 50% new players, and they find it accessible and fun. The veterans, like me, came back after leaving D&D because of the balance problems and overwhelming complexity of 3.x and Pathfinder.

There is no way I'd introduce a new gamer to either 3.x or Pathfinder. This version is fantastic.

And complaining is innately fun.

 

[Prism]

An example to explain why I like passive perception for pure simplicity reasons

A party of 5 is in combat with a bunch of goblins with plenty of hiding places. After each attack, each goblin can attempt to hide as a bonus action. If we don't use passive perception then every single goblin turn the DM has to make a stealth roll, and then every player has to make a perception roll and then compare. If we use passive perception then just one roll resolves the hiding - the stealth roll made by the goblin.

We use stealth (both PCs and monsters) in many combats. I prefer the quick 'passive' option as it speed things up. I completely understand that others might want the slightly slower to resolve but more variable rolling option. That's certainly how we used to play in other editions, but nowadays I prefer the speed of passive perception.

In one of our games I am DM to a player with a passive perception of 25. Almost nothing is hidden from him but I have no issue with that. He has invested a lot into his scout role.

 

[Guest 6801328]

Huh, this thread is up to 11 pages. Which has it evolved into: an argument about metagaming, or an argument about warlords?

 

[Arial Black]

The 'highly competent' fellow with +10 Perception demonstrates his competence in several ways: he's 20th level, has 18 Wis, is proficient in the skill and has a passive Perception of 20. There is no '20% failure chance'.

This does not mean that he always detects everything. The uncertainty is still there in the fact that the opposing Stealth checks are still random. Nothing has gone wrong, the competent guy doesn't 'fail', but an opponent might out-perform him once in a while.

 

[Caliban]

I am actually finding lately that I like Dwarves more with a Texan/Southern accent. Blasphemy, I know.

I'm going to be playing a Deep Gnome fighter in a game tonight. I've decided he's going to have an Australian accent.

Why? Because he's from the Land Down Under.