Disguise and taking 20

[MerakSpielman]

My players have been using Disguise a lot recently - primarily because the local law is on their tails.

Only one character has any ranks in Disguise. I'm allowing her to disguise other people, but only her ranks are used - the characters being disguised have to apply their own Cha bonus to the disguise roll. After all, they're the one acting the part, it only makes sense.

But then the players were still worried that their disguises weren't as good as they could be. They asked if they could be allowed a full day to have their disguise-person take 20 on her disguise roll and disguise the whole party. So now their disguise modifiers will, individually, be 20 +/- their Cha bonus.

I allowed it - it seems reasonable that, given loads of time and sufficient matierials, you can take 20 on a disguise check.

But I wondered at the legality of it.

So what do you think of my rulings for:

Disguising somebody else using one character's Rank and the recipient's Cha bonus.

Allowing taking 20 on disguise checks.

 

[mikebr99]

I'd say only taking 10...

Taking 20 actually represents do the thing 20 times and one of those times you will actully roll a 20. If the good disquise'r spends 20 rounds trying to make me look different... who's to say the 20th time is the best.


Mike

 

[mikebr99]

But... I'd give some situational bonuses... +5 or so for taking an extra long time to do it.


Mike

 

[fett527]

So what do you think of my rulings for:

Disguising somebody else using one character's Rank and the recipient's Cha bonus.

Allowing taking 20 on disguise checks.

I like the ruling of using the recipient's Cha bonus. Makes sense, doesn't break anything and there is no specific rule against it.

I also see no problem in taking 20 on disguise. Using the skill in this fashion meets all the criteria for taking 20. SRD:

When you have plenty of time (generally 2 minutes for a skill that can normally be checked in 1 round, one full-round action, or one standard action), you are faced with no threats or distractions, and the skill being attempted carries no penalties for failure, you can take 20.

Good show! No problems here.

 

[MerakSpielman]

Mike: So, essentially, you'd allow a take 15, then, right? Take 10 and a +5 bonus?

 

[mikebr99]

Mike: So, essentially, you'd allow a take 15, then, right? Take 10 and a +5 bonus?

Sounds good to me.

Mike

 

[dcollins]

This is what the skill says under "Try Again" (which is what allows Take 20):

Try Again: Yes. You may try to redo a failed disguise, but once others know that a disguise was attempted, they’ll be more suspicious.

My reading on this ("you can redo a failed disguise") is that it's not really a "Try" until you've confronted the enemy and attempted the opposed check (discovering whether it fools them or not). Therefore, I don't allow retries or Take 20 of this or any other obscuring-type skill, prior to an actual encounter making use of it. In fact, I don't even bother to have the player roll until they're actually confronted by the opposed check.


(For what it's worth, Sean K. Reynolds also ruled "no" in his article on Take 20 skills, although I don't find his reasoning there terribly strong: http://www.seankreynolds.com/rpgfiles/misc/take20.html)

 

[MerakSpielman]

This is what the skill says under "Try Again" (which is what allows Take 20):



My reading on this ("you can redo a failed disguise") is that it's not really a "Try" until you've confronted the enemy and attempted the opposed check (discovering whether it fools them or not). Therefore, I don't allow retries or Take 20 of this or any other obscuring-type skill, prior to an actual encounter making use of it. In fact, I don't even bother to have the player roll until they're actually confronted by the opposed check.

This occured to me as a possiblity to streamline gameplay - since the disguises don't really come unders scrutiny that often.

The thing is, the disguise skill assumes you're spending 10-30 minutes preparing the disguise. That's a pretty slip-shod job, by anybody's standards. It can easily take hours for a professional to apply false noses, realistic wigs, facial hair, etc., to change somebody's appearance to the satisfaction of the makeup artist. It seems reasonable to apply some sort of bonus when they're willing to spend a whole day at it.

 

[Lord Pendragon]

Therefore, I don't allow retries or Take 20 of this or any other obscuring-type skill, prior to an actual encounter making use of it. In fact, I don't even bother to have the player roll until they're actually confronted by the opposed check.

This is how I rule it as well. IMO a PC can't ever know when they've achieved a 20 on an opposed roll. The rogue trying to set up an ambush can't keep Hiding until he finally says "yeah, this is as hidden as I can get." The bard can't keep redoing his makeup until he comes to a point where he can say "yeah, this is the best I can do." Especially since such opposed checks are partially governed by raw ability scores.

For Disguise, I'd allow Take 10. The PC has a good chance of knowing when he's done what is, for him, a "fair job." But not Take 20.

 

[Apok]

Given that the spirit of the 'Take 20' rule was designed so that you could take extra time and precautions to do something right, I see no reason to not allow it for disguise checks.

Remember, you cannot 'fail' a disguise check; the check simply sets the DC for the opposed Spot check of whomever gives scrutiny. The impetus of 'failure' or 'sucess' rests with the Spotter, not the Disguiser.