D&D 5E Players Self-Assigning Rolls

[5ekyu]

However, saying "I want to ..." is sometimes an attempt to fish for information or to make the DM give something away. As in:

Player: "I want to open the door"
DM: "Door's trapped. Saving throw."
Player: "I never said I was doing anything, I only said I wanted to!"

Which means if someone says "I want to [do something]" the DM's only response can be "Well? Do you [do that]?"

Quite right, this is an action-result sequence.

Players or gms acting in bad faith is an issue just as applucable to any resolution mechanism. Just like you can portray this as player trying to cheat out info, others can point to bad faith gotcha GM waiting for players to forget to cover their backs with a casual comnent to spring a "but you didny say.." Bam.

No approach is proif against bad faith and in my experience trying to limit mechanics or play freedoms at rhe table to deal with bad faith efforts winds up punishing those not acting in good faith and rarely solves the bad ones... It just makes them work harder cuz you have made that a competition as opposed to unacceptable.

Sent from my VS995 using EN World mobile app

 

[DragonKnight88]

I don't know if we are 'trolling' but we have most for sure talking past each other.

I agree your version sounds like a pretty average table.

Thanks for that, I have been very hesitant to post in the discussions I have seen Some people get ripped apart in different threads it gets crazy. I got some really good advice from posters in my first post/question and some not so great information as well. Almost caused a fist-fight with my normal Friday night game.

 

[5ekyu]

Thanks for that, I have been very hesitant to post in the discussions I have seen Some people get ripped apart in different threads it gets crazy. I got some really good advice from posters in my first post/question and some not so great information as well. Almost caused a fist-fight with my normal Friday night game.

Fwiw i also find your example familiar.

Sent from my VS995 using EN World mobile app

 

[Severite]

Snip.

Ah, consistency. Consistency is it's own reward, it helps to maintain fairness, and more than a few players have been saved from low rolls, that simply did not count, though, because I am consistent, it has also more rarely resulted in a high roll being "wasted". There is also the benefit to keeping people who are prone to cheating from doing so, though I feely admit that is not really of much concern to me at this point in my life.

Hmm, as an example, let's assume you know without question, that you will be using the aforementioned investigation, will you be using intelligence, dexterity, or perhaps wisdom? All might be appropriate depending on what you are trying to determine, and what method you are using to do so.

I suppose I can turn this around. What is gained by making a point of pre rolling a die that you don't know that you will need, you don't know what modifier may be added to it if yp u do, and that you know makes me stop for a few extra seconds, while I get myself back on track, to tell you that you didn't need to roll, that you automatically succeed, but, due to examining the alien device, I DO need you to roll a d6, to see if you activated something on the alien device on accident while you did so?

The trick to all this, it is not about my rule or the highway, so much as this is the process that I use to bring the best game that I am able to run by using my process, why would you not respect that this is how our particular table works, any more than if your die falls to the floor, it gets picked up and rerolled?

 

[5ekyu]

Ah, consistency. Consistency is it's own reward, it helps to maintain fairness, and more than a few players have been saved from low rolls, that simply did not count, though, because I am consistent, it has also more rarely resulted in a high roll being "wasted". There is also the benefit to keeping people who are prone to cheating from doing so, though I feely admit that is not really of much concern to me at this point in my life.

Hmm, as an example, let's assume you know without question, that you will be using the aforementioned investigation, will you be using intelligence, dexterity, or perhaps wisdom? All might be appropriate depending on what you are trying to determine, and what method you are using to do so.

I suppose I can turn this around. What is gained by making a point of pre rolling a die that you don't know that you will need, you don't know what modifier may be added to it if yp u do, and that you know makes me stop for a few extra seconds, while I get myself back on track, to tell you that you didn't need to roll, that you automatically succeed, but, due to examining the alien device, I DO need you to roll a d6, to see if you activated something on the alien device on accident while you did so?

The trick to all this, it is not about my rule or the highway, so much as this is the process that I use to bring the best game that I am able to run by using my process, why would you not respect that this is how our particular table works, any more than if your die falls to the floor, it gets picked up and rerolled?

Int dex or wisdom.. Yes likely i will be using one and my descrption will either make it obvious or we have a history that means we can shorthand that.

After all, we are not playing in a game where which attribute makes sense for a given approach to a task is some great mystery that only the GM knows, right?

Sent from my VS995 using EN World mobile app

 

[Severite]

Int dex or wisdom.. Yes likely i will be using one and my descrption will either make it obvious or we have a history that means we can shorthand that.

After all, we are not playing in a game where which attribute makes sense for a given approach to a task is some great mystery that only the GM knows, right?

Sent from my VS995 using EN World mobile app

So you would refuse the table rules to intentionally derail the dm, who has put a lot of effort into bringing you a game that, presumably, you are enjoying, as, we apparently have history, and have been playing together for a while?

 

[5ekyu]

So you would refuse the table rules to intentionally derail the dm, who has put a lot of effort into bringing you a game that, presumably, you are enjoying, as, we apparently have history, and have been playing together for a while?

I have no idea how you jumped from a post about which ability was used to deliberate attempts to derail gms?

So perhsps my best response would be to deny eating tacos with jimmy hoffa, elvis and dracula in the conservatory with a lead pipe.

Sent from my VS995 using EN World mobile app

 

[Charlaquin]

There is no failure if they succeed.

Y... yes? I’ve lost the thread of this part of our conversation...

Or it means you're simply confounded by whatever it is you're dealing with.

How many times, for example, have you been looking for something in your house and been unable to find it, only to have someone else walk in and point right to it sitting there in plain sight?

Yes, but I don’t want to decide for a player at what point their character gets confounded and gives up. I also know that if unlimited retries are possible, very few players will give up, given that there is at least a 5% chance of succeeding. So I just skip over that process. Fine by me, success is a much more interesting outcome than getting too frustrated and bored to keep trying anyway.

Information has value and should not be given away cheaply.

Does this mean that if in fact there's nothing there (meaning success is impossible) you don't even call for a roll? There's still uncertainty on the player side...and it should be maintained where possible.

Correct. Although that alone doesn’t necessarily tell the players there’s nothing to be found, only that if there is anything, their method doesn’t have a reasonable chance of leading to them finding it.

I've had players get it stuck in their heads that dammit, there's a secret door in that wall and we're gonna find it whatever it takes. Never was any door, but they'd convinced themselves there was and spent ages looking for it. Your methods would never allow this to happen...again, unrealistic from the characters' point of view.

That sounds really boring to me. If you and your players have fun with spending ages looking for something that isn’t there, more power to you, but that’s definitely not my style.

 

[robus]

Nice try, but your attempts at twisting my words to your benefit are more likely to land you on my ignore list than prove your point. It's quite rude you know.

It seemed to beg the question but I didn’t mean to offend. My apologies.

 

[robus]

Thanks for that, I have been very hesitant to post in the discussions I have seen Some people get ripped apart in different threads it gets crazy. I got some really good advice from posters in my first post/question and some not so great information as well. Almost caused a fist-fight with my normal Friday night game.

Ha I can relate to that. I tried to introduce an idea from this forum to my group. You should have seen the horrified looks and gasps for air!