D&D 5E player knowlege vs character knowlege (spoiler)

[MikalC]

I’ve heard that if you repeat that ten times with your eyes shut tight while squeezing your fists and curling your toes, you can make it come true.

If that doesn’t work, try more eye of newt and wing of bat.

if you can’t differentiate between player knowledge and character knowledge you’re a pretty naughty word player

 

[Guest 6801328]

if you can’t differentiate between player knowledge and character knowledge you’re a pretty naughty word player

Did your mom buy you...oh, wait, that is your mom's skateboard, isn't it?

 

[MikalC]

Did your mom buy you...oh, wait, that is your mom's skateboard, isn't it?

can you be any more non sensical?

 

[Umbran]

if you can’t differentiate between player knowledge and character knowledge you’re a pretty ....

Mod Note:

Your language here, and the insult, are both not acceptable. Please treat people with respect on these boards. Thanks.

 

[Maxperson]

You have not effectively demonstrated that RAW forbids players from taking certain actions without first making a check to establish character knowledge. If such a restriction is part of a group’s social contract, breaking that contract would certainly be a jerk move. I’m not arguing against that, only disputing your claim that there is support for such restriction in the rules as written.

What's the point of knowledge ability checks if a PC can just know whatever the player wants it to?

 

[Guest 6801328]

What's the point of knowledge ability checks if a PC can just know whatever the player wants it to?

I'll try again.

When the player just decides their character "knows" something, all that means is that the character believes it. That's the case even if it's something the player him/herself also believes is true, such as trolls being vulnerable to fire, or Valindra Darkmantle being a lich. There is no guarantee this belief is true in the game world.

The only way to find out if your hypothesis is true is narrating a goal and approach. For example, "I'll hit the troll with my torch to see if fire keeps it from regenerating." That might require an attack roll, or the DM might even just give you an autosuccess (if, for example, the troll is paralyzed and there are no other enemies about.). You roll the dice, and the DM narrates the results. You, the player, might be very firmly convinced fire is going to work, because you've been playing D&D for 40 years and you know the DM doesn't often change up monster stats. But until the DM confirms that fire did the trick, it's just an hypothesis.

Another example might be, "I'll try to recall if I learned anything about trolls when I was a wee lad on the farm, sitting up at night listening to stories from the fugitive who told us all about Valinda Darkmantle." Again, the DM might just give you an autosuccess, tell you that you never heard any stories about trolls....or ask you for an ability check involving a skill. You roll the dice, and the DM narrates the results.

Got it?

 

[Charlaquin]

What's the point of knowledge ability checks if a PC can just know whatever the player wants it to?

The character can’t know whatever the player wants them to, because the player can’t know anything about the game world for certain until they have experienced it directly. You might think you know that trolls regenerate and taking damage from fire or acid stops that from happening, but maybe they don’t in this world, or maybe most of them do, but this particular troll doesn’t. You might think you know that Valindra Shadowmantle is an infamous lich, but the DM might have just thought the name sounded cool and used it for a completely different character. You can choose to act on what you think you know, but doing so runs the risk that you are mistaken. You might attack a troll with fire only to realize that in this world, trolls are healed by fire. You might kill Valindra Shadowmantle only to learn that she was a perfectly normal, innocent elf woman. Or, you could instead declare an action that draws on your character’s memory to see if you know any weaknesses trolls have or if you recognize the name Valindra Shadowmantle. And the DM might say you know these things, or they might say you don’t know them, or they might decide that it’s uncertain. The point of Intelligence checks is to give the DM a way to resolve uncertainty in the lattermost case.

 

[Bawylie]

What's the point of knowledge ability checks if a PC can just know whatever the player wants it to?

This is a good point. And it’s supported, to some degree, by the text which says checks are made in these fields to “recall lore.” I suppose recalling lore is the action in question. There may be uncertainty. There may be real stakes.

 

[Charlaquin]

This is a good point. And it’s supported, to some degree, by the text which says checks are made in these fields to “recall lore.” I suppose recalling lore is the action in question. There may be uncertainty. There may be real stakes.

Agreed, but what is not supported in the text as far as I can tell, is any rule forbidding the player from taking certain actions until they have taken an action to recall lore. There’s nothing in the rules that says you can’t use fire or against a troll until you’ve successfully recalled lore that allows you to do so, nor that you must attack a troll with something other than fire or acid a certain number of times or randomly determine what kind of attacks you can use against a troll if you fail an attempt to recall lore about them.

 

[iserith]

This is a good point. And it’s supported, to some degree, by the text which says checks are made in these fields to “recall lore.” I suppose recalling lore is the action in question. There may be uncertainty. There may be real stakes.

It's not a good point. Max is conflating thinking and knowing and thereby having the DM claim dominion over what a character thinks and by extension what the character attempts to do, both of which are the player's role. Intelligence checks are for resolving tasks to recall and deduce (when those tasks have an uncertain outcome and a meaningful consequence for failure), but the DM can't call for any ability check unless the players have described what they want to do e.g. "I try to recall the weaknesses of trolls based on my life growing up near the Trollhaunt" or "I try to deduce if trolls are vulnerable to fire based on available clues."

"I try to hit the troll with a lit torch" does not require an Intelligence check before the action declaration can be deemed valid. That's a pure authoritarian power grab by the DM. However, a player so inclined could - before attempting to hit a troll with a torch - try to recall lore about the weaknesses of trolls, possibly make an ability check at the DM's behest to resolve the task, fail, then decide to attack with an arrow instead. Or the player can choose to have the character attack with the torch anyway, taking a risk that this is a good tactic against this troll right here and not a bad one because the DM changed the stat block.