D&D 5E Knowledge skills in combat

[Garthanos]

For a historical analogue of how a pre-Enlightenment medieval society regards monsters, look at 15th century drawings of sea creatures. Even the educated people of the era imagined all sorts of fantastical and garbled nonsense. The depths of the seas and jungles were terrifying and unknown.

And they didnt have teleportation or any of those little real magics bouncing around it is communication and transportation tools that made more real information available in more modern times. Now of course you can make your world a load less magical and that would help in so many ways the game-world stay medieval or dark age like. The thing which makes the phb have 1 or 2 classes without spells is the thing which makes it unlikely to be that close to the ignorance levels of ancient times. Its all fun speculation though whatever you enjoy.

 

[Son of the Serpent]

Well, why? This is excellent roleplaying, the fighter shouting to the wizard to reveal some weakness about a mob. Although if I DM this normally is no arcana check but a nature check, unless the mob is some outer plane or magic beast. If it were undead maybe a religion check would help.

Got +12 in all of them. So whichever knowledge check. I was only saying arcana because the dm said it was arcana related.

 

[Son of the Serpent]

I do sometimes limit how much information can be relayed in combat - no 5 minute long discussions during your turn - and I may not do a complete info dump until after combat. For example seeing a grizzly bear I remembered the basics of talk calmly to make sure it doesn't get surprised, don't run, get pepper spray ready. Told the other people that if it does charge, just stand still (they frequently bluff charge).

But did I remember every detail about bears that I know? Probably not. Just the ones relevant to seeing one twenty yards away with no barrier between us and the bear.

So in D&D they may see a troll, know they have to use fire to stop it's regen. They may recall afterward that trolls in this region trolls are extremely rare and one hasn't been seen for decades. They may recognize the markings as being trolls from a region to the north or whatever other tidbits are useful for the story.

The issue is im not even allowed to ask if i know about weaknesses or relevant info on a creature to shape my own actions (and that can still involve roleplay. I dont get why people are acting like roling for knowledge reduces rp. It doesnt. It informa you out of game of knowledge your character has. The roleplay is what you do with that.). Im not allowed to ask about this info. But reasonably i wouldn't attack a knight in full plate in the same manner as a naked guy. Why should knowledge of a creatures vulnerabilities be any different? Sure i might not have time to relay the info (never would have done that. Doesnt seem ralistically possible to me) but i can use the info to change the decision im about to make possibly. Same as a rogue using skills to disarm a trap competantly instead of through trial and error.

 

[Garthanos]

Sure i might not have time to relay the info (never would have done that

spend an action helping an ally and grant advantage with an appropriate bonus rider.

 

[Son of the Serpent]

For me that implies no actual wizards/bards/clerics (or even Warlord historians) who are educated types adventuring. And that really was the point of some of these classes in legend and history for some of them collecting and propagating lore is the ancient bards middle name. Though they didnt write things down they memorized by rote early on and they were their cultures trusted historian teachers. Basically the classes most likely to have these skills are the ones who are most likely to have the background of exposure to what you just decided does not exist. No you're not wrong just saying that there is every bit of reason for those to actually exist if the world is anything like the default assumptions and though in the real world this stuff well isn't real and the stories are more embellishments than anything in one where it is real that lore would be way more vital to have distributed and I think probably would be more real too. (but then again the real world has anti-vaxxers who think some starlet knows more than scientists) so I am just putting out why your context may not be the assumed one for most other people.
You not letting them know anything seems wrong I suggest you warn people to be honest I would not assume a Bard would ever be as ignorant as your rulings make them out to be.

not my rulings for the record.

Also one would think part of the POINT of having high knowledge skills is to assume that the person has been collecting knowledge voraciously before this combat ever even occurred and likely before the campaign occurred above level 4 at least. It would be utterly strange in my opinion if you see an uncommon but well documented creature and roll a 32 total in the relevant knowledge and just dont know almost anything about it. Or nothing.

 

[Son of the Serpent]

spend an action helping an ally and grant advantage with an appropriate bonus rider.

what i mean is i never would have started relaying a 3.5 paragraph essay with excellent precision details then turn to the dm and say "did that as a free action right?" Im saying that particular thing wouldnt have happened. If i got a good chamce sure id relay info. But i understand that doesnt always make sense to do.

 

[Garthanos]

not my rulings for the record.

Yes I was commenting on Haffrungs game world derived rulings.

 

[Son of the Serpent]

Yeah, I didn't word that correctly. I meant to suggest that character knowledge should be based on player knowledge rather than numbers on a sheet, which is a perfectly valid playstyle, even if I don't subscribe to it.

It's similar to the "RP vs skill check" debate regarding social skills.

The numbers on the sheet effect how much knowledge a particular character has. Wizards typically are schooled. They literally ought to have more knowledge. This is represented by those numbers on that sheet. It is literally a resource for allowing a player power to effect the game world in the same way as the fighter's muscle increases his efficacy elsewise.

 

[Garthanos]

what i mean is i never would have started relaying a 3.5 paragraph essay with excellent precision details then turn to the dm and say "did that as a free action right?" Im saying that particular thing wouldnt have happened. If i got a good chamce sure id relay info. But i understand that doesnt always make sense to do.

I was demonstrating what I might do... and since there is already an ability to help, well the extra knowledge seems a bigger boon.

 

[Son of the Serpent]

Yes I was commenting on Haffrungs game world derived rulings.

Ah. Sorry. Got confused.