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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Lanefan" data-source="post: 7099506" data-attributes="member: 29398">Where mine is...well, are...that a) Passwall is a decent-level spell and thus by no means available to everyone (and even if it is, how often is it prepped?) whereas the ability to simply look for something is always-on for anyone; b) the use of Passwall leaves a rather obvious hole in the wall for a while (going by 1e, 5e probably made it shorter); and c) philosophically, having a secret door suddenly become part of the building where no secret door was before just because someone looks for it (yes, Schroedinger's Door) simply doesn't fly.  The building is what it is before the PCs get to it, secret doors and all.I can even give a real-life example of this.  A few blocks down the road from where I live is a mostly-derelict building, quite close to the street, that now and then homeless people use (illegally) for shelter.  I walked past it every day for 15+ years on my way to work.  One day when I was walking past it a guy just ahead of me ducked around its corner, and as I got to the same corner and looked the way he went I saw what I'd always taken to be just a part of the wall sliding shut; and no sign of the guy.  "Cool", I thought, "a real-life secret door!"I didn't know it was there until seeing this.  Obviously, however, it was.Were I a character in a game world that secret door would have always been on the DM's map (though of course I-as-character wouldn't know this or even what a DM was) even though I-as-character had never bothered to search for it.  Had I for some reason bothered to search before seeing it in use, however, the act of my searching would not have brought it into existence; and I could easily have failed to find it even though it was in fact right there.Which leads directly to...And I'll repost my question, for the third (fourth?) time, and put it in several different ways; and maybe this time you'll answer it instead of deflecting* it:* - your deflection above gives them prior knowledge of where to look.Can, in your system, characters search for and fail to find an existing secret door they have no prior knowledge of?  As a character, can I search a wall and fail (without any other ramifications at the time) to find a secret door when in fact there is one present?  Or does my failure bake in to the fiction that there is no door there to be found by anyone even if that wall happens for whatever reason to be a very logical spot where a secret door would be?Put another way, can the following scenario occur:Day 1: for whatever reason we search for secret doors in hallway A, finding nothing (not because there's nothing to find but because we had a moment of incompetence and failed in our search; in fact there's a secret door halfway down the north side) and then carry on exploring elsewhereDay 2: we find the Sword of Swordiness; we're now happy rich adventurersDay 3: we happen to go through hallway A again only this time when we're halfway along it the Sword of Swordiness pulls sharply toward the north wall as it has found the secret door we missed on day 1; thus both revealing to us that it has an always-on "Detect Secret Doors" ability and making us happier richer adventurers as said secret door led to a treasure vault.The reason I ask is this.  When searching for something like a secret door that you have no prior knowledge of there's several possible outcomes:1. The search is successful and you find a door.2. The search is unsuccessful in and of itself but you find a door anyway e.g. when the monsters on the other side hear you and attack.3. The search is unsuccessful because there is no door there to find.4. The search is unsuccessful because, while there's actually a door there to be found, you simply missed it; and a subsequent search by someone else might still find it (or e.g. you might come back a few hours later and see it standing ajar).I want to know if all these outcomes are possible in your system; particularly #4.Lan-"every time I walk by that building now I wonder to myself whether that secret door still works or whether it's been nailed shut"-efan</blockquote>

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