D&D General Hot Take: Uncertainty Makes D&D Better

[Pedantic]

All of that is fine and good, until you get to the point where padlocks fall off of their chains, secret doors pop open, traps disable themselves, and guards are struck blind whenever a rogue walks past them.

I don't like to use absolutes, but I make an exception for this one: success should never, ever be guaranteed. It's fine for other tables, but it gets reaaaly boring for me. No risk means no tension, and tension is the engine that powers the story.

That just feels like a need for better explication in the level range. Locks, mundane guards, secret doors and pit traps are not relevant challenges at high levels, and the game should tell the DM that.

 

[CleverNickName]

That just feels like a need for better explication in the level range. Locks, mundane guards, secret doors and pit traps are not relevant challenges at high levels, and the game should tell the DM that.

In Pathfinder, it wasn't uncommon for mid-level rogues to have incredibly high bonuses to a dozen different skills. At that point, any guard, lock, or trap is irrelevant according to the DCs listed in the core rules. At high levels, to have any risk at all the DM has to artificially increase the DCs to absurd levels, just to make things challenging for the party's rogue (and instantly deadly or impossible to everyone else in the world).

It's not great.

 

[Vaalingrade]

My problem with the 3.5E/Pathfinder system is that it eliminates uncertainty in the opposite direction. Eventually your character gets to a point where they have +20 bonuses, and failure is no longer possible. And then we're back to the same problem: your actions no longer matter, because you are going to succeed anyway.

That's why you observe stacking and don't keep adding new bonuses that avoid stacking.

Plus, I'm gonna be honest here -- at a certain point for certain characters, they should skill out of having to roll.

Character: "I am touched by the God of Leaping! Leaping is the thing I do! Bartok the Leaper has a poster of me in his room!"

Dice: "Aaaaahahahahaha Hahahahaha... oh mercy... Wait, you were serious. Let me laugh harder."

I agree that 5E is problematic. But IMO, the problem with 5E isn't the system...it's player style and expectations. I think 5E relies on players knowing how to "fail forward" more than the earlier editions did (and gives no guidance on how to do so.) And regardless of system, I always wish players treated combat like a dangerous last resort instead of the default mode of play.

They system is so afraid of a play having to add two and two that it makes improvement and being a skilled person impossible. Which, incidentally, makes me think that 'uncertainty' was just a side effect people roll with.

And I cannot disagree more with the idea of combat as a thing to avoid. IMO, it should be the big, fun setpiece. I absolutely reject the idea of combat as the last resort.

 

[Vaalingrade]

In Pathfinder, it wasn't uncommon for mid-level rogues to have incredibly high bonuses to a dozen different skills. At that point, any guard, lock, or trap is irrelevant according to the DCs listed in the core rules. At high levels, to have any risk at all the DM has to artificially increase the DCs to absurd levels, just to make things challenging for the party's rogue (and instantly deadly or impossible to everyone else in the world).

It's not great.

Are guards and locks honestly supposed to present risks?

I won't say anything about traps as I've been contemplating their right to exist at all outside of puzzles.

 

[CleverNickName]

Are guards and locks honestly supposed to present risks?

Of course. Why else would they even exist in the game?

If you're arguing that traps, locks, stealth, etc. shouldn't be risky, that's fine...but we're no longer talking about different rules systems. We're talking about different play styles and storytelling.

 

[Neonchameleon]

All of that is fine and good, until you get to the point where padlocks fall off of their chains, secret doors pop open, traps disable themselves, and guards are struck blind whenever a rogue walks past them.

I don't like to use absolutes, but I make an exception for this one: success should never, ever be guaranteed. It's fine for other tables, but it gets reaaaly boring for me. No risk means no tension, and tension is the engine that powers the story.

So use level appropriate challenges?

 

[CleverNickName]

So use level appropriate challenges?

Yes, for as long as it's possible to do so. In 3.5E/Pathfinder, that becomes less possible as level increases: for example, adjusting a trap so that it's mildly difficult to the rogue will eventually make it instantly lethal to everyone else in the party, even though they are all the same level.

And that's fine, if you're going for that style of play. I don't care for it.

 

[Pedantic]

Yes, for as long as it's possible to do so. In 3.5E/Pathfinder, that becomes less possible as level increases: for example, adjusting a trap so that it's mildly difficult to the rogue will eventually make it instantly lethal to everyone else in the party, even though they are all the same level.

And that's fine, if you're going for that style of play. I don't care for it.

But that's a mistake of scaling. It's not that you need to make a 15th level appropriate lock, it's that locks as a class of challenge are only appropriate in a 3-10 (or whatever) level range. If you want guards, traps and locks, then you set your game in the correct level tier.

 

[CleverNickName]

But that's a mistake of scaling. It's not that you need to make a 15th level appropriate lock, it's that locks as a class of challenge are only appropriate in a 3-10 (or whatever) level range. If you want guards, traps and locks, then you set your game in the correct level tier.

Yes, I could remove locks from the world when the party reaches Level X, or just handwave them. Players who have optimized their Open Locks skill won't be happy, but that is certainly something that I could do. Same thing for guards: I could just ignore or handwave them also, but that kind of hoses the players who optimized their Move Silently and Hide skills.

It's not a great solution.

 

[overgeeked]

Yes, I could remove locks from the world when the party reaches Level X, or just handwave them. Players who have optimized their Open Locks skill won't be happy, but that is certainly something that I could do. Same thing for guards: I could just ignore or handwave them also, but that kind of hoses the players who optimized their Move Silently and Hide skills.

It's not a great solution.

Exactly. The players who specialized in that want to overcome those obstacles and feel awesome. Removing those challenges takes away their chance to feel awesome and makes their specialization a waste. It's backwards thinking.

But it's a game play problem, really. It's a result of removing the changing game. BECMI. Dungeons, wilderness, castles, armies, immortality. You're not meant to do dungeon and wilderness exploration forever. They sort of tried to solve it with bounded accuracy, but it doesn't really work. Something that's impossible for a non-thief is trivial to pointlessness for a thief. Same problem with rangers and outlanders and wilderness exploration re: food & water, navigation, etc.