D&D 5E Guidance...

[clearstream]

True, I suppose I mean more that I would prefer feedback from the OP on our stances and suggestions before I bother investing anymore time and effort into it. Also, I certainly didn't want this this to become a "what is significant and what is not" debate since it is ultimately a matter of opinion.

Well, what I see is that layered buffs readily push character checks above the range of difficulty classes. Above "nearly impossible" - which can become fairly likely. It feels like a design disconnect. A flat +1 shifts the range in an uninteresting way.

When it comes to stances and suggestions, any it's-fine-as-is responses are kind of unhelpful, seeing as they don't advance the discussion. Maybe it is fine for such posters, but not for me. So they add nothing to the discussion. Better is where someone says something like, it is fine if you do X, have you tried that?

I find it most valuable to see other people's takes on how they play it at their table, where they have tweaked the cantrip.

 

[TheSword]

I posted this in the other thread but probably more appropriate here...

When the ranger is leading you through the jungle on an 8 hour journey and the cleric claims he can cast guidance 480 times to give said ranger +1d4 to his survival check to avoid getting lost, I would suggest doing one or more of the following things...

• Have the cleric make a DC 20 charisma check to avoid the psychological impact of what is essentially the magical equivalent of Chinese water torture.
• Have his god rebuke him for being flippant with divine miracles.
• Have his god withdraw magic because of the prayer equivalent of “are we there yet?”
• Apply disadvantage to the roll due to the distraction of the cleric mumbling in the ranger’s ear and flicking water at him continuously.
• Play out the entire journey and ask the player to say I cast guidance, then ask them to say it a further 479. Ask what the other players are doing to be fair.
• As DM decide the check be inconveniently required at the moment when the cleric is taking a dump and therefore is unable to cast guidance that minute. Unless the ranger stands next to him to have the spell cast (with concentration because of distracting circumstances, nobody likes to be watched)
• Make the cleric player accurately estimate how long one minute is 480 times (this will take about 8 hours). You might be generous and just make the player do this for one hour and use that as a sample set. Then roll a d480 (or 60 if generous) and if the number is higher than the guesses he got right then the spell doesn’t work.
• Set fire to your players handbook and go and play a simple, streamlined game like WFRP 4e or d&d 3.5e.
• Bump the player.

All these are acceptable responses to Guidance Spam in my honest opinion.

 

[Hriston]

The construction I'm drawn to is that RPG rules model the game fiction. So for certain elements of the fiction, there is a counterpart in the model. When speaking at a mechanical level - i.e. rules - we're articulating play at that level.

So it is right to say "one willing creature" and address that creature as if it were going to roll a d4, because articulated on the model layer, that is what is happening. This could add a lot of words to the text if we had to acknowledge it each and every time... but we do not need to do that.

The target continues to be the creature, represented at the model layer.

I’m not sure if I understand what you mean by “model layer”. If the fictional creature is the one rolling the d4, what does the player represent at the model layer?

 

[5ekyu]

I posted this in the other thread but probably more appropriate here...

When the ranger is leading you through the jungle on an 8 hour journey and the cleric claims he can cast guidance 480 times to give said ranger +1d4 to his survival check to avoid getting lost, I would suggest doing one or more of the following things...

• Have the cleric make a DC 20 charisma check to avoid the psychological impact of what is essentially the magical equivalent of Chinese water torture.
• Have his god rebuke him for being flippant with divine miracles.
• Have his god withdraw magic because of the prayer equivalent of “are we there yet?”
• Apply disadvantage to the roll due to the distraction of the cleric mumbling in the ranger’s ear and flicking water at him continuously.
• Play out the entire journey and ask the player to say I cast guidance, then ask them to say it a further 479. Ask what the other players are doing to be fair.
• As DM decide the check be inconveniently required at the moment when the cleric is taking a dump and therefore is unable to cast guidance that minute. Unless the ranger stands next to him to have the spell cast (with concentration because of distracting circumstances, nobody likes to be watched)
• Make the cleric player accurately estimate how long one minute is 480 times (this will take about 8 hours). You might be generous and just make the player do this for one hour and use that as a sample set. Then roll a d480 (or 60 if generous) and if the number is higher than the guesses he got right then the spell doesn’t work.
• Set fire to your players handbook and go and play a simple, streamlined game like WFRP 4e or d&d 3.5e.
• Bump the player.

All these are acceptable responses to Guidance Spam in my honest opinion.

From a divine's point of view, unless the ivine is opposed to the quest, why would the divine have an opposition to the cleric using his magic to helping them not get lost on the quest?

If the cleric uses some other spell to help, like say Enhanced ability or Aid that lasts for hour(s) do we get these same divine rebukes? If it was 8 castings of Light, then?

Seems like folks just get bent out of shape over using this cantrip to aid a task which can be assisted or replaced entirely by other magics.

Again, for me, even though I dont have these issues, I would rework it as task triggered, ongoingbthru thectask and an open expanded Help action.

 

[5ekyu]

BTW, from some games I have seen, not been in, I wonder how much of the Guidsnce issue comes from a lack of reactivity in scene management.

For example, it seems like there are more than a few who get bent out of shape knickers in a twist if someone wants to Guidance after a check is called for.

As in...

Player- I look thru the shelves
GM- roll int-investigate
Cleric I give guidance
Gm sorry check called...

But really what happened here was a lack of pause between the character being seen by other yo go search and the GM locking out the cleric guidance.

There was mo description by GM of the lead-into the act that really allowed the other player to jump in without interrupting the dialog.

Personally, in casual encounter time as opposed to combat time, I dont get into that kind of tick-tockery.

But again, maybe the solution is making Guidance a reaction.

 

[Blue]

I killed the Cleric.

But I did not kill the deputy.

 

[TheSword]

From a divine's point of view, unless the ivine is opposed to the quest, why would the divine have an opposition to the cleric using his magic to helping them not get lost on the quest? [...]

I think you took my post too seriously.

 

[clearstream]

I’m not sure if I understand what you mean by “model layer”. If the fictional creature is the one rolling the d4, what does the player represent at the model layer?

It arose out of the line that @iserith is taking. I agree with @iserith that there are notionally two layers 1) the fiction, in which creatures don't roll dice to accomplish tasks, but rather do work (or whatever) to do so, and 2) the model, in which the player the creature is mapped to applies the mechanics that the fictional act is mapped to. This is often shorthand, without a crisp distinction between the layers, and with participants moving fluidly back and forth between them... at times starting an act in the fiction layer, and completing it in the mechanics layer.

This means that a creature knows whatever it is in the fiction that equates with rolling the die, and that knowledge simultaneously exists at the model layer. I hadn't thought about it this way before.

 

[Hriston]

It arose out of the line that @iserith is taking. I agree with @iserith that there are notionally two layers 1) the fiction, in which creatures don't roll dice to accomplish tasks, but rather do work (or whatever) to do so, and 2) the model, in which the player the creature is mapped to applies the mechanics that the fictional act is mapped to. This is often shorthand, without a crisp distinction between the layers, and with participants moving fluidly back and forth between them... at times starting an act in the fiction layer, and completing it in the mechanics layer.

This means that a creature knows whatever it is in the fiction that equates with rolling the die, and that knowledge simultaneously exists at the model layer. I hadn't thought about it this way before.

I find it helpful to separate what happens in the fiction of the shared imaginative space from what happens at the gaming table, in the real world. I think what you’re calling “the model” is probably what I would call “the game”.

 

[Oofta]

But I did not kill the deputy.

I swear it was in self defense.