D&D 5E Is Intimidate the worse skill in the game?

That's not actually true. The DMG says over and over and over that the rules serve the DM, not the other way around and that the DM can change the rules. There is an opening in the rules for the DM to say that it won't work. That said, if the DM does so without a good in fiction reason for it not to work, it's an abuse of power and the players should find a new DM.

As an example, suppose you are fighting an unknown creature created by the DM that has the ability to stop magical spells and abilities from working as a reaction. You attempt to use your bonus action to magically teleport and swap places, but the creature uses its reaction to stop it from working.
The argument essentially boils down to that there is no difference between an ability that enables you to do X, vs an ability that allows you to negotiate with the GM for the possible chance of being able to do X, because the GM can say no to both.

Having the ability outright is a safer baseline than not having it. That is the difference between "The water level is between 10 and 20 feet" vs "The water level is 12 feet".
 

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No.
4e DCs don't scale with PC level.
4e DCs scale with Challenge, Power, Item, NPC, or Obstacle level.
I guess you are going to make me quote it again.

"Example: Shiera the 8th-level rogue wants to try the classic swashbuckling move of swinging on a chandelier and kicking an ogre in the chest on her way down to the ground, hoping to push the ogre into the brazier of burning coals behind it. An Acrobatics check seems reasonable.
This sort of action is exactly the kind of thinking you want to encourage, so you pick a moderate DC: The table says DC 14. If she makes that check, she gets a hold on the chandelier and swings to the ogre."

There is no other interpretation of that example other than picking the moderate 14 off of that table purely because Shiera is 8th level. If a 1st level PC made the exact same attempt 1 round later, the DC would be 10. The DC scales by level. I have provided the table for your reference.

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The argument essentially boils down to that there is no difference between an ability that enables you to do X, vs an ability that allows you to negotiate with the GM for the possible chance of being able to do X, because the GM can say no to both.

Having the ability outright is a safer baseline than not having it. That is the difference between "The water level is between 10 and 20 feet" vs "The water level is 12 feet".
Give me an unspelled out ability every day of the week and twice on Tuesday over a spelled out one. I can do waaaaaaay more with an ability that isn't spelled out to the nth degree than you ever will be able to with your spelled out one.
 

I guess you are going to make me quote it again.

"Example: Shiera the 8th-level rogue wants to try the classic swashbuckling move of swinging on a chandelier and kicking an ogre in the chest on her way down to the ground, hoping to push the ogre into the brazier of burning coals behind it. An Acrobatics check seems reasonable.
This sort of action is exactly the kind of thinking you want to encourage, so you pick a moderate DC: The table says DC 14. If she makes that check, she gets a hold on the chandelier and swings to the ogre."

There is no other interpretation of that example other than picking the moderate 14 off of that table purely because Shiera is 8th level. If a 1st level PC made the exact same attempt 1 round later, the DC would be 10. The DC scales by level. I have provided the table for your reference.

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The action is the thing that is leveled.
"This sort of action is exactly the kind of thinking you want to encourage, so you pick a moderate DC: The table says DC 14. If she makes that check, she gets a hold on the chandelier and swings to the ogre."

Because that the PC. doing it.
If a monster or trap is making the action, you use the monster's or trap's level. And that level does not have to match the PCs.
If it's a level 10th giant, the DC is 16.
 

Give me an unspelled out ability every day of the week and twice on Tuesday over a spelled out one. I can do waaaaaaay more with an ability that isn't spelled out to the nth degree than you ever will be able to with your spelled out one.
Only if the DM actually lets you.

That's the problem. Many, many, many, many, MANY DMs will not.

In my experience, the majority won't. Even otherwise pretty decent DMs frequently break down with open-ended abilities.
 

