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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Parmandur" data-source="post: 7524525" data-attributes="member: 6780330">For the purposes of discussion, "Difficulty Class" from pp. 238-239 in the 5E DMG, the main rules/guidelines on this topic, all emphasis in the original text:"It's your job to establish the Difficulty Class for an ability check or a saving throw when a rule or an adventure doesn't give you one. Sometimes you'll even want to change such established DCs. When you do so, think of how difficult a task is and then pick the associated DC from the Typical DCs table.[Table showing six numbers for "Very Easy" at 5 to "Nearly Impossible" at 30]"The numbers associated with these catagories of difficulty are meant to be easy to keep in your head, so that you don't have to refer to this book every time you decide on a DC. Here are some tips for using DC catagories at the gaming table."If you've decided that an ability check is called for, then most likely the task at hand isn't a very easy one. Most people can accomplish a DC 5 task with little chance of failure. Unless circumstances are unusual, let characters succeed at such a task without making a check.""Then ask yourself, 'Is this task's difficulty easy, moderate or hard?" If the only DCs you ever use are 20, 15 and 20, your game will run just fine. Keep in mind that a character with a 10 in the associated ability and no proficiency will succeed at an easy task around 50 percent of the time. A moderate task requires a higher score or proficiency for success, whereas a hard task typically requires both. A big dose of luck with the d20 also doesn't hurt.""If you find yourself thinking, 'This task is especially hard," you can use a higher DC, but do so with caution and consider the level of the characters. A DC 25 task is very hard for low-level characters to accomplish, but it becomes more reasonable after 10th level or so. A DC 30 check is nearly impossible for most low-level characters. A 20th-level character with proficiency and a relevant ability score of 20 still needs a 19 or 20 on the die roll to succeed at a task of this difficulty.""Variant: Automatic Success""Sometimes the randomness of a d20 roll leads to ludicrous results. Let's say a door requires a successful DC 15 Strength check to be battered down. A fighter with a Strength of 20 might helplessly flail against the door because of bad die rolls. Meanwhile, the rogue with a Strength of 10 rolls a 20 and knocks the door from it's hinges.""If such results bother you, consider allowing automatic success on certain checks. Under this optional rule, a character automatically succeeds on any ability check with a DC less than or equal to the relevant ability score minus 5. So in the example above, the fighter would automatically kick in the door. This rule doesn't apply to contests, saving throws, or attack rolls.""Having proficiency with a skill or tool can also grant automatic success. If a character's proficiency bonus applies to his or her ability check, the character automatically succeeds if the DC is 10 or less. If that character is 11th level or higher [Tier 3, incidentally], the check succeeds if the DC is 15 or less."They then go into the downsides of predictability, which is probably why the playtesters didn't want this variant to be the main rule.</blockquote>

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