Missing Rules

[Reynard]

In other cases, level of success may change the result. Leaping across a chasm and get a 5? You're hanging on by one hand and may still fall. Get a 10? Okay, you made it but you still have to pull yourself up as an action and so on.

Do you ever find that players are uncomfortable with that sort of uncertainty? I only ask because I have a couple players that do not like arbitrary shifts in difficulty for essentially identical tasks. For them, swinging on a chandelier or running up broken stairs should have a consistent DC. Of course circumstances can modify that difficulty and that's one place where 5E really shines: advantage and disadvantage are truly inspired mechanics for making rulings on the fly.

In short, I think you can have both.

 

[jgsugden]

Your PCs have heights and distances they can clearly jump. If they want to go beyond that, you decide how hard it is and assign a DC to the ability check. Those are the rules and they seem pretty easy to me to adjudicate.

As for missing rules? Psionics.

 

[Oofta]

Do you ever find that players are uncomfortable with that sort of uncertainty? I only ask because I have a couple players that do not like arbitrary shifts in difficulty for essentially identical tasks. For them, swinging on a chandelier or running up broken stairs should have a consistent DC. Of course circumstances can modify that difficulty and that's one place where 5E really shines: advantage and disadvantage are truly inspired mechanics for making rulings on the fly.

In short, I think you can have both.

You can't please everyone all the time, so I aim to please the majority most of the time.

But take the broken staircase as an example. In the case of a stone staircase it was loose bits of rubble and steps breaking off so acrobatics seemed appropriate. But how broken is it? Is it missing sections you have to leap across which might make athletics more appropriate? A wooden staircase with half-burned steps so use perception? Was there a pattern to the burn marks so investigation (particularly for that PC with the carpenter background)?

The same situation may call for different checks based on how I know my players will approach it. One may just take plow through while another may dodge gracefully. Someone may not have the strength to jump a chasm but I've described roots hanging down from the ceiling so they want to jump and swing across using an acrobatics check.

Last, but not least, I simply don't tell them a target number. I just describe the scene and let them know if there's a risk of failure and why.

 

[Reynard]

Your PCs have heights and distances they can clearly jump. If they want to go beyond that, you decide how hard it is and assign a DC to the ability check. Those are the rules and they seem pretty easy to me to adjudicate.

As for missing rules? Psionics.

What is the difficulty you would assign a 15' standing long jump? How did you arrive at that DC?

 

[iserith]

What is the difficulty you would assign a 15' standing long jump? How did you arrive at that DC?

There is no DC. The attempted action simply fails outright, no roll. Only a Str 30 creature can do this.

 

[Reynard]

Last, but not least, I simply don't tell them a target number. I just describe the scene and let them know if there's a risk of failure and why.

I use blind rolls too, usually to assess success when there is really no chance of failure, or when I don't have a preconceived notion of the outcome. Like say the PCs decide to go carousing in search of a loose lipped castle guard. That's a thing will little threat and likely success, so an appropriate check will help me as DM decide what exactly they find. A poor roll and they'll have to spend a decent amount in drinks. A good roll and they find a disgruntled peon looking to get back at his supervisor.

But those kinds of checks a different than the jump check IMO.

 

[Maxperson]

Right but the description of Athletics says you can use the skill to jump unusually long distances but provides no guidelines on that use of the skill. That's the sort of thing I am talking about.

If there were rules for it, it wouldn't be an unusually long distance. It would be a usually long distance for everyone with the skill. My take is that it's for once in a while "if we don't make the extra few feet we're dead" situations, and the DM needs to make that call.

 

[Reynard]

If there were rules for it, it wouldn't be an unusually long distance. It would be a usually long distance for everyone with the skill. My take is that it's for once in a while "if we don't make the extra few feet we're dead" situations, and the DM needs to make that call.

So what DC would you assign to that roll?

 

[iserith]

If there were rules for it, it wouldn't be an unusually long distance. It would be a usually long distance for everyone with the skill. My take is that it's for once in a while "if we don't make the extra few feet we're dead" situations, and the DM needs to make that call.

Short of there being some circumstance in the environment like, I don't know, a springboard or something that the PCs could use to get a few extra feet from their jumps, then the normal speed and jumping rules apply and they simply die in my view. The standard approach to jumping wouldn't work as they'd fall short. They're going to have to come up with something else.

 

[smbakeresq]

We had a thread on this before. I use 4e rules, the DC is the number of feet you want to jump using a running start, with your minimum as STR score. You add your athletics modifier also. So 25 feet is DC 25 with a running start of 10’ or 5’ with Athlete feat. Standing jumps are half those values.

This makes Boots of Striding and Springing worth attunement, tripling your jump ability is pretty big as an 20 Str PC can always jump 30’ from standing start.