The action is the thing that is leveled.
"This sort of action is exactly the kind of thinking you want to encourage, so you pick a moderate DC: The table says DC 14. If she makes that check, she gets a hold on the chandelier and swings to the ogre."
Of course it's the action that gets the level related scaling DCs. That's what you assign DCs to. The action.
If a monster or trap is making the action, you use the monster's or trap's level. And that level does not have to match the PCs.
If it's a level 10th giant, the DC is 16.
So what. The PCs get scaling DCs. Doesn't matter about the monster.
 

Only if the DM actually lets you.

That's the problem. Many, many, many, many, MANY DMs will not.

In my experience, the majority won't. Even otherwise pretty decent DMs frequently break down with open-ended abilities.
By many it's actually very few. Of the dozens of DMs I've played with over the years, maybe 2 would not have gone with it, and those were bad DMs. You leave those games, so any game you stay in is one that will "let" you do the things that you are able to do with the skill.
 

By many it's actually very few. Of the dozens of DMs I've played with over the years, maybe 2 would not have gone with it, and those were bad DMs. You leave those games, so any game you stay in is one that will "let" you do the things that you are able to do with the skill.
This would mean I would basically never play D&D, because, as I said, in my experience it's nearly all of them. As in, of the dozens of DMs I've had over the years, excluding the ones running 4e, perhaps three or four WOULD have allowed it, and all the rest guaranteed would not. They'd either just straight-up say no, or they'd "allow" it except only in a way that is totally neutered.

Because every creative open-ended use a DM allows is a future headache they sign up for. So they shut down 99.9% of creative options, and the 0.1% they allow through are so saddled with limitations and problems it's just not worth it. Hence my complaints about Intimidate, since the vast majority of DMs see it as "the Persuasion skill that makes targets hate you forever and, if they get the chance, actively try to hurt you later."

Open-ended stuff is only great in theory. I find that the practice is nowhere near as awesome as you say, because so many DMs are so adamantly against actual creative thinking. Anything genuinely creative derails their DMing, and is thus a problem to be eliminated, not an awesome thing to support. This is yet another reason why I have such a dim view of DMs who talk so much about "absolute power" and the importance of their "vision" and their apparent need to railroad and fudge and illusionism-ify their world etc., etc., etc.--because each and every one of those things is yet another tool to prevent creative players from ever derailing their games, from ever doing anything actually outside the box.

And then so many DMs wonder why their players never take risks, always prefer guaranteed options, fall into reliable tried-and-true SOPs, and reject creative fun actions in favor of boring reliable ones. Can't tell you how many times I've seen a thread or a Reddit post or a tweet or a Youtube comment or whatever else where someone says, in various different phrases, "Why are my players always such murder-hobos who never do anything fun or creative?! It's maddening!" But almost invariably, when when you actually dig in and find out how they run their games....they run them in ways that hammer home that emotional investment is for suckers, that no good deed goes unpunished, that mercy will guaranteed 100% always be exploited, that creativity and out-of-the-box thinking gets at best gently no-saled and at worst violently stamped out, etc. And if you try to tell them that, they either get defensive ("You don't know how my group runs!") or hostile.

Many, many DMs claim they support creativity. Very few of those who claim to do so actually do support creativity. Some of them it's because they're just hypocrites, claiming they're in favor of something they aren't, whether they realize it or not. Some of them, it's because they've got a lot of internalized "lessons" about how you "should" DM that prevent them from actually achieving the goals they want to achieve. Some, their definition of "creativity" is...more than a little deficient.
 


Which is far preferable to having a string of bad experiences.

You realise that by joining PUGs on the internet, you are selecting bad DMs? If these people where any good, or even had friends, they would have plenty of players, so wouldn’t need to invite random strangers like you to join.
So Roll20 should just stop existing? Myth-Weavers? The "looking for group" forum of this very website?

Your claimed logic doesn't work. There are plenty of reasons why an experienced DM might go looking for new players.

Edit: Furthermore, several of the best DMs I've ever had are people that I did join because they put up an ad. Including both my two favorite 4e DMs and my favorite 5e DM (Hussar).
 

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