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Message: <blockquote data-quote="iserith" data-source="post: 6943096" data-attributes="member: 97077">The ongoing or repeated task the uncertain outcome of which is resolved by passive Perception would be something like "keep watch for danger" or "search for secret doors" while traveling the dungeon. It's not "subconscious." It's a thing you're actively doing, repeatedly, over time. If you're doing some other task such as drawing a map, you're not keeping watch for danger. It's not "always on" radar. When it's treated that way is when some of the other rules in the book start to make less sense or seem overpowered.The chance to save yourself comes from the decision you make before the roll, not the roll itself. If anything, players should be trying to avoid making rolls since putting your life in the hands of a d20 is a risky proposition at best. While fun, rolling a die to get a random result is the opposite of control. UNLESS, the DM is one to say "No" or "Fail" most of the time unless a roll tells him or her otherwise. Then you'll see the phenomenon of players asking to make checks. Otherwise, the smart play in my view is to remove uncertainty from the equation as best you can so you automatically succeed and to never ask to roll.It's really a semantic difference as I see it. In context, I take "task done repeatedly" as necessarily an "extended one" because they take the same amount of time. Such a task is appropriately resolved by a passive check, if there is uncertainty as to the outcome. The player is effectively hedging his or her bet by trading time (an important resource) and the opportunity cost of performing some other useful task in exchange for never rolling less than a 10 if the DM finds the action declaration to have an uncertain outcome.I think it's reasonable for the skilled Investigator to always take less time than the unskilled one. It's part of niche protection and validates the player's build choices and decision on what to commit to during play. While it's funny to see the wizard bash down the door where the burly fighter couldn't, it's funny because it's weird. That weirdness can be avoided by handling the action resolution as we suggest.It's possible the passive Investigation part of that feat is a holdover from when passive Investigation was more of a common thing to see in-game. Even so, adjudicating as I and others have suggested brings it in line with the rest of the rules and makes is somewhat more valuable to a player (but probably never as valuable as a high passive Perception).</blockquote>

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