the_redbeard
Explorer
I was completely agreeing with this until the totally bizarre assertion that you don't have to critically think or experiment with puzzles in 5E. That's completely wild and obviously false. You can't roll your way through a puzzle in 5E any more than 1E. If you're letting the characters skip a puzzle because they made an Investigation check or something in 5E, that's identical to letting the characters skip a puzzle in 1E by rolling an INT check.
It's not identical. Ability checks are in the rule book as a DM tool in 5e (not a player tool, btb they are called by the DM) but ability checks do not even exist as a mechanic in 1e.
From 3rd edition onward, I've seen players demand to just roll a skill check instead of describing their actions in even the most general fashion. There are comparatively very few character abilities outside of combat that allow this in pre 3rd edition D&D. But there were always some: searching for secret doors for example.
To me the magic of roleplaying is engaging with the imagined environment. (Excuse me while I tell you all to get off my lawn). There were some campaigns I was aware of in the late 70s and early 80s were the players did not have character sheets at all. They had notes, but they did not have any hard rules information regarding their characters. Not just the rules (which the players had not read) but even the character sheets were all in the hands of the DM. That's unimaginable today with the sheer number of character abilities; it would be too much for a DM to handle.